Lords Sitting of 11 May 1922

Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

FRAUD AND FALSIFICATION BILL. [H.L.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to consolidate and simplify the law relating to fraud, falsification and kindred offences triable on indictment; and to move that it be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 1a.—(The Lord Chancellor).
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE (No. 2) BILL.
Brought from the Commons, read 1a, and to be printed.
SOUTH STAFFORDSHIRE WATER BILL.
Read 2a, and committed: The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
SOUTH WALES ELECTRICAL POWER DISTRIBUTION COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
LEICESTER FREEMEN BILL.
Read 3a, and passed.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (GUILDFORD EXTENSION) BILL. [H.L.]
Amendments reported (according to Order).
INDIAN HIGH COURTS BILL. [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment.

R.I.C. DISBANDMENT.
VISCOUNT LONG OF WRAXALL VISCOUNT LONG OF WRAXALL rose to ask His Majesty's Government what steps have been taken to provide pensions, allowances, and safe conduct for those members of the Royal Irish Constabulary who wish to leave Ireland with their

377
families; also, how many members of the force have been enlisted for service over-sea; and to move for a Return setting out all the details.
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I make no apology to your Lordships for asking you briefly to consider this afternoon the case of the Royal Irish Constabulary. It is a case urgent in itself and vital to the officers and men of that splendid force, and I venture to say that if it be not generously handled it may well be vital alike to the reputation for fair play and the honour of Great Britain. It would be a disaster if it were recorded in our annals that these officers and men had not been treated with generosity upon their disbandment. I do not rise to make any attack upon His Majesty's Government. I am one of those who hold that during the last seven or eight years, in fact ever since the war broke out, and especially during the last two years— a period when I had no personal experience because, for reasons of health, I had to resign my position in the Government—the problems with which His Majesty's Government have been confronted have been not only extraordinary in their number but complex to a degree which I believe was rarely, if ever, reached before, and that they have done their very best to solve those problems and to meet them as an English Government ought to meet them. For this reason, if for no other, I do not propose this afternoon to make any attack upon the policy of the Government with respect to the provision made for the Royal Irish Constabulary.
I have yet another reason, which is that in the suggestions which I shall venture with great respect to make to your Lordships and to the Government, I deal far more with detail than with any principle concerned in this provision. I have read a debate which took place yesterday in another place and I believe that an appeal addressed in this House to His Majesty's Government would be welcomed by them. I cannot help thinking that the support of both Houses of Parliament for the Royal Irish Constabulary, and for some changes of a more generous character, would be helpful to the Government and therefore helpful to the cause that I have at heart to-day.
It is unnecessary to remind your Lordships of the record of the Royal Irish Constabulary, but their period of existence
378
has come to an end and I think it is fitting that every opportunity should be taken to pay a tribute, however inadequate, to the services which that great force has rendered, and to remember how wonderful that record is. I remember, years ago, discussing that force with the late Lord Roberts, one of our greatest and most experienced soldiers and administrators, and he told me that in his opinion it was one of the finest, if not the finest force of the kind he had ever known—high praise indeed from such a man. The record of the Royal Irish Constabulary may be summed up in a very few words. Ever since their constitution, through all the perils, difficulties and trials through which they have passed, their record is one of stainless loyalty to the Crown and the State and fearless, undeviating devotion to duty. It is melancholy to think that it is for this wonderful performance of duty that so many of them are suffering to-day. A remarkable cartoon which appeared in Punch this week gives some idea of what is the prospect before them and of what is the situation with which we are faced now, exiled from their own homes, driven from the land of their birth for no other reason than that they did their duty.
My object, as I Lave said, is not to ask the Government to tear up their schemes and to draw up fresh ones, but to make some changes in those schemes as they are presented to Parliament. I realise that the Government have recognised, and recognised in many respects, the services of the Royal Irish Constabulary, but it is true that—
"The best-laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft a-gley,"
and it may be that the best schemes, unless meticulously examined while in the care and charge of Parliament, may not have the effect which their authors intended. Many serious mistakes may thus result with possibly great suffering to this distinguished force. Should that be the case, there would be great discredit to ourselves. The truth is that in considering the case of the Royal Irish Constabulary it is impossible to make any comparison between them and their present circumstances and any other force, military or otherwise, which has ever existed. Then, is no precedent, so far as I know, for the present situation. I believe, if it is to be met so that something more than justice may be meted out to the officers and Lien of this force, that

379
we must not hesitate to strike out a new line with respect to the provision made for them, and to strike it out boldly and fearlessly, because we know we shall be only doing what is right by men who have done their utmost for us.
The provision made for the Royal Irish Constabulary can be divided under two heads—(1) the pensions; (2) the allowances, called, I see, by the Chief Secretary by the very appropriate and simple name of compensation allowances. If I may be permitted to do so I shall refer to this second subject as the compensation allowances. Over all, as I understand it, with reference both to pensions and to allowances, there is established a tribunal with power to vary any of the arrangements made. I hope I shall be forgiven if I say that I have a criticism to pass upon the constitution of this tribunal, based upon very long experience of Ireland. I have known Ireland for more than half a century, and I have been connected with the Government of Ireland, and I have never been able to understand why it so often happens that the Government insist upon appointing Englishmen, or Scotsmen, or Welshmen, to preside over inquiries intended to investigate really difficult Irish problems. I hold, and I think many others who know Ireland and who have Irish blood in their veins also hold, that it is almost impossible to appreciate the difficulties of Ireland, to understand the conditions, and to realise what is actually going on or has been going on there, unless you live in the country, know the people, and, indeed, unless you have some Irish blood in your veins.
For this general reason, and on no personal ground, I regret that this tribunal is not to be presided over by a great Irish Civil Servant. It is to be presided over by a very distinguished Civil Servant, a personal friend of my own. A more capable man, a more impartial man, you could not possibly desire to find; but none the less I wish that a tribunal which has such wide powers and which deals with questions of such vital import to these officers and men were in the hands of those who really know from personal experience what has been going on in Ireland during recent years. I have no criticism to offer from any other point of view, but I believe that questions will arise for consideration by this tribunal which will require an infinite knowledge of the condition of things, which is almost incomprehensible to those who have not had personal experience.
I have no great criticism to pass upon the scheme of pensions. I think, generally speaking, it is fair, and in some cases it may be described as generous. But there is room for improvement. Some of the pensions which I have examined, especially in the case of the younger members, whether officers or men, appear to me to be too small. Of course, in the ordinary case of pensions while you take the number of years' service it is right and proper that you should hold, as the State always does, that if a man is pensioned when he is young and vigorous, he has opportunities of making a living for himself in other ways. In this case, however, it must not be forgotten that in the large majority of cases this opening is denied to these officers and men, through no fault of their own, and denied the more determinedly just in proportion as their service has been most dangerous and most loyal.
There is one question I want to ask which applies right through the service. A certain number of men have been employed in higher grades than that which they actually hold, and yet, when it comes to their pension, that service in the higher grade is not allowed to count. I do not know why that should be. I have here two or three cases which illustrate what I mean. Here is a senior officer who was in the Constabulary when I was in Ireland, who, to my knowledge, has rendered most brilliant service, and who was a divisional commander—a new grade since I was in Ireland. He had control of more than 2,000 men, and had performed his duties in some of the most difficult and dangerous areas. Yet, when it comes to pensioning him on compulsory disbandment, he is not allowed to count in respect of his pension the two or three or more years that he served as a district commissioner. There is another case of a junior officer, a district inspector, who served in the war, was recalled to the Royal Irish Constabulary, performed the duties of county inspector for two or three years, and yet the latter service is not allowed to count. It is thought in some quarters that the reason why it is not allowed to count is because there is a standing Treasury rule in connection with the force that there shall not be more than a certain number of county inspectors. If that is the reason, I submit, with great respect, that it ought to be swept away, and that if these men were performing these duties for any

