Commons Sitting of 11 February 1904

Preamble
The House met at Two of the Clock.
UNOPPOSED PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.

  PRIVATE BILLS (STANDING ORDER 62 COMPLIED WITH).
  Mr. SPEAKER Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of
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  Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the case of the following Bills, referred on the First Reading thereof, Standing Order No. 62 has been complied with, viz.:—Colney Hatch Gas Bill; London, Tilbury, and Southend Railway Bill; Rickmansworth and Uxbridge Valley Water Bill. Ordered, That the Bills be read a second time.

  PRIVATE BILLS (STANDING ORDER 63 COMPLIED WITH).
  Mr. SPEAKER Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the case of the following Bill, referred on the First Reading thereof, Standing Order No. 63 has been complied with, viz.:—Chippenham Gas Bill. Ordered, That the Bill be read a second time.
  East London and Lower Thames Electric Power Bill; North and South Woolwich Electric Railway Bill. Read a second time, and committed.
  Dumbarton Tramways Order Confirmation Bill. Considered; to be read the third time upon Monday next.

PETITIONS.
  LICENCES (RENEWAL).
  Petitions against alteration of law: from Bulwell; Frome; Bradford (two); Swansea (three); Earlestown; Padgate; Golborne; Haydock; Wigan; Isle of Wight; Newport; Ashton in Makerfield (two); Dawlish; Exeter; Leicester; Wigston; Chester; Manchester (six); Osmotherley; Morehampstead; Stockport; Cynfal; Oakengates; Llandudno; Maenan; Llanddeiniolen; Heckmondwike; Clayton West; Llangyndeyme; Bryn; Southport (seven); Skelmanthorpe; Lowton and Newton; Fowlmere; Nottingham (three); Ilfracombe; Fishtoft; Anglesey; Llandensant; Llanfairneubwll Valley; Gaerwen; Cemaes Bay; Dwyran; Brixton; Llangwyllog; Holyhead; Beaumauris; Cardiff (five); Ilkley; Rusholme; Earlestown; Warrington; St. Just in Penwith; Glossop; Salford; South Ferriby; Ashby (two); Donington Barracks; West Felton; Fairfield; Ilkeston; Colne; Dewsbury; Durham; Jarrow; Birks Morley; Boldon Colliery; Rogerstone; Liverpool; Keswick; and Nelson (three); to lie upon the Table.
  SEA FISHERIES REGULATIONS ACT, 1888.
  Paper [presented 10th February] to be printed. [No. 46.]
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  POOR PRISONERS' DEFENCE ACT, 1903.
  Copy presented, of Draft of Rules proposed to be made by the Attorney-General, with the approval of the Lord Chancellor and the Secretary of State for the Home Department, in pursuance of Section 2 of The Poor Prisoners' Defence Act, 1903 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  PENAL SERVITUDE ACTS (CON- DITIONAL LICENCE).
  Copy presented, of a Licence to be at large, granted to Florence Elizabeth Maybrick, to which is annexed a condition other than those contained in Schedule A of The Penal Servitude Act, 1864 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  Copy presented, of Reports of the Transvaal Labour Commission [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  TRANSVAAL.
  Copy presented, of Reports of the Transvaal Labour Commission, Minutes of Proceedings, and Evidence [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  AFRICA (No. 1, 1904).
  Copy presented, of Correspondence and Report from His Majesty's Consul at Boma respecting the Administration of the Independent State of the Congo [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  ARMY (SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1903–4).
  Estimate presented, of the Further Amount that will be required during the year ending 31st March, 1904, to meet the Expenditure in excess of that provided for in the original Army Estimates for the year, for the Pay, Transport, Supplies, etc., of the Army [by Command]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CIRCULATED WITH THE VOTES.

    Portuguese Tariff Bill and Lancashire Cotton Trade.
    MR. WHITE RIDLEY (Stalybridge): To ask the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been called to the Tariff Bill now being introduced by the Government of Portugal, which proposes largely to increase the import duties on cotton and mercerised goods; and whether, in view of the importance of this question to Lancashire exporters, the British Government have any means, by commercial treaty or otherwise, of bringing pressure to bear on the Portuguese Government with a view of modifying the proposed tariff.
    (Answered by Mr. Gerald Balfour.) My attention has been directed to the Portuguese Tariff Bill referred to by my hon. friend. At present no commercial treaty exists between this country and Portugal, but the matter has been the subject of representations to the Portuguese Government.

    Conference in Egypt on Cotton and Bourse Gambling.
    MR. FIELD: To ask the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to a conference consisting of the representatives of seventeen Governments assembled in Egypt to consider cotton and Bourse gambling in that country; and, if so, will he say whether he can arrange that reports of the proceedings will be furnished to the House.
    (Answered by Mr. Gerald Balfour.) I am aware that the organisation of the Egyptian courts (which is reconsidered once in five years) is under discussion by a mixed Commission, and that one of the subjects proposed for consideration by the Commission was legislation on futures. When the Commission has concluded its deliberations, His Majesty's Government will ascertain from the Khedivial Government how far any portion of its Report referring to this subject can be published.

    Future and Option Gambling in Canada.
    MR. FIELD: To ask the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the Criminal Code of 1892 of Canada imposed five years imprisonment and 500 dollars fine on persons making bargains in fictitious goods, wares, or merchandise in Canada or elsewhere with the intent to make gain or profit by the rise or fall in prices, and that this Act received the assent of the Governor-General in 1892, while the despatch leaving the code to its operation was dated March, 1903, and was signed by Lord Ripon; and whether he can explain the omission regarding this legislation from the Blue-book recently issued on the subject of future and option gambling.
    (Answered by Mr. Gerald Balfour.) The Blue-book includes on page 10 the full text of the Minute of the Canadian Privy Council, furnished in reply to the despatch addressed to the Canadian Government at the instance of the hon. Member, as to the nature and effect of any legislation in force in Canada prohibiting or restricting gambling in option and future contracts as regards foodstuffs. I can only assume that the brevity of the reference to Sections 201 and 202 of the Criminal Code arises from the fact that, as stated in the Minute, no prosecutions have ever been instituted under these sections.

    Import Duty collected on Wheat, etc., from British India.
    CAPTAIN SINCLAIR: To ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will state approximately the amount of corn duties collected on wheat, rice, and other grain from British India during the period while the recent registration charge of 1s. per quarter was in force.
    (Answered by Mr. Austen Chamberlain.) The approximate amount of duty paid on corn and grain imported from British India during the time the corn and grain duties were in force was £201,000. Of this amount £128,000 was paid on account of wheat, £52,000 on account of rice, £20,000 on other grain, and £1,000 on farinaceous substances.

    Learners in the Cork Post Office.
    ME. J. F. X. O'BRIEN: To ask the Postmaster-General why male telegraph learners in the Cork Office, who have recently qualified, are still on half-pay, and are compelled to perform two hours work per day in the sorting office without remuneration, on the ground that they are learning their duties.
    (Answered by Lord Stanley.) I am making inquiry on the subject, and I will communicate the result to the hon. Member.

    Contracts for Coal Supply to Enniscorthy Post Office.
    SIR THOMAS ESMONDE (Wexford, N.): To ask the Postmaster-General if his attention has been called to the matter of the contracts for the supply of coal to the Enniscorthy Post Office; and if he will call for the correspondence which has passed in the case between Messrs. Donohoe, Limited, and the postal authorities.
    (Answered by Lord Stanley.) My attention has not been called to the question of the supply of coal to Enniscorthy Post Office, but I will make inquiry on the subject and communicate the result to the hon. Member.

    Carriage of Mails between Limerick and Tralee.
    MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY (Limerick, W.): To ask the Postmaster-General if he will state why the mails are not now carried by the Great Southern and Western Railway Company between Limerick and Tralee.
    (Answered by Lord Stanley.) The Limerick and Tralee Railway is used for some of the mails for the district it serves; but the remainder are now sent by road because the railway company refused, some time ago, to continue to run trains at hours suitable for them except for a payment far beyond what would be justified for the service.

    Betting Legislation.
    MR. CHANNING (Northamptonshire, E.): To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he will

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    consider the advisability of introducing a Bill in the present session to deal with betting.
    (Answered by Mr. Secretary Akers Douglas.) I can only say that the Government have not found it possible to include this subject in their programme of legislation for the present session. At the same time, if a Bill dealing with street betting on the lines of the provisions recently obtained by several local authorities in their Private Acts were introduced by any hon. Member, it would, I think, deserve the favourable consideration of Parliament.

    Record of Cancer Cases in India.
    MR. WEIR: To ask the Secretary of State for India whether the Government of India have yet arranged to have cases of cancer recorded separately in dispensary and hospital returns.
    (Answered by Mr. Secretary Brodrick.) The revised returns provide a separate column for cancer cases, but I cannot say if they have actually been brought into operation. The Government of India have the matter in hand.

    Practical Cookery Instruction in Irish National Schools.
    MR. KENNEDY (Westmeath, N.): To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that the managers of a number of national schools in Ireland have provided cooking stoves and other appliances to give effect to the programme for instruction for cookery, particularly those for girls in the higher standards, prescribed by the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland for the present financial year; that in the notes to teachers issued by the Commissioners in November, 1902, it was intimated that instruction by practice in the simple forms of food preparation would be continued for some years; and, whether, seeing that the Commissioners have eliminated from their programme for the coming year practical instruction for cookery, particularly in the higher standards, except for convent schools, and in view of the expense that has been incurred, the Commissioners will apply the new programme for cookery in fifth and
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    higher standards to all rural schools so equipped where the manager applies for same, on the ground that the arrangements for instruction in cookery by itinerant instructors are insufficient.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) I am informed by the Board of National Education that provision for instruction in domestic economy in national schools is at present the subject of communication between the Board and the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction. It is not practicable, therefore, at present to add anything to the statement made in the introduction to the new programme. Cases, however, like that referred to in the Question will have the, fullest consideration.

    Audit of Belfast County Borough Accounts.
    MR. SLOAN (Belfast, S.): To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can explain why, in the reports made by the Local Government Board auditor on the Corporation accounts of the Belfast County Borough for the year ending 31st March, 1903, no reference has been made by the auditor to a series of complaints made to him; and will he give facilities to have an audit made by a competent firm of auditing accountants who would accept the responsibility of auditors.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) The auditor referred, in his report, to the representations made to him in respect to the question of rent to be paid by several trading undertakings and the excessive allowance for deputation expenses. Most of the objections were in the nature of criticism of the administration by the council of matters which were within its discretion and in which the auditor has no authority to intervene. The Board has perfect confidence in the auditor and is satisfied there are no grounds for superseding him as suggested.

    Dublin Metropolitan Police—Retention on Active List of Superintendents Narrisey and Dempsey.
    MR. SLOAN: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if

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    he will state why Superintendents Narrisey and Dempsey of the Dublin Metropolitan Police are retained on the active list, they being eligible for retirement on pension.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) There is no fixed period for the retirement on pension of members of the Dublin Metropolitan Police. They are permitted to remain in the service so long as they discharge their public duty with efficiency and to the satisfaction of their superior officers.

    Erection of Technical Schools in Ireland.
    MR. FIELD: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is prepared to state what the Government intend doing with respect to the provisions of a building fund for the erection of suitable technical schools in Ireland; and whether it is intended to continue the equivalent grant upon the original terms, as understood by the local authorities who levied a rate, to aid in supporting technical schools within their rateable area.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) I discussed these matters with the deputation that waited on me in Dublin on the 18th January, and have no further statement to make at present.

    Resolutions of Asylum Committees.
    MR. FIELD: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he has received a copy of resolutions adopted by the Conference of Asylum Committees at a meeting held in Richmond Asylum on the 25th and 26th November last; and, if so, will he state whether he proposes to deal with the points raised.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham) The resolutions propose (1) an increase of the present capitation grant of 4s. per week in respect of the maintenance of each pauper lunatic; (2) an extension of the period for, and alteration of the conditions upon, which loans are made for asylum purposes; (3) the establishment of a central laboratory in connection with asylums; (4) the introduction of a system of boarding-out of persons of unsound
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    mind; (5) the assimilation of the capitation grant payable in the case of patients maintained in auxiliary asylums established under Section 76 (1) of the Local Government Act, 1898, to that payable for patients in district asylums. In respect to (1), the amount of the grant in Ireland is the same as that payable in England and Scotland, and a proposal to increase it could only be considered in its application to the United Kingdom as a whole. Legislation would be necessary to give effect to the recommendations at (2), (4), and (5), and I am unable to undertake that such will be introduced during the present session. There are no funds available at present for the establishment of a central laboratory (3).

    Marine Works in Connemara.
    MR. O'MALLEY: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he will explain why the Marine Works Act of last year is not put into operation in Connemara; if he will state when the proposed works under the Act for Cleggan, Clifden, and Roundstone, in Connemara, are likely to commence; and whether, in view of the approach of the fishing season in these districts, steps will be taken to execute the proposed works at the earliest day.
    (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) With respect to the proposed works at Cleggan and Roundstone the Government has not yet received from the County Council the memorial and resolution prescribed under the Act. Forms for this purpose were communicated to the council early in August last. With regard to Clifden negotiations are still in progress.

    Construction of Military Maps.
    LIEUT.-COLONEL TUFNELL (Essex, S. E.): To ask the Secretary of State for War whether the map made of the country north of Ladysmith on a scale of four miles to an inch in 1896 has been continued southwards as recommended by the Director of Military Intelligence; and whether, in view of the want of funds for the provision of maps for military purposes during the late war, any additional funds are now available to enable the Intelligence Department to perform their duties satisfactorily.

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    (Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) Arrangements are now in progress for surveying the whole of British territory south of the Zambesi on a scale suitable for military purposes provided the co-operation of all the Colonial Governments can be secured. The whole question of increasing facilities for map preparation by the Intelligence Department is now receiving careful consideration.

    Construction of Railway Embankment between Chiromo and Blantyre.
    MR. WEIR: To ask the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that large quantity of the material used in the construction of the embankment of the railway between Chiromo and Blantyre was taken from the banks of the Shiré river, and that, owing to the nature of the material many miles of the embankment were washed away during the wet season; and, if so, will he state if the construction of the railway is under contract; and if so, at how much per mile.
    (Answered by Earl Percy.) I am not aware of the facts alluded to by the hon. Member. The conditions under which the railway in question is being constructed were explained in Africa No. 9 of 1903 (p. 3).

    Chinese Government and the Transvaal Labour Ordinance.
    MR. BUCHANAN (Perthshire, E.): To ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies what steps have been taken by him to ascertain the views of the Chinese Government on the regulations with regard to the proposed introduction of indentured Chinese labour into the Transvaal, which, in the despatch of 16th January, he stated His Majesty's Government considered to be necessary before sanctioning the Ordinance.
    (Answered by Earl Percy.) His Majesty's Government are in communication with the Chinese Minister in London on the subject.

  QUESTIONS IN THE HOUSE.

    War Office Intelligence Department
    DR. MACNAMARA (Camberwell, N.): I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War what recognition, if any, has been accorded to Sir John Ardagh, Major Altham, and the other officers of the Intelligence Division, for the preparation during the years 1896–1899 of memoranda, and the summarisation of these memoranda in the Handbook of Military Notes in June, 1899, of information which, according to the Report of the Royal Commission on the War in South Africa, gave a correct impression of the numerical strength, armament, and plans of the Boers.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. ARNOLD-FORSTER,): It is not customary to reward officers for faithful performance of the ordinary duties which appertain to their respective offices; and the preparation of the information alluded to forms part of the ordinary office work of the Intelligence Department. Sir John Ardagh was made a K.C.M.G. after his retirement in 1902, and Colonel Altham has been promoted to a substantive colonelcy.

    South African Reservists—Rifle-sights.
    DR. MACNAMARA: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War if he can explain how it was that every Lee-Enfield rifle placed in the hands of each of the 25,000 Reservists who were sent to South Africa in the winter of 1899 was so sighted that the rifle shot eighteen inches to the right at 500 yards; and what steps have been taken to prevent the recurrence of such an error.
    MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: As regards the first part of the Question will the hon. Member kindly refer to the ample information given on this subject by my right hon. friend the Chief Secretary, during the debate on the Queen's Speech of 1st February, 1900.† I may, however, point out that the error of the position of the sight was only 3/100 of an inch. As regards future action a more stringent
    †See (4) Debates, lxxviii., 340.

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    system of inspection of the sighting of rifles has been adopted so as to guard against a recurrence of this error.

    Military Armaments, Stores, etc—Precautions against Deficiencies.
    DR. MACNAMARA: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War if he can explain why, at the outbreak of the Boer War, there was the deficiency in armaments, reserves of guns, ammunition, stores, and clothing, and in regard to the power of output of material of war in emergency, described in Sir Henry Brackenbury's Minute of 15th December, 1899, and what steps have been taken to render this state of affairs impossible in the future.
    MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: I am afraid that it is not possible within the limits of a reply to a Question to give an answer to the first part of this Question, but if the hon. Member will kindly refer to Paragraph 55 of the Report of the Royal Commission he will find considerable information on the subject. As regards the second part of the Question, the provision of the guns, stores, clothing, etc., recommended by the Mowatt Committee is being carried out; and will practically be completed by the middle of 1904. To guard against a recurrence of deficiencies of stores it has been decided that the reserves shall be permanently maintained, and that any guns, ammunition, stores, or clothing withdrawn for service shall be immediately and automatically replaced.

    Galway Harbour—Naval Visits
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether he can state the number of His Majesty's cruisers visiting Galway Harbour during the past twelve months; and whether the harbour was visited during the year by foreign cruisers.
    THE SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. PRETYMAN,): His Majesty's cruisers "Good Hope," "Drake," "Hogue," "Sutlej," and four destroyers were at Galway on 30th July, 1903, during His Majesty's visit to Ireland; and His Majesty's cruiser "Hawke" visited Galway in May, 1903. H.M.
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    Gunboat "Skipjack" also visited Oranmore, near Galway, in December, 1903. The only foreign war vessel that has been reported as visiting Galway since the 1st January, 1903, is the French first class protected cruiser "Guichen," which was sent to search for the missing French transport "La Vienne" on the West-Coast of Ireland. She put in at Galway on the 23rd January last, and left that port on the 25th of the same month.
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: Are we to understand that the Admiralty consider this harbour perfectly safe?
    [No answer was returned].

    Proposed Coaling Station in South Wales.
    MR. OSMOND WILLIAMS. I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether His Majesty's Government will consider the advisability of accepting the offer of a port in South Wales as a Government coaling station and store depôt, which port lies within some nine or ten miles of a number of collieries upon the Admiralty list, and was offered at a rate which would practically render it self-supporting, and at which arrangements could be made for the storage of 300,000 to 500,000 tons of smokeless South Wales coal, which could be loaded at all times without dislocation of trade in South Wales or the payment of any emergency prices.
    MR. PRETYMAN: It is not considered desirable to accept the offer, as no circumstances, in the opinion of the Admiralty, are likely to arise that would render such a course necessary, nor is it desirable to store a large quantity of coal in South Wales, as it is of importance that coal shipped for the naval service should be fresh wrought.

    British Indians and Transvaal Draft Ordinance.
    MR. BUCHANAN (Perthshire, E.): I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether the Government of India has given its assent to Clause 34 of the Transvaal Draft Ordinance, by which Clauses 22 to 28, dealing with the return of labourers to their country of origin, shall apply to British Indians.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Mr.BRODRICK,): The Government of India has not been consulted as to any clause of the Transvaal Draft Ordinance, nor is its assent necessary; but, subject to the authority of the Secretary of State in Council, it controls the exportation of labourers from India, and its action will of course depend on the state of the law on the subject in the Transvaal, as well as on other considerations. I may add that the clause to which this Question refers is intended to have only a temporary effect, pending the passing of special legislation on the subject of Indian labour.
    MR. BUCHANAN: Has the Secretary of State for India given his assent to these clauses in the Transvaal Ordinance?
    MR. BRODRICK: No, Sir, I have given no assent to any ordinance at present.

    Transvaal Labour Ordinance—Transfer of Importers' Rights.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies, with reference to the Transvaal Labour Ordinance, if he can explain why the provision requiring the assent of the labourer to any assignment of the importer's rights has been withdrawn, whether the effect of the Ordinance as amended is that the rights to the services of the labourer may be assigned without his consent; and whether he proposes to ask the approval of Parliament to this part of the proposed legislation.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. LYTTELTON,): Under Section 11 of the Ordinance, transfers can only be made with the sanction of the Lieutenant-Governor and under regulations to be made by him, and due notice of transfers is to be given to the Superintendent of Labourers. It appears to me that these provisions enable the Lieutenant-Governor to take any steps which circumstances may render necessary in regard to the assent of the labourer to any proposed transfer. I do not propose to ask the approval of Parliament to this colonial legislation. The disallowance of such legislation is vested in the Crown
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    acting on the advice of the Secretary of State, and if, after the discussion on the general question of the introduction of Asiatic labour, I should feel it my duty to advise His Majesty not to exercise his power of disallowance, Parliament will have the usual opportunities of criticising my action.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSONasked whether the regulations to be made would contain a provision requiring the assent of the labourer to his being transferred?
    MR. LYTTELTON: I cannot answer that at present.
    DR. MACNAMARA: Under the Ordinance as it now stands, is the assent of the labourer necessary for his transfer to a new employer?
    MR. LYTTELTON: I have answered that Question.
    MR. FLYNN (Cork, N.): Would it be possible under the Ordinance for the right of transfer of these Asiatic labourers to be put up to public auction?
    MR. SPEAKER: Order, order. The Ordinance cannot be debated on this Question.

    Chinese Labour—Regulations for Recruiting.
    MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the recruiting of labour in China for the Transvaal will be carried on by persons responsible to British authority, and how, and by whom, appointed; and what steps will be taken under British authority to ensure that before the labourers leave China they are made fully aware of the wages they are to be paid and the very special restrictions under which their labour is to be performed.
    MR. LYTTELTON: The hon. Member will see that Clause 6 of the Ordinance (Cd. 1898) provides that no person shall introduce labourers into the Transvaal except under licence from the Lieutenant-Governor, and I am in communication with Lord Milner as to the manner in which he proposes to secure, under the licensing clause and regulations,

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    control in the matters referred to by the hon. Member and others, connected with the recruiting of these labourers.
    MR. JOHN ELLIS: Shall we have the reply of Lord Milner before we debate the subject?
    MR. LYTTELTON: I do not know, Sir.
    MR. BUCHANAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman furnish us either with a summary of the debates in the Legislative Council or Lord Milner's reasons for the enormous number of alterations in the Ordinance which have been made during the past week before the House is asked to come to a decision on the question?
    MR. LYTTELTON: The Blue-book contains a full report of the most important stage in the passing of the Ordinance.
    MR. BUCHANAN: In a recent Paper it is shown that there are five pages of Amendments telegraphed by Lord Milner, and no reason is given for any of these substantial Amendments.
    MR. LYTTELTON: The earlier stages are set forth in full in the Blue-book for the convenience and study of hon. Members. I cannot give any undertaking that the reports of the proceedings which caused these Amendments should be placed on the Table of the House before the debate.
    MR. J. A. PEASE: But cannot the House see the reasons for the alterations which have been made during the past week?
    MR. LYTTELTON: No, Sir.
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I understand that some of the alterations are of considerable moment. There must have been some despatch from Lord Milner to the Secretary of State explaining the Amendments and giving the reasons why they have been adopted. I do not see how the House can debate the question effectively until it has before it the reasons for accepting
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    these Amendments. Can the right hon. Gentleman lay on the Table of the House the despatch of Lord Milner dealing with the Amendments?
    MR. LYTTELTON: I will undertake to lay before the House any Papers dealing with the subject whenever they come before me.
    DR. MACNAMARA: Then can we have the debate delayed until we have the full information? I should like an answer to that Question.
    [No answer was returned.]

    Chinese Government and the Transvaal Labour Ordinance.
    MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies what steps have been taken by him to ascertain the views of the Chinese Government on the regulations with regard to the proposed introduction of indentured Chinese labour into the Transvaal, which in the despatch of 16th January he stated His Majesty's Government considered to be necessary before sanctioning the Ordinance.
    THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Earl PERCY, Kensington, S.): His Majesty's Government are in communication with the Chinese Minister in London on the subject.
    MR. BUCHANAN: May I ask whether, in view of the statement of the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs and the promise in the despatch of 16th January, the House will not be asked to express its approval of the Ordinance until it learns whether the Chinese Government has given its assent to these provisions, which the Secretary for the Colonies asserted was considered necessary by the Government.
    MR. LYTTELTON: I have dealt fully with these points in answer to Questions put to me by the Leader of the Opposition and other hon. Members. [Cries of "No"]

    Transvaal Mines—Convict Labour
    MR. WHITLEY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he is aware that at a

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    meeting of the Chamber of Mines, held in Johannesburg on 19th November last, a letter was read from the Transvaal Government offering 1,000 more native convicts for the mines; and, if so, will he state whether this offer was accepted, what is the total number of convicts so employed, what is the nature of the offences for which they have been convicted, and on what terms are they supplied to the mines.
    MR. LYTTELTON: I have cabled to make the inquiry, but as yet have received no reply.
    MR. WHITLEY: I will put it down again for Monday.

