HC Deb 25 June 1884 vol 289 cc1279-87
MR. ARTHUR ARNOLD

, in moving the following new Standing Order:— Estate Bills—188B, That in the case of any Estate Bill, the Committee on the Bill shall report specially to the House if the Bill contains provisions extending either the term or the area of any Settlement of Land, and the Report of the Committee shall be printed and circulated with the Votes, said, the terms of the proposed Standing Order which stood in his name were very plain and simple; but it would not be respectful to the House if he did not explain the object he had in view in proposing it, which, however, he would be able to do in very few words. He certainly would not have presumed to propose a new Standing Order if he had not been encouraged to do so by the Prime Minister. The House would be aware that in every Session there were a certain number of Bills introduced dealing with private estates. Those Bills always arrived somewhat late in the House of Commons, because, owing to immemorial custom, such Bills were first introduced in the House of Lords. He did not suggest that there should be any interference with that custom. It appeared to have grown out of the judicial functions of the House of Lords. The Lords had at all times had the power of consulting Her Majesty's Judges on matters of law, and these Bills, dealing with settlements, long leases, and limited ownership of land, were often of so complicated and difficult a character that their due examination required the highest legal attainments. If an Estate Bill had not been settled in the Court of Chancery, on petition to the House of Lords on the first reading it was referred to two of the Judges in rotation, not being Peers of Parliament, for examination and report. If an Estate Bill were introduced first into the House of Commons, it would be referred in the same way to two of the Judges, after a first reading in the House of Lords. There was, therefore, some advantage in the custom by which these Bills were first introduced in the other House of Parliament. When they came to the House of Commons, the House knew that two of the Judges had reported that the allegations contained in the Preamble of such Bills had been satisfactorily established, and that the provisions of the Bill were proper for carrying into effect the purposes of the measure, so far as the opinion of two of the learned Judges was concerned. These Bills were rarely opposed, and the exa- mination by the Judges was extremely useful in securing that Parliament should act with legality—at least with legality—towards the various parties. It was at this point that he had ventured to interfere, not in disapproval of the procedure upon Estate Bills, but in order to secure that the duty of Parliament, which was much larger than the duty of the examining Judges, should be as far as possible fulfilled. The Judges had only to see that the law was observed, and that the private rights of parties in these Bills were not unduly extended. The Judges had no concern whatever with the public interests in land. It was their high function to be interpreters of the law; but the Legislature, which composed both Houses of Parliament, had the much higher function of making the law. This House was now in exactly the same condition as the other House, in having no Report whatever in regard to questions affecting the public interest which might be involved in the introduction of one of these Bills. For instance, a settlement of land might be proposed to Parliament, which might include the land of half a county, and might be placed in hands which, from pecuniary embarrassment or some other cause, would not be the best, having regard to the improvement of the soil. But the House of Commons would not have one word on such a subject before it from Her Majesty's Judges; and the House, which, next to the rights and liberties of the people, was most of all concerned in the improvement of the soil, might, through some inadvertence, be guilty of neglect of duty in reference to one of these measures. Many hon. Members were of opinion that the settlement of land was opposed to simplicity of transfer, and might, in certain instances, be unfavourable to improvement. Lord Cairns himself was certainly of that opinion, because, in the Settled Lands Act, he had proposed that the life tenant should, with certain small limitations, have the power of selling any part of his estate with a view to the improvement of the remainder of his property. All of them, he was sure, would agree that when the House allowed a new or an extended settlement of land, they ought to know what they were doing. That was all he asked the House to agree to in submitting this Standing Order—namely that they should receive certain information upon points in regard to which it was not the duty of the examining Judges to report to the House of Lords. The Judges to whom these Bills were submitted had nothing whatever to do with the improvement of land. They had no concern whatever in the public interest in land; but the House of Commons had. He would only say, before resuming his seat, that there was a Committee of the House of Lords appointed in the year 1873, to report upon the improvement of the soil and the Land Laws generally, and he had been informed that the Report of that Committee was drawn up by Lord Salisbury. There was one remarkable sentence contained in it to which he wished to draw the attention of the House. It was this— The case for Parliamentary consideration lies in this—that the improvement of land in its effect upon the price of food and upon the dwellings of the poor is a matter of public interest. The Standing Order which he proposed asked only for such information as he respectfully submitted it was right that the House should obtain as plainly and simply as possible. He made the proposal with confidence that it would be accepted by Her Majesty's Government after the assurance of support which he understood he had received; and he was not without strong hope that, if it should be the pleasure of hon. Members, he would have the high honour of placing to-day among the Standing Orders of the House a perpetual record and acknowledgment of its sense of the public interest in land. He begged to propose the Standing Order which appeared in his name on the Paper.

