Lords Sitting of 26 July 1911

CORPORATION OF LONDON (BRIDGES) BILL.
Report from His Majesty's Attorney-General received and ordered to lie on the Table.
Moved, That the order made on the 29th day of March last, "That no Private Bill brought from the House of Commons shall be read a second time after the 4th day of July next," be dispensed with, and that the Bill be now read 2a; agreed to: Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed: the Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.

GLOUCESTER CORPORATION BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments: Further Amendments made: Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.
CENTRAL LONDON RAILWAY BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments, agreed to.
LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMENTS) BILL.
Reported from the Select Committee, with Amendments.
WOKING URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL (BASINGSTOKE CANAL) BILL.
Reported, with Amendments.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 5) BILL.
  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 11) BILL.
  Read 3a (according to order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

MERCHANT SEAFARERS AS WITNESSES.
LORD MUSKERRY LORD MUSKERRY rose to call the attention of His Majesty's Government to the extraordinary disabilities under which merchant seafarers labour in respect (1) to detention ashore and resulting enforced
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unemployment for the purpose of giving evidence at Board of Trade inquiries into shipping casualties in which they may in no way be involved; (2) to detention ashore and loss of employment when summoned to serve on juries; and (3) to loss of employment caused by their compulsory detention when subpœnaed to give evidence at Police Court and Assize trials dealing with criminal offences on British merchant vessels; and to ask whether His Majesty's Government will now give serious consideration to these grave hardships with a view to taking the necessary steps for either furnishing special relief to merchant seamen in these several cases or otherwise ensuring that in those cases where this is found impossible some adequate compensation for great loss sustained in the public interest will be payable to those concerned.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I will not detain your Lordships more than a few minutes, because I understand that the answer I am to receive will be to some extent a satisfactory one. But I would like to make perfectly clear to your Lordships the very real grievance of which the captains and officers of the merchant service complain. Nearly all the causes of detention mentioned in my Question mean a loss of employment, and it is a very great hardship where a man has worked his way up to be captain and is in command of a vessel, that, through no fault of his own, he should be deprived of that command and either have to spend a long period in unemployment on shore or else take a position as mate or second mate; and as the commands in the merchant service are to some extent limited, it may be a good number of years before that man could get command of a vessel again. I know that my noble friend Lord Herschell understands these matters as well as I do myself, and that he sympathises with the hardship which captains and officers have to suffer under the present state of the law.
This question is a peculiar one in a way, for it does not deal with one public Department but with two or three. The first part of the question as to detention for Board of Trade inquiries will, of course, be dealt with by the Board of Trade; the second part—detention for serving on juries—I fancy I am right in saying comes under the Lord Chancellor's department; and the third part—detention as a witness in a Police Court and at Assize trials—is dealt with by the

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Home Office. My suggestion was that this grievance might be met by taking the evidence of captains and officers on depositions or by commission, but I have heard from the Home Office that so far as the part of the question goes with which they are concerned they have no power either to take depositions or to take evidence on commission, and that the best remedy in order to give the relief sought would be to pass some short Act for that purpose. But the case of Board of Trade inquiries is slightly different. Those courts are not courts of law but courts of inquiry, and I have been informed that perhaps in that case depositions could be taken. I will read a short extract from a letter which will serve as an illustration of what happens at present—
"I joined here on Thursday the 18th instant, and two hours before sailing the Board of Trade man came on board and served a summons on me to appear at a Board of Trade inquiry at Cardiff on Tuesday the 23rd, held to investigate into the misconduct of the second officer on the last voyage. I had to leave my ship and go ashore again, and yesterday—the 26th—the Board of Trade told me that there is going to be no inquiry as the man has gone to sea again. My pay front them has therefore been stopped, and my services are no longer required. They have given me three days' pay and now they say they have finished with me. I do not know whether I have any claim legally, but I am sure you will agree that I have been very badly treated. They took me away from my ship and it may be years before I shall get the chance of serving again as first mate on a ship trading regularly to my home."
In the latter part of my Question I have mentioned pecuniary compensation, but that is not the sole thing that captains and officers of the merchant service desire. What they desire is that they should not be kept ashore for any of these causes and thereby lose their berths. Compensation, as I need not point out to your Lordships, would be very hard to assess. Take the case of the writer of the letter I have just read. To obtain a position as officer on a ship trading to a man's home is a privilege that is very highly sought after in the merchant service, and many officers would be content to receive much smaller remuneration in order to be able to enjoy that privilege.
I now come to the next case, that of being detained to serve on juries. I think that case ought not to be at all a difficult one to deal with, for already there are a certain number of seafarers, such as pilots, &c., who are exempt from service on juries. As they are exempted I cannot see any reason why captains and officers of vessels
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who are in active employment should not also be granted exemption from serving on juries. If His Majesty's Government are good enough to bring forward any measure to grant the relief for which the captains and officers ask, I hope they will be a little more expeditious about it than they have been in regard to the Bill dealing with uncertificated officers in British merchant ships. We were told on March 21 by the noble Lord who then represented the Board of Trade that that Bill had been drafted, but we have not heard a single word about it since. I beg to put the Question that stands in my name.
LORD HERSCHELL: My Lords, the question which the noble Lord has raised is certainly one of interest, and I feel sure that any proposal for mitigating hardships which may fall upon such a body of men as the mercantile community in general must command a measure of sympathy from all of your Lordships. The question, however, is rather a complicated one. I will deal first with the first portion of the noble Lord's Question, which is as to detention ashore for the purpose of giving evidence at Board of Trade inquiries resulting in enforced unemployment. The noble Lord suggested that depositions might be made use of. The existing state of the regulations is as follows. Depositions are used upon formal investigations into shipping casualties under two authorities. Section 691 of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, provides that whenever in the course of any legal proceeding instituted in any part of His Majesty's Dominions before any Judge or magistrate or before any person authorised to receive evidence, the testimony of any witness is required in relation to the subject-matter of that proceeding, then upon due proof, if the proceeding is instituted in the United Kingdom that the witness cannot be found in that kingdom, or if in any British possession that he cannot be found in that possession, any deposition that the witness may have previously made on oath in relation to the same subject-matter before any justice or magistrate in His Majesty's Dominions, or any British Consular Officer elsewhere, shall be admissible in evidence, provided that—(a) if the deposition was made in the United Kingdom it shall not be admissible in any proceeding instituted in the United Kingdom; and (b) if the deposition was made in any British possession it shall not be admissible in any proceeding instituted in

