COLONEL DICKSONsaid, the system of 1700 police in Ireland was a most pernicious one. The right hon. Baronet had talked about certain cases of murder in England remaining undiscovered, but he seemed to forget that that state of things was the exception in England. As to the police in Ireland having been instrumental in the arrest of the murderers of Mr. Fitzgerald, he gave the statement the most unqualified contradiction. Having made that statement, he would turn to the subject which he had placed on the notice paper, which was to call the attention of the Secretary of State for War to the fact that the Clothing made up at the Factory at Pimlico was not subjected to the same inspection as that supplied by contract, and to other matters connected with that establishment. He did this in no hostility to the War Office, or in any hostility to the Clothing Establishment itself. He had, however, to protest against the gradual increase of the establishment, to the injury of the general trade in shutting out those great contracting establishments which had already done good service to the country. The expense of the establishment at Pimlico was not less than £-70,000, or 13 per cent upon the value of the work produced, which was £560,000 last year. He had that day heard that it was intended that the establishment should supply the clothing to the Volunteers; and if that were the case, the trade would be most seriously injured, while the cost of the establishment would be enormously increased. What he had to complain of was, that although they had an Inspector General of Clothing, he did not inspect it. He ought to inspect the clothing supplied by the Government manufactory, as well as that supplied by contractors. He had been informed that Mr. Tate, the contractor at Limerick, had in June last supplied 800 tunics for the 20th Regiment. He had himself taken one of those tunics to an army contractor, who had pronounced it to be the best soldier's tunic he had ever seen. When these tunics arrived at the Government Factory the shoulder-straps and buttons were cut off and placed on the tunics made in the factory, which were sent down to the regiment; but they were there found so defective that the commanding officer had to apply to head-quarters for extra linen stuff to remedy the defects, and the matter was hushed up. What he contended for was, not that the Government should abolish its factories, but that a fair proportion of 1701 the work should be given out to be made by private firms.
SIR GEORGE LEWISsaid, that the tender of the contractor in Limerick had been accepted this year, and his work approved. With respect to the Establishment in Pimlico, as the Vote for it had been passed, it would he useless to enter into details in defence of that Vote, but were it necessary to do so, he could show by figures that the effect of the maintenance of the establishment to which the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Colonel Dickson) objected, had been to reduce the price paid to contractors and to supply the troops with clothing at a cheaper rate and more advantageously than under the former system. It was a great establishment, principally for the purpose of inspection. A large part of the work was executed outside the establishment by persons in their own homes. He did not know how the hon. and gallant Gentleman made out that the establishment cost £70,000 per annum. The annual charge was only £8,400, but as much as £20,000 was Appropriated this year for buildings.
COLONEL DUNNEsaid, that he concurred with his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Dickson) in thinking the Pimlico establishment an expensive one, but had no doubt that Colonel Daubeney's was a fair inspection.