    Labour Laws in Australia.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies, with reference to the imprisonment and deportation of British workmen landing in Australia under a contract of labour, why neither the Governor-General nor the Imperial Government made any use of the powers conferred upon them for the protection of British interests by the Commonwealth Act; and whether he will give an undertaking that in future Colonial legislation injuriously affecting the inhabitants of the United Kingdom will be brought to the notice of Parliament before it is assented to by the representatives of the Crown.
    MR. LYTTELTON: Cases of British workmen landing in Australia under contract of labour, other than those specially exempted under the provisions of the Australian Immigration Act, are so few that His Majesty's Government would not have been justified in refusing to sanction an important measure of legislation passed by the Commonwealth Parliament on that account. The measure has been in force for more than two years and not a single case of any British workman having been finally refused permission to land has been brought to notice. It would be impossible to give any general undertaking of the nature referred to.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: Did the Governor-General use his power of sending the Bill back for amendment?
    MR. LYTTELTON: No, Sir.

    Land Settlement in the Transvaal.
    MR. JOHN ELLIS: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will say what sum has been spent on the scheme of land settlement in the Transvaal; how many settlers are in actual occupation of holdings; what is the total acreage so allocated; and how much is in arable cultivation.
    MR. LYTTELTON: The latest information I possess on this subject is dated the 30th June last, and does not give several of the particulars asked for by the hon. Member. I am making inquiry as to the present position and for a Return as to these details.

    Trinidad Disturbances.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Chief Justice of British Guiana, who was deputed to inquire into the conduct of the police on the occasion of the disturbances at Port of Spain, Trinidad, in connection with the Water Ordinance, has yet furnished his Report; and, if so, will he state whether it is proposed to grant compensation to the relatives of those who lost their lives.
    MR. LYTTELTON: The answer to the first part of the Question is yes; to the second part, no.

    Maltese Council Election.
    MR. BOLAND (Kerry, S.): I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he will lay upon the Table of the House the text of the Bill introduced in the Council of Malta on 3rd February, purporting to amend the law relating to the election of members of the Council; and whether, in view of the fact that on the same day notice was given that a new general election will shortly be held, he will now publish the correspondence that has taken place.
    MR. LYTTELTON: I am not aware that a Bill was introduced in the Malta Council of Government on the 3rd of February for the purpose stated in the Question. I do not consider that any useful purpose would be served by

    1027
    publishing the correspondence in question at present, and I do not propose to do so.

    Railway Embankment between Chiromo and Blantyre.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that a large quantity of the material used in the construction of the embankment of the railway between Chiromo and Blantyre was taken from the banks of the Shiré river, and that, owing to the nature of the material many miles of the embankment were washed away during the wet season; and, if so, will he state if the construction of the railway is under contract, and at how much per mile.
    EARL PERCY: I am not aware of the facts alluded to by the hon. Member. The conditions under which the railway in question is being constructed were explained in Africa No. 9 of 1903. (p. 3.)
    MR. WEIR: It was the case not many months ago.

    Shipping Profits.
    MR. RUNCIMAN: I bog to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will state what were the total amounts of profits on shipping undertakings in the United Kingdom assessed for income tax in 1899–1900,1900–1901, 1901–2, and 1902–3, respectively.
    THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN, Worcestershire, E.): I am afraid that it is impossible for me to give the figures asked for. No such classification exists, and I am advised that any attempt to compile one would involve a great deal of trouble and that the results when obtained would not be accurate.
    MR. RUNCIMAN: Would it not be possible to classify the profits of shipping undertakings in the same way as is done with iron works?
    MR. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir I am advised it is not possible to separate the profits on shipping undertakings from those of other undertakings carried on by the same people.

    Merchandise Marks Act-Fraudulent Whiskey.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the hon. Member for Huntingdonshire, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he has received a copy of a resolution passed at a recent meeting of the Wester Ross Farmers' Club, urging the Government to take measures to stop the practice of describing and selling, as malt whiskey, blends of malt with raw grain or German spirits; and, if so, will he state what action it is proposed to take in the matter.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,): I have been requested by my noble friend the President of the Board of Agriculture to reply to this Question. I have not seen a copy of the resolution referred to by the hon. Member, but if a complaint that a breach of the Merchandise Marks Acts has been committed, in a specific case, is submitted to me, in accordance with the regulations made under Section 2 of the Merchandise Marks Acts, 1891, I will give it my careful consideration.
    MR. WEIR: Shall I send the right hon. Gentleman a copy of the resolution in order that he may make inquiries if raw grain or German spirit is sold as malt whiskey?
    MR. GERALD BALFOUR: I will give instructions that the hon. Member shall have a copy of the regulations dealing with this matter.

    Preferential Rates for Foreign Produce.
    MR. FIELD (Dublin, St. Patrick): I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether, in view of the fact that preferential rates are allowed by railway companies to foreign and colonial importers, he will cause inquiry to be made into the matter, and report the result to the House with a view to insure equality of treatment to all consignors.
    MR. GERALD BALFOUR: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given him to a similar Question on the 18th June last. The Board of Trade are prepared to investigate any specific complaints
    †See (4) Debates, cxxiii., 1314.

    1029
    that the law is being infringed as suggested, but they are still without evidence warranting a general inquiry.

    Canadian Mail Routes
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that the Canadian Government have appointed a Royal Commission to deal with the subject of transportation; that at the sitting of the Commission held in Sydney, Nova Scotia, during the third week of January last, evidence was produced that a 23-knot steamer could make the passage from Galway to Sydney in three days and fourteen hours; and that an experiment is to be made by means of a fast steamer during the coming summer, between Galway and Sydney or Halifax, with the view of obtaining information as to the best routes for the conveyance of His Majesty's mails over ocean; and, if so, will he state what contracts now exist, with whom and for what period of time, for the conveyance of His Majesty's mails between Great Britain and Ireland and Canada.
    THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. VICTOR CAVENDISH, Derbyshire, W.)—for Lord STANLEY: My right hon. friend has no information of any Commission appointed by the Canadian Government for the purpose to which the hon. Member refers, nor of any experiments to be made during next summer. The only contract which provides for a direct mail service between Great Britain, Ireland and Canada is one made by the Canadian Government with the Allan Line. He believes it has recently been decided to renew that contract for two years from August, 1904.

    Avoch Harbour.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland if he will state what sum the Fishery Board for Scotland propose to provide in aid of the construction of a harbour at Avoch, Ross-shire.
    THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. A. GRAHAM MURRAY,): I understand that the Fishery Board have intimated to the Avoch Harbour Trustees
    1030
    that all harbour funds at their disposal have been allocated, but that they are willing to consider an application from the Avoch Harbour Trustees if it is renewed in April next.

    Scottish Crofters' Act, 1886.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland if he will consider the expediency of introducing legislation to extend the benefits of The Crofters' Act, 1886, to small tenants holding under lease in the crofting counties at the time the Act came into force.
    MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: I am unable to make any promise of introducing legislation as suggested by the hon. Member.

    Bee Keeping in Ireland.
    MR. BOLAND: I beg to ask Mr. Attorney-General for Ireland whether he is aware that the instructions issued by the Department of Agriculture with respect to bee-keeping do not deal with the compulsory destruction of stocks infected with the disease of foul brood; and, if so, whether, in view of the fact that the honey produced in Ireland during the last year, for which statistics are available was 27 per cent. less than the preceding year the Department will favourably consider further representations with regard to the stamping out of this disease.
    THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. ATKINSON, Londonderry, N.): There is no power of compulsory destruction in the scheme. The county instructors appointed under the scheme have not, so far, experienced any difficulty in inducing owners to consent to the destruction of infected stocks when advised that such a course is necessary. The Department are advised that the wet season of 1903 sufficiently accounts for a reduction in the yield of honey in Ireland. The Department are prepared to give careful consideration to any further representations that may be made to them in regard to the disease in question.

    Cork Winter Assizes-Alleged Jury Packing.
    MR. FLYNN: I bag to ask Mr. Attorney-General for Ireland if his attention has been called to the proceedings at the Cork Winter Assizes, in December last, when, in the case of a prisoner, Eugene Heffernan, charged with the murder of his mother, thirty jurors were ordered to stand by by the Crown Solicitor; and, if so, will he say whether this action was taken with the sanction of the Irish law officers.
    MR. ATKINSON: The Crown Solicitor, in setting aside twenty-nine, not thirty, jurors in this case, acted in strict accordance with the directions contained in the Circular addressed to Crown Solicitors dealing with such matters, to which I have frequently referred. He was influenced in his action by reliable information which he had received from a respectable juror and from the police, that an effort would be made by the relatives of the accused through their extensive trade connections in the City of Cork to influence the jurors in the prisoner's favour.
    MR. FLYNN: I beg to ask Mr. Attorney-General for Ireland whether he is aware that at the recent Cork Winter Assizes, December, 1903, in connection with the trial of Connor O'Gorman on the charge of fratricide, nineteen jurors were ordered to stand by; and, if so, whether he can state what reasons, if any, were given by the Crown Solicitor for objecting to these men serving on the jury, and also, how many of the nineteen were Roman Catholics.
    MR. ATKINSON: The Crown Solicitor set aside these jurors because he had reasonable grounds for believing that, if sworn, they would not give an impartial verdict. I am not able to give any information as to the religious belief of the jurors set aside.
    MR. FLYNN: Am I to understand from the right hon. Gentleman that these proceedings have the approval of himself and the law officers of the Crown?
    MR. ATKINSON: Certainly.
    MR. FLYNN: And are we to understand that these jurors in this particular case were not to be believed, that they were perjurers?
    MR. ATKINSON: No, Sir, you are to understand nothing of the sort.

    Smerwick Fishing Industry.
    MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL (Kerry, W.): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether any steps have been taken to meet the wants of the fishermen of Smerwick, county Kerry, with regard to better pier accommodation.
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. WYNDHAM,): The Congested Districts Board has already expressed its willingness to contribute towards the cost of this proposed work, if undertaken by the county council. That offer still holds good. There are no funds available from other sources for meeting the cost of the work.

    Irish Magistrates and the Irish Language.
    MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can explain under what authority Mr. Thomas McDonogh Mahony, Cahirciveen, county Kerry, has been ordered by the Lord Chancellor not to act as magistrate because he has signed warrants in Irish.
    MR. ATKINSON: At my right hon. friend's request I will reply to this Question. The Lord Chancellor ordered Mr. Thomas McDonogh not to act as a justice because he, in violation of the express provisions of a statute to which his attention had been called, persisted in signing warrants in Irish characters, and refused to give any undertaking to desist from the practice, if permitted to continue to act as a magistrate.
    MR. BOLAND: What is the particular provision?
    MR. ATKINSON: It is in Act 22, Geo. 2, Chap. 6, and it provides that all the business of the Courts in Ireland must be conducted in the English language.
    MR. BOLAND: Will the right hon. Gentleman bring in a Bill to repeal that Act, or favourably consider one if brought in from these Benches?
    No answer was audible.

    Irish Road Construction Surcharges.
    MR. O'DOWD (Sligo, S.): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that several county and district councils in Ireland have been surcharged by the Local Government Board because of the construction and repair of roads on a width of less than sixteen feet, although, in reply to queries addressed them, the Board have stated that the law is not clear on the matter; and whether, seeing that, owing to the uncertainty existing on this point, and the fear of surcharge, many councils are prevented from repairing old roads on the existing width, and in view of the hardship imposed on communities residing in backward districts, steps will be taken to have it repealed.
    MR. WYNDHAM: It is undoubtedly contrary to the express provisions of the 55th Section of the Grand Jury Act, and, therefore, illegal to construct any new road of a width less than sixteen feet, and any change in the law in that respect would be most objectionable. But there is nothing illegal in the repairing of an old road of less width than sixteen feet, provided it be a public road. Whether a road is a public road or not is a mixed question of law and fact depending on many circumstances. If any county or district councils feel aggrieved by the decision of an auditor they can appeal to the Local Government Board, who are empowered to remit the surcharge on equitable grounds.

    Queen's College, Belfast
    MR. JOHN REDMOND: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, whether he would have any objection to lay upon the Table of the House a copy of the letter written by the President of University College, Dublin, to the Lord-Lieutenant on 11th January last, with reference to the claim of the Belfast Queen's College for additional endowment.
    MR. WYNDHAM: This letter was published in the Press, and it will be laid on the Table, together with the resolutions adopted by the Council and Corporate Body of Queen's College, Belfast, on the 4th December, on the same subject, which were also published and are referred to in the letter from the President of University College.

    Military Disturbances at Limerick.
    MR. JOYCE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been called to the fact that malicious injury claims amounting to £34 are being made against the Corporation of Limerick for the breaking of plate glass windows in that city by soldiers belonging to the Liverpool Regiment; and, whether, seeing that a number of these soldiers were caught in the act, and in view of the burden inflicted on unoffending citizens in having to pay for this destruction, he will propose such Amendment of The Local Government Act, 1898, as will enable these sums to be levied on the property or pay of the offenders.
    MR. WYNDHAM: My attention has been called to the matter referred to. Up to the present the sum claimed in respect of injury shown to have been caused by soldiers is £24, not £34. Soldiers, like other persons who commit such injury, are responsible civilly to the owner for the amount of damage done. There is no special exemption in their case.

    Royal Irish Constabulary—Sergeant Williamson's Trial.
    MR. SLOAN (Belfast, S.): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether, in view of the fact that Royal Irish Constabulary courts of inquiry are not open to the Press, and that the Inspector-General published in a Dublin paper a version of the trial of Sergeant Williamson, and refused to the solicitor for the defence copies of the depositions made by the witnesses, he will arrange, before the Royal Irish Constabulary Estimates come up, that the evidence shall be made available for Members; and whether, seeing that the officers who tried the accused were, after

    1035
    their first finding, summoned to the Castle by the Inspector-General, and were interviewed by him there, he will state the details of the findings.
    MR. WYNDHAM: The court of inquiry held in the present case was a Departmental one and the accused, with his legal advisers, was present throughout the proceedings. There is no precedent for publishing a report of the proceedings in the manner suggested, and I see no reason for departing from the customary practice on the present occasion. The officers constituting the Court were not summoned to an interview with the Inspector-General. The accused was found guilty of six charges of fraudulently and deceitfully altering figures in public documents.

    Valentia Ferry.
    MR. BOLAND: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether steps will shortly be taken to carry out the improvements, under the Marine Works (Ireland) Act, at Valentia Ferry, county Kerry; and whether a dredger will be provided to improve the harbours at Kenmare and other ports in the West and South of Ireland.
    MR. WYNDHAM: No decision has yet been reached in reference to the projected works at Valentia. The question of providing a dredger in connection with Irish harbours, to be placed at the disposal of local authorities on loan or hire, is engaging consideration.

    Cahirciveen Parish Committee
    MR. BOLAND: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Parish Committee scheme for the parish of Cahirciveen, county Kerry, has yet been put into operation; and, if not, can he state the cause of the delay.
    MR. WYNDHAM: The scheme, with the modifications proposed in it, will be considered by the Congested Districts Board at its meeting this week.

    Irish District Lunatic Asylums.
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware
    1036
    that the Treasury have refused to pay for the maintenance of patients in the district lunatic asylums in Ireland committed under the orders of the Secretary of State for War and the First Lord of the Admiralty; that this refusal has been decided upon in defiance of the express words of a statute passed in the first year of the reign of His present Majesty and of a circular issued from the Irish Lunacy Office, Dublin Castle, in the early part of the year 1902; and that the circular referred to was followed by another contradicting it; and, if so, will he state who is responsible for this change; and whether he will take step to have thy law as stated in the Act, and defined by the first circular, carried out.
    MR. WYNDHAM: The earlier of the two circulars was issued in error. The revised circular of May, 1903, was issued by direction of the Irish Government acting upon the advice of the law officers. The latter circular was to the effect that lunatic sailors and soldiers who have committed no crime, but are sent to asylums by the Admiralty or War Office under special statutory authority, are not to be treated as criminal lunatics and, therefore, not to be maintained at the cost of the Exchequer. They are not so maintained in England, and the Government does not think it can be contended they should be in Ireland.
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: Will the right hon. Gentleman state by whose advice this circular was issued?
    [No answer was returned].

    Land Commission in Longford.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL (Longford, N.): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland when it is proposed to hold another sitting of the Head Land Commission in Longford for the hearing of appeals; and will he, with a view to affecting the payment of the March rents, direct them to hold a sitting before 20th March at latest.
    MR. WYNDHAM: I referred this Question to the Land Commissioners, but so far have not received their observations. Perhaps the hon. Member will repeat the Question to-morrow.

    Care of the Insane—Scottish System.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been called to a resolution passed at a conference of representatives of the Irish District Asylum Committees, on 26th November, in favour of the system of taking family care of persons of unsound mind which is practised on the Continent and Scotland; and, if so, whether he intends to propose any legislation with a view to having the system legalised in Ireland as well as England and Scotland.
    MR. WYNDHAM: The resolution has been received, but I cannot give an undertaking that the Government will introduce legislation dealing with the matter during the present session.

    Collum's Estate, County Fermanagh.
    MR. EDWARD MITCHELL (Fermanagh, N.): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, whether, in view of the fact that the tenants on the estate of Collum, a lunatic in county Fermanagh, proposed to purchase their holdings under the Land Act of 1903, and were referred by the Lord Chancellor to the receiver, Mr. M'Clintock, of Dublin, and that the receiver at once proceeded to serve ejectments on the tenants, he will state if this has been done by the authority of the Lord Chancellor.
    MR. WYNDHAM: I am informed that no proposals to purchase have been sent to the receiver by the tenants on this estate.

    Labourers (Ireland) Acts.
    MR. SHEEHAN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether, in view of the fact that in connection with the Land Bill of last year, the Report of Land Commissioner Mr. W. F. Bailey on the working of previous Land Purchase Acts was issued as a Parliamentary Paper, he will, in view of the promised labour legislation, place upon the Table of the House the Reports of the Local Government Board Inspectors on the operations of the existing Labourers Acts.
    MR. WYNDHAM: The reports of the Board's Inspectors in respect to the
    1038
    Labourers Acts were made for the private information of the Board to supplement information already in its possession. For this reason, as I have already stated, they cannot be laid on the Table. Mr. Bailey's Report was made at the request of the Lord-Lieutenant, and the same objections did not apply to its publication.
    MR. SHEEHAN: But why not follow the precedent of last year, having in view the great importance of this question?
    MR. WYNDHAM: Because, I say the information gathered was only fragmentary, and intended to supplement that already in the hands of the Local Government Board.

    Irish Local Government Auditors—Qualifications.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he will state what is the standard of qualification for appointment as Local Government Auditor; whether any examination is necessary, or whether the appointment is merely by nomination; and will he grant a Return showing the number and qualification of gentlemen appointed to this position since 1st April, 1899.
    MR. WYNDHAM: Auditors, before entering upon their duties, must satisfy the Civil Service Commissioners in respect to their qualifications, which are determined by an examination in prescribed subjects. I am sending to the hon. Member a Return containing the information mentioned in the second part of the Question.

    Strabane Gas Works Loan.
    MR. HEMPHILL (Tyrone, N.): I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether his attention has been called to the inconvenience caused by the delay of the Treasury in giving a decision as to granting a loan of £15,000 to the Strabane Urban District Council for the construction of gas works in the town of Strabane, which loan has been duly sanctioned by the Board of Works in Ireland so far back as the month of August last year, and brought under the notice of the

    1039
    Treasury; and whether he will take steps to have the recommendations of the Board of Works carried into effect, so as to enable the urban district council to proceed with the construction of the gas works.
    MR. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: This loan was submitted by the Board of Works for Treasury sanction on the 9th November last. The Treasury hesitated to sanction it because the figures given on behalf of the urban district council appeared to make it doubtful whether the proposal was financially a sound one from the council's point of view. It has therefore been thought necessary to refer the matter back to the council, through the Board of Works, in order that they may clearly understand the financial effect, and may then decide, after further consideration, whether they wish to proceed with the loan.

    Longford Postal Arrangements.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether, in order to facilitate the earlier delivery of letters and parcels in Longford, he will direct that the auxiliary postmen for that purpose be placed upon the permanent staff of town letter carriers.
    MR. VICTOR CAVENDISH (for Lord STANLEY): My right hon. friend will have inquiry made on the subject.

SELECTION (UNOPPOSED BILL COMMITTEES) (PANEL).
Mr. HALSEYreported from the Committee of Selection that they had selected the following eight Members to be the Panel to serve on Unopposed Bill Committees under Standing Order No. 109:—Mr. Brynmor Jones, Mr. Carvill, Mr. H. D. Greene, Mr. Heywood Johnstone, Mr. Mellor, Mr. Paulton, Mr.Parker Smith, and Mr. Worsley-Taylor.
Report to lie upon the Table.

SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES) (CHAIRMEN'S PANEL).
Mr. HALSEYreported from the Committee that they had selected the following six Members to be the Chairmen's Panel and to serve as Chairmen of the two
1040
Standing Committees to be appointed under Standing Order No. 49:—Mr. John Ellis, Sir Thomas Esmunde, Sir James Fergusson, Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice, Mr. Laurence Hardy, and Mr. Stuart-Wortley.
Report to lie upon the Table.

NEW BILL.
  METROPOLITAN IMPROVEMENTS (FUNDS) BILL.
  "To authorise the appropriation of the surplus Funds derived from Battersea Park towards the opening of the Mall into Charing Cross, and other Metropolitan improvements," presented by Mr. Victor Cavendish; supported by Lord Balcarres; to be read a second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 55.]

