Commons Sitting of 6 July 1880

Preamble
The House met at Two of the clock.

MINUTES.
NEW WRIT ISSUED—FOR Berwick Borough, v. The Honble. Henry Strutt, now Baron Belper, called up to the House of Peers.
NEW MEMBER SWORN—Charles Dalrymple, esquire, for Bute County.
PUBLIC BILLS—Committee —Employers' Liability (re-comm.) [209], debate adjourned.
Committee —Report —Customs and Inland Revenue [221–255].
Report —Inclosure Provisional Order (Clent Hill Common)*[217]; Land Drainage Provisional Orders (Frodsham, &c.)*[207]; Pier and Harbour Orders Confirmation*[175]; Tramways Orders Confirmation (No. 1)*[173]: Tramways Orders Confirmation (No. 2)*[174]; Local Government Provisional Orders (Fleetwood, &c.)*[199].
Third Reading —Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Banbridge, &c.)*[201], and passed.

CONTROVERTED ELECTIONS.
Mr. SPEAKERinformed the House, that he had received from Mr. Justice Lush and Mr. Justice Manisty, two of the Judges selected, in pursuance of The Parliamentary Elections Act, 1868, for the Trial of Election Petitions, a Certificate and Report relating to the Election for the Town of Lichfield.
And the same wore read, as followeth:—

LICHFIELD ELECTION.
The Parliamentary Elections Act, 1808.
The Parliamentary Elections and Corrupt Practices Act, 1879.
The Parliamentary Elections and Corrupt Practices Act,.1880.
To the Right Honourable
The Speaker of the House of Commons.
We, the Right Honourable Sir Robert Lush, knight, and the Honourable Sir Henry Manisty, knight, Judges of the High Court of Justice, and two of the Judges for the time being for the trial of Election Petitions in England, do hereby, in pursuance of the said Acts, certify that upon the 28th, 29th, and 30th days of June, and the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 5th days of July 1880, We duly held a Court at the Guildhall, in the Borough of Lichfield, in the County of Stafford, for the trial of, and did try, the Election Petition for the said Borough between Sir John Swinburne, baronet, Petitioner; and Richard Dyott, Respondent.
And, in further pursuance of the said Acts, We certify and report that at the conclusion of the said trial we determined that the said Richard Dyott, being the Member whose Election and Return were complained of in the said Petition was not duly elected and returned, and that his Election and Return were and are wholly null and void on the ground of abduction by the Respondent's agents of voters, whereby they were prevented from voting at such Election, and we do hereby certify in writing such our determination to you.
And whereas charges were made of corrupt practices having been committed at the said Election, we, in further pursuance of the said Acts, report as follows:—

(a.) That no corrupt practice was proved to have been committed by or with the knowledge or consent of any Candidate at such Election;

(b.) We further report that the following persons have been proved at the trial to have been guilty of the corrupt practice of abduction of voters, whereby they were prevented from voting:—

Frederick Symonds, a Justice of the Peace for the Borough of Lichfield; James Spooner, Market Gardener, Lichfield;

(c.) We further report that there is no reason to believe corrupt practices have extensively prevailed at the Election for the Borough of Lichfield to which the said Petition relates.

Dated this 5th day of July 1880.
ROBT. LUSH.
H. MANISTY.
And the said Certificate and Report were ordered to be entered in the Journals of this House.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
  FURNESS RAILWAY CERTIFICATE, 1880.

    RESOLUTION.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That the draft Certificate of the Board of Trade now lying upon the Table, entitled 'The Furness Railway Certificate, 1880,' ought not to be made."—(Mr. Cavendish Bentinck)
    MR. EVELYN ASHLEYsaid, the Certificate was passed by the Board of Trade under the Railway Facilities Acts, and the opponents received a full hearing. Their objections were fully inquired into, Colonel Yolland, one of the most able and experienced of the Board's Inspectors, having been sent down to visit Whitehaven and make a local inquiry. Colonel Yolland's views were embodied in the Report which the Board of Trade had laid upon the Table of the House. The Trustees of Whitehaven Harbour had no locus standi as competing railway proprietors, because their railway only ran round the harbour, and could not in any way be of service in bringing the coal from the Croft Pit to the Furness Railway, that being the object of the promoters of the line for which a Certificate had been given. That was also the answer to the objection which the Harbour Trustees urged against the Board of Trade for not having given a Provisional Order instead of a Certificate. They had no power under the Act to make a Provisional Order unless the opposition came from a competent Railway or Canal Company. It was further urged that the modification in the scheme which Colonel Yolland recommended and the Board of Trade carried out to meet the representations of the Harbour Trustees as to the interference with their road were ultra vires. While he (Mr. Evelyn Ashley) denied this, he, at the same time, pointed out that this objection came with very bad grace from the Harbour Trustees, as it was at their instance, and for their benefit, that the alterations were made. The Board of Trade submitted that, having made a full inquiry, and heard all the parties concerned, and then made a Certificate in accordance with the provisions of the Act of Parliament, they might fairly ask the House not to annul their act without inquiry.
    MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCKsaid, he was greatly obliged to his hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade for the explanation he had been good enough to give. He had been intrusted with a Petition from the municipal authorities of Whitehaven, who were also the urban sanitary authority, in which a complaint was made of the Order of the Board of Trade, which had been placed upon the Table, under the Railway Construction Act. He had,

    1751
    therefore, considered it his duty to bring the matter under the attention of the Board of Trade, in order to see that no irregularity was committed, and no absolute injustice done. Having heard the explanation of his hon. Friend, he was bound to say that it did seem to him satisfactory as regarded the nature of the inquiry held. It also clearly showed that the technical grounds advanced by the Petitioners for objecting to the Order would fail before any Committee of the House, and that it would be held by the highest authorities that they had no locus standi in the matter. Under these circumstances, and feeling that the matter had been fully brought under the notice of the House, and in a mode that was satisfactory to the Petitioners, who, he hoped, would see that nothing had been left undone to establish their rights, if they had any, he had much pleasure in complying with the request of his hon. Friend, and he would not persevere with the Resolution he had moved.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

QUESTIONS.

  PRISONS ACT, 1860—THE PLANK BED.
  MR. P. A. TAYLORasked the Under Secretary of State for the Home Department, If he will state under what circumstances the plank bed was introduced into prisons; whether this form of discipline was found to answer any good purpose; and, if he will lay upon the Table the present instructions in regard to its use?
  MR. ARTHUR PEEL,in reply, said, that the history of the use of the plank bed in prisons was shortly this. A Select Committee of the Lords reported in 1863 that the use of plank beds, similar to the guards' bed in military prisons, should be resorted to during short sentences and the earlier stages of long confinements. In the Prison Act of 1865 there was an enactment to the effect that a convicted criminal prisoner might be required to sleep on a plank bed without mattress during such time as might be determined by the Rules of the prison. The fact of this plank bed having been almost universally used since 1865 might be taken to indicate that it had been found to answer its purpose. The Secretary of State gave
  1752
  orders in 1878 that women, men over 60, and children under 13, should have a pillow and a mattress of some other material used. The hon. Member had asked if he would lay on the Table a copy of the instructions with regard to the use of the bed. The rule as to the practice was to be found in the Report of the Prison Commissioners, which was laid on the Table on the 19th February, 1878. Of these Rules, Rule 16 ran thus—
  "A convicted criminal prisoner shall during the whole of his sentence, when it does not exceed one month, and during one month of his sentence when it exceeds that period, be required to sleep on a plank bed; but that a prisoner shall he allowed the opportunity of earning by industry the gradual remission of this requirement, which, however, he shall be liable again to forfeit by idleness, inattention to instruction, or misconduct."

  EDUCATION (IRELAND)—REMISSION OF RESULT FEES.
  MR. A. M. SULLIVANasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If, considering the inability this year of the parents of children attending national schools in the districts in Ireland to contribute as in better years the proportion of school fees required in order to entitle the teachers to results fees, and the consequent total loss of such reward to the teacher, though otherwise fully earned by him, the Education Board will take into consideration the advisability of some temporary modification of the rules, so as to remedy for the current year such loss?
  MR. W. E. FORSTER: Sir, this matter has had the attention of the Irish Government, and in consequence of their representations theTreasury have decided for the year ending the 31st of March, 1881, results fees shall be paid in schools in scheduled Unions to the extent of half of the full amount, irrespective of the local contributions.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.
  EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY (re-committed) BILL— [BILL 118.]
  (Mr. Dodson, Mr. Chamberlain, Mr. Attorney General, Mr. Brassey.)
  EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY (re-committed) BILL— [BILL 118.]

    COMMITTEE. [ADJOURNED DEBATE.]
    Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Amendment proposed to

    1753
    Question [2nd July], "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair" (for Committee on the Employers' Liability (re-committed) Bill):—
    And which Amendment was,
    To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "no measure dealing with the Employers' Liabilities for Injuries sustained by their Servants can be accepted as a satisfactory solution of the question which admits, as a ground of defence in any action or proceeding brought for the recovery of damages or for compensation in respect to bodily injury or loss of life, that the person by whose negligence the injury or loss of life is alleged to have been occasioned was employed in a common employment with the person killed or injured,"—(Mr. Macdonald.)
    —instead thereof.
    Question again proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
    Debate resumed.
    MR. WARTONsaid, he must insist on the necessity of referring the Bill to a Select Committee. The subject required a, great deal of careful consideration, owing to the various conflicting interests both of masters and men engaged in different trades and pursuits which had rules and customs peculiar to themselves. It would be impossible to lay down rules applicable to all these multifarious trades and pursuits. The House had not the requisite knowledge to do so, and the task could only be successfully undertaken by a Committee upstairs. Was it reasonable that one man should be liable for the negligence of another? He denied that it was either morally just or legally right. No doubt, on both sides of the House there was the deepest sympathy for the working men. Both sides wished to do what was right and just with regard to the working men; but what was the proposition of the Government? It only extended to some particular cases, and those were very few compared with those described as accidents; and he asked the attention of the Attorney General as to whether he had not known a long trial lasting some days, the question being to determine whether the event was the result of accident or of negligence? In his opinion, the Bill was not so logical as that of the hon. Member's (Mr. Macdonald's), because that hon. Member's Bill applied to all cases of negligence; whereas the Government confined it to cases of negligence on the part of those placed in a position of
    1754
    superintendence. He thought the best course was to provide compensation by way of insurance. In that case, no trial need take place, and the injured workmen would be compensated on the right and proper scale. For 40 years the law had been as it was now, and during that period employers and employed had entered into contracts under it. It would not be said that the workmen could not contract with their employers, and for this reason—that they were members of great Trades Unions, which were strong enough to dictate the rate of wages that should be paid. Employers of labour, he had heard on good authority, were disposed to be very generous, and to be ready for insurance purposes to put down sovereign for sovereign with their workmen. Was it not worth while, then, to inquire whether a system of insurance which would work satisfactorily to all parties could not be devised? It was a question which could well be considered fully and calmly by practical men in a Select Committee. The case of railway servants stood on a different footing, and he regretted that it had been used at the late elections as a lever for the intimidation of candidates. He opposed the Bill in its present form; and in reference to railway servants he thought their case ought not to be included in a general measure. The wages of miners and other persons engaged in dangerous employments were equal to the pay of a captain in the Army, and were something more than the emoluments of a curate in the Church. He, consequently, did not think they should claim to supplement those high wages by compensation in case of injury. He considered they should not pass hastily a Bill which would only lead to litigation; and he asked the House to take into consideration his counter scheme, which would do justice to all.
    MR. MACDONALDasked leave to withdraw the Resolution which stood in his name with reference to common employment.
    SIR EDWARD WATKINrose to a point of Order. This was the second occasion on which the hon. Member for Stafford had risen to withdraw his Resolution, and it was desirable to hear from the Speaker whether this was in Order or not. He should like to know from the Government whether they were in favour of the Amendment?
    MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not speaking to a question of Order. On Friday last the hon. Member for Stafford applied to withdraw his Amendment, and I put the usual Question, "That the Amendment be, by leave, withdrawn." Leave was not given, and now the hon. Member renews his application.
    SIR EDWARD WATKINsaid, he only wished to know exactly the position in which the House stood. The Resolution of the hon. Member for Stafford stated that—
    "No measure dealing with the Employers' Liabilities for Injuries sustained by their Servants can be accepted as a satisfactory solution of the question which admits, as a ground of defence in any action or proceeding brought for the recovery of damages or for compensation in respect to bodily injury or loss of life, that the person by whose negligence the injury or loss of life is alleged to have been occasioned was employed in a common employment with the person killed or injured;"
    and before he was permitted to withdraw it the House ought to be informed as to what was the attitude of the Government in the matter. Were they in favour of the Resolution of the hon. Member for Stafford or not? If they were in favour of it, there was all the more reason for sending the Bill to a Select Committee. If they were not, then, he asked, what bargain had been come to between Her Majesty's Government and the hon. Member for Stafford which induced him to withdraw that which he considered a cardinal proposition. Until a satisfactory explanation had been given on that point both by the Government and the hon. Member for Stafford, he should certainly oppose the withdrawal of the Resolution.
    MR. HINDE PALMERthought the motive of the hon. Member for Stafford in seeking to withdraw his Resolution, as well as the attitude of the Government in regard to it, was sufficiently clear from what had preceded. In submitting the Resolution the hon. Member for Stafford distinctly intimated that he did not wish to retard the progress of the Bill; and the Government had stated, over and over again, that they distinctly repudiated the hon. Member's proposition.
    MR. STAVELEY HILLhoped that the Amendment of the hon. Member for Stafford would be allowed to be withdrawn. It was intended there should
    1756
    have been a decision as to whether the question should or should not go to a Select Committee; but the Government had met them in a fair way, and it would, therefore, be far better to allow the Amendment to be withdrawn.
    SIR EDWARD WATKINsaid, that, with a strong desire to save the time of the House, he would not insist upon a division.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    MR. KNOWLESmoved that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee, with the view of afterwards instructing them to consider—
    "Whether efficient provision cannot be made for all persons injured during their employment, and for the widows and orphans of those killed by accident, by an insurance fund contributed by masters and workmen, and whether the same would not be more beneficial to the workman than the right of action proposed to be given by the Bill."
    The hon. Member said, that, having listened with great attention to the debate as far as it had gone, he had come to the conclusion that the Bill was so surrounded by difficulties that it could not be satisfactorily dealt with in a Committee of the Whole House. To confirm the principle of the Bill as at present drawn would only be to give rise to further agitation, which would be kept up until the liability of employers would be made to extend to the humblest among the employés entitled to give orders in manufacturing or mining operations. As to the Resolution of the hon. Member for Stafford, no doubt it had been withdrawn simply because pressure had been put upon him by the Government. [Mr. MACDONALD: No.] If the Government passed the Bill before the House, they would affirm the principle of the Resolution of the hon. Member for Stafford. In moving his Resolution the hon. Member referred to two or three cases, which he seemed to presume supported his views with regard to common employment. In the case of an engineman and a collier, or a miner, he said that there was no common employment between the two. In his (Mr. Knowles') opinion, there was a common employment between an engineman and a miner. He meant by an engineman not an engine driver, but the person who attends to the engine by which the miner was let down to his work in the

