Lords Sitting of 20 November 1911

SMALL LANDHOLDERS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
TOWNHEAD STREET (SHEFFIELD) BAPTIST CHAPEL CHARITY BILL.
Brought from the Commons.

GLASGOW AND SOUTH-WESTERN RAILWAY ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL.
To be printed. (No. 214.)
COPYRIGHT BILL.
Report of Amendments (which stands appointed for Monday next) put off to Monday the 4th of December.
SMALL LANDHOLDERS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
Read la; to be printed; and to be read 2a on Monday next (The Lord Pentland). (No. 215.)
TOWNHEAD STREET (SHEFFIELD) BAPTIST CHAPEL CHARITY BILL.
Read 1a, and to be printed. (No. 216.)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 7) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 10) BILL.
Read 3a (according to order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

PILKlNGTON'S DIVORCE BILL. [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to Order).
[THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 to 5 agreed to.
Clause 6:
6. It shall not be lawful for the said Dorothy Pilkington to intermarry with the said John Richards, and any such marriage shall be null and void.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (EARL LOREBURN): My Lords, I move, in accordance with custom, that this clause be omitted.
Amendment moved-—
Leave out Clause 6.—(Earl Loreburn.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
The Report of Amendment to be received To-morrow.

THE TERRITORIAL FORCE.
THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH*THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH rose to ask the Secretary of State for War—
The Territorial Force.
1. What was the strength of the Force on 1st October, 1911.
2. What was the number of officers, non commissioned officers, and men of the Territorial Force who were absent from camp training in 1911 (Permanent Staff excluded).

(a) What was the number of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men who attended camp training for one week only during 1911.

(b) The number who attended for two weeks.

(c) The number who did not attend camp training at all.

3. Of those whose engagements expired on 30th September, 1911, how many re-engaged for further service in the Territorial Force.
4. What was the number of recruits taken during the three years ended 30th September, 1909, 30th September, 1910, and 30th September, 1911, respectively.
5. What is the number of non-commissioned officers and men whose ages are under 19.
6. How many men fired the standard test on an open range during the last musketry year. Of those, how many qualified; how many failed to qualify.
Imperial Yeomanry.
7. In the latest Yeomanry Training Returns how many horses are there shown under the heading "Own," or "Relatives."
8. Territorial Horse and Field Artillery Batteries: Are these batteries marked for "fire tactics" at annual practice. How many of these batteries carried out annual practice in 1911.
9. What percentage does this represent of the total number of Territorial Horse and Field Batteries.
10. What was the total cost of the Yeomanry and Volunteers for the year ended 31st March, 1906.
11. What was the total cost of the Territorial Force for the year ended 31st March, 1911.
12. What is the number of officers who have resigned their Commissions during the year ended 30th September, 1911; and the number of new officers who have joined the Force during the same period.
13. How many officers are there on the Returns of the Territorial Force who are not resident in the United Kingdom.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, in putting this somewhat, I fear, rather long list of Questions to the noble Viscount the Secretary of State for War, I have no desire to occupy your Lordships' time with any lengthy speech, but I should like, by way of preface, to remind your Lordships that since its inception the responsibility of the Territorial Force has been considerably increased—that is to say, judging from the statements of official and responsible people, it is asked to perform duties far exceeding those which were originally demanded of it. I feel I must again remind your Lordships of the last authoritative statement that we had from the Committee of Imperial Defence. The Prime Minister, as the Chairman and speaking on behalf of that Committee, made this statement in the House of Commons—
"With regard to the military aspect it is, in consequence of the finding of this Committee, the business of the War Office to see that we have under all circumstances a properly organised and properly equipped Force capable of dealing effectively with a possible invasion of 70,000 men."
If language means anything at all, "under all circumstances" means when the Expeditionary Force or the Striking Force is out of the country, and "under all circumstances" must also cover the case of the Fleet being away. That is a very strong statement by the Prime Minister, and especially strong as it is the statement of the Chairman of the Committee of Imperial Defence. Since that pronouncement in the House of Commons we have had no words, official or non-official, issuing from that Committee altering, weakening, or changing that statement.
Since then the Secretary of State for War, speaking at Tranent in September of this year, made a statement which I maintain is entirely contrary to the view
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expressed by the Prime Minister. The noble Viscount said—
"If the Navy did its duty it was not probable that any considerable body of aggressors would get here."
The object of my Questions is to obtain information, so that we may be able to form some sober estimate of the facts and the condition of the Territorial Army. If in the view of the Secretary of State it is not probable that any considerable body of aggressors could get here, the original statement of the Prime Minister that we have to provide against an invasion of 70,000 men is not accurate; on the other hand, if we are again to relapse into the "Blue-water School" view, I think it might be asked under these circumstances, if an invasion is not practicable, how many men will be required. And if it is not probable that we shall have to encounter an invasion, why then should we talk of even the considerable number of men composing the Territorial Force of a strength of 260,000?
Around this question of the Territorial Force really hangs, if I may say so, a great deal of the value and efficacy of our whole original military scheme. We were to have—and that was a prominent feature as regards the Regular Army—a Striking Force of 166,000 men with six Divisions. Let us make a supposition. I confess I am I not inclined to think it is a reasonable supposition. But supposing we could send 166,000 men abroad in our Striking Force. We have to ask ourselves what would I remain behind to defend these shores. When this question was brought forward by me in July, 1910, Lord Crewe, speaking in reply to many noble Lords on this side of the House, made use of this very remarkable statement. He said—
"I cannot foresee a state of things which would make it imperative to send the whole of the six Divisions out of the country at one moment."
Had the noble Marquess been able to be in his place this evening, I should have liked to ask him whether in July and August of this year he still held the view that a state of things did not exist in which it might be imperative, in order to maintain the balance of power in Europe and to assert the rights of this country, that we should be able to land on the Continent a Striking Force and to send that Striking Force out of the country at once. In fact, my Lords, if the Striking Force cannot be sent out at once, but only in driblets, it

