Lords Sitting of 29 July 1897

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  SOUTHWARK AND VAUXHALL WATER BILL.
  Read the Third time, with the Amendments.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTHsaid he had some Amendments to propose to the Bill, but they were not animated by any hostility to the Southwark and Vauxhall Water Company, nor by any desire to restrict their facilities for obtaining, water with which to supply their customers. But there were points in the Bill which were against what he might call public polity. The Government hail decided that the whole subject of the London Water Supply should be referred to a Royal Commission; and it seemed to him to be desirable that, pending the Report of that Commission, nothing should be done by Parliament which might prejudice or prejudge t he subject referred to the Commission or encourage a long and costly fight during the next Session of Parliament while the Commission was holding its sittings. He was afraid that by passing the Bill as it stood there was a danger of both these undesirable things arising. The history of the Bill was a somewhat unusual one. The Southwark and Vauxhall Water Company had for some years been taking from the Thames water largely in excess of the amount allowed them by Parliament. They were allowed 24½ million gallons per day, and they had been taking upwards of 40 million gallons per day: and it was said that a large portion of that water had gone, not to better the supply of the consumers, but to make up the deficiency caused by leakages in the mains of the company, which leakages had greatly damaged or destroyed the roads under which they occurred. The Queen's Bench Division had, on the application of the Thames Conservancy, granted an injunction against the company forbidding them to continue taking
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  this excessive water from the Thames, but at the same time giving them a year of grace in which they might make arrangements to get out of the difficulty under which they would be placed by the injunction. It was too late to give the usual notices to both Houses, and Parliament came to the conclusion that the matter pressed, and therefore suspended the Standing Orders and allowed this Bill to be introduced without the usual notices. The Bill canto before the other House at a somewhat unfortunate time, and it was evident to the Committee that unless they hurried their proceedings, it would be impossible for the Bill to pass; consequently, without hearing the opponents, they granted the prayer of the promoters. On the Report to the House of Commons, a Motion was made to re-commit the Bill, and there appeared to be a desire on all sides of the House that the status quo should be maintained. It seemed, however, that the status quo had not been maintained. In Clause 4 of the Bill, a power was given to the company to raise and apply such capital as might be necessary to make proper provision for
  "the obtaining, drawing, impounding, and taking of water from the river Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in such quantities as may, after the expiration of this Act, be required by them."
  It seemed to him that that was one of the very subjects which would come before the Commission, and that it was not right that Parliament should now step in and direct this company to apply for an Act, which gave them power to take more water from the Thames, until they had a decision from the Commission as to whether it was good policy that such additional water should in future be drawn from the Thames. Under the same clause, a duty was imposed on the company of next year introducing a Bill to obtain these additional powers, and he did not think it desirable that an expensive contest should go on on the very subject with which the Commission would be dealing at the same time. He Would therefore propose to strike these provisions out of the Bill, and in order that the company should not be placed at a disadvantage with regard to its consumers, he would ask them to extend the time in which the company might take

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  additional water from the Thames in spite of the injunction to four years instead of two years as in the Bill. He would suggest that the whole question of when the company should apply to Parliament for a Bill, what the terms of that Bill should be, and whence the water should be taken, should remain perfectly open. He begged to move the first Amendment standing in his name, which was to leave out the second paragraph in the preamble,—
  "And whereas the hereinbefore recited Acts were repealed by the Southwark and Vauxhall Water Act 1852, but the Company notwithstanding such repeal were by such Act continued and placed under obligations to supply water within limits thereby prescribed and being the same as had been theretofore prescribed as aforesaid and authorised to obtain, draw, and impound for the purpose of such supply water from the river Thames above Teddington Lock."
  and to insert,—
  "And whereas the Conservators of the River Thames (hereinafter called "the Conservators") lately commenced an action (1896, T. No. 436) in the Queen's Bench Division of the High Court against the Company claiming an injunction restraining the Company their agents or servants from taking, diverting, or impounding from the River Thames a greater quantity of water than 24,500,000 gallons in every twenty-fours hours from midnight to midnight.
  And whereas on the 18th day of January 1897 judgment was given in the said action for the Conservators granting them the injunction claimed in the terms in which they asked for it.
  And whereas the Company now take water from the River Thames in excess of the quantity to which they are restricted under the said injunction, and it is expedient that notwithstanding the said injunction and without prejudice to any other questions the Company be temporarily authorised to take water from the said river in excess of such quantity subject to the provisions of this Act.
  And whereas a Royal Commission has been recently appointed to inquire and report upon the question of the acquisition and future management of the undertakings of the Metropolitan water companies and is about to commence its sittings.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Clause 2,—
  INCREASE OF COMPANY'S POWER TO TAKE WATER FROM RIVER TITAMES.
  Subject to the provisions of this Act and to the provisions of Section 297 of the Thames Conservancy Act 1894, the Company may from and after the passing of this Act by means of
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  their works whereby they are now authorised to obtain, draw, awl impound water from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) above Teddington hock, obtain, draw, impound, and take such quantity of water from the said river (including water from Platt's Eyot) in any day of twenty-four hours calculated from midnight to midnight and whether or not in excess of 24,500,000 gallons as may be required by them for the purpose of fulfilling obligations imposed upon them by statute with respect to the supply of water within their limits:
  Provided that unless and until otherwise authorised so to do by Parliament the Company shall not in any half-year ending on the twenty-third day of June or the twenty-fourth day of December as the case may be, obtain, draw, impound, or take from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) any quantity of water in excess of a quantity equal to the aggregate amount of 45,000,000 gallons in respect of the several days of twenty-four hours calculated from midnight to midnight during such half-year.
  And provided that the Company shall not obtain, draw, impound, or take from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in any day of twenty-four hours calculated from midnight to midnight any quantity of water in excess of 24,500,000 gallons when the flow of water over the weir about to be constructed by the Conservators of the River Thames (in this Act referred to as "the Conservators") across the said river at Penton Hook is in such day less than 300,000,000 gallons, or pending the construction of such weir when the flow of water over Bell Weir is in such day less than 265,000,000 gallons:
  Provided further that when in any such day as aforesaid the flow of water over the said weir at Penton Hook is more than 300,000,000 gallons or pending the construct-ion thereof the flow of water over Bell Weir is more than 265,000,000 gallons the quantity of water in excess of 24,500,000 gallons which the Company will in such day be entitled to obtain, draw, impound, or take shall not exceed the quantity flowing on that day over the said Penton Hook Weir or Bell Weir, as the case may be, in excess of 300,000,000 gallons or 255,000,000 gallons, as the case may be:
  Provided also that the Company shall not obtain, draw, impound, or take the water of the river Thames at such times, in such manner, or to such extent as to prejudice or affect the rights respectively of the Lambeth Waterworks Company, of the Grand Junction Waterworks Company, of the West Middlesex Waterworks Company, or any of those companies respectively under their respective Acts or agreements with the Corporation of the City of London or the Conservators, or to prejudice the right of the East London. Waterworks Company under the East London Waterworks (Thames Supply) Act 1867, to take or so as to prevent the East London Waterworks Company from taking water from the Thames as in that Act provided.
  Nothing in this Act shall be deemed to confer upon the Company any priority of right to take water from the river Thames or any tributary thereof as against any company,

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  body, or person already, or who may hereafter be, empowered by statute to take water therefrom, or any of the following companies already empowered, by who may hereafter be empowered by statute, to take water therefrom, that is to say, the East London Waterworks Company, the Lambeth Waterworks Company, the Grand Junction Waterworks Company, and the West Middlesex Waterworks Company, or to affect in any way the stipulations and provisions, either expressly or in fact, contained in the Staines Reservoirs, etc., Act 1896 for the protection or benefit of the said companies or any of them.
  Amendment made: Paragraph (3), after the words "conservators," omit the words, "of the River Thames (in this Act referred to as 'the Conservators')."—(Earl of Morley.)
  Clause 3,—
  PAYMENT TO CONSERVATORS.

  (1.) In this section the expression "average daily excess quantity" means the average of the quantities of water in excess of 24,500,000 gallons respectively obtained, drawn, impounded, or taken for the purpose of supply by the Company from the river Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in the several days of twenty-four boars, calculated from midnight to midnight, during the half-year ending in the twenty-third day of June or the twenty-fourth day of December, as the case may be.

  (2.) So long, hut so long only, as the Company take any water from the River Thames in excess of 24,500,000 gallons in any day of twenty-four hours calculated as aforesaid, the Company shall pay to the Conservators on the twenty-fourth day of June and the twenty-fifth day of December in each year the Sums hereinafter prescribed, and the provisions of Sections 293 (Contributions of Companies to be first charge on their receipts) and 294 (Payments of Companies to be without deduction and free front taxes, etc.) of the Thames Conservancy Act 1894 shall, mutatis mutandis, apply to such half-yearly payments. and the money payable to the Conservators under this Act shall be, in addition to and irrespective of any payments to be made to them under any other Act or under the hereinbefore recited indenture, made the first day of July, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-two, or agreement made the twenty-third day of December, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six.

  (3.) The sums payable half-yearly as aforesaid shall be—

  (a) From and after the passing of this Act until the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 5,500,000 gallons, the sum of five hundred and twenty-five pounds and five shillings;

  (b) From and after such time as the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 5.500,000 gallows until such quantity shall have first exceeded 10,500,000 gallons the sum if one thousand and two pounds and fifteen shillings;

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  (c) From and after such time as the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 10,500,000 gallons until such quantity shall have first exceeded 10,500,000 gallons, the sum of one thousand two pounds and fifteen shillings, and a sum calculated at tile annual rate of one hundred and ninety-one rounds per million gallons by which such quantity shall in the then last Mast half-year have exceeded 10,500,000 gallons;

  (d) From and after such time as the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 13,500,000 gallons until such quantity shall have first exceeded 16,500,000 gallons, the sum of one t thousand four hundred and eighty pounds and five shillings;

  (e) Front and after such time as the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 15,500,000 gallons until such quantity shall have first exceeded 18,500,000 gallons, the sum of one thousand four hundred and eighty pounds and five shillings, and a sum calculated at the annual rate of one hundred and ninety-one mounds per million gallons by which such quantity shall in the then last past half-year have exceeded 15,500,000 gallons;

  (f) From and after such' time as the average daily excess quantity shall have first exceeded 18,500,000 gallons, the slim of one thousand nine hundred and fifty-seven pounds and fifteen shillings.

  (4.) The Conservators shall carry to the Upper Navigation Fund, constituted by the Thames Conservancy Act 1894, all sums paid to them under this Act.

  Amendments made: Sub-section (2), after the words "any other Act or under," to omit the words, "the herein-before recited," to insert the word "an."—(Earl of Morley.)
  Sub-section (2), after the words, "fifty-two," omit the word "or" and insert the words,—
  "between the Company, and the Mayor and commonalty and citizens of the City of London or under an."—(Earl of Morley.)
  Sub-section (2), after the words "eighty-six," insert the words "between the company and the conservators."—(Earl of Morley.)
  Clause 4,—
  DURATION OF ACT.
  The Company shall, in the Session of Parliament to he held in the year one thousand eight hundred. and ninety-eight, introduce a local Pill for the purpose of obtaining such statutory powers of acquiring lands, constructing within eight years from the passing of this Act storage reservoirs told other works,

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  and of raising and applying capital as may be necessary to make proper provision for the obtaining, drawing, impounding, and taking of water from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in such quantities as may, after the expiration of this Act, be required by them for the purpose of fulfilling obligations imposed upon them by statute with respect to the supply of water within their limits.
  Nothing in this Act shall prejudice or affect any question which any body or person other than the Conservators and the Company may at any stage of such Bill desire to raise with respect to the said Bill or any of the provisions thereof, or may desire to raise before the Royal Commission on Water Supply in the districts within the limits of supply of the Metropolitan Water Companies, or may desire to raise elsewhere; and
  Nothing in this Act contained shall be held to prejudice or affect as against the Conservators or the Company the terms provisions to be inserted in the said Bill as to the obtaining, drawing, impounding, and taking water from the River Thames or the minimum flow of water to be left in the said river or the point of gauging such minimum flow.
  This Act shall, from and after the passing of the said Bill, be, ipso facto, repealed, and shall in no case be in force after the first day of September, one thousand eight hundred and ninety-nine.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTHrose to move his first Amendment to Clause 4, namely, to leave out the first paragraph of the clause from "The company" to "their limits."
  THE EARL OF MORLEYsaid that, without going into the merits of the question, he would point out that the Bill had a curious course through Parliament in some ways. This clause was carefully considered by one of their Lordships' Select Committees, it was opposed in that Committee, and the last three paragraphs of the clause were inserted in order to provide the safeguards that his noble Friend desired, namely, to prevent questions in dispute being prejudiced by anything contained in the Bill. He ventured to think it was somewhat late to alter on the Third Reading the drafting of the clause which had been deliberately arrived at. He was informed that the Conservators very strongly objected to the proposed prolongation of time, and pointed out that large sums of money had been spent in rendering the Thames navigable for a long distance, and that to take a large quantity of water from the river at certain times rendered it un-navigable. He thought it was of importance that the company should be
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  bound to come to Parliament as soon as possible, and that the shortest possible limit of time should be given to them to prepare the works which would obviously be necessary in the future. If the noble Lord would consent not to move the omission of the whole of the first paragraph of Clause 4, he would be prepared not to insist on the words to which he specially called attention, and would move to omit the words,—
  "for the obtaining, drawing, impounding, and taking of water from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in such quantities as may after the expiration of this Act be required by them."
  LORD TWEEDMOUTHsaid he was, of course, in the palm of his noble Friend's hand in that House, and his best course was to accept whatever was offered him and to be as thankful as possible. He admitted that the suggested Amendment would meet one of the points which he had raised, but he was very sorry that the noble Lord had not met him also on the other point. The result would be that next Session they would be practically face to face with a prolonged contest between this company and the various local authorities and the other water companies with regard to their proposal to take more water from the Thames at the very time that the Royal Commission was inquiring into the same subject. If his proposition had been accepted there would have been no further difficulty about this Bill in the House of Commons. He could say nothing now, but there was pretty sure to be some discussion on the point on which his noble Friend had not been able to meet him.
  THE EARL OF MORLEYmoved to omit from the first paragraph of Clause 4 the words "for the obtaining, drawing, impounding, and taking of water from the River Thames (including water from Platt's Eyot) in such quantities as may after the expiration of this Act be required by them."
  Amendment agreed to.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 16) BILL.
  Read the Third time.

