VOLUNTEERS BILL. (Hansard, 15 July 1897)

§ THE EARL OF WEMYSS
said he wanted to appeal to his noble Friend at the head of the War Office not to press this Measure in the present Session, but to let it stand over, so that the Volunteers of this country, who had not the slightest idea what the Measure meant, might consider it. The Bill was apparently a very small innocent. It was a Bill of only one clause, but it was revolutionary in its effect upon the civil status of the Volunteer. It practically took away from him his civil status. He was now in exactly the same position as any other civilian in the matter of debt, but if this Bill passed he would be put in the position of being capable of being imprisoned for debt, which no other civilian was subject to. He had drawn up a memorandum as to the position of a Volunteer which he had submitted to a great authority at the War Office, and to the secretary and adjutant of his old regiment, and they all admitted the truth of its contents. As this memorandum contained the gist of the whole matter, perhaps their Lordships would bear with him while he read it,— What is a Volunteer? He is a civilian, save when called out and doing duty. His service is voluntary. He cannot be forced to come on parade, to go into camp, or to nut on his uniform. He is not under the Mutiny Act, save when serving. He can resign by giving 14 days' notice, but the commanding officer can refuse to accept his resignation until he has paid any money he may owe to the regiment and returned his arms, accoutrements, or any other property belonging to the regiment. That is the hold which the commanding officer has over the Volunteer. A Volunteer is thus, except when he comes out to drill, manœuvres, or camp, essentially a civilian. He is a civilian soldier, and, save when serving, he is socially in the position of any other civilian. He has in no way lost his social status by becoming a Volunteer. If this Bill becomes an Act, what will be his position? If he has had his uniform given him 145 by his regiment or company on the understanding and agreement that he will make himself au efficient for three years and thus earn the capitation grant for his regiment, and fails to do this, he will be liable to imprisonment for non-payment of this money, in whole or in part, and he thus loses his civil status. This power of imprisonment for a regimental debt, now not possessed by a commanding officer, is given by the Bill, which extends rules for securing efficiency—rules which now do not involve imprisonment—to the earning of the capitation grant, and a fine for the breach of such rule for securing efficiency shall not be deemed a civil debt. Thus a Volunteer, a civilian when not on military duty, will, in the matter of regimental fines or money liabilities, lose his civil status, and will be liable to imprisonment for non-payment of a money debt. The word imprisonment hail been struck out of the second clause of the Bill, but it was in the Bill in the first clause, by which the power of imprisonment was practically given. The Volunteer was thus, he ventured to say, deprived of his civil rights. This was a great, a revolutionary, change, which ought not to be made without some very grave reason and without full consideration. He knew that everything his noble Friend did was for the interest of the service, and, of course, he had done this in the supposed interest of the service. In his opinion, however, it was not in the interest of the service. The case was this, that officers were anxious to fill their regiments and gave these uniforms to the men on the understanding that they would work out the cost by earning the capitation for whatever number of years would cover the original cost of the uniform. They sometimes had difficulty in getting these men to pay, for they left their regiment and the money was lost. But, as an old Volunteer, he ventured to say it would be better that any amount of money should be lost, and even that whole regiments should disappear, than that they should change the civil status of the Volunteer. He ventured to think that a force of the kind of the Volunteer force should be treated in the most careful manner possible, and that nothing should be done to put it, in regard to civil matters, in a different position to any other civilian in the country. The force, as a whole, did not know what the Bill meant, and, therefore, it was not an unreasonable request that the Measure should be postponed till next Session.

*THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Marquess of LANSDOWNE)
said he feared he should have some difficulty in converting the noble earl to his views in regard to this Bill, but he assured the noble earl and the House that the Bill did not make that serious invasion of what the noble earl termed the civil status of the Volunteer which he imputed to it. In a sense every Act of Parliament which rendered an individual liable to a penalty for the commission of an offence, to which penalty he was not liable before might be said to involve an alteration in the civil status of that individual; but he preferred to discuss the Bill on the practical grounds of its necessity in the interest of the force. The Volunteer corps formed a part of the defensive forces of the country; they had their place in all our schemes of defence and mobilization; they received assistance from the State—

§ THE EARL OF WEMYSS
The men do not.

