HC Deb 30 January 1860 vol 156 cc290-322
THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER

said, he rose to propose the appointment of a Select Committee— To inquire into the manner in which Contracts extending over periods of years from time to time have been formed or modified by Her Majesty's Government with various Steam Packet Companies for the conveyance of Mails by Sea; and likewise into any agreements or other arrangements which have been adopted at the public charge, actual or prospective, for the purposes of telegraphic communications beyond sea, and to report their opinion thereon to the House; together with any Recommendations as to the rules to be observed hereafter by the Government in making Contracts for services which have not yet been sanctioned by Parliament, or which extend over a series of years. He had little to do beyond proposing to the House the reappointment of the Committee, as the Motion carried with it its own recommendation, and he was not aware that there existed any intention to oppose the Motion. He only wished to say that one reason why he was anxious that the re-appointment of the Committee should take place at an early period was connected with the change which the Government were disposed to make in regard to a department which was henceforward to he considered responsible for what were called the packet estimates. At present, and for a considerable number of years, these packet estimates had been under the charge of the Admiralty; but the Government, after due examination of the matter, considered it desirable to make a change in that respect, and to hand over the principal charge and chief responsibility of them to the Post Office Department, with which they seemed more peculiarly connected. Upon the whole, that would be a more suitable arrangement. The Post Office would, of course, discharge its duty under the control of the Treasury, and in regard to the maritime portion of the duty would be assisted by the marine department of the Board of Trade, with the power of referring to the Admiralty in case of expediency. The Government thought the change desirable for the general advantage of the public service, but, at the same time, it would he proper that the Committee should have the opportunity of taking the subject under view if they thought fit, and delivering any opinion they might deem suitable to the merits of the case. With respect to the notice given by the right hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich (Sir J. Pakington) it was, of course, perfectly open to him to make the present Motion an opportunity for offering any comments on the conduct of the Committee which sat last year. He would not now by anticipation vindicate the conduct of that Committee—first, because he had not been a member of it, and, secondly, because he was not aware of any ground for impeaching its conduct; and, further, because he understood that the proceedings of the Committee, so far as related to the extent of the subject-matters to which attention should be applied, were proceedings unanimously taken by the Committee. He did not mean to say that the Committee were unanimous on all the questions they had to decide upon, but he was not aware of any difference of opinion arising as to their competency to inquire into the matters to which they did apply their attention. If he did not now further notice the subject involved in the notice of the right hon. Baronet, it must not be considered that there was any disposition on the part of the Government to censure the Committee, or to acquiesce in any censure which others might be disposed to pronounce. He would conclude these few observations by placing his Motion in the hands of the right hon. Gentleman, leaving the right hon. Baronet to address such remarks to the House as he might think fit. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by Moving the appointment of a Select Committee.

