Commons Sitting of 30 June 1875

MINUTES.
SUPPLY—considered in Committee—Resolutions [June 29] reported.
PUBLIC BILLS—Ordered—First Reading—Artizans Dwellings (Scotland) [229]; Public Health (Scotland) Act, 1867, Amendment* [230].
Second Reading—County Boards (Ireland) [51],put off; Industrial Savings Banks [185],put off.
Third Reading—Glebe Lands, Corporate Bodies (Ireland) * [47]; Royal Irish Constabulary *[219], and passed.
Withdrawn—County Boards (Ireland) (No. 2) *[27]; Compensation for Accidents to Workmen* [186].

COUNTY BOARDS (IRELAND) BILL.
(Mr. O'Shaughnessy, Mr. Butt.)
COUNTY BOARDS (IRELAND) BILL.

  [BILL 27.] SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  MR. BUTT, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that its object was to transfer to elective Boards the management of a large amount of taxation which was at present under the control of the Irish Grand Juries, the exercise of which power was

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  most anomalous. That amount was continually increasing, and in 1873 the money raised and expended by the Grand Juries amounted to £1,288,000, levied upon property of the rateable value of £10,000,000, and of the estimated value of nearly £13,000,000, and the purposes to which it was applied included, among others, the construction and maintenance of roads and bridges, the building of Court houses, the payment of prison and police expenses and the salaries of county officers. In England there was nothing whatever analogous to this state of things. The legitimate object of constituting the Grand Juries was the discharge of criminal business, and it was altogether anomalous and objectionable that a body nominated by the sheriff for that purpose should be charged with the administration of taxation. Up to the year 1836 the Grand Juries of Ireland levied taxation the same as in England. They were summoned the same as in England, and they administered and imposed their taxation in the same mode. The first and most important change was made in 1836, when the Grand Juries were required to deliberate on fiscal matters in public. This was a great advantage to the public, but other changes were made which were not so successful. The first was in the constitution of the Grand Jury, which was placed entirely under the control of the sheriff. The counties of Ireland were divided into baronies, which were somewhat similar to the hundreds in England. In the county of Cork the number of baronies were 23, while in other counties they were only seven or eight in number. In 1836 the Grand Jury were absolute, but now they were reduced to the position of a mere Court for the review of the decisions of local bodies. The sheriff had the power of selecting from the ratepayers in the baronies the names of persons who were to be on the Grand Jury, and he frequently chose those whom he knew would give a silent assent to the proceedings of the presentment sessions. That was substantially the system upon which for a long series of years the administration of £1,200,000 a-year was carried on. It was altogether an inefficient system, and the verdict was that in the whole of the levy of the taxation in Ireland there was not a shadow of personal control or representation. It was this system which he asked the
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  House to assist him in checking. In 1842 a Royal Commission was issued, upon which Sir William Somerville, Sir John Young, Mr. Serjeant Greene, and Mr. O'Ferrall sat. The Commissioners made a Report which contained recommendations in favour of a change. They cited instances of the mode in which the taxation was conducted, and pointed out the inefficiency of the appeals. But none of their recommendations had been carried into effect except the abolition of the office of County Treasurer. Yet it was shown that in some instances the persons chosen upon the road sessions could neither read nor write, and had no interest in the district proposed to be taxed. The same complaints were repeated before a Select Committee of the House of Commons in 1868, who recommended that the associated cesspayers should be selected by the ratepayers, and that no magistrate should be allowed to sit who had not an interest in the property of the district. In 1849 the Government, by the hands of Sir George Grey, brought in a Bill appointing District Councils and County Councils as distinct from the Grand Juries. Under that Bill two-thirds were to be nominated by what was intended to be, and would have been to some extent, a popular election, and one-third only were to be selected by the magistracy. The Bill was put off to a limbo to which a great many measures were often consigned. It was deferred until the following Session, with a promise that it would then be re-introduced, but that promise was never performed. In 1855 a Bill was introduced, also establishing County Boards, pretty much on the same principle, by Sir Denham Norreys. It fell through and was introduced again by the same hon. Member in 1856, and again in 1857, and there was then an end of that attempt at legislation. The next attempt was by himself (Mr. Butt) in 1861. He moved for a Committee of Inquiry, with a view of ascertaining how far the principle of popular representation might be employed. Mr. Cardwell, who was then Chief Secretary, opposed the Motion, and invited him to bring in a Bill, but he was not charmed with the invitation, knowing what became of Bills introduced by private Members. The Motion was defeated on a division, and if the Government objected to the present measure, he invited the Chief Secretary to bring in a Bill to carry out the

