HC Deb 26 July 1876 vol 230 cc1913-25

Order for Second Reading read.

MR. J. G. TALBOT,

in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, the question had been before the public for something like 20 years, and the failure to provide any solution hitherto was not creditable to Parliament. The sanitary difficulty was one to which public attention should be directed. He be- lieved that the public would be shocked at the scandalous condition of many burial grounds in the country districts, as well as some of the cemeteries of our large towns, and he hoped that one result of the discussion, by calling attention to the subject, would be an inquiry into their condition by the Government. So far as the Bill now before the House was concerned no further provision for burials was required in the metropolis or large towns, except in the sanitary direction he had indicated. But as to burial in the country generally, he believed he was correct in saying that the State had made no provision for it, but that it was a matter left at present to the charity of the Church. Then as to the wish of Dissenters, that they should be buried according to their rites, the way to remove one conscientious objection was not by transferring it from one set of shoulders to another—from Nonconformists to Churchmen, but rather by legislating in the direction of this Bill, which would relieve Nonconformists from the grievance under which they now laboured, as it would allow them to have a burial ground of their own. Would it not be better to treat the question from the sanitary point of view? His Bill proceeded upon that basis. It provided both in urban and rural districts for the establishment of unconsecrated burial grounds, creating no new local authority for this purpose, but calling upon rural and urban sanitary authorities to put the provisions of the Bill into operation, because the burial of the dead was a sanitary matter, which the State ought to take into its consideration and provide for. It also enabled several small parishes to combine for the purposes of the Bill. The chief peculiarity of the measure was the power it would give to minorities to put it into operation. Twenty ratepayers might call a meeting in any parish; if no poll was demanded, the votes of one-fourth of the ratepayers present would put in force the provisions of the Bill; and upon a poll the same proportion of votes would have the same effect. He admitted that there was no precedent for such a proposal, but it must be remembered that the Bill was one for the protection of minorities. With a view to limit the expense to the rates, the Bill contained what he might call a statutable suggestion to every Burial Committee appointed by a rural sanitary authority that a site for the new burial ground might probably be given by one of the chief landowners; but if not, provision was made for the purchase of the site, spreading the repayment over a period not exceeding 50 years. The Bill provided for the appointment of a Burial Committee, and if they did not do their work it gave power to the Secretary for the Home Department to take measures that the work should be done. There was also a provision to enable chapels to be erected where they might be desired, but only, let it be observed, where they were desired, and power was given to enable persons now disqualified from doing so to grant sites for burial grounds in the same way as sites for schools might be granted. He hoped the debate would not close before the House heard from the Home Secretary that the Government were prepared to take up and settle the matter on sanitary grounds. If they were prepared to do so, the best way in which they could deal with it was by the appointment of a Commission, the result of whose inquiries might form the basis of legislation. If the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Denbighshire (Mr. Osborne Morgan) were carried, it would only introduce into the churchyard alien ministrations without settling the sanitary question. For his own part, he was prepared to say that no churchyard should be extended without making provision in it for some portion of unconsecrated ground. He hoped he had shown, by the introduction of this measure, a bonâ fide desire to assist the solution of the question. In conclusion, he begged to move the second reading of the Bill, and he hoped, at all events, that if nothing else came of the measure this Session, the House would affirm its principle, which was neither controversial nor theological, but, on the contrary, social and sanitary.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. J. G. Talbot.)

