IRELAND.

HC Deb 08 August 1918 vol 109 cc1636-66

Mr. DILLON

I have no desire in the least to intervene and deprive the hon. Member of his right to reply, but these Debates upon the Motion for the Adjournment are always of a very unsatisfactory character, and cannot be concluded in the same satisfactory way or with the same procedure as ordinary Debates. We are now asked to adjourn for a period of two months, at a time when the situation in Ireland is more unsatisfactory and more uncertain than I ever remember it in my life. The truth is that in Ireland there is really no Government in the true sense of the word. There is, of course, a military dictator who carries out his own will, and there is really no law except the will of this Noble Lord who has been sent over as a dictator. There is no Government in Ireland which has the confidence of any section or any party in that country, and that is a very terrible condition of things, and one which, if it were necessary, I should be prepared to prove. The country is at present drifting, and as I fear, drifting towards disaster. In face of that condition of affairs there is no party, and there is no man in Ireland who knows what is the policy of what passes for a Government. We are left absolutely in the dark. Two months ago a policy was announced with every form of repeated pledge—since the new Government was sent over to Ireland—and when we questioned the representatives of the Government, we were assured that by that policy, of which in many details we did not approve, the Government would stand or fall. Minister after Minister declared that if they did not succeed in carrying that policy into effect they would resign office. That policy was thrown overboard in all its details after about five or six weeks, and now the people of Ireland are left in a state of blank ignorance as to what the policy of the Government is. When I listen to the speeches of Ministers in this House, and those which have been made in Ireland, it sometimes occurs to me that they have totally forgotten the fact that Home Rule, an Irish Parliament and an Irish Executive, is the law of this land and that, if nothing is done, automatically on the conclusion of the War an Irish Parliament will come into existence—it requires no further legislation—and an Irish Executive Government will take over the control of the country. In spite of that fact the Government is allowing the country to drift into such a condition as will make that great change by no means easy.

5.0 P.M.

I said no man and no party in Ireland knows what is the policy of the Government. A voluntary recruiting campaign has been starated, and in respect of that the Government has repeated all the blunders and all those transactions, with what has been described by the Prime Minister on a famous occasion as malignity, which destroyed the recruiting campaign under the late Mr. Redmond in 1914. They have launched the campaign under circumstances which foredoomed it to failure, and they have launched it under a threat of Conscription which has produced all the results which we prophesied and has not done anything to extend the military power of this country. The Government last April introduced and persisted in driving through this House a Clause taking power to conscript the Irish people against their will. I and my colleagues warned them that that power would create a situation which would make it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, for them to carry out their pledge to set up a Home Rule Government and settle the Irish question; and furthermore, that under the Conscription proposal they would gain no military strength, but, on the contrary, would seriously injure not only the military strength but the moral position of England. That is exactly what has happened. It is not very much to be surprised at that what we said, knowing the country as we do, should turn out to be true. I desire to say nothing against the Chief Secretary, but he underwent a kind of sea change. He was always supposed to be a friend to Ireland, a Home Ruler, an anti-Conscriptionist, and a sound Liberal. He goes to Ireland, spends a week there, and without consulting anyone of those who know the country, comes back here absolutely positive that he knows all about the situation, and treats with contempt and even insult any advice he gets from these benches.

I wish to say a few words on this question of Conscription. You have destroyed at its very outset all possibilities of the success of the voluntary recruiting campaign. Any man who knew Ireland could have told you that was so. You were warned that it was so. You are now leaving Ireland under the threat of Conscription, and I want to warn the Chief Secretary. You can make no step of progress towards the settlement of the Irish question until you abandon that idea. You will never be able to enforce Conscription in Ireland, and if you attempt to do it, so far from adding to your military strength, you will embark on a sea of trouble of which you have apparently very little conception. You will embroil yourself with America and American opinion, you will destroy the moral traditions of this country, you will madden Ireland and embark on a long vista of hate between the two peoples which will spread from Ireland to America, to Australia, to New Zealand, and to Canada, and you will find that that struggle which will result in Ireland will have consequences which will make any Minister who is responsible for it bitterly repentant for the rest of his mortal life. The Conscription of people against their will is, in my deliberate judgment, one of the greatest crimes any body of statesmen could be guilty of. It is the worst form of slavery, and when hon. Members argue in a sophistical way that because we are coerced to come to this Parliament, and because this is called the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, therefore the Irish people are not a separate people and must obey the orders of this Parliament even in such a matter as Conscription, that is a foolish, futile and preposterous argument. If ever there was a community of people in the history of the world who bear, as they have been acknowledged by British statesmen to bear, all the characteristics of a nationality, It is the Irish people. When you are, particularly under the aggravating circumstances which exist in connection with this matter, seeking to coerce the Irish people to submit to Conscription, is, in my deliberate opinion, as great an act of tyranny as has ever been perpetrated by Germany in Belgium. We were told to-day that she has attempted to perpetrate it in Poland, but I do not know about that. She may have induced the Poles to fight for her, but I have not seen that she has attempted to impose Conscription upon the Polish people.

I heard the other day, and I was amazed at it, the Leader of the House, and. I think, the Foreign Secretary talking with great approval and satisfaction because the Czecho-Slovaks, the Bohemians and the Jugo-Slavs had deserted in tens of thousands from the Austrian flag and gone over to the enemy. I want to know by what tie of allegiance we in Ireland are bound more to the British flag than the Czecho-Slovaks or the Jugo-Slavs are bound to the Austrian flag. I have not heard any generous word of recognition spoken of our soldiers who have fought with the most superb valour throughout all the years of this War in the very forefront of your battles, and who were described by Colonel Reppington as the best Infantry troops the British Army ever had, and who when they were taken prisoners and brought to the prison camps in Germany and subjected to all forms of temptation, out of the thousands of Irish soldiers only about thirty were seduced to desert the British flag. Yet we have British Ministers getting up here and holding up as examples to the world these Czechoslovaks and others who deserted their flag and went over to the enemy. I think it is an unwise thing under the circumstances that prevail in Ireland for Ministers to use such language as that and to hold up this action as a fine example. I say that not by any way of condemnation of the Czecho-Slovaks or the Jugo-slavs. I sympathise with them. I am in favour of all nationalities who are struggling for freedom. I am in favour of the Czecho-Slovaks. I have deep sympathy with the Bohemians, because the Bohemians are precisely on all fours with us. If you read their history you might imagine that you were reading the history of the Irish. They have gone through the same experiences. They have an Ulster question precisely like ours, a German minority in Bohemia, who claim to be a more highly cultured race and who cannot tolerate the Bohemian Government. You might imagine you were reading the history of Ireland, the circumstances are so similar. Yet Ministers pledge the faith of England for the emancipation of this nation from the domination of Austria and, as the Foreign Secretary said the other day, from the domination of a privileged minority in Bohemia. They forget how closely these observations apply to the case of Ireland.

