HC Deb 11 June 1880 vol 252 cc1785-811

Order for Second Heading read.

LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISH

, in moving, "that the Bill be now read a second time," said, he should be very brief, as various measures connected with the question had occupied the attention of the House during the last Parliament, when the Belief of Distress (Ireland) Act was first brought forward. He therefore hoped the House would, with as little delay as possible, pass the second reading of the Bill. When a measure on this question was before the House in February last, they knew that several months of great distress in Ireland must inevitably pass away before the harvest; but now they might look forward to a good harvest, and therefore provision would only have to be made for a few months, and by August, when the Act would be able to put in force, they hoped that the distress would be at an end. Their reason for not going into the larger questions which occupied the attention of the last Parliament was that those questions were fully discussed, and that Parliament decided in favour of certain measures by decisive majorities; but whether or not those measures were the best that could have been adopted, he should not now stop to consider. Still, they knew that the worst extremities of the distress had been avoided, and that death from starvation and disease consequent upon suffering had at least been averted. The main object of the present Bill was to provide the funds for carrying out the Relief of Distress (Ireland) Act of last Parliament. Under the Seed Potatoes Bill loans were advanced from the Public Exchequer to the considerable sum of £570,000; and further provision was made for advances by the Public Works Loans Commissioners in aid of the Unions to meet expenses in connection with out-door relief. In addition to those two provisions, advances of three different sorts had been authorized out of the Church Surplus Fund, as there would be advances made to landowners for improvements on their estates. When the question was first introduced into Parliament, it was thought, after some inquiry, the sum required would not exceed £250,000; but, before the Bill passed, it was found that £750,000 would be requisite, and it had been found since that the applications for loans largely exceeded the Estimate presented to Parliament. Those from landowners were for £1,200,000; the amount applied for by sanitary authorities was £118,000; and the baronial sessions applied for £185,000. It had been said that many of those applications would fall through; but whether or not that would be the case, it was impossible to say decidedly; but they had the fact that applications for loans had been made by 2,182 landowners, provision had been made for 1,723, and only 63 had been refused. It would have been impossible for those who were responsible to act on the presumption that a large proportion of the sum would not be required, and, after a careful consideration of the Estimate, they did not think it safe to provide a less sum than £1,500,000, excluding the £750,000 provided for. Then the question which remained for consideration was from what fund should the money be provided-—from the Church Surplus Fund or from the Public Exchequer? There were two reasons which made it almost imperative that the advances should continue to be made out of the Church Surplus Fund. After Parliament had deliberately determined what course to pursue, the Government ought not, without having any new facts before it, to make a change; but even if Parliament had not expressed its opinion, he thought the arguments against making these advances from the Public Exchequer were fundamental and irresistible. This system of making advances was certainly attended with danger, and if it was to be continued it ought to be carefully and jealously guarded by principle. He was certain if once they entertained the system of making advances at the low rate of 1 per cent to meet distress, similar demands would be made from other parts of the country, and they would be placing themselves in a position which would render their finance inextricably confusing. He hoped that the distress would be met out of the ordinary taxation of the country, and not by loan, and at a rate of interest which would cover the Exchequer from loss; but while they thought it necessary to adhere rigidly to the rule of securing an ample interest, there were certain works which must be of the greatest benefit to the country, and which would practically give them good security. Therefore, they had incorporated in the Bill a suggestion made by the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Shaw) to the effect that presentment sessions might give guarantees in favour of railway and other public companies that applied for loans, providing there was adequate security, by taking their security, and he hoped in that way they might facilitate the construction of improved means of communication that might be of importance to the country; and, acting on that principle, they were likely to get works made that were important, as the public would not give the required guarantee unless they believed the works would be a benefit to themselves and the district. The only other provision of the Bill related to the terms on which the Commissioners of Public Works might sanction grants for the purpose of the Fishery Piers Act. He was not going to say a single word with reference to these grants, or what was likely to be the result of them. He must confess, however, he had no very sanguine expectations as to the matter, for they had had evidence as to what the result of similar grants, amounting to £200,000, had been. Since those grants had been made, they had seen a great decline in the number of fishermen in Ireland; and he was understating the fact when he said that not one half so many men were employed in that business now as there were when these grants first commenced. Many people he knew held a different view, and that this source of wealth might be better developed if the grant were increased; but up to the present time, certainly, the results had not been encouraging. He hoped, however, their anticipations would be realized. There was, however, another reason for making the grant larger this year. In ordinary times the districts where these piers were erected had found the greatest difficulty in keeping them in order, and in a time of distress that difficulty was increased. Owing, however, to the liberality of the Canadian people and others, they found that if the works were once set in operation, considerable assistance would be forthcoming. That was a great reason why the present measure should be passed as rapidly as possible, because unless the works were in operation by a given time, the assistance he referred to would be lost. He, therefore, asked the House at once to read the Bill a second time.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Lord Frederick Cavendish.)

