CLASS II.—SALARIES AND EXPENSES OF PUBLIC DEPARTMENTS. (Hansard, 16 May 1878)

§ MR. O'DONNELL
said, he objected, in this Vote, to the sum of £289 for stationery for the purposes of the Queen's Colleges in Ireland.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, he must point out to the hon. Member that there was no item of £289 for the Queen's Colleges in Ireland.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
said, they had been informed by the Government that a portion of this Vote was intended for the purposes of the Queen's University in Ireland, and they calculated that the amount that would be so applied would be about £289. In order to justify themselves in making that calculation, they quoted the figure given in the Estimates of a year or two ago, and it was for that reason he should move the reduction of the Vote by the sum of £289, unless the Government would give them an assurance that, under no circumstances, would any portion of the Vote be spent in the present year for the support of the Queen's University in Ireland. He maintained that this Institution did not deserve to receive any grant of public money. Of course, neither he nor any Irish Member would rise in his place on the present occasion to oppose a Vote of this kind without having good reasons for so doing. If the money which they were asked to vote for the service of the Queen's University were really intended to be devoted to promoting the usefulness of that Institution, they would not think of persevering in their opposition. But if they could show that such would not be the effect of the application of this 42 money, he thought they had a right to ask the Committee to diminish the Vote by that amount.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, he must point out to the hon. Member that, while he would be in Order in objecting to the money being applied to a purpose which he deprecated, he would not be in Order in entering into any discussion of the merits of the Queen's University on this Vote.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
was afraid he had misunderstood the ruling, because he failed to perceive how he could ask the Committee on his ipse dixit to reject the Vote. He apprehended that it was not sufficient for a Member of the Committee to say that he objected to this or that Vote, without stating the grounds of his objection. If he objected to public money being voted for the use of the Queen's University, he did so for a certain reason; but he could not presume to ask hon. Members to follow him blindly into the Lobby, without giving any reasons for the request he made to them.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the hon. Member seemed not to have observed that the proper time would come when that question would be discussed on a Vote for the purpose of the Queen's University; but the present Vote was one for the Stationery Office, and upon that it was desirable to keep the arguments addressed to the Committee within the scope of the matters relating to the Stationery Office.

§ MR. PARNELL
remarked, that if the present Vote should receive the sanction of the Committee, a certain sum of money, amounting to £451,745, would be provided for the purposes of the Stationery Office. In looking at the purposes to which it was proposed to apply this money, he observed that a sum of £289 was to be applied to purposes—["No, no!"]—he observed that stationery to the amount of £289 was to be issued—["No, no!"]

§ SIR H. DRUMOND WOLFF
I beg to rise to Order.

§ MR. PARNELL
I am speaking to a point of Order.

THE CHAIRMAN
ruled that the hon. Member for Meath was in possession.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he observed that it was intimated to them that £289 was applied for the purposes of stationery and printing in the Queen's University 43 in Ireland during the years 1876 and 1877. From that he inferred that, out of the sum which they were now asked to vote, a somewhat similar sum would be applied during the coming or present financial year for the same purposes—that was, for the purposes of the Queen's Colleges and University in Ireland. He objected to the Department applying any money for stationery or printing for the purposes of these Institutions; and he desired to have the opportunity of stating to the Committee the reasons why he thought that the application of that portion of this large sum which they were now asked to vote would be a waste of public money. Therefore, he wished to reduce the Vote by the sum of £289, which the Government had informed them they applied in 1876 and 1877 for the purpose of stationery and printing in the Queen's University in Ireland. The Chairman had said, just now, that they could discuss that question when they came to the main Vote. But there was no portion of the main Vote set aside for the purpose of stationery and printing for the Queen's Colleges; and if they discussed that question on the main Vote, they would do so without having any opportunity of fixing upon a particular item in the Vote. The item in reference to this point was now before them; or, if it was not, the Government had at least intimated very plainly to them that they would apply a certain portion of this Vote for these purposes to the Queen's Colleges and University in Ireland. Therefore, he submitted, with great deference, that he should be in Order in stating the reasons why he objected to having any portion of this money devoted to that purpose, and also in moving to reduce the amount of the Vote by the sum of £289 or £300, which the Government had intimated to them would be so applied.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the hon. Member would be in Order in moving to reduce the Vote before the Committee by the sum of £300 or £289, or whatever other sum he thought proper; and he might also justify that Motion by stating that he believed that some such sum was likely to be applied to purposes which he deprecated; but there was no item in the present Vote which raised the question of the Queen's Colleges or University; and therefore, in the event of 44 the hon. Member inducing the Committee to adopt his view, it would not have the effect of depriving these Institutions of any portion of the money that might be required for them. It would, therefore, be plain to the Committee—and, he trusted, it might be clear to the hon. Member—that any discussion of the constitution or merits of the Queen's University would be wholly beside the question now before the Committee.

§ MAJOR NOLAN
wished to refer to what took place the other night. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Londonderry (Mr. Charles Lewis) then assured the Committee that, from his point of view, the proposed reduction of this Vote would be most disastrous to his Party in Ireland. He (Major Nolan) would not say it would be disastrous; but if they were to believe what the hon. Member for the City of Londonderry had said, the effect would be, at any rate, of very great importance. Consequently, he did not think it could be a waste of time on their part to discuss this Vote; and he thought his hon. Friends around him would be quite right in adhering to their intention to reduce it by £289, because that was the only sum in the Vote which was connected with anything that was objectionable from their point of view. They found the connection between the sum of £289 and the Queen's University established, because the Government had declared that in a past year that sum had been expended on that Institution. Now, the proposition which he made the other night he would venture to repeat to the Committee, and it was, that the sum of £289 should be omitted from the Vote, the Government taking that money later on, when the Committee were asked to pass the Vote for the Queen's University. It was, after all, a mere question of detail, whether they should vote the money for stationery for each Department separately, or lump the various sums together under the one head of Stationery Office. He did not say that it might not be better, and more convenient, under ordinary circumstances, to adopt the latter course; but he thought that it would be far better, in regard to a disputed item, that it should be taken in connection with the main sum of money voted for an Institution to which objection was taken. It might be thought that voting stationery and paper for the 45 Queen's University was a small question; and although that might be so considered in one aspect of the case, yet it had really become a very large question for the Irish Members to consider whether they should pass any Vote connected with this particular Institution. If they had the great moral advantage of having the great majority of the Irish Representatives on their side, he thought it was obviously their policy on every occasion to oppose the voting of any money for the Queen's Colleges. It was only by taking that course that they would show the Irish people that their Representatives continued to do their duty, but that a majority of English and Scotch Members had determined to overrule them on this question. He would not enter into the great question of education, as another opportunity would be afforded for discussing that subject. But they had been taunted with coming there and begging for money from the Imperial Exchequer. Well, the Irish Members were willing now to show that they did not want public money. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer would adopt the suggestion that he had made, it would afford an easy means of cutting the Gordian Knot on the present occasion; but, otherwise, he hoped that the omission of the £289 would be pressed to a division, in order to show that the majority of Irish Members were anxious, on every occasion, to prevent money, or anything else, being given to the Queen's Colleges, until all denominations in Ireland had equally advantageous educational establishments.

§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER
said, he understood that at the present moment the Committee were rather engaged upon a question of Order, raised by the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) and others, and that the point of Order was this—The Vote about to be taken was for a gross sum to be expended through the Stationery Office on all the Public Services in which stationery was required. Hon. Members found that a certain portion of that sum would, in accordance with the usual practice, be expended upon the Queen's Colleges. They desired to challenge the application of any public money to the Queen's Colleges, and they, therefore, proposed to omit a certain sum from the Vote, being about the sum which they 46 presumed might fairly be taken as representing what would be spent upon stationery for the Queen's Colleges. Then they said that, in order to justify themselves in making that proposal, it was necessary that they should show why with them these Colleges were an objectionable Institution, and why no public money should be given to them. Well, it might seem to them that it was unreasonable that they should propose to strike out that portion of the Vote unless they showed that, and they might say that they could not show it unless they were allowed to go into the whole subject of the Queen's Colleges. But, on the other hand, he apprehended there could be no doubt that the Rule which the Chairman had laid down was the one which must guide the Committee. It was that, in the discussion of this Vote, it was impossible for any Member, in a regular and orderly way, to go into the whole question of the merits of the Queen's Colleges; and the inference which he thought they must draw from that ruling was, that the present was not the proper occasion for the raising of that discussion. The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Galway (Major Nolan) had said that the Government might alter the form of the Vote so as to get the Committee out of the difficulty which it was in by withdrawing the small sum that was proposed to be applied to the Queen's Colleges, and voting it hereafter when they came to the Vote for these Institutions. That would be an inconvenient way of proceeding, and really it would make no difference, because the withdrawal of £300 or £3,000 from the Vote would not in any way impede the expenditure of so much of the money as was voted for the Stationery Office being applied to the Queen's Colleges so long as they were, and continued to be, recognized as an Institution which was entitled to Government support. But what he would undertake on behalf of the Government—he believed that it had already been promised—was this—If when they came to the Vote for the Queen's Colleges that Vote should be negatived, he would undertake that no portion whatever of the sum voted for the Stationery Office should be applied to them. That would obviate the difficulty which had been suggested by the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell), who had said that they 47 might, perhaps, negative the Vote for the Queen's Colleges, but that as they had granted the stationery it would still be supplied to them. He really hoped that they would not be called upon to discuss any further the point of Order; but that hon. Gentlemen, if they thought it desirable to try the question, and put in what was in the nature of a protest on their part on the present occasion, would move a reduction of the Vote and go to a division, remembering that the question of the Queen's Colleges themselves would be a matter for subsequent discussion. As he had already said, more than once, the Government would take care that ample opportunity was given for the discussion of that important subject on its merits.

§ MR. BIGGAR
said, he had never before heard a statement made by the Government to the effect that it made no difference whether a sum of money were struck out from the Votes or not, for that stationery would be supplied all the same to the Queen's University. He thought that was a most immoral doctrine, and one which struck at the root of the system of voting public money. He also thought that it was thoroughly unreasonable to ask Parliament to vote first, and then to hear arguments on the policy of the Vote. In his opinion, the only sensible plan was to allow the discussion to go on then.

