Commons Sitting of 17 June 1902

Preamble
The House met at Two of the clock.

Arrest of Mr. M'Hugh, M. P.
Mr. SPEAKER Mr. SPEAKER acquainted the House that he had received the following letter relating to the arrest of Mr. M'Hugh.
Chief Secretary's Office, Dublin Castle.
16th June, 1902.
Sir,—I have the honour to inform you that Mr. P. A. M'Hugh, Member of Parliament for North Leitrim, was arrested at Dublin on the 15th instant on a warrant charging him and others with Criminal Conspiracy and Intimidation which was issued on the 14th instant by Mr. R. L. Browne, Resident Magistrate.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your obedient servant,
J. B. DOUGHERTY.
The Right Honourable
The Speaker,
House of Commons.

UNOPPOSED PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
  LANCASHIRE COUNTY (LUNATIC ASYLUMS) BILL [LORDS.]
  Read the third time, and passed, with Amendments.
  GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY (No. 2) BILL [LORDS],
    RHYMNEY RAILWAY BILL [LORDS].
    AS amended, considered; to be read the third time.

  IRVINE CORPORATION ORDER CONFIRMATION.
  Bill to confirm a Provisional Order under The Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, relating to Irvine

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  Corporation, ordered to be brought in by The Lord Advocate and Mr. Solicitor General for Scotland.

  IRVINE CORPORATION ORDER CONPIRMATION RILL.
  "To confirm a Provisional Order under The Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, relating to Irvine Corporation," presented accordingly, and under s. 9 of the Act, read the first time, and ordered to be read a second time upon Wednesday 25th June, and to be printed. [Bill 236.]

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 7) BILL.
  Reported, with Amendments [Pro-visional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill, as amended, to be considered to-morrow.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 12) BILL.
  Reported, with Amendments [Provisional Orders confirmed].
  Bill, as amended, to be considered tomorrow.

  LONDON WATER BILL.
  Reported from the Joint Committee, with Amendments.
  Special Report brought up and read.
  Report, with Minutes of Evidence, and Special Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 222.]
  Bill, as amended, recommitted to a Committee of the whole House for Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 237.]

  MESSAGE PROM THE LORDS.
  That they have agreed to—Dublin, Wicklow, and Wexford Railway Bill, without Amendment; Birkenhead Corporation Bill, Erdington Tramways Bill, with Amendments.
  That they have passed a Bill, intituled, "An Act for authorising the Binning-ham and Midland Tramways, Limited, to construct additional tramways and other works; and to use mechanical power upon their tramways; and for other purposes." [Birmingham and Midland Tramways Bill (Lords).]

  BIRMINGHAM AND MIDLAND TRAMWAYS BILL [LORDS].
  Read the first time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.
PETITIONS.
  CROFTERS' HOLDINGS (SCOTLAND) ACT (1886) AMENDMENT (No. 2) BILL.
  Petition from Caithness, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  CROFTERS' HOLDINGS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  Petition from Caithness, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
  Petitions against:—From Aston Manor; Haworth; Brackley; Aylsham; Itteringham; Tuttington; Newton Park; Woking; Hamsterley; Leicester (eight); Ripley; Otley; and Stockton-on-Tees; to lie upon the Table.
  EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
  Petitions for alteration:—From Dunnington; March; Alston; Prestwich; and Leeds; to lie upon the Table.
  EDUCATION (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  Petition from Gourock, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  SCHOOL BOARD ELECTORATE (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  Petition from Caithness, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  MERCHANT SHIPS AS ARMED CRUISERS.
  Return [presented 16th June] to be printed. [No. 218.]
  COASTGUARDS (MEDICAL ATTENDANCE).
  Return [presented 16th June] to be printed. [219.]
  MERCHANT SHIPPING ACT, 1894.
  Copy presented, of Order in Council of the 11th June 1902, under The Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, confirming a Bye-law made by the Trinity House, dealing with qualifications of Candidates for Licences in the London and English Channel District [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  FOREIGN JURISDICTION ACT, 1890.
  Copy presented, of Order in Council of the 11th June 1902, entitled The West African Possessions and Protectorates (Fugitive Offenders) Order in Council, 1902 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  FOREIGN JURISDICTION ACT, 1890.
  Copy presented, of Order in Council of the 11th June, 1902, entitled The Indian (Foreign Jurisdiction) Order in Council, 1902 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  HARWICH HARBOUR.
  Copy presented, of Abstract of the Accounts of the Receipts and Expenditure of the Harwich Harbour Conservancy Board from the time of their incorporation down to and inclusive of the 31st March 1902, &c. [by Act]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 220.]
  DUBLIN HOSPITALS.
  Copy presented, of Forty-fourth Report of the Board of Superintendence, with Appendices, for the year 1901–2 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  DOGS, REGULATION (IRELAND) ACT, 1865.
  Account presented, of the Receipts and Expenditure under the Act for the year 1901 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  FINES, ETC. (IRELAND).
  Copy presented of Abstract of Accounts of Fines accounted for by the Registrar of Petty Sessions Clerks for 1900 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 221.]
  SUEZ CANAL (COMMERCIAL, No. 2, 1902).
  Copy presented, of Returns of Shipping and Tonnage, 1899, 1900, and 1901 (in continuation of "Commercial, No. 2, 1901") [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  TRADE REPORTS (ANNUAL SERIES).
  Copies presented, of Diplomatic and Consular Reports, Annual Series, Nos. 2821 to 2823 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.

  NAVAL EXPENDITURE AND MERCANTILE MARINE (GREAT BRITAIN, ETC.)
  Return ordered, "showing aggregate Naval Expenditure on seagoing force;
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  aggregate revenue; aggregate tonnage of Mercantile Marine; annual clearances of shipping in the Foreign trade; annual clearances of shipping in the coasting trade; annual value of imports by sea, including bullion and specie; and annual value of exports by sea, including bullion and specie of various countries, exclusive of China and South American Republics, but including British Self-governing Colonies, for the year 1901 (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 301, of Session 1901)."—(Sir John Colomb.)

  LOCAL TAXATION ACCOUNT, 1901–2.
  Return ordered, "showing, in respect of the financial year ended the 31st day of March 1902, the distribution of the proceeds of the Local Taxation Licences, Estate Duty, and Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Duties paid into the Local Taxation Account in pursuance of the provisions of The Local Government Act, 1888, The Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Act 1890, and The Finance Act, 1894 (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 345, of Session 1901)."—(Mr. Grant Lawson.)

  POOR RELIEF (ENGLAND AND WALES.)
  Copy ordered, "of Statement of the Amount expended by Boards of Guardians for In-maintenance and Out-door Relief in England and Wales during the half-year ended Lady Day 1902."
  "And similar Statement for the half-year ending Michaelmas 1902."—(Mr. Grant Lawson.)

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CIRCULATED WITH VOTES.

  Navy—Training Ships.
  MR. CHARLES M'ARTHUR: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether he can state the total amount expended annually in maintaining the Naval training ships, the number of boys so trained, and the average annual cost per boy.
  (Answer.) The information asked for in the Question will take some time to compile, and when compiled could not properly be compressed into the limits of an answer. If, however, the hon. Member will move for the information in the form of a Return, I shall be happy to furnish it.—(Admiralty.)

  Coronation Naval Review—Members' Tickets.
  MR. ARTHUR MORTON: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether the tickets for the Naval Review which are issued to Members personally will be transferable to their friends, in cases where the Members concerned do not themselves wish to attend the Review.
  (Answer.) The Board of Admiralty understand that the money granted is intended primarily to be applied to the purpose of enabling Members of the House of Commons in their public capacity to be present on the occasion of an important public ceremony, and they have accordingly arranged that the tickets issued to Members of the House shall be personal. An additional ticket has been issued in each case for the purpose of enabling a Member to be accompanied by a friend. I may add that, as far as I have been able to ascertain, the proposed arrangement is in accordance with the wish of a large majority of Members, and, if adhered to, it will certainly conduce to the general comfort and convenience. If the transfer of a Member's personal ticket were permitted in one ease, it is clear that it must be permitted in all cases, with the result that a very large majority of the passengers on the ship would not be Members of the House of Commons. I gather that this would not be in accordance with the general wish. The Admiralty therefore propose to adhere to the arrangement originally made, and tickets issued to hon. Members personally will only be available for the special trains and ships when presented by the Members whose names are inscribed on them. The same limitation applies to tickets issued for the sleeping accommodation on board the s. s. "Atrato."—(Admiralty.)

  Poor Law—Emigration of Girls to Canada.
  MR. VICARY GIBBS: To ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he will state on what grounds the Local Government Boar have decided that, as a general rule, pauper girls
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  should not be sent out to Canada above I the age of ten years, and in no case, except under very special circumstances, above the age of twelve years, as stated in the Board's memorandum of April 1888; and whether, having regard to the annual inspection described in the Board's circular letter to Clerks to Guardians of the 20th April 1898, the restriction as to the age of pauper girls proposed to be emigrated to Canada may now be removed or modified.
  (Answer.) The Rule referred to was made on the ground that where pauper girls are emigrated to Canada they should be sent at an age at which they will be adopted into and become part of the families of those by whom they are received. They thus become accustomed to Canadian life before they go into domestic service, and have the means of obtaining friends in the Dominion who may be expected to take an interest in them and to whom they can, if necessary, resort for advice and assistance. I do not think that the annual official inspection mentioned in the Question would afford a sufficient reason for altering the Rule referred to. I may, however, state that in the case of one emigration society I have tentatively allowed the emigration of girls over twelve. The society undertake to provide special training at an institution for the girl before emigration, and to secure on her arrival in Canada the assistance of some lady who is willing to act as her patroness and special friend.—(Local Government Board.)

  Patent Law Amendment Bill.
  COLONEL DENNY: To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he can hold out any hopes of making progress this Session with the Bill for amending Patent Laws.
  (Answer.) I have good hope that this Bill may be passed during the present Session of Parliament.—(Board of Trade.)

  Ireland—Congested Districts—Fishing Nets.
  MR. BOLAND: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieu I tenant of Ireland whether he is aware that an application to the Congested

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  Districts Board for four trap nets was made by John Sullivan, of Nedanone, Castle Cove, county Kerry; that the application was granted, but the nets, when forwarded to the applicant, were found to be 46½ yards short; and whether the deficiency will be made good before payment from the applicant is demanded.
  (Answer.) The facts are correctly stated. The deficiency was due to shrinkage in the process of tanning the nets. It appears to be the custom in the trade to quote for nets in the un-tanned state, but as the applicant may not have understood this when he applied for the nets, the maker has agreed to supply the deficiency without further charge.—(Irish Office.)

  Irish Land Purchase—Tithes and Quit Rents.
  COLONEL NOLAN: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he would state for any convenient period, for instance, the last ten years, the amount of quit rent and tithe rent-charge which the Government have obtained on the sale of estates in Ireland, under the Purchase Acts, in excess of the quit rent or tithe rent-charge which the Government had claimed on such estates during the previous six years; also, what has been approximately the total cost to Government for, legal inquiries as to quit rent and tithes on the above estates.
  (Answer.) The Land Commissioners are not aware of any case in which they obtained tithe rent-charge in excess of the amount claimed on such estates during the period mentioned. I am in correspondence with the Commissioners of Woods and Forests in respect of the question of quit rents, and will communicate with the honourable and gallant Member on the subject.—(Irish Office.)

  Volunteer Decoration.
  COLONEL WELBY: To ask the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether service in another branch of the auxiliary forces has ever been allowed to count towards the period of qualification for the Volunteer decoration.
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  (Answer.) The reply is in the negative.—(War Office.)

  South Africa—Medals for Officers of Transports and Hospital Ships.
  MR. FORSTER,: To ask the Secretary of State for War, whether a medal issued to commemorate any war or warlike operations has ever been granted to the masters and officers of transports or hospital ships; and, if so, whether, in view of the great services rendered to the country by the masters, officers, and crews of the transports and; hospital ships during the war in South Africa, it is intended to grant to them the South African medal.
  (Answer.) There are precedents for the award of medals to the masters of transports and hospital ships in a few exceptional cases. The question as to whether these precedents should be followed to any and, if so, to what extent, in the case of the masters, officers, and crews of transports and hospital ships employed during the war in South Africa, is at present under consideration, and I am not as yet in a position to make a Statement on the subject.—(Admiralty.)

  South African War—Suggested Contribution to Cost from Mines in Natal and Cape Colony.
  MR. GIBSON BOWLES: To ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether, in view of the increased security accruing to the trade and industry of the South African Colonies generally from the result of the war, His Majesty's Government propose to consider the propriety of communicating with the Governments of the Cape Colony and Natal, with a view to obtaining a contribution to the cost of the war from the proprietors of the De Beers and other South African diamond mines and gold mines outside the Transvaal and Orange River Colony.
  (Answer.) His Majesty's Government do not propose to do so.—(Colonial Office.)

  Factory Act—Fruit Preserving Order.
  MR. TALBOT: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will reconsider the Order issued by his authority for Fruit Preserving under the Factory and Workshop Act, 1901, with a view

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  of preventing the undue employment of adult women for excessive hours under Article 5 of the Order, and extending the exception given by Article 6 of the Order to young persons under eighteen years instead of only to those under sixteen years of age.
  (Answer.) I think the draft Order goes as far as it is safe to go at present. After a year or two of experience of its working it may be possible to make a further advance; but even if I were satisfied that the honourable Member's suggestions were practicable, I should hesitate to adopt them now at the cost of delaying for forty days the bringing into operation of the new Order.—(Home Office.)

(2.15.) QUESTIONS IN THE HOUSE.

  War Decorations.
  SIR JOHN COLOMB: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether Army Orders (No. 94, April 1901, and No. 180, August 1901) limit the issue of clasps to troops engaged in active operations in South Africa on or before the 15th July 1901. Whether, under existing regulations, officers and men who fought in South Africa between the 16th July 1901 and the 31st May 1902, inclusive, can only receive the bare medal, the same as has been awarded to certain officers and men who were never in South Africa at all during active operations; and, if so, whether he can give an assurance that steps will be taken to confer a clasp or clasps, upon troops for services rendered in active operations between the 16th July 1901 and the last day of the war, inclusive, to distinguish them from those who saw no fighting.
  THE SECRETARY OK STATE FOR WAR (Mr. BRODRICK,): The reply to the first two Questions is in the affirmative. As regards the last Question, a proposal has been made to add one clasp to the medal, but the subject is not yet finally determined.

  Royal Inniskillings and the Coronation.
  CAPTAIN NORTON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that the men of the 3rd and 4th Battalions of the Royal
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  Inniskilling Fusiliers are anxious to be permitted to assist in lining the streets of London during the Coronation festivities; and whether, in view of the fact that these battalions supplied many men to the 1st Battalion which so greatly distinguished itself at the battles of Peter's Hill and Colenso, and that some of these men have returned to the battalions in question, he will consider the advisability of meeting their wishes.
  MR. BRODRICK: Militia battalions who wish to be present at the Coronation ceremonies will be represented at the average of 150 per battalion. It is not possible to treat these two battalions differently to the others. I must remind the hon. Member that the space available for the Militia is necessarily limited.
  CAPTAIN NORTON: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think these battalions have priority of claim because they are Irish regiments?
  MR. BRODRICK: I do not.
  MR. JOYCE: Except in South Africa.

  Canteen and Mess Co-operative Society.
  CAPTAIN NORTON: I beg to ask the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether, seeing that in addition to the fact that Colonel Bridge was at one time on the Committee of Management of the Canteen and Moss Co-operative Society, it now appears, in spite of the Statement made by the War Office, that another Member of the War Office Committee at present inquiring into Army canteens was some years ago the paid servant of the Canteen and Mess Society, the working of which society is under the investigation of the committee, he will say what steps he proposes to take in connection with this matter.
  MR. BRODRICK: The hon Member has been misinformed on this subject.
  CAPTAIN NORTON: A letter from the officer in question, acknowledging it, has been published and not contradicted.

  Indian Rupee Coinage.
  MR. FIELD: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been

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  drawn to the fact that the Government of India coined, during the financial year, 1900–01, 150,000,000 rupees; will he give the profit per rupee that the Indian Government makes at the present price of silver, and the greatest number of rupees ever coined in a financial year during the ten years previous to the closing of the Indian mints in 1893; and will he take steps to prevent the inflation of the Indian currency if the Financial Member of the Viceroy's Council favours inflation, and, on the other hand, its contraction if that official favour that course.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON,): 1. The number of rupees coined during the financial year 1900–01, was 171,479,318, of which 135,970,779 were on account of the Government of India, and 35,508,539 for Native States; 2. In 1900–01, the net profit made on the coinage was about one-third of the outturn; the price of silver has fallen about 16 per cent. since that date; but there have been no recent purchases of the metal for coinage, so that the Government is making no profit at the present price of silver; 3. The largest number of rupees coined in any year from 1882–3 till 1893 was 129,016,730 in 1890–1; 4. Additions to the currency are not dependent merely on the opinion of the Financial Member of the Council of India. Coinage takes place only when the Government of India and the Secretary of State in Council are satisfied that there is a real demand by the trade for more rupees.

  Canadian Steel Bounties.
  MR. BROADHURST: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he can state the amount of the bounties paid by the Canadian Government on the manufacture or export of steel.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. J. CHAMBERLAIN,): Up to the 23rd of April last the bounty on steel made in Canada was three dollars per ton. From that date it is subject to an annual reduction until it expires altogether on 30th June, 1907.

  Customs Staff and the New Grain Duties.
  SIR JOHN LENG: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer
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  if he can state what additional number of officers will be required in the Customs Department consequent on the new duties imposed by the Finance Bill, and also what will be the increased annual cost of the collection of these duties.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Sir M. HICKS BEACH,): The Board of Customs have this matter under consideration, but they are not yet in a position to frame an Estimate of the addition to their staff which may be required to carry out the work connected with the new duties. They do not expect that the annual cost of collection will exceed 1 per cent.

  Silver Coinage.
  MR. FIELD: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will state the profit on the coinage of the shilling and the half-crown at the present price of silver; and will he explain why, in the case of the Australian Commonwealth, the British Government appropriates the entire profit on the coinage of silver for Australia, while in the case of the Dominion of Canada the Canadian Government mints its own silver and secures the profit; and, whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that Australia is a silver producing country; and that, in view of the great fall in the price of silver, Australia sells her silver for less than two shillings and buys it back when it has passed our Mint at the rate of nearly six shillings per ounce.
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: At the present price of silver, the gross profit on the coinage of silver sterling from bullion is in the case of a half-crown approximately Is. 7d., and in that of a shilling 7½d., but from this gross profit the cost of manufacture, etc, which is considerable, should be deducted to arrive at the net profit. I have no accurate estimate of this. The law provides that the Exchequer shall receive the profit on the silver coinage for sterling-using Colonies, of which the Australian Commonwealth is one; and we bear the loss on the gold coined there. The Dominion of Canada is not a sterling-using Colony, but has a local token coinage of its own. The last paragraph of the question is a matter of argument.

  Alien Immigration.
  SIR HOWARD VINCENT: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been called to the immigration between 1st January and 31st May, 1902, of no less than 28,337 aliens for sojourn in the United Kingdom, and mainly in the crowded districts of the East End of London, and that in the same five months 54,477 aliens arrived, stating that they were en route to America; and whether, in view of the effect of this immigration upon the labouring population of this country, he will urge the Royal Commission to sit de die in diem, and submit their proposals for legislation before the close of the session.
  MR. COHEN: Before the right hon. Gentleman answers the question, may I ask whether there is any evidence that all the 28,337 aliens, not stated to be en route for America, arrived, as stated in the question of ray hon. friend, "for sojourn in the United Kingdom," and settled in any particular quarter of London.
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE HOARD OF TRADE (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,): The answer to the supplementary Question is in the negative. The number stated are those of aliens arriving in the United Kingdom from Continental ports, who are not described in the Alien Lists as en route for other countries, and who are so described respectively. I have on other occasions informed the hon. Member that those not described as en route do not all come for sojourn in this country. I see no reason to make any representations to the Royal Commission as regards their procedure.
  MR. MACVEAGH: Will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to prevent the importation of aliens into the Stock Exchange?
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: And into this House?

  Metropolitan Fire Brigade.
  SIR HOWARD VINCENT: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will consider the desirability of legislation to transfer the Metropolitan Fire Brigade from the control of the London County
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  Council to that of the State, and making it a branch of the Metropolitan Police. Has not such a course been frequently recommended by those having experience?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. RITCHIE,): I am aware that the proposed transfer had been recommended by a Committee of which I was a member some years ago before the constitution of the London County Council, but I do not think that legislation in that direction is now practicable.

  London Water Bill.
  MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board what the procedure will be in reference to the London Water Bill when it comes back to the House from the Joint Committee; whether he will take care that the Report and Minutes of the Committee and the evidence given before them shall be printed and in the hands of Members before the Bill is taken; and, if he can say approximately at what date the Rill will be taken in Committee of the whole House.
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. WALTER LONG,): On the return of the Bill from the Joint Committee it will, in accordance with the usual practice, be recommitted to a Committee of the whole House, and will be subsequently treated as a public Bill. I cannot at present say when the Bill will be taken in Committee of the House, but it will not be until after the Report of the Joint Committee has been circulated. The evidence will be issued in due course, but I cannot undertake to defer the Committee stage until this has been done.

  Insurance Policies.
  MR. FIELD: I beg to ask Mr. Attorney General for Ireland whether he is aware that in certain cases Insurance Companies have issued policies and accepted premiums for many years without admitting the age on the face of the policy, and have then sought by a technical objection to delay and embarass the payment of the sum assured; and whether he will introduce legislation to secure policy holders.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. ATKINSON,): My attention has not been called to the matter referred to. The insured can always protect themselves by the contract they enter into with the companies. Legislation on the subject does not seem to be necessary.

  Dublin Police and the United Irish League.
  MR. NANNETTI: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether orders have been given to the members of the Dublin Metropolitan Police to attend at and take the names of people attending meetings of branches of the United Irish League in Dublin; whether he is aware that a number of constables and an inspector attended the place of meeting of the Mount joy branch on Thursday last, and interrogated those attending the meeting and asked for the names of the chairman and secretary; and whether this action of the police has his sanction; and, if not, will he give instructions to the police to discontinue it.
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. WYNDUAM,): No, Sir. No such instructions have been given. The hon. Member has not been correctly informed of the facts alluded to in the latter part of his question. The constable on beat-duty inquired the names of the chairman and secretary of the meeting. The constable was visited in the ordinary course of patrol by his inspector and sergeant. No other members of the force were present. The constable and his officers acted in accordance with the ordinary routine of their duty and quite irrespectively of the character of the meeting in question.
  MR. NANNETTI: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that an inspector and five constables stood at the door taking the names?
  MR. WYNDHAM: I understand that when the constable saw a crowd assembling, he asked the cause, as was his duty, and took the names.
  MR. NANNETTI: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the constable was actually invited into the room?
  MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member cannot discuss this matter by Question and answer.
  MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: Are we to understand that it is within the ordinary routine of duty of a police officer to demand the names of the secretary and chairman of any meeting that may be held in Dublin?
  MR. WYNDHAM: I said nothing of the kind. The constable had no instructions, but he very properly asked the cause of the crowd assembling, as was his duty.
  MR. NANNETTI: Will the right hon. Gentleman give instructions to members of the force to discontinue this practice of taking names?
  MR. WYNDHAM: Certainly not. It is the duty of an officer when he finds a crowd obstructing the pavement to find out what is going on.

  Ballycastle Local Government Elections.
  MR. MACVEAGH: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that, during the local government elections at Bally castle, County Antrim, on 4th June, a tent specially erected within the grounds of the Ramoan National Schools, the polling station for the district, was permitted to be used as a tally room for one set of candidates; and, seeing that written protests were served upon the presiding officer and upon the deputy returning officer, will the matter receive the consideration of the Local Government Board for Ireland; and will the attention of the Board of National Education in Ireland be drawn to these proceedings.
  MR. WYNDHAM: The Local Government Board has no knowledge of, and no control over the matter mentioned in the question, to which, however, the attention of the Commissioners of National Education has been drawn. If any illegality has been committed the parties aggrieved can seek redress by petition.

  White Estate, Bantry.
  MR. GILHOOLY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the

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  Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Land Judges have received from the Land Commission the valuator's report in connection with the sale of the White Estate, near Bantry; and if he can state approximately when the sale will take place.
  MR. WYNDHAM: The Land Commissioners expect to make their Report to the Land Judge during the present week. It is quite impossible to state, even approximately, when the sale will take place. As, soon as I receive information in the matter I will communicate with the hon. Member.

  Education Bill.
  MR. LEVY: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether an Education Committee appointed under the provisions of Clause 12 of the Education Bill would bear the same relation to the County Council as a Surveyors' Committee appointed by a County Council.
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): I should imagine that the answer is in the negative.

