Lords Sitting of 13 June 1884

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading —Metropolitan Police* (118); Local Government Provisional Orders (Poor Law) (No. 4) (Belchalwell, &c.) * (119); Local Government Provisional Orders (Poor Law) (No. 9) (Parishes of Ashen, &c.)* (120); Local Government Provisional Orders (Poor Law) (No. 10) (Parishes of Charley, &c.)* (121); Electric Lighting Provisional Order (No. 3) (Saint James, Westminster, &c.)* (122); Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Labourers Act) (Unions of North Dublin, &c.)* (123); Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Bandon Waterworks) * (124); Sea Fisheries Act (1868) Amendment* (125).
Second Reading —Gas Provisional Orders (No. 2) (Emsworth Gaa, &c.) * (105).

EGYPT—THE PROPOSED CONFERENCE —THE NEGOTIATIONS WITH FRANCE.

  QUESTION.
  THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: As I do not see the noble Earl the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Earl Granville) in his place, may I ask the noble Earl at the head of the India Office, Whether there is any information in the possession of Her Majesty's Government with respect to the progress of the negotiations with France with regard to the Conference which he is able to communicate to the House?
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: The noble Marquess might have anticipated the answer which I believe my noble Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs would have given had he been
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  in his place. My noble Friend is not in a position to-day to supply any information on the subject.

EGYPT (EVENTS IN THE SOUDAN) — RUMOURED FALL OF BERBER.

  QUESTION.
  THE EARL or CARNARVON: There is another Question I have to ask, of which I have given the noble Earl private Notice. It is with regard to the reports which have appeared in many of the newspapers with respect to the supposed fall of Berber, and the massacre of the garrison and the people in the town. I am quite aware that the reports are of a conflicting character; but I should be glad to know what the opinion of Her Majesty's Government is on the subject.
  THE EARL or KIMBERLEY: My noble Friend has unfortunately as good means of judging between these conflicting reports as I have. No fresh news has been received during the last two days. Some few days ago a report was received saying that according to the intelligence that had reached Mr. Egerton at Cairo there was reason to believe that Berber was safe. Since that telegram, which my noble Friend has seen in the newspapers, information has appeared— and, in fact, our intelligence is identical with it—stating that Berber has been taken and the garrison destroyed. We have no means of knowing which of these two telegrams is correct. Mr. Egerton is disposed to think that the later news is probably not well founded; but I have no means of stating whether that surmise is well founded, as I have no information on the subject.
  THE EARL OF CARNARVONsaid, he would repeat the Question another day.

THE MAGISTRACY (IRELAND) — APPOINTMENT OF MAGISTRATES—WESTMEATH.

  QUESTION. OBSERVATIONS.
  THE EARL OF LONGFORD, in rising to call attention to the annexed announcement, published in Dublin newspapers of 31st May, 1884—
  "The Magistracy,—County Westmeath.— On the recommendation of the Most Reverend Dr. Woodlock, Bishop of the Diocese of Ardagh. and Clonmacnoise, tho Lord Chancellor has appointed Edward Gleeson, Esq., M.D., of Banown House, Athlone, to the commission of the peace for the county Westmeath; "

