§
(1.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £7,427, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1889, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Fishery Board in Scotland, and for Grants in Aid of Piers or Quays.
§ MR. ESSLEMONT (Aberdeen, E.)said, he would appeal to the hon. and learned Member for Elgin and Nairn (Mr. Anderson) to withdraw his Amendment.
THE CHAIRMANThat Amendment, according to the practice in Committee, has lapsed. Therefore the Original Question is before the Committee.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTsaid, that being the case, he was desirous of making a few observations upon this Vote. He might be allowed, first of all, to express his gratification that the Fishery Board 3 of Scotland had given much more evidence of excellent and energetic work during the past 12 months than any year during his experience at the Board. In regard to what had been said about the Chairman of the Board (Sir Thomas Boyd), it was well known in Edinburgh that he was a man of excellent abilities, and had received the highest honour that the citizens of Edinburgh could confer upon a man as a citizen. He (Mr. Esslemont), therefore, would deprecate so strong a measure as that proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Elgin yesterday. He sympathized with the hon. and learned Member to this extent—as he had formerly stated—that he thought that £800 a-year was too large an amount to give to the Chairman of the Board, whilst there was nothing given to the other members, who were put to considerable expense, and had to sacrifice a great deal of time. He referred to the non-ex-officio members who devoted themselves to the work of the Board. He thought that if the salary of the Chairman, for whom, as he had said before, he had great respect, knowing him personally, were reduced to something like £500, and the £300 so saved were given to the practical members of the Board, to pay their expenses of attending the meetings, it would be a much better disposition of the money. He had already called attention to the salaries of the scientific members of the Board. These gentlemen had done very excellent work, but he could not help calling attention to the fact that these men were high salaried and were holding other positions in connection with the University, and receiving salaries for their professional duties elsewhere, and he doubted whether, in the interests of the Public Service, it was always expedient to have men high salaried in different departments, whose time and attention, and whose energy and strength, were required for the special appointment which they had already received. Well, having made that criticism, he must say that he had great respect for the ability of these scientific members of the Board. He would also express his gratitude for the services of the Committee which had been presided over by his right hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Marjoribanks). The question of mussel bait was a ques 4 tion of great importance to the white fishing industry, and he was satisfied that the Committee, which he hoped would be able to report at no very distant date, would bring to light facts which would lead possibly, and he trusted probably, to the settlement of this very much vexed question. He would not repeat what had been very much better said by his right hon. Friend the President of the Committee—namely, the right hon. Member for Berwickshire. He would only say that in all the statements the right hon. Gentleman had made as to this Department he perfectly agreed. He should like, however, to call the attention of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Lord Advocate (Mr. J. P. B. Robertson) to one particular question which he thought deserved the attention of the Fishery Board. An hon. Member had referred to the depredations of the trawlers among the lines and nets of the white fishery along the coast, and to many cases where damages had been recovered. Now, he desired to call attention to the fact that these fishermen were placed at great disadvantage in recovering these damages. The trawlers steamed into the bays frequently under fog, and frequently under the cover of night. They swept the nets away and disappeared, and the fishermen in their fishing boats had no means of overtaking, or of identifying, or of finding out the individuals who were responsible. He thought a little more money should be expended upon a kind of sea police—in the employment of a small steamer, which could watch the interests of the fishing industry around the coast, and act as a kind of sea police, seeing that the interests of the fishermen were properly guarded. He would point out also that they had many officers on the coast whose services could be availed of in this respect. They had the coastguardsmen, to whose duties might easily be added that of taking note of the trawlers who might encroach upon the territorial waters—that was to say, who might come within the three mile limit. The trawlers might be called on and required to carry such lights and numbers as would bring them within the view of the coastguardsmen. He would also suggest that the fishery officers should be made use of for the same purpose. Almost the only further 5 observation he had to make was that he thought that the question of harbours, in connection with the fishing industry, was one which was very much underrated. These harbours required to be safe, and be within range of the boats when the weather became rough. In bad weather a harbour of refuge at a considerable distance was of very little value to the fishermen. He would suggest that it was well worthy the consideration of the Fishery Board whether the funds at their disposal were sufficient for the purpose they had in view. He had constantly been making application for very much needed harbours on the coast of Aberdeenshire, but the continual answer received was that the Fishery Board had so small a sum at their command that very little could be done. He agreed with the hon. and learned Member for Elgin and Nairn that where money had been spent it had been spent in large sums, and in Aberdeenshire they looked with feelings of envy on what had been done on the coast of Banffshire, which had received a free grant from the fund. He would suggest to the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate that it was just about time that some of the neighbouring counties, with large fishing industries, should be taken into consideration, and he hoped that that would be done. He hoped and believed that the Government were preparing a Bill dealing comprehensively with the fishing industry, and he believed they had promised that that Bill would be taken towards the end of the Session. He trusted the observations of the right hon. Member for Berwickshire and other Members of the Committee would be borne in mind, in order that this measure might be of such a comprehensive character as to meet the desire of all the people interested. He would show the difficulties which existed as to the representation of the fishing industry. The fishermen at present had no franchise, and had no means of electing a representative Body; but he gave the Government credit for having, as far as they could, consulted the interests of fishermen in making recent appointments. He believed that three Members recently added to the Board had the recommendation of a large body of fishermen; and if they did not fairly and fully represent the fishermen it was because the Government, in making the 6 appointments, had no means of ascertaining very clearly what the views of the fishermen were. He should deprecate, in the present transitional state, when the newly appointed Board had set to work more energetically than heretofore, that they should hastily seek to make a change in the Vote at the present time. They should leave it to the Government to table their measure, and not in any way hamper the Board at the present time. He differed slightly from his right hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire in regard to his statement as to the powers of the Fishery Board, and he expected that the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate, in his reply, would take notice of that point. The right hon. and learned Lord Advocate was fully aware that very able legal opinion had been given that the Fishery Board had ample power to close the territorial waters around the whole coast of Scotland. He agreed with that opinion. There was nothing in the Act bearing upon this matter which would necessarily prevent the Board from closing the whole of the territorial waters if they found any reason for doing so. The Fishery Board conclusively reported that fishing by trawling within territorial waters—within the three mile limit—along almost the whole coast of Scotland was detrimental to the fishing industry, and was inflicting upon the line fishermen a very great hardship, without any commensurate result. He quite admitted that there were certain portions of the coast of Scotland where the territorial waters, within the three mile limit, were practically useless for line fishermen, and he submitted to the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate whether it would not be better at once to prohibit trawling within the territorial waters, and within the three mile limit, excluding from that regulation any portions of the coast where line fishing and net fishing in the ordinary way could not be profitably or conveniently conducted? He was sure, by all the Reports he had read upon the subject, by the opinions given, and by public opinion on the matter generally, that there would be no settlement on this question without an order such as he suggested; and if it were in the power of the Fishery Board to give that order, why should it not be given forth 7 with, so as to put an end to this vexed question and to this great hardship on the line fishermen upon which they felt so strongly? These fishermen were men who had done a great deal for the wealth of Scotland. Theirs was a hazardous and laborious occupation, subject to many dangers and to great risk to life. Many of these men had grown old in this industry, and all the time they had been gathering wealth out of the sea, and he thought it extremely hard that any alteration of the law should deprive them of their living. It was shown by facts which could not be denied that the interests of the fishing industry would be injured were trawling permitted. Every opinion worth having, from practical as well as scientific men, went to show that there was no occasion for trawlers to fish in territorial waters, and he trusted they would hear from the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Lord Advocate that immediate and energetic action would be taken along the whole coast to carry out this suggestion. If the Government did that, this agitation, which was causing so much heartburning, would be put an end to.
§ MR. HANDEL COSSHAM (Bristol, E.)I beg, Sir, to call your attention to the fact that there is not a Committee.
§ COLONEL MALCOLM (Argyllshire)said, he was exceedingly sorry that they were not to have the assistance and support of the hon. Gentleman who had last spoken in endeavouring to pass the Bill which he (Colonel Malcolm) and an hon. Friend had introduced.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTsaid, he was sure hon. the and gallant Gentleman did not wish to misrepresent him. The hon. and gallant Gentleman must have forgotten that he (Mr. Esslemont) had several times seen him in the Lobby, and had assured him that he would have his earnest and active support in regard to the Bill.
§ COLONEL MALCOLMsaid, that under these circumstances he begged the hon. Member's pardon. He regretted, at all events, that he had never been able to carry his Bill to a second reading, because the last clause in that measure exactly met the case to which the hon. Member had referred by prohibiting beam trawling within the three mile limit except when permitted by the 8 Fishery Board. In point of fact, the Bill exactly covered the ground which had been generally supported by hon. Members during that debate. There was another point in the Bill—namely, the fixing of the quarter-cran measure, and another part of the Bill referred almost entirely to the West Coast of Scotland. That Bill, however, was dead and gone, and he could only express a hope that the matter would be taken up by the Government in the new Bill which he believed would be introduced next Session. With regard to the Fishery Board generally, he entirely agreed that if there was only to be a sum of £800 voted by the members of that Board, it would be far better to divide it amongst the members of the Board, so as to pay the travelling expenses of those men who came from a distance, rather than that the whole amount should be put into the pocket of the Chairman. Then he hoped that this Fishery Board, if constituted, would gradually leave out the legal element. No doubt there was a time, when the Board was first constituted, when the Sheriffs did a very useful work on the Board; but that time, he thought, had passed, and he had no doubt now that, despite the fact of their having legal men amongst their number, the Board had to employ outside assistance whenever it found it necessary to go to a Court of Law. Of that, however, he was not sure. In order to reconstitute the Board he was informed that it would require an Act of Parliament, and when that Act of Parliament was brought in he trusted that the following points would be noticed. In the first place, he thought that the Fishery Board should have power to divide the coast of Scotland into different districts. The methods of fishing and the natural formation of the coast differed so greatly on the East and West Coasts, that he thought what was a perfectly good law on one part would be destructive on the other; and he should, therefore, think some power of this sort should be given to the Fishery Board, and there should be a representative Board in each district sending up Reports to the general Fishery Board as to matters of detail. Something of that sort had been attempted in England, and he thought that, to that extent, they would be doing well by copying the English example. To show the 9 necessity of drawing a distinction between different districts, it was only necessary to point to the observations which had been made during this debate with regard to trawling. Trawling on the East Coast meant beam or other trawling lines on the West Coast—it meant, in a large measure, circular net fishing. If they spoke to a Loch Fyne fisherman about trawling, the operations of the beam trawl would never enter his head. Therefore, he thought the Fishery Board should be very careful in dealing with these matters, seeing that, though the methods of fishing were perfectly understood by fishermen, different treatment was required in different districts. He thought, moreover, that the Fishery Board should have power to make regulations for the assistance of the fishermen in the different districts, which regulations should he ratified by the Secretary for Scotland. His object in proposing this was that, after all, at the present moment, the fishery regulations should be more or less tentative. They might introduce regulations in a district which seemed to be very good, but when they came to be worked out it might be found that they required alteration. If they were all crystallized in a Bill, or in an Act of Parliament, they might have to introduce another Act of Parliament to repeal what was found not to act properly; whereas, if the regulations were laid down by the Fishery Board, they could be easily altered and brought into use, and would be of good service to the fishermen in each district. There were two other matters which should be dealt with in the coming Bill. One of them related solely to the state of things on the East Coast—and he was rather surprised that no hon. Member representing that part of Scotland had mentioned it. He believed it was referred to casually by one hon. Member, though by whom he did not recollect. He alluded to the question of giving titles to fishermen for the houses they had already built—of adopting some cheap method of giving titles to houses which the fishermen, or their forefathers, had erected, and for which they were paying ground rent, but in regard to which they had no written title. There was one other point which had been constantly pressed on both sides of the House, and that was the right to use the waste foreshores 10 given under the Act 11 Geo. III., c. 31, that had been mentioned on several occasions and on both sides of the House, and he thought that this would be a very fit and proper occasion for the Government to lay down some simple plan for dealing with the matter. These were two questions which would be far better settled by the Government than by any private Board, and he hoped that, as they all had at heart the interest of this great fishing industry, they would endeavour to make it as good and satisfactory a measure as possible.
§ MR. E. W. DUFF (Banffshire)said, that the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Argyllshire (Colonel Malcolm) had undoubtedly alluded to one of the most important questions connected with the interests of the fishermen of Scotland, and that was the question of their title to the houses they had built. He would remind the hon. and gallant Gentleman that he (Mr. E. W. Duff) had, from that Bench, put a question to the late Lord Advocate on two occasions asking him when he intended to give effect to the recommendations contained in the Fishery Board's Report on that subject, and he had got the usual official answer that the Government were considering the question. He supposed the Government would continue to consider the question for some time. He was sometimes told that the question was one which would be more properly dealt with by the Local Government Board, and he therefore trusted that the Government would not forget it when they came to frame their Local Government measure next year. His hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Argyllshire had alluded to the Bill he introduced this Session. It might be out of Order to go into the details of that Bill, but he would merely say with regard to it that the hon. and gallant Gentleman was quite mistaken when he supposed that the fishermen on the East Coast were opposed to the Bill. His constituents had had several meetings on the subject, and had approved of the Bill, subject to one or two alterations which he need not go into. He could only say, if the hon. and gallant Gentleman would bring in that Bill again, he (Mr. E. W. Duff), for one, would give him his cordial support so far as the second reading was concerned. Now, the hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire 11 (Mr. Esslemont) seemed to think that an unfair amount of money had been given to Banffshire for the construction of harbours. Well, he could only say, in reply, that if the fishermen of Aberdeenshire would follow the example of the fishermen of Banffshire, and would contribute to the harbours to the same extent, they would be in a better position with regard to this matter.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTWe have done so, but we have not got anything.
§ MR. E. W. DUFFsaid, he would mention, as anillustration, the harbours at Findochty and Port Knockie, one of which was built and the other being built, costing £10,000 each. In one case the locality had contributed £4,000 and in the other £3,500. He challenged the hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire to quote a parallel in his county.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTI accept the challenge. We will raise the same amount of money if the hon. Member will guarantee that we shall get an equal grant from the Treasury.
