CONSIDERATION.

HC Deb 12 May 1885 vol 298 cc367-434

Order for Consideration, as amended, read.

SIR MASSEY LOPES,

in rising to move the following Resolution:— That the Bill be re-committed for the purpose of receiving a Clause providing for the repeal of so much of any Act or Acts relating to Parliamentary Registration in Counties and Boroughs as makes the expenses of Overseers of the Poor and Clerks of the Peace or Town Clerks, a legal charge upon the Local Rates, said, that in the Motion which he had submitted to the House he thought that no one could accuse him of factious obstruction to the course of the Business of the House. He hoped that the Prime Minister and every other hon. Member of the House would give him credit for being actuated by earnest convictions and by honest intentions. He thought that he was justified in taking the course which he had done by what had fallen on a previous occasion from the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board, who had said that he thought it was quite fair to raise this question on a Bill of this kind, and that he was sure there was no desire to obstruct the Bill. The Home Secretary had also said that the incidence of taxation upon real and personal property was most unfair and was radically unsound. He would put forward two statements in the most plain manner possible, in order that the question at issue might not be evaded, misrepresented, or misunderstood. The first was that he was making no claim whatever for counties which he did not equally make for boroughs, and the second was that he made no demands whatever for any county or borough in England or Wales which he did not make equally for Scotland and Ireland. He was going to confine his observations to the imme- diate question before them, and his contention was this—that the franchise and the exercise of it was a national and not a local responsibility, and that the increase of the franchise was a national and not a local benefit. He recollected that when the Prime Minister introduced the Franchise Bill he had said that the chief object of the Bill was that it was going to enlarge the basis of our Constitution. Was not that a national concern—a national object? He should like to ask the Prime Minister to tell the House whether the franchise was going to give any exclusive privileges to the class which he intended to saddle with the expenses of the franchise. The Government had already admitted the principle for which he was contending by giving a contribution towards the expenses, and by so doing they had admitted the justice of the claim which he now made. Why should they stop there? Why should they not pay the expenses of the overseers, who would be given a large amount of time and trouble by this Bill? Why should not the same boon be granted to boroughs as to the counties? Again, the Revising Barristers were appointed by the Government, and paid out of Imperial funds, and these Revising Barristers took the sole control of all matters of registration. If they were paid by the Imperial Exchequer, why should not their subordinates also be paid from the same source? He thought that the whole gist of the speech of the Under Secretary for the Home Department strengthened his position. The hon. Gentleman had objected that he had only spoken of the counties, but he had never made a single demand for any grant for the counties which he had not made for the boroughs; he had never made a claim for land which he had not made for houses; and he had never made a demand for the country which he had not made for the town. In proof of that he would remind them that when the late Government had given subventions towards this purpose, the lion's share of those subventions had gone to the towns and not to the counties. The Under Secretary for the Home Department had told them that rates were heavier in towns than in counties. The valuation, of course, was a matter of assessment. Formerly the property in land had been larger than that in houses; but now things were very different, the property assessed in land amounting to £66,000,000, where as that in houses was £125,000,000. There was another thing which must be kept in mind. In towns they had rates which included gas, water, markets, washhouses, free libraries, and numerous other matters; but in the country if they wished to have these conveniences they had to pay for them voluntarily and out of their private means. With regard to the proposal of the Government upon this matter, they put forward three contentions—in the first place, that it was inadequate in point of amount; secondly, that it was only temporary in its effect; and thirdly, that it was proposed to give nothing whatever to the boroughs. He did not hesitate to say that if additional duties were thrown upon the overseers they would require remuneration. In many parts of the country overseers were not paid at present, the farmers in the locality doing the work. He wished to know, if the Government were going to pay a rate in aid to the overseers in the counties, why they would not contribute towards the expenses of the overseers in the boroughs? He could see no reason why the Government should endeavour to shift their responsibility for providing for the additional burdens which they were now going to throw upon land. It was true that this was a small matter; but it was an additional burden, and they were met by the old story that they must wait for the County Government Bill before the injustice was remedied. In 1869, when he brought forward a Resolution in favour of the appointment of a Royal Commission into the incidence of local taxation, the Prime Minister met him by saying that the Government would be a Royal Commission themselves, and would deal with the matter much more rapidly than a Royal Commission would. But the matter had not been dealt with, and the promises of the Government had not been redeemed. They had found by experience that precedents were very dangerous in this matter, and they had become wary in consequence. Frequently they found that the Government, in proposing a small addition to local taxation, declared that it was an infinitesimally small matter, and thus it was allowed to pass, like the education rate, which began at 3d. in the pound, and now amounted, in many rural parishes, to Is. in the pound, and not unfrequently to even a larger amount. There were numerous other matters, such as the police, highways, &c, in which the same thing had occurred. This was not so much a question of amount as of principle. When once an addition was thrown on local taxation it grew, it crystallized, and then the right hon. Gentleman afterwards told them that it had become an hereditary burden. They had reason, therefore, to be cautious before allowing the thin end of the wedge to be inserted, and they were determined in every possible way to oppose the imposition of any fresh burden. He maintained that the imposition of every fresh charge was a breach of faith on the part of the Government. Only last year the President of the Local Government Board admitted that a Government measure of relief was distinctly promised in 1883. Although the right hon. Gentleman said that the measure was actually in existence, they had never seen it, and he doubted if ever they would. Then the Chancellor of the Exchequer had admitted that some relief was required in respect of local burdens. How had the Chancellor of the Exchequer fulfilled the pledge which he had given? He proposed now to put fresh burdens upon them, and now he sought to take away from real property the only slight indulgence at present accorded to it—the difference which existed between real and personal property with respect to the Death Duties. In 1853 the Prime Minister, speaking on this question, said— I say boldly you cannot defend the present incidence of the Income Tax on real property. Heal property should not be subject to unequal taxation. We must not forget the amount levied off real property of which personalty knows nothing. Then, again, the Prime Minister said— Some remission ought to be granted to property which is now subject to a great weight of peculiar and exceptional taxation; and we think that the best mode of framing that provision would be to charge the succession of rateable property upon the life interest of the person succeeding in the net annual income."—(3 Hansard, [125] 1398.) At the time the Prime Minister spoke the amount levied on real property, of which, as he said, personalty knew nothing, amounted to £12,000,000. Now local burdens had risen from £ 12,000,000 to £28,000,000. In other words, since the time when the Prime Minister stated that real property was subject to exceptional burdens, nearly 300 per cent increase had been made in those burdens, and yet the right hon. Gentleman and his Government now proposed to take away the only trifling indulgence real property enjoyed. This question had not been brought forward by him in any manner as a Party question. When he brought the matter forward in 1868, he was then an independent Member and a Conservative Government was in Office. At that time he was a borough Member, and the question was brought forward by him in the interest of the boroughs rather than of the counties. It should be distinctly understood that the question was now brought forward by them under pressure from the Government. They did not desire to bring it forward. The battle ground had been chosen by the Government, and the gauntlet thrown down by them, and they had had no option but to take it up. On frequent occasions the grievance of which they complained had been admitted and recognized by the Government, and yet the Government had hitherto disregarded the votes which the House of Commons had passed on this subject. They asked for no favour; they claimed no privileges; all they asked the House of Commons to give them was equity, equality, and justice. They said that it was neither right nor just that one description of property—one section only of the community—should pay for objects which were in themselves national. On the present occasion it was not a question of amount so much as of principle, and as a question of principle he was satisfied that the House of Commons would deal with the question justly, dispassionately, and free from Party prejudice. He would conclude with the Motion standing in his name.

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Bill he re-committed for the purpose of receiving a Clause providing for the repeal of so much of any Act or Acts relating to Parliamentary Registration in Counties and Boroughs as makes the expenses of Overseers of the Poor and Clerks of the Peace or Town Clerks, a legal charge upon the Local Rates."—(Sir Massey Lopes.)

MR. GLADSTONE

The hon. Gentleman has addressed himself to this question with the ability that he invariably shows whenever he handles it. He has emphasized the statement that he never moved it as a Party question. I entirely admit the truth of that allegation; but I must say if he had moved it as a Party question, he would have shown a very great deficiency of that faculty of clear sightedness as to the best means of attaining the end he has in view which he has invariably manifested. But the admission is made at once. Now, Sir, I have to deal with the speech and with the Motion of the hon. Gentleman. If I look to the speech, I find parts of it which afford ground that would perhaps provide the means for an accommodation. If I look to some other parts of that speech, it is formidable indeed. For example, the hon. Gentleman lays down in one part of his speech this principle, that all charges which partake of a national character, as I understand him, should be met from the Exchequer, and all charges which relate to national objects should be paid from the Exchequer.

SIR MASSEY LOPES

I did not say all.

MR. GLADSTONE

The Motion of the hon. Gentleman, I think, Sir, goes further than his speech. I think that, in the former Motion, the doctrine was laid down that charges having national objects in view ought to met from the Exchequer. I want to know how far that goes, and how much, if that principle is fully applied, there will be left of charges to be met by the rates? How many charges are there now defrayed from the rates which do not at present assume a national character as regards their substance and their aim. If we take the Poor Law, the greatest of them all, who will deny that the relief of the poor is a matter of the deepest and most profound national interest and policy? In truth, Sir, I believe that, with the most insignificant exceptions, the doctrine of the hon. Gentleman goes to the transfer to the Exchequer of nearly every important item now met by local rates. That is a very formidable doctrine, and I differ entirely from the hon. Gentleman in his idea of the principle upon which the partition has heretofore been made between local and national charges. I believe that the principle, and the wise principle, on which the Legislature of this country has mainly proceeded, and especially until a very recent period, was this—that those charges should be met locally which could be better, more economi- cally, and more effectively dealt with locally than if they were made national charges. That is my contention in opposition to the hon. Gentleman, and I am afraid, on the grounds, the very broad grounds, which have been laid down that it is impossible for me to hope that I can be reconciled with him. But when I come to other parts of his speech, I do not find the same amount of difference between us. His doctrine is summed up in a most emphatic passage which bore this character. He spoke of the introduction of "the thin end of the wedge;" of its being necessary for those who think with him to be on their guard against proposals made from time to time to increase local burdens, and he used these emphatic words— That the imposition of any fresh charge upon the rates would be a breach of faith on the part of the Government. Well, Sir, that is a doctrine which, at all events, lies within limits much more rational and much more manageable and approachable than his former proposals as to national objects. It is not necessary for me to say now, but I will say by-and-bye, what we have done and what, under the circumstances, we are prepared to do for the purpose of meeting the case presented to us—that no new charge should be by the present Bill and at the present time laid upon the rates. I reserve that for a more particular explanation afterwards. I turn now from the speech of the hon. Gentleman to the Motion, and I will say at once that it is impossible, for reasons I will presently give, to accept it. I will not dwell upon what may be called the argument of the principle of this matter. It was most ably dealt with by the Home Secretary in a recent discussion, and dealt with in a manner which, I think, no one has been able to cope with. The case of the hon. Gentleman, as I understand him, is this. Realty is unjustly burdened in comparison with personalty. Personalty, in his view, owes a debt to realty. I say, if that is true—I am not going to argue it, nor am I prepared altogether to deny it—but I say that if personalty owes a debt to realty, let personalty pay the debt that it owes. What does the hon. Gentleman propose? He proposes to transfer charges from a property fund—a fund which, according to Lord Beaconsfield's estimate, quoted by my hon. Friend, is five-sixths a property fund, to another fund, which is two-fifths, although I believe a juster estimate would be three-fifths—not a property but a labour fund, and that debt, which he believes to be due by personalty to realty, he wants to be paid, not by personalty, but in the main by labour. I must say I have never felt that argument to be just. I am obliged to enter my protest against it as I go along, although I have myself, in deference to the opinion of this House, perhaps not acted in complete conformity with it, because I felt that special circumstances might arise. But there is an inequality—a lack of justice—in that mode of dealing with the question which, undoubtedly, will have to be taken into consideration when some general adjustment arises. As to that matter of general adjustment, the hon. Gentleman says that the day is indefinitely postponed for dealing with the matter of local government and large readjustment of taxation, in the only manner which really satisfies justice—namely, not by throwing the burdens upon labour, but by adjusting the questions fairly between realty and personalty. He says that day is indefinitely postponed. I think, Sir, if I may say so, it does not lie in the mouths of hon. Gentlemen opposite to charge us with that delay. Our contention has been for years past that the House of Commons had now got inadequate means of dealing with its duties, and that legislation was in lamentable arrears. No person has been more earnest in pressing these doctrines upon the House than myself, and there is not a more grievous case of arrear than this question of local government and the readjustment of taxation. It has been postponed from year to year. It is a grievous case even as regards England and Scotland. It is a far more grievous case as regards Ireland. But what have we done? Have we done nothing in consequence of that opinion? We have endeavoured to persuade the House to enter upon the remodelling of its Procedure, to multiply its means of action, and to make other arrangements to enable it to overtake the arrears; and it is an historical fact that the views entertained by hon. Gentlemen opposite—no doubt, conscientiously—have made our task very difficult. They have steadily resisted our efforts at every point in that direction. ["No, no!"] What! The faculty of contradiction has been well developed in that portion of this House. Gentlemen who indulge their genius in those cries cannot have been in this House in 1882, when all through the Session we endeavoured to make efforts in this direction, and when we found obstacles were such that we could make no progress, we obtained an Autumn Session, and it was only after 35 days of incessant labour that we at length procured the adoption of a system merely initiative, which made the most timid and tentative efforts to introduce and carry the principle of devolution, by which alone this question could be grappled with. Surely it is a matter of fact, no more to be denied than the diurnal motions of the sun, that those efforts were steadily, and no doubt conscientiously, resisted by hon. Gentlemen opposite, and that, in consequence, we have never been able, never been allowed, to appoint a Grand Committee without its being made a subject of contest afresh. But what happened in connection with the Grand Committees? We have done, I must Bay, nothing—[Opposition cheers]—wait until I finish—excepting that we have proved the capacities of the Grand Committees to cope with the overwork. That, at least, has been proved satisfactorily in practice. The day will come, in our opinion, when this system will be largely and effectively adopted; and I tell hon. Gentlemen opposite that it is my firm conviction that if this question of devolution and reform of Procedure had been accepted and acted upon, this subject of local government and re-adjustment of local taxation would have been settled on a large scale, and would have been the law of the land at this moment. Therefore, I hold that it is not ourselves who must take the responsibility for the delay which has occurred. We ascribe it to the unfortunate error of hon. Members opposite—and I am afraid it is not the only case of error into which hon. Gentlemen opposite have fallen in offering steady resistance to our attempts at effecting a reformation. I pass from the question of delay, and I pass from the question of principle. We do not wish to fight this question as one of principle, because we ourselves have already made a concession which puts an end to the principle. We are not, therefore, going to contest this matter as one depending upon any principle of abstract justice, but rather upon those mixed considerations to which a Government must often have recourse. Having said that I now come to the two propositions which I have to lay before the House. I have, in the first place, to state to the House frankly, clearly, and as strongly as I can, that I cannot accept the Motion of the hon. Baronet; and, in the second place, I have to show to the House what it is that we can do and will do which will make a considerable approximation to the more moderate and limited portion of the proposal of the hon. Baronet, with the object of satisfying, if we can, the general sentiment, and of facilitating the attainment of a great Constitutional settlement—that is, the settlement of the Acts for the better representation of the people, to which the Registration Act essentially belongs. We have been labouring at this as the main object of our domestic legislation for more than a year, and we have entered into engagements connected with that object, which we will not fail in endeavouring to give the fullest effect to, not only in the mere letter of those engagements, but in their spirit. We are bound by those engagements not only to secure the passing of the Representation of the People Bill, but also to secure the passing of the Registration Bill, and of the remaining Bill, the passing of which will be absolutely requisite, in order to bring about, at the proper time, a General Election. I am not contradicted in making that statement, and therefore I may assume that I have stated a case which is undisputed. That is to say, that we are engaged to pass the Representation Bill—the passing of which is, at least, now hopeful, if not certain—and the Registration Bill, and a short Bill, which cannot be the subject of difference in detail, to bring about a General Election at the latter part of the autumn of this year. That is the effect of the engagements into which we have entered with regard to this subject—that is the purpose which we have before us, and it is one with regard to which the country ought not to be disappointed. The Motion of the hon. Baronet, however, is altogether inconsistent with the fulfilment of that purpose; and the reason is not because it goes beyond our views, I or because we have doubts as to the principle upon which it rests, but because it would be impossible for us to take up the complex and difficult task it would impose upon us compatibly with our carrying out the great engagements to which I have just referred. Let me point out to the House how that incompatibility is to be shown; and here let me say that I do not think that the second Motion of the hon. Baronet is an improvement upon the first. The first Motion might, it is conceivable, have been dealt with by some proposal of a general or modified character; but now the hon. Baronet goes right into the heart of the old system of registration, and requires us, by positive Resolution of the House, to introduce into the Redistribution Bill a clause which is to repeal parts of every Act of Parliament which imposes registration charges in any form upon the local rates. Has the hon. Baronet considered well the meaning of the proposal which he makes? The registration system of this country depends not only upon a number of complicated Acts of Parliament, but the subject of registration is so greatly mixed up with other subjects that it would be totally impossible, by any brief or simple method, to effect its separation from them.