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  and to inquire whether any change has been introduced by authority in the mode of recommending and appointing magistrates in Ireland, said, the recommendation appeared to be somewhat unusual in point of form. He meant no personal reflection, in putting the Question, upon Dr. Woodlock, nor upon the person appointed, nor upon the Lord Chancellor. What he desired to draw attention to was the ostentatious announcement that the appointment had been made on the recommendation of the Roman Catholic Bishop, without apparently any reference to the Lord Lieutenant of the county. Dr. Wood-lock, though his diocese bore an old ecclesiastical designation, resided at Longford. He had met Dr. Woodlock frequently at public Boards and otherwise, and always on good terms. The person appointed to the Commission of the Peace was a stranger, not in medical practice; but he was welcome in conducting an industrial enterprize in a part of the country where real enterprize was scarce. The question had a much wider meaning. Their Lordships might be aware that lately a section of the Irish Press, and also certain Members of the other House of Parliament, had pressed for the appointment of what were called a more popular class of magistrates; and the Representative of the Irish Government in the House of Commons had, he thought, rather incautiously given some encouragement to those who made that demand, by saying that the Lord Chancellor of Ireland had had his attention. drawn to the matter, and that in cases in which persons were properly recommended for the Commission of the Peace he would exercise his authority. He thought the Chief Secretary for Ireland went a little farther, and stated that the Lord Chancellor of Ireland would exercise his inherent privilege and make appointments himself. The result had been that the popular Party in Ireland had taken the hint thus thrown out, and that recommendations had come to the Lords Lieutenant of counties from quarters whence such recommendations did not usually come—Town Commissioners and Boards of Guardians, for example. However, Ireland was an eccentric country, and Boards of Guardians there appeared to be elected, not to administer the Poor Law, but for the purpose of gaining a platform from which to de-
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  nounce all law, especially because it had been made by the British Parliament. Gentlemen who sought appointments as magistrates for private reasons quite outside statutory duties. He did not believe that Dr. Woodlock would knowingly recommend an unfit candidate for the magistracy; but it ought not to be forgotten that he was the servant of a master who never slept, and that his first duty was to increase the power and influence of his Church beyond other considerations. And there were other Prelates of his Church whose sympathies, if he might judge by their language, were more widely popular, and they might possibly be induced to recommend magistrates of whose impartiality there might be some question. For this general reason he had been unwilling that the announcement which he had quoted should pass without review, as otherwise it might come to be accepted that the independent recommendation of a Roman Catholic Bishop, without reference to the Lord Lieutenant of the county, would be accepted by the Lord Chancellor and favoured by the Government. Probably many of their. Lordships would agree with him that such a course would not be of advantage to the public service. Therefore he had to ask whether any change had been introduced by authority in the mode of recommending and appointing magistrates in Ireland?
  LORD CARLINGFORD (Lone PRESIDENT of the COUNCIL): My Lords, there is no intention to change the mode of appointing magistrates in Ireland beyond what was stated by the Chief Secretary in "another place" a few weeks ago. The noble Earl, I think, rather underrates the difficulty which I think we all feel in respect of the satisfactory appointment of magistrates in Ireland, and the constitution of the Irish Magisterial Bench. He knows very well there have been many complaints arising out of the fact that the great majority of the Irish magistrates are drawn from the members of one Church. These complaints are for the most part unreasonable, because the fact I have just mentioned is generally inevitable, arising, as we all know, from the composition of Irish society, and from the fact that it is very often extremely difficult to find any gentleman in an Irish county possessed of the necessary

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  qualifications of a magistrate, possessed of sufficient education and leisure and independence, beyond those members who, as it happens, are members of the late Established Church in Ireland. It would, undoubtedly, be very difficult to find anything like a proportional number of persons belonging to either the Roman Catholic Church or the Presbyterian Church who are possessed of the obvious qualifications for appointment to the Commission of the Peace. Nevertheless, the Government do feel, and successive Lord Chancellors of Ireland have felt, that it is most desirable and necessary to take all proper means for the purpose of lessening this inequality, and of not allowing that difficulty—for it is a difficulty—to extend beyond the absolute necessity of the case. The Lord Chancellor of Ireland, as stated by the Chief Secretary for Ireland a month or two ago, has for some time made up his mind to exercise his undoubted right of appointing to the magistracy, in cases where he thinks it fitting and necessary, as far as possible in communication with and in concert with the Lord Lieutenants of counties, but, if necessary, even without that concurrence—in cases either brought before him by Lords Lieutenants of counties, or in cases which, in his own opinion, ought to have been brought before him but were not. That is undoubtedly his right, and if exercised, as I am convinced that such a right would be, and will be, exercised by the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, I cannot conceive that anything but good can come of it. However that may be, I have to tell my noble Friend that the general question, to which I have hitherto confined myself, is absolutely unconnected with the particular case which I am not surprised the noble Earl has brought before the House. I am not surprised he has been convinced by the extreme positiveness of the newspaper report that the facts are as the newspaper—I do not know what newspaper it was—states. But I have a letter from the Lord Chancellor, in which he says that the statement is absolutely and totally without foundation. It is a pure invention of the newspaper in question—whatever that newspaper may be—or of some correspondent. Dr. Gleeson, who has an important manufacturing concern in Athlone, and is, I believe, a most proper person to be placed
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  on the Bench, has been appointed by the Lord Chancellor in the ordinary way upon the recommendation of the Lord Lieutenant of the county.

