HC Deb 20 August 1857 vol 147 cc1933-44
MR. BAINES

observed, that to a great number of the Amendments made in this Bill by the House of Commons the other House had acceded. One point on which there was considerable variance between the views of the two Houses was as to the constitution of the governing body of the College. There were four of the metropolitan parishes which were mainly, if not exclusively, interested in this Bill, and these parishes were, St. Botolph, St. Luke's, St. Saviour's Southwark, and St. Giles Camberwell. When this Bill came down from the House of Lords the governing body which it proposed to establish was to consist of four elected members—one from each of the parishes above mentioned—and eleven non-elected members to be chosen by the Court of Chancery, thus making a total of fifteen Governors in all. The measure had been referred to a Select Committee of the Lower House, when, after much consideration, it was deemed desirable to raise the number of elected governors from four to eight, so as to give two representatives to each of the four parishes. It was quite clear that it was the intention of the founder that persons representing locally the four parishes should form a large part of the governing and managing body of the institution. The Committee of the House of Commons, therefore, recommended that there should be eight elective governors instead of four, and that there should be eight non-elective governors. There was a difference in the Committee as to how the non-elective should be appointed; at last they hit on a plan which he thought was not the best that could be adopted, namely, that three of the eight should consist of official persons—the President and the Vice President of the Committee of Privy Council on Education, and the President of the Poor Law Board. However ornamental their names might be, it was quite evident that you could never expect them to give a regular attendance as part of the governing body of the institution. His opinion was, that the Lords' plan was a better one, namely, that a certain number should be appointed by the Court of Chancery, which, it was well known, took great pains in satisfying itself as to the fitness of parties proposed as the governors of charities. The Lords insisted on the Amendment which they made in the Bill with regard to the elective and non-elective governors. He was strongly of opinion that it was desirable to adhere to the opinion of the Select Committee of the House of Commons, and to the unanimous decision of the House of Commons, with regard to the eight elected governors. He thought that, by doing so, they would only be giving a reasonable satisfaction to the four parishes. Those parishes had every reason to believe that the decision of the House of Commons would be adhered to. What he should, therefore, respectfully submit to the House, by and by, was, that they should affirm their decision that eight should be the number of the elected governors; but, first, he would move that the Lords' Amendments be considered.

Lords' Amendments read.

MR. BAINES moved that the House do insist on the Amendment which they had made in the Bill, to the effect that there should be eight elected governors.

