§ MR. HEALYI wish, Sir, to submit to you, as a point of Order, whether, on the Motion for leaving the Chair, I cannot call attention to your ruling and conduct in the Chair on a recent occasion? There has been some question whether any Motions raised on going into Committee of Ways and Means must not be relative to the Budget; but I have looked into the authorities on that subject, and I find that Sir Thomas Erskine May, in his Parliamentary Practice, ninth edition, lays it down that the ancient Constitutional doctrine of redress of grievances before Supply is now represented by the practice of permitting every kind of Amendment to be moved 489 on the Question that the Speaker do leave the Chair. I therefore wish to ask you, Sir, if I am not entitled to submit to the consideration of the House certain rulings of yours on a former occasion?
§ MR. GLADSTONE—
MR. GLADSTONEI rose to speak to that point of Order. The hon. Member has raised, very fairly and distinctly, the particular point which he wishes to submit to the decision of the Chair. He desires to know whether he is right in thinking that the question he proposes to raise respecting certain rulings from the Chair cannot be properly debated before going into Committee of Ways and Means, although it does not relate distinctly to the matter of Ways and Means. I also wish to submit to you, Sir, as the hon. Member has kindly stated the purpose with which he raises this question, certain other considerations that appear to me to bear upon the point of Order. The hon. Member, as I understand, desires to question certain rulings of yours. He desires to question your conduct in the Chair in the discharge of your duties as Speaker of this House. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that the hon. Member is right in saying that the mere want of relation between the subject he wishes to introduce and Ways and Means is no impediment, it appears to me that there are other impediments. They are these. In the first place, I observe that no Notice has been given of the hon. Member's intention to question your conduct in the Chair in the discharge of your duties. He gave a Notice this evening—though I did not hear the precise terms of it; but I believe I am correct in saying that a verbal Notice in the strict sense is, in this House, no Notice at all, and that a Notice must be put upon the Paper in a distinct and definite form.
MR. GLADSTONEI am not attempting to lay down any general dictum as to where Notice is necessary and where it is not. I am only observing that in this case there is no Notice before the House of the hon. Member's intention. Secondly, I observe that as the Motion before the House is "That the Speaker leave the Chair," and as 490 the hon. Member does not intend to make a Motion, but merely to call attention to the Speaker's conduct, that is a course which I think the House will not permit. I apprehend that if anyone were to attempt to call into question my own conduct or that of any other Member of this House days or weeks ago, he would not be permitted except under these two conditions—first, that he must give Notice; and, secondly, that he must submit a distinct Motion to the House. My belief is that that is a protection which would be extended to every Member of this House. If that be so, I do not enter into the question whether the Speaker ought to have greater protection than any other Member, or how much that protection ought to be; but I put it to you, Sir, for your consideration, that the protection afforded to the chief officer of the House in regard to matters connected with the discharge of his duties ought not to be less than that afforded to any other Member; and that the House should not allow his conduct to be called in question without the two safeguards of Notice and of a definite Motion. It is with some regret that I have to call on you to give a decision in a matter in which you are supposed to be yourself concerned; but I am sure that a sense of public duty will prevent you from allowing any indisposition on that score to interfere with your free and impartial judgment.
§ MR. HEALYBefore the Speaker gives his decision I would like to refer him to a precedent that will, I think, be found to govern the present case. On August 4, 1881, a question was raised by the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) in regard to Mr. O'Kelly's suspension; and the question was raised when, the Motion for the Speaker leaving the Chair having been negatived, no Division could be taken on the hon. Member's Motion. On that occasion the Prime Minister said—
Though you may be bound to accept the ruling at the moment, there is nothing to prevent your impeaching that ruling at a future time. If I am cast by what I deem to be an unjust verdict, I must submit to it for the time, though afterwards I may condemn it."—(3 Hansard, [264] 869–70.)The right hon. Gentleman also said—I admit fully that every Member of the House is entitled to impugn and pronounce censure upon the conduct of the Speaker on grave and sufficient grounds."—(Ibid. 866.)491 It is not from any want of courtesy to the Speaker that no Notice of this matter has been given on the present occasion. I had intended making the Motion on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply on Tuesday, and giving Notice in due course; but if I had adopted that course, I would, I knew, be counted out. I have, therefore, resolved to bring the matter forward on the Motion to take effective Supply. If I gave Notice, I might lose many excellent opportunities of bringing it forward. Three weeks ago I gave verbal Notice of my intention to call attention to this matter, and I have again given Notice to-day. I therefore disclaim any idea of being discourteous to the Speaker by not giving him Notice. Whatever the ruling of the Speaker may be I will accept it, altogether apart from the question that it is the Speaker's own conduct that I wish to bring under the consideration of the House.