SIR MASSEY LOPES

was understood to say that the object might be effected by the repeal of only three sections.

MR. GLADSTONE

I never said there were such a multitude of sections that a clause would not repeal them. But the important question is, what the repeal of the existing law upon the subject would leave behind it? It would involve a total reconstruction of our whole system of registration as it now exists by law. And what does that mean? How is our present registration system worked? Why, it is worked through over 16,000 officers, who are local officers appointed by the Local Authorities; and yet the hon. Baronet proposes that those local officers, so appointed by the different Local Authorities, should be paid out of the Consolidated Fund. How is the Consolidated Fund to control the charges which such officers may make? On the principle laid down by the hon. Baronet's Motion, we should have no right to do that —he makes no provision for the reasonableness of those charges, and he makes no provision for checking those charges.

SIR MASSEY LOPES

The Revising Barristers, who are the officers of the Government, would check them.

MR. GLADSTONE

The Revising Barristers are not officers of the Government—they are merely responsible to the Judge. The hon. Baronet appears to suppose that charges for Parliamentary registration are altogether separate from charges for other work, but they are nothing of the kind; they are mixed up inextricably with charges for wholly distinct work, such as those for municipal registration and for the preparation of the jury lists. But the matter does not stop there—the overseers are local officers, the assistant overseers have salaries paid them—they do not receive so much for registration, so much for this duty, and so much for that duty; but they are paid upon the aggregate of their complex duties. How, therefore, does the hon. Baronet propose to legislate, when he says all these registration charges are to be charged upon the Consolidated Fund? That leads me to the conclusion which will be obvious to the House. In order to carry out the principle of the hon. Baronet's Motion, the Government would have to undertake a large, a difficult, and an elaborate inquiry into a multitude of details which would require an amount of time, which I cannot define, but a minimum of time which would compel them to postpone for many months the giving effect to the large arrangement that has been entered into, and under which the law relating to the representation of the people has been remodelled. This is no obstinate determination on the part of Her Majesty's Government to join issue unnecessarily upon financial and economical points with hon. Members opposite, with whom we have had a satisfactory and hearty co-operation with regard to the Representation of the People Bill; but we have entered into a compact, and with that compact we are determined to go forward. I know that there is not in the letter of that compact any obligation to bring about a Dissolution at the earliest possible moment; but that obligation is included in its spirit, and it is vital to the success of the measure itself i that it should be fulfilled. Those who have examined the subject, and who are aware of the large understanding into which we have entered, know that we are bound, not only by general principles, but by convictions and principles which have been expressed in confidence, to give this new vast constituency about to be added to the old an opportunity at the first moment we can, under the arrangements which we are making, of exercising the franchise which has been conferred upon them. Let it be well understood that I will not venture upon all the details necessary to develop fully the proposition I have laid down; but that proposition, in general terms, is this—that the question of arranging the relations between the Government and the vast multitude of local officers who now stand upon a totally different footing, and of providing channels through which a large sum of public money—estimated by an hon. Member at £500,000 a-year, and quite certain, in my judgment, to exceed that sum if the amount of charges be left to those Local Authorities, and if the function of the State be reduced to that of paying—can only be done by a careful and well-considered measure. That careful and well-considered measure cannot possibly be made a portion of the present Registration Bill. As we will not consent to break up the great arrangement thus far prosperously advanced with respect to the representation of the people, and as we conceive that, without breaking up that arrangement, it is impossible to give effect to the hon. Baronet's Resolution—for I presume he does not mean there is to be no provision at all for Parliamentary registration—he casts upon us the framing of a system which cannot be framed in the time laid down, which has been run pretty nearly to the last sands, and which we cannot undertake to frame. That is my ease as regards the Motion of the hon. Baronet. But, as I have said before, we have already made one step in the direction in which that Motion points, and we are prepared to take another in the same direction. We must reserve the general subject of the final decision of the important question whether the registration charges are in toto hereafter to be placed upon the Consolidated Fund; and with that reservation I will now undertake to state to the House what is the further step that we propose to take in this matter. The hon. Baronet has laid the ground for us in objecting to the introduction, in connection with this or any Bill, of new charges upon the rates. What we are prepared to do is to meet what he has said with regard to overseers by an attempt, at any rate, to make an allowance which will meet the amount of charge due to the excess of labour about to be imposed by the Franchise and Redistribution Acts. The excess of cost arising out of that will be the basis of the proposal which we intend to make. For this year it will assume this form—that we shall impose on the Exchequer by means of Votes for England and Scotland and as regards Ireland by another machinery, an estimated additional charge caused by the Franchise Act besides the 2d. for each name on the Register that we have already promised to the county funds in England and Scotland. We consider that many weighty considerations have been urged for a grant in respect of county parochial expenses which, we admit, will be much increased. In boroughs, I may say, there will not be a sensible increase. The position in which we propose to stand is to meet at the present time the increase growing out of the Act. That may involve an allowance such as I shall describe. We estimate an increase at another 2d. per name upon the Register so far as the county franchise is concerned in England. The same principle will be applied to Scotland, and we are prepared to add to the £20,000 already promised another £20,000 for England and a corresponding sum for Scotland to meet the additional charge. Great administrative difficulties were pointed out by the President of the Local Government Board in the way of making payments to 16,000 overseers; and we have prepared a plan for meeting this difficulty upon the basis we have described, which is a basis of our own estimate of what may be a fair allowance, under the circumstances, to be made in the present year. As regards the payment of the expenses of overseers, we propose that the total sums to be paid for all the parishes in a Union shall be sent to the treasurer of the Union, the Clerk of the Guardians at the same time being informed of the proportional amount to which each of the parishes will be entitled, and the Guardians being requested to cause the several parishes to be credited with the sums thus paid. By this arrangement the trouble and expense of making separate payments to the overseers of the parishes will be avoided, whilst each parish will have its contribution, to the Union reduced by the amount repaid by the Government. That is an equitable and a simple system which may be adjusted by a Vote of this House, and which will not be liable to those fatal delays which would be caused by any attempt to legislate seriously on this subject during the present year. In order that there may be no misunderstanding as to the amount with which a parish is to be credited in consequence of the grant, we propose to inform the overseers of each parish of the amount paid to the treasurer of the Union with a view to its being placed to the credit of their parish. Thus they will, so to speak, have a security as against the Union. This arrangement will render it unnecessary for the Department to undertake the Herculean and probably the impossible labour of obtaining receipts from all those 16,000 overseers. So much for the case of England. In Scotland there will be the same increase in the proposed grant, and there no additional difficulty will be caused.

MR. GORST

I understand that no part of that grant will go to boroughs.

MR. GLADSTONE

I have stated already that the principle on which we proceed is to meet serious additional cost, and as far as we are aware there is no serious additional cost in boroughs. Therefore, we shall get on a different basis if we include boroughs.

MR. PELL

inquired whether the proposed subvention would be given only in respect of new names added to the Register in consequence of the new franchise, or to all names on the Register?

MR. GLADSTONE

No, Sir; we could not conveniently draw that distinction, and consequently the form of the subvention is so much per name on the whole Register; but this is our contribution in regard to the new labour to be imposed. I come now to the case of Ireland, which is different in various respects, and in this respect above all others—that the addition about to be made to the Irish constituencies extends as largely, or, at all events, very largely indeed, to boroughs as well as to counties, and consequently that the principle of meeting increased cost must be appled to boroughs in Ireland. I will go one step further and say that the total augmentation of the constituencies in Ireland relatively to the population will be, I think, very considerably larger than in England and Scotland. Therefore, the new labour will be larger. Another point in the case of Ireland is this—that a precedent was set for us in 1868, when remuneration was given out of moneys provided by Parliament to the officers employed in the work of registration—namely, to Clerks of Unions, Clerks of the Peace, and Town Clerks. The amount was £6,000 in 1868, and, with reference to the fruit produced in the addition to the constituencies, I think it was a liberal amount. We now estimate that the number of voters likely to be added to the Irish registration under the operation of this Act is no fewer than 500,000.

MR. PARNELL

asked what class of voters that £6,000 was provided for the registration of in 1868?

MR. GLADSTONE

I do not think it was confined to a particular class of voters. The reason why I have quoted it as a precedent is that the basis of the Vote was just the same as that upon which we are now proposing to proceed. The aim was to accelerate the registration and to make it run smoothly, so as not to delay the attainment of a great national object.

MR. SEXTON

inquired whether the grant was confined to the counties?