381
reasonable time, that period of service ought to count towards the augmentation of their pension.
I have also the case of a head constable, a rank which is equivalent to a warrant officer in the Army. He was acting-district inspector. He had thirty-two years' service, and on disbandment he gets a pension of £236, with which he has to make a new home. On that pension he could have retired several years ago. There are other cases with which I will not trouble your Lordships now, but I have given three different cases, two of officers in a commissioned rank, and one in a non-commissioned rank, and I can assure your Lordships that they are not cases specially picked out for their exceptional severity, but cases which represent the different classes to which I have referred. I submit that there is a real and substantial injustice, and that it can be remedied without either great cost to the State or any injury to the main framework of the Government proposals.
I come now to the second part of my subject—compensation and other allowances. While I do not hesitate to say that, in my judgment, these are not sufficient for the purpose for which they are required, there is also a different ground on which their reconsideration should be urged. Going carefully, as I have done, into the history of these proposals, I think there can be no doubt that there has been delay in dealing with them which might have been avoided, and that they have been dealt with, not boldly and as a whole, but piecemeal and in a way which has materially reduced the value of these allowances to the officers and men themselves; and for this reason. Disbanded, exiled from Ireland, and many of them knowing that their lives are not safe even on this side of the Channel, these men have but few alternatives if they are to start a new life and make a new future for their wives and children. To do this it is a matter of vital importance that they should know at once, without doubt or hesitation, what are the sums of money that they will have to deal with in order to make homes elsewhere. Delay in this case means almost more than it means in ordinary cases of a different kind.
I have here a summary which has been given to me, and which I have tested by the different forms that I have seen, which have been issued at different times to the
382
police, and I think this will show your Lordships and satisfy His Majesty's Government that these men have a claim based on the ground that there has been delay and piecemeal treatment. No doubt, when this question first arose His Majesty's Government hoped and believed, and their advisers in Ireland hoped and believed, that the Treaty would go through, and that a large number of the Royal Irish Constabulary would be able either to settle in Ireland in other capacities, or serve the authorities otherwise. But there arose then a unanimous demand on the part of the force for disbandment, and this demand was acceded to. Then came the delay of which I complain.
On March 27, by circular, the men were told their position and that disbandment was to proceed; but owing to the delay in obtaining the further information to which I have referred, they were informed that they would be told what they were going to get subsequently, and were sent back to their homes. Instead of collecting the men and their wives and children in or near the centre, these men were sent back to their homes. With what result? With the result that several of them were barbarously shot, while they were trying to find out what their terms were and to make some plans for the future. Again, there was delay in dealing with these men, with the result that Royal Irish Constabulary barracks were captured. This led to the formation of concentration camps, and I believe—though this I have been unable to verify—to the offering of the 1920 terms to the men. I had some responsibility, full responsibility, for the 1920 terms as they are called. But since then great events have happened. The Royal Irish Constabulary have, up to the present moment, continued to suffer under the most terrible cruelties that it is possible to imagine, and to offer them now terms which were adequate or were thought to be adequate in 1919, is certainly not generous, and I do not think it is just.
I do not seek to blame anybody for this condition of things. I know the difficulties; I know how great they have been, and how heavy has been the pressure of work of all kinds. But I respectfully submit to your Lordships and to the Government that the case of inadequacy is proved, or can easily be proved, and that the case of insufficient information and delay in deciding upon the terms justifies the view

383
that I expressed that mistakes have been made. If that is so, may we not in a matter of such gravity ask the Government to acknowledge that mistakes have been made and to endeavour to repair them before it is too late?
There is one other reason why the allowances should be on a generous scale. At present, as I understand it—I think there is no doubt about this—they are limited to the transfer of the men and their families and belongings to Great Britain, or some other part of Ireland. I suggest that such a limitation destroys in many cases the whole value of the grant that you are making. In many cases it would be actually dangerous for these men to transfer themselves from Ireland to this country. The vendetta that has pursued them for so long and with such deadly effect in their own country would pursue them here. Their lives, I believe (though it is difficult to credit such a statement in these days), and the lives even of some of those belonging to them, would be in danger if they sought to transfer their homes to another part of the United Kingdom.
Supposing it is not so. Supposing that I am indulging in the language of exaggeration in making these statements, there is another reason, known to your Lordships, known to the world, stated day after day in every one of our newspapers—known, as I say, not only here to ourselves, to our profound sorrow, but known throughout the world—that is, that in this country to-day there is an immense number of unemployed for whom no work can be found. We see passing along our streets processions, not in the technical but in the actual sense, of unemployed day after day. Our pavements are being worn out by men, educated, capable, full of integrity and every quality that is required to make good servants, for whom there is no employment. And it is suggested that you should ask these men from the Royal Irish Constabulary to join those melancholy processions, and to wait in the hope that at some time or other employment may be found for them. I said just now, and I repeat, that if you are going to deal successfully with these cases you must deal with them in a bolder fashion than this. I believe you must offer to them inducements which will enable them, and lead them it may be, to transfer themselves and their belongings from here to another part of the Empire.
May I put one case before your Lordships out of several with which I have been personally connected? A man who has served in the R.I.C. with rare distinction, who knows he is in the list of those whose lives are not safe, and that his life is not safe here and far less in Ireland, has left this country and gone to a country of which I have some little knowledge and where I believe there are good openings. He has gone there with the very best of introductions and with this object—that he may find some district in which he can settle and in which there may be openings not only for himself and those belonging to him but also for the officers and men of the force to which he belonged and who served in his own area. We talk in these days of schemes of emigration, of sending out good men and women; could there be a better scheme, could there be a more hopeful one, could there be one more likely to confer good on those who go and upon those who receive them than a scheme of this kind, if it be generously and wisely financed?
I submit that, very inadequately but still sufficiently for my purpose, I have made out my case, although it be in a very brief form. It is that this force deserves well, no force have ever deserved better, of this country. It is that their position is to be measured by the sad and sordid fact that the greater their devotion to duty the greater the danger to themselves. I have indicated that there are some additions which, without in any way impairing the main structure of the Government scheme, would improve it and would help those who have done so much for us. I frankly admit that I am urging treatment which is not merely just but amounts to generosity because in my judgment nothing less will solve this problem.
During the last 120 years there have been many occasions when Great Britain has been called upon to deal with the Irish problem. Proud though I am of my country and the part that she has played in her own domestic history within the United Kingdom and in the world, I should be a fool and a coward if I did not admit that we have made grave mistakes from time to time which have had the melancholy result of causing Irishmen to turn their backs on us and blame us for what we have done. Do not let us make another. Above all, do not let us make one in respect of men whose record is so splendid.
I am very grateful to your Lordships for your indulgence, and I have only one other word to say. In the great war, from whose shadow we are only just emerging, there were two basic principles, two great heritages of our race, which were more present in the minds of those who fought in that war than any other—that war in which millions of the best of our race fought, and in which so many thousands suffered permanent disablement or surrendered their lives. Those great principles were liberty and freedom, liberty to go about your own business in your own way, without interference so long as you kept wit bin the law; and freedom which meant, and means, immunity from the horrors and the cruelties of the tyrant and the bully. Those possessions, clear to us, are denied the Royal Irish Constabulary, and have been denied it for some time. We cannot restore the dead; we cannot bring any real solace to the widow and the orphan; but we can make both the present and the future brighter and better for them if we realise here that the principles to which I have referred are at this moment at stake. It is in the name of those sacred principles that I appeal to-day to His Majesty's Government. I hope, nay, I venture to believe, that I shall not appeal in vain.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT BIRKENHEAD): My Lords, in attempting to answer the very important Questions which the noble Viscount has put to the Government, I may perhaps be permitted to express, on behalf of us all, the extreme satisfaction and pleasure with which I am certain we have listened to the first important speech which the noble Viscount has delivered in this House. His distinguished family for generations, and indeed for centuries, has rendered illustrious public service in another place, and in welcoming the noble Viscount to this House I can assure him, on behalf of your Lordships, that we look forward to many occasions on which we shall profit from his rare and protracted experience.
I agree, as every one must agree, with every word that the noble Viscount has said in eulogy of the distinguished force whose affairs engage our attention to-day. It is the literal truth to say, as the noble Viscount has said, recording the opinion of Lord Roberts, that no finer force has ever discharged similar functions in any civilised country in the world. Many noble
386
Lords are well aware of the constitution, the history, and the records of these men for loyalty, for devotion to duty, and for courage. No body of men whose history is known to me has ever surpassed the men whose affairs engage the attention of the House to-day. Therefore, the noble Viscount will carry every one with him. He will certainly carry with him the Government, of whose difficulties lie spoke with so much understanding and appreciation, when he says that the terms offered to these men ought to be not only just terms but generous. I accept most unreservedly that rule as laid clown by the noble Viscount, and I agree with him without any qualification at all that if in any single particular it can be shown that the terms provided for these officers are not generous terms that matter must undoubtedly be put right.
I am of opinion, subject to a more careful consideration of the speech and of the detailed points made by the noble Viscount, that in their generality these proposals are extremely generous, and in making this observation I reserve to myself, naturally the right to consider in greater detail the criticisms which the noble Viscount has made. But I will make bold to say this, after having examined these terms, that I do not believe there has ever been in any country in the world a scale of pensions adopted so liberal as the one which is now under the consideration of the House. The proposals are contained in a Paper (Cmd. 1618 A), which has been presented to Parliament. Briefly, the provision made is that every man is entitled to a pension for life based on the actual length of service with twelve years added thereto, and calculated in accordance with the salary which he would have been receiving at the end of those twelve years. That is the general principle. In addition, any officer or constable who desires to move his home either to some other place in Ireland or elsewhere is entitled to receive any expenses of such removal up to a maximum of one month's pay for a married man, two months' pay for married men with less than three children, and three months' pay for married men with three or more children. Any officer or man who desires to leave Ireland is entitled, in addition to the allowance already mentioned, to be paid the travelling expenses of himself and his family and dependants to any part of the United Kingdom, and, if he prefers to leave his wife behind in