§ MR. SPEAKERIn replying to the points of Order which have been raised by the hon. Member for Monaghan (Mr. Healy) and by the Prime Minister, I have to say that I hope in deciding upon them I shall dismiss all personal considerations. I have to thank the hon. Member for Monaghan for the courteous manner in which he has referred to these personal considerations. I am bound to consider the matter as a question of Order and precedent. I can assure the House that I have had no Notice whatever of the point to be raised by the hon. Member for Monaghan, and until this evening I had no idea that any Motion was going to be made on the subject of my conduct. Immediately after the Easter Recess the hon. Member for Monaghan stated that he should at some future time take an opportunity of calling the attention, of the House to my conduct in giving a certain ruling in the course of an event that occurred on the preceding Friday. Prom that day to the present nothing has occurred that could make me suppose that any Notice was going to be given of my conduct in the Chair. No Notice having been given, it appears to me that I am bound to hold that the rule which I should lay down in the case of any other Member of this House I cannot depart from in my own case. It would be establishing a very difficult and dangerous precedent if the action of a Member of this House were 492 to be called in question without any Notice to that Member, and without the House generally being aware of the course about to be taken, and without the House being in a position to come to a decision on the matter. The House at large was not at all aware that the hon. Member for Monaghan was going to question any ruling of mine; and I should wish respectfully to submit that any question affecting my conduct in the Chair, or any ruling given by me, should come before the House in such a way that the whole House should be able to decide upon it either for or against myself. Under these circumstances, although it is certainly against my own personal feeling that the matter should not now come on, I am bound by precedents, and cannot depart from them for any advantage to myself. I must, therefore, rule that the proper course for the hon. Member for Monaghan to adopt is to give Notice, and put his Motion in a specific form before the House, so that the House at large may be able to pronounce an opinion upon it.
§ MR. HEALYI accept your ruling, Sir; but I desire to ask one question. Is that ruling based on the fact that no Notice has been given, or on the fact that the Motion has been brought forward when there could be no Division upon it?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTThis is such a very grave question, that I hope, Sir, you will be able to give a definite decision upon it. I should have thought, in accordance with the views expressed by the Prime Minister, that a review of the conduct of the Speaker could not properly be proceeded with without allowing the House to pronounce an opinion on the matter. Any other course would be one which would entirely destroy the authority of the Chair.
§ SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTEI think, Sir, there can be no question whatever that, for the convenience of the House, and in support of the authority of the high personage who presides over its debates, it is most essential that any Motion calling in question the conduct of the Speaker should be raised in such a manner that the House should have full knowledge that it was coming on, and also that the House should be able to pronounce an opinion upon it. 493 Nothing can be more important than that the delicate relations between the House and the Speaker should be maintained in all their integrity. We have the greatest confidence in our Speaker; but it is, of course, possible for anyone to go wrong, and it is right that there should be an opportunity of questioning his conduct. But for the maintenance of the proper proceedings of this House it is necessary that full and ample Notice should be given; and that there should be a proper opportunity of discussing and deciding upon any Motion impugning the conduct of the Speaker.
§ MR. HEALYI wish, as a point of Order, to call your attention, Sir, to a precedent which occurred in the case of your Predecessor in the Chair—namely, that of August 4th, 1881; and I ask that no decision should be come to on this point that has arisen until you have had an opportunity of seeing the Motion before you, and also of considering the point raised on the last occasion, when the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), after the other Motions on the Paper had been decided, proceeded to call attention to the suspension of the hon. Member for Roscommon (Mr. O'Kelly). I may also mention that the hon. Member for the City of Cork stated that he would not have an opportunity of dividing the House, and that the speech of the Prime Minister was directed to taking objection to the hon. Member bringing the subject forward on such an occasion. I should like to read two or three passages from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister upon that occasion. He said—
I should have thought it was a well-known principle of our system in this House—and I am astonished that a man with one-tenth part of the discernment of the hon. Member should not have perceived it, and had the hon. Member been guided by a right sense of his duty to the House he would have perceived it—that the judgment of the House stands between himself and the Chair, and protects the Chair from the charges that he has brought against it."— (3 Hansard, [264] 867.)There are other passages which I cannot find at the moment; but the whole argument of the Prime Minister during the debate was founded on the fact that the judgment of the House could not be taken on the occasion; and therefore I submit, as a point of Order, that until you, Mr. Speaker, have had an opportu- 494 nity of examining the Records of August 4, 1881, when Mr. Speaker Brand was in the Chair, it would be inconvenient to decide this matter at the moment.
MR. GLADSTONEI do not wish to anticipate the decision of the Chair; but I am not quite certain that I have understood the contention of the hon. Gentleman. I have the impression that these references may have been in a case where the question was immediate.
§ [Mr. HEALY handed to the Prime Minister the volume of Hansard from which he had been reading.]
§ MR. SPEAKEROn a matter so gravely affecting the interests of the House, I am clearly of opinion that not only, as has been stated, is it necessary that due Notice should be given of a Motion of this kind; but that the House ought to be in a position to give a final verdict upon the question proposed to be challenged; and that a challenge of the Speaker's ruling should not consist of mere fault-finding, but should be submitted to the judgment of the House.
§ MR. BIGGARMr. Speaker— [Cries of "Order!")
§ MR. SPEAKERDoes the hon. Gentleman rise for the purpose of raising a point of Order?
§ MR. BIGGARYes, Sir; I rise to a point of Order, and the point of Order is this—whether or not, in the circumstances, the Government cannot set up Supply in order to give an opportunity for discussing the matter, and a decision being arrived at—[Cries of "No!"]
§ MR. HEALYI beg to give Notice that on Tuesday next I shall put down, a Motion on this subject, and I shall see whether the Government will keep a House for the purpose of considering the question.
§ Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed to.