  Business of the House.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman what the business on Friday and in the early part of next week will be.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: On Friday the business will be the discussion of Vote 12 for the Navy. It will be remembered by the House that we put this Vote down for an evening sitting last week, but a Motion for Adjournment occupied most of the time which should have been given to it.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I would remind the right hon. Gentleman that this Vote is usually kept back as long as possible, so that we may retain an opportunity for raising Navy questions.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes, and a large number of Members are interested in the question proposed to be raised. It is necessary however, that we should take the Vote.
  SIR FRANCIS POWELL: Does the right hon. Gentlemen propose to take Estimates next Thursday?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes. As I have said before, we shall take the Scotch Estimates, subject to finishing the Report stage of the Finance Bill to-morrow, which I hope is not in doubt.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Will the Estimate for, £100,000 for the expenses of the Coronation be submitted before the Coronation ceremonies, in accordance with; precedent?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No. I should imagine it is not in accordance with precedent.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: It is in accordance with precedent?
  MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: When will the Report stage of the Vote for Lord Kitchener be taken?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: It is down for tonight, but I do not know whether it will be reached. On Monday and Tuesday next week the Education Bill will be taken, and, as the House is aware, the Tuesday evening sitting will be devoted to the Coronation Adjournment Motion. Wednesday I propose to leave open.
  MR. CALDWELL: When will the Third Reading of the Finance Bill be taken?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Possibly on that Wednesday.
  SIR JOHN COLOMB: Will the Admiralty Vote be taken on Friday?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: It will be taken on Friday. I shall not close the Vote on Friday, so as to give a further opportunity of raising questions upon it, if the House desires to do so.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: What questions are to be raised?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: My noble friend the Member for Woolwich is going to raise important questions which he

  845
  would have raised the other night had not private business prevented him.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: Is it not the case that the noble lord the Member for Woolwich joined with me in appealing to the right hon. Gentleman to keep back the Vote?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I cannot believe that my noble friend has been guilty of inconsistency so great, because he has, in public and in private, strongly urged mo to take this Vote on the earliest possible day.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS—STEAMSHIP SUBSIDIES.
That they give leave to the Lord Brassey to attend in order to his being examined as a Witness, before the Select Committee appointed by this House on Steamship Subsidies, his Lordship consenting.
NEW BILL.
  WILD BIRDS' PROTECTION ACTS AMENDMENT BILL [LORDS].
  Head the first time; to be read a second time upon Thursday, and to be printed. [Bill 238.]
  WAYS AND MEANS [16TH JUNE] REPORT.
  Resolutions reported—
  SURTAX AND ALLOWANCE ON SPIRITS.
  1. "That on and after the 17th day of June, 1902, the respective duties of Customs on imported spirits shall be increased by one penny."

  INCREASE OF CUSTOMS DUTIES ON GLUCOSE.
  2. "That on and after the 17th day of June, 1902, the duties of Customs on imported glucose, imposed by section 2 of The Finance Act, 1901, shall be, as respects solid glucose, throe shillings and three pence, and as respects liquid glucose, two shillings and sixpence."
  Resolutions agreed to.

EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
Considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
Mr. J. W. LOWTHERin the Chair.
Clause 1:—
Amendment again proposed—
"In page 1 line 11, to leave out the word 'shall,' and insert the words 'may with the consent of the council of the county.".'—(Sir Edward Grey.)
Question again proposed, "That the word 'shall' stand part of the clause."
DR. MACNAMARAsaid the Government had, as a result of pressure, decided to give autonomy for elementary education only to non-county boroughs with a population of over 10,000, and to urban districts with a population of over 20,000. He had endeavoured to point out that this proviso was not justified by educational considerations, and entirely destroyed the "one authority" scheme of the Bill. It was, too, at variance with everything which the Vice-President of the Council said on a similar proposal in 1896. The Bill of that year originally proposed to create 128 authorities, but under extreme pressure autonomy was given to municipal boroughs with a population of 20,000, and that increased the number of the education authorities from 128 to 197—an increase which the right hon. Gentleman declared to be disastrous to the whole scope of the Bill. If those were the opinions of the right hon. Gentleman in 1896, what had he now to say to the proposal which would increase the number to 329? But the oracle of the Education Department was absolutely dumb; he was probably stricken speechless by the educationally stupid proposal now before the Committee. He had desired to mitigate the evil by increasing the population limit, but had failed, and now he asked that autonomy should be given in the cases of these municipal boroughs and urban districts only at the discretion of the County Council. He appealed to the Government to make that concession and he did so on educational grounds. His proposal would at any rate secure paramouncy for the County Council, and it would tend to educational efficiency. These smaller and richer urban areas ought not to be allowed to contract themselves out of their proper obligations to the whole

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county, as this proviso would un doubtedly enable them to do. Take the case of the county of Kent. Canterbury and sixteen other authorities would be in a position to take themselves out of the county scheme, and Dover, Chatham, Maidstone, Tunbridge Wells, Folkestone, Rochester, Ramsgate, Gravesend, Margate, Faversham, Deal, Gillingham, Bromley, Beckenham, Erith and Penge would all be able to cut themselves apart from the county, and the Committee could easily imagine the condition of an agricultural county like Kent if they took out of it all those rating areas for the purpose of elementary education. They were continually being reminded of the need for additional rural schools, for more money for teaching, and for better staffs and apparatus. They were told that the rural school was the weakest link in the educational chain, and yet they were opening the door for all these rich areas to take themselves out of the county scheme, thereby weakening the hands of the county authorities. In the county of Lancashire thirty-one areas would be cut out, in Middlesex thirteen, in Staffordshire fourteen, and in the West Biding of Yorkshire fifteen—including such places as Rotherham, Keighley, Wakefield, Dewesbury, Botley, Barnsley, and Todmorden. Only the starving rural schools would be left in, in fact. He did think the Government might agree to give the county a general controlling influence and power to say whether or not these authorities should be allowed to contract themselves out. He regretted that they had not had the advantage during those debates of the presence of the Colonial Secretary. The right hon. Gentleman, in discussing the matter with his constituents on 17th May, described the Bill as an honest attempt to deal with the education question. He admitted that it was not a perfect Bill, and that Amendments might have to be made on matters of detail, such as the area of rating and the composition of the authority to be created, and he added that the Government were prepared to consider suggestions with an open mind. Why should not the Government then accept the moderate compromise embodied in the Amendment of the hon. Baronet the Member for Berwick, and make the County Council the
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paramount authority for educational purposes? Would it be in the interest of the county scheme that these small urban districts should be allowed autonomy, both administrative and rating, for elementary education?
MR. CRIPPSsupported the Amendment, because he held that the proposal of the Government in this matter would interfere to a serious extent with the fundamental principle of the Education Bill. He took it that that fundamental principle was financial unity within the county, or in other words that the County Council should have control of the county fund, and any interference with that principle seemed to him to be materially injurious to the true principle of the Bill, it would, in fact, be reactionary; it would be going back to what was the vice of education at the present time—the system of raising the education rate in too small areas. It was necessary that they should have the rate levied in a sufficiently wide area, and that area ought to be the county area. At the same time, while he desired to maintain the principle of unity as regarded financial control, he thought it would be possible to give administrative autonomy to the smaller areas, and he did not see that there would be inconsistency in so doing. If they did not have that financial unity within the county, if they had other arrangements, the whole principle of the Bill as regarded unity of administration for elementary and secondary education was cut asunder at its very foundation. Looking into the matter, he had found that these smaller urban and borough districts accounted for a population of about six millions. The populations in the counties outside London, and the bounty boroughs which were not affected, might be taken at something like 18,000,000, and, therefore, to begin with, this proviso cut out one-third of the whole population of the ordinary county districts. If they took these districts out of the Bill for elementary education purposes, and if they were not rated to the county for such purposes, the representatives of those districts would not form part of the county authority for elementary education purposes, because ther was no principle

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more firmly established as regarded local government than that the representative of a district which did not contribute to the rate, had no right either to act or vote in connection with the subject affected by the rate. That was laid down in the Local Government Act, 1888. As he had said, the result of this proviso in the Bill would be to take something like one-third of the County Council representatives out of the elementary education authority altogether, and, from his own experience, he would say the most important third, for it was beyond doubt that they got increased interest in educational matters where the population was less scattered. The result would be that for elementary education they would have the County Council minus the representatives of those particular areas, whilst for secondary education they would have County Councils plus the representatives of those areas, and that would create two entirely different bodies. It would take out of the elementary education authority a considerable number of the men most active in educational matters in the country districts, and that would re-act on the educational system, because there would not be sufficient interest in the country districts to maintain education at an efficient level. He would ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he could not hold out some hope of accepting the proviso, not necessarily in the form in which it had been worded, by the hon. Member for Berwick. He wanted the County Councils to have the opportunity of saying whether their districts should be cut out in the way proposed. The constituency he represented was made up of largo urban districts, and, therefore, it was one which was particularly affected by the Amendment. That, however, was not the consideration they ought to have before them. Parliament was now establishing a great educational organisation which ought to be effective for many years, and all smaller considerations ought to be put aside. From his own experience, he was sure that the Bill, as it stood, would work badly. Every Member of the House should have the courage of his opinions, and try and secure that the Education Bill was drafted in the best possible form.
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That best possible form seemed to him undoubtedly, to be the preservation of the financial unity of the county while giving such administrative autonomy as was required to these boroughs and urban districts.
MR. BRYCE: There is some force in the considerations urged by the hon. and learned Member for Stretford; but none of those considerations support the Amendment, because, even if the Amendment were carried, the difficulties which the hon. Member has so lucidly stated would arise with just the same force, though possibly not the same frequency, as under the proviso as it stands. I do not agree that it is essential that there should be one rating authority for the whole county. The position of these urban populations and their educational needs are different from those of the county districts, so that I cannot assent to the proposition laid down by the hon. Member. As to the arguments of the hon. Member for Berwick and others, I do not at all deny that they have some force, but they are conclusively answered by the arguments on the other side. What we want in the Bill is not theoretic symmetry and perfection, but the greatest amount of practical efficiency. In elementary education, practical efficiency is best secured by the close and vigilant control of local authorities, elected from not ton large areas, and not too far distant from the schools they have to supervise. Upon that principle, I should have been prepared to go even further than the proviso, and I hope the Government will adhere to it. That the needs of these districts are not the same is recognised by a later proviso which permits the local authorities for elementary education to be also the local authorities for secondary education. That is a valuable proviso, and will be the more valuable if the 2d. rate limitation is adhered to. The power of the local authority to raise an additional 1d. rate for secondary education will be very valuable, because it will enable more to be clone for secondary education than would otherwise be done. But if the authorities cease to be the authorities for secondary, education that proviso, as well as other provisos, will fall to the ground, so that in the interests of

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secondary as well as of elementary education the proviso is desirable and necessary. All the reasons which suggested the insertion of that proviso suggest its retention, and the Government would rather stultify the scheme of the Bill if they were to give way to this Amendment. It is true there may be a certain amount of practical inconvenience, but if we have to chose between theoretic perfection and real efficiency, we cannot doubt which way our choice should lie. If the inconvenience should prove to be as great as the hon. Member for Stretford division anticipates, it will still be possible for these local authorities to rid themselves of the duty and to fall into the county. That, I think, would be a far better way of avoiding the difficulty than that suggested by the Amendment. The latter seems to open up a very undesirable ground for controversy and friction between the county and the local authorities, and I hope the Committee will decide that the Government have chosen the wiser course, and reject the Amendment.
MR. FISONhoped the Government would not accept the Amendment, because, if they did so, it would absolutely kill the proviso. He had been a Member of the Yorkshire County Council, and of its Technical Instruction Committee, and he entirely disagreed with the view put forward by the hon. Member for Camberwell. He instanced the case of the ancient borough of Doncaster, with 30,000 inhabitants, which had hitherto conducted its educational work extremely well. The Corporation themselves had founded an elementary school, and had also set aside money for technical instruction. Was it fair and reasouable that that borough should have to go cap in hand to the West Riding County Council and ask permission to go on with the work they had so well begun? Another instance was that of Keighley. Was Keighley to be put under the heel of the County Council? If the Amendment in its present form was carried, he did not believe, from his knowledge of County Councils and County Council officials, that they would permit these small boroughs to take up educational work.
SIR EDWARD GREYsaid he really put forward the Amendment as a compromise, in the hope that it would make the proviso less deleterious to educational efficiency than it would otherwise be. He did not pretend that the proviso even with the Amendment would be as at is factory arrangement, but he would infinitely prefer the proviso thus amended to the proviso unamended. His solo object being to make the proviso less mischievous and arbitrary, he would willingly agree to any other compromise which would secure some definite point. The hon. and learned Member for the Stretford Division, who had put his finger upon some really important matters, had an Amendment on the Paper covering certain points. If the Government were prepared to accept that Amendment, he would willingly sacrifice his own in its favour, because a certain practical gain would be thus secured. Much of the argument of the hon. and learned Member was in support of the present Amendment; that part which was against it was also against the proviso as a whole, and that which was not against the whole proviso was in favour of the Amendment. There would doubt less be anomalies. The County Councils would have great difficulty in carrying out the present education scheme, but they would be much better judges of the needs of their own districts than Parliament could be, and if an authority like the County Council was to be placed in such a responsible, important, and difficult position, as the House had decided it should be, it ought to have a free hand, The hon. Member for Doncaster had given telling instances of individual boroughs which had done excellent work, and had said what a pity it was that they should be interfered with by the County Council. But the Committee were now discussing how to get a better and more complete educational system for the country than at present existed, and the fact that individual non-county boroughs had done the work well ought not to be made an obstacle in the way of a complete scheme for the whole county. If places like Keighley had done the work so exceedingly well, it was most desirable that they should be brought into close relation with the County Councils; they would be the leaven and the inspiration of the

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County Councils in extending the good works they had done within their own areas. He had put forward his Amendment in the interests of practical efficiency; the right hon. Member for South Aberdeen had said that he opposed it on the same ground. Some hon. Members on that side of the House were afraid the County Councils would be very bad authorities for dealing with elementary education. But the House had decided that they were to be the authorities, subject to this proviso. That being so, even supposing they would be bad authorities, was it desirable to insist upon their being worse than they need be? Was their power in the poorer districts to be crippled by there being withdrawn from them the great advantage of having some of those urban districts and non-county boroughs as part of their scheme? A rich district coming under the proviso might very reasonably feel that it had managed its educational affairs well, and that it would lose by being thrown into the county with its much larger area. But a poor district would be able to relinquish its powers under the Bill and to throw itself into the county, and it would, no doubt, do so. Therefore, if the Bill were left unamended, the County Council would be left with every urban district which would be a difficulty and a burden to it, and deprived of every urban district which would be an advantage to it. That certainly did not seem to make for efficiency. A further point that he would address to Members on his own side was that he was anxious to use every possible opportunity, whether in regard to education or anything else, for promoting a system of devolution. If the present temper of the country continued, they would be still pleading twenty or thirty years hence for devolution. He desired to work towards that by building up big local authorities, but the passion for setting up small separately elected independent authorities for special purposes was going to be one of the great obstacles to working out a big scheme of devolution. If they desired devolution, they must take their authorities and give them a clear field of control. Even if the Amendment were carried a County Council would still have power to delegate its powers to these local authorities. The plan he proposed seemed, from the point of view
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both of educational efficiency and of the future development of local government, to be the true lines on which to proceed. The County Council ought to have a clear field and ample powers of delegation to subordinate local authorities, but, above all, it ought to have a fair start.
THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): Two opposite schools of educational thought have been represented in this Debate. There is the school of thought represented by the hon. Baronet, by the hon. Member for North Camberwell, and, though perhaps in a less degree, by my hon. and learned friend behind me. They think that the Bill as drawn is educationally inefficient, and that it would be enormously improved by inserting the Amendment of the hon. Baronet, or, failing that, the Amendment of my hon. friend behind me. There is another school represented by the right hon. Member for South Aberdeen, who says that to accept the Amendment would be to destroy or greatly to impair the educational efficiency of the Bill-Now I find myself in full agreement with neither one nor other of these contending parties. My view is a more humble but, I think, a more practical one. The hon. Member for North Camberwell pours contempt on any man who is influenced in the structure of an Education Bill by any but purely educational considerations. He approaches the Bill purely in the spirit of a theoriser and professor. In my opinion, the man who approaches a question like this in that spirit may produce an excellent paper scheme, but it will be a scheme destined to remain a paper scheme for all time. We have to do with an existing system. We have to deal with a scheme which we have sufficient difficulty in modifying even to the extent which we are modifying it under this Bill; and if we are to pile up difficulty upon difficulty by uprooting every arrangement which has been come to in previous times, if we are to add unnecessarily to the labour already sufficiently great, by throwing into the opposite scale every single one of the communities whose interests will be touched by this Amendment, then it is quite conceivable that the Bill might be a much better one, but it will never be more than

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a Bill, I do not think the House would be well advised on that ground in taking either the hon. Baronet or the hon. Member for North Camberwell in this particular as their guide. I want to know how far these Gentlemen who want to make the educational map of England absolutely afresh, as if there had never been any educational or local government arrangements before—I want to know how far they are to proceed in their search after theoretical consistency. Are they going to deprive all those boroughs and urban districts of the powers they already possess in regard to technical and secondary education by the Act of 1889? If not, do not let them talk about consistency and theoretical perfection in our arrangements. If they are, then I give them ail credit as theorists, but from a practical point of view their scheme is even wilder than perhaps they intended it to be. Nor do I agree with the contention of the right hon. Member for South Aberdeen, that the plan we have proposed will, in its working, prove seriously detrimental to the cause of education, primary or secondary, or of the coordination of the two. Let mo, in the first place, point out that the view of the hon. Member for North Camberwell that the effect of the Bill as it stands will be to take out of the counties all the richer areas which are required in order to enable the poor agricultural districts to deal with their voluntary schools, is based upon a misconception. I have taken some trouble to go into this; and I find that, though there are counties that will lose by the exclusion of these boroughs and urban districts from the rating area, there are counties, on the other hand, which distinctly gain; and no general proposition can be laid down as to the effect upon rating which will be produced by the Amendment he supports. Again, in reference to the argument of the hon. Baronet, I must point out that he forgets the actual words of the clause. No merging of boroughs or urban districts is possible, except with the consent of the County Council, and under conditions which the County Council must agree to. Therefore, we may take it as certain, that whatever line the County Council take in respect of any borough or urban district which may desire to merge itself in the county, will be taken with full knowledge of
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such merging, and with full desire on the part of the County Council to accept the surrender offered them. We have been told ad nauseam that the effect of the proviso is to overthrow the one authority principle. Now the phrase "one authority" is a convenient and a brief phrase, and I should have thought well understood. What we aim at in the one authority principle is, in the first place, from a local government point of view, to got rid of the ad hoc business, and not to have two popularly-elected S bodies in the same area with equal authority over the rates, and both dealing with primary education; and, secondly, that primary education should not be divorced from secondary education in the artificial manner in which it is under our existing system; that the two should not be in antagonism and should not overlap, but that there should be a natural passage from one to the other on the part of those scholars who are fit for higher training. That principle is not interfered with by Clause 1. It must be remembered that these boroughs and urban districts have already powers over secondary education, and when you give them power over primary education in their district, you do give to a single authority in a single district those powers which will enable them to co-ordinate the two great and inseparable halves of education. I believe it will be found that if you give them the powers we give them, they will not only be able to co-ordinate primary and secondary education in their areas, but that they will gladly fall in with some general scheme of the county of which they are a part for dealing with secondary education on oven a larger basis. Therefore, though I do not contend that this clause as it-stands, with the proviso, reaches that theoretical finish and perfection which all of us in our speculative moods might desire, neither do I admit that it destroys the principle of the Bill, or that it will seriously impair that co - ordination of primary and secondary education which it is one of our great objects to attain.
MR. MATHERsaid he was indebted to the hon. Baronet, the Member for Berwick,

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for raising this question, because the debate which had taken place had very much cleared the air. He heartily endorsed the arguments which his right hon. friend the Leader of the House had used to show that this clause with this proviso was really one of the best provisions of the Bill. He had tried to amend the Clause itself in the direction of retaining the School Boards in large areas, and he had not yet given up all hope of being able to discuss that question again. For the moment, however, he thought they should fix their minds upon the fact that education, under local authority in some form or another, had been going on in non-county boroughs for something like thirty years. They must not forget that there were 115 towns with above 10,000 inhabitants, and urban districts with 20,000, which, at the present moment, were exercising all the functions of the new local education authority through the School Board In his own division of Lancashire, education had taken a, very progressive form during the last few years in small towns, and the Amendment under consideration would make a very considerable difference in small towns in Lancashire. It was essential above all things in regard to the education of the country in future, that the localities, and even the small localities, should be imbued with the spirit of progress in education—the local pride and ambition to enable them to say that their population would be the most highly educated people in the county or the country. They must not in any way discourage that ambition by the operations of the Bill. It was because he believed that the Government on this particular point had carefully regarded the conditions which existed in towns of above 10,000, up to the county boroughs, that he hoped they would tenaciously bold to that which they had laid down, namely, that it was only in the absence of that local spirit and local pride necessary to induce local authorities in the prescribed areas to undertake primary and secondary education, the County Council would in any way come in to undertake the duty for them. From that point of view he thought it was most important that his hon. friend the Member for Berwick
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should not divide the House on this subject. He thought the Committee might thank him for having raised the question, but after the expression of the opinion of the Government through the First Lord of the Treasury, he hoped his hon. friend would let this provision pass in the interest of education. It had been proved to demonstration in America that the smallest communities in that country had a perfect educational system from primary education upwards. What could be done in America in this respect could be done here. There was a further difficulty which might arise. He thought the councils of towns of upwards of 10,000 would be up in arms against this Amendment. They were proud of what they were doing, und he-believed it was the interest of Parliament to cultivate that spirit in them.
SIR FRANCIS POWELLstated that there were towns with largo populations, which no doubt would in the course of a few years become county boroughs, and it was better for the country that they should at once been endowed with full powers to deal with education, There were Oxford and Cambridge eminent in education. In Yorkshire, such towns as Rotherham, Keighley, and Wakefield, with populations, in the case of the former of 54,000, in the case of the two latter of 41,000 each, were surely entitled to regulate their own educational affairs. In Lancashire, Southport and Blackpool would soon become county boroughs. There would be great disappointment felt by those places if a change were made in the Bill whereby they would be prevented from getting the powers proposed to be conferred on them. They would be grievously hurt if the change suggested in the Amendment were adopted.
Sir, WILLIAM HARCOURT: The, right hon. Gentleman rather challenged me on an observation which I made on this Bill—that it does not appear to be a single authority Bill. It has been enthusiastically supported by the hon. Member for Rossendale. My hon. friend accepts the declaration of the right hon. Gentleman on the ground that the

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great object ought to be to have the largest possible number of small local authorities, because they have greater knowledge of the localities and greater facilities for looking into their educational requirements. I may have misunderstood the right hon. Gentleman, but from the first I thought his view was that the great evil had been the existing small School Boards, and that we were now going to have a great educational measure which was to set up single authorities. They were to be the county borough and the County Councils. Why to ordinary persons reading this Bill, it would appear to be exactly opposite from the principle laid down by my hon. friend the Member for Rossendale. What does the first Clause say? It says—
"For the purposes of this Act the council of every county and of every county borough shall be the local education authority."
This is the main principle of the Bill, and then those smaller authorities come in by way of carrying out that plan. But it would now appear that it is only the small authorities that are really of a valuable character, and that the county and the county borough councils are mere supplementary bodies to supply the wants of those valuable small local authorities. Now, that is the single authority Bill which has been paraded throughout the country as a great educational reform. We are coming—after I do not know how many days discussion, and we are not yet at the end of the first Clause—to learn that it was all a mistake, and that we must encourage, and, if possible, multiply to the greatest number, the small education authorities, and reserve to them not only the power of dealing with elementary education, of which they might have some special knowledge, but the power of dealing with higher education also. In point of fact this is not a single authority but a multiple authority Bill. That is an entire revolution upon what I think has been generally understood by the country. I believe that the phrase about a "single authority" has had a good deal to do with the opinions formed by many in regard to the Bill, and so as we go on with the measure it seems to me to change its character. The right hon. Gentleman said that by a single authority he meant nothing
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else but an authority that would combine elementary and higher education. That is the only singleness he contemplated.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I did not say that.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: It is very difficult to understand what the Government view is on that subject. I believe a great many persons supposed that there would be great benefit in having this powerful and intelligent County Council, as the dominant and regulating authority on education within the county. That was the idea presented. But this proviso doubles the number of authorities that are to be set up under the Bill. There are about 200 authorities at present, and to these you add other 200. When we proceed to discuss the Bill it must be treated from the point of view that there may be twenty or thirty different authorities, some larger and some smaller, but all acting from some different view of education, which is the great virtue of the measure according to my hon. friend the Member for Rossendale.
MR. MATHERindicated dissent.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: Very well, instead of getting something like uniformity of action, you will have in the counties different authorities proceeding upon different principles in their arrangements for education. The more you multiply small areas, according to the view of my hon. friend, the better the Bill will be. I am not one of those who think that the County Council is by any means a perfect body in which to deposit your education authority, but really when you come to this multiplication of inferior bodies for dealing with education, I would prefer what I understood to be the single authority principle.
SIR ALBERT ROLLITsaid this Amendment had been recommended on the ground that it was a compromise, and that it ought to be accepted in the interest of local government. Those who used that argument wholly ignored the history of this question which had preceded the present debate. What was really inspiring their action was that

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the non-county boroughs had long made a strong protest against the manner in which they had been treated by County Councils in dealing with the allocation of what was known familiarly as the whisky money. He hold in his hand a protest by the non-county boroughs of Lancashire against the mode in which they had been treated. They contended that they had not received their proper share, and the result had been that, instead of the advancement of education, which was promised by the Technical Instruction Act, great friction of feeling had been generated, and, forsooth, the suggested compromise was to say that those non-county boroughs which had been protesting against what they considered a very great injustice, should be placed under the domination of the County Council, by whom they contended that injustice had been inflicted. He could see in this nothing but cause for friction in the future. The real practical compromise consisted in the proviso which was inserted in the Bill by the Government for the purpose of maintaining conditions which were historical and in the interests of educational peace and progress, and it was not inconsistent with local government, but the contrary. They must remember that this was a local matter involving considerable care and detail, and, if he recollected rightly, the recommendation of the Royal Commission was that the areas for elementary education should be smaller than those for higher education. He ventured to say that the very best educational work of any kind whatever which had been done in the country had been accomplished by some of the smaller boroughs. He had in his possession a long list of such boroughs, and if their educational supervision was to be transferred to the rural authority the change would be reactionary. The educational interest in the boroughs was owing to their urban character, and the possibility of their united action with the surrounding districts which they actually served educationally at the present moment. The fundamental fact must be recognised that there was a paramount difference between the urban and the rural educational position. Take the case of Ripon, which petitioned that it should not be transferred to the educational supervision of a manufacturing interest in the West Riding of Yorkshire while it was
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itself a largely agricultural community. He would take another case, which could not be represented in the House, because it happened to be the constituency of the right hon. Gentleman who presided over the deliberations of this House—he meant Carlisle. There £40,000 to £50,000 had been spent largely on elementary education, and in the petition he had from that city it was stated that if they were educationally attached to the county there would be a great educational reaction. One great practical test was, whether the county authorities had rated themselves for the sake of education. There might be one or two slight exceptions, but he thought that no County Council had rated itself for educational purposes. [An HON. MEMBER: Wales.] Wales was an exception, but no English County Council had done so, perhaps with one slight exception. He should like the Committee also to consider for a moment the comparison between even the county boroughs and the non-county boroughs. He found that twenty-one county boroughs had rated themselves for education and thirty had not; and yet these were to be, most properly, the educational authority for all purposes. The proportion was only a third. In the case of the non-county boroughs it was surprising to find that no fewer than sixty-one had rated themselves and seventy-one had not, or, in other words, the proportion was nearly one-half. He believed that almost better educational work had been done in some of those non-county boroughs than in other parts of the country. They should be encouraged, and nothing should be done to destroy their existing educational work. The machinery might be different, but the men who worked that machinery would he largely the same; and if they found men doing useful, distinctive, successful work for education let them rely on these men to give their fellow citizens that education which would be most useful to them.
MR. DILLONsaid that the speech to which they had just listened was a most powerful indictment against the whole principle of the Bill. He had been filled with alarm in listening to the speeches on both sides of the House. The whole series of arguments went, in his opinion, to the destruction of the principle of the

