HC Deb 02 September 1895 vol 36 cc1518-34

Considered in Committee.

(In the Committee.)

On Clause I,

MR. T. M. HEALY

said he regretted he was under the necessity of objecting to the date inserted in the Bill with special reference to the continuance of the Arms Act (Ireland). So far as that one Act was concerned, the word December ought to be changed and August or May substituted. In 1874, when the Rules of the House were different from what they are now, Mr. Butt, on the Motion that the Speaker leave the chair, moved a Resolution to the effect that it was inexpedient, when an important Act had been passed for a limited period, especially if it conferred extraordinary powers on the Executive, to include it in a general Bill, instead of introducing a special Bill which would afford the House an opportunity of considering the propriety of its discontinuance or modification. If the Bill passed as it stood the Acts included would remain in force through the whole of next Session and until the 31st of December. Thus the Irish people would be deprived of the right to carry arms for the present year and the whole of next year. All the Conservative constitutional authorities, from Mr. Disraeli and Sir Stafford Northcote down to the hon. Member for South Tyrone [Laughter], had been against the practice. They objected to the renewal of the Coercion Act for Ireland and the Arms Act in 1873, when a Liberal Government was in office. When objection was being taken to the renewal of the Acts in 1874, Sir Stafford Northcote, who was Chancellor of the Exchequer, said his right hon. Friend at the head of the Government had determined that these Acts should not on any future occasion be put into the ordinary omnibus Continuance Bill, but, if it was desired to renew them, they should be dealt with separately. There was a distinct pledge that Acts of this kind should not be included in an Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. Mr. Henley, Member for Oxfordshire, who was regarded by the Tory party as a great constitutional authority, and a man with more common sense than anyone else in these islands, said it was a grave question whether the Continuance Bill did not extend to an inconvenient length through continuing many Acts which had better be left out. Sir Eardley Wilmot, another Conservative, deprecated the unconstitutional policy pursued by the Government, condemned it as indefensible, and apparently voted with Mr. Butt. When the Bill got into Committee Mr. Disraeli declared that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had expressed the views of the Government. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said the Government did not desire to carry this practice of continuing important laws further than it had been carried, but rather to restrict it. He further said it was not the intention of the Government to propose the continuance of these Acts again, and, therefore, if only the House believed the Government spoke with good faith, there was every intention to meet the opposing Members fairly. Having been reminded that he had come in with a large majority and recommended to use, it gently, Mr. Disraeli said:— Notwithstanding our spanking majority. I would prefer to use it with good humour; and I hope upon reflection the Irish Members will feel that they have carried that style of Parliamentary manœuvring far enough [Ironical laughter.] The Conservative Government of that date were compelled by the resistance of the Irish Members to drop the system of including a coercive Bill for Ireland in an omnibus Bill. In consequence they passed the Peace Preservation Act of 1875, in which the Arms Act was included; and in defending that, the then Attorney General for Ireland, Dr. Bull, put the ground of its continuance on disturbance in the North of Ireland. That was the only place in Ireland where the Act had not been enforced. Immediately after the passing of the Act the great riots took place in Belfast, when hundreds of men were shooting at each other. The history of this Act showed conclusively that its object was of an oppressive character. In 1875 it was passed for six years. In 1881 it was renewed for five years in an Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. In 1886 its renewal was resisted by the Irish Members, and it expired in 1892. The Conservative Government then included the measure in an Expiring Laws Continuance Bill, that being their first departure from the practice of Mr. Disraeli in 1874. The expiry in 1893 took place at a time when Parliament was about to be dissolved, and when Members were looking after their constituencies. But the Nationalist Members found a good substitute in the hon. Member for South Tyrone, who on September 18, 1893, said:— He objected to the renewal of the Peace Preservation Act, a measure of coercion which was unnecessary to the Government in carrying out their policy, especially as they had dispensed with the Criminal Law Procedure Act.

THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,) Tyrone, S.

