Lords Sitting of 4 May 1909

Preamble
NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
The King's consent signified, and Bill reported from the Select Committee with Amendments.
LITTLEHAMPTON GAS BILL, CONWAY GAS BILL. RAVENGLASS AND ESKDALE RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.] WANDSWORTH BOROUGH COUNCIL (SUPERANNUATION) BILL, LEYLAND AND FARINGTON GAS BILL.
Reported, with Amendments.
INDIAN RAILWAYS (SINKING FUNDS INVESTMENT) BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, without Amendment.
GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY (STEAM VESSELS) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
LAND DRAINAGE PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 2) BILL.
Brought from the Commons.
LONDON, CHATHAM, AND DOVER RAIL-WAY BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to.
LAND DRAINAGE PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 2) BILL.
Read 1a; to be printed; and referred to the Examiners. (No. 46.)
KIRKWALL PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
Read 3a (according to order), and passed.
CHILD MURDER (RECORD OF SENTENCE OF DEATH) BILL. [H.L.]

SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD ALVERSTONEMy Lords, your Lordships will expect me to explain in a
722
few sentences why this Bill has been introduced, and the reason that it takes the present form. Your Lordships will remember that at a late stage of the Children Bill last session my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack introduced a clause which provided, in effect, that in every case of murder of a child up to the age of one year by the mother, the Judge trying the case should have the option of sentencing the person as if convicted of manslaughter instead of pronouncing the sentence of death. My noble and learned friend supported that proposition on two main grounds. The first was the mockery, as he properly called it, under some circumstances, of pronouncing the death sentence in a case in which it was known that it would not be carried out, and he referred to the fact that the death sentence in the case of the murder of an infant child by the mother had not been carried out for something like twenty-seven years. He also urged his clause upon the ground that there would be a greater opportunity of getting convictions.
I felt obliged—and the majority of your Lordships agreed with me—to oppose the Lord Chancellor's proposal. It was open to the serious objection that it placed the death penalty in the option of the Judge, and, in my judgment, for reasons which I gave last year but need not repeat again, it would be a disastrous thing in the administration of the Criminal Law if any such option existed. In that view I was supported by the majority of your Lordships, and the clause did not pass. An appeal was then made to me from more than one quarter of the House, notably from the Bench of Bishops, that, as I had recognised to the full how undesirable it is that the death sentence should be pronounced where there is no reasonable probability of its being carried into effect, I should endeavour to deal with the matter so as, at any rate, to get rid of that objection.
The clause of last year proposed to deal with the deaths of children up to the age of one year. That, of course, might have been modified. A most careful examination of this question has led me to the conviction, in which I am supported by those who are working every day in connection with the protection of child life, that the number of child murders is so great—I

723
will not trouble the House with the statistics, although they are alarming—that we ought to do nothing to in any way spread the feeling that there is to be any less punishment in cases of child murder. Therefore, I felt that I was bound to deal with the case from the point of view in which I could meet the objection raised by the Lord Chancellor—namely, in regard to the pronouncement of the death sentence. After careful consideration and consultation with others competent to express an opinion, it seemed to me that the only way in which I could do that was by applying to a limited class of child murder the privilege now given in a number of cases of recording the death sentence instead of pronouncing it.
Then I had to consider the class of case to which that ought to be applied. It unquestionably ought not to be applied to cases where the child is murdered after the recovery of the mother from her confinement. Deliberate murders of infants from three to six or nine months by poor women who desire to get rid of their offspring are among the worst murders. Then there are, again, murders where preparation has been made, even before birth, for getting rid of the child. Therefore I have limited the Bill to cases in which the mother has not fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to the child, and in which the learned Judge thinks there ought to be an exercise of the prerogative of mercy.
It will be said, and truly said, that I am attempting to alter the considered opinion of the Judges of the day in 1860. I have attached to the Bill a short Memorandum reminding your Lordships that in cases of piracy (with attempt to murder) and burning of dockyards, cases in which, as in murder cases, sentence of death necessarily follows (12 Geo. 3. c. 24. s. 1; 7 Will. 4 and 1 Vict. c. 88. s. 2), there is express statutory authority under the existing law for following the procedure adopted in the Bill, namely, recording the sentence of death without actually pronouncing it 4 Geo. 4 c. 48; 7 Will. 4 and 1 Vict. c. 77. ss. 3 & 4); and up to 1862 that might have been done in cases of murder. As a result of the appointment of a Committee, on which many eminent Judges sat, the Act of 1862 was brought in, and since then the death sentence must be pronounced in all cases of murder. I recognise the weight
724
of that authority, and hesitated before introducing a contrary proposal; but I did feel that the case made by the Lord Chancellor for preventing the solemn pronouncement of the death sentence in cases where it would not be carried out ought to be met as far as possible. It seems to me that the best way of meeting it is that proposed in the Bill. I am quite aware that this Bill does not go as far as the proposal of the Lord Chancellor. As to my noble and learned friend's opinion, he will, of course, state it for himself. I did not introduce the Bill without conferring with him. I have also communicated with the Home Secretary, and as far as the Bill goes, he approves of it, though he would be glad to see it go further. Personally, I cannot conscientiously say that I think it ought to go further. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Alverstone.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD LOREBURN)My Lords, I have a few words to offer to your Lordships on the subject of this Bill. The House will recall that on the consideration of the Children Bill last session I moved an Amendment that in cases of child murder it should be in the discretion of the Judge, if he thought right, to abstain from imposing the death penalty, and to inflict, instead, a lesser and more proper sentence on the guilty prisoner. The grounds upon which I maintained that proposition were plainly stated. In the first place, it is wrong that the terrible and solemn event of passing sentence of death in a Court of Justice should partake of the character of mockery. My noble and learned friend said there had not been an execution for such an offence for twenty-seven years. Not for sixty years has there been any execution for such an offence, whatever Home Secretary, whether legal or lay, has been in office. The second ground was that the knowledge that the death sentence would be imposed in such cases prevented evidence from being obtainable for securing suitable and proper punishment for those who were guilty. That proposition has never been contested or denied. The third reason which I gave was that the same dread of committing the power of death over these unfortunate persons into the hands of the Executive Government moved juries to return verdicts of not guilty. In these circumstances it seemed to me a small thing to ask that His Majesty's

725
Judges, who have to discharge the painful duty of seeing that a proper verdict is given, so far as they can, in cases of life and death, should be entrusted with part of the prerogative of mercy, so that they should be able of themselves to say that this sentence should not be passed and that the wretched person should not be put in the agony of the dread of death when it was certain that the sentence would not be carried out. I cannot myself honestly say that I understand why His Majesty's Judges should object to being invested with this particular part of the prerogative of mercy.
Your Lordships did not assent to my proposal last year, but it was only rejected by a narrow majority. I was defeated by six votes, which, in this House, having regard to the experience of recent years, may be regarded as rather a triumph on my part. I was, however, defeated; but I am glad that what was said on that occasion has borne a little fruit. Now my noble and learned friend the Lord Chief Justice proposes that the sentence of death, instead of being pronounced in open Court, should be recorded in secret. But the punishment will still remain unless the Sovereign interposes. I think that with the knowledge that the punishment remains, the same influences will still operate on witnesses and juries. All that will happen is that the sad pageant of passing the death sentence in open Court will be dispensed with. Except for what takes place in Court, there is absolutely no difference between the present law and the law as it would be after this Bill passed. I shall certainly vote for the Bill, although I should be glad if it went further. But I am sure the Lord Chief Justice will not be surprised if, supposing that it is not altered in your Lordships' House, it comes back from another place wearing a very different appearance and going much further.
THE EARL OF HALSBURYMy Lords, the House is in a somewhat novel position. We have the Lord Chief Justice recommending a Bill which is to practically abolish the penalty of death according to law in certain cases by a statement that the crime of infanticide, at which it is directed, is appallingly on the increase. That is an extraordinary proposition; and my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack has suggested that he is going to vote for the Bill under the belief and conviction
726
that it is to come back to this House a very different Bill from what it is at present. I must say I do not think that is a very respectful mode of suggesting legislation to any deliberate assembly.
THE LORD CHANCELLORI said supposing the Bill not to be altered in this House in the first instance. I did not exclude that hope.
THE EARL OF HALSBURYOf course I accept that correction, but I gathered from what the Lord Chancellor said that his vote would be given for the Bill because he thought it would be altered. I confess that I entertain the same view towards this Bill that I did when its substance was last before the House. To any one who knows the statistics of infanticide, it is very unwise to take away from that crime the terrors that follow upon it. I believe that the present system acts as a deterrent, though not so much as it should do. This Bill is only to apply to those who may be supposed not to have recovered from the effects of child birth. The answer I make to that is that the Judge to whom so much is to be entrusted could not have performed his duty, or otherwise the conviction could not have taken place in that case. For those reasons I certainly shall vote against the Bill, and I am extremely sorry that this question should be, as I think, somewhat trifled with in the mode in which it has been. There is one reason, I think a very good reason, apart from what the Lord Chancellor has said, why the Judge should not be entrusted with this power. The power still exists of relieving from the death penalty where it is considered it ought not to be carried out, and that power is committed to the Government of the day, who exercise it subject to responsibility to Parliament. To entrust the Judge with the power of remitting the death penalty is to shift responsibility which ought to be borne by the Government of the day. That was one of the things gravely commented on a good many years ago, and which led to the alteration of the law in the year 1862, by which it was rendered necessary that the sentence of death should be pronounced by the Judge, leaving the power of remission to the Government of the day.
LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDMy Lords, as one who has for some years taken great interest in the reform of our