MR. OSBORNEMORGAN,

in moving that the Bill be read a second time upon that day two months, said, that notwithstanding the lateness of the Session he was glad that the hon. Member had had an opportunity of moving the second reading of the Bill, because he felt that the more such proposals as this were discussed, the more would it be seen that they were utterly inadequate to remedy the grievance they sought to remedy. If it had been brought forward as a sanitary measure, he should have had little to say about it, except that it was rather late to bring forward so important a measure on the 26th July. But the scandals to which the hon. Member had referred had not come home to his experience. Whatever necessity existed for increased burial accommodation in the crowded districts of Lancashire and Yorkshire, no such necessity existed in the district in which he lived. If they were to tell the Denbighshire peasant that the churchyard on the hillside in which the bones of his fathers were laid, and in which he expected to lay his bones, would shortly be closed for sanitary reasons, he would laugh in their faces. This was not a sanitary measure at all, for it did not contain a single provision for closing a churchyard, so that, unless its promoters were prepared to say that the interment of Dissenters was more injurious to public health than the burial of Churchmen—on account of the odour of sanctity in which the latter died, or something of that kind—theBill left the question of sanitary reform where it was at present. The hon. Gentleman had said that the object of the Bill was to relieve Nonconformists from the grievance of being compelled to bury their dead without the forms and ceremonies which they approved. How did the Bill attempt to accomplish that object? In the first place, it enabled a mere handful of ratepayers to call a meeting together, and if they obtained a vote in their favour, they were to put into operation the cumbrous machinery of the Bill. Why, this Bill was ten times more vicious in principle than the Permissive Bill of the hon. Baronet the Member for Carlisle, because while that Bill would enable a majority to oppress the minority, this one would give a power to a minority to oppress the majority. He could not conceive a more invidious task thrown upon the rural sanitary authority than that of requiring them to elect the Burials Committee every three years. In Wales, if not in England, almost every parish would be the hot-bed of discord whenever such an election took place. The question of expenses the hon. Member had treated as a mere bagatelle, and he proposed to allow the Burial Committee to purchase land as sites for burial grounds, though he hoped that persons sufficiently munificent would be found to make a free gift of the sites. He (Mr. Osborne Morgan) doubted whether under the present law there were more than a dozen such free gifts; and the ratepayers, therefore, would have to bear the expense, which would be extremely heavy. A short time ago an advertisement appeared in The Times from Bromley, a parish in Kent, a division of which county his hon. Friend so ably represented and according to that advertisement £12,500 would be required to provide a burial ground. There were 9,000 parishes in England in which there were no cemeteries, and in which the ratepayers would be entitled to invoke the assistance of this Bill. If a third only of those parishes availed themselves of its provisions, at a tenth of the money which the parish of Bromley required, the cost to the taxpayers would be over £3,000,000. The Bill would therefore be far too expensive, and such a proposal, emanating from a party that had always prided itself upon a stubborn resistance to increasing the burdens on local rates, seemed to him absolutely monstrous. The Dissenters did not want the Bill. They said—"We are entitled to be buried in the parish churchyards with such rites and ceremonies as we think proper; but you say—We will not grant you that right; we give you the right of obtaining cemeteries for yourselves, with the privileges of putting your hands in your pockets and paying for them. "What was that, but to give them a stone when they were asking for bread. If he and those who acted with him differed with the promoter only as to the machinery of the Bill, that matter might be arranged in Committee, and some agreement might be come to, but they differed as to the principle of the Bill. Neither did he think any good would come of referring the Bill to a Select Committee. That had been done before, and the whole question had to be fought over again. He objected to the Bill because it was a crude measure, because it was an utterly unpractical one, and because it would entirely fail to remedy the grievance which it professed to remedy. For those reasons he would conclude by moving its rejection.

Amendment proposed, to leave out "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day two months."—(Mr. Osborne Morgan.)

Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."

MR. BERESFORD HOPE

acknowledged the conciliatory tone both of the introducer of the Bill and the mover of the Amendment, but deprecated discussion as likely to be unfruitful at that period of the Session. Some hon. Members were prepared, if necessary, to vote for the Bill as a declaration of principle in which they concurred, while others were desirous to study the details of the measure; and probably, in regard to a question so complicated as this, no two hon. Members could be found to come to an identical opinion upon all points. Under these circumstances he would suggest to his hon. Friend that, having held out the olive branch, he should, now withdraw the Bill, and not put the House to the trouble of dividing on the second reading. At the same time, he hoped the Government would tell them something of their views about a question which it was now impossible for private Members to bring to a solution.