§ MR. R. W. DUFFsaid, that, at any rate, the fishermen of Aberdeenshire had not yet done this, and he should be very glad if they did. To spend a small amount of money upon many harbours would simply be throwing it away. Take, as an illustration, the case of Stonehaven. He believed Banffshire had got the large amount of money he had mentioned, because sufficient money had not been raised to make a harbour at Stonehaven. The Fishery Board thought it better to give a large amount of money for a good harbour at one place rather than to spend a small amount upon a bad harbour elsewhere. There was one matter of a practical character with regard to which he should like to have some information from some hon. Gentleman on the Treasury Bench, and that was as to what was being done in regard to the surplus herring brand fee. He had been Chairman of the Committee in 1881 which recommended that the surplus brand fee should go to the Fishery Board. Ever since the Treasury had been making inroads into this fund for Imperial purposes. When this brand money was first given in 1883, he found that the amount deducted from the brand fees was £5,405, which was the whole charge made against the surplus 12 brand fees. But if he looked at the last Estimate he found that had swollen to £6,514—that was to say, they were now getting less by £1,100 than they were getting in 1883. The charge principally increased in the year 1886. He found that in 1886 the charges against the brand fee jumped from £5,600 to £6,300; and, when they came to look into this, it appeared to him that the Government were going on the principle of pensioning everybody out of the brand fee—all the retired fishery officers seemed to be pensioned out of the brand fee. He found that the pensions in 1883 amounted to £398, and that this year it amounted to £758. He must protest against this. If the fishery officers had to perform a series of Imperial duties as well as other duties they ought to be paid for the work out of an Imperial fund—he referred to duties connected with trawling and the numbering of boats, and numerous other duties. Why should they be pensioned off out of the brand fee? He protested against it. Then it seemed to him that the whole of the stationery of the Fishery Board was charged out of the surplus brand fee. The stationery, which originally cost £30 a-year, had now run up so high as £121. He did not like to use strong language against the Treasury, but he thought that in this way they were acting somewhat shabbily, because there was no doubt that this money came wholly out of the fishermen's pockets. When he was Chairman of the Committee he entertained a strong opinion that the whole of the accumulated surplus ought to go to the Fishery Board; and there was an accumulated surplus of £31,000. Of course, on the Committee, they had to make the best bargain they could. The Treasury was represented on that Committee by a respected friend of his, Mr. J. Holms, who was no longer a Member of the House. He had been obliged to feel this gentleman's pulse, and ultimately it was arranged, as a matter of compromise, that the Treasury should give the brand money in future. Well, the Fishery Board were short of money for many purposes—for harbours, for establishing a proper system of mussel and oyster culture, and for other purposes. This was an appropriate fund for these purposes, and he submitted that the Scotch Members ought to get the accumulated surplus from the 13 Treasury. He had not the slightest doubt that if this money belonged in the same way to Ireland the Irish Members would have got it out of the Treasury long ago. He should expect to get some answer from the Representatives of the Government with regard to whether or not this money, which was now pocketed by the Treasury for Imperial purposes, ought not to go to the fishermen? He had put the same Question to the Predecessor of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate, and he had been promised an answer. He had not received an answer, however, and he sincerely hoped he should get it that day. He did not wish to go into the larger question of harbours. No one connected with the East Coast of Scotland could for a moment doubt the necessity for improved harbour accommodation. At the present moment they only got £3,000 a-year from the Government directly for their harbours, and that, they knew, was quite inadequate. Unless the Government were prepared to go into a large scheme of harbour accommodation, he had always said, and he should continue to say, he was opposed to the principle of getting grants for harbours here and harbours there which inevitably led to jobbery. What was wanted was to come to fair terms with the Treasury—that where the localities were willing to help themselves they would get money at a fair rate of interest. He thought at one time that he had got the Government to agree to that, and the hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) had promised him that he would in future grant money on the terms of the Act of 1861—that was to say, to be paid off in 50 years at the rate of 3¼ per cent. The hon. Gentleman had said they might require collateral security, but when they came to issue regulations they made collateral security a sine quâ non; and in many parts of Scotland there was no means at all of giving that. There were places where security was quite ample, and he could not see the necessity in such instances of requiring collateral security. This was a matter which he trusted the Government would also deal with in their Local Government Bill. He thought it would be a great principle to establish Harbour Boards, through which, within certain districts, they might get security and find means to defray necessary expenses. They had framed a very elabo 14 rate scheme in the Committee on Harbour Boards, and that, he thought, might very well be introduced into any Local Government scheme the Government might bring forward.
§ MR. FINLAY (Inverness, &c.)said, he desired to join in the appeal made to the Government by an hon. Member with regard to the Salmon Fishery Bill that it was understood was in preparation at an earlier period of the Session, and he earnestly hoped that the Bill would be introduced next Session, as he could assure the Government that the want of such a measure was very seriously felt. There was one very considerable grievance in his own constituency, which he would not particularly refer to, which it was hoped the Bill would provide a means of remedying, and he earnestly trusted, therefore, that the measure would be kept in view next Session. With regard to the various questions affecting sea fisheries which had been mentioned in the course of the debate, he noticed that the Secretary for Scotland had recently had an interview with hon. Members representing the Scotch fishery interest. Those hon. Members laid their views before the noble Lord, and it was to be hoped that the result of that deputation and the result of these discussions would cause the Government to give their attention to the propriety of dealing with these various questions, some of which were of a very urgent character. As to salaries of the fishery officers, there was no doubt that the duties of these officers had been very much increased. Their duties were now of very great importance indeed, and involved the possession of qualifications that were not required of these officials at the time when the scale of salaries was decided upon. He hoped the Government would take into consideration the propriety of affording adequate remuneration to these men. There was no true economy in underpaying officials who had to perform such important duties as those which devolved upon the fishery officers. There was another question of great importance to fishermen, particularly those on the East Coast of Scotland—namely, that of trawling. It had been brought forward time after time, and he believed that there was a consensus of opinion, that trawling within the territorial waters ought to be put a stop to. There were places where it might be 15 permitted, but he believed they were very exceptional indeed, and he held that the Government would do well to support the Fishery Board, and, if necessary, to stimulate it in making full use of the powers which had been conferred upon them in this matter. Personally, he would like to go a little further than the territorial waters, because there were banks where fishing was carried on almost entirely by Scotch fishermen, which were in some cases miles beyond the territorial limits-banks upon which, if trawling were allowed to continue, the fish would be entirely destroyed. There would be no difficulty in preventing trawling in such localities by British subjects, for they were, of course, amenable to British law. Of course, foreigners were not amenable to British law, but in their case it would be sufficient to forbid foreign vessels, trawling in these localities, from bringing their fish into English or Scotch ports. Either this method could be adopted or a Convention might be entered into with the nations to which these foreign trawlers belonged, if it was found necessary to prevent the destruction of the supply of fish on particular banks. If there were any difficulty in arriving at such a Convention practically, the purpose could be effected by the other method he suggested. By prohibiting the foreign vessels from bringing their fish into English or Scotch ports those vessels would be unable to get rid of their fish, the distance to their native ports being too great. The difficulty in regard to this matter was felt at the present moment by Scotch fishermen beyond the limits of the territorial waters.
§ MR. S. WILLIAMSON (Kilmarnock, &c.)said, as he had happened for a few years to be a member of the Scotch Fishery Board, he, perhaps, would be allowed to say a few words by way of contribution towards this discussion. He did not at all sympathize with the grudging comments made with regard to the salary of the Chairman of the Fishery Board. Sir Thomas Boyd devoted a great deal of time to the work of the Board. The other members were in the habit of attending perhaps, on an average, once a week, but Sir Thomas Boyd attended every day and superintended the work in many particulars, giving himself a great deal to 16 do. He did not think this gentleman was paid too high a salary—in fact, he should not like to estimate the monetary value of this gentleman's services, the matter being one for the Treasury itself to adjust. All he could say was, that he did not believe £800 a-year was too much. It might be that some other members of the Board, who came from a distance, were entitled to their travelling expenses, but the constitution of the Board was that of an honorary Body with a paid Chairman, and that constitution should not be altered without careful consideration. He did not sympathize with the comments made with regard to the position of the Sheriffs on the Board. The three Sheriffs of the maritime counties of Aberdeen, Orkney and Shetland, and Argyllshire were, he was free to say, the best members of the Board, and devoted a great deal of time to its work. A great many local questions were raised in the course of the operations of the Board, and these gentlemen always gave attention to such matters, besides being most earnest and desirous in promoting in every way the prosperity of the Scotch fisheries. He should think a great deal less of the Fishery Board if these gentlemen were removed from it, and their places occupied by other persons less likely to be useful. Some vague statements had been made as to the supposed unpopularity of the Board. What did these statements amount to? The Members who made them had, on the other hand, eulogized the work of the Board, and everyone who regarded the position of the Board and its work, not only this year, but in past years, must see that a great deal of useful work had been done by it, and must admit that, instead of this nagging criticism, it deserved encouragement. This he knew—that the Board would never be popular in Scotland amongst the fishermen, until a much larger amount of money was placed at their disposal for helping the fishermen in the construction of harbours. This was patent to his mind as soon as he joined the Board in 1881. As soon as the new Board was constituted, applications were sent in in shoals from all parts of the coast for harbour works. In a year the applications amounted to no less than 60, the amount asked for being from £2,000 or £3,000 to £60,000. Well, the amount the 17 Government gave the Board for the encouragement of this work of harbour construction was £3,000, and a small share of the brand fees, and this amounted to nothing at all when divided amongst so many. The first step taken was to ask the fishermen to send in a plan or survey of the manner in which they wished to extend the existing harbour, or build a new one, or put an old one into good condition. These plans and sketches and reports cost £10, £15, or £20, which amount the fishermen paid out of a small collection amongst themselves. They were content to make this collection in the hope that they would get something from the Fishery Board, but after spending their money and waiting year after year, the answer of the Board generally was—in fact must be—"We have no money." An hon. Member had referred to Stonehaven. It would be of immense importance to Scotland to have a good harbour built there, the position being a very exposed one. It was the best possible site for a harbour in the interest of the white fishing industry on the East Coast of Scotland. He (Mr. S. Williamson) had visited the spot with Sir Thomas Boyd, and had examined it in the presence of several Local Authorities. They had examined the site with the plans submitted to them, and the conclusion they had arrived at was, that it would be a highly beneficial work if the harbour could be constructed there. There were two plans, one of which, if carried out, would cost £27,000. That expenditure was deemed to be insufficient, and they had concluded that the better plan would be the more expensive one, the cost of which would be £60,000. It would be utterly impossible for the fishermen to raise that, even with all the assistance the Fishery Board could possibly give. The Board would have to hoard up their resources for five or six years in order to give £20,000 or £25,000, and in giving such a sum as that they would be depriving all other parts of Scotland of some little help. The fishermen, moreover, would not have been able to raise the collateral security required by the Government. The result was that this impossible work remained untouched. He would earnestly appeal to hon. Gentlemen who came there to criticize the action of the Fishery Board in a nagging manner to consider what it was 18 made the Board unpopular amongst the fishermen of Scotland. It was want of money. As harbours of this description would be works of national benefit, he would ask those hon. Members to urge the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer to grant a sum of £50,000 or £100,000 per annum to the Fishery Board, in order to give assistance in cases of this kind. If they did that, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer yielded to their pressure, there would soon be an end to all the complaints against the Fishery Board. The Board would no longer be unpopular, of that he was perfectly sure. It had been said, as to the scientific work of the Board, that something should be done to direct it more to the question of fish culture, than to those academical matters, which it would be better to leave to the Universities. The question of the propagation of lobsters and other shell fish, for instance, was a matter which the scientific branch should deal with. If the scientific branch could advance subjects of this kind, they would be doing a great deal of good. With regard to trawling, he himself had proposed in that House that trawling should be prohibited on banks and fishing grounds largely visited by line fishermen, even if outside the territorial waters; but at that time the Law Officers of the Crown on both sides of the House told him that this could not be done, and that the House had absolutely no power of legislation beyond the three mile limit—beyond the territorial waters. He hoped that the Law Officers of that day were in error, and that the view of the hon. and learned Member for Inverness (Mr. Finlay) would prevail. He trusted that the hon. and learned Gentleman would himself endeavour to deal with the subject. The powers which had been given to the Fishery Board with regard to trawling were of a very experimental nature, and he thought that Board had acted very wisely in so far exercising their statutable powers only in an experimental way. The evidence before the Committee was enough to show that the entire stoppage of trawling within the territorial waters could be carried out with great benefit and advantage to the in-shore fishermen.
§ MR. MUNRO FERGUSON (Leith, &c.)said, he hoped the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for Argyllshire 19 (Colonel Malcolm) would receive the attention it deserved from Her Majesty's Government. Several important points Lad been touched on by hon. Members, and, without recapitulating them at any length, he (Mr. Munro-Ferguson) would refer especially to the question of sites for fishermen's houses and the election of representatives on the District Fishery Boards. He held it to be extremely important that fishermen should be able to obtain titles to their houses without too much difficulty and expense. He had had some personal experience in this matter, and could inform the Committee that in certain fishing villages the ground rents were 2s. 6d. a-year. If the customary titles in these cases were changed into feus the cost to the fishermen of obtaining such a title would be £4 or £5, which was a prohibitive sum. With regard to carrying out the regulations for the protection of line fishermen within the three mile limit, he would point out that in order to carry out the regulations which had been issued by the Scotch Fishery Board the ships intrusted with the task of seeing that trawling was not carried on in forbidden waters should be sufficiently numerous. At present the situation was this. The Jackal, stationed in the Forth—or supposed to be stationed in the Forth, for she had not been there for a very long time—was too slow to be of any real service. In addition to that disadvantage, she remained anchored in the Forth, instead of going to the fishing grounds at such times as the trawling was carried on within the prohibited limits. Then, again, there were no practical men on board the vessel, men who knew where the trawlers went and who would be able to check their depredations. With no one on board who knew where the trawlers went there was not much chance of the Jackal finding them. Some reference had been made to the discontent which existed with the Fishery Board, and the reasons which had been given for it. He thought there was considerable truth in both the main reasons. The question of the money granted for the use of the Fishery Board was a most important matter, and he hoped Her Majesty's Government would have some regard to the amount of money which was spent in other countries with which we competed in fishing produce and in 20 the fishing industry. In Norway, for instance, enormous sums, compared with the revenue of the country and its resources, were spent on the development of the fishing industry and on harbours, and he thought that the fishing community in Scotland were entitled to much larger grants than those which the Fishery Board had at present at its disposal. Even the small amount of money which was received from the surplus of the brand fees seemed to go, at any rate to the extent of one-half, to the Treasury. The grant given last year from the surplus was £3,600, and the total sum received by the Fishery Board from surplus brand fees and the Government grant was over £6,000. He thought the Fishery Board should have the expenditure of the money it was supposed to receive, and he did not think the sum allowed was sufficient. The various questions which had been raised before the Committee had been debated in the House on many previous occasions, and he believed the neglect of these questions by the Government was one of the reasons of the very prolonged debates which the Scotch Estimates were receiving on this occasion. They were told last night by the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury that the Scotch were a practical people, and, therefore, ought to vote the Estimates with as little delay as possible. Well, it was exactly because the Scotch were a practical people and because their former attitude in regard to Scotch affairs had met with so little success that they had been induced to abandon their old plan and adopt a new attitude. He feared that debates on these matters would in future be much more embittered and prolonged than they had been in the previous experience of the House.