863
Bill. He was beginning to ask himself in the light of those speeches, "Why were they doing away with School Boards?" Hon. Member after hon. Member had declared that no educational authority had done such good work as the School Boards, and that the educational areas ought to be small, not large. But the object of this Bill, as they understood it, was to substitute for these small areas large areas with large educational authorities. That was the great principle which was held up and pressed upon the House when the Bill was discussed on the Second Reading. There was to be a large authority with large resources; and they had heard arguments which seemed to have great force about adding to the dignity of the local bodies by giving them these increased powers. But now they heard that the County Councils were thoroughly reactionary in educational matters, and that, therefore, the supervision of education was not to be thrown upon them. He could quite understand the concern of the hon. Member for Rossendale who had quoted American precedents and methods, and who had said that the smaller the area of the educational authority was, the better.
MR. MATHERsaid that what he had argued was that in America they could secure educational efficiency under local authority in an area with a population of 10,000 and even 5,000.
MR. DILLONsaid he could understand the views of his hon. friend who supported the small educational authority; but he could not understand the views of hon. Gentlemen opposite or the arguments now being used, and which would be used later on with overwhelming force when they got to Clause 8. It would be said that the rural authorities were reactionary, and that the only really progressive authorities were the boroughs. The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury had endeavoured to argue, with great subtlety, that the proviso did not destroy the principle of one authority; but he could not understand how any human being could accept that theory. If the proviso was adopted the principle of one authority was given up as
864
regarded the non-county boroughs which were excepted by the proviso, and the result would be the worst conceivable system in the world. There would be authority to deal with elementary education but which had not full power to deal with secondary education. There would be only small atoms of authority to deal with secondary education, which could only lead to perpetual squabbles with the County Councils. It would be infinitely better to give them either all or no authority. They were going, by the Bill, to set up 270 to 300 new authorities who were not to have complete control over all education. He supported that Amendment with all his heart, and he must confess that some of the speeches the evening had filled him with concern in regard to the future of the voluntary schools.
SIR WILLIAM ANSONsaid that he proposed to support the Amendment, and as he had spoken in favour of the proviso on an earlier occasion, he desired to say why he considered both the Amendment of the hon. Member for Berwick, and of the hon. Member for Stretford Division were quite consistent with the maintenance of such benefits as he thought would arise from the proviso. One merit of the proviso was, that they were throwing on the County Councils the immense burden of elementary education, and that burden would be lightened if autonomy in elementary education were allowed in the districts now under consideration. Whether or not any County Council felt the burden too heavy would be a matter for its own consideration. Then he had said, and still thought, the proviso would be valuable because it would retain that keen and concentrated interest in educational matters which had no doubt come to pass in great urban centres. It appeared to him that there was an impression amongst Members on the other side of the House, that it was impossible to have any interest in education unless they had financial control. He believed that the interest which existed in those urban centres would be as alive, and as valuable to the community, as it now was, even if the financial control were handed over, as his hon. friend the Member for

865
Stretford had suggested, to the county authority, leaving to the urban centres their autonomy for all other purposes. For those reasons, he thought that in voting for the Amendment he would not be acting inconsistently with anything he had already said. Further, there was very great objection, on principle, to breaking up the jurisdiction of the great local authorities, and withdrawing so many boroughs and urban districts that the area became, like the Irishman's coat, a number of holes stitched together. The policy appeared to him to be very undesirable. The county authorities would have no choice if an urban district or borough were to say that it would not become part of the county, but would retain its autonomy; although, if it subsequently desired to relinquish independence, the county authority would have to be consulted. Then, too, Clause 5 left it to the borough or urban district council to accept or reject the principle of the Bill; and the County Council would have no say in the matter. He did not know whether hon. Members had considered what would be the result if the optional clause remained in the Bill. Supposing the county with some urban districts and boroughs adopted the Bill, and others did not, there would be a conflict of authority, and a variety of educational control and jurisdiction, which would stultify the whole measure. What were the main arguments against the Amendment? They were, he would not say parochial, but local and personal. Member after Member had stated that they knew school boards and individual boroughs which had done good work. One hon. Member stated that the intellectual level of the rural district councils was so low that the grant of educational power was required to improve them; but he should be unwilling to make the children of a county the corpus vile of experiments for the education of rural district councillors. That was the sort of argument they had heard in favour of the autonomy of these small districts. There were, no doubt, important urban districts where good educational work was carried on, and one objection to the Amendment was based on the assumption that it would put
866
such districts in the humiliating position of having to come, as the expression went, cap in hand, to the County Councils. But was it to be supposed that there was such little regard on the part of one authority for what had been done by another authority, that those great urban centres would be maltreated by the County Councils; that they would be set "under the heel" of the County Councils; and would not have their work recognised and their position approved and accepted by the County Councils? He had too great a belief in the common sense and good feeling of their local authorities, to suppose that the Amendment of the hon. Baronet would be followed by any such uncomfortable if not unfortunate results as had been suggested. For that reason, and because he did not desire to see the general principle of the Bill needlessly departed from, he would support the Amendment.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid he could not help thinking that a great deal of the opposition to his hon. friend's Amendment was due to a misconception as to how it would work out in practice. There was an idea that the County Councils would manage the whole of the schools within their areas. Nothing of the kind would, of course, happen. For instance, he had heard the argument that a County Council could not possibly manage between 200 and 300 schools in the county. That was perfectly obvious; but the idea, as far as he could see, was that the County Councils should not manage the schools, but should supervise the education within their own areas. That was a totally different thing, and not at all inconsistent with using the town councils as local agencies. Hon. Members should recollect that the Amendment would not keep alive school boards at all, although it had been argued as if it would keep alive school boards in districts of 10,000 or 20,000 inhabitants. Nothing of the kind. School boards went in the districts referred to as in all other parts of the county. The town council became the local authority; and the only effect of the Amendment would be that the County Council would exercise its option in certain districts of making itself the

867
paramount authority, and of arranging with the local authority in regard to the management of particular schools. He had none of the horror of County Councils which some of his hon. friends appeared to have. They had had experience of the educational work of the County Councils in Wales for ten or twelve years; and he did not think any one would say that they had not done their work well; indeed he would go further and say that no other body to whom the work could have been entrusted would have done it better, at least in Wales. Therefore, after twelve years experience they in Wales were absolutely unable to participate in the horror of County Councils dealing with educational work which seemed to terrify some of his hon. friends. The hon. Member for South Islington said that the matter was started in some quarrel about whiskey between the non - county boroughs and the county boroughs; but the whiskey quarrel would remain exactly as it was.
SIR ALBERT ROLLITsaid he only mentioned that as an illustration of the kind of feeling which existed.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid it was, of course, a very natural feeling, as every town wanted to get as big a share of the money as it possibly could. But that was not friction. It was a simple natural operation. Wherever money had to be distributed, there would be men who would say that their share was not adequate. He wished to point out, especially to his hon. friends, what would really be lost if the boroughs were cut out from the general operation of the authority of the County Council. What would happen? The notion of managing three hundred schools was folly. He would appeal to hon. Members who had sat on County Councils, as he and many of his hon. friends had, as to what would happen. The first thing would be that the County Council would appoint a kind of superintendent of education for the county. That superintendent would visit the schools, and examine them, and report if there were any defects in any of them; and if there were, the schools concerned would be brought up to their work, and the result would be that the whole
868
level of education throughout the county would be kept up. At present there was a system of inspection by the central authority. An inspector went down once a year, paid a casual visit to the schools in the rural districts, and if there were any defects he wrote to the Education Department, and correspondence followed between the clerks of the Department and the local managers. What effect could that have? The pressure was too remote and too intermittent, and the inspector did not visit the district again for another year. Then, perhaps, a little further correspondence followed; and the result was that it took years and years to remedy defects in the rural schools. What would happen if there were really effective County Council supervision? The superintendent would report to the County Council, the pressure would be constant; the superintendent could report what progress was being made; and if the managers declined to act, the County Council could refuse them the grant until they did. The result would be that the managers would act; and if they did not, the County Council could act for them. There would be constant and not intermittent pressure. What would happen if the Amendment were not accepted? The districts referred to would not have the advantage of the organisation which the County Councils would set up; and they would not be able to retain the services of high class officials, who could not possibly be employed by small districts; If, however, they were inside the County Council area, they would have all the advantages of the organisation of the County Council. Speaking as a representative of boroughs, he said they ought not to be deprived of that advantage. They had, been told that the educational work in the towns had been magnificent; but that was an argument in favour of bringing them inside, and not leaving them outside the County Council area. He would ask the First Lord of the Treasury, or the Vice President of the Council, would the representatives of the towns be entitled to a voice in education out side their own districts? He thought he Committee ought to have an answer to that question. In Glamorganshire,

869
twenty urban districts would be autonomous. He wished to know whether the representatives of these twenty districts would have a voice in the arrangement of elementary education outside their own district. Would the First Lord of the Treasury point out a single Clause of the Bill which said so? As things stood now, they would be entitled to manage schools outside their own area, and impose taxation on districts where they had no responsibility. However high it might be the taxation would not affect them, because they were autonomous. They were entitled to know that before the discussion closed. Take the other side. These twenty districts which were autonomous were the most talented districts in Glamorganshire. Cardiff and Swansea were outside because they were county boroughs, but take the great district of the Rhondda Valley, which had the best school boards in the whole county, and which had a first-class system of education. What was left after these were left out? They had the district of Gower where, with all due deference to the hon. Member for that constituency, the main thing was to keep down the rates. And what a curse it would be if they deprived them of the educational zeal with which they had been filled for so many years. Liberalism had nothing to fear from education, and to leave these rural districts to themselves, without any impetus from the urban centres, where education was part of the daily life, would be a curse indeed. He appealed to hon. Members not to sever these interests; it was a bad thing to do in any case, but in the matter of education it would be worst of all. He knew the fears they had of the County Councils; they had been beaten in the County Councils. That was the feeling Conservatives had in Wales, but many of the far-seeing Conservatives had come round to the other view. When they were electing members of a County Council, judging by what the County Councils were now, all they had to consider was whether the candidate had the intellect of a road breaker. But directly they gave County Councils the management of the schools, they would bring in the religious and educational
870
interest; it would be education to the electors themselves, and they would get the best type of men. In the ordinary way a farmer voted for Squire "A" or Squire "B," the labourer did not care anything about it, and the grocer voted for his best customer. But that was not the ease when they approached a great question, and he asked the Committee not to judge the circumstances as they were now, but as they would be; not to sever these two interests, but to bring the urban to help the rural, and the organisation of the whole country to help the urban and rural as well.
MR. HENRY HOBHOUSEsaid he desired to ask the First Lord of the Treasury one question. The right hon. Gentleman had spoken just previously in very broad language of the powers of these boroughs under this Bill of co-ordinating education. Did the right hon. Gentleman allude to the powers they had under Clause 3 of the Bill, or did he foreshadow something that would give these boroughs higher power" than they had now? Was he to under stand that the Government only desired to maintain what might be called the status quo between small and middle-sized towns, because if that, and that alone, was the compromise, it appeared to be fair.
MR. STEVENSONsaid if this could be accompanied by a series of other Amendments, he might possibly support it. If, for example, its effect, if carried, would be to enable the County Council to exercise that complete system of devolution, by making use of the existing educational authorities, which had in so many places done excellent work, and to preserve above certain reasonable limits the existing school boards, the Amendment might be worthy of support. But most of these Amendments would be out of order. The only effect of the Amendment, as it stood, would be to apply to the non-county boroughs and urban districts, and to leave out the other educational authorities and the other smaller local Government areas, which they might like to include. In the former case, the local authorities would be subordinated to the County Council, and an unfortunate impression would be created upon the public mind, and they would be acting in a sense opposed to

871
the best interests of educational efficiency by removing from those who lived in these particular areas the true sense of local educational zeal, and local knowledge, and local responsibility which required to be exercised. At the same time, the moving of the Amendment had done useful service. It had shown the want of logic which existed in this proviso to the first clause, and it had elicited from the First Lord of the Treasury and others on the Ministerial side some extremely powerful arguments which might be reserved for future use against the very principle of the Bill itself. The non-county boroughs were at present represented on the County Councils, and all the educational zeal which was said, no doubt rightly, to be exhibited in certain non-county boroughs and urban districts would under the new condition of things permeate and leaven the County Councils, even if the Amendment were not carried. The non-county boroughs above a certain population, as for instance Lowestoft, in his own county, would be treated as separate entities under the proviso, but in addition they were, and would continue to be, represented upon the County Councils and would be able to permeate the County Councils with their real or alleged educational efficiency, and would be able to effect the very object at which the supporters of the Amendment were attempting to strive. Under the circumstances it would be wiser to support the proviso as it stood, strongly as he disagreed with it on the ground that it did not go far enough.
MR. A. J. BALFOURappealed to the Committee now to come to a decision on the Amendment.
SIR EDWARD GREYasked whether the right hon. Gentleman would answer the question raised by the hon. Member for the Carnarvon Boroughs with regard to the excepted districts being still represented on the County Council.
MR. A. J. BALFOURwas understood to say they would still be represented, but their representatives would not have power to levy the education rate.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEpointed out that they would be in the extraordinary
872
position of having people levying a rate over an outside district with which they were not connected at all. Could the right hon. Gentleman point to a single sentence which deprived them of the power of levying the education rate over other districts than their own?
MR. A. J. BALFOURthought they ought to follow the analogy of the Bill of 1888, in which certain places were given police powers independent of the county. They were in that respect out side the county, but they were represented on the County Council. The difficulty was not so great as it might at first appear, because the actual work would be done by the Education Committees.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: Not the levying of the rate.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No, the actual work. The levying of the rate would be done by the County Council, and in that it would not be proper for those who did not pay to have a voice.
LORD EDMUND FITZMAURICEpointed out that the boroughs to which the right hon. Gentleman referred were entirely exempted for certain purposes, whereas under the present Bill certain boroughs would be within the county for higher education, and out of the county for elementary education. If, therefore, the analogy of the right hon. Gentleman was applied, they would have the peculiar position, when the Education Budget was presented to the Council, of the representatives of certain districts having the right to vote on that Budget so far as higher education was concerned, and having no such right in regard to elementary education.
COLONEL BOWLESsaid he was Vice-Chairman of the Technical Education Committee in his own county, and represented on that Council an urban district which would be its own authority for elementary education. Therefore he would be in the position mentioned by the noble Lord. He expressed the belief that there could be nothing worse for education than such a proposition as that made by the First Lord of the Treasury, by which the County Council should be able to reject a district which, because of its

873
heavy rates, desired to come under the Council. They were just the districts in which education would be starved, because the people in them had not the money with which to provide the education necessary. They would have to go to the County Councils, and if those Councils were to be advised to reject them,

AYES.

Acland Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Hozier, Hon. James Henry (Cecil

Agg-Gardner, James Tynte

Dimsdale, Sir Joseph Cockfield

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Agnew, Sir Andrew Noel

Douglas, Rt. hon. A. Akers-

Hutton, John (Yorks. N. R.)

Aird, Sir John

Doxford, Sir William Theodore

Jackson, Rt. Hon. Wm. Lawies

Allen, Charles P. (Glouc., Stroud

Duncan, J. Hastings

Jacoby, James Alfred

Allhusen, Augustus H'nry Eden

Durning Lawrence, Sir Edwin

Jebb, Sir Richard Claver house

Arkwright, John Stanhope

Dyke, Rt. Hon. Sir William Hart

Johnston, William (Belfast)

Arnold-Forster, Hugh O.

Egerton, Hon. A. de Tatton

John stone, Hey wood (Sussex)

Atherley-Jones, L.

Elliot, Hon. A. Ralph Douglas

Kennaway, Rt. hon. Sir John H.

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Ellis, John Edward

Kenyon, Hon. Geo. T, (Denbigh)

Bagot, Capt. Josceline FitzRoy

Evans, Sir Francis H (Maidstone

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. W. (Salop.

Bailey, James (Walworth)

Fardell, Sir T. George

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Bain, Colonel James Robert

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edward

Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow)

Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manch'r

Fenwick, Charles

Lawson, John Grant

Balfour, Capt. C. I. (Hornsey)

Fergusson, Rt. Hn. Sir J. (Manc'r

Layland-Barratt, Francis

Balfour, Rt Hn Gerald W. (Leeds

Finch, George H.

Lee, Arthur H (Hants., Fareham

Banbury, Frederick George

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

Barlow, John Emmott

Fisher, William Hayes

Leese, Sir Joseph F. (Accrington

Bathurst, Hon. Allen Benjamin

Fison, Frederick William

Leng, Sir John

Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire)

FitzGerald, Sir Robert Penrose-

Leveson-Gower, Frederick N. S.

Beach, Rt Hn. Sir Michael Hicks

Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

Levy, Maurice

Bentinck, Lord Henry C.

Fitzroy, Hon. Edward Algernon

Lockwood, Lt.-Col. A. R.

Bignold, Arthur

Flannery, Sir Fortescue

Long, Col. Chas. W. (Evesham)

Bill, Charles

Fletcher, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Bristol, S)

Blundell, Colonel Henry

Flower, Ernest

Lowe, Francis William

Bond-, Edward

Foster, Philip S. (Warwick, S W.

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Foster, Sir Walter (Derby Co.)

Lucas, Col. Francis (Lowestoft)

Broadhurst, Henry

Gardner, Ernest

Lucas, Reginald J. (Portsmouth

Brookfield, Colonel Montagu

Garfit, William

Macartney, Rt Hn. W. Ellison

Brotherton, Edward Allen

Gladstone, Rt. Hn. Herbt. John

Macdona, John Cumming

Brown, Alexander H. (Shropsh.

Goddard, Daniel Ford

MacIver, David (Liverpool)

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

Godson, Sir Augustus Frederick

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Bull, William James

Gordon, Hn. J. E. (Elgin & Nairn

M'Iver, Sir Lewis (Edinburgh W

Burt, Thomas

Gordon, Maj Evans-(T'r H'ml' ts

M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire)

Caldwell, James

Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John Eldon

Manners, Lord Cecil

Cameron, Robert

Goschen, Hon. George Joachim

Mansfield, Horace Rendall

Campbell, Rt. Hn. J. A (Glasgow

Green, Walford D (Wednesbury

Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

Greene, Sir E. W (B'ry S Edm'nds

Markham, Arthur Basil

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

Gretton, John

Mather, William

Causton, Richard Knight

Guest, Hon. Ivor Churchill

Maxwell, Rt Hn Sir H. E (Wigt'n

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbyshire

Gunter, Sir Robert

Maxwell, W. J. H (Dumfriessh.)

Cayzer, Sir Charles William

Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton

Mellor, Rt. Hon. John William

Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

Hain, Edward

Melville, Beresford Valentine

Chamberlain, Ht. Hon. J. (Birm.

Hamilton, Rt Hn L'rd G (Midd'x

Middlemore, Jno. Throgmorton

(Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc'r

Hamilton, Marq of (L'nd'nd'rry

Mildmay, Francis Bingham

Channing, Francis Allston

Hanbury, Rt. Hn. Robert Wm

Mitchell, William

Chapman, Edward

Hants, Frederick Leverton

Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

Clive, Captain Percy A.

Harwood, George

More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire)

Coddington, Sir William

Haslam, Sir Alfred S.

Morgan, David J. (Walth'mstow

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Hayne, Rt. Hon. Charles Seale-

Morley, Charles (Breconshire)

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Heath, Arthur Howard (Hanley

Morley, Rt. Hn. John (Montrose

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Heaton, John Henniker

Morrell, George Herbert

Colomb, Sir John Charles Ready

Helder, Augustus

Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford

Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

Higginbottom, S. W.

Murray, Rt Hn A. Graham (Bute

Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

Hoare, Sir Samuel

Murray, Charles J. (Coventry)

Cranborne, Viscount

Hobhouse, Henry (Somerset, E.

Newdigate, Francis Alexander

Crombie, John William

Hogg, Lindsay

Nussey, Thomas Willans

Cross, Herb. Shepherd (Bolton)

Hope, J. F. (Sheffield, Brightside

O'Neill, Hon. Robert Torrens

Cubitt, Hon. Henry

Hornby, Sir William Henry

Orr-Ewing, Charles Lindsay

Dalrymple, Sir Charles

Horniman, Frederick John

Parker, Gilbert

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Hoult, Joseph

Parkes, Ebenezer

Dickson, Charles Scott

Howard, Jno. (Kent, Faversham

Pemberton, John S. G.

the Bill would do more harm to education than one could imagine. He should therefore support the Amendment.
(4.39.) Question put.
The Committee divided:—A yes, 272; Noes, 114. (Division List No. 230.)

Pierpoint, Robert

Seton-Karr, Henry

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Pilkington, Lieut.-Col. Richard

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney

Pirie, Duncan V.

Shaw, Thomas (Hawick B.)

Welby, Lt.-Col. A. C. E (Taunton

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Shipman, Dr. John G.

Welby, Sir Charles G. E. (Notts.

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Simeon, Sir Barrington

Wharton, Rt. Hon. John Lloyd

Pretyman, Ernest George

Sinclair, John (Forfarshire)

White, Luke (York, E. R.)

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

Whiteley, George (York, W. R.)

Purvis, Robert

Smith, H C (North'mb. Tyneside

Whiteley, H (Ashton-und-Lyne

Pym, C. Guy

Smith, James Parker (Lanarks.)

Whitley, J. H. (Halifax)

Randles, John S.

Spencer, Rt Hn. C. R. (Northants

Whitmore, Charles Algernon

Ratcliff, R. F.

Stanley, Hn. Arthur (Ormskirk

Williams, Colonel R. (Dorset)

Rattigan, Sir William Henry

Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somerset

Williams, Rt Hn J. Pow'll-(Birm.

Rea, Russell

Stanley, Lord (Lancs.)

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Reid, James (Greenock)

Stevenson, Francis S.

Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

Renshaw, Charles Bine

Stewart, Sir Mark J. M'Taggart

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Rickett, J. Compton

Stirling-Maxwell, Sir John M.

Wilson, John (Glasgow)

Ridley, Hn. M. W. (Stalybridge)

Stone, Sir Benjamin

Wilson, J. W. (Worcestersh, N.)

Ritchie, Rt. Hn. Chas. Thomson

Strachey, Sir Edward

Woodhouse, Rt. Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Roberts, Samuel (Sheffield)

Talbot, Rt. Hn. J. G (Oxf'd Univ.

Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm

Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

Taylor, Theodore Cooke

Woodhouse, Sir J. I (Huddersf'd

Robson, William Snowdon

Tennant, Harold John

Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr

Wortley, Rt. Hn. C. B. Stuart-

Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

Thorburn, Sir Walter

Wrightson, Sir Thomas

Ropner, Colonel Robert

Thornton, Percy M.

Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

Round, James

Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

Runciman, Walter

Toulmin, George

Younger, William

Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Schwann, Charles E.

Tritton, Charles Ernest

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Scott, Chas. Prestwich (Leigh)

Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward

Seely, Charles Hilton (Lincoln)

Warde, Colonel C. E.

NOES.

Abraham, William (Cork, N. E.)

Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Charles H.

O'Dowd, John

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Hobhouse, C. E. H. (Bristol, E.)

O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

O'Mara, James

Austin, Sir John

Howard, J. (Midd., Tottenham)

O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

Barry, E. (Cork, S.)

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Paulton, James Mellor

Bartley, George C. T.

Joicey, Sir James

Pease, J. A. (Saffron Walden)

Boland, John

Jones, D'vid Brynmor (Swansea

Pease, Sir Joseph W. (Durham)

Bowles, Capt. H. F. (Middlesex

Jones, William (Carn'rvonshire

Percy, Earl

Brand, Hon. Arthur G.

Joyce, Michael

Power, Patrick Joseph

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

Kinloch, Sir John George Smyth

Price, Robert John

Burke, E. Haviland-

Kitson, Sir James

Reddy, M.

Caine, William Sproston

Labouchere, Henry

Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

Campbell, John (Armagh, S.)

Lambert, George

Redmond, William (Clare)

Cawley, Frederick

Langley, Batty

Rigg, Richard

Clancy, John Joseph

Law, Hugh Alex. (Donegal, W.

Roberts, John H. (Denbighs)

Condon, Thomas Joseph

Leamy, Edmund

Roche, John

Crean, Eugene

Lewis, John Herbert

Roe, Sir Thomas

Cripps, Charles Alfred

Lloyd-George, David

Russell, T. W.

Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

Lough, Thomas

Seely, Maj. J. E. B. (I. of Wight)

Davies, M. Vaughan-(Cardigan

Lundon, W.

Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

Delany, William

MacDonnell, Dr. Mark A.

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Donelan, Captain A.

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Soares, Ernest J.

Doogan, P. C.

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Dunn, Sir William

M'Arthur, William (Cornwall)

Sullivan, Donal

Edwards, Frank

M'Kenna, Reginald

Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.

Farquharson, Dr. Robert

M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

Thomas, Alf red (Glamorgan, E.

Ffrench, Peter

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Thomas, F. Freeman-(Hastings

Field, William

Mooney, John J.