MR. KNIGHT

said, he rose to move that the debate be adjourned. He believed that a worse scheme than that propounded by the Charity Commissioners for the government of this institution could not be devised, and that the bargain which the Commissioners had made with the Fellows was as bad as it could possibly be. If the Bill were thrown out, no such bad bargain could ever again be made with the Fellows. There had been a constant struggle for many years between the officers and the objects of this charity. For many years the officers had been endeavouring to seize the property left by the founder for the benefit of the poor. The officers in those endeavours had been very successful. They had got rid of a great number of the objects of the charity. They had got rid of the sixty-eight boys who were to be instructed in school according to the directions of the founder. They had got rid of the thirty out-pensioners, and of the six chanters or under-Fellows. They had got rid of the almshouses, at least they allowed nothing for their repair, and gave nothing to the persons living therein except 3s. 6d. for coal every now and then. They had got rid of a great deal of the population by their mismanagement. They had power to grant building leases, and might have made the property worth £50,000 a year, whereas it was not worth £10,000 a year. After the constant fights which had been going on for years to put an end to the mismanagement of the charity, the Charity Commissioners entered into a bargain—which he could not call corrupt, because the Commissioners could not derive any personal gain by it, but which he must call most unjust—with the Fellows, who after having mismanaged the charity would by that bargain be enabled to retreat with the honours of war, their colours flying, and cash in their pockels—the actual value of their pensions being, as he had been informed, between £70,000 and £80,000. The right hon. Gentleman who had charge of this Bill, told the House the other day that the Charity Commissioners could not help entering into that bargain, because the Fellows had as good a right to the property as any Gentleman had to his estate. Now, part of the Fellows' oath was that they would lead a single life, that they would not accept any other service, or yearly wages, or stipend from any other person whatever; that they would faithfully, according to the best of their skill, and the plain grammatical sense of the statutes of the college, discharge the duties thereof; that they would never consent to give away any lands, goods, or things whatsoever belonging to the same college, and that they would not convert any part of the property of the college to their own use. And yet these were the people who they had been told were as complete owners of the property of the college as any hon. Gentleman was owner of his estate. The fact was that the struggle to get these estates began very soon after the death of the testator; and the Fellows had got them and plundered them ever since in the most disgraceful manner. The Archbishop of Canterbury was the visitor of the college, and had full power to correct all abuses in its management, but none of the Archbishops of Canterbury had discharged that duty. The Court of Chancery was frequently asked to interfere, but though there was a distinct trust for the poor, it preferred to leave the Archbishop of Canterbury to do so. The statutes for the government of the charity were made in 1626, in which year the testator died. In 1633 began the first quarrel for a surplus, for even so early as that year a surplus had accumulated. Ever since there had been quarrels for the surplus. These Fellows had, for a considerable number of years, been putting several thousands of pounds into their pockets. In 1633 there was a surplus of £240. The churchwardens of the parishes interested appealed to Lord Keeper Coventry with respect to it. The Fellows, he believed, violently opposed that appeal. The result was that Lord Keeper Coventry decided that £120, one-half of the surplus, should be placed in the common chest of the college, and that the residue should be applied to other charities contemplated by the testator, and he ordered that if there should be a surplus thereafter it should be applied to such of those additional charities as the Court should think fit. The Fellows had cut off the additional recipients of the charity. This opinion was given only six years after the death of the founder. Then came the civil wars, during which the income was greatly reduced, but he believed that it was decided that the loss should fall on the officers and not on the objects of the charity. After the Restoration, however, in 1667, Archbishop Sheldon went to Dulwich as Visitor, and, finding a surplus of £139 10s., decided that it should be expended in placing boys at the Universities, in weekly allowances, and in similar ways. In 1724 Archbishop Wake was visitor, and, finding that the income of the charity had increased from £800 to £1,000, he also, while giving the Fellows a share in the increase, directed that the residue should be apportioned in the manner ordered by Archbishop Sheldon. There had been one or two fights before the Court of Chancery, but no decision had been given as to whom the surplus was to go. The point raised had always been this:—are the additional Fellows a part of the corporation? And Chancery had always said, "They are not in the letters patent, and cannot be a part of the foundation." It was quite clear, however, that they ought to have been assistants to the corporation, instead of which they had been cut off one by one, and the whole of the surplus had gone into the pockets of the officers. Archbishop Sheldon, when making his redistribution of the surplus, was violently opposed by the college, and particularly by one of the Fellows. What did the Archbishop do? He turned the Fellow out, and there was not the slightest doubt that the present Visitor, if he chose, could do the same. Lord Langdale, when the question came before him, decided that Chancery had no power to touch the trust, though the Visitor had. Up to this time there was a surplus of some thousands, which the officers placed in the common chest; but on the 1st of March, which was what they called the dividend