I also wish to look briefly at the Suez Crisis in its rather wider setting of the whole struggle in the world which has been going on since 1945, and, in fact, earlier, between international Communism and those countries which wish to stop the spread of Communism.
I had hoped to have a little longer to devote to the next section of my speech, but in my closing sentences I want to look briefly at the Suez Crisis in its wider world context.
The Suez Crisis today is not the - I repeat "the" - crisis.
I can say quite categorically that the prestige of Britain, through the Suez Crisis and through the action of the Government, has never stood lower in world opinion than it does today.
He said this : "The Suez Crisis is not the—I repeat 'the' —crisis.
When we are discussing the Suez Crisis and matters of foreign policy of that type, however, it is quite impossible for the House to maintain that degree of supervision over the Executive.
Mr. Hunter asked the Secretary of State for War to take measures to speedup the payment of National Service grants to reservists called-up for the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Hunter asked the Secretary of State for War to take measures to increase the total amount of National Service grants to reservists called up for the Suez Crisis, so that their liabilities for hire purchase, insurance and house mortgages, etc.
Mr. Lewis asked the Secretary of State for War whether he will arrange for all reservists called up for the Suez Crisis to be sent home on indefinite leave, with liability for recall at 48 hours' notice, so as to enable these men to carry on with their civilian occupations and thus assist the country in overcoming its present economic difficulties.
This is what happened when the Suez Crisis burst upon us.
asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies the estimated cost of the damage suffered by the Rediffusion Company due to the action taken by the Maltese Government during the Suez Crisis in August and September ; whether he is aware that the Maltese Government have refused to pay anything to make good this damage ; and how Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom now propose that the cost shall be met.
Whatever the Government intend to do may or may not be wrong, but let us be quite clear that, until the Suez Crisis started, any claim that Egypt was being exploited by Britain in an imperialist or colonialist way was quite unfounded.
I should have very much welcomed it had the British Government at the earliest date of the Suez Crisis organised the users urgently and immediately to bring economic pressure to bear upon the Egyptian Government.
I am convinced that the speech of M. Pineau in France had something to do with the political manœuvres that have been taking place since the beginning of the Suez Crisis.
For instance, the shipping situation has been considerably worsened in the Recent Suez Crisis.
I believe that we shall never solve the problems which now confront us in the Middle East if we continue in the way we have been attempting, rather haphazardly, I think, to solve them up till the Recent Suez Crisis.
The Suez Crisis and the action of the Government there has produced, in our view, an intensification of a problem that was there for a very long time.
The gold and dollar reserves have been allowed to fall so consistently and so heavily under this Government that now, as defences not only of the United Kingdom but of the sterling area, they are much too low, too low for us to face the problems arising out of the Suez Crisis with anything but grave trembling of our hearts.
This debate is on the Suez Crisis, and some of us got in earlier when Parliament was recalled.
asked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware of the disorganised conditions which prevail in some of the larger telegraph centres as a result of the closing down of certain night appointed offices and the increased work arising from the Suez Crisis; and what steps he proposes to take to correct the situation.
The balance of that was merely to give an extract from the Prime Minister's Mansion House speech on the Swiss proposals and none of the argument about the Suez Crisis.
It is part of my case that the B.B.C. has not only - and I emphasise "not" - been indulging in Tory propaganda, but it has gone out of its way ever since the Suez Crisis at the beginning of August to withhold the truth from the British people.
Old-age pensioners in my constituency say, "You say, Mr. Hunter, that the Government say that they cannot afford it, yet in the Suez Crisis they could afford £50 million for military expenditure".
We have to remember that one of the most remarkable features of our own Crisis in Suez is that it has shown that, although we are sometimes inclined to sneer at it, there does exist a moral force in the world, and that the only hope of the world is to build up world moral opinion, and all that this country can do in these days towards that end should be done.
The country is entitled to more information about these matters, because industrial production, quite apart from the Suez Crisis and thanks to the economic policy of the Chancellor of the Exchequer over the past twelve months, is running at a level lower than a year ago.
What the hon. Gentleman is now telling us is in line with the suggestions of a succession of junior Ministers last week who got up in response to Questions show that we do not need controls, that the situation resulting from the Suez Crisis is quite all right, and the flow of supplies of meat, fruit, vegetables, and raw materials of all kinds will still be coming in; our stocks are all right, and prices will not get out of hand.
Lastly, I would pay tribute to the police as a whole, both mounted and foot, for the way in which they carried out a vast number of extra duties at the beginning of this month, when the Suez Crisis was at its height and Hungary was being crushed.
I do not think that even the Suez Crisis has caused either the hon. Gentleman or his right hon. Friend to forget that Act.
One would have thought that the Suez Crisis and the other Middle East events of the last few weeks would at least have caused the London Transport Executive to stay its hand.
Mr. Hunter asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, in view of the present emergency caused by the Suez Crisis, if he will take powers to prevent increases in the prices of meat, tea, bread, sugar, butter, and other basic foods.
One positive result of the Suez Crisis is that it has given a new impetus to European co-operation.
In view of this serious figure, plus the loss of revenue from the licensing of cars and Purchase Tax revenue on new cars - all this on top of the £50 million to which he referred the other day - does the Chancellor still maintain that the main structure of his Budget remains unaffected by the economic effects of the Suez Crisis?
(2) if he will take powers to prevent the hoarding of those foodstuffs which will be in short supply as a result of the Suez Crisis.
asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, (1) in view of the Suez Crisis, if he will take powers to prevent increases in the price of bread or other foodstuffs; (2) if he will take powers to prevent the hoarding of those foodstuffs which will be in short supply as a result of the Suez crisis.
