§ In ascertaining for the purposes of this Act the proceeds in Ireland of any Imperial tax or of any Irish tax, the Joint Exchequer Board shall treat the proceeds collected in Ireland as the proceeds of the tax in Ireland, subject to such adjustment as the Board think equitable, with a view to attributing to Ireland any proceeds of taxes collected in Great Britain but properly attributable to Ireland, and to attributing to Great Britain any proceeds of taxes collected in Ireland but properly attributable to Great Britain, and with a view to meeting cases where the rate of a tax is, or other conditions affecting the charge of a tax are, different in Great Britain and Ireland.
§ Mr. HEWINSI beg to move, after the word "shall" ["the Joint Exchequer Board shall"], to insert the words "in accordance with regulations made under this Section."
In moving this Amendment perhaps I may be allowed to allude to the consequential Amendment to add three new Sub-sections as an adumbration of the scheme I wish to submit to the consideration of the Committee. This Amendment follows as a consequence of the concessions already granted or adumbrated by the Government with regard to the Joint Exchequer Board. We are now in this position with regard to that Board. They have to deal with a large mass of questions, some of them questions of law and of legal interpretation. In regard to that class of question we understand the Government are going to provide some Amendment later on. At the other extreme there are questions of what the Postmaster-General the other day called pure financial and statistical estimates, and in which no matters of controversy came in at all. Between those two extremes in the functions which the Joint Exchequer Board will have to discharge, there are a large number of questions of general economics and general expediency or discretion, such, for instance, as the 1390 bearing upon the Irish taxes of the interpretation of Clause 2, Subsection (7), dealing with trade limitations, and with regard to those the Government at present have given us no indication at all of any willingness to make a change. We also understand from the Attorney-General that whatever Amendments the Government may suggest later on, they do not propose to give anything in the nature of an appeal upon questions of fact. If, as the Attorney-General adumbrates, there is to be no appeal upon questions of fact, I think it is all the more incumbent upon the Government to lay down very precise rules or a standard on which the Exchequer Board might act when it is discharging this particular part of its functions.
The Clause to which my Amendment relates has to deal with the ascertainment of true revenue. The general feeling on the Government Benches appears to be that there is really no room for doubt or controversy when you are dealing with the question of the interpretation of true revenue. My opinion is diametrically opposed to that, and I am going to propose a scheme by which the Government, if it cannot meet us altogether, can, at any rate, give satisfaction to the people of Ireland and of this country by adopting machinery which will make certain, things which are at present uncertain, and which will introduce stability where at the present time there is no prospect of stability. I hope that the Government will adopt this Amendment. I may point out it does not affect the framework of the Bill. It is merely a question of establishing precise and accurate machinery for dealing with certain classes of problems—machinery which, I think, would improve the Bill and which would certainly improve the organisation of the Joint Exchequer Board. I hope they will consider it very carefully. Of course, the nature of the financial relations in the Bill is determined by the actual financial relations between Great Britain and Ireland so far as they can be ascertained. There are many assumptions you could make if you were framing de novo the 1391 basis upon which your financial organisation is to be built. The Government choose the basis of true revenue. Their view appears to be that when you speak of true revenue you are speaking of some quantity definitely ascertainable which can be found out and set down, whereas really it is a question of controversy which belongs to what the Postmaster-General calls the arithmetical sphere. At an earlier period this afternoon one of my hon. Friends quoted passages from the Primrose Report showing very little acceptation of that sanguine view of the possibility of estimating true revenue.
I suppose that, among the many controversial statistical questions which surround the Irish problem there are very few which are more controversial than that of the ascertainment of true revenue. Ever since we have had an Irish question we have quarrelled about the hypothesis involved in estimating these quantities, and I do not see anything in the Rill which promises, if it should be passed, that the quarrelling will be less when the related but separated interests of Great Britain and Ireland have to be considered. In estimating true revenue you have a good many things to take account of. First, there is the nature of your taxation. The Debates which we have already had upon the taxing powers to be exercised by the Irish Parliament show how very different may be the result if you take one hypothesis or the other in making your calculations. We have had impassioned speeches, one, for instance, by the hon. and learned Member for Cork (Mr. T. M. Healy), in which he controverted the whole financial basis on which this Bill is constructed, and we have had other speeches denying the validity of the estimates made in the Paper issued by the Treasury. We have had speeches raising all kinds of questions relating to the incidence of taxes, and it is of the utmost importance that we should place all this on a satisfactory basis, and that the principle which it is proposed to lay down should be indicated as clearly as possible, and should be principles binding on the Board we are about to appoint, and from which it shall not depart. I think the Postmaster-General will agree with mc that of all questions which have ever been debated in economics, that of the incidence of taxation is the most controversial. If you take our experience during the last nine years it will be admitted that one of the main differences between parties has turned on the question of the incidence of 1392 taxation, and when you have set up the Irish revenue system, with these separate taxing powers, and still more if the actual number of commodities taxed is increased, I am sure everyone will admit that this question of the incidence of taxation may become an important factor in determining actually large amounts of money. That being so, I certainly should despair of ever getting any body of experts to discover the absolute truth of these arithmetical matters, as the Postmaster-General calls them. Short of getting to the region of absolute truth, if you can get to a working hypothesis which will reduce the danger of difference, I think it would be an enormous gain, and it would be a still greater gain if you could have rules laid down which the Board are going to follow. That is the whole object of this Amendment.
I do not, of course, withdraw any single word I have said with regard to the Joint Exchequer Board in its bearing on the interpretation of the Bill or on the question of what are the Irish services, or on the subject of Parliamentary control of finance. All these things have gone by the board now, and we have to wait for the Amendments which the Government are to put down to satisfy some of our objections. But here you have another question which may easily become exceedingly controversial. The Postmaster-General seems to think these matters are not so controversial. We think they are highly controversial. The method we suggest should be adopted to deal with them would not involve any sacrifice of principle, but it would have a good effect if it helped to conciliate a certain amount of opinion on this side with regard to what may become a precedent in future measures affecting other parts of the Empire. I do therefore ask the Government to consider this carefully. My first suggestion is that before you set the Joint Exchequer Board in operation you should have an Advisory Committee consisting of our best statistical and financial experts. I put down in my Amendment the Secretary to the Treasury, the Chairman of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, the Chairman of the Commissioners of Customs and Excise, and certain Irish officials. I suggest you should have this body of experts, thoroughly competent to deal, from their point of view, with these questions of Customs, and I further suggest that these experts should draw up a scheme of rules for the guidance of the Joint Exchequer Board in making the calculations of true Irish revenue which will 1393 have to be made to carry out the purposes of this Act.
You cannot get absolute truth. I am sure it is perfectly hopeless to think you would ever kill all controversy on this disputed question of the relations of Great Britain and Ireland; but I am quite sure that you can diminish the bitterness of that controversy, and diminish the controversy itself, if what you do is entirely open and above board, and if the whole world knows upon what main principles these proceedings are to be conducted, so that people will feel, whether the rules you adopt are perfect or imperfect, that at any rate they are rules that are going to be followed, and that there will be no important change from one period to another. The right hon. Gentleman is perfectly well aware that in all these fiscal matters one of the most important things we have to see to is not so much to guard against small changes, which you cannot, of course, avoid in all these important matters, but to create in your people a sense of stability. If you can do that, if you can get people to feel that although your action may not be perfect and may be open to this or that objection, at any rate you are doing your best, to lay down rules from one year to another, you will give them a feeling of confidence in what you are doing which otherwise it would be very difficult to create. I do not think that the question of Parliamentary control conies prominently to the front in a matter of this kind. I so far agree with what the Postmaster-General said the other day with regard to the functions of the Exchequer Board being confined to arithmetical matters, so long as they are questions you cannot debate comfortably in the House of Commons and they are not questions about which there is much controversy. But I think that if you follow the method which I suggest you will get indirectly the sense, if I may so call it, of Parliamentary control, because the whole thing is open, and can be raised in Parliament if there is anything felt to be particular iniquitous, although I do not for one moment suppose that the financial experts I have named in the Amendment will arrive at a conclusion as to the calculations of the true revenue of Ireland which will substantially differ from that which will be arrived at by any other group of experts.
It will come to a question of controversy about small points which will not be matters of great importance. You may 1394 start with a different principle and with different interpretations of this or that class of figures, but when you are dealing with the class of figures with which this Amendment is intended to deal—I am guarding myself in that way—and the question of what is the principle on which the true revenue of Ireland should be calculated, although you would have slight grounds for controversy, you would not have grounds for controversy which will be estimated in large amounts of money, which is the important thing. I hope the Postmaster-General will see his way to adopt that part of the Amendment as to the laying down of the rules and regulations. Do not leave the Clause in the vague and unsatisfactory form in which it now is. The impression Clause 24 leaves on my mind is that the Government see that this work has to be done, but, as a matter of fact, they have not carefully thought out the way in which it is to be done. I think, if I may say so without offence, that it is rather scamping work for the Government to put a Clause like that into the Bill without giving the body which is to be set up any guidance as to the principles upon which they are to act. The second part of the consequential Amendment provides that—
"The Committee shall as soon as may be present a Report to His Majesty, and thereupon His Majesty in Council may frame regulations founded upon the said Report, and in carrying out their duties under this Section the Joint Exchequer Board shall act in accordance with such regulations."
I do not think there is any difficulty about that. In the third part of the consequential Amendment I am copying the Government in providing for an appeal, supposing there is any serious dispute even on the question of these rules and regulations. I have provided that there may be an appeal in the form prescribed to the Privy Council on any question of controversy that arises. I feel this about the Amendment, that, although we may and do differ on the large political questions involved we say we are not going to accept Home Rule on any terms; we differ, and we have shown that we differ on almost every question we, have had to discuss during the Home Rule controversy—but here is a point upon which I appeal to the Government to say that it is surely possible for the two sides of the Committee to come to some agreement as to the general principles which are to be 1395 adopted in regard to the calculation of the true revenue of Ireland. On that ground I would ask the Government to give favourable consideration to the Amendment.
§ Mr. DAVID MASONI hope that the Government will not accept this Amendment. I appreciate very much the speech we have just heard from the hon. Member, and I think we may congratulate ourselves on the tone and temper of that speech.
§ Mr. HEWINSIt is a statistical question.
§ Mr. D. MASONAs an alternative to the non possumus attitude of having no Home Rule and having nothing to do with this Bill, it is a very great improvement.
§ Mr. CHARLES CRAIGYou will get that later on.
§ Mr. D. MASONI believe the Amendment is an honest and sincere attempt to discuss this Bill.
§ Mr. D. MASONOh, no.
§ Mr. D. MASONI said I believed that this is an honest attempt to improve the Bill, and as such it is worthy of the consideration of this Committee. I do not agree with the Amendment for the following reasons. In the first place, I think hon. Members will agree that there has been a considerable amount of criticism as to the number of these Committees, and even with regard to the creation of the Joint Exchequer Board itself, that it was another addition to the many Committees and Boards which it has been found necessary to create from time to time to help the machinery of government. Yet here is a proposal made to still further enlarge the number of Committees by the creation of a still larger and more cumbersome Committee. The consequential Amendment proposes that—
"Upon the passing of this Act a Committee, consisting of the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, who shall be chairman of the Committee, the Chairman of the Commissioners of Inland 1396 Revenue, the Chairman of the Commissioners of Customs and Excise, the Treasury Remembrancer in Ireland, and the Superintendent of the Statistics and Intelligence Branch of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland shall be appointed for the purpose of determining the method to be adopted by the Joint Exchequer Board in carrying out their duties under this Section, and in such determination the Committee shall provide for deductions being made for that portion of the total cost and charges of collection attributable to the collection of the proceeds of any tax."
Perhaps some other hon. Member later on may suggest the appointment of a further Committee to determine what this Committee is to determine, and it will become interminable.
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThat is in the Amendment.
§ Mr. D. MASONI was coming to that The third Sub-section of the consequential Amendment provides that—
"The Committee shall as soon as may be present a Report to His Majesty and thereupon His Majesty in Council may frame Regulations founded upon the said Report, and in carrying out their duties under this Section the Joint Exchequer Board shall act in accordance with such Regulations."
Further—
"If any two Members of the Joint Exchequer Board are of opinion that in respect to any matter within the provisions of this Section the Joint Exchequer Board have not acted in accordance with the aforesaid Regulations, they may represent the same to His Majesty in Council, and thereupon the said question shall be forthwith referred to and heard and determined by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council."
So that I honestly feel that this Committee, which again is dependent upon a further recourse to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council—
§ Mr. HEWINSThe Government are providing that in regard to the other points.