SIR JOHN PAKINGTON

Sir, I rise now, according to the notice which I have given, to submit to the House certain considerations with regard to the manner in which the investigations of this Committee were conducted during the last Session of Parliament, and the manner in which, as it seems to me, it would he desirable they should he conducted during the present year. But, Sir, before I proceed to state those considerations, I wish to clear the ground by saying, that I do not intend on this occasion to enter at all into the evidence which has been printed in the blue-book, nor to touch upon the case of Mr. Churchward, and the contract that was made with him by the late Government for the conveyance of the mails from Dovor to Calais and Dovor to Ostend. The hon. and gallant Member for Berkshire (Captain Vernon) has given notice of a Resolution on this subject, which he intends to move next week. It is perfectly clear, I think, that a definite issue must be raised upon the report of that Committee, whether or not this House approves of the recommendation it contains that the contract with Mr. Churchward should be violated. It would not be consistent with the rules of Parliament that that issue should be raised on the Motion the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer has just made for the reappointment of that Committee. It is, therefore, the intention of my hon. and gallant Friend, if I rightly understand his purpose, to move the Resolution I have mentioned for the purpose of raising that issue. For the same reason I will not touch upon the censure which that Committee have in their report passed upon Mr. Murray. I confess that I have a very strong opinion as to the grounds upon which it is stated that censure proceeded. The evidence on this question is so very much mixed up with the evidence relating to the conduct of Mr. Churchward that I think that if I were to enter into it I should inevitably bring on a highly inconvenient discussion with regard to both matters. I shall, therefore, limit myself to the object which has induced me to give this notice—that object being to raise the question whether the mode in which the examinations were conducted by the Committee and the shape in which they have drawn their report are consistent with a strict regard to justice or Parliamentary usage, but more especially whether it is consistent with the practice of this House in relation to all matters (I think I may speak in these general terms) which involve anything like a charge of personal misconduct. Now, Sir, I wish very much to submit the views I desire to express to the House in the most temperate language. I very much wish not to express and not to excite anything like angry feeling. I think in the discussion of this question last Session (and perhaps it was very natural that it should be so) there was mixed up a good deal of party heat and party acrimony; hut it would be most desirable this year, at all events in this stage of the proceedings, that we should avoid so far as possible reviving any feeling of that sort. Now, I will, in the first place, remind the House of the acknowledged rule—and I believe that there is no rule more generally acknowledged—that our Select Committees are bound to keep themselves within the terms of their order of reference. For a long period this rule was what I may call part of the lex non scripta of this House; but in that very valuable work for which we are all, in my opinion, very much indebted to Mr. Erskine May, one of the clerks at the table, and which I believe is quite accepted as a manual of Parliamentary practice, the necessity of confining Committees to their order of reference is strictly laid down. It becomes, therefore, no longer a lex non scripta, for Mr. May, in a few precise, strong words, has expressed it to be thus:— Like a Committee of the Whole House, a select Committee are restrained from considering matters not specially referred to them by the House. When it is thought necessary to extend their inquiries beyond the order of reference a special instruction from the House gives them authority for that purpose. Now, I think that every Gentleman, on both sides of the House, will admit that if this be recognized as the law of Parliament in all cases, it is more especially necessary that it should be observed with greater stringency than ever in any case in which it becomes the duty of a Select Committee to investigate any questions touching the honour and character of an individual. Our honour and our character, as I need not state to the House, is the most precious possession that we have. No doubt it becomes our painful duty now and then to entertain in this House charges against the conduct of individuals; hut I am sure that there is not a man on either side of this House who will question the propriety of what I say, when I state broadly my opinion that whenever it becomes our duty to entertain charges of personal misconduct, be they what they may, it behoves us and our Committees to be scrupulously cautious that every such charge is treated with the strictest regard to all the requirements of justice. I will now, with the permission of the House, call its attention to the terms of that part of the order of reference which was to guide this Committee in its inquiries respecting the Mail Packet Contracts; but I shall pass over that which relates to the Telegraph Contracts, because it has nothing to do with the question now before us. It says, That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the manner in which Contracts extending over periods of years have from time to time been framed or modified by her Majesty's Government, with various Steam Packet Companies for the conveyance of the Mails by sea, together with any recommendation as to the rules to be observed hereafter by the Government in the making Contracts for services which have not yet been sanctioned by Parliament, or which extend over a series of years. Those are the terms of the order of reference, and having read them I will now read a passage from the report of the Committee, which, I think, seems to show that the conduct of the Committee was not limited so strictly as it ought to have been by the terms of the order:— It further appears to your Committee that neither at the Admiralty nor at the Treasury were the officers with whom the decision rested influenced in granting the renewal of the contract by any corrupt or political motive. But your Committee consider that the conduct of Mr. Murray, the private Secretary of the First Lord of the Admiralty, was open to grave censure, but they have not sufficient evidence to show that any member of the Government was cognizant of the communications that took place between Mr. Murray, Mr. Churchward, and Captain Carnegie. Now, I cannot help very confidently thinking that hardly any Gentleman will rise in his place to tell me that this paragraph in the report is in accordance with the order of reference. I cannot think that any Gentleman will be of opinion that the order of reference justified the Committee in undertaking either to acquit, to convict, or to censure any gentleman for personal misconduct. I certainly did expect, nay, more, I desired and fully expected that this Committee would institute a full and searching inquiry into the principles and the policy upon which these contracts had been made. I further expected that they would investigate and report their opinion upon the wisdom and prudence with which successive Governments may have made these contracts. But, Sir, I did not expect that they would enter into the question of personal corruption or personal misconduct, which, in my opinion, had not been referred to them, and with which, further, I maintain they were not competent to deal. If this Committee had the right or the authority to acquit, why, then, of course they had the right to convict and to censure. Perhaps it may be said that my colleagues and myself ought to be obliged to the Committee for having acquitted us of every charge of corruption. But, Sir, I answer that we were in no sense before them. No charge of political misconduct was preferred, and I maintain that they had not, morally or legally, the right to enter into any such question, nor had they the right to negative such issues as personal misconduct. The right to acquit or to convict involves, as a matter of course, a trial. To have a fair trial two things are essential—namely, a distinct and specific accusation, and a competent tribunal; and I am prepared to maintain that in this case both those elements were wanting. I have heard that in reply to observations of this kind it has been said on behalf of the Committee, "Very true, we had no authority to inquire into misconduct or to try any charge of corruption on the part of individuals, but there was an under- standing in the House that we should enter into these questions." Now I have two answers to that. In the first place I deny the existence of any such understanding. But even if there were the understanding I say further that I protest in the strongest terms against the idea that the conduct of any man—that a charge of corruption or misconduct against any man—can be referred to an incompetent tribunal upon an understanding unless the man is a party to that understanding. Therefore the Committee was not justified in travelling as they did beyond the powers which this House entrusted to them. But, Sir, I am prepared to deny that any such understanding took place, and I rest my denial upon the debates which took place last Session with respect to the appointment and the duties of this Committee. I think that the highest authority to which I can refer is the language of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who moved for the appointment of the Committee, and I beg to remind him and the House that he rested his Motion solely and exclusively on the ground of public policy. In his speech he referred to several considerations which rendered the appointment of such a Committee desirable. He dwelt upon the great extent to which these contracts had increased; and, if I recollect rightly, upon the question whether a system had not grown up with these contracts which practically had the effect of taking them out of the jurisdiction of the House of Commons. He also dwelt upon another most important question—namely, the policy of granting subsidies with these contracts. Then, after touching upon the increase of the expense which also had arisen, the right hon. Gentleman moved for this Committee, but throughout resting his Motion exclusively upon these important public grounds—amply sufficient, as I think the House will feel, for the Motion he made, but not intimating in any way, that I recollect, that this Committee was to be made the engine of attack or recrimination upon any individual. Well, then, the hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of London (Mr. Crawford) also spoke upon that debate. He strongly approved of the appointment of the Committee, and dwelt, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer had done, upon the public grounds by which it was supported. He used the expression that "He did not think it was so much a question whether the making of a particular contract was to be charged as a ground of censure against this or that Government. Other hon. Gentlemen also spoke. Some of the speeches made were of a strong party character. Party feeling, at all events, was strong at that moment. But I think I am justified in saying that the tone of the debate was entirely in harmony with the tone adopted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and tended to this view of the question, that the object of that Committee was to entertain questions of public policy alone. Well, Sir, another debate shortly after ensued. It arose in consequence of the presentation of a petition by the right hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. E. P. Bouverie), from Sir William Russell who prayed that the Committee might be restrained from entering into the question of the Dovor contract because they might prejudice his interests in respect of an election petition then pending. The speech in which the right hon. Member for Kilmarnock introduced the Motion he made for that purpose was marked by a good deal of party spirit; but the reason why I have referred to it is, that in that speech the right hon. Gentleman expressed in very strong terms, in terms indeed as strong as I could use now, his opinion that the Committee was not a fit tribunal to investigate personal charges if personal charges should be preferred; and he gave his reasons for that opinion. In those reasons I entirely concurred; in some others that he gave at the same time I did not concur, hut I quite agreed with that conclusion. Well, Sir, he was followed amongst others