Summarized, his account of thi actual work plans adopted or under consideration sino his appoint. ment was:—
The Unemployed Grants Committee had passed schemes work submitted by local authorities amounting to $11,000,000. These would provide work for approximately 600,000 men-months, This was a new method of notation introduced by Mr, Thomas, The unit of a "'man-month" was the amount of work that will keep one man employed for one month.
In addition, schemes costing another £10,000,000 were—being considered by the committee, Of the schemes passed, a large number were for the improvement of the water supply in different localities, The committee appointed to consider proposals submitted by public companies to rank for Government assistance in the form of guaranteed interest or loan had approved schemes totalling £7,000,000, all of which were to be assisted by the guarantee of interest. These included plans from the Great "erin Railway, the London Midland and Scottish Railway, and the Metropolitan Railway.
Other schemes under consideration by this committee totalled £20,000,, 000, The chief one, costing £13, 000,000, was recently submitted by the Underground Railway of Londsn, and proposed an extension of the Present. tube railway northwards from Finsbury Park to Cockfosters, near Barnet, an extension of the Hammersmith tube to Nox and improvements of stati inner London. a Schemes from the LN.E. Railway (which were known to include alterations at Liverpool Street Station, London, and the electrification of suburban lines) and from the Southern Railway were in course of preparation. These railway plans were. in addition to the 87,000,000 which the railways had undertaken to spend in consequence of the remission of passenger duty by the Into Government. Much of this was to be spent on the improvement of goods stations, to make them available for the larger iporiments tu the use of steal for of 20-ton railway wagons.
sleepers, which was advocated last summer, had proved satisfactory, and as a start one railway had given orders for 13,000 tons of such sleepers, to be made of British steel.
The Electricity Commission had been asked to expedite its work. It had now completed schemes for half the country, including three-quarters of the population, and new contracts for £1,260,000 have been placed since July last.
The Post Office had undertaken to spend an additional £750,000 on telephone development this year and another £760,000 next year.
A programme' of road develop ment, to be financed from the Road Fund, provided, during the next five years, roads and £28,000,000 on existing classified roads. Work to the value of £7,150,000 had been already sanctioned on new roads and £13,- 260,000 on existing classified roads.
Under the Colonial Development Act, the construction of a bridge over the Zambesi, Africa, was to be begun at once. It would cost £3,000,000 and provide 50,000 man-months of work in Great Britain, The Canadian Visit Mr. Thomas referred to his Canadian visit. His main object was to encourage our export trade. On his return from Canada, he the steel manufacturers here and the result was that a combined British selling agency for British da, eliminating the wasteful competition of individual firms, and finance would be provided under Scheme for the Exports Credit placing of large: teel in Canada for'
late delivery against orders. There was also an announcement of much importance to the Lancashire cotton trade. Canada gives a preference to British goods, provided that 50 per cent. of the total labour involved in manufacture is British. Since Lancashire had to import raw cotton, which ts the product of labour in other countries, the finished product at present could not qualify for Canadian Preference.
He had little to say on omigration, declaring that it was a profound mistake to associate this matter in the Dominions with that of unemployment. He had induced the Canadian Government to. take 3,000 entrants every year under the Government training scheme for farm workers
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.