_The Prime Minister._ Honourable Colleagues,—The most important event of these last few days in the international world has been the French advance on the Ruhr. It is well to establish clearly the attitude of Italy with regard to this advance, since, for political reasons and also for reasons connected with the Stock Exchange, it has purposely not been properly estimated. It is necessary to go back to the Conference of Paris, and the rejection of Bonar Law’s proposals on the part of Italy, France and Belgium, in order to understand the line of conduct adopted by the Italian Government. It is a fact that each one of the Powers in the Entente has taken up an attitude of its own, due to its own particular conditions. Without taking into consideration the Americans, who have withdrawn their troops from the Rhine, this is the position of the Powers. England has not joined with France, but has not decided, at any rate up to the present, to recall her troops from German soil, nor has she changed in her friendly attitude towards France, as was set forth by the most recent communications from the Foreign Office. France, interested in the problem of reparations, has, upon the basis of the deliberations of the Commission appointed to enquire into this question, sent into the Ruhr a Board of Control for the production of coal and, later, troops for the purpose of protection. Belgium has afforded France some military co-operation and undivided political support. Italy has only given political and technical support, sending her engineers to the Ruhr. Our country could not isolate herself without committing a very grave mistake. She could not exclude herself entirely from any operation of control taking place in a region of coalfields, and, therefore, of fundamental importance in European and Italian economics. As regards the project for a continental alliance directed against England, such an idea simply does not exist. The Italian Government never suggested such a thing, and, in any case, would never have been able to consider the possibility of a continental union against England, both on account of her importance in the economic life of the Continent and of existing relations between Italy and that country.