387
Ireland while he is seeking for employment elsewhere, his family will receive separation allowance for a period of three months after disbandment.
The noble Viscount said, quite fairly, that in the main he was of opinion that these proposals were fair and generous, but he made some suggestions, with which I will attempt to deal, for improving them in a few specific instances. He spoke of the younger men who had been serving in the force for a few years only, and said that their pension is not sufficient wholly to maintain them during the present difficult times. A constable with less than a year's service, none of which, therefore, was spent during the period of active rebellion—the discussions began in June—or very little of which was spent in a period of actual rebellion, will, with the addition of twelve years to his term of service, receive a minimum of£46 16 s. per annum for life. I said that no such pensions had hitherto ever been thought of, so far as I am aware, in any force in any part of the world. It means that a young man who has served for one year will receive a pension of£46 per year for life, which is equivalent to the interest on a sum of money amounting to about£1,200. I have not the exact scale of pensions which is paid in the case of long service in the late war, but I believe the pension given to such a young man is more than the pension which is given to a man who served four years in the trenches and who has lost the sight of both his eyes. Even in dealing with cases like this we must preserve our sense of proportion. A young man with the whole world to choose from, with this country to choose from, with the British Empire to choose from, unwounded in the overwhelming majority of cases, is not treated ungenerously if he gets a pension on this scale.
But to meet the difficulty that during an interim period he may not be able to keep himself, the so-called "loading scheme," outlined in paragraph 4 of the terms of disbandment, was devised. By this means a constable aged 21, with a pension of£46 16 s. can raise that pension to£106 12 s. for the next two years, and the pension thereafter will be reduced to£37 16s. a year. To tide over the exceptional period of two years such a man can obtain money to maintain himself and his wife moderately, and after that the pension is reduced. I do not think any of your Lordships will say that it is reasonable, on
388
the most generous proposal, that in the ease of a man of that age who has sustained no disabling casualty the State should undertake for the rest of his life his exclusive support and thus discourage him from trying to discover some additional source of income.
As regards officers holding acting rank the noble Viscount put forward a suggestion which shall be further considered—namely, that it ought to be possible to reckon their pension as though, in fact, they had been given substantive promotion. The grant of eighteen years which they will receive will suffice to take them to the maximum pay of their rank, on which, therefore, they will all of them be pensioned. In no branch of the public service is acting rank counted for the purpose of pension. The noble Viscount is more familiar with these matters than I am, but I understand that during the late war it was not the practice to treat acting rank as a basis for pension.
The noble Viscount also referred to the constitution of the tribunal. I do not know whether your Lordships appreciate the fact that the expert tribunal deals with exceptional cases only. It cannot decrease any pension or allowance; it can only recommend to the Treasury an increase in grant. It has, as one of its members, Mr. Clayton, a senior officer of the Royal Irish Constabulary, the Chief of Police and the Deputy Chief of Police; and other officers of the Police and the Chief Secretary are always available to give evidence in support of special cases. I am told that no suggestion was made by the Royal Irish Constabulary in the discussions which took place that an Irish Civil Servant should be appointed on this particular body, and there are, in fact, at this moment no Irish Civil Servants who are remaining in the service of His Majesty's Government. I agree that is not a point of substance because the noble Viscount's objection could be met by placing upon the tribunal someone who until recently had occupied that position. The suggestion shall receive further consideration.
The next point with which the noble Viscount dealt was that of allowances. The Government scheme of disturbance allowance, by which a man receives one month's, or two or three months' pay as an advance on being disturbed, is intended to assist men in the actual removal of their homes from Ireland to any part of Great

389
Britain, or another part of Ireland. In the earlier part of my observations I stated what are the arrangements contemplated under this head. The noble Viscount makes two criticisms. In the first place, he says that on the whole these allowances, in relation to the demands upon the fund, are not adequate; and, in the second place, he thinks that a more complete and thoroughgoing scheme might be considered with the object of encouraging emigration to various parts of the Empire.
First as to the amount. It is a fact that this provision has up to the present been very little used by those for whose benefit it was devised. I have not before me the precise numbers, but in relation to the total number the toll of those who have availed themselves of this proportion is almost negligible. It is possible, of course, to draw the inference that the noble Viscount is right in his view, that the amount allotted is not adequate. Equally, one may draw the inference that the ties which bind these men to the country to which almost all of them belong are too strong even in existing circumstances to be lightly severed. But the noble Viscount is entitled to contend that if the number which has availed themselves of this provision is small no very serious additional expenditure would be involved by a reconsideration of the amount, and I will certainly assure him that his suggestion shall receive the fullest consideration. I will communicate with him after I have discussed it with those who are principally concerned.
On the subject of emigration the noble Viscount is, indeed, forcing an open door. It is in contemplation by the Government that many of the younger members, particularly the unmarried members, of this splendid force, equipped as they will be with the means of maintaining themselves until they discover employment, may play a great and perhaps a decisive part in building up the outlying parts of the British Empire. The noble Viscount is perfectly right when he says that no time would be excessive which is bestowed on the task of perfecting schemes which would produce this result. I can assure him that his co-operation, and the co-operation of his friends, will be very welcome on a matter in which, I know, he has great personal experience.
The noble Viscount has instanced a few cases in which there has been delay—
390
as he thinks, and as the facts at first sight appear to suggest, undue delay—in dealing with these matters. The noble Viscount, although he was good enough to inform me generally of the tenour of his observations, naturally could not furnish me with every detail in respect of which he desired information. I have not available at this moment the answer, if answer there be, to the case which he has made under this head, and perhaps lie will be so good as to enable me to reply to him in writing when I have the more specific information for which he asks. I have attempted to reply in detail to the questions put by the noble Viscount, and I may say, in conclusion, that the House is, in my judgment, greatly indebted to him for the effective manner in which he has called attention to this matter.
LORD CARSON: My Lords, I have a Notice upon the Paper—["to call attention to the treatment of British subjects in Ireland"]—which rather extends the scope of the debate, but I understand that the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack prefers that the two matters should be kept separate. I will first, therefore, deal for a very few moments only with the subject matter before the House. Every time the Royal Irish Constabulary are mentioned, there is a kind of enthusiasm about their history and traditions which one feels is general among all loyal parties who listen to it. But let us not be quite satisfied by merely paying our tribute to the loyalty of these men.
The noble Viscount on the Woolsack says that there never have been in any country such liberal terms as have been provided for the Royal Irish Constabulary. There never has been, in the history of any country, a force that has found itself in such a position as that of these loyal men. God knows, I ought to understand what these men have gone through. They followed me day and night, in and out of season, when you were enforcing the law, as they have followed every Chief Secretary and every officer you have ever employed over there. The noble Viscount who introduced this subject said we had made many mistakes in Ireland. Yes, and it was sometimes their loyalty in carrying out your mistakes that made these men unpopular. You are, therefore, approaching an entirely new subject matter, because there never has been before any position comparable to this, where a Government

391
abandoned a portion of their country without previously making provision as to the treatment of those who were loyal to them. To-day, five months after the Treaty, I venture to think that the condition of these men is the most unfortunate that could be depicted.
Behind and beyond all these questions of whether the terms you give them are generous, let me point out that there is a great question of practicability. What is happening at the present moment? Numbers of these men dare not go to their homes because the British Government have withdrawn, and they come over here in large numbers. They cannot get accommodation, and they are hunted about from one house to another. There are many places where, when people find out who these men are, they are, naturally or unnaturally, afraid to take them. The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack spoke of the small numbers who have availed themselves of the provisions for removing their families. But there is nowhere to remove them to.
I have here a report from General Prescott-Decie, who, to his great honour and credit be it said, is trying to do something to benefit these men by an organisation which he has kept up. He says—
"For men with families, especially large ones, we are unable to find accommodation. At this moment I have eight families in London which I am unable to provide for. This number looks small, but the fact is that the families are all in Ireland, and we dare not bring them over here because we have nowhere to put them. At this moment I have three families in Ireland which I must get out, whether I have accommodation or not. Sergeant A., himself in personal danger, I have told to come to London at once. His wife and seven children are in Southern Ireland. Their house has been frequently raided, and the wife in consequence has become insane, the children are in a terrified condition, and some of them are likely to become insane too from sheer terror. It is possible that force will have to be used to get them out. Sergeant B. and his son, also an ex-constable, have managed to escape from Ireland, and his family of four children, the eldest a girl of nineteen, are in Southern Ireland. They have no one to look after them or to take care of them. Sergeant C., wounded three times by Sinn Feiners, has escaped. He has not seen his family for two years. They are in the South of Ireland. His wife and several children are being terrorised and are in a miserable condition."
I want to know from His Majesty's Government what is going to be done in this class of case. It is an awful picture of your loyal servants, hunted out and followed with a view to assassination, and their families left at the mercy of these people
392
in the South and West of Ireland. That is a big question, and it must be dealt with.
I agree entirely with the noble Viscount who introduced this subject that there has been a great deal of delay in this matter. A number of these men (I do not know how many, because I have no means of ascertaining) have come to London, and your Lordships will at once see, since the force numbered some 10;000 to 15,000—I do not know exactly how many they were at the time—what interference with the labour market this may cause in the present condition of affairs in this country. It was one of the matters that we always foretold as part of our Unionist argument that, if this ever came to pass in Ireland, you would have an exodus from Ireland which would very seriously tax your resources in this country. Perhaps this question belongs more rightly to the other branch of the subject which I propose to bring before the House, but it is a very serious matter.
I press upon His Majesty's Government to take a very much larger view of their responsibility than the mere putting down of a certain amount which looks generous in comparison with Army pensions and other matters of that kind. Try to deal with the realities of the situation. Here is the kind of letter that is being sent to me. I received it the other day from the solicitor of the man to whom it came. This is what has been received by this man:
"I.R.A. Headquarters,
Dublin District.
"Take warning that it has become known to the authorities of the above organisation that you are serving in the special constabulary of the R.I.C. You have already been warned, since demobilisation from the Black and Tans, to quit the country without delay. This is the second and final warning. Take notice that all your movements since your enlistment in the R.I.C. have been carefully followed, and are well known to us. Let the fate of others who were traitors to their country be a further warning to you."
I got that with a request from this poor man's solicitor that I would advise, as the man had some chance of doing something, whether he could commute his pension. They asked me to try to get commutation allowed, as apparently it had been refused. I wrote a letter to the Irish Office over here, and received an answer to say that he could not commute his pension, unless he would undertake to emigrate.
I think that is a great mistake. Why should he not commute his pension if he

