HC Deb 02 July 1875 vol 225 cc920-34

SUPPLY—considered in Committee.

(In the Committee.)

(1.) Motion made, and Question proposed, That a sum, not exceeding £18,000, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1876, for Her Majesty's Foreign and other Secret Services.

MR. DILLWYN

moved an Amendment to the effect that no portion of the sum should be applied to an increase of salaries. The hon. Member said, that Mr. Rylands when in Parliament obtained the admission from Government that a portion of the money had been applied to increasing the salaries of Queen's messengers. He (Mr. Dillwyn) did not think that was a proper application of the money.

Amendment proposed, To add, at the end of the Question, the words "provided that no part of this sum shall be applied to the increase of Salaries."—(Mr. Dillwyn.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there added."

SIR ANDREW LUSK

said, a few years ago the sum asked for Secret Service was £30,000. Then it was reduced to £25,000, and now £24,000 was asked. He wished to know whether the Government could not reduce the sum to £20,000?

MR. GATHORNE HARDY

said, the hon. Baronet, being a great authority in the City of London on matters of financial administration, must know that certain occasions arose which prevented a limitation of the amount of expenditure. His hon. Friend, when serving the office of Lord Mayor, had entertained an Emperor, and no doubt he found the entertainment was more expensive than an ordinary entertainment. And so, with regard to the Secret Service, the expenditure under that head was very much larger some years than in others. As to the remarks of the hon. Member for Swansea, he might observe that the very name of this Service showed that, under certain circumstances, no limit should be placed on expenditure. This fund was administered with the greatest care and without any attempt to interfere with the due control of the Crown over any of its servants. He hoped the hon. Member for Swansea would not press the Amendment, which if it were adopted would improperly interfere with the administration of the fund.

MR. W. H. SMITH

also said that of late years no part of the fund had been applied to the increase of salaries.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Original Question put, and agreed to.

(2.) Motion made, and Question proposed, That a sum, not exceeding £4,852, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1876, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of the Queen's and Lord Treasurer's Remembrancer in the Exchequer, Scotland, of certain Officers in Scotland, and other Charges formerly paid from the Hereditary Revenue.

SIR ANDREW LUSK

wanted to know who was the Lyon King-at-Arms? In regard to another item, he had never heard any reason why there should be a Bible Board at Edinburgh. Then he objected to the sum of £199 for the Queen's Plate. The previous Government was very great in some instances and in others very small. It did away at one time with the £199, and then because some one asked them they restored it. He asked the present Government to have the courage to do away with the item entirely. The money was thrown away; and, besides, it was not their duty to provide funds for races. In several places there were no horses to run, and in other cases there were "walks over." He begged to move that the £ 199 be deducted from the Vote. [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER: The sum is £218.] The balance was for shooting with bows and arrows. They did not meddle with that.

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Item of £99, for the Queen's Plate, Edinburgh, be omitted from the proposed Vote."—(Sir Andrew Lusk.)

MR. W. H. SMITH

said, that the fees for armorial bearings exceeded the cost of the Vote, and if they did away with the Vote they would abolish the fees, and such a result would not be satisfactory to the economical mind of the hon. Baronet. The Bible Board was an ancient institution for the purpose of securing an accurate edition of the Bible. It was formerly paid for out of the hereditary revenues, which were surrendered to the State, and he therefore thought it ought to be maintained. The question of Queen's Plates had been frequently discussed in that House. The money was omitted from the Vote in 1870 by the late Government; but in 1872 a very strong representation was made by the Scotch Members, and at their instance the Vote was restored.

MR. J. W. BARCLAY

suggested that the money should be handed over to the Highland Society, when he thought it would be productive of considerable good. At present the expenditure did not tend to improve the breed of horses.

MR. M'LAREN

said, when the Scotch Plates were abandoned it was hoped that the Irish Plates would be extinguished too.

SIR PATRICK O'BRIEN

said, that if the Scotch Members did not wish for the Vote nobody else would object to its being discontinued. The Scotch and Irish Plates ought to be dealt with together, and he would suggest that in Ireland the Plates should be consolidated into one sum, to be run for at four places in alternate years.