§ DR. FARQUHARSON (Aberdeenshire, W.)said, that amongst the great variety of miscellaneous literature sent for the inspection of Members of the House, he should think that very few hon. Gentlemen present had paid special attention to the Reports of the Scotch Fishery Board, and yet he found that without such attention and without careful perusal of these Reports full justice could not be done to the amount of admirable and scientific work done by that Board. He should like to call attention to the services performed by the ship Garnet, which had been placed at 21 the disposal of the Fishery Board. He should consider it a misfortune if any restriction whatever were placed upon the scope and nature of the scientific work of the Board, but, at the same time, he quite understood the feelings of practical men in their want of confidence in the operations of scientific men in matters of this kind. They all knew that scientific methods were slow and complicated, and did not always seem to have a special bearing on the work in hand. They all knew that gentlemen who usually worked by rule of thumb liked to operate quickly, and that they even had considerable want of confidence in the slower methods of science. But he thought that in case of fishing practice must follow science, seeing that what was most wanted was a knowledge of the habits and migrations of fish. They wanted also the investigation of statistics. They particularly wanted this investigation as to the trawling question, in regard to which the Board had already done such good and practical work. As to the constitution of the Board, he was inclined to agree with those who thought that the Chairman of the Board was paid too much, and the other members of the Board too little, in that they received nothing at all. He did not suppose that the whole energy and ability of the Board was centred in the head, and that the body and tail had none. It was said that some of the other members of the Board did not attend regularly—then he thought that a small fee would stimulate them in their attendance. With regard to the question of the Sheriffs, he conceived that there was a great advantage in their being on the Board. They did their work well, and when inquiries were being held the presence of these gentlemen in a semi-official capacity gave very great weight to the proceedings. With regard to Professor Ewart, no doubt he discharged very important duties at the University, but his time was very greatly taken with his duties in connection with the Board. The work he was doing now was not only of great advantage to the Fishery Board, and to fishermen themselves, but also to the reputation of the University of Edinburgh. An hon. Member had directed attention to the fact that certain gentlemen who were doing valuable scientific work had no connection with the Board, and had expressed 22 the opinion that they should have some recognized position in connection with it—that, in fact, they should have the regulation of the scientific work. One of these gentlemen who had done most excellent work was a son of a most valued friend of theirs in Edinburgh—namely, Mr. Matthews, formerly Lord Provost of the town. He thought that this gentleman should have some recognized position on the Board. They had heard a great deal about trawling. Everyone who read the reports of these scientific men would see that they emphatically condemned unrestricted trawling, because there could be no doubt that trawling tended to injure the inmature fish and spawning beds, partly of herrings, and they know also that flat-fishing was completely destroyed by trawling. They had recently had to complain of what was a very objectionable thing—namely, an invasion of English trawlers who came from the Tyne, and it would be well if steps could be taken to put a stop to this. Then regulations were required for the oyster fisheries, which were almost extinct in Scotland, and greatly required development. He trusted that was a point which the Fishery Board would take into their consideration. He also concurred in what had been said in regard to the mussel beds. Now, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Marjoribanks) was doing an excellent work, and he quite agreed with the fishermen themselves, who, in this matter, were in no degree revolutionary. The fishermen did not want to take away anyone's property, or to have unrestricted powers; but what they did want was to have the necessary powers to enable them to obtain bait in order to carry on their industry. They themselves acknowledged that when unrestricted use of the beds was allowed the beds soon became exhausted, but they wanted at reasonable times, and at a reasonable cost, to be allowed to obtain the vessels which were necessary for their fishing operations.
§ DR. CAMERON (Glasgow, College)said, he wished to call attention to one point in particular—that was, the treatment of the West Coast of Scotland on this Board. He had hoped that the hon. and gallant Member for Argyllshire would have referred to that, but perhaps he was deterred by the fact that the Sheriff of Argyllshire was a valuable 23 member of the Board. That gentleman should not, however, be regarded in the least as a local representative. He was a resident in Edinburgh, and would rather be considered as connected with Edinburgh than with Argyllshire, though, being Sheriff of that county, he was expected to perform certain duties in connection with it. As a matter of fact, out of a Board of nine there was only one man who practically represented all the West Coast of Scotland, although the coast line was much more extensive than that of the East Coast. There had been some fishery investigations carried out on the West Coast, but they were considered to have been carried out in a perfunctory manner, and there was no expectation of its leading to a practical result. This was a point which deserved consideration in connection with the constitution of any new Board, or any alteration of the present Board—namely, the adequate representation of the West Coast. The West Coast was very largely interested in the question of harbour accommodation. As to the proposal of the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. S. Williamson), he considered that to impose legislative restriction on the scientific investigations to be carried out by the Board would be to tie the hands of the Board. The Board should be relied upon to limit their investigations to that which they considered necessary to bring about practical results. As to waste foreshores, he thought the whole question of foreshore rights was one to which the attention of the Government might well be directed in connection with the fishing industry. Public rights had been given away for the benefit of private individuals, often for absurdly small sums of money. Those rights, on compensation being given, might with perfect justice be resumed, and the resumption of these rights and their devotion to fishing purposes would in many cases be attended with great advantage and convenience to the fishing community.
§ MR. HUNTER (Aberdeen, N.)said, he had to complain that the prohibition of trawling had been withdrawn on some parts of the coast, in order to carry out scientific experiments. He did not object to the expenditure of the Fishery Board on scientific experiments, but he did object to experiments for 24 the purpose of ascertaining the habits of fish being carried out at the expense of the fishermen. He knew the danger of practical men undertaking or interfering with scientific experiments. No doubt there were many inedible fish which had acquired a habit of eating edible fish, but he did not see why the fishermen should pay the cost of setting up a theory upon the subject. He admitted that up to the present time the scientific investigations of the Fishery Board had not been of any remarkable value, but he had no desire that the Government should discourage the experiments, and he could not doubt that if they were continued a valuable result would be obtained in reference to the fish and the fisheries all round the United Kingdom. The hon. and gallant Member for Argyllshire (Colonel Malcolm) introduced a Bill in relation to trawling early in the Session, the object of which had already been described to the Committee. The Bill of the hon. and gallant Member had this drawback—that it dealt not only with the question of trawling, but with various disputable matters, and introduced two Sabbaths, the Scotch people being perfectly satisfied with one. The introduction of a second was only calculated to give rise to considerable discussion and difference of opinion. He had felt that if there was any prospect of dealing with the question of trawling in the course of the Session it ought to be entirely separated from any controversial matter, and accordingly he had introduced a Bill early in the Session dealing with the question of trawling alone. He had expressed his willingness to the late Lord Advocate to limit the provisions of the Bill, if it were considered that they ought to be limited, and in Committee upon the measure he was prepared to give certain powers to the Fishery Board. But what was the course pursued by the Government? Although they had abundant evidence in their possession to prove that trawling within the three mile limit was primâ facie injurious, they refused to support a Bill to prohibit it, although it met the approval of hon. Members on the other side of the House. On several occasions a Member of the Government blocked the Bill, and prevented it from being discussed, and when that course was not followed hon. Members sitting behind the Treasury 25 Bench were induced to block it. Owing to the refusal of the Lord Advocate to have the measure discussed he found himself compelled to give notice of the withdrawal of the Bill. The result was that, if the fishermen of Scotland would have to suffer for another year from the depredations of the trawlers, they owed it entirely to the Government. His hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Inverness Burghs (Mr. Finlay) had raised a question of very great importance; and, although he (Mr. Hunter) did not propose to enlarge upon the subject, he entirely supported the views of his hon. and learned Friend in regard to the course which the Government ought to take in reference to trawling. There ought to be no difficulty whatever in enabling the Fishery Board to control the fishing, whether it was carried on by trawling or otherwise, especially within the three mile or territorial limit. No doubt there was a distinction to be drawn between trawling within territorial waters and trawling carried on beyond the three mile limit. He thought that a strong case had been made out, quite sufficient for any purpose of practical legislation, that trawling within the three mile limit ought to be entirely prohibited, but that power should be given to the Fishery Board to make exceptions where good cause could be shown. At the same time he did not think that a sufficiently primâ facie case had been made against trawling outside the three mile limit to justify its entire prohibition; and he thought the Government ought to exercise great care in not pushing legislation beyond the absolute necessities of the case. At the same time there were beds, and shoals, and banks outside which were resorted to by the fish as breeding stations; and if the Government were prepared to empower the Fishery Board to deal with such an exceptional case he thought they would find plenty of support.
§ THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON) (Bute)said, that many useful and practical suggestions had been made in the course of the debate; and, if he was now unable to refer specifically to all of the topics which had been introduced, it was not from want of appreciation of their value or importance. He should touch upon the various topics he intended to refer to rather as 26 subjects of discussion than in reference to the order in which they had been introduced. In the first place there was the Fishery Board. Various comments and criticisms had been made as to the composition of the Fishery Board, as to the Chairman's salary, and as to the representation of fishing interests upon it. He would remind the Committee that there was one thing it was necessary for them to bear in mind, and that was that the Board was constituted comparatively so recently as 1882. It was perfectly true that the powers and functions of the Board had since then been very widely extended, and it would not be right or wise to doubt that the State, in creating the Board so strong, had carefully considered what its composition ought to be. He made that observation with special reference to the remarks which had been made as to the Chairman and the three Sheriffs. The experience of all who had sat on Boards of this description was that it was essential to the continuous and proper administration of the Board that there should be at least one member charged with the duty of being on the spot co-operating with the Secretary in keeping the business going. For that purpose it was desirable to have a salaried Chairman. Therefore, with that object it was necessary that there should be a salary, and the experience of the Department showed that the best plan was to have a salaried Chairman. They required for that position a person of good business abilities, and they must offer the remuneration that was likely to secure such services. He did not gather that there was anything like unanimity in the Committee in respect of the Chairman's salary, for he thought that several hon. Gentlemen—one of whom had spoken with the experience of a late member of the Board, and another from very competent knowledge—had stated that the best course was to have a salaried Chairman. He felt sure that the Committee generally would agree with him that, whatever might be said as to the qualifications of Sir Thomas Boyd, it was only fair and right that there should be no disparagement of his industry and his attention to his duties. When the Board was established, he presumed that then, as now, the object of the Legislature was that efficiency should be combined with economy. The second criticism which had 27 been made as to the composition of the Board related to the three Sheriffs. With regard to those gentlemen, although a lawyer himself, he did not see anything in the nature of things which rendered it absolutely necessary to have three lawyers appointed; but the presence on the Board of a lawyer, or some lawyers, was, he thought, desirable, because certain questions constantly arose which required a technical knowledge of law, and he imagined that the reason why it was prescribed by statute that there should be three Sheriffs was because that was a way of finding three men on the spot of presumable business capacity and administrative experience who were to serve for nothing. It was reasons of economy that brought about the arrangement. The present Government, he might remark in passing, were not responsible for that arrangement, and he only gave this as the fair and reasonable ground which actuated the Predecessors of the present Administration. Observations had been made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Marjoribanks) as to two members of the original Board who went out in 1888. And it was suggested that the mode in which the retirement was carried out had not been harmonious to the feelings of the retiring members, nor a due recognition of their services. He regretted that any impression of that kind should have been left upon these gentlemen in consequence of anything that had taken place, and he, therefore, desired to take that opportunity of publicly stating, on behalf of the Department in charge of the matter, that it was from no want of appreciation of the admirable manner in which those gentlemen had given their services gratuitously, with much attention and assiduity, and with great advantage to the public. He hoped that what he had now said would be accepted by the two gentlemen in question as an ample recognition of the value of the services they had rendered in the interests of the Public Service. He came now to another question of very great importance—namely, the proper representation of the various industries concerned on the Board. He thought he should be fully borne out when he said that that was one of the problems connected with the subject. The difficulty had been to find men with direct and ade 28 quate knowledge, and, at the same time, with administrative capacity, who could give their services to the Board. The problem had, in the meantime, been solved by the selection of new members of the Board; and he believed he was expressing the sentiments of those acquainted with the new Board when he said that the experiment had been very successful. The new members possessed that invaluable qualification—the confidence of the fishermen. Not only was it necessary that the members of the Board should be able and competent men, but it was further necessary that they should possess the confidence of those whose lives and living were largely affected by this legislation. He passed now to the largest subject which had been dwelt upon. As to the subject of trawling, he must remind the Committee that the policy of 1885 was an experimental policy. That was to say that the Fishery Board were intrusted to carry out investigations in order to satisfy themselves of the extent of the injury done by trawling, so far as the various fishing grounds were concerned, and they were further empowered to pass bye-laws regulating the mode of fishing. Scientific investigations, accompanied by experiments, had been instituted, and the Board proceeded to deal with particular parts of the coast gradually, so that they might acquire some experience in regard to the bye-laws which it might be necessary to lay down. As soon as the experimental inspection of a particular part of the coast was complete, and the results ascertained, the Board proceeded to prescribe regulations wherever positive injury had been proved. The Fishery Board had proceeded cautiously but assiduously; they had issued bye-laws as the result of their experimental investigations in the different localities, and he believed that a very large part of the East Coast had been, or would shortly be, proclaimed from trawling. He would remind the Committee that the Act of 1885 did not preclude or prejudge the question of trawling generally, and the results of the experiments were not mature enough to justify an absolute prescription. The Board had full power to deal with the matter, but it was thought that the experiments had not yet been sufficiently advanced to justify a universal rule for the whole 29 of Scotland. It would be found from their Report that the bye-laws laid down affected a very considerable part of the coast. There was great force, he thought, in the observation of the hon. and gallant Member for Argyllshire (Colonel Malcolm) as to the necessity for local powers to deal with fishing. Different districts required different treatment. He spoke with some personal interest in the matter, because he had the honour to represent a constituency whose frontier was wholly seaboard, and, therefore, he was fully alive to the immense interest at stake, and the necessity for protecting the fisheries. But it was necessary that there should be a cautious discrimination as to the circumstances which existed on one coast of the country, and the condition of things on the other. His hon. and gallant Friend proceeded to say that in any legislation that might be proposed there ought to be some recognition of the necessity of dividing the coast into districts. He did not suppose that his hon. and gallant Friend would expect him to say more upon that question now than that such a proposal was in complete consonance with the policy of the Act of 1885. According to the Act there were to be experiments carried out in various districts with a view of ascertaining whether it might not be possible to lay down some general rule. The hon. Member for East Aberdeen (Mr. Esslemont) and an hon. Gentleman below the Gangway had said something in regard to the propriety of limiting the scientific experiments. He hardly supposed that any vindication was necessary of the scientific experiments which were so essential a portion of the Act of 1885, and they would be acting in opposition to the spirit of the Act if the fullest powers were not given to the Board in that respect. As to the question of what checks ought to be required, he had already spoken in part, but it was a very interesting subject for Committee. With respect to the remarks of the hon. and learned Member for Inverness (Mr. Finlay) on the subject of legislation in reference to trawling beyond territorial waters, it was certainly a subject that demanded consideration, because the object of all fishery legislation must be to promote the prosperity of the industry; but it was hardly necessary to say that this was a delicate 30 question, especially when we might be trenching on ground in which other countries were interested. It would be indiscreet if anything more were said from that Bench which might at all prejudge the question. In reference to the question of trawling generally, several hon. Members had spoken of the injuries done by that mode of fishing to the fishing gear. He thought the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire was quite right in saying that the existing section of the Act of 1885 did not cover damages in respect of the loss of fish. That was his impression, but he did not speak at all ex cathedrâ on the subject. He certainly did not think that it did cover the loss of fish.
