§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, he had no alternative but to raise the question of the intimidation of Welsh witnesses before the Land Commission. Welsh tenant farmers who gave evidence before the Commission had been served with notice to quit and had been evicted, and, he contended, it was the duty of the Public Prosecutor, under the Act passed by the Unionist Government of 1892, to protect these witnesses. These cases 497 had been reported to the Public Prosecutor, and to the Home Office, and within the last few days the Home Office had intimated to the Commissioners their decision not to prosecute. That was a decision which he wished to challenge by a reduction of the Vote for the Home Office by £500. There were about a dozen cases reported, he believed, but he would take three or four as illustrations. The first was the case of a man called William Thomas, who gave evidence not only on behalf of himself but of his fellow tenants at their request. [Laugher] He thought it would be very instructive if the tenant farmers could hear the way in which their grievances were received by some of the. Conservative Members whom they had returned to Parliament. [Renewed cries of "Question."] He appealed to the Chair for an opportunity of discussing this question.
§ *MR. SPEAKERsaid, if the hon. Member would not indulge in recriminations he would endeavour to keep order.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, he desired nothing better as long as he was not interrupted. The first result of William Thomas having given evidence was that his landlord had practically raised his rent £5, and had since given him notice to quit. Hon. Members opposite appeared to approve of that action, and this Debate would serve at all events one purpose, namely, to show the approval of hon. Members opposite of intimidation of this character. He had, he submitted, proved that intimidation had been practised upon witnesses who had given evidence before the Land Commission. A charge made against another landlord was that he had evicted certain tenants because of their religious principles. That man got up a memorial for the purpose of its being signed by the tenants, and to be presented to the Land Commission, stating that the charge was not true, and the moment two of the tenants, one of whom was a widow, declined to sign the memorial, they received notice to quit.
§ *MR. SPEAKEROrder, order! The hon. Member is out of order in going into these details except so far as they bear upon the question of intimidation.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, that with great respect to the right hon. Gentleman in the Chair, that was just his point. Notice to quit had been given to other tenants on the same ground. Another tenant, named John Thomas, who had given evidence before the Land Commission, had also received notice to quit.
§ *SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEYsaid, that he had the names of William and Hugh Thomas, but he had not the name of John Thomas.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, that the witness he referred to had received notice to quit. Notice to quit was given though there was no complaint against the tenant. The next case was that of Thomas Davies, which came before the Land Commission at Carmarthen. He complained with regard to his farm that the place was in such a state of disrepair as to be absolutely uninhabitable. For six or seven years at least he had made this complaint. The sanitary inspector condemned the place as absolutely unfit for human habitation. The house had to be rebuilt. It was agreed that the rent in future should be £20. The tenant having given evidence before the Land Commission, was served with notice to quit, and the landlord refused to carry out the arrangements for afresh tenancy for £20 a year.
§ *MR. SPEAKERreminded the hon. Member that he must confine himself to the question of intimidation.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, he would quote from the evidence given before the Land Commission. Here was a case of eviction, and an admission by the agent of the landlord that they evicted because of evidence given before the Commission. There had been a previous complaint against the agent for threatening to evict a tenant unless he voted for a Tory candidate; a letter written by the agent was read in this House at the time. The same agent served a notice to quit upon his father, and evicted him. ["Oh, oh!"] The next case was that of a man called Harris.
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY,intervening, said he understood these cases had been laid before the late Home Secretary, who investigated them and decided not to deal with them. 499 If that was so they could not be brought up on the salary of the present Home Secretary.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid, the cases he was now mentioning had all occurred with the current financial year.
§ *SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY:These are cases which have nothing to do with me. They have been already dealt with by my predecessor.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEI am fully aware that there were cases——
§ *MR. SPEAKERI understood that the hon. Gentleman was complaining of the Home Secretary for not having taken steps in those cases; but the right hon. Gentleman received no intimation of them.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEI thought I had made that matter clear. Complaint was made in regard to three of the cases to the present Home Secretary, and with regard to the others, which were dealt with by the Public Prosecutor. I raise them on the salary of the Public Prosecutor.
§ *MR. SPEAKERI do not know whether there is anything about the salary of the Public Prosecutor in the Vote on Account. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman, who has probably looked into the matter, will tell me.
