§ MR. TUFF (Rochester)rose to call attention to the speeches of certain Members of the Opposition on the question of Home Rule for Ireland, and to move a Resolution. He said: In moving the Resolution that stands in my name I feel quite certain that the House will give me some indulgence in making what is almost my maiden speech. I appreciate the fact that I have undertaken to speak on a subject which is of the greatest possible importance, and in which the keenest interest is taken by Parties in this House and also outside. I am aware that the great question of Home Rule for Ireland has been debated in this House for twenty years or more, and it would be presumption on my part to attempt to obtrude my personal views on the subject. I have been at some pains to discover what the present views of prominent Members on the Opposition side are with regard to Home Rule, 1485 and in accordance with my Notice I will submit them for your consideration. Lord Rosebery, speaking at Epsom on 18th March, 1905, said—
An independent Parliament in Dublin and the Parliament that exists in London do, in their strictest sense, represent my idea of duality. If Mr. Redmond is in favour of that, I venture to tell him explicitly that he has yet to win over, not merely the majority, but the great mass of the nation that inhabits Great Britain, to his views.The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose, speaking at Manchester on 13th May, 1904, said—Whether they had that, or a settlement which had been called by the name of administrative Home Rule, in either case he thought, and hoped, he was not wrong in saying fur that great assembly, representing so much, that when the Liberal Party was asked to unsay all it had been saying with such vehemence, fortitude, steadfastness, and constancy for all these years—to unsay all these things was what would not be, what could not be, and what ought not to be.Lord Rosebery, speaking in the City of London on 9th March, 1905, said—You may do much for Ireland, you may do her inestimable good by proceeding on grounds of administrative reform, but there is one thing to which no statesman will ever expose his country, and that is the curse of dual government at the heart of the Empire. What are the results of dualism—a vulture gnawing at the very vitals of the Empire, and we, at any rate, may be forgiven who will not expose our Imperial heritage and our Imperial future to any such danger.The hon. and learned Member for Waterford, speaking at Derry on December 2nd, 1904, said—They (the Nationlists) had forced one great English Party to accept the doctrine of Home Rule, and to-day Home Rule was a living issue at every election in England, Scotland, and Wales; and in many of these elections Home Rule would be the dominant factor in the decision come to.Now we will turn to the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for East Fife, who, I am sorry is not in his place. In a manifesto written to the Chairman of the East Fife Liberal Association, 1st March, 1902, he said—If we are honest we must ask ourselves this practical question: 'Is it to be part of the policy and programme of our Party that, if returned to power, it will introduce into the House of Commons a Bill for Irish Home Rule?' The answer, in my judgment, is 'No.'Now, after deep consideration and with the greatest possible respect, I turn to the right hon. Gentleman the Member 1486 for the Stirling Burghs. In the House of Commons, 4th May, 1904, the right hon. Gentleman said—The right hon. Gentleman the Member for North Armagh who had just sat down had referred to a matter which was rather beyond their scope that night—namely, the question of the self-government of Ireland. That, of course, was the remedy which they (the Radicals) would apply.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN (Stirling Burghs)Did I say "Radicals"? That is your word, not mine.
§ MR. TUFFI would not dare to put any word of mine into the mouth of the right hon. Gentleman. [Cries of "Withdraw."] I do not withdraw, I substantiate it. I stand by the words I have read. [Cries of "Quote."]
§ MR. SPEAKERI understand the hon. Gentleman is reading a report of the right hon. Gentleman's speech.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANI interrupted the hon. Gentleman—for which I apologise—because, while professing to quote my words, he stated that I said something about the remedy which the Radicals would apply. I do not think that I ever in this House spoke of myself as the Leader of the Radical Party.
§ MR. TUFFThis is almost my first occasion to receive a compliment from the right hon. Gentleman, and I only hope that I am entitled to it. I am sorry that the leaders of the Opposition have not turned up in greater force this evening. I should like to tell the House what the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwick said. Speaking at Northallerton on March 15th, 1905, he said—
If the Liberal Party had not a good majority without the Irish Party, his opinion was that they had better not take office at all.Now let us see what the hon. and learned Member for Waterford has to say. Speaking at a banquet held in London on March 16th, 1905, he said—He did not himself think that Lord Rosebery's speech was likely to intimidate the Liberal Party, but if it did then so much the worse for the Liberal Party. [Cheers.] The position of the Irish Party was perfectly clear. They would support and keep in office in the next Parliament no Liberal Party, no Liberal Government, which took the Rosebery view 1487 of Home Rule for Ireland. [Great cheering.] And in a spirit of the most complete friendliness to the Liberal Party he gave them this word of warning, that even if they succeeded in the coming election in returning to the House of Commons with a majority which was nominally independent of Irish votes—a thing that he thought a good many were anxious for, but which he did not himself believe would take place—that even if they returned in that position to the House of Commons they would find the government of Ireland a sheer impossibility.We have now to go back to the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for East Fife. Speaking at Ladybank, September 28th, 1901, he said—For my own part, I believe as strongly as ever I did in the two governing principles, namely, the necessity of maintaining the universal, absolute, and unimpaired supremacy of the Imperial Parliament.Now we go back again to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Stirling Burghs. I have been most careful in my references, and if I am wrong the mistake can be quickly discovered. Speaking in the House of Commons on February 21st, 1905, the right hon. Gentleman said—Those who, like myself, have supported and still continue to support a policy of thorough and fundamental alteration in the whole system of Irish Government.I hope hon. Members will follow me, and notice that I have given a few mild extracts along with some of heavier weight. Lord Rosebery, speaking in the City of London, March 9th, 1905, said—It is not possible for any Government, however potent it may deem itself, to bring in any measure for establishing a Parliament, however subordinate, in Dublin, without first having made it a matter of special appeal to the country.The noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition in another place, speaking at Wandsworth, 8th March, 1905, said—That unless they gave more self-government to Ireland, the state of the country would be as had in the future as it had been in the past.There is another Member of the Liberal Party, who, though not a leader at the moment, is, we are given to understand, going to be one. I am sorry that he is not in his place. I refer to the hon. Member for Carnarvon. Speaking at Carnarvon on October 18th, 1904, he said—He agreed with the chairman (Mr. J. E. Graves) that there was no hope of reintro- 1488 ducing such a Home Rule Bill as that of 1886 or 1893. The question must be faced as a matter of business. They must have an effective Parliament for the whole country, and they could not have Home Rule for any one section without granting it to all. Legislation under existing conditions was impossible.The hon. and learned Member for Dumfries Burghs, speaking in the House of Commons, February 3rd, 1904, said—It was quite unnecessary to enter on an argument in favour of this policy of Home Rule, or upon any question of machinery, or how such a policy was to be carried out. It was a question of principle. The policy was brought forward, not as a matter of plain expediency, but as a matter of sacred duty.Another of the accepted and accredited leaders of the Liberal Party of the future who is absent—[An HON. MEMBER: Go on.] I will