  KING'S SPEECH (MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS).
  [EIGHTH DAY.]
  Order read, for resuming adjourned debate on Amendment [8th February] to Main Question [2nd February],"That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, as followeth:—
  "Most Gracious Sovereign,—
  "We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament."—(Mr. Hardy.)
  Which Amendment was—
  "At the end of the Question, to add the words 'But it is our duty, however, humbly to represent to Your Majesty that our effective deliberation on the financial service of the year is impaired by conflicting declarations from Your Majesty's Ministers. We respectfully submit to Your Majesty the judgment of this House that the removal of protective duties has for more than half a century actively conduced to the vast extension of the trade and commerce of the realm and to the welfare of its population; and this House believes that, while the needs of social improvement are still manifold and urgent, any return to protective duties, more particularly when imposed on the food of the people, would be deeply injurious to our national strength, contentment, and well-being.'"—(Mr. John Morley.)
  Question again proposed, "That those words be there added."
  SIR GILBERT PARKERsaid that when the debate was interrupted last night he was referring to the question of wages which had been raised by an hon. Member opposite, who had urged that the position of England in Europe was assured so far as its wealth and prosperity was concerned, as was evidenced by our standards of wages, living and comfort. Now he would be the last to say that those standards were not high in this country. No doubt they were higher than in any other countries—except new countries which had exceptional advantages, such as the United States and our own Colonies. But there was one statement of the hon. Member he must deal with. It was that the wages of certain skilled workmen, which in 1860 were 28s. 3d., had risen to 37s. 9d. by 1890. That, no doubt, was a remarkable increase, but he wished to point out that the increase in Germany of the same period was appreciably greater, starting from a lower standard. Was it strange that the standard should have been lower in this country? These were the days when Cobden had given this country a new and great policy, we were in an extraordinary position in the matter of our manufactures, and not in a serious position in the matter of our agriculture. Cobden then looked forward to the time when England would permanently command the manufactures of the world, for he held that the repeal of the Corn Laws would not only give a great impulse to our manufactures, but would inflict so severe a shock on our rivals by giving us augmented opportunities of competition all over the world that England would permanently maintain her position against Germany, France, and the United States. Those who held the opinion that free trade was not an unmixed blessing at all times and places had been again and again challenged because it had been said that the protectionist in America sold cheap abroad in order that he might sell dear at home. But he would like to point to the fact that America manufactured 'goods from raw material which she did not produce, and sold them just as cheap at home as abroad.
  1042
  Since 1824 there had been a tax on wool in the United States, which she had always had to import from Australia, South America, or elsewhere. Could any one suggest that the wages of workmen in the United States were low because the manufacturer sold his goods cheap abroad so as to sell dear at home? Take the case of tweeds. Why the United States, where twenty-five years ago there was no good American tweed, and only American shoddy was worn, now produced, in spite of the heavy tax on wool, tweed clothes as good and as cheap and as well made as any we produced in this country, and they were worn by 75 per cent. of the population of the States, while the workman engaged in making them got twice as much wages as the workman in this country. That seemed absurd on the face of it, but it sufficed to point out the moral he wished to be drawn from his remarks. The American workman, to begin with, was working in an area where he was absolutely secure, and the manufacturer commanded his home market. No doubt the. United States had great resources in her own borders which we did not possess. We had to go abroad to purchase food, a portion of which we might still be able to produce if the policy of free trade had rot pressed so heavily on the agriculture of the country. The United States had never exported so heavily as we had, neither had she imported as heavily. Her imports were £171,000,000, whilst the imports of England were £528,000,000, and her exports were £304,000,000 against our £347,000,000. But it was not reasonable to suggest that because the United States did not export so much she was necessarily poorer. The fact that her imports and exports were so well balanced showed that she was commanding her home trade. Was American-made furniture sold cheaper in England than in America?
  MR. FLAVIN (Kerry, N.): Certainly.
  SIR GILBERT PARKER: I beg your pardon.
  MR. FLAVIN: I beg yours.
  SIR GILBERT PARKER: Were American shoes dearer in England than in America?
  MR. FLAVIN: Certainly.
  SIR GILBERT PARKERsaid he had studied the question.
  MR. FLAVIN: And so have I.
  SIR GILBERT PARKER: And my conclusion is that they are not.
  MR. FLAVIN: I have worn the boots and paid for them, so I know they are.
  SIR GILBERT PARKERsaid he had done the same. The point he wished to make was that the margin of difference was not sufficient to justify the assertion that protectionist countries sold cheap abroad in order to sell dear at home. What was the policy of Mr. Carnegie and his fellow manufacturers? Did they dump simply in order to get rid of their surplus stock—did they desire merely to make England a Cheap-jack market? No, the policy of Mr. Carnegie and the other manufacturers was first to secure the home market and to use it as a leverage by which to capture fureign markets. They kept their works going for nine months in the year in order to supply the home market, and then, instead of incurring a loss by closing for the remaining three months, and keeping their men and factories idle, they kept them running by selling the goods produced at cost price abroad. They did not sell goods cheap simply to capture the English market. They had another purpose in view. It was not the trades unions who alone secured high wages for the working men in the United States; it was the fact that the manufacturers had a settled policy, by the quantity of production, to keep their workmen employed all the year round. By the policy they adopted of selling here at cost, they were able to reduce the expenses of their establishments and to avoid the loss which would be entailed by the temporary shutting down of the works. It was not done for philanthropic motives, but it was done in order to secure regular employment for the men all the year round, and the effect on the domestic and on national life, as well as on the manufacturers themselves, was very great and good. It produced confidence and security. Let them remember that if the cart of progress was to be
  1044
  drawn along, and if the capital which should draw it went lame, labour alone would not draw the cart. It was the command of their home markets that ensured employment and increased wages for the working classes in the United States, and which at the same time secured the manufacturers in their position. How did we stand in the matter of our home trade? Were we satisfied that we had the absolute command of it? When he read the table of our imports and exports he could not say that the prospect was, by any means, a cheery one, He would give a few trades in which there had been a rise in imports and a fall in exports. During the last nine years the figures for the increase of imports and the decrease of exports respectively were, in the boot and shoe trade, £2,159,000 and £920,000; in woollens, £18,000,000 and £38,000,000; in furniture, £5,500,000 and £600,000; in earthenware, £2,400,000 and £15,000,000; in glass, £11,700 and £1,300,000, and in silk, £38,000,000 and £8,000,000. That was a serious state of affairs, and it was certainly not what Cobden had anticipated. Cobden looked forward to seeing the manufacturers of England commanding the trade, not only of this country, but of all others. We, however, did not expect that, as we knew perfectly well that the discovery of the great mineral resources of the United States and the Colonies had altered the course of trade with those countries. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham was not the first to raise this question of the decline of British exports and the increase of British imports. Lord Rosebery raised it on the basis that if we went on—the signs were so alarming—we were bound steadily to decrease in power as a manufacturing nation. If was true that merchanting was increasing every day in this country, but manufacturing was proportionately decreasing. Moreover, our carrying trade, whilst it had increased, was slowly being competed with by Germany, and if the United States made up its mind to enter the theatre of shipping, we should probably have a bad time in the future. He altogether disputed the theory, suggested by the Cobden Club, that the fact that the amount of American shipping was insignificant as compared with British

  1045
  shipping was a sign of a lack of American prosperity. Why did not Americans invest in shipping? Because it was much more to their benefit to put their money into "industrials," which yielded a return of 15 or 20 per cent., than into shipping, which would bring them in 5, 7, or possibly, in some cases, 10 per cent. We, for our £528,000,000 of imports, were content to send out one-third of the amount of exports, and for the rest to pay by shipping alone. He did not suggest that England's position would be better if we had less shipping; on the contrary, he considered it to be absolutely necessary to England's future that her position in the carrying trade should be maintained. He did, however, wish to point out that thirty years ago we had the same position in the carrying trade and a better position in the manufacturing world. We had lost, on the one hand, and we had not gained proportionately on the other.
  Having been challenged on the question of colonial enthusiasm in the matter of preference, and as to the offer of the Colonies, he had looked the matter up in The Times, and he found there had not been a single dissentient voice from the Colonies or from any public body in the Colonies. On the contrary, every Legislature in the Colonies had expressed its sympathy with the belief in the idea of preference. The New Zealand Parliament had passed a Bill on the subject. Not only had the Premier of Australia spoken in favour of the proposal, but the Leader of the Opposition in Australia, whose form of preference might differ from that of his political opponent, had said again and again—
  "I propose to reduce the taxes upon British goods by 50 per cent. Whatever Sir E. Barton will do, I will do more."
  SEVERAL HON. MEMBERS: But he a free-trader.
  SIR GILBERT PARKERsaid the fact that Mr. Reid was a free-trader was a striking tribute to the argument he was addressing to the House. Sir Wilfrid Laurier also was a free-trader.
  MR. YERBURGHasked whether Mr. Reid asked for anything in return.
  SIR GILBERT PARKERsaid he had expected that question. Mr. Reid asked for nothing in return. Moreover, he had looked the matter up in the Canadian papers, and he unhesitatingly asserted that the Leader of the Opposition in Canada had so far coincided with the opinion and the action of the Canadian Government that again and again he had spoken in favour of preference. As to the question of his hon. friend, who did not know the exigencies of politics, even in this country? It was extraordinary that this movement should have met with so little opposition in the Colonies when one considered how eager opposing Parties were to dish each other. They were told that a preference could be given to Australia only on wool. That was inaccurate. A preference on wool was not our last resort. By giving a preference on agriculture, on meat and wines, we should benefit Australia more than by a preference on wool, because although the meat and wine trade was not worth more than 60 per cent. of the pastoral trade, it employed 50 per cent. more hands, and thus affected the working classes to a greater extent.
  His interest and belief in this scheme had led him to speak at greater length than he had intended. In conclusion, he could only say that he believed the future of this country depended upon a closer association and a common destiny with our Colonies. He felt that we could never retrieve the place we had lost in the industrial movement of Europe, but we could secure our position by a closer alliance with those nations which had supplied our trade, as it had declined with foreign countries. He believed that sooner or later preference would come, and so would a 10 or 20 per cent. tax upon foreign manufactured goods, in order to protect that trade which has been, and will be, for the prosperity of this country.
  SIR JOHN GORST: The hon. Member for Gravesend, who has just made an interesting and instructive speech, is, I presume, an opponent of His Majesty's Government, because he spent one part of his speech in advocating protection, and the other in advocating colonial preference, which are both policies that the Government have distinctly renounced. When the House

  1047
  adjourned last night, the hon. Member was trying to show that the German workman was much better off than the English workman, although I do not think that is very relevant to the question before the House. The hon. Member has omitted that part of his argument this morning. With the official policy and declarations of the Government I, like the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Bristol, am entirely in accord. We understood the President of the Board of Trade to say that a tax upon food was not within the sphere of practical politics, that the Government are opposed to colonial preference and general protection, and a 10 per cent. all-round tariff, and that their policy upon fiscal reform is freedom to negotiate, followed by retaliation if it obtains the approval and assent of Parliament. That is substantially the same as the statement made by the Prime Minister at Sheffield. It may have been a little more clearly put, but it was practically the official policy laid down at Sheffield, from which the Leader of the House has not departed in subsequent speeches. The President of the Board of Trade gave a very interesting psychological fact, which I think accounts a great deal for what has happened since. It appears that every member of the Government has got, like Faust, two souls, one is the official soul, which is retaliatory, and the other is a private, personal soul, which, in the case of most of the members of the Government is protectionist, though in one or two cases it is free-trade. This appears to account for all the vagaries which have taken place. It was the private and personal soul of the Prime Minister that prompted him to declare at Sheffield that he was in favour of reversing the fiscal policy of the last fifty years, a statement which drove the Duke of Devonshire out of the Cabinet. It was the same private and personal soul that prompted the President of the Board of Trade, on Tuesday last, to interrupt an hon. Member on this side of the House and tell the House that he wished it were possible to tax food.
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,)was understood to deny this statement.
  SIR JOHN GORST: It is quite clear that it was his protectionist soul that drove my right hon. friend the President of the Local Government Board to make speeches against those who were the supporters of the official policy of the Government. I gather from the speech of the President of the Local Government Board, which did not contradict the speech of the President of the Board of Trade, that this official policy will be maintained until after the division has taken place. The Secretary to the Board of Trade made a strong protectionist speech, but, with great ingenuity, it was not in favour of protection, but pointed out the most effective way of retaliating, and it was a good object lesson as to how a policy of retaliation may very quickly, under certain circumstances, develop itself into a policy of protection. Although this official policy of the Government is perfectly satisfactory, there is one singular circumstance about it, and it is that none of the members of the Government outside the House of Commons support the official policy at all. Some of us try to support the official policy of the Government by showing that colonial preference is undesirable, and by attacking the system of protection, but we meet with no encouragement of any kind from the Government, I want to ask a perfectly clear and definite question of the Government, which I think they might reply to on the spot, I want to know whether hereafter those who oppose the official policy of the Government, like the hon. Member who has just sat down, who go in for protection and colonial preference, will receive the official countenance and support of Cabinet Ministers in their candidature, to the exclusion of those who really and honestly support the official policy of the Government, [OPPOSITION cries of "Answer, answer."] That is a very simple question. I am a Tory of 1866, and during all my Parliamentary career I have served under the leaders who have been free-traders—the late Mr. Disraeli, Sir Stafford North cote, the late Marquess of Salisbury, and even the present Prime Minister, who has told us over and over again that he is a convinced free-trader. All the chiefs under whom I have served are staunch free-traders—

  1049
  Lord Cross, Lord Goschen, and the Duke of Devonshire, all of them still alive. To my noble friend I would counsel patience until this tyranny be past, and I hope he will live to be the head of the united Tory Party, with sound fiscal principles.
  It would be almost indecent for me to sit down without saying a few words in support of that official policy which was announced from the Treasury Bench. I understand that the Government are officially opposed to colonial preference. I think in the interests of one of the greatest possessions of the British Empire, the Empire of India, they are wise. This has been overlooked in the agitation out-of-doors, although it was mentioned by the late Secretary of State for India, and it is one which deserves the attention of both sides of this House before the fiscal question is finally settled, because India contains 300,000,000 of inhabitants who are subjects of the British Empire. Consequently India, is next to Great Britain, the greatest free market in the world. Now, the Government of India have the advantage of having—I was going to say no Parliament, but that would be scarcely respectful to this Assembly. They have the advantage of having the complete command of the services of the very greatest experts and the most experienced commercial politicians which the Government of the great Indian Empire provides. They have been advised that these colonial preferences could do little good and might do great harm to the interests of the Indian Empire. The Indian Empire has not very much to offer in the way of preference to us, and it has hardly anything which it can gain from us in return. That is the advice of the experts, and it is adopted unanimously by the Government of India. I will not trouble the House with the details of the reasons, so admirably given in a despatch, for the Government of India coming to that conclusion. But there is one danger which that Government have to fear from the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham to which I should like to be allowed to direct attention, because it is an admirable illustration of the extraordinary complexity of commercial relations, and I think it is a very good illustration of how people might do an
  1050
  immense amount of harm to commercial relations without ever dreaming that they were doing any mischief at all. It shows how an ignorant—I do not wish to use the word in a bad sense—it shows how an uninformed Government might put its hand into the delicate machine of commercial relations and do mischief they never thought of.
  This is how the difficulty arises. India is a debtor country. It has to pay a sum of £16,000,000 per annum to Great Britain for services rendered—Army charges, stores, the diplomatic services in Persia and China, and so on; and there is the large sum that comes home as interest on the immense amount of British capital invested in India railways. They do not pay in direct exports to this country, because the trade of India is such that India takes from the United Kingdom £35,000,000 worth of our exports, which are chiefly manufactures, and we take only £21,000,000 worth of her exports, which are chiefly raw materials, articles of food and tea, so that you see, instead of there being any direct surplus of exports to Great Britain it is the other way, and the trade with Great Britain enhances the amount somehow or other she has to pay back to Great Britain. Well, how does she pay it back? She pays it through British possessions from which the imports into India are £5,000,000, while the exports are £11,000,000, and through foreign countries from which the imports into India are £12,500,000, and to which the exports from India amount to the enormous sum of £51,500,000. It is through these exports to foreign countries that India pays her £16,000,000 of debt, and the difference between imports and exports between her and Great Britain. Of course, the way in which this takes place is enormously complicated, as people may suppose, but I give the House two illustrations which will show the sort of way in which these payments take place. Of raw cotton—there is a good deal of cotton grown in India—£8,000,000 worth are exported from India. Hardly any of it comes direct to this country. Raw cotton imported by us from India only represents £370,000. We get nearly all our cotton from America. But there is a very large export of Indian cotton to Continental countries. Germany takes

  1051
  £1,250,000 worth, France £480,000, Italy £807,000, and Belgium £1,856,000. In fact most of the Indian cotton, except what goes to Japan, goes to the Continental countries of Europe. This cotton is worked up by the cotton mills of France, Germany, and Belgium, and finds its way into the English market as cotton manufactures, and these are amongst the articles which the supporters of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham denounce as imports that ought to be stopped by a large import duty. India is an enormous exporter of all kinds of seeds, and amongst others of linseed. She exports altogether as much as £3,500,000 worth of seeds. We take a very good proportion of them ourselves, but £593,000 worth go to France, and £809,000 worth go to Germany. In France and Germany tins linseed is made into linseed oil. There are great oil presses in Marseilles, Bremen, and Hamburg. Somehow or other the French and the Germans have superior processes of pressing, and can, therefore, supply our market with linseed oil which is cheaper and better than that we make at home. At any rate we do a large trade in linseed oil with the Continent. Partly, therefore, the sum which India must transmit to this country arrives in this way in the shape of cotton manufactures and linseed oil. I have no doubt the great Commission now sitting will severely tax these products if they can. That is a danger the Indian Government look forward to. Here they see that a small protective tariff might have a most pernicious effect on the trade of India without anybody intending it at all. I do not doubt that India would have of find some other mode of making the transmission, but this way in which it is done is the easiest way. If you disturb this, India will have to find some other way, and she cannot find so good and cheap a way. The disturbance of this particular form of trade will put an additional burden on the already overburdened people of India. It would be a distinct disadvantage to the trade and commerce of the Indian Empire.
  While I am talking about India, may I revert to what I said a moment ago, that India is the greatest open market next to Great Britain in the world, and I say you
  1052
  could not possibly have any better test of the respective merits of protection and free trade for the protection and promotion of foreign trade, than the way in which the different nations of the world appear in the Indian market. In the despatch to which I have referred, there is an appendix which contains a short epitome of the Paper presented to Parliament on the trade of India, and I commend this little epitome to the most earnest attention of Members on both sides of the House, and especially to Members for Lancashire constituencies. I may mention that this appendix contains a statement of the amounts of the various articles imported into India from all the different countries in the world. I shall only trouble the House with one item, and that is cotton. In India they import altogether £1,658,000 worth of cotton yarn. How much of this is from spinners in Great Britain? Of that amount, £1,575,000 worth is from Great Britain, and from the whole of the Continent of Europe and the United States there only comes £73,000 worth. In the cotton manufactures exactly the same tale is told. Of cotton manufactures they import into India £18,323,000 worth, and of these there comes from the cotton manufacturers of Great Britain in competition with the whole world—because the whole world is in the Indian market—£17,525,000 worth. The whole of the Continent and the United States, and all our competitors put together, only supply £740,000 worth. These figures will not add up, but the difference is accounted for by the fact that I have left out a little margin which is imported from British possessions, such as Singapore and Hong-Kong. Who comes next to us? Why, Italy comes next with £143,000. The United States, the terrible competitors we are so much afraid of, import £81,000 of cotton manufactures and Ger I many £106,000. With figures like this before you, is it not true to say that the British manufacturer practically commands the entire market, and that no I other manufacturer is in it at all? And why do you command the market? You ask some of the Lancashire mill-owners. Let the hon. Member for Stalybridge ask some of his constituents why it is that they beat every nation in the world. It

  1053
  is because this is a free-trade country. The manufacturer can build his mill with untaxed materials, he can fill it with untaxed machinery, and he can get every one of those articles which are necessary for the manufacture of cotton in the cheapest market. He can buy his cotton in America, Egypt, and numerous other places, and every requisite for his manufacture in the cheapest market, and, therefore, he is able to undersell the American and German manufacturer whose Governments do not give him the privilege which the British manufacturer enjoys. It is said that we ought to rejoice in the prospect of lowering foreign tariffs. I wish that that prophecy might be fulfilled, but I do not think the cotton manufacturers of Lancashire would rejoice at that which would be no doubt beneficial to the world in general, for they would then lose the practical monopoly which I say they now enjoy of the Indian market, because Great Britain has been, and still is, a free-trade country. Let me recommend that argument to the consideration of the hon. Member for Stalybridge.
  There is one other danger sketched out in the despatch of the Indian Government. What would happen if India itself were a protectionist country? Hitherto we have been able to maintain in India free trade, but the noble Lord the Member for Ealing said in his speech that representations were being continually made for protection in India. I know that such applications were frequently made when Lord Cross and I were at the India Office. How were these representations met? The noble Lord told us that he said—
  "We have convinced ourselves that the policy of free trade is best for the inhabitants of this country, and we are giving to the population of India the same benefits that we ourselves enjoy. But supposing India became protectionist, what could you then say to the Indian manufacturers who want protection for their native goods? How could you refuse to them the protection you are giving to the manufacturers at home."
  You would not be able to maintain the present free-trade policy in India for a month. You would have a tax placed at once on your importations of cotton. Where then would your Lancashire trade be? Think of the enormous population in our Lancashire towns which is really
  1054
  manufacturing for the Indian market; and just think of the distress and confusion that would be entailed by a policy which deprives them of that market. I will not make a peroration, but I have thrown out some facts and arguments which the opponents of the Government ought to take into consideration before they press on the Government a change of their official policy. The silence of the President of the Board of Trade greatly alarms me. I do not know where I stand. I do not know whether the Government are really pleased at our support of their official commercial policy; but because I believe it is the best for the interests of the people of this country I shall continue to support it—even at the risk of displeasing His Majesty's Government. I promise to oppose in this House any attempt either to establish any colonial preference or to establish in this country a general protective system.
  MR. CHAPLIN: My right hon. friend below me has dealt in some detail with some proposals for fiscal reform, so far as they are likely to affect the Government of India and that country. He is alarmed, he tells us, at the silence of the President of the Board of Trade on this subject. Not having had the advantage, like my right hon. friend, of having been in the India Office myself, I think it would be more respectful to him if I leave it to some member of the Government or one familiar with the affairs of India to deal with that branch of the subject. I propose to go to the Amendment which is immediately before the House. My right hon. friend the Member for Croydon told the House yesterday afternoon that there was nothing in that Amendment from which he was able to dissent, or of which he could not approve. I am sorry to say that, differing entirely from my right hon. friend in that respect, I think there is very little in that Amendment that I am able to support. I have taken great interest in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman who moved it; and I have followed with all the care and attention I have been able to give to them the various speeches which have succeeded, but I am bound to say—and I hope I say it without any offence—that I have been able to find very little in any of them either

  1055
  to support or establish the three main propositions which that Amendment contains. And, with the permission of the House, I desire for a few moments to examine them and to say a few words on each. What is the first proposition? It is as follows—
  "That our effective deliberation on the financial service of the year is impaired by conflicting declarations from Your Majesty's Ministers."
  Conflicting declarations upon what? I presume upon the official or fiscal policies which are now before us. But the Government have expressly and repeatedly declared that there will be, and that there can be, no change in our fiscal policy during the present Parliament. And how conflicting declarations upon some future fiscal policy which may or may never come before the country [OPPOSITION laughter]—although I have very little doubt that it will, and with results which probably hon. Gentlemen opposite may not find altogether pleasant—how on earth conflicting declarations on a matter affecting another Parliament is to "impair our deliberations on the financial service of the present year," I confess I do not understand. It is not clear to me. I pass from that, which, after all, is a comparatively small matter, to the second proposition, and what is that?—
  "That the removal of protective duties has, for more than half a century, actively conduced to the vast extension of the trade and commerce of the realm and to the welfare of its population."
  Now, I venture to think that in that statement the right hon. Gentleman goes somewhat too far. If he had been content to say that for many years after the adoption of free trade, perhaps for a quarter of a century, that policy had been followed by these results, then I do not know that I should have had anything to say in dispute of that proposition, because undoubtedly it is the case. I make the admission; I have never questioned for a moment that for many years after the adoption of free trade there was a very remarkable and unexampled development of prosperity in the country. Those who were its authors, or at least most of them, have always been in the habit of putting that down to the credit of free trade. With great respect, there again I think they go too
  1056
  far and that, to a certain extent, they are mistaken, because there were a vast number of causes at that time which contributed to that development of our industries, and that great prosperity. Although I admit that undoubtedly free trade played a part, and probably an important part, in that development, I doubt very much if other causes did not play an infinitely greater part. There were all the great inventions of that time: steam, the telegraph, and other scientific discoveries. Railroads everywhere were being created, steamboats were being built, and the means of transport were being increased every year. Then there were the immense discoveries of gold in California, and later in Australia—the most fertilising agency in the world as it has been described—causing a great expansion of the currency—a period of rising prices—giving the greatest stimulus to enterprise which the world has probably ever known. All these things, in my humble opinion, contributed to the great development and prosperity of those years in a greater degree than even free trade itself. At that time, it should also be remembered, in this country we had the start of all other nations. We had lived for many years at that time under a system of rigid protection. Our great manufactories had already been established and thoroughly equipped, which was not the case with others. I am speaking of facts which are known to everyone who has studied history. The consequence was that we were, at that time, in a position to take the fullest advantage of all those adventitious circumstances, which was not the case with other nations. We were called at that time, and rightly called, the workshop of the world. In those days we supplied foreign nations with almost everything they required: and in return we bought their food and supplies of provisions for ourselves. Cobden, no doubt, at that time thought his expectations had been realised in a greater degree than ever he had hoped for himself, and for aught I know he believed, and he had some reason for believing, that in all probability we should continue selling cotton and buying corn for an indefinite number of years to come.