MR. GLADSTONE

I think it was not confined in any way to the counties. There is, however, one other distinctive point in the case of Ireland which I ought to mention. In England and Scotland we have only to deal with officers now known to the law in connection with this subject, and who now discharge functions belonging to the subject of registration; but in Ireland we have a new class of officers—namely, the rate collectors, for whom, of course, payment must be provided, and it is more expensive to impose new duties upon officers who have previously had nothing whatever to do with them. Without entering into details, I think I may say that the proposal with regard to Ireland will be found to be on the same general principle of equity as those with respect to England and Scotland; but it includes an item with regard to a new class of officers with which we have not to deal in England and Scotland. Having regard to the work to be done, and the desirableness of its being readily and well done, it is considered that a sum not exceeding £15,000 maybe paid to the officers named in respect of their new and additional duties during 1885. I think I have shown where we can get a clear and definite ground of action—namely, in paying on a fair computation for the new duties to be performed—and at the same time an opportunity will be afforded, before the House has again to consider the question, for an endeavour to devise a sound system of dealing with the question at large. That, I think, is all I need lay before the House upon this occasion. I trust the House will be disposed to recognize the spirit of moderation in which we have endeavoured to proceed. We thought it our duty to prefer the greater public good to the smaller. If we had preferred the smaller to the greater, we might have adopted a basis more clearly defined. But the great object we have in view is not to disappoint in any way the hopes of the people, or to defer the accomplishment of the great work in which we have been engaged. It is upon that basis that we make these recommendations to the House. We meet the hon. Gentleman, I think, fairly as regards the more moderate and more limited view of the case which he was content to present to us as his main and cardinal object; and, under these circumstances, I hope the propositions we have made, though not embodied in any Motion, may receive the approval of the House.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH

The great powers of the right hon. Gentleman are never more conspicuous than when he has to maintain an untenable position, by imputing intentions to his opponents which they do not recognize as their own, and making historical statements the accuracy of which we cannot admit. On those occasions he can make mountains out of molehills in order to induce the House to consider as difficulties those precise objections to which his own proposition is at least as liable as anything recommended on this side of the House. I will not attempt to follow the right hon. Gentleman in the earlier part of his speech except to say that my hon. Friend the Member for South Devonshire has never proposed or contemplated the placing of all local burdens upon the National Exchequer. He recognizes as fully as the right hon. Gentleman that certain taxation must be local in its administration and in the way in which it is levied. All that my hon. Friend has contended for in this matter is what the right hon. Gentleman has himself admitted—that personalty owes a debt to realty, and that this question cannot be settled until that debt is paid. The right hon. Gentleman imputed it to the fault of this side of the House that this question had never been dealt with by the present Parliament. When Her Majesty's Government asked for an increase of the powers vested in the Chair for the regulation of debate, they practically obtained from this House all the powers which they asked for. If the result has not been satisfactory, it is because their proposals were not framed in a way to meet the difficulty, rather than from any alterations which were made at the instance of the Opposition. This is not the time to enlarge upon the general question of local taxation. The point at issue is a small one—namely, whether in what remains of the time of this Parliament the debt from personal to real property shall in any way be paid; or whether, on the contrary, the proposal of the Government which would increase instead of diminishing that debt shall be accepted by the House of Commons? The right hon. Gentleman has conceded the principle contended for by my hon. Friend so far as to promise that the expenses of Clerks of the Peace and other county officers shall be a charge upon the Exchequer, and that with regard to these officers the legislation of this year shall not impose any new charge upon the rates. But he does not carry that principle into complete effect; for if he did so, by recognizing the debt due from personalty to realty, we should completely settle the question, so that what is a national charge would be imposed entirely upon the National Exchequer. My hon. Friend would never for a moment accept as a fair settlement a proposal which, while it meets these new charges in the counties, does nothing whatever to relieve the ratepayers of boroughs. The right hon. Gentleman dwelt upon the impossibility of passing these Registration Bills in due time if this matter were thoroughly dealt with. We say that it would be perfectly possible to proceed with this legislation as rapidly as might be required, and settle the question in ample time for the work of this year. The right hon. Gentleman has contended that without legislation of a complex nature it would be impossible to make such an alteration in the law as would impose these charges upon the Exchequer; but he himself proposes to impose upon the Exchequer a part of these expenses by a far more difficult and complex arrangement than if he imposed the whole. It would be perfectly possible, by putting a single clause in the Bill, to provide for the repayment by the Treasury to the different Boards of Guardians and Local Authorities in the country of all the expenses incurred in this matter of registration, precisely as the right hon. Gentleman now proposes with regard to a part. Why does he require any greater check upon the expenditure than that which at present exists, and which is as great a check as any which can be enacted by Parliament—namely, the allowance by the Revising Barristers, who are certainly not officers of the Local Authorities, of the expenses of registration? Really, I think that in making this proposal the right hon. Gentleman has answered his own objections. I will only say with regard to the remaining points that there is nothing more remarkable in the further concession made by the Government than the way in which Great Britain is treated as compared with Ireland. I should like to know, if the proposal to grant £15,000 a-year for the expenses of registration in Ireland, which now, from the Poor Law Returns, appear scarcely over to exceed £10,000, is equitable, why no more than £20,000 a-year should be granted to England for the same purpose? [Sir Charles W. Dilke: £40,000.] Even then there is an enormous discrepancy, for if the right hon. Gentleman refers to the Return of the Local Government Board he will find that the present expenditure on registration in England is more than £100,000. Everyone knows that under the new legislation this expenditure will be increased in all the English counties as much as in the Irish counties. But the great objection to the proposal is that it does not completely recognize as a national burden that which in principle the right hon. Gentleman admits ought to be imposed upon the National Exchequer, and that, so far as he does recognize it, he does nothing whatever for the more heavily burdened classes of ratepayers in the boroughs. Therefore, I trust my hon. Friend, will take the sense of the House upon his Resolution.

SIR CHARLES W. DILKE,

who spoke amid loud cries of "Divide!" said: I will not stand five minutes between the House and the division. I think it is only courteous and right that I should make a very few observations in reply to the right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Gentleman asks why we should not provide for the whole charges of registration. I thought my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister showed very clearly the impossibility of repaying the whole without completely reforming the system. If we take the whole charges the result will be that they will increase until they roach the formidable figure mentioned by my hon. Friend below the Gangway of £500,000 a-year. The right hon. Gentleman asks why the Revising Barristers cannot check these charges; but the work of Revising Barristers is not to revise financial accounts. As a matter of fact, the examination I have made of these accounts show that the sums vary in the most singular way for the work which is performed; and, of course, there is a temptation to allow liberal sums, because the more money allowed the better the work is done, and it would be to the interest of the Revising Barrister to allow charges, and there would be no chock upon the Revising Barrister. ["Divide, divide!"] The right hon. Gentleman asks mo why £15,000 is allowed in Ireland and only £40,000 in England? We have promised to consider this question between now and this day next year, and we make this proposal for this year only, and in the meantime the question will receive fall consideration. The grant of £15,000 for Ireland as compared with £40,000 for England is justified both by the enormous increase of voters in Ireland, out of all proportion to the increase in England, and also by the fact that borough voters are increased in Ireland when no change is made in England.

Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 258; Noes 280: Majority 22.—(Div. List, No. 180.)

Bill considered.

Clause (Informalities not to invalidate claims or notices of objection,)—(Mr. Tomlinson,)—brought up, and read the first time.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the said Clause be now read a second time."

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, he refused to accept the clause, on the ground that it would enable overseers to display partizanship in the publication of the notices.

Question put, and negatived.

MR. HORACE DAVEY,

in moving a new clause providing that— Medical or surgical relief and the giving of medicine shall not be deemed to constitute parochial relief within the meaning of the Representation of the People Acts, apologized for bringing forward this subject again after it had been discussed in Committee; but its importance, he thought, justified him in the course he was taking. There was in the Irish Registration Bill a clause precisely similar to that which he now proposed; and he could not understand why it was right in Ireland that the acceptance of medical relief should not disqualify the elector while in England it should. The relief was given in Ireland by a different machinery from that in England; but it was exactly the same in substance. The question in both the cases of England and Ireland was absolutely identical. The reason for the principle that the receipt of parochial relief should disqualify an elector was founded on the idea that a man who lived at the expense of the public ceased to be an independent citizen, or to be fit to exercise an independent judgment; but in the ease of the acceptance of medical relief the reasons vanished. He denied that medical relief pauperized a man so much as to make him too dependent to exercise the right Parliament had conferred upon him. If the receipt of medical relief were to disqualify a man, why should not the receipt of educational relief? It was argued in the latter case that the law compelled a man to have his children educated, and that if he was too poor to do it himself he must have recourse to the rates for relief. But the same argument applied to the question of medical relief. The moral duty upon a man of supplying medical relief to his wife and family was at least as strong as the moral duty of supplying them with education. Moreover, it was a duty which was recognized by the law. But there was another consideration which, it seemed to him, made it expedient to consider this matter, and that was the inequality with which it acted upon the rural and the urban populations. In the large towns there were hospitals and public dispensaries not supported out of the rates, but out of charity, or by endowment, which provided the inhabitants with medical relief which was not paid for out of the rates, and, therefore, did not come within the definition of parochial relief. In the country the case was far differrent. The rural population had no other source to apply to except the parish doctor. This disqualification would have the effect of taking away the franchise from a very large number of those only just enfranchised. A calculation made by one correspondent, who, he believed-, was within the mark, was that at least one-fifth of the new voters would be thus disfranchised. It would be a grievance which would be seriously felt by the rural population, who were looking forward to the exercise of the franchise. It might be said that this was not a proper Amendment to be introduced into a Registration Bill; but he again turned to the analogy of the Irish Bill. There was a clause in that Bill when it was introduced, and that showed that the Government thought it proper to introduce the subject in a Registration Bill.

Clause (Medical relief not to disqualify,)—(Mr. Davey,)—brought up, and read the first time.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the said Clause be now read a second time.

MR. STAVELEY HILL

opposed the clause, on the ground that it was impossible to distinguish between gratuitous medical and surgical assistance and other parochial relief which at present disqualified a voter. Agricultural labourers, for the most part, belonged to clubs, through whose agency they ob- tained the medical attendance which they required; and he should be very sorry to do anything which interfered with the incentive to join such clubs. By agreeing to the clause the House would discourage men from joining such clubs, and teach them to be dependent. Undoubtedly the whole matter might be reconsidered; but he did not think that this was the time to do so.

MR. JESSE COLLINGS

expressed great surprise at the extraordinary views of the hon. and learned Member who had just sat down (Mr. Staveley Hill). He hold that it would be a great mistake to punish poverty by attaching political disabilities to the receipt of medical relief, and pointed out that many labourers were too poor to join such clubs as the hon. and learned Member opposite had spoken of. Unless the clause were inserted in the Bill, Conservative overseers would be able to disfranchise the labourers right and left. In case of an accident in the harvest field the parish doctor would be called in, and away went the man's vote; or in his absence from home the parish doctor might attend his sick wife or child, and the man would be disfranchised. He appealed to the Government to support the clause.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, he could not personally accept the clause of the hon. and learned Member, though he did not wish to press his views too strongly upon the House, for he knew that many, whose opinion he ought much to respect, were strongly in favour of the clause. A very few days ago this question had been very fully discussed; why, then, raise it again? The time for such discussion was when the question was raised on the Franchise Bill. There was no reason why they should enter upon the question of enfranchising or disfranchising upon a Registration Bill. He would point out that if the clause were accepted, they ought to take away disqualification in respect of all parochial relief. He thought they should be careful before they held out to the poor any inducement to receive gifts by law, instead of endeavouring to obtain such relief by means of their own industry.

MR. E. STANHOPE

said, he hoped that they would not discuss the question on its merits. The question had been discussed on the Franchise Bill, and they arrived at the decision that certain conditions should be attached to the granting of the franchise, one of which was that a man receiving medical relief should be disqualified. That was a condition which had existed for many years past. He hoped the House would refuse absolutely to disturb that settlement in a Registration Bill.

MR. HENEAGE

said, he thought that it was far more demoralizing and degrading for labourers to run up bills with doctors which they could not pay, and in consequence of which their children were half starved and badly clothed, than to apply, in cases of accident or illness in their families, for the assistance of the parish doctor, who would only do what was required; besides which, the present law would hereafter place too much power in the hands of the overseers of the poor and the medical officer with regard to the disfranchisement of agricultural labourers.

MR. PELL

said, he thought that this question ought to be left to the good sense of the electors of the future. The better part of the new constituencies would, in his opinion, hesitate for along time before they assented to such a proposal as that of his hon. and learned Friend. In the Lobby the other day he heard an expression made use of by a not very insignificant Member of the House to the following effect—"I think this medical relief will be a good horse to run at the General Election." When he heard that expression he said to himself that he would have nothing to do with any Party that ran that horse.

MR. THOROLD ROGERS

said, he had been a Guardian of the City of Oxford for 12 years, and he had always thought that the most pedantic element in the new Poor Law was the disability inflicted upon the working classes on the receipt of medical relief. In the country districts the labourers must procure medical relief either by running up a bill with the local doctor or by going to the medical man of the parish. It was derogatory to the Poor Law administration that the medical man, perhaps the most highly educated man in the district, should be compelled to accept a remuneration at a rate far below that of any other professional man. Moreover, he thought that the highly skilled labour of the doctor in country places ought not to be one of those things which the working classes should be compelled to run into hopeless debt for, or incur the penalty of disfranchisement by accepting medical relief from the parish.

Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 87; Noes 50: Majority 37.—(Div. List, No. 181.)

MR. E. STANHOPE

complained that the Government had failed to carry out the arrangement which had been come to between the two Parties, by not having their supporters in the House, and asked whether they intended to take any steps to support their own views in this matter? He had done his best to assist the Government in carrying this Bill through; but after what had just happened the Government could hardly expect assistance from the Opposition.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James),

while acknowledging the assistance which the Government had received from the hon. Member, thought that the charge which he had brought against the Government was a strange one. He maintained that the Government could not have controlled the decision of the House. It was a matter upon which hon. Members had a right to form their own independent opinions, and they, including even some of his Colleagues, had done so. Though he personally regretted the decision to which the House had come, it was impossible to say that this was a question upon which Members should be expected, to follow blindly the dictates of Party. Taking that view, he would ask the hon. Gentleman whether the Bill ought to be put in danger on account of what had occurred?

MR. PELL

said, he hoped that the House and the country would now go further, and not permit any parochial relief to be a disqualification.

MR. HORACE DAVEY

remarked that in the wording of the clause he had followed almost exactly the clause in the Irish Bill introduced by the Government.

Colonel NOLAN

was not prepared to go so far as the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Mr. Pell) in holding that no parochial relief should disqualify a man from voting, although he thought that some accidental outdoor relief might be excepted.

MR. MORGAN LLOYD

said, that he had voted for the new clause as a protest against the state of the law which allowed a criminal to vote, and, at the same time, disqualified an honest man for accepting relief. He had last year proposed a clause imposing a temporary disqualification upon persons convicted upon crime, but failed to pass it. If that clause had been carried he would have been content to let the disqualification of paupers remain; but he thought that it was an outrage to the moral feelings of the community to refuse to paupers a privilege granted to criminals.

