London, Aug. 1
On adjournment of the House of Commons yesterday. Mr. S. S. Silver-man, Labour member for Nelson and Come, moved to annul two of the Defence Regulations which, he claimed, in the hands of any unscrupulous government or minister, would enable the executive to prevent the ex: pression of any kind of opinion in any newspaper.
Commander Stephen—King-Hall, R.N., National Labour member for Lancashire, Ormskirk division, in seconding the motion, said that such regulations giving enormous powers over the liberty of the press could be justified only if absolutely essential for the successful waging of the war Sir John Anderson, Home Secretary and Minister for Home Security replied that the question the House had decided was perfectly simple: it wa whether freedom for expression opinion should entail freedom to a sist the enemy by systematic publication of matter calculated to ferment opposition to the prosecution of the war, and whether we were to allow freedom for organized and persistent defeatist propaganda, In substance, he said, these regulations were accepted in all quarters of the House. The particular regulation criticized was not confined to the Press, but was designed to deal with persons who might be persistently employed in action calculated to impair morale.
No Home Secretary, he added would take action without the approval of the War Cabinet.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.