MR. GOLDSMID

asked how any reasonable man could imagine that they were encouraging the breed of horses by a Vote of £99? The amount should either be increased or withdrawn altogether.

MR. MACGREGOR

was in favour of the retention of the item in the Vote.

MR. RAMSAY

strongly supported the proposal to withdraw the Vote. He did not think the people of Scotland generally took such an interest in racing as to care for the sum in question.

MR. ORR-EWING

said, that until the Members for Ireland asked to have a similar sum omitted from the Votes the Committee had no right to complain. He hoped the Government would adhere to the Vote as it then stood, and not give way to certain Scotch Members' notions on the subject of horse-racing.

MR. CONOLLY

called upon the Committee not to support the hon. Baronet the Member for Finsbury in his absurd proposition. Ireland was united in wishing to retain a similar Vote for that country, because she did not wish to give up any of her national pastimes, and he thought that although Scotchmen knew the value of a "bawbee," there were some amongst them who liked to keep up the exciting competition of horse-racing for "the Queen's Plate." If this item was withdrawn, there would be a scramble amongst Scotch Members for the bawbees to be applied in prizes for cattle or sheep or pigs.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 43; Noes 154: Majority 111.

Original Question put, and agreed to.

(3.) £9,567, to complete the sum for the Fishery Board, Scotland.

GENERAL SIR GEORGE BALFOUR

said, that in 1824 an Act was passed allotting the small sum of £3,000 per annum for the improvement of piers and quays and the small fishery harbours of Scotland, and that this grant might be said to be a part of the payments under the agreement made at the time of the Union—at all events, it had been passed by Parliament as a part of the public policy of that period, to create openings for employing the then almost starving seafaring population on the coasts of Scotland, by providing for the fisheries of Scotland convenient havens to which boats engaged in fisheries could resort, or in which, in case of gales, the boats could find protection or refuge; and from 1829, when the first grant was paid under the Act of 1824, up to 1844, the money had been applied to the purpose for which the Legislature intended, and if not honestly and with entire success, at all events with some benefit to the very defective places, to which boats employed in the sea fisheries resorted, on the exposed coasts of Scotland. In that year the small grant was first appropriated to the construction of a harbour of a general trading character, and not one for purely fishery purposes, and for many years this fund was used for the extension, or rather construction, of the harbour of Dunbar, and he complained of this as the first considerable misappropriation of this portion of the Vote. No doubt to other places on the coast of Scotland grants had been made out of this small fund of £3,000, and no one could fail to think, on seeing the names of the owners of these fishing places, so aided, that influential parties had influenced the authorities in making grants to these favoured harbours; but it could not be denied that such places, so aided, were fishery havens, and within the Act. When the annual grants to Dunbar ceased, apparently in 1864, then the harbour of Anstruther, in Fife, was the favoured harbour, and since then the whole of this grant had been annually used for this one harbour; whereby, as he (Sir George Balfour) contended, this fund which had now for many years been applied to the improvement of the harbours of Dunbar and Anstruther, had thus deprived the many small harbours for fisheries of that and which they so much needed to adapt them for fishery purposes, and to which they were entitled. This misapplication could not have taken place if the Act of 1824 had been enforced in accordance with its provisions. This Act required that each locality receiving and out of the £3,000 should contribute one-fourth the outlay on the harbour improvements; and so long as the Fishery Board of Scotland were left free to decide on applications for money assistance out of the £3,000 grant, the contributions had been regularly paid, even by poor fishermen, who readily clubbed their earnings for the improvement of this little harbour. But this condition had been evaded in the application of this fund to the extensive and expensive improvements carried out at Dunbar and Anstruther, which had not supplied this portion of the expenditure required by the Act. It was true that funds were used in and of the grant from the Fishery Board; but these were borrowed monies from the Government or in the locality, and not of the description required by the Act of 1824; and he earnestly hoped the Government would take the whole matter into consideration, in order that the money that had been misapplied out of this special grant for so many years might be refunded, with a view to effect those improvements which the fishery havens of Scotland so much needed. He made these remarks not with a view of objecting to the harbours of Dunbar and Anstruther having been aided by public money, but merely with the view of pointing out that a very small fund of £3,000, specially applicable by law to the special object of creating facilities for our poor fishermen in carrying on their dangerous employment, had been used for a purpose different from that for which it was intended. He urged that Scotland had as just a right to have harbours provided out of public monies as England, and the harbours of Dunbar and Anstruther were fairly entitled to be looked at as works of general utility needed for our general trade and for our shipping; but these improvements ought to have been carried on by special grants voted by Parliament. He must also point out that the public money spent on harbours in the two countries, out of grants specially voted by Parliament, were in great contrast. Between 1840 and 1867, a period of 27 years, upwards of £5,000,000 was spent on the harbours of England, while in the same time only about £100,000 was spent upon the harbours of Scotland, though there was much more necessity to improve and maintain the Scotch harbours than there was the English ones, because Scotland had not the same manufactures as England had, and necessarily not the same wealth and commerce by which the harbours of England could be improved, extended, and maintained. But the most objectionable feature in respect to the misapplication of this Fishery Grant of £3,000 was, that practically it was more than covered by the fee that was now paid by the fish curers for the brand applied by the officers of the Fishery Board to the barrels of herrings intended for exportation. Under the old bounty system of encouraging trade and fisheries, and by which the herring trade of Scotland was largely subsidized from the Imperial Exchequer, a fee was formerly paid to the fisheries of the United Kingdom, on the export of herrings made to the Continent; but after discontinuing this bounty for some years, the policy was reversed, and a fee was levied in 1859, on the recommendation of Sir John Shaw Lefevre, on the brand to the herring barrels, which, after the payment ceased, had been continued to be affixed to the barrels of Scotch herrings. So productive had that fee proved that in 1874 the sum of £8,625 was raised from the Scotch herring fisheries, or nearly three times the amount of the grant for the improvement of the fishery havens, and the whole of this money was paid into the Exchequer as a part of the income of the year. Since 1859 these fees had amounted to close on £80,000; whereas the £3,000 grant for the improvements to Scotch fishery havens had only been about £48,000, nearly all of which had been spent on general harbours for commerce and trade, instead of, as the law required, on fishery havens. He would also contrast the exceptional prodigality, lately attempted to be shown by the Government towards Dover Harbour, on which it was proposed to lay out £1,000,000 sterling, and the rigid economy enforced against Scotland. The harbour of Wick, for instance, had been repeatedly reported on as deserving of public and, particularly by the Royal Commission of 1860, but no such and had ever been granted; whereas on harbours of England, such as Dover and Alderney, millions had been spent, and more money was yearly proposed to be spent, and, no doubt, would be laid out, whilst the many places in Scotland which, with only a fraction of the sum already spent on English harbours, could be usefully made into safe harbours, had been neglected, and the vast resources in fish in the adjacent seas, and better calculated than the land to yield wealth to the people of Scotland, and to extend industry and comfort amongst a large mass, had not been reaped, and all this loss owing to the withholding of pecuniary and.

