Victor Cazalet – 1940 Speech on Internees

The speech made by Victor Cazalet, the then Conservative MP for Chippenham, in the House of Commons on 22 August 1940.

I hope that neither false sentiment nor false emotion will govern anything I say. Rather I am animated, if I may say so, by a sense of decency and of due regard to the fair name of both my country and the Government that I support to-day. A few weeks ago there was a debate here on this subject. I do not say as a consequence of that debate, but following it, the Home Secretary made a statement which appeared to me, I admit, to be pretty satisfactory. A few days later a White Paper was issued, and I regret to say that the more I and some of my friends studied that White Paper the less satisfactory it appeared to be. It does not matter whether there are 18 or 80 categories in a White Paper if those categories do not apply to the people who are interned. The real point is, how many people are being released, and are going to be released, under the particular categories. We have had some information about that to-day, in answer to a Question; and I hope the Home Secretary will give us further information. I should be the first to admit that since that last debate some progress has been made; but the question remains whether enough progress has been made, and whether the speed at which the existing machinery can work, even given the maximum of good will, is satisfactory.

One cannot help asking oneself who is responsible. It may be said that that has nothing to do with the matter; but what is Parliament for if it is not to ask these questions? No ordinary excuse, such as that there is a war on and that officials are overworked, is sufficient to explain what has happened. I do not know whether the Home Secretary will agree, but I think that Members of Parliament have been extremely reticent in exposing cases of hardship which have come to all of us, and which, I regret to say, are coming to me every day, even now. One of the most serious aspects of this affair is not so much what is happening at home, because we can, and will, put that right, but the effect that this has had on our reputation abroad. It has been interpreted as an anti-Jewish campaign. Although I know that nothing is further from the mind of the Government than that, there are facts which lead to that interpretation. The Jews are, for political reasons, not being allowed to organise themselves to fight in Palestine. That may be right or wrong; I am not arguing about it. Jews who are refugees in this country have been interned. Perhaps some of those same Jews whom I myself saw in Dachau camp some years ago, who have been fighting our battle for years, are interned here, and have not been allowed to fight for their adopted country. I know that the propaganda which has been put out is untrue: I repeat that there is nothing further from the mind of the Government than to do anything which would lend colour to this misguided or mischievous propaganda.

We all know that what has been done has not been done deliberately, with a desire to be cruel, in order to propitiate the sadistic instincts of officials. Exactly the opposite is the case. Officials have been more than sympathetic. Those at the War Office I have found always helpful; and the Home Office officials, like the Home Secretary and the Under-Secretary, are only too anxious to help when we represent our case to them. Why is it that something has not happened? I am afraid it is because of sheer incompetence and mismanagement. I have no desire to ask for punishment, but I desire to see that similar things may not happen in the future. Also, what may start as incompetence and mismanagement may, if not corrected, very soon become cruelty. I admit that there has been exaggeration. I myself have taken very few cases to the Home Office, because it is so difficult to check the facts. Of course, there has been exaggeration, but I would say, in extenuation of some of the exaggeration of which perhaps hon. Members of this House have been guilty: how can you expect that there will not be exaggeration when it has taken over three weeks to get a letter from one party to another—[An HON. MEMBER: “Longer than that.”]—a month in one case that I know of; when the “Oxford Book of English Verse” has been decreed an unsuitable book for a refugee; when names have been lost; when people have disappeared? It is obvious that when those things occur you are bound to get an atmosphere in which exaggeration of statements will take place. I know that the Minister is the first to admit that mistakes have been made, and I know that neither he nor his Department is responsible. But I do not think that that is quite enough. Horrible tragedies, unnecessary and undeserved, lie at the door of somebody; and I want the Minister, if he will, to say that he realises that these mistakes which he has admitted have in certain cases resulted in appalling and most regrettable tragedies. We have, unwittingly I know, added to the sum total of misery caused by this war, and by doing so we have not in any way added to the efficiency of our war effort.

So much for the past; what of the future? Personally—and here I believe that I represent the views of the majority of Members—I have confidence in the two committees which are concerned with these people. But there are one or two points which I do not think come within the terms of reference of either of these committees. I asked a Question to-day about the financial condition of the wives of internees. I have had one or two very distressing cases brought to me. In one case the husband has paid for over three years into the Unemployment Insurance Fund. You would expect that when he is unable to earn any money his wife would be able to receive something by right, not by charity, of what her husband has contributed to that scheme in the past. But apparently the fact that he is not eligible for a job—and the only reason he is not eligible is because he is interned by the Government—means that his wife is not allowed, under the Regulations, to draw any unemployment benefit. I do not think that anybody, in any part of the House, will challenge those facts, or deny that this is a great injustice. I believe that there is a fund—the Prevention and Relief of Distress Fund—to which the wives and families of those internees can apply. I would ask the Minister please not to circulate to the Employment Exchanges, but to all the internment camps, this information, so that the refugees may inform their wives, many of whom are at their last gasp to-day, how to get relief quickly and legitimately.

