Commons Sitting of 23 March 1910

Preamble
The House met at Twelve of the Clock, MR. SPEAKER in. the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
St. James's Vestry Hall (Westminster) bill (by order),
Second Reading deferred till Wednesday next.
Barry Railway Bill (by order),
Read a second time, and committed.
Tipperary Gas Bill (by order),
Read a second time, and committed.
Private Bills, etc.,—Ordered, That Standing Orders 39, 128, 204, and 230 be suspended, and that the time for depositing Petitions and Memorials against Private Bills, or against any Bill to confirm any Provisional Order or Provisional Certificate, and for depositing duplicates of any Documents relating to any Bill to confirm any Provisional Order or Provisional Certificate, also for depositing at the Private Bill Office all Documents relating to any Order under The Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, be extended to the first day on which the House shall sit after the Recess.—[The Deputy Chairman.]
East Grinstead Gas and Water Bill,
Reported, with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
Message from The Lords,—That they have come to the following Resolution, namely, "That it is desirable that the Water Supplies Protection Bill [Lords] be refered to a Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament.

ENFRANCHISEMENT OF WOMEN.
Mr. McARTHURpresented a Petition, signed by 9,730 electors in the nine Parliamentary Divisions of Liverpool, praying for the passing into law of a measure for the enfranchisement of women, by granting to them the Parliamentary vote on the same terms as it is or may be granted to men.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Royal Marines (Pay of Reserve Colonel).
  Captain FABERasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he would state the pay of a reserve colonel, Royal Marines?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): Officers on the reserve list of colonels of Royal Marines receive the full pay of a colonel commandant, namely,£730 a year in the Royal Marine Artillery and £702 12s. 6d. a year in the Royal Marine Light Infantry.
  Captain FABER: Why did the right hon. Gentleman state, on 10th August last, that the pay was £600 a year and had not been increased?
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Member must give me notice of that. I have not the particular answer in mind.

  Floating Docks.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked whether the two floating docks figuring in the programme of new construction of 1910–11, and for which a total Vote of £9,141 was asked in the coming financial year, were to be capable of accommodating ships of the "Dreadnought" and super-" Dreadnought "type?
  Mr. McKENNA: The answer is in the negative.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Will the right hon. Gentleman give the total cost?
  Mr. McKENNA: I am unable to give any information beyond what is stated in the published Estimates.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked whether it would be possible to berth a floating dock for the accommodation of "Dreadnoughts" in the Medway without dredging; and, if not, when it was proposed to start the work?
  Mr. McKENNA: The reply is in the affirmative.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORDasked what would be, approximately, the total cost of each of the two floating docks now under construction by contract; what approximate amount would remain to be expended on them after the end of the ensuing financial year; when were the tenders for these docks received; when were they

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  accepted; whether he adhered to his statement of 5th July, 1909, that the docks would be finished in eighteen months or two years from that date; and, if not, what was the reason for the delay; what was the total amount which it was estimated would be required for providing accommodation for the floating dock at Portsmouth; and how much was to be expended for that purpose this year?
  Mr. McKENNA: It is undesirable and quite unusual at this stage of the progress of the work to give the information asked for in the first two parts of the question. The answer to the third part of the question is 19th October, 1909. With regard to the fourth part of the question, provisional acceptance was given by telegram on 27th November, 1909. It is expected that the docks will be completed about September, 1911. The figures asked for in the last part of the question are not available.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: Why has the right hon. Gentleman put the date later?
  Mr. McKENNA: I am not aware that I have done so. In answer to a supplementary question I stated that the work would be completed in from eighteen months to two years, and that period is included within the dates I have mentioned.

  Cruisers (Unarmoured and Protected).
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he was aware that the small cruisers of the "Boadicea" class were termed unarmoured cruisers in the Navy Estimates for 1909–10 and 1910–11, and unprotected cruisers in the Dilke Return of Fleets for last year; that the five cruisers it was proposed to commence in the coming financial year were called unarmoured cruisers in the detailed Estimates and protected cruisers in the Statement Explanatory; and whether he would clear up the apparent inconsistency by stating whether the proposed new ships would be protected or unprotected cruisers?
  Mr. McKENNA: Two vessels will be unarmoured cruisers of the "Boadicea" type; the design of the other three has not yet been settled, but it is probable that they will be of the protected type.

  Gills Bay (Naval Accommodation).
  Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if his attention had been directed to the superior advantages and shelter offered by Gills Bay in the Pentland Firth; and, if not, would he obtain a report thereon?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, Sir, the Admiralty are aware of the shelter obtainable in Gills. Bay.

  Portsmouth Dockyard (Employés).
  Mr. FALLEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he was aware that a number of mechanics who had served their apprenticeship in Portsmouth Dockyard, and who were discharged during adjustment or reduction, and who on discharge were obliged by family or other ties, and by the lack of work in the country, to sign on as labourers, had been and were being passed over in favour of mechanics taken from outside the dockyard, instead of having the preference over such men; and if he would consider their case?
  Mr. McKENNA: No, Sir, I am not aware of the circumstances referred to, but I am having inquiries made at once concerning the statement made in the question.
  Mr. FALLEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he could state when a reply to the petition, sent last year, of the skilled labourers of Portsmouth Dockyard would be made?
  Mr. McKENNA: I would refer the hon. Member to the answer given to the hon. Member for Chatham on the 10th of this month.

  " Neptune" and "Indefatigable " (Completion).
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked why, since the "Neptune" and "Indefatigable" were to be completed within the financial year 1910–11, there would on 31st March, 1911, be an outstanding liability against the "Neptune" of £15,235, and against the "Indefatigable" of £32,850?
  Mr. McKENNA: The outstanding liabilities, which are due to the fact that there is always some interval between the completion of the contract and actual payment of the final instalment, owing to the necessity of examining and collecting various certificates, settlement of questions of penalty, etc., will in no way delay the completion of the ship.

  Royal Marines (Reduction).
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKEasked what reductions had been made in the strength of the Royal Marines since the present Government came into office; and whether any, and, if so, what, further reduction was contemplated in the corps?
  Mr. McKENNA: With regard to the first part of the question, I would refer the hon. Member to the answer given to the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth on the 28th February last. With regard to the second part of the question, the hon. Member will find the answer in Vote A of the Estimates recently presented to Parliament.
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what is the policy of His Majesty's Government in regard to future years?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have already stated that it would be undesirable in answer to a question at Question-time to outline the policy of the Government for future years.

  Cost of Battleships—Royal Marines.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORDasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he was aware that it was difficult to find out exactly what the cost of adding a ship to the Navy was, owing to the present form in which the Navy Estimates were made out; whether the total estimated cost of H.M.S. "Temeraire," including guns, was £1,743,955; whether he would designate how much her outfit of ammunition and permanent stores, including reserve of guns and reserve of ammunition, costs; whether he could add a column or columns in the Navy Estimates showing what the whole cost of adding a ship to the Fleet was as far as material was concerned; whether it would be possible to schedule the various ratings in the complements actually allowed to every ship in the service, placing the commissioned ships on one list and nucleus crew ships on another list, instead of as now, Ships on Active Service, 70,345, etc.; and whether it would be possible, instead of placing Disposable Supernumertries, 19,955, as now, that their numbers could be shown in columns, stating their ratings and where they were stationed?
  The NOBLE LORDhad also given notice of the following question: To ask the First Lord of the Admiralty what was the proportion of service ashore and afloat of the Royal Marine forces; what time
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  was considered necessary for proper training of Marines in their military duties and what the average service ashore and afloat of the Marines would be under present conditions; whether it was intended to send all the Marines afloat in case of war, including the newly joined recruits; if not, how many was it intended to retain at headquarters; and how many it was intended to keep as a margin of reserve for filling up casualties after war began?
  Mr. McKENNA: I must ask the Noble Lord to defer these questions until next week, as I have not been able to receive the detailed reports from the Departments in time for me to give him a reply to-day.

  Nyassaland (New Labour Ordinance).
  Mr. REESasked the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether a new labour ordinance has been sanctioned for Nyassaland by the Secretary of State, or is now under the consideration of the Colonial Office; and, if so, whether, under the provisions of such ordinance, recruitment is forbidden, while the Governor is empowered to regulate emigration of natives to places outside the Protectorate?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for the COLONIES (Mr. Seely): An amending and consolidating law relating to the employment of natives within the Protectorate and their engagement for service outside the Protectorate was sanctioned at the beginning of this year. Recruitment of natives for service outside the Protectorate has been prohibited by this law, but a similar provision existed in the earlier law of 1904. The Governor is empowered by the law to regulate the emigration of natives to places outside the Protectorate, but similar, although less stringent, provisions existed in the earlier ordinances.
  Mr. REES: May I ask whether, though recruiting is forbidden, emigration does not proceed?
  Colonel SEELY: Yes, Sir. That is just the point. You are not allowed to ask the native to go, but if he insists on going the Government tries to take care of him, and see that he does not come to any harm, which he might do without supervision.
  Mr. REES: May I inquire whether under the existing regulations encouragement is or is not afforded by the authorities to the inhabitants of Nyassaland to emigrate?
  Colonel SEELY: No, Sir, there is no encouragement. We find that they insist upon going because of the high wages, and that they die in large numbers. To that extent we have to endeavour to protect them, and put stringent regulations in force to prevent them suffering in health.

  Lagos (Dispossessed Natives).
  Mr. KINGasked the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he was aware that the natives recently removed from their homes and holdings in the vicinity of the racecourse at Lagos were only removed under the presence and menace of the military; whether the dispossessed natives were obliged in consequence to wander about the country homeless; whether these natives have been compensated for ejectment; and, if so, how many, and to what extent?
  Colonel SEELY: The Secretary of State has received no information for many months past on this subject, but without definite proof to the contrary he cannot admit that there is any ground for the allegations of harsh treatment implied in the question of my hon. Friend. The policy of the Government of Southern Nigeria has been, as stated by me in reply to a question by my hon. Friend the member for Orkney and Shetland on the 4th of May, 1908, to give every consideration to the claims of the natives whom it was found necessary to expropriate. I stated on that occasion that liberal compensation was being awarded. I am now able to supply the actual figures. The area affected amounted to seven acres, most of which is described as "barren, destitute, and unfenced," and containing only 59 buildings of any description. The compensation awarded amounts to £13,347 in all, of which £5,316 is for land—a rate of over £750 per acre—and the remainder for buildings. The principle adopted was to give, as compensation for compulsory purchase, 20 per cent, additional to the value of land, and 10 per cent, to the value of buildings. The number of claimants compensated was ninety-two, and I may say that in order to avoid any reasonable ground of complaint, the local government agreed to a scale of compensation which appeared to err, if anything, on the side of generosity.

  Lagos Territory (Seditious Offences Ordinance).
  Mr. KINGasked whether during the fifty years since the Lagos territory was ceded
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  to the Crown any seditious act has been recorded against the Yoruba tribes; and, failing any such seditious acts, what are the grounds on which the Governor justifies the introduction of a Seditious Offences Ordinance?
  Colonel SEELY: In reply I beg to refer my hon. Friend to the answer given by me yesterday to my hon. Friend the Member for the Ashburton Division of Devonshire, in which I pointed out that this legislation is a codification of the law existing in the Colony.

  Colonial Chaplainships in Crown Colonies.
  Mr. RAINYasked the Under-Secretary for the Colonies whether he is aware of the declaration by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to Sir Walter Egerton (30th June, 1905) that it was explained to Bishop Tugwell that for a good many years past the policy of this Department had been to abolish the Colonial chaplaincies in Crown Colonies, and of the declaration by Lord Elgin to Sir Walter Egerton (31st March, 1908) that the policy of successive Secretaries of State for the Colonies for many years past had been to abolish Colonial chaplaincies in Crown Colonies, and there were none now remaining except those in the Eastern Colonies, which were a survival, and the chaplaincy of the Gold Coast, which was revived for special reasons some years ago; and whether the recent grants to Lagos involve a reversal of the policy contained in those declarations, and. if so, what are the reasons for this change of policy?
  Colonel SEELY: I am aware of the statements referred to, and I can assure my hon. Friend that the present Government has no intention to depart from the policy therein laid down. I explained yesterday, in answer to questions by my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich, and other hon. Gentlemen, that the creation of this chaplaincy had been considered to be justified by the exceptional circumstances of the European community at Lagos, and that any representations received from members of the different Christian denominations in the town would be considered in a spirit of complete impartiality. I may again point out that there is no question of any grants from the funds of this country.
  Mr. RAINY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that money will be provided out of the earnings of natives who have no interest in this question?
  Mr. REES: Before that question is answered may I ask whether it is not the case that the natives respect the British for endowing and practising their own religion?
  Colonel SEELY: Yes, Sir. In reply to the supplementary question of my hon. Friend (Mr. Rainy), of course it is the fact that the natives do contribute in so far as they pay taxes in that country, but the Secretary of State did not feel himself justified in refusing the request, which was backed up by the Legislative Council of Lagos, and for this reason, that it was pointed out to him by men of all denominations that unless some such step was taken there would be no white Christian minister to minister to the dying or to bury the dead.

  France (New Duties on Steel Goods).
  Lord BALCARRES (for Mr. Samuel Roberts)asked whether any information has been received as to the alteration or modification of any of the proposed new duties on steel plated goods or engineers' tools by the French Senate?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Buxton): I am glad to say that the Senate have agreed to an increase in the proportion of chrome, tungsten, and other metals which will make steel liable to the increased duties imposed on special steels. The duty of 50 francs per 100 kilogs. will now be leviable on steel which contains more than 6 per cent, of either chrome or tungsten instead of 4 per cent, of chrome or 2 per cent, of tungsten as provided by the Bill in the form in which it passed the Chamber of Deputies. So far as I am aware the duties on plated goods and twist drills and similar tools have not yet come up for discussion in the Senate.

  Far East (Government's Policy).
  Lord BALCARRES (for Sir William Bull)asked the Secretary (of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Government's policy in the Far East will be modified in such a manner as to not run counter to British and American commercial interests?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Edward Grey): The questions of the hon. Member are based upon misapprehension. In the matter of the Chinchow - Aigun Railway, in which His Majesty's Government have been pressed to take an
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  active part, they are unable to do so as they are bound to pay some regard to the provisions of the Anglo-Russian Agreement of 1899, which has never formally been abrogated. To interpret this attitude on their part as running counter to British or American interests is an entire misapprehension.
  Lord BALCARRES (for Sir W. Bull)asked whether the American Government has requested the support of His Majesty's Government for the Chinchow - Aigun scheme; and, if so, what reply has been given to the American Government?
  Sir E. GREY: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. The attitude of His Majesty's Government towards the railway scheme has already been defined in my previous, answer. The United States Government have been kept fully informed of their views and of the view of the Anglo-Russian Agreement of 1899 upon which they are based.

  Russia and Japan.
  Lord BALCARRES (for Sir W. Bull)asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has received any information concerning the reported agreement between Russia and Japan regarding Manchuria and Mongolia; and whether His Majesty's Government will define the right of those two Powers to interfere in the railway developments China wishes to make in those regions, by the agreements she has signed with American and British groups?
  Sir E. GREY: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. The hon. Member has already been informed that it is not for His Majesty's Government to admit, deny, or define the rights and interests of other Powers in the matter, and I must remind him of the agreement already referred to in previous answers.

  Egypt (Murder of Bautros Ghali Pasha).
  Lord BALCARRES (for Sir W. Bull)asked whether Abd-el-Aziz Rifaat, Mohammed Hilmi-el-Taleb, Abbas Hanafi. Sheikh Mohammed-el-Fiki, Mohammed Sadik Said, Mohammed Tewfik Naggar, Kamal-el-Elfi, Hassan Hosni, and Chefik Mansour were arrested in connection with the murder of Bautros Ghali Pasha in Cairo?
  Sir E. GREY: I understand that certain persons are accused of complicity with the assassin of Boutros Pasha, but their names have not been reported to me. I shall receive a report in due course.

  Secondary School Regulations.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked the President of the Board of Education whether, in view of the tendency on the part of some parents to withdraw their children from a secondary school to which they had been admitted under Article 20 of the Regulations for Secondary Schools after the expiration of either one or two years to enable them to become wage-earners, the Board will consider the advisability, in the interests both of the child and of the school, of amending Article 20 of and the Appendix to the above Regulations so as to secure that all students provided with free places in a fee-charging school shall, as a condition of entry, remain students of the school for a period of at least three years?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Trevelyan): The Board are aware that this tendency prevails among many parents of pupils at secondary schools. It is not, however, confined by any means to the parents of free pupils. It is now the practice of the Board in cases where this evil is prevalent to suggest to the school authorities that they should require an undertaking from the parent of each pupil on his admission to the school that he shall not be removed, without good reason, before completing an adequate period of school life. Such an undertaking, with a penalty attached, has already been exacted by certain school authorities with marked results. I am not, however, prepared to apply a rule of this character to the holders of free places only as distinct from fee-paying pupils. I may observe that representations have been made to the Board from a number of schools that the financial burden of the free-place rule is greater than was anticipated because holders of free places in fact remain at school longer, as a rule, than fee-paying pupils.

  Education Rates (Local Levies).
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked the President of the Board of Education whether he is aware that during the recent county council elections strong protest was raised, especially in the agricultural districts, against any further increase in
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  the county rate levied for the national service of education; and whether, in view of such protest, the Board will cease to put pressure upon local education authorities to levy a general, as distinct from a special or local, rate for higher education pending the promised readjustment between local and Imperial burdens?
  Mr. TREVELYAN: With reference to the first part of the question, I have no official knowledge of the protest referred to, but the hon. Member's statement contains within it no element of improbability. Protests against any increase of the rates are a common feature of county council elections. With reference to the second part of the question, it is the duty of the Board to call the attention of local education authorities to any defects or deficiencies in the supply of higher education in their areas and to insist that the schools and classes, for which their financial aid is sought, shall be conducted efficiently and in suitable premises. It is only in respect of the fulfilment of this duty that the Board can be said to put pressure upon the authorities to levy a rate for higher education. I am not prepared to give any undertaking that the Board will cease to exercise their proper functions in this respect.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURST: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that in the county of Gloucester, although every district has voluntarily allowed itself to be levied for a higher education rate for its own particular secondary school, yet His Majesty's Inspectors of Secondary Education are threatening to reduce the grant unless a general county rate is provided for this purpose?
  Mr. TREVELYAN: I do not think that is the form in which the Inspectors would put the matter. Presumably they are saying that the schools are not up to the standard required.

  Swine Fever (Departmental Committee).
  Mr. STANIERasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether he can now give the terms of reference for the Departmental Committee to inquire into swine fever; and who will constitute the members of that Committee?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Sir E. Strachey): Neither the constitution of nor the terms of reference for the Com-

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  mittee have as yet been finally settled, but so soon as they are I will communicate them to the hon. Member.
  Mr. STANIER: In view of the interest that agriculturists are taking in it, may I ask if the matter is being pressed forward?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I am quite aware of the interest that agriculturists take in this matter, and the hon. Member knows the interest I have always taken in it. It certainly will be pressed forward.

  Royal Navy (Re-engaging Pay).
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORDasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he could see his way to grant re-engaging pay of 2d. a day to all ratings in the Royal Navy who took on after 12 years' service to complete time for pension?
  Mr. McKENNA: The system of re-engagement pay referred to, which was formerly allowed to seaman class ratings, has been abolished for all men who entered the service after the 30th September, 1907, and it is not contemplated to reintroduce it.

  Anthrax.
  Mr. BARNSTONasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether, in view of the increase in the outbreaks of anthrax throughout the country, the Board will institute an inquiry as to the best means of exterminating the disease?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The Board's veterinary officers are continuously engaged in making inquiry as to the causes of the spread of this disease, and as to the measures that can most usefully be taken to control it. The Board are also considering what steps can be taken to bring About a more uniform and efficient method of diagnosis. They do not think that a general inquiry on the subject at the present time would be likely to be attended with any beneficial results.

  Italian Workers at Southampton (County Court Case).
  Captain FABERasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will state whether his attention has been called to a case at Southampton County Court on 15th March, which was described by Judge Gye as a scandal, and by which it appears that many Italians have been brought over to work on no wages either at Southampton or other places to which they were supplied; and whether he can see his way to suppress this traffic?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Churchill): I have seen newspaper reports of the county court case on which this question is based. The case related to Italians engaged in the ice-cream trade. I have no power to "suppress the traffic" as desired by the hon. Member, but I may say the conditions under which young Italians are brought to this country for the purposes of this and kindred trades have for some time engaged the attention of my Department in connection with the administration of the Aliens Act. From time to time leave to land at ports in the United Kingdom is refused under that Act to such Italians by immigration officers and immigration boards on the ground that they are not satisfied that the immigrants have, or can obtain, means of decently supporting themselves in this country; in other cases the immigrants produce sufficient evidence to satisfy the immigration officers or boards, and are given leave to land. With a view to assisting the officers and boards with information my Department makes inquiries, when occasion arises, into the way in which these immigrants are treated by those who brought them here, and I have reason to think that this action is proving beneficial. I shall continue to watch the matter very carefully.
  Captain FABER: Will inquiry be made about this particular matter?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I think inquiry has been made, but I will see.
  Mr. JOHN WARD: Can the hon. Gentleman tell me what became of the Bill which the Labour party promoted and passed unanimously through this House on this subject?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member can find that out for himself.

  Non-British Workmen (Great Britain).
  Mr. HUNTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he can give the number of men employed in Great Britain who are not British subjects?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The only information on this subject of which I am aware is to be found in the volumes of the Census for the year 1901. The numbers of persons returned as foreigners are shown in those volumes; and the occupations are given of 148,345 male foreigners, namely, 131,958 in England and Wales, 10,912 in Scotland, and 5,475 in Ireland.

