WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION BILL. (Hansard, 29 March 1906)

§ MR. AKERS-DOUGLAS (Kent, St. Augustine's)
said: On this Motion, I desire to ask a Question of the Under-Secretary for the Colonies—namely, whether he has any information to the effect that the Government of Natal have resigned, or tendered their resignation, and, if so, whether he can state the reasons which have led them to take this action.

§ MR. J. R. MACDONALD (Leicester)
asked whether the reports they had received in this country of certain Natal events which had happened yesterday and the day before were true. Those who had been following, week by week the course of public opinion in Natal understood that, at the present moment, that opinion was in a very dangerous and inflamed state. Consequently, he thought it was fair to say that martial law, carried out to the extreme capital sentence, ought to be very carefully revised by His Majesty's Government. He hoped the Under-Secretary for the Colonies would give the House an assurance that His Majesty's Government would demand that full information should be placed before them in regard to the sentences that had been passed by the Courts established under martial law, and that those sentences would be considered in cold blood, and not under conditions such as, unfortunately, existed in Natal at the present time. Re was the very last person, however, who would suggest for a moment that His Majesty's Government should interfere with the legitimate constitutional liberties of any of our Colonies. It was because he desired those constitutional liberties to be real and unassailable, when any unwarrantable attempt was made to assail them, that he hoped His Majesty's Government would recognise their grave responsibility to this country by revising the capital sentence passed on twelve natives under these inflamed conditions of public opinion. He hoped the Government would give the House an assurance that they would not allow the sentence to be carried out without the 1647 fullest investigation into the circumstances attending the act for which sentence had been passed.

§ MR. CHURCHILL
said he was much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the St. Augustine's Division of Kent, and to the hon. Member below the gangway, for having given him notice of the points they wished to raise. He would also acknowledge generally the moderation and caution which had characterised the observations of the hon. Member for Leicester. In reply he had to say that the Colonial Office yesterday received the following telegram from Sir Henry McCallum— Court-martial which tried murderers of police officers have sentenced twelve prisoners to he shot out of twenty-four tried for the offence. Proceedings of court-martial have been carefully reviewed by Governor in Council. The proceedings being in order and no injustice committed, I have accepted the unanimous advice of my Ministers that sentence shall he carried into effect. Another court-martial passed sentence of death on seven other natives, but as actions with which they were charged were not immediately connected with actual attack on police, the sentence in this case has been commuted. Lord Elgin immediately telegraphed— in some reports in the newspapers it was suggested that Lord Elgin was not the author of the telegram, and he need scarcely say that he himself would be guilty of no such unwarrantable presumption as to send a telegram on his own responsibility upon a matter of high State importance of this character— Lord ELgin telegraphed to the Governor of Natal asking for information and for a postponement of the execution of the sentences pending information. Had he not done so the twelve men who had been sentenced would have been shot at noon this day. He need scarcely say that His Majesty's Government had no intention of standing between persons convicted of murder and their proper punishment by law. They had no intention of invading the legitimate discretion of a responsible self-governing Colony, and certainly His Majesty's Government were not actuated by any want of sympathy with the people of Natal in the long and anxious trials through which they had been passing during the last three or four weeks. He thought that every one in the House who considered the question 1648 for a moment would see that a population not very numerous and in parts widely scattered, dwelling amongst a vast native population, must regard anything in the nature of turbulence and unrest as a matter which was of the most urgent and vital consequence to them and to all dependent upon them; but, having regard to the fact that it was the duty of the Government, from which they did not in any way recede, in the face of anything like a general native rising, or any serious emergency occurring, to come to the aid of the colonists of Natal with the armed power of the Crown, he thought it was not unreasonable that they should ask to be fully informed of any action taken under martial law for which an Act of Indemnity must ultimately receive the Royal Assent and of all steps involving life and death after the most imminent character of the emergency had passed away, before those steps had become irrevocable. Hon. Members had no doubt read in the newspapers the telegrams the Press agencies had sent to this country. He had at this moment nothing to add either by way of amplification or confirmation to those telegrams with regard to the action of the Natal Cabinet. Perhaps it might be possible to make a statement to-morrow or on Monday; but His Majesty's Government did not apprehend that any serious or grave constitutional issue would be raised. They had every reason to expect that the matter would be dealt with on both sides with composure and good feeling, and they believed that in following the path they had entered upon in sober integrity they would command and receive the support of the House of Commons.

§ SIR GILBERT PARKER (Gravesend)
said that the hon. Gentleman had not answered the Question whether the Executive Government of Natal had resigned or tendered its resignation.

§ MR. CHURCHILL
I said distinctly that I had nothing to add in the way of official information to the telegrams published in the newspapers, and when I have official information on the subject I shall take the earliest opportunity of conveying it. [Cries of "Is it true? "]

§ SIR GILBERT PARKER
asked whether the Government had received, through the Governor of Natal, the resignation of the Natal Government.

§ MR. CHURCHILL
No, Sir.

§ SIR GILBERT PARKER
asked whether the Natal Government had tendered its resignation. [Cries of "Answer."] He protested that the hon. Gentleman had not answered the Question which had been put to him. He would again press the hon. Gentleman. What they wished to know was whether the Natal Government had tendered its resignation through the Governor—whether the Government had information upon the point.

§ MR. CHURCHILL
said that the Government had no information which could be imparted to the House. [Cries of "Oh!".]

§ MR. EVELYN CECIL
asked how the Government of Natal was to be carried on if no Ministry could be induced to take office.

§ MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER
said it was perfectly evident that a very grave occurrence had taken place, and it was also perfectly evident that the Government had received information which they were not able to impart to the House. [An HON. MEMBER: Then why press for it?] He had a Question to ask. There was evidence to make the House believe that the Government of Natal had strong views on this question. He did not wonder that they had because, as the right hon. Gentleman said, the situation in Natal was very grave, and also this was a matter which had again and again been decided constitutionally in a sense which appeared to be entirely at variance with the action taken here. The law as he understood 1650 it was that in all our Colonies this prerogative must be exercised by the Governor on the advice of his own Ministers. The Governor had accepted the advice of the Ministry, but something had intervened which prevented the carrying out of the will of the Ministry and Government of Natal. The population of Natal was 82,000 whites and 956,000 natives, and it might be a very serious matter that the news should go out from this country that the whole constitutional machinery of Natal had been arrested by a telegram from England, admittedly sent without full knowledge of the facts, and admittedly contrary to the advice of the responsible advisers of the Crown in Natal. How long was this situation to last? Were His Majesty's Government prepared to take the full responsibility for any calamity that might occur as the result of this very unusual and very unconstitutional interference with the Government of a self-governing Colony? He did not think they had been ill-advised in raising this point. There was great urgency in not allowing human life to be sacrificed without endeavouring to ascertain what might be put forward on behalf of those accused. Still they ought to consider whether by interfering with the course of justice they might not be inflicting greater injury and by solacing their own views be acting contrary to the constitutional practice.

MR. STANLEY WILSON
asked why it had been left to an Under-Secretary to answer this most important Question. It was an insult to the House of Commons that the Leader of the House should absent himself from their debates at such a time.