SECOND READING.

HC Deb 18 March 1891 vol 351 cc1290-346

Order for Second Reading read.

*(12.35.) MR. W. BOWEN ROWLANDS (Cardiganshire)

I rise, Sir, to move that this Bill, which is to enable the owners and occupiers of Wales to have effectual control over the liquor traffic, be now read a second time. No one I suppose will care to deny that excessive indulgence in strong drink is an evil of gigantic proportions. The testimony of those best qualified to judge is unanimous. Medical men, men of the world, statesmen, philanthropists, Judges, and ministers of religion, are here agreed. The vice of intemperance stains our fair fame as a nation. It thwarts our remedial measures at home and brings discredit upon our best efforts abroad. Only a week or two ago Mr. Justice Hawkins, in some observations he made at the Reading Assizes, asserted that 80 out of every 100 prisoners brought up for trial assigned their fall to drink. It was stated in this House in April last, by the noble Lord the Member for Paddington, that it is difficult to over-estimate the evils which arise from the consumption of alcoholic drinks; and one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of Georgia in charging the grand jury, said that he found three-fourths of the violations of the law occurred in those parts of the country where whisky could be freely obtained, while there were very few in those districts where the sale of drink was restricted. No apology can, therefore, be necessary to the House or to the country for introducing any measure which makes an honest attempt to grapple with so great an evil. There have been in the past and may yet be in time to come valuable efforts made to stem the tide of misery which is caused by drink. In the Debate on the licensing question in this House last year the President of the Local Government Board told us that, in his opinion, the desire to see drunkenness reduced may be greatly assisted by legislation. This is a most valuable pronouncement from a responsible statesman. It is often said that legislative attempts to make men better are futile or worse than futile, because they are really a waste of time, and do not succeed in securing the result their promoters have at heart. It is considered a sort of axiom that you cannot make men sober by Act of Parliament; but, personally, I should like to see further efforts made in that direction before we proclaim, in advance, their failure in mournfully-prophetic tones. The fact that we cannot make men personally clean or personally pure by legislation was not allowed to stand in the way of sanitary or social reform, and by analogy the Legislature is qualified to effect the purpose which the promoters of temperance have in view. The noble Lord the Member for Paddington (Lord R. Churchill) while acknowledging the difficulties of the case pointed out the possibility of giving people, by legislative enactment, the power of making themselves sober. In that view I express my entire concurrence. It cannot, I think, be denied that one great cause of drunkenness is the number of temptations by which persons are assailed. Public houses are being constantly increased in number, or their capacity enlarged. The President of the Local Government Board admitted categorically last year to the hon. Baronet the Member for Cockermouth (Sir W. Lawson) that the existence of an excessive number of public houses tends to promote drunkenness. "Unquestionably," he said, "we say that the excessive number of public houses promotes drunkenness." A Report in the hands of Members of this House, dealing with the temperance measures which have been adopted in Sweden, and especially a pamphlet issued by Herr Rubenstein, the chief of the Stockholm Police, tells us most emphatically that the amount of drunkenness which exists in a town depends, to a great degree, upon the number of public houses. In 1849 Lord Harrowby, presiding over a Committee empowered to consider the question, stated that the multiplication of public houses for the consumption of intoxicating liquors was an exceptional evil of the first magnitude, and he went on to connect this increase with the increase of crime as cause and effect. In 1872 the then Home Secretary—Mr. Bruce, now Lord Aberdare—expressed a strong opinion that far more licenses existed than were required, and he attributed much of the mischief caused by drunkenness to the existing facilities for the purchase of intoxicating liquor. The right hon. Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Chamberlain) has more than once used language to the same effect; and the noble Lord the Member for Paddington says that Parliament and the State, by allowing such a condition of things to exist, force upon the people the consumption of alcoholic liquor, which "without such pressure would not be consumed." And he adds— The fatal facility of recourse to the public house makes it extremely difficult for multitudes of persons, in view of the hardship of their lives, to resist or avoid intemperance. I do not know that a graver indictment could be preferred against the Legislature of any nation. If a tithe of this be true there can be no doubt that Parliament and the State have aided and assisted the growth of this vice; and what I now ask is that Parliament should remove the reproach which has been urged against it not by direct and immediate legislation, but by giving the people themselves the means of checking the evil and protecting themselves if they are so disposed. That the number of public houses should have the effect attributed to them is only in conformity with the general laws of temptation. "The sight of means to do ill deeds does oft make ill deeds done." There can be no doubt that the gaudy splendours of the gin palace present to the poor and struggling visions of inconceivable and dazzling beauty which wean them from the duties they should do, from the scenes they should frequent, and from the society they should love. They take from them the very means by which they might provide for themselves and for their families by offering temptations almost irresistible to persons circumstanced as they are. There is no question of political partisanship at stake, but my proposal is one which must commend itself to all who take an interest in the welfare of the people and desire to alleviate the ills under which human nature is suffering. Various efforts have been made to cope with the difficulty by the reform of the licensing system and by other means; various Committees have sat and reported, but people seem to have come to the same conclusion in regard to the licensing laws that Cromwell did in regard to the laws of England—that they are an ungodly and tortuous jumble, susceptible of nothing but very drastic alteration instead of piecemeal or gradual reform. The present Bill provides that under certain circumstances the inhabitants shall have the power of escaping from this evil by their own motion. Mr. Bruce's Bill of 1872 was another attempt. The noble Lord the Member for Paddington spoke of this, and said that the licensing system then was no system at all. The whole trade united against it. It did not arouse sufficient enthusiasm in temperance circles to command warm support, and so it was withdrawn. Our proposed legislation need not prevent the consideration of such reform. If by it the traffic can be so reduced as to be rendered harmless there is no reason to dread our methods. But if, after every experiment, it still remains a curse, we give the people a means of escape. Where our proposals are not enforced there must be licensing management, and the better this is the better for the country. Light wines have been brought into consumption with a view of mitigating the evil, but this merely added another class of intoxicants, and failed to produce any salutary effect. Grocers' licences were introduced with the most benevolent intentions, and it was hoped that the system would work well. The practical result, however, has been, that it has led to secret drinking and to evasions and shifts, especially on the part of women. Indeed, it has become such an evil that I should be glad to see these licences done away with altogether. An approach to Free Trade was attempted. This also failed. The system of high licences was advocated by some, and was favoured by the trade as a welcome alternative; but that would enable rich brewers to buy up licences—they could afford to pay the price. Houses would be enlarged if the number was lessened, and so there would be a sensible diminution of the temptation. The next measure was the most extraordinary and hopeless of all; the restraint of adulteration. No less distinguished a man than Erasmus complained of it in his day, and tells us that "the water which they mix with it is the least part of the mischief." It is, of course, wrong to sell an article which is not what the seller represents it to be; but as far as evil to the consumer is concerned, it would be hard to put in it anything worse than the alcohol itself. But all these schemes have failed. In our view it is the drink which does the harm, and more or less accidental regulations of the traffic in regard to adulteration, and other circumstances, lessen the evil to so inconsiderable an extent as to render it desirable that some other measure should be resorted to. The principle of the Bill of which I move the Second Reading to-day is no new one. It was affirmed by a majority of 26 in this House in 1880; by 43 in 1881 and by 87 in 1883, when the hon. Baronet the Member for Cockermouth moved a Resolution placing the control of the liquor traffic in the hands of the inhabitants themselves. On that occasion the hon. Baronet had a majority of Welsh votes of 10 to 1 in favour of his Resolution. As a matter of fact, only two Welsh Members voted against it, and I should be very much surprised to find a single Welsh vote against this Bill to-day. Upon that occasion the hon. Baronet the Member for Devon (Sir J. Kennaway) proposed as an Amendment that instead of placing the licensing question in the hands of a body elected by the popular vote, provision should be made for extending the powers of the Licensing Magistrates, and that proposal was rejected after full consideration and a long and earnest Debate. Even as late as last year leave to bring in a Licensing Law Amendment Bill was given to the noble Lord the Member for Paddington, and the noble Lord included in his Bill a provision that in certain circumstances a majority of the inhabitants should have control over the licensing of public houses within their districts. Therefore, the noble Lord affirmed the principle of the present Bill, and I have full authority for the assertion that on both sides of the House the principle is regarded as the proper and legitimate method of dealing with the evil. Unhappily, the evil is not decreasing. The Lancet of the 19th of February last has this statement— It is appalling to find that the drink bill of 1890 amounts to £139,495,470—an increase, all medical science and common sense notwithstanding. It is not our business to moralise on this expenditure. To us it means so much cirrhosis, Bright's disease, gout, rheumatism, insanity, &c, disabling employment, taking the pleasure out of the life of families, and bread out of the mouths of children. If the paper called Breweries and Distilleries is right, material prosperity fails to diminish the evil. This paper, on the 14th of February, informs us that much as people may shake their heads, one proof of the returning prosperity of the working classes is to be found in the fact that there is a general rush to the gin bottle. Let us then give the working classes an opportunity of stemming this rush, and give the majority of the people who desire to live under conditions, which in their belief will conduce to the preservation of good order and morality an opportunity of carrying their wishes, into effect without being restrained by the will of a small minority. Not only did the noble Lord the Member for Paddington assert the principle of this Bill, but he defended it by argument. He said— On the face of it, it is not unfair that when you find a large and preponderating majority in a restricted area, who desire to live under conditions which in their belief conduce to order and morality, it is hard on such a majority that a comparatively small minority should be able to prevent their having their way; and what makes it especially hard in this case is that the power is a power which under the law of the land is actually enjoyed by the owners of property. He added that he did not consider the direct veto essential to a reform; but as the Temperance Body attach much importance to it, they, from their long labours in the cause, had a right to Some concession in this matter at least as a subject of experiment. He pleads for some measure of compensation under certain circumstances. But on this question of compensation the country has already spoken out in trumpet tones. We desire to give the bulk of the people the power which landlords now have and exercise with the approval of all good men. I will quote one instance from the Alliance News of 22nd August, 1890, where I find the following passage:— The Prince of Wales has again been solicited to allow the erection of a public house on his estate, and he has again refused. On this point I may also cite an opinion given by a man of vast property in this country—the Duke of Westminster—who in February of this year, at a meeting reported in the Times newspaper of February 10, 1891, of the local branch of the Church of England Temperance Society, said he believed that ground landlords had a good deal in their power to help the cause of temperance in an indirect way. As an illustration, he mentioned that in cases where leases had fallen in he had been able to abolish 37 out of 48 licensed houses. Then he goes on to hope that Sunday closing will soon be the law in England. The paper called Breweries and Distilleries comments upon our proposed legislation, and says that the real object of the writer—alluding to some paragraph in a paper—was to confer on this unhappy country of ours a new form of local self-government under the name of direct popular veto, to be presented to the House of Commons on the 18th instant. Then it goes on to argue that the use and enjoyment of alcoholic liquor is just as much necessary, as a staple article of diet, as bread, or beef; and that not even a fanatic would dream of prohibiting the latter. Sir, the common sense of mankind refutes entirely such an argument, and declines to entertain the view, that because the majority of the population veto public houses in a particular locality, therefore they should have the power to veto butcher's and baker's shops. It is idle to put to us such absurdities. I have never heard that evils flow from the consumption of bread and butter, save perhaps where it had been too dear. I have never known in the whole of my experience that crime could be attributed from eating a quantity of roast beef. In no police court of this country has a man ever been brought up for kicking his wife, and the plea being put in, that he had been led to the commission of the assault from having eaten too much bread and butter. This publication goes on to say that those who vote for this measure will be marked men—I hope that a great many of us will be marked men—and that at the next election that the trade will vote solidly—may it be said liquidly—against this proposal, or at any rate will withhold their countenance and support from those who are in favour of it. The sooner, they say, it is understood that who are not on our side are avowed enemies, the better it will be for all parties. I agree that if we have the matter fought out on that issue, there will not be longer any doubt either as to the vote which will be given in this House, or in the country. This Bill desires only to deal with these special circumstances affecting one portion of the Kingdom. The Bill refers to Wales alone, and if it be fitting, as the noble Lord the Member for Paddington put it, that an experiment should be tried, no place could prove so satisfactory for that purpose as Wales, where the great majority of the inhabitants ardently desire that such an experiment should be made. The interest which that part of the country takes in the temperance question is abundantly clear. There are a few figures with which I may, perhaps, trouble the House. On each ratepayer in various counties of Wales a paper was left, asking him whether he would give the ratepayers the power of deciding, by direct veto, the number of licences to be granted within his district; or, secondly, whether he was in favour of the prohibition of all licences for the sale of intoxicating liquors to the inhabitants. In the County of Anglesea there were 89 per cent. for the first question and 3 per cent. against, while there were 75 per cent. on the other side. In the County of Carnarvon there were nearly 10,000 "Yes," and 500 "No," and 400 "Neutral." Of the total of 10,000 householders 90.7 per cent. were in favour of the first question and 5 per cent. against, while 4.1 per cent. were neutral. In Merionethshire, 6,674 "Yes," 223 "No," 310 "Neutral." Of the total of 8,000 in this county, which is the only one which was anything like exhaustively canvassed, there were 926 per cent. who said "Yes," 3 per cent. "No," and 4.3 per cent. "Neutral." In Derby the total was nearly 5,000, and 84 per cent. said "Yes" and 9 per cent "No," while 5 were "Neutral." In Flintshire the same proportions practically were maintained. The same results follow, with slightly lessened numbers, with regard to total prohibition, but in Merioneth the figures are 83 per cent. "Yes," 9.7 per cent. "No," and 6.6 per cent. "Neutral." These figures are accessible to any opponents of ours who desire to verify them. We know from experience that if it were possible to bring to bear upon the people a counter influence, that influence would have been exercised; no one dared to attempt a canvass in the opposite sense; and we are entitled to assume, therefore, that these figures show that the vast majority of the inhabitants of Wales desire earnestly that this Bill should pass into law, and should become operative throughout the Principality. In bringing this Bill before the House, I, and those associated with me, have no object in view except to make an honest attempt to deal with what is confessed by all to be an evil. We desire to achieve no Party success in any shape or form; we cordially welcome the assistance of hon. Members on the other side of the House, as well as that of those who sit on this side; and no Party motive, direct or indirect, can be attributed to us in promoting a measure which will have a beneficial effect upon the people of Wales. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby said, in one of the Debates of this House, that the great majority of the Liberal Party were pledged to vesting the control of the liquor traffic in the public. I appeal, then, to them to vindicate their utterances. I appeal, on behalf of my county, that this experiment be tried within her borders. I appeal to the Liberal Unionists, who cannot very well refuse to listen to the voice of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, whom I have quoted already. I appeal also to that Party which numbers many doughty champions of temperance in its ranks, and which has among its chief ornaments the noble Lord the Member for Paddington. I desire to make my appeal to both sides of the House and to Members of every shade of political profession; to every man who loves his country or his fellow-men; who desires that Great Britain should wipe away the stain of intemperance from her escutcheon, should rid herself of this stain which paralyses her energies and confounds her wisdom, to all who long that homes should be happy and that hearts should be glad, who wish to promote the welfare of their fellows, and who desire that righteousness shall exalt our nation both at home and abroad, to support the Second Reading of this Bill, and, Sir, I believe that this appeal will not have been made in vain.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. W. Bowen Rowlands.)