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seems to me a farce and misleading to the public to speak of its being a striking force at all.
Then there is another point of view as regards the purport of these Questions. I do not myself believe that with a country like this, governed and controlled as we are by public opinion and to a great extent in times of crisis by public excitement—I do not believe that the country would allow the whole of the Striking Force to leave these shores and leave the country utterly denuded of all Regular troops. There is one other point. The Secretary of State for War said at Tranent that he would use the Territorial Force for what it is worth the first day of war. Now that is a strong and a bold statement, and my Questions are put to attempt, if that is so, to elicit the worth of the Territorial Force on the first day of war in strength, in efficiency, and in mobility.
I propose, with your Lordships' kind indulgence, to go through the list of Questions which stand in my name on the Paper. In my first Question I ask the noble Viscount what was the strength of the Territorial Force on October 1, 1911. In the second Question I ask for the number of officers, non-commissioned officers and men of the Territorial Force who were absent from camp training in 1911, Permanent Staff excluded. As regards the number of officers, non-commissioned officers and men who attended camp training for one week only during 1911, I am informed that figures were given to Colonel Sandys—no doubt the noble Viscount will confirm this when he replies—showing that the number was, in round figures, 76,500. As regards the number who attended for two weeks the figure was given at 155,000. Now I come to a very remarkable and, I must confess, a most unsatisfactory condition of things. In reply to Question (c)—the number who did not attend camp training at all—it was stated in reply to Colonel Sandys that this number amounted to 33,500. That represents twelve per cent. of the whole Force, and in that connection I cannot help remembering what the noble Viscount himself said on March 4, 1907. Speaking of the Bill which was then before the House of Commons, the Secretary of State said he hoped the men would fake a good long camp in the autumn. He said—
"In a mild way we have made camp compulsory. That seems a drastic thing to do, but it is absolutely essential."
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I am sure that is good sense and perfectly true. The maximum of training under the Territorial conditions is not a burdensome or a great one, and to say that there shall be no camp training at all, as is practically the case with these 33,500 men, reduces their service to a farce.
I now come to Question 3. My object in asking for the number of men whose engagements expired on September 30 last and who re-engaged for further service in the Territorial Force is this. If these men re-engaged in such very large numbers, I cannot understand what happens, say, to the Territorial Reserve. With regard to Question 4, I have been able to extract some rather remarkable figures from the Annual Army Report I find that for the half year 1908 the number of Territorial recruits was 39,000. Then came the boom in the Daily Mail, which did great service, and in the year 1909 the number of recruits sprang up to 110,000; but for the year 1910, which are the last figures that I have, the number of Territorial recruits dropped again to 42,000, which is very little more than for the half year in 1908. Then I come to Question 5—the number of non-commissioned officers and men whose ages are under nineteen. It will be very interesting to hear what the Secretary of State has to say upon that. In Question 6 I ask how many men fired the standard test on an open range during the last musketry year, and, of those, how many qualified and how many failed to qualify. I have not got very much to say as regards that, except that I should like to call your Lordships' attention to the fact that the standard test is not at all a high one. The distance is 100 yards, the number of rounds 23, the maximum of points 97, and the qualification is only 30 points.
Now I come to Question 7, in regard to the Imperial Yeomanry. I ask how many horses are shown in the latest Yeomanry training returns under the heading "Own" or "Relatives." The object of that Question is to ascertain in the case of mobilisation how many horses would be available. In Question 8 I ask whether the Territorial Horse and Field Artillery batteries are marked for "fire tactics" at annual practice. I see so many military experts here that I feel it to be presumptuous in me to mention anything on this subject, but there may be other of your

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Lordships who are not experts on this subject, and perhaps I may remind them of the fact that the Artillery practice is divided into three classes—first, fire tactics, which, speaking concisely, means the selection of the position and getting the guns into the position; secondly, fire discipline, which implies the handling of the battery after the guns are in position; and, thirdly, fire effect, which means the effect on the target. In all these three points a Regular battery has to be efficient. I want to know how this relatively applies to the Territorial Horse and Field Artillery batteries. As regards the second part of Question 8—how many of these batteries carried out annual practice in 1911—I am assured by all those who have personal experience in this matter that annual practice is most essential, in fact, is absolutely essential for any kind of efficiency at all. I do not think Question 9 is quite as clear as it should be. What it means is, What is the number of these batteries which earned out annual practice.
As to Questions 10 and 11, the Secretary of State told us at Birmingham that the cost of the Volunteer was £7 and the cost of the Territorial £11. That is a very interesting and significant fact, and I cannot help in regard to that calling your Lordships' attention to the number of men who did not attend camp at all. Taking the cost of the Territorial at £11, I arrive at this fact, that the cost of the 33,500 men who never attended camp amounted to £368,000, and it seems to me that a great part, if not the whole, of that money was completely wasted. I have nothing to say upon Question 12, and as regards Question 13 I want to be assured that there are no officers on the return of the Territorial Force who are not resident in the United Kingdom. For that purpose I ask how many officers there are on the returns of the Territorial Force who are not resident in the United Kingdom. I beg to put the Questions standing in my name.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (VISCOUNT HALDANE): My Lords, the noble Earl touched, among other things, upon events which he thinks happened recently, and on those he will not expect me to speak. If he has any Questions upon them, they should be addressed to the head of the Government. But he touched also on a number of
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questions relating to the Territorial Force on which it is my duty to give him as full information as I can. He spoke of the responsibility of the Territorial Force and of that responsibility as an increased responsibility. I do not think it is an increased responsibility. It is the same responsibility as existed when he so ably carried out the duties of Under-Secretary of State for War in Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's Government and dealt with the scheme. I can tell him broadly nothing new but what has already been stated publicly. I will sum up, and put into form the functions which the Territorial Force is designed to fulfil. Here they are, and I will state them in words which represent the advice furnished to me by the body on which I always rely for shaping policy—the General Staff.
I am advised by the General Staff that from their point of view the important thing is the organisation in suitable units of a Force sufficient to provide for three things, and I ask the noble Earl's attention to this, because on the accurate comprehension of it depends the answer to a good deal of what he said. The first of these three things is coast defence; the second is defence against raids on a comparatively small scale—that is to say, raids by a small force of 2,000 or so which may slip past the Fleet; and the third is the formation of a Central Force capable of reinforcing the local forces required for defence against these raids, and also capable of dealing with attack on a larger scale. The maximum strength of an attacking force of this nature has, for purposes of calculation and comparison—we wish to be on the safe side—been assumed to be 70,000 men. That is the standard up to which we wish to prepare. But I may observe that, according to the considered views of the Admiralty, which were expressed and published last January, no force of anything approaching that strength could possibly land on these shores. That is the considered Admiralty view.
Dealing first with coast defence, for which we make provision, we rely, to begin with, on the Regular Royal Garrison Artillery and Royal Engineers, who are required to man fixed defences. Next we rely on the Special and Extra Reserve battalions, which, when they have absorbed the unfit left behind by Line battalions and the surplus Regular Reservists, will