MR. MACGREGOR

supported the Vote. He thought the money spent upon Anstruther and Dunbar Harbours had been well spent, and he urged the Government to give more encouragement to small fishing harbours, both in Scotland and Ireland, by the advancement of small loans.

MR. W. H. SMITH

observed, that the Vote had been chiefly applied for the improvement of Anstruther Harbour; but that work was now drawing to a close, and the amount would be appropriated to another harbour for fishing purposes. He believed the hon. and gallant Gentleman was incorrect in saying that there had been any misappropriation of the Vote. There was every desire on the part of the Government that the funds intended for small harbours and fishery purposes should be properly applied to that object.

MR. BUTT

approved the Vote and called attention to the mode in which the Scotch Fishery Board managed matters in having fishery officers at the various stations round the coast of Scotland, who taught the people the best mode of fishing. He regretted that the Fishery Board which Ireland once possessed had been abolished. This Vote, though nominally £12,000, was actually reduced to £3,000 by the small fee which had been imposed in 1856 for "branding" herrings, which produced no less than £9,000. Although the Vote was comparatively inadequate for Scotch requirements, it was larger and placed on an infinitely better basis than the sum applied to Ireland. He hoped the Chief Secretary would give the same assistance to Irish fisheries and the same protection as was afforded to the Scotch fisheries.