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  recommendation of the Committee of 1842. The Bill which he now asked the House to read a second time gave the ratepayers some voice in the management of the lunatic asylums, and substituted a more efficient mode of dealing with the roads of a county than at present existed. He proposed by it to adhere to the old division of barony; but where the number of baronies in a county exceeded 12, power was given by this Bill to the Lord Lieutenant in Council to consolidate them. Next, it was proposed by the Bill that the cesspayers of each barony should elect three persons to be members of the County Board, and that the magistrates resident in that barony should elect a person to be a member of the County Board. That was his plan for reforming the County Boards. He would not limit the amount at which the cesspayer should have the right of voting, and in that respect he followed the provisions of previous Bills which had been introduced, but not passed into law. He believed that the proportion of three cesspayers to one magistrate would make a good board. His great desire was to bring the gentry of Ireland and the ratepayers more together, as he felt sure that the more they associated with each other in the jury and at local Boards, and the more they knew of their common interests, the more they would respect each other and live in harmony together throughout the country. His Bill contained clauses for the carrying out of the principle of this Bill, but he was afraid that as regarded the machinery of the Bill he had not been successful. Edmund Burke said that only a man sitting in a seat of authority could properly frame administrative clauses. He would like to see the Grand Jury in Ireland composed as the Grand Jury in England was of the first men in the county—of resident proprietors, and not of the agents of absentee proprietors. Under the present system in Ireland the sheriff nominated the agent of an absentee proprietor as a person to administer the affairs of a district. The administration of the law was degraded by that system. And there was a far greater evil connected with that system—namely, that in this great taxation for county purposes the people who paid the taxes had no representation. It was an enormous advantage to the people to teach them to have a voice in the expenditure
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  of the taxes to which they contributed. A taxpayer, if he had a voice, however small, in the expenditure of the taxes levied upon himself and his fellow taxpayers, felt very differently on that subject from a taxpayer who had no representation in the administration of money which was obtained by taxation. The taxes of which he was speaking were imposed by the Grand Jury and wholly paid by occupiers of property. Often some of the best men in England complained that the people of Ireland did not manifest sufficient self-reliance, and he was sorry to confess that the charge was true; but as long as the people of Ireland were deprived of having a voice with regard to the expenditure of the taxes which they were compelled to pay for the administration of the affairs of their own localities—as long as agents of absentee landed proprietors could dictate what local taxes they should pay—as long as they had no chance of being trained in a way which would stimulate independence, how could we expect them to manifest a self-reliant spirit? Not only were the people of Ireland not taught lessons of self-reliance, but what little self-reliance they had was taken away from them by teaching them in everything to look to the authorities of Dublin Castle as the supreme directors of their local affairs. He felt deeply that the people of Ireland would never become really independent until they obtained free institutions and were made responsible for the management of their own affairs. The hon. and learned Gentleman concluded by moving the second reading of the Bill.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. Butt.)
  MR. BRUEN, in moving, as an Amendment, that the Bill be read a second time that day three months, said, it was on account of two objections that he took that course—first, because he considered the measure did not satisfy those requirements which the treatment of the subject demanded; and, secondly, because the existing Grand Jury system did not require that subversive treatment which the hon. and learned Member for Limerick proposed. It was, in his opinion, quite unnecessary to transfer the powers of the Grand Jury to the representative Council contemplated. Before there could be any taxation of property

