BRITISH EMPIRE: The Week in Parliament Mar. 3, 1923

An opposition motion demanding the evacuation of Mesopotamia was defeated by 273 to 167 votes. Premier Law said: "The Government has an open mind on the question. . . . Mesopotamia is bound up with the Lausanne Treaty. . . . There is no question of oil and there never has been."

A Labor motion that every person should be eligible for an old age pension on reaching 70 years of age without reference to income was defeated by a narrow government majority of 22. Great excitement in the Labor benches and loud cries of "Resign!"

In the course of a discussion on the Tutankhamen discoveries, Mr. Hardie, Labor member, asked whether the Government had any proof that Pharoah's body was really in the tomb. "No, Sir," replied Mr. MacNeill, Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, "the Government is not aware that the body of his late Majesty is in the tomb!" Another wag solemnly inquired whether any request had come from Egyptians to dig among the tombs of British Kings and Queens in Westminster Abbey, and what reply would be made to it? A disgusted Under-Secretary merely glared at him.