Thomas, J. A (Glamorgan, Gower

Flynn, James Christopher

Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

Wallace, Robert

Foster, Sir Michael (Lond. Univ.

Moss, Samuel

Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan

Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

Murnaghan, George

Williams, Osmond (Merioneth)

Gilhooly, James

Nannetti, Joseph P.

Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Newnes, Sir George

Young, Samuel

Gray, Ernest (West Ham)

Nolan, Col. John P. (Galway, N.

Yoxall, James Henry

Grey, Sir Edward (Berwick)

Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

Griffith, Ellis J.

O'Brien, Kendal (Tipp'rary Mid

Haldane, Richard Burdon

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. Dillon and Dr. Macnamara.

Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Sir William

O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N.)

Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil

O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.

Hayden, John Patrick

O'Donnell, T. (Kerry, W.)

DR. MACNAMARAsaid that in the absence of the, hon. and learned Member for Stretford, he desired to move the Amendment standing in his name. He could not follow the First Lord of the Treasury in his statement as to what was the rating authority over the whole area, and what rates were to be levied in certain districts. What would he the effect of this Clause in regard to the incidence of the rates in the administrative counties? Roughly, they would have the rural area having no rate at all, for they would have no School Board, and the inhabitants would say that they preferred denominational instruction. It was true that in such areas there might be a number of devout people who spent much money voluntarily, and they would have a preference for a system which permitted them to contract out of paying for either system. In some cases half of the areas would have no local rate at all, and the other half might be rated up to 3s. or his. 4d. in the pound. If they were not going to throw the whole charge upon the National Exchequer, it ought to be equalised. The right hon. Gentleman had stated that the local authority was going to continue its old rate. Some districts would still be, rated at ½d. in the pound, and some at 3s. 4d. in the pound. Some districts might contract themselves out altogether. Therefore he hoped the Committee would put the finances of education upon a satisfactory basis and not continue this grotesque muddle which existed at the present time. Take the county of Essex, where the rateable value was about £3,000,000. There a rate of 1d. in the pound would produce £12,500. Perhaps in one-third of a rural area they would not levy a rate at all, and thus escape all local contributions, whilst in the other two-thirds they might have a hundred School Boards and be levying a rate ranging from 3s. 4d. in the pound down to ½d. in the pound. Village A might have no contribution at all; village B, perhaps, would have only a few devout people contributing handsomely to voluntary schools; in village C, because somebody left some money for educational purposes, there might be no rate at all; and in village
878
D they might have a rate of 3s. 4d. in the £. Tins Clause would perpetuate the financial muddle which was characteristic of the present system. With regard to Essex the total voluntary contributions from endowments and School Board rates and every other source was just about £100,000. He was trying to show the present state of muddle which they ought to endeavour to clear away before they went further in the matter. If a rate could be levied over the whole of Essex of 8d. in the£, they would then get more local contributions than from all the School Board rates, endowment foes, and every other local source, and that was what he wanted to conic to. They ought to have a statement from the Government about finance. They had heard from the First Lord that the non-county borough which was the administrative autonomy for elementary education purposes was itself to rate for this purpose. He protested against that. He asked, in the interest of the county as a whole, if they could not have an administrative unity they ought to have financial unity. It might be said—how can you have a rate for the whole county of 8d. or 9d. and hand it over to certain localities which have autonomy for administrative purpose? That what the Education Department was doing in connection with its grants. It gave them at so much per head. He admitted that the scheme was not ideal, but that was the fault of the Government. What he proposed was in the Bill of 1896 and the Government laid great stress upon it at the time. The proposal in this proviso was a matter which was denounced very strongly in 1896 by the Minister in charge of the Bill.
Amendment proposed,
"In page 1, line 11, after 'district,' to insert' and except as respects the raising of a rate or borrowing money for the purposes of this Act.'" (Dr. Macnamara.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted,"
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: The right hon. Gentleman a short time ago explained to us what we had not understood, namely, what was meant by a single education authority. Now we should like to hoar from him what he means by a single rating authority, because over and over again in these discussions the right hon. Gentleman

879
has insisted upon a financial rating authority. I should like to know, in accordance with this proviso, whether there is going to be a single rating authority in the county. As I understand there are to be a multitude of rating authorities, and that the authorities that come under this proviso will be rating authorities independent for this purpose of the general rating authority. That is perfectly plain. Therefore what we have understood to have been put forward by the right hon. Gentleman over and over again with regard to a single rating authority, has disappeared very much like the single education authority. Then there is another anomaly arising out of this which has only now come forward in the discussion. I think we are just beginning to inquire what is the meaning of this Bill. Nobody, who has been studying it has understood its principles or anything about it, and the explanation we have read has not made it clear, or, at all events, quite clear. As I understand now each of those independent authorities amounting to 200, or there about, will stand in this position in their respective counties. They will—the right hon. Gentleman will tell us whether they will or not—vote for the constitution of the Education Committee which is to conduct the education in all the rest of the county except in their own district, which they will conduct in their own manner. I do not know whether I am mistaken in that. If they have a voice in the election of the Education Committee they, of course, are dealing with the general education of the county, and the education which they themselves conduct in their own district may be of a totally different character from that conducted by the Education Committee. Then there is the point which was well explained by my noble friend on this Bench in regard to the rating authority and in regard to their rating liability. I understand from what the noble Lord has said, and it has not been contradicted, that in respect of primary education they will stand in a totally different position from that in which they will stand with reference to secondary education. Therefore as to the rating authority, and as to the
880
liability for rates, you will have a multiplicity of rating anomalies created by this proposal throughout the whole area. It appears that the single rating authority and the simplicity of financial administration entirely disappears, and so far from there being anything like financial unity on rating identity, every one of those several entities created by this proviso will create anomalies and an irreconcilable situation both in regard to education and finance. These are points on which I am sure the House will be glad to have fuller information.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: When the right hon. Gentleman speaks on this Bill it always seems to me as if he had just casually taken - the Bill from the Table of the House and for the first time cast his eye over its contents. I do not know where he gets them, but he also appears to be always imagining utterances made by myself or my colleagues which we certainly have never made, and which do not agree with anything which we have ever said, either in public or private. And these "dream Hansards" are thrown at our heads across the Table and we are asked to reply to them. I must decline to explain any speeches except those I have delivered, and these I will answer for to the best of my ability. The actual provision which the right hon. Gentleman appears to disapprove of has been in the Bill from the beginning, and on the face of the first Clause. There has never been any concealment about it, and so far as I remember it was dealt with in the opening speech in which I explained the provisions of the Bill. This Amendment seems to me to have all the disadvantages which may be urged against the Amendment we have just rejected, and also a great many disadvantages peculiar to itself. In so far as the Clause has been framed to respect existing interests in the localities, the end would not be attained by the adoption of the Amendment. I turn from that aspect of the question to the educational aspect of the question. We have been told over and over again, and it has not been contradicted, that in a great many boroughs there are most admirable examples of educational energy and efficiency. They have done that out of their own rates, which they

881
have raised to meet their own purposes. That you would stop entirely. By the Amendment these localities are left the nominal power of managing their own education, but they are forbidden any real power of maintaining the high standard they are anxious and prepared to pay for, because they are to be put under a, uniform rate settled by the county authority. I would earnestly hope that the House will not think it necessary to occupy very much time in the discussion of this Amendment.
Question put and negatived.
THE CHAIRMANruled as out of order all the other Amendments to Clause 1, standing on the Order Paper.
Question proposed, "That Clause 1 stand part of the Bill.
MR. CHANNINGsaid that the issue raised by this Clause was of supreme gravity, and at the same time of great difficulty to handle adequately. The Committee would remember that he had taken I upon himself, at the beginning of the discussion, to move the postponement of the Clause, for the obvious reason that its true and full nature could not be really determined by the House until a great many other points had been fully considered and decided upon by the House. He thought that difficulty was still before the Committee. The main issue raised by the Clause could not be separated from many subsidiary considerations which had to be settled afterwards. The question this Clause raised was whether they were going to make the local educational authority the County Council or the School Board. Many hon. Members had spoken in those debates as if School Boards had been killed by the rejection of a limited amendment earlier in Committee. He did not consider that the School Boards had been killed by their decisions, nor would be killed by the passing of this clause, or that the vitality of the School Board principle would be destroyed by the passing of this Bill in whatever shape it passed. This would not be a final discussion as to the destiny of the School Boards as one of the instruments for advancing
882
the education of the country. The question was, whether they should have a definitely localised representative authority, vital and energetic, or have a remote and indirect authority to deal with education. The discussion that afternoon had shown how easily the issues of this question might be confused. The case of the School Boards as educational authorities seemed to him to have been enormously and needlessly prejudiced by the arguments pressed against them. He had always held that the arguments made use of by the Vice-President of the Council for ending the School Boards were based on absolute misinterpretation of what the School Boards really were, and the work which they had done. He believed that all Members were nearly at one in the wish to have a strong and energetic central authority in a large area such, as a county, and at the same time to have within that area smaller authorities to work in smaller areas. He believed that that was what the Bill aimed at, though imperfectly, and that was what was aimed at both by the supporters of the County Council and the supporters of the School Board principle. He maintained that they could not obtain what they all aimed at, except on the ad hoc principle. It was obvious to anyone who studied the history of the question that the genesis of transferring educational administration to a county authority began in the suggestions of the reactionary officials of the Education Department to the Royal Commission appointed in 1886. The main idea of the proposals put forward then, and in subsequent years, one of which he had himself the satisfaction of defeating in the Local Government Bill of 1888—was to get rid of Mr. Forster's machinery pro vided in the Bill of 1870, and to transfer the schools to an indirect authority. That was intended to get rid of all restrictions on the voluntary school system and to hand over the educational resources of the country, both in the form of grants and rates, to the denominational schools. It seemed to him that any Bill which did not provide for the full development of the School Board system, or something equivalent to it, in large and small areas alike, would fall entirely short of the mark. The objection to the County

883
Council as the educational authority for elementary education had been admitted S over and over again. Even that after noon it had been admitted that it was wholly impossible for a County Council, cither by itself or its Committees, to deal with the details of the elementary schools all over the county. He knew that difficulties were already felt in regard to the very limited duties involved in the administration by the County Councils of the Technical Instruction Act. The tendency of the machinery of the Bill was destructive of all popular control, and it would inevitally throw the whole administration into the bauds of officials, who would really become the dictators of the situation. In the rural districts it would be physically impossible for he County Council and their Committee to deal with these details, and they would be left to the officials or to the representatives of the Associations of Secondary Schoolmasters' or of the Associations under the Voluntary Schools Act, or diocesan bodies, or some kindred body wholly irresponsible to the people. These persons would be free to give their time, and the officials would also give their time with the result that all the local schools throughout the district would be dealt with by officials in that way. By this machinery we were removing the control entirely from the people and handing it over to officials and others interested in furthering their own and objects not directly responsible to the people. He therefore considered that the machinery of this Bill was not machinery for improving local government as applied to education. What the Government were destroying and what they were seeking to destroy of this Bill was the principle of a directly elected authority responsible for education with the supreme duty thrown upon it of providing school accommodation and education in the locality. In the authority created in County Councils there was no obligation at all except to provide sums of money. The whole control of the education of the district was to be handed over to those who were not responsible to the people and could not he controlled by them. He considered that this Bill was the last outcome of an
884
unfortunate series of prejudices and shortsightedness in the past which some of the wisest friends of the Church of England had deprecated in the past, men like Dr. Perowne, the late Bishop of Worcester, and Canon Bury, of Northamptonshire, whose opinions he had himself quoted in former debates, and he objected to it on the ground that it would not conduce to educational efficiency. He regarded it as an educational loss to the people themselves that the management of education should be transferred from the hands of the School Boards where both women and direct representatives of labour had a, chance to control the education. On some School Boards that he was acquainted with women had done most excellent work. Under this Bill they would be debarred from doing anything. Equally important in his opinion was the direct representation of labour on School Boards. He had known most, admirable educational experts created out of working men, who, themselves, had been educated, so to speak, by taking a share of the educational work of the School Boards. He regretted the sweeping away of the system which had raised among the cream of the working classes Can enthusiasm for education which they had never had before and which had made experts and most enthusiastic workers of them, and most splendid workers from an educational aspect. First of all the work of higher education was taken away from the School Boards, and now we had a, complete surrender by the Government to the Ecclesiastical Party. He protested against the clause and begged to move that it be rejected.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid this clause established a new doctrine and the problem that had to be determined was whether this was a good or bad educational authority. They had to consider what powers the authority would have and what were the obligations under which it would be placed. In dealing with this clause to which they were asked to assent the Bill must be taken as it stood, for the Government had refused to give indication of any modifications. Last week two deputations were received by the Government. In one of these

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Nonconformists made known their grievances, especially in reference to elementary schools and the system of management provided by the Bill. But they received no satisfaction from an answer in which the right hon. Gentleman held out no prospect of modification in the Bill in that respect. The next day there was a deputation of ratepayers, and the right hon. Gentleman gave it to be understood that he would make a statement upon the proposed financial arrangements after laying the views of the deputation before the Chancellor of the Exchequer. But on Monday the right hon. Gentleman said he was not in a position to make any such statement, so the rating question must be taken as standing as it did before. The principles that had been put forward by the Government, with regard to this Bill—the merits of the new educational policy as illustrated by the Bill—had been in some respects explained away. The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord was astonished that anybody, for instance, should have thought that one of his principles was autonomy; again our delusion that the Committee laboured under was that there was a merit in the single rating authority. There, again, they were mistaken. The single rating authority had no merit whatever. A dozen rating authorities were as good as one. He had always understood that one educational authority and one rating authority was one of the objects of the Bill, but there apparently he was wrong. When considering the creation of a new educational authority certain requisites would be looked for. It would be assumed that the authority would have some special aptitude for the purpose, and it had been said that County Councils had this aptitude, reference being made to the manner in which they had dealt with technical education. But technical education was not at all the same thing as elementary education; and, whereas, technical education might be dealt with by a Committee not meeting frequently and having one essential purpose to deal with elementary education was a totally different thing. Elementary education should be the principal work of an education authority and not a mere subsidiary business of the authority responsible for it, and one would suppose that such an authority should be specially elected for the purpose of education, and
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that education should be the prominent feature of its business. Those seemed to him to be the obvious requisites of a first-rate education authority. One would desire, no doubt, that it should be an authority which should have a popular election and an authority which should represent the people on education, and one would also desire that it should be an autonomous authority conducting its own business in its own way without being subject to any interference from any superior authority, and further, that it should manage its own schools, and not be under the domination of any of its managers. How did the authority created by the Bill fulfil those requirements? It appeared to him that the Bill violated every single one of those principles. It was not an independent authority, for all through the Bill they would find that its action was subsidiary to that of the Board of Education, and in point of fact it had no control over a majority of the managers as against the minority. The authority might be a very good authority for managing technical or even secondary education, but when it came to primary education then it seemed to him not a suitable authority for managing 14,000 voluntary schools over a very large area. The County Council had no experience in primary education management, and it had to act through the Education Committee. The whole working of the Bill depended on that Committee, but it had not the right to appoint the Committee according to its own views of what such a Committee should be. He had been told that the Committee would be like any other Committee of a County Council; but, if so, what was the meaning of the clause requiring a scheme to be submitted to the education authority that anybody might come in and criticise, that might be changed at the will of the authorities of Whitehall, who, if the County Council did not accept a totally different scheme, had power to create a Committee according to their own views?
THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir JOHN GORST,: No, no.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid that if the right hon. Gentleman looked at the twelfth clause he would find that it was said of the scheme for the appointment of the Education Committee—
"Before approving a scheme the Board of Education shall take such measures as may appear expedient for the purpose of giving publicity to the provisions of the proposed scheme, and may, if they think fit, hold a public inquiry."
From this it appeared that any body might come, in and say that the scheme of the Education Committee of the County Council was a bad scheme, and upon that the Board might alter or refuse it. Then supposing the Board of Education and the County Council did not agree, what happened?
"If a scheme under this section has not been made by a council and approved by the Board of Education within twelve months after the passing of this Act, that Board may, subject to the provisions of this Act, make a Provisional Order for the purposes for which a scheme might have been made."
Therefore, if they did not agree within twelve months, the Board of Education could make the Provisional Order, and through the Committee made by that provisional order the County Council was to act as an educational authority.
SIR JOHN GORST: A Provisional Order requires confirmation.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTknew that; but what a position the County Council would be in They were supposed to make a scheme of their own, but had to come to Parliament to contest a scheme they did not approve. That was called the autonomous authority which was to conduct the education of the country. The managers of the voluntary schools could, if supported by the Education Department, snap their fingers at the County Council and refuse to obey their injunctions. The Government thus treated their own proposed education authority with the greatest distrust and most profound contempt. They treated the County Council as it they were children running in leading-strings, and not fit to be trusted with these great powers. According to the Vice-President of the Council, one of the great measures of the Bill was its decentralisation; but in reality it centralised education to a degree to which it
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was never centralised before. It was absolutely controlled by the central authority. Over the voluntary schools the education authority had had authority at all. A number of illusory powers were given under Clause 8, under which it was said that authority might order this or that, and that they could determine the curriculum of these schools. They could do nothing of the kind. The lowers of the Board of Education in regard to the code and curriculum remain, he understood, whore they were, and in order to earn a grant an inspection must be carried out to the satisfaction of the Department. So to say that the curriculum was in the hands of the County Council and under their control was to say what was not the fact. It was perfectly idle to say that the curriculum was in the hands of the education authority. There were other important provisions in the Bill which the authority was supposed to control. Let the Committee consider how far the authority they were constituting really controlled the important matter of elementary education. The local authority was supposed to have power to inspect these schools. But suppose their inspectors took one view and the inspectors of the Board of Education took another, what was to become of the Parliamentary grant? There was no power to enforce obligation except that of the withholding of the grant, and that power was in the hands of the Board of Education, not of the local authority. So much for the matter of inspection, on which the whole vitality of the schools depended. Then the consent of the local authority was required to the appointment of teachers. Surely they should be required to appoint the teachers, and not merely to consent to their appointment. That the primary act, the appointment of teachers, should rest in men who were superior in authority to the local education authority was a condemnation of the scheme altogether. They were the owners of the schools, and it lay upon them to show that the appointments by other people were improper appointments. That was a fatal blot in a system of education. Then there was the question of keeping these schools in repair. Even here the educational authority had not the determining voice. They might direct improvements or additional repairs,

889
and the voluntary managers might reply; "Oh, no; you are making requisitions which are quite unnecessary." If the local authority attempted to enforce their requirements the local managers could carry the matter to the Board of Education in London, so that the Board of education had there the final authority to decide the matter. Then there came the appointment of additional managers. This was the great concession made in respect of voluntary schools. The education authority might appoint one-third of the managers. Was there ever a more insulting position in which men could, be placed, than to say; "We put you in a position in which your authority shall be constantly called into question, and in which you shall always be a statutory minority." That was the plan proposed for conducting the educational work of the country. That was as regarded the powers given to this educational authority. But an authority of this kind ought not only to have powers; it ought also to have duties and obligations. This Bill imposed no obligations on the education authority. There was nothing to compel them to do anything at all. The Committee had never yet been told whether or not the optional clause was to be dropped. They were asked to establish this authority without knowing whether it was or was not to do anything for primary education. That was one of the most preposterous demands he had ever heard. If it was to be optional, they might have half the country conducting primary education under the Bill and the other half not. Could anything more absurd be conceived? If it was not to be optional, why was it not to be optional? Because if it was left optional the Government had grave doubt whether the Bill would be adopted. Was this great authority to be a co-ordinate authority for all education—primary, secondary, and so on? If so, how could it be optional? If it was not to be optional, why did the Government ever propose that it should be optional, and, having proposed it, why had they abandoned the option? Because they knew that a great many people would not accept the Bill. Then as regarded secondary education, that seemed to be put in the situation of the lady of whom it was said, "Oh,
890
no, we never mention her, her name is never heard." There was not a word about it in the Bill. All that was said in Clause 2 was that the education authority might do something which was not elementary education. That was a most extraordinary form of establishing secondary education.
THE CHAIRMAN: I would suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that it, would be better to wait until we reach the second clause before discussing that question. We are now considering only the first clause.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid he was referring to the general character of the Bill, and that all he desired to show was that there was nothing in the Bill calling upon the education authority to do anything in the matter of higher education. The provision which affected to do something of the kind would be entirely satisfied by some of the things being done which had been declared to be not elementary education, such as the establishment of continuation schools, and so on. In fact, the Bill made no adequate provision of any kind for secondary education. The country had expected a scheme in which secondary education was the main feature, and not one in which primary education had the first place, He did not say that primary education did not require more attention and further assistance, but the Government were absolutely ignoring secondary education, and the Bill offered no prospect of it being carried in at all. There was one very remarkable part of this question of secondary education, and it was a part upon which the Government had given no explanation. He referred to the financial arrangements. The whole question of secondary education depended upon—
THE CHAIRMAN: I must again remind the right hon. Gentleman that we are not discussing the question of secondary education yet. We are still discussing the first clause—the constitution of the authority—and presently we shall reach the proper clause which; deals with this question.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid that at the beginning of these discussions he proposed to call attention to the general hearing of the Bill, but the right hon. Gentleman told him that the proper time for discussing the general question would be when Clause 1, which established the whole principle of the Bill, was put from the Chair.
THE CHAIRMAN: No, no.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid the clause established an education authority, and whether hon. Members voted for it must depend more or less upon the general scheme of the Bill. An education authority which did nothing for secondary education was, in his opinion, a bad education authority. Therefore, when he was asked to say whether he would establish such an education authority, he would reply that it it provided for secondary education it would be a good one, but if it did not it would be a bad authority. Again, if it provided for primary education in one way it might be a good authority, and if it provided for it in another way it might be a very bad one. Therefore, he thought the Committee ought to have some idea of what that education would be, and what the new authority would have power to do. It would be quite out of order to go into detail on this point, but they were obliged to look generally at the provisions of the Bill in order to see what they were. He again repeated that there was no provision in this Bill for secondary education which was deserving of consideration until they knew what finances they were going to provide. To erect an education authority of this character, and to refuse to that authority out of its own funds the power to provide what it thought was necessary for the purpose, and to refuse to allow that authority power to levy a rate, showed a want of confidence in that authority which entirely defeated its object as an educational body, and prevented it carrying out any great scheme of education. To set up an authority such as was proposed in this Bill, and to limit by statute the rate which it should dispose of, was to adopt a course which would deprive it of its authority as an educational
892
body. If this body were to be trusted, it ought to be trusted in its finance. The Bill was to supersede the existing condition of things. By the settlement of 1870 two systems were set to work side by side—the voluntary school system under private management and the Board School system under public management. Those two systems had been in operation side by side for the last thirty years. One had succeeded and the other had failed. The object of this Bill was to remedy the failure of the voluntary system, and the scheme of the Bill was to destroy the system that had succeeded and set up the system that had failed. That was the scheme of the Bill. Nobody had ever denied that the part of our system which had been a success had been the Board School system under public control. The part which had failed was that which came under the intolerable strain of the voluntaryists who would not volunteer. The object of this Bill was to continue and perpetuate that system. Why did the one system succeed? Because it was under public control. Why did the other system fail? Because it was under private management. [A Ministerial cry of "No."] It was proposed to perpetuate that system of private management which in elementary education had fettered and confined education in this country, and they were now going to continue that system under conditions which he had already stated would be humiliating to the new educational authority. A body was to be placed in the responsible position of taking charge of elementary education. But, instead of giving authority to that body, the Government proposed to leave them under the control of the private managers, under whom the system had already broken down. That was the scheme of this Bill. He need not go into the rating question. Hon. Members knew the difficulties which would be encountered in raising rates for edudational purposes. In the rural districts, where these councils were the rating authority, the operation of the rate would be a bone of contention. They would be called upon to deal with elementary education with all the difficulties that belonged to the rating question, and all the difficulties that belonged to the religious question. That was not a

893
favourable start for a now education scheme. What would happen? Education would be a permanent, factor in the elections of these county councils, and in the contests which would take place we should see the opposition of a great class of this community—the Nonconformists, who rightly believed that the system of the management of these private schools was an injustice to them. They would make the county councils the battlefield of that religious difficulty. The education authority would become the cockpit of those religious difficulties. The battle would be fought out, not upon the clauses of the Bill, but after the Bill had been passed. It would go on from year to year. We should have a perpetual conflict as long as the injustice remained. The Government Bill left I he religious difficulty as it existed. The question did not concern Nonconformists alone, but all who were determined not to leave the education of the youth of this country mainly—almost exclusively—in clerical hands. That would he the battle which this Bill would introduce into county council elections. Therefore, unless the Government were prepared to change this Bill for the better in all its main elements, he believed that instead of advancing the cause of education it would be one of the most fatal blows that had ever been struck at the education of this country.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not propose to follow the right hon. Gentleman in the devious wanderings of his long speech, which have more to do with every other clause of the Bill than the one which is now under discussion. There is not a single important clause of the Bill on which the right hon. Gentleman has not given his opinion, and to which he has not raised objection. I really believe that three-fourths or more of his speech at least is relevant rather to subsequent clauses than to Clause 1. Unfortunately we are all human, and we have to discuss the Bill under human limitations, and one of those limitations from which we all suffer is that only one thing can be done at a time. The right hon. Gentleman thinks it is a sufficient excuse for commenting on all the subsequent clauses of the Bill that this authority has to deal with all the
894
subjects mentioned in those clauses, and that, therefore, all those clauses are relevant to a discussion of the character and organisation of the education authority. But supposing that we had pursued the opposite course to that which we have pursued, and had put the education authority at the end, and discussed all that it had to do on the earlier clauses of the Bill, then the right bon. Gentleman could not possibly have discussed what the education authority had to do until he knew what the education authority was to be, and he would then, in discussing this clause, which sets up the machinery of the Bill, have been probably more relevant than he has been today. It is impossible, I venture to say, if the House is to conduct its debates in a businesslike spirit, to go over the whole range of the Bill in Committee in this way. It is perfectly proper to do so on the First Reading, and the Second and Third Readings; but surely it is impossible to deal in a businesslike spirit with the Bill in Committee on these principles; because, of course, if a measure deals with one subject as an organic whole, it is true that every clause has some relation to every other clause, and in that sense you might move at the end of every clause that it should be omitted, and thereupon discuss the whole Bill over again from beginning to end. That is not the way, I think, to make good, practical progress with the Bill, and I certainly should regard myself as abusing the patience of the Committee if I were to follow the right hon. Gentleman. I will, therefore, only say in one or two sentences what I have often said before, that I think it is far better for education that we should have a certain number of elective authorities dealing with primary education alone, a certain number of other elective authorities dealing with secondary education alone, and a great many other authorities not-elective at all dealing with voluntary schools. That is the present system, and it is a bad system. It can only be put right by having an authority much on the lines of this Bill. If the right hon. Gentleman's criticisms are well founded, if, for instance, it is true, as he says, that; this new authority is too much under the control of Whitehall—he took exactly the opposite line in 1896—if that