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that British possession; and (c) if the proceeding is criminal it shall not be admissible unless it was made in the presence of the person accused. Under this authority in cases of inquiry into missing vessels we obtain depositions from abroad. They relate to such matters as loading and stowage of cargo, draught of water, manning and general trim and condition of the ship and her equipment at the time she last left port. The matter contained in these depositions does not affect certificates, and most frequently these depositions are taken in the case of missing ships.
The second authority is under the Rules. Rule 8 of the Shipping Casualties and Appeals and Rehearings Rules, 1907, under the heading of "Evidence" provides that affidavits and statutory declarations may, by permission of the Judge and saving all just exceptions, be used as evidence at the hearing. Under this Rule we hand into Court depositions of lighthouse-keepers and that class of witness, and they are generally accepted by persons against whom a charge is made as coming from impartial people, most of the evidence being taken from records. Another class of evidence by depositions would be that of the officers of another ship who last sighted a missing vessel or actually saw a ship go down without being able to speak as to the cause of the casualty. But in the bulk of inquiries witnesses who are detained are essential witnesses whose oral evidence, whether for or against an officer, cannot be dispensed with, because if the evidence is against the officer, that officer's representative in Court would be the first to object to the deposition being read, and the Court would doubtless refuse to allow it to be road on the ground that there was no opportunity of cross-examining the deponent. Even if the deposition was in favour of an officer and we let the deponent go, we cannot compel the. Court to receive the deposition, though as a rule the Court would be inclined to allow it.
LORD MUSKERRY: The noble Lord is dealing now only with Board of Trade inquiries?
LORD HERSCHELL: Yes. The officer's representative might well make a grievance that the Court had not before it in propriâ personâ a witness so favourable to his client, a mere deposition not carrying nearly so much weight as oral testimony. The inevitable result would be that when-
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ever a witness made a deposition against an officer and he was allowed to go, that deposition would be ruled out on objection taken by the officer's representative, while as a rule depositions in favour of an officer would, if the Court raised no objection, be allowed to go in. Every effort is made to let witnesses go if there is reasonable ground for thinking that their evidence is not absolutely essential—i.e., if others can speak to the same facts—but it is dangerous to relax the general rule that it is better to keep a witness than let him go. In some cases before an inquiry can be ordered many of the witnesses have scattered, and very often those we can detain represent the minimum of those we want.
In wreck inquiries the object is to bring the inquiry on for hearing as soon as possible after a wreck or casualty is reported, and assuming that all the essential evidence available is in the United Kingdom depositions and statements are taken as soon as possible after the casualty, and preparation is made for holding the inquiry as quickly as can be. But to prevent seamen shipping again to sea it is necessary to detain them from the very moment they have made their depositions or given their statements, so as to ensure their presence at the inquiry. There is a scale of allowance to men who are detained, but that, of course, does not affect the question of the subsequent loss of employment which they may suffer after the inquiry. The scale of allowance to which I have referred is paid to them day by day unless they are actually in the employ of and being paid by the owners, which not infrequently happens when they are of use to their employers on shore. But even in the case of wreck inquiries, which, as I have said, are held as soon as possible, no exception is taken to a witness shipping for a short voyage in the coasting or home trade if it is ascertained that it is practically certain that he will be back in time for the inquiry, and in the case of those inquiries which cannot be held for a long time owing to the fact that evidence has to be obtained from abroad—and this not infrequently happens—witnesses are constantly allowed to ship for two or three months voyages on their undertaking to acquaint the Local Receiver of Wreck of their return; and wherever representation is made before an inquiry takes place that detention until the inquiry is held in any particular case may mean serious loss of employment or the loss of permanent employment, every care is

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taken to examine the man's evidence to see whether it is essential or can be corroborated by someone else with a view to releasing him from attendance.
But in considering this question there are two points which should not be lost sight of. The first is that these wreck inquiries undoubtedly do contribute and have contributed in a marked degree to the interest of the shipping fraternity in general. A great deal of very useful information has been got from these inquiries which has contributed materially to greater safety. Secondly, we must be careful that in our desire to exempt certain officers of the mercantile marine from the hardships of detention as witnesses we do not thereby inflict hardship upon the officers whose conduct is called in question. An officer who gives evidence to-day which is of the greatest importance, even essential, to clear the character of another officer whose conduct is called in question, may himself later on be in the position of the officer whose conduct is called in question. I think, therefore, that as regards the question of depositions it is very difficult to do more than say that if, as soon as the inquiry is ordered, a witness can satisfactorily prove to the Board that hardship will result from his detention, then—while, of course, the Board cannot absolutely promise that they will exempt him from attendance—they will do their utmost to exempt him if by any possibility his evidence can be dispensed with without injustice being done to the interests of the inquiry. I am afraid that on this particular point I have not been able to give very much satisfaction to the noble Lord, but perhaps I may, before leaving this part of the question in reference to Board of Trade inquiries, state that with regard to compensation the scale has been found to work very well—that is, compensation during detention until the end of the inquiry.
But as regards giving compensation after the inquiry has ceased, a general rule has been made that no compensation can be given in those cases. But last year the Board of Trade took steps to ascertain how far the loss which results to officers detained to give evidence at wreck inquiries could be met by insurance, and they discovered that it was possible to insure officers for a premium of £1 6s. 8d. per cent., or for half that sum for £50, or 6s. 8d. for £25, and in each case this would be paid for detention without proof of loss.
LORD MUSKERRY: Am I to understand that the Board of Trade will pay this insurance?
LORD HERSCHELL: I did not say that. The Board of Trade have discovered that it is possible to insure officers at this rate, and they have brought the matter to the notice of the principal associations of officers and it is under their consideration. With regard to the second portion of the noble Lord's Question relating to detention on shore and loss of employment when summoned to serve on juries, this is a matter which concerns the Home Office. It is, however, the fact that they have received very few complaints with regard to the detention of seamen on shore for service on juries, but they fully recognise that seamen are in a different position from people on shore in this matter, as by being detained they may lose, not one or two days' employment, but the opportunity of securing employment for a whole voyage.
The whole question of jury service requires overhauling in view of the many admitted difficulties and inconsistencies of the present system. The Home Secretary has already drawn attention to the matter in the House of Commons and has promised an inquiry. The position of seamen with regard to jury service is a question which could very properly be included in such an inquiry, and when the inquiry is instituted the position of seamen will be carefully considered. As regards the third portion of the Question I am afraid I am not able to give very much satisfaction to the noble Lord, because my remarks as to depositions apply equally in this case as they do in the case of wrecks. Here, again, very few complaints have been received. At the same time the special position of seamen as witnesses in criminal prosecutions has been recognised for many years. For instance, under the regulations made by the Secretary of State under the Criminal Justice Administration Act governing the allowances payable to prosecutors and witnesses special provision is made for seamen, and the amount actually and reasonably incurred for their maintenance during detention on shore may be allowed.
The Home Office are always ready—and this remark applies equally to the Board of Trade—in spite of the hard-and-fast rule which exists as to compensation, to give consideration to any cases of special

