Lords Sitting of 5 June 1891

BRINE PUMPING (COMPENSATION FOR SUBSIDENCE) BILL.—(No. 131.)
Referred to the Examiners.
BRINE PUMPING (COMPENSATION FOR SUBSIDENCE) BILL.—(No. 131.)
  FORGED TRANSFERS (NO. 2.) BILL.
  Brought from the Commons, read la; and to be printed. (No. 147.)
  SEAL FISHERY (BEHRING'S SEA) BILL,
  Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed, and to be read 2a on Monday next; and Standing Orders No. XXXIX. and XLV. to be considered in order to their being dispensed with. (No. 148.)
ROYAL NAVAL VOLUNTEERS.

  QUESTION—OBSERVATIONS.
  VISCOUNT SIDMOUTH,who had upon the Paper the following Notice:—
  "To call attention to the position of the Corps of Royal Naval Volunteers as it will be affected by the proposed action of the Board of Admiralty,"
  said: My Lords, I am afraid that by a misunderstanding of mine I may have caused inconvenience to some noble Lords who may have wished to come down and speak on the position of the Royal Naval Volunteers. I understand that the document to which I was about to refer not having been laid on your Lordships' Table, I should be out of order if I were now to refer to it. The course I propose to take, therefore, is to ask the noble Lord who represents the Admiralty whether he would object to lay on the Table of the House the Report of Sir George Tryon's Committee upon the subject of the Royal Naval Volunteers.
  LORD ELPHINSTONE: There is no objection whatever to laying on the Table the Report to which my noble Friend alludes.

MUSEUMS AND GYMNASIUMS BILL. (No. 57.)
SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
LORD THRING: My Lords, this Bill has passed through the House of Com-
1694
mons without any opposition. It is approved by the Local Government Board, and I am sure its purposes will commend it to your Lordships. The first part relates to museums. At the present moment both Rural and Urban Authorities have power to establish museums free of charge. The object of this Bill is to allow Urban Authorities—not Rural Authorities—to establish museums, and to charge during a part of the week for the use of those museums for the purpose of giving lectures, or other purposes of education. The Bill reserves free of charge three days of the week; during the remainder of the week a museum may, as I have said, be used for lectures or other purposes of instruction. In a great many small towns, where they have not sufficient facilities or room for such purposes, this will be a very useful measure indeed; and, further, the expense of establishing museums which shall be free of charge is very heavy. The object of this Bill is, first of all, to encourage the smaller towns to establish museums by enabling them to earn something in those museums; and, secondly, which is a very good object to afford, as I have said, a place in which the inhabitants may meet, and where lectures may be given and instruction afforded for a small charge. The second branch of the Bill is of wider scope. Gymnasiums can be formed at present, but oddly enough only under the provisions of the Baths and Washhouses Act, which allows swimming baths, used for that purpose during seven months of the year, to be used as a gymnasium daring the winter months. That is the only way in which a gymnasium can be formed. I need not impress upon your Lordships the great advantages of gymnasiums. We all know how much drill and athletics have come into vogue, and how greatly they have been encouraged both in the army for the purpose of expanding the chests of the younger soldiers, and in schools for improving the physical condition of the children. The Swedish drill is, I believe, now used in all our elementary schools. I need not, therefore, insist upon the necessity for gymnasiums, and the object of this part of the Bill is to enable Urban Authorities to establish them without having necessarily to make them out of