ask the hon. Gentleman who interrupted me if he is making the speech, or if I am. The junior Member for Oldham, speaking at Sheffield on March 31st, 1905, said—It was all nonsense to pretend that the Irish question presented an insuperable obstacle to their agreement. Of course Mr. Morley was a Gladstonian Home Ruler; Lord Rosebery was opposed to Home Rule; but there was no question of a Home Rule Bill being brought forward in the next Parliament. It was a physical impossibility.The hon. and learned Member for Waterford is so deeply interested in this question that I must be excused if I mention him a little too often. I will not mention one of his English speeches at the moment I will tell the House what he said in America. Speaking at the Convention in America on August 31st, 1904, he said—I have come here to say to you that in our deliberate judgment all the efforts of the Irish race ought now to be concentrated on a determined advance towards the road to Home Rule. Home Rule is our platform to-day. National self-government, and that alone, is the plank on which we stand.I believe that it would be just as possible for Ireland to have a prosperous and free separate existence as a nation as Holland, or Belgium, or Switzerland, or other small nationalities.Now we will go back again to Lord Rosebery. Speaking in London on June 10th, 1904, he said—There is one further stumbling-block in the way of some of our friends, and some who would be our friends if this stumbling-block were removed. It is the stumbling-block of Irish Home Rule, by which we understand the establishment of a Parliament in Dublin. But 1489 I am perfectly certain, as certain as that I am standing here, that there is no possibility whatever of the next Liberal Government establishing, or attempting to establish, a Parliament in Dublin.What does the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Waterford say to that? On October 23rd, 1901, he said—Rather than be held by force, as we are to-day, under the British Empire, we would prefer to be linked with the meanest free country on the face of the earth.[An HON. MEMBER: Next please.]I have a few more here, and I intend to read them before I sit down. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Leeds, in a letter sent from the Liberal Central Association, Parliament Street, London, S.W., writes—
So far as I am concerned, I am a Home Ruler, but as I have frequently said to my constituents, the Nationalist Party has accepted, at any rate for the present, the alternative policy of the Conservative Party, and it is essential that we should see what result that policy is likely to have on Irish opinion and what are to be its further developments.We will see what the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Waterford has to say to that. In the House of Commons, on February 3rd, 1904, he said—Now I repeat that for us there is no such thing as an alternative policy to Home Rule. If your government in Ireland were as good as it is notoriously and admittedly bad, we would be still Home Rulers. Our position is that we assert we have the right to rule ourselves. Our position is perfectly plain. We are a Party of independent opposition. We are in opposition to every Government that does not accede to our demand for legislative freedom. For myself, I have sat in opposition in this House for twenty-three years. I have taken part in the overthrow by Irish votes of Conservative Governments and of Liberal Governments. I know not, of course, what the future may have in store for us, but I have a pretty clear conception of what our duty is. In my judgment, it is our duty to offer a vigorous and active opposition to the Government unless they show that they have made some appreciable advance on the road to Home Rule.Mr. A. Birrell, K.C., President of the National Liberal Federation, speaking at Oxford on June 11th, 1904, said—The Liberals were supposed to be at loggerheads about Ireland. It was utterly out of the question in the coming Parliament to stand up by the Treasury Bench and introduce either of Mr. Gladstone's great Home Rule measures. No such measure, by whomsoever introduced, could possibly pass, and, therefore, to hold it up as a thing which was to affect people's votes was ridiculous; it was a bogey, a bugbear.1490 The noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition in another place, writing in March last on the Liberal policy, said—At home, also, local government needs development, and the powers of local bodies are susceptible of judicious extension. Nor can we in this connection ever forget Ireland. Liberals will always be ready at the proper moment to extend the application of the principle of self-government in that country, whose sufferings from misgovernment have so often been a danger to the State.The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for East Fife, speaking at Canterbury on March 31st, 1905, said—That Mr. Tuffs Motion was intended to make mischief between the Liberal Party and the Irish Party. Surely this would not be possible, when we remember the close alliance there is between them, and how much the Liberal Party rely upon the Irish representatives to bring about the downfall of the Government.Hon. Members saw in the all-night sitting of last week what happy and united friends they are. The right hon. Gentleman also suggested that it was my intention to make mischief between the Liberals themselves. There is not much fear of that, especially as it seems to be quite understood that all the important offices of the State are to be triplicated in order that there may be room for a good proportion of Liberal aspirants to office. I was very glad, however, to see that the right hon. Gentleman concluded his speech by saying that it was not their intention to run away, and that he agreed that the time had come when the House of Commons might very well devote three hours to a discussion of the present position of the Irish question.I am not going to detain the House any longer. [OPPOSITION cries of "Go on."] I make a strong appeal to all hon. Members to show the country by their presence in the lobbies what their opinion and their idea is as to Home Rule for Ireland. Do they wish Ireland to have a separate Parliament, or do they wish for a loyal, devoted, and united Parliament? I beg to move.
§ *SIR WALTER PLUMMER (Newcastle-on-Tyne)After the manner in which the House has listened to the views just expressed by the hon. Member for Rochester, perhaps they will allow me, as still a young Parliamentary hand, to congratulate him upon what is virtually his maiden speech. By the fortune of 1491 the ballot he has not only been able to address us upon an important question of the day, and one which after the next general election will become an important question of the hour, but he has been able to please the Party opposite by preparing for them that which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife has foreshadowed as an agreeable and profitable evening. It has been said, and I believe sometimes with great truth, that the pleasures of anticipation not infrequently exceed the pleasures of realisation, and I am not altogether sure that in the case of the right hon. Gentleman that may not be the case to-night. The Resolution which I have the honour to second proceeds upon the lines with which we have been made very familiar of late by the Party opposite, of endeavouring to arrive at and analyse the policy likely to be adopted by those who may form a future Government. The precedent has been established by hon. Gentlemen opposite, and, however awkward it may now be, I do not think they can object to the same tactics being applied to them. No doubt we shall be told that circumstances alter cases, and that the circumstance that we are in office and they are not—though very anxious to be—makes permissible and legitimate in the one case that which in the other is not permissible. The whole argument of hon. Gentlemen opposite has, however, been for many months that we are an expiring Government. The charge has been reiterated again and again, and in this matter the Opposition is something like the long-expectant heir, who in somewhat indecent haste complains—to use the words the noble Lord the Member for Greenwich used the other night, though in a different connection—that the present occupant will not get on with his dying. I am glad that hon. Gentlemen opposite do not take exception to that interpretation of the view they take on this question, because it proves the right to base this Resolution upon that which it is practically based—namely, the assumption and presumption upon the part of Gentlemen opposite that they will come into power at the next general election.
