Commons Sitting of 8 March 1906

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

  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.:—North East Lincolnshire Water Bill.
  Ordered, that the Bill be read a second time.

  PRIVATE BILLS [LORDS].
  Mr. SPEAKER Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in respect of the following Bill comprised in the Report laid upon the Table by Mr. Speaker as intended to originate in the House of Lords, they have certified that the Standing Orders have not been complied with, viz.:—West Yorkshire Tramways.

  PRIVATE BILL PETITIONS [LORDS] (STANDING ORDERS NOT 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 Petition for the following Bill, originating in the Lords, the Standing Orders have not been Complied with, viz.:—West Yorkshire Tramways [Lords].
  Ordered, That the Report be referred to the Select Committee on Standing Orders.
  Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Electric Power Bill (by Order). Read a second time, and committed.
  London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway Bill (by Order). Second Reading deferred till Thursday next.
  South Wales Electrical Power Distribution Company Bill (by Order). Read a second time, and committed.
  London United Tramways Bill, "for conferring further powers on the London United Tramways (1901), Limited, for constructing tramways and widening and altering streets and roads, and acquiring lands in the counties of Middlesex and Surrey; and for other purposes," presented, and read the first time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.
  Romford and District Tramways Bill, "to incorporate the Romford and District Tramways Company; and to transfer to that Company the powers conferred by the Romford and District Tramways Act, 1903; and to confer further powers upon that Company, and for other purposes," presented, and read the first time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.
  Heacham Water Bill. "To incorporate the Heacham Water Company, and to enable the company to supply water with
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  in the parish of Heacham and certain other parishes in the county of Norfolk," presented, and read the first time; and ordered to be read a second time.
  Wigan and Heysham Railway Bill. Order (26th February) that the Wigan and Heysham Railway Bill be committed, read, and discharged. Bill withdrawn.—(The Deputy Chairman.)

PETITIONS.
  JUVENILE SMOKING BILL.
  Petition from Edinburgh, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS (RELIGIOUS TEACHING).
  Petition from Edlington, against alteration of law; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  INCOME TAX (ASSESSMENTS).
  Return presented, relative thereto (Part I.) [ordered February 22nd; Mr. Samuel Evans]; to lie upon the Table.
  SPRING ASSIZES ACT, 1879.
  Copies presented, of Two Orders in Council of February 27th, 1906, relating to the ensuing Intermediate Spring Assizes [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
  TRADE REPORTS (ANNUAL SERIES).
  Copies presented, of Diplomatic and Consular Reports, Annual Series, Nos. 3,533 and 3,534 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  PAPER LAID UPON THE TABLE BY THE CLERK OF THE HOUSE.
  Irish Land Commission (Account), Copy of Report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General upon the Account of the Irish Land Commission for the year ended March 31st, 1905 [by Act]; to be printed. [No. 82.]
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CIRCULATED WITH THE VOTES.

  Cadets College at Osborne—Cost of Training.
  MR. BELLAIRS: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty, if he will state what is the total annual cost

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  of a cadet's training at Osborne, to the State and to the parent, inclusive of all outfitters' charges and of proportionate charges for interest on capital cost, depreciation, and staff for all buildings and attached vessels; whether such charges allow for wastage owing to cadets being withdrawn; and whether he will state the number of cadets joining in the first batch, Midsummer 1903, and how many now remain.
  (Answered by Mr. Edmund Robertson.) The net cost to the State of a cadet's training at Osborne, after all payments by parents or guardians have been deducted, is approximately £98 per annum, inclusive of proportionate charges for interest and repayment of capital outlay, and staff for all buildings and attached vessels and boats, but exclusive of capital expenditure in connection with vessels. This estimate is based on the assumption that the full number of cadets will be borne in the college throughout each term. The fees paid by the parents for the cadet's training are £75 a year, but in the case of a certain number of officers of the Army or Navy in straitened circumstances this charge is reduced to £40 a year. All claims to this reduction are carefully considered in each individval case. In addition to this, the parents are expected to pay the amounts for pocket money, travelling expenses, &c, such as are usual in schools in this country, and to provide their sons with clothing. A total of seventy-five cadets joined the college when it was opened, of which number sixty remain. The wastage in this instance was exceptional.

  Accountant General's Department—Admiralty Branch Reorganisation.
  DR. MACNAMARA: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that, as a result of the reorganisation of the Accountant General's Department of the Admiralty, 138 clerkships, hitherto held by men successful in open competitive examinations, are in future to be filled by men who have passed neither educational nor medical test; and, if so, will he state the circumstances which warrant such a departure from the principle upon which the English Civil Service is founded.
  (Answered by Mr. Edmund Robertson.) A certain number of second division clerks will, as opportunity offers, be replaced by
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  temporary clerical assistants. As this new class of clerks will not be on the establishment, no medical or educational examination is necessary, only those who prove efficient being retained. This system has been in operation in the Supply Departments of the Admiralty for some years, and no new principle is involved in extending it to the Accountant General's Department. No established clerks will be discharged in consequence of the reorganisation.

  Post Office Inquiry.
  MR. GODDARD CLARK: To ask the Postmaster-General whether he will, in the inquiry on Postal grievances, deal with the tracers of the Comptroller and Accountant General's Departments, and other small classes, according to the Select Committee's recommendations.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) It will be for the Committee to decide what classes are included in their reference, which specifies principal classes.

  County Donegal Telegraphic System
  MR. HUGH LAW: To ask the Postmaster-General why telegrams addressed to Crolly Bridge, Gweedore, county Donegal, have recently been re-addressed to Annagry, though Crolly is within the free delivery radius from Gweedore; and whether, in view of the delay caused by the new practice, he will give instructions that such telegrams shall be delivered as formerly by the Gweedore telegraph office.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) I will have inquiry made and will communicate the result to the hon. Member.

  Special Service Seamen and Stokers.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty in reference to the non-continuous service seamen serving a limited period in the Fleet and a longer period in the reserves, what number and what proportion of such men will be thus borne at the end of the financial year in March 1907?
  (Answered by Mr. Edmund Robertson.) It is estimated that the total number of special service seamen and stokers serving in the Fleet at the end of the financial year 1906–7 will be about 1,400 and 3,500 respectively. The total number of

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  seamen and stokers, including these non-continuous service men provided for in the Estimates for 1906–7, is 44,000 and 29,430.

  Sir A. Douglas' Committee on Naval Personnel.
  MR. BELLAIRS: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether he will now reconsider his refusal to lay the Report of Admiral Sir A. Douglas' Committee, dealing with naval personnel, upon the Table.
  (Answered by Mr. Edmund Robertson.) It has already been decided to present this Report to Parliament.

  Licences of Ecclesiastical Commissioners Estates.
  MR. HERBERT ROBERTS: To ask the hon. Member for the Eye Division of Suffolk, as Church Estates Commissioner, what is the number of places upon the estates of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners which have been licensed for the sale of beer, wine or spirits, in or since 1890; and what is the number of places which have ceased to be so licensed during that period.

  Church Estates Commission Leases.
  MR. HERBERT ROBERTS: To ask the hon. Member for the Eye Division of Suffolk, as Church Estates Commissioner, what is the total number of leases granted by them in or since 1890; how many of these leases have contained a restrictive covenant in respect of the sale of beer, wines, or spirits; and how many have contained a prohibitive covenant in respect of such sale.
  MR. HERBERT ROBERTS: To ask the hon. Member for the Eye Division of Suffolk, as Church Estates Commissioner, what was, in 1905, the number of places upon the estates of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners licensed for the sale of beer, wine, or spirits; how many of these places were on estates directly managed by the Commissioners, and how many on land leased from them; and what was the aggregate rent received by the Commissioners in respect of the former.
  (Answered by Mr. Stuart-Wortley.) I regret that it is not possible to give full replies to these several Questions, as the requisite information could not be obtained without a careful review of all the transactions of the Ecclesiastical
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  Commissioners in relation to their building estates during the last sixteen years. For over twenty years, however, it has been the practice of the Commissioners to insert in new leases granted by them covenants absolutely prohibiting the sale on the demised premises without their licence of beer, wine, or spirits, except in cases of lettings expressly for hotels or licensed houses. In 1905 the leases (not agricultural or mineral) granted by the Commissioners were, renewals included, upwards of 600 in number; at short notice I am unable to say precisely how many have been granted during the whole of the last sixteen years, but the number given for 1905 is probably something like an anuual average. In or since 1890 the number of leases (other than renewals) granted expressly for licensed houses on all parts of the Commissioners' estates throughout England and Wales probably does not exceed eight, and in a few cases lessees of shops have been allowed to apply for licences for the sale of wines, etc., not to be consumed upon the premises. During the same period the Commissioners have suppressed (on the expiration of leases) sixty-two fully-licensed public houses on their estates, and in regard to a number of others, of which leases are at present running, have determined that their use as licensed premises shall cease with the expiration of the leases, and they will accordingly be suppressed voluntarily and without compensation. The Commissioners suppress all beerhouses as leases expire; but no record has been kept of the number so suppressed during the last sixteen years. The number of these must, however, be considerably greater than that of the fully-licensed houses suppressed as above mentioned. From the Commissioners' rental it appears that in 1905 there were on the estates vested in them for the purposes of their common fund or upon special trusts, or managed by their estates committee, 336 public houses, of which twenty-nine were held on yearly or short tenancies, and the remainder for the residues of terms of 999 years and under. (The aggregate rents of house property and ground rents alone received by the Commissioners for the year exceeded £625,000.) The rents of the twenty-nine houses on short tenancies (chiefly village or country inns) amount to about £1,300. I am not able to say that these figures include all the licensed

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  houses on such estates, as a large number of estates at the time of their becoming vested in the Commissioners were subject to leases (still unexpired) granted by the Commissioners' predecessors. In many of these there would probably be no covenant against the sale of wines, beer, and spirits, and consequently lessees may have obtained licences, although the premises were not expressly demised with that intention.

  Ecclesiastical Commission Staff.
  MR. HERBERT ROBERTS: To ask the hon. Member for the Eye Division of Suffolk, as Church Estates Commissioner, what is the present staff of the Ecclesiastical Commission; and what where the

  Year ending.

  Amount of salaries and wages.*

  Amount of pensions.

  £

  s.

  d.

  £

  s.

  d.

  31st October, 1890

  23,243

  19

  3

  3,502

  17

  2

  31st October, 1891

  23,634

  6

  6

  3,525

  1

  8

  31st October, 1892

  21,968

  1

  11

  5,563

  0

  0

  31st October, 1893

  21,749

  8

  10

  5,575

  18

  11

  31st October, 1894

  22,075

  3

  1

  5,057

  0

  7

  31st October, 1895

  21,804

  7

  11

  5,500

  14

  3

  31st October, 1896

  21,907

  11

  4

  5,938

  9

  5

  31st October, 1897

  21,382

  13

  2

  6,476

  11

  1

  31st October, 1898

  21,175

  2

  8

  7,058

  13

  9

  31st October, 1899

  21,711

  18

  7

  7,233

  13

  9

  31st October, 1900

  21,722

  7

  10

  7,330

  4

  11

  31st October, 1901

  20,885

  7

  1

  7,482

  7

  7

  31st October, 1902

  21,443

  4

  1

  8,004

  10

  9

  31st October, 1903

  22,192

  1

  7

  7,451

  15

  7

  31st October, 1904

  22,038

  8

  3

  7,654

  12

  5

  31st October, 1905

  21,916

  1

  11

  7,815

  8

  0

  * N.B.—Exclusive of salaries (amounting to £2,700 per annum) of two paid Church Estates Commissioners and the auditor.

  During the same period the work of the office has very largely increased in volume.

  amounts spent in salaries and pensions respectively during each of the financial years 1890 to 1905, both inclusive.
  (Answered by Mr. Stuart-Wortley.) The present staff of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners comprises a secretary, five other officers, forty-two clerks (including legal assistants), and eight subordinate officials on the permanent establishment, and thirty-one writers, typists, and others employed in temporary or non-pensionable capacities, in addition to porters, messengers, and domestic servants. The following table gives the amount spent in salaries and pensions respectively, for the years 1890 to 1905, both inclusive.

  Fenit Pier, County Kerry.
  MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland what is the amount spent in the building of the Fenit pier, county Kerry; what was the amount of the free grant given from the Exchequer; and what is the rate of interest and sinking fund per annum charged on the loan.
  (Answered by Mr. McKenna.) A loan of £95,000 was granted in the year 1882 to the Tralee and Fenit Pier and Harbour Commissioners, and, in addition, those Commissioners state that they have spent about £25,000 on capital account out of revenue. No free grant was given. Under the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898, a contribution is made from the Local Taxation Account in aid of the cost of the guarantee on the loan. The contribution amounted in 1904–5 to £855 9s. 8d. The rate of interest on the loan is 4 per cent., and the annuity, including interest and sinking fund, is £5 1s. per cent. per annum for forty years.

  Irish Training Colleges.
  MR. JOHN REDMOND: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if his attention has been called to the fact that the Board of National Education of Ireland have strongly urged, in the interests of education, the absolute necessity of maintaining the training colleges in a condition of utmost efficiency, and have unanimously urged upon the Treasury the necessity of making a free home grant for the Belfast, Limerick, and Waterford Training Colleges; and whether, in view of the fact that the settlement arrived at in 1890 has since been set aside by the action of the Government in granting a sum of £50,000 for buildings for the Government College in Marlborough Street, Dublin, he will take steps to secure that the Belfast, Limerick, and Waterford Training Colleges will not continue to receive unfair treatment in this matter.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) The Board of National Education have made representations in favour of a free home grant to the Limerick College, but do not apppear to have made any similar representations in respect of the colleges at Belfast and Waterford. These provincial colleges have all been opened since 1890,
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  with the full knowledge on the part of the promoters that a building grant would not be given to them, and I am informed that the Irish Government and the Treasury have consistently refused subsequent applications on behalf of these colleges for a grant to clear off the loans taken up for building purposes. The grant of £50,000 for new buildings, in connection with the Marlborough Street Training College, was made by the late Government two years ago out of the Irish Development Grant. It cannot be admitted that the making of that grant re-opened the settlement arrived at in 1890. The intention of that settlement was then stated to be to place the three denominational training colleges in Dublin on an equality of treatment as to building grants, with that previously accorded to the undenominational training college at Marlborough Street under the control of the Commissioners. The reasons for making the grant in 1904 were fully stated in this House by the right hon. Member for Dover, March 16th, 1904,† and His Majesty's present Government have had nothing whatever to do with that matter. As regards the future, I can at present only say that the whole subject of Irish education seems to me to require much consideration, and no statement regarding it can be made at this moment. I need hardly add that requests for building grants are matters to be dealt with by the Treasury as well as by the Irish Government.

  Queen's College Belfast.
  MR. JOHN REDMOND: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Government propose to give a further endowment to the Queen's College Belfast; whether the attitude of previous Governments has been that any additional endowments for the Queen's College, Belfast, must be part of a general settlement of the Irish University question; what the reason is for departing from this attitude; and whether, before doing so, there has been any consultation with the representatives of Ireland or with those specially interested in the question of university education in Ireland.
  (Answered by Mr. McKenna). It is not intended to give a further endowment to
  † See (4) Debates, cxxxi, 1305, et seq.

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  Queen's College, Belfast, or to depart from the policy which has been pursued by previous Governments with regard to the Queen's Colleges generally. Expenditure on the buildings of the colleges, whether for maintenance or new works, has always been outside the endowment properly so called, which consists of £7,000 per annum charged on the Consolidated Fund for each college and £1,600 voted annually by Parliament. The grant of £5,400, which has been placed on the Estimates for the ensuing year in aid of the building requirements of the Belfast College is conditional on an equal sum being devoted to the same purpose from contributions raised locally, and does not differ in principle from other grants which have been made in the past for analogous objects.

  Labourers' Cottage Schemes in Ireland.
  MR. SHEEHAN: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he will state the rates of interest at present chargeable under the Treasury Minute for loans granted for the purpose of the erection of labourers' cottages in Ireland, at periods of repayment not exceeding thirty years, forty years, and fifty years respectively.
  (Answered by Mr. McKenna.) The rates laid down by Treasury Minute are as follows:—For periods of repayment not exceeding thirty years, 3¾ per cent.; not exceeding forty years, 4 per cent.; and not exceeding fifty years, 4¼ per cent.

  Fraudulent Army Enlistment—Case of H. Flanagan.
  MR. CLAUDE HAY: To ask the Secretary of State for War if he will state what steps he proposes to take in the case of Gunner H. Flanagan, X Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, who on December 23rd 1905, was warned that he was to be tried by district court martial for fraudulently enlisting in the 6th Dragoon Guards on February 7th, 1902, and who, within two hours of being warned, was brought before the court, and despite the evidence in his favour, was convicted and sentenced to 112 days' imprisonment, and to be discharged with ignominy from His Majesty's service; and whether he will state why, on January 31st, 1906, the finding of the court was quashed and the prisoner released and ordered to rejoin his battery.
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  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Haldane.) This man was tried for fraudulent enlistment as a deserter from another regiment He denied this, but the court, having satisfied themselves from the evidence before them of the prisoner's indentity with the deserter, convicted him. When in prison he submitted a petition which caused the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief to make further inquiries, which satisfied him that the prisoner was not identical with the deserter. Accordingly, on the advice of the Judge Advocate-General, the conviction was quashed. The prisoner was given twenty-four hours' notice of trial, as required by the Rules of Procedure.

  Militia Training.
  MR. LANE-FOX: To ask the Secretary of State for War if he can give the names of the twenty battalions of Militia chosen for winter training this year.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Haldane.) I am afraid that I cannot give the names of the twenty battalions, as their selection is at present a matter of correspondence with the General Officers Commanding-in-Chief.

  Married Soldiers' Accommodation at Chatham.
  MR. BENNETT: To ask the Secretary of State for War whether, in some cases, the only accommodation provided at Chatham for married soldiers and their families consists of a single room for all purposes and, if so, whether he will take steps to see that this state of things is remedied.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Haldane.) The question of the accommodation for married soldiers at Chatham has been and is still receiving careful consideration in connection with the more general question of such accommodation at stations at home and abroad.

  English Mails for Cyprus.
  MR. HENNIKER HEATON: To ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether any arrangements now exist for the conveyance of English mails from Port Said to Cyprus; when did the late mail contract expire; why arrangements were not made by the authorities in Cyprus to

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  provide for a mail service before the late contract expired; and by what means British mails are now sent to Cyprus.
  (Answered by Mr. Churchill.) No contract steamers at present run between Port Said and Cyprus. The late mail contract with the Bell's Asia Minor Steamship Company expired in December last, and no fresh contract has at present been made, because the Legislative Council is opposed to the continuation of the system whereby a portion of the mail subsidy has in recent years been charged to the Locust Destruction Fund. The matter is engaging the further consideration of the Secretary of State. In the meantime mails to Cyprus continue to be sent to Egypt, from where they are forwarded by one or other of the four lines which regularly trade with Cyprus.

  Crown Colony Ordinances.
  MR. H. J. WILSON: To ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will lay upon the Table any Ordinances passed in the Straits Settlements, Hong Kong, or other Crown Colonies, and correspondence relating thereto, subsequent to and in continuation of the Return No. 147, of 1894, Contagious Diseases Ordinances, Colonies.
  (Answered by Mr. Churchill.) I have to refer the hon. Member to Cd. 9523, which was presented to Parliament in 1899 and contained correspondence in continuation of the Return mentioned by him. Ordinances which have come into operation subsequent to the date of the 1899 Blue-book, and correspondence connected therewith, will now be laid before Parliament.
  MR. H. J. WILSON: To ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he will lay upon the Table a Report as to the working and results of the Gibraltar Ordinance published in Cd. 618 of 1901, so far as it relates to venereal diseases, and include therein information as to how the chief of police obtains evidence that persons are suffering from such diseases before summoning them to attend at the Colonial Hospital under Section.9; and whether, in practice the Ordinance leads to the periodical, and indirectly compulsory, examination of prostitutes.
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  (Answered by Mr. Churchill.) The Governor of Gibraltar will be asked for information on the points referred to by the hon. Member.

  Moyallen (County Down) Letter Deliveries.
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: To ask the Postmaster-General whether, seeing that in the populous district of Moyallen, County Down, there is no second delivery of letters until 7.30 p.m., he can see his way to a mid-day delivery, so that letters received from England may be answered on the same day.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) I am having inquiry made on this subject, and I will communicate with the hon. Member as soon as the report is received.

  Scarva Pillar Box.
  MR. LIDDELL: To ask the Postmaster-General whether, in connection with the pillar box erected about two years ago at the cross roads in Lisnabrague, Scarva, County Down, he can arrange to have an evening collection, seeing that at the present time letters posted in this populous district during the day are not collected until the following morning, with the result that such letters do not reach their destination in Ireland until two days after being posted.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) This Question was fully considered a few months ago, when it was found that the cost of the postal service to Lisnabrague was already comparatively high, and that no additional expense was warranted for improvements. A collection is at present made from the letter box in question by the postman when delivering in the morning, and, in response to an application, the residents interested in the matter were told that an evening collection could only be afforded if they were prepared to bear the expense themselves. I regret that I am unable to provide such a collection at the public cost.

  Tidebrook Post Office.
  MR. COURTHOPE: To ask the Postmaster-General whether his attention has been called to the inconvenience caused by the closing of the Tidebrook post office; and whether ha

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  will consider the desirability of re-opening this office.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) The Tidebrook post office was closed because the sub-postmaster resigned, and no one else could be found to take the office. Endeavour is again being made to find a suitable candidate.

  Imported Linen and Cotton Goods.
  MR. LIDDELL: To ask the President of the Board of Trade if there are any Returns available giving the value of hand-embroidered, hem-stitched, and drawn-thread work on linen and cotton goods imported into the United Kingdom from Germany, France, Teneriffe, Japan, China, and other foreign countries during each of the past five years; and, if so, can he state the figures.
  (Answered by Mr. Lloyd-George.) The Answer is in the negative.

  Salisbury Train Arrangements.
  MR. CHARLES SCHWANN: To ask the President of the Board of Trade whether he will cause inquiries to be made as to the train arrangements in force at the stations (contiguous to one another) of the Great Western and London and South Western Railway Companies at the city of Salisbury, by which delays are caused to passengers, trains being fixed just to miss one another for obvious reasons.
  (Answered by Mr. Lloyd-George.) The Board of Trade have communicated with both the Railway Companies concerned, and have received a reply from each of them to the effect that the trains upon their respective lines are arranged to connect at Salisbury so far as circumstances admit, having regard to connections at other important junctions. The Companies add that they have done a great deal with the object of facilitating the interchange of traffic via Salisbury, and that there are eight trains running through from one system to the other daily, giving services without the inconvenience of change of carriage or station.

  German New General Tariff.
  SIR HOWARD VINCENT: To ask the President of the Board of Trade in what cases the rates
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  of duty of the new general tariff of Germany have not been modified by conventional arrangements; in what cases the rates of duty of the new conventional tariff are higher or lower than those of the old conventional tariff; and what are the approximate proportions of our exports to Germany in these three classes.
  (Answered by Mr. Lloyd-George.) The information asked for in the first and second parts of the Question will be found in the Return Cd. 2414, published by the Board of Trade. As regards the last part of the Question, a Return is being prepared, which will, I hope, give the hon. and gallant Member the particulars he desires.

  Rosyth Works.
  MAJOR ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty what sums are to be spent at Rosyth during 1906–7 under the Public Works and Loans Act, and from the votes respectively.
  (Answered by Mr. Lambert.) The only provision for work at Rosyth under Vote 10,1906–7, is a sum of £300 for repairs to existing houses on the Admiralty property. There is still an unexpended balance of about £40,000 on the total sum of £200,000 provided in The Naval Works Act, 1905, for preliminary expenses; but it is impossible at present to say how much of this balance will be expended during the coming financial year.

  Conscientious Objections to the Education Rate.
  MR. G. A. HARDY: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that a lady of eighty-three years of age is at present imprisoned for non-payment of education rate, and that she is one of 200 persons who have been imprisoned because of their conscientious objection to pay this rate; and will he consider whether any action can be taken to stay sentences of imprisonment pending the announcement of the Government financial proposals respecting the Education Bill shortly to be introduced.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) I have not heard of the particular case referred to in the Question, but I may say

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  generally that I have no power to intervene in the proceedings for the enforcement of the payment of rates. The matter is one of legal process, not within the province of the executive Government, and not subject to interference under the prerogative of the Crown. But I cannot help hoping that the sense of grievance may be mitigated or removed by the knowledge that the Government have undertaken to amend the Education Act this session.

  Colonial Candidates for the Civil Service.
  MR. HAROLD COX: To ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether appointments in the Home Civil Service and in the Indian Civil Service are open to Colonial candidates; and, if so, whether appointments in the Civil Services of the various self-governing Colonies are reciprocally opened to candidates born in the United Kingdom or in India.
  (Answered by Mr. McKenna.) Appointments in the Home Civil Service and the Indian Civil Service are open, subject to competition, where open or limited competition is prescribed by the regulations, to all qualified British subjects. I have no information on the point raised in the latter part of the Question.

  Examinations for Teachers' Training Colleges.
  MR. YOXALL: To ask the Secretary to the Board of Education whether a student who has passed the Oxford or Cambridge local senior examination, and who subsequently desires to enter a training college for teachers, would be required to present himself in Part I. of the Preliminary Certificate Examination, or whether success in the above-named University Examination can be accepted in place of Part I. of the Preliminary Certificate Examination.
  (Answered by Mr. Lough.) Part I. of the Preliminary Certificate Examination is an integral part of that examination, and is not imposed upon candidates for admission to training colleges who qualify for admission to a training college by passing one of the examinations other than the preliminary certificate examination recognised for that purpose. The Oxford and Cambridge senior locals are
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  so recognised, provided that the candidate satisfies the examiners in certain subjects specified in an Appendix to the Training College Regulations.

  Emigration of Poor Law Children to Canada.
  MR. LEWIS HASLAM: To ask the President of the Local Government Board if he will state the number of poor law children emigrated to Canada during 1905.
  (Answered by Mr. John Burns.) During the year 1905 the Local Government Board issued orders authorising expenditure by boards of guardians in respect of the emigration to Canada of 491 children.

  Adulterated Milk Prosecution at Cardiff
  MR. SILCOCK: To ask the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether his attention has been drawn to a case at the Cardiff City Police Court on Thursday, 4th January last, when J. E. Counsell, of Somersetshire, was summoned for selling milk not of the nature and quality demanded and fined £20 and costs; whether he is aware that evidence was given that the milk arrived at Cardiff at 6.18 p.m. on 21st November and was left exposed on the railway company's premises until the next morning before the inspector took a sample; that the churn had meanwhile been tampered with, and that a gallon of milk had been abstracted; and whether in view of the fact that farmers are held responsible for the quality of milk long after it has passed beyond their control, he will consider whether they will advise local authorities to take railway samples of milk immediately on arrival of the consignment at the station, or deal with the matter in any other way.
  (Answered by Sir Edward Strachey.) The attention of the President of the Board of Agriculture has been directed to this case, and inquiry is being made respecting it. I will communicate with the hon. Member again so soon as the inquiry is completed.

  Falcarragh Petty Sessions.
  MR. LAW: To ask Mr. Attorney-General for Ireland

  617
  whether he can say if any representations were received by the resident magistrate before the petty sessions held at Falcarragh on the 6th February last in connection with any of the cases tried on that day; and, if so, what was the nature of these representations, and by whom were they made.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) I am informed by the resident magistrate that he received no representation as to any case or cases to be heard at the petty sessions in question. The only communication he received was the usual notice from the petty sessions clerk setting out a list of the cases to be heard.

