EVICTED TENANTS (IRELAND) ARBITRATION BILL.

HC Deb 27 July 1894 vol 27 cc1146-218

COMMITTEE. [Progress, 26th July.]

Bill considered in Committee.

(In the Committee.)

Clause 1.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 6, after the word "determined," to insert the words "otherwise than for breach of statutory conditions 2 to 6."—(Mr. Barton.)

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

Debate resumed.

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

said, whatever might be the opinion of some hon. Members as to the Amendments upon this Bill, he believed that when the House came to consider this Amendment they would find it one of substance, and he confessed he was not able to understand why it was that the Government resisted it. The only reason he had heard advanced against this Amendment by the supporters of the Bill was that the exact words of the Bill were taken bodily from the 13th section of the Act of 1891. He submitted that that was not a sufficient reason for the rejection of the Amendment. Section 13 of the Act of 1881 was undoubtedly passed in respect of tenants who had been evicted for non-payment of rent. He said that was beyond all question. Nobody contemplated when that measure passed any other eviction save that which followed from non-payment of rent. Another important fact to be borne in mind was that every line of the 13th section was liable to be construed by the Courts of Law; but so far as he understood the particular section of the Bill now before them, not a line of it could come before any tribunal except that of which Mr. Piers White was to be the head. That made a great difference between the two clauses. Again, the Government expressly declared that they meant the arbitrators to have power to include other evictions. That was to say, they might include every other eviction than those for non-payment of rent. That completely differentiated the two sections. What were the statutory conditions to which his hon. and learned Friend who moved the Amendment referred? The first was as to the payment of rent, and, of course, that was set aside by the Bill itself. The other statutory conditions for breach of which a tenant might be evicted were waste, sub-letting or subdivision of holding, bankruptcy, interference with the landlord's right of re-entry, and erecting a public-house upon the holding. Surely it was not contended that if tenants were put out of their holdings for breach of any of these statutory conditions that then Mr. Piers White, Mr. George Fottrell, and Mr. Greer should have the power to reinstate them? He could not see any ground for that, and he had been trying to find out what it was that influenced the Government in opposing an Amendment like this. The only reason he could find was in the second statutory condition. A state of circumstances such as these would be possible under the second statutory condition. He took a farmer on any Plan of Campaign estate who had not been evicted—and there were certain farmers allowed to pay their rents because of certain conditions. Suppose that farmer allowed his farm to be used for the purpose of Land League huts being erected upon it—which had happened on five or six different estates—he could be evicted for breach of the second statutory condition entitled "persistent waste." In that case, of course, the owners of the land who had allowed farms to be used in this way would be entitled to get the benefit of this Bill. Apart from that one question he could not find a single reason for the Chief Secretary refusing to accept the Amendment of his hon. and learned Friend. He said that this Bill first of all contemplated evictions that were due to the non-payment of rent. That was the whole scope of the Bill when it was read a second time, and it was those evictions that had caused the administrative and social difficulty upon which the Chief Secre- tary had dwelt all through. Surely the right hon. Gentleman did not mean to say that tenants put out of occupation because of breaches of any of the statutory conditions laid down in the Act of 1881 were the tenants he had in his mind when he entered upon the consideration of this question? It never once occurred to the Mathew Commission; it never once occurred to the Chief Secretary; and he could not understand why the right hon. Gentleman should resist an Amendment of substance like this, and which was reasonable in character.

MR. CARSON (Dublin University)

said, as they had passed from the original tenants who were evicted for non-payment of rent into those other cases of title affecting the landlord's property, he thought it would be well for the Committee to understand what were the safeguards enacted by the Act of 1881, so as to prevent any injustice resulting to the tenant by reason of a breach of the statutory conditions which would entitle the landlord to evict. As the hon. Member for South Tyrone had just said, one of the statutory conditions was that if the tenant should not commit persistent waste by the dilapidation of buildings, or such waste as led to the detorioration of the soil. What the Committee were asked to do was to say that where a tenant had committed persistent waste, or where, after notice to desist from the particular waste which was deteriorating the soil had been given to him, he had still gone on and persisted in deteriorating the soil, and had in consequence been evicted, he should be put back. That was only one matter. Let him point out other protection which was given to the tenant so as to prevent injustice being done in exercising this right and putting him out for breach of the statutory conditions. The landlord, before he could give effect to his right at all, had to serve 12 months' notice of eviction on the tenant, and during that year the tenant had a right to apply to the Land Commission Court to restrain all proceedings if he could show to the Court that he had not done any injury to the holding, or if he was willing to pay compensation for any injury which he was shown to have done. On payment of such a sum as would repair the damage which was proved to have been done, all proceedings to put him out were at an end. They had, therefore, had a Court to which the tenant was enabled to apply for the purpose of getting rid of his own default in relation to the statutory conditions, and they must assume that where the tenants had any case they had applied to the Court, that the Court had laid down special terms on which they might stay in the holdings, and these terms had been disregarded by the tenants. The Committee were now asked by this temporary Commission, of which Mr. Piers White was to be President, to overrule these terms which had been laid down by the Land Court, and—whether the terms had been carried out by the tenant or not, or where the tenant had persisted in committing waste, deteriorating the soil, that he was unable to go to the Court to ask to be relieved of his default—to say that that was a case in which the landlord, after some eight or ten years, ought to take him back to his holding. If cases of that kind were to be allowed for one moment to be raised in Ireland they would have innumerable tenants in future disregarding these statutory conditions, and relying upon the House of Commons itself, by ex post facto legislation, giving them relief from what was practically their own default. The hon. Member for South Tyrone said that cases would arise where a tenant had built huts for sheltering evicted tenants. Of course, such cases would arise. He knew of a case where not only were houses built on the property, but the houses that were already there for the purpose of working the holdings were converted into separate huts for evicted tenants, and the whole structure of the houses changed. In this case the landlord exercised his right under the section of the Act of 1881, and the tenants had no ground whatsoever to go before the Land Commission to get relief, it being an act of the most persistent waste in relation to the dilapidation of buildings. The sole reason for which they were asked to over-ride the section of the Act of 1881 was to allow any tenants who, through their own wilful default, had taken away all the powers practically of the Land Commission, to get rid of the breaches of the statutory conditions. One of the inducements to Parliament to pass the Act of 1881, enabling tenants to get fair rents fixed, was that these statutory conditions should be regarded; but if the Government did not accept this Amendment, the result would be that in future the tenants would completely disregard them.

MR. T. M. HEALY

said, both the hon. Member for South Tyrone and the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Dublin University had said that there were innumerable cases where a tenancy was determined for a breach of statutory conditions. He would ask him to cite just one little one. One case was tried against a parish priest on the Lansdowne Estate, and, speaking from recollection, he thought that Lord Lansdowne failed in his ejectment proceedings, and then had to take proceedings in Chancery; but neither the tenancy of the parish priest or of any tenant in Ireland had been touched for a breach of the statutory conditions. He pointed out that the Amendment dealt only with tenancies from year to year, and, therefore, leaseholders were to be put under superior conditions to tenants from year to year, with regard to these statutory conditions. Personally, he should have no objection to the acceptance of this Amendment but for one reason—namely, that if they accepted this they must accept any other Amendment pointed to real or supposed possibilities, and thus they would sever themselves from the safe anchorage of saying that they would let all these cases of hardship or grievance, right or wrong, be tried by this tribunal. The Government had appointed a Commission which they regarded as a safe tribunal, and to this Commission the matter should be left. Under these circumstances, if any other course were adopted by the Government than that of opposing the Amendment, they would find themselves getting back into the Home Rule Debates of last year, when it was proposed to debar the Irish Parliament from committing all the sins in the Decalogue. Members of the Tory Party might propose that the Bill should not apply in the case of a tenant with red hair, or a lame leg, or of a tenant who had been in America or Australia. He did not consider Amendments like this were aimed at the removal of any just grievance, but only proposed with the object of producing a result which they saw last night when the Member for West Birmingham sat down and, rubbing himself with evident enjoyment, after having wasted a quarter of an hour, turned round to receive the congratulations of his friends. Under these circumstances, he could not advise the Government to accept any Amendment which would give that right hon. Gentleman an opportunity of again turning round to receive the congratulations of his friends.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN (Birmingham, W.)

Last night the hon. and learned Member for Louth said the House of Commons was not a school. Perhaps, Sir, that is the reason why he has no manners. Sir, he has just made a very important admission upon which I wish to base an appeal to the Government. We have been discussing this question for some hours, and may continue to discuss it for some hours more, because it is undoubtedly a very important question of principle. In the course of those discussions the principal opponent we have met with is the hon. and learned Member for Louth, and he has just told the Committee that all this opposition to our proposal is only for the reasons which he has given, and that, upon the merits of the Amendment, he sees no possible objection to it. I put that to the Government. We propose an Amendment to which the strongest advocate that can be found on the Government side in Committee sees no objection. Does not the Chief Secretary see that, at any rate, in such cases as this, he would be shortening the proceedings by giving way. Neither he nor anyone else can suggest that the acceptance of the Amendment would do the slightest harm to any living person. We have pointed out a number of cases in which the refusal to accept the Amendment would do harm. [An hon. MEMBER: You pointed out no case.] That is a contradiction, but it is not an argument. There are a number of cases in which you might do injustice. Not a single case has been referred to on the other side, and it is perfectly evident from the last statement of the hon. and learned Gentleman that such cases cannot be found. What is to be the conduct of the Government on the rest of this discussion? The hon. and learned Member for Louth, who seems to direct the proceedings—he directs the Chair; he directs the Government, and he would like very much to direct us—

MR. T. M. HEALY

The day has gone by when I used to.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I can remember the time when the hon. and learned Gentleman was in very different relations, and when he was a suppliant for favours. But I do not see that that is relevant to the Amendment. The hon. and learned Gentleman suggests to the Government that they should refuse any Amendment which we propose—however reasonable it is, and however impossible it maybe to find any objection to it—on the ground that if they accept our Amendments we shall devote ourselves to proposing a perfectly idiotic series of Amendments such as the hon. and learned Member suggested. We are not going to do anything of the sort, and we are not going to take his advice. But I do ask the Government, if they wish to help us to bring this discussion to a close, at all events to accept an Amendment to which their own side sees no objection, and which we have seriously pressed upon them.

MR. SEXTON (Kerry, N.)

said, the right hon. Gentleman must not suppose they had such short memories as to believe that the acceptance of Amendments would help to bring the discussion to a close. They knew, on the contrary, that the acceptance of Amendments last year was used by the Opposition as a justification for obstruction and a reason for moving further Amendments. He therefore warned the Government to be very careful how they accepted any Amendment, because undoubtedly it would immediately be used—no matter how devoid of merits the Amendment might be—by the right hon. Gentleman and those who followed him as an argument for justifying prolonged Debate and indulging in further obstruction. The only right the tenant would have under the paragraph of the clause to which exception was taken by the Opposition was to petition the arbitrators, and the powers of determining what should be done remained with the arbitrators, and it was a dangerous thing to insert words which might afterwards have the effect of inflicting hardship by exclusion. The right hon. Gentleman had staled that cases had been cited in which the refusal of this Amendment would inflict hardship on the landlords, but he did not remember a solitary case being cited. Although it was true that breaches of the statutory conditions of the Act of 1881 had been rare, there were cases in which the insertion of the words of the Amendment might inflict serious hardship on the tenant. His hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Healy), in opposing the Amendment, had spoken not merely for himself, but, as far as he was aware, the opinion of all the Irish Members. The third of the statutory conditions of the Act of 1881 stated that a tenant should not erect on his holding any dwelling-house otherwise than in substitution for those already on the holding at the time of the passing of this Act. Would the Committee observe that under this statutory condition, if a tenant had at any time during the late struggle allowed an outhouse to be used as a shelter for his homeless neighbour, or allowed a hut of any kind to be erected on his farm to shelter men, women, and children who had been evicted, that man would have been guilty of a breach of the statutory conditions, and for that breach could be evicted? Would the Committee say—would the hon. Member for South Tyrone say that that man should be denied the right to petition the arbitrators? He respectfully submitted that if that man were evicted for such an act he should not be shut out from the benefits of this Bill. There was also another case. It was a breach of the statutory conditions to cut turf except what was required for the use of the holding, and on such a trumpery question as that a tenant might be evicted for a breach of the statutory conditions. Would anyone contend that he ought to be shut out? A tenant evicted for a breach of the statutory conditions lost his right to compensation for disturbance, and the sale of his tenancy was not of any use to him. Such a man would have suffered a grievous hardship, and he thought he had made it clear that in such a case a tenant should be entitled to the benefits of the Bill.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir R. T. REID, Dumfries, &c.) said, the right hon. Member for West Birmingham had very justly observed that they had been discussing this matter for several hours. Under these circumstances, it would be admitted that the Government had already stated their views in regard to the Amendment, so that it was unnecessary to repeat them. It had been stated that the Amendment could do no harm, and, on the other hand, it could do no good. That being so, the Government were happy to have a rock upon which to build themselves in the concluding words of the 13th section of the Land Act of 1891, which were derived from the highest authority, and it seemed to him that it would be unwise if they were to depart from a precedent of that kind, especially when fortified by the good reasons given by the hon. Member for North Kerry.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR (Manchester, E.)

failed to see how the arguments of the hon. Member for Kerry had fortified the case of the Government. The hon. Member had told the Committee there were certain breaches of the statutory conditions, such as sheltering a homeless family in an outhouse or cutting turf from a bog, which would justify the landlord in expelling a tenant, and that a tenant so expelled clearly belonged to that class whom this Bill was intended to benefit. As his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Dublin University had pointed out, the existing land legislation in Ireland had made ample provision against any technical abuse of these statutory conditions by the landlord, and such cases as had been suggested could not possibly arise. By their own confession the Government had said that they did not mean the Bill to extend to that class of tenants who had committed such breaches of the statutory conditions as to cause the landlord to expel them. If that was their intention it should be expressed on the face of the Bill. The Government, they had always known, trusted to the votes of the Irish Members below the Gangway for carrying through their Parliamentary programme. It now appeared they not only trusted to their votes, but to their arguments, leaving the whole burden of supporting the Bill to the gentlemen from Ireland, not only in the Lobby, but in debate. No one recognised more genuinely than he the great ability of the hon. Member for Kerry, but he did not think that hon. Gentleman succeeded in dealing with this question, and he would express the hope even now that they might have from the Government some argument of their own.

MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER

rose, when—

Mr. J. MORLEY rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Question put, "That the Question be now put."

The Committee divided:—Ayes 175; Noes 119.—(Division List, No. 194.)

Question put accordingly, "That those words be there inserted."

The Committee divided:—Ayes 131; Noes 177.—(Division List, No. 195.)