I am quite prepared to admit that there are two difficulties which 1492 confront the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, and which, indeed, are inherent to this process of endeavouring to analyse in advance future actions and future intentions. The first is that he cannot quite know before the general election whether the incoming Government will have the sweeping majority which they so desire, and which will enable them to snap their fingers at the Irish Party in this House, and postpone Home Rule to the Greek Kalends—or whether they will only be returned to office instead of to power. It is conceivable that the right hon. Gentleman will declare that this Motion is premature, though if we are supposed to be, as hon. Gentlemen opposite do suppose that we are, on the eve of a general election, at which they are certain to be returned by a sweeping majority, I do not see on what grounds the Motion can be declared to be premature, unless it is upon the question whether they will be returned to power or merely to office. For upon that distinction a very great deal will depend. If they are returned at all, office is, of course, assured; but power is quite a different thing; and if I may employ a quotation which has been used before in this House by a former Member for Newcastle—Mr. Joseph Cowen—I would say with respect to that, ''There's the rub." But if the belief in a Parliament for Ireland amounts to a sincere conviction on the part of the right hon. Gentleman, his recommendation to the electors will not depend upon considerations of policy, nor upon popularity, nor even upon questions of time. The Resolution does not ask the right hon. Gentleman what he proposes to do after the general election, but it asks him what he proposes to recommend to the electors of the country.
The other difficulty is that the right hon. Gentleman does not know and cannot tell who may constitute or may not constitute this future Government. The demand greatly exceeds the supply. I venture to think that I who know who would like to be and expect to be members of that Government, and in this latter category I should like to place an hon. Member who is conspicuous by his absence to-night, 1493 and for whose absence there are, I think, reasons not difficult to assume—I mean the junior Member for Oldham, who observed the other day, in a speech at Sheffield, in that self-assumed role which he has already taken of one of the coming Leaders of the Liberal Party—that there was no question of a Home Rule Bill being brought forward in the next Parliament or I presume of Home Rule being recommended to the electors. Now this sweeping assertion which, if I did not know the hon. Member fairly well, I should at once have assumed to have been made after consultation with his recognised leader in this House—this sweeping assertion is no doubt also made upon the assumption that he and his new-found friends will have a sweeping majority at the next general election, and that under such circumstances they would be able to do just what they like, irrespective of the eighty votes led by the hon. Member for Waterford, fortified, as I for one thoroughly believe they will be, by some thirty members of the Labour Party, which will be an increasing factor in the Parliament. The Member for Oldham may know or may not know a great deal, but he does not know everything—and until and unless he is in the councils of the leaders of the Liberal Party he has no right to lay down the policy to be pursued by that Party in the next Parliament, or to rule certain things out of Court in this light and airy way. I have heard of a great and distinguished man in the last century whose learning was so great and whose opinion of that learning was so high that it used to be said of him: "I am the Master of Balliol College; what I know not is not knowledge." The hon. Member for Oldham seems to be qualifying as a twentieth century Jowett. This Resolution is, however, mainly concerned, not with would-be or expectant leaders, but with the official Leader of the Party opposite—with him who, having borne the burden and the heat of the day has, I venture to think, a right to expect the highest honour when the time comes. But we want to know, in view of their conflicting statements, whether the right hon. Gentlemen opposite remain on the respective sides of the fence which hitherto they have occupied with regard 1494 to Home Rule, and in respect to those who are now sitting upon that fence upon which side they mean to climb down. We want to know that, too, before the general election, for if we wait until after the general election I can readily conceive circumstances in which the question of the adoption of Home Rule will not depend upon the leaders opposite, or even upon the hon. Member for Oldham, but will rest with the hon. Member for Waterford and his Party, reinforced by the Labour Party. As the House well knows, there is an historical illustration of the ease with which a proposed course of action with regard to Home Rule before a general election can be suddenly changed after the result of that general election has become known.
Now, let me direct attention to some of the conflicting statements of the leaders of the Party opposite in respect to Home Rule. First, however, let me clear the air by quoting one of the declarations of the hon. Member for Waterford, who leads his Party in this House with conspicuous ability, and with whom, whatever other faults we may find with him, we cannot quarrel on the score of ambiguity. On St. Patrick's Day the hon. Member for Waterford said—
They would support and keep in office in the next Parliament no Liberal Party, no Liberal Government, which took the Rosebery view of Home Rule for Ireland.There we have a definite ultimatum, which matters little so long as no Liberal Government exists, but which may matter a great deal after the next general election. What, then, are the Rosebery views in respect to Home Rule, and how far are hon. Gentlemen opposite in agreement or conflict with them. Let us for a moment try and separate the sheep from the goats. Here is a recent statement of Lord Roseberry—There is one thing to which no wise statesman will ever expose his country, and that is the curse of dual government at the heart of the Empire.But, lest anyone would think that these are hasty expressions, let me quote what the noble Earl said three years ago—I am not prepared at any time, or under any circumstances to grant an independent Parliament in Dublin, and when I am asked an independent Parliament, or for anything 1495 that is to work up to an independent Parliament, I will tell you plainly that it is not on my slate.Now, having stated the Rosebery view, let me refer for a moment to the opinions of other Liberal leaders on the same subject. Take Lord Spencer. In another place that noble Lord said—They heard that Home Rule must he given up by the Liberal Party. He confessed that he could not agree to that himself. If the Liberal Party gave up Home Rule he must take a back seat.I do not wish to repeat quotations given by the hon. Member for Rochester, but I should like to give this summing up of the opinions I have quoted to the House by the right hon. Member for East Fife, which, let me say in passing, I prefer to the equivocal reply which he gave to a Scotch heckler, who asked—Should the Liberal Party be returned to power, will Mr. Asquith support Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman in introducing a Home Rule Bill for Ireland in Parliament?to which the right hon. Gentleman replied—That is purely an academical question which is of no practical or political urgency.Here is the unequivocal opinion written to the chairman of the East Fife Liberal Association—If we are honest" (mark well that preamble) "we must ask ourselves this practical question: 'Is it to be part of the policy and programme of our Party that, if returned to power, it will introduce into the House of Commons a Bill for Irish Home Rule?' The answer, in my judgment, is 'No.'Of course if the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Stirling Burghs is going to endorse the opinion I have just quoted, and to join Lord Rosebery in saying that under no circumstances will he grant a separate Parliament to Ireland such as Mr. Gladstone foreshadowed, then the situation will be completely altered in spite of his past assurances, and this debate will not have been without its value. But, if the contrary is the case, let it be stated here and now, or let the Liberal leaders take care to meet together quietly some time before the Liberal Federation meets in Newcastle next month, and agree upon some clear pronouncement of policy with regard to Home Rule in the new edition of the Newcastle programme. But if the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Liberal Party in this House disagrees 1496 profoundly with Lord Rosebery and the right hon. Member for East Fife and would be prepared to carry out in the next Parliament, reluctantly and under force of circumstances, and to recommend Home Rule to the electors at the general election, then let him say so here and now, without delay. The right hon. Gentleman has accused us of obtaining blank cheques from the country. Let there be none of it on his part; no seeking to get into power on the strength of free trade and then to remain in power on the strength of Home Rule. I believe that directly the election is over, assuming the anticipation of hon. Members opposite is achieved, free trade and the fiscal question, though still important in the country, will no longer be a burning Parliamentary question, but will be supplanted in importance in this House by the question of Home Rule.In such circumstance I would ask the Leader of the Party opposite—"Is he, or is he not, going to join his Chief Whip and 'stand or fall' by Home Rule," as Home Rule was understood in this House and the country, and by the Irish Party in the time of Mr. Gladstone? The right hon. Gentleman has two answers, one of which he will probably give. The first is the familiar formula—"Put me in, and then I will tell you." As to which, I imagine the hon. Member for Waterford saying—"In vain is the net spread in sight of the bird." The other answer is—"Yes, I will stand by Home Rule at the proper time," which is not in the next Parliament, which cannot be in the Parliament following the next, because whatever consensus of opinion there may be as to the Party opposite being returned at the general election, there is an equal consensus of opinion that a little Liberal administration will go a long way with the country, and it will not, therefore, be until the third Parliament from the present time that the Liberal Party or possibly the Labour Party will again have an opportunity of bringing forward a Home Rule Bill; but by then where I will the "standing by Home Rule" be on the part of the leader opposite? By then, I doubt not, the right hon. Gentleman will have met his reward and be 1497 occupying a seat in that other House of Parliament, where the Irish Party cease from troubling, and the weary Liberal is at rest.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That, in view of the conflicting statements which have been made by the various leaders of the Opposition on the subject of Home Rule, it is expedient that the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Stirling Burghs, should explicitly declare whether or not it is his intention to recommend to the electors of the United Kingdom the policy of establishing a Parliament in Ireland."—(Mr. Tuff.)