§ *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE
, continuing, said the corps received assistance from the State upon condition that they held themselves ready to serve their country when required to do so. Each individual Volunteer received certain advantages, which he received, in the main at all events, at the expense of the public, and in consideration of receiving those advantages he entered into a contract that he would, by attending a limited number of drills, make himself efficient up to a certain point. The man might end that contract, if he pleased to do so, by giving a moderate notice, but he maintained that while that contract was in force it was a reasonable thing that the corps should have the means of enforcing it against the man by some process simpler and more expeditious than a civil suit. If the Volunteer received his equipment and uniform, and, having received it, deliberately failed to make himself efficient, surely it was true that he perpetrated a double fraud or wrong—he did a wrong to his corps, which was cheated out of the capitation grant which he was bound to help in earning for it; and, on the other hand, he deprived the country of the services of an efficient soldier. The noble Earl spoke of this being a revolution, a revolution which 147 was not understood by the Volunteer force; but the Bill left the Volunteer force precisely in the position which they themselves always believed they occupied. ["Hear, hear!"] A recent decision of the Courts had thrown a doubt upon the law, but unquestionably until that doubt was created every Volunteer believed that these fines could be recovered from him by proceedings before a Court of Summary Jurisdiction. As a matter of fact, there was no case on record of a Volunteer ever having gone to prison for the non-payment of these fines, for the simple reason that in such cases a Volunteer either paid the fine, or made himself efficient, or showed good reason why he was unable to do so. With regard to the attitude of the Volunteer force towards this Bill he had been in communication with the Institute of Commanding Officers of the Volunteer Corps, and he was in a position to say that the members of that institute had considered the Bill and were entirely favourable to it. He believed he was right in adding that if they had any criticism to make in regard to the Bill it was that it do not go quite far enough. The Bill had been for some time before the public; it had passed through the other House of Parliament not without some discussion; it had passed through the whole of the usual stages in their Lordships' House, and he really did not think that the noble Earl had any ground for asserting that it had been in any way sprung upon the force in which he took so great an interest. He was reluctant to refuse any request coming from one so long and so honourably connected with the Volunteer force as the noble Earl, but he thought the noble Earl's request was not an entirely reasonable one, and he must ask their Lordships to read the Bill a Third time.

LORD TURING
pointed out that the Summary Jurisdiction Act allowed these penalties to be recovered as civil debts. Under that Act they might imprison immediately if a man did not pay, but if they enacted that the debts were to be recovered as civil debts they might recover before magistrates by exactly the same process, only they could not imprison unless the man had money and would not pay. For the words "shall not be deemed to be a civil debt" there ought to inserted "shall be recovered summarily 148 as a civil debt." In that case a man could not be sent to prison unless he could pay and would not pay. He did not think such dreadful consequences would accrue as Lord Wemyss had detailed, but in a Bill of this sort, under which a man merely committed a breach of contract, they ought to take steps to recover a debt as a civil debt.

§ LORD HERSCHELL
maintained that the provision of the Bill ran counter to the policy of the Legislature. The sixth section of the Summary Jurisdiction Act provided that where under any Act, whether past or future, a sum of money claimed to be due was recoverable on complaint to a Court of summary jurisdiction, such sum should be deemed to be a civil debt, and if recoverable before a Court of summary jurisdiction should be recoverable in the manner declared by the Act as recoverable and not otherwise. An order for the payment of money could be obtained, and if the money were not paid the complainant could have distress, and if the person could pay and did not pay he could be sent to prison. Was more wanted than that? Surely it would be much better instead of saying "shall not be deemed to be a civil debt" to say "shall be recovered summarily on complaint before a Court of summary jurisdiction."

§ *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE
said he could not pretend to be as conversant with points of law as the noble and learned Lord, and as he understood the words the noble Lord had suggested would achieve the purpose they had or ought to have in view, he thought the best course he could pursue would be to adjourn the Third Reading and ask the noble Lord to propose the Amendment. ["Hear, hear."]
Further Debate adjourned to Tuesday next.