MR. ARTHUR ARNOLD

said, he trusted the House would believe him when he said that he had no intention or desire to take part in a debate until he had for a longer period enjoyed the honour of a seat in that Assembly. But he had a strong objection to a leading principle of the Bill; he had used strong expressions with regard to it in that part of the country he had the honour to represent, and he had had an experience in the administration of a measure in some respects similar, an experience which was probably unique among hon. Members of that House, and he hoped for those reasons that he might be permitted to offer a few observations upon the Bill now under consideration. If he alluded to the probability that he had devoted a larger share of time to the study of the proceedings of that House than was usual with those who were candidates for a seat in that Assembly, it was only in order that he might make the humble confession before the House, that it seemed to him that any amount of external familiarity which it was possible to gain with those proceedings did but deepen the diffidence with which a Member rose for the first time to ask the Speaker's attention, and greatly augmented his anxiety to claim the largest measure of that kind and indulgent consideration, which, he had observed, was never withheld from one who occupied his present position. He spoke to-day under much disadvantage, because he had to protest very strongly against a leading principle of the measure which was now under consideration, proposed by a right hon. Gentleman whose career he (Mr. Arnold) had followed with admiration and respect, and because he should have to speak against and deplore the action of the late Government in this matter, and the tacit acceptance by the present Administration of their proceedings. Therefore, he would be unable to claim the sympathy of either side of the House. This Bill was said to be one for the relief of distress in Ireland. He might, therefore, refer to that distress, which, somewhat tardily, attracted the attention of the late Government. The noble Lord said attention was called in February last to the fact that severe distress was impending in Ireland, and he (Mr. Arnold) believed he said it was likely the distress would continue until the ensuing autumn. But what was the case? The attention of Lord Beaconsfield's Government was called to the existence of distress in Ireland very early in last autumn, and there could be no question whatever—at any rate, no question in his (Mr. Arnold's) mind—that it would never have assumed such grave and serious proportions as it had if the Poor Law system of the two countries had nearer approached assimilation. One great grievance — which always seemed to him to be a legitimate grievance—was found in the notorious difference which existed between the Poor Laws of England and Ireland. When the attention of the late Government was first turned to the subject, there existed gross inequalities in the Poor Laws of the two countries. They dealt with the evil in a most limited and imperfect manner. The result was that in Ireland the tenant farmer, who last autumn was subject to a period of deplorable distress, had been placed in a painful predicament. If he sought relief, he could only obtain it in the workhouse; and if he obtained it there—he had it on the very best authority, that of Dr. Hancock—if he left his home during the period of distress, the chances were that when he returned he would find his home gone, pulled down, and himself without occupation. Why did the late Government not see this position before? and upon them he considered rested a grave responsibility. If the tenant could not pay the landlord, he lost the benefit of the Act of 1870, and, in consequence of that, hundreds of people were pressed by their creditors, and distress appeared under the very eyes of the responsible Government. Why did he, therefore, in his first address, make so serious a charge? He did it upon this ground, that in the month of February the noble Lord at the head of the late Government (the Earl of Beaconsfield) made a discovery, whereby a difference which unhappily existed between the Poor Laws of the two Islands would be to some extent obviated. He discovered that the law to which he (Mr. Arnold) had just alluded—a law which was deeply responsible for the distress—did not apply to the wife and children of the tenant of a quarter of an acre of ground. It was a fact that the Conservative Government made this discovery in February, four months after the distress had been endured. They found that the wife and children might be relieved out of the workhouse, although the husband might go without any assistance. That in itself condemned their own negligence, because there was no reason why that interpretation of the law should not have been acted upon in the previous September. The present Bill was a heritage from the late Government; and on that point he must say that the noble Lord the Secretary to the Treasury (Lord Frederick Cavendish) was somewhat magnanimous, because he refrained from fixing the responsibility for the measure upon Her Majesty's recent Advisers. It was called a Bill for Relief of Distress in Ireland. Having regard to the title of it, he (Mr. Arnold) imagined that it would to some extent relieve the tenants; but when he looked into the matter, he considered that it would be more properly described as a Bill to relieve the landowners. ["Oh, oh !"] No doubt, there was a great deal in the present position of the landowners of Ireland which must attract the attention of hon. Members, and also their sympathy; but it seemed to him (Mr. Arnold) that those whom it was chiefly desired to benefit were left almost entirely out of the Bill. He was ready at any time to consider the position of the landowners in any part of the country; but he could not do so without at the same time having in his mind a very active sympathy for all other classes, and it seemed to him that the whole of this £750,000, or, at any rate, the major part of it, would be appropriated to the landlords. In this course, was the Housefulfilling its duty as the Trustee of the Church Surplus Fund? He said not. In giving that large sum of money to be dealt with by the landlords, the question was whether the House was obtaining for the people of Ireland any corresponding advantage to that which was given to the landowner? He had to look at the only information he could obtain as an answer to the question. He held in his hand a document which was drawn up in reply to the inquiries of the late Government, and was issued upon the responsibility of the late Chancellor of the Exchequer. He desired to know if the late Government made no further demand for information from the Board of Works in Dublin than was contained in the Schedule before the House? During the Lancashire Famine, he (Mr. Arnold) was the sole resident officer of the Government in regard to the Public Works Acts, and it was his duty to draw up a Report of this kind. He might presume, therefore, to say that he had some knowledge of what was wanted; and all he could say was, that if the late Chancellor of the Exchequer was satisfied with this Schedule, he (Mr. Arnold) must admit that great economy had been exhibited on the part of the Treasury in obtaining information on the subject. If thePaper in question had been issued by the Board of Works in Ireland as giving all the information they could afford, and as containing all that the House should be made acquainted with, he must say it was a disgrace to that Department. He found in it no mention of the names of landowners, no mention of the work to be carried out, no mention of the date of the application for loans; and no refer- ence to the date upon which the loan was issued. It was, in fact, a slender and meagre document, and he thought a more worthless document had never been laid before Parliament. When they referred to the Paper, they would find that two categories of loans were mentioned—first, those to landlords; and, secondly, those to sanitary authorities at 1 percent. No doubt, sanitary improvements might be made in many towns and villages in Ireland; but here the faulty operation of the Bill became apparent, for it was found that the landlords, appreciating the loans at 1 per cent, had borrowed, or, at any rate, had applied for, £1,184,058; whilst the sanitary authorities, who had to watch over the public interests, had only asked for loans to the extent of £141,079. As he had before said, practically this was a measure for the relief of the landlords of Ireland, who were obtaining, by the Forms of the House, an advantage which he believed it was never intended they should have, or which the House, as Trustee of the Irish Church Surplus Fund, ought to sanction. Then, again, the House was entitled to know what was being done with this