  Stonehouse County Court.
  Sir CLEMENT KINLOCH-COOKEasked whether the Government are proposing to remove the county court from St. George's Hall, Stonehouse, to Plymouth; whether he is aware that St. George's Hall is the most convenient position for the commercial and legal communities of the three towns, Devonport, Stonehouse, and Plymouth; and whether he will state to the House exactly what are the intentions of the Government in the matter?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The matter is outside the jurisdiction of the Home Office. The question should be addressed to the Treasury.

  Pembrokeshire Constabulary (Sergeant Rosser).
  Mr. W. F. ROCH (for Sir Owen Philipps)asked the Secretary of State if he will cause a public inquiry to be held into the circumstances which led to the premature retirement of the late Sergeant John Rosser from the Pembrokeshire Constabulary, which took place immediately following the recent General Election?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I am making inquiries, though the matter would appear from my hon. Friend's question to be outside the jurisdiction of the Home Office.

  Census of Unemployed.
  Mr. SNOWDENasked the President of the Local Government Board if he will consider the question of obtaining on the next Census paper information as to whether the person is unemployed on the date appointed, and for what length of time he has been unemployed during the previous twelve months, as is done in the United States?
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Burns): As I stated in the reply I gave on the 10th instant to a question on the same subject by my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough, the point has been considered, but the machinery of the Census does not appear to be suitable for collecting statistics of unemployment.

  Old Age Pensions.
  Mr. SNOWDENasked if the chairman of the Worcester County Council Old Age Pension Committee requires a police certificate with each claim for a pension,
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  stating whether the applicant has been in gaol during the previous ten years; and if this is a practice sanctioned by the Local Government Board?
  Mr. BURNS: I am making inquiries as to the practice of the pension committee and will communicate with my hon. Friend.
  Mr. SNOWDENasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury if the pension officers were under the direction of the pension committees and had to obey the directions of these committees?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hobhouse): The answer to both parts of the question is in the negative.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the chairman of the Worcester County Council Pension Committee did give these instructions to the pension officer and is he aware that they were confirmed by the Board of Inland Revenue.
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I do not quite know what the hon. Gentleman is referring to. If he will give me the details I will make inquiries.
  Mr. HUGH LAWasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that a number of claims are being made in Ireland by the Customs and Excise Departments for repayment of old age pensions in cases where no fraud is alleged to have taken place and where pensions were originally granted by pension committees with the concurrence of the pension officers, and paid for many months without question; whether it was the duty of the pension officers to have satisfied themselves before the pensions were granted as to the age of applicants, and to have appealed immediately to the central pension authority; and whether, seeing that the error, if any, in these cases was shared by the officers of the Inland Revenue Department, he will direct that no further steps shall be taken to prosecute the claims for repayment, except in cases where there is clear evidence of an intention to defraud?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: If the hon. Member will supply me with the particulars of any cases in which serious hardship has arisen by demands such as those referred to, I will have inquiry made into them.
  Mr. HUGH LAWasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury if he can state the reason of the delay in issuing a pension order book to James M'Bride, Gleneragh, Glin, county Donegal, to whom the local committee, whose decision was upheld by the Local Government Board acting on appeal by the pension officer, granted a pension as from 5th December last?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: There is a debt due to the Crown from the pensioner under Section 9 (2) of the Old Age Pensions Act in respect of pension money drawn prior to his having reached the statutory age of seventy, and the new pension is being withheld until the debt is liquidated by deduction.
  Mr. LAW: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me under what Section of the Act that is done?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: Under Section 9 (2).

  Local Government Board Staff (Public Bodies).
  Mr. SNOWDENasked the President of the Local Government Board if he can state the reasons which have induced him to permit members of the staff at the Local Government Board to sit upon borough councils and other representative elected bodies; and whether, having regard to the fact that the position of the Local Government Board as a supervising and appealing authority constantly brings it into contact with the work of the borough councils, any administrative inconvenience has resulted there from?
  Mr. BURNS: I believe a few cases have occurred in which members of the staff have served on local bodies, but I am not aware of any administrative inconvenience having been caused thereby. I may say that it now rests with me to determine whether, and, if so, on what conditions, a member of the staff may become a candidate for, or a member of, a local council, provided that the duties involved do not conflict with the personal performance of his official duties. If I find that any administrative inconvenience is occasioned I shall not hesitate to refuse permission.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: Will the right hon. Gentleman send a copy of that answer to the Board of Education?

  Chinese Pork (Isle of Man).
  Mr. FELLasked the President of the Local Government Board if his attention
  1046
  had been called to the promise made by the authorities in the Isle of Man that the Chinese pork which is being cured into bacon there, after being rejected at the ports of London and Liverpool, should not be offered for consumption in that island but should be exported at once; and if he would take similar action and that it is not landed in England for consumption?
  Mr. BURNS: I have no information with regard to the first part of the question beyond what has appeared in the public Press. As regards the latter part of the question I may refer the hon. Member to my reply to his question on the 17th instant.
  Mr. FELL: May I ask what possible ground there can be for allowing this meat in after it has been once refused, and whether it is proposed to send it back to-London, Liverpool, and other ports in any form?
  Mr. BURNS: The Local Government Board has no jurisdiction over the Isle of Man. That is my only answer.
  Mr. STANIER: Will the right hon. Gentleman have inquiry made to see whether any of it is coming back from the Isle of Man?
  Mr. BURNS: I will do my best to ascertain the facts.

  Register House, Edinburgh (Clerks).
  Mr. WATTasked the Lord Advocate whether half of the engrossing clerks in the Sasines Department of the Register House, Edinburgh, were suspended or unemployed from the beginning of August last until November; whether, for weeks immediately prior to August, many temporary extra clerks had been engaged in that Department; and will he say what steps are being taken by the Government to remedy this recurring problem of unemployment in that office?
  The LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. Alexander Ure): The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative; the answer to the second part is in the affirmative. Endeavours are being made to secure, so far as possible, that the employment of the permanent staff shall be constant throughout the year, but this must always be difficult so long as the most of the conveyancing transactions in Scotland take place at one term in the year.
  Mr. WATT: Can the right hon. and learned Gentleman say who is responsible for the engaging of one set of clerks and the suspending of the other?
  Mr. URE: There is no suspension.

  Spring Recess (House of Commons).
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAINasked the Prime Minister whether he still anticipates that it will be possible for this House to adjourn for a considerable recess at some time in the month of April?
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Asquith): I am still not without hope that it may be possible to get through the necessary business before the close of April, and then to adjourn for the Spring Recess.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he proposes that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should make his Budget statement for 1910–11 before this April recess?
  The PRIME MINISTER: As at present Advised, I should think not.

  Nigeria.
  Mr. KINGasked the Prime Minister, whether an opportunity would be given to the House to discuss the Seditious Offences Ordinance of Southern Nigeria and other Nigerian questions on the Colonial Vote?
  The PRIME MINISTER: Yes, Sir. With regard to the particular Ordinance referred to, as my right hon. Friend explained yesterday, this legislation is a codification of the existing law, and imposes no fresh penalties.

  Receiving Houses for Immigrants.
  Colonel CHALONERasked whether it is the intention to fulfil the pledge given to a Jewish deputation at the by-election at Manchester in 1908 by the present Secretary of State for the Home Department-, in which he said that he was authorised to say on behalf of the Government that receiving houses for immigrants must be provided wherever necessary, even if it required legislation; that the Government did not object to allowing right of appeal from decisions of Immigration Board to King's Bench; and that better provision should be made for the interpretation of evidence?
  Mr. MASTERMAN: These questions have been for some weeks past receiving my attention. In several of the ports there are already satisfactory places for the reception of the immigrants, but I am
  1048
  making enquiry with regard to the others, and especially London. The question of appeals would require legislation, and no legislation is at present possible. I believe the provision for interpretation is now good—at any rate, the Home Office, who invited complaints two years ago, have received none. But this, too, is a subject of inquiry.

  Income Tax (Collection).
  Mr. STEEL-MAITLANDasked the Prime Minister if he would ask the House to sit on Thursday, 24th March, for the purpose of passing an Income Tax Resolution and thereby minimising the, disorder of the national finances?
  The PRIME MINISTER: The answer is in the negative.
  Earl WINTERTONasked whether, with a view to minimising the financial chaos and loss to the Treasury, he will ask the House to sit on Thursday, 24th March, in order to pass a Resolution authorising the collection of Income Tax?
  The PRIME MINISTER: This is the same question and is covered by the same answer.

  Old Age Pensions (Scotland).
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Lord Advocate whether he is aware that the aged poor of Scotland are apprehensive lest their pensions shall not be paid after the expiration of six weeks from the 1st of April next, when, owing to the action of the Government on the Vote on Account, a sum of £900,000 only was voted for old age pensions for the whole of the United Kingdom; and whether he intends to take any and, if so, what steps to ensure that persons eligible for pensions in Scotland, after the expiration of six weeks from the 9th March, shall duly receive them?
  Mr. URE: The answer to the questions is in the negative.
  Mr. WATT: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the hon. Gentleman who asked this question has ever seen Scotland except on the map?

  Robert Simpson (Conviction at Glasgow, Newspaper Conspiracy Case).
  Mr. WATTasked whether in the case of Robert Simpson, of Glasgow, convicted in 1907 of conspiracy to defraud certain newspapers, the handwriting expert, Henry Gurrin, on whose evidence the conviction mainly depended, was the same expert in

  1049
  handwriting on whose evidence Beck and Edalji were convicted, but were subsequently released?
  Mr. URE: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply which I gave to him on the 12th May last, in which I pointed out that the conviction of the accused did not rest upon expert evidence as to his handwriting.
  The HON. MEMBERalso asked, has the right hon. Gentleman official information to the effect that since the conviction and imprisonment of Robert Simpson for conspiring to defraud certain newspapers, letters have been received by the judge who tried the case, by the "Daily Record" newspaper, and by the father of the prisoner, admittedly in the same handwriting as the incriminating telegram, which letters it was impossible for the prisoner to write?
  Mr. URE: It was represented to the Secretary for Scotland, in a petition in 1907, that certain letters had been received by the judge who tried the case, by the "Daily Record" newspaper, and by the father of the prisoner, which were alleged to be in the same handwriting as the telegram referred to, but upon examination this allegation was not supported. It is not therefore correct to say, as is suggested in the question, that the identity of the handwriting in the telegram and in the letters was admitted.
  Mr. WATT: Was the handwriting examined by Mr. Gurrin?
  Mr. URE: I cannot recollect whether it was examined by that expert or not, but the particular telegram was spoken to by one of the conspirators.

  Pilots in British Waters (Foreigners' Licences).
  Mr. SAMUEL ROBERTSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether it is the practice of Trinity House to grant licences to foreigners to act as pilots in British waters; and, if so, whether he proposes to advise that in future such practice be discontinued?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Sydney Buxton): I am informed by the Trinity House that it is not their practice to (grant licences to foreigners to act as pilots in British waters. The qualifications they require of candidates for such licences do not specify that they shall be British subjects, but every candidate has to be certified as "well
  1050
  affected to His Majesty's person and Government." I am further informed that no foreigner has applied for such a licence, at any rate in recent years, and that if such an application were made the Trinity House would probably, in the exercise of their discretion, refuse to entertain it.

  Loss of Steamship "Ellan Vannin."
  Mr. CHARLES DUNCAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the passenger-vessel "Ellan Vannin," which foundered recently, was about fifty years of age; whether there is any length of period fixed during which a vessel may continue to carry passengers; and, if not, whether some such provision could be made, or whether, as an alternative, more rigorous and frequent inspection of a vessel should be made as it advances in age?
  Mr. BUXTON: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. There is no-fixed age limit in the case of passenger vessels, but every passenger steamer is thoroughly surveyed at least once a year to determine whether she is in all respects fit for her intended service, and one of the principal points to be considered by the surveyors is the previous history and age of vessel. The survey is a rigorous one, and can be repeated at short intervals if the circumstances require it. I do not think any useful purpose would be served by a fixed age limit.
  Mr. CHARLES DUNCAN: Did the right hon. Gentleman ascertain what was the condition of the hull after the last survey?
  Mr. BUXTON: If the hon. Member will give me notice I. will have inquiry made.

  Government Factories (Short Time).
  Mr. WATERLOW (on behalf of Mr. Wiles)asked the Postmaster-General whether his attention had been drawn to complaints of short time being worked by the hands employed in the Mount Pleasant factory; and could he state whether steps could be taken to keep the factory more fully employed?
  The HON. MEMBERalso asked whether the right hon. Gentleman was aware that at the Bovey Place factory, in Islington, there are constant complaints of shortage of work; that, as a result, some men have been discharged and others are unable to earn a full week's wage; can he say what is the cause of this shortage of work; and what steps can be taken to keep the factory fully employed?
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel): I will answer these two questions together. I have given close attention to complaints of inadequate employment in these factories, and am endeavouring in various ways to secure a larger amount of work for them. I am not convinced that the factories are at present organised on the most economical lines, or that, apart from questions of wages, it would not be possible to reduce the cost of production of various articles. If such a result could be achieved it would not only admit of a saving for the State, but would also render it easier to secure continuity of employment for the staff engaged. In order that the matter may be fully investigated, I am appointing a Departmental Committee to hold an inquiry into the subject, of which my hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General will be Chairman, and on which my hon. Friend the Member for East Hull will give me the benefit of his business experience. The other members of the Committee will be officers of branches of my Department which are in direct relation with the factories.

  New Public Offices (Westminster).
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked the First Commissioner of Works what was the date on which the new public offices, Westminster, were completed by the contractors and occupied; whether the accounts for their construction had been completed; and if there had been any saving on the original estimate?
  The FIRST COMMISSIONER of WORKS (Mr. Harcourt): The date of completion was 30th July, 1908, and occupation followed immediately. The accounts have been completed, but it is impossible to make any statement at present as to any saving as there is a claim by the contractors for a large sum of money which must be decided by arbitration.
  Mr. JOHN WARD: Has an arbitration already been decided upon, and can the right hon. Gentleman indicate the probable time when a decision will be arrived at?
  Mr. HARCOURT: I would rather have notice of that question. I may say that an arbitration has been decided upon.

  Taxation of Minerals.
  Mr. REESasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether slates and slabs were classed as minerals for purposes of taxa-
  1052
  tion under the Finance Bill of the current year?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I must refer my hon. Friend to Clause 20 (5), which specifies the cases in which Mineral Rights Duty would not be chargeable.

  New Superannuation Act.
  Mr. SNOWDENasked if the right hon. Gentleman had received a request from the Civil Service to receive a deputation respecting the application of the new Superannuation Act; if so, what reply had been given; and would he receive such a deputation?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: A request to this effect has been received from the Civil Servants' Deferred Pay Committee, but, as has been intimated to the committee, my right hon. Friend has not seen his way to receive the deputation, as it is impossible to relax the rules governing the admission of existing Civil servants to the benefits of the Act.

  Devonport Dockyard (Apprentices).
  Sir CLEMENT KINLOCH - COOKEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention had been called to the fact that men who had served as apprentices in Devonport Dockyard and become established are placed at a disadvantage in respect to their pensions compared with men who had entered as yard boys and become established; and whether, seeing that the apprentices had to pass a competitive examination and yard boys do not, he would take the necessary steps to introduce such amendments as in his opinion may be necessary in the Superannuation Act of 1887 to remove this disadvantage, the disadvantage being that the former class of workman was only allowed to count his hired time for pension at the earliest from the age of twenty, while the latter class of workman had the privilege of counting his time for pension from the age of sixteen, thereby gaining two extra years?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I regret that I am unable to agree to any change in the existing conditions.

  Canal Communication (Stoke-on-Trent).
  Mr. JOHN WARD: Will the right hon. Gentleman state whether his Department will consider the advisability of making the necessary grant from the Development Fund to improve the canal communication with Stoke-on-Trent along the lines sug-

  1053
  gested by the Royal Commission on Canals and Waterways in their Report recently published?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: This is a matter, in the first instance, for the Development Commission when it has been constituted.

  Income Tax.
  Mr. J. G. BUTCHERasked whether, in view of the fact that large sums, amounting to some millions of money, are in the hands of companies throughout the country in respect of deducted Income Tax, the Government have considered the possibility of some of these companies going into liquidation before these sums are paid into the Exchequer; and whether, in view of such a possibility, the Government will reconsider their decision to delay the legalisation of the collection of Income Tax, and will take immediate steps to legalise such collection?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The Government see no grounds for reconsidering their decision in this matter, but I may remind the hon. Member that in the somewhat remote contingency of such companies going into liquidation in the course of the next few weeks, the Crown will, in the case of liquidations subsequent to 5th April next, be entitled to preferential treatment in respect of the tax assessed for the financial year, 1909–10.

  Land Purchase (Ireland).
  Mr. LONSDALEasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he is aware that in the estate of Mrs. E. J. Rice and another, Clonmain, county Armagh, in which the sale to the tenants was completed in November, 1905, the purchase money has never been paid; and if he will have inquiries made as to the cause of the delay?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): The Land Commission inform me that the purchase money of this estate was advanced and brought to credit of the matter on 4th November last, the day on which the holdings were vested in the tenants. The title to the property was examined and the necessary requisitions were issued to the vendors' solicitors in October last. It rests with them to apply to the court in the prescribed manner for the distribution of the funds.
  Mr. PATRICK O'BRIEN (on behalf of Mr. John Roche)asked the right hon. Gentleman whether he was aware that a num-
  1054
  ber of tenants on the Ahaseragh and Doon portions of the Clonbrock estate, county Galway, have been processed for interest at 4 per cent, on their purchase moneys; and whether such proceedings became necessary by reason of the Estates Commissioners, who were present at the negotiation, of carrying out their undertaking to complete the sale of this portion of the estate in one year from March, 1908?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I understand that the owner has instituted proceedings for the sale of this estate to the Estates Commissioners, and that it was one of the conditions agreed upon by the tenants that they would pay interest in lieu of rent to the owner at 4 per cent, until the holdings were vested. The Commissioners are informed that the tenants have refused to pay the owner the interest now due, and that he has taken legal proceedings for its recovery. The Commissioners gave no undertaking that the sale would be completed within one year from March, 1908, but they have expedited the proceedings for sale as far as possible.

  Industrial Schools Grant (Ireland).
  Mr. LONSDALE: What was the total amount paid out of the Parliamentary Vote in respect of the maintenance of children in industrial and reformatory schools in Ireland in April, 1908, and 1909, respectively?
  Mr. BIRRELL: In April, 1908, £26,853, and in April, 1909, £26,715.
  Mr. LONSDALE: Will the right hon. Gentleman say why only £25,000 has been put into the Vote on Account of this service, and how does he propose to meet the charges for maintenance in those institutions when the sums granted by Parliament have been exhausted?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The attention of the Treasury has been called to the fact that the Vote on Account was to some small extent insufficient for the purpose, and other provision has been made. There will be no delay in the matter.

  Irish Land Act, 1909 (Lord Lieutenant's Regulations).
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIGasked the Chief Secretary if he would state the number of cases on each of the three principal registers mentioned in the regulations made by the Lord Lieutenant on 15th February, 1910, under Section 4 of The Irish Land Act, 1909?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The following figures show the number of cases on the principal register on 15th February, 1910, being the date of the regulations of the Lord Lieutenant under Section 4 of The Irish Land Act, 1903: Direct Sales, 5,410; Sales to Land Commission, under Sections 6, 7, and 8, of the Irish Land Act, 1903, 458; Sales to Congested Districts Board, 16.

  Queen's University (Belfast).
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIGasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that the Faculty of Arts of Queen's University, Belfast, has recently passed a resolution to alter the regulations relating to the degrees of the university, so that scholastic philosophy, which heretofore has been accounted one of a number of optional subjects specified for degrees in arts, shall in future be subdivided into three subjects, namely, scholastic logic, scholastic metaphysics, and scholastic ethics, in each of which subjects separate courses of lectures shall be delivered, and each of which subjects may be selected as a separate option; and whether he is aware that there are already chairs of logic, metaphysics, and moral philosophy, and why it is proposed to duplicate them?
  The HON. MEMBERfurther asked the right hon. Gentleman (1) whether he is aware that the present lecturer in scholastic philosophy in Queen's University, Belfast, has applied to have his lectureship raised to the status of a professorship and to have separate lecturers appointed to assist him in teaching scholastic logic and ethics; and whether he will take steps to prevent public money being thus spent on denominational teaching; and (2) on behalf of what portion of the community or what religious denomination has the demand been made in the professedly non-sectarian Queen's University, Belfast, to provide separate courses of lectures in logic, metaphysics, and ethics, all taught from the scholastic standpoint?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I have referred these three questions to the authorities of the university, who inform me that no resolution of the Faculty of Arts such as the hon. Member describes has come before them; nor has any suggestion been made to them by the lecturer in scholastic philosophy or anyone else that his position should be raised to that of professor, or that separate lecturers should be appointed to assist
  1056
  him. No representations whatever have been made by any portion of the community or by any religious denomination with reference to the provision of separate courses of lectures in logic, metaphysics, and ethics from the scholastic standpoint.
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIG: In view of the fact that the information I have is in direct contradiction to that which the right hon. Gentleman has given, I beg to say that I will put down a question on this subject at an early date.