If the Chief Secretary for Ireland is a wise man, I hardly imagine that he will allow the House to adjourn without making some statement on the situation in Ireland and giving us some enlightenment, or attempting to do so, as to his policy and his intentions in regard to the Irish question, on which we have had, up to the present, since the great refusal and the throwing over of the Government policy, not a single word of enlightenment. I beg to warn him with all the solemnity that I can command, that until he abandons the threat of Conscription he can do nothing, and can take no step in the direction of a settlement of the Irish question. I think it is disastrous, inconceivably foolish, and I might almost call it an insane policy, to maintain the threat of Conscription if you do not intend to put it into effect. Nobody in Ireland believes that you do intend to put it into effect, but the threat which is constantly used, both by the Lord Lieutenant and by others in Ireland, keeps up a state of excitement and of bitter feeling, and has a most terrible influence towards throwing the whole population into the hands of the revolutionary party. It has already had a tremendous effect in that direction, and so long as it is kept hanging over the heads of the people that effect will continue.

There are three points which I wish to bring under the notice of the Chief Secretary, and on which I would ask him for a definite and clear statement. The first is the question of permits. I will dismiss that in a few words, because the Chief Secretary said that the methods of deal- ing with the difficulty about permits to enable us to come here to our Parliamentary duties could be improved, and that if we went to Downing Street we would get a permit authorising us to travel without further application to the police or anybody else. We were told that we should get that permit as a matter of course, and that it would have no limit of time. Some of my colleagues were there to-day, and their permits are only dated for three months. That is not carrying out the promise. The permits ought to be permits which would definitely get over the difficulty of leaving it in the power of the Executive Government to interfere with the attendance of Members of this House. I understood from the Chief Secretary that that is what was intended, and that if we called at the office in Downing Street we should get these permits as a matter of course and not as a matter of grace, and that there would be no limit of time. Another question is the prohibition of meetings. A Proclamation has been issued recently under the Defence of the Realm Act, prohibiting all meetings in Ireland unless a police permit has been obtained. A most extraordinary thing has arisen under that prohibition. It was interpreted by the police for the first three weeks as applying to all social gatherings and games as well as political meetings Not only was it interpreted so, but it was put into force, greatly to the annoyance of the people of Ireland, where the feeling is extremely bitter and exasperated. Football matches, Gaelic gatherings, dances, and concerts were interfered with and broken up, and in some cases the military were called in with fixed bayonets and threats were used. The question was raised in this House, and the Chief Secretary gave us an evasive and uncertain answer. Then the Gaelic League announced that last Sunday they would hold 1,500 meetings, one in every parish in Ireland, simultaneously. Thereupon Dublin Castle, after considering the situation for some time, announced that the prohibition so far as sports and concerts were concerned was due to a telephonic mistake, and the police were ordered not to interfere. It was a curious telephonic mistake, and it was only discovered when the question was raised in this House and the Gaelic League had decided to hold these simultaneous meetings last Sunday throughout Ireland. I want a clear statement upon that question.

I desire also a clear statement upon another branch of the subject, winch is of even greater importance. The Chief Secretary, in answer to a question the other day, affirmed his determination and the determination of the Government to maintain the prohibition on all political meetings in Ireland unless a police permit was obtained. I told him at once that we could not consent to apply for a police permit. We regard this prohibition as a deliberate attempt—there is no other explanation of it—on the part of the Government to throw the whole of Ireland into the hands of the revolutionary party and to kill the constitutional movement. What other motive could there be? The revolutionary party do not depend upon public meetings; they have their organisations which do not meet in public, and when they are attacked they fall back on private proceedings. To a constitutional movement such as ours the very breath of life is public meetings, but if we are to be told that we can only hold meetings as licensees of the Irish police we can hold no such meetings, because, by asking for the permit of the police and then holding the meetings, we would be defeating the whole purpose of the meetings and playing the game of the extreme party in Ireland, increasing its power and influence. Therefore there is no excuse for this proceeding, unless it be the deliberate policy of the Irish Executive—and many of their proceedings point to that as their policy—to throw the whole country into the influence and under the control of the revolutionary party.

I want to tell the Chief Secretary quite plainly that we cannot have this prohibition. It is possible that whenever a meeting which is held to be dangerous to the public peace or of a treasonable character is being organised to have it prohibited, and that is the rule which has been followed in regard to all public disturbances in the past, such as in connection with the Land League and previous agitations in Ireland. And when my right hon. Friend, in reply to me the other day—he sometimes makes these replies very quickly and without thought—said we were not at war in those days, I would ask the Chief Secretary, Was the country at war in 1916, when we had a rebellion in Ireland? This Proclamation, except for a short period after the revolution, was never put in force. Even then, when the country had been in rebellion, the Executive stopped meetings which were of a rebellious or seditious character, but they never dreamed if issuing a general order that no meetings of any sort or kind should be held, and I say that this Government, without anything like the excuse which existed in previous days, has gone to an extent of coercion wholly unparalleled in the course of the history of Ireland, and has embarked upon a policy and a method which can only have one explanation: that it is their deliberate purpose to put down and crush as far as they can all constitutional movement in Ireland, and leave the field perfectly clear for the unconstitutional, extreme, and revolutionary party in Ireland. I, therefore, demand from the Chief Secretary that he should modify or withdraw this Order so that we should be at liberty to address our constituents in Ireland, and so as to enable all meetings in Ireland of a political character, which are neither disorderly nor seditious, to be as freely held there as in this country. I do not think that is an unreasonable request to make. This country is at war, and you have not applied the present prohibition to it. I go further, and warn the Chief Secretary that, instead of promoting the peace of the country and increasing the chances of Ireland moving towards a rational settlement of the question, this policy will hinder it. Sometime or other you will have to settle the Irish question; you cannot wipe the question off the slate as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College proposed the other day. It will not be wiped off; you will be bound to settle it, and this policy, so far from promoting the progress and direction of a rational settlement is going right in the opposite way. Every day and every week that this Regulation is in force you will find that the Irish question will become more and more unmanageable, and, to use the words of the Prime Minister himself, more tangled.

