§ EARL GRANVILLEMy Lords, although I am not quite in order, having no Notice on the Paper, I believe it will be in accordance with the wish of your Lordships that I should now fulfil the pledge which I gave last week, that at the same time that a similar communication was made to the other House I should state to your Lordships the course which Her Majesty's Government propose to pursue with reference to the present condition of Ireland. With regard to the condition of Ireland, I do not propose to enter into any discussion. Whatever may be the differences of opinion as to the degree, as to some of the collateral circumstances, and as to the cause of what is now going on, all your Lordships are agreed that in certain portions of that country there exists a state of things not consistent with peace and order, or with the due security of life and property. It is the intention of Her Majesty's Government, after very anxious and continued deliberation upon the matter, to ask for some further powers from the Legislature to deal with that state of things, and in the course of the present week they will introduce into the other House a Bill for that purpose. Its general provisions will consist of positive enactments in amendment of the Peace Preservation Act of 1856, and revising certain of the provisions of the Acts of 1833 and 1847. Those provisions will relate chiefly to the possession of arms and gunpowder, to control over persons moving about at night, to compensation to individuals at the cost of districts, and to increased powers for obtaining evidence. The Bill will not place in the hands of the Government any general power of suspending personal liberty, nor will it revive the provisions of 1833 respecting courts martial; but it will provide means of summary trial and punishment without a jury, where necessary, for the offences committed under the Act. It will also confer more effective powers for the repression of offences against public order committed through the Press. 1861 The enactments will be for a limited time, and will take effect only in districts of Ireland proclaimed for the purposes of the Act by the Lord Lieutenant. I shall abstain from going into any of the details of these provisions, and from bringing forward any arguments in justification of them. I do so because I am most unwilling to initiate any debate in this House, which at this moment would lead, I think, to no practical result and might even be of a harmful tendency. Considering that your Lordships will very soon have the means of dealing practically with the subject—for I trust the consideration of the Bill will not take long in the other House—I hope your Lordships will approve the course which I have taken.
§ THE DUKE OF RICHMONDMy Lords, I must confess that I have listened to the remarks of my noble Friend with mingled feelings of satisfaction and surprise—of satisfaction at the Government being at last roused to some sense of their responsibility for their duties in governing the country—of surprise at the very meagre statement with which the noble Earl has favoured us. He deprecates anything like a debate on this occasion, on the ground that it might have a harmful tendency. How harmful tendencies can arise I cannot possibly see. I am not going to initiate a debate on a measure of which we have so very slight an outline; but I must protest against the discussion of the state of Ireland being further delayed in this House. The noble Marquess opposite (the Marquess of Clanricarde) has repeatedly postponed a Notice he has placed on the Paper for Returns connected with this subject. I regret very much that the noble Marquess has not yet proceeded to bring forward his Motion, for the information for which he asks for would be most valuable in discussing the condition of Ireland, and I hope that after what has fallen from the noble Earl he will bring it on at no distant day. The noble Earl in making his statement guarded himself against entering into the present condition of Ireland; but I cannot help thinking that that is the whole gist of the matter. It is a condition perfectly unparalleled in her history; and if measures, such as we have now heard, be necessary at all, they are necessary solely on account of that condition. I should have been glad if 1862 my noble Friend had favoured us with the reasons and with the circumstances that have occurred between the delivery of Her Majesty's gracious Speech and the present time to warrant the Government in applying to Parliament for the powers for which they now ask. Whether those powers are sufficient to meet the case, I will not, in the absence of the Bill itself, pretend to say. I hope they may be; but I confess I entertain very strong doubts whether the measure which my noble Friend has shadowed forth will be at all adequate to the exigency which has arisen in that unhappy country.
THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDEasked whether it was the intention of the Government to give the House the information necessary for the due discussion of the Bill before the Bill came up to them.
§ EARL GRANVILLEsaid, the Government would do so.
§ LORD REDESDALEsaid, the noble Earl had made one great omission from his statement. He had stated that certain punishments would be applied to certain offences; but he had omitted to state what those offences were.
§ EARL GRANVILLEsaid, he did not think it desirable to enter more into detail on this occasion. The offences would be distinctly declared in the Bill itself.
