LORD BROUGHAMwished to put a question to the noble Duke opposite, the First Lord of the Admiralty. He believed that towards the close of last Session a Commission or Committee was appointed to inquire into the subject of manning the Navy. He now wished to ask whether any steps had been taken by that Commission or Committee, and whether any report would be laid before Parliament? The subject was one of the most important of those connected with that most important of all questions—the effective force of our Navy, and it was one upon which he felt not an inordinate but a rational anxiety. He hoped above all things that expense would be no obstacle to the improvements which might be required in this department. If there were a man in the House who grudged the money necessary for this purpose, let not that man be listened to.
The DUKE of NORTHUMBERLANDsaid, that he had no difficulty whatever in answering the question of his noble and learned Friend. There was a Committee, 165 not a Commission, under the Board of Admiralty now sitting, to inquire generally into the state of the manning of the Navy, and embracing everything connected with the condition of our seamen. It had been sitting for several months, but no report had yet been made. The Committee was of a private nature, for the purpose of informing the Admiralty, and was composed of many most distinguished officers, in whose judgment the greatest confidence could be placed, and who would ever have prominently in view the good of the service. He entirely agreed that the question was one of great importance.
LORD BROUGHAMsaid, when he spoke of the expense, he had in his eye the undoubted fact of the wages being so much better in other branches of the sea service than in our Navy; and, not only in our own mercantile marine, but in the American service.