  Indian Council Drafts.
  MR. KESWICK: To ask the Secretary of State for India what amount of Council Drafts on the Indian Treasuries, since April, 1905, have been brought to account in excess of 19,250,000 sterling, as entered in the Indian Government's Budget last March; what are the circumstances to which such excess drawings are attributable, and to what purposes have those funds been applied; what are the present amounts of the Indian Government's cash balances in India and at Home; if the latter largely exceed the amounts usual in former years; has due consideration been given to the effects on Indian commerce of such a large withdrawal of funds formerly available in the presidency banks for Indian trade purposes; are the recent accumulations of gold here on Indian account connected with the artificially established rate of exchange arranged for in 1900; what is the amount on balance of enfaced rupee paper sent from or returned to India during the same period.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Morley.) The information asked for was given on the 1st instant in my reply to a Question put to me by the hon. Member for Hythe.†

  Second Term Rents in County Tipperary.
  MR. CONDONTo ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that the Land Sub-Commission, consisting of Mr. Edge, B.L., and Mr. Hunter Pringle, which recently heard cases in the Cashel rural district, county
  † See (4) Debates, clii, 1296.
  618
  Tipperary, have given decisions fixing second-term rents which have caused dissatisfaction among the tenants generally; whether he is aware that in the case of Mrs. Anne Lalor, tenant, Commander Kellett, landlord, in reference to two holdings, this Sub-Commission confirmed the first-term rent in one case, and slightly raised it in the other on an alleged increased area, poor law valuation made when prices were far higher being substantially lower than the new rents; whether he is aware that the pink schedule reports in both cases state that the tenant has insufficient working capital, and make that a reason for not reducing the rents; and that the Land Commission schedule of agricultural prices during the past fifteen years shows an all-round reduction in values; whether, with a view to providing a remedy for such fixing of rents by the Irish Land Commission, he will introduce a provision into the next Land Bill that rents shall be varied at least according to the variations of agricultural prices, having regard to the nature of the produce of each holding; and whether in these two cases of Mrs. Lalor the landlord's valuer estimated the fair rents at 13 per cent. under the rents fixed by the Sub-Commission.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) The decisions of Sub-Commission Courts are judicial decisions, and if either party to any case is dissatisfied with the decision of the Sub-Commission he possesses a remedy in the right of appeal which is provided by law. I am afraid that I cannot, in reply to a Question, enter into a consideration of the various controverted points which the hon. Member raises.

  Drainage of the Lower Bann.
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether Sir A. E. Binnie has yet presented his Report on the engineering works necessary on the Lower Bann to maintain the water of Lough Neagh at summer level and prevent the periodic flooding of the district; and, if so, when it will be printed and circulated.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) Sir Alexander Binnie's Report was laid upon the Table on the 28th ultimo, and I am informed that the Paper will be ready for distribution early next week.

  Land Purchase—Refusal of Advance.
  MR. GINNELL: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he will state the number of cases in which the Irish Land Commission refused, on account of excessive price, to sanction or to advance money in respect of purchase agreements made between landlords and tenants under the Land Purchase Acts prior to that of 1903, the average number of years' purchase paid for land under those Acts, the number of similar refusals on account of excessive price under the Act of 1903, the average number of years' purchase, including the bonus, paid for land under this Act, any cause for the increase other than the discontinuance of inspection for value and the withdrawal from the Commission of the power of refusal; and whether, in view of this increase, His Majesty's Government intend to revive the practice of inspection and the power of the Commission in all cases of sale to disallow prices in excess of value.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) The number of applications to the Land Commission for advances under the earlier Land Purchase Acts, which were refused, dismissed, or withdrawn, owing to defects in title, irregularity, insufficiency of security, and other causes, was 7,838, viz., under the Acts of 1885 and 1888, 3,812; and under the Acts of 1891 and 1896, 4,026. It would be impossible, without an examination into each of these cases, to state the number refused on the ground of insufficiency of security. Probably, however, this was generally the reason for the refusal. The average

  Classification.

  Number of year's purchase of rent, excluding bonus.

  Estimated number of years' purchase of rent, including bonus, actually paid to 31st January 1906.

  Direct sales

  22·9

  25·0

  Section 6

  22·4

  25·1

  Section 7

  20·0

  21·4

  Total

  22·7

  24·9

  The figures in the second column represent the number of years' purchase on rent. The bonus, when payable, is
  number of years' purchase in cases in which advances were made under these earlier Acts, will be found at pages 93 and 100 of the Appendix to the Report of the Land Commission for the year ended 31st March, 1905. Particulars are also given, with explanatory notes, in a Return to an Order of this House, Parliamentary Paper, No. 90, of the year 1903. With regard to cases under The Irish Land Act, 1903, the following figures have been compiled:—

  Table I.

  (1) Number of applications for advances entirely refused by the Estates Commissioners, because the prices agreed upon were not secured

  128

  (2) Number refused on account of insufficiency of security owing to the character of the holding

  83

  (3) Number of applications for advances refused in part because the prices agreed upon were not secured, lesser advances having been sanctioned than were asked for

  482

  Total number of cases in which, on account of excessive price or insufficiency of security, the Commissioners refused to make advances, or advanced smaller sums than those applied for

  693

  TABLE II.
  Return showing the average number of years' purchase paid for Estates purchased during the period from 1st November 1903 to 31st January 1906.
  calculated on the purchase money of estates, including tenanted and untenanted land. No estimate can be made of

  621
  the number of years' purchase which the bonus and the price represent on untenanted land. Further, the bonus is not declared to be payable until the purchase money is distributed, and the amount which may be payable has not yet been fully drawn. For these reasons no accurate reply to the Question, as put, can be given as regards the number of years' purchase, including bonus. In reference to that portion of the Question as to the causes of increase in price, it is to be remembered that, under the Act of 1903, the Land Purchase Annuity is 3¼ per cent. as against 4 per cent. under the previous Acts, and the Land Commission consider that to this circumstance the increase of price is to a large extent due. I cannot now make any statement as to the intentions of His Majesty's Government with regard to the suggested alteration of the Land Act of 1903.

  Militia Dress Service Cap.
  MR. H. BEAUMONT: To ask the Secretary of State for War whether the new dress service cap for the Militia will be issued at once to those battalions which do not possess the present cap and cover.
  (Answered By Mr. Secretary Haldane.) Militia battalions not in possession of the present pattern cap and cover will be supplied with the service dress cap during the current season. Battalions in possession of the present cap only will be supplied with covers.

  Vagrancy.
  MR. PIKE PEASE: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury, whether, in view of the Report of the Departmental Committee on Vagrancy, the Government intend to bring in legislation, at an early date, dealing with this subject.
  (Answered by Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman.) I think the hon. Gentleman is a little precipitate. The Report of the Vagrancy Committee has only just been issued, and until we have had time to consider its recommendations it is impossible to make any statement as to the intentions of the Government.

  Government Departments and St-Patrick's Day.
  MR. FIELD: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury
  622
  whether he can arrange that St. Patrick's Day will be recognised, as far as possible, a general holiday in all Government departments, especially in the War Department and in Ireland.
  (Answered by Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman.) I will make inquiries as to the existing arrangements and consider whether anything can be done to meet the hon. Gentleman's views.

  QUESTIONS IN THE HOUSE.

    Gun Practice in Cawsand Bay.
    MR. MALLET: On behalf of the senior Member for Plymouth, I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether he is aware that the lives of the fishermen are endangered by the firing practice from a gunboat at Cawsand; and whether he will consider the advisability of following the plan adopted by the Whitesand Bay batteries of restricting such practice to Saturdays and Mondays.
    THE SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. EDMUND ROBERTSON,): No complaint has been received of danger from gunboat practice at Cawsand Bay, and owing to the number of men under instruction, it would be impossible to confine the practice to Saturdays and Mondays. A complaint was received by the Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth, in December last, of firing which took place in Whitesand Bay, and instructions have been given by him to prevent a repetition of any dangerous practice in that locality.

    Australian and China Squadrons' Cordite Supply.
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether the cordite required by the Australian and China squadrons will be obtained in Australia in the future.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: The circumstances have not changed since this question was considered in 1904, when a decision was reached that the colonial requirements and those of the Navy were not sufficient to justify the expense of establishing a cordite factory in Australia.

    Admiralty Clerkships.
    MR. MURPHY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether, as a result of the recent re-organisation of the Accountant General's Department of the Admiralty, 149 clerkships hitherto held by men successful in open competitive examinations, are in future to be filled by men who have passed no educational test whatever, and who are not even required to furnish a medical certificate as to physical fitness; and, if so, whether he will state the circumstances warranting such a departure from the principle of open competition embodied in Clause 2 of the Order in Council of the 4th June, 1870.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: A certain number of second division clerks will, as opportunity offers, be replaced by temporary clerical assistants. As this new class of clerks will not be on the establishment, no medical or educational examination is necessary, only those who prove efficient being retained. This system has been in operation in the Supply Departments of the Admiralty for some years, and no new principle is involved in extending it to the Accountant General's Department. No established clerks will be discharged in consequence of the re-organisation.

    Dockyard Discharges—Rosyth Work.
    MR. BELLAIRS: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether, in view of the fact that the Rosyth dockyard project owed its inception to a Departmental Committee presided over by Mr. Pretyman, of which the terms of reference dealt exclusively with the accommodation of the dockyards in 1900 and the prospective demands on them, and that the forecasts of that Committee concerning impending congestion of shipping have been falsified so that there has been a net reduction of 6,776 men in ten months in the existing dockyards, the Admiralty will postpone all action in reference to Rosyth until the financial condition of the country is in a more satisfactory condition.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: I have nothing to add to the Statement I have already made in the course of the debate on the 1st March.†
    MR. ARTHUR LEE: I suppose the right hon. Gentleman is referring to the official Memorandum which he read to the House, in which he said he had no intention of abandoning or departing from the scheme?†
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: Those are the words I used, and I adhere to them.

    Admiralty Furniture Contracts.
    MR. O'GRADY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether his attention has been called to cases of contracts for furniture for his Department in which the Fair Wages Clause has been evaded; whether he will see that the clause named will be rigidly enforced in future; and whether he will consider the advisability of publishing the names or title of the contracting firms before the contracts are finally signed.
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: I am informed that no complaints have recently been received as to wages paid under contracts for furniture. All complaints of the evasion of the Fair Wages Clause are at once investigated. It is not considered desirable to publish the names of contracting firms.
    MR. O'GRADY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that much of the furniture manufactured for his Department is classed as sweated goods?
    MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: No sir.

    Australian Silver Coinage.
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the coinage of silver will now be allowed in Australia.
    THE UNDER-SECRETARY FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. CHURCHILL,): The question of the introduction of a special silver coinage for Australia, which has been under consideration for some time, will be further discussed verbally with Sir John Forrest, the Treasurer of the Commonwealth, who recently arrived in England.
    † See (4) Debates, clii., 1326.

    Suggested Interchange of British and Colonial Civil Servants.
    MR. WALKER: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies what reply has been made to the recent recommendation of the Public Service Board of New South Wales in favour of some interchange of public servants between the civil services of Australia and those of other parts of the British dominions.
    MR. CHURCHILL: The proposal referred to by the hon. Member has not been submitted to His Majesty's Government by the Government of New South Wales. Should the Colonial Government think fit to make any suggestion on the subject, the matter will receive consideration.

    Liverpool Trade in Spirits with Nigeria.
    MR. JAMES O'KELLY: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether his attention is being directed to the havoc worked by the liquor traffic among the natives in Nigeria and in adjoining British territory, where so much of the revenue is derived from alcohol; whether he is aware that shipments of Hamburg spirits are being continually sent out by Liverpool merchants, the cost of which for a case containing twelve bottles, labelled, capsuled, and packed in straw, amounts to only 1s. 4¾d. per case; will he say whether any complaints have been made by native chiefs with reference to the harm done amongst the natives by this spirit; and whether, seeing that a former Governor of Lagos has asserted that there are no other means at the disposal of the Government for carrying on the administration of the country than that derived from the revenue from the liquor traffic, the Secretary of State will consider the absolute prohibition of this traffic in Nigeria, Lagos, and other British territories, as is the case in the adjoining Congo Free State and in other portions of Central Africa.
    MR. CHURCHILL: I cannot say that evidence reaches the Colonial Office showing that havoc is being worked by the liquor traffic among the natives in the territories referred to. I have not been able to verify the figures given by the hon. Member as to the cost of the spirit employed in the trade; but I am aware
    626
    that they are shipped at very low rates. No complaints have been received by the Secretary of State, at any rate within a recent period, from native chiefs with regard to these spirits. The liquor traffic in West Africa has always been most carefully watched, and His Majesty's Government is very willing to discourage the consumption of spirits by any practicable means. The importation of trade spirits into Northern Nigeria and the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast is absolutely prohibited. These grave questions will continue to exercise the attention of the Secretary of State.
    MR. CATHCART WASON: Will the hon. Gentleman consider the advisabity of co-operating with France and Germany in prohibiting the introduction of spirits into this part of Africa?
    MR. CHURCHILL: Certainly, sir.

    Uganda—Mortality from Sleeping Sickness.
    MR. JAMES O'KELLY: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the population of Uganda has decreased in recent years from some 6,000,000 to about 2,500,000, and to what causes this depopulation is to be attributed.
    MR. CHURCHILL: There are no. statistics at the disposal of His Majesty's Government to prove to what extent the native population of Uganda has increased or decreased in recent years, but it is known that the sleeping sickness epidemic has been the cause of a very heavy mortality in certain districts.

    The Gold Coast—Cape Coast Castle Franchise.
    MR. NOLAN: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he is aware that Ordinance 17 of 1894 was put in force in the town of Cape Coast Castle, Gold Coast Colony, on February 14th, 1906, and that, under the Ordinance the bulk of the ratepaying population is denied effective representation upon the town, council; and whether, in view of the dissatisfaction amongst the people affected, and of the fact that a deputation is now on the way to London to submit the views of the Omanhim chiefs and people to the

    627
    Colonial Office, he will, under the circumstances, instruct the Governor to suspend the Ordinance pending the arrival of the deputation and a full inquiry into the facts to be submitted by them.
    MR. CHURCHILL: The Ordinance providing for the establishment of town councils to which the hon. Member refers, was extended to Cape Coast on July 1st, 1905. Under the Ordinance half the members of the council may be elected by the ratepayers. The objections which have been raised to the establishment of a town council under the Ordinance have been very fully represented to the Secretary of State, and most carefully considered; and, under the circumstances, the Secretary of State sees no sufficient reason to take the course suggested by the hon. Member.

    Indian Army Reorganisation.
    SIR EDWARD CLARKE: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been called to Section 3 of The Indian Councils Act, 1861, which provides that if any person appointed an honorary member of the Governor General's Council shall be in the military service of the Crown, he snail not, during his continuance in office as such member, hold any military command or be employed in any military duties; whether, in view of the fact that under the scheme of military administration about to be introduced, the officer holding the highest military command in India is to be the head of the new Army Department, and to become for all general purposes an ordinary member of Council, instead of, as at present, an extraordinary member, appointed only at the discretion of the Secretary of State, he has taken advice as to the legality of the constitution thus proposed; and, if so, whether he will inform the House what legal authorities have been consulted, and whether his action has been in complete accord with their opinions.
    I beg also to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been called to Section 2 of The Indian Civil Service Act, 1861, which provides that the Secretary, Junior Secretary, and Assistant Secretary to the Government of India shall be reserved for members of the Indian Civil Service, with certain
    628
    exceptions, namely the Military, Marine, and Public Works; whether he has been advised that the appointment of military officers to the secretarial offices of the two new Departments in India, namely, the Army Department and the Military Supply Department, can legally be made under this section; if so, whether he will inform the House what legal authorities have been consulted; whether, in the event of the appointment of military officers to the above post not being permissible under Section 2 of The Indian Civil Service Act, 1861, it is proposed that the appointment of such officers should be made under Sections 3 and 4 of the same Act, which provides for the provisional appointment of persons qualified under the Act, subject to the approval within twelve months of the Secretary of State in Council; whether, in that case, it is proposed permanently to fill these posts by a series of provisional appointments; and whether he has been advised that such procedure will be in accordance with the Statute.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Mr. JOHN MORLEY,): Perhaps I may be allowed to answer both the Questions together, by stating that I consulted not only the legal authorities at the India Office, but also the Lord Chancellor, as to the arrangements recently made in connection with the new Army Department, and they were clear and unanimous in advising that there can be no doubt as to those arrangements being in complete accordance with the law.

    Imperial Customs Service for India.
    MR. SCHWANN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether the organisation of the new Department, described as an Imperial Customs Service for India, has been adopted and finally sanctioned by the higher authorities in England, and do the proposals specifically exclude His Majesty's Indian subjects, also members of the Covenanted Civil Services, from the senior positions in India, and confine the Department to Europeans recruited in this country; and, if so, whether, in view of Clause 87 of the Act of William IV., 1833, and the Royal Proclamation of 1858, he proposes to take any action in the matter.
    MR. JOHN MORLEY: My predecessor sanctioned the formation of an Indian Customs Service, to be officered partly by members of the Indian Civil Service, and partly by persons appointed direct by the Secretary of State, and to take the place of existing Customs Services in the several provinces. Three of the five collectorships and three assistant-collectorships are reserved for the Indian Civil Service. For the rest the Secretary of State selects and appoints probationers as vacancies occur. There is nothing in the regulations which specifically excludes the appointment of natives of India who are British subjects.

    Labour Limitations in the South African Colonies.
    MR. ASHLEY: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will lay upon the Table a copy of the limitations proposed in the Transvaal and Orange River Colony in respect of the control of those Colonies over the conditions of native labour.
    MR. CHURCHILL: I would remind the hon. Member that the Governor will be required in the future, as now, by his instructions to reserve any bill subjecting non-Europeans to any disability to which persons of European birth are not subjected.
    MR. ASHLEY: Will a copy be laid on the Table, or is it reserved to the Government to deal with these limitations?
    MR. CHURCHILL: If the hon. Member will read my Answer he will see that the question will be reserved for the consideration of the Crown, and consequently it will come under the purview of the Secretary of State, and, through him, to the House of Commons.

    British Trade with South Eastern Persia.
    MR. T. HART-DAVIES: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if his attention has been called to the report of the Newcomen Mission to South Eastern Persia; whether he will take into consideration the advisability of obtaining a concession for a road from Bunder Abbas to Kerman, and of appointing a Consul-General at Kerman of a rank equal to that of the Resident at Bushire, and of placing Vice-Consuls at Yezd and Bam; and whether
    630
    he will consider the desirability of pressing on the Persian Government such reforms as will tend to facilitate trade between India and South-Eastern Persia.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir EDWARD GREY,): The Report in question has been received and is under consideration. The question of improving communications in South Persia has been carefully considered by His Majesty's Government; they are prepared to give a full measure of diplomatic support to private enterprise, but they would not feel justified in incurring expenditure from public funds on undertakings of the nature indicated. His Majesty's Government see no necessity for giving an increase of rank to His Majesty's Consul at Kerman; there are already a British Vice-Consul at Yezd and an acting British Vice-Consul at Bam. His Majesty's Government have pressed and will continue to press upon the Persian Government the desirability of adopting every measure to facilitate the trade in question.

    Macedonian Financial Commission.
    MR. GOOCH: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the financial control of the Powers over Macedonia is intended to end in two years time; and, if so, whether he will take steps in the meanwhile to provide for its continuance.
    SIR EDWARD GREY: The mandate of the International Financial Commission has been, in the first instance, limited to two years. How this came to be done will be fully explained in the Papers which will be laid soon. If it is desirable to renew this term, His Majesty's Government will support that, as they have supported other reforms necessary to improve the condition of affairs in Macedonia.

    Algeciras Conference.
    MR. BOWLES: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether His Majesty's Government are now in a position to make any statement with reference to the progress of the Conference at Algeciras.
    SIR EDWARD GREY: I do not think it would be desirable for me to make any

    631
    statement while negotiations are still proceeding.

    Unrest at Tangier.
    MR. ASHLEY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what steps are being taken, pending the result of the Conference at Algeciras, to secure the lives and property of British subjects in Tangier and its neighbourhood.
    SIR EDWARD GREY: His Majesty's Government do not consider that the existing conditions at Tangier are such as to call for special and immediate measures for the protection of the lives and property of British subjects there.
    MR. ASHLEY: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman has seen the report that tribal fighting is going on close to Tangier, and that Europeans cannot venture outside the town?
    SIR EDWARD GREY: There have been reports of that kind, and there has been a state of disturbance existing for some time past. But we have no information to show that there is increased danger, apart from the general disturbance which has existed for some time.

    Turkey and the Sinai Peninsula.
    MR. ASHLEY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Turkish troops have been withdrawn from Egyptian territory near the Sinai Peninsula.
    SIR EDWARD GREY: Turkish troops are still in occupation of certain posts in Sinai Peninsula. The matter is now under discussion between His Majesty's Government and the Sublime Porte.

    Maintenance of Main Roads.
    MR. ASHLEY: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether the Government contemplate taking any steps to throw the whole or any part of the upkeep of main roads on the Imperial Exchequer instead of as at present on the rates, in view of the increase in the heavy and light motor traffic.
    THE CHANCELLOR OF THF EXCHEQUER (Mr. ASQUITH,): I have already promised that this shall
    632
    be considered when the general question of local taxation comes to be dealt with. I am not prepared to say more at this stage.
    MR. ASHLEY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this is a very pressing question in the country just now?
    MR. ASQUITH: All questions connected with local taxation are very pressing.

    Payment of Members.
    MR. NORMAN: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will consider the desirability of making provision in the Budget for an allowance in aid toward the necessary expenses to which Members are put in the discharge of their Parliamentary duties.
    MR. ASQUITH: I am not in a position to make any statement as to the provisions of the Budget. The hon. Member may draw his own inferences from what the Prime Minister said last night.

    Galway Harbour Board.
    MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that the Galway Harbour Board are making arrangements with Messrs. Hutchison with the object of discharging a debt; and whether, in view of the interest of the Board of Works in this matter, he will instruct such Board to facilitate the negotiations now pending between the Galway Harbour Commissioners and Messrs. Hutchison.
    THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. MCKENNA,): I am aware that negotiations are proceeding between the Galway Harbour Board and Messrs. Hutchison. I understand the facilitation of the negotiations referred to by the hon. Member to consist in a proposal that the Board of Works should advance a loan to the Harbour Commissioners to enable them to discharge their debt to Messrs. Hutchison. The negotiations have, however, not reached a stage which will permit of my giving a definite reply to the latter part of the Question.

    Shop Assistants and Living-in—Protection from Fire.
    MR. SEDDON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will state the number of persons engaged in the distribution trade, under the living-in system, who have lost their lives through fire; and, seeing that two young persons lost their lives upon premises provided by their employer, on March 3rd, 1906, at Camborne, Cornwall, whether he will inquire what number of assistants were sleeping on the premises, what was the sleeping accommodation provided, and what were the means provided for escape in case of fire.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. GLADSTONE,): There are no statistics available on this point, so far as the Department is aware. The London County Council would perhaps be able to produce a return so far as London is concerned, by examining their records, but it is doubtful whether other local authorities could in all cases give the information for their areas, and the work of collecting the returns would be great. There is no question as to the serious danger of fire in many classes of shops. Evidence was given on the subject, especially in regard to projecting shops, before the Committee on the London Building Bill of last session. The whole of the evidence on this Bill is being summarised, at the request of the Select Committee appointed last session to inquire into means of escape from fire in large buildings. I have, however, no power to take any action in the matter. With regard to the second part of the hon. Member's Question I will, if he so desires, ask the local police to obtain for him such information as they can.
    MR. SEDDON: Will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to get a Return on this very important question?
    MR. GLADSTONE: If the hon. Member will speak to me privately and say what he desires, I will consider it.

    Harringay Vaccination Prosecution.
    MR. T. F. RICHARDS: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to
    634
    the case of Mr. Joseph Slack, of Harringay, who was summoned before the Highgate bench of magistrates on three separate occasions for refusing to have his child vaccinated, he declaring on each occasion that he held conscientious objections to vaccination; and whether he will take action to compel the authorities to give that relief to conscientious objectors which the Act contemplates, and put a stop to repeated prosecutions.
    MR. GLADSTONE: My attention has not been called to the case mentioned by the hon. Member. In 1904 a circular was sent to magistrates drawing attention to remarks made by the Lord Chief Justice on the proper interpretation of the section, but as the law stands I have no power to interfere with the discretion given to the justices in the matter of certificates of conscientious objection nor with repeated prosecutions.

    Sweating in the East End of London.
    SIR W. EVANS GORDON: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware of the practice among a certain class of employers in the East End of London, under which hands are made to sign indentures to work for a certain period without payment, on the pretence of their being taught a trade; whether he will consider the advisability of collecting a list of firms who treat their employees in this way, and of arranging that tenders from such firms should be refused by Government Departments and local authorities; and whether he has in contemplation any steps for the discouragement of home work and sub-contracting.
    MR. GLADSTONE: My right hon. friend has asked me to Answer this Question. I have no official information as to the existence of the practice alleged. The question whether any action should be taken to prevent the practice in the case of firms receiving Government contracts is a matter for the particular Departments concerned to consider, and I would suggest that the hon. Member should bring any information which he has in his possession before those Departments. As regards the last part of the Question I am not able to make any statement, but I may point out that certain powers of supervision and control in regard to homework are given to the

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    local authorities by the Factory Act, 1901, Section 107-10. Information as to the exercise of these powers has been obtained by the Home Office from the local authorities and is now being tabulated.

    Free Postage for Members.
    MR. KEIR HARDIE: I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether he can state, approximately, the cost which would be entailed upon the Treasury were Members allowed to frank letters posted within the precincts of the House.
    THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. SYDNEY BUXTON,): There is no material on which I can base any reliable estimate of the cost which would be entailed on the Treasury were Members allowed to frank letters posted within the precincts of the House. But I have had a Return taken of the letters posted from the two Houses of Parliament on the last three days of its sittings—Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday last. The total number of letters posted was 8,352, and the total postage was £31 18s. 4d., or an average of 2,784 of letters and £10 12s. 9d. of postage a day. It is estimated that 90 per cent. of this correspondence is posted by Members of both Houses. This would give an average of 2,500 letters a day, at a cost of £9 11s. 6d. of postage. How far these figures would be increased if franking were permitted, it is impossible to say.
    MR. KEIR HARDIE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what number of these letters were official documents sent out by the Vote Office?
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I understand that the Return given to me refers only to letters bearing stamps.
    MR. STANLEY WILSONasked whether, as Members were to receive on some future occasion their salaries, the Government would now consider whether they could not give them everything free, particularly free food.
    MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say how many of the 8,352 letters were posted by
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    Members of the House of Commons and how many by the Lords?
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I cannot say.

    The Post Office and the National Telephone Company's Employees.
    MR. KEIR HARDIE: I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether he accepts the findings of the Telephone Transfer Committee of last year relative to the position of the employees of the National Telephone Company; and whether he intends to embody these in a Bill this session.
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I propose, to accept the arrangements described in a Memorandum read by my predecessor in this House on the 9th August last† for giving effect generally to the recommendations of the Select Committee of last session with regard to the staff of the National Telephone Company. For reasons stated in Answer to a Question in this House on the 26th February ††, I do not propose to introduce a Bill dealing with the subject during the present session. The transfer will not take place until 1911.

    Trade Unions and Employment Returns.
    MR. FELL: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether the 271 trade unions, with a total membership of 581,121, which made returns of employment for January last, represent the whole or the bulk of the trade unions; or, if not, what proportion they bear to the total number of trade unions.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. LLOYD GEORGE,): The total membership of the trade unions making returns of employment for January last was about 650,000, of whom a certain number were superannuated, not entitled to benefit abroad, on strike, &c., leaving a net membership of 581,121 on which the percentage of unemployed was calculated. The number represented in the Returns is over three-quarters of the membership of all trade unions which give unemployed benefit, which are the only trade unions
    † See (4) Debates, cli., 829–30.
    †† See (4) Debates, clii, 786–7.

