HL Deb 13 November 1918 vol 32 cc4-34

THE EARL OF SELBORNE had the following Notice on the Paper—

To move, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty submitting that, whilst the Prime Minister is constitutionally responsible to the Crown for recommendations for the bestowal of honours, it is manifestly impossible for him to give his personal attention to an examination of the merits of all the cases which are brought to his notice; and humbly praying His Majesty to appoint a special Committee of the Privy Council to report to His Majesty on all recommendations in respect of such classes of honours as His Majesty may be pleased to refer to it, and to direct that the Report of this Committee on each case should be sent to the Prime Minister, and, when an honour which has been so reported upon has been conferred by His Majesty, that the Report of the Committee upon it should be laid before Parliament at the same time as the Gazette is published in which the grant of the honour is announced.

The noble Earl said: My Lords, I am glad to have one more opportunity before this Parliament comes to an end, of bringing to your Lordships' attention the question of honours, and I hope that I shall persuade you to accept the Motion which I have put upon the Paper, and thus make a definite suggestion for applying a remedy to a grievance which has already been proved, and which I can show is to-day becoming larger. Your Lordships' House has taken the lead of public opinion in this matter, as distinguished from the other place, which has shown a great indifference to a growing scandal.

On previous occasions I, and those with whom I have been acting, have endeavoured especially to draw attention to that particular form of danger which we believe to exist in the sale of honours mainly for the purpose of enlarging Party funds; and in that connection I think it may be said that we proved our case and achieved a certain measure of success, because, although my noble friend who leads this House never was willing to admit that the evil was quite so great as we think we have proved it to be, yet I do not be- lieve, if he was here, that he would correct me when I say that he admitted that there was an evil, and within certain limits he was prepared to do what he could to help us in mitigating it. Consequently he agreed, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, to do two things which had never been done before. The first was that all honours of every kind should be inserted in a supplement to the Gazette; secondly, that on each occasion there should be a statement of the public service in respect of which the honour had been recommended to His Majesty. I think that both those steps were important, and since that pledge was given all honours have appeared in the Gazette, and there has been a statement on each occasion of the reason for which those honours were given.

I do not say that those statements are all equally full or equally satisfactory. They are not. But at any rate they are a commencement of a definite explanation of what the public service is supposed to be in respect to which the honour has been granted. I am not going to deal with that aspect of the case to-day, though I am in a position to say that the danger of the sale of honours for the purposes of Party funds still exists. And, although I have no fresh case in respect of which I am authorised to give facts publicly, I could give facts privately either to my noble friend the Lord Privy Seal or my noble friend the Leader of the House, which would show that that danger, although possibly scotched, is not killed.

I want to draw your Lordships' attention to the fresh danger of abuse which arises from the fact of the great recent multiplication of honours. It is quite natural, after all the excellent service rendered by so many men and women in connection with this war, that there should be more honours granted than there were More, and I wish again to make the public fully understand that I and those with whom I am acting take the action we do because we want to preserve the system of honours for those who have deserved them by genuine public service. What we are afraid of is that if the honours are bought and sold in the market, or if they are given with such profusion and carelessness that the undeserving receive them, then the inevitable consequence will be that the deserving will reject them. They will become a by-word and a scandal, and the system will finally have to disappear. Therefore, in our judgment the only possible method of preserving the system of honours as a real reward for genuine public service is that it should be hedged round with such safeguards against abuse and such precautions against misapplication as to maintain and enhance the value of honours as a reward for public service.

The first of the fresh dangers to which I wish to draw your attention is lest all the proper forms, procedure, and precautions which are essential in this matter should be neglected and consequently that wholly unworthy persons should receive honours; and also lest His Majesty's Prerogative should also in this matter cease to be treated with the great respect due to it; and, finally that, as a result, the persons worthy of honour should come to regard an honour as dishonour. I want to exhibit to you this document. It is the third Supplement of the London Gazette of June 4. It consists of over sixty closely-printed pages, and this is only one Honours List. As far as I can make out, there are somewhere between forty-five and fifty names on each page. Though a good specimen, it is only one specimen of other lists. In the circumstances the Prime Minister's responsibility becomes a farce. The whole of this system rests on the Prime Minister's responsibility; he is responsible to the Sovereign for the recommendations made, and the honours are conferred on the subject by the Sovereign as a mark of his favour for the public service rendered. Now, who suggests that the Prime Minister in the middle of the war could have any real responsibility for the names contained in this Gazette? He would have been neglecting his work, he would have been doing very wrong, had he attempted to fulfill that responsibility. But it would be almost equally impossible in time of peace.

Therefore we have to find some other method of ensuring that the advice tendered to His Majesty is the result of due thought after the exercise of proper precautions, and that the proper forms and formalities have not been ignored. I do not doubt—I do not think my friends doubt—that the great majority of the names in this Gazette are the names of people who have earned their honour by faithful public service. Nor do I doubt that a great many of them have been recommended to the Prime Minister either by his colleagues or by some other responsible person whom he can fully trust—such, for instance, as the head of the Red Cross; and therefore, as regards the great number of these names, I do not doubt that the rewards are for real public service, or that the Prime Minister has had his responsibility covered by recommendations, either from colleagues or from people whom he can trust. But I assert quite definitely that that is not quite true of all these names.

On the several occasions when I have brought this subject forward I have been extremely careful never to make a statement that I was not in a position to verify. I have only given names when I was authorised to state those names, and I have only stated cases of another nature when I had the proof by me on the Table in such a form that I could make good at once what I stated. Now to-day, unfortunately, I have not been entrusted with any confidences which I can make public, but I have been entrusted with knowledge which I am allowed to state to my noble friends the Lord Privy Seal or my noble friend the Leader of the House privately, and I think I have sufficient credit with your Lordships that when I tell you the nature of the cases of which I can speak privately you will believe that I am not speaking in vain. In the first place, I can prove that great carelessness and impropriety and constitutional slackness have occurred in dealing with these honours. I will give you two cases. I have been informed of one case of a recipient of a high honour to whom no kind of communication was made before it was gazetted, and who had received no communication for a month after it was gazetted. I do not know whether he has received any communication since. But this honour was conferred on him without any kind of previous communication with him—a thing, I should think, absolutely and utterly unknown in other days. A corresponding case was where another gentleman had a high honour also conferred on him, and a notification was sent to him, but when he made inquiries he found that His Majesty's pleasure had not been taken, and therefore he declined it. Now, both those are in my judgment instances of great slackness, carelessness, and want of knowledge of constitutional practice, and show that the thing has not been done in the right way.

