HC Deb 15 March 1886 vol 303 cc821-2
MR. CLANCY (Dublin Co., N.)

asked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether, his attention has been called to the following statement, in the Second Report of the Petitions Committee, in reference to certain Petitions from Ireland against Repeal of the Union, viz.— Your Committee have, in the case of the Petitions from the South Division of Donegal, presented on the 26th February by Mr. Macartney, reported to the House the number of names appended thereto; but they are of opinion that many of the names are in the same handwriting; and, whether he will consider the propriety of taking steps to make the practice of affixing fictitious signatures to Petitions to Parliament a punishable offence?

THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. E. GLADSTONE) (Edinburgh, Mid Lothian)

, in reply, said, his hon. Friend the Member for Walsall (Sir Charles Forster) would give a more authoritative answer than he could. Undoubtedly his opinion was that although there might be, and probably would occur from time to time, abuses which he regretted from the unscrupulous use and employment of the power of petitioning, yet so far as the House was concerned the securities taken on the whole were quite sufficient. The constant and vigilant attention of the Committee on Petitions under the superintendence of his hon. Friend, he believed, caused the system, as a whole, to work satisfactorily, subject to the exceptional cases.

SIR CHARLES FORSTER

said, the Committee on Petitions found in two Petitions a number of signatures in the same handwriting. In Petition No. 243 it appeared that 12 persons signed a large number of names, and in Petition No. 244 seven persons appeared to have signed for 336. The Petitions were formal in other respects, and all the Committee could do was to notice the circumstances in the extract given in the Question. He would remind the House that it possessed powers for the punishment of this offence. Twenty years ago two persons were committed to Newgate for a term of imprisonment for having forged signatures to Parliamentary Petitions.