Local Authorities. (Hansard, 24 July 1878)

HC Deb 24 July 1878 vol 242 cc165-75 165

§ Clause 69 (Constitution of local authorities; lands and borrowing) agreed to.

166

§ Clause 70 (Provisions applicable by Order to local authorities).

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
moved to omit Sub-section iv., as follows:— For extending and applying to any local authority the provisions of Part II. relative to pleuro-pneumonia as regards the declaration of infected places, and slaughter, and compensation; or the provisions of Part II. relative to foot-and-mouth disease, as regards the declaration of infected places. He did not know why this sub-section had been introduced. If the Committee looked back to Clause 65, they would see that it said Part II. should apply to Ireland, except where it was said it should not; and if they looked again to Clause 67, they would see it said that the powers of Part II. conferred on the Privy Council should be conferred on the Irish Privy Council. The object of Clause 70 appeared to be to give further powers to the Irish Privy Council, and he could understand that the first three sub-sections might be wanted on account of the different position of the Inspectors; but he did not see that Sub-section iv. was required at all. It appeared to him that every power that was possessed by the English Privy Council with regard to local authorities, with regard to pleuro-pneumonia and foot-and-mouth disease, was already given to the Irish Privy Council by the clauses which he had mentioned, and the retention of this sub-section in the clause might only tend to obscurity.

§ MR. BIGGAR
said, that before the question of the omission of Sub-section iv. was put from the Chair, he had to move to leave out an earlier sub-section— namely, Sub-section iii.— For fixing the periods for which they shall be appointed, and their remuneration and allowances. These were matters which ought properly to come within the province of the local authorities, seeing that they were to be the paymasters. He would admit that if the remuneration and allowances of the Inspectors were to be provided out of money to be voted by Parliament, it would then be proper that the Privy Council should fix them as proposed by the clause. Such, however, was not the case. The local authorities were to be the paymasters, and he thought, therefore, that they should fix, not only the terms of the engagement, 167 but the amount of remuneration. The local authorities, being the guardians of the ratepayers' money, had a primary right to the distribution of it, and, in addition, they were acquainted with the circumstances of localities. They knew, too, the sort of man they were likely to get for a certain price in their own neighbourhood. Under all these circumstances, he did not think the subsection should be allowed to stand as it was. They knew, as a rule, that people were very liberal with other people's money, and he was disposed to think that larger salaries would be paid by the Privy Council than would be at all necessary.

§ Amendment proposed, In page 38, line 7, to leave out from the word "duties," to the word "allowances," in line 9, inclusive.—(Mr. Biggar.)

§ Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."

§ SIR HENKY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, he could not agree to the Amendment which had been moved by the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar). The object and desire of the Committee was, he believed, to strengthen, as far as possible, the Veterinary Department in Ireland, and especially that branch of it which was referred to in this subsection—namely, the Inspectors to be employed under the Act: He could conceive nothing more likely to weaken that branch of the Department than to allow the districts to starve, if he might so call it, the Inspectors who would have to carry out the Act. For these reasons, he hoped the Committee would adhere to the sub-section as it stood.

§ MR. BIGGAR
, begged to call the attention of the Committee to the system which was established for England. He really could not see why a difference should be made in the case of Ireland. By Clause 40, it was enacted that every local authority in England should, from time to time, appoint so many Inspectors as they thought necessary, for the purposes of the Act, and should assign to them their duties, salaries, allowances, &c.. What he contended for was this—that the local authorities in Ireland were quite as competent and trustworthy as similar bodies in England, and he could not see on what ground the authority and power of the former 168 should be so much curtailed as compared with the latter. The Irish Poor Law Guardians thought it a great grievance that in very many instances they were forced to pay much higher salaries than they considered necessary. Now, those proposals altogether weakened the power of the local authority, and put them into a very invidious position, in which they could not exercise any control or influence over their own officers.