by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hertford (Mr. Cowper), who, in a speech, not of the most kindly description as far as it regarded Gentlemen on this side of the House, also expressed an opinion in which again I entirely concurred, namely, that if personal charges were to be brought forward in connection with these contracts, they ought undoubtedly to be referred to a judicial Committee. The consequence of these two speeches was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer rose at the end of the debate, and particularly referring to the opinions they had expressed as to the unfitness of that Committee for judicial duties, he said,— The Committee was not appointed for the purpose of conducting certain cases of criminatory accusations against any Government in particular. It was not to try the case of Dovor or Galway in any other spirit than that in which it would be its duty to examine every other case of contract that might come before it. Now, Sir, I do not know what construction the right hon. Gentleman may now put upon those words, but I have no hesitation in telling him the construction not only that I put upon them now, but that I placed upon them then; and it was this. They were uttered in answer to the objection that the Committee was not a competent judicial tribunal, and they meant, as I took them, that it was the intention of the Government and of right hon. Gentlemen that that Committee should enter into questions of public principle and public policy, and into nothing else. I feel convinced that that must have been the meaning of the right hon. Gentleman, because if, at the moment he used those words, he had had it in his mind that the Committee were to be at liberty to asperse the character of an individual, and be at liberty to enter into charges of or accusations, whatever they might be, of corruption (none were ever before formally preferred that I know of), and to acquit or convict upon those charges, dealing, therefore, with the honour and character of individuals—if such were the case, I think the right hon. Gentleman was bound to state it to the House, after what had fallen from those other right hon. Gentlemen who had spoken before him. I accepted, therefore, the construction I had alluded to, and I made no objection whatever to the appointment of the Commmittee, thinking it a most proper step on the part of the Government to adopt. But I must at once state this to the House, that if I had at that moment had an idea that that Committee were going, not only to investigate the public policy involved in the making of those contracts, but the characters of individuals, and to presume to acquit and censure on imputations of personal misconduct or corruption, nothing would have induced me to consent to the appointment of that Committee, constituted as it was. But now, Sir, let me state to the House the grounds on which I rest my assertion of the unfitness of that Committee for the investigation of anything like personal character, and let me add that I do so from the conviction that there is no member of it who can feel the least objection to the grounds which I am obliged to state. Sir, the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the speech I have referred to, said that he thought the Committee ought to be most carefully selected, and I am free to admit that he fully redeemed his pledge—I say this, keeping in mind the two speeches that he made, and the intention which I have stated was to be inferred from them—so far as the investigation of that important question, what were the principles and the public policy which ought to govern these contracts was concerned. I am free to admit that the time had arrived for that investigation, and I also admit that I do not think it was possible for the right hon. Gentleman to select a Committee better qualified for carrying out that object. It contained several very distinguished members, and it was presided over by a most able member of this House; indeed, in that unusually large Committee, I do not think there was one man to whom I should have taken exception as one not thoroughly qualified to deal with the question stated. I own that my own individual opinion is always opposed to extending the number of Members composing Committees beyond fifteen; this consisted of nineteen Members, and considering the work they were appointed to do, and the questions I supposed were submitted to them, they could not have been better chosen. But, Sir, I am bound to state at the same time, that I do not think nineteen gentlemen could have been selected more unfit to enter upon an investigation or trial of any charge affecting the character or honour of an individual hon. Member of this House, or, indeed, of any one else. In this I hope I may not be misunderstood. I say it with no disrespectful feeling towards any of the members of that Committee. But my charge against them is this:—In the first place, whatever I may think about the prudence of appointing very large Committees to conduct any ordinary matter, I have no hesitation in saying that the appointment of a very numerous Committee to investigate anything like personal charges is not only opposed to the practice of the House, but it is opposed to all notions of a prudential character. But who were these Gentlemen? I look down the names, and I find men of high character, position, and credit; but I look in vain (I hope I do none of them an injustice) throughout the whole of that list for one man connected with the profession of the law. I find scarcely one that can be acquainted with the laws of evidence. I do not find a single Gentleman amongst them who is conversant with the mode in which business is transacted in our courts of law, who has ever been accustomed to judicial investigation of any kind, and who, therefore, is at all capable of conducting a judicial investigation as it ought to be conducted. Now, Sir, I am not sure that I can give the House a better idea of the objection I feel to the constitution of that Committee for the purpose I am now referring to, than by alluding to the examination of witnesses as conducted by their very able Chairman (Mr. Cobden). He is not now present, but I presume I am not irregular in thus alluding to him. There is no Member of this House less inclined than I am to speak with disrespect of the hon. Member for Rochdale. I trust, therefore, that I shall not be misapprehended in the observations that I am about to make. But any hon. Gentleman reading the examinations conducted by the hon. Member for Rochdale, will come to the same conclusions that I have arrived at—first, that he is a very acute and able man; secondly, that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer could not have selected a better man to superintend an investigation into the policy of the contracts in question; but, thirdly, that he could not have selected a worse man to conduct an investigation into the conduct of individuals. I appeal with confidence to any lawyer who has read the questions that will be found in the blue-book containing the evidence taken on that inquiry, and which were put by the hon. Member for Rochdale, and I ask him his opinion of those questions. I say they were questions which I believe would never have been allowed to be put in any court of justice in the kingdom, or before any other judicial tribunal where a proper course of examination and investigation is understood and pursued. There are, in my opinion, strong reasons why the Committee fell into the error—the only error that I charge them with. I do not suppose that any member of the Committee intended to do that which was wrong, or unfair, or inconsistent with Parliamentary practice. I make no charge of that sort against them, but I wish to express my belief that the Committee were led into the error of assuming to themselves powers that they did not possess, and of discharging duties for which they were, for reasons I have mentioned, unfitted. Upon these grounds I certainly shall object to a repetition of any such an investigation on any such principle. What the intentions of the Government may be I know not, but I do think that the proceedings before the Committee last year were such as to make it very desirable that we should now distinctly understand what the Committee, if reappointed, is to be. If the Committee is to go into an investigation of those principles of public policy to which I have referred, I entirely concur in the Motion of the right hon. Gentleman; nay, I will go further, and say I think that he could not do better than reappoint the same Committee. But, on the other hand, if that Committee, on its reappointment, is to deal with the character of individuals—if they are to entertain and to try anything like serious charges affecting the character of individuals—then I cannot consent to a repetition of such an investigation by a body of men, who, I think, are so entirely unfitted for the purpose. And here let me repudiate in the strongest terms—I beg it may not be for a moment thought that in the observations I am now making, the members of the late Government shrink from any investigation. On the contrary, we court it, we invite it. If there is any man in this House who thinks that any man connected with the late Government was influenced in the discharge of his public duties by motives of corruption, or by dishonest motives—from which I have no hesitation in saying we should shrink with indignation—if any such opinion as that is entertained, let it be avowed, and let the issue be tried. In that case I have a right to require and demand, that if such opinions are entertained no one should shrink from getting up to avow and proclaim them, and in that case I have a right to demand two conditions. The one is that there shall be a specific charge and accusation; and the other is that such specific charge shall be referred to a competent tribunal. I may remind the House that there is no lack of precedent upon the matter. Any hon. Gentleman who has sat for a considerable time in this House must recollect case after case of that painful kind in which charges against individuals have been brought forward, and I believe I am right in saying that the way in which the House has uniformly dealt with the matter, has been to appoint the Committee to investigate the particular subject, and not to enter into a fishing examination on the question to see if they could not find out any charges to be brought against the Government. The uniform practice of the House I believe has been this, to refer the charge to a Committee specially appointed with particular regard to its fitness for its duty, and as far as my experience goes, and I think no one will contradict me, there have been always three conditions observed in the selection of such a Committee. The first of these conditions has been, that instead of being an unusually largo Committee, such Committee has been unusually small, with the very obvious and proper motive of increasing and concentrating its responsibility. The second condition has been, that there shall be at least some Members of the learned profession on the Committee who should be capable of guiding the inquiries before such Committee in a proper manner, and taking care that no injustice was done to the parties whose conduct had to be inquired into. The third condition was, that the remaining members of the Committee should be constituted, so far as it was possible, of men who were perfectly free from any party prejudice or party interest. I trust, therefore, that in the remainder of the investigation—if there are any more grounds for suspicion with regard to the conduct of the late Government—I hope that what I say will not be forgotten. I hope we shall have a specific accusation brought before the House, and that a Committee will be appointed competent to try these matters. I trust that in making these observations I have adhered to the intention I began with of neither expressing nor exciting angry feelings. I have made these observations without questioning the motives of the Committee, and I hope without saying anything that any member of the Committee might take exception to; but I strongly hold, whatever may have led them into this course, that in so taking it they did not act consistently with the order of reference, and practically, although I am sure not with such an intention, consistently with the ends of justice. I do trust that if we are to have any painful investigation of this kind we shall take care not to infuse into it the elements of party feeling; but that after the investigation has taken place we shall all look back upon what we have done with a full conviction that we have done it with a proper regard to the interests of justice, and with a due consideration for the character and reputation of this House.