  SUPERANNUATION OF CORPORATION OFFICIALS.
  THE EARL OF MORLEYsaid he had an Amendment on the Paper with regard to this Bill, but after conversation he had had with the authorities of the Local Government Board, he did nut intend to move it. The Bill enabled superannuation allowances to be paid by the Corporation of Birmingham to its employés. The Bill, as first introduced, provided that the employés should pay it certain sum, to be deducted front their pay, this to be supplemented by a further sum to be given by the Corporation providing out of the rates superannuation for employés who had reached a certain age, or had broken down bodily or mentally. It seemed to him and others that it was not fair to employés if they retired voluntarily before the period at which they would be entitled to their pensions, that they should lose the whole of their contributions to the superannuation fund, or the corporation rates as the case might be. But this had been remedied, and it was provided by the Bill that, if an employé voluntarily retired before he was entitled to his pension, he would receive back his payments to the superannuation fund. If this were not done it would make employés far too dependent upon their employers, because if this power were given to municipalities generally it would be difficult to refuse it to large employers of labour such as railway companies and others. In addition to the actual sums he had paid to the fund—which, after all, were deductions from a to man's pay—which he received when he voluntarily retired, he should be entitled to some percentage on the sums accruing from year to year. But, finding the Local Government Board were opposed to his Amendment, on the ground that it would create a precedent, which it would be difficult for them to deal with hereafter, he would withdraw his Amendment, which he should be sorry to move in opposition to the view of a Government Department.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Bill passed.

  WORKMEN (COMPENSATION FOR ACCIDENTS) BILL.
  Amendments reported (according to order).
  Clause 1,—
  LIABILITY OF CERTAIN EMPLOYERS TO WORKMEN FOR INJURIES.

  (1.) If in any employment to which this Act applies personal injury by accident arising out of and in the course of the employment is caused to a workman, his employer shall, subject as hereinafter mentioned, be liable to pay compensation in accordance with the first schedule to this Act.

  (2.) Provided that—

  (a) The employer shall not be liable under this Act in respect of any injury which does not disable the workman for a period of at least two weeks front earning full wages at the work at which he was employed;

  (b) a hen the injury was caused by the personal negligence or wilful act of the employer or of some person for whose act or default the employer is responsible, nothing in this Act shall affect any civil liability of the employer, but in that case the workman may, at his option, either claim compensation under this Act, or take the same proceedings as were open to him before the commencement of this Act; but the employer shall not be liable to pay compensation for injury to a workman by accident arising out of and in the course of the employment both independently of and also under this Act, and shall not be liable to pay such compensation independently of this Act, except in case of such personal negligence or wilful act as aforesaid:

  (c) If it is proved that the injury to a workman is attributable to the serious and wilful misconduct of that workman, any compensation claimed in respect of that injury shall be disallowed.

  (3.) If any question arises in any proceedings tinder this Act as to the liability to pay compensation under this Act (including any question as to whether the employment is one to which this Act applies), or as to the amount or duration of compensation under this Act, the question, if not settled by agreement, shall, subject to the provisions of the first schedule to this Act be settled by arbitration, in accordance with the second schedule to this Act.

  (4.) if an action is brought to recover damages independently of this Act for injury caused by any accident., and it is determined in such action that the injury is one for which compensation ought to have been claimed under this Act, the action shall not be dismissed, but the damages recoverable from the employer shall not exceed the compensation payable under this Act; and the costs incurred ill defending such action, or any part of those costs, may be ordered by the court to be deducted froth the amount of compensation so payable.

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  (5.) Nothing in this Act shall affect any proceeding for a fine under the enactments relating to mines or factories, or the application of any such fine, but if any such line, or any part thereof, has been applied for the benefit of the person injured, the amount so applied shall be taken into account in estimating the compensation under this Act.

  LORD BELPERmoved in Sub-section (1) paragraph (b) to leave out "pay such compensation" and insert "any proceedings"
  LORD HERSCHELLsaid he did not see any necessity for the Amendment.
  Amendment agreed to.
  LORD BELPERmoved to leave out Sub-section (4), and to insert the following sub-section,—
  (4.) "If within six months an action is brought to recover damages independently of this Act for injury caused by any accident, and it is determined in such action that the injury is one for which the employer is not liable in such action, but that he would have been liable to pay compensation under the provisions of this Act, the action shall be dismissed; but the Judge, if he shall think fit, may himself proceed to assess such compensation and shall be at liberty to deduct from such compensation all the costs which, in his judgment, have been caused by the plaintiff bringing the action instead of proceeding under tins Act. In any proceeding under this sub-section, when the Judge assesses the compensation he shall give a certificate of the compensation he has awarded and the directions he has given as to the deduction for costs, and such certificate shall have the force and effect of an award under this Act."
  LORD RATHMOREsaid before the clause was passed he should like to refer to the notice of an Amendment he had on the Paper to leave out the clause as it originally stood in the Bill. The reason he gave that notice was that it appeared to him, and others who had great experience, that as the clause stood in the Bill it would be likely to hold out invitations to litigation in certain cases, and interfere with the policy of settlements on the line of friendly agreements and inexpensive arbitrations in a number of cases which it was the policy of the Bill to promote. He was bound to say that the alteration which had been made in the first clause, and the substitution of the Dew Sub-section (4) for the sub-section, as
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  it originally stood, had entirely removed his apprehensions on the subject.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Clause 2,—
  TIME FOR TAKING PROCEEDINGS.

  (1.) Proceedings for the recovery under this Act of compensation for an injury shall not be maintainable sinless notice of the accident has been given as soon as practicable after the happening thereof, and before the workman has voluntarily left the employment in which he was injured, and the claim for compensation with respect to such accident has been made within six months from the occurrence of the accident causing the injury, or, in case of death, within six months from the time of death. Provided always that the want of or any defect or inaccuracy in such notice shall Ind. be a bar to the maintenance of such proceedings if it is found in flue proceedings for settling the claim that the employer is not prejudiced in his defence by the want, defect, or inaccuracy, or that such want, defect. or inaccuracy was occasioned by mistake or other reasonable cause.

  (2.) Notice in respect of an injury under this Act shall give the name and address of the person injured, and shall state in ordinary language the cause of the injury and the date at which it was sustained, and shall be served on the employer, or, if there is more than one employer, upon one of such employers.

  (3.) The notice may be served by delivering the same to or at the residence or place of business of the person on whom it is to be served.

  (4.) The notice may also be served by post by a registered letter addressed to the person on whom it is to be served at his last known place of residence or place of business, and if served by post shall be deemed to have been served at the time when the letter containing the same would have been delivered in the ordinary course of post, and in proving the service of such notice it shall be sufficient to prove that the notice was properly addressed and registered.

  (5.) Where the employer is a body of persons corporate or unincorporate, the notice may also lie served by delivering the ramie at, or by sending it by post in a registered letter addressed to the employer at the office, or. if there be more than one office, any one of the offices of such body.

  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWNmoved after "and" [''and the claim"] to insert "unless."
  LORD BELPERsaid he had no objection to the Amendment, which was agreed to.
  Clause 3,—
  CONTRACTING OUT.

  (1.) If the Registrar of Friendly Societies, after taking steps to ascertain the views of the employer and workmen, certifies that any scheme of compensation or insurance for the workmen in any employment is on the whole under all the circumstances of the case not less favourable to the general body of workmen and their dependants than the provisions of this Act, the employer may, until the certificate is revoked, contract with any of those workmen that the provisions of the scheme shall be substituted for the provisions of this Act, and thereupon the employer shall be liable only in accordance with the scheme, but, save as aforesaid, this Act shall apply, notwithstanding any contract to the contrary made after the commencement of this Act.

  (2.) The registrar may give a certificate to expire at the end of a limited period not less than five years.

  (3.) No scheme shall be so certified which contains an obligation upon the workmen to join the scheme as a condition of their hiring.

  (4.) If complaint is made to the Registrar of Friendly Societies by or on behalf of the workmen of any employer that the provisions of any scheme are no longer on the whole so favourable to the general body of workmen of such employer and their dependants as the provisions of this Act, or that the provisions of such scheme are being violated, or that the scheme is not being fairly administered by the employer, or that satisfactory reasons exist for revoking the certificate, the registrar shall examine into the complaint, and, if satisfied that good cause exists for such complaint, shall, unless the cause of complaint is removed, revoke the certificate. When a certificate is revoked or expires any moneys or securities held for the purpose of the scheme shall be distributed as may be arranged between the employer and workmen, or as may be determined the Registrar of Friendly Societies in the event of a difference of opinion.

  (5.) Whenever a scheme has been certified as aforesaid, it shall be the duty of the employer to answer all such inquiries and to furnish all such accounts in regard to the scheme as may be male or required by the Registrar of Friendly Societies.

  (6.) The Chief Registrar of Friendly Societies shall include in his annual report the particulars of the proceedings of the Registrar Under this Act.

  LORD BELPERmoved in Sub-section (1), after "compensation," to insert "benefit." On the Committee stage of the Bill, he said, Lord Herschell made a criticism as to whether "compensation" or "insurance" covered all the matters which might be included in the purview of the Registrar under this clause. It had, therefore, been suggested that they
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  should insert the word "benefit," which would no doubt make the matter clear.
  Amendment agreed to.
  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWNmoved in Sub-section (4) to leave out "by the employer." He had, he said two reasons for proposing this Amendment. In the first place, he thought the words were calculated to convey a rather false impression of what the clause was really intended to mean, and, in the second place, he thought the clause would be better without them. In the Debate on Monday night, Lord Herschell pointed to these words as indicating that the schemes were to be administered by the employer. He believed that that was not the intention of the clause, and it was easy to conceive a case where the funds were being administered by some body which was composed largely, or perhaps mainly, of employés, in which some portion of those employés might obtain a majority in the governing body and might administer the funds in a manner to which a considerable number of the bénéficiaires might object. He thought that would be a very fair case for them to put before the Registrar and ask that the scheme should cease any longer to be certified on the ground that it was not being administered fairly.
  LORD BELPERsaid the Government were quite willing to accept the Amendment, leaving out the words "by the employer," on the ground that many of these schemes were administered by joint committees generally of workmen and employers. Very few were administered by employers alone, and it was just as important, whoever the funds were administered by, that they should be fairly administered, and that objection should be taken if they were not.
  Amendment agreed to.
  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWNsaid he had given notice of an Amendment to Clause 4, but if their Lordships would permit him, he would postpone it until their Lordships had discussed the Amendment which stood in the name of Lord Ellesmere, because it was possible, he understood, that it might not lie necessary for him to postpone his Amendment.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid it was merely a question of wording, but their Lordships would see that the clause did not read. Sub-section (4) ran thus,—
  "If complaint is made to the Registrar of Friendly Societies by or on behalf of the workmen of any employer that the provisions of any scheme are no longer on the whole so favourable to the general body of workmen,"
  and so on. Then, further on, the Subsection read,—
  "or that satisfactory reasons exist for revoking the certificate, the Registrar shall examine into the complaint."
  Some verbal Amendment seethed to be required; perhaps the noble Lord would look into it before the next stage.
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDsaid this should be done.
  THE EARL OF ELLESMEREasked their Lordships' kind indulgence for one who was not in the habit of addressing the House. Lord Camperdown had given notice to move to reintroduce words which stood in the clause as it was put before the House originally, and their Lordships would remember that Clause 4 was then in a form which by mutual agreement was considered unintelligible, and therefore a new clause, the present clause, was inserted on the Motion of Lord Belper. In the clause as it came up to the House there were certain words which Lord Camperdown wished to reintroduce—"within the scope of the trade or business of such undertakers." He had been pressed by persons connected with the cotton manufactures to bring this Amendment under notice, and it was proposed for the purpose of carrying out what appeared to have been the intention of the framers of the clause. The words, though the clause may have been badly drawn, must have meant something—must have been meant to convey some intention on the part of Her Majesty's Government, or of whoever caused them to be inserted. He did not know if they were introduced on the Motion of a private Member in the other House, and the object of his Amendment was to carry out what appeared to have been the original intention of the clause to deal with sub-contractors. A sub-contractor was generally understood to mean a person who contracted to do part of
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  the work within the usual business of the Person employing him—he did not pretend to give a legal definition—and it was not generally understood to apply to a contractor who did some work which was in the words of the Amendment, ancillary or incidental to and not part of or process in the trade or business carried on. The Amendment would not prevent the undertaker being liable for compensation to a workman employed under any sub-contractor who did part-of the process of the trade or business of such undertaker, but it would release him from liability to pay compensation to a workman employed by a contractor to do work which was not incidental to his own trade. To give an illustration which had been mentioned in the course of Debate in Committee, suppose a contractor undertook to paint a mill or factory, if he rightly understood the Bill, if an accident occurred to the painter or his man, by his falling off a ladder, the owner of the mill or factory would be liable to the payment of compensation. But if the undertaker or mill owner engaged the same contractor to paint his residence, and in carrying out the work a similar accident occurred, then under this Bill the owner would not be under liability to pay compensation. This appeared to be rather a curious state of things, and he could not help thinking that when the Bill came up from the other House, and the words he had quoted showed it, this was not intended. He did not know if the Government intended it now; he hoped they did not. It seemed absurdly unfair to make a man liable for compensation to a workman over whom he had no control, and whose competence for the work he had no means of judging. The clause as it stood provided that the undertakers should be entitled to be indemnified by the person who, independently of this section, would be liable, and he had been told, he had not sufficient legal knowledge on which to form an opinion, that this proviso would not work properly. A sub-contractor's workman might claim against an undertaker and get his award, and then when the undertaker went to be indemnified as under the Act he would be entitled to do, the sub-contractor might say, "No, I shall plead contributory negligence," or some other excuse, and he might decline

