§ SIR JOHN PAKINGTONSir, I have to request the indulgence of the House for a very few moments while I offer an explanation upon a personal question which has arisen between myself and an hon. Member of this House with respect to the Notice which I have given of my intention to move for a Committee of Inquiry into the Administration of the Navy. On Friday evening, as the House was breaking up, I spoke to my noble Friend the Secretary to the Admiralty, with the view of asking that Sir Baldwin Walker might not leave England until he had given evidence before the intended Committee. This led to a conversation, and I learned from my noble Friend that it has been the intention of the hon. and gallant Admiral the Member for the East Biding of Yorkshire (Admiral Duncombe) to renew a Motion upon this subject which he made last year; and not only that he has entertained that intention, but that he has been in communication with my noble Friend upon the subject; that the Admiralty have consented to grant the Committee, and that even some of the Members of that Committee have been selected. The House will at once understand that when I gave my notice I had not the least knowledge of any of these circumstances. On the contrary, as the hon. and gallant Admiral has not yet been in the House this Session, I had no reason to suppose that he was about to take up a subject of this magnitude and importance; but, as nothing can be further from my intention than to do anything discourteous to the hon. and gallant Admiral, I, without loss of time, wrote to an hon. Friend of mine who had negotiated between him and the Admiralty, and explained to him that I had no wish to act uncourteously; and that I should be ready to take any course which he thought would be right and fair under the circumstances. In answer to that I received an intimation from my hon. Friend stating that the course which he should suggest 494 was that I should leave the subject in the hands of the hon. and gallant Admiral. As I have said, nothing could be further from my intention than either to act or to appear to act with the slightest discourtesy towards the hon. and gallant Admiral, or any other Member of the House; and, since, provided the Committee is granted, and the investigation is complete and impartial, it can be of little moment either to the House or the country who may make the Motion for that Committee, I felt it my duty at once to comply with the suggestion which was made to me by the friend of the hon. and gallant Admiral. I am very anxious not to be misunderstood, or to appear in any way to shrink from the performance of the laborious duty which I had intended to undertake. I will only add that, as the investigation is not only a most important one, but must of necessity be very complicated and difficult, and probably very protracted, I earnestly hope that the hon. and gallant Admiral will lose no further time in bringing the subject before the House.