Are we to be told a few weeks hence that because of the Suez Crisis, and all that has happened in consequence, with its effects on our economy, a situation has now arisen in this country in which the Minister much regrets that it will now not be possible to allow the Commission this amount of capital expenditure for 1957?
Will he, therefore, not reduce or abolish this tax, at least for the period of the Suez Crisis, to keep these people in work?
Must we have Another Suez Crisis in order to bring this lesson home to them?
I shall not go into the whole history of the Suez Crisis, but ask the hon. Member to address himself to the practical question.
Since the beginning of the Suez Crisis there has been a fall in the productionof cars and car accessories.
155 and whether he will therefore continue control on the price of sugar after January, 1957, at least until the end of the Suez Crisis.
and whether for the period of the Suez Crisis he will introduce price control.
I said that I saw no reason why the Suez Crisis should give grounds for any general and serious increase in food prices.
asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is aware that the prices of sugar and tea are to be increased as a result of the Suez Crisis; and if he will now take steps, by price control or otherwise, to avoid such increases taking place in the immediate future.
Sugar will be decontrolled in January and it is, therefore, going up in price, not because of the Suez Crisis, but merely because of some people seeking extra profit at a time of national emergency.
Further, is he aware that the effects of the Suez Crisis are likely to be felt for at least another year?
Imports, prices affected by Suez Crisis, 560.
The Suez Crisis has underlined the need for a still greater expansion and plans are under active consideration.
It was not a great amount, but there was some indication of that, and that was before any of the effects of the Suez Crisis began to make themselves felt.
We may disagree very bitterly about the causes of the Suez Crisis and of the present need for petrol rationing, but whatever our views about the causes of this crisis, I hope the House will reach some measure of agreement about the best way of sharing the hardships which the crisis has imposed.
and if he will use these powers to prevent profiteering from shortages, following the Suez Crisis.
asked the President of the Board of Trade what powers he still retains to impose price controls; and if he will use these powers to prevent profiteering from shortages, following the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Zilliacus asked the Minister of Defence why, at the outset of the Suez Crisis, Her Majesty's Government requested the French Government to concur in postponing military action in the Suez Canal area for 60 days.
and how these figures compare with a date in July last, prior to the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Lewis asked the Minister of Labour the number of people unemployed and on short-time in the Parliamentary constituency of Carmarthen at the latest convenient stated date and how these figures compare with a date in July last, prior to the Suez Crisis.
asked the Minister of Defence why, at the outset of the Suez Crisis, Her Majesty's Government requested the French Government to concur in postponing military action in the Suez Canal area for 60 days.
It is no secret that this matter has been raised with us, long before the Suez Crisis arose, by the people in the industry, by the men and management alike.
Recently, I had an opportunity of visiting the United States, just after the full brunt of the Suez Crisis was felt.
It has been said - I have not the slightest idea what truth there is in this, and I hope that the Financial Secretary will be able to deny it - that because the Government are dissatisfied with the fact that a great deal of time of overseas B.B.C. programmes was devoted during the Suez Crisis to putting the Opposition's point of view side by side with that of the Government, a Foreign Office representative is now permanently established at Bush House.
, went out during the Suez Crisis.
The hon. Member must realise, when he reads the newspapers tomorrow morning, that another explanation has been given for what happened over the Suez Crisis.
Up till the Suez Crisis we were building up our alliances right up to the Russian threshold, in Europe and in the Middle East, and the nearer we reached her, or the nearer she reached us - because it was a reciprocal operation - the more and more points of friction we created.
I understand that the Governors took a decision not to allow any political meetings during the Suez Crisis.
While we do not desire to debate this Motion at any great length, we feel that it would not be right that the House should approve the decision to rise for the Christmas Adjournment tomorrow until 22nd January, until we have had some further statement from the Government about the Anglo-French discussions which preceded the recent Crisis in Suez.
The index for December and for later months, of course, will begin to show the effects of the Suez Crisis.
It was most noticeable during the Suez Crisis that the Soviet Union did not threaten Britain that the Red Army would sweep westwards and wipe out the troops of Western Europe.
Mr. Hare: Because of the Suez Crisis, over 25,000 reservists were recalled and over 10,000 Regulars, who would otherwise have completed their Colour service, were retained in the Army.
Is the Minister aware that there is very deep concern, particularly in Scotland, at the great increase in the number of emigrants to the Commonwealth countries that has taken place since the Suez Crisis, and does not he think that the Government, in association with the Commonwealth Governments, ought to give this House the fullest possible information about this increase in emigration so that we can decide properly what our attitude should be towards it?
They will not be up-to-date; they will relate to the time before the Suez Crisis was widely felt, for instance.
Mr. Sandys: Defence expenditure in 1956–57 is expected to be approximately £1,540 million of which about £35 million is extra expenditure due to the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Parker asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will introduce price control to prevent profiteering where shortages have arisen from the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Hunter asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what steps are being taken by the Government to give 160 adequate compensation for those British subjects who had to leave Egypt as the result of the Suez Crisis.
The reply was to the following effect:Defence expenditure in 1956–57 is expected to be approximately £1,540 million of which about £35 million is extra expenditure due to the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Parker asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will introduce legislation to re-enact the Courts Emergency Powers Act, 1939, and apply it to special areas which have been unfavourably affected by the Suez Crisis, so that leave of the court shall be required before judgment can be executed against a defendant who is in arrears with rent, mortgage payments or other debts.
asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will introduce legislation to re-enact the Courts Emergency Powers Act, 1939, and apply it to special areas which have been unfavourably affected by the Suez Crisis, so that leave of the court shall be required before judgment can be executed against a defendant who is in arrears with rent, mortgage payments or other debts.
Does not the Leader of the House think that it is very bad for the dignity of this place, this honourable House, for Ministers to make statements on Government policy outside the House and, as happened during the Suez Crisis and the passage of the present Rent Bill, to give information to the 1922 Committee and refuse to give it to this House?