The second question I ask is, Has every individual, who is of suitable age and physique, and against whom there is nothing from the point of view of security, been offered the chance of going into the Pioneer Corps? I believe that is absolutely essential. In asking the question, I must admit that I was perhaps guilty, because I did not realise the fact that there was quite a number of young refugees in this country enjoying positions and jobs, which would be denied to our own people because they were being called up, which they were holding merely because they were refugees. It is impossible that such a situation should continue, and I would be the first to admit it. Therefore I suggest, as a solution, that these young men should be offered the alternative of joining the Pioneer Corps, or, of course, being continued in internment. That offer should be made to men under the age of 35 or 40, and I would like all over a certain age, of suitable physique, to be offered the chance of going into an industrial corps from which the Minister of Labour could, if they were suitable, allocate them to various factories. I believe that if we got these two things it would certainly go a long way towards solving a very large number of hardships to-clay.

What about the position in Canada and Australia? It is clear that there are bound to be difficulties which require great tact, both on our side and on the side of the Dominions, to see that unnecessary hardship is not done. A number of refugees have gone out there in Category B. Those were the cases in the course of being examined by a new tribunal in this country, and many no doubt would have been placed in Category C. If they are in Category C, no doubt the Dominions will allow them that liberty and freedom that they would have enjoyed in this country, but how can the Dominions know whether they ought to be in Category B or C? If they are in Category B or A arrangements have to be made and accommodation provided for their internment, and it is in the interests of the Dominions, as it is in the interests of the refugees themselves, that this question should be decided as speedily as possible.

I know that the Under-Secretary has visited various of these camps, and I believe that conditions in the great majority of them have improved enormously, and that in future Lord Lytton’s Committee, which is now responsible, will see that the conditions in these camps are now kept up to the maximum efficiency that is possible. But I have received disturbing letters about Prees Heath and Sutton Park Camps, saying that men of 65 and 67 are still living under canvas. I do not know whether that is true or not, but if the Under-Secretary has visited these camps and is satisfied, either that the conditions are good, or that they are to be speedily changed, I accept the position at once. But it is only right in a Debate of this kind, when we all receive these letters, that an answer should be given.

There must be individual cases which are not to-day, and will never be, covered by any particular category in any White Paper. I want no refugee to be refused the right of being released simply because he does not come under any particular category. I want there to be an individual committee, or whatever body it may be, who will examine the request of an individual on its merits. We all know, in the individual cases which have been brought to our notice, how hard it is to put them in any particular category. There is always some exceptional case. Perhaps the parents had been rather careless at the birth of one or more of their children and had not registered them in the right country, and for this the individual is now suffering. There are certain categories of artists whose technical work, and, indeed, whose whole life work may be ruined unless they are given certain opportunities. You cannot put them into any particular category, but they must be examined on their own individual merits. I am content to abide by the statement made by a Noble Duke in another place when he said that the Government will be able, as time goes on, to secure the release of all those whose release would not involve any danger to the country. That satisfies me, (1), if that is the policy of the Government, and (2) if there is a correct interpretation of “as time goes on.” Personally, I believe that categories would be an entirely satisfactory way of dealing with this problem, and I accept it for the time being. Let us get the categories working, and get out as many people as possible, but, as time goes on, surely, there must be another criteria. Innocence, loyalty, honesty—these must be the deciding factors.

If a man is guilty, if there is the slightest suspicion that he has been guilty or is likely to become guilty, of in any way endangering the security and safety of the State, of course, he must be interned, but if his honesty, patriotism and loyalty are beyond doubt, then, I say, let such a man out. Give him his liberty to join with us in fighting for that freedom for which he might have been fighting for many years already. I ask the Minister to recognise that speed is of the essence of the whole problem. I know that he has problems and difficulties and confusion arising in the thousands of cases that are involved, and that there are tens of thousands of letters addressed to his Department, but I also know, as we all do, of the tragedies, sufferings and hardships which this control causes. I know also that the Government as a whole desire to do the right thing in this matter, and that they are just as appalled as any of us are at certain individual Cases that come to our notice. Frankly, I shall not feel happy, either as an Englishman or as a supporter of this Government, until this bespattered page of our history has been cleaned up and rewritten.