day, they put it all into their pockets and walked off with it. In 1834 the Charity Commissioners, a body of eleven eminent men, inquired into the subject, and said it was quite clear that the Fellows were putting into their pockets very much larger sums than were intended by the founder or were given by the statutes. In fact, until the present Charity Commissioners were appointed he could find nobody who supposed that the Fellows had not done so. The Commissioners decided that these persons had the entire right to the funds, a right which nobody could touch, and recommended that a compromise should be made with the Fellows on their own terms. Moreover, the Commissioners pointed out that as the properly was rising in value, so the surplus put into the common chest, and thence into the pockets of the Fellows, would increase. No doubt, it was said, there would, within a certain time, be £20,000 to be divided; and the Fellows in the most generous manner pretended that they were giving up something for the benefit of the public. The fact was that the indignant country was turning them out; yet, after misappropriating such large sums, and being let off with all this money, they wanted to retire with £70,000 or £80,000 in their pockets. The proposal was so thoroughly unjust and iniquitous that he did sincerely hope the House would not allow the Bill to be forced through at this period of the Session. Let another Select Committee be appointed next Session to inquire into the rights of the Fellows. Though Chancery could not touch the trust the Archbishop could, and he, as visitor, following the example set by Archbishop Sheldon, could send them neck and crop about their business if they did not agree to that which was right. The parishes were in this position—they all allowed that these retiring pensions were the grossest iniquity in the world; but they said, "The Charity Commissioners have sided with these Fellows, and as they possess great power and influence, we had better, perhaps, give up the £70,000, in order to obtain the rest." Now, this was a sort of compromise with the Devil, which he confessed he could not make out. It provoked him so much that he could hardly keep his temper when he talked about it. He did not like the scheme proposed by the Charity Commissioners. It was, he believed, their pet scheme—a model scheme—and if it passed there were to be a great many more like it. But as it came down from the Commissioners he thought it objectionable in more than one particular. Its effect would have been to give over the charity entirely to the wealthier classes, cutting out the poor altogether. It was to be a boarding-school for the upper classes, the orphans being left out of consideration. To a certain degree it had been altered in the Select Committee, but not at all to the extent he could wish, because the children were still to be subject to a tax of £8 or £10 per annum, which in such a wealthy charity ought not to be. Then there was no expansion; it was a sort of dead, dry scheme, drawn up without the least regard to the will of the founder, and so bad in itself that it would be better to do without it. He hoped the House would not allow them to carry out the scheme this year. Let the point be well considered whether the Fellows had a right to oppose a fair and just distribution of this money or not. He regretted to say that the Select Committee had not attacked the Fellows as they ought to have done, and as he hoped they would do next year. They did not say, "These men shall be called upon, as trustees, to account for the money they have already received and pocketed." On the contrary, they said, "As the Commissioners have given them to you, we will not interfere with your salaries." He wished to do so, but the Select Committee did not support him, because they had not inquired into the case. With respect to maintenance, it appeared that by the original statute £10 a year each was allowed for the maintenance of the Fellows. Archbishop Sheldon increased that amount to £15, but still the sum was, he admitted, very small. He had no doubt, therefore, that if the Archbishop had been applied to, as he ought to have been, he would have granted some further allowance. The Rev. Mr. Howes, the Senior Follow, who gave evidence before the Committee, said that he had been a Fellow of his college at Cambridge, and that if he estimated the value of his board and lodging there at £100 a year he should think it a fairsum. He (Mr. Knight) had no doubt, therefore, that if the Archbishop had been asked he would have fixed it at £100; but the Archbishop had not been consulted, and the next thing they heard of it was that the Fellows had taken to themselves £300 a year each, and £75 a year for a horse. The Select Committee said, "Suppose we take the Charity Commissioners' dictum, that this is their own property, yet surely board and lodging are not their own property—they are boarded and lodged while they perform duties, but not for ever, and surely they ought not for ever to receive those allowances of £300 a year and £75 for a horse each. [Mr. BAINES intimated that they did not receive that sum.] Yes; that was their own statement. They were to receive those sums for life. One got a curacy, another went somewhere else; they no longer performed any duties, but they still took that money, which belonged to the poor, every year pocketed it, and carried it off. These Fellows drank the best wine, rode fine horses, and led a splendid life of ease. Really it appeared to him as if the place were a sort of little Protestant monastery. If they complained of luxuries and abuses in Roman Catholic monasteries, they would be told that the monks had considerable duties to perform; but these people boasted that they did nothing. Mr. Howes said that he was lodged on a free and liberal scale, that his duties were very light—only preaching one sermon once a week,—that he had nothing to do for what he received. Unless these gentlemen could show some better reason for claiming so large a sum it ought to be considerably reduced, and, instead of complaining of a reduction, they ought to consider themselves exceedingly lucky in having received so much for so long a period. In conclusion he would move the Adjournment of the debate.