  1405
  to pay except as the result of long litigation. In a case of this kind, where the sub-contractor was a man of substance, say, for instance, a large engineering firm under contract to set up machinery, there would probably be no difficulty—and if one of their workmen were injured they, upon compensation being awarded, would pay without hesitation. Why then should not the claim be paid directly, why should there be two claims, one to indemnify for the other? On the other hand, if the sub-contractor were a small man, why should not he be equally liable? Of course, he knew the answer would be the undertaker should only deal with solvent contractors. That was all very well, and possibly that would be one result of the passing of the clause in its present state; but did the House really wish to snuff out all small and struggling employers, who, though only employing a few hands, yet would rise in scale of importance? Why should that be? The words of the Amendment supplied to him—they were not exactly his own—would, he believed, carry out the intention with which he had spoken. Apologising for hiving detained the House, and thanking their Lordships for listening to his explanation, he moved in Clause 4 "section 1," to add—
  "and that undertakers who have contracted with any other person to execute on, in, or about any works or premises, as defined by Section seven of this Act, any work which is merely ancillary or incidental to, and is no part, of, or process in, the trade or business carried on by such undertakers, shall not be liable to pay compensation under this Act in respect of any accident to the workmen of such contractor whilst engaged in executing such work."
  LORD HERSCHELLrecognised the object of the Amendment as being to restore to the clause the meaning originally intended when it came up front the other House, but he suggested that without any alteration in substance the Amendment should take a different form. As now proposed, it would form part of the proviso, but in that form it would not be so clear as it might be if the words down to "any work," in the fourth line, were omitted, and then the words added at the end of the proviso.
  THE EARL OF ELLESMEREsaid he was quite willing to adopt the Amendment in the form suggested.
  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWNsaid a few words from himself in support of the Amendment would obviate the necessity for his troubling the House again. The reason for an Amendment of this sort was that Clause 4, as it now stood in the Bill, was quite different from the clause as it came up to their Lordships. He quite admitted that the original clause was not in good grammar and unintelligible, and it had been said that the present clause substantially carried out what was the intention, but in reality, this substituted clause now in the Bill was very much more extensive than the clause sent up from the Commons, inasmuch as it now applied to any work of any kind or sort, while originally the clause referred to any work within the scope of the trade or business of the undertakers. It was a substantial difference, and it came to this, that if the owners of a factory or a railway were to enter into a contract with any contractor for any purpose whatsoever, they would become liable for compensation in the event of an accident to the contractor's man, simply because, besides having entered into the contract, they also had a railway, or were possessed of a factory. If it was the intention of the Government, as he believed it was, that the clause should be substantially the same as that which came up to the House, they would accept the Amendment either in its original form or as amended by Lord Herschell.
  THE PRIME MINISTER (The Marquess of SALISBURY)said that Lord Camperdown had stated rightly the object which the Government had in the Bill, and he and Lord Ellesmere were evidently speaking with the sympathy of the House when they said it was perfectly impossible to understand the clause as it came up to the House. He believed the words which had been proposed by Lord Ellesmere, amended by the noble and learned Lord opposite, would attain as nearly as it was possible to attain what they desired to get in this clause, but he did not think they would he justified in imagining that any words which they could draw up would provide a perfectly safe and reliable line in matters which were so closely connected and interwoven as these two kinds of employment. They had done their best, and they must consign their little babe to fortune. There

  1407
  was nothing more interesting to those who had often watched Committees in the House than to compare the prophecies which were made as to the meaning of a particular clause with the actuality which afterwards was revealed in the decision of the Judges. [A laugh.] They had done their best, and this was the most whole-smile form in which they could possibly place this legislation.
  Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTHsaid the three Amendments which stood in his name were really consequential on a change which was made in the Bill in Committee. On Monday night he moved an Amendment which had for its object to bring within the continuous operation of the Bill workmen in shipbuilding yards and other cognate trades who did part of their work in the yards and part of it outside the yards. Lord Belper could not accept the Amendment as a whole, but so far as shipbuilding yards came under the definition of a factory he was willing to accept the proposition. The noble Lord rested his case on the necessity of confining the Bill strictly to workshops which came under the definition of factory in the Factory Acts. In these Amendments he had endeavoured to meet the noble Lord's objection. In the first place, for instance, he proposed to insert after "yard" in line 40, Clause 7, "or factory where iron or steel plates, bars or girders are fixed or riveted."
  LORD BEETLE, regretted that he could not give any more favourable reply to the noble Lord than he gave on Monday. In the other House there was a promise to consider whether it was possible to meet the case of men working outside shipbuilding yards, and it was in pursuance of that promise that an Amendment was put down in his name. He was informed that if the Amendment were accepted it would lead to the admission of other cases besides those contemplated by the noble Lord. On this stage it was impossible to make any further extensions.
  LORD TWEEDMOUTHreminded the noble Lord that the promise given in the other House was not confined to men working in shipbuilding yards.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Clause 8,—
  APPLICATION TO WORKMEN IN EMPLOYMENT OF CROWN.

  (1.) This Act shall not apply to persons in the naval or military service of the Crown, but otherwise shall apply to any employment by or under the Crown to which Lids Act would apply if the employer were a private person.

  (2.) The Treasury may, by warrant laid before Parliament, modify for the purposes of this Act their warrant made under Section 1 of the Superannuation Act 1887, and notwithstanding anything in that Act, or any such warrant, may approve any scheme imposed to be certified by the Registrar of Friendly Societies under this Act.

  Amendment made: In Sub-section (2) leave out "may" to "certified," and insert "frame a scheme with a view to its being."—(Lord Belper.)
  Clause 10,—
  COMMENCEMENT OF ACT AND SHORT TITLE.

  (1.) This Act shall come into operation on the thirty-first day of March one thousand eight hundred and ninety-eight.

  (2.) This Act may be cited as the Workmen's Compensation Act 1897.

  LORD WINDSORmoved to leave out "thirty-first day of March" and to insert "first day of July." On Monday night he withdrew an Amendment to this effect, because he understood the noble Lord in charge of the Bill was prepared to consider the point. He sincerely hoped his noble Friend had been able to give the question favourable consideration.
  LORD BELPERsaid there was considerable force in the arguments the noble Lord advanced on Monday night, and the Government were willing to accept the Amendment. ["Hear, hear!"]

  FIRST SCHEDULE.
  SCALE AND CONDITIONS OF COMPENSATION. — SCALE.

  (1.) The amount of compensation under this Act shall be—

  (a) where death results from the injury—

  (i.) if the workman leaves any dependants wholly dependent upon his earnings at the time of his death, a sum equal to his earnings in the same employment during the three years next preceding the injury, but if the period of his engagement in such employment has been less than three years, then 156 times the average weekly earnings during the

  1409
  period of his actual engagement or. the sum of ono hundred and fifty pounds, whichever of those sums is the larger, but not exceeding in any case three hundred pounds, provided that the amount of any weekly payments made under this Act shall lie deducted from such sum.

  (ii.) if the workman does not leave any such dependants, but leaves any dependants in part dependent upon his earnings at the time of his death, such sum, not exceeding in any case the amount payable under the foregoing provisions, as may be agreed upon, or, in default of agreement, may be determined on arbitration under this Act to be reasonable and proportionate to the injury to the said dependants; and

  (iii.) if he leaves no dependants, the reasonable expenses of his medical attendance and burial, not exceeding ten pounds;

  (b) where total or partial incapacity for work results from the injury, a weekly payment (luring the incapacity after the second week trot exceeding fifty per cent. of his average weekly earnings during the previous twelve months, if he has been so long employed, but if not, then for any less period during which he has been in the employment of the same employer, such weekly payment not to exceed one pound.

  (2.) In fixing the amount of the weekly payment. regard shall be haul to the difference between the amount of the average, weekly earnings of the workman before the accident and the average amount which he is able to earn after the accident.

  (3.) The payment shall, in case of death, be made to the legal personal representative of the workman, or, if he has no legal personal representative, to or for the benefit of his dependants, or, if he leaves no dependants, to the person to whom the expenses are due; and if made to the legal personal representative, shall be paid by hint to or for the benefit of the dependants or other person entitled thereto under this Act.

  (4.) Any question as to who is a dependant, or as to the amount payable to each dependant, shall, in default of agreement, be settled by arbitration under this Act.

  (5.) The sum allotted as compensation to a dependant may be invested or otherwise applied for the benefit of the person entitled thereto, as agreed, or as ordered by the committee or other arbitrator.

  (6.) Any sum which is agreed or is ordered by the committee or arbitrator to be invested nay be invested in whole or in part in the Post Office Savings Rank by the Registrar of the County Court in his name as Registrar.

  (7.) Any sum to be so invested may be invested in the purchase of an annuity from the National Debt Commissioners through the Post Office Savings Bank, on be accepted by the Postmaster General as a deposit in the name of the Registrar as such, and the provisions of any statute or regulations respecting the limits of deposits in savings bank, and the declaration to be made by a depositor, shall not apply to such sums.

  1410

  (8.) No part of any money invested in the name of the Registrar of any County Court in the Post Office Savings Bank under this Act shall be paid out, except, upon authority addressed to the, Postmaster General by the Treasury or by the Judge of the County Court.

  (9.) Any person deriving any benefit from any moneys invested in a post office savings bank under the provisions of this Act may, nevertheless, open an account in a post office savings bank or in any other savings bank in his own name without being liable to any penalties imposed by any statute or regulations in respect of the opening of accounts in two savings banks, or of two accounts in the same savings bank.

  (10.) Any workman receiving weekly payments under this Act shall, if so required by the employer, from time to time submit himself for examination by a duly qualified medical practitioner provided and paid by the employer. If the workman refuses to subunit himself to such examination, or otherwise obstructs the same, his right to such weekly payments shall be suspended until such examination has taken place:
  Provided that if the workman objects to such examination he may appeal to the arbitrator, whose decision shall be final.

  (11.) Any weekly payment /nay be reviewed at the request either of the employer or of the workman. and on such review may be ended, diminished, or increased, subject to the mum above provided, and the amount, of payment shall, in default of agreement, be settled by arbitration under this Act.

  (12.) Where any weekly payment has been continued for not less than twelve months, the liability therefor may, on the application by or on behalf of either the workman or the employer, be redeemed by the payment of a !man sum, to be settled, in default of agreement, by arbitration under this Act, but not exceeding three hundred and twelve times the weekly payment payable at the date of the application, and such lump sum may be ordered by the committee or arbitrator to be invested or otherwise applied as above mentioned.

  (13.) A weekly payment shall not be capable of being assigned, charged, or attached, and shall not pass to any other person by operation of law.

  (14.) Where a scheme certified under this Act provides for payment of compensation by a friendly society, the provisions of the proviso to the first, sub-section of Section eight, Section sixteen, and Section forty-one of the 'Friendly Societies Act 1896 shall not apply to such society in respect of such scheme.

  (15.) In the application of this schedule to Scotland the expression "registrar of the, County Court" means "Sheriff Clerk of the county," and "Judge of the County Court" means "Sheriff."

  (16.) In the application of this Act to Ireland, the provisions of Ireland County Officers and Courts (Ireland) Act 1877, with respect to money deposited in the. Post Office Savings Bank under that Act shall apply to money-invested in the Post Office Savings Dank under this Act.