Then I can show that some very unworthy people have received honours. By "unworthy," I mean persons stigmatised in the public Courts for highly dishonourable conduct; and another form of unworthy person is a common, low, vulgar adventurer of the very worst type who has received an honour. Both these cases, again, indicate most extraordinary carelessness and slackness on the part of those dealing with this subject. Lastly, I can show that in some cases at any rate the real dispensers of the Prerogative have been not the Prime Minister or the Minister but the private secretaries; and if you think of it, when you come to deal with lists like these, unless the utmost care is taken and a real procedure is provided for dealing carefully with this important matter, it is sure to fall into the patronage of the private secretary; and if honours in this country are to be in the last resort, to whatever degree, conferred by private secretaries, then I think the time has come when honours should become a relic of the past. With such carelessness, with such utter want of responsibility—because private secretaries are people who are wholly irresponsible, people unknown to the Constitution, and with no responsibility—it is quite certain that the door will be open one day to corruption. I am making, of course, no suggestion of corruption against any existing private secretary. So far as I know there has been no taint of corruption in this matter. But what I say is that if honours are given on this scale, and if the whole system is left uncared for and slack, corruption one day is perfectly certain to supervene. All experience shows that; and it does not require any particular spirit of prophecy on my part to suggest it.

I think, therefore, I have shown that, in addition to the old dangers, there is a fresh batch of dangers; and I come now to the definite suggestion which I and my friends make to your Lordships' House and which we hope you will respectfully submit to His Majesty. Our suggestion is that a small Standing Committee of the Privy Council should be set up, consisting of, say, five or six members, with a secretary. That Standing Committee, of course, would be appointed by His Majesty on the advice of the Prime Minister.

The first question is, In respect of what honours should this Committee exercise any function? My answer is that only His Majesty and the Prime Minister can decide that question. It is quite clear that the Prime Minister can exercise his responsibility personally, and ought to, as regards the most important honours; therefore about them the intervention of no Committee of the Privy Council is required. It is also clear that in respect of other honours—I have particularly in mind the naval and military and the Civil Service honours, about which there has never been any question of improper bestowal—the Prime Minister can reckon in the future, as he has reckoned in the past, on the advice of his colleagues. Consequently, there are some honours with which he can clearly deal himself, and there are others in respect of which he can trust his colleagues; and it, is for him to decide and to advise His Majesty in regard to what honours he should utilise the services of this Committee of the Privy Council.

I do not attempt to define what those honours are; but in respect of them I can describe the kind of function that we think the Committee of the Privy Council could perform. As regards such honours as were submitted to this Committee, we think that it should examine each case carefully and report the public record of the person in respect of whom it was proposed to confer the honour. There would be no difficulty in our opinion in the Committee of the Privy Council doing this with a little care, with a little time, and with the assistance of a secretary. It would report, in regard to every name put before it, what the public record of that person was—honourable and dishonourable; and, when it had completed that report, there the function of the Committee would terminate. The sole responsibility for the decision to advise His Majesty to confer an honour would remain with the Prime Minister. But the Prime Minister would have before him the report of the Committee of the Privy Council as to these persons, and if he advised His Majesty to confer an honour on any one of these, and that honour were granted by His Majesty and gazetted, then at the same time the report of the Committee on that person should be laid or the Table of both Houses of Parliament.

By that plan you would ensure that every case was dealt with properly, and that such cases as I have mentioned—the people stigmatised of dishonourable conduct in the public Courts, or who can be exposed as common, vulgar adventurers—never could get into an Honours List. The Prime Minister, of course, would not have suggested to His Majesty to appoint these people had he known what their record was. He did not know. There was no proper machinery to keep him informed. But with the machinery of the Committee of the Privy Council the whole of a man's public record, honourable and dishonourable, would be before the Prime Minister, and he would recommend the King to confer an honour only in a case where the record was unblemished. Therefore I submit that the safeguard would be real.

It is true that there would be some delay; but what does that matter? What does it matter whether a Gazette like this is published on New Year's Day or two months later? Or, if it is important that it should be published on New Year's Day, then the preliminary steps that are taken on these occasions should be taken a month or two earlier. I cannot admit that delay is an argument of any consequence against the plan. Lastly, for the first time there would be a record. I attach great importance to this. Supposing that private secretaries were as efficient and careful as they very often are, but as I do not think they always have been in the cases I have mentioned, private secretaries come and go. There may be some tradition of record from one private secretary to another of the same Prime Minister, but if the Prime Minister is changed, particularly if he belongs to a different Party, there is no continuation of record at all, and the man of very doubtful reputation who has been well known to the private, secretary of one Prime Minister may be quite unknown to his successor. That is what I suspect certainly has happened in one of the cases I have mentioned to-day. Therefore I say that a permanent record of these matters in the office of the Committee of the Privy Council would be an additional guarantee, and this plan is one that merits the very favourable consideration of His Majesty's Government.

In conclusion I would only again express my conviction that, unless this matter receives more attention from His Majesty's Government than it has ever yet done, the system will not be able to last, because of the dangers and evils in respect of which I have been able to give your Lordships some indication and some specimen, and because the plain man will be inevitably driven to the conclusion that it is better to go without an honour than to share an honour with a man whose record is known to be dishonourable. I beg to move.

Moved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty submitting that, whilst the Prime Minister is constitutionally responsible to the Crown for recommendations for the bestowal of honours, it is manifestly impossible for him to give his personal attention to an examination of the merits of all the cases which are brought to his notice; and humbly praying His Majesty to appoint a special Committee of the Privy Council to report to His Majesty on all recommendations in respect of such classes of honours as His Majesty may be pleased to refer to it, and to direct that the Report of this Committee on each case should be sent to the Prime Minister, and, when an honour which has been so reported upon has been conferred by His Majesty, that the Report of the Committee upon it should be laid before Parliament at the same time as the Gazette is published in which the grant of the honour is announced.—(The Earl of Selborne.)