*(1.20.) THE MARQUESS OF CARMARTHEN (Lambeth, Brixton)

In rising to move the Amendment which stands in my name, that this Bill be read a second time upon this day six months, I claim that indulgence which the House is always ready to accord to every Member who addresses it for the first time. I daresay I shall be told that I am one of the advocates and apologists for intemperance. I care very little for imputations which I know to be unfounded, and I am just as much opposed to intemperance as the Permissive Bill gentlemen themslves. These are not my own words, Mr. Speaker, but the words of a very great authority on the licensing question—a member, I believe, of the United Kingdom Alliance, namely, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby. I have quoted them in order to carry the conviction to hon. Members opposite, as any words coming from such a source must necessarily do, that I am not the advocate and apologist for intemperance. The hon. Member who introduced this Bill has told us that this is in no way a Party question. I wish I could agree with him in thinking so; but my own personal experience has taught me that it is in some measure, at least, made use of as a Party question. I think it is a great pity that this should be the case, and that it would be much better if we could all agree to sink our Party differences and unite in doing what we can to diminish the evils attendant on drunkenness. But as I have said this is a question which is frequently made one of Party, and I will give the House an illustration of the way in which it is done. When I first had the honour to stand for the seat I now occupy; in fact, on the day after I had been chosen as a candidate, and before my views on the question of local option had been made known, a Liberal placard was issued to the constituency, headed "Great Temperance Demonstration," followed up by references to the Liberal candidate, and finishing with words to this effect— Temperance men of Brixton, come in your thousands to protest against this attempt to foist a young Tory lordling gin-distiller on the constituency. Within 18 months of that date a by-election arose in the adjoining constituency, and the Temperance Body were called upon to listen to an address from that high priest of temperance, the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir W. Lawson), who was to aid the Liberal Party in doing their best to foist on a neighbouring constituency the hon. Member for Kennington, who I think I am correct in saying, is at least ten times more intimately connected with the liquor traffic than I have ever been, against a teetotaler of 20 years' standing. And here I wish it to be understood that I have not a word to say against that hon. Gentleman on account of his connection with that traffic, because I know that his business is always honourably conducted; but, at the same time, I do think it a little hard upon me that a protest of the kind I have quoted should have come from the opposite side of the House, and that then our opponents should tell us that this is not a Party question. The chief part of the speech of the hon. Member who has introduced this Bill has been devoted to decrying the evils of drunkenness in this country. I am quite sure that with that portion of the hon. Member's address all Parties in this House will cordially agree. But it struck me that the hon. Member contrived to skate very lightly over the more stringent provisions of his Bill; and here I will ask the House to consider what it is that this Bill proposes to do. In the first place, it provides that if a majority consisting of two-thirds of those who vote upon the question so wish it, it shall be in their power absolutely and completely to shut up every public house in their district, thus taking it out of the power of every man who is not fortunate enough to have a cellar of his own to obtain any alcoholic liquor whatsoever, however much he may need it. This is bad enough; but the second provision is even more stringent, because under it, should this Bill be passed, a bare majority of the voters will be enabled to reduce the number of public houses to such an extent that, as far as I can see, there is nothing in the measure to prevent this bare majority from reducing whatever number of licensed houses may exist to one only for the entire locality. All I can say is, that if such a course were adopted in any district with which I might be connected I should very much like to be the owner of that one public house. With regard to the third provision, I think there is less objection to that than to those I have already referred to. It provides that in the event of a majority so deciding no fresh licences shall be issued for a specified district. There may, however, be cases, especially in growing towns and neighbourhoods, where this may prove a great hardship; but, on the whole, I think it is a fair and just provision. I may, perhaps, be allowed to remind hon. Members opposite that but for their opposition to the proposal this would have been the actual law of the land at the present moment. There is one other anomaly in this Bill to which I desire to call the attention of the House, and I should like to hear any hon. Member explain how it can be reconciled with the justice of the case? Hon. Members will observe, if they look at Clause 13 of Section 1 of this Bill, that it is thereby provided that, if the total prohibition of the sale of intoxicating liquor be carried, there shall be no appeal against that decision for a period of five years; but if, on the other hand, the prohibitory resolution is contemptuously rejected, and a victory is gained by the opponents of the Bill, one-tenth portion of the number of electors may put the whole district to the expense of a contest, not at the end of five years, but at the expiration of only two years. This seems to me a most unjust and, at the same time, an absolutely indefensible proposition. So much, Sir, for the Bill itself. Perhaps I may now be allowed to say a few words as to the general principles involved in this measure. There can be no doubt that those who support the introduction of this Bill are actuated by the best possible motives, and by a belief that it will tend to diminish drunkenness. I can only say that I heartily wish I could agree with them, and that, if I thought as they do, that the passing of a Bill limiting the number of public houses would result in a decrease of intemperance, although I could not support a measure containing such tremendously stringent provisions as this, I would go a long way towards it. I think that although this meddling with the rights of the public is open to grave objection, still, if the result is likely to be an increase of temperance and a diminution of drunkenness, the end would justify the means, even though it involves a restriction of the number of public houses and the abolition of those which might be proved to be unnecessary, provided no injustice were committed. But I ask, do the figures and the information we have obtained prove that the restrictive legislation already adopted has produced beneficial results of this character? It is true that we have not yet had entire prohibition in this country; but we have had restrictive legislation, if not in England, at least in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. I ask whether anyone who has carefully considered the matter would say that prohibition has proved a success in the countries in which it has been tried? All the evidence we have as yet had before us tends to show that prohibition has been a failure both under the Scott Act in Canada and in the United States, where drunkenness has enormously increased rather than diminished. But what is still more serious is that the effect of these prohibition laws in America has been to divert the liquor traffic from properly-regulated channels, and to encourage illicit drinking and illegal sale in houses where liquor is sold without any control whatever. In those places where the liquor traffic is under the least control, the prohibitive law has enormously added to the number of shebeens and illicit drinking houses. This being the case in America, what, Mr. Speaker, has been the result of restrictive legislation in those parts of the United Kingdom in which it has hitherto been tried? The hon. Member who introduced the Bill has spoken of a plébiscite which has been taken in Wales, and has said that the opinion of the majority of the Welsh people is thus shown to be in favour of his measure; but the House will have noticed that the hon. Member carefully abstained from furnishing figures as to whether drunkenness has increased or diminished in consequence of the Sunday prohibitive law in the Principality.

*MR. W. BOWEN ROWLANDS

I did not deal with Sunday closing in Wales further than to say that the Duke of Westminster was satisfied with the results, and that he hoped a similar law would soon prevail in England.

*THE MARQUESS OF CARMARTHEN

No doubt the Duke of Westminster may be satisfied with the existing law, but I understood the hon. Member to give us the figures to show that Sunday closing has been instrumental in decreasing drunkenness in Wales.

*MR. W. BOWEN ROWLANDS

The Royal Commission reported in its favour.