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  and expenditure of county monies there must be a presentment to the quarter sessions, next there must be a presentment to the Grand Jury, and after that it must come before a Judge of Assize for his fiat. In all these proceedings the interests of ratepayers and of the owners of property were represented and taken care of. The presentment sessions, at which all money presentments and orders for the performance of works must be originated, though composed of cesspayers and magistrates who bore the taxation of the country, did not, he admitted, thoroughly represent the cesspayers, but that portion of the existing Grand Jury laws could easily be amended. In considering the question the hon. and learned Member for Limerick started with the assumption that the rates were paid by the occupiers in a greater proportion than by the owners. The cesspayers, no doubt, paid those rates in the first instance, but those rates were deducted from the rents they paid, and therefore ultimately the burden of those rates were borne by the landlords. The truth of this proposition had been affirmed by more than one Committee of the House. The hon. and learned Gentle-man proposed by his Bill to give an undue influence to that portion of the community which paid the least rates—namely, the occupiers—because he proposed that three representatives of the occupiers in each barony should be elected members of the proposed County Board, which was to take the place of the Grand Jury, and only one member of the County Board should be elected by the justices to represent the owners of property. If the Bill were made law, in the county of Antrim, for instance, there would be 59 members of the County Board, and of those only 12 would be the representatives of owners of property. In the county of Armagh, the County Board would consist of 42 members, and of those only eight would be representatives of the owners of property. In the county he (Mr. Bruen) represented there would be 35 members of the County Board, and of those only seven would be representatives of the owners of property. In the county of Cork there would be 82 members of the County Board, and of these only 12 would be representatives of the owners of property. He thought he had shown that the direct representation which the hon. and learned Gentleman proposed to give
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  to owners of property was not a just proportion. In any case where the interest of owners and that of occupiers conflicted, the former would be swamped by the latter under the system proposed by the hon. and learned Member. That was not fair or just. One reason why he asked that the present system should not be destroyed was that it was one which could without any serious alteration be easily moulded so as to get rid of any injustice which might be supposed to exist under it. With regard to the complaint of the hon. and learned Member that the occupiers of property were not represented under the present system, that matter could be easily remedied by enabling the cesspayers of each barony, in accordance with the recommendation of the Select Committee of 1868, to elect their own representatives, and determining that the number so elected should not be overriden by the justices. No doubt, to a great extent the Grand Jury panel was constituted by the sheriff, but that official was bound to distribute his selection over the entire county, and it was not in many instances that sheriffs placed on Grand Jury panels the representatives of absentee landlords. The Select Committee of 1868 held that Grand Juries were in reality efficient representatives of the landed property of the county. He had never heard it urged that by the action of the sheriffs landed property was imperfectly represented. If the owners of property felt that they were not represented in the management of local affairs they would certainly complain, and the circumstance that they had preferred no complaint on the subject was extremely significant. The existing Grand Jury laws did not require to be altered as regarded presentment sessions and Grand Juries in the manner proposed by the Bill. In what county had the Grand Jury shown itself unfit to discharge the duties or to exercise the power with which it was invested? Ireland, since the introduction of the Grand Jury system, was covered with some of the best roads in the world, constructed on economical principles. The statement that county cess had uniformly been increased was not borne out by the facts. On the contrary, he maintained that it had rather diminished than increased. The accusation could not be brought against the Grand Jury system that it had failed to accomplish

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  that which it was constituted to perform, and he therefore submitted that no ease had been made out for its abolition; on the contrary, he thought it should be improved. The Bill they were discussing was studded, in his opinion, with imperfections which rendered it most undesirable that it should be read a second time. Amongst others he might allude to the female franchise which it created, and to Clause 7, which gave occupiers rated under £4 power of exercising by a vote large influence in the choice of representatives for these proposed County Boards, and it encouraged by the creation of new offices the reverse of economy. He was bound, however, to admit that he approved that provision in the Bill which gave the cesspayers more representation on the boards of management of lunatic asylums. Very judiciously, he maintained, could more direct representation be introduced. The best part of the Bill was that which related to compensation for malicious outrages; but, on the whole, he thought he had made out a good case for asking the House to reject the Bill.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day three months."—(Mr. Bruen.)
  CAPTAIN NOLANsaid, the Bill which stood on the Paper in his name was designed to achieve, in some respects, the object which his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) had in view. Having canvassed his constituents twice, he was in a position to say there was no secondary question on which they were so united as that they should be represented in some way on the Grand Jury in reference to fiscal questions. After the last Election, he prepared a scheme which he thought would give the occupiers a fair share in the representation, and his Bill was actually printed before that of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick was in type. Thus it happened that the two measures appeared on the Paper to-day; but his was not a rival scheme to that of his hon. and learned Friend—which, indeed, he approved and intended to vote for. Many of the objections which had been raised by the hon. Member for Carlow (Mr. Bruen) formed no ground for rejecting the Bill, because they were objections which could more properly be dealt with in Committee.
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  The present system was so bad that he and those who acted with him found it difficult to persuade Englishmen that so bad a system could be tolerated for one moment. Grand Jury cess amounted annually to £1,219,000 on a valuation of £13,300,000, or nearly 2s. in the pound, which was 12 times as great as the present rate of income tax falling exclusively on the occupiers of land, and yet being with equal exclusiveness administered solely by the proprietors of land. His (Captain Nolan's) Bill only aimed at dealing with the Grand Jury system in Ireland, and in that respect it differed from the Bill of his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Limerick. The Grand Juries had £500,000 to deal with over which the barony sessions had no control. They had the appointments of the county officers; the cesspayers had no voice in their selection. The main point which the hon. Member for Carlow touched upon, and to which he expressed some objection, was "popular" representation.
  MR. BRUENexplained that he did not object to popular representation, which harmonized and was associated with the action of the baronial sessions.
  CAPTAIN NOLANresumed: The principle of the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick was that the magistrates should be vested with the power of one-fourth of the representation, and the remainder of the electoral representation to be in the hands of the occupiers. The Bill was an extremely good one, and he should be glad to see it passed into a law, because it would remove a great many of the complaints that at present existed against the present system. He, however, differed from the hon. and learned Member as to the election of County Boards. It was a fair compromise; but if the Bill was rejected, it would be a better point of agitation that they should be elected by the whole of the ratepayers with the Ballot machinery, and not as proposed in the Bill of his hon. and learned Friend. He urged the desirability of the elections taking place upon the Parliamentary lists, and that the same election districts should be adopted, as a means of saving expense. With respect to the Grand Juries, the existing system of selection by the sheriffs was defective. There were in several of the counties in Ireland members of families who ex-