§ MR. PARNELL
wished to make a suggestion to the hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. O'Donnell), in consequence of the allegation of the Government that the reduction of the Vote by £289 would not affect the supply of stationery to the Queen's University. He should suggest, if that were so, that the hon. Member for Dungarvan should withdraw his Amendment, and should move to strike out the entire Vote. He was very serious in his opposition to the Queen's University in Ireland; and he could not but think that the power that the Government assumed of applying money, voted for this purpose to any Department, was a very faulty way of applying the Estimates. It was very strange that sums of money should be accounted for in the Public Services by items, when they were not intended to be applied to the Services for which they were voted. It placed the opponents of any particular Service in a dilemma; and the only way in which they could protest against any sum of 48 money being spent on the Queen's Colleges would be by objecting to the whole Vote. For that reason, he should advise the hon. Member for Dungarvan to object to the whole Vote; and, in the meantime, the Committee would have an opportunity of discussing the other items included in the Vote. He was determined not to vote any sum of money to the Queen's Colleges without entering his protest against it; and if they could not object to the particular application of any sum of money by the Government, they must divide against the whole Vote. The fault lay with the Government in framing the Estimate in this manner. In future, he should consider that it would be desirable for the Government to arrange these matters in a different way, so that hon. Members who objected to any particular sum would be able to do so, without being under the necessity of opposing the whole Vote.

§ MR. CHARLES LEWIS
observed, that it seemed to him that the Committee, to a certain extent, had suffered, in point of time and convenience, from the fairness and ingenuousness of the Government in dealing with this particular Vote. Had the Government moved, without specific details, for a supply for stationery for the Public Service, no one could have objected to the Estimate; but just because the Government had been fair and explicit in giving a larger amount of information as to the portions in which the stationery and printing was supplied to the different Departments, the Committee had been wearied by the various discussions on the matter. The objections raised, it was said, were conscientious ones; but when anybody said proudly that he did anything for conscience sake, he could not but suspect. He liked to hear a business argument and business reasons given when a Vote in Supply was opposed; but when he heard an item of £289 was objected to from conscientious motives, he could not but wonder that this should prove a dead fly in the ointment. This little matter it was which disturbed the digestion of hon. Members opposite, and which incited them to discuss, over and over again, the merits of the Vote for the Stationery Department. The hon. Member for Meath, who had last spoken, had recommended 49 that the Committee be divided against the whole Vote. Why did not hon. Gentlemen opposite at once challenge the whole Vote of £480,000, because £289 in stationery was supplied last year on account of the Queen's Colleges, if they really meant to take that course? Whenever they threw out a challenge to go to a division, it was accepted on that side of the House; but when it was thrown to them, they always delayed from it.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, that the Question before the Committee was the Vote for the Stationery Office, and upon that the hon. Member for Dungarvan had intimated his intention to move an Amendment that it be reduced by the sum of £289. He had pointed out to him that it was quite competent for him to bring on that Amendment; but, at the same time, he thought it his duty to state that the Amendment was not yet before the Committee. He must, therefore, ask the hon. Member for Dungarvan, whether he intended to move that Amendment?

§ MR. O'DONNELL
expressed his willingness to withdraw his Amendment, and to raise his objection to the supply of stationery to the Queen's University by challenging the entire Vote. He agreed with the hon. Member for Meath, that the Government provoked that course by the way in which they had framed the Estimates. He therefore moved the reduction of the whole Vote.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
would like to know whether the Vote of £450,000 was not to be applied for stationery in the different Departments? If that were so, he would wish to be informed in what way this sum of £289 was to be expended? No doubt it was to be applied, amongst other things, in providing three or four Institutions in Ireland with a certain amount of stationery; but he did not think that they were likely to get rapidly through the Estimates, when such arguments were addressed to the Committee as that they had just heard from the hon. Member for Londonderry (Mr. Charles Lewis). He had told them that when the Government applied to Parliament for a Vote of £450,000, the House ought to thank the Government for giving it any information as to the manner in which that large sum was to be expended. They did not, however, thank the Government for giving them 50 information, for it was the duty of the Government to furnish it, and it was the duty of the Committee to see that it was given. For his own part, he deprecated the enunciation of such a doctrine. Another point he wished to raise was this—It might be that when Parliament struck out a sum of £289 from the Estimates, as not applicable to a particular purpose, it would be within the power of the Government to take other means to perform the service which the House of Commons had said should not be performed. To that he entirely demurred, and he thought the Committee was interested in knowing whether or not it was correct; for, if so, Parliament had no control over the Estimates?

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
observed, that he would first reply on the question of the information given with regard to the particular distribution of the Vote of £450,000, now asked for on behalf of the Stationery Office. What was done in the composing of the Estimates of the year was for the sums to be inserted on account of the stationery which each Department had demanded from the Stationery Office in the preceding year. At the end of the year, when the proper accounts were made up, the whole was put together, and it became possible then to draw up such a table as appeared in the Estimates, showing how the sum of money granted to the Stationery Office had been distributed. In that way a table, 1876–7, showed how the money granted at the beginning of that year was distributed. On the Estimates so prepared the Government asked the House of Commons to grant £450,000 for the Stationery Office. Supposing that the House subsequently agreed to the Vote for the Queen's Colleges, the sum allowed to the Stationery Office, even if minus the £289, would enable it to supply the demands of the Queen's Colleges. On the other hand, if Parliament refused to make the grant to the Queen's University, the Stationery Office, although they might possibly have been prepared to meet the demands of the Queen's Colleges, would not be justified in supplying them, and would pay the money back through the Exchequer. If this particular sum of £289 were now struck out, and the House subsequently agreed that the Queen's Colleges should 51 be continued, the Stationery Office would have no money to pay for the printing required by the Queen's University and sanctioned by the House. That would necessitate a Supplementary Estimate. A similar table to that in the present Estimates would be given for 1879–80 in a future year, showing how this sum of £450,000 had been used; and if the Queen's Colleges were left out of the Vote by the House, no sum would then appear in the next table to the credit of the Queen's Colleges.

§ SIR ANDREW LUSK
said, that the explanation given of this £289 was to the effect that the sum would probably be required for the purpose of supplying the Queen's University with stationery. It was said that the stationery might not be required, and that, if not required, the money would be returned to the Treasury. He would like the Chancellor of the Exchequer to look at the matter in this way—Here was a large Vote of £450,000, and a little matter of £289 was sticking in the throats of his hon. Friends. Was it worth while to fight about so small a matter? Would it not be better to withdraw the sum of £289 from the present Vote, and add it to the Vote for the Queen's Colleges? The sum should be withdrawn from the present Estimate, on the distinct understanding that it would be brought on when the whole of the question of the Queen's Colleges was discussed.

§ MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY
could not understand the attempt to diminish the value of the control of that House over the public expenditure. This money was to be spent in the year on particular things. Suppose, for one moment, that the items given were omitted, did anyone think that the large sum in the Estimates would be voted by the Committee without previous inquiry as to the objects for which it would be applied? And that consideration showed the necessity for the enumeration of the items in the Estimates, and that in placing them there the Government had performed no perfunctory duty. He could not, therefore, follow the hon. Member for Londonderry (Mr. Charles Lewis) in what he had stated with regard to the ingenuousness of the Government in giving correct details of the different items. He understood that it had been suggested by the hon. Mem- 52 ber for Meath (Mr. Parnell) that the question of the Queen's Colleges was to be shelved until somebody moved to reduce the entire amount of the Vote. He wished to call attention to another "fly in the ointment." He used the expression of the hon. Member for Londonderry, and he hoped it would not interfere with his digestion; although it was very remarkable that the hon. Member should use so contradictory a simile—as if anyone ever took ointment internally.

§ MR. CHARLES LEWIS
observed, that he had never made the statement in the connection imputed to him.

§ MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY
said, that it was unimportant, and he would not pursue the subject. What he wished to mention was, that under the head of Stationery a certain amount was included for the supply of the Education Department. The Education Department in Ireland spent on stationery and printing, during the last year, £2,174. In Ireland they had a different system of National Education to that which existed in Scotland. In the latter country, the sum expended in the same year by the Education Department for stationery was only £124. He wanted to call the attention of the Committee to the extraordinarily large amount spent by the Irish Education Department for printing and stationery, and to suggest that this very large amount could be cut down. He thought he was in Order in mentioning this matter. The Education Department in Ireland arrogated to itself the right of printing, publishing, and supplying copybooks to the schools. It also supplied the schools under its control with all the literature they required, to the exclusion of all other publications, publishers, and printers. One result of that system he should not discuss, because it would be without the ruling of the Chair to go into the subject of the disadvantage under which Irish publishers laboured, in not being permitted to supply the schools. But there was another objection to the system by which the schools in Ireland were allowed none but books published by the Stationery Department; for, were the market open, it was probable a very different class of books would be introduced, and a much larger number of people would patronize the schools. Apart from the injury inflicted on the trade, the result of this 53 monopoly was very detrimental in other ways; because, if the contracts were open to public competition, it would, undoubtedly, be found that private enterprise could supply these books at a much lower rate than was now charged by the Printing and Publishing Department. Without pressing for a vote, he would recommend the subject to the notice of the Educational Department. It was not alone in this branch that the Government confined to itself the monopoly of printing and publishing. His attention had been directed to other Departments; and he found there was scarcely any work of a similar description to be executed in Ireland that was not kept out of the hands of the trades, and under complete Government control, to the great loss of the public, and in a manner perfectly unknown in this country or in Scotland.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
said, he would move, as an Amendment, that no part of this Vote be applied to the providing of stationery for the Queen's Colleges or University in Ireland.

THE CHAIRMAN
I must point out to the hon. Member that such a Motion is out of Order, and that he can only move a reduction of the Vote.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
said, he did not propose to question the ruling of the Chairman, but would call his attention to the fact that some years ago, when the Dover Mail Contract, concluded with Mr. Churchward, was under discussion, a similar Motion was made and agreed to. The course he now proposed to pursue was, therefore, in strict accordance with Parliamentary precedent.

THE CHAIRMAN
I must remind the hon. Member that in the case to which he refers the Proviso was moved by the Government, who were responsible for the Vote.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
asked, whether the Government had any privileges in connection with the Estimates which were not shared by the Representatives of the people?

THE CHAIRMAN
The Government necessarily bring forward the Estimates on their own responsibility and discretion, and place them before the House in the form and manner most convenient for discussion. It is the function of the Committee to criticize, reduce, or reject 54 the Votes; but the responsibility of framing them rests with the Government.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
replied, that it appeared by the Estimates that a sum of money was required for certain purposes. His proposition was, that the money be so granted to the Government, but with a Proviso that no portion of the Vote should be applied to a particular purpose. He failed to see what were the functions of hon. Members, if it was not competent to them to object in this manner. He asked, whether he was precluded from moving the Amendment?