    1757
    mine, by which his produce was brought to the surface, and by which he was himself brought back to the surface when his day's work was done. If there was no common employment between these two he did not know what constituted common employment. It was said that the proposed alteration of the law would only assimilate the law of this country to that of France, of Germany, of Belgium, and of other countries; but it seemed to be forgotten that the conditions of the labour market in the different countries differed most materially. In Belgium, for instance, women and children were employed in work connected with mining operations without any restrictions whatever; the working classes were paid at the rate of about two-thirds of the amount received in this country, and their hours of labour were about a third longer in duration. [Mr. MACDONALD dissented.] The expression of the hon. Member showed that differences of opinion existed; and, therefore, there was the greater importance for instituting such an inquiry as could take place before a Select Committee, which would have the full facts before it. It was further worthy of remark that in the countries to which reference had been made in support of the present proposal the relations of labour to the State were very different from those existing in this country. There the State owned the mines and the railways, and if colliery proprietors made no profit they had to pay no royalties—the Government taking the precaution to employ the best means of providing that profit should be made by appointing Inspectors to see that the operations were conducted on the best principles; but whether there was profit or not made upon English mines, those working the mines had to pay both royalty and rent, and there were instances in this country where rents and royalty to the extent of £15,000 and £20,000 a-yearwere paid, and no profits were made at all. There were many other differences between the conditions of labour in Continental countries and our own, which made an assimilation of the law as difficult as it would be unjust. In those countries to which he had referred there was a very arbitrary mode of settling disputes. If a strike occurred, before very long the military were called out. The proposals in the present Bill
    1758
    were calculated to destroy the freedom of contract, and he did not think that the House would be willing to go back to the practices which had obtained in the days of feudalism. He did not think that the hon. Member for Stafford would like to return to the days of serfdom and slavery which existed when the present law was passed, and there were only masters and men; but if they were to do away with freedom of contract they were going back to the old days of serfdom. He contended that up to the present employers of labour had done their duty to their employés. He did not like the existing law, for it was admittedly unjust; many celebrated lawyers and Judges had said so. Upon it, however, bad as it was, their institutions were built, and if it was altered the foundations of their great commercial undertakings would be rendered very unsafe. He could see nothing that was fair in the Bill. Nothing in the Bill indicated that it had proceeded from people of experience, and he could only come to the conclusion that it had originated with a class whose object it was to harass the employers of the country, and to set masters and men at loggerheads with one another—a class, in fact, whose very existence depended upon the keeping of masters and men at variance, whereas the success of trade rested in a great measure upon both classes working in harmony. The hon. and learned Member for Coventry (Sir Henry Jackson) had said that he could not see how compulsory insurance could be practical. He (Mr. Knowles) was confident that a practical method could be devised by a Select Committee which would satisfy ever body, and be an enormous boon to workpeople injured in their employment. It had been stated that this matter of insurance had been brought forward in consequence of this Bill. Well, he might point out that in a pamphlet written by Mr. Campbell, a gentleman of very considerable importance upon the subject, he stated that he had always known of such a provision as insurance for meeting accidents in dangerous employments before and since 1862, and he (Mr. Knowles) had since known the institution to gradually grow all his life. At all the collieries with which he had ever been connected arrangements were made to meet the consequences of accidents; but they were not of a permanent character. Since 1862 societies for the

    1759
    permanent relief of injured colliers had been growing, and they had done a great deal of good. If this Bill was passed the master would not be responsible for more than 5 per cent of the accidents, and what was to be done with the other 95? His object in sending the subject before a Select Committee was that the whole 100 should be provided for. That morning he had received a letter on the present Bill from a legal gentleman, in which he said that his sympathies were all with the Liberal Government; but he regretted that they had taken up such an arbitrary, slovenly, and ill-considered piece of amateur legislation as the Bill of Mr. Brassey, and he also regretted that the Attorney General had stated that the question of insurance had now only come to the front; whereas two witnesses gave evidence with regard to it to the Select Committee that had sat upon the subject. The necessity for an investigation was shown by the fact that the Government appeared not to know that for many years compulsory insurance had been in operation in Germany, and had? worked well. The Select Committee appointed by the late Government did not understand the question. The Government did not realize the importance of it. The Committee did not give prominence to this feature in their Report; and they, consequently, did not know that compulsory insurance in Germany had worked well. Now, these were the opinions of a legal gentleman who had considered the question well. As to the Bill now before the House, it should be remembered that it went much beyond the lines of their Report. The Committee reported that no extension of the law was desirable. He (Mr. Knowles) would enter his feeble protest against the alterations being proposed in the present law. The Bill he regarded as both undesirable and unnecessary, and it was anything but a compensation Bill. It was a litigation Bill, for all the compensation would be swallowed up in litigation. In the conversations that he had had with employers on this subject during the last two or three years, not one of them expressed themselves as desirous of shirking any fair and just responsibility. He trusted that the Government would not ignore the deputation which waited upon the Premier a week or two ago. It consisted of gentlemen who represented capital to
    1760
    the amount of between £1,200,000,000 and£l,300,000,000. They had considered this question over and over again for the last three years, and they had tried all sorts of ways to meet the question, with the result that the only method of preventing the continuous heartburnings of the workpeople was by some mode of insurances. If Government would give them an opportunity of submitting such a scheme to a Select Committee it would be fairly considered. It had been asked why the opponents of the Bill as it stood did not put their views on paper and let them be discussed in Committee of the Whole House; but he could see no force in such a suggestion, because in such Committee there was no opportunity of examining witnesses, and hon. Members who only kept domestic servants had no opportunity of gaining information as to the work of miners, who spent the greater part of their time underground, with nothing more to guide them in the conduct of their work than the dim and glimmering light of safety-lamps. In Committee of the Whole House there would only be a scramble for Amendments, and nothing like justice could be done. The Government, with their large majority, would affirm the principle of the Bill. Some gentlemen said the Bill would not be so bad as he feared, because employers generally of both political Parties believed that no Government would do such a gross piece of injustice as this Bill would involve. But now that those people who felt confidence in the protection of the House saw that the House was moving in so dangerous a direction, they saw it was time to realize their position. The feeling against the Bill was thus growing every day, and the numerous Petitions against it showed that people were getting alarmed. One firm, with a capital of £3,650,000, who employed many thousand workpeople, had, in their Petition against the Bill, stated that it would render it difficult, if not impossible, to compete successfully with foreign nations, and that all coal and iron property in this country would be very largely depreciated in value. Another argument he held against the Bill was that it would inflict injustice upon a large number of persons who had invested their money in mining property, which would be largely depreciated in value if the Bill passed.

    1761
    The Prime Minister, a few days ago, speaking on the proposal to give local option as to the sale of intoxicating liquors, admitted that if such option were given, the question of compensating the publicans whose property was depreciated in value would have to be considered. He should like to know whether the right hon. Gentleman would be prepared with a proposal for the compensation of mineowners, whose property would be rendered almost valueless if the Bill were passed in its present form? The present system of insurance was all very well; but one great difficulty in working-provident societies was that the men often went away to some other locality where such societies did not exist. Besides, the insurances were not like those against death or old age. The men were assessed at a very low rate in order to cover the risk of accident. If a man insured, again, for a railway journey, he paid his insurance money for his journey, and if he did not get injured he did not get anything returned to him. Again, that was lost and scattered to the wind, and, of course, rather fortunate for him. So, workmen running risks paid their quota towards those who had not been equally fortunate with themselves. If they could, by legislation, compel men and masters, because masters wanted more compulsion than the men, to accept the principle, provident institutions would cover a far wider area than they did at present. For instance, it was every man's duty to educate his children; but they found the people did not accept the moral obligation, and they had to pass an Education Act in order to compel parents to do so. Then, again, every man was under a moral obligation not to overwork his wife or his children; but it was found that many traded on them, and Parliament stepped in and said—"We won't permit you to trade upon them and work them more than they can stand." He thought there would, therefore, be no injustice in masters saying to their men—"We engage you in a dangerous occupation, and you shall contribute your 1d. or your 2d. per week," the masters, at the same time, being compelled to do the same. Was it any hardship that a man should be told—"You shall pay 1d. or 2d. per week in order to make provision for yourself and family in case of injury during
    1762
    your hazardous employment, or, if killed, to provide for your widow and orphans?" There was never any hardship nor anything degrading in such a course. Unless such a system were made compulsory, the masters could never be induced to contribute their quota, although he was convinced that they were willing to do what was right in the matter. Workpeople would do what was honest if they were led in the proper direction; it was not they who wished for this Bill, but only the agitators who had persuaded them that this Bill would make them more comfortable and more independent. Where the workpeople understood the question they did not want this Bill. He heard the other day from a man who, having been offered £100 by a railway company for damages sustained in a railway accident, went to law and recovered £105, only to find that the whole of that sum was swallowed up by the lawyer's bill. Many such cases would be met with if this Bill became law. It might be said that the evil of litigation would cure itself in time; but, in the meantime, how much misery and loss would have been sustained! A Select Committee, it was said, meant delay; but if preparations were made for the inquiry during the Recess, there was no reason why the Report should not be presented by Easter or Whitsuntide at the latest, when more time would remain for legislation than was afforded now. Nobody would suffer from the postponement, and the only loss would be one year's crop of lawsuits. He fully agreed in the remarks made by the hon. Member for South Durham (Mr. J. W. Pease), and believed that 19 out of every 20 men were indisposed for any extension of the law, or, in fact, wanted the present Bill at all. It was only through one or two going amongst them, representing that they wanted to obtain something that they would never realize or be kept independent in the case of accident, that a number had been induced to wish for it. He believed that the working classes would rather have some mode of insurance, so as to have a certainty, than to have to be dragged through Courts of Law. The amount of money which would be spent in litigation, but which might be employed in the creation of an insurance fund, would be enormous. The fact was, that the Bill had been hurriedly brought into the House. He did not believe

    1763
    that either the late or the present Government saw the full bearings of it when they introduced it. He hoped a Select Committee would be appointed to consider whether some alternative scheme, more just both to the working classes and to the employers, could not be devised. The hon. Member for Morpeth (Mr. Burt) had compared this measure to the Mines Regulation Act, and had remarked that when the latter Act was passed all the coalowners thought they were going to be ruined, whereas the result was that they were none the worse off. When the Mines Regulation Act was originally brought forward in its crude form it was a dangerous Bill, though nothing like so ruinous as this. After four years' discussion in that House the Mines Regulation Act was brought into its present state. In that case there was a limit to the liability which, under the present Bill, would be unlimited. He need not point out that no trade could prosper where masters and men were in constant litigation. If the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chester knew what would be the effect of this Bill he would not press it. The right hon. Gentleman's position seemed to be that of an election agent. He had got a Bill to pass and he must pass it, and he had got the Law Officers of the Crown to assist him. If those learned Gentlemen would put aside their law and apply their common sense to the subject, they would feel as strongly about the Bill as he (Mr. Knowles) did. The result of passing the Bill would not be to the credit of the right hon. Gentleman. It would do no good to anybody, but would injure both employers and employed. If the Government refused a Select Committee, they would lose a golden opportunity. He believed that before such a Committee evidence could be given to satisfy them that an alternative scheme of insurance would be better, not only for the employers but for the employed. In conclusion, the hon. Gentleman moved—
    "That the Bill be referred to a Select Committee, and that it he an Instruction to the Committee that they have power to consider whether efficient provision cannot he made for all persons injured during their employment, and for the widows and orphans of those killed by accident by an insurance fund contributed by masters and workmen, and whether the same would not be more beneficial to the workmen than the right of action proposed to be given by the Bill."
    MR. SPEAKERsaid, the first Question to put to the House would be that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee, and the second part of the Amendment as to the Instructions to the Committee could afterwards be put if the Amendment was carried.
    MR. KNOWLESsaid, he would move it in any way consistent with the Rules of the House. He would, then, simply propose that the Bill should be referred to a Select Committee, and if that proposal were assented to he should be happy to agree to any Instructions the Government might think right to give the Committee.
    Amendment proposed,
    To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "the Bill be referred to a Select Committee,"— (Mr. Knowles,)
    —instead thereof.
    Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
    MR. CHAMBERLAINsupposed that there was no Member to whom the House would listen more willingly and patiently than to the hon. Member for Wigan who had just sat down; because it was within the knowledge of the House that the hon. Member was himself largely interested in the trade and in the industry of the country, had great practical acquaintance with this particular question, and a knowledge of the subject which the hon. and learned Member for Bridport (Mr. War-ton) candidly and honestly acknowledged that he did not possess; and, moreover, it was well known to many that his relations with his workpeople had always been of a most honourable nature. He was, however, somewhat in doubt whether the hon. Member was speaking against the Bill or was speaking against time. He could say, however, on behalf of the Government, that they had no right—and they certainly had no inclination—to complain of the fullest and most careful discussion of the measure. They knew very well that it touched great interests, and the trade of this country was so complicated that it was difficult at first sight, without very careful consideration, to see what was the exact incidence of a Bill of this kind, and to what degree the various interests might be affected by it. But

