§ The following question stood on the Order Paper in the name of MR. GRIFFITHS.
28. To ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he has taken or proposes to take any action with regard to the 1087 Resolution he has received from the Legislative Assembly of Malta referring to the hon. Member for Lancaster" (Sir G. Strickland).
§ Sir G. STRICKLANDOn a point of Order. Before this question is put, may I beg leave to state to you, Mr. Speaker, that the question refers to a document which contains libellous statements against myself, which has been circulated to every Member of this House, and which has been submitted officially to you? I was informed that you would take no action thereon, and by this decision I was exempted from the duty of asking to be allowed to make a personal explanation. But, now that this document is referred to in a question as the basis thereof, I submit that I am entitled to ask you what is the procedure that I should follow for offering a contradiction, and making a personal explanation before any action is taken thereon, and that a document not before the House should not be dealt with by my right hon. Friend in any way, so long as I am unheard thereon?
§ Mr. SPEAKERAt the end of questions is the proper time for an hon. Member who desires to make a personal explanation.
§ Later—
§ Sir G. STRICKLANDI beg leave to make a personal statement, and will do so as briefly as possible. I will refrain from quoting each paragraph of the document I have here. It has been sent as propaganda to every Member of this House, without a copy of the speech which it denounces as unconstitutional. The' circulation of this document to each Member of this House compels this explanation, because the hon. Member for Pontypool (Mr. Griffiths) has made reference thereto in a question on the Paper, as if it deserved full credence without the other side being first heard. It would not have been proper or respectful to this House to sit silent when a document so circulated is made the basis of a question on the Notice Paper. The first paragraph of the document alleges that I have unduly asked for the interference of this House with reference to matters which are within the exclusive province of the Parliament of Malta. In that Parliament, the Speaker stops anyone who refers to reserved subjects, 1088 and you, Sir, did me the honour to make me mindful of my duty in refraining in this Parliament from referring to matters that are not reserved to the Imperial Parliament. But if the matters which are reserved to this Parliament are not to be referred to in this Parliament, then freedom of speech in this House is assailed if any weight be given to this document.
You, Sir, were most careful in restraining me from any aberration from the narrow limits of duty, on the occasion of my speech on 18th May, and I as carefully refrained from disobeying the ruling which you alone are competent to give. The second paragraph of this document insinuates that I obtained leave from the Malta Parliament on the plea of urgent private family affairs, and that those private family affairs do not exist. The nature of those urgent private affairs was by me communicated to the Speaker of the Parliament of Malta, and was accepted by him as sufficient and conclusive. I beg leave to assure you that those private affairs continue to-day as fully urgent as when I left Malta. It is further alleged that I have suggested that the Maltese Government is a pro-Italian Government, and that I have done so without any justification.
§ Mr. SPEAKERI must point out to the hon. Member that he is entitled to make an explanation in this House only on a matter which relates to his position here. He must not use this opportunity for dealing with matters that concern another Parliament and Government.
§ Sir G. STRICKLANDI gratefully avail myself of your permission to restrict my remarks in that way. I am accused of persistently endeavouring in this House and elsewhere to create friction and dissatisfaction between the Maltese and the British nation. If anything is notorious, it is that the contrary is the fact. I have never lost an opportunity of upholding the rights of the Maltese and the position of equality and mutual friendship that should exist between English and Maltese as citizens of the Empire and subjects of the King, and I have always been eager to acknowledge and to be proud of the land of my birth and of my mother's race. Nor have I claimed ascendency upon the fact that one of my race sat in the first separate House of Commons for the County of 1089 Westmorland from the same home, and that I am the seventh of my name to sit in this House for a Northern constituency. I have always upheld in Malta respect of the law by all and fair treatment of all. To benefit my native land has been the main object and principal aim of the work of my life. To accuse me of the contrary is a gross calumny. This document goes further, and purports to request the Secretary of State for the Colonies to send this Resolution to you. You decided to take no notice of it. The Resolution also asks that it be sent to His Majesty the King. I consider that such a suggestion is for the purpose of pro-Italian political propaganda, and constitutes an undue importation of His Majesty's name in order to influence opinions by having to acknowledge them.
§ Mr. SPEAKERThe hon. Member is now criticising a Resolution passed by another Parliament of the Empire. It is impossible to allow that here. With regard to his reference to myself, I sent a polite acknowledgment of the document which reached me from the Speaker of another House, which I would always do. There the matter ended as far as I am concerned. The hon. Member can make now only a personal explanation on a matter which he thinks deals with his honour as a Member of this House.
§ Sir G. STRICKLANDI consider that that honour is affected, not by the House of Parliament in Malta, but by the Prime Minister and Government of Malta, who caused this document to be circulated to every member of this House.
§ Mr. SPEAKERThe hon. Member must please not go into that here.
§ Sir G. STRICKLANDMy claim is, in the words of the Ninth Article of the Bill of Rights, which declares:
That the freedom of speech and Debates on proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or place out of Parliament.It was in the exercise of that freedom of speech that I made my statement on 18th May. My speech strictly referred to the responsibilities and functions of Government reserved to this Parliament. I feel that I have a duty to protect, not only my own rights, but the rights of every Member of this House in regard to freedom of speech on similar occasions, 1090 and I may be excused for feeling strongly upon the duty to protect that freedom of speech in this House, in so much as it was a Member of Parliament for Westmorland of my name, according to constitutional history, who met with expulsion from this same House of Commons by order of Queen Elizabeth for exercising his freedom of speech when Queen Elizabeth claimed to be the Head of the Church.