Now I come to my third point, and that is the question of the Ulster arms, which is a burning and vital matter. It is now over four weeks since it was declared that there could be no law and no respect for the Government in Ireland so long as this gross inequality existed. In the south and west of Ireland, and in all the Nationalist districts, the most stringent measures were and are being taken to disarm the population; seizures are going on, widespread military activities, breaking into houses, digging up gardens, and so on, in the search for arms. As I say, it has been going on all over the South-West and Midlands of Ireland, and a great many arms have been seized, and not only that, but I have had letters in the last two or three days of bitter complaint from farmers whose arms have been taken away from them and whose crops in consequence are being totally destroyed because they are even refused sporting cartridges. It is a great hardship, and I recommend the matter to the urgent and immediate consideration of the right hon. Gentleman. I only mention it in this connection to indicate something of the extreme rigour with which disarmament is going on all over Nationalist Ireland. Bodies of soldiers are sent out, houses broken into, and searches made of so exhaustive a character that they even go to the extent of looking under beds and searching in every hole and corner for arms. The Chief Secretary declared himself that to his knowledge and to the knowledge of the authorities there were 50,000 rifles in Ulster and twelve machine-guns. I do not know, because he did not say, how many rounds of ammunition there may be in Ulster, but I believe there are upwards of 1,000,000—certainly there is ample ammunition. What must be recognised is that those guns are there for the purpose of rebellion—you must not forget that. Those guns were brought in for the purpose, and not only that, but on the 24th September, 1914, six weeks after the War broke out, the present Leader of the House and the present Member for Trinity College went over to Belfast and they then and there declared that the moment the War was over they would call out the Ulster troops and use those rifles—to do what? To tear up an Act of Parliament and repeal it, not to repeal it through this House, but to repeal it on the plains of Ulster, by an act of rebellion actually announced openly amidst thundering cheers when they were surrounded, let me remind the House, by all the heads of the Presbyterian Church in Ulster.

Yet I heard attacks made on the heads of my Church because they intervened at the request of my people—and in my deliberate opinion intervened to save bloodshed and disorder in Ireland—and the Prime Minister comes up to that Box and sheds crocodile tears over what he describes as the horrible mistake of the Catholic hierarchy in Ireland, but never says a word in condemnation of the bishop of the Anglican Church or of the head of the Presbyterian assembly who stood beside the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College when he announced, while the War was going on, that the first act after the War would be to lead a rebellion against the King and Parliament or this country. But of course we know that these loyal Ulster-men can rebel whenever they like. In their case it is not treason at all, and I say it is a mockery for the Chief Secretary to come down and talk about his determination to get all these arms when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College defies him, as he defied him openly in the House of Commons the other day, when he told him he had never been approached on the subject. And the right hon. Gentleman said, "Oh, I did not know until now that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College controls the rifles." Did the right hon. Gentleman never read the speeches of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College 2 Did he read that speech an Belfast when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College, at a time when every rifle was worth lives to this country in this War, declared: Some men have said, I have allowed some of the Ulster rifles to leave Ulster. It is a lie, and as long as am the Leader of the Ulster party I will allow all the rifles I can get to come in, but no rifle will leave Ulster. Yet the right hon. Gentleman, our new ruler from Newcastle-on-Tyne, informs us that he does not know, and that it never occurred to him, that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College had any control over the Ulster rifles. I tell him that he has, and if he will speak to him to-morrow and to the hon. Gentleman the Member for East Down, they can get him every single rifle and machine gun in Ulster if they choose to do so, but I do not believe that he will ever get one, and if we come back in October we shall have some foolish excuse put up. Is it any wonder that people in Ireland when they see such games as that being played do not trust the Government? I would ask hon. Members who are now listening to me to take a note of the matter, and see whether the law is in that one respect fairly and equally administered as between the Orangemen of Ulster and the Nationalists of Ulster and the rest of Ireland. We hear a lot of talk about Ulster, and we must not forget that Ulster is very nearly half Nationalist. But the people in the North- East portion of Ulster are to be a privileged class, like the Germans of Bohemia. They are to be a superior race. They will not give up their arms, and the right hon. Gentleman and Lord French dare not take their arms, and night after night during the last three weeks the right hon. Gentleman has been obliged to get up at that Table and say that he can make no further statement on that question, but that he intends to get the arms. I wish him joy of the task, but he must pardon me for remaining incurably sceptical until I see the 50,000 rifles, the machine guns, and the ammunition collected in Dublin Castle.

Is it unreasonable on these points before we break up that we should get some statement from the Chief Secretary, and that we should also have some statement as to the general policy in Ireland? Do they still maintain the pretence of having any intention of settling the Irish question, or have they the courage to say frankly that they have abandoned that intention? Do they intend to let the law take its course, which would mean that, when the War comes to an end, an Irish Government under an Irish Parliament would come automatically into existence, or do they intend to act on the words of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College, which I have already quoted—"The first thing we shall do after the War is closed, and we have beaten the Germans, is to tear up your scrap of paper"? Does the Government propose to tear up the scrap of paper and violate the word of the King and of Parliament under the open threat of rebellion, not pretending that they have discovered any new merits of the question or that they are going to undo it because they think they were wrong, but because they have been threatened with rebellion if they do not instantly repeal the Home Rule Act? They have no more moral right to coerce or govern Ireland, and they have no more moral right to condemn Sinn Fein in Ireland as long as they maintain the position which they now maintain, that they are now denying, and intend in future to deny, to Ireland the right which this Parliament gave and to which the King put a signature, and that they are doing so, and will do so, under the threat of rebellion from a minority of the Irish people.

The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Shortt)

I will deal first with the two points raised by the hon. Member for East Mayo before I come to the general question. I deal first with the question of permits to travel backwards and forwards between their constituencies and Parliament. Those permits are absolutely necessary for the protection of the good government of Ireland. It is absolutely necessary that there should be some control over those who are able to get in and out of Ireland, and that necessity involves a second necessity, namely, that there should be at Holyhead an officer whose duty it is to see that no person without a permit is allowed to go on board ship. It might be said that there was at Holyhead a Home Office official who did not know the hon. Member, and that the result might be very considerable inconvenience to the hon. Member. In discussing this point, when we first arranged the permits, we came to the conclusion—and I assure the House that we were considering nothing but the convenience of hon. Members—[Laughter]—no doubt they laugh at me, but I am quite certain that they know that we had nothing but the convenience of hon. Members in our minds—and we came to the conclusion that it was better that they should have what was in real effect an identification card to enable it to be known at once that they were Members of Parliament who could go on board. I hope that that matter is now settled, and that hon. Members will appreciate it.