THE CHAIRMAN
The hon. Member will understand that he cannot proceed with the Motion indicated.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the Government had framed this Vote in such a way as to render impossible the rejection of any particular item, and he was, therefore, unable to move the reduction of the Vote by any specific amount. There were, however, several items in the Estimates by the reduction of which it would be ensured that no money would go this year to the Queen's Colleges and University in Ireland for the purposes of stationery and printing. The Vote was divided into items, none of which referred explicitly to the printing and stationery for the Queen's Colleges and University. Hon. Members were told by the Government that the sum of £289 was applied to that purpose in 1876–7; and he inferred that the Government, in framing the Estimates, had allowed for a similar amount in the present Vote. He wished to point out to the hon. Member for Galway (Mr. Mitchell Henry) that there were four other items, by moving the omission of which he would attain his object. Under the sub-headings E, F, G, H, there was the sum of £271,000 for printing, paper, parchment, and vellum. He thought that, as any expenditure for stationery and printing for the Queen's Colleges and University in Ireland would come from this amount, in the event of the Committee being induced to omit the items under these sub-headings, it would result that no money for these purposes would go to the Colleges this year.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
remarked, that in the case of the Dover Contract with Mr. Churchward, the Government 55 retained the item in the Estimates for a period of two years. The Government then accepted a Motion precisely analogous to that which he now made, and which he held it was competent to them to entertain.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he must direct the attention of the Secretary to the Treasury to a matter that was attracting considerable notice in Dublin. He saw, under the sub-head A, that the Examiner received a salary of £138 a-year. He did not know whether that gentleman was responsible for the matter he was about to complain of; but, if so, he would move the reduction of the total amount under this sub-head by the amount of his salary. His complaint was, that in consequence of a Memorial presented by the printers in Dublin to the employers in the trade, seeking for an increase of wages to the extent of 2s. weekly for time-work, and of from 6 to 7½ per cent for piece-work, the head of the Department and a considerable number of the employers having met to consider this very moderate proposal, it resulted that a fortnight's notice was given to every member of the Typographical Society in Dublin, including those printers who were employed for the Government Offices. During the interval, many of the employers and some newspaper proprietors, among whom he would mention The Freeman's Journal, agreed to the advance of wages, and continued to employ the men. A few employers, however, had not followed this very proper example. The Queen's Printing Office, where from 60 to 70 hands were previously engaged, was now closed—Mr. Thom, the manager of the office, having failed to get workmen from England to supply the places of those who were on strike. Some English printers did go to Dublin, and went to work in the Queen's Printing Office; but after finding out the position of things, and how very unfairly the manager of the office had acted towards his old hands, they refused to work any longer in the establishment, and returned to England. Ten weeks had elapsed since this rupture took place, and during that time Mr. Thom and his agents had searched all the large centres of industry and large Provincial towns in the United Kingdom for men, but, up to the present, their efforts had not been successful, as although in 56 numerous instances workmen were engaged, when they found out the actual state of affairs they returned to the localities whence they came. But Mr. Thom, having discovered that it was impossible for him to get enough men from England to fill the places of the printers who were dismissed, had sent all the Irish printing to be done in England; and, consequently, the journeymen, who asked for an advance of 2s. a-week, had been thrown out of employment permanently; and there was really no hope of their getting work again in Dublin, unless the hon. Baronet who had charge of the Estimates told the Committee that he thought the Irish printing ought to be done in Ireland. Very few of the large Dublin employers had refused to grant these reasonable demands of the men, and the course which Mr. Thom had taken appeared to him (Mr. Parnell) to be altogether unjustifiable. That being so, he should be glad to hear from the hon. Baronet where Mr. Thom's salary appeared in the Vote, and whether he was the gentleman described as the "Assistant Examiner of Printing and Binding" in Dublin?

THE CHAIRMAN
Does the hon. Member move to reduce the Vote?

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he had not moved the reduction of the Vote. He had only asked for information.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, Mr. Thom's salary was paid him for taking charge of The Dublin Gazette, and the Assistant Examiner of Printing and Binding was a kind of foreman in the office, who had to see certain work carried out. As to the rupture between Mr. Thom and his men, he knew nothing of it. Mr. Thom was bound to perform certain work; and, therefore, he was justified in seeking for labour during the time of the differences between him and his men.

§ MR. PARNELL
asked the Secretary to the Treasury, which was the item in the Vote providing for Mr. Thorn's salary? Unless he had that information, he should be obliged to move the reduction of the Vote by the amount paid to the Controller of the Department. He desired to reduce the Vote; but he did not know what item he could select in order to deal with Mr. Thom's stipend. The Vote was framed in such an extraordinary manner, and so few details were given, that it was utterly impos- 57 sible for a private Member to find out what he wanted to know.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
said, the complaint in this matter was, that a Government Department in Dublin, in order to defeat Dublin workmen, first tried to import labour from England and Scotland, and, failing that, had exported the Dublin work of the Government to England and Scotland. The Dublin printing of the Government was now being done in Edinburgh, and that course had been adopted for the purpose of saving the Dublin Department the necessity of yielding to the just demands of the printers. Of course, to a certain extent, it was quite right that an employer should go to a far distance for labour in order to counteract what he considered to be an unfair combination; but in this case the question arose as to what was, and what was not, an unfair combination? The charge against the Government Printing Office in Dublin was this—that whereas the printers, who had only asked for an advance of wages once before in the course of half-a-century, and who, upon this occasion, had only asked for an increase of 2s. a week on the establishment wages and 6 or 7 per cent upon piece-work, the Government Department, backed by the influence of the Stationery Office, first tried to defeat that very moderate demand by the importation of workmen, and, failing that, they had the work "jobbed out" at Edinburgh. He was informed that one of the reasons why the work could be done cheaply at Edinburgh, and thus the opposition of the Dublin printers easily defied, was that in Edinburgh the duty was being performed by females. Female printers were doing this work at a cheap rate, and the regular printers of Dublin were thrust out of employment in this unfair manner. Undoubtedly, labour had its duties, but so, also, had capital; and there ought to be some strong reasons shown before the Irish Government printing was taken out of the hands of the Irish workmen, and handed over to females in England and Scotland. He thought this a very serious question, and he was sorry to see the Government did not appear to be previously aware of what had been taking place.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
said, Mr. Thom had a very lucrative contract for the publication of Government papers in 58 Ireland, and he must say he did his work admirably. There was recently a strike in Dublin, on the refusal of an application for an advance of wages to the printers. There were other printing offices besides that of the Government in the city, and he believed the proprietors of most of these—and especially the newspaper proprietors—conceded the demands of their men; and it was only right to say that even now, with this increase, the wages of printers in Dublin were less than those given to similar workmen in England and Scotland. The point before the Committee was this—Mr. Thom had a monopoly given him by the Government of this extensive printing; and while he ought to be protected against unfair competition, on the other hand the Secretary to the Treasury ought to take care that the monopoly which was given to that gentleman was not used to oppress the people whom he employed. If the Secretary to the Treasury would say he would look into the matter and take it up in a right spirit—which he (Mr. Mitchell Henry) was sure he would do if he took it up at all—something might be done. It certainly was not right that printing, which the Government contracted to have done in Dublin, should be taken by the contractor to be executed in Edinburgh, unless there be some very strong reason for such a course being pursued. It was clear that the attention of the Government had not yet been called to the matter, and he hoped they would now look into it. Mr. Thom's labours in the cause of everything that was good in Ireland were so great, and the extraordinary volumes of statistics which he produced entirely by his own exertions were so valuable, that he (Mr. Mitchell Henry) was most unwilling to say anything, or to take any course, which should injure him. But, at the same time, he thought the Secretary to the Treasury ought to look into the matter, and see that the printing should really be done in Dublin, when it could be executed there on fair terms. He would not say a word against Mr. Thom, who richly deserved the support of that House for all he had done in the way of facilitating legislation by the admirable statistics he had compiled; but, at the same time, he must not be allowed to over-ride poor people by the great weight given him in consequence of his 59 having this monopoly from the Government.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, he agreed with the hon. Gentleman who had last spoken as to the admirable work which Mr. Thom performed. As to the direct salary which he received, it appeared in the Estimates—namely, £100—and that was paid for the assistance he rendered in editing The Dublin Gazette. That sum, he believed, represented the whole of the Government salary which was paid to Mr. Thom; and, considering his services, he did not regard that as an extravagant sum. With reference to the question of printing, it was not his wish in any way to injure the trade; but the Government required certain work to be speedily done, and, owing to the strike, Mr. Thom seemed to consider the best plan to adopt was to have it executed in other places. However, at the request of one or two hon. Gentlemen, he would consent to look into the matter.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the Secretary to the Treasury was mistaken if he supposed his attention had not been directed to this subject before, because his hon. Friend the Member for Mayo (Mr. O'Connor Power) alluded to it on Monday night. True, he did not do so at any length, and probably he did not make any impression upon the hon. Baronet; but as the hon. Baronet had been kind enough to say that he would look into the question, he (Mr. Parnell) would not persevere in his opposition to the Vote on that ground. With regard to the question itself, it was quite competent for the Committee to say, if contracts for printing to be performed in Dublin were entered into, that the work should not be sent by the contractor to be executed in Edinburgh or Glasgow, or elsewhere, and especially on so small a reason that the men had asked for an advance to the extent of 4s. a-week. There was no such emergency in getting out the work as the hon. Baronet seemed to think. The printing had only been put out because Mr. Thom said—"I will put down this strike; I will use the power and authority which the very lucrative Government contract I hold will enable me to use; I will enter upon this contest, and I will put down this demand from the men." He (Mr. Parnell) hoped the hon. Baronet would carefully look into the whole question.

§ MR. T. CAVE
said, he must protest against the new doctrine sought to be laid down by the hon. Member for Meath. If a contractor obtained a contract from that House to execute printing at a price, he was entitled—always supposing he was fair and reasonable—to get his work done as cheaply and as well as he could. He was sorry that the printers of Dublin had quarrelled with their master; but, at the same time, that was no reason in the world for laying down the doctrine—which would work most mischievously—that a contractor in that country or this had not a perfect right to get his work done as cheaply as he could.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the House had laid down an entirely different principle. The House had decided that the printing referring to Scotland should be done in Edinburgh; that that referring to Ireland should be done in Dublin; and that that referring to England should be done in London. He boldly asserted that, because he saw in the Vote separate and distinct items for printing in Ireland, Scotland, and England. If he had not recognized that principle, he should not have adopted the course he had; or, inasmuch as if they went upon the general principle of getting work done in the cheapest way, they would put all the printing together and have a contract for the lot. Then they would have the work executed in the cheapest place they could. If a Glasgow printer could do the printing cheaper than anyone else, by all means let the House of Commons, if it desired, give him the work. But, in this instance, the House of Commons had not chosen to do that, the Vote being presented in an entirely different way; and as long as they appeared in that shape, and a Dublin contractor sent his work to Scotland, he (Mr. Parnell) would protest against it.