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    invited to make these monthly Returns. The total membership of all trade unions is over 1,800,000. Valuable Returns of a non-statistical kind relating to employment are received monthly from a number of other unions. These are utilised in the article on employment, but do not enter into the total on which the percentage of unemployed is based.
    MR. FELL: Would it not be possible to make these Returns more complete? They are really of small value in the present form.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: It is the most complete Return made by any country and far more reliable than any other, but if the hon. Gentleman can suggest any improvement I will consider it.
    SIR HOWARD VINCENT: Do I understand that only one-third of the trade unions make a report?
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: On the contary, I said that all trade unions make some Return, but the Returns which are utilised are those of the unions which give an unemployed benefit, which involves a very severe test of unemployment. The other Returns are published by the Board of Trade.
    SIR HOWARD VINCENT: Where?
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: In the Labour Gazette.
    MR. R. DUNCAN: And the membership represented is three-quarters of the total.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: Over three-quarters.
    MR. CHIOZZA MONEY: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of urging upon the census authorities the provision of a column on the census paper, which would enable workmen to make some statement as to unemployment?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The next census will be five years hence, and I hope that before then we shall be having much better Returns.

    The Wreck of the "Dinnington."
    MR. CATHCART WASON: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been directed to the wreck of the steamship "Dinnington" on the island of Suitha, Orkney, and the rescue of the shipwrecked nine men by William Taylor and crew, and if some public recognition will be made of the services of the rescuers; and also whether the Board of Trade will consider the erection of some shelter that might be used by stranded sailors and fishermen, and if they would recommend the erection of a minor light to prevent such accidents in the future.
    MR. LLOYD GEORGE: Yes, Sir. My attention has been called to the circumstances attending the wreck of the steamship "Dinnington," and the rescue of some of her crew. An official inquiry has been ordered, and in connection with it, careful consideration will be given to the services of the rescuers. I am informed by the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses that they have had under consideration the question of lighting not Suitha, but the beacon on the extremity of Ruff Reef, which extends off Cantick Head, and is about half a mile distant from Suitha Island. This proposal has been held over till more pressing claims have been dealt with, but the loss of the "Dinnington" will no doubt be an added argument in its favour. The question of erecting a shelter is not one for the Board of Trade.

    Hours of Duty of Railway Servants.
    MR. BELL: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if he can state the total number of cases of engine-drivers, firemen, guards, and signalman employed on the British railways who had been on duty for thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen and eighteen hours and upwards per day for the month of March, 1905, and the total number employed in those grades; and if he will have the totals inserted in all Returns of such hours in future.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: It would be misleading to give the total number of instances of long hours for the different grades of railway men referred to in the Return issued for March, 1905, unless the total number of days worked was also

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    shown. The Board of Trade have not got the latter information for the month in question, but in obtaining future Returns the information desired by the hon. Member will be furnished.

    Liverpool and the Commercial Intelligence Committee.
    MR. A. WILLIAMSON: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether, in view of the importance of the trade of Liverpool and district, competent representation will be given forthwith to Liverpool on the newly organised Commercial Intelligence Committee, in accordance with the memorial which has recently been presented to the President of the Board of Trade by the Incorporated Chamber of Commerce of Liverpool.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: A memorial containing such a request has been received within the last few days, and is under consideration. I fully recognise the desirability of having such an important commercial centre as Liverpool represented, but there are difficulties in the constitution of the Committee. These I am now considering, and I hope to be able to announce the decision of the Board shortly.

    Roumanian Tariff.
    SIR GILBERT PARKER: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether the rates of duty obtained for the goods mentioned below in the commercial treaty with Roumania are higher or lower than the duties levied on the same goods under the Roumanian tariff which was in force up to the end of February 1906; and, if so, by how much the duties have been increased or diminished, and what are approximately the proportions of our total trade with Roumania affected by such changes of duty; the goods are specified under Nos. 102, 108, 190, 207, 324, 325, 333–340, 350, 358–360, 362–364 368, 369, 371, 381, 443, 579, 590, 591, 622, 786, 788, 845–847 (see Cd. 2828); and whether the reductions of duty of the new general tariff of Roumania secured by the United Kingdom by the treaty with that country are extended to Germany under the most-favoured-nation clause of the treaty between Germany and Roumania.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: The annual value of imports from the United Kingdom into Roumania covered by the Schedule attached to the Anglo-Roumanian Commercial Treaty and the supplementary agreement of February last, amounts to about £1,120,000, i.e., £617,000 on which the duties of the new Roumanian Tariff have been reduced, and £503,000 on which they have been conventionalised. Compared with the old Roumanian tariff the new conventional rates on these articles are reduced on imports to the value of £245,000; remain unchanged on imports to the value of £8,000,000; and are increased on imports to the value of £867,000. I shall be happy to give the hon. Member a list of the new and old duties showing the amount of the reductions and increases in each case. All the tariff reductions provided for in the Anglo-Roumanian treaty are extended to Germany under the treaty between Germany and Roumania. The German imports benefiting by these reductions amount to about £150,000 or rather less than a quarter of the corresponding imports from the United Kingdom.

    Unemployment Returns.
    MR. L. HASLAM: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade what was the percentage of unemployed in December, 1904, and in December, 1905, respectively, as given in the Board of Trade Labour Gazette; are these Returns furnished by employers and their associations, trade unions, local correspondents, and other sources; if so, what class of workpeople are included in the Returns; do the Returns include the unemployed absent from work through sickness or accident; and, if so, what percentages were unemployed from each of these causes.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: The percentage of members of trade unions returned as unemployed at the end of December, 1904, was 7·6, and at the end of December, 1905, 4·9. These percentages are based on Returns from trade unions giving unemployed benefit. The industries represented in the Returns included building, wood-working, iron and steel, shipbuilding, engineering, metal trades, coal mining, textile, paper, printing, leather, glass, and certain other trades.

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    The Returns do not include those absent through sickness, accident, holidays, or strikes, or for any other reason than want of employment.

    Standardisation and Audit of Municipal Accounts.
    SIR W. EVANS-GORDON: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he proposes to adopt the recommendations of the Joint Committee on Municipal Trading (1903) in regard to the standardisation of the municipal accounts and their subjection to the examination of independent professional auditors.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. JOHN BURNS,): As regards the standardisation of the municipal accounts, I have appointed a Departmental Committee to inquire and report as to the system upon which the accounts of the various local authorities in England and Wales should be kept. I am considering the subject of the audit of the municipal accounts, but I could not promise to introduce legislation for the purpose of giving effect to the recommendations of the Joint Committee on Municipal Trading on this matter.

    Local Rates and Destitute Soldiers and Sailors.
    MR. BENNETT: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether any steps can be taken by the Government to prevent paupers, whose destitution is due to injuries received during their service in the Army or Navy, from becoming a burden upon the local ratepayers.
    MR. JOHN BURNS: I have received a certain number of resolutions from Boards of Guardians to the effect suggested in the Question, and have communicated their views to the Admiralty and the War Office. I am not able to make any statement as to the feasibility of adopting the suggestion.
    MR. JOYCE: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to the case of an old soldier named Patrick Fogarty, who served through the Crimea and Indian Mutiny, and who has been
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    allowed by a generous British Government to die in an Irish workhouse?
    [No Answer was returned.]

    Displacement of Dwellings in St. Pancras.
    MR. LEA: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware that the Midland Railway Company have bought land situated between Euston Road and Phoenix Street, and Ossulston Street and Chalton Street, in East St. Pancras, with a view to the extension of their terminus; whether he is aware that this scheme will affect from 2,000 to 3,000 of the working classes; and, if so, what steps does he propose to take to ensure that the railway company in question shall rehouse these people.
    MR. JOHN BURNS: I have made inquiry on the subject and am informed that the company have purchased the freehold interest in the land referred to, but that before they can use it for the purposes of their undertaking they must obtain express Parliamentary authority. I will see that in connection with any Bill having this object the point to which my hon. friend refers is not lost sight of.

    Sheep Worrying by Dogs at Worplesdon.
    Mr. MARNHAM: I beg to ask the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he has been informed that on the night of 10th February, 1906, a flock of ewes and lambs belonging to Mr. G. Gatley, Bowers Farm, Worplesdon, was attacked by a dog or dogs, upwards of fifty of them being either killed or driven into the River Wey and drowned; and whether he will consider the advisability of introducing a measure whereby farmers and others may be compensated in such cases.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: My hon. friend the Member for South Somerset has asked me to reply to this Question in his absence. He has made inquiries into the case to which my hon. friend refers. The facts are quite correctly stated in his Question. He is sorry to say that similar occurrences are frequently reported to us, and there is no doubt that flockmasters

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    suffer very serious losses from the worrying of their sheep by dogs. He does not think that Parliament could be asked to pay compensation for those losses out of public funds, but he believes that the Bill of which he has given notice will do something to mitigate the evil, and he hopes to proceed with it at an early date.

    Grants for Agricultural Education.
    MR. BERTRAM: I beg to ask the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the Board of Agriculture, whether the sum of money placed at the disposal of the Board for grants-in-aid of Agricultural Education and Research is sufficient for the purpose; and, if not, whether the Board will consider the desirability of co-operating with the Board of Education with a view to utilising the resources of both Boards to the best advantage.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE (for Sir E. STRACHEY): We should be very glad to be entrusted with larger funds for the promotion of Agricultural Education and Research, and I believe that there is room for the profitable development of our work in this direction. The officers of the Board of Agriculture and of the Board of Education are in frequent communication on business connected with Agricultural Education, and my noble friend proposes to confer personally with the President of the Board of Education on the subject at an early date. We quite realise the advantages of co-operation between the two Departments.

    Grants to Agricultural Colleges.
    MR. BERTRAM: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Education whether the Board can aid agricultural as well as other forms of technological education, and upon what grounds the Board has refused to give grants-in-aid to certain agricultural colleges that have applied for them.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION (Mr. BIRRELL,): If the hon. Member will supply me privately with the names of the colleges to which he refers I will have the matter investigated, but so far as my information goes the places where grants have been refused are places which had already received grants from the Board of Agriculture in respect of the same work.
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    Agricultural education, as well as other forms of technological education, is aided by grants from the Board who are doing all in their power to assist its development. They are in constant co operation with the Board of Agriculture for this purpose.
    MR. BERTRAMasked if it was not the fact that the Board of Education and the Board of Agriculture necessarily differ in regard to the purpose for which grants are made, and can only give them for specified purposes?
    MR. BIRRELL: I understand there is-a little overlapping in this case, and I wilt look into it.

    Education Bates Return.
    DR. MACNAMARA: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Education whether he will grant a Return, showing for each county and county borough in England and Wales the amount raised by rates in each complete year since the appointed day under the Education Acts, 1902 and 1903, and the rate in the £ which that represents, under Part II. and Part III., respectively; showing also the same in respect of each borough and urban district council which is a local education authority for Part III. of the Act in each such area.
    MR. BIRRELL: I understand that the Departmental Committee appointed by the late Prime Minister are collecting statistics which will include the information desired by the hon. Member; and further that it is the intention of the Committee to submit Returns received by them for the information of the Government in an interim Report which they hope to present before Easter, There will, therefore, I think, be no reason to move for the Return proposed.

    German Children's School Hours.
    MR. L. HASLAM: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Education what are the hours during which scholars attend elementary schools in Berlin and other parts of Germany; what are the intervals between the school hours for meals and recreation; are meals, if provided at the schools, free of charge or paid for by parents or guardians; if free of charge

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    are the expenses of the meals defrayed by the municipality or the State.
    MR. BIRRELL: In Berlin and other large towns the public elementary schools meet for a morning session of 5 hours, on every week-day, beginning at 8 o'clock in the winter and at 7 o'clock in the summer. In rural districts there is generally a morning session of 4 hours on every week-day and an afternoon session of 2 hours, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. four days of the week. Lessons usually begin at 8 in the winter and at 7 in the summer. In some parts, however, they begin at 8 all the year round, though occasionally, during the more severe winter months, the school does not open till 8.30. In all cases there is an interval of from fifteen to twenty minutes between the second and third lessons, during which the children have lunch (zwetie Frühstück) and a break of from five to ten minutes between each lesson. With regard to the provision of meals to children, there is very considerable divergence in local practice. The school buildings are very often used as distributing stations, and the meals are provided free of charge to necessitous children. The municipality frequently contributes to the cost, but in no case is any part of the expense borne by the State or the Empire, nor, as far as I am aware, is any attempt made to recover the cost from the parents.

    Regulations for the Training of Scottish Teachers.
    MR. SMEATON: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether, in view of the disapproval of the recently published Draft Regulations for the preliminary education, training, and certification of teachers for various grades of schools expressed by certain school boards and other public bodies in Scotland, and emphasised at a public meeting in Edinburgh on 19th February last, he will consent to summon a conference, thoroughly representative of Scottish opinion, to consider and advise on the said Draft Regulations.
    THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. SINCLAIR,): The Regulations have been submitted to and reported on by the Provincial Committees for the Training of Teachers. Any representations made regarding them by school boards or other bodies interested
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    in the subject will be carefully considered, but the hon. Member's proposal is not one which can be adopted.
    MR. SMEATON: Will the Minute when drafted be laid on the Table of the House?
    MR. SINCLAIR: Yes, Sir.
    MR. SMEATON: And will it be open to discussion?
    MR. SINCLAIR: That rests with the House itself.

    Gartmore School Teacher.
    MR. CATHCART WASON: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland if his attention has been called to the dismissal of the head teacher by the Gartmore School Board; and whether any inquiry into the circumstances is being made by the Education Department or by the Scotch Office.
    MR. SINCLAIR: The Department is in communication with the Gartmore School Board in regard to this matter.

    Insanitation in the Island of Lewis.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that the local authorities in the Island of Lewis are unable to give effect to the provisions of the Public Health (Scotland) Act, or take such action as may be necessary to remedy the insanitary state of the townships, as disclosed in the Report to the Local Government Board for Scotland on the sanitary condition of the Lews, by the Board's medical inspector, Dr. Dittmar; and will he say whether the Local Government Board for Scotland have yet considered the desirability of taking over the public health administration of the island.
    MR. SINCLAIR: I am aware of the facts. No decision has been arrived at; but the matter is under the anxious consideration of the Local Government Board and myself.

    Highland Deer Forests.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland if he will introduce legislation requiring the proprietors of deer forests to fence in their forests in such a manner as to prevent deer from

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    ravaging the crops of crofters on the adjoining lands.
    MR. SINCLAIR: I am unable to make any promise now as to such legislation, but the point will be carefully considered.
    MR. WEIR: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of issuing a circular to owners of deer forests asking them to adopt this course?
    MR. SINCLAIR: I should like notice of that.
    MR. MORTON: In the case of deer straying through lack of fencing, are the crofters entitled to shoot them?
    MR. SPEAKER: Notice must be given of that Question.

    Peat Presents for Scottish Schools.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that, although the Scottish Office issued a circular on the 30th January, 1894, relieving children of the burden of carrying peats to school for the purposes of fuel, that circular has recently been overruled by a circular issued by a school board in the island of Lewis, to the effect that if parents do not send peats to school by their children, they will be required to pay for their school books, &c.; and, seeing that the departmental circular of 1894 was issued in the interests of the children and not in the interests of the parents, will he take such action as may be necessary to prevent its provisions being abrogated by the action of the local school boards and managers.
    MR. SINCLAIR: This is a matter for the discretion of the school board. The bringing of peats is a purely voluntary contribution, and the continuance of an old custom in the island with which the Department sees no reason to interfere.
    MR. WEIR: In consequence of this very unsatisfactory reply I shall take the earliest opportunity of calling attention to this matter.

    Gartmore School Teacher.
    MR. CATHCART WASON: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if his
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    attention has been called to the dismissal of the head teacher by the Gartmore school board; and whether, in view of the fact that if inquiry shows the teacher has been unfairly and wrongfully dismissed he has no redress, the Government will introduce an Education Bill for Scotland at an early day and refer it to a Committee of Scottish Members.
    THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Sir H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN,): The first part of this Question has already been answered by my right hon. friend the Secretary for Scotland, and as he has already stated on two occasions that the Government do not propose to introduce an Education Bill for Scotland this session, I do not see that there is anything for me to reply to.

    Irish Assistant Land Commissioners' Qualifications.
    MR. MEEHAN (Queen's County, Leix): I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether, on the reappointment of Assistant Land Commissioners, steps will be taken to test the qualifications of the gentlemen who will be appointed; and whether, in view of the fact that appointments heretofore made were drawn entirely from the landlord, land agent, military, and official classes in Ireland, some of whom had not any experience of farming, steps will be taken that qualification and practical experience, not politics or religion, will be the test of fitness in future in order to establish confidence in the tribunal.
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. BRYCE, Aberdeen, S.): Upon the re-appointment of Assistant Land Commissioners all possible pains will be taken to secure that the gentlemen to be appointed shall be properly qualified by knowledge and experience. Neither politics nor religion will be suffered to influence the appointments.

    Police and Public at Ardrahan.
    MR. DUFFY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if his attention has been called to the action of the police in the districts of Ardrahan and Claren Bridge in forcing their way into country houses against the will of the owners;

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    will he say if they are at liberty to search houses, break boxes and furniture, without a warrant; and will he give instructions to have such action put an end to.
    MR. BRYCE: On February 27th the police arrested, upon warrants, three persons who are charged with having fired into a dwelling-house; and I am informed by the inspector general that, upon making the arrests, the police searched the houses in which the prisoners resided and, in two instances, discovered unlicensed fire-arms. The searches were carried out with the permission of the owners of the houses, who are the fathers of the persons charged. I am informed that boxes were not broken open, and that no furniture was injured.

    Irish Cattle Exports.
    MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: I beg to ask the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he will state the number and approximate value of store cattle exported from Ireland annually into Great Britain; the number and approximate value of stores imported from other countries; whether he is aware that this Irish industry, on the security and protection of which the payment of their annuities by the small peasant proprietors mainly depends, would suffer injury if store cattle from foreign countries, where disease is known to exist and cannot be easily detected, were admitted; whether he is aware that stores have been sold in Ireland during the past year at low prices without any appreciable reduction in the price of the finished article; and whether, before coming to any decision, he will have regard to the feeling shown in Ireland on this question by all classes and sections of the community.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE (for Sir EDWARD STRACHET): The average number of store cattle exported annually from Ireland to Great Britain during the last five years is 476,000. No official information is available as to their value. No store cattle are imported from other countries. The Government take note of the reasons urged by the hon. Member in support of the maintenance of the existing law as to the importation of store cattle from abroad.

    Moville Telegraph Office.
    MR. O'DOHERTY: I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that the telegraph office at Moville is closed at eight o'clock in the evening; and whether for the general convenience he will arrange that on those nights when Transatlantic steamers are due the office shall be kept open, so that messages notifying their approach could be received.
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I will make inquiry on the subject and communicate with the hon. Member.

    The New Constitutions for South Africa—Committee of Inquiry.
    SIR HOWARD VINCENT: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if, before any decision is arrived at regarding the future administration of the Transvaal and Orange River Colony, he will yield, as suggested, to the wish expressed by the High Commissioner on behalf of all His Majesty's loyal subjects, and appoint an impartial Royal Commission to report on the various important matters connected with the problem, and the future peace and prosperity of the Colonies concerned.
    SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I cannot accept as accurate all the statements implied in this Question, and I do not quite understand what is meant by the future administration of the Transvaal and Orange River Colony, nor do I know who are included in the phrase "all His Majesty's loyal subjects." But, putting these embroideries aside, as a matter of fact it is intended to send out a Committee to report on the actual results likely to be created by various proposals for the basis of a new Constitution, especially as affected by the numbers, distribution, and social condition of the population.
    SIR HOWARD VINCENT: Can the right hon. Gentleman give the names of the Committee?
    SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: Not yet.

    Metric System.
    MR. NORMAN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if he will afford time this

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    session for the passage of a Bill, which would probably be non-contentious, to carry into effect the second of the three recommendations of the Select Committee of 1895, the first and third having already been carried out, namely, that after a lapse of two years the metric system of weights and measures be rendered compulsory by Act of Parliament.
    SIR H. CAMPBELL BANNERMAN: I can make no promise on the subject of such a Bill. It would, on becoming operative, necessarily render the use of all existing weights and measures 'illegal, and I do not think there is ground for anticipating with my hon. friend that such a measure would be non-contentious.

    Sweating in East End Trades.
    MR. O'GEADY: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, in view of the sweating that prevails in the furniture, glass-bevelling, boot and shoe, and clothing trades, particularly in the East End of London, he will consider the advisability of appointing a Royal Commission to inquire into the evils, with a view to legislation for its effective removal.
    SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I am in full sympathy with the hon. Member's object, but I fear that I cannot at this stage form an opinion as to whether an inquiry by a Royal Commission is desirable.
    MR. O'GRADY: Has the attention of the right hon. Gentleman been called to the fact that an exhibition is now being held in London of the sweated goods?
    SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: It has not, Sir.
    MR. O'GRADY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that many of the goods made or Government Departments can be classed as sweated goods?
    [No Answer was audible.]

    Incidence of the Education Rate Committee.
    DR. MACNAMARA: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury when the Inter-Departmental Committee, announced
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    by the late Prime Minister in August last as about to be appointed for the purpose of examining the incidence of the education rate, especially with reference to the heavily-rated necessitous areas, first met; how many meetings it has held; when it last met; when it will meet again; and when its Report may be expected.
    SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: The Committee was appointed on the 17th October last and held its first meeting on the 20th of that month. It has not taken any oral evidence, but has called for Returns from the local education authorities, which have, however, not yet been completely furnished. I understand that the Committee propose to submit in the course of the next few weeks an interim Report embodying the information received.

THE ARRANGEMENT OF QUESTIONS.
MR. SWIFT MACNEILLdrew attention to the fact that since the beginning of the session, on only two-occasions had all the Questions put down for oral answer been asked. To-day the Questions addressed to the Secretary of State for War had not been reached at all, and only two of the Questions addressed to the Secretary for Ireland had been asked. Would it not be more convenient if the Questions, with the exception, perhaps, of those addressed to the Prime Minister, were taken in their natural order, instead of being grouped according to the Ministers to whom they were addressed?
MR. SPEAKER: My personal opinion is that the grouping of Questions tends rather to economise time. By putting a number of Questions in succession to the same Minister, I think a good deal of time is saved. Whether, however, that is so or not, I venture to suggest that the subject might be one of those to be considered by the Procedure Committee. I would point out that if hon. Members could restrain themselves from asking supplementary Questions, there would be no difficulty in getting through the Questions on the Paper. To-day, in addition to the sixty-one printed Questions asked, twenty-five further Questions have been put. The two figures added together

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make exactly the total number of Questions on the Paper.
MR. BELLasked whether Questions could not be proceeded with in the unoccupied interval which so often occurred after private Bills had been disposed of.
MR. SPEAKER: Such a change would require an alteration in the Rules of the House.
MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Is there any Rule authorising the grouping of Questions?
MR. SPEAKER: The practice of grouping Questions is not prescribed in any Rule. It was suggested by the late Leader of the House and accepted by the House at that time.
One other Member took and subscribed the Oath.

NEW MEMBER SWORN.
Richard Hazleton, esquire, for the County of Galway (North Galway Division).

SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).
Sir William Brampton Gurdon reported from the Committee of Selection: That they had nominated the following eleven Members to serve on the Standing Committee on Trade (including Agriculture and Fishing), Shipping, and Manufactures, in respect of the Notice of Accidents Bill:—Mr. Cochrane, Mr. Carlile, Mr. Bell, Mr. Secretary Gladstone, Lord Robert Cecil, Mr. Solicitor-General, Mr. Evans, Mr. Glover, Mr. Myer, Mr. John Ward, and Mr. Havelock Wilson.
Report to lie upon the Table.

SELECTION (PRIVATE LEGISLATION PROCEDURE (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1899) (COMMISSIONERS).
Sir BRAMPTON GURDONreported from the Committee of Selection, That they had discharged Mr. Younger, and had appointed Viscount Dalrymple as a Member of the Parliamentary Panel of Members of this House to serve as a Commissioner.
Report to lie upon the Table.

NEW BILLS.
  CHARACTER NOTE BILL.
  "To make it compulsory upon employers to supply a Reference Note to a person leaving their employment and desiring one," presented by Mr. Bell; supported by Mr. Seddon and Mr. T. F. Richards; to be read a second time upon Friday March 30tb, and to be printed. [Bill 81.]
  MALE OFFENDERS (WHIPPING) BILL
  "To restrict the punishment of Whipping to the cases of Male Offenders under the age of sixteen years," presented by Mr. Lloyd Morgan; supported by Mr. Eugene Wason, Mr. Abel Thomas, Mr. Trevelyan, and Mr. G. Hay Morgan; to be read a second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 82.]
  PETTY SESSIONAL DIVISIONS (CLERKS) BILL.
  "To prohibit Clerks to Petty Sessional Divisions of Counties from undertaking prosecutions of persons committed for trial by the justices of such Petty Sessional Divisions," presented by Mr. Lloyd Morgan; supported by Sir Joseph Leese, Mr. Abel Thomas, Mr. Brynmor Jones, and Mr. Wallace; to be read a second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 83.]
  LAND VALUATION BILL.
  "To provide for the better Valuation of landed property in the United Kingdom," presented by Mr. Dundas White; supported by Mr. Pickersgill, Mr. Sutherland, Mr. Rainy, Mr. Findlay, and Mr. Wedgwood; to be read a second time upon Friday March 23rd, and to be printed. [Bill 84.]
  RESIDENT MAGISTRATES (BELFAST) BILL.
  "To make provision for the appointment and remuneration of Resident Magistrates in Belfast," presented by Sir Daniel Dixon; supported by Mr. Wolff, Mr. Sloan, Mr. John Gordon, Mr. Charles Craig, Mr. Thomas Corbett, and Viscount Castlereagh; to be read a second time upon Friday March 23rd, and to be printed. [Bill 85.]
  METROPOLITAN BOROUGH COUNCILS ASSOCIATION BILL.
  "To remove doubts as to the legality of the payment of certain expenses by Councils of Metropolitan Boroughs," presented by Sir William Bull; supported by Dr. Macnamara, Mr. W. F. D. Smith, Mr. Remnant, Mr. Crooks, and Mr. Nield; to be read a second time upon Friday March 23rd, and to be printed. [Bill 86.]
  AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS BILL.
  "To promote Agricultural Education and Nature Study in Public Elementary Schools," presented by Mr. Jesse Collings; supported by Sir John Kennaway, Mr. Rothschild, Sir Francis Lowe, and Mr. Hunt; to be read a second time upon Thursday March 29th, and to be printed. [Bill 87.]
  PURCHASE OF LAND (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
  "To provide facilities for the Sale of Land to Occupying Tenants; and to extend the system of Peasant Proprietary in England and Wales," presented by Mr. Jesse Collings; supported by Sir John Kennaway, Mr. Herbert Roberts, Colonel Kenyon-Slaney, Colonel Lockwood, and Sir Frederick Carne Rasch; to be read a second time upon Thursday March 29th, and to be printed. [Bill 88.]
  SMALL HOLDINGS (NO. 2) BILL.
  "To amend The Small Holdings Act, 1892," presented by Mr. Jesse Collings; supported by Colonel Long, Mr. Hunt, Mr. Bridgeman, and Sir Frederick Carne Rasch; to be read a second time upon Thursday March 29th, and to be printed. [Bill 89.]

