Commons Sitting of 18 October 1912

Preamble
The House met at Twelve of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Pier and Harbour Orders Confirmation (No. 4) Bill [Lords],
Read a second time, and committed.
Norfolk Fisheries Provisional Order Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Wednesday next, at a quarter-past Eight of the clock.
Falkirk Burgh Order Confirmation Bill,
"To confirm a Provisional Order under the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, relating to Falkirk Burgh (to be proceeded with under Sections 8 and 9 of the Act)." Presented by Mr. MCKINNON WOOD; read the first time; and ordered (under Section 9 of the Act) to be read a second time upon Monday, 28th October, and to be printed.

FORESHORES (SALES, ETC.).
Return presented relative thereto [ordered 17th October; Mr. Sydney Buxton]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 338.]
WHEAT.
Return presented relative thereto [ordered 7th August; Mr. Charles Bathurst]; to lie upon the Table.
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE (IRELAND).
  Mr. CHAPLIN: I beg to move, "That the Order of the Board of Agriculture, dated the 4th day of October, 1912, for the admission of Irish store cattle be now considered."
  In making this Motion, I may be allowed to say at once that I have no intention and never have had of making a Motion on this question which should be hostile to the present Minister of Agriculture, unless indeed there has been a continuation of the serious outbreak in Ireland and the admission of store cattle into Great Britain while that outbreak still continued. Of course, however, I do not for a moment believe the right hon. Gentleman would ever have agreed to it. Indeed, I have made my Motion as wide and general and innocuous as possible, both for this and for other reasons. In the first place, as the days pass by we are approaching the time in my opinion—should there not be any further outbreak, which God forbid —when the danger will be passed. Secondly, the county councils of this country are in many cases, from information which reaches me, taking this question in their own hands, and moving resolutions at their county council meetings to protect themselves, which I may add they have beyond all question the power and right to do, and therefore no further intervention upon my part, it seems to me, was needed. As far, therefore, as I am concerned, I should have been content, had there been no further outbreak, to leave matters where they were. I found, however, that in various parts of the House, and especially among the Nationalist party, there was very great anxiety for full discussion of this subject. That, I learned, I may say, from the hon. Gentleman who I understand fills the post of Whip to that party, who spoke to me one day on the subject in the Lobby, and asked me whether I really intended to raise a discussion upon this subject, upon which a good deal of anxiety he said was felt by the party whom he represented. I answered most readily that if that were so, I would most certainly avail myself of the offer so courteously made to me by the Prime Minister, and that I would endeavour to raise the question in the widest possible form. I am inclined to
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  think upon the whole, seeing how long a time it is since we ever had a wide and great infliction of this kind in this country, and that the whole question is more or less new to the large majority of the present Members of this House, I think I may say indeed to the present generation, I am inclined to think that a discussion upon this question, which after all is one of national gravity, if ever it took an extreme and prolonged form, will not by any means be a waste of the time on the part of the House of Commons.
  I make the Motion in the form in which it stands for the purpose I have just described. The chief factors in the situation appear to me to be as follows: First of all there is the recent outbreak in Ireland, and the fact that its existence for some time was apparently unknown to the Irish Board, and that animals had been actually exported to England before it was actually known. Secondly, there is the action of the British Department in suspending the further landing of Irish cattle in Great Britain. Thirdly, the demand from Ireland and the Nationalist agitation which quickly arose for their re-admission—
  Mr. GINNELL: Not exclusively Nationalist—non-party!
  Mr. CHAPLIN: Yes, non-party, I think. Fourthly, the first concession of the Government — namely, the opening of certain ports in Ireland for the embarkation of fat cattle and their landing at certain wharves in England for slaughter at the port; and, fifthly, the readmission of Irish store cattle, to be scattered again through England, Scotland, and Wales. It was upon this last point that the deputation, which waited not many days ago upon the right hon. Gentleman, was chiefly anxious. But so was I. I wish this afternoon to begin by referring briefly to the first concession of the Government in connection with the opening of the Port of Dundalk. The right hon. Gentleman will remember quite well that I raised that question on the very last night of the Session before we separated for the Recess at the very close of the Debate. In that case, and also in the second concession, namely, the admission of Irish store cattle under the new Order, the action of His Majesty's Government, in my opinion and in the opinion of the great mass of the deputation which waited upon him, was premature. That indeed has always been our main objection to the

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  recent proposals adopted by the President of the Board of Agriculture. We believe they were premature, and were adopted at a period when they involved a risk which, in our opinion, ought not to have been incurred. May I recall very briefly what the first concession was It was announced that the Port of Dundalk was going to be opened for the transmission of fat cattle to England. In my opinion, Dundalk was too near to an infected district to be safe. It was only some twenty or twenty-five miles away at the outside, as far as I could ascertain, from the borders of the infected district.
  I thought this was so serious that, very greatly to my own inconvenience, I waited until almost everyone had gone in order to raise my voice in protest against this premature reopening of a port quite close to an infected district. It was only at the very last moment before the House adjourned after the Sugar Debate was over that I got a chance of raising this question, and I pressed upon the President most earnestly and I think very respectfully that it would be wiser and safer to postpone the opening of that port, at all events for a further time. Why did I do so? Because, as I have pointed out, all my experience in the past—and I have had a great deal in connection with this question—has taught me in cases similar to the outbreak in the county of Dublin, that though the disease might be within the infected district to-day, it was perfectly possible, and indeed very probable and of common occurrence, that it might be twenty or twenty-five miles outside of it on the next day. As a matter of fact that was exactly what occurred in this case, for although in spite of what I have been saying, the port of Dundalk was opened for the transmission of fat cattle to England. The very thing I suggested as possible occurred almost immediately afterwards, because there was an outbreak in the immediate vicinity of Dundalk with the result that although the port had only just been opened it was found necessary almost immediately to close it again. I am not blaming the right hon. Gentleman and I never have done, because no one in this House as ever sympathised more than I have done with a man who had only recently taken up a new position in a department with the affairs of which he had, in all probability, had but a small opportunity previously of making himself thoroughly acquainted. Almost before the right hon. Gentle-
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  man was in the saddle he found himself confronted with the greatest disaster a Board of Agriculture could undergo and he was called upon immediately to deal with it and of course he had to rely upon the information given him by his expert advisers. I know most of them, and the chief of the office who was appointed by me is a gentleman I have always regarded as a man of great ability who has thoroughly learned his business at the Board of Agriculture, and if there be blame for anything that has happened since then it is him who is to blame and not the President with a small experience he has had, although I know the right hon. Gentleman will be ready to take the whole of the responsibility. In this action on the part of the Government there was the absolute confession that in this particular case they were entirely mistaken. There has been an admitted mistake in this case and there may be mistakes in others; but I quote that to show that I am not without some justification for the course I am taking in connection with this matter.
  With regard to the second concession, namely, the readmision of Irish store cattle into great Britain at the time that they were readmitted. The great deputation which waited upon the right hon. Gentleman represented all the great agricultural societies of England of every sort and kind from every part of the country. There were some representatives from Scotland, but not a great number, because there was not sufficient time to arrange the matter. The universal complaint of this deputation was that the re-admission of these cattle under all the circumstances was premature. Can anyone deny this, even to-day, who regards the simple facts of the situation? Supposing the Board experience a great piece of good fortune, which I sincerely wish may attend them, and no evil consequences follow, can anyone deny that there was justification for the attitude we took up, having in view the facts of the situation? The Minister for Agriculture had written a most courteous and reassuring reply to a political supporter and friend of his own, the hon. Member for the Buckrose Division (Sir Luke White), whom T am delighted to see in his place. He is the chairman of the Central Chamber of Agriculture for the present year. It was written on the 21st of September and it was most warmly welcomed by the whole of the agricultural community generally, for this reason. It gave them the one assurance they wanted more than any-

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  thing else in the world, at a critical time when they knew that the Nationalist party were bringing to bear the greatest possible pressure upon the right hon. Gentleman, the assurance that they would be protected.
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Runciman): I hesitate to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman, but I should like him from the very beginning to realise that absolutely no pressure was brought to bear upon me from the Nationalist party. That assumption, which had a great deal of influence in the country, is absolutely without any foundation in fact.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: Of course, I accept every assurance that the right hon. Gentleman gives me, but that there was a Nationalist agitation, the object and purpose of which was—[HON. MEMBERS: "No, not Nationalist."] It is a matter of common knowledge in every portion of the Press in Ireland and England that there was a Nationalist agitation. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO, Irish."] Did the Nationalists take no part in it? [An HON. MEMBER: "The 'Irish Times' led it,"]
  Mr. FLAVIN: Might I—
  Mr. SPEAKER: Would it not be better to allow the right hon. Gentleman to continue his speech? There will be plenty of opportunity of replying. The Five o'clock Rule is suspended.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: I have every sympathy in the world with the anxiety—I have often expressed it—of Irish members upon this subject; and before I sit down I may say something even yet to reassure them as to my feelings upon this point. That there was this agitation is a question of undoubted fact which no one contradicts, and of course there had been some anxiety on the part of agriculturists in England as to whether the Government might or might not in some degree-be affected by this agitation. All their apprehensions were removed by the letter of the right hon. Gentleman written upon 21st September last, because it was given in these words:—
  "Although I hope it may be possible for me to make further modifications in our regulations from time to time if no further cases of disease occur, specially precautionary measures will in any event be necessary for some time yet to come."
  Observe, that this was the unqualified condition—nothing could be clearer or
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  more simple—that further modifications might be expected if no further outbreak occurred. The letter was published to the world on 24th September, and of course it came like a thunderclap on those who read it, and who were so pleased with it when they read the announcement in the "Times" of the new departure on the 30th of the same month. No one was more astonished than myself when I found, as I did find afterwards, that that Order or announcement was sanctioned by the President of the Board on 28th September, only four days after his letter to the English public, through the mouth of the Chairman of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, had been published, and on the very day, moreover—this is a most curious and remarkable coincidence—when an announcement of a further outbreak in Ireland was published in the "Times." That was the position in which all those representative agriculturists in England found themselves on the day that the deputation waited upon the right hon. Gentleman. And that was not all, for there was another outbreak in Wicklow on 3rd October following. It was because of these recent outbreaks that I took the strongest objection to the new departure.
  My experience had taught me that the readmission of Irish stores, although of course it might possibly succeed, must be attended by a risk to English breeders, to English owners of cattle, and to English agriculturists generally, which ought not to have been incurred. Let me say why I disagree entirely with the policy of the new Order under which all this is being carried out, I disagree with it because it assumes that the animals which it admits into the interior of the country are not free from the danger of bringing infection with them. That is the assumption which underlies the whole of the Order, because they are subject to certain rigid restrictions intended to guard against the possibility of the spread of the infection. I have two things to say upon that point, and the first of them is this: either the animals admitted by the Order are free from the danger of carrying infection with them or they are not. If they are free they ought not to be subjected to these restrictions. They are restrictions of the most harassing character. They are something more than that; they are restrictions which, in my opinion, are totally futile and useless for the purpose of preventing the spread of the disease if the disease is carried by these animals; and if they are justly under the suspicion of the

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  Board of Agriculture, as they are other wise, they would not have made these restrictions. If they are not free from this danger, then I say they ought not to come at all until they are free and until they can come into the country without the danger of spreading the infection. That is the first thing I have to say. The second is this: The Order says that on arrival at the landing place they are to be detained for four days, a period which in my humble judgment is wholly insufficient to determine their free dom from disease. The period of incubation varies greatly, in some cases very greatly. You can seldom tell for certain how long that period will be. It depends entirely upon the particular circumstances and conditions under which the individual animal contracted the disease. The Order also provides that they are to be sent to a place of detention and there kept under supervision for thirty days more. How are they going to get there? The place of detention, according to the announcement in the "Times," is to be premises of the new purchaser of the cattle. They are to be conveyed as far as possible by train, and they are to be kept absolutely separate from all other animals. How easy it is— so delightfully easy!—for gentlemen sitting in an office to draw in legal form nice crisp, clean regulations like this. It is perfectly easy until you come to the station where the animals have to be unloaded. What is going to happen then?
  Take the case of large farms, of which I could quote scores in any county of England, and notably in great counties like Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, where the premises of the new owner will over and over again be, it may be, ten or fifteen miles from a station. They must travel to their destination, wherever it is, whether it be the premises of the new owner or any other premises. It is provided they are to go to another destination, where they are to be kept for thirty days, although I do not know that the premises of the new owner specifically given in the "Times" is actually contained in the Order. The announcement came from the Board of Agriculture, and therefore I rely upon it. They must travel along the high roads and often through lanes bounded by thick bulrushes in the county of Lincoln and others with which I am acquainted, and from which sometimes I have met my fate, or by high banks where your vision is extremely
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  limited. When you come to four cross roads, the Irish drove has to turn to the right or left, it does not matter which—I assume a perfectly normal case—and as soon as they turn they are met by an English drove of cattle either going to market or from one farm to another and they are all mixed up together. Supposing they escape that danger, your difficulties are not over. Here let me say I had a letter a few days ago from a Noble Friend of my own, a country gentleman thoroughly acquainted with all these matters, a gentleman who sat for some years in this House and who was also in charge of the Agricultural Department, which at that time was under the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the present Lord Heneage, and his letter is so much to the point that I think the House will forgive me if I read. it. He writes to remind me of the great danger of moving cattle along the high roads of this country, after being driven and knocked about in loading boats and trains, in a highly feverish condition, making them liable to any infection from unhealthy cattle or to develop quickly any latent disease. Speaking of his own county, Lincoln, with which I am equally well acquainted, he says:—
  "The highways and roadsides are largely grazed by the cows of the village cottagers, and they will he grazing there late this autumn on account of the abundance of grass and the disastrous hay crop which makes fodder scarce. The Irish cattle will pass through all these cows continually, as well as the droves of fat and store cattle going to and from fairs and markets, whilst they will leave their saliva and manure as they travel on the sides of the roads, all of which may be sources of infection and cannot possibly be traced should any cows or cattle become infected with foot-and-mouth disease."
  That is a very short, but it is an absolutely clear and true account of what would happen, and, mind you, it is in the case of animals which on your own showing are not free from the suspicion of disease. That is a risk which you had no right to impose, especially at the time you did upon the owners of cattle, be they high or low, rich or poor, and least of all in the case of these poor cottagers under any circumstances whatever. These animals you are sending through the country are justly under suspicion, and you ought not to have imposed this risk upon the people to whom I have referred. You are subjecting the owners of sheep, just as well as the owners of cattle, to the risk which these animals on your own showing must bring with them, and you are trying to do something under this new Order which has never yet

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  been done by any department of the British Government before. Perhaps you think we are unduly anxious upon the subject. Have we no right to be so? You rely upon inspectors you tell us. Well, we remind you of what happened at Liverpool. In spite of inspection on both sides of the Channel, that was how the disease was scattered through England. When animals were landed from Ireland, closely inspected on each side, it was found in Liverpool they were diseased, and they were scattered broadcast in various parts of the country. Then you point to the advice of your experts. Well, I have reminded you of the opening and rapid closing again of the port of Dundalk. Have we no doubts as to the effective administration of the Cattle Diseases Act in Ireland? I gave an instance upon that point on the night before the Recess to which no answer has ever been given so far as I have seen from that day to this. On 1st July the Minister for Agriculture made this statement in the House:—
  "There was, therefore, abundant evidence that the outbreaks had their origin in Ireland, and I am informed this morning by the Irish Department that the disease has been discovered there on a farm near Swords, in the county of Dublin, twenty-four cattle being visibly affected."
  That presumably was the latest information up to 30th June, because it was sent to the Minister of Agriculture on the 1st July. My attention shortly afterwards was called to a report, of the prosecution instituted by the Irish Board of Agriculture against people for concealing the disease. There I read the evidence given upon oath by one of the inspectors of the Department. The report says:—
  "Mr. William Malone, veterinary inspector to the Department, deposed that be visited a farm on 30th June and found more cattle suffering from the disease. On being examined that evening, the 30th June, seventy-four cattle were found to be suffering-from foot-and-mouth disease, and were slaughtered afterwards on that farm."
  That was precisely the same day as to which we were given the information by the right hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. T. W. RUSSELL (Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture, Ireland): May I interrupt the right hon. Gentleman. Seventy-four is a mistake for 24.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: I said at the time that this was a matter of great importance and that it ought to be contradicted at once if it were capable of contradiction. The right hon. Gentleman heard me. He was in his place; he followed me, and he
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  replied, yet from that day to this, neither from him nor from any other source whatever, has any reply of any sort or kind been given to the question I put before him. It was so important for this reason, that if 74 was the true number, it was quite impossible for such a large number of cattle to be found all infected at one time unless the disease had been for a considerable time in operation. Now, at this belated hour, six months afterwards, the Vice-President comes forward and tells us that this was an entire mistake. Although I was informed that the same reports were given in the Press everywhere—they were general—we are told that this was all a mistake. I should like to know how the mistake arose. The evidence was given upon oath—it appeared in reports which have never been contradicted—by one of the Irish inspectors. I hope before the day is over we shall have a clear explanation as to how the mistake occurred.
  I pass from that to say that it may be thought I dismiss too lightly the advice of officials and experts. I wish to say one word upon that subject which I have never said before, either in private or in public. When I was first appointed to the Board of Agriculture it was my firm conviction, and I stated so upon my re-election, that the first duty of the Department ought to be to make a resolute effort to extirpate the disease known as pleuro-pneumonia. My staff of officials and experts at the Board of Agriculture was not the same staff as is there to-day. The measure which was carried into law has been completely successful, and has been the greatest boon that ever was known to breeders and owners of cattle both in Ireland and England, for the reason that it enormously enhanced the value of their breeds and the prices they made, especially for the higher breeds of cattle, in every foreign market in the world. Yet if I had listened to the advice of my experts then—I am telling you the simple truth—that Act would never have seen the light of day at all. From that day to this I have always thought that, especially in matters connected with that Department,, its heads and Presidents will do wisely to be careful how far they are guided by advice which sometimes is given them, and with regard to which I cannot help saying that I think in this case has been most unwisely given. Let me say a word upon Irish administration, which will not be so easily disposed of as by telling me that it is a mistake. Rumours of all kinds have