SIR GEORGE GREY

said, that the only question before them was that the House should insist upon its Amendments, and he should not therefore follow the example of the hon. gentleman who had just sat down, which was quite irregular, and discuss the merits of the whole Bill. He reminded the House, however, that this was not a Bill of the Charity Commissioners, but that it was founded on a scheme originally prepared by them, which had passed through two Select Committees of the House of Lords, and one of the House of Commons, in which it had undergone the most careful inquiry and been considerably modified. He would not say more upon the merits of the Bill, because the hon. Gentleman had made the same speech as that which he had just addressed to them on the third reading. He was answered on that occasion by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Baines), and by the hon. and learned Member for Wallingford (Mr, Malins), and the third reading was agreed to by a large majority. The question before the House was practically whether there should be eight members in the governing body elected by the parishes, or only four. His right hon. Friend did not propose to interfere with the Amendment which related to other portions of the governing body, but he thought it desirable that the decision come to by the Select Committee and approved by the House, that the members elected by the parishes should be eight and not four, should stand part of the Bill. That being the only question before the House, he hoped that the discussion would be confined to that.

MR. W. WILLIAMS

said, that speaking on the part of the parish of Camberwell, although his constituents were by no means satisfied with the Bill, yet the difficulties which had been experienced in bringing matters to this point had been so great that they would much rather the Bill should pass in its present form than that it should be thrown out. He could not understand the ground on which the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Mr. Knight) opposed the Bill. He had given them a long statement from a pamphlet showing the horrible mismanagement of this charity for the last 200 years, and now he stood in the way of effecting any improvement by desiring to throw out a Bill which gave them better terms than they would ever be likely to obtain again.

MR. T. J. MILLER

said, that as a Member of the Select Committee he might be allowed to observe that he had heard the observations of his hon. Friend (Mr. Knight) with great surprise; because in the course of the lengthened investigation which took place before the Committee, it was his gratification to hear his hon. Friend express his satisfaction at the scheme which the Committee had recommended. His hon. Friend had to-night complained on just and strong grounds that the funds of the institution had been misapplied to a considerable extent, and had expressed regret, in which he (Mr. Miller) concurred, that the objects for which they were intended had not derived the full advantage contemplated by the founder. Now, the desire of the Committee, with a view to carry out the intentions of the founder, was to confer upon those objects as much of benefit from the institution as it was possible for Parliament to secure; and one of the most important Resolutions of the Committee was that a certain class of poor persons should come in and participate in that benefit; and of this Resolution his hon. Friend had in Committee expressed his unqualified approval. He (Mr. Miller) had also, with much surprise, listened to the objections which his hon. Friend entertained to the scheme embodied in the Bill. He said that hitherto the institution had been so entirely mismanaged as to be a disgrace to those who had the management entrusted to them, and that he put forward as a reason why the system should not now be altered. But one would have thought the logical deduction from these premises would have been the exact reverse. The gist of his hon. Friend's opposition, however, was to be found in his assertion that they were about to compensate the servants of the institution to a much greater amount than they were entitled to receive. Well, he admitted, and with some regret, that the amount charged upon the institution for those servants was somewhat large—not quite so large as his hon. Friend had stated, though still large. But the fact was, that by the statutes or ordinances of the founder, they were fully entitled to all they demanded, and he believed that nothing could deprive them of their title to make the demand except the authority of Parliament; and judging from his short experience in that House, he was satisfied that Parliament would not act upon a principle that went to deprive persons of vested interests of which they could not be deprived under the common or statute law of the hind without awarding a full compensation. If the sums of money which the Fellows received and the other advantages which they enjoyed were calculated, it would be found that the House of Lords and the Charity Commissioners had fixed upon exactly equivalent sums for their retiring allowances. But in doing so, far from doing the institution any injustice, it might be said that they did injustice to the Masters, Fellows, and Assistants, because under the items they were each entitled to a certain proportion of the income, whatever that income might be, and it had increased from £800 a year, at the time of the institution being founded, to £9,500 a year, with every probability of its reaching £20,000 a year within a very short time. If, therefore, the prospective advantages were taken into account they were entitled to more than was to be given to them. He trusted the House would concur in the proposition of the right hon. Gentleman to adhere to their Amendment.

