HC Deb 25 July 1859 vol 155 cc444-5

Order for Committee read.

House in Committee.

Clause 1,

SIR GEORGE LEWIS

said, it was with some reluctance that he rose to oppose the Bill. Having examined the matter he thought the House ought to consider well before they agreed to the Bill. There was no doubt it was very desirable that locomotives should be permitted to travel along turnpike roads and be subject to tolls like carriages drawn by horses, but the evidence did not satisfy him that the House would be justified in its present state of information in passing the Bill. The experiment had been hitherto tried upon only a very narrow scale, and he was informed that the engineer of the Board of Trade entertained considerable doubt whether there was sufficient experience to justify the granting of the permission sought for by the Bill. He therefore suggested that, for the present, the Bill ought to be withdrawn.

MR. RIDLEY

said, the evidence given before the Committee showed that the experiment had been tried to a large extent in Manchester and Liverpool in the most crowded hours of the day, and that no damage had ensued. It should be re- membered also that as the law at present stood there was nothing to prevent a locomotive proceeding from London to Edinburgh on the high road without paying a penny for turnpike.

MR. GARNETT

said, he thought that if the consideration of the Bill was postponed for a few days, until the evidence taken before the Select Committee could be printed, the House would then be in a position to deal with the measure. The Bill had been brought in to meet a necessity that had arisen out of a particular case in Manchester, where an experiment had been made in conveying coals from a neighbouring colliery into that city, but so high a rate of toll had been charged on the locomotive engine employed for that purpose as to be almost prohibitory of the traffic.

MR. HEADLAM

said, that as a member of the Select Committee, he was convinced of the practicability as well as of the expediency of a measure like the one before the House. Still he agreed with the right hon. Gentleman that it should be postponed till the evidence was before the House.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS

suggested that the Bill should be postponed till Thursday, when the evidence taken by the Select Committee might be in the hands of Members.

House resumed.

Committee report progress.