Mr. Hunter asked the Prime Minister what steps are being taken by the Government to give adequate compensation for those British subjects who had to leave Egypt as the result of the Suez Crisis.
asked the Prime Minister what steps are being taken by the Government to give adequate compensation for those British subjects who had to leave Egypt as the result of the Suez Crisis.
Would the full text of the speech reveal that the Prime Minister apologised to the American Ambassador for misleading him during the Suez Crisis, and did he express to the American Ambassador our gratitude to the American Government for keeping us out of a disastrous and expensive war?
We have lost four brigadiers, with their military experience, as a result of the Suez Crisis, and I am glad to see that the War Office is passing under civilian influence.
Even if he wrote a child's history of the Suez Crisis, I do not believe that he would find a child silly enough to believe it.
The real position today hasbeen acutely pointed by the Suez Crisis, particularly because it has drawn attention to the degree to which our economy depends upon the fuel reserves of the Middle East, and how narrow is the balance between disaster and success for the British nation in the next ten or fifteen years.
First as regards the Dagenham area, the motor car industry, as hon. Members will realise, is suffering from being in a depressed state at present following the Suez Crisis.
The coming of the Suez Crisis hit Dagenham, of course, but when the petrol shortage is over there will no doubt be a revival of some of those sales.
I believe that the Suez Crisis itself was not a major contributor to that deficit.
I say to the right hon. Gentleman who is to reply that it is not so much that they might go up now that the Suez Crisis is passing a little and some of the held-up imports come in.
I ask the right hon. Gentleman what his reflections are and how we are to get on once the Suez Crisis is over and we are back to the normalcy which the Government were trying to create by the credit squeeze.
I feel that for my hon. Friends and myself, who adopted a certain attitude at the time of the Suez Crisis, it will take a very considerable time indeed before the grievous blow struck at our purpose and at our interests by the United States is completely assuaged.
per kit of 10 stone on all fish sold has been imposed to meet the increased cost of fuel and diesel oil owing to the Suez Crisis?
As to the amount of oil imported from the U.S.A. since the Suez Crisis, I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given on 28th January to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Poole (Captain Pilkington).
asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster whether he is aware of the anxiety in the British Broadcasting Corporation about the increase in guidance and pressure from Governmentsources about the handling of the Suez Crisis in news items; and whether he will therefore define the extent to which his officials will be used to interpret the news to the British Broadcasting Corporation and to newspapers.
Is the Minister not aware that during the Suez Crisis the B.B.C. received what was called an unprecedented amount of "guidance and hints" from official quarters?
In particular, will he make available, for Members at any rate, in the Library, the London Press Service which is put out by the Central Office of Information, in view of the fact that in the critical days of the Suez Crisis the only London editorials quoted in the London Press Service were those which were entirely favourable to the Government of the day, thus giving a completely one-sided view of British opinion on this matter?
Will the right hon. Gentleman consult the Board of Trade about the question that my hon. Friend has put to him, in view of the fact that the amount of very stupid propaganda put out by the War Office in the Suez Crisis has made things very much more difficult for British exporters in the Muslim world?
In view of the serious damage done to our prestige in Western Europe as the result of the Suez Crisis, will the right hon. Gentleman bear specially in mind how great a mistake it would be to curtail the services referred to in my Question, relating to broadcasts to Western Europe?
A leading article in The Times yesterday said:The Suez Crisis, and Britain's reappraisal of her defence needs, must certainly lead to a reappraisal of her needs in Cyprus.
and the beginning of the policy of squeezing the home market, which has since been followed by hire-purchase restrictions and the credit squeeze and, finally, as a result of the Suez Crisis, the effects of the petrol shortage.
As that was at the height of the Suez Crisis, and as the Government have had power for several years to make this appointment and did not do so, is not this conclusive proof of the Government's dislike of the B.B.C.'s objective reporting of the Suez crisis and that they are doing their best to bring pressure to bear on the B.B.C.?
I am sorry to weary the House with all these figures, but it is important to do this small calculation in order to make it clear that by 1975, if we had anything like a Suez Crisis, we should be economically on our knees, not just concerned because we have some petrol rationing or we have to take certain steps to reduce our fuel oil requirements.
asked the Paymaster General what diminution of normal oil supplies to the United Kingdom has resulted in tons and per centum since the onset of the Suez Crisis; and how much of it has been made good from dollar sources.
Mr. Lewis asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in his forthcoming Budget, he will consider removing or reducing the additional petrol tax imposed as a result of the Suez Crisis and thereby assist in reducing the cost of living.
I believe that the real reason for the withdrawal of the first Bill, which was introduced in November, was not that given by the hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire - because the Government wanted to introduce the subsidy for herrings - but was because that Bill would have made utter nonsense at the time of the Suez Crisis.
However, I think it true to say that the improvement came about only when there was a certain amount of industrial uncertainty after the Suez Crisis at the beginning of the autumn.
The Question related to the amount of the increase of traffic on the waterways of this country due to the Suez Crisis.
a gallon emergency tax put on petrol when the Suez Crisis began.
tax put on petrol, aviation fuel, and diesel fuel for road vehicles during the Suez Crisis, reduce this increase by 9d.
asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that traders and business organisationsraised their prices at the time of the Suez Crisis on the ground that the 1s.
He is now suggesting that the Opposition point of view on, for example, the Suez Crisis, or on foreign affairs generally, should not be transmitted abroad.
I understand that at the height of the Suez Crisis the Central Electricity Authority was told to go slow in this matter because it was not always possible to get the oil.
Can the Minister say whether, since the Suez Crisis, any arms have been supplied by Her Majesty's Government to Egypt, Syria or Jordan?
