§ MR. STEPHEN CAVEsaid: It is with great regret that I feel myself obliged, for the first time since I have had a seat in this House, to intrude myself on the House with regard to a personal matter. It will be in the recollection of many hon. Members that on Tuesday last I made a few remarks on the amalgamation of railways, in discussing the Resolutions of the Chairman of Committees with reference to competition. No exception was taken to those remarks by any Member of the House; but it has been reported to me that, on the following morning, the hon. Baronet the Member for the Flint boroughs (Sir John Hanmer), who is Chairman of the Committee on a group of Railway Bills, among which is the Amalgamation Bill of the Brighton and other railways, publicly made use of the following expressions in the Committee-room:—
A matter has happened in the House which I think extremely improper. It happened at five o'clock, when the House was dead sick of private business, and therefore, although it was my business to answer the Vice President of the Board of Trade, I did not do so. The Vice President of the Board of Trade, in my opinion, gave a most improper expression of opinion upon the subject of a question now pending before this Committee, which he had no business to do, even if he had been a private Member, still less an official Member. Speaking on the question of competition, he expressed his opinion against the monopoly of railways. This was a question which was legitimately before the House; but he said there was another monopoly—that is to say, these amalgamations—and he said there was a gigantic scheme. His observations went to show that it was a very prejudicial thing, that it was now pending—and so on. He had no business to express that opinion.There was more to the same effect, with 352 which, after what has since passed, I will not trouble the House. Now, Sir, these are very strong expressions, especially from one sitting in a judicial capacity, and I cannot deny that they have given me great pain; but the hon. Baronet has assured me privately—and he will no doubt repeat it publicly—that he had no intention of saying anything personally offensive to myself, and that he is willing, as far as expressions go, to withdraw everything that has such an appearance. I cannot hesitate to accept this assurance, and to dismiss so much of the subject altogether from my mind. I cannot, however, help thinking it unfortunate that the hon. Baronet did not express his opinion in the House before those in whose minds what I had said was fresh, instead of doing so on the following day to a mixed audience in my absence—when I was, of course, unable to justify myself or to offer any explanations. I do not, however, wish to dwell upon this point. But as the hon. Baronet has told me, as frankly as he withdrew the form of his charge against me, that he adheres to the substance of it—which is, after all, the most serious part of the question—it is incumbent on me to clear myself if I can from these imputations, which, if deserved, would prove me unfit for the office I hold, and even for a seat in this House. Several months ago my attention was officially directed to the effect of railway amalgamations. Complaints reached the office from various quarters of increased charges and diminished accommodation, and it was suggested that the Board of Trade, which has no power of active interference in these matters, would not be doing its duty if it did not warn Parliament that monopoly was rapidly replacing competition, and that it behoved the House, in which the power really was, to take care that the public did not suffer by the change. Having spoken to the Chairman of Committees, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of London (Mr. Goschen), and other Members, who all concurred in this view, I proposed to take advantage of the Resolutions on Competition of my hon. Friend the Chairman of Committees (Mr. Dodson), and to go somewhat into the details of Bills of this Session. But, unfortunately, the discussion of these Resolutions was delayed until some of the Bills were before Committees. I then felt that it would be scarcely right to refer to the details of these measures, and therefore confined my remarks to the general question, 353 carefully avoiding any observation on the merits of particular schemes. I will read the only passage which can have reference to the Bill before the hon. Baronet's Committee—This year the number of Bills was only fifteen, but among them was a gigantic scheme affecting a large district in the South of England.This is absolutely all; and so guarded was I that I mentioned no name, and, as it happens, there is another scheme to which the description would apply, though I will not deny that the first was in my mind. The rest of my speech has reference to the general question, and even there I do not express myself against amalgamations; but that regulations for periodical future revision should be framed, and that certain Standing Orders should be amended, which could not, of course, affect Bills now in Committee. The House was full. The noble Chairman of the Standing Orders Committee followed me. The Member for Stockport (Mr. Watkin) spoke. The Member for Wick (Mr. Laing) was present; both always ready and watchful, and both interested; but it did not apparently occur to them, or to any one else, that I had the absurd intention of biassing the Committee. And I presume the House will not accept the doctrine, for it really comes to this—that Members are to be debarred from discussing general subjects, because the arguments may bear indirectly on some private Bill. Sir, this is the tenth year in which I have had the honour of a seat in this House, during that period I have frequently taken part in the business of Parliament. Up to this moment no exception has ever been taken to the propriety of a single syllable I have uttered in this House; and I confidently hope that the House will acquit me of having deserved it on this occasion.