very large fund. He had taken the pains to look over documents which had been presented, and he found that, four months after the commencement of the applications, in the ease of no fewer than 18 loans, varying from £1,000 to £10,000, applied for by landowners, the amount issued at the date of the document was under £100. He repeated, that four months after the time of applying there were 18 cases wherein the amount issued was under £100! What ground did that give them for believing that the people of Ireland were obtaining the benefit which had been assumed. It was possible that the Department in Ireland would tell them that this incomprehensible delay was necessary; but when similar grants were made to Lancashire, no unnecessary delay in spending the money took place. At the time of the Lancashire distress, Lord Howard of Glossop applied for a loan of £3,500 to improve his estate; and he (Mr. Arnold) and Mr. Rawlinson, the engineer, who was acting with him, took care that there should not be any unnecessary delay. They required only such plans as could be prepared in a single day; within four days after the application the works were in operation, in a week more than 100 persons were engaged upon them, and in four months there were 218 distressed men employed under the loan. If the same course were pursued in Ireland as was adopted at Glossop there would be in proportion to the amount granted 67,600 men employed, representing a distressed population of considerably more than 250,000. There was a flimsy pretence that there was security in the measure which hadbeen already adopted, that the landowners should give the tenants the benefit of the loans; but there was no safeguard whatever for the tenant under the Bill, for the words in the 9th clause of the Act which was supposed to embody that security was not worth the paper on which it was printed. In this matter there was no safeguard whatever for the tenants, who ought to have been assured of the benefits that were believed to accrue to them. Did hon. Members suppose for a moment that it was safe for the tenant farmers of Ireland, any more than for those of any other country, to trust to the mercy of the landlords? The past experience even of England, where landlords were as generous and as noble and as high in character as any in the world, would not warrant them in believing that. In 1847 a considerable loan was advanced by Parliament for the purpose of drainage in this country; and he was going to tell the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary what the landlords of Yorkshire did in regard to that loan. He did not pretend to say that the landowners of Yorkshire were any worse or better than the landlords of any other part of England. He was rather inclined to think that they were better. What they did in regard to that loan, however, he was able to state on the authority of the Agricultural Commissioner of The Times, Mr. James Caird. He wrote in 1851 as follows:— The Government loan is repayable in 22 annual instalments of 6½ per cent to repay principal and interest, and a few landlords charge their tenants 5 per cent of this annual sum, themselves paying 6½per cent. The tenants most frequently have to cart the tiles free of charge. And we are sorry to say that more than one instance exists in Yorkshire where the landlord charges his tenant 7½ per cent, thus putting into his pocket 1 per cent, besides receiving a presumably higher value for his land by an outlay to which he does not contribute a single farthing. This grasping conduct, so utterly at variance with the intention of the Legislature, is quite unworthy the character and position of a respectable landlord. If these things could be done in the green tree of England, why might they not expect similar occurrences in Ireland? When the House came to review the expenditure of the loan now proposed, he hoped they would be able to make a favourable comparison between it and the English loan to which he had referred. On the subject of labour, he must trouble the House to give its attention to a most extraordinary and a most wonderful Circular which appeared to have been put forth with the authority of the late Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Duke of Marlborough. He found that with regard to employment of distressed people a Circular was issued to the inspecting engineers. The words were as follows:— His Grace thinks it important in such cases, in order to prevent abuses arising, the wages of the people employed on relief works should be fixed below the ordinary rate for agricultural wages in the district. He (Mr. Arnold) said that a more monstrous instruction was never issued. If such a Circular bad been issued by Her Majesty's Government with reference to the works with which be had the honour to be connected in Lancashire, it would have been utterly impossible for them to have accomplished their object with any degree of success. The Circular of the Duke of Marlborough had but one meaning, and that was pauperism. If they artificially fixed wages below the current rate of the district, they pauperized the men who accepted such wages; and while the Circular was, in his view, offensive to common sense and to political economy, it was still more offensive to the men who were and who ought to be employed in these works. He had alluded to the scandalously insufficient information which had been conveyed to the House with regard to the public works; and he must say that he had one more reason to add why, for his own part, he very much objected to that principle of the Bill which was involved in the advance of money to the landlords with no substantial conditions, and at the very low rate of 1 per cent. The noble Lord who was at the head of the late Government spent a very large portion of his life in the vocation of a prophet. [Murmurs] He (Mr. Arnold) had watched the noble Lord's career for years, and he was now going; to vindicate the noble Lord's ability in that particular role. He was going to allude on that occasion to a single instance where he was successful in his prophecy. He might select 99 cases out of 100 where the noble Lord had failed. He was bound to admit that in this particular instance in which the noble Lord was successful as a prophet he had taken remarkable care to make his prophecy come true. There was one way of being successful as a prophet—a sure and certain way—and it was the course which the noble Lord had adopted. Upon the discussion of the Irish Church Bill, Mr. Disraeli said:— Another reason why I am greatly opposed to the confiscation of Church property is that when such property is disposed of it is always given to the landed proprietors. He (Mr. Arnold) was bound to say the noble Lord took remarkable care to make his prophecy come true; for it was his Government which was responsible for the bestowal of the first £750,000 in this direction, and the late Government was practically responsible for the £750,000 that was to follow. There was a proposition put before the House that this was a charitable measure. He could only find evidence to the effect that it was charitable with regard to the landowners, and he could not find provisions to insure that there should be a substantial benefit to the Irish people. He heartily concurred in another declaration of the noble Lord, when he said:— Whatever is given for the maintenance of pauper lunatics, or for any object of that kind, will go—at least the bulk of it will go—to the proprietors of the soil, whatever hocus pocus may he put forward to the contrary; and, "said his Lordship," I entirely disapprove of that. So did he (Mr. Arnold); he made the strongest protest he could against it, for he had been and always would be the opponent of class legislation. He did not oppose the principle of the measure simply because the class which was to benefit by it was composed of landowners. He objected to any class legislation whatever. The present Parliament was, perhaps, in a peculiar manner called upon to reform the relations between landlord and tenant. He should be glad and proud to assist in that work. He had said out of the House, and he said again in the House, that any measure of reform in this direction was not worthy of consideration, unless it furnished advantage to the landlord's interest as well as to other interests connected with the soil. He would do his utmost to promote reforms and justice between landlord and tenant, between the landowners and the general population of the country; and he would do his utmost to bring about the time when the soil of those Islands should no longer be the patrimony of a narrow, and, as they had proved themselves in legislation to be, a self-interested class, but should be the heritage and the home of a more happy, a more united, and a more prosperous people.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