MR. CRAIG SELLAR

, in seconding the Motion, said, the reasons why this proposal should be accepted, and be made a Standing Order of the House, had been so clearly explained by his hon. Friend that he felt hardly justified in trespassing upon the House, even for a few minutes, in urging anything in addition to what his hon. Friend had stated; but while his hon. Friend and he had the same object—namely, that they should give some formality to, and have some check upon, the proceedings of Committees in regard to Bills relating to settled estates in land, in the case of unopposed Bills, he was not certain that the motives which actuated his hon. Friend and those which actuated him were identical. His hon. Friend had stated that he desired that there should be a distinction made between Private Bills dealing with estates in land and Private Bills dealing with other matters. No doubt, as his hon. Friend had shown, there was a distinction made in the other House of Parliament. In that House it was provided that a Report should be made by two of the Judges upon all Estate Bills. The Judges were to report whether, assuming the Preamble was proved, they were satisfied that the Bill was a reasonable one, and calculated to carry out the intended objects; and they were further to report to the House of Lords what Amendments, if any, they had to suggest. In the House of Commons they treated Bills of this nature with somewhat less respect. They were, he might say, for the most part family Bills—Bills which dealt with estates connected with families. They were arranged outside the House, and, as a rule, were unopposed; and, undoubtedly, unless due supervision were exercised over them, some objectionable provision might be allowed to slip through Committee. The object of his hon. Friend the Member for Salford (Mr. Arthur Arnold) was to secure that these Bills should be marked in a particular manner, because they dealt with land; whereas he (Mr. Craig Sellar) desired that they should be marked in a particular manner, but for an entirely different reason. His hon. Friend had admitted candidly what was in his mind, and he (Mr. Craig Sellar) would admit just as candidly and frankly what his motive was. He supported the proposal, because he had no abiding confidence in the existing system by which legislation upon Private Bills was carried on in that House. There was not that amount of publicity which ought to prevail with regard to these Bills, especially when they were unopposed. The House delegated its functions to its Committees, and the Committees, to a large extent, delegated their functions to the Chairman of the Committee. That fact threw upon the Chairman a very grave responsibility, and particularly so in regard to measures which dealt with any question relating to land. He was of opinion that this was a responsibility which should not be thrown upon one man, however eminent he might be, but that it should be shared, to a large extent, by the House itself. He believed a Committee did well, in many instances, to delegate their duties to the Chairman of Committees; and certainly there would not be much objection if the Chairman of Committees was an ordinary official. But he thought the House would agree with him that the Chairman of Committees in that House was not an ordinary official. He was two or three important officials rolled into one. He was the hardest worked man in the House; and, however willing, able, and devoted to his duty a Chairman of Committees might be—and he was sure the House would agree with him that no more able, more willing, or more devoted official could occupy that position than the hon. Gentleman the Member for Rochester (Sir Arthur Otway)—no man, however willing, able, and devoted he might be, was capable of discharging the enormous mass of public duties which fell upon the Chairman of Committees. He would ask the House to consider for a moment what those duties were. From 2 o'clock until 7 he must be at the Table of the House whenever the House was in Committee; and, again, from 9 o'clock until probably 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning he was again to be found presiding over their deliberations, with his mind in a state of tension owing to the watchful care he was compelled to exercise over the complicated details of the clauses of Public Bills, or the intricacies of Supply. The next morning it was necessary that he should be down to the House by noon, in order to conduct the proceedings of the House in reference to unopposed Private Bills, and to wade through the clauses of a general mass of Private Bills that were placed before him. Was it possible that any man could discharge such duties with all the care which the House had a right to expect? No doubt, the Chairman of Committees had a most able staff of officials to assist him; but it was a very small staff—very much too small considering the large amount of Bills presented to Parliament. What supervision did the House exercise over this branch of Private Bill legislation? How was it to know that any Estate Bill, or any unopposed Bill, was before the House at all? Under such circumstances, it was impossible for the House to exercise any due or proper supervision over this branch of legislation. He believed that the time was not far off when a thorough and radical reform of the whole system of Private Bill legislation must take place. Indeed, it would appear, from recent discussions, that the time was nearly ripe now; and if he was in Order in referring to a recent debate in "another place," which only took place a few days ago, it would seem to be in contemplation to effect great reforms in that branch of the Legislature. No portion of the proposition submitted to the House of Lords was received with such acclamation in that august Assembly as the proposal for adopting new principles in dealing with Private Bill legislation in that House. It was perfectly true that the number of Estate Bills introduced into Parliament was limited. He held in his hand a list of those which had been introduced since 1873; and although they had apparently increased since 1873, the number was still only small. It amounted to about five, on the average, in a year. Some years there had been as many as nine, in some years seven, and in others only two; but the average was about five in each year. If the system of requiring Reports to be furnished should be once established, even in this small class of Private Bill legislation, it would help, and greatly help, the solution of the larger question of Private Bill legislation generally, which, he believed, not only in the House of Commons, but in the other House of Parliament, was nearly ripe, and for which the public out-of-doors had long been sincerely anxious. On that account he had much pleasure in seconding the proposal of his hon. Friend the Member for Salford.

