Commons Sitting of 19 March 1880

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Third Reading—National Debt [115]; Exchequer Bills and Bonds* [116], and passed.
The House met at a quarter after Three of the clock.

QUESTIONS.

  CUSTOMS RE-ORGANIZATION—COLLECTORS AT OUTPORTS.
  MR. SULLIVANasked the Financial Secretary, Whether the Collectors of Customs are to be included in the scheme for the Re-organization of the Out-Ports;
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  and, if not, whether anything is intended to be done to improve their salaries?
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON,in reply, said, the Collectors of Customs would not be affected. There was no intention of altering the present scale of salaries.

  THE OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE BOAT RACE AND THE LONDON STEAMBOAT COMPANY.
  SIR GEORGE BOWYERasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it was true that three powerful steam-tugs have been specially licensed to accompany the Boat Race on the 20th, and whether he is aware of the danger likely to accrue therefrom; and whether, in view of the fact that one of them swamped, last Saturday, a twelve-oared outrigger belonging to the London Rowing Club, he will have the licences cancelled and prevent the tugs from accompanying the race?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: Sir, I understand that the usual arrangements have now been made with the London Steamboat Company, and steam tugs will, therefore, not be used. The police authorities do not license steam vessels to accompany the race. This matter is entirely in the hands of the Thames Conservancy.

  H. R. H. THE PRINCESS FREDERICA OF HANOVER.
  MR. E. JENKINSasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether any demand will be made upon Parliament for any grant in consequence of the marriage of the Princess Frederica of Hanover?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: No, Sir. There is no foundation whatever for such an idea.

  PARLIAMENT—THE PROROGATION.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: I beg to move that the House, at its rising, do adjourn to Wednesday next. I believe the Prorogation will take place on that day, and therefore I make this Motion.
  COLONEL THE O'GORMAN MAHONsaid, that he presumed he would be in

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  Order if he now made the Motion of which he had given Notice.
  MR. SPEAKER: The Question before the House is that the House at its rising do adjourn until a particular day. The only Amendment which can be moved upon that Question is one to alter the day to which the House is to adjourn. The Amendment of which the hon. and gallant Member has given Notice will come on after the Order of the Day.
  COLONEL THE O'GORMAN MAHONsaid, he should move that the day to which it was proposed that the House should adjourn should be altered for the purpose of bringing on his Resolution. It would have been perfectly inconsistent with his duty if he had permitted the House to adjourn without calling its serious notice to the extraordinary letter which had been addressed by the Prime Minister——
  MR. SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Member has given Notice of a Motion to be brought forward to-day. That Motion will come on in the ordinary course after the Orders of the Day. The hon. and gallant Member cannot anticipate that Motion.
  Motion agreed, to.
  House, at its rising, to adjourn till Wednesday next.
  Message to attend the Lords Commissioners;—
  The House went;—and being returned;—
  MR. SPEAKER reported the Royal Assent to several Bills.

  FORM AND PRECEDENT—THE SUMMONS TO THE HOUSE OF PEERS.
  SIR GEORGE BOWYER:I rise, Mr. Speaker, to Order, and I desire to bring before the notice of the House an irregularity which has occurred in the message just delivered by Black Rod, in the hope that that irregularity may not be drawn into a precedent. The Usher of the Black Rod, in summoning the House of Commons, said, just now, that the Lords Commissioners "required" the presence of the Commons in the House of Lords to hear the Commission read. That expression is one which, according to the Books, has been held to be con-
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  trary to the dignity of the House. The expression which he should have used was that the Lords Commissioners "desired" the presence of the House of Commons. I wish, Mr. Speaker, to ask you to state from the Chair whether I am right on this point.
  MR. SPEAKER: The expression referred to by the hon. and learned Member may have been made use of by Black Rod. The ordinary expression is—"Desire the attendance of this House;" but I am not prepared to say that that expression may not have been made use of by Black Rod.
  SIR GEORGE BOWYER: I can state positively that the word used was "require" and not "desire;" and I should wish you to state, Sir, whether the word should not be "desire."
  MR. DILLWYN: I can certainly confirm what has been said by my hon. and learned Friend that the expression used was "require" and not "desire," though it does not appear to me that there is any material difference between them.
  MR. SPEAKER: I have already stated, in answer to the Question of the hon. and learned Member for the county of Wexford, that the word usually used is "desire."

