PUBLIC LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS. (Hansard, 16 May 1850)

§ COLONEL SIBTHORP
denounced this Bill as absurd in every sense of the word, and intimated his intention of moving its rejection upon the report being brought 109 up. He thought the people were already sufficiently taxed, and that this Bill would open the door to increased and indefinite burdens being placed upon them. He had no desire to curtail the amusements of the people; if he could add to them he should be happy to subscribe money from his own purse, and not exact funds from those who could not afford to pay. He thought the Bill was partial in its operation, that it was not demanded by the petitions which had been presented; and as, moreover, he thought it had been brought forward to gratify the whim of some parties and the vanity of others, he should take the advantage of a fuller House to move its rejection.

§ MR. STANFORD
said, when the Bill was introduced there was a distinct under-standing that it was a permissive Bill. It was, however, subsequently found that the Bill was not a permissive but a compulsive one. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Dumfries then gave notice of a clause of a permissive nature; but that clause, so far from assuring the sanction of two-thirds of the ratepayers of boroughs or towns, with a population of, or exceeding, 10,000 persons, simply stated that the adoption of the Act should be authorised by two-thirds of the burgesses assembled by a notice not earlier than ten days. He had opposed that clause, and moved an Amendment to it, and when six o'clock, the hour of adjournment, arrived, the further progress of the Bill wag postponed till the present occasion. He would support the Bill cheerfully if the hon. Member would modify it so that its provisions should be of a permissive and not of a compulsory character. The Bill in its present state had a very insinuating title, but nothing else. Take away the title and there was no Bill at all. A more crude or ill-digested piece of legislation he never saw, and he felt convinced that it would not give satisfaction to the country.

§ MR. EWART
must make exception to the manner in which the Bill had been attacked by the hon. Member for Reading, and would remind him that, if there were crude, crotchetty, and ill-digested Bills, there were also crude, crotchetty, and ill-digested speeches. Neither did he think it redounded to the credit of the hon. Gentleman that he should mark his noviciate by making an attack upon a Member for having introduced a Bill of this sort. The hon. Gentleman had said the Bill was not maturely considered; but he begged to remind 110 the hon. Member that it had been recommended by a Committee of last Session, and numerous petitions had been presented in its favour. Indeed, he was sure that the borough of Reading would approve of the Bill, unless, indeed, it was not a "reading" borough. He would make the hon. Gentleman a present of the joke, as he considered it suitable to the nature of his opposition. He had, in the alterations which he proposed to introduce into the Bill, endeavoured to conciliate opposition and meet the objections of hon. Members. He proposed that notices should be affixed on the doors of churches and chapels, and should be advertised in the newpapers also, and he was willing to introduce any further provisions into the measure which would remove all objections to it, unless those objections were of an unreasonable kind. He regretted that the hon. Gentleman opposite the Member for Reading had imputed motives to him which did not actuate him in bringing forward the Bill. He had brought it in on public grounds only, and for a public purpose; and feeling that conviction he did not think it necessary to reply to those who said to the contrary. He believed that the introduction of the clause which he proposed would have been more properly done on another stage of the Bill; but as the right hon. Secretary for the Home Department had given an opinion that it would be better to do so then, he was willing to accede to his suggestion. If the hon. Member for Reading was really desirous that the measure should pass, and would give to him (Mr. Ewart) his support, he would willingly agree to any proposition which might be made to make the Bill more perfect.

§ SIR G. R. PECHELL
said, he had instructions from the town he had the honour to represent, to put in a clause to extend the provisions of the Bill to towns with local Acts. At present it was confined to corporate towns, and he saw no reason why it should not extend to large towns which were not incorporated.

§ SIR G. GREY
said, there appeared to be considerable confusion with respect to the mode of proceeding with the Bill. The main question they had to determine was, whether the ratepayers had a sufficient control over the town councils. In order to give such a control, the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dumfries had proposed a clause; and to that clause the hon. Gentleman opposite, the Member for Beading, objected, and proposed an Amendment. 111 Upon that the clause was withdrawn, and a new one was substituted, to which the Amendment did not refer, and he would therefore suggest that the Amendment should be withdrawn, and that the Bill should be committed pro formâ, that the new clause might he considered, and that hon. Members might have an opportunity of seeing how it affected the Bill.

§ MR. HUME
was of opinion that the most important part of the Bill was that which gave a check to the ratepayers over the funds raised under the Bill, and as the new clause referred to that important point, he hoped the House would allow it to be introduced pro formâ, for the purpose of its being considered.

§ MR. STANFORD
had no intention whatever of imputing any sinister object to the hon. Member who had introduced the measure, for he entirely acquitted him of any such object. He would be the last person in the House to impute improper motives, and his own opposition arose entirely from his sense of public duty. He had no objection whatever to the course suggested by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for the Home Department, and he would not, therefore, any longer persist in his Amendment.