1695
swimming baths. As in the case of the museums, the gymnasiums are to be open free of charge for not less than three hours a day on five days a week; and the Bill further provides that during 24 days in the year these gymnasiums may be let. Therefore, the second part of the Bill is somewhat different in its scope, though its objects are similar to that comprised in the former part of the Bill. Shortly stated the object is, as I have said, to enable the smaller towns to form gymnasiums, and to maintain them without having the whole amount of the expense thrown upon the rates. It has passed so far without opposition, and I trust your Lordships will give it a Second Reading.
Moved "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Lord Thring.)
THE MARQUESS OF BATH: Will the noble. Lord State to the House what the rating powers are under this Bill, and what is the maximum of the rating it is in the power of the Local Authority to impose for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of the Bill?
LORD THRING: The rate is not to exceed a halfpenny in the £1. I should also state that the Act may be adopted without a poll. Under the existing Acts Urban Authorities are required to take a poll; but they may, by resolution, adopt this Act without taking a poll.
LORD HENNIKER: Perhaps your Lordships will allow me to say one word on the part of the Government. The noble Lord who has charge of the Bill has explained its objects so fully— and it is a very simple measure—that it is, I think, quite unnecessary for me to make more than two or three remarks upon it. All I have to say is this: it has passed through the House of Commons with the approval of the Local Government Board. The President of the Local Government Board, and those who advise him, approve of it in its present shape, with one or two small exceptions. Some small amendments have been put before the noble Lord who has charge of the Bill. I believe he accepts those amendments, and under those circumstances, on the part of the Government, I have nothing to say except that I approve it.
On Question, agreed to.
Bill read 2a (according to order) and committed to a Committee of the whole House on Monday next.

REFORMATORY AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL CHILDREN BILL.—(No. 125.)
SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
LORD MONKSWELL: My Lords, this is a Bill which has been successfully piloted through the House of Commons by my hon. Friend Mr. Howard Vincent. The Bill is very short and simple, but the changes it proposes to make in the law are great. They are changes, however, which I think your Lordships will unanimously agree should be carried out. The Bill proposes to abolish the right of parents of children in Industrial and Reformatory Schools, where they have been maintained and educated for a time, to have those children home again at the end of their period of detention, which, in the case of Industrial Schools, is until they are 16, and, in the case of Reformatory Schools, until somewhat later in life. Your Lordships will observe that this Bill does not in any way interfere with the wishes of the children themselves. There is nothing in it to prevent children going home if they wish to do so. The only object of it is to prevent parents compelling children, against their wish, to go back to homes where, possibly, they will be taught extremely bad habits, and be placed in circumstances which will lead to their relapsing into crime. The principle of this Bill has been already conceded in a Bill which has passed this Session, namely, the Custody of Children Act; and the measure is substantially a reproduction of certain clauses in the Reformatory and Industrial Schools Bill, which was passed by your Lordships' House last year. I need scarcely say that the present state of the law is really a matter of despair to the managers of schools. They too often see that the care they have taken in the instruction and moral education of the children who have been in their charge has been absolutely lost in the present condition of the law. I observe that in the memorandum to this Bill statistics are given from the well-known Reformatory School at Feltham,

1697
and I may say that I know something of that school, as I am Chairman of the Committee of Management. It is an exceedingly large school, containing over 900 boys. Two hundred of the boys are out on license. I may point out that the statistics put forward from this school are valuable, because we have special opportunities of finding out the future career of the boys for three years after they have left the school. We have an officer whose duty it is to follow up the boys for that period, and there are hardly any of them who escape his vigilance. The statistics are, therefore, absolutely truthful. We find that out of 1,000 boys who are sent back to their homes after the expiration of their period of detention, 169 relapse into crime; whereas of the same number of boys who are sent to some employment by the managers of the school, or are sent elsewhere, and thus preserved from the contamination of their homes, only 69 relapse into crime. That is to say, the law itself in its present condition deliberately makes criminals of 100 out of every 1,000 of those boys who are sent home from that school. Under those circumstances, it is, your Lordships will admit, stating no more than the fact to say that the law itself, after having provided for these children being taken out of the gutter, and for their being fed and clothed and educated at great expense to the public in these schools, obliges them to go back into the gutter;' where so many of them relapse into crime. In Great Britain there are about 1,500 boys sent back every year to their homes from industrial and reformatory schools; that means that the state of things which I have described, namely, sending boys back to become criminals against their own wish, putting them into temptation which they would gladly themselves get out of, affects as many as 150 boys a year. That is to say, the law itself deliberately makes 150 boys into criminals, who, if the law was altered, would be converted into respectable citizens. You may do three things with the boys going from these schools—you can either send them home to their parents, who have, in too many cases, driven them to commit petty thefts in order to get them boarded, lodged, and educated at the expense of
1698
the State; you have parents who get rid of all responsibility towards their children in that way, and who only ask to have them back again for the purpose of getting money—directly the children are able to contribute anything towards the family exchequer they are taken home again. The second thing you can do is to send the boys to places which may be found for them elsewhere than at their homes, that is, into some employment which may be found for them by the managers of the schools, employment where sometimes they can be got at by their old associates. There are some statistics quoted here to which I should like to refer your Lordships. Out of the boys sent to employment otherwise than to their homes from Feltham School who relapsed into crime, the great majority did not relapse into crime while in their employment, but had left their situations at the solicitation of their former companions. Their old associates find them out and entice them away from their employment, and then it is that they relapse into crime. Another thing which you may do with boys is to emigrate them, and so prevent them being contaminated by their old companions and associates. That, I venture to think, is the best plan to take with these boys, and the statistics bear me out as to that, for out of 76 boys emigrated to Canada during the last three years, only one has relapsed into crime. But even here the law does all it can to thwart and baffle us in our endeavours to give these boys the opportunity of making a better future for themselves, for the consent of the parents has to be obtained, and we find that in only one case out of four will the parents consent to the emigration of these boys. There will be no difference of opinion, I think, among your Lordships, as to the beneficial effect of this Bill. I have only spoken as to boys, and I do not propose to say anything about girls, because I have no special knowledge of reformatory and industrial schools for girls; but it must be very evident that the same arguments apply with even stronger force in their case as to the extreme undesirability of sending them back to their old associates. This Bill will undoubtedly do a great deal of good, and there may. on the other hand, be said of