MR. W. KENNY (Dublin, St. Stephen's Green)

said, he would move to insert after "determined," in the first sub-section of the clause, the words "otherwise than by voluntary surrender," so that the first part of the clause would read "where the tenancy of a holding in Ireland has been determined otherwise than by voluntary surrender." He trusted that the Government would not consider the warning thrown out by the hon. Member for Kerry on the last Amendment, and would see no reason for objecting to this Amendment. In the discussion of that Amendment it was said that there would be cases of hardship if the proposal were accepted; but it would be impossible for cases of hardship to arise under his Amendment, which would raise the question whether the case of a man who had voluntarily surrendered his holding to the landlord should come within the sub-section and have the right of reinstatement. Cases in which tenancy had been determined by voluntary agreement ought, he thought, to be excluded from the operation of the Bill, and no injustice would be done by such exclusion. There were three classes of cases in which there had been voluntary surrender. First, the most ordinary case, in 1880 or 1881, in which the tenant found his holding burdensome—found that even after he had got a fair rent fixed it did not pay to remain on it. The tenant in this class of case had gone to the landlord for reasons other than high rent and had said, "For a certain sum," or "If you will forgive me the arrears of rent I will surrender the holding to you," and the land had accordingly been surrendered. In a case of that sort to say that at the end of 12 or 13 years the old tenant was to be allowed to return and say to the landlord, "I have a right to be reinstated." Another class of case was that of the middleman, who, under the eighth section of the Act of 1887, had the right to surrender his holding when the rent he paid the landlord was greater than the rent paid by the tenants to him. This was a case which had occurred more than once. In such a case where the middleman had actually given up the land to the landlord and the landlord had resumed possession should the middleman be allowed the benefit of the provisions of this Bill? Thirdly, there was the case where the tenant's house being burnt, or "rendered incapable of beneficial enjoyment," he could, under the Act of 1860, surrender the holding. He wished to know whether the Government intended that these cases, or any of them, should come within the purview of the Bill, bearing in mind that in each instance the landlord might have been in possession for many years and might have incurred considerable expense? He thought this point ought to be raised and decided at the very outset, not only for the guidance of the arbitrators, but that unnecessary costs to the landlord hereafter might be avoided.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 6, after the word "determined," to insert the words "otherwise than by voluntary surrender."—(Mr. W. Kenny.)

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

SIR J. RIGBY

said, it was obviously important that cases of hardship should not be shut out where the equity was in favour of the tenant who had ceased to hold rather than that they should exclude possible cases which the arbitrators might deal with themselves. There must be many cases of great hardship in which tenancies had been voluntarily surrendered. Let them take the case in which a man had for years struggled against the burden of an exorbitant and unjust rent, and at last found it impossible to go on. No doubt it was a very awkward predicament that he was in having either to continue to his ruin to keep up his tenancy—his only means of livelihood—or to give it up, and no doubt many people in that position made what the law would call a "voluntary" surrender, but what, in fact, was the giving up of the last plank of safety because it could no longer be retained. Doubtless many of these tenants would say, "I have struggled to pay this unjust rent, and the Legislature has not come to my assistance. I am bound to go because my means of raising the rent are altogether exhausted." There must be many such cases, and he thought they were eminently of a character that ought to be brought within the purview of a Bill of this kind. The hon. Member had referred to the case of the middleman—not a common one—the case of the man who availed himself of the means afforded by the Act of 1860 to get rid of what was to him a damnosa hæeditas, from the fact that he was paying a larger rent to the landlord than he received from those actually occupying the land. There might be cases of the kind, but could the Committee imagine such a man desiring to get the land back again? At any rate, the introduction of the words of the Amendment into the Bill would of necessity exclude numerous cases in which no one, considering the actual circumstances, would wish to exclude the claimants. That would be against what the Government had already said, and there were special reasons why the Amendment could not be accepted.

MR. MACARTNEY (Antrim, S.)

said, the Attorney General had practically stated that a tenant who had surrendered his holding years ago on account of what was presumed to be exorbitant rent would come within the purview of the Bill, and he had assumed that it would be the task of the arbitrators to inquire into all the various difficulties under which the tenant laboured and was unable to pay his rent. The hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to have forgotten that the Chief Secretary had told them that the labours of the arbitration would be comparatively short, and that they would deal with the cases in groups. He (Mr. Macartney) could not imagine how the case set up by the hon. and learned Gentleman to the Committee as a reason for opposing the Amendment was to be sustained, because it was evident that if the tribunal were to consider the case of the tenant who had surrendered by reason of any exorbitant rent, it would have to go into an Inquiry, compared to which the function of the Land Commission would be a trifle. He observed that the hon. and learned Gentleman—indeed, everybody on the Front Bench—arrogated to themselves the right of setting up any number of supposititious cases against every Amendment; but if a possible case were mentioned by their opponents they objected. As to the case suggested by the Attorney General, no one had imagined during the First or Second Reading that such a case would come under the Bill.

MR. FLYNN (Cork, N.)

said, the effect of the Amendment would be to exclude from the benefits of the Bill a class of deserving tenants to whom the sympathy of the Committee ought to be extended.

MR. J. LOWTHER

said, he thought some fresh light would be thrown upon this matter. It now appeared, from the statement of the Attorney General, that the Government meant to benefit tenants who had voluntarily surrendered their holdings, perhaps many years ago. That announcement was calculated to make the Committee pause. The Bill was introduced with the object of removing what was alleged to be a social difficulty in Ireland, and that object was to be effected by facilitating the reinstatement of evicted tenants in the holdings they formerly occupied. He disapproved strongly of any such plan, and thought that persons who had been evicted, especially those who had been evicted for causes within their own control, ought not to receive boons under Acts of Parliament. Their position would then serve as a useful object-lesson to other tenants. This plan, of which he disapproved, but which had been sanctioned by the House by the Second Reading of the Bill, it was now proposed to extend, and other than evicted tenants were to be benefited. The financial provision made in the Bill must be insufficient to meet the additional demands that would be made upon the funds at the disposal of the arbitrators. He acquitted the Government of having sought to deceive, nevertheless the Bill, in the circumstances which had now developed, was a fraud upon Parliament. He feared that unless this Amendment were agreed to demands would be made before long upon the British taxpayer for additional funds. Against any such demands he should protest in the name of his constituents. He should not be deterred from fulfilling what he believed to be his duty to his constituents by the interruptions of any gentleman who combined disorder with discourtesy.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 144; Noes 190.—(Division List, No. 196.)

VISCOUNT WOLMER

moved an Amendment which he said had the object of excluding from the scope of the Bill cases in which the tenant's interest had been purchased by the landlord. That class of cases would include the case of a tenant who, having no dispute with his landlord, got into difficulties with a creditor. In such a case the landlord might purchase the tenant's interest. Again, a tenant might choose to vacate his holding, and put his tenant-right up to auction, when it might be bought by the landlord. He could not see how it could be said to be justice to reinstate a man in such circumstances.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 6, after the word "determined," to insert the words "otherwise than on a purchase by the landlord of the tenant's interest."—(Viscount Wolmer.)

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

SIR R. T. REID

said, his noble Friend wished to provide that wherever there was a purchase by the landlord of the tenant's interest no relief should be given. In answer to that, he would only refer to the case of a landlord proceeding by fi. fa., and putting the tenancy up to auction and buying it for an old song. It was quite impossible to accept the Amendment.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, the hon. and learned Gentleman took the case of a tenancy sold for a nominal sum under a fi. fa. Why was it sold for a nominal sum?

SIR R. T. REID

Because there is no competition.

MR. A.J. BALFOUR

Why is there no competition?

SIR R. T. REID

made an observation which did not reach the Reporters' Gallery.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

An admirable answer! A tradesman sells up a tenant's interest, and because the tenant has combined with others in what hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway call disapproval of the landlord's conduct, and has therefore deprived himself of his interest in the farm, he is to obtain relief under this Bill. If the tenant's interest is sold for a nominal sum, no human being is to be blamed except the leaders of the agitation in Ireland. On their heads lies the blame, and out of their pocket should come the money. They should not come for relief to the Irish Government and to the British taxpayer, who is the person who stands behind the Irish Government. If they choose to take this course in the exercise of what they conceive to be their public duty, let them bear the cost and let them not come down to this House and ask us to bear the cost. We have been engaged for some time in trying to make this Bill consistent with the Orders of the House. It was laid down by the Chairman, and I think he has not been contradicted by any other authority, that at the present moment the Bill is not in Order, and that either by altering the title or altering the Bill it is absolutely necessary it should be brought into Order. We have been trying to make the substance of the Bill conform to the title. I believe the Government prefer to make the title conform to the Bill. I am curious to know what the new title of the Bill is to be, and I ask the Government to tell us, before we proceed with these Amendments, how they propose to make the title accord with the Bill? They have deliberately refused to accept our Amendments, excluding voluntary surrenders, and excluding purchase and all the rest of it, and I wish to know what form of words they propose to introduce into the title so as to bring the measure into conformity with the Standing Orders of the House? They have had a whole night and a whole day to think of it, and they might possibly shorten the discussion by making an announcement. At all events, we have a right to know what is the title their ingenuity suggests for adequately covering the provisions of their own measure.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

said, he quite understood why the Government could not accept the Amendment, and if he held their views he should resist it. The Solicitor General had talked about Members introducing all sorts of absurd exemptions. He would advise his hon. and learned Friend not to lose his temper so early, and not to indulge in language of that kind, because, after all, what Members of the Opposition had been doing since the Debate commenced had been trying to keep the Bill within the lines of its title. Of course, if this Amendment were carried one-half of the evicted tenants in Ireland would not have any ground whatever for going into the Court, and this was the real reason why the Government ought to oppose the Amendment. Nearly all these men were trespassers, and therefore if the Amendment were carried they would be put out of court. As to the value of tenant-right, the real reason why the landlord was able to buy the tenant's interest for an old song was that the authors of the Plan of Campaign, who had brought about these evictions for political purposes, would not allow the competitive value of the interest to be obtained in the open market. The proof of this was that, whenever tenant-right was sold outside the area of the agitation it fetched a fancy price. In the province of Ulster as much as £20 an acre was sometimes obtained for tenant-right, and it had been given in evidence upstairs that £40 an acre had been obtained for it. Gentlemen opposite having rendered nugatory the free sale clauses of the Land Act, and having thus robbed the tenants of their interest, asked Parliament to end their work and to put the tenants in the same position as that which they occupied before those hon. Members interfered.

MR. SEXTON (Kerry, N.)

said, that no one could listen to any speech delivered by the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down without being convinced that the hon. Member was not able to give the Solicitor General any lessons in the art of keeping one's temper. As to the inquiry of the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. A. J. Balfour) respecting the title of the Bill, he (Mr. Sexton) had never yet heard that a discussion in Committee on the clauses of a Bill could be interrupted for the purpose of amending the title. The time to amend the title would not be reached until the completion of the proceedings of the Committee. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. A. J. Balfour) was six years Chief Secretary for Ireland, and in that time he might have learnt that tradesmen in Ireland did not pursue the tenants by means of writs of fieri facias. The cases in which they did so were extremely rare. A man in Ireland had to arrange with his creditors as he had to do with his landlord, the only difference being that while the creditor was willing to accept fair terms the landlord was not. As to the question why landlords were able to buy tenants' interests for a small price, the hon. Member opposite (Mr. T. W. Russell) thought he improved his argument by proving the high value of the tenant-right. As a matter of fact, the high value of the tenant-right proved the universality of the detestation in which the landlord's conduct was held by the community. It was because the community was convinced that the landlord's conduct had been cruel and exacting that people refused to enter into competition with him. These cases had arisen before the Plan of Campaign came into existence, and people so execrated the landlords who sold the tenant-right that nobody would have any part in the sale except the landlord. The tenant, therefore, suffered as great a hardship as if he had been evicted.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

I do not know whether the Government are going to take the hon. Member for Kerry (Mr. Sexton) as their universal provider of answers. I put to them a question, and the hon. Member for Kerry has decided that this is not the proper time to answer it. I cannot agree with him in that respect. We had a promise from the Chief Secretary (Mr. J. Morley) last night that we should have an announcement, not to-day, but soon, on a subject which is of some interest. With regard to the argument the hon. Gentleman has just addressed to us, he has, after all, confirmed all I said to the Committee except that we still differ on the question whether tradesmen proceed by writ of fi. fa. or not. I say that such cases are not so few in number as to be unworthy the consideration of the House. The hon. Gentleman has not at all denied that the absence of value in tenant-right in other parts of Ireland than Ulster is due to what amounts to the general conspiracy which prevails in other parts of Ireland. I accept that statement from so high an authority. I should like to point out that a more extraordinary way of showing disapproval of the landlord's conduct than that of allowing him to purchase the tenant's interest for almost nothing and refusing to let the tenant sell his interest for what it is worth I never heard of. Nothing equals it except the burning of the Irish banker's notes in order to show disapproval of the Irish banker's politics.

MR. SEXTON

said, the right hon. Gentleman did not appear to see that if people had competed with the landlord for the purchase of the tenant-right they would have allowed him to receive an unjust rent.

SIR R. T. REID

I rose with the hon. Member for Kerry, but gave way to him. I will communicate to the Chief Secretary what the right hon. Gentleman has just said. I think he will be in the House before long. Probably, under these circumstances, we shall now be allowed to go to a Division.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 143; Noes 198.—(Division List, No. 197.)

MR. BARTON

said, he hoped the Government would accept the Amendment he had now to move, and he did not see on what ground they could reject it. It was after the word "determined," to insert the words— otherwise than in pursuance of an order of a Judge of the High Court of Justice where a Receiver has been appointed. In the case of an estate managed by the Land Judge in the interests of mortgages the Judge would have to consider before making an order of ejectment whether it was right and proper to do so. It was a distinct rule in the Land Judge's Court that a receiver might not bring an action of ejectment except practically in open court. He put it to the Committee whether a man ejected under these circumstances ought to be allowed to claim the right of reinstatement and thus override the judgment of the Court. Such a case could not be a case of unjust rent or a case in which a landlord had exercised a discretion imprudently or unreasonably, because injustice could be prevented in more ways than one. Was the Committee prepared to bring about a conflict of jurisdiction, as it might do if it refused to adopt this Amendment, between the High Court and the new tribunal to be set up under this Bill? This was a matter which the Government ought to take into consideration. He would ask them to consider the case of an infant, say, a girl of eight or 10 years, whose estate was being administered and in which the Lord Chancellor would have full discretion. If that was so, was it fair or reasonable in such cases as these to override the orders of Judges of the High Court? He asked the Government to consider the interests of persons who were well deserving the consideration of the House. Surely the Committee was not going to raise up this conflict of jurisdiction, and he appealed to the Government to give their serious consideration to this important point of the arbitrators overriding the High Court.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 6, after the word "determined," to insert the words— Otherwise than in pursuance of an order of a Judge of the High Court of Justice where a Receiver has been appointed by the High Court."—(Mr. Barton.)

