LIQUOR TRAFFIC (LOCAL OPTION) (SCOTLAND) BILL.

HC Deb 26 April 1907 vol 173 cc386-460

Order for Second Reading read.

* MR. R. BALFOUR (Lanarkshire, Partick)

in moving the Second Reading, said he would endeavour to deal with the subject as briefly as possible. The evils of intemperance need not be dwelt upon; they must at various times have come within the cognisance of every Member of the House. The highest medical authorities had expressed themselves in unmistakeable terms on the subject, and many of our leading municipalities had issued warnings to their citizens with respect to the physical deterioration arising from the abuse of alcohol. Temperance reformers had laboured with this problem for many years, with a self-devotion which could not be too strongly recognised by the House. They had been called upon to struggle with the obstruction of vested interests, and with the indifference of those who claimed that the growth of public sentiment would be sufficient to bring about a better state of things, and that legislative interference was not necessary. Temperance reformers did not claim that intemperance could be removed from our borders by Act of Parliament, but they did claim—and that most strongly—that it could be greatly mitigated by legislation which would lead to the withdrawal or restriction of facilities for obtaining alcoholic iiquors—facilities which were so greatly in excess of reasonable requirements as to be a public scandal. It might be argued that the removal of facilities would not in itself reduce intemperance. They might as well, he suggested, argue against the efficacy of the petition, "Lead us not into temptation." But there was available evidence that cause and effect were very closely allied in this matter. The returns of cases of drunkenness in Glasgow for three-year periods before and after the passing of the Forbes-McKenzie Act were: before, 71,648; after, 53,146. Cases of drunkenness on Sunday for similar periods were: before the passage of the Act, 4,082; after, 1,466. There was further evidence to the effect that cases of crime committed when under the influence of drink during the same periods were: before the passage of the Act, 34,972; after; 19,370. These figures spoke for themselves. But let them take a more recent example in another country with which he was personally familiar. The city of San Francisco met with a great disaster about a year ago. Before the disaster there were about 3,200 public-houses, and arrests for drunkenness averaged about 1,500 per month. The public-houses were closed during May and June, and reopened during August and September. The arrests for drunkenness during the closed two months were 259, and for disturbance of the peace 78; while during the open two months the figures were 994 and 280 respectively. He maintained that these comparative figures afforded very strong evidence in support of the contention that intemperance could be effectively dealt with by the curtailment of facilities—that was, of temptation. This brought him to the consideration of the method of dealing with the question. The Bill before them applied to Scotland only, and there could, he submitted, be no question that Scottish opinion was pronouncedly in favour of the principle of local option, with power vested in the ratepayers to prohibit, or, alternatively, to restrict the opening of public-houses within their respective areas. The Bill introduced by Mr. Hunter Craig, lute Member for Govan, two years ago, entitled "Liquor Traffic Local Veto (Scotland) Bill," was discussed in the late Parliament on 5th May, 1905, and although it was defeated by a majority (Ayes, 109; Noes, 142) of 33, it was supported by thirty-three Scottish Members, against fourteen dissentients, or a majority of over two to one in favour of the Bill. Then let them take the record of the present Parliament. The local option Resolution, moved by his hon. friend the Member for the Appleby Division of Westmoreland on 10th April, 1906, was carried by a large majority (Ayes, 271; Noes, 44); and on that occasion it was supported by thirty-one Scottish Members against only three dissentients. They were entitled to assume that the opinion of the Scottish people on this subject was represented by the Scottish Members of the House, especially as their Vote in support of local control in the last Parliament had been so amply confirmed in the present Parliament, and it could not be disputed that the question of temperance legislation was fully before the Scottish people throughout the last General Election. If further confirmation of Scottish opinion was desired it was to be found on the records of the House, a large number of petitions—he understood about 550—having been lodged in support of the Bill, while about fifty five petitions had been lodged against it. Local option in various forms, doubtless designed to meet the varied wishes and circumstances of each case, had been adopted in most of our Colonies, and there was a progressive sentiment in the Colonies in favour of thus placing the control of the liquor traffic in the hands of the people. The same remark applied to the United States, and it was difficult to understand on what principle it could be maintained that the people whose comfort and well-being and whoso hearths and homes were alone concerned should not be empowered to control their own destinies in this, matter. Landowners had been accustomed to exercise the legal right of prohibiting or limiting the opening of public-houses on properties controlled by them. On what principle could it be maintained that communities should not be entitled to exercise the same privilege? Surely a community of people had rights at least equal to those of an individual. Arguments had been put forward that prohibition in localities would lead to the contamination of adjacent areas. But if that were so, the adjacent areas had the; remedy under the Bill in their own hands. Further, it had been argued that prohibition would result in evasions of the law. On that principle it might with equal force be claimed that there should be no punishment for crime because criminals sometimes evaded punishment; but for his own part he had confidence enough in the administration of the law in this country to feel sure that there was no ground to apprehend serious difficulties in that connection. For convenience he would state the details of the Bill. It provided that— A poll shall be taken upon a requisition signed by not less than one-tenth of the parish electors of the area. The parish electors are ratepayers. Electors may sign requisitions for both a prohibitory and limiting resolution, and where there are requisitions for both such resolutions, the poll on them shall be taken together. The poll shall be taken not earlier than three weeks, or later than four weeks, after the requisition or requisitions have been presented. When a poll is taken of both a prohibitory and a limiting resolution, an elector may not vote for more than one resolution. The votes on the prohibitory resolution shall be counted first, and if that resolution is carried, the votes on the limiting resolution shall not be counted. If the prohibitory resolution is not carried, the votes polled in favour of such resolution shall be added to those polled in favour of the limiting resolution. If a majority of not less than three-fifths of the votes recorded are in favour of a prohibitory resolution, the said resolution shall be carried, and so long as such prohibitory resolution remains unrepealed, no certificate shall be granted or renewed for the sale of excisable liquors within that area. And if a majority of the votes recorded are in favour of a limiting resolution, that resolution shall be carried, and, during the time such limiting resolution remains unrepealed, the number of certificates to be granted for the sale of excisable liquors within that area shall not exceed three-fourths of the number existing at the data of the poll, without prejudice to the discretion of the licensing authority to grant a less number of certificates than the three-fourths. In either case, the resolution shall come into operation in the area on the 28th day of May in the year succeeding that in which the poll is taken. Provision is made under which arrangements may be carried out with the licensing court for carrying out limiting resolutions on the most equitable terms. Where a prohibitory or limiting resolution is in force, a further poll shall not be taken before the expiration of three years from the date such resolution came into force, but after such expiration another poll may be taken: (a) if a prohibitory resolution is in force then, on a resolution for repealing the same, and (b) if a limiting resolution is in force, then on a prohibitory resolution, or on a resolution for further limitation, or a resolution for repealing the existing resolution; and the same majorities shall apply as in the case of the original poll. The local authorities and areas were set forth in Clause 7 of the Bill, and were believed to be in conformity with the conditions with which the Act would have to deal, It was proposed that the Act, so far as it related to existing certificates, should come into operation on the 28th day of May next, after the passing thereof, but the provisions of the Act relating to requisitions and taking of polls should come into operation immediately after the passing thereof. The governing principle of the Bill was that it conferred upon the inhabitants of local areas in Scotland the power to exercise a direct control over the liquor traffic in their neighbourhood. There might be points of detail in the Bill which would require modification, but that was a question for the Committee Stage; they now contended for the principle of the Bill. It did not legislate in advance of public opinion; it merely provided means under which the public could express their wishes, and give practical effect to them, and the possession of power—even if not exercised—to prohibit or restrict the issue of certificates would have a most wholesome influence upon the manner in which public-houses were conducted, and—where exercised—the promoters of the Bill held the view that there would be created in these areas "object lessons" of comfort and prosperity which would lead to the adoption of similar measures in other areas. He appealed to the House to give the Scottish people the power which they desired, and he begged to move the Second Reading of the Bill.

* MR. BARNES (Glasgow, Blackfriars),

in seconding the Motion, said arguments in favour of the measure were well known and had often been stated. The experience of our own Colonies and the Scandinavian countries had justified the statement that the time had arrived for some practical action to be taken. He wished to remove an erroneous impression which appeared to exist in the minds of some hon. Members in regard to the attitude of the Labour party upon legislation of this character. A few weeks ago the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydvil, whose enforced absence from the House he was sure they would all deplore, stated that drink was not the primary cause of unemployment. With that the Labour Party agreed, and would have agreed if he had said further that the primary cause of un-employment was the private ownership of the means of life. Upon that occasion the hon. Member was much misunderstood, and he wished to assure the House that the members of the Labour Party were glad upon all occasions to associate them-selves with any well-conceived effort to lessen an insidious and gigantic evil which, whatever might be said about its general consequences in regard to unemployment, they were all agreed was the cause of much individual unemployment, of poverty, suffering, and mental and physical weakness, and in its social and moral aspect was eating into the national life of the country and weakening national efficiency. The Labour Party Conference last year discussed the same proposition that was embodied in this Bill, and after a lengthy discussion it was found that delegates representing 660,000 were in favour of the proposal and those representing 103,000 against it. The significance and strength of those figures was emphasised when he pointed out that the 103,000 minority were by no means against temperance legislation, but were against this particular proposition because it did not go far enough to satisfy them. In seconding the adoption of the Bill he was speaking on behalf of the Labour Party. He was also speaking as a Scottish Member, and he had the authority of the Scottish Temperance Party who had dome him the honour of asking him to second this Motion. A strong argument in favour of the Bill was the fact that no less than sixty-one out of seventy-two hon. Members repre- senting Scotland were pledged to its support. If representative Government meant anything he thought that fact alone was sufficient to warrant the assent of Parliament being given to the Bill. In Scotland they had had Sunday closing for many years, and in recent years they had adopted earlier closing than formerly. A good deal of cheap sarcasm had been indulged in with regard to the Forbes-MacKenzie Acts, but no one in their sober senses in Scotland would desire to go back to the bad old time prior to the passing of those Acts. A good many figures had been submitted to the House in connection with convictions for drunkenness and things of that sort. He did not propose to give any figures, because he found they were often used to bamboozle people. Anyone who had ordinary intelligence and powers of observation could sec for themselves an immense improvement in the streets of Glasgow, Dundee, and many other places as the result of the earlier closing of public houses which had taken place in Scotland. Scotland was now ripe for another step in temperance legislation. He appealed to English and Irish Members—and he was sure there was no need to appeal to Welsh Members—and to all sections of the House not to stand in the way of Scotland bringing about a reform of this kind. He had much pleasure in supporting the Bill upon its merits. It did not go far enough for him, because he would like legislation which would eliminate private profits from the drink trade, which he would like to see conducted, if possible, in accordance with the public welfare, and in such a way as to provide counter-attractions in the public-house other than alcoholic liquors. The Bill was good so far as it went, because it was an extension of a democratic principle to a matter vitally affecting the people in their everyday life. It was an extension of that principle in the best of all possible ways, because it extended the principle without the intermediary who was always biassed by class, money, or political interests. He did not wish to say anything in a disparaging sense of the publican, who he believed had got more than the ordinary fair share of the milk of human kindness. He did not believe the public-houses however supplied an ordinary and legitimate demand; they created that demand. Those who treated the demand for alcoholic liquors in the same way as a demand for any other commodity showed a lamentable lack of knowledge of human nature with all its frailties and weaknesses. As a workman many cases came under his own observation of men who would be willing under the operation of this Bill, if they had a chance, to remove public-houses out of their way in order that temptation might be removed. There were men who would willingly vote for the abolition of public-houses, who desired to give up the drink, but could not do so because they had so often to pass the open door of the public-house with its enticing smell. Although in such cases the spirit was often willing the flesh was very weak. This Bill would give such men an opportunity on saying themselves from the temptation to drink. It had been said that in New-port the Sunday closing of public-houses had resulted in the people going three miles to get drink. He thought such things were only temporary, and they would very soon right themselves, and in any case the temptation to drink in Newport would be less than it was before. It was said that measures of this kind would tend to separate certain sections of the community one from another and would cause a good deal of dislocation. That might be so, but he would remind the House that the power they sought to give to the people was as a matter of fact already enjoyed and exercised by public companies and by landlords, many of whom laid it down as a stipulation that there should be no liquor shops within their particular areas. As a matter of fact there were a great many places near London where large areas had been so fixed up by the landlord and no intoxicating liquor was sold in them. A few weeks ago he was down at Nottingham in company with one of the representatives of that county, who took him over one of the districts in that county where this very provision had been carried out by the landlord, and he could not help noticing the prim, well-kept appearance and the general prosperity of that district as compared with other parts. Even if the effect of this measure was to separate one part of the community from another, he did not think it would be a bad thing, because such an object lesson would in time tell in other places. The statement was sometimes made that they could not make people sober by Act of Parliament. Nobody sought to do anything of the kind, but what they did seek to do was, at all events, to cease making people drunk by Act of Parliament. As the very word itself implied, licence was given to people to sell drink, and this privilege was enjoyed on account of something which had been done in the House of Commons. The object of legislation and the function of Parliament was to make it easy for people to do well and difficult to do ill. It was upon those lines that this Bill was framed. He had much pleasure in seconding the Motion, and commending the measure to the judgment of the House.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."

* MR F. E. SMITH (Liverpool, Walton)

moved an Amendment asking the House to decline to proceed further with a measure which, while leaving the right of supplying alcoholic liquor in clubs and dispensaries unrestricted, would deprive brewers, licensees, and the investing public of their property without compensation. He said he did not know whether there was any prospect of the Government taking up the Bill, but no doubt in the course of the debate they would hear. If there was any prospect at all of the Government taking it up there was perhaps no excuse necessary for one who had no claim to represent Scotland moving an Amendment. He might remind the House that an hon. Member from the north of England who spoke in a similar debate two years-ago claimed to take part in the discussion, although an English Member, on the ground that if the principle of local option was applied to Scotland, it must inevitably be extended to England. Ho could not help thinking that if that view was well founded and shared to a considerable extent by hon. Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, it was reason-able that English Members should not be precluded from expressing their opinions. He might also remind the House that the Scottish representatives on the other side had hardly in the past practised the moderation in these matters which they expected from Members of the present Opposition who did not occupy Scottish seats. Hon. Members representing Scot-; land had been by no means backward—he thought quite rightly—in expressing their opinions on Licensing Bills which related exclusively to England. In the division on the Sunday Closing (England) Bill of 1897, two voted against and thirty-six for the measure. He did not think he need pursue that argument. The seconder of this Bill had pointed out that Scotland in its temperance legislation was already far ahead of England. He agreed that there were many statutes on the book relating to Scotland which went further than English licensing legislation. There was provision for Sunday closing, for ten o'clock closing, and for holiday closing; but he drew a rather different inference from the fact that Scotland possessed these exceptional conditions. He did not gather that it was suggested in any quarter of the House that Scot-land was to-day more sober than England. Unless that position was advanced, hon. Gentlemen were driven to one of two assumptions, namely, either the assumption that the Scottish people were inherently more addicted to drunkenness than the English—a proposition which he would like to hear hon. Members commending to their constituents—or, the assumption of the entirely inconsistent view that this exceptional remedial legislation, not yet attempted in England, had produced no satisfactory results in Scotland. The hon. Member for the Spen Valley Division, who had unrivalled claims to be heard from the temperance reform point of view, had indicated a clear and impressive opinion on this very point. Writing in the "National Re-view" he said— Broadly speaking these improved conditions are in force in Scotland and intemperance and all the evils of the drinking system abound there. He did not think that was very encouraging. When the House was asked to adopt special legislation on the lines of local veto, one was inclined to look to hon. Members for guidance as to the principle on which local veto depended, but one discovered that very little assistance was given by those who had spoken in this House or elsewhere. What was the principle or criterion by which to judge legislation on which local option was alleged to depend? Was it trust in the people? The House would see that the last thing which the advocates of this measure did was to trust the people. That was what they neither proposed nor tolerated. They would only trust the people within the limits of their own preconceived prejudices. In other words, if the people in a particular district were desirous of additional facilities, it was not proposed by the Bill that they should get them. They would not hear of these facilities being given, although they were necessary and reasonable. Considerable reference had been made to the fact that there were large areas in this country in which by prohibition imposed by landlords there had been practically a suppression of the trade in alcoholic drinks. He would like some evidence—and none up to the present had been forthcoming—that persons who were denied in these districts the opportunity of getting alcoholic refreshment were in the condition of idyllic enjoyment they were assumed to be in by those who had spoken of those districts. He entirely declined to believe that the people who lived in those districts were satisfied without alcoholic refreshment, any more than Members of this House would be satisfied if they could not obtain it. He would like to see any Government, however great its majority, propose that in the smoking-room they should be denied constant opportunities of obtaining it. The most powerful Government of modern times could not last a week if that were proposed. As to the instance of the Toxteth Division of Liverpool which had been mentioned, he replied that no evidence could be more instantly disposed of by those acquainted with the facts. In the first place, nearly all the houses in the Toxteth division were rented at, £30 a year, and therefore the people living there were almost all able to keep such reasonable refreshments as they required in their own cellars. He could show hon. Gentlemen a map indicating the licensed premises in Liverpool, and could demonstrate that some of the largest and most profitable premises in Liverpool were those in the district contiguous to Toxteth. They were doing a wholly fictitious trade by reason of the absence of licensed premises in the Toxteth Division. In other words the thirsty inhabitants of Toxteth were indulged at the expense of their neighbours while they continued to adorn the perorations of teetotal speeches. Was there anybody in the whole House who believed in local option as a complete remedy? He had been at some pains to ascertain, and he said unhesitatingly that there was no prominent temperance reformer in this country who believed that a remedy would be found in local option. The hon. Member for Partick in spite of his present attitude was a strong and logical opponent of the principle of local option. A representation was made to the Home Secretary on the subject of Sunday closing in England, and the question arose whether it could be effected by local option or by some centralised control. The hon. Member for Partick was one of the signatories of the memorial. The significant argument used by the hon. Gentleman was thus stated— Local option would be unworkable and impracticable. It would multiply in hundreds of cases the border difficulty. It would create and increase the nuisance and evil of travelling for drink. This would mean an increase in public drunkenness. Did the hon. Gentleman think that people who would travel for drink on Sunday would not travel on week-days The memorial continued— Referring the matter to the localities would involve needless and unwelcome strife and expense every few years in all parts of the country. Surely it was obvious that if local option was undesirable in connection with Sun-day closing on account of the border difficulty and travelling, it was equally so in regard to prohibition. It was also worthy of the attention of the House that any measure which provided as one of its terms for the introduction of absolute prohibition was open to every objection which could be urged by the experience of the civilised world to prohibition pure and simple. He thought he could satisfy the House that that was a reasonable proposition. It did not matter to the individual who felt that he was denied the facilities to which he was entitled whether the prohibition proceeded from a centralised authority in London or a local authority in the town in which he lived. In either case the drought was equally intolerable to the individual. What had been the experience of the whole civilised world so far as prohibition was concerned? It was well known that the attempt to establish prohibition in the United States had been an unqualified and disastrous failure. [An HON. MEMBER: No.] He was sure he could satisfy the hon. Gentleman that he had not used too strong language. An American committee consisting of fifty distinguished sociologists in a Report on this subject said— The efforts to enforce prohibition during forty years have had deleterious effects in public respect for courts, judicial procedure, oaths, and law in general, and for officers of the law, legislatures, and public servants. The attitude in the United States of every prudent candidate was expressed in the words— I am in favour of Maine law, but against its enforcement. A book had been placed on the Table of the House within the last few days containing most exhaustive Consular reports as to the results of prohibition in the United States, and so striking was the conclusion at which they unanimously arrived that he made no apology to the House for quoting the following extract— At one time or another seventeen States have had stringent prohibition. It is now only retained by three (agricultural) and in these it cannot be looked upon as a success. Parts of prohibitory States have always been in open rebellion against the law; drinking has never been impossible, the sale of liquor has always been profitable and seldom disreputable. Violation of the law has been open and avowed. In urban districts it has not been possible to find any sound ethical basis for the law or to persuade the majority to regard its violation as immoral. Juries have violated their oaths; judges have hesitated to impose statutory penalties, blackmail and corruption have been directly instigated and the law brought into contempt.