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  reached me over and over again to the effect that the movement of cattle in Ireland out of infected districts by night is something which is not only possible, but is not uncommonly occurring for the purpose of transmission to England. I do not know in the least—I have no means of knowing—whether it be true or untrue, nor have I inquired. But what I do know is that the Irish administration—I wish the head of it were here now—has over and over again been confessedly unable to prevent cattle driving in the light of day. I am not prepared to risk all the fortunes of the agriculturists in England upon the power of this Irish administration to prevent the removal of cattle from an infected district by the dark of night. If you cannot prevent cattle driving in the broad light of day—that you have admitted over and over again and proved by the fact that you have not stopped it—it is not much reassurance to us with regard to your administration when we are told to rely implicity upon you to prevent the removal of any cattle whatever during the dark hours of the night out of an infected district which is bounded by an enormous number of miles.
  All impartial people must admit that I have made out a case which, at all events, justifies a great deal of anxiety on the part of the English agriculturists. I will not repeat anything I have said about the President of the Board of Agriculture. I am not saying anything I have said for the purpose of making complaints against him. I know that he has been faced with a singularly difficult position. But I wish to say one word more in regard to Ireland. On that point I wish I could make the Members who come from Ireland to this House believe that not one of those on whose behalf I speak or myself is lacking in sympathy in the smallest degree for the sufferings which I know well enough thousands of farmers must be undergoing in Ireland at the present time. I am also bound to remember, as the President of the Board of Agriculture himself said to the deputation the other night, that, after all, my first duty is to English agriculturists, and in this House I am trying to represent in the first place the fortunes of the English agriculturists. Yet I do honestly believe that in the interests of both it would have been wiser and better, in spite of your troubles and anxieties in Ireland, if you could have had a little longer patience, perhaps for another week or ten days, or a fortnight, even, we will say, three weeks at the most, before this
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  concession was made to you. Because it may imperil—even yet the danger is not over—the extirpation once again of this disease from the United Kingdom as a whole, and it is to that, that I am looking above all and before all, as the greatest boon that you can offer to the agricultural interests of the United Kingdom at the present time.
  1.0 P.M.
  Sir LUKE WHITE: I desire to support the Motion, and I am glad the House of Commons has an opportunity to-day of discussing this most important question, because it is of the very greatest importance to agriculture in this country and in Ireland that this matter should have full and free discussion. As to foot-and-mouth disease, we are all glad to find that up to June last for thirty years past no foot-and-mouth disease existed in Ireland. During that period there have been, not a large number, but a number of outbreaks from time to time in this country, and when we consider and compare Great Britain with Ireland we are not surprised at the outbreaks which have taken place. They have not been outbreaks owing to animals in this country coming into contact with animals coming from our Colonics or from abroad, but there are innumerable ways by which, as has been shown by the Departmental Committee which considered this question, the disease can be brought to this country in many and various ways. Whenever an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease has occurred in Great Britain the Irish Department of Agriculture has immediately made an Order preventing the importation into Ireland of cattle from Great Britain. That has been the perfectly right course for Ireland to take. In justice to her position, that was the only method which she could adopt. But after the experience of thirty years we now meet with what I must term a very exceptional Order. It is for the first time in the history of the two countries since these Orders came into force, that the Minister for Agriculture in this country has allowed Irish store cattle to come to Great Britain from districts in Ireland which, it is true, are free from disease. That ought never to have been allowed. I know that there is in Ireland a great amount of public feeling, and in the interests of stock-breeders of Ireland there is an absolute necessity, as soon as possible, that they should send to this country a great number of store cattle,

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  and we in this country are ready to receive store cattle from Ireland. We are suffering great loss by not getting the cattle from Ireland as we have previously done, but what we say is Take care that no cattle come from Ireland when foot-and-mouth disease exists in that country. Let Ireland wait, as the right hon. Gentleman said, for a few weeks, and if Ireland had waited for a few weeks and could have shown that she had A clean bill of health as far as foot-and-mouth disease was concerned, there would have been no difficulty in the way. Let me, for the sake of argument, illustrate what would be the position of Ireland and of this country if this was going to be a precedent for the future. I remember some eight or nine years ago when in the House of Commons we had many debates with regard to our allowing Canadian store cattle to come to this country, and no one objected more strongly to the admission of store cattle from Canada than the Members from Ireland. They said, "It is true, in Canada there are great provinces which are absolutely free from foot-and-mouth disease, but still we have to take Canada as a whole, and beyond Canada there is America, and we should never be free from the risk of having foot-and-mouth disease if we supported the introduction into this country of Canadian cattle."
  What can the Irish Members say to-day if they support this when Canada has great provinces absolutely clear and free from foot-and-mouth disease and asks, as Ireland is entitled under this Order to send store cattle under certain restrictions, that she may be allowed to send store cattle in the same way? Ireland has made a great mistake. She has injured her trade with this country in endeavouring to obtain such an Order as that which is now before us. With regard to the whole question we in this country have no feeling against Ireland. We know that Ireland is suffering as well as Great Britain, but we say as the right hon. Gentleman says, Let Ireland have patience. Let the people of this country have patience until it is absolutely clear that we shall be free from foot-and-mouth disease. It is a matter which concerns not only our agricultural districts in this country, but the whole population of Great Britain and Ireland. If we were to run the risks which are being run if cattle are allowed to come in under the Order it may be,
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  if outbreaks should occur, agriculture in this country would suffer a great and serious blow. In the coming winter, without any doubt whatever, meat would be much dearer than it is to-day, and agriculture would suffer greatly in consequence. With regard to my position on this matter, I have to say that as I happen to be the chairman of the Central Chamber of Agriculture in this country for the present year, I have come into contact with a great many of the agricultural societies throughout the country. Immediately there was the proposal to issue this Order the Central Chamber of Agriculture held a special meeting at Chester, and a resolution was proposed by the right hon. Gentleman opposite. There was a full discussion with regard to the proposed Order. The meeting was fully representative of the agricultural interest, and at the close of the discussion there was a unanimous feeling that the Order ought not to come into existence, and ought not to be proposed. Since then there was a deputation to the President of the Board of Agriculture little more than a week ago, and if ever there was a deputation representative of the agricultural interest of Great Britain that was one, and there was a unanimous feeling with regard to this particular Order. Since that time there have been a great many meetings of agricultural societies throughout this country, and one and all have passed resolutions disapproving of this Order.
  I know that in certain districts—take, for example, in Scotland—you have a unanimous feeling, so far as the breeders of cattle are concerned, against this proposed Order. But, on the other hand, you have those who are dependent upon the purchasing and feeding of store cattle, and you have, to a certain extent, people who are supporting this Order because it may help them so far as store cattle are concerned. Store cattle may come, and they would not be affected by this Order. It is quite true that this Order does not apply to Scotland, but it applies to Newcastle. Newcastle is a port where livestock can be brought, and from that port they can be taken to Scotland. As to opinion in this country so far as agriculture is concerned, I assert today without any fear of contradiction, while here and there throughout Great Britain there may be people who would take the risk under this Order, still taking the whole of the agricultural interest, I say that the owners of pedigree

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  stock, as to which it would be a disaster to this country if foot-and-mouth disease should happen to break out, and taking also the dairying interest, there is a unanimous opinion that they ought not to be jeopardised, as they would be by this Order. I ask the House of Commons to support this Motion in the interest of agriculture itself. Assume, for instance, that store cattle were landed at the port of Hull. They would then be distributed throughout Yorkshire, and some would have to go twenty miles by train, if they did go by train, but as a general rule they go by road from the large market of distribution. If they went by train, twenty miles in many instances, when they were disembarked at the railway station, they would have to be taken in droves by road in some cases ten or fifteen miles. When I look at the Order which has been made I find that this is the provision:—
  "Cattle moved under this Article shall he moved by the nearest available route, and as far as practicable by railway, and dining such movement shall not be permitted to come in contact with animals not being moved under this Order."
  It is absolutely impossible to carry out that provision. Even if the animals have been detained four days, there is still risk twenty-one days afterwards that foot-and-mouth disease may break out. I say with regard to that it is not a practical Order, if it is the intention that all animals introduced from Ireland on arriving at the ports in this country shall then be taken to the farmers who have purchased them in separate droves without coming in contact with any other animals. This is a very serious question to the agriculturists of this country. They only ask that delay should take place until Ireland is free from the disease.
  Mr. KILBRIDE: How many days do you want?
  Sir LUKE WHITE: I cannot say the number of days, but I say that Ireland must wait until the expert advisers can say that in the interest of agriculture in this country cattle can be allowed to come from Ireland without any restriction whatever. So long as these restrictions are placed in the Order it will be impossible for English farmers, or a great majority of them, to obtain those animals, because they feel that if they did so they would be running too great a risk, and such a risk ought not to be allowed.
  Mr. FIELD: The right hon. Gentleman who submitted the Motion, and with whom
  1622
  I have been acquainted for a number of years, will recollect that when he was President of the Board of Agriculture, I waited upon him in regard to certain matters affecting the cattle trade of Ireland. Therefore I cannot reckon him among those who have had no experience. He seems, however, to have given way to the outbreak of suspicion. Hon. and right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Opposition, somehow or other may be called the members of the prophetic bench, because they are always prophesying evil things that are to happen from what is done by this House. I do not intend to enter into details. That is a matter that, I think, I can leave to right hon. Gentlemen upon the benches opposite. I want the House to understand that we Irish Members do not desire to minimise the danger, and for this reason: Ireland stands to lose more than Great Britain. The character of Irish stock is mainly the value of it, and Great Britain does not depend so much upon her agriculture as Ireland does, because she has vast manufactures and other industries to fall back upon if her agriculture failed. I would like to remind the hon. Gentlemen opposite that there are other interests in this country besides agriculture. Now, we want to co-operate in safeguarding regulations with regard to cattle imports. I do not see any necessity for panic legislation, and I maintain that this matter should be discussed not as a party political question. May I remind the right hon. Gentleman who introduced this matter of several mistakes he made? In alluding to this question he spoke of the attitude of the Irish Nationalist party. I am proud to be an Irish Nationalist. I was elected and sent here as an Irish Nationalist, but I am also president of the Irish Cattle Traders' and Stockholders' Association; and notwithstanding the fact that my opinions are pretty well known, I am safe in saying that the majority of the members of that association probably do not agree with my political views; and notwithstanding that fact, it was through that association, of which I have the honour to be president, that this agitation was raised. I want the right hon. Gentleman and those acting with him to understand that this is an Irish agitation, and not a Nationalist agitation in the political sense of the word at all; and I want him to understand that Conservatives and Unionists have just as much to lose, and in some cases more, than Members of the Nationalist party. I also want to bring

  1623
  before the right hon. Gentleman this fact, that the agriculturists and the public on both sides of the Channel are equally interested in finding a satisfactory solution of this question with the least possible dislocation of trade.
  Some hon. Members may hardly realise the importance of this subject. There is an old proverb that says: "We never miss the water until the well goes dry." And in this case we will hardly miss the cattle until we find the want of them later on. I know the House docs not like figures except figures of speech or rhetoric. I will only give the average of the imports for the last three years, that is 1909, 1910, and 1911. The average imports of the last three years from Ireland into Great Britain were 851,614 cattle, 775,553 sheep, 322,018 pigs, per annum. I know it has been asserted by some hon. Members in this House and by some correspondents in the newspapers outside that it would make no difference if this importation was dropped. I fail to see as a business man how you could stop such large supplies as that and how it would be possible not to affect the agricultural and other interests of this country. May I say that according to fluctuations the value of that importation would be from £14,000,000 to £18,000,000 per annum. That means an enormous sum to Ireland or any other country. With regard to the fat stock the meat, dealers in the North of England and Scotland buy an enormous quantity of Irish cattle—oxen, heifers, sheep, and pigs. The last time I was speaking to the President of the Manchester Association he pointed out this very peculiar, and in my opinion, illogical circumstance, that at the present time store cattle are admitted to Manchester, after being quarantined for four days, but notwithstanding that fact fat cattle will not be allowed in at all. It appears to me there would be less danger in allowing fat cattle in than store stock. Fat stock must be cleared off.
  The hon. Gentleman opposite thinks there is no danger in delay. If lie knows anything about agriculture, and I presume he does, being Chairman of the Chamber of Agriculture, he must know that it is essential that fat stock must be cleared off the land. The grass is beginning to grow; if the frosty nights come you will have less grass and you want to make room upon your farm for the stores, otherwise you will have no fat cattle next year. Time is essential in this matter. You
  1624
  cannot wait. It is not a question of what the Chamber of Agriculture thinks, it is a question for the practical man engaged in the industry who knows exactly what he wants, and therefore I. say the question cannot afford to wait until the hon. Member makes up his mind that Irish cattle should be allowed into this country. I would prove later on there is no danger. Cattle cannot be produced in a week or two, you cannot cram cattle the same as you can turkeys. They must go through a certain process for a certain time. The right hon. Gentleman who brought forward this Motion is a great defender of protection. His Motion practically supports the importation of foreign meat to the detriment of British and Irish stock owners and the great mass of the consumers. I have a very important letter here which I received this morning from the National Federation of Meat Traders—
  "RESTRICTIONS ON IRISH FAT STOCK.
  "Dear Sir,—I am directed to advise that whilst the Board of Agriculture have promulgated an Order admitting Irish store stock into the United Kingdom under proper supervision, fat stock which are urgently needed for the food supply of the people, are only admitted to the foreign animals' wharves. My executive submit that fat stock could be admitted with proper safeguards to the markets of Great, Britain, with even less risk than store stock, as the former are for immediate slaughter, whilst the latter are allowed to travel the country. I am accordingly to invite your good offices in bringing pressure to bear on Mr. Runciman to admit Irish fat stock to the markets of Great Britain under proper supervision, and further to ask. if you could see your way to urge this course when the Vote of Censure on the Right Hon. Henry Chaplin, M.P, is taken on Friday next. I shall be happy to arrange for leading representatives of the meat industry, to wait upon you at the House of Commons, in order to make personal representations on this important matter, at any time to suit your convenience, on bearing.—I have the honour to remain, your obedient servant, WM. PAYNE, Secretary."
  That comes from the National Federation of Meal; Traders, a body consisting of 200 affiliated associations in various parts of Great Britain with from 30,000 to 35,000 members, and I do think it is rather important, and that that expression of opinion should have some weight with the House. I have another letter from Scotland. Of course the Scotch are a shrewd people and know what they want, and although something is said about Scotland not being interested in this matter I think this letter affords proof to the contrary:—
  "88, Elcho Street,
  "Glasgow,
  "17th October, 1912.
  "Dear Sir,—I enclose copy of letter sent to Mr. Runciman, Minister for Agriculture: We take the liberty of respectfully approaching you on the question of the admission of Irish store cattle into Scotland. Our membership is 1,600, and we cater for, roughly,