  Amendments made: In paragraph (i) leave out "same employment" and insert "employment of the same employer"; leave out
  "but if the period of his engagement in such employment has been less than three years, then 156 times the average weekly earnings during the period of his actual engagement";
  at end of same paragraph insert:—
  "and if the period of the workman's employment by the said employer has been less than the said three years, then the amount of his earnings during the said three years shall be deemed to be one hundred and fifty-six times his average weekly earnings during the period of his actual employment by the said employer."—(Lord Belper.)
  LORD BELPERmoved at the end of Sub-section (3), after "accident," to insert:—
  "and to any payment not being wages which he may receive from the employer in respect of his injury during the period of his incapacity."
  The object of the proposal was that in fixing the amount of the weekly payment regard should be had not only to the difference between the amount of the average weekly earnings of the workman before the accident and the average amount which he was able to earn after the accident, but also as to whether any payment in wages had been received for the injury already. In other words, it was intended that what was called smart money should be deducted from the compensation which was paid.
  LORD HERSCHELLasked if the words "not being wages" should appear in the Amendment. The arbitrator was told to take into account the man's wages, but he was rather puzzled by the words "payment not being wages."
  THE PRIME MINISTERsaid that the words were introduced in view of a certain ambiguity of phrase which prevailed in some districts. It was not uncommon for employers to give what was called succour, and that they gave to men who were off in consequence of ill-health and injury. To that succour was given the name "ill-wages." The words "not being wages" could not possibly do any harm.
  THE EARL OF DURHAMsaid he was glad the Amendment had been moved. When he moved the Amendment last
  1412
  week he did so because he thought it very fair to both employers and employed. He did not quite understand when the period of incapacity began—whether at the beginning of the third week after the accident, or whether the arbitrator would have to take the first two weeks into consideration. The employers in Durham had no wish to have smart money pail during the first fortnight deducted.
  THE PRIME MINISTERsaid the employer could, of course, give what he liked to the injured man. No words could prevent him from giving money to the injured man if he so pleased. Incapacity had nothing to do with the amount of money the man was receiving, and the definition was not controlled by the act that no claim arose in respect of the first fortnight.
  THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRYsaid he was glad to endorse what had fallen from the Earl of Durham, and also to know from the Prime Minister that he realised that the employers of Northumberland and Durham had been giving smart money to their employés. It was of great advantage that the arbitrator should know that the smart money had been a free gift by the employers for many years past, and the employers did not in any way consider it part of the wages. He agreed that the smart money should be continued. It would certainly benefit the men to a greater extent than would the Bill, for the simple reason that a man received money to go on with from the employer during the first fortnight. It had been of enormous benefit to the men in the past.
  LORD HERSCHELLthought the Amendment would enable the arbitrator to take into account the suns received during the first fortnight. He suggested the words "during the period of his incapacity after the commencement of the time for weekly payments as herein mentioned."
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDthought his noble and learned Friend had misunderstood the intention of the Government. It had intended to take into account moneys paid by the employer during the first fortnight.
  LORD SHANDsaid that if the employer said he did not -wish the money to be taken into account the arbitrator would not do it.
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORD: Certainly not.
  Amendment agreed to.
  LORD HERSCHELLsaid that in the fourth clause there was a provision that "the undertakers shall be entitled to be indemnified by any other person who would have been liable independently of this section." The only person entitled to require medical inspection was the employer. Therefore in some cases the real person interested had no power to employ a medical man. He moved an Amendment providing that any person by whom the employer was entitled to be indemnified should have the power to employ a medical man as well as the employer.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: We have no objection to that.
  Amendment agreed to.
  LORD BELPERmoved a new subsection providing that where a workman has given notice of an accident he shall, if required by the employer, submit himself for medical examination, and that if he refuses to do so his right of proceeding under the Act shall be suspended until he submits. He said the sub-section was introduced to meet the case mentioned by Lord Windsor. In the case of an accident it might be desirable in the opinion of the employer to find out the state of the workman immediately after notice of the accident had been given, because it might happen that the actual inquiry into the matter might not take place for several months.
  LORD WINDSORsaid he would like to explain the course he was about to take. He was very grateful to the noble Lord for moving the Amendment which practically covered the ground he endeavoured to cover on the Committee stage; but at the same time the alteration in Sub-section 10 was of such a nature that if it were not pressed, he would be content to see this sub-section left out. Subsection 10 was now so much altered that on the whole he and those with whom he acted would prefer to see the Bill remain as it was, wit bout this new sub-section.
  LORD BELPERthought the House had better confine itself to this Amendment, which seemed reasonable and necessary.
  Amendment agreed to.
  LORD BELPERmoved a further Amendment to Sub-section (10), to the effect that if a workman objects to the employer's medical man or to his report, he may submit himself for examination to one of the, medical men appointed for the purposes of the Act, whose certificate shall be conclusive evidence of his condition.
  THE PRIME MINISTERsaid the clause was so essentially just that the observations of his noble Friend Lord Windsor puzzled him a little, and he would be glad to know why he objected to it.
  LORD WINDSORsaid that the objection he took was to the latter words, namely, that the opinion of the Government medical man should be conclusive evidence of the man's condition. They seemed to imply that the employer could not after that go before the arbitrator.
  THE PRIME MINISTERsaid that the only thing settled was the condition of the man when examined by the medical man. That was only one of the facts of which the arbitrator would have to judge.
  THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRYsaid that under the clause the injured man might repudiate the employer's medical man, and insist on taking the opinion of the Government medical man, and that opinion would be absolutely conclusive.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Amendments made: In Sub-section (10), leave out "otherwise" and insert "in any way"; leave out from the same sub-section the words,—
  "provided that if the workman objects to such examination he may appeal to the arbitrator whose decision shall be final."—(Lord Belper.)
  LORD WINDSORmoved the omission of Sub-section (10) in order to substitute for it the following words,—
  "Where any weekly payment has been continued for not less than six months the liability therefor may, on the application by or on behalf of the employer, be redeemed by the

  1415
  payment of a lump sum, to be settled, in default of agreement, by arbitration under this Act, and such lump sum may be ordered by the committee or arbitrator to be invested or otherwise applied as above mentioned.
  The effect of the Amendment was that the maximum sum of 312 times the weekly payment was abolished, the fixing of the maximum being left entirely to the arbitrator; and only the employer was given the right to apply for commutation of the amount. He preferred the subsection as it stood unamended; but, as some Amendment was deemed necessary, he understood the Government were willing to accept his words.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: I should like to know why the workman is not to apply for commutation.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: The noble Lord is so accustomed to negotiations that he will understand that where something is given on one side something must be given on the other. I understand the words moved by the noble Lord are assented to by the representatives of the men. The sub-section as it stands is impossible. It has created great discontent in the minds of the employers; but the Amendment is accepted by both sides.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Amendments made: Insert after "payment," in Sub-section (13), "or a sum paid by way of redemption thereof"; after "law," at the end of the sub-section insert, "nor shall any claim be set off against the same."—(Lord Belper.)

  SECOND SCHEDULE.
  ARBITRATION.
  The following provisions shall apply for settling any matter which under this Act is to be settled by arbitration:—

  (1.) If any committee, representative of an employer and his workmen, exists with power to settle matters under this Act in the case of the employer and workmen, the matter shall, unless either party objects, by notice in writing sent to the other party before the committee meet to consider the matter, be settled by the arbitration of such committee, or be referred by them in their discretion to arbitration as hereinafter provided.

  (2.) If either party so objects, or there is no such committee, or the committee so refers
  1416
  the matter or fails to settle the matter within three months from the date of the claim, the matter shall be settled by a single arbitrator agreed on by the parties, or in the absence of agreement, by the county court judge according to the procedure prescribed by rules of court, or if in England the Lord Chancellor so authorises, according to the like procedure, by a single arbitrator appointed by such county court judge.

  (3.) Any arbitrator appointed by the county court judge shall, for the purposes of this Act, have all the powers of a county court judge, and shall lie paid out of moneys to be provided by Parliament in accordance with regulations to be made by the Treasury.

  (4.) The Arbitration Act 1889, shall not apply to any arbitration under this Act; but an arbitrator may, if he thinks fit, submit any question of law for the decision of the county court judge, and the decision of the judge on any question of law, either on such submission, or in any case where lie himself settles the matter under this Act, shall be final; unless within the time and in accordance with the conditions prescribed by rules of the Supreme Court either party appeals to the Court of Appeal; and the county court judge, or the arbitrator appointed by him, shall, fur the purpose of an arbitration under this Act, have the same powers of procuring the attendance of witnesses and the production of documents as if the claim for compensation had been made by plaint in the county court.

  (5.) In any arbitration under this Act any party may, subject to rules of court, appear by any person duly appointed on his behalf.

  (6.) The costs of and incident to the arbitration and proceedings connected therewith shall be in the discretion of the arbitrator. The costs, whether before an arbitrator or in the county court, shall not exceed the limit prescribed by rules of court, and shall be taxed in manner prescribed by those rules.

  (7.) Where the amount of compensation under this Act shall have been ascertained, or any weekly payment varied, or any other matter decided, under this Act, either by a committee or by an arbitrator or by agreement, a memorandum thereof shall be sent by the said committee or arbitrator, or by any party interested, to the registrar of the county court for the district in which any person entitled to such compensation resides, who shall, on being satisfied as to its genuineness, record such memorandum in a special register without charge, and thereupon the said memorandum shall for all purposes be enforceable as a county court judgment. Provided that the county court judge may at any time rectify such register.

  (8.) Where any matter under this Act is to be done in a county court, or by to or before the judge or registrar of a county court, then, unless the contrary intention appear, the same shall, subject to rides of court, be done in, or by, to, or before the judge or registrar of the county court of the district in which all the parties concerned reside, or if they reside in different districts, the district in which the accident out of which the said matter arose occurred, without prejudice to any transfer in manner provided by rules of court.

  1417

  (9.) The duty of a county court judge under this Act, or of an arbitrator appointed by him, shall, subject to rules of court, be part of the duties of the county court, and the officers of the court shall act accordingly, and rules of court may be made both for any purpose for which this Act authorises rules of court to be made, and also generally for carrying into effect this Act so far as it affects the county court, or an arbitrator appointed by the judge of the county court, and proceedings in the county court or before any such arbitrator.

  (10.) No court fee shall be payable by any party in respect of any proceeding under this Act in the county court prior to the award.

  (11.) Any sum awarded as compensation shall he paid on the receipt of the person to whom it is payable under any agreement or award, and his solicitor or agent shall not be entitled to recover from him or to claim a lien on the said sum awarded for any costs except such as have been awarded in the arbitration.

  (12.) The Secretary of State may appoint legally qualified medical practitioners for the purpose of this and any committee, arbitrator, or judge may, subject to regulations made by the Secretary of State and the Treasury, appoint any such practitioner to report on any matter which seems material to any question arising in the arbitration; and the expense of any such medical practitioner shall, subject to Treasury regulations, be paid out of moneys to he provided by Parliament.

  (13.) In the application of this schedule to Scotland—

  (a.) "Sheriff" shall be substituted for "county court judge," "sheriff court" for "county court," "action," for "plaint," "sheriff clerk" for "registrar of the county court," and "act of sederunt" for "rules of court."

  (b.) Any memorandum referred to in paragraph eight of this schedule may be competently recorded for execution in the books of council and session or sheriff court books, and shall lie enforceable in like manner as a recorded decree arbitral.

  (c.) Any application to the sheriff as arbitrator shall be heard, tried, and determined summarily in the manner provided by the fifty-second Section of the Sheriff Courts (Scotland) Act 1876, save only that parties may be represented by any person authorised in writing to appear for them, and subject to the declaration that it shall be competent to either party within the time and in accordance with the conditions prescribed by act of sederunt to require the sheriff to state a case on any question of law determined by him, and his decision thereon in such case may be submitted to either division of the Court of Session, who may hear and determine the same finally, and remit to the sheriff with instruction as to the judgment to be pronounced. Paragraph four of this schedule shall not apply to Scotland.

  (14.) In the application of this schedule to Ireland the expression "county court judge" shall include the recorder of any city or town.