393
can start himself here? It is all very well to talk of the statesmanship of emigration, but do not drive men into your Colonies with a feeling of bitterness that they have been badly treated in their own country. There is many a man, and, especially, many a woman, who would just as soon be put in penal servitude—it is particularly so in the case of the Irish—as have to go, as they think, away into these places of which they know nothing and where they have neither friends nor relations. We have had enough in history of driving men away to foreign parts, and then finding these men hostile to us afterwards. I think, if I were a constabulary man, and after risking my life for some twenty years, I was told that the real solution of my difficulties was: "Now we are done with you and do not want you, go off 3,000 miles beyond the sea, where you know nobody and know nothing of the conditions of life, and thank God you are still a British citizen," I should feel bitter. And so, believe me, will these men if they are treated in that way. I cannot see why a man should have it made a condition of his receiving commutation of his pension that he should be hound to emigrate. It may be that the younger men will do so willingly and voluntarily, and it may be of assistance to them. But for these men with families, and particularly the middle-aged and older ones, it is not so easy a matter as some people seem to think.
There is only one other point that I should like to introduce to the House and to the attention of the Government, and it is this. I do not know exactly how the matter stands, but I receive a great many letters from police in Ireland, who write that they had been disbanded, and when the Government were in want of men to carry out their policy at that time, of putting down Sinn Fein outrage, they were asked to come back, or they volunteered to come back. These men write to me to say that when they are paid off and disbanded, now that they are no longer wanted, nothing of what they have done during these last two or three years of the most horrible times that we have ever gone through, is counted towards any additional pension. Yet that is the period which has made their lives impossible, and I cannot but think that it is an injustice which ought to be remedied. I hope that whenever the case of these men comes up it will always be treated, not on any precedent but as an isolated case for which
394
you can find no precedent, and in which all our resources ought to be strained in doing what is simple justice.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, I appreciate that an important debate is to be initiated by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Carson, but I understand from what he said that the Lord Chancellor prefers that these two subjects should be kept separate. Therefore, I ask to be allowed to bring a few, but important, details to your Lordships' notice before this subject is actually dropped; I promise that I will not stand an unduly long time between the noble and learned Lord and the House. I am particularly emboldened to do this by reason of the fact that I notice that the Lord Chancellor carefully guarded himself, while associating himself with the present terms, against shutting the door to the consideration of any argument that might be put before him.
In one sentence I think it may be said, not unfairly, that the terms now before the R.I.C. are a little better than the terms given in the Act of 1920, but I was very glad to notice that Viscount Long, who maintains his authorship of the Act of 1920, no longer considers that the terms for which he was responsible are adequate for the situation. We, of course, voted against the Act of 1920, but I am sure there are many of your Lordships who will rejoice that once again they find themselves in agreement with the noble Viscount, Lord Long, on the Irish question. For the fact that the present terms are a little better than those of the Act of 1920 we have to thank the Government, but I maintain, without hesitation, that they are utterly inadequate.
The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack stated that they are the most generous terms that have ever been offered. I contest that view absolutely. Will the noble and learned Viscount be surprised to hear that these terms are considered to be less favourable than the terms actually given in the Home Rule Act of 1914? I will tell him why. Under the Act of 1914 the Royal Irish Constabulary were to remain a reserved service for six years. Members of the force, therefore, would have been drawing full pay during those six years. Those six years would have been considered towards pension, and at the end of the six years, twelve years were to be added in the case

395
of compulsory retirement and six years in the case of voluntary retirement. The double result of the Act of 1914, therefore, would have been that a member of the force would have got the benefit of eighteen years' service added for pension in the case of compulsory retirement, and of twelve years' added in the case of voluntary retirement, and in addition to that he would have had those six years during which lie would have been drawing full pay and allowances and during which he would have been able to look round the world to find something to do when he left the force.
That is entirely forgotten now, and I do not hesitate to say that the least that can be asked for is that some period of full pay should be given to all these men, in the very special circumstances of the case, to enable them to look for employment, such as they must look for. They cannot possibly expect to spend the rest of their lives on their pensions alone. That is one of the first details I wish to bring to the notice of your Lordships, and of the Government. I hope we shall not hear any more about these being the most generous terms that have ever been offered.
This disturbance allowance, of course, is justified: no one can maintain that it is not. But the amount is ungenerous; it is almost stingy. The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has mentioned the amounts; I will not quote them again. But it will surprise your Lordships to hear that those amounts, as I am informed, are less than those given under the Treasury Royal Irish Constabulary Regulations when members of the force hitherto have been moved about on duty. I will quote from a letter from an ex-officer of the Royal Irish Constabulary, a friend of mine, who says—
"My transfer allowance from the south to the north under the R.I.C. Regulations would exceed by a good deal the two months' pay now allowed me to transfer my furniture to England."
And the same applies all through the ranks of the force. Why do you give a man less to move to England to save his life than you gave him when you moved him about in normal times in Ireland on duty for your own purposes? You give him less when the danger is more urgent and the expense is greater.
How is this move to be made? How do you expect members of the Royal Irish Constabulary to move their furniture and their effects to England? No Irish firm
396
will do it; that we know from experience; they dare not. English firms have to be employed, and the prices charged by English firms have been exorbitant, and naturally so. They have had to take the risk of sending their employees to Ireland, and it is not surprising that they have insisted upon high prices. I do not use the term "exorbitant" therefore in any complaining way. The Government must have known this when they fixed the rates lower than those in the existing Regulations. The point is thoroughly understood by the members of the Royal Irish Constabulary, and they are not satisfied that they have been fairly treated. I have seen one estimate as high as this: I have been informed by an officer of the R.I.C. that this disturbance allowance will just pay a third of the cost of removing his effects to England. That is not generous treatment, and I think there is no question that the majority of the House will agree.
Here is a small detail, but not unimportant. How is this disturbance allowance to be paid? It is to he paid on demand. If your Lordships will look at the document you will find it the most astounding announcement ever made. I will read it—
"In order to avoid any delay in the payment of these allowances they will be payable on demand at the date of disbandment, or at any time within six months thereafter;—"
Well, you pay on demand.
"it must, however, be clearly understood that every officer or man who receives such an allowance will be required to produce to the tribunal referred to in paragraph 7 below—"
—he may be up in Cumberland but he has got to produce it to the tribunal in London—
"evidence that he has in fact moved his home;—
Your Lordships will see that if, by any chance, payment in advance is asked for there is no money—he cannot move:
"and if he has not moved his home or if the reasonable expenses of such removal are less than the amount of the allowance which he has received, the tribunal may require him to refund the whole or part of the allowance as the case may be."
Payment on demand after you have been before a tribunal, and a tribunal which will be meticulously careful, is almost a mockery. These men are here penniless. They have had to flee the country. The least you can do is to pay them at once, and leave the settlement of the accounts to be made afterwards.
There remains only one other point. We are in a peculiar Parliamentary

397
position. There is a Bill before the House of Commons. I do not know, but I think it is possible it may be certified as a Money Bill when it reaches us. It is unusual, I know, for your Lordships to discuss matters which are in legislative form before the other House of Parliament, but this ease is quite different. We must appeal to the Government to alter their scheme and take greater powers for the progress of the Bill through the other House. I am sure, therefore, your Lordships will not regret the time given to this subject this afternoon. We shall all be most grateful to the noble Viscount for the points he has raised, and I sincerely hope (I say it with all the solemnity of which I am capable) that we shall keep true faith with these men, and see a different scheme in a very few weeks from that which is now before Parliament.

