Mr. WEBB:

They might have the Board of Trade in front of them. The Board of Trade might be in the dock, and I am not sure that they would have the Board of Trade behind them. For that reason, among others, I think that if you want this inquiry, the inquiry would have to be rather longer than between now and the 1st August. We could not get all the facts which it is desirable that we should have, and we should not be able to probe into the facts in anything like that time. On the other hand, I think the House will know that an inquiry, something of this sort, is being pressed for in all sorts of quarters. I do not want to make anybody or any party responsible, but certainly I have had evidence that an inquiry is desired by manufacturers, by traders, by Chambers of Commerce, and we are obliged to take notice of that fact. How much am I entitled to say? There is no doubt that the subject is very seriously under consideration by the Government, and I think, if my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth would be content with an assurance that he will hear about the Committee very soon, but not ask me to say what the Committee can do and what form the inquiry can take, he would not be disappointed. I do not want to disguise from the House that it is not an easy thing to do. We have first to settle the scope of the Committee. If you give it an unlimited scope, you get altogether too large an inquiry. On the other hand, if you attempt to confine the scope, of the inquiry, you have to be very careful to see that you get in what ought to be got in. The personnel of the Committee, or the Commission, or the body making the inquiry is not at all easy to settle. You really want, as the hon. Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) said, somebody acquainted with financial machinery, and I think we want a little statistical, shall I say economic, experience also. Frankly, I am not in a position to make a definite statement as to the form that the inquiry will take, and still less as to the personnel, but if the hon. Member will ask the Prime Minister about that to-morrow, or at a later date, I think he will get satisfaction.