  Labourers (Ireland) Act, 1906.
  Mr. JOHN REDMONDasked whether, having regard to the deadlock which has arisen owing to the money provided under the Labourers Act of 1906 having been exhausted, and bearing in mind the need for continuing the beneficent operations of that Act, the Government will introduce a short measure dealing with the subject, in view of the fact that all parties in Ireland are united in desiring that the building of necessary labourers' cottages should continue?
  Mr. BIRRELL: It was provided by the Labourers Act of 1906 that £4,250,000 may be advanced on Land Purchase terms for the provision of labourers' cottages and plots. The whole of that amount has either been advanced or earmarked for advance in respect of pending schemes. The number of cottages and plots which will be provided under the Act of 1906 is estimated at about 23,500, and the number provided under previous Acts was 21,50), making the substantial total of 45,000 cottages and plots. Of the 23,500 cottages which are being provided under the Act of 1906, at least three-fourths have not yet been completed, and tenants for these have to be found. It is, however, admitted that a good deal will remain to be done before the provision of accommodation for labourers can be said to be reasonably satisfactory. The Government are favourably disposed to the continuance of the policy of providing labourers' cottages, and the question of reviving the powers of borrowing for that purpose which existed before 1905 has been under consideration. Whether it will be possible to legislate for making further loans on anything approaching Land Purchase terms is a question upon which I can make no statement at the moment, but the Government will give the matter careful consideration, regard being had to the financial situation for the time being.
  Mr. JOHN REDMOND: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that on this matter there is no difference at all among the different parties in Ireland, and that if a measure were proposed by the Government, it would be entirely uncontroversial. I think I am justified in saying that.
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am very glad to hear it, and it is quite in accordance with my own view. It is the desire of the Government also to meet the demand if it can possibly be done.

  Lawless Areas (Ireland).
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIGasked the Chief Secretary whether his attention has been called to a statement made by Mr. Justice Wright, at the spring assizes for county Galway, to the effect that until the activities of certain secret or powerful organisations in the county were diminished or checked it was hopeless to expect any improvements in the condition of certain lawless areas; and whether he proposes to take any steps against such organisations in county Galway so as to bring about an improvement in the condition of the county?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I have seen a newspaper report of the learned judge's statement. The police are doing their best to prevent the commission of offences, and to deal with all persons who break the law individually or collectively.

  Universities of Ireland.
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIGasked whether any arrangement, similar to that proposed for Queen's University, Belfast, for the duplication of lectures in logic, metaphysics, and ethics, and for the segregation of the undergraduates pursuing courses of study in philosophy, exists, or is proposed in the University colleges of Dublin, Cork, or Galway; and whether there exists in any University in the United Kingdom in receipt of public money a precedent for such duplication of lectures and such segregation of students?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am informed by the Universities authorities that they do not propose to duplicate lectures in the manner described in the question.

  Land Purchase (Ireland) Acts.
  Mr. JOHN REDMONDasked whether agreements for the sale and purchase of land under the Land Purchase (Ireland) Acts entered into and lodged after 15th
  1058
  of September, 1909, and made on the basis of the financial terms of the Land Purchase Act of 1903, are being returned to the landlords and tenants with a view to their being altered to suit the new financial conditions; and whether it was the intention of the Government to so treat agreements entered into and lodged between 15th September and the date of the passing of the Act of 1909; and, if not, whether, in view of the fact that in Ireland it was generally understood that the new financial provisions would take effect as from the latter date, the Government will introduce legislation to give effect to this understanding, which the support of all parties in Ireland would make non-controversial?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Under Section 13 of the Act all agreements lodged or entered into after 15th September are future purchase agreements, and, as such, are subject to the new rate of annuity. This date was chosen as being as late a date as possible, while avoiding the rush to lodge agreements which might have taken place if a prospective date had been named. I had, however, hoped that before the Bill became law that date might be changed to the date of the passing of the Act. But a financial change of this nature could only properly have been made while the Bill was in Committee of this House, and no opportunity for making the change arose. The position has now become much complicated owing to the fact that in many cases revised agreements, in lieu of the returned agreements, have already been lodged, and in a large number of other cases new agreements are in process of making. In the case of some of these new agreements the revised terms are more favourable than the original terms to either the vendor or the purchaser, and in such cases the party so favoured would naturally object to revert to the old terms. I have, therefore, reluctantly come to the conclusion that much inconvenience and confusion would arise were the date to be altered.

  Mobilisation of Troops.
  Captain FABERasked the Secretary of State for War if he will state whether the chief constable of a county in Scotland asked the War Office whether they could arrange for the mobilisation of troops to take place in winter, as the horses in his county, being used for agricultural purposes, were not available in the summer months?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Haldane): There is no information at the War Office to show that a chief constable asked any such question.

  King's Regulations (Officers' Precedence).
  Sir HARRY SAMUELasked whether honorary rank, under Paragraph 229 of the King's Regulations, confers all the rights and advantages of substantive rank as regards precedence, and is only limited by not entitling the holder to military command?
  Mr. HALDANE: If the hon. Member will kindly read the paragraph he will find that it states that an officer holding honorary rank is entitled to precedence attached to the corresponding rank of combatant officer, and that such rank will not entitle the holder of it to the presidency of courts-martial or to military command of any kind except over such officers and men as may be specially placed under his command.

  War Office Directories.
  Sir HARRY SAMUELasked whether it is in accordance with the decision of the Army Council that officers holding temporary or honorary rank should have the prefix temporary or honorary placed before their rank and names in official directories issued under War Office authority; if not, could this decision be promulgated; and whether the honorary rank of captain is granted and not the rank of honorary captain, etc.?
  Mr. HALDANE: In the Quarterly and Monthly Army Lists, to which the hon. Member presumably refers, the actual ranks held by officers are shown, whether substantive, temporary, or honorary. This is in accordance with Section 163 (d) of the Army Act. In reply to the last part of the question the honorary rank of captain is granted.

  Army Qualifying Examination.
  Sir HARRY SAMUEL (for Mr. Norman Craig)asked whether, during the period since the reinstitution of the Army qualifying examination, there has been a diminution in the number of candidates relatively to the number of vacancies; and whether the absence of competitive examination during the latter portion of such period has been due to a dearth of candidates?
  Mr. HALDANE: The Array qualifying examination is a mere qualifying test, and there are no vacancies named in connection with it. The absence of competitive examinations last year was due to the fact that the number of qualified candidates presenting themselves was not in excess of the number of vacancies available at Woolwich and Sandhurst. It must be remembered that the intake of cadets into Woolwich and Sandhurst was increased owing to the demand for Regular officers for the Special Reserve and Territorial Force.
  Sir HARRY SAMUEL (for Mr. Norman Craig)asked whether the Army Qualifying Board is responsible for the Army qualifying examination; whether the Civil Service Commissioners, who controlled the competitive examination, have any control over the Army qualifying examination; and whether the Army Qualifying Board is composed wholly or mainly of examiners drawn from London University?
  Mr. HALDANE: The Army Qualifying Board, under the Presidency of Sir Henry Craik, is responsible to the Army Council for carrying out the Army qualifying examinations. The Civil Service Commissioners have no control over the Army qualifying examination. The Army Qualifying Board is composed of representatives of the following educational bodies, who grant leaving certificates for Army purposes: The Scotch Education Department, the Central Welsh Board for Intermediate Education, the Oxford and Cambridge Schools Examination Board, the University of London, the University of Birmingham, the Oxford Local Examination Delegacy, and the Cambridge Local Examination Syndicate.
  Sir HARRY SAMUEL (for the same hon. Member)asked whether, in the case of the Army qualifying examination, there are moderators to regularise the standard of papers set; whether such moderators took any part in supervising the papers set to candidates in the recent Army qualifying examination; who such moderators are; and whether the competitive examination is abandoned or merely suspended until the number of candidates warrants its reintroduction?
  Mr. HALDANE: The standard of the papers set at the Army qualifying examination is regulated by and co-ordinated with that of the leaving certificates for Army purposes by the Army Qualifying Board. The papers set at the recent exami-

  1061
  nation were, as usual, reviewed and approved by the Board. The competitive examination is not abandoned, but the necessity for holding such an examination depends on the number of qualified candidates presenting themselves.

  Territorial Force (Hospital Equipment).
  Viscount VALENTIAasked the Secretary for War, in view of the fact that on mobilisation some county associations are ordered to provide within a week a fully-equipped general hospital, the administrator of which is expected to arrange for having a call upon local tradesmen for hospital equipment, drugs, and surgical appliances, besides fittings for a building in which to store them, that the local tradesmen appear unwilling to set aside the requisite stock owing to the inconvenience to them of locking up the capital required, and that the county associations are precluded by C. M. 221 from incurring any expenditure on purchase, storage, or other provision for equipment, whether he will consider the necessity for a special grant to be devoted to the above object?
  Mr. HALDANE: The whole question is under consideration.

  Militia and Special Reserve.
  Mr. E H. CARLILEasked the Secretary for War if he will state how many officers of the Militia and Special Reserve have been given commissions in Regular battalions or regiments each year ending 31st December from 1900 to 1909, inclusive?
  Mr. HALDANE: The figures are as follows:—1900, 449; 1901, 487; 1902, 287; 1903, 266; 1904, 102; 1905, 147; 1906, 158; 1907, 99; 1908, 99; 1909, 83.
  Mr. CARLILE: Arising out of that answer, may I ask whether it is proposed to gradually discontinue the advantages previously given to members of the Militia and the Special Reserve?
  Mr. HALDANE: No, Sir. You can enter the Army now through the Special Reserve, as you could through the Militia.
  Mr. CARLILE: Do not the figures which the right hon. Gentleman has just given indicate an intention to discontinue them?
  Mr. HALDANE: I do not think so. It will be observed that the drop began just after the war. There were only 102 in 1904, which was long before the Territorial Force was created.

  Defective Ammunition (Aldershot).
  Mr. FELLasked if any trouble has arisen with the ammunition for the guns at Aldershot, and if a number of shells were recently condemned; and if the cause of the defect has been discovered and arrangements made which will secure the future ammunition from deterioration?
  Mr. HALDANE: About eighteen months ago some of the ammunition at Aldershot was found in an unsatisfactory state. No shells were, however, condemned. The cause of the defect has been discovered, and arrangements have been made to secure future supplies from deterioration.
  Mr. FELL: Is that the last occasion?
  Mr. HALDANE: As far as I am aware, that is the last occasion.

  Southend Education Committee (Proposed Exclusion of Ministers).
  Mr. NEWTON (for Mr. Newman)asked the President of the Board of Education whether the Southend Town Council have recently submitted to the Board of Education a scheme for the education committee for the borough, containing a provision that no clergy or ministers of any denomination shall be eligible to serve as non-council members of the committee; whether he is aware that there are in Southend, besides five council schools, three Church of England schools, and one Roman Catholic school; whether he is aware that a petition has been presented against the proposed exclusion of ministers from the committee; and whether, under these circumstances and in view of Section 17 of the Education Act, 1902, he will undertake to refuse the approval of the Board to the provision in question?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Runciman): The answer to the first, second, and third parts of the question is in the affirmative. Objections to the scheme are at present under consideration, and I am not prepared to anticipate my decision on them by any statement at present.

  Income Tax Railway Companies).
  Captain FABER: I beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer a question of which I have given him private notice, namely, if he will state whether he can legally give a guarantee to the effect that railway companies can, if they transfer the Income Tax now overdue, recover the money in the event of the Finance Bill not being passed?
  The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Lloyd-George): I only received the hon. and gallant Member's notice this morning, and I have really had no time to give to the matter. I should like to consider it a little longer, and, if he would put down a question on, the Paper, I should be very glad.

  Railway Companies (Rating).
  Mr. REESasked whether any relief in the rating of railway companies is contemplated; and whether underground companies which relieve street traffic are to be rated in future for the benefit of competitors who wear out roads and add to congestion of traffic, and to the expenses of repairing and widening streets?
  Mr. BURNS: The Government are not at present contemplating any legislation upon the subject of the rating of railway companies.
  Mr. REES: May I ask whether the rating of railways in general, and of underground railways in particular, is not inequitable as compared with that on other kinds of property?
  Mr. BURNS: That is a matter of opinion. The suggestion implied in the question is that railway companies are differentially treated, and the hon. Member suggests that owners of vehicles do not contribute. But I may inform him that both tramway companies and municipal authorities which own tramways contribute very substantially to local rates and to the maintenance not only of their own track, but of a certain portion of the road on either side of the track.
  Mr. REES: But do not the railways contribute irrespective of the use they make of the roads?
  Mr. BURNS: Only in the same way as the authorities I have named contribute to the rates in respect of their property.

  Whisky (Grant in Aid).
  Lord HUGH CECILasked the President of the Local Government Board if he is aware that the Somerset County Council have been informed that the January instalment of the whisky money will not be paid during the current financial year? If that is so, what is the reason for it?
  Mr. BURNS: I have not received any information on the subject. Had I received notice of the question I would have done my best to get an answer.
  Lord HUGH CECIL: The President of the Board of Education told me he had informed the right hon. Gentleman that the question would be asked.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I mentioned to my right hon. Friend the fact that the Noble-Lord was going to ask a question, but I could not say what the question was. That was only a few moments ago.

  "Dreadnought" Building (Thames Contract).
  Mr. BOTTOMLEYasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he can ascertain from the Thames Ironworks Company the date on which the crane which they have ordered in connection with the "Dreadnought" is to be delivered?
  Mr. McKENNA: Nine months from the date of the order.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Do I understand that for a period of nine months no material progress is to be made with the construction of the new "Dreadnought"?
  Mr. McKENNA: No, Sir; the hon. Member would be in errox in drawing that conclusion.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Did I understand the right hon. Gentleman to say yesterday that no substantial progress would be made with the "Dreadnought," and no secret could possibly escape, because the crane would have to be delivered and erected before the work on the vessel really commenced?
  1.0 P.M.
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Member will remember that yesterday stated I was not aware that any order had been given. The hon. Gentleman asked me to accept the facts from him and to reply on the assumption that his statement was accurate. I could only reply on the information supplied me, but since yesterday I have been able to inform myself better, and I shall be happy to reply to the hon. Member in the course of the Debate which he proposes to raise.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: What is the date of the contract—the date from which the nine months will be calculated?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have not got the exact date. As a matter of fact, I believe the order was given some time in the course of last month.
  Sir FORTESCUE FLANNERYasked if the First Lord would consult the Con-

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  struction Department of the Admiralty as to the possibilities arising from foreign workmen supervising the erection of the crane, and, if the answer is unfavourable, will he ask the directors of the company to cancel the foreign contract?
  Mr. McKENNA: I will consult all persons and take any precautions that are considered advisable.
  Sir F. FLANNERY: I beg to give notice that I will raise the question on the Motion for the Adjournment of the House.

  NOTICES OF MOTION.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE: I beg to give notice that this day four weeks I will call attention to the present arrangements with regard to elementary education, and move a Resolution thereon.
  Mr. REES: I beg to give notice that this day four weeks I will call attention to the evils resulting from the practice of canvassing at Parliamentary Elections, and move a Resolution.
  Mr. ARBUTHNOT: I beg to give notice that this day four weeks I will call attention to the recent rise in Continental tariffs and the powerlessness of the United Kingdom to obtain concessions.

BILLS PRESENTED.
The following Bills were presented and read the first time:—
COTTAGE HOMES FOR AGED PERSONS BILL.
"To enable local authorities and private individuals to co-operate in the provision of dwellings suitable for occupation by aged persons where no suitable houses are available," presented by Mr. PRETYMAN; supported by Mr. Gardner, Colonel Lockwood, Sir Thomas Nussey, Captain Peel, Mr. Shackleton, Mr. Verney, and Colonel Warde. (To be read a second time upon Monday, 4th April.)

CHEAP TRAINS BILL.
" To amend the law relating to cheap trains for the working classes," presented by Mr. BOWERMAN; supported by Mr. Hodge, Mr. Hudson, Mr. James Thomas, Mr. John Taylor, Mr. William Thorne, and Mr. Wardle. (To be read a second time upon Monday, 18th April.)
CONTBIBUTORIES' ANNUITIES BILL.
" To establish a system of life annuities for persons over fifty-five," presented by Sir WILLIAM BULL. (To be read a second time upon Monday, 4th April.)

CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 1) BILL.
Order for Third Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this Bill be now read the third time."

FINANCE BILL (COLLECTION OF INCOME TAX).
Earl WINTERTON: I desire to raise a point in connection with the Income Tax. In the course of the discussion on the Second Reading of the Bill the Government abandoned their first line of defence in regard to the collection of this tax, and now we do not hear so much about the difficulty of collecting the tax without bringing in the whole Budget. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer devoted a considerable portion of his speech to proving that if our contention on this side of the House was that the Government had plenty of time in which to bring in the Resolution, the fact was they only had three weeks. I think the right hon. Gentleman did well not to rely on the original arguments, for it has been clearly pointed out on this side that it would have been perfectly easy for the Government to have brought in the Resolutions embodied in the first part of the 1909 Budget, and thus have authorised the collection of Income Tax. I do not want to repeat the arguments for the collection of the tax which have been put forward with such force by my hon. and Noble Friends on this side of the House. I merely want to raise this point at this time, because I think it is desirable that before this House adjourns we should have an opportunity of knowing on which horse the Government declares to win. If they say they have not had time in which to authorise the collection of the Income Tax I would point out that they have a very excellent opportunity of obtaining that time to-morrow. No one's religious susceptibilities will be offended by working to-morrow or by the Government asking the House to sit on Thursday, 24th March, and then they could perfectly well pass a Resolution authorising the collection of the Income Tax. There is no reason why they should not do so.

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This is a new House of Commons. It has only been sitting a few weeks, it is only likely to have a very short life, and it is well to make as much as possible in the way of work out of that life. I am sure hon. Members opposite who cheer that sentiment want to have as large an opportunity of discussing the affairs of the nation while they are in the House of Commons as possible. I think, moreover, that anyone who followed the Debates in the last Parliament generally and on the Budget will agree with me that the Government at that time were only too anxious to work this House by sitting at all times, and that they did not in those days consider the convenience or even the health of hon. Members. We were asked to sit at all times, whether night or day, and oftentimes with the result that grave inconvenience was caused to hon. Members. No inconvenience would be caused by sitting to-morrow, and therefore I appeal to the Government and to the right hon. Gentleman, if they wish to avoid the financial chaos, which is getting worse every day, and for which hon. Members on that side of the House are entirely responsible—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh ! "] I do not think it is denied that that is so. At any rate, will hon. Members opposite who challenge my point against them read the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer two days ago. He devoted two-thirds of his speech to proving, or trying to prove, that if anyone was to blame for the delay it was the House of Lords, and then he went on to say that the Government had only had three weeks in which to deal with the situation, and those three weeks had to be given to Supply. My point is that you have to-morrow, which is not going to be given to Supply, and if you are bonâ fide in this matter, and genuinely anxious to pass this Resolution, you can perfectly well sit to-morrow without any inconvenience to anyone, and show your supporters that you are anxious to forward the Budget.
That is the appeal I make to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I do not wish to support that appeal by using any of the arguments which have been used from this side of the House. They are, as I think, unanswerable, and show the danger to the country of this continued chaos which is going on. I only desire to call attention to the fact that in the last few days throughout Europe the principal organs of the Press have given considerable atten-
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tion to this matter, and they all of them look upon the present condition of affairs as a financial scandal of the first water. I will go further, and say that papers of Liberal tendencies on the Continent that have formerly sympathised with hon. Members opposite now cannot understand why they are refusing to do the simplest thing in the world and authorise the collection of the Income Tax. [An HON. MEMBER: "They have not got a House of Lords."] An hon. Member says they have not got a House of Lords, but they have far stronger Second Chambers than the House of Lords, and they are quite as well able to recognise the difficulties and the dangers of the situation as the hon. Gentleman who made that observation. I say that the party opposite have lost all the support they had in the Press of Europe and all countries by their continued refusal to collect Income Tax, and that by so doing they are delivering a shattering blow to British credit and that of her Colonies.
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: The refusal of the Government to collect Income Tax appears to me to be not merely a grave dereliction of their public duties, but it is a direct violation of the pledge which they gave, not once, but many times, in this House and in the country. In his speech delivered on 2nd December, the last which he delivered in the last Parliament, the Prime Minister gave a clear and deliberate pledge to the House of Commons that the duty of the new House of Commons would be to pass the Budget unaltered, and to pass, too, the necessary Resolutions to collect the taxes. That was the pledge, or one of the pledges, on which the General Election was held, and that was one of the pledges by which the people were deceived into voting—such of them as did vote—for His Majesty's Government. There were also other pledges which deceived them. The hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. John Redmond) told us that he was deceived, and he advised his Irish friends in the country to vote for the Government upon a complete misconception of one of the Prime Minister's pledges, and there again the Irish electors in this country were deceived. I say that that pledge was that the first act of the new Parliament would be to impose these new duties and collect them, and that has been deliberately violated for the purpose, I suppose, of some party manœuvre, or for the purpose of some concession or some desirable surrender, after a base intrigue, to the hon. Member for Waterford. It was not the