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amount to 100,000 in all ranks. These Special Reserve battalions are small in time of peace, but the Extra Reservists and the other additions swell up these third battalions in many cases to 1,100and 1,200. We also rely for coast defence on certain technical units of the Territorial Force raised locally in defended ports and trained there. The Army Troops battalions and a few batteries from certain Divisions of the Territorial Force are also allotted to garrison duties.
Now I come to the second heading—defence against raids on a comparatively small scale; and this implies that we should have troops along the coast for the purpose, of repelling these raids and being in superior force when they come, and, above all, being able to hold them until the Central Force can come up. For that purpose we have assigned eleven Mounted Brigades and ten Divisions of the Territorial Force. As regards the third heading—the formation of a Central Force—three Mounted Brigades and four Divisions of the Territorial Force are originally allotted, and in the event of serious attack this Force would be augmented by Mounted Brigades and Divisions forming part of the local forces as soon as the main point of attack had been determined. Arrangements are also made to include in the Central Force two Divisions of the Regular Army if, when the necessity for taking expeditionary action arises, the Territorial Force is not considered capable of undertaking the duties of home defence without the aid of Regular troops. I do not think it is desirable to go further into the details of organisation for home defence.
As regards the case which the noble Earl put of the Expeditionary Force being abroad, it is the business of those who are responsible for forming a judgment on that matter to consider the whole of the circumstances of each case, and in shaping their campaign to see how they stand. I would remind the noble Earl that if the Expeditionary Force was going away for a long time or distance, the Territorial Force would be adequately trained, because the Territorial Force must be embodied on the very day on which the Expeditionary Force is embodied.
THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: How about Belgium?—I mean if they had to go to Belgium.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: Assuming such a hypothetical case, it is the business of those who are responsible for the strategy of this country to see that proper dispositions are made, either that the whole of the Expeditionary Force does not leave or that the coast is so protected by the Fleet that the Expeditionary Force may safely leave. The view expressed in the Admiralty Memorandum points to the second alternative. But I do not think it either desirable or possible to lay these things down ahead. They are matters of military and naval strategy which must be decided in reference to the circumstances of the case arising. It is the duty of the General Staff, and it is what the General Staff exists for, to advise when certain steps can be safely taken and to advise when those steps cannot be taken. They may think it desirable to keep two Divisions at home, or they may not. Finally, it is considered that in certain contingencies the forces which would be now available for home defence in the absence of the Expeditionary Force are sufficient for the duties which they would be called upon to perform, although I entirely agree with the noble Earl that it would be more satisfactory if the Territorial Force was recruited to full establishment in peace. It may, however, be assumed that the ranks would rapidly be filled on a crisis arising. Moreover, we have now over 50,000 veterans on the list, of whom it is probable that we could count upon at any rate 15,000 or 20,000 active men to reinforce the Territorial Force, and these are men who would have valuable influence from the i fact that they are highly trained.
These forces, taken together, amount to the following total. If the Expeditionary Force is at home you have, of course, an enormous Army of nearly 600,000; but if the Expeditionary Force is away, if the whole of the six Divisions are away, you still have 100,000 in the Special Reserve battalions, and, taking the figures to-day of the Territorial Force, over 260,000 Territorials and probably from 15,000 to 20,000 National Reservists ready and willing to take their part; and with a considerable number of Regulars, including Garrison Artillery Engineers and the fighting units left over after the requirements of the Expeditionary? Force on mobilisation have been satisfied, there would be upwards of 400,000 troops at home. The standard which we have set ourselves to compare against is a

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possible invasion of 70,000. If the number is above 70,000, our superior Fleet would have a target which they would at once pierce and destroy, and if anything like 70,000 men came over the view of the Admiralty is that they would be in a similar position.
Look how we stand as regards 70,000 men. If 70,000 men were to come over they would be in this unhappy position, that with our superior Navy their lines of communication would be in danger. I do not know how many of your Lordships have studied these matters, but I. need hardly remind you that the last thing an enemy is likely to risk is the sending of any considerable body of troops with their lines of communication liable to be broken at any moment. That means they may do a certain amount of mischief, but they lose the great body of their troops. With 400,000 troops at home, organised in proper units, with an admixture of Regulars and Special Reservists, with Regular Garrison Artillery in the fixed positions, and with the formations which exist now, all I can say is that I think the last thing that is likely is that any enemy would risk the certain destruction of his Army of 70,000—that is, assuming he could get it here.
The great difference between the two views that obtain on this subject is this. The first lays stress on the deficiencies which exist to-day in the numbers of the Territorial Force, and treats the Territorial Force, organised in fourteen Divisions and fourteen mounted brigades, with their etceteras, as a huge Army which is to be marched to the field of action. If it were to be so, with their want of training, and to some extent affected by deficiency of numbers, the Territorial Force would be a most unwieldy body. But as I have explained, the Territorial Force is rather to be looked upon as a large reservoir, not of men, but of organised units, with auxiliary services, with their transport and everything as complete as we can make it, out of which is formed the Central Force, the real Striking Force, the Force which is there to swoop down on an invading force. In front of that, is the line of Territorial troops along the coast in the I various commands, and then the troops defending important positions, consisting of 100,000 Special Reservists, well-trained men containing among them a large pro-
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portion of Regular Reservists highly trained. That is the system, and the Central Force, which is organised partly of Territorial units and partly out o Regular units, is so designed as to make it as rapidly mobile as possible. The organisation of this Force has been a matter of the closest, attention for several years past, and I now believe it to exist in a condition of considerable efficiency.
It is quite true that the Territorial Force is unfortunately short of a good many men. It is five-sixths of its establishment. That is considerable; but still it is between 40,000 and 50,000 men short, I wish that it were fuller. It ought to be fuller. It could be fuller. I know districts in London where people are keen about the Territorial Force, where they work, and where the Territorial units are in consequence up to establishment and in an efficient condition. I know other districts of the country where nobody takes any great interest in the Territorial Force, and where as a result things are slack. I know Territorial commanders who have put their backs into the matter, and not only have their full number of men, but have waiting lists. But there are other commanding officers—and, unfortunately, in this great city of London there are some—who take the view that they have only to lie on their backs and the apples will somehow fall into their mouths. But people must work. The great bulk of the commanding officers of the Territorial Force and their stairs do work, otherwise we should not have got five-sixths of the establishment as we have at present. But, as I say, there are others who take a more easy-going view of their duty. I hope those will be stiffened up before long, and that people will recognize that the Territorial Army can only be kept alive by patriotism and the energy which patriotism inspires.
Then there are a number of people—some of your Lordships, I think, among them—who say, "Oh, it is ridiculous to try and organise a Territorial Force on a voluntary basis; what we want is compulsory service." Assuming that you do want compulsory service, how soon are you likely to get it I Are you agreed upon it? Is any large party in the country likely to influence an election on your Side? And if you have to wait years before you convert people to your views, what are you to do in the meantime?