  SUPPLY (ARMY ESTIMATES).
  Order for Committee read.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. HALDANE,): I rise upon this Motion to make the statement which is customary about the policy of the Army in the ensuing year—the year which lies in front of us, and I address the House with unfeigned diffidence. My predecessors, or many of them/have been people of great military knowledge, or, at any rate, knowledge
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  with regard to military matters. Never did a Minister rise to address this House on subjects connected with his department with less prepossession. Whether that is a merit or not, it has at least enabled me to approach the consideration of the questions which I had to face in the beginning of last December with an open mind.
  Since that time I have busied myself, I think I may say unremittingly, in consultation with the best expert opinion I could obtain, in considering the situation. It is not a very easy situation. It is not one in which I feel very happy in laying before the House. The path is spread with difficulties. Nobody realises more than my predecessor in office how difficult the position of a War Minster is in taking up the affairs of the Army at this juncture; but so far as the question of expenditure is concerned, while I cannot comfort the House by saying that the expenditure of this country is otherwise than enormous, it may to some extent assuage our grief to think that we do not stand alone in this situation. German military expenditure has risen in the last eleven years some 25 per cent, and now stands at £31,000,000, as against our £30,000,000. The French military expenditure is some £29,000,000, an increase of 7 per cent. The United States, a very efficient nation, confine themselves to a Regular Army of some 60,000 men; but that Regular Army, I am sorry to say, costs that very efficient people close upon £23,000,000 sterling. In view of the situation, what I have felt to be my duty was this—to face the question as a business man and endeavour to disentangle what the real situation was and to lay it candidly and fully before the House of Commons. Let me say at once—and this is the only personal reference that I have to make—that I have found my task a fascinating one. There is no part of the question connected with the Army which does not possess peculiar interest. To any one coming to it new the great science which has been evolved in the last few years and which has taken the place of the old art of war, the science of military organisation, is in itself a matter of profound interest. The men one comes across, the new school of young officers—entitled to the appellation of men of science just as much as engineers or chemists—were to

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  me a revelation; and the whole question of the organisation of the Army is fraught with an interest which, I think, is not behind that of the study of any other scientific problem. But the matter does not stop there. The Army touches social questions in the closest way. The relations of capital and labour, the whole problem of education, the topic of temperance, the science of medicine, questions relating to the Empire—and I am one of those who are not ashamed to say they take the deepest interest in them—and, last, but not least, the science of economy, these are topics which in themselves are very attractive. I have endeavoured in the three months which have been at my disposal, with the best assistance I could get, to make as complete a survey as I could of the situation, not with the view of putting forward ready made plans and schemes—nothing has been further from my intention—but with the idea, if it were possible, of putting my finger on the spot which is the source of the great expenditure to which the nation is committed.
  Whether I have done that the House will judge after it has heard me; but in the survey I have applied this test and this only. I have rejected—and I should suggest that they ought to be rejected as unnecessary—all the things that do not make for fighting efficiency. Fighting efficiency is the one test to which we should submit propositions which arise at a time when we have none too much money. If we had Army Estimates of £50,000,000 a year to play with I could suggest many things which would be delightful and interesting; but if this Parliament has been returned pledged to anything, it is to cutting down unnecessary expenditure. I have therefore felt it my duty to scan the Estimates and our military policy with a view to seeing how much could be eliminated which did not make for fighting efficiency and fighting efficiency only. When we have to look into our household affairs we find often that -we have to put down our carriages and horses and our champagne, and perhaps our cigars; and I am not sure that we are always the worse for the process.
  Now, Sir, I shall come at once to what I have to put before the House of Commons, and in coming to it I wish to say this—I approach the problem with a
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  sense of the enormous difficulties which my predecessors had to contend with and I have had to contend with. The work of keeping down the cost of the Army cannot be the work of one Secretary of State or one Party only. It must be a continuous process. If you try to reduce the bulk of a patient by cutting off his leg, you may get down his weight, but you will not do him any good; and if you meddle rashly with the complicated organisation on which our military policy depends, you will find, when your time is over, and when the swing of the pendulum brings in another set of Ministers, perhaps with different ideas, and perhaps under some popular impulse, that you return to the old state of things with a new avalanche of expenditure, and things are worse than they were before. Therefore, it is my desire, as far as I can—though there are points, perhaps on which we differ deeply—to try to keep up the continuity of things as far as the good work of my predecessors in office is concerned, and, on the other hand, to lay a foundation which all may accept.
  Now, Sir, I come to the broad, bare facts of the situation. The Army Estimates are only £17,000 less than they were last year; and I can say that it was difficult enough to keep them at the figure at which they stood even in that year. I found myself face to face with what are called automatic increases to a very large and considerable extent, I am not talking of new services which, naturally, soldiers would have liked to carry out. Some of these new services were necessary, and we have effected those which were essential to fighting efficiency out of savings derived from automatic decreases, so that they have added nothing to standing charges. But we found there were automatic increases amounting to nearly £800,000. There is the increased cost of the Army Reserve, and you could no more get rid of that payment than you could get rid of the payment of interest on the debt of Consols. Then there is the increased charge for stores and clothing, due to the approaching exhaustion of surplus stocks from the late war. That amounted to the large sum of £290,000. We have been living upon surpluses. The right hon. Gentleman opposite was able last year to reduce his Estimates by making

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  use of some £500,000 worth of surplus clothing and other things. I, too, have been able to keep down the Estimates by £400,000, because there was a surplus available. Next year there will not be such a surplus; the surplus which arose from the war will be exhausted; yet the soldier has to be clothed. He must have his boots and shoes, and medicine and blankets; and the result will be that in that and items of the kind there will be an increase of no less than £500,000, which will have to be met somehow by further economies. We have been living far too much on borrowed money in the Army, and the difficulty of getting it down is a very formidable one for a Minister.
  Then there is the increased charge for the service of loans—that is, for the payment by instalments of those sums borrowed under the Military Loans Act by our predecessors, and which we have to pay. Then there is the increased sum for pensions, rather more than half of which is for pensions for the rank and file. These amount in all to £597,000. Moreover, there was a windfall of which the Estimates of last year had the benefit, but from which my Estimates get no benefit. This was certain money which came from India for rifles and small arms ammunition for which we had contracted to pay. That brought the automatic increases over last year's figures to the sum of £780,000. I found myself face to face with that; but I went to the military experts and consulted them, and never had a Minister more reason to be grateful to his distinguished colleagues on the Army Council. They took the matter into their hands and in nine weeks they got rid of that £800,000, and they told me that the Army was as efficient for fighting purposes as it was before. I remember reading in the brilliant book written by my lion, friend the Member for Manchester, the life of his father, how Lord Randolph Churchill found himself face to face with the great difficulty of cutting down the Army and Navy expenditure. He tried to get rid of this or that extravagance, but the result was that every attempt at working out economy without the help of the experts landed him in two items of expenditure against every one of saving. I certainly have found no cause to repent of consulting the experts, nor have I
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  anything else but a feeling of gratitude for the ready way in which they have met our efforts and taken on themselves the business of studying economy in the organisation and administration of the Army.
  I pass now to the situation as it stands. As I have said, I have no cut-and-dried plan. To make plans in haste is to repent of them at leisure, and three months is too short a time for any one to produce a scheme; but I do not think it is too short a time in which to produce some sort of survey of the entire situation; and I think I have got something like a view of the situation which I wish to lay before the House. First of all as regards increase of expenditure. In the year 1896–7 the Army Estimates were £18,156,000. In the present year my Estimates amount to £29,796,000. When you come to the reason for this you will find it partly in the increase in personnel. In 1896–7 the personnel under Vote A was 156,174, while to-day it stands at 204,100. If you pass from personnel to units you find that whereas in 1896–7 there were 142 battalions of the Line, to day there are 156 battalions, a very substantial increase. And of them only seventy-one are at home against eighty-five abroad. Looking a little more closely into the details of the increase, I find to-day that the Guards have been increased by three battalions and that fourteen battalions of the Line have been added between 1897–8 and the present time, that is to say, we have seventeen more battalions to-day than we had at that time, and the whole increase of fourteen units of the Line has been used for the purposes of arrangements abroad. Two battalions were brought home last year—one from Halifax and the other from Bermuda—and I think the right hon. Gentleman opposite is to be congratulated on having got rid of those places as requiring anything like the defence to which they were thought, to be necessarily entitled. The result is that there is a net increase of two battalions at home and twelve battalions abroad, the distribution being eighty-five battalions abroad and seventy-one at home; and if you take them from the point of view of personnel, you will find that to-day there are some 60,994 men of the infantry of the Line at home, and 83,292 abroad. In 1896 we had in South Africa some 6,719 white troops.

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  At the present day, on the first of this month, we had 20,370. When you consider that no man in South Africa costs much under £150 a year, you will see what an enormously increased charge that is. There are increases of expenditure under other heads, such as for troops maintained abroad. In Egypt we have 4,338 white troops; in Gibraltar, 5,041; and in Malta, 9,152. If the whole institution of the Army is dealt with, you will find that whereas, in the year 1896, there were just under 35,000 white troops in the Colonies—I am not touching India—there are to-day 52,432, an increase of nearly 18,000. That being so one sees very clearly where the sources of the rise of the cost of the Army have originated.
  But the case does not stop with the Increase in the number of men and of the battalions; the cost of keeping the men has gone up. We have increased the pay of the men. No doubt that is a very good thing to have done, although I am not quite sure that it has had a result upon recruiting such as we might have expected from it. The increase of cost is pretty alarming to those who look at the Estimates with the view of seeing how they can be cut down. Whereas in 1896 the cost of the soldier was £63, this year the annual cost is £81. I am talking now of the regulars. The officer to-day costs £484 as against £450 In 1896–97. That is a moderate increase in view of the increased cost of living. The Army Reserve costs £10 5s. 10d. per man as against £9 2s. in 1896–97. The Militia have gone up enormously. A Militiaman costs to-day £21 19s. 3d. as against £13 19s. in 1896–97. The Yeomanry cost £21 5s. 2d. as against £11 9s., and the Volunteers cost £7 Is. lid. as against £5 2s. I am not expressing any opinion on these figures. I am only giving the House the facts with regard to them. A brief comparison of the Army Estimates taken as a whole in point of establishment shows that the number of the establishment has increased by 46,000 as compared with 1896–7, and the cost has increased by £5,999,000, that is to say by nearly £6,000,000. Other items have gone up, and if you take the gross total you find we are spending under various heads £11,742,000 more than we did in 1896–7, and the
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  disappointing thing is that the increase is under every head. That is a very difficult state of things to deal with, and one which must give rise to a certain amount of irritation. We must proceed in this matter with the utmost circumspection and care. I do not profess to be able to put before the House any large or far-reaching plans for bringing about a reduction. I shall have some ideas to put before the House, but I draw a distinction between ideas and plans in this matter. I have only had three months to deal with this matter, and it is better to make only a survey now and proceed slowly and cautiously, because I feel that anything I do in a hurry is very likely to turn out wrong.
  The first question that is likely to be put by the impatient man in the House and the impatient man in the street will be, "Why not reduce the number of battalions?" "You," they will say, "have had a great increase in the number of battalions of the line, why do you not cut them down and reduce them?" There was a rumour the other day in the papers that I had decided to recommend the abolition of ten home battalions of the line. I tried to describe that rumour correctly as a nidus equinus, which is a polite and classic way of calling it a "mare's nest." If I had decided to do anything of that kind it would have been in military eyes tantamount to insanity. For many years past we have been working in this country under what is called the Cardwell system, and the theory of this system is that the best way of training your recruits is to link your battalion at home with the battalion abroad. This means that one half of the regiment is abroad and the other half is practically in a depot where men are trained and passed out to India and the Colonies. India will not take recruits of less than twenty years of age, and it desires to have them sent out trained and finished. The result of our system of training is that our battalions at home in time of peace are nurseries or training schools for supplying troops to India and the Colonies. In time of war it is different. The reserves are called out to fill up the home battalions, and the drafts to India would be stopped, and thus we should have

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  an effective fighting force. We have in this country a short service system which operates at the present time as a much too short service system. We have abolished the three years enlistment, which was one of the greatest mistakes ever made. We are still reaping the whirlwind having sown the wind. At present the drain is enormous, but if you take the other system of nine years with the colours and three with the Reserves, it is obvious that drafts can much more easily be sent out to India, which will not take men at a less age than twenty. In my opinion, we shall, perhaps, come to adopt seven years and five years, but on that point I do not wish to say anything at the present time.
  We have got to ensure the drafts for India, and it is India which is the cause of the greatest drain upon our establishment at home, and the direct cause of our necessity to keep up so large an establishment as we do within these islands. The Indian establishment being between 70,000 and 80,000 men and the Colonial establishment being 52,000 odd we have to maintain drafts to fill up the wastages in these battalions in India and the Colonies, which are caused by men passing in to the Reserve as their time goes out, and that drain passes on to the battalions at home. We have got more than enough men if you take into account the Reserves and the Militia to man three Army Corps, but we cannot help ourselves to mobility so long as we keep our Indian and Colonial establishments at their present height. The three years system enormously increased the Reserves, which stand at 100,000, and the next year they will number 122,000. Their pay last year was £845,000. This year it will b e considerably over a million, with the result that there has been an increase of £220,000 on this amount.
  How are we to deal with this situation? It is formidable alike in regard to cost and numbers of men, numbers which are not controlled by the persons responsible for the moment, but which are a feature of the situation. This is a Parliament which does not wish to destroy the Army recklessly; it wishes to proceed circumspectly; it asks for more efficiency for less money, a natural thing to ask for, but more easy to ask for than to supply; and that is the problem. We feel that we have some
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  sort of mandate to attempt to solve it, so strong is the desire in the country that this efficiency at less cost should be brought about, and this involves the whole question of Army organisation. Difficult as is the problem, it is made less hopeless when you take into account the serious way in which it is being considered by the Army itself. A new school of officers has arisen since the South African war, a thinking school of officers—a thinking school of officers who desire to see the full efficiency which comes from new organisation and no surplus energy running to waste. There are certain undesirable things which I feel certain that with this new spirit in the Army we can get rid of if we only conform to certain conditions.
  The first thing we want is absolutely clear thinking about the purposes for which the Army exists and the principles in which it is to be organised. That perhaps seemed a trifling thing to say, but it would seem even more trifling to say that copy book maxims are useful things. Every error multiplies itself into millions. In the Army you are dealing with an enormous body of men under all sorts of complicated conditions, and if you are not perfectly clear what you want to do with these men, and on what principles you desire to fashion their organisation, you may be involved in an amount of expenditure and in a state of confusion you cannot realise beforehand. I come here to say a few things about which I can speak the more freely because the principles are the result of clear thinking, not on my part, but on the part of right hon. Gentlemen opposite. One principle is that of the Blue Water school. We do not take that as an abstract dogma to be applied without regard to circumstances. We do accept it in this sense—that the Navy itself at its present strength is capable of defending these shores from invasion. It was laid down with extreme clearness by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of London on May 11th last, in a speech to which we all listened with the deepest interest, because we felt it marked a new stage on the way to efficiency, that on the hypothesis of the worst possible moment of our military position, and on the calculation of Lord Roberts, accepted by other military critics, it would not be possible

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  to attempt an invasion of our island with less than 70,000 men, and no admiral of the British Fleet would undertake such a task. That is the advantage of a strong Navy, and very useful when considering the cutting down of all unnecessary Army expenditure. The right hon. Gentleman the late War Minister was of opinion that no foreign nation would care to land 5,000 or 10,000 men. If they did land 5,000 or 10,000 it would be of no use, because they could not come subsequently and take them away. Such a number of men might cause some annoyance but they would all be cut up, not one of them would get back. I ask what general in Europe would throw away 5,000 or 10,000 men merely to cause us annoyance? They would be promptly cut off on the same principle which prevents the invasion of 70,000, because of the great mobility of the Fleet at the present time. The Fleet to-day is intensely mobile in virtue of the valuable policy of continuity in naval organisation, for the inception of which we are grateful to hon. Members opposite, and which we intend to follow out in its consequences with regard to Army reorganisation.
  Let us start then on the assumption that we are in earnest with this principle, and that is now a continuous principle. It is the principle of the late Government; it is the principle of the Defence Committee; it is the principle of the Navy; it is the principle of the War Office, and the Army Council; it is the principle of the present Government just as it was the principle of the late Government. It is an accepted principle, and one on which the rule of clear thinking should apply. We have bed rock fact here for the organisation of our defence. If we are to attempt to provide against the contingency of that being wrong we shall have to provide against various other contingencies overwhelming in their multiplicity and uncertainty. I came to office in December, and being of a curious and inquiring mind, and having taken a great interest in Blue Water principles, I set to work to see whether, following out the policy of my predecessors, I could not find some things in our Army organisation which were inconsistent with those principles, and which therefore might be gently removed. I found that distinguished soldiers whom
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  I consulted were exactly of the same mind. They said, "Let us think clearly and act strongly." We set to work, and I take the things which engaged our attention one by one.
  Any one who knows Surrey, and goes down into the neighbourhood of Dorking, will find there certain curious structures, inherited by my right hon. friend opposite and handed over to me. You will find there large wire fences surrounding seven to nine acres of land, and a large construction that looks more like a water-tank than anything else, containing ammunition of various sorts. I stumbled upon one the other day when taking one of my reflective walks abroad, and going in I found some 3,300 rounds of ammunition, cordite, lyddite, shrapnel, the latest pattern of gloves for people working with intrenching tools, and the latest pattern of the mark 3 axe, which had come down from Woolwich to replace the mark 2 axe. I estimated with an eye not wholly unpractised in these matters that there was no less than £25,000 worth of stores there, and I afterwards ascertained I was very nearly right. I asked one in charge how many men had been there for work, and the answer was, "I never saw a unit in the three years I have been here." I asked when the guns had been last there, and was told they had always been at Woolwich. I asked whether there were any more of those constructions, and was told that from a neighbouring hillock I could see a dozen more with the naked eye. These constructions had a definite origin, in a time when the Navy was not the Navy of to-day, when people had not the confidence in the Navy that they have in it to-day, and above all when the Navy had not that mobility which belongs to our splendidly organised Fleet at the present time, and when it may have been necessary to make other provision for the defence of these shores. What an advantage it is when you can get rid of these things, root and branch, by the aid of the firm principle. Those things were considered carefully and in great detail; and now, with the consent of the Government and of the Defence Committee and as the result of acting on a belief in the principle which

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  we have inherited from our predecessors, they are going to disappear root and branch and as fast as they can be made to disappear.
  I come to another case. In those days when we had not got hold of the principle that the Navy was to defend these shores, we carefully defended various points all along our coasts. They are defended to-day with guns for the most part of an antiquated pattern and obsolete, though some are of good and of a modern pattern. But be that as it may, and whatever they are, excepting at certain points where they are required for naval purposes, these guns are absolutely useless where they are. They are going—three hundred of them—as fast as they can be got rid of, again with the full concurrence of the Army Council, the Navy, and the Defence Committee, who have considered these things together and not separately, in virtue of their joint policy. In that way we shall get rid of a very considerable and substantial amount of expenditure. I am not suggesting that the right hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition side are responsible for their being there. They inherited the policy. I only say that I feel myself free to get rid of these things root and branch without feeling there is any controversy about them or that I am breaking continuity of policy.
  I come now to another case, where the Navy were the sinners. I found that the Island of St. Helena had a garrison of 100 men, costing between £10,000 and £12,000 a year, who were there to defend some 5,000 tons of coal, and when we came to look into the matter the curious thing was that nobody supposed that they were in a position to defend the coal. They had two obsolete guns which were placed in a position where they had no command of the scene of any attack that was likely to be made, and a foreign force landing on the other side of the island could easily have overcome the garrison and obtained possession of the coal. There was obviously no justification for keeping that up, and it has gone.
  Another head is the extension of the principle of Blue Water defence to our colonial garrisons. We have that under consideration just now, and we
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  have decided upon it in principle. These establishments where there are both guns and men for the purposes of naval bases have in many cases become obsolete-because of the change of policy in the Admiralty. The Admiralty do not want naval bases in the same way as they did before. Their new strategy, which depends upon mobility, involves certain naval bases which will be well defended. But there are certain of them quite obsolete in the Colonies and various other places. We propose to apply the principle of getting rid of superfluities of guns and men in connection with them.
  I found lastly that we still maintain the traditional policy of surveying the interior of these islands and making on a large scale a continuous reconnaissance of positions with a view to defending the country against an invading army. I suppose there are plans for the defence of the City of Birmingham against a German Army. I hope the right hon. Gentleman who sits for West Birmingham will derive much comfort from that fact. These reconnaissances cost a great deal of money each year, and they are to come to an end also.
  These are small matters in themselves, but they are matters with which we have had to attend to within a very short time. I think I shall have the approval of the House generally for the principle which I have laid down for dealing with these matters; and I feel a certainty that when my time is over and the other side succeed to the responsibility they will carry out that principle in the same way, with the result that the Army will be organised on one principle. I do wish to say that we have suffered very much from changes in the past. Let we take another and final illustration for the moment. There is a place of which we used to hear a good deal in this House, but of which we hear very little now, called Wei-hai-wei. Wei-hai-wei was originally a naval base; now, I believe, it is a watering-place. Whether or no the Admiralty have deserted it, the Army has not; We are keeping up a native regiment there which we enrolled for the purpose of defending it, and which costs us £20,000 a year. No one wants that regiment,

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  and consequently the Government have decided to disband it at once.
  All these amount together to no very enormous sum; but I am certain that a beginning on this principle and the fact that it is accepted by both sides of the House and pushed forward continuously will lead in the end to economies. Ah, Sir, if we had only had a continuous principle for the last thirty years we should have been very comfortably off to-day in Army expenditure compared with what we are. The Navy has got something like a continuous principle. I envied my right hon. friend the Secretary to the Admiralty when he brought in his Budget. He had a simple principle which he had inherited from right hon. Gentlemen opposite and in which they support him warmly, the principle of continuous organisation of the Fleet, and principles of strategy and disposition which have remained constant for at least several years, and which we hope will remain constant for many years more. But in the Army it has never been so. In the last half-century we have had no less than four great Army policies, which have led to the throwing away of a vast deal of money. First there was the policy of Lord Palmerston, which was the outcome of the work of the Committee which insisted upon the fortification of the shores of this country on a scale which I am glad to say we have long since abandoned. That was a very serious enterprise, and it cost some £7,420,000, which might absolutely be at the bottom of the sea, so far as concerns use for any purpose. Then came another policy, the eight army corps scheme of 1875, which fortunately never got beyond paper. But, although it did not get beyond paper, it was nutritious as regards increase of expenditure. It led to new ideas about Imperial defence, and to a large loan raised for that purpose in 1889, out of which came most of the money for those London defences of which I have spoken, and which are now condemned in the light of our better knowledge. It is not too much to say that under that scheme a very considerable sum of money was absolutely wasted, not only on permanent works, but on personnel and other services. Finally there was the policy which nearly became very
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  costly, the six army corps scheme in 1901. Perhaps the most lasting and permanent memorial of that policy are the Tidworth barracks on Salisbury Plain. There you see stretched out before your eyes acres of beautiful brick buildings capable of containing, not the forces which are there at the present time, but forces a great deal larger. They are standing empty in large part at the present time, and yet they are built for permanence and with a design which would deserve the highest praise if only anyone to-day was so innocent as to think of pitching down an army corps in the middle of Salisbury Plain. They represent a monument of wasted expenditure. We are using those barracks for the much more modern and useful organisations of troops in existence at the present time, the direct outcome of the work of the Esher Commission; but they owe their origin to a more ambitious notion which was due to that confused thinking against which I have protested. In 1901 we ought to have known something about the Blue Water principle and the power of the Navy to defend our shores. We ought to have separated the notion of a striking force for defending the Empire abroad from the notion of home defence. Yet there was an organised plan which apparently owed its origin to German models and under which Home defence and foreign necessities were mixed up together, with the result that there was one huge Army projected which was to unite in itself the function of a striking force and the functions of that home defence which even at that time were seen to be unnecessary. The result was a scheme which, if carried out, would have brought the Army Estimates up to £40,000,000. But, fortunately in the event, with the aid of the new policy of the right hon. Gentleman opposite and the work of the Esher Commission, all this was cut down, and the worst of it remains in the barracks at Tidworth which represent the outcome of the policy.
  These things illustrate the necessity for extraordinary caution in that kind of expenditure. I think it has been very disastrous for us that we have had so much money to spend. Our way of raising money for the Army has been by military loans, and when you raise

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  money by loans it is very easy to spend it. You have not to account for it on the Votes. We have raised upon loans during the last few years very large sums indeed. In the ten years ending 31st March, 1906, we have spent £16,065,000 on loans, and under Vote 10 another £16,145,000, making in all £32,210,000. I have to provide in this year's Estimates for a sum of £1,081,500 for interest on the sinking fund for these loans. My right hon. friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with my complete concurrence, decided that a check must be put upon the loan policy. You cannot bring it to a close all at once; but we are going to try to pay our way in these matters, and I am quite certain it will make us look rather more closely to our expenditure. One hon. Member perhaps comes to me and says, "I was promised a barracks for the constituency which I represent, and we have got the money for the site, and we have laid the foundation." I have had to say to more than one hon. Member, "That may be right, but I represent the taxpayer, and I cannot consent to the large expenditure which is involved unless I am satisfied that it is absolutely essential to the fighting efficiency of the Army." How can I be satisfied until I know what policy turns out to be and what the organisation of the Army ought to be? You have been contemplating a heavy expenditure in a permanent form for services which may become altogether useless owing to a change of policy, and until I feel certain what that policy ought to be I propose to look very carefully into all expenditure of this character.
  Now, Sir, I pass from that to the larger and more important matters to be considered as regards the future. At present I will add merely the to I am trying to ascertain what ought to be the fixed policy as regards barracks, in order that we may keep expenditure on something like a contiuuous footing. Passing from these things, which, after all, are mere matters of detail, we come to a larger matter, namely, the principle of the organisation of the Army itself. The Army ought to be so organised that it can respond to policy. If it is necessary to have a large Army at any time—as it may be necessary, for who can say when we may not be
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  threatened—then we ought to have the easiest possible means of increasing our Army. We ought also to have the means of decreasing the Army and shrinking the organisation without making it less efficient. We have learnt a great deal since the South African War. Whatever else that war accomplished, it has taught the nation to be sober, to be serious, to put aside the spirit of militarism and to reflect upon war as well as other things with a view to better preparations and better organisation. There is a new spirit in our officers. They are men to-day of highly scientific training and reflective minds. The inquiry by the War Stores Commission shows that frightful waste and peculation took place in South Africa. Why did it take place? Why was there that leakage? We know, thanks in a large measure to the Esher Committee and other investigating bodies, why that was. Unlike the other great nations, we had never established any thinking department for the British Army. If there had been such a thinking department, they would have made out plans for the operations in South Africa, with the result that the distinguished generals who went there would have thought out every inch of their progress before they undertook it, instead of having to devise ways and means as they went along. Those who have read the Report of the Esher Committee will know what I mean. Those who have read the account of the Japanese campaign will know the profound advantage of a thinking department embodied in the General Staff. The late Government, however, did a thing for which they deserve the thanks of this nation—they carried out the principles of the Esher Committee, and they have laid the foundation of a General Staff. We have got to work it out; and it will not be my fault if continuity is not observed in that policy, and if we do not give opportunities for dividing executive functions from administrative details If instead of the Commander-in-Chief in South Africa being responsible for the stores and for every detail of administration which he could not look to himself, having regard to his field and other executive duties, he could have known that these administrative matters, so colossal

