Mr. Duff Cooper is the Government's most fluent debater. He
has the capacity to speak without notes, a gift which is exceedingly rare on the Front Bench, where the presence of the despatch box provides a constant temptation to Ministers to rely on their manuscripts. He had a fairly easy task in introducing the Reserve Forces Bill, which extends from two to five years the period during which the " A " Reserve is liable to be called up. He used the somewhat disquieting argument that if during the recent Palestine disturbances trouble had broken out elsewhere there would have been no " A " reservists left to meet the new emergency. Since no one is to be compelled to accept this greater obligation, the Bill passed without a division. Several speakers em- phasised the point that when men are paid a small retainer to induce them to continue as reservists, it seems absurd to take their pay into account for the purposes of the Means Test. Sir Victor Warrender did not entirely meet this grievance when he replied that in cases where the reservist himself was unemployed, only 5o per cent. of his reserve pay was deducted from his unemployment allowance. * *
Previous page