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One would have thought that these considerations would have led those who favour compulsory service to say, "Any-how, in the meantime let us do all we can to recruit the Territorial Force up to its strength." But there are many who take a different view, and who go about advising people not to enlist in the Territorial Force. I have no doubt that the, as I think, misplaced services of these men have cost the Territorial Force between 20,000 and 30,000 men by this discouragement. There can be no doubt about the effect which the energies of the National Service League have had upon recruiting—
LORD NEWTON: The National Service League has brought in a great many recruits.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: The noble Lord has been an honourable exception to the general rule of the members of the National Service League. There are a good many people who have worked hard, but there are a large number who have taken an exactly opposite course, and have gone about preaching, "Do not join the Territorial Force. Let us get rid of this sham, and then let us get compulsory service." I think I heard the noble Lord opposite once say that the coming into existence of compulsory service would not be a thing of to-day or the day after. If people hold those sound views, then I should have thought the sensible course was to throw themselves with energy into stirring up the national spirit in favour of enlistment in the Territorial Force. Be that as it may, the Territorial Force stands to-day in this position. This year we had some 45,000 men who were due to go out. Over 25,000 of them re-engaged, and the, shortage was more than made up by new recruits. There were others who went to the Regulars and some who emigrated. Good trade always has an adverse effect, and the Territorial Force has suffered through the prosperity of these times. But you have, as I say, five-sixths of the Territorial Force, enough to give you the organisation which the General Staff desires, enough to provide the Central Force and to provide the coast defence force. I am far from saying that I do not want to get the rest. I should be thankful if I could get them, but there is no reason to sit down and despair at this moment about the Territorial Force. If people will only throw their energy into it in the way that is being
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done in many parts of the country, the Territorial Force would be very quickly up to establishment.
I will now turn to the specific Questions raised by the noble Earl. In Question I the noble Earl asks what was the strength of the Force on October 1, 1911. The strength of the Force on that date was 9,475 officers and 254,692 non-commissioned officers and men, and in addition there were 724 Royal Army Medical Corps officers of general hospitals and sanitary service available only on mobilisation, and 976 officers of the Officers Training Corps and Unattached List—a total of well over 265,000. The reply to Question 2 is that the numbers present in camp for fifteen days and over were—Officers, 6,975; noncommissioned officers and men, 148,318. Those who attended for eight days and less than fifteen were—Officers, 1,011; non-commissioned officers and men, 75,523; and those who attended in camp for less than eight days were 63 officers and 330 non-commissioned officers and men. The totals are—Officers, 8,049; non-commissioned officers and men, 224,171. The numbers absent with leave were—Officers, 1,450; non-commissioned officers and men 25,317. The numbers absent without leave were—Officers, 41; non-commissioned officers and men, 6,703. Totals—Officers, 1,491; non-commissioned officers and men, 32,020. The noble Earl said that taking the cost of the Teiritorial at £11, the men who never attended camp must have cost £368,000; but I would point out that, being absent from camp, they were not paid.
The answer to Question 3 is that out of the 45,957 whose engagements were due to expire between October 1, 1910, and October 1, 1911, about 27,000 have reengaged for the following periods—for one year, 23,427; for two years, 2,004; for three years, 492; for four years, 1,036; total, 26,959. The numbers actually discharged on termination of engagement were 34·7 per cent. of those due to go, as against 35·8 per cent. last year. I now come to Question 4. The number of recruits taken was as follows: For the year ended September 30, 1909, 110,020; men enlisted with previous service, 10,573. For the year ended September 30, 1910, recruits 42,239; men enlisted with previous service, 3,391. For the year ended September 30, 1911, 39,086; men enlisted

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with previous service, 2,203. In Question 5 the noble Earl asks what is the number of non-commissioned officers and men whose ages are under nineteen. The number on October 1, 1911, was 32,494 out of 254,602—that is to say, 12·70 per cent. With reference to Question 6, the standard test can only be fired on an open range. The figures for 1910–11 will not be available till the end of the year, but the following are the figures for the musketry year 1909–10: Recruits, 66,624 tested—36,089 qualified, 30,535 failed. Trained men, 113,096 tested—90,672 qualified, 22,424 failed. These figures have been affected by the shortage of ranges, but we are acquiring ranges as rapidly as we can. I wish golf links did not sweep so many of them away, but we have acquired or reconstructed about 100 new ranges, including 51 miniature ranges, since the beginning of the year.
I now come to the noble Earl's Question regarding the Imperial Yeomanry. In answer to Question 7 I may say that the number of horses at this year's camp was 20,660, made up as follows: Property of officers, non-commissioned officers and men, 7,778; hired, 12,868; Government, 9; property of Association, 5. This is the only information we have as to horses. Following upon the new powers which were given in the Army Annual Act of last April the horse organisation has been altogether recast. Under that Act the Associations now have powers to take horses compulsorily, and for that purpose an accurate census of horses was required. We began by taking before the Act passed a police census, which was valuable as giving us some indication of the number of horses in the country. I estimated that there were upwards of a million and a-half useful horses at the disposition of the Associations, and they are classifying them all over the country. Additional remount officers have been appointed for the purpose, as well as veterinary officers, and the adjutants and non-commissioned officers allotted to them are making a complete classification and census of the horses in the country. The Yeomanry will have their own horses assigned to them, and the Regulars will have their own horses assigned to them. The horses are classified—those fit for Cavalry and Artillery and so on—and the census is proceeding rapidly. It has already given us sufficient result to enable us to mobilise the Expeditionary
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Force with the requisite horses, and I see no reason to doubt that it will provide adequately for the Yeomanry. The Yeomanry are naturally interested in looking after their own horses. In addition to that, we are encouraging and advancing funds for the Associations to purchase horses.
I now come to Question 8. The answer to the first part of the question is, No. If the noble Earl will refer to the Instructions for Practice of Artillery, he will see I that Section 17 provides that—
"Brigades and batteries of Territorial Force Artillery will not be classified, but officers commanding Divisional Territorial Force Artillery are at liberty to issue locally an order of merit. The order of merit should be based on the instructions issued for the classification of batteries."
In 1911, 127 Territorial Horse and Field Artillery batteries carried out practice. Biennial practice can only be carried out at regular practice camps, but commanders-in-chief can authorise practice annually where other ranges are available which are primarily used for Regular troops. We have been hampered hitherto by want of Artillery ranges, but this year we have acquired two new ones, one at Salisbury Plain, and the other in Northumberland, which ought to prove very useful.
In answer to Question 9, the percentage is 76·8. In Question 10 the noble Earl asks what was the total cost of the Yeomanry and Volunteers for the year ended March 31, 1906. The Imperial Yeomanry cost £527,250, effective; £19,550, non-effective; (total, £546,800. The Volunteers cost £1,528,400, effective; £140,540, non-effective; total, £1,668,940. That is to say, the total cost, effective and non-effective, of the Imperial Yeomanry and Volunteers was £2,215,740. The Territorial Force cost £3,017,855, effective; £147,760, non-effective; total, £3,165,615.
As to Question 12, looking through the Gazettes for the twelve months ended September, 1911, the number of Territorial Force officers who resigned during that period was 916; the number of new officers of the Territorial Force—that is, on first appointment—during the same period was 875. Both these figures are exclusive of officers of the Unattached List and of the Officers Training Corps. The answer to the thirteenth and final Question is that officers of the Territorial Force must have their permanent residence in the United Kingdom under the Territorial