SIR FRANCIS BARING

—I am sorry the Chairman of the Committee is unfortunately absent, so that it falls to me to make some observations in answer to the right hon. Baronet. Any public man in the discharge of public duties is a legitimate object of criticism, and no member of the Committee has any reason to complain that the right hon. Baronet has thought fit to bring their conduct before the House. I am glad, however, that the right hon. Baronet has, by limiting his remarks to the question whether the Committee were justified in the course they took and fit to conduct the inquiries upon which they entered, relieved me of anything like pain in replying to him. I rejoice that the question has been brought forward now, because it relates not only to the past but to the future; and as a Committee is about to be appointed to investigate some other cases with regard to contracts, and as the conduct of Government officials in certain transactions has been questioned, it is right the Committee should know what course they are to pursue for the future in their inquiries, and whether they are or are not at liberty to extend their inquiries into matters which relate to personal misconduct. As far as I understand the tenor of the right hon. Baronet's observations, he maintains, first, that the Committee of last year was unfit to conduct a judicial inquiry, and next, that the order of reference gave them no authority for carrying their examination the length they did. Now, I am not prepared to stand up here and say that any Committee I ever saw appointed by this House was well fitted to conduct a judicial inquiry. You cannot, in this assembly, find judges on any question who shall come up to the standard of strict judicial impartiality, and are consequently obliged to select so many from one side and so many from the other, and allow the truth to be evolved by the discussions between them. But on the whole I do not think, as far as my experience goes, that upon a personal question you find that the verdict is dictated by party motives, not the honest feeling of honourable men, or that a political man seeks merely to gratify political animosity, and run down the personal character of his opponents. I may allude in proof of this to the very Committee we are speaking of. It so happens that we condemned both parties. I am afraid we must not look for thanks to the Treasury Bench, because we found fault with the conduct of the very men whose political supporters we are, and condemned an arrangement made by one of my most intimate personal friends upon this side of the House. It is not my business, however, to defend the composition of the Committee, that was the work of the House itself, and if faulty, or not properly cast, should have been objected to at the time it was nominated. When the right hon. Baronet spoke of a judicial inquiry, I would remind him that the verdict of a Committee, selected after the most approved fashion, is seldom more satisfactory to the parties whom it condemns than that of one appointed in the ordinary way. There was a great inquiry upon the administration of the Admiralty during the Government of which the right hon. Baronet was a member; it was conducted by five Gentlemen appointed by the Committee of Selection, in the most judicial manner, and who came to a unanimous decision. Surely the verdict of such a Committee, one would suppose, must have commanded the respect and confidence of the House. Not at all; it led to a long debate, and the right hon. Baronet himself so far from being satisfied with a decision arrived at in the most judicial manner, was among the first to denounce it as characterized by party prejudice and party bias. As I have said, it is not for me to defend the selection of the Committee, but I do not know that it would have been more likely to gain the confidence of the right hon. Baronet if it had been selected judicially. The next point is whether the House gave authority to the Committee to inquire into what we did inquire or not. I confess that the difficulty never struck me, and it is very remarkable that I do not think it ever struck any one member of the Committee. We had not the slightest notion that the construction which the right hon. Baronet seeks to put upon that order of reference was the construction which we were bound to observe. He has said that we were wanting in lawyers, but I am afraid that even some lawyers were on the Committee. At all events, we had Gentlemen who came from the opposite side, and I should have thought they would have stated any objection which they felt to our exceeding our power. But, if we look at the minutes of our proceedings, not the slightest objection will be found to have been taken by those Members to the course which we followed, or that they themselves abstained from going into those questions which it is now said we should have avoided. The right hon. Baronet says that in the course of the debate he understood distinctly that it was never intended the Committee should go into personal charges, and he quotes the discussion on Sir W. Russell's petition. I look back to that discussion, and I confess that I am surprised the right hon. Baronet after reading it should have given as the result that which, to my mind, is just the reverse. First we have the hon. Baronet (Sir S. Northcote), who claimed that the inquiry into transactions with regard to Dovor should not be skin deep. I think he was quite right. I am stating only what in his notion the inquiry ought to be, and, having mentioned his name, I may add that, although he took views in which a majority of the Committee did not concur, he gave every facility to make the inquiry efficient. Then we have the late Attorney General for Ireland (Mr. Whiteside), who submitted that the late Government had a right to demand that the charges made against them should, without delay, be inquired into by that Committee, in whose honour every hon. Member ought to be prepared to repose the most implicit confidence. He said the late Government had a right to inquiry by that Committee, and now we are told that it was extremely improper that the Committee should have inquired at all. I am surprised that the right hon. Baronet, if he were in the House, did not rise to contradict his hon. and learned Friend, and to say that it was not in the least intended the inquiry should extend to anything connected with personal questions. The right hon. Member for Oxfordshire (Mr. Henley) followed, and, although he may not be a lawyer, he is a chairman of quarter sessions. That right hon. Member said, on that occasion, that everybody concurred in opinion that there ought to be an investigation into the charges which had been made. We did investigate. I do not suppose that every hon. Gentleman will agree in the opinion to which we came. Upon that there will naturally be a difference of opinion, but I do say the inquiry was as fairly conducted as it could well be. I think I have shown that, as far as regards the expectation of the House itself, the inquiry into personal charges was expected, and most of all by hon. Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House. It was claimed and pressed by them, and I can hardly believe that Gentlemen will now change their tone and blame the Committee for doing that which they suffered those who sat by their side to demand when the Committee was first appointed. Is there anything in the words of the reference to prevent inquiry? The Committee are to inquire "into the mode in which contracts have been made." Supposing there had been a practice of regularly paying certain officers for passing contracts, what would be the use of the Committee if they were not to inquire into that? What is the use of telling certain gentlemen to inquire, and, at the same time, that the moment there is anything personal or not commonplace, their inquiry is to close? If the House think as I do, I hope they will say so. I only wish I had never been put on the Committee. It was by far the most disagreeable of any Committee upon which I ever sat in my life, and I shall be very glad to be relieved from it. But it is of importance that Committees in future should know whether, when the strict words of the reference are in their favour, they are to be stopped from going fully into the question of improper transactions. I hope that in some shape we shall ascertain what Committees are to do—whether they are to be free or tied down as the right hon. Baronet suggests. I have carefully avoided going into the details of the evidence, or anything which relates to personal questions. I have no wish at all—very far from it—to repeat opinions which I held in the Committee, and there is no Gentleman here but must feel that having to balance contradictory statements is an extremely painful and very unpleasant task. It was with great regret that I went into all those disagreeable matters, and I can assure the right hon. Baronet that, as far as I am concerned, I have no intention of saying a word unnecessarily in censure of any of the parties who were brought before the Committee.