MR. BUTT

said, before the Order was discharged, he would like to have an opportunity, as a member of the Disestablished Church in Ireland, to say a few words upon the Bill. The real question, as he understood it, really was—whether Dissenters should have separate burial grounds, or whether they should be permitted to perform their rites and ceremonies in the old churchyards. Let him briefly tell the House what had been done in Ireland. In 1824 a Bill was passed by the Imperial Parliament giving Dissenters the right of burial, with their own rights, in the Irish churchyards. Up to that period the law as to burial in Ireland and England was exactly the same. That law was introduced to the House by a great lawyer, Mr. Plunket. Mr. Plunket, in introducing the Bill, which afterwards passed, made a remarkable statement as to the law. He declared that the Protestant parson had a freehold in the churchyard, and no one could enter without his leave without committing a trespass. But besides his rights as a possessor of the soil, he was appointed to superintend Christian burial, and he could grant permission for interment. By the Act of Uniformity he was to read the Burial Service of the Church of England over every person, and therefore, if the Protestant clergy insisted upon their rights, the Act virtually deprived the general body of the people of their right of interment. As he (Mr. Plunket) put it—it was an interception of the rights of the people, imposed upon them by the Act of Uniformity. That was how the matter stood in England at the present day. According to the law of the land, every person living in the parish had a right to be buried in his churchyard with what rights he chose, subject to the rights of the Protestant clergyman before mentioned. There was no illegality in the performance of those rites. Supposing a clergyman had performed the rites of the Church of England, or waived their performance, there was no law to prohibit the performance of Dissenting rites in Protestant churchyards. Therefore, there was no illegality in the performance of those rites, and the only difficulty in the way was the Act of Uniformity. So far as to the law on the one side. Now, mark what it was on the other. According to the law at the present time, everyone had a right of interment in some Protestant churchyard. His relatives were entitled to claim it, subject to the rights of the parson. There was no difficulty but the Act of Uniformity in the way, and of that Act Churchmen had little reason to be proud; for it expelled the best men in the Church of England, and left a legacy of weakness and dishonour to the Establishment which she had never recovered. It was that Act only which stood between the full right of the Dissenters to use the churchyards for burial. And what did that word burial mean at the Common Law? It did not mean simply placing the body in the ground. It meant interring it with such solemnity, and such reverential rites, as each person in his own conscience desired to be employed. That was the right of burial which the Common Law gave to every parishioner, and the Act was intercepted only by the Act of Uniformity. He most cordially supported the Bill of his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Denbighshire (Mr. Osborne Morgan) to admit Dissenters to the same rights in England which they had long enjoyed in Ireland. They had found no inconvenience, no dissension to result from the system in Ireland. He (Mr. Butt) was brought up in his childhood in an old parsonage close to the churchyard, and he well remembered with affection that some near and dear to him lay buried there. He thought it would be a great misfortune if the affections of the people were turned away from the old churchyard, by their being sent to the cemetery instead of their bones being laid by those who were near and dear to them in the old churchyard. He did not think it was an act of statesmanship to take away from the old churchyards the affections and the memories of a large proportion of the people, nor did he think it was entirely consistent with Conservative principles thus to detach burial from the religion of the land. He opposed the Bill on the ground of Christian liberty; on the ground that it really was not fair to refuse the Dissenters the Common Law right which they at present possessed, and on the good old Conservative principle that they ought not to detach the affections of the people from the Church and the churchyard, and weaken the Church by relegating the people in that way to the cemeteries.