727
Criminal Law, I regret that I find no cause for enthusiastic support of this Bill. I must congratulate my noble and learned friend the Lord Chief Justice on his appearance to-day as a Criminal Law reformer. That is a role which I am afraid has not been played hitherto by our principal Judges. My noble and learned friend, with every good intention, has introduced a measure which, if analysed, cannot be satisfactory to anybody. My noble and learned friend in this very proposition gives the key to what the remedy ought to be. Why should he not say that if the conditions to which he refers exist and the woman takes the life of the child at a time when she has not recovered from the effects of child-birth, the offence should then become one of manslaughter? If that were the provision in the Bill it would meet all the objections and would throw upon the Judge the responsibility of saying what the sentence should be. How is humanity benefited by this Bill? Do you spare the feelings of the prisoner? What is to be her fate? She is to be told, as she descends into the cell, possibly by the female warder, that the sentence of death has been recorded against her. The fact remains that it is the sentence of death. But the proposition of my noble and learned friend gets rid of the deterrent effect of the death sentence being pronounced in open Court. I ask, Is this an advance in criminal reform? I say it is not. I was at one time in despair
728
that we should have any reform in our Criminal Law. We have lately had several great reforms. My noble and learned friend Lord Halsbury gave us the reform under which prisoners are permitted to be examined in their own defence. We were told that all the evils possible would result from that reform; but now we have Judges bearing testimony to its value and thanking the Legislature for allowing them the opportunity which this reform affords of acquitting innocent persons who might otherwise have been convicted. Then my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack gave us the Court of Criminal Appeal. We were again told that that would produce evils, but it is working wonderfully well, and innocent people are being set free by virtue of that Court. Had my noble and learned friend suggested in this Bill that if, owing to a woman's condition after child-birth, she had committed a crime that might rank as manslaughter, we could then insist that the Judge should bear the responsibility of saying that she should not be sentenced to death but to exactly that amount of punishment that represented the measure of her crime.
On Question?—
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 75; Not-contents, 18.

CONTENTS

Canterbury, L. Abp.

Morley of Blackburn, V.

Haversham, L.

Loreburn, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Ridley, V.

Herschell, L.

Wolverhampton, V. (L. President)

Selby, V.

Hindlip, L.

Crewe, E. (L. Privy Seal)

Hylton, L.

Bangor, L. Bp.

Lawrence, L.

Bedford, D.

Lochee, L.

Airedale, L.

Lovat, L.

Lansdowne, M.

Allendale, L.

Ludlow, L.

Salisbury, M.

Alverstone, L. [Teller.]

Mac Donnell, L.

Balfour, L.

Marchamley, L.

Beauchamp, E. (L. Steward.)

Barnard, L.

Monk Bretton, L.

Camperdown, E.

Barrymore, L.

Monkswell, L. [Teller.]

Cawdor, E.

Belper, L.

Mount Stephen, L.

Cromer, E.

Biddulph, L.

Newlands, L.

Dartmouth, E.

Blythswood, L.

Newton, L.

Hardwicke, E.

Braye, L.

Northcote, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

O'Hagan, L.

Morley, E.

Burghclere, L.

Pentland, L.

Roberts, E.

Colchester, L.

Reay, L.

Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.)

Colebrooke, L.

Ribblesdale, L.

Waldegrave, E.

Courtney of Penwith, L.

Sanderson, L.

Egerton, L.

Sandhurst, L.

Cross, V.

Ellenborough, L.

Savile, L.

Falkland, V.

Eversley, L.

Shuttleworth, L.

Hampden, V.

Farrer, L.

Sinclair, L.

Hardinge, V.

Fitzmaurice, L.

Waleran, L.

Knutsford, V.

Grannard, L. (E. Granard)

Weardale, L.

729

NOT-CONTENTS

Marlborough, D.

Liverpool, E.

Curzon of Kedleston, L.

Lovelace, E.

James, L.

Bath, M.

Nelson, E.

Kinnear, L.

Bristol, M.

Macnaghten, L. [Teller.]

Ampthill, L.

St. Davids, L.

Cathcart, E.

Atkinson, L.

Saye and Sele, L.

Halsbury, E. [Teller.]

Collins, L.

Zouche of Haryngworth, L.

Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

INDIAN COUNCILS BILL. [H.L.]
Commons Amendments considered (according to order).
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURN)My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Amendments made by the Commons, subject to the insertion of certain Amendments in the following new clause which has been inserted by the Commons:—

Commons' Amendment.
After Clause 2, insert the following new clause—
3.—(1) It shall be lawful for the Governor-General in Council, with the approval of the Secretary of State in Council, by proclamation, to create a council in any province under a Lieutenant-Governor for the purpose of assisting the Lieutenant-Governor in the executive government of the province, and by such proclamation—

to make provision for determining what shall be the number (not exceeding four) and qualifications of the members of the council; and

to make provision for the appointment of temporary or acting members of the council during the absence of any member from illness or otherwise and for the procedure to be adopted in case of a difference of opinion between a Lieutenant-Governor and his council and in the case of equality of votes and in the case of a Lieutenant-Governor being obliged to absent himself from his council from indisposition or any other cause.

(2) Where any such proclamation has been made with respect to any province the Lieutenant-Governor may with the consent of the Governor-General in Council from time to time make rules and orders for the more convenient transaction of business in his council and any order made or act done in accordance with the rules and orders so made shall be deemed to be an act or order of the Lieutenant-Governor in Council.
(3) Every member of any such council shall be appointed by the Governor-General with the approval of His Majesty and shall as such be a member of the Legislative Council of the Lieutenant-Governor in addition to the members nominated by the Lieutenant-Governor and elected under the provisions of this Act.
Your Lordships are aware of the circumstances under which what was then Clause 3 was struck out when the Bill left your Lordships' House. Both the noble Marquess opposite (Lord Lansdowne) and the
730
noble Lord who sits next to him (Lord Curzon) were emphatic in saying that the rejection of the clause was not permanent or final. I welcomed that language, feeling that it indicated a conciliatory spirit, and I resolved in my own mind that I would do the best I could in the circumstances of the case to meet that spirit. But, of course, my view of the importance of the old Clause 3 remains very much what it was. I do not believe that the noble Marquess opposite, for example, would contend that what I have indicated as the principle of that clause was an erroneous principle—that it would be a great error and a great inconvenience, both to the Government of India and to Parliament, if, whenever a proposal was made to attach an Executive Council to a Lieutenant-Governor, there should arise in Parliament here a full dress debate in each House on Second Reading, in Committee, on Report, and on Third Reading. I felt very strongly—and I regretted that your Lordships did not agree—that that would be a great error.
Then there is another point which ought not to be overlooked. I have been addressed more than once by noble Lords opposite of great authority and exhorted to pay respect to the Government of India. The Government of India, as a matter of fact, were strongly in favour of the old Clause 3, and Lord Minto, in his speech the other day, under the formal and almost solemn circumstances of an address to his own Legislative Council, said that he greatly regretted that your Lordships had omitted Clause 3, and added that he was in perfect accord with the Secretary of State in this proposal. A very important member of the Executive Council in Calcutta used the same language. The Press used language of a precisely similar kind, and I should like to trouble your Lordships with a passage. Though it has one or two personal references in it, which I may or may not regret, I do not think they at all impair the value of this criticism. The Times of India, speaking of Clause 3 and the action against Clause 3, quote the Viceroy's