§ *MR. SOARES (Devonshire, Barnstaple)said he wished to ascertain from Mr. Speaker his formal riding on the Amendment which stood in his name. This was a point of considerable importance not only in this debate but in other debates of a similar nature. He submitted that the Amendment was in order with the Notice of Motion given by the hon. Member for Rochester, although, perhaps, not strictly in order with the Resolution which had been founded on the Notice of Motion.
§ MR. SPEAKERAn Amendment must be relevant to the Question put from the Chair. The Question put from the Chair relates to Home Rule; but the Question raised by the Amendment of the hon. Member relates to the administration of Irish affairs by the present Government. That is a different Question altogether. The Amendment is not in order.
§ *SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANMr. Speaker, a stranger situation than this never presented itself to the House of Commons. A stranger Motion never appeared on the Notice Paper of the House of Commons. The hon. Member for Rochester seeks to elicit from the Member for Stirling Burghs—why he should seek to rob my constituency of the poor honour of the definite article I cannot understand; I will take the liberty of putting it in, and talking of, the Stirling Burghs—a statement of the advice which he will submit to his electors at the election. The election! Here is courage 1498 for you. I thought it was the word they never mentioned; an idea that only visits them in their worst dreams; its introduction is little short of profanity, but it marks a falling-off from the high standard pursued by the Party—no, not by the Party opposite, but by the Government opposite; I am not sure that they are unanimously supported by their Party [An HON. MEMBER: Oh, yes.]—the high standard, I say, that they have set themselves in living up to the full limit of the Septennial Act. Sir, this is a new thing in the House of Commons. This kind of interrogation is a thing which all Scotch Members have encountered on the platform. We call it heckling. It is a wholesome practice between a Member and his constituents. I believe the word, and in some poor degree the practice, has, like many other good things, come south into England and established itself here; but this is the first occasion of it in the House of Commons.
The hon. Member who introduced the Motion is a recent addition to our number, and he may have acted in the innocence of uninstructed adolescence. His Parliamentary childhood has been passed in strange scenes, and he probably has thought that one irregularity more or less does not much matter. But I am not so sure that the hon. Member can claim all the immunity which attaches to a young Member. I remember many years ago the late Mr. Bernal Osborne saying in this House when a Member claimed some indulgence on this account, "He may be a young Member, but he is evidently an old practitioner." The hon. Member by co-operation with other Members sitting around him obtained this great opportunity, and no doubt the Motion which stands on the Paper is the result of the co-operation of himself and of those other Members under high official sanction. That being so, I am afraid I am not able to congratulate the authors of the Motion either upon their ingenuity or their adroitness. I do not profess to be an accomplished draftsmen by any means, but if the hon. Member had come to me I could have drawn a Motion of a much better and more effective type. What does he do? He calls attention to a variety of declarations on the subject of Home Rule. His speech, in fact, 1499 consisted almost entirely of a recital of these declarations. I would complain of them first of all that they were not very well grouped; but the Members of this House, at least, whose opinions were quoted, I trust, before this debate finishes, will have an opportunity of explaining and justifying their statements and sentiments; and, after all, these are only the signs of a healthy, intelligent, and independent consideration of a difficult and complex subject. Having recited these declarations, which it is no part of my duty to deal with, the hon. Member fastened upon me, and called upon me to stand and deliver. But he seems to be ignorant of the fact that his leader—not, I believe, his fiscal leader—has already informed him that in his opinion—and that should be final with the hon. Member—my speech on the Amendment to the Address moved by the hon. Member for Waterford was saturated with Home Rule. So that ought to dispose of me in the estimation of the hon. Member.
Sir, this Motion, I fear, is not to be attributed so much to innocent curiosity as to my views on Home Rule as to a desire possibly to furnish to the Unionist Party a field day in which they could disport themselves with some appearance of unity. It was no doubt thought that the hon. Member would regain that confidence which deserted him when his leader's policy has been called in question in the House of Commons, and make up for the incoherence and pusillanimity of the Party opposite by leading an attack in force upon another policy altogether, and a policy which in no sense can be said to be at this moment before the House or the country. When such an attack is made upon us we have no lack of strategical courses to pursue which have high example and authority to commend them. For instance, we might have searched about for someone who would move an Amendment which would altogether baffle the earnest inquirer. Again, we might have moved the "previous Question," and there never was a case more fitted for it. And, lastly, we might have run away. But we are all here, and the hon. Member will find that his kindly inquiries will be met with a 1500 not unfriendly smile. But, Mr. Speaker, wonders will not cease. Do my eyes deceive me? The Prime Minister is in his place. This is an abstract Motion brought forward by a private Member on a private Member's night and dealing with a question that cannot be dealt with in this Parliament. What more do we want to taboo it? If there is a debate and a division on such a Motion, it is of no consequence, "for he himself has said it"; and surely he will not think of wasting his time aid that of his faithful followers in listening to the discussion. If this would be true, according to the Prime Minister, where inquiries were addressed to a Minister of the Crown with regard to his public policy, while the country had been agitated by a great controversy raging from one end to the other, how much more certainly can we say that it is of no consequence when it merely deals with the opinions of a private Member on a subject which, as I say, is not now prominently before the country. Yet here the right hon. Gentleman is. I presume he must have been lingering in the purlieus of Westminster, and, looking up, he saw that the light was burning, and it occurred to him that the House might be sitting. He has looked in upon us; and I am sure that I express the desire and the feeling of every one on this side of the House when I say that I trust he and his friends will not spend more time among us than is entirely convenient to them.