  1057
  But after a time there came a complete change in this respect, and it arose in this way. Foreign nations became tired of always depending on us for everything in the way of manufactured goods they required, and they determined to establish workshops of their own. How did they set about it? The first thing they did was to resort to our own discarded weapon of protection as the most potent instrument they could use for the purposes of the great object they had in view. Of course we are all familiar with the statements Cobden made at that time about foreign countries all being ready to follow our example. I desire to speak with the utmost respect in every way of Cobden. He was not only a great man, but I am sure he was a perfectly sincere man, and that all he prophesied again and again on this subject he most thoroughly and absolutely believed in himself. All we say against him is that he was mistaken on this point. No man in the world could have been more completely mistaken than he was. I will not repeat his prophecies, because every one knows them. He thought at first that the moment we adopted the principle of free trade all other countries in the world would hasten to follow our example; and, if Cobden had been right, we should have arrived undoubtedly and beyond all question at the ideal which, I suppose, each of us would set before himself—certainly I for one have never wavered in that opinion—namely free exchange. But, unfortunately, Cobden in all his predictions on this point turned out to be absolutely wrong. Exactly the opposite has happened. What we have seen, for many years, is this: foreign nations, one after the other, adopting a system of protection. As a matter of fact, I believe we are the only great country left in the world which still adheres to a system of free trade; but we have not got, and never have had free trade or anything whatever approaching it. That is why I have always been careful never to pronounce myself, as I have heard so many Gentlemen in all parts of the House pronounce themselves, "a convinced free-trader," and for this simple and sufficient reason: we have not got and we have never had free trade, and there is not a single man, in my generation at all events, who is able to speak
  1058
  from any practical knowledge or experience of the merits, or otherwise, of that system. On the contrary, not only have other countries one and all resorted to protection, but they have adopted that system with results which in recent years are most remarkable, and of which Cobden himself never dreamt for a single moment.
  Some Gentlemen in this House profess to see no cause for alarm or anxiety or disquietude in connection with the present position of our trade. They think that the Board of Trade Returns and the Blue-book which has been published absolutely demolish the case which has been put forward for fiscal reform. So far as I understand him, the Leader of the Opposition is one of them. But there are other members of his Party who do not agree with him. Only on Monday, the right hon. Gentleman who moved the Amendment spoke of the conditions of our employment and of our trade as being such as to give cause for the gravest reflection. Another leading statesman belonging to the Party opposite made, some years ago, so striking and so remarkable a statement on this branch of the subject that I make no apology for quoting it to the House. In 1896 he told the country that year after year our Consuls and the Board of Trade warned us that we were no longer, as we once were the undisputed mistress of the world of commerce, but that we were threatened by one formidable rival at any rate. "I mean Germany," he said. Then he pointed out that our imports of manufactured goods from Germany rose from £16,000,000 in 1883 to £21,000,000 in 1893, or an increase of 30 per cent. in ten years, and that into a country which believed it had the monopoly of supplying the world with manufactured goods. Then he went on to say "In some of our Colonies, India and Egypt, German trade had gravely menaced British trade," and, finally, he added, "Surely an inquiry might be instituted, short, practical, and exhaustive into the cause of the decline of British trade and the alarming increase of our foreign rivals." "Germany," he concluded "is engaged in an industrial war with us, and in that, I think, unless we take precautions in time, she is not

  1059
  unlikely to succeed." Who was the statesman who made these observations? He is the statesman who, I understand, is the latest ally of the Leader of the Opposition. I mean Lord Rosebery. That was Lord Rosebery's case in 1896. That is my case, only more so now. The experience of the years that have elapsed since then have confirmed it, and with every word Lord Rosebery said at that time, I most entirely agree. Let me support Lord Rosebery's view by a single statement from the Blue-book. I could give many, but one is sufficient. It shows two things at all events; but I am bound to say that it seems to me that the students of the Blue-book book on the other side, as far as can be judged by their speeches, have been very careful to over look it. It shows firstly, that one of the cardinal doctrines of the Cobden Club that protection is necessarily fatal to successful competition in any industrial country, a statement endorsed by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon last night, is absolutely demolished by the test of actual experience. It shows, secondly, that whereas our commercial supremacy was originally achieved under what hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite call, and what the mover of the Amendment called, "the impoverishing system of protection," we are beginning to lose that commercial supremacy under a system of free trade.
  I listened to the speech of the Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade on Tuesday, and I desire to take this opportunity of expressing to him my most sincere congratulations on the very remarkable speech he delivered, by which he held a crowded House in rapt attention for over an hour. Like him, I desire to take, as an illustration to support my view, the Iron and Steel Trade. There is, and can be, nothing more important. Moreover, that trade is one in which, until a few years ago, we stood alone, in which we were unapproached and absolutely without a rival in the world. If hon. Gentlemen will try it by the test which is recommended in the Blue-book, what they will find is this. I take the year 1879 for this reason, because it was the year in which Bismarck abandoned free trade and resorted to protection. Hon. Gentlemen would find that the consumption of pig-iron, which is the best test of all, be-
  1060
  cause all iron and steel manufactures have to pass through that stage, in 1879 in Germany was 2,216,000 tons, and in England, 6,000,000 tons. But in 1902, whereas England had increased to 8·7 million tons, Germany had increased to 8,403,000 tons. In other words this country, with a start which was immense, increased only 2,000,000 tons, whereas Germany in the same period increased 6,000,000 tons. But that is nothing to America, which, during the same time, increased her production of pig-iron from 2,700,000 tons to 17,000,000 tons; i.e., an increase of 15,000,000 tons, while we had increased 2,000,000 only. I do not, however, rest my case upon America, because her natural resources are so great. Her area is so vast, and her coal and iron are often so much nearer the service than ours and so much easier to obtain. But I am not aware that Germany has any similar advantages over this country, and yet this is the result which we see under the system of protection, in the only country left that adheres to the system of free imports. We are caught and beaten by one of our protectionist rivals and outdistanced altogether by the other; and that in one of the chief and leading industries in the country. Where is this to stop? Is there no feeling of uncertainty and anxiety in this matter in the minds of hon. Members opposite. It is steel and iron to-day. It will be one of the other great industries to-morrow. I ask, with great earnestness, hon. Members of this House to consider is this a satisfactory condition of affairs?
  I have only given one instance out of the many I could give because I did not wish to detain the House. Are we to sit still and do nothing, which I take to be the policy of the Opposition, in the face of these remarkable circumstances and facts which we see to-day, or are we to be moving? There is nothing in the world which surprises me so much, after giving credit to hon. Gentlemen opposite for having investigated and stated their case, as to see with what comparative in difference they regard it, and how little they seem to recognise the enormous change in the general position during the last twenty years, and the great necessity for doing something, at all events, to try and deal with the situation before it is too

  1061
  late. If it is to be met at all what is the remedy for it? Lord Rosebery, who does, or did appear to be alive to the gravity of the situation in 1896, thought he found both the cause and the remedy as well; though I think he was inaccurate, for in the course of the same speech he said—
  "The cause is not far to seek, for the last sixty, seventy, or eighty years Germany has fitted herself by a most perfect system of technical education to be a great industrial nation."
  Nobody values the benefits of education more than I do, but when did this alarming increase begin? I beg hon. Members to consider this; curiously enough it was not until Prince Bismarck abandoned free trade and adopted the policy of protection and supplemented the advantages of education most effectually by securing for German manufacturers the undisturbed possession of their own markets. And if it was due to education alone, will any hon. or right hon. Gentleman explain to us how it is that this system of perfect education, having been in force for sixty, seventy, or eighty years, according to Lord Rosebery, did nothing to increase the prosperity of our rivals until they commenced to live under a system of protection. Let me say with regard to education, whatever may be its undoubted merits, that to suppose it is a remedy in itself is the greatest delusion in the world. Supposing it enabled you to produce your goods better and more cheaply than you ever did before; everyone knows perfectly well that the duties would be immediately raised, and your position would be worse than ever.
  Now I pass from that to another branch of the subject. Others tell us, the Member for Fife, I believe, is one, that the fault lies with our manufacturers and workmen—want of enterprise in the one, of skill and industry in the other. I do not believe it, and until the contrary is proved I regard it as a libel upon both. No; there is another and a better reason for it. I have talked to men of business by the score and they all agree in this. That for succesful competition in trade, security for capital and the most effective means for cheap production are essential. Our rivals find security for capital in the possession of their home market, which is
  1062
  practically, to all intents and purposes, kept for them. And the secret of cheap production is large production. But for large production the first essential is that you shall have the largest possible market always open and assured to you. How do we stand in that respect as compared with our foreign rivals. They have always two markets open to them, their own, which is protected, and the market of this country, which is always open to the world, where they can compete with our own manufacturers and workmen to any extent they please. On the other hand, we have only what is left to us of our own markets by our rivals, the neutral markets of the world which are trifling, and the markets of the Colonies. It is in these industrial conditions, I am convinced, that the explanation will be found that while foreign countries under a system of protection have been increasing their production by leaps and bounds, we are caught and beaten in the race for trade, and unless some other steps are taken to avert it, we shall be beaten still worse in the future. What, then, is the remedy? There are three policies before us. One is the policy of the Opposition, which is to do nothing; the second is the policy of retaliation, which is the policy of the Government, and which, so far as it goes, is good, but it fails in two respects. It will not recover for you the markets you have lost, nor will it help you in others which are absolutely necessary to the workers of this country. Secondly, if it means anything, it means, according to the President of the Board of Trade, that in certain conditions duties will be imposed on manufactured goods. Now I remember perfectly well Mr. Gladstone's opinion on this point. He declared that nothing on earth would ever induce him to agree to protection upon manufacturers unless agriculture was included. Well, then! What remains. If these markets in place of those we have lost are vital to the interests of the workers of this country, who depend upon employment for their livelihood, where are we to look for them? Why, where should we look? Except to the Colonies, to the markets of our kith and kin beyond the seas? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Bristol, in whose speech

  1063
  the other night I thought I detected a note of indifference to the Colonies, said the trade of our Colonies can take care of itself, and we must dissociate ourselves from any idea of Colonial preference. I differ from the right hon. Gentleman in toto on this point. We often hear that no offer has been made to us by the Colonies, that there is no disposition on their part to meet us. No disposition to meet us? Why, already they voluntarily give us a preference, some of 33 per cent. others of 25 per cent. and so or, over foreign countries. And have we not had a note of warning of the very first importance upon this point? Let me read a passage from the "Summary of Proceedings" of the Conference between the Colonial Secretary and the Colonial Ministers in 1902—
  "The Coloniall Ministers stated that if they could be assured that the Imperial Government…would grant to the food products of Canada in the United Kingdom exemption from duties now levied or hereafter imposed, they would be prepared to go further into the subject, and endeavour to give to the British manufacturer some increased advantage over his foreign competitors in the markets of Canada.…Meanwhile they determined to present to the Conference a Resolution affirming the principle of preferential trade and the desirability of its adoption by the Colonies, also expressing the opinion that the Government should reciprocate by granting preferential terms to the products of the Colonies in the markets of the mother country."
  Then they concluded with this very significant warning—
  "If, after using every effort to bring about such a readjustment of the fiscal policy of the Empire, the Canadian Government should find that the principle of preferential trade is not acceptable to the mother country generally, or to the Colonies, then Canada should be free to take such action as might be deemed necessary in the presence of such conditions."
  Surely that statement should do something to dispel the illusions of the hon. Member for Bristol—and what is the only inference we can draw from it? Why, that we cannot stand still. We must go forward, or else we shall go back; and, if we are to go forward, where else have we to look to but to our Colonies? What is the objection to this proposal? Excepting that it may lead to difficulties with the Colonies instead of to increased advantages, I have not heard what seems to me to be a single reasonable objection
  1064
  urged against it. Let me say why I think the balance of argument is distinctly in favour of the proposal. There are Members present who have had some experience of the Colonies. I would ask them is there anyone who has had the same experience, or is so universally recognised as the best Colonial Secretary we have ever had, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham? When my right hon. friend the Member for West Bristol, or the Leader of the Opposition, or any other distinguished Member opposite tells me that the Colonies will not do this, that, or the other; that you cannot successfully negotiate with them; that this policy, if tried, will end only in raising greater difficulties than exist at present—my answer to them one and all is that the man who is acknowledged to be the best Colonial Secretary we have ever had takes the opposite opinion, and if I have to choose between two conflicting opinions I prefer his opinion to theirs. One objection is that this policy cannot be carried out without some duties on food. Everybody knows how trifling the duties which have been proposed are.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: At present.
  MR. CHAPLIN: I do not know what reason the right hon. Baronet has for doubting the right hon. Gentleman for West Birmingham when he distinctly states that any duties he imposes will not be high duties—that they are to be low duties, not exceeding 2s. a quarter on corn.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: Is it not a matter of certainty that they will have to be increased to carry out their object?
  MR. CHAPLIN: That is precisely one of those differences of opinion between the ex-Colonial Secretary and hon. Gentlemen opposite in which I prefer the opinion of my right hon. friend the Member for West Birmingham. It is often stated that the policy will raise the price of living. I deny it; and on the other hand, I affirm—and I am prepared to argue and demonstrate before any audience in the world—that if this proposal is adopted, it will result

  1065
  in actually reducing the cost of living, instead of increasing, to the poor. And who are the people who object to the proposal of a 2s. duty on corn? Some gentlemen, I regret to say, on my own side have even left the Government in consequence of it, and yet, one and all are men who, only two years ago not merely voted for, but most energetically supported and defended the imposition of a similar duty upon food, the only distinction being that in one case it would have increased the cost of the loaf by something less than half a farthing, while in this case it would increase the cost by something less than a whole farthing. Lord Goschen, one of the keenest opponents of this proposal, defended the imposition of the shilling duty, with consummate ability in the House of Lords, and, in the course of an admirable speech, he maintained at that time that—
  "If the duty had been 2s. the bakers would have hesitated to raise the price of bread."
  It is upon this trifling charge, this imperceptible distinction, that some of my oldest and best friends, for whom I entertain the deepest regard, have thought it necessary to leave the Government of the Party with which they have been associated all their lives. And now, we know from experience that the duty imposed two years ago did not affect the price of bread in the slightest degree ["Oh!"]—Well, if you do not believe me, let me read on this point a statement made by a leader of the Labour Party who has been adopted as the Labour candidate for one of the divisions of Manchester. This statement was made on the morning before his adoption—
  "He might say that when the duty of Is. was put on a few years ago the workers did not pay the 1s. It had been his duty to ascertain the price of bread, and he had visited shops in Hulme and Salford for that purpose on the 1st of the month, the results of which visit he sent to the Board of Trade. All the time the registration duty was on the price of bread, so far as Manchester was concerned, did not vary in the slightest degree."
  If, therefore, there is nothing in the objection on the score of food, what is there that remains? There is absolutely nothing so far as I know except some minor objections urged by the right hon. Gentleman the
  1066
  Member for Bristol, in which he puts to me some questions; one of them was—
  "How will you be able to resist the demand for an increase in the duty however small they are at first?"
  And he quoted other countries, like Germany and France, where they began with duties of 1s. and then 2s., which have now risen to 12s. But surely the answer is complete. It can never be raised except by the will of the voters themselves, and there is all the difference in the world between the conditions of the two countries, and of the voters in France and Germany and the conditions of our own country of the voters here. This argument has been raised over and over again in the country, and it has been used by men who ought to have known better. It is not conceivable that they are Dot aware of the reply to it. A vast number of voters in France are peasants owning little farms, they possess an enormous political influence, and it is because they wish it and desire it that those duties have been raised and are maintained as they are. But the position in those countries is exactly the opposite of what it is with us. Here the great majority of the people own no land at all. Their first requirement here is a cheap and abundant supply of food, and they have the power, which they use, and they always will be able to enforce it. The same thing holds good in Germany, though not precisely to the same extent; and in Germany there is another reason in addition—she has an enormous military frontier to defend. At any moment it is conceivable that Germany may be involved in war with some of her neighbours, and then instantly all the food which comes across her frontiers would be stopped; and therefore it is a matter of absolute military necessity that she should grow the main portion of her own food supply. But none of those conditions attach to us and it is the most futile argument to say that because duties in France and Germany began at 1s. and went up to 12s. that it is inevitable that the same thing would happen in this country. Then my right hon. friend says that I maintain that these duties will not raise the price of wheat, or the cost of living, and yet I

  1067
  tell the farmers they will be of help to them. The statement is not altogether accurate, for I never said they would not raise prices. What I did say was that the duties on corn would not raise the price of bread. The other duties might raise the price of food to a very trifling extent. Although they will not raise the price of bread, the duties upon corn will be, small though they are, I believe, some advantage and some help to the farmer.
  The right hon. Gentleman asks me if colonial preference is to be limited to food or is it also to be extended to manufactures. The answer to that has been stated over and over again by the ex-Colonial Secretary, who says it is impossible to lay down the precise details of any arrangement for colonial preference with regard to manufactures until a mandate has been given by the country and until either he or others are in a position to begin the negotiations. My right hon. friend said—
  "But if the duties will not raise prices, will the Member for Sleaford tell me why maize and bacon are excluded?"
  As regards bacon, I have never said that the price of meat may not be to a trifling extent raised; and in reply to his question upon maize, I will answer it by asking him another. Why did the right hon. Gentleman himself draw a distinction between the 1s. duty on flour and maize? The duty on maize was made less than the duty on wheat by the right hon. Gentleman, when he imposed the 1s. duty in the first instance, and it is for the same reason, I believe, that maize is excluded now. But all these things are details and are lost in the great principle which is before us, and upon that my mind is absolutely made up. When my right hon. friend asks me and others, as he did the other night from that place, to abandon and give up the policy which we have been advocating in the country, little does he know the character of the man or those who support him if he thinks or believes we would ever entertain that notion for a moment. I oppose the Amendment for the reasons I have given already, and I support the Government because their policy, so far as it goes, is good. But above all I support the views which I advocate to-night
  1068
  because I believe them to be absolutely necessary in the future interests of the country, and above all in the interests of the workers who depend upon employment, and because I believe them to be right. I support them because I not only believe, but I know—I am not speaking now of the House of Commons—I know they represent the feeling of that great Party in the country with which for all my life I have been connected, and, sooner or later, I am absolutely persuaded and convinced that they will ultimately triumph and prevail.
  MR. BRYCE (Aberdeen, S.): I have listened with a great deal of interest to the very able speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sleaford, and I hope he will not think me disrespectful if I do not follow him through the arguments and figures which he has placed before the House. They are not new to us, for they have frequently been brought before the country during the autumn campaign and I think I may say they have been answered. [Cries of "No, No!"] I will confine myself to traversing one or two statements he made with regard to the growth of the German iron and steel industry as compared with our own. The right hon. Gentleman attributed the growth of Germany industrial prosperity to Bismarckian protectionism of 1879. Is he not aware that industrial prosperity advanced more rapidly under the lower duties of many years ago than during the time of Bismarck?
  MR. CHAPLIN: My impression is that a great increase took place in later years.
  MR. BRYCE: That increase occurred after the tariffs were lowered. Exports of iron and steel during the last three years have risen 20 per cent. in England, whereas the imports have been almost stationary, and the same argument applies to the woollen trade. There again there has been an increase in spite of the statements to the contrary which have so often been made. The right hon. Gentleman quoted the dictum of Mr. Gladstone to the effect that if protection is given to any manufacturing industries it must also be given to agriculture. I

  1069
  agree that you cannot protect the manufacturing industries without doing something for the oldest and still the greatest of all our industries. A 2s. duty on corn has been mentioned, but I have heard members of the protectionist party say that not less than 10s., 15s., or 20s., a quarter would be of any substantial use to the farmers of this country. Will the right hon. Gentleman promise that he will never ask us for more than a 2s. duty on corn? Is that the utmost limit of his desires? I believe that 2s. would only be the beginning and it would gradually mount higher and higher.
  It is a very significant fact in this debate that nearly all the speeches in support of the Government have come from the protectionist Members of this House. The subject is very large and important, so large that if it were not for the exigencies of other public business we might go on discussing it—even if the discussion were confined to the other side of the House, where such difference of opinion exists—for another fortnight or three weeks. But I think there is another subject very interesting in the debate besides the great question of protection and free trade. It has been a debate largely devoted to a search for, and inquiry into, the policy of His Majesty's Government. That is what we are largely engaged in endeavouring to discover. It is not an easy question. Their policy is an evasive and elusive policy, and when it has been discovered, as some of us hope we have discovered it, it turns out to be a very small policy, infinitesimal in quantity. The policy represents a particle of radium almost invisibly small, but it does not resemble radium in this respect—it is by no means luminous. We have had three speeches from the Government. The first was that of my right hon. friend the President of the Board of Trade. There is no more clear thinker in the House than the President of the Board of Trade, and no one better able to express what his opinions are. I think I may venture to say that there is no one whose statements with regard to his own opinions we may except with more unqualified confidence. His speech was an encouragement to those of us who desire to see the Government come down on the free-trade side, but it was
  1070
  by no means a complete deliverance, because I noticed that he said he was him self not in favour of protection for Great Britain. He was careful to say that he was speaking only for himself and not for the Government, and he went so far as to say that, although he was not personally in favour of colonial preference, he hoped the time would arrive when the country would be in favour of colonial preference. That was an alarming deliverance to those who think a wish is very apt to find expression in means being taken to carry it out. When my right hon. friend calling himself a free-trader says that, I begin to fear that he and those who act with him will endeavour to accelerate the arrival of the period. The second speech was that of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade. It was just such a speech as might be delivered to the Tariff Reform League. The third speech was that of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board. It was a very brilliant effort because the right hon. Gentleman, if he will allow me to say so, succeeded in attaining what is one of the rarest attitudes of an expert Parliamentarian. He made a speech and said nothing. We were really no wiser as to the policy and intentions of the Government after the right hon. Gentleman sat down. I can only suppose that he thought it the best way. For the hon. Gentleman said too much in Wiltshire and too little at West minster. If this is the attitude in which we are still left with regard to the intentions of the Government, we may properly look at what are the broad facts of the case.
  Now, what is the attitude of the Prime Minister? The Prime Minister said at Sheffield that what we wanted was a fundamental reversal of the free-trade policy of this country. He has allowed his free-trade colleagues to go out of the Cabinet. Why did he allow them to go out? We know from their deliverances that it was not on the policy of retaliation they left the Government. Then we had a significant deliverance by the Prime Minister at Manchester. He put forward that his main duty in the present crisis was to keep his Party together. He seemed to forget for the moment that he was Prime Minister of this country and to remember

  1071
  only that he was leader of the Conservative Party. I think that is hardly a proper attitude for a Prime Minister. He ought to feel his duty to the nation as well as his Party. He conveyed the impression that he was thinking at this crisis not of what was best for the nation, not of the duty of the Government to lay their policy before the nation, but of his duty at all hazards to keep the Conservative Party together. What conclusion does one draw from such a deliverance? That he will take the course that seems best calculated to keep his Party together, that he will watch how the Party is going, and that he will endeavour to ride in the direction that the Party is going, so that the unity of the Party may be maintained. What was the attitude of the Conservative Party? When the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham launched his scheme it contained four items—colonial preference, food tax, retaliation, and the 10 per cent. duty on manufactured goods—the last of which came a little after the others. What the country has seen in the discussion during the whole of last autumn was that the food tax is not wanted except by the land-owning interest; that colonial preference has been coldly received and would not succeed if it had not been mixed up with retaliation; retaliation had been better received than colonial preference, but standing by itself it would not excite any enthusiasm at all. That which has excited enthusiasm has been the proposal of protection for manufactured goods, only qualified by the wish and the hope that it was higher than the 10 per cent. now suggested. Now, the real issue before the country is not retaliation. It is whether we are to have retaliation as defined by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham or free trade. The real force behind the whole agitation is protection. That was said with perfect candour by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sleaford. We were told yesterday by a leading Member of the Conservative Party that in the country those who refused to follow in that direction were being ostracised and boycotted. The President of the Board of Trade said that the 10 per cent. was proposed because it would
  1072
  bring in revenue. Is it because it would bring in revenue that it is acclaimed by those manufacturers on the mock Royal Commission, and who are sitting now to say how it should be imposed? Surely we all know and feel that the real force and interest of the manufacturers who are supporting the movement is in order that they may make gain by this tariff. It may be proper gain, that I do not discuss. We cannot possibly ignore the motive behind the movement. What is perhaps still more conclusive proof of the phenomena is that nearly all the candidates standing in support of the Government are protectionist candidates, and that in the course of their candidature they narrow down the programme with which they begin.
  What is the conclusion we may reasonably draw from the attitude of the Government and their Party? I venture to think that the Government are hardly dealt with by some of their own supporters on the other side of the House. The hon. Member for Oldham in the vivacious and interesting speech he gave us yesterday attributed to them deliberately dark designs. I think he could not overrate the craft of the Government, but he underrates its weakness. It does not seem to me to be out of deliberate purpose to beguile their supporters or the country, but out of mere hesitation, that they are adopting this doubtful attitude which baffles the desire to find out what they mean. They are playing a sort of seesaw between free trade and protection, but if we look at the attitude of the Government and if we see what is happening in their Party, we may feel certain that if the reins are held so loosely as this the horse will run away with the driver. I cannot doubt, when I see how strong the passion of protection is, that unless there is a fundamental reversal of the policy of facing both ways which has distinguished the Government during the last six months they will be swept, whether they will or not, into a purely protectionist Party. The President of the Board of Trade said the Government would fight for free trade. It is a very feeble kind of fighting that they have done so far, and I hope that at any rate when the Colonial Secretary speaks he will endeavour to clear up the