731
language which I have already fairly described, and then proceed—
"Then we have here Sir Edward Baker, the only Lieutenant-Governor who would be immediately affected by the acceptance of the clause, declaring that the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal cannot undertake the duties that will be imposed upon him under the Councils Act without assistance. On the other side we have to set the opinion of Lord Curzon's Government in 1905—"
I hope the noble Lord will forgive me for reading this—
"We are not impressed by that authority, not only because water has run under the bridges at a tremendous pace since it was penned, but because it represented a school of thought that has contained few elements of permanence."
There are other remarks about the noble Lord which I need not quote. The article proceeds—
"Then we have Lord Mac Donnell informing the Lords that the choice lies between corporate government whereby the Executive Government is weakened, or personal government whereby the Executive Government is strengthened. That remark puts Lord Mac Donnell out of court. There is no more direct connection between Government in Council and Executive weakness than, let us say, between Lord Mac Donnell and consideration for one's subordinates."
It is a remarkable fact, of which I am only now beginning to understand the full significance, that the Government of India are very sensitive to the intervention of Parliament wherever that can be properly, constitutionally, and conveniently avoided, because language is apt to be used both in another place and in your Lordships' House which in this country, of course, is appraised at its proper value, but what is a mere indiscretion here or in the other House becomes a danger in India. I am bound to say—and I have had the singular advantage of feeling the brunt of the indiscretions in both Houses—I think the palm for master indiscretion must be given to the noble Lord, Lord Mac Donnell, because his language, more than once repeated and put down in the formal shape of an Amendment on the Paper, in regard to the Partition of Bengal has been felt by the Government of India and by myself as having been a most injurious indiscretion, perhaps the most injurious that I have had experience of during my three and a-half years of responsibility for the affairs of India.
I pass from that and turn to the immediate Amendment. My object almost from the first, certainly since the weighty
732
speeches in another place of Lord Percy and Mr. Balfour, was to secure that an understanding should be arrived at. My very strong desire is that there should not be exhibited to India a spectacle of any avoidable friction or contention between the two Houses of Parliament, and that the Bill and the regulations that will eventually be framed upon it should go before the people of India as having been granted by the Parliament of Great Britain freely and practically unanimously. That is my point of view. I am told that Asiatics have great difficulty in understanding our Parliamentary system of Government. Sometimes we have a little difficulty ourselves. But what is our system? It may be defined as "contention plus compromise." My principle, therefore, in reference to India would be to have as little Parliamentary contention as possible, and every reasonable compromise that is possible. I have every reason to believe that the noble Marquess opposite, and your Lordships generally, will feel that the Amendment to the old Clause 3 to which we ask the House to agree is a reasonable compromise. The point of it is that Bengal is to have an Executive Council. That, I think, is agreed to by everybody. It is earnestly desired by the new Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal.
Then upon the point whether the Government of India is to be free to proclaim an Executive Council in provinces beyond Bengal, what I propose is that the Governor-General shall, if he deals with any other province beyond Bengal, draft a proclamation to be laid by the Government upon the Table of both Houses for sixty days. This may seem a very long period, but communications between the Secretary of State and the Government of India will be, or may be, tolerably numerous, and it is desirable to give plenty of time. The proclamation will remain on the Table for sixty days, and if an Address is moved by either House against the proclamation it is thereby estopped; if no Address is moved it will become operative at the end of the sixty days. At first I thought that it ought to be an Address of both Houses, but it was represented to me that this would be to strip one House of its veto, and, being seriously anxious to meet the fair claim of every one concerned, I agreed that the proposal should take this form, that an Address from either House should be sufficient to stay the

733
proclamation. There is not really much in this either way, because I cannot imagine the Government of India, with the sanction of the Secretary of State necessarily, sending home a draft proclamation with, I presume, the reasons for it set forth—I cannot imagine such a proclamation coming home and being vetoed by either House. It would be impossible—the case of Bengal proves it—for your Lordships to resist a proclamation deliberately framed constituting an Executive Council in another provincial government. Therefore I have every confidence that, in effect, this will make very little change.
I should like to say a word upon the Amendment standing on the Paper in the name of Lord Mac Donnell, which is to the effect—as I understand it, that, if it should seem fit, the same powers of revoking and making changes in the Constitution and so forth as now exist under the Statute of William IV, of 1833, should extend to these new Councils. I would point out that the Act of 1833 has been a dead letter, and in reference to the Councils of Bombay and Madras it has never, so I am informed, once been acted upon. The Amendment conveys a kind of innuendo that these councils, when brought into existence, will very likely work so ill that it will be necessary to alter their conditions of existence, of function, and of authority. The Government cannot accept this Amendment. I object to inserting in the Bill, which is an enlarging measure, language which really implies that you suspect that, so far as this provision goes, it may end in either moonshine or mischief. Besides, it is against all tradition of Indian government and administration to take back powers once conferred and to annul bodies once created. I do not think I need or ought to detain your Lordships longer. I beg to move.
Moved, That this House doth agree with the Amendments made by the Commons subject to the insertion of certain Amendments in the new clause which has been inserted by the Commons.—"(Viscount Morley of Blackburn.)
THE EARL OF CROMERwho had an Amendment on the Paper to omit, from the third line of the new clause inserted by the Commons, the words "any province," and to insert, in their place, the words "the province of Bengal," said: My Lords, it will be observed that I have an
734
Amendment on the Paper which virtually covers the same ground as that of the noble Viscount, and, with your Lordships' permission, I will deal with the two together. The noble Viscount has given us the history of the past in connection with this clause. I do not in the smallest degree challenge the accuracy of his statement, but as I think that the story permits of being related in two different ways I should like to give my version.
Your Lordships will remember that some months ago when this subject was first broached the Government of India wrote a Despatch in which they threw out a hint—I do not think it can be called more than a hint—that Executive Councils should be established in the Lieutenant-Governorships; but they added what appeared to me to be the very wise proviso that that could only be done after very mature consideration and full consultation with the various authorities concerned. Upon that this clause was introduced into the Bill. Possibly there may have been consultations with the local authorities in India, but, if so, we were not informed of them. When the measure came to your Lordships' House some noble Lords objected to the clause on its own merits, but I think the general feeling of your Lordships was not to reject the clause altogether. What we thought was that the evidence laid before us for such a very important piece of legislation as this was insufficient, and that before this clause was put upon the Statute Book we ought to have some indication of the opinion of the Lieutenant-Governors.
The noble Viscount did, indeed, read us a telegram from the Viceroy of India. It was a very important telegram, and naturally we attached very great weight to its contents; but it did not contain the smallest allusion to consultation with Lieutenant-Governors. Neither was any reason given why the Government of India had so entirely changed its mind in the course of the few months. We all therefore, myself certainly among the number, thought that the views of the Lieutenant-Governors should be obtained. What happened in the other House very much confirmed my impression in that respect. I am, I believe, precluded from reading any passages in debate in the other House, but, so far as I understand, Mr. Hobhouse, who was in charge of the Bill, deprecated any

735
further consultation with Lieutenant-Governors. But I must be allowed to say that his arguments tended to exactly the opposite conclusion. What he said was that the Lieutenant-Governors exercised very great authority inside their provinces, but that they could not be reasonably asked, neither could they expect to be asked, to give their opinions on subjects outside their provinces. My Lords, that is my case. Nobody expects that a Lieutenant-Governor should dictate the general policy of the Government of India, but this is a matter essentially inside their provinces and that is why we think their opinions should be invited.
The circumstances have materially changed since I placed my Amendment on the Paper. The difference between my Amendment and that of the noble Viscount is this. Both of them limit the immediate operation of the Bill to Bengal, but whereas by my Amendment fresh legislation would be required, under the Amendment of the noble Viscount Executive Councils will be able to be called into operation without legislation and merely with the proviso that the proclamation is to lay on the Table of both Houses. I quite agree as to the undesirability of Indian matters being frequently before Parliament, though I am not quite certain that I am filled with the same amount of terror as the noble Viscount as to indiscretions which might be committed in this House. At the same time, I should not like to propose anything which would involve frequently bringing Indian questions before us. Therefore I am quite prepared, for my own part, to accept the noble Viscount's Amendment and to withdraw my own.
I should like, however, to add that I certainly could not have withdrawn my Amendment if the noble Viscount had not provided in his Amendment that either House of Parliament should have control over the proclamations. This appears to be a subject about which the House of Lords has eminently a right to exercise some direct control. It is not a financial question or one which in any way touches the privileges of the Commons. It is an Imperial question, and it is a notorious fact that whereas there are a considerable number of members in your Lordships' House who have had actual Indian experience, that experience does not exist to so great an extent among members of the other
736
House. I should like also to thank the noble Viscount for the manner in which he has met my own proposal and others, and I have now great pleasure in withdrawing my Amendment.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I acknowledge with pleasure the admission made by the noble Viscount the Secretary of State at the outset of his speech when he told us that his proposals had been approached on this side of the House in a conciliatory spirit. It has been our desire from the first that this question should be dealt with in a conciliatory spirit, and we have, I venture to think, done all that lay in our power to prevent the discussion from following party lines or from ourselves doing anything which might suggest the idea that we desire to make party capital out of the proposals of His Majesty's Government.
The noble Viscount told us what was, in his opinion, the principle of Clause 3, which has now been restored to the Bill. May I venture to tell him what was the principle which underlay our observations upon that clause? We felt that the clause was one which dealt with matters of such immense importance, matters really of Imperial importance, that this House ought on no account to part with the full and effective control which at this moment it possesses over the provisions of the clause. I cannot believe that we shall be regarded as having been unreasonable in taking that view. What is it that this clause does? It has been spoken of as if it dealt with some purely local and comparatively insignificant detail. Under this clause a new constitution can be given to these great Indian provinces—provinces including a population exceeding that of these islands. To say to those provinces, You shall for the future be governed, not by a Lieutenant-Governor, but by a Lieutenant-Governor with a Council, which is to include native members, and perhaps native members with no experience—to say that is to announce to these important parts of the King's Dominions that their political constitution is to undergo a fundamental change at the bidding of the Parliament of this country. Upon a question of that kind I conceive that this House has a right to have an opinion, and to act upon that opinion; and, if I may be allowed to say so, I am not very much moved by the argument which the