Fortunately, we did not have to call up any reserves for the Royal Navy in the Suez Crisis, but we can never be sure that we might not have to do so should another emergency develop in the future.
I should like to know whether we may have an authoritative reply to the statements which have been made that during the Suez Crisis we were threatened by the American Sixth Fleet.
I should like to have it either confirmed or denied that the American Fleet in the Mediterranean took any hostile action at all towards our ships during the Suez Crisis.
I hope that we do not run into Another Suez Crisis, or that would go by the board.
If the confusion spreads in the Conservative Party, are we to have Another Suez Crisis in the next year or two?
though, if they can imagine that they reflect the views of this country during the Suez Crisis, they can imagine anything.
The Suez Crisis made the United Nations a controversial issue.
It is because we believe that this new emerging world has the right to claim for itself the rights and privileges that we boast of in Britain, and should have the best chance of making use of them in peace and justice for its own people, with the help of this country rather than in the face of the opposition of this country, that we see in the Suez Crisis a turning point.
I simply cannot understand the extraordinary schizophrenia which gets into hon. Gentlemen opposite on this subject; though, if they can imagine that they reflect the views of this country during the Suez Crisis, they can imagine anything.
Is the hon. Member seriously suggesting that the whole policy conducted by the Opposition throughout the Suez Crisis was entirely due to injured amour-propre?
I do not know whether any hon. Member remembers it, but I have to stress the fact in order to continue my argument about the effect of the American attitude towards the Suez Crisis.
This is a stream of events broadening down from Suez Crisis to Suez crisis almostindefinitely in the future.
In addition, I bitterly resent the disgusting appeal to Jingoism of such papers as theDaily Sketch,which during the Suez Crisis carried the front page headline Let the cry babies moan ".
In view of the great variations in the statements made from time to time as to the amount by which petrol is now higher in price than it was at the onset of the Suez Crisis, namely, last July, can my right hon. Friend say whether the 2½d.
a gallon since the pre-Suez Crisis was the effect of the increased price the companies have to pay to producers, plus the retailers' margin.
Can the hon. Gentleman give any sensible or logical reason why he will not accept the suggestion made in my Question, or some such suggestion, when everybody, irrespective of political opinion, would agree that if these prices went up because of the Suez Crisis they ought to be reduced now that the reason for the increase has gone?
more per pound since the Suez Crisis; and if he will now take steps to have these increases removed.
Does the hon. Member realise that these assumptions are based upon his own assumptions, contained in the reply which he gave me last week, in which he told me that the increases dueto the Suez Crisis were being offset by seasonal reductions, and that the reductions will fluctuate?
Members will recall that the Suez Crisis forced us to study this aspect of docking.
In Chapter 4, page 10, talking about the supply of energy, it says:The Suez Crisis in the fall of 1956 dramatically focussed the world's attention on Western Europe's energy problem.
I am happy to say that at present, at Rolls-Royce, the industry is working overtime, but only a few months ago in the winter, partly as a result of the Suez Crisis, Rolls-Royce was working a four-day week.
What I wonder at is the fact that after the Suez Crisis we were able to get even 200, let alone 2,000.
These Clauses have been tabled because of our disappointment at the failure of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to take any action about the reduction of the Petrol Duty except to remove the extra shilling which was added during the Suez Crisis.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Hartlepools (Mr. D. Jones) has referred to local authorities and bus companies being forced to apply for the retention of the extra fares charged during the Suez Crisis, and my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) said that companies and undertakings would soon be bound to apply for yet further increases.
I know that many of my hon. Friends do not know who the Foreign Secretary is, and I wish I did not; but we used to see a lot of the right hon. and learned Gentleman at the time of the Suez Crisis.
The fact that not only a number of Commonwealth countries ran down sterling balances during the Suez Crisis, but that now Ghana and, shortly, Malaya are to be independent and will have under their control the spending of their sterling balances, whether on sterling goods or dollar goods, means that a very serious strain is being put on the functioning of the sterling area.
The right hon. Gentleman's figure, even for this year, was arrived at only by including something which I should hardly describe as a tax concession, that is to say, the withdrawal of the extra duty imposed by reason of the Suez Crisis on petrol and other hydro-carbon oils.
I could, of course, show a much more graphic increase if I were to base the comparison on the low figure during the Suez Crisis; they have risen nearly one third from that point.
It was all these which were lacking at the time of the Suez Crisis last year and which gave some of us very great anxiety about the way in which the normal safeguards against irresponsible action by the Government were being avoided.
Major Wall asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what further 56 steps Her Majesty's Government are taking to secure the release of the two British subjects imprisoned by the Egyptian Government at the time of the Suez Crisis.
Many things have happened during the last year, not excluding the Suez Crisis.
One thing which happened at the time of the Suez Crisis is often forgotten.
That is quite disturbing, because in this House we have felt, certainly ever since the Suez Crisis, that the Government have lost their morale and has leaned far too much on civil servants.
Similarly I believe that if we had had a Foreign Affairs Committee in close touch with the Foreign Secretary, not telling him what to do, but hearing reports from him from time to time and showing a continuous interest, it is unlikely that the Suez Crisis would have occurred in the form it did.
Stocks of oil in the United Kingdom are considerably higher today than before the Suez Crisis, and other measures for strengthening the position further are under consideration.
As the Parliamentary Secretary has said, the Suez Crisis played its part.
"Mobility" and "striking force" are the key words, but some of us suffered a severe shock when the Suez Crisis occurred and found that it took ten days to get our troops to Suez from Malta.
Frankly, I think it was a miracle that, during the Suez Crisis, newly independent countries in Africa did not demand the full payment of their sterling balances.
It is true that last year's figures might have been affected by the Suez Crisis, when there was not the same amount of traffic on the roads and there was more on the railways, but if a comparison is made with two years ago it is found that the freight traffics of the Commission have been just about the same this year as they were two years ago, despite the fact that during those two years there have been at least two increases in charges.