MR. D. DAVIES

said, that he always supported the Government when he believed they were right, and he had generally thought that they were right. On this occasion he had voted against the Government. He did not want to say much against the Government before a General Election, for it would only make them unpopular. He thought, however, that it was too bad that the Government had put them in the wrong, and he was determined to put himself in the right.

Clause added.

New Clause (Informations as to persons disqualified by parochial relief,)—(Mr. E. Stanhope,)—brought up, and read the first and second time.

Clause amended, and added.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line IS, by inserting, after the word "of," the words "the holding of."—(Mr. Warton.)

Question, "That those words be there inserted," put, and negatived.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line 15, by leaving out the word "each," and inserting the word "a,"—(Mr. Warton,)—instead thereof.

Question, "That the word 'each' stand part of the Bill," put and agreed to.

On the Motion of Mr. Attorney General, Amendment made, in Clause 6, page 6, line 13, after "apply," by inserting— And revising assessors shall continue to be elected in accordance with 'The Municipal Corporations Act, 1882,' as amended by any Act of the present Session with respect to municipal elections.

Amendment proposed, In Clause 13, page 9, line 11, insert, as separate paragraphs,—"Where a Parliamentary county forms part only of a county at large, the local authority, for the purpose of dividing that Parliamentary county into polling districts, and assigning polling places, shall appoint a committee for such Parliamentary county, consisting of members of the local authority resident therein, and such committee shall, in accordance with such regulations (if any) as may he made by the local authority, take into consideration the division of the said Parliamentary county into polling districts, and the assignment of a polling place for each district, and for that purpose shall hold meetings at some convenient place or places in the said Parliamentary county, and hear applications for, and receive evidence respecting, districts and polling places, and shall report to the local authority the polling districts and polling places which they consider will he in conformity with the enactments relating to the division of counties into polling districts and with this Act, and will best meet the convenience of the electors in the said county in recording their votes. Where a Parliamentary county extends into more county quarter-sessional areas than one, the said committee shall he a joint committee consisting of members of the court of county quarter sessions of each of such county quarter-sessional areas who are resident in the said Parliamentary county."—(Mr. Heneage.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, he had no objection to the Amendment in its present form, which was different from the form in which his hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby had introduced it in Committee. The proposed Committees were only to report, and not to finally decide the question.

MR. BULWER

opposed the Amendment as wholly unnecessary.

MR. MELLOR

supported the Amendment.

MR. J. G. TALBOT

opposed the Amendment on the ground that this matter had already been taken in hand by the Quarter Sessions in many cases, one of which he instanced to be in his own experience in Kent. If this Amendment were carried, it would impose upon these counties the necessity of doing again what they had already done, causing unnecessary trouble and expense.

MR. E. STANHOPE,

in opposing the Amendment, said, that it would be likely to excite Party feeling in quarters where no Party feeling existed at present.

Question put.

The House divided;—Ayes 116; Noes 36: Majority 80.—(Div. List, No. 182.)

Other Amendments made.

Amendment proposed, In page 9, line 24, by leaving out from the words "a court" to the words "this Act," in line 25.—(Mr. John Talbot.)

Question put, "That the words 'a court' stand part of the Bill."

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Other Amendments made.

MR. JAMES STUART

said, in pursuance of a Notice he had already given when addressing the House before, he rose to propose an addition to Clause 15 to provide that no person in statu pupillari should be entitled to be registered as a voter in respect of his occupation of any chambers or premises in any of the Colleges or Halls of the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge. By this and a subsequent Amendment he desired to define exactly and to make operative the enfranchisement which the House desired to make by the decision it had already come to on this subject. He desired to exclude from the operation of the enfranchisement it proposed those who were in statu pupillari. These words, however, included a larger number than were ordinarily understood. They included those between the first degree, Bachelor of Arts, and the subsequent degree, Master of Arts, and those between degrees of a similar character. It had been suggested to him to substitute for the words "in statu pupillari" words to designate undergraduate members only. He did not wish to be pedantic in the matter, and, therefore, he should move the Amendment in a form different from that of which he had given Notice. It might, perhaps, be supposed that he regarded undergraduates as incapable of exercising the franchise. On the contrary, however, he thought that undergraduates of full age were as capable of exercising the franchise as any other class of persons in a similar position. He entirely denied, also, that undergraduates would be a "rowdy" element at the elections. He believed that if they had responsibility attached to them they would exercise in the most "unrowdy" manner all the functions assigned to them. Much misapprehension appeared to prevail as to what the politics of the undergraduates were. When he was himself an undergraduate, no doubt their politics were very largely Conservative; but it was not so now. The record of the recent debates at the Union, Cambridge, indicated the style of mind of the undergraduates, and would enable one to judge whether they would be such a bad addition to the constituency. In regard to crotchets like the nationalization of land, the Cambridge undergraduates had pronounced against them in the Union by two to one. On February 10 the undergraduates, meeting in the Union under the same influences of panic as that House itself met shortly afterwards, voted by a majority of 149 to 80 that the present Government was unworthy of the confidence of the country. Again, a motion expressing regret at the disintegration of the Conservative Party and at the inability of its Leaders to control its action was carried at a full meeting of the Union by a majority of one. Now, what were the limits and scope of the question before the House? He had lately found that there were resident within the walls of the Colleges of the University of Cambridge the following numbers, roughly speaking, of undergraduates:—Of first-year undergraduates, 200; of second-year, 500; and of third-year, 500, or, in all, about 1,200. At the period of registration next before they entered as freshmen almost exactly one-half of the undergraduates entering Cambridge were under the age of 19, and the other half were over the age of 19; and, remembering that they began their residence in October and resided till the following June, it would be found that there would be to be put upon the Register on any given date nearly 250 persons from the list of undergraduates, 100 of whom would be, when on the Register, in their third year, and the other 150 would be in their fourth or higher year. A very slight change made in the method of entering undergraduates into their rooms and of making them terminate their occupation—arrangements that were entirely in the hands of the tutors or the governing body for the time being of each College—might increase the number of undergraduates that would be put on the Register from 250 to 800. That was a dangerous position to place a body of persons in. He did not say that they would be likely to yield to any temptation; but, even though they did not yield to it, they would be exposed to suspicion and unfair accusation when they took action affecting the entrance and occupation of rooms. If the election were to take place between January and July, then, of all that number, whether of the 250 or the 800, only 100 roughly, or, it might be, 150, would be actually in residence in the University. The others would have gone clean away, and would be brought back as voters in a place where they had ceased to reside. If the election took place between July and January, not one, with the rarest possible exception, of the voters in question would be actually in residence. The position then of the undergraduates was exceptional, and their treatment, whether they received votes or not, would require to be exceptional; and he thought matters should remain as they were, on the ground of their non-residence and of the circumstances of their occupation. The hon. Member concluded by moving his Amendment.

Amendment proposed, In page 10, line 20, after the word "repealed," to insert the words,—"Provided, That no person shall he entitled to he registered as a Parliamentary voter in respect of his occupation of any chambers or premises in any of the colleges or halls of the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge, if he shall not have obtained a degree in one or other of the said Universities before the end of his period of qualification, as defined by 'The Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878.'"—(Mr. James Stuart.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, he had listened to the interesting speech of the hon. Gentleman with very great pleasure; but before the debate was continued he asked the House to allow him to call attention to the practical question before it. He pointed out that if this Amendment were adopted the law would be left exactly in the same position in which it at present stood. The Amendment would create no difference in the position of things which at present existed. He pointed out that no undergraduate ever occupied his premises for the whole 12 months. He had made inquiries with respect to the practice at Oxford and Cambridge, and he found that undergraduates took their rooms for cer- tain terms, the authorities having power to enter them, and the undergraduate not being allowed to leave the rooms without permission of the authorities. The hon. Member, indeed, did nothing by his Amendment but declare what the law was at present; and he hoped that the House would not pursue a subject any further which had been adequately discussed on a previous occasion.

Mr. HARRINGTON

maintained that this clause was not unnecessary. It seemed to him that the hon. and learned Gentleman would have done better in opposing the Amendment if he had devoted his argument chiefly to the points of the lodger franchise rather than to that of the household franchise. He pointed out that the practice in Ireland was to place on the Register every student of Trinity College who had the right to obtain a vote and who voted on his qualifications for the City of Dublin. In this way no fewer than 300 students holding College rooms were placed by the Revising Barrister on the Register to vote for the city.

Mr. J. LOWTHER

reminded the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Stuart) that in 1867 a Motion substantially identical with that now before the House was made by Mr. Cardwell, introducing into the Act of that day disqualifying words which existed in the Act of 1832. On that occasion the subject was fully discussed. In the first instance, Mr. Cardwell, succeeded by a narrow majority in obtaining the assent of the House of Commons to the proposition, although the late Mr. Fawcett condemned in strong terms Mr. Cardwell's disfranchising proposal. On a subsequent occasion he himself had made a Motion, on the Report stage of the Bill of 1867, to expunge that provision, which was similar to that now brought forward by the hon. Member for Hackney. The House decided upon that occasion, by a majority of 60, that provided the students at Oxford and Cambridge were entitled by law to vote, no objection ought to be thrown in the way of their exercising the franchise merely on account of their being students. He had at that time presented a Petition from the Council of the Senate of the University of Cambridge praying for a removal of this monstrous disqualification which was introduced into the Act of 1832. In "another place" Lord Cairns introduced words which rendered the intentions of Parliament free from any ambiguity; but by a comparatively narrow majority, those words were struck out when the Bill returned to the House of Commons, which resulted in the claims of College occupiers being disallowed by the Court of Common Pleas on appeal. He trusted, however, that upon this occasion the House would decline to be led into the commission of so gross an injustice as to place upon adult undergraduates the stigma of being the only class amongst Her Majesty's subjects who were unfit to exercise electoral rights, and would decline to convert what had been introduced as a measure of enfranchisement into one of disfranchisement, in direct violation of the distinct assurances of the Prime Minister.

THE JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL (Mr. OSBORNE MORGAN),

in reply to the question of the hon. Member for Westmeath (Mr. Harrington), who had asked whether the students at Universities would not have a right to vote as lodgers, remarked that the students were not in any sense lodgers, inasmuch as for 25 weeks in the year they had no absolute right even to enter their rooms, from which they were always liable to be turned out at a moment's notice. He held in his hand a letter from a distinguished authority at Oxford, who stated that the undergraduates of the University had no more connection with the City of Oxford than the soldiers in the barracks had. He was strongly in favour of giving votes to graduates residing at the University; but he maintained that it was manifestly unjust for the City of Oxford and the town of Cambridge to have a number of voters placed on their Registers who had no local connection whatever with them.

Mr. GORST

observed that the arguments of the Judge Advocate General and of the Attorney General were in direct contradiction. He should support the Attorney General, as he thought there was no need for special legislation on this subject. He saw no reason why they should not leave the students at Oxford and Cambridge to be dealt with by the law applicable to other classes of persons. But for a section of the old Reform Act of 1832, a large number of graduates and undergraduates would have been placed on the Register. The Attorney General said that, if left to the operation of the ordinary law, those not resident would not come on the Register. What reason, therefore, was there for any special proviso?

MR. BRYCE

said, that the necessity for introducing this proviso arose from the fact that the provision in the old Reform Act had been repealed in Committee. It became necessary, therefore, to see that in consequence of that repeal they did not allow the occupation of College rooms, for which there was no parallel anywhere else, to give a right to the franchise. He was inclined to think that the Attorney General was right in saying that as the law stood undergraduates could not acquire the franchise; but there was uncertainty about the matter. They knew that the students of Trinity College, Dublin, had been placed on the Register, and it might be in the power of the authorities at Oxford and Cambridge to make such regulations as would enable their students also to vote at the borough elections. If undergraduates were given the franchise, the discipline of the University would be seriously interfered with. Undergraduates were at present forbidden from taking part in elections; but it would be impossible to prevent a voter from attending political meetings. There would, if the Amendment were agreed to, be a conflict between the general law of the land and the disciplinary law of the University. Another reason for refusing to grant the franchise to undergraduates was that the town had nothing whatever to do with the University. They had separate jurisdictions, and the jealousy between them had sometimes been very keen. Undergraduates were at the University to complete their education, and were not supposed to intend remaining there. Their position was, therefore, different from that of lodgers or occupiers in every other part of the country. The difference between the position of undergraduates and that of the senior men was that the latter made the University their home. According to the statements in the Press, the Hebdomadal Council of the University of Oxford had agreed to a resolution deprecating the extension of the franchise to undergraduates, and the Vice Chancellor of the University had written to him expressing his disapproval of the proposal.

