§ In the case of any district lunatic asylum in Ireland, established or to be established for a district consisting of more than one county (including a county of a city and a county of a town), the Lord Lieutenant may, by Order in Council, direct that any money advanced, or to be advanced, by the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland for any of the purposes of the asylum shall be repaid by the counties forming the district in such manner and in such proportions as may be fixed by the Order.
MR. T. M. HEALYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer for a pledge that, ample security being given by the Grand Jury, Irish Lunatic Asylum Boards should get loans on as favourable terms as those on which the Scotch Industry Loans were granted.
§ * MR. HANBURYsaid that, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer had stated, the whole question of these loans was one which ought to be considered, and it would be considered very soon, because 1321 the Acts of Parliament regulating these loans and the rate of interest varied very considerably without any very good apparent reason. He hoped the hon. and learned Gentleman would consider the pledge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer a sufficient indication of the view of the Government, that, as far as they probably could secure it, when the security was of exactly the same character, the same rate of interest should be chargeable in the three countries.
§ * MR. HANBURYsaid, that by the 18 & 19 Vic. cap. 109, the Lord Lieutenant was empowered to make orders for the apportionment of the moneys actually expended on lunatic asylums. At that time no interest was chargeable on advances. Interest was first imposed by the Public Works Loans Act of 1877, and the Board of Works thought it necessary to have the power to make an early apportionment in such cases. Since 1877 these loans had grown very considerably, and when two or three authorities were concerned in the loan up to the present moment the apportionment of their share in the loans had not been made until the work was actually completed, and these works had sometimes taken seven or eight years to complete. During that time, of course, advances had been made, and it had been impossible to obtain payment of the interest on the advances as soon as they were made, owing to the fact that the apportionment could not be made until the work was actually completed. The hon. Gentleman would see that that certainly was not a fair arrangement to the lending authority. It was only fair that interest should be got on moneys actually advanced. It was proposed under this clause that the apportionment should be made between the different authorities when the advances were made, and that they should pay interest on their share.
§ MR. MAURICE HEALY (Cork)said this was a matter which excited very great interest in Ireland, and it acquired importance from the fact that, owing to the overcrowding of lunatic asylums, a great many of them had been considerably extended, and large sums of money had been spent upon their 1322 extension. The attention of the Secretary of the Treasury had been called to the fact that the advances to the asylums were being made on such terms as to practically enable the Treasury to make a profit. During the first few years he should think that the Chief Secretary must have received some hundreds of resolutions from different public bodies protesting against the terms which the Treasury imposed. These protests had come not from Nationalist Members of Parliament, but from Grand Juries composed of landowners and country gentlemen. Though he admitted that they had received on the present occasion a more favourable statement as to the rate of interest than they had previously succeeded in extracting, on the other hand the substance of the reply was that the local bodies in Ireland were now to pay interest which previously the Treasury could not extract.
§ MR. PARKER SMITH (Lanark, Partick)said that this appeared to be a Scottish grievance rather than an Irish one. Scotland had been paying 1 per cent. against 3½ on the part of Ireland, as well as a reasonable amount for lunatic asylums against nothing at all on the part of Ireland.
MR. T. M. HEALYsaid that a deputation, composed of gentlemen belonging to Grand Juries, recently waited on the Lord Lieutenant with reference to this grievance. They applied for some fair consideration with regard to these loans, but instead of receiving a pledge that the loans would be reduced to the market rate, the Board of Works practically said Ireland had not been paying interest and they wanted coercive powers. The Government should give a statement as to their policy with regard to these lunacy loans. Why was the clause necessary at the present time? He complained that, instead of hon. Members getting reasons for Pills in the shape of Blue-books or Treasury statements, the Government practically brought forward their financial proposals in such a manner as to cause the House as a whole to play at blind man's buff.
§ * THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid he had not seen the clause before that day. Certain counties in Ireland had joined themselves together for the purpose of loans for lunatic asylums, and, without such an 1323 apportionment as was here provided, the loans would not be properly arranged. This clause legalised that apportionment, and if sanction was not given to the clause possibly the whole matter would be suspended; but he would give an undertaking to look carefully into the question before next Session, when he hoped to make some proposals affecting the rate of interest on loans generally.
§ MR. MAURICE HEALYasked why the clause was drawn in such a manner that no Member of the House could possibly understand that it was a clause which imposed a fresh charge on Irish taxpayers? Though the clause purported to be one for the apportionment of these charges, no one would suspect that the apportionment was little more than a process of levying interest. These loans had probably been made for more than half a century. The basis of the original system was that interest was not to be paid until an apportionment was made; and they must assume that the Treasury calculated the original rate of interest in view of the circumstances in which the advance had to be made, and that no interest would be payable pending an apportionment. The clause was unintelligible to the House until the Chancellor of the Exchequer explained that it was a proposal enabling the Treasury to levy a charge on Irish taxpayers which during half a century had never previously been made. Next Session was the time to make any change in the mode of apportionment of the loans and the charges for them; and in these circumstances he asked the right hon. Gentleman to withdraw the clause this year.
§ * THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERadmitted that there was some reason in the view which had been urged, but the Government did not feel able to withdraw the clause. He was advised that it went beyond the payment of interest, and that it was necessary to legalise the apportionment between counties. If the Committee passed the clause the Government would undertake to make such an Amendment in it on Report as would secure that it should not involve any new charge of interest on counties before the date when the interest became due.
MR. T. M. HEALYaccepted the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He thought, however, that 1324 the Resolution on which the Bill was founded was too narrow. It had only regard to the case of the Draperstown Railway; but the Committee were passing a clause creating a further charge on the taxpayer. He submitted as a point of order that it was incompetent for the Committee to pass the clause at all at this stage, because, while creating a fresh charge, they were not basing their procedure in reference to it. He suggested that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should undertake to withdraw the clause now, and that hereafter the Committee should have the advantage of debating this matter in Committee, and not on Report stage.
* THE CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANSI may point out that the last words of the Resolution of the House are, "and for other purposes relating to local loans." I think those words will cover this clause.
§ Clause negatived.
§ Clause 5,—