Motion made, and Question proposed, That in the case of any Estate Bill, the Committee on the Bill shall report specially to the House if the Bill contains provisions extending either the term or the area of any Settlement of Land, and the Report of the Committee shall be printed and circulated with the Votes."—(Mr. Arthur Arnold.)

SIR ARTHUR OTWAY

I do not rise for the purpose of following my hon. Friend the Member for the Haddington Burghs (Mr. Craig Sellar) in any of the observations he has made, and which, no doubt, are of considerable importance, in regard to Private Bill legisla- tion. Nor will it be expected that I should enter into the general question of the settlement of land, which has been raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Salford (Mr. Arthur Arnold). I will only say, with regard to the Standing Order itself, which has been proposed by my hon. Friend, that I think it will be a valuable addition. There is no doubt whatever that great responsibility would be cast upon any Member of the House who occupies the position I do if it were not for the protection afforded me by the knowledge that these Estate Bills have been thoroughly investigated by two of Her Majesty's Judges before they reached me. If it were not for that fact, I could not undertake to give my sanction to these Bills without a much more elaborate investigation than the time and opportunities I have at my disposal would allow me to devote to them. I wish my hon. Friend the Member for Salford to put his mind at rest in regard to these Bills, which have already been passed, if he supposes that they have not been very carefully and thoroughly considered. In the first place, it is not unimportant to remember that all of them, when they are introduced in the House of Lords, undergo a careful investigation at the hands of one of the most experienced public servants of the country—Lord Redesdale, the Chairman of Committees in that House, assisted by able counsel. That noble Lord has had a very long experience; and when the Bills come down to me, they have already received the sanction of his high authority. When they reach me, I give them as careful an investigation, and devote to them as much time as circumstances will allow, and I have the assistance of two most able men in the process—a gentleman who gives me his services in the position of secretary, a gentleman of considerable knowledge and some 30 years' experience—and I have, in addition, the assistance of the counsel to Mr. Speaker, of whom it is quite unnecessary for me to say one word in praise. The House, therefore, may be pretty well satisfied that these Estate Bills do receive very careful investigation. However, as they do treat of important matters, and contain the important proposals to which my hon. Friend the Member for Salford has referred—involving probably questions of entail and disentail, I agree with him that it is desirable the attention of the House should be called to the circumstances of all Bills of such a character by such a Report as that which my hon. Friend suggests in his proposed Standing Order. Indeed, I know of no better form of bringing the provisions of Bills dealing with the settlement of land before the House. Therefore, I have much pleasure in supporting the proposal of my hon. Friend. I will only add one word in regard to the observations of the hon. Member for the Haddington Burghs. Certainly, the labour imposed upon the Chairman of Committees is, no doubt, sufficient for any one man to undertake; but it is not quite so onerous as my hon. Friend supposes. Private Business is not undertaken by the Chairman every day. If it were, it would be perfectly impossible for any one man to preside at this Table, and conduct the Private Business of the House at the same time; but the duties of the Chairman in connection with Private Bills are limited to two days a-week.

Question put, and agreed to. 188B. Resolved, That in the-case of any Estate Bill, the Committee on the Bill shall report specially to the House if the Bill contains provisions extending either the term or the area of any Settlement of Land, and the Report of the Committee shall be printed and circulated with the Votes.

Ordered, That the said Resolution be a Standing Order of the House.