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

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

asked whether Mr. Justice Monroe, of the Land Court, who had charge of 1,400 estates, including a large number of tenants, was to have his decisions set aside by Mr. Fottrell and Mr. Greer? He invited the Committee to take in illustration the case of a tenant who, in spite of the reduction of rent and the forgiving and wiping-out of arrears, had been turned out by the Judge's order. That occurred very frequently indeed. What did the Bill propose? It proposed that these arbitrators should override Mr. Justice Monroe. Surely the Government were not in earnest in making so monstrous a proposal. Where would they, after this, get new tenants to take these farms if the arbitrators were to override the orders of the Judges armed with authority by Parliament? He believed they would bring the whole machinery of the Land Judges Court to a standstill. Surely the Government, even in their enthusiasm for reinstating evicted tenants, could not propose to override the decision of a Judge of the High Court. It was one thing to deal with Lord Clanricarde; it was another thing to deal with Mr. Justice Monroe and interfere with his work as a Judge.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

Mr. Mellor, I see the hon. and learned Member for Louth in his place, and I desire to make a personal explanation of some words which I used with regard to him at an earlier period of the evening. In answer to an interruption on the part of the hon. and learned Member, I said that the time was past when he was a suppliant for favours, or something to that effect. The hon. and learned Gentleman is of opinion that these words of mine may be misconstrued, and that a meaning may be attached to them which I certainly did not intend to convey. Therefore, I ask the leave of the Committee to say that I did not intend to impute to him that he would have accepted favours which it would be dishonourable for him to accept. I will only add that, although the hon. and learned Member and myself have been bitterly opposed to each other, I never thought of attributing to him anything of a dishonourable character.

MR. T. M. HEALY

I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman. I admit my remark was of a provocative character, and I also desire to withdraw it.

MR. CARSON

, in supporting the Amendment, asked whether it was proposed by Government to give these temporary confiscators practical power to turn a Judge of the High Court out of property he was administering either for the benefit of creditors, minors, or other persons whose interests he was bound to protect? That was practically what they were going to do, and it would create serious conflict between the arbitrators and the Judges of the High Court. Where tenants had been turned out for non-payment of rent, and the property was sold, the Land Court, Act gave a guarantee to the purchaser that the land was only subject to the particular tenancies mentioned. That was provided by the 61st section. The tribunal which it was now proposed to override gave what was known in Ireland as the guarantee of a Parliamentary title. The unfortunate purchaser of 12 or 13 years ago, who knew nothing of the facts, would now, under this Bill, be turned out in favour of a tenant who might have been evicted two or three years before he purchased the property through the Encumbered Estates Court. Such a thing was absolutely ridiculous. It would turn topsy-turvy all the rights of property in Ireland, and would be practically repealing all the guarantees which had been given.

SIR J. RIGBY

said, he agreed that it was ridiculous. The hon. and learned Member took a case which no rational being would entertain, an extreme which he himself said was ridiculous. They should consider what they were coming to. They were exhausting themselves in finding these ridiculous cases. Let them take care they did not lay down rules for the arbitrators which would be supremely ridiculous. There must be a primâ facie case for reinstatement shown.

MR. CARSON

I do not know what a primâ facie case is.

SIR J. RIGBY

said, there were Members present in the House who did, and it scarcely mattered whether the hon. and learned Gentleman understood what a primâ, facie case was or not. In all arbitrations there was risk of error. The Amendment would lead to no satisfactory result, and it was merely an attempt to insult the arbitrators beforehand. If they were going to have a Second Reading Debate upon every Amendment that was moved by hon. Gentlemen opposite, it would be impossible ever to get through the Bill.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

confessed that he was lost in admiration at the number of new and extraordinary principles which had been laid down for the Committee by the great luminary at the head of the English Bar. The hon. and learned Gentleman had now said that they were going to set up a most extraordinary tribunal, something between an Inquisition and a Vehmgerichte, which was to sit in secret and deal with the property of the landlords in Ireland, and indirectly with the lives and interests of a great number of the tenants. Because it had these extraordinary powers, the Attorney General said that was a reason why the Committee ought to trust it entirely. Then why on earth should they give the arbitrators any instructions at all? To do so was a most unreasonable interference with the liberty that ought to be accorded to the most extraordinary tribunal ever created by an English Government. Not one single Amendment which had been proposed had been objected to on its merits, neither had it been shown that any evil would have resulted from assenting to it, and the Government had gone as far as to admit that in some cases injustice or mistakes might possibly be prevented by accepting them. Why, then, did the Government refuse to improve the Bill, and at the same time to conciliate the Opposition by adopting Amendments which they admitted could by no possibility do harm? It must be because in this matter the Government were not their own masters, and they had in all these cases to look to the other side of the House for reasons why an English Government should refuse to accept Amendments of this character. All he could say was that this certainly was not a usual or a fair way of discussing the details of so important a measure as this.

MR. J. MORLEY

said, that he did not understand his right hon. Friend's reference to the position of the English Government.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I mean the predominant partner.

MR. J. MORLEY

said, that if the predominant partner had done its duty by Ireland years and generations ago this Bill would not have been necessary. He made no concealment upon that point; he was always delighted when Irish Members below the Gangway favoured the House with their views and opinions on these questions. The faults in the Land Act of 1881 were due to the House taking the very course which the Committee were now invited to take. His right hon. Friend asked why the Government did not attempt to conciliate the Opposition; but the House was well acquainted with the amount of conciliation that existed on the part of the Opposition in moving Amendments to this Bill. He quite agreed with his right hon. Friend as to the inexpediency of having a Second Reading on every clause and section in the Bill. Would any Member of the Opposition get up and say that any of the Amendments discussed that night had been designed to improve the Bill? There would be no end to the discussion if the Committee were going to impose on the arbitrators every kind of restriction in cases which it was absolutely certain they would never have to deal with it. It could not be done, and, moreover, the Government did not intend to try.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, it was evident that the right hon. Gentleman did not intend to answer the arguments that had been adduced in support of the Amendment, and, therefore, he could not help thinking that in making personal recriminations the right hon. Gentleman was endeavouring to occupy the time of the Committee unnecessarily. The hon. and learned Attorney General had, however, attempted to answer the arguments which had been put forward in support of the Amendment, and he would do his best as briefly as he could to deal with the extraordinary assertions which lay at the bottom of the hon. and learned Gentleman's contention. The arbitrators by the Bill were to take into consideration the circumstances under which the evictions took place. If circumstances of the district pointed, in the opinion of those three gentlemen, to the advisability of reinstating the tenant evicted by the Landed Estates Court, what was there to prevent them acting upon the primâ, facie case put forward? Why should they not consider the reasons the Land Court Judge had for ordering evictions? While the Bill said that the arbitrators were to consider a primâ, facie case, it compelled them to leave out of account considerations which the Government told the Committee in debate ought to govern them. Under these circumstances, the arbitrators would be obliged, by the very title under which they hold office, to do what they might think was a gross injustice upon individuals and a great violation of the practice to which Parliament had in the most deliberate manner given its sanction. If the Government rejected this Amendment without further debate it would prove that they regarded all debate as intrinsically evil, and that the sooner they brought it to an end by legitimate or illegitimate means the better for them and for their Bill.

MR. HALDANE (Haddington)

said, the right hon. Gentleman opposite had brought forward two arguments in support of Amendments, first upon cases in which the Lord Chancellor could exercise his jurisdiction, and secondly with regard to the circumstances under which the arbitrators might think it advisable to take action. He should like to ask why under this Bill the Judge of the Landed Estates Court should be put in an exceptional position as compared with any Judge who exercised his functions with regard to any other Act he had to administer? This Bill was brought forward for a temporary purpose only; it was to be in operation for a period of three years from the date of its coming into operation, and was introduced in respect of a view of things that was not within the purview of existing legislation. If it was intended to amend the powers of the Judge of the Landed Estates Court that would have been done, but this Bill contemplated something different, and it appeared to him to be right that its powers should be extended. The right hon. Gentleman said the wording of the clause was such that the arbitrators would be bound to take into consideration the circumstances of the district, and, as he understood the right hon. Gentleman's argument, the circumstances of the district were sufficient to exclude it from consideration As he read the section there were three things the arbitrators were to look to. First, whether the circumstances of the district was sufficient to warrant a re-instatement; secondly, the circumstances under which the eviction took place; and thirdly, whether there was any other circumstances to be considered. The arbitrators might look at one or all of these. The general principle was laid down that it was not desirable to narrow the class of cases the arbitrators had to consider, and that it was better to leave them with unfettered discretion. When that principle was accepted, and the Opposition still attempted to get in particular exceptions, how was it possible to meet those attempts except by repeating what had been said already? Strong epithets had been hurled against this tribunal; it had been called a tribunal of confiscators, and his right hon. Friend behind him preferred to call it the Inquisition, and, not satisfied with that, called it the Vehmgericht. But when they came to consider the arguments what did they amount to? One hon. Member said it was a Bill to evict the Land Commissioners, and other said it was a Bill to go back on the provisions of the Settled Estates Court Act of 1858. True, the Act of 1858 guaranteed titles; but they were interfered with by the Act of 1881 and by the Act of 1887, passed by the Conservative Government. In the face of these facts it was unreasonable to advance the arguments now used.

MR. BARTON

thought the speech they had just heard the most remarkable they had yet had in the Debate. The Attorney General said the arguments brought forward were ridiculous because no tribunal, and especially this particular tribunal, would think of admitting these cases, but now the hon. and learned Gentleman showed they were the most reasonable cases, and the very ones that the tribunal ought to admit. This showed the value of the answers they had received from the Government, and he would ask on whom they were to rely; whether they were to rely upon the leading equity lawyer of Ireland or the leading equity lawyer of England? The leading equity lawyer in Ireland was of opinion these cases ought to be re-instated by Mr. Piers White, and the Attorney General said they were too ridiculous to be entertained by the arbitrators.

MR. WYNDHAM (Dover)

said, the absurdity of the argument against the Amendment could be shown in a single sentence. The hon. Member for Haddington (Mr. Haldane) had asked them why they should put the Judge of the Landed Estates Court in an exceptional position, and in his turn he would ask the hon. and learned Gentleman why they should put the head of the Court in an exceptional position, and treat him with less respect than they treated every new tenant? Under the Bill every new tenant, though he might pay a merely nominal rent, though the fact of his occupying the holding might produce in the district almost civil war, every tenant of that character had a right to override the decision of the head of this Court.

MR. HALDANE

said, the Landed Estates Court could put the tenant in exactly the same posision as any other Court.

MR. WYNDHAM

said, the argument that it was better to leave unfettered discretion could only be used when they allowed them no discretion in the case of the 1,500 tenants. They adopted a graduated scale, having the new tenant at the top, with the Landed Estates Court and the arbitrators at the bottom.

MR. T. M. HEALY (Louth, N.)

said, the Landed Estates Court never ordered these ejectments; they were brought by the Receiver without the Judge—at least in civil bill ejectments—investigating them. This was not the judicial decision of the Judge in any way. If the Receiver thought there was too much rent due he took proceedings, and if the Judge sanctioned those proceedings he concurred as a matter of course ex parte. Yet in this House it was suggested that a Judge of the land had thoroughly investigated all these matters; that he had satisfied himself judicially—first, that the rent was fair; and, next, that it was due. He said that the entire suggestion on which the Amendment was founded was wrong; it was a mere office transaction, without the judicial mind of the Judge being brought to bear upon it.

MR. W. KENNY (Dublin, St. Stephen's Green)

said, the speeches they heard just now from the Attorney General and the Chief Secretary showed what they were coming to. These gentlemen, after listening to the case made by the supporters of the Amendment, said that no rational being would make an order in such cases as those brought forward. If that were so, if they were cases in which no Judge exercising a judicial mind would make an order, then why not include them? He supported the Bill as it stood, upon the ground that the Bill as it stood would set up an appellate jurisdiction in respect of the orders made by the Judge of the Landed Estates Court; there would be a direct conflict of jurisdiction in cases in which the Judge of the Landed Estates Court had made an order for the eviction of a tenant. The hon. Member for Haddington (Mr. Haldane) had fallen into a complete error. The case referred to by his hon. and learned Friend had reference to the orders of two Judges—first, the order of Mr. Justice Monroe, as President of the Landed Estates Court, or the chief receiver, Mr. Murphy, giving leave to bring the ejectment; and, secondly, after ejectment brought, the formal order of the Judge of the Common Law Division. That was a wholly different state of things from that referred to by the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Haddington, who thought it was only a conflict between the Judge who made the order for the eviction and the arbitrator. The case they were now setting up was that against Mr. Justice Monroe and his Court they were setting up an appellate tribunal without any appeal, because the Bill proposed to give no appeal from this Council of three. Possibly, at a later stage, it might be proposed that all three of the arbitrators were not to sit together, and that the order of any two might be sufficient. If that was so, were they coming to this: that an order signed by Mr. George Fottrell and Mr. Greer, who knew as little about the law as any solicitor he ever met—Mr. White was the only lawyer of the three. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] Probably these two gentlemen, Mr. Fottrell and Mr. Greer, might know something about the practice and procedure, but they knew nothing about the law, and they might have Mr. Fottrell and Mr. Greer signing an order which would override an order of the Judge of the Landed Estates Court. He therefore objected to including within the scope of the Bill the class of cases which came within the category to which the Amendment referred.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 113; Noes 171.—(Division List, No. 198.)

THE CHAIRMAN

The next Amendment in Order stands in the name of the hon. Member for Preston.

SIR R. TEMPLE (Surrey, Kingston)

I have an Amendment on the Paper.

THE CHAIRMAN

The Amendment of the hon. Member is not in Order.

MR. HANBURY (Preston)

said, his Amendment was to leave out the words "the first day of May 1879," and insert "the 31st day of October 1882." It would be seen that this Bill as it stood dealt with the case of a tenant who had been absent from the farm for so long a period as 15 years, and yet it enabled that tenant with the consent of the arbitrators to go back. It was a distinct contravention of the existing law of the land. The Statute of Limitations at the present moment distinctly laid down that the right of recovery should not extend over a period of 12 years, yet in spite of that Statute of Limitations the Bill extended the period to 15 years, and by doing that the Government were adopt- ing a retrograde step. In Stephen's Commentaries on the Laws of England it was stated that the Statute of Limitations under the old law was a period of 60 years. About 60 years ago that period was reduced to 20 years; and it had since been considered that 12 years, which was the present period, was the proper period of limitation. It was therefore plain that every time Parliament had dealt with this period of limitation it had curtailed it. But now the Government proposed to extend the period in the matter of evicted farms in Ireland; and if the Statute of Limitations—which was the basis of all property—was to be tampered with in Ireland, what guarantee had they that it would not be done generally throughout the United Kingdom? His object, therefore, was to bring the Bill in this particular into harmony with the ordinary law of the land. No doubt they would be told, on behalf of the Government, that the date, 1st of May, 1879, was the date mentioned in the Land Act of 1891. But it should be noticed that that date was only 12 years back from the time the Act was passed in 1879; and that, as that Act was voluntary, the circumstances of the two measures were entirely different. If the Act were voluntary, and the landlord and tenant could agree as to terms between themselves, there was no reason in the world why they should not go back 20 years, or 50 years if they liked. It might be said that this was not a legal claim on the part of the evicted tenants, but that it was an act of grace given them by Parliament. If it were a legal claim on the part of the tenants, then clearly the Statute of Limitations ought not to be done away with; but as it was an act of grace, was it not a monstrous proceeding to give the evicted tenants more than they would have if they had a legal claim? Then, if they were doing away with the Statute of Limitations with regard to real property, they were doing away with it with regard to personalty as well. He regarded the claim of the landlords for arrears of rent as personalty, and the Statute of Limitations prescribed a period of six years instead of 12 years in the case of personalty. But while the Government in the case of the tenant extended the period from 12 to 15 years, in dealing with the landlord and his arrears of rent, they actually reduced the period from six years to two. Surely the same principle ought to be applied to both landlords and tenants alike. This was only one of the many injustices to the landlords which the Bill contained, but it seemed to him to be one of the most glaring; and, with a view to remedying it, he would certainly press his Amendment to a Division.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 6, to leave out the words "the first day of May one thousand eight hundred and seventy-nine," in order to insert the words "the thirty-first day of October one thousand eight hundred and eighty-two."—(Mr. Hanbury.)

