§ Resolutions [18th March] reported.
§ SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACHsaid, had the Chancellor of the Exchequer been present, he should have asked him whether the question of providing the necessary funds for the defence of our Colonial harbours and coaling-stations would be dealt with in the Bud- 482 get, or whether, after the statement of the noble Marquess last night, any further announcements would be deferred until the consideration of the Vote for Fortifications in the Army Estimates?
§ MR. COURTNEYsaid, his right hon. Friend could not have anticipated that this point would be raised, or he would have been in attendance; but it might be assumed that it would not be necessary to refer to the matter in the Budget.
§ MR. GIBSONsaid, it had been generally stated in the newspapers that the Lord Lieutenant had recently decided not to reduce the present number of Sub-Commissioners until the arrears of cases had been disposed of. He desired to know what was the view of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary as to the duration of time for which these temporary Sub-Commissioners would be continued? He noticed a very substantial reduction in the Estimates for this year and last year. Last year's Estimate was £157,000; this year it was £88,000. The continuance of the temporary Sub-Commissioners would, however, necessarily cause a very substantial increase in the Estimates for this year. Another matter on which he wished an explanation from the right hon. Gentleman was the proposed Divisional Magistrates Bill. When would that Bill be brought in, and would it be similar to the one which was withdrawn last year for the re-organization of some of the branches of the Constabulary?
§ MR. TREVELYANsaid, with regard to a matter of such immense importance as the constitution of the Land Courts, the Government did not hesitate to come before the House of Commons with the confession that the elapse of three or four months had made a great difference in their calculations. The Estimates were closed at the end of last year, and at that time the Land Commission had no adequate idea of the amount of work it would be called upon to accomplish. In the closing months of last year the number of originating notices had fallen; but in the few months that had elapsed since the number of such notices had very largely increased indeed, and now stood at a much higher estimate than, the Land Commission could have foreseen in December last. In December last, the Land Commission came to the 483 conclusion to recommend the Irish Government to largely reduce the number of Sub-Commissioners, and the Estimates were framed with the idea that that reduction would take plane, making a difference of about £70,000 less. In view of the great increase in the number of originating notices the Irish Government, in consultation with the Land Commission, had come to the conclusion to keep up the existing number of Sub-Commissioners until the arrears were worked up, and the business of the Land Commission reduced to its normal dimensions. The Irish Government had asked the Treasury to sanction the retention of all the Sub-Commissioners for four months longer, and after that time the number would be reduced to what might be considered a normal number. His Bill dealing with the subject of Divisional Magistrates was in an advanced state, and he renewed his promise that if hon. Members did not throw any absolute impediment in the way it would be introduced in the course of the present financial year. The pay of these officers would come out of the County Courts Vote, and though the title by which they were to be known had not been settled in absolute terms, they would be the same men and perform exactly the same functions as the present Divisional Magistrates.
MR. J. LOWTHERsaid, that when he heard of the intention of the Government to dispense with the services of several of these Sub-Commissioners, he felt a sense of relief. They had managed to attach to themselves a greater amount of odium and less confidence than any other quasi-judicial tribunal ever before enjoyed. He withdrew his description "quasi-judicial," for as regarded the Sub-Commissioners and the Head-Commissioners, they were simply a conglomeration of partizans who appeared to cast all judicial instincts to the winds, and to consider that their sole duty was the carrying out of political objects. It was disappointing that the country could not he relieved from the discredit of being served by such personages.
§ MR. TREVELYANadmitted that the figures in the Estimate were not accurate.