* MR. LEIF JONES (Westmoreland, Appleby)

Would the hon. Member read what the report says about local option in contradistinction to prohibition?

* MR. F. E. SMITH

thought he had made it clear to the House that the basis of his argument was that a local option Bill which provided for prohibition was open to the same objection as prohibition itself. He would deal with the observations on local option in a moment. But let him call as a witness an honourable Gentleman opposite. The hon. Member for the Woodstock Division of Oxfordshire visited the United States last summer, and in an article in the Nineteenth Century he had given testimony which everyone would greatly value as to the experience of prohibition there. At the hotel where he resided no representation whatever could procure him any drink (he noted in passing that his hon. friend had evidently exhausted the arts of entreaty), and after dinner, being desirous of some alcoholic refreshment, he left the hotel to see if he could discover it in the town. In walking through the town he passed a doorway which somehow suggested alcohol. He would point out to the House that they could not legislate for exceptional cases, and therefore they could hardly assume that the average man enjoyed the highly developed sensibility of his hon. friend. His hon. friend said that he entered a bar and obtained drink—it was only a glass of beer—but half a dozen other persons were drinking; and flasks of whiskey were freely sold to disreputable persons afterwards. He paused to lament the fall of his hon. friend. A Liberal Member! A temperance reformer! A theological lecturer! Who would not laugh if such a man there be Who would not weep if Atticus were he? He continued that in an hour's walk he saw four or five other drinking-places and met at least twenty-five drunken men and women. There must have been a hiatus in his hon. friend's narrative, for he went on to state that he next visited the police station. That was a somewhat ambiguous phrase; but let it pass. There he saw six "drunks" who had just been brought in. He thought that the House would admit that so far as prohibition itself was concerned the whole of the case had disappeared, and that no reasonable temperance reformer would say that prohibition had been anything but a disastrous failure when applied to States containing large urban populations. As to the machinery of the Bill, prohibition de-pended upon the parish election register: i.e., the county council or municipal electors. But that would exclude the household franchise electors, the occupancy voters, the service voters, and the lodger voters. Now prohibition could be carried by three-fifths of the votes polled; but the voters constituted only one-twelfth of the population; and assuming that a third voted in a large population, three-fifths of a third of a twelfth, that was one sixtieth of the population might carry prohibition, and one-seventy-second of the population might carry limitation of public-houses in the town or district. He was reminded that in a Consular report for 1907 it was stated that in Waterville, New Hampshire, one elector turned up and unanimously carried the cause of prohibition! It was said that local option might succeed when prohibition failed. He thought that that was illogical. Let them take the case of New Zealand. In 1881 Sir William Fox's Act for local option was passed, and in 1893 the Alcoholic Liquors Sale Control Act was passed. There were elections in 1902 and 1905, but no progress had been made. On the other hand, there was a very considerable retrogression. In 1905 there were six districts in which there was no licence. The reductions had declined from nine to four, and there had been a very significent growth of prosecutions for illicit drinking. In 1871 these amounted to seventy-one, whereas in 1904 they had increased to 216. In regard to Canada the author of an article in the Daily News said that in Canada legislation has got ahead of public opinion on the temperance question. The law in most of the provinces is so stringent that it is generally disregarded, not openly, but with a pretence of disguise. And the highly respectable paper the Christian Guardian of Canada said— It was easier to secure the Scott Act in the counties than to secure its enforcement and permanence. Even the critics who held views so strongly as the hon. Member for Spen Valley said that— Experience of the United States and Canada, whose temperance opinion was more general and advanced than here, showed that in the country districts the power was widely used, and that in towns the power was comparatively little used, and where used was laxly and with difficulty enforced The most serious difficulty of all was in regard to clubs. He had carefully read Section 81 of the Scottish Licensing Act of 1903. He admitted that the regulations under that Act in regard to clubs were a little more close than those of England; but that did not prevent those clubs being formed. And what was the result? Every single advance that was made in favour of temperence was lost by the growth of those clubs. [Cries of "No, no."] Hon Gentlemen did not agree, but he did not think that anybody in the House who had considered- the matter would deny that in the large towns in Scotland the number of clubs had very largely grown within the last few years. [An HON. MEMBER on the MINISTERIAL Benches: They have been killed.] The hon. Member did not agree, but he did not think that anyone in the House from Scotland who had considered the reports of chief con-stables would deny that clubs had very largely increased in numbers within the last few years. So far as England was concerned, in 1887 there were 1,982 clubs, whereas in 1905 they had increased to 6,554, or an increase of over 4,000 during the same time that attempts were being made to get rid of licensed premises. It might be asked whether the objections which they urged to this Bill were purely destructive, or, in other words, whether they had any suggestion to make for the purpose of dealing with drunkenness in Scotland. He would point out that one vital difficulty in dealing with the proposals in the present Bill was the complete insecurity that was given to the licensed victuallers in Scotland. It was of the first importance that these should be of good character and respectability; and, if that were so, was it not clear that every single added element of precariousness in their position rendered it more difficult to obtain such a highly respectable class of men as licensees? He would take a concrete case. Let them suppose that in Glasgow by a three-fifths majority licences were refused to the present licensed victuallers and that after three years experience another poll was taken and that it was decided that the licences were to be restored. There was no provision that the men who had lost their living by having their licences cancelled by the previous poll would receive new licences. Could there be any more retrograde step than that? He said without hesitation that the only way of dealing with such a case as that in Scotland was to introduce legislation analogous to the legislation in England in 1904. [Ironical cheers.] He knew that that proposal would be treated as preposterous by certain hon. Members from Scotland. It was always difficult to discover where the Liberal Party stood on this question of compensation; but Mr. Gladstone had said over and over again that if they interfered with them the licence holders ought to have compensation. It was curious to realise that the authority of Mr. Glad- stone was now seldom quoted in this House except on the Opposition Benches and amid Ministerial dissent, but what did Mr. Gladstone say?— If Parliament should think it wise to introduce any radical change in the working of the liquor laws in such a way as to break down the fair expectations of persons which have grown up—whether rightly or wrongly, it is not their fault; it is our fault—their fair claim to compensation ought to be considered by the liberality of Parliament. He and those whom he represented con-fined themselves to the modest aspiration that those interested in licences should not be precluded from assisting each other by a statutory system of mutual insurance. In Scotland to-day he was strongly of opinion that in many places the number of licensed houses was far in excess of the wants of the population. For instance, in the county of Kinross there was a public-house for every 202 of the population; and in Auchtermuchty there was a public house for every sixty of the population. Of course that excess could have been, but had not been, dealt with under the existing powers by the licensing magistrates. But what was taking place in England? In 1905 519 men were refused a renewal of their licences on the ground that they were not required. In 1906 1,575 were refused a renewal of their licences on the ground that they were not required; and the reason given was that compensation would be given to them. Was not that a valuable step made in the progress of reform? But what was the progress made in Scotland? In the same year forty-six licences had been taken away. They would never get a Scottish bench to reduce the number of licences so long as these persons were exposed to the great injustice of losing their livelihood. When they were told that the introduction of such legislation in Scotland would endow the brewers, he would point out that in England it was notorious that if twenty of the largest brewers in this country were taken it would be found that they had subscribed more to the compensation fund that had already been established than they had gained from it by the extinction of licences; that the Act had not only taken money from the brewers, but had at the same time done an immense amount of good for temperance. He would recommend to hon. Gentlemen opposite that they should extend to the judgment of their neighbour's affairs the same standard of conduct that they applied to their own. He had exchanged many cheerful glasses with hon. Gentlemen on the other side who were now wearing an unnaturally austere expression, and he would suggest to them that it was unwise for any great Party to yield to the temptation of trying to effect moral reforms at the pecuniary charges of other people. He appealed to the House to resist the temptation of laying up for themselves treasure in heaven by the inexpensive method of confiscating other people's treasure on earth. In the belief that that, and that alone, would be the effect of this Bill, that it would not advance the cause of temperance reform, but would work great injustice and injure a large number of reputable and respectable citizens, he begged to move.

VISCOUNT CASTLEREAGH (Maidstone),

in seconding the Amendment, said that the mover and seconder of the Second Reading had not touched various important objections to the Bill. All Members had one object in front of them, and that was the promotion of temperance in the country. But their ideas as to the promotion of temperance widely differed. Most Members on his side of the House would agree that certain methods, instead of bringing about a spirit of temperance all over the country, would have the diametrically opposite effect. He did not believe that anything in the nature of coercive legislation would promote temperance. Far more could be done by way of education, bringing up, and self-control. If he was convinced that local veto would secure temperance he would be the first to support it. But it would have the effect of promoting secret drinking, a system which all deplored, and of disseminating traffic in that bad spirit which far more from its quality than the quantity was so detrimental to the mental and physical conditions of all classes of the community. He ventured to say that if local option was adopted the victim of this evil would be subjected to the temptation of secret drinking in so-called social clubs. The Royal Commission of 1899 fought strongly against local option, and there was no doubt the effect of prohibition would be to increase the number of so-called clubs, and also lead to the serious anomaly that a man desiring to quench his thirst would have to go into the next locality where prohibition was not, and where the public houses would be doing what was called a roaring trade. Temperance must be set up by other means than strict regulations to restrict the sale of liquor. He would like to point out to those who were opposed to drinking on the ground that it was morally wrong that local option would not carry out their idea to any extent. Bills had been brought in by the Liberal Party in 1893 and 1895, and both those Bills died in their infancy. But they had one provision which was absent from this Bill. They gave three years breathing space before the Bill came into effect. It might be that the Government proposed to take up this measure, and it would be convenient to hear in the course of the debate whether that, was their intention and whether they intended to deal with the question of local option in a Bill which enacted that three-fifths of those voting could close the licensed houses, and that limiting resolutions could be carried by a bare majority. In local elections at the present time, only 25 per cent, of the electors on the average voted, which meant that, while the Bill affected to give popular control, the very people who were most deeply concerned might have no voice in the adoption of local option at all What was the position of the working man who was entirely prohibited under this Bill from obtaining that sustenance from liquor which all were entitled to have? First, he would be able to obtain it on the order of his doctor, when he would only be allowed to have one drink. The other solutions were that he might be driven to belong to a club, or to content himself with water. This was a very arbitrary measure, and it was obvious that the danger of drinking to excess was far more imminent when a man was kept thirsty than when a man was able to quench his thirst without great difficulty. Under the Bill it would be possible for one area to be a prohibited area, while in the area next to it there was no prohibition at all. He did not think local option, had ever been an unqualified success. In New Zealand it had only caused the trade, previously carried on in the light of day, to be carried on in secret under the most disgusting and degrading conditions, and which naturally gave great trouble to the police, who had to resort to all sorts of espionage in order to find out how and where it was conducted. Again, in the United States, of seventeen districts which had adopted local option only three had adhered to their decision. It was obvious that the working man, after ho had failed to obtain from his doctor the necessary assistance to enable him to quench his thirst, would have recourse to so-called clubs, and the result would be to exchange a properly controlled and licensed liquor trade for an uncontrolled, unlicensed secret liquor traffic; the spirit supplied would not be the good spirit that public houses now sold, but the spirit which would be detrimental both mentally and morally to those who consumed it. It was easy for one fanatical temperance reformer to pledge seventy Scottish members in a day. If those pledges were of the same nature as those by which the Government in other matters were supposed to be bound, too much importance need not be attached to them. He thought the legislation that had already been passed had carried out the object which all had in view, namely, the promotion of temperance all over the country. The last measure passed in l904 allowed what this Bill did not, a system of compensation. It was now said that licensed victuallers had no reason to expect compensation, because they carried on their business under an annual licence which need not be renewed. But when their business had been taxed as it had been, and had been considered permanent property, and supported in that way by the Government, it could not be contended. that compensation should not be given. In regard to Wales it could not be claimed that the Sunday Closing Act of 1881 had resulted in anything but a large increase in the number of drinking clubs. But, above all, the Bill was class legislation, and for that reason, if for no other, he would ask hon. Members to support the Amendment which he begged to second.

Amendment proposed— To leave out from the word 'that,' to the end of the Question, and add the words, 'this House declines to proceed further with a measure which will cause dislocation and insecurity amongst those engaged in the licensed victualling trade without any compensating; advantage to the public, which leaves the right of supplying alcoholic liquor in clubs and dispensaries unrestricted, and which will deprive brewers, licensees, and the investing public of their property without compensation.' "—(Mr. F. E. Smith.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be loft out stand part of the Question."

* MR. GULLAND (Dumfries Burghs)

asked the House to note that no Scottish Member had ventured to move or second an Amendment to the Motion for the Second Heading. The English Members who had undertaken the duty had exposed their limited knowledge of Scottish conditions. Parish council electors were a sixth, not a twelfth, of the population; and although it might be the case in England that as low a proportion of voter's as 25 per cent. took part in local elections, the people of Scotland had a higher opinion of their rights and duties as citizens, and 75 per cent. was the more probable proportion of the electors who went to the poll. The allusion of the noble Viscount to the United States really referred to the policy of prohibition, which was a very different thing from local option. This was not a prohibition Bill. With regard to local option, which was the policy of this Bill, it was reported by a member of our own Embassy that the systems of local option had had the greatest success in the States, and had, in fact, secured prohibition over the widest possible area with the least possible friction. These were Scottish principles and they wished to see them embodied in the law of Scotland. The noble Viscount had talked of compensation, but the Amendment spoke of confiscation of the property of the licence holders. He challenged the contention altogether that these people had any property. It was not their property; all they had was the advantage of a privilege which had been granted to them. Whatever England might have done, Scotland in this matter, as in many others, was on an entirely different footing. The Scottish people did not recognise that the licence-holders had any further property in the licence than the yearly value of the privilege granted to them by the community. At the present time no one suggested that licence holders should be given compensation, but nobody would object if the trade wished that they should have an insurance fund upon a voluntary basis. In fact, at the present time there were companies who would, he had been informed, take that risk, and no doubt, in anticipation of the passing of this Bill, the licence holders had already effected insurances. So far as the question of restriction was concerned, Scotland's experience of previous measures of restriction was that they had been a great success. No one wished to revert to Sunday trading or to closing later than ten o'clock on week-days. Everybody admitted that Sunday closing had been a success, and if a house could be closed one day in seven, why could it not be closed on the other six? The closing at ten o'clock on week-days had also been a great success. The streets were quieter late at night and people went to bed earlier, and no one save the trade and its friends found any objection to that. The club difficulty had not been experienced since Lord Balfour's Licensing Act of 1903. Nothing had been said since the Act was passed and powers were given to the magistrates to close such places. Before then undoubtedly the police had great difficulty with those clubs, but the provisions of that Act were such that the club difficulty had been got over. They could have this further reform without difficulty with regard to clubs. Hon. Members talked about the hap-hazard nature of the system to be introduced by the Bill, but he suggested that the present system was infinitely more haphazard, for no one under it got any guidance from the law, and in different parts of the country the greatest differences prevailed in the policy that was pursued. Unfortunately they had no really democratic Bench, and the promoters of the Bill were asking that the people by popular election should be allowed to say how they wished the matter to be carried through. Hon. Members had pleaded very strongly on behalf of the working classes. They, after all, were the great sufferers, and they wished this Bill to pass. The rich people never allowed a public-house to be set down opposite their doors, but the poor man had to put up with that nuisance, and he had known many men who, finding a public-house set up at the foot of their stair, had had to consider the alternative of sacrificing either their property or their children. This Bill was not, he admitted, a complete remedy. No Bill ever was a complete remedy for the question it was meant to solve, and if other remedies could be suggested they would be glad to consider them. But here they had a concrete Bill demanded by the people of Scotland. It would not completely stop drunkenness, but it would do something to remove that curse which, he regretted to say, was the national curse of Scotland. All the people of Scotland asked was to have the power in their localities to work out their own salvation.

