BRITISH PARLIAMENT

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 136, 10 June 1940, Page 8

BRITISH PARLIAMENT

SECRET SESSIONS

HOME DEFENCE QUESTIONS

(British Official WirelesS.)

(Received June 10, 1 p.m.)

RUGBY, June 9

Both Houses of Parliament will meet this week in secret sessions, the House of Commons on Tuesday and the House of Lords on Wednesday. The purpose of the secret sessions is to enable members to have a frank discussion of the question of home defence, which has assumed new and- vital significance, as Mr. Churchill clearly indicated in his statement in the House of Commons last Tuesday.

Certain questions were addressed to the Prime Minister at the time and he intimated the readiness of the Government to accept a secret session owing to the implied desire of a few members, not confined to one party, to debate in secret past responsibilities for deficiencies of which recent experience is held in these quarters to have demonstrated the serious extent.

It is believed that this suggestion was frowned upon by both the Premier and the Lord Privy Seal, Mr. C. R. Attlee, / who stressed that this is the moment for concentrating on prosent and future effort rather than alleged past omissions, and Parliamentary circles anticipate "that this will be found to be in accordance with the general feeling of Parliament.

the exception of electrical accessories, the entire vehicle, ready for the front, is turned out in the works. It is typical of the adaptability of French industry that as an adjunct to the motorlorry factory is a department for the production of shrapnel for air defence.

Before the war, a factory not far from Paris was producing motor-cars world-famous for their speed, power, and luxury. It has an English manager, who clearly possesses extraordinary drive and versatility, for he has set his workers to the production of machine-guns, tanks, cross-country "liaison" vehicles, cross-country tractors, and a semi-automatic anti-tank gun. The tank, which carries a crew of two, driver and gunner, is claimed to be a revolution in this weapon of warfare. It is the design of a Frenchman, based on an entirely new conception. Plates are eliminated and replaced by castings of special armour steel. The method of construction permits the designer to place the metal thickness where it is requir-d reducing vulnerability to a minimum and allowing space to be used to the utmost advantage. The tank weighs 12 tons, and 10 are turned out every day. The cross-country "liaison' vehicle is a weirdly efficient lOKiy. Its wheels are independently driven and move at atmost any angle as they cross unevon ground. Another motor works, one of the [largest in the world, started shell- | making on the very day war broke I out. A scheme for turning the factory from peace to war production had been in cold storage, and it was not many days before it was sending large-calibre shells to the front. Hundreds of tons of encumbering machinery and material were removed. The motor plant was reinstalled elsewhere. The staff was hurriedly trained j for the new task. Equipment capable of adaptation was reconditioned and re-erected in such a way as to allow a single worker to man several machine tools.