11 NOVEMBER 1932, Page 3

Parliament Our Parliamentary Correspondent writes : " The general debate

on Unemployment initiated by the Labour Party has thoroughly justified itself. All parties made a genuine effort to avoid -party controversy, and as a result the debate was a good sounding-board, which is all that such debates can ever be. It is a pity that the Prime Minister thought it necessary to speak himself. because the motion of Mr. Lansbury was not a vote or censure, and therefore called for uo general defence or exposition of policy by the head of the Government. Mr. MacDonald called his speech thinking aloud,' and Mr. Lloyd George's sardonic comment that he could only pray that the Prime Minister thought better silently was not undeserved. The truth is that thinking aloud about the World Economic Conference, which is the Prime Minister's next big personal preoccupation, is still prema- ture. The House of Commons has not yet grasped and cannot yet with discretion be told the great potentialities of this Conference. It would have been better, therefore, to leave departmental Ministers each to say their piece.