* MR. C. B. HARMSWORTH (Worcestershire, Droitwich),

said that as the Motion which stood in his name on the Paper † might not be reached, he would now make a few remarks, although he had no desire to stand between hon. Members for Scotland and their wish to get the Bill passed. He would rejoice to see it go to a Grand Committee. He would make no apology for intruding into the discussion, because, although the Bill related chiefly to Scotland, he held that English Members ought not to be debarred from participating in the debate. He did not intend to traverse the main Provisions of the Bill, nor did he propose to express any opinion as to the merits or demerits of the Bill. He was quite content that Scotland should have her desires. But he desired to bring before the House what he considered to be a fatal defect in the measure. It made absolutely no provision, so far as he could see, for any kind of compensation to be paid to licensees deprived of their licences; that was a fatal defect in the Bill. He was not in the slightest degree interested on behalf of the trade; in fact, as a Liberal candidate, he knew how active their opposition could be. He spoke simply as an ardent temperance reformer. He had always regretted that, except in the case of Scotland and per-haps of Wales, no substantial measure of temperance reform had been carried in his lifetime, and he attributed much of the difficulty encountered in the temperance movement to the want of recognition of some equitable principle of compensation. If this Bill was passed into † On Second Reading of Liquor Traffic (Local Option) (Scotland) Bill, to move, "That no Bill for gfving the ratepayers control of the liquor traffic in their respective areas can be accepted as satisfactory to this House unless provisions be contained therein for giving, as an act of grace, an adequate time notice of equitable compensation to those persons who may be deprived of their licences by the exercise of the power which it confers. law, he did not believe that a single licensing authority would put its provisions into force. Conditions might be different in Scotland; but, after all, in all these matters equity must be observed, and he believed that hon. Members for Scotland would greatly expedite the passing of the Bill, and would commend it to public opinion, if they would agree to insert in Committee some such provision as he was suggesting. Licensees had no legal right whatever to compensation; there was nothing to prevent the authority from reducing the value of licences held by issuing ten times as many more, and indeed, that had been suggested by wayward and erratic reformers as a method for bringing the question to an issue. The State might at a moment's notice resume the right granted, but the inevitable result would be much suffering among a respectable body of traders as much entitled to consideration as any other class in the community, and he supported the principle of his proposal as an act of grace and expediency. It was sometimes said that under the Act of 1904 the licensing trade were paying their own compensation. That was true to some extent, but it was not altogether true, and in his opinion it ought to be understood that where any compensation was made, it was made not so much at the expense of the trade as at the expense of the State, which for purposes of expediency had postponed its right to resume the monopoly value of its own licences. If any provision of the kind were made, regard should be had for the actual licensee, and brewers should not get the larger share. The Report of the Peel Commission in 1899 contained a suggestion of a time limit of seven years in England and five years in Scotland, and if that recommendation in the Minority Report had been in the following year expressed in a Parliamentary enactment, the people of Scotland by this time would have had the control of the liquor traffic, and the people of England would have been well on the way to that consummation. Scotland was fortunate in being free from the application of the Act of 1904; the value of licences had not so much increased, and the adoption of an equitable principle of compensation would be the less difficult. As a temperance reformer he took his stand on the Report of the Peel Commission, believing that upon that ground a great temperance reform could be constructed with recognition of the principle of compensation. He would like to point out that; although the principle of compensation was not fully acknowledged in Scotland, it had been recognised by some of our greatest temperance reformers, and it was undoubtedly recognised in the Peel Report. There was one other point he would like to put to the House. In the course of the next year or two they were to have a comprehensive measure of licensing reform for England, and he took it as an axiom that in that measure some provision would be included in regard to compensation. Was it possible to conceive that they might have in England compensation for licences and a measure running coincidently in Scotland which made no such provision He commended that point to the Government. He did not stand there as an advocate of the trade in any respect; he had suffered too many blows and shocks from the trade in the course of his career as a Parliamentary candidate, but still he maintained that every class was entitled to equitable consideration in that House. He said, moreover, that if they were to move forward they would have to recognise the principle of compensation. If only it had been recognised a few years ago, both England and Scotland would now, as he had said, either have control of the liquor traffic, or be a long way on towards that great and desired consummation.

* MR. CHARLES ROBERTS (Lincoln)

said that some points had been raised by previous speakers on which he desired to touch, but before doing so he would refer to another point which appeared in the literature which had been circulated among Members. It had been said, for instance, that this question was not before the country, and that no hope had been held out for the passage of such a Bill into law. On the eve of the last general election the licensed trade issued a manifesto which he had thought might be useful on some future occasion. He had a quotation from it which he would read; appealing to licensed traders it ran— No general election has ever meant so much to you as this. If you do not exert yourselves now you will have to face (1) Local Veto; (2) Time limit; (3) The revival of so called magisterial discretion; (4) Repeal, reversal, or amendment of the Licensing Act of 1904; (5) Sunday closing. It went on in that strain and wound up with a flight of rhetoric— Self-preservation is the first law of nature. No local veto, no confiscation, no increased taxes on licences, no time limit, no Sunday closing. And then with ringing eloquence— Still the some cry—'Freedom with sobriety, England free, and England sober. This matter was before the country at the general election and was debated in 1905. The Scottish Local Veto Bill of that year was a more drastic measure, proposing a majority vote and not a three-fifths vote. He noted the fact that no less than twenty members of the present Administration voted for that Bill, including the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Secretary of State for Home Affairs, and he thought most of the prominent members of the present Ministry. Coming to some of the arguments advanced by the other side, it had been complained that a three-fifths majority would be unjust. He thought himself that three fifths was too high a requirement. The usual requirement in local option Bills in the Colonies and elsewhere was a majority of voters.

An HON. MEMBER

Of all the electors?

* MR. CHARLES ROBERTS

No; of those voting. In some eases it was provided that 30 percent. of the electors should vote. There would be no objection to that, though, of course, it was a detail which it was not his province to discuss just now, but he entered his caveat against the introduction of the three-fifths majority. At the present moment the Province of Ontario, in Canada, was rising with some indignation against the practical working of the three-fifths majority. If it were required in ordinary elections, the complexion of the House of Commons would be completely changed. The Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool, the Member for the Droitwich Division, and he himself would not be in the House; in fact, he did not know what ravages would be the consequence of such a change in the law. With reference to clubs, surely the Scottish provision was totally different. In Scotland they had the annual registration of clubs, and no club could be started in Scotland without the assent of two members of the licensing body. The police, the town council or the parish council could object to clubs on specified grounds, and they could be struck off the register. That seemed to be adequate, and he did not believe that Scotland would find real difficulty with clubs, any more than the no-licence districts of Canada or the no-licence districts of the United States. The question of compensation was also, no doubt, a committee point. It was a question which doubtless would affect the minds of hon. Members on the Second Reading, and for that reason he thought it wise to say a few words upon it. An English Member could perhaps deal with it better than a Scottish Member, because the English Member knew the distinction which existed and had to be drawn between English law and Scottish law. Hon. Members opposite, including the hon. Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool, had spoken as if no reduction of licences was going on in Scotland at the present time. But the reduction of licences in. Scotland had been most remarkable. The Report of the Licensing Commission showed that in 1829there were 18,000 licences in Scotland. To-day there were 6,99l. They had got rid of 11,000 licences in Scotland without compensation since 1829. Some 4,000 of these, no doubt, had been turned into off licences in 1882. They surrendered their rights of on-sale, but neither asked nor got compensation. The reduction was still going on at the present time. If they took the years from 1900, the figures showed that the reduction was steady and constant each year both of on-licences and of grocers' licences. Since that time, in Scotland, they had seen a reduction of 3.2 percent, of on-licences and 3.6 of off-licences. The reduction without compensation in Scotland was just as great as the reduction with compensation in England. English Members, therefore, must not insist upon a system of compensation in Scotland, where the conditions were totally different from what they were in England. In Scotland there was never a decision like that in Sharpe v. Wakefield, because the law was so clear that it was not necessary to have such a decision. The English theory of the licence was fatally obscured by the experiment of the free sale of beer between 1830 and l870. Scotland was free from that. Magisterial discretion had always been tree in Scotland. The hon. Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool had said that his remedy for the evils in Scotland was to apply to Scotland the English Act of 1904. Might ho remind the hon. Member of the opinion of a Member of his own Party—Lord Balfour of Burleigh, a man whose knowledge of Scotland and whose fairness and moderation would be recognised? Lord Balfour of Burleigh, speaking on the English Licensing Act of 1904, declared that it would be a gross injustice to Scotland to extend to that country the provisions of the English Aft. He explained that all Scottish licences were subject to the full discretion of the licensing authority; that the tied house system did not much exist, being checked by the Scottish magistrates, while English magistrates had no power to check it except in the case of new licences; that the practice of the Inland Revenue department was different; that it often did not charge duty on the licence at all, and might only get two and a half years purchase of the profits as against our rule of ten or twelve. He did not pretend to know what Lord Balfour's view of this Bill might be, but he was entitled to quote the distinction drawn by him between Scotland and England, and to urge that in Scotland they had a country far more like Canada, or the United States, or some eighteen of our Colonies where not one penny of compensation had over been paid. 'The value of licences in Scotland was much smaller than that of licences in England. In the literature which had been circulated it was said that Victoria had compensation. Why? Because before local option was set up the licences had secured in an Act of 1885 a statutory right to renewal in set terms. That was exactly what had never been given in Scotland, and Scotland must therefore not be counted with Victoria, but with the countries which set their face against compensation. He wished to refer to the American experience. He was in the State of Maine last autumn, and his own impression was totally different from that of the hon. Member who had referred to the subject. Surely hon. Members would recognise that the conditions of Maine and of the local option States were totally different from the conditions here. In Maine they had a territory as large as Scotland, and over that the Legislature by one cast-iron statute, passed sixty years ago, prohibited for all time wholesale and retail sale, though not the importation (they had not the power to do that). Surely there was an immense difference between that local option and that which was proposed in this Bill, under which local areas would secure the privilege of no-licence with the support of public opinion behind them, and under which there would be periodical opportunities for reconsideration. If they really wished to see how things worked in America, he would refer to the State of Massachusetts, because, of all the thirty local option American States, it was the most urban and the most industrial. The density of its population was equal to that of the United Kingdom. When people said that the proposal would not work in the towns, he would not argue with such prophets—he would confidently disbelieve them. In England, we had an elaborate system of by-election significance; but the prophets were often much mistaken in the results. There had, however, been almost no experience of local option polls, but everyone was confident that local option would never be carried. Such dogmatism was, he thought, misplaced. In those parts of the United States which he visited he took the opinion of officials and police, and of the man in the street, and it was just in those very districts where local option had proved a. success that people had expressed a doubt as to whether it could be carried or worked. As to the actual working of the system under urban and industrial conditions, he had only to say that it was in the towns, and not in the country districts, that during twenty-five years working of the local option law of Massachusetts most progress had been made. Taking a ten-mile radius round Boston, there was a population of 1,200,000 persons. Of these, 650,000 lived in areas under licence conditions, and 550,000 lived under no-licence conditions. There was no getting away from the fact that the people who lived in the no-licence areas supported and voted annually for the no-licence system. The central point of the experiment was perhaps the town of Cambridge, with a population of 100,000, with 13,000 weekly wage-earners, which had been for twenty years a no-licence area. During the last four years it carried no-licence by an average majority of 3,801 on an 89 per cent, poll. It had fewer prosecutions for illegal sale than the licenced city of Boston adjoining, and it had no difficulty with its clubs. As for the compensating public advantages, he had a mass of facts which justified him in stating that comparing licence with no-licence districts, and the same districts under licence and no-licence, there was a diminution shown of 66 per cent, in intemperance. The death-rate and the infantile death-rate had fallen markedly in the no-licence areas, while the increase in wealth had been marked. He asked the House, in conclusion, not to refuse to communities, who were grappling and struggling with a great source of evil and degradation, the chance of trying this no-licence system, of which there had been favour-able experience in so many countries. He asked for a partition of territory between licence and no-licence areas, for some cities of refuge, for some place at all events, where a man with a drunken wife, or a wife with a drunken husband, could get away from this fatal temptation which came from thrusting the supply of alcoholic liquors on every hand upon the people. The House might think some of them over-earnest in pressing for the passing of this measure. But its advocates had followed out in imagination how much it meant in terms of human happiness for many households, and they asked that the measure should be passed because they believed that it would give assurance of deliverance in many districts, and the hope or, at worst, chance of deliverance in all.

MR. MUNRO FERGUSON (Leith Burghs)

said he offered no apology for taking part in the debate, because, whatever he might be, he certainly was not an Englishman. His name had been on the back of a Local Veto Bill a long time before many who had spoken that day were in that House—a circumstance much to his disadvantage. In discussing this Bill they were discussing the main principles which should govern licensing reform. They had not made much progress along the lines of the principle embodied in the Bill, but he had not withdrawn his support from it in the least degree, because he regarded it as an essential part of licensing reform. The licensing reform of four years ago had helped them with regard to clubs, and, above all, it had helped them to improve and make the licensing authorities more responsible in the country. In towns they had a pretty democratic licensing body, indirectly elected and representative of the people. In the counties the licensing had been conducted by a heterogeneous mob of justices, but that had been considerably improved under the last licensing reform in Scotland. He would suggest that they could not treat Scotland like New Zealand, whether in church matters, educational matters, licensing matters, or anything else. He did not think that public opinion in Scotland would admit the prohibition or reduction of licences without the question of a time limit, at any rate, being taken into consideration. If they did not give a time limit, then they must pay some money compensation for taking away the licence immediately. Personally he had never been much of an advocate of compulsory compensation. He believed that they must give a time limit; it need not be as long as in England, because licences were sold in Scotland at something like four or five years purchase. Without the time limit, they would remove from the support of licensing reform a large mass of public opinion, and the most responsible kind of influences which they could find in the country. Therefore, he thought that the point raised by his hon. friend behind him was an essential element of licensing reform. The matter ought to be dealt with at this stage of the Bill because whatever might be their conviction as to the veto itself, as temperance reformers they must cooperate and go hand in hand if they were to overcome the dead weight of influences against them. His other point was to give the licensing authority freedom in regard to the particular manner in which they desired the local veto to be exercised. They desired to give the licensing authorities more freedom in dealing with the liquor traffic, and it was impossible to give them freedom with one hand if they held the veto in the other. He did not think they could make the veto effective unless they eliminated the element of Party politics. Under a Local Veto Bill they would stir up the liquor trade, and it would be most effective in all the referenda which were made to secure the popular voice. They must be careful, how they put themselves in opposition to the liquor trade. In every election the trade was a most formidable force, and it would enter into every field where it found its predominance threatened by a Local Veto Bill. The conflict would be carried on in a most embittered manner unless they could first of all eliminate private profits: until they had done that they could not successfully apply the veto. He felt sure that a vacillating policy would be a bad policy. It had boon suggested that Greenock would be a good place for prohibition; but the facilities for drinking there were very i great, and that was why he should fear a vacillating policy. The only security that they had under the present system of conducting the liquor traffic for private profit lay in a very strong licensing authority, and veto without other provisions would not strengthen, but rather weaken, that authority. At the present time they were not being so much pressed to reduce licences as to grant them. Until they could secure disinterested management, he was of opinion that they could not do better than keep the licensing authorities as strong and independent as possible, and he was not at all sure that on the whole the influence of public veto would be an advantage. The disadvantages they had to deal with wore the influences of the liquor interest brought to bear on local politics, and the only way in which that influence could be met was by disinterested management. Disinterested management did not enter anything on its books for goodwill; it was able to give up a licence whenever a local authority wished it; it desired to co-operate with the licensing authority and with the police; it gave no encouragement to the people to drink; the profits it made were devoted to counter attractions other than the public- house, in some other portion of the area. He did not think it was fair to judge of disinterested management by what had been done in this country. It was only when they had a monopoly ever a large area that they could fairly test the system—they could then close the houses or conduct them under any regulation they liked. He was not sure that he was in favour of the municipalisation of the liquor traffic. Ho had no prejudice against municipal trading. But the liquor trade was about the last form of municipal trading he would desire to see. The Scandinavian system ho took to be a success, but the Russian system was probably a failure. It was upon those lines they must advance if they wished to cope with the liquor evil. He was as sensible of the horrors of the liquor traffic as any prohibitionist, and if it was in his power to say that there should be prohibition of the existing system in this country, and if he thought regulations could be made stiff enough to carry out the law, he would be in favour of prohibition, because he believed that they would be better off without any alcohol at all if the traffic could be abolished. He did not, however, think it was practicable in this country, except in some very limited areas. He was heartily with those who sought to mitigate the terrible curse of drink, which was certainly as great in his own country as in any country in the world; but he was strongly of opinion that local veto by itself would be a barren proposal unless accompanied by a scheme of licensing reform. This was an opportune moment for insisting upon alternative methods being considered. Fgures in reference to the votes of Scottish Members had been given upon this subject. Personally, he had always supported local veto, but in giving their support to the principle many of them bad always insisted that the regarded it as an essential part of any reform that other principles should be incorporated with it.