MR. RAIKES

said, he could not help thinking that hon. Gentlemen opposite had not shown any disposition to act on the advice of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General, and the first person to offend in this respect had been the hon. and learned Gentleman's Colleague, the Judge Advocate General (Mr. Osborne Morgan). It appeared to him that, however long they continued the discussion, they were not likely to get very much further, in view of the circumstances the hon. and learned Gentleman had pointed out. They were rather beating the air—in fact, there was something that savoured of an academic disquisition in the debate. He ventured to believe that they would do well if they retained exactly the position at which they had arrived after the discussion in Committee, and if the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. James Stuart) withdrew his Amendment. The Attorney General had pointed out that it was only fair to treat members of the Universities at least as human beings. They were entitled to as much consideration, surely, as the meanest of mankind. The Legislature was about to grant electoral privileges to every capable citizen found in every part of the United Kingdom; yet, in the opinion of two or three Professors in the sister Universities, it appeared that there was only one human being unfit to exercise the franchise—namely, the undergraduate for whose benefit the Universities existed. The hon. Member who had moved the Amendment had alluded to the active interest which the undergraduates took at the present moment in public affairs; and he (Mr. Raikes) was glad that no false modesty had precluded the hon. Member from mentioning the resolution of the Union Society in which his own candidature for Parliamentary honours had been supported. He did not know whether, after the speech the hon. Member had made tonight, the result would be the same if the Union were now to give a decision. He was anxious to press the House to consider whether or not—considering that they had on former occasions been unwilling to accept, as a fancy franchise, the possession of a University degree—they were now prepared to lay down the converse principle that the non-possession, of a University degree was to be a disqualification. If they were prepared to assert that principle, and push it to its logical conclusion, the only electors in the University would be Professors and Masters of Arts. As some outside opinions with regard to this subject had been offered, he might be forgiven if he referred to a communication he had received from one of the leading Liberals in the University of Cambridge. This gentleman said that he hoped he (Mr. Raikes) would support the Amendment for giving votes to the undergraduates; that he had asked all kinds of people—tutors, proctors, old residents, young men, &c, &c., and they were all in favour of it, and could not see that it would, do any harm; that, as a matter of fact, if the law were amended, very few undergraduates would get upon the Register, because, coming up to the University at the age of 18, they very frequently changed their rooms or lodgings; that to exclude people in statu pupillari from the franchise would be to keep out people who ought to have the vote; that the political results would be very doubtful, and that the change would not be detrimental to discipline. [Cries of"Name!"] This communication was from Mr. Oscar Browning, of King's College, Cambridge, a Liberal, from whose Liberal opinions it was a pity his Friends on the Ministerial side of the House had departed on the present occasion. He trusted the discussion would be now allowed to come to a conclusion, as he did not think it would lead to any practical result.

MR. W. FOWLER

said, that if he understood the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General aright, the clause under discussion would be merely declaratory of the law as it stood, if it were carried. If that were so, he could not see what harm it could do, If it were passed, it would, at any rate, put an end to doubts as to whether the undergraduate, under the law as it stood, could vote or not. He wished to see that doubt cleared up. He agreed with hon. Gentlemen opposite that there was something peculiar in voting the disfranchisement of any class of persons over 21 years of age, and qualified in other respects. But this was a peculiar case. These undergraduates were a body of men who came into the town, and yet were not of the town. They came into it for a temporary purpose, and that purpose fulfilled left it again—at any rate, that was the case with most of them. Then there were some other considerations which had not yet been mentioned which he should like to suggest. The registration of voters for the town of Cambridge would be greatly disturbed if a large number of persons had to be put on every year and a large number taken off. With regard to the question as to how discipline would be affected if undergraduates were to be allowed to vote he had received letters from both sides. Some thought there would be no difficulty in the matter, whilst others believed the system would very much disturb the Universities, both in term and out of term—in term, because it would be impossible to command the non-participation of undergraduates in elections; and out of term, because a great many undergraduates would come up to the University to vote, and it would be impossible to prevent them coming, although their presence in the town out of term, and at election time, might be most undesirable. He would suggest to hon. Gentlemen opposite that if the clause were carried they would take away one of the greatest arguments in favour of University representation. They were told they had University representation, because the Members of the Universities had no votes for the towns; but if this clause were carried, and all Members of Universities had votes in towns, that argument would no longer hold good. It was not proposed to refuse votes to real, bonâ fide residents in the Colleges who paid rates. The clause passed the other day would give a vote to those who were bonâ fide occupiers in the Colleges; but if the present proposal were accepted, it would extend the franchise to temporary occupiers, who were not really occupiers at all. He must say that if these undergraduates were to have votes, their votes should be limited to the Universities. Why should they not vote for the Universities? They were Members of the Universities, to which they therefore belonged; but they should not vote for a town to which they did not belong. That, he thought was a clear and obvious argument. Something had been said with regard to Ireland—to undergraduates of Trinity College having re- ceived the franchise. But if a mistake had been made in regard to Ireland, it was no reason why they should make a mistake in regard to England also. They ought rather to endeavour to put the law right in Ireland than to make it wrong in England because it was wrong in Ireland. The Irish case, so far as it went, was an argument in favour of the Motion of his hon. Friend. It was quite clear that this case was a most peculiar one; and whilst he would be the last person to desire to disqualify anyone—anyone, he meant, really fitted in other respects to enjoy the franchise—he thought these gentlemen should not vote for the town to which they did not belong, but for the University to which they did belong.

MR. HEALY

said, there never had been an occasion on which there had been more chopping and changing on the part of the Government than there had been on the present occasion. Hardly five minutes ago the Judge Advocate General (Mr. Osborne Morgan) had delivered an admirable homily on the evils of undergraduate voting, and had read out a letter from a gentleman at Oxford, who had said that undergraduates were like soldiers—they did not pay rent, taxes, and so on. These were exactly the same arguments which he had himself lately used about the students of Trinity College, Dublin; but, on turning to the Division List, he found that "the right hon. G. Osborne Morgan" was amongst those who had opposed him on that occasion. To give an instance of the manner in which hon. Gentlemen voted on Irish questions without having regard to the merits of the case, the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. James Stuart) himself, who now wished to disqualify the students of Oxford and Cambridge, on that occasion voted against him. What regard could they have to the declarations in the House of such hon. Gentlemen? They seemed to be voting for expediency. All the Irish Members wanted was even justice. If the students of Oxford and Cambridge were to have a vote, let the Dublin students have a vote also; if the Irish students were not to have a vote, then withhold it from the students of Oxford and Cambridge. The Irish Members wanted no more—they would be contented with no less. He would ask the House for a moment to go back to what happened in Committee. When he (Mr. Healy) had pointed out that the Irish students had a vote, it was pointed out to him that the English students could not vote, because there was a clause in an Act of Parliament which said that they should not. The Government said that was the reason the English students were debarred from voting. That being so, they were asked to repeal the clause; but in reply they said—"Repeal or no repeal these students have no right to vote." Had any attempt been made to explain how 300 Trinity College students found their way at one time on the Register of the City of Dublin? Could the English Attorney General explain how it was that, even though the clause referred to were repealed, English students would not have a right to vote, yet Irish students would be able to get on the Register? There was no other reason which prevented the undergraduates of Oxford and Cambridge from getting on the Register, that he knew of, than this clause; and yet, when its repeal was proposed, the Attorney General said—"You may repeal away, but the law will be still the same." He (Mr. Healy) could not follow that at all; but, be that as it might, he would ask the House to give a vote consistent with that they had given on the subject of the Trinity College students, so as to bring about uniformity in the matter between the two countries.

THE JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL (Mr. OSBORNE MORGAN)

said, he was under the impression that the Amendment on which he had voted had been an Amendment to disfranchise all members of Dublin University, and not students only.

MR. HEALY

Distinctly students.

MR. THOROLD ROGERS

said, he did not understand the circumstances under which the graduates and under-graduates of the University of Dublin had votes, and he should like to know what they were. He should be rather disposed to think that those who were interested in these persons being disallowed the privilege of voting for the City of Dublin had not tried the legality of the question.

MR. HEALY

We have no appeal in Ireland.

MR. THOROLD ROGERS

Then they ought to have an appeal—they were in a bad way. With regard to the par- ticular case now before the House, he thought it probable that the situation was precisely as the Attorney General had stated. He had told them that no undergraduates would come on the Register. Well, he (Mr. Thorold Rogers) did not believe that any graduates would come on the Register; he did not believe that a single Fellow would come on it. A Fellow of the University was not a freeholder in the strict sense of the word. The hon. Members for Cambridge (Mr. W. Fowler), Hackney (Mr. James Stuart), and the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Bryce) were in such a position that if they were to misconduct themselves the visitor of their College could turn them out, neck and crop, without any appeal whatever. He thought he was right in saying that the authorities of the Universities and of the Colleges had power to dispossess a man at a moment's notice. The Fellow or Head was by no means a freeholder of property. [An hon. Member: You can appeal.] There was no appeal; but he thought it quite possible that graduates had not even occupation, and that the and that the right of any one of them to vote could be disputed under this clause. What was the situation? It was this—the undergraduate had an absolutely precarious tenure of his rooms. In most cases, his tenure was so precarious that he was not even in the position of a lodger, even the furniture in his rooms belonging to the College. ["No, no!"] Well, it was so at his College; it was gradually becoming the case at all; and, as a consequence, the undergraduate was only occupying furnished lodgings at the risk of being sent away from the College at a moment's notice. Even those who lived in the Universities had no rights as against the Universities. The rule at the University of Oxford was this—that the non-collegiate students and those, being members of the Colleges, who lived outside the Colleges, were in the position of occupying lodgings for which they were obliged to pay for eight weeks three times a-year. He had been one of the delegates of lodgings once himself, so that he was acquainted with these facts. A student might be required by the delegacy of unattached students to leave his lodgings at five minutes' notice, and he would have no rights as against anyone. He had no right to prevent anyone going into his rooms, the owner of the lodgings being bound to go in if the authorities requested him to. He had no rights as against anyone whatever. Therefore, he (Mr. Thorold Rogers) did not believe that anyone of these persons—he would even say that from the Heads of the Colleges down to the lowest clerk no one in the University possessed the status which entitled him to be put upon the Register of the town. But that was a very different thing from what might occur under the Revising Barristers. He thought something had been said to-night about the incompetence of those gentlemen, and he had heard it said that some were not over-honest. ["Oh, oh!"] Well, he had heard it said so—and that therefore, there might be some sort of dodging the constituencies being jerrymandered. In this way a great many people might be put to considerable, expense, through the necessity of vindicating principles of law in consequence of this clause. And that was not all. It was a question of what in the future would be the relations between the university of Oxford and the city, and between the University of Cambridge and the town. Members of the University knew perfectly well that for many years, even for centuries, there had been the worst possible blood between the city and the University, and between the town and the University, and it was desirable not to recall that things. The position of the undergraduates in the Universities was unquestionably precarious. If he were to describe the undergraduate, he should say he was a kind of educated gipsy who camped at the University for eight weeks at a time, and then went away, having no interest in the place, and leaving no connection behind him beyond, it might be, his debts. He (Mr. Thorold Rogers) did not think it was desirable that these persons should be pitchforked into local politics. But what he was shocked at more than anything else was that on both occasions when this subject had been under discussion the two members for the University of Oxford opposite (Sir John Mowbray and Mr. Talbot) had never said a word about what would occur between the University and the City of Oxford if the undergraduates were enfranchised, though they knew that the authorities of the University had deprecated the change by a formal vote. He had not believed I in University Members before, and he I was still less in favour of them now, and he thought that the sooner the anomaly was done away with the better. He did not know how the senior Member for the University would explain entire silence on the matter. He (Mr. Thorold Rogers) had never voted for the right hon. Member in the past, and it was not likely that he should ever do so in the future; indeed, he earnestly hoped he should be spared to use his best endeavours to prevent the right hon. Member and his brood from ever coming into the House again.

SIR JOHN R. MOWBRAY

said, he apprehended that the House would not expect him to remain silent after the reference which had been made to him by the hon. Member for Southwark. That Hon. Gentleman had taken the opportunity of departing from that which had been called an academic discussion by indulging in a great variety of thought and idea. He had attacked the Revising Barristers, declaring that they were incompetent and prejudiced— he did not know that the hon. Member had not even gone the length of charging them with dishonesty. The hon. Member had also attacked the undergraduates, describing them as a set of camping gipsies. In spite of the privilege the undergraduates in the University of Oxford had had for years past of availing themselves of the political genius of the hon. Member, it was clear they had never profited by it, but remained as ignorant as they were before the hon. Member was called to the professorial chair. Then, having disposed of the Revising Barristers and the undergraduates, the hon. Gentleman had attacked his (Sir John R. Mowbray's) Colleague and him self. He had said he had never voted for them. Well, they had never asked for his vote. From the position they were in they were never in the habit of soliciting the votes of their constituents. He did not know how the hon. Member had voted—he had certainly never asked him for his vote or expected it. He (Sir John R. Mowbray) had not vote with the hon. Gentleman on this question; and when asked why, as representing a University, he had not said anything on the subject—his answer was because this was not a University question. It had not been raised by University Members, or even by Professors sitting opposite. It came form a quarter below the Gangway—a quarter, he must say rather to be viewed with suspicion.Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. He did not wish for any votes from that side of the Gangway any more than he wished for them from the other side. The question was one rather for the City of Oxford and the borough of Cambridge than for the Universities; it was a question whether the House would disfranchise a particular class of people. If the undergraduates were of legal age, and in occupation of a tenement which would qualify them otherwise for a vote, they should be treated as other people. The head of the house, the Professors and resident tutors if they were in such occupation as would give them a vote under other circumstances were entitled to have that vote. It was unnecessary for University Members to intervene, first, because it was not a University question; and, secondly, because he thought the case had been well put by the Attorney General to-night, when he had said it was unnecessary for any clause of this kind to be added to the Bill. The only regret he had was that the Attorney General, having given them wise advice not to be led into all these questions as to the number of undergraduates, the political opinions they entertained, and the relations between "town and gown"—the Attorney General having a desire to avoid all these subjects—his Colleague sitting by his side should have proceeded to read letters and open all these subjects again. It was for the House to judge of the policy of that proceeding, and it was also, as he had said, for the House generally to discuss the question at issue. It was not a matter which was to be decided one way or other by the Universities, or on which the opinions of the University Members could be expected in any way to guide the House. It was unnecessary to add the clause to the Bill; and, therefore, considering this not so much an academic question as one concerning the City of Oxford and the town of Cambridge, he should vote against the Amendment.