SITUATION IN IRELAND.
LORD CARSON LORD CARSON had given Notice to call attention to the treatment of British subjects in Ireland. The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, I make no apology for inflicting upon your Lordships a second speech on the matter regarding which I have placed a Notice upon the Paper. I can assure your Lordships that I ant not going back on any part of our old controversy. The truce, as it was called, and the Bill are passed. The Government are irretrievably committed to the policy of that Act. They have withdrawn their troops and all protection from their adherents in Ireland, and that is the situation we have to accept. Let us see how British subjects are still getting on there. I said a few moments ago that it is five months since the Treaty was passed, and I cannot help thinking that it is a lamentable reflection that out of all that abject surrender we never got peace for one man.
My speech this afternoon will, I hope, be short, but the meaning of it is this. You have gone out of Ireland, and you have set up nothing in your place. Let us be under no delusion; let us try to see a real picture of Ireland, however poorly I may portray it; and let us then ask the Government how that situation is going to be dealt with. We hear a good deal about a Provisional Government, for whom we passed a Bill, to whom you have handed over arms, and who, you say, are the
398
Government of Ireland. It is perfectly plain to anybody who is following what is going on in Ireland that there is no Government at all. I have no doubt the Prime Minister was perfectly genuine at the moment, with that enthusiasm which always follows upon a new surrender—I have no doubt he was perfectly sincere and enthusiastic—when he thought of the great joy that this surrender would bring to everybody, and the impassioned loyalty that in the future we should receive from Ireland.
But what is the condition of affairs? Many people think that there is a contest going on, and that this is the whole matter of dispute between Mr. Collins and his Party, as representing the Provisional Government, and Mr. de Valera, as representing a Republican Party who are opposing the Treaty. That is a very, very small part of what is going on in Ireland. But those two Parties have each paralysed the other. In addition, throughout Ireland there are independent armies all operating on their own, and doing locally exactly what they please in the way of handing over the property of one set of men to the other. Look at Dublin. Do you tell me that there is a Government in Dublin? If there is a Government in Dublin why are the Four Courts allowed to remain in the hands of a Republican Army which has no connection even with Mr. de Valera? He is out on his own with his army. He has ousted the Judges appointed by His Majesty, who were handed over by the so-called Treaty to the Provisional Government. This army is in possession not only of the Law Courts, but of the offices. They are in possession of all the records under which minors, cestui que trusts, and other people entitled to properties administered by the Court, receive their moneys. If all those documents were destroyed it would throw into utter chaos every one of the estates concerned.
And yet we are told that there is a Government in Dublin! What are they doing, and why do they not put an end to such a state of affairs? The truth is that there is no Government, as I said before. Almost every important house in Dublin is in the hands of one army or the other. They have seized the offices of the Port and Docks Authority.
THE EARL OF MAYO: They have given them up now.
LORD CARSON: But they had seized them. They have seized the Masonic Hall, they have seized the Kildare Street Club where a few remaining Irish landlords, who, I suppose, wished to die in Ireland as they have lived there, used to congregate. A member of your Lordships' House was reading a book in the library—I believe there is a very good library there—when a man came up with a revolver in his hand and told him to go down and turn out; and he had to obey. That is not nearly all. These armies go out every morning to the shops and requisition what food is necessary to carry on. Of course, they do not pay for it. It is not that the Government cannot find out who is doing this sort of thing, because it is done in broad daylight. If there is the slightest hesitation on the part of a shop assistant to comply with the requisitions the revolver is immediately placed upon the counter. Then practically every night there is firing in the streets all through the night.
But that is not the worst. I will tell your Lordships what they have begun to do within the last few weeks. They are now taking the families of those who are out of work, or families they want to oblige, or through whom they want to show their power, and bringing them up to your house or mine if we happen to be fortunate enough to be residents of Dublin. They knock at the door and say: "This is a family out of work. You are to take them in and keep and support them until it is convenient for us to get them something to do." Just imagine the sort of life that people are living in Dublin. Then, going down from the town to the country, I wonder whether your Lordships know that, without dwelling upon murders or outrages which are innumerable, five Protestants were murdered in south-west Cork on April 27. To show what sort of people the victims were, I know that one of them was a most respectable solicitor of many years' standing. He was 72 years of age. Another man who was murdered upon that occasion was 83 years of age. They might have allowed him to live out the few years which at best could have remained to him, but they shot him dead. These are matters which, if you took each one and examined into the horror of it, I dare say would be very moving; but they are only incidents in the general terror which is being caused.
What they are doing is this. They are, without the passing of any law by the 400
Provisional Government or by any Government, whenever they choose, walking into any house, whether it be a gentleman's residence, or a farmer's residence, or a shop, and saying: "Within one hour you turn out and we will put in somebody in your place." These are not isolated cases. There are things that go on every day. I have here a list of men who on one estate alone were all given notice to clear out, and they all cleared out. I do not think I was ever more touched than I was the other day. I was down in the country far away in Kent. I drove up to my own door and found an old Irishman there who had come all the way from a county in Ireland to ask me, on behalf of himself and a number of other Protestants on a particular estate, what they were to do. What he told me was this. He said: "I have been there for thirty years; I have ten children. I have received this notice, and every other Protestant tenant in the district has received a similar one: You are requested to leave the house now held by you on or before the 26th instant. If you remain in possession of said house you will be evicted therefrom not later than above date. By Order." I could give your Lordships lists of houses and demesnes which have been taken over, but it is of no use doing so, and of farms where the whole stock has been taken away.
I have here a letter which was sent me by a bank director in Ireland yesterday, enclosing copy of one received from one of his branch managers:—
3rd May, 1922.
"Gentlemen,—I think it well to let you know that our good customer, Mr. X., was served with a notice from the I.R.A. last Saturday to give up all his farms and stock and shops with ever thing contained therein; also his private dwelling house in fact, even thing belonging to him; and was only given one hoar to clear. He had to comply with the order. He is at present staying in a hotel here. The amount of property sized would I am sure amount to over£20,000. The reason given for this seizure is the happenings in Belfast."
These are matters of which you hear, or of which you can hear, but I would ask your Lordships to picture in your minds what must be the state of nerves and health of the people whose daily lives are lived in the midst of such happenings, no man knowing the moment his own door will be knocked at, and he be the victim. Far better that he should be dead. What is the result? You have London and English places crowded at the present moment

401
with refugees. What are they to do? Surely the Government ought to face the matter.
Let me refer to one other case. That which I am depicting in a few words in regard to individual cases represents what is going on everywhere. That is what I wish to impress upon this House. I have a letter, a graphic letter, written, but not to me, by a man who dared to resist. His house was attacked, and there was no one there but himself and a boy. They were awakened by a battering at the door, and eventually they went down into the hall with revolvers. The door was finally broken open, and-ten men were there with bombs. They shot the first three who came in, and wounded one more, and the others went away leaving the bombs behind them. What do your Lordships think is the fate of those men who dared to defend themselves? Of course, they are refugees for evermore from their home and their property. They will have to lose their identity in some way or other or they will be followed and slaughtered because they dared to defend their homes which were once under the protection of the British Government.
What I want to ask the Government is this. How is this problem going to be dealt with? It is no use saying: "We do not want to encourage a general exodus from Ireland." I ask the Government to give these people a lead as to what they ought to do. After being faithful to British rule for all these years, and fighting your battles—and these are the men who did fight—surely it is not much to say: "What do you advise us to do? Do you advise us to stay here till we are shot, or till we die of our nerves as a consequence of this terrible treatment, or do you advise us to emigrate to England? And if we go there, how shall we be supported?" What you are saying to these people really is: "We do not care what happens to you." Ireland, as the Colonial Secretary said, must be worse before it is better. Probably so, but the price that is paid is paid in the lives and the misery not of those men who fought against you, and now fight amongst themselves, and who are preventing government, but in the lives of the men who not only supported your Government when it was in power there, but who, when you told them they were to be handed over to this Provisional Government under the treaty of surrender, were
402
willing to accept that so long as their lives and property might be saved.
I hope peace will come, and I can look forward to the time when these great statesmen will be saying: "Look how peaceful Ireland is now." Yes, I hope it may be so, but it will be at the cost of the annihilation of every friend you have. Is the British Government, is the British Empire, so hopeless, so devoid of gratitude, so devoid of honour, that they cannot even conceive any method to alleviate the sufferings of these unfortunate people? I shall be told: "You must have patience." It is no good telling these people that they must have patience. Patience for what? To see their property taken away, and themselves driven out or killed? "You must have patience till there is an Election"—an Election which you put off for three months, prolonging the agonies of these poor people. What Election? An Election held in these circumstances would be a perfect farce.
I wish that I was not brought into daily contact with these old friends of mine who swarm to me in England. I had a deputation the other day from one of the counties in the North, outside the Six Counties. They came to me in the most honourable way, and said: "What are we to do now? What is the line we had best take? Are we to support the Free State in that little part of the county where we are probably strong enough even to run a candidate of our own on proportional representation, or are we to support de Valera?" I said to them: "What would you run your candidate as?" They said—and it only shows how hard old opinions die—"Oh, as a Unionist." "What," I said, "in the midst of a county full of de Valera's men and Collins' men ! Do not," I added, "trouble about Unionism any more. It is not you who have hauled down the Union Jack; it is the Government." I gave them this advice as the only advice I could think of—"Do nothing, keep your counsel to yourselves. If you support the Free State you will be murdered by de Valera's followers, or some other I.R.A. men, and if you support de Valera you will probably be murdered by the other side." That is the condition of affairs that exists in Ireland to-day. Property is changing hands every hour without the law, very often without even the knowledge of the Provisional Government. My point is that what you have set up there is hopeless and