MR. J. LOWTHERreplied, that we should be then, called upon to pay a much larger sum than appeared in the Estimate. The amount of property con- 484 fiscated, without any sort of compensation, was £400,000 per annum; and it would cost as much to confiscate that sum as had been abstracted from the owners' pockets. He failed to understand from the statement of the right hon. Gentleman what this country would be expected to pay during the coming financial year. No idea had been given by the Government as to the permanent arrangements which were to be made with reference to this most costly body of Commissioners and Sub-Commissioners; and he thought the House had a right to ask when the right hon. Gentleman hoped to be able to carry out the numerical reductions which had been referred to. The right hon. Gentleman, as he understood him, now proposed to continue for four months the services of gentlemen who had discredited the State, and whose employment involved a ruinous expenditure. He hoped the House would have some assurance that the Government would before long discontinue the expenditure of the public funds to which he referred. A great deal of the blame had been cast upon the Sub-Commissioners; but he thought the blame should be borne by the responsible Commissioners themselves, and that the British taxpayers should not be called upon to contribute indefinitely towards the payment of an expense of the kind, which was wholly disproportionate to the results, discreditable as such results were, which had been thereby obtained.
§ MR. COURTNEYThat £400,000 is in perpetuity. The cost of the Court is not perpetual.
MR. J. LOWTHERsaid, that that was so, no doubt, until it should be increased by political exigencies causing another scramble for the remainder of the property.
§ MR. WARTONsaid, that, fortunately, the Government would not exist in perpetuity, and another Ministry might hold Office at the expiration of the 15 years' term, which would not give the same instructions to the Commission as this Government had done. He hoped the Government would give the House an assurance that the rate of taxation in Ireland would be reduced, and that the Attorney General would be able to tell the House, notwithstanding his speech of two days ago, that he was no longer an advocate of confiscation.
§ SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACHsaid, he did not expect that the Secretary to the Treasury would be able to announce any reduction in the taxation of Ireland; but it was to his mind clear that the actual expenditure in Ireland during the ensuing year for the purposes of the Land Commission, would exceed the Estimate which had been recently presented. He thought that some change was urgently called for in regard to the amount of this expenditure which would be recouped by suitors, and the amount which would be paid for initiatory fees by persons who invoked the action of the Land Court. It was unfair to the taxpayers that they should be called upon to bear so large a proportion of the costs of suits which were entered for the personal advantage of the individuals instituting them.
§ MR. COURTNEYsaid, the question was, without doubt, one of great moment, and the matter of revising the scale of fees was one which might require to be dealt with, and he would examine it with great care. But they must remember that it would be a serious matter to so raise the fees as to bar the tenants from taking advantage of the benefits of the Courts. Strong reasons would be required to induce the Government to make any change in the scale.
§ MR. GIBSONasked what was the gross amount received from suitors last year?
§ MR. COURTNEYreplied, it was very small, something about £3,000.
§ MR. LEWISsaid, that the Government did not seem to have any fixed intention with regard to the Sub-Commissioners. They alternately announced that the Sub-Commissioners were going to be dropped and re-appointed. It had been understood that some of these appointments were to be made for a temporary period, and they had evidently been made upon the condition of good behaviour in the judicial decisions. Directly he had discovered, during the progress of the Land Act through Committee, that by means of these posts the semi-legal and semi-farming classes were to be allowed to work their will on the property of the landowning class, he predicted that the result would be a kind of helter-skelter reduction of rents. On questions under the Land Act, the action taken by the Government was influenced by the attitude of hon. Members from 486 Ireland below the Gangway. He was bound to protest against the class of persons selected as Sub-Commissioners, the result of such selections being that the machinery had failed to produce anything like the fair and impartial results which were expected, and for which the taxpayers of the country had paid.
§
Resolutions agreed to.
Ordered, That the Resolutions which, upon the 18th day of this instant March, were reported from the Committee of Supply, and then agreed to by the House, be read as follows:—
Ordered, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide, during Twelve Months, for the Discipline and Regulation of the Army, and that the Marquess of HARTINGTON, The JUDGE ADVOCATE, and Mr. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN, do prepare and bring it in.
Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 144.]