*THE MARQUESS OF CARMARTHEN

I hold in my hand the Report of the Commission appointed to inquire into the operation of the Sunday Closing Act in Wales, and I hope the House will allow me to quote a few figures which are there given by the Commissioners. I should state that the Commissioners sent out circulars to the Chief Constables of the 16 police divisions of Wales with a view to gather statistics in reference to drunkenness in, Wales during the five years preceding the Act and five years subsequent to it. The Commissioners say— We thought it right, however, to procure for ourselves, upon a basis carefully prepared, with reference to our inquiry, and so as to be as fair and as free from error as possible such statistics as were available. In doing so we resolved to take the 24 hours from 6 on Sunday morning as the fairest definition of Sunday for our purpose. We did so because it is obvious that cases which occurred earlier than that hour in the morning ought to be attributed rather to the dissipations of Saturday night than to anything which, in the proper sense of the word, could be termed Sunday drunkenness. The Commissioners then give a tabulated comparison of the number of convictions obtained for offences involving drunkenness on Sundays in each of the five years mentioned, namely, from 1877 to 1881 inclusive, and from 1884 to 1888 inclusive. They also give a Return from four police districts as to which no comparison is possible, but such figures as they do give show that drunkenness in those counties has rather increased than diminished. I will quote the averages given of the results in the 12 counties from which full Returns were obtained for the two periods of five years. They are as follows: In Anglesey, before 1882, there were 13 convictions, and afterwards 7, or a slight decrease; Carnarvonshire, 75 in the first period and 57 in the second, also showing a decrease; Flintshire, 30 in the first period and 33 after, or a slight increase; Montgomeryshire, 17 in the first period and 12 in the second, a slight decrease; Brecknockshire, 32 in the first period and 9 in the second; Radnorshire, 13 in the first period and 3 in the second; Cardiganshire, 7 in the first period and 5 in the second; Glamorganshire, 379 in the first period and 643 in the second, or a large increase; Pembrokeshire, 11 in the-first period and 17 in the second; Carmarthenshire, 9 in the first period and 11 in the second; Cardiff, 32 in the first period and 90 in the second; and, in Neath, 8 in the first period and 18 in the second. These figures show that the cases of Sunday drunkenness, after the passing of the Act, were almost half as numerous again as the cases before the passing of the Act. If Glamorgan is excluded from the calculation, as it is contended it ought to be owing to its proximity to England, though I cannot quite see the reason, the average number of cases of drunkenness before the Act is 22 to 25 after. I defy supporters of the Bill to contradict these figures, which show conclusively that the passing of the Act has not done much to decrease drunkenness on Sunday. There has been an inquiry before a Select Committee into the operation of the Irish Sunday Closing Act. [Mr. T. W. RUSSELL: Hear, hear!] It is true that neither that Select Committee nor the Welsh Commission advocated a repeal of the Sunday Closing Act; but do either of them advocate its extension? Let me read what the Royal Commissioners say in their Report on this point. They say— We must dismiss as equally impracticable the proposal to close public houses absolutely and for all purposes for the whole of Sunday. Such a law would impose a great hardship on those who legitimately travel on Sunday, and would probably encourage the growth of illicit drinking. In this connection I may mention the very valuable evidence given before the Commission by Mr. David Davies, of Cardiff, than whom from his knowledge and experience no one is entitled to speak with greater authority. He gave evidence which is indisputable of the enormous increase of shebeens in Cardiff since the Welsh Sunday Closing Act came into force, and so absolutely and clearly did he make out his case that Lord Aberdare, who is a strong supporter of Sunday closing, was bound to admit the fact. The Select Committee upon the Irish Act did not specifically pronounce against the total closing on Sunday, but they certainly do not pronounce in favour of it, and I think they do not even recognise the possibility of it. In fact, they treated it as an absolutely impracticable idea. And here I should like to quote the evidence of Mr. O'Donel, the Chief Police Magistrate of Dublin. Referring to some evidence given before a previous Committee he says— My view remains the same—that the total closing of public houses on Sunday would inevitably result in an enormous increase of shebeens, and bring about a far more demoralising effect than would be caused by leaving matters as they now are. If, in the opinion of experts, such would be the result of closing public houses on one day in the week, how much more serious would be the danger if the public houses of a locality were closed altogether? A man who wants a drink will certainly find means to obtain it, and it is surely better that he should get it in a place subject to legal control than in some unlicensed house. I think there is a great deal to be said for shutting up public houses for longer hours on Sunday, and perhaps for shutting them at an earlier hour on Saturday night; and when a publican is discovered supplying a drunken man with drink, by all means let him be prosecuted with the utmost rigour. But I appeal to the House not to pass a measure which will result in the increase of illicit drinking houses, bogus clubs, and shebeens, which are a prolific source of drunkenness, immorality, and crime. I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time on this day six months.

Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."—(The Marquess of Carmarthen.)

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

*(1.35.) MR. J. M. MACLEAN (Oldham)

I rise to second the Amendment which has been proposed by my noble Friend. It seems to be usual in this House for those Members who are obliged to speak on proposed measures of legislation of this kind to explain that they have no personal or interested motives in taking one side or the other. Personally, I can disclaim any fanaticism and also any pecuniary interest in any distillery or brewery; neither do I take up the question as a politician, for I suppose the temperance vote in the borough I represent is quite as strong as the publican vote. I look at this matter, I think, fairly. Bills of this kind raise the very important question how far it is right for a majority in this country to interfere with the enjoyments and amusements of the minority. By this Bill it is proposed to sweep away entirely the right of the minority in any particular district to drink any kind of strong liquor, and I maintain that would be a very strong measure indeed for this Parliament to take. The hon. and learned Gentleman who moved the Bill rather congratulated himself on the fact that the Bill was an evasion of direct legislation by the Imperial Parliament. I should have admired his courage much more if he had come forward with a Bill for enforcing prohibition throughout the whole of the United Kingdom, but he knows perfectly well a measure of, that kind would have no chance of passing this House. The hon. and learned Gentleman falls back on the principle of local veto and says— If two-thirds of the people of any district think there should be no strong liquor sold in their district give them the right to impose their will upon the minority. He made a very able and good humoured speech, and if the carrying out of an Act of this kind were entrusted to him, and men like him, very possibly it might be worked in a tolerably fair spirit. But the Bill itself is drawn in a very unfair and intolerant spirit. There is a clause which provides that when prohibition has been carried by the whole of the ratepayers no change shall be made for five years afterwards. That clause, coupled with the other clause which allows the advocates of prohibition to demand a fresh poll two years after the sense of the ratepayers has been taken, shows how this Bill is intended to favour one particular class of the community alone. I have been, to some extent, reassured as to what might be the effect of popular veto in this matter by the example of what has taken place in the London County Council within the last two years. We know that when some of the members of that Council were elected they had great ideas of what they were going to do to reform the amusements, and improve the moral taste of the population of London. We have heard very little lately of that outcry, because the members of the Council soon found the real sense of their constituents was very much against the interference contemplated. It is quite possible that if the verdict of the people could be obtained, say, every six months, on a question of this kind, it would be found that the people were against any kind of prohibition such as is contemplated by the Bill. But the measure itself lays it down that when once the champions of the Bill have got their grip on the throat of that section of the population who indulge in strong drink, they are not to relax it for five years, no matter by what means the decision may have been brought about. I do not think that is a state of things that will commend itself to the good sense of the people of the country. The Mover of the Bill asserted that the Bill would redress the evils arising from the consumption of intoxicating liquors. He quoted the figures of the liquor bill of the country. He showed us what we all know from the speeches made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer that there has been a very large increase in the consumption of intoxicating liquor during the last two or three years. But he fails to make out his case unless he can show that along with that increase there has been a corresponding increase in the amount of crime and pauperism and mortality. It is always put forward as an excuse for measures of this kind that the consumption of strong drink inevitably leads to an increase in the number of criminals and paupers, and an increase in the death-rate. I challenge any Member opposite to show that the increase in the consumption of strong drink has been accompanied by anything in the way of an increase either of pauperism or of crime. At the present time pauperism is less in proportion to the population than it has been at any time within the last 50 years, and we know from statistics that a good many of our prisons are, happily, nearly empty. If there has been any increase in the death-rate of the country, it has been due to the severity of the winter rather than to any increase in the consumption of intoxicating liquor; indeed, last year the Chancellor of the Exchequer gave as one reason why there had been such a largely increased consumption the fact that many people had drunk rum to arm themselves against influenza. My strong objection to the Bill is that, practically, it would have no effect in bringing about the result which the hon. and learned Member desires. I believe its operation would be at once costly and useless. The hon. and learned Gentleman did not attempt to prove that prohibition anywhere has been successful in effecting the purpose he has in view. Everyone who has visited the United States will agree that the Prohibition Laws there have either been repealed or are only retained where it is well known they are systematically evaded. I have some facts here taken from a Blue Book which has recently been presented to the House, showing what has been the result of the Prohibition Laws in the various Australasian Colonies. In Queensland a Bill was passed in 1885, and another in 1886, and the Report is that the ratepayers there are quite indifferent to the law, which has produced no appreciable effect upon drunkenness. In Western Australia the Liquor Laws are inefficient to prevent Sunday opening and sly drinking; while in New Zealand it is admitted on all sides that the Local Option Clauses of the Act of 1881 have not had the effect anticipated, and the cost of elections has been very considerable; in many cases every vote cost over £2. Lord Hopetoun reports that in Victoria there is a general indifference, that the Local Option Clauses have not done good, and that Sunday closing has caused no decrease in drunkenness. It is said that an Act of this kind has been very successful in Scotland. I daresay it is possible that a Sunday Closing Act has been more effectual in Scotland than in Wales. Scotland is a whisky-drinking country, and the people can easily take home on the Saturday night a supply sufficient to last them over Sunday. They are thus able to combine an outward observance of the law on Sunday with an inward indulgence in as much whisky as they wish for. But it is otherwise in Wales, which is mostly a beer-drinking country. The hon. and learned Member stated that the operation of the Sunday Closing Act in Wales has been fraught with great advantage to the people. The Commissioners make no statement of that kind. The inquiry by the Royal Commissioners showed that the Sunday Closing Act has been a complete failure. [Cries of "No!"] Well, the Commissioners say— In those districts which were already temperate and progressive in sobriety, it has acted as a powerful aid to the cause of temperance by removing a temptation from a weak minority. But that minority was always a small, and, we think, a diminishing one; we also doubt whether the earnest and zealous advocates of the cause of temperance who have appeared in such large numbers before us would have found their efforts to reduce it still further more hampered by the possibility of obtaining drink under the old system than by the evasion of the present law, which has been proved before us. We admit, however, that the majority of them seem to hold a different opinion. In Cardiff, and some of the mining districts, the Act cannot be said to have diminished intemperence. We have already indicated our opinion, that the provision of places open on Sunday for the enjoyment of social intercourse and innocent recreation, not incompatible with due attention to the religious duties of that day, would prove in practice as strong an inducement to the formation of temperate habits as the mere closing of the public houses without the provision of any such counter attractions. The Commissioners go on to say— Had it been our duty to advise on the form of the original legislation, we might have suggested that some facilities should have been given for obtaining drink in small quantities for domestic consumption. I think that shows that they were in favour of the repeal of the Act prescribing the total closing of public-houses in Wales on Sunday. That is a fair argument to draw from, the words of the Report. The Commissioners go on to say that extraordinary precautions will be necessary in order that the Act may be worked effectively in the future. It is difficult to tell who is a bonâ fide traveller or not, and no doubt the law has been evaded to a large extent by people pretending to be travellers. The Commissioners, to put an end to this state of things, proposed that the occupier of every house licensed for the refreshment of travellers should be compelled to keep a book in which the name of every person served should be entered, and the date on which he was served, this book to be open to the inspection of the police. This seems very much the same thing as proposing that nobody shall travel about this country on Sunday unless he carries a passport certifying who he is, and is able to give such an exact description that the police may be able to find out where he lives, and whether he was a bonâ fide traveller on that date. But the Commissioners were not satisfied even with that extraordinary precaution, because they laid down certainly a very remarkable theory, that every district in which prohibition was enforced should have what I may call a strategical frontier. They recommended that the boundaries of boroughs and counties should be remodelled, because people now come over the border from one district to another and get drink in Monmouthshire, for instance, where the Welsh Sunday Closing Act is not in force, so that the whole division of counties and boroughs, according to these Commissioners, would have, to be altered in order that prohibition might be successful in any particular district. This is the way in which the Sunday Closing Act in Wales is at present evaded. What would be the state of things if these difficulties were multiplied sevenfold by the enforcement of total prohibition in many districts of Wales throughout the whole week? Why, it would be necessary—and here I think of the great question of cost, for hon. Members who support measures of this kind say they would reduce the expense of maintaining the Police Force in this country, because so many constables would not be required—it would be necessary to increase the Police Force enormously before we could prevent the systematic evasion of laws of this kind. It is the case elsewhere, and the case in Wales just now, under the Sunday Closing Act. We should have to set up a Custom House, with Inspectors, at every strategical frontier of the district to be defended, and every traveller going into the district under a law of this kind would be liable to have his luggage searched, so that it might be seen whether he was carrying strong liquor into the district. We should have the strongest barriers set up all round the Puritanical districts where this would be enforced. In fact, we should have a revival of the system of Custom Houses to enforce the payment of duties, the inconveniences of which are so strongly felt on the Continent. One of the chief blessings of life in this country is that an Englishman can enjoy perfect freedom of intercourse with his fellow-men. Of course, all that would be done away with under this Bill. Everywhere bad blood would be raised. The people of one district would be fighting against the people of another, and there would be a most minute inspection into the habits and ways of every man travelling along the high road in the country. Perhaps this would be carried into the private household, and we should have every man shadowed by a spy to know whether he consumes strong drink or not. In fact, this is one of those proposals of legislation Lord Salisbury so happly ridiculed in a recent speech to the Associated Chambers of Commerce, when he protested against the craze for inspection which now inspires so many measures brought into this House. If we go on at the present rate we shall soon arrive at a state of things when half the population of the country will be perpetually engaged in inspecting the other half. The moral sense of the community would be perverted if a law of this kind prevailed, and the state of things revived when public opinion was on the side of smugglers. The law would be systematically evaded, and people would not be better, but worse, off for legislation of this kind. I oppose this Bill because I think it is one of the many mischievous attempts which are made from time to time in our day, and which we hear of so constantly, to do away with that spirit of respect for personal liberty which has always formed a distinguishing feature of English civilisation.

