RESOLUTION. (Hansard, 27 March 1871)

§ SIR JAMES ELPHINSTONE
said, that as he understood the transfer of Deptford Dockyard was to be made To-morrow, he felt bound to bring forward the Motion of which he had given Notice on the subject. The Dockyard had been valued at £400,000. It was sold to two different individuals, but a portion remained which he was told was worth £134,000. This property was sold to Mr. Austin, brother-in-law of the Solicitor to the Admiralty, who, it was stated, sold his bargain to the Corporation of London for a premium of £21,000; no proper advertisements of these transactions having been inserted in the newspapers, so far as he (Sir James Elphinstone) could find. Mr. Evelyn, of Wotton, in Surrey, had written a letter declaring that the sale to Mr. Austin, and the transfer to the Corporation of London, required a better explanation than any that had yet been offered. Last year, in answer to a statement he made in that House, the First Lord of the Admiralty declared that there was not the smallest truth in the assertion that Mr. Austin was a relative of the Solicitor to the Admiralty. Now, if a Committee were granted on the subject, the correctness of the statement he made would not only be proved, but probably something might be found out about the Greenwich election. He moved for the appointment of a Committee of the House to consider the subject.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
seconded the Motion. As the hon. Baronet stated, Mr. Evelyn, the former 681 ground landlord, made the assertion in the public papers that Mr. Austin's offer must have been very much under the value, because he was aware that a much larger sum had been offered. He had himself been informed by a professional gentleman in the City that a client of his own was prepared to give a much larger sum—from £100,000 to £125,000—for the Dockyard, but that he felt it would not be accepted, for, if divided into lots, it would fetch a much larger sum. A valuation of the Dockyard was made in 1865, and since that time considerable sums of money had been expended upon it. A portion of the Dockyard was purchased of Mr. Evelyn in 1856, on condition that it should be devoted to none other than dockyard purposes, and was sold by Mr. Evelyn for about £33,000. Mr. Evelyn had since purchased about 15 acres from the Government. To show the difference in valuation in reference to this land, Mr. Murrell, an official of the Government, valued this land at £46,000; another valuer valued it at £20,000; and the referee fixed the price at £27,900. But this did not fairly represent the proportion of the value of the whole, because the land so purchased by Mr. Evelyn had no river frontage; the piece, however, which had been sold to Mr. Austin had 1,000 feet of river frontage. It was contended that the sale to Mr. Austin must have been very much under the value because a larger sum had been offered, and it was alleged that if the Dockyard had been put up for auction it would have fetched a much larger sum. Mr. Murrell, who was consulted on a former occasion, was not asked, but Mr. Marsh, the agent of Mr. Austin, was engaged in arranging the bargain. He believed there were other names than the name of Mr. Austin connected with the transaction, and that for some time it was proposed to turn the locality to shipbuilding purposes. It was only in despair of being able to pay over the amount to the Government that the Corporation was applied to with a view to a cattle market. This matter ought to be referred to a Committee in order that they might know in what position the sale to Mr. Austin really stood. The hon. Member for Montrose (Mr. Baxter) had stated that the Corporation had asked to have the title made out to them. 682 When Mr. Austin did not complete the purchase, why did not the Government recover possession of their ground, and effect a sale to the Corporation on terms clearly advantageous to the public? It was for the purpose of clearing up the whole transaction that he seconded the Motion of his hon. and gallant Friend.

