The Week in Parliament Our Parliamentary correspondent writes : Seldom
can a ruling from the Chair have wrought such havoc among assiduously prepared speeches as in the Privilege debate on Monday. Even if the Opposition leaders did not snarl " Foiled —but a time will come ! " they might well have done. For they had assembled in the belief that Mr. Hore-Belisha had at last been delivered into their hands. The technical breach of privilege had indeed been laid at the door of the Court of Inquiry, but it had seemed reasonable to suppose that the real blame could be brought home to the Army Council (which was supposed to have set up the Court at a time when the matter to be investigated was under the consideration of the House of Commons) and in particular to the responsible Minister. However, the attackers were almost completely baffled when Mr. Speaker refused to allow discussion of issues which did not arise from the actual terms of the report. History might have been different if on an historic occasion the presiding officer of the Senate had ruled that it was out of order to approach Caesar with a petition on the Ides of March. * * * *
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