§ MR. T. W. RUSSELLI rise to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister a question of which I have given him private Notice. The right hon. Gentleman, in a speech which he made yesterday, said—
It singularly happens that in 1886, in proposing the Irish Government Bill, we did face this very question, and we did state that if the 80 inhabitants of the North-East corner of Ireland, forming a very small and limited portion indeed of the general community, were resolutely desirous of being exempted from the operation of that Act, we should be prepared to entertain a proposal to that effect, and I believe we made that declaration with the general concurrence of those who are termed the Nationalist Party.I now desire to ask the right hon. Gentleman to refer me to any authority for that statement. In the second place, I desire to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, seeing that Mr. Parnell, who was then the Leader of the Irish Party, repeatedly said that Ireland could not spare the services of one single Irishman, upon what basis the right hon. Gentleman has stated that the proposal to which he referred met with the general concurrence of the Irish Party.
§ MR. SEXTONI rise to Order. I desire to ask whether this complicated argument of the hon. Member is a matter which can be dealt with in the form of a question?
§ MR. SPEAKERI have not seen or heard the question before. I think that the hon. Member should have compressed his question into narrower limits, and should have confined it to asking the right hon. Gentleman upon what grounds he based his statement.
§ MR. SEXTONThen, Mr. Speaker, will you request the hon. Member to submit the question for your approval?
§ *MR. SPEAKERI gather that the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister is prepared to answer the question now.
§ MR. W. E. GLADSTONEI am quite prepared to answer the question. I will give the hon. Member two references. The first and main reference is Hansard, vol. 370, pp. 1,053 and 1,054, in which my statement of 1886 is contained; and, secondly, to vol. 372, pp. 1,219 and 1,220, where a passage is given in which I stated that we had never receded from that original statement. Then the hon. Member asked me what authority I had for saying that that proposal was received with general concurrence by the Irish Nationalists. I rather think that what I said was "concurrence or acquiescence," because I thought at the time that "concurrence" was a rather strong expression.
§ MR. T. W. RUSSELLI quoted from the report of the right hon. Gentleman's statement in The Times.
§ MR. W. E. GLADSTONEI am pretty certain that I used the words "concurrence or acquiescence." My impression was that the Irish Party did acquiesce in the adoption of even so extreme a proposal, provided by means of it they could open a road to peace in their country. What I understood Mr. Parnell's language to mean was an earnest deprecation of such a proposal, speaking in the same spirit by which O'Connell was always governed in his great desire to see that Ireland should move in unison. I most cordially concur in the statement that Mr. Parnell would not be opposed to such a proceeding, provided it were found that it offered concord to Ireland instead of the present painful disagreement.