MR. A. C. CORBETT (Glasgow, Tradeston)

said the hon. Member who moved the rejection of the Bill had said there was no evidence that those who lived in prohibition areas were in favour of the system. He had some experience of his own prohibition area. He had never heard of any resolution being passed against the system, even by the smallest minority, and there had never been any representations made to his agents against the system. The area contained a large population of working people, and there was plenty of evidence that they were not dissatisfied with the principle of prohibition. His hon. Friend, who had some connection with a much larger area than his in the neighbourhood of Liverpool, had said that his experience was identical with his own. He could not conceive of any evidence more complete that the people were not dissatisfied with prohibition where it was carried out. In the neighbourhood to which he had referred the local authority had year by year passed a resolution asking the magistrates not to grant any new licences. In 1905 a statement was issued, signed by the President of the Local Government Board and other Members of the Government, to the effect that disinterested management established by Government had every-where failed, whether in Russia, Norway, Sweden, or South Carolina. That statement was nowhere seriously challenged, but a good deal of light had been thrown upon it by recent experience, which showed that South Carolina had for fourteen years definitely abandoned the system: that Sweden had declared against the sale of brandy, and that Russia had about as bad a system as any country could possibly have. Before 1894 anyone in that country could start a distillery or sell spirits in any shop, and since the introduction of the new system the consumption of spirits had increased, more especially in those provinces where the monopoly had been the longest in force. The case of Norway had been quoted as an example of the success of the system, but the convictions for drunkenness showed a state of things far worse than we experienced in our own country, whilst a still wider lest was to be found in the consumption of spirits. His objection to disinterested management was not based upon any abstract principle. It was his business to see that as few people were made drunk as his influence permitted. The point, however, was more for consideration in Committee than on a Second Reading, as also was the proposal for a time limit. Every Member of the House who believed that local option would bring about good results, and was likely to make people more sober, was bound to vote for the Second Reading, and reserve to them-selves the right to discuss points in Committee. He ventured to think that there was a vast amount of unanimity amongst the Scottish people upon this subject. The Corporation of Glasgow had passed a resolution in its favour, the city parochial authorities had passed a similar resolution, and so had the Govan Parochial Board. So far from it being the case that a measure of this sort would not apply favorably to large towns, his belief was that the most favorable opportunity was to be found in the suburbs of our large cities. Working men ought to be able to choose some part of a town to live in where their children would be free from the temptation of the public-houses. The working classes had a right to have neighbourhoods of their own which would be immune from the drink temptation which was so injurious to themselves and to their children.

* MR. BARNARD (Kidderminster)

took objection to the statement that a good many points in the Bill could be better discussed in Committee than in the House. There had been many different Resolutions passed and private Bills framed dealing with the temperance question. He thought it was essential to have some far-reaching measure instead of these piecemeal proposals which enormously complicated the question with which they were dealing. The Scottish Bill of 1903 increased democratic influence in connection with the licensing authority. In some parts it gave half of the licensing authority to the county councils or local authorities. That was a long step forward. The proposal in the Bill now before the House practically amounted to this. The population of any tiny village would be able to decide in its own area this vital and enormously important matter. While he was in favour of local control he did not think it desirable that little communities should be given powers of the far-reaching character proposed by this Bill. Legislation dealing with the liquor traffic should not be passed hastily. He reminded the House that last year the Act dealing with Sunday closing in Ireland was com-mended to the House because a com-promise had been arrived at between the town traders and the temperance party on the question of the distance to be travelled in order to come within the definition of bona fidetraveller. He desired at that time to speak, not against the measure generally, but on that particular point. The application of the closure prevented him from stating what he wanted to say, and he voted against the Bill on the ground that it had not been sufficiently discussed. Immediately afterwards the newspaper for which the hon. Member for the Appleby Division was responsible announced with great prominence how he had voted, and stated that temperance men should lose no time in expressing disapproval of his action. He hoped the promoters of this Bill would be tolerant of the views held by others who, while desiring the same end, did not regard the machinery now pro-posed as that which was most likely to achieve the wished-for result. He was not in Parliament through the support of the grout trade organisations of the country. He had promised nothing to any temperance society, and yet he had the National Trade Defence Association denouncing him and going; in favour of his opponent. That gave him a title to speak with some degree of impartiality. The whole difficulty on this question arose in connection with compensation. The supporters of the Bill had not touched that matter, and it would be interesting to know what was the real meaning they attached to the term "time limit." If they would state what it meant, he believed that would go a long way towards solving the question. Both the majority and the minority Reports of the Royal Commission presided over by Lord Peel agreed in stating that something should be done for persons whose interests were affected by the reduction of licences. The whole crux of the matter was a fair consideration of the interests of the people involved, and if only they could be dealt with in a more or less generous spirit he believed they would rapidly get reform which everyone desired to see, whereas disregard of the personal interests would inevitably delay the solution.

* MR. SHERWELL (Huddersfield)

said that one's view of legislation was necessarily determined by the object which was in view Many persons were accustomed to regard the problem of intemperance as one of drunkenness. In his view that estimate was neither adequate nor satisfactory. If the problem before politicians and reformers was merely the reduction or suppression of flagrant drunkenness, the problem to be solved would lie in very much smaller compass, for after all the number of habitual drunkards was comparatively small and they formed but an insignificant proportion of the total population. His own point of view was probably not the point of view of the ordinary temperance reformer, or of the ordinary advocate of licensing reform. He approached the question from a strictly economic point of view, being chiefly impressed by the economic waste and danger represented by the average expenditure of the people on alcoholic drinks. When it was realised that the average expenditure of the working classes of the country as a whole was not less than 6s. per week per family, the House would see how serious was the strictly economic aspect of the question. The high and unnecessary expenditure upon alcohol was the real measure of the gravity of the problem. With the principle underlying the Bill he was in hearty agreement; its provisions were, in his opinion, unnecessarily limited, but they represented an extension of the democratic principle of local self-government, and on that ground alone they were entitled to favorable consideration. He believed that there was no sound reason in logic for withholding the principle of local control from the conduct of the liquor trade, and certainly the admission of the principle in other forms of political and administrative procedure constituted precedents which they were logically bound to follow. The real defect of the Bill, in his opinion, was that it unduly restricted the proposed extension of the democratic principle. He believed that, the admission of the principle of local self-government carried with it the necessity of oilier powers and options than those included in the provisions of the Bill. The principle of the Bill was embodied in two main provisions, the first of which was concerned with the reduction of licences in accordance with local opinion. Personally he was not so much enamoured of the reduction of licences as a remedy as were others whose judgment was entitled to full respect. He recognised the desirability that there should be few licences rather than many, both for the lessening of temptation and for the purposes of more effective police supervision. Nevertheless, he believed that its value as an instrument of reform had been much exaggerated. It was to be remembered that the diminution in the amount of alcohol sold and consumed was never in proportion to the reduction of licences effected. A large part of the trade formerly done in the suppressed houses was always diverted to the remaining houses, which consequently had to be enlarged to admit of the greater volume of trade. That had been the experience of Birmingham and elsewhere, where extension of premises had necessarily followed suppression of superfluous licences. Within the last half-century there had been a considerable reduction in the number of public-houses in Scotland, but there had been no corresponding diminution in the amount of alcohol consumed. Despite the difference in the number of licences, the amount of spirits consumed per head of the population in Scotland had remained practically stationary, and was only fractionally less at the present time than it was half a century ago. While admitting the advantages of legislation for the compulsory reduction of licences where there was an excessive supply, he did not regard such legislation as properly the first step to be taken. In considering the present excess in the number of licensed premises and the steps to be taken to effect a reduction, they must have regard to the causes which had produced the excess. In his judgment the true remedy lay not so much in legislation or in administration as in the just application of economic forces. The excess in the number of licensed premises had arisen from the fact of wholly inadequate taxation. Originally our licensing system was a free trade system, and licences were issued on a free trade basis. Gradually, however, the evil consequences of unrestricted traffic in liquor began to be realised, and Parliament had busied itself throughout the centuries in imposing restrictions, the effect of which had ultimately been to transform our licensing system from a free trade system into a close monopoly with full monopoly privileges. Parliament, however, while transforming the character of a licence, had never adjusted taxation to the change in the character of the licence, and, consequently, had failed to exact from the licensee a payment in any way commensurate with the value of the privilege conferred. In his judgment the first step to be taken to bring about a substantial reduction in the number of licences was to apply the economic check of adequate taxation. The value of such a check had already been powerfully illustrated in the case of Scotland. Prior to I880, the sum paid for a publican's licence in Scotland was almost insignificant. In that year, however, Mr. Gladstone recast and increased the publican's licence duties. The increase, it was true, was quite inadequate, but its immediate effect was to bring about the surrender of something like 4,000 publican's licences in Scotland. For his own part, therefore, he would have preferred to postpone legislation for the compulsory reduction of licences until after a revision and increase of the licence duties. The other main provision of the Bill was the much more controverted one of local veto. Personally he had always been favourable to the principle of local veto, and was prepared to support its inclusion in a comprehensive measure of licensing reform, but he differed from some of his hon. friends in his estimate of the results to be expected from it. Speaking from his investigations and study of the working of prohibitory laws in all parts of the world, he ventured to suggest to the House that there was no evidence to show that local veto, if enacted, would solve the problem of intemperance in those great urban communities in the country where the problem most pressed for solution. It had been mentioned in the course of the debate that there were many areas in the United Kingdom where prohibition was already established by the will of the landlord, but he submitted to the House that no sound deduction could be drawn from those in support of the expectation that local veto would be effective under the provisions of this Bill in ordinary urban areas. The districts referred to were chiefly respectable residential areas in close proximity to licensed areas. Indeed the boundaries in many cases were wholly artificial. People who went to live in them went there knowing that prohibition was already imposed, and therefore aware of the existing condition of things. In the cases contemplated by the Bill, however, the proposal was to enforce prohibition by the will of a majority in districts where licensed houses already existed. In the case of Toxteth Park, to which reference had been made, it had to be remembered that abundant facilities for the purchase of liquor existed in adjacent districts. He was not depreciating the value or advantages of these prohibition areas. On the contrary, he welcomed them, but he thought it right to suggest that they could not fairly be pressed so far as they sometimes wove pressed as arguments for local veto elsewhere. They depended very largely for their success upon the existence of a "safety-valve" in the shape of facilities for the purchase of liquor in closely adjacent areas. The hon. Member for Particle, who had moved the Second Reading of the Bill, in adverting to the objection that these adjoining areas frequently suffered from an excessive number of public-houses as a con-sequence of no licence in the prohibition areas, had suggested that under the Bill these licence areas had the remedy in, their own hands, but he apparently did not appreciate the fact that if these areas were themselves to adopt prohibition in self-defence they would in that way destroy the "safety-valve" upon which the success of present experiments in prohibition in adjoining areas largely depended. In the course of the debate considerable stress had been laid upon the success of local veto in the United States and in the British Colonies, hut the experience of those countries simply confirmed doubts of the practicability of local veto in large urban communities. Undoubtedly both in the United States and in the British Colonies local veto had been successful in sparsely-peopled districts, but it had not solved the problem of the towns. His hon. friend the Member for Lincoln had referred particularly to Massachusetts and to the no licence areas in that State, but he ventured to point out to him and to the House that the urban areas under prohibition there were chiefly suburbs of Boston, and, in the judgment of those responsible for the no-licence campaign in Massachusetts, were dependent for their success upon the safety-valve afforded by the adjoining licence districts. His hon. friend had referred to Cambridge, a city of about 100,000 inhabitants, but Cambridge was to all intents and purposes a part of Boston, although administratively separate. It was impossible for a stranger to say where Boston ended and Cambridge began. It was true, as his hon. friend had said, that the people of Cambridge had for twenty years given a majority for no-licence, but if his hon. friend had analysed the vote in the separate wards of the city, he would have seen that whereas the University and superior residential districts which princi- pally comprise the city had consistently voted for prohibition, the poorer industrial districts had year after year voted for licence, although their votes had been overborne by the votes of the residents in the better class districts. It might be suggested that such coercion of the working class wards would not arise under the provisions of the Bill now before the House. That was true but did hon. Members appreciate the fact that the admission really involved an admission of the ineffectiveness of the Bill in the districts which most required attention? If local veto was not likely to be adopted in ordinary working class areas or in urban communities, then clearly some other method of reform was required which would offer a half-way house before the goal of entire prohibition was ultimately reached. It was for this reason that he, and others with whom it was his privilege to act, advocated permissive experiments in what was known as disinterested management The alleged failure of disinterested management in other countries had been emphasised in strong terms by the hon. Member for the Tradeston Division of Glasgow who had referred particularly to the Government spirit monopoly in Russia, the State dispensary system in South Carolina, and the so-called Gothenburg system in Sweden and Norway. He (Mr. Sherwell) held no brief for the system of State monopoly either in Russia or elsewhere. He and his friends had always pointed out the limitations and defects of any form of Government monopoly, and had repeatedly emphasised the fact that where, as in Russia, the Government had power to open dramshops in any locality without regard to local opinion the system was fore-doomed to failure. Nevertheless much of the criticism that had been directed against the Russian spirit monopoly was misleading. The figures showing the revenue from the monopoly, for example, were constantly used without regard to the facts, first, that the adoption of the system had been gradual and that, consequently, as it was extended to new areas the volume of trade naturally increased: and, secondly, that under the former system the Government received excise duties which now were included in what were called the profits of the monopoly, and their inclusion naturally swelled the so-called profits, and suggested an extraordinary increase in the amount of spirits consumed. Nor was the hon. Member justified in stating that the dispensary system in South Carolina had on account of its failure been abolished, it had merely been abolished as a State system, but had been re-enacted in the much more satisfactory form of a local option system under which the dangers of centralisation would be eliminated. The hon. Member in referring to Sweden had implied that the system of disinterested management there had so far failed as to call forth commendation from the Swedish Parliament. As a matter of fact the Swedish Parliament had recently given the most explicit evidence of its approval of the system by enacting legislation which came into operation in the present year extending the system to the rural districts from which it had hitherto been excluded. Such notion was surely an emphatic endorsement of the merits of the system on the part of the Swedish Parliament. The hon. Member for the Tradeston division had laid great stress upon the arrests for drunkeness in Norway and Sweden, and had used those arrests as conclusive evidence of the failure of the Gothenburg system. He (Mr. Sherwell) was always sorry when temperance reformers based arguments on comparative statistics of drunkenness. Nothing could be more misleading than a test of that kind. It was certainly true that the arrests for drunkenness in some Norwegian and Swedish towns were high as compared with similar towns in England, but if the hon. Member suggested that that was a test of failure, then he could not limit the test to the system of disinterested management, but must in fairness apply the test to other methods of dealing with the liquor traffic also. For example, there were two towns in Norway which in point of population, economic and geographical conditions were fairly comparable, namely, Bergen and Stavanger. In Bergen the system of disinterested management was in force as regards spirits, whereas since 1896 Stavanger had been under prohibition in regard to spirits. Taking the last quinquennial period he found that the arrests for drunkenness in ratio to population had been higher in Stavanger under prohibition than in Bergen under disinterested management. Did this therefore imply that prohibition was a failure? Or again, he would take Port- land, the principal city in the State of Maine, which had been under prohibition for nearly sixty years. During the last ten years the arrests for drunkenness in Portland had averaged thirty-four per 1,000 of the population, or four times the ratio of arrests in Liverpool, and slightly more than four times the ratio of arrests in London. Would the hon. Member suggest that these figures necessarily implied the failure of prohibition, a system which he himself advocated? Surely if statistics of drunkenness were made the evidence of failure in the ease of disinterested management, they must also be made the evidence of failure in the case of prohibition. Suggestions of failure in the case of disinterested management could only arise from a misconception of what the Gothenburg system really was. It was not an abstraction, but the amalgamation of various restrictions, each of which had been advocated by the hon. Member for Tradeston and his friends all their lives. Its principal features were the elimination of the inducement to sell liquor, the reduction of the number of public-houses, the shortening of the hours of sale, the non-employment of barmaids, the raising of the age limit for children and young persons, the abolition of sales on credit, and other similar provisions. Was it really to be seriously suggested that these restrictions actually aggravated the evil of intemperance? Let him take the case of Bergen to which reference had been made. It was incontestable that under the system of disinterested management the bar sales of spirits had been considerably reduced. Was the House to understand that this reduction in the bar sales of spirits had actually increased the amount of drunkenness? If such deductions were to be drawn, then clearly the hon. Member for Tradeston was logically bound to renounce the advocacy of all restrictions of the liquor traffic, and to oppose that which he had hitherto supported. He wished in closing to express his regret that the Bill contained no provision for the enactment of a time limit which would clear the ground for such experiments as the people desired. It was perfectly true, as had been suggested that afternoon, that there was no vested interest in licences in Scotland, and there-fore no claim in legal equity to compensation; but those who were students of political procedure in this country knew that the legislative solution of such problems was not founded so much on legal equity or on an abstract principle of justice, as upon a broad sentiment of justice which largely determined public action. Everyone who had studied the question knew that it was impossible to clear the ground and secure complete liberty for experiments in different localities until they had resolutely faced as a mutter of practical politics this question of assumed vested interests, and he thought that the promoters of the Bill would best advance the cause they had in view if in Committee they would include in its provisions an equitable time limit for definitely ridding the country of the compensation difficulty.

