"f'he new rules of procedure proposed by the Government came
before the House of Commons on Tuesday and Wednesday. It may be noted, as a curious instance of the strength of Parliamentary tradition, that the Labour leader, who avowedly desires the Government to create a new earth by innumerable Bills, opposed the amended rules in the supposed interests of the private Member. How the House is to indulge in endless debates, and at the same time to pass more Bills than ever, Mr. Atiameoe
did not explain. To the mere layman the curtailment of the Report and Third Reading stages seems an obvious necessity, and the creation of two new Standing Committees, making six in all, for the consideration of Bills is another move in the right direction, as it provides the private Member with useful work. The proposal to refer most of the Estimates to Standing Committees and to assign twelve instead of twenty days to the general debates on the Estimates was opposed on the time- honoured ground that it would deprive the House of control over the Government. The system, long practised in the French Chamber, has not had any such effect. The French Committees, in fact, exercise a far closer control over expenditure than our House of Commons.
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