MR. T. P. O'CONNOR

said, the Attorney General had commenced the discussion in a proper manner. He had asked the House to discuss a single point; but, unfortunately, owing to the Rules of the House, the hon. and learned Gentleman bad since been precluded from speaking, and his Colleague, who had followed him, had not pursued the line of thought initiated by him, the result being that the House had been wandering now for some time. If the hon. and learned Gentleman would ask the leave of the House to speak again—and doubtless, under the circumstances, that leave would be at one accorded—in a few words he would be able to clear the debate of matters which confused it at the present moment. This was the position in which they stood. He understood the hon. and learned Gentleman to agree with the Irish Members on two points—first, that it was undesirable that undergraduates should have votes; and, secondly, that the law on the subject, whatever it was, should be the same in the three countries. If the House thought undergraduates should not have votes at all in Oxford and Cambridge, did they not think the same with regard to the undergraduates of the University of Dublin? If the Attorney General desired the law to be the same in the two countries, he wished to ask how was it that students in Dublin were allowed to qualify as lodgers; and if they were allowed so to qualify, would not the hon. and learned Gentleman take means to prevent their being allowed in the future, as undergraduates in Oxford and Cambridge were prevented? This was the difficulty of the Irish Members—there were 312 undergraduates in Trinity College on the Register of the City of Dublin at the last registration; but the hon. Member for Westmeath (Mr. Harrington), who had interested himself in this subject, had got the number reduced to 146 by proving cases of joint occupation—cases in which students joined at their lodgings instead of occupying rooms separately. But the new franchise would abolish this distinction. There would be now a possibility of two men getting a vote for the same lodging if it were sufficiently highly rented. The 146, therefore, would, in the future, be raised to 312, because joint occupancy would be held to be a good qualification. Well, did the Government seriously contemplate a state of things in which all the undergraduates in Oxford and Cambridge would be disqualified and those allowed to vote in Dublin would be increased from 146 to 312? The hon. Member for Westmeath called his attention to the fact that under the single Member system the grievance would be much greater in Dublin than it had been hitherto—although he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) could not see that that was altogether germane to the subject. The hon. Gentleman tae Member for Hackney (Mr. James Stuart) had been reminded by the hon. and learned Member fonersntents.selves o had deprecated the chantgeford if the undergraduates were enfranchised, though they knew that the authorit (Mr. Healy) of his inconsistency in regard to the subject under discussion; and certainly the hon. Member should be pressed for a ore satisfactory explanation of his conduct than lie had yet given. If it could be declared in distinct words in the English Act that the undergraduates of Oxford and Cambridge were not to have votes, it was absurd for the House of Common to insist on leaving the franchise to undergraduates of Trinity College, Dublin. He hoped an answer would be given sufficiently lucid to show hon. Members what they were voting for.

MR. GIBSON

said, he desired to make a few observations upon this Amendment before a vote was taken upon it. The hon. Gentleman the Member for the town of Galway, who had just sat down, asked for an assurance that the Attorney General would take means to prevent undergraduates and members of the University of Trinity College at present on the Register of the City of Dublin from voting for the city; or, in other in other words in connection with a scheme of general enfranchisement, he asked the Government to pledge itself that it would bring forward a measure of disfranchisement the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister having, in all his great speeches in reference to this matter, indicated that his desire was to enfranchise all capable citizens, and to do nothing which could in any shape or form be called disfranchisement. In correction with the Dublin University at the present moment—not in reference to a future registration, but at the present moment—there were a substantial number of internal resident students of Trinity College on the Register of voters for the City of Dublin. The Government were asked in this discussion, in reference to Oxford and Cambridge, to give a pledge that they would remove from the Registers in Dublin such existing qualified voters. Such a pro- position could not be considered for a moment. With regard to appeals against the decisions of the Revising Barristers, the highest Court in Ireland—namely, the Court of Exchequer Chamber—to which such a case could be taken, had been applied to on the subject of the legality of the vote of the undergraduates of Trinity college, and that Court had decided that those gentlemen were entitled to be on the Register, and there they were, and there they would remain. A few days ago the House, when in Committee, determined to repeal the section which had disqualified residents in the Oxford and Cambridge Universities from voting and now the hon. Member for Hackney asked, notwithstanding that repea1, that the provisions so repealed should be virtually re-enacted, so as to Prevent, those who might now be able to get upon the Register from arguing their case. A man living within the walls of a College to have a qualification must be 21 years of age, in possession of qualified premises duly rated; and now for the first time in the history of Reform legislation, it was sought to apply to these people coming within every single one of the qualifying clauses a positive statutory disqualification, so that the Registration Courts would not be able to listen to the arguments they have to submit on the state of facts. He was not surprised that the Attorney, General had suggested that it would be wise to leave the consideration of this matter to the ordinary tribunals who had to consider electoral law. What case the hon. Member for Hackney, who had introduced the subject, made out for the favourable consideration of the House? He had admitted that undergraduates, if of full age, were as capable citizens any other electors who were to be found on the Electoral Roll. The hon. Member admitted, not only their; possession of a technical qualification, but he declared that if they were of full age they were as capable as any other citizens described by the Prime Minister. It was said that the occupation of the undergraduates was precarious; but that was not a question which could be considered by the House. If they were entitled to be on the Register, by reason of the possession of the ordinary qualification, they were entitled, and that was all that could be said. It was not for the House to say what period of actual occupation in the year should qualify a particular class of persons; that was a matter for the Registration Court. As to the question of assimilating the law between the two countries, surely the 15th clause had been introduced for the purpose of putting the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge on a level with Trinity College, and of taking away from the undergraduates of Oxford and Cambridge the disqualification which did not bind and fetter the Dublin University undergraduates. There" was nothing to compel the students to live within the walls of the University. If a student elected to pursue his studies in the City of Oxford, the town of Cambridge, or the City of Dublin, he would have a vote. Was it not, then, abhorrent to common sense to say that if he came into rooms in College in order to study more quietly that was a reason why he should lose the right to vote? But he would not detain the House longer. The matter did not admit of wide argument. It had been discussed on a former occasion, when the Government, after argument, deliberately withdrew their opposition; and he could not imagine, for the reasons he had given the House, that this clause would meet with any general acceptance from the majority of the House.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, that, with the permission of the House, he would intervene for one moment—particularly because the right hon. and learned Gentleman had misunderstood what he had said. When the question was discussed in Committee he had been opposed to the repealing clause. He desired to see no vote given to graduates or undergraduates; but he had been completely overwhelmed by the arguments used, and had found it useless to attempt to take any objection to the repeal of the clause. When this proposal affecting undergraduates was made two hours ago by his hon. Friend (Mr. Stuart) he had endeavoured to deprecate the discussion, and had been in hopes that his hon. Friend would withdraw the Motion, as he had thought the law sufficiently clear. But his suggestion had not been accepted, and they had discussed the question at full length. With regard to assimilating the law of England and Ireland, he was not sufficiently familiar with the conditions under which students of Trinity College lived in the University of Dublin to be able to say why it was that they were admitted to the lodger franchise. They had not in Oxford or Cambridge such conditions as would entitle undergraduates to the lodger franchise. In England the question had been decided by the Court of Appeal.

MR. HARRINGTON

What are the conditions deemed essential in Oxford and Cambridge?

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

There are no conditions deemed essential. The condition of the law is that undergraduates are not voters.

MR. HARRINGTON

What is the difference between the condition of students in a College and lodgers in an ordinary dwelling-house?

MR. SPEAKER

I must remind the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General that he is departing from the ordinary practice in making a second speech.

DR. CAMERON

said, he thought it would be highly undesirable to allow the discussion to terminate without something being said by an hon. Member from a Liberal point of view. He had been astonished during the past two hours to hear the most liberal sentiments, with one exception, expressed on the Conservative side of the House, and to find all the reactionary speeches coming from the Liberal side from below as well as above the Gangway. This showed that Radicals, as well as other people, were no judges of the merits of their own case. During this discussion much had been said about the discipline of the Colleges, and how the proposed enfranchisement would disturb the minds of the heads of the Universities, and would disturb the undergraduates if the latter were allowed to take part in local elections. Did the House consider that an interest in politics—an active interest in politics—was of no use to students? He regretted to see that, while that question had been dealt with affirmatively by hon. Members on the Conservative side of the House, an opposite view had been adopted by the Radicals. So long as he had thought the Government were going to stick by their original proposition he had remained silent; but he must say that the manner in which they had behaved in regard to the matter to-night passed all comprehension. The Attorney General, when the clause was proposed the other day, said that he could not accept it; but he now declared that he had been overwhelmed by the arguments which had been adduced.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

No; by the numbers.

DR. CAMERON

Well, if not by arguments, by numbers. The hon. and learned Member had not yielded to numbers to-night. He had changed his front, and had not even challenged a division. When a decision had been come to to-night which did away with the decision of the Committee the hon. and learned Gentleman told them, at the commencement of the debate, that he could not entertain the proposition. Then he told them that it would make no difference to the electorate. He (Dr. Cameron) trusted that the Prime Minister, for the sake of the consistency of the Liberal Party, would take an opposite view to that of his Colleagues; and that, if the clause went to a division, he would follow his own professions, and not vote for the imposition of a statutory disability on a class of citizens who would otherwise be entitled to vote.

MR. DAWSON

said, that the great measure of which this Bill was a part, being a Bill for enfranchisement, he did not see why they should now attempt to disfranchise anyone. It had been said of the students that their tenure of their rooms was precarious. Well, the service franchise was also precarious; the tenure of the coachman or the gardener was precarious, because he was liable to be dismissed at any time. It was admitted that young men at the Universities were a class who were perfectly capable of exercising all Constitutional privileges when they reached the age of 21 or 22 years. If these young men would ever be able to form a political opinion at all, they would be as capable then as at any other time. He believed the Prime Minister himself had commenced, not only his political career, but his career of statesmanship at a very early age. There was a reason why, though he could on general grounds, he could not on particular grounds, give his adhesion to the proposal before the House. Ireland was a Catholic nation, yet the Catholics had no residential University. Although there was a so-called Catholic University, it had no students who were required to reside in College. It was a mock University—merely an Examining Board without professors, teachers, halls, or studies. He did not think, therefore, that the people of an alien faith should have political power through University representation, whilst the great mass of the people were deprived, not only of University representation, but of a real University at all. That was the only reason why he was opposed to the granting of the franchise to this particular class in Trinity College. But if there were a similar class of Irish Catholic young men, it would be far from his wish to deprive one undergraduate, however different might be his political views from his own, from the exercise of the franchise when that undergraduate had attained the age of manhood and the maturity of his intellect.

Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 84; Noes 81: Majority 3.—(Div. List, No. 183.)

MR. JAMES STUART

said, there were certain clauses in the Cambridge Award Act of 1856 which repeated the Act of 1832 to a certain extent. He had, therefore, to move an addition to the clause which had been already adopted by the House.

Amendment proposed, To add at the end of the foregoing Amendment, the words "Provided also, That nothing in 'The Cambridge Award Act, 1856,' shall prevent any occupier of such chambers or premises from having a right to be registered as a Parliamentary voter."—(Mr. James Stuart.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

MR. RAIKES

said, the impression left on his mind by the statement of the hon. and learned Gentleman just now was that graduates, bachelors, or any other persons occupying rooms in Colleges, were neither owners, tenants, nor lodgers. If that were so, this Amendment would not give graduates the right to vote.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, that the premises were only occupied for 24 weeks in the year, with the exception of those occupied by the heads of Colleges. The Amendment proposed by his hon. Friend was for the purpose of meeting that difficulty. If the clause were not repealed, no Fellow or graduate, or other person entitled to vote, would be able to be rated to confer upon him the right of voting.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH

said, after the extraordinary decision which the House had just arrived at, he was disposed to the opinion that no member of the University ought to be allowed to vote for the town. This was a specimen of Professorial Liberalism. It was well known which way the majority of resident members and undergraduates were likely to vote; and the Liberal Professors had, therefore, deliberately set themselves to work to disqualify that class of voters. In saying this he was simply stating facts which must be well within the knowledge of any persons acquainted with Oxford and Cambridge; and there were the two Members for the town of Cambridge in their places who had voted for the last Amendment because they knew that the students would vote against them. These men were to be disqualified because they were students, although, they might be of full age and have the necessary qualifications; and the two hon. Members for the town of Cambridge knew very well what the effect of those votes would have been in relation to their seats. For himself, he thought it was a very questionable matter whether, looking to the great difference there was between the University franchise and the town franchise, any member of the University should have a vote for the town; but he must say that if they were to qualify any member of the University on account of residence in rooms, either in or out of College, as voters for the town, they ought to qualify them all, and that nothing could be more unfair than to qualify a special class and disqualify the rest. He should, for these reasons, certainly vote against this Amendment.

MR. HEALY

said, the effect of the last Amendment being, as he understood, to disqualify undergraduates in England, he wished to know whether the Government would apply the same principle to the case of the Irish undergraduates? ["Hear, hear!"] Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board would, reply to his inquiry.

SIR CHARLES W. DILKE

said, he did not think he should be in Order in entering into the question raised by the hon. and learned Member for Monaghan (Mr. Healy) with regard to the undergraduates in Ireland on this Bill. He had, however, expressed his view of the matter by cheering what the hon. Member had just now said—namely, that there was one law for England and another for Ireland.