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

SIR R. T. REID

said, the hon. Member had framed his argument on a fanciful analogy—an analogy which did not exist in form, and did not at all exist in substance. The Statute of Limitations said to a man—"You have been so sluggish in exercising your right; the Courts have been open to you so many years; and as you have not availed of them, it is time to prevent you from making up an old story by closing their doors." But the ground on which the Bill was based was that the evicted tenants could not get into the Courts. He thought the hon. Gentleman would see that there was a distinction. The hon. Member did not appear to be satisfied with that, but it really turned upside down the argument on which he had founded his Amendment. The date, the 1st of May, 1879, was taken from the 13th section of the Act of 1891. The Government believed it was a satisfactory date, for it was the commencement of the disturbed period, within which matters had taken place in Ireland which it was their policy to put an end to reasonably and fairly, if they could do so. They could not, therefore, accept the Amendment.

MR. CARSON

said, the argument of the Solicitor General, if briefly examined, would show a most curious state of affairs under the Bill. The hon. and learned Gentleman contended that the Statute of Limitations said to a man—"You have been so sluggish in the assertion of your rights that we will not allow you to assert them after 12 years." In other words, if the tenants had rights and did not assert them, they would be barred in 12 years; but because the tenants had no rights, the Bill said they would not be barred until after the lapse of 15 years. A more extraordinary argument to put before an assembly which was supposed to have some remnant of understanding left, even in the middle of July—and after a long and arduous Session—he had never heard. But it did not end there. The Solicitor General had said that even if a trespasser—a man with no rights—got into a holding 12 years ago the evicted tenant under the Bill would not be able to put him out; but because the person in possession happened to be the landlord who owned the place, and got into possession 14 years ago, the evicted tenant could put him out under the Bill. The proposal was to go back to 1879. The present Government were in Office from 1880 down to 1885—that was in the time when those evictions were fresh—and why did they not bring in a Bill to suggest even that the evicted tenants ought to be restored to their holdings? On the contrary, the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary said in 1886 that it was about time that there was a Bill to prevent the tenants from robbing the landlords of their land.

MR. J. MORLEY

I never said anything about bringing in a Bill. I said it was a proper object of policy.

MR. CARSON

said, he did not know how the proper object of policy could be carried out except by a Bill, for certainly there was no law to prevent the confiscation at the present moment. The words of the right hon. Gentleman were— The late Government, to their credit, had passed an Act to prevent the landlords from confiscating the property of the tenants. He did not think they would be able to deal satisfactorily with Ireland until they had passed some legislation to prevent the tenants from confiscating the property of the landlords. And the method which the right hon. Gentleman now proposed for preventing the tenants from confiscating the property of the landlords was to throw aside the Statute of Limitations and say, 14 years after the tenants had lost all legal claim to be restored to their holdings, that the landlord is to be turned out of his own property and the tenant is to be put back. The Solicitor General had said that the Statute of Limitations was intended to penalise the sluggishness of creditors in asserting their claims. But if there was sluggishness in this instance where did it lie? It lay amongst the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary and his colleagues, who had sat for years on the Treasury Bench whilst these evictions were going on, and never thought of introducing such a Bill as this until they became dependent upon the support of hon. Members below the Gangway, which showed that the policy of the Government was not due to the pressure of agrarian distress in Ireland, but was due to mere political and Party considerations. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General was perfectly well aware—astute lawyer that he was—that in replying to the Amendment he was putting forward a most preposterous argument as to the meaning of the Statute of Limitations; and he therefore fell back on the old argument that the date was taken from the 13th section of the Act of 1891. But he asked the hon. and learned Gentleman did he really think there was any analogy in saying, as the 13th section of the Act of 1891 said to the landlord who had evicted a tenant 14 years ago, "You may if you like put the tenant back in possession again"; and saying, as the Bill said, "Whether you like it or not, you must restore the evicted tenant to his old position as tenant?" The arguments that had been put forward on behalf of the Government were merely intended to make a show of replying to the Amendment, for they did not give any sound reason whatever why the Amendment should not be accepted.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR (Leeds, Central)

said, the absurdity to which his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Dublin University had reduced the argument of the Solicitor General was so complete that he noticed that not even the hon. and learned Gentleman himself could refrain from a kindly laugh at his own discomfiture. But the argument of the Solicitor General was open to another answer. The hon. and learned Gentleman had treated the Statute of Limitations as if it were a penalty against the sluggishness of persons who might have made a claim, but did not do so. He held that the Statute of Limitations was not intended in any way to be penal, but was intended to preserve the stability of property. It was not desirable that events which occurred so many years ago as those mentioned in the clause should be revived for the purpose of transferring property from one person to another.

MR. T. M. HEALY

said, that if it was a very lame argument to say, in defence of the clause, that the 1st of May, 1879, was the date fixed in the Land Act of 1891, he would like to know what about the Arrears Act of 1882, under which a tenant evicted might apply for reinstatement and insist upon it compulsorily?

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

No, no.

MR. T. M. HEALY

said, he was glad to have that denial from the Leader of the Opposition, for it enabled him to put a question to the right hon. Gentleman. The clause in the Arrears Act was either compulsory or non-compulsory. If it were non-compulsory, he asked the right hon. Gentleman would he now consent to its re-enactment, with necessary modifications in matters of detail, in this Bill? He remembered that the Land Commission, who had to administer the Arrears Act, were called "confiscators" at the time; and the hon. Member for Guildford said they knew neither law nor facts, and were "a low body." He, therefore, took it that not much importance was to be attached to the attacks which the Opposition were indulging in now against the members of the present tribunal.

MR. BRODRICK (Surrey, Guildford)

said, the hon. and learned Member for Louth had mixed up two irrelevant matters—

MR. T. M. HEALY

I always do.

MR. BRODRICK

said, the hon. and learned Gentleman had taken the Arrears Act of 1882, which was a compulsory Act, but did not extend back 15 years, and had mixed it up with the Voluntary Act of 1892, which only extended back 12 years. He ventured to submit that the argument of the hon. and learned Gentleman had a tendency against the proposal they were now asked to adopt—namely, to go back 15 years and reinstate all the tenants evicted since then, and do it compulsorily. The proposal to go back 15 years was really the most ridiculous part of the Bill. It was absolutely impossible to turn out men who had been 15 years in possession of their holdings, and it would be more in accordance with the legislation that had taken place if the Arrears Act, which reinstated tenants compulsorily, was taken as the starting-point for the present Bill. That would get rid of the difficulty about the Statute of Limitations. With regard to the statement of the hon. and learned Member for Louth that he had assailed the Land Commissioners, he admitted that he had held strong feelings with regard to the Land Commissioners, or rather with regard to the Sub-Commissioners; and all he had heard of the proceedings of the various Sub-Commissioners, and their divergence of opinion, justified him in saying—if he did say it—that some of them were ignorant of law and facts; but he did not believe he described them as "a low body." He was not in the habit of using that style of argument; and, indeed, the language was more like the language of the hon. and learned Member for Louth than of any other Member in the House.

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

said, he thought the legal argument was entirely with his hon. Friend the Member for Preston. But he would point out that the date of 1879 was fixed upon in the 13th section of the Act of 1891, because that was the period at which the agricultural depression commenced to be felt in Ireland. That date was adopted without protest by the House, and he saw no reason for departing from it now. Indeed, if they were to deal with evictions in this way at all, he thought the tenants who were evicted because the House of Lords rejected the Compensation for Disturbance Bill had a greater claim on the House than those who had been put out since 1866; and, therefore, if there was a Division on the Amendment, he should support the Government.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, that for the second time in the course of these Debates the hon. and learned Member for Louth had contested his interpretation of the Arrears Act of 1882. He denied that the Arrears Act was compulsory at all in the sense that this Bill was compulsory. Under the Arrears Act a tenant who had no right of redemption in his holding could only get back to his holding with the consent of the landlord; but during the six months in which a tenant had the right of redemption or any prolongation of the time by the Court, he could get back compulsorily. He was, therefore, curious to know whether the challenge of the hon. and learned Member for Louth to the Opposi- tion to agree to the insertion in this Bill of the reinstatement clause of the Arrears Act was a chance expression or deliberate policy on the part of himself and his friends?

MR. T. M. HEALY

said, he had asked the question of the Opposition entirely on his own initiative. For his part, he considered the insertion in the Bill of this particular clause from the Arrears Act with the necessary modifications would be extremely valuable, as the recognition of the compulsory principle would mark a considerable difference in the attitude of the Opposition towards the Bill. With regard to the challenge of the hon. Member for Guildford as to his use of the phrase "low class" as applied to the Land Commissioners, Hansard of July 17th, 1882, recorded that the hon. Gentleman said a majority of the Sub-Commissioners neither knew law nor had regard for facts. He added— It was said that they had already got down to a low class of persons, and it was undesirable to go lower down. If it was not possible to find persons in Ireland to carry out the provisions of the Bill they ought to send over Englishmen to do the work.

SIR R. TEMPLE (Surrey, Kingston)

said, the Solicitor General had told the Committee that the principle, if not the sole object of the Statute of Limitations, was to penalise those who had neglected to bring forward their claims in time. That was the principle, so far as it went, but it was not the object of the Statute of Limitations. Its main principle and object was to secure the safety of property; and it was properly and justly applicable to the present case.

SIR F. S. POWELL (Wigan)

said, the clause, in going back to the remote period of 1879, would work great injustice. It would weaken the tenure in their property of the most deserving persons in Ireland through no fault of their own. Sometimes the landlords would be injured and sometimes the tenants would be injured, whether they were to blame or not; and therefore it was the duty of the Committee to take such opportunities as might present themselves to limit the time of the operation of the clause.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 137; Noes 72.—(Division List, No. 199.)

Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; Committee counted, and 40 Members being found present,

MR. BARTON

said, he desired to move an Amendment standing in the name of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Dublin University, the object of which was to limit the operation of the Bill to evictions that had taken place before the Act of 1887. This was in some respects a most important Amendment. He would put it to the Government—and especially to the Solicitor General—was there to be any finality on this question? If all tenants evicted up to the date of the passing of the Bill were to be reinstated, there could be no reason why tenants evicted after the passing of the Bill should not be reinstated also. Suppose the Bill passed by the 1st November—a sanguine estimate—could anyone suggest a reason why a man evicted after that date should not be reinstated? The scheme of the Bill was that anyone evicted up to the passing of the Bill, at whatever date it passed, should be eligible for reinstatement. After that date there was to be no reinstatement unless by new legislation. That was most unjust and impolitic, because it must inevitably mean that, triennially or quinquennially or decimally, they would have to have a reinstatement Bill, because those tenants evicted after the passing of the Bill would have as good a claim for reinstatement as those evicted before. The Solicitor General would not say the present Government was not a just one. He would not argue that since they had come into Office they had allowed harsh evictions to take place, but that they were not likely to occur in future. Therefore, they should find a terminus—a point at which reinstatement should cease. In the Amendment the period of the passing of the Act of 1887 had been chosen. He submitted to the Committee, and hoped to convince the Solicitor General, that the tenant who had been evicted since the passing of the Act of 1887 had no right to reinstatement under the Bill. The Act of 1887 met a grievance that many tenants complained of—namely, that the rents fixed in 1882 and 1883 and 1884 were too high, by ordering a complete readjustment of rents. That was not the only benefit conferred by that Act. Under it every tenant who was in possession at the time of the passing of the Act could obtain a stay of execution to prevent an ejectment, and was allowed to pay up his arrears by instalments. And that Act remedied another grievance. Hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway said that leaseholders were excluded prior to that from the benefit of the land legislation. In the Act of 1887, therefore, they were included. Therefore, he put it to the Solicitor General whether the Bill did not meet every grievance which had been suggested during the Debate? It would be most interesting if hon. Members below the Gangway would tell the Committee the grievances that had been suffered since the passing of that Act. Was the Chief Secretary going to attempt to carry on that just administration which he had hitherto advocated? Was he going to reinstate the men who had been evicted since he came into Office? If so, why? He well knew that these men had no grievance; therefore, let the right hon. Gentleman accept the Amendment and exclude from the benefits of the Bill tenants evicted under the Act of 1887.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 7, after the words "seventy-nine," to insert the words "and before the twenty-third day of May one thousand eight hundred and eighty-seven." — (Mr. Barton.)

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

MR. DILLON

said, the hon. and learned Member had made an appeal to the Nationalist Members, and to that appeal he proposed to give an answer. He was asked on what ground it was claimed that tenants evicted under the Act of 1887 should have a right to reinstatement. The hon. and learned Member was not in the House when the Act of 1887 was passed, but he had had an opportunity of reading the Debates upon it. Did he forget that the Act was avowedly introduced by the Government of the day for preventing evictions in Ireland; did he forget that the machinery which for the first time appeared in an Act of that kind—machinery known as the bankruptcy clauses—was inserted for the purpose of preventing a number of harsh evictions which were pending at that time? And was he aware that those bankruptcy clauses were struck out largely owing to the protests of Liberal Unionist Members who met at Devonshire House? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, who was responsible for that—

MR. A. CHAMBERLAIN (Worcestershire, E.)

You stopped the whole arrangement.