Mr. DILLON

Do I understand that without going to Downing Street we will get that permit?

Mr. SHORTT

I can only say that I arranged with my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary that that was to be done, that Members of Parliament will be entitled as a right to a permit; but for their own convenience and for better security it was resolved to ask them to carry a permit of that sort, and that it will be available for all time as long as permits are necessary, and that they shall not be required to get their photographs taken.

Mr. HAZLETON

Why should I have to get one for three months to-day?

Mr. SHORTT

If the officials are not carrying out what my right hon. Friend and I agreed to, I will put pressure on them that they should carry it out. I can only tell what was arranged between my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and myself. So far as I am concerned, I will see that it is carried out as far as I possibly can. With regard to the prohibition of meetings, I am bound to say that hon. Members below the Gangway have an extraordinarily difficult standard as to what is an insult. A perfectly innocent statement made by me is resented as a grave insult, but about as gross a charge as could possibly be made when made against me is mere courteous persiflage.

Mr. DEVLIN

Who started it?

Mr. SHORTT

The hon. Member suggested that it is the deliberate policy of the Irish Government to ensure that the constitutional party and the constitutional movement shall be destroyed, and that we should deliberately try to set up in Ireland a rule, a party, which goes for unrest, which goes for rebellion, and which plays absolutely and entirely into the hands of Germany in this War. To accuse me of that is no insult, but to accuse them of not doing all they might do to help the Government is an insult which calls for denunciation, and they have denounced me in every possible way, and have accused me of the most dishonourable conduct of which a Minister can be guilty. All that is perfectly fair and perfectly right, and there is no insult contained in it at all. That shows how true it is that the Hibernian character is sometimes inclined to exaggeration, and it shows how true it is that hon. Members say many things which they do not mean. I do not believe that there is a single Member in this House who believes that either Lord French or myself would be guilty of any such deliberate treason to this country.

What is the position? The most dangerous and seditious propaganda was carried on by Sinn Feiners—who had been captured by the advocates of physical force—at their meetings and publicly preached sedition. We are asked whether we could not have taken other steps, but the very first thing that would have happened, after proclaiming Sinn Fein, would have been that the physical force party would have turned their attention to the Gaelic Society, or to some other equally innocent association. We are bound to close every possible avenue that may be open to the advocates of physical force. The means employed is to stop public meetings at which sedition is preached, and the only possible way is to use a system of permits, and to ask the assistance of all reasonable, people. We know that for ordinary meetings which are known to be innocent, permits are obtained as a mere formality. What happens? If a Member wants to address his constituency where is the great insult in issuing a permit? What is the intolerable inconvenience to which he is submitted? All that it means is that the gentlemen who organise the meeting for the Member have to send a postcard to the police, to say where they are holding the meeting at which the Member is to address his constituents, and a permit will be sent by return of post.

Mr. DILLON

The right hon. Gentlemen has misinterpreted what I said. It was not inconvenience that I complained. What I complained of was the fact that this system of permits gave a political advantage to our opponents, and we cannot consent to give them that advantage.

Mr. SHORTT

I would ask the hon. Members who are the opponents to whom the advantage would be given?

Mr. DILLON

I mean the Sinn Feiners.

Mr. SHORTT

I am told that I have favoured the Sinn Feiners, and frequently the papers have attacked me for fostering Ulster opponents. What is the fact? All parties alike get permits. There is no favouritism, no differentiation, and if there be a meeting where it is known perfectly well that sedition is intended that meeting can be stopped. But where we know perfectly well that no sedition is intended, as, of course, is the case in any meetings at which hon. Members desire to address their constituents, and where there would be no sedition talked, there would not be any trouble whatever. But it is essential and necessary to control political meetings where it is known that there is intention of seditious speech making, and I myself know of no more convenient method of controlling such meetings than that method which has been established. It only involves a little reasonable acquiescence and assistance on the part of hon. Members in this House. If they would only appreciate the amount of sedition that has been talked in Ireland they would be quite ready to acquiesce and see that we are justified in asking loyal Members of this House to appreciate the circumstances in Ireland.

Mr. SWIFT MacNEILL

Does the right hon. Gentleman not know—he is a learned and distinguished lawyer—that the right of holding public meetings is a common law right, and why should we hold our meetings under the permission of some policeman?

Mr. SHORTT

My hon. and learned Friend is really a little unreasonable. Hero we are in the middle of a great war.

Mr. MacNEILL

Let the War alone.

Mr. SHORTT

It is all very well to ask us to forget the War, but the Government of Ireland are not going to forget the fact that we are in the middle of a great war and we are bound to take steps to prevent sedition in that country, and they are taken under legislation which has been passed for War purposes only. I know what the common law is perfectly well, but we are living under extreme and abnormal circumstances, in which we cannot help these things being done. I have tried to explain to the House, and I hope I have succeeded, that this is a reasonable and absolutely necessary regulation. It asks very little of hon. Members in this House.

Mr. DEVLIN

You are always on the side of the rebels!

Mr. SHORTT

Is not that an insult? All we ask hon. Members is that they should acquiesce in this Regulation, so as to prevent really seditious meetings from taking place. With regard to the question of Ulster arms, I am not going into that, except to this extent: I am taunted, apparently, with having left the control of arms to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College. I have not, in fact, asked anyone to take control of the arms, and when I say that I mean personal and physical control. I do not acknowledge the right hon. Member for Trinity College or the Member for East Clare, who is now described as the leader of the Sinn Fein party—I do not recognise either Gentlemen as having control over anybody else in Ireland, and I shall only deal with those who have physical control of arms, So long as I am connected with the Administration, I shall acknowledge nobody outside the Government. I have already explained my position in regard to arms, and it is that we mean to get them without trouble if I can, as I am sure everybody in the House would prefer should be done. If we cannot get them without trouble, we will get them.