§ LORD GEORGE HAMILTONsaid, he wished to draw attention to the arrangement under which this country made an advance of £5,000,000 to India to meet the expenses of the Afghan War. In 1881 the Prime Minister admitted that it was necessary to make this grant to India, and he suggested that it might be a sort of punishment to this country for Parliament having given its sanction to the war. In order to make it penal in its operations the right hon. Gentleman deliberately departed from every financial principle he had previously laid down. He made the payments in the following way:—£2,000,000 was given back to India as being a loan due from England to India, and the remaining £3,000,000 was spread over six years in six equal payments of £500,000. The arrangement was so obviously open to objection that a number of Gentlemen on both sides objected to it. However, this annual payment of £500,000 had been made in each of the financial years since 1881; but to his amazement the Chancellor of the Exchequer the other day issued a note from the Treasury asking 487 for an additional grant of £500,000, or; in other words making the payment for this financial year £1,000,000 in place of £500,000. "The Chancellor of the Exchequer, who had not given a shadow of a reason for departing from the under-standing, was going on his own authority to alter an arrangement entered into by the House. The proceeding was certainly of a rather remarkable character, and he did not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer would have brought it forward in the way he had but for the fact that in view of an impending General Election he wished to be able to go before the country with the probability of a surplus next year. In the circumstances he thought they ought to have some explanation from Her Majesty's Government. Were the Government going to relieve the ensuing financial year from this charge of £5,000,000, or did they intend to relieve the next financial year 1885–6? The transaction to which he had called attention was not only peculiar in itself, but it would establish a principle which had never before been sanctioned by the House, and he therefore hoped the Secretary to the Treasury would be able to give some explanation of the reasons for adopting this very remarkable course.
§ GENERAL SIR GEORGE BALFOURsaid, he thought the noble Lord had done good service by calling attention to this subject. This payment of one of the £500,000 promised to India in aid of the expenses of the Afghan War, in anticipation of the time fixed for its issue, was a misappropriation of funds, and no other words could properly express the fact. By diverting this sum from the payment next year to its payment in the current year, the result was that the surplus of this year would be lessened, and the amount thereby required to be appropriated diminution of the National Debt would be largely cut down. All money charges dealing with the funds so as to vary the accounts of the Kingdom should be resisted. They might well remember the way Lord Sherbrooke dealt with the Income Tax. Every year ought to support its own burden, and he was surprised that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was not in his place to explain this matter.
§ MR. M'COANsaid, that, with reference to the Diplomatic Vote, he de- 488 sired to interpose a few remarks between the present discussion and the Irish grievances which were to follow. He wished to justify the pertinacity with which he had persisted in bringing before the House the question of the suppression of the Bosphore Egyptien, an Egyptian newspaper, published at Cairo.
§ MR. SPEAKERIt is not in Order to bring forward the question of an Egyptian newspaper on the Motion that I leave the Chair.
§ MR. M'COANremarked, that he proposed to bring it forward undercover of the Diplomatic Vote. [Cries of "Order!"] This was the only opportunity he should have for bringing a grave scandal under the notice of the House.
MR. J. LOWTHERsaid, he supposed the hon. Member must confine his remarks to the action of some official whose salary was included in the Vote.
§ MR. SPEAKERThe hon. Member will not be in Order in bringing the subject forward.
§ MR. COURTNEYsaid, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would have, doubtless, been in his place if he had had the slightest suspicion that the noble Lord intended to call attention to his conduct. He had sent for his right hon. Friend, who would probably make his appearance presently. That the noble Lord was a little unreasonable appeared from the fact that he complained of the Chancellor of the Exchequer doing what he had himself recommended in former years. His right hon. Friend did not act on his own authority, and he had no power over the action of Parliament. He was not coming to that House for an Act of Indemnity; but he was proposing to vary an Act of Parliament, and the very Bill now before the House was one of the steps taken to carry out that proposal. His hon. and gallant Friend (General Sir George Balfour) said that every year should support its own burden. That was true; but the burden to be supported every year was the burden for the Service of the year—the burden of defraying the Administration of the year. This, however, was a special arrangement in respect of a grant made to the Indian Government in alleviation of the cost of the Afghan War. It was thought convenient that the payment should be 489 made in six annual instalments; but he denied that this sum of £500,000 formed part of the Service of the year. In reality, the noble Lord had made a mountain of a molehill. There was no attempt to steal a march on Parliament. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had done nothing on his own authority. His right hon. Friend had simply submitted a proposal to the House for altering an arrangement which was made some years ago, and without the consent of the House that alteration could not be carried into effect.