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  pressed themselves very much annoyed if not selected to serve on Grand Juries. But care should be taken that in the selection of Grand Juries Party spirit should not be imported into the choice. If the Bill now under consideration were rejected, the occupiers would assuredly get up an agitation, and would insist on their right to elect all the members of the Grand Jury. At present, in choosing Grand Jurors, the sheriff was under no restriction; he could summon whom he pleased, provided they had a certain property qualification. But surely representation ought to accompany taxation, and the ratepayers should have the power to elect the men who were to tax them. He thought that County Boards would give people legitimate means of combining in order to pass any measure which they might believe to be of public advantage. One object of great public importance which might have been promoted in this-way was the construction of Irish railways upon the security of local rates. If these Boards were refused, Parliament would take upon itself a great deal of responsibility, and would probably retard in no small degree the development of the material interests of Ireland.
  MR. STEPHEN MOOREwould only say a few words; and first he would say that he was opposed to the Bill brought in by the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt); and in opposing it he would take a shorter line in his argument than that taken by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Carlow (Mr. Bruen). He would not go into a consideration and discussion of the whole of the clauses, but he would say that he objected to the Bill as a whole. He could not agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman that there was such a necessity for amendment of the Grand Jury system in Ireland as he advocated. The Grand Jury system in Ireland was an institution that had existed for a great number of years, and had been found to work beneficially. There might have been some faults in it. As had been stated, some of them were in allowing the high sheriff to evade the law by which Grand Juries were constituted; but he maintained that there were blots to be found in every large institution. With regard to the allegation that there had been Grand Jury jobs, to put down which a more perfect system was required, he would point out
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  to the House that the hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Captain Nolan) had said that jobs were allowable, and that would upset the whole purpose and object of the hon. and gallant Member's Bill. He allowed that in large institutions jobbery was not only allowable, but desirable.
  CAPTAIN NOLAN: I never had the slightest intention of giving utterance to such an extraordinary statement.
  MR. STEPHEN MOOREsaid, the hon. and gallant Member might not have given utterance to that statement in those precise terms; but he was understood to say that it was right at times to choose certain men to carry out a particular work even though their appointment was opposed by some. Well, this in the minds of those who so opposed was jobbery. Now, as regarded this Bill, they had had in Ireland, unfortunately for some time, what might be called "sensational" agitation for legislation on the subject of the Grand Jury system in Ireland. He meant by "sensational," that it was uncalled for, and it was certainly opposed to the "Conservative" view of Ireland. He quoted the words of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick, indicating that there was a strong feeling of Conservatism in Ireland. Grand Juries were a very old institution in Ireland, and Irishmen, after all, were attached to old institutions. In his opinion, this agitation was got up by sensation-mongers in Ireland, though he did not point the phrase at the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Limerick. There was one thing in which he was agreed with the hon. and learned Gentleman, and that was that any system that could bring about a friendly feeling between the landlords and the ratepayers on the question of rating was desirable; but he must say, with regard to the election and selection of Poor Law Guardians, that all ratepayers were not suited by education, and that there were some chosen as members of Boards of Guardians who were not as well suited to deal with the financial questions as they might be. With regard to the Grand Juries, they were generally composed of men of education, and they were not more apt to err than other large assemblies; and when the hon. and gallant Member for Galway said there were large sums of the money of the counties in the hands of the Grand Juries in Ireland, he did not

