§ LORD RAVENSWORTHpresented a petition from the Inhabitants of the Borough of South Shields and places adjacent, praying that the Dean and Chapter of Durham may be empowered to apply some portion of the fund arising from the sale of lands for the formation of wet docks at Jarrow Slake, and the approaches thereto, to the extension and improvement of the means of religious instruction in the said borough. The noble Lord said, that the petition was characterised by so remarkable a unanimity on the part of all classes of the populous borough from which it came, that it was peculiarly deserving of their Lordships' attention. The prayer of the petitioners simply was, that the Dean and Chapter of Durham, who were the ecclesiastical patrons of South Shields, should be empowered to employ their surplus funds, or such portion of them as they might deem fit, in the extension and improvement of the means of religious instruction in that district. The case of the borough was a very urgent one. Nearly the whole of the land on which the town was built was the property of the Dean and Chapter of Durham. The population amounted to about 30,000 souls. The borough was divided into three perpetual curacies, which were under the charge of seven clergymen, and the sum devoted to those clergymen of the Established Church for the spiritual instruction of the people was 1,300l. per annum—a sum miserably inadequate to supply the wants of the district; and the consequence was, that in addition to the endowments they received from legitimate sources, the curates were compelled to resort to grants from various public societies in order to enable them to maintain their position. At the present moment they were in receipt of aid from the Additional Curates Society, the Pastoral Aid Society, and another association established for similar objects. Now, in a place where the bulk of the property actually belonged to the Church, that surely was a state of things which ought not to be allowed to exist. To remedy the evil, at least to some extent, the hon. and learned Member for South Shields (Mr. Ingham) had introduced a Bill into the other House. It was to be hoped that measure would be passed into law, for the present position of affairs in the borough was most discreditable, and should not be tolerated a single day longer. 2019 Nor were matters much better in the adjacent parish of Jarrow. That parish was extremely populous—and it contained numerous manufactories; the village of Jarrow was inhabited chiefly by fishermen and other poor persons; and yet the emoluments of the incumbent were variously stated at from 150l. to 190l. per annum. He believed there was an endowment for the education of twenty-two children, and steps were at present being taken to establish a national school in the parish; but still the means of instruction, both religious and secular, were scanty in the extreme, and presented a remarkable contrast to the state of things centuries ago. There existed in Jarrow the ruins of an ancient monastery, built in 608, which supported and educated the most distinguished men of the middle ages. He need not say that the present state of the parish, with regard to the means of education, was very different from what it was then. As to the condition of the diocese generally, he regretted to say that great deficiencies existed, the ancient parochial system being now quite inadequate to supply the spiritual wants of new communities in that diocese. The diocese of Durham possessed many peculiarities. In Durham, as in all mining counties, shafts were often sunk in lonely and retired places, far away from the parish church, and harbours were almost as frequently constructed at spots where nothing of the kind was ever thought of before. The consequence was, that the seats of population had gradually changed; large masses of the people were not now within reach of the parish church, and the population itself had greatly outgrown the means of religious instruction under the ancient parochial system. What he wanted was a change in the present state of the law. The Act under which the Ecclesiastical Commission was constituted, and which gave it those extensive powers that it now possessed, was the 3 & 4 Vict. c. 113. By the 49th clause, it was provided that the profits of suspended chapters were to be paid to and their estates vested in the Ecclesiastical Commissioners; but there was no provision made in the Act—and here was the subject of his complaint—for supplying the immediate and urgent wants of the districts from which such revenues were derived. The interest of the money—so it was provided—was to be paid by the Commissioners into the common fund, out of which they were to grant pecuniary 2020 aid to such districts as they might deem most necessitous, no preference being given to one diocese over another. He thought that was a great blot in the law, and he was under the impression that the words in the Act which bore so unjustly upon the dioceses from which the funds administered by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were derived, were introduced surreptitiously and without the knowledge of Parliament. He looked with great objection to the government of the country by sets of Commissioners, and he believed that the Church was quite competent to distribute its own revenues; but at all events, if the Church was still to be managed by an irresponsible Commission, Parliament ought certainly to provide for the constitution of diocesan Boards, through which assistance might be afforded to necessitous districts out of the surplus funds belonging to each locality. The noble Lord concluded by laying the petition on the table.
§ THE EARL OF CHICHESTERsaid, that South Shields was one of those numerous cases in which the population had outgrown the means of spiritual instruction. He would be glad if ample provision were made for such cases, but he begged to inform the noble Lord that the principle upon which his petition was based was decided on by Parliament many years ago, and decided in opposition to the views advocated by the noble Lord. The principle adopted by the Legislature was, that the surplus funds of wealthy chapters should be applied, not to the particular district from which the money was derived, but to those places in which the wants of the population were the most urgent. If the law were to be altered now, as suggested by the noble Lord, it must be altered with respect, not to the diocese of Durham alone, but to all districts similarly situated. That would create confusion and uncertainty, and defeat the objects contemplated by the Legislature in the constitution of the Ecclesiastical Commission.
§ LORD RAVENSWORTH, in explanation, said, what he complained of was, that words in the original Act which had been inserted, and which would have met the case, had been, as he believed, surreptitiously removed.
§ Petition ordered to lie on the table.