ORDER OF THE DAY.
  NATIONAL DEBT BILL.— [BILL 115.]
  (Mr. Raikes, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson.)
  NATIONAL DEBT BILL.— [BILL 115.]

    THIRD READING.
    Order for Third Reading read.
    THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, in moving that the Bill be now read the third time, said, he desired to correct a statement which he had made inadvertently to his right hon. Friend the Member for the City of London (Mr. J. G. Hubbard) the other night in regard to the rate of interest to be paid on the Terminable Annuities which were to extinguish, by 1885, the £6,000,000 of Debt. His right hon. Friend had rather put into his mouth the rate of 3¾per cent, the amount at which the last Terminable Annuities for that purpose were issued. But, on a careful consideration of the matter between the officers of the Treasury and the National Debt Com-

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    missioners, it had been decided that the reasons which led to the fixing of that rate of interest on previous occasions did not apply in the present state of the market. In the present state of the money market, it had been thought that 3½per cent was the proper rate of interest to be fixed. In this case the effect of this operation would be that the Annuities to extinguish the £6,000,000 in ten half-yearly payments would only be £1,320,000 a-year. There would, therefore, be a smaller demand on the new Sinking Fund, and the amount of the Fund applicable to the reduction in the present year would only be £172;000.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."—(Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.)
    MR. LAINGwished to remind the House of the danger which might arise in times of commercial depression or panic by the maintenance of a large Floating Debt. He thought that where the policy of the Government necessitated the occurrence of deficits in successive years, these deficits, instead of being allowed to accumulate, should be wiped off by new taxation.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Bill read the third time, and passed.

  MOTION.
  MR. SULLIVAN, in seconding the Motion, said, he rejoiced to find that on the first occasion since his re-entry within the walls of Parliament his hon. and gallant Friend had given utterance to sentiments identical with those which he held more than half a century ago. His hon. and gallant Friend had proved himself in other days no craven in the cause of Ireland, and came there now with the snows of nearly 90
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  winters on his head, to make what might be the last effort of his long life in an appeal to the justice and generosity of English people. At what moment was this appeal made? The Prime Minister of England, having marked attentively the growing feeling amongst the people of this country, and amongst the educated classes, in regard to Irish discontent, determined to take this opportunity of inflaming passions of the kind that were aroused in the days of the Lord George Gordon riots. His hon. and gallant Friend had protested against such an attempt. He had pleaded, not for war or enmity between the English and Irish races, but for sentiments of conciliation and friendship. Ireland, he (Mr. Sullivan) declared, was more loyal from 1782 to 1795 than she had ever been from that day to this. Having taken his share in some of the stormiest scenes in Ireland since 1846, he could only say he never saw a moment more fruitful of hope or more conciliatory to every good citizen than at the time of the birth of the Home Rule movement. It was absurd to say that the demand of the Irish people for the control of their domestic affairs implied disloyalty to the Empire. Was Australia or Canada disloyal, or was any other Dependency of the British Crown, to which England, with that generosity which she never failed to display outside Ireland, had granted representative Institutions, disloyal? The Irish people had formulated a demand for a Native Parliament; but they had expressly left in it power to an Imperial Parliament to deal with Imperial affairs, and allow Ireland to settle her own domestic affairs. Well, that was accepted in Ireland by Conservatives as well as Liberals; but when a Conservative majority was returned the blood seemed to freeze in the veins of the Tory Home Rulers. He would be glad to see his countrymen pursue their views by steady rather than by violent means, and it had been the purpose of his life to bring the gentry and the peasantry of Ire-land together, and uniting them in sending Representatives to an Irish Parliament. The movement for Home Rule quelled the insurrectionary idea in Ireland; it was a blessed message for the people, who saw that order and liberty might be gained without resorting to strife or bloodshed. He would tell the Prime Minister that there was a feeling grow-