  1625
  1,000,000 people While appreciating your responsibility and recognising the difficulty of the situation you have to deal with, we fear that if something is not done soon we will have to face extremely high prices in the spring of next year, and scarcity is not a good thing either for the trade or the consumer. By reducing home supplies we are playing into the hands of the American Meat Trust, who are now the largest operators in the Argentine. We have no desire to place any obstacles in the way of foreign operators, yet we are not inclined, if it can at all be avoided, to play into their hands or to assist them in controlling oar markets. No store cattle means no fat cattle. Whatever you may do or have done we believe yon are impressed with the necessity of preserving the health of the herds and flocks of the three Kingdoms. All we ask is that in the consideration of the whole case you do not overlook the distributors or consumers who claim to have restrictions removed as soon as consistent with safety."
  I think that goes to show that there is a case for the people which should be considered as well as for the agriculturists. It must not be forgotten that we Irish Members represent not alone graziers but also the store cattle keepers. The store tattle keepers are generally poor men who cannot afford to wait, and who must have an outlet for their stock. Graziers and store keepers are dependent on Irish stores, not only in Ireland, but in England and Scotland, and farmers in Scotland and also in the north of England have informed me that they have a good crop of roots this year. In regard to the restrictions imposed on the admission of Irish cattle we know how some of the chambers of agriculture can be managed and engineered; how a certain big landlord, or a man of influence can carry others along with him. I know one case—I am quite certain of it—where the President of a Chamber of Agriculture—I shall not mention names—last week was very strongly impressed with the necessity of admitting Irish store cattle, but he had an interview with an influential gentleman and he changed his opinion. That is how things are engineered, and I know it to be an absolute fact from my own knowledge. In a great many instances, of course, the breeders of cattle are also enormously interested in this matter, for often a breeder will pay two thousand pounds for a bull. I maintain, notwithstanding what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman and by the hon. Member opposite, that we must regard this question as a whole and not consider it in reference to merely one section of the community. The whole of the community must be considered, though in regard to Ireland the subject involves more to those interested in the cattle trade in that country than it does in other countries, because it is one of national importance. The Government, too, are deeply concerned, because a great deal of the land in Ireland is being sold, and unless
  1626
  the people are able to realise their stock both they and the owners of the land will be seriously affected, and, in fact, there is a very grave outlook for Ireland unless this question is settled and settled immediately. Of course it is true, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, that in England some of the local authorities have passed resolutions not to allow Irish cattle to be admitted.
  That may suit certain districts that do not want Irish cattle, and, of course, we cannot force Irish cattle upon them, but in other areas the livestock is wanted, and the people there should be allowed to act according to their convictions, and they ought not to be bullied or intimidated by exaggerated statements and ideas as to Irish cattle and by all the supposed dangers which are pictured to them. It has been very frequently said, and I think it is one of the reasons why the Irish cattle question has assumed such proportions in England, that we want to conceal the existence of disease. That is not so at all. We have had twenty-nine years' practical immunity from foot-and-mouth disease since the last outbreak, and that may have engendered a feeling of security. It may be that in busy times some cattle which were passed while in incubating disease, which was discovered on this side. I do not deny that; it is undoubtedly true. But we have got to look at the surrounding circumstances, and, in my opinion, so far as Ireland is concerned, if we compare the regulations of Ireland with the regulations in England they are vastly superior to those in England. In England you have a cordon. I know what I am talking about, for I have been President and ex-President of various Cattle Trade Associations, and I have had experience. In regard to the regulations in England, I find that in this country the markets are opened very much sooner, and much more easily than can be done in Ireland. I find that the cordon here is only 15 miles, but the right hon. Gentleman scheduled three whole counties straight off and closed Dublin port and market.
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wimbledon (Mr. Chaplin) spoke of strong resolutions which are not carried out; but, as a matter of fact, in Ireland we are coerced and persecuted in a fashion that would not be tolerated at all by men of business. With regard to the officials, I think Mr. Hedley and Mr. Prentice went through the outbreak twenty-nine years ago, and I went through it along with them, and I will never forget it. Both

  1627
  those Gentlemen are as good and efficient officials as there are in the world, and I think the Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture in Ireland (Mr. T. W. Russell) will agree with me in that. The Irish Cattle Traders' and Stock Owners' Association and the Dublin Victuallers' Association co-operated in carrying out what I regarded, and I still regard, as regulations which were too severe. We agreed before this unfortunate outbreak took place on a deputation to the right hon. Gentleman to take further precautions with regard to the inspection of cattle. We also assisted the Department in every way to carry out any regulations which were made. I desire to draw attention to the manner in which this whole thing has been engineered in England. I was a Member of the Departmental Committee on Foot-and-Mouth Disease. It came out there in evidence that England had nineteen outbreaks in 1911, and, mark you, we had no outbreaks for the last twenty-nine years. Up to the present there have been something like eighty outbreaks in England, and we have had this year thirty-one outbreaks in Ireland. I ask the right hon. Gentleman the Vice-President to listen to my remarks upon this question, because I think he is a fair-minded man on this particular question. Seventeen of those thirty-one outbreaks in Ireland were in Swords—that is to say, more than half in one particular district. The other outbreaks were sporadic and were immediately taken hold of. Although we have had such an outcry about the importation of stores and the enormous danger, so much so that you would think it was a sort of agricultural earthquake, according to the two right hon. Gentlemen and the hon. Gentleman who spoke on this Motion, the fact is that in two provinces—Munster and Connaught—there was not a single outbreak of any kind, and it is mainly from those provinces that the stores come. There is a theory amongst the experts, and I do not know whether I can be classed as an expert or not, though I suppose I am on the roll, that this disease cannot come spontaneously. I do not know that I should quite agree with that, because in my view there are conditions and circumstances which may combine to produce the disease in a certain situation. However, that is what the experts say, and the world leaves everything to the experts. If that theory be true, then this disease must have been
  1628
  conveyed. Where was it conveyed from? England, of course, has had intermittent outbreaks of this disease for a number of years. I put it to any fair-minded hon. Member, is it not more likely that this disease was imported from England than, from anywhere else?
  There are some people who make another statement. I give it for what it is worth, because I do not pretend to endorse it. The statement has been freely made in letters to the newspapers, though I do not say you should always take notice of what is written to the newspapers, that this, disease was maliciously introduced into Swords. I do not hold or agree with that, but I mention the fact to show the feeling there is in Ireland upon this question. If we got this disease, as we undoubtedly have, since I have every confidence in Mr. Hedley and Mr. Prentice, who say we have, though some people say there was no-disease, then I think it is quite reasonable to assume that it came from England. If that be so, we now have these English Members attacking Ireland on a national question with regard to a disease which we got from you. [An HON. MEMBER: "We are always wrong."] I do not say you are always wrong, but you are seldom right. At any rate, the disease was very mild, and, as a matter of fact, like the disease that affects the House of Commons, it was only a mouth disease. There were no sheep took it, that I am aware of, or very few, and I think one case of pigs. The treatment of it in Ireland was very drastic. What happened in this country? We had sensational paragraphs in the newspapers about rinderpest, and cattle plague; we had sensational photographs of constables watching cattle plague and stopping rinderpest, and all that kind of thing. We had as well the Waterford head and all kinds of sensational questions. I do not like to say anything to anyone who was a member of the Departmental Committee along with me, but I am bound to say I was rather surprised at some of the questions asked by the hon. Member for Wiltshire (Mr. C. Bathurst). He was a member of that Departmental Committee, and he signed the Report, the concluding paragraph of which was as follows:—
  "In view of the tendency abroad to exaggerate the-extent of foot-and-mouth disease when it occurs in Great Britain—"
  I suppose it is only because the disease was not in Ireland then—
  "and the consequent restriction of trade, it is desirable that the Government should, through the British

  1629
  Consuls, clearly intimate its actual extent to foreign countries."
  Everyone here has, I suppose, liberty of opinion, and it is about the only liberty we have in Ireland sometimes. If I may say so, I think the hon. Member ought not to have put the question he addressed about this. I have always had the courage of my convictions, here and elsewhere, and I tell you as a matter of fact that there never was any foot-and-mouth disease in the exact Dublin district. The cattle were examined before the man bought them, and they were examined by an inspector after he bought them, and they were inspected and examined after being killed, so that there were absolutely three inspections. The hon. Member wanted to know whether the children of Dublin were affected. I maintain that even at the present time, with things as they are, that we have the cleanest cattle bill of health of any country in Europe. We have less foot-and-mouth disease; we have practically no pleuro-pneumonia, very little tuberculosis, and swine fever is much less than it is in Great Britain. Now that the President of the English Board has returned, I could, if I chose, quote extracts giving the number of outbreaks of disease of various kinds which have occurred in England within the past and the present year, and the House would be alarmed. Since the issue of the Regulations which have been so much complained of, over 400,000 cattle, sheep, and pigs have been imported into England from Ireland. They have been examined twice on our side and again here, but not a trace of disease has been discovered. That is my answer to the Mover and Seconder of this Motion. We are so confident in Ireland that these reports are exaggerated that we invite a party of experts to come over from England and go all over the country. What is more, we promise to pay their expenses, provide them with motor cars, and give them a good time. I am absolutely serious in this proposal. If such statements are made in the House as have been made, the men who make them ought to be in a position to verify them; therefore we ask experts to come over and see for themselves and make their report. That will prove whether or not the statements I have made are correct.
  I hope that the ordinary course of business will soon be resumed, notwithstanding what has been said here to-day. There are many ports which ought to be opened. I have one suggestion to make. My association some time ago passed a resolution
  1630
  to the effect that it would be useful to have-an advisory committee. I know that officials do not like outsiders, but I think that such a consultative committee would be exceedingly useful. After all, a very curious state of things exist. We have two or three different authorities with officials possessing very wide powers. No such powers are given to officials with regard to any other trade. I think the people concerned in the trade have a right to be consulted, and I believe that if my suggestion were adopted many things might be done to prevent an undue dislocation of trade, and at the same time carry out the necessary safeguards. It would tend to greater harmony of working between the trade and the officials, and it would also bring the officials into contact with members belonging to local representative institutions. It is a curious anomaly that in what is called a free country you should have half a dozen officials who can practically ruin you. No doubt safeguards; must be imposed, but my view is that it can be done in such a way as to prevent a great deal of loss to those concerned. Personally, I will take every opportunity I can to help to carry out what I have suggested. I hope that the result of this Debate, will be that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Chaplin) will withdraw his Motion, and that English agriculturists will be glad to receive healthy cattle from uninfected areas in the healthiest cattle country in the world.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURST: I have listened with great interest and some amusement to the speech just delivered, and I only regret that I found it in many respects somewhat unconvincing. I for my part, welcome this opportunity of discussing in a friendly spirit a matter of such great importance to stock owners on both sides of St. George's Channel. I rather fear that if certain aspirations of the Nationalist party are realised, and Ireland has a separate Parliament of her own, there will probably be on a matter such as this far more serious difficulties, in consequence of the lack of opportunity to exchange ideas on such an important question of international interest, which opportunity fortunately we enjoy to-day. The hon. Member for Dublin (Mr. Field), speaking from his point of view, has said that he cannot wait. He quoted a letter from Glasgow, to which I take no exception. The writer suggested that the restrictions should be removed as soon as possible consistent with safety. That exactly

  1631
  expresses our view. But what we earnestly ask the heads of the two Departments concerned is that the restrictions shall not be removed until such removal can be considered consistent with safety. The hon. Member also read a letter from the National Federation of Meat Traders. I am not going to suggest that the interests of the meat traders are in all respects identical with the interests of the stock owners. What the meat traders in their letter say is that further facilities should be granted for the admission of fat stock for immediate slaughter. I, for my part, would welcome the admission of fat cattle from Ireland to a greater extent than at present for immediate slaughter, assuming there were facilities at the ports for dealing with such cattle. The hon. Gentleman suggested—and I think it was an unfortunate suggestion, and certainly is not based upon any good foundation—that Chambers of Agriculture in this country can be engineered by landowners and other persons of some influence and authority in their district.
  Mr. REDDY: By dukes!
  Mr. C. BATHURST: I think that is a most irrelevant interruption. I am not aware of a single Chamber of Agriculture in the country in which any duke takes any active part whatever. I am not here to defend dukes. It always seems to me very unfortunate that dukes should be so generally and continuously introduced into our discussions. My experience of British agriculturists is that they are far and away the shrewdest body of commercial men to be found in this country, and they are the least likely to be engineered by outside influences. The hon. Member laid great emphasis upon the arguments relating to the value of our export trade in pedigree cattle. I think there are some short-sighted views taken both inside and outside this House on the subject of this very important and increasingly valuable export trade to other countries. The very fact that there is such a trade undoubtedly raises the standard of quality of our stock throughout the whole of the United Kingdom, and is doing so to an increasing extent in Ireland, in which I am glad to say a considerable export trade has recently grown up.
  There is strong reason why we should welcome this export trade, because we
  1632
  owe our large supplies of meat from foreign and Colonial sources to this country very largely to the fact that we have for many years past sent out sound cattle of high quality to these countries which are now exporting meat to us. There is this further reason why the consumer in this country should take every step to prevent the widespread development of disease. Judging by past experience—I am sorry the hon. Gentleman whom I am endeavouring to reply to has left the House whenever there has been a scourge throughout the coontry and serious contagious cattle disease the price of meat has risen considerably, and consumers above all other persons ultimately have had to suffer. I have been very much criticised in Ireland. I have been accused of entering into a conspiracy with my right hon. Friend to destroy Irish trade. [HON. MEMISEBS: "Hear, hear."] I can assure hon. Members sitting below the Gangway that so far from destroying or injuring in any way Irish trade I feel the fullest sympathy for them in the loss and inconvenience from which they are suffering at the present time.
  Mr. HAYDEN: What about the children?
  Mr. C. BATHURST: I am coming to that in a moment. At the same time what we do feel—we who do our best to consider the interests of British stock owners and consumers in this country—is that our first consideration must be for the health of our livestock at home. I for my part admit what the hon. Member said just now with regard to the Irish Department of Agriculture. I think that Department is well staffed, and has carried on its administration in the interests of Irish stock owners with very great advantage during those few years in which it has been in existence. I admit in many respects—I say this in face of the right hon. Gentleman who presides over our own Board—their administration has sometimes been wiser than that exercised by our own Department, particularly with regard to swine fever to which the hon. Gentleman has referred.
  2.0 P.M.
  But as regards this particular question of foot-and-mouth disease, we have to remember that the Irish Department has never had an opportunity of dealing with an outbreak since the Department came into existence. The result is that, however expert and well qualified the officials of the Board may be, they have not had the

  1633
  experience which the officials of our English Board enjoy in consequence of the wider opportunity of dealing with the disease. I have also to admit that the English Board has not since it came into existence in 1889 had any experience of foot-and-mouth disease in Ireland so as to constitute a precedent in the matter of Regulations restricting the importation of Irish stock. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Dublin reminded us that there were seventeen outbreaks at Swords. The very fact that there were as many as seventeen outbreaks in a single small village is a strong indication that the administration of the Department as regards foot-and-mouth disease is not so efficient and has not proved so effective as the similar administration in this country. No case can be quoted in England since the Board came into existence—perhaps I should not say since the Board came into existence, but certainly during the last ten years—of seventeen outbreaks of any seriously contagious disease occurring in a single village or parish in Great Britain. The right hon. Gentleman the Vice-President of the Irish Department has himself indicated to the House one reason why the continuation of these outbreaks may be possible. He has not adopted measures, which the English Board adopt in the event of an outbreak taking place, of slaughtering all animals that have come into contact with an animal found to be affected. He has himself confessed that animals in adjoining fields, whether they have been in contact or not, under his administration have not been slaughtered when the outbreak occurred. We all know that contact is possible over hedges and fences between one animal and another, and unless all animals that have been or possibly can be brought in contact with these animals are slaughtered the danger of the spread of the disease must be seriously increased.
  The hon. Member for Dublin reminded us, and properly so, what occurred after the outbreak in Ireland. I may remind the House that it is largely in consequence of what occurred at that time that serious apprehension is being felt at any relaxation of previous existing Orders by our own Department so far as Irish stock is concerned. Outbreaks occurred in this country. I think I am right in saying that they were notified in this country before any notification was given in Ireland of the original outbreak itself. That element alone must create a certain amount of doubt, hesitation, and even suspicion on
  1634
  the part of British agriculturists against those who administer the affairs of the Irish Department. There is another factor to which attention is drawn which we must consider. In the evidence of Mr. Cantrell, who represented the Irish Department before the Departmental Committee, it is said that the local officials, or rather the officials of the local authorities in Ireland, do not all possess the same qualifications which the officials of our own county councils possess. [Laughter.] Really I do not know the cause of that laughter. I am quoting from one of the officials of the Irish Department, and he admitted candidly there is not required from these officials in Ireland the same standard of veterinary qualifications which our Board insists upon in the case of our officials in this country.
  Mr. RUSSELL: The hon. Member is mistaken, as usual. The officials of the Department who look after these matters are a thoroughly qualified veterinary staff.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: I am very much surprised at that interruption in view of the fact that these particular officials were spoken of as part of the staff dealing with foot-and-mouth disease and other contagious diseases in Ireland.
  Mr. RUSSELL: They may be called in in aid of our own staff during this outbreak, but the whole of the administration of the Contagious Diseases Animals Act is in charge of a veterinary staff in whom we have every confidence.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: The right hon. Gentleman has had to admit that these ill-qualified men have had to be called in to aid in coping with the disease in Ireland. Such persons are not called in in this country. It is now suggested that because these animals are brought from non-scheduled areas that that is sufficient to remove our apprehensions on this side of the Channel. Assuming that the scheduled area in Ireland is the same size as here, that is a fifteen mile radius from the initial outbreak, it means a circumference of something like a hundred miles, out of which the passage of animals has to be prevented by the Irish Constabulary or other persons employed by the Department. On the face of it it is impracticable. I do not wish to refer to cattle-driving or anything of that sort, but apart from any tendency to drive cattle, for political or any other purpose, there is the

