HC Deb 05 August 1887 vol 318 cc1381-2
MR.P. O'BRIEN (Monaghan, N.)

I wish to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland the following Question, of which I have given him private Notice:—Whether his attention has been called to a report in The Daily News of this day of a meeting of the landlords of Tyrone, held in Omagh yesterday, at which a letter was read from the Duke of Abercorn, in which the following paragraph occurred:— The Irish landlords are to be sacrificed on the base excuse of maintaining the Union, and the whole of Ireland is to suffer for a few disturbed counties; whether the Government accepts the Duke's interpretation of their Irish policy, and approves of the language in which he describes it?

MR. SPEAKER

Order, order! That is not the usual form of a Question. The hon. Gentleman is asking the opinion of the Goverment.

MR. P. O'BRIEN

Then, perhaps, I may put the Question in the following way:—Whether, in deference to the opinion of the Duke of Abercorn, the Government will cancel the application of the Coercion Act to the whole of the Irish counties, and apply its operation to portions of the disturbed counties referred to?

THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR.) (Manchester, E.)

I have received no application of that character from the Duke.

MR. P. O'BRIEN

I will repeat the Question on Monday.