    1765
    he was bound to say that it appeared to him that the greatness of the interests concerned made the Representatives of those interests in the House altogether too timid. They had the hon. Member for Wigan telling them that it would render the great properties invested in mines and similar undertakings almost worthless. He could only say that if the hon. Gentleman could show that one-tenth of the accusations he brought forth were justified, he (Mr. Chamberlain) would be the first one to try and induce his Colleagues to withdraw the Bill from the House. Sidney Smith used to say that Consols were the greatest fools in Europe. He would not say that of the interests concerned; but he would say that whenever this question was touched they were always met by exaggerated apprehensions. The hon. Member had confessed, with regard to the Mines Regulation Act, that he and those who worked against the Bill had entertained exaggerated notions and apprehensions.
    MR. KNOWLESexplained, that what he did say was that he objected to the crude Bill as it came into the House; but, after four years' discussion, it was made a different measure.
    MR. CHAMBERLAINwas glad to hear that the Bill as it left the House was so satisfactory. That was the first time he had heard a mineowner say so. He knew very well that the hon. Member declared at the time that the Bill would be the ruin of the country, inasmuch as it would so hamper the home industries that their workmen and the employers would have no chance with competition abroad. The hon. Gentleman had said that this Bill was 20 times worse than the Mines Regulation Bill. Well, the extra cost thrown upon the mineowner under the Mines Regulation Act was 6d. per ton; some put it at 1s. It had been estimated that the extra cost to the mineowner under this Bill would be ¼d. per ton, or l–24th of the liability imposed by the Mines Regulation Act. He was right in reminding the House that the same objections were taken to the Factory Acts when they were first brought before the House; and he might quote some expressions of opinion in reference to legislation with regard to the merchant shipping, and also for the security of the public on railways. They knew, however, that
    1766
    those industries had not suffered, but had gone on developing and improving; and he ventured to think that it would be so in the interests now represented to be in such a state of alarm by the hon. Member for Wigan. He thought they must say that the discussion on this measure, protracted as it was, cleared the ground and paved the way for further progress. They were able to estimate the objections taken to the Bill, together with the alternatives proposed for the acceptance of the House. One thing was very marked, and that was that everybody agreed that something must be done, and that a clear case had been made out for an alteration of the law, and that the sooner the alteration was made the better would it be for all interests concerned. It had been made clear that the objections to the Bill were practically confined to two classes—the representatives of the railway interest in the first place, and of the mining interest in the second. The great bulk of the trading interests of the country were perfectly silent on the subject. ["No, no!"] Well, he had seen objections taken by the general trade of the country to the Bill known as that of the hon. Member for Hastings, but none to the Bill before the House. But the case for an alteration of the law was precisely the strongest in those two cases from which the greatest objections came. The agitation began in connection with the railway interest, and arose from that almost monstrous interpretation of the law which recognized as fellow-servants the working-man earning 80s. a week and the man drawing £2,000 or £3,000 a-year as general manager. They had been told on a previous occasion by the hon. Member for Wigan that there were, on the whole, 500,000 persons employed in the mining industries of this country, out of which number about 100,000 persons were annually killed or temporarily maimed annually by accident! So that, the whole of those so employed were killed or disabled every five years. There must be something wrong in the system under which such an enormous waste of human life and under which such an enormous amount of human suffering became possible, and a change might surely be able to remedy this state of things. The objections taken to the Bill were really to the original draft as it was

    1767
    introduced to the House and before the modifications, which were promised by the President of the Local Government Board in his opening speech, were made. No doubt, the original Bill created some exaggerated alarm; but the ground for this had been removed by the alterations. These alterations had all been indicated by his right hon. Friend in his opening speech, and, without affecting the main principle of the Bill, they were intended to define its application more clearly. The Government had limited the definition of the term "superintendent" until it came to be a person delegated with authority—a master or a person having others under his control, in contrast to persons employed in manual labour. The hon. and learned Member for Coventry (Sir Henry Jackson) had told them there was no principle in such a definition; but, for his part, he thought otherwise, as he felt confident there was a real distinction between persons in that position of authority, acting in lieu of the master, and for whom the master was expected to make himself almost personally liable, and in whose selection he must exercise particular care and attention, in contrast with the ordinary workman who could in no way exercise control. Then, they had made another modification, to which the hon. Member for Wigan had not alluded, which had a most important bearing on all the objections which had been urged against the Bill—they had limited the amount of liability. They had left no longer any room for extortionate demands; and what they had done was in the interest of the workman as well as of the employer. There was no longer any reason to expect any difficulty would arise from extortionate claims being made upon the employers. The alternative proposals made by the opponents of the Bill would, if accepted, impose much greater liability on the trade and industry of the country than was contemplated by the Bill itself as it now stood. Take, for instance, the proposal of the hon. and learned Member for Coventry. He had urged that the law could not be left as it now was, and that he was willing to accept the principle of the Bill of the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald), if he was granted certain concessions. Now, what were those concessions which the hon. and learned
    1768
    Member for Coventry said he was willing to adopt? The Bill which the hon. Member for Stafford introduced would make employers liable for acts of negligence of every workman in their employ. The hon. Member for Cardiganshire (Mr. D. Davies), for instance, had 4,000 workmen in his employ; and, therefore, if the Bill of the hon. Member for Stafford was introduced, the hon. Member for Cardiganshire would become liable for the acts of negligence of the whole of his 4,000 workmen, whereas the Bill before the House would only make the hon. Member liable for 50 out of the 4,000. The hon. and learned Member for Coventry asked that he should receive concessions limiting the compensation to £150, whereas the present proposal was three years' wages. The average wages of the county would not produce more than £200; and, therefore, all that the hon. and learned Member asked in return for raising the liability about 80 times was that damages should be reduced from £200 to £150. That was sufficient to show that hon. Members did not really understand the effect of the present Bill. Then, with respect to the alternative of "compulsory insurance," the hon. Member (Mr. Knowles) said he was willing to pay £1 for £1 paid by his workmen, and was willing that that should be not for accidents occasioned by negligence, but for all accidents to which workmen were liable. But he also said that the Bill did not deal with one-twentieth of those accidents. Thus, while he said the Bill was going to ruin all the mining industry of the Kingdom, he was willing to undertake a liability which could be proved authentically to be ten times greater than the liability which could be incurred under the Bill. Could those arguments be serious? Were they really presented with a view to acceptance by the House, or were they only put forward to delay the progress of the Bill? Of one thing he was certain. If their proposals were carried into effect, the persons whom they represented would say that the Government proposed to scourge with whips, but their Representatives proposed to scourge with scorpions. There was clearly an admitted grievance on the part of workmen, although the extent of that grievance was open to difference of opinion.

    1769
    Among the grievances which existed there was another which had not been considered, and that grievance was that there was a positive immunity granted to large employers as compared with smaller employers. [Mr. MACDONALD: Hear, hear!] If the smaller employer extended his business, and substituted for his own personal inspection that of managers, the workmen were left without any compensation from the manager in case of an accident, and so the employer, at present, escaped all liability. Now, if it was admitted such a grievance existed, surely it was wise to attempt to remedy it, and it was almost dangerous to meet much a grievance with the answer non possumus. Agitation continued, the House was stormed, and hasty legislation was the consequence, which was much more injurious to the interests involved than it would have been if the matter had been taken up in time. There were now before the House three separate proposals. First, there was the proposal of the hon. Member for Stafford, and, as they had been urged to speak frankly on the matter, his right hon. Friend said, in the plainest possible terms, that the Government were unable to accept the principle of that Bill. He was not quite sure that there was not some ground for difference between a stranger and a workman. A stranger was entirely outside the operations; a workman was, to a certain extent, a partner in an enterprize, and to a certain extent he might be called upon to share the risk. On this ground, and on the ground that a principle which would involve so indefinite a liability would interfere with trade and enterprize, they had found themselves unable to accept it. The hon. Member for Stafford had not been over anxious to press his conclusion, and he had written a letter in which he had pointed out the nature and extent of the grievance of the workman, and had suggested that it should be met by making answerable for negligence not only the employer, but all those exercising a delegated authority. That modified view of the case was the one which they had endeavoured to meet by the Bill. The hon. Member for Hertford (Mr. Balfour) would also abolish the distinction between the workman and the stranger, and he would do it, not by elevating the workman to the position of the stranger, but
    1770
    by depressing the stranger to the position of the workman. He would lessen the existing liability of the employer, and would not extend it in the case of the workman. No one but the hon. Member had been bold enough to support his view. One effect of that would be that the Railway Companies would be relieved from liability in respect of accidents; and he did not think the public would travel in peace of mind if they knew that they were deprived of the security furnished by the fact that a Company would have to pay a heavy penalty for injury due to negligence. The third proposal was the Bill of the Government, and what, it did was to lessen a practical grievance. It was not possible to obtain finality in this or any matter; but if the Bill were passed the case for interference would be very much weaker than it was at present. Now, what real objection could be urged against the Bill as it now stood? The most serious was that urged by the hon. Member for Wigan—that it would encourage litigation. To lessen the risk of that the Government entreated the assistance of the House; and if there were any way in which the liability to litigation could be reduced, the Government would be glad to accept it. But the general argument was an argument against all concession of legal right, for, if there were no law, there would be no litigation. They could not have a legal remedy without opening the way to litigation. Whether, in practice, the amount of litigation would be as serious as was supposed he was inclined to doubt. One or two questions might arise; but as many decisions would settle them once for all. The probability of litigation had been immensely lessened, if not altogether removed, by the proposal to limit the maximum amount of compensation. The largest sum a workman could receive would not generally exceed £200, and in a vast number of cases it would be much less. No doubt, the employer would make an effort to come to some agreement; and as a sum of from £20 to £50 would represent the difference between the claim and the offer, it was not likely that sensible people on either side would waste the money that should go into the pocket of one party or the other. Whether the Bill would do anything to expose us still further to foreign

    1771
    competition, and how far it would do so, depended upon the amount of compensation; and when it was reduced to an amount which represented an average of a farthing per ton on every ton of coal raised, it could not be urged that that would seriously affect our ability to compete with foreign enterprize. This was not a new proposal; it would only restore the law to what it was before 1837. No doubt, the hon. and learned Member for Coventry would dispute that opinion; but it was abundantly endorsed. The hon. and learned Member would not dispute that the Government Bill would make the law less onerous to employers than was the law as laid down in Scotland previously to 1862; and it had not been shown that trade in Scotland had been hampered by a law much more stringent than that proposed. He also believed with the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald) that there was no doctrine similar to their own in any other country; as in Belgium, Germany, and Italy it was altogether unknown, and from Prance he had a letter stating that the number of accidents in Trench mines was very much less than in England. He would be very sorry, however, to lay much stress upon that statement, although it could not but show that no wrong would be likely to result if a similar principle of liability for negligence was adopted in this country. He might further say that the Government did not believe in the principle advocated of compulsory insurance, of which no practical proposal had yet been laid before the House; at the same time, they were willing to consider any Amendments designed to give practical shape to the suggestions which had been made with reference to insurance. He understood there had been a meeting of hon. Members who opposed the Bill, in order to see whether they could mature a scheme of insurance. He did not know whether they came to an agreement—[An hon. MEMBER: No.]— but he inferred they had not done so, because no Notice of an Amendment indicating such an agreement appeared on the Paper. A question would arise as to whether a scheme of insurance was to apply to all accidents, or only to those contemplated by the Bill. If it was to apply to all, the liability it would impose upon the trade of the country would be ten times
    1772
    greater than that proposed by the Bill. Then the question would arise—where was the House going to stop? If they were to have a system of compulsory thrift, why should they not adopt the scheme advocated by the Earl of Carnarvon in "another place?" He did not see any more reason for compelling a workman to insurance of this kind than he did for forcing every man to insure his house or his life. The proposal of the hon. Member for East Sussex (Mr. Gregory), that the master's contribution to an insurance fund or the sum thereby insured should be a set-off, was rather a complicated one; but, still, it was worth that consideration which could be given to it in Committee. He was afraid it was uncertain whether, by accepting this or any other proposal, they could conciliate ail opponents of the Bill; because many objections went much deeper than that there was no scheme of insurance, and, indeed, went to the principle of the measure altogether. There was no reason to believe that in a Select Committee the proposals would assume a more definite shape than they had done in the House; and he could not but look upon the suggestion of insurance as a dilatory plea, which would have the effect, although it might not have the intention, of stifling the Bill altogether. There was no reason to apprehend indefinite liability, because liability was carefully limited, and he did not see why it should not be met by a system of voluntary insurance. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Wigan concluded his speech by an earnest appeal to the Government to refer the Bill to a Select Committee. In the first place, let him say that the matter had been inquired into in the most exhaustive way by a Committee three years ago, and on which Committee the hon. Member himself sat. What reason was there for supposing that anything new on the subject of compulsory insurance would be laid before a fresh Committee? The natural result of sending the Bill to a Select Committee would be to delay its progress. Besides, he thought a Select Committee was not the proper tribunal to whom to refer it. They were not dealing with mines and railways only, but with various other interests also, which could not be represented on a Select Committee, and were likely to be represented on a Committee of the

    1773
    Whole House. He had already said that the hon. Member for Wigan had frankly admitted that the effect of referring the Bill to a Select Committee would be to make legislation impossible this Session. The hon. and learned Member for Coventry had said he would use his best endeavours to secure an immediate Report, so that they might proceed in the present Session. But the hon. and learned Baronet knew that he could not necessarily control the action of those who might happen to be his Colleagues. It was perfectly absurd to suppose that if the Bill were referred to a Select Committee the result would be other than he had described. If that were so they would have an agitation, because this was a question which interested a great number of people. The hon. Member for Wigan had spoken about a great number of Petitions having been presented against the Bill. Did the hon. Gentleman recollect that there had been a much larger number presented in favour of the Bill, and that it would be much easier to get a great number of signatures in favour of the Bill than against it? On the one hand, they had the almost unanimous opinion of the working classes of the country in favour of the Bill; and on the other hand, they had a more or less divided opinion on the part of the employers. He did not say that the Bill was perfect; but the Government were ready to come to the consideration of Amendments in Committee with a frank and open mind. He trusted that they would be allowed to make progress. A Select Committee was a natural resource of a Government that did not want to legislate, and of a Parliament that was weary of legislation. This Government or this Parliament was not yet tired of legislation. If Parliament would approach the question with a hearty goodwill they might settle it, at all events, for a time, and they might remove great injustices and glaring irregularities, and make a real contribution to the contentment and also to the security of the working population.
    MR. SCHREIBER,who had given Notice of an Amendment that the House should go into Committee on the Bill that day three months, said: Sir, Her Majesty's Government, I am certain, will not complain of any amount of discussion which this measure may receive.
    1774
    First, because this particular Bill has never had a second reading; and next, because, as has been already seen, discussion helps the Government to understand the consequences of its own proposals. Now, Sir, when this question was first brought under the notice of this House, we were told, in peremptory tones, that "it was time we made up our minds and passed a Bill." It will hardly be believed that when a Member of the Government went so far as to address that language to the House of Commons, the Government itself had not performed the preliminary exercise of making up its own mind, as is shown in the altered provisions of the re-committed Bill before us. Well, then, after the very interesting and instructive debate of last Friday on the Bill, I cannot deny myself the hope that fresh light may again have broken on the minds of Her Majesty's Ministers. For example, there was the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Coventry (Sir Henry Jackson), who never addresses this House without instructing it, and who is always so sensible that, if I did not know he was an eminent lawyer, I should have thought he was a layman. Well, the hon. and learned Gentleman pleaded—and pleaded passionately—for three things. First, that the Bill should go to a Select Committee; next, that a maximum amount, say, of £100, should be named for compensation in the Bill; thirdly, that the principle of mutual assurance should receive recognition in the Bill. His prayer was, at the time, refused; and if, having considered the matter in the interval, Her Majesty's Ministers still persist in that refusal, I see nothing for it but to labour with the same persistence for the rejection of the Bill. My first objection, Sir, to this Bill is founded upon considerations of time. We are still too near to the late General Election. We ought to wait till that event has receded further into the distance, and we are able to legislate in colder blood. Brought forward at this juncture, the measure has too much the appearance of a "bill" drawn upon the capitalists of the country to pay an electioneering debt. Further, if, in the present state of Public Business and at this period of the Session it is impossible to make a good measure of this Bill, then every hour spent upon it will be an hour wasted. But, Sir, I go