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wish of the electors that the finances of the country should be postponed and thrown into confusion. No, the Government would have been beaten on that point at the election. Had they desired to carry out their pledges they would have collected these taxes. But it does not rest upon the pledge given by the Prime Minister on 2nd December, because in this House he referred to that pledge and said it ought to have been of a more comprehensive character. What is that more comprehensive character? It was that the first act of the new House of Commons would be to deal with the financial exigencies of the situation. I am glad hon. Members approve of that pledge and let me ask whether anyone will get up and tell me that the collection of the Income Tax is not one of the financial exigencies of the country? [HON. MEMBERS: "All the taxes."] All of them, and this is one of them; and when the Prime Minister promised that he was going to deal with all of them he did not tell us that he was going to omit one, and that one of the most important. Therefore I say after that pledge, repeated as it has been to this House and in the face of the country I fail for my part to understand why the Income Tax has not been collected and a Bill brought in for that purpose. But we are told that it would be improper to bring in a Bill. Why? Is it beneath the dignity of the Government or of Gentlemen sitting on those benches to bring in a Bill? Is it difficult for them to bring in their Budget—this people's Budget which the people have condemned? Why, it is not beneath the dignity apparently of His Majesty's Government to indulge in intrigue, in party manœuvres, to go hand in hand to the hon. Member for Waterford and ask for his assistance, possibly for his dictation; it is not beneath their dignity to bring forward policies, modify them under threats and abandon them under dictation, but it is beneath their dignity to take the necessary measures to see that the finances of this country are placed upon a proper footing, and to carry out the business of this country in a proper manner.
But then we are told we cannot break up the people's Budget. The people's Budget must be submitted to the House in its entirety, or not at all. We have not the smallest objection to the people's Budget being submitted. Our complaint is that it has not been submitted already. As the Government have decided, for some reason best known to themselves, to post-
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pone the submission of the Budget there was every reason why they should have brought in an interim Bill, which would have been passed in this House and elsewhere in the course of a day or two, legalising the collection of the Income Tax, and let that be in operation until the people's Budget was produced in its entirety. Had the Government taken that course the collection of Income Tax would have been legalised, and the country would not have lost large sums of money owing to borrowing. I suppose the real object of the Government is to produce as much chaos, as much confusion, as much disturbance of the public convenience, and as much loss to the public Exchequer as they can, of course, with the object, no one doubts it, of being able to go to the simple electors who, I suppose, will believe them, and saying it is all the House of Lords. But the electors are not fools enough to believe that. I cannot help thinking that even the most easily led Undersecretary sitting on those benches does not believe such a pretence as that, and you will have to justify your action by some other reasons. The truth is that the Government have neglected to appreciate what is the cardinal fact of the situation, that the people's Budget has been condemned by the people themselves. Will anyone tell me that the Budget would have passed in this House had it been brought forward some three weeks ago before these negotiations with the Members from Ireland were in progress? Of course it would not. Hon. Members from Ireland were challenged to name a single constituency in favour of the Budget, and they failed to respond to the challenge. Had the Government realised that fact they would have gone forward with a straightforward and honest policy, they would have passed those portions of the Budget which the people have not condemned, and put the affairs of the country on a businesslike footing, and they would have avoided that verdict which will come upon all politicians who prefer the interests of party to the service of the nation.
Mr. BOTTOMLEY: I should like to say one or two words on the position in which we find ourselves from the point of view of the finance of the country. I do so from the point of view of a Member who in most things endeavours to act according to his own independent ideas, and who has studiously, since this Parliament met, refrained from recording a vote or taking

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any steps which could by any act of imagination be construed as being hostile to the Prime Minister or calculated to embarrass him in a position which I have, from the outset, recognised as one of peculiar difficulty and one calling for the sympathy and loyal support of every Member of the House in his endeavour to grapple with a situation unprecedented in the history of the country and demanding the greatest elements of statesmanship that any national situation could call for. I cannot help feeling that if the Prime Minister had proceeded on the lines originally laid down by him and accepted by him and by his Government there would have been a very much better state of things from the point of view of the reputation and the credit of the Government, as well as the credit of the country, than that which exists to-day. It is perfectly true that the Prime Minister said in December last that the first act of the Government, if it retained power, would be "to provide both retrospectively and prospectively for the needs of the current financial year," but there was a literary and subtle qualification which I am in the habit of looking for in the declarations of the Prime Minister. He probably knew more of the inherent difficulties with which he would have to deal than we could. He said:—
"I trust the new House of Commons will assemble at such time as to make it possible to provide retrospectively and prospectively for the requirements of the current year."
One wonders why in that state of things we were kept nearly a month after the close of the polls before we assembled, during which period no one will deny that we might have passed the old Budget if it had been submitted to us, or rejected it, as the case might be, as far as this House is concerned. The Prime Minister was very emphatic. He said:—
" If we are fortunate enough to enjoy the confidence of the House, our first act will he to reimpose. as from this week, all taxes and duties which were embodied in the Finance Bill, and to validate nil past collections and deductions."
That was the first declaration. It was in that state of things that I went to my Constituents and said that whatever views we entertained on the constitutional point of view, if this party came back to power we should at once proceed to put the country back into the position as it was before the General Election, and get on with the Budget. What was the next declaration? The new Parliament met, and
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we had a Speech from the Throne, to which too little reference has been made in these Debates. His Majesty, then speaking the words suggested by the Government, after dealing with the usual references to foreign affairs, told us the order of business for the new Parliament:
" First of all Estimates for the service of the ensuing year will be laid before you in due course."
They have not been laid yet. The last instalment of the ordinary Civil Service Estimates was only circulated this morning. The Revenue Estimates have not been circulated at all yet, and there has been no opportunity of considering the Civil Service Estimates of the year, and the hon. Member (Mr. Gibson Bowles) pointed out how unfair it is to the House to take a Vote on Account of Estimates which are not on the Paper, because by giving a Vote on Account you theoretically and actually approve of the whole principle of the Estimates in regard to which you give the Vote. That was to be the first thing:—
" You will also be asked to complete the provision which was made in the last Session of Parliament fur the year about to expire, but to which effect has not yet been given."
I refer to that as corroborating the pledge of the Prime Minister that the re-imposition of the Budget taxes was to be taken in hand immediately after the Estimates had been considered. Then there came this extraordinary, in view of what has happened, pledge of the Government through the lips of His Majesty:—
" The expenditure authorised by the last Parliament being duly incurred, whereas the revenue required has not been provided by the imposition o£ taxation, recourse has been had to Parliamentary sanction for temporary borrowing. Arrangements have been made at the earliest possible moment to deal with the financial situation thus created."
How have we dealt with it? We have proceeded to give the Government further borrowing powers. Instead of leaving the situation thus created, the first thing we did was to pass another Borrowing Bill and make an enormous raid upon the Sinking Fund. I refer to these historical events as leading up to the point I want, to make that the Prime Minister has been led astray by evil counsels from a statesmanlike and constitutional course. Here is the third point. There are the pledges of the Government to which I have referred, the pledge given when the Budget was rejected, the pledge, in the words of His Majesty's Speech, and the pledge given when the Prime Minister came to speak on the Address in this House. In

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that speech, speaking of the Budget and the Lords Resolutions, he said:—
" We regard both of them as integral parts of our policy, and, so far as we are concerned as a Government, we stake all our credit on carrying them through this House."
That was said with respect to the Budget and the Constitutional Resolutions. Then the Prime Minister used these words in the concluding sentences, and they are very interesting:—
" Speaking for myself and my colleagues. I can say with a clear conscience we have, in this matter, only two objects in view. The first is, as far as we are responsible for it, to carry on the King's Government with credit and efficiency."
[MINISTERIAL Cheers.] Hon. Gentlemen who cheer seem to read into that statement some sinister meaning which the words do not express. I shall continue the quotation in order to show how the right hon. Gentleman differentiated between the credit and efficiency of the Government and the constitutional crisis:—
"and on the other hand to put an end at the earliest possible moment by the wisest and most adequate methods we can devise to the constitutional condition which enables a non-representative and irresponsible authority to thwart the purposes and mutilate the handiwork of the chosen exponents of the people's will."
In the first place the Prime Minister -put credit and efficiency, and on the other hand the constitutional question. That was the condition of things in which this Parliament met. I am myself prepared to make allowances for the difficulties of the Parliamentary situation when you find that a section of Members, normally supporters, are opposed to you on some particular matter. I am prepared to make allowances for negotiations behind the Chair, and for the continuation of the party system—the process of negotiation being one of the guarantees for its continuation. I would press this question upon the Chancellor of Exchequer: What was the difficulty in the way pending the result of these negotiations, and pending the introduction of the Budget, to "validate," to use a phrase of the Prime Minister, the collection of Income Tax, which is our principal source of ready money income, instead of borrowing from the people who owe the tax? It is admitted that a Resolution has for all practical purposes the effect of law, always on the assumption that it will be embodied in a Bill. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer j asked, What Bill? They made that appeal to the Opposition. Surely that is a matter entirely for the Government. Surely,
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whatever the Budget is, you must have a Resolution for the Income Tax passed in Committee, and when the Prime Minister reintroduees the Budget one of the things we shall do is to consider a Resolution in Committee to impose that tax quite independently of what the other provisions of the Budget may be. I do not know why we have not had that done, and I cannot help thinking that the Noble Lord (Earl Winterton) makes a good point from the statesmanlike point of view when he says, with regard to your answer that you required the three weeks, the period up to the ecclesiastical Easter, for Supply, you have a day to spare to-morrow. We met to-day at noon for the purpose of getting away earlier for our holidays, and we have been going home at seven and eight o'clock in the evening. There was also the period of a month between the close of the election and the meeting of Parliament, and therefore from every point of view there has been ample time.
I do hope—and I wish to press this upon the Government—that in the interest of the credit of the Government and of the country the Budget, in some form or other, is to be passed before Parliament is dissolved. If they cannot do it in the original form, let them at the last moment do what they should have done at first, namely, take such action as will secure the support of the wings of the party, and give the other place an opportunity for swallowing the Finance Bill, which, we understand, the other place is now gaping to swallow if it only had the opportunity. If you do not pass the Budget at all, what will be the position? We will have to go to the country, however unconstitutional the Lords were when they threw out the Bill from the Parliamentary point of view, making it appear that they were right in rejecting the Budget. If that is so, how can we make the purely abstract constitutional question part of the election appeal, when the pivot on which it turns is certain action by the House of Lords, which the House of Commons has itself endorsed?
Now I have to say, and I do so without any offensive meaning, that the question of strategy with respect to the Budget should be dealt with in this way. I was present at a great meeting shortly before the late Prime Minister assumed office. I sat near him, and I was impressed by certain observations he made in criticising the policy of the then Government, the Opposition of to-day. He said that:—
"Last and worst of all, they are losing confidence in themselves, and we are told—told emphatically and

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abundantly—that the method of their going will be a masterpiece of tactical skill. Tactics,"
said Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, repeating the word,
'' ladies and gentlemen—the country is tired of tactics. It would have been better for them if they had had less tactics and more reality. But they have lived for years on tactics, and now they have died of tactics."
It is because I do not wish that fate to overtake the present Government that I have intervened for a few minutes in this Debate.
Lord HUGH CECIL: I rise to sum up in a few words what has been the course of these discussions so often repeated. They have been repeated because the defence of the Government has always been inadequate and shown to be inadequate, and we shall continue to draw public attention to the matter until the wrong complained of is remedied and until the public mind is fully enlightened on the matter. There is no dispute that serious mischief has arisen. The Government admit that. That is common ground. We pointed out that the serious mischief might have been avoided by the adoption of any one of three ways. It might have been avoided by a temporary Bill passed through last Parliament or through this Parliament. It might have been avoided by their bringing in their Budget, as they were pledged to do, as the first business in the new House of Commons. It might also have been avoided—and this is the point raised by my Noble Friend the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton)—by taking some of the preliminary Resolutions necessary for the Budget at an early stage, or, if you please, to-morrow. What are the defences which the Government make? The first defence is that they have not had time. That defence must now be abandoned, for it is manifestly inadequate. They spent a great deal of time on the Temporary Borrowing Bill. They had a great deal of surplus time when the Supplementary Estimates were considered, and they are going to spend three days in the month of March upon the Veto Resolutions next week. That time would have been ample to pass the Income Tax Resolution or to pass a temporary Bill. Secondly, the Government have recourse to the defence of what may be called "the landlady's cat." It is well known that dishonest or incompetent landladies are apt to blame the cat. The Government uses the House of Lords in the same way.
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They say it is the cat has done it whenever any of the property has got broken. In fact, and in truth, the action of the House of Lords has had no bearing whatever on their proceedings. No adequate defence of their action or inaction of the House of Lords has had no the present Parliament is concerned, the House of Lords is perfectly willing to pass the Budget if this House sends it up. They have said so. They wished last year to submit the Finance Bill to the judgment of the country. The House of Lords is quite prepared now to accept the verdict of this House of Commons on the point whether the country is for or against the Budget. There is no constitutional deadlock now existing. It is perfectly easy to settle the financial situation in any way this House wishes, either by the whole or part of the Budget, or by Resolutions which are to lead up to the Budget. There is no difficulty. To say that it is the fault of the House of Lords is to impose on the credulity of ignorant people. As far as the present Parliament is concerned the House of Lords has nothing whatever to do with the crisis that has arisen.
Finally, there is the doctrine of the dignity of the Government and of the House of Commons. It is impossible to show that the Government's dignity will not be outraged by any particular course, because no one knows what their own sensibility is except themselves. But I would certainly observe, as my hon. Friend has pointed out, that their dignity is very elastic in some directions. They make declarations only to abandon them in a few days. They conduct all sorts of serious business without apparently any sense of the gravity of the matter involved. On the first day of the Session they promised to bring all the Army Votes and the Navy Votes in the ordinary way, and apparently this change did not occur to them until just before the Vote on Account was taken. Conceive a serious Government suddenly thinking that they might withhold Supply and deciding on it in a few days or a few hours. I question whether levity or recklessness was ever carried to a more critical point. But while their dignity presents all these strange tergiversations and strange changes of mind, yet their dignity does not allow them to bring in either the whole of their proposals or part of their proposals. Because the House of Lords once disagreed with them on a financial matter it is not

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consistent with their dignity to do what they themselves want, or what they apparently suggest, or part of what they want, or to take the preliminary steps towards doing what they want. So great an authority as Lord St. Aldwyn in another place has pointed out that the Resolutions on which the Budget is founded operate later in point of time by weeks and even months. So it would have been perfectly possible to begin their proceedings on this Budget by carrying first the Resolutions and then adjourning the matter and doing the rest at their convenience in the ordinary stages. But everything is being sacrificed to making out a case against the House of Lords which is not a real case, and which is fundamentally an insincere case.
I am quite sure that that is not how great measures are carried. I am quite sure that whether the country decides for the House of Lords or against it it will not think better of the Government for making up a case which has no reality. The right hon. Gentleman asked us why we made this protest, and why it has been renewed, and allusion has been made to the Budget. I am quite content to leave the Budget to the Irish Members and their constituents. The right hon. Gentleman by his confident manner seems to think he has squared the Irish Members. But we still have some hope that even Members from Ireland will vote according to their conviction and the convictions of their constituents. It is, of course, possible by holding out hopes of Home Rule and other matters that they may be induced to vote on the particular issue in a way which is contrary to their convictions, and that will be sufficient to deal with the Budget. Our concern is that the Government should not use a financial crisis for which they themselves are responsible, the discredit of which only belongs to them, for the purpose of raking up a case against the House of Lords when no real case has been made. The Government in every part of this argument is unreal. Fox example, they make a great fuss about creating a new financial precedent, and yet they are going to propose to take away the financial powers of the House of Lords altogether. What matters a financial precedent if that is done 1 Of course, the whole thing is unreal. It is a pretence from beginning to end. The effort is to rake up dirt to throw at the House of Lords, and so, if possible, to deceive the electorate on a great constitutional question.
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It is against these methods that we protest, and we shall continue to protest in every way we can to bring home this matter to the conscience of the country.
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: I wish to say in a few words the great sympathy which I have with the anxious solicitude of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the First Lord of the Admiralty to get in the money after Easter. Those of us who have got this sympathy with their solicitude may venture to suggest that there is one way in which it might now be done, and that is the way suggested by my Noble Friend the Member for Horsham, that they should ask the House to pass this Resolution on Thursday next. I confess, as a humble Presbyterian, that I do not know what ecclesiastical difficulties there may be in regard to the holidays at Easter, but it does seem that the conflict between those difficulties and that of avoiding great financial confusion might be allowed to issue in the passing of that Resolution on Thursday, when there is ample time to do so. A great part of the contention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Debate on the Second Reading was that there has not been time enough to pass it up to now. We adjourned many evenings at an early hour. Then there is the whole of this day which could be used for the purpose, and also to-morrow if need be. We were told there was a pledge of the Prime Minister, and it was repeated by the hon. Member for South Hackney, to carry on the Government with credit and efficiency. It seems to have been a mistake by the Official Reporter. The method by which the Prime Minister seems to have carried it on was by credit but without efficiency. Hon. Members opposite on the Labour Benches have cheered when any mention of the financial confusion has been made. It is a strange matter that the financial confusion has apparently been minimised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his speech the other day, whereas such stress is laid on it by the hon. Members on the Labour Benches.
It would be interesting perhaps to know whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer has received in the matter of the collection of the Income Tax any advice from the-same financial advisers who have previously advised him with regard to the Finance Bill, and, if so, whether those same financial advisers in the City or in the public offices have approved of the course that has been taken over the administration of the Income Tax or whether

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they have disapproved. It was remarked to me in the City the other day that the Chancellor did not so often go near the City nowadays, and perhaps one is inclined to ask whether in his misgivings he seemed to think when he was going to that Garden of Eden there were swords pointed at him in every direction, on which were inscribed, "No thoroughfare: Nathaniel Rothschild." But I think perhaps if he had stationed himself in any disguise, in the disguise perhaps of a constable, outside the Bank or in Lombard Street, even from the casual passerby he might have heard sufficient to enable him to guess the extent of the very real disagreement with the way in which the finances have been carried on. What are the reasons that were urged only just the other day? Perhaps the First Lord of the Admiralty in the quiet times since he spoke the other day has been able to understand the many misconceptions which were present in his mind when he made his speech. I would like for a moment to explain one or two of them. The First Lord of the Admiralty on that occasion distinguished between Resolutions which have no force with regard to Income Tax, and Resolutions which would be the foundation of an Act of Parliament. Is there any conceivable foundation for such a contention in regard to the Resolution being the basis of an Act of Parliament? If a Resolution with regard to the Income Tax was passed now, would not that be the foundation for an Act of Parliament, or, if it is not going to be the foundation of an Act of Parliament, what comes of a statement like that of the Home Secretary when he said that the Budget would be passed without the alteration of a line or a syllable or even a comma? Of course, a Resolution, as anyone who has inquired into the matter knows, is as legal and just as binding as any ordinary Resolution passed for any Finance Bill previously. Or, again, the First Lord of the Admiralty objected that the Inland Revenue might be breaking the law upon the subject. He never attempted to deny for one instant that the Inland Revenue, or the servants of the Inland Revenue, are already breaking the law with regard to the Land Tax, if not the House Duty. In the circular to bankers, in which they told them to proceed in the usual way, before the Resolution was passed, they have strained the law much more than they would do by collecting the Income Tax after passing the Resolution.
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The passing of the Resolution would enable the Income Tax to be collected. But the circular to the bankers, before the Resolution on which the Finance Bill is founded has been passed, is a greater straining of the law than any collection on an Income Tax Resolution would be. The right hon. Gentleman seemed to imagine that the local Commissioners could not be asked to proceed with the Income Tax because they would have to do so by distraint. He apparently was not aware of the fact that the local Commissioners asked to be allowed to proceed with the collection of the Income Tax in the form of a request, and not a demand note, to say that it was intended, as formerly, to collect the tax. It was absurd to imagine that the people would not have paid the Income Tax, and that they would have made a distinction between the payment of that tax and the spirit, tobacco, or any other duty. If the people had been unwilling to pay the Income Tax, then why did they not object equally to payment by deduction instead of on the demand note?
There is only one more point which I should like to emphasise on this question. The contention is that the whole Budget must be brought forward before any money is collected. Right hon. Gentlemen seem to have a very convenient control of their memory, as a fashionable lady has over her eyes when she does not wish to see inconvenient acquaintances. They seem to forget that the provisions of the Sinking Fund were already passed on the Budget of last year. But that is not the whole case. The Resolution is only a temporary measure, and, like all the other Resolutions, it could be gathered up again into one whole Finance Bill, which it is necessary to pass in toto or not at all. Hon. Members on these benches have been taunted with having sought to treat this matter merely as a party question. If it were done in a campaign against another place, and if the Resolution was from the point of view of manœuvring with that object, there might be some ground for the contention. But when it is urged upon the Government that they might have collected this tax by administrative methods, or might have collected a very large portion of it by administrative methods, there is no question of party tactics whatever. The whole question is whether confusion could be avoided by administrative methods, even if not by a Resolution or a temporary Bill. There is no doubt that anyone conversant with the details would support the contention that

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the Government should not go on with this perpetual credit, this perpetual muddle, this system of borrowing, which is a loss to the taxpayer, but that they should be content to—
" Take the cash, and let the credit go,
Nor heed the rumbling of the Irish drum."
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Lloyd-George): This is not the first time this question has been discussed in this House during the course of the last three weeks. I do not complain of that, but I must take note of the fact that no new argument has been advanced, least of all by the hon. Member who has just sat down—not even the two or three rather cheap and tawdry jokes which have already passed muster, and, indeed, have become commonplaces on many platforms on his side. These are not new. The attempt to be offensive to Ministers is certainly not new, and we are quite accustomed to it. What has been said by the Noble Lord is not new. With his usual dialectical skill, with the great vocabulary which he has always at command, and with his resource in metaphor and epigram, we really had the same arguments which he has addressed to us before, and the only thing new that he introduced was to compare the House of Lords to a cat. He said we blamed the House of Lords in the same way as the landlady blamed the cat. The only thing the Government do is to decline to hand over the control of the larder to the cat. That is the only dispute between us. We do not set the cat to watch the cream. No; we keep the cat in its proper place. But in this case it certainly is responsible. Was it not the cat that upset the jug of cream? Certainly she threw out the Budget, which has led to this confusion. That is the whole matter. I have said that we have heard nothing new on the financial question. The only thing new in what has been said this afternoon is the disagreeableness of tone and phrase introduced by the hon. Member for York (Mr. Butcher). He has spoken of a discreditable intrigue. How does he know? Is he in the habit of bringing charges against people without knowing whether they are true or false?
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: Certainly not. But I can form my own inferences and opinions as well as any man, and I am fully justified in what I said.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Very well. I am very glad to have the standard on which
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hon. Members form their conclusions when they bring serious charges against their political opponents. The charge is that of a discreditable intrigue. That is a very serious charge to bring against not merely Ministers, but against another party in this House. It is a discreditable intrigue purely because he infers it, and because we happened to meet and discuss with some hon. Members what is the position. He knows nothing of what was said, nothing of what was concluded, but he says it was a discreditable intrigue. Why? Not because he has any evidence of it, but he simply chooses to bring the charge, and that is cheered by hon. Members on that side of the House. We will know in future that it is not necessary to have any evidence when these charges are brought. It is enough to bring the charge against political opponents.
It is enough that the charge should be brought. To say a man is guilty of a discreditable thing there is only one question he asks, Is he a Liberal, is he a Nationalist, and that is quite enough evidence. Those are the bases upon which hon. Members opposite attack Ministers, and attack hon. Members from Ireland. Three weeks hence they will make the same charges, and it will make no difference whether there are any new facts. They come to a conclusion before they know anything. Therefore, I think it is very useful that the hon. and learned Gentleman should have revealed not only his own temper and mind in this matter, his own attitude, his own sense of British fair play for opponents, but that he has also revealed the temper and attitude of his colleagues sitting on that side of the House. Is it a discreditable thing to go what ho calls "hand-in-hand" with the hon. and learned Member for Waterford—that is the charge?
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: I said "cap-in-hand."
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: If the hon. and learned Gentleman says that is what he meant I am quite willing to accept it. I am perfectly certain what he did say was "going hand-in-hand."
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: It is really of very little importance. I meant to have said "cap-in-hand," but I have not the slightest objection to the other phrase.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: He accepts the phrase. Then it is discreditable. Let me tell the hon. Member, who has been in.