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Force Regulations. We have no figures showing how many officers have been given leave to travel abroad or in the Colonies. I may mention in this connection that the Territorial Force has the following Regular officers, in addition to those of whom I have spoken. There are fourteen Divisions of the Territorial Force and there are fourteen Major-Generals who are commanders of Divisions, each of whom has a General Staff officer. Those, of course, are all Regulars. In addition, there are thirty-one Regular Brigade commanders, and there are some ex Regular commanders still commanding Brigades, but the policy is to substitute active Regular officers on half-pay for the retired officers who were in during the earlier stages of the Force, so that the Brigade commands may as nearly as possible be filled by Regular officers, who would know that their promotion depended on the success they made in handling their Brigades. Nine exceptionally capable Territorial officers have been promoted to command Brigades. There are 406 Regular adjutants and 4 ex-Regular adjutants. These represent the Regular element which is attached to the command of the Territorial Force. I think I have now answered all the Questions which have been put to me, but if there is any further information which any of your Lordships desire, of course you have only to address a Question to me on the subject.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: My Lords, the noble Earl made the object of his Questions very plain in his opening statement, but I think there is some little embarrassment in mixing up a question which is so largely one of Territorial Force statistics with the more general considerations with which the noble Earl prefaced his Questions. We who sit here and who heard the noble Earl when he was seated on the Front Government Bench as Under-Secretary for War fully appreciate the interest which he takes in the Territorial Force; but I must admit that his view was then rather different from what it is now. He used to speak in the accents of a fond and indulgent parent. He now always seems to me to speak as if he were afraid that an affiliation order was going to be made on him with regard to an offspring which he desires to discard. The difference is certainly very marked, and I notice that the noble Earl feels so much the change that he does not even designate the noble
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Viscount by that more affectionate appellation which usually obtains between colleagues.
We are, I think, in some little difficulty this evening if we pass by the first part of the noble Earl's speech in order to address ourselves simply to the statistics which we have heard, because the noble Viscount opposite also speaks in two voices. When the noble Viscount first introduced this scheme we were given to understand that the numbers upon which he relied for the Territorial Force were really the minimum, not the maximum. I do not propose to follow those who speak of the Territorial Army as if it were a failure. Not for a moment do those of us who were concerned with the Volunteers, as they were before, feel that anything but good has been done by the efforts of the noble Viscount and of the General Staff as regards the organisation, the equipment, and the training of the Territorial Force. And I think we should do ourselves great injustice if we appeared in this House to show ourselves wanting in appreciation of the spirit which the Force has shown, and the efforts which the Force generally has made to come up to the demands of the military authorities. But when we have said that we have not said all.
I am afraid I must press upon the noble Viscount again, without wishing to go into the broad question, which will be rediscussed, no doubt, in this House on some Motion before we leave the whole composition of the Territorial Force, that we are still in ignorance of some most material facts which really will settle the competence of the Force for the business on which it is to be engaged. The noble Viscount two or three times to-night alluded, in that rotund manner in which he treats all big figures, to 100,000 Special Reservists and remnants of the Army who will be here after the Expeditionary Force has left these shores. I have said, on behalf of noble Lords on this side and with the authority and support on one occasion of Lord Roberts and on the other of Lord Grenfell, who is present to-night, that the quotation of that figure is really valueless to us unless it is accompanied by a clear military opinion of the value of those 100,000 men, disjointed as they are to some extent and consisting to a large extent of battalions from whom the best men have been already taken.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: I gave that figure on the authority of the General Staff. I should not have said it if the whole scheme had not been prepared by the General Staff, and the Adjutant General had not assured me that the numbers would be there.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: A second point which is left in doubt is this. I listened with a little impatience to the noble Viscount's reiteration of the old argument that while the Expeditionary Force would be going abroad the Territorial Force would be under training. There are a number of cases in which that would not take place. If there was trouble in India, a large number of troops would be sent, and then more would be sent; and it would be at a late stage in the operations that any Secretary of State for War would feel himself justified in dislocating the trade of the country by calling out the Territorial Force. Yet unless you call them out you cannot train them, and unless you train them I do not think there is any military authority in the country who would like to pit them against Continental troops.
There is another consideration. We quite agree with the noble Viscount that there is no occasion to despair. But the fact remains that he asked for 315,000 men and has only got 260,000, and of those 260,000 a certain number have not been able to come up to the training that he desires. I think that some day these points must be reckoned up, not from the parental standard nor upon the critical standard of the past parent, but as a national subject. We must consider how the ranks of the Territorial Army can be filled up if we are to continue our voluntary system. I have before from this place pressed on the noble Viscount what I believe is the only possible solution. It is that he should adopt a National Reserve; that he should take all men in the National Reserve who in military opinion are fit for service, men under forty or not much above forty; that he should organise them in companies in each county, and that those companies should be attached on mobilisation to the Territorial Force, eliminating from that Force, at all events for the first six months, all those men who had not got a year's service and who had not shot their classes.
I know, of course, that you may say that more may yet be done in the way of
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recruiting. The noble Viscount complained of persons who went about the country and decried recruiting for one reason or another. The greatest elements in the matter of recruiting are not individuals, however distinguished or however biassed in favour of national service; they are members of the whole Government themselves and the whole policy of the Government. You have spent, according to the figures which the noble Viscount gave us, £1,500,000 extra annually trying to induce good citizens up to the number of 315,000 to give up their leisure and ease in order to serve the country in the Territorial Force. But you have spent thirty millions on the Estimates in the last five years in inducing people not to consider what they can do for the State, but in teaching them that the business of the State is to look after them. So long as you preach the doctrine that it is for every man to consider how much he can get out of the State, you certainly will not induce people to come forward in as large numbers as you desire and give gratuitous service to the State under conditions that have ruled hitherto.
I feel great difficulty in urging the noble Viscount to spend more money on the Territorial Force. I know that there are those who think that another £300,000 will arrest the depletion which almost inevitably must occur this year and next year. If that be so, it may be wise to make the expenditure; but if that expenditure is coming off the Expeditionary Force and the Regular Army, then I think we ought to look afresh at the whole of our military expenditure. As regards the figures which the noble Viscount has given, I do not know that any of them are very new to us. I do not think they are discouraging from the standpoint of those who believe that you can go a certain distance, but you never will be able to go the whole distance, in the direction the noble Viscount desires. For my own part I hope that in the course of next year, when we see how far the rather gloomy I anticipations of recruiting are realised, we i shall be allowed to take stock of the whole position without being told that we are actuated by any desire to make political capital out of the possible failure of the Territorial Force to come up to the expectations of the Government. I trust we shall recognise that, with the advance of foreign affairs and with the great changes