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hardship. I may say that quite recently the attention of the Home Secretary was drawn to the case of the captain of a ship who had lost his position owing to being kept on shore to give evidence at the Assizes, and on representation being made to the Treasury substantial compensation was actually awarded; and compensation has been awarded in similar cases of great hardship by the Board of Trade. I hope the noble Lord will realise that both of these Departments are anxious, wherever it may be possible, to mitigate any hardship which may fall upon the people in whose favour the noble Lord speaks. They are exceedingly anxious to do everything they can in the matter.
LORD ELLENBOROUGH: My Lords, I maintain that jury service is an exceedingly unfair and unjust burden to put on seafaring men. It would not be difficult to draw up a Bill exempting them, in the same manner that pilots are exempted. As a matter of fact, a seafaring man does not really reside in the home which throws upon him the obligation of serving on juries. He provides a home for his wife and family, and if during the intervals when he is home from a voyage he is called upon to serve on a jury he may lose his appointment and suffer great hardship in consequence. The laws of this country are made by people who live on land, and as minorities must suffer those who follow the nomad life of the sea have suffered in consequence; but I think all fair-minded people are of opinion that such suffering on the part of minorities should be reduced as much as possible.
As regards Board of Trade inquiries, it is true, of course, that evidence on deposition which has not withstood proper examination has by no means the strength of evidence that is given in Court. Therefore I think it would be difficult to draw up a Bill to prevent detention of officers and men in these cases that would in any way meet the justice of the situation without jeopardising others at the inquiries which take place. The Board of Trade do not see their way to draw up such a Bill. I would suggest to my noble friend that he should, in conjunction with the Imperial Merchant Service Guild, endeavour to draw up a Bill containing suitable clauses to deal with this matter. Of course they would have to get the advice of experts, and I dare say the Board of Trade might be inclined to assist them.
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I hope some alteration will be made in the law as to compensation, making the compensation more liberal. I am speaking not only in the interests of mercantile marine officers, but in the interests also of the men before the mast, who frequently get detained to give evidence in various cases and thereby lose their employment. I hope the Board of Trade will continue to study this question, and that by next year they will be able to do something, and that at any rate they will bring in a Bill to relieve seamen from the obligation of serving on juries.

PUBLIC HEALTH (IRELAND) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading, read.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(The Earl of Shaftesbury.)
LORD HAVERSHAM: On the Motion for the Third Reading I should like to ask why this Bill, which is a very important one as it affects the inspection of meat for human consumption, is made optional and not compulsory. It is left entirely to the urban district councils in each district in Ireland to decide for themselves whether or not they will make these by-laws. I have some suspicion that this Bill would not have been introduced unless there had been considerable lathes on the part of these authorities in making provision for general slaughterhouses. Therefore I do not think the matter should be left optional. In England in similar cases we are under the most stringent regulations. For instance, in my own neighbourhood there have been two outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease, and the consequence is that not a single animal can be moved from any of our farms without the permission of the President of the Board of Agriculture. That is putting the thing as it appears to me on a proper compulsory footing, and I cannot see what confidence the noble Earl can have that under this optional Bill urban district councils in Ireland will exert themselves to make these by-laws and carry them out.
THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY: I am afraid we always do things differently in Ireland. I understand that this matter was thoroughly thrashed out in the other House, and it was agreed that for the

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present at any rate the matter should be optional upon these urban district councils. I imagine that if the Bill is found not to operate in a satisfactory manner a further Bill will be introduced to make it compulsory.
THE EARL OF MAYO: As I had the honour of moving the Second Reading of this Bill in the absence of the noble Earl, Lord Shaftesbury, perhaps I may say one or two words. With regard to the case of foot-and-mouth disease to which the noble Lord opposite referred, I am certain that if there was foot-and-mouth disease in Ireland our Board of Agriculture would act in exactly the same drastic manner. As to making the Bill compulsory, the noble Earl has pointed out that we do things rather differently in Ireland. Had this Bill been made compulsory there might have been some difficulty in getting it through the House of Commons. We trust that the urban district councils will carry out the Bill, and I have every confidence that they will because in Ireland we are fighting tuberculosis very zealously and there is a strong public opinion on the matter which, I think, will assist in this Bill being efficiently carried out.
On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed.

LOSSES ON SMALL HOLDINGS.
THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK*THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK rose to ask the President of the Board of Agriculture whether his attention has been called to the serious loss sustained by certain tenants of small holdings provided by the Hampshire County Council under the Small Holdings Act, 1908; whether he is aware that the loss to the tenants owing to a storm which occurred in May last amounts practically to an entire year's rent of the holdings; whether under these circumstances there is any power on the part of the county council to make any remission or reduction of rent to the tenants who have so suffered, or whether, in the event of any such tenant being unable to pay the full rent of his small holding, the county council will be compelled by law to take proceedings for the recovery of the rent in order to protect the county ratepayers as far as possible against a loss in respect of any such small holdings; and whether the Board of Agriculture has any power under the Small Holdings Act, 1908, to make any contribution towards compensating tenants who have sustained the losses referred to.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, before asking the noble Earl the Question which stands in my name I wish to explain to your Lordships the circumstances which have led to difficulties with regard to certain tenants under the Hampshire County Council. My object in putting this Question is to obtain from the President of the Board of Agriculture an authoritative statement as to the powers which county councils legally possess of granting assistance in this and similar cases, and how far county councils would be justified in making use of those powers with respect to the obligation that is put upon them of seeing that in the creation of small holdings no loss shall fall upon the ratepayers. The story I have to tell is not a very long one, and I venture to think it is not altogether an uninstructive one. In the year 1909 the Small Holdings Committee to whom the county council of Hampshire delegated their powers considered that it was desirable, in order to provide land for certain applicants in the south-eastern part of the county to purchase a farm which had been offered to them. This farm consisted of 120 acres. It was favourably situated and the soil was suitable for market gardening, and being within eight miles of Portsmouth and of Gosport it had accessible markets for the produce of the small holders.
A scheme was accordingly submitted to the Board of Agriculture and approved by them, and the farm was eventually purchased by the county council at the price of £5,600. We have also spent £73 on redeeming the Land Tax and £75 on repairs and adaptation, and we are spending a further £420 in erecting two cottages on the farm which are now in course of construction. Subsequently a scheme for the adaptation and division of the land was submitted to the Board and approved by them, and the rent to be paid for the farm amounted to £311 17 s., or an average of £2 12 s. per acre over the whole of the farm. A certain number of tenants were found who were willing to accept the land on those terms, and they entered into occupation of the farm at Michaelmas, 1909. I think your Lordships will see that from the suitability of the land this farm seemed admirably adapted for the purpose for which it was acquired. The rent, I admit, was a full one, but that, I think, must inevitably be the case when local authorities acquire land which they subsequently let to small holders. I can only