§ MR. ONSLOWsaid, that he had asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what was the meaning of that Bill, and the right, hon. Gentleman had said that it was a mere formal matter, and was the same as was done last year. If the expression was Parliamentary, he should say that the Government were juggling with the Bill. They were playing ducks and drakes with an arrangement which the House of Commons had made in former years, that the money should be paid in equal instalments. He should like to know whether India had asked for this £500,000 to meet expected difficulties in the coming year? The noble Lord had done good service in bringing the matter before the House.
§ MR. E. STANHOPEsaid, that the explanation of the Secretary to the Treasury was not satisfactory. The hon. Gentleman had complained that his noble Friend had given no Notice of his intention to raise the question; but the fact was that Orders on the Paper had been so continually changed that Members never knew what was going to be put down. His noble Friend was anxious to get information from the Government as soon as he could, and there had been no opportunity of doing so till the present time. Whenever explanations were given it was at an hour of the morning when there was no one present to hear them. The arrangement was a most inconvenient one, both for England and for India, because if Parliament in a particular year refused to vote the annual amount India would be placed in a ridiculous position, because she had already credited the amount in her accounts. It would appear, if the Government insisted on this proposal, as if they intended to punish those who had supported the Afghan War. 490 A deliberate arrangement had been made which, ought not to set be aside. If that system had to be carried further, it would be possible for a Government just before a General Election to take advantage of an accidental majority, and refuse the Vote in order to serve their own purposes. He strongly objected to a proposal to relieve the finances next year by an operation of that kind, and his noble Friend had done good service by calling attention to the question.
§ MR. WARTONsaid, the Government were flying in the face of an Act of Parliament. He had detected them on Sunday morning at 5.30 in a similar attempt, and he should never lose an opportunity of exposing such conduct. Every year since he had been in the House he had called attention to another matter, which was a public scandal. He meant the Vote for the Public Prosecutor and his Office. The hon. Member for Wolver-hampton had used oven stronger terms than himself on that question. The Public Prosecutor received £2,000 a-year, and his assistant £1,000, and there was £800 or £900 additional voted for the Office. Nothing was done for the money, and all their remonstrances had been treated with contempt. As at present conducted, the office of Public Prosecutor was a sham and a disgrace to the Profession, the country, and the Government; and the Government ought to say whether it was their intention that the present unsatisfactory condition of things should be continued.
§ SIR HENRY HOLLANDsaid, it might relieve the mind of the hon. and learned Member to be informed that a Departmental Committee was sitting on this subject, and that it included the hon. Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. H. H. Fowler), himself, and others who had both felt and spoken strongly on the present working of the Office, and upon the necessity of reconsidering the conditions upon which it was constituted.
§ MR. THOMAS COLLINSregarded the £500,000 payable to India as so much diverted from the reduction of the National Debt, to which it ought to have been applied, even if the sum had had to be raised by extra taxation.
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. CHILDERS)said, he believed that the Departmental Committee on the Office of Public Prosecutor was approach- 491 ing the conclusion of its labours. With I regard to the £500,000, he regretted the hour at which he had been compelled to make an explanatory statement, of which, however, a report did appear in The Times. The House had determined to pay £5,000,000 to India by remitting £2,000,000 that had been lent, and making six annual Votes of £500,000 each. Pour had been made. The year 1884–5, which they were just approaching, would be, from a financial point of view, a very much worse year than the year 1883–4 or the year 1885–6. There would be no windfall next year, while this year included in its Revenue the remnant of the 1½d. additional Income Tax and of the Railway Tax, amounting to between £800,000 and £1,000,000. The Government thought that, in as much as there would be a surplus this year, they should adopt the hint given to them by the noble Lord the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton), and take the fifth £500,000 from the year that would most easily bear it. Having the money, this was a more prudent course than levying additional taxation. Nothing was concealed; it was a thoroughly open financial transaction; and he trusted the House would not think that the Government had acted unwisely.
§ SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTEsaid, he was not at all prepared to say that the course taken by the Chancellor of the Exchequer was an unwise one; still, the matter was one that ought to be brought distinctly under the notice of the House. For, if there was a point more than another on which the Prime Minister used to dwell strongly when he was attacking the conduct of financial affairs by the late Government, it was that there should be only one Budget a-year; indeed, the Prime Minister would hardly admit that circumstances could arise to justify a second Budget, and in Opposition he would have been likely to have said that the course proposed was a violation of the very first canons of finance. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer made his Financial Statement last year, it was within his knowledge that next year would be an unfavourable one as compared with this, and it would have been right and proper for him to have said that this year might bear a burden which belonged to the next. If he had done so, the House would have had before it the arrange- 492 ments for the year, and would probably have confirmed his views. Instead of that, he waited until the end of the year, and then altered the arrangements. The amount involved was of less importance than the principle, for if the Chancellor of the Exchequer could in this way anticipate a burden, it would be equally open to him, if he found it more convenient, not to impose upon himself, but to get rid of a burden of this kind until the succeeding year. He (Sir Stafford Northcote) thought it was necessary, in the interests of financial accuracy and correctness, that the House should take notice of this matter. The change which had been made at the close of the financial year might have been carried out at the beginning of the year. It might be that this arrangement was intended to avert a deficit in the coming year, and he should watch the Budget with more interest on that account. He considered that his noble Friend had done quite right in calling attention to the matter, as it might otherwise have escaped the attention of a large number of Members.
§ MR. SCLATER-BOOTHthought it right to say that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his speech a few nights ago, made the statement which the House had just listened to. He objected to the system of prospective Budgets, which seemed to find favour with the Government, and thought that every year should bear its own burdens. The transaction to which attention had been called was an illustration of a financial policy precisely the reverse of that which had distinguished the Administration of the present Prime Minister in former days, and marked a new departure in finance.
§ LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILLsaid, he wished to point out to the House and to the public, not the extravagance of the Government, for that did not need illustration, but the extremely fallacious and, if he might use the word in a strictly political sense, the extremely dishonest character of the financial policy of the Government. Under their financial arrangements the Supplementary Estimates had grown to an extent never before known; and he desired to point out what effect that had had upon Public Business. In the first place, the policy of the Government in submitting large Supplementary Estimates 493 had deprived the House of the slightest control over the finances of the year. Certain Estimates were presented on the faith of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the House voted them; whereas if the real Estimates were presented they would be seriously criticized and possibly opposed. In the second place, the Chancellor of the Exchequer regularly and habitually under-estimated the finances. It was a perfectly understood maxim with Liberal financiers that it was right and proper and legitimate in politics to under-estimate the year's Expenditure, so as to pet the country to believe for the moment that they were pursuing an economical course of action. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer was in the habit of producing reliable Estimates of the Expenditure of the year, he would be relieved from the duty of coming down to the House in the early part of the Session with a supplementary demand for money. Hours and hours before Easter, which ought to have been devoted to the consideration of the legislative proposals of the Government, had been taken up with discussions on Supplementary Estimates; and when all lands of accusations were thrown out against the Opposition as to the inability of the Government to make progress with their Legislative Business, the fault in reality lay with Her Majesty's Government. This scandal was also created, that, Supply having to be put down before Easter for several nights, the Government gave opportunities to Members to raise discussions on various matters, and the consequence was, they had the scandalous spectacle presented of the House of Commons voting millions and millions of money in the small hours of the morning. Clearly, it was no use for them to look to the Radical Party for any check to be placed upon the Government with respect to their financial policy or this waste of public time; but it was within the province and duty of Members of the Opposition to lose no opportunity of pointing out to the public, not only the extravagance of the Government, but also the waste of time which was caused by the unreliable and unsatisfactory Estimates which the Liberal Chancellor of the Exchequer year after year laid upon the Table of the House of Commons.
