§ On the Order for the Third Reading of this Bill,
§ LORD HALSBURYsaid, he wished to call attention to a state of affairs which had arisen in connection with this Bill. Originally he introduced this Bill, and the Lord Chancellor introduced a similar one subsequently; and both were put down for Second Reading on the same day. At that time he stated that he was willing and anxious to confide the Bill to the care of the Lord Chancellor; and, as a matter of fact, he had neither moved the Report stage nor the Third Reading stage of the Bill. He certainly understood, however—he did not say that his noble and learned Friend pledged himself on the point—that the measure was to receive the favourable attention of the Government, and he had noticed with some anxiety that this Bill had never yet been on the Order-book of the House of Commons. But the situation was somewhat changed. Whatever his chances might have been in handing the Bill to some hon. Member in the other House, the Government had since that time taken the whole 620 time of the House, and it was absolutely impossible, unless the Government themselves intervened, that this Bill could have any chance of passing into law. Circumstances had recently occurred, to which he did not wish to refer, which seemed to him to emphasise the necessity for a change in the law. It had become an absolute scandal at the present time to see the way in which the law was administered. Not a day passed in which the injustice of this grievance might not be illustrated by some case in which a person was accused of an offence and yet be unable to give an account of his conduct in a Court of Justice save in exceptional cases. As the Lord Chancellor had said that the prejudices against the measure had diminished, he could not see any reason why some effort should not be made to carry this Bill into law, particularly as the one element, supposed to be a discordant one, and which might have raised obstruction in the House of Commons, had been removed.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORassured his noble and learned Friend that there had not been the slightest alteration in his view with reference to this Bill being passed. There was every intention on the part of the Government to pass it into law. He reminded the noble Lord, however, that he had himself held the office of Lord Chancellor in a Government which was in power for six years, which had this Bill under their charge more than one, and yet they did not succeed in passing it into law. [Lord HALSBURY: "They tried."] If it was so easy to pass a Bill like this, then the late Government ought in that time to have succeeded. He had no objection to the Bill.
§ LORD ASHBOURNEsaid, he was in favour of the principle of both Bills, but he deplored the omission of Ireland from measures where its presence was essentially necessary. He hoped that in the interest of the administration of the law the Bill would pass for this country, but he had no doubt that in many quarters acute disappointment would be felt at the omission of Ireland from a Bill which appeared to demand its presence.
§ Bill read 3a and passed.
§ House adjourned at Five o'clock