    1775
    further, and I say that whatever the state of Public Business, whatever the period of the Session, and whatever the time at our command, we shall never be able to make a good measure of this Bill. For what is its real character? It is a Bill, Sir, to harass the employer, to multiply accidents, to vex capital, to reduce wages, and, generally, to "kill the goose which lays the golden eggs." It is, then, a Bill most strongly to be resisted in the interests of the very class who have forced this question to the front. Now, I do not know, Sir, what pledges hon. Gentlemen on either side of the House may have given to their constituents; but I gave none on this, or any other question, unless, indeed, it were that I would do my best to prevent the right hon. Gentleman at the head of Her Majesty's Government from ruining the great interests of the country, and which pledge I now discharge by my opposition to this Bill. What, then, is the position of the employer? His interests and the requirements of the existing law already impose upon him extreme carefulness in the prevention of accidents, which have their most fertile source in the carelessness of the men. And what does this Bill do? It extends the liability of the employer by setting up a division and sub-division of delegated authority; it increases his risks by tending to make the men less careful; and, having extended his liability and increased his risks, it subjects him to heavy fines, levied under these new and most inequitable conditions. Now, Sir, that the liability of the employer will be increased by the delegation and sub-delegation of authority is evident already; that the workman will be made less careful is not, perhaps, so apparent; but what other effect can the knowledge have than that, in the event of an accident, he or his representatives will be compensated out of the employer's pocket? And this is not the only way. The Bill, if it is to come into general operation, will be fatal to the system of mutual insurance, which is the best security for increased carefulness, by making it the interest of each man to keep a watch upon his fellow. This Bill, Sir, and mutual insurance are alternatives which exclude each other. If this Bill is to prevail it will be fatal to mutual insurance, which is educating the workman in providence and carefulness. If
    1776
    mutual insurance is to prevail, why are we wasting our time upon this Bill on this, the 6th of July? And now, a few words with respect to the real bone of contention—the payment of compensation. I shall be told that if almost all accidents have their origin in the carelessness of the workmen, the employer has only to prove it and he will not be fined. But how is he to prove it, when all the witnesses are retained on the other side? Besides, I dare say that to the Law Officers of the Crown, who spend their lives in the extatic contemplation of interminable law-suits, nothing seems so natural, or even agreeable, as that an employer should carry his workmen into the County Court; but I tell the hon. and learned Gentleman, that the relations which now obtain between the best of masters and their men are so strained and difficult that it only requires the able assistance of a few local attorneys to make them altogether impossible. In this matter, Sir, no greater evil can befall the men than to hand them over to that parasite of their class, the pettyfogging attorney. Well, then, is the employer the person who ought to bear this fine? The Government will say, of course, he is; but this Government displays a wonderful aptitude for being liberal with other people's money, and strongly reminds me of the man in Sydney Smith's story, who was so moved with a charity sermon that he emptied both his neighbour's pockets into the plate. For myself, I shall think that the equities of the question are better understood when I hear what compensation the State offers to an employer in the event of his stock, his plant, his mine, his property being injured by an accident having its origin in the carelessness of the men. Can, then, employers bear this fine? In the present state of trade they cannot. With one conspicuous exception, better known to me than to any hon. Member of this House, but well known to many hon. Members of this House, the ironmasters of South Wales, during the late depression of trade, closed their works rather than continue an unprofitable manufacture. Since this Government was formed we have had again a heavy fall in the prices of coal and iron. Let these gentlemen once think that the Government proposes to lay upon them burdens greater than they can bear, and they

    1777
    may close their works again—this time without the conspicuous exception. And if they do I would have the Prime Minister look to it, for he will hardly realize his Estimates of Customs and Excise. That, Sir, would be a wholesome lesson, and would teach the right hon. Gentleman the obligations of the State to those great pioneers of industry, whose capital must be profitably employed if the taxes are to be paid. Once more, Sir, from what fund is the employer to take this fine? If out of the labour fund of the employed, wages must fall. If, as I think more accurate, out of the pockets of the consumers, prices must rise, and we shall lose our markets. In either case this Bill should be opposed, not so much on behalf of the employer whom it fines, as of the workman whom it will ruin. And now, Sir, a few words as to the "muddle" into which all Public Business is getting—this Bill included. It is due to the utter incapacity of Her Majesty's Government to understand the House of Commons, or their un willing-ness to take this House into their confidence. Three measures are now before us which this House detests. I need not name them; but this is one of them. Between the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary there would seem to be a division of labour and a distribution of parts. The latter threatens the House of Commons, and the former coerces his own majority. But Party allegiance may be strained until it snaps; and to threaten this House is the surest way to stop all legislation. Let me recall the experience of 1866, when we deposed a Minister who threatened us, and changed a Government rather than pass a Bill which we disliked. And let me invite the right hon. Gentleman to take some account of the wishes of his faithful followers, and of the stubborn resistance of his opponents, and allow this Bill to go to a Select Committee.
    MR. HUSSEY VIVIANthought this was a question on which they ought to attach weight to the opinion of those who knew something about the relations between employers and employed. In the speeches which had been delivered he failed to find any justification for the legislation which was now being proposed. The President of the Board of Trade alluded very slightly to the Select Committee which investigated this question. He did not
    1778
    wonder at this, because the Report of the Committee was wholly adverse to the lines laid down in this Bill. The Committee reported that no case had been made out for any alteration of the law relating to the liability of employers to their workmen for injury in the course of their employment except in three cases —that of Corporations, that of employers who delegated their authority, and that of contractors, whose men were considered not to be in common employment with those who were engaged in similar work in the same place. With these exceptions, the Committee stated that no case was made out for legislation; and yet the Government were now proposing, on their own Motion, and, as he thought without justification, to alter the existing law on wholly different principles. The President of the Board of Trade seemed to think the law had been altered in 1837; but that was not the opinion of the Committee. He wanted to know what justification there was for the Government, without any investigation, coming forward and proposing this tremendous alteration of the law? They adopted the crude measure of the hon. Member for Hastings (Mr. Brassey); but, immediately after throwing it on the Table, they saw the necessity of taking it back and introducing into it material alterations. The President of the Board of Trade had said that those who asked that the matter should be duly considered put forward a dilatory plea. He denied altogether that such was the case. He was not in the House when the Home Secretary characterized those who proposed to refer the Bill to a Select Committee as "ringleaders," and he was glad he was not present. This was a very grave question. They were dealing with the whole of the industries of this great country, introducing new relations between employers and employed in opposition to the Report of a strong Committee; and were those who asked for further consideration to be told they were putting forward a "dilatory plea," and to be called "ringleaders" in preventing legislation for the good of the working classes? He denied that they were taking any course but what would be beneficial to the working classes. His impression, from what the right hon. Gentleman said, was that he did not see the full extent

    1779
    to which the present liability of employers would be extended. By the 3rd section, even as modified, if a man were injured through the negligence of another who had any authority delegated to him, the owner was to be liable for the negligence of one over whom he had not the slightest control. He went the entire length of the Committee which reported to the House, and would go further. The person selected by the master to superintend might be regarded as representing the master, and the master ought to be held responsible for negligence on his part. But how to define "agency" was one of the most difficult points which could be conceived. Anyone who had experience of Election Petitions would understand that, and it was still more difficult to define agency in the case of mines. The right hon. Gentleman who spoke last spoke lightly of the crop of litigation to which this Bill would give rise; but that was what he (Mr. Hussey Vivian) most objected to. That was a consideration which might recommend the measure to the favour of the lawyers, who lived by litigation, but not to him, who regarded litigation with horror and detestation. He had had a long business life, and throughout the whole of his career had looked upon litigation as something horrible; but that was not the lawyer's view of it, nor was it to be expected that he should regard his bread and butter with horror. A lawyer, therefore, was not a proper judge of the propriety of passing a law likely to entail endless litigation between employers and workmen, nor was he capable of pronouncing a sound opinion upon it; and when he interfered between them and their workmen, and caused serious questions to arise between them, then he (Mr. Hussey Vivian) must deprecate and dissent from such legislation. It had been pointed out by the Member for Stafford that an employer would be bound to prove that the injury was not caused by the act of his agent. But a master must do his best to uphold his agent, otherwise his influence over the workmen would be destroyed. He hoped it would not be supposed that he desired to escape any pecuniary liability which he ought properly to come under; but he strongly objected to the indefinite character of the liability which was likely to be created by this Bill. The Bill proposed that the
    1780
    injured man was to be compensated at the rate of three years' earnings. How were they to define three years' earnings? He had known wages to change to the extent of 100 per cent. If the suggestion of the hon. and learned Member for Coventry (Sir Henry Jackson) were adopted, then they would have something to go upon as to what their utmost liability would be, and they might provide against it by means of insurance. It constantly happened that men exhausted their capital in opening mines; little was required to carry them on afterwards. Under this Bill such men might be absolutely ruined. The Government were acting without investigation, and with very little knowledge of the subject. The community of feeling between employer and employed was of a sacred character, and cognate with the relations of a family; and unless master and man pulled heartily together success would not be attained. They must not suppose that any man would be so inhuman as wilfully to endanger life. To allege that this Bill would prevent casualties was to allege a thing that would not hold water for a moment. Speaking for himself, he could say the most bitter moments of his life were those in which he witnessed the fearful results of an explosion in one of his own pits, and saw the unfortunate men carried off in their coffins. Whenever such a calamity occurred, the owners were ready of their own accord to do ten times as much for the relief of the afflicted as this Bill sought to impose upon them. It was not the question of pecuniary compensation they objected to, but the sowing of discord. He did not think sufficient consideration had been given to the question of insurance. A contribution of, perhaps, ½ per cent of the wages, met by an adequate contribution from employers, would be sufficient to deal with all accidents. There would be no difficulty in dealing with individuals, and less in dealing with districts, the fund being managed by the workmen themselves. Already one-fourth of the colliers of the country, or 120,000, were embraced in existing insurance arrangements; and, if one-fourth, why not all? The Government had a golden opportunity of accepting a provision of this kind. The masters were ready to come forward and to assist handsomely in such a scheme; the lessors of mines were as much in-

    1781
    terested as the lessees, and probably would assist also. This was a paltry Bill, because it would deal with only one-tenth of the accidents that occurred, and it would probably waste in litigation more than it would secure for the injured. Was it to promote discord and yet to provide for only 10 per cent of the accidents, that Government desired to legislate? To do so little and to create such difficulties, was not worthy of a strong Government like the present. If the Government would take up the subject comprehensively, they would find their supporters united; but if they persisted with this Bill, they would be endeavouring to force upon their supporters a measure distasteful to them in order to reverse the legal precedents of centuries that had come down to this country from the time of the Romans. Supposing the House went into Committee, every clause would be fought; and, by-and-bye, the Bill would go to "another place" with all the marks of a battle-field in a civil war, strewn with the corpses of friends and brethren. For these reasons, he urged that it should be referred to a Select Committee.
    SIR HARDINGE GIFFARDthought it would be better to refer the Bill to a Select Committee, but not for the reasons just urged. He took it that, in the main, they must start with the assumption that the law in regard to common employment must be altered; and the only question really was whether the Bill carried out that alteration. The difficulty in regard to a scheme of national insurance was to make it sufficiently far-reaching to comprise all branches of the community. He remembered a case in which a painter was injured by being knocked off a ladder by a railway servant moving a turntable, and, although they were strangers, they were held to be in the same employment. In the same way, the guard of a train starting from York might be held to be in the same employment as a pointsman in London, and the guard could not obtain compensation for an accident caused by the pointsman. He thought an alteration of the law was imperatively called for, and the only doubt which he had was whether the Bill efficiently carried out that alteration. He could not admit that the alteration of the technical rule of law was inconsistent with the Report
    1782
    of the Committee. The unreasonableness of the rule had become more urgent in modern times through the multiplication of great Companies, in which there was no individual master to be negligent. He should be disposed to affirm that where there was a person who represented the master, although he had no pecuniary interest, yet, if intrusted with authority, he should be held responsible. As the Bill was drawn, it left a question much wider than that to be disposed of. The hon. Gentleman who had just sat down seemed to entertain a very low opinion of lawyers, for he regarded them more in the phase of instigators of litigation than in the phase in which they more frequently appeared— that of dissuading their clients from engaging in litigation. It was they who, in the exercise of their profession, saw the injustice of such laws as this, and were most anxious to have that injustice done away with. The true view should be to consider the principle of the Bill as established, and that then the Bill should go to a Select Committee—not to inquire into the principle as to whether there should be an alteration of the law, but as to its operative completion. If they insisted upon the Bill going forward in its present form, there would not be time to pass it.
    MR. WIGGINsupported the Amendment. He had a short time since attended a meeting in Birmingham of over 200 large employers of labour, and they passed a resolution to the effect that it was very desirable that the Bill should be referred to a Select Committee, in order that its provisions might be carefully considered, and calling on their Representatives in Parliament to vote for a proposal to that effect. That feeling was not confined to the employers in the Midland Counties, but extended to the whole country and to Scotland, because the opinion prevailed that the Bill was being pressed on with undue haste, and that it ought not to become law without being fully inquired into. He trusted that the Government would yield on this matter, and that the Bill would return from the Select Committee so amended that he could give it his cordial support.
    MR. M'INTYREsaid, he thought that an employer of labour ought to stand in the same position towards those he employed as he did towards the out-

