HC Deb 31 May 1892 vol 5 cc337-48

Queen's Consent signified (by Order).

THIRD READING.

Order for Third Reading read.

Motion made and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."

(2.9.) MR. THOMAS ELLIS (Merionethshire)

It will be unnecessary for me to take up much time in recommending my Amendment to the House. Several witnesses were brought before the Committee on this Bill, and gave evidence that fishing in the streams running through the common and commonable land had been enjoyed by the inhabitants of the town and district without interference, let, or hindrance from time immemorial. The Chairman and the Committee generally assented to the principle that nothing should be taken away which was now enjoyed by the people of the locality, and assented to the introduction into the Bill of Clause 53, which is intended to safeguard the rights of the inhabitants of the town of Rhayader and district. But I think it came out very clearly in the discussion on Report the other day that the clause as it stood did not safeguard the rights of those inhabitants. I think the Chairman of the Committee (Mr. Campbell-Bannerman) and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain) in that discussion admitted they were willing to maintain all the usages and privileges the people hitherto have had, and the new clause I have to propose does nothing more than safeguard immemorial usage, and maintain for the people of the district a cherished privilege they have always enjoyed, have highly valued, and a continuance of which they look forward to after the Corporation of Birmingham have control over the land. Clause 53, which ostensibly has that object, will, I am afraid, simply lead to litigation, in which the peasants and townsmen would have little chance against the very powerful and distant Corporation of Birmingham, having all the legal weapons ready to carry a matter before a Court of Law. The least, I think, that we can ask the House on behalf of the people is that in the Act the intention of Parliament shall be clearly expressed; and so, without taking up the time of the House further, I move the re-committal of the Bill in order that for Clause 53 may be substituted a clause in the following terms:— The inhabitants of the districts and of the town of Rhayader may continue as heretofore to fish in the Rivers Elan and Claerwen and their tributaries flowing through the manor of Grange and the manor of Builth above the upper end of the upper reservoirs and in the lakes adjacent thereto, to take turbary and to cut fern and rushes over such commonable land without interruption by the Corporation, subject nevertheless to the bye-laws authorised by this Act.

Amendment proposed, to leave out the words "now read the third time," and add the words "re-committed in respect of Clause 53."—(Mr. Thomas Ellis.)

Question proposed, "That the words 'now read the third time' stand part of the Question."

(2.14.) MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN (Birmingham, W.)

The Motion is an unusual one, and the course pursued by the hon. Member is an extremely unusual one in relation to a private Bill which has been carefully considered by an important Hybrid Committee, and has been discussed in the House on more than one occasion. I must remark with some surprise upon the absence of the Chairman of the Committee on this occasion. He, as Chairman, is really responsible for the provisions of the Bill as it left the Committee, and I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman is not here to defend his own proceedings. In earlier discussions upon the Bill, Welsh Members represented that the Corporation intending to become owners of this land might thereby endanger certain rights and privileges hitherto enjoyed by the inhabitants of Rhayader and district; and the Corporation, in reply, stated plainly that their object in obtaining possession was merely to guard the vast interests intrusted to them, and that when called upon by the necessities of the case to spend six millions sterling, it was only reasonable that they should have full security that their work should not be thrown away and their money lost in consequence of proceedings which might endanger the purity of the water. But they said subject to this they were perfectly willing that every right which heretofore had been enjoyed by these people should be continued to them, and accordingly when the matter came before the Committee it was very fully gone into, and not only were witnesses heard who represented the views put forward by hon. Members; but the Hybrid Committee, being unwilling that any doubt should remain as to the justice of their final decision, took the subject into its own hands, and invited the attendance of other witnesses in order to be absolutely certain that the views of the locality should be fully represented. And apparently with regard to all the other matters discussed on the Second Reading, the wishes and desires of the in-habitants were fully satisfied. I was informed by the Chairman of the Committee that the witnesses went away absolutely satisfied with the provisions which the Committee were prepared to introduce into the Bill on their behalf. Then the Committee had to deal with this question of fishing. It should be understood that while undoubtedly there has been a certain amount of fishing—not considerable, but a certain amount of fishing—as to which the Committee called evidence and came to the conclusion—quite independently of the Corporation, and acting entirely on what I believe to be precedents guiding the proceedings of a Committee on a private Bill in such cases — to decline to turn into an absolute legal right that which had heretofore been enjoyed on sufferance; but decided to introduce Clause 53, to which I invite the attention of the House. I am informed that that clause was not prepared by the Corporation of Birmingham; but, on the contrary, it was imposed upon the Corporation by the representatives of local interests as absolutely satisfactory. But hon. Members go much further than those whose interest they profess to represent; and on the Report stage of the Bill they again raised the question, and endeavoured to turn these rights—as to which there is no sort of dispute between us—into absolute possession, contrary to past usage. They endeavoured to do this by inserting the words "and privileges," which we were told might be interpreted into something more than the word "rights." This was resisted by the Corporation and by the Chairman of the Committee, who explained what I have now repeated, and gave the reasons for the decision of the Committee, and then by a large majority the House rejected the proposal. Now, in another form the hon. Member raises what is practically the same Amendment. It is raised with the object of introducing into the Bill rights of a vague character which are not now absolute. The course pursued is unusual and very unfair to the Corporation and the landowners with whom the Corporation have entered into preliminary arrangements. I am by no means certain that any alteration of rights at this stage would not be resented by the landowners, and throw into confusion the arrangements already made. Under the circumstances, I hope the House will maintain the decision already arrived at, and reiterate its rejection of this proposal.

