GENERAL WYNDHAMsaid, he wished to ask the Secretary for War, whether any and what steps have been taken, or are in progress, to alter and amend the Royal Warrant dated the 6th of October, 1854?
GENERAL PEELsaid, he could assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that his change of position had in no respect altered his opinion of this Warrant, or of the means by which alone it could be satisfactorily dealt with. The Warrant was founded upon the Report of a Royal Commission; it had been in operation for three years and a half, and he was only stating what had been admitted on every occasion on which a question had been asked upon this subject, when he said that it had not acted satisfactorily, but had, on the other hand, given rise to great and, he believed, very just complaints on the part of officers. When he went to the War Office he found there the draught of a new Warrant, with many of the provisions of which he should be perfectly satisfied. Still he had always held that no alteration ought to be made in a Warrant of this description without having been investigated by, and having received the sanction of a Royal Commission. It was therefore his intention, with the advice and consent of his colleagues, humbly to submit to her Majesty that a Royal Commission should be appointed to consider the Report of the Commission on which the Warrant of 1854 was founded, and the existing system of promotion in the army. He had already invited the Members of the former Commission to become Members of the new one. He would take care that every branch of the service should be fully represented, 324 and it would be an instruction to the Commission that every class of officers who thought themselves aggrieved by the operation of the former Warrant, should have an opportunity of being fully heard before it.