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this House before, that the hon. and learned Member for Waterford is an honoured Member of the House, and I think I can say, and I do not think anyone here will challenge me, a much more distinguished Member of this House than the hon. and learned Gentleman. And it has not been regarded as a matter of detriment or dishonour not merely to men sitting on these benches now, but men belonging to the party opposite, his own leaders, to go hand-in-hand—not cap-in-hand—hand-in-hand with the hon. and learned Member for Waterford, to walk into the same Lobby, and make arrangements with him in matters which affect not merely Ireland, but Great Britain as well. Arrangements of that kind have been entered into by Conservative leaders before now, while the hon. and learned Member thinks it is discreditable to go hand-in-hand with a distinguished Member of this House purely and simply, because he is a countryman of his own who ventures to disagree with him. This is the only new matter, and the cat illustration of the Noble Lord, and this very offensive attack upon distinguished and hon. Members of this House by the hon. and learned Member for York. With regard to the rest the Conservative party found a new ally in the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley), who presented his case with his usual skill, and with great skill. I cannot complain of the fairness with which he has put it. He has been perfectly fair in his statements of the difficulties of the case, and he has put a point of view which I agree he is perfectly entitled to put, and which he has put with thorough fairness as far as Ministers are concerned, and consequently with greater effect. Let me say this. The Noble Lord referred to the dignity and susceptibilties of his Majesty's Ministers. We have never used that phrase; we have never put it on the ground of the dignity even of the House of Commons, let alone that of His Majesty's Ministers. It is not a question of dignity, or of anyone's susceptibilities; it is a question of surrendering privileges which are matters of real substance and controversy.
The Noble Lord says we do not realise the magnitude of certain movements which we have taken. If he will allow me to say so, it is he who does not quite realise the magnitude of the sacrifice which he is inviting the House of Commons to make. It is not a question of dignity. He is inviting us to abandon the position which the
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House of Commons has held for fifty years in finance. He cannot possibly realise the gravamen of the difference between the two Houses. We certainly do. We know perfectly well it is one of the greatest questions of his life time, or of mine, and probably the greatest issue raised during the last two or three hundred years. Therefore, everything that depends on this controversy must be a matter of the deepest consideration. If the House of Lords takes a certain view, and their friends, and if the House of Commons takes another view I do not think either House could surrender points in this great conflict without at the same time surrendering their principles, and the nation, in my judgment, has decided, and, therefore, we are bound to carry out the instructions which we regard the nation as having given to us, and to set this matter right at the first possible opportunity. Certainly we are not in a position to surrender anything which we won in the past. It is not, therefore, any question of susceptibilities.
2.0 P.M.
It is a question of the rights of the Commons of England. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Hackney, who sympathises with the general position taken up by right hon. Gentlemen in regard to the Veto, says why do you not pass the Income Tax Resolution? I can assure him it is not merely a matter of pedantry on the part of the Government, but it is because we feel the reality of the contention that you cannot split up the Budget into Resolutions. The Noble Lord quoted an authority for whom no one has greater respect than I have, that is, Lord St. Aldwyn, who is one of the most distinguished financiers who ever had charge of the Exchequer, and a man of great judgment. I am very glad to see that Lord St. Aldwyn made a speech full of sagacious and prudent counsel. I venture with great diffidence to differ from him because he, on the whole, has been extraordinarily impartial in his action towards this controversy. It is not his fault that the Budget was thrown out. It was against his considered advice. He is one of the staunchest Conservatives in the country, as the Noble Lord knows. He is a Conservative of rigid conservative principles, and he would have been the last man to have broken away from his party on a great constitutional issue of this kind unless he were convinced that it was a mistake. He warned them in the most solemn way as to the mistake they were making. He ostentatiously held aloof from them. The Noble Lord has

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quoted his remarks for one purpose, but he has not quoted them for a purpose which is much more germane, and that is that in throwing out the Bill altogether he foresaw what would happen.
It is all very well to say that this is a purely political question, but the Lords ought to have foreseen the possible political complications that might have resulted from a General Election. Is not that one of the things they ought to have foreseen? Let us assume that everything the Noble Lord says about the Irish Members is correct. As a matter of fact it is not, and in the late Parliament they constantly supported the Land Taxes, and supported them most enthusiastically, while, with hon. Members sitting on this side, making it quite clear that agriculture should not be charged, on which hon. Members on this side were just as keen as they were; but as far as the taxation of urban values, they were enthusiastic supporters of the principle of those taxes, which, undoubtedly, as the Noble Lord will admit, were responsible for the rejection of the Bill by the House of Lords. Let us assume that his view is the correct one, and that the delay is due to the Irish Members. Is not that one of the very things the House of Lords ought to have foreseen? They cannot now wash their hands of the whole business and say, "We have no responsibility for it." They certainly ought to have foreseen it, and it does not minimise their responsibility, because, as I pointed out the other day, if this Budget were rejected, that would not minimise the financial confusion, it would aggravate it. All the patience which the Government may display with a view to smoothing the difficulties is really in the interests of clearing up the financial confusion, and will not aggravate it. The Noble Lord must know that perfectly well.
The hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley) asked why we did not bring in an Income Tax Resolution, and said that if we had done that the borrowing and the extension of the Sinking Fund would not have been necessary. That is not the case. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire, who has had experience in these matters, would admit that the Borrowing Bill would have been absolutely necessary, even if we had passed the Income Tax Resolution on the very first available day.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: A Borrowing Bill, but not for the same amount.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Not for the same amount, but exactly the same Borrowing Bill, and the suspension of the Sinking Fund would have been necessary. March 1st was the first clear day we had. Assume for the moment that we could have taken that day and passed an Income Tax Resolution. You could not have collected the Income Tax in a month. The first thing to do would be to send out the assessments. We should have probably got the money which the banks have retained, but that is about all. Individuals would not have paid, and we should have collected comparatively little before 31st March. The difficulty was that we could not have borrowed beyond 31st March without a Bill. A Borrowing Bill and the suspension of the Sinking Fund would have been equally necessary, even if we had passed an Income Tax Resolution on the very first available day.
Mr. BOTTOMLEY: I did not say that the passing of an Income Tax Resolution would have obviated the necessity for borrowing. We were told in the King's Speech that one of our first duties would be to rectify the financial confusion. My point was that if we had introduced the Budget, as we pledged ourselves to do, we should have had full borrowing powers by 31st March.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The hon. Gentleman is perfectly wrong there. It would have been necessary to borrow in any event. The Bills are only up to 31st March. We had to extend the period, and there was no power except by special Act of Parliament.
Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Under what Bill do you borrow up to 31st March?
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Under the old Appropriation Bill. Therefore we should have had to get a Borrowing Bill for that specific purpose, in order to renew the bills. The Appropriation Bill has not been passed yet, and we could not have had an Appropriation Bill under any conditions before to-day. We had to make arrangements for renewing our bills before today, otherwise there would have been vastly worse financial confusion than there is at present.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Surely the right hon. Gentleman did not mean to say that the Appropriation Bill was not passed? It was passed in the last Session of Parliament.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I agree. That is the Bill under which we borrowed.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Then the Appropriation Bill was passed?
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Yes; that was a verbal slip. The Appropriation Bill only enabled us to borrow up to 31st March of this year. Therefore we had to get special powers for that purpose. The Noble Lord (Earl Winterton) says, "Why do you not take to-morrow?" I do not know whether the Noble Lord can speak for his party, but I would ask him, as their temporary leader, whether he would undertake on behalf of his party to say that they would give us the whole of the Budget to-morrow?
Earl WINTERTON: That is a quite irrelevant reference to my speech. I said that the right hon. Gentleman, in a previous speech, put forward as his principal line of defence the fact that the Government had not had time to pass a Resolution, and I stated that there was to-morrow. I have no right to speak for Members on this side, but I believe they would be perfectly willing to sit to-morrow to pass a Resolution.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The Noble Lord is wrong. We have never said that we had not time to pass a Resolution. On the contrary, the line we have taken is that you have to take the Budget as a whole. After all, our financial scheme is just like the financial scheme of any other Government. You cannot take an individual tax by itself. The taxes are so adjusted, according to the views of the Government, as to distribute the burden fairly between all classes. The Noble Lord may say that we have not done so, but that is our view. It is bound to be the view of every Government and of every Chancellor of the Exchequer. You cannot pick and choose, and say, "We will take the taxes which fall upon the middle classes and leave outside the Land Taxes and the Licence Duties; we will only pass the taxes of which the Opposition approve." Every Government presents its financial scheme as a whole. For that reason we could not undertake to bring in in a Resolution merely for the Income Tax.
Lord HUGH CECIL: You will have to bring in a Resolution relating to the Income Tax sooner or later.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The Noble Lord knows perfectly well the way in which the
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finance of the year is dealt with. There is first the statement of the whole position and plan of the Government.
Lord HUGH CECIL: The right hon. Gentleman has told us that we are not to have that statement.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: No; I do not know what on earth the Noble Lord is thinking of. I repeatedly said yesterday, in reply to hon. Members from Ireland, that I could not answer their questions because they would have to wait until the financial statement was made. Certainly there must be a financial statement in order to show what the position of the revenue is.
Lord HUGH CECIL: There is really some ambiguity. I understood the Prime Minister to say that the Budget of 1909 was to be passed before the Spring Recess, and that there would be no financial statement of the whole financial business of 1909–10 until a later period of the Session.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The Noble Lord is now referring purely to the finance of next year. I am talking about the financial statement—the Budget of this year. I certainly do not propose at the present time merely to get up and say, "Mr. Speaker, I move." There must be some explanation. As the Prime Minister has. already pointed out, there will have to be certain alterations in the Bill itself, and they will have to be explained. You cannot possibly get up and simply say, "I move the Income Tax Resolution." You cannot do it. It has got to be done as part and parcel of the whole scheme of finance for the year. I have not yet heard from anyone authorised to speak on behalf of the Opposition—the Noble Lord has not told us—whether or not the Income Tax includes the Super-tax.
Lord HUGH CECILmade an observation inaudible in the Gallery.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The Noble Lord has no objection! The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Austen Chamberlain) has yet to speak. He was not here when I put the question before. I think it is rather important, when we are pressed in this matter by the Noble Lord, to note that he has not yet explained whether he includes the Super-tax.
Earl WINTERTON: I am ready to include the Super-tax. But I am not the Leader of the Opposition, any more than

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the right hon. Gentleman is Leader of the party opposite.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The difference is the Noble Lord pretends to be, and I do not pretend to be. Really, it is quite impossible that we should deal with the matter piecemeal in the fashion suggested. I have already explained that so often that I apologise to the House for explaining it again. I am doing it out of courtesy to hon. Gentlemen opposite. I have tried to fellow their arguments one after the other. That is really the reason. We will do our very best, and at the earliest possible moment, to deal with the financial difficulty. Quotations, I know, have been made from the speech of the Prime Minister. The Noble Lord said that the Prime Minister had stated, "The first act of this new Parliament will be to reimpose the old taxes." I think that is going to be so. I do not think the Noble Lord said that the Prime Minister had broken his pledge by passing the Consolidated Fund Bill. I do not think he takes that view. The Leader of the Opposition did not. The view of the Leader of the Opposition was, and I think that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire took the same view the other day, that it was the primary duty of the Government to set up Supply—to pass Supply. "Therefore the first act of the new House of Commons will be to reaffirm, and to pass the Budget." I think that is so. I think it will be the first Act.
Lord HUGH CECIL: Several acts have been done already.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Really, I do not think that the Noble Lord imagines that he would put the Budget through before making the necessary arrangements for Supplies?
Lord HUGH CECIL: Why did not the Prime Minister say so?
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I think that is rather a pedantic interpretation of the words of the Prime Minister, to say that he meant that he would put the Budget through before Supply, before temporary borrowing, and before even the most urgent business that can possibly come before the country. If that is his view, all I can say is that he is straining the language of pledges to a point which he is not justified in doing. He is certainly not justified in making a charge of breach of faith upon such flimsy evidence as that.
Lord HUGH CECIL: My charge is not a charge of breach of faith.
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: What is the meaning of the words, "first act"?
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The meaning of the words, "first act"? They have only one meaning. They mean the first Act of Parliament that is passed in the Session. That, in my judgment, will be the first great Act of Parliament passed this Session, the moment we get through our Consolidated Fund Bill. It is true that we are putting forward Resolutions with regard to the Lords. The Prime Minister said at the Albert Hall, in a most distinct fashion:—
"It is our first duty (in referring to what he called the "invasion of the privileges' by the Lords), to make a recurrence impossible."
That was said before this Parliament was elected. It was said before the General Election. That is equally an emphatic pledge. Some hon. Members have complained that to that extent it means breaking our pledge by not putting the Veto Bill through all its stages before ever we come to the Budget. The Noble Lord is not the only Member of the House on his side, and, after all, hon: Members who sit on this side of the House are entitled to their views just as much as hon. Members on the other side of the House. I do not think the Government is doing at all what the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for York (Mr. J. G. Butcher) calls discreditable when it is taking in account the views of its own supporters. The Government really are going out of their way to clear up the financial mess, as it is called, at the earliest possible moment. There is no harm being done—except the harm that has already been done. The first time we could have taken the matter would have been next Tuesday. But it is a matter of small moment to the three or four months that have been thrown away by the action of the House of Lords. I do not think the Noble Lord can fairly complain that we are putting it off for another three weeks when it is in order to put on record our feeling, and to make it absolutely clear that in future the House of Lords is to be deprived of its power to create another mess in the finances of this country.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: The Chancellor of the Exchequer has complained that in the course of this discussion my hon. Friends on this side of the House have advanced no new argument. I think it would necessarily be, when we discussed one particular point several times

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without getting any sort of an answer that appears to us to have any substance of force in it, that we should repeat the same arguments to get that answer. The right hon. Gentleman himself, by the necessities of the situation, has also not contributed any fresh arguments. He is now suggesting an interpretation of the Prime Minister's statement, "That the first act of the new House of Commons would be to validate all the duties and taxes proposed to be imposed by the late Budget," which, I think, that statement will not bear. He treats the word "act" in that passage as if it referred to an Act of Parliament. I think undoubtedly, to anybody who reads it—and I should be content to appeal to the Prime Minister himself on the subject that what he meant when he spoke in that way was that the first "work," not the first "Act of Parliament"—not the first Bill which may technically pass through all its stages and receive the Royal Assent—but the first work that this Parliament should set its hand to. I do not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer was very successful in his gloss of that "phrase. But he did succeed in showing one thing. I must give them credit for this, that if the Prime Minister had made a definite statement in this House, that that would have been the first act of the new House of Commons—the first work of the new House of Commons—if his colleagues and he possessed the confidence of the new House as he thought they would. He made an equally definite and contrary statement at the Albert Hall, in which he said their first work would be something else. It is not my duty to reconcile the inconsistencies of the Prime Minister as pointed out by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself did not undertake the task. Let me sum up in the fewest possible sentences what is our complaint against the Government, and what we conceive to be the reasonable complaint of the country against the Government.
The Government are anxious to throw the whole blame for all this disturbance which has occurred upon the House of Lords. They appear to us to be anxious, in order the more to blacken the character of the House of Lords, to make that disturbance as great as possible and to continue it as long as possible. We say that had the Government chosen, pending the carrying of the great appeal between the
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two Houses to the country, to take the steps which were open to them they could have saved any confusion whatever from arising. They might have regularised the great revenue-bearing taxes of the country before the last Parliament was prorogued. If that was done they might have carried out their original intention, as expressed by the Prime Minister in the last speech he made to the last House of Commons, as validating these taxes as the first work of the House, and if they could not have afforded, owing to the pressure of financial business, to validate them all they might at least have obtained the Resolutions which would have validated the collection of the Income Tax, through the non-collection of which the great disturbances and loss to the revenue has incurred, is incurring, and will be permanently felt. Why do they not do these things? Why did they alter their intention? The Chancellor of the Exchequer was angry at the language used by the hon. Member for York. The gravamen of the charge made by the hon. Member for York was that the Government proposals contained in the. Prime Minister's speech were modified under a threat and were abandoned under dictation.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: That is not what I objected to. What I objected to was that he characterised that as a discreditable intrigue.
Mr. J. G. BUTCHER: What I referred to as a discreditable Parliamentary intrigue was to try and get the hon. Members from Ireland to vote against their convictions, and the convictions of their constituents, for the Budget for the purpose of some further advantage.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: The Chancellor of the Exchequer has often, availed himself of a small point to cover up his unwillingness or his inability to meet the real charge brought against him. If the Government followed out the intention originally expressed by the Prime Minister, we should have no complaint. They would have brought their Budget on at the earliest possible moment; they would have proposed in the time between the meeting of Parliament and now to validate those taxes which are most urgently required, and to the non-collection of which the major portion of the Chancellor's difficulties are due. The Land Taxes contribute practically nothing to the revenue of this year. After the Chancellor of the Exchequer had agreed

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to share his plunder with the local authorities lie only anticipated he would get little more than £50,000, and a Budget of £160,000,000 is not upset for a Land Tax of £50,000. It is the non-collection of the Income Tax that has caused the difficulty, and the Government might have validated that in the second week that Parliament met. Why was it not done? The House adjourned in order that Ministers might dine, and the country borrows for the same reason. What were the Chancellor of the Exchequer's objections? They are twofold. First, he says it would not have prevented him from still having to borrow. That is perfectly true. But it would have limited enormously the amount of his borrowing. The Chancellor said he would have got very little. He would have got the whole of the money in the banks, the whole of the money from the joint-stock companies, a vast number of the biggest payments by individual taxpayers, and—I will not undertake to give a figure—but I will undertake to say that if he will consult his officials at the Treasury and Inland Revenue they will tell him that in the circumstances of this year he might have got a very large proportion of the money of which he is now deficient owing to there being no authority to ask for the taxes at all. The right hon. Gentleman says that in that case you are asking us to deal with the Budget piecemeal. No, you need not have let it go piecemeal from this House. You might have proceeded with other Resolution as time offered, and then have let the Budget leave the House as a whole. I do not know whether it would leave the House or not. The Chancellor has admitted to-day, what we all know, that the real reason for the delay is to try and smooth the difficulties in the path of the Government.
Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: No, I did not say that.
Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: "A little patience that may have the effect of smoothing the difficulties now in our path." I am not going to attack the hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. John Redmond), and least of all in his absence. I do not know what his attitude to the Budget is, but I rather gather from his earlier speeches that he thought the Budget was an excellent Budget for us, but not a good one for Ireland; and as long as you took Ireland out of it he was quite ready to vote for it for Englishmen and Scotsmen. I am not quite sure if he still holds that view. At the beginning of the Session we know
1094
he offered his support to the Government at a price. These are his own words:—
"We offer our support at a price, and we will not give it for nothing."
And the reason for the delay is the Government is trying to beat down the hon. Member's price and to get it at a lower price than he is willing to accept. Is that creditable? Is that the kind of Parliamentary arrangement which the Chancellor of the Exchequer would like? The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Foreign Affairs does not very often favour us with his presence in this House, but he has found time to make one or two speeches elsewhere. He was talking the other day of the log-rolling that might be anticipated from Tariff Reform. Yet here is his own Government engaged in logrolling operations for four months at the expense of the commerce and revenues of the country.
That is our complaint. There would have been no confusion worth talking about if you had taken the earliest opportunity of validating the collection of the taxes as the Prime Minister said you would. You have chosen not in the interests of the country, not for any great constitutional purpose, but in order to smooth the way through Parliamentary difficulties, in order to placate a Parliamentary Opposition, to sacrifice the interests of the country to a Parliamentary and party intrigue and, as the natural result of that, the commerce and the trade of the country is kept in uncertainty, the revenue of the country is in arrear, the expenditure of the country has increased by the interest you have to pay upon the money which you will not collect, but will borrow, and the credit of the nation is depressed. Every week those proceedings go on the credit of the country is further injured, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer well knows after his experience with the issue of Exchequer Bonds the other day.
Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time," put, and agreed to.
Bill passed.