  Amendments made:—Leave out, "the said sum awarded for any costs except such as have been awarded in the arbitration," and insert,—
  "or deduct any amount for costs from the said sum awarded, except such sum as may be awarded in the arbitration on an application made by either party to determine the amount of costs to be paid to the said solicitor or agent, such sum to be awarded subject to taxation and to the scale of costs prescribed by rules of court."
  In Sub-section (12), paragraph (b), leave out, "memorandum referred to in paragraph eight of this schedule," and insert, "award or agreement as to compensation under this Act"; leave out the words "paragraph four" in the sentence "Paragraph four of this schedule shall not apply to Scotland," and insert as a new sub-section "Paragraph four and seven."—(Lord Belper.)
  On the Motion of Lord BELPER, Standing Order XXXIX was dispensed with.
  LORD BELPERmoved, "That the Bill be now read a Third time."
  Motion agreed to.
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSSsaid that his noble Friend Lord Salisbury, on the Second Reading Debate, did him the honour of referring to the little circular he had sent round to the Peers inviting them to help him in the resistance which he purposed to offer to the Bill as his "sermon." He accepted the term. Sermons varied greatly; some were eloquent and enthralling and others—pace the right reverend Bench—were prosy and soporific, but all sermons were expositions of truth, and he hoped the truths contained in his sermon had gone home to his noble Friend. At any rate, his noble Friend ought to be pleased with a sermon the text of which was the noble Marquess's own dictum, that "Liberty is the noblest idol before which any man could bow." He would have gladly moved this Motion on the Second Beading of the Bill, but he postponed it at the solicitation of the Marquess of Londonderry, who had said that, if there was not a good Division upon it, it would be injurious to the Amendments they had in view. He therefore yielded under the impression

  1419
  that his noble Friend meant business, that he would have brought into action some great one-hundred-ton gun charged to the muzzle with destructive projectiles; but it turned out that the weapon of his noble Friend had nothing in it but blank cartridge. [Laughter.] The Amendments moved by his noble Friend dealt only with mere matters of detail. There was only one Amendment which to his mind meant business. That was the Amendment proposed by Lord Rathmore to strike out, of the Bill the infamous and unjust provision that a man was to be responsible for the acts of another man whom he did not know and over whom he had no control or authority. He thought it was a strange thing that that House, which in the matter of justice was the last Court of Appeal, should have allowed such a gross injustice to be perpetrated. He looked upon this Bill as the embodiment of the evil and mistaken legislation which had been going on in this country for the last 27 years, ever since Mr. Gladstone introduced the system of State interference with contracts in what was generally known as the Compensation Clause for Disturbance in the Irish Land Bill of 1870. The original intention and object of Governments was to act as police, and to make men safe in the possession of their property and of their individual liberty. But the character of recent legislation had been the reverse of that. It had interfered with the individual; it had interfered between employer and employed, owner and tenant; had made, forbidden, and modified contracts; and to do this it had taken the property of the few, as in Ireland, and transferred it to the many without compensation. The fact was, Governments had taken to playing the part of Providence, and had dismissed the economical doctrines of supply and demand to the four winds of heaven. In their political legislation, however they adhered to those doctrines, and if a demand were backed by sufficient votes the supply of legislation was not wanting. He had received many letters on this question, two of which he would read extracts from. The first gave the view taken of the Bill by the manager of a great private coal estate. This gentleman had sent him some figures, with which he would not trouble their
  1420
  Lordships, and said these figures showed the definite minimum effect of the Bill en that estate. He continued,—
  "I say minimum effect, because the amount which may ultimately be traced to malingering is not possible to estimate. In reading through our figures it must be remembered that ours is not a dangerous district. I mean we have never had disasters from explosions of gas. To raise the price of coal is the only advice and consolation given to us, but no such advance is possible except after a long period, and as a direct consequence of the closing of the weaker collieries through the operation of the Bill. That many such collieries will ultimately close if the Bill passes is certain. The Bill is grossly unjust in principle. Admitted, if you like, that accidents should be compensated for (they are already done so by increased wages being paid to risky employment): why should employers only bear the brunt; and why should not the workmen also subscribe? For, apart from the money value of their subscription, we should then, as we do now, have their moral support in defeating the impositions of the idle and the shammers. Or, take another view; assuming that the average selling price of coal throughout England is 6s. a ton, of which 5s. 6d. is wages, and 6d., or less, profit; why should all accidents come out of the 6d. and nothing out of the 5s. 6d.?"
  He had another letter from a gentleman who was a printer, and who said that if this Bill passed, and any accident happened in his printing office, he would be ruined. But he would read them some extracts from the great Liberal organ of the north of England, The Newcastle Chronicle, the proprietor of which was Mr. Joseph Cowen, who used to be one of the most able and eloquent Members in the House of Commons, and one of the most thoroughly honest and true Liberals. He said,
  "The so-called Workmen's Compensation Bill, described by Sir James Joicey as the most important and the most socialistic Measure submitted to Parliament for half-a-century, and by Mr. Fenwick as the boldest stride in the direction of collectivism that any Government has yet ventured to take, has passed its Second Reading in the House of Commons without discussion." "The Measure is a Wages Reduction Bill; and, because it is a Wages Reduction Bill, it is also a Strike Fomentation Bill. It is likewise, as the majority of those who took part in the Debate admitted, an Accident Promotion Bill, and a Malingerers' Encouragement Bill. But it is more than that, it is a Compensation Out of Employment Bill. The Bill, should it become an Act, will lead to the discharge of old workmen, or men who have impaired sight or hearing, of men who are below the average in dexterity, and of men who are addicted to intemperance."
  He further said:—
  "We find that Mr. Asquith in his speech said, the larger share of the burden will fall upon wages, and that the other portion will be imposed upon an industry in which the margin of profit has reached almost the vanishing point."
  That was what a competent authority on these questions said, mid he believed that that paper was taken in by the workmen in the mining industry. It had been pointed out that the Bill did not include the agricultural labourer. Its authors admitted it to be incomplete, and a right hon. Gentleman had boasted that the Bill was not logical. But he (Lord Wemyss) would tell them what was logical—germs—germs are always logical, and it was certain that the Bill would be extended further, and before long they might find its principle in their kitchens and domestic households. Indeed he had happened to dine at Mr. Asquith's the day they had discussed in the House of Commons the admission or exclusion of different industries, and he had said to Mr. Asquith how childish it was to attempt to draw vain distinctions, as the day would certainly come when, if his cook scalded her hand or his housemaid broke her nose through falling downstairs, he would have to pay them compensation, and rightly, as they were of the weaker sex and more needed protection. Let him now say a word with reference to the position of the Government to the Conservative Party in regard to this matter. A General Election took place two years ago which placed the Conservative Government in an enormous majority. What did that election turn on? He had stated in that House when he undertook a review of the situation in the autumn of 1595, that he knew for a fact—at least it Was told to him as a fact—that Captain Middleton, the chief agent of the Conservative Party, told his noble Friend (Lord Salisbury) and the Conservatives that that election meant that the middle classes and the best of the working classes repudiated and were tired of this perpetual interference with their affairs by Parliament; that this Parliament had been returned not to bring on Measures of that kind—but practically to do nothing—and remember this Bill was due not to pressure from without but from within. He had spoken of the pressure from
  1422
  within, and his noble Friend (the Prime Minister) had accepted the soft impeachment that he was more or less carrying out speeches and proposals made during the last election.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: I said our action represents the speeches we ourselves have made.
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSSsaid he was not sure whether his noble Friend would go the whole hog, or was prepared to go the whole length of the proposals then made—he trusted not, for he remembered that in the House in 1895 he described certain proposals put before the country as a saccharine policy; these were seven in number and he had called them legislative lollypops. Here was what they were:—Old Age Pensions, Workmen's Dwellings' Bill, Poor Law Reform, Compensation to Injured Workmen, Increased Power to Local Authorities for the better Housing of the Poor, the Prevention of Pauper Immigration, and Shorter Hours for Shop Assistants. That was the programme of a very distinguished Member of Her Majesty's present Cabinet, the right hon. Mr. Chamberlain. He (Lord Wemyss) did not know—he only hoped it could not be so—whether the noble Lord who was at the head of the Government had swallowed all these lollypops. [Laughter.] At any rate, two of them had been disposed of. The first was the awkward question of Old Age Pensions. There was nothing so convenient as shunting a question by a Commission, and that difficult question had been got rid of by being sent to a Commission. Now they had got this Compensation to Injured Workmen Bill, which made two they could account for. How about the other five? Time and history would tell. At present he did not know; but the result of this Bill was that liberty and property had been more or less raided, and, although the Bill might not annex Johannesburg, at any rate he knew one thing that had been annexed, and that was the Conservative Party. Let them see for a moment what the result was of this policy upon the Conservative Party, so far as he knew and heard it outside at the present time. The licensed victuallers, when the Government came into power, had full hope that justice would be done to them, because his noble Friend at the head of the Government had advised them to wait

  1423
  until a Conservative Government was in power, and then, probably, they might hope for justice. But no sooner was he in power than that question also was tied up indefinitely by being sent to a Royal Commission. Now as to the Irish landlords? When they rejoiced over the return of a Conservative Government did they expect Mr. Gerald Balfour's Bill? He rather thought not, and as the licensed victuallers were now hostile to the Government he could hardly believe that the Irish landlords could be very friendly. As regarded the employers, he did not think there was much in this Bill to attract their affection and love to the Government. He had got with him a letter, which he should not trouble them to read, from Lord Grimthorpe—and he knew others who were quite as disgusted as he was with what was going on—stating that he (Lord Grimthorpe) intended to withdraw all subscriptions from the Conservative Party. And then all who worshipped the idol of the Prime Minister felt more or less disappointed and betrayed. And after all what had the Bill done for the Government? Nothing delighted or amused him more on the Second Reading of this Bill than to see that no sooner had it been brought in—of course on purely philanthropic grounds, and for the purpose, more or less, of pleasing the workmen—their noble Friends (Lord Ripon and Lord Kimberley), trumped the whole thing at once by saying: "it is a very good Bill so far as it goes; and an excellent thing, no doubt, to do justice to the working men, but you must not draw these distinctions; it is a Bill which must apply to all, and the cost must not come out of the employers' pockets only, but be made a common public charge." He supposed they meant to include cooks and housemaids. Here they had squared the employers. Was it right that the money should only come out of the pockets of the employers? No. If the State chose to go in for that kind of legislation, let right rev Prelates pay and every one else—right rev. Prelates who trooped into the Lobby led by their Archbishop—a very Canterbury Pilgrimage—to cast burdens on the employers which they should also share. ["Hear, hear!" and laughter.] He said let every one pay. If that was to be done—and he thought when the time came the country
  1424
  would say—unless it said "a plague on both your Houses"—"let us get rid of this grandmotherly legislation"—that justice and right lay on the side of the Opposition in dealing with this subject, and not with the supporters of the Government. He did not know that he need trouble them with any further remarks. He thought their Lordships had lost a great opportunity of raising the character of the House, such as would possibly never return, and that was by showing their independence, and that they were not simply blind followers of their Leader, because no reasonable man could doubt—he was speaking of what the belief outside was—that if this Bill had been brought in by the present Opposition, the Government of his noble Friend and the whole Conservative Party would have kicked it out as an uncalled-for and unclean thing. ["Hear, hear!"] Be that as it might, he regretted that their Lordships, who were the body supposed to check and override all rash and unprincipled legislation, had not, on this vital occasion—to the great disappointment and loss of prestige of the House—struck a stalwart blow in defence of liberty and against the retrograde legislation to which the earlier portion of his remarks referred. He should like to read to their Lordships from a grand speech made by Mr. Joseph Cowen at Newcastle on the occasion of the celebration of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, when he reviewed the whole reign, and the great and the good work that had been done during the time of Her Majesty's wondrous and blessed reign, and ended with this:—
  "Invidious privileges, unmerited disabilities, and mortifying distinctions, political, civil, and ecclesiastical, which appeared necessary only through the mists of error, or which were magnified into importance only through the medium of prejudice, have been swept away. We have striven to inspire the humble with dignity, the desponding with faith, the oppressed with hope; and the British Empire has become a model of popular liberty and personal prosperity as firm as the earth and as wide as the sea. But, by an unaccountable infatuation, we are reforging the very restraints the removal of which brought us such social happiness and civic success. National character is the outcome of personal character. The strength thereof can be no more than the sum of the strength of the persons who compose it. But this obvious fact is strangely overlooked. Man, too, it should be remembered, is not clay to be moulded, or marble

  1425
  to be cut. He grows under the hand. The outline of to-day becomes the fetter of tomorrow. A statute which this year embodies a fact, next year may prescribe a bondage. Wherever there is life there is movement. As Mr. Spencer has shown, we can no more elude the laws of human development than we can elude the law of gravitation. Society is a living organisation, and if walled in by rigid mechanical apparatus it cannot fail to be dwarfed and impeded in its growth. Yet under some well-meant but purblind perversity we ate doing this. We are suppressing emulation, legislating all the initiative out of the people, and enervating them by perpetual State aid. Government is being substituted for the individual, and everything is being reduced to its inception. All we want is to, be let alone. Let us have fewer laws and less officialism, but let us strengthen the principle of law and the spirit of justice by education, and aim at making men, not machines. Then all will be well."
  These Were noble words, and as wise and true as they were eloquent, and he himself had ever worshipped at that idol which his noble Friend held up to them for worship, and as to which, while speaking of it in that way, his noble Friend brought to the altar of liberty such a Bill as this. Now, he was a humble Member of their Lordships' House; he had not long to be in it; but throughout his later years he had ever done his best to tight on the side of true individual liberty, to resist State and official interference with men in their ordinary concerns of daily life, between employer and employed, or between anyone who has to do with the trade and commerce of this great manufacturing country. Such had been his endeavour—to resist this State officialism, rightly or wrongly, but, be thought, the one thing above all others they should endeavour to avoid was that free-born people should become, through evil legislation, enfeebled, infantine, nurslings of the State. In the view he had taken and in the words he had spoken he had simply given expression to the deep and strong faith that was in him. He believed that liberty was the one thing, above all others that made life endurable. In the view he took of this kind of legislation he might be wrong; they, the majority, might be right. This time alone could show. But if he were wrong, he would rather be wrong with Joseph Cowen than right with Joseph Chamberlain. [Cheers and laughter.] He begged to move the Bill be read that day three months.
  THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I must call the noble Earl's attention to the
  1426
  fact that the Bill has been read a Third time. He could move that it should be passed this clay three months if he likes.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: I do not think that we all heard my noble Friend put the Third Reading.
  THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I put the Third Reading and declared the contents had it.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: Lord Wemyss's Motion for the Bill to be Read this day three months was on the Paper.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: I think he was preparing to speak, and in these circumstances I should think it is by misunderstanding that he has been prevented moving that which it was his intention to move. It must be remembered that my noble Friend on the Cross Benches did not probably hear distinctly. I hope it may be in accordance with the Rules of the House that he should be allowed to move his Motion.
  THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid there was at least one instance where a mistake having been made the House had been allowed to rectify it, and he thought this course might be adopted here.
  Question put "That the Bill be read the Third time."
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSSmoved to leave out "now" and add at the end of the Motion "this day three months."
  *THE BISHOP OF WINCHESTERsaid he would be sorry that the Bill should pass through the last stage of its journey towards the Royal Assent without a few words of cordial sympathy and sanguine support front the Episcopal Bench. He thanked the noble Earl for his taunt in remindimg the House that last Monday 20 Bishops went into the Lobby in favour of what they believed to be the cause of practical justice, of genuine liberty, and of wise and reasonable progress and reform, in a matter so closely affecting the wellbeing of the largest class in the community. That vote of theirs was an act which spoke better than many words. There were several points of view from which their Lordships had approached the consideration of this great question. Some had approached it from the point of view of those interested in great industrial undertakings, be they mines, or railways,