Let me deal with the general policy of the Government. The policy of the Government is exactly what it was before I joined the Government, namely, the policy which was declared by the Prime Minister in March. It is true that circumstances have to a certain extent altered, but I hope and believe they have not altered to any such extent as will affect that portion of the dual policy which we talk of as Home Rule. What is the position in regard to that? I should like to give what I conceive to be the position in Ireland to-day. Ireland—I think I am justified in saying this—is being restored to a peaceful state in which law and order are being observed. Remember, I have said peaceful only. Ireland is to-day extremely prosperous. There is no material grievance, no grievance financial, no grievance like that which resulted from famine, none of the grievances which one could call material grievances, which commonly give rise to trouble amongst peoples. But, and I admit this absolutely frankly, while you have a peaceful people in Ireland, while you have a prosperous people in Ireland, you have all over the South, middle, and West of Ireland deep and bitter resentment and discontent. I know that perfectly well, and I know as well as any hon. Member in this House what the reason is, and really the problem of Ireland to-day is how to bring about a set of circumstances in which the ground for that discontent is removed. I know it is sentimental; I know the one thing that will remove it as well as any hon. Member below the Gangway, but there are only two ways in which you can get Home Rule. One is by physical force—that is out of the question—and the other is by passing what is necessary through this House. That is the problem with which we are faced. How is that going to be done, and what steps are necessary? Because, although it is true, as the hon. Member for East Mayo has said, that a Home Rule measure is upon the Statute Book, it is suspended for the period of the War, and I am not at all sure that he is quite right when he says that it comes automatically into operation at the end of the War unless something is done.

Mr. DILLON

I am sure!

Mr. SHORTT

Then the hon. Member is in conflict—and I regret to say it—with some very distinguished lawyers. I am not at all sure about that, but for the purposes of argument—

An HON. MEMBER

Mr. Redmond thought so!

Mr. SHORTT

So did I until yesterday, but a great lawyer has put to me a proposition with regard to it which I do not pretend to have considered, but which certainly has a very serious difficulty in it. However, let us take it for the purposes of argument to-day that it will come automatically into force at the end of the War. The Suspensory Act was passed because it was felt by the Government of that day, 1914, that something must be done to meet the Ulster party and the Ulster objections. From that time onward every attempt has been made to bring Irishmen together—the Buckingham Palace Conference, the suggestions that were made by the present Prime Minister, the Convention—every time that Irishmen have come together to consider the point the question has been: What is to be done to meet the difficulty of Ulster? That question faces us to-day, and hon. Members talk as though the Government had abandoned Home Rule, as though Home Rule was a thing dead and gone. It is absolutely nothing of the sort. There is a Committee which has been labouring at various schemes dealing with this Ulster question, and I have arranged myself to come back again in the Recess, instead of giving my whole time in Ireland, in order to meet a Sub-committee to go into certain other points. We are doing our best to get a measure into a form which will ensure it passing through this House, and that is the one thing which is absolutely essential before you can take the necessary steps to remove discontent in Ireland. Now I am justified in saying this, and even at the risk of being called insulting I shall say it. We have been accused of the bankruptcy of British statesmanship What sign is there of any Irish constructive statesmanship to-day? What help are we getting? We are getting any amount of destructive criticism, aye, and not only destructive criticism, but there is great denunciation and great abuse of what we are trying to do. What hon. Member has ever made a suggestion, since the Convention failed, of some way in which the labours of the Convention might be brought to fruition and to success? I have been twitted in some of the Irish newspapers, and, indeed, in some of the English newspapers, with being out of touch with feeling in Ireland and out of touch with the Irish people. How can it be otherwise when every single representative of Ireland refuses to see me in public or to be known to have ever come near me, with the exception of, perhaps, half a dozen?

Mr. DILLON

That is on account of Conscription. As long as you are going to conscript our people I am afraid that will be the case.

Mr. SHORTT

If I am not to get any help, I must do my best to work without it, but is that a reasonable position to take up? Do hon. Members below the Gangway really think they are forwarding the solution of this great question by standing aloof, by refusing to be seen discussing anything with a member of the Government?

Mr. DEVLIN

We know how we were treated when we did discuss things with Ministers.

Mr. SHORTT

I have not found that the hon. Member has discussed much with me, but perhaps he would rather not. Hon. Members come to me when they have got any trouble with their constituents, like anybody else, and I am sure they will do me the justice of saying that I have invariably done the very best I could to meet that which they desired. I am only too anxious to meet Irish Members, to get Irish opinion. I have done my best, failing the help of Irish Members of Parliament, to get those in Ireland who will meet me and give me their opinions. When I offer an opinion in this House it is not my own—it is the best which I can gather from the best advisers I can find in Ireland. I have done my best to get it, but if hon. Members who are the mouthpieces of Irish constituencies, who represent, or ought to represent, the feeling of Ireland, do not come and help me, if they will not come and say, "Let us see the draft of your Bill and see if we can help you with it," I am helpless to meet their wishes and desires. But I can assure them that I am only too anxious for their help, only too anxious for their assistance and their opinions, only too anxious to get what help they can give me. That is the position, so far as I am concerned, with regard to general policy. It remains unchanged.

An HON. MEMBER

Are you in favour of Conscription still?

Mr. SHORTT

I am not in a position to say anything more about Conscription than has been said by the spokesman of the Government on the subject. I have explained my position as well as I can, and I can say no more on that, but I do ask during this Recess that those who represent Ireland should at least give me some assistance in my attempts to solve this terrible problem.

Mr. DILLON

You have never asked us before. This is the first time it ever was asked.

Mr. SHORTT

Do I understand from that—I welcome the interruption with the greatest pleasure—that if I do ask, the hon. Member will come and help me?

Mr. DILLON

I only said you never asked it before.

Mr. SHORTT

Do I understand from that complaint that the hon. Member will come and help me? Because if so, I ask him here and now, before I sit down.

Mr. DILLON

I make no pledge of that character at all, but undoubtedly the right hon. Gentleman left the House under the impression that he had been asking for assistance and advice from Irish Members. He never did to this hour. This is the first time on which he has approached me or made a hint to me that any advice or assistance would be acceptable.

Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL

I desire to intervene only for two or three moments, but the speech of the Chief Secretary has contained two statements of very great importance, and it has also been marked by one omission. The omission was to say anything to the House with respect to the intentions of the Government between now and the middle of October with regard to Conscription.

Mr. SHORTT

It cannot be enforced before the House reassembles. If the right hon. Gentleman will look at the Act, he will find that an Order in Council cannot be made unless the House is sitting.