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in naval armaments, it is imperative for this country to have a Force up to the full numbers which the General Staff desire on which to rely in case of invasion.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, I did not intend to take any part in this debate, but the noble Viscount opposite made an unprovoked attack on a body of which I am a member, and I feel some resentment at the charges winch he has brought against us in this connection. From the long statement to which we have listened from the noble Viscount I grasp two, and two only, important facts. One is that the Territorial Force continues to decrease in numbers, and the other is that it continues to increase in expense. In charging other persons with being responsible for this state of things the noble Viscount shows himself the most ungrateful of men. Nobody has ever succeeded in obtaining from his political opponents such support as the noble Viscount has obtained for this particular scheme. I do not think he ever had more enthusiastic supporters of it than the noble Lords who sit upon the Front Opposition Bench in this House. The persons who have done more for it than anybody else are those who belong to the opposite side of politics, and the only opposition that his scheme has encountered has been from the Party to which the noble Viscount himself belongs, and principally from the Labour Party, by whose votes the noble Viscount is kept in office. Therefore maintain that not only is he a singularly ungrateful politician, but he has no right to bring charges of the kind against any body of persons whatsoever. I do not believe, with the exception of the members of the Labour Party, that anybody has ever said a single word to dissuade persons from enlisting in the Territorial Force. The noble Viscount knows perfectly well that the reason why the Force is in an unsatisfactory condition is that the obsolete voluntary system is no longer able to meet our requirements. And what, apparently, we are destined to discuss session after session and year after year is the continual diminution in numbers and the continual increase in expenditure of the Force, because no responsible member of the Government has the courage to come forward and tell the country the plain truth, the plain truth being, as the noble Viscount knows as well as everybody else, that the voluntary system is played out and that under it
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there is no probability whatever, so far as any reasonable person can see, of his ever obtaining the numbers for which he originally asked.
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: My Lords, there are some points arising out of the questions and answers which we have just heard to which I should like to draw your Lordships' attention. One remarkable fact is that the numbers of the Territorial Force seem subject to great variation. In September the Secretary of State for War, speaking in Scotland, is, reported to have said—
"On the 1st of July last the strength of the Territorial Army was 270,000 officers and men."
But on the day of speaking—which was the 27th of September—the noble Viscount mentioned the Force as then numbering 273,000 officers and men, an apparent increase in three months of 3,000. But three days later, on October 1, the strength was 264,167; that is a. decrease in three days of 8,833. We have no information later than the 1st of October. I trust that the rapid decline which set in during the last three days of September has ceased.
In the same speech the noble Viscount referred to the points mentioned in the third and fourth Questions asked by the noble Earl—namely, recruiting and re-engagement. The noble Viscount is reported to have said—
"There were 35,000 recruits, and 25,000 had re-engaged, making 60,000 men who had come in this year."
But I demur to the statement that 60,000 men had come in this year, because of that number the 25,000 men who had re-engaged had never really gone out of the Force. They are the same men remaining on in the Force for one, year only, and they are not new recruits. It is just the same as saying that if you took 9 gallons out of an 18-gallon cask, leaving 9 gallons at the bottom, and then were to add another 9 gallons, that you had taken in 18 gallons when of course you had only taken in 9. So the noble Viscount has not taken in 60,000 recruits—he has taken in 35,000 recruits, and 25,000 men never went out of the Force but remain in for one extra year.
The second Question of the noble Earl's upon the Paper deals with the efficiency of the Territorial Force. The efficiency of any Force as an instrument of war depends both upon numbers and upon training. For instance, on the point of

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numbers, take a battalion 400 strong; no matter how well trained those 400 men are, they cannot possibly perform battalion duties which require 800 men to adequately carry them out. The battalion would be inefficient on the score of numbers. As each unit in a Division is inefficient on the score of numbers, so the whole Division would be inefficient, and for the same reason the whole Army. We see from the Return that the Territorial Force is numerically a decreasing Force, and consequently annually less efficient in point of numbers. On the point of efficiency in training it appears that 33,511 officers and men did not attend camp this year. That is an increase of 7,516 absentees in comparison with the year before. Moreover, of those who did attend camp, 12,882 fewer attended for the full period of training. We arrive, therefore, at the fact that as the Territorial Force decreases in numbers, so the number of untrained men in the ranks increases, and the number of men attending camp for less than the full period increases. The Under-Secretary of State for War is reported to have said, in a speech made at a distribution of prizes to the London Rifle Brigade last week, that—
"He hoped to lay before Parliament a Report by Sir John French on the efficiency of the Territorial Force."
Until that Report appears, dealing, as it must deal, with the facts and figures I have just mentioned, I shall make no further comment on the efficiency of the Territorial Army.
Questions 10 and 11 of the noble Earl make a comparison between the cost of the Yeomanry and Volunteers in 1906 and the cost of the Territorial Force in 1911. The noble Viscount, speaking at Birmingham on October 24, is reported to have said that—
"He was a believer in spending money on raising the quality of the Force. They had gone up in the last four years from £7 spent on the Volunteer to £11 on the Territorial."
But as the total cost must depend upon the total number of men in the two Forces, I should like to draw your Lordships' attention to a comparison in numbers made between these two Forces by the noble Viscount the Secretary of State for War on September 27 last. The noble Viscount is reported to have said—
"Instead of a nominal 250,000 Volunteers and Yeomanry which they previously possessed, they had now 273,000 Territorials."
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I find, by referring to the General Annual Report on the British Army published in 1911 that the total strength of the Yeomanry and Volunteers on October 1, 1906, excluding the Permanent Staff, was 278,719, which is not a nominal 250,000. We now know that the strength of the Territorial Army on the 1st of October was not 273,000 but 264,167. In making the comparison the noble Viscount has added to the Territorial Army 8,833 officers and men who were not present, and at the same time has dispensed with 28,719 officers and men from the Volunteers and Yeomanry who were actually present and serving. Consequently in making the comparison between the two Forces the noble Viscount has credited the Territorial Force with 37,552 men to whom they are in no manner of way entitled. If the noble Viscount wishes to make a comparison between the old Auxiliary Forces and his new Territorial Army which shall be favourable to the latter, I think he would do well to avoid the point of numbers and rely upon the excellence of his paper organisation. The Territorial Army will be fewer in numbers than the old Auxiliary Forces but will cost more. How much more, if bounties and bonuses are to be given, rewards paid for bringing recruits, and separation allowances granted, it will be difficult to estimate.
The important point is the efficiency of the Territorial Army for the purpose for which it is maintained. The old Auxiliary Forces were condemned lock, stock and barrel, by a Royal Commission as inefficient. I trust that we may before long see this Report on the Territorial Army by Sir John French, and that he will inform us if that Force is efficient for the purpose for which it exists, namely, to be able to defeat beyond all doubt 70,000 Continental invaders in the absence of the entire Regular Army. On the departure of the Expeditionary Force we are left at home with four Regular battalions of Infantry, three regiments of Cavalry, and some 16,000 Artillery Reservists. I have often mentioned these figures in your Lordships' House, and they have never been challenged. The noble Viscount has mentioned that 100,000 Special Reservists would be available for home defence after the departure of the Expeditionary Force. But the noble Viscount has also told us that the Special Reserve was not for mobilisation. Again, in the Special Reserve are 27 fourth battalions earmarked for