SIR JOHN HANMERIn the first place, I beg leave to express the satisfaction which it gives me—as it would to any other Gentleman—to make any amends to the right hon. Gentleman for anything in which he may have thought that I conducted myself to him with less courtesy than he deserved. It is only justice to myself to state that, the very moment I learnt that objection had been taken by him to my remarks, I sought him out and stated, what he has very correctly repeated, that, if there was anything in the form of what I said which was offensive or hurtful to his feelings, it would give me pleasure and satisfaction to withdraw it— 354 I should do so most heartily and readily—but, at the same time, if I were asked whether I adhered to the opinion I had expressed? I said I do adhere to it, and there is no reason why I should not do so. I do adhere to it in the plainest and most direct manner, and I am prepared to defend everything I said, barring the form, and anything that may have offended him. It so happened that the other afternoon there was a long debate in the House on the question raised by the hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Committees. The House was tired and impatient on the subject—so impatient that it would not listen to what the noble Lord the Member for the East Riding (Lord Hotham) wished to say; who, of all others, had the best right to be heard on such a subject. For me therefore, to get up at a time when the House was necessarily anxious to proceed to other business of great importance would have been perfectly futile. Besides, I did not happen to be sitting in the line of sight, and your eye, Sir, would naturally have fallen on some other Member. But I had a reason for what I did say next day before the Committee of which I happened to be Chairman. That Committee has got before it a most perplexed, troublesome, difficult, and arduous question. The difficulty of it may be estimated when I say that I was credibly informed yesterday that, notwithstanding all the pains I have taken, with the assistance of the Referee, to keep the proceedings within due bounds, the inquiry cost the moderate rate of three and a half guineas a minute. I, hoping to save expense, had suggested to one of the counsel who appeared before me the day before, that I thought he need not call witnesses from other systems of united railways, because really the Committee were perfectly aware of everything that could be said on the subject. But I said so-and-so took place the night before in the House of Commons; such-and-such doctrines were, according to my understanding of them, expressed by the right hon. Gentleman the Vice-President of the Board of Trade, and therefore it may be for you now to consider whether you will or no be content with the evidence as it stands, or call other witnesses. That was my sole reason for saying what I did, and I had no wish to cavil at what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman. At the same time I do fairly own I did feel very greatly aggrieved by the right hon. Gentleman's speech, and he will pardon me 355 when I say he has not altogether recollected the whole of it. A sentence has been omitted that had a very great bearing upon the question. I have been a Member of this House for a very great number of years; and certainly, for a long time while I was a Member, whenever a question was sent to a Committee upstairs it was considered exceedingly wrong in any private Member to allude to it in any way, still more for any official Member to do so. I can remember the time when official Members always left the House when there was any question pending about the private business. But of all official Members, for the Vice-President of the Board of Trade to express an opinion when a question was pending before a Committee which might prejudice the decision of that Committee—he, I think, is about the last Gentleman that should do so. But I express that opinion with the greatest courtesy to the right hon. Gentleman. We agree to differ. He holds one opinion; I hold another. The right hon. Gentleman certainly did perplex and trouble my waters very much indeed. We have a very difficult question to decide, and whichever way we decide it I feel very little doubt that something more will be heard about it when the Report is made. When the Report is brought up, if the right hon. Gentleman thinks fit to object to the Bill in its reported state, well and good; he will then have a proper opportunity of doing so; but I do not think that the time he selected to call in question the matters before the Committee was the right time for doing so. The right hon. Gentleman said that he objected to railway monopoly. Now, upon the subject of railway monopoly, which had been discussed for a long time before, I could have said a great deal; but not wishing to inflict my speeches upon the House unnecessarily, I said nothing about it. But the right hon. Gentleman went on to say that, while he objected to monopoly as far as it rested upon competition, there was another kind of monopoly which arose out of amalgamation, and that he had no objection on principle to amalgamation. But, after having declared that, the right hon. Gentleman went to say that there was a gigantic scheme of amalgamation going forward in the South of England, and his speech certainly led us to believe that he objected to that scheme. But why and upon what principle did he object to it? He had said just before that he did not object to the principle of amalgamation, 356 and therefore he could not object to the scheme upon that ground.
§ MR. STEPHEN CAVEMy statement with regard to amalgamation followed what I said with regard to this scheme.
SIR JOHN HANMERWell, it all comes to the same end. At all events, the right hon. Gentleman uttered the words before I did. I thought that the right hon. Gentleman, who is connected by representation with that part of England, was arguing the matter upon some particular and local ground, which I thought he ought not to have done; and for the reasons I have given, I told the counsel before the Committee what I did the next morning. That is the long and the short of it. I willingly withdraw any expression that may have hurt the right hon. Gentleman; still I may, as I must, think that he selected the wrong time for making a statement upon this subject.