§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILLIn view of the fact that the temperature has greatly lowered from, what it was last night, and also of the facts that the afternoon is very early, that the Opposition have attended in great numbers, and that the attendance of the Liberal Party is scanty, the House will, perhaps, allow me to make a few short remarks on the general contents of this Bill before it finally passes from the control of the House of Commons. The first remark I am anxious to make is in connection with the enormous growth of the Expenditure of the country. This is a subject in which Her Majesty's Government ought to be particularly interested, but in which it is perfectly 615 clear from their action they have taken very little interest indeed. The right hon. Gentleman opposite (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) will observe what, perhaps, he has not noticed before, that the total appropriation of grants out of the Consolidated Fund amounts to £56,000,000, and I think he will find that is an increase of about £5,000,000 over the appropriation from I the Consolidated Fund in the last year of Office of the late Government. Some of that increase may naturally be necessary, but I am certain that the whole increase is not necessary; and I think it is a subject for comment that the four years of Office of the present Government have been marked by a regular increase in the Public Expenditure, and also by a variety of extremely insincere statements and promises from Her Majesty's Government as to the necessity of reducing the Expenditure and as to the necessity of Parliamentary inquiry. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, two Sessions ago, in answer to the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Rylands), distinctly promised a Parliamentary inquiry into the Public Expenditure of this country; but, like all the promises of the Government, it was made only to be broken, and it has been completely evaded. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has given no opportunity to Parliament to make a thoroughly exhaustive inquiry into the financial condition of the country; but he has contented himself with informing the House of Commons that he had himself occupied the Recess in going through the Expenditure of the various Public Departments. That is a statement which the House is perfectly unable to examine. The right hon. Gentleman may have been so occupied; but his occupation may have been extremely easy and light. What I want to impress on the House of Commons, and particularly on those outside the walls of Parliament, who take more interest in the subject than Members of the Liberal Party, is that there will be no possibility of checking the regular and rapid growth of the Public Expenditure until the Government of the day allow every single Department spending money to be brought under the rigid examination of a Select Committee of this House. I am certain that until that course is adopted, and until the Government are prepared, if necessary, to set aside a whole Session 616 for financial reorganization by the method I have suggested, the House of Commons will exercise not the smallest or slightest control over the Expenditure, and, unless something is done before long, the Expenditure will be something like £100,000,000 a-year. I regret that I am unable to congratulate the Chancellor of the Exchequer upon his tenure of Office, in the character of the steward of the finances of this country. He has been almost as unsuccessful as he was at the War Office and the Admiralty. The finances of the country, as a whole, are in a disorganized state, and the various measures the right hon. Gentleman has brought forward, from time to time, to case and remedy the state of things, are celebrated only by the fact that they have not passed into law. I will particularly invite the Chancellor of the Exchequer to take advantage, if he can, of this eleventh hour to make some explanation to the House of his conduct with regard to his measure for debasing the gold coins of this country. The proposal, which was apparently made seriously by him, was to issue from the Mint gold coins of the present nominal value, but of a debased manufacture. That proposal was received with hooting and a shout of laughter by the entire country, the moment it was produced at the Table; and I think it is really almost a case of Ministerial indecency, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, having made such a proposal, I suppose with the consent of his Colleagues, and the suggestion having been scouted indignantly by the whole commercial and financial community, with the exception of a few interested bankers, who happen to have on their hands a considerable stock of light half-sovereigns—that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should not have given the House some explanation of the reasons for which it was brought forward and for which it was withdrawn. The fact will remain, however, that his tenure of Office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, which is now drawing to a close, will be marked by a measure for debasing the gold coinage, and by the successful protest of the public against that most nefarious transaction appearing on the Statute Book. It will not, perhaps, be pleasing to the House that I should make any remarks on the general failure of the Government to carry 617 into law any single one of the legislative proposals they made at the beginning of the Session. It would be unnecessary, as well as being inconvenient, to do so, because I imagine that the public