MR. DILLON

said, the hon. Member was at college in those days. What happened? A meeting was held of the Liberal Unionist Party at Devonshire House, and thereat a strong protest was drawn up against the bankruptcy clauses. It was perfectly true that they were objected to by nearly every Member for Ireland, but they were also objected to by the Duke of Devonshire and by the hon. Member's father, and the Liberal Unionists drew up a rival programme of their own. The result was, that after a long Debate in the House the whole of that machinery was dropped out of the Bill, and nothing was substituted to prevent harsh evictions. No one who took part in or had studied those Debates could doubt that the Tory and Liberal Unionist Government of the day were well aware that those evictions were likely to take place, and the duty was imposed upon it to prevent them; but instead of fulfilling that duty they allowed the opportunity to pass, and nothing was done. The hon. Member for Mid Armagh asked on what ground the Irish Members held that men were unjustly evicted since the Act of 1887 was passed. The Irish Members showed at the time that that Act was passed that there was a large number of men in Ireland who owed arrears of rent, and the fact of their having been proceeded against for excessive rents proved that they were in danger of harsh and unjust eviction. The evictions had been carried out, and Members of the Irish Party, speaking in that House, had repeatedly told Members that those difficulties would arise and that they would have to be dealt with. Those evictions had been going on ever since. Did the hon. Member know how slow these Land Acts were to bring relief to the tenants? Did he not know at the time the Act was passed there were many leaseholders who were in arrear? What provision was made to bring relief to those men? What about the men whose rents would have been reduced or were reduced in some cases by 40 per cent., and who were afterwards evicted for non-payment of rent? What about the number of cases of persons proceeded against and decreed for arrears before the Act passed? They all knew these men were unable to obtain the benefit of this Act. The primâ facie case for a reinstatement in the case of all those tenants would be this: that owing to delays in legislation in that House, owing to the want of proper provisions in these various Acts, including the Acts of 1881 and 1887, to secure that all tenants would have the power of availing themselves of the benefit of those Acts a large number of men had been unjustly, harshly, and cruelly debarred from the benefits which the great body of tenants had obtained. The claim of the Irish Members was an equitable claim, that these men were entitled to be put in the same position as the general body of the Irish tenants. They claimed, further, that these tenants had been robbed of a large property; that it should be restored to them as they were equitably entitled to it, and as it had been taken from them owing to a defect in the law.

SIR E. ASHMEAD - BARTLETT

said, the hon. Member had spoken of "robbery," but he himself was mainly responsible for the sufferings of the tenants who had been evicted since 1887. He himself was the principal author of what was known as the Plan of Campaign. The House was perfectly well aware that very large sums of money were paid by the tenants evicted under it into what was called the War Chest, for which the hon. Member for Mayo and his friends were responsible. No account had ever been rendered of the expenditure of that money, and he thought they were entitled to ask for an account before they allowed the tenants who were evicted under the Plan to share the benefits of this Act.

VISCOUNT CRANBORNE

invited the Government to reply to the observations of the hon. Member for Mid Armagh, and not to trust to the defence of the hon. Member for East Mayo, who had given a history of Irish land legislation which must have amazed all who listened to it. As he ventured to say on the previous evening, in his opinion the Act of 1887 went a great deal too far, and he was quite at a loss to see where the hardships complained of came in. The hon. Member for East Mayo, when he made his speech, must have thought he was talking to Members who entered Parliament for the first time at the last General Election. It was all very well to say that the bankruptcy clauses were withdrawn at the dictation of the Liberal Unionist Party, but he and his friends never suggested anything in their place. One of the chief objects for which that Act was passed was in order that the rents fixed under the Land Act of 1881 might be reduced, as many people considered they were too high, having regard to the depressed condition of agriculture. Since that date, at any rate, no rents had been fixed by any Act of Parliament, and, therefore, every tenant evicted since that date had been evicted solely because he could not or would not pay a fair rent. He ventured to say that, under the circumstances, these tenants were not entitled to receive any benefit under this Bill. He would make an appeal to the Government. They had left the defence of their policy in the hands of the hon. Member for East Mayo, who had given them a perfectly erroneous history of the land legislation of the last few years. Surely it was only reasonable that the Committee should have from some Member of the Government some more reasonable explanation.

MR. A. CHAMBERLAIN

said, he did not think that the Committee had got at the truth about the bankruptcy clauses. The hon. Member for East Mayo had given them a mere fanciful sketch of the subject, and had attacked him personally for his inexperience and youthfulness. That he did not mind, but he did think he had a right to complain of the attack made on the conduct of his father in the last Parliament.

MR. DILLON

I made no attack on the conduct of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham; I merely said he was present at the meeting at Devonshire House which protested against the bankruptcy clauses.

MR. A. CHAMBERLAIN

said, he was at a loss to understand why the hon. Member said the Liberal Unionists had secured the rejection of these clauses. He challenged the hon. Member to deny that the whole of the Irish Members took the same view. Although he might plead guilty to youthfulness and inexperience, he would point out that some Members grew older without growing wiser. Although he was not present at the Debates in the House he had read the Reports of them, and he thought he could supply the defects in the hon. Member's history. The bankruptcy clauses were in the Bill as originally introduced; exception was taken to them by almost all the Irish Members, and they were dropped in deference to the generally expressed wish of the House. Then came a very interesting chapter in the history which seemed to have escaped the memory of the hon. Member. After the clauses had been withdrawn the right hon. Member for West Birmingham made a suggestion that it would be desirable that the insolvent tenant should have the opportunity of having all his debts—even those due to his tradesmen and to the gombeen man—dealt with on the same footing as the arrears of rent. This view was approved by the present Chancellor of the Exchequer and the then Chief Secretary for Ireland; the present Leader of the Opposition expressed his willingness to accept it, if the Irish Members would approve. But the hon. Member for East Mayo would have nothing whatever to do with it. If, therefore, any blame attached to anyone because this question was not dealt with as far back as 1887, it was to the hon. Member for East Mayo, who now took advantage of the difficulties he had himself caused to make a further demand on the generosity of the House of Commons.

SIR R. T. REID

said, anyone who had heard the remarks of the hon. Member for Rochester would conclude that tenants existed on this earth solely for the purpose of making rent for their landlords. If so, why were the three Acts of 1881, 1887, and 1891 passed, the express object of which was to relieve the tenant? If it was fair to blame the Conservative Party for passing the Acts of 1887 and 1891, possibly it would be equally fair to blame the present Government for having passed the Act of 1892. The noble Lord seemed to think that these tenants evicted after 1887 were solely to blame for their present unfortunate condition. He thought, however, the blame was to be found elsewhere, for up to the year 1891 many of them were in such a position that no one could well go to their assistance and relief.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR (Leeds, Central)

congratulated the Government on having attempted at last to give some satisfactory reply to the arguments of his hon. and learned Friend. The Solicitor General had commented on the remark of the noble Lord the Member for Rochester, and had suggested that he had spoken of the tenant as merely a rent-paying machine. He could tell the hon. and learned Gentleman there was not a more humane man in this House.

SIR R. T. REID

If I said anything personally offensive, I withdraw it. It was far from my intention.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

said, he readily accepted that explanation. As had been pointed out for the last 14 years, Acts of Parliament had been passed in order to assist the Irish tenant in these times of agricultural depression. But that depression had equally affected England and Scotland. In those countries, however, it had been met by means of voluntary arrangements between landlords and tenants, and it might have been the same in Ireland had it not been for compulsory legislation. What chance was there under the present Bill of ending the difficulties of the question? After the Act of 1887 no such Bill as the present one should ever have been brought forward, for the Irish tenants had no legitimate grievances that called for State intervention. The hon. Member for East Mayo had, indeed, mentioned two—one of which, he suggested, would have been provided against had not the bankruptcy clauses in the Bill of 1881 been rejected.

MR. DILLON

What I said was that in 1887 the Government recognised that there was a grievance for which a remedy was required. They only provided a bad remedy, and when that was withdrawn they produced no other.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

And the hon. Member also proposed no other?

MR. DILLON

I did certainly.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

I venture to say that this is an imaginary grievance.

MR. DILLON

explained that the difficulties he had alluded to would not have been removed even if the bankruptcy clauses had been adopted. As a matter of fact, he was never in favour of those clauses; but he thought they were fully entitled to assume that, as the then Government considered those grievances sufficiently serious in their character to require them to introduce the bankruptcy clauses into the Bill, and those clauses were not adopted, then the Government ought to have provided some other means of meeting the hardship that they by their conduct allowed existed.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR (Leeds, Central)

said, that the Act of 1887 provided for any legitimate grievance of the tenant on the score of execution brought against him in respect of any debt. Was it to be maintained also that tenants who were evicted in 1887 were to be brought within the scope, of the Bill because it gave relief to leaseholders under £50 a year? He could not imagine that it was the serious intention of the Government to put forward such a contention as that. This was a serious and important question, and unless the Government could show that this Bill was likely to be final, he thought the strongest possible argument was afforded in favour of the Amendment.

MR. SEXTON

said, that with regard to the bankruptcy clauses of the Act of 1887, they never could have been accepted, because they proposed to put the ordinary creditor on fundamentally the same terms as the landlord. The case, of course, was that the ordinary creditor had sold his goods at market value and was paid for them, and was entitled to be paid for them. That was not the case of the landlord, and it would have been scandalously unjust to compel an ordinary creditor who had sold his goods to take the same dividend as a landlord would have to take by reason of the decreased value of the land. He saw in that House English landlords who had for years past been giving reductions to their tenants amounting to 40 per cent. without any pressure, and without any inducement beyond their own sense of justice. If they had resisted the claims of justice, and if it had been necessary to take steps for the relief of English tenants, would anybody in that House suggest that Englishmen, in order to obtain abatements, would have to declare themselves bankrupts? If anyone had made such a proposition in regard to Englishmen public opinion would have scouted it out. He should have thought that the speech of the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down would have been more valuable if he had had some knowledge of the letter of the law and the system of administration. Did the hon. Member know that where Section 30 was applied it became a matter of bankruptcy, and that County Court Judges in Ireland were in the habit of getting the tenant to file an affidavit of his debts and assets, and to show who his creditors were. Did the hon. Gentleman think that procedure of that kind, which put the tenant to expense and humiliation, and tended to utterly despoil and shatter his credit, was a mode of administration likely to bring relief. Could he deny that Section 30 did not bring relief to the tenant and it had been administered in such a way by the County Court Judges in Ireland that the tenants could not take advantage of it. They had heard a good deal about the beauties of the Act of 1887. The first adjustment of rents under the Act of 1887 lasted for only three years. After 1889 the tenants were left in the lurch because of the increase of prices; and their condition had been just as bad since that time as it was before. Why had nothing been said about Section 7? Why had not the hon. Gentleman said anything about the clause introduced by his distinguished brother? Until the Act of 1887 was passed a tenant could not be evicted from his holding except by physical force. A tenant so evicted knew exactly the position in which he was placed—that he had six months in which to redeem, and that if he did not do so then his tenancy had determined; but by the Act of 1887 a policy of stealth and surprise was substituted. He lost his tenancy merely through the service of a registered letter, and up to this very hour there were tenants in Ireland who did not fully appreciate the legal effect of the service of a registered letter. The tradition of centuries was in their blood, and they still thought that unless the Sheriff came and put them out they had every right in their homes. The most painful function that could fall upon a Judge of the Rent Courts was to endeavour to make the peasants of the West of Ireland understand, when they came into Court to have a fair rent fixed, that by reason of the service of the registered letter under the Act of 1887 they had long ago ceased to be tenants. There were hundreds and thousands of tenants in Ireland who had lost their tenancies since 1887 by reason of this process of service by registered letter, and who had been injured as seriously as any tenants who had been forcibly evicted.

COLONEL SAUNDERSON (Armagh, N.)

said, he must express his amazement at hearing the hon. Member advocate the system of eviction by Sheriffs. Never in his wildest moments had he anticipated such a thing. It appeared that this was another injustice to Ireland. The Irish tenant had during long centuries acquired such an affection for Sheriffs and evictions that the great defect of the Act of 1887 was that it did away with those interesting visitations which were so much missed and deplored by the infatuated Irish tenant. What Ireland wanted was finality in this legislation. Over and over again he had heard statesmen declare, as the merit of a particular scheme of Irish legislation, that it was to be a final one; but it would now appear that there was to be a final settlement of the Irish question about every two years. Last year the hon. Member for North-East Cork said that the man of all others who was hated by the Irish peasantry was the landlord. He knew something about Ireland, and he declared that the gombeen man was hated more than the landlord; and because the bankruptcy clauses would inflict an injury on the shopkeeper and the gombeen man they were rejected as an injury rather than a benefit. He acknowledged that the Chief Secretary had put himself to much trouble to gain a personal knowledge of Ireland. The right hon. Gentleman last year undertook a journey to the West of Ireland to see for himself what the condition of affairs was. Accompanied by a County Inspector he went on a tour of inspection. The first thing he saw was a man working in a field, with some policemen sitting on a bank with rifles, and on asking who the man was, he was informed it was a gentleman working on an evicted farm. Further on he saw another gentleman also protected by policemen, and, on inquiry, was told it was a Mr. Blood. Having had an interview with Mr. Blood, the right hon. Gentleman passed on, and then he met a carriage and pair, and asked who the occupant of the carriage was. "Oh," was the reply, "that is one of the evicted tenants." This information had such an effect on the right hon. Gentleman's mind that he immediately returned to Dublin. Now, the only virtue of this Amendment was that it had some flavour of finality about it. Nothing would make the Bill a good Bill, but the Amendment would make it a less bad Bill.

MR. J. MORLEY

said, there was only one remark in the hon. and gallant Member's speech which bore in the least upon the subject they were discussing. He admitted that he had not studied the Amendment.

COLONEL SAUNDERSON

My right hon. Friend misunderstood me. What I said was that I thought if the Amendment were accepted it would be a less bad one.

MR. J. MORLEY

said, that the hon. and gallant Gentleman talked about finality, and seemed to think that this Bill was introduced to settle the Irish question. He could not conceive how the hon. and gallant Member could impute to him so ridiculous a notion as that the Bill was intended as a settlement of the Irish question. There was an old historian named Giraldus Cambrensis, who said he thought the Irish question would be settled a short while before the Day of Judgment. Personally, he did not take so despondent a view; but still he did not believe the Irish question would be settled so long as this House, and more especially this Parliament, which comprised another House far more ignorant and prejudiced on Irish questions—[Loud Nationalist cheers, which drowned the conclusion of the sentence.] With regard to the particular Amendment, if the promoters of the 13th section of the Act of 1891 thought it desirable to include in the relief extended by that section a certain class of evicted tenants, why should not the same class of persons be included in the present measure of relief?

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

said, he was not going to vote for this Amendment, but he wished to know where this thing was to end? Did the Chief Secretary propose to abolish ejectment for nonpayment of rent altogether? That was the logical outcome of the matter. He saw no reason why the evictions he (Mr. Russell) had described should not be taken into consideration as well as previous evictions.

MR. J. MORLEY

The hon. Member might just as well ask me how long I am going to be Chief Secretary. If he will answer that question, I will answer his.

MR. FISHER (Fulham)

said, he had heard no speech relevant to the Amend- ment. They had been trying to bring the scope of the Bill within its title, and they were trying by the Amendment to bring the Bill within the Report of the Commission on which this legislation was founded.

MR. CARSON

rose, when—

Mr. KILBRIDE rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put"; but the Chairman withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.

Debate resumed.