§ MR. HUNTERsaid, that that had already been decided in several cases.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, he should suppose that that was so. It would be exceedingly difficult to ascertain the loss, but he would rather not express an opinion at present as to what the actual state of the law was. Certainly when the wrong-doers were able at night to get rapidly out of sight there would be great difficulty in identifying them, and he could not see what means there could be of recouping those who had sustained loss. He felt, however, the necessity for caution before he pronounced whether it was practicable to carry out the section within the lines of the policy of the section itself. A suggestion had been made with regard to the insufficiency of the English sea police. That also was a matter which fell mainly within the province of the Fishery Board, and the speeches which had been made in the Committee with regard to it would have been more appropriately directed to the Fishery Board than to Her Majesty's Government. The same remark did not apply to the observation of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Marjoribanks) about the fishery officers. He felt the force of what the right hon. Gentleman had said as to the qualification under an old Act, 48 Geo. III., which might be altogether obsolete considering the novel duties the fishery officers were now called on to perform. It was certainly only reasonable to press that the question should receive consideration, but the consideration necessary would involve consultation with those who had practical experience. He 31 dared say the right hon. Gentleman would be willing to give the Government the benefit of his views on the subject. The question of the salaries of the fishery officers was one that he could not say much about until the functions and qualifications of the officers themselves had been ascertained. Before that was done it was scarcely possible to pronounce an opinion upon the matter, especially in the absence of an understanding as to what the qualification of the candidates was to be. Some of the fishery officers, at the present moment, performed valuable public services, but it was quite true that some of the functions discharged by them were of a novel, and in some respects a laborious character. He had no doubt the right hon. Gentleman would agree with him that the present condition of business did not require that be should enter more fully into the matter. He would, therefore, pass on to the question of harbours. He had said something last night, which had been misapprehended, as to the present extent of the powers of the Fishery Board in respect of harbours. No doubt the work done had not realized the large expectations which had been formed of it on the assumption that the subject was to be dealt with in a more comprehensive way. It was only right to say that progress was being made of a substantial kind. The Committee would be able to judge what use the Fishery Board had made of their powers as respected harbours by referring to page 23 of the Report. No good would be accomplished by frittering away sums of money inadequate to effect any practical object, and no doubt many applicants had been disappointed. The hon. Member for Banffshire (Mr. B. W. Duff) had made a suggestion which was entitled to careful consideration—namely, the use that might be made of local resources in connection with the construction of harbours. He only mentioned the matter for the purpose of saying that the suggestion was an important one, and well worthy of consideration; and he hoped the hon. Gentleman would not look upon his introduction of the subject as having been thrown away if he only obtained the publicity which his statement would secure. There was one phase of the question with which he was unable to deal, as the hon. Member had 32 not given him Notice of his intention to raise it, but his hon. Colleague the Member for Wigtonshire (Sir Herbert Maxwell), who represented the Treasury, would deal with it subsequently. There were certain other subjects incidental to the question of the fisheries which he would not notice, not from any want of respect for the hon. Gentleman who had raised them, but because they were subjects which would be more appropriately dealt with by the Fishery Board, such as the fishermen's dwellings, the use of the foreshores, and other cognate matters, which, involving as they did an interference with private rights, would require to be dealt with by legislation. [Sir GEORGE CAMPBELL: No.] He took the dissent of the hon. Member for Kirkealdy as representing the view his hon. Friend took of the matter. In the view of the hon. Member it was always easy to legislate upon these matters.
§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLEasy, but not novel.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, he could only say that these questions required much fuller consideration than could be given to them in a debate upon the Estimates. They were questions in which a large portion of the fishing population were deeply interested, and would require careful treatment. The only other point was the Salmon Fisheries Bill. The Government proposed to introduce that Bill in the course of the present Session, but he could not name the precise day, nor was it material, as the only object was to secure that the measure should be before the country during the Recess.
§ MR. MARJORIBANKS (Berwickshire)said, he should only trouble the Committee with a few observations. What he understood in regard to the Salmon Fisheries Bill was, that it would be introduced this Session in order that it might be before those interested in the matter during the Recess, so that there might be an opportunity of considering its provisions before the beginning of next Session. He thought it was absolutely necessary that the Chairman of the Scotch Fishery Board should have a considerable salary. The work of the Board must in a large measure fall upon the Chairman, and unless it was proposed to pay the gentleman who occupied that position a 33 very substantial salary, it would be impossible to get a sufficiently capable man to perform the duties of the office. He thought the new appointments which had been made to the Board would be satisfactory, and he hoped that the same principle would be adopted in making other appointments in future. In regard to the Gentlemen who had retired, he could only say that they felt somewhat sore at the manner in which they had been treated. Nothing, of course, could be more courteous and candid than the expressions which had been used towards these Gentlemen by the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate, but he (Mr. Marjoribanks) must repeat that they felt the treatment they had received very keenly, and had desired that the matter should be brought before the House. He could not altogether agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman as to the view he took of the Act of 1885 with regard to trawling. The provisions of the Act gave to the Fishery Board far more than experimental powers. It gave to the Board ample powers to deal with trawling, and to prohibit it not only within the three mile limit but in other places, if the experiments they were authorized to carry out proved that such a step was necessary. Their action was not confined in any way whatever, but they had power to prohibit trawling altogether, if necessary. According to the Report issued by the Board, they had come to the conclusion that in shallow and confined waters trawling did a great deal of harm, and also that in such districts the inconvenience occasioned to the trawlers by the prohibition of trawling would be exceedingly small. Judging from the evidence given in the Report, he certainly thought the time had come when they should take the bull by the horns and prohibit trawling altogether. He was quite sure that none of those who were interested in fishery matters would be satisfied until the Board absolutely prohibited trawling. The right hon. and learned Gentleman's answer in regard to the qualifications of the fishery officers was quite satisfactory, but he could not say as much in reference to the point of increase of salary. He did not think the duties of the fishery officers required any considerable amount of definition, and if the right hon. and learned Gentleman would go to Dover 34 House they would be able to tell him fully what the duties of the Scotch fishery officers were. He had been able to trace out some very important duties last night, and all of them were new duties which had been imposed upon the officers within the last few years in addition to their original duty of branding the barrels in which cured herrings were packed. It was for that particular purpose that the fishery officers were originally appointed, but the other duties which had been thrown upon them since were of infinitely higher importance than branding the herrings. No recognition of these additional duties had been made either in the shape of salary or improvement of position. In regard to harbours, he had not mentioned that question last night in reference to the Fishery Board, because neither in the past nor in the present had any confidence been reposed in the Board as to their administration of harbours. He did not say that that was altogether the fault of the Board, but it was a curious fact, with regard to the correctness of which be would challenge contradiction, that of all the fishery harbours the Fishery Board had undertaken—and he supposed that since they were instituted they had advanced money to something like 36 different harbours—there was not one of them in which an ordinary Scotch fishing boat could get in at low water spring tides. It certainly appeared to him that the first requisite of a good fishing harbour was that it should be accessible to the fishing boats at all states of the tide, and it was singular that this first requisite had not been carried out in the case of a single harbour provided by the Fishery Board. He quite admitted that the Board had not a large sum of money to deal with, or that they were likely to get more. Consequently the fishermen of Scotland must not at present expect much in the shape of harbour works and improvements from the Scotch Fishery Board.
§ DR. CLARK (Caithness)said, that in 1886 and 1887 the late Lord Advocate, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Clackmannan (Mr. J. B. Balfour), promised the introduction of a measure to re-constitute the Fishery Board, and it was admitted that that would be a convenient time for doing so, as the Act of 1882 expired in October, 35 1887. Lord Lothian had sent a letter to him (Dr. Clark), not a private one, intimating that it was the intention of the Secretary for Scotland to introduce a Bill for that purpose this year, but the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate had now sat down and had not said a single word or given the slightest hope that the Scotch Office intended to do anything in the matter. It would, therefore, appear that they were moving backwards, and that the pledge which had been given to bring in a Bill was not to be carried out.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, the hon. Member would perhaps allow him to explain that the subject was at present under the consideration of the Government, with the view of legislation if necessary. There were certain subjects connected with the fishing question which pointed towards legislation, and it was most desirable that they should be comprehensively dealt with. It was for that reason the subject had been deferred in order that it might be dealt with in a satisfactory manner.
§ DR. CLARKsaid, he was glad to have had that explanation. They were, however, told the same thing last year, and more than that, a Bill for the purpose was promised this year; it had not, however, been brought on. Even now the Fishery Board was altogether unsatisfactory and required re-construction. The old Board, which ceased last year, did not possess the confidence of the people for a great many reasons, and in the first place, because it had no one on the Board who represented the classes affected by the legislation. The members of the Board were always fighting among themselves. One clique—the scientific clique—wanted all the money spent in one direction, whereas the clique of practical men wanted to spend it in another, and the members of the Board were consequently at sixes and sevens among themselves. They had now got rid of one section of the Board, comprising two of its members, whose time having expired, had ceased to be associated with the Board. Nevertheless, the Board still remained unsatisfactory, and required to be re-constructed. The sooner it was re-constructed the better. The position of both the Chairman and the Secretary was unsatisfactory. He had no doubt Sir Thomas Boyd was an 36 able business man, who could carry on usefully a large printing business and manage Insurance Companies; but what was wanted in the Chairman of the Board was a man who knew something about the fishing question. The position of the Secretary was also a farce, and until recently the Chief Clerk had a higher salary than the Secretary. He had nothing to say against the Secretary. He was an old sailor, like himself, but he ought to be enjoying his pension instead of occupying a position in which he ought not to be placed. What was wanted in the Secretary, as in the Chairman, was a man who knew something about fishing, and a man who would not be paid less than his clerk. He hoped next year, when Bills dealing with trawling were introduced, they would not be blocked by the Government, but that they would be referred to a Select Committee, and the desires of the majority of the Scottish Members regarding them given effect to. The statement of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate was by no means satisfactory, and he was afraid next year they would have the same discussion over again. In regard to the fishery officers he should be glad to see them paid double the amount of salary they were now receiving. He thought they ought to receive the same remuneration as officers employed in the same kind of work in England and Ireland; being Scotchmen, a couple of pounds a-week was considered to be quite sufficient for them—
§ DR. CLARKsaid, he had been under the impression that the salary began at £100. He hoped that something would be done in the matter.
§ MR. MUNRO FERGUSONsaid, he looked upon the question of the sea police as one of great importance. He did not think the Scotch Harbour Board would have much influence at the Admiralty in securing a better class of ships or more ships, however urgently they might be required. Therefore, if it would help the right hon. Gentleman and give him any facility, he was prepared to move the reduction of the Vote by a sum of £1,000. The question of the sea police entered more or less into the Lord Advocate's argument with re 37 gard to scientific experiments in protected waters. He was afraid that success would not be attained until there was an extension of the prohibition against trawling within the three miles limit. Until that protection was rendered efficient the result of the experiments of the Fishery Board would be anything but satisfactory. It was believed that the protected waters were poached, and that the Regulations of the Fishery Board with respect to particular areas were constantly ignored. Trawling took place within them now; therefore, unless they had some assurance that the question would receive attention from the Government, and that they would take it up, the best course would be to move the reduction of the Vote. He could only regret that the Fishery Board had very little influence with the Admiralty. He was sorry that the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate had not been able to give a single pledge as to any of the reforms which had been before the House for years past, and to which the attention of Her Majesty's Government had been over and over again drawn. Not a single pledge had been given that any of these reforms would be carried out, and therefore he must say that the statement of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate was exceedingly unsatisfactory.
§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL (Kirkcaldy, &c.)said, he wished to say a word or two in reference to the last part of the speech of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate. What he complained of in regard to the speech of the right hon. and learned Gentleman was not what be had said, but what he did not say. When the right hon. and learned Gentleman said that legislation on such a question would be novel, he had ventured to interrupt the right hon. and learned Gentleman with a "No!" to suggest that, although legislation might be difficult, it would by no means be novel. He could not conceive that a House which had passed an Irish Land Bill and a Crofters Bill, and various other measures of the same kind, could be accused of novel legislation if they were to undertake to deal with the title of the fishermen to their houses and their right to the foreshore. The principle that the fishermen had a right to their improvements was a principle which had been thoroughly accepted by the legislation 38 of that House, and he did not think that there was a stronger case in the whole of the United Kingdom than that of the fishermen. They had built good and valuable houses, but they had no legal tenure whatever, and they were liable to be turned out at any moment at the will of the landlord. The hon. Member for Leith (Mr. Munro Ferguson) had suggested, as one means of getting rid of the difficulty, that charters might be granted. Some liberal landlords had granted a few charters, but many landlords had not done so. He did not expect the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate to say off-hand that he would remedy the grievance, but he had expected a more sympathetic answer to assure the people of Scotland that this question would receive the best consideration of the Government. He should have thought that after the practical speech of the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Conservative Member for Argyllshire (Colonel Malcolm)—a Liberal speech in the best sense of the word—that the Government would feel there was such a consensus of opinion on the question that the time had come for legislation in regard to it. In the reign of George III. our ancestors passed an Act entitling fishermen to the use of the foreshores, and of that privilege they had now been deprived. The way in which the foreshores of the country had been made over to the landlords during the last few years was perfectly scandalous. He confessed that he had never listened to a more practical debate in that House, and therefore he would not waste time by prolonging it.
§ DR. B. MCDONALD (Boss and Cromarty)said, there were a few points upon which he desired explanation. The first had reference to the Inspector of Salmon Fisheries. What did that officer do for the money he received? What fisheries did he inspect? The river fisheries or the sea fisheries? Were the proprietors of the fisheries not able to take care of their own property, and why should Parliament be called upon to pay a man to do their work? He trusted that the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate would explain what the functions of the Inspector of Salmon Fisheries were. He had never seen the gentleman who occupied that position, except on one 39 occasion, when he saw him engaged on a pleasure tour in the Highlands. He had not been able to find out what his duties were, and why they should pay him a salary was more than he could understand. Then, again, there was the last item on the Vote—£50 for the two commanders of gunboats. He wished to know what the gunboats were, and who the commanders were. There were none on the staff of the Fishery Board. Was it an annuity given to the gunboats for their services against the crofters two years ago? He wished to have a complete explanation of the item. As the whole Vote had been travelled over, he would probably not he out of order if he made a remark in reference to the herring brand. The fees for the herring brand brought in over £8,000 a-year, but the expenses of collection only amounted to £5,600. There was a great disproportion between the amount received and what he could not help regarding as a wasteful expenditure. There was another grievance in connection with the Fishery Board—namely, that while the East Coast was fully represented upon it, there was no one to represent the West Coast.