What I did put to the Chief Secretary was this—that inasmuch as the Government was boasting of governing Ireland without exceptional legislation, they had no right to renew the Arms Act, that being exceptional legislation.

MR. T. M. HEALY

Does the hon. Member suggest that I have not read his words verbatim from Hansard? There are no trimmings or filigree work about that statement of his at all. [Laughter.] He hoped the hon. Member, however, was not ashamed of his opinions. The Irish Party then thought that as the Liberal Government were endeavouring to press forward a large measure to give to the Irish people the right to make their own laws in their own way, they were entitled to have from the Irish Party some consideration in regard to minor measures which they thought to be necessary for the Government of Ireland. He did not then, nor did he now, follow the Irish Party in that argument, but for the sake of solidarity, one must go with one's party—[Ministerial laughter]—and so no protest was made at that time against the continuance of the Act. Hon. Gentlemen opposite who laughed had very often to go with their Party whether they liked it or not, and they considered their conduct, instead of blameworthy, all the more heroic, on that account. [Laughter.] He was far from saying that the Government would not be able to make out some case, owing to the shortness of the Session, for the present continuance of the Bill if it were renewed for a brief period, on the ground that they had not time to consider the matter. But it must be clear to everybody that the Irish Party could not allow the continued appearance of the Bill in the schedule of Bills that were to be passed as a matter of course. As an illustration of the way the thing worked he would mention that on a Saturday night, about 12 o'clock, in the town of Cavan, a party of the Royal Irish Constabulary first entered the licensed premises of Mr. Terence Fitzpatrick, Main Street, and searched his house from top to bottom, his garden and out-offices, without any result, and then went direct to the residence of Mr. Mulligan, Main Street—[Ministerial laughter]—and knocked up him and his family out of bed. [Ministerial laughter and cries of "Order, Disraeli!" from the Irish Benches.]

MR. FARRELL

Make that person over there keep order. [Ministerial cries of "Order!"]

MR. T. M. HEALY

said the hon. Member for the Altrincham division of Cheshire bore an historic name——

MR. FARRELL

Yes, and that is all. He has no brains. [Ministerial cries of "Order!"]

MR. T. M. HEALY

And there was nothing for the right hon. Gentleman to laugh at in the spectacle of a family being knocked up out of bed at two o'clock in the morning. If the hon. Member were knocked out of bed at that hour—he was sure he would be found at home like Mr. Fitzpatrick and Mr. Mulligan—but the hon. Member would not like his family to be disturbed in this way in a vain search for arms, because there were no arms. He would advise the hon. Member for Altrincham to study the speeches of his illustrious relative on the Arms Act, and especially the speech of Mr. Disraeli, delivered in Buckinghamshire, at the General Election of 1874, in which he depicted an Irishman going for a midnight walk, when the hand of a policeman was laid on him, and he was trotted off to prison, his house visited, and the beds of his family ripped open. But the hon. Member perhaps could console himself with the thought that when Mr. Disraeli came into office in 1874, the first thing he did was to renew the Act of the Liberal Government of which he had complained only six months before. It was time for this policy to come to an end. In an agricultural country like Ireland, to deny the farmer the use of a fowling-piece to kill vermin on his farm was to deprive him almost of a necessary of life, A man wanted a gun to shoot crows or rabbits on his farm; he applied to the Resident Magistrate for a licence—for the ordinary magistrates were not allowed to interfere in this matter; and the Resident Magistrate having a grudge against him, because he attended a meeting of the Land League, or refused to sign a petition against Home Rule, refused him the licence, like the case of the farmer with 300 acres in the county of Limerick which had recently been brought before the House. The Chief Secretary in reference to that case read off an answer to the effect that he could not dive into the mysterious recesses of the Resident Magistrate's mind, and that was all the satisfaction the men got. Had the Act, on the other hand, prevented outrages and murders? The Government's own Coercion Act of 1887 proved that, in their opinion, it had not. Could anyone say that the wrongdoer, the evil-minded man, the murderer—had been prevented from getting either pistols or guns by reason of the existence of this Act? Nothing of the kind. The Act had only been used to worry and annoy Members of the Nationalist Party, against whom the Administration had a grudge. The Government did not put it in force against riotous people, or against those who ought to be controlled—namely, emergency men and gamekeepers. If the records were examined for the last seven years, it would be found that 30 or 40 outrages had been committed by emergency men, without even a wet finger, as they said in Ireland, being laid upon the offenders by the officers of the law. Persons of the bailiff class were very ready in the use of pistols; water bailiffs were free in the use of firearms. The Government tolerated such user or misuser of arms without condemnation, but attempted to enforce the Act against what he called the more respectable body of the farmers of the country. He submitted that the course he was taking was a reasonable one. If the Motion he should conclude with were rejected, he would have to divide against that portion of the Schedule which renewed the Act itself. He trusted, however, that they would hear from the Government some statement to the effect that even if they insisted that in certain counties in Ireland the Act should be enforced, there should be some system of appeal from the Resident Magistrate to the County Court Judge. He moved to omit the word "December" and insert "August."

