§ [SECOND READING.]
§ Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE EARL OF CRAWFORD)My Lords, I ask your assent to the Second Reading of this Bill, which reaches us as an agreed measure from another place, and the object of which is to meet a well-recognised requirement. It authorises the provision of allotments and of agricultural requisites by urban councils in Ireland. Those urban councils have not at present the powers in regard to this matter possessed by English urban councils, and this Bill proposes to vest them with these powers for the duration of the war. Already considerable progress has been made in providing allotments, and the Bill sets out in a form which is familiar to those who have studied the English side of allotments the ordinary procedure for supplying manures, seeds, and agricultural implements by the Irish councils to the allotment holders; for meeting the expenses, and for preventing losses on the part of the councils. It specifies the manner in which the price of articles supplied by a council is to be repaid, and contains the ordinary clause allowing necessary supplemental and consequential provisions to be included in an Order. I do not think the Bill is likely to provoke much controversy. Its need, as I say, is recognised; and it would appear that the work which can be carried out under this Bill will be as satisfactory in Ireland as it has proved in similar circumstances in this country.
§ Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Crawford.)
§ On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House to-morrow.