MR. SULLIVAN
said, both the hon. Gentlemen who had last spoken were in the wrong. There was no contract, in the ordinary sense of the word, in this case, and that was precisely the error into which the two last speakers had fallen. While being called a contractor, Mr. Thom was not put into competition with anyone. The facts of the matter before the Committee were these:—The Dublin printers thought fit to require the masters in that City to raise their wages. Of course, they had a perfect right so to 61 act; and he must remind the Committee that while some did not submit to this compulsion others did. Mr. Thom who, on a previous occasion, had thoroughly kept himself clear from all connection with the Printers' Association, and who opposed that Society successfully, would not agree to the terms of the men as to an increase of wages. That being so, he (Mr. Sullivan) regretted that the matter had been brought before the Committee that night. He considered it would be a deadly blow given to the printers of Ireland if hon. Members propounded on the floor of that House that the work could be done in Edinburgh cheaper than in Dublin; because it would put the printers of Dublin in the odious position of having driven the trade from the City. That was why he deplored such a discussion being raised. He hoped the present difficulty would be adjusted, and he believed it might be by the display of a little kindliness on each side.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
said, it was a fact within his own knowledge that there had been very great delay in printing documents which ought to be produced in Dublin in consequence of the copy having to be sent to Scotland. One reason why the Government had printers in London, Dublin, and Edinburgh, was that there were documents peculiar to each country which required to be got on with at short notice. The Government printing in Ireland was done in Dublin for that reason; and if the Government printer for Ireland, as a rule, had his work done out of the Irish capital, of course there would be great inconvenience and delay. For his part, he was quite content with the answer of the Secretary to the Treasury—that he would inquire into the matter. At present, it was provided that the Irish printing should be done in Dublin, for the sake of convenience and expedition; and unless it was done in that city, Parliament must alter the system under which the work was given to the contractor. He (Mr. Mitchell Henry) made every allowance for Mr. Thom; and he regretted the delay occasioned in the execution of work in consequence of his not seeing his way to do what the other masters had done.

§ MR. O'DONNELL,
in answer to the hon. and learned Member for Louth (Mr. Sullivan), who objected to the fact 62 of the Dublin work being sent to Scotland being stated on the floor of that House, said the matter had been fully ventilated before it was mentioned in debate. The Dublin printers had clearly stated the facts in a Memorial they had sent round to Members of Parliament, and in their trade organ, The Irish Artizan. They themselves said that work was being done in Edinburgh which ought to be done in Dublin; and, consequently, there was not the slightest ground for saying that harm had been done, or was likely to be done, to the interests of the Irish printers, by referring to the matter in that House. The statement of the hon. and learned Member for Louth, as to the previous collision between Mr. Thom and his men, had far from weakened the cause of the men. Mr. Thom had first come in contact with the men by refusing to have any belonging to a society in his office; and now, when they asked for a slight increase of wages, he made use of his immense resources, and "jobbed" the work out at Edinburgh.

§ MR. BIGGAR
said, it was quite clear that Mr. Thom, rather than submit to an advance of wages, as other masters had, would rather "job" his work out at Edinburgh. He—Mr. Thom—could afford to submit to a temporary loss, in order to force his employés to come to his terms. The argument of the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Mr. T. Cave), that the House should allow the work to be done in any place the parties chose, would, of course, be good if the work were open to competition, and if the papers ordered to be printed in Ireland were such as did not require to be produced in a certain time. In this case, Mr. Thom was not a contractor. He obtained whatever he charged on the understanding that the printing should be supplied and be in Members' hands in a definite time. He thought it only reasonable that Mr. Thom should be asked to give the same rate of wages as his neighbours, and nothing more was asked.

§ MR. MACDONALD
observed, that the salary of the editor of The London Gazette began with £600 a-year, with a maximum of £800; that the first-class clerks began on £300, and rose to £400 a-year; that the second-class clerks began with £200, and rose to £300 a-year; and that third-class 63 clerks began with £100 a-year, and rose to £200. Then there were warehousemen in the same office who began at £120, and rose to £130 a-year. He desired to know whether this rule of raising salaries applied to the printers as well as the others engaged in preparing The Gazette; or whether it might be the salaries of the printers lessened as those of the other employés in the office increased? For his part, he saw no reason why those that really did little work should have ever-increasing salaries, while the men who did the work got less. This was not paying according to work done at all.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, the hon. Member fell into a mistake in imagining that the clerks to whom he referred were of the same grade as the men employed in the printing office of The Gazette. Those clerks were civil servants, having increases to their salary in the same way as those employed in the Foreign or Home Offices, or other Departments. Their salaries rose by given increments each year, until the maximum was reached.

§ MR. MELLOR
asked, if that increment occurred in all those Departments without reference to the qualifications of the official servant? because, if so, he considered such a principle one of the worst ever introduced.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, the increment was supposed to represent the knowledge a clerk obtained in the time he had served. He came in as a probationery clerk at £90 a-year, after having passed the Civil Service examination, and he had increases of £10, or £15, or £20 a-year as time went on, and these advances represented the knowledge he was supposed to have acquired during the time he had been in the service.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he wished to make a suggestion to the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury with reference to the £3,000 to be voted for Hansard's Debates, as he was unable to do so on Monday night when the subject was under discussion. At present, Mr. Hansard sent round proofs to Members of the House, and they were entitled to make any corrections they pleased. They were entitled to disregard the proofs entirely, and give their own version of the speeches which they had made. This really meant that a Member could supply 64 a brand new speech. ["No, no!" "Hear, hear!"] He understood that to be the case; and he knew that last Session speeches were reported in Hansard which were certainly not delivered in that House. He had listened to speeches in that House, and he had read entirely different versions of them afterwards in Hansard. It was the custom of Mr. Hansard to report all speeches in the third person, with the exception of those delivered by Ministers. Well, he had seen speeches in Hansard relating to Irish questions delivered by Gentlemen who were not Ministers, and yet they were in the first person singular. He could not believe that those speeches, produced in this most minute way, were those delivered when the subject was under discussion. Nor could he believe that Mr. Hansard supplied proofs of some speeches at all in the form in which they were published. He had no fault to find with the proofs which Mr. Hansard sent round. He (Mr. Parnell) rarely made any corrections in those sent to him. Last Session he only had to make two or three unimportant ones, and this Session only one or two. But what he had to suggest was, that any correction which a Member made in the proof of his speech, except it should be merely a grammatical error, should appear, not in the body of the speech, but as a foot-note appended to that speech. By that plan, they would be able to see what Mr. Hansard's ideas really were as to the speeches of Members, and they would read his report, and not the versions of their utterances as supplied by hon. Members themselves. He thought it exceedingly important, that whatever alterations or corrections Members desired to make in their speeches should be appended as footnotes to those speeches, or, otherwise, no one would know what they were paying for. Practically, if the present system continued, they would be paying to enable Members to alter or do what they liked with their speeches.

§ MR. MITCHELL HENRY
said, his hon. Friend the Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) could not expect to have all his speeches reported at length in Hansard, for if he did he would require a Hansard to himself. He thought his hon. Friend had not read Hansard very carefully, or he would have seen that the speeches which were supplied by Members in the first person were always distinguished 65 by an asterisk, to show that they had been so supplied. All who had sat in that House for any length of time must remember the remonstrances which had been urged against the Vote for Hansard' s Debates, on the ground that Mr. Hansard refused to alter speeches in any manner a Member desired. What he (Mr. Mitchell Henry) believed to be the general rule was this—such alterations in a report as were necessary, and within fair and reasonable bounds, were allowed; but Mr. Hansard felt himself under moral responsibility to the House of Commons not to permit those extensive alterations which his hon. Friend the Member for Meath had spoken of. Before he sat down, he wished to remark that Mr. Hansard had informed him that the most careful speakers—and those most careful of the honour of the House of Commons and of the time of the country—were precisely the gentlemen who took the most pains to correct their speeches. The Prime Minister (the Earl of Beaconsfield) corrected his speeches very carefully for Hansard; the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) had always done so; and he (Mr. Mitchell Henry) remembered the right hon. Gentleman speaking in the House of the hard task he found it to correct his speeches for the printer. He (Mr. Mitchell Henry) ventured, therefore, to suggest to his hon. Friend the Member for Meath that perhaps he might with advantage devote some portion of his own time to correcting those of his speeches which were reported. His doing so might possibly trench on the time which he now had for speaking in the House; but, at any rate, by his so acting posterity would have a better opportunity of judging of the quality of his utterances than would otherwise be afforded.

§ MR. BIGGAR
said, the great value of Hansard's Debates was to place on record the exact words uttered—especially by Ministers. He considered that Mr. Hansard ought to supply a first-rate report on being paid what was reasonable and fair for his labour. At present Mr. Hansard was paid too little for a good report, and too much for an incomplete one. He regarded the practice of supplying proofs for correction as most objectionable, and it certainly was a bad precedent for a Member to contribute his own speech. No alteration should 66 be permitted unless it were inserted in italics, or in brackets, to indicate that it was an alteration. Unless that were done, what was the use of referring to Hansard in order to quote the exact words which were used? Of course, the exact words employed upon such a subject as the Eastern Question were of great importance, and in a permanent record of what occurred on other subjects the exact words used were equally essential. Unless the corrections or alterations of hon. Members were plainly distinguished from the report, the present system of reporting speeches would be of no advantage. What ought to be done was this—to say to Mr. Hansard—"Here is a certain sum to do the best you can with, but you are either to give a good report or none at all." Either the work should be properly done, or the House should be in no way responsible for it. At present, he thought the reports carried no official weight with them.

MR. J. COWEN
had considered that this subject was disposed of on Monday. He thought the Gentlemen who passed this criticism upon Mr. Hansard had no practical grievance whatever. He would undertake to say—and he spoke with some knowledge of such duties—that it was impossible to conceive a man doing the work better or more fairly than Mr. Hansard did, considering the circumstances, considering the disadvantages, and considering the position in which he was placed. It was scarcely worth while prolonging a discussion on a subject which had already been under the consideration of the House; but he felt desirous, at least, of lodging his protest against the unjust condemnation of a gentleman to whom the House and the whole British nation were indebted, and who for over 40 years had conducted a very thankless and unprofitable work with great ability and much self-sacrifice.

§ MR. PARNELL
thought he had paid Mr. Hansard the highest compliment which he could possibly pay him. He did not say, as his hon. Friend the Member for Galway (Mr. Mitchell Henry) had asserted, that he never took the trouble to correct the reports of his speeches. What he, in reality, said was, that Mr. Hansard's proofs of his observations in that House were so good, that he seldom or never found it neces- 67 sary to correct them. This, surely, was a very different statement from that which had been put into his mouth by his hon. Friend the Member for Galway. He distinctly stated—and he had no doubt that Hansard would report him as having so stated—that he very seldom found it necessary to make corrections in the proofs which Mr. Hansard furnished to him. Indeed, he found it scarcely at all necessary, both this Session and last Session, except in unimportant details, to make any corrections in the reports of his observations. The recommendation he made was that any alterations which Members made in the proofs should be appended as foot-notes to those proofs, and should appear as foot-notes to Hansard's reports of the speeches afterwards. Otherwise, hon. Members would not know what they were paying for. They would not know whether they were paying for Hansard's reports, or for the reports of the Members themselves. For his own part, he had very much more confidence in Hansard's reports than in any report which a Member might make of his own speech, either before or after it had been delivered.