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  and vast, were in competent hands subject to his control, we should probably have had none of that waste and none of those scandals which have been so unfortunate in their result. If that division of labour had taken place you would have had your plans thought out, and the general would have known exactly what he had to do, instead of having to improvise his plans on arrival in South Africa. But that is all over, and we have learnt a great lesson from it. Even in this short interval much has been done, and the Army was never more efficient than it is at the present time. Our Army is now on a better foundation as regards organisation and a better foundation as regards the knowledge of officers, and I include cavalry and infantry officers just as much as Engineers and Artillery, than it has been at any previous period, and this has resulted because we have learnt the lesson of that war and have tried to carry out these things.
  Let us see what results from studying the principles of the lessons learnt in the war. Let us get rid of all these London defences, useless coast guns, and all those sorts of expenditure of which I have spoken, and as to which the present Government have already given the order for them to come to an end, and come to things which must be dealt with. It must be remembered that this country is in quite a different position from that of any foreign nation. If Germany or France go to war they have conscription, and they are in this position—that in time of peace they must keep up a vast military organisation. They have only one war to contemplate on a large scale, and that is with their neighbours across the border. They have to be ready to mobilise and to fight within perhaps ten days from the time of the order being given. Therefore they must be ready. It is absolutely necessary that their reserves should be trained up to the eyes and ready when called upon to take the field at once. But the British Army is not like that. We live on an island, and our coasts are completely defended by the Fleet. Our Army is wanted for purposes abroad and over-seas. It is necessarily a professional Army; we could not get such an Army by conscription. It must be of high quality;
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  but because of the limited nature of its functions—to strike at a distance—it ought to be of strictly limited dimensions. Have we ever thought, scientifically and clearly, what these dimensions ought to be? I do not think so. I know that certain things have been worked out, but I do not think the whole problem has been dealt with in its entirety. Here is an island, the striking force of which does not exist for the defence of these coasts—it does not exist merely for our own insular interests. This island is the centre of an Empire consisting of nearly 12,000,000 square miles and including some 400,000,000 of population, and we have to protect the distant shores of that Empire from the attack of the invader. We want, therefore, an Army which is very mobile and capable of rapid transport. For fighting which has to be at a distance and cannot be against large masses of men it ought to be upon a strictly limited scale, and perfect rather in quality than expanded quantity. There never has been enough: careful thinking about this problem. If the Army is not wanted for home defence, then its size is something which is capable of being calculated. The size of the striking force is the principal ingredient in the present cost of the Army.
  The probable reduction of Army expenditure, however, does not rest merely with the War Office. I am trying to economise; but, after all, the big items come from policy; and that does not rest with the War Office, which is only an instrument in the hands of the Government of the nation for carrying out policy. The reduction of expenditure rests greatly with the Foreign Secretary, the Secretary for India, and the Secretary for the Colonies, and also the First Lord of the Admiralty, for naval policy does in some degree give rise to military expenditure. It is the business of Parliament to consider these things, and to consider what effect policy has upon military organisation. I wish we were near the time when the nations would consider together the reduction of armaments, when they would reflect that it is policy that leads to these things, and would realise that only by united action can we get rid of the burden which is pressing so heavily on all civilised nations. I have said before that it is not possible

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  for me to make reductions in regard to battalions, or individuals at home on any very great scale while the establishments in India and the Colonies remain as at present.
  I promised at the beginning of this speech to try to put my finger on the point which has led to the great increase in the cost of the Army. The Indian establishment has remained at the same figure for many years past. But a great increase has taken place in our colonial establishment—the number is 54,000 men—between 1896–97 and the present time. There lies the key to the rise in expenditure from £18,000,000 to nearly £30,000,000. How are we to determine the size of the striking force? That must be done on strictly scientific principles having regard to consideration of policy. I think you can determine even now to a large extent what it ought to be. I do not think you can exclude from the consideration of the question any matters which have a bearing on the problem you have to solve. A short time ago we were menaced on the North-West frontier of India by Russia. Are we menaced by Russia to-day? [Cries of "No."] Have circumstances changed or have they not? Are they not different from what they were? If circumstances have changed, is it necessary to maintain that vast establishment in India, which causes us at home inevitably to incur a large expenditure in keeping up the materials from which to supply drafts for the Indian Army? The same is true of your policy in the Colonies.
  There is still something else that must be taken into consideration. I am putting forward no plans, and cannot put forward any until I have had a long time for consideration. But there are certain conditions of the problem which are not very difficult to define. I do not think you will ever satisfactorily reduce your striking force, even if you have solved the scientific problem how much you require for action abroad, unless you provide some power of expansion behind it in this country. That is the effect of the Report of the Norfolk and Elgin Commissions. We spend a vast deal on the Army and we want to spend less. The question is how we are to succeed. If you have a reduced striking force, how
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  can you most cheaply provide for the support and expansion which should be behind it and on which you may rely in great national emergencies? There is one striking difference, which I think has never received sufficient attention, between this country and Continental countries. In Germany from the moment the order to mobilise is pronounced until the time the troops actually come into contact with those of other nations the interval may be very short—a few days only. That involves the necessity that the expansive power of the German Army should consist of men highly trained and ready to take the field at once. The men must have gone through a full course of military training. But that is not so with ourselves. We are on an island, and our striking force is for use abroad and our power of expansion is a power of expansion the exercise of which may be called for, but which gives us always a considerable interval. If we had to fight a great war on the plains of India or in defence of its frontiers it is not likely that such a contingency would come about without a considerable time elapsing. We know that a long time must elapse, and in that period there is the possibility of training men and getting them ready. That seems to point to this, that we differ in toto from the Continent in the fact that for the forces on which we have to depend to come to our aid and to expand our regular Army we should have a long time for preparation.
  If that is so, surely it is within the limits of possibility to devise a system—I am not professing to devise it now—under which the period of training may be divided into two parts—one to be very elementary, very elastic, very easy for everybody according to his circumstances, and the other to be reserved for the period after hostilities have broken out. The second, of course, will of necessity be expensive. We all know, even those most attached to the Volunteer Forces, that it would be hard upon them at the present moment to set them against seasoned troops. But the Volunteers would be admirable troops after a certain amount of training and after serving with fighting men in the field. That was proved in the South African War. In order to train a very large

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  number of men in a thorough fashion you require the influence of some great national impulse. Such an impulse would come if hostilities had broken out and this country was in real jeopardy. Then I believe you would find men flocking to be trained. But in time of peace is it necessary to go as far as we do even with our Volunteers.? I should like to see far more men voluntarily taking it upon themselves to acquire the elements of military training in time of peace. I do not see why people should not use the rifle as well as play football; why they should not go to a rifle club instead of going to races. These things might be done voluntarily. What I wish to say is let them do these things for themselves. I am perfectly certain that anything like compulsion or conscription will defeat its own purposes. If you are to get people to give their services you must assign to them definite functions—a definite service which they can render to the country. For that purpose you have to map out an organisation. I do not see why the rifle club, cadet corps, the Volunteers, all the different forms of military organisations which we have at present should not be encouraged, so that the people should be able to organise themselves, so that you should have your citizens possessing the elements of that knowledge which would be requisite for them if they were called upon not only to defend their hearths and homes—because I think considering the strength of our Navy they are not likely to be called upon to do that—but to come to the assistance of the Regular Army in other ways. It that were so, then, obviously, the only economical way of dealing with the matter would be to divide the period of training into two parts—the one elementary and elastic, the other intended to put the Volunteer on the footing of the Regular soldier. I have gone into this question with military authorities very closely. They are at one in thinking such an organisation would be possible, if worked out not merely at headquarters, but if the organisation were designed in such a fashion that all these things should exist in skeleton, as it were, in time of peace. You might, perhaps, thus form in time of peace a reservoir into which would flow the various streams of people from
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  every class who take an interest in rifle-shooting and in drill; people who had the taste might be encouraged to form themselves in a definite fashion into the units of this skeleton organisation; and you might prepare the machinery by which, on the outbreak of hostilities, you could turn the streams which had flowed into this reservoir, some of them perhaps rather muddy, into pure streams which would give support to the Regular Army.
  These are skeleton ideas, just as they are ideas of a skeleton organisation. I cannot say whether they can be worked out or not. You will, I think, have to resort to something of the kind if you are to have behind your striking force the certainty of a power of expansion, the necessity of which has, I feel, taken hold of the minds of a great many of the people of this country. Such an organisation as I am speaking of could not be effectively worked through the War Office alone. It must be decentralised; it must be worked by military local government; and by that I mean local government by the people themselves, not by those who would impose on them from without military duties which they might not be disposed to undertake. This must be the work of a citizen army. In the Franco-German war, after the defeat of the main part of the regular army of France, Gambetta, a civilian, made a people's army, which, in conjunction with the army of the Loire, gave infinitely more trouble to the German strategists than the regular army had given. I read the other day something written by Prince Frederick Charles of Prussia, who took a distinguished part in that war. He said—
  "There is for a leader nothing more oppressive than a situation that is not clear, nothing more trying than bands of armed irregular troops, aided by the population and the nature of the country, and relying for support on a strong army in the neighbourhood."
  Mr. Pitt, speaking in this House in the time of the troubles with Napoleon—on February 29th, 1804—said that the great mass of our population might be made fit to serve many useful purposes in the hour of danger, and that he would be glad if measures calculated to call into action with effect were concerted and carried into execution. These measures,

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  he said, should be arranged beforehand, leaders appointed, companies formed, and no man should be allowed to run about in confusion calling, "Oh! that I could be in any way useful to my country." I think we can dismiss from our minds all notion of organising ourselves voluntarily up to the war standard in time of peace, all notion of playing at being real soldiers, which we shall never be, and spend the little money that will be necessary, and which will take the place of more costly things we have now, in organising ourselves in skeleton as a nation purely voluntarily and according to the mind of the individual locality, on some such lines as I have indicated. I believe that if that were done, if you had military local government under the control of the people themselves, you would have solved more problems than one. No Ministry would go to war unless it had the people at its back. I have often heard the question asked whether treaties should not be submitted to the people before they are made? Perhaps we shall never get to that stage; but I do think that in this fashion you might get control on the part of the people over the military organisation, which would be the best guarantee that no war would be entered upon without the full consent of the people. A nation under arms in that fashion would be a nation under arms for the sake of peace and not for the sake of war.
  I have sketched ideas which cannot be worked out by any one Government. They must take a long time; but that distinction between peace and war training, which seems the peculiarity, and the happy peculiarity, of our islands, does seem to me something worth considering, and whether, in connection with that, the real way to obtain it is not by way of devolution of military administration to local government units.
  If that were done there would remain the question which gave the right hon. Gentleman opposite so much trouble—I mean the Militia. I agree it is not to-day in a satisfactory condition; and I think the origin of the want of satisfaction with their position is, as in the case of the Volunteers, that there is no definite function assigned to them. The Militia are the children of the soil called
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  into being theoretically by our Constitution through the Lords-Lieutenant and Deputy-Lieutenants who represent the Crown. I am afraid that the functions of the Lords-Lieutenant and Deputy-Lieutenants are rather nominal than real, and I do not see why we should not make it a condition of the appointment of Lords-Lieutenant and Deputy-Lieutenants that they should be persons who take some interest in Militia organisation. I do not see why we should not regard the Militia as a force which is much more akin to the Regulars than to the Volunteers. I should like to see the Militiaman's functions a little more closely defined. After all, he is a Regular, who for nine-tenths of the year is engaged in civilian duties. Or, if you like, he is a civilian who for one-tenth of the year is engaged in militiary duties. He is not compelled to go abroad, but he always has done so willingly in support of the National Army in times of emergency, and I hope he will always do so in the future; but I should like to see him used, not in the disastrous way he was used only a very short time ago. He was an institution very valuable for military purposes, almost a pure regular reservist. That was a system under which the Militia was first bled white for the Regular Army, and then asked to go out in their depleted battalions to fight. It was fatal to the Militia, and it never recovered. By all means let the Militia be the support of the Regular Army, but let them train in their own units and under their own officers and keep up their distinctive functions, if you are to have any recognition from them and the public of the part they have played in the past and the possible part they may play in the future as something cheaper than the Regular soldier, the man who gives part of his time and who does not put the State to the expense of paying for the whole of his time. I think the Militia principle of using the civilian might be extended to a great many other parts of the Army, like the Army Service Corps; for a good deal of the work done by Regular soldiers is of a civilian character. But that is a topic in which I do not desire to enter at the present moment.
  These are ideas which might lead to economy in administration. We have an object lesson in the army of

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  Switzerland, which numbers 500,000 men and costs £1,200,000. Switzerland is a very small country and the army has to he raised by conscription, and from the reports furnished to me the men of that army are as good as you could wish to see—good even from the point of view of branches like the artillery. I have taken hold of an idea which I may not be able to work out, but which I am ambitious enough to think might be carried out by my successors, of not going on the costly system of paying for all your men as if you had to pay for all their time, but of looking to your Militia and then looking to the Volunteers whom you do not pay at all for the services they render. It seems to me that if you do that you have the foundation of a system by which you may succeed in reducing the size of your striking force to an extent which you could not do without the support I have described, and which would enable you to make economies on a large scale. What is vital is the courage necessary to drive such a conception through. I believe the want of economy arises from the want of exactness of conception. One of the great merits of Mr. Gladstone's famous Administration of 1868, which got rid of so much waste, was that he insisted on clearness of conception of what the State was to do and to be asked to pay. He ruthlessly drove on to economy, scrutinizing small items just as closely as the large ones. We have got to do that in every department of the life of the Army. I hope I have been able to throw out some ideas. If I may have the support of the House in carrying them out during my tenure of office, I shall feel encouraged to believe that at least we may produce a line of action which, if taken up and followed continuously, will in the end lead to that reduction in Army expenditure which we all so much hope for.
  But I must touch on one or two other points. One of them is the great group of social questions. You cannot organise such a thing as a British Army without coming very closely into contact with the relations between capital and labour and the great questions that arise in connection with contracts and the or-
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  ganisation of labour. We are trying to deal with these questions in a fashion as free from red tape as possible. There are old traditions under which people refused to see the representatives of trade unions merely because they were the representatives of trade unions and not the employe s of the State. But we are in a somewhat different position now. After all, the Army is a nationalised industry; and the Minister who occupies my position has to be extremely careful in dealing with labour—he would like to be generous, but as he takes every penny he gives to labour out of the pockets of the great mass of British workmen when he puts it on their tea, tobacco, and beer, on their food, on their sugar, he has to be careful what he does. That very principle of looking for efficiency obtains just as much in the relations of labour to capital as in any other department of the Army, and I think the State ought not to be benevolent in expenditure of public money even in the matter of wages. We want to be model employers but not extravagant employers. It must be remembered that there are certain advantages in being in the service of the State. These things must be taken into account. That once being granted, these principles being conceded, I for one am anxious and ready to confer on all these questions with the representatives of labour, not merely those inside the House, but those outside. We cannot accept abstract principles without having their practical application worked out. It is sometimes said we should pay the trade union rate of wages. Often there is no trade union except the trade union of the people in the Government employment, and then your principle gives you no help whatever. In other cases the trade union rate is the same as that of the district, and the course is plainly to take the trade union rate in that case. All these matters have to be considered in the concrete. Much controversy need not have arisen if these cases had been so considered. I propose to encourage conference in the matters directly with myself or with those who are responsible to me in the position of directors, and perhaps we should try to organise a small business and informal and elastic Committee to which I hope to refer such questions when

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  they arise. These things will be more properly dealt with, in detail at a later stage. The same general principles of economy, the same necessity for clear thinking which applies in the organisation of the Army itself, apply to the Relations of capital and labour.
  The education of our officers is a great question. General Sir John French made speech in London the other day, in which he dwelt on the desirability of connecting the Universities more closely with the education of our officers. That may be very difficult in detail, but in principle it ought not to be difficult. I have noticed in our new Universities with delight, degrees established in special sciences. Why should there not be a B.Sc. degree in the science of war? A part of the study must consist in work at some military school close to the University. Sympathising, as I do, with the growth of the scientific spirit among the officers of the Army, I look forward to the time when such University education will play a larger part in the training of the officer. It may be convenient to say now that we are impressed with the rather hard condition of the average officer at the present time. His rate of pay has not increased with the rate of pay of the soldier; and, although the finances do not allow us to be generous, we can do some little things, among them this—the officer's wife and family will in future have free conveyance if the officer is sent away on duty. Another little thing is that the travelling allowance of subalterns and captains will in future be the same as that of the field officers. The small difference—the difference between 12s. 6d. and 15s.—is provided for in the present Estimates.
  I shall be asked two questions—one as to the field gun, the other as to the short rifle. I have a strong view that our field guns should cease to be antiquated. We are pushing on the armament of the troops at home with the field gun, and by May 31st two Army Corps, arithmetically measured, the Aldershot real Army Corps and the other nominal Army Corps, will be completely armed. As regard the short rifle, I have consulted the best expert opinion, and the reports are unanimous that on the balance the short rifle is the
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  best weapon. We all know it has certain disadvantages; but its merits outweigh them, and the troops are being rapidly armed with it.
  I have concluded what I have to say. In general, the broad lesson of the present position seems to me to be that we must see where the problem of expenditure lies. I once heard a memorable speech of Lord Beacons-field's in which he said the key of India lay not in Kabul, nor in Kanda-har, but in London. It seems to me the lesson we have to derive from the study of the Army problem is just the reverse. The key to the reduction of expenditure does not lie in London. We can cut down the size of the Regular force, as it is here, to a limited extent without touching things abroad. We can probably save in a variety of directions. We are working at that, I pledge myself to the House, as closely as anybody could work. But the real key to the reduction of Army expenditure lies in policy abroad, and, as I have said before, in India and in the Colonies; and that proposition I commend to the consideration of the House. Ten years ago the nay of the Army was £5,500,000. To-day it is nearly double. What is the reason? Mainly the increase abroad. Ten years ago there were seventy-four battalions abroad. To-day there are eighty-five. Is it possible to shrink this vast and costly organisation? Yes, I think so, if that skeleton of expansion of which I have spoken is lying behind, which will become a very real expansion in time of national emergency, and which, until a time of national emergency, need not be made a real expansion. If the Colonies would follow suit with the creation of a potential Army, and if it was possible that an empire with many millions of people might raise potential forces of such a character as would make great strength a certainty for generations to come, no Power could wage war with a people with such possibilities behind it. No opposing nation would know what it had to confront when it got to close grips with an angry people fighting for liberty and for all it held dear.
  This Parliament seems to me to have a great chance. We have a magnificent driving power. We have a mission, it

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  seems to me, in this matter of Army reorganisation. The people are not in antipathy to the Army. They love the Army. They care about these things. But they want to put them on a footing in which they believe. They want to get the Army into a shape which will make them feel that it is their own Army, an institution of which they are proud and which they can hold in the same esteem in which they hold the Navy. We wish to take the controversy about the Army, if possible, out of the lines of those things which are matters of reproach to be hurled across the floor of the House at us and back again; we wish to have them made as much matters of national business as the Navy and foreign politics. I have outlined no scheme to-night. I have merely thrown out ideas which have resulted from such study as I have so far made of the subject. I may be wrong in thinking that progress is possible along those lines; but I do not think I am. All the expert opinion encourages me in the conviction that it is along these lines, and these lines alone, that the problem can be solved. Two things it wants—driving power, which we have here, and continuity of policy, which depends for its attainment on your moderation. Do not force me to handle the Army rapidly. Do not force upon me things which I could not do, and which I would rather resign my office than try to do, some things which have been talked of and which would not only lead to injury of the Army but would lead at once to a reaction so strong that probably in the end it would hurl the Party to which I belong out of office and would lead to the bringing back of those who, impelled by angry opinion outside, would take steps too violently reactionary. It is only by a policy of moderation that you can get continuity of policy; and it is only by continuity of policy that you can cut down the cost of this vast and enormous organisation with which we have to deal. I think the Army problem has been studied too much apart from its social and non-military aspects, from the aspect in which it touches the life of the country, from the aspect in which it touches tradition and sentiment. All this you have to bring on your side if you would solve the problem. The
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  problem is, after all, a lay problem. Underneath the technicalities of military organisation and military problems you find there lies some big question of common sense on which the layman may pronounce. I commend to the House the duty of reflecting and working on these lines even in the elementary stage to which I have been able to bring them on this occasion. Ours is a great opportunity; and if you who sit around me, and you who sit opposite me, will but join hands in a national endeavour, then I for my part promise that I will do the utmost, to the final limit of my strength, to prevent our joint endeavour from being paralysed by anything like Party bitterness.
  Motion made and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: I am certain that I am expressing not only my individual opinion, but the opinion of every one on this side of the House, when I tender to the right hon. Gentleman my respectful congratulations for the most admirable and interesting speech with which he has gratified us. He has made an appeal which I am sure has not fallen on deaf ears. The right hon. Gentleman desires that the Army question shall be taken out of the sphere of Party politics, and believes he can count on hon. Members on the Opposition side to assist him in his endeavour. I will be the foremost to say and do anything to assist the right hon. Gentleman. I ventured to give him that assurance long before I knew that I should be in a Party so reduced in number as this is and I repeat now that if by my knowledge or my forbearance I can in any way assist the right hon. Gentleman and make his task easier I shall indeed be glad. I have served a hard apprenticeship in this matter, and have been the subject of criticism which has sometimes seemed informed by Party view and personal prejudice rather than by a clear desire for the national welfare; but I believe the right hon. Gentleman will have not only good-will, but good fortune. The right hon. Gentleman comes to his task with the authority conferred by a great

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  majority, with a personality acceptable to the House, and with a great driving power behind him, and he has done wisely in not hastening on the path he has decided to tread. He suggested, but I do not think he meant it as a reproach, and I do not think it is a reproach to us, that others had not been so cautious in this matter.
  I would remind the right hon. Gentleman that there is a very remarkable difference between the position in which he stands and that in which his two predecessors stood when called upon to deal with Army matters. My predecessor had to deal with the Army at the close of a devastating war, and to meet all the problems which it presented; and when I took office I was absolutely compelled to act at once, for the Army was disappearing. It was impossible for me or any one in my place to stand still and do nothing. Something had to be done at once, and if nothing had been done the Army would now have to be recreated from the beginning. Now the right hon. Gentleman is in a more convenient position: he proposes to leave things in status quo. He can afford to do so at present, he says, and says truly that the Army was never better in personnel or organisation. The right hon. Gentleman finds an Army Council formed on a principle of which he approves; he finds a large and growing force of long service infantry; he finds recruiting steadily progressing, and the long-service enlistment very large. He finds the garrison artillery full up, he finds 600 of the new field guns ready to his hand, the cavalry remounted, the officers who were wanting for the most part supplied, and a new system of Staff organisation set up, a system which I feel confident we can depend upon him to apply. With all these beginnings it is not wonderful that the right hon. Gentleman should, after two years of the existing system, be able to do what his predecessor was unable to do, and to take time before making any further change. I will guarantee that in another year and a half the right hon. Gentleman, if he is still in the same mind and will be content to let things alone, will have a force such as this country has never seen before.
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  With the general propositions laid down by the right hon. Gentleman I am in general agreement, and I consider that the most important of his statements is that he intends to apply to the Army the same rule as has been applied to the Navy, and to get rid of everything that is not absolutely necessary for success in war. If he does that nothing more can be asked of the right hon. Gentleman's administration, and I shall have nothing to complain of. That rule ought to be the basis of all Army organisation, and directly we begin to neglect it waste begins. The right hon. Gentleman said that what was wanted more than anything else was clear thinking; but I am not sure that in every respect the right hon. Gentleman observed his own counsel. In spite of all his lucidity and the great care he took to inform the House, there were one or two instances in which the right hon. Gentleman did not, as it appeared to me, seem to think so clearly as we should have liked. He spoke of the enormous effect which the acceptance of the blue-water school principle must have on the re-organisation of the Army, and he drew from that pre-miss conclusions which were inevitable. He told us that the work of the Army was not to provide for the defence of this country but service abroad. That is a doctrine with which I cordially agree. I think he attached perhaps too much importance to some of the new departures which even in the short time he had been in office he had been able to consider and which he was actually making. The proposal to do away with the London defences is not new. It was a conclusion arrived at some time ago by the Committee of Defence. And I remember well an Order being issued cancelling the appropriation of all the guns for those defences. Upon the small matter with regard to St. Helena we are all agreed. It was settled long ago. In respect of the survey, the saving to the nation will be infinitesimal. I associate myself to the full with what the right hon. Gentleman has said about the growth of a school of young officers who have made a serious study of their profession, and who are willing to use their knowledge for the benefit of the nation.

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  A greater liberty of transference from one part of the Army to another will give these officers such an opportunity of professional service as has not been possible before. On all these points there is general agreement.
  But when the right hon. Gentleman spoke of the inadvisability of change, and the value of a continuous policy, and to prove his point referred to the Navy he was not very impressive. I am not sure that the parallel drawn with the Navy is quite legitimate. It is true in a sense but not quite true. A policy for the Navy is a thing of modern growth. I can remember when there was no policy, and when in an emergency the Admiralty could not send five fresh ships to sea. And while naval policy is now continuous, it is subject to extraordinary changes. Within the last three years the Navy has undergone a change far more drastic than any proposed for the Army. There has been also a change in Army policy; but rightly it has been the consequence of the development of a strong Navy. Until that strong Navy existed the present Army policy was an impossibility.
  There is only one matter on which there is likely to be a serious difference of opinion between the right hon. Gentleman and myself, and in that matter the right hon. Gentleman was, I think, somewhat inconsistent with his own admonition to think clearly. The right hon. Gentleman said that he looked forward to a great change in the body from which the Regular Army was was to be reinforced in time of war. I quite agree. No doubt retrenchment in the Regular Army must come, and it can only be effected by destroying battalions or by reducing their establishment. I shall continue to advocate the naval plan of having skeletons, which can be easily expanded in time of war. The right hon. Gentleman was wrong in supposing that no estimates has been formed of the force necessary to be kept up in time of peace. That force varies with one factor—the troops to be maintained in India and the Colonies. Given that factor, the rest can be deduced, and has, as a matter of fact been deduced.
  The right hon. Gentleman seemed to lapse from his usually clear thinking
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  when he said that we must have vast crowds of semi-organised men in this country who are to be used in time of war. He cannot have been thinking quite clearly, because he has already told us in the clearest manner possible that the war contemplated is not a war inside this country at all. Then what was the particular point of quoting General Chanzy's campaign? The right hon. Gentleman said that General Manteuffel was greatly embarrassed by having large numbers of semi-organised men hanging on his flank. Probably he was; but the lesson which the right hon. Gentleman drew from that war is not quite so reassuring to me as it is to the right hon. Gentleman. After all, the French forces outnumbered the Germans; they were fighting with all the advantage of possessing this irregular contingent; yet in a few weeks, despite their gallantry and their numbers, they were routed, Paris was compelled to surrender, and Prance was compelled to sign a disastrous peace. Where then is the parallel to the circumstances which surrounded General Chanzy's fight? Are we to fight, let us say, for the neutrality of Belgium, if that should be our fate, or elsewhere outside these islands, and to take with us these bands of irregular troops?
  MR. HALDANE: I was only pointing out that, if we had a large reserve of what I call semi-trained people in this country, experience shows that with the proper machinery they can be converted far more rapidly into effective fighting people than if they are not trained at all.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: I am sure I do not desire to misrepresent the right hon. Gentleman, but I fail to see what is the value of the analogy drawn from the campaign on the Loire, for clearly the advantage of General Chanzy arose from having large numbers of undisciplined men for the assistance of the Regular Army.
  But I will drop that analogy and take up a much more serious line of criticism. There has been a good deal of discussion lately as to our having in this country so few men trained in the use of arms. Lord Roberts has said that I if we had 1,000,000 men on whom we

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  could draw, men trained to the use of arms, we should be very fortunate. Again, Sir Ian Hamilton the other day contrasted the condition of things in this country with that in Japan. He told us of the number of men in a party of Japanese civilians who had been trained to use the rifle, and declared that no such case could be found here. But this belief, so unfavourable to us, rests upon no foundation. At this moment of time we are paying for no less than 960,000 Englishmen to bear arms in time of peace, and on the most moderate estimate there must be well over 4,000,000 people in this country who have been trained at the cost of the State to use the rifle. This is an enormous number, and yet it is true, as the right hon. Gentleman said, that our Army is not organised for war; from that I deduce the conclusion that it is not enough to have great crowds of men who have received this preliminary training to guarantee us against disaster in war. I think we are travelling in rather a dangerous path. This idea of what may be called second-best armies is very dangerous. The second-best fleet lies now at the bottom of the Sea of Japan, and the second-best army was destroyed on the plains of Liau-yang and Mukden. I would like to know whether there is any military authority—I do not ask for any names—for the proposition that you can safely enter upon modern warfare with a reasonable chance of success with an army constituted in the way suggested by the right hon. Gentleman.
  MR. HALDANE: I never said that we should fight with an army in that condition. What I said was that, if we had that kind of organisation with the period of training divided into two parts, we would be able to produce a very large supporting and contributory force.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: It is undoubtedly true that in ordinary circumstances we should have some notice and breathing time, but, granting all the advantages due to that circumstance, there must be such an enormous difference between any army constituted on those lines and the armies considered necessary to secure success in other countries that
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  there can be no comparison. I will ask where is the right hon. Gentleman going: to get his officers for these hundreds of thousands of men who will possess no officers trained in the modern sense at all. You are apparently to have everything which in other countries is considered unsuitable for carrying on of a successful war. I know that we are an insular people and that we are proud of our insular position and insular ideas, but sometimes when. I find the whole world against us I am inclined to think that the whole world may be right and that we may be wrong. No other country in the world holds the views that we hold on this question. Every other country thinks that if you are to obtain victory in war, you must have two years training of all I men taken from the flower of the population, and that those men must be trained by officers who have given a lifetime to their work; and that in order to take the field you must have all the proportions of an army with equipment to correspond. We take a totally different view. If it be really possible to produce an army which can fight outside this country against the best modern troops of the world, and can succeed after having had a training such as the right hon. Gentleman has described, and officered as such an army must be officered, then I say it is the greatest discovery ever made. If it is true I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman. I think it is splendid. I hope it is true. But if it be not true, if other countries are right and we are wrong, then what will happen? If the scheme is carried out it will be the most popular thing, I suppose, that was ever done in this country; but if when we have a war this army is destroyed, I do not think the popularity of the scheme will give us much consolation. The military opinion that I have been able to ascertain does not justify the conclusion that the view of the right hon. Gentleman is a right view. I will quote Lord Roberts' opinion, as given before the Royal Commission. Lord Roberts was asked whether he would employ a Militia battalion, and the reply was—
  "Certainly I would not employ a battalion that I was not so sure of as regards training in the same prominent position as I should employ a Regular battalion."

