HC Deb 23 July 1901 vol 97 cc1322-3
MR. BARTLEY (Islington, N.)

I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether the Committee appointed to inquire into the Boer refugee camps will be authorised also to inquire into the conditions of the loyal refugees and to report on the sufferings and privations and condition of their wives and children who, on account of their loyalty, were driven from their homes and compelled to live in camps and elsewhere during the war.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. BRODRICK, Surrey, Guildford)

It is not proposed to hold such an inquiry, but no doubt in reporting on the refugee camps the Committee will have in their mind the discomforts and privations to which British refugees have unfortunately and, I fear, unavoidably been exposed, in spite of the special efforts made for their relief and the generous help provided by the Mansion House Fund.

MR. BARTLEY

Is the inquiry not to be extended to the condition of our own loyal subjects who have suffered similar hardships and privations? Is there to be no special inquiry into their case?

MR. BRODRICK

The question of the hon. Member is a very different one. Our loyal subjects are not in refugee camps; they are in Cape Colony, where they have resided for some time. The Boer women and children are in refugee camps, where they have been brought together in a short time, and what we desire to know is whether the conditions under which they are being detained are sanitary.

MR. BARTLEY

But is the case of our own loyal subjects who have been subjected to as great privations not to be inquired into simply because they are loyalists?

MR. BRODRICK

This is not a question of loyalists, as to whose condition no question has arisen, but an inquiry into the condition of the refugee camps.

SIR JOHN COLOMB (Great Yarmouth)

Is there any precedent for sending out women to make such an inquiry?

* MR. SPEAKER

Order, order! That does not arise out of the question.