403
unequal to doing anything to remedy the situation.
All the time this is having a reaction upon Ulster whose Parliament was opened by the King exactly a year ago. Of course, horrible things have occurred there, but it is all the re-echo of this same policy. I am not talking in any spirit of hostility to the Government. I fought my battle as well as I could; but they have created the situation, and have persisted in it, and we have to accept it. But, knowing as I do these men on both sides, I cannot but lament the grave mistake you made in leaving open this sore of the border line between these two Parliaments; a daily encouragement to the one side to terrorise, and a daily encouragement to the other side to mistrust even you who are the supreme Government in Ulster in the last resort. To-night I am merely asking that the situation should be faced. I ask that these wounded soldiers of your policy should be considered not as mere items, not as atoms or eyphers in your body politic, but as human beings, suffering as no other men or women have ever suffered under the British flag.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, in a powerful and sombre speech the noble and learned Lord has depicted the conditions which undoubtedly exist over a considerable part of Ireland to-day. In the course of his observations he illustrated his point by citing the case of a constituency in which he was asked to offer advice as to whether or not a candidate should be run as a Unionist. If I understand the situation of that particular constituency the fact is that no one would have a chance of being returned there except under one of two contingencies, either that he was a supporter of the Provisional Government, or a supporter of Mr. de Valera. If that is a true index of the state of political opinion in that constituency it was not a very practical proposal that a candidate should be put forward who called himself a Unionist. And the difficulty felt in this case is, indeed, fundamental, and has for a long time been fundamental, in dealing with the whole of the South of Ireland. In other words, with the exception of the University seats, it has been for many years impossible to put forward in any part of the South of Ireland, with the slightest chance of success, a candidate calling himself a Unionist. I do not deal with the case of any particular constituency, but
404
if the average election is taken that is almost the truth.
It is this circumstance which more than any other has provided an argumentative basis for those who have contended over a long period of time that at least in that part of Ireland where it is true that no Unionist candidate has any chance of being returned there should, in some form or other, in some degree or other, be committed to them the guidance of their own affairs. The old controversy was whether the predominance of this Party in the South entitled them to extend their domination to the North, where it was not even pretended that they were anything but a relative minority. The bitterest of our controversies for many years raged round this one aspect of the problem, and the number of those who contended that if it were possible to isolate the problem of the North from the problem of the South there was, nevertheless, a strong case for giving some form of self-government to the South, would never have been found to have been relatively high in either House of Parliament.
We are all aware of the history of the last seven or eight years in Ireland. The noble and learned Lord has said with perfect truth that terrible things are being suffered by a class of the population whom he rightly calls loyalists, sufferings not only in relation to their property but also in relation to their persons. That is perfectly true. But let us attempt to present a complete picture of Ireland to-day, wherever the responsibility may be. That is the case which I have argued before in this House, and am prepared to argue now and hereafter. Let us attempt to see the situation which exists not only over a single part of Ireland but over the whole of Ireland. Lord Carson has said with truth that terrible and appalling things have taken place in Belfast. He says they are the reaction of that which has taken place in the rest of Ireland. I am not concerned to dispute or to confirm that opinion, but it is true that Catholics, in circumstances revolting to every humane man, have been done to death in the North of Ireland in the last few months and even in the last few weeks. It is equally true that in other parts of Ireland Protestants, by what is described as a "pogrom," have been murdered in circumstances of terrible barbarity.
Side by side with these detestable outrages, in which Protestants have, murdered

405
Roman Catholics in Belfast in the name of God Almighty, and in other parts of Ireland Roman Catholics have murdered Protestants on purely religious grounds, you have had going on in Ireland during the last three months isolated cases of encounters between military representatives of the Provisional Government and the soldiers who support Mr. de Valera. There was a case the other day in which three or four of the regular troops of the Provisional Government were shot outright as the result of a murderous assassination by a body of soldiers supporting Mr. de Valera. Not long ago, in a concerted assault which was made by troops who acknowledged allegiance to the Provisional Government upon troops who are supporting the opposite cause, as many as five soldiers of the. Provisional Government were killed and nine or ten seriously wounded.
All these things have taken place, and it is the fact that in certain moods, and at certain periods, the Irish people will be found capable in moments of excitement, religious or political, to commit murders. If you go to an ordinary meeting, either in Belfast or in Dublin, instead of marking approval of the rhetorical or other contribution that is made by the speaker, forty per cent, of the crowd will produce revolvers from their pockets and fire them in the air. It is unquestionably true that Ireland has not kept pace in the development and improvement of its civilisation in any part of that country with the improvement and the progress that have taken place in the other parts of the British Dominions. The very illustrations that were given by the noble and learned Lord of that which is taking place in Dublin at this moment show the extraordinary perversity and addiction to paradox of his fellow countrymen, because be it observed—so far as I understand that to which he calls attention, and it is indeed remarkable in the history of a revolutionary movement—this attack is not directed in any special degree at the Protestant section of the population.
What has happened? Except in comic opera it could not happen in any country in the world but Ireland. The Provisional Government—and I will say something in a moment as to the circumstances in which they are addressing themselves to their task, and as to the prospect, be it good or bad, that they will prove equal to that
406
task—the Provisional Government at the present moment is nominally the responsible authority for maintaining the Government of the South of Ireland with such resources as are available to it.
The noble and learned Lord is perfectly right when he says that a military section of the population which does not owe allegiance either to Mr. Collins or to Mr. de Valera has, not without some sense of humour, descended upon the Four Courts, the place where the laws are administered, the seat of the Judges, the traditional sanctuary of the Irish race, and is there maintaining itself. As the noble and learned Lord rightly said, they make occasional forays. They make them upon the neighbouring shopkeepers, without any distinction, I am informed, of religious belief, but guided principally by considerations of tactical safety and geographical propinquity. Having taken from the shop whatever they require for their purposes, they are naturally asked, or have been asked in one case at least that came under my observation: "By what right do you make this requisition?" To which the answer of the leader was: "We make it in the name of the people of Ireland." The shopkeeper said: "Do not take any offence, but I want to make this matter regular, so that I may know hereafter where to go for the liquidation of an account which is now becoming considerable; are you supporters of Mr. Collins or are you supporters of Mr. de Valera?" To which the reply was: "We are supporters of neither. We are supporters of the Irish people, and of the Irish people only." Upon the shopkeeper expressing, in very respectful language, the anxiety he felt as to the lucidity of the replies with a view to ultimate liquidation, the leader replied immediately: "Be under no apprehension. The Irish people, if and when it comes into its own, will never repudiate the debts incurred in the service of its loyal soldiers." Such things as these could, of course, happen only in Ireland. They could happen only at a very exceptional period of Irish history.
The noble and learned Lord says, if there is a Government in Ireland, how is it that these men are allowed to stay there? In the first place, they are there in very considerable numbers; in the second place, they are armed with rifles, bombs and revolvers; and, in the third place, the Provisional Government has not, up to

407
the present, been provided with any artillery at all, and I assure your Lordships, though your Lordships need no assurance on that point from me, that the prospect of expelling a considerable number of resolute men, well armed, from a building which is fairly strong and which can be loop-holed, through the military representatives of a Government which possesses no artillery, is by no means an inconsiderable military undertaking.
The true position seems to be—and this again is paradoxical—that the actual, nominal Government in Ireland, the Provisional Government, instead of estranging, as every other Government in Ireland always has succeeded in estranging, the support of voters, citizens and electors, is materially, so far as one can judge, acquiring that degree of support which comes from the sympathy which is given as a rule not to Governments but to Oppositions, of whom it is felt that they are not exactly getting their chance. The view is becoming more and more spread in Ireland that, owing to the illicit and sporadic violence which is being displayed by these gunmen in one part or the other of the country, the Government is not being given that opportunity, that fair chance, which even in Ireland seems here And there to command the support of the people, of proving that it can carry out its functions.
I have no doubt at all that the principal cause of the undoubted and grave mischiefs which the noble and learned Lord has described, and of which most of us are aware, was the most disastrous resolution on the part of the Provisional Government, taken, not indeed without consultation with this Government, but against our earnest and most strong advice, the resolution in favour of the policy of postponing the Elections in Ireland. That, I have no doubt, is the principal explanation and cause of all those mischiefs which we observe around us to-day. It is a dangerous thing in matters of this kind to make prophecies. I am very cautious, and, as I take leave to say, I have been throughout cautious in the predictions which I made in this matter. I prefer not to put it in the form of prophecy, but we are assured—I do not know whether the information of the noble and learned Lord is in the same sense—by those who appear to us most highly qualified to form an opinion on behalf of almost every section of Irish
408
thought that it is certain that the Provisional Government will obtain a large, and perhaps an overwhelming, majority in the forthcoming Elections.
On that point it is objected, if I understand the noble and learned Lord aright: "But what value will an Election taken in these circumstances possess?" If it be true that the Provisional Government is at this moment so weak that it is subject to the depredations and cannot control the illegal violence of these various military sections in all parts of the South of Ireland, and if it be none the less true that they will succeed at the polls, be it observed that the necessary inference is not that the Elections are not freely held, not that the Elections do not supply a most significant illustration of the true feeling of Ireland, but that the weaker the Government in the exercise and the possession of military force, the more striking will the tribute be to the reality of Irish opinion if the result be as is anticipated.
Had the Elections taken place when they were contemplated by all the Parties who negotiated this Treaty that they should take place, what would have been the result, if this hypothesis is well founded? The result would have been that an overwhelming majority of the population of Southern Ireland would have agreed with the expressed opinion of both Houses of Parliament here that we had in the Articles of the Treaty a basis of a settlement which might be acceptable, and which might provide the hope of a permanent peace between the two countries. We are asked to see in that which is taking place in Ireland, to-day, unhappy as it admittedly is, a reason for tearing up, or for despairing of, all that has been done in the interim, although, as far as I know, no one seriously disputes that those proposals have received in that interval the support which I have indicated, and although, as I most profoundly believe, those proposals as a settlement would still command the support of the majority of electors of Ireland, and the support of an overwhelming majority of the electors of Great Britain.
What is the alternative to allowing this Government, until the moment when it is armed with real powers, to endeavour to correct the state of affairs which exists to-day in Ireland? I detected in the speech of the noble and learned Lord not much appreciation of the real difficulties in which