MR. GIBSON

said, he did not want to re-open the discussion on the question of undergraduate voting; but he thought it right to speak before the hon. and learned Attorney General rose, in order to give an opportunity of a case being stated. He believed he had given the hon. and learned Gentleman an opportunity of stating to the House his opinion on the Amendment just disposed of, based on the principles of fair play; but the hon. and learned Gentleman had elected to give them an astonishing opinion on that Amendment, which had been followed by the Prime Minister's leaving the House rather than vote in support of it. He was at a loss to understand how the Attorney General was able to present as his opinion, to be adopted by the House, that the last Amendment was but declaratory of the law and unnecessary. He thought that the position of the House with reference to this Amendment was in the last degree unsatisfactory, and he thought it a very hard thing not to be able to use the strongest and harshest language in reference to what had occurred. Personally, he had a very strong feeling in reference thereto; and bearing in mind what had been pointed out by the right hon. Baronet the President of the Local Government Board as to the urgency for passing this Bill rapidly through the House, and taking that in connection with the sanction which the Government had given to the course taken to-night with reference this Amendment, he was bound to say that, in his opinion, it would lead necessarily to the re-examination and re-discussion of certain important matters.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir FARRER HERSCHELL)

said, they had hitherto managed to keep tolerably cool in the course of the discussion, and to avoid imputations of a kind which arose solely from Party considerations and had only a Party effect. Certainly he felt a little startled by the vehemence of the language which had been used by the two right hon. Gentlemen opposite and by the arguments which they had addressed to the House on this Amendment. It was surely a matter for fair consideration how far it was desirable that those members of the Universities who were still under pupilage should be introduced into the field of Party warfare while they were at the Universities for educational purposes. That was a question which he thought might well influence hon. Gentlemen in dealing with such a matter as this. But it seemed that right hon. Gentlemen opposite could not give any Member on the Ministerial side of the House credit for anything but Party motives in the course they were taking with regard to this question. Hon. Gentlemen opposite, he supposed, judging others by themselves, only dealt with the effect of the vote; their argument was that the vote was the result of Party motives. [Dissent.] He was using the argument of right hon. Gentlemen opposite, not his own. They said that inasmuch as the vote would have a particular Party result, it could only have been dictated by Party motives—that was what their argument came to. But against that argument he protested as not being sound or valid. He was inclined to say rather what right hon. Gentlemen opposite would perhaps say, on further consideration, that it would be a fair and legitimate subject for consideration whether those persons who were in a state of pupilage should have the right of being registered as voters. But right hon. Gentlemen opposite had put before the House that hon. Members on that side were voting in a particular way because their vote would, have a particular result; they said that hon. Members who supported the Amendment asked that those who were of full age and who would be entitled to vote should be deprived of their votes because those votes would be given against themselves. He submitted that there was no such motive. The question was whether it was desirable to bring those students who were at the Universities for the purposes of education within the arena of the politics of a University town and that was a totally different question from that of whether those to whom no such argument applied should be deprived of the franchise because, as right hon. Gentlemen opposite said, they would vote against the Conservative Party.

MR. BERESFORD HOPE

said, he desired to explain the vote he was about to give. He should unhesitatingly vote for the Amendment of the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. James Stuart). He looked on the question simply as an academic question; and, totally independent of any possible politics of any Profession, he should forget for the moment the proceedings of his hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General. It was simply a matter of fact whether undergratuates had a right to vote or not, and of policy whether it was desirable to confirm the claim. Undergraduates lived under very peculiar and exceptional circumstances. But the graduates of a University were in the position of any other gentlemen who lived in a town. They had, either within or without the Colleges, their houses, which should be put on the same footing; many of them were family men; they paid their rates and taxes; they mixed with the affairs of the town, and in many of their relations they were simply and absolutely citizens. He knew that was so in Cambridge, and no doubt it was the case at Oxford; and to deprive these graduates of their votes as a vendetta for what had taken place in the case of undergraduates—with great respect to his right hon. Friend—was as good a piece of nimble logic as he had ever heard. He trusted the House would simply look at the matter as a question of common sense and common justice, and would vote for the Amendment.

MR. W. FOWLER

said he protested with all the force he could use against the insinuations conveyed in the insulting speech of the right hon. Baronet the Member for East Gloucestershire (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach). He considered it rather hard that an insinuation of the kind which had been made should have been thrown out against him; and he thought that the right hon. Baronet would to-morrow, on calmer reflection, be sorry that he had made it. He pointed out that the object of this clause was merely to put Cambridge in the same position as Oxford. Under the Statute of 1856 the resident graduates even would not be able to have a vote. Its object was to put the matter on the same footing that it would have been upon if the peculiar Statute in question had not been passed. He could conceive of nothing more fair and reasonable than that; and he did not see why the Cambridge men should be in a position different from that occupied by the Oxford men.

MR. J. LOWTHER

said, he had a suggestion to make which might meet the views of hon. Gentlemen near him,—that was to say, of those who objected to this invidious and indefensible distinction between graduates and undergraduates in connection with a matter which had nothing to do with their academic status He thought the position of his hon. Friends would be best retained by moving the re-committal of the Bill. He thought right hon. Gentlemen opposite misapprehended the feeling of hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House if they were under the impression that they were going to allow any petty considerations, such as the convenience of Her Majesty's Government, or any view of cramming this measure through the House of Commons, to prevent their seeing justice done in this matter. He was afraid that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General had not had his brief given to him soon enough, because he said that the matter was to be decided on the question as to whether undergraduates as opposed to graduates should or should not have the vote. But that had nothing to do with the Amendment, which was a distinct proposition put forward by the hon. Member for Hackney for a Proviso being introduced into the Bill with regard to the Cambridge Award Act of 1856. If the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor ^General had the Act in his hands he would see that it dealt with an arrangement made between the University authorities on the one hand and the Municipal authorities on the other for the apportionment of local burdens in the town of Cambridge; it had nothing whatever to do with graduates or undergraduates; it was simply an arrangement with regard to College property being made subject to local taxation. The hon. and learned Gentleman had misapprehended the case entirely.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir FARRER HERSCHELL)

I beg pardon; that was just my argument.

MR. J. LOWTHER

said, the Solicitor General had stated that the Question before the House was that of undergraduates as opposed to the question of graduates, and had wholly ignored the fact that the disqualifying section of the Award Act applied equally to both. If the hon. and learned Gentleman would refer to the Bill he would see that such was the case; and he must say that the remarks of Gentlemen on those Benches were strongly called for in connection with the Government, who, he was compelled to say, had stultified themselves in every stage of these proceedings. He trusted that by some means, whether by re-commitment or other mode of procedure, they might yet get the opportunity of bringing this matter again before the House.

MR. H. S. NORTHCOTE

said, that up to the moment of the last division hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House were not aware that it was the intention of the Attorney General, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, to repudiate the engagement into which they had entered on an earlier stage of the Bill, when the hon. and learned Gentleman accepted the original Amendment of the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. J. Stuart), and consented to a clause being moved later on. He (MR. H. S. Northcote) was entirely unprepared at the time at which the question was again raised for what had taken place. He and his hon. Friends had no idea that the Government had come to this decision; and that being so, he did not think there was very much ground for surprise if some warmth of feeling had been manifested in the course of this discussion. He was, however, ready to acknowledge that the speeches of hon. Gentlemen who represented Cambridge had been more courteous in tone than that of the hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Thorold Rogers), who, he regretted to observe, was not in his place. The hon. Member in the course of his remarks had alluded to the undergraduate as a kind of gipsy, who left with no connection with the University except, perhaps, through his debts. In his opinion, the Professor had a much better claim to that title, because when he left the University he might be said to be without a place for the sole of his foot. He thought there was just ground for complaining of the political "Billingsgate" of the hon. Gen- tleman, and was glad that the right hon. Baronet the Member for East Gloucestershire had announced his intention of opposing this Amendment.

MR. HORACE DAVEY

said, he would not imitate the hon. Gentleman who had just sat clown, but wished to express his surprise at the somewhat spiteful manner in which the right hon. Baronet the Member for East Gloucestershire (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) had shown his feeling on the result of the last division. He (Mr. Horace Davey) had voted in that division, and should vote for the present Amendment. Again, he utterly repudiated the insinuations of the right hon. Baronet and those of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Gibson) that the Members who voted in the majority on the recent division were actuated by Party spirit. He had no conception as to whether the undergraduates would, on the whole, give a larger vote on one side than on the other; indeed, he was quite indifferent as to how they might vote; but he did care that undergraduates who went to the Universities for the purposes of education should not be mixed up in town politics. He had some interest in one undergraduate, at least, at Cambridge.

MR. SPEAKER

I would remind the hon. and learned Gentleman that he is travelling beyond the Question before the House.

MR. HORACE DAVEY

said, he would not follow the bad example that had been set by hon. Members opposite, but would conclude his observations by saying that, although he was not sure, he was under the impression that there was an Act similar to the Cambridge Award Act, relating to Oxford. Speaking from memory, he believed that there was the same clause in the Act as that which was the subject of the Amendment before the House, and, if so, it would have to be dealt with in the same way.

MR. J. G. TALBOT

said, he should vote for the Amendment of the hon. Member for Hackney. He wished, however, to say that he agreed with his right hon. Friends in thinking that Her Majesty's Government had behaved badly in this matter; and, though declining to be led by what had happened into violent language, he must add that the Liberal Party had behaved badly also. He was not going to follow their example, however, and behave badly to the graduate members of the University. He did not know what their politics were; but as the Amendment would remove a disqualification, he intended to vote for it.

MR. E. STANHOPE

said, he did not wish to say anything further with regard to the job that had been perpetrated.

MR. SPEAKER

I do not think that the observation of the hon. Gentleman is one which ought to be allowed to pass.

MR. E. STANHOPE

said, in that case he would at once withdraw it, and substitute "the attempt of the Liberal Party to manipulate the franchise for their own benefit." After what had passed he thought it was perfectly clear that they could not go on with the Bill to-day. The Government did not seem to know their own mind on this subject. After two hours' discussion the Attorney General had risen to support the last Amendment of the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. J. Stuart), and since this Amendment had been moved with regard to Cambridge, they had had a similar clause suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. Horace Davey) with regard to Oxford. It was evident that they could not proceed under the circumstances, and he, therefore, begged to move the adjournment of the debate.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. E. Stanhope.)

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, they had now discussed this University question for two days, and they had arrived at a decision about which there could be no possible controversy. The Government had always laid stress on the necessity of passing the Bill without delay, and no one knew the importance of that better than the hon. Member who had moved the adjournment of the debate. But they had now come to a deadlock, and unless the Bill were proceeded with at once, it would not be passed before Whitsuntide, and there was no Town Clerk or Overseer who would be able to perform the duty required of him by the Act. They would be imposing upon the Clerks of the Peace the duty of issuing their precepts at a time when they could not perform them. He asked, under the circumstances, that the hon. Gentleman would allow the debate to proceed.

SIR MICHAELHICKS BEACH

said, he was anxious to address a few words to the House, because he wished to say that if he had given the hon. Member for Cambridge (Mr. W. Fowler) any personal offence, he was sorry for it. He had felt warmly, and had spoken warmly, and although he still held his original opinion on this subject, he should be exceedingly sorry if he had hurt the feelings of the hon. Member. If the discussion on this Bill went on for another week, the responsibility rested with the Government for not adhering to their original proposals. He hoped his hon. Friend would persevere in his Motion for the adjournment of the debate.

SIR CHARLES W. DILKE

said, there would be no inconvenience to the Government personally if the discussion on this Bill was delayed. It was of no special interest to them if the Bill was not passed for a considerable time. It was no question for the Government at all. It would not specially inconvenience or distress the Government if the House did not pass the measure at all; but it would throw the whole electoral machinery of the country into confusion, and would undoubtedly have the effect of delaying the General Election, which was not desirable.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

said, he thought it was most unfortunate that the Government should have changed completely round in the last division, and had taken a course which was altogether opposed to the principles upon which the Bill was founded. He could not understand how this question of the educational position of a voter could be brought in to alter the qualification of the voter. He was bound to say that, after the change which had been made in the spirit of the Bill, he did think it would be desirable to postpone any further proceedings at present. He thought it would be their best plan, in order to get rid of the little heat which existed, and not unnaturally, as he thought, to take the remainder of the measure at a later Sitting.

MR. BULWER

said, he desired to make a personal appeal to be allowed to move the next Amendment which stood in his name on the Paper. He believed it was not opposed by the Attorney General, and if it were not agreed to tonight, it would occasion him great personal inconvenience.

MR. T. P. O'CONNOR

thought the Front Opposition Bench had been a little unkind to the Attorney General. With regard to the question of adjournment, he would point out that there were very few Amendments remaining on the Paper, and they were all very anxious to have these measures settled as soon as possible, so that the work of registration could be proceeded with at once. They on those Benches were very anxious that they should he passed as soon as possible, and should not be postponed in this way.

Question put, and negatived.

Original Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 89; Noes 24: Majority 65.—(Div. List, No. 184.)

MR. J. LOWTHER

I beg to give Notice that, on the Motion for the third reading of this Bill, I will move that the Bill be re-committed with a view of inviting the House to reconsider the decision to which it arrived on the previous Amendment.

MR. BULWER

said, he wished to move to add, in Clause 18, page 11, line 27, "and includes the Justices in General or Quarter Sessions assembled for the Isle of Ely." The object of this and consequential Amendments was to restore to the Isle of Ely its ancient jurisdiction.

Amendment proposed, In page 11, line 27, add "and includes the justices in General or Quarter Sessions assembled for the Isle of Ely."—(Mr. Bulwer.)

Question, "That those words be there added," put, and agreed to.