(2.14.) MR. T. W. RUSSELL (Tyrone, S.)

The fact that there are three Local Veto Bills on the Paper today, one of which is an Irish Bill, is my excuse for intervening in this Debate. One of the first things which struck me this afternoon was that there was nothing Welsh in this Bill save its title. Its rejection was moved by a Member for a Metropolitan constituency, and seconded by a countryman of my own who sits for a Lancashire constituency; and I suppose, therefore, that it may be taken for granted that not a single Member from the Principality could be found courageous enough to face the undertaking of moving the rejection. I have listened to Debates on the temperance question for 26 years, and I never remember a Debate taking place in which the hon. Members who opposed these Bills did not rise and say that they were as much opposed to intemperance as those on this side of the House, and that it is not a Party question. While I have no doubt that hon. Members are sincere in making that statement, people outside the House see that these hon. Members do nothing to abate intemperance, and I am very much afraid that it has become recognised that the Liberals have become the party of temperance reform. Just as in the struggle in America against slavery the Republican Party became the Party of the Abolitionists, so when measures intended to abate the evils of intemperance come before this House hon. Members opposite are not keen to support them. I think that the arguments used by the noble Lord who moved the rejection of the Bill were more questions for discussion in Committee than arguments in connection with the Second Reading of a Bill. My noble Friend objected, for example, to the proposal for a two-thirds majority, and he objected to the clause providing that the Bill, if passed, shall remain in force five years; but, after all, these are objections not to principle, but to detail. These should be reserved for Committee, at which stage they would form proper subjects for a "give and take" policy. The Temperance Party have always held that the country is ready and anxious for Imperial legislation on the question, and, therefore, I am sorry that the Debate has been made one upon Sunday Closing. The noble Lord said that Sunday Closing in Wales had been a failure, and hinted that something of the same kind had been the case with regard to Ireland. Now, I have no right to speak for Wales: the Welsh Members will do that, but it struck me as a rather singular fact that a Commission had been appointed to inquire into the working of the Welsh Act, and, after hearing all evidence, that Commission positively refused to advise the repeal of the Act. I think, therefore, that hon. Members are entirely out of court when they come to this House and declare that measure to be a total failure. If it is a total failure, why had not the Commission the courage to recommend its repeal? We are told that the Welsh Members are in favour of the Bill. Surely that is some proof that the people of Wales also hold the same view. The noble Lord, referring to Ireland, said that the Committee which sat upstairs in 1888 did not recommend the extension of total Sunday Closing. Now I was a Member of that Committee, which was asked for by hon. Members opposed to Sunday Closing, and the recommendation made was that the Act had worked so well in Ireland that the five cities ought to be included which were excluded in 1878, from its operation; and, more than that, the Committee recognised that where the Act had not been quite successful, the reason was the prevalence of the bonâ fide traveller, and they recommended that the bonâ fide traveller should have to walk six miles in order to get drink. I maintain, therefore, that the noble Lord was entirely wrong as regards that measure.

*THE MARQUESS OF CARMARTHEN

I myself advocated more strict provisions for Sunday Closing. All I stated was that neither the Commission nor the Irish Committee recommended the complete closing of public houses on Sunday.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

What does the noble Lord mean by complete closing? Does he mean closed to bonâ fide travellers? The Temperance Party do not recommend the closing of public houses to bonâ fide travellers; they only contend that the bonâ fide traveller should be one in earnest. The Act where it has failed has done so, not because it is prohibitory, but because the prohibition is imperfect. We have a great deal of prophecy indulged in in all these Debates as to the dreadful things that are to happen if this measure is passed; but are there no dreadful things happening now, and are we to be afraid of trying to grapple with them? The hon. Member for Oldham has taken what is real and substantial ground against this Bill, namely, that it is an interference on the part of a majority of the people with the rights and enjoyments and privileges of the minority. That is a substantial argument, and I have no desire to burke it. But what does it amount to? The hon. Member for Oldham is bound to admit that where the Act is put in force there must be a majority desirous of getting rid of the traffic, or prohibition could not be decreed. But he denied that the majority had a right to interfere with the privileges and rights of the minority. I will meet him on his own ground, and ask the hon. Member what right the minority in a district have to force upon the majority all the cruel results of this liquor traffic—crime, pauperism, lunacy, and all sorts of mischief, and increased taxation? If the majority have no right to coerce the minority, it becomes infinitely worse when the minority have a right to enforce on the majority this traffic with all its baneful results. The hon. Member for Oldham also declared that prohibition had failed wherever it has been tried. But we have prohibition, more or less, throughout the United Kingdom, and where there is not complete Sunday closing the hours of sale are much less than on week days. The contention of the Temperance Party is that as are the facilities for obtaining drink so will drunkenness be; and the day upon which the hours are reduced is that day upon which there is least drunkenness. The hon. Member also stated that the result had been disastrous in our colonies. I am not concerned to deny that attempts to enforce this Act have failed in several colonies. I think that the Temperance Party are badly advised when they burke any fact like that, but it is not necessary to go to the colonies for proof as to what prohibition is capable of doing. There are not many things in Ireland we can quote with pleasure; but there is one thing in this connection we can hold up for admiration in this House. For 25 years in Ireland there has been carried out the experiment of absolute prohibition, not in an agricultural district, but in a town in which there are 4,000 or 5,000 factory operatives living. This town belongs to one man, and he once had a seat in this House. From the time the town was built no public house has been allowed to be opened within its boundaries. And what is the result? In that town, in County Armagh, there is no police barrack. Will you find another town in Ireland of which this can be said? A town of this size, under the ordinary conditions, with public-houses, would have some 14 or 15 policemen stationed in it. In Bessbrook there are no police and no police barrack. There is no pawn-office, there is no workhouse, no pauperism, no overcrowding, no destitution; and the people, if you ask them, will admit that they owe these blessings to the absence of public-houses. It is true the town of Newry is within a short distance of Bessbrook, but we do not find that the people rush to Newry to get drink, as we are told people will under such circumstances. I decline to go to Canada or Australia for illustration when I have this example at Bessbrook, and there are hundreds of parishes in England and Scotland where landlords have adopted this method of protecting their property, and where the plan has worked admirably; and I say this right that owners have and use for the protection of their interests is a right that ought to be given to occupiers, who have interests as valuable as owners. Now, the hon. Member for Oldham went a step further, and declared that it did not necessarily follow that increased drinking produced increased crime, or that it increased pauperism in the country.

*MR. J. M. MACLEAN

I asked for proof that it had done so in recent years.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

Well, it is quite true that the action of the liquor traffic in this direction may be met by action on the other side. It is quite possible that the consumption of drink may increase in times of prosperity and yet that pauperism may not increase in the way you might naturally expect. But that is not a proof of the innocence of the liquor traffic. It is because increased prosperity enables the people to spend more. But the hon. Member cannot deny the testimony of every Commission and every Committee which has inquired into this subject, that drink is the source of seven-eighths of the crime, of three-fourths of the pauperism, and of nearly all of the destitution of the country. Something was said in the beginning of this Debate about the adulteration of drink, and that has always been an argument with hon. Members. In talking with me and commiserating my total abstinence they have said, "It is not the good drink, it is the bad drink, that does the harm," and they have let themselves loose upon adulteration. Now we have had this question settled for all time. For the last few weeks we have had a Committee sitting upstairs upon a very interesting inquiry into this very subject. The hon. Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) alarmed us last Session by declaring that the Irish people were being destroyed by drinking new whisky, and that fusel oil was the thing that did the harm; and he made a piteous appeal that whisky should be confined for two years in bond before being let out to do its work—that it should be an imprisoned spirit for that period. I am glad to say the House granted a Select Committee to inquire into this subject. It has been a most interesting inquiry; there have been experiments with fusel oil, with ether, with whisky one year old, two years, three years, five years old, and it is surprising that any of the Members of the Committee were sober at 3 o'clock. But one thing comes out of the inquiry without doubt—that fusel oil is not the criminal at all. It has been proved to demonstration by the right hon. Member for Leeds (Sir Lyon Playfair), who is quite full of the subject, that the fusel oil contained in whisky is not the real sinner—that new whisky is rather less harmful than old whisky. I hope, then, that we have heard the last of the cant about adulteration and good drink. Let people make up their minds it is the alcohol that does the mischief. Another argument I have heard against the Bill is that, while the principle may be approved, there is objection to dealing piecemeal with the question. "Why Wales?" it is asked. "Why not England, why not Ireland, why not Scotland?" To that I say, we have done our best under the circumstances. We have Bills for each country on the Order Book. There are good reasons for proceeding in a tentative way. If Wales, or Scotland, or Ireland wishes to have no public-houses, or fewer public-houses, why should the people of Wales, or Scotland, or Ireland be denied the carrying out of their desire because England has no such desire? ["Hear, hear!"] I appreciate that cheer. It means, I presume, "Why don't you carry such an argument to its logical conclusion?" I will tell you why. Nobody who has lived for 50 years ever dreams of carrying out anything to its logical conclusion. I prefer to vote for a sectional Bill rather than for a general Bill, because I wish to see the experiment tried before we commit ourselves to a larger area. It has been tried with Sunday closing, and I am prepared to proceed in a similar way with this. I am not at all inconsistent. The other night I voted with the Welsh Members in favour of the Welsh people having their way in regard to Church Establishment, and I should be inconsistent if I refused to let them have the same right in regard to the establishment of public-houses, and, if it became a choice as to which should have precedence, I should say begin first with the public-houses! I repeat, it is a wise thing to proceed in a tentative way. What does the Bill propose to do? It is not necessarily a Bill for prohibition. It is quite true that the people in any locality can decree prohibition, and I contend for their right to do this, if they wish. They may decree prohibition, or they may content themselves with saying no new licences shall be granted, or they may decree there shall be no restriction. A most important decision was submitted to the judgment of the House of Lords within the last few days. I have never wavered in my opinion—I am not going to anticipate that judgment, but I have never wavered in my opinion that as regards England, Wales and Scotland, Magistrates have a right to withdraw public house licences as they choose; they must act judicially, but they have the right undoubtedly in my opinion. But should the decision of the House of Lords put that beyond all question, will it not be infinitely better that Magistrates should have some indication of local opinion in the district rather than go upon their own responsibility, and shut up public houses here and there, simply because they think they are not wanted? It would be infinitely better to give them this guiding direction, rather than allow them to deal with the matter after their own discretion, without any guide at all. There are two classes of Members to whom I may appeal to vote for this Bill even with the prohibitory clause. In the first place all Temperance Reformers—and I am glad to see a considerable number in the House—will vote for the Bill on temperance grounds, pure and simple. They, like myself, have been struggling for something like 30 years against the evil, and they are anxious to see something done. We shall vote for the Bill because it is a Temperance Bill designed to do temperance work. But there is another class of Members who may vote for it on totally different grounds. I can understand Members saying I do not care whether the people increase or lessen public houses. I am in favour of the Democratic principle of giving people local control. I, too, am in favour of that principle. Both as a temperance man, and as one who believes that the people should control the traffic, I vote for the prohibitory clause. For the House of Commons to reject this Bill to-day would be a most disastrous thing. I took a line last Session in opposition to many of my hon. Friends with whom I have always worked in this cause, because I was anxious, above everything, to try and get something done to stay this evil. After having listened to Debates for many years on this question, I say it would be a disastrous thing if the House of Commons, in the face of facts that meet us in our daily life, were to throw out the Bill. Much do we hear of workmen's questions and of labour problems, of which the issues are higher wages and more leisure, and here, I say, is a Bill that practically secures both these things. It will enable wages to be saved that now are squandered, time to be properly occupied that now is wasted. We hear of the miseries of "Darkest England" and of the "submerged tenth" of our population, of farm colonies and the exportation of those who have stumbled or fallen in our midst. But here is a means that offers a chance to men who have stumbled through weakness to regain their position at home. Instead of exporting them to colonies beyond sea, give them a chance of living a brighter life at home. I beseech the House of Commons not to throw out the Bill. The evil we have to deal with is an increasing evil, and with the increase of our material prosperity shows no abatement; indeed, the tendency, unfortunately, is the other way. Because this evil has been increasing while we for the last half century have been talking about it, I beg the House of Commons not to reject the Bill, but to allow this experiment to be made; give the people the chance of separating themselves from the nuisance and evil temptations that Magistrates, in innumerable instances, force upon them.