The real charge against this Government is that in the two years which have followed the Suez Crisis and the tragic events of that time there has not been any attempt - although we have had that period of two years - to produce any kind of coherent policy; to redress the balance; to retrieve the mistakes.
They did not even agree about the Tripartite Declaration which was, in itself, almost the direct cause of the subsequent Suez Crisis.
I take, therefore, something which was written, which applied at the time of the Suez Crisis and which is more vividly, I think, applicable today.
He also said how the Government should have handled the Suez Crisis.
As was pointed out by my right hon. Friend the Member for Smethwick (Mr. Gordon Walker), the House should remember that, owing to the state of emergency to which it reduced the country at the time of the Suez Crisis, this Tory Government had to take action and introduce new Defence Regulations; not merely new Statutory Instruments but to make far-reaching Defence Regulations which are quoted in the Blue Book.
That covers the hon. Member's questions about the Suez Crisis.
Leaving aside this proposed inquiry by a Select Committee, does not the Prime Minister feel that, in view of the somewhat serious allegations made by Mr. Randolph Churchill about matters that were not debated in this House at the time of the Suez Crisis, nor have been since, it is desirable that the Government should make a considered reply?
I made further inquiries about exactly what was happening, and I understand that the hon. Member was trying again to raise the whole terrible and ghastly issue of the Suez Crisis.
That was done during the Suez Crisis, and could be done again now.
Shortly after this answer was given we had the Suez Crisis, at the end of 1956.
Mr. Emrys Hughes asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what facilities have been given to authors and 410 journalists to study documents relevant to the difficulties of the Treasury in maintaining the value of the £ during the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Emrys Hughes asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what extent he has studied the financial difficulties of the Treasury during the time of 411 the Suez Crisis, with a view to safeguarding the £ sterling in any future national emergencies.
asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what facilities have been given to authors andjournalists to study documents relevant to the difficulties of the Treasury in maintaining the value of the £ during the Suez Crisis.
asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what extent he has studied the financial difficulties of the Treasury during the time of the Suez Crisis, with a view to safeguarding the £ sterling in any future national emergencies.
My point is that our position is basically far more stable than it was two, three or four years ago, when we had the Suez Crisis.
Apart from the balance of payments questions, any trouble in the Middle East would affect our oil supplies, as it did in the Suez Crisis, when the oil supplies to the electricity undertakings were cut by 90 per cent.
I quite agree that at the time of the Suez Crisis it rocketed up, but it came down again.
It is probably true that 658 in the Suez Crisis we quite overestimated the likelihood of an intention to block our trade through the canal.
I have no complaint of his conduct during the Suez Crisis.
I see the right hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan) making some notes, for which I am much obliged; I have no complaint of his conduct during the Suez Crisis.
If ever there were a paper which was responsible for misleading public opinion in this country at the time of the Suez Crisis it is, I believe, that national paper.
I want to return for a few moments to the main subject of this debate, the Suez Crisis, and all it has meant in unhappiness as regards divided homes.
I am bound to say that I was a little surprised that the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition decided to use this Financial Agreement and the need to pass a Resolution in support of it as an opportunity for rehashing all the old controversy about the Suez Crisis.
The gold reserves in the four years, it is true, have increased by £ 160 million, but the emergency borrowing in the Suez Crisis and in 1957, the sale of national assets such as Trinidad oil, the extraordinary aid from Germany and elsewhere, have been almost £ 600 million, to say nothing of the £ 350 million of United States and International Bank lending to the sterling area last year.
Mr. Brockway asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster if he will make arrangements in the information services to south-east Asia to revert to the practice, in operation before the Suez Crisis, of distributing editorial comments critical of the policy of Her Majesty's Government as well as comments which are favourable.
asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster if he will make arrangements in the information services to south-east Asia to revert to the practice, in operation before the Suez Crisis, of distributing editorial comments critical of the policy of Her Majesty's Government as well as comments which are favourable.
At the time of the Suez Crisis we were told that if the Suez Canal were nationalised and put into the hands of the Egyptians they would not have enough pilots?
Surely it is true that there is now a wider variety of suppliers of oil in different parts of the world than there was a few years ago during the Suez Crisis.
Since the war we have had one or two occasions, notably during the Suez Crisis, when oil suddenly was cut off from this country and very great efforts were made to produce very large stocks of coal as quickly as possible.
We had Cyprus during the Suez Crisis and we had no Middle East oil.
I remember that we went into the Summer Recess with the Suez Crisis just beginning and when we had a Government policy that was full of dubiety and ambivalence; the Government could not make up their mind.
At the time of the Suez Crisis I remember it being argued in this House that there must be British control of the Canal because the Egyptians could not run it themselves.
At the time of the Suez Crisis the American Government very clearly, without standing on ceremony, told us how strongly they disagreed with the official policy of Her Majesty's Government.
I have had more letters about this Bill than about any subject since the Suez Crisis.
Although I have not, I must confess, had time to think of various precedents, I believe I am right in saying that on no less an occasion than the Suez Crisis the Government did announce their intention to deliver an ultimatum to Egypt and we did have a debate on the Adjournment to try to stop them doing so.
However, those negotiations and their execution were overtaken by the events which are commonly described as the "Suez Crisis".
The Commission met in 1955 to carry out its business, but no settlement had been reached at the time of the Suez Crisis.
Members will remember that after the Suez Crisis we were all told that there would be an extreme and urgent shortage of oil.
The events before the war, and even the events leading up to the Suez Crisis, are as unknown as the events of thousands of years ago.
I remember Mr. Menzies' efforts during the Suez Crisis.