    1783
    side world, and ought to be equally responsible in case of accident in the one case as in the other. The workman had no opportunity of selecting his fellow-workmen, and the negligence of his fellow-workmen, through which he was injured, ought to be held to be injury by his employer. He submitted that there was no ground for referring the Bill to a Select Committee, and that there was nothing in question which could not be arranged in Committee of the House. He contended, also, that the Bill was in strict accord with the recommendations of the Select Committee of 1871.
    MR. GLADSTONEsaid, he wished to represent respectfully to the House that they had arrived at a point when they were perfectly ripe for a decision. The question before them was not the whole matter that was involved in this very important Bill, but the comparatively simple and narrow question whether the Bill should be referred to a Select Committee. The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Sir Hardinge Gif-fard) had given his reasons with great brevity and simplicity for thinking that that course ought to be adopted; but, whether hon. Members leaned to the affirmative or to the negative, he put it to the House, as men of business, that the time had arrived when they were ripe for deciding the matter. The subject, he would almost say, hardly admitted of extended debate, for what were the principal pleas that had been put forward? Some hon. Members had spoken in support of the proposal for a Select Committee, but with a frank avowal that they were opposed to the principle of the Bill, and they desired to promote whatever was likely to avert its enactment. Those Gentlemen were, undoubtedly, the minority of the House. The great majority of those who were friendly to a Select Committee, and of those who deprecated such a reference, were, however, agreed in the admission, like the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, that an alteration in the law was desirable, and that it ought to be brought about with every possible despatch. Setting aside those who were opposed entirely to the principle of the Bill, he thought there were two classes of persons, two kinds of reasons, to be considered in favour of the proposal to refer the Bill to a Select Committee. Some
    1784
    hon. Gentlemen thought that the reason was to be found in pointing to a proposition like that contained in the 3rd clause, which fixed a certain number of years passed in employment, and the wages received in those years, as the rule for determining the maximum of compensation that was to be paid, and urged that that was not a good principle, but that a sum of money should be substituted. That might be, or it might not be—he did not give any opinion on the point at present. It was a question, however, which would be considered with the greatest advantage in Committee of the the Whole House. Moreover, that was a question which, if considered by a Select Committee, could only be decided there on the same class of considerations that would present themselves to the minds of every Member of that House; and if it were so considered and decided, the probability was that the Bill would come back again only to promote renewed discussion. He ventured to add that not only would they gain nothing by the reference to the Committee upstairs, but that they would lose a great deal. Much more thorough and varied light would be thrown upon the Bill when discussed in the House than it would be if the work were undertaken by a number of Gentleman sitting in Committee round a table. But the real argument, after all, which had been advanced in favour of referring the measure to a Select Committee, was the one which seemed to be the most conclusive against the adoption of that course. He referred to the argument that a scheme of general and, perhaps, compulsory insurance ought to be embodied in the Bill. Her Majesty's Government had no disinclination whatever to see the voluntary principle, with all the advantages which belonged to it, applied to the great object of compensation for accidents; but before being disposed to allow the fate of the Bill, so far as it depended on them, to rest on the introduction into it of a plan of that kind, they must ask themselves, as men of business, the question whether those who put forward that proposition, and were so anxious for its adoption, were themselves prepared with a plan which might be carried into effect? Now, on the contrary, there were no elements of that description. It was now five weeks since he had the honour of receiving a deputation, to which an hon. Friend

    1785
    behind him had referred. There were assembled at that deputation a very large number, not only of persons of the highest influence, but of the ablest men of business to be found in this country; and among those men of business was Mr. Baxter, and there was not an abler man, as far as he knew, to be found among them, and there were many of those men of business who proposed the recommendation of such a plan. But this was an abstract recommendation, and not anything like a practical scheme. It was accompanied by an intimation on the part of some that the thing might be done, and by others with expressions of misgiving and doubt whether it could be done, and with an avowal that it would be a very good thing if it could be done. Now he begged to state, with very great respect, that these were not the kind of proposals that ought to be referred to a Select Committee. In order to justify a number of Members of that House taking into their hands a consideration of that kind, it ought to be already in the shape of a practical project, framed by men of considerable authority and practical experience, instead of being, as it was, a project altogether in the air. They were far more likely to create a method of insurance against accidents if they passed this Bill, and then applied in that manner a spur to the able and vigorous intellects of the Gentlemen who had brought up the subject, than if they referred it to a Committee. As far as the Government were concerned, much as they wished that a plan of that kind should be tried, much as the Government conceived that when they were freely and voluntarily adopted between masters and workmen they were the best of any schemes that could be devised under general liability enacted by Act of Parliament, yet they could not but say that this argument as it stood was an argument against, and not for, reference to a Committee. There was another motive which weighed very much with him in thinking that they would be doing unwisely by referring the Bill to a Committee. The working men of this country were happily, to a certain extent, directly represented in that House, and they were morally and indirectly represented to a much larger extent by the intelligence and philanthropy of many Members, among whom were many great employers of labour;
    1786
    but their direct representation being small, it was natural that they should view, partly, indeed, with confidence, and partly, also, with jealousy, a reference of the Bill to a Committee upstairs. To conduct an investigation with closed doors would be far less likely to carry the confidence of the working men of the country than if, in open Committee, they gave up all the time that was necessary for a careful and patient consideration of every practical proposal that might be made. For these reasons he hoped the House would decline to refer the Bill to a Select Committee, and that it would be able to arrive at a decision that evening.
    MR. STAVELEY HILLsaid, he was strongly convinced, notwithstanding the speech of the Prime Minister to the contrary, that the Bill should go to a Select Committee. The Mines Regulation Bill was rejected because the House was anxious that it should come before them in a more complete shape, as it eventually did, after being referred to what was practically a Select Committee; and he maintained that the two cases were similar. They objected, not as the Prime Minister seemed to imagine, to the 3rd clause of the Bill, but to the 3rd sub-section of the 1st clause, which had no limit in it whatever, and which made a master liable for the negligence of any person in his service to whose orders a workman was bound to conform or did conform. In conclusion, the hon. and learned Member expressed his profound regret at finding that the Government intended to press forward the Bill in its present crude condition.
    SIR EDWARD WATKINwished to know whether, in the event of this Bill going into Committee, the Government would be prepared to introduce, or to favour the introduction of, a measure on the question of a general assurance against those casualties of life which were attached to our industries, and to put an end to the Bill now before the House, provided that hereafter a measure relating to insurance was passed?
    MR. GLADSTONEreplied, that if a well-considered plan of insurance were submitted to the House in Committee, it would be the duty of the Government to give full consideration to the subject.
    Question put.
    The House divided: — Ayes 259; Noes 130: Majority 129.—(Div. List, No. 43.)
    Question again proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
    It being ten minutes before Seven of the clock, the Debate stood adjourned till this day.

  CUSTOMS AND INLAND REVENUE BILL— [BILL 221.]
  (Mr. Play fair, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Frederick Cavendish.)
  CUSTOMS AND INLAND REVENUE BILL— [BILL 221.]

    COMMITTEE.
    Order for Committee read.
    MR. GLADSTONE: I propose to go into Committee pro formâ on this Bill, and I think I shall have time to state the changes which will be proposed. The regulation clauses will be amended in detail. The exemption will be reduced to £10. Farmers' land will not be included. The allowance for waste will be 6 per cent. Collection will be monthly. The standard will be 57 per cent for duty, and likewise for drawbacks on exports. The deduction from the permissive charge will be 4 per cent. The drawback to maltsters will be paid in one sum. The private brewer will be allowed to brew only on his own premises. The wine duty clauses will be dropped; the billiard-room keeper will stand exactly as he does now. The relief to hotels will not apply where the hotel keeper has in a separate part of his premises a public-house business. The composition for stamp duties on transfer for municipal stock we propose to fix at a lump sum of 12s. 6d., instead of 8d. per annum. I shall also have to move a Resolution in a separate Committee of the Whole House to raise the duty on public-houses according to a scale, at £5 per £100 rating, from £100 upwards, instead of stopping, as the Bill now does, at £100.
    MR. CALLANasked whether any alteration of duty had been made with respect to public-houses in Ireland?
    MR. GLADSTONEsaid, that would stand for consideration in Committee. They were only going into Committee pro formâ just now.
    MR. STORERasked whether opportunities of discussing these questions would be given to Members who had Motions on the Paper?
    MR. GLADSTONE: Yes.
    Bill considered in Committee, and reported; to be printed, as amended [Bill 255]; re-committed for Thursday 15th July.
    The House suspended its Sitting at Seven of the clock.
    The House resumed its Sitting at Nine of the clock.

MOTIONS.
  ARMY (HIGHER RANKS).

    RESOLUTION.
    MR. TREVELYAN,in rising to move—
    "That steps should be taken to reduce the active list of generals to the point at which it, is adequate, and no more than adequate, to the actual requirements of the Service of the country; that no appointment should henceforward he made to honorary colonelcies, due regard being had to the interest of existing officers;
    said: Sir, there is this drawback about an exceptional case, that its possessor finds it hard to determine at which end to begin; and a stronger case than this, I venture to say, was never laid before the House of Commons. I have been long enough in this House to know that what it likes are facts; and facts it shall have—so clear, so strong, so plain and self-evident that, without comment or explanation, they constitute an argument in themselves. Englishmen— and small blame to them—are not accustomed to look abroad for instruction; but there is one country to which they are not ashamed to look for instruction with regard to Army matters, and that is Germany, or rather Prussia. We are never ashamed—it would be the height of folly if we were—to ask how Prussia treats any question relating to the maintenance of a National Army. The Prussian Army, in time of war, comprises 600,000 men present with the Colours. That Army is under the command of 150 generals. There are 13 generals in command of districts, 31 cavalry generals, 28 infantry generals of division, and 52 of brigade. 13 generals of artillery, and an average of 10 or 12 engaged in military administration. Every one of those generals is on the active list; and, as soon

    1789
    as he is unable to perform his duties, he leaves that list. To command the British Army of 400,000 men there are on The Army List 215 generals, 169 lieutenant generals, and 242 major generals, or 626 generals in all. That is to say, the list of generals, as shown on our Army List, for 400,000 men equals the active and retired list of the Prussian Army of 600,000 men; or, to put it in another way, our list of generals is more than four times as great as the Prussian list of generals who command the Prussian Army. Our retired list of generals is one which no man can number, and it is difficult enough to say how much our generals, active and retired, are paid; for the Estimates, framed more reasonably than they were 10 years ago, are not yet of a nature to assist the researches of an independent Member who is interested in military matters. But it stands something like this. Staff pay on the English Establishment, £19,000 a-year; honorary colonelcies, £203,500; salaries for administrative duties, say, £25,000; full-pay of general officers, £130,000; distinguished service money, £15,000; reduced and retired generals of Royal Artillery and Engineers, £47,000; half-pay to officers of the rank of general, say, £50,000; pay to general officers in India, £70,000; pay and pension, including colonels' allowances, to general officers of the Indian Service resident in England, taken approximately, at £240,000 a-year. These sums, added together, reach the enormous total of £784,500, or three and a-third times as much as that paid for commanding the greatly larger Army of Prussia. The larger part, but not much the larger, is borne by India; but I do not distinguish between what India and what Englandbears. We are here to protect the unrepresented millions of India. If we are not their protectors, if we do not see that their interests are not sacrificed to the private interests of individuals, there is no amount of exaction to which they will not be exposed. Well, that is the sum which, under the head of General Officers, the taxpayers of the British Empire are out of pocket yearly; and what is the value which they get for their money? Here I must ask hon. Members, who are not acquainted with the details of our military system, to prepare themselve for the incredible. Count-
    1790
    ing His Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief, we have 20 general officers employed in military commands at home. Engaged on administrative duties at home we have 14 general officers. Seventeen of our generals are actively employed in India, and 12 in the Colonies; so that, in all, 63 of our generals are actually at work at any given time—that is to say, while on an average every general in the Prussian Army, who is actually employed, costs his country £1,460 per annum; every general in the British Service, who is actually employed, costs the yearly sum of £12,444. The cause of this monstrous state of things is that, instead of a fixed list of generals, a list to which a man is promoted, not because he is to be called a general or to get the emoluments of a general, but because the country requires the services of a general, we have an immense, an amorphous, an unmanageable agglomeration of generals, old and young, effective and non-effective, men capable of discharging any military employment in the world, and men so notoriously incapable that no Minister in his senses would intrust them with the charge of a brigade. No less than 34 are not generals at all, but colonels and lieutenant colonels with temporary rank as brigadiers. The country ought to know that while, with the help of India, it is paying £750,000 to maintain a perfect army of generals, when there is duty to be done in India of the nature which falls to the lot of a general, proper men for the purpose are not to be found on this endless roll; but 34 officers of a lower grade have to be selected, and their pay raised, in order to fulfil the duties to which our list of generals, as at present constituted, is, by the confession of the Horse Guards and the War Office, unequal. And, no wonder; for instead of making the position of a general a business, and one of the most honourable businesses, we have turned it into a mere rank with no attributes except the name and the pay. When there are vacancies on the list of generals, instead of choosing the best man and the fittest man, we shovel in all the names that happen to stand at the top of the list of colonels. There may be here and there an exception; but that is our system. Are hon. Gentlemen aware what, in deal-

    1791
    ing with the appointment of general officers, a system of seniority means? In many callings age is no disadvantage. But it is not so with a general. Youth, or that excess of vital power and redundant health which, except in a few very fortunate people, advancing age too surely impairs, is a definite and indispensable qualification. Just think what the duties of a general are. To be awake when others are sleeping; to be about when others are stationary; to have at his fingers' ends the details of the transport, the commissariat, the exact local distribution of all the force under his command. And, with all this on his mind, to conduct the military operations; and, when the day's marching or fighting is over, to sit down and do another day's work at his desk. During his first and, perhaps, his most remarkable campaign, Pichegru relates that he himself only slept, on an average, one hour in the twenty-four; and, to come to our own successful general, I should just like to have a return of the number of hours a-day which Sir Garnet Wolseley spent in his saddle in South Africa, and on his legs in Canada and Ashantee. Let us look at our great wars, and at the age of the men who did so much for the glory of their country. The Duke of Wellington became a major general at 33; Lord Anglesea at 34; Lord Hill at 33; Lord Beresford at 39; Lord Combermere at 31; Lord Londonderry at 32. On the morning of Waterloo there was only one man in the British Army over 50; and that solitary individual was General Picton. That is the state of things that must exist in a fighting army, if it is to fight successfully. Let us see how it stands with us. In 1854, on the eve of the Crimean War, a Commission was appointed to inquire into the condition of the higher ranks of our Army. It was a most distinguished Commission, whose recommendations and observations were worthy of the closest attention; for it included the names of Lord Hardinge, Lord Raglan, Lord Seaton, Sir John Burgoyne, Sir Hew Ross, Sidney Herbert, Lord Dalhousie, and Lord Grey. The Commission reported that—
    "The average age of existing major general is not less than 65, and that the lieutenant generals who will command divisions are, of course, older still."
    They enlarged with great force and ability on the danger of intrusting
    1792
    troops to commanders who were past their prime, and who, if they gained experience as commanders in one campaign, would be superannuated before they had time to make use of it in another; and then, as a remedy, they proposed to give commands to colonels and lieutenant colonels—that was to say, they could think of nothing better than to intrust the duties of a general to others than a general, because the generals whom we possessed were too old to exercise them. Now, that was a poor and weak remedy. It did not go to the root of the evil, and could be called very little better than a palliative; but that was the worst that could be said against it. It is left for a Government of our own day to invent a remedy that is a great deal worse than the disease. Things did not mend after 1854. In the year 1873, for instance, the four lowest officers on the list of major generals were aged respectively 53, 57, 55, and 51. The four lowest on the list of lieutenant generals were aged 73, 56, 73, and 82. The four lowest on the list of generals were aged 65, 72, 77, and 73. The evil is as great as ever; but the time has come when it can be mended. Purchase has been abolished, and a clear field has been made on which the new construction of our Army can be built. Where there has before been a vast and complicated multitude of vested interests, there is a tabula rasa, on which the authorities might make what sketch they choose, and might fill it up as they like. There never was such a chance for a bold and great Administration. And what was done? On Army questions I have never been and never will be a Party man; and, therefore, I cannot help saying that both the Liberal and Conservative Governments were to blame for what followed. The Liberal War Office, which had abolished Purchase, which ought to have had cut, dried, and ready, the organization by which it proposed to supersede the old abuses that had grown up under Purchase; which did not require a Bill, to be carried with difficulty through the two Houses, in order to effect what was wanted, but by a simple exercise of its volition and a few strokes of the pen, might have accomplished all that the nation had a right to demand. The Liberal War Office put off dealing with that question through the latter half of 1871, through the whole