§ MR. SYNAN
wished to call the attention of the hon. Member who had moved the Amendment (Mr. Biggar) to the fact that the clause gave power to the local authority to appoint an Inspector, and that that Inspector must be a veterinary surgeon. The Government appeared to have had a difficulty in dealing with the question in Ireland; and, therefore, the power of the Privy Council, in particular cases, to over-ride the local authority in Ireland, might become necessary. For instance, if the local authority should refuse to appoint a professional Inspector, where it was in their power, power ought to be given to the Privy Council to over-ride the decision, and to appoint a professional Inspector where they could find a proper one. He, therefore, thought the hon. Member for Cavan would see that it was absolutely necessary for the Privy Council to have that power; but he remarked that the whole question would be opened again on his Amendment to the 71st clause.

MR. CHAMBEELAIN
asked the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury, whether the words of the sub-section were not supererogatory, as there were words in a previous sub-section which rendered them unnecessary?

§ MR. BIGGAR
explained, that the question of the Government appointing a veterinary surgeon was not referred to in the sub-section. The sub-section to which he objected did not propose to make any qualification, but only fixed the period for which the Inspectors were appointed, and the amount of their remuneration and allowances. He objected to the clause, because the Lord Lieutenant might appoint an Inspector with a special object, and the appointment might continue for a very long time after the object of it had ceased.

THE O'CONOR DON
said, he must confess that there was a great deal of force in what had fallen from the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar). It 169 seemed to him that the Bill and the clause were really making great distinctions between England and Ireland, and as they were told it was a Bill for securing uniformity, he confessed he could not understand on what ground the difference was made. All the local appointments in England under Clause 40, whether they were of veterinary surgeons or not, were to be made by the local authorities, and their salaries were to be fixed by the local authorities. But when they came to Clause 70, dealing with Ireland, all those points were to be fixed by the Privy Council. The hon. Member for Limerick (Mr. Synan) proposed in the following clause an Amendment which would make the two countries, to a great extent, similar, with regard to the question of veterinary Inspectors. It would certainly be unreasonable, on the ground of uniformity, to leave the clause now under discussion as it was.

MR. GORST
thought the hon. Member for Birmingham was perfectly right in his suggestion. The Committee had already given the Privy Council in Ireland the power to determine the terms and conditions upon which Inspectors were appointed.

THE O'CONOR DON
said, that the Committee had done nothing of the sort, as they had not passed a single section of the clause. It might be that it would also be necessary to make an alteration in Sub-section ii.; but it was practically in the power of the Committee to leave out the whole of the clause, to postpone it, or treat it in any other way they thought fit.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
really almost thought that the Secretary to the Treasury would promote getting on with the Bill if he were to postpone the clause. He did not see why the clause at all was wanted. If, however, it should be wanted in the Bill, the hon. Baronet might bring it up again on the Report. The Privy Council had already given power to carry out the scheme by Section 67.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, he must point out to the right hon. Gentleman that the clause, having been already amended, could not be postponed.

§ Question put.

§ The Committee divided: — Ayes 47; Noes 102: Majority 55.—(Div. List, No. 233.)

170

§ MR. J. W. BARCLAY
rose to move an Amendment in Sub-section iv., when—

THE CHAIRMAN
pointed out that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford had already proposed a Motion on those words, and the Question would have been put, but that the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar) had proposed an earlier Amendment. It would now be his duty to put the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman, which was to leave out Sub-section iv.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
confessed that he had had some doubts in his mind since the suggestion which had been made by the right hon. Member for Bradford, as to whether there was such an absolute necessity for the words in that sub-section. He should not like at the moment to pledge himself that no such necessity existed; but what he proposed was that they should withdraw the sub-section now from the Bill, and if he found, on consideration, that a necessity for it existed, he would ask leave of the Committee to re-introduce the words on the Report, and to justify them by the statement he would then make. He only wished to guard himself, should he find it absolutely necessary to re-introduce them; but, on the statement of the right hon. Gentleman, and after carefully reading the clause, he was not prepared to say, at that moment, that the case was not provided for in other parts of the Bill.

§ MR. KAVANAGH
conceived the object of the Amendment to be simply to remove the discretion from the hands of the Privy Council, and he asked the hon. Baronet (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) to pause before he accepted the suggestion.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, that Subsection iv. stood upon rather different grounds from Sub-section ii. Sub-section iv. would have the effect of preventing the provision relating to pleuro-pneumonia from applying to any part of Ireland without the express direction of the Privy Council. He did not think that would be very advantageous; but he believed the Committee were quite satisfied with the proposal of the Secretary to the Treasury.