*(2.45) MR. STANLEY LEIGHTON (Shropshire, Oswestry)

As a very old temperance advocate I may be allowed to say a few words on this Bill. I congratulate the hon. Member who has just spoken and the hon. and learned Gentleman who introduced the Bill, upon the tone of their speeches, with a very large portion of which I find myself in agreement. I have used similar language and the same arguments over and over again, and I look at the question from the stand-point of a reformer. Anxious as I am to promote the cause of temperance, I beg leave to impress upon hon. Members that the cause of temperance is universal, and not local. Surely comparatively sober Wales does not, or ought not, to occupy our minds quite so much as disorderly, drunken London. There are more public-houses, in proportion to population, in London than anywhere else; it is to London that temperance reformers ought to turn their attention; it is there, among the drunken, degraded population of the Metropolis, I should be glad to join with my hon. Friends in promoting temperance reform. The Bill is to apply to Wales. Do hon. Members know there is no such a place as Wales? There are 12 shires grouped together, and in old Acts, for certain judicial purposes, these shires have been designated Wales; but the purposes and objects for which they were grouped have long ago passed away. Welsh people occupy England and English people occupy Wales. In my own district of Powisland, once a part of historic Wales, now a part of Shropshire, there are a large number of Welsh people, whereas in many districts of the 12 shires there is a larger English than Welsh population. The Wales which was created by an Act of Henry VIII. is not a district for which a proposal like this can be conveniently put forward. Just as well might you attempt to legislate for East Anglia, Mercia, or Northumbria; just as well might you go back to the Heptarchy as seek to legislate in this manner for Wales and Monmouth. There is a practical difficulty which does not seem to have occurred to hon. Members. My own county borders on the Counties of Flint, Denbigh, Montgomery and Radnor, it is a long, irregular boundary—are we to have an Act like this in operation on one side of the border line and not on the other? If the 12 counties formed an island there might be some excuse for exceptional legislation. The Sunday Closing Act, which is in operation in the 12 shires, has caused the greatest amount of inconvenience all along the border. There is one parish where the division runs along the centre of the road, with the result that one side of the road public houses close on Sunday; on the other side they are open—a cumbersome and most awkward arrangement for the inhabitants and the trade. But my objection is not only to the local character of the Bill; from the temperance point of view, I ask what will be the direct and indirect effect of this measure? We know, from the Report of the Commissioners, that in those places where the Sunday Closing Act has been in operation, numbers of unlicensed houses have almost invariably sprung up where drink is sold. Such, notably, has been the effect in Glamorganshire and in Cardiff. As a temperance advocate, I protest against legislation which will have this effect. This Bill may be described as one for the creation of unlicensed drinking houses. Then the Bill proposes to authorise certain persons to sell drink, quite apart from the Licensing Authority. Every druggist and pharmaceutical chemist is to be allowed to sell as much liquor as he likes. All a person has to do is to get a certificate from a doctor, and he may go to one of these places and buy as much liquor as he likes; and I do not know that there is anything to prevent him drinking it on the premises. Every druggist in the 12 shires may set apart a room where persons may be supplied with drink. With this exception, it is to be made a punishable offence to dispose of liquor. I do not quite understand what is meant; the obvious way of disposing of liquor is to drink it. But if a man disposes of liquor, he is to be punished by having all his utensils taken away from him. It may be observed too, in passing, that the Bill indirectly introduces women's suffrage. I object to having the Welsh people and the English people who live in Wales treated as a conquered people; I object to them being considered a people upon whom, as the hon. Member said just now, experiments may be tried. One of the hon. Member's argument was that the Welsh people should be the corpus vile of experiment. I think it was an unpatriotic argument. I object to such exceptional legislation; the Bill is a retrograde step, and it is injurious to the cause of temperance to deal with it on local, not universal, principles, and after the piecemeal fashion of this crude Bill.

(2.58.) MR. M'LAGAN (Linlithgow)

As frequent references have been made to Scotland, I, as a Scotch Member, may be allowed to say a few words. Certainly, I can say the experience in Scotland is that where there is increase in consumption of drink there is increase in disorder, and where there are more licensed houses more police are required. The noble Lord who moved the rejection of the Bill said that Sunday closing in Scotland had been a failure, but he gave us no proof of that. The hon. Member for Oldham, too, said that drinking is carried on secretly. What proof is there of this? Police statistics show that in the arrests for being drunk and disorderly, the proportion on Sundays is as 1 to 3½ on every other day in the week; and a certain portion of the Sunday arrests are due to the drinking on Saturday night. There can be no question but that Sunday closing in Scotland has been successful in its object. The Bill for Scotland is identical in principle with the one now before the House, and in speaking on the principle of this Bill, I am also speaking on the principle of the Scotch Bill. Why do we want this Bill? We want it because every other plan to stem the tide of drunkenness throughout the Kingdom has been tried and failed. Every landed proprietor has the power of keeping licensed houses off his land, and why should not the people have a like power? We have tried in Scotland what would be the effect of giving such a power, and we have found that there is a majority of five to one in favour of the people having the control, and, if the control is granted, five to one in favour of having prohibition of all licensed houses. It is said that it is more constitutional to have Licensing Boards than to give the people a direct veto. I do not admit this, and in any case where Boards have been tried in Canada they have failed, and the Canadians have been obliged to resort to the direct veto. Moreover, I contend that if we ask the people to vote on one principle, and on one principle alone, we shall get a truer idea of what their views are than if you call on them to vote for a new Board. Notwithstanding what is sometimes asserted, I maintain, on the authority of Mr. Goldwin Smith, Mr. Hepworth Dixon, and Mr. Osborne Smith, that wherever prohibition has been tried in America it has not failed but succeeded. It has been pointed out, for instance, that in one American town of 60,000 inhabitants there is no policeman. Mr. Hepworth Dixon, when he was there, asked whether there was a gaol, and he was told that there was, but there had been no one in it for two years, except a man who had come from another country. It is said that in Canada the people have voted against the continuance of the veto. That was because the law had not been enforced. In those parts of Canada where the Scott Act is in operation there is a less consumption of drink per head of the population than where it is not in operation. For instance, in Prince Edward Island, where the Scott Act is maintained in full force, the consumption is only half a gallon per head, whereas in British Columbia, where the Act does not prevail, the consumption is eight gallons per head of the population. As the hon. Member for South Tyrone (Mr. T. W. Russell) has shown, Sunday closing has not failed in Ireland, and it has not failed in Scotland. It cannot be said this is a tyrannical measure, as it merely gives the people the control they ought to have over the liquor traffic, and I entreat the House to give it a Second Reading.

(3.8.) MR. M. J. STEWART (Kirkcudbright)

I will not trespass long on the attention of the House, but I wish to say a few words on the principle of this measure, and in support of the Second Reading. I think it will be admitted by all Members, whether for or against the Bill, that a great part of our licensing administration has been a failure. There are several hundreds of Statutes dealing with the subject on the Statute Book, and yet we know as a fact that there is no great diminution of drinking, while public houses are, if not on the increase, at all events, not perceptibly diminishing. I think something ought to be done to restrain the number of those public houses, and unless some severe, and perhaps, what may be called drastic, legislation is placed on the Statute Book, a more moderate measure will not effect the object we have in view. I have always advocated the adoption of moderate measures, and have often reasoned with my temperance friends because they are too anxious to get things all their own way. I feel that you can really only touch this subject by treating it piece by piece. It is all very well to say it would be right and wise to adopt a general measure over the whole country. The hon. Member for Shropshire stated that real and great inconvenience was caused by having a number of public houses situated on the very confines of his county. No doubt a comprehensive measure might be a very useful one, but would that suit all the different localities? I maintain that if this measure is adopted there will be no real hardship in any particular locality, because it will have the assent of two-thirds of the ratepayers. There will be no forcing a large minority to agree to the wishes of a small majority. I am glad that the hon. Member who moved the measure has put in the two-thirds majority. I would not be a party to a scheme by which a mere majority would have the power of imposing its will on a locality. The question is a very important one, involving many considerations besides that of passing the Bill through this House, for we have the question of compensation before us, and though it has been determined that money compensation shall never be paid, it is a sort of compensation to say that public houses shall have a certain notice before they are called upon to close their doors. I question whether Parliament would sanction the taking away of a licence even at one year's notice. There would have to be several years' notice. You cannot expect legislation in opposition to public opinion, but you can expect to legislate with public opinion, and that public opinion in this country is not to treat harshly those to whom the law has given certain rights and powers, so long as those rights and powers are exercised in a proper manner. I would say to my temperance friends, in this House and out of it, that if they would adopt some such scheme for controlling the number of public houses in a district as is proposed in this Bill, or early closing on Saturday night, or a scheme for closing for a greater number of hours on Sundays, or for diminishing the infringement of the Sunday Closing Act under the bonâ fide traveller clause, they would be doing a great deal towards establishing proper temperance principles throughout the country. But if these points are not attended to, even if we get the Second Reading of this Bill we shall still be a long way from what is right and just on this great question. I may be asked on what general grounds do I support the Bill? Well, in the first instance, I support this Bill because I admit the principle of it, and we may depend upon it that at the next election there will be a very strong consensus of opinion on this point—that the people shall have more say in the giving and control of licences than they have had hitherto. Last autumn I made a tour in Canada and the United States, and I noted a profound feeling among all persons there both of high and low degree that the Prohibition Acts, although they may not have been carried out in their entirety in different States, are nevertheless wise and reasonable, and the people there will not allow those Acts to be taken off the Statute Book. On the whole, these Acts are doing good, and therefore we ought to try the experiment of giving similar powers to Wales which the Bill asks for. In Yarmouth in Nova Scotia, a town of 8,000 inhabitants, no intoxicating liquors are allowed to be sold, and in that town they have no Poor Law and no paupers, the people are contended and most obedient to the law. The men there are fishermen, and, owing to the conditions of their occupation, they have to remain at home three-fourths of the year. They occupy that time in tilling small patches of arable land; but they are just the sort of people who, making their harvest by fishing in a small space of time, would spend the best part of their leisure consuming alcoholic liquors if it were not for the Prohibition Law. As it is they are very comfortably off. Pauperism does not exist amongst them, and though there is not very much to make them rich, they are contented. I move about a great deal in Scotland, England, and other countries, and I can assure the House that my experience is that wherever there are no public houses there are fewer policemen, and the poor are fewer and better off. Those who visit the prisons must know that the inmates, by their own confession, get there from having given way to drink. Many persons consider that the County Council would not be a fit body to manage these matters. My opinion, however, is that if we make the areas large there will be no tyrannical operations going on in them; and so long as a large number of persons are got to deal with the matter, whether in a County Council or other body, a just and fair view will be taken on the whole. Although I do not approve of all the clauses in the Bill, I shall, with great cheerfulness, vote for the Second Reading.