§ Mr. D. MASONIt is ancillary to your proposal. It will increase the amount of confusion if we were to accept this Amendment. If these gentlemen referred to by the hon. Member are such excellent 1397 men for his Committee, it is very possible that the Treasury in Ireland and the Treasury of the Imperial Exchequer will appoint them. They will be eligible, I presume, and if they are the financial experts that he evidently believes them to be and are suitable to the purpose, they will very probably be appointed. But it would add to the confusion to create a further Committee, and one so cumbersome in its composition as the Committee which has been suggested by the hon. Member. He says this Clause is far too vague, and I think he used the word "scamping."
§ Mr. HEWINSI said it did not define the principles.
§ Mr. D. MASONI think I am right in saying the hon. Member said it was far too vague in its terms. In the nature of things you must be vague to a certain extent. That is to say, you have, first, to appoint to the post men suitable for the purpose and then leave them as wide powers as possible. If you try to define what they are appointed to do, they have been appointed to determine—that is, to judge. If you are going to crib, cabin, and confine them in their judgment and to hold them down in this direction and the other direction, you are in a sense taking away from them the functions which they have been created to do. To be able to determine, you must have as wide freedom as possible. The very fact that the powers are wide is the best proof, if proof is needed, that the Clause has been wisely and properly drafted In the nature of things you must make these powers as wide as possible. I quite agree that you must be very careful in the appointment of members of the Joint Exchequer Board. I quite agree in the care the hon. Member has taken in selecting very eminent and distinguished men, and I have no doubt the Irish Treasury and the Imperial Treasury will follow that example in the composition of the Exchequer Board when it comes to be drawn up. But to suggest that you should have a further Committee to check this Exchequer Board and that they should have the right to appeal to the Privy Council seems to me really to be adding to the existing confusion and not advancing the object we all have in view.
The arguments with regard to the Exchequer Board have been directed to the fact that it was not necessary—that it was 1398 superfluous—and yet the lion. Member suggests that we should add to the number of Boards by the creation of a further Board. I believe this is a necessary Board. If there are new conditions being created there must be new machinery to deal with the new conditions. This Exchequer Board will be a check upon the Treasury. It will really be purely a Hoard created for the purpose of determining matters of fact—matters as to the allocation of taxes, the amount going to Ireland and the amount going to the British Treasury—and that surely is a pure matter of fact, and I entirely dissent from the view which has been expressed by the Leader of the Opposition that this means determining policy. I cannot for the life of me understand why the hon. Member does not perceive that this body only has to deal with the facts of the case. It is quite true that facts affect policy and policy in turn governs expenditure, but there are certain taxes passed and this Board has to determine the allocation and the proceeds of these taxes and it particularly refers to the ascertaining of true Irish revenue. Surely, that is essentially a matter of determining—a matter of judgment. I quite agree that you will require very able and very expert men on that Board to be able to ascertain what that allocation should be, but the Committee surely will agree with me that this is essentially a question of determining actual facts which exist. Therefore I have no doubt that the Government will be willing, as they always have shown themselves willing, to receive any suggestions from distinguished men who may be called upon to join this Exchequer Board, and I hope that they will certainly not add to the existing confusion, if any confusion exists, by supporting the Amendment.
§ Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONThe hon. Member has made a very interesting speech, but the only reason he has given against the Amendment is that it would lead to the creation of an additional Committee. I think it is one of the most important Amendments which has been proposed during the whole course of the Bill, and I do not think the mere argument that it would lead to the creation of an additional Committee ought really to stand in its way. It is very important indeed, before altering the financial relations between Great Britain and Ireland, that we should know exactly how the two countries stand financially one towards the other. At present we do not in the 1399 least know what the true revenue of Ireland really is, and as the financial provisions of the Bill are entirely based upon an estimate of true revenue, surely some endeavour should be made to obtain the figures in this respect which, at any rate, are approximately correct. It is quite true that the Primrose Committee referring to true revenue, say:—
It would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is so wide as to impair seriously the value of the calculations.That is to say the calculations in respect of true revenue. But a little later on in the Report they go on to say:—The data for the exact calculation of true revenue neither exists, nor under present administrative machinery, can he procured.If that is the fact, and I believe it is, is it a satisfactory state of things on which to build up a most delicate financial scheme which the Government tell us is going to harmonise the financial relations in the future between this country and Ireland. On what evidence are these calculations based? The evidence given before the Primrose Committee on Irish Finance has been withheld from this House, although a great many efforts have been made to elicit it. I believe if that evidence was forthcoming, hon. Members would find the opinion given by the gentlemen who gave evidence before the Committee would differ very considerably from the opinions embodied in the text of the Bill. Every writer on the subject of Irish finance agrees that the present estimate of Irish true revenue adopted by the Government is very wide of the mark indeed. This does not apply only to Unionist writers; it applies even more strongly to Nationalist and Home Rule writers. Take Professor Oldham, who is a distinguished Irish economist and financial authority. In his pamphlet, "The Public Finances of Ireland," he says:—The revenue contributed by Ireland is not really known.That is to say, the true revenue.It is estimated by a process of guess work annually conducted in the Treasury, with results (where they can be tested) that we in Ireland find to he inaccurate.Professor Kettle, another very distinguished Irish economist, who sat in this House not long ago, says in his book, "Home Rule Finance":—We deliberately challenge their accuracy as lo details, and their authority as to classification. …In the last normal year, for instance, the revenue collected in Ireland was returned as £11,250,000, and 1400 the revenue contributed by Ireland as only £9,250.000, It cannot be too plainly understood that the first of these is a known and recorded figure; the second is little better than a conjecture.If you turn to the writings of Lord Mac-Donnell, you find exactly the same thing. Last year, in an address at Queen's University, he said:—The highest Treasury authorities have admitted that in calculating what is called Ireland's estimated true revenue, the Treasury has acted largely on guess work.…In the beginning, the Treasury deprecated the attachment of weight to these calculations. But the myth, like all myths, has grown with use, and now the White taper, as it is called, which reproduces the myth year after year, is referred to in the House of Commons and outside. … as an authentic and authoritative document.The right hon. Member for West Islington (Mr. Lough), in his pamphlet on "Irish Finance," says:—Without a Customs harrier, the true revenue of Ireland can never be ascertained, and it is strange that any Irishman can assent to a financial settlement which will not ascertain this.And yet hon. Members below the Gangway are at the present moment supporting a financial settlement before the necessary calculations and adjustments have been found out. It is not really necessary in support of the argument of my hon. Friend who moved the Amendment to go to what I may call external authority. What does the Secretary to the Primrose Committee say in the appendix to the Report? He deals in turn with all the Customable and all the Excise articles, as well as Income Tax, etc. In dealing, for instance, with the revenue from cocoa, he says:—The revenue from Cocoa Duty is apportioned between the three Kingdoms according to population. … No other method has, since 1891, been devised for apportioning the Cocoa Duty revenue.He points out that the revenue from chicory and coffee is dealt with in the same extremely unreliable and slovenly way, and he tells us that the same method has been applied to the true revenue of Ireland as regards dried fruits. If you take the basis of population, you cannot possibly get a more unreliable method in trying to find out the true revenue of Ireland. The Secretary to the Primrose Committee goes on to deal with foreign and Colonial spirits, and he points out in the appendix that every single quantity under a gallon does not come under the permit system, and that therefore absolutely no record is available for determining the true revenue so far as these smaller quantities are concerned. In respect of sugar, tea, and wine, he points out that the true revenue is based on the result of inquiries instituted no less than ten years ago, and 1401 is really worth nothing. I will quote a couple of sentences:—In that year (1903–4) the owners of vessels carrying these goods between Great Britain and Ireland were requested to furnish weekly statements throughout the year of their shipments.….Officers of Customs were directed to make occasional examinations of these goods. … and were instructed to compare the results of their scrutinies with the shipowners' accounts.I should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman who will reply for the Government whether he thinks that is a businesslike basis on which to found the financial provisions of this Bill in respect of true revenue. I may say in regard to the Tea Duty that in 1903–4 it was 6d. on the pound, and that now it is 5d. With the ever-increasing consumption of tea in Ireland, it is perfectly evident that the basis at that time on which the Treasury made their calculations cannot possibly hold good at the present moment in respect of true revenue. It is perfectly well known also that large quantities of tea are sent over by various grocers by parcels post. These quantities, which, I am told, in Ireland amount to a large sum indeed, are absolutely unaccounted for in the figures of the Government in regard to tea as shown in the White Paper. The same argument applies to sugar. In 1903–4 the duty on sugar was a good deal higher than now, and as the consumption of sugar in Ireland has enormously increased since then, the estimate made at that time cannot possibly hold good at the present day. Then as to sugar, no account has been taken of the great number of articles in which sugar plays a very important part. I refer to jams, marmalades, chocolate, candied peels, and other such items. Over 120,000 cwts. of these preserves were imported into Ireland in 1909, and there is absolutely no calculation of the amount of sugar contained in this quantity of material brought into Ireland for the ascertainment of true Irish revenue. If you take glucose, Ireland is credited with absolutely no returns as to that commodity at all, and yet the figures of the Department of Agriculture show that 54,000 cwts. were imported in 1909. In regard to tobacco, the true revenue of Ireland, according to the secretary to the Primrose Committee, is also based upon proportions ascertained no less than ten years ago. The Secretary to the Primrose Committee has pointed out that the returns are based on information casually, voluntarily, supplied by tobacco manufacturers and dealers where these gentlemen happen to choose to give information to the Trea- 1402 sury; but surely that is utterly unreliable and insufficient information to go upon, and, just in the same way as in respect of sugar and tea, very large quantities of cigars and cigarettes go into Ireland at the present moment by parcels post in respect of which we have no official Government Report at all. That exhausts most of the Customable articles. With regard to all the other Customable articles in Ireland, the secretary to the Primrose Committee says the revenue is calculated in the same rough-and-ready way, according to population, which, as I said before, can give absolutely no proper estimate of true revenue. In regard to Excise, hon. Members know very well that no permits, as in the case of whisky, are required for the removal of beer from place to place. The secretary to the Primrose Committee points out that—no official statistics are available bearing on the question of true Trish revenue from this source. In the absence of such statistics, it has been necessary to base the adjustments on information derived from various sources, chiefly from returns supplied by traders and dealerswho send in returns whenever it happens to suit them. To my mind, a more serious point is in regard to Income Tax and Estate Duties. In the case of the Estate Duties, because the figures which are dealt with are a great deal larger, the same utterly unreliable and slovenly method has been relied on, as far as the probate for the Estate Duty is concerned, no attempt even being made to arrive at the true revenue. The revenue up till now has been taken merely as collected. With regard to Legacy Duty, the secretary to the Primrose Committee quotes the opinion of the Inland Revenue. They say—this tax is collected in the country where the deceased was domiciled, and even assuming that it falls on the recipient of the legacy, there is no means of ascertaining in which of the three Kingdoms the recipient of any particular legacy is domiciled. This branch of revenue must therefore be taken as collected.The Succession Duty has been treated in exactly the same way. The Income Tax revenue is calculated in an even more unreliable and slovenly method. The Secretary to the Primrose Committee says:—as to Schedule A there is no means of ascertaining where the persons lived who are in receipt of the income derived from such property, and there is therefore no alternative but to assign those items in accordance with the figures of collection.9.0 P.M.And this is the basis on which the Government is calculating the deficit which is going to fall upon the British taxpayer. In regard to Schedule C, that is to say profits from Government securities, and 1403 part of Schedule D, that is to say profits from public companies, the secretary to the Primrose Committee confesses himself that very large adjustments are necessary to arrive at the true revenue, but he goes on to add—
as, however, the machinery of the Income tax cannot be employed to ascertain where the recipients of interest and dividend reside, the adjustments are made on the basis of the probate statistics on resealing.Could there be a more ludicrous method of estimating the Income Tax on the basis of the Estate Duties for the five years ended 1907–08? As hon. Members know, the Estate Duty is not paid at all by Irish banks, limited companies, railways, corporations, or certain classes of trustees, but, according to the last reports of the Irish banks, the market value of their invested funds amounts to no less than £23,000,000 sterling. What information drawn from the statistics of Estate Duties on properties of deceased persons could possibly give the slightest inkling of the real amount of Income Tax deducted from dividends on these moneys from outside Ireland? I do not see that you could arrive at any basis which would be the slightest good for the purpose of arriving at estimates of the true revenue. Take, again, the rubber shares bought by investors in Ireland during the last few years. What can the statistics of Estate Duties of deceased persons for the five years ending 1907–8 do to throw any light at all on the amount of Income Tax attributable to Ireland in respect of these shares? The result is, in the opinion of those who have studied the Government proposals, that there is an enormous sum by which the Government is out in its estimates, and yet, in spite of all this, the Primrose Committee tell us—It would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is so wide as to impair seriously the value of the calculations.I would like to know what evidence they have for this statement. Once more I ask the Government will they produce the evidence on which the financial provisions of this Bill have been formed? Surely the House is entitled to have this evidence, and it is all the more entitled to have it as during the progress of these Debates it is shown on what flimsy grounds these financial provisions have been framed. An accurate estimate of true revenue it is quite possible may turn out to give more fabourable terms to Ireland and reduce the figure of the deficit, and so shorten the period before which financial revision must take place, and I do not think that 1404 anyone would object to Ireland getting a fair share in the event of a more accurate estimate being made. On the other hand, it is quite possible that it might turn out that the deficit is very much greater than is supposed, and that the period therefore would be considerably longer before any financial revision of the Bill would take place, but whatever the issue may be of the inquiries, the House ought really to have the truth in this respect. No Government has any right to rush through a revolutionary financial scheme of this description without knowing upon what financial basis the scheme rests. I apologise to the House for quoting these various statements, but I do not think they have been quoted before, and I think that they are important as coming from gentlemen who have studied this question, and they are, I submit, germane to the Amendment proposed by my hon. Friend. I will end by one more quotation which, I think, should be heard by the Postmaster-General and the learned Attorney-General. It is written by a gentleman who for forty years was a Customs official in Ireland. He says:—The basis on which the accounts are prepared is in many respects highly misleading and inaccurate so far as it purports to be a true account of Irish revenue.He goes on to say—and knowing him personally, I know it to be absolutely true—that:—It was not written from any political standpoint whatsoever.