outside, as well as the Members of this House, have all along been aware that every one of those proposals were never seriously made. No one will suppose that the right hon. Gentleman opposite the Secretary of State for the Home Department was serious in producing the Bill for the Government of London. One has only to remember the facts to see that he was indulging in one of his more than usually elaborate jokes. He made two speeches of great length and great humour on the proposal, and then being met by some slight opposition—an opposition confined to the Lord Mayor and a few Friends who usually dine with the Lord Mayor—he immediately threw up the proposal, refusing to proceed with it any further. I do not think that until the present Government came into Office, the House has ever been treated in that way by Ministers of the Grown. When legislative proposals have hither to been brought forward, they have been introduced with a serious desire to pass them into law. If the action of the right hon. Gentleman had stood by itself, it might not have tempted one to have made any invidious comment upon it; but, as it is, there was also another measure which evidently was not intended seriously, but which was intended for far worse purposes than any which marked the right hon. Gentleman's measure. I mean the Merchant Shipping Bill. It is perfectly evident that it was never seriously the intention of the Government to press the proposal on Parliament, but that it was a device simply of the lowest, the meanest, the most wretched, and most miserable electioneering character, got up by that ill-famed circle in Birmingham, who assist in Ministerial elections, for the purpose of promoting, if possible, some kind of pseudo-sympathy in the Liberal ranks on behalf of the merchant seamen of this country. If the statements of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Chamberlain) with respect to the merchant seamen of this country and the risks they run were true, he is evidently in this dilemma—that the action of the Government in dropping the measure is 618 simply flagitious in the highest degree. A large proportion of the loss of life which may take place during the coming autumn and winter, owing to the conduct of the Government in dropping this Bill, may be laid directly at the door of the President of the Board of Trade, or else the inference arises that his statements were utterly inaccurate from beginning to end, in which case he is branded as a Minister who, for the chance of an electioneering advantage, does not hesitate to damage and injure one of the most important, if not the most important, industry of the country. I think the public will look to and hold the Government responsible for, and will free the Opposition from, any responsibility for the total waste of a whole Session of Parliament without a single thing being done which can, directly or indirectly, advance the prosperity of this country in the smallest degree. There has been an irrecoverable waste of time, seeing that this is almost the final Session of a Government that came in on the cry of legislative economy. I hope that the Government will not attempt to make any explanation of the fact, because it must be obvious to them that whereas, as a general rule, explanations are dangerous, in this case they would be absolutely fatal. I pass from the general subject to one or two of the details included in the Bill now before the House. I will invite the noble Lord the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to explain, with a little more detail than he did a short time ago, the action of the Foreign Office in suppressing the Commission under which Lord Northbrook is about to proceed to Egypt, by which it will not be laid on the Table of the House until too late to be of any service. It is a most transparent and ridiculous evasion to say that the Commission is not ready, and that the Foreign Office has not yet composed its terms. Lord Northbrook's journey to Egypt has been decided on by the Government for several days. It is perfectly well known by the Government what Lord Northbrook's title is to be, and in what form the Commission is to be couched. I am afraid it is only of a piece with the general suppression of all information relating to the foreign policy of this country, that documents which could so easily be produced should be suppressed, and kept back from Parliament 619 until some period when they will be of no use for the purpose of discussion. In regard to the noble Lord's appointment, I will make one remark that has not as yet been made. The Public Service of this country has hitherto been uniformly free from the least connection with the commercial and financial private enterprizes of the City of London or of the great commercial centres of the country, and up to the time of the present Government the Foreign Office has been scrupulously fair in this respect. Now I do hold, as a general statement of public policy, and without making any particular charge, that the appointment of Lord Northbrook is a departure from that sound general rule. There is no use whatever in concealing from the House or the public that Lord Northbrook is closely connected with the great financial house of Baring. If Lord Northbrook had gone out by himself, the objection I am making might seem to be strained, though I should still consider the appointment to be bad; but when I recollect that Lord Northbrook is going out in company with Sir Evelyn Baring, and that, therefore, two members of the great house of Baring are to be intrusted, as far as I can make out, with the sole disposal and almost