§ MR. BUTT
said, as he understood the ' two sub-sections, their effect would be this. In England, there were certain provisions in the Bill which took effect 171 by the Bill itself. They imposed certain duties upon the local authorities and upon Inspectors the moment cattle disease broke out. If those sub-sections were struck out, the law would be the same in Ireland. If they remained in, he did not think there could be a doubt that the clause would be a dead letter in Ireland, unless the Privy Council chose to send down special instructions. It was a very different thing to say that the Privy Council was to control the action of the Inspectors. That they could do, both in England and in Ireland; but there was a large portion of the Bill which would be a dead letter, if the sub-sections were not left out.

§ MR. J. W. BARCLAY
said, the real question was, whether the Bill was going to be made compulsory in Ireland as it was in England? Under the Bill, so far as they had proceeded, the Privy Council had certain discretionary powers as to extending provisions for dealing with disease. But there were in the Bill itself certain imperative duties, unqualified by the discretion of the Privy Council, laid upon Inspectors, in the first instance, and local authorities. Every local authority was bound to declare a place where pleuro-pneumonia existed an infected place, and they were also bound to slaughter animals infected with pleuro-pneumonia. There were some similar provisions with regard to foot-and-mouth disease which were also compulsory; but if the sub-sections were allowed to stand in the Bill, those provisions would not be compulsory in Ireland as they were in England, unless the Privy Council so determined. Upon that point, he agreed with what the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) had just stated, and he thought there ought to be no doubt or hesitation in the mind of the Committee with regard to it. If there was anything essential in the Bill at all, it was that the regulations and restrictions which were absolutely compulsory in England should also be compulsory in Ireland.

§ MR. PELL
thought the remarks of the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. J. W. Barclay) were hardly complimentary to the Committee. He had repeated, not quite so well as the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. Butt), the object of his remarks, and a part of it almost in the very words. Now, he had hardly made up his mind yet whe- 172 ther the hon. Member for Forfarshire was opposing the Bill, and joining with those who were throwing up a barrier to check its progress or not. He was inclined to think, from the observations he had just heard, that he was doing so; but he was hardly doing it in a fair and open manner. Some of his remarks made at the outset, he must believe were made with the object of improving the Bill and advancing it; but when the hon. Member really came to a repetition of the remarks made by the hon. and learned Member opposite (Mr. Butt), which were certainly pertinent, when he got up immediately after the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and repeated what he had said, only toned down and diluted by an amount of Scotch paraphrase and parenthesis—

§ MR. BIGGAR
rose to Order, asking whether it was in Order for one Member to refer to another in a sneering manner?

THE CHAIRMAN
said, that the hon. Member for South Leicestershire was perfectly in Order.

§ MR. PELL
thought that the hon. Member for Forfarshire might remark, with reference to the intervention of the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar)—"Save me from my friends." He was going to say that when the hon. Member did that to which he had referred, he thought they could only view him, and he hoped that his constituents would view him, in the light of an opponent of the Bill. If he had misunderstood the hon. Member's views—and he hoped he had not—he should be sorry to have said anything unjust. If the hon. Member really wished, to see the Bill passed, then, in the interests of business, he thought it would be well if the hon. Member, at all events, did not repeat and dilute those remarks which they were always glad to hear from one who was able and competent to deal with the question.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
did not pretend to say whether the remarks were applicable or not; but if they really wished to get on with the Bill, he must say that it was desirable to avoid making personal remarks upon the conduct of hon. Members.

§ SIR JOSEPH M'KENNA
agreed to a very great extent with what had fallen from the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) as to the effect of 173 that clause. But he imagined that those who drew the Bill and assisted in drafting it had some good and bonâ fide object in making the distinction which was made by the clause; and he hoped that, in good faith to the large number of Irish. Members, the hon. Baronet would stick to his Bill, and support the sub-section.