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER

said, he was sorry his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary had been obliged to leave the House on Public Business, as he would have spoken with more authority than he could command, but as he knew his right hon. Friend's views he would endeavour to state them. His right hon. Friend would have concurred in the suggestion of the hon. Member for the University of Cambridge, that no further progress should be made with the Bill. They could not expect at that time of the Session any practical result from a division on the principle of the Bill; and to vote on the second reading now, would be voting on something in the nature of an abstract Resolution. The measure involved many details which could not be accepted without considerable discussion. The discussion which they had already had could not fail to make it evident that it was the duty of the Government to give their best attention to this question; his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary was giving his attention to it, and no doubt he would consider during the Recess whether it would be possible in another Session to make any suggestion or proposal on the subject; but he thought it would be inexpedient at the present time to attempt to develop any views of the Government on the subject, which must either be done fully, or the statement would really amount to nothing. He thought perhaps the best course would be to allow this Bill to be withdrawn, or, if there was any indisposition to withdraw the Amendment, to adjourn the debate, which it was obvious could not be discussed with any prospect of a practical result.

MR. WILBRAHAM EGERTON

said, that the Bill only touched a portion of a large and difficult question, but it was an honest endeavour on the part of Churchmen to meet the views of those who differed from them. He had no hope of ever being able to satisfy all parties who considered themselves aggrieved, as there were many who would accept no compromise upon the question. He was very glad to have an assurance from the Chancellor of the Exchequer—which had, indeed, been given in "another place" by another Cabinet Minister—that the Government would take this matter into consideration, and he hoped that next Session they would be able to introduce a Bill which, without giving up the rights of Churchmen, would remedy any grievance of which the Dissenters could justly complain. He therefore recommended his hon. Friend the Member for West Kent to withdraw the Bill.

MR. J. G. TALBOT

said, he had no wish to divide on the Bill, nor did he wish to divide the feelings of hon. Members upon the matter. He hoped that as the Government had announced their intention of dealing with the question, that a pacific solution of it would be arrived at. The hon. and learned Member for Denbighshire had another idea as to the way it should be dealt with, but probably they were both wrong, and as it was a question which must be solved in one way or another, he was pleased to find the Government were prepared to undertake it. He quite agreed with the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) that we ought not to sever the association of the living from the resting-places of the dead, but it was because Churchmen had such an intense affection for their churchyards, where, for 300 years, nothing but the words of consolation of the Burial Service had been heard, that they objected so strongly to their—he would not say desecration—they objected to the provisions of a Bill which allowed not merely Roman Catholic services, and what Secularists called their Liturgy to be performed, but harangues to be delivered, displacing the services of the Es- tablished Church, unless proper securities were taken against them. The associations connected with burial grounds were of a sacred character, and they would never allow them to be desecrated or misused. He understood the Amendment would be withdrawn. [Mr. OSBORNE MORGAN: No.] That being so, it would be better to move the Adjournment of the Debate.

MR. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN

said, he should not have spoken had not the hon. Member for West Kent (Mr. J. G. Talbot) made a speech so defiant and strong in its language that it might have been delivered on the second reading of a Bill vehemently opposed, and ought never to have been delivered on a Bill about to be withdrawn. He, for his part, had advised that the withdrawal of the Bill should not be opposed; but after the speech to which they had just listened he should certainly vote against the Bill or against the adjournment if a division was called. The Bill itself was in his opinion a bad Bill, but it was needless to discuss its details when its passing was impossible. He (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) had many tenants and neighbours who were Nonconformists, and he altogether deprecated and protested against the tone and language of the hon. Member for West Kent. That hon. Member and those who thought with him appeared to draw a broad line of demarcation between Churchmen and Nonconformists, as if the latter were scarcely of the same race as themselves. When the hon. Member used such a word as "desecration" in regard to the services of Dissenters in churchyards, he was doing his best to render any settlement of the question impossible. If the Church of England was to maintain its position in this country, it would not be by cultivating a spirit of narrow exclusiveness, but a spirit of enlarged toleration, and in these days it was much more desirable to draw near and heal the breach between the Church of England and the Nonconformists rather than widen it by such language as that of the hon. Member for West Kent.

MR. J. G. TALBOT

explained he had not used the term "desecration"with reference to the burial of Dissenters, but to rites which might be introduced in churchyards under the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Denbighshire (Mr. Osborne Morgan), which would in the estimation of Churchmen amount to "desecration."