1699
it what cannot be said of many Bills, it is perfectly certain it will do no harm at all, and I hope, therefore, your Lordships will read it a second time. There is only one further observation I have to make: my noble Friend Lord Camperdown has suggested that the Bill might be applied to Scotland. So far as I am concerned, I should be very glad if the Bill could be applied to Scotland; but if there is any danger from delay, or of the Bill being wrecked in the House of Commons by any addition of that kind being made to it, I should ask your Lordships to pass this Bill without amending it as the noble Lord suggests.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Lord Monkswell.)
THE EARL OF COURTOWN: As the noble Lord has stated that the Earl of Camperdown has suggested that the Bill should be amended by being made applicable to Scotland, I would make the same suggestion with regard to Ireland. I am not very well acquainted with any such schools in that country, but unless the noble Lord who has charge of the Bill objects, it appears to me that what is desirable to be done in England and Scotland would also be desirable for Ireland.
THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: The Bill appears to me, from what I understand of it, to be a very good one, but I confess I do not know what is meant by the saving clause that the Bill is not to apply to Scotland or Ireland. I should be very sorry to do anything to imperil the passing of the Bill, and if it is stated that embodying any Amendment of that sort would be fatal to the Bill, I should not press it; but I own that at the present time I think some reason ought to be given why a Bill, which appears on the face of it to be a good one, and to be equally applicable to other parts of the three Kingdoms, should not be extended to Scotland.
EARL STANHOPE: I think this is a most useful Bill, but I deprecate its being extended to Scotland and Ireland. As my noble Friend Lord Camperdown will see, there is a very long list of measures waiting for consideration in the House of Commons, and I think even such a small Bill as this would, if any delay arose, run the risk of not being passed this Session. There-
1700
fore, though I agree with my noble Friends who have last spoken that this Bill should be extended to Scotland and Ireland, I think it would be better for this Session to allow it to apply only to England. As a manager myself of an Industrial School in Kent, I may say that I think this is a most valuable Bill for the purpose of enabling managers of these institutions to apprentice boys, without their parents having power to exercise a veto on their being apprenticed, and also for enabling managers to emigrate boys to Canada or elsewhere. I am sure this is a most useful measure; and I am confident that every manager of an Industrial School will hail the Bill with pleasure.
LORD DE RAMSEY: My Lords, the Secretary of State assented to this Bill in the other House on the distinct understanding that if it were found possible to introduce a Government measure dealing with Reformatory and Industrial Schools, this Bill should stand aside so that the subject might be dealt with as a whole; but, unfortunately, the chance of passing such a measure appears to be a rapidly diminishing one, and this Bill being virtually a reproduction of the 17th clause relating to Reformatory Schools, and the 21st clause relating to Industrial Schools in the Government Bill, the Government hope that this Bill may be read a second time. It is only part of a measure which it was hoped would be a very valuable one, but to obtain a part of it is better than having none at all. The clauses mentioned are based on the Report of a Royal Commission, and the principle of them has already been assented to by your Lordships. With regard to extending the measure to Scotland there is no objection whatever if it is thought well to apply it to that country; but as regards Ireland I hope the noble Earl who made the suggestion will defer the question until a further stage.
THE EARL OF COURTOWN: I do not press it.
LORD DE RAMSEY: Under these circumstances, I hope your Lordships will give the Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, agreed to.
Bill read 2a (according to order), and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Monday next.