    1793
    of 1872, through the whole of 1873, and left the work which they themselves were absolutely bound to complete, to be made or marred by their successors. And how did those successors fulfil the task? In 1877 Lord Cranbrook issued his Royal Warrant for Promotion and Retirement. What did Lord Cranbrook do? Did he reduce the enormous burden on the country., and provide us with young and effective generals by diminishing the list to the size that was wanted, and by promoting on to that list by selection? Nothing of the sort. He began by fixing the establishment of generals for the Guards and Line alone at 200, or quite thrice as many generals as are wanted for the service of our entire Army. Then he announced that that was to be an active list, and, consequently, that all general officers over 70 were to be retired; a process which reduced his list to about 200. And then, having fixed a list twice as large as the nation wanted; having reduced the number of generals to the size of that list; he then proceeded to create an enormous number of fresh generals, which eventually increased the list to a great deal more than half again the size which I have named, and announced that it would be the business of the War Office of the future to reduce the list to 200 by checking the rate of promotion for the next generation of officers. Was there ever such a device heard of before? It was foreseen by the Commission of 1854 that a compliant War Minister might some day be persuaded into such a course by the military men who surround him, and they have emphatically condemned it by anticipation, and warned the country against being ever infatuated enough to adopt it. But a Minister has been found to adopt it; and the consequence is that for the passing moment, indeed, we have some younger generals on the list. Here and there among men of 60 and 65, we find a man of 46, 47, and 48. But the advantage has been purchased by the certainty of a block in promotion, such as 10 or 15 years hence would make a major-general of an age for active service a thing to be stared at as a phenomenon; which would break the hearts and ruin the careers of all the ambitious and energetic colonels and officers in our Army. Before promotion returns to the same miserably slow rate of pro-
    1794
    gress at which it crept along before the abolition of Purchase, the list of generals in the Guards and Line alone will have to be reduced by the slow, the cruelly slow, system of absorption of vacancies from 302 to 200. If we require 34 colonels on temporary rank to help our present comparatively young generals to do their duty, how many do you think we shall require when the full effect of Lord Cranbrook's scheme has had time to show itself? To fix the list of generals twice as large as is required, and then to swell that list more than half as much again by giving promotion to the officers of the present, at the expense of the officers of the future, is the most signal instance of subordination of private to public interests that has taken place in the time of any man living. Against that indefensible proceeding the Liberal Party protested, as a Party, in 1877; and I now call upon the Liberals, and upon as many Conservatives as put the interests of the Army before Party considerations, to condemn and to undo it now. To that Resolution which calls for an active list of generals, which should be an active list in fact, and not in name, I have, I believe, the assent of every every energetic and aspiring officer in the Army; and for that Resolution which calls for the abolition of the honorary colonelcies I claim the vote of every economist in the House. What is the real cause of the enormous cost of our Army, in its higher ranks, and what is the great difficulty of ascertaining and reducing that cost? It is that in the case of the Army we have lost sight of the great principle that always should govern the relations between the public and the servants of the public—the principle that those servants should be paid either in the shape of salary for the work that is still doing, or of pension for work that has been done. But these honorary colonelcies are neither salary nor pension. They are nothing more nor less than offices —old sinecure offices, which have descended from the bad old days of corruption and jobbery, and which, even in those bad old days, were distinguished by being especially obnoxious to a public sentiment which was then so little squeamish as to swallow almost anything. In the middle of the last century, people who were revolted at nothing else were revolted at the idea of

    1795
    the so-called leader of a battalion turning a few shillings by the clothing of every live soldier, and a few pounds by the clothing of every dead one; filling the muster-rolls with fictitious names, for which he drew pay, and making a small fortune when the regiment was decimated at a battle, where he was not present, or in an unwholesome climate where it was quartered, while he was comfortably seated over his whist-table in a London Club. And in the middle of this century, public opinion at last became too strong for the continuance of such an evil system. In 1854, Sydney Herbert gave the colonels a fixed allowance, in lieu of their old gains as contractors; but continued to them the responsibility of superintending the clothing of the regiment. But, in the next year, Lord Palmerston took away from them that responsibility, and turned the honorary colonelcies, for good and all, into pure, unadulterated, and unmitigated sinecures. They are not salaries, for the essence of a salary is that work shall be done for it; and, except attending, possibly, the regimental dinner, a colonel did no work, as colonel, from year's end to year's end. And, if possible, still less are they pensions. The characteristic of a pension is that it should be a fixed annual sum, proportioned to the salary and length of service of the person who receives it, beginning from the moment that he retires from service, never increasing in its amount, and, above all, never being enjoyed at the same time as salary. So strictly is this last condition observed in all other Departments, from the highest to the lowest, that when a Cabinet Minister, who has earned a pension, again takes Cabinet Office, his pension is withdrawn. But it is not so in the Army. The Field Marshal Commanding-in-Chief, while he draws £4,432 a-year as Commander-in-Chief, draws £2,200 a-year as colonel of the Grenadier Guards. The Military Secretary, while he draws £1,500 a-year as Military Secretary, draws 1,000 a-year as colonel of a regiment of the Line. The Adjutant General, while he draws£2,000 a-year as Adjutant General, draws£l,000 a-year as colonel of a regiment of the Line. One year and another, there are 20 high placed officers who enjoy these so - called pensions contemporaneously with, and in addition to, most ample
    1796
    salaries. I ask the House of Commons what it would think if it was proposed to introduce this precious system into any other Department of the Public Service? If our Judges of the High Court and our Lord Chancellors were to have, in addition to their salaries, honorary Recorderships or Masterships rising from £1,000 a-year a-pieee? If our admirals were to be gratified by having among them a hundred richly paid honorary post-captaincies, of which the snuggest and best were reserved for themselves by the high naval officials who distributed the rewards of the Service at Whitehall? The truth is that the whole thing is indefensible, and all War Ministers for a long time past have known it.
    "I am not at all disposed," said Lord Card-well, "to enter upon a defence of the system of honorary colonelcies."
    Lord Hampton went further—
    "I desire," he said, "to disclaim on my own part any defence of the system of honorary colonelcies; for I think that the system is not a good one, and might very easily he improved."
    There never was but one tenable ground of defence for them, and that ground can be held no longer. There was a time when they were employed to compensate officers for the vast and frightful losses of money which they endured under the system of Purchase in the Army. In the year 1833 a Committee of the House of Commons sat to inquire into military sinecures, which, at that time, included the honorary Governorship of a great number of old unused castles, such as Berwick, Scarborough, Tynemouth, and Pendennis, but which, then as now, consisted mainly in the honorary colonelcies. The Duke of Wellington appeared as a witness to defend these sinecures, and to defend, at the same time, the enormous size of the list of generals. The ground of his defence was nothing more nor less than that officers must be compensated by sinecures for the money which they had sunk in buying their commissions.
    "They have purchased," he said, "their commissions for large sums, and, being colonels of regiments, they cannot sell out; their money is sunk in the Service, and lost to them and their families for ever."
    The officer sunk his money, and was half ruined, and the public had to maintain the expense of a great mass of

    1797
    sinecures in order to ease the burden of those whom the Purchase system had stripped bare of their property. But now Purchase has gone—has gone long ago; and all this mass of honorary offices, and this great overgrown list of generals, ought long ago to have gone with it. Since the day when I first asked the House, more than nine years ago, to stop the appointments to honorary colonelcies, no less than three-fourths of the present generals have obtained their promotion to the list, and have taken their place among the claimants for these offices. When the day conies for them to be abolished, as it surely will, heavy and grave will be the responsibility of the Parliament which, by rejecting the Resolution which is now submitted to it, entails such an immense and needless additional burden upon the Exchequer. The prospects of lieutenant generals and major generals who look forward to colonelcies should be accurately reckoned, and made good to them in the shape of pensions, immediate or deferred; but the injustice, for it is nothing less, of a system under which officials at the Horse Guards being allowed to draw, in addition to their salaries, these great sums of money which they themselves defend, upon the ground that they are pensions for meritorious officers, should be put a stop to now, at once and for ever. The right hon. Gentleman at the War Office is the man to do this. He it was who, by a well considered and most successful scheme, depleted the over full ranks of admirals and post captains in the Navy with advantage alike to the officers who went and the officers who remained. Let the right hon. Gentleman ascertain how many officers are wanted for actual employment; how many generals to command at Gibraltar and Aldershot, in India and in Ireland; how many lieutenant generals are required to command divisions; how many major generals to command brigades; just as the Lord Chancellor ascertains how many Judges are required in each section of the High Court. Then, having ascertained what the duties are, and having allotted an officer of the proper rank to each, let him allot to each officer an adequate salary. I am not one of those who think that a working major general is overpaid on £700 a-year, and 12s.
    1798
    a-day allowances. And let nobody thenceforward be made or called a general, unless a general is wanted to do general's duties; and then let the fittest man be taken. Now that we have no longer got Purchase we must have selection. There is no real difficulty about it. Before Purchase was abolished the Duke of Cambridge came before a Royal Commission, and announced that he, as responsible head of the Army, did not feel equal to selecting lieutenant colonels to command battalions. But Purchase was abolished, and His Royal Highness found himself quite competent to appoint lieutenant colonels. So, if Parliament insists upon it, he will find the selection of generals no impossible task. The truth is that when the duties to which a man is promoted are real duties promotion almost makes itself, and the best man is sure to be selected. Let the Government give the country the 100 generals for whom it has work, and restore to the name of general the prestige which will accrue to it when it is a reality instead of being, as it so often is, a sham; and you will do as much to educate the public spirit and maintain the efficiency of the Army as, in the end, you will do to save the pocket of the taxpayer. And, when generals are past work, let them retire on a fair and certain pension proportioned to their rank. Two or sometimes even three deserving officers might be pensioned for the sum that now is consumed in addition to a salary by one man or another who is not a retired officer at all; by reducing the Active List of generals to what the Service required; and by retiring superannuated generals on a fixed and well-ascertained scale of pension, you will save to the nation an annual sum the capital of which will more than cover half the capital which was expended, and, wisely expended, in abolishing Purchase. That course is one which, as Englishmen solicitous for the condition of the Army, and as Members of Parliament who are guardians of the public purse, we are equally bound to take, and in the confidence that many present will agree with me, I beg to move the first Resolution of which I have given Notice, and, subsequently, if that is carried, the second.
    MR. ANDERSONsaid, he had great pleasure in seconding the Motion of his

    1799
    hon. Friend (Mr. Trevelyan), and he hoped the same success which attended a portion of the Resolutions moved some years ago would follow that now before the House. What he alluded to was a set of Resolutions, one of which was for the abolition of Purchase, which had been rendered unnecessary by being taken up by the Government of the day, and which had been moved by his hon. Friend and seconded by himself. The reforms which the hon. Gentleman proposed to carry out, and the abuses which he had pointed out in the great age of our generals, and the great number of them, were matters which had been pointed out over and over again, and still remained mi-reformed; and he thought, considering the opportunity presented to the country so excellently by the abolition of the Purchase system, it was not creditable to Parliament that it had not occupied itself since that time in making the necessary reforms. But there was a great obstacle to all reforms in the Army; and he felt satisfied that, strong as the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Childers) was, he could not overcome the vis inertia which prevailed at headquarters, which was at the Horse Guards under the old system, and was now at the War Office; while the Commander-in-Chief was not only a Royal, but a sort of life appointment. It was worse long ago, for not only was the Commander-in-Chief, but the Military Secretary as well, was a kind of permanent appointment. By agitation in the House they got rid of the Military Secretary, and got that office turned into a five years' appointment, and he was afraid there would be no geuuine reforms in the Army until the Commandership-in-Chief was made a Staff appointment of the same five years' duration. He believed the Commander-in-Chief was a most excellent officer. He, no doubt, thoroughly understood the Army as, perhaps, no other man did; but he was prejudiced by belonging to the old school, and while he understood the Army he managed it in the old school way. He believed there would be no reform as long as the present system remained. There was another way in which that difficulty could be got over if the right hon. Gentleman would treat the Army government in another manner. There used to be a Lord High Admiral to manage the Navy; but that was so in-
    1800
    convenient that it was abolished, and the Navy was put under a Board of Admiralty. Why not abolish the Commander-in-Chief, who bore the very same relation to the Army which the Lord High Admiral did to the Navy, and let the Army be put under a Board similar to what the Navy was put under? He believed under such a system, with younger men, they would have reforms which, without it, they could never have. His hon. Friend the Member for the Border Burghs had so completely covered all the ground that he would not detain the House long, or stand in the way of those military Gentlemen who wished to take part in the discussion. He should, therefore, only say a few more words, and those would be on the honorary colonelcies. The hon. Member had stated that the cost of them was £203,000. He understood that in 1871 the figure was £162,500, and he was sorry to find that the amount had increased by some £40,000 since that date. He had hoped that the amount had decreased; because he had seen that, time after time, certain regiments had been given to Royal Dukes. Now, he would like some little explanation about that, and he had no doubt the right hon. Gentleman knew how that increase had taken place. They were informed by Lord Cardwell that when several regiments were given to Royal Dukes they were only paid for one of them. Thus the Prince of Wales was paid £1,350 for the 10th Hussars, and the Duke of Cambridge £2,200 for the Grenadier Guards, while they were told that the other regiments they held were purely honorary. He wanted to know if that remained the fact now, and if the other regiments since given to those distinguished personages were entirely honorary. He found the Prince of Wales had not only the 10th Hussars, but also the Rifle Brigade; and the Duke of Cambridge had not only the Grenadier Guards, but the 17th Lancers, the Royal Artillery, the Royal Engineers, and the 60th Rifles. He wished to know if the whole of them were honorary. He believed they were, and he hoped that was the fact; but, in recent discussions, he had seen it stated otherwise in print; and he thought the facts of the case ought to be made known to the country. If they were honorary, he, for his part, hoped that before long the

