§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANWhat day can the right hon. Gentleman 455 give us for the Motion of my right hon. friend the Member for Berwick?
§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLASI understood last night that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwick had taken this notice off the Paper. I had hoped my right hon. friend the First Lord of the Treasury would be in his place to-day. I am afraid, however, that I must ask that the Question may be deferred. I hope my right hon. friend will be here on Monday.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANThere will be a day given.
§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLASI cannot go farther than I went yesterday. If the right hon. Gentleman took the Question off the Paper, he can make an application. [Cries of "No, no!"] I gave no definite promise that a day would be given. I said it must be at the discretion of the Prime Minister.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANI understood that arrangements were made in the usual way last night—that a day would be given, it being left to the Government to fix a day, subject to the convenience of the House.
§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLASI had not heard of that, but my right hon. friend the Member for the Wellington Division of Somerset has just told me he distinctly stated he must see the Motion. My right hon. friend has just whispered in my ear that some negotiation took place last night, but I understand him practically to confirm what I said, that any Motion of that sort would be handed to the Prime Minister, and he would give an Answer on his return to the House.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANThis Motion has been taken off for the "convenience of the Government. It was part of the arrangement made. The hon. Member for Peebles-shire shakes his head. What part had be in the transaction? Was he present when the arrangements were made?
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANI think the hon. Member had better keep his head steady. I distinctly understood my right hon. friend to remove the notice from the Paper with a view to reviving it and replacing it on the Paper after Whitsuntide, for a day which would be appointed after communication with the Government.
§ THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY (Sir A. ACLAND-HOOD, Somersetshire, Wellington)I suggested that the Motion should be taken off the Paper and that when the Prime Minister came back to the House he should be asked a Question as to whether he would give a day for it after Whitsuntide. I fully expected at the time that the Prime Minister would be in his place to-day and able to answer the Question.
§ MR. HERBERT GLADSTONE (Leeds, W.)I must remind my right hon. friend that I asked him particularly whether I was to understand that it was a case of Monday next or no day at all. He said he must take counsel on that point. He came back to me and said that if my right hon. friend the Member for Berwick would withdraw his Motion, and if my right hon. friend would put a Question to the Prime Minister to-day, an announcement would be made with regard to a day after Whitsuntide. It was an absolute condition of the withdrawal of the Motion that a day after Whitsuntide should be given.
§ SIR A. ACLAND-HOODI do not want my words to be misconstrued. I did not desire to force hon. Gentlemen to act against their wishes, and I thought that in the circumstances the best course was to take the Motion off the Paper and put a Question to the Prime Minister as to when a day could be given
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANIf the question of a further consultation is to turn upon when a day is to be given we are quite content, but we do not wish it to turn on the question whether a day is to be given, and what the Home Secretary said rather tended in that direction.
MR. GIBSON BOWLESAm I right in concluding that there is no intention on the part of the Government to refuse a day?
§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLASThere is no such intention. I was not aware this arrangement had taken place between the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Leeds and my right hon. friend. I can not answer for the Prime Minister, but I have no doubt about the matter.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANI am sorry to be pertinacious; it is necessary. I really do not see why the right hon. Gentleman should not have been fortified with sufficient authority from the Prime Minister to give an Answer which would have been satisfactory to us. If he is not able to answer so simple a Question without referring to the Prime Minister it is placing him in a rather undignified position.
§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLASI regret if that is so. I thought the Prime Minister would be here to-day. I did not know this compact had taken place. I cannot pledge myself, in the Prime Minister's absence, to a definite statement on that point. I will undertake to do so on Monday if the Prime Minister is not here.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANWe shall assume that a day will be given.