Notes & NeAvs 



ISSUED QUARTERLY BY THE ROYAL SOCIETY 

 FOR THE PROTECTION OF BIRDS 



Vo!. VIII.] 



WINTER, 1919. 



[No. 8. 



The New Plumage Bill. 



A Bill for the suppression of the Plumage 

 Trade has again been drafted by the Govern- 

 ment and its introduction promised. Is this 

 Bill to become an Act of Parliament, or is it to 

 remain a pious promise only ? or, when intro- 

 duced, is it to dribble away into a futile mockery 

 of itself under the opposition of vested interests ? 

 The answer lies entirely with those who wish 

 for such legislation and on the amount of 

 steady and united pressure brought to bear 

 upon the Government from all sides. If these 

 efforts are not a match for the efforts employed 

 by a moneyed trade, and by all its ramifications 

 in and out of the House, the cause of the Birds 

 will be lost, and the present hideous slaughter 

 will continue as long as the supplies of birds 

 make it profitable to serve the gods of greed 

 and vanity. 



It will "be remembered that export of skins 

 and feathers of wild birds has been prohibited 

 by India, by Australia, and by nearly every 

 British colony ; that a Bill to prohibit importa- 

 tion into Great Britain was passed by the House 

 of Lords in 1908 ; that private Bills have been 

 blocked persistently, but that the only one 

 permitted to test the opinion of the House by 

 a First Reading showed an immense majority 

 in its favour ; that the Government Bill of 1914, 

 after securing a still greater majority, dragged 

 on and on through committee- — and was allowed 

 to drag on and on— until the war clouds burst. 

 [Whether a Bill which any Government 

 sincerely desired to pass would be permitted 

 to linger on from February to August, at the 

 dictation of a handful of wholly unimportant 

 obstructionists, when the voice of the country 

 had plainly demanded it, is another matter. 

 It is at least a useful warning and food for 

 thought.] It has also to be remembered that 

 for two and a half years after the outbreak of 

 war the scandal existed of utterly useless and 

 utterly undesirable luxury articles being allowed 

 place in ships that could not bring in sufficient 

 foodstuffs to the nation. 



On July 26ih, 1919, as reported in the 

 Autumn Number of Bird Notes and News, a 

 deputation from the Royal Society for the 

 Protection of Birds, headed by the Duchess of 

 Portland, waited upon the President of the 

 Board of Trade, to ask that restrictions imposed 

 by D.O.R.A. in 1917 upon the importation of 

 plumage should be continued until legislation 

 such as Parliament had approved could be 

 introduced to make the temporary measure 

 final. 



The reply of Sir Auckland Geddes was : — 



" I can assure the Deputation that so long as these 

 restrictions are possible the Board will take very good 

 care that such restrictions on feathers whose importa- 

 tion is objectionable will be retained." 



Little more than a month after this promise 

 was given all restrictions were removed and a 

 traffic described by a member of the present 

 Government as "an utterly indefensible 

 traffic " was again resumed. [Lord Sankey's 

 judgment as to the legality of the Board of 

 Trade proclamations would necessarily have 

 had the same effect.] 



The inevitable enquiry from the Society as 

 to why the undertaking made to them had so 

 speedily been set at naught, brought the 

 following answer from the President of the 

 Board : — 



" It was not found possible to continue the restric- 

 tions in view of the decision of the Government to 

 abolish the whole system of restriction on imports. — 

 . . . A Bill is in draft to deal with this matter, 

 but in view of the pressure of Parliamentary business 

 it is not possible to say when it will be introduced." 



Questions in the House from General Page 

 Croft a)Kl Colonel Yate have elicited .similar 

 replies. 



The Bill has, hoirever, been drafted. It remains 

 for all who are opposed to the senseless and 

 barbarous destruction of bird life to resolve that 

 a corresponding ])ressure shall make of this Bill 

 an essential part of " Parliamentary business." 

 It remains for them to prove that righteous 