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service abroad with the Expeditionary Force. You cannot have these battalions abroad and at home at the same time.
In Question 6 the noble Earl asks how many men have qualified in musketry. The musketry of the Territorial Army is a perfect puzzle. But this much I have grasped, by a laborious study of War Office orders and letters, that in the Territorial Army there are two ways of qualifying in musketry. One is in virtue of the value of hits made on the target; the other is in virtue of discharging a certain number of rounds quite irrespective of hitting the object aimed at. In short, men may qualify by hitting or by missing the target. I submit that it is necessary that these two classes should be separated into distinct headings—(a) men qualified by hitting the target, and (b) men qualified by missing the target the required number of times. Unless the return is separated, as I suggest, it is of no value. It would also be useful to add the number of men who have not fired at all, or who have not completed the musketry course.
The noble Earl, in Question 7, touches on the horse supply problem. There is no need to discuss that subject any further, because the noble Viscount has announced to the country in the most decided terms that the problem is now solved beyond all question. Speaking at Birmingham on October 25 last, the noble Viscount is reported to have said—
"There were a number of problems on which they were working now. He was glad to say the horse problem, not only for the Territorial Force but for the Regulars, was practically solved, although it had been deemed insuperable. It was quite true that the motor car had superseded a great many horses, but it superseded them in the Army as well as outside. Large portions of the transport were now conducted with motor cars, and that relieved them from the obligation of providing a certain number of horses, and, for the rest, there were enough and to spare by a large margin in this country for all the requirements of the Army."
I understand from that statement that if the Regular Army and the Territorial Force were mobilised to-morrow, there would be enough horses and to spare by a large margin. There is a finality about that beyond which I shall not attempt to go.
LORD WYNFORD: My Lords, might I ask the noble Viscount to make the answer to Question 8 a little clearer? Do I understand that no account is taken
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of fire tactics during the practice of the Horse and Field Artillery batteries? If not, how is it possible to arrive at any idea of the efficiency of the batteries? Fire tactics is a most important matter, and it is the chief difficulty that occurs with the Territorial Horse and Field Artillery batteries. It is a matter in which it is very difficult to give them practical training and instruction.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: The utmost instruction is given. Fire tactics, of course, are included. But these batteries are in a varying state of efficiency, some of them being very much further on than others.

PACIFIC CABLE BILL.
House in Committee (according to order): Bill reported without amendment, and to be read 3a To-morrow.

MILITARY MANŒUVRES BILL. [H.L.]
[SECOND READING.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, this Bill introduces no new subject. In the year 1905 a Bill similar in most material respects passed through your Lordships' House and was a good deal discussed. The Military Manœuvres Act which was passed in 1897 was a very useful measure, but those who promoted it felt themselves bound to go in a very careful and gingerly fashion, with the result that they tied themselves up a good deal. It has proved a very valuable Act, and the only reason for now wishing to amend it is that experience has shown certain points on which it is thought that, without initiating hardship on anybody, indeed with general goodwill, improvements can be made. This Bill is not in all respects the same as the Bill of 1905, but it is in the main the same.
The purpose of the Bill is this. I will take the case of what happened last year. We scheduled certain districts in the eastern counties and meant to have manœuvres there, but the drought made it undesirable to hold the manœuvres. The result was that, having surveyed the ground and everybody being really anxious that we should go there, we found ourselves unable to go there next year, as under the law as it stands the same area cannot be scheduled for manœuvres more

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than once in five years. It does seem right that in a case of that kind you should be entitled to go there notwithstanding that the period of five years prescribed in the Act of 1897 has not elapsed. Further, it seems right that if you have been to a particular area and the people there, the county council, for instance, say they would like to see you back again two years or three years afterwards, that you should be able to go. This Bill on this point proposes to do two things. If you actually have not gone to the place, then it is as if it had never been scheduled and you can schedule it again. If, on the other hand, you have gone and the county council asks you to come back two or three years afterwards, it may be, then, if everybody desires it, you can schedule the area again and go back. That is the first change which it is proposed to make.
Another change is this. Subsection (2) of Section 1 of the existing Act requires a draft of the Order in Council authorising manœuvres to be sent to the county, borough, district, and parish councils of the area affected not less than six months before the Order is to come into force. Under subsection (3) of Clause I of this Bill, this period of six months is reduced to four, in cases where the draft is sent out before the 30th of April in any year.
There is another provision which really causes enormous embarrassment. As your Lordships know, under the Military Manœuvres Act, 1897, there is a Military Manœuvres Commission, which is not military but is appointed by the local bodies, and to which the Secretary of State appoints a certain number of civilians, always less in number than those elected by the representative bodies. That Commission says where within the scheduled area the troops are not to go. As the law at present stands, it says that you are not to go upon certain ground which might cause inconvenience to the public. That is quite Tight. But there are certain places where the Military Manœuvres Commission cannot allow the troops to go even where no harm is done. These places include all plantations and woods. The result is sometimes disastrous. Nobody wishes the Commission to schedule a plantation where damage would be done, but I remember at three o'clock one morning watching manœvres at sunrise, and I saw a brigade come up and attack an entrenched position, and even with my lay eyes and inexperience
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I saw that the attack which had been ordered was an attack which could only end in the utter destruction of the attacking force. I asked the Inspector-General who was with me why this was. Had I judged wrongly "No," he said, "my language about it would be very much stronger than yours." These troops could have come up protected by fire from the woods on each side, and it would have been a perfectly legitimate military operation, but the Military Manœuvres Act does not allow anybody to go into woods under any circumstances. The result is we never can carry out effective military manœeuvres. What we suggest is that, subject to the careful control of the Military Manœuvres Commission—and I again remind your Lordships that this is a civilian Commission—permission may be given to operate in certain woods and parks which are at present shut to the military.
I come now to a point in which my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu is interested. The existing Act gives power to two justices to order roads in the manœuvre areas to be closed for not more than twenty-four hours, or, in the case of main roads, not more than twelve hours, but the procedure for obtaining such an order is very cumbrous. It requires seven days to get such an order. What we are anxious for is that we should be at liberty to apply to the justices for authority without the seven days elapsing, and the provisions as to notice are in this Bill made more elastic. The time during which the use of main roads may be suspended is not to exceed six hours in any one day; and in the case of main roads where there would be inconvenience to the public we should not be likely under any circumstances to apply to the justices to make an order. But we are tied up unduly by the provisions of the Military Manœuvres Act as they already stand, and we ask to be freed from them.
There is another clause which is new. On various occasions attempts have been made by persons whose lands or water supplies had been made "authorised" lands or supplies to escape from their liability to have them actually used during the manœuvres by putting up notices suggesting that entry on the lands or use of the supplies was unlawful. Clause 4 imposes on persons who act in this manner liability to a fine not exceeding £5, which.