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  Then he was asked—
  "Do you think they would be up to the standard required for meeting an invasion, supposing it were to arise?"
  The reply was—
  "No, for they would be pitted against the very best troops that could be brought here."
  Sir Ian Hamilton was asked whether, if the Militia were trained for six months on enlistment and underwent their month's training in subsequent years, with their shooting training as well, they would be fit for the fighting line. His answer was that it could only be a matter of opinion, and he added—
  "But I would prefer to use them to relieve Regular troops in garrisons and coaling stations, lather than to rely upon them to take the field."
  Lord Wolseley said he thought that if they were asked to fight with such troops they had better make peace. Asked if it might not be possible to bring them into a condition to fight with reasonable prospect of success, he said—
  "Certainly, but then you would have to give them a corresponding amount of training to make them equal to the Regular soldier."
  He was next asked how long it would take to make 300,000 auxiliaries equal to cope with 200,000 highly-trained Regulars. He said—
  "I think the best answer I can give you is the answer that a German officer would give you—what the Germans exact from their men before they turn them into the Reserve; if you wish to have men capable of fighting as Regular soldiers you have to train them as the Germans do, and keep them for eighteen months or two years and then turn them away, and have them up for periodical trainings annually."
  Sir John French was asked—
  "Would you be satisfied to meet those troops with our Auxiliary Forces after a year's training? "
  He replied—
  "I should think it would be very risky. You would prefer not?' 'I should prefer not.'"
  he answered.
  The next question was—
  "After what period do you think you would be satisfied to do so?"
  The answer was—
  "A period that would make them equal to Regular troops."
  I might continue the recital almost indefinitely. I do hope the right hon.
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  Gentleman will at some time or another give us his reasons for believing that the Continental—in fact I may say the universal—view is wrong. That is what it comes to. If we are to leave our troops unorganised in every way, un-officered, and are never to train them in the way troops ought to be trained in order to win victory in battle, will the right hon. Gentleman tell the House whence he has obtained sanction for his opinions, that this can be done wisely or safely?
  I cannot help raising this one note of protest, and it is the only note of protest I desire to utter at this stage of the discussion, because I feel that the vagueness—no doubt the reasonable and pardonable vagueness of the picture—is calculated to raise a considerable amount of alarm in the minds of those who feel that we want an organisation much more resembling that of the Navy than that which he has described. The Navy has never taken the view that you can sacrifice quality for quantity. It is true that we have introduced short service in the Navy, but of not less than five years, and the number of men under that scheme does not exceed 5,000. I do trust that the right hon. Gentleman will pause before he commits this country to any reduction of the Regular Army until he is prepared to say with perfect confidence in this House what he is going to offer in its place. I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman upon what he has said as to improving the education and the organisation of the general staff of the Army, for, undoubtedly, there is room for improvement.
  The right hon. Gentleman has told the House that he has closed short-service enlistments. I regret the fact—but I note with satisfaction that unlike many others who speak with less authority, he did not say that it was closed because short-service enlistment had proved a failure. Short-service enlistment was a very great success during the short time it was open, and no less than 54 per cent. of the recruits enlisted for short service. If you do desire to open short-service recruiting again, you may do so with perfect confidence that you will obtain the recruits; but that there must be short service recruiting is absolutely certain. The thing must happen, because you

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  cannot keep on indefinitely a Regular Army on a long-service basis alone consistently with, any considerable reduction of the Army Estimates. You must, sooner or later, come back to the short-service enlistment in some shape or another. I venture once more to assure the right hon. Gentleman—with the exception of the one point which I have ventured to suggest—that on every other line which he desires to make progress he will have in me a supporter who knows his difficulties, who sympathises with him, who shares his view as to the general directions upon which we ought to progress, and one who will be his ardent well-wisher, and whose chief desire is that he may obtain a larger measure of success than his predecessor.
  MAJOR SEELYcongratulated the Secretary for War upon the speech which he had made. He felt sure that if he carried out the intentions which he had expressed to the House he would receive that general support for which he had pleaded. The right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down seemed very anxious to earn the title "friend of the Volunteers," but his whole argument would be of value if he followed it up by proposing a system of continental conscription. Circumstances might arise where a great force would be required, and the number had been placed by some at 1,000,000 men and by others at 500,000. How could we possibly raise that number except by continental conscription, or unless we relied upon the voluntary offerings of a free people, or unless the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon was prepared to say that we must maintain such a Regular force in peace time as would provide them with the Regular force they would require in time of war to conduct a great European war.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTERsaid he had said nothing whatever about the Volunteers, but that he had, as a matter of fact, endeavoured to use the Volunteer material for the purposes of war. What he referred to was that sort of nebulous force which the Secretary for War was about to call into being.
  MAJOR SEELYsaid he understood that the late Secretary of State for War was the friend of the Volunteer, but at any rate, he was not friendly to a large force of Volunteers. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon's object had been to reduce the Volunteers, to go in the contrary direction to that which had been pointed out by the Secretary of State for War, and to make the Volunteers approximate more nearly to the Regular Army, and so to rely upon only Regular troops. Certain hon. Members had pleaded again and again in this House for this object, and at last they had heard some result of their words. They had continually argued that it was impossible for this country to maintain a huge Navy and Army adequate to our needs, and they urged that whilst they must have an Army for immediate needs they must have also behind them the patriotic service of the whole people. That could not be obtained by compulsion, because the people of this country would never submit to being compelled to serve in the Army. The people of this country had determined to keep in their own hands the question whether they should or should not go to war, and for that reason they insisted upon voluntary service, not from any sense of cowardice, but because they were determined that when the time came they should be allowed to decide whether they would wage war or not. For that reason he believed that it was only by encouragement and not by compulsion that we could obtain the forces which we required. He urged the right hon. Gentleman not to pursue the course which proved so disastrous last year, for he believed that the recent election had shown that the people of this country were determined that they would maintain the voluntary principle; and it was only by encouragement on the lines he had suggested that the authorities could hope to obtain any large number of men. Whilst thanking the Secretary of State for War, might he put in one caveat on the question of the linked battalion system. Members sympathised and agreed so entirely with his general view that it would seem churlish to sound a note of disagreement; but he thought it was as well to point

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  out this difference at once. They protested against the theory that it was necessary to have the same proportion of Regular troops at home as abroad. When Mr. Cardwell's system was produced it was a great advance upon previous schemes, and it so happened that at that time the number of troops at home and abroad were about the same. They were now of the opinion that they wanted far more troops abroad than at home for various reasons, and still more because of the acceptance by the late Prime Minister on behalf of the Committee of Defence of the theory that the defence of this country was an affair of its citizens. For these reasons they believed that we did not require so great a force of Regular troops in thus country. He did not agree with the statement that this was an essential part of military doctrine. With regard to the possible invasion of this country he had never been one who believed that any naval force was a complete security against invasion. In uttering a note of warning, he wished to point out that the belief that the naval force was a complete security was based upon expert opinion. If that naval opinion had ever been very gravely at fault, it behoved them to doubt whether they could run so huge a risk upon a hypothesis which might conceivably be wrong. The whole of naval opinion a few years ago was devoted to trying to ascertain which would win, the Japanese or the Russian Navy; and he had it on good authority that some of this expert opinion, which told them invasion was impossible, gave the Japanese Fleet three months before the Russian Fleet sent it to the bottom. He believed that in the archives of the War Office some such opinion was to be found. On a previous occasion he had pointed out many instances where naval expert opinion had been wholly wrong, and he ventured to bring this most important question to the notice of the House, not because he did not belong to the blue-water school, or because he did not believe that we ought to spend much more money on the Navy than on the Army, but because he was of opinion that invasion was like being run over by an express train: it was fatal when it happened. It was unwise to assume that a thing was impossible because the probabilities seemed to be
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  against it. But, after all, the Secretary of State for War longed to see the people of this country serve in the Army of their own free will; and all who had endeavoured to recruit men for the Auxiliary Forces knew that the defence of the soil argument was the principal incentive to voluntary service. When, therefore, there was the least chance of this training being developed it was unwise to take away the great inducement to that voluntary service, which might in the future be of great value in all parts of the world. He had nothing in the nature of criticism to make in regard to the statement made by the Secretary of State for War, and Members were grateful for what he had said. The right hon. Gentleman had made an impassioned appeal to the people of this country and to hon. Members of this House to set aside Party bitterness, and all hoped that his appeal would be responded to.
  LORD MORPETHsaid the Secretary of State for War had very wisely preferred to wait to learn the facts of his office before he came down to this House to ask for any wide changes in the organisation of the Army. They were told that it was easy to diminish the armed forces because at the present time there Was a large increase in treaties of arbitration. He did not think this country could rely on any security of that sort. If France, instead of strengthening her Army in past years, had reduced her forces he thought the deadlock which appeared to exist at Algeciras would be even greater than it was. But the right hon. Gentleman had told the House that it was impossible to diminish the Army, at any rate materially, until the authorities were able to relieve the Indian and Colonial garrisons—that meant until some change of policy abroad in regard to the north-west frontier of India, or in regard to the position in South Africa, enabled them to diminish those forces. When that happened it would no doubt be possible to diminish the troops in those regions. Sometimes the House heard lamentations as to the large cost of the armed forces of this country. It seemed to him that there was no good in lamenting that expenditure had risen, and was rising,

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  without also seeing whether they could diminish the cost with security to this country. It was not the cost alone that they had to look to, but the facts that underlay the necessity for that cost. The right hon. Gentleman had said that they must rely on the large force which would stand behind the striking force. It seemed to him that the right hon. Gentleman placed too much reliance on a rather vague force that might be called into being. At one time he seemed to hint that this force would be organised by local bodies—county councils, municipal authorities, or even private associations. Everybody who took an interest in the strength of the Army must welcome institutions like rifle clubs and rejoice that the people of the country were taking an interest in what was, after all, the A.B.C. of military matters—the ability to shoot straight. But, unfortunately, they had to look at the facts of our social life as they were. It was unfortunately the fact that football was more interesting than shooting at the butts. That being so, they must provide some military machinery, some military organisation, by which men who were to be taught shooting would be enrolled in order to qualify themselves as marksmen. It seemed to him that the right hon. Gentleman made a mistake in the instance he chose for the purpose of showing the advantages and the uses of a large number of unorganised troops or bodies of men. He quoted Prince Frederick Charles and what might be called the national war in France, when organised resistance had broken down. In that case the resistance, although gallant and prolonged, and although it inflicted great loss on the Prussians, had no eventual bearing on the result of the war. We should look in this country to the forces we had rather than to ill-defined forces which did not exist. He did not disguise from himself the fact that at the present moment the Auxiliary Forces were in many respects ill-trained, ill-qualified, and unready to meet European troops of quality in the field of battle. Large numbers of Volunteers and Militia were sent to South Africa during the late war. Although ready to give them praise for what they did and to recognise the patriotism and spirit which led
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  them to go to the field of operations, everybody who had any experience of those troops knew that if, instead of going to South Africa to meet comparatively few brave but ill-equipped men, they had had to meet in an easier country the highly trained and disciplined Armies of Continental Powers, many of those troops would have fared very badly. But the fact that men were not ready to go at a moment's notice was no reason why they should not be made ready, as the right hon. Gentleman had pointed out. If instead of relying upon some ill-defined force the War Office would devote some of its benevolence—some of its attention—to the strengthening of the Auxiliary Forces, whether Volunteer or Militia, he thought there would be found in them an almost inexhaustible reserve force which might be extended in time of war to very large dimensions. There they had a skeleton which they could fill out into a living organism for war. The relative value of the Volunteers and the Militia was a question which was sometimes discussed. These discussions were unfortunate. He doubtep whether it was possible to keep two Auxiliary Forces, organised on different principles, in being. But it would be perfectly possible to create a single Auxiliary Force, whether it were called Militia or Volunteers, which would be one force under military law, but with certain conditions of elasticity in regard to terms of enlistment, nature and length of training, and even in regard to pay. What stood in the way of the Auxiliary Forces at the present time? The Volunteers considered, rightly or wrongly, that they had been slighted. What was certain was that the Militia, throughout the whole course of its career, had been little better than a step-child of the military authorities of this country. It had always been the Cinderella of the armed forces, and he did not suppose there was any reasonable Militiaman who expected that it could ever develop into the favourite child of the War Office. But he did say that the Militia was capable of expansion and improvement, and that it was a force which could be polished up at comparatively short notice if it were favoured by the War Office. If it received the assistance to which it was entitled it would be a valuable service. The

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  Militia had been bled of its best and steadiest men to supply troops for the line under the so-called system of the Militia reserve now abolished. It had been bled at the other end by being made a nursery of recruits. It was a force which had always been regarded with a certain amount of ridicule. The fact that it should have lived down this ridicule showed its vitality. In the time of the great Napoleonic wars it provided a vast number of men who were not only available for home defence but actually served in the field in the line battalions; during the Crimean War it provided men for the Mediterranean garrisons, and during the South African War it provided organised units to fill up the gaps when there was difficulty in finding Regulars or Volunteers to supply the deficiency. This showed that they had in the Militia that skeleton or nucleus to which the Secretary of State for War referred. The right hon. Gentleman alluded with approval to the Swiss Militia. That was a cheap Militia and service was compulsory. It was a Militia for the defence of its own native soil. The Swiss people were one of the most democratic and one of the freest nations in the world, but in spite of that they had a great history of military glory and pride. What the Swiss had done surely the people of this country were sufficiently patriotic to do also. It was not proposed that the Army which was to stand behind the Regular Army should be for foreign service. It was an Army for the defence of this country, and only in emergencies for foreign service. While the view taken by the Blue Water School contained a great element of truth, it might sometimes be pushed to a dangerous extreme—an extreme which in the days of Queen Elizabeth was called the idolatry of Neptune. He did not think this country could afford to say that it would rely altogether on the Fleet. It was not probable that an enemy would be able to invade this country in great numbers, but unless the Auxiliary Forces were properly organised and equipped, and under commanders who understood the material with which they had to deal and who were able to use them, they would prove a helpless crowd in the presence of more highly organised Armies if they came
  702
  into conflict. Although he agreed with the right hon. Gentleman about the necessity of building a military policy on certain clearly denned lines, it must always be borne in mind that this country was exposed to the danger of sudden attack. It was just those military ventures which appeared most hopeless, which most military officers shrank from, that daring spirits undertook and which led to the most startling success. The attack on Quebec had been practically given up as hopeless by every naval and military member of the British forces, but General Wolfe made it a startling and wonderful success. For that reason this country must be prepared with some organised force to meet invasion in time of war. He remembered that during the war in South Africa, although we were in conflict with only a small State thousands of miles away and with no Fleet, there was a deep feeling of insecurity in this county. All recollected the hasty, ill-considered and expensive measures that were then thought necessary to supply deficiencies. If we were ever to engage in a war with a great military Power it was essential for the security and stability of the country that there should be here an organised force. It was said, and he agreed, that this country could not support an overwhelming Navy and at the same time provide a great Army, that our professional Army should be small but of great efficiency, and that behind that we should look to the great mass of the Auxiliary Forces, who, therefore, should be treated with benevolence and encouragement. The officers and men were willing to learn and to qualify themselves for the duty put upon them if they only received that encouragement from professional soldiers and the War Office which was their due.
  MR. CHARLES HOBHOUSEsaid it was a very long time since they had had a speech from any Minister on the subject of the Army which had elicited such a general feeling of contentment and approbation as the one they had listened to this afternoon. The right hon. Gentleman, in opening his speech, told the House that three months was far too short a time to produce a new scheme of

  703
  reform of the Army; but he could not help remembering that on almost the corresponding day last year the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon made a speech in which at the end of seven months he produced a full-fledged scheme for the reform of every department of the British Army. He was not going to deal with the scheme which the right hon. Gentleman then produced, the most important parts of which had been swept away by the Memorandum which the present Secretary of State for War had laid on the Table of the House; but there were one or two points in connection with that scheme which must inevitably come up in any discussion of the proposals of the present Secretary of State for War. The right hon. Member for Croydon had told the House that two concurrent periods of enlistment were impossible. Now at the time the right hon. Gentleman gave up office there were not two concurrent periods of enlistment but four, although not all of his making.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTERsaid that what he had stated was that concurrent enlistment was inevitable, and he had always maintained that.
  MR. CHARLES HOBHOUSEsaid that he had a quotaion from a speech the right hon. Gentleman made on 8th April last, which appeared in The Times, in which he said that it was impossible to proceed with two concurrent periods of enlistment.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTERsaid that for two years he had been preaching and practising exactly the opposite doctrine.
  MR. CHARLES HOBHOUSEsaid he was quite aware of that, but it only showed how inconsistent the right hon. Gentleman's theory was with his practice. His point was that when the present Secretary of State for War came into office he found that there were four periods of concurrent enlistment. He was glad to see that the right hon. Gentleman had swept away three of them, and that at present the only possible period of enlistment was one of nine years service with the colours and three in the reserve. There had been unquestionably some
  704
  feeling of disappointment amongst Members op the Ministerial side of the House that it was possible for the right hon. Gentleman to reduce the expense of the Army by only £17,000. But considering the short time at his disposal and the legacies left him by his predecessors, he thought they should be glad that the present Secretary of State for War had been able to make a reduction of even £17,000. It had to be remembered that the cost of all branches of the Service—especially in the manufacture of guns, clothing, and supplies of all sorts of necessaries—had gone up. The cost of labour and material had largely increased, and all these inevitably helped to swell the Estimates. One thing in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman had pleased him immensely, viz., when the right hon. Gentleman said that although he had some ideas he had no plans, and he went on to express his approval—even if that approval were tentative—of a continuance of what was known as the Card well scheme. He himself recollected the time when he was taunted with being the only surviving believer in the Card well Scheme, and he was delighted that that view had been re-adopted with the general approval of the House. He was glad that the right hon. Gentleman was going to keep the system of linked battalions, for it was the universal experience that that was the only way to provide proper drafts for the battalions serving abroad. The late Secretary for War had sketched out a plan by which there were to to be brought into existence eighteen or nineteen large depôts, which were in due process of time to replace the linked battalion system. He wanted to know whether these large depôts with their buildings were to be continued at large cost, or whether they were going to be thrown into the hotch-potch with the London defences. If the right hon. Gentleman followed that course, he was certain that in the immediate future he would be able to add to the saving of expenditure already affected. It was important to notice that the three principles laid down last year by the right hon. Member for Croydon and the late Prime Minister for the maintenance of the Army had been fully answered by the Secretary of State for War.

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  These were the possibility of invasion, the duty of the Army to fight abroad, and the position in India governing the number of soldiers in this country. He was rather of the opinion of the hon. and gallant Member for the Abercromby Division of Liverpool that the Committee of Defence had minimised the position of foreign armies, and in thinking that the commanders of these armies would not under certain circumstances sacrifice 5,000 or 10,000 men in order to get possession of one or other of our great arsenals. He had seen something of the landward defences of our great arsenals, and was convinced that if by some mischance a force of 10,000 foreign troops were landed in close proximity to, say, Portsmouth or Plymouth, they could do such incalculable and incredible damage as all the strength of our Navy would not be able to redress within a reasonable time. He hoped that any scheme of defence of this country would be so perfect in regard to the repulsion of these possible raids that our arsenals would really rest in genuine and not imaginary security. He should have liked to have referred at a little greater length to the question of whether the defences of India were so good as they were a year ago. He thought that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon laid it down that the requirements of India in time of war were 120,000 men in the first year, and 60,000 in the succeeding year, and he should like to know whether the Secretary for War agreed with those figures. He had not gathered clearly by what method the power of expansion behind the Regular Army was to be provided. The right hon. Gentleman had devised a very extensive and not a very costly scheme of regaining the Volunteers. The system of brigading, however, had not yet been extended to the Militia. The system of this brigading, by which new officers were to be appointed to the Volunteer brigades, had left behind a large number of officers, who were practically in charge of brigade districts and who would now be superfluous. Were those officers going to be used for brigading the Militia, and, if not, under what system was the Militia going to be brought into line with the Volunteers from the point of view of Army organisation? He hailed with
  706
  much satisfaction the right hon. Gentleman's desire to create a national interest in the Army. There was public sentiment in regard to the Navy, and those who, like himself, had served in the Army, would give anything to see it directed towards the Army. It was a bar to the advance of the Army that it had never been so popular as the Navy, but there was no reason why, under proper management, it should not take its place side by side with naval force.
  MR. WYNDHAM: Although some of the speeches to which we have listened might tempt me to recrimination, I shall resist that temptation. The Secretary of State has asked us to set all partisan spirit on one side. I respond to the appeal. It would, in my opinion, be ungenerous to do otherwise in view of one memorable sentence in the right hon. Gentleman's speech; I quote it verbatim—
  "Never was there a period when the Army was in a more efficient condition than to-day."
  That was a legacy of which the right hon. Gentleman does not complain. Again, a great part of his survey was based, as the right hon. Gentleman most frankly and generously admitted, on the conclusions and advice tendered by the Defence Committee, and his theory, if not based upon, almost entirely coincided with, the important speech made last session by the present Leader of the Opposition. But, of course, there may be other legacies, of which the right hon. Gentleman complains, though he has uttered no complaint. He remarked somewhat pointedly that in the period under review in the earlier portion of his speech there had been an increase in the personnel of the Army of 46,000 men, and in respect of it an increase of cost to the Army of about £6,000,000. That is £130 per head. But if we take into consideration that during that period a new rifle was given to the Army, and a new gun, that the pay of the soldier was increased, his accommodation improved, and the amenities of his life made far more desirable, I do not think that £130 per man is at any rate obviously an extravagant figure. The whole point is whether the increase in personnel was necessary. The Secretary for War will not think that I lack admiration for his speech if I do not pay him all the compliments he deserves. I share to the full the

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  admiration which the right hon. Gentleman's notable effort has excited; it was a luminous speech, which flooded the whole question with light. There was one passage, however, which, perhaps owing to my imperfect attention, seemed to lack the lucidity which characterised the rest of the speech. I will come straight to that portion of the speech, in which lies the heart of the matter.
  The right hon. Gentleman dealt with a striking force, its size and character, and then in quick transition dealt with another problem—namely, the fact that the number of men and of battalions which we had at home depended upon and was conditioned by the number of men and of battalions that we had in India and the Colonies. I would myself say that if our Army at home is sufficient to be the nursery and school for our Army in India and in the Colonies, then at no great additional cost we can provide out of that nursery and school a striking force of sufficient size. There are not two problems; there is one dominating problem, that of having a proper nursery and school for our Indian and Colonial garrisons. Until that problem is satisfactorily solved, the problem of a striking force becomes of minor importance; we need not bother our heads about it until we have found the solution of the primary problem. At the end of his speech the right hon. Gentleman said that the key of the problem of reducing expenditure is to be found in the garrisons which we maintain in Colonial stations. But the lock into which that key is to be fitted is by the very nature of our Empire a complicated one with many intricate wards. Hon. Members will find a very good picture of that lock on page 22 of the Army Estimates, where there is given on one sheet of paper the distribution of our Army throughout the Empire. Rightly or wrongly, we have 156 battalions of the Line.
  Following the right hon Gentleman's example, I will stick to Infantry of the Line to illustrate the problem. Of those battalions seventy-one are at home, and eighty-five abroad, fifty-two being in India. I agree that all chances of reduction depends on the number of battalions we have out of this country. I should be very sorry to encourage any section of the House to expect a reduction in the Indian garrison; and with
  708
  that deduction there are thirty-three battalions abroad to be accounted for. We have gone very far in removing the unnecessary garrisons abroad in Canada, Esquimault and Bermuda. If you analyse the position of our battalions throughout the Colonies, excluding India, you will see that the opportunity of any great measure of reduction is very remote. I am not pressing this, but I think it is very important to take it into consideration. The reduction of the three battalions, at Gibraltar, and the seven battalions at Malta raises the whole question of the Mediterranean, and I for one cannot hold out any hope to this House that at any early day we are going to abandon those historic stations. There is a view held I know, a highly speculative view in my opinion, that if a war broke out we should clear out of the Mediterranean, and the right hon. Gentleman may have gone some way in favour of the conclusions based on that view. But still the House would be surprised to hear that we are going to have less than three battalions at Gibraltar and seven at Malta.
  Then we come to another group, which I may call the Egyptian group, to which we may add the garrisons at Cyprus and Crete; there you have four battalions. I put it to the House that those four battalions do not only touch the question of the fighting efficiency of the Army, they are also a point of support to many important diplomatic questions, and we cannot on this Question, as I think the right hon. Gentleman will admit, deal with our Army problems as Germany can deal with her Army problem. Some of our Colonial garrisons are an inherent part of our diplomatic machinery and cannot be tampered with without altering the whole course of our foreign policy. I pass at this stage to another group, namely, the battalions at Mauritius, Bermuda, the Straits Settlements, Hong Kong and Ceylon—five battalions in all. The right hon. Gentleman is prepared to push the conclusions of the blue water school very far. I invented the name, quite accidentally, in this House, and I am prepared to go a long way with it, but I do not think the right hon. Gentleman can go the whole way. But supposing he could, there is a reduction of five battalions to be obtained there, and we