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say that the rent that was put upon the land was the lowest possible rent that would recoup the county council for the expenses which they had incurred.
These tenants entered on the holdings with, I think, every prospect of success. I regret to say, however, that that has not been realised, and the purchase of this farm has been found to be satisfactory neither to the county council nor to the tenants. In the first year, unfortunately, swine fever broke out on the farm and forty pigs, the property of our tenants, were slaughtered, and although the tenants received compensation for those pigs they lost what is most valuable to those who grow market garden stuff, the manure which is necessary for maintaining the fertility of the soil. And then, although they did not have a bad season, the price of market garden produce was so low that in many cases it did not pay the small holders to send the stuff into the market. One tenant after a short experience gave up the land. Another of our tenants, who held rather a large holding, at the end of last year became bankrupt and thereby involved the County Council in a loss of £120, half of which, I trust, we shall succeed in obtaining from the Board of Agriculture through the good offices of my noble friend the President. The other tenants carried on through the year and paid their rent, and in May of last year it appeared that they had got through their difficulties of the preceding year and had every prospect of a good season.
But I am sorry to say that this was not to be. For on May 23 last a storm of exceptional violence visited that district and it so happened that the full brunt of this storm, which I believe was in the nature of a cloud break or waterspout, was unfortunately poured on the land in the occupation of our tenants. I received a report from the small holdings officer as to the great amount of damage that had been done. I took the earliest opportunity of myself inspecting the farm, and. if I had not seen it with my own eyes I really could hardly have believed that forty minutes' rain could have wrought such havoc. The crops were washed out of the ground, and the cabbages at the bottom of the hill were smothered and entirely covered over with potatoes and other crops which had been washed down from above. On the top of the hill the soil had been entirely washed away; all
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the poultry on the farm had been drowned; the gravel of the roads had been washed over the fields and a great part of the manurial value had been washed out of the ground. So violent was the downpour that it washed a plough a distance of 120 yards down the hill, and on the line of railway that runs at the bottom of the farm the train was stopped for a considerable time. I immediately instructed the small holdings officer to go into the question of the amount of loss which these small holders had sustained, and he has estimated the damage at £366, which, as your Lordships will observe, is considerably more than twelve months' rent of the farm.
I should like to say one word about the tenants on this land. They are—and I include the man who unfortunately went bankrupt—hardworking, industrious men with considerable experience and knowledge of market gardening, but like, I fear, a large number of small tenants under county councils, they have a very limited amount of capital. County councils are frequently accused of having little sympathy with applicants for small holdings and of exaggerating the amount of capital necessary to enable a man to take a small holding. I think those criticisms come from those who have not had much practical experience in regard to land. I can only speak from my own experience in my own county, but can honestly say that I do not think we are liable to that charge. On the contrary, I should say that if Small Holdings Committees are to be blamed at all it is rather for stretching a point in favour of the applicants and in many cases putting men on the land who have not sufficient capital to stand two or three bad seasons.
These unfortunate tenants of ours, owing to this storm, have lost a considerable part of the small capital which they put on the land, and it would appear to be almost impossible for them to pay, certainly to pay in full, the rent that becomes due at Michaelmas next. The question then arises, What are the Small Holdings Committee to do? I understand that the Board of Agriculture have no power to grant any assistance to these men from the Small Holdings Fund, and I take it that the county council would have no right to make any grant or loan to them. Therefore the question remains, What powers have the county council through their Small Holdings Committee of remitting the rent, or at any rate some

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portion of the rent, that will become due in a short time? I may say that the Small Holdings Committee, and I as chairman, feel a responsibility in this case in having put the men on the land, and therefore we desire to treat them with every possible consideration. At the same time we have to bear in mind the obligation that we have to the ratepayers in the matter. We have to remember that Mr. Harcourt, when he introduced this Bill in the House of Commons, stated that no part of the payment of rent was to fall on the rates. Lord Robson, who was then a Law Officer of the Crown, stated in the House of Commons that in his opinion the rates were most carefully guarded in this respect by the Act; and I observe that in the last Report of the Small Holdings Commissioners it is stated that county councils are bound to see that the creation of holdings does not result in a loss which will fall on the rates. Therefore our position with regard to these tenants appears to me to present considerable difficulties.
I have seen it stated—I do not know whether the President of the Board of Agriculture agrees—that county councils should act towards their tenants in the same way that a just and liberal landlord would treat his tenants in similar circumstances. It is hardly necessary for me to point out to your Lordships that there is a vast difference between the position of an individual landowner and the position of a local authority which holds land as trustee of the ratepayers. The individual landlord, of course, if he so wishes, can deal most liberally with his tenants. He can make them an advance of money by loan, he can remit part of their rent, or reduce their rent permanently at his own expense. But county councils are in a perfectly different position and possess no similar powers; and I do not think it will be contended, however much the county council may sympathise with men in this position, that they have any right whatever to exercise their benevolence by putting their hands into the pockets of the ratepayers.
Then I know we may be told that this is an exceptional case and therefore may be treated in an exceptional manner. I do trust it is an exceptional case. But there are many other circumstances which are not exceptional and of which we have all
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had experience, such as the failure of crops through bad weather, or the loss of animals in consequence of disease, which may easily put county council tenants in precisely as difficult a financial position as our tenants find themselves in at the present moment. I should like to know what county councils are to do when they find that their tenants are unable to pay their rent through no fault of their own. Landlords have in the past behaved very generously to tenants in those circumstances, but I should like to know what the view of the Board of Agriculture is as to what county councils should do in similar circumstances. Are county councils to insist on the payment of the rent, and, if the tenants are unable to pay, to put them out of the land? And are they to put on the land other applicants who they have on their books and who possess a little capital? Or, on the other hand, are they to act the benevolent landlord at the expense of the ratepayers? I can only say that if the Board of Agriculture favour the latter view the ratepayers of the country should recognise that sooner or later—I think it may be rather sooner than later—they will have out of the rates to produce money m order to keep these small tenants on the land.
These are questions of considerable importance to county councils, to the ratepayers whom they represent, and to the tenants who occupy the land. I hope that my noble friend will be able to tell me what the Small Holdings Committee of the Hampshire County Council ought to do in the circumstances which I have endeavoured to describe with regard to these tenants; and I should be grateful to him if he would go rather further than that, and indicate what he considers the general principles should be on which county councils should deal with those cases of tenants who, through no fault of their own, find themselves unable to pay the rents when they become due. I beg to ask the noble Earl the Question that stands in my name.
THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (EARL CARRINGTON): My Lords, I was somewhat comforted by the conclusion of the noble Earl's speech. He began by asking me what would be the powers of county councils in certain circumstances, and then he went onto describe a most lamentable catastrophe that had happened to a farm which he described as admirably suited for the