MR. CARSON

said, that he had put the Amendment on the Paper in order to test the sincerity of the statement that if the late Government had brought in the Act of 1887 at the time suggested by Mr. Parnell, then the necessity for this Bill would never have arisen. Prior to the Act of 1887 there were a large number of tenants who did not come under the Act of 1881, and there was a special grievance in relation to those holdings which had not been dealt with by the Legislature. What did the Act of 1887 do? [Cries of "Divide!"] He did not think hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway would gain much by crying "Divide." The Act of 1887 not only provided that leaseholders should come in and claim the benefits of the Act of 1881, but it provided a most important and material clause. The 13th section provided that where proceedings were taken for the recovery of holdings for non-payment of rent the Court had power, if non-payment was not through the conduct, act, or default of the tenant, to stay proceedings or order the arrears to be paid by instalments, so that by going beyond that Act the Committee were asked to enact that the tenant had a right to be restored to his holding, even where eviction had taken place from his own "conduct, act, or default." He saw very little use in passing an Act of Parliament to give relief of this character, and which gave the fullest power for granting relief, if immediately afterwards they were to say—as they were trying to say by this Bill—that notwithstanding the fact that such conduct had arisen through the tenant's own conduct, act, or default, he should be reinstated in his holding. The hon. Member for South Tyrone had asked where was this to stop, and the Chief Secretary had said, "After all, this is only a temporary phase of the Irish question?" How did the right hon. Gentleman know that it was a temporary phase of the Irish question? Had he read a recent speech of the hon. Member for East Mayo, in which that hon. Gentleman had declared that whenever the Tory Party again came into Office there would be a worse land agitation in Ireland than had ever been known before? In the face of that threat were they to be told that this Bill was merely to deal with a temporary phase of the Irish question? All he could say was perhaps it would be necessary for hon. Members opposite, when they regained power after such agitation as was predicted, to bring in another Bill of the same character as the present. But, above all, the arguments that had not been answered in this case were made over and over again in the Debate—namely, that they were not proposing any new land legislation that would in the future prevent these evictions, and if it was admitted that by not so doing no new land agitation and protection for the tenants was necessary, they would be fixing a proper limit to the measure by applying it to cases prior to the Act of 1887.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

rose, amidst cries of "Divide!"

Mr. FLYNN rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put;" but the Chairman withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.

Debate resumed.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I constantly observe, without being quite able to explain, the anxiety of hon. Members below the Gangway opposite to divide just on the stroke of 10 when the pairs are due. Notwithstanding the impatience of hon. Members there is still a word or two to be said upon this Amendment before the Committee goes to a Division upon it. I wish very much to impress upon the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary the difference between the 13th clause of the Act of 1881 and the present Bill. The right hon. Gentleman says he is fully entitled to say that that clause dealt with all the classes of tenants, even with those whom we seek to exclude from the Bill. But, then, he will leave out of sight the fact that inasmuch as that clause is altogether per- missive no difficulty whatever could arise in any of these extreme cases. Our answer, if we had been attacked by an Amendment similar to this now proposed, would have been that no such case could by any possibility have arisen, because all the persons interested in preventing it would have had the power of veto. The landlord, the sitting tenant, and everybody else had to agree before anything whatever could happen. But in this case it is a totally different thing. The only persons who can pronounce a veto on the reinstatement of the tenant under the Bill are the arbitrators who will be established under the Bill. An hon. Member says, "And the sitting tenant." We will discuss the sitting tenant hereafter. I do not want to take up time prematurely by discussing that important matter. But I would say that the position as to the sitting tenants or as to the heir having the right of veto given to them is perfectly illusory. It is a right, as I have been told by the organ of a considerable Party in Ireland, which is tempered by the blunderbuss. It does not seem to me that there is any value in a right which is tempered by the blunderbuss by exasperated competitors. Therefore, there is, as I say, a great difference in principle between Clause 13 of the old Act, which was purely voluntary—which allowed everyone to object and to establish proceedings ab initio—and this clause which does not allow the parties interested to interfere and leaves the final decision absolutely in the hands of the tribunal it is proposed to appoint. It is not fair to expect the House of Commons or the Irish people to have unlimited confidence in a tribunal of three persons, who, although they may be very respectable gentlemen, are certainly not archangels. It is a little too much to expect that we should have absolute and unlimited confidence in them when they are called upon to deal with extremely complicated matters bearing upon the interests and the property of a large section of the Irish people. I think the absurdity of asking the House to trust these gentlemen in the matters we have been discussing is clearly shown by the divergence of opinion amongst the supporters of the Bill. We have had in the course of the Debate statements made by supporters of the Bill in absolute contradiction to the views taken by the Government, and even in absolute contradiction to the views of hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite. Well, Sir, when lawyers disagree, how are we to expect that these three gentlemen—these three black swans, as I have before called them—will always be able to come to a decision if they differ? It is certain that cases will be brought before them, and will be decided by them, which the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary has admitted ought to be excluded from consideration. So much in regard to the comparison which my right hon. Friend has made between the clause of the Act of 1891 and the present Bill. Then I go on to say that I go further than my hon. Friend behind me. I intend to support the Amendment, because I do think it is desirable to have some kind of test by which this constant interference is to be determined. My right hon. Friend proposes that we should deal with all cases of eviction which occur down to the passing of the Bill. Well, what reason is there for taking that particular period? What possible ground of distinction can there be between a person evicted before the end of 1894 and a person evicted at the beginning of 1895? You have absolutely no finality whatever, supposing you take the Act of 1887. I do not want in particular to defend that Act, but if you should take it you would have a logical resting place. You could say, "We have taken that period, because, until that Act was passed, redress was not given to certain classes of grievance. After that redress was given, we admit there ought to be some finality in this legislation." And here we take our stand; but just think what this House is asked to do. I will not say this Government, but I will say that this Legislature has again and again, for a considerable period, been asked to pass Acts as messages of peace to the Irish people. No sooner have we passed au Act than we have been asked to pass another. When that is pointed out, hon. Gentlemen opposite reply—"That is because you did not take our advice." Remember, those hon. Gentlemen have always supported these Acts, but they have always reserved to themselves—what shall I call it, not exactly a locus penitentiæ, but a place, or opportunity—for urging a further claim. Even with the Home Rule Bill that is the case, and that will be the case to the end of time, I do not care if you were to pass a new Bill providing that rents should not be claimed at all in Ireland. That would not satisfy hon. Gentlemen opposite. They would still say that there was something reserved for a future opportunity. That may be all very well for hon. Gentlemen opposite. It may assist them to pose before their countrymen as going beyond British Representatives; but it is not a position to be taken up by any Government that they should attempt to cure social and administrative difficulties by raising up a new crop of difficulties; and when they had the frank admission of hon. Gentlemen opposite that this Bill is not to be a final Bill, I say the time has gone by when they can come forward and pretend that they are consulting and taking Irish opinion, for the fact is that they themselves do not go as far as Irish opinion. They ought to form their own opinion and stick to it. As it is, we have had it clearly shown to us in the course of these Debates that the opinion of the Government and that of the Chief Secretary is that a certain class of cases ought to be excluded by the arbitrators, and the only reason for not excluding them by the Bill is that Irish Members will not consent, and say it is no use making these constant concessions to hon. Gentlemen opposite when even then you cannot claim that you have arrived at a position of finality. If the Government would have the courage of their convictions, and in this matter tell us what it is they are dealing with—with social and administrative difficulties brought about by the Plan of Campaign, and that even though they did not approve of the Plan of Campaign, they are anxious in the interest of Ireland to do something to prevent the evil effects of that conspiracy—then I think on grounds of national interest and in the interest of Ireland we should go a certain way with them. When, however, they yield to pressure and introduce a Bill which everyone in the House knows—and everybody, even hon. Gentlemen opposite, know—is only the beginning of further agitation, then I do think it is time for us to make some sort of protest.

MR. J. MORLEY

I do think that the right hon. Gentleman, who, as everyone knows, is one of the most clear and able and lucid speakers, has seldom made a speech in this House which has shown a greater departure from those qualities. He has made what is, in fact, a Second Reading speech. A few sentences, it is true, he devoted to the Amendment before the House, but the larger part of his observations had no more bearing upon the particular proposal before us than it had on any other of the 279 Amendments on the Paper. My right hon. Friend admits that if this were a social and administrative difficulty which we ask the House to give us special powers to deal with, he and hon. Gentlemen like him would be inclined to go a considerable way with us. The point we are now upon is the area of the social and administrative difficulty. My contention is that the area of the difficulty appeared to gentlemen opposite when they were in power to come down to tenants evicted as late as 1891. Two or three years have since passed by, and we bring the area down to the present day, but both gentlemen opposite and ourselves carry it beyond 1887, which is the limit fixed by the Amendment. I will not say anything more about the Amendment, but I will venture to call attention to the proceedings on the Amendment. The Amendment was put down in the name of the hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Carson). He chanced not to be present, and it was moved in a pretty full, elaborate, and learned speech by the hon. and learned Member for Armagh (Mr. Barton). Various gentlemen have discussed it. My hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor General (Mr. R. T. Reid) answered the Mover of the Amendment in a speech more full, more elaborate, and quite as learned. Then comes down the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Carson) who ought to have moved the Amendment himself. I make no complaint of his absence; to use a memorable phrase of his Leader (Mr. A. J. Balfour), he was probably "more agreeably employed." He comes down, and after we are all satisfied with the discussion on the subject, he endeavours to revive our languid interest. Then my right hon. Friend the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain) enters into a more full and copious discussion than anybody else, and roams—I do not like to say rambles—over the whole field of the Bill. That is the method in which the discussion of this Bill is being conducted, and probably it will necessitate some steps being taken by the Government.

MR. WYNDHAM (Dover)

said, he could not support the Amendment.

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

The Committee divided:—Ayes 103; Noes 158.—(Division List, No. 200.)

MR. HANBURY

The Amendment I have upon the Paper is in line 7, to insert after the words "seventy-nine," the words "and the former tenant thereof is now resident in Ireland." There are three very good reasons which will, I hope, commend themselves to the commonsense of the Government for introducing these words. In the first place, these words are adopted from the Reference to the Mathew Commission. It was into the facts in reference to tenants of this class that the Commissioners were directed to inquire. The Reference runs in these terms:— Whereas we have deemed it expedient that a Commission should forthwith issue to inquire into and report upon estates in Ireland where the tenancies of a holding or holdings have been determined since 1st May, 1879, and in respect to which claims to be reinstated have been made by tenants evicted therefrom and nonresident in Ireland, &c. Surely the inquiry by the Commission is the whole basis of this Bill, and I think we shall be on much safer ground if we really follow the Reference to that Commission. Undoubtedly the Commissioners were directed to deal with evicted tenants now resident in Ireland. These were the exact words of Reference, and where we have so little evidence in support of the Bill we ought at least to keep as much as possible to those cases which formed the subject of evidence. In addition to this reason for the limitation, I ask the Committee to remember that the plea of hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway in support of this Bill, and strong I have thought it to be, is the plea of pity. We are told that these unfortunate tenants live within a few miles, and often within sight, of their old holdings, and that it is very hard, and adds to the bitterness of their lot to live year after year close to the homes from which they have been evicted. A touching plea, I admit; and, further, it has been strongly urged by the hon. Member for Mayo that there are 9,000 or 10,000 women, children, and relatives of these evicted sufferers. These are the arguments mainly relied on in support of this Bill. I do not by my Amendment require that the tenants shall be living near their holdings; I only follow the words of the Commission's Reference and say "resident in Ireland." I do not want men to come from America, Canada, or the Colonies, and claim to be restored to farms they may have left 15 years ago. I would limit the operation of the Bill to evicted tenants actually resident in Ireland. It has been pleaded that families of evicted tenants are in a condition not far removed from starvation, and I fear this must be so; and it is to the relief of such the resources under the Bill should be devoted rather than to those who have found employment in the United States or the Colonies. These last are in a totally different position, and on their behalf the plea of pity does not operate. Surely it is not good policy to tempt these men to give up such employment as they may have been able to obtain elsewhere by an offer to reinstate them in their more or less miserable holdings in Ireland. I am not sure but that it might give rise to very serious complications with the Government of the United States, and certainly it would be well to a void, all questions of domicile and naturalisation; but such questions might arise if we allowed domiciled citizens of the United States to come back and claim, with State assistance, the right of reinstatement on the soil of Ireland. One great objection to this Bill is the fact that owing to the great number of tenants who may apply for reinstatement it cannot be seen how the Commission can make any of their orders absolute until all the petitions have been sent in and until years have elapsed; but I do see that if we limit the applications to residents in Ireland then the year might be considerably shortened, and the greater part of two years would remain for the arbitrators to deal with the cases before them. From every point of view the Amendment is desirable, unless it is the fact that the Bill is designed to bring back what I will venture to call a very turbulent and dangerous element of the population which left Ireland for the United States many years ago. A very different thing this to assisting to return to their farms those unfortunate men who since their eviction have, to their credit, lived peaceably in Ireland.

Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 7, after the words "seventy-nine," to insert the words "and the former tenant thereof is now resident in Ireland."—(Mr. Hanbury.)

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

SIR R. T. REID

The hon. Member has founded his Amendment on the Reference to the Mathew Commission, but he has not touched upon the recommendations of that body after they had heard and considered the evidence. I think that if, instead of attaching so much importance to the terms of Reference, he paid more attention to the findings of the Mathew Commission, he (the hon. Gentleman) would see that they cover most of the ground occupied by the Bill.

MR. HANBURY

The Mathew Commission were limited to tenancies of this kind. The claims of evicted tenants now resident in Ireland was the entire limit of their Commission.

SIR R. T. REID

That does not seem to me to conclude the matter or to offer any very special argument in support of what the hon. Member wants to do. He wants to draw a line whereby no person not now, at the passing of the Act, resident in Ireland shall receive any benefit under the Act. That line of demarcation does not seem to me to be consistent with justice or expediency. I can imagine many cases in which such exclusion would operate unjustly. An evicted tenant may have died, but he may have a representative whose right and title ought not to be affected by the fact that he resides, for example, in England. The hon. Member has recognised that natural sympathy we all must feel for the man who in wretched circumstances sees day by day others in occupation of his old home, but there may be other cases quite as meritorious. A man having suffered an unfair or inconsiderate eviction may have been constrained by necessity, instead of settling down near his holding, to come to England seeking a means of livelihood. I do not see why this praiseworthy effort should not command our sympathy or disentitle him to any benefit this Act would give. It seems to me that the case the hon. Gentleman has put, that of a man coming back from America, is one that could be readily dealt with by any sensible person, and such cases may well be left to the judgment of the sensible and distinguished men who are to be made arbitrators by this Bill. But I think the hon. Gentleman must have been driven to the last extremity for argument when he suggested that difficulties might arise out of the question of domicile. I do not desire to be dogmatic upon any point of International Law, and the more one knows of that subject the less will be the inclination to dogmatise, but I think I can assure the hon. Member that by no possibility can any unpleasantness such as he suggests arise under the clauses of this Bill.