EASTER ADJOURNMENT.

  SOMALILAND.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do meet to-morrow, at Ten of the clock, and that, after the Report of the Royal Assent to Acts agreed to by both Houses, Mr. Speaker do adjourn the House, without Question put, until Tuesday, 29th March."—[The Prime Minister.]
  Mr. J. L. BAIRD: I rise to call the attention of the House to the Question of Somaliland. This subject was raised on the Supplementary Estimates, and the Home Secretary made a speech in which he talked a good deal and said nothing in particular, and he certainly led us to suppose that a future opportunity would be afforded for discussing the affairs of Somaliland before any definite action was taken by the Government. Most of us who discussed the Question on this side of the House relied upon the promise that nothing would be done of any material importance until the House had had a further opportunity of considering the Question. Here are the words of the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary:—
  " I hope the Committee will have confidence in the Government, and will believe we are endeavouring to relieve the cost and strengthen the situation and contract the area of our responsibilities in Somaliland, and at the same time to do justice to our obligations to those who, through mistaken policy on our part, have been led to rely, to some extent, at any rate, upon the protection of our military forces."
  That was practically a pledge on behalf of the Government to carry out our obligations to those in Somaliland who have been relying upon us to stand by them. What do we find? In the Blue Book issued yesterday, in the instructions sent to Sir William Manning, the Commander-in-Chief of Somaliland, there occurs the following passage:—
  "They propose to evacuate the interior and limit British occupation to the holding of the two or three important towns on the coast by small garrisons, it being, however, understood that the evacuation is not to be carried out unless and until the friendly tribes can reasonably be said to be in a. position to hold their own against the Mullah."
  That despatch is dated 7th January, and in view of that statement it is rather trifling with the House for the Home Secretary, with this knowledge in his possession, to leads us to suppose that no definite policy had been decided upon, and that matters would be left as they were until a further opportunity had been given to us to discuss the Question. Instead of that we find that the actual evacuation of Somaliland has been decided upon—in fact it commenced yesterday when the natives were to be warned of what was going to happen. Not only are we to leave the natives in the lurch, but we are going to steal away like a thief in the night, and leave them to stew in their own juice. The Secretary of State telegraphed to the Commissioner on 18th September last to the following effect:—
  "Previous experience has shown that self-protective measures on the part of the friendly tribes have proved
  1096
  the most effective means of bringing the Mullah to reason, while action of this kind is in accordance with the policy of the Government, which aims at encouraging the tribes to rely upon themselves for their own defence against the Mullah."
  That is a stereotyped sentence which emerges from Downing Street whenever they have a difficult question to settle which they wish to shirk. They talk of previous experience showing that this course is necessary, but it has shown nothing of the kind. It has shown that the tribes are quite unable to protect themselves, and they have been taught to rely upon us; and unless we protect them they will be raided and killed and their goods will be destroyed. The Commissioner is told:—
  " If. therefore, you think the step advisable, you may tell the tribes that, as the Mullah continues to attack them and has broken off negotiations with us, they must take measures they think proper to protect themselves."
  And yet we are told by those who have, not the slightest knowledge of Somaliland that such a step is in accordance with our dignity as the protectors of that country. The Commissioner never said this was advisable. On the contrary, in reply to the question put to him as to its advisability, he said:—
  " It would be to throw them (the tribes) straight into the Mullah's hands to tell them now that they must rely entirely on their own efforts, whereas if they can first gain some initial success with our moral support, they will be encouraged to rely more on their own unaided efforts in future."
  The only effect of this policy will be to throw the tribes straight into the Mullah's hands. The Government issued their directions to the Commissioner without consulting this House, authorising the evacuation. Only a few months ago the following telegram was sent to the Commissioner:—
  "The question of our future policy in Somaliland has been under my consideration, and while it is not practicable at present, or perhaps desirable, to outline that policy in full, I am of opinion that if it is to have any stability, the principle on which it must be based is that of inducing the friendly tribes to take a more active part in their own defence. There is no doubt that during the last few months, the Mullah has been considerably discredited, and the friendly tribes have shown on more than one occasion that they can hold their own against his raiding parties. It seems probable that if they were given to understand that they must rely more upon their own exertions, they would be able, with a certain amount of military support from the Government, to make still greater headway against the Mullah, and perhaps in time they would be able to dispense with Government support altogether."
  The wish is father to the thought. The Somalis look upon us as their supporters and protectors, and it is hoped in time that they will learn to take care of themselves. That is not the policy which will enable us to build up that great civilising

  1097
  influence which has worked so successfully in other parts of the British Empire. If we are going to play fast and loose with the good work of British officials there, we must expect a very serious attack on our prestige in that country. Putting aside all this talk about previous experience, what is the real reason? On 12th March of last year the Secretary of State telegraphed to the Commissioner:—
  "The cost of transport required to maintain troops in present position is so great that His Majesty's Government must, reconsider the whole question of their policy in Somaliland."
  There is the real reason. Why should not the Government be frank about it? They have not got to pay the money out of their own pockets. The ratepayers have got to pay, and they are entitled to say whether they are prepared to find the necessary money to meet the cost of transport when the sole reason for the desertion of Somaliland is apparently that the Government find the cost of transport for a particular movement, which was of passing importance, excessive. What is in store for these unfortunate men from whom they are running away and whom they are leaving in the lurch? On 3rd April last the Commissioner, whose opinion had been asked with regard to the general situation in Somaliland, telegraphed as follows:—
  " With respect to the general situation, I hope that it is realised that if failure of local transport compels us to withdraw from Ain before the Mullah declares his intentions, we may rind ourselves forced to retire first from the coast, and eventually from the county altogether. If the Mullah were to advance as we retire we could not protect our troops for long from Burao or Sheikh, and much less from Berbera."
  This is the opinion of a man who has been nine or ten years in the country, who is one of the finest administrators, as I have no doubt the Secretary of State will say, we have in the Colonial Service, and who has had unrivalled experience in Somaliland. He says it is impossible to protect our tribes from Burao or Sheikh, and much less from Berbera, and yet you intend to run away and leave them in the lurch. I can hardly think that this is in accordance with the sentiments of the nation. Gentlemen who usually occupy seats below the Gangway opposite are in the habit of making a very great fuss about the lot of the natives in the Congo. I entirely share their views on the subject, but I think their speeches must certainly enormously increase the difficulties of the Foreign Secretary, who is fully aware of the circumstances there, and is doing his very best to improve them. We are responsible
  1098
  for the welfare of the natives of Somaliland, and yet you are deliberately handing them over to a system of Government which is far worse than anything which obtains in the Congo. You are handing them over bag and baggage to the Mullah. I think I have been about as near as anybody to the Mullah, and I am bound to say he is a most disagreeable person with whom to have anything to do. Anything more unpleasant than turning women and children out to starve in the desert it is difficult to imagine. Yet we are handing over 200,000 loyal British subjects to treatment of that sort with our eyes open simply because the Government will not ask the House of Commons whether they will find the money necessary to meet a temporary military requirement. The Government asked the Commissioner to inform them of the number who will be affected. He replied:—
  " The total population of the tribes with whom we have treaties of protection may be roughly estimated at 200,000, though only about half that number will be immediately affected by withdrawal. They have for the most part been in loyal co-operation, and though some who are not in immediate danger may be described as lukewarm, and their apathy is due more to their reliance on us to protect them in case of danger than to any disloyalty to us or leaning towards the Mullah, whom they have now learned by experience to hate and fear."
  You are handing over these men to the tender mercies of the Mullah, when, by the showing of our Commissioner, they hate and fear him, and we are the nation who are for ever making such a fuss because of the misgovernmentof the Belgians in the Congo. Surely the two things are incongruous. Surely we must see the beam in our own eye before we want to remove the mote in the eye of our neighbour. Who is this Mullah? The hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon), I believe, had the privilege of an invitation to spend Saturday to Monday with the Mullah, but he could not see his way to do so. He may have one opinion about him, but here is what a certain Mohamet Salah, who is the reputed head of the sect to which the Mullah professes to belong, wrote to him as recently as 27th February:—

  " The letter is said to be a reprobation of the Mullah's brutality and excesses and general maltreatment of the Mahomedans, and, after accusing him of being a religious imposter, whose sole object is to become Sultan of the Somali coast, he warns him that if he does not mend his ways letters will be sent to all the neighbouring tribes denouncing him and urging them to rise against him."
  This is the man to whom you propose to hand over Somaliland. Somaliland may be a barren country, but what about the

  1099
  Somalis? They are British subjects, just like ourselves, but they have the misfortune to have no votes. I think that is a reason for paying more attention to their welfare than you probably would to people whose votes might result in your being returned or not being returned to power. I regret very much that I am perhaps the only representative here to-day to speak on behalf of the Somalis. They have been loyal to us on many occasions. They are gallant men, to whom many Englishmen owe their lives. I am one, and I think it is a most contemptible thing that, without giving Parliament the chance of discussing at all what is to be the policy adopted with regard to these people, and when you have lulled Parliament to sleep and given them to understand that nothing further is going to be done until there is a further opportunity for discussion, we and the Somalis should be allowed to wake up one morning and find that the Somalis are going to be abandoned to the Mullah. I suppose the idea is that they might hold their own against the Mullah. Our Commissioner (Captain Cordeaux) wrote, as far back as January, 1909, and circumstances have not changed since then:—
  "There is no disguising the fact that the Mullah has never abandoned the idea of becoming the master of the whole of Somaliland. It is only question of time and of opportunity."
  We are giving him the opportunity deliberately and of set purpose. He has waited his time as he knew he had only to wait; he has got his opportunity, and he is going to become master of Somaliland. The Commissioner says he does not consider it possible to hold Burao or Sheikh or that we could protect our tribes from Berbera. Berbera lies on the coast; it is of no importance except as a trade centre, and when the Mullah is in occupation of the interior trade will naturally cease. If you are going to abandon the country, why not abandon the whole? This holding of the coast is simply keeping a point of danger open which will occasion expeditions into the interior. Consequently you are running the danger of having to spend money in defending what is absolutely worthless instead of spending a little more in order to defend those tribesmen who have been loyal to us in the past, and who look to us for protection. There is a great deal more than that in the whole question. The Somalis are not confined to Somaliland. They are the
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  greatest wanderers in that part of Africa. What influence is our action going to have on the Somalis in the interior? Does anybody believe that the news will not spread like wildfire that we have been beaten by the Mullah? I remember in the year 1899, at the time things were going badly with us in South Africa—the time when we had no friends in Europe, the representatives of the European Powers in Abyssinia were doing their best to persuade the Emperor Menelik that his opportunity had come. Till that time we had only to remind Menelik of the fate of the Dervishes, but now they will be able to point to the successful revolt of the Mullah. That alters the whole position of affairs. This is not a question affecting a small body of men. We, have no right to look after merely the best part of our possessions, and I maintain we are bound to enter a protest against the action of the Government in this matter. We live on prestige in North-East Africa, and on prestige entirely. I think we have acted very foolishly in giving up a very strong position in Abyssinia, and we are acting still more foolishly in convincing the natives that we are not strong enough to protect them as we have done in the past, and that in future we are going to leave them to look after themselves. The very fact that the Somalis are great traders and great wanderers will only add to the disastrous effects of the policy of the Government. I do not know whether the Government have made any arrangement with Italy in this matter. I can see nothing in the recently - issued Blue Book. But the records of the party opposite in regard to Africa are, unfortunate. Those records are darkened by the names of Majuba and Gordon, and the words "too late" are applicable to both those cases. Do they intend to add a third like achievement? I earnestly beg of them to remember that these brown men—or black men—whom they are treating so atrociously have the right to say, in the face of all men, cicis Brittanicus sum, and to deprive them, without being consulted, of that right is a thing which no Government of this country ought to do unless it has the clear wish of the nation behind it.
  3.0 P.M.
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for the COLONIES (Colonel Seely): I am sure the House listened with great interest to the speech of the hon. Member who, some time ago, had some knowledge of the matters to which he has referred, but that that

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  knowledge is not very recent will be realised by those who have listened to Debates on this question. It is only fair to say that hon. Gentlemen in all parts of the House must have been somewhat surprised at the peroration of the hon. Gentleman. He told us he approached this matter in no party spirit, but at the same time he referred to incidents of the past in regard to which he made an attack on the Liberal party, and he asked the House to believe that we were now doing the same kind of thing. I hope I shall be able to show that the arguments of the hon. Gentleman were based upon ignorance of the state of affairs existing on the spot, and a complete ignorance of what has been stated in the House. The first complaint of the hon. Gentleman was that no notice was given to this House of the intentions of the Government to contract their area of responsibility, and, indeed, the hon. Gentleman used somewhat harsh language in that respect. I will assume he was not in the House on 3rd March last, as indeed, I was not, through no fault of my own, when—
  Mr. BAIRD: I was present.
  Colonel SEELY: The hon. Member was present, but, of course, was not paying much attention to the proceedings. The gravamen of his charge is that no notice was given to this House of any intention to restrict our area of responsibility in Somaliland. That is absolutely wide of the truth. I have in my hand the OFFICIAL REPORT of what was said by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who, in my absence, replied on behalf of the Colonial Department. My right hon. Friend said:—
  "I hope the Committee will have confidence in the Government and will believe we are endeavouring to relieve the cost and strengthen the situation and contract the area of our responsibilities in Somaliland."
  Mr. BAIRD: Will the right hon. Gentleman read to the end?
  Colonel SEELY: Certainly. I can assure the hon. Member I do not intend to let him off. He has made a most unjustifiable attack on the Government under circumstances which may gravely embarrass us with foreign countries. My right hon. Friend continued:—
  " And sit the same time to do justice to our obligations to those who, through mistaken policy on our part, have been led to rely, to some extent, at any rate, upon the protection of our military forces.''
  There was clear notice given by a responsible Minister that we proposed to contract our area of responsibility in Somaliland. If the hon. Member had read the
  1102
  Blue Book he would have read on page 89 words to the effect that it was intended that representatives of the Colonial Office should make a full statement of policy on behalf of the Government, but in deference, however, to the military advisers, who represented that such an announcement at this juncture "might compromise your position and limit your possibilities of action," no definite announcement was made, but merely a general indication of the manner in which the Government regarded the situation. I put it to all impartially minded men in this House and in the country, Did we not go as far as we possibly could, in indicating our position that on every ground of policy it was advisable for us to strengthen the situation and contract the area of our responsibilities, in making the statement which my right hon. Friend did on that occasion; and I also put it to all impartially minded men, is it right or wise for an hon. Gentleman at one and a-half hour's notice to get up in this House and bring charges of bad faith against His Majesty's Government when it is clear that the indication was as full as it could possibly be in view of the military situation of three or four weeks ago? I wish to enter a protest against that part of the speech of the hon. Gentleman. I do not think that his remarks were fair, and I am quite confident that had he read what I have quoted he would never have said what he did say.
  So much for the notice given to this House. I now come to the general explanation of our policy in Somaliland, and I cannot help thinking that if the hon. Member knew the position he would not have made the speech he did. When I have had to address this House on the subject of Somaliland I have always indicated quite clearly that we did not hold the interior of that country, as we hold other dominions, because it would be impossible to do so except with a force infinitely greater than any which this House would stand from any party in the House, however much it desired to support it. Had the hon. Member been here on 15th March last he would have listened to a Debate which would have shown conclusively that even if we had wished to make a permanent and effective occupation of Somaliland, similar to that which we have in India, we should not only not have received support from the Irish Members or from the Labour Members, or from the Liberal Members, but we should not have received support from hon. Gentlemen on

  1103
  the Opposition, side of the House. Those hon. Gentlemen who were present on that occasion will remember that we had speeches from two hon. Gentlemen who had even greater knowledge than the hon. Member—one the hon. and gallant Member for Winchester (Captain Baring), whom I am sorry not to see in his place to-day, and the other was a speech from the hon. Member for Blackpool (Mr. Ashley), both of them knowing Somaliland well, both of them pointing out that this was a country of no value which we could not occupy except in great force and at great expense, and both of them begging the Government, who were then thought to be contemplating a wild and extravagant scheme, not to adopt such a course. I was at that time in the position, as the House well remembers, of defending the Government against the charge, made on that side by hon. Members who knew most about the subject, of indulging in a rash expedition in Somaliland. It is desirable to quote one phrase from the speech of the hon. Member for Blackpool, and his words were not so strong as those of the hon. Member for Winchester. He said:—
  "As the Committee knows, the country is the most thinly populated in our Empire. It is dried up for want of water for nine months of the year; the largest tree is a glorified thorn bush; it is a country inhabited by a few wild tribes and a great many wild animals. During nine months of the year you could often go eighty or a hundred miles without finding any water. Naturally no agriculture is possible. The country is inhabited by nomad tribes. There is no chance of any agricultural wealth coming to us. though there is the chance that some mineral wealth may come to us in the dim and distant future."
  On these grounds we were urged not to indulge in wild schemes of expansion. The reason of the Debate was that we had found it necessary largely to increase our garrisons in Somaliland. Under the late Government various policies were pursued. There were expeditions which were not successful, and then there were withdrawals which were attended with more or less success or disaster, as the case might be. But finally we found a situation which I ask the House to bear in mind, and which I must endeavour to describe. We held Berbera, which is on the coast, and we have a few men at a place which is forty miles inland, and some more at a place which is thirty-eight miles inland. We knew the Mullah was going to pursue the aggressive, and we had information that he had a large force in the vicinity, and we had either to clear out at once—a thing which every Government contemplated—or to strengthen the
  1104
  garrisons. At some considerable cost we brought troops from India and some parts of Africa to make sure that we were not driven out in a hurry.
  Let us again remember the situation. There was this place, Berbera, on the coast, and these two little places up in the interior, and only a few men many miles away. No one could conceive a more hopeless strategic position, but it would be the worst thing to do to clear out and let the Mullah, who is a very aggressive person, think that we could not hold our own when we wished to do so, and therefore we increased the force. Some of these reinforcements are still there, some have been sent back to different parts of Africa, where their presence is urgently required, and now we have done what is already announced in this Blue Book. We have come to the conclusion that there are only two policies open to us. One is to take the step protested against by hon. Members opposite, who know the facts of the case, and have a great expedition to break down the power of the Mullah, to build a railway, make great roads, and effectually occupy the whole of Somaliland. We could not, however, get a majority of this House to do such a thing, even if we thought it wise, in view of what I haves quoted from the hon. Member for Blackpool, whose knowledge of the Question is very great. We could not get this House to agree to such a course. We must, however, do that or else hold the coast in strength and avoid the great risk of holding little isolated positions forty and thirty-eight miles respectively in advance of that point on the coast which we hold. May I put in a phrase the gravamen of the situation in Somaliland? We could not afford protection. So long as our presence there could afford protection there was something to be said for holding on to these places, but when it was found —as it was found—that unless we kept there a body of men which was far greater than was thought reasonable we could not protect the tribes around simply by occupying these isolated positions, then it seemed plain to us that the only other course open was to hold the coast in strength and to abandon these positions which were so dangerous to ourselves and of no advantage to the friendly tribes. That is the course which we have adopted, and General Manning, who is in command there, has full authority to deal with the situation as he thinks fit.

  1105
  I now come to the question of the friendly tribes. I have dealt with it in its broad aspect by saying that the fact that we occupy isolated posts in the interior is no help to the friendly tribes except those who are quite close to those isolated posts. In point of fact, it has been no help. There have been raids and counter-raids which we have been totally unable to stop with the small force at our disposal. But we were very careful indeed in this matter that no steps should be taken to leave anyone who relied upon British protection helpless. In our instructions to General Manning—and here again I must call the language of the hon. Gentleman in question, he would not have used it had he read this Blue Book— we stated clearly that a condition of withdrawal was that he was to be satisfied that the friendly tribes were able to protect themselves. The friendly tribes have been armed, and we have already received information that these friendly tribes have attacked the Mullah's followers and have defeated them and captured camels, and I am sorry to say, from the point of view of the Mullah's followers, inflicted loss upon them. That is subsequent to the Blue Book. I will lay the papers. It is very likely in our view, and in this we are supported by our military advisers, that the fact that we are abandoning these posts will, in the long run, make the lot of the people in Somaliland far happier and far better.
  Mr. BAIRD: A very long run.
  Colonel SEELY: No, not a very long run. The hon. Gentleman is probably not aware of the extent to which the tribes have suffered while we have occupied these isolated posts. What is the good of occupying isolated posts when you cannot protect the people? I think I have disposed of the question of the friendly tribes by reference to the Blue Book, where it is plainly stated that the withdrawal was to be conditional on their being able to protect themselves. I now come to the question whether this is a well conceived policy agreed upon by men who may be relied upon in the country not to sell the country's honour. Anyone might have gathered from the hon. Gentleman's speech that we were a party of men who desire to throw away everything that we have got, and to abandon these poor men to their fate. I was very interested to hear him refer with approval to the Foreign Secretary. He seemed to imply that had the right hon. Baronet had control, this
  1106
  course would not have been taken. Of course, the hon. Gentleman is aware that these decisions are taken on the responsibility of the Government as a whole, and I may tell him at once that in every step in this matter we have acted always with the full approval and concurrence of the Foreign Secretary, that he has sat upon Committees with me on this matter and investigated it in every particular. I have the names of those with whom I have been in consultation daily on the subject—Lord Morley and the Secretary for War—and all these have fully considered the strategical, political, and the moral aspects of this Question, and have agreed upon the policy. It may be, of course, that the hon. Gentleman, whose unrivalled knowledge of the matter is shown by the fact that he owes his life to a Somali, possibly because he never went within 150 miles of the Mullah, though I do not pretend to say that the Mullah is one to spare the hon. Gentleman if he crossed his path—it may be that the hon. Gentleman is right in the view that he has put before the House, that in the course we have pursued, which is not to hold Sheikh, Burao, and Hargeisha, but to hold, instead, Berbera, as before, with two other garrisons, thus turning the line from north to south to east and west, we may be open to the charge which he has levelled, and that by so doing we are abandoning our friends to their fate and injuring the prestige of England. But I will put it to the House that it is perhaps conceivable that Lord Morley, Lord Crewe, the Foreign Secretary, and the War Secretary, who have been in conference with me on the matter, may perhaps have some lingering desire to fulfil their pledges to subject races, and may perhaps have some glimmering of the thought that we should maintain British prestige. I put it to him as a possibility, I do not ask him to believe me, but the facts I have stated are true, and every step has been taken after the most care ful, anxious, and prolonged deliberation, and with the sole desire and object to maintain our prestige in East Africa and elsewhere, and to fulfil our obligations to these tribes who have relied upon our protection, and who see to-day that in this and all matters, while we are not going to do rash and foolish things in trying to pursue people whom we cannot catch, and whom the hon. Gentleman could not catch, we shall still endeavour to maintain the high honour and integrity of the British Empire.