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is the penalty for certain offences under the existing Act.
Then there is a Scottish clause. On the Manœuvres Commission in England you have to have representatives of the county and other large boroughs in the area over which the Commission operates. When the Bill was passing through Parliament a clause was put in for Scotland, by which every royal burgh, parliamentary burgh, or police burgh, was put in the same position as an English county borough. The result is that in Scotland the Manœuvres Commissions have become quite unwieldy. Nobody wants this, and we propose to alter it. These are the main provisions of the Bill. I think they are not very onerous; they certainly would enormously arid to the value of the machinery of the Military Manœvres Act of 1897, which I think was a child of the noble Marquess's opposite. That Act has worked extraordinarily well, but we have outgrown it, and what we want is to adapt the Act to the circumstances which experience has shown us we ought to deal with.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Viscount Haldane.)
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: My Lords, I do not wish to delay the House on the Second Reading of this Bill, with the general principles of which I am entirely in harmony, but there are two or three points about it which possibly in Committee may be arranged. One is with regard to main roads. I do not think the noble Viscount's advisers have quite realised how important main roads are. Take the Great North-road, the Bath-road, and about thirteen roads of that nature. These, I think, might very easily be exempted from the operation of the Bill by inserting a schedule to that effect at the end. It would be, I submit, almost as unfair to interrupt the traffic on the Great North-road as it would be to stop the traffic on the Great Northern Railway at some point between, say, York and London. There is another point, affecting the New Forest. In the case of the New Forest there have always been words inserted in Military Manœuvres Acts defining the Verderers Court as the authority to declare it a manœuvre area. Possibly between now and the Committee stage there may be something done by the noble Viscount on his side which may lead to a reassurance on these points.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I have no doubt that this Bill contains points which may be conveniently examined when we arrive at the Committee stage, but I rise simply for the purpose of welcoming the Bill as a whole and expressing the opinion, which I think will be generally shared in the House, that the proposals of His Majesty's Government for strengthening the hands of the military authorities in connection with manœuvres are reasonable proposals. In fact, in our view this Bill is an overdue Bill, and some change of the law such as that now contemplated might well have been made before now. The proposal that leave should be given to use the same area in certain circumstances more than once in live years, with the consent of the county council; the proposal that the notice given to the local authorities should be shortened from six to four months; the proposal that the proceedings for closing roads should be rendered less cumbrous; and the proposal that the Military Manœuvres Commission should be given leave to include lands enclosed as woods and plantations within the manœuvring area—all these are, to my mind, distinctly legitimate amplifications of the powers now given to those, responsible for the conduct of these very valuable instructional proceedings.
In connection with the question of including woods and plantations within the manœuvring area, I am well aware that there has been a good deal of suspicion and heart-burning in the past. I am, perhaps, entitled to be heard as a witness, because I have filled the office which the noble Viscount opposite now fills; and not only that, but I happen to live in a part of the country which is within measurable distance of Salisbury Plain and therefore gets perhaps more than its share i of manœuvring. And if the House will not think me too egotistical, I will add that I was Lord Cardwell's Under-Secretary when the first manœuvres were instituted, and I have a lively recollection of the difficulties we then had to encounter in coming to terms with those controlling large areas within the districts which were to be used for the manœeuvres. But there has undoubtedly been a considerable movement I of public opinion in favour of giving greater opportunities to the troops to make use of the surface of the country without restriction and reservation, and I attribute

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that change, which I think is a most fortunate one, to the fact that not only have the military authorities always shown themselves most courteous and considerate to those with whom they were brought into contact on these occasions, but that the conduct of the troops themselves has, so far as I am aware of these things, been beyond all praise and has really given hardly any occasion for public or private complaint. The general feeling, I think, in the part of England that I know best is that the people are glad to see the troops, and glad to have them back again when they have been in the country once.
I think the noble Viscount was also quite justified in dwelling upon the fact that this Bill places us in the hands of Commissioners, who are a body not by any means purely military in their complexion, but composed partly of a military and partly of a civilian element, and so composed that the civilian element preponderates in numerical strength. We have the less hesitation in supporting this Bill because, as the noble Viscount truly said, a great many of the proposals which it contains are to be found in the Bill which the late Government introduced and. were unable to proceed with, I presume owing to the difficulties anticipated by the then Secretary of State in another place. But I think, as I said just now, that there is a great support from public opinion, a support that seems to me to increase with every year that passes, and that the general feeling in the country now is that the efficiency of the troops must come before all other considerations, and that any sacrifices which individuals are called upon to make in order that their training may be satisfactory are, after all, a comparatively small matter, and not sacrifices which any of us need hesitate to make. I therefore gladly give my support to the noble Viscount's Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

TELEGRAPH (CONSTRUCTION) BILL.
House in Committee (according to order): The Amendments proposed by the Select Committee made: The Report of Amendments to be received To-morrow.

LOCAL AUTHORITIES (IRELAND) (QUALIFICATION OF WOMEN) BILL.
Read 3a (according to order), and passed.
House adjourned at twenty-five minutes past Six o'clock, till To-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock.