§ MR. J. H. LEWISI beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the Unemployed Committee will have power to consider and to report to the House upon the desirability of preventing the disfranchisement of those who have recently been deprived of employment through no fault of their own, and have in consequence been compelled to apply for parochial relief?
§ MR. KEIR HARDIEasked when the names of the Committee would be put on the Paper?
§ SIR W. HARCOURTI hope the names will be put down to-night. I stated yesterday that I thought it very undesirable that the Committee should be involved in any questions of a political character, and that the matter of disqualification was one rather for the House than the Committee. My hon. 758 and learned Friend the Member for Louth has already called attention to the clause inserted in the Poor Relief (Ireland) Bill, 1886, during the administration of the Member for Midlothian, to the following effect:—
No person shall be incapacitated from being registered or voting is a Parliamentary elector by reason of his receipt of relief under this Act.