  1073
  darkness of the position. My right hon. friend the Member for Cambridge University asked some questions, but neither the Colonial Secretary, nor any Member on the Treasury Bench rose to answer. I hope he will answer them now. It is surely not necessary that we should wait for the return of the Prime Minister to have an answer. These are not matters of Parliamentary tactics, but questions on which the mind of the Government must have beer constantly fixed for the last six months, and on which we must presume that they have a policy which every one of them knows. May I repeat them to the Colonial Secretary, and perhaps he will permit me, the first time I have the pleasure of addressing him, to offer him the congratulations of many friends on this side of the House on the post he has attained in His Majesty's Government. May I venture to ask him—Will the Government not merely fight as the President of the Board of Trade says for free trade, but will they fight against protection? Will they fight against protection by repudiating protectionist candidates, where such candidates stand? Will they cease sending letters of encouragement to protectionist candidates? Will they cease to give aid and comfort to the protectionist Party? Will they declare themselves opposed in principle to colonial preference which necessarily involves the taxation of food? I will endeavour, if my right hon. friend doubts that, to show that colonial preference involves the taxation of food? These are points on which we are really entitled to have some answer from the Government, because without any answer we do not know in what direction to turn. Everyone of us on these Benches desires to support the Government against their opponents, followers of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham. The Government say that protection or preference will not be in view at the next election. But will the Government tell us what will be in view at a more distant period? What gain is it to us to know that when the Government go to the next election they will be against protection and preference and only in favour of retaliation, if we also know that the great bulk of their supporters
  1074
  are in favour of both. Surely the Government have had sufficient time to consider this question to tell us what they think of the protectionist policy, and what is to be for the good of the country in the future beyond the next general election?
  Let me come for a few moments to the argument of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade on the subject of retaliation. Surely the argument for retaliation is the very thinnest that was ever presented to the nation. It is the very smallest and frailest barque which can carry the fortunes of a Government. What does it amount to? The idea is that we are to secure a fairer treatment for our exports by imposing, or threatening to impose, import duties on the goods of countries which have tariffs against ourselves. Of course, we can imagine a case in which retaliation might be profitable. I suppose the most orthodox economists have admitted that there might be a country to which protection might be profitable. So we can imagine a case in which retaliation might be a proper remedy. But does any case exist now? Will the Government give us a case, for it is only in that way that we can test whether retaliation can be imposed. There is a maxim that deceit lurks in generalities and I do think that there is a good deal that leads to confusion and difficulty in those general statements in which the Government deal. They never give us a concrete case. What is it that they have in their mind? We are told that if a case of outrageous unfairness arises it may properly be dealt with by retaliatory duties. But what is outrageous and unfair? We are apt to talk as if foreign tariffs are imposed for the express purpose of injuring British trade. Is that true? Foreign tariffs are imposed for the purpose of benefitting foreign manufactures. We are free-traders because we believe that that policy is for our own interest; and it is not to injure manufacturers abroad that the duties are put on in Germany and the United States. If you say that if a tariff is so drawn and framed that it hits British goods, that it is outrageous and unfair, and that that is the test. In that case what do you say to the Colonies? There are no tariffs which have been drawn more

  1075
  clearly in the view that the competition of the colonial manufacturers is a competition with the British manufactures. And yet we all know that they are not drawn in a spirit of unfriendliness to us. The Colonies draw their tariffs in order to benefit their own people. There must be a strong case in order to show that there is a desire on the part of foreign Governments to benefit foreign manufactures with an unfriendly and hostile feeling against us. The President of the Board of Trade says that the Government wants the power to impose retaliatory duties against foreign-countries who have high tariffs. But have they not got that already. There is nothing to prevent them coming down to the House and proposing duties which would induce foreign Governments to reduce their tariffs. I do not understand why this proposal requires a tremendous reversal of our existing policy. I believe that there is a statute that expressly provides for that, and there is nothing in our Constitutional usage to prevent it. It is quite true that Sir Robert Peel said that he had tried retaliation and gave it up. In that famous deliverance of his which marked the turning point in our commercial fiscal policy, he declared that it was only after repeated efforts to adopt the policy of retaliation that he had been obliged to give it up in despair. There is nothing to prevent the Government adopting a retaliatory policy, but they must give us a concrete case, showing the benefit that would follow. They cannot assume that they should be granted general powers, by which alone they could impose retaliatory tariffs. I say that no Government should come before Parliament and ask that they should be allowed, without approaching the House of Commons, to ask authority to impose retaliatory duties or to alter existing duties up or down. That would be to inflict an injury on private interests. Our manufacturers are entitled to submit to Parliament a case of injury done to them by foreign tariffs, and it is impossible that the Government should have the power to impose retaliatory duties on foreign goods without that information before them. The President of the Board of Trade was unfortunate in his statement of this part of the case of the Government. I cannot gather whether he contemplated that
  1076
  there was any case in which the Government desired to act without having first the authority of Parliament; and I wish he would clear that point up. It is a thing on which the Government must be informed before the general election, and I do not see why Parliament should not be informed of it now.
  Let me take a concrete case, in order to show the difficulty of the position. There is no country whose import duties, whose high tariff, injures our trade so much as the United States. Of course, the Russian tariff is higher, but the United States is a much bigger market. It would be absurd to retaliate against any country if not against the United States. But on their own showing the Government could not retaliate against food from the United States; and they could not retaliate against raw material either. What remains? Only manufactured articles. But the manufactures we import from the United States are valued at £20,000,000, and more than one half of these are either practically raw materials or half-manufactured goods, so that there is only £8,000,000 or £10,000,000 worth of goods which it would be possible to attack. Do you suppose that retaliation on a trifle of that kind would injure the United States? The United States, with its great home market, would not care for almost any duty you would impose. She would rely on her home market, and her manufacturers, who are exceeding powerful, would not allow their protective system to be broken down by a petty thing of that sort. Therefore, you cannot hope to retaliate on their manufactures. And the case of the United States applies á fortiori to every other kind of retaliation. The practical objection to retaliation is that it must be either one of two things. It must be either a mere threat, not intended to be followed up by the imposition of duties. But if a mere threat, then it is a game of bluff, and the game of bluff is not creditable to a great country. We have had enough of bluff already, and it was not successful with a small country. But on the other hand, if intended to be carried out seriously, see what the cost of putting on the retaliatory duties would be. In the first place you would have a tariff war, and in that war the duties of the foreign country would be raised against you.

  1077
  Trade would suffer, and the diversion of trade from its accustomed channels would entail a very heavy loss. That was the experience of Germany and Russia, and the experience of the tariff war between France and Italy proved that there was not only a direct loss to trade, but that the trade did not come back to its old channels. In neither case can it be shown that trade was substantially benefited as the result of the tariff war. Then the second result of the imposition of retaliatory duties is that you accustom our own country to a policy of protection. It sees duties put on goods not for the purposes of revenue, and it familiarises the country to the idea of protection. Not only that, but you stimulate the desire of other trades, not so favoured, for protection. You put on a duty on a particular class of goods, let us say, iron or woollen goods, and you assume that that protection given to that particular industry alone. But other industries would ask why they should be left out in the cold, and you would have a particular and growing pressure from these other industries to have the same benefit given to them as had been given to the other industries. And then, lastly, if the policy of retaliation succeeds, and if you bring down the duties against your own country, the natural course would be to take off your own duties. But you cannot, for you would be met with the great difficulty that those who had bought land, purchased machinery, erected works, and made all preparations for carrying on their business on the basis of these duties, would turn round and complain that you had deprived them of the benefit of the duties. That is not theory, but the experience of every protectionist country in the world. It is easy to impose protective duties, but very difficult to take them off. The appetite grows with the eating. By the very process with which the Government declares they are fighting for free trade, this country would become protectionist itself.
  I notice that the President of the Local Government Board argued that by putting a retaliatory duty on you would prevent dumping. I thought I noticed a little confusion in the mind of the right hon. Gentleman. Dumping is not done by foreign countries
  1078
  but by private persons, and retaliation will not prevent it unless the duty be high enough to keep the dumped goods out altogether. The only way in which you can prevent dumping is to dump yourselves, and that can only be done by making the home consumer pay more in order that you may be able to sell cheap abroad. Therefore, in order that you may have free trade in the rest of the world you will cease to have it yourselves. If you look abroad you will find that every country which practises retaliation is protectionist. I do not know of any free-trade country which has tried the policy of retaliation. There may be some countries that have tried it, I admit Holland is very nearly a free-trade country, and there are other countries which have such low tariffs that they are nearer free trade than protection. But it is only the countries which have high tariffs that practice retaliation. They do it with maximum and minimum tariffs, and to that we shall also be driven. It is only by having two tariff scales and shifting a country from one to the other that we can carry out a policy of retaliation. I do not deny that cases can be imagined in which a policy of retaliation may fairly be proposed; but I am sure the, House of Commons will not trust that power to a protectionist Government. If we had a Government in which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Bristol was Chancellor of the Exchequer and in which the President of the Board of Trade retained his present office, I can imagine that the House of Commons might perhaps allow retaliation, although even then it would be a very dangerous experiment. But I am perfectly certain that with a Government such as we have, which contains so many avowed protectionists, it would be perfectly impossible for this House to permit retaliation. We oppose retaliation not merely because no case has been shown for it, not merely because we believe that a policy of a tariff war is a ruinous policy, but also because we believe that it would lead us straight to protection.
  So much has been said on the general aspect of the question that I will not ask the House to listen to any more figures on the subject or to any disquisitions as to the effect protection

  1079
  would have on any particular trade or industry. But there are one or two general aspects of the question which I should like to ask the House to consider. This country having had free imports for two generations there is scarcely a man amongst us who is able to remember the old system. We nowadays can hardly realise how fortunate we have been. You want to live in a protectionist country in order to know what are the fruits of a high tariff. In comparing this country with countries which have a high tariff, I was struck by the fact that the relation of the classes to each other in this country is more friendly and more wholesome than it is in protectionist countries. There is less jealousy, less suspicion, and less of the idea that one class is making profit at the expense of another in this country than there is in countries where manufacturers or agriculturists are allowed to enrich themselves at the expense of the consumer. I think we should be doing very little service to our politics and social order if we were to give occasion for the complaints and heartburnings which would necessarily and naturally arise between classes if one class thought its interests were being sacrificed for the benefit of another class. If the price of manufactured articles increased there would be at once a demand on the part of the workmen for higher wages. In some industries it is possible wages would be increased, but in other industries, less directly concerned with production, and above all in unskilled industry, wages would not increase but the cost of living would rise; and, therefore, you would put a greater pressure on the poorest classes of the community and there would be a reiterated demand for higher wages in order to enable the poor man to meet the increased cost of living. That is to say, you would probably inaugurate an era of strife and trade disputes by the very fact that the consumer would be paying more for the necessaries of life without having higher wages. It is possible that there might be a general rise of wages over the whole field of labour; but that would take a long time to come about. If, however, there was a rise of wages in the cotton industry it would mean the discontinuance of our cotton exports in some lines of business, because the cotton trade in some of its lines is
  1080
  conducted on such a narrow margin of profit that if the cost of production were enhanced it would be impossible to carry it on.
  There is another advantage which any one who visits a protectionist country such as the United States will perceive that we possess under our system of free imports. Any one looking at the legislation of this country would be almost surprised to notice how small a part of our daily legislation affects the pecuniary interests of individuals. Very few of our Acts of Parliament have the effect of putting money into or taking money out of the pockets of any individual, or taking money or giving it to any class or trade. We stand almost alone in that respect. In a protectionist country a large part of the legislation is occupied in making changes in the tariff which operate to the pecuniary benefit of one class or another, and the greatest interest in legislation is excited by that part of the work of the Legislature. In fact it may be said that the Legislature in a protectionist country is chiefly occupied with tariff questions. It is only now and again that the tariff is wholly changed but the subject is never at rest. The manufacturers are an organised body and are constantly at work conveying their view to the members of the Legislature and to the executive Government and pressing for tariff changes which would benefit them. This causes constant uncertainty, and a business man never knows on what basis he may have to conduct his business, as he does not know whether the tariff is to go up or down. Large business organisations are formed whose sole business is to control the Legislature. The iron men, the soft goods men, and so on, form themselves into organisations whose object is to influence the Legislature. They subscribe large funds with which they create an agitation all over the country, and when an election comes they offer funds to the Party supposed to be most in their favour, and pledge that Party to their support. At present there are comparatively few questions in which we are concerned with the pecuniary interests of individuals or of constituences, but as soon as we have a protective tariff we shall have each constituency looking at the issues to be decided, not from the point of view of the general interests of the country,

  1081
  but from the point of view of what it may gain or lose. That is a necessary result of a fluctuating tariff. If we have avoided all these evils, need we suppose it is because of some peculiar quality inherent in our own nature. There was a time in the 18th century when the Parliament of England had not that purity which it now has; and if we have maintained an exceptionally high level of purity in public life and legislation, may it not be partly due to the fact that we have, to quite an exceptional degree, removed all temptation, and that we have given our legislators no opportunity of serving private pecuniary interests as is so often done in many other countries. When I think of the enormous benefit it has been to us to have our Legislature free from all these disturbing and malign influences which damage public life, I cannot but regard with the greatest alarm any proposal to follow the example of other countries in which changes of tariff are common, and in which it is possible for a Government to help a particular branch of industry.
  We have heard a great deal about the predictions of Cobden. There is one prediction of his to which I wish to call attention. Some of his predictions have not been realised, but the fact that a prediction has not been realised is no reason for abandoning the policy behind it. Cobden predicted that with the growth of free government the world would be more at peace. We have had free government, but the world is not at peace; but we do not abandon on that account free government. The last fifty years has been the only period in English history when we have not been at war with a great Continental Power. May we not attribute that in some degree to the fact that all the great Continental countries, and the United States also, have good reason for keeping open trade with the country which gives them the best market. I know there have been moments when peace has been in danger, and when the fact that there was a strong interest in great manufacturing countries, such as France, Germany, or the United States, to keep open trade with England was a most powerful though silent influence in the direction of peace, and it would be a great misfortune for us to lose the security for peace which our great free
  1082
  market gives. There is, unhappily, enough of ill feeling between nations without losing such an advantage in the direction of preserving peace.
  I want to know from the Colonial Secretary if he is in favour of colonial preference, whether he contemplates that any such preference is to extend to their manufactured goods. Would the 10 per cent. proposed by the right hon. Member for Birmingham on manufactured goods apply to the Colonies as well as foreign countries. Would colonial manufactures be admitted without a duty or would it be imposed upon them. If it were imposed upon them, what became of the union with the Colonies which we are told to expect? If it is not intended to be imposed upon them, and they are recognised as being entitled to have a preference on manufactured goods as well as foodstuffs, would not such preference be more or less of a bonus and stimulus for them to manufacture against us? Canada gave her steel manufacturers a bonus which actually doubled the amount of iron and steel we received from her. In that case dumping would go on, and the Colonies would obtain advantages which they were never intended to have. I am afraid that a system of commercial treaties within the Empire may really retard that federation which the right hon. Member for Birmingham desires. There is nothing the Colonies care more about than their own fiscal freedom, and every bargain made between the mother country and a colony will be the subject of discussion in the Colonial Legislature, the question being whether the bargain is not too good for us and too bad for them. I have talked with many protectionists in France and the United States, and I never met one of them yet who did not admit that, although he thinks protection good for his own country, he believes free trade is good for England. They all say that. I suppose hon. Gentlemen believe foreign protectionists believe it to be their interest to say so. I assure them that this statement has been made to me in moments of confidence. During the last seventy years we have built up a mighty fabric of commerce and trade unknown even relatively at any other stage of the world's history, and we have done that by trusting to the British race. We have built up our

  1083
  trade by the energies of our own people. While our competitors were relying on high tariffs and protected markets, we have followed the course that nature has marked out for us. The policy of free imports is the only true policy for an island nation such as we are, lying as we do between the old world and new; an island people unable to provide our own food, and a people eminently fitted to undertake maritime pursuits, with the result that we do two-thirds of the commerce of the whole world. We have set an example to the world in persevering with this free-trade policy for the last sixty or seventy years, and now, as the Government desires free trade, they will do it a very bad turn by making this country protectionist. If we persevere and set an example of self-reliance and conform to economic law, it will be to our lasting honour that we have given a very powerful help to those forces of reason and justice which are making for free trade in protectionist countries.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. LYTTELTON,): I will first thank the right hon. Gentleman for the courtesy and kindness of his personal reference to myself; but as far as I could follow his speech the first part of it was devoted to showing that retaliation was a very small thing, a trifle in itself, while the latter was devoted to showing that it was a very serious thing [Mr. BRYCE: In its consequences], and would lead to tariff wars. You cannot have it both ways. At any rate, it was serious enough to cause the resignation of my right hon. friend the Member for Croydon.
  MR. RITCHIE: No. Really I should have thought that the explanation I gave of the reasons of my retirement would have shown my right hon. friend that retaliation was not the cause.
  MR. LYTTELTON: Yes, Sir, but my right hon. friend admitted himself, in writing, on 15th September, that—
  "Any proposal for retaliatory duties would inevitably lead to protection, and produce far greater evils than they were destined to prevent."
  MR. RITCHIE: If my right hon. friend is going to quote the letter he had better read it all.
  MR. LYTTELTON: I have read the point in the letter which I thought was relevant to the matter I had in hand.
  MR. RITCHIE: If my right hon. friend will not read the whole letter I must read another paragraph of it—
  "I am in entire sympathy with the desire to unite the mother country and the Colonies more closely together, but I know of no method by which preferential treatment can be accorded to the Colonies other than that which has been advocated by the Colonial Secretary—namely, the taxation of food, which involves, as a consequence, an increase of taxation. To this policy I am opposed."
  MR. LYTTELTON: I quoted the passage on which I relied, and, with great deference to my right hon. friend, the passage just read does not appear to require any modification of my original statement. Now I wish to say with perfect frankness at the outset that I do not intend, in a debate on the Address, to discuss a scheme for preferential duties which is not part of the scheme of the present Government, and into the details of which of course I cannot enter.
  There were two questions asked by the right hon. Member for Cambridge University which I think were fair Questions One was. "Will the Government support those who honestly support the Government fiscal programme?" My answer is, "The Government will support those who honestly support, the Government programme." The second question was, "Will they oppose those candidates who go further than the fiscal programme of the Government in opinion, and who may be the advocates of colonial preference?" My answer is, "Yes; they will support those candidates who are in favour of the Government fiscal programme, even if their own opinions go farther than it." I hope that these two answers are at least plain. The noble Lord the Member for the Ealing Division of Middlesex appealed to those members of the Government who were going to speak after him not to go beyond the President of the Board of Trade in their utterances on this subject. I venture to think there ought

  1085
  to be reciprocity on the part of anyone who makes that demand. My noble friend the Member for Greenwich made a very able and eloquent speech. It would be unpardonable of me to demand relevance or materiality from most Members in a peroration, but from my noble friend I think I may do so, for he is lucid even when impassioned and he is clear though fervid. In his peroration he referred to a certain view of the Empire as a view of a gigantic profit-sharing business, and I suppose in doing that he endeavoured to cast some blame or reflection on the policy of the right hon. Member for West Birmingham. Since I have been at the Colonial Office I have been very much impressed by the business qualities of my distinguished predecessor. They are at once my envy and my despair. But I am even more impressed by the ideals and the traditions which he has left behind him. It would be a gross injustice to describe the policy of my right hon. friend as a policy which was in any sense dictated by mean and sordid ideas. I do not think my noble friend believed that that was the case; but I should like to bear testimony to the fact that there is no portion of the work of my right hon. friend the Member for West Birmingham at the Colonial Office which does not impress me with the great traditions and the great ideals of my predecessor with regard to the Colonies and colonial policy.
  With regard to colonial preference, I appeal to my friends and to my opponents not to close the door upon it. They ask us not to support it. Let me beg of them, as one who has something to do with the Colonies, not to commit themselves against it. After all, what a man of genius and great historic imagination said fifty or sixty years ago on this subject is still true. Carlyle said—
  "Our little isle is grown too narrow for us, but the world is wide enough yet. For another six thousand years England's sure markets will be among new Colonies of Englishmen in all quarters of the globe. The mother country can say, looking on her Colonies, Here are lands and seas, spice lands, corn lands, timber lands, overarched by zodiacs and stars, clasped by many sounding seas; wide spaces of the Maker's building fit for the cradle yet of mighty nations and their sciences and heroisms."
  The tendency is, if I may say so, on the part of some speakers, to shut the door on
  1086
  this splendid ideal. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] I think that my noble friend the Member for Greenwich, when he spoke of profit-sharing and when he examined so minutely the balance-sheet as between the Colonies and ourselves, fell into the very error which the last speaker referred to—I mean the error of going too nicely into considerations of profit and loss and in not considering sufficiently the great ideal in question. I do not wish to argue the matter. I have said distinctly on several occasions before that I thought the future of colonial preference and its details required further discussion, cautious and deliberate discussion, before it is embarked upon, but it is no part at this time of the policy of the Government. Let me recall the actual history of the situation at the present time. Canada is ready to go even beyond the 33⅛ per cent. which she gives us. South Africa has carried out the Conference proposals made by the Customs Union. New Zealand has just passed a statute by which she gives a preference to this country sometimes double, sometimes 50 per cent., and sometimes 20 per cent. As regards the Commonwealth of Australia, according to my latest information, Mr. Deakin indicated in an interview that it was entirely erroneous for a London newspaper to say that the result of the elections was dead against Mr. Chamberlain's policy. That policy was supported by the whole of the Ministerial Party in Australia, by the majority of the Labour Party, and by an influential minority of the Opposition.
  SIR. CHARLES DILKE: Has he not since that interview pledged himself not to propose legislation in that direction?
  MR. LYTTELTON: My predecessor has endeavoured to knit closer the bonds between us and the Colonies; and since I have been in my present office I have done everything I possibly could to foster the sentiment referred to by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Aberdeen, and to obtain greater co-operation in Imperial defence, greater mutual knowledge, greater co-operation in Imperial counsel; and, inasmuch as we have got so much closer connection with the Colonies by these means, will you

  1087
  not regret it if you say that in the great sphere of commerce alone a closer link is to be wholly excluded? I trust that I make my position perfectly clear. Colonial preference is not a portion of the Government programme, but I do ask every hon. Member, and especially the Imperial Members of the Party opposite ["Oh, Oh!"] to pause a long time before they commit themselves to any view hostile to if. An attempt has been made, principally by the right hon. Member for the Montrose Burghs and my noble friend the Member for Greenwich, to put the issue before the country as if it was the issue between protection and free trade. The right hon. Gentleman, in a passage not characterised by his usual urbanity and logical sequence of thought, accused me and Mr. Charles Booth of being protectionists. The point was whether Mr. Charles Booth and I were protectionists because we were in favour of a 5 per cent. all-round uniform duty. Is that protection? [Cries of "Yes."] If that is a protectionist view, then the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues in the late Government are surely protectionists, for they were responsible for the Government of India, and the Government of India fiscal system is a 5 per cent. all-round duty.
  SIR HENRY FOWLER (Wolverhampton, E.): The right hon. Gentleman is correct in saying that the Government at home sanctioned the imposition of a 5 per cent. duty in India, but they insisted on the imposition of a corresponding Excise duty.
  MR. LYTTELTON: I think that the Excise duty is only on one commodity—namely, cotton. Just see the looseness with which this term is used, and the absurdity of any Gentleman, however distinguished, attempting to rule out a policy by calling it what he thinks to be a bad name. If Mr. Charles Booth is a protectionist because he advocates a 5 per cent. all-round duty, then every Cabinet Minister of the last Liberal Administration is a protectionist, because they were responsible for the 5 per cent. duty in India. [Cries of "Oh!"] Right hon. Gentlemen opposite do not seem altogether satisfied with that line of reasoning. [OPPOSITION Cheers.] As
  1088
  they do not like a specific instance, may I give them authority in the matter? Will any right hon. Gentleman, however orthodox, refuse to accept Sir George Cornewall Lewis as an authority on fiscal matters? What did he say in 1857, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer? He quoted the words of Arthur Young—
  "If I were to define a good system of taxation, it would be that of bearing lightly on an infinite number of points and heavily on none."
  And he added—
  "These opinions, though contrary to much that we hear at the present day, seem to me to be full of wisdom and to be a most practical guide in the arrangement of a system of taxation."
  I think I have disposed of the point [Cries of "Oh!"] as to whether the advocacy of such a duty as the 5 per cent. all-round duty in trade entitles any fair-minded man to call the advocate a protectionist. Suppose that, having such a duty on commodities, you used it, though imposed for revenue purposes, for the purpose say, of colonial preference, does that make it a protectionist duty? [Cries of "Yes" from the FREE TRADE UNIONISTS.] I observe that the Opposition is rather more cautious than the free-food Party. If a duty is imposed for the purposes of revenue, are you debarred from using it for other purposes? [Cries of "Yes."] If so, you must say that if a tax, put on for any purpose, incidentally benefits the home producer or our colonial kinsmen, it becomes protective. That seems to me to be pushing orthodoxy to the verge of fanaticism. If I put a duty on a commodity for revenue purposes, and if I am told that I cannot use that duty for the purposes of colonial preference or in order to benefit the home producer, I venture to say that any candid - minded man would say that this is not business but asceticism. It is not rational loyalty to a doctrine; but the superstitious worship of a dogma. [Cheers and cries of "Oh!"]
  There is no man in the House from whom I would more cheerfully accept banter than the right hon. Member for Montrose. I did not expect him to have read any of my speeches at Leamington, but he put one of them in the forefront of his observations. I would make this very modest demand, however, that if he dignifies any utterance of mine in that way he will first read my speech and