LORD JOHN MANNERS

I entirely agree with the observations of the right hon. Baronet who has just sat down on the great importance, with regard to the future conduct of this Committee, or of any similar Committee, that some expression of opinion on the part of the House should be given relative to the specific subjects of inquiry to be brought under their investigation. The impression that I derive from sitting day after day on that Committee was not the impression that was derived from it by the right hon. Baronet, and which he has just given to the House. The right hon. Baronet said there was no difference of opinion amongst the members of the Committee as to the validity of the course the Committee pursued, and I understood my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the few observations that he made, to intimate a similar opinion; but as a member of the Committee, I may say, that repeatedly were objections made in the Committee-room to the course of investigation that the Committee appeared to be determined to enter on; and if there was no actual division of opinion taken, it may easily be explained when one recollects that no fewer than four members of that Committee were members of the late Government, whose conduct was supposed to be impugned before that very Committee. Repeatedly did I say—"This is an investigation which, in justice to the parties implicated, ought not to be persevered in." I felt, however, as my colleagues in the late Government felt, that if we pressed and persevered in our opposition, it would at once be said by those who were actuated by party pique and party rancour that we were endeavouring to shield ourselves from an investigation that we fully courted. The right hon. Baronet (Sir Francis Baring) said, there was an inconsistency, because my right hon. Friend near me (Sir John Pakington) says the Committee was improperly constituted for the investigation of personal charges, whereas no such objection was raised at the time the Committee was appointed. But I agree with my right hon. Friend that when the Committee was appointed it was not anticipated that personal questions would be brought before us. The Committee was confined to the subject of contracts, and the reference on which we acted was couched in the most clear and explicit terms. Now, I draw the distinction, and I make this concession to the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Portsmouth, that if the conduct of any members of the late Government should seem to have been implicated in the course of the investigation, for the conduct of which we were appointed, there would then be no objection to the course which the Committee actually took. But the complaint of my right hon. Friend and myself is that, travelling far beyond the legitimate limits of the questions which were referred to them, the Committee went wholly out of the beaten course, and implicated the conduct and character of individuals who were not before them, and who were not members of the late Government at all, in a way that was quite unprecedented, and that, as I felt then, and still feel, was eminently unfair. The right hon. Gentleman knows, that in the course of these proceedings repeated objections were taken by myself and by other members to this course of proceeding; I said then, and when the further occasion which we are promised arises I shall repeat, that this course was unfair. While entertaining the deepest respect for the members of that Committee, I am still anxious that the House shall say how far this great Committee, consisting of nineteen members, shall proceed in this special course of inquiry, because, as a member of the late Government, I feel, after what has already occurred, that I shall be out of my place on the Committee, and that if the same kind of questions as were brought up last year are to continue to be investigated, then the members of the late Government ought not to be upon it to decide on what, to some, may appear to be their own case; and, further, I feel that our presence is unfair to the claims of other persons not members of the late Government, whose claims might be defended with greater freedom than we can possibly do, on account of the offices we formerly held, and the charges that have been brought against us. I must solemnly protest if this investigation is to go on, against its being referred to a tribunal of the kind. Entertaining this opinion, if it is the pleasure of this House to re-appoint this Committee, and, if it is, further, the pleasure of the House to refer to it questions of this delicate and painful nature—a course against which I protest—I hope the House will relieve me from the unpleasant duty of being a member of a Committee where my services can be of no use, but must rather be a hindrance to a full investigation of the subject, and to that full and free defence which other persons not members of the Government are entitled to expect at our hands.

SIR FRANCIS BARING

explained, that he certainly remembered a division of opinion in the Committee as to whether certain questions ought or ought not to be put, but with all deference to the noble Lord he did not remember any difference of opinion as to the course of the inquiry.

