The Struggle For Peace

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merits to Spain or by failing to implement the assurances and
the undertakings that they had given when they accepted the
British formula. No intimation could be plainer than that.
I expressed my personal opinion that I believed the assurances
given by the Italian Government would be fulfilled and
carried out, but I made it perfectly plain that if they were not,
then the chances of agreement were nil.
*' The position of the party opposite is, I think, perfectly
plain from the discussion to-day. Indeed, if it was not plain
before, it was made plain by what the hon. Member for
Gower has just told us. He would not negotiate either with
Germany or Italy. He would not even enter into conver-
sations with them to see whether there were any grounds for
negotiations."
MR. GRENFELL : " Separately."
THE PRIME MINISTER : " He would stand on a platform
and tell a straight story and invite them to make peace with us
on terms which would be satisfactory to ourselves. I wonder
whether he is ingenuous enough to think that that would be
a practical step towards a solution of the difficulties."
MR. GRENFELL : ** Hitler does it. He tells the world, and
he has had great success."
THE PRIME MINISTER : " He has not made peace. One
has only to look at the situation in Europe as it is to-day and
consider whether it has improved or whether it has got worse
during the last twelve months, to see whether we have any
chance of ameliorating the situation unless we ourselves
are ready to take some practical step, at least, to find out
whether there is any possibility of making terms—not terms
which are satisfactory to us alone but terms which are mutually
satisfactory to the countries which enter into negotiations
with us. How unreasonable we should be if some other
country were to propose that we should enter into conversa-
tions with a view to making an agreement—it might be a
political agreement or a commercial agreement—if before
entering into the conversations we made a demand that they
should concede a large proportion of the most important
things we wanted to get. That is the process suggested by
the hon. Member.**
MR. GRENFELL : " The right hon, Gentleman is reading