MR. HALL

insisted that no safeguards against "desecration"of churchyards had been provided by the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Denbighshire. He had himself admitted the fact.

MR. OSBORNE MORGAN

said, that in moving the second reading of his Bill he had distinctly said that he had introduced no safeguards, because, in his individual opinion, none were necessary, but that if any safeguards were suggested from the other side they should receive from him the fullest consideration.

MR. HALL

thought safeguards were necessary. The right hon. Member for Sandwich (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) had misunderstood the remarks of his hon. Friend the Member for West Kent (Mr. J. G. Talbot). He simply tried to show that Churchmen had those strong feelings for the resting places of the dead to which the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) referred, and that under the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Denbighshire those feelings might be seriously violated. When his hon. Friend spoke of "desecration," he referred not to the Nonconformist service, but to the Secularist Liturgy, the use of which they would probably desire, equally with clergymen, to see rendered absolutely impossible in their churchyards.

MR. OSBORNE MORGAN

stated that after the second speech of the hon. Member for West Kent he felt some difficulty in withdrawing his Amendment. He must divide the House.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Sir William Edmonstone.)

MR. RAMSAY

said, he was surprised, and very much regretted that a discussion of that nature should be necessary in that House. In Scotland they had ample experience of the freedom of interments in the graveyards of that country, and he must say that although even a Secularist might pronounce any sort of oration over the grave of a deceased relative which he thought proper, it did not appear to the people of Scotland that such an oration was any desecration to their feelings. Scotland might well be cited as an example of a country where there was perfect freedom to inter in such way as the relatives of the deceased might think proper. In the graveyards of Scotland the Ritualistic Episcopalian might perform the ceremony according to the Burial Service of the Episcopalian Church, the Roman Catholic might do the same, according to the ritual of Rome, and a Presbyterian might be interred without any form of worship at the grave. It was becoming the practice to recite passages of Scripture and deliver short prayers; but on no occasion had the feelings of the people of Scotland been violated or offended in any way, and in his opinion the sooner they saw a similar liberality in existence in England the better it would be for the Established Church.

MR. J. G. HUBBARD

said, all he desired was that a system under which we had lived for so many years should not be wantonly broken up. He desired to maintain the order which he believed was precious to the people, and to preserve the sacred character of churchyards. He, however, considered that a time had arrived when all Churchmen admitted that some change in the law was necessary, and they were prepared to approach this question in a spirit of charity and conciliation.

MR. SAMPSON LLOYD

said, that as the churches and churchyards were national property no one had a right to use them unless subject to those restrictions which the nation imposed. He therefore thought some compromise should be adopted on this question which would satisfy the views of Churchmen and moderate Dissenters. The Bill was not a religious Bill at all, and he regretted that religious feeling had been introduced in connection with it.

MR. GREGORY

said, he did not think that the Opposition were acting in a spirit which was likely to produce a settlement of the question.

MR. J. G. TALBOT

desired to say that he was sorry that if, under the strong feelings he entertained on the subject, he had used any expression which could give the least offence to hon. Members opposite. The hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) had referred to the feelings of Nonconformists, and his (Mr. J. G. Talbot's) object was to show that if feelings existed on the other side of the House they equally existed on his side. He repeated that he was sincerely sorry if he had said anything which could be the least offensive to hon. Gentlemen opposite. It was quite unintentional; and he still hoped that the Bill would be allowed to be withdrawn.

MR. OSBORNE MORGAN

said, that after the appeal of the hon. Member for West Kent he would not persist in dividing the House.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Question again proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."

MR. ASSHETON CROSS

said, he must apologize for not being present during the discussion on the Bill. Nothing but pressing business of a public character would have kept him away. He was very glad to think that the discussion had ended in the way it had done. He sincerely hoped that in the course of next Session they would be enabled to come to some satisfactory arrangement on the subject. He was quite sure that the best course they could take was to avoid doing anything to raise an angry feeling on the one side or the other.

Amendment and Original Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Bill withdrawn.