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  tell the English and Scotch Members that the presentments had to be approved by the baronial sessions or counties. The hon. and learned Member for Limerick had certainly not brought any charges against the Grand Juries, but he had against the high sheriffs. Now he (Mr. Stephen Moore) had the honour of acquaintance with many of the high sheriffs in Ireland, and to his knowledge they had exerted themselves in a most impartial manner in the discharge of their duties in selecting gentlemen to sit on Grand Juries in their counties. There were, when the members to serve on Grand Juries were about to be selected in the counties, many who were desirous to go abroad; and there were many, who were owners of property, who did not desire to sit on Grand Juries. It was, however, always desirable to have owners of property on the Grand Juries. It had been said that members of baronies should only have power to vote on questions relating to their own particular baronies; but that he (Mr. Stephen Moore) thought would be as invidious as it would be to say that a Member of this House should not vote on any question not affecting his own particular county or borough. The strongest argument that had ever come under his notice happened in the South of Ireland, at a meeting of a Board of Guardians, wherein a very influential member of that board, said—"Of all the bodies in Ireland, the Grand Juries are the only bodies who are above corruption."
  MR. O'REILLY, in supporting the measure, thought that the hon. Member who had last spoken (Mr. Stephen Moore) had not read the Bill, or he would not have given utterance to the sentiments which he had expressed in his speech. He wished to state the question as regarded Grand Juries fairly. For 29 years he had been a member of a county Grand Jury in Ireland, and he admitted they had done their duty creditably. As to the question of presentment sessions, they were at present the only representative form of fiscal management in a county, and in them the Grand Jury determined for each barony the number of cesspayers to be associated with the justices. They were not always the highest cesspayers, the selection being practically left to the representative of the barony. For instance, suppose a road was to be made in any particular
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  barony, nothing was easier than to select for that particular year the cesspayers who were known to be in favour of the road, and the next year other cesspayers would be selected. Then, as for the magistrates, he challenged the statement that they represented property in any large proportion. There were scores of men who held more land and paid more county cess than many who, from circumstances, had been made magistrates. One objection to the Grand Jury system was, that it was a temporary, transient, and shifting body. It was fair to infer that where there was liability to abuse it might occur, and he therefore thought there ought to be some better control over the patronage of the county offices now possessed by the Grand Jury. When an office became vacant the Grand Jurors were widely canvassed, and the selection might depend upon a slight change in the panel which might be made by the sheriff. He had known cases in Ulster and Leinster in which barony cess collectors had been appointed at 1d. and 10 d. in the pound when the collection had been tendered for at 6d. In his opinion, it was desirable to mingle classes in the administration of their common interests. In Ireland bodies for local government might be classed under three heads. There were corporations which had the control of roads and buildings, local administration, and, to a considerable extent, of local institutions; then there were Boards of Guardians for the relief of the poor, the control of medical relief, and with authority in sanitary matters; and, thirdly, there were the Grand Juries. By the measure of his hon. and learned Friend it was proposed that all these bodies should be amalgamated, and he would suggest whether it would not be well for Ireland if they were to devote themselves to the question of organizing a good system of county government, which should solely deal with all the matters now administered by the present branches of county government—namely, the Boards of Guardians and the Grand Juries. The same central body should also have the control of education. He was persuaded that such a system would be attended with efficiency and economy. He should heartily support the Bill.
  MR. CONOLLYsaid, that as the system proposed in the Bill would not furnish in any proper sense a representation of property, those who advocated

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  it advocated an absurdity. He admitted there was a great deal of the feudal element in our Grand Jury system, but it was capable of improvement by an admixture of popular representation. He objected, however, to be governed by the mob. Hon. Gentlemen on the other side proposed, first of all, to destroy, and then to re-construct; but he, as a supporter of Conservative principles, declined to abolish an old system simply on the ground that it contained flaws; because, from close observation, it would be seen that it would be far easier to remedy these flaws than to set up an entirely new machinery. He thought, however, that the Government would do well if they should turn their attention to those points in the Grand Jury Laws which were capable of amendment. If they did so, they would receive assistance, not only from the other side of the House, but from the Grand Juries themselves
  MR. M'CARTHY DOWNINGsaid, it was satisfactory to find that, from both sides of the House, the Government had received opinions that the Grand Jury system was defective, and ought to be amended. The question had been agitated for 35 years; several Committees had reported against the present Grand Jury system, and if the late Government had taken action on the Report of the Committee of 1868 it would not have been necessary to introduce this Bill. The practical exclusion of cesspayers from presentment sessions impaired, and sometimes destroyed their representative character, and this grievance could be remedied by making Poor Law Guardians also the cesspayers of those sessions. Their experience as Guardians fitted them to act with magistrates in managing county affairs. The county cess had risen largely in many counties. He admitted that, in his own county, the Grand Jury attended to public interests and conserved the public purse; but this result was not regarded with so much satisfaction as it would be if the Grand Jury possessed a more representative character. The late Government endeavoured in some way to meet the question, but the Bill brought in two years ago was not at all suited to meet the case. He believed there was no measure which the people of Ireland were more anxious about, as a secondary measure, than the present, and he thought the Government would meet
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  with a large share of popularity if they supported a Bill to remedy the defects in the existing system, and gave a fair representation to the ratepayers of the country.
  MR. MULHOLLANDopposed the Bill, which he considered was really a measure to abolish the present Grand Jury system in Ireland, and that was a strong course to take with an institution which, as had been said by hon. Members opposite, was looked upon with veneration. That system had been reported upon by a Committee, when it was held that the system had not been productive of any cause of complaint. He believed the Grand Jury system fully enjoyed the confidence of the people, and that Grand Juries were more strict guardians of the public purse than the presentment sessions. He trusted the Government would be able at some future time to bring in a Bill to carry out the recommendations of the Committee of 1868. Presentment sessions ought to be more representative, but he hoped Grand Juries would not be interfered with.
  MR. STACPOOLEbelieved the Grand Juries of Ireland really represented the property of that country. They were ratepayers as well as Grand Jurors, and in that way they paid a large proportion of the county cess. If they had elected Boards there would be a good deal of jobbery, because the cesspayers were the greatest jobbers possible, their principle being "Scratch me and I'll scratch you." It also should be borne in mind that Grand Juries could not originate any taxation, that being done at presentment sessions—in fact, they had only a veto. He trusted the Government would leave the Grand Juries as a final Court of Appeal.
  MR. MUNTZsaid, that if it were possible for an English Member to comprehend an Irish question, he had gathered that the Grand Jury cess meant this—that a certain number of gentlemen were appointed by the High Sheriff of the county, and that they had the power of taxing the ratepayers. ["No, no!"] Well, he did not know what they might call the power of taxation; but he thought that where the Grand Juries had the power to guarantee a dividend to a railway, that was very much like a power of taxation. If the hon. Member for Downpatrick, who had just spoken, had been

