Herbert Bowden, leader of the House of Commons, said yesterday that the Labor Government was sympathetic to a proposal for debate on the plight of Soviet Jewry but declined to make a promise for a date for such debate.
He made the statement in reply to a question from Sir Barnett Janner who asked when time could be found to debate a motion on the Soviet Jewish situation which was asked in a proposal signed by 150 members of all parties. Another Member of Parliament, Sir John Foster, submitted a similar motion for debate on the same subject which was couched in more assertive terms than the other.
The independent labor weekly, The Tribune, charged in its current issue that the British Communist Party suppressed a report by one of its officials which indicted the Soviet Union for its continued oppression of Russian Jewry. The Tribune published a summary of the findings of the report which was prepared by Alec Waterman and sent to the executive of the British Communist Party shortly before his death last April. Waterman was a leading member of the party for about 10 years before his death.
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