unlimited control of England's political and financial interests in Egypt, I say that the appointment ought never to have been made, that members of that house ought to have been excluded, because of the fact that they are members of that financial house who are being intrusted with those duties. I should like to point out, in this connection, that there literally would be no difference whatever in sending out two members of the house of Rothschild to sending out two members of the house of Baring. The two are almost equal in greatness and in their great pecuniary interests in the East; and it stands to reason, that if Her Majesty's Government had proposed—supposing a member of the house of Rothschild, by circumstances and his public position, fitted to undertake the task—to send out such a member, there would have been a great cry of displeasure from the House of Commons and the country. But there would have been no difference between the position of Rothschild and Baring; and I hold that this mission of the two Barings to Egypt with the immense powers which 620 have been intrusted to them, and knowing the enormous interest which the house of Baring has in the East, is a departure from that sound and scrupulous care, which, until the days of the present Government, has always been observed by Administrations to keep separate public interest from private enterprize. I do not wish to make any remark with regard to the general Mission of Lord Northbrook, nor do I wish to say anything with respect to the Vote of Credit for General Gordon, further than to say that the proceedings of the Government are obviously insincere, that they are not in the least connected with the good of the country, or with the future good of Egypt. They are simply two transparent electioneering devices. The process which the Government has gone through is very analogous to that which is gone through on the Turf, and if the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Hartington) had not left the House, he would be able to illustrate more easily than I can the process to which I allude. When a person owns a horse in a race on which he has invested a considerable sum of money, and is afraid of one or two other horses in the same race, it is not unusual for him to invest a small sum on each of the others, in order that, if his own horse is beaten, he may save himself from total loss or from ruin. This process is called "hedging." That, I believe, is a process not unknown on the Turf; and it is, as I have said, exactly analogous to the process which Her Majesty's Government have adopted in regard to their general position in this country. They have placed an enormous stake on the question of Parliamentary Reform—in fact, they have staked their whole existence on that question, and on whatever success may attach to them on the agitation for the abolition of the House of Lords. That is their principal stake; but the Prime Minister and his Colleagues, perhaps, thought it might be well before Parliament separated to "hedge," and it occurred, therefore, to the Prime Minister and his Colleagues to "hedge" on General Gordon and also on the general condition of Egypt. They, therefore, place a small sum of money on General Gordon—£300,000—but for the purposes of "hedging" they might as well have placed 3d., and they also place a small stake on the general condition of Egypt 621 in the shape of one of their own Colleagues. That is the policy to which a Liberal Ministry condescends. Merely for the purpose of preventing the Opposition from drawing the attention of the country forcibly and effectively to the position of Egypt and General Gordon, it has resorted to these two extremely unworthy and low and mischievous manœuvres. Turning now to another question, I have no doubt the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies (Mr. Evelyn Ashley), whom I am glad to see is in his place, will be glad of an opportunity of explaining to the House the position of Mr. Mackenzie in Bechuanaland. This matter is worthy the attention of the House, for it will recollect that when the Colonial Office informed Parliament that the original Convention with the Boers had broken down, and a new Convention was necessary, one of the guarantees which the Government gave to Parliament, that the interests of the Native tribes should be effectively and vigorously looked after by a Representative of the British Government—a guarantee which prevented any violent criticism of their policy—was the appointment of Mr. Mackenzie. It was known that he was a strong and vigorous philanthropist, devoted to the cause of the Native tribes, if anything, hostile to the Boer interest, well acquainted with their criminal and wicked modes of procedure, and that he would, as Representative of Great Britain on the borders of Bechuanaland and the Transvaal, exercise a decided Protectorate over the Native tribes. But now, in that appointment, we are enabled to detect the extreme insincerity, the utterly humbugging character of every step which Her Majesty's Government take for evading Parliamentary discussions, by a bogus appointment of this nature. The moment that Parliamentary discussion is evaded, the moment when the appointment appears likely to produce the effects which those who receive the news of the appointment expect from it, it is cancelled, and any inconveniences which may be likely to arise to the Government are removed. We read in the newspapers, the other day, that Mr. Mackenzie had been removed from Bechuanaland. No doubt, we shall be told that it is a mere temporary removal, and that he has simply been sent down to confer with Sir Hercules Robinson at the Cape, and 622 that, in process of time, he will return. If the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies should say so, I know that he will be saying what the Colonial Department told him; and while I would not, for a moment, disbelieve the statements of the hon. Gentleman, yet I would take the liberty of disbelieving entirely the collective statements of the Colonial Department. I am certain that Mr. Mackenzie has been permanently removed, and that the only and great guarantee we have in this House that the interest and safety of the Native tribes shall be looked after has gone. No doubt, some cipher will be set up in Mr. Mackenzie's place, who will be a convenient instrument for allowing the Boers to work their entire will upon the unfortunate Natives of Bechuanaland. In referring to these subjects now, I am only casting bread on the waters, to which, when the House meets again in October, we shall, no doubt, be able to refer. But they are subjects which the Government must be aware are engaging the attention of the country as well as of the Opposition; and if the Government think that, in October, they are going to rivet the attention of Parliament to their proposals for enfranchising 2,000,000 of persons, they are making a very grievous and a very fatal mistake. Finally, I want merely to allude to a matter to which, by some very questionable manœuvres on the part of the Government, I was prevented from alluding the other night. I wish now to refer to the state of Ireland, and the forces, civil and military, which the Government still maintain in that country in order to preserve the peace. The Government took an immense Vote the other night for the Constabulary in Ireland, a Vote larger by some £600,000 or £700,000 than was thought necessary in the time of their Predecessors; and when I drew attention to the fact that in view of this large increase it was very essential that the Representatives of the Irish Government should make some statement, no reply was made from the Ministerial Bench, and the Prime Minister interrupted the business by his statement on Egypt and the Conference. It was promised that the Report of the Vote should be taken at a reasonable hour on Monday; but, in the absence of the Prime Minister, the hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Court- 623 ney), who treats with the utmost disregard all pledges of that kind, brought on the Vote, and prevented my asking for some information. The hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) showed that the force of police was kept at a maximum while crime had fallen to a minimum; and what we want to know is, why, if the state of Ireland has really improved, this large demand has been made? If, on the other hand, the returns of crimes are fallacious, if the diminution of out rages is not to be relied on, if there is still seething among the Irish people criminal tendencies of a dangerous nature, then we want that statement made to the House from the Treasury Bench, and in an official manner. I will point out why we should have an authoritative statement of the condition of Ireland from the Treasury Bench. The great Crimes Act, which was passed by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department, which, I believe, was entirely due to his genius, and which has been successful in restoring a semblance of order, draws to a close in the latter part of next year; and the question whether it is to be renewed, or not, must come up in the early part of the Session of 1885. It is, I contend, then, the duty of the right hon. Gentleman and the Irish Government to prepare the House of Commons, by previous statements, as to the condition of Ireland for the great problem as to whether the Act is to be renewed or not. It is altogether wrong that we should be left under the impression that crime is diminishing in Ireland, and that bonâ fide genuine order has been restored, while we see that a far larger expenditure is being incurred on the Police Establishment for the preservation of order in Ireland than we have spent before. It is wrong that Ireland should be left under the impression that Ireland is quiet, and that then in the early part of 1885 the Secretary of State for the Home Department should come down to the House and in his grandest and most imposing manner should demand a renewal of that Act. Or, perhaps, he or the Prime Minister might state to the House that the renewal is not necessary, without the House of Commons being in a position to judge as to the judiciousness of the policy to be pursued by the Government. I think 624 I am justified in putting these interrogatories to the Government, and in making these general criticisms, both by the general features of this Parliamentary Session, and on account of the extremely bad character which Her Majesty's Ministers, as a collective Government, enjoy. I feel that Members of the Opposition cannot allow the Session to close without expressing once more their entire distrust of the policy pursued by the Government, whether at home or abroad, and calling upon the Government once more to explain to the House what course their policy is likely to take in the future.