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purpose of small holdings. The tenants on this farm seem to be persecuted by misfortune. They lost their pigs the first year. In the second year one of their number went bankrupt, though I do not think that is a solitary incident either in the case of a small farmer or a large farmer. The noble Earl stated that the rest were doing fairly well, and he paid them no doubt a just compliment in saying that they were a hard-working and industrious body of men, the unfortunate man who went bankrupt included. Then he went on to tell us that small holders would not be able to stand three or four bad seasons. I should think very likely not. I do not know many farmers who could. If a man has three or four bad seasons running, it must necessarily cripple him to some extent. The noble Earl went on to say that the storm to which he referred destroyed this farm, and he also mentioned his own personal responsibility in having put these persons on the land. I think every fair-minded man would acquit him of any responsibility on that score, as no one could possibly have foreseen such a calamity as a deluge of such violence as to wash a plough 120 yards and to wash away the soil of the farm. I think the case is a very exceptional and a very sad one, and I believe that such a thing will not easily happen again in England whatever may happen in Australia and other countries where they are exposed to devastation by floods.
The noble Earl asked me whether there was any power on the part of county councils to make a remission or reduction of rent to tenants who suffer in this way. The noble Earl knows as well as I do that under the Act there are no funds out of which the Board can help these tenants. As regards the remission or reduction of rent the position I am informed on the best authority is that the county council can use their discretion as to the time which should be allowed for payment by those from whom payment may reasonably be expected in course of time, but they are not entitled out of the rates to assist their tenants by contributing in any way towards making up their loss. I think everybody will agree with that. If I had tried to insert any such provision in the Small Holdings Bill, there would have been no earthly chance of my ever seeing a Bill of that sort on the Statute Book. Then the noble Earl asked me what the general principles are. In some cases—I hope not in many—the
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county council may find that the finances of their tenants are exhausted, and that recovery of the rent is impracticable. In such cases, they might accept a surrender of the tenancy, and if the tenant, by the assistance of his friends or of any enactment that we may hereafter pass, can obtain the necessary capital to start a fresh tenancy, the council might then help the industrious and hard-working man by reletting the holding to him at a fair rent, having regard to any injury that might have been done to the land in such an exceptional case as the noble Earl has laid before the House. As the Board of Agriculture approved of the scheme tinder which these holdings were provided, it is possible that the Board will have to share with the county council their loss under the scheme, and if the council act on the lines suggested the Board will, of course, most readily and liberally accept any liability that might arise by such action. As I have already privately informed the noble Earl, everybody must consider this an exceptional case, one of real hardship and one in which I firmly believe not only the public but the House of Lords will be glad to assist.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Why the House of Lords?
EARL CARRINGTON: As owning one-third of the land of England. I am sure the House of Lords would respond to any appeal of this sort. I am obliged to the noble Earl for having brought the matter forward, and I hope that this discussion may pave the way for an appeal for subscriptions, and I am sure no more worthy object could be found for public benevolence.
THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK: Do I understand the noble Earl to say that the county council would have no power of remitting the rent in these circumstances—that is, of wiping it off—but that their only power would be to postpone the payment of the rent if they thought the tenant would eventually be able to pay it?
EARL CARRINGTON: Yes, that is the case. They will have to cut their losses. But if there was any chance of a man going on in his holding, they have every right to postpone the payment of rent in that case.
LORD LAMINGTON: I hope the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack will take to heart this illustration of the working of his favourite panacea of putting people back on the land.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD LOREBURN): I do not know to what the noble Lord refers.
LORD LAMINGTON: The noble and learned Lord has often made speeches on the value of getting people back on the land as a means of arresting destitution in the country.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I have never made a speech of that kind. All I did was, when a Bill for Scotland was before the House on Second Reading, to state that it ought to be discussed for the reason, among others, that the best people were leaving the land and coming into the towns. I cannot understand why I have been brought into this discussion.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I think the House is indebted to my noble friend for the extremely interesting account which he has given us of this episode in the history of what may prove to be a typical case of small holdings. It is, of course, perfectly true, as the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture has told us, that this catastrophe was an exceptional one. I suppose there are many chances to one against a similar cloud-burst taking place in the centre of a patch of allotments; but, as my noble friend truly said, it is not only these exceptional risks which small holders have to run. There are the everyday risks of country life with which we are all familiar—epidemics of disease such as swine fever, which the noble Earl particularly mentioned, and which sometimes play havoc amongst allotment holders. Then you may have two or three bad seasons following. I think the noble Earl said it was inconceivable that there should be such a succession of bad seasons. At any rate we can carry our minds hack to a succession of bad seasons in the seventies, when half the farmers in the country would have gone bankrupt if they and their landlords had not stood shoulder to shoulder and made arrangements for tiding over the crisis.
What is important is that we have elicited distinctly from the noble Earl that in cases of this kind the only thing which
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the county council can do is to give time to the tenants who have sustained these losses, although I think he indicated that to some extent the Board of Agriculture was prepared to share the loss with the county councils. I think that is a new development. I do not remember having been told of it before. But the moral, I think, of the whole affair is to enforce what so many of us have ventured to urge from this side of the House. We are in no way hostile to the policy of small holdings, but what we do desire is that that policy should be pursued with the greatest caution possible, and, above all, that men should be chosen who are known to have at any rate a moderate amount of capital with which to work their holdings. But if the kind of policy which I understand the noble Earl advocates of creating small holdings indiscriminately all over the country and in defiance of the better judgment of the county councils who really know what the local circumstances are is pursued I am afraid you will find that the county councils will be saddled with a large number of tenants with perhaps not too much knowledge and with not nearly enough capital, who on the first touch of misfortune will go bankrupt, involving a serious loss to the ratepayers, and possibly, as we now understand, to the taxpayers as well. I am therefore glad that my noble friend has laid this matter fully before the House.
THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: The noble Earl made one remark which I did not quite understand, and which no doubt he will be able to explain. He said that county councils had no power to abate any portion of the rent in any circumstances, but at a later stage in his speech he said, "Of course, they have to cut their losses," and he also said that the Board of Agriculture would be prepared to share their losses with them. I should like to know under what provision of the law the Board of Agriculture will be able to share losses with the county councils, and out of what fund the money will come.
EARL CARRINGTON: Out of the Small Holdings Fund. I have got £100,000.
THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: Has the Board of Agriculture power to apply that Fund to any purpose that it likes?
EARL CARRINGTON: To any purpose under the Act. It is all in the Act if the noble Earl will refer to it.