(2.20.) SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE (Exeter)

With reference to an observation of the right hon. Gentleman on the absence of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Stirling Burghs (Mr. Campbell-Bannerman), I beg to say I have received a letter from the right hon. Gentleman, in which he says he expected the Bill to come on yesterday, that he is called out of town to-day, and he has asked me to represent generally, in his absence, the views of the Committee of which I was a Member. We entirely accepted the principle laid down that nothing should be done to take away existing rights; but while we were extremely unwilling to deprive the inhabitants of any privilege of fishing hitherto enjoyed, we felt it was impossible in this Private Bill to convert a privilege into a legal right. In coming to this decision the Committee were unanimous, and I hope the hon. Member may not think it necessary to press the Amendment.

(2.21.) MR. LLOYD-GEORGE (&c.) Carnarvon,

We submit that the right of the public to fish in the Elan and Claerwen should be no more and no less than it has been. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. J. Chamberlain) has stated that Clause 53 was introduced to protect the rights of fishing; but when it comes to a construction of the section nothing can be maintained but actual legal rights, not actual usage, in the past. The position is this: the riparian tenants have the right of fishing in the rivers, and they and their successors would have a freehold of those rights, but these are not the rights of the public we want to preserve. Just as the exercise of a right of way for over twenty years gives a title, so we want to secure that the right of fishing which for the last thirty or forty years the inhabitants have enjoyed without interference from the landowners shall continue in the future as in the past. We recognise the distinction between this right and a strictly legal right, but no landowner has interfered in the past, nor would any landowner deny the right. We wish to ensure that under the new landowners—the Birmingham Corporation—the same right shall continue.

(2.25.) MR. TIMOTHY HEALY (Longford, N.)

I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. J. Chamberlain) in the interest of his Bill, to give a little further consideration to this question. The clause proposed is really much milder than the existing clause. Very properly the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Stafford Northcote) stated that the Committee did not desire to confer rights not already in existence. The Committee were right in that view, and I endorse it. But that is not the position striven for. Nobody is asking for any right to be conferred which is not already in existence. The words of the new clause are: The inhabitants may continue to do things "as heretofore." The rights of the riparian owners, are left exactly as they were, and the arrangements they may make with the Birmingham Corporation will not be affected. Further, the recognition is subject to all the bye-laws the Corporation may make for the object they have in view—namely, the preservation of the purity of the water, and why the Corporation should object I do not know. I think, unless the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to make the concession, his Bill may be placed in a position of considerable peril. The Bill has to pass through the House of Lords, and a Dissolution is impending. If a Petition is lodged against the Bill in the House of Lords it may be that the Bill may have to return to the House of Commons, and so the decision on the Bill may be relegated to a new House of Commons in which the right hon. Gentleman will not have the assistance of his Unionist majority. This is a danger I venture to indicate to the right hon. Gentleman if he takes a too "high-horsical" attitude. I shall be glad to facilitate the progress of the Bill, and have every sympathy with its object—namely, to secure a good water supply for a large district; and I trust that the Corporation may see the advantage of giving a pledge, if they cannot accept the clause in its present form, that they will in another place have some regard to the views put forward by hon. Members near me. The Amendment is a very small one, and I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman would have been the doughtiest champion of public rights on such an occasion. Let me point out this: that the clause as it stands is, unintentionally no doubt, practically illusory in consequence of the use of the word "right." There is no right; there is only a good old custom that the people should fish; and why the Corporation of Birmingham should, on the score of the purity of the water, seek to prevent that I cannot conceive. I see the hon. Member for Bordesley (Mr. Jesse Collings) is about to speak, and I hope he will take up a reasonable position, as he has fought hard for rights and privileges where none existed in the case of the agricultural labourers and others. I hope he will do something to prevent these rights being taken away from people under words which are intended to give a right and do not give one.