§ Sir J. D. REESI hope the Government will accept the very important Amendment of my hon. Friend appointing a Committee to determine the method to be adopted by the Joint Exchequer Board for carrying out their business. I also hope that the hon. Member for Coventry (Mr. D. M. Mason) will, not add to the many Committees which already exist, a Committee of one to establish a sliding scale to determine the amount of sincerity which attaches to the different Amendments which may be moved from this side of the House. It is a Committee which, with all respect to him, we can well dispense with, though I am not at all sure that the establishment of a Committee of that sort would not prove far more inconvenient to his friends than to Members on this side. I cannot agree with what the Postmaster-General has said about the duties of this Exchequer Board having reference merely to questions of facts and figures. I speak, as I always speak, with the utmost respect for the right hon. Gentleman's ability in regard to figures. It was said of one that omniscience was his 1405 foible. It may be said of the right hon. Gentleman that figures are his foible, but they are not everybody's foible, and the dealing with these figures is a matter of the utmost difficulty and the utmost importance on which a decision has to be arrived at by this Committee.
I speak in the presence of many hon. and learned Gentlemen sitting in this House, but I submit that it is absolutely impossible to say where the point of law or where the point of fact begins, for the ingenuity of Members learned in the law either in this House or outside can show that any question of fact may be brought into an appeal upon a point of law, or vice versa. I submit that is a kind of argument—whatever the Postmaster-General may do with it—which the Solicitor-General will never condescend to adopt in its entirety. The Joint Board of Exchequer will have to decide questions of fact. Suppose it dealt with a figure such as that mentioned in Lord MacDonnell's letter to the Times, in which he said that in ninety-three years Ireland had paid to England £325,000,000 over the money spent during that time in that country. That is precisely the kind of thing that this Board would have to decide, and on which they are to arrive at a final decision. It is suggested that the question of true revenue is a simple matter. That is positively absurd. I do not suppose there is a more difficult question than what is true love and what is true revenue. Both questions are exceedingly difficult, and it is impossible to say which is the more difficult of the two. The Amendment, which in its fourth paragraph, provides for an appeal to the Judicial Committee. It has been suggested that this is rather an unnecessary thing. I wonder whether hon. Gentlemen learned in the law looked at the law reports in the Times of yesterday. I saw there an appeal from the Indian High Court, prima facie a very high class tribunal. The Government tell us that they take very great pains in selecting the barristers they appoint as judges in India. There may be a difference of opinion about that, but still I assume that it is a good High Court, though circumstances would lead one to grievously doubt that. I start with the assumption that it is, but the last appeal which came before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council resulted in the contemptuous reversal of the decision of the High Court in India as being contrary to all precedents and principles.
1406 Why is this body, the Exchequer Board, which is really no more distinguished than the High Court in Calcutta, to have its judgment regarded as final and conclusive, and not only final and conclusive I In this Exchequer Board you have a body of officials who are to be above the law. So profound is my respect for officials, so-much do I believe in their intellectual integrity, in their experienced and tried impartiality, that I do not at all fear, like the hon. Member for Graves-end, that they may be led to import politics into finance. I believe they would steer perfectly clear of that particular difficulty. Permanent officials do not import politics into their duties; at the same time they will be none the better if they are to sit as a kind of star chamber of this description. It would be enough to demoralise an Aristides himself, or a permanent Under-Secretary, or anybody else who in our own time may correspond as nearly as possible to that classical character. I do think that an appeal should by all manner of means be provided, and my hon. Friend's Amendment does provide for that. It may be said that my hon. Friend is creating an extra Board—and I admit it is a serious offence, but, after all, he has learned it from hon. Gentlemen opposite. It is to be a Board, however, with a temporary and transitory function to perform, and, having performed it, it will disappear, and will not sit like the old man of the sea on the taxpayer's shoulders so long as there is a penny in his pocket to be squeezed out of it by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Paragraph (2) of the Amendment, as I think anybody will allow, provides a most excellent Board, as good as could well have been put together for the purpose indicated. I should welcome some means of getting to close grips with the problem which is before us in connection with Clause 24, and which, I think, the Government, instead of grappling with it, have consistently and persistently evaded. In the wording of paragraph (4) of the Amendment it says that such questions shall be determined by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council "constituted as if hearing an appeal from a Court in Ireland." This is a somewhat ambiguous expression. My hon. Friend here describes the Privy Council as possessing attributes with which it is to be endowed. It is really a Court of Appeal for the Colonies and dependencies, and it has not yet become a Court of Appeal in any other 1407 sense. That function is in respect of the United Kingdom being discharged, as is well known, by the House of Lords in its judicial capacity. I think it would be well if the Government would provide for an appeal, not merely in the case of officials, but, as I would prefer at any rate, an appeal on behalf of the subject in Ireland against the decision of this irresponsible financial body which it is proposed to set up. My hon. Friend who last addressed the Committee referred to the functions of the Joint Exchequer Board, and I only do so for the purpose of dwelling in passing upon the extreme inconvenience and loss to a very important industry in this country which will result, that is the tea industry, of which I have some experience, unless my hon. Friend's Amendment is accepted. Bad as it is to have a commodity, raised by British capital with British labour in British Possessions, taxed with something like 70 per cent, or 80 per cent, of its value, it is felt almost more by those concerned in the production and distribution to have varying rates of duty, and that is what we shall certainly get unless there is some appeal against the decisions of this body, and unless it comes, as all bodies in this country should, at least we democrats think so on this side of the House, under the control of what we are told under this Bill, is to continue to be an Imperial, Parliament. I cannot see what could be more consonant with the whole scheme of the Bill, if there is to be a real federation, though I cannot say there is any federation about it. And if there are any Imperial attributes remaining, than that there should be an appeal provided on behalf of the subject, as well as on the action of the Joint Exchequer Board to a body like the Committee of the Privy Council.
When the last Imperial Conference met in London and right hon. Gentlemen were in office, it was urged on behalf of the Dominions and Commonwealths present that there should be one great august tribunal comprising the functions of both the House of Lords in its judicial capacity and the Privy Council, to deal with all appeals of all descriptions from all parts of the British Empire. If Ireland is to remain part of the British Empire under this Bill, and it may do so by accident, what could be more proper than that it should have an appeal to the Judicial Committee to the Privy Council. I hope that that will he the result, and that it will lead to the 1408 constitution of the Judicial Committee with a proper body of judges. The Lord Chancellor has at this moment a Bill before the House of Lords to amalgamate the functions of the House of Lords in its judicial capacity with those of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. I welcome this Amendment as much on that ground as on any other. Something of the sort, or something substantially the same appeal's to me to be absolutely necessary. I welcome it particularly on the ground that it will lead, I believe, to what is an appropriate Imperial provision for appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. If it is the case that the Joint Exchequer Board will be relieved from the control of the Imperial Parliament, then it is obviously necessary that some other body must be set up, and none is so equal to the occasion as the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, particularly when it is fortified and strengthened as it will be under the Lord Chancellor's Bill, which is proposed by one of the most distinguished of their own Ministers. Other hon. Gentlemen who have addressed the Committee have dealt at some length with the financial functions of the Joint Exchequer Board, and I will not weary the patience of the Committee with vain repetition, which not only characterises the heathen, but is not an uncharacteristic of Members of Parliament.
§ Mr. KINGI cannot pretend that I have given profound study to this very important Amendment, but still I have devoted as much time and attention as possible since the dinner interval. I therefore venture to rise on behalf of Members sitting below the Gangway to offer some criticisms, and on mature consideration our opposition to this proposal. I did not hear the Proposer of this Amendment, but I have had the great advantage of hearing the hon. Member for East Nottingham (Sir J. D. Bees), who brings great official weight and authority on behalf of any cause which he may espouse. Whatever side of the House he may sit and whatever cause he may temporarily be devoted to he will always, at any rate, be listened to with great attention by myself. I call the attention of the Committee, in the first place, to the fact that we are setting up another Committee. My experience of this House and its proceedings is that, if anything, it sets up too many Committees. I was successful yesterday in opposing a Committee proposed from the other side of the House, and I hope my opposition to this proposal will induce the House 1409 eventually to reject it. I am confident that will be the case, but I venture especially to point out the peculiar composition of this body that is proposed. First of all, there is the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury. I am quite sure he will make an admirable chairman of any Committee that is set up anywhere, but I fancy his time is already fully occupied, and if he only attends to all the numerous duties which he has to perform, I am sure he will not want to preside over another Committee. Then there is the Chairman of Commissioners of Inland Revenue. I believe our Inland Revenue is increasing, under the admirable Budgets that we have had during the last few years, by leaps and bounds. Therefore, I think that that gentleman has already enough to do. The next Member proposed for the Committee is the Chairman for the Commissioners of Customs and Excise. As there may be differences between the Customs and Excise of the two countries under the beneficent system of Home Rule that we are introducing, I think that gentleman will have plenty to do, and ought not to be taken away to serve on this Committee. Next there is the Treasury Remembrancer of Ireland. I am not aware what duty that gentleman performs, but I have no doubt that in Ireland he plays a very important part. Fifthly, there is a Superintendent of the Statistics and Intelligence Department of the Department of Agricultural and Technical Instruction for Ireland. I observe that this gentleman's title occupies two lines of print, and under those circumstances he occupies a place far too high for me to contemplate.
Therefore, I consider the setting up of a Committee of this kind quite unnecessary, and I shall oppose it if it goes to a Division. I hope my hon. Friends sitting upon this side, and especially below the Gangway, will do the same. I think that this Committee will certainly set up a record in what we may call the art of circumlocution. The Joint Exchequer Board is not to get straight to work; it is to have rules drawn up for it by another body, and then when those rules have been drawn up and it has got to work, a special machinery for upsetting its decisions and the work it has performed is proposed by this Amendment. The hon. Member suggests that before the Board gets to work two or more of its members should be able to take a case to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. All these circumlocutory methods are quite unneces- 1410 sary. Personally, I would be as ready to trust an Irishman with my watch or purse as an Englishman, and I believe that that is the principle upon which Englishmen generally regard the Home Rule Bill. All the circumlocutory methods of this kind introduced as safeguards are to my mind perfectly irrelevant and unnecessary, and I shall have pleasure in voting against this Amendment.