  1427
  or factories; others, like the noble Earl, from the point of view of those interested generally in economic science and public policy. There was, however, another and a quite different point of view from which those who sat on the Bench behind him were bound to approach a question of this sort. Most of those on the Episcopal Bench had spent, perhaps, the best years of their lives as parish clergymen. They had been day by day in intimate contact with those for whom Parliament was now endeavouring to legislate. They had been in touch with, the artisan class at close quarters, not as their employers or political leaders, but as personal friends in their homes. They had seen, as other Members of their Lordships' House did not see, the homes of the working men at times of sickness, suffering, and accident, when the irony of the words just used by the noble Earl would be apparent indeed, namely, that all the working man wanted was to be let alone! They had in this Debate. heard, possibly too exclusively, the question of collieries and the like alluded to. There was undoubtedly in a pit village, in a factory town, or among the working men connected with some great railway company, a natural and necessary esprit de corps or fellowship asserting itself in a manner which made voluntary associations for meeting special needs not only possible but easy to manage and to multiply. But in not a few trades to which this Bill would apply the conditions were very different. It had been his privilege, before he became Bishop of Winchester, to preside for some years over a diocese which contained such industrial centres as Woolwich, Chatham, Battersea., Deptford, and others. There, for the most part, there was no such esprit de corps among the working men, even among those engaged in the same occupation or working in the same factories. They came from distances, their homes were scattered, and they had comparatively little common life such as belonged to other centres like those he had spoken of. In such regions more than elsewhere it was difficult to give the spirit and vitality which every one would desire to see, to the voluntary associations about which so much had been said. But in those crowded regions, at least as much as elsewhere, were men suffering from the kinds of accidents—
  1428
  often incapacitating them for only a short period—for which this Bill was meant to find a remedy, and for which he believed it would provide a remedy that would be thoroughly efficient. Where a voluntary association would be cumbrous or unworkable, this Bill would step in and meet the need. He spoke from close practical experience in welcoming it. It was not for him to speak for Bishops who were not there, but he confessed his withers were unwrung by the taunt of the noble Earl that the Bishops went into the Lobby against the rights of property. He was one of those who did believe in the principle of throwing the cost of all accidents primarily on the trades concerned, and then, ultimately and indirectly, upon the public at large. ["Hear, hear!"] He found it difficult to believe that the prognostications of evil they had heard on this subject were likely to have any such dire fulfilment, or that the existing voluntary associations, where wisely managed by masters and men, would greatly suffer. He ventured to believe that those associations had at their root a principle of vitality which depended upon something else than purely economic considerations. If he thought this Bill was the putting of the torch to the funeral pyre of contracting-out, and the bringing to an end all voluntary associations and schemes, he for one should not have voted for the Bill. But it was not so. These schemes had something different both in their principle and in their operation to the mere working out of economic laws. They had been, and they would continue to be, far more elastic in their character than any merely legal and obligatory scheme could be. They were meant to deal, and would continue to deal, with further-reaching modes of beneficent help to those in trouble; with provision for sickness, for superannuation, and for many other things which legislation could not reasonably touch. Above all there were employers all over the land who contributed to societies like these, not because they believed in the long run they would save their own pockets, but because they were co-operating on a standard of friendly relationship with the men who were working in their employment. [Cheers.] He therefore disagreed altogether with the prophecies that these voluntary schemes would come

  1429
  to an end because of this Bill. He believed better things of our great employers of labour. Prophecies of ill were always rife at times like these when reform was in the air. Look at the factory legislation of 30 years ago, and recall the prophecies which were given utterance to then! It had been said that history was amusingly careless of the reputation of prophets, and he believed that, given a little time, they would find the forebodings of evil they had heard about this Bill vanish like their predecessors into empty air. [Cheers.]
  THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRYacknowledged the ability of the speech in which the noble Lord had moved the rejection of the Bill, and regretted that he would be unable to follow him into the Lobby should the noble Lord carry his protest to a Division, a course which he hoped would not be adopted, and for this reason. He thought he could express the opinion of many who were connected with trade, that however just and right it might be to criticise the details of the Bill, they would not like to be considered for a moment as objecting to the principle of any Bill calculated to safeguard the lives and limbs of men engaged in dangerous occupations, or as denying the claim to compensation of men who were injured while so employed. On this ground he would be unable to vote with the noble Lord. The reason why he had ventured to trespass on the indulgence of their Lordships for a short time was because, owing to the rules of Debate he was unable to reply—he knew it would have been a feeble reply—to the very able speech, as his speeches invariably were, with which the Prime Minister wound up the Debate on Tuesday week. So able were the criticisms of the noble Marquess upon the comments put forward by noble Lords who did not agree with the details of the Bill, that if he did not try to prove that some of his arguments were open to objection, it might be considered, after the great ability with which the noble Marquess advocated the Measure, that the speech was unanswerable, and the line taken in opposition absolutely indefensible. In the first place a word or two on a somewhat personal matter. The noble Marquess in the kindest possible manner informed him that he had been guilty of a want of
  1430
  political prudence in not having recognised the fact that Mr. Chamberlain was the spokesman of the Conservative Party. He acknowledged himself guilty of that want of political prudence, but it was due to the fact that he had not been blessed with the gift of extraordinary foresight in regard to political matters. For years past he had read the speeches of the noble Marquess with the admiration and respect they deserved, and there were portions of those speeches indelibly impressed on his memory. He confessed it was with profound astonishment he heard spoken of as the spokesman of the Conservative Party a right hon. Gentleman who some years ago was described in totally different language by the noble Marquess. His mind reverted to a speech made by the noble Marquess at Watford in 1883, in which he commented at considerable length on the advocacy of manhood suffrage, the Dis-establishment of the English Church, and the views held by Mr. Chamberlain. He went on to express his surprise that with Mr. Chamberlain expressing such views Lord Granville and Lord Hartington should sit in the same Cabinet with him, and he epitomised his remarks—not to weary the House by quoting at length—by saying—
  "the exhibition was seen of Mr. Chamberlain uttering the wildest and most extreme opinions, and yet remaining the colleague of men whose horror of these opinions is well known. If no measure he taken in regard to it, if they continue to sit quietly by his side in the Cabinet, you may depend upon it being the beginning of the sure decay in Parliamentary Government of the system under winch you have flourished so well."
  A month later, alluding to Mr. Chamberlain, in a speech made at Dorchester, the noble Marquess said:—
  "But it is in domestic politics very many of us must feel with respect to the legislation which has gone on for some time past, that it is moving silently, perhaps, but steadily in a direction that is little to our minds. We are upon an inclined plane. An inclined plane leads us from the position of Lord Harlington to the position of Mr. Chamberlain, and from the position of Mr. Chamberlain to the depths over which Mr. Henry George reigns supreme."
  Though, therefore, he pleaded guilty to want of political prudence, he did not think the offence was absolutely unpardonable if he failed to recognise after

  1431
  these remarks that Mr. Chamberlain was the spokesman of the Conservative Party. ["Hear, hear!"] There was another remark the noble Marquess made, and he put it forward in all fairness, and it appeared at first sight a very plausible point. The noble Marquess—he would not say jeered—but considered it somewhat ridiculous for the coal-owning interest to look with dismay on an increase of 2d. a ton in the cost of production if the Bill became law. The remark was a perfectly fair one, the question of 2d. a ton must seem infinitesimally small, and noble Lords having no practical experience of the coal trade might naturally say, "What an outcry of coalowners about a paltry 2d. a ton." Upon this he desired to say a few words. He ventured during Debate on the Second Reading to point out that on an average production of 500 tons a day it meant an increase of expenditure of £1,125 per annum, a large sum for a colliery struggling for existence, and with hardly any margin, and his noble Friend, who was the largest colliery owner in Durham, would contradict him if he was wrong in saying that with an increase of 2d. a ton in the cost of production his collieries would cost him £17,000 more. To add this 2d. a ton, though it might seem ridiculously small, meant a very large sum to an owner struggling to maintain his colliery in working. There were three or four collieries now out of working in the county of Durham, where the difference of 2d. a ton less in cost of production would mean they would still be at work, giving employment to a large number of men. The amount did seem infinitesimal, but the House should understand what it meant. The noble Marquess went on very justly to say he had referred to Consular Reports, and that they showed how exaggerated the notion was of a burden of 2d. a ton. Genoa, he said, afforded a fair representation of what was going on in the Mediterranean, and coal prices there varied from 8s. 3d. in December to 5s. 11d. in September.
  THE PRIME MINISTERsaid "prices" was a misprint for "freights."
  THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRYsaid he supposed that was so. The noble Marquess remarked that with such a wide difference 2d. a ton would have little effect. But the variations in the price
  1432
  of coal were very considerable as between summer and winter. Prices were very different when the days were long to what they were when days were short, when weather was warm and when weather was cold, but he reminded their Lordships that considerable differences in price were taken into calculation in considering the cost of production, and the cost of production went on over the whole year. The same result occurred with other productions, and he might bring the fact home to their Lordships by reference to agricultural produce. He had been looking through the statistics showing the average prices of British corn per quarter of eight Imperial bushels in England and Wales as ascertained under the "Corn Returns Act 1882." The prices of wheat in 1896 were, in the, week ending August 29, 22s. 4d. per quarter; in the week ending September 26, 24s. 4d.; in the week ending October 31, 30s. 9d.; and in the week ending November 28, 33s. 4d. per quarter. So that in four months there was a difference of 11s. per quarter. This was a larger difference in regard to wheat than was shown in the figures quoted in regard to coal, yet he had no doubt that any British farmer would declare that it would be ruinous to his interest to put a burden of an extra shilling upon him. for growing wheat, though the figures were proportionally much higher. The noble Marquess went on to say:—
  "To my mind, the great attraction of this Bill is that I believe it will turn out a great machinery for the saving of life."
  If that were to be the result he would be the last to say a word against it, for he fully agreed that the saving of life, the prevention of accidents, was the one question to which all owners and employers should devote themselves, and to which he maintained they had devoted themselves. He was glad to think there was an Act to provide for the greatest possible precautions in, and the closest inspection of mines, and the establishment of rules and regulations, to break which was absolutely criminal, and in addition it was to the interest of owners themselves, apart from their philanthropic feelings, to watch and carefully guard the safety of the men in their employ. But would this Measure prevent accidents, would it lead to greater precautions