737
noble Viscount founded upon opinion in India and particularly upon the opinions expressed by the Anglo-Indian Press. I submit that we are far better judges of what is constitutionally due to this House, I would say even than the Government of India, and certainly than the Anglo-Indian Press.
We quite understand that the noble Viscount should desire that if it should be found necessary hereafter to create these Councils in other parts of India, the Government of the day and the Government of India should be relieved of the trouble and anxiety by which Parliamentary legislation is always attended. Therefore, many of us have from the first been favourably disposed to an arrangement which, while it avoided these inconveniences, at the same time preserved to this House an absolute and unqualified right of having an effective voice with regard to any proclamations hereafter issued under this clause. Surely that is not an unreasonable view. In the first place, do not let it be forgotten that although the Government of India at this moment is in favour of the third clause of the Bill its affection for the policy which it involves was a few months ago certainly of a very lukewarm character, and it is well known that at a not very remote period the proposal was regarded with unfavourable eyes by the Government of India.
There is another matter. The whole question, as the House remembers, has been lately considered by the Decentralisation Committee, which has presented a very interesting Report dealing with many Indian questions. When we come to examine the Report of that Committee we find that it contains no such proposal as that embodied in the Government's Bill. The proposal of the Decentralisation Committee was, as the noble Viscount knows, of a very different character. Another consideration which greatly weighed with us was the failure to consult the Provincial Governments. As to that I must say that I noticed with considerable alarm and much regret a tendency to treat the opinions of the Provincial Governments as if they were not of any very great importance. I believe that nothing could be more unfortunate than to create the impression in India that changes of this kind can be carried out over the heads of the Provincial Governments.
738
Many of us hold the view that, in these circumstances, whilst the extension of Executive Councils to other provinces might be allowed to remain indefinitely in abeyance, it might be well to make this concession in the Province of Bengal, and I should have gladly supported the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Cromer. But, my Lords, in deference to the very strong representations which have been made to us, and having, as we have, a strong desire that upon a question of this kind there should be no acute difference between the two sides of the House, we are of opinion that the arrangement offered to us by the noble Viscount is one which we may reasonably accept. The essence of that arrangement, of course, is that an Address from either House of Parliament would be sufficient to arrest the further progress of a new proclamation. The noble Viscount told us that in the event of a proposal under this clause coming home from the Government of India and being proposed by the Government of the day, he could scarcely conceive that it should be resisted. I say most certainly that if a proposal of that kind came to us backed in such a manner I cannot conceive that it should be lightly put on one side; but we do desire to maintain, as I said a moment ago, a real and effective control over the matter. We have that real and effective control at this moment, and I certainly do not think we should have been justified in parting with it. I am glad that the noble Viscount has been able to meet us in so reasonable a spirit.
EARL ROBERTSMy Lords, I deeply regret that I was not able to be present when the discussion on this Bill took place a few weeks ago, but I am glad to have this opportunity of saying how entirely I am in accord with the opinions then expressed by Lord Lansdowne, Lord Curzon, and other noble Lords who voted against Clause 3. I regard the formation of Councils in the provinces where they do not already exist as not only unnecessary, but as not being likely to help Lieutenant-Governors in carrying out their onerous duties. But, at the same time, under the Amendment introduced by the noble Viscount, I would certainly not offer any objection to a Council being introduced in Bengal. The important question of the appointment of a native member to the Viceroy's Council has been settled; but

739
I cannot help expressing my great regret that the noble Viscount has not delayed, at any rate for a time, the carrying out of a measure which is likely to have such momentous consequences. I very much doubt whether the presence of a native member in the Viceroy's Council will not be a matter of distrust among the ruling Princes. It certainly will not satisfy the demagogues who are now shouting for it, and, so far as I am aware, it is not desired by the people of India generally. The people believe in their English rulers, but, for reasons of their own, they have not the same feeling of trust in native officials, owing, no doubt, to the prejudices of caste and religion. Some years ago a question arose in India which created a considerable amount of caste and race feeling. I was at the time in Madras, and Sir Madhava Rao, an old friend of mine with whom I was talking the matter over, said—
"This is the fault of your own people. They raise these questions without knowing what the feelings of the people in India are."
In the course of further conversation, I asked what would happen supposing we left the country. He replied:—
"If you went to the Zoological Gardens, opened all the cages, and let all the wild animals loose, there would be a terrific fight, and at the end of the fight the tiger would walk proudly over the dead bodies of all the other animals."
Asked whom he meant by the tiger, my friend replied—
"I mean the Mahomedans from the north."
I do not know whether my friend's prognostications will ever come true, but of this I am certain, that India would never be governed by Bengal Baboos. I am confident that the Bengal Baboos of the present day and men of that class, who are shouting and clamouring for position and place, would not be heard of six months after we had left the country.
LORD MAC DONNELL OF SWINFORDMy Lords, with your Lordships' permission and indulgence I should like to offer a few remarks upon the personal references which have been made to myself by the noble Viscount the Secretary of State for India. This is the second occasion during the course of these debates on which the noble Viscount has thought fit to make depreciatory remarks regarding myself. I feel, therefore, that it is due to myself and to the House that I should, as
740
briefly as I possibly can, and with an avoidance of anything like acrimony, so far as I can manage it, explain to your Lordships what my position is. I was invited by the noble Viscount to assist him in the discussing and framing of the schemes of reform now before the House. The letter in which the noble Viscount invited my assistance is entirely at variance in spirit and in language with the language which he has thought fit to apply to me this evening. I most willingly gave my assistance to the noble Viscount, coming over from Ireland for the purpose, and after fully and carefully discussing the whole of the proposals embodied in the Bill I received from the noble Viscount an expression of his thanks and satisfaction for the assistance I had given him. Afterwards we differed. I have always thought that matters connected with India were outside the sphere of party politics, but even if they were not, I do not think that the bonds of party should lie upon me so heavily, sitting on this side of the House as I do, that in a matter of the first Imperial importance I should not express to your Lordships my honest convictions. I have endeavoured, with all respect to the noble Viscount, to express those convictions in this House, and on only two great subjects—namely, the appointment of a native member to the Viceroy's Council and the creation of Lieutenant-Governor Councils—was I really at variance with the noble Viscount.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNThe Partition of Bengal.
LORD MAC DONNELL OF SWINFORDI will come to that. Upon these points, if it were necessary for me to ask for your Lordships' approval of my action I could find it in the fact that my views were in harmony with those of the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, who with such distinction presided over the Government of India; with those of the noble Lord, Lord Curzon, who has done in India work which the present time is not capable of appreciating; and with those of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, who knew a good deal of me in India. It is quite true that in regard to the Partition of Bengal I held an opinion at variance with that of the noble Viscount, and at variance, to my regret, with that of Lord Curzon. The whole of my early life was spent in Bengal. I know every district of it. I know the

741
temper of its people and the course of its history, and my belief was that if advantage was not taken of this great occasion to remove a source of what I believe to be real hardship and also a source of much discontent we should be losing a great opportunity. I may be wrong, but that was my honest opinion, and I endeavoured to express it in the Amendment which I placed on the Paper in such a manner as to interfere as little as possible with established facts. This is the history of my intervention in these debates.
I have been accused by the noble Viscount the Secretary of State of being a bureaucrat, and to-night, by inference, he accuses me of a want of consideration for my subordinates. During thirty-five years of service in India I have been brought into personal connection with the great men who have built up and maintained the British Empire there, from John Lawrence downwards, and one of the lessons I learned at their feet was that, a chief must carry his officers with him. I believe, if your Lordships will excuse the personal reference, that I am the only person now living of the Sovereign's servants in the East who has administered the affairs of four great provinces one after another—administered them in times of stress, in times of war, and in times of famine and plague—and in each province it was necessary for me to carry my officers with me, for without them I could have done nothing. I ask your Lordships whether the great men who have administered the Indian Empire would have placed me in one great government after another if it were true that I was discourteous or unfair to my subordinates and unable to carry them with me. The great men with whom I have been associated in India were able to play on that stormy harp whose strings are the hearts of men. They did not learn by sitting in offices or by writing books how men should be managed.
LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTONMy Lords, I have no desire to intervene in the difference, if difference it be, between the noble Lord who has just spoken and the Secretary of State. Still less would I venture for a moment to take up the position which he has sometimes occupied with regard to me of a tertius gaudens when differences of this nature arise in your Lordships' House. I think there is not one of us who will not have listened
742
with some sympathy, as well as with respect, to the personal vindication of himself which has just been offered by the noble Lord, Lord Mac Donnell. I will not pursue that matter further, except to say that, in my judgment, the passage which the Secretary of State read from the Times of India in its reference to Lord Mac Donnell was singularly ungenerous in tone, and that your Lordships might very properly have been spared its quotation in this House. Neither do I propose to follow the noble Lord, Lord Mac Donnell, on the present occasion into the wholly irrelevant question of the Partition of Bengal. I have always counted myself unfortunate that in dealing with that measure I did not secure the support of the noble Lord. The measure has already, I believe, justified itself, and will continue still further to justify itself in the future; but clearly that is a matter which it would not be proper for me to discuss on the present occasion.
I have risen because, having taken some part in the previous discussions on this Bill and having had some responsibility for recent affairs in connection with India, I do not like to give an altogether silent vote. The noble Earl, Lord Cromer, gave a correct description of the circumstances in which this Bill left your Lordships' House a few weeks ago, and in which we are now asked to recede from our previous attitude with regard to Clause 3. There are many of us in this House, of whom I certainly am one, who hold strongly to the view that government by an individual is for the greater parts of India a better, a more efficient, a more vigorous, and a more rapid form of government than government by a Cabinet or by a Council. There are many of us, too, who regard with some apprehension the placing of native gentlemen, however talented, in positions where they will be called upon in the future, without a previous training in official life and without the steadying influence which service in India gives, to exercise great powers of patronage over natives and English alike. That was the view of some of us who had had experience of India; but the view, I think, of the majority of your Lordships, who have not had that particular experience, was that the reasons given for Clause 3 in the form in which it was first submitted to the House were inadequate and perfunctory. I will not go over that ground again.

