PERSONAL EXPLANATION. (Hansard, 24 June 1886)

LORD RANDOLPH CHURHCHILL (Paddington, S.)
said, he wished to 270 take that opportunity of calling attention to some remarks made in his absence on Monday night by the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy (Sir George Campbell) with reference to Mr. Moore. Those remarks, as reported, appeared to be in the nature of a personal attack upon himself, and also an attack upon the character of one of the very best public servants whom the country ever possessed. The hon. Gentleman was reported to have said, in the discussion on the Indian Budget on Monday, that— He protested against the waste of money resulting from the re-arrangement of offices which enabled gentlemen in the prime of life to retire upon large pensions. He found that a Mr. Moore, who had retired on a pension of £800 per annum in consequence of so-called rearrangement of offices, had been acting as Private Secretary to the noble Lord the late Secretary for India. He did not know who was responsible for that matter, but he could not help regarding it as a monstrous and a gross job. The hon. Member was reported to have accused him (Lord Randolph Churchill) of having been guilty of a monstrous job in appointing Mr. Moore as his Private Secretary, and also, he supposed, of having been guilty of a gross job in regard to the re-arrangement of offices—

SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL&c.) (Kirkcaldy,
Perhaps the noble Lord will allow me to explain. I said nothing of the kind.

§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
The hon. Gentleman will have his opportunity of speaking afterwards. In the interests of the gentleman in question he was bound to take notice of the matter. The re-organization scheme under which Mr. Moore retired from service in India was approved by the Secretary of State (the Earl of Kimberley) in Council on January 6, 1885. Its author was Mr. Godley, now Permanent Under Secretary of State for India, and it was considered by the Finance Committee of the Council and by the Council itself. In accordance with that re-organization the number of appointments in the higher grades of the Service was reduced, and the salaries in the lower grades were increased. The result was a saving, prospective if not immediate, which was thought to be for the interests of the Public Service. In order that the scheme might be 271 brought into operation it was thought that such of the existing holders of the offices dealt with as were willing to retire should be allowed to do so. One of the provisions of the scheme authorized the Secretary of State to grant a pension for past services without the production of the usual certificate of incapacity for further service. In accordance with the provisions of this scheme Mr. Moore, having served 26 years in the India Office, and having been originally in the employ of the old East India Company, tendered his resignation on February 3, 1885, and the resignation took effect on the 24th of June, the latest possible date under the terms of the scheme. It was accepted by Lord Kimberley on May 15, a month before the Government went out of Office. Mr. Moore was granted £733 per annum, which was the pension he had earned; not £800, as the hon. Member said. These were the circumstances which the hon. Member apparently thought could justly be described as amounting to a gross and monstrous job. The transaction was no more in the nature of a job than was the retirement of the hon. Gentleman himself from the Indian Service. The hon. Member retired at the age of 50, in the prime of life—he might say, judging from the hon. Member's appearance, in the youth of life. Then the hon. Member retired on a pension of £1,000 a-year. But more than that. On the hon. Gentleman's retirement he was appointed to a seat on the Indian Council at a salary of £1,200 a-year. Yet the hon. Member objected to the retirement of Mr. Moore on a pension of £733 a-year, and his employment afterwards by himself (Lord Randolph Churchill) at the small and inadequate salary of £300 a-year. He supposed that his appointment of Mr. Moore as his Secretary was the gross political job of which the hon. Member complained.

§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL
No, no; I deny that.

§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
said, that on taking Office he learned by the greatest piece of good fortune that Mr. Moore's services were available, and the entire India Department told him that if he could secure Mr. Moore's services he should be exceptionally fortunate. Mr. Moore's experiences were conspicuously exceptional; 272 and certainly if during the time he (Lord Randolph Churchill) was at the India Office he had been able to discharge the duties with any degree of satisfaction, it was greatly owing to the assistance he received from Mr. Moore. He supposed he should not, in the opinion of the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy, have been perpetrating a gross job if he had put a near relative of his own into this lucrative office, as the present Secretary of State had done. Instead of taking that course, he had endeavoured to secure the services of the best man that the Indian Service could produce. Until he became Secretary of State he was unacquainted with Mr. Moore. He had thought it right, in justice to Mr. Moore—about himself he did not care—to make these observations, in order that the public might not be misled by the accusations of the hon. Member.