I pass from this light but still not unimportant aspect of the situation, and I say that the question which the hon. Member has lightly and in this absurd method brought before us is one of the gravest questions that can affect our country. In so far as he makes a demand on me that I should state what, in certain future contingencies, will be the particular policy which I shall recommend to my electors, I say it is a preposterous demand which he has no right to make, and which I altogether decline to satisfy. But as to my opinions on Irish government they are well known to all of you. They have been expressed again and again by action and speech in and out of the House, and I would say further that the course of events during the last two decades, so far from mitigating or weakening my views, has done much to confirm and strengthen them. I would say, 1501 whatever may be the right solution of it, this question of the better government of Ireland directly and imperatively confronts both Parties in the State. That has been admitted by us on this side of the House when we voted for the Amendment on the Address moved by the hon. Member for Waterford. It has been admitted by the Government in the terms and the circumstances of Sir Antonym MacDonnell's appointment made with the express concurrence of the Prime Minister; and it has been confirmed by the justification offered for the recent Irish policy of the Government by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in another place. This marks the conclusion which both these great Parties have come to within this very year. Let me take first the words of Lord Lansdowne, who said—
Anybody who has studied this question is aware that there is room for considerable improvement in that old-fashioned and complicated organisation.And he said again—In endeavouring to arrive at that result and to break down the barrier which has too long and too often divided Dublin Castle from the rest of the country my right hon. friend "(that is the late Chief Secretary)" was taking a step in the right direction.These are true words and significant words. Lord Lansdowne is an Irishman, a great personage in that country, devoted to Ireland and spending a great part of his life there, thoroughly acquainted with affairs, and here, he speaks of the "barrier which has too long and too often divided Dublin Castle from the rest of the country." I pass from this confession to the Amendment to the Address which was moved by the hon. and learned Member for Waterford. What were the terms of that Amendment?—We humbly represent to Your Majesty that the present system of government in Ireland is in opposition to the will of the Irish people, and gives them no voice in the management of their own affairs; that the system is consequently ineffective and extravagantly costly, and that it does not enjoy the confidence of any section of the population; that it is productive of universal discontent and unrest, and has been proved to be incapable of satisfactorily promoting the material and intellectual progress of the people.Sir, we voted for that Amendment, and hon. Members opposite voted against it; and I think it was perfectly natural that 1502 they should, do so, and this not only on the ground of the familiar excuse that an Amendment to the Address cannot be accepted by a Government for it would constitute a vote of want of confidence, but on this other ground, that I admit it is so wholesale an indictment of the whole system of government in Ireland that I could well imagine men of moderate views on the subject shrinking from committing themselves to it. But I invite the House calmly and quietly to take this Amendment clause by clause as I propose to do; and I ask how many Members, if any, will dispute its accuracy? Does any one say the system of government in Ireland is not in opposition to the will of the Irish people? Who can say that with the presence of this huge majority of Irish Members? Does anyone deny that the Irish people have no full voice in the management of their own affairs? Does anyone say that the system is effective and that it is not extravagantly costly? Who is there will say that the system enjoys the confidence of every section of the population, or that there is any section whose confidence it does enjoy? Why even that little section on the other side of the House only gives a grudging confidence when the Government does everything it tells them to do. Lastly, is it disputed that there is great discontent and unrest in Ireland? Is it disputed that the material and intellectual progress of the people is not promoted by the present system? Why, take them one by one, and I will venture to say there is not one man out of ten, be he Unionist, Home Ruler, or be he what he may, who can deny this tissue of charges brought forward by the hon. and learned Member for Waterford.For a moment let us look back over a period of twenty years. Ireland was then, and had been for years before, seething in social disorder. The old traditional remedy, of course, was coercion; but the time had come when the people of this country were sick of coercion, and on either side men were declaring in a loud voice that they would have no more of it. Then came Mr. Gladstone with his two heroic attempts at remedy. They failed; but who will deny that the attempts, although they ended in failure, had a deep effect in 1503 the pacification of the country? There is no man who took a part, humble though it may have been, whether as Member here or as a voter at the polls, in helping towards the adoption of those remedies who has not a share of the credit and satisfaction in bringing about that improved state of things. What was the principle at the root of this policy? It was the right of the Irish people to the management of their own domestic affairs. The successive plans by which this was to be given to them failed to satisfy the country, as I have said; but the principle of self-government, the principle of an elective element that shall be the governing element in Ireland, remains, in our view, the only principle consonant with our constitutional habits and practice, and, what is more, the only principle that will ever work. I came the other day upon a phrase that admirably expresses the matter—
Popular control, and popular confidence, which cannot be had without it, are essential to administration of the best kind.Well, these are our views. I have to ask the House to allow me to make a quotation—and I do not use the words for any purpose of taunt or controversy. They are words of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham uttered in 1885. They were often used in the controversy of those days, and I quote them because they are incisive, memorable words, and accurate in their description of the truth—An Irishman at this moment"—and this is as true now as it was then—cannot move a step without being confronted with, interfered with, controlled by an English official appointed by a foreign Government, and without a shade or shadow of representative authority.Sir, this is what lies at the root of the mischief; and until the principle of representative authority is applied in such a form as shall give the people of Ireland the effective management of Irish affairs—You will go on if you like with a system like the present, the value of which may be judged by the words I have quoted.I for my part would be for adopting such methods and such a plan as may appear to me most likely to bring to a successful issue this principle and the 1504 policy arising from it. But if I am further asked tostate details to as the particular plan or a particular method to be adopted, I altogether decline to do so. Again, I may be asked questions as to time and priority. We are all aware of the fact that there are great masses of arrears of British legislation to be dealt with, and there are other questions brought forward calling for consideration, one of the most urgent which I would name being the education question which the Government have raised. If a demand is made that I should say as a private Member what precise priority should be given to each one of those great questions, I say that it is a preposterous demand which ought not to be made. But, the fact is, if we are to have an interrogatory raised on the question of Irish government and Government policy, am I the proper person to be interrogated. ["Yes."] Is it not, rather, the responsible Government? [An HON. MEMBER: They never answer.] I find that a few years ago, in 1895, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham laid down this as a general principle. He said, "He" (the Minister to whom he was replying)
is a member of a Government that has forgotten how to govern and has not learned how to resign. Let the right hon. Gentleman resign; we will find him a policy. But we are not going to lend him our prescriptions while he takes the fee. What is he on the Front Bench for? I do not see why we should prescribe until we are called in.But passing from that, which is, I think, a very sound view taken by the right hon. Gentleman, where is the responsibility in regard to the future policy in, as well as the present condition of, Ireland? It is there (pointing to the Treasury bench). Is there ambiguity? It is there. Is there obscurity? It is there. What is the Irish policy of the Government? Is it a continuance of what they themselves called twenty years of resolute Government, with coercion, as its implied sanction and its ultimate development? Is it, on the other hand, the policy of conciliation and co-operation, of which Sir Antony MacDonnell was the herald angel? Or is it the policy—their present apparent policy—of satisfying the Orange faction, which spoke and Sir Antony MacDonnell was dropped at once? Or is it a mosaic or alternation of these three policies? 