MR. BOTTOMLEY (Hackney, S.)

said he did not consider it necessary simply because the measure before the House referred solely to Scotland to offer any apology for intervening in the discussion. Scotland was part of the United Kingdom, and so long as that remained the fact he would feel it his duty on all occasions to do everything in his power to promote the interests of his Celtic neighbours. He would like seriously to express the hope that neither the mover nor the seconder of this Bill nor any of its supporters would suspect that because some hon. Members on that side of the House were utterly opposed to such legislation they were in any way behind them in a desire for temperance reform. It would be mere affectation for any man to pretend that he did not realize the gravity and solemnity of the evil with which temperance reformers were endeavouring to grapple. But their differences were fundamental. If he might say so without appearing disrespectful to the projectors of this measure, he would suggest that the mistake they made was in endeavouring to introduce into the deliberations of a purely political assembly such as the House of Commons considerations and arguments of an evangelical character. One hon. Member introduced a measure for Sunday closing, saying he had found the principles of the Gospel so successful in various other callings of life that it was his intention to introduce them into Parliament. The hon. Member who introduced the Bill used the argument that they must do their best to see that the petition, "Lead us not into temptation," was not infringed by their legislation. He ventured to say that such arguments placed the opponents of measures of this kind in an invidious and unfair position. In reply to hon. Members who told them that the Bible was to be the rule of faith and conduct in all public affairs, one would be justified in quoting passage after passage from that same Book, every word of which was antagonistic to any kind of legislation which had for its object the restriction of the liberty of every citizen to indulge in alcoholic refreshment to his heart's content. [Laughter.] That phrase was received with a levity for which he was not responsible. He preferred to base his opposition to this measure upon the simple, practical, political ground that, tested by experience, logic, and fact, restrictive legislation never had—in any part of the United Kingdom, at any rate—had any beneficial effect. There was no argument, and there were no statistics which supported the theory that restrictive legislation had ever promoted temperance. England with-out any restrictive licensing legislation in regard to early closing was a more sober country to-day than either Scot land, Wales or Ireland. He made himself responsible for that general statement based upon some investigation into the subject. England was every year becoming a more sober country, whereas, tested by statistical facts, Scotland was becoming a less sober country. In England to-day the proportion of drunkenness was 6per 1,000 in Scotland it was 9 per 1,000. He asked any hon. Member for Scotland to disprove that statement. He went further, and said that, whereas during the last twenty years the figures confronting them in England had been steadily decreasing, those in Scotland showed an increase of 50 per cent. He did not think there was much good to be gained by going into these details and statistics. They had to look at the matter from the point of view of their knowledge of the world. He ventured to say the evil of drunkenness, great as it was, was grossly—perhaps unconsciously—exaggerated by those who made it the main purpose of their lives to grapple with it. But whatever its extent might be he was satisfied that no amount of closing of public-houses in any given district would have the effect of preventing the man who intended to be intemperate from gratifying his desires. Looking at Scotland and Wales, they would find that was beyond question. They would find secret drinking, bogus clubs, and—what to him was the greatest danger of this legislation—home drinking to an extent which was absolutely unknown in those areas where such legislation did not exist. He would rather see one hundred men drunk in the public-house than one drunken man among his family and his children. [Cries of "Oh, oh."] He said that with de liberation aud seriously. [A LABOUR MEMBER: Where do they go to when they leave the pub?] He had yet to learn that a large percentage of men left the public-house in that condition, and that the licensed victualler in his own interest did not do his utmost to see that no man became intoxicated on his premises. But assuming that every man who got drunk did so in the public-house, and went home in that condition, was it not better that he should do so when his confiding Wife alone was up, and the members of his family were retired to rest, than that he should be sipping and sipping in the midst of his innocent family, and setting himself to defy the State, saving: "If you wish to prevent me doing that which I have a right to do, 1 will show you you are not going to succeed?" Was it not a remarkable fact that throughout this discussion not a speaker in favour of the Bill had pretended that in the majority or minority Reports of the Royal Commission there was one word in favour of local veto? He thought that was an overwhelming fact.

AN HON. MEMBER

said that a large measure of popular control was specially recommended.

MR. BOTTOMLEY

said he did not maintain that there was no suggestion that after five years Scotland should have a large measure of local control, but that in the Report there was no recommendation of the general principle of local veto. A reference to the Report would justify his assertion.

* MR. CHARLES ROBERTS

said there could be no doubt that in the case of Scotland local option was recommended.

MR. BOTTOMLEY

said that a reference to both Reports would show that they avoided recommendation of the principle. He had not found that recommendation, and he was surprised that up to the present no speaker had found it and read it. He was struck by the fact that when the Irish Sunday Closing measure was before the House a large number of hon. Members who were avowed total abstainers declared them selves thoroughly opposed to legislation of this kind. If the House looked at the figures for Scotland, it would be driven to the conclusion that prohibition in Scot-land had been a dismal failure. It was said that statistics could prove anything. In future that would have to be modified by saying that statistics could prove anything in the world except that restrictive licensing legislation had ever done an atom of good for temperance reform. Here were the figures of drunkenness for the city of Glasgow, taken from the records of the Scottish courts:—13,456 in 1904, 14,931 in 1905, and 20,247 in 1906. That was with such prohibition as they had to-day. A startling fact which he commended to the attention of the House was that in those places where there was the largest number of public-houses the statistics of crime and drunkenness were in an inverse ratio to the number of public-houses. No doubt hon. Members would have difficulty in believing that, but the official statistics showed it to be the case. Again, he commended to the notice of the House the argument that drunkenness per se was not the great evil that temperance reformers would wish the community to believe. Only a limited number of persons suffered from the disease, and the main point in respect of this legislation was to consider on what ground hon. Members could claim the right to legislate and to say that three-fifths of a community, with a limited franchise, should be endowed with the power to say that the remainder of the community should not have facilities to take liquor. The right claimed could only be justified on the one ground that the consumption of alcohol was a pestilence and a curse condemned by the general opinion the whole community. If that was the case, how could hon. Members pressing forward this legislation justify the taking of more than £30,000,000" annually for the use of the public services from the liquor trade? If the argument of the temperance reformers was that drinking was such a pestilence in the common judgment of the whole community as justified a three fifths majority, with a limited franchise, preventing any one from touching drink, it must thon be a serious thing for them to rely on the entire expenses of the Army, Navy, and Civil Services being paid out of the taxes derived from the revenue from drink. He reminded hon. Members of what took place when the Liberal Party tampered with this question not many years ago. The Liberal Party was shattered and vanquished by attempting to force this un-English measure on the English people. He was not fond of quoting Latin, but he remembered that one of the sixpenny appendix phrases that he got from a dictionary was Fiat experimentum in corpore vili. He knew very well that the phrase meant this, '' Try this experiment, if you like, on the vile corpus of the Scottish people, and if it succeeds, perhaps we can keep the English people waiting a little longer.'' 134 out of 150 Liberal candidates were defeated at that election, and they attributed their defeat to local veto. Were hon. Members on his own side of the House going in these early days of revived Liberalism to run the risk of shattering their party again? A great demand was being made on the Party loyalty of the Government supporters who wished to act up to their election pledges, but as one who knew human nature he could not bring himself to believe that legislation of this kind was calculated to do any good whatever. He was always anxious to avoid anything in the nature of an artificial peroration, but he would like to quote the words which Sir William Harcourt uttered during the Oxford election of 1873, which contained a most eloquent denunciation of legislation of the kind now proposed. That distinguished statesman said— If there be one Party which is more pledged than another to resist a policy of restrictive legislation having for its object social coercion, that Party is the Liberal Party. The proud title which it has assumed proclaims the principle on which it is founded to be that of liberty. The connection between Liberalism and liberty is that liberty, as understood by Liberals, does not consist in making others do what yon think right. The difference between a free Government and a Government which is not free is principally this: that a Government which is not tree interferes with everything it can, and a free Government interferes with nothing except what it must. A despotic Government tries to make everybody do what it chooses. A Liberal Government tries, as far as the safety of society will permit, to allow everybody to do as he wishes. It has been the tradition of the Liberal Party consistently to maintain the doctrine of individual liberty. It is because they have done so that England is the country where people can do more what they please than in any other country in the world. The Liberal Party has strenuously and successfully laboured for generations to break down all systems of restrictions—restrictions of commerce, restrictions of political rights, restrictions of opinion, restrictions of religion, all founded and established by people who sincerely believed that these restrictions were to the advantage of society, by compelling people to do what they could for themselves and for their neighbours. It is this practice of allowing one set of people to dictate to another set of people what they shall do, what they shall think, what they shall drink, when they shall go to bed, what they shall buy and where they shall buy it, what wages they shall get and how they shall spend them, against which the Liberal Party have always protested. The policy of the Liberal Party has been for generations a policy of emancipation from restriction. I am against the whole system of petty molestation and irritating dictation, whether by a class or by a majority. I do not admire the grand maternal Government which ties night-caps upon a grown-up nation by Act of Parliament. I am against putting people to bed who want to sit up. I am against for-bidding a man to have a glass of beer if he wants to have a glass of beer. These are not actions of a Liberal policy, for they are the negation of the principle of liberty. One set of people want to attack liberty of action in one respect, another set of people want to attack it in another respect; some people want to dictate the conduct of employers, others to impose terms on the employed. Some want to meddle with the rights of the owners of public-houses; others to invade the rights of the owners of private houses. The form is different, but the error is the same. Unless we resolutely make a stand against this sort of thing, depend upon it liberty itself will suffer. Tyranny is a weed which is indigenous to the soil of power alike at all times and in all places. We have limited the Crown, we have limited the aristocracy, and depend upon it, if liberty is to be sacred, a democratic House of Commons must know how to limit itself. The Liberal Party, having won liberty for the English people, if need be, will yet defend it from the assaults of democratic despotism.

THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. SINCLAIR, Forfarshire)

said the duty he had to discharge was to inform the House of the attitude of the Government in regard to the measure. It was no part of his duty to travel over the large field which had been traversed that afternoon. All of them in Scotland recognised, and not least those who had to deal with the administration of Scottish business, such as the prisons, asylums, and other institutions of the country, that this evil in Scotland was of terrible dimensions, and it was obvious, if they were to seek the remedies for that evil, they must at any rate have the sympathy and support of the majority of the Scottish people. There was no doubt whatever as to the condition of Scottish opinion in regard to the Bill. Over and over again the opinion of the House had been taken upon Bills embodying the principle this Bill contained, and over and over again an overwhelming number of Scottish Members had voted in its favour. This was the sixth time during the last twenty-six or twenty-seven years that a measure embodying the principle of local veto had been discussed and voted upon in the House. He would give the House the voting of the Scottish Members. In 1880 a majority of the Scottish representatives by thirty-eight to three voted in favour of the principle; in 1881 the majority was thirty-seven to three; in 1888 it was thirty-six to three; and in 1899 it was forty to fifteen. It was therefore clear that Scottish people and Scottish opinion generally sought protection from this evil, and asked for the right to apply the principle of local control. On behalf of the Government he had simply to say that they heartily supported the principle of the Bill. The Bill itself left much to be desired, not only in regard to what was in it, but in regard to what was not in it. The Bill, the Government hoped, might be read a second time, the effect of which would be that it would go to the Scottish Standing Committee. With regard to that stage the Government would reserve to themselves full liberty of action, and they must not be considered as being committed to any of the details of the measure, as they at present stood, or to the view that it could be made a practical measure of reform. But so far as lay within their power they wished to co-operate in advancing the question a stage during the present session, and to do what they could to make it a practical measure, whatever its fate might be, in the lifetime of the present Parliament.

* MR. CARLILE (Hertfordshire, St. Albans)

said that he noticed that three of the hon. Members opposite who were going to vote against the Amendment now before the House had spoken of the necessity for the insertion in the Bill of the principle of compensation. He need hardly say that hon. Members on that side of the House were in agreement with that proposal, but the ideas of the Opposition as to the form in which compensation might be inserted in the Bill were of a different kind. Hon. Members opposite suggested the insertion of a time limit, but in his opinion and in that of those who acted with him such a limit would not in any sense form a proper method of compensation. It would be impossible for the licensee who was given notice of the termination of his licence, even in seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years to recoup himself for his capital and means of living. Indeed, he would go so far as to say that many owners of licences would prefer to be robbed of their property at once rather than have hanging over their heads for such a long period the danger of ultimate ruin. Some of them were now at a time of life at which they could start afresh and. secure their future and that of their families, whereas if they waited they would not at the expiration of the time limit be able to do so. They knew quite well that if this principle was adopted for Scotland it would doubtless be extended to England, and therefore as Englishmen they bad a right to be heard. Many speakers had said that the conscience of the country was uneasy at the number of public-houses. If that were so, by all means let them remove the evil, but to propose to remove it, as the Bill did, at the expense of their neighbours' pockets was taking a step in the direction of doing evil in order that good might come. It was not right that the public conscience should be soothed at the expense of other people's property. He also felt that what was proposed was an intolerable piece of tyranny—that a relatively small number of persons should have a right to say that no one should have a glass of intoxicating liquor, but must drink the particular beverage which they thought desirable. He did not think people south of the Tweed would tolerate such a thing for a moment. He had no personal interest in the liquor traffic, and he had been a water drinker for the last thirty years, but he had never found other persons insisting that he should take another form of beverage, and therefore he did not desire to force water upon them. Then again, another objectionable feature was that the whole question was to be revised every three years. That meant that the present holders of licences would be robbed of their property and means of livelihood without compensation, and yet after a few years the whole question was to be reopened. One result of that would be that should the decision of a locality be reversed, the present high type of licence-holder would not again be found to reenter so precarious a calling, and the traffic would pass into the hands of those who would have no pride in the good conduct of their houses, and who would feel no interest in the welfare of their customers. Then there was no provision dealing with clubs. Those who knew anything of large and populous districts were aware that drinking clubs were the worse means of supplying liquor. They were under no kind of control by either the magistrates or police, and were nothing more nor less, many of them, than drinking hells. He did not believe the people of Scotland, with the examples of Edinburgh and Glasgow before them, wanted the Bill, because the magistrates had already been given more power than the justices in this country to refuse the renewal of licences. At present, under the Scottish system, the people had a direct voice in the appointment of the borough magistrates. The proposed legislation would operate almost exclusively upon the poor man, which was not at all right. If the measure proposed to deal with the question upon lines of adequate compensation without differentiating between rich and poor it would be more likely to commend itself to the public and to hon. Members on his side of the House. Then there was the methylated spirit evil, which was on the increase, and no attempt to deal with it was contained in the Bill. In conclusion he declared that the Bill would lead to sly drinking through the medium of chemists' shops and other ways. It would, moreover, be a great hardship to the travelling public. For these reasons, and because he believed the force of public opinion was travelling surely in the direction of greater habits of sobriety, he would certainly support the Amendment.

* MR. HERBERT ROBERTS (Denbighshire, W.),

on behalf of himself and his Welsh colleagues, cordially supported the principle of the Bill. Wales had taken for many years a great interest in this question, and on two occasions a Welsh Local Veto Bill had passed a Second Reading. In 1891, in a Conservative House of Commons, a Welsh Local Veto Bill passed its Second Reading and on that occasion only one Welsh representative voted against it. In 1893 substantially the same measure was read a second time and only two Welsh Members voted against it. If now they had a Welsh Local Veto Bill before the House he thought he might say that it would have the support of every Member from Wales. Reference had been made to the Licensing Commission, of which he had the honour of being a member, and he would like to make clear the fact that a specific recommendation was made on the point involved in this Bill. In the Chairman's Report it was pointed out that in Scotland and Wales the case was different from that of England, and in those countries the cause of temperance reform was in a much more advanced stage than it was here. The Commission suggested that at the end of five years in Scotland and seven years in Wales a wide measure of this character might be applied to those countries. In many ways, indeed, the result of that Commission had been the foundation of all temperance reform, because the House had passed some of its most important declarations. That was a good augury for this Bill and indicated, that in some form the principle of it, as far as Scotland was concerned, would soon become the law of the land. There were certain difficulties with regard to the application of local veto to England which were not applicable to Scotland, and therefore there was a reason for dealing with legislation for Scotland in advance of legislation for England. He had been much interested to gather from the debate the strength of Scottish opinion upon this point, not only from what was said by the mover and seconder but from the weight of Scottish opinion in Scotland itself. It would be a great advantage in dealing with the question through-out the country that the experiment should be tried in Scotland, and in his opinion it was most gratifying that the Government, through the Secretary for Scotland, had announced their decision in favour of the principle of the Bill. He had been referred to as one who had more responsibility than any one else in the House in regard to the application of the principle of local veto to large building areas. He was responsible for working a considerable area in Liverpool in which the sale of drink was prohibited, and he would like to corroborate what had been said as to the beneficial working of the principle. He had never received a petition, or resolution, or a protest, nor had his firm, from any one living in that area, and speaking from his experience as a business man, he was glad to say that nothing but good had come from the application of that principle in the area for which he was responsible, and the social and moral welfare of the people in those districts was higher than it was elsewhere. After all, practical experience was very valuable in the solution of a question of this kind. He was not disposed to take a very sanguine view as to the possibilities of legislation, but he was sure that if the principle of this Bill were applied in England, Scotland, and Wales, it would bring nothing but good into the life of the nation, and that the present Parliament, however remarkable its achievements might be in other directions, could not do better than pass this Bill.