895
is his contention, then let him move an Amendment on a later clause putting that right.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: Hear, hear!
MR A. J. BALFOUR: Very well, let the right hon. Gentleman wait till then. If he thinks, as he says, that voluntary school managers are not sufficiently under the control of the education authority, let him wait till we come to Clause 8 dealing with that point and move an Amendment remedying that defect. If he thinks that some alteration in another part of the Bill would prevent the religious difficulty from coming in, let him move an Amendment to that effect—though, much as I respect the right hon. Gentleman's ability, he will be a greater man even than I think he is if he finds a method of dealing with education in this country which does not raise the religious difficulty. But if he can do it, let him do it. This, however, is not the time to do it; and I would very earnestly ask the Committee not to expend time on what must after all be a profitless debate at this stage of the Bill. If we can make the Bill at the later stages in accordance with the general views of Members of the Committee, we will not object to the discussion of proposals, but if we fail in doing so, let him object to the whole thing at a later stage. I would respectfully beg the Committee not to follow the example of the right hon. Gentleman, and wander at large over the whole scope and surface of the Bill. I hope the Committee will feel, as regards the broad principles of the measure, that they have been so fully discussed on the Second Reading and on the various fundamental Amendments which have been raised in the course of the clause that we may now be allowed to have a division without any further debate.
MR. BROADHURSTsaid he would confine his observations to Clause 1, although he objected to the whole Bill from beginning to end. The first clause was that which sought to destroy nearly all that was effective in elementary education and to glorify a bad system which had most signally
896
failed. This was a School Board killing Bill, and it set up what had been the voluntary system in the place of the Board Schools. He found that a great number of hon. Members who had now the School Boards in the death-grip spoke most respectfully and with great consideration about them, but their commendation of the boards was never heard until they were perfectly satisfied that their days were numbered, and that the old parish system was to be revived again in their place. The County Councils and other local boards had at present more to do than they could successfully get through in the time at their disposal, and he objected to a great system of national education being referred to bodies which were already overworked. That was his objection to this clause. The Vice President the other night said that the County Councils were elected on the democratic principle, and according to the right hon. Gentleman's logic the Councils must be democratic. That was not so. The Councils could not be democratic, from the fact that the members must be men of means and of considerable leisure. The electors, therefore, were limited in their selection of candidates to the class who had time and money to place at the disposal of the county work. In a speech in 1898 the Vice-President condemned these bodies as education authorities. In his speech on the Code that year he used these words—
"Then there is the general dislike to education in country districts on the part of all classes of society. This is not my opinion; it is what our school inspectors say. One of them whom I have quoted before says; 'The farmer and the squire are no friends to elementary education. They associate agricultural depression and low rents with compulsory education, and they grudge to pay for that teaching which deprives them of servants and furnishes their labourers with wings to fly from the parish. On the other hand, the labourer has not learnt the value of education. The earnings of his children are important to him, and the present shilling obscures the future pound. What is good enough for them is good enough for their children.' "
Whose fault was it that the labourer did not appreciate education? Those who, according to the right hon. Gentleman, were against the higher life and thought of the people were those whom he was going to place as complete masters of education

897
in the country. If the right hon. Gentleman favoured those opinions in 1898 how could he favour this Bill? The Bill sought to create that which the right hon. Gentleman and his inspectors entirely disapproved of. The right hon. Gentleman could not be in favour of School Boards and against them. He was in a corner, out of which, with all his powerful Parliamentary agility, he would find himself quite unable to escape. He must either deny the Vice-President of 1898 or denounce the Clause now under consideration. The right hon. Gentleman in the same speech went on to demonstrate the superiority of board schools over voluntary schools. One of the most remarkable exposures he had over read of the inefficiency of the schools the right hon. Gentleman was going to set up was given in that speech. He would remind the right hon. Gentleman of the figures he had then quoted; they were so interesting, and they were given with more authority than could have possibly been given by any other Member of this House. The right hon. Gentleman went on to describe the superiority of the board schools, which he was now going to destroy, over the voluntary schools. He said there was a considerable difference in numbers and efficiency between the board and the voluntary schools in London. There were 513,000 children in the board schools in London, and 224,000 in the voluntary schools. The board school scholars were therefore in numbers rather more than double those of the voluntary schools; but of the junior scholarships given by the Technical Instruction Committee to all elementary schools, the board school children carried off 299, while the children of the voluntary schools only gained 26. What did the right hon. Gentleman say to Clause I of this Bill now? In Manchester, the right hon. Gentleman went on to say, the board school children numbered 42,000, and the voluntary school children 52,000; but the board school children carried off forty Owen scholarships to the Manchester Grammar School, and the voluntary school children only two. In Liverpool, where there were 37,000 board school children, and 74,000 voluntary school children, the former carried off sixteen scholarships, and the latter only two. That was the result of a system which this Bill was intended to destroy.
898
[Hon. MEMBERS on the Ministerial Benches; "No."] Yes; this Bill was intended to destroy the board schools and to hand them over to the party led in this House by the noble Lord the Member for Greenwich. That was the head and front of the Bill. All the great work for the nation which the School Boards bad been doing was to be destroyed in order to please a section of the community. If Clause 1 became part of the Bill, as far as he could see, it mattered little what followed. The worse it was, the sooner it would be ended by another general election. He sincerely trusted that the Committee, even at the eleventh hour, would rescue national education out of the deadly clutches of the authorities that were waiting outside—deadly wherever they had laid their hands on education either in this country or any other. He hoped the Committee might, even at this moment, delete this Clause from the Bill, because it would give national education into the hands of those whom the Vice-President had declared to be the deadly opponents of education in the country-districts.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid that the First Lord of the Treasury had stated that he would not follow the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Monmouth in his devious wanderings. If their wanderings were devious, it was because the path of the Government was devious. He thought the Committee were entitled to one or two explanations—and that was the time to ask for them—as to the meaning and purpose of the Government in regard to this Bill. The first Clause started by saying that—
"For the purposes of this Act the Council of every county and of every county borough shall be the local education authority."
He thought they were entitled to know whether the County Council or the County Borough Council was to be the local education authority, or whether it was simply to have the power of appointing another body which would be the educational authority. The whole crux of the question was whether the Committee appointed by the County Council would bear the same relation to the County Council as the Surveyors Committee. When the First Lord of the

899
Treasury was asked this question he replied—
"I imagine that the answer will be in the negative."
Surely they were entitled to have an authoritative announcement. There were two tests as to the position of the County Council. One was the test of the Police Committee, the other was that of the Surveyors Committee. If the County Council was simply to have the same authority over education as it had over the police, then it was no authority at all, and it was a gross misnomer to call it the local education authority; and this Clause ought to be deleted, if, on the other hand, the position of the Committee which would be appointed was that of the Surveyors Committee, then the County Council was really the education authority. The Surveyors Committee was entitled to do nothing except what was delegated to it by the County Council. At any moment the County Council could withdraw the authority given to the Surveyors Committee and take is upon themselves. He asked the First Lord of the Treasury whether the County Council under this Clause could say to the Education Committee "You cannot deal with such and such a subject."
MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid it appeared to him that that question was not relevant to this Clause, though it might be to Clause 12.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid that the right hon. Gentleman started by asking the Committee to declare that the County Council was the local education authority; and he was perfectly entitled to discuss the subsequent clauses by assuming that they would stand as they were. If that were the case the Bill was inconsistent. They were asked to stultify themselves by making a declaration, to be incorporated in an Act of Parliament, which they knew perfectly well was not true. The County Council was not the education authority, but some other body which was brought into existence not by the County Council, but by the County Council subject to the approval of the Education Department. There was another important matter. Under this Clause they did not set up one authority. The discussion on the Amendment of the
900
hon. Member for Berwick would have been valuable if only it had brought forth the declaration from the First Lord of the Treasury that the one authority argument was a pure delusion.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I never said that. I said the argument of the right hon. Gentleman opposite was a pure delusion.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid that the statement made by his hon. friend was that the purpose of the First Lord of the Treasury in bringing in this Bill was to set up one authority, and it was that that the right hon. Gentleman said was a pure delusion.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid that the Bill did not set up one authority, but several. Let them take a county where the majority of the population was in county borough areas and urban district areas. The majority of the County Council would be elected by men who were exempted from the operations of the County Council Committee, He had asked the right hon. Gentleman whether the County Council Committee would have the power of declaring the policy in regard to elementary education, and he answered that the urban and county borough areas would not have a vote so far as the rate was concerned. But the policy was the main thing. Once the educational authority declared for a policy involving expenditure, the County Council would have no option but to pay. If the educational authority was elected mainly by the representatives of the urban and county borough areas, which were autonomous, they might go in for an elaborate educational policy, and the men who would have to pay for it would be the members for the rural districts who would get up and protest that it was unfair. He thought the Committee ought to have some declaration as to how the Government were going to get out of that difficulty. The representatives of the urban areas and the town council areas would elect the same men again. It had been conceded that the educational policy, with regard to rural districts, should be different

901
to that with regard to urban districts, but if they got au urban district which had a Board of its own, with which the County Council could not interfere, and they elected the educational men for the whole county, and if that educational authority declared for a policy involving expenditure, the County Council would have no option but to pay. He did not think any Bill had ever been introduced into the House of Commons which contained so incongruous and unfair a proposition as that embodied in this measure. As bearing on this question of the authority, he thought they were entitled to some declaration from the Government on the question of finance. They had heard all sorts of rumours as to where the finances were going to come from. If the whole burden was going to be cast on the rates there might be something to be said for giving autonomy to these districts of 10,000 and 20,000, but if the burden was to be cast entirely on the Exchequer, what possible argument was there for those exemptions? They had heard rumours that the corn tax was to be devoted to this purpose. They were to have dear bread and cheap catechisms. How was it that this declaration was withheld from the Committee? They knew perfectly well that there were going to be fundamental changes in the whole character of the Bill.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Why?
MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: Then let us know whether that is so or not.
The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is anticipating a statement which is relevant to the next Clause, but which has no relevance to this.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid he was much obliged for the information that such a statement was going to be made on the next Clause.
THE CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member has misinterpreted what I said. I did not say it would be made. What I meant by my interruption of the hon. Member was that if any such statement is to be made, it would be relevant to the next Clause.
MR. LLOYD-GEORGEthought they were entitled to get it at the first opportunity. The position as it was was an
902
impossible one. The Government were setting up a thing which they called an Educational authority, which was no educational authority at all. It was a misnomer to call it so. What would be the position of an urban district having nothing but voluntary schools. That district would return members to the County Council, who would have a voice in the control of the schools of the parishes adjoining their own, but who would have nothing to say as to the management of their own schools. The whole scheme was so preposterous that to invite the Committee to solemnly declare that they were setting up an authority on education was a farce. It was no authority on education.
DR. MACNAMARAsaid he desired to say one last word on behalf of the great School Boards, and the managers of the urban schools, who had, for the last thirty years, worked for the educational progress of the country amidst public disregard, and who were now met with contumely in that House.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Not by me.
DR. MACNAMARAsaid the Vice-President had not hesitated to tell them that their work was shoddy.
SIR JOHN GORST: I said nothing of the kind. What I said was that the instruction given in some of the art schools of the evening schools in London as compared with the instruction given in a proper art school was shoddy. I restricted my observations entirely to the question of art.
DR. MACNAMARA: To the work of the science and art schools?
SIR JOHN GORST: No, art.
DR. MACNAMARAsaid that now he was confronted with a curious spectacle, indeed, on the Front Bench, for no one could say anything but good of the great School Boards to-day. They had this satisfaction, that the First Lord of the Treasury had never said anything unkind about them, and was endeavouring to make their expiring moments extremely happy by saying nice things about them. He ventured to say that in transferring the work of these great School Boards to

903
the county borough councils they were taking the greatest educational leap in the dark that they had ever taken in this country. If these schools were handed over to the County Councils they would add a greater work and responsibility to their duties than all the municipal work in secondary technical and university education put together. It could not be done. What would happen was that this work would be handed over, not to the councils of the county boroughs, but to a body of non-representative persons who would be largely under the influence of the paid officials of those boroughs. He was convinced that that was not wise from the point of view of educational progress. The hon. Member for South Islington had stated that the various county boroughs supported the principle of this Bill without any reservation whatever. He had been in communication with the town clerks of all these sixty-seven county boroughs, and the replies he had received showed that only one, Leeds, was unconditionally in favour of the Bill, thirteen were conditionally in its favour, but suggesting such alterations as would
have made it difficult for the authors of the Bill to recognise it afterwards; nine were against it; four were simply in favour of a clause making the cost of education an Imperial charge; one passed no opinion; one decided to take no action; thirty-one passed no resolution at all; and from seven he had received no reply. He was entitled to submit to the Committee this statement of the actual facts in regard to city councils who, it had been asserted, were generally in favour of the Bill. In the great boroughs it would be physically impossible for the councils to carry on this educational work, in addition to their municipal work. This proposal of the Government was the greatest leap in the dark the country had over seen.
MR. A. J. BALFOURrose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
(7.18.) Question put, "That the Question be now put."
The Committee divided:—Ayes, 248; Noes, 175. (Division List No. 231.)

Hall, Edward Marshall

M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire)

Round, James

Hamilton, Rt Hn Lord G. (Mid'x

Majendie, James A. H.

Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

Hamilton, Marq. of Land'nder'y

Manners, Lord Cecil

Seely, Charles Hilton (Lincoln)

Hanbury, Rt. Hon. Robert Wm.

Martin, Richard Biddulph

Seely, Maj. J. H. B. (Isle of Wight

Harris, Frederick Leverton

Maxwell. Rt Hn Sir H. E (Wigt'n

Seton-Karr, Henry

Hatch, Ernest, Frederick Geo.

Maxwell, W. J. H. (Dumfriessh.

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Heath, James (Stafford, N. W.

Melville, Beresford Valentine

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew

Helder, Augustus

Middlentore, John Throgmort'n

Simeon, Sir Barrington

Henderson, Alexander

Mitchell, William

Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

Hickman, Sir Alfred

Molesworth, Sir Lewis

Smith, H C (North'mb, Tyneside

Higginbottom, S. W.

Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

Smith, James Parker (Lanarks.

Hoare, Sir Samuel

Montagu, Hon. J. Scott (Hants.)

Spencer, Sir E. (W. Bromwich)

Hobhouse, Henry (Somerset, E.

More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire)

Stanley, Hon. Arthur (Ormskirk

Hogg, Lindsay

Morgan, D. J. (Walthamstow)

Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somerset

Hope, J. F. (Sheffield, Brightside

Morrell, George Herbert

Stanley, Lord (Lancs.)

Hornby, Sir William Henry

Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford)

Stewart, Sir Mark J. M'Taggart

Hoult, Joseph

Mount, William Arthur

Stock, James Henry

Howard, John (Kent, Faversh'm

Muntz, Philip A.

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Howard, J. (Midd., Tottenham

Murray, Rt Hn. A Graham (Bute

Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

Hozier, Hon. James Henry Cecil

Murray, Charles J. (Coventry)

Talbot, Rt. Hn. T. G. (Oxf'd Univ.

Hudson, George Bickersteth

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

Thorborn, Sir Walter

Hutton, John (Yorks. N. R.)

Nicol, Donald Ninian

Thornton, Percy M.

Jackson, Rt. Hon. Wm. Lawies

O'Neill, Hon. Robert Torrens

Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

Jebb, Sir Richard Claver house

Orr-Ewing, Charles Lindsay

Tritton, Charles Ernest

Jessel, Captain Herbert Merton

Parker, Gilbert

Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward

Johnston, William (Belfast)

Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlingt'n

Vincent, Col Sir C. EH (Sheffield

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Peel, Hn. Wm. Robt. Wellesley

Warde, Colonel G E.

Kenyon, Hon. Geo. T. (Denbigh

Pemberton, John S. G.

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. W. (Salop.

Penn, John

Webb, Colonel William George

Keswick, William

Percy, Earl

Welby, Lt.-Col A. C. E (Taunton

Kimber, Henry

Pierpoint, Robert

Welby, Sir Chas. G. E. (Notts.

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Wharton, Rt. Hon. John Lloyd

Lambton, Hon. Frederick Wm.

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Whiteley, H (Ashton-und-Lyne

Laurie, Lieut.-General

Pretyman, Ernest George

Whitmore, Charles Algernon

Lawrence, Joseph (Monmouth)

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

Lawrence, Wm. K. (Liverpool)

Purvis, Robert

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Lawson, John Grant

Pym, C. Guy

Wills, Sir Frederick

Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

Quilter, Sir Cuthbert

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage

Randles, John S.

Wilson, J. W. (Worcestersh. N.)

Leigh-Bennett, Henry Currie

Rankin, Sir James

Wilson-Todd, Wm. HL (Yorks.)

Leveson-Gower, Frederick N. S.

Rasch, Major Frederic Carne

Wodehouse, Rt. Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Lockwood, Lt-Col. A. R.

Ratcliff, R. F.

Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm

Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham

Rattigan, Sir William Henry

Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

Long, Rt Hon. Walter (Bristol, S

Reid, James (Greenock)

Wortley, Rt. Hn. C. B. Stuart-

Lucas, Col. Francis (Lowestoft

Renshaw, Charles Bine

Wrightson, Sir Thomas

Lucas, Reginald J. (Portsmouth)

Renwick, George

Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

Lyttelton, Hon. Alfred

Ridley, Hn. M. W. (Stalybridge

Wyndham-Quin, Major W. H.

Macdona, John dimming

Ritchie, Rt. Hn. Chas. Thomson

Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

MacIver, David (Liverpool)

Roberts, Samuel (Sheffield)

Maconochie, A. W.

Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Armstrong.

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

M'Iver, Sir Lewis (Edinburgh W

Ropner, Colonel Robert

NOES.

Abraham, William (Cork, N. E.)

Cameron, Robert

Dunn, Sir William

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Campbell, John (Armagh, S,)

Edwards, Frank

Allen, Charles P. (Glouc., Stroud

Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

Ellis, John Edward

Ambrose, Robert

Cawley, Frederick

Emmott, Alfred

Asher, Alexander

Charming, Francis Allston

Evans, Samuel T. (Gl'amorgan)

Asquith, Rt. Hn. Herbert Henry

Clancy, John Joseph

Farquharson, Dr. Robert

Atherley-Jones, L.

Condon, Thomas Joseph

Fenwick, Charles

Austin, Sir John

Craig, Robert Hunter

Ffrench, Peter

Barlow, John Emmott

Crean, Eugene

Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

Harry, E. (Cork, S)

Cremer, William Randal

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire)

Crombie, John William

Flynn, James Christopher

Boland, John

Dalziel, James Henry

Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

Bolton, Thomas Dolling

Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

Furness, Sir Christopher

Bowles, Gibson (King's Lynn

Davies, M. Vaughan-(Cardigan

Gilhooly, James

Broadhurst, Henry

Delany, William

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Grey, Sir Edward (Berwick)

Bryce, Rt. Hon James

Dillon, John

Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton

Burke, E. Haviland-

Donelan, Captain A.

Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Sir Wm.

Burt, Thomas

Doogan, P. C.

Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil

Caldwell, James

Duncan, J. Hastings

Harmsworth, R. Leicester

906

907

Harwood, George

Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

Schwann, (Charles E.

Hayden, John Patrick

Morley, Charles (Breconshire)

Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

Hayne, Rt. Hon. Charles Seale-

Morley, Rt. H n. John (Montrose

Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

Helme, Norval Watson

Moss, Samuel

Shaw, Thomas (Hawick B.)

Hemphill, Rt. Hn. Charles H.

Murnaghan, George

Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

Hobhouse, C. E. H. (Bristol, E.

Nannetti, Joseph P.

Sinclair, John (Forfarshire)

Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

Newnes, Sir George

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Horniman, Frederick John

Nolan, Col. John P. (Galway, N.)

Soares, Ernest J.

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

Spencer, Rt Hn C. R. (Northants

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Norman, Henry

Strachey, Sir Edward

Jacoby, James Alfred

Norton, Capt. Cecil William

Sullivan, Donal

Joicey, Sir James

O'Brien, James F. X. (Cork)

Taylor, Theodore Cooke

Jones, D'vid Brynmor (Swansea

O'Brien, Kendal (Tipper'y, Mid

Tennant, Harold John

Jones, Wm. (Carnarvonshire)

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E)

Joyce, Michael

O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N)

Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, F.

Kearley, Hudson E.

O'Connor, James (Wick low, W.

Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr

Kinloch, Sir. John George Smyth

O'Donnell, T. (Kerry, W.)

Thomas, J. A (Glamorgan, Gow'r

Kitson, Sir James

O'Dowd, John

Tomkinson, James

Labouchere, Henry

O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N

Toulmin, George

Lambert, George

O'Malley, William

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Langley, Batty

O'Mara, James

Wallace, Robert

Law, Hugh Alex. (Donegal, W.

O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S)

Layland-Barratt, Francis

Pease, Alfred E. (Cleveland)

Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)

Leamy, Edmund

Pease, J. A. (Saffron Walden)

Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan

Leng, Sir John

Perks, Robert William

White, George (Norfolk)

Levy, Maurice

Philipps, John Wynford

White, Luke (York, E. R.)

Lewis, John Herbert

Pirie, Duncan V.

Whiteley, George (York. W. R.)

Lough, Thomas

Power, Patrick Joseph

Whitley, J. H. (Halifax)

Lundon, W.

Price, Robert John

Whittaker, Thomas Palmer

MacDonnell, Dr. Mark A.

Reddy, M.

Williams, Osmond (Merioneth)

Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

Redmond, John E. (Water ford)

Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Redmond, William (Clare)

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Rickett, J. Compton

Woodhouse, Sir J. I (Huddersf'd

M'Kean, John

Rigg, Richard

Young, Samuel

M'Kenna, Reginald

Roberts, John H. (Denbighs)

Yoxall, James Henry

M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Robson, William Snowdon

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. Herbert Gladstone and Mr. William M'Arthur.

Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

Roche, John

Markham, Arthur Basil

Roe, Sir Thomas

Mather, William

Runciman, Walter

(7.30.) Question put accordingly, "That Clause 1 stand part of the Bill."

AYES.

Abraham, William (Cork, N. E.

Bond, Edward

Colomb, Sir John Charles Ready

Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

Agg-Gardner, James Tynte

Bowles, T. Gibson (King's Lynn

Compton, Lord Alwyne

Agnew, Sir Andrew Noel

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Condon, Thomas Joseph

Aird, Sir John

Brookfield, Colonel Montagu

Cook, Sir Frederick Lucas

Allhusen, August's Henry Eden

Brotherton, Edward Allen

Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

Ambrose, Robert

Brown, Alexander H. (Shropsh.

Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Brymer, William Ernest

Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

Arkwright, John Stanhope

Bull, William James

Cranborne, Viscount

Arnold-Forster, Hugh O.

Burke, E. Haviland-

Crean, Eugene

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Butcher, John George

Cripps, Charles Alfred

Austin, Sir John

Campbell, Rt Hn. J. A. (Glasgow

Cross, Herb. Shepherd (Bolton)

Bagot, Capt. Josceline FitzRoy

Campbell, John (Armagh, S.)

Cubitt, Hon. Henry

Bain, Colonel James Robert

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Ed ward H.

Dalrymple Sir Charles

Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manch'r

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbyshire

Delany, William

Balfour, Capt. C. B. (Hornsey)

Cayzer, Sir Charles William

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Balfour, Rt Hn Gerald W (Leeds

Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

Dickson, Charles Scott

Banbury, Frederick George

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

Barry, E. (Cork, S.)

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. (Birm.

Digby, John K. D. Wingfield-

Bathurst, Hon. Allen Benjamin

Chamberlain, J. Austen (Wor'cr

Dillon, John

Beach, Rt. Hn. Sir Michael Hicks

Chapman, Edward

Disraeli, Coningsby Ralph

Bentinck, Lord Henry C.

Charrington, Spencer

Dixon-Hartland, Sir F. Dixon

Bignold, Arthur

Clancy, John Joseph

Donelan, Captain A.

Bigwood, James

Clive, Captain Percy A.

Doogan, P. C.

Bill, Charles

Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E.

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Blundell, Colonel Henry

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Doxford, Sir William Theodore

Boland, John

Collings, Rt. Hon Jesse

Duke, Henry Edward

The Committee divided:—Ayes, 305; Noes, 122. (Division List No. 232.)

Durning-Lawrence, Sir Edwin

Leigh-Bennett, Henry Currie

Rasch, Major Frederic Carne

Dyke, Rt. H n. Sir William Hart

Leveson-Gower, Frederick N. S.

Ratcliff, R. F.

Egerton, Hon. A. de Tatton

Lockwood, Lt.-Col. A. R.

Rattigan, Sir William Henry

Elliot, Hon. A. Ralph Douglas

Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham

Reddy, M.

Fardell, Sir T. George

Long, Rt. H n. Walter (Bristol, S.

Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edward

Lucas, Col. Francis (Lowestoft)

Redmond, William (Clare)

Ffrench, Peter

Lucas, Reginald J. (Portsmouth

Reid, James (Greenock)

Finch, George H.

Lundon, W.

Remnant, James Farquharson

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Lyttelton, Hon. Alfred

Renshaw, Charles Bine

Fisher, William Hayes

Macdona, John Cumming

Renwick, George

Fison, Frederick William

MacDonnell, Dr. Mark A.