  1089
  then quote it accurately. He asked me whether I was ignorant that Kingsley and Carlyle and Ruskin were opponents of the Corn Laws. Yes, Sir, I knew that when I was at Eton. I did not quote those distinguished men as advocates of the Corn Laws. They were opposed to them as I should have been. I quoted them as enemies and assailants of the old doctrine of laissez faire of the Ricardian economists. I do not think that anyone who has read any of those authors will attempt to deny that they were opponents of those doctrines. The right hon. Gentleman said that "the gloomy doctrinaires" would have made short work of me. That does not much concern me, because those doctrines are as dead as their authors. What is the general principles on which free-traders act? They were laid down long ago by Adam Smith. The first was, "Give me what I want and I will give you what you want." The next is, "The merchant is not a citizen of any particular country;" and the third is that the individual, by following his own advantage, is necessarily led to benefit society. Those are the fundamental doctrines of Adam Smith, and I think I fairly represent them, and they are really the basis of the doctrine of free trade. In trade there are no obligations of patriotism, said the free-traders. From the dealings of trade must be eliminated the prejudice of country. The great wheel of commerce must revolve monotonously, no matter whom it crushes in its orbit. It is weakness and sentimentality, they think, to attempt to check the friction and loss and suffering which might result from the remorseless progress of commerce entirely uninterfered with by law. In my speech at Leamington I pointed out that that was the doctrine against which men strove for a long time, and that the various Factory Acts, which were designed to save and support the worker, were expressions of a revolt against this doctrine. The deduction to be drawn from these Acts was, I said, that you cannot abandon human beings to blind forces, and that you must keep a controlling hand upon the conditions of industry and have a regard to the physical well-being of those who are engaged in an industrial system. The under-
  1090
  lying lesson to be learnt from this conflict of the last fifty years is expressed in that legislation—of which it will not be denied the Conservative Party were the pioneers, though the Liberal Party have fully supported and adopted the principles—which is a negation of the fundamental doctrines of Adam Smith and an affirmation of the principle that individuals cannot be left to pursue their own advantage uncontrolled by any other consideration. In other words, you must not consider merely the aggregation of wealth. You must also consider the ultimate effects upon society. What I venture to think is the corollary from those premises which I have just laid before the House is that the lesson has been thoroughly learnt in internal trade, but it is not—and this appears to me to be so astonishing—so clearly perceived in international trade. While the Legislature of this country says, on the one side, "We cannot disregard the conditions of industry, and we will not allow wealth to be produced without consideration of them," you cannot have the Legislature saying on the other side, "We will open every port at every time to all goods produced under all conditions," and so proclaim at the same time to all the world that we have not one single weapon with which to defend the fabric that we have raised. How is it possible that those two systems can have any congruity? How is it possible that they can stand for any length of time side by side? The right hon. Member for the Forest of Dean gave out of his repository of facts a list of a number of laws in foreign countries which he said were as good laws as ours.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: Yes, and some much in advance.
  MR. LYTTELTON: Yes. My point was that the conditions of industry under which commodities were produced in England were greatly superior to those of the great protective countries abroad. I have not the slightest doubt that the conditions of industry here are much better, but I do not ask him to accept my authority; I will give him the authority of the right hon. Member for East Fife. He said—
  "Talk about Germany and the wages of a protectionist country! I hope you will compare

  1091
  from the materials the Blue-book has placed at your disposal, the wages the standard of living, and the hours of labour of the German workmen to your own."
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: The right hon. Gentleman is perpetually quoting me as if I agreed in the doctrine he is laying down. I quoted his speech on the specific point that he alleged that protective duties must be put on to compensate us for our heavy charges on manufacturers in respect of certain specific Acts, which I say are met by Acts which put heavier charges on the manufacturers abroad.
  MR. LYTTELTON: I never said a word about protective duties at all. What I pointed out was that the conditions of industry in England which had been prescribed by the Legislature caused the output of commodities here to be dearer generally than the output of commodities a broad. I said that among other features which were noticeable was the fact that conditions of labour were very much worse abroad. I will quote another authority—the right hon. Member for Montrose. He said—
  "Next, in regard to Germany, it was a fact that some 4,000,000 of workers there, or two-thirds of the whole, were returned as earning less than 15s. a week. Sixty-five per cent. of the total were earning less than £10 per annum, and 85 per cent. less than £1 a week. Did these facts show Germany to be a paradise? So far from being a paradise it was not even purgatory, but a lower state still."
  That is a country which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Forest of Dean says, so far as I can understand him, is producing commodities under the same conditions as we produce them ourselves.
  We have had in the course of this debate very frequent references again, as to what I may call almost the elementary particulars of this subject. We have had trotted out again the old idea that you can look upon the consumer as one person, and the producer as another. It cannot be too often said that in 99 per cent. of cases the producer and the consumer are the same individual. Suppose that I were a workman earning £100 a year—suppose that I were a glass-worker, and that by the advantage of buying cheap commodities my income were £20 a year better than it would be
  1092
  if I had to buy at a dearer price. Suppose that by the process of dumping, or any process of unfair competition, my employer's business were annihilated; no doubt it would be very convenient that I should buy my commodities at £20 a year cheaper than I could under a different system, but suppose that my inherited skill in the work I had practised were lost, and that I was unable to find employment again for a year or two, and then at an employment and under conditions in which my training would be wholly useless, is it not obvious that the money which I save from buying cheaper commodities might be too dearly gained, and that the friction and loss and suffering which was occasioned by the sweeping away of the industry might be much heavier than the gain which I have made by being a purchaser of the cheaper commodities? I see that hon. Members smile at that as if the doctrine were something new. I do not profess for a moment that it is. [Cries of "No."] I am sure that my right hon. friend the Member for Aberdeen will at any rate admit the honoured name of Professor Henry Sidgwick as a great authority on economic matters, and I think I could show him a passage which is the foundation of what I have endeavoured to lay before the House.
  The right hon. Member reminds me of his question about colonial preference, but I thought that I had answered that at the beginning of my speech. I said that in a debate on the Address I would not enter into the question of what the details of colonial preference would be, colonial preference not being part of the Government programme, but being in the future only.
  There is one general observation I should like to make in conclusion. I have tried to show that the sense of the community has revolted, at any rate in internal commerce, from the extreme doctrines of individualism, but yet that a large party maintain that they should still endure in international relations. I venture to think that the obstacle to our getting free from those doctrines is the strong sense—in many ways a very good thing—of individualism which exists in this country.

  1093
  A French writer has said, "Men fall often by the same qualities by which they rise." In one period individual energy may be justified, but in a world of organised and be-tariffed communities, individual energy may fail in commerce as the undisciplined valour of the Gaul failed against the legions of Caesar. It is a rule and practice in this House that when a proposal is brought forward by which individual enterprise, authorised by Parliament, is threatened by State or rate-aided competition very special circumstances must be adduced before any such competition is permitted. That recognises to some extent the powerlessness of individual enterprise when it matches itself with State or rate-aided enterprise. At the same time we do not recognise that in international trade relations at all. When I was a member of the Royal Commission upon the Port of London we had in evidence most interesting and elaborate statements with regard to the progress made by Germany and France in their dock enterprise, and we heard how docks in those countries, elaborately equipped and aided by the municipality and the State, were by an equally elaborate system supported by State railways. This great organisation of foreign trade, which must, I think, be regarded with alarm by those who think carefully upon it, is pitted against our individual enterprise. Hon. Members well know how fine an enterprise the London dock companies were at the beginning of last century. Now they are practically unable to raise a single shilling. They have been exhausted, almost financially annihilated, among other things, by the competition of these very great State and rate-aided institutions. If foreign companies have by means of this enterprise power to strike, they have also taken upon themselves the power to defend themselves by high tariffs. It is against such a system as that hon. Members opposite say that nothing can be done—that nothing effective can be done either by retaliation or otherwise. I rejoice to be a member of the Unionist Party, which at any rate is awake to the state of affairs which prevails at the present time, and which is ready and anxious to do its best to apply a remedy.
  MR. LOUGH (Islington, W.)said that the position in which the House had been placed by the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Colonial Secretary was curious. Throughout the debate they had been trying to obtain from the Government a clear statement of their policy. On Monday the President of the Board of Trade said that that policy was unhesitatingly against protection, and that even after the next general election, the Government would not take up colonial preference, or carry out the policy of retaliation, except by bringing each particular case before Parliament. But the speech of the Colonial Secretary to which they had just listened was steeped from beginning to end in preference and protection. The hon. Member for Cambridge University, speaking in the name of many on his own side of the House, asked if the Government would support candidates at the next General Election whose support of the Government was limited to the policy of retaliation. The Colonial Secretary, in reply, said that the Government would do so if these candidates were supporting the Government "honestly." The right hon. Gentleman laid emphasis on the word "honestly." and that practically amounted to a charge of dishonesty against hon. Gentlemen in this House whose conduct during the past few months had been a credit to themselves and to Parliament.
  MR. LYTTELTONsaid that the hon. Member must not say that. He made no charge of dishonesty against any hon. Gentleman in the House.
  MR. LOUGHsaid that the right hon. Gentleman took no exception when he mentioned that emphasis had been laid by him on the word "honestly," but only when he put a comment upon it. A second question had been asked by the hon. Member for Cambridge University—viz., would the Government lend their support to candidates and organisations which went further and advocated a policy of preference? That was a most momentous question, and the Colonial Secretary said that the Government would give their I support to candidates who advocated colonial preference. How could the President of the Board of Trade reconcile

  1095
  that answer with what he had said a few days ago? It was scarcely honest for the Government not to be more candid to the House and the country in giving their real opinion on this matter. The Colonial Secretary had quoted a very noble passage from Carlyle. It was a pity to bring the splendid observations of that eminent literary man into the narrow sphere of political controversy in this House. They all agreed with Carlyle that our little Isle was grown too narrow for us, but. he maintained that the defence of free trade by the Liberal Party was a powerful instrument in the hands of Providence to build up that great colonial Empire which was being placed in danger by the action of the Government. The right hon. Gentleman talked as if the country had no experience of colonial preference. Did not the right hon. Gentleman know that we had had two centuries' experience of that policy? There was not a suggestion in the speeches of the Member for West Birmingham which had not been made over and over again years before the right hon. Gentleman was born. We had had preferences on sugar and timber and all the produce of the Colonies, and these had nearly brought about the disruption of the Empire. Gradually the principles of free trade had been substituted for that policy, and the effect on the Colonies had been to unite them with the mother country in stronger bonds than any merely selfish tie. The Colonial Secretary was not well advised in trying to make Party capital out of the confidence, love, and respect which they all entertained for the Colonies. The question was whether the good feeling which now existed would not be endangered by the policy of colonial preferences. It was admitted by the Member for West Birmingham that our trade with the Colonies was growing every year. Fifty years ago our whole export trade to the Colonies was less than £20,000,000, while last year it was £110,000,000, or five times as great, and this great expanse had taken place under free trade.
  AN HON. MEMBERasked whether it did not occur to the hon. Gentleman that if we refused the offer of the Colonies they would enter into an alliance with other nations.
  MR. LOUGHsaid he denied that there was any offer from the Colonies. Such a thing as an offer ought to be made in a distinct and formal manner, and there was none such. The proposals of the Government had, in fact, plunged the Colonies into as great a turmoil as this country. The Colonial Secretary had produced some of the most commonplace arguments in support of protection. He suggested that workmen's trade unions were an infringement of free trade; he might just as well have said that a trade union among barristers interfered with the operations of free trade. The definition offer trade for the purposes of the controversy was perfectly simple; it was that the Government should not interfere with the trade relations between this and other countries. He had never heard a more preposterous statement than that made by the Colonial Secretary that we had not a weapon left in our hands to defend our trade interests against attacks from foreign countries. Our commerce was greater than that of any other nation in the world, both per head of the population and in total volume. How was it that so serious a crisis had arisen so suddenly, and why should it have been sprung upon the country? The best summary of the case had been given by the Under-Secretary of the Board of Trade, who stated that the whole agitation rested on the one point that the exports of this country were small and unsatisfactory compared with the imports. His case rested on three statements. First, that the exports were not of sufficient quantity, second, that they were not of the right quality, and third, that they did not go to the right destination. The problem was not properly answered by dealing with special trades. No doubt it was easy to select a particular trade and prove that it had failed. Trades constantly failed and free-traders never undertook to make all trades successful. Nor when we prove that a given trade is very successful do we meet the difficulty. Neither is it necessary to quarrel with Gentlemen opposite who select some particular year for their calculations. The right answer to the argument avoids all such side issues. What, then, is the proper answer to what may be called the Birmingham

  1097
  policy? If he might say so very respectfully the proper answer was that there was not a word of truth in the statements which had been made. Exports were not and could not be less than imports. Perhaps the matter can be more simply explained if I trace for a moment the origin of this fallacy. The idea that exports were smaller than imports perhaps arose in the Statistical Society where a paper was once read by a distinguished man on what he called "The Excess of Imports." There could be no excess of imports. Imports were like income or wealth; there could not be too much of them, and they were all advantageous if properly used. Then the matter was carried to its second stage by a distinguished statesman who arrived in this country from the Colonies. He heard the story that the imports of the country were excessive and he crystalised the situation as follows—
  "Yes, and we pay a hundred and sixty million sovereigns every year for this excess."
  That remark excited ridicule throughout the country because we had not got a hundred and sixty million sovereigns to pay and even if it had it would not have met the difficulty because they were supposed to have been paying them annually for twenty years. Therefore, according to Mr. Seddon the country would require not a hundred and sixty million sovereigns but 3,000 million sovereigns. That was all nonsense. No sovereigns went out. Our money would not be accepted by the countries which sent the imports. The third and final stage of the fallacy was reached in one of the speeches of the Member for West Birmingham, who said—
  "Suppose all industrial enterprise in this country died out, that mills were stopped, that there was no work, so that the all people were idle, and that the country's ships went to the bottom of the sea, what would happen then?"
  He said—
  "Then our imports would treble and the country would have to import to the value of £1,500,000,000!
  What a statement to make! Probably no greater example of absurdity had ever been reached in the domain of human error. If our exports fell away to nothing then our imports would also disappear. My argument will be assisted if I give a simple definition of what exports are.
  1098
  Exports consist of material and services. That definition covered every form of export. But I will be asked if the matter is so simple as this, how is it so many people should have fallen into error? The answer is because they had made an improper use of the Government Blue-book, the Statistics, Abstract, and other publications of the Board of Trade. They assumed that complete information was furnished, but the story could not be found in any such documents, nor could a Government Department have prepared it. He was not attacking the Department when he called attention to the necessary limitations of their publications. If anyone would look up the story the Department gave of trade, he would find that the destination of exports and imports was not properly set out, the ports to and from which they were shipped only were given. Thus it appeared that Holland and Belgium sent this country a great deal more produce than they actually did. The Board of Trade specially warned readers as to this inaccuracy. But the great defect was that the Blue-book gave no account of services. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham said the best export was that which contained the least material and the most services. He would therefore, no doubt, be prepared to admit that the best export of all was that which contained no material and all services. What were those services? The first and greatest was the service of the country's shipping and that was entirely omitted from the Blue-book. There was the further service of building the ships which carried the nation's commerce to every part of the world, and that too ought to be regarded as part of the country's export. If such services were included they would not have these ridiculous statistics thrown at them. The late Colonial Secretary at Liverpool, looking at the fifty-five miles of quays in that most wonderful seaport, said—
  "I am accused of leaving out ships but I do not intend to leave them out. Our shipping is worth £90,000,000 sterling."
  But he did not proceed to correct his fallacious statistics and include ships as part of the country's export. It was said during the debate that a large quantity of

  1099
  produce come from America and Russia and that this country sent nothing in return. This country, however, did 60 per cent. of the ocean carrying trade of America and 55 per cent. of the ocean carrying trade of Russia, and all the produce from those countries was paid for by the services which this country in that way rendered to them. Other services were enterprises carried on abroad. Those were export as much as anything else. An attempt was made to confuse the capital with the profits of such enterprises. That was not necessary. If he invested £1,000 in a Brazilian railway it might pay nothing, in which case it would not be an export; but if it paid £60 a year and if he brought that £60 back to this country in the form of coffee or wheat or other imports, then certainly it would be an export. Taking the definition of exports as given by the Member for West Birmingham, it would be found that the exports were equal to the imports and that this country sent out no money whatever. Exports might exceed imports, but it was impossible that the imports could exceed exports any more than water should ascend beyond its own level.
  The second objection was that the exports were not of the right character, that there was not enough of manufacture in them. But it would be exceedingly difficult to maintain this position. What did hon. Gentlemen wish to send out? Was it more iron? or silk? or woollens? The commerce of this country had grown without any interference from the Government; the nation was exceedingly prosperous; and if exports in any given direction were increased without also increasing imports, the effect would be to displace something else. Did hon. Gentlemen opposite want to destroy the maritime supremacy of the country, or to displace British enterprises abroad? If they did they would meet with the greatest resistance. He did not believe that the House would interfere with the commercial liberty which the country had enjoyed so long. He believed the third objection was that we had too much commerce with foreign nations and not enough with the Colonies, but he had already dealt with this point and shown that cur exports to the Colonies were steadily increasing,
  1100
  and any artificial interference with the progress of this business would tend to break up the colonial Empire altogether and endanger the colonial trade which was now in existence.
  He turned for a moment to the argument of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade with reference to dumping. He did not think that this question had been fairly examined. The Member for West Birmingham had defined dumping and said that it took place when a country produced more of any commodity than it was able to consume that then it could only get rid of the surplus by dumping it. and that Great Britain was the only country in which this dumping could take place. He had already spoken of one monstrous mistake the right hon. Gentleman had made, and he would only say now that if there could be a greater it would be the right hon. Gentleman's definition of dumping. Let the House consider it for a moment from the standpoint of a business with which he was familiar—the tea trade. Forty years ago no tea was produced within the Empire. It was all imported from foreign countries. Last year 325,000,000 lbs. of tea were grown in India and Ceylon, but the United Kingdom only consumed 250,000,000 lbs. What was done with the 75,000,000 lbs. that remained over? Why it was dumped. He had never heard anything so thoughtless as the statements with reference to this great branch of business. If dumping were a crime there was no nation in the world that committed it for such a long period as the British nation. It would be impossible to adopt any new principle with regard to dumping in a. one-sided manner. If dumping were bad then this country's dumping abroad should be stopped; but if it were interfered with the country would get into difficulties of which hon. Gentlemen had no conception. We dumped 20,000,000 tons of coal abroad every year. We dumped our cottons, our woollens, our iron. We had done it for generations. According to the ex-Colonial Secretary dumping occurred when the country produced more than it could consume. Was the production, then, of every nation to cease when her own wants were supplied? Would France have to consume all the wines she produced? Were the

  1101
  fruit and spices of the East all to be consumed in the countries which produced them? Were the carpets of Persia all to be used in that country? All such suggestions were the foolish utterances of men totally unacquainted with trade. It was hardly an exaggeration to say that dumping was the foundation of English commerce, the palladium of our business freedom, and the man who interfered with it would be an enemy to his country.
  He would now turn to the policy of retaliation which the Prime Minister had adopted. It had been stated that foreign nations had treated us with outrageous unfairness in raising up a wall of hostile tariffs against us, from which great injury had fallen on our commerce, but he would observe that there were two distinct features in the commercial ideas of foreign countries. In the first place the country which shut out our goods by tariff still wanted to trade with us, but they put on a high tariff to exclude some particular goods of ours. In the second place they only treated us in the same way that they treated every other country. And why should they not do that? If a country had the power why should it not shut out whatever goods it pleased? What was the effect of a high wall of tariff? The effect was that it oppressed their own people, and did not do us any harm, because whatever goods the foreign country sent over here they must accept payment for them in some other kind of goods from us. Their walls of tariff, then, only limited the power of selection on the part of their own people, and compelled them to take payment from us through some of the narrow channels which their governments still left open, which were more profitable to us than what they would select if the wider field had not been closed. The merchants of this country were not such fools as the Government supposed, they were able to protect their own interests and to secure that whatever the limitations protective systems might impose, profitable bargains were always made with the foreigner. Free trade was the best weapon to fight hostile tariffs. This weapon had served them well in the past, and if they stuck to it now it would serve them well in the future. Retaliation was the thin end of the wedge, and its adoption would
  1102
  inevitably lead to the broad system of protection. Let us examine the single experiment in retaliation which the Government have made. Nearly every Member of the Government who had spoken had mentioned the Sugar Convention as a good illustration of their successful interference with "dumping," and as an example of retaliation. The Sugar Convention Bill was an Act shaped on the ideas of the late Colonial Secretary. It had only been in operation some five months, and how had it effected already the consumption of sugar? Between 1902 and 1903 the consumption of sugar had fallen by 10 per cent. Sugar was the raw material of a good many commercial enterprises, and the fact that one-tenth of that trade had been destroyed by the action of the Government was an example of the folly into which the House had wandered. The Sugar Convention Bill was passed for the sake of the Colonies, and they were told that the effect of the measure would be that the export of sugar from the West Indies would be doubled and the decline of the industries of those islands would be arrested. As a matter of fact, in the year in which the Act had been carried into law the export of sugar from the West Indies was less than the previous year, for in 1902 the total was 1,200,000"cwts., whilst in 1903 the total was 700,000 cwts. Therefore they had not secured the end which they had been striving to obtain. They voted £250,000 as a free gift to the sugar industry, to keep it going until the Convention came into operation. What ought they to pay now when the Act had come into operation, and when they had given, what might prove, a final blow to the sugar industry of the West Indies? The great triumph of the Convention was to be the abolition of those noxious bounties which had depreciated the price of sugar below the cost of production. The moment the bounties ceased sugar was to advance 5s. per cwt., and the Government had adopted this policy regardless of the blow it would have given to British trade if their calculations had been correct. But what happened? The price of sugar had not advanced when the bounties were abolished, thus proving that their nature and effect had been entirely misconceived, and the whole enterprise, which culminated in the Sugar Convention Act, was a huge fatality. In

  1103
  the debate last year on this question the President of the Board of Trade said that if they gave protection to raw and refined sugar they would secure protection for sugared goods, and he said that if the Commission declared that sugared goods were not to be protected in the same way the Government would take immediate action when Parliament met. When the Commission met they stated that sugared goods were not in the same position, and refused the confectioners any protection, and this had struck a very severe blow at the confectionery industries of this country. This simple illustration was a proof that this House ought to hesitate before making any further experiment in the same direction.
  There was one other aspect of this question of protection and free trade. They were too adopt to forget what an important country Ireland was, and how deeply she Was interested in those great experiments. The people of Ireland were suffering from the high price of sugar, and they were paying between £400,000 and £500,000 a year in extra taxation owing to the imposition of the sugar tax some two or three years since. Whatever they did in regard to these matters in this country Ireland had to bear her share of any loss or any mistakes they made. Looking back on the last century they could see the effect of both the policies on that unhappy country. Under fifty years of protection Ireland endured the greatest famine in her history. Then followed fifty years of free trade, during which her industries had been ruined and her population reduced to half, and now there was the keenest political discontent throughout the country. The fact was that whatever this Parliament did it could do no good to Ireland. Still, there was a standpoint from which hon. Members from Ireland c add regard this question. Free trade meant fiscal freedom, but the idea of Colonial preference or any Imperial zollverein would lead us in an opposite direction. It was quite in accordance with the principles of free trade that Ireland should have the right to put on her own taxes, as the Channel Islands did. Ireland suffered very much under the 1s. corn duty, and, without saying that Ireland was very deeply interested in the fiscal question, he ventured to say that British protection offered no more advan-
  1104
  tages to Ireland than British free trade. On the contrary, the principles of free trade were more likely to be advantageous to Ireland than protection.
  The concluding paragraph of this Amendment referred to the blessings of free trade. They were divided into three parts, which had been laid down by all the great apostles of free trade. In the first place the Government should not interfere with trade; in the second place the resources of the State should be found by direct taxation; and in the third place there should be strict economy in the services of the State. By direct taxation the burden could be laid fairly upon the rich, as well as the poor. The disadvantage of protection was that an undue proportion was pressed out of those who could least afford it. They had been told that foreign countries had adopted protection, and they had done it because it was a good means of wringing a large sum out of the people without knowing exactly how it was paid. Under free trade they saw how taxation was paid. The Government had failed in all three respects. They were the most extravagant Government the country had ever known; they relieved direct taxation instead of indirect taxation; and now they were trying to give the deadliest blow of all to the country by interfering with its commercial freedom. He appealed to free-traders opposite to stick to the principles which they had fought for in such a gallant manner and he was quite sure if they did this that victory would crown their efforts.
  And, it being half-past Seven of the clock, the debate stood adjourned till this Evening's Sitting.

EVENING SITTING.