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

My Lords, I do not propose to contest the fact stated by Lord Selborne, that there may have been mistakes made such as those to which he has referred. I myself came across a mistake of that character six or eight years ago in which two members of your Lordships' House were concerned, and which produced very singular results. I also came across a case quite recently in which two persons of identical names, not only living in the identical street but living actually in the same great block of buildings, were confused through a mistake which perhaps was not quite inexcusable. Mistakes I have no doubt do occur. Mistakes perhaps will go on, but I propose to devote myself to the remedy proposed by Lord Selborne, which in my opinion is not likely to improve matters, but rather, as I shall attempt to show your Lordships, may, by diffusing responsibility, do more harm than good. I will, if I may, deal with the remedy proposed by Lord Selborne. He suggests that a special Committee of the Privy Council should be set up, consisting of half a dozen members, who are in effect in certain particulars to replace the Prime Minister. I was surprised to hear from Lord. Selborne that the Prime Minister is to choose what cases are to be sent to this Committee.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

What class of case.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

Quite so. What class of case shall be referred to this committee. Some classes evidently can be reserved to the Prime Minister, and those are classes which Lord Selborne indicated, in a parenthetical remark, the Prime Minister himself, owing apparently to ample time, is capable of giving personal attention to; and by inference the larger honours, such as those referred to in this Gazette here, are to be referred to the Privy Council Committee. I would point out to your Lordships at once that the gravamen of the charge has always been that great personages of great wealth receive honours at the hands of His Majesty, and at the instance of the politicians, in return for money.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

That is one of the charges.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

It is the gravamen, I think, of the charges. You are not going to get rid of that difficulty in this way. The great people are going to be reserved to the Prime Minister; the humble people against whom such charges of money corruption are not brought, I presume, are to be referred to this Committee. It is quite clear, therefore, that if Baronetcies, Garters, Stars, and Peerages are to be reserved to the Prime Minister, the danger to which Lord Selborne alluded in his last speech, although he did not refer to it much to-night, will not be in any way eliminated. I want to say a word, not quite so much in reference to what Lord Selborne has said to-day, but in relation to this Gazette; and he inferred that this enormous Gazette—and he and others have written it in the public Press—is a recognition of honour at the expense of the soldiers.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

I did not say so. Nobody suggested it.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

I am reading a letter which appeared a month or two ago from a number of well-known public men, in which they are dealing with this very point, of the number of honours conferred, and one of the phrases is— The men who most deserve honours are nearly all under arms, and at the present time it is the names of these men the country would prefer to see in the Honours List. The inference is that the honours are being given to the civilians in undue numbers, and that the soldiers are not being duly rewarded. I want to deal with that point, because I think it is based on a complete misapprehension. The Order of the British Empire was instituted in order for the Sovereign to give recognition to persons, men or women, who were not fighting, but who none the less were contributing much towards war service. But the number of decorations given under the Order of the British Empire is quite insignificant in contrast to the numbers given to soldiers. That, of course, is natural, but people do not realise that a considerable number of decorations, quite apart from the ordinary service medal, which has not been allotted, are special recognitions and given to the troops. I will not trouble your Lordships with complete figures, but I will give you three or four.

There have been 1,500 C.M.G.'s, 7,500 D.S.O.'s, 28,000 M.C.'s, 1,600 bars to the M.C. of the first class, 18,000 D.C.M.'s, 8,800 Military Service Medals, and 80,000 Military Medals. That will show your Lordships that in point of fact, when numbers are compared, the difference between the two is significant. For every decoration given to a civilian I suppose twenty, fifty—I do not know how many, but a very much larger number—have been given to the soldiers, and it is sot quite right to assume that when civilian work is rewarded it is done at the expense of the soldiers. Apparently, as the important recommendations to His Majesty are to be in the hands of the Prime Minister, this Motion only applies to subordinate categories of honour. To my mind, that is a very grave objection to Lord Selborne's scheme. Let me outline what the procedure will be.

TEE EARL OF SELBORNE

I never said where I would draw the line. I said a line must be drawn, but I left the Prime Minister to draw it. I never said I would draw it.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

No, my noble friend was very cautious not to tell us what his scheme really was, but he said that those personages with whom the Prime Minister and his colleagues were likely to be familiar would be excluded from reference to this Committee. That I roughly interpret to be a baronetcy or knighthood or—

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

No, that is not my view.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

At any rate, there is to be some division.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

Yes.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

Some will go, and some will not go. That, I say, seems to me to be open to very grave objection. How will the actual procedure work? As the Motion puts it, the King will have to settle what categories of honours are to referred to this Committee, but it is quite clear that this means that some are not going to be referred to it. Some will be referred, and some will not. Certain classes of honour—those which are subject to this special inquiry—therefore become suspect at once. It is a kind of black list that is being formed which has to be purged before this Committee of the Privy Council. I think that that is an objectionable thing. It would be most difficult to settle what special class of honour has to be submitted to this special kind of scrutiny. Of course, if there are to be half a dozen members of the Privy Council upon whom these duties are to devolve, they must be impeccable. The politicians who are blamed in this matter are all, or most of them, I presume, Privy Councillors. They must therefore be excluded from this Committee clearly. They are, rightly or wrongly, supposed to be very susceptible to lobbying, and I dare say this Committee will be thoroughly well canvassed. Take it a stage further. The Ambassador and the Foreign Minister, of course, must be excluded. I presume that the high Civil Servants will be excluded. I presume also that Dominion and Overseas members must be excluded. Clearly they must. Finally, the Lord Chancellor, I doubt not, would take steps to prevent Judges from serving. You rather reduce your panel to which this enormous responsibility is going to be handed over, and it is not going to be quite so easy as some people seem to think to find a panel of active and leisured men who will take charge of a task which may really be very onerous indeed. For my part I am not at all sure that they would perform their function with any particular success.