MR. H. J. TOLLEMACHE

said, he desired to move an Amendment to Schedule 2, of which he had given Notice. It was in page 14, line 12, after "list," to insert— As published in the report of any election court or election commissioners who have held an inquiry within the limits of the said constituency during the year one thousand eight hundred and eighty. The effect of the Amendment would be simply this. Under the Corrupt Practices Act of 1883 the Clerks of the Peace had to prepare and send to the overseers a list of all persons in every township in a county scheduled as guilty of corrupt practices. The Clerks of the Peace had to give descriptions of these persons; but they had no means of identifying them or of finding out what qualification they possessed. It was impossible, therefore, for the Clerks of the Peace to give proper descriptions of the scheduled persons. All he asked in his Amendment was that the Reports of the Election Commissioners should be sufficient for the purpose of identification, and that if the Clerks of the Peace should send round the schedules annexed to the Reports of the Commissioners, nothing more should be expected of them in this regard. In the case of a portion of the county of Chester two boroughs had been scheduled as having been guilty of corrupt practices. Something like 4,000 voters had been scheduled, and unless the Bill were amended as he proposed, the Clerks of the Peace would have to obtain particulars of the qualifications of these persons, which they had no means of doing.

Amendment proposed, In page 14, line 12, after the word "list," insert the words "as published in the report of any election court or election commissioners who have held an inquiry within the limits of the said constituency during the year one thousand eight hundred and eighty."—(Mr. Henry Tollemache.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, this was merely a question of the precept which would be issued—a matter of instruction, or form of telling the overseers what the law was, and the Amendment could not alter the law, or assist anyone in carrying it into effect. Whatever was the duty of the officials would not be affected by this precept. No doubt, it would be impossible to provide a special description of 4,000 persons. The description given would be that which would be found in the Report of the Election Court.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, he now begged to move to add the Amendment on the Paper, at the end of line 25, on page 34. The Amendment was an attempt to attain some solution of the difficult reform to which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Westminster (Mr. W. H. Smith) had called attention. He (the Attorney General) had felt there was great difficulty in the matter, and had endeavoured to give the county overseers some better instructions. The Form had now been divided under three heads—namely, "Instructions where Property consists of several Buildings; for instance, Cottages let by the Owner;" "Instructions in case of what is commonly called the Service Franchise;" and "Instructions in the case of a House let in separate Tenements." He hoped this would throw some light on this difficult subject.

Amendment proposed, In Schedule 2, page 34, line 25, at end, insert,— Note.—The description of the property in the first column should he a copy from the rate book, and should he filled in by the overseers, and if it is a house numbered in a street should specify the street and number. The following instructions should be annexed to the form, with such alterations, if any, as the overseers think necessary for adapting them to the circumstances of the parish or of the property to which the notice refers.

Instructions for filling up a Form.

Instructions where Property consists of several Buildings; for instance. Cottages let by the Owner.

In the second column insert "cottage in Lane," or otherwise describe its locality.

In the third column insert, opposite to the description of the cottage in the second column, the name of the man who now inhabits it, and has inhabited it since the fifteenth day of July last.

If it has not been so inhabited state so, or omit the dwelling house from the second column.

The head of the family alone is considered to be the occupier.

Instructions in case of what is commonly called the Service Franchise.

The dwelling house in the second column may be either—

1. (a.) A separate house—for example, a schoolmaster's house; or
2. (b.) A part of a dwelling house separately occupied as a dwelling—for example, a room or rooms over a stable, or caretaker's rooms in an office:

If it is a separate house, insert in second column, "house in road," or otherwise specify its locality.

If it is part of a dwelling house, insert in the second column "rooms over stable," "basement of office," "rooms over shop," or otherwise specify the locality of the room or rooms.

In the third column insert, opposite to the description of the dwelling house in the second column, the name of the man who now inhabits it, and has inhabited it since the fifteenth day day of July last.

If it has not been so inhabited state so, or omit the dwelling house from the second column.

In filling up the return it must be recollected that, under the Representation of the People Acts:—

1. (a.) In the case of a man who occupies by reason of any "office, service, or employment, if the same house is inhabited by any person under whom such man serves in his office, service, or employment, such man is not considered a separate inhabitant occupier; for example, a butler occupying rooms in his master's house is not such an occupier, although, if he occupied rooms over a detached building, such as a laundry, he might be such an occupier;
2. (b.) The head of the family alone is considered to be the occupier.

Instructions in the case of a Souse let in separate Tenements.

The dwelling house in the second column may be any room or rooms in the house which are separately occupied as a dwelling.

Insert in the second column the position of the room or rooms occupied; for example, "First floor, front room."

In the third column insert, opposite to the description of the room or rooms in the second column, the name of the man who now inhabits it, and has inhabited it since the fifteenth day of July last.

If it has not been so inhabited state so, or omit the room or rooms from the second column.

In filling up the return it must be recollected that, under the Representation of the People Acts:—

1. (a.) A man who occupies any room or rooms in a house separately must be entered, although he is entitled to the joint use of some other part of the house; for example, a man occupying separately the first floor front rooms, and having joint use of a wash-house, must be entered;
2. (b.) The head of the family alone is considered to be the occupier.

If the landlord of a house let out in separate tenements lives in the house, he must not return the names of the occupiers of tenements in that house.—(The Attorney General.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

Mr. r. H. PAGET

said, the Amendment set forth that the description of the property in the first column should be a copy from the rate book. Would it not be well, to prevent mistakes, to add the words "omitting the names of female occupiers?" There might be many female occupiers on the rate book—they would not be eligible to go on the Register, and yet, if an absolute copy of the rate book were made, they would get on it. The Amendment was a definite instruction to the overseer to take each name and put it down.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH

said, that from his experience of rate books in counties they were not kept with sufficient accuracy to make it possible for the overseers to fill up lists by merely taking copies of those books. Tie could name cases whore cottages were included in farms in the rate book, and where that would continue to be the practice, the cottages being occupied by persons who ought to be put on the list of voters. A stable, if occupied by a servant, might qualify for a vote, but it would not be mentioned in the rate book.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, it would be the person rated, and not necessarily the occupier, who would have the vote; the overseer would know that a female could not have it. As to what had been said by the right hon. Baronet the Member for East Gloucestershire (Sir Michael HicksBeach), what had been done in respect of the service franchise would give sufficient information.

MR. HARRINGTON

desired the hon. and learned Attorney General to consider the case of a house let in separate tenements. It seemed to him that the last part of the Amendment was by no means consistent with the meaning and purport of the Representation of the People Act. The Amendment said— If the landlord of a house let out in separate tenements lives in the house, he must not return the names of the occupiers of tenements in that house. He did not see anything whatever in the words of the Act which could disqualify the person who occupied a portion of a tenement house as an inhabitant occupier. Some confusion had been introduced into this matter a moment ago with reference to the lodger franchise. The agent was to be presumed, in all such cases as those mentioned, to be the owner; and if they introduced an instruction of this kind, and sent it broadcast through the country, the result would be that for the purpose of filling in the names the agent or manager in a tenement house would be considered as the owner of the house, and therefore a large number of people who would otherwise be entitled to the lodger franchise would be disqualified. The custom in many cases of tenement houses was to allow one man to collect the rents from all the other tenants in the house on behalf of the landlord, he himself residing in the house as one of the tenants. It would be easy to contend before the Revising Barrister that the agent was to be regarded as owner, and that his occupation of a portion of the house should be a disqualification to all the other persons who occupied portions, and would entail upon them the necessity of annually claiming to vote as lodgers. He (Mr. Harrington) contended that the last few lines of the instruction were inconsistent with the Representation of the People Act, and that, if passed, instead of forwarding and facilitating matters, the Amendment would lead to a great deal of contention before the Revising Barrister. With regard to the description of property in the first column, which the Amendment said should be copied from the rate book, the forms should be properly filled in by the overseers before service. He drew attention to this because he had seen hosts of requisition forms sent back to the people to be properly filled in. The overseers who would have to perform this duty were not always the best qualified men, and the authorities should be prepared for their making a great many errors. He would, furthermore, suggest to the hon. and learned Gentleman the desirability of introducing some such words as would make it clear that the requisition form was to apply to one rating only. He (Mr. Harrington) did not wish to detract from the excellent instructions contained in this Amendment. He regarded them, as of the utmost importance, and considered it necessary, in order to carry out the object of the Bill, to introduce them. He was of opinion, however, that if the hon. and learned Gentleman would consider the points he had mentioned, he might be able beneficially to amend the instructions to the people at large. Some overseers conceived that they discharged their duty, where the landlords' names appeared in the rate book in connection with some 10 or 20 ratings, by putting the rate numbers at the head of the requisition forms. The result of this operation would be that the one form would not contain all the information that it would be necessary to have in it if any of the houses wore tenement houses. The result would also be that the rate clerks would, in the case of such holdings, specify the ownership in general terms by saying that in the case of such and such a lane the landlord occupied the whole of it, and it would be impossible, from the requisition form, to distinguish between the different persons residing in the premises.

Question put, and agreed to.

MR. TOMLINSON

said, he desired to add, in page 37, after line 37, the following words:— Declaration of Correctness of Claim. I am acquainted with A.B. of I have read his claim, and believe it to be correct. My means of knowledge are derived from my being [Landlord, Brother, &c.] of the claimant. E.F. [State residence and calling of deponent] Witness, G.H. [State residence and calling of witness]. He had brought this Amendment forward in Committee, and he should not have submitted it again if it had not been very generally pressed upon him in the meantime. Representations had been made to him to the effect that the present form gave rise to serious mistakes. The witness to the filling in of the form should not be the person who testified to the validity of the lodger's claim. When the lodger was absent from home it was impossible to find anyone to fill up the form properly, and a man might fill it up without being able to testify for both purposes. The object of putting in the words "My means of knowledge are derived from my being," &c, was to call the attention of the deponent to what he was really doing. He (Mr. Tomlinson) thought that if this Amendment, or one like it, were inserted, it would tend to prevent mistakes.

Amendment proposed, in page 37, line 32, to leave out all the words after the word "claimant," to end of line 33.—(Mr. Tomlinson.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)

said, that in this matter they were not making new law, but were simply adhering to the form of 1878, which was a most useful one.

MR. E. STANHOPE

said, that he himself had had heard complaints on this subject since the question had been brought forward in Committee.

MR. H. G. ALLEN

said, he thought the Amendment, if adopted, would be found very useful, as, under existing circumstances, the law might be greatly abused. Unless there was some provision requiring one person certifying to correctness of claim to state his means of knowledge, a person might certify without hesitation, and, subsequently, when cross-examined upon the subject, he might reply—"Oh! well, I stated what I believed to be correct—I do not know that what I said is not correct; but I really do not know much about it."

MR. WARTON

said, that, practically, the two Amendments relating to this matter constituted one only, and therefore he apprehended that the few remarks he had to make would not be out of Order if he applied them to both. He was strongly of opinion that there ought to be a clear statement with regard to the witnesses to these forms, because he had a distinct recollection that it was brought out in evidence before the Commissioners that in several places the Liberal election agent himself had signed as witness. He need not say that that was a very great abuse, and that every precaution ought to be taken in the case of persons put on the Register on account of a form of the franchise which was peculiarly liable to fraud. In his opinion, no one ought to be put on the Register under this qualification unless there was some person who was prepared to state in plain words in what his knowledge of the individual claiming to be registered consisted.

Question put, and agreed to.

On the Motion of Mr. Attorney General, the following Amendments made:—Schedule 2, page 39, line 2, after "should," by inserting "if there is more than one list;" page 41, line 27, at end, by inserting— Note.—In the case of a declaration by a person on the old lodgers list this form must be adapted so as to suit that list.

Schedule 3, page 47, line 30, in margin, by inserting "In a parish in the city of London substitute twenty-five for seven miles."

Amendment proposed, In page 49, line 12, leave out "vote," and insert "be registered as a voter."—(Mr. Attorney General.)

Question proposed, "That the word 'vote' stand part of the Schedule."

MR. WARTON

said, he should be glad to hear from the hon. and learned Gentleman the meaning of the words— A person entitled to vote in respect of any right reserved by sections thirty-one and thirty-three of the Reform Act of 1832? What was the reserved right? There was no definition.

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, the definition would be found in the Act of 1876, which said that the term "dwelling house" was to include a separate portion of a dwelling house. There was no express definition.

MR. TOMLINSON

said, that when the Bill was in Committee there had been some discussion on the Definition Clause, and it had been proposed to include all the definitions that were required in the Redistribution of Seats Bill and to adopt them by references in this Bill. As nothing, however, had been heard of the matter since that time, he supposed it had escaped notice.

Question put, and negatived; words inserted.

On the Motion of Mr. Attorney General, the following Amendments made:—Schedule 3, page 70, line 4, leave out "name and situation," and insert "description;" Schedule page 73. line 16, at end of line, insert— Note.—This form must he adapted to suit the various lists.

The ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir Henry James)

said, all the Amendments on the Paper having been disposed of, he should be glad to have the permission of the House to read the Bill a third time. But having regard to the Notice of Motion given by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for North Lincolnshire (Mr. J. Lowther) for the recommittal of the Bill, he scarcely liked to do so in the absence of the right hon. Gentleman unless he had the assent of the hon. Member for Mid Lincolnshire (Mr. E. Stanhope).

MR. E. STANHOPE

said, he was quite ready to give the hon. and learned Gentleman his assent. So far as his right hon. Friend was concerned, he did not think he would be disposed to oppose the taking of the third reading to-night, and he should therefore offer no opposition.

Motion made and Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time,"—(Mr. Attorney General,)—put, and agreed to.

Bill read the third time, and passed.