THE ADEN HINTERLAND
LORD LAMINGTON LORD LAMINGTON had the following Notice on the Paper—"To ask the Secretary of State for India what are the reasons that determine the policy of His Majesty's Government to prevent railway construction in the Aden Hinterland." The noble Lord said: When I recently asked a Question bearing on this subject the noble Viscount could not on that occasion be in his place. I was not given any explanation why the Government adopted such a non possumus action in regard to this matter. Perhaps the noble Viscount will be able to give me some reason now.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (VISCOUNT MORLEY): My Lords, I am afraid I cannot acid anything in substance to what has already been said on this subject by my noble friend behind me. I quite understand the interest that Lord Lamington takes in this matter. He and I were concerned at the same time in Indian administration. But I do rather wonder that he should think it necessary to raise the question in the form he does, because he is really well aware—nobody in England is better aware than he is—of the line of policy which, wisely or unwisely, His Majesty's Government determined to adopt at the time when Lord Lamington was Governor of Bombay. That policy has up to this point worked most successfully. I am not sure that we were fortunate enough to have the approval of the noble Lord, but he will be glad to know that in our view and in the view of the Government of India to-day—though perhaps less so at the time—and in the opinion of my noble friend Lord Crewe, that policy has thoroughly justified itself. It is part of that policy, as the noble Lord well knows, that we should avoid entangling ourselves in any responsibility in that wild region the Hinterland of Aden. That was the old policy. Then, for good reasons or bad, the Government of which Lord Curzon was at the head in India took another view. Then we reverted to the older view; and it was part of that policy that we should not entangle ourselves in any responsibility by anything like railway construction, nor should we encourage other people to entangle themselves, and us consequentially, in any such responsibilities. I do not believe that I can add anything to the general line of argument with which my
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noble friend is thoroughly familiar. It is true that the Turkish authorities are encouraging surveys in their own territories—that is to say, in the territory north of the line which was drawn and accepted at the time when my noble friend was Governor of Bombay; but that is no reason at all for our encouraging British subjects or any others in making lines to meet the Turkish line if it is ever constructed. So long as the Turkish line does not violate the line of demarcation settled at the time I am referring to, it cannot be to our interests to permit those for whom we should be ultimately responsible to embark in railway construction. The noble Lord asks for reasons. Those are the reasons. They are plain, and they lie on the surface of the policy which has been adopted, and we see no reason whatever to go back upon them.
LORD LAMINGTON: I wish to thank the noble Viscount for his courteous reply. Though I was aware that those circumstances then dictated his policy, still I maintain that the Government cannot for ever take up a dog-in-the-manger attitude and say, "We are not going to do anything ourselves and we are not going to let anybody else do anything." You cannot suppose that you are for ever to prevent a district over which you have assumed some responsibility being opened up and developed in a way in keeping with ordinary civilisation. I believe there have been railway projects put before the Government of India or the Government of Bombay for the purpose of opening up the Aden Hinterland. The responsibility to be assumed by His Majesty's Government would not be pecuniary. It would only be, I presume, in the keeping of good order. I think the noble Viscount exaggerates the character of any disorder that is likely to take place in the Aden Hinterland. The people there are not warlike. Their actual warfare consists of a few people out of each village getting behind rocks and trees and taking pot-shots at their opponents. Possibly a few people are killed, but after a week or two of these operations the war is over. I submit that we cannot for ever assume this non possumus attitude of not allowing the country to be developed by other people. The Government, as I say, would incur no responsibility except that of keeping order, which is a risk of the most remote kind.

THRIFT AND CREDIT SOCIETIES BILL. [H.L.]
[SECOND READING.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY: My Lords, your Lordships were kind enough last session to refer to a Select Committee a Bill dealing with the subject-matter of the Bill of which I am moving the Second Reading. Ample evidence was heard by that Committee from all those best qualified to speak on the subject. Their Report is now in your Lordships' hands, and it is upon that Report and the recommendations contained therein that this Bill has been drafted. I may say that I should have introduced this Bill long ago had I not been led to understand that the Government had the matter in hand and were shortly going to make a move in this direction with the idea of introducing a Bill which I hoped would meet the requirements indicated in my Bill of last year. We waited some time, and our powers of waiting being exhausted I thought there was no better course to pursue than to proceed with this Bill independent of any Government measure, and I think there is ample justification for this procedure from the fact that the Government Bill has only just been brought in. And now that we have seen it in print we find that its operations are confined entirely to England, and that the other parts of the United Kingdom, where an amendment of the law is urgently required, are left out altogether. I do not wish to discuss the Government Bill to-day. It would be premature to do so, and there will be opportunities for criticism when that Bill comes up for Second Reading. But I should like to hazard this opinion, an opinion in which I hope the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture will concur—namely, that there is nothing in these two Bills to make them run counter one to the other. There is nothing in them to clash, and if both Bills become law those who are interested in setting up these thrift and credit societies will have the choice of two systems, both of which I believe are sound, and in every way I think it would be an advantage to have the two systems. But, of course, the noble Earl will forgive me if I say that I prefer the existing machinery and this Bill which proposes to improve upon it.
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I will first explain what are the needs which this Bill is intended to meet, and then I propose to show how the Bill meets them. But I would like first to say that this Bill does not seek for powers to set up or establish thrift and credit societies. There is apt to be a little confusion on this point. These powers have existed for a great many years past. The Irish Agricultural Organisation Society, as far back as 1894, hearing of the success of these small agricultural banks on the Continent—which banks were created for the purpose of undermining the power and tyranny of the usurer and moneylender—made a special study of the systems in vogue on the Continent and finally the Raffeissen system was selected. I do not wish to enlarge upon the reasons for which that system was chosen. There is not time to go into it now. Nor do I wish to weary your Lordships by going into the different systems that exist on the Continent. Suffice it for me to say that the Raffeissen system is the most popular of all, and under that system a number of poor men, powerless to offer individually any degree of security to a banker or a capitalist, join together and create by union greater credit than they could offer individually. The Raffeissen system having been selected by the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society, it was found necessary to register these societies under the Friendly Societies Act, and powers were given for this purpose by the Treasury in the year 1898, and the machinery was further greased and helped along in 1899 by the Act introduced and passed by Sir Horace Plunkett. So you will observe that the machinery for setting up these thrift and credit societies has been in existence for many years past, and is applied to the whole of the United Kingdom. This Bill is to improve the existing machinery, to make it more elastic, and we propose to do this upon the lines recommended in the Report of the Select Committee of last year.
The needs which this Bill is intended to meet are shortly these. First of all, incorporation. When these thrift and credit societies are registered under the Friendly Societies Act they have, not being incorporated societies, to act through trustees. They cannot sue or be sued, and this is a very cumbersome and tiresome procedure. Under the Indian Act, passed by Lord Curzon in 1904 when he was Viceroy of India to enable thrift and credit banks to exist in India, these banks become ipso