  KING'S SPEECH (MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS).
  Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Amendment [8th February] to Main Question [2nd February],"That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, as followeth:—
  "Most Gracious Sovereign—
  "We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and

  1105
  Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament."—(Mr. Hardy.)
  Which Amendment was—
  "At the end of the Question, to add the words But it is our duty, however, humbly to represent to Your Majesty that our effective deliberation on the financial service of the year is impaired by conflicting declarations from Your Majesty's Ministers. We respectfully submit to Your Majesty the judgment of this House that the removal of protective duties has for more than half a century actively conduced to the vast extension of the trade and commerce of the realm and to the welfare of its population; and this House believes that, while the needs of social improvement are still manifold and urgent, any return to protective duties, more particularly when imposed on the food of the people, would be deeply injurious to our national strength, contentment, and well being."—(Mr. John Morley.)
  Question again proposed, "That those words be there added."
  MR. J.F. HOPEsaid the question under discussion was so large that it was difficult to know where to begin, and, judging by the experience of previous speakers, it was equally difficult to know where to end. He would deal first of all with an argument which had been advanced in the course of the debate to the effect that if we changed our fiscal system we should discourage the efforts of those who in foreign countries were advocating the policy of free trade. Exactly the contrary had been urged in the Frankfurter Zeitung, which argued that it was the bad example of Germany which encouraged the present movement in England, and pleaded for a commercial treaty with England. With the statistics of the prosperity of Germany before them, however, it was manifest that such an argument must fall flat with the readers of the Frank furter Zeitung. He has examined the trade statistics of Russia, Germany, Italy, Holland, France, and Belgium, and, taking the figures for 1890 and 1902, he found that in every case, with the solitary exception of Russia, those countries had increased their trade with us in manufactured goods, and we had decreased our trade with them. Taking 1890 and 1902, the first and last years for which the figures were available, he found that Germany in 1890
  1106
  sent us £9,500,000 of manufactured goods, and we sent them £16,000,000; in 1902 they sent us £16,000,000, and we sent them £16,500,000, or a balance against us of £6,000,000. In the same way, between the same years the trade with Italy showed a balance against us of £1,250,000; with Holland (mostly German through trade), £6,750,000; with France, £7,250,000; with Belgium £7,750,000; and with the United States £20,000,000; or a total balance against us with these six countries of no less than, £49,000,000. It was perfectly clear that with these facts before them all the wisdom of the professors would not avail with the people of Germany against the actual experience of their traders and merchants. The only means by which we could induce them to treat us more liberally was to play the same game. This fact showed the difference between ethics and economics; in ethics it was wrong to do evil that good might come, but in economies the only way to bring about true free trade was to indulge freely in retaliation.
  So far as the, productive character of a country was lessened, so far did it lose something of that energy and virility whereby alone it had been made and would continue to be great. An illustration of the truth of this statement was seen in the contrast between a manufacturing town and a watering-place, the one a town of producers and the, other a town of consumers. Everyone connected with towns of that description would recognise that in the one there was an energy, corporate and individual, which was lacking in the other. Although the agencies of the distribution of wealth might be multiplied, still there was something inseparable, from the productive character that we should be sorry to part with in our national life. He did not for a moment say that we had come vet to be a country of consumers, but there were ominous tendencies in that direction. He had seen statistics of employment, divided into industries, in which the numbers employed had decreased within late years, those in which the numbers employed had not increased in proportion to the population, and those which showed an increase in proportion to the population. The first category included

  1107
  agricultural labourers, clockmakers, hemp and jute makers, lead miners, silk Workers, tin miners, tin-plate goods makers, and zinc workers; the second included chemical manufacturers, coal miners, dress industry, glass manufacturers, and textile fabrics; while the only Trades included in the third category were books, prints and maps; engine and machine makers, fitters and boiler makers; food, lodging, tobacco, and drink; and houses, furniture, decoration, and building. These facts were somewhat significant. Those in the book trade were engaged in a strictly protected industry; machine makers largely made that which would subserve and increase industrial development abroad; boiler makers had great difficulty in exporting, owing to the bulk and shape of their products; those engaged in the industries connected with food and drink obviously could not export to any great extent; and the houses and building trades were protected by the circumstances of their occupation from the competitive importation of ready-made goods. Therefore, according to those statistics, of the actually productive staple industries of the country there was not one in which an increase was shown. And that must be the natural consequence when a home industry had neither the market at home to itself nor the free entrance to foreign markets, for the greater the flow of imports the less must be the employment at home.
  No Member would wish as an ideal that we should be a nation of consumers only. As to the diplomatic aspect of the question, it would probably be admitted that when diplomacy was stripped of its conventional finesse it resolved itself into inducements or threats. In many instances the questions of difference between nations, while not of first-rate importance, were still of great importance to large sections of the community, and in such cases how could we proceed? What inducements had we to offer? To enter into an alliance, with its accompanying risks, for the sake of a purely trade advantage was not worth the game. To offer territory was to part with real property in exchange for a very doubtful and contingent advantage. The offer of cash down would not be tolerated by any Chancellor of the Exchequer, and it would be an induce-
  1108
  ment to every nation in the world to blackmail us. We could not offer trade advantages, as we had given them away already. Having, then, no inducements to offer, could we offer threats? To go to war for an ordinary trade advantage would be simply wicked and immoral. We could do nothing without the power of retaliation, which at present we did not possess. He would not confine this argument merely to cases of commercial advantage; it could be applied to questions of international importance not necessarily or exclusively connected with trade.
  In our difference years ago with Portugal an allusion to Oporto wine would have had a potent effect; the Newfoundland Fisheries dispute might have been ended by a reference to champagne and silks; and there were conceivable circumstances in which mineral oil might be of considerable diplomatic service. But, how should this power of retaliation be exercised? Statements had been made to the effect that it would be used only after Parliament had been consulted in each case. That was good as far as it went, but he would like to go further. The procedure on a Finance Bill or a Convention Bill was no more than the rest of the British Constitution—a good fighting machine. Just as in case of national emergency he would give the Executive Government power to raise and apply money without the previous consent of Parliament, so he would pass a general statute giving the Executive Government the power, within certain limits, to retaliate on its own responsibility, subject to the judgment of Parliament afterwards, against any country that treated us unfairly. In Germany the Government had not general or universal powers, but a restricted power of increasing or diminishing tariffs, which was subject to the judgment, not of the Reichstag, but of the Bundesrath only. When a country like Germany possessed such a power, surely we ought to allow our Government the use of a weapon equally prompt and effective, and not trust merely to the wisdom of this somewhat garrulous assembly. ["Oh!"]. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose had recently stated that the advocates of reform in this matter were acting on pure hypotheses. He could

  1109
  assure the right hon. Gentleman that in Sheffield there was no hypothesis whatever about the matter. There was real and sore distress, partly accounted for by the fact that there had been some delay in the Government orders for armour-plate—a point to which he hoped the Civil Lord to the Admiralty would give some attention—but more largely due to circumstances which nothing but economic change could touch. It must necessarily be so when shafting made by his constituents ceased to find a market at the Tyne ports, because Germany by its cartel system was able to sell the same article at £3 per unit less. There was no sin in dumping itself. It was a perfectly legitimate commercial operation. But as a matter of business, if one side played at it the other should also. His ideal was that dumping should be stopped on both sides, but if we could not get an entrance into foreign markets we ought at least to keep command of our own. If he might venture a criticism on the proposals of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, he did not think his right hon. friend had quite explained how he would harmonise the conflicting claims of the revenue and the retaliatory tariff. Looked at simply for the purposes of revenue, the tariff would not be effective for retaliation against dumping; and, on the other hand, in the conceivable case of retaliating against all the world, next to no revenue would be brought in. That was a difficulty which deserved attention. His suggestion would be that the Government should put the highest revenue tax on foreign manufactured goods their experts advised; they would then have their revenue and machinery. Having their revenue and machinery they should then add, in case of necessity, duties on any particular articles in accordance with the needs of fiscal warfare. In reply to the objection that they would never know what revenue they were likely to get, he would say that they should calculate their revenue well within the mark and let the balance go to he sinking fund. But then this question arose: the policy of the Government was to open foreign markets; how would that affect industries which do not export, particularly agriculture? From the policy of negotiation and retaliation he did not think agriculture or other non-
  1110
  exporting industries could gain. Would it gain under the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham? If, as was said in the case of the corn duty, the first shilling did not count, the only advantage to be secured was in the second shilling, and he did not think the addition of a shilling to the price of corn would make the difference between prosperity and depression. Therefore, as at present formulated, neither proposal met the difficulty. He thought the way out of the difficulty was indicated by Lord Salisbury some years, ago when he stated that exporting industries were suffering from foreign tariffs, while non-exporting industries were suffering from a home excise in the shape of rates. In the one case the remedy was to get rid of foreign tariffs, and in the other to reduce the rates.
  Some critics had attacked the Government for proposing a revolution in the fiscal policy of the country. Although he disagreed with this he ventured to think that the proposals of the Government were not a small or insignificant part of the policy of fiscal reform. The proposals of the Government were good in themselves, and might be advocated and put into operation quite apart from any further measures. He remembered that during the discussions on the Finance Bill of 1902, he ventured to put forward views on fiscal policy which had since become more fashionable than they then were; for he found fault with it because it contained no retaliatory proposals. On that occasion the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Aberdeen was kind enough to say that he had given a lucid exposition of exploded fallacies. He presumed the right hon. Gentleman still thought them fallacies but he must recognise that whether fallacies or not they had still considerable detonating power. The change had been such that nobody two years ago would have ventured to predict.
  A good deal had been said against the attitude of the Prime Minister on this question. For his personal defence he needed no one but himself; but as a matter of speculation it was interesting to know what other course his critics would have had him take. Was he to anathematise the right hon. Gentleman

  1111
  the Member for West Birmingham, and all his works? If so, he would have been unfair to his own convictions, because he went with the right hon. Gentleman at least half the way. Was he to accept the new policy wholesale, and make it his own? If so, he would have been open to the charge of committing his party, unprepared and unsuspicious, to a revolution of which no man could see the end. Was he, again, to resign his post and acknowledge himself overcome by the stress of the situation? If so, he would have been false to the trust which a united party had unanimously committed to him a year before. Another course was possible to him, to accept the necessity for fiscal change, to determine the time and the measure of its application according to a sense of what was practicable for Parliament and expedient for the State, and to hold together his party for work, for reform, and for conservation in other regions of no less importance than the fiscal sphere. This the Prime Minister had done, and in so doing, he believed, he would be followed by the very great majority of his supporters with a loyalty which difficulties and calumny would make the more staunch and the more enduring.
  The Government had been asked not only to declare their policy but also the actual details and methods by which they wished to carry their policy out. It had been said that it would not be very long before they had a General Election, and therefore he presumed that the Opposition also had a policy. What did they propose in regard to education? He did not know whether the solitary representative of the Opposition Front Bench would like a little cross-examination upon that. [Cries of "Yes," and an HON. MEMBER, "There is only one on the Government Bench."] The Opposition ought to be prepared to state how they would carry out a reform in the financial system of the country. Would the hon. Member in charge of the Front Opposition Bench be prepared to stand a cross-examination as to how they proposed to carry out their education policy? Did they propose to restore the School Boards, buy up the Voluntary Schools, or take them over without paying for them, and give secular instruction in all
  1112
  schools? His point was that the questions he had just put to the Opposition were no more unreasonable than the questions put to the Government as to how they were going to carry out their proposals in regard to fiscal reform. Ho feared that some of his friends forget that forty years passed from the time when first an agitation for free trade sprung up till the time when it was consummated under the treaty of 1860. They had to deal with what to many Englishmen had become a religion, and they could not drive religious convictions, even though they be based on ancient superstition. But that the change must come, and that it need not be feared, he was equally convinced. People talked sometimes as though, before free trade. England was a poor country of mean account; but our shipping supremacy was created by the Navigation Act of a Republican Government, our wealth (according to Sir R. Giffen) trebled between 1750 and 1800, and our credit, under another fiscal system, brought us triumphant through the strain of the great wars. It was true that by the middle of the last century the old system had done its work and could no longer stand; but the success of that which followed was aided by a rare combination of events and sentiment with which it became associated in the public mind, or the results of which it usurped in the popular tradition. It was synchronous with great discoveries of gold and a marvellous development of applied science. Again, it represented triumph over the landed interest, and the landed interest was not popular in the towns. Those who opposed it had opposed the Reform Bill, and it was therefore associated with democratic principles, a conjunction which all subsequent experience had shown to be fortuitous. Above all, the age in which it was passed was an age of illusions. Peace, brotherhood, the reduction of armaments, the decay of national sentiment, and rivalries were looked on as the natural fruit of diffused knowledge and extended communications. Now racial hatreds are everywhere stimulated, national rivalries are more bitter than before, armaments are multiplied on every hand. For our material defences they had learned their lesson. He trusted that in the economic sphere as well they would recognise the

  1113
  truth, that if we wanted peace we must be prepared for war.
  SIR. JOHN BRUNNERsaid the junior hon. Member for Oldham, whose speech gave so much pleasure to all who heard it, gave credit to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham for courage and belief. No man in this House failed to recognise the courage of the right hon. Gentleman, and they gave him full credit for belief in his own doctrines. He, however, had come to the conclusion that there was but little foundation for that belief, and he had arrived at this decision after reading the ex-Colonial Secretary's speeches and criticisms upon them. The familiar case of the tin-plate trade had been blown into atoms, upon the highest possible authority, by Sir John Jones Jenkins, who had shown that in 1902 the tinplate trade showed the largest amount of business ever known in the history of the trade. Sir John Jones Jenkins explained that it was only the old-fashioned tin-plate works which were at a standstill, and that in the United States the rise in the price of tin-plates caused by the tariff had cost them so much that it would have paid the country better to have paid the cost of those works and pensioned all the work-people off at full wages. The right hon. Gentleman had also told them that the average price of wheat in the ten years following the repeal of the Corn Laws was higher than the average price of the three preceding years. This self-appointed teacher was not aware that the Act of 1846 decreed that the new duty should not come into operation until February, 1849. Therefore he took the years 1847 to 1856, as the ten years following repeal, including two years under the old duties and two years at 70s.a quarter, during the Crimean War. Again the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham told his audience at Newcastle-on-Tyne that the alkali trade of that neighbourhood had been ruined by foreign competition. This trade was carried on by two methods, one employing sulphur, and the other ammonia both invented in France in 1808. After many experiments it was then decided that the sulphur process was the best, because sulphur was the more
  1114
  easy to obtain. This process was rapidly developed in England and many fortunes were made by it. In 1861, however, a distinguished Belgian started again the ammonia process, and after experimenting with it for ten years he succeeded with his process and in 1873 made 2,600 tons of alkali. The process thereafter underwent an enormous development with the result that last year the amount of alkali produced by it had risen to 1,610,000 tons, while the total output of the sulphur process, the one worked at Newcastle, declined during the same period from 525,000 tons to 150,000 tons. Was that due to foreign competition? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham did not know even the A B C of this trade, and to attempt, by legislation, to stop such a process was like trying to legislate against last year's rain. He had come to the conclusion that the Member for West Birmingham was not a safe guide with regard to the position of certain specific trades. What were really the reasons why some trades were languishing in this country? One of the reasons was that the works in which the business was carried on were old-fashioned. There were trades which were seriously injured (he had no hesitation in saving in the presence of friends of his who represented organised labour), by the old-fashioned ways of some of the trades unions. Just as the plant in some works was old-fashioned, so the trades unions were old-fashioned if they limited the out-put and drove hard bargains with employers as to new designs, if they unduly limited the number of apprentices, or limited mechanical appliances.
  Before they descended to such a method as protective duties, at least let the employers and the employed meet together in a friendly fashion and set their house in order. He was an employer in the wire trade, one sympathetically but mistakenly dealt with by the Member for West Birmingham, and he knew that it was suffering from a lack of courage on the part of the employers and consideration on the part of the employees. He hoped that before long employers and employed would meet together in that trade also to see if anything could be done to the mutual advantage of both. The right hon. Gentleman

  1115
  the Member for West Birmingham said that under a system of protection they would have greater steadiness of employment. The right hon. Gentleman had proved the contrary by his own statements. What was it that had produced trouble in the tinplate trade but an import duty—not a duty imposed in this country but in another. Impose duties in this country and they would produce violent charges just as duties imposed in another country had done. The first imposition of a tariff, and every change in a tariff, brought upon one trade or another some derangement. The steadiness of employment was less in every protected country than in our own. He had spoken of one cause why some of our trades were languishing, but there was another known as "rule of thumb" management.
  He had heard of a woollen mill in Yorkshire, where on one floor the foreman had unlimited power of ordering a certain chemical, while the foreman on the floor below had unlimited power of ordering another chemical which counteracted the one above. The same traveller sold both. Not one of the directors knew why either chemicals was used. He remembered having a conversation with a soap manufacturer, a customer of his own. He coaxed the customer to tell him how much soap he had turned out in the previous six months and found that only one-third of the alkali supplied had gone out of his factory in the shape of soap. He recommended him to find out where the other two-thirds had gone. That gentleman discovered that it had gone down a sewer through a broken pipe. That was one instance of I "rule of thumb." His own firm once got a claim from a glassmaker, who said that his glass was ruined by the amount of sulphur in the alkali sold to him. The hon. Member knew there was no sulphur in the alkali, and he paid a visit to the glassworks. He succeeded in getting a sample of baryta which was being used there, and he sent it to the public analyst of Newcastle-on-Tyne for analysis. It was found to be sulphate of baryte, instead of carbonate of baryta, as it should have been. Hence those tears. Naturally no more was heard of the claim.
  1116
  Reference had been made in the course of the debate to the making of electrical machinery. It was the fashion now to be in favour of scientific education, but it was not so twenty years ago. A great blow came then upon the trade of making electrical machinery. By the Electric Lighting Act of 1882, any person who established an electric lighting installation in a town was bound, at the end of twenty-one years, to hand it over to the authorities of the town without any addition to the price for good-will or prospective profit. No business man in his senses, undertaking a new and risky business, would trade on such terms. The author of the Act was the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham. Only a fortnight ago he heard of a case which afforded an illustration of how English trade got behind. It had been behind, but it was recovering. An Englishman, resident in one of the British colonies, found in the neighbourhood of his factory a plant which was likely to to produce a new dye. He sent a specimen to a correspondent in England, and that correspondent sent it to the Colonial Institute, with the view of ascertaining whether anything could be made of it. The authorities of the Institute said they never examined anything except for the Colonial Office. The English correspondent sent the specimen to a well-known firm of chemical manufacturers in Germany, the firm which was now threatening India with the absolute loss of the trade in indigo. They produced a new dye from it and that dye had been registered in the joint names of the German company and the English correspondent. The House remembered very well how, not long ago, a number of deaths were caused from the drinking of beer containing arsenic. In a trial just finished the names of two firms had been mentioned—one of whom made sulphuric acid containing arsenic and the other used the acid in making glucose for brewers. That trial had brought to light an appalling ignorance on the part of these firms, which was a shame to the chemical trade. He was glad that the English firm who manufactured sulphuric acid should have been excused from any allegation of fraud, but their ignorance was absolutely appalling.

  1117
  The causes of slackness I have spoken of are all removable causes. As showing the disadvantages of the protective system the hon. Member mentioned the case of an American inventor who introduced into England a machine by which matches were made without the intervention of hand labour from the time the blocks of wood were put in until they came out as finished matches. In England, matchmaking by that process was now a most prosperous trade, and the company was paying large dividends. The same machine was tried in Germany. It could only be used with a particularly soft wood, and none suitable was to be found within the limits of the Zollverein. The duty on the wood introduced from other quarters was so high that it was absolutely impossible to make the matches in Germany. He could give another illustration from the soap trade in Canada. His friend, Mr. Lever, had a soap factory in the colony, and he wanted to use cotton seed oil for making soap. All soap materials there were duty free, but cotton seed oil was not on the list. The other soap manufacturers did not want to use cotton seed oil and they took measures to prevent it being put on the list. That was an example of the lobbying that took place under protection.
  The noble lord, the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs said that a free trade Government could do nothing for trade. Those who thought so were totally mistaken. The United States, 100 years ago, determined that the improvement of harbours and rivers should not be left to the locality, and should not be left undone because of the poverty of a locality. One Government in Europe after another had done great things to help trade, and in a thoroughly wholesome fashion, by reducing the cost of the internal transit of goods, the cost of the receipt of goods at ports, and the cost of loading. They were told that no practical recommendation came from the Opposition side; he submitted this one to his own leaders. The fruitful cause of protective duties was extravagant expenditure. He threw back in the teeth of any man the imputation that he was a Little Englander.
  MAJOR SEELYsaid the hon. Baronet who had just sat down had shown clearly from practical experience how very much greater were the influences of scientific invention and co-operation between employers and employed, and other factors, than the factor of import duties upon trade. In that matter he struck at the root of the question which was agitating the country and the House as to whether, after all, import duties could help us in any way whatever. He was sure that hon. Members, free traders or free importers, were grateful to the Secretary for the Colonies for the speech he had made that day. The right hon. Gentlemen said, suppose you place an import duty of 5 or 10 per cent. for revenue purposes and you find, incidentally, it has a helping effect on the home producer or to the Colonies, are you to say it is a protective duty and you are to have none of it? He ventured to say, Yes. The Colonial Secretary had described free traders as being fanatics and ascetics in this cause. Frankly, he confessed that he was a fanatic or an ascetic, because he believed that any tax which had a protective effect was a tax which this country would do wisely to forswear. He had been impelled to the belief that protective taxes, whether small or large, whether involving colonial preference or not, contained so great and manifold evils that he for one would never be a party to their imposition. [OPPOSITION cheers.] Although the holding of this belief might drive him from the ranks of the Conservative Party, still he adhered to that decision. Anyone who proposed to take the grave step of voting against the Government ought to give some reason why he held this faith so strongly. He had already stated his objection to agree to a tax which would help the home producer, although imposed for revenue only. He cited the case of the working man who lived under the two systems. The working man at present went to a shop to buy sugar and other articles. He was aware that he was spending 6d. more than he need spend if there were no taxes at all. But the working man said to himself, "I know that the Army and Navy are necessary, and I am willing to pay my share." Under the system suggested by the right hon. Member for West Birmingham the working man, in

  1119
  buying his necessaries, would be aware, not only that he was paying 6d. more, bur he would now say, "A portion of the 6d. goes towards the Army and the Navy, but a portion also goes to provide Messrs. Jones and Robinson, the owners of the factory, with more money to employ more footmen and drink more champagne." And the working man would speak the absolute truth.
  He agreed that the economic loss of wealth to the people of the country was very slight, because much of the money gained by the manufacturer would be distributed among his workpeople, but no one could deny that the man who paid protective taxes had a definite grievance. No one would also deny that the system under which we lived did produce a greater degree of social content than prevailed in any other country; and though he believed that while the economic loss suffered by protection was greatly exaggerated by free trade speakers, yet the social evils of protection had received nothing like sufficient attention. A country which had adopted free trade and reverted to protective duties, however small, must do one of two things. It must cither transfer the people to great countries with illimitable resources, like America, or it must have a military despotism such as prevailed on the Continent. He might be wrong in that belief, but at least it was a belief by greater authorities than himself. Taxes could not in any case be a source of wealth, and experience had proved that they could not transfer wealth from one country to another by putting on taxes. As countries could not tax one another, a Government had then to consider in what way they should put a tax on the people of their own country, on which class, and for the benefit of what other class. Now they came to the crux of the case, and the cause of all the agitation in the country. Were they going so to put on their taxes that part of them should be taken out of the pockets of the producers and the consumers, and put partly into the coffers of the State and partly into the pockets of another class of consumers and producers, or were they going to continue the principle under which we, had lived for the last sixty years, that money taken out of the pockets of the general public
  1120
  should go straight into the coffers of the State? He for one adhered to the view that it was wiser to stick to the plan of taxation for revenue purposes only, and he would ask his right hon. friend the Colonial Secretary whether he believed it possible to pledge his Government that they would, under no circumstances, except for purely temporary and combative purposes, impose any restrictive duties of any sort or kind on foreign manufactures?
  MR. LYTTELTON: The policy of retaliation does not prescribe the imposition of import duties on any class of commodities except for defensive purposes.
  MAJOR SEELYsaid he was glad to hear from his right hon. friend a definite pledge that it was no part of the policy of His Majesty's Government, that they had no intention now, nor at any future time, before or after any election, to put import duties of any sort or kind, except as a purely temporary expedient, upon foreign manufactured goods.
  MR. LYTTELTON: My hon. and gallant friend has no right, after asking a question and receiving an answer, to make a speech, and put into my answer that which it did not contain.
  MAJOR SEELYsaid he was sorry if he had misinterpreted his right hon. friend's view, but the matter was of so much importance, for it really embodied the whole question at issue. Might he ask him what was the position of His Majesty's Government? [MINISTERIAL cries of "No."] It was apparent that His Majesty's Government could not possibly give that pledge, because their supporters had practically unanimously applauded every speech, every statement, of the Secretary to the Board of Trade when he pointed out that the imports of certain classes of foreign goods had deprived the working classes of £5,000,000 of wages. He excepted from this remark those who had remained firm to their free trade principles, although many had been half driven from them by some leaders of the Party, and many others had been misled. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham had said that it was possible by a system of import duties to give 300,000 poor families in this country, who