Sir, acknowledging, as I fully do, the ability which has marked the first address of the hon. Member for Salford (Mr. Arnold), and congratulating him upon the manner in which he has commanded, and justly commanded, the attention of the House, I think it my duty immediately to rise and protest with all the energy of which I am capable against the extraordinary doctrines which he has laid down. The hon. Member has thought himself justified in casting upon the late Government imputations which are not only utterly unfounded and unjust, but which, I venture to say, it is unworthy of him to have made. I want to know by what right the hon. Gentleman speaks of the policy of Her Majesty's late Government in this very difficult and delicate matter of the relief of distress in Ireland as having been inspired, as he would lead us to believe, by a desire to assist, not the people, but the landlords of Ireland? I say, without charging the hon. Member with anything in the nature of intentional misrepresentation, that his whole speech and his whole charge are founded upon a total misapprehension and inversion of the facts of the case. ["Withdraw !"1 Do I hear an hon. Member say "Withdraw?"—[Mr. O'CONNOR POWER: Yes. Withdraw!]—when I am rebutting an accusation levelled against us without the slightest foundation?

MR. ARTHUR ARNOLD

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for permitting me to say that I certainly made no accusation against Her Majesty's late Government that it was their intention to benefit the landlords? I said they had conspicuously failed to take proper security for the benefit of the people of Ireland in their legislation.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