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  in the last Parliament, he would have had the pleasure of hearing the subject discussed. He would remind the House that, upon that occasion, there was a long discussion upon a guarantee given by the Grand Jury, county of Water-ford—a guarantee of 5 per cent to a railway for the little convenience of having the line taken through their land, and which 5 per cent. if it was paid, would have to come out of the rate to be levied on the county. This had been his experience of the Grand Jury cess, and it had occurred to him—" How would we like such a state of things in this country? "He felt it was absolutely indispensable to govern Ireland as a part of the Empire—as a part of ourselves—and that being the case, he looked upon the present Bill as a glorious attempt on the part of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick, and an attempt which did credit to him, to remedy the present objectionable state of the law. He would vote for the second reading of the Bill, merely in the hope that it might have some weight with the Government in inducing them to legislate upon the subject.
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACHsaid, the speech they had just heard showed the difficulty felt by English Members in discussing Irish affairs, because the hon. Member said the Irish Grand Jury system was a thing he would not put up with in his own country; and yet it was a fact, that whatever might be said of the Irish Grand Jury system, it was, at any rate, so far as regarded the representation of the cess or ratepayers, in advance of the English system. The hon. Member for Cork (Mr. M'Carthy Downing) had suggested that in consequence of the various opinions expressed during this debate, the Government would be easily able to make up their minds to introduce a measure to deal with the question; but he (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) had found a singular want of unanimity on the part of those who had spoken as to the defects in the present law and as to the manner in which those defects should be remedied. The hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) said the Irish should act like the English, independently of centralizing influence. Now, in England the levying and the administration of county taxation were not in the hands of representatives
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  elected by those who paid the rates; they were even less so than was the case in Ireland. The county magistrates levied and controlled the whole amount of the county rate levied in English counties for prisons, police, lunatic asylums, county buildings, and county bridges; although they had nothing to do with the management of roads, which were managed by Highway Boards and surveyors of parishes. The English system, therefore, involved a far greater anomaly than the present state of the Grand Jury law in Ireland, where the Grand Juries had rather a controlling than an initiative power. The advocates of this Bill rather unduly depreciated the value of the Report of the Committee of 1868, although that Committee comprised Representatives of the popular party. The Report was one of the fullest and ablest documents ever presented to the House; and in that Report the Committee said—
  "Practically, the Grand Jury now forms a Court of Appeal from the decisions arrived at in presentment sessions, and all proposals for county works, with slight exceptions, came before presentment sessions and cannot he legally sanctioned except with their approval."
  In these presentment sessions the cesspayers were represented, but he would not say that they were represented in a satisfactory way. Yet they were more directly represented than county ratepayers in England. But why had proposals for abolishing the theoretical anomalies in English county government met with so little favour? Because we in England looked at the matter in a practical spirit. However great the anomaly might be in theory, in practice the result was an economical and able administration of county affairs. If the same test were applied to Ireland, if Irishmen would ask themselves how far, by the adoption of such a system as that sketched by the hon. and learned Member for Limerick, their county affairs would be better and more economically administered, he was not sure they would be ready to alter the existing system. The Committee of 1868 came to the conclusion that, however open to objection certain parts of the system might be in theory, its administration was generally pure and economical. Indeed, it had been admitted that it was not the Grand Jury who were most liable to the

