I have given notice to the Minister that I want on this Motion for the Adjournment to draw the attention of the House to the waste of precious raw materials and labour supplies on luxury building not only in Manchester, but over the whole of this country. I should like the House at once to understand that my complaint is not based on a few isolated cases of misjudgment where small licences have been granted for work which readily could have been postponed. My complaint is that the luxury building in this country at the present time has reached what I can without overstatement describe as positively gigantic proportions. Hon. Members may get some idea at once of this when I tell them that in the City of Westminster, where we sit, spending in recent months averages the rate of some £4,000,000 a year on building licensed by the Ministry of Works, in addition to the £100 decoration licences granted by the local authorities, and in addition to housing requirements which are sanctioned elsewhere. Hon. Members who may be tempted to think that Westminster has suddenly become a hive of export industry might be somewhat disillusioned if they looked at the schedules printed by the Ministry of Works of what this building consists.

I propose to give a few examples of the building work licensed by the Ministry of Works. At 49, Conduit Street, in Mayfair, a ladies' hairdresser was allowed a licence for £3,300 in order that he might adequately satisfy his clients with a suitable Mayfair background. At 39, Conduit Street, a licence for £2,700 was granted to a bevy of fashionable dressmakers and tailors to carry on their business. Round the corner, at 170, New Bond Street, a cosmetic shop, in order to ply a purely luxury trade in New Bond Street, was granted a licence for £2,535.