Well, I will not attempt to put into the mouth of the hon. Gentleman language which he says it was not his intention to use. I will accept the modified challenge which he now throws down to us, and I will ask the House to allow me, in a very few words, to treat this matter from the point of view from which we had to look at it from the beginning. The House must bear in mind that we had to act in circumstances very different from those which now present themselves to Parliament and the country. We had, in the first place, to ascertain what were the real facts of the case. Those facts are now known. We had, in the next place, to ascertain how far the distress of which we had been warned was really likely to extend. We had to ascertain how far the ordinary means of grappling with any distress that might occur would be sufficient for the purpose. And when we had satisfied ourselves that the ordinary means were not sufficient, it became our duty to consider in what manner we could provide for the mitigation and relief of the distress, so as to do the least permanent injury to the people of Ireland, including, and especially including, the great mass of the labouring population. Well, we are accused of having been negligent in this matter. Negligent? In what respect? Negligent in making inquiries? No. Let hon. Members remember how easy it is to get up exaggerated reports and make out cases for Government assistance, and what mischief arises if Government listens to the first tale that is told, and offers assistance which turns out afterwards not to have been required. My noble Friend the late Lord Lieutenant of Ireland personally gave the greatest and most anxious attention to this matter; and from the moment at which it became known that there was likely to be a failure in the ordinary crops of the year, and distress among the people, he took every possible means to ascertain by inquiry what the extent of that distress would be, and how far the ordinary means of relief would go. Well, the first duty of a Government, I apprehend, is to endeavour to make the ordinary law suffice for the maintenance of the people. We ought, in the first instance, to depend upon the proper operation of the system of poor relief; and we therefore had to inquire how far the system of poor relief established in Ireland, not by ourselves, but by Parliament in years gone by, was likely to be sufficient. But we very soon had our attention called to the fact that there were deficiencies in that system which would render it necessary for us to take extraordinary precautions, and to give to the Poor Law Guardians power to act beyond those which the law had conferred upon them. It was, however, necessary in this case to proceed with caution, for out of what funds were Poor Law Guardians to administer relief to such as might apply for it? Obviously, out of the rates of the district. But who were the ratepayers of the district? Why, many of them were persons who would themselves be in a position of considerable poverty and straitened circumstances, and who would themselves be suffering from the very causes which made it necessary that there should be a strict, not to say sceptical, examination of all statements that might tend to throw extraordinary demands upon the poor ratepayers. We were prepared to encounter the fact that there would be occasion for such extraordinary relief; and while we did not encourage any undue and hasty dependence upon extraneous assistance, we prepared from the first to recommend the Guardians of Unions to administer relief upon the freest possible principles, and we determined that we would give them our support, even though it should be necessary for us to do so without the previous consent of Parliament. Then came this important question. When you found that in a particular district there was likely to be great distress, and that the people would be in a position in which they would require more than ordinary assistance if they were to maintain life, you had to consider where they were to obtain the means of getting subsistence. Well, we placed the Poor Law as far as we could out of consideration, and we asked— How are these people to be supported when it comes to an extremity? By direct grants of food, or money from some central fund? or are they to be encouraged to obtain employment and earn for themselves the means of subsistence? Well, I apprehend that the hon. Member for Salford would be one of the last men in this House to say, when you have to choose between alternative modes of relieving distress, choose the direct distribution of alms. I apprehend he would say that it was far better for the future welfare and character of the people of Ireland that, whenever it was possible to do so, they should be supported by a system under which they would be able to obtain subsistence in return for work. Well; but then where was the employment to be found? Obviously, that depends, to a considerable extent, on the seasons of the year. In certain seasons employment ought to be found in agricultural work. But we were looking at a time when there would be little ordinary agricultural work to be done, and we had to consider where would be found the employment which should stand in its place. Well, now, what has been the course of matters in Ireland for a considerable time, and in other parts of the country also? It has been very much the habit in certain parts of the country for employment to be provided by the landowners of the district employing the people upon works of a remunerative character. Accordingly, we hoped that, in seasons when the people were in want of employment, employment would be provided by the landlords. But this fact came immediately before us—that the very time when there was most need for additional employment was the time when landlords had the least ability for giving employment. I do not wish to raise any question of a controversial character, or that could give rise to acrimonious feelings; but everyone knows perfectly well that during the last autumn and winter the position of the landlords in Ireland was one of very considerable difficulty and embarrassment; and, so far from their being able to give extraordinary assistance by way of employment, they were not able to give even the ordinary assistance which they had been in the habit of rendering. I regret exceedingly the absence from this Parliament of several of my hon. Friends who were Members of the late Parliament, and whose names I am sure are held in honour even among those who differ from them in politics. Among those Sir Arthur Guinness and Mr. King-Harman devoted themselves to the work, and did all they possibly could to meet the exigencies of the time by the employment of labour and by means of personal exertion which reflects the highest credit upon them. But there were a large number of landowners who were not in a position to make similar exertions without assistance. Well, we then began to inquire how far the ordinary advances made by the State in ordinary years would meet the exigencies of the case. We found, in these circumstances, great slackness in applying for the ordinary advances; and, when the attention of the Treasury was directed by the Lord Lieutenant to the subject, we at once determined to do all that we could in order to facilitate the taking up of those advances, so that they might give employment to the people. We had, in the first instance, to deal with the regulations of the Board of Works in Ireland, and to see that the necessary provisions were made, and greater facilities were then given in the month of September for taking up the loans on the ordinary terms. But this failed to accomplish our object; and in the month of January we were informed by the Lord Lieutenant that the steps for affording relief to the people which we had taken were insufficient, as the landlords did not come forward to apply for the advances, and that if we desired to give employment to a people who were on the verge of starvation we must adopt some other measures. What other measures? Either the step of lowering the terms on which advances were to be made to the landlords, or resorting to some other mode of finding the necessary employment. In these circumstances we considered that the fairest and wisest way of securing immediate employment for the people was to encourage the landlords to take up those loans; and we therefore took the step which has been so severely commented upon by the hon. Gentleman of making advances to the landlords. We offered to lend money to the landlords at little more than a nominal rate of interest for the purpose, not of assisting the landlords, but of assisting the people who would be employed by the landlords. ["No !"] Cannot, I would ask, the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Gentlemen give us credit for having that idea and intention in our minds? Are hon. Members opposite so determined to find us in the wrong that they can see nothing but a desire to assist the landlords in a step which we took not at all to benefit them, but simply to do what seemed to us to be best to provide work for the people? With regard to the imputation that our object was to assist the landlords, such an idea never entered into our heads until it was put into them by the discussions in this House.