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. CHILDERS)Sir, I came down to the House prepared to listen to the remarks of the hon. Member for Eye (Mr. Ashmead-Bartlett) on the subject of foreign affairs, being under the impression that that hon. Gentleman apparently had not exhausted all his repertoire last night, and that he, perhaps, intended to give us a second edition of his speech; but, instead of the hon. Member for Eye, we have listened to the speech of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock (Lord Randolph Churchill), of which we, of course, had no Notice whatever. And possibly it is because we have had no Notice that the noble Lord commenced his speech by complaining of the thinness of the Benches on his own side. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: I said the other side.] Yes; but he alluded to his own side also, and, considering that when the noble Lord spoke there was no one on the Front Opposition Bench, and only one Member on the Back Benches, the sarcasm was well understood by the House. The noble Lord has given us a speech of some duration, from which it is quite evident that he thinks that the mantle of Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Beaconsfield—at any rate, of Lord Beaconsfield in his earlier years—has fallen upon his shoulders; and, therefore, the noble Lord claims the right to make the House acquainted with his idea of the progress of Public Business during the Session. Now, Lord Lyndhurst always did that in the House of Lords, I think, after full Notice; and, certainly, the speeches of Lord Beaconsfield were always highly prepared, and for them the Benches where he sat were ready with much applause. Indeed, the cri- 625 ticisms I used to hear from him on the work of the Session when I was a young Member of this House, were delivered to a full audience, and amid the cheers of the supporters of those statesmen; whilst to-day I noticed—however much I may appreciate the cheers of the hon. and learned Member for Bridport (Mr. Warton)—that the noble Lord's speech had for its chorus only that particular cheer. [Mr. WARTON. pointing to other hon. Members: No, no!] Then, if there was another cheer, it must have been like the "No" to the third reading of the Franchise Bill—inaudible. The noble Lord commenced by singling me out for attack with reference, not only to the Business of the Session, but also to my whole public career. He was very severe on what I had done both at the Admiralty, where I was 14 and 15 years ago, and at the War Office; but I noticed that, severe as his language was, he took very great care not to allude to any facts or any circumstances to which I could reply. This is the sort of argument which you meet with in some third-rate newspapers, and it is very much in accordance with the practice of the noble Lord. But, at the same time, I should have been very glad if he had given me something to which I could have replied. If he had done so, I should have answered him, and I hope with success; but not having done so, it would be altogether out of place if I defended myself without knowing what is the attack. The fact is, the noble Lord is extremely skilful in one mode of attack—that is to say, in calling names and using violent epithets. I took down some of them, and will read them to the House—"Ministerial indecencies," "nefarious transactions," "devices of the lowest and meanest character," "conduct flagitious to the highest degree," "transparent and ridiculous evasions," "obvious insincerity," "most unworthy manœuvres," "extreme insincerity." Now, that I characterized the other day, and I repeat it, as the favourite way of the noble Lord, to which we are perfectly accustomed both in and out of this House; but if the noble Lord wishes to emulate Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Beaconsfield, will he allow me to say that that was not their style of attacking their opponents? The weapon of Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Beaconsfield was in 626 each case a very sharp and telling weapon; but it did not consist of violent language and calling names. They might have used an occasional epithet which has remained—and the beauty of that kind of attack is that a particular epithet may remain; but, without meaning it in an offensive sense, I may say that they did not indulge in this sort of vulgar abuse. If the noble Lord will allow me to give him a little advice on matters of this kind, I should recommend him to give up this style of abuse, which really does not remain, and which hurts nobody, and attack us for our acts in some particular matter, and then leave his attack and our answer to the judgment of Parliament and of the country. In the few things which the noble Lord did say to us he showed great inaccuracy, which a little care would have enabled him to avoid. He said that, two years ago, I promised that there should be a Committee of this House to inquire into Expenditure. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Several Committees.] And the noble Lord further said that I had not carried out that promise. Now, in the first place, let me tell him that it was not I who made the promise, but the Prime Minister, and that the promise was made not two years ago, but one year ago. In the discussion last year on the Budget, my right hon. Friend said that if it was the express wish of the House that a Committee or Committees should be appointed to inquire into Expenditure, that was a wish which he shared. What happened? We waited for the expression of some such wish, but heard of none, either on the part of the independent Members of the House, or on the part of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for North Devon (Sir Stafford Northcote); and, therefore, the suggestion of the Prime Minister naturally fell to the ground. What I subsequently undertook to do, with the assistance of my hon. Friend the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Courtney) and the Heads of the Departments, was to make