§ DR. E. MCDONALDWell, one man, the Sheriff of Argyllshire; but the Sheriff of Argyllshire lived in Edinburgh all the year round, and only went round to Argyllshire now and then. He thought there ought to be some one on the Board who understood what was required for the West Coast as well as the East Coast.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELL (A LORD of the TREASURY) (Wilton)said, the Treasury had been charged with having neglected the representations which had been made to them in former years in relation to the herring brand. He might say that not one single farthing of the surplus revenue and expenditure received from the herring brand went into the Treasury. Of course, when the Post Office made proposals to extend telegraphic communications to certain remote districts in Scotland, the Treasury naturally declined the responsibility of sanctioning them until a guarantee was found, and that guarantee had been found out of the surplus from the herring brand. As he had stated, the Fishery Board had to spend a portion of the 40 surplus fees in aiding the Post Office to make telegraphic communications in connection with the fisheries, and such communication had been greatly extended in late years. The sum expended from the herring brand fees last year amounted to £1,500. It was also said that the Government had no right to charge against the surplus fees any portion of the pensions awarded to the men who carried on the work of branding. In regard to the question of pensions, it was said that the time of the Fishery Officers was not entirely taken up by the branding business, and, therefore, it was not fair to charge the whole of the pensions upon the surplus fees. It did seem unfair to charge the public with the whole of the pensions, seeing that some of the time of the officers was taken up in branding, although they had other duties to perform, and that was the opinion of the Treasury. The sum of £121 charged for stationery seemed to him to be a fair charge to fall upon the surplus fund. The hon. Member who called attention to the branding fees asked why the branding could not be done for nothing. He was afraid it would be very difficult, either in Scotland or anywhere else, to get any work done for nothing, and the men who were employed in branding naturally expected to be paid. It was a work which occupied a great deal of time, and it was necessary that it should be adequately remunerated.
§ DR. R. MCDONALDsaid, he had not contended that the work should be done for nothing. He had only called attention to the disproportion in the amount received for fees and the money actually expended.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, he could not admit that there was a disproportion. The branding fee was a very small one.
§ DR. R. MCDONALD4d. a barrel.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, that it had been reduced to 4d. It was now half of what it used to be. The Report of the Commission which sat in 1856 estimated the expenditure in connection with branding fees as £3,280. As the business had increased so had the cost, and both receipts and expenditure occupied about the same proportion; therefore, he denied that there was any disproportion.
§ MR. FINLAYsaid, he wished to say a few words in consequence of what had fallen from the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. S. Williamson) in regard to the question of trawling beyond territorial limits. He was glad to find that the hon. Member agreed with him as to the importance of dealing with the question of trawling within the territorial limits in the interests of the fishing industry. No legislation and no bye-laws dealing with the subject could be satisfactory or adequate for the prevention of the destruction of fish which did not embrace not only the territorial limits, but also the banks situated beyond those limits frequented by the Scotch fishermen. He could not help thinking that the hon. Gentleman was wrong in saying that in 1885 the legal authorities on both sides of the House had laid down that it would be contrary to National law to deal with banks beyond the territorial limits. He apprehended that there must have been some misapprehension on the part of his hon. Friend in regard to that matter. All that could be meant was, it would be contrary to International Law for them to pass any Statute imposing penalties on foreigners with respect to trawling on any banks or places in the sea outside the territorial limit. As to that there could be no controversy whatever. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Lord Advocate spoke of it as a matter of extreme delicacy and difficulty, because it might affect International relations, but he apprehended that no lawyer would dispute that it was perfectly competent for the House of Commons to impose penalties upon British subjects who trawled in certain portions of the sea, although such portions happened to be beyond territorial waters. The only difficulty that could arise was in the case of foreigners, but even foreigners might be subjected to penalties by means of a Convention between different Governments dealing with the subject. Even if that were found difficult to arrange, he apprehended that for all practical purposes the difficulty would be got over by making it illegal to land fish caught in forbidden grounds in a British port. He had made these observations for the purpose of making the matter clear, and in order to remove what he could not help thinking was a misapprehension. 42 He entirely agreed with his hon. Friend the Member for Leith as to the necessity for increased stringency in regard to the Marine Police.
§ MR. S. WILLIAMSON (Kilmarnock, &c.)said, he agreed with his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Inverness (Mr. Finlay) as to the necessity for prohibiting trawling in territorial waters, but he believed it was held to be outside the powers of the House to stop any lawful enterprize—and trawling was a lawful enterprize—being carried on beyond the three mile limit. He hoped his hon. and learned Friend might be able in the future to deal with this question by a Bill, or in some other way.
§ MR. E. W. DUFFsaid, the explanation of the hon. Baronet the Member for Wigton (Sir Herbert Maxwell) was altogether unsatisfactory. He blamed the Treasury for gradually absorbing the whole of the brand surplus. When the brand surplus was first given to the Fishery Board, the amount deducted from it was only £5,400, but the amount deducted from it this year was £6,500, or £1,100 more than formerly. The conditions were exactly the same now as they were when the brand was first established. There always had been guarantees for the extension of telegraphic communications, and the grants for those purposes had been very nearly the same. The grant in 1886 was £1,300, and in 1885 £1,000. He objected altogether to money being taken out of the branding fees for the purpose of guaranteeing telegraphs, although he admitted that a portion of the branding fees had always been appropriated to grants in aid of telegraphs. Then, again, the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate told them that the pensions of the fishery officers were paid out of the surplus of the herring brand fees. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that the officers had other duties to perform; but if that were so, and they had other duties to perform besides the branding of herrings, he did not see why the entire amount of their pensions should be paid out of the amount of their branding fees. He believed the pensions amounted to something like £750. He asked fur an explanation why the branding fees cost £1,100 more for collection now than they did in 1883. He altogether objected to the principle that 43 the fishermen who were interested in the fishing stations should pay for the telegraphic communication provided for them. If the right hon. Gentleman would turn to the Civil Service Estimates he would find that something like £50,000 a-year was voted for the purpose of subsidising telegraphs in various parts of the world. For instance, there was a sum of £1,900 for such places as St. Vincent, and £35,000 for the Cape of Good Hope, as well as a large sum for telegraphic communication at the mouth of the Gambia and Lagos, yet when they wanted to lay down telegraphic wires at their own doors the Treasury said they must have a guarantee. He objected to that policy altogether. No doubt he should be told that the subsidized Telegraph Boards were for Imperial purposes, but the telegraphs to remote parts of Scotland might also be useful for Imperial purposes if some Paul Jones were some day to come down upon the coast of Scotland. It was, therefore, just as necessary to lay them down on the coast of Scotland as it was at the mouth of the Gambia. He held that the telegraphs ought to be paid up by the Treasury without any guarantee whatever. He ventured to say that the explanation given by the hon. Baronet the Member for Wigtonshire (Sir Herbert Maxwell), in regard to the money expended out of the branding fees, was by no means satisfactory. He had no wish to prolong the discussion; but, unless he got some more satisfactory explanation, he should consider it his duty to move the reduction of the Vote.
§ MR. HUNTER (Aberdeen, N.)said, there was one matter he desired to refer to, which he had inadvertently omitted when he first addressed the House. He referred to the very serious injury which was inflicted by trawlers on line fishermen. The Lord Advocate had referred to one difficulty—namely, the difficulty of measuring the damage or ascertaining the value of the line or bait destroyed. He would make a suggestion to the right hon. and learned Gentleman, although he did not expect to get an answer at the present moment. He trusted that, considering what the difficulties were that were to be overcome, he might find in the suggestion a solution of the difficulty. Prohibiting 44 trawling within the three miles limit would go a long way in adverting collisions between the trawlers and the line fishermen. Occasionally very serious injury indeed was inflicted upon the line fishermen by the trawlers. He found from the Fishery Report, that in one case alone, on the Clyde, the fishermen suffered in the years 1886–7 a loss of about £800. There were two difficulties that had to be met. In the first place there was the difficulty of giving definite damages for what was an indefinite loss to the fishermen—the loss of his catch and the loss of time. But the greater difficulty was that of catching trawlers, especially when injury was done to the lines during the night. In a very large number of cases the trawlers escaped detection. He thought that both these difficulties might be met by a system of insurance. A small tax might be imposed on the trawlers, and a fund might be created for the purpose of providing compensation to fishermen, that compensation being granted on certain fixed and definite principles, which would cover the actual cost of the nets destroyed, and also give some reasonable compensation for loss of time and loss of catch. The matter might be regulated by the local officials. It was only reasonable that the trawlers as a body should be liable in this way. It thought it would be more satisfactory to the fishermen to have a fund in the nature of an insurance or indemnity fund of this kind, because the fishery officers, without any legal inquiry, would be able on the spot to say what sum in a given case a line fisherman ought to get out of the fund. The costs of litigation were so serious under the present system, even when they caught the trawler, as practically to diminish to a very large extent the value of the remedy in the hands of the fishermen. He had called it an Insurance fund, but he did not use that word in the strict sense; it was rather a general fund in the shape of indemnity. He did not ask the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate to give any answer to his request at the present moment, but he submitted the suggestion to him for consideration. He should be glad if the right hon. and learned Gentleman would put it before the Fishery Board, and pay some attention to it himself, 45 and, if possible, exercise his own ingenuity in advising some satisfactory means of overcoming the difficulty.
MR. ERASER-MACKINTOSH (Inverness-shire)said, he had listened with great attention to the speech of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate, which was a very able and conciliatory one; but, at the same time, he must say that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had omitted to answer a number of objections which had been stated to this Vote by his hon. Friend, He had overlooked the point raised by his hon. Friend the Member for the College Division of Glasgow (Dr. Cameron), as to the constitution of the Board with reference to the West coast of Scotland. The importance of the West coast fisheries had received a most insufficient amount of consideration; the interests of the East and the West coasts fisheries were entirely different. He (Mr. Fraser-Mackintosh) desired to call the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate's attention to the important question of harbour accommodation in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. He was not speaking of great harbours, but of small harbours or piers which fishing vessels could reach in all weathers. These small harbours would not cost much, and would be of immense value to fishermen in the Highlands and Islands. He hoped the Government would take into their serious consideration the necessity for developing the fisheries in the North of Scotland. A suggestion had been made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Majoribanks) in regard to the harbours already constructed by the Fishery Board. The right hon. Gentleman said that not one of them fulfilled the objects for which they were constructed. Surely that was an important matter, deserving the attention, not only of the Fishery Board, but of the Government. In the case of the harbour constructed in the Northern part of the Island of Lewis, in the County of Boss, the fishermen themselves declared that had the work been carried out as laid down by the Fishery Board they would be altogether ineffective. Notwithstanding that a representation to that effect was made to the Fishery Board, no deference whatever was paid to the opinion of the people. Thousands were laid out in the 46 harbours, and which had proved to be practically ineffective. He impressed on the Government the importance of looking very closely to the engineering element in reconstituting the Fishery Board in order to avoid such misapplication of money.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLAND (Sutherland)said, that he represented a constituency which was much interested in the questions of trawling and harbour accommodation. He hoped the Government would take into their serious consideration and speedily carry out the suggestions which had been made in the course of the discussion. The right hon. and learned Lord Advocate, in the discharge of his duties, which he had certainly carried out in a more pleasant manner than they had been accustomed to witness in the official who filled that high Office, had given them assurance that these matters would be attended to. But he could not forget that in previous years they had received the same sort of assurances as were now given to them, and that nothing had ever been practically done. He hoped, however, that the present discussion would bear some fruit. The hon. and learned Member for the Inverness Burghs (Mr. Finlay) had suggested the prohibition of trawling on certain banks outside the territorial limit, but the views of the Sutherland-shire fishermen, so far as he had ascertained them, were that trawling should be permitted within the three mile limit and confined to it, leaving the waters outside to the line and net fishermen, the reason being that the trawlers had completely depleted the banks inside. In the Local Government Bill promised for next year powers should be taken for a larger scheme of harbour construction than had hitherto been adopted, Local Boards being constituted for the purpose of raising money. On the North of Sutherland-shire there were 80 miles of rock bound Coast with a scattered population supposed to make a livelihood by fishing, yet there was not a single accessible harbour on that shore to which they could run for shelter. At Golspie, the local fishermen, by their own efforts, had constructed a breakwater which was not to be despised, and thought about £1,000 would be sufficient for what more was required to be done, and though their application had been before the Fishery Board for some 47 years they had got nothing. There was another matter he desired to make an observation upon. It had been referred to already by his hon. Friend the Member for Ross (Dr. R. McDonald)—namely, the salmon fisheries. Salmon was in no respect public property in Scotland, and he did not see why the Committee should vote a sum of £600 to an officer for inspecting the salmon fisheries; as the fisheries were private property he could not understand why the proprietors did not pay for the inspection. The country of course did not expect that the proprietors of salmon fisheries should do the work of inspecting salmon fisheries themselves, but it was a very questionable policy to ask the country to pay the work of an Inspector. Then, again, he would point out that no explanation had been given by the hon. Baronet the Member for Wigton (Sir Herbert Maxwell) in regard to the item of £50 put to commanders of gunboats. He wished to know what was the meaning of that item. Of course, if services were rendered to the Fishery Board in Scotland by the commanders of gunboats, it was only proper that they should he remunerated. It would, however, be interesting to know what was the amount of this item last year.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, the amount was given to the commander of the Jackal, whose services to the Fishery Board were not covered by his pay as an officer of the Navy. The sum was paid for services performed on behalf of the Fishery Board.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLANDsaid, he had been under the impression that the item referred to another subject altogether. He was glad to hear the explanation which was given by the hon. Gentleman. He knew very well that good service was performed by the Jackal, and he did not object to this being paid for. He did not think that the answer of the hon. Gentleman in reference to the fees for herring branding was at all satisfactory. It was not enough to say that the same proportion existed between the income and the expenditure as was maintained in 1886. There ought to have been a larger increase in the revenue than in the expenditure, owing to the enormous increase in the number of barrels branded. He thought that Her Majesty's Government ought to take active and vigorous measures to carry 48 out legislation in regard to the prohibition of trawling and making provision for harbour accommodation. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Marjoribanks) had stated last night that the income derived from the herring fishing alone was equal to the rental of the land. Every penny of that money was spent in the localities, which was a great deal more than could be said in regard to the rental of the land. It would be seen that this industry was, without exception, the most important industry in Scotland; though he was of opinion that the Fishery Board was performing its duty better now than for some time past, a great deal remained to be done by it for the benefit of the fishermen in Scotland. He hoped the scientific investigation which was being carried on would, although he was disposed to question the utility of the investigation, have a more direct practical bearing than it had yet had on the herring fishing, which was by far the most important part of the industry. He was not questioning the value of the experiments, but he failed to see that hitherto they had any direct practical bearing on the herring fishing. Probably the foundation might be laid by those experiments for something that hereafter might be of use to the fishermen. That was quite possible, but hitherto he did not believe that the catch of herrings in Scotland, or of any other fish, had been increased by those experiments.