§ SIR ANDREW LUSK
wanted to know where they were? It appeared to him that they were rambling over the whole Vote.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the Question before the Committee was the Vote for the Stationery Office.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
desired to call attention again to the subject of the Queen's University and the Queen's Colleges. Before doing so, however, he would point out that there was a Vote here for stationery which would be supplied to the Civil Service Commission. He hoped the hon. Baronet would briefly give some information concerning this Vote. He understood that in the Civil Service examinations changes had lately been made which imposed denominational disabilities. Until the last year or two, he believed, candidates who passed the Civil Service examination for India became entitled to an allowance of from £150 to £200 per annum.

THE CHAIRMAN,
interposing, said, the hon. Member was entirely out of Order in discussing the rules of the Civil Service Commission, which had 68 nothing whatever to do with the Vote for Stationery.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
said, he was going to ask a question on the subject. He was raising the point on the Vote generally, and not on any particular item. On the general Vote, he begged to move its reduction by the sum of £271,000—that being the amount required for printing, paper, parchment, vellum, and binding for the various Departments. He did this on the following ground:—The Government had informed the Committee that they were going to supply printing, paper, parchment, and vellum for the use of the Queen's Colleges; and, as they declined to bring forward these matters under special heads as items, his only resource was to object to the payment of any public money to the public Departments in respect of stationery. In this manner he should object to the grant of any money for the Queen's University in Ireland. He objected to the item relating to printing for public Departments, because it included printing for the Queen's University, and would enable that University to lay before the House of Commons documents representing the Institution as a success, whereas everybody in Ireland knew perfectly well that it was not a success. In like manner, he objected to furnishing paper to the public Departments, because that would allow a supply of paper for the examinations of the Queen's University and the Queen's Colleges; and he objected to being in any way a contributor towards facilitating those extraordinary examinations, as to the character of which many Professors of the Queen's University had themselves borne testimony. He objected to paper being supplied for the Greek matriculation examinations. Again, he objected to the parchment and vellum, because they were employed for the diplomas or degrees granted by the Queen's University. He should continue to object to this item until some provision was made to distinguish the good degrees from the bad degrees in the Queen's University. He did not know how far the Chairman could permit him to go on justifying his objections. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman might consider it hardly sufficient for him merely to state that books printed by the Stationery Department for the Queen's University contained Returns 69 which were erroneous. It might be thought that the Committee was entitled to be informed how they were erroneous, and how the examination papers were used for purposes which were not real. At the same time, if the Chairman held that it was only in his power to state his own opinion that these items were misapplied, he could, of course, only bow to such a ruling. He now merely asked the Chairman whether, when he affirmed that the money asked for in this Vote would be expended on public Departments, and, consequently, on the Queen's University as well, he was entitled to show that it would be misapplied?

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
said, this point of Order occupied a good deal of time on the last occasion when this Vote was under consideration. He then ventured to appeal to the Chairman for a decision; and it was stated, during that discussion, that the item for stationery with reference to the Queen's Colleges represented the amount which had been expended in 1876–7. Now, these were either Estimates or accounts. Taking them to be accounts, they were also indications of the amounts of money which it was expected would be required for the same expenditure again. There was a marked distinction between an Estimate and an account. If he were told that this was an account, he must ask the Government—"What is your Estimate?"

§ MR. A. F. EGERTON
said, that although the hon. Member had risen on a point of Order, he appeared to be going into the question as to what was an Estimate and what was an account.

§ MR. PARNELL
expressed his belief that his hon. Friend was speaking on the point of Order.

THE CHAIRMAN
thought the hon. Member's remarks were somewhat remote from the point of Order which had been raised. Hon. Members ought to confine their observations to a discussion of this particular Vote. It raised the question of the supply of stationery to the public Departments, and any hon. Member might object to its application to a particular Department; but he could not go into the constitution of that particular Department at length. That had better be done in the discussion on the Estimate for that Department.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the difficulty the Committee were placed in was this—The sum of £451,745 was asked for by the Government for the expenses of the stationery and printing Departments. The Government furnished the Committee with an account of monies paid to the different Departments in 1876–7, and in that account there occurred an item of £289 for printing and stationery for the Queen's Colleges in Ireland. Of course, this was an intimation by the Government that a somewhat similar sum would be required for the same purpose out of the present Vote. Consequently, in voting this £451,745, the Committee were voting a sum of £300, in round numbers, for the purpose of the Queen's University and the Queen's Colleges in Ireland. By his ruling the Chairman refused to give hon. Members an opportunity of stating their objections to applying that sum for such a purpose. Irish Members were, therefore, prohibited from stating why they could not conscientiously vote any money for any purpose in connection with the Queen's Colleges. As this was a matter of the gravest importance, and as there had been several discussions on the subject, he submitted that hon. Members were entitled to have the opinion of the Speaker of the House on this important question. Therefore, he begged to move to report Progress, in order that they might have the decision of the House of Commons and of the Speaker as to the correctness of the Chairman's ruling.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, he had not excluded any debate on any of the items which appeared in the account, although he had endeavoured to confine the remarks of hon. Members to the subject under discussion.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
I appeal to the House to protect its Chairman. We have here, Sir, an unexampled attempt to set your authority at naught; and, under these circumstances, I think it would be only becoming of us to express now that they have confidence in your ruling, and that it is not to be set aside by such an attempt as has been made on this occasion.

§ MR. DILLWYN
hoped his hon. Friend the Member for Meath would not press his Motion to a division. If every single particular relating to every Department in the country were allowed to be discussed in the consideration of this Vote, the Committee would be landed in an illimitable debate.

§ MR. LYON PLAYFAIR
said, that when this question was originally brought forward, he expressed his opinion that it might be just and reasonable for the Irish Members to move a reduction of the Vote by the amount which, on the average, was spent on the Queen's Colleges, as expressive of their dissent from that particular item. He was perfectly aware at the time that this was not described in the general Estimate as a Vote for the Queen's Colleges. If the Irish Members divided now against the whole Vote for the Stationery Office they would place on record in another, but still in the most emphatic, manner, their protest against the Queen's Colleges; and, after that, he hoped they would allow the other Votes to be taken. He trusted his hon. Friend the Member for Meath would not put the House in a false position by pressing to a division his Motion for reporting Progress.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
denied that there was any disposition on that side of the House to treat the authority of the Chairman other wise than with the greatest respect. But when a grave and delicate technical point, on which many senior Members appeared to differ, was before the Committee, it was quite competent for an hon. Member, with all respect for the Chairman, to ask for an appeal to a higher authority. The right of appeal was a protection to Members against possible errors on the part of the Chairman, and it was likewise a protection to the Chairman himself, who, in case of necessity, might be fortified by the supreme authority of the House. He did not think it was fair for the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury to address himself in such a manner as he had done to a Member who was seeking a solution of a delicate and difficult point.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
said, it appeared to him, when they were discussing this question the last time, that every Member of the Committee was most anxious to ascertain the decision 72 of the Committee on the point raised. He thought that if the Chairman had given his decision on that occasion, it would have been acquiesced in by all. For his own part, he would state quite unreservedly that, in his opinion, the views put forward by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Edinburgh (Mr. Lyon Play fair) were perfectly reasonable. The Irish Members were quite justified in fighting against the item of £289 for the Queen's University. No one, he believed, had denied their right to exhaust all the Forms of the House in protesting against the item. But if their action in this respect necessitated resistance to items, in regard to which they entertained no conscientious objections, of course an injury was done to Public Business, and a certain obstruction was raised which did not appear to be of a Constitutional character. He must join his hon. Friend in regretting the course which the hon. Baronet had thought proper to adopt. Of course, it was a matter of taste and judgment; and if he considered there had been anything like a disposition to set up the opinion of a small minority of the Committee against the decision of the Chair, no doubt it was to be expected that the hon. Baronet would stand up for what might be called the dignity of the Chair. At the same time, he thought the hon. Baronet himself would not be prepared to deny that a Member of the Committee, even if he stood alone, would be acting in a manner that was not disrespectful to the Chair by taking his case, as it were, to a higher Court of Appeal. The hon. Baronet said he would ask the House to support the authority of the Chair. This, however, was not the House, but only a Committee of the House. What he would now submit to the consideration of his hon. Friend the Member for Meath was the argument put forward by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Edinburgh. The Irish Members had stated more than once the nature of their objection to the payment of any money to the Queen's Colleges. An item relating to those Colleges came on for consideration now. Let them, therefore, lodge their protest against that item, and when the other items came forward, let them take them all in order, and protest against every one of them. That would be as complete and as 73 thorough a protest as even the most patriotic Irishman could desire.

§ MR. BIGGAR
did not think his hon. Friend the Member for Meath intended any disrespect to the Chairman or his ruling. Like his hon. Friend, he differed from that ruling; but all they asked was, that the decision of the highest authority—namely, the Speaker of the House—should be obtained on the question.

§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER
The doctrine laid down by the hon. Member for Cavan is exactly that which we cannot admit. He says that when any point arises on which your ruling, Mr. Chairman, seems doubtful to any Member of the Committee, that Member has a right to appeal from your ruling to the ruling of the Speaker in the Chair. Now, that I imagine to be a misconception on the part of the hon. Member. The Chairman of the Committee is absolute in the direction of the Business of the Committee, and there is no appeal from the Chairman of the Committee in the direction of the Committee to the Speaker—or anyone else. That doctrine being obviously necessary for the proper conduct of Business, we must support you, Sir, in your ruling, even if I were to differ from your individual opinions. Hon. Members may have differences of opinion; but we must, for the sake of Order, submit to the ruling of the Chairman.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, that nothing in his manner, or in what he said, conveyed any disrespect to the Chairman. It was perfectly absurd for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to say that there was no appeal from the Chairman of this Committee. From this Committee an appeal lay to the House and to the Speaker with reference to any point of Order which might have been decided. It would be monstrous to confide to any Member of the House the right of deciding, beyond appeal, upon matters of Order and matters of form. There was an appeal on matters of Order from the Chairman of Committees to the highest functionary of the House—namely, the Speaker himself. From any decision of the Speaker they could appeal to the House. He repudiated strongly, and with indignation, the charge of the hon. Baronet—a charge which the hon. Baronet ought not to have made, and which he would not have made if he had 74 really understood the position of affairs. His appeal on this occasion was not an attempt to over-ride the authority of the Chair. He submitted that this Committee was entitled to make a direction that the opinion of the Speaker and of the House should be taken upon the point of Order which the Chairman had decided. Were any other contention possible, it would be tantamount to placing the Chairman of Committees in a higher position than the Speaker of the House of Commons, and the House of Commons itself. The Standing Order of the House very properly provided the means by which the Committee could, if it pleased, at any time submit any ruling of the Chairman of Committees to the decision of the Speaker, and from the decision of the Speaker to the decision of the House itself. On one occasion, the Speaker of the House was actually held down in his Chair by hon. Members when he desired to go contrary to the opinions and feelings of the majority of the House, and to commit a breach of Privilege in the interest of the Sovereign. It was absurd to set up any person or authority above the authority of that House. He was entitled to ask the Committee, by moving to report Progress, to submit to the Speaker or to the House any question as to the ruling of the Chairman. He wished to point out that the items which the Irish Members objected to were not items in the account at all, but sub-heads in the Vote itself. Sub-head E was for printing, &c., for the public Departments, and the Irish Members contended that, as a portion of the money was to be spent for the purposes of the Queen's Colleges and the Queen's University in Ireland, they had a right to state their reasons for objecting to it. The conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in seeking to prevent the right of the Speaker to control the conduct of the proceedings of the House, even though the offender was a functionary as high in rank as the Chairman of Committees, would be consistent in the case of an arbitrary Minister or an absolute Monarch; but it was altogether out of place in this country and in existing circumstances. To permit a proceeding of the kind was apt to lead to serious encroachments upon the rights of Parliament. The occupants of the Ministerial Bench were too much in the habit of supposing that 75 they, in their own persons, constituted the House of Commons, instead of being simply Members of it, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, as one of the Members, having been intrusted with certain functions. The right hon. Gentleman certainly had no power to decide a question of Order upon a point which had been raised by another Member of the House who wished to appeal to the Speaker; and, unless a satisfactory answer was forthcoming, he should certainly think it his duty to divide the Committee upon the question.

