§ (1) The powers and duties of the revising barrister with respect to the determination, in the case of duplicate entries, of the entry to be retained for voting as a Parliamentary elector under Sub-section (14) of Section twenty-eight of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, as amended by Section five of the Registration Act, 1885, and Section forty-four of the Local Government Act, 1894, shall be exercised and performed as respects the whole of the Parliamentary borough of London by some one revising barrister (in this Act referred to as the special revising barrister) selected for the purpose by the Lord Chief Justice of England; and the barrister so selected shall, after the lists of Parliamentary electors for the whole of the Parliamentary borough of London have been revised, hold a revision court for the purpose of the exercise of those powers and the performance of those duties.
§ (2) The time within which any court for the performance of the said duties and the exercise of the said powers may be held shall not be limited by the provisions limiting the period for the revision of lists of electors, but no such court shall be held later than the twelfth day of November, and the powers and duties of the special revising barrister at the court shall be limited to those for which provision is made by this Section.
93§ (3) In cases where under paragraph (c) of Sub-section (1) of Section live of the Registration Act, 1885, it would be necessary for the revising barrister to retain the entry in the lists first revised, the special revising barrister shall determine the entry to be retained by lot.
§ (4) Every town clerk shall, as soon as the revised lists of the Parliamentary electors are received by him from the revising barrister, send a copy of the lists so revised to the clerk of the London County Council, together with notice of any entries contained in those lists which he has reason to believe to be duplicate entries, and it shall be the duty of the clerk of the London County Council to examine all the lists sent to him as a whole, with a view to Ascertaining any entries in those lists which are duplicate entries, and to cause any such duplicate entries to be brought to the notice of the special revising barrister when holding his revision court.
§ (5) Any notice of selection of an entry to be retained for voting under Sub-section (14) of Section twenty-eight of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, sent to a revising barrister in pursuance of that Sub-section, shall be forwarded by him to the clerk of the London County Council, who shall deliver all such notices received by him to the special revising barrister.
§ Mr. HARMOOD-BANNERmoved to omit Sub-section (3).
This Sub-section certainly does seem to carry this principle of a single vote to an absurdity, and they are to gamble in votes where the voter has not selected. I think this principle of the lot is quite new. I do not think we have it in our Parliamentary franchise at all, and it is an extension of the law. I presume, however, if it is accepted in this Bill it will be carried further, and applied to Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, and other places. It does seem to me extraordinary that a man is to have his place of voting decided by this particular system of lot. Of course those of us who know the great difficulty of getting voters to select a place where they will vote are aware that it is only through the active intervention of the agent and the liberal use of circulars and great pressure that a voter is induced to come up and select his place of voting. Of course there may be something in it, inasmuch as it may settle the one place in which he is to vote as the place of his abode, but that where there are two places a revising barrister is to set to work by a 94 lottery, and determine where a voter has to vote is, I think, the height of absurdity and ought to be excised from the Bill.
§ Sir W. BULLI beg to second the proposed Amendment, and I also object to the system of deciding the place where a man is to vote by lot. A duplicate entry can far more reasonably be arranged, and I do not see why a man who has four or five votes should not have the exercise of them one after another. That is, if he did not vote in one place, why he should not vote in the next one, and the matter could be so arranged that the qualifications could be set down in order of value, taking the higher value first, and then going down the scale. How is it to be decided? By lot? Is it to be done by dice, or to be drawn by a slip of paper, or is it by trial, by fire, or by water? What is the exact principle on which a revising barrister must act? Is it to be done in public? Does he put down three cards and choose the ace? I am strongly against gambling in all forms.
Mr. HARCOURTI am indeed surprised that an hon. Member belonging to the learned profession which is graced by the hon. Member for Hammersmith, with some acquaintance of Electoral Law, should be unaware that this has been for a period of about 25 years the law of the land in registration matters.
§ Sir W. BULLI am shocked.
Mr. HARCOURTThe shock, I hope, will be tempered by the age of the crime. What happens in a case where no selection is made by the voter is that the barrister is directed by statute what he is to do. He is first told that if there is a freeman's qualification he must take that first. If there is not a freeman's qualification but there is a residential qualification, he shall take that first. Failing either of these two, the barrister is to allot the voter to vote in that division of which he first revises the list. How is the barrister instructed which list he shall first revise? By the Redistribution Act of 1885, Section 14, Sub-section 2a These are the instructions:—
At the first revision after the passing of this Act the revising barrister shall first settle by lot the order of the divisions of the borough for the purposes of the allotment.He settles by lot which register he will revise first, and he is told he must allot the voter to the register which he revises first. You are doing at one remove what the law cumbrously does in two, and you are carrying out the intentions and 95 practice of the law for 25 years of settling this not very important matter by lot.
§ Amendment negatived.
§ Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
§ Sir H. KIMBERThere are one or two points upon which I should not like to be misunderstood. I am in favour of successive occupation between all continuous boroughs, not only in London, but elsewhere in the United Kingdom, but this Bill was not necessary for the carrying of that reform. The evil of the disfranchisement, it is said, of 50,000 people every year owing to their not having successive occupation is altogether over-rated. In the case where a man has to move from one borough to another his name remains on the register for a very considerable time, and he can, and does, vote in respect of it. There are some hard cases, no doubt, when a man leaves just about the time that the register expires. Then he loses the one and does not gain it in the other. I have always been in favour of lessening that difficulty by giving successive occupation between consecutive boroughs, but it should be done not in London only, but between all parts of the Kingdom. There are many London boroughs which have more than one Member. In one case there are seven—as many as Birmingham—and in three or four they have four Members each, and in no fewer than about a dozen others they have two or three. In all there are 16 cases, and in all of them successive occupation in London still exists. I have no objection in the world to its being extended to the whole of the County of London, but if it is extended to the County of London why should it not be given to every other county in the Kingdom? There seems to be no reason to compare one area with another. We should press it as far as the analogy will go. It is the same as regards simultaneous polls. If you want to make London like Birmingham, they already exist as regards the large boroughs, but if you want to compare the two areas together you should give Birmingham an area which will include all the other towns, such as Aston Manor, Walsall, and the others. I have yet to be convinced that simultaneous polls are a good thing for any district. Now we come to the principal object of the Bill—the abolition of the dual vote—and I propose the rejection of the Bill in these terms, "That this House declines to pass a Bill 96 which proposes to amalgamate into one borough a whole county, containing 59 out of 670 constituencies in the United Kingdom, and thereby first depriving large numbers of electors of their existing voting power, and, secondly, while professing to have for its sole object the removal of anomalies, leaves greater anomalies existing and unremedied, creates further anomalies, and seriously affects the representation of the people."
§ Mr. HARMOOD-BANNERI beg to second the Amendment.
§ The UNDER-SECRETARY for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. McKinnon Wood)This reasoned Amendment for the rejection of the Bill on the third reading purports to be a representation of what is contained in the Bill, but I think it will be possible in a very few minutes to show that, instead of being a representation of what is contained in the Bill, it is positively a grotesque caricature of what is proposed. Take the first statement in the Amendment, that the Bill proposes to amalgamate into one borough a whole county containing 59 out of the 670 constituencies in the United Kingdom. Nine hundred and ninety-nine out of a thousand ordinary men would suppose from these words that the Bill proposes to abolish 58 of the boroughs in London and leave London but one Parliamentary division. Of course, the hon. Baronet knows that the Bill does not mean that, but that is what appears from the Amendment to be the tremendous proposal made in the Bill. As a matter of fact, this phraseology absolutely means nothing at all. Not a single division disappears or is altered in any respect whatever. They all remain as at present. The second proposition in the Amendment is that the Bill deprives large numbers of electors of their existing voting power. That is one of those half-truths which are the most deceiving things in the world. Tens of thousands of people by this Bill will preserve their voting power, which they now lose by mere accident, and which, if they lived in any other town, they would not lose. As a matter of fact, instead of there being fewer electors taking part in London elections there will be tens of thousands more electors. Certain electors will lose a superfluity of votes. They will only be able to vote once instead of twice or half a dozen times, but not a single elector will be disfranchised. The third proposition in the Amendment is that the Bill, while professing to have for its sole object the 97 removal of anomalies, leaves greater anomalies existing and unremedied. That is true of every Reform Bill that ever existed. Every Reform Bill leads to other anomalies. The hon. Baronet has not justified, or attempted to justify, the existing anomalies. There is one point on which I agree with the hon. Baronet. In the concluding words of the Amendment he says that the Bill seriously affects the representation of the people. Of course, that is the object of the Bill. It does affect the representation of the people. It does mean that a great many people who now lose their votes will in future possess and make use of them. I was very much struck with a remark made by the Noble Lord the Member for Marylebone (Lord R. Cecil). He said he never heard anyone object to the present arrangement. It is curious that one of the constituents of the Noble Lord told me that he moved only 30
§ yards and lost his vote for more than 12 months. I think there is no need for a public complaint after we have heard the statement made by the hon. Member for Barnard Castle (Mr. A. Henderson) as to his own personal experience. There is no use of a public complaint after that to induce Parliament to remedy a grievous injustice and anomaly. Hon. Members opposite confess that they cannot defend the loss of the right of successive occupation in London. Some of them say they cannot defend plural voting in London. These are the two things dealt with in the Bill, and I do not think more words are required to induce the House to consent to the third reading.
§ Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
§ The House divided: Ayes, 161; Noes, 29.