*MR. G. OSBORNE MORGAN (Denbighshire, E.)

The noble Lord who moved the rejection of the Bill expressed his regret that the question has been made a Party question. In that regret I cordially join. But whose fault is it that it has been made a Party question? The promoters of the Bill would welcome most heartily the co-operation of the noble Lord, as of any other Member who sits on the Conservative Benches—and as, in fact, they welcome the very able assistance and co-operation of the hon. Member who has just sat down. Speaking from the experience of nearly a quarter of a century, I can say this has been made a Party question from the very first by our opponents. In my county almost every licensed victualler is an unpaid Conservative agent, and every public-house is a centre of Conservative activity. Whenever we take up a newspaper on the occasion of an election we see it stated that the licensed victuallers' vote will go solid for the Conservative candidate. It is a remarkable fact that of the three Members who have risen to oppose this Bill, not one is in any true sense of the word connected with Wales. The noble Lord who moved its rejection takes his title from Wales. The hon. Member beside him (Mr. Maclean) is, I believe, the proprietor of a Welsh Conservative newspaper; and the hon. Member who spoke last but one on the Conservative side (Mr. Stanley Leighton) says he has a number of Welshmen in his constituency. But I am afraid that after the speech which the hon. Member has addressed to the House he will not find much support among his Welsh constituents. The hon. Member has said there is no such place as Wales. I suppose the hon. Member will tell us next that there is no such person as the Prince of Wales. The fact is that all the arguments founded on Wales being an integral part of England come too late. We have given distinctive treatment to Wales in the matter of Sunday closing, and the Government themselves claim credit for having passed a separate Intermediate Education Bill for Wales; and we know that nearly one-half of the Members of the House adopt special legislation for Wales in regard to disestablishment and disendowment of the Church as one of the planks of their platform; and, therefore, it is mere pedantry to attempt to deal with Wales as if it was merged in England. As to the argument of the hon. Member for Oldham, I was amazed to hear him say that the Welsh Sunday Closing Act is a failure. The hon. Member, if I remember rightly, was the man who pressed for the appointment of the Royal Commission. No doubt he thought that the Commission when it was appointed would curse the Sunday Closing Act, but, like the Moabite prophet, so far from cursing, the Commission blessed, the measure altogether. I took great interest in the inquiry and attended several of its meetings, and I can say that there was some police evidence to show that in some districts drunkenness has increased, but I believe that is due in great measure to the extra vigilance which the police exercise. The Commission laid hold of three causes which have led to the failure of that Act, namely, the bogus clubs, the bonâ fide traveller, and the English border. So far from advocating the repeal of the Act, the Commission actually recommended that it should be made more stringent in these three particulars. I will read the conclusions at which the Commission arrived—and I may here mention that the hon. Member opposite did not read the whole of the passage. They said— One of the suggestions most frequently made to us was the Report of the Sunday Closing Act on its modification in the direction of repeal, by permitting the opening of public houses for a short time in the middle or evening of the day, for sale both in or off the premises, or for the table only. We cannot, after giving the fullest and most careful consideration, endorse either of these recommendations …. We are convinced that a change in either of these directions would be so unwelcome to so vast a majority of the population in so large an area of the Principality, that we do not think it ought to be forced on this larger area for the sake of a possible benefit to the rest of the country. Moreover, we find an almost complete absence of evidence of a desire for such an amendment of the law on the part of those classes who would be most likely to require or use it. It is a very remarkable fact that where-ever this experiment has been tried, whether in Wales, in Scotland, or in Ireland, the majority of the people are in favour of its being continued. It is said that this piecemeal legislation is the thin edge of the wedge. No doubt it is. This is an experimental measure. But if we make experiments, surely it is desirable that they should be made on congenial soil, and under the most favourable circumstances. I am sure I am within the mark when I say that wherever the people who are most directly affected, and who therefore, take the strongest interest in the question and am best qualified to judge of its merits, are consulted, there is an overwhelming preponderance of opinion in favour of the Bill. I prefer the opinion of those who have been sent to this House by express mandate to give their votes in favour of the Bill to the views of gentlemen who cannot be said in any sense to represent Welsh opinion. I shall look with some curiosity at the Division List, to see if there is one single Welsh Member who has the hardihood to vote against the measure. At present it is the Magistrates who are intrusted with the delicate duty of deciding whether there shall be any more public houses. But the fact is that in Wales, perhaps even more than in England, the Magistrates are not a representative body, and they have not got the confidence of the people. Though the population of Flintshire is almost entirely Nonconformist, there is not one single Nonconformist Magistrate in the county. I do not think there is any part of the country where the conditions for trying this experiment are so favourable. Recollect that this is to be the power of the majority over the minority. It is not to be the despotic power of one man. Yon see over and over again what you are bound to call a "despotic" exercise of power by the Prince of Wales, on his estate, and by the Duke of Westminster, and you approve; but you deny to the majority the right of exercising a similar power. Yet the ratepayers are the most conversant with their own requirements and wishes. They are the people who suffer—not the Magistrates and their families. They wear the shoe, and those who wear the shoe know best where the shoe pinches. I do not say that there may not be in this Bill some points which it is desirable to alter in Committee, but they are all questions of detail. I ask the majority of the House to vote for the Second Reading and to support the principle of local veto generally, and I ask it to vote for the Bill in response to the appeal of the Principality, which has with no uncertain voice expressed approval of its provisions. I believe that if you were to reject this Bill, backed as it is by the unanimous voice of Wales and of its Representatives, you would make Representative Government an absolute fraud and a sham.

*(3.35.) THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. MATTHEWS,) Birmingham, E.

Mr. Speaker, I had the honour, yesterday, to receive a deputation from the United Kingdom Alliance in connection with this subject, and they claimed that the Government should allow a fair field and no favour. I have to inform the House that the Government accede to that request, and that we do not intend to put any pressure on those hon. Members who usually support us in the Division Lobbies. The Government leave hon. Members to take whichever line they think best. Speaking, however, for myself, I do not suppose that there is any hon. Member who is not sensible of the enormous mischief of excessive drinking, how much crime, pauperism, and misery throughout the country are due to the habits of intemperance, which, unhappily, are still too prevalent in these Islands. I do not think we are all agreed in the view which has been expressed in the course of the Debate, notably in the speech of the hon. Member for South Tyrone, that the partaking of alcoholic drink is an evil thing in itself, and a public wrong and crime. That is an opinion which I strongly and emphatically repudiate. We all agree that there ought to be a remedy, if we could find one, that would not prove worse than the disease. The hon. Member who introduced the Bill enumerated various legislative failures that have taken place in connection with this subject. In fact, the whole path of the House of Commons is strewn with skeletons and wrecks of legislation affecting the Liquor Question. There was Mr. Bruce's Bill of 1871, the Light Wines Bill, the Grocers' Licence System, restraints on adulteration, all of which have failed. Yet the hon. Member hopes by this particular legislative nostrum to succeed where other men have failed. I think that the hon. Member (Mr. Bowen Rowlands) has overstated the effect of the words which fell from the President of the Local Government Board. My right hon. Friend did not say that temperance could be brought about by legislation, but that wise and well-considered legislation could assist the cause of temperance. I am bound to say, as far as my own observation goes, and as far as I have been able to study the subject, there are many directions which open up a prospect much more hopeful than this rough and coarse method of total prohibition. There is, for example, the high licence system in force in the United States, and there are methods which have been suggested by the right hon. Member for West Birmingham. Those methods of reform hold out greater hopes of mitigating the social evil connected with the liquor traffic than that which is suggested by the promoters of this Bill. Describing the measure as briefly as I can I should say that it is a Bill which enables the ratepayers of any sanitary district, by popular veto, to prohibit absolutely within that district the sale, and only the sale, of intoxicating liquor. That seems to me to be unjust. The promoters of the Bill are proposing that at the end of the current licensing year, without any delay, without compensation, which we are told has gone for ever into the limbo whence nothing returns, with nothing to alleviate the harshness of the measure, we shall absolutely put a stop to the trade of a vast number of persons who have just as much right to the consideration of the House as all other law-abiding citizens, and whose trade has been fostered and protected by the Legislature. They are men who have been called upon to assist the police in maintaining public order and the public safety. To deal in that arbitrary way with so large a class of persons seems to me unjust. The measure also appears to me to be unjust to those moderate drinkers whose liberty I could not consent to control in this way. It would tell especially against the moderate drinkers of the poorer classes. The Bill does not prohibit the importation of drink. The rich man could send for drink to the neighbouring district, and he could get in as large a supply as he chose; but you would compel the poor man to go across the border and import drink for the rational and legitimate wants of his family. That seems to me to be a grave objection to the measure. If you permit importation across the border, how can you suppose that those who are easily tempted would abstain from going a short distance in order to be supplied with drink? Again, and this brings me to another objection, which is a very strong one. The measure is not a sincere one. It is a half-hearted and insincere measure. The hon. Member for South Tyrone said that the Bill means higher wages and more leisure to the working man. If that is his opinion, why should not the promoters be straightforward and honest, and prohibit the use of intoxicating liquors, and not merely the sale? If it be really true that the consumption of intoxicating liquors was so great a social evil, why do not hon. Members have the courage to say that there shall be no more consumption of intoxicating liquors in the country? It seems to me, therefore, to be unjnst, illogical, insincere, and half-hearted to strike at the sale and not at the use of alcoholic drink. I object to referring a question which involves such difficult social inquiry to a tribunal of a majority of two-thirds, or to any majority of ratepayers. I say this with no distrust to the ratepayers. In so complicated a question the representatives of the ratepayers are the proper tribunal to be referred to, rather than the whole body of the ratepayers, consulted by a popular poll and swayed by many influences. The Bill is launched as an experiment to be followed elsewhere; but in my opinion its working would simply be impossible in the larger towns. If it were attempted in London, for instance, I should be sorry to be responsible any longer for the peace and order of the Metropolis. As far as I can see, experience is against the system of prohibition, which is the groundwork of the present experiment. I will not attempt to repeat the arguments that have fallen from the noble Lord (the Marquess of Carmarthen), who, in a speech characterised by so much humour and ability, has moved the rejection of the measure. In those arguments the noble Lord showed how unfair the measure would be to the people of this country; and without amplifying what he has said, I would simply refer to the teachings we have derived from the experience of prohibitive legislation in other countries. The case of Canada, though not conclusive, is strong against the expediency of the system. The Scott Bill came into operation in Canada in 1878, the area of operation being the county. In Ontario 28 out of 42 counties adopted the Act, and two cities out of 11. After nine years' experience 10 counties repealed the Act, and all the others are taking steps to repeal it. In Quebec the Act was adopted originally by six counties, and two repealed it after a short experience. Turning to Australia, Queensland is the example most in point with regard to the Bill before the House, for that Bill was framed on the Queensland measure. The hon. Member for Cardiganshire avows that his Bill is founded on that of Queensland, its main provisions being exactly the same as those of the Queensland Bill. In Queensland there has been no single poll taken upon absolute prohibition; there has been one poll taken for reducing the licensed houses by one-third in number; and there have been 42 polls altogether against granting any new licences. In five or six cases the Resolution, not to allow any more new licences, has been rescinded. The inference I draw from these returns is that the experiment has not been successful. As to the American States, Mr. Gold win Smith has pointed out very powerfully the failure of prohibition there, especially in Maine and Vermont. The attempt in Maine has been a complete and absolute failure, inasmuch as liquor is there sold to everybody who wants it in nearly every town in the State. In fact, no attempt is really made to enforce the law, and when it is seen that the law is thus evaded, on what ground, I ask, does the hon. Member for South Tyrone (Mr. T. W. Russell) anticipate in this country the results he hopes may follow the enactment of prohibitive legislation. If you compare the committals in Maine with what takes place in Canada, you will find that, whereas under prohibitive legislation in Maine there were 1,316 committals for drunkenness in one year, in Canada, when there was no prohibition, there were only 593 committals for the same class of offences, the population being about the same in both cases.