I gather from the Motion that this Committee has no initiative. Yes; I am right in that. The Prime Minister therefore recommends an honour, but he does not recommend it to the Sovereign; he recommends it to this Committee. They will examine the man's claim. They report upon it. The report goes to the Prime Minister. If it is favourable, presumably the Prime Minister sends that report to His Majesty. But if it is unfavourable? Suppose the Prime Minister takes a strong view on the subject; suppose he differs from the view taken by this Committee, is the Prime Minister to be bound by the decision of these six gentlemen? And if His Majesty desires, as he is often bound to do, to discuss the question of an honour, or, if you like, a promotion in the Peerage of one of your Lordships, I take it that the Sovereign is not expected to call in these six gentlemen with whom to discuss a matter which, so far as I can see, rests entirely within his Majesty's Prerogative. I do not see how the Prime Minister can be bound by the decision of these gentlemen. At least it seems to me most improbable that he would be, and in many cases—I do not say in all—the Prime Minister would certainly be in a position to know infinitely more about the candidates than this Committee. The Ministers of State are living amongst the active and influential minds of the day. If they went to suggest an honour for a Member of Parliament or for an Overseas Minister or Ambassador, they have means at their disposal better than those which this Commitee will possess.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

I do not want to interrupt my noble friend, but has a little misunderstood what I said. I never suggested—it is not my idea—that this Committee should express any opinion whether an honour should be conferred or not. It would simply state what the record of the individual was, leaving it entirely to the Prime Minister whether he was going to recommend that individual or not. If he does recommend him the record, as drawn by the Committee of the Privy Council, must be published at the same time.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

Is that business? You set up a Committee to inquire into the man's character and personality. You tell the Committee, "This has nothing to do with honours; we merely want to know what is the man's record. You are a kind of official 'Who's Who.'" They cannot pursue it except in relation to the conferment of a public honour by His Majesty, and therefore it is no use saying that they are not to consider the question of an honour but merely the question of his record. This Committee are going to be appointed; they know that their report is made in relation to a particular honour in respect of a particular man; and that is, I think, where the noble Earl, on reflection, will find that his case is weak. They will not know as much, in many cases, as the Ministers who are responsible. There are no politicians on the panel, there are no Ambassadors, there are no Overseas Ministers. If it is proposed to confer an honour upon a Member of Parliament, upon an Ambassador, upon an Overseas Minister, the people who can get the good advice are the Prime Minister, who knows the Members of Parliament, who is in touch with the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in the case of an Ambassador, and who can be in communication with a Governor in the case of Overseas statesmen. And if a Prime Minister has to advise His Majesty on matters of vastly greater importance and moment than the Order of the British Empire, is it wise to disperse the responsibility and share it with a Committee of this kind?

On these matters, especially where the Prerogative of the Crown is so very closely concerned, one cannot be too careful in examining the routine with precision. What happens next? The Prime Minister reports the name to the Committee; the Committee report it back to the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister recommends to the Sovereign, who graciously confers an honour if he thinks such a course suitable. Meanwhile, the notice of appointment is gazetted. But simultaneously with the publication in the Gazette, the report of the Committee is to be published as a Parliamentary Paper. This seems to me to be open to the very gravest criticism. In making their reports to the Prime Minister this Committee will know that publication has got to, or may, ensue. Take an ordinary case, any commonplace case. We will take that of a man who has received knighthood, and who is recommended by the Prime Minister for a baronetcy. The Committee, I think, considering the object for which they are set up, would be perfectly entitled—you could not stop them—to say that they quite approved of this, that the man was unexceptionable in character, but that they recommended the step with reluctance.

They could say that perfectly well. Or else they might equally well justify the recommendation of an honour to a man who, according to Biblical precedent, at some time or other before that date had been bereft of style and title; and they would be entitled to explain why they did so. In fact, I think they would be obliged to explain why they did so, knowing that their reports are to be printed. Can anybody expect that the dossiers issued by these six gentlemen—could anybody expect under these conditions that these reports would be free, or candid, or unreserved? Lord Selborne says they are to publish what is honourable or dishonourable in a man's career. I do not think you will find a Committee which will be prepared to make what may be just but none the less very grave charges against a man, unless that Committee is invested with very much stronger powers and receives statutory authority rather than a mere recommendation of this kind.

And let me, finally, refer to the position of the candidates themselves. Will they consent to this procedure? Of course, there is going to be publicity about it. These six gentlemen, in nine cases out of ten, will not know anything of the existence of these kind of people who are receiving rewards at the hands of His Majesty. And here let me say one personal word about the Order of the British Empire. It so happens that throughout the war I have found myself in touch with humble people who are getting small credit, who are working unobserved, but who are doing, and have been doing, the great work of the war. Those are the people who are receiving the Order of the British Empire. It has been my duty on more than one occasion to make recommendations for that Order. I know the kind of man and the kind of woman who is receiving recognition from the Sovereign under that Order, and I cannot say how bitterly I resent reading this kind of thing in a paper written by persons of high standing and full of honours about the humble people who are receiving well-earned and hard-earned recognition for work which has been of incalculable value. I read this kind of thing— It has become obvious that a Minister overwhelmed by public duties of the most arduous kind cannot possibly supervise the distribution of honours or prevent the monetary corruption and debasement of standards which will assuredly ensue. He would be obliged to neglect other vital duties. And in the next line one reads— A new Order of the British Empire has been instituted. In a recent Gazette the names cover no less than 60 quarto pages… We make no suggestion of corruption— and so on. But it is a suggestion of corruption. It refers to the danger of a peculiarly mean kind of pecuniary corruption, and so on. I cannot express to your Lordships the indignation I feel when, knowing as I do the kind of people who are getting this recognition under this new Order of the British Empire, I read that it is alleged that there is monetary corruption or debasement of interests, or anything of that kind.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

There is no such allegation whatever in that letter.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

It says "We make no suggestion of corruption," but it is there, for what did I read three lines before? "A new Order of the British Empire has been instituted," and so on. I know it is read in that way; I read it in that way and I know other people have so read it. I also know that many people resented it as bitterly as I do myself. I say it is impossible that these five or six gentlemen can know all about the candidates. There will have, therefore, to be publicity. They will have to have an office, they will require a secretariat, very likely a large one; they will have to conduct correspondence, and I think in all probability they will have to have personal interviews. At the present moment recommendations are made by Ministers with personal knowledge of candidates. If this Committee do not know anything about the candidates they will have to pursue their inquiries as best they can, and it will perfectly well be known, of course, that So and So's case is to come up for discussion on such and such a day. And that will be the thing which I should imagine many people would resent. I do not suppose I exaggerate in saying that many people would refuse to submit themselves to a cross-examination of that kind, perhaps with the knowledge that they had been graded as B2 or B3, perhaps blackballed altogether. Now, if he is successful he knows that he has to have a report about his character and his personality published as a Parliamentary Paper. Either the report will be a conventional panegyric which will be a farce, or it will be a confidential and intimate report, the publication of which would, I think, be an impropriety. I cannot imagine any more distressing ordeal for an honest man to go through who is recommended for an honour which he has well deserved at the hands of the State.