Question proposed, "That 'December' stand part of the clause."

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

Although the present Amendment has for its effect merely an alteration in the date, the hon. and learned Member has taken the opportunity of raising upon it the general question of policy, and therefore I rise at once to reply to him. I may, in the first place, say that the inclusion of this Act in the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill was approved of by my predecessor on June 17th, and therefore it is really the Bill of the late Government we are defending, and not merely our own Bill. Moreover, I may call attention to the fact that it is open to the Lord Lieutenant at any time to withdraw the operation of the Arms Act, either from the whole of Ireland, or from particular counties, or from parts of counties in Ireland. The power of withdrawing the operation of the Act was never at any time exercised by the Government while Mr. Morley was Chief Secretary. The other day, when I urged, in defence of the course of action adopted by me, that I was merely continuing the policy of my predecessor, the hon. and learned Member objected to having Mr. Morley thrust down his throat, as he expressed it; but I must remind the hon. and learned Gentleman that we have to address the vindication of our policy, not merely to him and to the hon. Members who sit near him, but to the whole House—["Hear, hear!"]—and I think the House generally will see the extreme significance of the fact that Mr. Morley felt himself compelled, in the interest of good Government, to continue the Act, although undoubtedly, had he obeyed the private behests of the hon. and learned Member and his friends, he would either have suspended the Act by proclamation or allowed it to drop altogether. The hon. and learned Member raised no objection to this Act in 1893. Again, in 1894 no protest was uttered either by him or any of his colleagues on that Bench. ["Hear, hear!"] It is true, as the hon. and learned Member says, that my hon. friend the Member for South Tyrone, in 1893, proved an excellent substitute, but I think we have a right to ask why it was that this excellent substitute was not supported by the hon. and learned Member? [Cheers.] When my hon. Friend got up at that time he urged in defence of his action what he desired to impress upon the House, which was that if the Irish Government were able to dispense with the Crimes Act, they ought also to be able to dispense with the Arms Act. ["Hear, hear!"]. The hon. and learned Gentleman said that at all events my hon. Friend would not deny the plain statement in "Hansard," but when he came to read these words the Committee will agree with me that the contention of my hon. Friend was absolutely substantiated. What were the words? The hon. Member for South Tyrone, said— He objected to the renewal of the Peace Preservation Act as a measure of coercion unnecessary for the Government carrying out their policy, especially as they had dispensed with the Criminal Law and Procedure Act. [Cheers.] Nothing could be plainer than that. It was clear that my hon. Friend, in objecting to the Peace Preservation Act, was merely urging upon the Government their inconsistency in dispensing with the Crimes Act whilst at the same time they retained on the Statute-book a measure of exceptional legislation of this kind. ["Hear, hear!"]. But the hon. and learned Gentleman did not read the reply of the late Chief Secretary for Ireland given to my hon. Friend. Mr. Morley said upon that occasion:— My only answer to the hon. Gentleman is that the Peace Preservation Act has been in force for many years. I do not regard the Act as a measure of coercion, but essentially as a measure of police regulation. [Cheers.] I pass from 1893 to 1894. Again the hon. Member and his Friends sat silent on those Benches when the Act was renewed. [Cheers.] He says the Government of that day urged upon him that they were entitled to some consideration in minor matters which they considered necessary for the good government of the country. The hon. and learned Member tells us he did not altogether approve of that sentiment, but felt bound to have some regard for solidarity in his Party. [Laughter.]

