HC Deb 14 March 1865 vol 177 cc1653-60

Order for Second Reading read.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."

VISCOUNT GALWAY

said, that this Bill was not only opposed by the landowners, but also by the Great Northern Railway. The measure was virtually the same that had been rejected by a Committee upstairs last Session, and he thought that whenever two railway companies had had a fair stand-up fight, at an expense to each so enormous as to be scarcely credible, it was most unfair and unjust for the beaten company to bring forward an almost identical scheme next Session. No doubt the route proposed was not exactly the same. The object of the Bill of last year was said to be to convey coals more cheaply, and many Members were influenced in its favour by an undertaking on the part of the Great Eastern Company, which promoted it, to carry coals at a farthing per ton. That was entirely left out of the present Bill, and several clauses put in by the Committee were now omitted. The Great Northern had been for years and were now carrying coal at half the rates now proposed. The Committee of last Session sat twenty-five days, and nearly killed its Chairman; but it decided almost, if not quite unanimously, in favour of the Great Northern Railway. That company were now making a line to supply the missing link, being the termination of their loop-line, which went directly into the coal field. It was unjust to bring in the present scheme, at all events until the effect of the new line had been tried. He believed that it would so relieve the main line of the Great Northern of their coal traffic as to enable them to carry any amount of coal that might be put upon the line. The Great Eastern shares were only at 47, yet they came down to fight the Great Northern again upon a project that would, in all probability, be thrown out. He moved that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.

Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."—(Viscount Galway.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

MR. CHEETHAM

contended that the Bill was not identical with that thrown out last Session, which was an independent line, and did not connect the Great Eastern on the one hand and the Lancashire and Yorkshire on the other, as was proposed by the present Bill. Instead of being in the hands of three companies, like the scheme of last Session, it would be only one main line of 113 miles in length, and bringing the large district served by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway into direct communication with the Eastern Counties. The capital of these two companies amounted to £40,000,000, and their lines extended over 1,000 miles. There was, therefore, every assurance that the line would be economically made and carefully conducted. How was coal obtained at present in the eastern counties? It had to come by the Great Northern to Peterborough, and the expense sometimes prevented it from being laid down in the districts of the Eastern Counties Railway. The eastern part of London was without any great coal depot in connection with the coal brought by railway. From an official account of the quantity of coal brought to London, it appeared that in 1854 the proportion brought by sea was 78 per cent, and by rail 22 per cent. But in 1864 the supply brought by sea was only 58 per cent, while that brought by railway had increased to 42 per cent. The conveyance of coal by railway was thus seen to be steadily increasing, and it was of the greatest importance that this necessary of life should be conveyed as economically as possible to the 600,000 persons in the east of London, whose dwellings surrounded the London station of the Eastern Counties Railway. In 1854 the total quantity of coals brought into London was 4,344,000 tons, and in 1855, it was 5,655,000 tons. He believed that the reduction in the price of fuel alone would justify the House in passing this Bill. The noble Lord admitted that he appeared before the House as the advocate of the Great Northern Railway. When he (Mr. Cheetham) last had the honour of a seat in Parliament, he promoted the Bill giving the Great Northern an access into Lancashire. It was opposed by the North Western on the ground of injury to their traffic and the value of their property. But what had been the result? Parliament had granted the opening of the communication to the Great Northern, yet the traffic of the North Western had since increased so enormously that the line was almost inadequate to its conveyance. The Great Northern line had been a public benefit to the people of Lancashire, and the present Bill would equally benefit the public without injury to any existing lines. He trusted that the House would send the Bill to be examined upon its merits by a Select Committee, and by their decision the promoters of the Bill would cheerfully abide.