I therefore think that the scheme, which must be judged upon its technical merits and how it will work, is open to objection from many points of view. In many ways, of course, it is a censure upon the Prime Minister. Lord Selborne says that the House of Commons is lax in this matter, but that really is the proper place to bring these charges against the Prime Minister. There must be at any rate one righteous man in the House of Commons. Perhaps even a Privy Councillor could be found. But this is a direct charge against the Prime Minister, and I should have thought that it is a criticism which should have been directed to his personal attention in the House of Commons itself.

I have read this Motion with the very greatest care, and I cannot help thinking that sufficient heed has not been given to the actual scheme, to the scope or to the capacity of the Committee, to the objection I have referred to on the score of publicity, and to the position of the man whose services are to be recognised, nor to the exclusion of certain grades of honour from the purview of this Committee. Altogether this question has been discussed in your Lordships' House three, or perhaps four, times. My noble friend Lord Curzon, who is still detained abroad and cannot therefore attend here to-day, has already given to the House and the public a pledge that the greatest care shall be exercised in view of the increased number of honours conferred owing to the war, and that the most careful scrutiny and examination shall take place. Great care has been exercised. I daresay mistakes have been made. I think that I have referred already to one or two cases with which I am familiar. But I am convinced that this Committee is not the right way to remove the danger of such mistakes as have been referred to.

It is quite possible that mistakes will be made. The Prime Minister is the last person to claim infallibility on his own behalf. As one knows, sometimes the wrong man is appointed to a colonelcy or governorship, or to the management of a railway or business, or indeed to Ministerial rank, and to the end of time mistakes I daresay of this kind must occur; but of this I am convinced, that mistakes are much less probable where responsibility is concentrated upon one man, aided as he is and must be by really well qualified colleagues. Such responsibility should not be diffused amongst a Committee. It will be unversed in ninety-nine cases out of 100 in the direct problem at issue. The Committee will be answerable to Parliament, and it will not be, I imagine, appointed by the Sovereign. I think a Committee of this kind is quite unfitted for duties which relate to the Public Service, and also to the Prerogative of the Crown. These duties of recommending honours to His Majesty are of such far-reaching importance that by tradition, by long custom, and I think also by propriety, they are entrusted by the Sovereign to the care of his First Minister of State.

THE MARQUESS OF CREWE

My Lords, I am sure that your Lordships will all have recognised the sincerity and conviction with which the noble Earl behind me brought forward this Motion, and we all honour him for the strong desire which has been evident to-day and on former occasions to remove all that seems to act against the purity and dignity of public life, and of the grant of honours; but at the same time I cannot help hoping that your Lordships will think twice before you adopt the remedy which the noble Earl suggests, for some of the reasons which have been made by the noble Earl who has just sat down. This is an age when Advisory Committees are greatly in the air. There is a tendency to fortify, or sometimes possibly to hamper, all responsible persons by surrounding them with an Advisory Committee, but the essence of an Advisory Committee and of its value must be the expert knowledge which it possesses. Such an expert Committee as the Advisory Council on Industrial Research, composed of the first scientific men of the day, advises the Lord President of the Council and the other Ministers who form that. Committee of Council, but it cannot be, I think, stated by my noble friend that this particular Committee can claim, or indeed acquire, the particular kind of expert knowledge which is needed for the grant of honours, because, quite rightly, my noble friend eliminates from his suggestion those cases in which expert knowledge is required, simply because that expert knowledge is forthcoming already.

When it is a question as to which Colonel should receive the Companionship of the Bath, which Indian Civil Servant should receive the K. C. I. E., the Prime Minister naturally relies upon his colleagues who are the heads of the Department concerned, and therefore it may be assumed that all those classes would not come under the notice of this Committee at all. It therefore would appear that, leaving aside the special case of the Order of which the noble Earl opposite spoke in some detail—namely, the Order of the British Empire, which stands on a somewhat different footing, although even there I take it the great bulk of the recommendations are made by and on the responsibility of the heads of the Departments—the conferment of Peerages (including steps in the Peerage), of baronetcies, of Knight bachelorships, and of membership of the Privy Council, are the only kind of honours which could fall within the purview of this Committee. And, as the noble Earl has pointed out, it would seem likely that a considerable number of these would be withdrawn by the Prime Minister himself from the inspection of the Committee on the ground that he preferred—and was highly competent, to do the work—to examine into the claims of those who might be put forward from one source or another for the conferment of such an honour.

I think it rather interesting to consider what the opinions of Prime Ministers would be in a matter of this kind. My noble friend Lord Selborne and I have the honour of knowing no less than eight Prime Ministers. Of those eight, four, I am happy to say, are still with us, and if my noble friend would invite the opinion of any of those four as to the appointment of an Advisory Committee of this kind to report upon the past history of gentlemen who are put forward for honours of the kind I have mentioned, I think he would not find much agreement with his view from any of the four. I also see, as the noble Earl opposite did, some difficulty in the selection of the personnel of such a Committee. It must obviously be composed of people who are themselves not likely to be the recipients of honours, and therefore I think it would have to be composed entirely of noble Dukes who are also Privy Councillors, and who have also received the honour of the Order of the Garter. Such men, I think we may suppose, may be taken to have reached the highest summit of earthly bliss and eminence, and they therefore would be in a position to look down from the mountain heights on all possible aspirants for honours of every kind. But, as the noble Earl pointed out quite seriously, it is not exactly easy to see what class of Privy Councillors would be selected for this particular function.

But my real objection to the proposal of the noble Earl is the one which was alluded to by the noble Earl opposite—namely, that it takes away the responsibility of the Prime Minister in this matter. The present system of government, whatever its merits, has to my mind one, unhappy demerit—, namely, that of the destruction of the collective responsibility of Ministers, and if to this is to be added the destruction of their individual responsibility to the Crown it seems to me that there is not very much left. I do not agree with the statement of the noble Earl that it is manifestly impossible for the Prime Minister to give his personal attention to the merits of all the cases that are brought to his notice. In a sense, of course, it is true, all promotions in the Army are made by the Army Council, but nobody supposes that the actual members of the Army Council inquire personally into the promotion of every officer who gets his company. It is done by a system of inquiry and devolution, and even in war time I think it is quite possible for the Prime Minister to establish a system of inquiry by persons upon whose judgment he could rely, which would make it possible for him to take the responsibility of laying the name before the Sovereign.