  1635
  serious danger of leakage where you have got so wide a circumference and a comparatively small number of persons to act as sentries to prevent the passage of those animals out of that area. My right hon. Friend has very properly called attention to the serious danger involved in the passage of animals on this side from the ports to the premises of the purchaser. What in my opinion deserves further emphasis is the short period, a period of only four days, during which the Board considers it necessary to retain these animals at the ports. Such a period can only be based upon the length of time during which the disease is in an incubatory stage. On that particular subject there is no exact scientific knowledge. It is referred to in the Report of the Departmental Committee, which was signed unanimously.
  "The incubation period, which is by no means clearly established, may be from one to ten days, the more usual period being from two to rive days."
  Assuming that the maximum is ten, and it is by no means established that it is only ten, how can the right hon. Gentleman fix a period of detention of four days only at the port? But the risk of incubation does not stop there, because the Report goes on to say:—
  "There does not appear to be any definite knowledge of the length of time during which it—
  that is, the infection—
  "may remain active outside the body of an animal. Those who have had practical experience when the disease was prevalent among the stock in this country, consider that, the period does not usually exceed one month, and when the virus is exposed to sun and light it is much shorter. By experiment it has been found to remain active for a period not exceeding four months. It has, however, been stated by one of the expert witnesses that manure may remain infective for that time, and he also considers that infectivity under conditions which ate favourable may continue for twelve months."
  That being the case, with all the danger involved in herding these animals together in markets, or at the port, on ship board, and in trucks on the other side, we must bear in mind the additional risk involved when, as the hon. Gentleman already suggested, the temperature is raised owing to their being huddled together and the excitement of the animal consequent upon such treatment. But it is not merely the actual infection caused by the animal itself, but the actual infection of what we call the "mediate, contagion," which may result in the disease being carried to other animals through transmitting matter. The hon. Member for Dublin referred to my reference to the communicability of this disease to human beings.
  Mr. FIELD: To the statement that they had it.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: Let me remind the hon. Member that he himself signed a Report to the effect that the disease is known to affect human beings.
  Mr. FIELD: That is not the point at all.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: Be good enough to wait, and I will answer the alleged charge. The hon. Member has objected to my asking—and I asked in perfect good faith— whether the suggestion that was made in Ireland to my knowledge by a certain leading doctor there was well founded, to the; effect that a child or children had suffered from this disease.
  Mr. KILBRIDE: Who was the doctor?
  Mr. C. BATHURST: I am not entitled to give the name, and there is no reason to give the name, because within three weeks afterwards an official of the Department was reported to be suffering from foot-and-mouth disease. Well, if you may trust the leading English newspapers-after all, it is our chief source of obtaining reliable information—[HON. MEMBERS: "It is"]—it was stated that according to a report by two leading doctors in Dublin this official was suffering from foot-and-mouth disease. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] For some reason, of which I have no knowledge, it was ultimately decided, not by the doctor, but by the officials of the Department of Agriculture, that he was not suffering from the disease, and he was allowed to go on his holiday.
  Mr. FIELD: May I remind the hon. Gentleman that it was three weeks after he put these questions that this matter was reported in the English Press; and with regard to the reliability of the English Press, I pointed out in my speech that the English Press exaggerated the whole thing. The officer in question was suffering from blood poisoning, and not front foot-and-mouth disease.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: I do not think that any question I can put to this House is likely to affect the professional opinion of the leading medical men in Dublin. What is the reason why the Department suggested that this was not foot-and-mouth disease against the opinion of the doctors? Solely because the incubation period must have been longer than was suggested in this Report. Considering what very little precise knowledge there is as to the period of incubation between animal and animal,

  1637
  and apparently none in the case of human beings, surely that was not a sufficient reason for the Department to go entirely contrary to the expert opinion of leading medical men. I do not think, however, that that subject is very material to our present discussion. So far as the right lion. Gentleman is concerned, our charge is that this particular Order is premature. Unless there are further outbreaks during the next few weeks, little apprehension will be caused in the minds of British agriculturists if the Board of Agriculture decide to admit Irish store cattle without any restriction to this country. The present compromise is unsatisfactory to all concerned. We do not consider on our side that the so-called safeguards are real and effective, and our Irish Friends naturally say that if there is no reason to suspect the carriage of infection from Ireland to this country—and that is a consideration on which the right hon. Gentleman himself has largely based the step he has taken—all restrictions might with advantage be removed. I think that is a perfectly logical position, but a half-way house like this, which is very difficult to define, which is unconvincing in the minds of most British agriculturists, is a course which suggests some vacillation on the part of the right lion. Gentleman's Department, which I very much regret and deprecate.
  I want to ask the right hon. Gentleman and the Vice-President why it is that they think it necessary to insist in every case, whether normal or otherwise, upon the fifteen-mile radius. Any unnecessary restrictions imposed in this country and in Ireland make it so much harder to carry out a firm policy in the interests of the cattle trade or livestock trade in both countries. The right hon. Gentleman suggested two days ago in this House that because I signed this Report that I, like my colleagues, approved generally the procedure of the Board of Agriculture in the event of outbreaks occurring, and that necessarily I approved the details of such procedure as regards the prescribed radius. For my own part, I rather closely cross-examined the witnesses, particularly the expert witnesses, before that Committee on the subject of the 15 mile radius, and what they pointed out was that in all normal cases, in their opinion, a 15 mile radius should be regarded as the maximum necessary. What they also agreed in saying was that there are many considerations which should be taken into account before
  1638
  such a large radius as 15 miles can be justified. For instance, there is the question whether the country is flat or mountainous, whether there, are impediments to the carriage of saliva and other media of infection or the absence of such impediments. Those conditions are to be taken into account, and yet a uniform radius of 15 miles is imposed in every case. I suggest that if each case were treated on its merits, this 15 mile radius might be considerably reduced with far less grumbling and doubt about the wisdom of these restrictions than exists in both countries to-day.
  I asked the right hon. Gentleman whether there was on record in his Department any case in which the infection was found to have been communicated over a distance of more than ten miles, and he told me, in a somewhat indefinite way, that such cases had occurred. I do not remember any case having been brought before the Departmental Committee, although the witnesses were rather closely examined on the subject, and I shall be interested to know if the right hon. Gentleman is able to say what were the cases of which there is knowledge at the Board. I do hope that the Board of Agriculture will not relax its restrictions on the importation of stock, whether from Ireland or any other country, until they are absolutely certain that there is not the smallest risk of the conveyance of disease to the flocks and herds of this country. It is perfectly true that Ireland is suffering a serious loss at the present time. Her livestock industry represents about one quarter of the whole trade of the country, and we are all conscious of the loss entailed, particularly when the peasant proprietors of Ireland are unable to pay their annuity instalments. We all recognise that; but it must also be recognised that our interests in this matter are identical in the long run, because stock owners on both sides of the Channel are likely to suffer if we take a short-sighted view, and if as the result we have disease not merely widespread throughout this country, but if we also get a bad reputation abroad in consequence of failing to observe the restrictions which are recognised now as being adequate and sufficient throughout the whole world. Suggestions have been made for setting up a dead meat trade in Ireland, and I could never understand why Irish stock owners-have not taken up this question, because they could get a large part of the profit which is now made by stock owners on this side of the Channel. I am reminded that

  1639
  a movement has been inaugurated for setting up a dead meat trade in cattle between Ireland and this country, and if it is evolved and developed it will be to the great commercial advantage of Ireland and prevent those financial losses which cause such searchings of heart when unfortunate attacks are made by one section of the stock owners in this House upon other sections of stock owners, although possibly our interests in these matters are absolutely identical.
  Mr. RUSSELL: I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wimbledon (Mr. Chaplin) is not in his place, because at the beginning of what I have to say I wish to deal with a point that he raised during the course of his speech. He called into question the accuracy of the statement made by the Department in regard to the outbreak at Swords, and he stated that Mr. Malone, the veterinary officer, who first discovered the disease at Swords, stated in the Petty Sessional Court that when he visited the farm on Sunday the 30th of June he found seventy-four animals affected. He said that had never been contradicted. I tried to make an explanation at the time, but the right hon. Gentleman, although he is probably the most courteous man in the House, waived me down. The first occasion I had to explain what the Department had done with regard to the outbreak at Swords, I stated that the inspector came back at 7.30 on Sunday night, 30th June, and reported that after examining the whole herd he found there were twenty-four animals which were affected with foot-and-mouth disease. That was an accurate statement. Mr. Malone, who was examined at the Petty Sessions Court, said the same thing, but the twenty-four was made into seventy-four. I think any hon. Member who looks at the report will understand how the "two" became "seven" in transmitting the report. It strikes me as being very probable that in the transmission of Mr. Malone's evidence from Swords the "two" became "seven," either by mistake of the reporter or the compositor. I wish to state as plainly and as briefly as I can the Irish position on this question. We have been charged with carelessness. We have been charged with conniving at breaches of the law. A great many charges have been made against us. The position taken up by Ireland, by men of all parties in Ireland—the right hon. Gentleman has really no right
  1640
  or title to say this was a Nationalist agitation; it was an agitation in which the whole of Irishmen without regard to party or creed joined—was this. We never asked for cattle to be admitted into Great Britain from the infected ports of Ireland until they had been declared free from disease. That demand was never made, but, on the other hand, there was a universal opinion that the same measure of treatment ought not to be meted out to the unaffected areas of Ireland. It was stated over and over again to me by deputations that Ireland was part of the United Kingdom, and that Munster, Connaught, and nineteen-twentieths of Ireland ought to have the same rights and privileges as Devonshire.
  That was the position taken up by the Irish people. They have no desire, and have never put forward any claim, that British ports should receive animals from affected areas. They recognise this question has two sides—the Irish side and the British side, and that the British side has quite as much right to be considered as the Irish side. Let me point out, in confirmation of that view, this statement of fact. There have crossed over from Ireland since 30th June, when the British ports were closed, unless those ports were opened for the reception of fat cattle, 356,000 animals. I ask the attention of hon. Members to this. There is an element of suspicion in the House in regard to the state of Ireland with reference to this disease. It cannot be mistaken. There is no direct charge, but there is any quantity of insinuation that disease is being concealed, and that the Department is not acting fairly. You cannot mix with Members without finding this out, and you cannot read English newspapers without finding it out. Since 30th June 356,000 animals, cattle, sheep, and swine have crossed over from the unaffected portions of Ireland. They have not come from Dublin, Meath, and Louth; they were excluded. They have been examined in Ireland by the veterinary inspector of the Department, and they have been examined in England at the port of landing by the veterinary inspector of the Board of Agriculture. In every case there has been a post mortem examination, and my right hon. Friend will confirm me that not a trace of disease has been found in a single animal of these 360,000 that have crossed. I say that one fact annihilates all the suspicion, all the insinuation, and all the innuendo we find here

  1641
  and everywhere else. I ask hon. Members, who have a right to consider their own country in this matter, a right I have never denied, to face that fact. I ask them, if disease is being concealed in Ireland, would it be possible for that number of animals to cross over and be examined by their own officers without some trace of disease being found? I ask them to face that fact to-day before this Debate comes to an end.
  I want now to deal with the charge against the Department—a charge practically repeated to-day—of its inaction at the beginning of this outbreak. I do not think there has been any charge of that kind save and except at the commencement of this outbreak. The charge is all the other way. My hon. Friends on the other side of the House have never wearied of denouncing me in Ireland for the drastic action which the Department took. The House will excuse me if I spend a few minutes on the case of Swords, because it is the real charge against me. We have had thirty years of immunity from this disease in Ireland. It has been in England, in Scotland, and all over the Continent of Europe, but Ireland has remained untouched for thirty years. A fact of that kind would really tend, I will not say to make us careless, for that would be unforgivable, but at all events we were not on the lookout for the disease as we should have been had we had it in the country more recently. It had occurred in England, where I think there were twelve or thirteen cases— —
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: In what counties?
  Mr. RUSSELL: I think the last case occurred in Cumberland. Let me point out how we stand. The moment that the Cumberland outbreak was confirmed an Order, which was practically automatic in the Department, came into operation. The ports were closed in Ireland against all tattle and all animals subject to disease coming from Great Britain. That Order has been commented upon, but it comes about in this way. No matter whether the Vice-President or the Chief Secretary is in Dublin the officer in charge of the Department, if foot-and-mouth disease is announced in England, at once closes down the ports.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: It is an illegal Order.
  Mr. RUSSELL: That may be; but, in justice to the Department and to those in
  1642
  charge of the Department, I will point out that the Order is entirely in the interests of Great Britain. We import very few animals into Ireland from Great Britain, and if disease came to Ireland, we being the greatest exporting country, of course, Great Britain would suffer more than Ireland. Therefore, let us be just to the Department. This Order was in existence long before I had anything to do with it. All we did was to take every step possible to keep out the disease. I do not approve of the Order, and during the past fortnight, after discussing the point with my colleagues, we have opened the ports in Ireland to sheep from Scotland. Foot-and-mouth disease has not touched Scotland at all. Every year from 40,000 to 50,000 sheep come from Scotland to Ulster, and we have now allowed these sheep to come in with a certificate of origin and the certificate of a veterinary officer that they are in good health. Last year 346 pedigree animals came into Ireland from England. That, no doubt, is an important matter, but it is a very different thing to the cattle going from Ireland to England. These pedigree animals are allowed in on a certificate of a veterinary surgeon, together with a certificate of origin. I felt I had no right to ask that the ports of Great Britain should be opened while I was keeping the ports of my own country closed.
  I come now to another point. The disease was discovered at Swords on Sunday, 30th June. We did not know it was there, and I have been asked why we did not. How could we know it was ever there? We had not the slightest idea that foot-and-mouth disease was existent. The local authority in the county of Dublin and the veterinary officer of those authorities had not the slightest idea of the fact. I admit in the month of July—I came across here specially in order to answer certain questions—I explained that the moment that the disease was discovered in Liverpool we took steps, and we tracked it down, and one of the very objections to the action of the Department since that time is that it has been of the most drastic character. We stamped the disease out in Swords; we kept it there for six weeks, and it never got beyond the parish. We stamped it out in Meath; we stamped it out also in the county of Louth, and nearly seventy days have elapsed since there was a case in that part. Now I come to the other counties. In Wicklow there were two cases.
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIG: How long ago?
  Mr. RUSSELL: The last one was a fortnight ago. The previous one was six weeks ago. County Wicklow was clear of the disease for twenty-eight days. On the twenty-ninth day there was another animal affected, a quarter of a mile from the original place, but the attack was of the slightest possible character. In Kildare there have been three cases, and these, too, have been of a light character, and there does not seem to be any symptom of the disease spreading in either of those two counties. Fermanagh is the other county. I see the hon. Member for North Fermanagh is in his place. My officers reported that the first case was a serious case; serious for the reason that the disease had broken out on a small farm on which there was no accommodation for isolation. Therefore the only thing we could possibly do was to slaughter every animal on the farm. I wish the House to understand that in the three counties of Dublin, Meath, and Louth there has been no case for something like seventy days, and I think the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wimbledon, who knows so much about this question, will admit that that is a sufficient quarantine period. Coming to the other three counties, the disease has been confined to well-defined narrow limits, and only one or two animals have been affected. The counties are well under control. In Fermanagh we have eight veterinary surgeons going round the whole county and examining the animals. In Wicklow and Kildare we have taken the same precautions. I am frequently asked how was it that the disease got into Ireland. I admit that that is a very important question. The most patient inquiries have been made. I believe [turning to the President of the Board of Agriculture] in Great Britain there have been twelve or thirteen outbreaks.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: I think if the President of the Board of Agriculture will speak for himself, instead of prompting the Vice-President for the Irish Board, it would be better.
  Mr. RUSSELL: May I point out that this is a matter affecting England. I do not require any prompting in regard to Ireland, but I was consulting my right hon. Friend as to the number of cases there have been in Great Britain. I am only speaking for the veterinary staff of the Department that has inquired into this matter. We have had everything ex-
  1644
  amined in the Swords district that could possible give a clue. We have no clue, save that the disease being prevalent in Great Britain, it is possible that cattle salesmen and cattle drovers passing between the two countries might have introduced it. The only reason for its being at Swords in our veterinary officer's opinion is that there must have been some communication by the cattle salesmen or cattle drovers from some parts of the country where the disease prevails, and that the cattle drovers and cattle salesmen might have gone to the Dublin market and from the Dublin market into Swords. That is the finding of my veternary officers.
  With regard to Kildare I am happy to say we have really got the cause, and I think I ought to give the information to the House, because this is of some interest to England as well as to Ireland. After the case at Kildare I was attracted by a meeting held at Ballysax. There, a widow who kept a lot of pigs had the disease brought into her piggery. This meeting, which was presided over by a most responsible gentleman, asked the Department to inquire into the origin of the disease, and they hinted in their resolution that it came from the Curragh Camp. I instituted an inquiry, and sent one of our most experienced officers—notwithstanding what the right hon. Gentleman said, we have some experience—down to Ballysax to make an inquiry. He has reported officially that the evidence seems to be that the disease came from the officers' mess at the Curragh Camp. They had been importing French wines with straw envelopes on the bottles, and they had been importing French fruit packed in loose packing material in boxes. The officers, or rather the people in charge, had distributed this to this old lady who had buried her pigs in it, and the effect was that in three days the pigs were infected with disease everywhere.
  Mr. KILBRIDE: There were no cattle affected there at that time?
  Mr. RUSSELL: There were no cattle affected there at the time. The cattle were infected afterwards. I am bound to say this information will be of some use to the country, because the question of this loose packing material has been discussed. It was referred to by the Committee which sat upon the question. It is very difficult to deal with it, because you will interfere with trade to a large extent in devising any remedy; but I think it right