COLONEL SAUNDERSON

The hon. and learned Gentleman has, I think, proved one thing at any rate—that however able a lawyer he may be he does not know much about Ireland. Now, I wish to point out, in regard to the Amendment proposed by my hon. Friend, that you have already decided that in cases where two claimants appear on the scene of action, then these distinguished and amiable gentlemen, these "sensible persons" who are to determine the fate of Irish tenants and landlords in the future, are to have the power of dividing the farm into two, by way of establishing peace in Ireland. That has already been done. Now, I have some acquaintance with the origin of Irish fights and disagreements that must occasionally occur, and I venture to mention a fact of which you, Sir (Mr. A. O'Connor in the Chair), are no doubt perfectly aware, that most of the crimes in Ireland, apart from what we call agrarian crimes, arise out of claims set up for some piece of property. Now you have determined that—just by way of establishing peace—rival claims may be settled by division.

MR. FLYNN (Cork, N)

On a point of Order, I submit that the hon. and gallant Gentleman is not speaking to the Amendment but to a former Amendment about two tenants.

THE CHAIRMAN

desired Colonel Saunderson to proceed.

COLONEL SAUNDERSON

I am absolutely in Order, and this is to the point. We are now discussing whether the representative of an Irish tenant may come back from America and claim a farm. There may be two claimants, possibly three, but I take two. Of these two, one may be an Irish tenant who was evicted say five years ago, and the claimant from America may represent a tenant evicted 14 years ago, and these two would-be Irish tenants have to set up their claims before this remarkable tribunal for the division of a farm on which probably there will be only one house. Whether the happy families are to live in one house or not we are not told, but I ask the Committee to consider for a moment whether an arrangement of this kind will tend to the peace, prosperity, and happiness of Ireland? It would be a much more sensible thing, viewing the peculiarities of the country, if you were to introduce into the Bill a clause providing that the survivor shall have the farm. You allow the claim of a representative who need not be son or even daughter of the former tenant—it may be widow, nephew, cousin, or distant relative—who may come over to Ireland after the lapse of many years and put in a claim to divide a farm in Clare, or some other peaceful county; and these three gentlemen are to decide whether the tenant who was turned out many years ago, or perhaps his widow, coming back from America, shall divide the farm and live in the same house with another. Is not making a proposal of that kind trifling with the House? Can anything be conceived more ridiculous or absurd? And then we hear the hon. and learned Gentleman, in eminently Parliamentary and legal phraseology, speak on the condition of affairs in Ireland of which he absolutely knows nothing! My hon. Friend proposes that claims shall come only from men resident in Ireland who are known, and whose relationship to the former occupant of the farm may be established; but here you propose to allow a representative to come from America, Australia, New Zealand, and the uttermost parts of the earth and, I presume, upon his ipse dixit, to represent a former tenant who resided on the farm 14 years ago, and to claim the attention and decision of this wonderful tribunal you are setting up. I should like to hear some hon. Member below the Gangway acquainted with the affairs of Ireland prove how a proposal of this kind will tend to the pacification of my country. I venture to say that nobody who knows anything of Ireland can defend the proposal of allowing representatives of tenants to come from nobody knows where, and put in these claims which it will be impossible to refuse, otherwise, I suppose, you will have to establish Commissions in America and elsewhere to determine who is the representative of the original Irish tenant. My hon. Friend makes a very sensible proposal, which I do not see how the Government can refuse. Of course, we know they will refuse it, for they have practically announced that they do not intend to accept from us any Amendment whatever, and their reasoning is very simple. They say, "You have passed the Second Reading of this Bill; you have swallowed the principle of the Bill, and any Amendments you propose to us we look upon as antagonistic to that principle you accepted on the Second Reading." I never before heard such an argument addressed to a Committee of the House of Commons by any Government. The right hon. Gentleman imagines we have wasted the time of the House; but allow me to point out that if we have been unduly long, and if our speeches have seemed to be too frequent—

THE CHAIRMAN (Mr. A. O'CONNOR)

I would call the attention of the hon. and gallant Member to the fact that the Question before the Committee is the insertion of certain words, and he must deal with that.

COLONEL SAUNDERSON

To the best of my ability I have dealt with those words, but I bow to your decision, Sir, and pass on to say this: This Amendment of my hon. Friend has not been met by argument, and it is a proposal to which I cannot see why hon. Members below the Gangway should object. It will not be popular in their constituencies to provide that a nephew, cousin, uncle, aunt of a former tenant may appear on the scene from America after 14 years have elapsed, and claim reinstatement. My hon. Friend would prevent what undoubtedly would become the source of an addition to the social confusion in Ireland, and I am sure that without such Amendment the clause will be one of the most unpopular things this House could effect by legislation. To avoid further increase of social confusion in Ireland and possibly bloodshed, I support this proposal of my hon. Friend, and it ought to have the support of hon. Members below the Gangway, for I am certain it would be popular among their constituents. I feel convinced that when the Government realise not only the simple character of this Amendment, and the extent to which it will prevent confusion in Ireland, they will overcome their scruples and accept this as an improvement of their Bill.

MR. MACARTNEY

The Solicitor General has complained that my hon. Friend, in founding his Amendment on the Reference to the Mathew Commission, left out of view the recommendations of that Commission, and that this was his main or only argument. But the hon. and learned Gentleman cannot have read, or if he has read he must have forgotten, paragraph 16 and 17 of the Report, in which the Commissioners say that evicted tenants live in the vicinity of the estate supported by the assistance of friends or ass ociations, and, having no occupation, hang about the farms, never relinquishing the hope of returning, and that it is not surprising that authorities have considered additions to the local police force necessary. Now, the Bill, we understand, has been introduced to remove an adminstrative and social trouble, and it is evident from their Report that the Commissioners consider these social and administrative troubles have arisen from the fact that evicted tenants remain in the neighbourhood of the evicted farms, and there is not a word in the Report, not an expression in their recommendations to show that the Commissioners ever had the slightest idea of extending their recommendations to any tenant not resident in the country, and not, therefore, in their opinion one of the chief causes of that social trouble to remove which the Bill has been brought in. We have heard various arguments from the Front Bench, but I think not one with less foundation than this last. The Amendment is founded on the Reference to the Commission; but when we come to read the recommendations of the Commissioners, comparing the language in the Report with the facts in evidence, I think it is perfectly evident that my hon. Friend can find ample justification for his Amendment.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

Anybody who knows anything of the tenants evicted under the Plan of Campaign knows that many of them have left the country, have gone abroad, or have found in England or Scotland means of earning a living. If that is true of tenants evicted since 1886 much more is it true of tenants evicted between 1879 and 1886; if one class has scattered the other has much more scattered. Now I put it to the Government, Do they think that by putting temptation in the way of these people to come back and claim these farms out of which they could not get enough to live upon they are doing these people good service? They are doing nothing of the kind. Many of these ex-tenants are earning their living in other ways, and, I am glad to think, in far more comfortable circumstances than when they were in occupation of their holdings, and I cannot for the life of me see why the Government should offer encouragement to these people to return to Ireland where they cannot live. This is a substantial and useful Amendment, and I shall support it.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend who moved this Amendment and with my hon. Friends who have supported it. I cannot help thinking that the Chief Secretary must have been rather surprised at the line of defence taken up by the Solicitor General. My hon. Friend based his Amendment to a considerable extent on the Reference to the Mathew Commission, and pointed out that that Reference distinctly confined the investigations of the Commission to the case of tenants resident in Ireland. The Solicitor General expressed a wish that my hon. Friend had thought more of the Report of the Commission and less of the Reference. On that Report I do not make any attack, nor against the excellent gentlemen who formed the Commission do I say a single word. They were a body of gentlemen, however "sensible," with whom the hon. and learned Gentleman has had nothing to do, except that he is now a Member of the Government who at the time made the appointments. But who is responsible for that Reference? The very gentleman who ought to have got up and given expression to the views of the Government on this occasion, who did not do so, but left that duty to his lieutenant. The Chief Secretary for Ireland—he alone, or I presume with the assent of his Colleagues—is the person responsible originally for confining the investigation of this Commission, on whose labours this Bill is founded, to tenants living in Ireland. Clearly his own opinion must have been at that time that the Bill should be confined to these tenants, and at least we have a right to ask why his opinion changed between the time when the Commission was appointed and the time when this Bill was introduced. We have the gravest reason to complain that there has been no explanation of the change. The investigation of the Committee was directed to a few estates, not to the whole of Ireland; but the finding of the Commission was the main reason put forward against the Amendment. As the hon. Member for South Tyrone has said, to otter temptation to people who, whether in America, in England, or Scotland, have now settled down to other modes of life and means of livelihood to return to Ireland and put in claims, is doing no good service to them and is a cruel wrong to Irish tenants. My hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Saunderson) appeared to think that the representative of an Irish tenant must necessarily be a relative; but that need not be so; he may be, for anything I know, anybody who takes out letters of administration.

MR. J. MORLEY

There is another Amendment on that point.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

And will the Government accept it?

MR. J. MORLEY

intimated a negative.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

Then I must take the Bill as I find it. He need not be a relation of the person who held the tenancy; he may be unconnected by blood or friendship, and his only connection may be the fact that he has a debt, payment of which can only be obtained by taking out letters of administration, and he may come from America and, before the arbitrators, put in a claim to all the privileges of this Bill. It is ridiculous. We have often discussed—and very recently in the other House, though I have no right to refer to a Bill there—the means of preventing the immigration of pauper aliens, but this Bill if it is left unamended will encourage such immigration; and when we are all agreed that the immigration of pauper aliens is a thing to be discouraged in London, Leeds, and Manchester, I fail to see why it should be encouraged in Ireland. We ought to have to deal only with Irishmen living in Ireland, and I base that contention on the deliberate opinion of the Government and of the present Chief Secretary when he framed with the utmost care the Reference to the Mathew Commission. I ask the Committee to endorse that opinion by supporting the Amendment of my hon. Friend, who desires to confine the advantages of the Bill, as the Chief Secretary originally desired to confine them, to tenants living in Ireland, not extending them to those who many years ago may have sought in foreign countries and in foreign citizenship means of livelihood wholly different from their old occupation. Of course, the Government may refuse this and every Amendment, but as yet no reason has been given for departing from their original position when drawing up the Reference to the Commission and now substantially embodied in the Amendment of my hon. Friend.

MR. BUCKNILL (Surrey, Epsom)

One word may be added with a quotation of language used by the Chief Secretary in support of the not improper demand for an explanation. Before the Commission issued, which was, I think, in October, 1892—I speak from recollection—the Chief Secretary for Ireland addressed a letter, dated 26th September, to the hon. Member for Long ford which was published in The Times of September 28, at page 7, in which the Chief Secretary for Ireland notified to the hon. Member for Longford the intention of the Government to issue a Commission, which is known now by the name of the Mathew Commission. In that letter the Chief Secretary drew the attention of the hon. Member for Longford in terms to the nature of the Commission, which appear to me now to require some explanation. I will read the whole sentence as it appears in The Times— We (meaning the Government) intend that the area of the inquiry shall particularly cover estates within the scope of Section 13, where disputes still exist between landlords and evicted tenants, but excluding all cases where the evicted tenants have left the country. These are the exact words as they appear in The Times. The answer of the hon. Member for Longford has not yet been published; but I feel some curiosity to know how that hon. Member met this particular part of the sentence, what were his views and those of other Irish Members of the proposed exclusion of that particular class of tenants from the scope of that inquiry and this Bill. All else that I had to say has been better said by others, and I waited until the Chief Secretary was present before quoting from his letter.

MR. J. MORLEY

I have no right whatever to complain either of the right hon. Gentleman or of the hon. and learned Member for reminding the Committee of the language that was used by me in announcing the intention of the Government to issue the Mathew Commission, and the words I introduced into the Order of Reference to that Commission. To the views which I then expressed more specifically and personally in the letter from which the hon. and learned Member has read an extract, explaining the object which I had in my mind at the time and still have in my mind—to those views I still adhere; that is to say, I do not expect or contemplate that the operation of this Bill will be to invite back to Ireland a number of men from Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, and elsewhere, in order to make claims for reinstatement in holdings from which they had been evicted 10 or 15 years ago. That exclusion was my policy then, and it is the policy which I do not conceive to be shut out or negatived by the machinery which it is proposed to set up in this Bill. But I am not willing to exclude from the consideration of the arbitrators cases of emigrant tenants who may have a fair claim, and whom it may be desirable, in the interests of the social peace of the district, to restore. Anybody who knows Ireland—and no one knows it better than the hon. and gallant Member for North Armagh—knows that there may be cases where land is at this moment unoccupied, and where it might be very desirable, if a returned emigrant set up a claim for reinstatement upon it, that the arbitrators should have power to recognise that claim and put the man into the holding. I do not think, however, that such cases would be frequent. This is my apology, if you like to use that word, for any apparent inconsistency in the language I used in the document quoted by the hon. and learned Member opposite, and my refusal or unwillingness to assent to this Amendment. I do not think it would be politic to invite men to come back from America or other parts of the world to put forward claims under this Bill. I do not think the inducement is sufficient, and even if some of them were to return to Ireland for that purpose I do not suppose that the welcome they would receive from the arbitrators would be such as would operate as an encouragement to others to do the same. I adhere to the policy upon this matter that I have always held, but I do not deem it expedient to shut out of view the fact that there may be circumstances which make it desirable to give the power to reinstate tenants who at the moment that the Bill becomes law do not happen to be resident in Ireland.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

The statement of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary is a very important one, because it certainly shows that a complete change has taken place in the policy of the right hon. Gentleman since be wrote that letter to the hon. Member for Longford in 1892. The right hon. Gentleman now says that he does not desire to invite persons over from America to make claims under this Bill, but in 1892 he said he desired to exclude such persons, which is a totally different thing. The explanation of the right hon. Gentleman does not show why he desired to exclude these men in 1892 and why he desires to include them in 1894. I venture to say the change was made much later than might be supposed from the interval which elapsed between the date of the letter and the introduction of this Bill, because upon the Second Reading of the Bill the Chief Secretary spoke of the limited number of evicted tenants who would come under the operation of the Bill. He said that there were altogether 5,900 evicted tenants, of whom some 2,000 had gone abroad or were otherwise disposed of, and that that would leave only 3,900 to be dealt with under this Bill, and when I reminded him that it appeared from the Report of the Parnell Commission that in eight only out of the 15 years since the passing of the Act of 1879 there had been 24,000 evictions, he met that statement by asserting that all the remaining evicted tenants had been disposed of, and that they would only have to deal with 3,900 under this Bill, because the rest had gone to America or had been otherwise disposed of. Undoubtedly this Bill will be a call to those tenants who have gone to America to come back, raising social difficulties that do not now exist. Let us speak plainly. The Government has shown to-night a determination, which I think is very deplorable, not to accept any Amendment whatever to the Bill. Here is an Amendment which will have the effect of carrying out the right hon. Gentleman's own declared policy, but new pressure has been brought to bear upon him, and he consequently goes away from his own opinion and conviction, though he still thinks it is not desirable that these men should be excluded, and now seeks to throw the whole responsibility in the matter upon the arbitrators. We have had no answer to the Amendment, and we are justified in repeating our argument again and again that the only justification for the Bill is that it may remove social and administrative difficulties. How are you going to deal with the social and administrative difficulties in Ireland if you bring back to that country a number of men who have become absorbed into the populations of other countries, and who are perhaps contentedly living there? The right hon. Gentleman has spoken of the advantages that may accrue to those persons who may return, but there are a great number of those persons whose return may be far from an advantage to ourselves. In 1882 there was a great flight of Irishmen to America and other parts of the world, and some of those gentlemen who have not been successful abroad, and who have not obtained influential positions in Tammany Hall, may find it convenient to return to Ireland. Is the Government going to say to them, "Well, we cannot make you all city marshals, but at least we can offer you the next best thing—we can make you evicted tenants?"