§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYI must confess I feel surprise at the attempt of the Government to stifle discussion in this House upon a subject more deeply interesting to the country at large and more important than any other which we could consider. The state of Ireland is of the gravest possible kind; yet one would imagine, from the bald and meagre statement and the very mild language of the noble Earl (Earl Granville), that there was nothing more than some ordinary disturbance, in respect to which it was perfectly unimportant whether it was dealt with soon or late, whether by strong measures or weak, whether by machinery adequate or inadequate to its object. Indeed, the noble Earl gave to the subject no greater fulness of statement, nor greater earnestness of description, than if he had been moving the second reading of a private Bill. My complaint is, he has put off discussion in this House by representing that the Government were about to make a state- 1863 ment, and when the statement comes it is so bald an adumbration of some future legislation that it is absolutely inadequate to satisfy the just requirements of the House. I venture to enter my protest against treating the state of Ireland as a question which ought not to be submitted to Parliamentary discussion. The evil which we have to deal with is in one sense, I believe, utterly unprecedented. It is not that there have been great crimes—for it is, unhappily, the fate of all communities to have great and serious crimes committed among them—but it is that, in large and important districts of Ireland, the population is on the side of crime. You cannot get evidence, you cannot get convictions; and, as I understand the noble Earl's statement, to neither of those evils does he propose the slightest remedy. A peculiar tribunal, as I understand, is to deal with the offences created under the Act—such as going about at night after a certain time and the possession of arms and gunpowder; but I have not heard that it is proposed to place the fearful offences against life, which have been of late prevalent, under any other jurisdiction than that which has hitherto been found utterly inadequate to deal with them—namely, to a jury which sympathizes with the objects of the criminals. I will only express my hope that the noble Earl will lay on the table the Returns mentioned in the Motion of the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Clanricarde), and that the Bill will come up to this House at a sufficiently early date to enable us to discuss the subject without any great delay. The complaint we have to make of the Government is this — that while they are, and very rightly, introducing measures in order to meet the evils under which Ireland has been suffering, neither by their acts nor by their language have they shown any proper appreciation of the frightful magnitude of their danger, nor of the duties that are incumbent upon them in reference to it. We have, of course, no power of quickening their action in that respect; but I can only express what I believe to be the general feeling on this side of the House, that the measures which the noble Earl has announced do not, as far as his description of them enables us to conceive their effect, in any degree meet the necessities of an emergency which, at all events, 1864 excites a far deeper feeling on the other side of the Channel than it appears to do in the mind of the Government.
THE EARL OF CARNARVONsaid, he wished to understand clearly whether the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Clanricarde) deemed the explanation of the noble Earl (Earl Granville) to be of such a nature as to induce him to abandon his Motion for Returns. He thought it would have been better to have had some discussion of the question immediately after the statement of the noble Earl. He wished to ask the noble Marquess whether he intended to leave the Notice on the books, or whether he intended to proceed with his Motion before the Bill—which he was informed would be introduced in the Commons on Thursday—reached their Lordships?
THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDEsaid, that on this question he was in the hands of their Lordships. The noble Earl (Earl Granville) having stated the readiness of the Government to give the information referred to, and having expressed an opinion that a discussion on the subject would be hurtful, the matter was so serious a one that, though agreeing with the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Salisbury) and the noble Duke that the Government had not hitherto shown that they comprehended the gravity of it, he hesitated to share a jot of their responsibility. If the measure of the Government was insufficient, upon them must rest the whole responsibility. Those of their Lordships who did not remember, as he unluckily did, the passing of the Act of 1833, would find, on reference to the records of the House, that it passed in April, and that at the close of the Session, in August, the King was able to congratulate Parliament on the total cessation of crime, the measure having been so effective as to tranquillize the country in four months. In 1847 Lord Russell's Government, of which he was a Member, introduced a Bill, portions of which were to be embodied in the present measure, in November (Parliament having met early partly on account of the financial crisis) and at the prorogation in the following autumn Her Majesty was able to congratulate Parliament on crime having thereby been effectually put down. He trusted the provisions of the coming Bill would be equally effective. If the House were 1865 desirous that his Motion should be proceeded with, he should not shrink from the task; but under existing circumstances he would rather it were brought forward by some noble Lord opposite. After the remarks of the noble Earl he hesitated to take upon himself any responsibility in the matter.
§ House adjourned at a quarter before Six o'clock, till To-morrow, half past Ten o'clock.