MR. T. M. HEALY

In my own Party.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

It is the privilege which the hon. and learned Member claims for himself that he denies my hon. Friend the Member for South Tyrone. After all, I do not think the hon. Member has any reason to complain of my hon. Friend. What does it come to? He said my hon. Friend then spoke and is now silent. Yes, but the hon. Member was then silent and now speaks. [Cheers.] The hon. and learned member then proceeded to deal with what he calls the raid for arms at Cavan, and he stated that this raiding took place at midnight. I can only say I have no information of the kind, and I believe it to be impossible. At all events, if it was done it was illegal under the Peace Preservation Act, because the first clause of that Act requires that all searches should take place between sunrise and sunset. ["Hear, hear!"] I cannot help thinking that upon this occasion the hon. and learned Member has been misinformed. If the search took place under this Act and really was carried out at midnight, the police were clearly guilty of illegal action.

MR. T. M. HEALY

I read the extract from the Freeman's Journal. [Laughter].

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

I presume the Freeman's Journal, like the hon. Member, was probably misinformed. ["Hear, hear!"]. What happened? A box containing arms arrived at Cavan Railway Station merely described as hardware, addressed to an individual who declares that he never got the arms at all. On opening the box the nature of the consignment—consisting of rifles—became detected by a porter, the knowledge became public property, and the police would have been guilty of gross dereliction of duty, if they had not done their very best to trace the arms and ascertain what became of them, and I am informed that the search was carried out, but I conceive not at midnight as the hon. Member says.

MR. T. M. HEALY

Has the right hon. Gentleman any information on this point?

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

No, Sir, naturally not, because I never expected that the point would be raised.

MR. T. M. HEALY

It is raised in the newspapers.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

It is raised in the Freeman's Journal, but I am not responsible for the Freeman's Journal. [Laughter and cheers.] If the hon. and learned Gentleman had been good enough to give me information beforehand that the search was alleged to have been carried out at midnight, I should have been glad to have made inquiries. In the meantime I am sceptical on the subject. I am told that no objection was made by the person who inhabited the house to the search being carried out. The hon. Member went on to tell the Committee that the habitual use of firearms in Ulster led to fearful loss of life. Is that an argument against the Bill? Instead of being so, it seems to me a strong argument in favour of the Bill. [Cheers.] Let me tell the real reasons why the Bill is required. In the first place, there is a certain class of crime in Ireland which does not occur at all, or is so rare in this country as to be practically a negligible quantity—namely, the crime of moonlighting. In view of the frequency of crimes of that class it is eminently desirable that persons of a bad reputation should not find it easy to procure arms. That is one of the great reasons for retaining this Act, as Mr. Morley said, as a measure of police regulation, and the other is the reason indicated by the hon. and learned Member himself—namely, that in Ireland you have in times of political and sectarian excitement encounters between large crowds of partisans. These crowds, even as it is, are armed with sticks and stones, and if there were no restrictions as to the use of firearms, and if these people whom the police have now to keep apart were provided with firearms, it is clear there would be a great danger of a repetition of those scenes of which, unfortunately, we have had conspicuous instance in the streets of Belfast. [Cheers.] These are the principal reasons why this Act is still necessary. There is no evidence to show that the Act bears hardly on those who really require firearms. I will tell the Committee the number of licences granted during the year from August, 1894, to July, 1895. The number was 5,639, and the number refused was only 362. No persons are prevented from having a licence unless there are serious reasons for it. I mention these figures to show that there is no real hardship in maintaining this Act, and I think, with my predecessor, that its continuance is merely a matter of police precaution.