MR. BERNAL OSBORNE

There is something peculiar in the speech of the noble Lord. He has now taken an opportunity to protest against the decision of a Committee of which he was a member, he, during the whole time, having sat patiently by, voted upon every question, and yet made no protest. I confess I have great temptation to go fully into this case, for I entertain a strong opinion both on the composition of the Committee and the judgment to which it came, but I shall resist that temptation; and I think it would have been wiser and more discreet on the part of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich (Sir J. Pakington) if, instead of now raising a debate on this question, he had left the matter in the hands of a Member of the Committee who has given notice of a Motion in reference to it for next week, since it is inconvenient to have two discussions upon the same subject. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich says that this was not a competent tribunal. I agree with him that it was not a competent tribunal, but I agree with him for different reasons. I think the present Government, or rather the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was greatly to blame for the formation of the Committee; but I don't find that the right hon. Gentleman took any exception to its constitution at the proper time. What were the circumstances attending its constitution? Instead of having the usual number of fifteen Members, nineteen were appointed; and what was the reason alleged for that course by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer? Why, that he was obliged to put four extra members on the Committee, they being members of the late Government. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich has been vapouring a little tonight. "Show me (says he) any specific charge." I took the liberty to bring forward a specific charge last Session, and to say that I suspected and had strong grounds for suspecting that the right hon. Gentleman the late First Lord of the Admiralty had tampered with the exercise of the elective franchise at Dovor by bringing the Admiralty influence to bear upon it. That was notorious, and was one reason for the appointment of the Committee. Sir William Russell made the same allegation in his Petition. So that if the right hon. Gentleman wanted a direct charge, there it stood, pointing directly at the late First Lord of the Admiralty and his private Secretary. When the Committee was appointed the Chancellor of the Exchequer entered into a private arrangement, as it appears to me, with the hon. Baronet the Member for Stamford (Sir S. Northcote), and with right hon. Gentlemen on the other side. It was, in fact, an agreement to hush up the inquiry altogether; and was nicely arranged on the old Scotch system of "Scratch me and I'll scratch you." The hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) suspected as much, and protested at the time against the constitution of the Committee, adding that if the House really wished to have an impartial and trustworthy inquiry the Committee ought to be nominated by the Committee of Selection. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich talks about there being no legal members on the Committee. At least one-fifth of the Committee, however, were judges in their own case, and so much was this felt to be so that the hon. Baronet the Member for Stamford, though he took part in the proceedings and put questions to bring out the case for his friends with more ability than most lawyers would have shown, could not sit in the Committee when it came to a vote, but left the room. The noble Lord (Lord J. Manners), however, voted manfully upon every division, and yet now, forsooth! he will not serve any longer. The truth is that this is an attempt to whitewash the private secretary of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich. He was a member of the Conservative Committee for managing the Elections—a circumstance to which the right hon. Gentleman must have been privy. There never was such a Committee in the world as that which sat to inquire into the Dovor contract. One fifth of them being accused of tampering with the elective franchise at Dovor were actually judges in their own case. Surely the House will see through the veil attempted to be thrown over this transaction. In spite of all the management exhibited, a verdict of guilty has been returned, and then the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich, discontented with that, turns round and says the Committee did not quite act according to the order of reference. I have been looking back to that matter, and that being so I was a little surprised to hear the right hon. Gentleman make such an assertion, remembering that for twenty-five years he was a chairman of quarter sessions, and that his public services have recently been commemorated by the presentation of a magnificent silver-gilt shield. I don't see in any of the compartments of that splendid shield, illustrating those branches of the public service to which the right hon. Baronet is supposed to have devoted himself—namely, the navy, the colonies, education, and justice—any view of Dovor, or any medallion of his private secretary; and I would recommend him, in the event of his having any supplementary shield presented to him, to devote a whole compartment of it to a pictorial illustration of that interesting seaport, What, I ask, were the words of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in moving for this Committee on the 7th of July? He said, If the Committee were appointed it would be the study of the Government—and he hoped they would receive the assistance of others who were qualified to aid them—to select the names of those hon. Members who were to constitute it, with the view of securing, as far as possible, an impartial and thorough-going inquiry. Mr. Gladstone is not always so plain, and nobody could have been mistaken as to what the right hon. Gentleman meant by "an impartial and thorough-going inquiry." He added, "with regard to the scope of the inquiry, he was desirous that it should be as wide as possible." There was no mistake about that, but yet no objection was made on that occasion by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich. Acting in accordance with the advice given by Lord Brougham to the late Mr. Zachary Macaulay in reference to his illustrious son, he generally speaks on every question. But on that occasion he never said a single word. But on the 12th of July, when the Committee was nominated, the hon. Member for Stamford, the late Secretary to the Treasury, was unusually animated. Laying aside his ordinarily calm, business-like manner, he became indignant:— This inquiry (said he) ought not to be skin-deep, but fully and properly gone into, and he believed the more the subject was inquired into, the more it would redound to the credit, and not discredit, of the late Government. The subject was one which could not properly be discussed in that House, but should be referred to a Select Committee; and if it were discussed without the assistance of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose (Mr. Baxter), it might be said that the Committee had not been appointed fairly, nor the subject properly gone into. This Committee would have to go into the whole question as to what were the principles upon which the packet contracts were founded, and they would have to state whether the Galway, Dovor, and other contracts were right or wrong."[3 Hansard, cliv. p. 1086.] Did the hon. Baronet make any protest in the Committee as to the line of examination which was being pursued? No; but he put as able questions as any lawyer could have done; and, what was more, he refused—and properly refused—to vote on a matter in which he conceived himself to be a judge in his own case. I say it is a very unfortunate thing that the right hon. Baronet did not take this exception before. He is a chairman of quarter sessions, and ought to know that it is unlawyer-like to challenge the constitution of a jury to which he had assented. I say that the Committee from first to last had a most suspicious character. It was acknowledged by the Chancellor of the Exchequer that in its formation he found a great difficulty because of these four Gentlemen being put upon it. However, he got over it, and I will say no more about it; but I do hope that, on the appointment of this new Committee which the House is called upon to appoint, it will be appointed upon different grounds, and composed of different men from the last; and, in my judgment, the House would act wisely if it referred the nomination of the Committee to the Committee of Selection. Do not let us have any arrangements made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer with his late private secretary the hon. Member for Stamford—no endeavours to hush up this question; and when the verdict has been delivered, do not let us have any of the members of the Committee coming here and declaring that he objects to the formation of the Committee and its conclusions. I thought at the time that the House made a false move, when a Petition was presented from Sir W. Russell, who had charged the late Government with having interfered with his election, that it should have gone into the Dovor case at all. How stands the case now? You are going next week to debate upon the evidence in this blue-book, and a Committee will probably be struck next week to try the Dovor election petition. I maintain, if the House wishes to retain public respect, and to avoid such scenes as this, it should refer the nomination of the Committee to the Committee of Selection upstairs. By the way, I may observe, that although the right hon. Baronet (Sir John Pakington) claims the verdict of the Committee as one of acquittal, in fact it was no such thing—it only amounted to a verdict of not proven; but I tell the right hon. Baronet fairly that I cannot believe that he, with his legal experience and his acquaintance with business, could ever have allowed his private secretary to take the part he did without his knowledge; and until he explicitly denies it I shall continue to disbelieve. The right hon. Gentleman volunteered to be examined before the Committee, but his memory was singularly defective in this case, and he quite forgot that he had given orders to Captain Carnegie to go down and contest Dovor, until Captain Carnegie produced a letter from his private secretary, and then the right hon. Gentleman found he had made a mistake. As far as Dovor is concerned, I bear the right hon. Gentleman no ill-will. I am disposed to say let bygones be bygones, for I feel rather grate- ful to him for getting me away from there. But there is another consideration. What is the effect upon the people of this country as to their views of Parliamentary Committees of this House? The right hon. Baronet the Member for Portsmouth (Sir F. Baring) says that no Committee is to be trusted, and that is the decision to which the country is coming. You are urging on a measure of reform though the country is said to be so apathetic, and do you not see the end? If anybody will support me, I will oppose altogether the nomination of this Committee by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for I feel convinced, that if you are to have any fairness in the nomination you must refer it to the Committee upstairs. Let it not be a matter of arrangement between the two front benches. All Governments, no doubt, wish these things to be hushed up. They are disagreeable matters to raise; but if you wish the decision of the Committee to go to the public with authority and weight, let the Members of this House insist that the nomination be left to the Committee of Selection.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

said, he had not intended to take any part in this discussion; but after the astonishing statement of the hon. Gentleman, who had just sat down, he felt bound to assure the House—and he was sure the Chancellor of the Exchequer would bear him out in it—that there had been no kind of agreement or private arrangement or compact whatever between him and the Chancellor of the Exchequer with respect to the appointment of this Committee, and he was quite at a loss to know on what grounds the hon. Gentleman made such a charge. He believed, indeed, the list of the Committee was shown him before the nomination; it was usual to show the list to those who took an interest in the question and to those who were asked to serve, and in both those capacities the list of the Committee, after it was drawn up, was shown to him. But as to any private arrangement or compact as to its composition he could assure the hon. Gentleman there was no foundation for it whatever. He differed from his right hon. Friend the Member for Droitwich to some extent as to the course taken by the Committee, for bearing in mind that this very Committee had arisen to some extent out of charges made against the late Government, he thought it probable that the Committee would inquire into those charges in respect to certain contracts that were challenged. And when Sir William Russell presented a petition, praying that the Committee would not enter into the case of the Dovor contract till his petition were considered in Committee, he (Sir S. North-cote), speaking on the part of himself and his colleagues, had felt it his duty to say they were anxious the matter should be inquired into. For himself, he never objected to the course the Committee took; but he could bear out the statement of the noble Lord the Member for Leicestershire (Lord J. Manners), that once or twice in the course of the inquiry Members of the Committee expressed their opinion that they were travelling out of the record. He had never supported that view; the majority of the Committee was always against it; but he was bound to say that it had been urged. When he urged an inquiry, he did not expect the kind of evidence that would be brought before them. The charge against them was that they had renewed a particular contract without sufficient public grounds and from a suspected corrupt political motive. Now, as he knew that he was the person who in the last resort had sanctioned that contract, and that he had done so purely on public grounds, he was anxious that the matter should be thoroughly investigated. The hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. B. Osborne), had condemned the Committee because four members of the Government were appointed on it. But unless that were the cause the persons who were accused would have no opportunity of making their defence. Either they must appoint Gentlemen who understood the case, and then they ran a risk of partiality; or they must secure impartiality by appointing Gentlemen who knew nothing of the subject; and then the danger of a partial report was just as great, because there would be no one to elicit those facts which ought to be brought in justice to those interested in the case. He confessed he did not see his way to a solution of this problem, but he could assure the hon. Gentleman opposite that there was no foundation for his charge of a compact between the late and the present Government or to the appointment of a Committee.