  "DREADNOUGHT" BILDING (THAMES CONTRACT).
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: I desire to direct the attention of the House to a subject which was dealt with somewhat briefly at Question Time yesterday, and to which an incidental reference was made during questions to-day. The subject is the circumstances under which one of His Majesty's ships, a "Dreadnought," is now being constructed, or is about to be constructed by the Thames Ironworks Company. Quite recently, in response to a good deal of pressure from questions in the House and outside it, the Admiralty placed a contract for one of these "Dreadnoughts" with the Thames Ironworks Company. Until to-day I was not a naval expert, and I do not profess to know the special considerations which led to the placing of the contract with that particular firm. I only know that in shipbuilding circles and in the City the colloquial name of that vessel is H.M.S. "Polling Day." But, the order having been placed, and all difficulties of a financial character incidental to guarantees and so on having been got over, the Thames Ironworks Company proceeded to make the necessary arrangements for carrying out this contract, and yesterday I addressed to the First Lord various questions as to the condition under which that work was being done. I have one complaint only to make in regard to the First Lord. I did think that after my question had been on the Notice Paper twenty-four hours the First Lord might have thought the matter of sufficient importance to induce him to make some inquiry, not simply from his own Department but from the shipbuilding company itself, as to whether or not there was any foundation for the suggestions in my question. The right hon. Gentleman said he had not done so yesterday. He tells us to-day that, to use the phrase of the Colonial Secretary just now, a glimmering has dawned upon him of the wisdom and necessity of inquiring of the people really concerned as to whether or not there is any ground for the suggestion I am about to make. According to my information, this is the position. The Thames Ironworks Company, having secured this contract—the first contract it has ever had for building a "Dreadnought"—found that it did not possess a certain portion of the plant known as a floating crane. A floating crane is something requiring a great deal of expenditure and very considerable time for its erection. I confess that up to yes-
  1108
  terday I do not think I could have passed an examination upon the difference between a "Dreadnought" and a Thames steamboat, but I have had the advantage of a conference with experts since then, and, leaving out, perhaps, the right hon. Gentleman, I believe I am as good an authority on the subject now as the Civil Lord. I understand that a "Dreadnought" is the name of a certain type of battleship, and that a battleship is one of those wonderful developments of modern civilisation designed to send a maximum of people into eternity in the shortest possible time. It is essential for our security that everything in the nature of secrets or of private methods of construction should be safely carried out, and it is because it has been suggested that that condition is going to be violated that I brought the matter before the House yesterday. When the Thames Ironworks Company knew that they would require this crane to be built one would have thought that they would seek tenders, estimates, and plans from British firms not only of great experience in this kind of work, but firms some of whom have actually constructed floating cranes, and some of whose floating cranes, in all respects similar to the one now to be erected, are being used for the building of our "Dreadnoughts." Let me say at once that there is no fiscal aspect in this matter. It is not a question whether or not we can get some article at a cheaper price, or a better article at the same price, in another country, and that therefore we ought to take it. I give a rough and ready illustration of that argument, for it is suggested by my hon. Friends around me that from the fiscal point of view if the German Government proposed to present us with a floating crane we ought to accept it. I should myself be sorry to walk under a crane obtained in that way. This is a question entirely of national defence, a question of insisting upon the conditions necessary to our safety in the carrying out of the work. The Thames Ironworks Company having sought estimates and specifications from British firms, and having got almost to the point of signing the contract, suddenly decides to place the contract in Germany. Dismissing altogether the fiscal aspect of the question, I would point out that the crane will take nine months to erect. We were told yesterday by the right hon. Gentleman that until the crane is actually erected and complete no special progress will have been

  1109
  made with the building of the "Dreadnought." He used one extraordinary phrase. He said that until the crane commenced its work certainly nothing in the nature of disclosing secrets could happen. My information is to the opposite effect. My information is that contemporaneously with the erection of the crane the "Dreadnought" will be on the slips or on the land in some form, and that it will be very near the place where the crane is being erected. The "Dreadnought" will be undergoing some process of erection while the crane is being erected. The right hon. Gentleman says that during these nine months nothing of much consequence will happen. I would remind him that there will be foreign workmen in the neighbourhood whose work will be supervised by foreign foremen, or secret service agents, who will make observations of what is going on. I want to know how this nation can rely upon getting the "Dreadnought" in two years' time according to contract if for nine or ten months nothing important is to be done in the construction of the battleship? Even in Government dockyards a period of two years is the quickest on record for the erection of a "Dreadnought." My suggestion is that for nine months foreign workmen will be employed erecting the crane in close proximity to the "Dreadnought" works. T have in my possession, in case that statement should be challenged, one of the plans accepted by the Thames Ironworks Company, showing the relative position of the crane works and the "Dreadnought" works. From that plan it appears that there will be only a few yards between the two. The foreign workmen employed in the erection of the crane will have to pass through the "Dreadnought" works when going to and from the crane works, and they will have the fullest opportunities for observing what is going on in connection with the building of the ship.
  I may be told to-day that the crane is going to be erected in some other part, or that in the case of the "Dreadnought" the engines and boilers are going to be put in at some other place. But, according to the plans propounded by the shipbuilding company, the two classes of work are to go on contemporaneously and in proximity. That being so, I do not think there is much harm in suggesting to the House that pressure should be brought to bear on the shipbuilding company to sacrifice in the interest of secrecy in the building of the ship the advantage which they
  1110
  may secure under the proposed plan. The crane is going admittedly to be built by German workmen and according to German designs. The more the right hon. Gentleman establishes the fact that the crane is of some special character which British firms could not build the more hopelessly that gives away the case, because if anything goes wrong no one but the German contractors and workmen can go into the yard to rectify it. The right hon. Gentleman may treat the matter lightly, but it seems to me to be an important matter requiring attention. I am told that German workmanship sometimes goes wrong. If that is so, admittedly the construction of the "Dreadnought" must stop, and we must resort to all sort of devices to cover up the secrets of the ship until German workmen are brought to rectify the mischief. The whole object of giving this "Dreadnought" contract to the Thames Ironworks Company was to give London, and labour in the London district, some advantage. On the other hand, the essence of building for naval battle purposes is secrecy. I think it is stipulated that everything in the ship will be of British workmanship. When the right hon. Gentleman tells me that everything is to be secret, what does that mean? Is there any clause in the contract which says that no foreign workmen are to be engaged in erecting any of the plant or equipment of the company incidental to the building of the ship? I tell him there is not. I tell him there is nothing to prevent the shipbuilding company bringing 200 or 300 German workmen to supervise it and placing them in control of the crane; yes, and leaving some of them in control of it to see if it would work satisfactorily at the very time that observations would be most valuable to anyone who wishes improperly to make them.
  Yesterday, when the right hon. Gentleman was answering me—I have the OFFICIAL REPORT here—he said, in answer to one question, that the contract contained a clause securing all necessary secrecy; and then later on, when I pressed the right hon. Gentleman as to some such conditions as I have just mentioned, he said, "I do not know whether a German firm has got the contract, but every precaution will be taken to ensure secrecy." I think the right hon. Gentleman, if I might say so, with respect, might have treated the whole matter a little more seriously yesterday. I think, instead of suggesting that it was impertinent on the part of a private

  1111
  Member, however independent, to question the infallibility of the Admiralty, he might have even suggested that he was glad to have the information conveyed to him, and regretted he had not made an investigation from the shipbuilding firm, and promised to do so, thereby relieving us of some anxiety. Those are the facts The crane must be erected contemporaneously with the vessel. If not, nine months must elapse before the "Dreadnought" makes any tangible progress, and then it cannot be finished under two years, if, indeed, it is ever finished under such conditions by this shipbuilding company. I assure the right hon. Gentleman that the explanation which he gave yesterday that this was a matter of no consequence, that no secrets would be divulged at any stage during the time when the "Dreadnought" must be built contemporaneously with the crane, has rather convulsed expert workmen. I have received several telegrams on the subject to-day, and they may be all summarised in the colloquial phrase, "Loud laughter." I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will treat the matter more seriously than he has done, and that I shall not be accused of fiscal heresy or feelings of Jingoism, or any other such motive, when I call attention to what I consider to be a grave dereliction of business competence in making the necessary arrangements when this great departure was made of giving an order to a firm which never built such a ship before and which had not the equipment—a fact which ought to have been known to the Admiralty before giving the contract—and generally when I call the attention of the Admiralty to a matter which is deserving of serious inquiry.
  Sir FORTESCUE FLANNERY: I would not refer to the matter which has been dealt with by the hon. Member for South Hackney were it not that I am impressed by the serious gravity of the question to which he has called attention. I hold in my hand the Naval Estimate, which this House has already partly discussed, and at pages 206, 207, and 208 I find a description of the new "Dreadnoughts" "Superb" and "Vanguard," two battleships. Those descriptions give the length, breadth, displacement, the number and size of the guns, and a great number of other details, which are very clearly and very specifically set forth. But when we come to look at the other vessels that are to be constructed, such as the "Hercules," the
  1112
  "Colossus," the "Conjuror," the "Conqueror," the "Monarch." and the "Princess Royal," I find there are no dimensions, not even the length or breadth or the width. The leading feature of the design of the "Hercules" and the "Colossus" must be known to the Admiralty, because both of these ships were laid down in July of last year. Therefore I presume that the policy of the right hon. Gentleman has been to conceal entirely from this House and from the country the details of the design and even the leading features of the designs of these vessels, which have been laid down as long ago as last July. And, if I may say so, with very great respect, that is a policy which both sides of the House, I believe, will regard as wise, because perhaps we have made too much publication hitherto of the details of our ships. I believe that in the country it will be considered that the fewer particulars of our designs, especially of our new "Dreadnoughts." that are made public the better it will be for the interests of the Navy. I now turn to the First Lord's statement which accompanies these Estimates, and on page 15 I find that the "Neptune" was launched at Portsmouth eight and a half months after being laid down, and that the "Indefatigable" was launched from Devonport within eight months of being laid down. What was the reason of that short time with those ships? Here I am going to make a comparison between the light that is thrown upon this question by the rapid progress in the Government yards as shown by the right hon. Gentleman, in his own statement, and the answers to questions put by the hon. Member for Hackney and myself, and what were given yesterday.
  The reason that the building slips have been occupied for so short a time as eight and eight and a half months has been owing to a new system of construction with which the right hon. Gentleman is thoroughly familiar; that the various parts of the hull of the vessel shall be prepared beforehand to the fullest possible extent before the keel is laid and the building slip occupied by the actual assembly or bringing together of the parts which form the hull. But whilst those parts are being shaped, and whilst the frames are being turned and the beams and other parts of the structure of the vessel are being prepared for assembling and erection, they will disclose to the eyes not merely of the naval architect, but of an ordinary intelligent mechanic, understanding generally

  1113
  the construction of such vessels what are to be the features of the design, the sizes, and practically the whole of the general arrangements of the ship. The answer has been given by the right hon. Gentleman to-day, that for nine months the construction of this crane by foreign contractors will go on, and he cannot possibly be unaware that during those nine months the salient parts of the structure of the hull to which I have referred must be progressing in the yard in such a way that the observer must see them, and that they could not be concealed from him. That being so, the manufacture in the Thames Ironworks must go on in such a way concurrently with the crane, that, if the facts are as stated by the hon. Member for Hackney, the foreign workmen and their supervisors must become acquainted, and cannot avoid becoming acquainted, with the designs of the vessel in her general and her particular features. It is useless to conceal the dimensions of this vessel from this House, and to omit them from the Estimates if the opportunity is given to foreign workers to ascertain these particulars to the disadvantage of this country. I agree with the hon. Member for Hackney in deprecating, with great respect, the manner in which the right hon. Gentleman dealt with this question yesterday. My principal object in rising now is to express the hope that he may be able to deal with the matter in a different spirit to-day. I can believe perfectly well that the Thames Ironworks Company, having got this contract, proceeded for reasons of their own to sublet this portion of it, or at all events to obtain plans for carrying out the contract in a manner suited to themselves, and without consulting the Admiralty. What I hope is now the whole of the facts are before him, that the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to bring pressure to bear on the Thames Ironwork Company so as to induce them to take a very different attitude with regard to this matter. The hon. Member for Hackney said there was nothing fiscal in this question. I do not know whether there is anything fiscal in it or not, but I do know that the hon. Member for the Ramford Division gave great publicity as to the influence he was bringing to bear in order to relieve unemployment in the East End of London. The great object he had—and I think some Members on the Labour Benches opposite associated themselves with him in the pressure which was put on the Admiralty—was
  1114
  to relieve the distress by getting some work for the East End, and so relieve unemployment. But what do the Labour Members say to this matter now? I do not want to introduce any party or fiscal aspect into this question, but I cannot avoid saying that the Thames Ironworks Company from their experience—and I know what their experience is—could have made this crane themselves. They have the plant, the knowledge and the workpeople, and they could have given greater employment in the East End if they had made the crane for themselves rather than alienate the work to the foreigner. I hope in this aspect of it, that it may still be possible to deal with the case. This is not a fiscal question, I agree, but it is a question of spending the taxpayers' money and employing foreign workmen, who, while they are being employed are enabled to obtain secret knowledge which is kept from this House. I sincerely hope that as the result of this matter having been brought forward the right hon. Gentleman will find a way out of the difficulty, and that it will elicit from him the declaration that he will take such steps as lie in his power to remove the danger which has arisen, and which I think was admitted by the hon. Member for Hackney before this Debate began.
  Mr. G. N. BARNES: My hon. Friend who has just sat down has referred to the Labour Members, and he expressed some wonder as to what our attitude would be on this question. The Labour Members have not discussed it, but I would venture to put forward the view, at all events, of one Labour Member in regard to it. I am glad the question has been put before the House in such a temperate manner by both hon. Members, and that they do not regard it as a fiscal question. That simplifies matters. I was very careful to listen to the speeches that have been made, with a view to making up my mind on the matter. Let me say that, for my part, I am extremely sorry that this subject has been introduced in what I may call a piecemeal manner. I say frankly I am interested in the placing of this particular contract, and, I hope, other contracts with the Thames Ironworks Company. As a trades unionist I know the conditions of labour at the Thames Ironworks, and that they are infinitely better than those of any other works in which Government contracts are placed. Therefore, I am glad that the contract went there, and I hope that others will go there. But why should the

  1115
  Thames Ironworks be singled out in this way in regard to a matter which is common to every place where Government work is done? I have been in nearly all the yards where Government contracts are executed. What do I find? I find foreign machines of all sorts in pretty nearly every yard that I have visited. A year or two ago I happened to be in one of the workshops of a yard on the Clyde—much larger than this one, two or three times as large, a place where they can produce a battleship right from the pig-iron up to the guns and mountings, and there I found machinery of all descriptions from Germany and France.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Was any of the machinery being built while "Dreadnoughts" were being constructed?
  Mr. BARNES: I could not say. They were not "Dreadnoughts" that were being built, but some craft were being built of a much more secret character, and I say I found there a travelling crane of the same character as the one in question, only to traverse the land instead of the water, which came from a foreign country. Craft were being built—submarines, as a matter of fact—and I should say that it is much more important to keep them secret than in the case of "Dreadnoughts."
  Sir FORTESCUE FLANNERY: Was that crane in course of construction?
  Mr. BARNES: It had been in course of erection by foreign workmen while these craft were under construction, but not at the particular time I was there. The crane had been built, I suppose, by foreign workmen. Therefore I deprecate the matter being dealt with in this piecemeal fashion and in regard to one particular firm. As to the possibility of secrets being revealed as a result of foreign workmen being there, I cannot help thinking that it is all bogus. I was a British workman —though I may not be earning my living so honestly now—for a number of years, and I have worked in shipyards and engineer shops in England and Scotland for over twenty years, therefore I may be said to be the sort of person corresponding to the person who is sent over from Germany to construct this crane— that is to say, if such a person has come, I do not know. I know, as my hon. Friend opposite knows, how difficult it is for anybody, let alone a workman, to make out the whole construction of a ship or the designs of a ship, or more especially the
  1116
  designs of a craft, who happened to be on a crane, even alongside the ship or craft. The hon. Member for South Hackney said that the construction of the ship and the crane would be contemporaneous. I cannot think that should take place because the crane must be built before the ship if it is to be used in the construction of the ship.
  My hon. Friend also said- and this was one of his strongest points—if it could be made out, that after the crane was finished German workmen will come along and make anything right that happens to go wrong with the crane. Is not that again a rather large assumption? Are we so helpless in this country that we have not got engineers to rectify any defect about a crane after it has been constructed by German workmen? If this particular firm are going to construct the crane, and if German workmen are to come after it has been constructed and used in connection with the later processes of the ship, then I can imagine there is something in the argument, and if that were so I would have some sympathy with the hon. Member in the point, and I think it would be a matter for fair consideration by the Admiralty as to making arrangements with the firm by which that could be prevented since it seems to me that would be the only time when it would be possible for anyone to get any secrets out of the construction of this particular ship. I do not think that is going to be very likely.
  After all, I read in the newspapers sometimes about certain arrays of "Dreadnoughts," and of ships of the Navy at Portsmouth or elsewhere, and on those occasions I frequently read also that Prince So-and-so from Germany, or Prince So-and-so from Japan, or France, or somewhere else, has been on our ships, received in a royal manner, and shown everything I suppose it is possible to show. I should say probably some of those men, with engineering knowledge much superior to any knowledge any German workman is likely to have in the construction of a crane, with knowledge appertaining to naval warfare and gunnery and everything of that kind, I think if there is any fear of secrets being divulged that it will be ten times more likely in the case of those foreign people of high rank, on the ships finished and in actual use, than it would be in the other circumstances mentioned.
  I think that we ought to be the last people to talk about placing obstacles in the way of workmen constructing cranes or anything else, because, after all, there

  1117
  is such a thing as retaliation, which is so much talked about by the other side. I happen to know that there are from this country working in other countries large numbers of operative engineers, constructing cranes and various other things. I have been in some of the shops, and some of the yards, where some of the ships of the German Navy have been built, and what did I find there? I. found British machinery; I found machinery from Manchester, lots of it. I could take you to Blöehm and Voss, of Hamburg, where I know there is machinery from Manchester. I made no inquiry as to whether Manchester workmen placed the machinery in position, but I think it is very likely that they did. At all events, I do know there are hundreds— nay, I think I should be within the mark to say there are some thousands —of British engineers who work in Germany, in France, and in other Continental countries. Therefore, if you are going to deal with this matter at all, do not let us forget there is the other side of the question, and that if we begin to put any obstacles in the way of the Thames Ironworks buying their goods from the cheapest market, and I do not believe in buying them in the cheapest market, as I think we ought to have regard to the conditions under which they are produced, but if we are going to impose some conditions on those people who get Government work, that they must have some regard to the conditions under which the things are built, or if we are going to impose any condition at all, do not let us do it, I say again, in a piecemeal way, but in the way of a general policy to apply to the Thames Ironworks and any other ironworks.
  4.0 P.M.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: What the hon. Gentleman has stated is perfectly true, that we have British workmen, and I hope we always shall have them, all over the world working. But this question is a question of a quite different nature. It is the building of a great floating structure to mount a crane that is to build a ship of the most secret character, or supposed to be of the most secret character, at a time when, without saying anything in the least irritating, a neighbouring country is building ships of the same character, and that they might possibly get at the secrets of our ships. I think the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley) deserves the greatest credit for bringing this matter forward and having it thrashed out on both
  1118
  sides. It is not a party thing; it is not a fiscal thing; it is what is best for the State, in which probably we shall all agree. The point I want to bring forward is this, it is one of those little cases by which you might create very great irritation between the two countries in the near future unless this thing was properly settled now. Supposing there was such a thing as spying and disagreeableness of that sort of men about a yard, I would say it would make matters very disagreeable between the two countries, and it would be much better not to have it at all. With regard to the right hon. Gentleman's remarks, I am not quite clear how he can build a ship in two years when he says it will take nine months to build a crane, and when the ship is not going to be commenced before the crane. That rather puzzled me in his remarks yesterday, and I would like to know very much how he is going to manage that.
  I wish to point out to hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite that there is-no objection to having foreign workmen working at our tools, but there is great objection, I think, to this proposal with regard to the floating crane. I want to ask any hon. Member below the Gangway, do they suppose for one moment that if Germany was building a "Dreadnought," and if she wanted a British floating crane, that she would allow the British to be in the same position as the Germans are going to be, or said to be, in this crane? I think that is a fair proposal. My great point is do not let us say or do anything, and a little small event of this sort has a great effect, that may make irritation between these two nations, more particularly in the state of affairs we are in now when we are at war, as far as competition goes, in regard to shipbuilding. Another point is that, as far as I understand, this "Dreadnought" that is to be built has gone to a firm with no plant. I do not think that is a very wise proceeding. It has been said it was done for political motives, but I will not agree to that, because I think that London ought to have a big battleship, and I have said so for a long time. But if the firm has not got the plant necessary I do not think that that is a wise or businesslike proceeding. I should like the right hon. Gentleman to answer me as to that, and also how it is if the ship is not to be begun for nine months, until the floating crane is finished, it is to be built in two years.
  Mr. BERTRAM FALLE: I venture to make a protest against the introduction of