§ MR. LLOYD-GEORGEYes, Sir, there is. I had two Motions down dealing with the Home Secretary and the Public Prosecutor, and I thought it would save time to take the two separate cases in the one Vote. With regard to the case of Harris, this man was tenant for 15 years. The landlord had paid the rates of the farm for the whole of the 50 years during which the man and his predecessor had been in the farm. The man gave evidence before the Commission. The next step was that the landlord immediately added the rates to the rent. The overseer, who was a good Conservative and Churchman, gave evidence before the Land Commission, and stated that the landlord had informed him that the tenant 500 had had the rates added to his rent because of the evidence he had given before the Commission. It was perfectly obvious that there had been a misdemeanour under the Act. Notice to quit had been served on tenants without any adequate complaint, and in some cases, on the admission of the landlord or agent, merely because of evidence given before the Commission. The Home Secretary or the Public Prosecutor ought to take steps to protect these witnesses; otherwise it would be impossible to elicit the truth. It was only the worst landlords who would be guilty of intimidation, and it was just against them that evidence ought to be given. The result of this intimidation had been that 40 tenant farmers who offered to give evidence were afraid to come forward. After hearing the statements of tenants and landords, the Commissioners were perfectly unanimous that there was a prima facie case for prosecution.
§ *SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY, in reply, said he fully admitted that after a Royal Commission had gone down to Wales, and had emphatically informed all the tenant farmers and others who might be disposed to give evidence that they would be protected in the evidence which they gave, it was the duty of the Home Office and all concerned to see that the Act of Parliament intended for the protection of those tenants should be adequately carried out. His point was that with regard to every case brought before him the most ample inquiry had taken place, and every justice had been done. When, last December, the Chairman of the Royal Commission, accompanied by the hon. Member for Swansea District, called upon him and stated what had taken place, they gave him a list of cases as to which they thought the Public Prosecutor might have taken action, but as to which the Public Prosecutor did not think there was anything on which to proceed. They stated that while they did not think there was the smallest chance of wholesale evic- 501 tion, there was a feeling of insecurity existing, and they gave him three cases, those of William Thomas, John Sturm, and Hugh Thomas, with the papers relating to them, with regard to which, in their opinion, inquiry ought to be made. He sent the papers to the Treasury Solicitor, whose report was to the effect that in his opinion there was no evidence upon which the persons said to have used intimidation could be satisfactorily proceeded against. He looked carefully into the cases, and, not being completely satisfied as to one of them that there might not be a chance of conviction, he directed a special inquiry on the spot, because he felt that if there was a reasonable chance of conviction it was right that proceedings should be taken. He did that also because he thought that in the interests of good landlords it was desirable that, if there was a case for it, an example should he made. The inquiry which he made resulted in the fact that, according to the judgment of his advisers, there was no case for proceeding. Not satisfied with that decision, he referred the matter to the Attorney General, and he was of the same opinion. The Attorney General said: "In my opinion there is not sufficient evidence to justify proceedings against two persons mentioned for an offence under the Act." He could not be blamed, therefore, for not taking legal action.
§ MR. VAUGHAN DAVIES (Cardigan)said, he took a personal interest in this question because he was one of the chief instigators in getting the evidence in his own county put before the Commission. He impressed on the tenant farmers and freeholders that all they wanted was truthful evidence, and no abuse of landlords. The witness he wished to cite was Daniel Jenkins, a schoolmaster in his county and a small farmer.
§ *SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEYI rise to order. He is not a witness whose name was before the Home Office 502 or the Public Prosecutor, so far as I am aware.
§ *MR. SPEAKERThe hon. Member must be in a position to vouch for this matter having been brought before the Public Prosecutor.
§ MR. VAUGHAN DAVIESI believe it was laid before the Public Prosecutor.
§ *MR. SPEAKERIs the hon. Member in a position to vouch for that fact? He merely says, "I understand it was so."
§ *SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEYThe information I have from the Chairman of the Commission is that there were six cases brought before the Commission, and the name mentioned by the hon. Member does not happen to be one of them.
§ MR. VAUGHAN DAVIESIt is vouched for. This witness was picked out by the Committee to give evidence as being one of the most intelligent men in the district.
§ *MR. SPEAKERsaid, that it was really not material what the precise evidence was. He understood that the allegation was that evidence was given, and in consequence of that evidence being displeasing to the landlord the tenant was evicted or punished, and that all this had been brought before the Public Prosecutor. These were the circumstances which the hon. Member ought to be in a position to place before the House.