* MR. YOUNGER (Ayr Burghs)

said that he had been connected with the brewing trade in Scotland all his life, but the system in Scotland was different from that in England, and being what was called a free trade brewer, he owned no houses, so that his interest was only indirect, and was limited to any possible dislocation of the ordinary channels of distribution. He was convinced that although Scotland was said to be ripe for this change and desired it, the restriction of the sale of liquor would increase consumption rather than decrease it. He had had a fairly good experience of Parliamentary contests, but he had never found out that Scotland wanted local control. It had always appeared to him that at elections the question was treated as a joke, and that there was no serious intention behind it except on the part of extreme temperance reformers. They had an importance out of all proportion to their numbers, because they were the balancing factor in many constituencies, and it was on account of their votes that Members had been compelled to pledge themselves to this principle. There was, he submitted, less excuse now than there had been in previous years for interference with the existing system. He also had the privilege of sitting on the Royal Commission, in consequence of whose Report many changes had been made in Scotland. They had an interesting Bill passed in 1903 which amended and consolidated the whole of the laws relating to the licensing system in Scotland, and constituted the licensing boards on a democratic basis. So far as he had himself been able to judge, those boards were working admirably, and were giving great satisfaction. The system appeared to be one which did not, as far as he could see, require any change or improvement. He did not on personal grounds make any objection to the proposal of his hon. friend opposite, unless he was to take the first clause of his Bill as meaning that brewers in the prohibited areas were not to be allowed to deal in a wholesale way. That, he understood, was not intended by the Bill, but he wished to have the point made clear, as it was not at all clear in the Bill, which was so clumsily drafted that he thought it would be impossible for any Committee to deal with it properly. When the Royal Commission was sitting they had under cross-examination a very extreme teetotal witness, who was asked whether, as he would prohibit the sale of drink in a given area, he would prohibit its manufacture there as well as its importation. His answer was in the affirmative, and his cross-examiner then said, "And you would place that power in the hands of the majority," and pointed out how that might cut both ways. One objection to the Bill was its restrictive character. They already had enough restriction in Scotland, and the latest attempt had not been a brilliant success, for the shortening of hours of opening in Edinburgh and Glasgow had apparently not tended to greater sobriety in those two cities. There could be no doubt that the people in Edinburgh and Glasgow did not go to bed at ten o'clock at night any more than did the people in London; they got their supplies outside public-houses, where there was no restriction, and consequently drinking went on to greater excess than formerly. In connection with the recommendation in Lord Peel's Minority Report the House might be interested to know that it did not exactly embody Lord Peel's view on the subject of local veto. Part 5 was never considered by the Commission as a whole, as the unfortunate difference of opinion between Lord Peel and his colleagues on the neutral panel had arisen on the administrative portion of the Report and occasioned his Lordship's withdrawal. While he would have cleared up the misunderstanding on the part of the hon. Member for South Hackney as to the recommendations in the Minority Report if the previous speaker had not done so, he had no doubt the House would notice that while a measure of popular control, under proper safeguards, was recommended, the nature of these safeguards was not suggested. In point of fact Part 5 as originally submitted to the Commission contained Lord Peel's matured view of what these safeguards should be, and it would interest the House to be placed in possession of his recommendations. They were as follows— The licensing authority should be empowered on a requisition of a certain proportion of the ratepayers to take a poll of the rate-payers on two questions.

1. "1. Do you prefer the present system or prohibition of on-drinking houses (hotels and restaurants excepted)?
2. "2 Do you prefer the present system, or local management?

We think that a three-fourths majority of the registered electors should be required to carry prohibition, and a two-thirds majority to carry local management. In the unlikely event of both being carried by the required majorities that with the larger vote would of course carry the day. To avoid danger of fluctuations a vote should be taken not oftener than once in seven years. In ease of local management being adopted the local authority should decide how far it should extend its operations. It should be carefully laid down that not more than a certain percentage of profits should be devoted to local objects entirely unconnected with the rates. He could not of course tell what had happened, but he conjectured that Lord Peel had to cut out his view as to the necessary safeguards in order to secure adhesion to his Report by those Commissioners who had continued to act with him, otherwise he would have had to face the risk of standing alone.

MR. HERBERT ROBERTS

I think I ought to say the hon. Member is in-correct in his assumption that the members who signed the Minority Report did not concur in the whole of their recommendation.

* MR. YOUNGER

said he did not suggest that. What he did suggest was that Lord Peel modified his original Report to meet the views of the other members of the minority. Then there was the question of the franchise. With reference to the poll to be taken under the Bill, the parish council register was perhaps the widest they had in Scotland; but that franchise was not nearly wide enough, as it would cut out a great number of persons who ought to be heard on a question of this kind. He would also like to point out in discussing the question of compensation that the Bill proposed to hand over the distribution of liquor in the prohibited areas to the local chemists, and he rather thought there would be a great many chemists established if the Bill passed. He believed that Scotsmen would be just as clever in evading the law as people in other places. In America it was very easy to obtain a doctor's prescription, and he thought it would be as easy in Scotland. He remembered reading of one place in America where the doctors began to make some difficulty about prescribing, and at last a very ingenious person imported a pet snake into the locality, with the result that there was no difficulty in getting a prescription if a person could show he had been bitten by that snake. The only difficulty was to secure the services of the snake, as it was necessary to book it three or four weeks in advance. He had listened to the half-hearted commendation of the Bill by the Secretary for Scotland, and he regarded the right hon. Gentleman's statement really as an entire condemnation of the manner in which the Bill had been drawn and the provisions it proposed to enact. Under the circumstances, he asked if it was wise or fair to introduce a novel proposal of this kind, and endeavour to base it on a sure foundation upstairs, when the Secretary for Scotland certainly by implication had condemned it. The Government ought to deal with the question themselves, and he did not think it was right or statesmanlike to send such a Bill to the Scottish Grand Committee for the purpose of having it knocked into shape.

* SIR JOHN JAEDINE (Roxburghshire)

said it seemed to him that most of the objections raised on the Bill could be dealt with by the Committee upstairs. Scotland had by its representatives endorsed the principles of the Bill in this and the last Parliament. They were approved by the serious and religious people of Scotland, and he had no doubt that if the Bill were passed into law it would be administered, in the rural districts with every regard for the wishes and welfare of the people, so careful and efficient were the elected Boards.

SIR HENRY CRAIK (Glasgow and Aberdeen Universities)

said he would not have risen but for the boldness of the hon. Member for Dumfries in declaring that no Member on that side would be prepared to oppose the principle of the Bill. It was scarcely possible, after such a statement, that they who were distinctly opposed to the Bill in its entirety should refrain from putting their views before the House. They had heard some curious explanations of the views of hon. Members opposite, and they had been allowed to see that at least there was a very wide difference of opinion on that side of the House. Perhaps the most candid of all statements made by Members opposite was that of the hon. Member for West Denbighshire, who had calmly asked them to make the experiment with regard to Scotland. Was anything ever addressed to Scottish Members with more calm assurance than that the doubts as to the application of the principle to England should be solved by making the experiment upon the unfortunate body of Scotland? He asked the House to notice in the first place how far they were going to apply this principle of a popular vote. Were they quite certain what the effect in every case and in every district would be? Hon. Members opposite seemed to take it for granted that it would be almost universally either limitation or prohibition. The effect of the voting, however, was quite uncertain, but if it resulted as was expected by the authors of the Bill, there was the great danger that it would drive the evil into hidden corners, and it would still go on without the necessary restrictions and police supervision now exercised over public-houses. He wondered if hon. Members who spoke so bitterly of public-houses were in the habit of reading the exposures of what went on in some of the poorer tenements of Glasgow. These things were enough to show them the danger of driving these evils underground. He opposed the Bill because it was beginning at the wrong end. Had they done all they ought to do in education, in improving sanitary conditions, in teaching the people the necessity of obeying sanitary laws, and in teaching them self-respect bodily and mentally? Had they trained them in those physical exercises that made them throw off the evils of the alcoholic habit? Had our magistrates and tribunals also punished sufficiently the men and women who brutalised themselves by drink and made themselves a danger to society, or had they punished drunken crimes with the severity that ought to have been directed towards their suppression? Had they not been inclined too much to condone offences against the person committed under the influence of drink? Were they justified in allowing a restriction of the kind proposed on the liberty of their fellow-citizens? He was certain that the great mass of opinion in the country would think it their first duty before doing so to use every method of invocation And punishment and cure upon those guilty of making themselves a danger or a nuisance to their fellow-beings. Because there were a few alcoholic men who

were a burden to themselves and to others they were not justified as a nation in imposing a restriction of this sort on the liberties of grown men and women. They were always told by Liberal Members for Scotland that they represented the whole of Scottish opinion. He left them in that profound conviction, but he did not share it with them. They knew how active a small clique of faddists might be. He believed the national feeling, once it thought this question had come within the range of practical politics, would turn against it in a way which would startle hon. Gentlemen opposite.

MR. R BALFOUR

rose in his place and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Question put, "That the Question be now put."

The House divided:—Ayes, 276; Noes, 106. (Division List No. 145.)

AYES.
Abraham, William (Cork, N. E)	Brunner,J.F.L.(Lanes., Leigh)	Crombie, John William
Abraham, William (Rhondda)	Bryce, J. Annan	Crooks, William
Agnew. George William	Buckmaster, Stanley O.	Cross, Alexander
Alden, Percy	Burns, Rt. Hon. John	Crossley, William J.
Allen,A.Acland (Christchurch)	Burnyeat, W. J. D.	Dalmeny, Lord
Ambrose, Robert	Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas	Dalziel, James Henry
Ashton, Thomas Gair	Byles, William Pollard	Davies, Timothy (Fulham)
Asquith,Rt.Hn. Herbert Henry	Cameron, Robert	Delany, William
Astbury, John Meir	Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.	Dewar. Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)
Atherley-Jones, L.	Carr-Comm, H. W.	Donelan, Captain A.
Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)	Cawley, Sir Frederick	Duffy, William J.
Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury,E.)	Chance, Frederick William	Duncan,C. (Barrow-in-Furness)
Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)	Channing, Sir Francis Allston	Dunn, A. Edward (Camborne)
Barker, John	Cheetham, John Frederick	Dunne,MajorE.Martin(Walsall)
Barlow, Percy (Bedford)	Clarke, C. Goddard (Peckham)	Elibank, Master of
Barnes, G. N.	Cleland, J. W.	Erskine, David C.
Beale, W. P.	Clough, William	Esmonde, Sir Thomas
Bell, Richard	Coats,SirT.Glen (Renfrew, W.)	Essex, R. W.
Bennett, E. N.	Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)	Esslemont, George Birnie
Berridge, T. H. D.	Collins,SirWm.J.(S.Pancras,W.	Evans, Samuel T.
Bethell,SirJ.H.(Essex.Romford	Condon, Thomas Joseph	Everett, R. Lacey
Bethell, T. R (Essex, Maldon)	Cooper, G. J.	Faber, G. H. (Boston)
Billson, Alfred	Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)	Fenwick, Charles
Black, Arthur W.	Corbett,C.H.(Sussex,E.Grinst'd	Ferens, T. R.
Boland, John	Corbett, T. L. (Down. North)	Ferguson, R. C. Munro
Bowerman, C. W.	Cornwall. Sir Edwin A.	Findlay, Alexander
Branch, James	Cowan, W. H.	Flavin, Michael Joseph
Brigg, John	Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)	Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter
Bright, J. A	Cremer, William Randal	Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry
Freeman-Thomas, Freeman	Macpherson, J. T.	Samuel, Herbert L. (Cleveland)
Fullerton, Hugh	Mac Veigh,Charles (Donegal,E.)	Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)
Gibb, James (Harrow)	M'Callum, John M.	Schwann,Sir C. E. (Manchester)
Gilhooly, James	M'Crae, George	Sears, J. E.
Gill. A. H.	M'Kenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald	Seaverns, J. H.
Ginnell, L.	M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)	Shackleton, David James
Glendinning, R. G.	M'Micking, Major G.	Shaw, Rt. Hon. T. (Hawick B.)
Glover, Thomas	Maddison, Frederick	Sherwell, Arthur James
Gooch, George Peabody	Markham, Arthur Basil	Shipman, Dr. John G.
Grant, Corrie	Marks, G. Croydon(Launceston)	Sinclair, Rt. Hon. John
Greenwood, Hamer (York)	Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)	Sloan, Thomas Henry
Gulland, John W.	Massie, J.	Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie
Gurdon, Sir W.Brampton	Masterman, C. F. G.	Snowden, P.
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius	Meagher, Michael	Spicer, Sir Albert
Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.	Menzies, Walter	Stanger, H. Y.
Hall, Frederick	Micklem, Nathaniel	Stanley,Hn.A.Lyulph (Chesh.)
Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis	Molteno, Percy Alport	Steadman, W. C.
Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)	Mond, A.	Stewart, Halley (Greenock)
Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r)	Morley, Rt. Hon. John	Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)
Harmsworth,R.L. (Caithn's-sh)	Morse, L. L.	Stuart, James (Sunderland)
Hart-Davies, T.	Morton, Alpheus Cleophas	Summerbell, T.
Hayden, John Patrick	Murphy, John	Taylor, John W. (Durham)
Hazel, Dr. A. E.	Murray, James	Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)
Hazelton, Richard	Myer, Horatio	Tennant, Sir Edward(Salisbury)
Hedges, A. Paget	Napier, T. B.	Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)
Helme, Norval Watson	Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)	Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)
Hemmerde, Edward George	Nicholson, CharlesN(Doncast'r)	Thompson, J.W.H.(Somerset, E.
Henderson,J.M.(Aberdeen, W.)	Norman, Sir Henry	Thorne, William
Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)	Norton, Capt. Cecil William	Tomkinson, James
Hodge, John	Nugent, Sir Walter Richard	Torrance, Sir A. M.
Holden, E. Hopkinson	O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)	Toulmin, George
Horniman, Emslie John	O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)	Trevelyan, Charles Philips
Howard, Hon. Geoffrey	O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth)	Ure, Alexander
Hudson, Walter	O'Shaughnessy, P. J.	Verney, F. W.
Hutton, Alfred Eddison	O'Shee, James John	Vivian, Henry
Jackson, R. S.	Parker, James (Halifax)	Walters, John Tudor
Jacoby, Sir James Alfred	Paulton, James Mellor	Walton, Sir John L. (Leeds, S.)
Jardine, Sir J.	Pearson, W.H.M.(Suffolk, Eye)	Ward, John (Stoke upon Trent)
Johnson, John (Gateshead)	Philipps,J.Wynford (Pembroke	Wardle, George J.
Jones,Sir D.Brynmor(Swansea)	Phillipps, Owen, C. (Pembroke)	Waring, Walter
Jones, William (Carnarvonshire	Pickersgill, Edward Hare	Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan)
Joyce, Michael	Pirie, Duncan V.	Wason,John Cathcart(Orkney)
Kearley, Hudson E.	Pollard, Dr.	Waterlow, D. S.
Kekewich, Sir George	Price, C. E. (Edinb'gh. Central)	Watt, Henry A.
Kelley, George D.	Price, Robert John (Norfolk,E.)	Wedgwood, Josiah C.
Kettle, Thomas Michael	Pullar, Sir Robert	Weir, James Galloway
King, Alfred John (Knutsford)	Rainy, A. Rolland	White, J. D. (Dumbartonshire)
Kitson, Rt. Hon. Sir James	Raphael, Herbert H.	White, Luke (York, E. R.)
Laidlaw, Robert	Rea, Walter Russell (Scarboro'	Whitehead, Rowland
Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)	Reddy, M.	Wiles, Thomas
Lamont, Norman	Redmond, William (Clare)	Wilkie, Alexander
Law, Hugh A. (Donegal. W.)	Richards, Thomas(W.Monm'th)	Williams, J. (Glamorgan)
Lehmann, R. C.	Richards,T.F. (Wolverhampt'n	Williams,Llewelyn (Carmart'n)
Levy, Maurice	Richardson, A.	Wills, Arthur Walters
Lewis, John Herbert	Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)	Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.)
Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David	Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)	Wilson, J. H. (Middlesbrough)
Lough, Thomas	Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)	Wilson, J.W.(Worcestersh. N.)
Lundon, W.	Robinson, S.	Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)
Luttrell, Hugh Fownes	Robson, Sir William Snowdon	Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)
Lyell, Charles Henry	Roe, Sir Thomas
Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)	Rose, Charles Day	TELLERS FOR THE AYES—
Macdonald, J.M.(FalkirkB'ghs)	Rowlands, J.	Mr. Robert Balfour and Mr. Leif Jones.
Mackarness, Frederick C.	Runciman, Walter
Maclean, Donald	Russell, T. W.
Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.	Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)
NOES.
Acland-Hood,Rt Hn. Sir Alex. F.	Ashley, W. W.	Banbury, Sir Frederick George
Anstruther-Gray, Major	Balfour, Rt Hn.A. J.(CityLond)	Baring, Capt. Hn. G.(Winchester
Arkwright, John Stanhope	Balfour, Capt. C. B.(Hornsey)	Beckett, Hon. Gervase