  1119
  any foreign material into British dockyards, and I still more strongly protest against the introduction of aliens in connection with the building of British battle-ships.
  Mr. CHARLES GOLDMAN: As this is the first occasion on which I have addressed the House, I hope hon. Members will extend to me the consideration which they always show to new Members. I rise to call attention to the serious position of the granite industry, which is closely associated with our naval policy. I submit that the decline of this industry is largely due to a departure on the part of the Government from the settled policy and practice of the past. I regard this as a burning question not only because I have the honour to represent a granite constituency, the members of which regard the serious condition of the industry with the gravest alarm, but also because I contend that under no conceivable circumstances should the materials for the construction of our docks be under the control of any foreign Power. For upwards of forty years the Government have been in the habit of drawing their supplies exclusively from our home sources. They have subjected our granite to the severest tests the ingenuity of man could devise, with the result that to-day our granite stands unchallenged before the whole world.
  Mr. JOSEPH KING: Is the hon. Gentleman in order in discoursing upon granite in this connection?
  Mr. SPEAKER: Perfectly.
  Mr. GOLDMAN: In discoursing upon granite I wish to show the extraordinarily important bearing which granite has on our whole naval policy. The very fact that we have these quarries open, and that we could rely upon skilled labour to develop the material, gave a sense of security to the nation which cannot be expressed in the mere difference of prices between English and foreign tenders. By the policy which the Government have inaugurated we have subjected our dockyard construction to the greatest possible danger, relying as we are now doing almost exclusively upon foreign material. It stands to reason that, seeing how many quarries have already closed down, and how few still remain, we are reducing the defensive powers of our own granite quarry owners, and strengthening the power of attack of our foreign rivals. The
  1120
  moment will inevitably arrive, if this policy continues, when our quarries must close down. Suppose the industry comes to the point of extinction, so that we have to rely for our supplies entirely upon Norwegian or Scandinavian granite, and that those countries were involved in war, what would happen to our dock construction?
  Let me take another point. Supposing this country was engaged in a war with a foreign Power, and Scandinavia decided to observe strict neutrality, what would be our position in regard to contraband? I was under some apprehension on this subject, and addressed a straightforward question to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. That question was:—
  "Whether in the event of war in which this country was engaged, granite imported from abroad for the purpose of Admiralty dock construction would be contraband of war."
  The reply was that:—
  " Stone, according to the Treaty of London, was not contraband of war."
  I must admit that that answer for the moment quieted my apprehensions, until in a somewhat venturesome moment, perhaps, I dipped further into the hallowed pages of a blue book. There I found an answer in Article 24, which says:—
  "The following articles arc susceptible to be treated as contraband of war ‥‥ vessels, crafts, and boats of all kinds, floating clocks, parts of docks, and their component parts."
  I would like to know whether the Admiralty was aware of this fact when they gave the contract for Rosyth and Haulbowline. I should also like to know whether this discovery of the circumstances will alter the character of the reply that the right hon. Gentleman the Foreign Secretary gave me?
  There is still another aspect of this question which arose out of the remarks of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Hackney. There is the question of secrecy. I understood that secrecy was a very important point of our naval policy. I should like to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether it is not a fact that in the matter of our dock construction, the handing over contracts to foreigners, that sub-contractors are supplied with full drawings and designs, and that they have plans of our docks? If that be the case, what is the need of the precautions we are taking in this matter of naval secrecy? I need only ask hon. Members of the House to glance at any Ordnance map and there they will find the whole plan of the docks carefully blocked out. It must be

  1121
  done with the object to conceal from the eye of the ordinary public the complete character of our docks. These are a few points I should like to raise on the question of national security. There is another very important point—a commercial question. I should like to draw the attention of the First Lord to it, and to anticipate the argument that may come from the Government to the effect that after all the present Government are only following on the lines of the late Government. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] Let me tell, or remind, hon. Gentlemen opposite what was the condition when the late Government for the first time admitted or sanctioned the use of foreign granite for our dock construction. Up to 1896, as I have tried to point out, British granite was exclusively used. At that time the production of our quarries amounted to 156,000 cubic feet per annum. Then, for reasons which are not material to my argument, the Government decided on a vigorous naval policy and on a vigorous policy in "respect to dock construction. The result was that they decided to build Dover docks, Gibraltar docks, Malta docks, and Simonstown docks. All this meant a great congestion of work, and the quarries were not able to meet the demand at the particular time. They were limited to a period of time.
  It was out of the stringency of the moment that the Government of the time said they should meet the situation by allowing some foreign granite to be imported, and the Government of the day gave their sanction to that in view of the great overlapping in these years. I would like to remind any hon. Member in this House who knows anything at all about mining that you cannot increase your supply from 130 cubic feet to 7,500,000 cubic feet, which the Government demanded, in that space of time, and for that reason the Norwegian granite was allowed to come in. That was an occasion of emergency, but if it was wrong on the part of the Government of the day to initiate that policy, how much greater is the wrong on the part of the Government that sees the evil effect and will not raise a finger to meet and to mitigate such a situation, but are deliberately aggravating it. I have known great distress created by the great disturbances in this industry, driving thousands of men out of employment, and I think I have a right to claim the support of hon. Members below the Gangway opposite, who are so anxious to
  1122
  proclaim themselves the friends of labour. I hope I did not offend them when I was not able to join them the other day when they voted against their own Amendment. I should feel I was failing in fulfilling my duty if I did not endeavour in the strongest and most emphatic terms to express my views upon this subject, living as I do in the midst of this great granite industry, which in ordinary circumstances should have afforded a means of prosperity, but which, owing to this policy, has suffered a great reverse, which has brought disappointment and misery and desolation to many an honest home of British quarrymen.
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): Before I come to reply to the observations of the hon. Member opposite on the subject of granite, I think the House will expect me, in the first instance, to make such reply as I can to the observations of my hon. Friend the Member for South Hackney (Mr. Bottomley). He complained that yesterday I did not answer his question on the subject of a floating crane of German construction with the seriousness which the matter required. If in any answer I gave him I offended him personally, I need hardly assure him it was far from my intention. He presented a case to me yesterday, and I told him, in reply to his first question, that my information on the subject was extremely limited, but that he might rest confidently assured that no secrets would be divulged, as there was a term in the contract which prevented the divulgence of any secret matter, and that the Admiralty took constant precautions to ensure that that particular term of the contract should be kept. I should have thought that that in itself would have been accepted as a sufficient answer. Of course, if we start with the assumption that the Admiralty are unable to carry out their business and take no precaution to enforce their contracts, and that they are careless or indifferent as to the preservation of the necessary secrecy—if we start with that assumption, I admit to the hon. Gentleman there is need for inquiry. But primá facie, I should have thought it was a sufficient answer that we had secured secrecy under the terms of our contract, and that we take means to enforce it. Now when I tell the House, before I come to the facts—and they will have an entirely different colour from that in which they were presented by my hon. Friend—that we always have an Admiralty overseer and several assistant overseers at the works, and that every precau-

  1123
  tion is taken by them to secure the fulfilment of the contract in other respects, I hope the House will assume that we should not allow any of these alarming incidents to happen, such as suggested by my hon. Friend and by the hon. Member for Essex. Before I leave the treatment of the question may I call my hon. Friend's attention to the fact that he opened the discussion to-day by informing the House that the "Thunderer" is colloquially known in shipping circles and in the City as His Majesty's ship "Polling Day."
  Hon. Members have always disclaimed any desire to say anything disagreeable to the Admiralty, but they deeply deplore the unfortunate manner of the Admiralty in replying to questions. It is also suggested that the First Lord of the Admiralty has been animated by unworthy motives in giving the contract to this firm, and it is said that the contract was given in view of an election, and that under the circumstances considerable excuse must be made for the difficult position in which the Admiralty found themselves in consequence of their misconduct. I would inform the House that it is not always possible to inform the public of all the facts, but it so happens that the tender of the Thames Ironworks was the lowest tender, and I hope that is a sufficient answer to all the aspersions which have been made against the Admiralty in this respect. I will come to the facts. The Thames Ironworks Company, in order to secure for themselves what they hope and believe an absolute certainty of completing their contract in very good time, and in order to give satisfaction to the Admiralty, so that they may stand a good chance of getting further contracts in the future, determined to put down the best plant available. The Noble Lord has suggested that we gave this contract to a firm which had not built ships before, and which had no suitable plant. May I point out that the Thames Ironworks is well known as a shipbuilding firm, and may I inform the House that they built the "Black Prince," a cruiser with which the Noble Lord opposite is well acquainted? I think hon. Members will agree with me when I say that a firm capable of turning out a "Black Prince is, primá facie, a capable firm. It is true that they were having for the first time a "Dreadnought" contract to fulfil, and as they have taken a "Dreadnought" for the first time, naturally they desired to obtain the best possible plant. Consequently
  1124
  they issued tenders to various firms for certain parts of a floating crane, namely, the jib, the boiler, and the machinery The pontoon, which I suppose represents a good half of the whole upon which the jib was to be erected, is being built by the Thames Ironworks themselves. They issued tenders to various British firms and two German firms. As my hon. Friend, with that dialectical skill we always expect from him, has poisoned the well by his statement before I start by saying that I only had my information from the contractors, and that of course they must not be believed, it is difficult for me in these circumstances to impress the House with the truth of my statement. I must necessarily rely upon the contractors, but. personally, I believe what they told me to be true. They informed me that they received but one tender from a British firm, and that the price was about the same— they would not say whether it was lower or higher—as the price of the German firm, but when they came to examine the designs there was no comparison between them. The design of the German firm was greatly superior. I have been compelled by hon. Members like the hon. Gentleman opposite to advertise Norwegian granite to be good in quality, and I am extremely sorry to have to advertise the fact that the Thames Ironworks Company came to the conclusion that the German design was better than the British design. I am consoled, however, by the fact that, as my hon. Friend has reminded the House, there is not a shipbuilding yard in Germany where British plant is not used. We may well concede to them, therefore, the right of supplying certain kinds of plant of a superior quality to that which we we can supply at the present time.
  With regard to floating cranes, it must be remembered that, owing to the natural conditions of German shipping yards as compared with ours, they have made far more use of floating cranes than we have in the past. Consequently, they have had much greater experience in building them. The Thames Ironworks Company, for the sake of the design and for the sake of the merits of the plant, and not on the ground of the price, determined to accept the German tender. Now we come to the question whether German workmen will be engaged in erecting the jib, and whether they will for months have the run of the dockyard, and be able to unearth our secrets. The Thames Ironworks Company will for six

  1125
  months be engaged in building the pontoon. During the same time the jib, boiler, and machinery will be in course of construction. At the end of, perhaps, five, or, perhaps, six months the jib and machinery will be sent over in parts, and the parts will be put together, and will foe erected on the British pontoon by British workmen under the, supervision of one German, so that all this possible army of spies resolves Itself into one German supervisor, who will be greatly occupied in attending to his own business. That is not the whole story. It must be observed that this crane is a floating crane.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Has the right hon. Gentleman seen the contract between the Thames Ironworks Company and the German crane builders?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have not seen the contract, but I have seen a responsible representative of the firm, who gave me his assurance as late as last night that the facts I am now stating to the House are the correct facts, and I hope the House will accept them.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me to read the clause?
  Mr. McKENNA: If my hon. Friend will allow me to finish the whole of the story lit will find before I have completed that his present interruption is irrelevant. This crane is a floating crane, and consequently it is not on land or in the dockyard at all, but in the river. The pontoon upon which the crane will be erected some six months hence will be situated at a point some 100 yards from the slip. The approach to the pontoon will, of course, be through the dockyard gate. The road from the dockyard gate to the edge of the water lies behind a building, which completely obscures the view of the ship, so that the German supervisor when he has to make his way to the pontoon will simply pass through the dockyard gate, make his way to the edge of the water, and step on to the pontoon where he will be engaged. It must be remembered, too, that there Is an Admiralty overseer, with several assistant overseers, always at the dockyard supervising the execution of the contract, and this one German engineer, needless to say, will no doubt be the subject of observation. That is not all. This dockyard, like nearly every other dockyard in the world, is adjacent to open water. If this German engineer or anybody else—if the
  1126
  hon. Member himself—wished to get a view of this ship he could do so by hiring a skiff for a shilling and getting a waterman to row him up Bow Creek. He will then be able to get a great deal nearer the slip and have a far better view than can be obtained from the pontoon where the German engineer will be employed. Yet out of all these simple facts this myth of a scare has been raised, and my hon. Friend considered it so urgent yesterday that he asked leave to move the adjournment of the House. Although the crane will not reach this country for another six months, he could not wait till to-day to discuss the question.
  We have had an opportunity of answering this case on the spot. I hope the House and the country will take similar stories cum grano salis, to use the expression of the hon. Member. The Admiralty will, of course, exercise every precaution to see that secrets are not divulged. Even if more German workmen were coming over —as my hon. Friend suggests—they will be confined to the pontoon, and will not be near where the "Dreadnought" is being built. Then there is the question of the repair of the crane. Suppose some repairs should prove necessary. The crane is a floating crane, and can be moved from place to place, therefore, if repairs become necessary, it can be towed away to a spot where there will be no danger from spying eyes. The crane is to be used for lifting heavy weights, and as Boon as it has done its work it will be removed from the dockyard and transferred to the place where the ship will be taken after being launched. The people employed on the crane will be purely British. To sum up, during the two months that the parts of the crane are being put together, there will be a single German engineer employed, and he will have no access to the dockyard. Afterwards the crane will be removed from the dockyard to Dagenham, and there is not the smallest ground for anticipating that any Admiralty secrets will be divulged.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEY: May I ask whether the contract which he now tells us is to be carried out "with the assistance of one German workman only, contains a clause that the contractors are to supply, deliver, complete the erection of and hand over in good working order after all trials have been carried out, the crane to the satisfaction of the Thames Shipbuilding Company?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, that is so, and the German firm naturally, in order to executs

  1127
  that part of the work, send a German engineer who is to supervise the work. That is so. They are quite right to insist that a German engineer should come and supervise the work of the British workmen in order to ensure the satisfaction of the contract. With regard to the matter of granite. I hope the hon. Member will forgive me for reminding him that this subject is not new in this House. We have examined and re-examined it. debated and redebated it several times, and therefore I can only give him the very briefest answer in reply to the new case he has brought before us now. As to the quality of the Norwegian granite we have, thanks to the action of the late Conservative Government, had enormous experience of Norwegian granite. The facts are not quite as the hon. Member stated them. The late Conservative Government, from 1896 onwards, continually used it in all their big works. I quite admit that in the first instance it was because they were unable to obtain a sufficient supply of British granite but in subsequent contracts it was continuously used, with the result that we were quite satisfied that Norwegian granite is suitable for dockyard purposes. With regard to the Rosyth contract there was a difference in price, roughly speaking, of £30,000—that is to say, the contractors offered to tender at £30,000 less if they were allowed to buy their granite where they pleased than if they were limited to buying their granite in Great Britain only. We accepted the lower tender, and I have never repented of I having done it. Why should we call upon the taxpayers to pay £30,000 more to the contractor for limiting his power of purchase, when we should not dream of paying £30,000 in our own case? If the hon Gentleman were engaged on a great contract, and could save £30,000 by buying Norwegian granite, he would buy Norwegian granite; and why should I, who have to safeguard other people's pockets, do for them differently from what I would do for myself?
  Mr. GOLDMAN: I have found that the contract is no cheaper, because when you are dealing with a matter of this character, knowing that the competition of this country is coming to an end, while there is large competition in Norway, you have to take an average of your cost. You need more granite in the future, and once you destroy the opportunity of competition between this country and that country
  1128
  you are going to make that article dearer, and in that case, when you average the cost, you will find that article dearer.
  Mr. McKENNA: We have had this argument over and over again—that once the British granite industry is ruined the Norwegians will have a monopoly, and will put up their price. We have gone into that, and there is no sign of the ruin of the British industry. We are still providing vast quantities of granite. Further, it is mainly British capital that is engaged in Norway; it is British ships that carry the stone, and it is British workmen, to a large extent, who are working the stone. Are we to suppose that these Britons all have merely in prospect to ruin the British home industry in order that they may make more? I have had deputations oil the subject again and again, and statements of this kind have been made again and again, but no proof has ever been brought forward, and we were perfectly satisfied at the Admiralty that there was no concerted desire or any conspiracy amongst the Norwegian producers to ruin the British trade with the object of raising their prices afterwards. I can assure the hon. Member that it is a mare's-nest. The contract having been given to the contractor upon the terms that he could buy his granite where he pleased, I understand he exercised the liberty by buying the granite in Norway, I and, so far as the Admiralty is concerned, we have nothing more to say in the matter.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: Can the right hon. Gentleman answer my question how he reconciles the two statements?
  Mr. McKENNA: I did so. I stated, what I did not know yesterday, that this is a floating crane to lift large weights into the ships, and it will only be used after the ship is launched. It will be completed in the river after the launching, when it is wanted.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNE: I want to enter my emphatic protest against the way in which this firm's name has been brought before the House. I live in the division in which the Thames Ironworks is situated, and have taken a keen and lively interest in the work given to this yard. It is a well-known fact that all the Northern firms when building boats of this description have been absolutely opposed to the Thames Ironworks Company, chiefly because it is the only shipbuilding firm in the country which has given an eight-hour day. From that day to this the Northern

  1129
  firms have absolutely refused to allow this particular firm to become part and parcel of what is known as the Shipping Federation. It has been stated that there was a great deal of pressure brought to bear upon the First Lord with reference to giving the contract to this firm. I deny that absolutely, as far as I am concerned. It is true that a deputation waited upon the First Lord some time ago, but it was for the purpose only of giving the firm a chance of tendering. It has been denied the right of tendering for a "Dreadnought," or any other boat, for a long time, and I believe, as long as this country will insist upon building "Dreadnoughts," the Thames Ironworks ought to have the same chance of tendering as any firm in the North. The Noble Lord opposite made a charge against the firm, and said the Government were giving the contract to a firm which had no plant. The First Lord has stated that they built the "Black Prince," and I think they have built one of the finest boats that ever floated on the water for the Japanese Government —one of the boats which did the greatest amount of destruction in that unfortunate war between Japan and Russia. I enter my emphatic protest against the way in which this matter has been brought before the House. I am not aware where the hon. Member (Mr. Bottomley) got his information from, though I know he is a man who knocks about the City a great deal. I am not sure whether some of the Northern firms have not prompted him to bring the question before the House. It is absolutely unfair.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Adjournment.—Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Master of Elibank.]

Business of the House.
Sir HENRY DALZIEL: I should like to" ask whether it is the intention to take the Resolutions on the Paper with regard to the relations between the two Houses every day next week, except Friday; and is it the case that Supply is to be taken on Thursday or not, and, if so, what business will be put down? I should further like to know whether it is still the intention of the Government to introduce their policy with regard to the House of Lords in the form of a Resolution in the House of Lords, or whether it is their intention to introduce the Resolution in the form of a Bill. If I might be allowed to do so, I
1130
would ask that during the. Recess the Members of the Government who are here should consider very seriously whether they ought not to introduce the policy regarding the House of Lords in the form of a Bill and not in the form of a Resolution, as has been announced. There is the obvious reason which will appear at once even from the party point of view, and that is, if we are to have an election, it is much better to light an election on a Bill than on a Resolution. The man in the street does not understand a Resolution. A Resolution is at best a pious opinion. A Bill is the embodiment of a legislative proposal, and I would very strongly urge the Government even at this late hour to reconsider their whole policy with regard to the manner in which they are going to introduce their policy as to the House of Lords into the Second Chamber. I would ask the Government to reconsider their intention in regard to introducing a Resolution in the Second Chamber.
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Master of Elibank): In reply to my hon. Friend I have to say that the Government propose to devote the whole of Tuesday, the half of Wednesday, and all Thursday to the Motion to go into Committee on the Veto Resolution. We do not propose to take Supply on Thursday, and, as my hon. Friend has said, Friday is naturally a day for private Members. With regard to the latter portion of my Friend's question, I am sure he is too old a Parliamentary hand to expect me to make any pronouncement of policy on behalf of the Prime Minister, but if he will put a question on the Paper I am sure the Prime Minister will be glad to answer it on the re-assembling of the House on Tuesday.
Sir HENRY DALZIEL: I shall be pleased to do so.
Question put, and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at Twelve minutes before Five o'clock till to-morrow morning at Ten o'clock.

PETITIONS PRESENTED DURING THE WEEK.
The following Petitions were presented during the week and ordered to lie upon the Table.
MONDAY.
Women's Enfranchisement — Petitions for legislation, from Southampton, and Wolverhampton.
TUESDAY.
Glasgow Gas Consolidation Bill—Petition for additional provision, referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.
WEDNESDAY.
Women's Enfranchisement — Petitions for legislation from East, North, North-East, North-West, South, and South-West Manchester (six), Gateshead, Jarrow. Kirkdale, Newcastle - upon - Tyne, St. Augustine, and Tyneside.