Part of the debate – in the House of Commons am ar 25 Gorffennaf 1922.
Will the hon. Member take the trouble to look at it? The 1919 Act was based entirely on taking property away from the undertaker without his consent. When you do that, when you take property without the consent of the owner and without his having a right to make any bargain, it is obvious you must under those circumstances protect him from the effect of what Parliament has done by depriving him of his property. There is a totally different consideration here, and if the hon. Member would really be guided by the advice of the leaders of the association, of which he is a vice-president, who have considered this matter in the closest detail, and have agreed to the Clause at a conference to which he was invited but did not come, he would not make alarming speeches of the character he has done. By so doing he is hardly treating this matter seriously. I want to say one word in answer to the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. A. Williams). There is, I admit, some distinction between the cases of the urban districts, in whose interests the hon. Gentleman made some observations to the House, and of the other authorities. But I have had that matter surveyed with the closest care. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will pardon me if I do not weary the House at this time by attempting a detailed examination of it, but I can assure him that the Commissioners have looked at and have tabulated the whole of the districts, urban and rural, which might be affected, and they have assured me that no harm whatever can come to those urban districts from the effects of Clause 15. The Commission have full powers to deal with this matter in a way that may be just. I do not want to argue the matter at greater length, but I repeat that the fears which have been expressed are not at all likely to materialise.