§ MR. T. CAVE
said, the hon. Member for Meath might be correct in saying that he intended no disrespect to the Chairman; but, whether he did so intend or not, he was certainly disrespectful to himself and to other hon. Members who had come down to the House with the bonâ fide intention of discharging their duties to the country in Committee of Supply. He (Mr. Cave) had come to that House, in obedience to the will of his constituents, to vote with the Government when, in his opinion, they were right, and against them when he believed they were wrong. He trusted his conscience would acquit him of ever having given a vote which was not in accordance with this principle; but when the hon. Member for Meath and one or more other Members conspired, as it was well understood before going into Committee that they had done, in order to prevent progress on Supply——

THE CHAIRMAN
ruled that the expression "conspired" was out of Order.

§ MAJOR NOLAN
pointed out to the hon. Member for Barnstaple that, according to a recent ruling of the Chairman, the use of the word "confederates" would be quite in Order.

§ MR. T. CAVE
said, he would at once substitute the word "confederated" for the word "conspired;" and, in any case, he had a right to object to the hon. Member coming down to that House, together with a few confederates, in order deliberately to obstruct the Business of Parliament.

§ MR. PARNELL
asked the Chairman to rule that an hon. Member was not in Order, without clear proof, in charging him with deliberately interrupting the progress of Business.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, that as the hon. Member for Meath had asked him for a distinct ruling upon this point, he 76 was bound to say, from what had occurred in the course of the Committee, that he had not felt justified in stopping the hon. Member for Barnstaple in the statement which he was making.

§ MR. T. CAVE
said, he should be sorry to over-step the ordinary rules of debate; but it was a deplorable humiliation, and was intended so to be, that the House should have to listen, over and over again, to the same arguments—if, indeed, they were worthy the name—and that the hon. Member for Meath should have the impertinence——

THE CHAIRMAN
ruled that the use of the word "impertinence" was not Parliamentary.

§ MR. T. CAVE
said, he would at once with draw the expression; but, in doing so, he must remind the Committee that the hon. Member for Meath had demanded that the debate on the Hansard Vote should be resumed, although it had been thoroughly considered the previous night, because, forsooth, he had been absent from his place during that discussion; and he must express his regret that he could not use the strongest words in the language in reference to the conduct of the hon. Member, whose return to that House had been a curse to the United Kingdom.

§ MAJOR NOLAN
protested against the violent language of the hon. Member for Barnstaple. The hon. Member for Meath had millions behind him—not millions of electors, of course, but millions of the population of the country—and the opinions which he expressed were, therefore, not to be despised. As for the hon. Member for Barnstaple, the constituency which he was supposed to represent did not number more than 11,000.

THE CHAIRMAN
remarked, that the population of Barnstaple, or the number of electors in the borough, had nothing to do with the Question before the House, which was that he should report Progress.

§ MAJOR NOLAN
said, he had only made the comparison between the relative positions of the hon. Members for Meath and Barnstaple, because the remarks of the last-named Gentleman, which he heard immediately on returning to the House after having dined, seemed to require that he should do so. It was well known that millions of people in the United States, in Australia, and in the 77 Colonies, were of opinion that the Irish Members in that House were set at defiance.

MR. SULLIVAN
pointed out that when the hon. and gallant Member for Galway incidentally mentioned the fact that he had been dining an hon. Member opposite said, audibly—"He looks like it." He tried not to hear offensive observations of this kind; but on the present occasion he could not help it, and everyone knew the imputation which was conveyed in the remark.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, that whenever any observations of an offensive or personal character reached the Chair he always endeavoured to repress them; but, at the same time, he must point out to the hon. and learned Member for Louth that nothing had a stronger tendency to bring the proceedings of the House into contempt than for hon. Members to rise in their places and call attention to snatches of private and confidential conversations which they might happen to overhear.

MR. SULLIVAN
said, he had tried not to observe the bad manners and rather vulgar conduct of some hon. Members of that House, but he could not succeed in doing so. He would not have called attention to the observation just made, had it not been sufficiently audible to be heard across the floor of the House.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
regretted that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not made his meaning more clear. An hon. Member had a right to appeal against a decision of the Chairman; but he must, in the first place, appeal to the Committee, and if the Committee could not agree upon the point, he was within his right in moving to report Progress, in order to call attention to the point which he had raised.

MR. SULLIVAN
appealed to his hon. Friend the Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) to allow the matter of the Chairman's ruling to drop, and to take a division upon the Vote, whereby hon. Members could record their protest against it. There would be an opportunity hereafter of discussing the whole question of the Queen's Colleges. He (Mr. Sullivan) while ready, at any time, to participate in genuine discussion to the fullest extent, would not be a party to any dilatory resistance to the progress of Business.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, there were several ways of appealing against the decision of the Chairman, and he was acting on a precedent set last Session. On that occasion, when he objected to a ruling from the Chair, he was told that his proper course was to move to report Progress, and that was all he had done on the present occasion. He denied the right of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to set up Standing Orders of his own in reference to the way in which the Business of the House ought to be conducted; and he contended that if any hon. Member thought a decision from the Chair was wrong, he had a right, without being bullied, to ask that the opinion of the highest authority in the House should be taken upon the question. He had no fear of any threats that might be made against him; and as for the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Mr. T. Cave), he would not have dared to say what he had said outside of the House, or any where beyond the jurisdiction and the protection of Parliament. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer desired to send him back to Ireland, he should be glad to quit his connection with that House.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the observations of the hon. Gentleman had nothing to do with the Question before the Committee.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the attacks which had been made upon him had tried his patience to the utmost. It was no pleasure to him to sit in that House from its sitting till its rising; and if the Chancellor of the Exchequer objected to his being there he could challenge his presence, which he wished the right hon. Gentleman would do forthwith.

MR. J. COWEN
thought the discussion to which they had listened a most unfortunate one. He had great respect for the abilities of the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell), who discharged his duties according to his conscience; but he objected to the nagging sort of opposition which he offered to several questions, and which had, over and over again, defeated the object which he had in view. He hoped a division would be taken upon the question of the Vote, as suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Louth, which had been thoroughly ventilated by the Committee, and that they might get out of the atmosphere of irritation in which they had been for some time.

§ MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY
said, the difficulty had arisen on the question as to whether the Committee had power to appeal against a decision of the Chairman? and, as that was a question of much importance, he thought a division ought to be taken upon the question of reporting Progress.

MR. O'CONNOR POWER
said, he was certain the Chancellor of the Exchequer could not have meant that the decisions of the Chairman were beyond appeal. The state of the case was, that unless the Committee required direction there was no appeal. He should like to have a decision on the question; but, under the circumstances, he thought his hon. Friend the Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) would gain nothing by dividing, the opinion of the Committee being evidently in favour of the ruling of the Chairman.

§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER
said, he agreed with the hon. Member for Mayo (Mr. O'Connor Power) as to the undesirability of prolonging this discussion; but he wished to say one or two words, in order to avoid any misconception. He was not present when the question was raised, but he heard the speech of the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar). He understood that hon. Gentleman to argue that there was a right, on the part of any Member of the Committee who might be dissatisfied with any ruling from the Chair, to appeal to the Speaker and the House. Against such a doctrine he wished to enter a protest. If the House were constituted as a full House, and a question of Order was raised, there could be no doubt that any hon. Member might rise and appeal to the Speaker to settle the point. When, on the other hand, the House was in Committee, any hon. Member might appeal to the Chairman to settle a point of Order, and in this case, also, the decision was final, unless an appeal was made to the House. Undoubtedly, there was an appeal to the House; but it must not be that of a single Member, but of a majority of the Committee. This was all he meant to say in answer to the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar), who contended that every individual Member had the right to appeal to the Speaker from a decision of the Chairman. He hoped the hon. Member who had moved to report Progress would at once proceed to do so, if 80 he intended to take the opinion of the Committee on the question.

MR. SULLIVAN
said, that after what had been advanced, he saw no reason for dividing upon the Main Question at the present time.

§ MR. BIGGAR
said, when he spoke he stated that he did not profess to know clearly what the rights of the Committee or the Chairman were. The right hon. Gentleman laid it down, however, that there was no appeal whatever from the ruling of the Chairman, though it now appeared that there was, in some roundabout way, a power to appeal. As regarded some remarks which had recently been made, he would say that he did not think they ever set the opinions of the Chairman at defiance. He and his hon. Friends had only urged their own views with as much force as possible, and on this occasion he had not heard a single argument against their contention. They had been denounced in strong terms; but no one had used an argument to show that they could not discuss the Queen's Colleges on this particular Vote.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, it now appeared that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had stumbled into the position he (Mr. Parnell) took up, and that he had not previously examined his premises. The right hon. Gentleman announced, with all the importance belonging to the Leader of the House, that there was no appeal from the decision of the Chairman, and he (Mr. Parnell) had protested against such a doctrine, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer now admitted he was wrong. ["No, no!"] If hon. Members could not believe their own ears, he was sorry for them. He moved that Progress be reported, because he wished that the ruling of the Chairman should be submitted to the House. Of course, if the Committee decided not to report Progress, that was equal to saying they did not wish the ruling of the Chairman to be submitted to the House. All this matter would have been ended long ago had it not been for the intemperate interruption and language of the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Mr. T. Cave) and the Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson), who ought to have had more sense than to take up the impractical position which he had done. Under all the circumstances, he would not put the Committee 81 to the trouble of dividing on the Question of reporting Progress; but he would ask leave to withdraw. ["No, no!"]