HABITUAL DRUNKARDS.
LORD HERSCHELL,in rising to call attention to the punishment of habitual drunkards; and to move that it is expedient that an inquiry should be instituted to ascertain whether some better method of dealing with such cases cannot be substituted, said: My Lords, somewhat more than a year ago, in calling attention to the subject of inequality of sentences, I referred incidentally to the treatment of habitual offenders convicted of drunkenness. Naturally enough the observations of my noble Friend on the Woolsack were on that occasion entirely devoted to the main topic which I then introduced to the notice of the House, and no reference was made to this subject. I think, therefore, that I need make no apology for calling attention to it now, especially in connection with the facts stated in a Petition which I have to present from the Reformatory and Refuge Union and the Central Committee of the Discharged Prisoners' Aid Societies of Great Britain and Ireland. It appears that the number of commitments every year amount in the United Kingdom to 250,000, and those commitments are distributed between the three countries in this proportion: 160,000 in England, 47,000 in Scotland, and 44,000 in Ireland. For some reason, I do not know exactly what, the proportion of commitments in the three Kingdoms differs very considerably. In England the ratio of commitments per 1,000 of the population is—males, 4·1, females, 1·5; Scotland, males, 6·8, females, 4·2; Ireland—which stands between the other two countries in number of commitments—males, 5·5, females, 3·3. In other words, that is to say, in England there is 1 commitment to 190 of the population; in Scotland 1 to 80: in Ireland 1 to 100. The 250,000 commitments are believed to represent, according to an approximate estimate, only about 145,000 individuals —viz., 112,000 men and 33,000 women. That is on account of the very numerous commitments which occur in individual cases. Of the 33,000 women, who represent 77,000 commitments, 11,000 had had 10 imprisonments and upwards recorded against them; of the 112,000 men 16,250 had a like number of imprisonments, that is more than 10 times,
1702
so that it will be seen that the proportion of the repeated convictions is much greater in the case of women than in the case of men—in fact, it is over 60 per cent. more in the case of women than it is in the case of men. Of those commitments of females your Lordships ought to know that the great majority are in respect of drunkenness. In fact, over 50 per cent. of the total commitments of women were for drunkenness alone, and 80 85 per cent. for drunkenness and closely-allied offences, such as disorderly conduct and breaches of the peace. When we turn to individual towns we find that the same results are to be seen on a survey of the commitments throughout the whole country. There are cases where, in a single year, the same person is committed to prison for drunkenness as many as 52 times. A considerable number are committed from 30 to 52 times yearly: that is to say, there are persons who are brought before the magistrates and sentenced to imprisonment—the same persons—every week in the year. During the past year in Glasgow, where the number of commitments to prison of women exceed that of any other town in the Kingdom, there were 10,500 commitments. Of those 10,500 commitments, 450 women alone were responsible for 4,000; they had been committed, many of them from six to a dozen times, and some of them as often as 34 times. So that out of that very large number of commitments, it will be seen that a very limited number of persons are responsible for a very large proportion of them, something like 40 per cent.; and it is a very common case with many of these women that they return to prison on the day they are released or the day after. At Millbank during the past year this was the experience. I have some particulars from Millbank Prison also, where it appears that during the past year there were imprisoned under short sentences 105 women, all of whom had been convicted more than 40 times, and there were 56 of them who had been convicted upwards of 50 times. Those were the numbers of women undergoing sentences in one prison alone, Millbank, in a single year. I will only trouble your Lordships with one or two