I have followed with interest and anxiety the problem of compensation for those who lost their property during the Suez Crisis.
My hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary will be well aware that, like many of my hon. Friends and many hon. Members opposite, I have taken a keen interest in this matter, chiefly for the same reasons as other hon. Members who have constituents or friends who have been affected by their property being confiscated at the time of the Suez Crisis.
The last time there was equal road and rail ton mileage was during the Suez Crisis, when petrol and fuel oil were rationed.
In that year we had the Suez Crisis, out of which the Chancelor was translated to higher regions, and became Prime Minister a year after.
When the Suez Crisis developed they had to leave Egypt.
In reality, as well as constitutionally, the right hon. Gentleman is personally responsible for the Bill we are now condemning, and in this he is as stubborn as the Government which he once left when they were being equally stubborn and equally foolish over the Suez Crisis.
I have been aware of that ever since the Crisis in Suez.
Yes, Sir; I have been aware of that ever since the Crisis in Suez.
One of the outstanding examples of the contribution that the B.B.C. can make was its coverage at the time of the Suez Crisis.
As soon as we got over the Suez Crisis, that was for-gotten.
If they are spoiling for Another Suez Crisis - [HON.
It is extremely instructive to a legislator to read the two-day debate on the Rent Act, which took place during the Suez Crisis, and which was of the very greatest importance.
As, throughout my parliamentary life, I have devoted most of my speeches to foreign affairs, I must tonight, even at this late hour, give the country, my constituents and this House one, and only one, warning which I gave prior to the Suez Crisis in 1956.
I shall not take any sides on the question of the Suez Crisis, because that raises the temperature of the House.
This country cannot afford Another Suez Crisis or getting itself entangled by taking one side or working on one side or the other.
During the most critical time, when one hoped that relations would improve between our country and the U.A.R., the Leader of the Opposition spoke in the United States and was asked a question on television about what he thought of the troubles in Panama, and over the networks of the United States he is said to have said that it would have been very much better if during the Suez Crisis the Americans had let Great Britain deal with the Egyptians as she wanted to.
I see no major reverse of policy or any making of headway in improving relations with the U.A.R. I know they desire to improve them, and I perfectly agree that the broadcasts over Cairo Radio do nothing but damage to the good intentions which the Government have or desire to have with the U.A.R. I hope that at the right time the Minister will be able to tell the House and the country, in view of what must be Another Suez Crisis on the horizon, what is Her Majesty's Government's foreign policy towards the U.A.R., and towards the Government and the State of Israel.
If the present Government, of all people, get themselves into a Suez Crisis - I hope they will not do so - they have nobody else to blame but themselves.
Mr. M. Foot asked the Prime Minister what facilities were provided by Her Majesty's Government to Mr. Terence Robertson, the author of a recently published book on the Suez Crisis of 1956.
asked the Prime Minister what facilities were provided by Her Majesty's Government to Mr. Terence Robertson, the author of a recently published book on the Suez Crisis of 1956.
In the book which I understand my right hon. Friend is now reading on the Suez Crisis - or what was alleged to be a crisis - he will find that President Eisenhower and the late Mr. Dulles gave a quite different interpretation from that given by Mr. Harold Macmillan or the United Kingdom Government.
Would he not also agree - although I will not mention names - that during the Suez Crisis, for example, my hon. Friends and I could have raised this sort of matter, although doing so would not and could not have taken us very far?
We had a recent classical example in the early days of the Suez Crisis.
I can never forget the Suez Crisis.
Before I give way to the right hon. Gentleman, because he is anxious to intervene, I would remind him of another occasion when action was taken against President Nasser during the Suez Crisis when our forces were much weightier and much better equipped than they are now.
At the time of the Suez Crisis, we had a special dispensation for Saturday meetings.
She has fought on our side in two wars and her ports were of immense value to this country during the Suez Crisis.
Mr. Holden wrote: "Aden Colony crossed a political watershed during the months of the Suez Crisis, from the firmly proclaimed imperial restrictions of Lord Lloyd in May"— he was the person who indicated that we were going to stay in Aden for ever— "to a dawning realisation in December that the old bonds could be broken after all.
Mr. Holden wrote:Aden Colony crossed a political watershed during the months of the Suez Crisis, from the firmly proclaimed imperial restrictions of Lord Lloyd in May" - he was the person who indicated that we were going to stay in Aden for ever - to a dawning realisation in December that the old bonds could be broken after all.
When petrol rationing and other restrictions on oil use were required during the Suez Crisis the Government were able to act under the Defence Regulations.
The procedure outlined in the Bill is that adopted during the Suez Crisis when the provisions were made under Defence Regulations.
Some of us remember the Queen's Speech of 1956 when we were not able to give the Speech the normal debating that we generally give it because that was the very day of the Crisis in Suez with which the right hon. Gentleman was so intimately associated.
Has the Minister seen reports of the vast profits made by certain oil companies out of the Suez Crisis, and has he suggested to the companies that they might reduce their prices substantially now that the crisis is over?
How, then, does my right hon. Friend explain the fact that Sir Anthony Eden, as Prime Minister in 1956, threatened to introduce legislation at the time of the Suez Crisis to take over the B.B.C., and that had it not been for the firm management at the top of the B.B.C. e might have achieved that sinister objective?
Will my right hon. Friend look at the rather hair-raising revelations contained in Mr. Harman Grisewood's recent book about the pressures applied to the B.B.C. by the then Conservative Government in 1956 during the Suez Crisis?
Bearing that in mind, his account of the Suez Crisis of the late 1956 becomes all the more disturbing.
As my hon. Friend said, he was prompted to raise the matter by the publication of Mr. Harman Grisewood's book "One Thing at a Time", and, in particular, by the account given by Mr. Grisewood of the conflict which occured between the B.B.C. and the Government of the day during the Suez Crisis of 1956.