§ SIR R. ASSHETON CROSSsaid, he entirely agreed with the noble Lord that 494 it was a bad practice to put pressure upon the Departments for the purpose of getting them to make the Estimates as small as possible. Not only was the practice bad, but it caused no saving whatever. With reference to the question of the Public Prosecutor, he might say that under the Act of 1879 great power was left in the hands of the Attorney General; and he could not help thinking that if the country had not been unfortunately deprived of the great services of the late Lord Justice Holker, a great deal of assistance would have been afforded by him as regarded the carrying out of that Act. He did not wish to impute too much blame to the Attorney General for not having worked that Act as he thought it should have been worked; but he was bound to say that no single action seemed to have been taken by the Law Officers of the Crown in order to put it properly in force. The operation of the Act had been left entirely without the guidance of the Attorney General. He was very glad to find that they were shortly to have the Report of the Departmental Committee before them; but he hoped it was not too late to state that he felt convinced that it would be a great mistake to join together the civil and criminal business which had hitherto been conducted by the Secretary to the Treasury. Whatever recommendation the Government might adopt, he trusted they would not combine the civil and criminal business. It was very important that they should be kept separate, for he was convinced no single person could manage the two satisfactorily. He would also suggest that some permanent office should be established for successive Attorneys and Solicitors General. At present they remained in their own chambers and had no permanent staff; a small permanent staff as well as permanent offices should be provided.
§ MR. STUART-WORTLEYsaid, that the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman (Sir R. Assheton Cross) who had preceded him as to the necessity of special offices for the Attorney General, raised also the question of the advisableness of such offices for the principal Secretary of the Lord Chancellor, who was becoming more than ever the executive head of a Department of Public Justice. The correspondence, precedents, and experience accumulated 495 under the principal Secretary would be scattered to the winds and rendered of no avail to his successor, unless some such change were made. There was a marked difference in the case of the Lord Chancellor and the Attorney General and the Solicitor General, because the latter could be seconded in their duties by professional gentlemen who need not be withdrawn from active practice at the Bar; but the Lord Chancellor was unable to have the assistance of gentlemen in active practice. He (Mr. Stuart-Wortley) wished also to mention one remark which suggested itself in reference to this extra Vote of £500,000 to the Indian Treasury. He supposed that there was no principle more strongly laid down than that of the Prime Minister at Mid Lothian that the charges of the year should be met by the income of the year. These payments, however, were not only in defiance of the Prime Minister's own doctrine in Mid Lothian, but were also in total disregard and defiance of the wishes of the Indian Government; as anyone might see who cared to read the correspondence on the subject of the Indian contribution to the Egyptian War. The form in which the proposal now came before the House was of particular value. It constituted a partial departure from the Government's own departure from their own original principle. It seemed to him (Mr. Stuart-Wortley) that it required no very great power of discernment or acumen to see that the Government seemed to think it eminently desirable, in the face of the probability of a Dissolution, that there should be a prospective estimate of a surplus.
§ MR. SEXTONsaid, that this was the most interesting discussion which he had ever heard. It was not only interesting, but unprecedented. He was not aware that ever before noble Lords and hon. Gentlemen had at that stage of a Report introduced a Resolution affecting a Committee of Ways and Means. They had not only discussed the Consolidated Fund Bill, but had also ransacked the finances of Ireland and England and India in order to find materials for an afternoon's debate. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had ingenuously remarked that he had no idea that this debate would come on that day; but he (Mr. Sexton) would wish to know who had any idea that it would 496 come on that day but the noble Lord the Member for Middlesex? He ventured to say that at 3 o'clock that afternoon the mind of the noble Lord (Lord George Hamilton) was as empty of the subject for his speech as was that of the babe born yesterday. He had already said that this debate had been unprecedented, and he had never known that stage of a Committee of Ways and Means to be used for the purpose of raising a debate of that kind in all his previous experience of legislation. The debate that afternoon had been the most remarkable piece of "mental gymnastics" to which they had been recently treated in that House. The noble Lord the Member for Woodstock (Lord Randolph Churchill) had proved himself to be a mental gymnast of the first order; and altogether it had been most instructive for himself and his hon. Friends to watch the mental agility of the Tory Party. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Gibson) had mainly contributed to the success of this device. He confessed that he was surprised at the mature political acumen of the right hon. Member for North Devon (Sir Stafford Northcote) and those associated with him upon the Front Opposition Bench during their performance that afternoon. He strongly suspected that, whilst their tongues were on Orders 3 and 4 their eyes were upon the clock, and their minds upon Orders Nos. 5 and 6—Revision of Jurors and Voters Lists (Dublin) Bill. They had that afternoon a new experience of the fact that their progress had been hindered by an Englishman, one of the leaders of politics, and that such a course of procedure was not confined to Irishmen. It was also interesting to find the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin take part with others in the device by which two hours of useless talk had been launched upon the House, and which prevented the Bill by which the electors of Dublin were to obtain their elective franchise being brought before the House.