Mr. SAMUEL

I know it must come before the House to be discussed, but it is the fact that this threat of Conscription while self-government is still denied to the Irishmen—and that is the essential point—has thrown Ireland into a state of turmoil and has created most of the difficulties with which the right hon. Gentleman and his Administration have to cope. And it is that false modesty, as many of us think it, which is responsible for many of the troubles now in Ireland, while at the same time it has not produced, and appears to me unlikely ever to produce, a single additional soldier to help to fight our battles in this War. The two positive statements that my right hon. Friend's speech contained were such as I think all of us in this House were very glad indeed to note. The first relates to the arms which are stored in Ulster. The right hon. Gentleman said definitely and specifically that, either with trouble or without trouble, the present Irish Administration is determined to secure possession of those arms.

Mr. PRINGLE

He did not tell us when he would take trouble.

Mr. SAMUEL

That, I think, is a most wise policy, for there will be no real peace in Ireland, there will be no real sanction to the policy of administration, so long as it can be said, and said with truth, that while one party, which is willing to use physical force to secure its ends, is suppressed by all the power of the Executive, and its weapons taken away from it, another party, which is willing to use physical force for other ends, but equally against the law, is allowed to retain full possession of whatever arms it has been able to accumulate. The other statement is that the Government are still engaged in the endeavour to find a legislative solution of the Home Rule problem, and that he himself during the Recess intends to take part in the deliberations of the Government Committee, with a view to framing a legislative measure. What does that mean? I am quite sure my right hon. Friend would not say that to the House unless the Government intended that those efforts should have some substantial result. He would not make a declaration of that character merely in order to mark time, to keep the attention of the Irish people engaged upon those deliberations, to hold the matter in suspense, while at the end he knew very well that nothing would come of it. I am quite sure that my right hon. Friend is not capable of a policy of that kind. If he tells the House of Commons on the eve of the Adjournment that during the Recess he and his colleagues are to be engaged in endeavouring once more to frame an acceptable Home Rule measure which can pass into law, he means that it is the-intention of the Government to produce such a measure to Parliament. That is why, I take it, his speech is of great importance. He could not wish us to draw any other conclusion. I welcome both those declarations—the declaration with regard to arms, and the declaration with regard to a Home Rull Bill. While I welcome them, I do ask my right hon. Friend to beware of such a course of policy as once more will only raise hopes to destroy them, which will only give assurances which are afterwards to be broken. If he tells the Irish people that he means on the one hand to secure complete disarmament of the rebel forces in Ireland, of whatever character they may be, and, further, that it is the intention of the Government to proceed effectively to frame a legislative measure to grant self-government to Ireland, we take note of those undertakings, and let him beware he does not lay himself open to the reproach, so many British statesmen in Ireland have had to bear, of raising hopes only to destroy them afterwards.

6.0 P.M.

Mr. DEVLIN

I would like, if he would permit me to do so, to congratulate the right hon. and learned Gentleman on the tone and temper of his speech. It has been no pleasure to Members on these benches to engage in controversy with him, and though, to judge from his appearance, he seems to think that is not a sincere statement, I can assure him that it is absolutely sincere. He has, he says, diagnosed the Hibernian character. I hope he has learned this lesson, that one of the chief characteristics of a Hibernian is this, that when he is hit on one cheek he does not turn the other. There is one diagnosis I have also made of the English character, and it is this, that neither by military operations can you suppress the freedom of a country nor by insulting the representatives of the people in this House can you get further along the line you desire to go. I have stated that I have noticed gleams of comfort in the speech the right hon. and learned Gentleman has delivered. In the first place, I disagree with my colleagues altogether that the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not mean what he says when he states that he is determined to get the Ulster rifles. I accept that declaration. I am quite sure that the right hon. Gentleman will procure these rifles, and I am one of those who quite agree with him that if he is to secure these rifles it ought to be by the most peaceful methods. We have never sought, and we do not seek now, to have any tactless or provocative conflict in securing these rifles, but we want in this matter—it is all we have ever asked for—that if you seize rifles of Southern volunteers, because you believe an army of civilians is a danger to the State, then you have to take precisely the same action against the same spirit manifested in Ulster. That is our position. We are in this fortunate position, too, that we can congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the fact that he knows the number of rifles in existence, and he knows where he can find them. That is half the work done, because Lord French and the right hon. Gentleman have not manifested any great intensity in carrying out their methods by half measures. He knows where they are, he knows how many there are, he knows where to find them, and I have no doubt, with the force at his back, he will get all these rifles, and in that matter, at all events, he will satisfy what is not only the feeling of Ireland in this matter, but the intense feeling of the masses of the people in this country, because, so far as I can gather from Members of this House from different parts of England and Scotland, they could not for the life of them understand why these raids for rifles were made on the premises of the Irish Nationalist volunteers, why private houses, and even the presbyteries of clergymen, were raided where there were no rifles at all in order to secure them, and yet these rifles are in vast armouries in the North of Ireland. I know one lordly castle in Ulster in which there are over 7,000 rifles. I am not in the secrets of the Ulster Unionist party, but I know what is an obvious and a common fact known to anyone, that you have only to go to one of these lordly castles in order to get 7,000 rifles. In this matter we want equality; that is all we have asked for, and I am very glad, at all events, that in relation to this matter we are going to secure equality from the right hon. Gentleman.

The right hon. Gentleman gave a lecture this afternoon on the evils of sedition. I think sedition is a very elastic expression. I am no worshipper of words. I regard disloyalty as the highest form of virtue if you are disloyal to a thing that is inconsistent with public liberty. I go not to Mr. de Valera or the right hon. Gentleman the Member of Trinity College. I can go to the right hon. Gentleman's leader for some lessons as to the best form in which you can be seditious within the law. Sedition is the revolt of a weak people against what they think is a public wrong. Sedition, on the other hand, becomes a virtue if it is preached by the leaders of political parties in this country, backed up by wealth and power in a powerful and wealthy country! I confess that if I were a Unionist statesman and a member of the Coalition Government every time the word "sedition" was mentioned I should slyly slink out of the House and wait behind the Speaker's Chair until the discussion had terminated. I myself during the past four years have been applying myself to the study of seditious literature, and I confess I have found no more inspiring vindication of sedition than the speeches which were delivered, not by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Trinity College alone, but by many of the eminent constitutional statesmen who sometimes adorn the Ministerial Bench opposite.