an exhaustive inquiry into the Expenditure of each of the spending Departments, I stated at the beginning of the Session that I had, during the last Recess, inquired into the Expenditure of half the Civil Departments, and I also stated that I hoped to complete the inquiry during the next Recess; and that if the House then desired to adopt a 627 Committee of its own, to go through the whole of the Expenditure, we should not only accept it, but should consider it a very judicious proposal. I repeat that now. I further stated that the result of the inquiry which I proposed to make would appear in the Estimates of the various Departments, and it has appeared. But let me remind hon. Members that, although there are, from time to time, suggestions in this House in favour of economy, the great mass of the suggestions on the subject of Expenditure are to increase it. It is the Treasury which is unpopular in the Departments, and, I am sorry to say, in this House, because it is perpetually fighting the battle of economy; and, if we had now the sort of support which the House of Commons used to give the Treasury in keeping down Expenditure, I can only say that we should be most glad of it. The suggestions to increase Expenditure are as 20 to 1 of those to reduce it. If this House can see its way to revise the Public Expenditure, there is no one who will more rejoice to receive that assistance than I shall, however much the noble Lord may think fit to depreciate the fact. The noble Lord has referred to the large increase which has taken place in the Expenditure since 1880, and said I had not explained the reason for it. But I made a most careful explanation of that increase in my Budget Speech not only this year, but also last year, and I went very much into detail in order, on the one hand, that those who are interested in questions of economy might see the direction of increasing Expenditure; and, on the other, that those who, like the noble Lord, are anxious, for political motives, to attack the Government in respect to their Expenditure, should be able to see clearly what is the cause of the increase in the last few years. I have pointed out that, first of all, almost the whole of the increasing Military and Naval Expenditure was due to an augmented charge for the Iron-clad Fleet and its armament. I once more submit that fact to right hon. Gentlemen opposite, who are constantly complaining that we do not spend enough money in that direction. They left the Iron-clad Fleet in an unsatisfactory and backward condition. ["Oh, oh!"] We found that the building of iron-clad ships had so run down, that it was absolutely necessary to in- 628 crease that Expenditure. On some heads we have doubled it, and the only criticism we have received since is that we have not carried that increase far enough. And so with respect to guns. It fell to us to take Office when the old gun was condemned, and our Predecessors had done nothing towards introducing improved guns beyond, I admit, valuable inquiries. And so it became necessary for us to add largely to the Estimates for Guns, increasing them by several hundred thousand pounds. Again, since 1880, there has also been a large increase in the Vote for Education and the subsidies for local purposes, and in the Post Office and Telegraph Services; and if anyone will take the trouble to add up all these items—I have not got them with me now, not knowing that the noble Lord was going to make this attack—he will find that they will of themselves account for the increase in the Expenditure during the last four or five years. Then the noble Lord proceeded to attack me, because, as he said, my proposals have not been passed into law. I am afraid, if that is to be taken as a serious complaint against a Chancellor of the Exchequer, some of my most distinguished Predecessors sitting on both sides of the House have likewise been subject to severe blame. But, as a matter of fact, is it the case that I have failed to pass my proposals into law? Last year I made two considerable proposals, apart from small matters—one was the measure with reference to the permanent reduction of the National Debt, and the other the settlement of the different questions connected with the Railways as regards the Passenger Duty. Both these passed into law. This year I also made two proposals in my Budget Speech, and these were—first, the measure for reducing the interest on the National Debt, which has since passed into law; and, secondly, the Coinage Bill, which did not come before the House for second reading, because, owing to the failure of the Franchise Bill in the House of Lords, it became necessary to drop some nine or ten Government Bills, among which it was included. ["Oh, oh!"] It was dropped for no other reason, and I will point to the fact that at the time these Bills were dropped, the Coinage Bills stood for second reading the following week. The noble Lord 629 said that I was guilty of gross Ministerial neglect because I did not give an explanation of the Bill. I should have been guilty of such neglect if I had inflicted on the House such explanations of a Bill which had not reached its second reading, or after its withdrawal. Then the noble Lord subjected the Bill to one of those attacks of a violent character which he is in the habit of making. He said that it was scouted with hooting and laughter by the whole commercial community. But will the noble Lord excuse me if I say that, after my original explanation of the Coinage plan, there was another statement put before the House and the public in a letter by the noble Lord, as to the grounds upon which he