The Week in Parliament Our Parliamentary Correspondent writes :—I cannot
recall ever having witnessed a more skilful performance than Sir John Simon's conduct on Monday of the Com- mittee stage of the Public Order Bill. Always urbane, never at a loss for the right argument, ready to meet points when they were sound. never wavering on essentials, he disarmed his opponents, encouraged his friends and succeeded through a gruelling Parliamentary day in avoiding a division on any of the questions that seemed likely at one time to raise controversial issues. He radiated such an astonishing atmosphere of friendliness and goodwill that Mr. Herbert Morrison positively cooed at the Treasury Bench, and the House was treated to the spectacle of Lord Winterton and Mr. Aneurin Bevan paying one another respectful compliments across the floor of the House. The only discordant note in this wedding-breakfast atmosphere came from Mr. Dingle Foot on the Liberal benches, who had memories of the fierce battles on the Incitement to Disaffection Bill, and was unable to suppress his rooted distrust of anything sponsored by a Liberal National and supported by Tories. But the whole tone of the debate was a most effective answer to the gibes of the Fascists at Parliamen- tary institutions.
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