  709
  should have no garrisons in the Far East. Again, those battalions cannot be discussed from the point of view of fighting efficiency, it might be wrong or it might be right to have one battalion of white troops at Hong-Kong, but it cannot be said that it was an absurd view to take, that we need one such battalion there as the point d'appui for the whole of our diplomatic position in the Pacific.
  But if hon. Gentlemen have taken account of the Mediterranean battalions and the five garrisons in our world's service and the four battalions in Egypt, there remain the fourteen battalions in South Africa. I ask the House, is it practical to contemplate at the present moment any reduction of those battalions? [Cries of Yes.] Well, that is one of the questions we shall have to consider at the invitation of the Secretary of State for War, but I think I have in this matter put forward a presumptive case that only in South Africa is there a chance—a remote chance which we must not speculate too confidently upon—of a reduction being effected. The whole increase of the cost of the Army is in the main due to additional burdens which have become incumbent upon us in recent years, which have necessitated our having garrisons in these places. For a time the problem was settled in an illusory manner. The word "temporary" used to be bracketted against the battalions in Egypt, but those battalions have been in Egypt ever since, and the right hon. Gentleman will not solve the problem, and I am sure by his candour to-night he will not pretend to do so, by putting the word "temporary" against the fourteen battalions in South Africa. If he finds it impossible, as I fear he will, to take away any considerable number of these thirty-three battalions, then the hope of any great economy in the cost of the Army is one which we cannot confidently entertain. The recent additions to our Army cost us £130 per annum per man, and for the considerations that I have shown, if the Government do cut down the cost by three or five battalions they will not get the Cardwell system, of which the right hon. Gentleman seems to approve, to work as it was intended to work. Some of us think the Cardwell system has been exposed to a strain that it
  710
  will not bear, and if we are to have clear thinking upon this matter we must either recognise that the Cardwell system must be carried out theoretically, according to the intentions of its author, or else we must have some other system which will admit of our having more battalions abroad than are kept at home.
  I do not intend to make a Party speech or to take up much more of the time of the House, but, speaking for myself and probably for others as well, I am not persuaded that the right hon. Gentleman is on the right track in respect to the Militia. The right hon. Gentleman takes the view that the Militia is to be kept in a watertight compartment, divorced from our line infantry, and many share that view. I can only say that under these conditions the Militia is perishing, and I do not see in these conditions any element for the revival of it. Although it is not my place to throw out any suggestions to-night, I think it would be wise to revert to the old principle advocated for the Militia of 100 years ago, namely, that it should be regarded as a provisional battalion closely connected with the territorial regiments. We might defend this principle on the ground both of prestige and tradition. At present our country has two traditions, the old tradition of the numbers of the regiments and the new territorial tradition which came to life during the war in South Africa. Before the war it would have been impossible to make the Hampshire Militia believe they were part and parcel of the Hampshire regiment, but since the war it is quite different. I commend that suggestion to the right hon. Gentleman.
  The right hon. Gentleman said no word about the Yeomanry. May I put in a word of appeal that he will devote his zeal to every other portion of the forces before he deals with the Yeomanry. In that case, I ask him with respect to leave well alone. I rose only to draw attention to a part of the right hon. Gentleman's speech which, perhaps, through some fault of my own, did not seem so clear as the greater part of his address.
  The right hon. Gentleman dealt, it seemed to me, somewhat too hardly with the building of barracks on Salisbury

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  Plain. Again, there are two sides to the question, and a good deal might be said for and against it. Salisbury Plain was bought as a manœuvring ground. It has been turned into a second Aldershot and into a collection of rifle and artillery ranges. I regret that, but why was it done? It was done because we had to have new barracks in this country. The old barracks were a disgrace and were admitted to be so. Many had to be pulled down, and our military advisers recommended that barracks should be built so that the troops of different branches of the service could be exercised together. Then the science of economy came in. It was found far cheaper to build these barracks upon ground belonging to you than to buy new land. Much can be said on both sides of the question, but I shall always lean to the opinion that it will be better to leave Salisbury Plain as clear as you can, and that when you have a great manœuvring area you should allow no consideration of economy to lead you to turn it into anything else.
  On the question of the Volunteers the right hon. Gentleman threw out the theory that we should have elementary instruction of an elastic character until a time of war. That was so important and far-reaching a view that, I think, we may well ponder it before we pronounce any opinion upon it; but I will admit that it is a logical deduction from the extreme theories of the Blue-water school. Let me say one word to those who represent the Volunteers in this House. Why do the Volunteers now cost so much more than they did? Because Mr. Stanhope, Lord Lansdowne, and others were exposed year after year to the demand that the Volunteers should have all the necessaries and all the accessories of Regular troops—their own transport, their own guns, and much besides. If you do that you cannot make the process of elementary training elastic without at the same time making it grossly extravagant; and we come to the bed-rock of the volunteer question, which is that you cannot train large bodies of troops in this country, except during periods of great patriotic exaltation, when you are not permitted to deviate from the high road without paying a bill almost as costly as any run up in time of war.
  MR. MOLTENOsaid he wished to refer to the position in which many Members were placed by the speech of the Secretary of State for War and the Estimates which had been placed before the country. They had been returned with a strong mandate from their constituents to retrench and cut down expenditure. They had also been returned with a mandate for social reform. He listened with the greatest interest to the Speech of the Secretary of State for War, but it was with a sense of disappointment that he found there were so many excellent technical reasons why no reduction was possible. If there was to be social reform it must cost money, and where was it to come from? Could they burden the people any further? It was only in regard to the Naval and Military expenditure that they could conceive any reduction. In 1895 there was spent on the Army and Navy £43,000,000 sterling. This year he understood the amount was £73,000,000 sterling, or an increase of £30,000,000. The Secretary of State for War, he was glad to say, had not closed the door upon them entirely, because he had told them that the expenditure on the Army depended upon policy, and the right hon. Gentleman had further pointed out that the increased expenditure had largely been caused by the very large increase in the force maintained abroad. He ventured to suggest that the time had come when the 20,000 men need no longer be maintained in South Africa. There was an opening for a substantial and solid reduction in expenditure by reducing the forces in that country. The history of our connection with South Africa showed that expensive militarism had always attended our forward policy there, and the lesson to be learnt was that if this country was prepared to pursue a policy of leaving questions concerning South Africa alone to be dealt with by South Africa itself, then the time had clearly come when it was unnecessary to maintain these large bodies of troops in that country. He particularly suggested that a force such as that maintained at Middelburg in Cape Colony was wholly unnecessary, and if there were any disaffection the force would be wholly inadequate. But there was no disaffection. The Boers had accepted the situation and had

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  given every evidence of their acceptance of it, and he understood that the Government were going to act upon it. He was not in a position to say what had been the cost of the troops in South Africa, and of military works and other expenses connected with the maintenance of the force there, but it could not have been less than three or four millions a year since the War terminated, and there was an additional expense connected with supplying the battalions with fresh troops. There would seem to be a substantial reduction therefore in view, and he would urge the Secretary of State to carry out the reduction at as early a date as possible. Ministerialists had been returned by a large majority in favour of the policy of peace, retrenchment, and reform, and they were bound to give some effect to the mandate. It was time that they determined to effect some change with regard to this gigantic Military expenditure and set their faces like flint against the forward policy in armaments.
  CAPTAIN CRAIGsaid he rose not to criticise in any hostile spirit the statement of the Secretary of State for War, but to supplement one of the most important points in his long and interesting speech. The point which had occurred to the people in this country was that no matter how efficient the Army, the Auxiliary Forces, the Militia, the Yeomanry, and the Volunteers might be they were always face to face with the problem—What had the country done in the way of preparation in the event of all the forces at the disposal of the Crown being absorbed by war? What preparation had been made in order to cope with the vast number of patriotic Britishers who desired to take up arms to supplement those other forces? If they walked abroad in the country generally they would find that the people took an interest in Army matters. From the point of view of their use in time of war, if ever this country was in such a plight as it was before the South African campaign, it was to be hoped that those walking about prepared to take arms would be met with some organisation such as had been indicated by the Secretary of State for War. The right hon. Gentleman was perfectly
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  right in treating the vast mass of Volunteers as, in the first place, not all available for foreign service, and he had also to take into consideration that a Volunteer of this evening might not be a Volunteer tomorrow morning; but nevertheless a man who could ride and shoot and bear himself properly in every way, who might not belong to any Auxiliary Forces, was still a valuable asset to the war material which might be required in an emergency. It was necessary to take some steps—no matter what policy might be thrown across the floor of this House as to the re-organisation of the Army, the Militia or the Auxiliary Forces—that this country might be assured that the moment there was an outbreak of war the vast material at its disposal would be seized upon and encouraged and taken proper care of. He had noticed some instructions which were issued by the French Minister for War to those in charge of depôts for recruiting, and he thought this applied to the timorous man who came forward in the event of a national emergency. The French Ministry had given out that these men had to be treated courteously and welcomed to the service which they were willing to undertake for the national good. He thought that there was both mismanagement and discourtesy shown when the Volunteers came forward on the last occasion, and that could only be remedied if those at the head of the Army would impress upon all officers and men that, whilst the great bulk of those who served in South Africa and other campaigns still leavened the Army, this was a Volunteer country and that a Volunteer was to be treated in the hour of need the same as a soldier. They ought to give encouragement to men to come forward at critical periods; that should be put into the text books and put before a soldier as soon as he enlisted as well as before the officer at Sandhurst or Woolwich. The spirit of calling upon the country as a whole to support a war should be clearly understood by our generals and colonels from the time they entered the Army, so as to fulfil the ideas which the Secretary of State for War had so ably put before the House to-day. In response to the War Office appeal

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  many men would very likely come forward and give a hand, but if they did so under present conditions there was no method of receiving them in some new unit which would appeal to the men. There were in some districts most efficient Militia and Yeomanry, and on this side of the water there were most efficient Volunteers. The authorities might be able to put their hands on a district where all three forces existed, but when war broke out they would not come forward in sufficient numbers to make a new unit equally efficacious if taken to the seat of war. He agreed with the Secretary of State for War that men should take upon themselves the proper duties of citizenship and learn to shoot, or ride, or shoe a horse, or do any of the things necessary for work in the field. If they threw themselves heart and soul into the idea of citizenship and the training which the Secretary of State indicated, it would not require a very long time to make the scheme work homogeneously, so that these units would be useful either in South Africa or any other country. They were constantly face to face with this problem, and so far nothing whatever had been done to assure the people of the country that they were safe. They had rifles, bandoliers, uniforms, and all the accoutrements that vast wealth could command, but when it came to men they had to turn round and say, "Will you come and save us in a difficult situation?" If the country was aroused to help in such a situation, the least they could do was to ask the War Office authorities to have that machinery in such perfect order that they could go to the recruiting officer, be taken freely by the hand, taught their duty, and sent to the front, and when at the front treated exactly the same as the regular troops were. It should not be forgotten that the regular troops were Volunteers also—it might be a long or short service—and they should be trained to look upon Volunteers as their equals in every respect.
  COLONEL HERBERTsaid he claimed that indulgence which was always extended to an hon. Member who addressed the House for the first time. The statement of the Secretary
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  of State for War had given him much pleasure, and he had been pleased to listen to the graceful, sympathetic and appreciative words he had used with regard to those who collaborated with him at the War Office. Having had some experience himself, he could assure the right hon. Gentleman that he had taken the best course to secure the highest service which an efficient staff were able to render. He was confident that if the Secretary of State for War approached the problems of the men in the same sympathetic spirit as that which he had applied to the higher officers of the staff, he would win from the rank and file the same hearty co-operation which he was sure he had received from the headquarters staff at the War Office. The right hon. Gentleman had come before the House this evening less in the character of a great Army reformer than in the character of a reformer of War Office finance. It might be urged, as it had been by the hon. Member for East Bristol, that the results of his attempts at economy had been to save only a paltry £17,000; but as one who had had some little experience in dealing with the preparation of Estimates, he would say that, personally, so far from being disappointed he hailed that decrease as a considerable triumph under the circumstances which the right hon. Gentleman had had to face. In his experience in dealing with Estimates he had found that there were really only two items of expenditure upon which they could expect at once to make a large and sweeping reduction, and these were the item of men and the item of stores. Under the head of stores and supplies, the right hon. Gentleman had adopted a wise policy in not making a great reduction, but, on the contrary, in making an increase in order to make up for the exhaustion of those supplies which remained over at the end of the war. It was false economy to let the stores get too low. In regard to the question of making a sweeping reduction of the number of men, again he thought the right hon. Gentleman had done well to advance slowly. He had shown that a reduction could be made without making those changes which were the most unsettling things in the Army. He had succeeded in making a reduction notwithstanding the fact that he took over

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  the Estimates already prepared by another Secretary of State, and having had but little experience and only three short months to work in. In looking through the Estimates he had recognised the truth of the fact which the right hon. Gentleman had pointed out, namely, that military expenditure had the peculiarity of an absence of finality, the effect of which was that expenditure incurred in this year might have to be paid for by a still larger expenditure in the course of another three or four years. They had that exemplified very strongly in the unfortunate change which was made a few years ago, when the whole terms of service in the Army were suddenly altered, and a three years term adopted instead. That change was being paid for to-day by no less a sum than £300,000. There was £220,000 as increase for reserve pay; £30,000 as increase in the cost of recruiting, because as the three years men were gone they must get others in their place; there was another increase of £32,000 for bounties given to men to re-engage in order to make up the waste which was not properly calculated before; and, further, there was another £20,000 for various allowances which came in in consequence of the increased cost of raising further men; making a total of £302,000. If the right hon. Gentleman could find a means of putting an end to that form of expenditure he would advance a considerable distance towards the solution of the problem which he had before him. The right hon. Gentleman had very truly said that the question of the reduction of the number of men lay in another department, the key to which really was India. That was a question upon which the House would have to declare itself upon another occasion. But there was a moral to which he would draw attention from this example, which showed that the right hon. Gentleman was advancing along a proper line when he did not express any intention of making great and sudden changes. The Army required, above all things, a period of rest. There was nothing that so contributed to the efficiency of the Army as the knowledge that there was some sort of security that what existed to-day would not be changed to-morrow. The first condition
  718
  of an Army was that there should be a steady supply of men, and equally that there should be a good supply of capable and efficient officers. When the terms of service were changed, as they had been during recent years, they could not wonder that there was not that anxiety to enter His Majesty's service that there should be and that there had been in the past. They saw in the units to-day men serving side by side under no less than four different systems of enlistment. Each one of those different terms of service was a grievance to the other three. It was impossible that they could all be equally satisfied, and they were therefore establishing in the units, by those things, a condition of things which militated most seriously against the efficiency of the Army. With regard to the provision of officers, the right hon. Gentleman had spoken of the arrangements which he hoped to bring about to raise the educational standard of the Army. He would ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider also whether he could not introduce the highest possible standard of competition among the younger officers of the service. They had, in the Army, a system totally different from that in the Navy, in that the junior ranks of the Army were dealt with entirely by seniority, while the senior ranks only became subject to selection. In the Navy the junior ranks were more subject to selection than they were in the Army. If they could raise the spirit of emulation among their junior officers they would find that the Army had an even larger number of highly educated and efficient officers to draw upon than it had at present.
  MR. LEA (St. Pancras, E.)said he wished to preface his remarks by thanking very heartily the right hon. the Secretary of State for War for his announcement that flogging was to be abolished in the military prisons of this country. He sincerely hoped that that removed the last vestige of corporal punishment in the Army.
  And, it being half-past Seven of the clock, the debate stood adjourned till this Evening's Sitting.

EVENING SITTING.

  SUPPLY (ARMY ESTIMATES).
  Order read, for resuming adjourned debate on Question [8th March], "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
  Question again proposed.
  Debate resumed.
  MR. LEA, continuing his speech, said with regard to the reduction of our military expenditure, that Members of this House must have viewed with alarm the growth of the Army Estimates during the last twelve years. When they realised that in that period the expenditure had almost doubled, it must be with regret that they noted that there had been no improvement as regarded efficiency. He had noticed a very strong desire, in London and in the country, to see a very great reduction in both the Army and Navy Estimates. He did not however, view a reduction in the Naval Vote with either complacency or sympathy. It must be remembered that we had to face an absolutely different military problem from that of any Continental Power. We were a great manufacturing country, dependent on other countries for our food supply; for that reason it was of paramount importance that we should keep our trade routes open, and that necessitated our having an important Navy. In his opinion the financial resources of this country could not stand the strain of the expense of an Army on the Continental pattern and an important Navy as well. Therefore, he had no hesitation in urging the House to press the right hon. Gentleman to give some assurance that in the next few years he would make a substantial reduction in the Army Estimates. In his opinion there never was, and never could be, any fear of an armed invasion of these Islands. In the first place the fighting force employed would have to be of sufficient magnitude to overcome any possible opposition brought against it in the first four or five days after it had landed on our shores. It was computed that such a force would require to be 40,000 or 50,000 men, and the amount
  720
  of shipping necessary to bring such a force over could not be massed at any foreign port without giving the British Admiralty ample time to mobilise the Fleet, and render any such attempt unsuccessful. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon had said that any continental nation would look upon the sacrifice of 10,000 men as a cheap price to pay for the occupation of one of our naval arsenals, but he thought that had the right hon. Gentleman been more familiar with the defensive works of our arsenals he would not have made the remark. If we were at war with a continental nation it would be unnecessary to bring an invading force to this country or to subject it to any force whatsoever, because when once we lost the control of the trade routes and food supplies ceased to come in we should be face to face with famine; invasion would be rendered unnecessary, and to maintain a great army at home to provide for such a problematical state of things was throwing a burden upon the country which it ought not to be called upon to bear. The Army of this country should be as small as possible in times of peace, but should, through its training and organisation, be capable of very vast expansion in time of war, but not such an expansion as the hysterical and frenzied expansion that took place in the spring of 1900, which resulted in large amounts of public money being wasted. At present the Army was largely over-manned, but the number of men borne on the strength of the Army very much depended on the course pursued by the particular Government in power. We had now some 20,000 men in South Africa. That was a great expense to the taxpayer of this country. The object of these men being there was to overawe the Boers who were disarmed. As soon, however, as the Chinese outrages took place the Boers were allowed to have arms for their protection against the Chinese marauders, and the result was that in the event of an explosion those arms would be used against the men who were there to overawe and keep down the Dutch. There was no doubt that the state of Parties in the present Parliament was due to a deep sense of resentment on the part of the people of this country at the growth of the naval and

  721
  military expenditure and many who sat on the Liberal side of the House were very greatly disappointed that in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War there had been no forecast of any reduction in the Estimates. They all realised that whilst this vast expense was going on the great social reforms for which the country was waiting were marking time; that it was impossible to carry them out while money was being spent and wasted in this unproductive fashion. It was not for him to say where reduction should be made, but the people required a reduction and he should have great sympathy with any Liberal Member who had to meet his constituents at the next election knowing that no great reduction had been made. The great reform, the only reform that they must ask for was to make the British officer earn his pay and live on it. The officer of the future must be a different man from the officer of the past. The military officer was not comparable with any other professional man in civil life in the strenuousness with which he learned and conducted his business. As an efficient servant of the taxpayer he was one of the greatest frauds that ever existed. It had been said that the British military officer was badly paid, but he was better paid than officers in any continental army and was less efficient. All the campaigns and expenditure in which we had been engaged during the last twenty years had commenced with a series of ghastly blunders, many of them being the result of inefficiency and the want of study on the officers' part, and those blunders had to be redeemed by the lives of our soldiers. We did not even learn from experience, because the blunders of fifty years ago were perpetuated in more recent times. The charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava had its counterpart in the charge of the Lancers in the Egyptian Campaign. The deploying of the guns in a very exposed position in Afghanistan was the prototype of the incident in the Battle on the Tugela in the last war, when Lord Roberts' son lost his life in attempting to recapture the guns there The blunder of Spion Kop was a mere reproduction of that at Majuba, with
  722
  this difference, that at Spion Kop the generals were at the bottom of the hill. No one could come to any other conclusion than that the success of our expeditions had been the result of the pluck and luck of our men. It was only that which brought us through. It certainly was not generalship, and the sacrifice of life and money would have been considerably less if those responsible had been more efficient and more conversant with their duties. He attributed the inefficiency of our officers to the training they received, which in his opinion was of the wrong kind, and he advocated the adoption of a system more nearly analogous to that adopted at West Point, U.S.A. He also suggested that there should be a much larger percentage of men raised from the ranks to a commission, and that promotion should be by way of selection and not by seniority; that an inspecting officer should visit the various regiments and battalions and work with them for a fortnight at a time, giving no notice of his visits, and that they should select for promotion those whom they thought most fit to be promoted.
  MR. J. R. MACDONALDsaid he desired to draw attention to the condition of labour in the arsenals, and to move, "That, in the opinion of this House, the conditions of labour in the Arsenals should be, as regards hours, wages, and right of combination equal to the best trade union private firm." In doing so he took the opportunity of thanking the right hon. Gentleman for the very generous and sympathetic references he had made in his very remarkable speech to the relations which ought to exist between the War Office as an employer of labour and those it employed. Labour Members generally would like the right hon. Gentleman to repeat in the House also some of the welcome assurances which he had given to deputations outside, and to enable the right hon. Gentleman to deal with one or two points, he would draw attention to one or two matters in connection with the Resolution he proposed to move.
  The right hon. Gentleman was well aware of the conditions of labour in

  723
  the arsenals, but his remarks on that point did not quite cover the whole field, because there was a large body of labour outside these arsenals which required sympathetic attention much more than even the labour inside the arsenals. For the purposes of discussion this evening he did not propose to refer to those matters because they felt perfectly certain that the right hon. Gentleman would approach those matters from the point of view of reform. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would approach the subject of the underpaid workers and the underpaid women workers in precisely the same frame of mind as that in which he approached the subject of the better paid arsenal skilled worker. He dared say it was impossible to dissociate military control from a certain amount of particularism, a certain narrowness of view, and a certain amount of red tape. As an illustration, he mentioned what went on regarding new engagements at Enfield Lock and other places. When a man's application for a situation had been received he was ordered to be vaccinated. The right hon. Gentleman would not suppose that one of the Members for Leicester could allow that to go without a protest. The man was a week off duty, and got no pay. He had to pay for his own vaccination, although it was carried out by the doctor on the spot, and the dispenser, he was informed, sailing very near to what remained of the Truck Act, actually went round the shops and collected half-crowns from the victims whom the right hon. Gentleman had ordered to be vaccinated. He felt sure that the Minister who earlier in the day had made sympathetic statements about the relations between the Government and its workpeople would put an end to that. The right hon. Gentleman might take it that that was only one instance of many similar things belonging to a class of relationship which he hoped would soon be put an end to. In considering the question of Government employment in arsenals he would like to approach it from the point of view from which the right hon. Gentleman approached his task this afternoon. What was the idea of an arsenal? Why did we have arsenals? That was a question it would take a considerable time to explain
  724
  but one point that ought to be emphasised was that if the Government was going to have an arsenal at all it ought to be the most efficient machine for doing the work. Regularity and certainty of employment were necessary if that efficiency was to be obtained. They must adapt the whole machinery of the arsenal control so that the State would receive the most efficient service from the staff of men employed there. The essential condition of efficiency in the arsenals was a proper minimum wage. If the right hon. Gentleman made up his mind to treat the men as though he was a model trades union employer he could count on the support of the Labour Members, and count also on their protection against illegitimate pressure being put upon him. In that connection he reminded the right hon. Gentleman there were about 3,000 workers in Woolwich whose wages were under 24s. per week. In view of the expensive living in London he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would listen sympathetically to the request that the minimum should be raised to 30s. per week. He drew attention also to the methods of work under the War Office. He thought the War Office had been a little too fond of piece work in the most aggressive, aggravating, and objectionable form. Piece work was always work done in a rush, and men were actually engaged on piece work in the danger houses. The mere mention of this fact would, he did not doubt, set the Department on an investigation, which would result in the discovery of a serious grievance that ought to be remedied. He called attention also to some serious attempts to reduce the standard of pay for piece work. He cited several instances of what he regarded as attempts to grind down the wages of the men to the lowest point, and expressed the hope that the right hon. Gentleman would also institute an investigation into this matter. He was glad to find the right hon. Gentleman had committed himself to the recognition of trades unionism, but he was not sure how far some of his subordinates thought he had committed them. He had a letter written only the day before by one of the right hon. Gentleman's subordinates of the Royal Army

  725
  Clothing Department, declining to receive a trade union deputation in regard to the case of some men who had been discharged. He was glad a Wages Board was to be created, for, if fairly and equitably constituted, it would do an enormous amount of good. It would raise the level of labour and make the workman more comfortable as the Government servant. He suggested, however, that the right hon. Gentleman might adopt the course pursued by the Postmaster-General and inquire into the whole subject of the basis of employment and the organisation of labour. He begged to move.
  MR. BARNESseconded the Amendment, and said he wished to associate himself with what had fallen from his hon. friend as to the very remarkable speech they had heard from the War Minister that afternoon. They welcomed the slight improvements which had been effected, and took them as an indication of much more that would follow. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would find ways of dealing with the matter in a larger and more comprehensive way than had yet been done, so that the social and industrial measures which they desired might be passed through this House as early as possible in order to effect some relief from the burdens which the people had to bear. That result could not be effected unless there was economy on the one hand and a new source of revenue obtained on the other hand. Those with whom he was associated welcomed the desire manifested by the right hon. Gentleman to connect the Army with the civic and social life of the people of the country. It might be that these contemplated changes would not have as their first result the lessening of the risk of war; but ultimately they believed it would have that effect, as it would tend to introduce that feeling of responsibility on the part of the people of this country which must be brought to bear upon questions of that kind. He also welcomed the declaration of the right hon. Gentleman that the Department would be prepared to sanction a system of collective bargaining between themselves and the workmen. The workers had to thank the present Prime Minister
  726
  for doing, while he was War Minister, what he could to improve the condition of the workmen, it being largely due to the right hon. Gentleman that the workmen enjoyed the eight hours day. The right hon. Gentleman said then that the workshops of the Government ought to be as good as those of private employers in regard to pay and conditions of labour. To illustrate the present position he would take the case of one class of men engaged at Woolwich Arsenal, viz., the engineers. The average rate of wages of those employed by the first flight of employers in the whole of the London district was 41s. 5d. The minimum under which no man who was a member of the Society of Amalgamated Engineers could be allowed to take employment was 39s. At Woolwich Arsenal 90 per cent. of the men were only receiving 37s. 6d., and there were a number of men working at 35s. and less. Then the system of piece work was defective, and under it he had know men to work for 30s. a week. The system of fixing prices was also wrong, and he knew of one man who worked for thirty hours and got 8s. So far as he was concerned, and he thought he was voicing the opinion of trade unionists generally, they thought that a man, who had served seven years, at the termination of his employment should be brought to the standard rate of wages in his trade. While the best employers did not do so, there were many employers who paid from 2s. to 4s. less than the standard rate on the termination of apprenticeship, but who in no instance, so far as he knew and so far as the agreement between the trades union and employers were concerned, retained the wage below the standard rate after the age of twenty-three. But in the Woolwich Arsenal it was customary to pay these men about £1 or a guinea a week, and it was only with the utmost difficulty that they could get the standard rate of wages until five or six years after the termination of their apprenticeship. This was an insidious way of reducing wages, and one which might well be looked into. He had made an inquiry as to the practice in the Royal Dockyards, and he found that at Devonport, on the termination of a man's apprenticeship, he was paid only 2s. below the rate, and the full rate was