EDUCATION DEPARTMENT — OVERPRESSURE IN BOARD SCHOOLS.

  QUESTION.
  EARL DE LA WARRasked the Lord President of the Council, Whether the Report of Dr. Crichton Browne, relative to over-work in elementary schools could be laid upon the Table of the House? He thought the Lord President of the Council would agree with him that the document ought to be in their Lordships' hands, as it referred to a subject which had lately been much under public notice, and would probably be shortly again brought under the consideration of the House.
  LORD CARLINGFORD (LORD PRESIDENT of the COUNCIL)said, he could not agree with the noble Earl that this was a document which it was the duty of the Government to lay on the Table. It was not in any proper sense of the term a Report to the Education Department. It was a letter of enormous compass, dealing with matters of the moat controversial kind, containing the theories of Dr. Crichton Browne, and reflecting on various Departments, including the Education Department. He believed that it grew out of a conversation between Dr. Browne and the Vice President of the Council, who was afterwards much astonished at receiving such a document. The Education Department were in no sense responsible for it, and were not going to make themselves responsible for issuing it as a Parliamentary Paper. It would be extremely inconvenient if any gentleman had it in his power to discharge a document of this kind at the head of any Public Department, and then to require that Department to publish it in the form of a Blue Book. Of course, Dr. Crichton Browne was at liberty to make his own document public in any way he pleased. Certain Papers had been promised in "another place" on the subject of overpressure in schools, and whatever was presented to the House of Commons would be laid also on the Table of their Lordships' House.
  LORD HOUGHTONsaid, he thought it was only fair to Dr. Crichton Browne

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  that they should know whether this Report or letter was initiated by him or by the Department.
  LORD CARLINGFORD (LORD PRESIDENT of the COUNCIL)said, that he had had no personal communication with Dr. Browne on the matter; but he had no reason to believe that it originated in any proper sense with the Education Department.

AFRICA (EAST COAST)—ANGRAPEQUENA.—QUESTION.
VISCOUNT SIDMOUTHasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether negotiations on the subject of Angra Pequena were still proceeding, and, if so, whether he could state how soon they were likely to be terminated? Seeing the First Lord of the Admiralty in his place, he wished to ask the noble Earl whether he would lay on the Table any Reports received" from the Commander-in-Chief on the South African station with regard to Angra Pequena, as he understood that it had been visited of late by that officer?
THE EARL OP KIMBERLEY: I may state, in the absence of my noble Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, that as Correspondence is still going on between Her Majesty's Government and the German Government upon this subject, it is not possible at present to make any communication with regard to the negotiations. My noble Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty (the Earl of Northbrook) has asked me to answer the Question as to the Report of the Commander in Chief on the South African Station. He desires Notice that he may look over the Correspondence, in order to see whether it could be published. If so, he will be glad to produce it.
THE EARL OF CARNARVONsaid, that his noble Friend behind him had done good service in repeatedly calling attention to this subject. It was a serious one, and still more serious that the negotiations should be allowed to drag on for such a great length of time, as in that part of the world the British and the German interests touched each other very closely. His own experience of German policy had always been that it was extremely reasonable and conducted in a reasonable spirit. At the same time, the longer the matter was delayed the greater the risk of misunderstanding
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arising. He was afraid that the change of Government at the Cape would not facilitate a solution of the question; but he thought that if his noble Friend the Foreign Secretary had seen his way to deal with the matter more promptly, and bring it to a settlement some months ago, he would probably have found it more easy as far as the German Government was concerned. He, for one, would be glad to see the question disposed of satisfactorily, and disposed of without delay.
THE EARL or KIMBERLEYsaid, that the matter had been affected to a considerable extent by the change of Government at the Cape, because his noble Friend would see that it was impossible to deal with it without communication with the Cape Government. But he did not see why there should be any further unreasonable delay in dealing with the question.

AFRICA (EAST COAST)—ANGRAPEQUENA.—QUESTION.

  SEA FISHERIES ACT (1868) AMENDMENT BILL [H.L.]
  A Bill to further amend the Sea Fisheries Act, 1868—Was presented by The Earl of RAVENSWORTH; read 1a. (No. 125.)
  House adjourned at Five o'clock to Monday next, a quarter past Four o'clock.