HC Deb 20 April 1875 vol 223 cc1286-7
MR. BUTT

asked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether he is prepared to lay upon the Table of the House the communications received by the Irish Government from the magistrates and police authorities of the county of Westmeath and the adjacent districts; and also the paper or papers containing a statement of agrarian murders committed in Ireland in 1874? To explain the Question the hon. and learned Gentleman read the following passages from the speech of the Chief Secretary in introducing the Peace Preservation Act:— The Government have felt it their duty to consult, both confidentially and more or less publicly, the magistrates and police authorities of Westmeath and the adjacent districts on this matter. Of course, it is impossible for me to give in detail to the House the information which we have received on this head; but, speaking generally, I may say the magistrates and the police authorities are unanimous in assuring us that this Ribbon conspiracy exists now as strongly as ever, and that its action has only been kept down by the repressive force of this law. We are told of cases where outrages of serious character—in some instances murder—are only in abeyance on account of the existence of this Act."—[3 Hansard, ccxxii. 1010.] He further stated that on the 22nd of March the right hon. Baronet referred to papers containing information respecting five cases of murder.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH

, in reply, said, the public communications he referred to were resolutions passed at meetings of magistrates and published in the newspapers; but other communications were obtained as confidential communications. In making quotations from constabulary and magisterial Repon the circumstances of the agrarian murders committed in 1874, he was careful to confine himself to those points which were matters of public notoriety. It had been announced that the murders had been committed; that certain persons were not ready to assist in discovering the offenders; and that the offenders had not been brought to justice; and he did not mention any names except the names of the murdered persons. The whole of the documents could not be presented to the House without disclosing confidential communications which he did not read, and which he could not have intended to bring before the House.

MR. BUTT

gave Notice that on Thursday he should move for the production of the Papers, so far as they were referred to in the speeches of the right hon. Baronet.