1703
other facts. The Chaplain of Millbank Prison, who gives these particulars, states that one woman had upwards of 400 convictions against her; but as her husband, a small landlord, had paid nearly £200 in the shape of fines on her behalf, she must have been taken to the Police Court more than 600 times. I give your Lordships these facts and figures, which are really of a very startling, and I may say, appalling nature, because one knows that in the case of these women they not infrequently become the mothers of children, and when your Lordships remember that, unfortunately, proclivity to alcohol is now believed to be to a considerable extent hereditary, it will be seen at once that the disaster to the country is not represented merely by the effect upon the unfortunate people immediately concerned, of whose committals I have just been speaking. The object of punishment may be either that it shall act as a deterrent or as a preventive, or for reformatory purposes; but whether the punishment inflicted be regarded as a deterrent or as a preventive, or for reformatory purposes, in whatever light it may be regarded, I do not think it can be doubted that the facts to which I have called your Lordships' attention show that the existing system has completely broken down, and is really a disastrous failure. We are continually inflicting these punishments without producing the slightest effect, without benefiting the individuals who are thus dealt with, without deterring them from repeating the conduct which has led to their imprisonment, and without in the slightest degree its acting as a deterrent to others. And I do not think it is at all wonderful that these short terms of imprisonment are not productive in the case of habitual drunkards of any beneficial result. The truth is they are not long enough. The persons committed are not long enough under any kind of control, or subjected to the necessary moral teaching. No one can expect that any sort of beneficial moral result is likely to be obtained by such short commitments, and we cannot expect that by the present system we shall ever really do any better than we are now doing. I am not, however, prepared to suggest what change is necessary. I am not going, myself, to lay down the principles
1704
upon which we ought to proceed, because I admit that a great deal of consideration would have to be given to the matter before ultimately determining upon any change in the present administration of the law, or in the law which is at present administered. But I do think that the facts to which I have been calling your Lordships' attention, justify the Petition which I have to present from the authorities I have mentioned, who have devoted themselves to questions of this description and to the welfare of persons of this class, that there may be an inquiry into the matter in order to see whether we cannot make some change in the system which will produce better results. One suggestion made is that the only chance of success in the case of habitual offenders is to have a longer period of detention, in order that time might be given for the formation of better habits and for moral influences to be brought to bear upon those persons, as to whom, in many cases, it should be recollected this evil is more a disease that a crime. That seems to be the only hope of bringing about a better state of things. Of course, one sees at once that there would be a difficulty in sentencing persons to any considerable term of imprisonment for such an offence as this, even in the case of habitual offenders, for the reason that there would perhaps be a sentiment or feeling of inadequacy, a sense of disproportion between the punishment and the offence. But I do not think the same reasoning would apply, or that there would be the same sentiment at all, if it were frankly recognized that these people were to be detained really for their own good, and in the hope of curing them of an evil habit which is disastrous to themselves as well as to society; and I do not think, therefore, that if, instead of the present short sentences of imprisonment, there were a somewhat lengthened period of detention in an institution for the cure of inebriates, or in a department of our ordinary places of confinement which might be allotted specially to the treatment of these cases, there would be the same objection. That is one of the remedies which has been proposed, and which it has been said has been found in many cases to be successful. Although it is impossible to produce any beneficial