MR. ARTHUR ARNOLD

I beg again to say that I cast no imputation on the motives which actuated the right hon. Gentleman or the Government of which he was a Member. My statements were plain and straightforward.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

Then I throw aside, as I am most happy to do, any question of imputation as to motives, and I shall now address myself to another kind of question, on which I freely admit it is open to hon. Gentlemen very fairly to take opposite views. If you had to consider what was the best way of getting people employed, were you better advised in doing it through these advances to the landlords, or should you have undertaken some other system? If some other system, what should that system have been? A favourite idea, I believe, is that the necessary aid should be afforded through the medium of something in the nature of public works. That is, I admit, an opinion which is very fairly arguable; but after having considered the question many and many times, and procured all the information we could get, we came to the conclusion, which I am still prepared to support, that to advance money to the landlords was a better mode of carrying out the object which we had in view than advances would be made for the purpose of public works. First, there was the extreme difficulty of settling what kind of public works there should be. We did, indeed, to a certain extent, introduce what may be called public works, because we made advances in connection with sanitary measures and encouraged presentments which are also more or less in the nature of public works. But we had to bear in mind the very great danger which, both in theory and by experience, we knew attaches to a system of public works. Nothing can be more likely to demoralize a people than by employing them on public works. In theory that is so, and by experience in Ireland that was so. We were guided by the experience which was acquired by the great famine of 1847, when the system of public works was tried and pushed to a great extent. Large sums were expended in Ireland, and, at the same time, the system utterly failed in producing relief to the people, and it demoralized the masses. People neglected their occupations because they were tempted to go into the public works; and if they went there, it was a question whether they could be made to do a fair day's work for their money. Public works were then instituted, not for the sake of the works themselves, but for the purpose of providing employment for the people; and it became a matter of impossibility to compel people who were employed in certain work to do a fair day's work, the object being to keep the people alive. If the hon. Gentleman is acquainted, as no doubt he is, with Sir Charles Trevelyan's accounts of those times, he will be aware of instance after instance in which, when public works were going on, people came down, neglecting everything else, to the public works, and spent their time in doing nothing; and it being impossible to refuse them money, the overseers or Inspectors found it impossible either to call upon them to do work they were physically incapable of doing, or refuse them the means of support. A second and more serious evil was that it drew the people off from that which it was their duty to attend to. I mean the cultivation of the land. Well, last winter you had to endeavour to keep the people from suffering owing to the scarcity of the previous autumn, and you had to look forward to something more fearful, something of larger dimensions than the distress than prevailing. You had to look forward to the misery and ruin that might have been occasioned this year if proper attention had not been paid to the preparation of the ground for the potato and other crops. Evidence was given the other day that in the present year a greater breadth of potatoes had been sown, and greater breadths of crops generally, and our policy was this —we did not adopt the system of taking a large number of people off the cultivation of the land; but, on the contrary, we kept them there, and encouraged them to apply themselves to it. The hon. Member spoke with a degree of bitterness which I was surpised to hear in regard to the Duke of Marlborough's Circular, that the wages paid should be somewhat below the usual agricultural wages. He thought they would be pauperizing them. I do not know where to draw the line in regard to pauperizing; but the great object of the regulation was to prevent people giving up the necessary work of agricultural operations by giving them an incentive to cultivate their own land, and by the result we cannot undertake to say that we may not have made mistakes in this matter. We were acting, to a great extent, tentatively; we were making experiments; we wanted to know how far these things were true; and how far this or that measure would meet the difficulties of the case. You say now, looking at the matter from a different point of view—"Oh! you ought to have done this or that." How should we have known how these things should have been done except by trying what the effect of this or the other would have been? You must bear in mind that you are criticizing our proceedings after they have taken place; that we were pioneers in a matter which now opens to your view. But, even so, I am prepared to say, as to the great broad lines of our policy, that if we had to do the same thing over again, I would do exactly as we have done. Observations have been made in the course of the discussion as to the funds from which the loans have been made, and that is, no doubt, a question for very serious consideration. We felt that it was a desirable and necessary thing that for the sake of keeping the people alive in Ireland, rather than letting them suffer the worst pangs of destitution, some advances should be made. We thought it would be a matter of very serious consideration whether, on that account, we ought to depart from principles laid down as a general rule for advances to be made throughout the Kingdom. The advances were to be made at an exceptionally, and very exceptionally, low rate of interest on account of the distress in Ireland. You would have to consider whether the same thing would not have to be done throughout the United Kingdom; whether the people of England or Scotland, or any other part of Her Majesty's Dominions—at any rate, any other part of the United Kingdom—would not have an equal claim to advances; and we know that although the distress in certain parts of Ireland was exceptionally great, we know also that parts of England and Scotland were in great distress, and advances have had to be made there; but then we were met by this—and it was urged more from Ireland than from any other part of the Kingdom—"Do not allow these difficulties to stand in your way. Whatever may be your difficulty with regard to the Kingdom generally, you need not be troubled with that difficulty with regard to us, for we have a fund, which is an Irish fund, and no better use can be made of it than by giving employment to the starving people of Ireland." There seemed to us to be a great force in that argument. We did think it was not an improper thing to apply that fund, not at a permanent expenditure, but for this exceptional purpose. We thought that that was a proposal to make; and, in the first instance, we supposed and hoped that a much smaller amount would be sufficient to meet the exigencies of the case, and we proposed, hoping that it would be sufficient, to recommend an advance of £750,000 out of that fund for this purpose. Then came the question, how were we to go on and get the work done which was necessary to employ the people? It was necessary, in order to employ the people, that we should invite persons to come forward and take up this money and apply it in the employment of labour. There were the landlords, there were the Unions, there were the baronial sessions all coming forward—invited to come forward and make applications. It was difficult for us to say up to the last moment how far these applications might go. They might fall short of the amount we contemplated having to expend; or, on the other hand, they might largely exceed it—as a matter of fact, they did largely exceed it; and I apprehend that the Bill now brought forward is brought forward on account of the feeling of the Board of Treasury and the Irish Government that if these applications are to be met it will be necessary that some further funds should be provided, and they take the line of following the principles we laid down, and are asking a larger sum from the Irish Church Surplus Fund for that purpose. Of course, the Bill is the Bill of Her Majesty's Government; but I frankly admit that in this matter Her Majesty's Government are following the lead, and, to a great extent, are obliged to follow the lead, which was given by the late Government. I am perfectly ready, on behalf of my late Colleagues and myself, to accept that responsibility. It is perfectly open to the present Government to throw over as regards the future what was done. They have not done so, and I thank them for it. I think they have taken the right step. [Laughter] I do not know why that observation should call for laughter. I acknowledge I claim that this is a measure founded upon the course which we adopted, and we adopted that course on grounds which I have endeavoured to explain to the House. Of course, it is not for me to say that mistakes may or may not have been made; and I do trust that the House, having listened to what I have attempted to say, will do us the justice to admit that in the course we took we were animated by no desire but the single-minded desire to do that which, in our consciences, we believe to be best for the people of Ireland, and that it was no negligence on our part that led to those matters which had been complained of, but the circumstances with which we had to grapple—circumstances wholly different we say from those to which the hon. Gentleman refers, and to which he naturally refers, bearing in mind the honourable part he took in the transactions of the time, but which were wholly different circumstances from those which existed in Lancashire during the Cotton Famine. Last March I endeavoured to show in what particulars there was a difference. I do not desire to revive those controversies. I rose for the sake of protesting against what, if I had said nothing, might have been inferred regarding the character of our conduct; and I hope I have cleared myself and my Colleagues.