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facto incorporated societies, and wherever there is machinery set up in the different parts of the Indian Empire for providing these societies they are always ipso facto incorporated societies. We only claim for the United Kingdom the privilege which exists in India. I do not think there is any really valid objection to incorporation being granted to these societies. You will find that the Select Committee, in Paragraph 9 of their Report, unanimously recommend that these societies should have incorporation so as to enable them to sue and be sued and to hold property in their registered names. Provision is made in Clause 3 of this Bill to meet this requirement. Clause 4 is a necessary corollary to Clause 3.
Having dealt with the need of incorporation we come to trading. We ask that trading powers should be granted to these thrift and credit societies, which at present are restricted entirely to banking business. Unless power is given to trade there is no alternative but to form a separate society under the Industrial and Provident Societies Act, which does give power to trade. This is also a rather cumbersome and troublesome procedure. The whole success of the cooperative movement depends upon getting men voluntarily to combine, and when you have got them to combine you should not surround them with niceties of law. They find it almost impossible to understand why they can act under one Act—namely, the Friendly Societies Act—and then in order to do something else have to study the Industrial and Provident Societies Act. Then it is asked why cannot two societies be formed in the same district, one for banking purposes and the other for trading purposes. In the backward and poorer districts of Ireland it is found sometimes impossible to get more than one efficient committee or set of officers; to find two would be impossible. So we suggest that the committee should be entrusted not only with banking powers but also with trading powers.
I know there is great diversity of opinion on this question. The Select Committee of your Lordships' House went most thoroughly into the question, and weighed most carefully all the evidence they could get on the point. Amongst others we had the evidence of Sir George Murray, whose severance from the Treasury I am sure your Lordships all regret. Sir George Murray stated that he saw no fundamental objection
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to permitting thrift banks to be carried on together with trading—of course subject to certain safeguards; and the safeguards he suggested were that you would have to restrict very closely the area in which these unlimited societies act, and that the question of unlimited liability would have to be thoroughly safeguarded also. We propose to do both of these things in this Bill. You will see in Clause 5 that rules are provided for restricting the area in which these societies can operate, and subsection (a) says that the rules of a thrift and credit society shall provide that it shall carry on business only within such area as may be specified in the rules, not exceeding ten miles from the registered office of the bank. We also suggest that separate accounts shall be kept of trading transactions. I think there is no real cause for alarm with regard to these trading powers.
Then comes the need of setting up central societies. Having encouraged individuals to co-operate and form small societies of their own, you have to go a step further and get those societies when they are formed to federate into a central society. This is done in all co-operative movements, and we suggest that it should be done in the thrift and credit co-operative movement. In this case the central society has certain functions allotted to it which are clearly set out in the Bill. If your Lordships will look at Clause 7 you will find that the central society has for its object the receipt of deposits and the creation of funds to be lent out to thrift and credit societies, and generally to assist the working and development of such societies; and the thrift and credit societies may hold shares and make deposits in and become members of such central society. There is provision for a certain amount of inspection and auditing of the accounts of these societies. This is a point to which I know Lord Welby attaches great importance, and rightly so. He may not be satisfied with the provisions in the Bill to meet this point, and, if so, no doubt he will offer criticisms and I hope suggestions on the point. At the same time I think that we must be careful not to have too rigid a system of inspection with regard to these societies or an undue amount of interference on the part of the Government or anybody else which would be inclined to be looked upon with suspicion by the members of the society. I hope and believe the Bill does make good and sufficient provision for the auditing of the accounts of these

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societies. Those are the three needs which this Bill is framed to meet.
All the other clauses are fairly straight. forward. Clause 10 deals with the liability of past members of a society at the dissolution of the society, and Clause 11 is to prevent a contingeney which might occur—namely, a society might be set up and reserve funds got together simply for the purpose, when there is a good surplus fund available, of breaking up the society and sharing out alike. Therefore it is necessary to put in a provision that upon the dissolution of a thrift and credit society such funds should be devoted to an object of public utility in the area in which the society carried on its business. In suggesting central societies I would like to make it quite clear that those engaged in the banking business need take no umbrage in this matter. Indeed this proposal ought to facilitate the banking system. One of the most important banks in Germany has intimate relations and has come to a regular arrangement with two great cooperative unions, of which the Raffeissen Union is one, and I think the central societies might be a stepping stone between the small village credit societies and the banking system of this country.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Shaftesbury.)
EARL CARRINGTON: My Lords, I do not think anybody would complain of the noble Earl for introducing a Bill on a subject of which he is undoubtedly the pioneer in your Lordships' House. On the contrary, everybody who takes an interest in credit societies—and I believe their name is legion on both sides of the House—would congratulate him on having done so, and perhaps I may be allowed to congratulate him also on the lucid and plain manner in which he explained his somewhat intricate Bill. The noble Earl said that he had been waiting a long time for a Bill to come from this side of the House, and that he thought it his duty not to delay bringing his Bill forward any longer. I might say, in explanation of the apparent delay on our part, that it has been our object in all our land legislation not to rush it hastily before the public, but to try to build it up stone by stone and brick by brick and place it on an economic basis. We try to make it safe and practical, and we try to make it self-paying. That is the reason why, in a complex matter of this sort, we thought it right to consider the
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question very carefully before venturing to submit a Bill of this importance to your Lordships.
The noble Earl said he thought there was nothing in his Bill which ran counter to the Bill which I shall have the honour to ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading to on Tuesday next. I will not go into that. But I hope your Lordships will extend favourable consideration to my Bill, as the subject is of such importance that the Leader of the Opposition has himself asked the Government to grant facilities for its passage through both Houses. The noble Earl's Bill and my own Bill will both be of great use and assistance to those small holders who have been under discussion this afternoon on the Question put by Lord Northbrook, and perhaps I may be pardoned for saying one word on that subject. One would think, from what has been said on the opposite Benches, that small holdings were a new discovery. People ask, What in the name of fortune is to happen if these small holders are subject to bad seasons? It seems to be thought that small holdings are something new in England. On the contrary, before our Act was ever thought of there were a quarter of a million small holdings, 6,000 of which exist in Hampshire alone. In my wildest dreams I never could have hoped that I would get 6,000 small holdings in Hampshire during the two and a half years in which the Act has been in operation. Yet there are all these lamentations and prognostications of ruin! The great majority of the 6,000 small holders in Hampshire have gone through the bad times mentioned by Lord Lansdowne in the seventies and eighties. They have gone through the cattle plague and the outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease, and are still in existence at this moment. These croakings are really very far-fetched, and it is as well for the people of England to know that there is nothing new in the system of small holdings. They have existed for years and years and have been able to pay their way, and there is no reason to suppose that the new small holdings will be in any way less successful or less a boon than were the small holdings in days gone by.
Lord Shaftesbury in his Bill proposes that these societies should be started subject to what I think may be described as a rigid set of rules. If you look at pages 1 and 2 of the Bill you will see that the rules of