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  ing throughout England that what the Irish people asked was only just; but how had their demand been met by the Government? By a declaration that England would not reason with them—she would only strike. Lord Beaconsfield said he would not even inquire. He could not rise to the Christian height of saying—"Let justice be done, though the heavens should fall." He would have his own way, and there was no chance for the Irish people, even though in the attempt to check these chances he imperilled the Empire. The American Colonies had been lost by the same doctrines as those which appeared in the Beaconsfield Manifesto, and Canada had only been retained because she got Home Rule. The Prime Minister himself was the real dismemberer of the Empire, for he imperilled it by trying to hold Ireland as the American Colonies were sought to be held. The English people were told that Home Rulers were traitors to their Queen and country. If that was so, the Government which, like the present Government, refused to remove such traitors from the Privy Council, from the lord lieutenancy of counties, and from the commission of the peace, were the blackest traitors of all. What was the meaning of the Premier's Manifesto? It was to teach Englishmen, if he could, that the country was struck at by the Home Rule Party; and if he could succeed in convincing them that their trade and prosperity would be injured, it would rouse the English working classes to hunt the unhappy Irishmen out of their towns. Lord Beaconsfield, however, had spoken too late. He could not teach that lesson to the working men of England; for, thank God, the days had gone by when passions could be roused between race and race and creed and creed. Undeterred by the threats of Lord Beaconsfield, who wanted to come back to power on an anti-Irish cry, the Irish Members intended to hold fast by the Home Rule policy, to press the demands of Ireland, and to appeal to the impartial judgment of the English people. There was an honourable name to be won by any Irish Member who at home would do all in his power to discountenance violence, while in the House of Commons he asserted with courage and fortitude the claims of his countrymen to self legislation.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That this House highly disapproves of the attempt of the Prime Minister to stir up feelings of hatred between England and Ireland for the purpose of furnishing an election cry to his followers, and regards with indignation his flagrant misrepresentation of the loyal efforts of the Home Rule party to extend the blessings of constitutional government to Ireland."—(Colonel The O'Gorman Mahon.)
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: Sir, I think it will seem strange to many that, on the occasion of the last Sitting of a Session of Parliament which has been specially devoted to the consideration of Irish distress and the measures to be take you for its relief, language should be employed and harangues delivered such as those we have just listened to. As far as regards the observations of the hon. and gallant Member for Clare (Colonel the O'Gorman Mahon), everyone must have listened to them with the feeling which is due to one of his advanced years, who comes back, after many years experience and political life, to tell us that he now finds, under a new name, that agitation renewed of which he remembers the early days under the name of the Repeal of the Union. We could not but listen with feelings of interest to many of the reminiscences of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, knowing that we were listening to one who has had the experience of years upon his head. But when the hon. and gallant Gentleman, passing from the region of history, went on to the region of prophecy, one could not but feel that there was something singularly inappropriate in the reference he made to the possible sound of that gun-boat which, as he tells us, is to be the introductory signal of the advent of a Royal Prince to Ireland for the purpose of declaring the institution of a National Parliament. Sir, if gun-boats are indeed employed upon the coasts of Ireland, it is for the relief of distress, and not for the purpose of giving the signal of insurrection; and if a Royal Prince is likely to visit the coasts of Ireland it would be rather, I think, on a mission of charity and friendliness than on the one to which the hon. and gallant Member refers. I will say but little of the observations of the hon. and gallant Gentleman. I appreciate entirely the spirit in which the hon. and gallant Member speaks; but my right hon. Friends and myself think that it is

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  altogether inappropriate, both on account of the time and the circumstances in which we stand, that any question of the kind now under consideration should be introduced into this House. I confess that, listening to the speech of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, I was very much puzzled as to what the meaning of this demonstration was; but when I heard the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Louth (Mr. Sullivan), then, indeed, I began to perceive what the animus and the intention were. This, Sir, is an electioneering appeal; and the hon. and learned Member, and possibly some of his Friends, are endeavouring from the platform of the House of Commons to address the constituencies of the United Kingdom and to do a stroke of business for a certain political Party. I think the hon. and gallant Member for Clare spoke on this subject of Home Rule with impartiality as far as the two great Parties in this House are concerned. But everybody must have observed the very different attitude of the hon. and learned Member for Louth. According to him, it was a Conservative Government that was to blame in this matter. It was that Government that was dashing the cup of hope from the lips of the Irish people, and it was that Government that was denying an inquiry into a matter of such immense importance as that of Home Rule. As we could not but remark that every other Party was pointedly excluded from the observations of the hon. and learned Gentleman, we are led to believe that the hon. and learned Gentleman and his Friends base their hopes of success on giving their political support to some other Party. Sir, I admit that such tactics are clever; and I admit that the hon. and learned Gentleman makes good use of his presence in this House, which he and his Colleagues are continually telling us they wish to separate themselves from.
  MR. MITCHELL HENRY: No, no! Not separate! What then?
  COLONEL THE O'GORMAN MAHONsaid, that the only demand which he and his Friends made was for the right to legislate for their own domestic affairs.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER:I believe the principle is, "What is yours is mine, and what is mine is my own."This, I believe, could be taken as the short and simple motto of the Home Rule Party; at any
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  rate, it is not the motto we are inclined to accept. We do conscientiously think that this demand ought to be resisted on the ground that it is likely to be injurious to the interests of the nation, and particularly injurious to the interests of Ireland. We may be wrong in our views, and others may have sounder views on this matter than ourselves; and, if so, they are perfectly at liberty to put them forward. But whether we are right or wrong, I say, unhesitatingly, looking to the effect of such a measure as is proposed, that it is not a measure to be played and trifled with, or one with regard to which anyone has the right to come forward and say that he distrusts and dislikes it, but will, nevertheless, make it a subject of inquiry. This is a very clever electioneering move, and the hon. and learned Gentleman has put excellent arguments into the mouths of those whom he wishes to use them; but we are not to be taken in, and I believe the nation is not to be taken in, by such sophistry. Although we quite acknowledge the ingenuity with which the hon. and learned Gentleman has spoken, we do not think his tactics upon this present occasion will meet with any success in the electioneering contest upon which we are about to enter.
  MR. MITCHELL HENRYrose to address the House, when——
  Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
  House adjourned at a quarter after Five o'clock till Wednesday next.