MR. T. M. HEALY

observed that the right hon. Gentleman tried to convey that the search for arms at Cavan could not have occurred after midnight, because such a thing would have been illegal—in other words, that the police in Ireland always acted legally. [Cheers.] It was a remarkable fact that the right hon. Gentleman should have been in a position to give partial details of this incident, and should not have been in a position to give information on the very point which was made the subject of complaint in the public Press—namely, the hour of night and the illegality of the search, and of the method in which it was conducted. The right hon. Gentleman confessed that he was wholly without information on those points. They read telegrams of atrocities in Armenia on the authority of newspapers, and really, when Members of Parliament were sneered at for producing newspaper reports, he would ask what other sources of information could they have with regard to matters occurring in distant places? Would the right hon. Gentleman suggest what newspaper in Ireland they might rely upon? [Laughter.] Until he placed at their disposal official sources of information, he must excuse them for relying on what were called the ordinary channels of information. Mr. Morley's administration of this Act had been referred to, but there was this, at any rate, to be said about Mr. Morley's administration—that there were no complaints of night searches under it, and that his Government were hardly warm in office when this case arose in Cavan. And it was one thing to have an Act administered by one Government, and another and quite different thing to have the same Act administered by another Government. For instance, the Coercion Act was in force under Mr. Morley's administration, but he did not use the Coercion Act. The right hon. Gentleman's taunts about inconsistencies did not trouble him at all. He might say with the right hon. Member for West Birmingham that it was not he who had altered, it was only circumstances. The taunt of inconsistency, therefore, might safely be remitted to Birmingham. [Laughter.] The Chief Secretary had dealt with the case in County Cavan, entirely leaving out of the scope of his reply the Constitutional view presented, namely, the question of the renewal of the Act, what was contrary to the Bill of Rights, the right of the subject to bear arms, and of its renewal in this form year after year, without giving Parliament the opportunity of considering it except in the Schedule of a Bill. For the purposes of that argument he had quoted Mr. Butt, a Constitutional authority, Mr. Disraeli, and Sir Stafford Northcote. He did not cite them to strengthen his argument about the incident in County Cavan or the defence of his consistency. The Constitutional question the right hon. Gentleman had left out of sight, but it was one that would have to be dealt with. The right hon. Gentleman had met the argument about the use to which the Act had been put in a very remarkable manner. In the North of Ireland it was never enforced. He would venture to say there was not an Orangeman in Belfast not in the possession of firearms; but the Act was enforced in the South of Ireland in the manner to which he had referred. The right hon. Gentleman said there were only 362 cases of refusals to grant licences throughout the country, but the Committee would be in a better position to judge of the breadth and effect of those refusals if they were told in how many counties in Ireland the Act was in force. Off-hand he could not say how many counties were proclaimed; but, if they were few, these refusals might be a very irritating number. On the other hand, 5,639 licences were granted; but to whom were they granted? If to emergency men, bailiffs, and mercenaries of the landlord class, that would be no answer to what he had said. His argument was that the Government had not been able to put down moonlighting and other outrages by the Arms Act, because they had been obliged to pass a Coercion Act in addition. It was unreasonable that the class upon whom alone the Act should press heavily, should be the respectable tenant-farmer class, and that they should be subjected to this irritation because of a small number of evil-doers. Nor had the right hon. Gentleman in any way vindicated the discretion of his resident magistrates. It was a monstrous thing that a resident magistrate without check on his discretion should be allowed to say to a decent farmer having 300 or 400 acres of land—a man with a stake in the country—"you shall not be allowed to bear arms." It was hardly likely that a man of this class would go about at night, with blackened face, firing into his neighbours' dwellings. The right hon. Gentleman was afraid to give the reasons that operated in the minds of resident magistrates. He had replied effectively on some points from a purely debating standpoint, but this was a matter to be considered from a constitutional standpoint. This Government had pledged itself to equal laws for England and Ireland, it had been allowed under the special circumstances of the Session the renewal of certain Acts, but Irish Members were entitled to a reply as to their policy on these measures of a restrictive character.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