1505 We have seen how that distinguished public servant was called in and installed in order to carry out the new policy in a new spirit. The Prime Minister was well aware of the views of the man he was employing. "I am an Irishman," said Sir Antony MacDonnell, "a Roman Catholic, and a Liberal in politics. I have strong Irish sympathies." And he added, "I find that there is a substantial measure of agreement between us." Why did this new policy break down? Because it was discovered that Sir Antony MacDonnell, with the concurrence of the Viceroy, was assisting a little group of Irish landlords and leaders of moderate Unionist opinion to carry out this policy of reform and administrative conciliation with the help of the Irish people. That was his offence; but the mention of the elective principle, attenuated as it was and restricted in its scope' brought about the explosion. What a spectacle! To see this strong Government, which set before itself ends in themselves worthy and honourable, shrinking back in terror when it found that there was a danger that the adoption of the only means by which these ends could be attained might expose them to the charge of touching the accursed thing and being tainted with Home Rule. They became the slaves of unfounded prejudice. The charge was made. It was carried into the lobbies. Sir Antony MacDonnell was rebuked and the Chief Secretary was sent into the wilderness. Our only puzzle is why he went there unaccompanied—why, when he went into the wilderness he did not take with him the head of the Government, who was well aware of the general drift of the policy the Under-Secretary had in view. This was all owing to the action of a knot of—I do not want to use an offensive expression—a knot of intolerant politicians. Let the House consider for a moment. Supposing this knot of intolerant politicians had acquiesced, would Sir Antony MacDonnell have been told that his conduct was indefensible? Would the Chief Secretary have resigned? No, Sir, on land purchase these hon. Members and their Party were with Sir Antony MacDonnell and Lord Dunraven; but any recognition of the desires of the majority in Ireland, any check on the domination of their own 1506 fraction of the Irish people, raised an outcry, the Government ran away, Sir Antony MacDonnell was rebuked, and the Chief Secretary was thrown to the wolves. With this Government the voice of this little section is the voice of Ireland. For the moment, the Government have capitulated, but it cannot be for long. They cannot fight against fate. They are themselves on the high road to the evolution of a new and wholly altered system of government in Ireland, whether they like it or not.I wish to take no partisan view of this question; but what is the situation? We have had this MacDonnell episode; the Government found that the turning point was reached, and that they must embark on a policy of conciliation, not only of generous and open-handed gifts of money and other methods of kindness to the Irish people, but of conciliation, which meant sympathy and co-operation in the management of the affairs of the country. We see glimmerings of apprehension on the part of the Government of the lesson learned by Ministers and high officials one after another who have gone to Ireland with undetermined minds, or full of prejudice against the Irish view, and yet who have found by experience how indefensible and how devoid of light and hope is the present system of government in Ireland. If the Government had designed to pave the way for what they call and denounce as Home Rule, could they have done better than they have in setting their stamp on the character of the Irish people by inducing Parliament to agree to so vast a grant of British credit, and by entrusting the mass of them with the responsible duties of local government? The Government have gone bail for the Irish people, for their character, for their capacity, for their integrity and—to adopt the poetic word of the late Chief Secretary—for their chivalry. Are you going to say, "Thus far and no further?" Are you going to trust them only up to the doors of Dublin Castle? Is this the last word of your statesmanship? Let me tell the hon. Member for Rochester that it is not the last word of ours. The Liberal Party, through twenty years of effort and sacrifice, amid misrepresentation and vilification, have pursued and 1507 contended for the cause of good government in Ireland; and so, as time and circumstances allow, we will prosecute the same beneficent course, believing that we shall have the sympathy of our countrymen with us, believing also that the divisions between the different sections of society in Ireland are healing, and will heal the faster as better government extends, and not without hope, I thank Heaven, that both Parties in the State, as the goal is better realised, will unite in the effort to attain to it.
§ MR. JOHN REDMOND (Waterford)When notice was given by the hon. Gentleman opposite of his intention to raise the question of Home Rule, I understood that the hon. Gentleman's object was to challenge the principle and policy of national self-government in Ireland, and I rather welcomed the opportunity which seemed to be opening before the Irish Nationalist Party in this House of once more stating the case of Ireland. But when I read the terms of the Motion I was surprised to find that the hon. Gentleman did nothing of the kind, but confined himself to asking certain Questions—relevant or irrelevant, pertinent or impertinent, of the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition as to what his action would be in a contingency that has not yet arisen. I am not sure that in such circumstances there is any necessity for the Irish Party to take part in this debate at all. The Motion does not challenge us; it does not challenge our cause—the cause of Home Rule; it cannot be meant to embarrass us, and, therefore, it seems to me we have only an indirect interest in the discussion. Still I think that if we remained silent our silence would probably be misunderstood and misinterpreted, and, therefore, I propose to state once more frankly to the House the position of the Irish Party and of myself on the question of Home Rule.
If the hon. Gentleman imagines that we are likely to budge one inch from our position on the question of Home Rule, he is likely to be grievously disappointed, and if he expects to confuse the mind, either of the House of Commons or of the country, as to what our attitude on the question of Home Rule is he is likely to be still more grievously disappointed. Our attitude on this question has been ab- 1508 solutely unchanged for twenty-five years. We regard the government of our country by this Parliament as a usurpation; we deny the validity and dispute the moral binding force of the Act of Union. What you call a treaty we say was vitiated ab initio by force and fraud. We demand self-government, not as a favour, but as a right; we base our demand, not upon grievance, but upon the inherent and unalienable right of the Irish nation to govern itself. We say plainly that we would rather be governed badly by our own Parliament than well by this Assembly. We are accused of disloyalty. Disloyalty to what? Why are we in Ireland not given something to be loyal to? By nature I believe that Irishmen are as loyal as any people in the world. Yes, but to a system of government maintained by force against the will of the people we are disloyal, and will continue to be disloyal.
The hon. Gentleman did me the honour of quoting a number of speeches of mine. He quoted some speeches of mine delivered in America, and I rather think he did so with the idea of conveying to the House the impression that I had spoken in one sense in America and in a different sense here. [Cries of "No."] I am glad to hear from hon. Members who have been longer in the House a disavowal of any such accusation. I would feel utterly dishonoured and ashamed of myself if I had ever made a statement in America or Ireland more extreme than the statements I have made in this House. I believe in frankness in these matters. I believe we have nothing to gain—I believe that no Party has anything to gain—by a policy of make-believe, evasion, or concealment. I have no objection to state again to this House what my individual attitude on this question is. I believe the present system of government in Ireland is in principle so unconstitutional and in practice so ruinous to all classes and interests in Ireland that, if I had to choose between the continuation of the present system and absolute separation from the Empire, I would not have the slightest hesitation in deciding in favour of separation. More than that, if I believed that there was the smallest reasonable chance of success, I would have no hesitation in 1509 advising my fellow-countrymen to endeavour to end the present system by armed revolt. But Sir, while those are my views, I am and always have been profoundly convinced that by constitutional means and within the Constitution it is possible to arrive at a compromise, based upon the concession of self-government, or, as Mr. Gladstone used to say, autonomy, to Ireland, which would put an end to this ancient international quarrel upon terms satisfactory and honourable to both nations. Such was the settlement proposed to Ireland in 1886 and 1893. For reasons which perhaps will be understood, I wish to recall the fact that Parnell accepted in this House the principle and policy of the settlement of 1886 and 1893. He accepted it in the name of the Irish Nationalist Party, and his acceptance of it was ratified by the public opinion of Ireland and of the Irish race in America and elsewhere. I have been recently accused by a distinguished nobleman of having in some way or other repudiated the acceptance of that compromise and settlement. I deny that, and, if necessity arose, I could prove that my denial is true. But, after all, the individual statement of the hon. Member for Waterford, when he was not the representative of the Irish Nationalist Party in the House of Commons, and when he spoke for himself, was a small matter. I repudiate and deny that statement; but, after all, what is important is that, speaking here now, with full authority and responsibility, in the name of the whole Irish Nationalist Party, I say that that Party has not departed one hair's breadth from the position which was taken up in 1886 by Mr. Parnell, and after his death in 1893 by the Irish Members of the day. To-day the position is this. No doubt time and experience have pointed out to us many defects, as we think, in the clauses of the Bills of 1886 and 1893; but so far as the principle and the policy of the settlement contained in those Bills are concerned we never have repudiated them, and to-day we would be willing, as we were in 1886 or 1893, to accept them as bringing to an end, as we would hope for ever, the wretched and blood-stained chapter of English misrule and of consequent Irish disloyalty and resistance.