MR. MITFORD

, having been a Member of the much-abused Committee of last Session, wished to say that it sat five or six weeks. The Chairman was sometimes carried from his bed to the Committee Boom, and from the Committee-room back to his bed. About 11,000 questions were asked during the inquiry, and the walls and tables were covered with maps of the country. As the statement of his noble Friend (Viscount Galway) had been disputed by the hon. Member for Salford, he might say that he had been at the pains to compare the present Bill with that of last year, and that, in his opinion, it was virtually and substantially the same Bill. It was brought in, it was true, under a different name. Last Session it was called the "Great Eastern Northern Junction," but now it was the "Lancashire and Yorkshire and Great Eastern Junction Railway Bill." The Great Eastern Company had done well to put their friends into the foreground, but how the junction with the Lancashire and Yorkshire line was to make this a good Bill, it puzzled him to know. The Great Northern Railway had pledged itself to the Committee last year to lay out £1,000,000 to fill up the district. The other House had required the same pledges and they could not get rid of them; and these new lines, with one exception, received last Session the sanction of Parliament. It would therefore be a manifest wrong to admit the competition which the House had refused to permit last year, and for which they were charged with these responsibilities. The purity of the motives of the Committee had been impugned by several authorities, and particularly by a Yorkshire newspaper, in terms which he was sure would induce the hon. Member opposite, though so greatly opposed to corporal punishments, to agree with him (Mr. Mitford) richly entitled the writer to be flogged half-a-dozen times round Westminster Hall. All sorts of motives had been most unjustifiably attributed to them. The fact was that they had paid the greatest attention to the subject, and decided upon the evidence brought before them. It was alleged that if the Bill of last Session were passed coals would be brought into London 2s. or 3s. a ton cheaper than at present, but evidence to substantiate this allegation was not forthcoming. Canvassing on this subject had gone on to a frightful extent. Before going to a division, he would beg hon. Members to ask themselves two questions—first, was it desirable to support the decisions of their Committees? and secondly, was there anything special in this case which should induce the House to reverse the decision of the Committee of last year?

MR. CHILDERS

asked the House to allow this Bill to go to a Committee, not on any personal grounds, for he was not interested in any railway, but solely on behalf of the people of the West Biding of Yorkshire, who had petitioned the House unanimously in support of the Bill, and who asked no more than that the Bill should be fairly considered. They stated that if a man wished to go to Exeter, Birmingham, or Lancashire he had two routes to choose between, but if he wanted to go from London to Yorkshire he had practically but one. They further alleged that the Great Northern was itself the child of competition; that it had itself been rejected once or twice, and ought not, therefore, to come down to this House to oppose the present measure. If the shares of the company to which the noble Lord had alluded were only at 46½, he would remind the House in what position those of the Great Northern were until it had attained its present high place by doing its duty; and if the House did its duty now, he hoped the Great Eastern would be yet in the same position as the Great Northern. It had been said that there were not special regulations in this Bill which the Bill of last year contained, but it would be seen from the shorthand writer's notes that the Bill of last year was rejected because it contained those very provisions. [The hon. Gentleman then read an extract from the shorthand writer's notes to the effect that the Chairman of the Committee objected to the Bill on the ground that as the gradients were so favourable that it was proposed to carry coals at a farthing the ton, it would not be fair to other companies who had not got the same gradients.]

MR. E. C. EGERTON

opposed the Motion for the second reading on the ground that it was not in accordance with the usage of the House to read a Bill a second time which had been once rejected. He believed there was no instance in which the House had approved of a railway scheme after they had in the preceding Session sanctioned a competing project, and had by that determination induced the successful parties to incur a considerable outlay. There was a case in point last year, but the position of the Great Northern now was much stronger, as they were now laying out a million of money in consequence of the Acts passed last year. Last year the late Chairman of Committees (Mr. Massey) had said that the weight of evidence was against the future progress of the Bill, that the promoters had been recently heard, that the district was in the hands of a public company, and that it was an abuse of the patience of the House to bring the subject forward. As a director of the Great Northern he could say that every facility had been offered by the company for the carrying of goods and passengers southward. The House, anxious to put an end to vexatious interference with property, ought to pause before sanctioning such a scheme as this.

MR. BRIGHT

said, he believed the hon. Gentleman who had last spoken was a director of the Great Northern. Of course, anything the hon. Gentleman said was entitled to weight, but it should be taken with the understanding that he was a director. He had nothing to do with any of these railways, nor, indeed, had he any pecuniary interest in any railway in the kingdom; but the House was asked to reject this Bill, he thought, on a very insufficient ground,—namely, that it had been once rejected by a Committee of that House. He believed that that had been about the fate of nearly every great Railway Bill, but the very fact that the Bill was brought a second time to that House was at least some evidence to show that there were parties who considered the subject of sufficient importance as to induce them to take this matter up, and they were anxious that this Bill should be carried. It was very well known that the parties who were supporting this Bill were not entirely those who supported the Bill last year. At one end of the line there was a company with 400 miles of railway and an expenditure of £20,000,000, and at the other end a company with 600 miles of railway and £20,000,000 of expenditure, and they desired that both those great companies should have facilities for carrying their traffic from one point of the country to the other. It was really too bad that at this time of day they should hear of the question of protection to the Great Northern Company. If that argument had been listened to he supposed that they should not have now more than two or three long lines of railway throughout the country. He had not heard a single argument, and he did not think that one could be offered to the House, which would justify it in rejecting this Bill, which came before them with admirable gradients and the promoters of which offered to take coals to the metropolis at so low a price. If the House would send the Bill to a Committee the promoters would have no objection to the Committee inserting the same clause, as were in the Bill of last year, and he had it on the best authority that they were induced to leave out these clauses in consequence of some observations which fell from the Chairman of the Committee which inquired into the Bill of last year. He (Mr. Bright) was sorry that that hon. Gentleman who some years ago was rather favourable to free trade, although he sat amongst Protectionists, should in regard to railways seem to have gone back to his old love of Protection. He hoped the House would give the promoters of this great measure a chance of having it fairly considered before an impartial Committee.