MR. MORGAN LLOYD

hoped that the Government would review the Vote, and that the claims of Wales would not be forgotten.

MR. M'LAREN

thought the hon. and learned Member for Limerick had somewhat misunderstood the state of affairs in Scotland. The hon. and learned Gentleman spoke of a Board superintending the deep-sea fisheries; but the Fishery Board which existed in Scotland only took charge of their herring fishery. It was an unpaid Board, while, he believed, most of the Boards in Ireland were generally not unpaid. The only use of the Board was to appoint and direct the officers to superintend the herring fishery, and see that the herrings exported were packed in a particular way, and if they were so packed, that they should be branded; and those receiving the brand on the cask had to pay a fee. The whole expenses for the brand was a little over £6,000, while the receipts were about £9,000, thus showing a large surplus—Parliament, in fact, gained £2,300. But there were other items included in the £12,000. There was £3,000 for piers, and smaller sums for cruisers and cutters. These latter sums were not in any shape or way a charge for the fisheries of Scotland. They were for what he called the police of the sea. Boats came from France, Holland, England, Ireland, and the Isle of Man, and it was necessary there should be some power to keep them in order. When these sums were deducted there only remained some £3,000 for piers, while £9,476 was given to the Irish Fisheries. He had no objection whatever to the Irish Vote, but he denied altogether that Scotland received more than she contributed for the fisheries

MR. BUTT

said deliberately that Ireland did not receive the benefit that Scotland did, and said what they wanted in Ireland was not a paid Board, but a Board of Irish gentlemen. Give Ireland an unpaid Board and a system of branding, such as Scotland had, free for 10 years, and then she would be able to compete with Scotland on something like equal terms. From the Scotch Union up to 1856 the Scotch fisheries had the and of the Government.

MR. SHAW LEFEVRE

said, if Scotland really derived any great advantage from the Board and the branding system there would be force in the argument for extending it to Ireland, and perhaps to England and Wales also. The truth, however, was that the system had been condemned by three successive Royal Commissions, who had come to the conclusion that it was a bad system, and that the success of the Scotch fishing was not due to the branding at all, but to other causes. There was an immense export of herrings from the East Coast of England carried on without any branding system whatever.

MR. J. W. BARCLAY

said, that at one time there was a bounty offered in Scotland for the curing of herrings; but whether it was due to that fact that the herring fishery made such progress and became so developed he could not say. He thought the system of branding was of very great advantage to Scotland, and knowing something about the herring trade, he was prepared to state that it could not be practically carried on without that system. A number of curers tried to do away with it after a charge was made for the brand, but they found it did not succeed, and there was a much larger portion of herrings branded now than was formerly the case. As regarded the Fishery Board, he did not put too much confidence in them, because they took no interest in the catching of the fish. One other matter to which he referred was that of the two cruisers. An opinion prevailed that they might be of much greater service than they were if they spent most of their time in harbour instead of cruising at sea. During a recent storm, when some of the fishermen lost their valuable nets, they were asked to go and see if they could find them, but they said their orders were to be confined to saving life. Now, seeing that they were there, he thought the Admiralty ought to instruct these cruisers that under the circumstances he had named they should give some little assistance to the fishermen.

MR. RAMSAY

thought it was due to the officers of the Revenue cruisers to say that he met this week with a gentleman from the North of Scotland, where there was a very active branch of the fishery trade prosecuted during the summer months, and he assured him that these vessels rendered very important services to the fishermen, and on many occasions had been the means of saving their nets at sea and towing the small boats into harbour during a storm. As regarded the question which had been raised by the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt), he begged to say what the Scotch Members complained of was this—that the Votes for Scotland, taken in the aggregate, did not correspond either with the population of the country or its taxation, and that there was a very undue proportion given to Ireland and to England also. [Laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen might laugh at his statement; but the truth was when they were called upon to deal with economy and retrenchment by their constituents they were met with the assertion, which they could not deny, that the Votes taken in the aggregate for England and Ireland, and for any branch of the public service, exceeded in amount and proportion those given to Scotland.

MR. DILLWYN

objected to the practice which was growing up of discussing Votes, not with reference to the amount required for the public service, but with reference simply to the question of how much Scotland, Ireland, England, or "Wales might happen to be receiving under the same head. The simple question they had to decide was, whether the Vote now before the House was good for Scotland or not, and it had nothing whatever to do with Ireland.