§ Mr. RONALD M'NEILLThe hon. Member opposite (Mr. King) began by giving us the interesting information that he had recently been dining, and, in the self-complacent mood which we hope was induced by a generous vintage and good cigars, the hon. Member prided himself that his opinions would prevail and defeat this Amendment. In that he was probably correct; we on this side have no hope that the Solicitor-General will shake himself free from the controlling influence of the hon. Member. But notwithstanding the very baffling position in which we are placed by the hon. Member having come back after dining, I will offer one or two' observations in a contrary direction to those of the hon. Member. The hon. Member for Coventry (Mr. D. Mason) said it was important that great care should be taken in the appointment of the Gentlemen who were to serve on the Joint Exchequer Board. That is, I will not say a platitude, but at all events a very important announcement. Does not the hon. Member think that the Committee might go a little further than the mere assertion of the principle that care should be taken in the appointment of gentlemen to serve on one of the most important bodies ever set up? Might not the Committee have sufficient interest in the personnel of this Board to insist upon knowing who were to be placed upon it before they agreed to the Clauses bringing the body into being? Earlier in the evening one of my hon. Friends pointed out that Mr. Gladstone, when setting up the Land Commission in 1881, set out in the Bill itself, not only every detail concerning the working of the proposed Commission, its staff, methods of work, and remuneration, but also the names of the gentlemen who were to serve on the Commission. We have heard nothing from the Government to show why that precedent is being departed from in the present case. The principle is a good one, and I think the hon. Member for Coventry might go further, and support us in demanding that the names of these gentlemen should be 1411 known before the Bill passes from the House. The Amendment before the Committee is very important in more respects than one. The Exchequer Board is to have thrown upon it the duty of investigating and then regulating in a very far-reaching way the finances both of Ireland and of Great Britain in so far as they affect the Constitution set up by this Bill. It is very important, having regard to the fact that these are continuing functions to be exercised over a long period of time, that there should be some definite fixed method by which the Board shall work, so that there may be some sort of continuity in their operations, and the work whether made public or not, put on record so that their successors may know the methods which have been adopted. It is the greatest mistake to suppose that all this Board has to do is to decide what is the true revenue of Ireland at the date of the passing of this Bill or that its functions are in any way temporary. The most important part of its duties are those thrown upon it by Clause 36. It is admitted that the deficit period, if it ever ends at all, will not end for a long period of years. We on this side are very sceptical whether we or our children or grandchildren will see its end. I do not suppose that anyone imagines that it will come in less than half a century. Look at what the Joint Exchequer Board have to do: they have to report in periods of three years the state of the financial relations between the two countries with a view to determining whether the deficit period is to be brought to an end.
§ Sir J. SIMONNot every three years.
§ Mr. R. M'NEILLNo, but whenever they have reason to report that for three years the finances have changed from the conditions prevailing at the present moment. I do not believe they will make such a report for a long time. But, in order that they may be able to make that report when the time comes, it is clear that the necessary statistics and investigations must be carried on from year to year; otherwise they could never tell when the time had come to make the report. It is very important, supposing the time ever arises, that the Exchequer Board should then investigate the true revenue from Ireland upon the same footing and by the same methods of calculation that are to be applied at the present time. Under the Bill there is nothing to secure any such 1412 continuity of method. The Amendment is of value from that point of view, because if carried it would set up a definite principle or doctrine by which the operations of the Joint Exchequer Board would be guided from time to time, and thereby ensure that fifty, thirty, or twenty years hence, whenever it may be, the same methods of calculation would be applied to the problem as are brought to its solution at the time of the passing of the Bill. Let me pass from that to another aspect of the case. We are dealing here with this question of true revenue. I have in my hand the appendix to the Government White Paper. The Primrose Committee have told us—and they laid stress upon the point—that the figures set out under the column "As contributed" are merely an estimate. We have got to bear that very clearly in mind. By what method have these estimates been made? There is some apparent sanctity attached to the word "estimate," especially if it comes from the Treasury. People are inclined to say that a Treasury Estimate must be something very near the mark, and it is almost too sacred to inquire into the evidence the Treasury officials have had at their disposal, or the methods by which they have arrived at their conclusion. Let hon. Members look at the figures under the head of "Excise." They will find that the revenue as collected in Ireland is £2,000,000 more than is contributed by Ireland. Now can any Treasury official give more than the widest possible guess as to the difference between the revenue from Excise "as contributed by Ireland" and the revenue from Excise "collected in Ireland"? The material is not at their disposal. We have had evidence from all sorts of expert sources to show that there is not the possibility of getting at anything which could really be called an estimate, and which should not rather be called a pure guess. Take one other figure—and a material one—the Income Tax. Under that head we find there is £300,000 difference. There, again, what possible evidence is there to go upon? One turns again to the Primrose Committee's report, and we get a little insight into how these so-called estimates are framed. These gentlemen say:—
As regards revenue, the materials for exact classification are admittedly imperfect.How far does the word "imperfect" satisfy the situation that these gentlemen reveal? 1413Official records localise the receipt of revenue, but with one or two exceptions they do not make it possible to identify with precision the final incidence of the whole of the sums collected,They go on in these words—and I have been pointing out the discrepancy between the two sides of the accounts as regards the Excise—and say:—Accordingly, it has been necessary in the case of taxes on commodities to obtain, from time to time, through the agency of traders and carrying companies, special returns of the quantities of dutiable goods passing between Great Britain and Ireland.What is the use of putting down all that with all the solemnity of a Government White Paper, and calling it a Treasury estimate, when the figures show a difference in the two sides of no less than £2,000,000? We are told by another body of experts that it is a guess arrived at from such scraps of evidence as may be picked up from trading and carrying companies. As regards the Income Tax:—In the case of direct taxes to draw certain inferences from observed indications in the official statistics and to apply these inferences to the figures of revenue as collected.I think, to begin with, that is a very good example in the paper of what the hon. Gentleman the Member for Somerset calls a method of circumlocution. However that may be, it is only a way of hiding from us as far as they can the utter unreliability of the figures upon which the whole finance of this Bill is being based. Therefore it does become, when you look at it from that point of view, that some such principle should be laid down as proposed in the Amendment of my hon. Friend for having some sort of fixed method by which we can test the actions of the Joint Exchequer Board when it is set up. In moving this Amendment my hon. Friend quoted a few words in this report where the Commissioners say—and I think the Solicitor-General fired this passage at me in the earlier part of the afternoon as showing the reliance which ought to be placed upon this very guesswork paper:—It would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is so wide as to impair seriously the value of the calculations.Having regard to what I have just called attention to as to the evidence derived from carriers and the inferences drawn with regard to direct taxation, I wonder whether these gentlemen really have a right to say that it would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is so wide. For instance, they go on to say this with regard to this very question of true revenue—this is from the White Paper:—In consequence, however useful it may be for giving an approximate idea of the true revenues of 1414 Great Britain and Ireland respectively, it could not serve as a sufficiently firm basis on which to found a permanent financial arrangement between the two countries.What is the use of their saying that it would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is not so wide as seriously to incur the value of their calculations after they go on to lay down themselves that the margin of error is, at all events, so large as to make these figures perfectly worthless, so far as founding upon them any permanent financial arrangement between the two countries? That is not all. I find that this Committee take occasion in the course of their Report to examine the financial scheme that was put forward in the last Home Rule Bill. The sentences ought to be of interest to the Postmaster-General, who talks about insoluble problems. They say as to a problem being insoluble:—A problem is not insoluble because an answer cannot be found for it, but because there are so many plausible answers found that the number of solutions threatens to equal the number of solvers.That appears to me to be the case with regard to ourselves at the present day. Speaking of the scheme of 1893, they say—and they have been talking of the great simplicity of the schemethat the simplicity of the arrangement was more apparent than real, for we now know that the exact ascertainment of true revenue is, with the existing machinery of this Bill, more difficult than seems to have been realised in 1893.The right hon. Gentleman opposite in answer to that point in an earlier Amendment answered, that that was all very well, but that the Joint Exchequer Board were going to provide an improved machinery which would get over that difficulty in which the Primrose Commission found themselves confronted.
§ Mr. R. M'NEILLThe right hon. Gentleman says "Hear, hear." I hope he will get up presently and tell us what is the machinery. What is the means at the disposal of the Joint Exchequer Board? What will be at their disposal in a couple of years' time that was not equally at the disposal of the Treasury, which utterly failed to find any exact or approachingly exact figure as the true revenue of Ireland, or which was not equally at the disposal of the Primrose Commission?
§ Mr. R. M'NEILLThe Custom-House was equally at the disposal of the Treasury and the Primrose Commission. These 1415 were a body of experts appointed by the Cabinet, as we are told, to advise the Government as to the basis on which to found this legislation. Is any Member of the Government going to get up and say that they appointed this Commission to advise them with the view to this legislation and did not put at their disposal any means of getting at the true revenue or the true statistics on which the true revenue of Ireland was founded? The means at the disposal of these gentlemen must have been quite as full and accurate as anything which can be laid before the Joint Exchequer Board whose future operations, so far as we know up to the present, are entirely mysterious. We do not know how they are to work. The Bill does not lay down any method for them to work, and there is nothing to show what means they will have at their disposal to get hold of statistics or to investigate these insoluable problems, and this is another reason why it is important that we should get some definite method of working laid down either in the Bill or through such a Committee as my hon. Friend suggests we should set up. And their proceedings should be conducted in public, because it is most important that the methods of their calculations should be known to the outside world and open to criticism, and it is more important still that they should be open to the review of this House, and perhaps most important of all, that there should be on record some security for continuity and stability in the method of these gentlemen working, so that the same methods applied to-day may be applied in the future when we come to the revision of the financial relations.
§ Sir JOHN SIMONThe hon. Member for Hereford who moved this Amendment said of it, that it was an Amendment which in no way aimed at destroying or undermining the Bill, that in moving the Amendment he accepted, for the purposes of argument, the general principles of the Bill, and that he recommended his Amendment to the Committee upon its merits, and that it would improve the detailed structure of the Bill. I accept the spirit in which the hon. Member moved this Amendment without any reservation at all, and I think those of us who have heard the Debate will recognise that the matter has been discussed in a reasonable, as well as an interesting way. I think it is possible to show, I think indeed it is quite easy to show, that the proposal made by 1416 the Amendment would not improve the Bill at all regarded as a matter of merits, and I want to put before the Committee the reasons why I hold that view. The Clause we are dealing with is Clause 24, and as that Clause stands, it throws upon the Joint Exchequer Board the duty of ascertaining true Irish revenue. The Amendment which is now before the Committee is an Amendment which would substitute for the conclusion of the Joint Exchequer Board, or for their unfettered judgment in the matter, the rules or directions that might be laid down or arrived at by some elaborate body or a Committee consisting of eminent officials mentioned in the Amendment.
The problem what is the true Irish revenue, and how you are to arrive at it, is certainly not a very easy problem. It is a problem which has been a good deal discussed, and it is a problem of the solution of which some hon. Gentlemen opposite seem to assume the greatest doubt. The hon. Gentleman the Member for one of the Divisions of Kent, who has just spoken, used extremely strong language about what he called the White Paper. There are two White Papers which appear every year, and have appeared for eighteen years past, but for these White Papers, which are the attempts of the Treasury, poor faltering attempts they may be, he has the most undisguised contempt. He thinks, to use his own language, that they involve the wildest possible guesses, and he says he cannot conceive how any reasonable person could attach any serious importance to the figures which they put forward as if they were accurate figures. The same view was expressed in greater detail, and with quite as much strength of language by the hon. Member for Salisbury in support of which he made some quotations. I have only one quotation to make, but I respectfully commend it to the attention of the hon. Member because it comes from a well-known book against Home Rule, which was drawn up by a committee of eminent Unionists, and I see that the hon. Member for Salisbury, who speaks in such strong terms about the accuracy of the White Paper, was vice-chairman of the committee responsible for the book. In that book an essay is written by the right h on. Gentleman the Member for East Worcester, who is an ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer, and in the course of that essay he has occasion to say what he thinks of 1417 the White Papers which the vice-chairman of the committee of Unionists who published the book, speaks of in such contemptuous language, and which do not commend themselves to the good sense of the hon. Gentleman. This is the quotation. The ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer says:—
By way of introduction to any adequate discussion of the possible financial proposals of any Home Rule measures, it is desirable to set out in some detail the existing financial relations of Ireland and Great Britain. The Treasury calculations upon this subject—that is to say the White Paper.The Treasury calculations upon this subject are embodied in two White Papers which have been prepared and published annually during the last eighteen years. It is true that doubts have from time to time been expressed upon the accuracy of these calculations and of the methods by which the materials on which they are based have been collected. As to this it is only necessary to nay that the information in the possession of the Treasury officials is infinitely more voluminous and likely to be more accurate than any in the possession of private individuals, and there is no reason to suppose that the succession of eminent public servants who have been in turn responsible for the preparation of these returns, have been moved in one direction or another by prepossessions or bias.[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] So far we are agreed.Their one attempt has been throughout to present a statement as accurate as it is possible to make it on one hand of the case of the existing administration in Ireland, and the expenditure incurred there, and on the other of the revenue derived from persons or property living or situated in that country. As the Prime Minister said on 27th November last year, the utmost pains have been taken to make the estimates of true revenue approximately correct, and it is believed that the total revenue as given in the revised returns approximate closely to the facts.
§ Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONWas that written before or after the report of the Primrose Committee?
§ Sir J. SIMONThe hon. Gentleman knows that better than I do, because he was one of the editors of the book, but I do not suppose that he will suggest that the report to the Primrose Committee has upset the whole of the case made by the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer. When I look at the Report of the Primrose Committee, I find a statement that it would be a mistake to infer that the margin of error is so wide as to impair seriously the method of collection. I will come to the appendix in a moment. The hon. Member opposite referred to it, but I am bound to say it does astonish me a little when the principal financial authority who took part in this volume uses language of that kind about the accuracy of the White Paper, that we should be told by one of the Gentlemen responsible for the book that in his view the whole thing is a wild guess and that not the slightest reliance can be placed upon it.
§ Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONI was quoting the opinion of the Secretary to the Primrose Committee.
§ Sir J. SIMONThe point is, does he or does he not assert that the White Paper gives a fairly accurate account of Irish revenue?
§ Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONWhat I said was that the Secretary to the Primrose Committee, in the appendix, showed us the inaccuracy of the White Paper.
§ Sir J. SIMONI take it that the hon. Member's view is that it is inaccurate.
§ Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONYes, according to the Secretary of the Primrose Committee.
§ Sir J. SIMONLet me deal with the hon. Member's reference to the appendix to the Primrose Committee. What the hon. Member does not seem to realise, and what apparently is not realised by the hon. Gentleman who spoke last, is that the very matters to which they point are the matters met by the provisions in the Home Rule Bill. The hon. Gentleman quoted from the appendix of the Report to show that up to the present, in order to make out what true Irish revenue is, the Treasury authorities have bad to make calculations on an elaborate scale, not based upon absolutely precise facts, about such things as the consumption of tea in Ireland. The hon. Member who spoke last is entirely mistaken if he supposed that when tea passes through Great Britain to Ireland there is any compulsory Customs examination, because there is nothing of the sort. The whole of the tea drunk in the United Kingdom pays duty in London with the exception of the small portion which I believe pays duty in the port of Liverpool.
§ Mr. RONALD M'NEILLI never suggested that.
§ 10.0 P.M.
§ Sir J. SIMONI think the hon. Member suggested that there would be nothing available in the future which was not available now for making this calculation, and that is the point I am addressing myself to. As things are at present, however accurate or inaccurate the White Paper may be, it has to be made out without the assistance which the Home Rule Bill provides. If you are exporting from a British port to France you have got owing to the Customs regulations an accurate and a compulsory record of what is passing from this country. That, however, is not true 1419 if you are sending the stuff from England to Scotland or from England to Ireland. The very thing which the hon. Member for Salisbury referred to with such satisfaction in the appendix to the Primrose Committee's Report is the device which is used without the machinery of the Home Rule Bill, but the moment Clause 16 begins to operate that will no longer be required. Clause 16 does this for it applies to the transport of goods between England and Ireland and Ireland and England those regulations and requirements which exist in the case of the export or import of goods from or to England across the Channel, and the consequence is that the accuracy of the statistics we have in case of France will only become possible between this country and Ireland as soon as you apply Clause 16 of the Home Rule Bill. I thought anybody who took an interest in the White Paper knew that perfectly well. What the Secretary of the Primrose Committee is point-out is that under the existing condition of things the Treasury have to do their best to find out how much duty is paid at the Port of London on tea which has been drunk in Ireland. The same thing is true about other commodities. Clause 16, for statistical purposes, is going to provide a machinery which will give as accurate a set of statistics as those produced by the Board of Trade or the Customs Department in relation to our foreign trade. The Committee will now see what is meant when the Report of the Primrose Committee says that, with the existing machinery, it is not possible to be more accurate than the Treasury have been in the past. They point to the fact that, with the existing machinery, it cannot be more accurate, and, with that in mind, we have provided the machinery contained in Clause 16. I do not think it is a fact that the White Paper gives one a precisely accurate figure. I do not think that is true. But what is said both by the right hon. Gentleman the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer and by the secretary of the Primrose Committee, and, as far as I know, by other competent authorities, is that it is a figure which may be regarded as substantially accurate, which contains very likely errors, but errors which tend to cancel one another. I do respectfully suggest that hon. Gentlemen have been taking part in this Debate under a misapprehension, and that the answer to be given to the question put by the hon. Mem- 1420 ber as to what machinery would be at the disposal of the Joint Exchequer Board which is not at the present time at the disposal of the Treasury is Clause 16 of this Bill. Let me come back now to the speech of the Mover of the Amendment. He commended his proposal to us because he thought it was actually going to improve the working out of this Home Rule scheme on its merits.
§ Mr. HEWINSWorking out this particular point.
§ Sir JOHN SIMONI think the hon. Gentleman will see that I am not misrepresenting him. The hon. Member said what I think he was quite entitled to say, and the temper of his speech supports what he said, namely, that we are making this proposal because many of us are interested in getting this matter through, and if your Bill comes into force "my scheme is better than yours." I do not think he is right about this. The question is, if your object is to find out true Irish revenue, is it, or is it not, a good thing to lay down as soon as the Bill passes precise regulations and rules to determine how you will arrive at the correct figure. [HON. MEMBERS: "Yes."] That is the question. I suggest one reason why it is not. The hon. Member who spoke last does not expect this deficit question will disappear, or that the true Irish revenue will overtop the Irish expenditure for some years to come. Is it in the circumstances a wise thing that we should lay down now a precise set of rules and regulations by which to calculate this matter when, for all we know, between now and the time to make the correct calculation arrives there may be better methods of making the calculation, and there may be elements in the problem we are not aware of now, and other taxes which nobody has thought of at this moment, or some of our existing taxes which may have been removed in the meantime. Let me point this out. Since the last Home Rule Bill, the Bill of 1893, you have had the whole rearrangement of the Death Duties and you have had the Super-tax, the Land Taxes, and other things. How could anybody have said in 1893 that you could have laid down a series of precise and detailed rules and regulations which would have operated with completeness and without difficulty even in the situation as we know it in 1912? It is really not a wise course to endeavour to do what is almost an impossible thing, 1421 or at any rate a difficult thing, namely, to lay down precise rules and regulations as to the future. It is, however, perfectly possible to indicate a general principle on which one might proceed, and Clause 24 does indicate and lay down this general principle. It says primâ facie, the revenue collected in Ireland should be treated as the revenue contributed by Ireland. That is absolutely true, so far as the Licence Duties are concerned. It is true as regards the mass of the Estate Duties; it is true as regards the Land Taxes; and it is true as regards a very substantial portion of the taxation of Ireland. It is not true, of course, of such things as the Tea Duty, the Tobacco Duty, or, as a matter of fact, the Income Tax, which is one of the most difficult elements in the matter. It is certainly fair to say the Clause, as drafted, lays down this. Take first the revenue collected in Ireland, and then make such adjustments upon that figure as is just and expedient to arrive at the best and truest calculation we can hope to get. I say that is the extent to which it is wise to go, and it is to that extent the Clause does go in laying down the principle on which we are to proceed.
Finally, not only is it true to say that under Clause 16 we shall now get accurate statistical experience on which this calculation may be made in future—something undoubtedly more accurate than in the past, though I think the inaccuracy of what we have had in the past has been grossly exaggerated. What is the purpose for which it is important to find out the true Irish revenue? Speeches have been made to-night which would seem to suggest that the Transferred Sum depends on the true Irish revenue. It depends on nothing of the kind, and has nothing to do with the true Irish revenue. It is built up on a basis which has no connection with the true Irish revenue, and is a sum of money representing the actual cost of certain actual services. The idea that you want this Committee in order that the Transferred Sum may be ascertained when this Bill starts is really a complete and utter misunderstanding of the financial provisions of the Bill. The principal purpose for which it is wanted is to ascertain hereafter if and when that day comes that for three years running the true Irish revenue has been sufficient to pay the true Irish expenditure. That is a very different matter, and when that time comes our Bill provides that the Joint Exchequer Board should report to 1422 this Imperial Parliament on the subject. We in the Imperial Parliament shall then have the full matter in our own hands, and we are not necessarily going to shut our eyes to the true facts if they are misunderstood or misconceived. That is the sense in which the true Irish revenue is important for the purposes of this Bill, and with great respect I really suggest to hon. Members opposite that they have a little misunderstood the purposes for which, and the extent to which, the provisions of Clause 24 are important.
§ Mr. R. M'NEILLNo one on this side of the House, so far as I recollect, suggested that it had anything to do with the ascertainment of the Transferred Sum.
§ Sir J. SIMONI hope the hon. Member knows I would not intentionally attribute any misunderstanding to hon. Gentlemen opposite, but I certainly thought from expressions which were used, though I may have misunderstood them, it was thought the Joint Exchequer Board would use Clause 24 for the purpose of fixing the initial figures with which this Bill is to start. We are, at any rate, agreed that is not so, and I suggest, in those circumstances, and approaching it as I wish most emphatically to do as a question of merit alone and I hope with no improper prepossession in favour of the Bill as it stands, that Clause 24 would not be improved by introducing the revised machinery as proposed by the Amendment.
§ Sir E. CARSONNo one can deny, I think, that, so far as Ireland is concerned, if Ireland is to be considered in this matter at all, this is one of the most important Clauses which have to be discussed in relation to this Bill, and I am very sorry, that, as usual, we have got a very short time in which to discuss it. I am not going to follow the hon. and learned Gentleman in his quotations from the Home Rule Book. I think he made very little of them. All they really come to is that my right hon. Friend the Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Austen Chamberlain), in his article, said the most accurate information he could get was from the White Paper published by the Treasury, and although it had been published for eighteen years they had admittedly never been able to get at more than what they conceived to be the approximate amount of the true revenue of Ireland. My own opinion is that, if the true revenue of Ireland could be ascertained, Ireland would be in a very much 1423 more favourable position than that which the hon. and learned Gentleman tries to put forward. The hon. and learned Gentleman himself gave away the whole case as to the propriety of the finance of this Bill without further investigation when he told us that they had had to insert Clause 1G for the purpose of ascertaining the true revenue, or the revenue at all, derived from Ireland by the payment of Customs Duties, which he says have always been paid either in London or Liverpool, and never in Ireland. What a travesty of legislation that is! You are basing the whole of your Financial Clauses in this Bill on the estimate that there is a deficit of £2,000,000 from Ireland, and there is no material by which you can ascertain the true revenue of Ireland under existing conditions.
There is no material. The Report of the Primrose Committee is subsequent to the White Paper, and that committee took evidence, which the Treasury does not. The Treasury guesses from the Returns before it. The Primrose Committee took evidence, that suppressed evidence of which we have heard so much, and which I have the greatest suspicion is being purposely kept back for some reason. The case of the Solicitor-General is that they have had to put Clause 16 into the Bill because up to this there is no machinery, no statistics, and no method by which one could get at the Customs revenue which is properly attributable to Ireland, and we are asked to start under those conditions by saying our guesswork is that Ireland does not pay its way, and £2,000,000 a year is the deficit in the account between England and Ireland. It say that is very unfair to Ireland, and it is grotesque for founding the finances of a Home Rule Bill. It does not rest there. I noticed the hon. and learned Gentleman was very keen about this Clause. He said it was necessary to get these materials, and I quite agree with him, but he entirely forgot that Clause 16 has nothing to do with Income Tax or with Death Duties. How is he going to ascertain what nobody has ever been able to ascertain up till this moment? Neither the Primrose Committee nor the White Paper professes to ascertain what is the amount of Income Tax or of the Death Duties attributable to Ireland. And the Government are going to leave it as it is. They have no Clause 16 dealing with Income Tax or with the Death Duties: they are going to 1424 leave it exactly as it is, and they reject the Amendment, which says that a Committee of this House or some other body ought to set up some principles by which you are going to ascertain the proper revenue in relation to Income Tax and Death Duties, as well as other matters. The Amendment asks that some principles should be laid down for this Joint Exchequer Board to act upon. Let this Committee look at what the Government are doing. They are setting up this Joint Exchequer Board of Treasury clerks. But how are they going to do what neither the Primrose Committee nor the Treasury itself has been able to do for eighteen years? What they say is this: You are to attribute to England everything that is collected in England, and you are to attribute to Ireland everything that is collected in Ireland. That is a broad principle, and so far as Ireland is concerned there could not be a more unfair principle. I think all the companies out of which income is derived from dividends are either English or foreign, and on every shilling that comes into Ireland of accumulated income, apart from mere earnings, Income Tax is deducted at the source—that is, in this country. I believe that even Guinness's the largest company in Ireland is an English company. I think almost every Irish bank is an English company, and could there be anything more unfair than to start with this—that in the estimate of the incomes of Ireland you are to say that everything collected in England, which means really the whole of the accumulated wealth of Ireland, is primâ facie to be credited to England? It is absolutely absurd.
