Public Ownership of Industry

Manawatu Times, Volume 66, Issue 290, 6 December 1941, Page 8

Public Ownership of Industry

(British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, Dec. 4.

By 336 votes to 40 the House ol Commons rejected a Labour amendment In the debate on manpower, moved by Mr G. Dagger, to the effect that, in order to secure the full utilisation of national resources in the war effort, Industrie* vital to the successful prosecution of the war, and especially transport, coalmining and the manufacture of munitions, should be brought under public ovrtiershlp and control, and that the necessary legislation should be brought In as soon as possible.

At a special private meeting of about 100 members of the Labour Parliamentary Party, the leader of the party, Mr Attlee, appealed in the strongest possible terms for support of the Government manpower motion. He said that the vote for the amendment, which was tabled by 31 Labour members, would be a vote against the Government. The meeting decided to support the motion. It is understood that over a quarter of the meeting voted in favour of the amendment, and there were a lot of abstentions. The Minister of Labour, Mr Bevln, when winding up the debate in the House, replied to criticisms received during the debate. Concerning the Labour amendment, ! Mr Bevin said that the Government had been working on problems associated with transport for a considerable time. He claimed that the change made by the new railway agreement and I altered railway administration had proi duced very good results. The distribution of coal and other materials was also far better now than at any time since the outbreak of war.

Turning to the problem of registration for national service, Mr Bevin said that under the military service side of the Act his department had to. deal with the registration of 6,850,000 persons. The total registration had involved 17million people. The allegations made during the debate about men “standing about” In factories and about absenteeism were greatly exaggerated. As a result of the essential-work order, the time of turn-round of ships had been reduced by nearly two and a-half days per ship on the average; that equalled nearly li-million tons of shipping. Mr Bevin then claimed that the Government had done a great deal to improve conditions of work for people. There had been great development in welfare organisations. For those engaged in munitions, canteens wer* coming into operation at the rate of 10C a month, while 85 per cent of the factories employing 200 persons and ovei had canteens of their own. The Labour Parliamentary Party li to hold another special meeting te consider Mr Bevin’s statement and the party’s attitude to the Bill. '