    1801
    Duke of Cambridge would get the whole of them. That seemed to him an easy way out of the difficulty. If the colonelcy of every regiment was given to the Prince of Wales or the Duke of Cambridge without pay, as an additional honour, as soon as it became vacant, they would in that way get rid of all that they complained of, and in a satisfactory manner. The hon. Member had spoken about there being no defence of the honorary coloncies by anyone; but he (Mr. Anderson) remembered very well that they had sometimes been defended by Lord Cranbrook—then Mr. Gathorne Hardy—who had stated that these positions were fair rewards for an honoured career, and that such prizes were given for long and high services. But if they were really so, it was rather a remarkable fact that so many of them went into the War Office or Horse Guards. In fact, they were entirely the result of a system of selection, and of a kind of selection that seemed to have become pure favouritism. That was one of the grounds on which he thought these appointments in the highest degree unsatisfactory; and he agreed with the hon. Member in thinking that the sooner the country got rid of them, and instituted some more satisfactory system, the better it would be for the Army. He had great pleasure in seconding the Resolution.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That steps should at once be taken to reduce the active list of generals to the point at which it is adequate, and no more than adequate, to the actual requirements of the service of the Country."—(Mr. Trevelyan.)
    COLONEL LOYD LINDSAYsaid, he had listened with great interest to the speech of the hon. Member for the Border Burghs (Mr. Trevelyan), and had closely followed up all the facts and deductions that had been adduced; but he entirely failed to see that he had succeeded in establishing his ease. The hon. Gentleman began by drawing a comparison between foreign Armies— especially that of Germany—and our own; but he (Colonel Loyd Lindsay) must at once say that such comparisons were really of little worth, unless a similarity between the two cases could be proved; and it should be borne in mind that we had large Colonial possessions to watch over, where officers had to be constantly sent to fill important
    1802
    appointments and carry out various duties in connection with those places. His hon. Friend went on to describe a state of things which, as a matter of fact, had entirely disappeared from our Service. He showed how, in former days, general officers who commanded regiments were men engaged in all sorts of business connected with the clothing and establishment of their respective corps; but his remarks on that head, though they might very well bear on the circumstances of 25 years ago, were in no way applicable, as hon. Members knew, to the present condition of affairs. At the present moment, the honorary colonels who had been denounced had nothing to do with the discipline or conduct of the regiments they commanded. What was their position? They were simply men in receipt of a pension for long and honourable past services in the Army, and nothing else. That was, in his opinion, the only defence which could be set up with regard to those colonelcies; and if they were abolished, what gain, he would ask, could be arrived at except an economic one? and he was unable, he confessed, to see how any such gain would arise. These general officers, who were borne on the Establishment of the Army, were receiving £450 a-year. Anyone looking at The Army List would find that they were borne on the non-effective side of the Estimates; and surely £450 a-year was no large pension for a man who had served, perhaps, 40 years in the Army. What, he would ask, was the position of an officer who had ceased to be in command of his regiment, his five years having expired? Reviewing his position, an officer so placed would find that if he retired he would receive as colonel £420 a-year, and the difference between that and £450 (the pay of a general officer) was only £30 a-year. Beyond that, it was, he thought, without doubt, very gratifying to such a man to be allowed to call himself general. If his hon. Friend desired, as he understood he did, to limit the number of appointments, and to lay down a rule that there should be only a certain number of general officers—as many as there were appointments to give away—the result of the adoption of his proposal would be to narrow the field of choice to such an extent that it would be impossible for the authorities to pick and

    1803
    choose the men they would wish to select. Now, in every business in life, if a man desired to be master of the situation, it was better, he maintained, to have half-a-dozen persons from whom to make a selection than to be limited to one; and, as matters now stood, the Secretary of State had the whole list of general officers from whom to pick. If an officer retired, he had to consider that £420 a-year was his retiring allowance; but he might say to himself that he would rather run the risk of going on and taking the chance of becoming a general officer. Before he could attain to that he would have to wait, perhaps four, five, or six years, and what pay did he receive during all that time? Two hundred a-year; while supposing that he had retired as a colonel on £420, there was a distinct gain to the State of the difference between those two sums. His hon. Friend, he might add, in the comparison which he drew between our own and foreign Armies, did not say a single word about the Militia, the Re-serves, or the Volunteers, nor give the House any idea of what the establishment of general officers for that large number of about 450,000 men would be. His hon. Friend made a great point of the age of the generals who served in the old days. But those days had now gone by; and though the services of young officers were very desirable, it should not be forgotten that some of the most successful generals of our times were advanced in years. What did his hon. Friend say to Moltke, Blumenthal, and Sir Colin Campbell, who was already old at the time of the Crimean war, but who still was subsequently selected to command our Forces in the Mutiny? Why, his hon. Friend, by his system of excluding men at 65 or 70 years of age, would have prevented these eminent men from rendering service to their countries. In our existing system, against which the proposals of the hon. Member were levelled, there were, no doubt, blots; but he maintained that it had on the whole worked satisfactorily, and it should, therefore, continue to have his support.
    SIR HARRY VERNEYthought the real question for the House to consider in connection with the subject under notice was whether the Army was overpaid. He was of opinion, upon that point, that no comparison could be
    1804
    made between our Army and that of any other nation, for the British Army did much more important and dangerous service, and received less pay, than any other Army in the world. Its circumstances were very different from those of the Armies of any other country, being liable to service abroad at any moment, whereas the Prussian Army resided in its own villages and in its own homes. For his part, he did not mind whether generals had pensions or regiments, but to bring the interests of the Service into account, he should prefer their having regiments, as the honorary colonels often did everything they could to benefit the regiments with which they were connected and to minister to their comfort. There was one great advantage in having a large number of general officers — namely, the advantage gained by having many men from whom to make selections. For general officers they wanted to be able to select young men, and he regretted that there were not more of them to choose from. No man could be more opposed than he to favouritism; and he was convinced that his right hon. Friend (Mr. Childers) would not fail to introduce many of the reforms in the administration of the Army of which it stood in need.
    MR. CHILDERSsaid, he was sure the House would permit him to congratulate his hon. Friend (Mr. Trevelyan) on the instructive statement with which he accompanied his Motion. No one would appreciate that statement more than himself (Mr. Childers), because he could not help remembering the time when his hon. Friend stood shoulder to shoulder and side by side with him (Mr. Childers) at the Admiralty, to fight a question very similar to this, in going through the details of the very great reforms found absolutely necessary for the administration of the Navy; and for which, however great might have been the differences of opinion at the time, both as to principle and details, he believed they might now claim that it had been entirely successful, and that not only the Service generally, but the prospects of officers, had been greatly improved. For that reason, on whatever points he and his hon. Friend agreed or did not agree, he begged to thank him for having brought forward so manfully a great scheme of reform in connection with the higher ranks of the Army. He felt sure

    1805
    that the debate, whatever their individual opinions or the intentions of the Government might be, could not but be beneficial and helpful to those who, sooner or later, would have to deal with the question. His hon. Friend would, perhaps, allow him to say that it would, however, be rather hard upon those who were now responsible for the administration of the Army, if it were held that on the spur of the moment, when the Government had not been two months in Office, it was their duty to take steps for greatly reducing the list of generals, or to put an end altogether to the appointment of honorary colonels, and commence from the present month a totally different system from that now in existence. That would not be a reasonable proposition. What he should, in reply, endeavour to do was to show in what respect he felt himself bound to agree with his hon. Friend in the principles which he had laid down, and in what respects his views were open to considerable question. He should then indicate what course the Government had intended to follow, irrespective of the Motion his hon. Friend had brought forward, and he would appeal to his hon. Friend to say whether or not he considered the Government were pursuing the right path. He must ask the indulgence of the House, considering the enormous mass of complicated questions which he and his advisers found unsettled when they took Office, if it should be thought that they were not proceeding so rapidly as could be wished. There might be some appearance of slowness; but he might speak for himself, and he thought also for his Colleagues, that when they had once made up their minds they would not hesitate to carry their plans into effect. But it must not be forgotten that those who had held responsible positions like the charge of the great Services had to balance considerations of a very delicate character; and in the case before the House there were especial considerations to be borne in mind, as affecting both the feelings and claims of those who devoted their lives to their country. The Government felt it incumbent on them to proceed with caution and deliberation. He thought his hon. Friend had failed to realize some of the essential facts of his case. He had referred to the perfect organization of the German
    1806
    Army. That organization had involved enormous labour on the part of its authors, and there was much for us to learn from it. But, at the same time, he must remind his hon. Friend that the conditions of the Service were totally different from those which existed in the English Army. Germany had no India and no Colonies; her Armies could never have occasion to go more than 500 or 1,000 miles from her frontier. She was, essentially, a compact Power, both in respect of her internal and external requirements. The requirements of the English Administration extended from pole to pole and all round the world; probably over a greater distance than had ever been subject to any Power, unless it were Spain under Charles V. and Philip II. That was a valid reason why the German Army could not be taken in all respects as a model for us, and why it was by no means easy to adopt the proposition of his hon. Friend to follow her in fixing the number of generals. But he must say he did not understand where his hon. Friend got his figures from. He could not accept their accuracy. His hon. Friend had given the number of general officers on the Active List as 600; but that was not correct. He (Mr. Childers) had before him statements of the actual number of British general officers, whether in connection with the Army proper, or the Indian Staff Corps, and under no possible arrangement could he see there were 600 Generals on the Active List of the Army. The number was very considerably less than that. Perhaps the House would allow him to state what the present arrangements of the Army were as to the numbers of general officers, and the nature of the emoluments, whether they were called pay, pension, or salary. Now, the state of things appeared to be these. There was a List which was called the Establishment of General Officers. That consisted of a body of 292 general officers of Cavalry and Infantry in England, and 50 general officers of Artillery and Engineers; but it was contemplated by the Warrant of 1877 to reduce the number 292 to 200. The Artillery and Engineers were intended to be left as at present. That was, strictly speaking, what might be called the Active List of general officers, and it was supplemented by the Retired List of general officers under the War-

    1807
    rant of 1877. He must admit that he thought it was in many respects a curious anomaly that the general officers on the Active List and the body of retired general officers under the Warrant of 1877 received precisely the same emoluments. In either case it was £450 a-year, and in either case the general might receive at some future time £1,000 a-year in the shape of some honorary colonelcy. But there was no question but that this was a very remarkable anomaly; and he was bound to say that, in his opinion, it was quite indefensible in principle. His hon. Friend who moved the Resolution had clearly defined what a pension ought to be, and none of the conditions of a pension were to be found in the case with which he was dealing. In fact, all the arrangements in this respect were curious and anomalous, and, in his opinion, had nothing to justify them but their antiquity. He would also admit that the arrangement for the pay of general officers seemed to him almost as anomalous. A colonel, when he reached that position, had the option of either taking a pension of £420 a-year, with the ordinary rank of general, or remaining in the Service on pay at the rate of £200 a-year, hoping some day to succeed to the establishment of general officer. When he attained the establishment he received a rate of pay which never altered, whether he became a lieutenant general or a full general; but waited on in the hope that a vacancy on the list of honorary colonelcies would provide him with £1,000 a-year. It was quite true that in awarding honorary colonelcies he believed the Army universally felt that the Commander-in-Chief very wisely exercised his discretion, and with great fairness. But both as to progressive pay, and as to the system of pension, he was bound to admit that, in his humble judgment, the view expressed by his hon. Friend (Mr. Tre-velyan) was precisely the view on which the great reform was introduced at the Admiralty which had worked so well; and it was a view which they ought to take into consideration in any arrangement affecting the superior officers of the Army. He would go a little further. With respect to what his hon. Friend had said in reference to the size of the list, it was, no doubt, the case that the late Government followed gene-
    1808
    rally the advice of the Royal Commission; but, in one respect, the Government went very much beyond the Report. There was to be a considerable reduction in the list of general officers; but, instead of taking full advantage of the large retirement for age, the Government had filled up the vacancies, creating an enormous promotion in 1877, and left to their successors the disagreeable task of gradual reduction. Whether that was a wise arrangement or not was not for him (Mr. Childers) to say—it was a matter which had passed, and could not be re-considered now. The Report of the Royal Commission made mention of honorary colonelcies, not defending them in principle, but stating that the system was not unpopular; and they also pointed out that disqualifications which might apply to active service would not apply in time of peace, and that it would be erroneous to regard the Establishment as if it were only composed of officers who were intended for active service. He had always regarded that Report as having added very greatly to their knowledge, and guided them satisfactorily to many changes which had to follow the abolition of Purchase; but he was bound to admit that, in his opinion, the Commission did not give sufficient time to the consideration of the proper position of the Establishment of general officers. He would not blame the War Office, because the changes which were recommended and effected by the Commission were so vast and the difficulty so great; but the full deliberation which it deserved had not yet been given to the important question of the proper construction of the Active List of generals. He did not think, for instance, that it was in consonance with what they had found to be advantageous of late years that the Active List should consist of persons admittedly not fit for active service. He would sum up with three or four suggestions. He thought it was well worthy of consideration whether it would not be advantageous to the Public Service to carry the change effected in 1877 by the construction of the Retired List a good deal further, so that the Active List should more nearly represent the numbers of officers really competent for active service, and should bear a nearer relation to such number as might be required, not only in time of peace, but