proposed to oppose it, and if anything was received with hooting and laughter it was the letter of the noble Lord. His arguments, at any rate, were universally received with hooting and laughter. I suppose it was my taking no notice of his letter that has hurt the noble Lord's feelings. But the House will agree with me, that I should have been doing a very extraordinary thing if I had taken the trouble to refute the statements of the noble Lord—statements which were received with so much ridicule that they could not have needed any serious refutation. There were, no doubt, objections of a solid character raised to the Bill by authorities who have every right to respect, which I should have been prepared to meet in the course of debate; but these objections were based on totally different grounds to those advanced by the noble Lord. Well, so much for myself and those matters to which, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, I have thought it my duty to refer. But there is another thing which the noble Lord said, calling for remark and reprobation. He said that Lord Northbrook's appointment was ridiculous, and a transparent evasion of our duty; and he went on to say that his ground of objection to Lord Northbrook's appointment was that he was connected with the great house of Baring. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: One of the objections.] I think he afterwards used the words that Lord Northbrook was a member of the house of Baring, and he went on to say that, considering the financial position of that house and the financial interest that house had in the affairs of Egypt, Lord Northbrook 630 ought not to have been sent to Egypt as Her Majesty's Commissioner on the present occasion. If I were going to make use of violent epithets such as those made use of by the noble Lord, my first business would be to apply one to his absence of information as to Lord Northbrook's position and the position of the house of Baring. Lord Northbrook is not, and never has been, a member of the house of Baring.
§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILLThe right hon. Gentleman will allow me to explain. I said Lord Northbrook was a member of the house of Baring; but I did not imply that he was connected with the firm. I only meant to imply that he was a member of the house of Baring in the same way that the Secretary of State for the Home Department is a member of the house of Harcourt.
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. CHILDERS)No; the noble Lord shall not escape in that way. He never said anything about the house of Harcourt. I appeal to the House whether he did not say that Lord Northbrook was a member of the house of Baring in the same way that a Rothchild is a member of the house of Rothschild. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Hear, hear!] And then the noble Lord went on to ask, what would be thought if a member of the house of Rothschild were sent out to advise on the affairs of Egypt? I tell the noble Lord that there is no foundation for that statement. Lord Northbrook's position historically is, that he is the son of a most distinguished Member of Parliament, a former Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Francis Baring, and that he has no connection whatever with the commercial house of Baring. Lord Northbrook is as free from fault in that way as the noble Lord would be, if anyone were to throw in his face that he was a member of the house of Churchill. What would the noble Lord have said when Lord Melbourne made Sir Francis Baring Chancellor of the Exchequer? I suppose he would have said that Lord Melbourne had selected as Chancellor of the Exchequer a member of the house of Baring, and that he had no right to do so. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Certainly.] Nobody else said so, or would have dreamed of saying so. Lord North- 631 brook's connection with the house of Baring is, it is true, that he is a member of the highly respectable family of Baring, but with the firm of Baring Brothers, and the commercial transactions of that house, he has no more to do than I have. And I would say further, that if this line of argument is to be adopted with reference to gentlemen connected with great banking houses who are engaged in public affairs, what would the noble Lord have said of a Gentleman who, some years ago, was sent to Egypt by a Tory Government on a most important mission—I allude to that of Mr. Cave. Mr. Cave, a distinguished Member of Parliament and Privy Councillor, in Lord Beaconsfield's Administration, was a banker, an actual member of a banking house; and yet there was not a single word heard from Gentlemen sitting on these Benches as to the propriety of sending out Mr. Cave to Egypt. I might multiply instances, and refer to the cases of Lord Ashburton and Mr. Herries, great banking names, especially the former, whose employment was of such great service to the public. However, I will only say that the attack made by the noble Lord on Lord Northbrook would be utterly unworthy of him, but for the fact that he makes these attacks so frivolously and so frequently that we are accustomed to attach no great importance to them. The other portion of the noble Lord's statements it is not for me to criticize. I have dealt with that portion which concerns myself and the financial business with which I have been directly or indirectly concerned of late; and all I can say is, that when the noble Lord attacks me again I hope he will, in the first place, be a little more moderate in his epithets, and, in the second place, a little more accurate in his facts.