  1121
  had been deprived of their work by the importation of foreign goods, 30s. a week. If there was one germ of truth in it, what an illimitable hope it held out to all these people who were struggling on the verge of poverty, and who thought that they saw by this method a relief from all their troubles! The true division was between those who believed that the exclusion of imports would, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham contended, give wealth to those who had no wealth, and employment to those who sought it, and could not find it, and those who, like himself, held that that was an idle dream. He asked his right hon. friend whether the Government would pledge themselves to the view that it was idle and absurd to suppose that relief from all their troubles could be obtained by import duties, and he could get no answer. He did not blame the Colonial Secretary, but from his right hon. friend's speech, and from that of the Secretary to the Board of Trade, it could be seen that they did believe that relief from the troubles of the poor was to be found in the imposition of import duties and taxes. If the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham had deluded himself and the people of this country, with the best and most patriotic motives no doubt, into the belief that relief would come from taxation, then they must oppose his proposals by every means in their power, so that other greater reforms might not be swept aside, and so that bitter disappointment might not render our people more miserable than before. If it were true that any relief from suffering could be obtained from the imposition of import duties, then for Heaven's sake let the Government come forward with it at once. Let the Secretary to the Board of Trade, who had told them that £5,000,000 were abstracted from the pockets of Englishmen, stand forward at once like a man and say that he and his colleagues would put an end to these sorrows and troubles. He honestly believed that the hon. Gentleman sincerely believed it; but the hon. Gentleman could not say so—and why not? In order to keep the party together! He did not wish to say anything unkind, but he could not be a party to trifling with the deep feelings that had been aroused, and honestly
  1122
  aroused, on both sides in this matter. He was firmly convinced that all this protectionist talk was nothing but folly and an idle dream. For his own part no talk of retaliation, or of holding the Party together, would induce him to support a Party which held that idle dream, and he would unhesitatingly vote and would urge upon his friends not to doubt for a moment, but to vote also for the Amendment, which represented their opinions of the truth.
  MR. PARKER SMITH (Lanarkshire Particle)said that there was no section of the House which felt more deeply than those who agreed with the opinions of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham the loss from which the House suffered by his absence from this debate. They felt how much that absence prejudiced the cause in which they were interested. But there was one thing they thoroughly appreciated, and that was the generous sympathy which the House had shown for the cause of that absence, and the friends of the right hon. Gentlemen would not soon or lightly forget the deep and true feeling which inspired the phrases of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose when he informed the House of the cause of the absence of the opponent and friend with whom he had hoped to cross swords in this great arena. Such words leave a mark, not to be obliterated by the dints or the dust of the keenest party controversy. They had heard a very striking speech from the Colonial Secretary, with every word of which he thoroughly agreed. As one of his earliest friends in this House, he hoped he would be permitted to congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on that speech, which showed to the world what his friends had long known, how fit he was to be the occupant of the great office ho now held. But there was another speech upon which a vast deal of emphasis had been laid by those opposed to the Government on that side of the House and on this, and that was the speech of the President of the Board of Trade. Those who were opposed to the Government were inclined to take that speech as a final and permanent definite declaration of policy, but to his mind it was nothing of the kind. He took it simply as an interim

  1123
  report—an explanation of the present policy of the Government, together with the personal opinions of the right hon. Gentleman who spoke it. The President of the Board of Trade had rightly declined to state the future policy of the Government, and he quoted as an unanswerable precedent the action of Mr. Gladstone. In due time and at a future time the policy of the Government would be put before the country, and it would be on higher authority—the authority of the Prime Minister himself, who, with all respect to the President of the Board of Trade, was a higher authority than he, was. He must say that he could not accept the system of successive General Elections which had been expounded by the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade. That was taking a great deal too many bites to the cherry. It was not in the power of anyone to say what the issues at the next General Election would be. These issues would form themselves, and no declaration now could hinder the Prime Minister or the Party from going to the country on the larger policy of Imperial consolidation, and preference to the Colonies if and when it seemed expedient to them to do so. The Prime Minister very rightly in his speech at Sheffield reserved his freedom on that point, and they, his followers, declined to take any limitation on that except from himself. It seemed to him that the line which the President of the Board of Trade had taken was a false line, it was open to attack from the free trade side and it was open to an acceptance which was just as damaging. It admitted too much, and reminded him of the excuse of the servant girl who, when an unfortunate baby appeared, said "Please, sir, it was only a very little, one." That was an excuse which would not carry any weight. In view of the declaration of the President of the Board of Trade, what became of the great Sheffield speech of the Prime Minister and the solemn questions which were asked in it? The Prime Minister said—
  "The second question I will imagine put to me is this—'Do you desire to reverse the fiscal tradition, to alter fundamentally the fiscal tradition which has prevailed during the last two generations?' Yes, I do. I propose to alter that tradition by asking the people of this country to reverse, to annul, to delete altogether from their book of maxims of public conduct the doctrine that you must never put on taxation except for revenue purposes."
  1124
  Then as to liberty of negotiation the Prime Minister said—
  "Will the remedy you propose be complete? It will not be complete even if tried in its integrity, because the country will not tolerate the taxation of food."
  Was the whole answer to these questions to be that the Government wished to have the power, after obtaining the concurrence of the House of Commons, to use retaliation? That was not enough, as the outcome of such a speech. Mountains would have been in labour and have brought forth a very small mouse indeed. If the principle of freedom of negotiation were accepted, as it appeared to be on that side of the House, he asked why not proceed with it at once? It was said by the ultra-fiscal purists that retaliation was impossible, that it might lead to a tariff war. Of course it might, but so might any diplomatic negotiation lead to war, and it was the business of diplomatists to avoid that. The same was true in regard to fiscal negotiation. He denied the assertion that it made no difference in negotiating treaties, whether we had a power of retaliation or not. He would like to read an extract on this point from Mr. Morley's "Life of Cobden." In defending the policy of the French Treaty of 1860, Mr. Morley said—
  "It is absurd to quarrel with the treaties because they do not sound in time with the verbal jingle of an abstract dogma. It is beside the mark to meet the advantages gained by the, international action of commercial treaties by the formula 'Take care of your imports and your exports will take care of themselves.' The decisive consideration is that we can only procure imports from other countries on the cheapest possible terms upon the condition that producers in those countries are able to receive our exports on the cheapest possible terms. Foreign producers can only do this on condition that their Governments can be induced to lower hostile tariffs; and foreign Governments are only able, or choose to believe that they are only able, to lower tariffs in face of the strength of the protected interests by means of a commercial treaty."
  He wished to give a further instance. He met the other day a gentleman who was concerned in drawing up the McKinley Tariff, who gave him a most graphic description of proceedings when that tariff was being drawn up. Article after article was discussed by the Tariff Committee, and the amount of duty to be imposed upon it. On one article the expert adviser of the Committee said "Be careful; remember 90 per cent. of

  1125
  this article comes from Germany; put on a low tariff." A low tariff was accordingly imposed. On another article it was said "Three-fourths of these goods come from France; you must not put the duty too high, for France can meet you." The duty was fixed accordingly. Another article came forward, when it was said "Oh, this article comes from England, do what you like with it." That was the style in which foreign countries dealt with a country which could not defend itself. There was another instance, and it was contained in the Blue-book on India issued the other day. In this Blue-book the views of the Government of India on the question of preferential tariffs were set forth and they stated that so far as they could see at present such a policy would not suit them. But they gave a variety of cases in which the Government policy, the policy of negotiation, where the tariff had actually been used in India, and used as a weapon against foreign countries in tariff negotiations had been of immediate and great value to the people of India.
  The right hon. Baronet the Member for Northumberland (Berwick) had challenged them to cite a single instance in which the power of retaliation had been used with satisfactory results. Well, he would give them some from this Blue-book. In the year 1900 France proposed to submit imports from India to the higher or general tariff. More recently Russia threatened to raise her already exorbitant duty on Indian tea following the passing of the Sugar Convention Bill. In the former case the Indian Government were able, by the grant of a small tariff concession in favour of vinegar and copperas, to secure most-favoured-nation treatment, and to escape the almost penal enhancement to which their coffee and pepper would otherwise have been subject. In the Russian case the Government of India advised the Secretary of State that they would be prepared to impose a differential duty on Russian petroleum. "In both cases," it was stated in the Blue-book, "negotiation was rendered possible by the fact that India possesses an import tariff," and was ready in case of need to differentiate against the goods of other countries, the Governments of which assumed a hostile attitude.
  THE MASTER OF ELIBANK: What had they lost in Ceylon over the Russian case?
  MR. PARKER SMITH: Ceylon has nothing in the world to do with it.
  THE MASTER OF ELIBANK: But what have the planters lost?
  MR. PARKER SMITHobjected to these irrelevant interruptions. He was stating the case of India, and was proving from the Blue-book which had been quoted from by the other side on points favourable to them, that the Government of India had in the last few years reaped advantage from the very policy which the Home Government were claiming liberty to use, and which it had been asserted by hon. Members opposite it could not under any possible circumstances be of advantage to any Government to have. Indeed the Indian Government declared that in their opinion a greater freedom of policy would be attended by beneficial results, for they went on to say that if Japan were made to understand that the Indian Government were free when necessary to differentiate against foreign countries it would be possible to get better terms from the Japanese Government than had hitherto been the case. Thus they had three concrete instances of the advantages gained by the possession of these additional powers. But there was a great deal more beyond. He frankly confessed that it seemed to him there was no line of demarcation in this matter. Once accept the principle of using tariff for other purposes than revenue only and a great many other things must follow.
  It was said long ago by Adam Smith that defence was more important than opulence. Now-a-days there were many things more important than opulence, and we wanted freedom to use the tariff in order to obtain them. The country would be asked for a, full and deliberate mandate to use the tariff for political purposes, to obtain employment and a higher class of employment for the people, and to draw the, parts of the Empire closer together—to bring the Colonies into closer union with ourselves. This undoubtedly meant preference, a duty on manufactures, a general tariff, a tax on food. He was not afraid of going with these views to the country

  1127
  when the country had had time fully to understand them. There were of course many difficulties to be faced, and some of them had been stated by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Bristol. Much elaborate negotiation would be involved, much adjustment in favour of one Colony or another corresponding to what the Colonies were willing to give us. The right hon. Gentleman had asked would it be a fair bargain to allow colonial imports to come here free while our exports were taxed. But how did that differ from the present condition of affairs? Only in so far as that was the slate of things with foreign countries as well as with the Colonies. They can all send their goods here free while we on our part had to pay duties on those we sent them. The worst that could be argued against the proposal for preference, then, was that the Colonies would be in the same position as foreign countries were in. He regretted that the right hon. Baronet the Member for the Forest of Dean had minimised unduly the capacity and willingness of our Colonies to meet us, but if after all we could not make a bargain with them we should be very much as we were. Free trade within the Empire—which was what we were hoping for in the future—might be far out of reach now; but was not the path to a union of that kind through closer arrangements with the Colonies? The influence of the Zollverein on German unity had not been sufficiently appreciated by the noble Lord the Member for Greenwich who did not appear to realise all that it had to do in leading up to the Union of the German Empire. German historians and economists placed great stress upon it and upon the public spirit of Prussia in entering into agreements with the smaller scattered States—separated not by the sea which united but by the land which divided—and in standing without scruple the great pecuniary loss thereby involved for a long time, they held that these bold sacrifices and this Fiscal Policy led up to the consolidation of the German Empire. Two other parallels were quoted by the noble Lord—the cases of the Union with Scotland and Ireland—and he drew from them the conclusion that in these matters fiscal interest counted for very little. He himself took an opposite view. The
  1128
  Union with Scotland took place in 1707, and at the time there was a strong feeling against it which was only overcome by the fact that the Union meant prosperity and fiscal advantage to Scotland. What better witness could they have of that than Sir Walter Scott, who, by the mouth of Bailie Nicol Jarvie describes how the strong feeling against the Union was overcome when it was discovered that by admission to the West Indian and Virginian trade Scotland gained wealth, prosperity, and happiness. That was the manner in which cordiality was created between the two countries. But how was it that with regard to Ireland the exact contrary was the case? There the Union was brought about on political grounds—grounds absolutely sufficient as he thought—but unfortunately England's fiscal policy proved absolutely destructive to the material interests of Ireland. No one would deny that the policy of free trade, however advantageous to England, was ruinous to Ireland in the middle half of the last century, and he feared that the fact that adversity instead of prosperity to Ireland being the result of that financial policy was responsible for the continuance till the present day of the feeling against the Union. Had the Union made Ireland financially prosperous in the same way as it did Scotland, the feeling against it would assuredly have died out by now.
  Another argument which had been brought forward was in connection with the old Corn Laws. But nobody in their senses wanted to go back to the Corn Law policy of sixty years ago. Those Corn Laws were an absolute and hopeless blunder. That view was held by the most scientific protectionists, the German school, who had put the theory on a sound basis. But the Corn Laws were but a small and unimportant factor in the condition of the country. The real contest in the free trade controversy of sixty years ago lay between the manufacturing interest and the agricultural interest; and it was political passion that had given an exaggerated importance to the Corn Laws. They were perfectly unnecessary and led to extravagant prices in bad times without keeping the prices steady in good years, when they were inclined to fall too low. Cobden, in 1842, said the Free Trade

  1129
  movement was a middle-class agitation. He complained that the intelligent mechanics stood aloof, and the Chartists were hostile and suspicious. It was the great capitalist class who formed the basis of the anti-Corn Law movement, because they felt that their order was at stake. It was a false idea altogether that the growth of this country in the last fifty years was owing solely to free trade confined to those whose knowledge of history is only derived from political books and pamphlets. People forget that in the period immediately preceding steam had come into general use and that there had been an absolute change in our whole system of commerce. Adam Smith writing not much more than a century ago told them how in those days it took six weeks to carry a load of four tons by road from Edinburgh to London and back, while it took an equal period to take 200 tons the same distance by sea. Since then there had been an enormous and unparalled extension. Adam Smith told them also that the growth of population constituted the most decisive mark of a country's prosperity. Well, in the first half of the nineteenth century the population of Great Britain increased faster than it had ever done either before or since. In the forty years from 1800 to 1841—a period which the right hon. Gentleman opposite said was one absolut3ly miserable and wretched, the population of the United Kingdom increased by 65 per cent., and in the forty years 1851 to 1891—he left out the period of the potato famine—the increase was only 38 per cent. If they left Ireland out of consideration, and if they took Great Britain alone the increase in the first forty years was 70 per cent. and in the second period 60 per cent. Those were the days when the doctrine of laisser faire prevailed in all directions, growth was chaotic, and vast towns were springing up while there were not in existence sanitary or factory laws. It was the novels of the period that gave the truer picture of the state of the country. They had been referred by Mr. Morley to novels, and especially to those of Mr. Disraeli and Mrs. Gaskell. Let them read those and they would find that the most burning questions of that day, were not as to the dear loaf. They would remember the case of the old lady in "Sybil" who, when told she
  1130
  needed the cheap loaf, replied that the difficulty was she had no money to buy it with. The grievances dwelt upon were in connection with the Truck system and the repeated strikes, and they arose, too, from the wild and uncontrolled action of trades unions, as well as from the loss of employment from time to time, owing to the uncertain condition of trade. In "Sybil" the worst grievance is put thus—
  "We don't see enough of our young Queen's head, for we are not paid in money but in waistcoats."
  That was also the kind of grievance described by Mrs. Gaskell, who had an intimate acquaintance with the condition of the people of Manchester. The distress during the period of the corn laws was caused not so much by the high price of bread as by the reaction from the war and the distress which followed on it, and by the rotten poor law which existed at the time and which encouraged men to believe they could prosper as well without as with employment. Then, too, there was the change going on from the staple agricultural condition to the industrial state of civilisation. Everybody was entering into fresh employment under conditions that were absolutely chaotic. These changes in the social system meant friction and much suffering, and of that they had an illustration in connection with the west of Scotland. The thriving textile industry of that district failed and was gradually transferred to Lancashire and other parts of the country. The great mineral industries sprang up to take its place, but the change which occurred during the time that it was going on led to very great distress. But was it fair or honest to exploit those memories of old bitterness and to pretend that a duty less than a tenth of the amount of the old corn tax could have in the slightest degree the effect which the old tax had. It was the old story of giving a dog a bad name and hanging him. But it was just as unfair to give oneself a good name when it was not deserved. That seemed to him to be what the Free Food League was doing. They were using a name which was entirely foreign to their doctrines, principles and operations, and which was absolutely incorrect in itself and calculated to mislead. They were trading under a fraudulent name.

  1131
  That seemed to him to be beyond the legitimate sphere of political warfare. When it was pointed out to the Duke of Devonshire he admitted that the name might be incorrect and somewhat misleading, but that it did not matter. He himself did not think that that was an adequate way of dealing with such a misrepresentation. The Free Food League meant that food was to be had free. To be accurate the name of the League should be "The Free From Protective Taxes Food League." There was no justification in using a name which was liable to misunderstanding, and to which the persons using it had no right.
  The President of the Board of Trade gave it as his personal view that it would not be wise for the country to adopt the new fiscal policy. That might or might not be true at the present time, but he did not consider that the right hon. Gentleman gave any strong reason in support of his contention. He said that the effect of protection would practically be to put a tax on the consumer for the benefit of the producer. He himself did not consider that protection could be justified when it imposed a tax on the consumer for the benefit of the producer; but that it was to be justified when it imposed a tax for the benefit of the country at large. The best and soundest form of protection was protection by which no money was raised at all. Take the case of carpets in the United States. Before the McKinley Tariff there was a very large export of carpets to the United States. The McKinley Tariff put on a very heavy duty, with the result that a certain kind of carpet ceased to be imported into the United States. What happened? According to the arguments of hon. Gentlemen opposite the price of carpets ought to have gone up, and the consumers should have suffered; but the price did not rise at all; it remained exactly the same. The only difference was that the carpets were made in the United States instead of in Scotland, and that the workmen in the United States, as well as the manufacturers, had the whole benefit instead of the Scottish manufacturer and Scottish workman. That was an example of successful protection which increased employment to the benefit of the country at large. He thought
  1132
  hon. Gentlemen who differed from them on the question, should at least give them the credit for being concerned for the interests of the country at large, not for the interests of individual industries. It was not well for hon. Gentlemen to assume that all the virtue was on their own side if they wanted to understand what really was the position of their opponents. The view taken by the free importers was the view of those English political economists who thought only of the interests of the individuals composing the nation, and who assumed that what was good for the individual would be necessarily good for the nation as a whole. That did not follow at all. The view entertained in Germany and other countries where the principle of protection obtained was, that the interests of the nation were to be considered in preference to those of the individual, that if employment were encouraged it would be a general advantage to the country, and that by protection fresh employment was created, from which further wealth and prosperity followed both for the nation and for its individual members. There were two kinds of imports, namely, the labour causing imports and the labour displacing imports. All countries welcomed imports that caused labour, but imports which displaced labour were on a different footing altogether, and did harm to the country which imported them. The additional cheapness gained was small, but the loss in employment was very great. That was the only reasonable view to take. The English school of economists assumed that fresh employment could always be found if labour were displaced by imports, but that was a mere assumption, though it was the fundamental postulate upon which the whole structure of this reasoning depended. At present there was great difficulty in various directions in finding fresh employment. It was not contended that the country was ruined already, but it was con: tended that other countries were progressing more rapidly than this country, and they asked the people of this country to consider whether a doctrine of economy, which was good and right in a different state of conditions when this country had an overwhelming pre-

  1133
  dominance as a manufacturing country, should apply now, when this country was being left behind by several foreign rivals. I It was because the change was taking place more and more rapidly that it seemed to him that the time had arrived to reconsider the old doctrine and take thought as to whether free trade, which was a right policy when this country was the strongest in the world, remained a right policy now, when this country was becoming weaker than foreign countries. He hoped that when the time for a General Election came the country would be able to arrive at a right and wise decision.
  MR. BELL, said that Labour Members had not taken very much part in this important debate. During the whole of this week the speeches on both sides of the House had been of a very practical character, and, whether for or against the Amendment, had been entirely in favour of the working-man's interest. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade in his speech the other day, said that Mr. Cobden complained that the labour leaders took no part in the movement for free trade. It seemed singular that at present the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham also complained that the labour leaders took no part in this question. As far as his memory served him from reading the history of the trades unions, there were not in the days of Cobden what they now recognised as trades union leaders, and it would have been rather difficult for Cobden to have had the support of the trades union leaders when there were none. The hon. Member who had just spoken also referred to the trades unions in 1842, and to their wild action as being responsible for many of the difficulties of those days. He understood, however, that the trades unions were not in existence in reality until 1871, and any such unions as might have existed during the time of Cobden and during the years the hon. Member referred to were simply spontaneous combinations of workmen who felt themselves oppressed by employers. What did really suprise him was that the objects that both sections in this question had in view was the interest of the British workman. Those who wanted to tax his food wanted to do it in his
  1134
  interest. Those who wanted to maintain the present position, so far as the fiscal question was concerned, likewise desired it in the workman's interest. He had no doubt that when they came to scrutinise the division list they should find that those gentlemen who went into the Lobby on Monday in order to show their practical sympathy with the working man and the working man's interest, by taxing their food and other commodities, would be the same people as would be found in the Division Lobby on Tuesday in order to support the importation of Chinese labour into South Africa—and this in the interest also of the British workman. He certainly felt unable to reconcile the two positions. Even granting their contention, for the sake of argument, that protection would find them more employment, surely to take Chinese labour into South Africa, thus depriving the British workman of employment, could not also be to his interest. It had been said that the trades unionists of this country were not against the proposals—both the official and the unofficial policy of the Government—now before the country. Here, at any rate, he voiced the unanimous opinion of the few labour men they had in this House; and whilst Members who had spoken might say that they were speaking in the name of the working classes of this country—whilst perhaps they might admit that they were, for they were in this House by the support and co-operation of the working classes—at any rate, the direct voice of the working man had not been heard before now. At the outset the Trades Union Congress, which was the highest authority in this country—at any rate of the organised workmen—had proclaimed practically unanimously against the proposals which were now submitted for their consideration. And in spite of what had been stated from the Treasury Bench by the various Ministers of the Cabinet, they still maintained that the real object in view was the taxation of food whenever the opportunity was convenient, and as far as the organised section of labour was concerned they meant to resist it for all they were worth. He was grateful for the few complimentary references which the right hon. Member for the Sleaford Division of Lincolnshire made to one of his esteemed friends, Mr. Kelly, of

  1135
  Manchester, some of whose remarks he had endeavoured to use as being favourable to his views with regard to a protective tariff, and he would assure the right hon. Gentleman and the House likewise that his good wishes would be appreciated not only by Mr. Kelly himself but by all of them who were interested in this great question. Whilst the wishes of the right hon. Gentleman were endorsed by all of them, he ventured to say Mr. Kelly would be a great acquisition to this House, to them at any rate who directly represented labour, although if he were a Member there would be one vote the less for the views held by the right hon. Gentleman, because the Gentleman who now represented the division which Mr. Kelly was contesting was a very strong supporter of the right hon. Gentleman's views. It would be one more to their side if Mr. Kelly were returned, and therefore he wished him every success in his election campaign.
  He thought it would be well at this juncture if he were to state the views of the representatives of labour on this great question, although some tendency had been shown to despise, perhaps, any observations made by those who were placed in the front rank of the movement and were endeavouring to lead the men as far as their own lights would enable them. The representatives of the great labour movement issued a manifesto to the whole of the workers of this country, and the result on being analysed showed that out of thirteen labour members in this House, the twelve who were present—one was absent at the time through illness—signed this manifesto; out of forty-four directors of the Co-operative Wholesale Society, thirty-seven signed the manifesto; and of the members of the Central Board of the, Co-operative Union, numbering eighty, seventy-three signed the manifesto. Of the thirteen members of the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress one was bedridden for many months, but the other twelve signed the manifesto; the Committee representing the whole of the trades unions by federation numbered altogether sixteen, and fourteen of them signed the manifesto; and of the twenty-three labour representatives who formed the Moseley Commission to America sixteen signed the manifesto. So that here they
  1136
  found a very large majority, in fact, you might almost say the whole, against the proposals. Here, at any rate, they had practically the unanimous voice of the representatives of the trades unions and of the co-operative movement in this country. He thought that they had some reason to understand this question for themselves. Fortunately, they were not now quite so illiterate and ignorant as they might have been during the year 1840, and thereabouts, the time to which the right hon. Member had referred, and they had an opportunity now at all events of considering some of these things. The hon. Baronet the Member for the Northwich Division referred to the trades unions as being one of the things which to some extent injured the industries of this country. He was not one who would stand up here or anywhere else and say that trades unions had not made any mistakes, and that they had not done very unwise things on some occasions; but he claimed that there were employers as bad as any trades union had ever been. It was the bad employers, the oppressive employers, who were really the cause of the inception of trades unionism; and whilst perhaps a trades union in one instance might have shown some stubbornness in refusing to negotiate with the employers, he would guarantee that on the other side they could find five employers who were equally stubborn in refusing to negotiate with the union. He knew what this stubbornness was, and the employers knew what it was, and unless both employers and representatives of trades unions could exercise a little commonsense and come together and discuss these things in a proper and friendly and amicable way, they might expect similar things to occur in the future. He had had some experience in this matter; and he ventured to say that where there were good feelings existing between the representatives of the trades unions and the representatives of the employers they heard little or nothing of strikes or any troubles of the kind.
  And, it being Midnight, the debate stood adjourned.
  Debate to be resumed this day.
  Adjourned at one minute after Twelve o'clock.