AT WESTMINSTER
IT is not comfortable for either House to get back into its working clothes on the day of the State opening of a new session of Parliament. This is true when a mere King, so to speak, is the central figure of the pageant. But when, as on Tuesday, a new session is opened by a Queen who combines dignity with the pride of youth and a zest that is now apparent to all the world—who will forget the hearty laugh with which she set off from the Palace to the House of Lords ?—the duty of the politicians to get back to work is almost intolerable. * * * * Parliament of course has invented a means of descending by stages to the plane of ordinary life. It is used correctly in the House of Lords, as one would expect. The Sovereign having delivered her speech, the House adjourns for some hours, and then reassembles to hear only the complimentary speeches of the mover and seconder of the Address in reply to the Gracious Speech. The descent has begun. It is enough for one day. The veil of night separates their lordships from the resumption of the normal political tussle. Yet even in the House of Lords the path downwards is lit by a glimmer from the world of affairs. Before the Address was moved on Tuesday, a Bill for the better regulating of select vestries was read a first time. * * * * The House of Commons tumbles downstairs much faster. The Address is moved and seconded with more or less regard for the conventions, but then the Leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister open the general debate on the contents of the Queen's Speech. When party leaders face each other, even on ceremonial occasions, controversy tends to break in. Mr. Churchill mentioned on Tuesday the argument that con- troversy should be subdued in a Coronation year. But what a caterwauling from the Opposition there would have been, he observed, if on this account the Government had left the denationalisation of steel and transport out of this year's pro- gramme. Within living memory, the first day's debate in the Commons used to end there, but latterly back-benchers have seized this opportunity to talk. On Tuesday the Commons continued the debate until 10 p.m. and the usual half-hour's adjournment debate followed. * * * * Major Anstruther-Gray, who moved the Address in the House of Commons, delighted the Opposition by saying that the Queen's Speech followed the pattern expected of it. "And if someone were to say there's nothing very much new in it," - he continued, " I would beg to say that it's none the worse for that." For once the voice of the Commons was a little more circumspect than that of the Lords. Lord Mancroft, in mov- ing the Address there, said bluntly that since 1945 the country had been over-legislated. He noted the modesty of the new programme and exclaimed: " For this relief much thanks." Some Labour Members supposed that Major Anstruther-Gray was exposing inadvertently the meagreness of the Government's plans; in fact he was expressing a traditional Tory view. * * * * Mr. Attlee, apparently quite unconcerned by Mr. Bevan's decision to challenge Mr. Morrison's place as deputy-leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party (Mr. Attlee himself was re-elected leader unopposed on Wednesday), made one of those cool and darting attacks on the Government which he manages quite skilfully. He promised a debate on the Government's economic policy next week and emphasised the growing risks of unemployment. * * * * Mr. Churchill was bothered with a cold on Tuesday and was not in his best form. He got into a muddle about the amount of compensation paid when the railways were nationalised. But he based the Government's reputation squarely on the propo- sition, " which no one will doubt," that the country's position was better, actually and relatively, than it had been a year ago. Wycombe clearly agreed with him. J. F. B.
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