The noble Earl has said with great frankness that in his opinion this has not been done, and that proper inquiries have not been made. That is a charge, as the noble Earl pointed out, if not against the Prime Minister himself, at any rate against his entourage and those whose opinion he is able to take. It is no business of mine to put up a defence for the Prime Minister in such a matter. He is as competent as anybody is to put up a defence of that kind for himself. But even if it were so—which personally I do not admit, and upon which I express no opinion—it does not follow that the particular remedy which the noble Earl suggests is the proper one to apply. A more simple and obvious remedy would be to ask the Prime Minister to appoint some gentleman—whether called a private secretary or not does not matter—upon whose opinion he can rely for the special function of examining into all these cases in the light of the information that he is able to obtain from the different Departments. But, as I said, my main objection is the abstraction from the Prime Minister of his proper responsibility in this matter, and the consequent effect upon the Prerogative of the Crown. I trust therefore that, although recognising to the utmost the admirable intentions of my noble friend, your Lordships will not agree with his Motion.

LORD LEE

My Lords, may I express my warm agreement with the strong and spirited protest which was made by the acting Leader of your Lordships' House with regard, not to those high honours to which reference has been made, but to the very humblest class of honours referred to by Lord Selborne when he produced a copy of a recent Gazette. Your Lordships are aware that in that Gazette there are possibly 2,000 names. But those names, as has been shown, are mainly of people who would necessarily be utterly unknown to members of the Privy Council, but who none the less have deserved as well of their country during this war as any member of the Privy Council or of your Lordships' House.

If we consider that the whole population of these islands has been mobilised for war, even if we assume that only one-quarter of those who are not serving in the Army or Navy have done some work in connection with the war, that Gazette does not represent one name in a thousand of those war-workers. Every one of those names have been submitted by some responsible official under the Government, or a body like the Red Cross; they have been most anxiously considered and weighed before being recommended; and they represent, I believe, in 999 cases out of 1,000, individuals who have perhaps not only given their time, but have worked without remuneration day and night during the years of this war. These small rewards, while they may seem a contemptible thing to some very distinguished people, mean a very great deal to them—not merely the conferment of the small honour itself, but the fact that it is given personally by the hand of the Sovereign. As the head of a subordinate Department I have had to recommend a small number of those persons for the British Empire Order. I know how numerous have been the names of deserving people, how anxiously their claims have been weighed one against the other, and how in the end the recommendation put forward has in all cases been put forward solely on merit.

I think it is time that a protest were made against this attempt—I will not say conscious attempt, but the effect is the same—to depreciate the value of these small rewards; because it can have no other effect but to poison the pleasure and the pride that these humble individuals must naturally feel at the recognition of their services at the hand of their Sovereign. I hope, whatever attacks may be made upon the system of conferment of high honours, there will be no more of this brandishing of large Gazettes, and suggesting that in some way or other the honours are not real or are not a credit to their recipients.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

My Lords, there have been several discussions upon this subject in your Lordships' House, and I have always been impressed by the earnestness with which my noble friend Lord Selborne has urged the necessity for greater caution in the distribution of honours. I am prepared to go a certain length with him. I am quite ready to admit that the suspicion which undoubtedly prevails in regard to this question would not exist unless there was a certain amount of foundation for it. I am quite prepared to believe that there have been cases where the Crown has not been well advised in the exercise of the Royal Prerogative. I am quite prepared to believe also that there have been indiscretions—blunders—perpetrated very often by people who are not in the front of the scene, but who are rather in the position of the subordinate agents of the Government. I am quite prepared to believe all that; and if my noble friend could really show me a way of preventing the possibility of abuses, or even of mistakes, I should certainly be inclined to follow him.

But while I make these admissions, I have always felt that it would be a grievous injustice to the community of which we are members to allow the impression to go abroad that there was anything like general venality or corruption in the matter of the distribution of honours. I believe, on the contrary, that our public life here is as clean in this respect as that of any other country—probably much cleaner; and that it would be a libel to suggest that the whole system of our public patronage was permeated by the kind of motives which are sometimes imputed. Where mistakes have been made, by all means let us point them out; and let us ascertain who is responsible for them, and let us visit those who are guilty. But the complaint that I make of the particular proposal which my noble friend has put forward is that, far from fixing responsibility more distinctly where it ought to be fixed, it tends to transfer responsibility, and to transfer it to a wrong set of shoulders.

This question came before your Lordships' House last year and your Lordships then took action upon the subject. You refused, indeed, to agree to the preamble of a Resolution moved by my noble and learned friend Lord Loreburn—a preamble which seemed to many of your Lordships to amount to a plea of guilty where no such plea ought to be entered. But you agreed to two Resolutions—one of them requiring the publication, in every case where an honour was conferred, of a full statement of the reasons for which that honour was given; and the other fixing upon the Prime Minister the responsibility—and it is a very remarkable responsibility—of satisfying himself that "no payment or expectation of payment to any Party or political fund is directly or indirectly associated with the grant or promise of such honour or dignity." Those Resolutions were accepted by my noble friend Lord Curzon on behalf of the Government. He explicitly told the House that, speaking for the Government, he accepted those Resolutions; and we have a right to assume that since they were passed those Resolutions have been observed not only in the letter but in the spirit. Those Resolutions surely were a not unsubstantial achievement on the part of my noble friend Lord Selborne and those who think with him.

What has passed, I would ask, since those Resolutions were carried to make a new departure necessary? My noble friend told the House that the danger was far greater now than it was then, mainly because of the immense increase in the number of distinctions which are being conferred owing to the war. But, my Lords, I cannot believe that if there has been anything like—corruption is too strong a word—but anything like an improper reward of Party services, it can be supposed to have taken place in connection with these war honours. The cases that your Lordships were asked to consider specially last year were cases where Peerages and high honours of that kind has beer given as a reward for political services associated with large contributions to the political war chests. No suspicion of that kind arises in connection with this great host of honours which are being conferred in connection with the war.

I confess that I should very much prefer to leave the responsibility where it is now—with the Prime Minister. I recall the words which were used in the debate of last year by my noble and learned friend Lord Loreburn, than whom no Peer was more anxious to put an end to any abuse in connection with the conferring of honours. Let me read Lord Loreburn's words. He said— I am quite content if the Prime Minister insists on being told the whole of the facts, and then settles the matter with the honest determination, with which we justly and naturally credit every Prime Minister, that he will put down corruption. I think we have, a right to ask His Majesty's Government whether that condition is now fulfilled. I hope, since the Resolution of last year, that we may take it that the Prime Minister does insist, I do not say in going personally into every one of these thousands of minor honours to which reference has been made, but in satisfying himself, either by himself or through the heads of Departments who are responsible to him, that no impropriety has taken place.