I trust the right hon. and learned Gentleman is steadily pursuing his Hibernian studies. He will learn this in Ireland—as, indeed, one can learn it in any country in the world—that what is crime in people in a modest position cannot be other than a crime in castles and cannot be a virtue in people in big position who happen to have great wealth and power behind them. Whatever you do in this House let us not hear these lectures on sedition. You talk sedition! There was no seditious spirit in Ireland until the Ulster movement started, remember that! It took a long time in Ireland for the constitutional party to eradicate that intense spirit of disloyalty that seethed in the minds and the hearts of Irishmen because of the sufferings and persecutions of seventy years. But this party succeeded in doing it. I ask the right hon. Gentleman this question. He is a lawyer: Supposing you find the vast body of the population who believe that this country will never hearten to the cry of justice, liberty, or peace, and that the only method by which they can break the shackles that bind them, or even can win ordinary legitimate public reforms, is by physical force, and you tell them you will not consent to physical force, and they then are taught to walk along the lines of constitutional thought, and they take you at your word and follow you, as the Irish party have followed this party for forty years? Suppose you tell them to trust to the power of reason and not to the abitrament of the sword? You tell them to appeal to the spirit of justice of the British people instead of organising rebellion against them. Supposing that, believing you—as they believed us—and supposing that policy so far as the vast masses of the British people is concerned, that that principle was established—as it was, because I have never in Ireland, and never will, stand on a platform and allow the English people to be attacked—I have stood before the most extreme audiences and have resented attacks upon the English people. They are not responsible for all this. All I know about the English people is that for ten years they were loyal to. Home Rule, and at General Elections they sanctioned the policy of Home Rule, and this House, which was empowered to express the views of the people of England, registered its faith in Home Rule and passed it on to the Statute Book. This Home Rule Bill, after going through all the vicissitudes of the Parliament Act, reached the Upper House, was forced upon it, and these English people remain faithful.

What the Irish people say—and this is the ground, this has been the reproach upon your own hypocrisy, although you carried it through this House with the consent of England, Scotland, and Wales, though it stands upon the Statute Book, a great English lawyer, backed up by a great British party, a great constitutional party, the Imperial party, the party that stands for the stability of the State and the upholding of law and order, that that party organised the forces of rebellion against that Act, and, what is worse still, those forces succeeded!

How can you expect, from circumstances of that character, that the people can have any faith in moral suasion or even in Parliamentary enactments? You attack the people first for sedition, and then turn round and find out that they have some reason for it. The Unionist Members in this House, in their difficulties and in an attempt to use Irish troubles for the purpose of promoting party purposes in Ireland, go over there and create a physical force and stir up rebellion against an Act of Parliament. Is it any wonder that those who have got that Act of Parlia- ment want to keep it there by physical force? Therefore, I say, if you get down to it the real custodians of constitutional liberty are the Nationalist party, and the great enemies of constitutional liberty are the rebels who rebel against an Act of Parliament. I do not know whether or not that is an Hibernianism, which the right hon. Gentleman can understand? At all events, the ordinary plain man, who can understand ordinary plain things, I think, without asking me to defend everything that has occurred in Ireland, will find it difficult to understand how you can enshrine yourselves in the glass case of Constitutional perfection, while you denounce every one whom you call rebels and whose rebellion is against the rebels that rebel against the Constitutional action of this Parliament.

It is not a very difficult task for the right hon. and learned Gentleman to fashion out his measure against our advice. If you had taken our advice over the three of four years which preceded the rebellion there would have been no rebellion. We have been taunted here with giving advice. It is quite true on many occasions prior to the rebellion we were asked for advice; but it is equally true that all the blunders made were made because those concerned did not take our advice. The right hon. and learned Gentleman need not be in such a tremendous difficulty as he says he is for lack of our advice, because he ought to know—I do not know whether or not he does—whether he has been sufficiently long in his position to know—but he ought to know as a Member of this House that we have had dealings before with British Ministers. We have had negotiations time after time. It was not because we felt there was anything to compromise about. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to pay attention to this. These conferences were not because we had anything to compromise about, because we have made it known unmistakably where we stand in regard to the claim we make for the freedom of our country. He does not know-the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House knows—and I put to him this question: Has there ever been a single occasion, so far as he knows, when British Ministers have entered into consultation with us upon matters vitally affecting our country and found that Irish Members broke their word? The right hon. Gentleman has had no dealings with us, or even conversations with us, but the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House can contradict me if what I say is untrue. We are the victims of broken promises. Does the right hon. Gentleman suggest that we are to go and consult with him and discuss and decide with him, and then to be told that what has been decided cannot be carried out. Is it any wonder that we do not want conferences with British Ministers, and frankly I say that I do not think any good purpose is served by that course. You know what we want perfectly well, and you know whether you can give it or not. If you are prepared to concede what Ireland wants, Ireland's representatives will be prepared to carry that out in Ireland, No doubt the right hon. Gentleman opposite has studied the whole question in all its fullness, and when he introduces a large and generous measure of Home Rule which will satisfy the aspirations of the Irish people, he will not need any consultation with Ireland's representatives here, because their position is clear and unmistakable.

The Chief Secretary stated that we contributed nothing to constructive statesmanship, and that our criticism was always destructive. I say that the right hon. Gentleman ought not to make allegations about things he knows nothing about. We had not only attended to our own business and our public duties in Ireland, but we have attended almost every day for nine months at the great Convention in Ireland, and I do wish Englishmen would not be so constantly throwing in our teeth that Irishmen can never apply themselves to the task of Ireland's future. What happened in that connection? The position is entirely misunderstood. We set out to create a Constitution for our country, and we succeeded in agreeing upon everything except customs, and the Ulster Members never intended to agree to that. If the right hon. Gentleman had turned to them and said they never contributed one solitary ounce of wisdom or statesmanship to the deliberations of that Convention, he would have been right. That Convention consisted of Nationalists and Members representing Ulster, the moderate Unionists from the North, Labour men and others, and upon every question, except Customs, every? Member of the Convention, except the small group of Members from Ulster, were in perfect agreement. How, under these circumstances can the Chief Secretary say that Ireland will not contribute anything to a solution of this problem.

