MR. GLADSTONEI rise, Sir, to move that, during the remainder of the Session, Government Orders of the day have precedence of the other Orders upon Wednesdays. I take this opportunity of saying that it will be for the convenience of the House, with reference particularly to lodging Amendments to the Ballot Bill with a view to the Report, that the House should meet to-morrow at 12 o'clock. I shall state in the course of this evening what business we propose to take when the House meets to-morrow.
§ MR. RYLANDSsaid, he was not surprised, considering the present state of the Order Book, at the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government asking the House to agree to the Motion he had just proposed. He could not, however, allow it to pass without expressing, as an independent Member, his belief that hon. Gentlemen had good grounds of complaint in relation to one of the most important matters which claimed the attention of Parliament—namely, the voting of Supplies to Her Majesty. He did not venture to cast the blame on anybody; but he wished to point out that during the remainder of the Session the House had to pass 17 Votes of the Army Estimates, amounting altogether to at least £8,000,000, and that those Votes, including as they did such items as transports, stores, clothing, and materials of war, all required the most careful consideration. The Government had not yet sufficiently justified themselves in regard to the proposed increase of Army expenditure, and therefore, in his opinion, those Votes ought not to be hurried through the House. Then in the Navy Estimates, no fewer than 14 Votes remained, amounting in the aggregate to £6,000,000; while there were 10 Votes to be considered in the Civil Service Estimates, amounting to £500,000. Nobody knew better than the right hon. Gentleman that the spending servants of the Crown were continually stretching forth their hands in order to get possession of the public money, and unless that ten- 850 dency was checked by the vigilance of the Members of the House of Commons, no one need be surprised at the Estimates increasing every year. The Government asked this year for no less than £72,000,000, which could not be drawn from the taxpayers of the country without imposing a serious burden on them, and it was an unfortunate circumstance that the House should be asked at the close of the Session, in a perfect scramble to vote sums amounting in the aggregate to £15,000,000. No doubt it was very difficult for hon. Members to remain at their posts at this period of the year, and it seemed to him a perfect farce to ask the House in the second or third week of August to vote all these sums of money. The practical object he had in view was to express a hope that next year, at all events, the House would not be placed in a similar position. This Session one of the most important parts of the Business of Parliament had been thrust aside till a season when it could not be properly dealt with. If a similar course were adopted next year, he trusted that independent Members on both sides of the House would resist any such attempt on the part of the Government, and refuse to sacrifice the interests of the country to party exigencies.
§ Motion agreed to.
§ Ordered, That, during the remainder of the Session, Government Orders of the Day have precedence of the other Orders upon Wednesdays.—(Mr. Gladstone.)