Ridley, Hon. M. W. (Stalybridge

FitzGerald, Sir Robert Penross-

MacIver, David, (Liverpool)

Ritchie, Rt. Hn. Chas. Thomson

Fitzroy, Hon. Edward Algenon

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Roberts,. Samuel (Sheffield)

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Maconochie, A. W.

Roche, John

Fletcher, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

Flower, Ernest

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

Flynn, James Christopher

M'Iver, Sir Lewis (Edinburgh W

Ropner, Colonel Robert

Foster, Philip S. (Warwick, S W.

M'Kean, John

Round, James

Gardner, Ernest

M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire)

Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

Garfit, William

M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

Seely, Charles Hilton (Lincoln

Gilhooly, James

Majendie, James A. H.

Seely, Maj. J. E. B. (Isle of Wight

Gordon, Hn. J. E. (Elgin & Nairn)

Manners, Lord Cecil

Seton-Karr, Henry

Gordon, Maj Evans-(Tr'Hml'ts

Martin, Richard Biddulph

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Gore, Hn. G R C. Ormby-(Salop

Maxwell, Rt Hn Sir H E. (Wigt'n

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John Eldon

Maxwell, W. J. H. (Dumfriessh.)

Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

Goschen, Hon. George Joachim

Melville, Beresford Valentine

Simeon, Sir Barrington

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Middlemore, Jno. Throgmorton

Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

Green, Walford D. (Wednesb'ry

Mitchell, William

Smith, H C (North'mb, Tyneside

Greene, Sir E W. (B'ry S Edm'nds

Molesworth, Sir Lewis

Smith, James Parker (Lanarks.

Gretton, John

Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

Spencer, Sir E. (W. Bromwich)

Guest, Hon. Ivor Churchill

Montagu, Hon. J. Scott (Hants.)

Stanley, Hn. Arthur (Ormskirk

Gunter, Sir Robert

More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire

Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somerset

Hain, Edward

Morgan, David J. (Walthamst'w

Stanley, Lord (Lancs.)

Hall, Edward Marshall

Morrell, George Herbert

Stewart, Sir Mark J. M'Taggart

Hamilton, Rt Hn Lord G. (Mid'x

Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford

Stirling-Maxwell, Sir John M.

Hamilton, Marq of (L'nd'nderry

Mount, William Arthur

Stock, James Henry

Hanbury, Rt. Hn. Robert Wm.

Muntz, Philip A.

Stone, Sir Benjamin

Harris, Frederick Leverton

Murnaghan, George

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Hatch, Ernest Frederick Geo.

Murray, Rt Hn. A Graham (Bute

Sullivan, Donal

Hayden, John Patrice

Murray, Charles J. (Coventry)

Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

Heath, James (Staffords., N. W.

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bach)

Talbot, Rt Hn. J. G. (Oxf'd Univ

Helder, Augustus

Nannetti, Joseph P.

Thorburn, Sir Walter

Henderson, Alexander

Nicol, Donal Ninian

Thornton, Percy N.

Hickman, Sir Alfred

Nolan, Col. John P. (Galway, N.)

Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

Higginbottom, S. W.

Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

Tritton, Charles Ernest

Hoare, Sir Samuel

O'Brien, James F. X. (Cork)

Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward

Hobhouse, Henry (Somerset, E.)

O'Brien, Kendal (Tipperary Mid

Vincent, Col. Sir C E H (Sheffield

Hogg, Lindsay

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Warde, Col. C. E.

Hope, J. F. (Sheffield, Brightside

O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N.)

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Hornby, Sir William Henry

O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.)

Webb, Colonel William George

Hoult, Joseph

O'Donnell, T. (Kerry, W.)

Welby, Lt-Col A. C. E (Taunton

Howard, Jno. (Kent, Faversh'm

O'Dowd, John

Welby, Sir Charles G. E. (Notts

Howard, J. (Midd., Tottenham)

O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N

Wharton, Rt. Hon. John Lloyd

Hozier, Hn. James Henry Cecil

O'Malley, William

Whiteley, H. (Ashton-un. Lyne

Hudson, George Bickersteth

O'Mara, James

Whitmore, Charles Algernon

Hutton, John (Yorks. N. R.)

O'Neill, Hon. Robert Torrens

Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

Jackson, Rt. Hn. Wm. Lawies

Orr-Ewing, Charles Lindsay

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Jebb, Sir Richard Claver house

O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

Wills, Sir Frederick

Jessel, Captain Herbert Merton

Parker, Gilbert

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington

Wilson, John (Glasgow)

Joyce, Michael

Peel, Hn. Wm. Robt. Wellesley

Wilson, J. W. (Worcestersh. N.)

Kenyon, Hon. Geo. T. (Denbigh)

Pemberton, John S. G.

Wilson-Todd, Wm. H. (Yorks.)

Kenyon-Slaney. Col. W. (Salop.

Penn, John

Wodehouse, Rt Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Keswick, William

Percy, Earl

Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm

Kimber, Henry

Pierpoint, Robert

Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Worsley, Rt Hon. C. B. Stuart-

Lambton, Hon. Frederick Wm.

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Wrightson, Sir Thomas

Laurie, Lieut.-General

Power, Patrick Joseph

Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

Law, Hugh Alex. (Donegal, W.)

Pretyman, Ernest George

Wyndham-Quin, Major W. H

Lawrence, Joseph (Monmouth)

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

Lawrence, Wm. F, (Liverpool)

Purvis, Robert

Young, Samuel

Lawson, John Grant

Pym, C. Guy

Leamy, Edmund

Quilter, Sir Cuthbert

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

Randles, John S.

Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage

Rankin, Sir James

910

911

NOES.

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Hayne, Rt. Hon. Charles Seale-

Rigg, Richard

Allen, Charles P. (Glouc., Stroud

Helme, Norval Watson

Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)

Asher, Alexander

Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Charles H.

Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

Asquith, Rt Hon Herbert Henry

Hobhouse, C E. H. (Bristol, E.)

Robson, William Snowdon

Atherley-Jones, L.

Hope, John Deans (Fife, West

Roe, Sir Thomas

Barlow, John Emmott

Horniman, Frederick John

Runciman, Walter

Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire)

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Russell, T. W.

Bolton, Thomas Dolling

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Schwann, Charles E.

Broadhurst, Henry

Jacoby, James Alfred

Scott, Chas. Prestwich (Leigh)

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

Joicey, Sir James

Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

Jones David Brynmor (Swansea

Shaw, Thomas (Hawick, B.)

Burt, Thomas

Jones William (Carnarvonshire

Sinclair, John (Forfarshire)

Buxton, Sydney Charles

Kearley, Hudson E.

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Caldwell, James

Kinloch, Sir John George Smyth

Soares, Ernest J.

Cameron, Robert

Kitson, Sir James

Spencer, Rt Hn. C R. (Northants

Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

Labouchere, Henry

Strachey, Sir Edward

Cawley, Frederick

Lambert George

Taylor, Theodore Cooke

Channing, Francis Allston

Langley, Batty

Tennant, Harold John

Craig, Robert Hunter

Layland-Barratt, Francis

Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.

Cremer, William Randal

Leng, Sir John

Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, E.

Crombie, John William

Levy, Maurice

Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr

Dalziel, James Henry

Lewis, John Herbert

Thomas, J. A (Glamorg'n, Gower

Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

Lough, Thomas

Tomkinson, James

Davies, M. Vaughan-(Cardigan

M'Kenna, Reginald

Toulmin, George

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Duncan, J. Hastings

Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

Wallace, Robert

Dunn, Sir William

Markham, Arthur Basil

Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S.

Edwards, Frank

Mather, William

Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)

Ellis, John Edward

Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen

Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan)

Emmott, Alfred

Morley, Charles (Breconshire)

White, George (Norfolk)

Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan

Morley, Rt- Hn. John (Montrose

White, Luke (York, E. R.)

Farquharson, Dr. Robert

Moss, Samuel

Whiteley, George (York, W. R.)

Fenwick, Charles

Newnes, Sir George

Whitley, J. H. (Halifax)

Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

Norman, Henry

Whittaker, Thomas Palmer

Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

Norton, Capt. Cecil William

Williams, Osmond (Merioneth)

Furness, Sir Christopher

Pease, Alfred E. (Cleveland)

Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Pease, J. A. (Saffron Walden)

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton

Perks, Robert William

Woodhouse Sir J. T. (Huddersfi'd

Harcourt Rt. Hon. Sir William

Philipps, John Wynford

Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil

Pirie, Duncan V.

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. Herbert Gladstone and Mr. William M'Arthur.

Harmsworth, R. Leicester

Price, Robert John

Harwood, George

Rickett, J. Compton

It being after half-past Seven of the clock, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
Committee report Progress, to sit again upon Monday next.

EVENING SITTING.

  FINANCE BILL.
  Order for Consideration, as amended, read, and discharged.
  Bill re-committed in respect of New Clause, Surtax and Allowance on Spirits, and New Clause, Increase of Customs Duties on Glucose (in pursuance of Resolutions of Committee of Ways and Moans.)—(Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.)

  FINANCE (RE-COMMITTED) BILL.
  Considered in Committee.
  On the first of the new clauses—
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSONsaid he did not wish to oppose the new Clause, but he thought the Committee was entitled to some information as to its effect on the revenue. Would any harm result from delaying it?
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: I wish to get it reprinted tomorrow morning.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: What do you estimate will be the effect on the revenue?
  SIR. M. HICKS BEACH: Very trifling indeed.
  Clauses agreed to.
  Bill, as amended in Committee, and on re-committal, to be considered Tomorrow. [Bill 239.]

  LICENSING BILL.
  As amended by the Standing Committee, further considered.
  MR. BROADHURSTsaid he wished to move to insert a Clause providing that if the holder of any licence authorising the consumption of intoxicating liquor upon the premises refused to supply the reasonable demands of a traveller for refreshment other than intoxicating liquor, he should be liable upon summary conviction, for the first offence, to a fine not exceeding 40s., and for any subsequent offence of a like nature to a fine not exceeding £5. The object was, he explained, to compel licensed victuallers to supply refreshments other than intoxicating drinks to any person who demanded it. Many hundreds of young people now indulged in cycling, and many of these desired refreshment other than intoxicants or aerated waters. They preferred, in fact, a cup of tea or coffee and a slice of bread and butter, but they were constantly refused by licence holders. Hence this Clause. He submitted it to the Grand Committee but was unfortunately defeated on a division, although he got a considerable amount of support. As a fact, the Clause imposed no new obligations, but it was desirable to have power to inflict a penalty in cases of refusal. He was sure he had the sympathy of the Home Secretary, as well as of the hon. Member for the Burton Division of Staffordshire.
  New Clause (Supply of non-intoxicant refreshment)—(Mr. Broadhurst)—brought up, and read the first time.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause be read a second time."
  SIR JOHN BRUNNERhoped the Amendment would be favourably considered by the Home Secretary, for he could assure the right hon. Gentleman that magistrates in different parts of the country were desirous that publicans should be compelled to supply the reasonable demands of travellers in this respect. Bicyclists had found that beer was not a good liquor on which to travel, and the House should not discourage the demand for non-intoxicating refreshment. Relatives of his own who had been bicycling, or
  914
  playing in football matches, had been refused such refreshment in indignant and supercilious tones, and had been told "This is a house for the sale of drink." The law which allowed a house to be kept open for the sale of intoxicating drink and did not insist upon the supply of other refreshment was a faulty law. The Home Secretary would find that in accepting this Clause he would have the support of the magistracy and of the public in general.
  MR. T. W. RUSSELLsaid when this clause was before the Standing Committee, the Home Secretary said the licensed victualler was not even bound to supply intoxicating liquor, his obligations differing in this respect from those of an innkeeper. He was in sympathy with his hon. friend on that matter, and he would like to know the reason for the difference. If a licensed victualler was legally entitled to refuse even beer to a traveller, what on earth was the use of having him at all? What was the duty of a licensed victualler in "merrie England"? He knew what it was in Ireland and Scotland, but he would like to be told if there were two kinds of licences in England.
  SIR BRAMPTON GURDONsaid it must have been the experience of many Members that they were often unable to get even bread and cheese at public-houses, and some of the refreshment rooms at the railway stations were very little better than the public-houses in this respect. It was true that at many railway stations an excellent luncheon could be obtained, but he was sorry to say that the refreshment room at the Ipswich station was practically converted, he might say absolutely converted, into a drinking bar. To get a glass of whisky was easy enough, but it was difficult to obtain other refreshment that many travellers desired. He earnestly hoped the Home Secretary would take this matter into serious consideration.
  MR. HARWOODsaid he thought the distinction drawn between innkeepers and licensed victuallers was a barbarous novelty, and that all licensed holders should be compelled to supply the

  915
  reasonable requirements of travellers. The licensed victualler engaged a monopoly, and in return he was bound to perform certain services. He recently took some young friends, after a long walk, to an out-of-the-way public-house in the Isle of Wight. He asked for luncheon for them, but he was absolutely refused until he threatened to oppose the renewal of the man's licence. Such conduct, he submitted, was contrary to the spirit of the law.
  MR. GEORGE WHITEsaid that on application to a magistrates' clerk he got confirmation of the Home Secretary's statement to the Committee upstairs that there was a distinction between a licensed victualler and an innkeeper, and he certainly considered it most desirable that that distinction should be abolished. Surely the House would approve that. Cyclists and other travellers ought to have no difficulty in getting a cup of tea.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. RITCHIE,): The arguments in favour of the Amendment are largely drawn from personal experiences, and although such experiences are exceedingly valuable I suspect that an alteration of the law based on them would not be quite desirable in the general interest. Circumstances under which individual Members have met with scant courtesy required to be fully explained before they can be acted upon. My hon. friend the Member for South Tyrone has correctly stated what occurred in the Committee upstairs when the Bill was before them and when this Amendment was rejected by a very considerable majority. The position is just this—the licensed victualler is not compelled by his licence to supply anything at all. The proposal now is that he should be compelled to supply a thing he does not sell, and if he does not supply it he is to be liable to a criminal prosecution. [Laughter.] I notice that a different principle is to apply to the temperance hotel-keeper. He is not even to be compelled to supply what he professes to sell. I have been asked what is the difference between an innkeeper and the licensed victualler. Well, the latter carries on his business
  916
  under statute, while the innkeeper is compelled by common law to supply to any traveller who applies for it reasonable food and lodging. I think to make a licensed victualler subject to the criminal liability proposed in the clause, while the innkeeper, who is not a licensed victualler, is left untouched, is to make a very serious alteration in the law; and however desirable some alteration of the liabilities of innkeepers or licensed victuallers may be when we are considering a general revision of the licensing laws, I demur altogether to the alteration being introduced by an Amendment to a limited measure of the kind now before the House. After all, hon. Members have the remedy in their own hands. They may oppose the renewal of the licence of a man who refuses to supply reasonable refreshments, and think the licensing authority would be right in taking the fact into consideration upon the question whether the licence should be renewed or not. On these grounds I deprecate the introduction of such an Amendment as this into the Bill.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSONsaid the distinction that existed according to the Home Secretary's interpretation of the law between the licensed victualler and the Innkeeper was one that should be removed. But this distinction had nothing to do with the question before the House at all. This licensed business was a monopoly of the most enormous value. It was a monopoly which the Government refused year after year to touch, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer preferred rather to tax the bread of the poor this year than to touch it. There was no monopoly comparable in magnitude and value to it, and he was going to say in its corrupting influence. The licensed trade enjoyed these privileges from the State and had no right to complain of any of the fresh obligations being placed upon them. He was quite sure this proposed clause would be to the advantage and convenience of the people of this country, and therefore asked the House to pass it.
  MR. GOULDINGsaid he thought the House was taken at

  917
  a disadvantage in having to discuss an important Bill of this kind at such short notice, seeing that the great majority of hon. Members interested had not expected the Bill to come on. He warned those who were inclined to ruin the liquor trade that, much as they disliked the grain duty, the taxes lost by the ruin of the licensed victualler would have to be made Up in some such way as the grain duty. The licensed victualler was taxed out of all proportion to any other class of the community, and for this a distinct duty was laid upon him, and more should not be required off him. They had heard the experiences of various hon. Members in visiting public-houses. Well, he had always found that the temperance man was the most impatient and irrational man on the face of the earth. He expected the licensed victualler to supply him with all sorts of things he did not sell, and his orders were often given in the most incomprehensible manner. Altogether the temperance man seemed to be overcome with his own importance and authority; indeed, he was prepared to exercise authority over everything and everybody. He spoke as a frequenter of public-houses, and when going round his constituency he found, if he wanted a little refreshment, the public-house a much more genial place to enter than one of those temperance dens, where they found everyone in the place imagining themselves to be altogether of a superior character ready to pull down everything and to complain of everything. He went into a public-house and took his refreshment and enjoyed it after his day's work, and he there met good fellows who had done their day's work and were in good humour to talk to their Member. For that reason he went to the public-house, but he could not recollect a single occasion when he was refused food. He had gone into a public house times without number; he meant to continue to do so, and he thought he was as fit for work as anyone who frequented only temperance taverns. Hon. Members who required tea, eggs, and so on, must remember that it was not the duty of a publican to keep a kettle always boiling to supply temperance people. It would be a grievous wrong to inflict a penalty
  918
  for these omissions unless they at the some time considerably reduced the licence duties. The hon. Member for Leicester had complained that lie was unable to obtain proper and necessary refreshment at railway bars. The hon.; Member had been most unfortunate in the bars he had visited, because usually there were delightful glass cases of sweetbreads and gingerbreads, which ought to satisfy the appetite of the most inveterate teetotaller, and he had found that when he ordered a glass of beer he could always get a sandwich with it. He therefore rejoiced that the Home Secretary had decided not to accept the. Amendment, but to continue to give the licensed victualler the same obligations to discharge which he had undertaken to discharge when he took out his licence, and which he had discharged uncommonly well up to the present day.
  MR. EMMOTTsaid the speech of the hon. Member for Devizes was very interesting and amusing, but it had extremely little reference to the Amendment. The hon. Member had told them about his habits and his constant visits to public-houses. He had told them that he had never asked for food and been refused, but he had not told them that he had ever asked for food.
  MR. GOULDING: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member, but for the credit of the cuisine of the public-houses I must say that I have often asked for food and have always got it.
  MR. EMMOTTthought his hon. friend must have chosen his public houses very carefully. The purport of the new clause was that where it was not now necessary to provide such refreshments it should, in future, be necessary. Therefore, the fact that he had never suffered from being unable to get the food he required had really no relevance to the subject under discussion. The Amendment was a most reasonable one; it would effect a very desirable change in the law, and if the hon. Member for Leicester went to a division, he should certainly support him.
  MR. BOUSFIELDsaid it was his experience at public houses in the country that publicans were very much put about if they were asked to supply anything to eat. He belonged to the irrational class of people who believed that temperance ought to be promoted as far as possible, and being of opinion that the Amendment would be of material assistance to the cause of temperance he should vote for it. He was glad the Home Secretary had expressed his sympathy with the Amendment, and, although it might not be much use making any appeal, he thought the present was a very favour able opportunity for introducing a provision which had been long wanted. He had always voted against the extreme measures of teetotalism, because he recognised that the public-house was to a great extent the meeting-place of the people. But he wanted to see the public-house a place to which the teetotaler could go as well as the man who wanted a glass of beer. One would hope that with the advance of education, the younger people would desire to spend their evenings somewhat more arduously, but the fact remained that many a weary man was in the habit of meeting his friends in the only place now open to him, viz., the public-houses. At the time the Parish Councils Bill was under discussion he attempted to insert a provision to enable the councils to provide parish-rooms in which such men could meet without being obliged, as the price of enjoying the fellowship of their friends, to drink to the good of the house more than was good for them. That proposal was opposed by hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House, but he was glad to notice that the present Amendment would have something of the same effect. He wanted to see public - houses where teetotalers could have their drink. [An HON. MEMBER; So they can.] But in many places they would be unable to get what they wanted. Such a proviso as that now proposed would greatly help the cause of temperance, and he would be glad to see it inserted.
  MR. MARKHAMhad not intended to take part in the debate, but, as one who had lived
  920
  and been brought up among working people, and who knew the evils and miseries caused by drink, he felt bound to protest against the speech of the hon. Member for Devizes. That such a speech should be delivered, in which temperance places were described as "dens," and so forth, was monstrous and wicked. [Laughter.] He defied hon. Members who laughed to deny that the bulk of the misery among their own constituents was due to drink. The hon. Member had referred to his "good fill." It was the "good fill" which caused all the misery.
  MR. GOULDINGthought the hon. Member was going too far when he called a glass of beer a "good fill." What he really said was that he had a glass of beer and asked for what he wanted to eat.
  MR. MARKHAMsaid he was in the recollection of the House. What the hon. Member said was that he had a "good fill."
  MR. GOULDING: No. ["Withdraw."]
  MR. MARKHAMsaid he would withdraw the statement, although he was convinced that he was correct. If the hon. Member had seen as much as he had of the misery and poverty caused by drink, he would go into these public-houses less frequently. Reference had been made to the interference of temperance people, but what interference was there in trying to better one's follow men?
  MR. GRETTONsaid that the Amendment was intended to secure travellers certain things in public-houses which the previous speaker maintained he could not get at the present time. This question had been debated very carefully before the Grand Committee, and, if he remembered rightly, the Amendment was defeated by a very large majority. On that occasion he met the hon. Member for Leicester with a proposal which he was still prepared to carry out. The Amendment raised an intricate point of common law, which would be better dealt with by

  921
  a small amending Bill; and if the hon. Member would bring in such a Bill, he was prepared to put his name on the back of it. He had been in communication with the Cyclists Union on the matter, and knew their views. What they complained of was that the common law was so excessive in its penalties that it was extremely difficult to get a conviction under the law as it stood, and they suggested that the amount of the fine should be placed within the discretion of the magistrates, so that they might obtain a reasonable execution of the law, and secure that which the law intended they should have. The right hon. Gentleman was correct in saying that there was no obligation in law on a holder of a victualler's licence to supply intoxicating liquors. An innkeeper very often held such a licence, but he had full control over his inn, and need only supply shelter and refreshment to travellers who reasonably demanded it. This Amendment went a great deal too far, and, as it would complicate the law to a considerable degree, he should certainly vote against it.
  MR. JOHN BURNS: The more this Amendment is discussed, the more its merits appear; and the hon. Member who has just spoken has given strong reasons why it should be carried. On the Grand Committee the hon. Member represented the liquor trade with great ability, persistency, and imagination. He now says, on the merits of this Amendment, that if an amending Bill were introduced, having the same object, he would gladly associate himself with it. It seems, therefore, that his only objection to the Amendment can be on the ground of its inappropriateness in the present Bill. But that is a matter of opinion. Some of us are under the impression that we shall not have another opportunity of amending and improving the licensing laws for some years, and, as a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, the hon. Member, being prepared to support the substance of the Amendment in another form, ought to vote in favour of it now.
  MR. GRETTON: My position is that the Amendment goes too far. The point which the hon. Member urged I should be glad to support, but I am not prepared to go so far as the words of the Amendment.
  MR. JOHN BURNS: The Amendment simply asks for the licensed victualler to be required to supply reasonable demands for refreshment. That does not mean that a small innkeeper should rise to the menu of the hon. Member for Manchester, or that he should satisfy the tastes of hon. Gentlemen who are Members of the Amphitryon Club, noted for its twenty-two or twenty-four courses. Take a party of motorists twenty or thirty miles away from a well-established place of refreshment. Lady motorists often re quire tea, coffee, and eggs, and it seems to mo that licensed victuallers, as well as innkeepers, ought to be compelled to supply that class of refreshment. The Home Secretary has shown great tact and skill in his conduct of this Bill, and never more so than in his admission tonight that substantially he agrees with this proposal. But he says this is not the time nor the occasion. The right hon. Gentleman's hand wants forcing, and I should like to see him beaten in a non-Party division. If that were done, I am sure that no one would be more glad than the Home Secretary, except the First Lord of the Treasury, who is a motorist, and doubtless prefers a cup of good tea to a glass of bad beer. The hon. Member for Devizes made the kind of speech that one would expect a candidate to make in a district where nearly every other house that was not a public-house was a beer-shop, and the licensed victuallers' interest in that district is very strong. But I can assure the hon. Member for Devizes that the sensible licensed victuallers and the progressive innkeepers who are adapting themselves to the demands of cyclists and motorists will not thank him for his speech. I know something of public-houses, or at any rate the best side of them—which is the outside. The hon. Member opposite has practically said that the licensed victuallers' trade is non-progressive, and does not wish to adapt itself to the requirements of the public. The hon. Member for Devizes has told us that an inn is a place where you can got drunk, or immoderately the worse for liquor, and where hospitality is not extended either to man or beast.
  MR. GOULDING: The hon. Member is making a statement which is directly opposite to what I said. I said