My noble friend proceeded to give the House illustrations of the still greater scandals which he thought had taken place since the Resolution of last year. Will my noble friend forgive me when I tell him that I really was not greatly impressed by the two or three cases which he cited. There was a case where there had been a failure to notify the honour to the individual upon whom it was conferred—a blunder which might very well be committed in the middle of the stress and strain that are inseparable from the war. The second case I did not note, but it seemed to me to be a case of that kind.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

The case of vulgarity.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

Oh, yes; the case of the vulgar adventurer. That might lead to all sorts of enquiries as to what constituted vulgarity and what was an adventurer. At any rate, my noble friend's indictment at that point did not seem to me to be a very formidable one. Then I will take my noble friend's plan. I think it was rather mercilessly dissected by my noble friend Lord Crawford, but I am bound to say that it seems to me to be a plan which would not be at all likely to work well or produce the desired result. You are to set up a small Committee of the Privy Council. The Committee is not to have individual cases referred to it, but certain classes of honours are to be marked off and within those classes particular cases may be referred to the Committee. I think this would work very badly indeed. How are you going to draw the line between the class of cases which ought to go to the Committee and the class which ought not? That seems to me to be full of difficulty. Then what is the Committee to do? The Committee is to inquire into the honourable or dishonourable antecedents—

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

The record.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

The honourable or dishonourable record of the person whom it is proposed to honour. How is the Committee to adjudicate upon the honourable side of the record? Will your Committee really be in a position to deal intelligently with the merits of each individual whose services it is desired to reward? The Minister can get from his official chief full particulars, and particulars of a reliable character; but this Committee would have no particular knowledge of the case at all. It would be turned on to investigate from the beginning the career of people with whom it had nothing to do, and whom it was quite incompetent to criticise. I do not think the Committee would do its work nearly as well as the responsible head of a Department, who would be able to say what he thought of the man who had served under him. But, then, how will it work when you come to the dishonourable side of the record? That seems to me to be a very serious task to impose upon any Committee. It means turning this Committee into a sort of private inquiry office, who are to rake up—

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

I used the word "record." Record is conviction in public Court, or something of that kind.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

How would you catch your "vulgar adventurer" on a point of that kind? I doubt extremely whether a Committee of the Privy Council would be a very useful detective for such purposes. With every desire, and I have a sincere desire, to support my noble friend, I feel that he is putting upon this Committee a task which would be a very odious one, and which it would not be at all likely to perform to the satisfaction of anybody. Above all I feel, as I said at first, that by putting responsibility upon the shoulders of a Committee you take that responsibility off the shoulders of the men who ought to bear it, and they are the Prime Minister and his colleagues.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

My Lords, I do not think that my noble friend Lord Selborne is open to any censure, as the Lord Privy Seal seemed to think, because he has brought forward this question in your Lordships' House. The noble Earl seems to think that no Motion of this kind, supported by a very moderate speech such as my noble friend Lord Selborne delivered, ought to have been made except in the presence of the Prime Minister in the House of Commons.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

No! I did not say that. If the case was as serious as alleged I rather indicated that it was surprising that the Minister responsible—namely, the Prime Minister—had never been faced on the subject himself. I did not attempt to censure Lord Selborne for making the Motion. That is the last thing in the world that I would wish to do.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

I thought the noble Earl did, but I will not dwell any more upon that point. Having listened to the speeches of the three noble Lords who preceded me, I felt that the way of a reformer was very hard. Nobody denies the existence of these mischiefs. Nobody in the debates before has denied that these evils exist. Everybody has admitted them. My noble friend Lord Lansdowne, speaking with all the great weight of his authority in your Lordship's House, never denied in the former debates the existence of these mischiefs. On the contrary, he assisted Lord Selborne in carry- ing in a modified form the Resolution which stands on the records of the House. Yet what sort of language does the noble Earl use, and the noble Marquess behind me use, in regard to these occurrences? They say mistakes may have been made—blunders, indiscretions. Those are the words.

Does any noble Lord believe in his heart that there are nothing but blunders and mistakes and indiscretions. I mean, of course, that we are used to very moderate language in your Lordships' House, I am glad to say, and many of these phrases are euphemisms, because we do not like, and think it better manners not, to call things by their proper names. None of us believe in our hearts for a moment that there is not ground for charges of something much worse than blunders or mistakes or indiscretions. I am not, of course, denying what my noble friend Lord Lansdowne said just now, that on the whole the administration of honours is not corrupt. I entirely agree with him; but there ought to be no exceptions. Honours are not things which ought to be conferred generally purely, generally without corruption. There ought to be no possibility in this country of anything like a charge that honours are and have been sold for money, directly or indirectly, or that they have been granted without all that care and all that sense of responsibility which honours, if they are to be honours at all, ought to receive. That is why I say that the ways of the reformer are hard.

The task which some of us have undertaken to try and produce a remedy is very difficult. You always can find objections. Great constitutional authorities, like my noble friend the Leader of the Opposition or my noble friend Lord Lansdowne, will always be able to say, "Oh, but you are doing a very serious thing; you are interfering with the Prerogative," or "You are depriving those of responsibility who ought to bear it." It is perfectly true, we are changing a little bit, or trying to change a little bit, the burden of responsibility. I earnestly hope that we are not interfering with the Prerogative, but it seems to me that there can be no deeper injury to the Prerogative in this country than that there should be a well-founded suspicion that some of the honours which His Majesty is called upon to confer are conferred for unworthy motives.

It is not possible, if I may say so with great earnestness to your Lordships, to meet a case of this kind with merely, may I call it—my noble friend will forgive me—constitutional pedantry? We require to look the thing in the face, and to say, "Are we doing all that we can do to prevent any of these evil practices?" My noble friend the Lord Privy Seal was apparently in great doubt as to the kind of honours which we have in view. In one part of his speech he seemed to think they were only the very small honours of which we were thinking; in another part his mind was evidently on a different plane, because he spoke of honours with which he thought Overseas Ministers and Ambassadors would be better qualified to deal than anybody else. I do not quite know what was in his mind. But the only honours which I think we desire to exclude are honours of such a very special kind that it may be quite obvious it is a matter for the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister alone to deal with them. These are not honours as we hope that are or could be the subject of any corrupt or improper use. But, broadly speaking, we are thinking of all the honours which have been under discussion so often in your Lordships' House—knighthoods, baronetcies, even membership of your Lordships' House. We are thinking of all those, and if the matter is to be dealt with at all we ought to deal with those.