99| Division No. 804.] | AYES. | [8.30 p.m. |
| Abraham, W. (Cork, N. E.) | Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford | Montagu, Hon. E. S. |
| Acland, Francis Dyke | Gooch, George Peabody (Bath) | Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall) |
| Alden, Percy | Greenwood, G. (Peterborough) | Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen) |
| Allen, Charles P. (Stroud) | Gulland, John W. | Morse, L. L. |
| Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth) | Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale) | Murray, James (Aberdeen, E.) |
| Balfour, Robert (Lanark) | Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose) | Myer, Horatio |
| Barnes, G. N. | Hardy, George A. (Suffolk) | Napier, T. B. |
| Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.) | Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester) | Norman, Sir Henry |
| Beale, W. P. | Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire) | Nussey, Sir Willans |
| Beck, A. Cecil | Hart-Davies, T. | Nuttall, Harry |
| Bell, Richard | Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale) | O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth) |
| Benn, Sir J. Williams (Devonport) | Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N. E.) | O'Grady, J. |
| Bonn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.) | Haslam, James (Derbyshire) | O'Kelly, Conor (Mayo, N.) |
| Berridge, T. H. D. | Haworth, Arthur A. | Parker, James (Halifax) |
| Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon) | Hedges, A. Paget | Pearce, William (Limehouse) |
| Boulton, A. C. F. | Henderson, Arthur (Durham) | Pearson, Sir W. D. (Colchester) |
| Bowerman, C. W. | Henderson, J. McD. (Aberdeen, W.) | Philipps, Col. Ivor (Southampton) |
| Brace, William | Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.) | Pickersgill, Edward Hare |
| Brooke, Stopford | Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe) | Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central) |
| Brunner, J. F. L. (Lanes, Leigh) | Higham, John Sharp | Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.) |
| Bryce, J. Annan | Hobart, Sir Robert | Radford, G. H. |
| Buckmaster, Stanley O | Hodge, John | Raphael, Herbert H. |
| Burns, Rt. Hon. John | Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset, N.) | Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough) |
| Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Horniman, Emslie John | Rendall, Athelstan |
| Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles | Hyde, Clarendon G. | Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth) |
| Bytes, William Pollard | Idris, T. H. W. | Ridsdale, E. A. |
| Cameron, Robert | Jackson, R. S. | Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford) |
| Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight | Johnson, John (Gateshead) | Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke) |
| Cawley, Sir Frederick | Jones, William (Carnarvonshire) | Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford) |
| Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R. | Keating, M. | Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland) |
| Clough, William | Kekewich, Sir George | Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester) |
| Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.) | King, Alfred John (Knutsford) | Sears, J. E. |
| Corbett A. Cameron (Glasgow) | Laidlaw, Robert | Seely, Colonel |
| Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead) | Lamb, Edmund G. (Leominster) | Shipman, Dr. John G. |
| Cornwall, Sir Edwin A. | Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester) | Stanger, H. Y. |
| Cotton, Sir H. J. S. | Lambert, George | Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire) |
| Crosfield, A. H. | Lea, Hugh Cecil (St. Pancras, E.) | Steadman, W. C. |
| Crossley, William J. | Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich) | Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal) |
| Curran, Peter Francis | Lever, W. H. (Cheshire, Wirral) | Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon) |
| Daiziel, Sir James Henry | Levy, Sir Maurice | Taylor, Austin (East Toxteth) |
| Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.) | Lewis, John Herbert | Taylor, John W. (Durham) |
| Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.) | Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire) |
| Dunn, A. Edward (Camborne) | Luttrell, Hugh Fownes | Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton) |
| Essex, R. W. | Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs) | Tomkinson James |
| Esslemont, George Birnie | Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J. | Verney, F. W. |
| Evans, Sir S. T. | MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.) | Walker, H. de R. (Leicester) |
| Everett, R. Lacey | Mallet, Charles E. | Walters, John Tudor |
| Fenwick, Charles | Markham, Arthur Basil | Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton) |
| Fuller, John Michael F. | Massie, J. | Waterlow, D. S. |
| Gibb, James (Harrow) | Menzies, Sir Walter | Weir, James Galloway |
| White, Sir George (Norfolk) | Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P. | Wood, T. M'Kinnon |
| White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire) | Wiles, Thomas | |
| White, Sir Luke (York, E. R.) | Wills, Arthur Walters | TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton. |
| Whitehead, Rowland | Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.) | |
| Whitley, John Henry (Halifax) | Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton) | |
| NOES. | ||
| Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F. | Forster, Henry William | Rutherford, Watson (Liverpool) |
| Balcarres, Lord | Gardner, Ernest | Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand) |
| Banbury, Sir Frederick George | Haddock, George B. | Stanier, Beville |
| Bull, Sir William James | Harris, Frederick Leverton | Stone, Sir Benjamin |
| Carlile, E. Hildred | Hay, Hon. Claude George | Thornton, Percy M. |
| Cave, George | Heaton, John Henniker | Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire) |
| Courthope, G. Loyd | Hill, Sir Clement | Walrond, Hon. Lionel |
| Craig, Captain James (Down, E.) | Hills, J. W. | |
| Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers | Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington) | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir H. Kimber and Mr. Harmood-Banner. |
| Duncan, Robert (Lanark, Govan) | Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel | |
| Fell, Arthur | Renton, Leslie |
§ Main Question put, and agreed to. Bill read the third time, and passed.
§ Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Joseph Pease]
§ House adjourned at Twenty minutes before Nine o'clock.