§ MR. BRUEN
said, that the question he had to ask was, whether Sub-section iv. should be taken out of the Bill? They had had a proposition from the Secretary to the Treasury to withdraw those two sub-sections for the purpose of reconsidering them, and before he did so he should like to place the following consideration before the Committee. He imagined the effect of Sub-sections iv. and ii. was to give to the Privy Council the power of withholding from the local authorities certain official powers if they thought fit. He thought that was a very wise provision, because they must not forget that there had been cases in Ireland where the Boards of Guardians had not proved equal to the duties they had had to perform, and which had been dissolved by the Local Government Board, and their duties fulfilled by paid Commissioners. Now, if the power were taken out of the hands of the Privy Council, he, for one, should think that the Bill could not be carried out in Ireland; and he, therefore, hoped it would be passed through in its integrity.

§ MR. J. W. BARCLAY
hoped the Committee would excuse him for again rising, but he thought it necessary to reply to the personal attack of the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Pell). He was quite willing to admit—and he was sorry for it—that he could not address the Committee with the same terseness and eloquence as the hon. Member; but he endeavoured to do his duty to his constituents as well as he could, and it was for them to say whether they were satisfied with him or not. The hon. Member had expressed a doubt as to whether he desired to obstruct the Bill, or to improve it. Now, he would appeal to hon. Members on both, sides of the House, whether he had not uniformly endeavoured to improve the Bill. He voted for the second reading, having, during the debate, expressed his opinion that the restrictions sought to be imposed with regard to home cattle were 174 not sufficiently stringent, and all the Amendments he had moved were in conformity with the opinions which he then expressed.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
wished to make one remark with regard to what had fallen from the hon. Member for Carlow County (Mr. Bruen). He rather gathered from the hon. Member's remarks that he supposed this clause was meant to give greater power to the Privy Council in Ireland over the local authorities than existed in England. That was a question into which he did not propose to enter. He could not say how far that might, or might not, be necessary. There might be great differences of opinion about it in Ireland. What he wanted to state was that as the Secretary to the Treasury had undertaken to withdraw Sub-section iv., and also Sub-section ii., and to bring them up on Report, if he found it necessary to do so, if he did bring them up on Report, he would have to do this. As they now stood, they gave power to the Privy Council in Ireland to prevent the Act from coming into operation in certain parts of Ireland. The sub-sections stated that they might define whether the local authorities were to apply them or not. "Well, by Part II., they were to arrange what they had to do with regard to home diseases, and they were to give powers to the local authorities. If those powers were not given to someone in Ireland, the Act with regard to home diseases could not be enforced. If the Secretary to the Treasury thought it necessary, on account of the relation of the local authorities in Ireland to the Irish Government—about which he did not give any opinion—to keep some special power of that kind, it would also be necessary not only to give the Privy Council in Ireland the power to apply the Act all through Ireland, but to make it obligatory upon them so to apply it; or else, after having passed, as they supposed, a stamping-out Act for the two Kingdoms, they might find that the Privy Council of Ireland would not put it in force.

§ MR. SYNAN
said, that by Subsections iii. and iv., power was given to the local authorities in Ireland to appoint Inspectors who were not professional men. The Privy Council wanted to reserve to itself the power of appointing professional men, supposing 175 the local authorities said they would not appoint a professional man, because they could get a non-professional man at a cheaper rate. The Government proposed, under Sub-section iii., to fix the period for which these Inspectors should be appointed, and their remuneration and allowances. Was it right to give to the Privy Council in Ireland, where the local authorities had power to appoint non-professional men, the power of appointing professional men, and of fixing their remuneration and allowances? His hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Butt) was quite wrong in supposing that this power, if preserved, would make a hiatus in the Act. No; the local authorities in Ireland had the same power under Part II. of this Act as the local authorities in England. It was, therefore, for the Committee to say whether the Privy Council Orders should have this over-riding power or not. In his opinion, it was necessary for the efficiency of the measure. As, however, the Secretary to the Treasury had asked for time to consider the matter, he, for one, had no objection to give it him, and he thought that the debate on the point might be discontinued.

§ Amendment agreed to; Sub-section iv. struck out accordingly.

§ On the Motion of Sir HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON, Sub-section iii. and Part (2) were struck out of the clause.

§ Clause, as amended, agreed to.