Now I come to the British Empire Order. I confess I did interrupt the noble Earl rather warmly just now, because I felt very deeply the way in which he put it to us. I yield to none in my admiration of the great services which many of these humble people have conferred upon the country. I have had the honour of standing by His Majesty when he has conferred these distinctions, and I have felt and reflected how much more deeply they deserve many of these honours than some more highly-placed individuals. I confess I resent the sort of implication which, in the heat of the moment, the noble Earl seemed to throw out, that we who are more fortunately placed, and those of us who, no doubt unworthily, bear honours on our breasts, are critics of those humble individuals. Of course, the noble Earl almost makes it impossible for us to say a word if he really thinks, which I am sue he dyes not, that we ignore the humbler folk in the pride of our hearts in our own position. No, My Lords, all honour to these humble people. All honour to them for what they have done during this great war. But is it not right that we should seek to keep at their highest value the honours which these men have had conferred upon them? Are we to be shamed by the noble Earl opposite, the acting Leader of the House, because we humbly are doing our best to see that these honours shall be maintained at their high standard? Surely not. Surely we are only doing our duty, and are not susceptible to the sort of shameful innuendo of my noble friend's observation. What is it that we are afraid of in respect of that Order? My noble friend who moved this Resolution to-night said that he was convinced that the Prime Minister was not able himself to exercise any kind of check upon the selection of these honours. My noble friend spoke with knowledge. He knows that in certain cases the Prime Minister has not exercised any check. I put it to my noble friend, Are they satisfied that these honours should be conferred practically upon the advice of private secretaries?

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

Which honours—the O.B.E.?

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

I would rather not say.

THE EARL OF SELBORNE

I will tell you.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

I will answer if I know.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

I would rather not say, because, if I can avoid it, I do not want to say anything more about the British Empire Order after what has passed. I take it that there are a large number of honours—I will not put it too high, but a considerable number of honours—practically conferred by private secretaries. Is the House satisfied with such a system? Is that really a good system? Does anybody believe it is a good system? Of course not. I am not speaking of cases where the Prime Minister relies on the advice of one of his colleagues or relies on the advice, let us say, of the head of the Red Cross or the local heads of the Red Cross, all of whom, as far as I know, are ladies and gentlemen of high standing in every way. But is it satisfactory that the other system should prevail? If it is not, then surely we ought to try to find a remedy, and the fact that it is unprecedented, and that it interferes to some extent with the hitherto accepted responsibility of the Prime Minister, ought not to be used as an answer to us unless some other plan can be devised.

Let me say one word about the plan which is suggested in my noble friend's Motion. The noble Marquess behind me, I think, and other noble Lords, have said that the institution of a Committee like this of the Privy Council, to advise, is an unprecedented affair, and that is not likely to produce good results, that it dilutes responsibility, and so forth. But let me quote from a humble precedent. I have the honour to be a member of the Advisory Committee in my county for the appointment of magistrates. That was instituted a certain number of years ago in order to advise the Lord Lieutenant in his recommendations. It was said in the counties that certain evils had grown up, not precisely the kind of evils we are now talking of, but other evils had grown up in regard to appointments to the Bench; and it was said that if Advisory Committees were appointed to advise the Lord Lieutenant, these evils would be largely avoided. They were appointed. As far as I know, the system has worked admirably. None of the difficulties which are foreseen by my noble friend behind me, or by the noble Marquess, have arisen. The Advisory Committees have worked admirably; there has been no difficulty about them whatever. What does happen? Somebody with knowledge of a proposed magistrate brings his name before the Advisory Committee. The Advisory Committee are able to discuss amongst themselves whether they think he is a suitable person for the Bench. There are representatives, I need not say, of the different political parties, but that is nothing to the purpose in this particular question. There is no difficulty about it and it works very well. And the appointments of magistrates have, as I believe, been more satisfactory in the public mind than they were before, and no difficulty arises. If that can be done in the appointing of justices of the peace in counties, should it not be equally successful in the appointment to honours on a larger scale in the matter of the Honours Lists in this country? I suggest to your Lordships that this ought not to present any difficulties.

But I do not desire to dwell any longer upon that side of the matter. It seems to be a simple remedy, a remedy indicated by obvious considerations. I will just say this. My noble friend seemed to have some difficulty as to how these Privy Councillors would be appointed. He has only to read the Motion. They are to be appointed by His Majesty. He thinks there would be no Privy Councillors who would be exempt from a position which laid them open to all sorts of suspicions. I do not think so. I see no difficulties on that head. There are many gentlemen, noble Lords and others, holding the office of Privy Councillor, who are abundantly to be trusted in this matter, and if they had direct responsibility thrown upon them there is no reason to suppose for a moment that they would not, exercise it under every proper care and feeling. After all, is it true that they are open to the same kind of difficulties as the Prime Minister himself? They are not overworked, as he is; they have not got the care of a great Empire, as he has; they would not be the leaders of a political Party, as he is; they would not have all sorts of persons round them who are not governed by the highest motives, as he is. In every way they would be in a far better position, and being many and not one, if one of them found himself the object of pressure he would always be able to fall back upon his colleagues and so avoid the impact.

Lastly, I would make an appeal to your Lordships. You do not approve of this particular remedy. That is possible. The objections of the Lord Privy Seal, Lord Lansdowne, and the noble Marquess (Lord Crewe) may convince you or may not convince you—I do not know how it is with regard to that that the remedy is not the best remedy. Well then, my Lords, for goodness sake propose some remedy. Do remember that we are standing before the country at a time when everything of this kind is being called in question. There is no question whatever that the great mass of the people are intensely suspicious. They believe that there are many matters in respect of politics and politicians and the by-ways of politics which will not bear the light. I earnestly hope we may do everything that is possible to eliminate all these suspicions. We have an immense responsibility. There is going to be an Election, probably one of the most momentous Elections which have ever taken place in English history, and I should have liked for it to have been possible to say that at the last moment, before that Election, at any rate the House of Lords showed itself fully alive to its responsibility as the guardian, above all other bodies in this country, of all that appertains to honourable distinction; that it had stepped forward and said that, in so far as it could manage it, it would prevent any of these evils from taking place in the future, and so we might go with clean hands and clean hearts before the people of this country.

On Question, Motion negatived.