MR. JOHN LOCKE

said, that he had certainly been under the same impression as his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Miller), and had understood that the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Mr. Knight) was highly delighted at the conclusions at which the Select Committee came, and had expressed his satisfaction at the prospect of the benefits of the institution being extended to eighty boys and to four parishes, with a population of 150,000 souls. The representatives of those parishes were extremely anxious that the Bill should pass, and the Master, Warden, and Fellows would be the only persons who would have reason to be pleased if the hon. Member for West Worcestershire should succeed in overthrowing it. Although the original scheme had not been carried out in spirit, there was no doubt it had been carried out to the letter, and that there was no foundation for the charge that downright robbery had been committed by the officers of a charity of which the Archbishop of Canterbury was the visitor. If the Master-Warden and Fellows took a little too much, it would only be for their lives; and, considering the dignity, honour, and position which they gave up, and the failure for fifteen years of all attempts to place the institution upon a new footing—whether made by the Visitor, the Court of Chancery, the Charity Commissioners, or Parliament—he did not think that objection ought to induce them to reject the Bill.

MR. HADFIELD

expressed a conviction that the poor of this country were injured to a vast extent by the misappropriation of various charities, and he regretted to add that the Courts of law, and even Parliament itself, had sometimes sanctioned arrangements contrary to the intentions of the founders. In the proportion that the sums to be paid to these officers were in excess of what they were strictly entitled to receive, in that same proportion would the poor objects of the charity be denuded of their rights, and from what he had observed of the provisions of the Bill, and more especially as regarded the payments to be made by poor scholars, he really feared the interests of the poor had not been sufficiently attended to.

MR. BAINES

said, that although an entrance fee would be allowed to be charged, the governors would have ample discretion to admit boys without the payment of any fee at all.

SIR W. HEATHCOTE

said, he thought there was great inconvenience in raising a discussion on the merits of this Bill upon the very narrow question whether the House should agree or disagree to the Lords' Amendments with respect to particular parts of the measure. He understood the objections of his hon. Friend (Mr. Knight) to relate chiefly to the allowances to be paid to the persons who were retiring from a position in which, as far as he could gather, they had a vested interest; and he believed it had never been the practice of Parliament to dispossess persons of positions in which they had a vested interest without according them a fair retiring allowance. The other question related to the arrangements with respect to the governing body. These were the only points before the House, and whatever might be the merits of the case, it could not be said they had not been carefully considered. It appeared the parishes concerned were satisfied, and the other parties were satisfied with the powers given to the Chancellor, and therefore he (Sir W. Heathcote) hoped his hon. Friend would not press his objections to the Bill, and drive the House to vote on an issue which he had not raised.

MR. COX

said that he full himself placed in a somewhat difficult position respecting the hon. Gentleman's Motion, for although the hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Locke) had presented a petition from the four parishes in favour of the Bill, he (Mr. Cox) had been told by persons, parishioners in St. Luke's, that they were in favour of its postponement during the present Session. Under all the circumstances, however, and considering that the Bill gave the four parishes eight representative governors in all, he should support the proposition of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Baines).

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Resolved,— That this House doth insist on its Amendment at page 2, line 18, to leave out the word "16," but doth propose to insert the word "19" instead of that previously inserted; and doth insist on its Amendments in page 2, lines 21 and 26; and doth not insist on the other of the said Amendments to which the Lords have disagreed.

Committee appointed, To draw up Reasons to be assigned to the Lords for insisting on several of the said Amendments to which the Lords have disagreed:"—Mr. BAINES, Mr. TAVERNER MILLER, Mr. WILLIAM WILLIAMS, Mr. Cox, and Sir JOHN RAMSDEN. To withdraw immediately; three to be the quorum.