1705
result by a short detention of two or three days or a week, it has been found that, where you can keep these persons from obtaining the means of becoming intoxicated for a longer period, and can bring moral influences to bear upon them, in very many cases the result has been eminently successful. As I have said, I am not now laying down the principles on which a change should be made, but that is one suggestion that has been put forward. All I am now urging is this: that the facts I have brought before your Lordships are sufficient to justify an inquiry whether something cannot be done to replace a system which it must be admitted has entirely broken down and proved a lamentable failure. As to the form which such an inquiry should take, I do not feel any particular concern: that I should be quite content to leave to Her Majesty's Government. What I should suggest as perhaps the simplest and least cumbrous form would be a Departmental Committee appointed by the Home Office, but I do not myself lay any stress upon the particular form which the inquiry should take. I do think it is not desirable that we should let the present state of things continue any longer, without at least making an effort to see what is best to be done, getting all the advice we can possibly get, and all the experience we can possibly get upon the subject in this and other countries, for the purpose of seeing whether some steps cannot be taken to amend the present truly lamentable state of things, which is not only disastrous and mischievous to the country, but calculated to impair respect for the law itself—a system whereby these persons can be sentenced to only short terms of imprisonment, without apparently producing the slightest advantage to themselves or anybody else. I beg to move for the inquiry stated in the Motion which stands in my name.
Moved to resolve—
"That it is expedient that an inquiry should be instituted to ascertain whether some better method of dealing with such cases cannot be substituted."—(The Lord Herschell.)
LORD DE RAMSEY: My Lords, the noble and learned Lord has touched upon a most difficult and complicated
1706
subject. Legislation upon this subject has been rendered more difficult by the very evident intention of Parliament a few years ago to allow no compulsion whatever in the treatment of inebriates. The Act of 1879 really only passed the House of Commons on the distinct understanding that nothing in the shape of compulsion should be in the Bill. It was, therefore, virtually a tentative measure, and to a certain extent I must thoroughly agree with the noble and learned Lord, that it has not fulfilled the wishes of those who brought it in. The noble and learned Lord has given us some eloquent and terrible statistics of repeated, one may almost say continual, convictions. The Act of 1879 gives no power to increase the penalties for continued offences under that Act. The powers under that Act have been very much limited in the matter of inflicted penalties. But, my Lords, the great difficulty in this matter is that when an inebriate is taken to the home—or rather I should put it in this way, that when he or she voluntarily goes to the home in the one case, or is committed to it in the other—they are taken away from their usual employment. The only idea seems to be to keep them away from drink, and then they are turned out from the home again after perhaps a very short period of detention, or at all events a period not exceeding 12 months, probably without employment of any sort, and without any kind of supervision to keep them away from their old enemy. I agree with the noble and learned Lord that an inquiry may do good in this matter. As lately as 1888 the Inebriates' Act was passed, which was intended to help previous legislation, and if possible to better it; and it may interest your Lordships to know that in the Report of Mr. Hoffman there is this statement—
"The new Inebriates' Act"—
that is, the Act of 1888—
"Is working much more smoothly than the old one did, and when it becomes more generally known and appreciated, many, I presume, will avail themselves of the great advantages it affords."
Then he goes on to mention that other retreats are being opened upon the same lines as the Dalrymple Home, and he evidently, from his general remarks, anticipates that a larger number of indi-

1707
viduals will avail themselves of these refuges. Bat, my Lords, the numbers of persons as we have them before us now upon these figures are really but drops in the ocean, and if any means could be devised, although this matter has already been thoroughly looked into by a Committee, if some suggestions could be brought forward which would by means of such changes as the noble and learned Lord has mentioned, or otherwise, without throwing a heavy cost on the rates of this country, enable inebriates to be dealt with in refuges where they would be looked after, and by some means brought back again to the condition of civilised beings, we should feel that we had obtained a valuable result for the time and trouble devoted to this subject. With regard to the Motion of the noble and learned Lord, I beg to say that there is no objection whatever to an inquiry.
On Question, agreed to.

BETTING AND LOANS (INFANTS) BILL [H.L.]—(NO. 141.)
Amendments reported (according to order); and Bills to be read 3a on Monday next.