743
Accordingly, what we asked for at that stage was that in the interval between the time when the Bill left this House and the date when it should come back the noble Viscount should give us, if it lay in his power, further information as to the views of responsible persons in India, more particularly those who would be affected by this change, whether they were persons in positions of authority or whether they were the leading classes of the community in the provinces that were likely to be affected. As I listened to the speech of the noble Viscount the Secretary of State to-night, I naturally asked myself whether he had supplied your Lordships with the information for which we asked, and which would be sufficient to justify us in receding from our opinion. So far as his speech is regarded from that point of view, I do not think that any one of your Lordships will say that any substantial addition has been made to our information. We have merely been told, what we knew before, that the Government of India are now in favour of this proposal; but, as the noble Marquess behind me has pointed out, their conversion on this matter, although convenient, has certainly been extremely rapid, and only six months ago they were saying something entirely opposite.
The case as regards the Lieutenant-Governors has been given away. Nobody contends that any Lieutenant-Governor in India at the present time is in favour of this proposal, with the important exception of Sir Edward Baker in Bengal. I do not, of course, desire to depreciate the authority of that officer, and I agree that when an official so competent speaks so strongly as Sir Edward Baker did in the debate on the Budget the other day at Calcutta about the needs of his province, the Government at home and your Lordships would accept a considerable responsibility if you ignored that appeal. I may say, in passing, that the case made cut by Sir Edward Baker, resting as it does on the enormous increase in the responsibilities of the Lieutenant-Governor and the work that will devolve upon him and his officials in consequence of the changes in the system of Legislative Councils which this Bill is going to introduce. is in itself the strongest corroboration of the views taken by many noble Lords on this side of the House, including myself, as to the drastic and far-reaching character of the proposals with regard to those Councils which are embodied in this Bill.
744
All the way through it has been our contention that these Legislative Councils in the provinces will not be large debating societies, but small Parliaments, and here we have the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal practically using that argument as a justification for asking for further assistance to himself. As I say, I think that this is a request on behalf of the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal which it would be impossible for us to resist. But at present he stands alone. No other Lieutenant-Governor has been or can be quoted as being in favour of the proposal at this date.
Then the noble Viscount said that the Press of India is in favour of the proposal. I probably make as close a study of the Indian newspapers as does the noble Viscount, and when he quoted that passage from the Times of India, which, by the way, I had also read, I only regretted that I had not brought down with me a passage from the same paper a week or two earlier which expressed a very unfavourable opinion of the manner in which the noble Viscount has conducted this Clause. However, I agree with the noble Marquess behind me that what an isolated Anglo-Indian newspaper says for or against the proposal is not very germane to this discussion. Surely it would have been much more pertinent had the noble Viscount been able to tell us that in the interval that had elapsed since your Lordships dealt with this measure there had been any substantial demonstration of opinion in India in favour of this Clause. To some extent there has been an expression of opinion in its favour, but I cannot help thinking that it has in the main emanated from those who thought that if this Clause were introduced into the Bill and these new Councils set up, opportunities for serving upon them would be created for themselves. I doubt very much whether these provisions have been regarded by any class in India as likely to tend to the betterment of government in that country. Suppose that instead of introducing this provision for Executive Councils in the Lieutenant-Governorships with a clear intimation that he proposed to place natives upon them, the Secretary of State had merely proposed to create Councils of three or four officers, all of whom were to be Europeans and members of the Civil Service. I doubt if he would have found any enthusiasm in any part of India in favour of the proposal. I do not, how-

745
ever, desire to labour that point. I have merely been contending that, so far as additional information is concerned, we stand in no different position from that which we occupied some six weeks ago.
In that case, is there anything in the present state of affairs which justifies us in accepting the proposals now made, as the noble Viscount very justly remarked, in a spirit of compromise? I think that there is. The situation is rendered very different by the steps that he has taken to-night. In the first place, the appointment of an Executive Council is definitely limited to the case of Bengal. In the second place, we are to have opportunities of Parliamentary discussion before any similar appointment can take place in the future. In the third place—rather a small point to which the noble Viscount did not allude—he has introduced into his Amendment a form of words which gives to the Lieutenant-Governor greater powers in the future determination of the duties, authorities, and distribution of work between the members of his Council than were provided in the original form of the Bill. All of these, I think, are points to the good, and justify those of us who regarded the original proposal with some suspicion in adopting a friendly attitude towards the present Amendment of the Secretary of State. I do not think that he will expect me to say that it comforts us for one moment on the main principle. Although the existence of this power will prevent any weak or ignorant Viceroy, any impulsive or despotic Secretary of State, if such a combination is at any time to be contemplated, from introducing an Executive Council into a province of India where it is not required, yet at the same time I take it that it is a pretty correct prevision of the future when the noble Viscount says that the authority of this House or of the other House of Parliament in the matter is one which is not likely to be frequently or rashly used. As a matter of fact, what will happen?
I think your Lordships, in accepting this compromise, ought to have a clear idea as to the future to which we commit ourselves. Bengal will have its Executive Council, as I understand, straight away. I have very little doubt that before many years have passed, when the present Lieutenant-Governors in India are changed and others have taken their places who
746
may not, perhaps, hold similar views, and when constant agitation—and if there is one thing certain it is that when once you concede this privilege to Bengal agitation will immediately start for its extension to other provinces—has prevailed, you will have Executive Councils extended to province after province, and that within the next twenty years there may scarcely be a single province, with the possible exception of those on the extreme frontier, which will not have an Executive Council. If that be a correct forecast of the future, it is a .state of affairs which I, at any rate, cannot regard altogether without apprehension; but, at the same time, the guiding consideration in our minds, I think, ought to be that the responsibility in this matter rests with the Government, and with the Government alone. All through this Bill the attitude taken by the Secretary of State, the manner in which he has more than once appealed to us not in any way to break the coherence or the symmetry of his measure for fear of re-arousing the unrest in India which he hopes by his legislation to allay, has placed the Opposition in a very difficult position, and all of us, I think, who have thought over the matter have come to the conclusion that in the last resort we must leave the responsibility where it has been assumed, where it rests, and where history will ultimately place it. With this expression of my views I will say that I think we may on the present occasion, with justice both to ourselves and to the attitude we have previously taken, accept the compromise which has been offered by the noble Viscount.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNMy Lords, with your Lordships' indulgence I should like to say one sentence in regard to what fell from the noble Lord behind me, Lord Mac Donnell. I do not suppose that there is anybody in this House who is more averse than I am from introducing personal elements into an Imperial discussion. My feeling, which may have appeared needlessly pointed towards the noble Lord, has remained with me since the week in December when I first had the honour of explaining to your Lordships the policy of the Government in all these matters. At that very moment the noble Lord launched views about the Partition of Bengal which he has repeated since, and which were not merely pious opinions. A view against the Partition of Bengal,