(2.33.) MR. JESSE COLLINGS (Birmingham, Bordesley)

The speech of the hon. Gentleman contains a covert threat of Party action, and is, practically, an attempt to coerce the House into acquiescence with the Amendment. The arguments made use of were most extraordinary. The hon. Gentleman had to admit that the practice of fishing was only on sufferance, and he desires to turn this privilege into an absolute right. The hon. Gentleman also said that the difficulty was that the Birmingham Corporation might, under the Bill, make bye-laws, and that in case any pollution took place the inhabitants might find themselves deprived of the fishing. I think the House will admit that in such a case they should be deprived of it.

MR. HEALY

That is what I said; that if there was pollution they would be deprived of it.

(2.37.) MR. JESSE COLLINGS

The sole argument of the Birmingham Corporation and the object of the Committee upstairs was that, after the Corporation had laid out this enormous sum of money to get pure water, it should not be rendered of no avail by the pollution of the water. Anyone who followed the proceedings before the Committee must know that everything that could be met consistently with a supply of pure water was met by the Corporation, and the rights of those interested was met in every way. This Amendment is, in fact, an attempt to throw out the Bill; for if it is re-committed at the present stage of the Session, as it will have to go to the House of Lords, there is no guarantee that it will go through at all. The Welsh people, in whose midst three or four millions will be spent, would be the first to object to that. The Birmingham Corporation are entitled to a great deal of sympathy in the difficult position in which they are placed. For years they have been in a state of anxiety as to their water supply, and now the question is becoming more important and the sources of the supply more precarious. The difficult position which they are in is proved by the fact that they propose such an enormous outlay, which they would not be likely to do if it were not absolutely necessary. The whole question has been thoroughly threshed out during an eighteen days' inquiry in the Committee upstairs; everyone interested has had the fullest opportunity of stating his case; and, therefore, I think the Committee are in a better position to judge as to the desirability of such a clause than we are without any consideration of it. I hope the House will support the decision of the Committee.

(2.40.) MR. WINTERBOTHAM (Gloucester, Cirencester)

I protest against any suggestion that anybody in this House wants to keep the people of Birmingham from having a supply of water. I think the feeling is unanimous that they ought to have it, and to have power to make bye-laws to secure the purity of the water. But I am entirely in sympathy with the Welsh Members, and I think if they did not take every opportunity of protecting the people they represent they would fail in their duty. It is all very well for the hon. Member for Bordesley (Mr. Jesse Collings) to speak of five or six millions being spent, but how much of it will go into the pockets of the Welsh people? You will spend a lot of money in burying pipes underground, and give a great deal to the landowners; but the people we are interested in are those who have enjoyed the fishing. Under the much-abused landlord system they have enjoyed the fishing, and they are afraid that when they are handed over to the Corporation they will be interfered with, and they ask that the privileges they have enjoyed in the past should not be taken away. Is that not a fair and reasonable demand? I hope my hon. Friends will persevere in their duty, and leave no stone unturned to preserve these rights to the people of Wales. The sole reason of the action to-day and on Report is not to defeat the Bill, not to prevent the people of Birmingham having the water, and having it pure, but to maintain the existing privileges and customs of this Welsh district. I hope many hon. Members on the other side will take the same view and support the Amendment.

Question put.

The House divided:—Aves 125; Noes 67.—(Div. List, No. 155.)