  1645
  to tell the House that after the most careful inquiries we could make that is the finding we arrived at. The commander-in-chief, to whom I appealed, acted, I am bound to say, very promptly, and issued an order to the whole military service in Ireland that this material was not to be distributed but burnt, and we advised traders, by public announcement, to do the same thing.
  My whole position on this question is that we acted the moment that we found the disease to be in Ireland. No doubt the information came from Liverpool, where the cattle were sent. The disease did not show itself to the officers who examined the cattle upon embarkation. I was asked on the last occasion how the officers let the cattle get on board ship. I see the hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. W. Peel) still asks that question. Perhaps he will allow me to give my own version and experience of the case. I went down to Swords with Mr. Hedley, whose name has been mentioned so often to-day, with a view to seeing an actual case of the disease. There was a herd of nine young bullocks, which were driven into a pen. They were all examined, and their mouths opened and examined. One animal was found to be infected with the disease. The tongue was in a shocking condition, and the animal must have suffered a great deal. All the others were free that night; but they were all slaughtered, for I gave the order for slaughtering the whole nine the next day. After they were slaughtered a post-mortem was held, and six of the animals were found to be infected. But on the night before they might have gone into any vessel at the North Wall and been taken over from Dublin absolutely free from the disease. That is my answer to the hon. Member from Cork. Whatever be the period of incubation, there is a period when the disease is not visible.
  Mr. POWER: The right hon. Gentleman has given us some evidence as to how this got in. Was there any evidence of a disease of this nature in the parts of France from which these packages had come?
  Mr. RUSSELL: The last statement I saw about France was that there are 100,000 cases there. The animals crossed undoubtedly from Dublin, and they undoubtedly affected the animals on the steamship that night. It is the transmission of the disease that constitutes the right of England, as I have always main-
  1646
  tained in Dublin, very often at great odds, to object to animals coming from the infected areas until the disease has been eradicated. I am sorry that the hon. Member for the Wilton Division (Mr. C. Bathurst) is not in his place, for I have something to say to him which I have desired to say for some time. The hon. Gentleman's speech to-day was cast in a very different mould from the speeches he has delivered in the past. He was good enough to say to-day that he really thought that the Department of Agriculture in Ireland was a rather admirable institution. In fact, he told my right hon. Friend that it compared very favourably with his own. That is quite mild. I am going to put it a little higher. I am not prepared to admit the superiority of either England or Scotland or Wales, and the reason I say that is that Scotland and Wales are doing their very best to get an institution like the Irish. They have not succeeded up to the present. I am not prepared to take a back seat, so far as the Department and its machinery and its staff are concerned, to either England or Scotland. Why has the hon. Member said all the things he has said? He expressed the greatest interest in the Irish cattle trade. He had great sympathy with it, but let us see what he has said. Does a man sympathise with a country under a great calamity—because this has been a great calamity to Ireland; £1,500,000 has been lost already, and more will be lost before this is remedied—who publishes in the House of Commons the statement that the children on the streets of Dublin are running about with foot-and-mouth disease? Is that sympathy? If I may speak for the Irish Members, and I am one, I would rather that that sympathy was kept. There never was a particle of foundation for that statement. The medical authorities of Dublin disowned it the moment it was made. Has the hon. Member ever withdrawn it or uttered the slightest apology for it? I am sorry he is not here.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: Does the right, hon. Gentleman complain on the ground that it is impossible that the thing can happen, and did he ever give notice to my hon. Friend that he was going to make this attack upon him, because I am quite sure he would have been ready to meet it if ho had?
  Mr. RUSSELL: I think the hon. Member knew pretty well that I would reply to him. He surely could not expect the Minister

  1647
  responsible for this matter to pass over a statement like that. The Chief Secretary stated from this box that there was not a word of truth in it. He never withdrew it or apologised for it.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: I think I ought to say, in defence of my hon. Friend, that he told me this morning that he did not know whether he would be able to stay here to hear the whole Debate because he had to catch a train for an important engagement. Secondly, the right hon. Gentleman has not answered the first question I put to him, namely, whether the medical authorities in Dublin held that it was impossible that this disease could be communicated to human beings?
  3.0 P.M.
  Mr. RUSSELL: The public medical authority in Dublin never entered into the question whether it was possible that this disease could be communicated to human beings or not. They had to answer the question put by the Chief Secretary in the ordinary course, Is this true? I am not challenging that it is possible to communicate it. The hon. Member brought forward the fact that the inspectors of the Department had taken the disease. The Department have denied it, and medical certificates have been given. I saw one medical certificate that an officer of the Department was suffering from the effects of foot-and-mouth disease, and I am bound to say the medical gentleman who gave that Certificate might have given it to every officer of the Department. We were all suffering from it. It is quite true that several inspectors of the Department suffered from blood poisoning, but the case which was reported to be foot-and-mouth disease is hotly challenged to this day. But what object had the hon. Gentleman in circulating a report of that kind? What good was to be achieved? It was not even sympathy. The whole case is doubtful. I have not taken any hard and fast line upon it. That was the effect of the certificate. It might have been given to myself. I was suffering very badly. But even supposing it were true, I ask what good was to be done by a statement like that? Here was an acute conflict, if you like to put it that way, between England and Ireland, and it was balancing the scale of England against the Irish Department. What was another statement made by the hon. Gentleman? He stated in this House, in my own hearing, that the veterinary officers of the Department were not as com-
  1648
  petent as the English officers, and when he went on to explain that he said that for a generation past they had never seen foot-and-mouth disease in Ireland. He had been telling us something before that that it had been in the country all the time and had been concealed. That was the theory of the last Debate—an impossible theory.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: To what Debate does the right hon. Gentleman refer in which it was held to be the theory that foot-and-mouth disease had been in existence in Ireland for twenty-five years?
  Mr. RUSSELL: The Debate was on my salary. I forget the exact date, but it-was in the month of July. Let me take up the question now of the veterinary staff, for this is part and parcel of the ground of suspicion. It is quite true that on the veterinary staff of the Department there WPS a very considerable number of officers who had never seen a case of foot-and-mouth disease. We have a veterinary college of our own and young men are not now in the habit of coming across here or going to Edinburgh. Mr. Hedley's name has been mentioned to-day—the Chief Officer of the Department. I am sorry to say he is stricken down. He is one who is suffering severely from the effects of foot-and-mouth disease. Mr. Hedley was in charge of this question when the Privy Council was the authority in Ireland. He was in charge during the whole outbreak of 1883 and 1884, when Ireland had 114,000 cases of disease, and when the period spread for eighteen months. Mr. Hedley went through that whole period, not as an ordinary officer, but as the officer in charge. I saw a letter the other day from a county council in Ireland to the President of the Veterinary College in Ireland, suggesting that he should come down and test a case as a Court of Appeal on Mr. Hedley. A Court of Appeal and Mr. Hedley in a case like this! Mr. Hedley knows more about foot-and-mouth disease than all the veterinary officers in the country put together. What we have aimed at—and I wish the House to understand this—is never to act upon the authority of a single officer when a case of suspicion has been reported. There have been more than 300 cases of suspicion reported from different parts of the country; we have sent down men, and we have never confirmed the report that it is foot-and-mouth disease until Mr. Hedley had seen the animal, or

  1649
  the head had been sent to the laboratory for examination. It has been stated that there has been random and loose treatment in this matter. Notwithstanding all that, there are lots of people who believe that there has never actually been a case of foot-and-mouth disease in the country.
  There are two other officers in Ireland who were through the former outbreaks. What is the use of the right hon. Gentleman speaking as he has done? Can he state that any officers of the Board of Agriculture in England have had as long or as much experience as they have1 had. I am not under-rating them at all—the very opposite—but I say that to tell the country that a man like Mr. Hedley and the other officers are not fit for the duties they have to perform, and that they do not know the disease when they see it, is to state what is not correct. Hon. Gentlemen may say that they make the statement out of sympathy for the men, but it is a kind of sympathy which I do not understand. We have had a competent veterinary staff. No doubt we have had to enlarge it, but we have taken care, when we have got officers into the Department from outside for temporary work, never to send them to diagnose foot-and-mouth disease. There was plenty of work for them in the markets, and we left the experienced officers to deal exclusively with this disease itself. All this, whatever was the intention, has had the effect of poisoning the public mind in England. I do not say that was the hon. Member's intention, but that was the effect of it. It has been taken up by newspapers and meetings all over the country, and whatever the hon. Member's intention was, he has managed in various ways to circulate information, most of it absolutely false, and doing serious detriment to the Irish cattle trade. The right hon. Gentleman, towards the conclusion of his speech to-day, gave additional evidence of his distrust of the Irish management of this disease. What was it? He said, "You cannot prevent cattle driving in daylight; how can you prevent disease in the dark?"
  Mr. CHAPLIN: What I did say was that constantly you had not been able to prevent cattle driving. Then I asked whether the rumours which were common had any foundation, namely, that animals had been moved, and were frequently being moved, from infected districts to beyond boundaries in order to be transhipped. Whether these rumours were true or not
  1650
  I do not know. Then I did ask this question, "If you cannot prevent cattle driving in broad daylight, is it more easy for you to prevent the moving of cattle in the darkness of the night?"
  Mr. RUSSELL: Will the House observe that that is another rumour? Supposing I say to the right hon. Gentleman, "Have you got a single fact you can bring for ward in defence of a proposition of that kind?" That is what I complain of. I know wags in Ireland who have been writing letters to hon. Members. I know it from my own knowledge. Now let me meet that case. I know that the hon. Gentleman would not put it forward if he had not received it from some source he deemed reliable. I frankly say so. I say there is not one particle of truth in any such thing, and I desire here and now to pay what I consider a well-deserved compliment to the Royal Irish Constabulary in the most public place in the world—the House of Commons. We have had the most faithful and devoted service from the Royal Irish Constabulary. I say the cordons drawn round these infected places have been faithfully kept. This is one of the things in regard to which I think we are rather better organised than you are in England. I hope the House will not feel offended if I say that we have a better police force and more of them than you have in England in proportion to the population. As a matter of fact, we have a police force which for work of this kind could not be excelled. I tell the right hon. Gentleman that the cordon drawn round an infected place was such that a rat could not get through. I am quite satisfied that the right hon. Gentleman would not make a statement to the House of Commons, and would not give publicity to rumours, unless he believed it was necessary; but they will be read outside to-morrow; and unless they are contradicted people will say that they are facts. I say there was no truth whatever in the statement—none whatever. The law has been faithfully carried out, and its execution by the police has been beyond all praise. I have had my quarrels in days gone by with the police force; but I say now in regard to this work that they have rendered most valuable service. I have been blamed in Ireland for being too strict. The hon. Member for the St. Patrick's Division of Dublin—I do not know if he is in his place—
  Mr. FIELD: Yes.
  Mr. RUSSELL: The hon. Member has very often been angry at what we have done. I tell the hon. Gentleman first of all, and I want the House to understand, that it is not a question of one single section of people in Ireland; it is a question of all sections. They are all concerned in this trade, and the farmer in the Bally-mena district in the county Antrim is quite as much interested in the export of cattle as the farmer in Cork, and is quite as anxious to get the restrictions removed. I wish the House to understand that this is not a question affecting one party in Ireland; it is a question affecting Ireland as a whole. I do hope that these insinuations and innuendoes about the existence of disease where it does not exist, and has not existed, shall be heard of no more. As the Noble Lord (Lord Balcarres) gave expression to an opinion on this question one night in the small hours before the House rose, I may refer to it as an illustration of the way in which this mischief works. An announcement was made in the House in reference to the case of a head which was said to have come from Waterford. Suddenly one day information reached the Department that a head bad been found in a shop in Liverpool with traces of foot-and-mouth disease on the palate, and with the tongue cut out as if to show cruelty. That night the Noble Lord spoke, I think on the Adjournment Motion, of the Waterford head as having "been the cause of the gravest anxiety in this country, and that it had renewed the fear and the suspicion that foot-and-mouth disease existed more widely than was supposed.
  Lord BALCARRES: I have only come in by chance. I have not looked up the speech. I only wish to ask who announced, and on what authority it was announced, that this infected carcase or head had reached an English port. As far as my recollection goes, all I asked was that investigation should be made in order that if that was so it should be properly tracked down to its source to prevent further infection. I said nothing about cruelty.
  Mr. RUSSELL: The Noble Lord rose that night, and stated that this information had caused great alarm. All I said in reply to the Noble Lord was, "Please keep an open mind about the Waterford head."
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: Why did not the Government keep an open mind? Why did not Runciman keep an open mind?
  Mr. RUSSELL: I am dealing with this as another example of the suspicion engendered throughout the country.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: It was spread by Runciman.
  Mr. RUSSELL: I said to the Noble Lord, "Do try to keep an open mind on this Waterford case." What has become of the Waterford case I One thing certain, at all events, is that the head never came from Waterford. That is why I asked the Noble Lord to keep an open mind.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: The statements volunteered by the Minister for Agriculture— —
  Mr. RUSSELL: All that I—[HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."] What will I withdraw? [HON. MEMBERS: "Your charge."]
  Lord BALCARRES: The right hon. Gentleman should either withdraw his attack on myself or on his colleague.
  Mr. RUSSELL: All the attack I made on the Noble Lord was when I say that he gave additional currency to the Waterford case that night, when I asked him to keep an open mind. Now, who was right and who was wrong? [An HON. MEMBER: "Your colleague."] My colleague at all events did this. He joined with me in appointing two gentlemen to investigate the whole matter, and because of that investigation Waterford was cleared. But this is just one of the countless instances in which the public mind was poisoned against Ireland.
  Lord BALCARRES: The right hon. Gentleman has made, without notice to me, a gross personal attack upon myself of a most unjustifiable character. I do not remember when this occurred, but it was some time presumably in July. An official statement was made by the President of the Board of Agriculture that a diseased head or a portion of the head had reached this country.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: Diseased and mutilated.
  Lord BALCARRES: I was charged with having given further currency to a charge of cruelty in Ireland. That I repudiate utterly. I said in the House that this official announcement by the President of our Board over here had caused great anxiety, and so it did, not only here, but in Ireland too, because it stated definitely