  MOTION.

    IRELAND—THE PRIME MINISTER'S LETTER TO THE LORD LIEUTENANT. —RESOLUTION.
    COLONEL THE O'GORMAN MAHON, in rising to move—
    "That this House highly disapproves of the attempt of the Prime Minister to stir up feelings of hatred between England and Ireland for the purpose of furnishing an election cry" to his followers, and regards with indignation his flagrant misrepresentation of the loyal efforts of the Home Rule Party to extend the blessings of constitutional government to Ireland,"
    said, he had counted on having his Resolution seconded by his noble Colleague (Lord Francis Conyngham);but he was sure both sides of the House would hear with regret that the close attention which the noble Lord had given to his Parliamentary duties in the early part of the Session had so impaired his health that he had been
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    obliged to demand leave of absence, and to repair to the Continent, where, he regretted, he was now unable to leave his room. Deprived of such a Seconder, he had not sought for another. In the condemnation which he desired to pass on the Representatives of the Government he wished hon. Gentlemen who usually sat on his side of the House to participate, for it was far from him to give exclusively to the Tory Party the blame which, he was sorry to say, should be shared to a certain extent by others as well as the Prime Minister and the Leader of the opposite side of the House on the Treasury Bench. A native bard, who wanted to convey his ideas of what the respective Parties in the House happened to be with regard to his unfortunate country, expressed himself in these words—
    "Oh, who can look on history's damning leaf,
    Where Whig and Tory—thief opposed to thief,
    On either side in conscious shame are seen,
    While Ireland's form hangs crucified between.
    Who, Justice, who, such rival rogues can see,
    But flies from both to honesty and thee."
    Where was that "honesty and thee" to be found? Not among the Whigs or Tories in that House. He believed that honesty and justice were to be found in the people of England and Scotland, divested of that taint and slime which these wretched political Parties attempted to cast on them. He believed the people of Ireland had only one chance—that of appealing to them. He believed that they ought no longer to come to that House to be treated with the contumely and contempt with which he had seen their Petitions treated since he came into that House. When he went back to his countrymen he would tell them no longer to burden Parliament with their Petitions, but to rely upon themselves, to concentrate their energies, and to look for honesty and fair treatment from the people of England and Scotland, and to pay no heed to the wretched squabbles of English Parties, who were playing shuttlecock and battledore with Ireland until she at last dropped to the ground and remained hopeless until they had another quarrel, and again raised her to be again tossed about. That, he believed, was the proper advice. The Premier of England had issued a denunciation of what was a mild construction of a principle which, more than half a century ago, when he