747
launched by a noble Lord of his great Indian authority, inflicted a very serious blow on Lord Minto and myself and the Government of India. Here had we been for two years upholding the Partition of Bengal against great difficulties, and with an opinion of it not much differing from that of the noble Lord. The agitation had more or less cooled down, but when a noble Lord of his authority said that it was the greatest blunder ever committed by the Government of India it kindled the ashes of what was an expiring flame.
LORD MACDONNELL OF SWINFORDI do not think it is an expiring flame.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNThen in that case it is still worse. Lord Minto and myself, at all events, were bound to treat it as an expiring flame. We will not be parties to a reversal of that Partition. I have said that before, and I venture to say it now. The noble Lord is perfectly entitled to his own opinion; but at a time when he found the Executive Government taking a certain view and doing their best against many and enormous difficulties, I should have thought that a noble Lord who had been so eminent a servant of the Indian Government for so long a time would not have added to those difficulties.
Lord MACDONNELL OF SWINFORDI can only make a further remark with your Lordships' permission, but I should like to say that my object was to obtain a reconsideration of this question in connection with what was and is a revision of the entire Indian political situation. You are considering the entire scheme and scope of Indian Government, and I thought that the circumstances were such as could properly permit of my bringing this matter under the consideration of your Lordships.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Amendment moved to the new clause inserted by the Commons—
"In lines 3 and 4, to leave out the words 'any province under a Lieutenant-Governor' and to insert the words 'the Bengal division of the presidency of Fort William.'"—(Viscount Morley of Blackburn.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNI now move to insert, after subsection (1),
748
the new subsection standing in my name on the Paper.
Amendment moved to the new clause inserted by the Commons—
"After subsection (1), to insert as a new subsection :
'(2) It shall be lawful for the Governor-General in Council with the like approval by a like proclamation to create a council in any other province under a Lieutenant-Governor for the purpose of assisting the Lieutenant-Governor in the executive government of the province. Provided that before any such proclamation is made a draft thereof shall be laid before each House of Parliament for not less than sixty days during the session of Parliament and if before the expiration of that time an address is presented to His Majesty by either House of Parliament against the draft or any part thereof no further proceedings shall be taken thereon without prejudice to the making of any new draft.'"—(Viscount Morley of Blackburn.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD MAC DONNELL OF SWINFORDMy Lords, the Amendment which I have placed on the Paper, proposes to insert, after subsection (3), the following proviso—
"Provided always and be it enacted that it shall be lawful for the Governor-General in Council with the approval of the Secretary of State in Council to revoke or to suspend so often and for such periods as the said Governor-General in Council shall in that behalf direct the appointment of councils in all or any of the said provinces under Lieutenant-Governors or a Lieutenant-Governor or to reduce the number of councillors in all or any of the said councils and during such time as a council shall not be appointed or shall be suspended in any province under a Lieutenant-Governor the executive government thereof shall be administered by the Lieutenant-Governor alone."
This proviso is no innovation. As the noble Viscount, the Secretary of State for India has said, it is to be found in the Act of 1833. Your Lordships are aware that Executive Councils have existed in Madras and Bombay from early time, but these Councils were different from those contemplated under the Bill. The Councils contemplated by the Act of 1833 consisted of three officers who were selected from the Company's servants in India—from what is now known as the Indian Civil Service—for their ability, their experience, and their trustworthiness. Notwithstanding the fact that the Council was so constituted, the Government in 1833, and at an earlier date, thought it right, in their prudence and foresight, to provide that under certain circumstances the Government of India and the Board of Control, as it was then, now the Secretary of State, should have the power to revoke the establishment

749
of any Council, to suspend its operation for any particular time, or to reduce the number of its members. That provision was in the nature of a precaution against emergencies when personal government through the Governor was considered to be the most desirable and most efficacious in the interests of British rule in India.
The noble Viscount stated that this provision of the Act of 1833 is practically obsolete, that it has never been put into execution. I think the noble Viscount will find that the provision has been put into execution. Three members of Council were appointed under the Act, but that number has been reduced to two. Two members now exist in the Councils of Madras and Bombay, and the reduction was effected under that particular Act. It therefore cannot be said that the provision has fallen into disuse. But I go further and say that where you have an Act which is passed not to compass any immediate object but rather for a preventive purpose, surely its efficacy is established by its not being put into operation rather than the reverse. One estimates the efficacy of preventive measures by the fact of their not being made use of. If this particular section of the Act of 1833 is not introduced into this Bill, it is quite possible that the Government might have to pass legislation ad hoc for the purpose which this particular section was intended to meet. Besides, the Councils for the future are to be very differently constituted from what they have been in the past. The Councils in the future are to be mixed Councils, composed partly of European officers of the Crown and partly of native politicians with no previous experience of administration. Who can cast his eyes into the future and say that circumstances may not arise when it will be necessary for the Government of India to have a power, in the first place, to reduce the number of councillors in these Councils? In the next place, if the Councils became so divided that administration was blocked or inefficient, who can say it would not be useful for the Government of India to have power to suspend the Council for a time? The mere existence of such a power would be a safeguard against any such block or inefficiency as I have referred to.
I cannot think that there is anything disrespectful or calculated, as the noble
750
Viscount seemed to think, to throw suspicion upon the Councils to be created, in the fact of our extending to these new Councils the provisions which already exist in regard to the old Councils. In point of fact, the easiest way of doing it would be to say that the provisions of this section should apply to all new Councils created. I should be the last to bring forward a measure which would cast suspicion on the new Councils, but at the same time we cannot say what the future has in store for us. It is the opinion of the majority of your LordshipsȔan opinion which I shareȔthat the creation of Councils in Lieutenant-Governorships is an experiment. It is an experiment which should be safeguarded, and it would be very much better if that safeguard were applied in the beginning rather than at the time when the emergency arose.
Amendment moved to the new clause inserted by the CommonsȔ
"After sub-section (3), to insert the words 'Provided always and be it enacted that it shall be lawful for the Governor-General in Council with the approval of the Secretary of State in Council to revoke or to suspend so often and for such periods as the said Governor-General in Council shall in that behalf direct the appointment of councils in all or any of the said provinces under Lieutenant-Governors or a Lieutenant-Governor or to reduce the number of councillors in all or any of the said councils and during such time as a council shall not be appointed or shall be suspended in any province under a Lieutenant-Governor the executive government thereof shall be administered by the Lieutenant-Governor alone.'"Ȕ(Lord Mac Donnell of Swinford.)
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNMy Lords, I have already said as much upon this Amendment as it seems to require. The noble Lord is, I am sure, wrong, if I may say so, when he states that the Act of 1833 has been applied. I have proof that it has not been applied in this. We took the opinion the other day of the Law Officers of the Crown upon the question whether the Crown has or has not the right of putting a third member on to the Council of Bombay or the Council of Madras, and the opinion of the Law Officers was that the Crown has that right. It follows, therefore, from that that this Statute of 1833 has not come into operation; otherwise the Crown would have been stripped of that power.
LORD MACDONNELL OF SWINFORDBy the Act of 1833 three members are

751
appointed to the Councils of Madras and Bombay. There are only two members on each of those Councils now. Consequently one must have been reduced, and I am not aware of any power to reduce the number except the provision in the Act of 1833. That is the only existing authority, so far as I know—and I have made inquiries on the point—by which a member of Council could be reduced, and under that authority one member has been reduced in the Council of Madras and also in that of Bombay.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNMy legal advisers lead me to believe that it was not done under this Act, but under some prerogative of the Crown or I know not what. At any rate, Sir Courtenay Ilbert, for example, lays it down that the Act has remained a dead letter and has never been put in force. But whether I am right or wrong is immaterial. I think I am right. The noble Lord's speech really confirms the suggestion that I brought forward before he moved his Amendment. It is to insert into this Bill a provision which is a sheer innuendo. The House is being asked to give this power as if they expected these Councils, as the noble Lord does, to need to be revoked or mutilated.
LORD MACDONNELL OF SWINFORDI beg the noble Viscount's pardon. I do not expect it, but I think it is only right to retain this power.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNIf we are going to guard ourselves against all the evil things that may happen, of course we may make a great many clauses. I submit, with great earnestness, that it is most undesirable to insert such an ungracious innuendo as the last parting blow of your Lordships to this Bill. And when I say that, I hope I am not understood as complaining for a moment of the treatment the Bill has received at your Lordships' hands. I cordially confirm all that the noble Marquess claimed. The debates have been thoroughly fair, entirely free from acrimony, replete with weighty arguments, and I should be glad if the last proposal made should not be the ungracious proposal mentioned by the noble Lord.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I must say that it seems to me that if sheer arguments are to be weighed,
752
my noble friend Lord Mac Donnell has had the best of this discussion. You have here provisions which at the present moment are applicable under the existing law to the Councils of the Presidencies of Madras and Bombay. Lord Mac Donnell's suggestion is that there is no reason for discriminating in favour of the new Executive Councils, and that if precautions of this kind are desirable and form part of the existing law in respect of the old Councils, they are certainly not less desirable in the case of the new Councils. That seems to me to be a somewhat difficult argument to meet, and I must say that the provision is one which might have very well been included in the original proposals made by His Majesty's Government for introducing Executive Councils into provinces where they do not now exist. But the noble Viscount states that his advice is to the effect that the section of the Act of 1833 on which Lord Mac Donnell relies is a dead letter. The noble Lord, Lord Mac Donnell, says, on the contrary, that there have been within his knowledge cases in which the Executive Councils were diminished, and he contends that they were diminished under this Section of the Act of 1833; and the noble Viscount, I observe, is not able to tell us under what statutory enactment they were diminished if they were not diminished under this particular provision of the law. Therefore, on the strict merits of the case, I should have been very much inclined to support my noble friend on the Back-bench opposite. But the consideration which weighs more with me is this. We have now arrived at the very concluding stage of the Parliamentary discussion of this Bill. If we carry the Amendment of the noble Lord the Bill will have to go back to the House of Commons, and, judging from past experience, it seems to me highly improbable that my noble friend's Amendment would find favourable acceptance there. If that were so, I do not think we should care to take the responsibility of insisting upon the Amendment when the Bill came back without it to this House. Upon the whole it seems to me better, in the circumstances, to incur such risk as may arise from the omission of this clause, to accept the anomaly, for I think it will be an anomaly to have a provision of this kind applicable to the old Councils and not to have any provision of the same kind applicable to the new councils—it seems

753
to me that we must face those disadvantages, and that it would probably be wise on my noble friend's part if he did not insist upon taking the sense of the House.
LORD MACDONNELL OF SWINFORDI withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Commons' Amendment as amended, agreed to: the rest of the Commons' Amendments agreed to, and Bill returned to the Commons.