1510 I cannot in the time at my disposal deal as fully as I would have liked with this question. But let me very shortly recapitulate—summarise, so to speak—the main features of the system of rule in Ireland which, in my judgment, make the Home Rule question an urgent and vital question to-day before both the country and the House of Commons. The present system of rule is unconstitutional, quite apart altogether from its tainted origin in the Act of Union, and in its everyday working practice it is unworkable. The majority of the people who are ruled have no power in the government of the country. The country is governed by a minority. The representation of Ireland in this House has been reduced almost to a farce. Five men from a small corner of Ulster have more power in this House in the government of Ireland than eighty-six men representing the rest of the country. It is unconstitutional in another sense. The people of Ireland have not the benefit of the British Constitution. They are suffering under a permanent disability in the form of an exceptional law which does not exist in England, Scotland, or Wales, or in any other portion of the British Empire—a law under which at the caprice and the will of a single man trial by jury may be suspended and trial by paid servants and deputies of the Executive Government substituted for it. The government is not only unconstitutional; it is a bad government. It does not fulfil any one of the elementary duties of a government. It does nothing for the industrial development of the people; our industries in Ireland were destroyed by Act of this Parliament, and ever since the Union your English Government has done nothing to help in their resuscitation; the population has gone down, and is still going down; labourers and artisans have not decent dwellings; our seaport towns are falling into decay because the piers and harbours built by one of your centralised and nominated boards are crumbling into the sea; our fishing industry is dying; and, above all, our educational system in all its stages—elementary, intermediate, and University—is fifty years behind the educational system of the least progressive country in Western Europe. And this government, unconstitutional, 1511 bad, and inefficient, is the most costly in proportion in the world, and, on the statement of your own financial experts, Ireland is over-taxed every year £3,000,000 as compared with the rest of the United Kingdom. Is it any wonder in those circumstances that no class in Ireland is satisfied with British rule? Fifty years ago Lord Chief Justice Whiteside used these words:—
''He was compelled by respect for truth to admit that the government of Ireland was very inefficiently conducted. He was a Protestaet and a Conservative, but he must say that were Ireland as far removed from England as Canada, the system of government there would be blown to pieces as easily as a house of cards. He would say that the Government of Ireland was opposed to nine-tenths of the intelligence and intellect of the people.That was fifty years ago, but every word of that was as true of the government of Ireland to-day as it was then. Unfortunately Irish Unionists in the days of Whiteside, just as they have been ever since and are to-day, were silenced by the horrible system of preferment which alone has induced the Irish minority to consent to the robbery and misgovernment of their country. There are some signs to-day of the truth coming to the surface in Ireland. I will not allude to the Uunraven movement, and I will not allude to the recent declaration of men like Sir West Ridgeway, but I do desire to quote two or three words from a recent letter published by Lord Rossmore. Lord Rossmore was, at one time, a Grand Master of the Orange Society in Ireland. He was a man whose name was associated with the most extreme hostility to the principle of self-government for Ireland. He declared that he had come to the conclusion that the extreme section of Unionists in Ireland were seeking to establish the worst form of slavery, and that this was being done by the men who professed no constructive policy whatever in relation to their country or their fellow-countrymen.. His Lordship declared that their policy was purely negative, and that the so-called Loyalist minority in Ireland were blindly following the lead of a few professional politicians who felt that their salaries and positions depended on the divisions and antipathies of those who should be working together for the good of their common country. That minority ha 1512 not changed. Its sympathies have not widened, and its heart has not softened for a hundred years. It is the same minority which in 1793 opposed the first efforts of the Irish Parliament to secure Catholic emancipation, and which, on the testimony of Cromwell and Lecky, drove the Irish people into open revolt. It is the same minority that sold their country in 1800 for emoluments and honours, and that has ever since opposed every single measure of reform proposed for Ireland. Catholic emancipation, land reform, Church reform, the ballot, the franchise, local government, and every single reform they have opposed, and to-day these place-holders and place-seekers alone oppose Home Rule. Such a system cannot continue. Some people say that Home Rule is dead and others say it is sleeping. Mr. Speaker, this debate has proved that Home Rule is neither dead nor sleeping, but it is a live, urgent, and insistent question, and in my judgment it is now merely a matter of selecting the particular form of the remedy that has to be applied. In my opinion, it is now as someone has said quite recently, a question of time, method, and opportunity.I have listened to the speech of the Leader of the Opposition with great attention and some anxiety. I am not called on to declare that that speech is in all particulars alsolutely satisfactory. As far as the right hon. Gentleman himself is concerned, I needed no declaration from him. The right hon. Gentleman has been consistent and courageous all through; and as the Leader of the Liberal Party and as the man who I, for my part, hope will soon be guiding the destinies of this country, his declarations to-night have been worthy of himself and his record. I think the right hon. Gentleman is wise and right in refusing to answer the irrelevant and impertinent Questions which were addressed to him as to what his method would be of advancing the policy he avows in a contingency that has not arisen. I assure the right hon. Gentleman and the Liberal Party that when they succeed to office they will find that the difficulties of the Irish question have been seriously exaggerated, and that the supposed hostility of most of the English people to a fair and moderate settlement 1513 of the Irish demand has been enormously exaggerated. They will also find that this will be an urgent and insistent question which will knock loudly at the door of the next Parliament.