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a thrift and credit society shall provide quite a number of things—from paragraph (a) to paragraph (j). The noble Earl apparently contemplates that these societies should obtain money from a central authority registered under the Companies Consolidation Act, 1908. I venture to suggest to the noble Earl, as our experience is so very limited at the present time, whether it would not be better to avoid being so precise at the beginning. Would it not be better to allow plenty of latitude and allow these societies to develop naturally and in the way that is most suited to British conditions as experience may show? I quite agree that the noble Earl's Bill applies to Ireland and Scotland, and that my own Bill applies to England alone.
THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY: The noble Earl is mistaken in thinking that my Bill lays down a hard-and-fast rule that these banks are to obtain their money from the central society. Clause 7 only gives power to the central society to set up reserve funds, but there are many other ways in which thrift and credit societies could obtain working expenses, and probably the last persons they would go to would be the central society.
EARL CARRINGTON: The rules I was referring to are in Clause 5. I was not referring to the rules in Clause 7. One considerable advantage that this country possesses over other countries is in our great banking system, and I hardly think the noble Earl quite recognised that fact so as to utilise it as far as possible. One way, I think, in which his object might be attained would be by securing the confidence of the existing banking system by providing for a more independent audit, and one on which the banks could independently rely. By the noble Earl's Bill the audit of all these societies is to be made by some person connected with the society and not by an independent person. Then we hope to secure their co-operation by framing rules so as to satisfy the legitimate requirements of bankers. I think the most important thing which is left out of the noble Earl's Bill is that the Government should take some active part in the formation of such societies. I am all against, and never would have anything to do with, these great schemes of dipping one's hands into the pockets of the public Treasury and bringing out tens of millions for experimental objects, however good those objects may be; but I think that the Board of
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Agriculture should take an active part in the formation of these societies by paying the preliminary expenses, so as to provide them with a secretary, set them on their legs and help them through the most critical part of their life—that would be, of course, when they were first being formed. Perhaps the House would agree that the best coarse would be to proceed with the Government's Bill with its financial provisions first, and incorporate in it any provision from the noble Earl's Bill which it might; be desired to include. I venture to throw out that suggestion to the noble Earl. I need hardly repeat how very much we on this side of the House welcome his having brought forward a Bill on this most important subject, and we do not propose to offer any opposition to the Second Reading. We heartily welcome it as far as it goes as an earnest of the desire to come to some decision on a great policy which both sides of the House have at heart.
LORD WELBY: My Lords, I am very glad that the noble Earl has brought this measure to the Second Reading. I think, considering the time that the Bill has been before the House and the fact that it has been submitted to a carefully chosen Select Committee, it is very undesirable that there should be ally further delay in getting the opinion of this and the other House of Parliament upon the important provisions embraced within it. My noble friend below me (Lord Carrington) remarked on what he considered the rigid provisions of this Bill. I have looked carefully through these provisions, and I am afraid I cannot altogether agree with him. I think the provisions are in themselves not over-rigid, but such as are calculated to maintain and promote the credit of the banks established under them. My noble friend appears to think that these banks may interfere, or perhaps I should say be unpopular, with the ordinary banks of the country. The real fact is that the great stream of credit can never reach these small persons in villages, people who want a loan of a few pounds, and who have not enough credit of their own. One great merit in this Bill to my mind is the manner in which it encourages that spirit of self-help which has developed itself of late in Ireland. The noble Earl's Bill provides that districts should be formed and that the societies established in those districts should be limited to carrying on their business within

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those areas. The consequence is that all the members of the societies will be well known to each other, and I lay immense stress on the fact that they will be able to gauge the real credit of the humblest member of the society who comes to them for a loan. The loan so granted is one that could never be granted by a bank. No joint stock bank could go into an inquiry as to the credit of these humble persons.
We must all have been struck by the very great progress that has been made in Ireland within the last thirteen or fourteen years. The idea of co-operation has really taken root in Ireland, and the number of societies already created by the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society is remarkable. There have been established 357 dairy societies, 106 agricultural societies, and 268 of these credit societies, turning over between them a sum of between £2,000,000 and £3,000,000. I believe that the benefit which this system of co-operation is having in Ireland will be very much increased by the passing of this Bill. The Bill as the noble Earl introduced it last year was very carefully considered by Lord Mersey's Committee. That Committee carefully considered whether it was safe to allow these thrift and credit banks also to undertake cooperative trading. One of the great objects of the whole system of co-operation is that the bodies with whom money is deposited, who collect money for the purpose of making these loans, should have as many advantages as possible towards increasing those deposits; and it was conclusively proved before the Committee that trading co-operation, under certain proper limitations, might safely be entrusted to societies in small districts, especially when it was coupled with the condition that trading should only be carried on with the members of the society. I think, with the safeguards provided in the Bill, the power of trading might be extended to these banks, though I know that as a general rule it is not considered desirable that trading and banking should go together.
This country is exceedingly behindhand in this question of co-operation. We have only to look abroad to see what an enormous extension of co-operative trading has taken place. I believe there are no fewer than 17,000 of these trading societies in Germany. The great central Bank of Prussia, which was established almost on purpose to act
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as a central bank to the societies throughout the country, has an enormous capital and turnover. If you turn to France you find very much the same state of things. The Bank of France is obliged to lend £4,000,000 free of interest to the societies which carry out loans of this kind, and almost wherever you turn you find credit societies of this kind advancing small loans to humble agriculturists who cannot get the advantage of banking accounts or that acquaintance with bankers which would enable them to obtain small loans. I should like to see the same facilities extended throughout the agricultural districts of this country.
The audit question has been alluded to. I am not satisfied with the provision on that subject in this Bill. I need not allude to it now, because that is essentially a question for Committee, and it is one on which I feel certain the House would desire that proper precautions should be taken. One point I hope will not be lost sight of in connection with these measures. In Ireland the progress that has been made has been based on self-help almost entirely, and I look upon the progress which has been made there as one of the most promising signs of the times. I therefore trust that this Bill, and supplementary measures if necessary, may find favour with your Lordships and the other House of Parliament, in order that the principle of thrift and co-operation may be more fully availed of.
THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY: There is only one word I wish to say in reply to the observations of the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture. I would point out that the Bill permits outsiders to be elected by the societies for the purpose of inspection. And with regard to the noble Earl's criticism that it would be better to bring the Government into this Bill, I would remind him that the principle is to try and drive home to the people of this country the value of self-help and not to encourage them to look to the Government for everything.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

BISHOPRICS BILL. [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to order): Bill reported without amendment, and to be read 3a on Tuesday next.
House adjourned at half-past Six o'clock, till To-morrow, a quarter past Four o'clock.