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    (Colonel The O'Gorman Mahon) took his place in the House of Commons, he had advocated, and that was Repeal of the Union. What was the answer the Minister of the day, who was an honest man, gave to his demand? He said—"Prove to me that the majority of your countrymen are in favour of the repeal of the Union, and I then shall, as Minister of the Crown, deem it my duty to counsel the King and his Ministers to take into serious consideration the demands of the majority." Then there came a change. The Whigs were turned out, and they forgot their promises, and the Tories came in, and they had given no promise; and now, how did the Minister of the Crown look on a mild construction of that original demand, which would have been recognized half-a-century ago if approved of by a majority of the Irish people? They saw how he treated it in his recent Manifesto. This country of England had been favoured by Providence in the most extraordinary manner, and no one who looked on the pages of history could deny it. Her escapes from ruin had been marked and frequent. He had no need to tell the House of the fate of the Spanish Armada, destroyed by a hurricane; but, coming home to our own time, they had in 1796 the Minister of Prance sending an Expedition from Brest under General Hoche, which was composed of 17 sail of the line, 13 frigates, 15 transports, and 15,000 troops, with an abundant supply of arms and ammunition for the patriots of Ireland. That Expedition met the same fate as the Spanish Armada, through the intervention of Providence. Six thousand troops certainly got into Bantry Bay; but they departed without the necessity of a shot being fired by the British troops. Then there was the Dutch Expedition, which was detained for five weeks in the Texel by contrary winds; and the other French Expedition which landed in Killala, and when a mere handful of Frenchmen defeated all the Royal troops that happened to be in the country, and were very nearly coining to Dublin. England, nevertheless, thought her hold upon Ireland insecure, and hence the legislative Union—the miscalled Union; and what were its results? That Ireland was at present in a much more dissatisfied state than even after that disgraceful Act was carried. Who
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    were the first men to protest against it? The Orange Corporation of Dublin, then not only exclusively Protestants, but Orangemen of the worst type. It was necessary, perhaps, to explain to the House that the Orangeman who, in England, was an emblem of liberality, was, in Ireland, an emblem of bigotry and intolerance, as if it were an ordinance of Providence that there should be no assimilation whatever between England and Ireland. The two nations were of a different race. In religion and in natural feeling there was nothing in common between the two countries; and when Parliament took upon themselves to tell the world at large that they were, indeed, competent to make laws for Ireland, and that they knew infinitely better than Irishmen what Ireland wanted, they displayed an arrogance which was really intolerable—utterly intolerable. He was standing on the brink of the grave; but if they were to be his last words, he would say to his countrymen, never submit to the insults of the Saxons, never permit them to domineer over you, but, in public bodies or private bodies, by all lawful means, resist them to the last. He would not detain the House longer. [Cries of "Go on!"] Well, he would occupy two minutes more by telling them what was the meaning of Home Rule. The Press of England, for what reason he knew not, had hitherto concealed what it was. This demand was represented as a demand for separation. Such, however, was not the case. Its real meaning might be gathered from a Manifesto of the Home Rule League. That Manifesto stated that the League was formed for the purpose of obtaining for Ireland the right of self-government by means of a National Parliament assembled in Ireland composed of Her Majesty's Lords and Commons, with the right to legislate and regulate all matters relating to the internal affairs of Ireland, and to have control over Irish resources and revenue, subject to the obligation of contributing a just proportion to the Imperial Exchequer. It proposed to leave the Imperial Parliament power to deal with all questions affecting the Crown and the Government legislation affecting the Colonies and other Dependencies, and all matters pertaining to the defence and the stability of the Empire at large. That did not look like severing the fortunes of Ireland from

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    those of England, or an attempt to disunite and destroy the Empire. He had been astonished to read in the papers yesterday that the Attorney General had stated at Pre3ton that all Irish complaints were fictitious and imaginary, and that they were dreaming about their wrongs. The hon. and learned Gentlemen was, no doubt, a Volunteer—a member of the "Devil's Own"—but if the hon. and learned Gentleman said to a comrade that he had got a prod of a small sword in the ribs or a bullet under the breast some years ago, when he was young, and all the tinkering and plaistering of the doctors had been insufficient to close up the wound, and, therefore, he was unable to attend a muster, what would be the nature of his feelings if his comrade exclaimed—"What is the use of complaining of a wound received so long ago? You must march." Then, how could it be said that because the British Government had been treating his country for centuries, instead of days or years, in the most scandalous manner, that everyone in Ireland was dreaming? When he went back he would tell his countrymen to bide their time. As long as he lived, at all events, there would be no recourse, recommended by him, to the ridiculous insurrections which had been forced on his country once or twice; but if they were not given justice now, when the tomb was closed over him, some of the hon. Members listening to him would be quoting his words, that when the first cannon shot was fired by a gun-boat hostile to the British Flag, from either France or America, that shot would be the signal for the arrival of a Royal Prince in Ireland, sent by Her Majesty to open an Irish Parliament in College Green, and then it would be for the people of Ireland to choose their allies—he hoped they might be English, but it might be otherwise. He begged to move the Resolution of which he had given Notice.