MR. SEXTON

Such speeches as that we have heard from the right hon. Gentleman offer full explanation why British law and British administration have become detestable to the Irish people, speeches inspired by the spirit of mockery and taunt. Let me submit specific reasons against this Amendment. If these words are inserted no man who is out of Ireland at the passing of this Act can make a claim. There are hundreds of poor tenants who, by reason of their eviction, go to England or Scotland to take part in such work as they can find in the summer and autumn and do not return until November.

MR. HANBURY

They are resident.

MR. SEXTON

What does "resident" mean? Has not absence from Ireland—occasional absence—debarred a man from the exercise of the franchise? Ingenuous Tory gentlemen know little of the subtleties of the legal mind when applied to the construction of the law in Ireland if they do not realise that a few months' absence in England may be held to exclude a man from a claim under the Act. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman does not intend that temporary absence should operate as exclusion.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

Hear, hear.

MR. SEXTON

Should the representative of a tenant who has died be excluded? Surely it is not intended that the property of an Irish tenant, which has some value, should, at his death, necessarily come into the possession of the landlord? By right of law and equity such property passes to the representative of the deceased, but by these words that representative would be ousted. In the case of an evicted tenant in America it is contended that no matter under what circumstances he has emigrated he ought to be excluded. We have known of many men who have gone to America simply because they were unable to get a living nearer home, but they have wives and children at home; they have still home interests in Ireland near the old home, they working in America to provide the means of subsistence. Does the right hon. Gentleman contend that a man who has been driven for a time to America to secure the means of life should be excluded from the benefits of this Act? I am sorry that the hon. and gallant Member for North Armagh, the only Irish landlord who has taken part in this discussion, should have seen fit to treat the subject of this Bill and the sufferings of men, women, and children, under the tyranny of eviction, in a spirit of broad farce. Let me remind the Committee of what took place in relation to evictions on Lord Clanricarde's estate. Evicted tenants found shelter on a plot of ground on the property of the parish priest. Through a Court of Law Lord Clanricarde obliged the priest to expel the tenants from that plot of ground, but the tenants found shelter in huts and outhouses of other tenants, and then Lord Clanricarde set his agents to work to hunt out these poor creatures, and by threats to prevent any assistance or shelter being given to them. The Times alluded to these proceedings as "devil's work," and am I to be told that people driven from the country by such tyranny as this are to be denied participation in this act of mercy passed by a British Parliament? I put the question with some confidence to the right hon. Gentleman, and invite his answer.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

Certainly, I accept the invitation, and I can assure the hon. Gentleman that to such an argument I have no inclination to reply in a spirit of mockery. It is the first argument that has been offered in support of the Bill as it stands. I think the hon. Member has made out a case for amendment of the Amendment, for I believe that none of us desire to exclude from the purview of the Bill the personal representative of a former tenant. Therefore, I venture to move at once the addition after "former tenant thereof," of the words "or his personal representative." But in regard to the matters referred to by the hon. Member, though I defer to the opinion of others upon the legal point, I do not think it can be held that temporary absence in England or Scotland establishes a man as non-resident in Ireland any more than it can be maintained that I am not a resident in Birmingham because the Government keep me 18 months in London. I really do not think that such a man could legally be held to be non-resident. Then the hon. Member puts another case, that of a man who has gone over to America to find work, leaving wife and children behind. Such cases are, I suppose, exceptional.

MR. SEXTON

We know of many.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I do not deny their existence, and am endeavouring to deal with such cases. Surely a man who has left his family domiciled at home cannot be said to have lost residence or domicile in Ireland?

MR. SEXTON

He may really have no residonee—wife and children may have merely the shelter of a miserable hut.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I wish frankly to acknowledge there may be exceptional cases to meet which we invite assistance to amend our Amendment. These are not reasons for rejecting the Amendment, though it may require alteration. If the Government will say they are willing to accept the principle of the Amendment we are quite willing that exceptional cases should be provided for. Meanwhile, to meet one of the objections, I propose the addition of the words "or his personal representative."

Amendment proposed to the proposed Amendment, after the word "thereof," to insert the words "or his personal representative."—(Mr. J. Chamberlain.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted in the proposed Amendment."

MR. T. M. HEALY

I invite the Committee to pause in dealing with the question of absenteeism. That is a very large question, and it affects landlords as well as tenants. What would become of the Duke of Devonshire if he were to get the law as it is proposed to be administered by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham? He rarely goes to Ireland.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

He was there last year.

MR. T. M. HEALY

Once in 10 years has he visited Ireland.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

He had not been there since his brother was murdered.

MR. T. M. HEALY

Has Lord Clanricarde lost a brother in Ireland? He was there in 1872, 22 years ago. Has anything happened to him? So I might go on with nine-tenths of these gentlemen. There is Mr. Henry Arthur Herbert, of Mucross; he has not been in Ireland since 1874, when he ceased to be a Member of this House. Is the Conservative Party going to invent a new doctrine in regard to absentee tenants which is not to apply to landlords? Let me give another.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL

I rise to Order. There is no proposal in the Bill to reinstate evicted landlords.

THE CHAIRMAN

The Question before the Committee is the Amendment to the Amendment.

MR. T. M. HEALY

I was going to deal with this question of residence. Some three years ago the Court of Appeal in Ireland admitted to the franchise a tenant in Tyrone who lived in Glasgow, and only came to Ireland for the 15th August, a Catholic holiday, and at Christmas, some two or three times in the year. He paid rent and taxes for the whole time. But the following year the very same man, paying the same rates and taxes and the same rent, was disqualified by the same Court of Appeal under the very same conditions. Nobody who knows the conflicting decisions, on the question of residence in relation to the franchise, can doubt that the greatest confusion will arise if such questions are imported into the decisions of the tribunal such as is contemplated in the Bill. A man can now be conveyed from Queenstown to New York for 38s. This I know is only a recent reduction of the rate, but years ago the fare to Boston was only £3, and it was a constant thing throughout County Donegal for large squads of poor men to cross the Atlantic after the harvest to earn enough to pay their rent on return. What was the case with the evicted Olphert tenants? They lived in wretched, miserable shielings, places such as no humane Englishman would put his dogs or even his pigs into. I have seen a woman and three children issue from a den not two yards square, into which the rain dripped through the sods that formed the rough roof. The House was dealing with matters which touched the very heart-strings of the Irish people. The whole question of exile as well as of eviction was involved in those cases, and yet in regard to them the right hon. Member for Birmingham had nothing but jibes about Tamanny Hall and the City Marshalship of Dublin. He would invite English gentlemen to consider this matter carefully. It was simply because long ago your fathers had suits of mail and muskets, and our fathers only skiens and saffron shirts, that you were now the landlords and we the tenants. The English had no better title to Ireland than that they were better armed some hundreds of years ago. The men who had been cleared out of their farms had gone to the only country which gave them food and freedom and blessing, as John Bright had said. To-day Birmingham cast back the blessings of John Bright; and when Parliament for the first time offered to Irishmen decent consideration and a decent tribunal the right hon. Member for West Birmingham would shut out the exiles whom their laws had driven from their native soil.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

I do not think that anyone could have listened to the hon. and learned Member's speech without fooling that every word he said represented long-cherished emotions and bitterness of spirit which afforded some key to the difficulties of the present situation in Ireland. That speech was not altogether relevant to the Amendment, but nevertheless it was a most suggestive speech and raised questions that must be taken into consideration. I would point out to the Government that the Bill goes to the root of the Irish question, and raises all the slumbering controversies of a decade of agrarian agitation. It is perfectly clear from the hon. and learned Member's speech that this Bill will require time for its discussion. It is not tolerable that we should be accused of obstruction when such speeches are delivered. I do not blame the hon. and learned Gentleman. I have no right to blame him. But if he has the right, as he unquestionably has, to make such speeches in the House, it is grotesque and absurd to pretend that the Bill is one to be disposed of in a week. The hon. and learned Gentleman has spoken the echo of centuries of passion.

MR. T. M. HEALY

Hear, hear!

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

I recognise that. I recognise that the speech came from his heart. But are those who, though understanding the hon. and learned Gentleman, do not agree with him, to be silenced while he is allowed to speak? Is that tolerable or possible? I say it is grotesque and absurd to suppose that this Bill, which touches every phase of the Irish question, and which is introduced at the end of July, is going to be passed under such novel conditions, under conditions which you never asked us to undergo when dealing with questions of the kind before. The hon. and learned Member spoke the sentiments of a vast body of opinion in Ireland and out of it. And on what views are those opinions based? That the Bill is not dealing by a process of amnesty with a social difficulty, but is restoring rights which have been taken away. The Government, on the other hand, call the Bill an amnesty and privilege to the Irish tenants. The question of which view is to be taken goes to the root of the Bill. It is evidently proposed by the Government in one spirit and accepted by hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway in a different spirit; and until it is decided on which of these two principles the Bill is to be discussed, it will not be discussed reasonably and in a businesslike way. As to the point of the Amendment now before the Committee, I agree with the general views of the right, hon. Member for West Birmingham, and will vote for the Amendment to the Amendment. But it must be on the understanding that when the question of personal representation is subsequently raised we can express our views on it, and that the words "personal representatives" should be altered, seeing that the phrase does not necessarily mean, legally, any relative or even connection of the remotest kind. As to what the hon. and learned Member for Louth has said about people going to America, he is quite right. It has come to my knowledge that many Irishmen from Achill go to America and return annually.

MR. J. MORLEY

You mean to England or Scotland?

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

In addition to those who go from the West of Ireland to England and Scotland, I came across cases of persons who actually went to America every year and came back to Achill in the winter. The knowledge came to me with a shock of surprise. I believe that if the word "domicile" is inserted in the Amendment all these objections will be successfully met. It is said again and again that these three gentlemen who are to form the tribunal are to use a wise discretion, and I see no reason why it should not be left to them to discriminate whether the person applying for the benefit of the Act is a bonâ fide resident in Ireland or whether his domicile is in some other country.

Question put, and agreed to.

MR. BARTON

moved to insert after the word "resident," in the proposed Amendment, the words "or domiciled." The object of this Amendment to the proposed Amendment was to cover the cases of persons who went to America, England, or Scotland for the purposes of temporary business occupation, and with the intention of returning to Ireland again.

Amendment proposed to the proposed Amendment, after the word "resident," to insert the words "or domiciled."—(Mr. Barton.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted in the proposed Amendment."

MR. J. MORLEY

The speech of the Leader of the Opposition was, neither in tone nor in language, unworthy of the occasion which has produced it; but one may regret that the right hon. Gentleman did not allow the insight which he possesses into what he has called the bitterness of spirit that underlay deep Irish memories to guide him more in the policy he recommends. If the right hon. Gentleman had applied his mind to the proposals of the Government in the light of those emotions and feelings the depth and strength of which he recognised in the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Louth, they might now have been in a very different position, for Members would have felt that they had at least been employing the time spent on the Bill upon topics worthy of a great Assembly. That is my answer to the right hon. Gentleman. If the right hon. Gentleman had only dealt with our proposals in the spirit evinced in his speech, Ireland might have felt—whether the Bill is carried or not—that the House had at last awakened to some sense of sympathy with her, and with the dominant passions and emotions of her people. The speech of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Louth, moving the House as it did, and calling for the recognition which the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition gave it, must assuredly make hon. Gentlemen opposite reflect whether it is not better and worth while to approach this Bill even now with a desire to see these things in Ireland at an end. If gentlemen opposite would only try and see these things as Irishmen see them, instead of opposing our proposals merely for the purpose of a little paltry, Party fight, we would not have brought the Bill in in vain, even if it were necessary to effect some transformation in it. So far as this particular Amendment is concerned, all I can say is that, with the recollection of the traps and pitfalls offered to us in the shape of Amendments to the Home Rule Bill before me, I cannot say whether I will accept this word. At the proper time, however, I will consider the matter, but for the present I can only say I see no reason for departing from the attitude I have already taken up.

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

I rise in response to the appeal which has been made by the Chief Secretary. I think that the Chief Secretary has recognised before now that I have not been irreconcilable towards this Bill.

MR. J. MORLEY

Hear, hear!

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN

When I heard the right hon. Gentleman say now that it would be something if this Bill should not be brought in in vain, even though it had to submit to some transformation, I thought it was a hopeful expression of opinion, and one which I gladly recognise. I ask the Committee to take advantage of the higher mood to which it has been raised by the eloquent speech of the hon. Member for North Louth, and to see whether even now, at this last moment, we may not do something at all events towards settling this controversy raised between the two sides of the House. My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary went too far when he accused hon. Members opposite of a want of sympathy with Ireland. Ireland includes something more than the people—even though they are the majority—who are represented by hon. Members opposite. We are not so inhuman as not to feel sympathy with those who, through their own fault or the fault of others, have been brought into a condition of great distress and suffering, but we also feel sympathy with those who will be brought into distress and suffering by the passing of such a Bill as this. We feel sympathy for the new tenants—those who are called "land-grabbers" and "legalised brigands"—men who carry their lives in their hands, but who have been guilty of no greater offence than that of trying to earn their livings honestly. When we are told that it is baneful that these controversies should be allowed to continue, let it be remembered that the real difference between the two sides of the House is whether this Bill should be voluntary or compulsory. By a voluntary Bill we would provide for a vast number of persons for whom our sympathy is claimed, but by a compulsory scheme injustice would be caused to a great number of persons we wish to protect. I do not think, however, that the appeal of the Chief Secretary should be received without hope, and as the hon. Member for Louth had said earlier in the evening that he would accept the principle of the Arrears Act, and as the principle of that Act is that of voluntary agreement, I still hope that there may be between the Chief Secretary and the hon. Member for Louth and the Members of the Opposition some possible modus vivendi.

Question put, and agreed to.

Question put, "That the words 'and the former tenant thereof, or his personal representative, is now resident or domiciled in Ireland' be there inserted."

The Committee divided:—Ayes 110; Noes 165.—(Division List, No. 201.)

It being after Midnight, the Chairman left the Chair to make his report to the House.

Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.