  923
  that I did not know of an occasion upon which I had passed a public-house where I could not get anything to cat in moderation, such as eggs and bread and butter.
  MR. JOHN BURNS: Then let the hon. Member go down to any garrison town, like Alders hot, where the soldiers are practically driven into beer shops, and where it is impossible to get either tea, coffee, or bread and cheese. Anyone who hag lived in a garrison town and who has seen the difficulty that the soldier, the sailor, the tourist, and the traveller experience who want moderate refreshment, and who are not teetotalers, but who are driven to buy alcoholic drinks when they require other kinds of refreshment, must admit that this Amendment is a reasonable one. Many publicans, to their credit, are adapting themselves to the supplying of refreshments of the kind which this Amendment seeks to make universal—and why? We are not inflicting any injustice on the publican. If a publican had to choose between supplying six men with six quarts of beer at 4d. per quart, or supplying six men with six shilling teas, he would prefer the latter, because he would make more out of the teas. Some of the brewers may not like this proposal, which is not resented by the progressive publican who owns his own house, but is resented by the brewer who owns tied houses and who wishes the public-house to be a "boozing shop" only, and not a place of refreshment for man or beast. The publican who owns his own house invariably carries out what is proposed in this Amendment, and thus confers great benefit upon the whole community. What is an advantage voluntarily with some publicans ought to be made compulsory upon all, in return for the licence and the privilege and monopoly which the licence confers upon every innkeeper. At the time when rapid traction, motor cars, golf and cricket clubs, and walking excursions are taking vast crowds into the country districts, we ought to encourage the people to go into the country and into the rural districts, for this will not only help the country people and the shopkeepers
  924
  there, but it will also help the innkeeper. For those reasons I intend to support this Amendment.
  MR. RITCHIE: I do appeal to the House to come to a decision now upon this question. This point has already been debated for an hour, and we have some other very important questions to discuss before we can make much progress with this Bill.
  SIR E. W. GREENE: I cannot understand why the hon. Member for Battersea has made the assertion that brewers are against supplying other articles of refreshment besides beer. I have done a great deal of cycling, and "I must confess that whenever I have stopped and asked for tea I have always been able to get it. As for the brewer, I have the-fortune, or the misfortune, to be the chairman of a large brewery company, and only a month ago I ordered a circular to be sent out to every public-house belonging to the brewery company putting it before the publican that he should supply tea, or anything else that the people should call for, and I believe that as a rule the majority of publicans do this. The House must bear in mind that a demand for anything will always bring a supply. Wherever there are cyclists about, I am sure publicans will be found willing to meet their requirements. It is very hard, however, that they should be forced to do this when they already have heavy burdens placed upon them, and I thoroughly agree with the Home Secretary that we should not force upon the trade a heavier burden than they already have to bear.
  MR. LABOUCHERE: I was astonished when I heard the Home Secretary get up just now and tell us that we were almost obstructing this Bill.
  MR. RITCHIE: No, no.
  MR. LABOUCHERE: At any rate, the right hon. Gentleman appealed to the House to have a division upon this point. The right hon. Gentleman was not in a majority during the first half hour of the debate, and then he was quite willing to encourage talk upon this subject. I am perfectly certain that the hon. Member for Leicester is too old a

  925
  Parliamentary hand to accept the suggestion made by the hon. Gentleman the Member for South Derbyshire, who proposes that this question should be dealt with by an amending Bill. A clause in the hand is worth any amount of amending Bills in the bush, and I trust my hon. friend will go to a division on this question. I was surprised to hear that whereas an innkeeper is obliged to supply intoxicating liquor, a publican is not obliged to do so. If that is the law, the sooner we change it the better. I do not "bike," I do not like walking much, and I do not go much into public-houses; but supposing I were "biking," and I wanted some beer, how am I to know the difference between a public-house and an inn? I think that if a publican is granted a monopoly to supply a particular article, he should be obliged to supply that article. We go a, step farther, and say, that not only shall he be compelled to supply beer, but also tea, coffee, and other refreshments such as bread and cheese. The hon. Gentleman opposite says he thinks this is a desirable thing, but he objects to do it only in an amending Bill. Why he should not oblige the public by doing it now I do not know. I believe my hon. friend's Amendment will do more for the cause of temperance than a great deal of that with which my very hot temperance friends on this side of the House advocate, because the real reason why we are such a drunken people is that in public-houses practically nothing is consumed but beer and spirits. Many people who simply want light refreshments are unable to get anything but beer and spirits. In the public-houses in Germany where you buy beer and spirits you can sec the father sit down to his glass of beer, the wife to her tea, and the children to buns and ginger beer in Germany they bring their families into the public-houses, and this has a humanising effect. If you place upon every one of these public-houses the obligation of supplying other refreshments besides intoxicants as in Germany, I think you would find that large numbers who are now obliged to take beer would come in and take tea and other such refreshments, and they would take with them their families, and this would have a humanising effect. For
  926
  these reasons I shall most warmly support the Amendment of my him friend.
  MR. SEELY: I think everybody who has listened to this debate must agree that this is a most important question, and I think it is one which ought to be the subject of a com promise. I think most people will be surprised to hear what was said by the Home Secretary, that licensed victuallers were under no obligation to supply either food or drink or anything else. It certainly seems unreasonable that when a man is given a monopoly to supply drink, he should be under no obligation to supply other refreshments. Practically by preventing eating houses from supplying drink you have prevented the existence of cafés and eating houses such as those which exist abroad, and which are pre vented from existing in England because a large part of their profits are made on intoxicating liquors. I think this is a great misfortune, and I do not think licensed victuallers can say that it is unreasonable that they should be under an obligation to supply food. The hon. Member for South Derbyshire expressed himself as being of the same opinion. He also expressed the view that this particular Amendment is very vague and wide, and is rather too serious an obligation to place suddenly upon all the licensed victuallers of this country. I should like to know if we can have some undertaking from the Home Secretary, or could the hon. Member for South Derbyshire suggest some Amendment which would get over the difficulty, and which would provide that those who are giving the monoply of supplying intoxicating liquors should be under the obligation to supply other kinds of refreshment. I should like to know if the Home Secretary would agree to support a measure brought in by the hon. Member for Leicester and the hon. Member for South Derbyshire. If the right hon. Gentleman would undertake to give time and consideration to such a Bill, I think that would get over the difficulty. I feel confident myself that if a proposal of this kind were adopted, it would have far more beneficial results in promoting real temperance than anything else which is proposed in this

  927
  Bill, or in any other temperance reform which has been brought forward in recent years. I wish to press upon the Home Secretary the very great importance of this subject, for he now has an opportunity of dealing with a question which, I believe, will do more good in

  AYES.

  Abraham, Wm. (Cork, N. E.)

  Hobhouse, Henry (Somerset, K.

  Pemberton, John S. G.

  Agnew, Sir Andrew Noel

  Holland, William Henry

  Perks, Robert William

  Allan, William (Gate-head)

  Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

  Pirie, Duncan Y.

  Allen, Chas. P. (Glouc., Stroud)

  Horniman, Frederick John

  Power, Patrick Joseph

  Allhusen, Augustus Hy. Eden

  Hudson, George Bickersteth

  Reddy, M.

  Ambrose, Robert

  Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

  Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

  Ashton, Thomas Gair

  Jacoby, James Alfred

  Redmond, William (Clare)

  Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbt. Hy.

  Jessel, Captain Herbert Merton

  Rickett, J. Compton

  Barry, E. (Cork, S.)

  Johnston, William (Belfast)

  Rigg, Richard

  Boland, John

  Jones, D'vid Brynmor (Swansea

  Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)

  Bolton, Thomas Dolling

  Joyce, Michael

  Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

  Bousfield, William Robert

  Labouchere, Henry

  Roche, John

  Bowles, Capt. H. F. (Middlesex)

  Lambert, George

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

  Langley, Batty

  Runciman, Walter

  Caldwell, James

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow)

  Russell, T. W.

  Cameron, Robert

  Law, Hugh Alex. (Donegal, W.)

  Schwann, Charles E.

  Campbell, John (Armagh, S.)

  Layland-Barratt, Francis

  Scott, Chas Prestwich (Leigh)

  Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

  Leamy, Edmund

  Seely, Maj. J. E B. (Isle of Wght

  Cawley, Frederick

  Leigh, Sir Joseph

  Shaw, Thomas (Hawick B.)

  Channing, Francis Allston

  Leng, Sir John

  Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

  Condon, Thomas Joseph

  Levy, Maurice

  Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

  Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Sinclair, John (Forfarshire)

  Crean, Eugene

  Lloyd-George, David

  Smith, H C. (North'mb. Tynesid

  Cremer, William Randal

  Lundon, W.

  Soares, Ernest J.

  Dalrymple, Sir Charles

  MacDonnell, Dr. Mark A.

  Spencer, Rt. Hn. C.R. (N'rthnts

  Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

  Sullivan, Donal

  Davies, M. Vaughan-(Cardigan

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah

  Taylor, Theodore Cooke

  Delany, William

  M'Kean, John

  Tennant, Harold John

  Dillon, John

  M'Kenna, Reginald

  Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)

  Donelan, Captain A.

  M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire)

  Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, E.

  Doogan, P. C.

  M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

  Thomas, David Alfd. (Merthyr)

  Duncan, J. Hastings

  M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

  Thomas, J. A (Glamorgan, Gower

  Ellis, John Edward

  Markham, Arthur Basil

  Tomkinson, James

  Emmott, Alfred

  Maxwell, W. J. H. (Dumfriesshr

  Toulmin, George

  Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Farquharson, Dr. Robert

  Morley, Charles (Breconshire)

  Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S.

  Fenwick, Charles

  Moulton, John Fletcher

  Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)

  Ffrench, Peter

  Murnaghan, George

  Welby, Sir Charles G. E. (Notts.

  Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

  Nannetti, Joseph P.

  White, George (Norfolk)

  Flavin, Michael Joseph

  Norman, Henry

  White, Luke (York, E. R.)

  Flynn, James Christopher

  O'Brien, Kendal (Tipper'ry Mid

  Whiteley, George (York, W. R.

  Furness, Sir Christopher

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  Whitley, J. H. (Halifax)

  Galloway, William Johnson

  O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N.)

  Whittaker, Thomas Palmer

  Gilhooly, James

  O'Connor, Jas. (Wicklow, W.)

  Williams, Osmond (Merioneth)

  Gladstone, Rt. Hn. Herbt. John

  O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

  Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

  Goddard, Daniel Ford

  O'Donnell, T. (Kerry, W.)

  Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

  Gordon, Hn. J. E. (Elgin & Nairn

  O'Dowd, John

  Wilson, John (Glasgow)

  Guest, Hon. Ivor Churchill

  O'Kelly, James (Roscomm'n, N.

  Wilson, J. W. (Worcestersh, N.

  Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton

  O'Malley, William

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil

  O'Neill, Hon. Robert Torrens

  Hayden, John Patrick

  O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Mr. Broadhurst and Mr. John Burns.

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlingt'n

  Hobhouse, C. E. H. (Bristol, E.)

  Pease, J. A. (Saffron Walden)

  NOES.

  Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

  Balcarres, Lord

  Bignold, Arthur

  Agg-Gardner, James Tynte

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manch'r

  Bill, Charles

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Balfour, Rt Hn Ger'ld W. (Leeds

  Blundell, Colonel Henry

  Arnold-Forster, Hugh O.

  Banbury, Frederick George

  Bond, Edward

  Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

  Bathurst, Hon. Allen Benjamin

  Bowles, T. Gibson (King's Lynn)

  Austin, Sir John

  Beach, Rt. Hn Sir Michael Hicks

  Brassey, Albert

  Bain, Colonel James Robert

  Bentinck, Lord Henry C.

  Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

  this country than any other proposal connected with temperance reform.
  (10.14.) Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes, 154; Noes, 173. (Division List No. 233.)

  Brookfield, Col. Montagu

  Heath, James (Staffords, N. W.

  Quitter, Sir Cuthbert

  Bull, William James

  Helder, Augustus

  Randles, John S.

  Butcher, John George

  Henderson, Alexander

  Rankin, Sir James

  Cavendish, V. C. W (Derbyshire

  Hickman, Sir Alfred

  Rasch, Major Frederic Carne

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor

  Higginbottom, S. W.

  Ratcliff, R. F.

  Chamberlain, Ht. Hn. J. (Birm.

  Houston, Robert Paterson

  Rattigan, Sir William Henry

  Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc'r

  Howard, John (Kent, Faversh'm

  Reid, James (Greenock)

  Chapman, Edward

  Hutton, John (Yorks, N. R.)

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Charrington, Spencer

  John-tone, Heywood (Sussex)

  Renshaw, Charles Bine

  Clive, Capt Percy A.

  Kenyon-Slaney, Col. W. (Salop)

  Renwick, George

  Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E.

  Lawrence, Joseph (Monmouth

  Richards, Henry Charles

  Coghill, Douglas Harry

  Lawrence, Wm. F. (Liverpool)

  Ridley, Hn. M. W. (Stalybridge

  Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

  Lawson, John Grant

  Ritchie, Rt. Hn. Chas. Thomson

  Colomb, Sir John Charles Ready

  Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

  Roberts, Samuel (Sheffield)

  Compton, Lord Alwyne

  Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage

  Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

  Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

  Leveson-Gower, Frederick N. S

  Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

  Cranborne, Viscount

  Long, Rt Hon. Walter (Brist'l, S

  Ropner, Colonel Robert

  Cripps, Charles Alfred

  Loyd, Archie Kirkman

  Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

  Dickson, Charles Scott

  Lucas, Reginald J. (Portsmouth

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Digby, John K. D. Wingfield-

  Macdona, John Cumming

  Sharpe, William Edward T.

  Disraeli, Coningsby Ralph

  MacIver, David (Liverpool)

  Simeon, Sir Barrington

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A Akers-

  M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

  Skewes-Cox, Thomas

  Doxford, Sir William Theodore

  M'Iver, Sir Lewis (Edinburgh W

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

  Duke, Henry Edward

  Majendie, James A. H.

  Spear, John Ward

  Darning-Lawrence, Sir Edwin

  Manners, Lord Cecil

  Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somerst)

  Dyke, Rt. Hon. Sir Wm. Hart

  Melville, Beresford Valentine

  Stanley, Lord (Lancs.)

  Egerton, Hon. A. de Tatton

  Middlemore, Jn. Throgmorton

  Stock, James Henry

  Faber, Edmund B. (Hants, W.)

  Milner, Rt. Hon. Sir Fredk, G.

  Stone, Sir Benjamin

  Fardell, Sir T. George

  Mitchell, William

  Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

  Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edward

  Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

  Talbot, Rt. Hn. J. G (Oxf'd Univ

  Finch, George H.

  Mooney, John J.

  Tollemache, Henry James

  Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

  More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire

  Tritton, Charles Ernest

  Fisher, William Hayes

  Morgan, David J. (Walth'mst'w

  Walker, Col. William Hall

  Fitzroy, Hn. Edward Algernon

  Morrell, George Herbert

  Webb, Colonel William George

  Fletcher, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

  Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford

  Wharton, Rt. Hon. John Lloyd

  Flower, Ernest

  Mount, William Arthur

  Whiteley, H (Ashton-und. Lyne

  Foster, Philip S (Warwick, S. W

  Murray, Rt. Hn. A. Gr'h'm (Bute

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Gardner, Ernest

  Murray, Charles J. (Coventry)

  Willox, Sir John Archibald

  Garfit, William

  Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

  Wills, Sir Frederick

  Gordon, Maj Evans-(Tr. H'ml'ts

  Myers, William Henry

  Wilson, John (Falkirk)

  Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John Eldon

  Newdigate, Francis Alexander

  Wilson-Todd. Wm. H. (Yorks.)

  Goschen, Hon. George Joachim

  Nicol, Donald Ninian

  Wodehouse, Rt. Hn. E. R. (Bath

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

  Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm

  Green, Walford D. (Wednesb'ry

  Orr-Ewing, Charles Lindsay

  Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

  Greene, Sir E W (B'ry S Edm'nds

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Wortley, Rt. Hn. C. B. (Stuart-

  Greene, Henry D. (Shrewsbury)

  Peel, Hn. Wm. Robt. Wellesley

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Gretton, John

  Pierpoint, Robert

  Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

  Hain, Edward

  Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

  Young, Samuel

  Hall, Edward Marshall

  Pretyman, Ernest George

  Hanbury, Rt. Hon. Robert Wm.

  Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

  Hatch, Ernest Frederick Geo.

  Purvis, Robert

  Heath, Arthur Howard (Hanley

  Pym, C. Guy

  MR. EMMOTThad a new Clause on the Paper in the following terms:—
  "Any reasonable costs, charges, and expenses which licensing justices may incur in supporting or defending any decision of theirs against which an appeal is brought, and which are not recovered from any other person, shall, in the case of licensing justices acting in and for any petty sessional division of a county, or acting in and for a municipal borough having a separate commission of the peace, but not having its own court of quarter sessions, be payable out of the county rate; and in the case of licensing justices acting in and for any municipal borough having a separate commission of the peace and its own court of quarter sessions, be payable out of the borough fund or borough rate. The said reasonable costs, charges, and
  930
  expenses shall be taxed by the proper taxing officer of the court of quarter sessions, either in or out of sessions, or of the High Court of Justice, and the county treasurer or the borough treasurer, as the case may be, shall be entitled to attend such taxation, and to have seven days' notice given to him of the day appointed there for, together with a copy of the bill to be taxed."
  MR. SPEAKER: This clause is not in order, because it proposes to place a charge upon the rates. That cannot be done on the Report stage of the Bill.
  MR. EMMOTTsaid the clause was put down as a substitute for Clause 19 of the Bill, and so would not really place a

  931
  fresh charge on the rates. He desired to know whether that made any difference to the ruling.
  MR. SPEAKER: A clause proposing a new charge upon the rates cannot be introduced on the report stage. There is a clause in the Bill which deals with' the question of the costs of the magistrates. If the hon. Member likes, he can move an Amendment on that, provided that he does not propose to increase the charge.
  MR. GALLOWAY MR. GALLOWAY (Manchester, S. W.) moved to leave out Clause 4, which provided that—
  "Where a licensed person is charged with permitting drunkenness on his premises and it is proved that any person was drunk on his premises, it shall be on the licensed person to prove that he and the persons employed by him took all reasonable steps for preventing drunkenness on the premises."
  The hon. Member said he thought the clause would be less objectionable if the Amendment standing in the name of the hon. Member for Southampton (which was to leave out the words after "him," and insert "did not knowingly suffer the said drunkenness to take place on his premises") were accepted.
  MR. RITCHIEwas not prepared to accept that Amendment.
  MR. GALLOWAYsaid the clause as it stood was most objectionable. The right hon. Gentleman on Monday night refused a clause which he moved, on the ground that it was introducing a new principle. But this Clause 4 introduced a principle never known to English law before. There was considerable discussion on the clause in Grand Committee. The clause as it now stood compelled a person who was accused of being guilty to prove himself innocent, and the old principle of English law that a man was assumed to be innocent till he was proved guilty was done away with. It proposed to put upon the publican and licence-holder the onus of proving that he, or somebody employed by him, took all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness on his premises. If the clause were confined within the narrow limit of its exact words, it would not be open to much objection, but what he objected to was that the words would be strained.
  932
  How was it going to be possible in some circumstances for the licence-holder to prove that somebody employed by him took all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness on the premises? Supposing he was not on the premises at the time the offence was committed, he would have to rely upon somebody acting for him, to prove that that person took all reasonable steps. Lot it be remembered that the real punishment for the offence would not fall on the shoulders of the person who committed the crime, but would fall, in the shape of endorsement of the licence, or otherwise, upon the licence-holder. He believed the clause was against all English law and the principles of administration of justice in this country, and he, therefore, moved that it be loft out.
  Amendment proposed—
  "In page 2, line 5, to leave out Clause 4."—(Mr. Galloway.)
  Question proposed, "That the words of the clause to the word 'took,' in line 8, stand part of the Bill."
  MR. RITCHIE: What is the additional obligation cast upon the licensed victualler by this clause 1 At present he ought not to permit drunkenness on his premises. Very well, this clause pre-supposes before putting any further obligation upon the licensed victualler, that drunkenness has been proved to exist upon his premises. If drunkenness has been proved to exist upon his premises, then I think it is perfectly right and proper, having regard to the responsibility of the licensed victualler, and having regard to the great evil of drunkenness, to say that it should lie upon his shoulders to prove that he, and those employed by him, have taken all reasonable precautions to prevent drunkenness. We are only carrying out the intentions of the Royal Commission which inquired into these matters, when we ask Parliament to say to the publican who is charged with having permitted the drunkenness which has been proved to have taken place on his premises, that he must prove that he and his servants took proper, precautions for carrying out the law and preventing drunkenness.
  MR. FLOWERthought that the speech of the Home Secretary was a complete justification for the Amendment of the hon. Member for Southampton. Let the House remember that in dealing with this question they were dealing with a class of persons who did not commend themselves altogether to the sympathetic feeling of the House but who, nevertheless, were entitled to receive from it justice. Lot the House see that they got that justice. The Majority Report of the Royal Commission on Licensing Law made a very interesting and important pronouncement on this point. They said that where a person was found drunk on licensed premises, or was observed leaving them in that condition, the licence holder should be required to prove that he and his employees were ignorant of the drunkenness, or if they knew it, they did not permit the offender to remain. The Minority Report added that where a person was found drunk on the premises, or was seen leaving the premises in a drunken condition, it should be incumbent on the publican to show that neither he nor his servants knew of the drunkenness or allowed the person to remain on the premises. He could not agree with the suggestion of his hon. friend the Member for South-West Manchester, to leave out the clause in its entirety, but he confessed he thought they had a right to ask the Home Secretary to consider, when Amendments to the clause were considered, whether he ought not to provide some reasonable measure of protection in the interest of the licensed holder, such as was suggested both in the Majority and Minority Report of the Royal Commission.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  SIR BARRINGTON SIMEONproposed an Amendment to the clause, providing that it should lie on a licensed person to prove that he and the persons employed by him had not knowingly suffered drunkenness to take place on his premises. He said that in the clause there was nothing
  934
  but vagueness and difficulty. Every difficulty was put in the way of the unfortunate public an. As the Clause stood, it required that the publican must have taken all reasonable steps. That was a difficult thing to do, for what one bench of magistrates thought reasonable another bench of magistrates might not think reasonable. The onus of proof was placed entirely on the publican, and taken away from the police, and the publican was subjected to vague obligations which he did not know existed, and which he had no opportunity of knowing existed. He asked why, in this matter, a publican should be placed in a different position with respect to the law from the proprietors of the New Gallery, the Crafton Gallery, or the Savoy Hotel, where balls were frequently held, and at which some young men might be idiotic enough to drink too much champagne. To make a distinction would be to establish one law for the rich and another for the poor, and he hoped the Government would not do that. He could not imagine why the Government should not accept the Amendment; but if they did not, all he could say was that it would be pressed to a division.
  Amendment proposed—
  "in page 2, line 8, to leave out from the word 'him,' to the end of Clause 4, in order to insert the words 'did not knowlingly suffer the said drunkenness to take place on his premises'—(Sir Barriugtou Simeon)—instead thereof."
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."
  MR. RITCHIEsaid that the Clause attempted to deal in a moderate way with one of the greatest curses with which we were afflicted. Any one who had had the experience which he had now had could not fail to know that a very large proportion of the violent crime of the country originated through persons coming out drunk from public houses. He said, without fear of contradictions that a great deal of crime was caused

  935
  by drunkenness on the part of persons who must have been known by the publican or his assistant to be drunk when they were served. They got into a state of frenzy in which they were prepared to commit any crime. This was an attempt to put a stop to that great evil. The law as it stood at present—which was the law that the hon. Gentleman proposed by his Amendment to maintain—had been found to be inoperative and ineffective. It had been found to be perfectly impossible to prove against a publican that he had knowingly suffered drunkenness to take place on his premises, and therefore the law had remained a dead letter. What was it that the Government asked? It was that in cases where drunkenness was proved to have taken place upon licensed premises it should lie upon the shoulders of the licensed victualler to show that he had taken all proper precautions to prevent it. Having regard to the great privileges which were conferred upon licensed victuallers, the least they could do was to call upon them to prevent drunkenness, and to show that they had used all precautions in their power to put down what he had no hesitation in describing as an intolerable state of things. If the House adopted the Amendment, they would revert to a condition of the law which had proved to be ineffective. The Clause as it stood did not impose upon the licensed victualler any obligation which he was not perfectly capable of performing. He hoped the Government would receive the support of the House in their attempt to deal with this matter.
  MR. ASQUITHsaid he was very glad that the right hon. Gentleman had said what he had said. Any one who had held the office now occupied by the right hon. Gentleman was aware that drunkenness was the most fruitful source of crime in this country, and to bring home to the licensed victualler actual knowledge, was to impose on those who had the enforcement of the law an absolutely impossible obligation. All that the Clause proposed was that the publican should take all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness.
  936
  That was a duty which he could perfectly well discharge, and a burden not heavier than ought to be imposed upon him. He earnestly hoped the Government would stick to the Clause in the form in which it now stood.
  MR. TOMLINSONsaid he wished to support the views of his hon. friend who had moved the Amendment. The Clause as it stood violated principles of justice which declared that a man should not be presumed to be guilty until his guilt was proved. He knew that the Home Office was well acquainted with exceptions to that principle of English law. For instance, a mine owner or a manager of a mine was held personally responsible for an accident which had happened in a pit, unless he could show that he had taken all proper precautions. That was reversing the ordinary rule of jurisprudence, but he thought Parliament ought to be very cautious in still further reversing a rule which was one of the safe-guards of the liberty of the people of this country. He should vote with his hon. friend for the Amendment.
  MR. MARSHALL HALLsaid that on behalf of those who supported the Amendment, he wished to resent the suggestion put upon them that they were in any way the enemies of temperance, and the friends of drunkenness. He yielded to no man in his sympathy with temperance, and in the view that drunkenness was a grave offence. But if they were going to put a burden upon the licensed victualler which he could not bear, they ran the risk of doing him an injustice which would rebound upon the heads of those who did it. He believed the public were amply protected under the existing law, the doctrine of which was to hold the innocence of a man until he was found guilty. Under the Clause as it stood, the onus was put upon the publican of proving something which it was impossible for him to prove. The Amendment, on the other hand, asking a publican to prove something was reasonable. He was perfectly sure that if they treated the publican fairly, he would, in his turn, treat the public fairly, and the interest of the public would be looked after, and the

  937
  cause of temperance would he safeguarded. He thought that when a reasonable Amendment like this was moved, it was the duty of the Home Secretary to accept it. There was a very strong feeling indeed on that side of the House among those who thought that if the publican was wanted to do the best he could on behalf of temperance, this Amendment should be passed.
  MR. LAWSON WALTONsaid that his hon. and learned friend had apparently some little difficulty in reconciling his support of the Amendment with his zeal of the temperance cause, because he betrayed the real motive which actuated him and his hon. friend in declining to go to a division in support of the last Amendment and uniting their forces in support of the present Amendment. In its present form this Amendment was simply a revival of the old Amendment which the House had rejected without a division. The last Amendment proposed to leave the law exactly as at present by striking out Clause 4; and the present Amendment proposed to introduce words which, would neutralise that Clause. The Bill undoubtedly created a new statutory offence, which would be held to be committed by the licensed person unless he could show that he had taken all reasonable steps for preventing drunkenness on his premises. Was it not in the interests of temperance, and of the community at large to establish such an offence? When anyone considered the enormous importance of the conduct of the liquor trade in relation to social order and crime, it was not too much to ask the House to cast the duty on the publican of proving that he had taken all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness on his premises. On these grounds he hoped the House would resist the Amendment.
  MR. RANDLESsaid they were all at one in their desire to diminish drunkenness. The only difference between them was as to whether the Amendment or the Bill best secured the object in view. He agreed with the Home Secretary, and believed that the right hon. Gentleman would find a large body on that side of
  938
  the House backing him up in his intention to stick to the Bill as it stood and carry it into law. He could not see how any Member, if he looked at the Amendment dispassionately, could say that it would be equally effective with the clause as it stood in the bill to diminish the evils that they all deplored. He hoped the House would give the Home Secretary every support in carrying the Bill into law, irrespective of Amendments moved by supporters of this Amendment on the one hand, or those who supported the Amendment just defeated on the other.
  MR. H. C. RICHARDSsaid if it were true that this Clause created a new offence, as was stated by the hon. and learned Member for South Leeds, he should like to know from the Home Secretary whether it was his desire to place upon publicans burdens which did not now exist. He had been sent to the House to support the Majority Report of the Royal Commission, and this Clause went far beyond either the Majority or Minority Report, and however good the intents of the Home Secretary might be, it was most unfair to the publican. He contended that the Amendment ought to be accepted in the interests of those who are anxious to see the spread of temperance. If the Clause went beyond what was recommended in both the Majority and Minority Reports, who on earth induced the Home Secretary to take this hostile action against the trade. It was not, he was sure, of the right hon. Gentleman's free will, but perhaps of some Parliamentary draftsman. They ought not to put a new offence on the publican, and so treat him differently from any other trader. He could not help thinking that this attack upon the publican was because of his political susceptibilities. Hon. Members opposite knew that he voted against them, and hence their hostility to him. The Government were pledged to the Majority Report of the Licensing Commission, and they ought not to commence operations by laying new burdens upon the publican.
  MR. REGINALD LUCASsaid he thought his hon. friend

  939
  had put his Amendment on the wrong basis. The whole point of the Bill was that they wanted to get at the root of the evil; they desired to deal with those who got drunk on licensed premises, and with those who enabled them to get drunk. Nobody in the House would contend that all publicans permitted drunkenness on their premises, but drunkenness should be stopped at any cost, and he thought that the Clause in the Bill as it stood, would enable the authorities to get at the bad publicans better than the Amendment would. The Amendment was that the publican had "not knowingly suffered the said drunkenness to take place on his premises." He could imagine a publican who had deliberately neglected his duty, and then tried to put the blame on his employees. That was the class of man they wanted to get at. The words in a Clause were that the publican should take all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness on his premises; and he certainly thought that they were sufficient to safeguard the interests at stake, and to secure the end that was desired. If there were any choice between the words in the Amendment and the words in the Clause, he would say that the latter would be better, and therefore he saw no sufficient reason for voting for the Amendment.
  MR. BOUSFIELDsaid he merely wished to put two points to his hon.