There is no way of getting at the real amount that goes to Ireland. What do the Government propose as a solution of that question. Having laid down these broad principles of deduction—the deduction being generally at the source—what are the Joint Exchequer Board to do? The only direction given to it is that the broad principle is to be carried out subject to such adjustment as the Board may think equitable! Just fancy the income of a country being dependent on adjustments which a Board may think equitable, without a single rule being laid down as to what is equitable! It is merely that one man may come forward from England and say he thinks so and so is equitable, and another man may come forward from Ireland and say he thinks that something 1425 else is equitable. The thing is too absurd. You set up no rule as to what is to constitute equity, except that you say they are to attribute to Ireland any proceeds of taxes collected in Great Britain properly attributable to Ireland, and to attribute to Great Britain the proceeds of any taxes collected in Ireland properly attributable to Great Britain. What the conditions are to be is left at large. I venture to say that on no body except Parliament, or somebody acting under Parliament and responsible to Parliament, there never were such wide taxing powers conferred before.
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThey are not taxing powers.
§ Sir E. CARSONYes, they are.
§ Sir J. SIMONThey are not taxing powers. The taxing authority is the Imperial Parliament or the Irish Parliament.
§ Sir E. CARSONThat is a mere legal quibble, for this reason, that if they allocate less taxes to Ireland the Irish subject will have to be taxed more, and if they allocate less taxes to England the English subject will have to be taxed more. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] The Postmaster-General shakes his head. He seems to think it makes no difference whether you raise more or less taxes in any one year, and that it does not in the least affect the amount of taxes you have to put on in the next year. That is quite absurd. These gentlemen are to report, "We think it is equitable that so much taxes collected in England should go to Ireland, and we also think it equitable that so much taxes collected in Ireland should go to England." On what basis? On no basis.
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELNothing of the kind.
§ Sir E. CARSONOn no basis in this Clause. What the Amendment proposes is that before you pass this legislation you ought to set up some principle upon which Commissioners are to act in estimating the revenues both for Ireland and for England. Let me put one or two cases to the Solicitor-General to point out the difficulty. Supposing a man has a residence in England and a residence in Ireland—I am thinking of one or two; there are only one or two fortunate Irishmen who happen to be rich—and lives for part of the year in Ireland and for part of the year 1426 in England. What are the Commissioners to do in taking the Income Tax, all collected over here in realised securities, to find out what is just and equitable to attribute to Ireland and what they are to attribute to England? On what principle are they to act? Are they to hold an inquiry as to how many months he spent in Ireland and how many months he spent in England, and make out a sum as to how much by reason thereof he ought to give to England or Ireland? The thing is impossible. There is no way in which you can do it. What is equitable in these circumstances? What ought you to attribute to Ireland and what ought you to attribute to England? Let me take another point. Let me take a very ordinary case with which probably the hon. and learned Gentleman is not so well acquainted as I am or as the right hen. Gentleman who sits on his right and who is not allowed to speak in these Debates (Mr. T. W. Russell). How are you going to ascertain the amount of Income Tax collected in England that is paid over to Ireland? What is your process under the Bill of ascertaining that? You have no process, and you have no principle. You could not get it. You could not go to every company that pays dividends and has extracted them at the source and ask them, "Can you tell me how many Irishmen you have on your list? Can you tell me how much of your dividends you send over to Ireland?" It is impossible, for the simple reason that there are many Irishmen with accounts in London banks into which these are paid. You could not tell. My belief is that as regards all these it is Ireland that suffers in this matter, and for the simple reason that you lay down as your basis that primâ facie, everything that is collected in England is to go to England.
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThe right hon. Gentleman says primâ facie everything collected in England is to go to England and the Joint Exchequer Board is to allocate to Ireland so much, therefore it will make a difference in the tax raised in Ireland how much they allocate. The amount of the revenue of the Irish Parliament has nothing whatever to do with the determination of the Joint Exchequer Board.
§ Sir E. CARSONReally, have we come to this, that it is not of the least importance whether you find out the true revenue-of Ireland? The more you investigate this-the more farcical the whole thing appears. 1427 How are you to ascertain the proper amount of Income Tax to be, in the words of this Clause, "attributable to Ireland"? I defy anyone to tell unless you go round to every company, unless you go round to every foreign company, unless you go to the bonds which are in the banks and try to find out whether people who get them are Irishmen or not. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Balfour) to-day referred to my own case. Would a bank return me as an Irishman or would they attribute my income as properly assessable in this country? Would they investigate whether I had a residence in Ireland? Would they try and find out what my domicile is? And, in point of fact, I do not know what it is myself. Surely this matter is not sprung upon the Government. The Solicitor-General spoke very eloquently about Clause 16, and dealt with the Customs, but he did not tell us what he was doing with Income Tax. I have only time to deal with the Income Tax for a few moments, but it applies equally to the Death Duties. How are the Death Duties to be done? According as the Board thinks equitable. If you are to decide upon the question of whether a man has a domicile or not that raises the question that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Balfour) dealt with and which was interrupted by the right hon. Gentleman. Are these Gentlemen solemnly
§ to sit down and consider as regards the return of Income Tax paid by every citizen of the United Kingdom, go through them one by one, and try and ascertain what is the domicile of each one for making out the revenue between the two countries? I put a question the other day to the Prime Minister on this subject, and it was answered by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Herbert Samuel). Of course, it was beneath the dignity of the Prime Minister. I put these cases, one, two, and three, as regards these very questions of residence, joint residence, residence in two countries, banking account in one country and banking account in the other, and the right hon. Gentleman referred me to a White Paper, which said that all they could do was to guess at the thing. What is the answer I get to-night? That at half-past Ten—
§ It being half-past Ten of the clock, the CHAIRMAN proceeded, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 14th October, to put forthwith the Question on any Amendment already proposed from the Chair.
§ Question put, "That those words be there inserted."
§ The Committee divided: Ayes, 187; Noes, 311.
1431| Division No. 354.] | AYES. | [10.30 p.m. |
| Aitken, Sir William Max | Castlereagh, Viscount | Gordon, John (Londonderry, South) |
| Anson, Rt. Hon. Sir William R. | Cave, George | Gordon, Hon. John Edward (Brighton) |
| Ashley, Wilfrid W. | Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor) | Goulding, Edward Alfred |
| Astor, Waldorf | Cecil, Lord R. (Herts, Hitchin) | Greene, Walter Raymond |
| Baird, John Lawrence | Chaloner, Col. R. G. W. | Gretton, John |
| Balcarres, Lord | Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Worc'r.) | Guinness, Hon. Rupert (Essex, S. E.) |
| Baldwin, Stanley | Chambers, James | Guinness, Hon. W. E. (Bury S. Edmunds) |
| Banbury, Sir Frederick George | Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry | Gwynne, R. S. (Sussex, Eastbourne) |
| Barnston, Harry | Clive, Captain Percy Archer | Haddock, George Bahr |
| Barrie, H. T. | Clyde, J. Avon | Hall, D. B. (Isle of Wight) |
| Bathurst, Charles (Wilts, Wilton) | Cooper, Richard Ashmole | Hamersley, Alfred St. George |
| Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks | Courthope, George Loyd | Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.) |
| Beckett, Hon Gervase | Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.) | Hamilton, Marquess of (Londonderry) |
| Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth) | Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth) | Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence |
| Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish- | Craig, Captain James (Down, E.) | Harrison-Broadley, H. B. |
| Beresford, Lord Charles | Craig, Norman (Kent, Thanet) | Herbert, Hon. A. (Somerset, S.) |
| Bigland, Alfred | Craik, Sir Henry | Hickman, Col. Thomas E. |
| Bird, Alfred | Dalziel, Davison (Brixton) | Hill, Sir Clement L. |
| Blair, Reginald | Denniss, E. R. B. | Hills, John Waller |
| Boles, Lieut.-Col. Dennis Fortescue | Doughty, Sir George | Hill-Wood, Samuel |
| Boyle, William (Norfolk, Mid.) | Eyres-Monsell, Bolton M. | Hohler, Gerald Fitzrey |
| Boyton, James | Fell, Arthur | Hope, Harry (Bute) |
| Bridgeman, W. Clive | Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey | Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield) |
| Bull, Sir William James | Finlay, Rt. Hon. Sir Robert | Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian) |
| Burdett-Coutts, W. | Fleming, Valentine | Home, E. (Surrey, Guildford) |
| Burn, Colonel C. R. | Forster, Henry William | Horner, Andrew Long |
| Butcher, John George | Foster, Philip Staveley | Houston, Robert Paterson |
| Campbell, Capt. Duncan F. (Ayr, N.) | Gardner, Ernest | Hume-Williams, W. E. |
| Campbell, Rt. Hon. J. (Dublin Univ.) | Gastrell, Major W. Houghton | Hunt, Rowland |
| Campion, W. R. | Gibbs, George Abraham | Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk. |
| Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred | Gilmour, Captain John | Ingleby, Holcombe |
| Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward H. | Goldman, C. S. | Jessel, Captain H. M. |
| Cassel, Felix | Goldsmith, Frank | Kebty-Fletcher, J. R. |
| Kerr-Smiley, Peter Kerr | Orde-Powlett, Hon. W. G. A. | Strauss, Arthur (Paddington, North) |
| Kerry, Earl of | Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William | Swift, Rigby |
| Kimber, Sir Henry | Parker, Sir Gilbert (Gravesend) | Sykes, Alan John (Ches., Knutsford) |
| Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement | Parkes, Ebenezer | Talbot, Lord E. |
| Lane-Fox, G. R. | Peel, Captain R. F. | Terrell, George (Wilts, N. W.) |
| Larmor, Sir J. | Peto, Basil Edward | Terrell, Henry (Gloucester) |
| Law, Rt. Hon. A. Bonar (Bootle) | Pole-Carew, Sir R. | Thomson, W. Mitchell-(Down, N.) |
| Lawson, Hon. H. (T. H'mts., Mile End) | Pollock, Ernest Murray | Thynne, Lord A. |
| Lee, Arthur Hamilton | Pretyman, Ernest George | Touche, George Alexander |
| Lewisham, Viscount | Pryce-Jones, Col. E. | Tryon, Captain George Clement |
| Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury) | Quilter, Sir W. E. C. | Valentia, Viscount |
| Locker-Lampson, O. (Ramsey) | Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel | Walrond, Hon. Lionel |
| Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R. | Rawson, Colonel Richard H. | Ward, A. S. (Herts, Watford) |
| Long, Rt. Hon. Walter | Rees, Sir J. D. | Wheler, Granville C. H. |