§ MR. MACDONALD CAMERON (Wick, &c.)said, that he also was dissatisfied with the answer of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Ross, in reference to the herring brand fees and the cost of collection. What he principally felt annoyed at was that the hon. Baronet would not admit that there was a disproportion between the expenditure and the revenue.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, there really was no disproportion, taking the totals into consideration.
§ MR. MACDONALD CAMERONsaid, he thought that an explanation ought to be given of the reason why the cost of collection was 70 per cent of the total amount. He also considered that the answer of the right hon. Gentleman the Lord Advocate in reference to the item of £50 for commanders of gunboats 49 was misleading. When the right hon. and learned Gentleman was asked to whom the sum of £50 was paid he stated that it was paid to the Commander of the Jackal. Now it happened that the Jackal was the gunboat associated with the protection of the herring fisheries in Scotland, and he found that the Commander of the Jackal was down in the Estimates for a sum of £100, in addition, to his naval pay.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, that he was in error in his previous statement. The Jackal was separately remunerated, and the £50 was paid to commanders of gunboats for fishery services, the remuneration being calculated on a similar scale.
§ MR. MACDONALD CAMERONsaid, he did not think the Fishery Board, notwithstanding the additions which had been made to it, would meet the requirements of the fishing industry until there were more practical men upon it, and in order to mark his dissatisfaction with its operations and with the promises of the Government, he moved to reduce the Vote by £150.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £7,277, be granted for the said Service."—(Mr. Macdonald Cameron.)
§ MR. ASHER (Elgin, &c.)said, he rose in consequence of remarks made by his hon. Friends the Members for Inverness and Kilmarnock (Mr. Finlay and Mr. Williamson), in regard to the prohibition of trawling outside the territorial limit.
THE CHAIRMANOrder, order! I rather think that subject is outside the limit of this Vote. A statement has been made and the matter has been closed, and it does not appear to be relative to the action of the Fishery Board.
§ MR. ESSLEMONT (Aberdeen, E.)said, he was sure it was by inadvertence that the Lord Advocate had not answered a point which was raised last night. Just before Progress was reported last night he asked the hon. Baronet the Member for Wigtonshire (Sir Herbert Maxwell), or the Lord Advocate, for some explanation of the item of £2,000, which was set down for scientific investigation. He had no doubt that the £2,000 might be very 50 properly paid, but some information, he thought, ought to be afforded as to who received the money.
§ DR. R. MCDONALD (Ross and Cromarty)said, he had one question to ask in reference to the £20,000 allowed to the Fishery Board in Scotland, for boats and fishing gear for the crofters of the Highlands. How much of that money had been spent, and how many boats and what fishing gear had been provided out of it?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONpresumed that the hon. Gentleman referred to advances to fishermen under the Crofters Act. Down to the 7th of that month £11,390 17s. 3d. had been advanced.
§ DR. R. MCDONALDHow many boats had been provided?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, he had not particulars upon that point, but he would endeavour to supply the hon. Gentleman with them. He wished to take the opportunity of referring to the office of the Salmon Fishing Inspector. This office was constituted under the Act of 1882, and the duty of the Inspector was to inspect all the salmon fisheries in Scotland under the Fisheries Act. It was quite a mistake to suppose that the office was created in the interest of the salmon fishery proprietors; on the contrary, those proprietors were subjected to the inspection by Act of Parliament.
§ DR. CLARKasked whether the item of £5,635, for cost of collection, included the salary of the 30 fishery officers and general inspectors?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONYes.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTWhat is the explanation of the £2,000?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONthought that the hon. Gentleman would find the particulars in the Fishery Report. He was not able to find the passage, but he had no doubt that the expenditure was legitimate and authorized.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTTo whom is the money paid?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONI cannot say off-hand.
MR. PHILLIPS (Lanark, Mid)said, he desired some information with reference to the extra salaries paid to commanders of gunboats. Were those officers not like other civil servants—namely, paid for their full time? If so, why did they get anything extra for 51 merely naval service on the coast of Scotland?
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, that there was a Treasury Minute, dated the 30th of November, 1850, which assigned the payment of £100 a-year to naval officers engaged in matters connected with the fisheries, for the extra labours imposed upon them.
MR. PHILLIPSsaid, he did not see why these officers should get any more than their ordinary pay for their full time. It seemed to him that it should be a principle in the Government service that when a man was paid for his full time he should give his full time. He objected to the principle that a man should get a kind of retaining fee when he entered the Government service, and that for any work he performed he should be paid extra.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, this included correspondence.
MR. PHILLIPSasked if they were to understand that the commanders of gunboats spent £100 a-year in correspondence? If the hon. Baronet assured him that that was absolutely the case, he would withdraw all opposition to the payment.
§ SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, that that was the reason for the Treasury Minute of November, 1850; and if the hon. Gentleman had been as long at the Treasury as he had been, he would know that the Treasury required very solid reasons for the allowances they made.
MR. PHILLIPSsaid, that it seemed to him that the Minute of 1850 ought to be revised. He did not believe that the commander of any gunboat spent £100 a-year in connection with fishery work. Because he objected to the principle of paying men a retaining fee, and then paying them for work they performed, he should vote with his hon. Friend the Member for Wick.
§ DR. FARQUHARSON (Aberdeenshire, W.)said, there seemed something very mysterious about the £2,000 paid for scientific investigation. He did not object to such investigation, and he thought that scientific men ought to be well paid, but it was only right that the Committee should know where the money went to.
§ MR. ANDERSON (Elgin and Nairn)said, he understood that the Motion he proposed last night could not, in pursuance 52 of the Rules of the House, be put now. That was the Motion to strike out the salary of the Chairman of the Fishery Board. He confessed he had listened with care to the explanations given by the Lord Advocate, and that his views with regard to that salary were not in any degree changed. He thought that the proper course would be to reduce the salary from £800 to £400 or £500 a-year and give the remainder to the other members of the Board. It was perfectly clear from what had fallen from hon. Members in the course of the debate that the practical men who ought to be placed on the Board should be paid for their services. Money ought to be found for that purpose, and it might be found out of the £800 paid to the Chairman of the Board, which was an enormous salary to be paid for the work the Chairman had to do. He confessed the most bitter disappointment at the attitude taken by the Government in regard to the fishery question. The debate upon this Vote was an exact repetition of two debates which he had had the honour of listening to in the House of Commons. It was absolutely sickening to him, and it must be to every Member who took a deep interest in the prosperity of the fishing industry, to be told, as they had been told two or three times this Session, that the Government were preparing—he believed that the Government went almost as far as to say that they had prepared—a measure dealing with the constitution of the Fishery Board and with other fishery matters, and to find that yet upon this occasion not a single word had fallen from the Lord Advocate as to that measure. He did not believe that a line of that Bill had been prepared, and he joined heartily in the protest, not so much against the Fishery Board, as against the gross neglect of the Government in regard to the various fishery matters.
THE CHAIRMANI did not rule that the Motion made by the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Anderson) last night could not be made again, but I stated that in accordance with the practice of the Committee the Motion had lapsed. That was when the hon. Member for Aberdeen (Mr. Esslemont) was appealing to the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the Motion.
§ Question put.
§ The Committee divided:—Ayes 72; Noes 122: Majority 50.—(Div. List, No. 343.)
§ Original Question again proposed.
§ DR. CLARKsaid, he would like the Lord Advocate to tell them something definite about the £2,000 set down for scientific investigation. He understood that the sum was spent by Professor Ewart and a scientific committee in experiments, and that it did not go to the Board at all.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, that that was the case. He was informed that the gentlemen engaged in the experiments, so far from making money, were really out of pocket.
§ MR. MACDONALD CAMERONasked what staff were engaged in making the experiments?
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONcould not say, but thought that the information would be found in the Fishery Board's Report.
§ MR. MARJORIBANKSthought that he could give hon. Members a little information upon this point. He knew that a great deal of work had been carried on by the scientific department of the Scotch Fishery Board, and that there was a great deal now being done by Professor Ewart. Work was also being done by Professor Mackintosh in the laboratory at St. Andrew's; there was a laboratory at Granton, and it was proposed to establish another laboratory somewhere in Bute, he thought it was at Rothesay. He really believed the money was properly spent, and he hoped his hon. Friends would now allow the Vote to be taken.
§ MR. ESSLEMONTsaid, he was quite satisfied with the explanation, and therefore did not desire to press the matter further.
§ Question put, and agreed to.
§ (2.) £990, to complete the sum for the Lunacy Commissions, Scotland.
§ DR. FARQUHARSONsaid, that this was one of the cases, not an isolated one, in which the Scotch procedure was very much better than the English procedure. He had a practical object in saying this, because he wished to impress upon the Government the desirability, in view of the Lunacy Bill which was promised, of considering the Scotch system, with the 54 idea of establishing it in England. First of all, they had in Scotland small lunacy districts, and a resident Commissioner went round the districts frequently, thus ensuring very frequent inspection of lunatics. He believed that in Scotland a lunatic was properly inspected three or four times a year; but a lunatic in England was lucky if he saw an Inspector once in two years. Lunacy inspection ought to be frequent, and made by the same Inspector, so that he could observe whether any improvement was taking place or not in a lunatic's condition. In Scotland, too, they had more Commissioners in proportion to the number of lunatics than there were in England. He believed that in England the Commissioners did their work well, but there were too few of them. Here, too, there were a certain number of lawyer Commissioners who went round with the doctors, and that from a practical point of view was not wise. No lawyer visited lunatic asylums in Scotland; there were legal gentlemen who dealt with any case from a legal point of view when necessity arose, but they did not go round to pronounce opinions upon cases of insanity which only doctors could pronounce. He had one practical suggestion to make. In Scotland the Commissioners were not prohibited from private practice, and that was an arrangement which gave rise to some inconvenience. The Commissioners might, whether they acted from the highest motives or not, have aspersions cast upon them of unjustly favouring one man more than another. He did not think they did, but thought that it was an anomaly that men occupying the position of Lunacy Commissioners should be allowed to engage in private practice. He certainly thought that it was worth the while of the Lord Advocate or his Representative to consider whether it was not desirable to remove a condition of things which might give rise to misconception.
§ Vote agreed to.
§ (3.) £1,948, to complete the sum for the Registrar General's Office, Scotland.
§
(4.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £3,347, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come
55
in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1889, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Supervision for Relief of the Poor and for Expenses under the Public Health and Vaccination Acts, including certain Grants in Aid of Local Taxation in Scotland.