§ MR. BAXTER
said, that if the statements which had been made were true, he quite agreed that it would have been necessary that a Committee should be appointed to inquire into this question. He fully agreed that whenever imputations were made against an individual in a case of this kind a Committee was a proper tribunal to consider them. This matter, which was discussed in July last year, had been again brought up, and he could only repeat the explanation he then made to the House. It was extremely unfair again to have imputations cast upon Mr. Bristowe, the Solicitor to the Admiralty, a gentleman so highly respected, and formerly a Member of the House. As he told them last year, if anyone was to blame in the sale of Deptford Dockyard, it was not Mr. Bristowe, but himself. He acted on the best advice he could obtain, and if he had done wrong he was amenable to the censure of the House. He complained that, after the explanations given, the hon. Baronet should have come down to repeat the accusation. Mr. Bristowe had nothing to do with the sale except, as Solicitor to the Admiralty, to carry it out. This had been called a mysterious bargain; but there was no mystery about it whatever. When the present Government came into office they found it had been decided by a Committee unanimously that Deptford Dockyard should be closed. That decision was accepted by both sides of the House—by several Executive Governments, and it became the duty of the present Administration to carry the decision of the Committee into effect. The first thing to be done was to take advice as to the mode and 683 manner of selling the Dockyard. He consulted a number of professional and commercial gentlemen—he saw 12 or 15 leading gentlemen connected with the City of London, who knew the value of property on the banks of the river, and their unanimous advice was on no account to put up Deptford Dockyard to public auction, for they said in the present depressed state of trade on the river very likely there would be no offer at all, which circumstance would injure the eventual sale of the property. They advised that two or three gentlemen, acquainted with the value of such property, should carefully go over the Dockyard, and value if confidentially for the Admiralty. It was said there had been an offer of £200,000; but there was not a syllable of truth in that representation. It was pure invention from beginning to end. Steps were taken to let it be known all over the kingdom that Deptford Dockyard was for sale. It was announced in the Money Article of The Times, and was mentioned in almost every newspaper, that the Government were most anxious to sell Deptford Dockyard, either in whole or in part. That announcement was copied into nearly every newspaper in the United Kingdom, but the only offers received were £45,000, £50,000, £55,000, £58,000, and £60,000. The valuation made by the Government official was £80,000. The offer accepted was £75,000 from Mr. Austin—that is, £71,500, and an obligation on the buyer to put up buildings for the Government to the extent of £3,500. The hon. Baronet (Sir James Elphinstone) said there was a valuation of the property at £134,000. Now, they got £75,000 from Mr. Austin and £30,000 from Mr. Evelyn—in all £105,000.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
observed that the £134,000 was only the value of the site, and did not include materials, stocks, and slips.

§ MR. BAXTER
said, the property was much more valuable at the time of the valuation than it was at the time it was sold; that being the case, the Government made a good sale, and it was rather hard lines to ask for a Committee to inquire into a sale effected under these circumstances. Of course Mr. Austin did not get the benefit of the plant and stores in the Dockyard; a large portion was sold and realized a large sum for 684 the Exchequer, and ever since the Government came into office men had been employed in removing stores from Deptford and Woolwich, and in sending them to Portsmouth and elsewhere. Personally he did not know anything about Mr. Austin until the time arrived for handing over the property, and it was not until Mr. Marsh disclosed his principal that the name of Mr. Austin was mentioned at all. He was told that Mr. Austin was not at first over-satisfied with his bargain; and at one time would have accepted a profit of £500; a Member of that House had told him (Mr. Baxter) so. It was not Mr. Austin's fault that the money was not paid down; he was anxious to pay it at once; but when the sale had been effected it was found that there was a dispute between the Woods and Forests Department and the Admiralty; it was doubtful which of the two could give Mr. Austin a title; the question had to be referred to the Law Officers of the Crown, and it involved an investigation which necessitated months of delay. If anything was wrong, it was that the Corporation should pay so much money for the property, and he would suggest the appointment of a Committee of the Corporation to investigate the matter. Everything had been done by the Admiralty in the most open manner. It was merely bound now to hand over the property; and the only question was, whether the title should be made out to Mr. Austin or to the Corporation. After that explanation, he hoped the House would not assent to the Motion for a Committee of Inquiry.

SIR JOHN HAY
did not think the statement of the hon. Gentleman satisfactory. He had no wish to cast imputations on anyone. He (Sir John Hay) could not see the necessity of the Board of Admiralty forcing a sale of this Dockyard at a time when they admitted that all such property was greatly depreciated. Surely the Admiralty were not so pressed as to be compelled to sell the property at a time when it was impossible to obtain anything like its value. It could be of no consequence to the country to force a sale of this property. It was only of consequence to the Admiralty, who thus desired to make a fallacious show of low Estimates. It was the conduct of a petty tradesman who, being on the verge of bankruptcy, desired to get rid of his stock at an alarming sacri- 685 fice. The Dockyard, too, was sold to a gentleman who had not paid the purchase money for it, amounting to £75,000, and Mr. Austin quietly hands it over to the Corporation of London for £95,000, being a profit of £20,000. And now we hear this further disclosure that the Admiralty, instead of handing the property over to Mr. Austin, were about to transfer it at once to the Corporation of London, who wished to establish a cattle market on it. The advantage of this arrangement was completely on the side of Mr. Austin, who pocketed £20,000 profit, which was thus lost to the public. Now, that was one of those questions which he considered ought to be inquired into by a Committee of the House. He did not intend to attach suspicion to anyone connected with the transaction. At the same time it was notorious that in all parts of the country insinuations had been made of certain persons having been discreditably mixed up in it.