§ MR. SWIFT MACNEILL (Donegal, S.)To ask the Prime Minister whether he is aware that by an Act, 30 and 31 Vic, c. 62, passed in 1867 holders of the offices of the Lord-Chancellorship of Great Britain, the Lord-Lieutenancy of Ireland, and the Chancellorships of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, which are confined to members of the Protestant faith, have been relieved from the necessity of making the declaration required of the Sovereign as his first public act on accession to the Throne in repudiation of Roman Catholic doctrines, notably the doctrine of Transubstantiation as idolatrous and blasphemous, and that no Roman Catholic has, since the abolition by statute of this declaration, been enabled to fill any of those offices; whether he is aware that the Sovereign alone is required to make this declaration by which he is placed in an isolated position, and that in the event of a Regency the declaration is not required from the Regent of the Kingdom, and that other statutory provisions secure that the occupant of the Throne should be a professor of the Protestant faith; and whether, having regard to the fact 444 that the making of a declaration of this kind is couched in terms offensive to the feelings of the King's Roman Catholic subjects and unnecessary for the exclusion of Catholics from the Throne, the Government is prepared to take steps to secure by legislation the abolition of this declaration which is imposed exclusively on the Sovereign.
(Answered by Mr. Asquith.) The question whether steps cannot be taken to alter the language of the declaration while leaving the sense untouched has been the subject of much consideration, and presents many difficulties. The Government are not as at present advised prepared to introduce legislation, but they will give careful attention to any suggestions which seem likely to lead to a solution.