§ MAJOR NOLAN
hoped the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) would be allowed to withdraw the Motion, because, otherwise, several hon. Members would be placed in a very invidious position.

§ MR. BARING
wished to know who was responsible for the awkward position in which they found themselves?

§ MR. DILLWYN
said, he had listened with great attention and pain to what had taken place, and he thought great blame was to be attached to both sides. Considerable blame was due to the Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) for the tone he adopted at first, and strong objection must be taken to the very intemperate language which was subsequently used by the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Mr. T. Cave). No doubt the Committee was in an unpleasant position; but there were faults on both sides.

§ MR. LYON PLAYFAIR
feared they were getting into another personal altercation, just when they were on the point of obtaining a division. Hon. Members had seen the force of the appeal made to them that they should allow a division to be taken on the main issue, and not press the Motion to report Progress; and, therefore, it was very desirable there should be no opposition to the withdrawal of that Motion.

§ MR. STORER
did not think it would be at all consistent with the dignity of the Committee to pursue the course just suggested. The credit of the Committee was impugned by the Motion to report Progress; and hon. Members, having placed themselves in a false position by that Motion, did not now wish to persevere with it. For his part, he did not think they ought to be allowed to withdraw; but that they should be forced into a division.

THE O'CONOR DON
had been many years a Member of that House, and that was the first occasion that he had heard an hon. Member, who was in favour of making Progress, oppose the withdrawal of a Motion to report Progress.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, as far as he was concerned, he certainly should not take a division.

§ MR. PARNELL
moved the reduction of the Vote by £271,000, being the sums under sub-heads E, F, G, and H, out of which amounts might be paid to the Queen's Colleges in Ireland. By the ruling of the Chairman he was unable to state the reasons he had for objecting to any monies being paid to the Queen's Colleges; and, therefore, he would content himself with simply moving the reduction of the Vote.

§ MR. MACDONALD
said, that there were one or two items of which he should like to have some explanation. The first was that for the Chief Mineral Inspector. He should like to know what the work performed by that official was, and what the office had to do with Woods and Forests? He saw that the gentleman was paid £800 per annum, and his emoluments were greatly increased by his giving lectures on Mining and Mineralogy at the Geological Museum. The next point was that of the two Commissioners, who received £1,200 per annum each. In addition to that, the First Commissioner received £1 6s. 8d. and £11 for such offices as Keeper of Westminster Hall, and for locking the Hall Door. He mentioned these small matters as a protest against the multiplicity of offices held by one man, and also as a protest against gentlemen getting a salary of £1,200 a-year holding such offices as these. Then he found, in addition to the salary of the Receiver General, an item of "allowances personal;" and there not being any explanation of it, he should like to know what 83 was the cause or explanation for the "allowances personal?"

§ MR. MELLOR
called attention to the arrears of rental, which had been increasing annually. He had asked a question upon that subject years ago, and he received a promise that the matter should be inquired into; but he found that little or no attention had been given to it since that time, and he saw that the irrecoverable arrears had increased by £1,000.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, in answer to the first question of the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald), with regard to the Chief Mineral Inspector, the gentleman in question was a scientific man—Mr. Warington Smyth. His duties consisted of inspection and supervision over the various mining properties belonging to the Crown. Those properties were of considerable extent, and he believed that the amount of gross receipts from those sources during the previous year had come to something like £53,000. The time of this gentleman not being fully occupied in Government work, he had been allowed to utilize his own time by giving lectures at the Geological Museum in Jermyn Street; and he would point out, that by following that course, the country generally benefited by the gentleman's knowledge and power, as well as the Department that paid him his salary. The large amount of property that was at stake necessitated the engagement of a person of the kind; and, he believed, taking into consideration the powers and ability of the gentleman in question, that he was not overpaid by his salary. He was afraid he had forgotten the exact point with regard to which the reference to personal allowances was made; but he would point out to the hon. Member for Stafford, that when the item of personal allowances was recorded in the Estimates, it meant a remuneration for particular services performed by an official, and was so mentioned in order that the sum might not be supposed to attach ordinarily to the office. It was only on account either of length of service, or some extra or peculiar work, that an addition was made to anyone's salary, and it was to prevent its becoming a part of the salary that it was placed in the Estimates in the form of a personal allowance. With regard to the small sums paid to the First Commissioner of Woods and Forests for certain offices in 84 connection with Westminster Hall, he believed those items were put down in accordance with an old custom which attached to that particular office. It might be rather antiquated in its form; but the emolument, such as it was, the First Commissioner continued to receive, though he believed there was no particular duty performed in respect of it. His attention had not been called before to the point raised by the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Mellor), as to the arrears of rental; but he certainly would look into the matter, now that his attention had been called to it.

§ MR. GREGORY
wished, if he were in Order, to call attention to a retiring allowance made to the late Solicitor to the Department, in assessing which he thought that sufficient consideration had not been given to the period of service of that gentleman.

§ MR. HERMON
said, he would take that opportunity of recognising the readiness with which the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury, who had so recently taken charge of the Estimates, evinced in answering questions and offering explanations; and, in the case under notice, he was very glad to see that the Department was occupying the attention of the hon. Baronet; because, for many years, when he had had a seat on the other side of the House, and on several other occasions, he had pointed out that this was a Department which required special attention. He thought that when they looked at the estates that came under the management of the Commissioners, they would agree that those estates required to be managed more efficiently.

§ MR. PARNELL
agreed with the hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Hermon) that the Department was scandalously managed; that the country was entitled to a much larger return from the Woods and Forests; and that the expenses of management ought to be very much diminished. He did not think the Committee really understood how the Department was situated. In fact, it was a most extraordinary state of affairs. They found, by the Report of the Royal Commissioners, issued in 1855, that the cost of management alone of these Woods and Forests amounted to 25 per cent of the gross revenue. Now, what were those estates? They were, practically, something like the estates of private gentle- 85 men, and what landed gentleman would like to have it said that the cost of managing his private estate was 25 per cent of its gross revenue? In some of the estates the cost of management exceeded their gross revenue. There was Windsor Park; and he must say that Windsor Park ought not to appear under that head at all. It should appear under the head of Royal residences. The gross revenue of Windsor Park amounted to £5,509 18s. 6d., and he found, from the Report of the Royal Commission, that the management of Windsor Park was put down at £24,738 11s. l0d. He supposed that a great deal of the management meant the expense of keeping up the Royal Palace; but, if so, it ought to have been included under the proper head. If it did not, he thought it was a perfectly monstrous thing that the management of the Park, apart from the Palace, should be £24,000; while only about £5,000 was derived from all the magnificent grass land in Windsor Park. It appeared to him that many of the estates were unprofitable; and he would press upon the Secretary to the Treasury the advisability of getting rid of some of these unprofitable estates. He would refer him to the Alice Holt Wood, which returned a gross revenue of £1,725 5s. 1d., while the cost of management was £632 16s. 9d., or 36.59 per cent of the revenue. The Vere Woods showed a gross revenue of £1,746 16s. 8d., and the cost of management £743 4s. 11d.—the percentage in that case being 43½. In the Forest of Dean the gross revenue was £12,550 1s. 4d., and the cost of management £6,138 2s. 4d., or 48.89 per cent. There were three woods—the Delamere, the Hazelburgh, and the Salse Woods—of which the Returns were not given. In the High Meadow the gross revenue was £5,377 12s. 10d., and the expenditure £1,600, or 30.5 per cent. The gross revenue of the New Forest was £10,207 10s. 2d., and the cost £8,987 16s. 4d., or 88.4 per cent. Now, he could not imagine how the New Forest returned such a very small revenue, as, from the nature of the property, one would think it one of the most valuable, instead of the least productive. The Parkhurst revenue was £420, and the cost £272, or 64.70 per cent. The Woolmer estate was the only one which was at all economical, the revenue being £1,000, and the cost £101, being only 86 a percentage of 9.19. Taking at random a variety of arrears of rental since 1853, he found that in that year the gross revenue was put down at £358,266, and the expenditure at £111,711; and out of the gross revenue there was paid into the Exchequer only £252,000, so that the expenditure in that year was nearly equal to half the revenue. In 1864 the gross revenue was £432,148, and the expenditure £129,414. The amount paid in was £300,000, or rather more than double the expenditure. In 1870 the gross revenue was £447,000, and the expenditure £87,000, the amount paid in being £375,000. Of course, things were going on a great deal better; and he found in 1877 the gross revenue was £488,000, the expenditure £83,902, and the amount paid in £410,000.

§ SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF
hoped his hon. Friend the Secretary to the Treasury would devote his attention to the Office of the Woods and Forests, which was now in the anomalous position of being practically exempt from Parliamentary jurisdiction. He had not a word to say against the present Commissioners, who were men of high character and great ability; but the Department, being unrepresented in that House by any officer over whom Parliament could have control, required entire re-organization to preserve it from abuses which were liable to spring up.

§ MR. DILLWYN
remarked that the expense of the management of the Woods and Forests was altogether out of proportion to the revenue derived from them. What he wished particularly to call attention to, however, was the position of Windsor Park. That really was one of the Royal Parks, and ought to be regarded as such. It was absurd to treat it as a public Park, managed as property by the Woods and Forests, which was an accounting Department, when it cost £24,000 a-year, and only yielded £5,000 in return. No private person would manage property in that way. As a Royal Park its cost ought to rank as one of the charges paid to the Crown, and appear on the Estimates as such.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
maintained that the charge of mismanagement brought against the Department of the Woods and Forests by the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Par- 87 nell) had not been proved. No doubt at one period the expenses very largely exceeded the receipts; but the difference had been steadily diminishing under the management of the last few years, the amount paid into the Exchequer for the year 1877–8 having been £410,000, as compared with £190,000 in the year 1838–9. However, he was quite prepared to give the Vote his particular attention. The Committee ought to remember that such property as Woods and Forests was necessarily unproductive for long periods. Young timber was not in a condition to be turned into profit, and considerable sums had to be spent for its maintenance. At present there was very little large timber standing; for the most part the trees had not attained such a growth as to be available for sale. Hence the disproportion between the expenses and returns, in part at least. Windsor Park, he submitted, was enjoyed as much by the public as by the Sovereign herself; and it ought never to be forgotten that of the £24,000 expended upon it, no less than £11,000 was for the maintenance of the lodges and roads, which enabled the public to enjoy its beauties. Under the original arrangement, however, it was distinctly understood that the Park should be maintained for the enjoyment of the Sovereign.

§ MR. MACDONALD
reminded the Committee that an increase of revenue was not necessarily an indication of better management—they might be eating the most valuable portion of the property away, and leaving it valueless. Had not the mineral property under this Department been developed, until at least it was, to a large extent, exhausted?

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, that was hardly the case. The receipts from the mining property amounted to some £53,000 annually.