*MR. W. BOWEN ROWLANDS

Will the right hon. Gentleman refer to the figures for the Falkland and Pitcairn Islands, and other places, which show that prohibition has achieved most successful results?

*MR. MATTHEWS

I do not see the relevancy of the interruption. I was giving reasons for saying prohibition was not, on the whole, successful, and taking the case of Maine as a prominent example. What relevancy, then, can the case of the Falkland and Pitcairn Islands have? I should be happy if I could follow the hon. Member in any plausible and well-contsidered scheme to put an end to the temptations of drink; but on such a question as this I am bound to look round me and see what has followed the attempts already made in the same direction. In Vermont there is a marked increase in the number of places where liquor is sold, in spite of prohibition, and there is no concealment about the violation of the law. I have recently had occasion to make minute inquiries into a totally different subject, namely, the mode of dealing with the sale of inflammable liquors in America, and I have found, to my surprise, that the legislation affecting those commodities is of a much more stringent character than I should care to propose in this country, and yet this stringency of the law is accompanied by an almost total disregard of its provisions. Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania are instances of States which have tried prohibition, and have afterwards rejected it by great majorities. These facts give strong ground for pausing before launching on an experiment which is despotic in its operation, and unjust to largo classes of the community. There has been a plébiscite in Wales showing, it is said, a strong feeling in favour of the Bill. In five Welsh counties there are 23,000 people who voted in favour of the Bill out of the total of 90,000 ratepayers in those counties. In spite of all the canvassing of the United Kingdom Alliance, only 23,000 have voted for giving the ratepayers power to decide the number of licences, and only 19,000 have voted for absolute prohibition. The hon. Member for South Tyrone used the ingenious argument that, as Sunday prohibition had stopped drinking in Wales, therefore total prohibition will diminish the total consumption of intoxicating liquors. I am not sure that that argument is sound. Certainly the premiss is doubtful, to begin with. I do not wish to dogmatise. I will not assert that Sunday closing has increased drinking, but it would be equally rash to say that it has diminished it. The Report of the Commission seemed to show that where the population are inclined to temperance, there Sunday closing has been of avail; and where the population are not inclined to temperance, there Sunday closing has done harm. Do hon. Members suppose that the passing of the Bill would incline people to temperance who are not already so inclined? Do you think that by closing the houses you can incline people to temperance? The people who have good intentions in that direction are the people who are independent of legislation. The persons who would welcome the Bill are the very persons who can do without it. The account given by the Commissioners of what I may call the fraudulent drinking on Sundays in such towns as Cardiff and Swansea, and of the amount of systematic drinking Sunday closing induced, makes me feel that I should be reluctant to introduce similar evils into rural districts where there is a considerable mining population. Much, therefore, as I wish to assist any well-considered experiment in the hope of putting down the evils of intemperance, I do not feel, nor do those who think with me upon this Bench feel, that the measure before the House offers such a prospect of success as would justify us in voting for the Second Reading.

(4.5.) MR. J. MORLEY (Newcastle-upon-Tyne)

The right hon. Gentleman seems to me, judging from his concluding remarks, to have entirely misapprehended the scope and significance of the Bill. Of course, if a population were not inclined to temperance, the powers given to a two-thirds majority under the Bill would not be exercised. The right hon. Gentleman spoke of the five counties in which only 19,000 out of 90,000 ratepayers voted for prohibition. Then, why does the right hon. Gentleman object to the Bill, because in those five counties prohibition could not have been carried? These remarks of his show how little he grasped the scope of the measure. As to Maine and Vermont, the right hon. Gentleman's statements were very extraordinary. He referred to the last official Reports received from the Representatives of Great Britain in the United States. From these Reports I find that in Vermont, where prohibition was adopted in 1852, intemperance is held to have decreased. In Maine prohibition has been in operation for over 40 years, and the results are regarded as so satisfactory by prohibitionists that there is no movement for the repeal of the law. The right hon. Gentleman omitted to mention other States where prohibition had been a distinct success, such, for instance, as Alabama. Our Vice Consul there has testified to that success. Massachusetts, which first adopted prohibition, had indeed since rescinded it, but it remains a local option State; and they have the power there of passing two of the Resolutions out of the three enumerated in the Bill before the House. The right hon. Gentleman denounced as insincere and irrational the attempt to deal merely with the sale and not with the use of intoxicating liquors. But we do not desire to give powers of such scope to a two-thirds majority, because the experiment might fail. The proposal of the Bill is the only effective way in which popular control over licensed houses can be exercised. All Parties have agreed that it is necessary to place licensing powers under Parliamentary control, and those who support the Bill add the supplementary proposition that it is only effective control when a decisive majority in the community are given the power of saying "yes" or "no" to the Resolutions contained in the Bill. All the talk of the tyranny exercised by majorities is beside the mark. Whether the popular control is exercised through a Municipal Council in towns, or through a County Council, or through a Licensing Committee—however the control of licensed houses is vested in an elected body—the majority of the electors, practically, are given the power of suppressing public houses altogether. Nothing can hinder a majority from saying, "We will vote for no man as a member of the Licensing Body who will not vote for the total suppression of licensed houses." So far, then, from that point of view raising an objection to the Bill, it is rather a recommendation to it, for the Bill requires a two-thirds majority, and not a bare majority merely, to vote suppression. Hence all the taunts and reproaches that have been applied to the supporters of the Bill of allowing the mere majority to tyrannise over the minority are entirely beside the mark as a criticism of the proposal. Whether we have Municipal Bodies or Special Licensing Bodies to be the instrument through which popular control over licensed houses is to be exercised is, I think, a far less important matter than that there should be no mistake—and this is my justification for the Bill—in the minds of those who work the measure as to what is the true direction of the popular will. The sole question, then, is how we can secure with the least embarrassment to other local interests the expression of the popular will on those two great matters of reducing the number of licensed houses and of total suppression—whether the popular will on this matter, which goes to the very root of social life, shall be expressed indirectly at second hand through a representative body who have to deal with all sorts of general questions of local government and all sorts of personal issues, or whether the question shall be answered and decided upon plain issues of principle, and that alone. That, then, is the case which I make for the Bill, and I believe the more it is considered the more unanswerable it will be found to be. I have always held it for certain that the moment the temperance movement acquires a certain momentum and as soon as we have adopted a widely-extended franchise there will be no settlement of the question until we resort to a Bill of this kind giving to localities, with proper supervision and safeguards, the right of saying "aye" or "nay," whether they will have licensed houses at all in their midst, or how many they will have. I urge this point on the attention of the House because I know there are some hon. Members who are rather shocked at what is undoubtedly in some respects a new piece of machinery in our political system. Yet the principle is not entirely new, because now a poll of the ratepayers is necessary to the adoption of the Libraries Act and for other purposes. It may be said that it is done in those cases because the money of the ratepayers is involved; but it seems to me that it would be quite as legitimate and reasonable to take the feeling of the people by poll in a question of this kind, which quite as much affects the healthiness of social life as the expenditure of rates and taxes. It has been contended that we ought to make our Municipal Bodies as important as we can, and that, having elected men in whose general character and capacity we have confidence, we ought to leave it to them to settle how many licensed houses there shall be in a district, or whether there shall be any. But it is exactly in the best interests of municipal government that I believe we should be wise in sparing them in their elections from a question so full of perturbing, passionate, and confusing elements as this, and I contend that we should be all the more likely to obtain desirable and capable representatives on our Local Bodies if we kept the elections free from all the excitement of a licence or no licence ticket. On that point, at least, we might defer to American experience, for it has been found there, wherever a Municipal Body is the licensing power, that all the issues in an election are subordinate to the one of a licence or no licence ticket. For my own part, therefore, I think we could do nothing worse than mix up great questions of local government in a particular locality with the question of "aye" or "nay" on a temperance or licensed victuallers' ticket, for it would deal a deadly blow at the healthiness of municipal government. I do not think there is much force in the objection that the machinery of the Bill, the taking of the polls, would involve considerable cost to the ratepayers, nor in the objection urged against the Bill last year by the President of the Local Government Board, that if it were adopted it would lead to a great and violent reaction. I see no reason whatever to suppose that such a result would follow. I remember very well that in the Debate on a Local Option Resolution in 1883, Mr. Caine mentioned a case in which, in the City of Liverpool, a poll was taken on the water question: 38,300 votes were recorded, and the cost was less than £1,000. Again, a poll taken in the Wandsworth Union, the population in which is 210,000, cost only £280. Therefore, the cost of polling cannot be put forward as a serious argument. Now, something has been said about landlords having the power to suppress the sale of drink at their own absolute will and pleasure. But I do not think the force of this argument is fully understood by certain hon. Members opposite. It has been pointed out that the Duke of Westminster said, in a speech quoted by the hon. Member who moved the Bill, that he had suppressed 37 out of 48 licensed houses on his property, and he was loudly applauded for doing so. But do hon. Members see the position in which they place themselves by approving that action and yet objecting to the Bill? Their position is this: that a landlord might abolish licensed houses on his property, though the people who live on it do not wish it; but the people themselves who do wish it are to be denied the opportunity. I am aware that the introduction of the referendum is a novelty, and I am prepared to argue it on its own merits if this were the proper occasion for doing so; but this is not an occasion for a discussion as to whether or not it is well to refer back questions from the Legislature to the Electoral Bodies. But it is worth while, perhaps, to point out the success of this instrument for testing public opinion in Switzerland. The practice there of submitting important issues of local government to the corrective votes of the citizens of a particular Canton is said to have taken root in the country, and no one thinks of abolishing it. I should like to read to the House what is the testimony of Sir F. Adams, the British Minister at Berne, on this subject of the referendum. He said— As to the moral effect which the exercise of this institution has had upon the people, we are assured that it is admitted to be salutary-even by adversaries of democratic government. The consciousness of individual influence, as well as the national feeling, is declared to have been strengthened; and the fact of a large and, on several occasions, increased participation of the people in the vote is quoted as tending to prove that their interest in political questions is growing keener. The application of the referendum as worked in Switzerland, and the issues raised by it are so easy to understand, and, in most cases, at all events, are so independent of Party manœuvres, that public opinion acquiesces at once in the result, and the general feeling entertained in the country with reference to a particular question finds its accurate and, for the time, final expression. I submit that such an experience of the working of this piece of machinery is thoroughly satisfactory, and that on that ground, at all events, no objection can be made to the Bill now before the House. The Bill has been attacked as a piece of piecemeal legislation, and a merely local measure. But then the whole history of temperance legislation in some of its most important sides has been a history of progress in local temperance measures. If I remember aright, it was in 1839 that there was first of all a partial Sunday closing in London. Then three or four large boroughs outside, like Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, and Newcastle, also adopted partial closing. It was, I think, in 1848 that there was partial Sunday closing in England and Wales generally. Then, in 1853, we had complete Sunday closing in Scotland and in 1878 it was extended to Ireland, with the exception of the five exempted towns. In temperance legislation we have gone on in this way step by step, and from locality to locality. That Wales desires this there can be no dispute, because we have not yet heard one single Welsh Member oppose the Bill, and I do not expect that we shall. The Member for Shropshire on this and on other occasions has claimed to speak for Welshmen, but his views seem to be repudiated almost with unanimity by the electoral majority in Wales. In voting for the Bill I confine my support of it to the principle, and I leave myself absolutely free as to the conditions, the machinery, the details, with which that principle is to be applied. I find, for example, that the majority required for the admittedly strong step of prohibition is a two-thirds majority "of those who vote." I think the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington was far wiser when he required for the prohibitive veto a majority of two-thirds "of all the ratepayers on the register." It would not be at all fruitful or safe to force prohibition with less than the support of two-thirds or three-fourths of the total number of persons entitled to vote. But these and other objections can be dealt with in Committee. In supporting this Bill I am supporting nothing but the proposition that the direct vote of the inhabitants of a district taken upon the question whether they will have licensed houses in their midst, and, if so, how many, is the only practical way of securing for the small householder the same protection against the drink traffic as is possessed by the owners of large landed estates. I do not argue the Bill on the physiological ground that some authorities believe alcohol to be injurious to the human constitution. I do not argue either on the moral and social ground of the miseries inflicted by excessive drinking on human character and on human society. Whether alcohol is or is not injurious to bodily health, whether excessive drinking is or is not at the root of half the woes of our social life, whether a restriction of licensed houses would or would not make a deep mark on the social habits of our people I do not ask, and it is not the question to-day. The question to-day is a political one. The House of Commons has agreed that the principle of control over drinking houses must be conceded, and the only question is, how the preponderating voice of the community for its own protection can be most faithfully expressed. The hon. Member for South Tyrone made an eloquent appeal to the House not to I throw out the Bill and thus reject its principle. It will be much to be regretted if that appeal falls on deaf ears. The time has gone by for flattering phrases and pious opinions about temperance reform. Let it not be forgotten that there are 1,000 or more estates and parishes in England and Wales which have been cleared of licensed houses by great proprietors. The small freeholder calls for the right to secure for himself the same protection. The workman and the small freeholder have just as much repugnance to the proximity of the public house as any Member of this House has. I have always said that the temperance movement is by far the greatest and the deepest moral movement in this country since the anti-slavery agitation. Twice this Parliament has felt the force of that movement, and those who go to large meetings of our countrymen, which are so efficacious for testing and instructing public opinion, and for feeling and quickening the pulse of the electors, are well aware that few notes command a response so instantaneous and so hearty as a reference to intemperance. We are all talking, some of us rather vaguely, about social reform, but I venture to say that all practical projects of social reform taken together would not do half as much for improving the material prosperity of the country and the well-being of our countrymen as the progress of the temperance cause. Yes, and it is because I am persuaded that we can only effectually promote this cause by the present measure, or a measure of this kind, because I am persuaded that by putting this potent instrument into the hands of the people themselves, we shall take a further step than has yet been taken for securing temperance reform, I shall vote for the Second Reading of the Bill.

