§ Mr. GINNELLI desire to make a personal explanation which concerns the correctness of the OFFICIAL REPORT as well as myself. On the 7th November, in my absence, you, Sir, read and caused to be inserted in the OFFICIAL REPORT a letter from Sir John Dickinson, a magistrate at Bow Street, stating that I had been sent to prison in default of paying a fine imposed upon me on a charge of having made a false statement. That was certainly the charge, but it was not the act for which I was convicted and for which 349 I have been punished. As the letter is calculated to mislead the House into believing that I was convicted of making a false statement and the Home Secretary-is quite capable of so construing it—
§ Mr. SPEAKERThe hon. Gentleman is not entitled to take advantage of the liberty which the House gives him of making a personal explanation to make charges against other people. He can exculpate himself, but he must not make charges against others.
§ Mr. GINNELLThe letter inserted in the OFFICIAL REPORT leads to a misconception of what actually occurred. I desire to show, as briefly as possible, that I have not been convicted of making a false statement, but that what I was convicted of and punished for was the offence of writing my name in the Gaelic language—an act which I never denied but voluntarily proved—and that the allegation that this was a falsehood was abandoned. I wrote my name in the language used throughout this country before the arrival of the Romans, the language in which this City of London was given the name it still bears, and the language of a considerable number of Irishmen and Scotsmen whose help you have been very glad to get in the War, some of whom have died for you and some of whom are still in the trenches fighting for you. Cheques written throughout in Gaelic pass freely through the banks in Ireland. My name, as written by me at Knutsford, would be understood by most intelligent people throughout Ireland and throughout the larger part of Scotland. I produced competent witnesses to prove that the name I signed was my true name and that the Anglicised form of it, by which I am known here, was arrived at in accordance with the rules governing names of the class to which it belongs. I put in evidence receipts for money made out to me wholly in Gaelic; I put in evidence an annual publication in Gaelic comprising my name and address in that language; I put in evidence letters and post cards addressed to me at this House exclusively in Gaelic, readdressed here and delivered to me at my private residence. I produced as a witness an official of the House of Commons Post Office who proved that he and his colleagues in that office have been accustomed to readdress similar letters and cards to me from time to time since I first entered Parliament. The cumula- 350 tive effect of all this evidence was that a chairman of Quarer Sessions said that there was no occasion to examine my witnesses then in Court, it being no longer disputed that the name I had written was my name in Gaelic. Thus the charge of having made a false statement was abandoned, and I was punished for the offence of having written my name in Gaelic, an act which I never denied, but voluntarily proved and which I maintain I am entitled to do So far as the Censor allows the public Press to inform us, England is the only one of the Allied countries that has imprisoned a member of its Legislature for having written his name in the language of his country.