409
the Provisional Government has been placed. In the interval before they are I armed with the moral support which comes from the expressed opinion of the constituencies, they have been faced by almost every conceivable disadvantage in the task to which they have addressed themselves. They did not anticipate, and we did not anticipate, the determined opposition to these. proposals which would be made by Mr. de Valera. They did not anticipate, and we did not anticipate, that the debates in Dail Eireann would be either so long protracted or so evenly divided. And I may say, in passing, that in the circumstance that even from those proposals which were made to the Irish representatives so large a section of the Irish people dissented, on the ground that these proposals did not go far enough, may perhaps be found a partial answer to those who complain so frequently and so loudly in this House that our overtures were not made to them at an earlier stage. My Lords, I am informed, and I cannot for obvious reasons speak more definitely, that after preparation and in the near future there will be a resolute and organised attempt to assert the force of authority more closely and more sternly than has hitherto been found possible by the Provisional Government in Ireland.
We have, until the Election takes place, only two alternatives before us. The first alternative is that we shall turn round to the Provisional Government in Ireland and, before them and before the whole world, say: "Having regard to that which has happened and that which is happening, and basing ourselves upon that as a justification, we tear up the instrument that we signed and we bring back the British garrison to reinforce the 10,000 troops or more which we have kept in Ireland." That is one alternative. Its dangers, its disadvantages, its necessarily tragic consequences, do not need elaboration on my part. Its adoption would rejoice the heart of every enemy which this country possesses in every part of the world. The other alternative, and the only other alternative, is to respect the spirit and the letter of the Treaty to which we set out hands, until the result of the Irish Election, and that which follows upon the Irish Election, make it plain whether the other side to the contract are able, not for a fleeting period of a few weeks but for a period sufficient to supply an adequate proof of permanent good faith, to discharge their part of the
410
contract as fully and as loyally as we have attempted, and are endeavouring, to carry out our part.
I have made no attempt, to-day, to depict the situation in a rosy aspect. Ireland is passing through a period to, which you can hardly discover an analogous period in any stage of her constitutional development or retrogression, according to the point of view, which history affords us, and having regard to the nature of the transition it was necessary that you should have in power, for a period which we hoped would be short but which, through no fault of ours, has proved inordinately long, a Government which was a Government and yet not a Government, which had ostensibly the responsibility of governing without many of the most vital powers upon which the functioning of government depends. We should be flinging away what hope there is of the substance for all that is certain of the shadow, if we impatiently and petulantly surrendered the task to which we have set our hand.
The noble and learned Lord has said that these refugees in Ireland are entitled to a lead from the Government and to advice from the Government. That is true. All British subjects who are suffering in Ireland, whether they be suffering in Belfast or whether they be suffering in the South, are equally entitled to the consideration of the British Government, and to the best advice that can be given to them. The noble and learned Lord spoke with disapproval of a sentence which I should have thought not an unreasonable one, which fell from my colleague, the Lord Privy Seal, in another place, not long ago, in which my right hon. friend said that while arrangements were in contemplation under which a sum of money would be set aside to provide for the necessities and dangers of those who were refugees from Ireland in the circumstances indicated and described by the noble and learned Lord, it was not desirable, if it could be avoided, that there should be a general exodus, from Ireland.
What is proposed is that in cases where there is danger of the kind indicated by the noble and learned Lord, on proof of such circumstances a fund shall be made available for the relief of the necessities of those persons who establish the reality of their cases before a Committee appointed to hear and report upon such matters. How large the fund provided will ultimately

411
be it is not, of course, at this stage possible to say, but a considerable appropriation in the first place has been arranged for, and it is, of course, extremely desirable that all those who in Ireland are not in positive danger should make every effort to stay until the new system is in operation. I presume to offer to no man the advice that he should stay when he is exposed to dangers to which I myself am not exposed. The noble and learned Lord has spoken in language in no way too strong of the difficulties and the misfortune of those who cannot leave their property—I think it was Lord Donoughmore, on an earlier Question, who insisted upon this point of view—and are therefore confronted with the alternatives of risk to life or person or the abandonment of everything that they possess in the world.
There is in our view a clear obligation, and there will be a clear obligation upon the Government of Ireland, as and when established as the result of the Election, to make compensation in all those cases, because the true fact is that these acts of illegal violence are not in the main being done (I think the noble and learned Lord in his speech recognised this) either by the forces of Mr. Collins or by the forces of Mr. de Valera. In some cases, of course, they are done by the forces of Mr. de Valera, but they are being done in the main over all parts of Ireland where the authority of the central power at this moment does not extend, by gangs of violent scoundrels, who have obtained uniforms and who are seizing every opportunity either of pursuing private vendettas or of gratifying the mere vulgar predatory appetite. It is undoubtedly the function of the Irish Government, if and when formed, to pay such compensation as may be required to meet such cases. I have no doubt at all that this Government, in the elaborate taking of accounts which is contemplated in the Treaty as inevitable between the two communities, will hold such an Irish Government strictly accountable in relation to these matters.
It must not be taken, however, if for any reason (and I prefer not to enter upon the alternative conceivable reasons), this reasonable expectation is not made good, that I exclude the reasonableness and the force of the contention that citizens who can prove that they have lost property or their possessions in these circumstances, and, having regard to the general dis-
412
solution of authority in the country, can receive assistance and compensation from no other source—if, I say, they can establish this (and such is the melancholy teaching of the next few months), I do not, of course, exclude the reasonableness of an expectation that they should receive help from those in this country who have undertaken their responsibility in this matter.
I have not attempted, so far as I know, to deny one single circumstance in the account which the noble and learned Lord has given. From the nature of the case many of those incidents are not specifically known to me, but, on the other hand, other incidents comparable to them are, and I have no reason at all for suspecting the entire reliability of the account given by the noble and learned Lord. And all I have to say in reply to the indictment, the gloomy and founded indictment, which the noble and learned Lord has brought, is this. There never was a period of more difficult transition, there never was a Government addressing itself to a task so formidable with less adequate means, and nothing can give them the authority which they most urgently require, except the sanction and the imprimatur of the Irish people, as conveyed at the Elections. If and when that sanction is so given, it will be for those who receive it—and I indulge the hope that they will receive it, and will receive an emphatic expression of it—if they have not done so already, to vindicate the confidence which has been placed both in their resolution and in their good faith. I have only this to add, that I have reason to suppose that, even before that Election takes place, there will be a concerted and organised attempt on the part of the Provisional Government to deal with some of the graver mischiefs to which such powerful reference has been made to-day.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I feel I owe the House an apology for not having followed the noble and learned Lord on the back bench, and for having deprived the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack of the privilege of saying the last word in this discussion. But I thought, in the interests of the debate, it was most desirable that the House should be made aware of the view of His Majesty's Government upon the tremendous case made by my noble friend, Lord Carson. I therefore waited in the

413
hope that we should obtain something from the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack which would be of use and. guidance to us in this discussion. And I am not sorry that I waited, because it seemed to me at the close of his speech, when the noble and learned Viscount came to deal with the question of compensation, that he went a good deal further than his colleagues have done when treating this part of the question. I will come to that in a moment.
But the noble and learned Lord left the case of my noble friend, Lord Carson, quite unshaken. He indicated the immense complication and difficulty of the Irish problem. He showed how slender were the military resources which the Government has at its command. He reminded us that in Ireland both sides were a good deal to blame, which is, I think, perfectly true, and he spoke of the nasty habit which Irishmen have of carrying about revolvers even when they go to public meetings, and on other occasions. But the noble and learned Lord did not give us any hint as to the possibility of finding a way out of the present terrible position in Ireland. There is no question, I am afraid, as to the facts. Nor, I am afraid, is there any question as to the extent to which His Majesty's Government have abdicated their responsibility in the matter.
As to the facts, I am not going to follow the noble and learned Lord in his most depressing recapitulation of them. I do not think it is contested that at this moment, throughout a great part of Ireland, brigandage, naked and unashamed, is rampant. I do not think it is contested that intimidation is, I will not say universal but general; intimidation, remember, followed by the threat of murder, a threat not infrequently exercised in the most horrible circumstances. There are cases of kidnapping which have not been disputed. Religious persecution is going on apace. Industrious farmers are being ousted from their holdings and are liable to have their cattle driven off—farmers to whom, remember, the Government of this country have solemnly by Act of Parliament given fixity of tenure. What becomes of your fixity of tenure when you are liable to be hunted off your farm by the miscreants of the neighbourhood? Then it is not disputed that there is a very general repudiation of contracts or that in many cases the documents necessary to enforce those contracts
414
have been seized and made away with—a very serious symptom. In a great part of Ireland the Courts of Law are not functioning at all, and whit is, perhaps, the most serious thing of all is that, owing to changes which have lately been made in the Irish administration, His Majesty's Government are wholly without secret and private information as to what is proceeding in different parts of the country.
I am afraid that it may be thought that my strong feelings on this subject have led me to exaggerate, but I should like to read half a dozen lines from a well-known Irish newspaper, the Irish Independent, which is, I believe, a paper of Nationalist tendencies and in sympathy with the Irish Free State. This is what the Irish Independent said two or three days ago:—
"Business throughout the country is dislocated and depressed and, in addition, traders have through organised and wholesale robberies lost enormous sums of money. These robberies have been g dug on fur sons, time, and within the last few clays raids for money or goods have been made in no less than eight counties. From end to end of the land banks have been robbed and the traders are in many places thinking of closing down."
All this seems to me—I am afraid I must say it—the penalty which we are paying for the disastrous precipitation with which we broke up the machinery of the Irish administration before we had any reason for supposing that there was any other machinery to put in its place.
I do not think anyone will be surprised that in those circumstances a very bitter cry should rise from the people who are suffering under this tyranny in Ireland. We are told—it is the old prescription—that we must have patience. How lone is that patience to last? I think it has been on the whole exemplary, but I understand that it must last longer still. Can we be surprised if some of these unfortunate people are becoming impatient? Can we be surprised if they ask how it can be that this great country, which has throughout its history fought the battle of freedom at home and abroad, can now allow a part of what was the United Kingdom to be placed under the terrible tyranny which has been described to us this evening? The people who are suffering so much are naturally asking to whom they are to turn for redress. I am afraid that, particularly within the last few days, His Majesty's Government have informed them with great candour that it is of no use to turn to them. There has