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  temptation to jobbery; and no money could have been expended more economically than the money which had been laid out upon the roads of Ireland. The Committee said that no increase in the Grand Jury cess had been shown to be due to the extravagance of the Grand Juries; but could the same statement be made of some of the elected municipal councils of England and Ireland? Under those circumstances the Committee did not consider it necessary to recommend the abolition of the existing system, believing it could be so far modified as to do away with all just objections that were raised to it; and they did not believe it would be desirable to abolish or materially alter the constitution of Grand Juries, which, as a general rule, represented the landed property of the counties. The desirability of some further control by the cesspayers over the administration and taxation of the Irish counties had always been admitted, and measures for the amendment of the Grand Jury system with this view had been from time to time proposed. The Committee to which reference had been made recommended certain alterations in the constitution of Grand Juries in order to secure that they should be thoroughly representative in their character. They proposed that no person should be elected to serve on any Grand Jury who was not connected with the county by property or residence; that lists of qualified persons should be prepared; that no barony should have two representatives on a Grand Jury until one from every other barony in the county was nominated, or until the list of qualified persons was exhausted. He thought, without expressing any final opinion on these recommendations, that they were practical and in the right direction, and they could easily be introduced into an amending Bill. At the same time, it should be remembered that the Bill brought in by the late Government two years ago was so unfavourably received as to show that this question was surrounded with difficulties. What was offered, however, for their acceptance in the measure before them? The Bill proposed that, instead of the Grand Juries appointed under the existing law, there should be elected representative Councils so constituted as to include a stronger ratepaying element than was found
  764
  among the magistrates who at present formed the Grand Juries. In addition to the ratepayers it was proposed that the councils should include, as ex officio members, the mayor and one member of the town Council of every borough included within each particular county, together with one member from each Board of Guardians. He failed to see why this class of ex officio members need be elected, seeing that the ratepayers would, as a body, be represented by the elected members of the Councils. Taking the proposals altogether, he contended that they would give undue influence to the occupiers of property, and arm them with a greater proportion of power than had been suggested in any proposal heretofore offered to the House. On the whole, he thought that the existing Grand Jury, which represented the social influence and high character of the landowners of the country, was an element in local government which could not be replaced by any Council constituted on the principles laid down in this Bill. The real grievance in the present system was that, although the Grand Jury law professed in various ways to give an adequate amount of representation to the taxpayers, it failed in making that a real representation. That was admitted on all hands, and the Committee which sat in 1868 made a number of suggestions based on practical good sense, in order to remedy that defective state of things. One of these recommendations, however, would have tended to an undue multiplication of elections—an unfortunate circumstance in connection with bodies which we entrusted with the administration of local affairs. Another suggestion, that the Grand Jury cess should fall equally on the owner and occupier of property, might be most unjust in the case of existing leases, where the tenant had covenanted to pay the entire amount in consideration of other advantages. As far as he was able to judge off-hand, the suggestion which had been made by the hon. Member for Cork County was by no means a bad one. It was that the elected Poor Law Guardians should be, ex officio, the representatives of the cesspayers at the presentment sessions for the districts in which they were elected. That plan would, he thought, work well if the boundaries of the electoral divisions were made conterminous with those of baronies, and divisions of coun-

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  ties. If a scheme could be framed which would provide uniform areas for the payment of local rates and the work of local administration, he thought it might include a remedy for all the real grievances which could be said to exist under the existing Grand Jury system. He could not undertake that next Session he should be able to introduce a Bill relating to this matter; but he would endeavour, when an opportunity was afforded him, to lay a scheme before the House based upon the principles which he had laid down. In conclusion, he could not hope on such an occasion to secure the support of the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Galway, who wished for a complete revolution in the system of county administration; but he might appeal for the asssistance of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick, whose speeches on questions of the kind were always eminently Conservative. There were other questions connected with Irish legislation which were more pressing than this, and he hoped, therefore, that it would not be thought necessary on the present occasion to press a Bill which, instead of proceeding upon the lines he had indicated, was based upon the destruction of much that was valuable and efficient, in order to remedy a grievance mainly theoretical, by the substitution of a system from which no one expected to obtain better practical results than were at present achieved.
  MR. SULLIVANasked the right hon. Baronet whether he intended that the Poor Law Board of Gurdians should be the elements from which the new body should be taken under his indicated measure of next Session?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACHsaid, his suggestion was that the elected Guardians should be members of presentment sessions, and have a voice from the presentment sessions to the county presentment sessions.
  MR. BUTT, in reply, said, the right hon. Baronet had correctly described him as a Conservative; but he was Conservative in the sense of placing his trust in the people and wishing to secure for them a fair share in the representatation, rather than in the sense of that new-fangled Conservatism which would crush popular rights and place all the power in the hands of the few who happened to possess the wealth of a
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  country. The Grand Juries in England stood upon a footing altogether different from those in Ireland, whose members were selected by the sheriffs, and who further had an altogether different class of duties to perform. He regarded the old Grand Jury system as of great importance, considering the objects with which it had to deal, and he looked upon the proposal to give to Grand Juries a power to impose taxation upon the counties as an excrescence upon the old constitutional objects for which they were appointed. The power to impose taxation upon the counties was, however, now proposed to be given to an isolated body, comprising 23 gentlemen selected by an officer of the Crown. For his own part, he should far rather have a fixed than a fluctuating body, but they committed the management of local affairs in Ireland to this isolated body. If the gentry would come to reside among the people of Ireland, the people would have confidence in them, and they would get rid of this class legislation. The principle of the Bill before the House was to give to the people of Ireland a control over the local taxation of the country. He should certainly feel it his duty, after what he had heard the right hon. Gentleman state, to divide the House.
  MR. LAWcongratulated his hon. Friends on that side of the House on the interesting and valuable discussion which had taken place on the Bill. It seemed now to be universally admitted that the present system was one which could not be maintained, and he must say he thought the right hon. Baronet opposite had indicated a satisfactory mode of dealing with the question. He could not see any disposition on the part of any hon. Members to deal with the subject as a matter of class legislation, and he would therefore, after the sketch which the right hon. Baronet had given of the measure which he intended to introduce next Session, appeal to his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Limerick not to press his Bill to a division. The Bill which the right hon. Baronet had promised would in the main carry out the recommendations of the Committee of 1868 pretty much as the late Government proposed to do two years ago, by making the representation of the general body of taxpayers on the presentment sessions real, instead of