MR. GRAY

said, the question before the House was the distress in Ireland, and it might be as well to remind the House what the actual condition of affairs in Ireland was at that moment. There were some 500,000 persons at least at that moment in Ireland dependent for their means of subsistence, from day to day, upon charitable organizations. Those persons received a weekly dole of Indian meal, sufficient, mostly, to give them one meal each per day of that kind of sustenance which in England would scarcely be given to a gentleman's cat. On a recent occasion, the right hon. and learned Gentleman the late Attorney General for Ireland (Mr. Gibson) said he thanked God that no person had died of famine in Ireland. If that were the fact he, too, thanked God; but he was inclined to doubt whether many persons had not died of famine in Ireland. Persons might die of famine without having been found by a Coroner's Jury to have died of starvation. Many diseases were produced by famine—such as pleurisy, and many others—and a man might be returned as having died of one of those diseases when he had actually died of privation of food. But although he knew, as well, possibly, as any person in the House, the kindly disposition of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, he was inclined, when he read that declaration of his, to ask him with what motive he made it. Did he say, on the part of the Government, "Thank God, we, the Government, have saved the people of Ireland from starvation?" If so, was there any justification for his saying it? If people had not died of starvation, to whom was that due? Was it due to the late Government? He feared no person could say it was. The fact was that a number of charitable organizations—one founded by her Grace the Duchess of Marlborough, to whom every credit was due; another had been instituted in the Mansion House; another had been instituted by the Land League; a fourth was under the auspices of The New York Herald; and a smaller one under the Philadelphia Committee—these had collected between them £400,000 at least, and it was owing to these charitable organizations that the people had been preserved from starvation. It certainly was not owing to anything that had been done by the late Government, or to anything that the present Government had so far done, or proposed to do. Let that be distinctly understood. They were now in this position—that these charitable organizations had received large sums, and having expended them, except any small residuum that might be left, had, up to this, kept the people from starvation without any thanks to the Govern- ment, but in spite of the Government. Now these charitable funds had come to a close. The Mansion House Committee had received £170,000, and there was only about £18,000 left. That was about a fortnight's supply. The Land League Fund was in somewhat the same condition. There was very little left. Of the Duchess of Marlborough's Fund there was £14,000 left. They were getting money in hundreds, and spending it in thousands. The position they had to face was this—that the funds of these charitable organizations, which up to this had done the duty which should have been discharged by the Government, and which it was the fundamental and primary duty of any Government to discharge—to keep the people alive—were about to fail, and the whole responsibility must be thrown on the Government. That was the position of affairs, and within a fortnight or three weeks there would be 500,000 persons thrown upon some other organization—persons who had been supported between February and this by voluntary charitable organizations. Under these circumstances, he would not dare to take upon himself the responsibility of impeding the Government proposal in the slightest degree. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland had distinctly recognized his responsibility in the matter. He had distinctly declared in that House that the Government were prepared to face that responsibility, and that he was prepared to keep the people from absolute destitution, and from everything approaching to famine; and being assured of that, when the Government brought a measure forward, he— whatever the measure might be—was prepared to vote "Aye." At the same time, he was bound to say that he did not see anything in the Bill itself adequate to meet the necessities of the case. The Relief Bill of the late Government gave to the Government power to lend to the Poor Law Guardians money which they might spend for the purpose of out-door relief. Now, matters having reached the present pass, it appeared to him that the only efficient way of meeting the distress between now and the harvest was to give outdoor relief, and he believed that that was the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman himself. So far as the relief works were concerned, or any devices of that nature, it was too late to consider them-Last year was the time to consider them-Remember, the late Government had been warned, not only by the public Press, but in that House. The Representatives from Ireland gave most solemn warning, this time 12 months, that famine was impending. They were laughed at. That was the time to make adequate preparation by public works; but that time had now passed. All they could do now was to feed the people from hand to mouth. If they could do that, well and good. But, so far as the proposals in the Bill were concerned, they were utterly inadequate to meet the present distress in Ireland. They gave advances to landlords on certain terms. He did not discuss whether they were fair or unfair. Individually, he considered them unfairly advantageous to the landlords. But the question was, whether they were going to meet the present distress? He said they were not, because the money would not be expended for many months—some not till next year. They expected that the immediate distress would be over when the harvest came—namely, in six weeks or two months. How much of the £1,500,000 was going to be expended between now and then? Very little. There was one proposal in the Bill on which he looked with great approval; that was the £30,000 for fishery piers. What was the history of the proposal? The Canadian Government, which had shown far more generosity than the late Government, gave a grant of £20,000, without any conditions, towards the distress in Ireland. That fund was intrusted to the late Colonial Secretary, who proposed that a Joint Committee, comprising three members of the Mansion House Committee and three members of the Duchess of Marlborough's Committee, should administer it; but he imposed the condition that it should be expended in reproductive works. The Committee decided to give £10,000 for the fishery piers, on condition that the Government would advance three times that amount to the same object, and that the works should be commenced in three months from the date of the allocation of the money. He wished to know whether that portion of the £30,000 would be expended within three months as from the 31st of May? because, if not, the £10,000 from the Canadian Government would not be available From his experience of the Board of Works, his fear was lest the whole sum might be lost. If the money were to be spent in sufficient time to utilize the grant, he believed that that would be found to be the only portion of the Bill which was worthy of a moment's consideration. He very much regretted that many of the works which had been presented for by local bodies, who had full knowledge with respect to their different districts, had been refused by that Board. He had ventured to make these few observations to the House as one who, being connected with one of the charitable organizations, dare not take it upon himself to interfere with any proposal made on the authority of Her Majesty's Government to relieve distress in Ireland. At the same time, he strongly concurred in the remarks of the hon. Member for Salford (Mr. Arnold), whose admirable speech would be received with much satisfaction and appreciation throughout Ireland. The proposals of the Administration were utterly inadequate, and he foresaw the greatest dangers impending. The Poor Law organization would not afford sufficient relief for distress, and there would be terrible troubles and sufferings ahead during the next six weeks or two months. Still, the Members of the Government had taken upon themselves the responsibility in this matter, and upon them the results of that responsibility would rest.