THE MAHOMEDAN ELECTORATE.
LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTONMy Lords, I have a Question on the Paper of which I gave notice to the Secretary of State, and which he, perhaps, will allow me to put with a few words of explanation. It runs as follows:—
"To ask the Secretary of State for India whether he can give to the House any further information concerning the proposed Mahomedan electorates under the Indian Councils Bill, and other matters connected with the operation of that measure."
I may reassure the House at once by saying that I do not propose to say anything about other matters connected with the operation of that measure, My few observations will be confined to the question of the Mahomedans, a question which I was told I could not raise on the strictly limited discussion on the Amendments hitherto before your Lordships, but which I think the Secretary of State will not think it improper on my part to raise this afternoon, because of the immense importance of removing any ambiguity that may exist on the subject.
Your Lordships, I am sure, will be agreed as to the great importance of securing a satisfactory representation of the Mahomedan community in India, under the provisions of this Bill. As the House knows, they desire a representation in excess of their numerical strength and an exclusively Mahomedan electorate for all bodies concerned in returning them to the new Councils. The Mahomedans in India have understood, and we have understood, that the position had been conceded by the Secretary of State. That belief rested, in the first place, upon the strong assurance of the Viceroy given to the Mahomedan deputation whom he received more than two years ago, and it was confirmed by the observations made by the noble Viscount opposite
754
in the debate on the Second Reading of the Indian Councils Bill. I need not trouble your Lordships by reading his remarks, which I have here, in full, but they amount to a definite pledge that both of the requests I have named—the demand for a separate register and the demand for representation in excess of numerical strength—would be met by the Government. The words of the noble Viscount were—
"These two demands we are quite ready and intend to meet to the full."
We were very glad to receive that assurance from the noble Viscount, and there, as I think most of us thought, the matter satisfactorily terminated. But the other day there was read in the House of Commons a telegram from the Viceroy, dated April 12, in which the Viceroy said—
"The method proposed is simply that in general electorates such as municipalities, district boards, and provincial councils, all sects and classes, including Mahomedans, will vote together. By this means some, but not sufficient representation will be obtained for Mahomedans. In addition, a certain number of seats will be reserved for Mahomedans, and no one but Mahomedans will have a voice in filling them. They may be filled in many ways—by election pure and simple, by election by association, by electoral colleges, or by nomination, as the circumstances of each province require. The methods will vary in different provinces, and will be subject to alterations from time to time as experience may dictate."
These words, if interpreted in the ordinary meaning of the language, certainly suggested that, so far from there being a separate register for Mahomedans, there were to be two processes in their election to these Councils. In the first place, there was to be a sort of mixed general election in which they would take their chance with Hindus and other persons, and then if, owing to their lack of numbers or want of organisation, they found themselves in an inferior position, that deficiency was to be made up either by election or by nomination on the part of the Viceroy or by some other means.
My apprehensions on that score were, to some extent, confirmed by the speech delivered in the Budget debate at Calcutta by Mr. Gokhale. Mr. Gokhale has been mentioned as a capable leader of native opinion in India, and he has developed an almost extraordinary prophetic capacity of anticipating what is in the mind of the Secretary of State. In the debate at Calcutta to which I have referred, Mr. Gokhale spoke as follows:—

755
"I think the most reasonable plan is first to throw open a substantial minimum of seats to election on a territorial basis, in which all qualified to vote should take part without distinction of race or creed. And then supplementary elections should be held for minorities which numerically or otherwise are important enough to need special representation, and these should be confined to members of the minorities only. What minorities in the different provinces should have special representation and how many seats should be assigned to each minority must depend upon the special circumstances of each province. The great advantage of this plan is that it provides for composite action by all communities up to a certain point and then it prevents injustice in practical operation to minorities by giving them special supplementary electorates of their own.
If that were a correct divination of the views of the Government of India, it would mean not only, as I have said, that there would be this system of a mixed election to start with and then a supplementary election for Mahomedans, but that the same treatment might be applied to minorities belonging to other sects and communities in India.
When the Viceroy's telegram of April 12 was published in India great consternation was, not unnaturally, caused among the Mahomedans, and they represented everywhere that they were afraid that the pledge given to them was likely to be departed from. They said they were quite willing to surrender any claim to vote in a mixed electorate so long as they could be assured of the right to vote on a register of their own. When the Secretary to the Treasury, Mr. Hobhouse, was challenged on this matter in the House of Commons, he made an explanation. I confess to having studied it, in so far as it is reported in The Times, many times over, but I cannot understand the conclusion to which it is intended to lead. The Secretary to the Treasury, in his defence of the telegram, or rather in his explanation of the telegram, about which he seemed to think there had been some misunderstanding, pointed out that the local authorities in India would no doubt find it impossible to apply a uniform system under which the principle of election for Mahomedans would be carried out. We can fully appreciate the difficulties of a single cast-iron mode of election on a separate register for Mahomedans throughout the country. We can understand that such a scheme is impossible. My object in putting this Question on the Paper is not to have those difficulties further dwelt upon, or even cleared up. My sole object is to ask the noble Viscount to make some declaration
756
to us, which I suspect he is not at all unwilling to do, that for the ambiguity in the position from which the Mahomedans suffer so much there is no cause, that the pledges given by the Viceroy and the Secretary of State still hold good, and that whatever be the actual method or variety of methods adopted in the last resort, the Mahomedans will still retain their separate register, and will not be required to go through the double process of taking part first in a general election and then in a special election.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNMy Lords, the noble Lord is perfectly right in thinking that I am not sorry to have an opportunity of clearing up more than one ambiguity that has arisen in connection with this vitally important subject. So far from complaining, I really am obliged to the noble Lord for giving me that opportunity. I need not detain your Lordships long. I think I shall do what is best by reading textually parts of the telegram I received from the Viceroy last night. First, upon the speech of Mr. Hobhouse, which the noble Lord naturally referred to, the Viceroy says this—
"The speech has been interpreted as meaning that major portion of representatation accorded to Mahomedans is to be given through the mixed electorates, such as district boards and municipalities, on which they will vote conjointly with other classes, and that the special electorates in which Mahomedans will vote separately are only intended to supplement general elections, and will carry only a small number of seats."
Then the Viceroy points out, as the noble Lord has done, what would follow from that. He proceeds—
"I need hardly say that this is not at all what we contemplated. Our intention was that Mahomedans should have, by means of separate electorates, a number of seats closely approaching that to which their numerical proportion in the population would entitle them, and that over and above this they would obtain some seats in mixed electorates such as district boards and municipalities, Universities, Presidency corporations, and as landholders. In Bombay, for example, under the scheme detailed in my telegram of February 8, four seats are specially assigned to Mahomedans, and in addition to these, two Mahomedans will be elected by landholders and district bodies of Sind, so that they will secure a certain minimum of 6, or 28 per cent., their ratio to the general population being only 20. In the United Provinces, where they number only 14 per cent.; they will have four special seats, or nearly 20 per cent. of the seats assigned for election. Of course, the same ratio cannot be applied in all provinces, and allowance must be made for the status, character, and educational attainments of Mahomedan population in each case."

757
All that, I think, is intelligible enough. The Viceroy goes on to say—
"There has also been misapprehension of our views regarding nomination, which are intended to be merely a temporary expedient to be resorted to until the community should be ripe for election. I do not understand any Mahomedan here to claim concession suggested—namely, that wherever elections are found possible they should be conducted on basis of separate representation of the Mahomedan community. If interpreted literally, that would involve having separate Mahomedan electorates within the various electorates proposed, such as Presidency corporations, district boards, and municipalities, Universities, landholders, and the commercial community. This is manifestly impracticable. It could only be effected by recasting the entire scheme and increasing maximum strength of all councils as fixed by Bill. On the whole case, my view is that present proposals as now explained do reasonably fulfil pledges given to Mahomedans."
Something was said by the noble Lord as to what the Mahomedans had expected and what they had asked for. The Moslem League declared, on February 4, that the arrangement in the Despatch of the Government of India, dated October 1, 1908, on the reform scheme was in keeping with the maintenance of the principle of effective Mahomedan representation, and had also the virtue of linking the various class interests together in the rural and territorial electorates. They went on to say—
"The Mahomedans are under a heavy debt of gratitude to your Excellency and to your Executive Council for the Despatch."
That shows that the Mahomedans, construing the Despatch of October in the way that I have described, were contented and grateful, and that if the Government of India go on with their projects and the working out of their schemes on the present lines they will certainly come up to the demands and expectations expressed by the Moslem League on February 4 last. It is quite easy to discover inconsistencies in a matter so intricate, complicated, and difficult as this adjustment of Mahomedan representation, and those difficulties become greatly multiplied by the fact of distance, the cumbrousness of telegraphic communication, the length of time a despatch takes, and so on; and I do not think it is to be wondered at that language has occasionally been used which seems out of accord with language used at some other date. But this, at all events, is the last view of the Government of India, and it is for the Government of India to work it out. Lord Minto says here—and I