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  ideal, and at the same time reforming instead of putting an end to the existing Grand Jury system.
  MR. MITCHELL HENRY, on the contrary, hoped his hon. and learned Friend would not shrink from a division. The real question on which they were about to decide was whether representation should go with taxation or not in future in Ireland. That was a principle which was dear to the people of England, and it would be an important point gained to have the sense of the House taken on it on that occasion. Another question on which they would also divide was whether Grand Juries should be relegated to their true and proper functions—namely, those of dealing with criminal business. Moreover, the Chief Secretary for Ireland had carefully guarded himself against promising to bring in a Bill on that subject next year.
  MR. ARTHUR MOOREsaid, he was not at all satisfied with the explanation of the right hon. Gentleman, and hoped his hon. and learned Friend would not shrink from ascertaining the opinion of the House upon his Bill. Such a great variety of matters was now brought before Grand Juries that it was impossible for the county business to be properly done.
  Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  The House divided:—Ayes 125; Noes 182: Majority 57.
  Words added.
  Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to.
  Second Reading put off for three months.

INDUSTRIAL SAVINGS BANKS BILL.
(Sir Edward Watkin, Mr. Sherriff, Mr. Knatchbull-Hngessen.)
INDUSTRIAL SAVINGS BANKS BILL.

  [BILL 185] SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  SIR EDWARD WATKIN, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, its object was to enable companies to establish savings banks for their servants, the matter being purely voluntary as between master and man. The hon. Member concluded by moving the second reading of the Bill.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Sir Edward Watkin.)
  MR. SALT, in moving that the Bill be read a second time that day three months, said, he held that savings banks ought to be under regulation by law. These would not be, and he should therefore move the rejection of the Bill. He did not question the good intentions of the hon. Member who had charge of the Bill; but he contended that the Bill, as drawn, if he rightly understood it, might lead to undesirable, if not to disastrous results. The Bill practically proposed to embody in a public and general Act certain provisions contained in two private Acts relating to important railway companies. The clauses to which he referred enabled a company to collect money on deposit as in a savings bank from its servants, and to employ this money in the business of the company. No sufficient regulations were to be found in the Bill for publicity, and no efficient scheme for Government control. He repeated that, especially in the case of weak companies, this system might lead to disaster.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day three months."—(Mr. Salt.)
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, he was not disposed to throw any impediments in the way of the extension of savings banks; but the House was not in a position to deal this Session with the question raised by that measure. The whole subject of the reform of savings banks was one which demanded the attention of Parliament and of the Government, and he hoped to be able at the proper time to take it up. There was no use in carrying the measure further then.
  Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  The House divided:—Ayes 82; Noes 107: Majority 25.
  Words added.
  Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to.
  Second Reading put off for three months.

ARTIZANS DWELLINGS (SCOTLAND) BILL.

  LEAVE. FIRST READING.
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in moving for leave to bring in a Bill for facilitating the Improvement of the Dwellings of the Working Classes in Large Towns in Scotland, said, that early in the Session he had promised, the moment the Artizans Dwellings Bill for England had received the Royal Assent, that he would introduce a similar measure, precisely on the same terms, applicable to Scotland—of course, on the understanding that it should be passed as it was drawn. He accordingly now moved for leave to bring in the measure referred to.
  Motion agreed to.
  Bill for facilitating the Improvement of the Dwellings of the Working Classes in Large Towns in Scotland, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Secretary CROSS and The LORD ADVOCATE.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 229. J

  PUBLIC HEALTH (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1867, AMENDMENT BILL.
  On Motion of The LORD ADVOCATE, Bill to amend "The Public Health (Scotland) Act, 1867," in respect of Loans for Sanitary Purposes, ordered to be brought in by The LORD ADVOCATE, Mr. CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER, and Mr. Secretary CROSS.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 230.]
  House adjourned at five minutes before Six o'clock.