  1433
  being taken? He did not think that greater precautions could be taken. He thought he had shown their Lordships that it would not be the means of preventing accidents. There was the experience of other countries to show that the higher the compensation the greater the number of accidents, the greater the number of applications. The noble Marquess, replying to a deputation of members of Provident Societies in 1893, in reference to Mr. Asquith's Bill, used these words:—
  "When it is said that the existence of the Act will be a great inducement to employers to prevent accidents, I think those who say so have forgotten how easy it is for employers to protect themselves from the pecuniary result of those accidents by insurance."
  It was not a question of insurance against pecuniary loss; these pecuniary losses would not prevent accidents, and owners felt that, while they felt that their interests were unjustly treated. Their Lordships would remember that in Debate on the Second Beading he asked his noble Friend who so ably introduced the Bill to say what deputation had waited upon the Home Secretary, what request had been made by any body of men for the introduction of this Measure. His noble Friend could not then give an answer, and said he would make inquiry, but the question was coming to ass end, and he had yet to learn whence came the demand for the Bill, and that the working men of the country had given any decided opinion in its favour. He had already stated that Mr. Wilson, the Secretary of the Durham Miners' Association, and Mr. Pickard, of the North Riding, had declared, as representing the miners' interests, that they did not want the Bill. Additional proof was given by Mr. Wilson, the Secretary of the Durham Miners' Association, and largely connected with the mining population of Northumberland, in an address to the Miners' Association, on Saturday, in the course of which he said:—Here was a Bill now in the hands of the House of Lords, which had never been demanded, never asked for by any single body of workmen in the country. There had never been a conference or a congress, there was not an association of workmen which had asked for that Bill. All that they had asked for was a Bill to make
  1434
  the employer liable for every accident for which he was responsible, either by employing defective machinery, or employing careless workmen. With that they would have been satisfied. Mr. Wilson went on to say,
  "This Bill said that for every accident that happened in the mine, whether caused by the act of God, or by carelessness, or by defective machinery, the employers should pay for it. This was unjust to the employers, and what was unjust to the employers could not be just to the workmen."
  Those were the words, not of a Conservative employer of labour, but of an advanced Radical. ["Hear, hear!"] The rev. Prelate who had just addressed them seemed to think that employers were taking a very pessimistic view with regard to the future of this Bill. He sincerely trusted they were. Nothing would give him and the noble Lords with whom he was acting greater pleasure than to find after the lapse of years that they were wrong in their calculations, that they had overestimated the dangers of the Measure, and that their apprehensions were groundless. He feared, however, that that pleasure was not in store for them.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: I suppose that as a matter of courtesy I ought to make some observations in answer to the speech of my noble Friend Lord Wemyss, but I feel that I am hampered by the difficulty that I can say nothing which has not been said before. I can scarcely say anything in my own defence which I have not said already. I will only deal with a very small portion of my noble Friend's speech. In those portions of his speech where he counts up the gains or the losses in the electioneering contest, where he decides which interest is pleased with us and which interest is angry with us, I decline to follow him; he is asking me to a servitude which I decline to accept. lint with many of his views I sympathise to a certain extent and under limitations, but I demur to the idea which appears to haunt him, that by classifying the Measure whose merits are under discussion with other Measures of whose demerits he is convinced, he thereby condemns the Measure he is attacking. It is perfectly true he objected, and I objected, to the disturbance clauses of the Act of 1870, but what has that to do with the merits of

  1435
  the Bill before the House? ["Hear, hear!"] My Lords, he has quoted many distinguished persons, Mr. Cowen and Mr. Middleton, whose name I was somewhat surprised to hear in this discussion. I doubt whether the information which has been carried to the noble Lord of Mr. Middleton's observations was stamped with the accuracy which he would desire. The objection to this Bill, as far as I can analyse it, is twofold—the objection I mean, not on account of the interests which rightly or wrongly, imagine themselves to be menaced, but the objection on the ground of economic principle. One of the objections is that the Bill will transfer a burden from one set of people to another and is thereby interfering with their rights of property. The other objection is that it fetters that liberty which we ought above all things to cherish in the lives and in the fortunes of our working classes. With respect to the transfer of property, I have already pointed out to my noble Friend that it is not the proposed Bill that is Socialistic, but the existing state of things which it will replace. My noble Friend always imagines that the Poor Law is free from all the objections of Socialism.
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSS: It is a social Act.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: A social Act, but it is an Act which traverses all the principles my noble Friend is so fond of laying down, and which puts on the State the duty of providing that which, according to his principles, the individual should provide for himself. That is what the Poor Law has done. I do not say that in strict principle the Poor Law is in every respect to be defended—there are two important schools upon that subject—but it has been for three centuries part of our social structure, and I think most people will agree that its general influence not only upon the happiness of the people but upon the stability of the country has been advantageous, and not detrimental. ["Hear, hear!"] Now take the Amendment of Lord Rathmore, which seemed so reasonable. What an atrocious and infamous act to make a railway company pay for the action of some person—an entire stranger to the railway company—who has mutilated or killed some person employed on their line. But supposing a man now, under the
  1436
  existing law, laid a sleeper across the rails and killed an engineman, who paid for the support of the wife and children? The owners and farmers of the fields around who have no interest, or the very smallest possible interest, in the prosperity of the railway which passes through their country. They, at least, are the last people who, according to the strict principle of the noble Lord, ought to pay; and if we have transferred the burden from the ratepayer to the industry we have been guilty, not of a Socialistic act, but of a return to the healthier principles which my noble Friend is so fond of preaching. I refer to the principles of my noble Friend, because I regret the extraordinary line he is taking. I think he discredits the cause—not from any personal quality of his own, but by his action, he discredits the cause which he desires to serve. There is a great danger of Socialism in the present day; it is an inclined plane down which we are tending to move, it is a snare which we should avoid in all our legislation; but it is impossible to cry "Wolf" when there is no wolf there, and if you perpetually cry out "Socialism" whenever an Act for the benefit of the people is introduced, you do not weaken the Socialistic propaganda by so doing. On the contrary, you destroy the argument which will be used against it, and you give to every Socialist reasoner a basis for saying that the arguments against his views are simply imaginary, and pointing to your own extravagances as his proof. I think that is the great danger of such language as my noble Friend has used with regard to this Bill and one or two Bills besides. To my mind the line which is to be drawn in dealing with State interferences is largely affected, if not entirely governed, by the question whether you are saving property or saving life. ["Hear, hear!"] My noble Friend is the head of an organisation—I have sometimes thought he is the only member of an organisation—[laughter]—called the Liberty of Property League. The name is a most just one. Where property is in question I am guilty, like him, of erecting individual liberty as an idol, and of resenting all attempts to destroy or fetter it; but when you pass from liberty to life, in no well-governed State, in no State governed according to the

  1437
  principles of common humanity, are the claims of mere liberty allowed to endanger the lives of the citizens. ["Hear, hear!"] Look at the tyranny, according to such principles, with which you deal with sailors. You do not allow men to go to sea in any cranky ship they please; they are endangering their own lives and they are endangering the lives of other men, and for that reason their liberty must be restrained, and the State must be satisfied that the ship they go to sea in is fit to use. The same consideration applies to railways, applies to mines, applies to a thousand other things. The State lets a right and it is the duty of the State, to see to those interests which are represented by safety of the and limb in all its citizens, and the claims of property to be free from interference, however high you put those claims, must bow and give way at once if the lives of the citizens of the State are in question. Those who would examine on what road we are travelling I would ask not only to consider our progress, a lamentable progress to some extent, I admit, on the road of Socialistic development, but also to consider that series of enactments, commencing with the first successes of Lord Shaftesbury, winch have dime so much to save life and health amongst vast masses of our artisan population. That is a distinct movement. They are not isolated Acts; one has followed another. At their introduction they were met by fears of the same kind as those which my noble Friend has expressed. Their unlimited spread was freely prophesied, and every kind of danger was pointed out as likely to result from their enactment, and such fears mastered even the masculine minds of men like Sir Robert Peel and Mr. Bright. But the prophecies have not come true. On the other hand, great interests have been served, an unexpected amount of health and freedom from the causes of diseases or of death has Been introduced into our artisan population, their prosperity has been enormously increased, and, though efforts are occasionally made—the wisdom of which one is inclined to doubt—to extend the principle of those Acts further than the circumstances of the case will justify you in doing, Parliament has never moved with a hasty or rash or reckless step, but has always
  1438
  considered, with the utmost circumspection, the advance it thought it right to make in order to satisfy its supreme duty of protecting life even at a temporary cost of money. If anybody, doubts the effect of this great series of legislation, I would ask him—it is not a very severe task to put upon him—to cast his eye over Mr. Disraeli's novel "Sybil." There is in that novel a most striking picture of the straits to which our manufacturing population was reduced at that time. Compare the picture drawn there to the picture you may see now and you will see that the interference of the State, judiciously and carefully applied and with due circumspection, without fanaticism, hurry, or passion, may have a most enormous and most salutary and gratifying result in exalting the health and increasing the happiness of the people. It is very dangerous to apply the language of formula, the language of rigid principles as they are called, to discussions of this kind, and where the interests of life are in question it is very dangerous to dwell too much on the interests of property, as though they could be weighed in equal balances against each other. Such is not the case. I should be sorry to lay down in answer to the general principle of my noble Friend any general principles in return; but I do strongly demur to the accusations, not veiled accusations of mere interested motives, which he has flung at men who have desired to remedy great evils and to remove a great stain from our industries, and who in doing so have transgressed no right of property that had a claim to be regarded, and who certainly may be supported in their hopes by reflection on the splendid results which in the past in dealing with a closely analogous case have followed the efforts, even bold efforts, of those who desired to remedy and prevent some of the hardest injuries by which mankind is afflicted. [Cheers.]
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: My Lords, the closing words of the noble Marquess were that this was an analogous case to the well-known Factory Acts. That is a proposition I entirely deny. [Cheers.] I do not yield to the noble Marquess in my admiration of those—they were Conservatives, at least Lord Shaftesbury was—who introduced the system of Factory Acts; but the Factory Acts

  1439
  were Acts for the purpose of seeing that factories were so conducted as to secure as far as possible the health of those who were employed, and the limitation of hours, which was one of the most contested portions of those Acts, was called for because it was thought that in the case of women and children the length of hours was not consistent with the health of those employed. ["Hear, hear!"] The noble Marquess repeatedly described the Bill before us as a Bill for the protection of life and limb. I find nothing in the Bill which is for the protection of life and limb. Before this Bill was introduced negligence in the employer rendered him liable, under conditions no doubt not legally entirely satisfactory, but rendered him liable to compensate the employed, and so far it was a strong inducement to him to see that accidents were not caused by his negligence. What does this Bill do? The very object of the Bill is to eliminate the question of negligence for the most part, and to say that in all cases those who suffer from accidents shall be compensated or their families when the accident is fatal. Where is there in that any additional safeguard for life and limb? It is when the life has been sacrificed or the limb has been hurt that in one case the family is secured, very properly I think, in a certain provision, and in the other case, if the man is prevented from continuing his employment or is not able to earn the same wages, he also will receive an indemnity which the employer will have to provide. But where is the security against the accident itself? It is a security against the consequences of the accident. ["Hear, hear!"] I believe myself that there will be under this Bill no sensible increase whatever in the inducements to employers to prevent accidents which may occur. Therefore I entirely deny that the noble Marquis has a sound basis for his argument when he puts it on this being a Bill for the protection of life and limb, or that this Bill is on all fours with the legislation he calls analogous. ["Hear, hear!"] The object of the noble Marquess in introducing these arguments was to counteract the argument of my noble Friend on the cross Benches, that this is, as he termed it, a Socialistic Measure. The noble
  1440
  Marque ss referred to the Poor Law. I am not any more enamoured than the noble Marquess of the practice of calling Measures by opprobrious names; but if we are to term Measures Socialistic, then I say that the Poor Law was undoubtedly a Socialistic law, and further, that this Bill is directly an extension of the same principle. The Poor Law provides that no man shall suffer from want of shelter, food, or clothing. This Bill will provide that no man shall suffer from an accident that may befall him in the means of maintenance for himself or his family. The principle is the same. The difference is that in one case the State provides subsistence.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: The parish.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: I call it the State, whether the relief be given out of the rates or out of the taxes. There is no denying that rates and taxes are not the same thing, but rates must be considered to be levied from a public source by taxes imposed on certain property in this country, and we have more and more, and, I think properly, gone in the direction of relieving that particular class of property from what is considered an undue burden thrown upon it. As I said before, I believe this must be recognised as a State affair—["hear, hear!"]—and I do not believe in the justice or fairness of throwing on the employers exclusively the results of accidents they will not have the means of preventing—not merely throwing upon them, which I think would be just, the results of accidents caused by their own negligence, but throwing on them individually, on each particular employer or company, the new burden of having to provide for those accidents the result of which they cannot in a large number of cases prevent by any means in their power. I say it may be Socialistic—I am not frightened by the word—but if the people of this country are persuaded that it is not too great a burden for the country to bear to relieve the working men in these trades—or it may be in all trades—from the result of accidents, then I say that it would be perfectly fair and just, if the country so decides, that the public purse should bear the burden. It will then be distributed over all the employers of the country, and what is more, to a considerable extent over the workmen themselves. That may be

  1441
  Socialistic, but it would be fair and just, and although I approve of the principle of this Bill because it does make a provision for the workman, I do not approve of the manner in which the principle is carried into effect. The noble Marquess used one argument which I cannot help introducing. He alluded to the case of an engine-driver going from London to Birmingham, who was killed in consequence of an obstruction placed on the railway. The noble Marquess said that the result of that accident would be to entail now the payment of the maintenance of that engine - driver's family by some parish through which the engine passed.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: They might live in the parish.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: The noble Marquess knows that it is exceedingly improbable that the engine-driver's family would be residing in a small rural parish. They would be far more likely to be living in a large town. I do not think—although I must freely acknowledge that the rating argument is an extremely ingenious one—that it has very much bottom in it or that it will support such a superstructure as tins Bill creates. We may have our own opinion as to the consistency of various public men, but I think on the occasion of a Bill of this kind it is more to the purpose to consider the bearings of the Measure itself and its effect on the interests of the whole nation than the particular course pursued by certain public men or the result it may have on the interests of our Party warfare. Holding the general view I do that the Bill, as far as it goes in giving compensation, is one that may properly pass, I shall not be able to vote with my noble Friend against the Bill. [Cheers.]
  The House divided on the Question that "now" stand part of the Motion.