§ MR. VAUGHAN DAVIESsaid, that the tenant's landlord was a banker, and that the tenant had overdrawn his account, and that he was peremptorily asked to settle it. The tenant was a schoolmaster, and the school was in the centre of his landlord's property, and he got notice from the School Board that he must give up his school. He had to do so, and also to give up his land, and he was prevented from living in a cottage on the estate. That, he thought, ought to be sufficient evidence for the Public Prosecutor. He wished to give some 503 examples of the statements this witness made before the Commission.
§ *MR. SPEAKERThe hon. Member is not entitled to go into details of this description. It is sufficient to say that the man's evidence caused eviction. The hon. Member is not entitled to convert this into a discussion on the relation between landlords and tenants.
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURYsaid, that he desired to point out to the House the position in which they were. The Vote on Account had been discussed for a whole night in Committee, and for the greater part of another night. It had now been discussed on Report for two hours. Prom the nature of the case the number of possible subjects that could be dealt with on a Vote on Account was unlimited, because the Votes traversed the whole range of our Civil Service Estimates. No subject, therefore, was excluded from its purview, and it would be possible to have a discussion upon it which would last not for one night, but for 20 or 30 nights. But in his judgment the House ought to come to the conclusion that there must be some limit put to this discussion. [Cheers.] The old practice of the House was to confine to Supply the discussion of subjects arising on Supply, and on Votes on Account what was debated was the length of time which they should last. He confessed that now that the Government had made arrangements by which Supply was to be brought forward every Friday they might revert to the old practice to great advantage. As far as he could judge an adequate amount of time, taking the whole Vote together, had been given to the Vote, and he begged to move that the question be now put.
§ *MR. KNOXasked, whether it was in order for the right hon. Gentleman to make a speech in moving the Closure.
§ *MR. SPEAKERsaid that, on a former occasion his predecessor had deprecated the practice, but had not 504 held it to be out of order. He hoped the House would now agree to the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman.
§ DR. CLARKcontended that there had never been a Vote on Account taken during the last 10 years on which a long discussion on some point had not been taken. This time last year the Report stage began at four o'clock and lasted the whole night, although the Committee stage had occupied a whole day. The only questions that had been discussed in this Vote related to foreign affairs, and there were many who desired to hear something as to the condition of affairs in Matabeleland.
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURYI was making no complaint of the Opposition. I only wish to point out that we cannot open up an unlimited field of discussion.
§ MR. LEWISobserved that the other evening the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury undertook to give the Welsh Members facilities, and adjourned the discussion upon the particular question in Supply then under Debate in the House, two hours earlier. Of course, it was not the fault of the right hon. Gentleman that the Welsh Members did not get the two hours for discussion on the question which had been before the House, neither was it the fault of the Welsh Members. They were now obliged to discuss this question at half-past four in the morning, and all they asked for was, that now they had been placed in this unfortunate position, they should have the opportunity and the right of discussing a question of deep and vital interest to thousands of tenant farmers in Wales, and if such a discussion was put an end to then he would ask the Speaker to allow them to divide against the Closure as a protest.
§ MR. W. ALLEN (Newcastle-under-Lyme)asked the First Lord of the 505 Treasury if he would put down the Colonial Office Vote for Thursday week. THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY hoped to put the Colonial Office Vote on some day when there would be a larger attendance than there was likely to be on the first day of the re-assembling of Parliament after the holidays.
§ DR. TANNERAre you afraid of America?
MR. HERBERT ROBERTSsaid, it seemed from the admission of the right hon. Gentleman himself, that he found some difficulty in making up his mind as to whether there had been intimidation in one case, and gave instructions that a special Inquiry should be made into it. He thought, under these circumstances, it must be plain to the House from the Debate upon this question, that the Witnesses Protection Act required alteration and strengthening. As a protest, and to bring out the depth of the sentiment of Wales on this question, he begged to move to reduce the Home Secretary's salary by £100.
§ *MR. SPEAKERThe hon. Gentleman cannot move an Amendment. I have put the question that the House agree with the Committee, and after I have put that question no Amendment can be moved.
§ *MR. SPEAKERagain put the question, "That the House do agree with the Committee in the said Resolution,'' and declared the Ayes had it.
§ DR. TANNEROn a point of order —[Cries of "Order!"]—I would ask you, Sir, whether, when any Member rising in his place asks for a reduction of the salary of any—
§ *MR. SPEAKEROrder, order! I have already ruled upon that, and since then the question has been put.
§ Question put, and agreed to.