§ SIR GEORGE BOWYERsaid, he rose to ask a Question of the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, or the First Lord of the Treasury, regarding the circumstances under which the Royal assent was given to the Extradition Ordinance lately passed by the council of Malta, after papers relating thereto had been laid before Parliament. The proposition he wished to maintain with regard to colonies with a mere constitutional form of government, which were practically governed by the Crown, was that a reasonable time ought to elapse between the laying of the papers relating to an Ordinance passed by the Colonial Government before Parliament and the Royal assent being given to that Ordinance. In the island of Malta a constitutional form of government existed, but in reality it wan a mere form. The Governor was assisted by a Council, having legislative powers, and 1851 composed of a few elected members, but the majority of its members were persons holding official positions under the Crown. An Ordinance passed by the Governor in Council remained suspended for four months; and if the Royal assent were given to it within that period, it came into operation; and, on the other hand, if there was no disallowance of the Ordinance by the Crown, it by the mere lapse of time acquired the force of law at the end of the four months, and could only be repealed by another Act of Council, or by an Act of Parliament. The general practice had been not to give the Royal assent immediately, but to allow some time for consideration. Shortly before the meeting of Parliament he received intelligence that an Ordinance for extradition had been proposed by the Governor of Malta for the consideration of the Council. He was informed that it was an Ordinance of a very remarkable and unusual character, though he had been told by the noble Duke at the head of the Colonial Office that it did not include political cases. It appeared to him to be one liable to great abuse, as it included offences which might be charged merely for the purpose of obtaining the extradition of political refugees, bat at any rate it comprised many offences not to be found in treaties as to extradition between this and other countries. Under the extradition treaty with France the crimes comprised were murder, attempt to commit murder, forgery, and fraudulent bankruptcy. Under the treaty with the United States the crimes included were murder, assault with intent to commit murder, piracy, arson, robbery, forgery, and utterance of forged paper. But the offences comprised in the Malta Ordinance were fourteen in number, of the most varied description—namely, unlawful arrest, detention, or confinement for the purpose of extorting money; rape, bigamy, taking away or concealing an infant or suppressing its birth, or substituting one infant for another; wilful homicide, or an attempt to commit wilful homicide, or wilfully inflicting severe bodily harm; abortion, malversation of public officers, any offences against public credit, fraudulent bankruptcy, theft, when aggravated by violence, by means, by person, or by place; fraud, in the cases contemplated in any one of the Articles 276 to 282 inclusive of the criminal laws of Malta; arson, wilfully sinking or destroying a vessel, or exhibiting any false light or signal with intent to bring any vessel into danger; and escape from a place of punishment when 1852 the fugitive was under sentence for one of these offences. Considering the number and variety of these offences, there would be no difficulty, if an abuse were intended to be made of the Ordinance, in getting up a charge in Italy against some political refugee in Malta, and obtaining the surrender of the person, who might then be tried in Italy, or not tried at all, but detained for an indefinite time, until, as the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Layard) or the Chancellor of the Exchequer had observed, the people of Italy had become thoroughly prepared for trial by jury, and were able to try persons according to the forms of English law. He would remind hon. Gentlemen, that though at present his friends were political refugees from Italy, the day might come when their friends might be in that condition. He did not therefore bring the subject forward from any party motive, but simply from a conviction that such a law was liable to great abuse. If the Italian Government wished to lay hold of a political refugee in Malta, what was easier, for example, than for the police to get some abandoned woman to swear a rape against him? There were women who would swear such a charge, if necessary, against the most respectable Members of that House; and if a deposition to that effect on oath were taken before a magistrate in Italy against a political refugee in Malta, that person must be delivered up to the Piedmontese or the Italian Government, to be dealt with as they chose. It might be said, that when a person was delivered up by virtue of the Ordinance, he was not to be tried for any offence except that for which he was delivered up. But that clause was a complete delusion, for the man might be sent to a dungeon, and might remain there—as Count Christen and many other persons long remained—without any trial whatever. And then, as the Italian Government did not bind themselves to try any person surrendered for no other offence than that for which he was surrendered, this country would have no right to interfere at all. On the 10th of February he asked for the papers regarding the Ordinance, but was told he could not have them, as the matter was under discussion by the Council of Malta. He applied to the Under Secretary of State about it, and he told him that the Extradition Ordinance was of the same character as those of other countries. The Duke of Newcastle told him the same thing. He afterwards moved an Address for the papers, which was agreed to, and on the 16th of March they were laid on 1853 the table. His hon. Friend had full notice that he intended to bring the Ordinance before Parliament; but he found a notice in the Gazette of the 31st of March, that the Royal assent to the Ordinance had been signified in Malta, and it therefore must have been given about a week after the papers were presented to Parliament. The result was, that the Ordinance had now passed out of the hands of Parliament. Any hon. Member wishing to interfere with it must bring in a Bill for that purpose, He thought the House was entitled to some explanation from the Government as to why the Royal assent should have been given to the Ordinance before Parliament had been afforded a reasonable opportunity of objecting to it.
§ MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, he was sorry if the hon. and learned Baronet imagined he had been deceived by any action of the Colonial Office. The real state of the case was this. Some time back the subject was brought under the notice of Her Majesty's Government by the Government of Malta, who, finding that from the position of the island they were exposed to an influx of criminals from the neighbouring countries, especially from Sicily and Italy, applied for an Extradition Ordinance. The matter had received careful consideration in the island and in the Foreign and Colonial Departments of Her Majesty's Government, and it had also formed the subject of negotiation at Turin, it being necessary that a corresponding decree should be made by the Government of Italy. The negotiations at Turin, on the part of the Maltese Government, were conducted by Dr. Dingli, a Maltese official and lawyer of the highest distinction. The result had been that in February last the Ordinance received the almost unanimous approval of the Council of Malta. About the same time the negotiations at Turin came to an end, certain modifications having been accepted. There had been no hurry in giving the Royal assent to the Ordinance; but the Government of Italy had a right to expect that such assent should be given without needless delay. The hon. and learned Gentleman urged that the mere fact of one Member of Parliament moving for a copy of such an Ordinance ought to have been sufficient to induce the Government to delay giving the Royal assent to it until he had had an opportunity of bringing the subject before the House. The hon. and learned Gentleman would not find many persons to agree with him in that doctrine. The Go- 1854 vernment would have been stultifying themselves if, after their long negotiations with the Government of Turin and the Colony they had longer delayed to give the Royal assent to the Ordinance. The Ordinance was passed at the request of the Government of Malta, and the Council of Malta, containing members elected by the inhabitants, had agreed unanimously to the greater part of the Ordinance. The only two points on which there was any question was, first, whether it was to be retrospective; that is, whether it should apply to persons who had committed offences before its promulgation; and next, whether the delivery of a criminal to the Italian Government should operate as a discharge of all other offences than that for which he was delivered up. The first point was settled by a clause in the Ordinance which provided that a notice of four months should be given to any person residing in Malta before it could be applied; and next, it was provided that the Ordinance should not come into effect until the Government of Malta had received from the Government of Italy a declaration protecting the person given up from prosecution for any other offence than the one for which he was delivered up. That was a protection entirely unknown in other cases. The list of offences was certainly unusually numerous; but it must be remembered that Malta was a place peculiarly exposed to be turned into an asylum for all manner of offenders. The greatest care had been taken to include in the list only offences of the gravest character, and that they should be all strictly defined. The hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to imagine that it would be easy for the Government of Italy to get hold of a political refugee by trumping up a criminal charge against him; but some degree of confidence was essential in these matters, and any Government which would act in such a way could not be dealt with by any form of treaty. The hon. and learned Gentleman's objection to the Ordinance arose, he was afraid, entirely from his unconquerable suspicion of the Italian Government. Her Majesty's Government did not believe, with the hon. and learned Gentleman, that it was necessary to provide greater safeguards against the Government of Italy than against any other Government, and they saw no reason for the suspicion and alarm which he expressed.
§ MR. DARBY GRIFFITHsaid, he was very glad that the hon. Baronet the Member for Dundalk (Sir G. Bowyer) had 1855 turned his attention to that subject as the manner in which the Royal prerogative was exercised, with respect to the Colonies, was by no means satisfactory. It was worthy of consideration whether matters of the kind Complained of were to be done in an almost clandestine manner at a time when they might be brought under the notice of the House of Commons. He (Mr. D. Griffith) had occasion lately to ask the Prime Minister and the Solicitor General how far the prerogative of the Crown would enable them to give up any possession of a Colony without the opinion of Parliament being taken thereon. The noble Viscount at the head of the Government stated that it was the prerogative of the Crown to give up any possession without the consent of Parliament: but the Solicitor General introduced an important qualification, that Parliament was to be consulted in the case of a settlement of a country by emigrants from this country, where the colonists carried out with them the laws and institutions of the mother country, and also in the case of a Colony for which this country had legislated. This would seem to introduce a very important modification of the doctrine of the noble Lord, since it might probably be presumed that there were few Colonies or possessions of the Crown the condition of which may not have been materially affected by Imperial Legislation. It was time that the country should know what the Prime Minister could do by the use of the prerogative of the Crown without the authority of Parliament.
§ Motion agreed to.