§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £146, 461, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1905, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Committee of Privy Council for Trade and Subordinate Departments, including a Grant in Aid."
§ *MR. WEIR (Ross and Cromarty)said he wished to call attention to the question of light railways in the Highlands of Scotland. The predecessor of the President of the Board of Trade stated that special consideration would be given to the Highlands. He would ask the right hon. Gentleman to use his influence with the Treasury to give effect to that undertaking. There were many districts in the Highlands in which neither dukes nor millionaires were interested, which ready required assistance. Light railways would be of enormous advantage to the fishing population; and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would give the matter his earnest consideration; otherwise all the money which had been spent on surveys and other preliminaries would be lost. There was another matter. This House granted a large sum for the construction of a breakwater at Mallaig in connection with the extension of the railway; he wished to know why the Department had not stirred up the North British Railway Company to complete the work. The breakwater was extremely dangerous; surely it was within the province of the Board of Trade to take action. Twelve months was long enough in which to inquire into the matter: and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would not allow another twelve months to elapse before taking action. The North British Railway Company did not carry out the work for which they had received a subsidy.
711 He would urge on the Board of Trade to bring pressure to bear on the railway companies in order to secure a uniform set of by-laws on all the railways throughout the kingdom. It was very confusing to have different by-laws on different lines. He knew railway directors had great influence in this House; but the President of the Board of Trade ought to be head and shoulders over all the railway directors in the country. He appealed to the right hon. Gentleman to take action. Then, as to overcrowding in railway carriages, it was no uncommon thing, especially in lines in the vicinity of Loudon, to see first-class carriages overcrowded with passengers irrespective of what fares they had paid. He had frequently counted as many as eighteen passengers in one compartment. That ought not to be allowed, and the President of the Board of Trade was responsible. He wished to know what action the right hon. Gentleman proposed to take. The right hon. Gentleman said on a previous occasion that the attention of the railway companies would be drawn to it; but what did the railway companies care about overcrowding? They cared only about dividends. This question of overcrowding had been dealt with by the Viceroy of India in connection with Indian railways, and he could not understand why the President of the Board of Trade could not deal with it here. At any rate he would continue to call attention to it until he received some satisfaction. Every year the railway companies were displaying a greater amount of arrogance. If a third-class passenger was found in a first or second-class carriage he was pulled out by the collar. That was an unseemly state of affairs, and ought not to be permitted. He felt some delicacy in attacking the President of the Board of Trade because he had a very small salary; unfortunately he would be out of order in moving that it be increased. The right hon. Gentleman, however, accepted the position and received all the honour and glory attaching to it, and he must take the cuffs and kicks if he did not do his duty. He himself considered the Board of Trade had miserably failed to put a stop to overcrowding. Every year it got worse. As for himself, when railway companies 712 found, as they appeared to be able to find, that he was a Member of this House, they sent him most courteous replies to his communications; but he was shocked at the manner in which the public was treated by the companies. He should like to know what precaution the Board of Trade were taking to prevent a disaster such as happened at Paris a year ago. What precautions were the Board taking to protect people travelling on the tube railways nearly one hundred feet beneath the surface. He trusted before the new lines were opened that the President of the Board of Trade would take care that the carriages were fireproof, and that the public safety would be insured. He, himself, would sooner walk than travel by a tube railway seventy or eighty feet below the surface, where he would have no possible chance of escape in the event of an accident. When he remembered the Paris disaster he thought it was time that they should cry "Halt." The Board of Trade had a large staff of inspectors, and the right hon. Gentleman should see that the safety of of the public was secured.
With reference to the steamers plying to the Western Highlands, he wished to know if they were inspected every year. Some of them were tubs fifty or sixty years old, and they had to traverse the stormy Northern seas exposed in many parts to the Atlantic. Were their boilers and engines examined yearly? This last point referred to the North British Railway Company. Only that morning he had been looking at the casualties on that railway; and he thought that the President of the Board of Trade ought, in the interests of the public, to require the enforcement of the rule forbidding a railway company to employ men for thirteen or fourteen hours a day. The public were exposed to serious danger through the long hours of railway employees.
§ And, it being Midnight, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
§ Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.
§ Adjourned at five minutes after Twelve o'clock.