415
been a solemn abdication of responsibility for the maintenance of law and order in Ireland by His Majesty's Government. This complete repudiation seems to me to be something new. I do not think we have ever had it in so complete and cynical a form as during the last few days.
NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: During the early days when we were discussing the Treaty the language held by Ministers went to show that the safety of the minority in Ireland would be put in the first rank amongst the stipulations which we were to make in coming to terms with the other side. One cannot help thinking at a moment like this of the famous note which has lately been issued at Genoa, and which has attracted so much attention, and particularly of the clause in which His Majesty's Government and other Powers insist that foreigners are to be allowed to live and trade in security in Bolshevist Russia. We are, I am afraid, creating a new kind of domestic foreigner in Ireland who is not to be given even the chance that the British foreigner is to be given in Russia.
I spoke a moment ago of the discussions which took place when the Treaty was being considered by this House and by Parliament. At that time we were told by the Prime Minister that written assurances had been given to him and his colleagues by the Sinn Fein plenipotentiaries guaranteeing the protection of the Irish minority. The Prime Minister went on to say that there was to be a new Irish Army which was to maintain order and support the civilian forces. A considerable number of new armies are romping about in Ireland at this moment. I do not know whether any of them are supporting the civilian forces, or whether, indeed, there are any civilian forces to support, but I mention that as showing how widely different, were the expectations then held out from the reality with which Lord Carson has brought us face to face this evening. And the most significant sentence of all was, perhaps, that in which the Prime Minister assured the people of this country that he was able to say that the object of the Provisional Government would be to make living in Ireland not only possible for the minority, but as attractive as possible for them. My noble friend, Lord Carson, gave us an idea of what the amenities which are at present offered to residents in Ireland are
416
in order to render residence in that country attractive to them.
Throughout those discussions the impression left upon our minds was that there was a general atmosphere of good will and close understanding between the Irish leaders and our Government, and that His Majesty's Government were holding a kind of watching brief and would make it their business to see that those expectations were made good. But, to my mind, nothing has been more noticeable than the steady weakening of the language held upon this point by Ministers. We now have the naked avowal that His Majesty's Government have parted with all control over the administration of the country. All they can screw up their courage to do is, when any particularly heinous incident is brought to their attention, to promise that they will bring the matter to the notice of the Provisional Government, and will urge them to give protection to persons attacked. The question we have a right to ask is: "Supposing the Provisional Government will not give the protection, or, what is much more probable, supposing the Provisional Government cannot give the protection, what is to happen then?" I dwell upon that point because I am not at all anxious to make any personal charge against Mr. Collins or Mr. Griffith. I believe that they would probably be very glad indeed if they were able to bring about a better and more orderly condition of things.
But can they do it? I believe they are every whit as helpless as His Majesty's Government in the matter. What is their position? They have to hold their own not only against their, so to speak, official opponents—the Party led by Mr. de Valera—but against the forces led by the guerilla leaders whose names are sprung upon us from time to time. Then there is the organisation of the Transport Union in the background, and, what really is worst of all is, they have to face what is undoubtedly taking place, which is a general liberation in Ireland of all those forces of lawlessless and disorder which are, I am afraid, endemic and always latent in that country.
What then is to happen supposing the Provisional Government, fighting against these tremendous odds—and they are tremendous odds—is unable to make good its pledges? That is really the question that interests us. I want to make one thing as clear as I can. I do not ask His Majesty's

417
Government to place us in possession of their plans, either military or political, for dealing with a crisis of this kind should it arrive. They will naturally say that they desire to keep their own counsel, and that they will tell us when the time comes, but I think there is one thing that they might tell us quite explicitly at this stage of the proceedings. Can they not answer the question whether they do or do not intend to wash their hands altogether of those who have suffered under this terrible persecution in Ireland?
I heard with satisfaction the statements of the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack to the effect I hat a Committee of some kind was being set up to inquire into the question of compensation, and. I noted that he spoke of the clear obligation on the Government of Ireland to make good the losses sustained by some of these victims. I think he went on to say that His Majesty's Government would hold the Provisional Government responsible if satisfaction was not given. That really carries the case rather further, I think, than it has been carried yet, and I should be very glad if, before this discussion ends, we could be told quite plainly whether it is the policy of His Majesty's Government to require the Provisional Government to deal justly with these claims for redress, and, if the Provisional Government fails in its duty, then, to use the Lord Chancellor's words, to hold them accountable for the omission.
If that is said quite plainly I think it will mark an important advance. Although our power of compensating and making good is very limited, although you cannot bring the dead to life, although you cannot restore the homes which have been devastated, although you cannot make amends for the anguish which has been occasioned to many of these poor people, and for the loss of health, bodily and mental, resulting from this perpetual persecution, you can at any rate do something for those who find their position so bad as to be untenable. You can, as my noble friend, Lord Long, has suggested in the case of the Irish Constabulary, give the sufferers the means of making a fresh start in life somewhere where they will enjoy the rights of citizenship, and the freedom to live and have their being which are, I am afraid, at this moment being denied to them in their own country.
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: My Lords, before this debate closes I wish to draw
418
your Lordships' attention to an assumption, to my mind obviously fallacious, running through the whole of the speech of the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack. I think this debate will live in our memories for many years—a debate in which we have learned to the full the humiliation, in which England has been steeped, and the misery in which all our Irish fellow subjects are plunged who, at any time, were loyal to the. King or fought for the Empire. The speech of the Lord Chancellor amounts, I think, only to this. The Government are hoping to be rescued from the position in which their tremendous gamble has placed them by the result of the Election that is to take place next month in Ireland. The Lord Chancellor has told us that in his opinion the great majority of the voters will vote for the Treaty and the Provisional Government. He may be quite right. But how does he know that they will be allowed to vote? His speech and his hopes are based on the assumption that there will be free election in Ireland. All the signs of the times lead us to suppose that the gunmen will rule supreme at the ballot box. What civil force, or military force, has the Provisional Government to enable it to control the whole country on one day so that every Irishman may give his vote freely and without fear?
Do we not know by the miserable record of past years that there is no nation more subjected to moral intimidation than Ireland. If the atmosphere which Lord Carson has described, which Lord Long has described, which the Lord Chancellor has admitted, continues to prevail, how can you expect these men to take their courage in their hands and vote for the Treaty and the Provisional Government. If the gunmen do rule supreme at the ballot box, and the people of Ireland do not dare to support the Treaty, what then? That is the question which the whole of the electors of Great Britain have now begun to ask. What then? On that subject it will be the duty of the Government to tell us at the earliest possible opportunity how, if all their hopes are destroyed, they are going to rescue Ireland and Great Britain from the terrible condition of humiliation and chaos into which their policy has plunged both countries.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: If the noble Earl had put that question to me

419
before I addressed the House I should have been able to have given him a reply; but I will do so at a future date.

PASSPORTS IN PALESTINE.
Loan RAGLAN: My Lords, I beg to ask His Majesty's Government what reasons exist for the continuance of a system of permits for travel between Palestine and French Syria and Palestine and Egypt. Syria has been for hundreds of years, indeed for thousands of years, one country. Three years ago, in circumstances with which your Lordships are familiar, it was divided into two, as England may be divided into two by a line drawn from London to Bristol. The two areas are the French mandated zone of Syria and the British mandated zone, otherwise Palestine. There are naturally a very large number of persons who reside in one zone and have property, relatives and business interests, in the other. These persons, if they wish to visit the other area, have very often to travel considerable distances to the places where passports are issued.
They have to hang about for two or three days in the offices from which they are issued, pay considerable sums for the passports themselves, and the various visas, and in addition may have to spend considerable sums in bribing doorkeepers and other officials. Any able-bodied man who really wishes to cross the frontier can do so by the simple method of
420
taking a short cross country walk. But there are persons, however, who wish to use the high road and the railways, especially infirm persons and traders, and they have to suffer this great inconvenience. I shall be glad to know from the noble Earl whether the Government are taking any steps in the matter. As regards the Egypt and Palestine frontier the British Government has control on both sides, but, nevertheless, passport restrictions are more stringent there than, perhaps, on any other frontier in the world. What the reason for this is I do not know, and I shall be grateful if the noble Earl will inform me.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (THE EARL OF CRAWFORD): My Lords, as the noble Lord was informed on the first of this month there is no special system of passports between Palestine and French Syria and Palestine and Egypt other than the ordinary passport and visa system which is in force in each of these countries. The only difference is that persons leaving Egypt are required to obtain an extra visa, which, however, it is hoped to discontinue or modify in the near future. The French visa charges for Syria are higher than the visa charges for Palestine and Egypt, on which point His Britannic Majesty's Ambassador at Paris has been invited to make representations to the French Government.
House adjourned at five minutes past seven o'clock.