§ MR. R. N. FOWLER (LORD MAYOR)said, he rose to protest against the ridiculous suggestion of the hon. Member who had just spoken, that the debate was a useless one. He appealed to the Chancellor of the Exchequer as to whether the remarks of the noble Lord the 497 Member for Middlesex were not of great importance?
MR. GORSTsaid, he also rose to protest against the speech of the hon. Member for Sligo (Mr. Sexton). It was too much to expect the whole time of the House of Commons to be devoted to Irish subjects. He wished to remind the House that enormous sums of money had been voted for the three Services at an hour of the morning when ample discussion upon them, was impossible, and for that reason it was necessary to take the existing opportunity of asking questions upon the subject. He himself had no idea what Bills were on the Paper; but it was simply monstrous to endeavour to prevent hon. Members, who had some regard for the interests of the nation, raising a discussion upon items of importance. Why had not the remarks of the noble Lord the Member for Woodstock (Lord Randolph Churchill) been answered? The Secretary to the Treasury admitted that there was no answer.
§ MR. COURTNEYI have not said so.
MR. GORSTsaid, that he understood from the Secretary to the Treasury that the Government could not answer those remarks. There was, however, another Cabinet Minister in the House who had not spoken—the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. The charge against the Government was one which certainly ought to be answered. It was, why did they habitually under-estimate the Expenditure of the year, and so necessitate the bringing in of Supplementary Estimates at a time which was inconvenient to the House? He supposed that Ministers had made up their minds not to answer the questions which had been put, and so it must go forth to the country that the Liberal Government pleaded guilty to the charges which were preferred against them.
§ MR. TOMLINSONmaintained that the course adopted by the Opposition was perfectly justifiable in the circumstances of the case. He thought the most extraordinary event of the afternoon had been, not the debate, but the speech of the hon. Member for Sligo.
§ COLONEL KING-HARMANsaid, the hon. Member for Sligo had attacked indiscriminately every Bench above and below the Gangway on both sides of the House, and had charged them with Ob- 498 struction. He would remind the House that the Morning Sitting would not have been held at all but for the conduct of certain Irish Members in deliberately talking out the debate on the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Bill. The conduct of the hon. Gentleman reminded him very much of a scene he witnessed the other day in a Town Council in the West of Ireland.
§ MR. SEXTONI rise to Order. Have the reminiscences of the hon. and gallant Member anything to do with the Consolidated Fund Bill?
§ MR. SPEAKERI do not think the remarks that have been made for some little time past at all relevant to the question. I have allowed a good deal of latitude; but I must say that, in my opinion, these matters have obtained a length that they ought not to have done.
§ COLONEL KING-HARMANsaid, he begged to apologize for having spoken contrary to what the Speaker considered was in Order. He would not have risen but for the remark of the hon. Member for Sligo that the discussion had been kept up in order to prevent the Dublin Jurors and Voters Revision Bill coming on. He would only add that, in his opinion, hon. Members were justified in complaining of the conduct of Ministers in not replying to the questions which had been raised in the course of the discussion.
§ Resolution agreed to.
§ Instruction to the Committee on the Consolidated Fund (No. 1) Bill, That they have power to make provision therein pursuant to the said Resolution.