  1653
  that a fresh and hitherto unknown outbreak had occurred 100 miles from Swords. Now the right hon. Gentleman charges me and his colleague alternately, and finally concludes by saying I did this with the object of poisoning public opinion in this country. I repudiate that with emphasis in the most unqualified form. I state that the right hon. Gentleman is not justified in making such a statement, and I challenge him to read my words to the House, and I will guarantee that there is nothing of the sort in them, and I ask him to be so good as to withdraw.
  Mr. RUSSELL: If the Noble Lord thinks I meant to make any attack on him, I will withdraw it unreservedly. All I meant to say was that this Waterford case was the means of further poisoning the public mind—
  Lord BALCARRES: Through me.
  Mr. RUSSELL: And in the speech which he delivered that night the Noble Lord drew further attention to it. That is all I meant to say, and I asked him then to keep an open mind. The advice was sound because it turned out as I have said that what was supposed to be a Waterford head never saw Waterford, and nobody knows where the head came from. In Ireland the position for the last three months has been one of very great difficulty. There have been occasions when the interests of England and Ireland appeared to be directly hostile. It has not been always easy to steer an even keel, and to keep in mind the two positions in England and in Ireland. But this is what the Department has striven to do, whether successfully or unsuccessfully. I wish to add this: So far from the Irish people cloaking this disease or endeavouring to conceal it or fighting against these Orders and restrictions as a whole, the Irish people recognised what they had to lose, and have given the Department every possible assistance, and even where the restrictions were very severe and caused serious loss, they have not hesitated to incur that loss and do their best in aiding the Department to stamp out the disease. With regard to the present position of matters I am glad to say that there is extremely little of the disease left. Three of the counties affected are entirely free from it, with a seventy days' quarantine. The remaining counties are causing us very little anxiety now, perhaps with the exception of Fermanagh. I hope that before many days, at any rate before any long
  1654
  time elapses, it will be possible for this trade to resume its normal course, and that this intercourse of so much importance to Ireland and of so much benefit to England as well will be resumed along its normal lines, and that we shall have heard the last of this matter.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Though I am greatly interested in the subject, I had not intended to say anything about it, but I do feel bound to take note of the peculiar methods which the right hon. Gentleman introduces into every subject that he discusses in this House. I listened with the greatest surprise to the attack which he made on my hon. Friend the Member for Wilton (Mr. C. Bathurst). I should have thought that if personal charges so violent were to be made against any Member of this House, the least he could have done was to inform that Member that they were to be made, so that he could have had an opportunity of being here and meeting them when they were made. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why did he go away?"] He was here at any rate during part of the Debate, but if I were in his place, and the charges were made against me that were made against my hon. Friend, without notice beforehand that he intended to make them, I would think I was being treated in a most unfair way. There is more than that. I think in any case we would have had ground to take that view, because we find that he made similar charges against the Member who is here, and it -was found that there is no truth or foundation in the charge from beginning to end. I for one, without knowing the facts or having followed them, have not the slightest hesitation in saying, that in my belief, if my hon. Friend had been here, he would have shown just as conclusively the maliciousness of what the right hon. Gentleman has said. I said I was interested in this subject. I hope the President of the Board of Agriculture will not accuse me of sham sympathy when I say that I realise as fully as Irish Members do, how important this question is for them, and how essential it is, if possible, that the trade may resume its normal operations.
  We all feel that, and it is really in a ease of this kind a question of balancing the risks with the disadvantages. That is the whole case. I have felt from the start that the President of the Board of Agriculture, though he has not had personal experience of the terrible evils of this disease, has studied it since he became

  1655
  Minister of Agriculture, and does realize what they are, and I am quite sure that he is anxious-not to run any risk which is incommensurate with the advantages derived. I have listened to the questions of my right hon. Friend at different times, and I felt that they were questions on which I was not going to make up my mind. But it is entirely a question of weighing the risks and the disadvantages. I would take precisely the same view with regard to the disadvantage to Ireland as I would in reference to Scotland, and the risk is as much in the one case as in the other. I followed the deputation which waited on the right hon. Gentleman, and it seems to me that the advantage to the Irish store cattle dealers, with a very restrictive permission to send cattle under this Order, is not at all commensurate to the risk which is run in sending the cattle. It seems to me that the risk is very considerable, because admittedly the cattle were under suspicion in England, and anybody must realise that cattle going along our roads in any part of the country risk meeting other cattle and communicating disease. It seemed to me, and I still think, that the amount of business which can be done under these restrictions is so small that the result was not worth the risk which was involved. I know from the speech of the hon. Member for Cork that the idea which is in the mind of Irishmen is this, that in England or in Scotland you draw a cordon round the infected areas and you do not allow cattle to come out of those infected areas, but there is free movement of cattle everywhere else. The Irish point of view is that you take a larger area in Ireland where there is no disease and no suspicion of disease, and the Irish say, "Why should you not allow cattle to be moved freely in those districts?"
  What I would aim at would be to try to find out whether it is possible to act in that way without detriment to the interests of England, and, if it were possible at any ports in Ireland near districts perfectly free from infection, and not near districts which are not free from infection, I would allow the cattle to go freely from those districts. If that is possible, I would like to see that done. If it is not possible—I really do not profess to be able to say whether it is possible to safeguard it—if it is not possible, then the only other course, in the interests of Ireland as well as of Great Britain, is to wait, as the hon. Member opposite said, until Ireland as a
  1656
  whole has a clean bill of health, and then let the cattle come in. The right hon. Gentleman talked about the immense loss. There is immense loss, and everybody deplores it, but after all, as far as I can gather, it is not a loss which is very immense, if it only means a few weeks' delay. That is my view, though I may be wrong. It is a loss, of course, but there is plenty of grass in Ireland. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] I am told there is; at all events, I should say that even in the interests of Ireland it is better to try to keep the cattle until there is a clean bill of health, and then let them come in, than to move them when there is risk of disease and have the whole trade under suspicion. That is my view. I am sorry that other engagements make it impossible for me to hear the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, but my whole view of the case is this, that the Order he has given is not worth the risk, and that if it is possible to allow the trade freely from some ports it ought to be done, but if it is not possible, then the whole of the trade ought to be shut off until Ireland has a complete bill of health.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: The right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has expressed the view which sometimes we have put on previous occasions in this House. What I chiefly rise to ask is this: All these Cattle Diseases Acts of modern times have been passed in our own lifetime in the House of Commons. They were passed, as a rule, as consent measures. Everybody agreed to them and, if possible, applied them. They have been the subject of very conflicting decisions, and men of the greatest learning have disputed as to their meaning. But nowhere was it ever suggested while these Bills were going through the House of Commons that we the Irish Members, who were consenting parties to those Bills, ever permitted the Government to put, so to speak, a cork in the Irish bottle, and close the trade at every port in Ireland. We never agreed to it; it was never pretended that that was the meaning of those measures, and I think that we are entitled, while I do not like to lay down any hasty doctrines, and I hardly think this is the tribunal most fitted for it, yet I do think that when an English Minister is prepared by a stroke of the pert to sign the death warrant, as he has done for many a small Irish farmer, that there should be some tribunal or some court of appeal to know whether that is the meaning of those Statutes which he affects to

  1657
  put in force. For myself I humbly say, I doubt it. There are provisions in the Acts for stopping foreign ships and for quarantining an area or a place, but I respectfully say that except a Court influenced by panic, or except a Department influenced by panic, that in normal times no Court and no Minister would ever dream of making the suggestion that those Acts gave him the power by a single stroke of the pen without inquiry to stop the whole trade of Ireland. Let the House remember this: that, practically speaking, we have no other trade. I remember very well Isaac Butt used to tell the story of a Protestant Minister of Trinity College, of the difference before the Union and after the Union. He said at the time before the Union, when Ballinasloe fair took place a hundred thousand animals were sold and only a hundred went to England, and now when Ballinasloe fair takes place ninety-nine thousand of the animals go to England, and the question was put: What did they do with the animals before the Act of Union? The answer was that their flesh was eaten at home and their skins were curried and turned into leather which was used at home. That was the argument of Isaac Butt.
  To-day our steamships depend upon this trade; our farmers depend upon this trade; the rents they pay to the landlord depend on this trade, and the annuities they pay to the Government depend upon this trade, and suddenly, as out of a blue sky, without any consulation with the Irish authority and upon the mere report of the author of the Waterford head, and, as far as I know, upon the mere report of an individual inspector in Liverpool, the Minister of a friendly Government whom, we are told, another of the Waterford heads holds in the hollow of his hand—[Laughter]—I hope the constituents are laughing—suddenly signs an Order by which every steamship in the country and every port in the country, hundreds of miles away from the scene of this infection, is closed. That was bad enough because after all nobody pretends that the right hon. Gentleman, the Minister for Agriculture understands our country. We cannot expect it, but he would not even take the trouble of consulting the Irish Department. I asked him a question, did he consult any authority; was there any minute made at the time this portentous Order was promulgated, any solemn minute made as to the material and as to the evidence upon which it could go. And the answer was that he did it
  1658
  upon his own responsibility. Very good! When anger and passion were shown in this House in July last at his action and when the House as a whole began to realise the seriousness of the position, then the device of Richard Piggott is adopted. I really do not think in my experience since the Piggott forgery a device more contemptible was ever adopted; for what happened? One night when this House was putting some pressure on the right hon. Gentleman, and when we were maintaining that Munster and Connaught at least were free from the disease, and that the infection was a hundred and fifty miles from our ports, the right hon. Gentleman comes down and declares in his most solemn and meekest manner that at Liverpool a portentous discovery had been made, because not only had the Irish sent to Liverpool a head which manifested and proved the existence of foot-and-mouth disease, but the wicked Irish in addition had mutilated the head and had cut from it the portions from which the disease could more readily be detected, and all this is done by us. That is a slur on the Irish Department as well as upon the country. I do not know what the innuendo is, but I suppose it is that all this is done practically so that disease might be disseminated in this country, that is so far as I know.
  When the right hon. Gentleman, the Minister for Irish Agriculture, says that the Member for the Wilton Division (Mr. C. Bathurst) disseminated the slander, I agree with him. I think his action was deplorable, but it had no such effect as the official statement made by the right hon. Gentleman. I venture to say if that statement had not been made at that moment from the Treasury Bench and by the right hon. Gentleman that every port in Munster would have been opened. Of course, now he will say they would not, but I will say this, that had they been opened not a single trace or tittle of disease would have reached this country, because Munster is as absolutely free from the disease as the best parts of this Kingdom. It is a strange fact, however, that if ever Free Trade, thorough and absolute and naked Free Trade got a blow, it is over this business, because the right hon. Gentleman in the interests of Free Trade allows every form of infection to come into Ireland from France, which for a hundred years has not been free from the disease. There is practically not an area corresponding to a Department which has not got the

  1659
  disease in France. Notwithstanding that the author of this Free Trade policy allows them to get in, and in order to save 2½d. we have lost a million and a half of money. That is practically what the naked theory of Free Trade comes to. I do not believe that as yet the full effect of this action has been felt in England and Scotland. Unless you have store cattle you cannot have fat cattle. It is absurd to talk about instituting a dead meat trade as a substitute for this trade. It is the store cattle of Ireland that becomes the fat cattle of England and Scotland—not exclusively, but to a very large extent in some counties—and when meat goes up in price at Christmas and later on, as it must do, because of the exclusion of Irish stores, many of the working classes of Great Britain will hardly thank the right hon. Gentleman so enthusiastically as he supposes. What is the remedy that he has adopted? Instead of quarantining these cattle in Ireland and taking a certificate of origin for them, his present plan is to coop up the store cattle in particular areas of the most unsuitable, and some of them I am told of the most insanitary, description. No doubt he will say that he had to prescribe some remedy owing to the pressure put upon him. What would have been easier than this? We know that he does not trust the Irish Department to the extent of consulting them before he issues an Order, but has he consulted them as to whether he has adopted the best means of relieving the situation either in England, Scotland, or in Ireland? I will make this suggestion. Where store cattle are about to be shipped, instead of having the quarantine period in England, why not have the period of detention in Ireland, where the cattle come from? Is it reasonable to impose upon the exporters of store cattle the obligation of having to feed these stores for four days at enormous expense, at a time when hay and fodder will be dear, instead of letting the farmer who is about to ship his animals go to the Irish Department and obtain a clean bill of health, and then letting the animals be at once shipped to England or Scotland?
  We are told of the great advantages that will arise to Ireland under a Home Rule system. But this is a disadvantage that is arising to us under the Imperial system. This is Imperialism—that the Minister of the Irish Department is not even consulted, much less trusted, by the Minister of the English Department, who is supposed to have the same interests at
  1660
  heart. So far as my experience goes, the President of the Board of Agriculture has inflicted upon Ireland more loss, more sorrow, and more suffering than the author of fifty Coercion Acts. If he wants to judge of that, let him attend one of these fairs, as I have done. He may perhaps go disguised as an agriculturist. I have seen poor men, wet with the rain, with very little clothing upon them, who have been out from the early morning trying to sell their beasts, driving them home several miles along the road, with no buyers, and with nothing to meet the rent or the instalment on the farm. I declare frankly that if I believed the measures were necessary for England, I would cordially support them. If I believed that this measure of exclusion was essential to the protection of the flocks and herds of England and Scotland, I would freely acknowledge that your interests in the matter are greater than and superior to ours, that your cattle are more costly and your pedigree in many respects better, and as far as I am concerned I will not have one word of criticism to offer. But it is a dreadful thing to think that a man can be shovelled from one Department in the Cabinet to another, without necessarily-having any special qualifications for his post. So far as I know, the right hon. Gentleman may be the most expert man in Europe. But we have often watched this shifting from one Department to another. A man to-day may be Secretary to the Admiralty; to-morrow he is Secretary to the Treasury; the next day he is Minister for Agriculture—for no reason whatever for aught we can tell, except the whim of the Prime Minister, or it may be of some person behind the Prime Minister. [Several HON. MEMBERS: "Redmond."] I must certainly acquit the Member for Waterford of any such responsibility here. Ministers change from office to office for aught we can tell without any previous training or experience.
  This is the great Imperial system that we have to reckon with. If Ireland had a few years' experience of this kind of thing, the country would probably be able to develop its trade upon some other lines. But we have been encouraged to send our cattle to this market. Your money is always good, and I do not think there is a friendlier feeling between any sets of people than there is between Irish sellers and English buyers. I know that when an Irishman comes into England with his cattle he is welcomed, and very often treated like a gentleman. I wish to make

  1661
  that acknowledgment. But the right hon. Gentleman's Order came upon our country like a bolt from the blue. He did not take the matter gradually. He did not first exclude the port of Dublin, then the port of Drogheda, then the port of Dundalk, and so on, according as he noticed the spread of infection. That is not what he did. He put a wholesale Order on every port in the entire country. He gave our country, not only an inconsiderable, but in my opinion, a mortal blow. Because when the hon. Member for Luton talks about the mischief done, I am sorry to say that it was the action of the right hon. Gentleman which cast the first slur upon Irish cattle as a whole. What I want to know is: is this going to be the normal position of Irish trade? Is our country to be always at the nod of a Minister, be he experienced or inexperienced? Is the investment of the country in land and in cattle always liable to be held up by the right hon. Gentleman? If it is, let us have a test case. Let us try if that is the law. It is no answer to say, as the right hon. Gentleman said in July last: "Oh! the Irish are more particular than Ave are," because Orders have been made at the Irish ports excluding cattle from England and from Scotland going into Ireland. That is no answer to us.
  4.0 P.M.
  We are not responsible for the action of the Irish Department. Let the Government, if you like, have a test case, and see whether the Irish Department have acted legally or not. The Irish Department is not subject, so far as I know, to anybody except the Prime Minister. It may be subject to the Lord-Lieutenant, but he is subject to the Prime Minister. Be that as it may, so far as the action of the Irish Department is concerned, I say one word from the Prime Minister, and the right hon. Gentleman would be compelled to withdraw the Order. We have no such remedy. Whereas our trade with you is £20,000,000. your trade with us so far as cattle and sheep is concerned—I am not quite certain of the figure—does not I think, run to £100,000 per year. Therefore, neither from the point of legality, money, value, or practice, can the right hon. Gentleman take refuge in the precedents that have been set from the Irish side. His Department is the creature of the Government. If they have done wrong the Government can rescind and cancel the Order. We cannot, nor can the Irish Department cancel his Order. We are at his mercy, certainly, when all these con-
  1662
  sequences can flow and follow from the mistaken and heedless act, as I conceive it to be, of a single Minister. We are-entitled to know whether his action is legal, and, if it be legal, whether in the future—perhaps at a time of even greater distress than the present year has unfortunately given to Ireland—the same thing will happen again. The hay in three-quarters, certainly in half of one side of the country, has been almost altogether-destroyed, so that this calamity has come to ns at a most unfortunate moment. It has come at a time when half the country has been injured by the harvest, which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wimbledon described as the worst harvest in England for fifty years. It is an unfortunate thing for us. In those parts of the country where poverty has been most-chronic they have been a little more-favoured with sunshine, so that I do not say the calamity is universal. But undoubtedly so far as the better parts of the country are concerned we have had perhaps as distressful a harvest as in England. The two calamities coming together, the stoppage in cattle and the harvest, has brought us, as I say, to a more deplorable condition of things than any I remember. I therefore say we are entitled to know whether the legality of this has been submitted to the Law Officers of the Crown; and if it is to be made the normal legal procedure of the Department, what have been the means taken to find out really how the law stands in this matter?
  Mr. FALCONER: I rise for the purpose of expressing the view, as far as I have been able to gather it, of the farmers in Scotland as to the supply of store cattle from Ireland. The Leader of the Opposition has stated a view which commends itself to me. I believe that the farmers of Scotland generally hold the view that the matter is entirely a question of risk on the one side and of disadvantage on the other. With regard to the question of risk, I am not going to travel over ground which has been covered in discussion as-to disease in Ireland, except only to say that I have followed, as far as I can from day to day, the information which has been supplied with regard to the disease. I am satisfied that the time has come when the risk of importing cattle from Ireland, from the unaffected area, is, under proper precautions, practically nil. I will in a sentence tell why. There are twenty-six counties in Ireland in which there has been