  AYES.

  Abraham, William (Cork, N. E.)

  Barry, E. (Cork, S.)

  Cameron, Robert

  Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

  Bathurst, Hn. Allen Benjamin

  Campbell, John (Armagh, S.)

  Agnew, Sir Andrew Noel

  Beach, Rt Hn Sir Michael Hicks

  Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

  Allan, William (Gateshead)

  Bignold, Arthur

  Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

  Allhusen, Augustus H'nry Eden

  Bill, Charles

  Causton, Richard Knight

  Ambrose, Robert

  Blundell, Colonel Henry

  Cautley, Henry Strother

  Anson, Sir William Reynell

  Boland, John

  Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbyshire

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Bolton, Thomas Dolling

  Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

  Arnold-Forster, Hugh O.

  Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J. (Birm.

  Asher, Alexander

  Bousfield, William Robert

  Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc'r

  Ashton, Thomas Gair

  Brassey, Albert

  Channing, Francis Allston

  Asquith, Rt. Hn. Herbert Henry

  Broadhurst, Henry

  Chapman, Edward

  Atherley-Jones, L.

  Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

  Charrington, Spencer

  Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

  Brookfield, Colonel Montagu

  Clive, Captain Percy A.

  Bagot, Capt. Josceline FitzRoy

  Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

  Coghill, Douglas Harry

  Bain, Colonel James Robert

  Bull, William James

  Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

  Balcarres, Lord

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Compton, Lord Alwyne

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manch'r

  Burns, John

  Condon, Thomas Joseph

  Balfour, Capt. C. B. (Hornsey)

  Caine, William Sproston

  Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

  Balfour, Rt Hn Gerald W (Leeds

  Caldwell, James

  Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

  friends who intended to support the Amendment. Did they or did they not think that the publican ought to take all reasonable steps to prevent drunkenness on his premises? Any of his hon. friends who supported the Amendment would be taken as not thinking that a publican should take reasonable steps. [An Hon. MEMBER; What are reasonable steps?] The phrase was a common form in Acts of Parliament, and quite ordinary phraseology. The other point he wished to mention was that there would be very little difference in practice between the words in the Clause and the words in the Amendment. The chief difference was that the Amendment was bad draughtsmanship, and the clause was good draughtsmanship, because the Amendment suggested that the publican should be asked to prove a negative. He could not do that, because he could only say that he had taken such and such precautions, and given such and such instructions. The publican would go into the box, and state to the magistrates what steps he had taken, and they would decide whether they were reasonable steps or not.
  (11.14.) Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes, 322; Noes, 52. (Division List No. 234.)

  Craig Robert Hunter

  Holland, William Henry

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  Cranborne, Viscount

  Horniman, Frederick John

  O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N.)

  Crean, Eugene

  Hoult, Joseph

  O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.

  Cremer, William Randal

  Howard, John (Kent, Fav'rsh'm

  O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.

  Cross, Herb. Shepherd (Bolton)

  Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

  O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

  Dalrymple, Sir Charles

  Hutton, John (Yorks, N. R.)

  O'Donnell, T. (Kerry, W.)

  Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

  Jacoby, James Alfred

  O'Malley, William

  Davies, M. Vaughan-(Cardigan

  Jebb, Sir Richard Claver house

  O'Neill, Hon. Robert Torrens

  Delany, William

  Johnston, William (Belfast)

  Orr-Ewing, Charles Lindsay

  Denny, Colonel

  Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

  O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

  Dickson, Charles Scott

  Joicey, Sir James

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

  Jones, David Brynmor (Sw'nsea

  Pearson, Sir Weetman D.

  Dillon, John

  Jones, William (Carnarvonsh're

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlingt'n

  Donelan, Captain A.

  Joyce, Michael

  Pease, J. A. (Saffron Walden

  Doogan, P. C.

  Kearley, Hudson E.

  Peel, Hn Wm Robert Wellesley

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Kenyon, Hon. Geo. T. (Denbigh)

  Percy, Earl

  Doxford, Sir William Theodore

  Kenyon-Slaney, Col. W. (Salop

  Pilkington, Lieut.-Col. Richard

  Duke, Henry Edward

  Keswick, William

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Duncan, J. Hastings

  King, Sir Henry Seymour

  Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

  Durning-Lawrence, Sir Edwin

  Labouchere, Henry

  Power, Patrick Joseph

  Dyke, Rt. Hn. Sir William Hart

  Lambton, Hn. Frederick Wm.

  Pretyman, Ernest George

  Edwards, Frank

  Langley, Batty

  Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

  Egerton, Hon. A. de Tatton

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow

  Pym, C. Guy

  Emmott, Alfred

  Law, Hugh Alex. (Donegal, W.

  Quilter, Sir Cuthbert

  Evans, Sir Francis H. (Maidst'ne

  Lawson, John Grant

  Randles, John S.

  Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

  Layland-Barratt, Francis

  Rankin, Sir James

  Faber, Edmund B. (Hams, W.)

  Leamy, Edmund

  Rasch, Major Frederic Carne

  Fardell, Sir T. George

  Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

  Rattigan, Sir William Henry

  Farquharson, Dr. Robert

  Lees, Sir Joseph F. (Accrington

  Rea, Russell

  Fellowes, Hn. Ailwyn Edward

  Leigh, Sir Joseph

  Reddy, M.

  Fenwick, Charles

  Leng, Sir John

  Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

  Ffrench, Peter

  Levy Maurice

  Redmond, William (Clare)

  Field, William

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Reid, James (Greenock)

  Finch, George H.

  Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Bristol, S.

  Renwick, George

  Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

  Lough, Thomas

  Rickett, J. Compton

  Fisher, William Hayes

  Loyd, Archie Kirkman

  Ridley, Hn. M. W. (Stalybridge

  Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

  Lucas, Reginald J. (Portsmouth

  Rigg, Richard

  Fitzroy, Hn. Edward Algernon

  Lundon, W.

  Ritchie, Rt. Hn. Chas. Thomson

  Flannery, Sir Fortescue

  Lyttelton, Hon. Alfred

  Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)

  Flavin, Michael Joseph

  Macdona, John Cumming

  Roberts, Samuel (Sheffield)

  Fletcher, Rt. Hn. Sir Henry

  MacDonnell, Dr. Mark A.

  Roche, John

  Flynn, James Christopher

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

  Roe Sir Thomas

  Foster, Philip S. (Warwick, S. W.

  Maconochie, A. W.

  Ropner, Colonel Robert

  Foster, Sir Walter (Derby Co.)

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah

  Round, James

  Furness, Sir Christopher

  M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

  Runciman, Walter

  Garfit, William

  M'Arthur, William (Cornwall

  Russell T. W.

  Gilhooly, James

  M'Kean, John

  Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

  Gladstone, Rt Hn Herbert John

  M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire

  Schwann, Charles E.

  Goddard Daniel Ford

  M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

  Scott, Chas. Prestwich (Leigh)

  Godson, Sir Augustus Frederick

  Majendie, James A. H.

  Seely, Charles Hilton (Lincoln

  Gordon, Hn. J. E. (Elgin & Nairn

  Manners, Lord Cecil

  Seely, Maj. J. E. B. (Isle of Wight

  Gorst, Rt. Hn. Sir John Eldon

  Markham, Arthur Basil

  Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

  Goschen, Hn. George Joachim

  Maxwell, W. J. H. (Dumfriessh.

  Shaw, Thomas (Hawick B.)

  Green, Walford D. (Wedn'sb'ry

  Melville, Beresford Valentine

  Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew

  Grey, Sir Edward (Berwick)

  Middlemore, John Throgmort'n

  Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

  Curdon, Sir W. Brampton

  Milner, Rt. Hn. Sir Frederick G.

  Sinclair, John (Forfarshire)

  Hain, Edward

  Mitchell, William

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, E.)

  Hamilton, Marq of (L'nd'nderry

  Moles worth, Sir Lewis

  Smith, H C (North'mb. Tyneside

  Hanbury, Rt. Hn. Robert Wm.

  Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

  Smith, James Parker (Lanarks.

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil

  Montagu, Hon. J. Scott (Hants.)

  Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

  Harmsworth, R. Leicester

  Moon, Edward Robert Pacy

  Soares, Ernest J.

  Harwood, George

  Mooney, John J.

  Spear, John Ward

  Hatch, Ernest Frederick Geo.

  More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire

  Spencer, Rt Hn C. R. (Northants

  Hayden, John Patrick

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Stanley, Hon Arthur (Ormskirk

  Hayne, Rt. Hon. Charles Seale-

  Morrell, George Herbert

  Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somerset

  Heath, Arthur Howard (Hanley

  Moss, Samuel

  Stanley, Lord (Lancs.)

  Heath, James (Staffords., N. W.

  Mount, William Arthur

  Stevenson, Francis S.

  Helder, Augustus

  Murnaghan, George

  Stirling-Maxwell, Sir John M.

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Murray, Rt Hn. A Graham (Bute

  Stock, James Henry

  Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Charles-

  Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath

  Strutt, Hn. Charles Hedley

  Henderson, Alexander

  Nicol, Donald Ninian

  Sullivan, Donal

  Hickman, Sir Alfred

  Norman, Henry

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Higginbottom, S. W.

  Norton, Capt. Cecil William

  Talbot, Rt. Hn. J. G. (Oxf'd Univ

  Hobhouse, C. E. H. (Bristol, E.

  Nussey, Thomas Willans

  Taylor, Theodore Cooke

  Hobhouse, Henry (Somerset, E.

  O'Brien, Kendal (Tipp'rary Mid

  Tennant, Harold John

  942

  943

  Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, E.)

  Whiteley, George (York, W. R.)

  Woodhouse, Sir J. I (Huddersf'd

  Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr)

  Whitley, J. H. (Halifax)

  Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

  Thomas, J A Gramorgan, Gower

  Whitmore, Charles Algernon

  Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart

  Tollemache, Henry James

  Whittaker, Thomas Palmer

  Wrightson, Sir Thomas

  Tomkinson, James

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Toulmin, George

  Willox, Sir John Archibald

  Wyndham-Quin, Major W. H

  Tritton, Charles Ernest

  Wills, Sir Frederick

  Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

  Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S.)

  Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

  Young, Samuel

  Warr, Augustus Frederick

  Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

  Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan

  Wilson, John (Falkirk)

  Welby, Sir Charles G. E. (Notts

  Wilson, John (Glasgow)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

  Wharton, Rt. Hon. John Lloyd

  Wilson, J. W. (Worcestersh. N.

  White, George (Norfolk)

  Wilson-Todd, Wm. H. (Yorks)

  White, Luke (York, E. R.)

  Wodehouse, Ht. Un. E. R. (Bath

  NOES.

  Agg-Gardner, James Tynte

  Hope, J. F. (Sheffield. Brightside

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Austin, Sir John

  Houston, Robert Paterson

  Richards, Henry Charles

  Bailey, James (Walworth)

  Hudson, George Bickersteth

  Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

  Banbury, Frederick George

  Jessel, Captain Herbert Merton

  Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

  Bentinck, Lord Henry C.

  Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, V.)

  Bond, Edward

  Leigh-Bennett, Henry Currie

  Sharpe, William Edward T.

  Butcher, John George

  Leveson-Gower, Frederick N. S

  Shipman, Dr. John G.

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  MacIver, David (Livepool)

  Skewes-Cox, Thomas

  Colomb, Sir John Charles Ready

  M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

  Thornton, Percy M.

  Disraeli, Coningsby Ralph

  Morgan, David J. (W'lthamstow

  Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

  Flower, Ernest

  Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford

  Walker, Col. William Hall

  Galloway, William Johnson

  Myers, William Henry

  Warde, Col. C. E.

  Gardner, Ernest

  Nannetti, Joseph R.

  Webb, Colonel William George

  Gordon, Maj Evans-(T'r H'mlts

  Newdigate, Francis Alexander

  Welby, Lt. Col. A C E (Taunton

  Gore, Hn G R C Ormsby-(Salop

  Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

  Greene, Sir E W (B'ry S Ed'm'nds

  O'Dowd, John

  Greene, Henry D. (Shrewsbury)

  Parker, Gilbert

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Sir Barrington Simeon and Mr. Goulding.

  Gretton, John

  Purvis, Robert

  Hall, Edward Marshall

  Ratcliff, R. F.

  MR. GRETTONsaid that in the absence of his hon. friend the Member for South Salford, he desired to move the Amendment standing in his name. It referred to the system of endorsement. It was the custom among brewers, distillers, and publicans, to hold more than one licence; and there was some ambiguity in the Bill as to whether an entry in respect to any individual should apply to the whole of the licences held by him, or only to the licence in respect of which the offence was committed. If he had an assurance from his right hon. friend the Home Secretary, that the entry would only apply to the premises in respect of which the offence was committed he would be prepared to withdraw.
  Amendment proposed—
  "In page 4, line 20, after the word 'premises,' to insert the words:—'(4) The entry of a conviction in the register of licences, shall, in
  944
  cases where the licensed person holds licences in respect of more than one set of premises in the licensing district, be so made as to relate only to the premises on or in respect of which the offence was committed.'"—(Mr. Gretton.)
  Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir ROBERT FINLAY,)said he hoped his hon. friend would not press the Amendment. The entry on the register would be in respect of a particular licence; but it would be impossible to confine the effect of that entry to certain premises. Surely, if a man were guilty of conduct in regard to certain premises, which showed that he was not a fit person to have a licence, that should be taken into consideration if he applied for a licence for premises other than the premises in respect of which the offence was committed.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  MR. HARWOODsaid he desired to move the omission of Clause 9, though not in any spirit of opposition to the Bill. He regretted he was not able to raise the question in the Grand Committee; but he now asked the Home Secretary to drop the clause because it had nothing to do with the general principle of the Bill. The Home Secretary had opposed a previous Amendment on the ground that the Bill did not deal with the general question of licensing, and that, therefore, it was outside the proper scope, of the measure, fie acknowledged it was an omnibus Bill, but that clause was a passenger who had no business on the omnibus, and he, therefore, asked the Home Secretary to put him out. The question involved in the clause was one which dealt with the principle of licensing. It proposed to hand over grocers' licences to the magistrates, and to make them like all other licences. In doing that they would be taking a very serious step in connection with the licensing question. He approached the matter entirely from an impartial point of view. He had no interest in the trade, and did not care two straws about grocers personally; but he cared very much for the licensing question, which he considered was one of the greatest problems after the Education problem which lay before the House of Commons; and he objected to its being dealt with piecemeal now. The Bill before the House was not a proper Bill in which to attempt a partial solution of the licensing question Why did he call it a partial solution? Because the grocers' licences were the only licences which were now carried on under the principles of Free Trade. All the rest of the drink traffic had been handed over to the magistrates. What was the feeling of the masses of the people about the licensing problem? They felt very
  946
  strongly that a great mistake had been made by past legislation in handing over that enormous monopoly, without securing any return to the community. He was not speaking from the temperance point of view, or from the point of view of the trade; but he thought hon. Members would agree that enormous profits had been handed over to a limited number of persons. He knew of premises which were worth £1,200, but for which, after the licence had been obtained, £1,000 was asked, and within three months they were sold for £5,000. They had been very foolish in handing over such a monopoly; and he maintained that if the trade received State countenance, it was a natural corollary that the State should claim some of the advantage. That being so, how unwise it was to hand over the one portion of the field of Free Trade to the magistrates. If the grocers' licences were handed over, they would immediately increase in value; high rents would be charged for the shops; and the consequence would be that the grocers would have to charge more for the liquor they sold. The Home Secretary now proposed to hand over those licences to the magistrates, although both the Majority and Minority Reports of the Royal Commission, on which he was acting, recommended a serious alteration in the licensing authority. Yet without altering that authority, the right hon. Gentleman proposed, without compensation or stipulation, to hand over the only bit of Free Trade that now remained. He was pleading only on the broad principle of the proper handling of the licensing problem. The way in which the liquor monopoly was walled round us was simply astounding; and when the people of England realised that the monopoly meant bad liquor and dear liquor, they would rise up against it. The liquor was not half as good as it should be, and was not served in the manner in which it should be served

  947
  Would any hon. Member venture to state; that the present position of the licensing question was satisfactory? He asked the Home Secretary to hold his hand, because the particular portion of the field which was now left might offer them a chance of effecting an improvement, or of trying some great principle of licensing. They were asked to give; that up to a body which both the Majority and Minority Reports, and everyone who knew anything of the system, regarded as unsatisfactory. He was not a magistrate himself, but from his boyhood he had seen the working of the magisterial system in reward to licensing questions; and he said that the system was unjust, and often disgraceful. Men were put on the Bench because they were teetotalers or because they; belonged to the trade; and they were whipped up to support or oppose a licence, not on its merits, but because they were committed to one side or the other. Yet it was to such a tribunal, which was admittedly unsatisfactory, and which was often absurd and unjust, that it was proposed to hand over the remaining bit of freedom in the trade they had got. That was a serious step. Why was that bit of freedom reserved by Mr. Gladstone? It was not an experiment; and it was successful in doing what Mr. Gladstone claimed for it, namely, that it would improve the quality of the liquor sold in public houses enormously. There were now 10,000 grocers' licences, but a great many were merely wine merchants' licences. The right hon. Gentleman did not propose to interfere with wine merchants' licences, and he wished to remind the House of the absurdity of that. If a man sold liquor, and nothing but liquor, he was let off; but if, in addition, he
  948
  sold bread, and candles, and groceries, he was to be fined. He wished the House to understand the practical working of the proposal. It required a town of between 30,000 and 40,000 inhabitants to keep a wine merchant going. Therefore, apart from the largo towns, if the clause were passed, the people would be driven into the public houses for their liquor. Was it wise to compel the people to go to a public house when they wanted a bottle of wine or spirits I Mr. Gladstone proposed his system because he said it would be a good thing if people were able to get liquor without having to go to a public house; yet it was now proposed by the Government that the people, except in the large towns, would be compelled to go to the public houses; and even in the large towns the wine merchants were merely the dependencies of the public houses. Again, he would remind his temperance friends that it would be better for temperance and for Sunday closing if people could be encouraged, under responsible conditions, to buy their liquor in bottle. There was no licensing arrangement which in forty years had produced so few scandals as the grocers' licences. There might be a case of abuse here and there, but was there any licensing arrangement which had worked so well during forty years. He, therefore, asked the Home Secretary to hesitate before he took that step. They should also consider the great difficulty of adding 10,000 more licences, all of which would probably have to be compensated in the ultimate settlement, which would be sought, not in popular veto, but in popular control. Why had the Home Secretary not seized upon the 30,000 beer licences which were granted before 1830. He dropped them because he found they were a monopoly, and

  949
  that they would be extremely difficult to handle, He had no party feeling in the matter. He had no feeling for or against drink; but he felt it was a very grave problem, and that the House should be left as free a hand as possible. He, therefore, appealed to hon. Members to support the omission to the clause which was a stranger and an alien. Nothing else in the Bill would be affected, and no harm would be done. If these licences were handed over to the magistrates the control of the House over them would be gone, and could only be recovered after serious difficulty and at enormous expense. He earnestly begged the Home Secretary to consider the question of withdrawing the clause.
  Amendment proposed:—
  In page 4, line 21, leave out Clause 9.—(Mr. Harwood.)
  Question proposed, "That the words of the Clause to the end of line 25 stand part of the Bill."
  MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid he desired to strongly support the Amendment. He was quite unable to understand why the Home Secretary had brought the clause into the Bill. As his hon. friend had just said, it was an alien, and, certainly, not calculated to facilitate the progress of the measure. He did not know of any question regarding which more ridiculous proposals were made, or on which such profound ignorance of the impulses and springs of human action prevailed than on the question of the liquor traffic. He maintained that the grocers' licence was a great preservative against drunken-
  950
  ness. It kept people from the public house, and, at the same time, gave them that supply of drink to which they were quite entitled, if they desired it. Under the Bill wholesale wine merchants and wholesale spirit merchants were practically excluded from all control except that of the Inland Revenue. He thought that was quite right. His hon. friend the Member for the Spen Valley Division proposed that the wholesale wine and spirit merchants should be subjected to the control of the justices. What would happen? Any person who wanted to order a dozen bottles of champagne from his family merchant might one day find that that merchant had been disestablished and disendowed by some chance meeting of magistrates. That was a perfectly absurd proposal. The wholesale wine merchant was the wine merchant of the rich, the grocer was the wine merchant of the poor; and, therefore, the clause had the worst of all stigmas because it was class legislation. It did not interfere with the wholesale wine merchant, but did interfere with the grocer who sold a single bottle of spirits or wine to households in the lower middle class in the country. That was a temperate class. It was more temperate than the very poor, and more temperate than the rich. It was a class moderate in its demands, and decent and sober in its habits; yet it was that class that was going to be attacked. He had examined the question of drunkenness as a philosopher. [An HON. MEMBER laughed.] He did not know whether his hon. friend meant that he was speaking as an expert on the subject. He did not profess to speak as an expert; but he had examined the question apart from the shibboleths of Party politics, and the

  951
  idea that the habits of the people could he changed in a day, or a year, or a generation, by coercive means. His opinion was that a great deal of drunkenness was the result of false good fellowship. Men went into a public house; one man stood a drink, and it was considered a part of good fellowship, decent feeling, and even good manners that his friends should return the compliment. Therefore, people in a public house were subjected, not merely to the temptation of an appetite for drink, but to the more subtle temptation of false good fellowship. All that could be avoided by the grocer's licence. A man who wanted liquor got it in either of two ways. He got it either from the public house (though it was not as good there as at the grocer's, or at the grocer's. If a man went into a public house he was liable to stop, and if he stopped he would be liable to lapse into taking more drink than he cared for. If he went to the grocer's, he could bring home his bottle of whiskey and drink it with his wife. [An HON. MEMBER; Oh!] He did not see any harm in a man taking a drop of whisky with his wife. He would prefer him to take it with his wife than with any other lady. He took as much as he wanted under the supervision of the domestic deities, and was less liable to take as much as he would in a public house. One of the reasons given for interfering with grocers' licences was that they increased drunkenness among women. There were, of course, women who got liquor in grocers' shops which appeared as tea; but there were also women who drank chloral at chemists', and women who got drunk at confectioners', where they went to purchase jam tarts and oyster patties. The fact was, that a woman who had a
  952
  craving for drink would get it no matter what obstacles were placed in her way.
  It being midnight, further proceeding on consideration, as amended (by the Standing Committee) stood adjourned till Thursday.

  LABOUR BUREAUX (LONDON) BILL COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read. Objection being taken.
  MR. LOUGHsaid he hoped the hon. Member would with draw his objection as the Bill had the approval of the Government, and was entirely non-contentious.
  MR. CREMERsaid he too hoped that the hon. Member's objection would not be persisted in. The Bill was not a Party measure.
  Bill considered in Committee and reported; as amended, to be considered upon Tuesday next.

  MEAT MARKING (IRELAND) BILL.
  Order for Committee Read, and discharged:—Bill Committed to the Standing Committee on Trade, &c.
  ICE CREAM SHOPS (SCOTLAND) (No. 2) BILL.
  Read a second time, and committed for Thursday.

  PUBLIC LIBRARIES (IRELAND) BILL.
  Read a second time, and committed for Tomorrow.
  Adjourned at ten minutes after Twelve o'clock.