MR. BANKS STANHOPE

said, that like the hon. Member for Birmingham, he had nothing to do with the Great Northern or the Great Eastern, but he appeared there on behalf of a very large body of people who happened to be concerned in the navigation of the river Trent, with which, if this Bill passed, it would seriously interfere. The navigation above Gainsborough was carried on by small vessels, but below the town large foreign vessels came in, and it had been proved that the existence of a bridge, which by this Bill it was proposed to make, would totally put an end to the navigation of the Trent. He would appeal to the President of the Board of Trade upon this subject, to whom the people would look for the preservation of the navigation of the rivers of England. It might be said that these were points for the Committee to decide; but, unless a clear case of public necessity could be shown by any line, the promoters had no right to subject those who would be injured to the necessity, at great expense, of defending their interests against two powerful companies. He urged the House not to destroy private property and ancient navigation for a line as to which no public necessity could be shown.

MR. AYRTON

said, he cared nothing for these rival railway companies, but wished to say a word for the great manufacturing interests and the private coal consumers of the eastern districts of London, who would be largely benefited by the passing of this Bill. They at present paid more for coal than any other persons, and they were subjected to a coal tax beside. Surely, then, if by any contrivance of art or science coal could be cheapened in London, it was the right of the consumers that this subject should be fully inquired into. No doubt, the Committee of last year had decided according to their lights, but was their decision to be final? When such great interests were involved, he hoped that their decision would not be considered final, and that the House would not reject a measure which was regarded throughout the metropolis as of great importance, but allow it to be inquired into by a Committee up stairs.

MR. MILNER GIBSON

said, that the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Banks Stanhope), had asked for his opinion as to the mode in which that line would effect the navigation of the Trent. In answer to that appeal he had, in the first place, to observe that the jurisdiction of the Board of Trade upon matters of that description was limited and clearly defined. When any work was proposed which in their opinion would interfere with our internal navigation, it was their duty to inquire into the subject, to lay their Report before the House, and the Report was referred to the Committee on the Bill. If the present Bill were to go before a Committee they would follow that course, and report frankly and unreservedly to the Committee; but he did not think it was any part of his duty to give an opinion beforehand in reference to the merits of the scheme. The whole question could only be properly considered by a Select Committee; and he should, therefore, vote for the second reading of the Bill.

MR. W. ORMSBY GORE

said, that the Committee of last year, of which he was a Member, sat for twenty-five days, and came to a unanimous decision, reject- ing the scheme, and it had met with a similar fate in the House of Lords. The expressions of the Chairman, which had been quoted, did not contain the reasons upon which that decision was given. Last year the promoters of the Bill came forward with a plausible proposal to carry coals at a farthing a ton; but, as the clause was now omitted, the company came to Parliament with a worse grace this year. He felt satisfied that if the Bill went before fifty Committees they would all come to the same conclusion.

VISCOUNT BURY

wished to say a few words on behalf of a body of people who had not hitherto been considered in this matter, the people of the Eastern Counties, who would receive essential benefit from the passing of this Bill. The coals consumed by them were now carried round by Peterborough and Ely. These coals would be 2s. or 3s. a ton cheaper if the proposed line were constructed, and he hoped, therefore, that the House would not refuse to read the Bill a second time.

CAPTAIN JERVIS

contended that the Bill ought to be read a second time, and that the question ought not to be decided on the floor of the House. There were not nine men out of ten in the House who knew anything about it. He strongly objected to a monopoly of a large and important district being granted to an existing company. The real question at issue was, whether a railway company which had expended £20,000,000 —the Great Eastern—should be allowed to establish a connection with another company which had expended £6,000,000. As to the Board of the Great Eastern Company, though their Bill had been rejected last year, they thought it due not only to their shareholders, but to the public to bring it in again in its altered form. The question really was one between railway directors, and was whether twenty millions of capital and the people of the Lancashire and Yorkshire districts were to be kept back by another company, which kept the Great Eastern out.

Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."

The House divided:—Ayes 121; Noes 162: Majority 41.

Words added. Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to.

Bill put off for six months.