I wish the Convention had been open to the public. It was so eminently a respectable body that it was as orderly as the House of Lords compared with the House of Commons. During the whole nine months we sat on that Convention I do not believe the Chairman was called upon in one single instance to intervene between what the right hon. Gentleman has called the excited Hibernians on one side or the other, and it was an assembly that would have been a credit not only to Ireland, but to any part of the world. With regard to the Chairman of the Convention I desire to say on this occasion that although I have never been a political associate of his and I differ from him profoundly in politics, I say that Ireland and the Empire and all who are anxious for a solution of this question owe a great deal to the tact and judgment and patriotism of Sir Horace Plunkett. Is it right to say that Ireland makes no contribution to the solution of this question when you find Southern unionists, Western unionists, landlords, and men who have come into bitter conflict with the general population, agreeing upon everything except customs? If we did not absolutely agree, can the House not understand how it was that a gathering of that character could not secure complete agreement upon a matter that had so passionately divided Irishmen for centuries when the whole wisdom of the British Empire cannot solve this question? At any rate we came nearer to agreement in that Convention than you were ever able to do in England, and having made our contribution to a wise solution of this problem, it is for those who have the power to see that Ireland shall have the material fruits of the labours of that Convention and the patriotism and statesmanship which was displayed in coming as near to a solution as it was humanly possible to do. I did not intend to touch upon this question, and I apologise to hon. Members and to Mr. Speaker for having occupied the House so long with this aspect of the question.

I come now to a very serious and important matter, and I am glad that the Leader of the House is present. I sincerely appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to-night to drop Conscription in Ireland. My hon. Friend the Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) has pointed out that there was not a single prophecy we made in the course of the Debate upon the question of the application of Conscription to Ireland that has not been fulfilled. We warned you, and I think we stated the case most moderately, as to what would be the consequence of imposing Conscription on Ireland. If Conscription could even secure you material military assistance there might be some justification for it, but it will not secure you the slightest military aid or help. On the contrary, I understand that before Conscription was introduced by this House you were getting 1,200 recruits a month, and since Conscription has been introduced practically you are not getting one-third of that amount. That shows that Conscription is not frightening the people, but it has irritated them, it has spread bad temper and bad feeling, and it has created the idea in the minds of the Irish people that you want to exterminate them, because you want to force them along a path which is unrecognised under any constitutional Government in the world by imposing upon them a military law that would not be imposed upon any other country in the world without its consent. So long as you were honest, so long as you intended to do justice to Ireland, the chivalry and loyalty of Ireland, in her devotion to the cause of small nationalities and human freedom contributed her share magnificently. I challenge anyone to deny the statement that for the first two years of the War, under voluntary recruiting Ireland's contribution was greater than the contribution even of this country or of Scotland, outside the large industrial centres. What, in heaven[...]s name, can be the good of forcing this question or keeping it alive? I believe you will never impose Conscription. In the first place, if you attempt to impose it you will create such a condition of things as will arouse a spirit of revolt, anger and irritation, not only in Ireland, but in America, in Australia, in Canada, and in every country where the Irish race have found a home. In addition to that, there are still many Irish soldiers fighting with the superb valour of their race, whose hearts are weary and whose feelings are harrowed at the condition their country is in to-day. If you want to kill their moral, pursue this policy. Those splendid Irish-American troops whom I saw coming from great ships last Satur- day in Liverpool, one-third at least of whom are sons of men of Irish birth, they love their country, too. They love their country as deeply, and I would say more profoundly, than the Irish at home. They are going out to fight your battles in France. Are they to be sickened, dispirited and disheartened in the task they are undertaking by the memory that Ireland is a welter of discontent and dissatisfaction and revolt against one of the Allied Powers on whose behalf they are fighting? I say you can get nothing valuable, no military strength, by keeping this wound open. Why do you not frankly get up and say: "We will drop Conscription. We will tell the Irish people we will drop it, and we will settle ourselves down to try once again to utilise the best efforts of our statesmanship and apply the highest sagacity we possess to solving this problem." I quite agree it is almost idle to talk about settling the Irish question when you create such a pandemonium in the country. You should soften asperity. You want to win the people back to believe in your principles. You should say to them: "We are now going to put one of our chief war aims into operation; we are going to have a Government in Ireland sustained by the will of the people." Why not drop Conscription and give the people an earnest of your sincerity? Why not show them that you are really willing to try and solve this problem? If you will do that, then, in my judgment, the question will be solved. Do not let us stop until the War is over before we start again to attempt to solve the problem of this racial war between two great nations. You do not want Ireland angry, irritated, indignant and passionate. You do not want England angry with Ireland. But, by your policy, you are creating and fostering mutual hatred between two peoples who ought to live together in friendship and goodwill for all time. The best thing you can have as a foundation for peace in this War will be peace between Ireland and England, and I am confident if the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House is bold enough and statesmanlike enough to make this declaration, that Conscription has disappeared and that something will be done to move along the path of conciliation and goodwill, every blessing will come, not only to the man who does it, but it will come mutually to the two nations, who will rejoice at what he has done.

Mr. PRINGLE

I do not intend to continue the Debate which has been engaging the attention of the House, but there is one question I would like to put, either to the Chief Secretary or to the Leader of the House. There was a sentence in the Chief Secretary's speech which appears to have escaped the attention both of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Cleveland (Mr. Samuel) and my hon. Friend the Member for West Belfast (Mr. Devlin). The Chief Secretary, in dealing with the Irish policy of the Government, said that policy now was the policy of the Government when he took office. I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman if he adheres to that statement?

Mr. SHORTT

Yes.

Mr. PRINGLE

Then I wish to remind the right hon. Gentleman what the policy of the Government was when he took office. That policy was declared by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Blackfriars Division (Mr. Barnes) on the 16th April last, when he was dealing with the Conscription Clause, in this sentence. He was answering a question put by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife, among others—a plain, clear, straightforward question, "What are you going to do in the interval before this Conscription Clause comes into force?" The answer was equally plain, clear, and straightforward, "We are going to bring in a Home Rule Bill and pass it through this House, if it is possible to do so." Do the Government still intend to pass the Home Rule Bill before they put Conscription into operation in Ireland? That is a wholly relevant question to put to-day, and I think my hon. Friends from Ireland, having got a declaration from the Chief Secretary, should insist on a plain, clear, straightforward answer to it, either from the Chief Secretary or from the Leader of the House, before we separate for the holidays. I hope the Chief Secretary will state now whether the Government policy to-day is the Government policy as defined by the right hon. Member for Blackfriars on the 16th April. Will he do so? I get no answer to that question, either from the Chief Secretary or from the Leader of the House. What, then, is the use of appealing to hon. Gentlemen from Ireland to help? The object of the statement of the right hon. Member for Blackfriars was to get the Clause and the Bill through Parliament. It succeeded in doing it. Is it now to go forth to the people of this country and the people of Ireland that the statement of the right hon. Gentleman was a fraud on the country and a fraud on this House? If the right hon. Gentleman cannot answer that question, it means that it is.