  CONTENTS

  69

  NOT-CONTENTS

  6

  Resolved in the affirmative.
  LORD BELPERmoved to add to Subsection (6) the words:—
  "in the case of the death or refusal, or inability to act of an arbitrator, the Judge of the County Court may, on the application of either party, appoint a new arbitrator."
  Amendment agreed to.
  Further Amendments made: In Subsection (7), after "sent," insert the words "in runner prescribed by the rules of Court" after "shall" ["who shall"], insert the words "subject to such rules"; leave out "charge" and insert "fee"; in Sub-section (9), add at end of the Subsection:—
  "and such rules may be made by the five Judges of the County Courts appointed for the making of rules under Section one hundred and sixty-four of the County Courts Act 1888, and when allowed by the Lord Chancellor, as provided by that section, shall have full effect without any further consent."—(Lord Belper.)
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDsaid that in the words which had been added to the second schedule as follows:—
  "or deduct any amount for costs from the said sum awarded, except such sum as may be awarded in the arbitration on an application made by either party to determine the amount of costs to be paid to the said solicitor or agent, such sum to be awarded subject to taxation and to the scale of costs prescribed by rules of court,"
  the words "in the arbitration" had been inadvertently used. He moved their omission, and the insertion in their place of the words by the Arbitrator or the County Court Judge."
  Amendment agreed to.
  LORD BELPERmoved "That the Bill do pass."
  LORD HERSCHELLsaid he desired to call attention to what was probably the unforeseen effect of leaving out the word "employer" in Clause 3, about which there had been a little discussion. If the Committee of the workmen managing a fund or scheme mismanaged it, the Registrar of Friendly Societies, on it being shown to him that the scheme was Lot properly managed, had no alternative but to revoke the scheme, and as a

  1443
  consequence the original liability reverted back to the employer. Therefore the workman had only to mismanage a scheme in order to bring about the end of that scheme. He hardly thought that was a result which the Government foresaw.
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDthought his noble and learned Friend was raising a false objection. The objection seemed to be that the workmen might intentionally mismanage their own scheme—
  LORD HERSCHELL: No; I do not mean that. He had no particular love for the clause, and he only interposed because he thought the Amendment might have gone further than the Government intended.
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDsaid there was an opportunity of considering the point elsewhere, and it would be considered elsewhere.
  THE PRIME MINISTER: Do I understand the noble Lord to desire that a scheme should go on after it had been proved that it was mismanaged? [Laughter].
  LORD HERSCHELL: No; I do not desire it should go on; but I thought the Amendment of the Government might have a larger effect than the Government intended. My only desire was to assist the Government. I am sorry now I spoke. [Laughter].
  Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.

  PARISH COUNCILS (SCOTLAND) (CASUAL VACANCIES) BILL.
  Amendments reported (according to Order), and Bill to be Read 33 on Tuesday next.
  WEIGHTS AND MEASURES (METRIC SYSTEM) BILL.
  Amendments reported (according to Order), and Bill to be Read 3a Tomorrow.
  NAVAL WORKS BILL.
  Read 2a (according to Order), and committed to a Committee of the whole House To-morrow.

  OUTDOOR RELIEF (IRELAND) BILL.
  THE EARL OF DENBIGH, in moving the Second Reading of this Bill, said its main object was to indemnify the Guardians of some Unions in Ireland against the consequences of having given outdoor relief, technically against the law, but with the sanction of the Local Government Board.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid that if he read the Bill rightly its scope was considerably beyond that which the noble Lord explained. The noble Lord said the Bill was required for the purpose of enabling certain liabilities which had been incurred by Boards of Guardians to be returned to them. That was provided by the second clause, and that he understood, but by the first clause there was to be a general power, up to a certain time, for the Local Government Board in Ireland to authorise that relief to be given. He did not quite understand what that relief was.
  THE EARL OF DENBIGHsaid he was perhaps not quite correct in saying that the only object of the Bill was to indemnify Guardians. That was the main object, but the noble Earl was correct in saving that the Bill went slightly further, and he must remind the House that a very short time had been allowed for the operation of the Bill. It only extended until the 1st day of September, and it was intended to meet certain cases of extreme poverty and distress which the Irish Government thought it advisable to grant outdoor relief to.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYthought the Bill contained a most extraordinary provision. He could quite understand the necessity of the policy of outdoor relief, which had always been considerably limited in Ireland, but unless there was some specific distress in respect of which it was thought there should be special relief grants, it certainly seemed a curious proceeding to relax the whole system of outdoor poor relief in Ireland for two months in order to enable the Local Government Board in Ireland to authorise anywhere they pleased that which was contrary to the principles of the Irish Poor Law. He did not remember ever having seen such a Bill, and one of which there was apparently no explanation.
  VISCOUNT CLIFDENsaid his objection to the Bill was that it enfranchised paupers in Ireland, an object which was not worthy their Lordships' House. One clause of the Bill, however, he considered important, and that was that which affected the enfranchisement of the pauper and gave him a vote the same as any other man. He was very much against that, as he had always been under the belief that taxation and representation ought to go together.
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Marquess of LANSDOWNE)said the Irish Government had, in view of the state of the country, considered that it was necessary and desirable that exceptional extension of the Poor Law system should be permitted during the present summer—that was, within the period ending the 1st of September. That was the general scope of the Bill, and under it, so far as those exceptional measures of relief had been extended before the passing of the Bill, it would be possible to indemnify those local authorities which had acted in that way, and who would otherwise be liable to be surcharged.
  THE EARL OF DENBIGHreminded the noble Lord that the Bill had been drawn en almost the same lines as the Bill passed by Mr. Morley when he was Chief Secretary.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: As a temporary provision?
  THE EARL OF DENBIGH: Yes.
  VISCOUNT CLIFDEN: Was the franchise clause in that Bill?
  THE EARL OF DENBIGH: I think so.
  Read 2a (according to Order), and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.

  MERCHANT SHIPPING (EXEMPTIONS FROM PILOTAGE) BILL [H.L.]
  Read 3a (according to Order), passed, and sent to the Commons.
  POOR LAW BILL.
  Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.
  CONSTABULARY (IRELAND) BILL [H.L.]
  Read 3a (according to Order); an Amendment made; Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.

  SCHOOL BOARDS' EXPENSES BILL.
  Read the Third time.
  Clause 1,—

  PAYMENT OF SCHOOL BOARD CONFERENCE EXPENSES.
  (1.) The school board of any district may, subject to regulations made by the Education Department under this Act, pay out of the school fund—

  (a.) the reasonable expenses of any members of the board, or of the clerk to the board, in attending any conference of school boards held for the purpose of discussing any matter connected with the duties devolving upon them; and

  (b) any reasonable annual or other subscription towards the expenses of the conference.

  (2.) A school board shall not pay under this Act the expenses of more than three persons attending a school board conference.

  (3.) The Education Department may make such regulations as they think fit for regulating payments by school boards under this Act.

  (4.) Expressions used in this Act have the same respective meanings as they have in the Elementary Education Acts 1870 to 1893.

  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDmoved in Sub-section (3), after the words, "make such regulations as they think fit for regulating payments," to insert the words, "and the amount of payments." He proposed this Amendment with a view of meeting the objections which had been raised to the holding of more than one of the proposed conferences a year.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid he thought the Amendment would render the Bill more intelligible.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.

  JAMESON RAID.
  EARL CARRINGTONasked the Prime Minister whether, as it had been determined that no punishment or penalty was to be inflicted on those persons who were the instigators of what was known as the Jameson Raid, he did not consider that it was right and just that the commissions of Sir John Willoughby and of those officers who obeyed orders under mistaken impressions should be restored to them. The circumstances were so well known to their Lordships that he would not say anything else except to express their very earnest hope—he might say the general hope—that Her Majesty's Government might be able to see their way to consider this matter favourably.
  LORD CHELMSFORDsaid he should like to support the prayer of the noble Lord. He thought they all felt—he certainly did himself—that the punishment which had been inflicted upon these officers had been a very severe one. Although, of course, legally speaking, they thoroughly deserved what they had received, at the same time he thought the punishment had been very unequal. He trusted that the noble Lord might receive a sympathetic answer.
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Marquess of LANSDOWNE): With my noble Friend's permission, I will answer the Question. Her Majesty's Government are not aware of any reasons which would justify the restoration of their commissions to these officers. If the Parliamentary Inquiry, which has lately been concluded, had had the result of materially altering the aspect of the case, we should have been glad to reconsider our decision, and, if it could have been shown that any injustice had been done, to take steps for the purpose of redressing it. But no facts materially affecting their position have been elicited, and the Committee has made no recommendation in their favour. Their case seems to us to stand substantially where it did when the decision of Her Majesty's Government was conveyed to Sir J. Willoughby in the official letter of September 16, 1896, which has been published with the proceedings of the Committee. I quote the following passage from it,—
  "The statements now made by you only show that you had allowed yourself and others to be led into the commission of a very serious
  1448
  offence by most erroneous information as to the attitude of the Imperial authorities. Moreover, I am to observe that you disregarded the order of the High Commissioner to retire immediately from Transvaal territory. I am to add that, to an officer of your standing and experience, it should have been evident that an authority given by the Administrator of Matabeleland to organise and take part in an attack on a friendly State was ultra vires and invalid, and in such a case it was your duty to verify that authority by direct application either to the High Commissioner or to the Secretary of State."
  Nothing has, in our belief, happened since that letter was written to justify us in arriving at any other conclusion. The House will remember that 13 officers were implicated in the Raid, and that eight of these officers were, at the suggestion of the Attorney General, discharged on the ground that, although they had undoubtedly taken part in the expedition, there was nothing to show that any of them had been
  "concerned in the preparation and fitting out of, and actively engaged—or engaged at all—in, the getting up of the expedition, or that they did more than some hundreds of others did in obeying the orders of their leaders at the last moment.
  The five officers committed for trial were differently dealt with, because, to quote the words of the Attorney General, they were
  "prominently connected with the scheming, preparing, fitting out, and inducing others to join in the expedition."
  Of this offence they were convicted, and for it they were sentenced by a properly-constituted Court. It was clearly established by the evidence that they had disregarded the express orders of the Queen's direct representative to withdraw immediately from Transvaal territory. They were—I am quoting from the High Commissioner's message—directed "to return immediately," and told that—
  "This violation of the territory of a friendly State was repudiated by Her Majesty's Government, and that they were rendering themselves liable to severe penalties."
  Our decision followed the finding of the Court, and we do not consider that we ought to go behind it, nor do we admit that, even if it were shown that some of the persons concerned in the Raid have been less severely punished than these

  1449
  officers, this would of itself be a sufficient reason for asking Her Majesty to exercise her prerogative for the purpose of restoring to them the commissions which they were required to resign last year. I greatly regret that it is my duty to announce to my noble Friend a decision which may seem to him a harsh one. We are, however, unable to arrive at any other.
  EARL CARRINGTONsaid this was such a serious matter for a brother officer that he need hardly apologise for trespassing upon their Lordships' time for a minute or two while he said a word in reference to the answer of the Secretary for War, which he had heard with the greatest possible disappointment. He had read a letter, dated September 15, 1896, in answer to a letter written by Sir John Willoughby. With the permission of their Lordships, he would like to read that letter. It was dated
  "H.M. Prison, Holloway, Sept. 1, 1896.
  "To General Sir Redvers Buller, V.C., G.C.B., etc.
  "Sir,—I have the honour to state that I took part in the preparation of the military expedition and went into the Transvaal in pursuance of orders received from the Administrator of Matabeleland, and in the honest and bonâ fide belief that the steps were taken with the knowledge and assent of the Imperial authorities. I was informed by Pr. Jameson that this was the fact. It was in these circumstances and on these statements that I took in time other officers with me—namely, Major II. F. White and Captains R. Grey and R. White, and the foregoing explanations apply to them, also.—I have, etc.,
  "JOHN WILLOUGHBY."
  This letter had never been withdrawn. Sir John Willoughby, who, when he signed that letter, thought Jameson had approved of the actual words, and that Jameson had seen the letter as drawn out and signed by him, was only by severe cross-examination got to admit that he might have worded it differently. But neither he nor Jameson ever denied that the effect and result of their conversation was to make Sir John Willoughby certain that the Government would not object, and he was therefore justified in saying so to his junior officers, who had no option but to obey. About these officers not having returned when in the middle of the enemy's camp and having received a message from the High Commissioner,
  1450
  as far as he could see there was no evidence to prove that this was ever shown to any junior officers. Sir John Willoughby, perhaps, got the order and read it, and wilfully disobeyed it. That he himself did not know. But there was no evidence to prove that either of the junior officers knew that this distinct order from the Government had been sent out, and he was bound to say that, as an old brother officer, knowing these officers well and what they had done, it was with the most profound disappointment and regret that he had heard the decision of the Government. It seemed to him that in this matter fair play had not been exercised, that there was one law for the rich and another for the poor, and that, although the instigators of this disgraceful and unhappy business had escaped without penalty and punishment, it had fallen on those who, after all, to the best of his belief, were only their dupes and agents. ["Hear, hear!"]
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I think it would be useless on the present occasion to attempt a general review of the evidence given either during the trials or before the Parliamentary Committee. I only wish to make one observation with regard to what the noble Earl has said. He is quite mistaken when he expresses his belief that there is nothing to show that the orders sent by the High Commissioner, first from Mafeking and afterwards Irma Johannesbug, failed to reach the officers for whom those orders were intended.
  House Adjourned at Twenty Minutes past Eight o'Clock, till To-morrow, a Quarter past Four o'Clock.