MAJOR NOLAN

said, that the responsibility for the advance of the £1,500,000 provided by the Bill rested with the late Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was quite right in accepting for that advance; but he did not explain how it was that the amount of the advances to be made had risen from £750,000 to £1,500,000. The expenditure of the former sum was sanctioned by the late Government; but the other £750,000 was one of the promises entered into by the Irish Board of Works during the late Election, and would have received the sanction of Parliament. That was an utterly unconstitutional proceeding, and it was one of which the Irish Members had a special right to complain, because it was to come out of a Fund on which they had hoped to rely for aid in converting a large portion of the small holders in Ireland into peasant pro- prietors. He did not think the House ought to sanction these advances because they had been promised by the permanent officials. In order to prevent these advances they had no need to break any positive promises. All they had to do was to insist on the observance of proper and stringent rules for the proper application of the money. Many of the landlords who had obtained advances were, he believed, not in a position to lay them out in a proper manner, and they ought not to be allowed to spend them improperly or for purposes other than those sanctioned by Parliament. They ought also to take care that no money granted to relieve distress was expended after the distress had ceased to exist. No adequate explanation had been given as to why double the sum voted in the House had been promised to landlords and sanitary boards in Ireland. He did not object to the advance of money to landlords as a means to the relief of distress; but he believed, as these advances had been appropriated, only a small portion had been devoted, or would be devoted, to the relief of distress.

MR. W. E. FORSTER

, interposing, stated that up to the 31st of May the money issued amounted to £268,000 or £259,000.

MAJOR NOLAN

said, his argument that the whole of this £1,500,000 would not go to the relief of the distress was not sensibly affected by what the right hon. Gentleman had just stated. As to the fishery portion of the Bill, he fully endorsed what had been said by his right hon. Friend (Mr. Gray). He looked upon the money there involved as being money extremely well spent; but as to that part of the measure which related to baronial railways, he could only say that he thought the baronies were bad bodies, and that they ought to be abolished. His principal desire was to impress upon the Government that, amidst the various plans and schemes that might be suggested, there was an imperative necessity that they should do something practical without delay.

MR. PARNELL

moved the adjournment of the debate, which it was manifest could not at present be brought to a close. If the Chief Secretary for Ireland was anxious to pass the fishery portions of the Bill, he could embody them in a separate measure, and it would then be possible to get on.

Motion agreed, to.

Debate adjourned, till this day.

The House suspended its Sitting at ten minutes to Seven of the clock.

The House resumed its Sitting at Nine of the clock.