The discussion up to now of this question is very encouraging, and I should think it requires little more to influence the Home Secretary. So far, the discussion has been confined to one particular point, but may I call attention to the terms of the Resolution, which are as follow: To call attention to the question of Workmen's Compensation; and to move, That in view of the unsatisfactory state of the law relating to Workmen's Compensation and of the fact that the War Addition Acts expire at the end of this year, this House is of opinion that a Government Bill to amend the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906, should he introduced and passed dining the coarse of this Session. 10.0 P.M.

There are other Acts affecting workmen's compensation. I believe there are three or four Acts dealing with compensation to workmen in a different way to the Workmen's Compensation Act. There is Lord Campbell's Act; the Employers' Liability Act: and on the top of those comes the Workmen's Compensation Act. It is not only a question of amending the Workmen's Compensation Act, but the codification of all the Acts dealing with compensation to workmen. I will give my reasons for this. I might as well remind the right hon. Gentleman that the pigeon-holes at the Home Office are pretty well stocked with suggestions on this matter from the Labour party. The Employers' Liability Act gives compensation on the basis of a full wage and compensation for death is the same under both Acts, but under the Employers' Liability Act you must establish to the satisfaction of a jury the fact that the employer had some knowledge of the defect of the machine, otherwise you do not get compensation. The Workmen's Compensation Act only pays 60 per cent, instead of the full wage, and this Act has gradually taken the place of the bigger Act. Since the passing of the Workmen's Compensation Act in 1597 and the passing of the Employers' Liability Act in 1882 a new condition of things has arisen, and very often those who do not know the conditions of the later Act accept the principles of the Workmen's Compensation Act without inquiring into their rights under the bigger Act. The result has been that gradually the Workmen's Compensation Act has been accepted in cases where I know that a good case existed under the Employers' Liability Act. Although I am grateful to the Committee which sat under the chairmanship of the hon. and learned Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Gregory) for going as far as they did, I cannot accept the principle of 60 percent, offered in the Holman Gregory Report. There is only one solution of this difficulty, and it is that the equivalent should be made the same under one Act as it is under the other so that a man shall not be deprived of his rights under the Employers' Liability Act.

The hon. Member for Preston (Mr. T. Shaw) referred to a most iniquitous instance of a decision under the existing Workmen's Compensation Act, and I would like to give one or two examples. Two men were killed putting on the hatches of a ship. They had finished a day's work with the cargo. It seems that the combings of the hatches were defective, and the hatch gave way, and they were both precipitated into the hold of the ship and killed. That was manipulated by the legal mind and the county court judge who tried the case into decision that these men were not in or about any part of their occupation at the time the accident occurred, and the county court judge, with his brilliant legal acumen, in giving that interpretation, likened it unto putting the cork into a bottle and taking it out of the bottle, which he said was no part of the process of filling or emptying the bottle. How could a man fill a bottle or empty it without taking out the cork? These are only some of the samples of legal decisions which have been given. The hon. Member for the Springburn Division (Mr. Macquisten) said that security was better than compensation. The hon. Member as a lawyer will remember that in 1905 the Home Office set up a public inquiry into the cause and prevention of dock accidents, and it lasted seven months. Amongst other places we visited Glasgow, and there we found the hon. Member for Springburn was one of the most vigorous opponents of a Measure of that kind being passed, and at that time he was not a Member of this House.

There is another question to which I would like to call attention, that is, light employment. I want to give another example of how this works out. Only on Monday last one of our chaps came to me. He had been practically maimed for life. He incurred injury to the spine. He is able to do very little indeed, and, being rather illiterate, could not take a writing job. Indeed, the strain of sitting down in one position was too much for him. The employer offered him light work which the man tried, but was unable to carry it on. His compensation was reduced by the county court judge to 1d. per week in view of the fact that he had secured light work. He has now neither the light work nor the compensation. Both have gone. Another point is in connection with the question of giving notice of the accident to the employer within a certain period. This notice has to be given by the injured work-man, and if he does not give it within six weeks his claim for compensation is prejudiced, and the county court judge in cases has absolutely ruled him out of court. I do not want to harrow hon. Members with details of my own case. I have before told the House what occurred to me nearly 40 years ago. But I know men who have not been able to give notice within the six weeks, and whose relatives were ignorant of the fact that notice had to be given. That has actually happened, and it has been used to oppose the claim to compensation. As to the question of malingering, the insurance company, to whom the employer hands over his liability at so much per head, will take good care that the man does not malinger. From the date of the accident until he is forced back to work again by repeated special surgical examinations, they sit on his doorstep trying to persuade him to accept loss than he is entitled to. There, is no fear of malingering. There is no humanity about an insurance company, whatever there may be about employers. The fact is that the employer hands over his liability for compensation to a company which is making a dividend out of the misfortunes of the men. These are points which I commend to the right hon. Gentleman's notice, and I hope he will deal with them when he is answering, as I am sure he will, in a sympathetic spirit.