Even supposing the hon. Member's view of the Arms Act were accepted, the Amendment would not be appropriate, since it would apply to all the expiring laws included in the Bill. His object would be served by a Division on the inclusion of the Arms Act in the schedule. As to the hon. Gentleman's constitutional argument, I certainly do not think that this Act, sanctioned in several Parliaments, under Governments drawn from both parties, can be called a violent violation of the liberty of the subject. I do not touch on the Irish aspect of the case; that has been sufficiently dealt with by my right hon. Friend near me. But I am quite ready to agree with the hon. Member that if Parliament had plenty of time to deal with the measures contained in this schedule, if all speeches were brief, if no unnecessary speeches were made, I am decidedly of opinion that there are some Acts which we continue year by year which might very properly be made perpetual or dealt with separately by Parliament. I go a step further, and say that among the Bills which under such circumstances I should like to see dealt with in that way would be this very Arms Act. But that is not the question before the House. The question is whether we shall or shall not continue for the ordinary term an Act which has been considered necessary not merely by the Party now in power or the present Government, but by a Party and by an Administration which on almost every aspect of the Irish question differed fundamentally from the Party now in office. I hope, therefore, the hon. Gentleman will not press this particular Amendment to a division, but that, if he desires to take the opinion of this House, he will do it by an Amendment to the schedule by which this Bill, and this Bill alone, may be excepted from the general provisions of the Act.

MR. T. M. HEALY

said, he had no objection to take the course suggested. But perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would allow him to say that, if this Parliament was unable to deal with these questions; if all the speeches were not brief, and if there was obstruction, so far as the Irish Members were concerned, there was a very simple way of getting rid of the difficulty by sending them back to their own Parliament.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.

MR. T. M. HEALY

then moved to omit the Arms Act from the schedule of the Bill.

MR. J. DILLON (Mayo, E.)

supported the Amendment. The subject, he said, had been very fully dealt with by the hon. Member for North Louth, and he only desired to raise one point. It had been the practice of resident magistrates to grant licences to carry arms to emergency men without inquiring into their character. Now, it was notorious that the Irish Government afforded ample and superabundant protection to these emergency men by the police whenever it was thought necessary. He protested that these men, who by the very nature of their calling were reckless and quarrelsome, fond of a row, and sometimes subject to considerable provocation, should, as a matter of course, be allowed to carry arms, when respectable, honest men in their neighbourhood were denied the right. The Chief Secretary had given as a reason for this Act that crimes were committed in Ireland by means of firearms, and he referred to the moonlighting outrages. For the last two or three years since the Coercion Act had been dropped crimes of that class had almost totally disappeared. But, he would ask, were no crimes of violence committed in this country by the use of firearms? It was a matter of notoriety that firearms were as frequently used with deadly effect in this country against the police, and, if even-handed justice were done as between the two countries, was there not equally as much justification for applying the Arms Act in England as there was in Ireland? The Chief Secretary had given figures to show that the number of unsuccessful applications for licences was comparatively small. The reason why the number was not larger was that Irishmen holding Nationalist opinions refrained from applying, knowing that they would be subjected to the indignity of a refusal. He had himself never obtained the right to carry arms. Rather than run the risk of a refusal he had abstained from applying for a licence, and hundreds of thousands of Nationalists had been influenced by the same motive. Was there anybody in that House having any knowledge of Ireland who really believed that the Arms Act had the effect of preventing crime? If a man intended to commit a moonlight outrage or any other kind of crime, he procured the necessary arms somehow. The men who applied for licences were not those who were likely to transgress the law. The Act, which was not honestly administered, was simply a cause of irritation and an insult to Ireland.

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

The Committee divided:—Ayes, 136; Noes, 22.—(Division List, No. 36).

Schedule agreed to.

Bill reported, without Amendment; to be read the Third time To-morrow.