758
entirely concur with him—that we can have no part in any scheme which is not felt to be a loyal adherence to the pledges which both the Viceroy and I have more than once given to the Mahomedans; and when this scheme, completed and worked out, comes to be examined it will be found that we have carried out the pledges to which the noble Lord referred.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, we have every reason for being grateful to the noble Viscount for the interesting information he has just given to the House So far as I was able to follow his statement, it seemed to be of a distinctly reassuring character. It is not very easy to follow an explanation of the kind, and other similar explanations have sometimes had the effect of rather perplexing people's minds. I hope therefore, that the noble Viscount will let us have, at any rate, the substance of the documents from which he has quoted, so that we may have an opportunity of considering them at leisure. But I gather that the essence of what is in the mind of the Government of India is this, that the Mahomedans are to depend upon a separate Mahomedan electorate for a measure of representation fully equal to whatever they are numerically entitled to, and that that amount of representation may be supplemented by any other representation which the Mahomedans are able to secure in competition with other candidates at the mixed elections. That, of course, suggests a widely-different arrangement from that which some of us fancied we had gathered from the extremely puzzling and cryptic telegram read in the other House lately. But what comforts me most of all in the noble Viscount's statement is the announcement which I understood him to make that the Viceroy believes that at this moment the Mahomedans are contented and grateful for the arrangements which they are being led to expect. I trust that that confidence will not be in any way misplaced on their part.
VISCOUNT MORLEY OF BLACKBURNNo representation has been received to the contrary—that is the exact language—from the Mahomedans.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEI was going to remind the noble Viscount that these pledges to the Mahomedans have been of the fullest and most emphatic character.

759
There is a long series of them, beginning with the pledge given by the Viceroy, followed up by the pledge given by the noble Viscount to the Mahomedan deputation, followed again by his statement in this House on the introduction of the Bill this year—those pledges have been reaffirmed in the other House of Parliament by the representative of the India Office; and, of course, we must all feel that it would be a public disaster if anything were to happen which would make it open to the Indian Mahomedans to contend that those pledges had not been fulfilled to the utmost extent. I welcome the noble Viscount's announcement that, in his mind, at any rate, there is no doubt whatever that those pledges will be so made good.

THE TERRITORIAL FORCE.
THE EARL OF DARTMOUTHMy Lords, I rise, in accordance with the Notice standing in my name on the Paper, to ask the Under-Secretary of State for War when commanders of units of the Territorial Force may expect the additions to the permanent staff already sanctioned. I am sure your Lordships fully realise the importance that the recruits who have been enlisted should have an experienced staff in order that they might receive the necessary instruction. In the past they have been a good deal hampered by a shortage in the staff. In one of my own units there were in camp no fewer than 600 recruits, and the extra work thrown on the shoulders of the reduced staff made it extremely difficult to give the necessary instruction. If that is so in an ordinary infantry unit, the difficulty is obviously much greater in the scientific units; and where you have a new arm, all the surroundings of which are entirely strange to the men, it is clear that if you are going to secure that efficiency for which the County Associations have been made responsible there must be a proper staff to give the instruction. Sanction has been given up to eight permanent staff per Infantry battalion, and, in addition to that maximum the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief may sanction the attachment of any number of temporary instructors. These extra instructors beyond the maximum of eight depend, I understand, upon the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, but I do not propose to raise this point now. All I wish to-day is to urge upon my noble friend the great importance of this question and the
760
pressing necessity for the promised instructors. Nothing would encourage the Territorial Force more than the completion of their staff, and the completion of the equipment that has been promised. I would also ask my noble friend if he could tell us how many of these additional members of the permanent staff have been appointed, and how soon commanders of units may expect to have their full complement.
LORD LOVATMy Lords, I desire at the same time to call the noble Lord's attention to the grave deficiency in the staff for training the Artillery. As the noble Earl has said, the Artillery require more careful training, possibly, than any other branch of the service. They have more work to learn, and owing to the Field Artillery and Horse Artillery being entirely new corps, taking the place of garrison batteries, not only the men but also the officers are in most cases, in a sense, recruits. Yet for the instruction of a battery thus composed there are no competent instructors except the adjutant and the non-commissioned officer. In an average battery there are from sixty to eighty absolute recruits, but there are only two men—the instructor and the adjutant—to put them through the difficult and varied work they have to learn. It is quite impossible, even in a matter like foot-drill or riding, to take more than twenty men at a time, and when it comes to instruction in signalling, gun-laying, and such matters, the class, if the instruction is to be at all adequate, should not consist of more than six men. Is it not possible to admit the principle, where units have been raised absolutely de novo and where the whole of the men are untrained, as is the case in the Horse Artillery batteries, and, to a lesser extent, in certain Field batteries, that additional instructors should be given. I know that some of the Generals have stated that the work is going on admirably, but I would like to quote two other opinions. One is that of an officer of the French General Staff, who came over to address a meeting on the subject. He stated that the whole question of Artillery must turn on your permanent staff of instructors. The other day I took a German officer of Artillery over a certain battery, and, while expressing himself interested in the work that was done, he pointed out that, with the small number of instructors that were present, it would be impossible, even with Regular soldiers, to get them properly

761
trained. In the British Isles we give only forty drills to Artillery recruits and the fortnight's training. Is it not, therefore, essential that they should receive the best instruction possible? I would suggest that, if we cannot get Regular non-commissioned officers, we should be willing in these Artillery regiments to put up with corporals, bombardiers, or men who had been in the ranks and had just left. They could, at any rate, relieve the permanent staff of some of the instruction.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE FOR WAR (LORD LUCAS)My Lords, I am sorry if I did not make the point clear in my reply to the noble Earl, Lord Dartmouth, the other day. In the statement I then made I did not intend to convey that eight sergeant-instructors were to be appointed to each battalion. That number was to be the maximum, and was only to be given to very scattered battalions.
THE EARL OF DARTMOUTHI did not mean to suggest that I thought that every unit throughout the country was to have eight men. I understood the noble Lord to say that the maximum was to be eight.
LORD LUCASThe eight sergeant-instructors were only to be given in the case of very scattered battalions, with no companies within, say, a distance of five miles. There are very few of such battalions in existence. The average per battalion is very much smaller than eight. If the noble Earl will give me an instance where he thinks that it is clearly impossible for the work to be done by the present permanent staff, I would be very glad to have the matter considered. With regard to the point raised by Lord Lovat, I would point out that the whole of this question of permanent staff is complicated by the fact that we have at the present time a very large number of recruits; and, although anxious to see these recruits properly trained, we do not want to lay down an establishment of permanent staff on the basis of the work that is to be done at the present time. I quite admit that when you have anything like a hundred recruits in a battery a permanent staff of two is inadequate; but we provided for that some time ago by saying that if cases were brought to our notice—we asked that they should be—where more instructors were required we would attach temporary instructors. If there are cases of that sort
762
we would be very glad to have them considered from that point of view. But that is an entirely different question from having a permanently larger establishment of permanent staff.
LORD LOVATNumerous batteries that I know of have made application for extra instructors, but have not obtained them.
LORD LUCASIt has to be remembered. that an instructor on the permanent staff is a very expensive item, and costs altogether, if you take into consideration the non-effective charges as well as the actual cost of the man himself, between £150 and £200 a year. If the County Associations could arrange to have the clerical work now done by the instructors transferred to somebody else the instructors would be free to give more time to their proper and more important duty. I do not say that that would meet the difficulty entirely, but it is worthy of consideration. I will undertake to see that the case of the Artillery shall be considered. Our reputation is very much involved in the success of the Territorial Artillery, and we will do all we can to give it the very best chances possible.
THE EARL OF DARTMOUTHWith the permission of the House, I should like to ask a supplementary Question. Am I to understand that all that the County Associations have to do is to satisfy the Army Council that the existing staff is not sufficient for the work, and that in that case the necessary additions will be made. Obviously, expense is involved. You cannot run a Twentieth Century national defensive force on principles of Elizabethan finance. You have to pay for it, and if the force is to be a success I do not think expense ought to stand in the way.
LORD LUCASI hope the noble Earl will not think that I wish in the least to speak slightingly of the Associations, whose representations on this point, as on others, will receive the fullest consideration. But this is primarily a military matter as apart from administration, and we are bound to look at it in that light. We are not inspired in this matter by niggardly questions of pounds, shillings, and pence, but there is behind it the consideration as to how far the training of the Territorial Force should be entirely in the hands of men of the Regular Army attached to it for that purpose. One

763
encouraging feature that I see arising is the fact that in a great many places Territorial non-commissioned officers are coming forward and doing this work very satisfactorily indeed. That was comparatively unknown before. The efficiency of the non-commissioned officers is one of the elements on which the Force as a whole will depend, and
764
one of the effects of this apparent shortage of the permanent staff is to bring these men out and improve their efficiency by inducing them to do this work.
House adjourned at twenty minutes past Seven o'clock, till Tomorrow, half-past Ten o'clock