Mr. Ross: It is estimated that for a full year the increased fuel costs to Scottish agriculture and horticulture arising from the Suez Crisis and devaluation will be about £400,000.
It seems that the lessons of the Suez Crisis of 1956 have not been completely learnt by many people, including those who then opposed the Eden Government.
In 1957 at the time of the Suez Crisis I was a Class "A" reservist.
Just after the Suez Crisis I was doing National Service as a fighter controller.
My hon. Friends the Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Kimball) and the Member for Harborough (Mr. Farr) have given very accurate and eloquent testimony to the social revolution which has overtaken the countryside in the last decade or so and which will make the whole concept of petrol rationing infinitely more complex in execution than that of which we had experience at the time of the Suez Crisis.
If this legislation had been passed after the Suez Crisis, the powers which are now being sought by the Government would have been automatically employed by such a Bill lying dormant but capable of resuscitation.
Good examples are the demonstrations that took place during the Suez Crisis and the Cuba bomb crisis.
Apart from entry to the EEC, which was divisive within the parties, the main differences between the parties have been over the handling of the Suez Crisis and in our attitudes to South Africa.
Then the Suez Crisis was upon us and, at the by-election in the immediate aftermath of that fruitless escapade, the physically diminutive but politically mature daughter of the famous Lloyd George won the hearts and votes of the people of Carmarthen.
My first political memory is of the Suez Crisis, when I took part in a spontaneous demonstration.
As he flies from capital to capital at considerable risk to his political and physical health, it is only natural that one should think back to the machinations of John Foster Dulles during the Suez Crisis.
They - or perhaps it was their fathers - used to say at the time of the Suez Crisis that a Tory's patriotism shows only when someone is going to get killed.
He is also believed to have details of a plot to assassinate President Nasser during the Suez Crisis and details of meetings between officials from American intelligence agencies, the National Security Agency, the CIA, the FBI, GCHQ and M15.
Mr. Dalyell asked the Attorney-General when the Lord Chancellor intends to make available all public records relating to the Anglo-French-Israel negotiations before the 1956 Suez Crisis.
1956 was a significant date, for it was the year of the Suez Crisis, our withdrawal from the middle east in ignominy, and the closure of the Suez canal.
I am reminded of what the American Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, said in the aftermath of the Suez Crisis, about Britain having lost an empire and not yet found a role.
There was argument about that at various legal levels, right up to the highest, at the time of the Suez Crisis and there were those who always had doubts about some of the legal recommendations.
At the time of the Suez Crisis, the Father of the House and I clashed - something of which he generously reminds me occasionally.
I left Iraq in the middle of the Suez Crisis.
Many people viewed the Suez Crisis with some misgivings, but our Royal Navy and merchant ships lent their support in that episode, too.
Before I take any lectures from the right hon. Gentleman about Israel or the middle east, I remind him that when he was Government Chief Whip at the time of the Suez Crisis, I and many other Members of Parliament demonstrated against British aggression in Egypt, which - as we knew at the time - was done in collusion with France and Israel.
I was in a sense fortunate when I learnt to drive because it was at the time of the Suez Crisis.
The only time since well before the second world war when there was disagreement in Parliament on political lines was over the Suez Crisis.
That has marked consequences, shown most clearly in the Suez Crisis when the world decided that it did not wish three sovereign states to continue a war and simply pulled the plug on them.
From 1924 until shortly after the Suez Crisis, the constituency that I now represent was held by Captain, later Sir, Anthony Eden, who became a Conservative Prime Minister.
Mr. Burden: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will give General Service medals to those who served during the Suez Crisis.
I was a Member of the House at the time of the Suez Crisis.
If the hon. Gentleman had been in the House during the Suez Crisis, the Falklands conflict or the Gulf war, he would have heard plenty of criticism flying around the Chamber - just as there was during the second world war.
Their service was largely overshadowed by the fact that, at the same time, the Korean war was raging, and, later, by the wars in Malaya and Borneo and the onset of the Suez Crisis.
It was the time of the Suez Crisis and I was rather hoping that the Royal Air Force would fetch me back as a reservist.
The early warning sign which led to some understanding of that occurred way back in the Suez Crisis.
However, Pakistan has never been forgiven by Muslim Egypt for our role in the Suez Crisis.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman mentioned the Suez Crisis, during which I was but a twinkle in my mother's eye.
Like my hon. Friend I was not around at the time of the Suez Crisis - apparently, unlike many Opposition Members - but I am sure that my hon. Friend knows his history.
Draconian powers to restrict the free movement of individuals still exist under the Emergency Powers Acts of 1920 and 1964, but they have not been imposed at any other time of war since 1945, including during the Korean war, the Suez Crisis, the Falklands war or the Gulf war.
During the Suez Crisis, they rightly said no to our requests.
There was an exception during the Suez Crisis when the then Opposition vigorously opposed the line that was being taken by the then Government.
Is he aware that Muslim Pakistan supported our country during the Suez Crisis against another Muslim country?
Given recent comments by former military chiefs that the armed forces are dangerously overstretched, particularly following the Afghanistan deployment, and given that British military reservists are being compulsorily called up for first time since the Suez Crisis, does the Leader of the House accept that this country must either increase the defence budget or reduce its commitments to ensure that no damage is done to our fighting capability and that lives are not unnecessarily put at risk?
Its soldiers are extremely specialist, as the Minister is aware, so their call-up was going to be unusual and slightly more difficult, especially as the procedure had not been practised since the Suez Crisis.
how much money is allocated to their upkeep; and how many are buried there, broken down by military personnel who fought in the (a) Suez Canal zone emergency 1951 to 1954 and (b) Suez Crisis 1956.