(4.43.) MR. LLOYD-GEORGE (Carnarvon)

As a Member of the Committee which organised the plébiscite, I should like to re-assure the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary as to the origin of that undertaking. The United Kingdom Alliance had nothing whatever to do with it. Again, the right hon. Gentleman said that out of 90,000 householders in five counties only 23,000 voted in favour of the Bill; but the explanation of that is that the plébiscite was only taken in specific localities, although they were typical localities. In my own constituency Political Parties are very evenly balanced, yet there, and in the boroughs, which are deemed to be the Conservative stronghold, the voting was very largely in favour of the Bill. Every precaution was taken that a fair vote should be secured. The chairman of the committee who organised the plébiscite was a gentleman who took a prominent part in opposing my candidature for this House, and one of the three gentlemen responsible for the accuracy of the figures was at one time Unionist Member for the constituency. The right hon. Gentleman professed to doubt the existence of a preponderating sentiment in Wales with regard to temperance, and the hon. Member for Shropshire doubted the existence of such a place as Wales, in the same way as the Postmaster General the other day doubted the existence of such a people as the Welsh people. If that goes on we shall have reason to become somewhat sceptical of the existence of a Tory Party in that country at all. The attitude of hon. Gentlemen opposite and of the Government on this question affords a strange contrast to that which they took up in regard to the tithe question. They said it was necessary to deal with the tithe question because of the scenes of disorder which occurred in Wales arising out of the collection of tithes; but the amount of disorder that arises in connection with tithes is as nothing compared to the disorder that arises in connection with public houses. Yet the tithe question was regarded as so urgent that Session after Session a Tithe Bill was brought in. And on this point every possible obstacle is put in the way of our discussing it. I hope that the temperance party in Wales will take note of that fact at the next election. We are all agreed that there is an excess of public houses. Figures that can be quoted conclusively show that the number of public houses in Wales is excessive—in many districts grossly excessive—yet the population of such districts is powerless in the matter I think that a Bill once introduced into this House fixed as a proper standard one public house for every 1,500 inhabitants, two for 3,000, and an extra one for every additional 1,000 persons. Yet in one Welsh town of 1,200 inhabitants there are no fewer than nine licensed houses; and in Bangor there are eight times as many as there should be on the basis I have laid down. According to the present law, the Magistrates are entitled to have regard to the requirements of the district. In some recent cases in which I was concerned, applications were made for the renewal of licences; a plébiscite in the locality had been obtained as to whether these licences should be renewed, and two-thirds of the population were against the renewal; yet the Magistrates granted the renewals. This was a reductio ad absurdum, and it is to meet such cases as these that this Bill has been introduced. It provides machinery for obtaining evidence as to the requirements of the locality and making the Magistrates act upon such evidence. I implore the House to pass this Bill, which will give to the inhabitants of a district the power of removing from their midst, if they so desire, the contaminating influence of the public house. This is a great and momentous social question which touches the very root and fabric of society. I believe that there is a growing demand for a measure like this, and that when the time comes—as soon it will—for the nation to give its verdict upon the question, that verdict will be that the people will no longer allow their intellects to be enfeebled and their moral senses to be blunted by the demoralising influence of strong drink.

*(4.58.) SIR E. HAMLEY (Birkenhead)

There is no doubt that a revision of the Liquor Laws is greatly needed, but that it should be effected by partial and one-sided legislation like this Bill, would be very unfortunate. It ought to be dealt with by a comprehensive measure introduced by the Government after an inquiry, in which all the interests concerned are fully represented and considered; the interests of temperance, the interests of the licensed victuallers, who, as pursuing a lawful business, are entitled to the protection of the Legislature, and the interests of the community generally, who have just as much right to derive their comforts from the public house as the teetotalers have to obtain theirs from the teapot or the pump. If the matter were taken up in that spirit we might hope to have a measure which would conciliate all interests and possess the inestimable advantage of being applicable to the whole country instead of a particular locality. As to the notion that the habits of our lives ought to be controlled by plébiscites, that would lead to an intolerable tyranny such as I hope the people of this Kingdom will never submit to, even though it should be recommended by those who call themselves Liberals, or by any other nickname. One advantage of the Government dealing comprehensively with this subject would be that this House would be relieved from these perpetual demands upon its time, and another that it would remove a permanent cause of irritation and ill-will in every constituency. Every Member of this House must be conscious that there is no subject which produces such bad feeling in a constituency as this liquor question, which in a great measure is due to the fact that the advocates of temperance, strong in the goodness of their cause, and justly strong, are very apt to deal with it in a spirit regardless of everybody's feelings but their own. It is because a measure like this Bill would put fresh difficulties in the way of a comprehensive Government proposal, and would thus be hostile to the true interests of temperance, that I shall vote against the Second Reading of this Bill.

(5.2.) MR. J. PARKER SMITH (Lanark, Partick)

I avail myself of the opportunity of stating the reason why I support this Bill. I do so in conformity with the attitude I took up when I was elected for the constituency I represent, an attitude which by temperance men and by the trade was declared to be sound and satisfactory. Like the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle I accept the Second Reading of this Bill as a declaration in favour of the principle that there should be a direct reference to the inhabitants of a locality of the question whether there shall be fresh licences, a reduction of licences, or no licences at all. In that question I have Scotland in my mind as well as Wales; the principle is as applicable in the one country as in the other. When, however, we get into Committee on the Bill, we shall find ourselves confronted with various difficulties, as to which, in voting for the Second Reading, we shall be in no sense committed to an opinion. There will arise the question of compensation. We have sanctioned and encouraged the investment of men's capital in a business, and we cannot, in justice, and in the absence of misbehaviour on the part of the holder of a licence, in a moment deprive him of this invested capital, simply because we have changed our minds on a matter of general policy. I do not say that such compensation should come from Imperial or from local sources; it might come from the revenue derived from the issue of licences, which stands upon a wholly different footing from the proceeds of other forms of taxation. By increasing the cost of licences a fund could be formed for such compensation. Another form of compensation would be by time—by giving to a licencee the time to work out the value attaching to the licence he holds. I do not want to enter into the question of legal rights; but there is a question of moral right which impresses itself on my mind, and must impress the minds of all who consider this question fairly. If you do not acknowledge this moral claim you will make such a Bill unworkable, as being repugnant to the sense of justice of every man who fairly considers the subject.

*(5.5.) COLONEL HUGHES (Woolwich)

This is a step in legislation directed against one particular trade; but I do not know that the arguments supporting it may not be used in reference to many trades. Take, for instance, the trade or profession of a solicitor. The licence for a solicitor to practise is annually renewed during good behaviour. It is not difficult to prove that litigation in excessive quantities is injurious to the community. One of the features in Jack Cade's programme of reform was first to kill all the lawyers; the reformers of the present day wish to kill the trade of the publicans. If the number of licensed victuallers is too large, and if their houses are open too long, then reduce the number of houses and shorten the hours; but let it be done with fairness, and let any legitimate trader be compensated when he is required to give up his business in what is supposed to be the general interest. In my love for temperance I am not going to be led away into doing an injustice to any man. I am sure no one who supports this Bill will argue that when the number of solicitors in a district is supposed to be in excess of requirements their certificates shall be withdrawn; but let those who vote for an arrangement in which one particular trade is concerned have regard to a general application of the principle which may come home to those who least expect it. It is a principle I cannot agree with, and therefore I shall vote against the Bill.

*(5.7.) MR. COGHILL (Newcastle-under-Lyme)

Speaking as a teetotaler of 13 years' standing, I give a cordial support to the Bill. The control of the issue of new licences has been admitted by the Government in their licensing proposals, by which the issue of such licences was to be suspended. We need not go far beyond the precincts of this House to find that the number of licensed houses is far in excess of requirements. We have nothing to expect from the action of Magistrates in this matter. Very recently there was an instance reported in the Press of how the Justices fail to recognise the local opinion in connection with licences. The Kensington Board were petitioned, and strong representations were made to them against the issue of a licence for a house on the ground that the existing number of houses was excessive, and the particular application was for a house opposite the workhouse, and where it would be a continual source of temptation to the inmates when out of the workhouse. The Chairman declined to refuse a licence because, to use his words, "A few old women could not resist temptation." When it was pointed out that there were a large number of old women, still he said he did not care though they were hundreds. There is not much, then, to expect from the action of Magistrates. We have been told of the tyranny of this proposal, but I assert that it is an application of the true principles of Liberty that when the inhabitants of a locality find in their midst more public houses than should be there, then the opinion of the majority should prevail against the tyranny of an influential minority. We wish to secure freedom from the caprice of Magistrates and the dictation of brewers and publicans, and protection from the evil of intemperance in our midst.

(5.10.) The House divided:—Ayes 185; Noes 179.—(Div. List, No. 91.)

Main Question put, and agreed to.

Bill read a second time, and committed for to-morrow.