§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL
said, he thought the tone of the noble Lord's speech was somewhat hard upon him, because when the noble Lord informed him of his intention to bring the matter before the House he had told the noble Lord that he had entirely misapprehended the purport of his speech. He did not intend to make an attack on the noble Lord, or upon Mr. Moore. The report of his speech which appeared in The Times was condensed to about a fifth of what he really said, and he was not at all surprised that it should have conveyed a false impression to the noble Lord. What he denounced as a monstrous and gross job was not the appointment of Mr. Moore by the noble Lord as his Private Secretary, but those who shunted Mr. Moore while he was still in the prime of life, and gave him a pension. In that respect he thought the noble Lord had proved his (Sir George Campbell's) case to the very hilt. He still said that the system under which such a man was shunted by the re-organization of offices was a monstrous and gross job. Re-organization was popular in all offices, for it enabled efficient men to retire with three-fourths of their salaries and accelerated promotion. But such re-arrangements took place too often in many public offices. As regarded what had been said about himself, he wished to say that he did not enjoy a pension at all; he enjoyed an annuity—the result of a contract for 273 which he paid largely himself; and the noble Lord was greatly mistaken if he supposed he (Sir George Campbell) was associated with any re-organization, or that he received anything whatever he was not entitled to under the strict law of contract.

§ THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. HENRY H. FOWLER) (Wolverhampton, E.)
said, that the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy, after having been face to face with the noble Lord opposite, now, in the absence of the Under Secretary for India, charged Lord Kimberley with having been guilty of a gross political job, and had repeated the statement over and over again without having brought forward a single bit of evidence—

§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL
said, he had made the statement originally in the presence of the Under Secretary for India, who had the opportunity of contradicting it.

§ MR. HENRY H. FOWLER
said, it had been contradicted already, and he would contradict it again. The Indian Council determined to re-organize this particular branch of the Indian Service, and Mr. Moore was perfectly within his right in retiring. The Secretary of State very much objected to Mr. Moore's retirement, and very much deplored the loss of his services. Mr. Moore's place had not been filled up, and there was consequently an actual saving in the office. He dared say Mr. Moore, if he were present, would characterize the amount he received, not as a pension, but as an annuity. The hon. Gentleman first charged the noble Lord opposite with being guilty of a monstrous political job, and, the noble Lord having completely pulverized the case, the hon. Gentleman then went on to make a similar charge against Lord Kimberley. He much regretted that the hon. Gentleman had thought it necessary to make these serious charges, for which there was really not the slightest foundation.

§ MR. W. H. SMITH (Strand, Westminster)
said, he thoroughly agreed with the observations which had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Henry H. Fowler). He had often himself regarded re-organizations with considerable jealousy; but no greater mischief could be done by those who wished to watch these re-organizations than to speak of an economical, wise, and proper re- 274 organization in the way the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy (Sir George Campbell) had spoken. It was part of the contract into which a public servant entered that if he was retired compulsorily he was to receive a pension, and Mr. Moore was perfectly within his own right in availing himself of the opportunity offered to him to withdraw from the Public Service. He protested against the language of the hon. Gentleman as calculated to do great injury to the Public Service as a whole, and to place great obstacles in the way of an economical re-organization.

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER (Sir UGHTRED KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH) (Lancaster, Clitheroe)
said, that everyone in the India Office much regretted Mr. Moore's retirement. The unfortunate consequence of bringing these personal matters into debate was that one personality led to another; and he simply wished to say that he listened with extreme regret both to what the noble Lord opposite had said with regard to the present Private Secretary of the present Secretary of State, and also to the language used by the hon. Member behind him with regard to another appointment.

§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
said, all he had urged was that if his appointment of Mr. Moore, who was a stranger, as his Private Secretary was a gross political job, obviously the appointment by Lord Kimberley of his son to the same position was still more a job.

SIR UGHTRED KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH
said, he was glad to hear that the noble Lord did not imply that that appointment was a job.

§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
Not at all.

SIR UGHTRED KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH
said, that nothing could be more excellent than the way in which that gentleman discharged his duties.