MR. HOPE

said, that as a member of the Committee he felt bound to bear testimony to the fairness of its proceedings. He so far agreed with the right hon. Baronet the Member for Portsmouth, that he did not recollect any substantial question being raised of the Committee going be-yond its legitimate bounds—at least there was no formal discussion on the point, and certainly no division was taken. He had objected at first to serve on the Committee because he foresaw that it would lead to strong personal conflicts, and he should be very happy to be relieved from future attendance. It was not for him to defend the composition of the Committee, but if the hon. Member for Liskeard (Mr. B. Osborne) would look to the proceedings of the Committee he would find that in every division the Members of the late Government were in a minority, and therefore that no one of the recommendations made by the Committee were adopted in consequence of their opinion. In the main, however, he was happy to say the Committee were unanimous, and he would leave it to the House to say whether a Committee that was unanimous in its main decisions was not worthy of confidence.

MR. H. HERBERT

said, he hoped that if the members of the Committee were to be reappointed there would be some distinct understanding as to how far it was to go, and how far the words of the reference were to cover its inquiry. Having taken a great interest in the debate which had so often been alluded to, he had certainly derived from it the impression that the inquiry was to be of a judicial character, and that it was appointed more or less to try, so to speak, the character and conduct of the late Government. In that impression he was fortified by the words of the right hon. Member for Bucks (Mr. Disraeli), who said on that occasion that as there seemed no chance of the Dovor Election Petition coming on for trial that Session, it would be unfair to the members of the late Administration to deprive them of the opportunity of promoting an investigation into all the circumstances of this case. Why should the right hon. Gentleman have said that, if the Committee were to be debarred from going into that case? So entirely was he impressed with the view he had stated, that although he was a member of the Committee, yet, having been prevented from serving by having to attend an Election Committee, when he was requested to be present at the drawing up of the report, he said that he did not think it was right that a member of a Committee who had not heard the evidence should assist in drawing up the report. Therefore he had certainly never been more astonished in his life than when he heard the right hon. Member for Droitwich get up and object to the course taken by the Committee. He might add that whatever might have been the impressions on the minds of hon. Members, they were caused mainly by the speeches of the right hon. Baronet's own friends.

LORD LOVAINE

said, he thought it might fairly be concluded from that discussion that it was not safe to entrust to a Committee of that House an inquiry of a judicial character, in which the reputation of private individuals was more or less involved. As a member of the late Government, he should state that he would be again prepared to pursue the course he had adopted in that matter; but that was a question into which he would not then enter. He had risen solely for the purpose of pointing out the extreme inconvenience which must arise from allowing the conduct of private individuals who had no opportunity of defending themselves to become the subject of inquiry before a Committee, which according to the confession of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Portsmouth himself, partook more or less of a political character.

CAPTAIN LEICESTER VERNON

said, he should not then intrude on the time of the House were it not that he was anxious to notice an obervation which had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and which had been repeated by the right hon. Member for Portsmouth. The right hon. Gentleman stated that he believed the Committee were unanimous with respect to the extent of the inquiry in which they were to engage. He (Captain Vernon) was himself an independent member of the Committee, and he felt bound to say that he was no party whatever to that unanimity. It was his opinion that the Committee, in entering rather into personal than public matters, had departed from its duties, and that when the House appointed the Committee there was no idea that it was to subserve political ends. When the Committee devoted nearly the whole of its time to inquiring into the question whether Captain Carnegie was right in coming to the rather astonishing opinion that Mr. Churchward, in offering him his political support, was attempting to seduce him from the paths of Admiralty virtue, he believed it was turning aside from its duty for peddling objects and postponing the interests of the public to those of individuals. The Chancellor of the Exchequer might object that the proper place to make this remark was in the Committee, and the time when it showed an inclination to depart from its instructions; but he had taken both that time and place to make the objection, though he was put down by the argument that the public out of doors were anxious upon the "Carnegie and Churchward" question, and that they must be satisfied. He ventured to say, too, that the Committee had not so much to do with the public out of doors as with their own business; but still he was put down with the Shibboleth "the public out of doors." Now no one entertained a greater respect than he did for the public out of doors, but there was a time and a place for everything, and it certainly appeared to him that there was no reason why the Committee should have entered into many of the details they had investigated. Independent Members then found themselves, without the slightest reason, drawn into a perfect whirlpool of party conflict. They saw gentlemen on the jury whose proper place was in the witness box, and plaintiffs and defendants adjudicating on their own case. It was easy to foretell from the first that some over-nice and over-scrupulous persons would refrain from voting on matters which personally concerned themselves, and that others, not so scrupulous, would not be restrained by any such fanciful feelings, and it needed therefore no ghost from the grave to say what would be the inevitable verdict. To that verdict he intended to call attention on the 7th of February, but in the meantime he hoped that if the Committee were re-appointed, its duties would be strictly defined, and that it would have the hardihood to restrain itself within them. He had no intention, therefore, of drawing on two debates on the question, as the hon. Member for Liskeard (Mr. B. Osborne) had accused some Members of wishing to do, neither had he any intention of whitewashing the private secretary of the late First Lord of the Admiralty. He had not the slightest doubt that when light was let into the affair that gentleman's character would need no whitewashing. The hon. Member for Liskeard, who evidently felt very sore at what he called the attempt of the late First Lord of the Admiralty to tamper with the constituency of Dovor, [Mr. B. OSBORNE: Hear, hear!] laid some stress on the fact that that right hon. Gentleman had volunteered to be examined, and insinuated that he had gained nothing by his motion. But the right hon. Gentleman was not the only person who had volunteered, and those other persons who had volunteered, as far as he recollected, had not taken much by their motion either.