§ DR. CAMERON (Glasgow, College)said, that this was a Vote which ought not to be allowed to pass without some protest. The Board of Supervision in Scotland performed duties which were performed by the Local Government Board in England; but, whereas the Local Government Board in England was, through the President of the Board, directly responsible to Parliament, the Board of Supervision in Scotland was not directly responsible to Parliament. It was true that the Solicitor General for Scotland was an ex-officio member of the Board, but he did not know whether that hon. and learned Gentleman ever attended. On occasions when he had proposed to ask the Solicitor General for Scotland questions in regard to the action of the Board, he had found himself referred to the Lord Advocate as the representative in the House of the general government of Scotland. He maintained that the whole Vote for this Board was superfluous and unnecessary, and that the duties discharged by the Board would be infinitely better discharged, and discharged in a more Constitutional manner, by a department of the Scotch Office. What was the constitution of the Board? There was a paid Chairman, who, he believed, was practically the Board, but who, unlike the President of the Local Government Board, was totally inaccessible to Members of the House of Commons. Then there was the Lord Provost of Glasgow and the Lord Provost of Edinburgh and the Solicitor General for Scotland. They were to have an extra Lord Provost in Scotland; Dundee was recently created a City, and forthwith the Provost of that new-born City assumed the title of Lord Provost. Why should not the Lord Provost of Dundee be added to the Board of Supervision? On what earthly grounds should they select two Lord Provosts as members of this Board? He did not say they were not useful members at times. As a matter of fact, he knew that when there was great destitution in the Highlands the Lord Provost of Glasgow went to the Board of Supervision in order to lay before them 56 certain facts which had come to his notice. But he discovered in connection with the matter that the Lord Provost of Glasgow did not generally attend the Board of Supervision, and they could not make a more irrational ex officio selection than that of a Lord Provost. The Lord Provost of a Scotch City had nothing to do with the administration of the Poor Law. If they selected the Chairmen of certain large Parichial Boards there would be some sense in it, but to take men whose duties were entirely confined to the administration of municipal affairs, and who had nothing whatever to do with the administration of the Poor Law and had no experience in connection with it, and who had no special qualification for a seat on the administrative Board of Supervision, seemed to him (Dr. Cameron) and utter absurdity. He believed that, as a matter of fact, one at any rate of the Lord Provosts did not habitually attend. He did not know whether the Lord Provost of Edinburgh did, although he was on the spot; and he did not know whether there was any quorum required when the Board met, or whether it simply met to register the decisions of its Chairman. The Solicitor General for Scotland was a member of the Board. He would like to know how often the Solicitor General attended the meetings; how often the Lord Advocate, whe Solicitor General, attended the meetings of the Board? The right hon. and learned Gentleman gave no indication that he was an assiduous attendant. He (Dr. Cameron) did not wonder at it, for a gentleman in the right hon. and learned Gentleman's position, who had much work to do in London, and who was very busily engaged when he happened to be in Edinburgh, could not be expected to devote much time to the work of the Board of Supervision, especially when he had no particular interest in it. He presumed that the object of putting the Solicitor General for Scotland on the Board as an ex officio member was that the Board should have the benefit of his legal advice when any knotty question turned up. There were four other legal gentlemen members of the Board—namely, the Sheriffs of Perthshire, Renfrewshire, Ross and Cromarty, and Sutherlandshire, and there was also Lord Hamilton and Mr. Dundas. The Board was composed in the most arbitrary manner; 57 it was composed without reference to the fitness of things, and it was intrusted with powers of very great magnitude. He did not mean to criticize the method in which it discharged its duties. It discharged its duties—he had no doubt the Chairman did—conscientiously, but in many respects it appeared more sluggish in its action in connection with the relief of the poor than it would be if it had its representative in the House of Commons. For instance, there had been a great amount of destitution in the Highlands, but it was not until public attention was called in every conceivable way to the distress, that the Board of Supervision took any steps to obtain official reports upon it. Again, there was a question which was always cropping up—namely, the propriety of giving relief under certain circumstances to able bodied poor. He was certain that if they had a representative of the Scotch Poor Law system in the House of Commons, this question would be brought under his attention, and he would see the propriety of considering the question of relaxing on occasions of emergency the very strict regulations under which alone in Scotland relief could be given. He believed that at the present moment the Board of Supervision was intrusted with the duty of distributing the £20,000 voted by Parliament in aid of medical relief in Scotland. No doubt the Board distributed that money in accordance with certain principles; it laid down certain requirements, and said that unless a Parochial Board complied with those requirements it should not participate in the grant. He imagined that the Board of Supervision should go further, and should have the power of insisting upon Boards making provision such as was to be found in every civilized country for the treatment of the sick and poor. Again, he was perfectly certain of this, that if the Board of Supervision in Scotland was directly represented in the House of Commons, the Parochial Boards would not long be constituted in the most absurd manner they now were, and that the representative element would be introduced into those Boards to an infinitely greater extent than it was at present. It was only on a few of the Boards—on the urban Boards, some 11 or 12—that there was any attempt at popular representation. 58 Even on those Boards the popular representation was of the most absurd character. There was a system of multiple voting, and it was tempered by ex officio members and representatives of Kirk Sessions, and so on. Altogether they had throughout the whole Poor Law system of Scotland an administration carried on by Bodies either of a purely non- representative character, or of a representative character which would not be tolerated for a moment if there was a direct representative of the Board in the House of Commons. The duties intrusted to the Board would, he presumed, be largely increased in future. He presumed that the duty of distributing the Probate Duty Grant was to be intrusted to this Board. In the first place, the immense amount of the expenses at present incurred in connection with the Board might be saved if the duties discharged were transferred to the Scotch Office, and discharged by some official of that Office. A single official, who might be paid a much smaller salary than was now paid to the Chairman of the Board, would suffice to do the duties performed by the Chairman. The Secretary for Scotland would be responsible for the duties at present performed by the Board of Supervision, and he or his representative in the House of Commons would then be directly responsible to the House. He (Dr. Cameron) was perfectly certain that no one would attempt to defend the constitution of the Board of Supervision. As to the way in which the Board had discharged its functions, he might mention that it neglected to lay down stringent rules in regard to the distribution of medical relief by parishes, that it neglected to initiate or to recommend the initiation of any reform in the constitution of Parochial Boards, and that it had neglected its duties when any attempt was made to recover property belonging to the public under Act of Parliament for the purposes of the Poor Law. There was a very considerable sum of money raised by collections at church doors in Scotland. This money collected at church doors was the property of the poor, and it was expressly provided by Act of Parliament that the money should be distributed among the poor. In certain cases the collections were handed over to the Parochial Board, but in the vast majority of cases they were not 59 handed over to the Parochial Board, but were dealt with by the representatives of the Established Church. That certainly was not in accordance with the provisions of the Act of Parliament. He did not say whether the present practice should be continued or not; but he thought it was the duty of the Board, in the public interest, to see that the law with regard to moneys raised for the relief of the poor was carried into effect. What did the Board do? They furnished Returns of the amount collected at church doors, but they took no trouble to see that the money was devoted to the purpose for which it was intended. On several occasions the House of Commons had ordered to be presented a Return giving, in a consecutive form, the amount of money so collected which had not been handed over to the Parochial Boards. The late Mr. Duncan M'Laren obtained an order for such a Return, and he (Dr. Cameron) had also obtained an order for a like Return, but the Return had never been produced. Its production was not agreeable to the Board, and it would have entailed upon them some trouble. He received privately an intimation that if he wanted the information he might find it by wading through a mass of Blue Books. Was there ever such a reply to an order of the House of Commons for the production of a Return? He proposed to reduce the Vote by the sum of £5,000, which would be somewhere about the amount saved by the abolition of this absurd Board, and the transference of its work to the Department of the Secretary for Scotland.
§ DR. CAMERONThen I will move to reduce the Vote by £3,000.
§ Motion made, and Question proposed "That £347 be granted for the said Service."—(Dr. Cameron.)
§ DR. CLARKsaid, he had intended to move a reduction of the Vote by a smaller sum than that mentioned in the present Motion, but he had no hesitation in supporting the reduction by the larger amount named by his hon. Friend the Member for the College Division of Glasgow (Dr. Cameron). He would very briefly state to the Committee the historical facts relating to the relief of 60 the poor in Scotland. Up to 1579 the cost of the poor was entirely defrayed from church door collections. In that year the justices were empowered to raise assessments, but that power was, in 1597, transferred to the Kirk Sessions. So Kirk Sessions had the right to levy assessments on property, and from such assessments, and the church door collections, the entire revenue for the relief of the poor came. In 1672 the heritors were associated with the Kirk Sessions in spending the money, but the arrangement did not work well, and in 1693 it was decided by the Privy Council that one-half of the collections should go to the Heritors. That continued till 1845, when the Poor Law Act was passed. By that Act the Heritors' rights were transferred to the Parochial Board. He supposed that the reason why the Scotch Parochial Boards were in an unsatisfactory condition was because of the historical defect, for now they had got the Kirk Sessions, the heritors, and the ratepayers forming the Parochial Boards. By the Act of 1845, which was still in operation, the Board of Supervision was empowered to send to the Kirk Sessions for information. In the form which the Board of Supervision sent out they inserted a clause of the Act, which was to the effect that in all parishes in which it had been agreed that assessments should be levied for the relief of the poor, all moneys arising from the ordinary church collections, from and after the date on which such assessments had been imposed, belonged to and should be at the disposal of the Kirk Session of each parish, providing always that nothing thereinafter contained should authorize the appropriation of the proceeds of collections other than those which were then in whole or in part legally applicable, or should deprive the heritors of the right to examine the accounts of the Kirk Sessions and to inquire into the manner in which the funds had been applied. Up to 1845, as he had said, one-half of the church collections was spent by the Kirk Sessions in support of the poor, and the other half went to the heritors; but by the Act of 1845 the whole sum was to remain with the Kirk Sessions, to be spent for the relief of the poor. That, he supposed, would be the question in dispute, and on that point he wished to read an opinion given by 61 Judges just before the Act of 1845 was passed. There was a case of Panmure v. Sharp heard on the 30th of May, 1839. In that case Lord Gillies said—
I hold it to be a sacred principle in the civil polity of Scotland that the collections at the doors of our churches are in truth the property of the poor.Lord Mackenzie said—The ordinary collections at the doors of parish churches belong to the poor. This was expressly decided in the case of Hamilton.Lord Fullarton said—The illegality of making any collections at ordinary parish churches to interfere with the voluntary contributions for the poor is admitted. Collections cannot legally be made at the doors of parish churches for any other object than for the support of the poor.By the Act of 1845 the money was to be used for the purposes to which it had hitherto been applicable, and by the decision of the Courts the money could only be used for the support of the poor. The Kirk Sessions, however, claimed that they could use the money for their own poor; that, in short, they could use it as a means of keeping the people in the Established Church. That question came before the Courts, and in the case of Cunningham v. M'Ewan, heard on the 9th of February, 1854, Lord President M'Neill said—The question is not whether the Kirk Sessions are to administer the fund for the poor of the Established Church. In regard to one-half or the whole of the collections, no such doctrine could be maintained by any Kirk Session. They are to administer it for the poor of no particular denomination. They are not to pervert a fund raised for the relief of the poor generally to the relief of those in connection merely with the Established Church. They hold that fund for a National purpose.Lord Rutherford, who coincided, said—I am surprised at the position taken by the Sheriff Depute, that this fund, given to the Kirk Session for the purpose of general distribution, could possibly be reserved for the purpose of benefiting the poor of the Established Church. That is a monstrous doctrine, and I am astonished it should even be mooted now. The duty of the Kirk Sessions is most sacred. They have no right to inquire as to religious belief. They are bound to look to the circumstances of the party, and to that alone.He thought this decision of the Court of Session, which had never been overridden by any legislation, clearly proved that the church door collections were the property of the poor, and ought to be spent for the benefit of the poor. 62 He did not mean to say that they ought to be spent on paupers, but that they ought to be spent in charities for the poor, those on the verge of pauperism. A Return had been made of the moneys arising from church door collections in assessed parishes since 1845, and from it he noticed that of £17,095 received in 1846–7, £8,587 had been spent in the relief of the poor, and £6,826 for other purposes. He found that in 1867–8 the receipts had increased to £22,000, and that £10,400 was spent in relief of the poor and that £10,400 went to other purposes. Last year there was £38,746 received, of which only £8,000 was spent in the relief of the poor, and over £29,000 was spent for other purposes, so that bit by bit the church door collections were being diverted from their proper use. Last year, when the collections amounted to £38,746, they spent less in the relief of the poor than wag spent in 1816–7, when the church door collections were only £17,000. He doubted very much whether they could legally spend the money on "other purposes." Decisions had been given that they could not, but in the form sent out by the Board of Supervision the Board did not ask for the information. The Board said that in filling up the Return it was unnecessary to specify upon what the money was spent. They underlined that statement, or, in other words, especially called the attention of the Kirk Sessions to the fact that they ought not to give the Board of Supervision the details which the Act of Parliament said they ought to give. In fact the Kirk Sessions did not bother very often to make a Return at all. Sometimes the form had been returned without any information being given in it at all; but not a single fine had been imposed, although fines ought to have been imposed. He would not take up the time of the Committee further, but he hoped to hear from the Lord Advocate some reason for the course adopted by the Board of Supervision. He did not bring forward this matter because a Conservative Government was in power; as a matter of fact, the illegality had been winked at by both Governments. What he was anxious to know was the ground upon which the Board of Supervision had acted?
§ MR. CALDWELL (Glasgow, St. Rollox)agreed with all that had been said with regard to the law of Scotland 63 concerning church door collections. There was no doubt whatever that such collections ought by law to go to the relief of the poor. There was no doubt that the Kirk Sessions were bound to devote the money to that purpose, the management of the fund being in their hands. But on the other hand the Board of Supervision had no power under Statute to intefere with the distribution of the money by the Kirk Sessions. All the Board of Supervision were empowered to do was simply to call for certain returns. Whether the law ought to vest the Board of Supervision with power to see that there was a proper application of the money was a matter open to consideration, but at present the fact stared them in the face that the Board of Supervision had no power under Statute to call for a Return beyond the Return presented every year according to the requirements of the Act. At the same time hon. Gentlemen must not suppose that the community of Scotland were without a remedy, because the Act of 1845 laid it down very distinctly that any Heritor in any parish might call the Kirk Session to account for any misappropriation of money.
THE CHAIRMANIf the statement as to the limited power of the Board of Supervision is correct, this discussion is irrelevant to the Vote.
§ DR. CLARKsaid, that what he had endeavoured to establish was that the form sent out by the Board of Supervision did not represent the spirit, wording, or intention of the Act, and that the powers the Act of 1845 gave to the Board had not been carried out. The Act empowered the imposition of certain fines in case of necessity, but the Board of Supervision had neglected to impose them.
THE CHAIRMANI did not understand that that was the point raised. The question is whether the Board of Supervision have failed in their duty under this Vote.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONthought the point was exactly as the Chairman had put it. The Act of Parliament imposed the duty upon the Sessions clerk or other officer appointed by the Kirk Session to report annually to the Board of Supervision, and the penalty for refusing to make the report was one which fell on the Session clerk or other officer appointed. He understood the Chair 64 man's ruling to be that the question of what was a proper application of this money was not before the Committee, and, therefore, he turned to the observations of the hon. Member for the College Division of Glasgow (Dr. Cameron). As to the constitution of the Board of Supervision, he did not say that the Provosts of Glasgow and Edinburgh attended the meetings of the Board regularly by any means, but the business of the Board was conducted in such a way that if there be any question upon which it was natural to suppose that the Provost of Edinburgh or of Glasgow was likely to have certain information, he received an intimation that his assistance was desired. The business of the Board was necessarily conducted in the main by the Chairman and those members of the Board who were paid for attending to it. As the hon. Gentleman no doubt knew, the Sheriffs of the counties specified in the Act received an allowance of £150, and they attended regularly the meetings of the Board. The hon. Gentleman was also aware, no doubt, that the Commission which inquired into the public offices of Scotland in 1870 reported that there was a very large amount of work done by the Board; indeed, anyone who had had experience of the proceedings of the Board must know that there was a constant volume of business requiring attention at the hands of the Board. Questions affecting the administration of the Poor Law, questions relating to the public health, had frequently to be dealt with, involving, as they did, a large number of legal points. Questions arose as to buildings, and as to individual cases of paupers, all requiring an amount of attention which would take up a very large share of the time of any general public Department in England if there was such a transference as the hon. Gentleman desired. When holding the Office of Solicitor General for Scotland, several questions had arisen in the office of the Board of Supervision, and his attendance had been requested, and on those and other occasions he had been present at the meetings of the Board. With regard to the points of objection which the hon. Gentleman stated to the conduct of business by the Board, he would only say one word. It was said to be a great cause of complaint against the Board of Supervision that they had allowed the 65 constitution of Parochial Boards to remain in an anomalous position, but clearly a Board established by Act of Parliament had no business to interfere with the constitution of another Body created by the same Statute. Again, so far as the representation of the Board in Parliament was concerned, the hon. Gentleman was aware that the Board was in constant communication with the Scotch Office. The work of the Board was necessarily more or less of a legal character, and the distance alone between Edinburgh and the Scotch Office in London would cause delay in the settlement of questions which might arise, and which delay he regarded as most undesirable. The Committee would be aware that a certain number of functious of the Board were exercised continuously in person by the Chairman, and the consequence was that the work of the Board in discharging a number of important duties was never interrupted. He thought the Committee would have observed that there had not been any case of neglect on the part of the Board given, and he ventured to say that the money asked for by this Vote was abundantly well earned.