§ MR. DILLWYN
explained that he did not object to the expenditure of £24,000 on Windsor Park, or doubt that a large part of that sum was applied to the use of the public, as well as of the Crown. All he contended was, that the money for its maintenance ought to be voted by that House—that it ought to be put into the shape of a Vote, and appear in the Estimates, like the cost of Richmond Park, for instance, and not made a matter dealt with as though managed for profit.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, the present arrangement was effected by an Act of Parliament, and that it would require an Act of Parliament to reverse it.

§ SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF
asked how the officers of the New Forest were paid, and to whom were people to go if they wanted a road to be made there?

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, that information on these matters might be obtained from the new Verderer.

§ SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF
insisted that, the officers of Woods and Forests being Government officers, their salaries should be submitted to Parliament. It certainly appeared to him very extraordinary that there should be Government officers all over the country without the House knowing who was responsible for their salaries. He had asked for the information in vain, and he thought the public interest required that the condition of the Office of Woods and Forests should be entirely revised, and that it would be a good work for his hon. Friend to undertake it.

§ MR. MUNTZ
held that all the receipts from the New Forest should go into, and that all payments in connection with it should go out of, the Exchequer. The reply of the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) was the one they had so often heard before—namely, that things were not so bad as they appeared, because, while a few years ago the expenses of management amounted to nearly 50 per cent, they had gradually come down to 25. Now, what would any hon. Member think of a steward who charged 25 per cent for the management of his estate? [An hon. MEMBER: 2s. 6d. per cent.] Well, he was glad to hear it was so low. He hoped his hon. Friend would continue, as he had hitherto done, to discourage extravagance, and that the Department would, by-and-by, double its revenue, and so abolish a national scandal. The expense of management might very properly be reduced to 5 or 7½ per cent.

§ MR. GREGORY,
in corroboration of the hon. Baronet's (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson's) remarks, said, that in walking recently through a portion of the property in question he was struck by the large quantity of young and growing timber, which spoke very highly 89 for the managers of it. At some future time there would be a good return; but at present the Woods and Forests were necessarily unproductive to a certain extent, owing to the large expenditure incurred by the planting and maintenance of young trees. Last year he was through the New Forest, and he had observed a similar state of things there.

§ MR. RAMSAY
also urged the adoption of an Estimate, expressing a hope that the Vote would take that form before next year. With regard to the question of management, no one knew better than the hon. Baronet himself, when he stated that since 1839 the revenues had increased from £190,000 to £410,000, that during the last 40 years the annual income from all real estate had increased in nearly as great a proportion without any reference to its management. An increase in the revenue of the Department, therefore, ought not to be accepted as a proof of good management. Enough, he thought, had been said to satisfy the Committee that the management of this property was anything but what it ought to be. He trusted that before next year some definite proposal for better administration than at present existed would be devised.

§ MR. WHITWELL
admitted that the management of the Woods and Forests entailed considerable expense, and expressed his satisfaction at the good accounts given of the growing timber. He found that the expenses of ordinary management—wages, salaries, and allowances—amounted to £16,000; but, turning over a leaf, he found that no less than £5,000 for legal expenses had to be added—a sum which appeared to him excessive.

§ MR. MUNTZ
expressed himself satisfied, from an examination of the accounts, that the expenses of management were fully 25 per cent.

§ MR. O'DONNELL
suggested that the Keeper of the Records should be placed upon salary instead of having to depend upon fees.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, that by arrangement made with the Government, all the time of the Keeper of the Records was duly accounted for; but that official was permitted to occupy his spare time in doing work outside the office, in order that he might acquire a general knowledge of the investigations in which he was en- 90 gaged. With regard to the legal expenses of the office, they were necessarily incurred for the custody of a large number of deeds and records of exchanges and sales which took place under the direction of the Department. The property was scattered all over the country; and, that being so, he did not think the staff could be considered as excessive. At the same time, there might be points in regard to which improvement could be effected.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, the cost of managing the properties to which reference had been made amounted to 25 per cent of the net revenue. The expense connected with the management of 12 of the properties was £43,258, while the revenue only amounted to £38,000.

§ MR. BIGGAR
observed, that in addition to fees the Keeper of the Records received £150 salary. He suggested that the fees should go into the Treasury.

§ MR. MACDONALD
said, he had almost made up his mind to move a reduction of the Vote; but, remembering that the hon. Baronet had only recently entered upon his present Office, he would rest satisfied with expressing a hope that by next year the Secretary to the Treasury would be able to present a different record under this head.

§ MR. DILLWYN
directed attention to the item of £1,200, paid as salary to the Consulting Surveyor. The gentleman who occupied that position was also allowed private practice; and this, he thought, was to be deprecated. No man could properly serve two masters; and he hoped that the hon. Baronet (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) would direct his attention to this particular point. It seemed to him that the Consulting Surveyor received a sufficiently large salary to command his whole services. He should also like to know whether that officer was connected by partnership, 91 or otherwise, with, any of the other officers of the Department?

§ MR. GERARD NOEL
said, the Consulting Surveyor was in no way connected with any of the other officers of the Department. It was most important that there should be a gentleman of the highest ability in that position; and such an officer the Department now possessed. His duties were of an onerous description; and he received only £1,200 a-year.

§ MR. MACDONALD
said, there were several items in connection with the Vote to which he desired to direct attention. Commencing with the Private Secretary to the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works, he found that that official also drew a salary as senior clerk in the Financial Secretary's Department of the War Office. In fact, two offices might almost be said to be the order of the day in these Departments. Again, he found that there was a Superintendent of Furniture at £400 a-year, a Deputy Superintendent, and an Assistant Superintendent. There was likewise a Store Keeper of Furniture. The object of the heads of Departments seemed to be a multiplication of offices; and he should like to have a general review of all those persons who were connected with the various Departments in Hyde Park, or somewhere else. He had been told that a number of them might be turned to better account in the British Museum than as occupants of Public Offices. He had referred to the fact that there were four officials connected with Furniture; but his objections under the Vote did not end with them. He found that there was a Superintendent for the supply of Coal and Firewood, and a Superintendent for the supply of Candles and Oils. He should fancy that it would be easy to find a man perfectly capable of combining these two offices at a single salary. Unless some satisfactory explanations were given, he should feel it his duty to move a reduction of the Vote to the extent which would be implied in the cutting off of, at least, four officials, whom he regarded as totally unnecessary, and whose continuance was simply equivalent to a scandalous waste of public money.

§ MR. GERARD NOEL
said, that with regard to the Private Secretary to the First Commissioner, a certain sum was 92 deducted from his salary to compensate a clerk in a lower division for performing his duties. As regarded the Superintendents of Furniture, to which the hon. Member had alluded, he could assure him that those gentlemen had ample work to do. They had to look after the supply and repair of furniture in all the Public Offices in the occupation of Her Majesty's Government, in the House of Commons, in the Law Courts, in the Police Courts, in the Customs' Buildings, and in the Inland Revenue, and many other Departments to which he need not refer. They had, also, duties to perform in connection with the accommodation necessary for the different Commissions, and they had to take inventories of all the Public Offices. The hon. Member had only to glance at Class I. of the Estimates on Public Buildings to see the enormous number of those buildings which the officials in question had to look after. With reference to the Superintendent of Coals, he could assure the hon. Member that the duties of that officer were by no means light or unimportant. The Government made large contracts for coal in various parts of England, and it was necessary to have a gentleman who understood the different kinds of coal, and who could bring experience and knowledge to bear upon the duties of his office. As regarded the post of Superintendent of Candles and Oils, it was under consideration whether that office might not be combined with some other.

§ MR. MUNTZ
said, no sufficient answer had yet been given to the question as to the Consulting Surveyor. That gentleman might be a very valuable servant; but, in addition to his salary, he found, a few lines further down in the Estimates, that salaries were paid to four first-class Surveyors and six of the second class. Surely, those gentlemen ought to be able to perform the work which required to be discharged without paying £1,200 to a Consulting Surveyor. He knew that £1,200 in itself was a very trifling sum; but he appealed to hon. Members to look back upon the Estimates, and see whether it was not the case that year after year there had been an increase of expenditure in this Department?

§ MR. WHITWELL
inquired, whether the Surveyor who had been brought 93 home from China and Japan would have the superintendence of diplomatic residences in more than one place, and whether he would supersede the local Superintendents?

§ MR. GERARD NOEL
said, the gentleman referred to had been for many years in China and Japan; and, having learned his duty thoroughly, he had been brought home to England, and was now one of the first-class Surveyors. It was his duty to visit the different Embassies of Europe; but he would not supersede the local Superintendents.

§ MR. MELLOR
asked, whether the Consulting Surveyor, with his £1,200 a-year, did not receive, at times, payment for other than Government work? Did he not, in fact, receive commissions on work done by contractors?

§ MR. GERARD NOEL
replied, that the official in question received no commissions, but simply a salary of £1,200 a-year.

§ MR. MACDONALD
said, that seeing the proposed Vote was in excess of that of last year, he would move its reduction by £791.

§ MR. BIGGAR
did not understand how the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald) had arrived at that particular sum; but he thought that if his hon. Friend would propose to leave out entirely the Vote for the Consulting Surveyor, he would simply be doing his duty. A more pernicious system could not exist than that of having a Consulting Surveyor paid by Government for part of his time, with liberty to take general practice. Hon. Members must be aware of what such a system might give rise to. He did not know the name of the gentleman referred to in this particular instance, and he could have no personal grudge against him. That gentleman might be immaculate and pure; but there could be no greater temptation than that which existed under the present system, for a Consulting Engineer or Surveyor to be employed by parties 94 who wished to carry out little jobs for their own interest.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he desired to direct the attention of the Committee to the circumstance that one of the 15 third-class clerks, who received £300 a-year as a regular salary, also got £50 per annum as receiver of the tolls at Chelsea Bridge. That allowance was paid out of the tolls; but it appeared that there was a regular keeper who was paid for receiving the tolls. It seemed that the third-class clerk received the tolls from the toll-keeper; but all that the former functionary had to do might very well be performed by some official of the numerous Government Departments. A separate salary ought not to be allowed for such a purpose as this. There were several other salaries included in the Vote; but he could not trust himself to go into them in detail.

§ SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON
said, he would ask the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Downing) not to report Progress. The Committee had discussed the Vote at considerable length; and, if the hon. Gentleman would withdraw his Motion, he would move to report Progress when the Vote was agreed to.

§ MR. PARNELL
said, he merely wished to ask—["Oh, oh!"]—it was impossible for hon. Members who had not been present the whole evening to understand the situation. He merely wished to ask a question of the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works. It was, whether he knew how many times the Consulting Surveyor was consulted during the past year? He could not make out whether the Surveyor was consulted at all. He believed it was a sinecure office.

§ MR. GERARD NOEL
said, it was impossible to give an answer to a question of that kind; but if he were to say "a thousand times," he should be considerably under the mark. The office 95 was no sinecure, the gentleman in question being consulted almost every day by the Department.