Main Question again proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."

(2.52.) SIR HUSSEY VIVIAN (Swansea, District)

I rise to move that this Bill be read a third time this day six months. I have not the slightest intention of divesting the great community of Birmingham of their necessary supply of water, but I represent a far larger community than Birmingham, and one far nearer this water supply than the City of Birmingham. Our population in Glamorganshire and Monmouthshire is increasing at an enormous rate, and there is no population in the United Kingdom which is increasing at anything like the same ratio as that of the mineral districts of South Wales. During the last ten years the population of Glamorganshire has increased by 33.4 per cent., and is now 1,740,000. If that rate of increase is continued, in a hundred years our population will be between ten and twelve millions. It is of the greatest importance that we should be secure of a proper water supply, not only for our present population, but for any future increase. I am quite aware, Sir, that this matter has been investigated by a strong Committee upstairs, and that, therefore, we labour under a great disadvantage in bringing forward any question of this kind on the Third Reading. But our case was not brought before that Committee in any formal manner. By the courtesy of the Committee—which I desire to acknowledge—the hon. Member for Merionethshire (Mr. Thomas Ellis) and myself were invited to give evidence and state our views. But the House, with a long experience of the way matters are fought out before Committees, will appreciate that the evidence of two witnesses called in that manner would not produce the same effect as witnesses of various kinds—experts and others—led by eminent counsel, were likely to produce on such a Committee. My hon. Friend stated the case of Wales generally, and I stated the case, so far as I was able, of the mineral districts of South Wales. What I desire to point out is that while the district which is sought to be taken by Birmingham is eighty miles distant from that city, that district is only fifty miles distant from the centre of the great mineral district of the North. The population of the district of Birmingham is not increasing in any degree in the same ratio that our population is increasing. As I said before, it is highly probable that in a comparatively short period our population will be some millions; and standing here as I do, more or less representing Glamorganshire and Chairman of the County Council, it must be admitted that our first duty is not only to protect the interest of our present constituencies, but also the interest of those that may come after us, even by a long distance. I would point out to the House that the areas of the clean gathering ground—that is, the areas of the gathering ground above the range of cultivation—are comparatively limited, and that in this instance the Corporation of Birmingham propose to secure for themselves for ever an area of not less than forty-five thousand acres of clean gathering ground. Then, again, it is nearer to us than to them. I must point out also that the sites of the reservoirs are also extremely limited. You cannot in many cases catch the water, because of the elevated land; and then, again, another element is the altitude at which you can construct these reservoirs. Some of our districts, containing the most dense populations, lie at a very considerable elevation, between seven hundred and eight hundred feet, and you will require, therefore, to establish the reservoirs for the supply of that population at a level that will reach the population by gravitation. Now, that is one of the important elements of this scheme which is proposed, that we are enabled by the favourable character of the gathering ground and of the reservoir ground to intercept the water is such an elevation as would bring it to their town, and also bring it to the great mass of their population. It is very difficult to select a place where the same favourable conditions exist as exist in this particular spot which has been selected by Birmingham. What we desire is that before this large area is allocated to one community there should be a careful and impartial investigation of the whole of the water-producing areas of that part of Wales. We believe that there are large areas lying at a point nearer to Birmingham, which would not be so near to us, which would be perfectly capable of supplying Birmingham with all the water which they require. We also are informed, by a statement which has been circulated to hon. Members to-day, that the present water supply of Birmingham is amply sufficient for their immediate wants, and had been very much understated to the Committee. I observe from the statement which has been circulated to-day that the amount of water at present available for Birmingham is twenty and a quarter millions of gallons daily, whereas the consumption is there stated to be fifteen millions; but I see that by the evidence before the Committee that it was also stated at seventeen millions. This statement also points to the fact that the whole amount available for Birmingham at present is twenty-eight millions of gallons daily, and that they have a surplus of something like thirteen millions; so that really there is no pressing necessity for this present large scheme which Birmingham has instituted. As I said before, we have no desire to prevent the great community of Birmingham from being properly supplied with water, but what we desire is that this matter should be judicially and impartially investigated before this great area is allocated to Birmingham. I beg to move the rejection of the Third Reading of this Bill.

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

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

Bill read the third time, and passed.