The events of the 1956 Suez Crisis demonstrated that; Us unwillingness to support the pound, which, as a reserved currency was under severe pressure, was a compelling factor in causing the United Kingdom to withdraw from that ill-fated and ill-conceived adventure.
Unlike many in Whitehall, I was once upon a time swept up in the Suez Crisis.
It is a long time since I was last in Iraq - it was during the Suez Crisis of 1956.
Mr. Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what plans the Government have to award a General Service Medal to those involved in the Suez Crisis in 1956.
Dr. Moonie: Service in Operation Musketeer, the Anglo/French Landings during the Suez Crisis of late 1956, was marked by the institution of the General Service Medal 1918–1962 with clasp near east.
It could shake apart the pro-western Governments in the middle east on whom the west has so painstakingly worked since the Yom Kippur war, just as the Suez Crisis and invasion fuelled middle eastern nationalism in the 1950s and 1960s.
My Lords, like my noble friend Lord Wright of Richmond, I doubt that we have been in as big a muddle over our international relations since the Suez Crisis, nearly half a century ago, which a few of us will remember only too well.
During the Suez Crisis, Canon Claude Jenkins once preached to a group of Oxford undergraduates and began his sermon with the words: "Probably few of you remember the rejoicings in the streets on Mafeking night".
I understand that it is the first time since the Suez Crisis - possibly since the Second World War - that the Territorial Army has been called up on this scale.
They were there, for example, during the Suez Crisis in the following year.
Operation Telic involved the largest compulsory call-out of reserve forces since the 1956 Suez Crisis.
As we discovered before we had access to North Sea oil and gas, interruption of supplies in the past were numerous - the Suez Crisis, the Iranian revolution, the Arab oil embargo.
People forget that I live in a community where, on the back of our problems in Egypt in 1956, we built a block of houses for those who had to get out of Egypt because of the Suez Crisis.
Why, therefore, are reductions not being proposed for the Queen's and Light Divisions, the Parachute Regiment, which has not been used in a paratroop role since the Suez Crisis, or the Guards Division?
The operation in Iraq has involved the largest call-up of reservists since the Suez Crisis in 1956.
Whether it was the Suez Crisis or just mundanely my interpretation of the order book, the foundry men would look at me with sympathy - they did not doubt best intentions - and say, "Well enough, but it will be different - things always are".
He served in the role of Chief Whip between 1955 and 1959, and is widely credited with holding the Conservative Party together during the Suez Crisis.
In that role he rendered invaluable service to the country during the Suez Crisis in keeping the government and his party together.
He showed enormous skill in this post, helping to keep his party together during the difficult days of the Suez Crisis, despite his own deep personal reservations.
It was the British that went through to that and made the greatest miscalculation of the weighing of votes and opinions in the Security Council since the Suez Crisis.
I regret profoundly, however, that the United Kingdom has lost its role as honest broker in the middle east - a role that it had redeveloped since the Suez Crisis 50 years ago - largely as a result of the Prime Minister behaving like Mr. Bush's poodle and as a result of his frankly ridiculous stories about why we should invade Iraq, stories that, I am pleased to say, some Opposition Members did not believe.
In my more uncharitable moments, I am reminded of that famous Aneurin Bevan put-down during the Suez Crisis.
We have many fences to mend, as indeed we had 50 years ago at the time of the Suez Crisis, when we also sought regime change and equally drew false conclusions about the real threat to our people and our interests.
Anyone examining the relationship between Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt will realise that whatever the niceties and whatever the attempts by the British to spin it - and Churchill - at the end of the day we were a supplicant, as we have demonstrably been since the Suez Crisis.
In the past, we have seen the Suez Crisis, the OPEC embargo, the Iranian embargo and the Russian interruption of supplies to Ukraine.
This was during the Suez Crisis and it has already been mentioned that there is an echo from that time in some of the issues of today.
In other words, if there is a worldwide shortage of oil and gas - as happened during the Suez Crisis, the OPEC embargo, the Iranian crisis, and on several other occasions - we would be vulnerable to the European Community deciding that oil and gas should be shared fairly across the whole Community.
During the Suez Crisis the Z reservists were called up.
The two worst decisions that this country has made in my lifetime have been to do with the Suez Crisis and the war in Iraq.
There is a celebrated case of a compensation scheme after the Suez Crisis, with its legislative provision that "the determinations of the compensation body shall be final".
From the naivety of Arthur Balfour in 1917 to the ill-fated Anglo-Iraqi treaty of the 1920s, and from our attempts to leverage power in Egypt between the King and the Wafd-which sowed the seeds for the 1952 revolution-to our subsequent handling of the Suez Crisis, such events have left an unhappy legacy.
There were, for example, substantive motions of no confidence during the Suez Crisis.
The noble and learned Lord referred to those which took place against the backdrop of the Suez Crisis.
This was there with the Suez Crisis and our invasion of Afghanistan in 1839.
I approach this from the viewpoint of the Suez Crisis, which was one of the most emotional experiences that I went through as an 18 year-old.
This week, as a good Welsh socialist, I have been reading a new biography of Aneurin Bevan, who, in relation to the Suez Crisis, stated that military success would, “only prove that we are stronger than the Egyptians.
The Iraq war was a shameful blot on our country's history and indeed the biggest foreign policy disaster since the Suez Crisis.
It was the year of the Suez Crisis; the year of the Clean Air Act; and the year that the United Kingdom turned on its first nuclear power station.
It was done in the first Gulf War and even in the Suez Crisis, when the Cabinet was told about collusion even though the House of Commons was lied to.
I would gently chide those on the Conservative Benches, because after the Suez Crisis - the other post-war global diplomatic disaster that Britain blundered into - there were repeated attempts in the remaining eight years of Conservative Government after 1956 to get a public inquiry, but they were systematically rejected, and that was a dangerous precedent.