SAVINGS BANKS BILL.—(No. 142.)
On Report of Amendments,
LORD HERSOHELLsaid: My Lords, there is a question which I should like to ask the noble Lord who has charge of this Bill with regard to a matter to which my attention has been called. Under the 16th section of the Trustee Savings Bank Act, 1863, there was power to make what were called "special investments." The 10th section of this Bill puts certain restrictions upon special investments being so made, and the last sub section (i), of the clause is this—
"The power to make special investments shall not be exercised by any bank unless the bank has exercised the power before the 20th November, 1890."
My attention has been called by the Trustees of an important savings bank to the fact that under the existing Statute, and in accordance with their own Rules, they have made special investments subsequent, and very shortly, I believe, subsequent to that date; and they do not see why that hard and fast line should be drawn at the 20th Novem-
1708
ber, 1890, and why the time fixed should not be "after the passing of this Act." Of course, it is reasonable enough to make any regulations you please to come into force after the passing of an Act which it is thought expedient to make, but it does not seem reasonable to draw a line which is not drawn by the passing of the legislation, and to say here that all banks which may not before this-arbitrary date have made these special investments shall not only be under restriction in making them in future, but shall not be authorised in having done so under the existing Statute, and under their rules. I do not know what the noble Lord may be able to state as to what reason there may be for fixing this particular date.
THE SECRETARY TO THE BOARD OF TRADE (Lord BALFOUR of BURLEIGH); The reason for the clause is this: The power of making special investments has not in all respects worked very satisfactorily, and investments have been made in securities and in ways which are not properly, in the opinion of the Treasury and of the National Debt Commissioners, in pursuance of the powers and within the proper province of bankers—I mean investments which cannot be quickly realised with certainty at the prices paid for them when the investments were made. It is thought-that no encouragement should be given to those investments in future. The object of putting in this date—the 20th November last year—was that any bank which had then exercised the power should not be arbitrarily interfered with; and the reason for not accepting the suggestion made by the noble and learned Lord, and letting the time run up to the passing of this Act, is the fear that banks which have not found the necessity of making these investments in the past might take alarm at the proposal to take the power away from them, and for the purpose of keeping the power might make investments between the bringing in and the passing of the Bill. The idea was that any bank which has not done it within the last seventeen years to' the 20th November, 1890, is not prejudiced if the power is taken away as at that date. There is, of course, no Amendment actually before the House, and I sincerely hope the noble and learned

1709
Lord will not press an Amendment of that kind, to do away with the period which has been fixed, without very careful consideration.
LORD HERSCHELL: I do not know when this Bill was brought in, but I should have thought it is not likely that banks would have rushed purposely into these investments because this Bill had been brought in. In fact, it was not noticed by the officials of this particular bank to which I have referred, until it was too late for any steps to be taken in the House of Commons, that there was any such prohibition. It was in consequence of that that they were led to make an appeal, which has induced me to make this intervention. I will wait for the Report to be received, but I shall then ask to have leave to move the Amendment I have proposed.
Report received.
LORD HERSCHELL: I propose now to amend Clause 10, page 6, by leaving out (" 20th day of November, 1890,") in order to insert the words (" passing of this Act.")
THE PRIME MINISTER AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (The Marquess of SALISBURY): I think it would be better, as we have no difficulty in this House at the stage of Third Reading, if the noble and learned Lord would give us notice of his Amendment. I should like to inquire a little more about this. I confess it sounds to me a very strange provision, and I should like to know a little more about it.
LORD HERSCHELL: Then I propose to move it on Third Reading.
Bill to be read 3a on Monday next.

PRESUMPTION OF LIFE LIMITATION (SCOTLAND) BILL.—(No. 143.)
Amendments reported (according to order); and Bill to be read 3r on Thursday next.
EVIDENCE IN CRIMINAL CASES BILL [H.L.]—(NO. 144.)
Amendments reported (according to order); and Bill to be read 3a on Monday next.
HERRING BRANDING (NORTHUMBERLAND) BILL.—(No. 92.)
Amendment reported (according to order); and Bill to be read 3a on Monday next.

INDIA (MANIPUR).
Address for—
"Translation of the Conditions entered into by Rajah Gumbheer Singh, of Manipur, dated the 18th day of April, 1833; and of Correspondence between the Government of India and the Court of Directors in 1852 as to the relations between Manipur and the Government of India."—(The Marquess of Ripon.)
Paper laid before the House and to be printed. (No. 149.)
House adjourned at twenty minutes past live o'clock, to Monday next, a quarter before Eleven o'clock.