Bottomley, Horatio	Hardy, Laurence(Kent Ashford	Remnant, James Farquharson
Bowles, G. Stewart	Helmsley, Viscount	Roberts,S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)
Boyle, Sir Edward	Hervey,F.W.F.(BuryS.Edm'ds	Roche, John (Galway, East)
Bridgeman, W. Clive	Hill, Sir Clement (Shrewsbury)	Rutherford, John (Lancashire)
Bull, Sir William James	Hogan, Michael	Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)
Burke, E. Haviland-	Houston, Robert Paterson	Sandys,Lieut.-Col. Thos.Myles
Butcher, Samuel Henry	Hunt, Rowland	Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)
Carlile, E. Hildred	Kennedy, Vincent Paul	Sheehan, Daniel Daniel
Castlereagh, Viscount	Keswick, William	Sheehy, David
Cave, George	Kimber, Sir Henry	Smith,Abel H.(Hertford,East)
Cavendish,Rt. Hon. Victor C. W.	Lambton, Hon. Frederick Wm,	Smith,F.E. (Liverpool, Walton;
Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)	Liddell, Henry	Stanley,Hon.Arthur(Ormskirk)
Cecil, Lord John P. Joicey-	Lockwood,Rt.Hn.Lt.-Col.A.R.	Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)
Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone,E.)	Long,Col. Charles W.(Evesham	Thomson, W.Mitchell-(Lanark)
Chamberlain, RtHn.J.A.(Wore.	Long,Rt.Hn.Walter(Dublin, S)	Thornton, Percy M.
Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E.	Lonsdale, John Brownlee	Tilled, Louis John
Craig,Charles Curtis(Antrim,S.	Lowe, Sir Francis William	Tuke, Sir John Batty
Craik, Sir Henry	Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred	Turnour, Viscount
Crean, Eugene	M'Calmont, Colonel James	Vincent, Col. Sir C. E. Howard
Dixon-Hartland, Sir Fred Dixon	M'Hugh, Patrick A.	Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)
Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-	Mason, James F. (Windsor)	Walrond, Hon. Lionel
Du Cros, Harvey	Mildmay, Francis Bingham;	Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)
Duncan, Robert(Lanark, Govan	Morpeth, Viscount	Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.
Faber, George Denison (York)	Nicholson, Wm.G.(Petersfield)	White, Patrick (Meath, North)
Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.)	Nield, Herbert	Wilson,A.Stanley (York, E. R.)
Fardell, Sir T. George	Nolan, Joseph	Wortley, Rt, Hon. C B. Stuart-
Fell, Arthur	O'Hare, Patrick	Young, Samuel
Finch, Rt. Hon. George H.	O'Kelly,James(Roscommon, N.	Younger, George
Fletcher, J. S.	Pearce, Robert (Staffs. Leek)
Forster, Henry William	Pease, Herbert Pike(Darlington	TELLERS FOR THE NOES—
Gardner, Ernest (Berks, East)	Percy, Earl	Viscount Valentia and Lord Edmund Talbot.
Gordon,SirW.Evans-(T'r Ham.	Powell, Sir Francis Sharp
Halpin, J.	Ratcliff, Major R. F.
Hamilton, Marquess of	Rawlinson.John Frederick Peel

Question put accordingly, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

The House divided:—Ayes, 262; Noes, 106. (Division List No 146.)

AYES.
Abraham, William(Cork, N. E.)	Brunner,J.F.L.(Lancs., Leigh)	Cremer, William Randal
Abraham, William (Rhondda)	Bryce, J. Annan	Crombie, John William
Agnew, George William	Buckmaster, Stanley O.	Crooks, William
Alden, Percy	Burns, Rt. Hon. John	Cross, Alexander
Allen,A.Acland (Christchurch)	Burnyeat, W. J. D.	Crossley, William J.
Ambrose, Robert	Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas	Dalmeny, Lord
Ashton, Thomas Gair	Byles, William Pollard	Dalziel, James Henry
Asquith,Rt.Hn. Herbert Henry	Cameron, Robert	Davies, Timothy (Fulham)
Astbury, John Meir	Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.	Delany, William
Atherley-Jones, L.	Carr-Gomm, H. W.	Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)
Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)	Cawley, Sir Frederick	Donelan, Captain A.
Baker,Joseph A. (Finsbury,E.)	Chance, Frederick William	Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness
Baring,Godfrey(Isle of Wight)	Channing, Sir Francis Allston	Dunn, A. Edward (Camborne)
Barker, John	Cheetham, John Frederick	Dunne,Major E.Martin(Walsall
Barlow, Percy (Bedford)	Clarke, C. Goddard (Peckham)	Elibank, Master of
Beale, W. P.	Cleland, J. W.	Erskine, David C.
Bell, Richard	Clough, William	Esmonde, Sir Thomas
Bennett, E. N.	Coats,Sir T.Glen (Renfrew,W.)	Essex, R. W.
Berridge, T. H. D.	Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)	Esslemont, George Birnie
Bethell,Sir J. H.(Essex,Romf'rd	Collins.Sir Wm. J.(S.Pancras, W	Evans, Samuel T.
Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon)	Cooper, G. J.	Everett, R. Lacey
Billson, Alfred	Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)	Faber, G. H. (Boston)
Black, Arthur W.	Corbett,C.H (Sussex,EGrinst'd	Fenwick, Charles
Boland, John	Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)	Ferens, T. R.
Bowerman, C. W	Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.	Ferguson, R. C. Munro
Branch, James	Cowan, W. H.	Findlay, Alexander
Brigg, John	Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)	Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter
Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry	Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.	Samuel, HerbertL.(Cleveland)
Freeman-Thomas, Freeman	Macpherson, J. T.	Schwann. C. Duncan (Hyde)
Fullerton, Hugh	M'Callum, John M.	Schwann,SirC.E.(Manchester)
Gibb, James (Harrow)	M'Crae, George	Seaverns, J. H.
Gilhooly, James	M'Kenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald	Shackleton. David James
Gill, A.H.	M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)	Shaw,Rt.Hon.T.(Hawick B.)
Ginnell, L.	M'Micking, Major G.	Sherwell, Arthur James
Glendinning, R. G.	Maddison, Frederick	Shipman, Dr. John G.
Glover, Thomas	Markham, Arthur Basil	Sinclair, Rt. Hon. John
Gooch, George Peabody	Marks,G.Croydon(Launceston)	Sloan, Thomas Henry
Grant, Corrie	Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)	Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie
Greenwood, Hamar (York)	Massie, J.	Snowden, P.
Gulland, John W.	Masterman, C. F. G.	Spicer, Sir Albert
Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton	Meagher, Michael	Stanger, H. Y.
Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.	Menzies, Walter	Stanley,Hn.A.Lyulph(Chesh.)
Hall, Frederick	Micklem, Nathaniel	Steadman. W. C.
Halpin, J.	Molento, Percy Alport	Stewart, Halley (Greenock)
Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis	Mond, A.	Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)
Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)	Morley, Rt. Hon. John	Stuart, James (Sunderland)
Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r)	Morse, L. L.	Summerbell, T.
Harmsworth,R. L. (Caithn'ss-sh	Morton, Alpheus Cleophas	Taylor, John W. (Durham)
Hart-Davies, T.	Murphy, John	Taylor,TheodoreC.(Radcliffe)
Hazel, Dr. A. E.	Murray, James	Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury
Hazleton, Richard	Myer, Horatio	Tennant, H. J.(Berwickshire)
Helme, Norval Watson	Napier, T. B.	Thomas,Abel(Carmarthen, E.)
Hemmerde, Edward George	Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)	Thomas, SirA.(Glamorgan, E.)
Henderson,J.M.(Aberdeen, W.)	Nicholson, CharlesN(Doncast'r	Thompson.J.W.H(Somerset,E
Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)	Norman, Sir Henry	Thorne, William
Hodge, John	Norton, Capt. Cecil William	Torrance, Sir A. M.
Holden, E. Hopkinson	O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth)	Toulmin, George
Horniman, Emslie John	O'Shaughnessy, P. J.	Trevelyan, Charles Philips
Howard, Hon. Geoffrey	O'Shee, James John	Ure, Alexander
Hudson, Walter	Parker, James (Halifax)	Verney, F. W.
Hutton, Alfred Eddison	Paulton, James Mellor	Vivian. Henry
Jackson, R. S.	Pearce, Robert (Staffs. Leek)	Walters, John Tudor
Jacoby, Sir James Afred	Pearson,W.H.M.(Suffolk,Eye)	Walton,SirJohnL.(Leeds, S.)
Jardine, Sir J.	Philipps,J. Wynford(Pembroke	Ward,John(Stoke upon Trent
Johnson, John (Gateshead)	Philipps, OwenC.(Pembroke)	Wardle, George J.
Jones,Sir D. Brynmor(Swansea	Pickersgill, Edward Hare	Waring, Walter
Jones, Leif (Appleby)	Pirie, Duncan V.	Wason, Eugene(Clackmannan)
Jones, William (Carnarvonshire	Pollard, Dr.	Wason,John Catheart (Orkney)
Joyce, Michael	Price,C. E. (Edinb'gh. Central)	Waterlow. D. S.
Kearley, Hudson E.	Price, RobertJohn(Norfolk, E.)	Wedgwood, Josiah C.
Kekewich, Sir George	Pullar, Sir Robert	Weir, James Galloway
Kelley, George D.	Rainy, A. Rolland	White, J. D.(Dumbartonshire)
King, Alfred John (Knutsford)	Raphael. Herbert H.	White, Luke (York, E. R.)
Kitson, Rt. Hon. Sir James	Rea, Walter Russell (Scarboro'	Whitehead, Rowland
Laidlaw, Robert	Redmond, William (Clare)	Wiles, Thomas
Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)	Richards,Thomas(W.Monm'th	Wilkie, Alexander
Lamont, Norman	Richards,T.F.(Wolverh'mpt'n	Williams, J. (Glamorgan)
Lehmann, R. C.	Richardson, A.	Williams,Llewelyn(Carmarthn
Levy, Maurice	Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)	Wills, Arthur Walters
Lewis, John Herbert	Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)	Wilson,HenryJ.(York,W.R.)
Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David	Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)	Wilson,J.H.(Middlesbrough)
Lough, Thomas	Robinson, S.	Wilson,J. W. (Worcestersh,N.)
Lundon, W.	Robson, Sir William Snowdon	Wilson.P.W.(St.Pancras,S.)
Luttrell, Hugh Fownes	Roe, Sir Thomas	Wilson,W.T.(Westhoughton)
Lyell, Charles Henry	Rose, Charles Day
Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)	Rowlands, J.	TELLERS FOR THE AYES—
Macdonald,J.M.(Falkirk B'ghs	Runciman, Walter	MR Robert Balfour and Mr. Barnes.
Mackarness, Frederic C.	Russell, T. W.
Maclean, Donald	Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)
NOES.
Acland-Hood,RtHn.SirAlexF	Banbury,SirFrederickGeorge	Bridgeman, W. Clive
Anstruther-Gray, Major	Baring,Capt.Hn.G(Winchester	Bull, Sir William James
Arkwright, John Stanhope	Beckett, Hon. Gervase	Burke, E. Haviland-
Ashley, W. W.	Bottomley, Horatio	Butcher, Samuel Henry
Balfour,RtHn.A.J.(CityLond	Bowles, G. Stewart	Carlile, E. Hildred
Balfour,Capt,C.B.(Hornsey)	Boyle, Sir Edward	Cave, George

Cavendish,Rt. Hon. VicterCW.	Hunt, Rowland	Rutherford,John(Lancashire)
Cecil,Evelyn(Aston Manor)	Keswick, William	Rutherford, W.W.(Liverpool)
Cecil, Lord John P.Joicey-	Kimber, Sir Henry	Sandys, Lieut-Col.Thos.Myles
Cecil,Lord R.(Marylebone,E.)	Lambton, Hon. Federick Wm.	Scott,SirS.(Marylebone,W.)
Chamberlain, RtHn.J.A. (Wore	Liddell, Henry	Sheehan, Daniel Daniel
Cochrane.Hon.Thos.H.A.E	Lockwood, Rt.Hn.Lt.-Col. A.R.	Sheehy, David
Condon, Thomas Joseph	Long, Col.Charles W.(Evesham	Smith,Abel H. (Hertford, East)
Craig,CharlesCurtis(Antrim,S.	Long,Rt.Hn. Walter(Dublin,S.	Stanley,Hon. Arthur(Ormskirk
Craik, Sir Henry	Lonsdale, John Brownlee	Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)
Crean, Eugene	Lowe, Sir Francis William	Talbot Lord E. (Chichester)
Dixon-Hartland,SirFred Dixon	Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred	Thomson, W. Mitchell-(Lanark)
Douglas, Rt.Hon.A.Akers-	Mac Veigh,Charles(Donegal, E.)	Thornton, Percy M.
Du Cros, Harvey	M'Calmont, Colonel James	Tillett, Louis John
Duffy, William J.	M'Hugh, Patrick A.	Tuke, Sir John Batty
Duncan,Robert(Lana'k,Govan	Mason, James F. (Windsor)	Turnour, Viscount
Faber, George Denison (York)	Mildmay, Francis Bingham	Valentia, Viscount
Faber,Capt. W. V. (Hants. W.)	Morpeth, Viscount	Vincent,Col.SirC.E.Howard
Fardell, Sir T. George	Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)	Walker,Col.W. H. (Lancashire)
Fell, Arthur	Nield, Herbert	Walrond, Hon. Lionel
Finch, Rt. Hon George H.	Nolan, Joseph	Warde Col.C.E.(Kent.Mid)
Fletcher. J. S.	O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)	Warner,Thomas Courtenay T.
Forster, Henry William	O'Dowd, John	White,Patrick(Meath,North)
Gardner, Ernest (Berks. East)	O'Hare, Patrick	Wilson, A.Stanley(York, E.R.
Gordon,SirW.Evans-(T'rHam.	O'Kelly,James(Roscommon, N	Wortley,Rt. Hon.C. B.Stuart-
Hamilton, Marquess of	Pease,HerbertPike(Darlingt'n	Young, Samuel
Hardy,Laurenee(Kent,Ashf'rd	Percy, Earl	Younger, George
Helmsley, Viscount	Powell, Sir Francis Sharp
Hervey,F. W. F(BuryS. Edmd's	Ratcliff, Major R. F	TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—
Hill,SirClement(Shrewsbury)	Rawlinson,JohnFrederickPeel	Mr. F. E. Smith and Viscount Castlereagh.
Hogan, Michael	Remnant, James Farquharson
Houston, Robert Paterson	Roberts S.(Sheffield, Ecclesall)

MR. R, BALFOUR

claimed, "That the Main Question be now put."