| Lonsdale, Sir John Brownlee | Remnant, James Farquharson | White, Major G. D. (Lancs, Southport) |
| Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston) | Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall) | Willoughby, Major Hon. Claud |
| Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. (Droitwich) | Rolleston, Sir John | Wills, Sir Gilbert |
| MacCaw, Wm. J. MacGeagh | Ronaldshay, Earl of | Wilson, A. Stanley (Yorks, E. R.) |
| M'Neill, Ranald (Kent, St. Augustine's) | Rothschild, Lionel de | Winterton, Earl |
| Malcolm, Ian | Royds, Edmund | Wood, Hon. E. F. L. (Yorks, Ripon) |
| Meysey-Thompson, E. C. | Rutherford, John (Lancs., Darwen) | Wood, John (Stalybridge) |
| Middlemore, John Throgmorton | Rutherford, W. (Liverpool, W. Derby) | Worthington-Evans, L. |
| Mildmay, Francis Bingham | Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood) | Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart- |
| Mills, Hon. Charles Thomas | Sanders, Robert Arthur | Wright, Henry Fitzherbert |
| Moore, William | Sanderson, Lancelot | Yate, Col. C. E. |
| Mount, William Arthur | Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.) | Yerburgh, Robert A. |
| Neville, Reginald J. N. | Smith, Harold (Warrington) | Younger, Sir George |
| Newman, John R. P. | Stanley, Beville | |
| Newton, Harry Kottingham | Stanley, Hon. G. F. (Preston) | TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. |
| Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield) | Starkey, John Ralph | Amery and Mr. Hewins. |
| O'Neill, Hon. A. E. B. (Antrim, Mid) | Stewart, Gershom | |
| NOES. | ||
| Abraham, William (Dublin, Harbour) | Cotton, William Francis | Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale) |
| Abraham, Rt. Hon. William (Rhondda) | Crawshay-Williams, Eliot | Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose) |
| Acland, Francis Dyke | Crooks, William | Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire) |
| Adamson, William | Crumley, Patrick | Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale) |
| Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D. | Cullinan, John | Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West) |
| Agnew, Sir George William | Dalziel, Rt. Hon. Sir J. H. (Kirkcaldy) | Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N. E.) |
| Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartonshire) | Davies, Ellis William (Eifion) | Haslam, James (Derbyshire) |
| Allen, Rt. Hon. Charles P. (Stroud) | Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth) | Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth) |
| Arnold, Sydney | Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.) | Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry |
| Baker, H. T. (Accrington) | Dawes, J. A. | Hayden, John Patrick |
| Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury, E.) | De Forest, Baron | Hayward, Evan |
| Balfour, Sir Robert (Lanark) | Delany, William | Hazleton, Richard |
| Baring, Sir Godfrey (Barnstaple) | Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas | Helme, Sir Norval Watson |
| Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset) | Devlin, Joseph | Henderson, Arthur (Durham) |
| Barnes, G. N. | Dickinson, W. H. | Henry, Sir Charles |
| Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick) | Dillon, John | Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.) |
| Barran, Rowland Hurst (Leeds, N.) | Donelan, Captain A. | Higham, John Sharp |
| Barton, William | Doris, William | Hinds, John |
| Beauchamp, Sir Edward | Duffy, William J. | Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H. |
| Beck, Arthur Cecil | Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness) | Hodge, John |
| Benn, W. W. (T. H'mts, St. George) | Duncan, J. Hastings (York, Otley) | Hogge, James Myles |
| Bentham, G. J. | Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor) | Holmes, Daniel Turner |
| Birrell, Rt. Hon. Augustine | Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid) | Hope, John Deans (Haddington) |
| Black, Arthur W. | Elverston, Sir Harold | Horne, Charles Silvester (Ipswich) |
| Boland, John Pius | Esmonde, Dr. John (Tipperary, N.) | Hudson, Walter |
| Booth, Frederick Handel | Esmonde, Sir Thomas (Wexford, N.) | Hughes, S. L. |
| Bowerman, C. W. | Essex, Richard Walter | Illingworth, Percy H. |
| Boyle, Daniel (Mayo, North) | Falconer, James | Isaacs, Rt. Hon. Sir Rufus |
| Brace, William | Farrell, James Patrick | John, Edward Thomas |
| Brady, Patrick Joseph | Ferens, Rt. Hon. Thomas Robinson | Jones, Rt. Hon. Sir D. Brynmor (Sw'nsea) |
| Brocklehurst, W. B. | Ffrench, Peter | Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil) |
| Bryce, J. Annan | Field, William | Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth) |
| Buckmaster, Stanley O. | Fiennes, Hon. Eustace Edward | Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East) |
| Burke, E. Haviland- | Fitzgibbon, John | Jones, Leif Stratten (Notts, Rushcliffe) |
| Burns, Rt. Hon. John | Flavin, Michael Joseph | Jones, William (Carnarvonshire) |
| Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas | France, Gerald Ashburner | Jones, W. S. Glyn-(Stepney) |
| Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney C. (Poplar) | Gill, A. H. | Jowett, F. W. |
| Byles, Sir William Pollard | Ginnell, Laurence | Joyce, Michael |
| Carr-Gomm, H. W. | Gladstone, W. G. C. | Keating, Matthew |
| Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich) | Glanville, H. J. | Kellaway, Frederick George |
| Cawley, Harold T. (Heywood) | Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford | Kennedy, Vincent Paul |
| Chancellor, Henry George | Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough) | Kilbride, Denis |
| Chapple, Dr. William Allen | Greenwood, Hamar (Sunderland) | King, J. |
| Clancy, John Joseph | Griffith, Ellis J. | Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade) |
| Clough, William | Guest, Hon. Major C. H. C. (Pembroke) | Lardner, James Carrige Rushe |
| Clynes, John R. | Gulland, John William | Law, Hugh A. (Donegal, W.) |
| Collins, G. P. (Greenock) | Gwynn, Stephen Lucius (Galway) | Lawson, Sir W. (Cumb'rld, Cockerm'th) |
| Collins, Stephen (Lambeth) | Hackett, John | Leach, Charles |
| Condon, Thomas Joseph | Hall, Frederick (Yorks, Normanton) | Levy, Sir Maurice |
| Cornwall, Sir Edwin A. | Hancock, J. G. | Lewis, John Herbert |
| Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas | O'Malley, William | Shortt, Edward |
| Low, Sir F. (Norwich) | O'Neill, Dr. Charles (Armagh, S.) | Simon, Sir John Allsebrook |
| Lundon, Thomas | O'Shaughnessy, P. J. | Smith, Albert (Lancs., Clitheroe) |
| Lyell, Charles Henry | O'Shee, James John | Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton) |
| Lynch, A. A. | O'Sullivan, Timothy | Smyth, Thomas F. (Leitrim, S.) |
| Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs) | Outhwaite, R. L. | Snowden, Philip |
| McGhee, Richard | Palmer, Godfrey Mark | Soames, Arthur Wellesley |
| Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J. | Parker, James (Halifax) | Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert |
| MacNeill, J. G. Swift (Donegal, South) | Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek) | Stanley, Albert (Staffs, N. W.) |
| Macpherson, James Ian | Pearce, William (Limehouse) | Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West) |
| MacVeagh, Jeremiah | Pease, Rt. Hon. Joseph A. (Rotherham) | Sutherland, J. E. |
| M'Callum, Sir John M. | Philipps, Col. Ivor (Southampton) | Sutton, John E. |
| M'Curdy, C. A. | Phillips, John (Longford, S.) | Taylor, John W. (Durham) |
| M'Kean, John | Pirie, Duncan Vernon | Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe) |
| McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald | Pointer, Joseph | Taylor, Thomas (Bolton) |
| M'Laren, Hon. H. D. (Leics.) | Pollard, Sir George H. | Tennant, Harold John |
| M'Laren, Hon. F. W. S. (Lincs., Spalding) | Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H. | Thomas, J. H. |
| Manfield, Harry | Power, Patrick Joseph | Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton) |
| Marks, Sir George Croydon | Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central) | Toulmin, Sir George |
| Marshall, Arthur Harold | Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.) | Trevelyan, Charles Philips |
| Martin, Joseph | Priestley, Sir Arthur (Grantham) | Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander |
| Mason, David M. (Coventry) | Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.) | Verney, Sir Harry |
| Masterman, Rt. Hon. C. F. G. | Pringle, William M. R. | Wadsworth, John |
| Meagher, Michael | Radford, G. H. | Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince) |
| Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.) | Raffan, Peter Wilson | Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent) |
| Menzies, Sir Walter | Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (South Shields) | Wardle, George J. |
| Millar, James Duncan | Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough) | Waring, Walter |
| Molloy, Michael | Reddy, Michael | Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay |
| Molteno, Percy Alport | Redmond, John E. (Waterford) | Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan) |
| Mond, Sir Alfred M. | Redmond, William (Clare, E.) | Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney) |
| Money, L. G. Chiozza | Redmond, William Archer (Tyrone, E.) | Watt, Henry A. |
| Mooney, John J. | Rendall, Athelstan | Webb, H. |
| Morgan, George Hay | Richards, Thomas | White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston) |
| Morrell, Philip | Richardson, Albion (Peckham) | White, Patrick (Meath, North) |
| Morison, Hector | Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven) | Whitehouse, John Howard |
| Morton, Alpheus Cleophas | Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln) | Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P. |
| Muldoon, John | Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs) | Whyte, A. F. (Perth) |
| Munro-Ferguson, Rt. Hon. R. C. | Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford) | Wiles, Thomas |
| Nannetti, Joseph P. | Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside) | Wilkie, Alexander |
| Needham, Christopher T. | Robinson, Sidney | Williams, J. (Glamorgan) |
| Neilson, Francis | Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke) | Williams, Llewelyn (Carmarthen) |
| Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster) | Roche, Augustine (Louth) | Williams, P. (Middlesbrough) |
| Nolan, Joseph | Roche, John (Galway, E.) | Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.) |
| Norton, Captain Cecil W. | Roe, Sir Thomas | Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Worcs., N.) |
| Nugent, Sir Walter Richard | Rose, Sir Charles Day | Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton) |
| Nuttall, Harry | Rowlands, James | Winfrey, Richard |
| O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny) | Rowntree, Arnold | Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glas.) |
| O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.) | Russel, Rt. Hon. Thomas W. | Young, Samuel (Cavan, East) |
| O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool) | Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland) | Young, William (Perthshire, E.) |
| O'Doherty, Philip | Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees) | Yoxall, Sir James Henry |
| O'Donnell, Thomas | Scanlan, Thomas | |
| Ogden, Fred | Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton) | |
| O'Grady, James | Seely, Col. Rt. Hon. J. E. B. | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. |
| O'Kelly, Edward P. (Wicklow, W.) | Sheehy, David | G. Howard and Captain Guest. |
| O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N.) | Sherwell, Arthur James |
§ The CHAIRMAN then proceeded successively to put forthwith the Question on any Amendments moved by the Government of which notice had been given, and the Questions necessary to dispose of the
1432§ business to be concluded at Half-past Ten of the Clock at this day's sitting.
§ Question put, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."
§ The Committee divided: Ayes, 313; Noes, 190.