Vote agreed to.

(4.) £4,460, to complete the sum for the Lunacy Commission, Scotland.

(5.) £5,045, to complete the sum for the General Registrar's Office, Scotland.

(6.) £60,235, to complete the sum for the Board of Supervision and Public Health, Scotland.

MR. GOSCHEN

asked whether the large increase in the Vote was due to the allowance of 4s. per head given for lunatics; also, whether that sum represented the whole of the Vote required for lunatics in Scotland, or only a part?

SIR WALTER BARTTELOT

inquired whether the 4s. was given for the lunatics in workhouses as well as in asylums?

SIR ANDREW LUSK

asked if the Government were taking care that the money granted was properly applied?

MR. W. H. SMITH

said, that the amount asked represented the whole of the normal Vote for pauper lunatics in Scotland for the year. All pauper lunatics were under the control of the Board of Lunacy, and the amount put down in the Vote was the maximum allowed per head. It did not follow that the total amount would be either required or expended; but it had been thought wise to put the full amount in the Estimate. There was no Estimate or payment made for pauper lunatics in workhouses in England, but there was in Scotland. In the case of the Irish Vote for the same purpose which had to be submitted, it represented only three-fourths of the annual amount.

MR. RAMSAY

said, the grant was only given to lunatics under the control of the Lunacy Board, and that by no means embraced the whole of the lunatics in Scotland. He complained that the Scotch grant had been commenced 60 days later than the English grant, and thus Scotland had been deprived of £10,000. Injustice was consequently done to Scotland in that as in many other respects.

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHE-QUER

said, that he had had a good deal of communication with the hon. Member, and consequently had agreed to recommend the allowance being given for Scotch lunatics, though it would not be given in the case of England. The hon. Member now made another complaint that the grant did not commence till 60 days after the English Vote; but then if this scheme ever came to an end, the Scotch would get paid for 60 days extra at the end of the period.

MR. RAMSAY

, speaking in the name of the Scotch people, thanked the Chancellor of the Exchequer for what he had done in the matter, and said the more thoroughly he understood it the more convinced he would be that he had done what was right.

MR. M'LAREN

thought there was some misunderstanding on the subject. It was a mistake to suppose that all lunatics in Scotland were paid for. No pauper lunatic was paid for, unless he was under the control of the Board of Supervision.

MR. PELL

said, that by means of exceeding importunity Scotland appeared to have obtained a concession which placed her at an advantage as compared with England, and that that fact ought to serve as a hint to English Members to proceed in the same way.

MR. M'CARTHY DOWNING

asked why the grant of 4s. per head for lunatics in Scotland should not be extended to Ireland and England?

SIR WALTER BARTTELOT

said, that it appeared that in Scotland the lunatics in union workhouses were paid for at the rate of 4s. per head, and he thought it high time for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to put the three countries on the same footing in that matter. That concession ought either to be withdrawn from Scotland or given to England and Ireland.

MR. GOSCHEN

wished to know, as a matter of fact, whether anything had been given to Scotland which was withheld from England and Ireland?

THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHE-QUER

said, the original proposal of the Government was to make a grant of 4s. a-head in respect to all lunatics under the charge of the Lunacy Commissioners; and it was made under the impression that it would work in the same way in all parts of the, United Kingdom, but that it would not apply to lunatics retained in the workhouses and not under the Lunacy Commissioners. That proposal was made with reference to England. Then it was brought to their notice from Scotland that there were many classes of lunatics there which did not exist in England. The lunatics in Scotland were classified in a different way from that adopted here, and were under the Lunacy Commissioners where that was not the case in England. The system being different in that respect, there was a difference in the payment. He did not think their English friends would be prepared to adopt the Scotch system and to have the same supervision by the Lunacy Commissioners as existed in Scotland, otherwise the case would be very much altered. Were they so, the Government would be prepared to give the grant to the same class of lunatics.