The House divided:—Ayes, 251; Noes, 95. (Division List No. 147)

AYES.
Abraham.William (Cork, N.E.)	Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas	Dunne,Major E.Martin(Walsall
Abraham, William (Rhondda)	Byles, William Pollard	Elibank, Master of
Agnew, George William	Cameron, Robert	Erskine, David C.
Alden, Percy	Campbell-Bannerman Sir H.	Esmonde, Sir Thomas
Allen,A.Acland (Christchurch)	Carr-Gomm, H. W.	Essex, R. W.
Ambrose, Robert	Chance, Frederick William	Esslemont, George Birnie
Ashton, Thomas Gair	Channing, Sir Francis Allston	Evans, Samuel T.
Asquith Rt.Hon. Herbert Henry	Cheetham. John Frederick	Everett,R. Lacey
Astbury, John Meir	Clarke, C. Goddard (Peckham)	Faber, G. H. (Boston)
Atherley-.Jones, L.	Cleland, J. W.	Fenwick, Charles
Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)	Clough. William	Ferens, T. R.
Baker, Sir Joseph A.(Finsbury	Coats,Sir T.Glen (Renfrew,W.)	Ferguson R. C. Munro
Baker, Joseph A.(Finsbury, E.)	Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)	Findlay, Alexander
Baring,Godfrey (Isle of Wight)	Collins,Sir Wm.J.(S.Pancras,W	Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter
Barker, John	Cooper, G J.	Freeman Thomas, Freeman
Barlow, Percy (Bedford)	Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)	Fullerton, Hugh
Beale, W. P.	Corbett,C H (Sussex,E.Grinst'd	Gibb, James (Harrow)
Bell, Richard	Cornwall, Sir Adwin A.	Gilhooly, James
Bennett, E. N.	Cowan, W. H.	Gill, A. H.
Berridge, T. H. D.	Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)	Ginnell, L.
Bethell,Sir J.H.(Essex, Romf'rd	Cremer, William Randal	Glendinning, R. G.
Bethell, T. R (Essex, Maldon)	Crombie, John William	Glover, Thomas
Billson, Alfred	Crooks, William	Gooch, George Peabody
Black, Arthur W.	Cross, Alexander	Grant, Corrie
Boland, John	Crossley, William J.	Greenwood, Hamar (York)
Bowerman, C. W.	Dalmeny, Lord	Gulland, John W.
Branch, James	Dalziel, James Henry	Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton.
Brigg, John	Davies, Timothy (Fulham)	Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.
Brunner, J. F. L. (Lanes, Leigh	Delany, William	Halpin, J.
Bryce, J. Annan	Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)	Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis
Buckmaster Stanley O.	Donclan, Captain A.	Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)
Burns, Rt. Hon. John	Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness	Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r)
Burnyeat, W. J. D.	Dunn, A. Edward (Camborne)	Harmsworth,R.L. (Caithn'ss-sh
Hart-Davies, T.	Micklem, Nathaniel	Sloan, Thomas Henry
Hazel, Dr. A. E.	Molteno, Percy Alport	Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie
Hazleton, Richard	Mond, A.	Snowden, P.
Helme, Norval Wat on	Morley, Rt. Hon. John	Spicer, Sir Albert
Hemmerde, Edward George	Morse, L. L.	Stanger, H. Y.
Henderson, J. M. (Aberdeen, W.)	Morton, Alpheus Cleophas	Stanley,Hn.A.Lynlph (Chesh.)
Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)	Murphy, John	Steadman, W. C.
Hodge, John	Murray, James	Stewart, Halley (Greenock)
Holden, E. Hopkinson	Myer, Horatio	Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)
Horniman, Emslie John	Napier, T. B.	Stuart, James (Sunderland)
Howard, Hon. Geoffrey	Newnes, F. (Notts, Basselaw)	Summerbell, T.
Hudson, Walter	Nicholson,CharlesN. (Doncast'r	Taylor, John W. (Durham)
Jackson, R. S.	Norman, Sir Henry	Taylor,Theodore C.(Radcliffe)
Jacoby, Sir James Alfred	Norton, Capt. Cecil William	Tennant,Sir Edward(Salisbury)
Jardine, Sir J.	O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth)	Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)
Johnson, John (Gateshead)	O'Shaughnessy, P. J.	Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)
Jones, Sir D.Brynmor(Swansea	O'Shee, James John	Thomas,Sir A.(Glamorgan, E.)
Jones, Leif (Appleby)	Parker, James (Halifax)	Thompson,J.W.H. (Somerset, E
Jones, William (Carnarvonshire	Pearson, W.H.M. (Suffolk, Eye)	Thorne, William
Joyce, Michael	Philipps, J.Wynford (Pembroke	Torrance, Sir A. M.
Kekewich, Sir George	Philipps, Owen C. (Pembroke)	Toulmin, George
Kelley, George D.	Pickersgill, Edward Hare	Ure, Alexander
Kettle, Thomas Michael	Pirie, Duncan V.	Verney, F. W.
King,Alfred John (Knutsford)	Pollard, D.	Vivian, Henry
Kitson, Rt, Hon. Sir James	Price, C. E. (Edinburgh,Central	Walters, John Tudor
Laidlaw, Robert	Price, Robert John (Norfolk,E,	Walton,Sir John L.(Leeds, S.)
Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)	Pullar, Sir Robert	Ward, John (Stoke upon Trent
Lamont, Norman	Rainy, A. Rolland	Wardle, George J.
Lehmann, R. C.	Raphael. Herbert H.	Waring, Walter
Levy, Maurice	Rea, Walter Russell (Searboro'	Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan)
Lewis, John Herbert	Redmond, William (Clare)	Wason,John Cathcart (Orkney)
Lough, Thomas	Richards.Thomas (W.Monm'th	Waterlow, D S.
Lundon, W.	Richards, T. F. (Wolverh'mpt'n	Wedgwood, Josiah C.
Luttrell, Hugh Fownes	Richardson, A.	Weir, James Galloway
Lyell, Charles Henry	Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)	White,J. D. (Dumbartonshire)
Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)	Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)	White, Luke (York, E. R.)
Macdonld,J.M.(Falkirk B'ghs)	Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)	Whitehead, Rowland
Mackarness, Frederic C.	Robinson, S.	Wiles, Thomas
Maclean, Donald	Robson, Sir William Snowdon	Wilkie, Alexander
Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.	Roe, Sir Thomas	Williams, J. (Glamorgan)
Macpherson, J. T.	Rose, Charles Day	Williams, Llewellyn(Carm'rth'n
M'Callum, John M.	Rowlands, J.	Wills, Arthur Walters
M'Crae, George	Runciman, Walter	Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)
M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)	Russell, T. W.	Wilson, J. H. (Middlesbrough
M'Micking, Major G.	Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)	Wilson, J.W.(Worcestersh. N.)
Maddison, Frederick	Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)	Wilson, P. W. (St.Pancras, S.)
Markham, Arthur Basil	Schwann,Sir C.E.(Manchester)	Wilson, W. T.(Westhoughton)
Marks,G.Croydon (Launceston)	Seaverns, J. H.
Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)	Shackleton. David James	TELLERS FOR THE AYES—
Massie, J.	Shaw, Rt. Hon. T. (Hawick B.)	Mr. Robert Balfour and Mr. Barnes.
Masterman, C. F. G.	Sherwell, Arthur James
Meagher, Michael	Shipman, Dr. John G.
Menzies, Walter	Sinclair, Rt. Hon. John
NOES.
Acland-Hood,Rt.Hn.SirAlex.F.	Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)	Gardner, Ernest (Berks, East)
Anstruther-Gray, Major	Cecil, Lord John P. Joicey-	Gordon,SirW.Evans-(T'r Ham.
Arkwright, John Stanhope	Cecil,Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)	Gwynn, Stephen Lucius
Ashley, W. W.	Cochrane, Honn.Thos.H.A.E.	Hamilton, Marquess of
Balfour,Rt Hn.A.J.(City Lond.	Craig,Charles Curtis (Antrim,S.	Helmsley. Viscount
Balfour, Capt. C. B. (Hornsey)	Craik, Sir Henry	Hervey,F.W.F.(Bury S.Edm'ds
Banbury, Sir Frederick George	Crean, Eugene	Hill, Sir Clement (Shrewsbury)
Beckett, Hon. Gervase	Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-	Hogan, Michael
Bottomley, Horatio	Du Cros, Harvey	Houston, Robert Paterson
Bowles, G. Stewart	Duffy, William J.	Hunt. Rowland
Boyle, Sir Edward	Duncan,Robert (Lanark,Govan	Keswick, William
Bridgeman, W. Clive	Faber, George Denison (York)	Kimber, Sir Henry
Bull, Sir William James	Faber, Capt, W. V. (Hants, W.)	Liddell, Henry
Burke, E. Haviland-	Fardell, Sir T. George	Long,Col.Charles W.(Evesham)
Carlile, E. Hildred	Fell, Arthur	Lonsdale, John Brownlee
Cave, George	Fletcher, J. S.	Lowe, Sir Francis William
Cavendish,Rt.Hon.Victor C.W.	Forster, Henry William	MacVeigh.Charles (Donegal,E.)

M'Calmont, Colonel James	Rawlinson,John Frederick Peel	Tuke, Sir John Batty
M'Hugh, Patrick A.	Remnant, James Farquharson	Turnour, Viscount
Mason, James F.(Windsor)	Roberts,S.(Sheffield, Ecclesall)	Valentia, Viscount
Morpeth, Viscount	Rutherford, John (Lancashire)	Vincent,Col.Sir C. E. Howard
Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield	Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)	Walker, Col. W. H.(Lancashire
Nield, Herbert	Sandys,Lieut.-Col.Thos. Myles	Walrond, Hon. Lionel
Nolan, Joseph	Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone,W.)	Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.
O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)	Sheehan, Daniel Daniel	White, Patrick (Meath, North)
O'Dowd John	Sheehy, David	Wilson,A.Stanley (York,E. R.)
O'Hare, Patrick	Smith,Abel H.(Hertford East)	Wortley,Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-
O'Kelly, James (Roscommon,N	Smith,F.E. (Liverpool,Walton)	Young, Samuel
Pearce, Robert (Staffs. Leek)	Stanley,Hon.Arthur (Ormskirk	Younger, George
Pease,Herbert Pike (Darlingt'n	Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)
Percy, Earl	Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)	TELLERS FOR THE NOES—
Powell, Sir Francis Sharp	Thornton Percy M.	Mr. Mitchell-Thomson and Viscount Castlereagh.
Ratcliff, Major R. F.	Tillett, Louis John

Bill read a second time.

Main Question put accordingly.

Motion made, and Question put, "That the Bill be committed to a Committee of the whole House."—(Sir William Bull.)

The House divided:—Ayes, 75; Noes, 239. (Division List No. 148.)

AYES.
Acland-Hood,Rt Hn.SirAlex.F.	Forster, Henry William	Sandys,Lieut.-Col. Thos.Myles
Anstruther-Gray, Major	Hamilton, Marquess of	Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)
Arkwright, John Stanhope	Hervey,F. W. F.(BuryS. Edm'ds	Sheehan, Daniel Daniel
Balfour, Capt. C. B. (Hornsey)	Hill, Sir Clement (Shrewsbury)	Smith, Abel H.(Hertford,East)
Banbury, Sir FrederickGeorge	Houston, Robert Paterson	Smith,F.E.(Liverpool, Walton)
Boyle, Sir Edward	Hunt, Rowland	Stanley,Hon. Arthur(Ormskirk
Bridgeman, W. Clive	Keswick, William	Straus, E. A. (Abingdon)
Burke, E. Haviland-	Kimber, Sir Henry	Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)
Castlereagh, Viscount	Liddell, Henry	Thomson,W Mitchell-(Lanark)
Cave, George	Long, Col. Charles W(Evesham	Thornton, Percy M.
Cavendish,Rt. Hon.VictorC.W.	Lonsdale, John Brownlee	Tillett, Louis John
Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)	Lowe, Sir Francis William	Tuke, Sir John Batty
Cecil, Lord John P. Joicey-	MacVeigh, Charles(Donegal,E.)	Valentia, Viscount
Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)	Morpeth, Viscount	Vincent, Col. Sir C. E. Howard
Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E.	Nicholson, Wm. G.(Petersfield)	Walker,Col. W.H.(Lancashire)
Craig,Charles Curtis(Antrim, S.	Nield, Herbert	Walrond, Hon. Lionel
Craik, Sir Henry	Nolan, Joseph	Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.
Crean, Eugene	O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)	White, Patrick (Meath, North)
Cross, Alexander	O'Dowd, John	Wilson,A. Stanley(York,E.R.)
Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-	O'Hare, Patrick	Young, Samuel
Du Cros, Harvey	O'Kelly, James(Roscommon,N	Younger, George
Duncan, Robert(Lanark,Govan	Pease,Herbert Pike(Darlington
Faber, George Denison (York)	Powell, Sir Francis Sharp	TELLERS FOR THE AYES—
Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.	Ratcliff, Major R. F.	Sir William Bull and Mr. Remnant.
Fardell, Sir T. George	Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel
Fell, Arthur	Roberts,S(Sheffield, Ecclesall)
Fletcher, J. S.	Rutherford, John (Lancashire)
NOES.
Abraham,William (Cork,N.E.)	Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon)	Chance, Frederick William
Abraham, William (Rhondda)	Billson, Alfred	Channing, Sir Francis Allston
Agnew, George William	Boland, John	Cheetham, John Frederick
Alden, Percy	Bottomley, Horatio	Clarke, C. Goddard (Peckham)
Allen, A.Acland(Christchurch)	Bowerman, C. W.	Cleland, J. W.
Ambrose, Robert	Branch, James	Coats,Sir T.Glen(Renfrew,W.)
Ashton, Thomas Gair	Bright, J. A.	Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)
Asquith,Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry	Brunner,J.F.L.(Lancs., Leigh)	Collins,SirWm. J.(S. Pancras, W
Astbury, John Meir	Bryce, J. Annan	Cooper, G. J.
Atherley-Jones, L.	Buckmaster, Stanley O.	Corbett,A. Cameron(Glasgow)
Baker,Joseph A.(Finsbury,E.)	Burns, Rt. Hon. John	Corbett,CH(Sussex,E Grinst'd
Baring,Godfrey(Isle of Wight)	Burnyeat, W. J. D	Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.
Barlow, Percy (Bedford)	Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas	Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)
Beale, W. P.	Byles, William Pollard	Cremer, William Randal
Bell, Richard	Cameron, Robert	Crombie, John William
Bennett, E. N.	Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.	Crooks, William
Berridge, T. H D.	Carr-Gomm, H. W.	Crossley, William J.
Dalmeny, Lord	Lamont, Norman	Robinson, S.
Dalziel, James Henry	Lehmann, R. C.	Robson, Sir William Snowdon
Davies, Timothy (Fulham)	Levy, Maurice	Roe, Sir Thomas
Delany, William	Lewis, John Herbert	Rose, Charles Day
Donelan, Captain A.	Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David	Rowlands, J.
Duffy, William J.	Lough, Thomas	Runciman, Walter
Duncan, C.(Barrow-in-Furness	Lundon, W.	Russell, T, W.
Dunn, A. Edward (Camborne)	Luttrell, Hugh Fownes	Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)
Elibank, Master of	Lyell, Charles Henry	Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)
Erskine, David C.	Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)	Schwann,SirC.E. (Manchester)
Esmonde, Sir Thomas	Macdonald,J.M. (FalkirkB'ghs	Seaverns, J. H.
Essex, R. W.	Mackarness, Frederic C.	Shackleton, David James
Esslemont, George Birnie	Maclean, Donald	Shaw, Rt. Hon. T. (Hawick B.)
Evans, Samuel T.	Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.	Sherwell, Arthur James
Everett, R. Lacey	Macpherson, J. T.	Shipman, Dr. John G.
Fenwick, Charles	M'Callum, John M.	Sinclair, Rt. Hon. John
Ferens, T. R.	M'Crae, George	Sloan, Thomas Henry
Findlay, Alexander	M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)	Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie
Flavin, Michael Joseph	Maddison. Frederick	Snowden, P
Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter	Markham, Arthur Basil	Spicer, Sir Albert
Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry	Marks,G.Croydon (Launceston)	Stanger, H. Y.
Freeman-Thomas, Freeman	Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)	Stanley, Hn. A.Lyulph(Chesh.)
Fullerton, Hugh	Massie, J.	Steadman, W. C.
Gibb, James (Harrow)	Masterman, C. F. G.	Stewart, Halley (Greenock)
Gilhooly, James	Meagher, Michael	Stuart, James (Sunderland)
Ginnell, L.	Menzies, Walter	Summerbell, T.
Glendinning, R. G.	Micklem, Nathaniel	Taylor, John W. (Durham)
Grant, Corrie	Molteno, Percy Alport	Taylor, Theodore C.(Radcliffe)
Greenwood, Hamar (York)	Mond, A.	Tennant, Sir Edward(Salisbury
Gulland, John W.	Morsel L. L.	Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)
Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton	Morton, Alpheus Cleophas	Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius	Murphy, John	Thomas, Sir A.(Glamorgan, E.)
Haldane, Rt, Hon. Richard B.	Murray, James	Thompson,J.W.H.(Somerset, E
Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis	Myer, Horatio	Torrance, Sir A. M.
Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)	Napier, T. B.	Toulmin, George
Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r)	Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)	Ure, Alexander
Harmsworth,R.L. (Caithn'ss-sh	Nicholson, CharlesN.(Doncast'r	Verney, F. W.
Hart-Davis, T.	Norman, Sir Henry	Vivian, Henry
Hayden, John Patrick	Norton, Capt. Cecil William	Walters, John Tudor
Hazel, Dr. A. E.	Nugent, Sir Walter Richard	Walton, Sir John L. (Leeds, S.)
Hazleton, Richard	O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth)	Ward, John (Stoke upon Trent)
Helme, Norval Watson	O'Mara, James	Wardle, George J.
Hemmerde, Edward George	O'Shaughnessy, P. J.	Waring, Walter
Henderson, J.M. (Aberdeen,W.)	O'Shee, James John	Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan)
Hodge, John	Parker, James (Halifax)	Wason, John Cathcart(Orkney)
Hogan, Michael	Pearce, Robert (Staffs. Leek)	Waterlow, D. S.
Holden, E. Hopkinson	Philipps, J.Wynford(Pembroke	Watt, Henry A.
Horniman, Emslie John	Philipps, Owen C. (Pembroke)	Weir, James Galloway
Howard, Hon. Geoffrey	Pickersgill, Edward Hare	White, J. D. (Dumbartonshire)
Hudson, Walter	Pirie, Duncan V.	White, Luke (York, E. R.)
Jackson, R. S.	Pollard, Dr.	Whitehead, Rowland
Jardine, Sir J.	Price, C. E. (Edinb'gh,Central)	Wiles, Thomas
Johnson, John (Gateshead)	Price, Robert John(Norfolk,E.)	Wilkie, Alexander
Jones, Leif (Appleby)	Pullar, Sir Robert	Williams, Llewelyn(Carmarth'n
Jones, William (Carnarvonshire	Rainy, A. Rolland	Wills, Arthur Walters
Joyce, Michael	Raphael, Herbert H.	Wilson. Henry J. (York, W. R.)
Kekewich, Sir George	Rea, Walter Russell (Scarboro'	Wilson, J. H. (Middlesbrough)
Kelley, George D.	Redond, William (Clare)	Wilson, J.W. (Worcestersh. N.)
Kennedy, Vincent Paul	Richards, Thomas (W.Monm'th	Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)
Kettle, Thomas Michael	Richards,T.F. (Wolverh'mpt'n	Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)
King, Alfred John (Knutsford)	Richardson, A.	TELLERS FOR THE NOES—
Kitson, Rt. Hon. Sir James	Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)	Mr. Robert Balfour and Mr. Barnes.
Laidlaw, Robert	Roberts, John H. (Denbighs
Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)	Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)

Bill committed to a Standing Committee.

And, it being after half-past Five of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 3.

Adjourned at twenty-two minutes before Six o'clock till Monday next.