1435| Division No. 355.] | AYES. | [10.40 p.m. |
| Abraham, William (Dublin, Harbour) | Barran, Rowland Hurst (Leeds, N.) | Buckmaster, Stanley O. |
| Abraham, Rt. Hon. William (Rhondda) | Barton, William | Burke, E. Haviland- |
| Acland, Francis Dyke | Beauchamp, Sir Edward | Burns, Rt. Hon. John |
| Adamson, William | Beck, Arthur Cecil | Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas |
| Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D. | Benn, W. W. (T. H'mts, St. George) | Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney C. (Poplar) |
| Agnew, Sir George William | Bentham, G. J. | Byles, Sir William Pollard |
| Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartonshire) | Birred, Rt. Hon. Augustine | Carr-Gomm, H. W. |
| Allen, Rt. Hon. Charles P. (Stroud) | Black, Arthur W. | Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich) |
| Arnold, Sydney | Boland, John Pius | Cawley, Harold T. (Heywood) |
| Baker, H. T. (Accrington) | Booth, Frederick Handel | Chancellor, Henry George |
| Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury, E.) | Bowerman, C. W. | Chapple, Dr. William Allen |
| Balfour, Sir Robert (Lanark) | Boyle, Daniel (Mayo, North) | Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S. |
| Baring, Sir Godfrey (Barnstaple) | Brace, William | Clancy, John Joseph |
| Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset) | Brady, Patrick Joseph | Clough, William |
| Barnes, G. N. | Brocklehurst, W. B. | Clynes, John R. |
| Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick) | Bryce, J. Annan | Collins, G. P. (Greenock) |
| Collins, Stephen (Lambeth) | Jones, Rt. Hon. Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea) | Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek) |
| Condon, Thomas Joseph | Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil) | Pearce, William (Limehouse) |
| Cornwall, Sir Edwin A. | Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth) | Pease, Rt. Hon. Joseph A. (Rotherham) |
| Cotton, William Francis | Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East) | Philipps, Col. Ivor (Southampton) |
| Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth) | Jones, Leif Stratten (Notts, Rushcliffe) | Phillips, John (Longford, S.) |
| Crawshay-Williams, Eliot | Jones, William (Carnarvonshire) | Pirle, Duncan Vernon |
| Crooks, William | Jones, W. S. Glyn-(Stepney) | Pointer, Joseph |
| Crumley, Patrick | Jowett, F. W. | Pollard, Sir George H. |
| Cullinan, John | Joyce, Michael | Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H. |
| Dalziel, Rt. Hon. Sir J. H. (Kirkcaldy) | Keating, Matthew | Power, Patrick Joseph |
| Davies, Ellis William (Eifion) | Kellaway, Frederick George | Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central) |
| Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth) | Kennedy, Vincent Paul | Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.) |
| Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.) | Kilbride, Denis | Priestley, Sir Arthur (Grantham) |
| Dawes, J. A. | King, J. | Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.) |
| De Forest, Baron | Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade) | Pringle, William M. R. |
| Delany, William | Lardner, James Carrige Rushe | Radford, G. H. |
| Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas | Law, Hugh A. (Donegal, W.) | Rattan, Peter Wilson |
| Devlin, Joseph | Lawson, Sir W. (Cumb'rld, Cockerm'th) | Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (South Shields) |
| Dickinson, W. H. | Leach, Charles | Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough) |
| Dillon, John | Levy, Sir Maurice | Reddy, Michael |
| Donelan, Captain A. | Lewis, John Herbert | Redmond, John E. (Waterford) |
| Doris, William | Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Redmond, William (Clare, E.) |
| Duffy, William J. | Low, Sir F. (Norwich) | Redmond, William Archer (Tyrone, E.) |
| Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness) | Lundon, Thomas | Rendall, Athelstan |
| Duncan, J. Hastings (Yorks, Otley) | Lyell, Charles Henry | Richards, Thomas |
| Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor) | Lynch, A. A. | Richardson, Albion (Peckham) |
| Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid.) | Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs) | Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven) |
| Elverston, Sir Harold | McGhee, Richard | Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln) |
| Esmonde, Dr. John (Tipperary, N.) | Maclean, Donald | Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs) |
| Esmonde, Sir Thomas (Wexford, N.) | Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J. | Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford) |
| Essex, Richard Walter | MacNeill, J. G. Swift (Donegal, South) | Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside) |
| Falconer, James | Macpherson, James Ian | Robinson, Sidney |
| Farrell, James Patrick | MacVeagh, Jeremiah | Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke) |
| Ferens, Rt. Hon. Thomas Robinson | M'Callum, Sir John M. | Roche, Augustine (Louth) |
| Ffrench, Peter | M'Curdy, C. A. | Roche, John (Galway, E.) |
| Field, William | M'Kean, John | Roe, Sir Thomas |
| Fiennes, Hon. Eustace Edward | McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald | Rose, Sir Charles Day |
| Fitzgibbon, John | M'Laren, Hon. H. D. (Leics.) | Rowlands, James |
| Flavin, Michael Joseph | M'Laren, Hon. F.W.S. (Lincs., Spalding) | Rowntree, Arnold |
| France, Gerald Ashburner | Manfield, Harry | Russell, Rt. Hon. Thomas W. |
| Gill, Alfred Henry | Marks, Sir George Croydon | Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland) |
| Ginnell, Laurence | Marshall, Arthur Harold | Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees) |
| Gladstone, W. G. C. | Martin, Joseph | Scanlan, Thomas |
| Glanville, H. J. | Mason, David M. (Coventry) | Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton) |
| Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford | Meagher, Michael | Seely, Col. Rt. Hon. J. E. B. |
| Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough) | Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.) | Sheehy, David |
| Greenwood, Hamar (Sunderland) | Menzies, Sir Walter | Sherwell, Arthur James |
| Griffith, Ellis J. | Millar, James Duncan | Shortt, Edward |
| Guest, Major Hon. C. H. C. (Pembroke) | Molloy, Michael | Simon, Sir John Allsebrook |
| Gulland, John William | Molteno, Percy Alport | Smith, Albert (Lancs., Clitheroe) |
| Gwynn, Stephen Lucius (Galway) | Mond, Sir Alfred M. | Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton) |
| Hackett, John | Money, L. G. Chiozza | Smyth, Thomas F. (Leitrim, S.) |
| Hall, Frederick (Normanton) | Mooney, John J. | Snowden, Philip |
| Hancock, J. G. | Morgan, George Hay | Soames, Arthur Wellesley |
| Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis (Rossendale) | Morrell, Philip | Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert |
| Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose) | Morison, Hector | Stanley, Albert (Staffs, N. W.) |
| Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire) | Morton, Alpheus Cleophas | Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West) |
| Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale) | Muldoon, John | Sutherland, John E. |
| Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West) | Munro-Ferguson, Rt. Hon. R. C. | Sutton, John E. |
| Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N. E.) | Nannetti, Joseph P. | Taylor, John W. (Durham) |
| Haslam, James (Derbyshire) | Needham, Christopher T. | Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe) |
| Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth) | Neilson, Francis | Taylor, Thomas (Bolton) |
| Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry | Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster) | Tennant, Harold John |
| Hayden, John Patrick | Nolan, Joseph | Thomas, J. H. |
| Hayward, Evan | Norton, Captain Cecil W. | Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton) |
| Hazleton, Richard | Nugent, Sir Walter Richard | Toulmin, Sir George |
| Helme, Sir Norval Watson | Nuttall, Harry | Trevelyan, Charles Philips |
| Henderson, Arthur (Durham) | O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny) | Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander |
| Henry, Sir Charles | O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.) | Verney, Sir Harry |
| Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.) | O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool) | Wadsworth, John |
| Higham, John Sharp | O'Doherty, Philip | Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince) |
| Hinds, John | O'Donnell, Thomas | Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent) |
| Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H. | Ogden, Fred | Wardle, George J. |
| Hodge, John | O'Grady, James | Waring, Walter |
| Hogge, James Myles | O'Kelly, Edward P. (Wicklow, W.) | Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay |
| Holmes, Daniel Turner | O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, W.) | Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan) |
| Holt, Richard Durning | O'Malley, William | Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney) |
| Hope, John Deans (Haddington) | O'Neill, Dr. Charles (Armagh, S.) | Watt, Henry A. |
| Home, Charles Silvester (Ipswich) | O'Shaughnessy, P. J. | Webb, H. |
| Hudson, Walter | O'Shee, James John | White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston) |
| Hughs, S. L. | O Sullivan, Timothy | White, Patrick (Meath, North) |
| Illingworth, Percy H. | Outhwaite, R. L. | Whitehouse, John Howard |
| Isaacs, Rt. Hon. Sir Rufus | Palmer, Godfrey Mark | Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P. |
| John, Edward Thomas | Parker, James (Halifax) | Whyte, A. F. (Perth) |
| Wiles, Thomas | Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Worcs., N.) | Young, William (Perthshire, E.) |
| Wilkie, Alexander | Wilson, W. T (Westhoughton) | Yoxall, Sir James Henry |
| Williams, J. (Glamorgan) | Winfrey, Richard | |
| Williams, Llewelyn (Carmarthen) | Wood, Rt Hon. T. McKinnon (Glas.) | TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. |
| Williams, P. (Middlesbrough) | Young, Samuel (Cavan, East) | G. Howard and Captain Guest. |
| Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.) | ||
| NOES. | ||
| Aitken, Sir William Max | Goldman, C. S. | Newton, Harry Kottingham |
| Amery, L. C. M. S. | Goldsmith, Frank | Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield) |
| Anson, Rt. Hon. Sir William R. | Gordon, John (Londonderry, South) | O'Neill, Hon. A. E. B. (Antrim, Mid) |
| Ashley, Wilfrid W. | Gordon, Hon. John Edward (Brighton) | Orde-Powlett, Hon. W. G. A. |
| Astor, Waldorf | Goulding, Edward Alfred | Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William |
| Baird, John Lawrence | Greene, Walter Raymond | Parker, Sir Gilbert (Gravesend) |
| Balcarres, Lord | Gretton, John | Parkcs, Ebenezer |
| Baldwin, Stanley | Guinness, Hon. Rupert (Essex, S. E.) | Peel, Capt. R. F. (Woodbridge) |
| Banbury, Sir Frederick George | Guinness, Hon. W. E. (Bury S. Edmunds) | Peto, Basil Edward |
| Barnston, Harry | Gwynne, R. S. (Sussex, Eastbourne) | Pole-Carew, Sir R. |
| Barrie, H. T. | Haddock, George Bahr | Pollock, Ernest Murray |
| Bathurst, Charles (Wilts, Wilton) | Hall, D. B. (Isle of Wight) | Pretyman, Ernest George |
| Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks | Hall, Fred (Dulwich) | Pryce-Jones, Col. E. |
| Beckett, Hon. Gervase | Hamersley, Alfred St. George | Quitter, Sir W. E. C |
| Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth) | Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.) | Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel |
| Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish | Hamilton, Marquess of (Londonderry) | Rawson, Colonel Richard H. |
| Beresford, Lord Charles | Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence | Rees, Sir J. D. |
| Bigland, Alfred | Harrison-Broadley, H. B. | Remnant, James Farquharson |
| Bird, Alfred | Herbert, Hon. A. (Somerset, S.) | Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall) |
| Blair, Reginald | Hewins, William Albert Samuel | Rolleston, Sir John |
| Boles, Lieut.-Col. Dennis Fortescue | Hickman, Col. Thomas E. | Ronaldshay, Earl of |
| Boyle, William (Norfolk, Mid) | Hill, Sir Clement L. | Rothschild, Lionel de |
| Boyton, James | Hill-Wood, Samuel | Royds, Edmund |
| Bridgeman, W. Clive | Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy | Rutherford, John (Lancs., Darwen) |
| Bull, Sir William James | Hope, Harry (Bute) | Rutherford, W. (Liverpool, W. Derby) |
| Burdett-Coutts, W. | Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield) | Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood) |
| Burn, Colonel C. R. | Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian) | Sanders, Robert Arthur |
| Butcher, John George | Home, E. (Surrey, Guildford) | Sanderson, Lancelot |
| Campbell, Capt. Duncan F. (Ayr, N.) | Horner, Andrew Long | Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.) |
| Campbell, Rt. Hon. J. (Dublin Univ.) | Houston, Robert Paterson | Smith, Harold (Warrington) |
| Campion, W. R. | Hume-Williams, W. E. | Stanier, Beville |
| Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred | Hunt, Rowland | Stanley, Hon. G. F. (Preston) |
| Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward H. | Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk. | Starkey, John Ralph |
| Cassel, Felix | Ingleby, Holcombe | Steel-Maitland, A. D. |
| Castlereagh, Viscount | Jessel, Captain H. M. | Stewart, Gersnom |
| Cave, George | Kebty-Fletcher, J. R. | Strauss, Arthur (Paddington, North) |
| Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor) | Kerr-Smiley, Peter Kerr | Swift, Rigby |
| Cecil, Lord R. (Herts, Hitchin) | Kerry, Earl of | Sykes, Alan John (Ches., Knutsford) |
| Chaloner, Col. R. G. W. | Kimber, Sir Henry | Talbot, Lord Edmund |
| Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Worc'r.) | Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement | Terrell, George (Wilts, N. W.) |
| Chambers, James | Lane-Fox, G. R. | Terrell, Henry (Gloucester) |
| Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry | Larmor, Sir J. | Thomson, W. Mitchell-(Down, N.) |
| Clive, Captain Percy Archer | Law, Rt. Hon. A Bonar (Bootle) | Touche, George Alexander |
| Clyde, J. Avon | Lawson, Hon. H. (T. H'mts., Mile End) | Tryon, Captain George Clement |
| Cooper, Richard Ashmole | Lee, Arthur Hamilton | Valentia, Viscount |
| Courthope, George Loyd | Lewisham, Viscount | Walrond, Hon. Lionel |
| Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.) | Locker, Lampson, G. (Salisbury) | Ward, A. S. (Herts, Watford) |
| Craig, Captain James (Down, E.) | Locker-Lampson, O. (Ramsey) | Wheler, Granville C. H. |
| Craig, Norman (Kent, Thanet) | Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R. | White, Major G. D. (Lancs., Southport) |
| Craik, Sir Henry | Long, Rt. Hon. Walter | Willoughby, Major Hon. Claud |
| Dalziel, Davison (Brixton) | Lonsdale, Sir John Brownlee | Wills, Sir Gilbert |
| Denniss, E. R. B. | Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston) | Wilson, A. Stanley (Yorks, E. R.) |
| Doughty, Sir George | Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. (Droitwich) | Winterton, Earl |
| Eyres-Monsell, Bolton M. | MacCaw, Wm. J. MacGeagh | Wood, Hon. E. F. L. (Yorks, Ripon) |
| Fell, Arthur | McNeill, Ronald (Kent, St. Augustine's) | Wood, John (Stalybridge) |
| Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey | Malcolm, Ian | Worthington-Evans, L. |
| Finlay, Rt. Hon. Sir Robert | Meysey-Thompson, E. C. | Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart- |
| Fleming, Valentine | Middlemore, John Throgmorton | Wright, Henry Fitzherbert |
| Forster, Henry William | Mildmay, Francis Bingham | Yate, Col. C. E. |
| Foster, Philip Staveley | Mills, Hon. Charles Thomas | Yerburgh, Robert A. |
| Gardner, Ernest | Moore, William | Younger, Sir George |
| Gastrell, Major W. Houghton | Mount, William Arthur | |
| Gibbs, G. A. | Neville, Reginald J. N. | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Lord |
| Gilmour, Captain John | Newman, John R. P. | A. Thynne and Mr. Hills. |