  727
  paid him at the termination of a year. The same was the case at Sheerness, and Portsmouth; and, at Chatham, the full rate was paid at the termination of the man's apprenticeship. He asked the right hon. Gentleman to at least bring the War Office conditions up to the standard recognised by the Admiralty. Still more important was the question of the chances of promotion to the men in the Royal Arsenal now as compared with a few years ago. There seemed to have been a disposition on the part of all the departments of State for the last year or two to ear-mark all the posts of trust for men of University training, and to debar workmen from the chance of promotion they used to have. He admitted that some time ago there was room for improvement. As an old Arsenal workman he knew from experience that kissing sometimes went by favour, and therefore they were not at all averse to some examination—competitive if they liked—in order to ascertain if a man were really competent for these important duties. The report of a special Committee which sat in February or March of last year stated that the Committee were of opinion that the classes referred to as managerial should form the Upper Division, and that the qualifications of all should, if possible, include a University education of a standard to be approved. It might be thought that a man could at least aspire to be a foreman. But the Committee's recommendation on that point was that a man must have a University education if he would aspire to that rank. In answer to their protest the men were told that men had educated themselves in the past and could do so in the future to a point fitting them for the highest possible positions. He ventured to say that that was a mere playing with words. A man who had the necessary qualifications and had taken advantage of the opportunities which were now fortunately open to him at the Woolwich Polytechnic and other places should have the chance of rising to positions of trust and responsibility. It would be an incentive to them to give better and more loyal service, and therefore would be not only in the best interests of the men themselves, but of the Army and War Office administration.
  728
  Amendment proposed—
  "To leave out from the word 'That,' to the end of the Question, in order to add the words 'in the opinion of this House, the conditions of labour in the Arsenals should be, as regards hours, wages, and right of combination, equal to the best trade union private firm'."—(Mr. Ramsay Macdonald.)
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. HALDANE: I have no exception to take to the tone of the mover and seconder of the Amendment. I have always felt that much of the difficulty which arises over these questions of wages and hours of labour is due to the abstract nature of the questions raised. I think the House will agree that a good many of the points raised by both hon. Members are points which it is impossible to debate across the floor of the House, but which are eminently adapted for discussion by such a joint Committee of the War Office and representatives of the men as we announced some little time ago we were prepared to appoint. We cannot bind ourselves by the discussions of such a Committee, but the result will have very great weight with me in coming to a decision as to what ought to be done. There are some other points which appeared to raise questions of another kind. There is the question of vaccination, which was raised by the hon. Member for Leicester. The origin of the system under which the War Office insist on the vaccination of the people who enter the employment at Enfield is that, some years ago, there was a scare and the men came and asked for it. The War Office provide vaccination at their own expense, and if a man is ill as the result of the vaccination the War Office give him sick-pay during that time. I am strongly in favour of vaccination in these cases as a preventive against an outbreak of smallpox, but, in asking for it, I recognise that the charge should come upon the public and not on the employee. We do not propose to alter the system, but I can assure the hon. Member that, if there is any case, as I gather there is a case, in which a fee of half-a-crown has been asked, it shall be very strictly dealt with. I agree with the hon. Member

  729
  that we ought to do all we can in our power to make the Arsenal a model of efficiency. I am very sorry that other calls upon my time in connection with the duties of my office have prevented me from spending quite as much time as I should have liked to do with the nationalised industry, but I do my best. As hon. Members know, we have swept away, as far as possible, the whole system of red tape which prevented men from having access to us for the purpose of having their grievances considered. I do not want every workman who has a grievance to come and see me; but my instructions are that a workman shall have free access to the person with whom he is in direct contact, that we shall lay down no abstract rules to prevent a trade union representative accompanying him, and that, in cases of grievances affecting classes of men or questions of principles, there shall be, if necessary, free access to the Secretary of State. We want to get at the truth of the matter. We wish to be model employers, frugal employers, it may be, but, dealing on the footing of the standard rate we wish to do everything we can to show that we are what we mean to be, model employers. It is my wish that the question of whether there is a satisfactory minimum wage at Woolwich Arsenal, and the question of the men who are receiving 24s. a week shall be brought before the joint Committee for investigation. With regard to the difficult question of fellowship piece work, the system was abolished in the case of lyddite shells, because I am perfectly certain it led to pressure. I shall be quite ready to look into the matter as it affects the handling of gunpowder, but other things that are done under the system, such as filling cartridges with cordite, stand on a different footing. So far as apportionment is concerned, that is a matter which we desire to look into. We have no interest in the matter except to see that everyone gets fairly paid for his labour. The system has been in existence for a long time, and it enables some men to earn a good deal of money which they might not otherwise earn. As to the question of over-staffing with superior officers, that is not a mistake the Government are prone
  730
  to make, because the Treasury look with the utmost jealousy at every superior appointment that is made. I do not think it is likely that there are too many superior appointments at Woolwich, but I am prepared to examine any representations that are made about slowness in the promotion of the men. For these superior positions we require men with scientific knowledge, though that may not be absolutely indispensable. Hon. Members will realise that they are appealing to the wrong person if they ask me to abolish scientific knowledge for a good deal of the work that has to be done. My life had been spent in preaching the necessity for better education and scientific training. I would like to throw open the Universities in England, as they are thrown open in Scotland, to the working classes. I would rather the working classes took advantage of the increased facilities that are opening up to them and obtain that scientific knowledge than that they should press me to appoint them to these posts without the scientific knowledge that in many cases is indispensable. There may be cases at Woolwich where there may be a better system of promotion. That is a matter I will look into. My whole desire is to get the best men for the important places. There is no distinction now between a man in one kind of coat and a man in another kind of coat; the distinction now is between brains. With regard to the clothing factory, I think there has been a mistake. I am told that the two men to whom reference has been made are kept on. We cannot discuss individual cases in this House; we can only discuss general questions, and I have given an earnest of the way in which I shall endeavour to deal with all matters relating to Woolwich Arsenal, Enfield Arsenal, and the Pimlico clothing factory. At Woolwich there are some things which contrast very well with what takes place at private yards. There is the 48 hours week system. If there are any big questions of principle, I and my hon. friend are always accessible, and we hope to have this conference going before very long, at which these and other thorny matters can be threshed out. That is the spirit in which we are handling the whole of the labour question,

  731
  and I hope we shall find we are all really of the same mind and are all working for the good of the community.
  MR. CROOKSjoined in the general congratulations extended to the Secretary of State for War upon his speech, and agreed absolutely with the rights hon. Gentleman that they wanted to deal with general principles. There was a question he wished to ask, and that was whether a man who had a conscientious objection to vaccination and had obtained an exemption certificate from a magistrate would be compelled to be vaccinated before he was taken on.
  MR. HALDANE: I do not know, but if I had to decide the matter, I should say the man would have to be vaccinated. That would be my decision from the point of view of the good of the community.
  MR. CROOKSsaid he would accept that. Having put a man out of work they ought to pay him.
  MR. HALDANE: While he is being vaccinated.
  MR. CROOKS: It is not unreasonable to ask you to pay him for the whole time. The man should be paid while the lymph is germinating.
  MR. HALDANE: If a man who is in our employment has to be vaccinated, he is paid while the lymph is germinating. There seems to be some confusion about this, but if there is anything wrong I will see that it is put right.
  MR. CROOKSsaid there were one or two points to which he desired to call the right hon. Gentleman's attention. He wished to know if all the women working in the Pimlico factory were getting sufficient wages to keep them. He had been making inquiries as to who these women were, and he was told that they were mostly the wives of old soldiers who were given work as compensation for the good behaviour of their husbands. Preference was given to them in proportion to the size of the family, and a
  732
  widow with four children would have preference over a widow with one child. He had ascertained that these women were paid 11s. a week. He told one of the officials that he thought that wage meant starvation, and the answer he received was, "Yes, but it is constant." Of course it was permanent starvation. Too much importance might be attached to the scientific attainments of a young man, and much of his apparent knowledge might be matter of memory. He should, in addition, give evidence of being practically acquainted with the work. The wages paid in some of the departments were quite inadequate, and he attributed the higher percentage of accidents among the lower paid men to the constant domestic worry caused by insufficient payment. It was not to be expected that the Secretary of State for War should have personal knowledge of all the matters referred to, but it was a grievous mistake to rely upon figures giving the average rate of wages, for the average was often arrived at by including a number of highly paid officials whose services were not required. The average wage might be comforting to the fellow at the top, but it was no comfort to the fellow at the bottom. They had been promised sympathetic consideration, but that was not what they wanted. Sympathy was cheap. He used to be told that the cheapest thing they could get was advice, but since he had been a Member of Parliament he had come to the conclusion that advice had been outclassed by sympathy. When the Arsenal workmen heard of this promised sympathy to-morrow morning he expected they would ask the tallyman to let them have a suit of clothes on the strength of it. In times of peace when there were a lot of people looking around to find something to keep them out of mischief, the Government sent them down to the arsenal and gave them titles and they went round the works ordering people about. If those men did the same thing in private works the employers would send to the nearest police station to have them removed. The Treasury ought to keep a separate account as to the cost of these men. These men were called supervisors, and it was said that they were learning something. He did not mind this so much,

  733
  but he objected to the men's wages being cut down in order that these people should be found soft jobs. It was a wicked thing that such men should be there at all, with their titles and their salaries, because it meant grinding down the wages of the most useful workmen in the arsenal. It was no use saying that the Secretary to the Treasury would not stand it, because the workmen ought to be paid a proper wage. The Government had attracted the best workmen into their service because the men believed that Government employment was the best, but promotion was very slow, and there was a good deal of discontent, which was due to the fact that they were overstaffed with officials. When the question was investigated it would be clearly demonstrated to the right hon. Gentleman that there were many officials they could do without. It was all very well to say that the men could come forward and state their case, but they did not all possess the same amount of moral courage, and they all knew the influence of the overlooker. He hoped that the Secretary of State would accept this Resolution and that the Government would make up its mind to pay trade union wages and observe trade union conditions in all Departments. Of course they had the right to demand in return the best labour the men could give. They did not wish to increase the cost to the country, but the account ought to be separated, and so much put down for the work actually done and so much for the superfluous members of the staff. If this were done then they might be able to get decent wages for the poor women and the workmen, and also be able to deal with some of the pensioners. In the lyddite explosion it had been clearly demonstrated that piecework caused the death of those sixteen men. There was a big field in which improvements might be brought about in the arsenal, and the idlers ought to be told that the Government could do without them. If they got rid of about 90 per
  734
  cent, of the officials the workmen would be able to do the work better.
  COLONEL LOCKWOODreferred to the discharge of men at Waltham Abbey. He should be glad to know if there was any prospect of a re-engagement of those men. Some of them had been for five or six years in the service and they were practically starving. He did not wish to press the right hon. Gentleman unduly in this matter, but he wished to know whether there was any hope for them or any prospect of being employed in the factory to which they had been attracted by the hope of Government work.
  MR. HALDANEsaid that the answer must depend on what supply of cordite the War Office required. The employment was spread as much as possible, so as to make it regular. But the War Office could not control the demand for cordite.
  COLONEL LOCKWOODsaid he understood that more work was to be given to the Government factories than to private firms.
  MR. HALDANEsaid they had to consider workmen in other parts of the country as well as in Government factories. The War Office tried to maintain an even balance, but they were bound in the interests of the State to support these other factories, but they tried to do the best they could for their own employees.
  MR. LUPTONthought that in the speech of the Secretary of State for War there were grounds for hope that that economy would be secured which Liberals had preached to the people all over the country. He entirely sympathised with the remarks of the hon. Member for Leicester and with his Amendment. He thought fair wages could be found without increasing the Estimates if they went in for reductions of expenditure in other directions. He

  735
  should like to point out to the House the sources from which the money might come. The right hon. Gentleman on the Opposition Bench had asked where they could make those reductions without impairing the efficiency of the Army. He would like to point out that the garrisons in South Africa, Malta, China—
  MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! The hon. Member must confine his remarks to the Question before the House, namely, the Amendment moved by the hon. Member for Leicester.
  MR. LUPTONsaid that with reference to the Amendment moved by the hon. Member for Leicester, the Secretary of State for War did not altogether touch the point with regard to the compulsory vaccination of the men in the works, and it was open to question whether he ought to force his views on this subject upon unwilling workmen. As far as the management of the works was concerned there was not the slightest reason why a man who went through a Government establishment should not become a most scientific engineer. Workmen, by studying in the evening, had educated themselves, and had risen to the highest positions, and he trusted that the way would be cleared for allowing the workmen to rise to the higher positions. It should be made essential that those who were placed in charge of the workmen should go through the humbler positions, and get a practical knowledge of their work, and that, combined with scientific knowledge, would give efficiency. Let the staff see that those at the top had gone through the various stages of labour, and then they would get much greater efficiency than they obtained at the present time. He sympathised with the remarks of the hon. Member for Leicester, and if any men were underpaid and were not getting a fair living wage he hoped the Government would set an example by removing any such blot from Government employment.
  MR. LANE-FOX (Yorkshire, W.R., Barkston Ash)said that first of all he should like to allude to the speech of the hon. Member for East St. Pancras. He believed that it was considered bad form for a new Member to be criticised in this House, but his excuse was that he started from the same level, because he was also a new Member. When an hon. Member of this House who had served His Majesty stood up and said that a British officer was not a workman in the sense that he was not doing work, that he was the greatest fraud on earth, and that this was due to the bad training he received at a public school, then he had no hesitation in saying that the hon. Member would come to regret that one of his earliest speeches in this House contained such a statement as that, which was absolutely unfounded. He regretted that the hon. Member was not now in his place, but he felt sure that all those who heard his speech would be ready to repudiate what he had said, and they would be ready to tell him what their opinion of him was. To pass to a more savoury subject, he entirely disagreed with the remarks he made and his covert attack upon the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War. He should like to endorse the opinions expressed in the very remarkable speech which they had heard from the right hon. Gentleman representing the War Office. The appeal which the right hon. Gentleman made not only to the House but to the country would not fail to be responded to by those who took an interest in Army matters. He was afraid when the right hon. Gentleman spoke of decentralisation he might not always receive the encouragement he would like. If this matter drifted into the hands of some county councils, he feared that some would not be as enthusiastic as they ought to be. He was a member of the West Riding County Council. They had strong opinions on certain questions; he wished he could think their enthusiasm on imperial matters was as

  737
  strong as on some others. At all events, he hoped that if the right hon. Gentleman made an appeal to the country it would be successful, and that the country would rally to him and make the Army a truly national concern. The particular thing he wished to allude to was the disappointment it had been to him and some other Members that further reference was not made to the question of rifle ranges. The right hon. Gentleman had asked what forms of waste there were which could be done without. One was the waste of time and money and ammunition incurred by many members of our Auxiliary Forces, when they came to the range to shoot. It was not their fault or that of their officers, but because they had not had a proper opportunity of being trained and taught to shoot before they went on to the range to shoot their course. They knew this was not the moment to ask the right hon. Gentleman to incur expense, but they hoped when the Liberal ship did come in he would find an opportunity of spending money on this particular branch of the service, because he was sure it would save a great deal of waste that was going on at the present moment. A great deal was being done by means of Morris tubes and other devices, but that was not enough. In his own part of the world he did his best to have a rifle range started not many years ago. They got the land and a good deal of money given, and he believed they could have carried it through if they could have got more money. They wrote to the War Office when the late Government was in power asking for £150, and they were told there were no finances to provide the money. Had that £150 been given a rifle range would have been in existence for the use of Volunteers from a large tract of country, who would thus have been far more competent to go on the range and shoot their course. This was a distinct waste that was going on, and he hoped
  738
  the right hon. Gentleman would see his way to help our population to become what a great many wished—efficient servants of the State and soldiers. He desired to point out another item of expenditure which, if slightly increased, would give a much larger value. He referred to the sum in the accounts for the provision of horses and riding schools One thing which was much wanted in the Yeomanry was an opportunity of more riding parade before the actual training came on, and he suggested that the grant of £100 should be doubled. The speech of the right hon. Gentleman would give satisfaction throughout the country, because everybody would recognise they had had a promulgation from the Government Bench which would secure continuity of policy. He did not agree that it was a mistake to have a big Army and a big Navy. He assured the House he should go to bed that night with a very much greater sense of security and sleep better for having heard the speech of the Secretary of State for War, because he felt that the country was absolutely safe in his hands. He was sure that everything he had said would be endorsed by the Conservative Party to which he belonged.
  MR. HALDANEappealed to the House to let the Speaker now leave the Chair. The whole debate would still remain open, and he would be enabled to reply to the speeches which had been made. This he could not otherwise do.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Main Question put, and agreed to.

  SUPPLY.
  Considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  [Mr. EMMOTT (Oldham) in the Chair.]

ARMY ESTIMATES, 1906–7
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a number of Land Forces not

739
exceeding 204,100, all ranks, be maintained for the Service of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland at Home and Abroad, excluding His Majesty's Indian Possessions, during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1907."
MR. HALDANEsaid he understood the desire was that the debate should continue.
LORD CASTLEREAGHsaid he thought the service Members in the House should take a very prominent part in the debate, and he was sure the House would not withhold from them that indulgence which was always extended to a minority when they endeavoured to point out anything which they felt was not conducive to the well-being of their profession. For the most part the speech of the War Secretary was a great source of gratification to them, and they now felt that that economy about which they had heard so much would not be practised with regard to the Army, because he considered that no large economy could be effected without seriously impairing the efficiency of the Army. He considered they were certainly indebted to the late Government for the steps they had taken with regard to efficiency. They had had tributes from both sides of the House that the Army was perhaps now in a better condition than before. They were, to some extent, in agreement with the Prime Minister in his antipathy to large armaments; but, until the day arrived when national disputes would be settled by arbitration, it was incumbent upon them to assist the Government in maintaining these armaments which alone could ensure for us that place we ought to occupy among the nations of the world. He noted with satisfaction that the War Secretary had made no allusion to a reduction in the number of units in the Army. The rumour of such reductions had had a most disquieting affect upon
740
Members belonging to the service, for such reductions must have constituted a danger to the country. He felt that in the units, in times of peace, they had systems of organisation which in times of war could carry out an efficient service. It did not matter if in times of peace those units were in skeleton condition, because in time of war it had been proved that the military spirit of the country was not wanting. They welcomed the suggestion of the Secretary of State for War with regard to the continuing of the policy of the late Government, and they would all go home with a feeling of far greater security. Referring to the training of officers the noble Lord advocated an improvement of the courses through which the officer went on first joining. At present, instead of learning, he crammed a subject. He admitted that it would be an excellent thing if officers could go to Oxford and Cambridge, but he thought there was plenty of scope provided at Sandhurst for them to learn their profession. The Militia officer, probably had his own profession to which he had to devote most of his time, consequently the question arose as to how the Militia officer could be trained so as to efficiently handle the men placed under him. There was nothing easier than to train the ordinary Englishman to take his place as an efficient soldier in the ranks; but he thought the War Secretary should turn his attention to the difficulty of educating the officer in the efficient handling of men. The noble Lord next referred to the question of the Volunteers, and expressed the hope that the Volunteer force would be divided up into brigades of uniform size, and trained as brigades, under the supervision of the officer who would command in time of war. The main point in which they could congratulate themselves was that they felt, as officers, that the Secretary of State for War had the interest of the Army at heart, and he assured that right hon. Gentleman that he would have the

741
support of everyone who, like himself, was in the Army.
MR. VERNEYsaid he desired to offer a few words on the connection between the Universities and the Army. That, he thought, was a matter of very great importance. Oxford and Cambridge had opened their curriculum very largely in the course of the last fifty or sixty years. There were those alive who remembered the time when no one could take a degree there except in classics or mathematics. Now a great diversity of subjects were admitted to the advantage of the country and of the Universities themselves. One might go to these Universities and take a degree in law, medicine, theology, science and languages, besides classics and mathematics, but, strangely enough, so far, military science had been left out. He thought the reason for that was that the Army up to this time had not been considered a learned profession but since the time of the Franco-Prussian war—from the days of Moltke down to the days of Marshal Oyama and Admiral Togo what had happened showed that unless the leaders of combatants by sea or land considered their duties from the point of view of members of a learned profession, they could not look for success. The success of those leaders had been gained by learning applied to the profession of which they had been so distinguished ornaments. The Universities might go a long way in the direction of giving a curriculum which an officer in the Army could avail himself of. The War Office might approach the Universities and the Universities might approach the War Office in regard to this matter. He had great hope that that was going to be done. There were two objections which might be raised. Of course anything like specialisation was very much opposed by many of the leaders in University life, and yet there had been introduced into our Universities in recent years a preparation of a very special kind for
742
certain professional careers. The objection on the military side was one which every soldier felt. Anything like an infringement of the privileges of seniority in the Army was felt to be serious, and it was looked upon with jealousy, he might almost say of a professional kind. It would not be popular in the Army, to say the least of it, to allow a man who had taken his degree at a University to have any seniority whatever in the Army over even the youngest cadet who had just left Sandhurst. His plea was that the Secretary of State for War should do what he could to remove these objections, so that the Universities might open their doors wider and give opportunities to officers who had time and opportunity for working at the scientific branches of their profession. Why was it that there had been in the country recently the anticipation of a great reduction in expenditure? He held in his hand what he thought was one of the most interesting tables of statistics of the armaments of Europe he had ever seen. It was a comparative table showing the increase of expenditure on European armaments including Navies in the ten years beginning with 1894 and ending with 1904. The gross increase of the expenditure on the armaments of France, Germany, Russia (before their war) and Italy, including expenditure on their Navies and Armies, was £27,000,000, while the gross increase in the United Kingdom of expenditure, including that on the Army and Navy during the same ten years, was no less than £50,000,000, or nearly double that of the four great military powers of Europe. He hoped there would be in the near future a great diminution in that enormous expenditure.
MR. GUESTsaid he wished to join in the general chorus of praise with which the speech of the right hon. the Minister for War had been greeted on all sides of the House. If any evidence were wanted of the remarkable

743
power which that speech revealed, it would be in the fact that the right hon. Gentleman had freed this military controversy from the trammels of Party considerations, and, what was more remarkable, had damped down the disappointment which from first to last his Estimates had created in regard to the reduction of military expenditure. The speech was one which revealed a moderation and a courage, not to say self-restraint, which had been absent from most of the speeches he had listened to from Ministers of War. The policy of the right hon. Gentleman fell into two divisions. First, the policy of dealing with small abuses, which he might call the policy of the new broom. The right hon. Gentleman was sweeping all the dirty corners of the War Office and was getting rid of the abuses which had grown up there, and had resulted in some of the ridiculous spectacles revealed in the military fortifications of London. Second, his policy was constructive and far-reaching. It was an elastic policy, because great stress was laid on having a system which could be adapted to peace and war conditions. Moreover, it was a policy which would be popular. He thought that in relying upon popular feeling the right hon. Gentleman had struck the best note of all. He believed that in these democratic times if we were to fight a war, it must be a popular war, not only from the considerations the right hon. Gentleman raised, but, above all, from financial considerations. The creation of a potential citizen force, and the intention shown by the right hon. Gentleman to rely on the local authorities, urban and rural, to give him assistance, was in conformity with the general movement of military events in this country as well as in Europe. That consideration was one which should fortify the right hon. Gentleman in the direction in which he was going, for every one of the countries of Europe was moving in the direction of a shorter conscriptive
744
period. In France the term had been reduced from three years to two, and in Prussia a shorter period was under consideration. There was a general tendency to rely more and more on a Militia than on a professional Army. That was the reason why he thought there was a great mistake last session when the proposal was made to make the Militia liable for foreign service. He anticipated that if a war was a popular one, the Militia would volunteer for such service. Some people were able to contemplate with equanimity those continental incursions which the War Office had not been able to get out of its mind; but he could not hide from himself that the popular spirit on which they relied might urge them in the direction of military operations and that the public temper might be bellicose; and from that point of view it was one of the best features of the right hon. Gentleman's policy that his popular force was not an existing, but a potential force, and would take time to realise.
MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: And in the meantime somebody may declare war upon us.
MR. GUESTsaid that anything like time and reflection between the adoption of an idea and its being carried into practical effect was repugnant to the right hon. Member for Croydon. That right hon. Gentleman's argument was covered by the consideration that we were separated from the Continent by a strip of water which made it impossible that hostilities could come upon us suddenly or with anything like rapidity. It was curious that the right hon. Gentleman, who was an extreme advocate of the Blue-Water School, should bring forward the idea now that we were liable to a sudden invasion. He was glad to see that two very considerable steps in advance had been made in the general doctrine which should guide our policy in regard to the

745
military position. The first of these was that we had entirely given up any idea of taking any part in continental wars. That idea, which originated in Mr. Brodrick's first speech on military re-organisation, was that we might, at any time, be called upon by treaty obligations to take a part in European wars, somewhat similar to the part we played in the Napoleonic wars. That idea was now wholly abandoned by the War Office, and he hoped that it would never be suggested in this House, as it was sometimes suggested outside, that the friendly relations between ourselves and France rendered us liable, if hostilities broke out between that Power and any other, to take any part in the operations which might ensue. There was one point in the right hon. Gentleman's speech which the hon. and gallant Member for Aber-cromby Division alluded to with some cautious words, and that was with refersence to the Cardwell system of linked battalions. He agreed that some hon. Members thought that the right hon. Gentleman had gone too far in supporting the Cardwell scheme in all its naked rigour. There were two views of the linked-battalion system. One was that it was essential for th maintenance of our Indian and Colonial forces, and the other was that it was quite unnecessary. He himself would not go to either extreme. The origin of the Cardwell system was that we must have a depôt at home to supply drafts to India and to the Colonies, and that at that depôt there might be a unit to supply a second battalion in case of war. That did not exclude the possibility of the depôt supplying drafts for two units; but he did not believe that that quality was necessary, and he contended that it had broken down in theory and in practice. In his humble opinion the reason why one battalion at home had never in practice been able to supply the drafts for more than one regiment in India or the Colonies, was
746
because of the waste that occurred at home. If it were possible to eliminate that waste it might be a different matter. The Secretary of State for War was very much impressed with the limitation of the funds at his disposal; but he would suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that there was another limitation even more absolute than that of money—viz., that of men. Mr. Brodrick was bitterly assailed for having made a paper Army, and it was principally a paper Army because the men recruited were of little value. They never came to maturity and never became a military asset. It was a waste of money to recruit badly, and that was why Mr. Brodrick's scheme was condemned. If the Secretary of State for War made up his mind to a smaller Army he would get a cheaper Army because he would not have the same waste. Let the right hon. Gentle man take his courage in both hands; let him face the expert advisers with whom he was on excellent terms, and he would be very much surprised if by his plausibility and tact the right hon. Gentleman was not able to affect great reforms in the Army. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would not think that he had any bias or prejudice because he had been associated in moving for the reduction of the infantry. He was glad that there was now at the War Office a right hon. Gentleman who was prepared to consider all these matters without prejudice or fear.
MR. ARNOLD-FORSTERsaid that the hon. Gentleman had repeated, not for the first time, one of many misrepresentations which had been made in regard to himself. Now that he was in a position of more freedom and less responsibility he had the opportunity of contradicting one by one these misrepresentations as they arose and he intended to do so, and perhaps hon. Members would not in the future misrepresent him again. The

747
hon. Gentleman had stated that he had expressed a view in regard to the possible invasion of this country which he had never expressed, and had reiterated a statement which he did not make. What he said was this—
"I have seen this matter stated in various ways. I have seen it stated that, provided our Navy is efficient, the greatest anticipation we can form in the way of the landing of a hostile Army would be a force of 5,000. I should be deceiving the House if I said that represented the extreme naval view. The extreme naval view is that the crew of a dinghy could not land in this country in the face of the Navy."
He hoped the hon. Member would do him the justice, when quoting his words, to repeat what he had actually said and not what the hon. Gentleman thought he said.
MR. GUESTsaid that his view on reading that passage was that the right hon. Gentleman was in substantial agreement with the dinghy idea. He did not want to pin the right hon. Gentleman to the number of men in the dinghy, but the point was whether the theory of the Blue Water School would hold water or not.
MR. ARNOLD-FORSTERsaid that that would not do at all. The hon. Gentleman had quoted a misstatement of what he had said, and was he now to understand that the hon. Gentleman withdrew that mis-statement that it had always been his policy that there was a danger to this country from raids—a danger which should be guarded against? He thought that was a very unhandsome apology on the part of the hon. Gentleman.
MR. GUESTsaid he did not withdraw the general contention that the right hon. Gentleman had said in his speech that not even a small force could be landed in this country.
SIR HOWARD VINCENTmoved to report progress and ask leave for the Committee to meet again.
Motion made and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress; and ask leave to sit again."—(Sir Howard Vincent)—put, and agreed to.
Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.

PARLIAMENTARY VOTERS (REGISTRATION) BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Debate arising.
MR. CREMERformally moved the Second Reading of this Bill.
SIR WILLIAM BULLsaid that they ought not at that hour of the night to proceed with a private Bill on a most important subject, containing sixty clauses.
And, it being Midnight, the debate stood adjourned.
Debate to be resumed to-morrow.
GEORGE WHITELEY (moved the adjournment of the House, and said that on Monday the Prime Minister would move the suspension of the twelve o'clock rule.
Adjourned at one minute after Twelve o'clock.