MR. ORR-EWING

said, that if Scotland was dealt justly with, that was all she required. Now, as regarded medical grants, some years ago the grant for Scotland was fixed at £10,000, and it had never been since increased, while the grant for England was £157,000. Now, if England got her due proportion as regarded population, she ought only to receive £65,000. Then as regarded pauper lunatics, England received £357,000, while Scotland only got £61,000. Such figures as these could be multiplied in other cases, and they showed that Scotland had good ground for complaint.

Vote agreed to.

(7.) £5,360, to complete the sum for the Household of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

MR. ANDERSON

objected to that part of the Vote which related to Queen's Plates in Ireland. It was pointed out in the evidence taken before Lord Rosebery's Committee that the money for Queen's Plates was absolutely thrown away, so far as the breeding of horses was concerned, and that they neither amused the people nor improved the breed of the horses. It was promised last year that before another year this matter would be re-considered, in order to ascertain whether the money could not be devoted to a more useful purpose. He did not want to take the money away from Ireland, but he did desire that it should be devoted to some more useful purpose in connection with the improvement of horses.

MR. CONOLLY

hoped they would be spared these vexatious interferences on the part of the Scotch Members in matters which did not concern them at all. ["Oh, oh!"] They did not understand the question, and they cared less about it. There was a large body of Irish people who loved racing, but the Scotch were different. Their blood did not run so fast as that of the Irish, and he altogether objected to the interference in this House of Scotch Members in matters purely belonging to Ireland.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH

said, that the question of principle had been decided by the division which had already occurred that evening. He had been in communication with several hon. Members, and with some of the leading men on the Irish Turf on the subject, and they had been unable to suggest any mode in which the money could be more usefully distributed than by means of these Plates. Any practical suggestions that might be made by Gentlemen possessing local knowledge which would lead to an improvement in the breed of horses in Ireland by otherwise distributing this money would receive the careful consideration of the Government.

MR. M'LAREN

, in reply to the observations of the hon. Member for Donegal (Mr. Conolly), said, the Members who were elected in Scotland were not elected for Scotland alone, they were elected to the Imperial Parliament, and as Members of that Parliament, they had a perfect right to interfere in the affairs of the whole nation. He had as much right to interfere in anything appertaining to the constituency of the hon. Member, as the hon. Member would have a right to interfere in anything affecting the constituency of Edinburgh which was brought before the House.

MR. J. W. BARCLAY

suggested that some of the money which was given for Queen's Plates should be devoted to offering premiums for the best stallions.

MR. ANDERSON

said, if Scotch Members had nothing to do with Irish affairs, how came it they were allowed to vote upon them? If votes in this House were confined to nationalities, the Scotch Members would manage things a great deal better than was done at present.

MR. WHITWELL

objected to money being wasted in Queen's Plates.

MR. R. POWER

was sorry to hear his hon. Friend who had just spoken object to Queen's Plates, because he had seen him on the back of a racehorse, though he admittted it was a broken-down one.

MR. CONOLLY

said, he would apologize to the Scotch Members if he had said anything offensive to them.

GENERAL SHUTE

hoped that that House would not refuse a Vote, the object of which was to preserve and improve the excellent breed of Irish horses.

MAJOR O'GORMAN

had just one word to say. He hoped the Government would never give premiums for the breeding in Ireland of cocktails. Another thing he would like to see—the races for the Queen's Plates run faster, and he suggested that they should not get the money unless they did the distance in a given time.

Vote agreed to.

(8.) £20,165, to complete the sum for the offices of the Chief Secretary for Ireland.

(9.) £265, to complete the sum for the Boundary Survey, Ireland.

(10.) £1,621, to complete the sum for the Charitable Donations and Bequests Office, Ireland.

MR. MELDON

complained of the way the Commissioners were at present appointed, and expressed a hope that the Government would institute a change.

Vote agreed to.

(11.) £82,355, to complete the sum for the Local Government Board, Ireland.

(12.) £4,221, to complete the sum for the Public Record Office, Ireland.

(13.) £14,331, to complete the sum for the Registrar General's Office, Ireland, &c.

(14.) £16,600, to complete the sum for the General Survey and Valuation of Ireland.

(15.) £25,692, to complete the sum for Pauper Lunatics, Ireland.

House resumed.

Resolutions to be reported upon Monday next;

Committee to sit again upon Monday next.