So far as our position is concerned words have been quoted to the House, and if I may take a phrase from the speeches of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, all I have to say in regard to those quotations is, "What I have said I have said." I have been taunted in regard to our relations with British Parties. Sir, we are an independent Party in this House, and we cannot ally ourselves with any English Party, Liberal or Tory, which does not make the concession of self-government to Ireland a principle in its programme, or which attempts to shelve the demand of Ireland for Home Rule. There is only one way of ruling any intelligent people, and that is by consent. A great Irish statesman, whose greatness has not yet, in my judgment, been fully acknowledged either by his own countrymen or by this House—I allude to the late Mr. Isaac Butt—said in the year 1867—
There is but one secret in governing Ireland, as there is in governing any country, and it is to govern for the good of the whole people. Abandon the policy of maintaining any English interest, or any Protestant interest, or any class interest, or any interest but that of the Irish people. … When Irish legislation is influenced as exclusively by the wants and wishes of Ireland as English legislation is by those of England, then, and not till then, will Ireland be governed as a free country.That should be the Irish programme of any wise British Administration, and that Irish programme can only be carried out by the restoration in Ireland of that national Parliament to which the hon. Member alludes in his Resolution.
§ THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,) Manchester, E.I have only a few minutes in which to address the House, but I think in those few minutes I can compress all that it is needful for me to say on the present occasion. The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has spoken with his wonted lucidity and force, and no man who has heard him can have the smallest doubt as to what 1514 his meaning is. He is of opinion that the only cure for the ills of Ireland is a Home Rule scheme on the broad lines of the Bill of 1886 or the Bill of 1893. He does not deny that in certain circumstances he might like more, but he is perfectly prepared to take that, and he is not prepared to take anything less than that. He also thinks that this is a vital question to Ireland and also an urgent question for Ireland, that it cannot be allowed to slumber, and that the next Parliament, if he can manage it, will have to deal with this question in this sense. I am not sure that I interpreted rightly the phrases of the right hon. Gentleman opposite, but, at all events, if they meant anything different from the principles of the Home Rule Bills of 1886 and 1893 that would not content the Irish Party; it would not, in their opinion, solve the Irish question, and it would not be even a step in the right direction which would be worth taking. That is the view of the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down. [An HON. MEMBER: He never said that.] If the hon. and learned Member for Waterford differs from anything I have said let him contradict me. He was amply satisfied with the speech made by the right hon. Gentleman who now leads the Opposition, and he appeared to think that that speech might be summarised in the way I have just summarised his speech—that the right hon. Gentleman opposite holds, as the Member for Waterford holds, that nothing short of the Bill of 1886 or 1893, in its broad principles, will meet the Irish case, and that the Irish case is an urgent case and should be dealt with immediately and on those lines.
That was the interpretation put by the hon. Member for Waterford on the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Stirling Burghs. I confess my powers of interpretation did not quite lead me to the same conclusion. I did not see that clear utterance upon this question which I should have thought he would have given after all the reproaches he has levelled against me for obscurity. I should have thought he would have found it within his powers to make a statement to the House as clear as the one I am making on this subject. He could have left us 1515 in as little doubt as the hon. and learned Gentleman has left us. He has not done so. [OPPOSITION cries of "Oh."] He has not only not done so, but he has done nothing towards answering the appeal made to him in the Resolution. The right hon. Gentleman says the appeal is of an unusual character. He says it deals with a matter not before the present Parliament. I agree that it deals with a matter not before the present Parliament, and I agree that up to a relatively recent date appeals upon subjects not before the Parliament in existence were not usually addressed to those who were, or those who expected to be, Ministers of the Crown. But a new practice has arisen, and as the right hon. Gentleman has rather lent himself to that practice, I should have thought he would have been the first to jump up and tell us what it was he was going to recommend in the name of his Party at the next election. And that reminds me. The hon. and learned Member for Waterford, in all the latter part of his speech, assumed that the right hon. Gentleman was speaking for his Party. I did not catch that from the right hon. Gentleman. I do not think he claimed to speak for his Party, and I can easily guess the reason. If he had spoken in the sense assumed by the hon. Member for Waterford, with whom he agrees, he could not have spoken for his Party without at once being disavowed by Gentlemen on his own bench. He wisely refrained from placing himself in a position which no doubt he would have found extremely embarrassing. But when he claims his right as a private Member to hold silence in this matter [OPPOSITION cries of "He did not hold silence," and "He did not run away."] I think he forgets that if the prophecies of which he has been so lavish, and which have been re-echoed by almost every Gentleman who sits behind him, as to the results of the next general election prove true, we are dealing with a period at which he will have ceased to be a private Member, and this Resolution touches a period in which he will no longer be able to claim the privileges of a private Member. I shall have regained that enviable position, [OPPOSITION cries of "When?"] according to the right hon. Gentleman [renewed 1516 OPPOSITION cries of "When?"]—when the next general election takes place.
There is one peculiarity which I wonder whether hon. friends of mine have noticed in this debate and in the utterances made by the Party opposite on the subject of Home Rule. I think some statements have been quoted by my two hon. friends to-night in which distinguished Gentlemen belonging to the other side have told us that they will not take office unless they are returned independently of the Irish Party, and that their difficulties will be very great if they depend upon Irish support.
§ MR. LOUGH (Islington, N.)What about the Education Act?
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURLet me translate that into practical language. It means that if hon Gentlemen are returned in a large majority, then the Members for Ireland may whistle, but if they are returned in a small majority, then in "Heaven's name justice for Ireland." And I think some of the difficulty hon. Gentlemen opposite have in stating what exactly they may like to do if they are returned to power in the next Parliament is because they are not yet quite certain whether they will or will not be independent of hon. Gentlemen from Ireland, and until some revelation on the subject is vouchsafed to them we must expect hesitating and ambiguous answers to such questions as have been asked of them by my hon. friends to-night.
The right hon. Gentleman was good enough to interpret certain recent events, of which he gave a most erroneous account—["Oh"]—an utterly and hopelessly erroneous account ["Oh"] as indicating some approximation between the opinion of some hon. Gentlemen on this side with those which he himself holds. There is no such approximation if he holds, as I believe him to hold, the doctrines to which he has constantly given utterance. There is, I believe, not a single man on this side of the House who does not hold as the cardinal article of his political faith that Home Rule for Ireland would be a gift fatal to Ireland and fatal to England. We stand now, one and all of us, as far as I know, exactly where we stood in 1517 this matter in the year 1886, when the first Home Rule Bill was introduced, and in the year 1893, when the second Home Rule Bill was introduced, and if, in the course of that political evolution of which the right hon. Gentleman spoke, a time should come when, under the impulse of hon. Gentlemen below the gangway, the Radical Party opposite should attempt again, for the third time, to try the same unhappy adventure, I promise them they will find on this side of the House opponents absolutely unanimous and strenuously resolved to say that the unity of the kingdom shall be preserved.
§ MR. GEORGE WHITELEY (Yorkshire, W.R., Pudsey)continued the debate, amid Ministerial cries of " Asquith."
§ THE SPEAKERI cannot accept that Motion. The Question was only put from the Chair at half-past ten, after speeches from the proposer and seconder lasting nearly an hour, in which the opinions of a great number of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen were challenged. Since then there have been only three speeches, and, therefore, I do not think it would be right to put the Question.
§ MR. GEORGE WHITELEY,amid considerable interruption from the Ministerial side, continued speaking until twelve o'clock.
§ And, it being Midnight, the debate stood adjourned.
§ Debate to be resumed upon Tuesday next.