HC Deb 22 June 1881 vol 262 cc1035-7
MR. O'DONNELL

rose to ask the opinion of Mr. Speaker as to a Motion he proposed to make on a point of Privilege arising out of a Minute containing a Report recently issued by the Treasury, affecting the telegraphists and postal clerks. He said the question affected one of the most important Privileges of the House, which had been violated by an eminent Member of the Government. The fundamental privilege of the House was its right to be freely approached by all classes of Her Majesty's subjects when petitioning for the redress of grievances; and so deeply was that principle involved in the Constitution that it was an established maxim that the redress of grievances must even precede Supply. In former times the House had even gone so far as to say that a petitioner arrested under formal process must be released from prison in order that he might attend the House and make his appeal. Such a case was reported in Hatsell as occurring in 1624. In that year one Arnold, a feltmaker, came to the House to prepare a Bill affecting feltmakers, and it was ordered by the House that the feltmakers then imprisoned in the Fleet should be allowed the Privilege of the House in order that they should have full opportunity of stating their grievances. He hoped the matter of which he had to complain would be satisfactorily explained away by the Government, and that they would take the proper steps to deprive their act of the appearance of being a precedent which might in future prevent the free approach of all classes of petitioners to that House.

MR. SPEAKER

The hon. Member appears to me now to be going into the merits of the question which he desires to bring before the House. I have to inform the hon. Member that I have carefully examined the Treasury Minute to which he has called my attention, and to which his proposed Motion refers. Should the hon. Member think fit, upon Constitutional or other grounds, to bring that Minute under the notice of the House, it will be open to him to do so by Motion in the usual manner; but there are no grounds whatever for giving precedence to a Motion of that character as a question of Privilege. I, therefore, could not allow the hon. Member, without instructions from the House, to proceed to-day with such a Motion as a matter of Privilege.

MR. O'DONNELL

I, of course, accept your ruling, Sir. The point on which I was about to ask your formal decision was as to the Treasury Minute at page 9 of the Report, with special reference to the sentences— In the first place, the Lords of the Treasury-are not prepared to acquiesce in any organized agitation which openly seeks to bring any voting power to hear upon the House of Commons. The next sentence of which I complain is— My Lords, therefore, reserve to themselves the power of directing that the execution of the terms referred to may be suspended in any post office in which the members are known to be engaged in any extra-official agitation. My contention to you for permission to bring in a Motion is founded on those two sentences—that they constitute a threat to refuse redress of grievances to any member of the Post Office Depart- ment who shall engage in an agitation having for its object the redress of their grievances by the House of Commons. If you rule that that interference with the action of the telegraph clerks in consulting the House of Commons for the redress of grievances is not a breach of Privilege, I shall take the earliest opportunity of bringing in a formal Motion condemning the action of the Government in interfering with the rights of the telegraph clerks, and seeking to limit the powers of this House for redressing the grievances of any class of Her Majestys subjects.

MR. SPEAKER

I may say that the hon. Member was good enough to call my attention to the passages which he has read from the Treasury Minute, and, of course, I have paid particular attention to those passages; but they are not such as to cause me to alter the opinion which I have expressed to the House.