SECOND READING. (Hansard, 9 March 1900)

§ *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir M. WHITE RIDLEY,) Lancashire, Blackpool

I rise to move the Second Reading of this Bill, and I need add but little to what I said on its introduction. The House will recollect that in the autumn session^* it was announced that the Government were prepared to pay to married civil servants called out for active service in South Africa one half of their salaries. I was then asked what we were prepared to do in the case of the Metropolitan Police, and many watch committees and joint standing committees throughout the country also inquired what could be done for Reservists belonging to the constabulary. I said at once I thought it was right and proper that the Metropolitan and the provincial police authorities should be able to deal with these men on terms fairly comparable with the treatment of civil servants, and I promised, if necessary, to introduce a Bill to legalise provision being made for the wives and children of police reservists called out for service abroad. I have since found there is a strong feeling on the part of the standing joint committees representing the counties and watch committees representing the boroughs that power should be given to them, and in fact I understand that many of them have taken advantage of the promise I made of a Bill, in order to deal liberally with these cases. The object of the Bill, which I now ask the House to read a second time, is simply to enable watch committees and standing joint committees, and the Secretary of State in London to make a provision for the wives and families of police Reservists who have been called abroad analogous to that which is being done for the Government civil servants, who were in the same position and are now serving in South Africa. The necessity for the Bill arises from the fact that, under the Police Act of 1890, a police Reservist called out for permanent See The Parliamentary Debates [Fourth, Series], Vol. lxxvii., page 550 (statement of Mr. Wyndham); page 575 (statement of Sir M. White Ridley). 497 service is no longer a member of a police force. It is, therefore, not within the power of the standing joint committees or of the watch committees, as the case may be, to give any gratuities or allowances to the families of those Reservists while they are abroad. The Bill gives the necessary power, but leaves the exercise of it entirely optional. The amount of the grant from local rates is limited by the provision that, counting in also the allowances and remittals made by the War Office, the total money received by a Reservist's family shall not exceed his full pay as a constable. The general effect of this will, I think, be that the grant from the rates will correspond to that made by the Government, viz., half-pay. It may be more or it may be less in certain cases, but, at all events, it is, up to the limit stated, entirely in the option of the local authorities. I have had the most general testimony from the police authorities connected with the Home Office, and no less from the Scottish Office, that it is their desire to be able to make some allowance within these limits to the wives and the families of these men. The Bill is limited to a year—to this particular war. I cannot myself imagine that in any quarter of the House there will be any objection to the proposal, and I therefore earnestly commend the measure to the favourable consideration of the House.