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER

I was sorry to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Liskeard lay down the doctrine that it was the desire of all Governments to hush up these matters—for my hon. Friend has himself been a member of various Governments, and one is led, therefore, to suppose that when he makes so sweeping an assertion he is giving reminiscences of his own sentiments in such cases. For my own part, I beg leave to disclaim such a disposition. I am desirous that this matter should be fully inquired into. My hon. Friend gave loose to his imagination to an extraordinary extent in what he said about some secret understanding between mo and my hon. Friend opposite, with whom I had once the honour of being intimately connected in a public capacity. There never was any such understanding between us. I do not believe I ever exchanged a single word with my hon. Friend on the subject except across this table. A fertile imagination is certainly sometimes a most inconvenient thing. This question appears to me a very simple one. It would seem that if the Committee were not unanimous in the view they took with regard to the scope of their inquiry, at all events no Gentleman who differed from the rest of the Committee thought proper to place his dissent on record; it is also quite clear that a great majority of the Members entertained no doubt whatever as to the nature of their duties, and I am bound to say, as a question affecting the practice of the House of Commons, that it is very inconvenient that members of a Committee who entertain opinions with regard to the proper limits of their inquiry which differ from those of the majority, and which differ from the course which the Committee is actually pursuing, should remain silent in the Committee, being restrained by the fear of imputations from putting their views upon record, and then, not having stated their views to the Committee in an intelligible form, should afterwards make appeals to the House, and make complaints of the conduct of that Committee. Such a course appears to me to be hardly fair on the part of Gentlemen towards the other members of the Committee to which they belong. With regard to the merits of this particular case—the terms of the order of reference and the line of inquiry which was pursued—I confess that the right hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich, who introduced this question, I must say, in the most temperate manner, appears—if I may be permitted to say so—to be in error in the view which he has taken. The opinion of the House of Commons is generally in favour of the course which the Committee has pursued. I do not speak now of the judgment which they came to, for that is a perfectly proper matter for review and question by this House; but it is perfectly impossible for a Committee appointed under an order of reference such as was passed in this instance, altogether to avoid what may be called personal matter. Undoubtedly the inquiry was one directed in the main to the policy of certain measures, and therefore I think it would be an inconvenient course to refer the subject to the Committee of Selection; but although such was its character, it was not simply an inquiry into an abstract matter of policy, but into the conduct of Executive Governments; and collaterally and in a secondary manner it was, of course, a question involving praise or blame of the conduct of those Governments for the manner in which they had acted. How is it possible for a Committee required by this House to inquire into the manner in which contracts were framed or modified by Her Majesty's Government, to make their inquiry thorough and searching if they are restrained from pronouncing a sentence of either praise or blame on the men by whom those contracts have been so framed or modified. The right hon. Baronet very fairly and justly says that the inquiry was one into the wisdom and prudence of the conduct of the Government, and that if the Committee found that their conduct had been deficient in wisdom and prudence, no doubt they ought to express their sentiments with regard to it. But although he admitted that they might declare their conduct not to have been prudent, they were not from that circumstance to infer any blame. The right hon. Baronet also finds fault with the Committee for having alluded to "corrupt motives." It appears to me that the Committee, instead of being censured, deserve rather to be commended for the mention which they have made of this branch of the subject, because the Committee having, by a very large majority, arrived at the conclusion that the Dovor contract was made without sufficient inquiry into the grounds of the claim for its extension, and having gone on to express their views with respect to it, they afterwards, in a spirit of equity and of consideration for those whose conduct they had been condemning, inserted a paragraph declaring the opinion of the Committee that, notwithstanding an error had been committed, no ground existed for the imputation of corrupt motives. The Resolution was thus worded:— It further appears to the Committee that neither at the Admiralty nor at the Treasury were the officers with whom the decision rested, influenced in granting the renewal of the contract by any corrupt or political motive. That passage appears to me clearly to show that the Committee not only acted with equity and fairness, but that they adopted it with a view of precluding any supposition of invidious interference that might otherwise be entertained. I believe, moreover, that the constitution of the Committee was well adapted for the purposes of the general inquiry for which it was appointed. I grant you that the mixture of what may be called personal matter is productive of much inconvenience, and is to be regretted when it comes incidentally under inquiry and cannot be made the subject of investigation by itself, without entailing other and very serious inconveniences; but this cannot be charged upon us by way of constraint—it is a matter of constant recurrence in inquiries by this House. The Committee on Contracts, for example, which sat in the years 1856, '57, and '58, was appointed not as a Committee for criminatory charge, notwithstanding which, in the investigation of a great number of proceedings of this nature, they found it necessary to express opinions in the nature both of praise and blame with reference to the conduct of those concerned in the making of those contracts. A great and natural desire has been expressed by members of the Committee that the sense of the House should be expressed as to whether they have exceeded their jurisdiction. Now, Sir, having listened attentively, and I hope calmly and impartially to this debate, I must say that I collect the sense of the House to be that the Committee did not exceed the jurisdiction given to them, and that they could not but pronounce a sentence of blame or praise upon the framing of the contracts which they were appointed to examine, when such an expression of opinion appeared to them to be called for. But it is of course my duty to remind the right hon. Baronet that if in his opinion the Com- mittee have exceeded the bounds assigned to them, and that for the future they will require to be limited in their proceedings otherwise than by the discretion of the members, it rests with him to move an Amendment in words, or in some other manner to obtain an expression of the positive opinion of the House; and I have no doubt that any opinion which may be expressed by the House will receive attention at the hands of the Committee.

SIR HENRY WILLOUGHBY

said, that as one who had the remarkable pleasure of serving on the Committee, he must give it as his opinion that the grand question for which the Committee had been appointed had been almost lost sight of, when the inquiry passed from a consideration of the general policy which ought to regulate postal contracts, into details of a personal character. As far as the evidence had gone he was inclined to think that the points which had been complained of were occasioned by the absence of definite responsibility in any of the official departments. The Dovor case, which had assumed the dimensions rather of an election petition, might be taken as disposed of; but he wished to remind the right hon. Gentleman (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) that the Galway case remained still to be diposed of. Was it intended that nineteen Members of the House should be doomed for another Session to the wretched task of wading through a similar mass of evidence, altogether apart from the great object of the inquiry V Would it not be possible in some way to treat the charge of corruption as a separate inquiry, and to carry it on distinct from the main object of investigation? His experience of last year led him to believe that it was utterly impossible that practical benefit could result from a renewal of the course of proceeding which was then adopted. He thought it right, however, to state that as regarded the spirit by which the Committee had been animated, it was his firm conviction that they had carried out the very difficult undertaking in which they were engaged as fairly as was possible. With respect, however, to their proceedings as published, be found that some 300 questions and answers, composing the whole of the evidence taken in one day, had been omitted. This was the more to be regretted as it included the valuable testimony given by Mr. Wilson and Mr. Rose—one of whom was now in India and the other in Canada. The evidence, he knew, had been printed, but was not included in the Report which had been laid on the table.

MR. HOPE

explained, that when the evidence of the last two days on which the Committee sat had been printed, it was thought advisable that it should not be reported, as a fresh subject was therein opened up, the understanding being that they were to conclude with that portion of the testimony which related to Dovor.

Motion agreed to.

Select Committee appointed.

Power to report from time to time.