    1809
    also in time of war. In that respect, they ought to take time and care to see how far they could move in that direction; and also, they should, as soon as possible, and with a due regard to vested interests — which the hon. Gentleman himself was anxious to respect—see whether it would not be possible to abandon the anomalous system which made the emoluments of officers on the Retired List the same as those of the Active List, and which left open to the one as to the other that enormous jump from £450 to £1,000, the latter sum being one many officers for a long time on the Active List or on the Retired List never attained. His hon. Friend had referred to the arrangements that had been made in the Navy. He (Mr. Childers) did not say that those arrangements ought to be literally copied. But they must remember that the depletion of the Active List of the Navy was effected not only by the limit of age, but by that most important condition which it was, in the first instance, somewhat difficult to carry out—namely, that officers should, after a certain period of non-service, be compelled to retire. That was the most effective weapon for keeping the Ser-vicein anhealthycondition. Thehalf-pay of a rear admiral was the same as that of a major general on the Establishment— about £450 a-year; but the pay of a vice admiral was nearly £600 a-year, and the pay of an admiral was something over £750 a-year, while the lieutenant generals' and generals' remained a constant quantity. So, also, the retired pay of a rear admiral averaged £600 a-year, that of a vice admiral £750 a-year, and that of an admiral £900 a-year. He hoped the House would encourage and assist the Government, if they should find it practicable, to apply a similar system to the Army—a system which would, in time, get rid of the colonels of regiments, except as honorary officers connected as such with the regiments to which they had belonged, and would be so adjusted as not to disappoint the legitimate expectations of those who were on the major generals' list. Of one thing he was perfectly certain. The Royal Commission of 1876 said that the only justification of the present arrangements in the Army was to be found in the fact that they were not unpopular; and he was certain that if they adapted to the Army the
    1810
    system in the Navy to which he had adverted, it would not be unpopular, provided that great pains were taken to respect vested interests. In that case, he felt sure that such a reform as he had indicated would be beneficial to the Service. He, therefore, hoped that the House would accept the statement he had now made as an earnest of a genuine intention on the part of the Government to do what they could to put the future arrangements as to the appointment, the promotion, the number, and the retirement of general officers of the Army on a satisfactory footing. His hon. Friend knew as well as he (Mr. Childers) what were the difficulties which they had to go through at the Admiralty, and the complexity of the details of the settlement there. All this would have to be gone through in regard to the Army; and he trusted that his hon. Friend would admit that his statement showed their earnest desire to grapple that subject, and to proceed with it in the direction which had been approved by Parliament in the case of the sister Service. If his hon. Friend, and those who thought with him, would leave to the Government the task of seeing with what details and conditions such a change as that should be effected, he would probably not deem it necessary to pledge the House in the words of his Resolution to an immediate alteration, which it would be impossible to carry out without very considerable difficulties, and also without injury to the Service, but which, if accomplished with discretion and after due inquiry, would, he believed, be acceptable alike to the House, to the Army, and to the country.
    LORD EUSTACE CECILsaid, he understood that his hon. Friend the Member for the Border Burghs (Mr. Tre-velyan) had advocated a scheme of reform that deserved considerable attention; but he (Lord Eustace Cecil) must admit, from his own official experience, that there was much to be said in favour of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Childers) refraining from taking the subject in hand at once, because there were a great many questions connected with the Army still pending, and likely to be pending for several years; and it was hardly fair, therefore, to expect that the right hon. Gentleman should have already made himself

    1811
    master of all those questions, and should have been able during the short time he had held his present Office to give the House a complete idea of any scheme of reform which he might hereafter propose. He (Lord Eustace Cecil) understood that the hon. Member for the Border Burghs had drawn a comparison between our Army and foreign Armies; but in looking at the list of generals in foreign Armies, he thought that that hon. Member had only obtained the list of those who were actively employed. When, however, they compared the number of generals in our Army with the number in foreign Armies, it should be remembered that, whether the system was bad or good, tradition had long established the custom of amalgamating the generals of all branches of our Army together; and it was only since the Warrant of 1877 that what was called a Retired List had been placed in The Army List, so that those generals who were ineffective from age were put aside by themselves. He admitted that a re-arrangement of the list would be desirable; but that was, after all, a matter of detail. As to the number of generals, his right hon. Friend said, and said truly, that the hon. Member for the Border Burghs did not state the number correctly. The list of generals, said the hon. Member, was as many as 600. In l878 the number, no doubt, was 632; but he (Lord Eustace Cecil) looked into The Army List for June, 1880, and found that the number had dropped down to 476. As to the question of economy, the hon. Member for the Border Burghs thought that by some arrangements he might save certain portions of that rather miserable sum— something like £300,000 a-year—that they paid to general officers. When they compared the pay of general officers with the emoluments of the Law, the Church, or several other Professions, he thought that £400 or £600, or it might be £1,000 a-year for an honorary colonelcy was not, after all, too much to be received by a man who had been in the Service 30 or 40 years, and who, perhaps, had been wounded in the service of his country. The hon. Member for the Border Burghs might wish to abolish honorary colonelcies; but he did not believe that the hon. Member wished to abolish pensions. He believed the hon. Member wished to see an Active List—that there should not be anything further than a re-arrangement
    1812
    of the present system. The question as to certain allowances which were received by illustrious and distinguished personages who had to deal with our Army was a very delicate one. Whether the actual sum they received was too much for the work they did he must leave to Ministers of the Crown to decide. He thought there should have been a little more consideration on the part of hon. Members who looked with a certain amount of jealousy upon some honorary colonelcies held by illustrious Princes in this country; but he thought that those hon. Members ought to inquire into the facts, and consider them more carefully, before they referred so publicly and invidiously to the offices and emoluments of these illustrious personages. If it could be shown that the pay and pensions which the latter received were more than the duties they discharged entitled them to, they, he was sure, would be the first to offer to resign these emoluments. He could only repeat that whenever the right hon. Gentleman brought forward his promised reforms they would be considered on that side of the House without prejudice; and he hoped they would be just and characterized by a spirit of fairness.
    MR. TREVELYAN, in reply, said, he should not trouble the House with many remarks on the criticisms which his views had undergone. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the War Office (Mr. Childers) had spoken with courtesy, and he thought also with wisdom and thorough knowledge of the Department over which he presided, in what he had said; but he (Mr. Trevelyan) could not concur in the remark he made to the effect that the Resolution was somewhat premature. So far as the right hon. Gentleman was concerned, it certainly was not. It was 10 years ago that Purchase was abolished, so that there was little ground for alleging the Resolution to be premature; and he did not think it was premature as regarded the public feeling on the subject. The right hon. Gentleman had called in question some of his (Mr. Trevelyan's) figures; but there could be no doubt that England and India, one year with another, were now spending £750,000 annually on their generals, and only 63 were employed, so that each really cost the country £12,000 or £12,500 a-year. The answer of his right hon. Friend was

    1813
    satisfactory to his mind. He gathered from it that the honorary colonelcies were going. That was the necessary corollary from the re- arrangements which they were told were to take place between pay and pensions. What he was still more interested in, however, was this—that henceforth the rank of general should imply that certain duties were to be discharged by the officer who held it, and that he should be taken by seniority, and not by selection. That was enough for him. And as to promotion by selection, not by seniority, he took leave to draw the inference that when the list of generals was only adequate to the performance of the duties of generals, the officers on that list would be promoted by selection. After the speech of the right hon. Gentleman and the feeling which the House had manifested, he felt he should not be justified in asking for a division, and he left the subject with the most perfect confidence in the hands of the Government.
    GENERAL BURNABYsaid, he would say, with reference to the remarks of the hon. Member for Glasgow (Mr. Anderson), that the Commander-in-Chief had most important duties to discharge, and it would be most unfortunate if his tenure of office was limited to the term of five years. The Duke of Cambridge, abstracting himself from all other avocations, had devoted himself to the welfare of the Army. So far from being prejudiced, he was opposed to change for the mere sake of change, it was true, but there was no man who was a stronger advocate for all those rational and well-considered measures which the lapse of years and altered circumstances had necessitated. He was an officer endeared to the Army and trusted by the nation, and it would be extremely unwise to limit the tenure of his office as proposed. The hon. Member who brought forward the Motion (Mr. Trevelyan), he might add, had left entirely out of account the Militia and Volunteers, who, with the Regular Army, constituted a body of something like 500,000 men ready at any moment, to say nothing of another 500,000 who had passed through the ranks, many of whom, no doubt, could be raised, and who would require to be officered.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  MAINTENANCE OF MAIN ROADS.

    RESOLUTION.
    MR. R. H. PAGET,in rising to call the attention of the House to the expense of maintaining Main Roads, and to move—
    "That, in the opinion of this House, it is not just that the cost of the maintenance of Main Roads should he wholly and entirely home by the Local Rates,"
    said, that a Petition on the subject, very numerously signed, had been presented from the county of Somerset, in which it was alleged that, owing to the abolition of turnpikes, a grievous burden had been thrown on the agricultural interest for the purpose of keeping the roads in repair; and he hoped the Government would not lightly set aside the claims of Petitioners to be heard because those claims were urged with moderation.
    Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members being found present,
    MR. R. H. PAGETresumed. He held in his hand a Return which showed that there were 10,000 miles of main roads, which were maintained at an expense of £300,000—an average of £31 per mile—while the mileage of roads not main roads was 57,000, and the average cost per mile £14. The main roads were intended for the benefit of the community, and without them the ordinary commercial enterprizes of the country could not be carried on. The burden of maintaining them, however, fell solely upon the ratepayers, who justly held that they were aggrieved. When the turnpike system was in vogue the burden of maintenance was borne by the public at large; but, by the abolition of the system, the burden, to the extent of £500,000 a-year, was transferred to the shoulders of the ratepayers—in other words, partly on the owner and partly on the occupier. That, he contended, was unjust and unreasonable. The question was, Who was to pay for the maintenance of the highways? It would be said that the proper persons to pay were the landlords. That was one of the stock arguments which were always being brought forward. But it was an argument which ought at once to be thrown aside. The Amendment which had been brought forward

    1815
    was no Amendment at all. It was said that the cost of maintaining the roads ought to be borne by the occupiers. But that position was entirely untenable. Then it was said that there ought to be a division of the rates. But he felt sure that no relief would be obtained in that way. He thought that no satisfactory settlement would be reached until they reverted to the principles which were adopted in earlier days, when all who used the roads wore made to pay for their maintenance and repair. Those principles were laid down in a well-known Statute, the 43rd Elizabeth, which provided that the liability to pay should be in proportion to the ability to pay. Everybody had to supply labour for the maintenance of the roads with horses and carts, and, if he had no horses or carts, with personal labour. Hon. Gentlemen opposite were much interested in the Land Question, and were, many of them, anxious to create a peasant proprietary; but, in the present state of things, the burdens on land were so great that nobody would be anxious to take them upon his shoulders. He wanted to draw attention to one fact— the progress of personalty and realty. They were both progressing year by year; but while realty—land and houses —was making steady advances, personalty was advancing by leaps and bounds. Now, what he maintained was this—that, in view of the these facts, every Chancellor of the Exchequer should carefully consider the adjustment of taxation, and should maintain it without considering how it affected these two classes of property. Under the auspices of the late Government advances were made in aid of local taxation; but the new charges had absorbed the whole of the recent subventions. He pointed out these evils; it was no part of his business to find a remedy; but there were more ways than one of meeting the evil. One was the method of subvention out of Imperial funds, with which they were all familiar. Then there was the Bill which had been laid on the Table for the establishment of a horse tax, in order to create a fund in aid of the roads. It had also been suggested that the assessed taxes should be thus employed. It had further been suggested—a suggestion which he was inclined to think the most feasible—that the dog tax should be handed over to
    1816
    the local authorities in aid of the maintenance of roads. A few years ago the Commissioners of Inland Revenue recommended—what was now practically carried out—that the dog tax should be collected by the county police. Moreover, in Ireland, the dog tax was handed over to the local authorities, and that was a precedent entirely in point. The amount of the dog tax received in 1878 was £371,000, and a Return made up to Lady Day in the next year brought it up to £422,000. The allocation of a tax which might be collected in the country and applied to country uses, as was done in Ireland, would be a lit mode of meeting a just and reasonable claim. The Highway Act had had the effect of introducing a classification of roads, and if the State singled out the main roads as entitled to such a contribution for their maintenance they would be found ready to its hand. In conclusion, he might say that the grievances of the English farmers were not urged with the vehemence with which those of their brethren in the sister Island were often put forward; but they ought not on that account to receive less consideration from the House, for there was no question to which attention was so much turned in the rural districts as the one included in his present Motion. This question should not be pooh-poohed. The farmers of the country asked, not for favour, but for justice. They would be found among the most loyal of the people. "These burdens," they said, "are new; they were imposed at a time when we were afflicted, and we have a right to ask that these things should be carefully considered." This was no imaginary grievance. The demand was moderate, and he had urged it temperately. He begged to move the Resolution of which he had given Notice.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That, in the opinion of this House, it is not just that the cost of maintenance of Slain Roads should he wholly and entirely home by the. Local Rates."—(Mr. Richard Paget.)
    MR. J. R. YORKEsaid, this question was, as hishon. Friend (Mr.R. H. Paget) had stated, one of great and ever pressing importance. Most county Members on that side of the House, who had to attend Vestry and other meetings of their constituents, in the course of the Recess,

    1817
    must have remarked what very great importance appeared to be attached to the subject in the minds of their rural constituents. He could only say, for himself, that whereas foreign affairs were in a troubled condition, and Members of Parliament sometimes addressed harangues, treating of Eastern and other foreign questions to their constituents, their remarks on those subjects fell comparatively flat on the ears of the audience, compared with the avidity with which they listened to any allusions to agricultural questions, and more especially when they treated of the highway grievance. That, he thought, was the experience of almost all of them; and they felt very strongly that the Session ought not to pass by without a new Parliament and a new Government having their attention directed as forcibly as possible to the pressing importance of this question. His hon. Friend had narrated, with great accuracy, the history of the question. There was no doubt that turnpikes, for some time past, had been felt to be a doomed institution. Whatever their merits, and, as his hon. Friend very properly said, they were constituted on the principle that those who used roads should pay for them, and that they should pay for them just in proportion to the amount in which they used them, still they were, to a certain extent, an anachronism, dating back to the time when road traffic was much more important, before the introduction of railways, and when the relative cost of collection was nothing like so great as at present. When the cost of collection, in some cases, amounted to something like 30 per cent on the total receipts, it became evident that an institution such as that of turnpikes could no longer be reckoned among the permanent institutions of the country. Well, the way in which this matter first came before the public was in consequence of the injustice and the hardships of the piecemeal disturnpiking of roads. Every year most of the country Members had applications made to them, from districts scheduled, for disturnpiking by the Turnpike Committee, and every year some victims were selected for a termination of their precarious existence. The Turnpike Committee in 1877 made a Report, which showed the embarrassment which they experienced in dealing with those matters. They said the circumstances
    1818
    of the several trusts varied so much that it was impossible to apply any one rule. In some districts the turnpike road formed a thoroughfare between two populous towns, and almost assumed the character of a street, large sums being paid out of the tolls for lighting and watering. They continued—
    "In such cases, and where no agricultural district intervened, your Committee had no difficulty in recommending that the Trust should he discontinued. But no greater cases of prospective hardship in parishes came before your Committee than where a line of road, with a very heavy mineral traffic, between two towns, or to and from a railway station, passed for a considerable distance through agricultural parishes."
    And the next sentence was important, because they said—
    "Whatever may be the provision for other parts of the country, it seems to your Committee that some general provision will have to be made to meet the cases."
    Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
    House adjourned at half after Twelve o'clock.