  1663
  no disease at all. In county Dublin, where the first outbreak took place, there has been no disease for sixty-six days. Everyone will agree that that is sufficient to give a, practical guarantee of absolute immunity. In county Meath there has been no disease for sixty-four days. In county Louth sixty-five days. If you take the three other counties, which have been more or less affected, in county Kildare there has been no case for thirty-two days. That, most practical farmers I think will agree, should secure immunity. In county Fermanagh, which has been referred to by the Vice-President, it is thirty-two days since the last case.
  Mr. RUSSELL: Since the first case.
  Mr. FALCONER: Oh, yes. The last case was on the 16th September, a month ago. I gave the wrong figure. In county Wicklow, as I understand, the last case was seventeen days ago. What I say in regard to that is that the Irish Board of Agriculture have been remarkably successful in their handling of this disease. I am sure that is the general opinion of Scottish farmers with regard to that Board. Their feeling is one of admiration. I am not alone in my opinion. The hon. Member for Bute, who is not here, said at a public meeting a few days ago that he himself had been through Ireland and had come in contact with the Board. He spoke in the highest terms of the Irish Department, and the way in which they had handled this question of disease, and that, I believe, represents the real genuine opinion of the whole of the people of Scotland. I have often heard it discussed, and I have heard the opinion expressed that the action of the Irish Board of Agriculture is one which we in Scotland might very well follow if there was disease. I do not say there is any such thing as absolute immunity from foot-and-mouth disease. That, of course, is impossible under any procedure, but I do say, when you have it confined as it is in Ireland to a small corner, and with confidence in the vigour of the people who have charge of the Agricultural Department, then it is safe to assert that the risk of bringing it in, if you restrict your importations to the unaffected areas, is very much reduced, so much so that I think you are entitled to say you are protected in bringing in the cattle. So much for the risk. Let us look at the other side, at the disadvantage that would be caused by the continued exclusions of the cattle.
  1664
  There are large districts in Scotland which are practically entirely dependent on Irish store cattle, and I am glad to be able to reciprocate what was said by the hon. and learned Member for North-East Cork with regard to the relations that exist between the farming people in Scotland and the Irish farmers and cattle dealers. Their course of trade has been creditable to both sides. There is complete confidence, and I am sure that the cattle dealers are fully aware that it is as much to their interest to give confidence to the people buying the cattle as it is to the people buying the cattle to make sure that they are free from disease. The peculiar position of Scotland is this, that whereas the Order under discussion admits cattle into England, no similar Order extends to Scotland, and there is absolute exclusion without any limit. It has been suggested as a reason for that that the Scotch farmers are not so much dependent upon Irish stores as the English farmer. That is not at all the case—indeed, it is the very reverse. According to statistics issued by the English Board of Agriculture, 7 per cent. of the English stores are got from Ireland, and 30 per cent. of the whole stores of Scotland are got from Ireland. Even that is not all. If you take the leading counties where cattle feeding goes on, and into which these stores come, you will find that two-thirds and three-fourths of the stores in the great farming districts are obtained from Ireland.
  Mr. KILBRIDE: Fifeshire?
  Mr. FALCONER: Yes, Fifeshire and Forfarshire and parts of other counties. I do not want to go into the figures in detail, but this is not a question of thousands, or of tens of thousands of pounds; it is a question of a million and a half. What is going to happen? If they do not get the store cattle the farmers that grow crops for feeding these cattle will be absolutely ruined. There is no other purpose for which the farmer can use his turnips; if he does not get the cattle they are worthless; so also with straw. The loss there will be of very great dimensions and real ruin will be staring a great many of the farmers of Scotland in the face if they do not get in the Irish store cattle. The disadvantage to which the farmers will be put by the continued exclusion of Irish stores is out of all proportion to the risk to be run. I know that is the opinion held in the great cattle centres. I am told on very reliable authority that is the view entertained. A public meeting held in

  1665
  the cattle market of Edinburgh two days ago unanimously expressed the opinion that the time had come, when, subject to suitable precautions, Irish store cattle ought to be introduced. I therefore hope that the Minister of Agriculture will be able to-day to tell us that Scotland at any rate is not to be in a less advantageous position than England and that we should be allowed to get in store cattle for the Scottish farmer. I must assume that that is the case, because I noticed that two days ago he intimated in the House, in answer to a question by the hon. Member for Bute (Mr. Harry Hope), that be was in communication with the Glasgow authorities to ascertain whether suitable accommodation could be provided for four days' detention of the cattle. So far as I am able to gather from practical farmers that is not the best way to deal with the matter, and it is quite unnecessary, and they infinitely prefer that the inspection and quarantine should take place in Ireland. There are various reasons for that. One is that you have plenty of room near the ports in Ireland where you can provide suitable accommodation for the cattle; and that is a matter of first-class importance.
  The second point is that in that way you can increase enormously the number of cattle you can ship across in a given time instead of providing for this to be done at one port in Scotland which has very limited accommodation. If the cattle are kept four days at Glasgow, it will be four days before any more cattle can be 'detained, and it is too much for one authority to have the cattle examined. The end of September and the beginning of October is the time when the Irishmen must get rid of their cattle, and that is the time the Scotch farmer must have them. You must ship them in October, otherwise in the journey across the Channel they get knocked about, and you cannot tell what disease may come upon them. Another point is that if you have them lying in Glasgow for four days you will reduce them in condition to such an extent that it will take you a month to feed them up again. Anyone who knows anything about the cattle trade knows that if a farmer goes to an ordinary auction market and buys cattle he is off to the train with them at the earliest moment, so that there shall not even be an hour's delay, because they know that knocking them about and detaining them always creates difficulty in getting them into good condition for
  1666
  feeding. On all these grounds I urge the Minister for Agriculture to consider whether he cannot make some arrangement for having the cattle examined and certified on the Irish side. This may not be of very great consequence, but I am hopeful that within a week or a fortnight all these restrictions will be removed. One more word. I do not think that perhaps the true state of matters as regards dealing with this question in Scotland is quite realised. There would be no chance of the infection spreading amongst the cattle in the parks of Scotland. So far as passing over the roads is concerned, they will practically have the roads to themselves. While I would be as strongly in favour as anyone of taking every practical and possible precaution to prevent the risk of disease in the interest of the farmers most of all and in the interests of the trade, I deprecate any unnecessary restriction, and I would urge that everything that can be done to make the flow of cattle from the Irish farmer to the Scotch homestead as feasible, as little interrupted, and as expeditious as it can possibly be made should be done.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Might I ask you, Sir, whether the remark made by you early in the sitting that we might sit after Five o'clock holds good according to the Order under which we are now sitting?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I have refreshed my memory by looking at the Order passed by the House last Monday. The terms of it are:—
  Government Business shall not be interrupted under the provisions of any Standing Order regulating the Sittings of the House.
  But this is not Government business. I hope I have not misled the House by a chance observation earlier in the Debate. I am clearly of opinion that this, not being Government business, stops at Five o'clock. After that period Government business can be taken.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: As that is the case, perhaps I may be allowed to intervene in the Debate at this stage. The discussion which we have had this afternoon has shown that, unlike many discussions on the administration of a Government Department, there is no clear-cut party division, for opinions have been supported on the other side of the House, on this side, and on the Irish Benches, which were almost identical on the subject of the Irish trade,

  1667
  and I know there are some hon. Members, both in the Conservative party and in the Liberal party, who, speaking purely from the English point of view, do not take the view that the whole agricultural industry of this country should be considered as merely as a stock raising and breeding industry, but that their own direct interests and the interests of their constituents are those of cattle fatteners and feeders, just as the main agricultural interest in this country I believe in the districts south of the Tweed and to some extent north of the Tweed may be said to be that of cattle raising. Here the division of opinion is peculiarly complicated, and it is certainly useful on a Friday afternoon that we should be able to have the opinion of the House freely expressed without any of the ordinary party restraints.
  Perhaps the House will allow me to recall the events of last June and July, which caused so much alarm on both sides of St. George's Channel. Towards the end of June cases of foot-and-mouth disease were discovered in the Liverpool markets, up in Cumberland, and in very rapid succession we received reports, coming in as many as eight and nine in a single day, confirming our officials. We found the disease had spread all the way from Liverpool, across England to the Humber, and from the Solway right through to the North Sea, through Cumberland, Westmorland, and Northumberland. The very first notification we had of foot-and-mouth disease having broken out was confirmed immediately by some of the veterinary officers of the Board, and we were bound to be careful in receiving reports from these officers that they were corroborated by those who had some direct knowledge of the disease. Immediately the reports were confirmed, I counted it my duty, as every Minister for Agriculture has always counted it his duty, to put the Order in force prohibiting the movement of animals and also prohibiting the importation from the country from which the infection had come. There was no doubt about it on this occasion. It may have been the case in the past, but we have no evidence that at any time within the last twenty-eight years any infection had come from Ireland. On this occasion no doubt it did come from Ireland, and it was absolutely necessary that it should be dealt with without a moment's delay. Let the House remember the time lost while the disease was incu-
  1668
  bating, and let it also be borne in mind that in that period no fewer than 60,000 animals had been sent over to the North of England. During ten days the officers of my Department, and the representatives of the local authorities, traced all those animals to their destination and kept them under supervision for some time. I understand that the hon. and learned Member for Cork took exception this afternoon to the Order under which we acted; but I would remind him that promptness is the very essence of the virtue of such an Order. If prompt action is not taken such Orders will be useless.
  The hon. and learned Gentleman asked me if the Order was legal. There is no-doubt about that; and it would be a waste of time to ask the Law Officers of the Crown to interpret what is perfectly plain on the face of the Act of Parliament. The Order is perfectly legal. The Act was passed with the consent of every party in this House, and one cannot expect beneficent results from such an Order unless the powers given are promptly applied. It is perfectly impossible to control this disease in Ireland or Great Britain unless such Orders are promptly carried out. What has happened since then? We have got the disease under control on both sides of the Channel, after herculean labours on the part of the permanent staff under the control of my right hon. Friend and myself. There are only two or three isolated spots which can now be called infected, instead of a great belt of country across England being under the suspicion. In Ireland, in the counties of Dublin, Meath, and Louth, together with Wicklow, Kildare, and Fermanagh, we have dealt with the disease with equal success, and so far as is humanly possible it is now isolated in Kildare, Fermanagh, and Wick-low.
  It is not only desirable to ascertain the position of the infected place. It is also necessary to ascertain the date when the-last trace of the disease was to be found; and that is a material point to be borne in mind when relaxing any Orders under which we work. As the season progressed it became necessary for us to consider the condition of the farmers on both sides of the Channel and the risks of the scourge. In this question we had to weigh on one side the risk and on the other side the advantage. It is impossible, in dealing with a disease of this nature, to eliminate all risk. There will always be a certain element of risk so long as there are

  1669
  animals to breathe, winds to blow, and birds to fly. Distance and time, therefore, are of great importance. While the season was progressing I was watching, with great care, the full information given by the Irish Department as to the outbreak, and was seeing that every precaution was taken, and I came to the conclusion, as the season went on, that, although we could not do what was desired by many Irish agriculturists, namely, throw open the ports at once and restore the normal trade, yet it was possible for us to take cautious steps in the direction of bringing the trade back to its normal condition.
  One of the suggestions made by the right hon. Gentleman who opened this discussion was that I misled the agriculturists of England when I communicated with the hon. Member for Buckrose (Sir Luke White). I think he suggested that in my letter to that hon. Member I had told the agriculturists of England that I had no intention whatever of opening the English ports to Irish cattle—at all events in the near future. I think that if he had read that letter carefully he would have seen that I stated quite clearly in that letter that I intended to modify the Orders from time to time, as the area of the disease was reduced. I stated quite clearly that I intended to do that pretty soon, if no further cases occurred, and, further, that special precautionary measures would be necessary for some time to come. Let me take each one of those points in order. The modifications which I have made are complained of by the hon. Members from Ireland because they are so slight. The right hon. Gentleman opposite says they are almost revolutionary. I hope that somewhere between them there may be a channel of truth, but certainly the modifications I have made are only modifications which are to be regarded as a stepping-stone to the restoration of the normal trade. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman wishes to see the normal trade restored just as much as I do. I said there were to be modifications if no further cases occurred. What happened? All this time I would have the House believe that I was not idly resting on a single letter to the hon. Member for Buckrose. Every day I was in closest communication with those who were in touch with the disease in various parts of the country, and was considering the whole situation from the national and United Kingdom point of view, as well as from the English point of view. During that time I was obviously not entitled to
  1670
  be idle in preparing for the further modifications. It is said that two cases broke out after I had written my letter to the hon. Member for Buckrose, and therefore I ought to have stopped, at that very moment, any modifications I had in mind I may tell the right hon. Gentleman that I did consider those cases. One was in Fermanagh and the other in county Wick-low; both of them were on practically the same spot as the outbreaks which had preceded them, and, indeed, it was almost unfair to call them fresh outbreaks, because they were almost on the same farms. In Fermanagh there was the artificial boundary between one farm and another, but the animals affected were not more than half a mile distant.
  I had to consider was that fresh outbreak of sufficient importance to endanger the English trade, to increase the risk of bringing any infection into England or into Scotland, or was it an outbreak within a prohibited area so well isolated that there was not any risk, or very little risk, or very little appreciable risk—it is impossible to measure it accurately—of the disease spreading beyond the boundary. I came to the conclusion, after weighing the thing up, that if you interpreted my letter to the hon. Member for Buckrose according to the letter I was not entitled to modify the Order. I take it I have to administer the Board of Agriculture, not according to the letter, but according to the spirit, and you must give some practical consideration to the real circumstances and not to the merely literal circumstances in which I have to administer my Department. I came to the conclusion that no additional risk was run by issuing the Order, and getting machinery at work for restoring the normal trade, bit by bit, at the earliest possible moment. The risk, as measured against the advantage, is extremely difficult to ascertain, but I point out how complicated are the interests that are concerned. In the first place, the English breeders are naturally and rightly alarmed at any restrictions, as also are the Scotch breeders, who are just as worthy of consideration as other people. Think what happens in their case. If foot-and-mouth disease gets into their herds it is quite certain to run through them with great rapidity, for there is no disease so infectious, either amongst human beings or animals, as foot-and-mouth disease, and it will destroy the value of the herds, and, what is of still more importance is, that it destroys the breeding value of the herds. I have many scores of letters from farmers