§ DR. CAMERONsaid, he did not consider the answer of the Lord Advocate satisfactory, because he had, as usual, been remarkably skilful in evading strong points, and confining himself to weak ones. He had told the Committee that the distance between Edinburgh and London would be an insurmountable obstacle to the proposal made, owing to the delay which would occur in communications. He imagined that there were just as many important questions arising in connection with the Criminal Law in Scotland, and yet they had never heard of any Lord Advocate proposing to deprive himself of his jurisdiction in criminal matters on the ground of his office being in London. He objected to this Board as being absolutely non-representative, and as being constituted on no intelligible principles whatever. He objected to it also as being an absolute anachronism. There was a Chairman who might or might not be selected for special fitness, but the Board itself consisted of the Lord Provosts of Edinburgh and Glasgow, two thoroughly excellent men, and thoroughly conversant with local matters, but who had nothing to do with the 66 Poor Law. Then there were four Sheriffs on the Board, who, he (Dr. Cameron) had no doubt, gave decisions upon points of law; but the matters which had to be decided did not require the attendance of four Sheriffs, at £150 each; and, further, they were told that the Provosts of Edinburgh and Glasgow were only present when their attendance was requested. He objected that they should only attend when their co-operation was desired in passing any particular measure. His Motion was not mainly or appreciably on the ground of the way in which the Board discharged its duties. He had specified earlier in the afternoon the way in which the grant in aid of medical relief was distributed, and he said it was the duty of the Board to at least recommend the Parochial Boards in Scotland to provide medical attendance and medicine for the poor and pauper lunatics in the districts in which they lived. Then he had pointed out that a great hardship had arisen with regard to the granting of relief to able-bodied poor. He did not think that this was a matter on which the Board of Supervision should legislate, but a matter on which, if it was worth what it cost, it might be expected to recommend legislation. He had also referred to church door collections for the purpose of showing the neglect of the Board in seeing that the intention of the law in that matter was carried out, and protesting that the Board should comply with the Orders of that House, and not treat them with contempt. He held that the Office of Secretary for Scotland might be increased in value to the country, and expenditure vastly reduced, if the number of Edinburgh Boards were cut down, and they were amalgamated with the Scotch Office as a Department of that Office. This particular Office was organized upon no rational principles, and yet it dealt with most important matters—namely, the care of the poor and sanitary administration in Scotland, with regard to which he said there ought to be direct representation in Parliament. What would English Members think if it were proposed that, instead of the President of the Local Government Board being a Member of the Government, and sitting in the House of Commons, some respectable gentleman outside should be placed at the head of the Department, and no one left in the 67 House to answer directly for its acts? And yet that was precisely the position in which Scotch Members found themselves. The Board was not properly constituted, and would not be so until they had a Minister in that House whom they could hold responsible for any neglect that might take place. One word as to what had fallen from the Lord Advocate, to show why he had moved the reduction of the Vote. He did so on the ground that the Board would be more efficient if it were a Department under the control of the Scotch Office, and on the ground that there would be much less expense to the country in consequence.
§ DR. CLARKasked, if he should be in Order in referring to a misleading Circular which had been issued by the Board?
THE CHAIRMANIf the hon. Gentleman would confine himself to and establish that point, the discussion might proceed.
§ DR. CLARKsaid, he had endeavoured to show that by the Act of 1845 power was given to the Board to supervise a portion of the money given for the purpose of the poor. The Board had sent out a Circular intimating that this money should be illegally spent, and that was why he wished to see the Vote reduced.
DR. R. MACDONALDsaid, he desired to point out a serious grievance under which medical officers in Scotland lay. In England the medical officers were appointed by the Local Board as in Scotland, but after appointment no Local Board could dismiss them, whereas in Scotland the Parochial Board could dismiss a medical officer without giving any reason whatever. Medical officers in England were supposed to be able to act independently with regard to the inmates of workhouses if any member of the Board acted improperly. That was his case, and while in England he had always been able to do his duty even if the Guardians were in the wrong, in Scotland it was different. If the medical officer dared to hint that the conduct of a Guardian was not satisfactory with regard to pauper lunatics; if he did not do exactly what the Board told him to do he must go, and there was no appeal. Medical officers in Scotland felt that they were really impotent in this matter, and that the 68 Parochial Boards had everything in their own hands, but the stupidity of the system would be seen by the fact that Inspectors of Poor, who were inferior officers in Scotland, in a position equivalent to that of relieving officer in England, had an appeal to the Board of Supervision. He had an appeal, while his superior officer had no appeal, and the consequence was that if the latter said or did anything which the Parochial Board did not like with regard to any particular case he was called upon to give in his resignation, or else he would be dismissed without any reason being assigned. He had himself experienced this, and for that reason he thought that the Board should interfere to give medical men in Scotland the same chance as their brethren in England, and so enable them to do more justice to the poor than they were able to do under existing circumstances.
§ MR. M'LAGAN (Linlithgow)said, before the Committee came to a decision on this question, he wished to give his reasons for not supporting the Motion of the hon. Member for the College Division of Glasgow (Dr. Cameron). He took exception to that Motion, because it would carry out a system to which he decidedly objected. The hon. Member said there was no representation in the House of the Board of Supervision. He (Mr. M'Lagan) had been in the House for 20 years, and had always understood that the Lord Advocate was the Representative of the Board of Supervision. He understood his hon. Friend to say that he wanted the Department to be under the Secretary for Scotland. He protested against the Office being in London, on the ground that if the Office were so appointed they would be carrying out a system of centralization to which he objected. He trusted the Lord Advocate would long continue to represent the Board of Supervision.
§ Question put.
§ The Committee divided:—Ayes 78; Noes 181: Majority 103.—(Div. List, No. 344.)
§ Original Question again proposed.
§ MR. HUNTER (Aberdeen, N.)said, there was a matter of urgent importance to which he desired to draw the attention of the Lord Advocate. It was his impression that the practice hitherto in Scotland with regard to vaccination was 69 that no accumulative penalties should be enforced. He understood that the Public Prosecutor in Scotland had been content with one penalty only. Now, ii was brought to his knowledge by an influential friend of his that he had been recently prosecuted more than once for refusing to have his child vaccinated. He asked the Lord Advocate to give the Committee a promise that in future, in no case whatever, should any person be prosecuted twice over for the non-vaccination of the same child.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, that was obviously a question to which he could not be expected to reply without further information. He might, however, say that he was not aware of the practice to which the hon. Gentleman referred.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLAND (Sutherland)said, he wished for some information with regard to the relations between the Board of Supervision and the Inspectors of parishes in Scotland. He had received some complaints with regard to the instructions given by the Boards to Inspectors which they had refused to carry out. The matter had been laid before the Board of Supervision, but they had taken no notice of it and made no reply. He wished to know what were the powers of the Board in this respect, and the reason for the discourtesy which they had shown? Further, he wished to know how it was that an officer of the Board of Supervision could be spared to act as emigration agent? If he could be spared for that purpose, he did not see why his services should not be dispensed with altogether.
§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL (Kirkcaldy, &c.)said, he knew that there was a great deal of friction between the Parochial Boards and the Inspectors. It appeared to him that the powers were too much centralized in the Poor Law Board. He was in favour altogether of Local Government, and thought that the Local Board should have power over their own servants—that they should be able to engage, order, or dismiss them.
§ MR. HUNTERsaid, that in consequence of the unsatisfactory answer of the Lord Advocate he should be compelled to move the reduction of the Vote by the sum of £2,000. Although he did not profess to be accurately informed on the subject, his impression was that the 70 pactice had never been to press for cumulative penalties, and that in Scotland the prosecutions were in the hands of public authorities who were responsible to the Lord Advocate. Whether that was so or not, he never heard of prosecutions for cumulative penalties until a few weeks ago, and it seemed to him that there was being introduced into Scotland, for the first time, that pernicious system which had produced such bad results in England. The reason why vaccination had been so much more successful in Scotland, where there were fewer objections against the Acts, was the infrequency with which pecuniary penalties were demanded, or to the fact that they were not demanded at all. For the first time after many years an article had appeared in The Encyclopedia Britannica by a most distinguished physiologist and graduate of the University of Aberdeen, expressing views entirely opposed to that which had been the unanimous opinion of the medical profession on the subject of vaccination. He should not express any opinion either for or against vaccination, nor did he ask the Committee to express any opinion on that subject, or upon the subject of compulsory vaccination; but he wanted to take the opinion of the Committee upon the practice recently introduced into Scotland—he believed for the first time—of pressing for cumulative penalties. In 1867 a Committee of the House was appointed to inquire into the operation of the Vaccination Acts; they made a unanimous Report, with one or two sentences only of which he would trouble the Committee. They were to the effect that the Committee had considered the effect of the change in the law introduced by the Act of 1857, which, contrary to the provisions of previous English or present Scotch Acts, made a person liable to repeated penalties for not allowing his child to be vaccinated; that in enactments of this nature, when the State, in fulfilling a duty, found it necessary to disregard the wish of the parent, it was most important to secure the support of public opinion, and as the Committee could not recommend that a policeman should be empowered to take a baby to the vaccination station, a measure which could only be justified by extreme necessity, they recommended that in any case, if two half penalties 71 or one full penalty had been imposed on the parent, the magistrate should not impose any further penalty for the non-vaccination of a child. He believed there were few hon. Members in that House who were prepared to compel a person to vaccinate himself against his will, or compel the parent to vaccinate his child against his conscientious opinion. Nothing would justify such a law. He, for one, could never feel justified in attempting to force the opinions of some people upon parents. If there was any truth in the vaccination theory at all, it was that vaccination gave protection to those who were vaccinated; and if that were not so, why should vaccination be continued at all? It seemed to him that there was no foundation for this doctrine of cumulative penalties, and, as some support to the Vaccination Law, he thought it desirable to draw the attention of the Government to the natural consequence which must ensue from the introduction into Scotland of this system.
§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £2,347, be granted for the said Service."—(Mr. Hunter.)
§ DR. FARQUHARSONsaid, he thought that where it was found possible to exercise discretion these cumulative penalties should not be pressed too harshly; but that was a very different thing from abolishing them altogether.
§ MR. HUNTERsaid, his object was to ascertain the sense of the Committee, which would not have a legal effect, but a sensible effect, in influencing the minds of those who carried out the law.
§ DR. FARQUHARSONsaid, the legal abolition of cumulative penalties would be practically the surrender of compulsory vaccination altogether. A large number of societies would spring up, provided with funds, which would simply pay the expenses of those who did not desire to have their children vaccinated, and thus the children would be deprived of the protection which the large majority of medical men had agreed was afforded by vaccination against a terrible disease. His hon. Friend said that the non-enforcement of the compulsory clauses was the explanation of the greater popularity of vaccination in Scotland as compared with England; but his own 72 explanation would be that this popularity was due to the superior intelligence of the Scotch nation and their superior education. His hon. Friend had spoken of the article in The Encyclopedia Britannica. He had read that article very carefully, and was of opinion that, inasmuch as it expressed the views of one man only, it ought not to have appeared in its present form, but that it should have taken a survey of the whole field. It was an able and ingenious article, by a friend of his own, and a man of great abilities, but he thought few persons would agree with it. He believed the writer, in principle, was wrong, and that the appearance of the article was a great scandal.
§ MR. CALDWELLsaid, the prosecutions in respect of the Vaccination Acts were conducted at the expense of the Parochial Boards throughout Scotland, each Board having jurisdiction in its own parish for the purpose of enforcing the Acts. It was asked that the Board of Supervision should interfere with these Local Bodies, and direct them not to enforce the law which at present allowed cumulative penalties. But if the law allowed these penalties, the Parochial Boards were entitled to prosecute for them; the Board of Supervision had no power to interfere with the Local Authorities in carrying out the law in this particular respect. Considering that the complaint against the Board of Supervision was that it did not interfere with the Local Bodies in matters which the law had defined as devolving upon them, the complaint was one which should not be received by that House.
§ DR. CAMERONsaid, he could not recognize the relevancy of the hon. Gentleman's objection, because the Vote comprised the grant for the officers in question. He was sorry that the Lord Advocate could not follow the example of his Colleague the President of the Local Government Board. As a matter of fact, these repeated penalties were enacted by a mistake, and against the wish of the House of Commons, by a majority of one or two votes in a very thin House of Lords. Mr. Forster carried the Act, and that right hon. Gentleman had more than once stated in that House that the House of Commons, on the Report of a Select Committee, refused to sanction repeated penalties. 73 The Bill went up to the House of Lords, and, as he had said, by a majority of one or two, the intention of the House of Commons was defeated. Both parties were now agreed as to the desirability of doing away with cumulative penalties. The question was not one of medical science, but purely and simply of administration—that was to say, whether they would be more likely to attain the object in view by making a martyr of him, repeatedly punishing a person for not doing what the law required, or by inflicting a small penalty upon him and allowing him to go free. It was agreed by both parties that the creation of petty martyrdom did more to spread hostility to the Act than small punishments. A Bill had been brought in on the subject by Mr. Dodson, at that time President of the Local Government Board, which Bill would have passed but for the determined opposition of the Fourth Party, represented by the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington (Lord Randolph Churchill). Again, the present President of the Local Government Board (Mr. Ritchie) had issued a Circular to Boards of Guardians in England requesting them not to enforce these penalties. In Scotland the matter rested on a different footing. Cumulative penalties had not been pressed for, and the result was that there had never been any serious agitation against vaccination, and, so to speak, Scotland had been the best vaccinated part of the United Kingdom. They asked simply that the Lord Advocate should imitate the example of his Colleague the President of the Local Government Board in discouraging these repeated prosecutions, and that could be done in Scotland with a success which was not within the power of the President of the Local Government Board, inasmuch as the prosecutions were conducted by Public Prosecutors who were directly under the control of the Lord Advocate. In these circumstances he trusted the right hon. and learned Gentleman would have no hesitation in giving the desired pledge.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, he would point out that the Statute provided that penalties might be recovered by summary proceeding, or by complaint in writing made by the Inspector of the poor of the parish. Accordingly, the duty devolved on the 74 Parochial Boards, acting through their Inspectors.
§ MR. HUNTERsaid, he had not moved the reduction of the Vote byway of censure of the Board of Supervision, and still less as a censure of the local Guardians, but rather with the view that the Motion would indicate to the Local Authorities that, in the opinion of the House, those grants should not be continued if they persisted in prosecuting for cumulative penalties.
§ Question put.
§ The Committee divided:—Ayes 89; Noes 178: Majority 89.—(Div. List, No. 345.)
§ Original Question again proposed.
§ DR. CLARKasked the First Lord of the Treasury whether he would grant a Select Committee to inquire into the proportion of grants received in England, Scotland, and Ireland in aid of the maintenance of the poor?
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH) (Strand, Westminster)said, he could not answer a question of that kind without Notice.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLANDsaid, he had received no answer from the Lord Advocate to the question with regard to the Inspectors of the Poor.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, that power to dismiss the Inspectors of Poor was vested in the Board of Supervision. He could not doubt that the Board would direct its attention to the conduct of an officer in regard to a specific matter, and, therefore, he thought there must be some misapprehension as to the case to which the hon. Gentleman referred.
§ SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLsaid, on the first suitable opportunity, he should draw attention to the injurious results of making the Inspectors independent of the Parochial Boards, inasmuch as they could not be suspended or dismissed without the sanction of the Board of Supervision.
DR. R. MACDONALDsaid, the right hon. and learned Gentleman had not replied to his suggestion that medical officers in Scotland should be placed in the same position as they were in England and Ireland, so that they might not be dismissed at the caprice of the Parochial Board.
§ MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSONsaid, as a matter of fact, the Board of Supervision did consider the merits of any case in which a medical officer stated a grievance of the kind.
§ Question put, and agreed to.