  1671
  in this country who had a personal acquaintance with foot-and-mouth disease thirty years ago, and they have told me over and over again that foot-and-mouth disease did far less harm than most people supposed, but in nearly every case I noticed that those letters came from gentlemen who were fatteners and not breeders, and where an animal easily recovered it would fatten up with great rapidity, and if they bought animals which had just recovered from foot-and-mouth disease they naturally earned a large profit on the transaction and that was done thirty-five years ago with great success in many parts of the country. I know a farmer in my own county of Northumberland who did remarkably well out of exactly that kind of trade in the seventies. But how different that is from the breeder. I have ascertained by personal communication with those who were afflicted with foot-and-mouth disease in the 'eighties that in the breeding stocks, where foot-and-mouth disease broke out they almost invariably lost their calves. To begin with the calves are not able to suck, and in many cases the cows would not allow them to suck or allow milk to be taken from them at all, and almost certainly immediately after that the next attempt to produce a calf resulted in an abortion. The effect of that on the breeding stocks of the country was so disastrous that in 1885, when we had the last great outbreak here, the direct loss to breeders was estimated at no less than £2,500,000. I cannot put on one side that consideration, for although fattening in England is a vastly important trade, the owners of stock will not buy cattle from Ireland or elsewhere. I have to consider also the existing trade. The hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. T. M. Healy) speaks of strong measures in the issue of Orders. Does he suggest that I ought to have consulted all sorts of people?
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: No, only your Irish colleagues.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I kept in the closest possible touch with the Irish Department from first to last.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: The right hon. Gentleman admitted to me that you never consulted him.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: In the issue of Orders I intend to act in this matter with great promptitude and entirely on my own responsibility. If there is to be consultation,
  1672
  it must be after the issue of the Order, when it may be modified, rather than before, when the loss of time might do great damage to English herds.
  I come to the export trade. The export trade is cut off entirely and without a moment's notice in the countries which buy our most valuable stock. The House may be interested to know that Australia, Canada, South America, New Zealand, Argentina, the United States of America, and Uruguay, to say nothing of the European countries, issue orders against importations from this country of our best animals immediately on telegraphic communication reaching them that there has been an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. I am happy to say that Scotland has had complete immunity from the very first, and one of the advantages that I hope Scotland may gain from that immunity is that her export trade may not be interfered with. I quite realise that the figures of the export trade are not large, and it may be that some Gentlemen who are in the export trade attach undue importance to it. We are all prone to that. The breeders and the fatteners all look at these matters from their own point of view, I believe quite rightly; but it is of far more advantage that the export trade should be preserved for other reasons than for the purely monetary reason. It has the effect of raising the standard of British stock, which no other trade has done. We have not in England, I am sorry to say, the excellent arrangements that they have in Ireland for providing pedigree bulls for farmers. I hope we shall copy the example of Ireland in that before long. But the whole effort to raise the standard of stock in England has really come from the breeders who at all times keep their eye on the export market as being one of the directions in which they get their best prizes. That also was a consideration which I could not leave out of account.
  Then I come to the dairy farmers. If the disease had broken out among the great dairy farms, it would have cut off the supply of milk to London with enormous rapidity. I am not exaggerating when I say—and I have taken care to ascertain how far damage would have arisen—if foot-and-mouth disease had come down the Thames valley instead of crossing the north of England, through Cumberland and Northumberland, the milk supply of London would have been halved in the course of the summer. I must see it from

  1673
  the point of view of the consumer as well as that of the dairy farmer. Then I come to the feeders. They were likely to have a far greater loss than they have known for twenty or thirty years past. Last year in many parts of England there was a great shortage of winter feeding. This year the conditions are better. This season in Norfolk they had a better supply of winter feeding than for many years past. Certainly in the north of England if there had been a complete cessation of Irish importation of store cattle, during the coming winter it would have meant that many farmers who have specialised in this industry would have found themselves entirely without any profit. The number of store cattle exposed for sale in England, Scotland, and Wales, in the course of a single year in the principal markets—I cannot give every market, for I am not sure of the figures of some of the smaller ones—is no less than 960,000. Of these 540,000 in a normal year come over from Ireland. They may vary from time to time. Last year, when most of our pastures were burnt up, the number went down to a considerably lower figure, but it may be taken roughly that the number is as I have stated. When I am told that, you may cut off these 500,000 cattle without affecting the price of store stock I must take leave to be incredulous. Although the figures have shown no rise in the price of store stock, if the whole of these 500,000 were cut off, it would mean financial ruin to an immense number of people.
  Then I think I was entitled to consider the case of the Irish farmer. I have stated that primarily my duty as Minister of Agriculture is to consider English agriculture. But I am a Member of the present Government which is responsible for the government of Ireland, and I take up the point of view that if I were never, under any circumstances, to take Ireland into account, I should be failing in my duty as an Imperial Minister. I have no idea for a single moment of sacrificing the interest of British agriculturists to the Irish farmers—I am sure my hon. Friends will feel that is a perfectly justifiable position to take—any more than I have that the interest of Irish farmers should be sacrificed for that of British agriculturists. But there is no reason why we should not make an arrangement which may be modified from time to time, and which will fit the interests of both. When the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition says I must weigh the risk
  1674
  against the advantage, he put to me two practical alternatives as having occurred to his mind as a way out of this difficulty: either the risk is great and you ought to keep out all Irish animals altogether, or you ought to open one or two ports absolutely. Let me examine that. If the risk can be cut down to an almost disappearing quantity, I am not prepared to keep them out altogether. That is why I issued the Order, and why, in spite of the request made to me by the distinguished deputation a fortnight ago, I intend to maintain that Order, and to maintain it so long as the risk is not increased. I believe that our experience will justify us in the action which we have taken. The second alternative, the opening of one or two ports absolutely in Ireland was a difficult one for me to adopt. In Ireland cattle can be sent by train.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: You could easily remedy that.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I am remedying that. If I had adopted the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman, and that alone, I should have had no security against the risk of animals coming out of infected areas down to these ports. There is nothing more difficult than to manage a certificate of origin, as everybody in tariff countries know, though perhaps a certificate of origin in regard to cattle is a little more easy to manage than with regard to goods. In any case the difficulty exists, and I was not prepared, and am not prepared yet, to admit all animals freely on any amount of inspection.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: We never asked for that.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: No. The request which was made was not of that character.
  Mr. JOHN O'CONNOR: Will the right hon. Gentleman admit them from such, areas as are outside the infected areas?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: The hon. and learned Gentleman will hear exactly what J have done in a moment. The alternative, which I had before me was not to take one or two ports and to say that we will restore them entirely to their normal conditions without any restrictions and with no quarantine at this end, and none of the elaborate arrangements which have been in force at the other. That I could not undertake. I felt that it would be a risk at present. I hope shortly that it will be

  1675
  possible to do it. The other was to take Ireland in portions and to provide a cordon around the infected areas so tight that no animal from those infected areas could come outside. That was the first barrier which the disease would have to meet. The next point was I wanted to make quite sure that even with the passage of time there was not likely to be any recrudescence of disease in any other parts of Ireland. We run the same risk in England, and we have to act with great care in England. I therefore provide that there should be other sieves through which this trade could be passed—the inspection over in Ireland, the knowledge of where the animals come from, and a careful inspection when they arrive in England. I have not been satisfied with the foreign inspection, and have provided that they should be kept under detention for four days in the ports where they arrive, and that then they should pass out to the farms where they will be fattened and ultimately end their lives. But in doing that I was really screwing up animals under severe restrictions in the areas in Ireland which were immune from disease.
  When the right hon. Gentleman asks me whether I think the preparations over here were sufficient, I tell him no, they were not sufficient, and I could never have imagined that they would be sufficient. Anyone who knows anything of foot-and-mouth disease knows perfectly well that four days' quarantine is not sufficient. He also knows that if animals are passing along the highway they may run the risk of infecting in those highways and villages the flocks and herds they meet. In this case also I admit that inspection by veterinary officers, however good, whether the staff belongs to the local authority or not, would not be sufficient. But he leaves out of account in reckoning up the safeguards the greatest of all safeguards, and that is that these animals should come from the immune districts in Ireland. Indeed, were it not for the fact that they have to come through ports and on board ship they ought to be able to circulate just as freely as animals coming from Cornwall and Devon.
  It is only the fact of the trade having to be conducted through the ports, coming through the narrow neck of the bottle, and crossing finally to be distributed to a thousand and one farmers within a very short time on this side, which justified the
  1676
  special precautions which have been taken in case, despite all our care, some diseased animal should slip through. The only justification for still closing our ports would be first of all that the information which we have from Ireland with regard to the area of the disease was inaccurate. I tell the House without any reserve that I have scrutinised with the greatest care all the accounts of the Irish administration which have come under my notice during the last three months. I do not believe that the Irish Department have resented that for a single moment, because it is of the very first importance that I should get information from Ireland on which I can rely before opening the ports here. The conclusion I came to was that the veterinary staff in Ireland were—and I have stated it publicly—not only capable but honest. I believe that many of the rumours which have come over from Ireland originated in this way, being entirely without foundation, because when they were carefully sifted it was shown that there was nothing in them. There is one case which was raised by the Member for Cork, the famous Waterford case, and the hon. Gentleman is never more delightful to listen to than when he talks on the subject of Waterford. The information which I have given to the House has always been of the frankest description, and I give that information from the veterinary officers without cutting or leaving anything out, but stating it exactly as it has come, from the veterinary staff.
  Mr. T. M. HEALY: Why did you not punish them for telling a lie?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: It was not a lie. They made their statement on information, as a member of any other profession would do—the legal profession, for instance. It was said that the head came from Waterford, and the Irish Department made the fullest inquiry possible; because it was obviously an extremely dangerous thing, and bad for the trade of England as well of the trade of the South of Ireland. The matter was thoroughly thrashed out by one of the solicitors for the Department, Mr. Wood, who was at one time a respected Member of this House. He sifted the whole thing out, coming to the conclusion that the head had not, in fact, come from Waterford, though it was not possible to find out where it had come from. Certainly it had not come from Waterford, which was a good thing for the South of Ireland, and I gave the fullest publicity to the fact to show that, so far

  1677
  as our suspicion was concerned, it was entirely dissipated. We lost no time in tracking rumours to their source, and everyone knows that such rumours give a very bad impression about Ireland, when, in fact, there is no foundation whatever for them. Although I am not responsible for Irish administration, we are all of us bound to admit that the Irish Department conducts its work well and honestly, and it has behind it in its administration for the prevention of disease what we have not got in England, namely, the Royal Irish Constabulary. We have not in this country, as they have for their purposes, such a force as the Royal Irish Constabulary. I believe the machinery of this Department to be of a first-rate order. Many of these rumours which reach us are wholly unfounded, and the areas that have been certified to be immune were in fact immune, and because they were immune we were able to take this step for the opening of the ports. I understand that the request was made this afternoon by an hon. Member behind me that Scotland should be added to the operation of this Order. I would point out to him one overwhelming fact, which I hope he and his hon. Friends in Scotland will deal with one way or another. It is this: that in Scotland nearly every local agricultural authority has in operation at the present time an Order restricting the importation of Irish stock, which, I believe, entirely forbids them.
  Mr. FALCONER: I know that those restrictions were put on by the local authorities solely because the President of the Board of Agriculture excluded Irish cattle. Those local authorities are now summoning meetings for the purpose of removing restrictions the moment there is a prospect of the cattle coming in. That is the case in Falkirk and other counties.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I am very glad to find I have such a great effect with the local authorities in Scotland at the present moment. Falkirk and Fifeshire, which my hon. Friend mentioned, and nearly every eastern county, and certainly every western county, with the exception of Ayrshire, have Orders prohibiting the importation of Irish stock. Until those are removed, it is impossible for Irish stock to be imported into Scotland. I can only hope that the Scottish local authorities will do what I have done. If they will go into the question very carefully in detail, and will not depend on vague rumours, they will realise that under the very cautious restric-
  1678
  tions it is possible for the animals to come in without any risks being run by their own herds.
  Mr. C. E. PRICE: This morning I received a request from the authorities in Edinburgh asking me to have some ports opened in Scotland on precisely the same terms as in England
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: May I ask if that is an offer from the Leith Harbour authorities?
  Mr. PRICE: The authority is the executive Committee of the local authority of the city of Edinburgh under the Diseases of Animals Act.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: You cannot import animals into Edinburgh without passing through Leith, as my hon. Friend knows, and I should like to know the position of Leith before I give a definite reply.
  Mr. PRICE: Through Glasgow.
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Glasgow is in exactly the same position. I cannot now go into the Scottish position in any detail, as time, does not permit, but it is impossible to clear up the Scottish position unless the local authorities themselves are going to agree. I hope they may do so. I really cannot take this step until I see some chance of local opinion in Scotland being precipitated on this subject.
  Mr. FALCONER: As this matter is of first-class importance, I should like to ask whether there is any difficulty about the cattle coming into Glasgow and being conveyed to the counties where the local authorities are in favour of their coming? They are meeting next week, and would there be any difficulty in that?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I obviously cannot authorise the importation of animals into Glasgow if the local authority have an Order against it. The Glasgow local authority are taking the whole thing into consideration at the present time, and, as I have already informed the House in answer to a question, when I have further information to give I will be only too glad to communicate it to the House. I have one of the officers of the Department down there now. He is seeing whether there can be in Scotland the same accommodation for carrying out the Order as is to be be found in Birkenhead, Cardiff, and elsewhere. In conclusion, I would like to say only one word about the stage which we have now reached. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition said

  1679
  that the importation as it was now allowed was so small and of such a tentative character that it was very little worth while, that it did not help the farmers in Ireland, that a good deal of harm would be done, and a minute risk would be created. I do not think that is of appreciable amount, but I would point out that this is one of the precautions which will lead ultimately to the restoration of the normal trade. If it is suggested to me that Munster and Connaught should be treated—I mean if it is suggested by the Leader of the Opposition on his responsibility—might be treated as separate countries, and that all their ports might be thrown open quite freely, I should certainly not wish to stand in the way. I do not know whether he made that as a practical suggestion. Perhaps I might have some communication from him on that subject. What I would say to him is that, although the present Order may be criticised, time, which is rapidly passing, has shown that so far no harm has been done in England. Our Fat Cattle Order has now been in operation since the beginning of July; 360,000; animals have come in under it, and not a single trace of disease has been found; no infection has been communicated from the foreign animal wharves where they have landed in this country; and, so far as we can see, the passage of time is likely to prove that the Store Cattle Order will bring no more harm to English agriculturists.
  Mr. SANDERS: Can the right hon. Gentleman say how many have come in under that Order?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Very few up to the present, because the new Order has only been in operation since 7th October. I doubt very much whether more than a thousand have come in.
  Mr. SANDERS: As many as that?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I think about a thousand. That is a very small number. The right hon. Gentleman opposite agrees that we cannot treat Ireland as a foreign country. I am not going to treat Ireland as a foreign country. If I did I should exclude all her animals for six months.
  Sir JOHN LONSDALE: Can the right hon. Gentleman give the people in the North of Ireland some assurance that the modification with regard to store cattle will be applied to their ports?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: It would be inconvenient for me to take the different ports one at a time. I hope to have them all working again soon—Heysham is one of the most important, and Holyhead I am also considering—so long as the railway-companies can provide us with the requisite facilities. The real question is, Was this Order issued too soon or was it not? I am speaking entirely on my own responsibility, and I hope the hon. Gentleman opposite will not undertake to criticise my permanent staff again as he did this afternoon. I believe that we have not taken undue risk, and that we have not issued the Order a moment too soon. As soon as I find it safe to do so, I intend to extend it to other ports and to relax the restrictions.
  Mr. GINNELL: May I ask whether the pig trade, which is becoming very important in Ireland, will participate in any relaxation with regard to cattle?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Yes; we regard the pig as an animal.
  Mr. SHEEHAN: I have listened carefully to the right hon. Gentleman's statement, but I have failed to find any justification whatever for the course, which has been adopted in Ireland. He says that no harm has so far been done to the cattle trade of England. Is no consideration required for Ireland, where £1,500,000 has already been, and, according to the Vice-President more is to be, lost? The whole of the cattle trade is excluded from two provinces where, for over twenty years, no disease has existed. The right hon. Gentleman says that he does not intend to treat Ireland as a foreign country. In what other way is he treating Munster and Connaught? He is not giving to them the same treatment that he is giving to English counties, where there is a fifteen miles radius, which the hon. Member for Wilton (Mr. C. Bathurst) considers is entirely excessive. I can only express my sense of the terrible ruin which even one week's continuation of these restrictions means for the store cattle trade of Ireland.
  It being Five o'clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
  Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House of 14th October, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."
  Adjourned accordingly, at Three minutes after Five o'clock, till Monday next, 21st October.

  PETITIONS PRESENTED DURING THE WEEK.
  The following Petitions were presented during the week and ordered to lie upon the Table:—
  MONDAY.
  Bankruptcy Bill [Lords]—Petition from Glasgow, for alteration.

  THURSDAY.
  Franchise and Registration Bill—Petitions for alteration, from Kilmacolm and Leicester.
  Trade Disputes (Pickets)—Petition from Goole, for alteration of law.

  FRIDAY.
  Franchise and Registration Bill—Petition from Lenzie, for alteration.