Sitting of 26 May 1868

MINUTES.
NEW WRIT ISSUED—For Dublin City, v. Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness, baronet, deceased.
PUBLIC BILL—Report of Select Committee—Sale of Liquors on Sunday (Ireland). [No. 280.]
Report—Sale of Liquors on Sunday (Ireland) * [31–138].

FRAUDS UPON BURIAL SOCIETIES.

  QUESTION.
  MR. P. A. TAYLORsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been called to the following passage in a charge to the Grand Jury at Liverpool in March last by Mr. Justice Mellor:—

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  "In conclusion the learned judge referred to frauds recently practised upon burial societies, and said that, in many cases he feared that the registration of death was a mere farce. In one of these cases, he said, the doctor had given a certificate of death without being aware that the person was dead; and if such was the usual practice, and he was told it was, the sooner it was changed the better."
  Whether he has not observed similar complaints—namely, of certificates of death being given without any inquiry or knowledge, to have been made by the Coroners for London and, Manchester; and if he will state what steps have been taken to remedy so dangerous a practice?
  MR. GATHORNE HARDY: Sir, my attention had not been called to the passage in Mr. Justice Mellor's charge until the hon. Member put his Notice upon the Paper. I have made inquiry, and I understand the Judge's reference to the subject arose from two certificates having been given of the deaths of persons who were not actually dead. Men affected to have been present at the houses or at the deathbeds of those represented to have been dead, and they brought with them certificates from medical practitioners stating the cause of death in each case. They had gone to the medical practitioners, stating that the persons were dead, and the medical men, remembering that they had attended them for certain complaints, without further inquiry gave certificates stating that the deaths had resulted from those complaints, while in fact neither person was dead. Under the Registration Act the Registrar is to receive, either from a person pie-sent at the deathbed, or some one in the house, a statement of the death and of the cause of it, and the usual practice is to obtain from a medical man, if one has been in attendance, the statement of the cause of death. The Registrar is not bound to go and see that the person is dead, but under the statute he is to receive the statement from those who were present or who are cognizant of the facts; and if these persons make a misrepresentation, under a recent statute they are liable to penal servitude. With respect to the second part of the Question, I have had no complaint from the Coroner of London; indeed, he has written to me since the Notice was given to say that he has no complaint to make. There were some complaints from Manchester, and there has been some correspondence between the Coroner of Manchester and the Home Office, and, in consequence, be-
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  tween the Home Office and the Registrar General; and the Registrar General stated in effect that the Registrar on the spot was acting in conformity with the statute in receiving the statement and the medical certificate; and that he had no option but to enter in his book that which was stated to him by persons who appeared to have authority for making the statement. We have not contemplated any alteration of the Act of Parliament, for it would be impossible that the Registrar should inquire into every case; and as every person who makes a misrepresentation renders himself liable to a severe punishment, I think with due vigilance that this dangerous practice may be put a stop to.

REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE (IRELAND) BILL.—QUESTION.
SIR COLMAN O'LOGHLENsaid, he wished to ask the Chief Secretary for Ireland, To fix some day after the Whitsuntide Recess for the Committee on the Irish Reform Bill, when it could be taken as the first Order of the Day?
THE EARL OF MAYO, in reply, said, he had ascertained that it would suit the convenience of the Irish Representatives if the Committee on the Irish Reform Bill were taken on Thursday fortnight (Juno 25); he would, therefore, fix it for that day and arrange that it should be the first Order of the Day.

OUTRAGES IN JAPAN.

  QUESTION.
  COLONEL SYKESsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, What truth there is in the statement in the China Newspapers that our Ambassador in Japan, on a first visit of ceremony to the Mikado, or Emperor of Japan at Kioto, accompanied by a European escort, was attacked by Japanese and twelve of the escort wounded; and whether twelve of the crew of a boat belonging to the French ship of war Dupleix were assassinated on landing on the estate of Prince Losa, near Osaka, and what effect have these outrages had on the relations between the British and French Governments with that of the Emperor of Japan; and, whether the Mikado, or real Emperor of Japan, has ratified the Treaty we made with the Tycoon, or supposed Emperor?
  LORD STANLEY: It is true that Sir Harry Parkes, on his way to pay a visit of

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  ceremony to the Mikado, accompanied by a mounted escort, was attacked by a party of Japanese fanatics, supposed to be only three or four in number. They took the escort by surprise, and wounded eight or nine persons, but it is hoped none of them mortally. I am bound to say that the Japanese authorities did everything that could possibly be expected of them, both in the way of exerting themselves to detect the offenders and making the apology due to our Ambassador; and they have gone so far as to promise compensation to the men injured in the event of any of them becoming permanently disabled. Therefore, however unfortunate the accident may have been, I think there is nothing in it which will in the slightest degree affect our present good relations with the Japanese Government. I understand also that the difference between them and the French Government, arising out of the murder of a boat's crew, has been amicably arranged. Within a few days of the time when the last despatches were sent off, Sir Harry Parkes received an envoy from the Mikado, who was authorized to express the Mikado's desire to cultivate friendly relations with Foreign Powers, and to take upon himself all the obligations of the Treaty we had made with the Tycoon.

POST OFFICE—THE CAPE MAIL.

  QUESTION.
  MR. CANDLISHsaid, he wished to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, If any Contract has been effected with the Union Steam Shipping Company for the conveyance of an intermediate Monthly Mail between England and the Cape of Good Hope; if he will have any objection to lay all Correspondence and Contracts with the said Company upon the Table of the House; and if, previously to concluding any such Contract or Contracts, tenders were invited from, or offers made by, any-other Company for the performance of this Mail Service, or any part thereof?
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTH, in reply, said, a contract had been made with the Union Steam Shipping Company, for the conveyance of an intermediate Monthly Mail between England and the Cape of Good Hope. The proposals for it were made so long ago as the early part of last year; they were accepted by the Treasury in June of last year; but circumstances had occurred which had delayed the execution
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  of the contract until the present time. He believed, however, it would be laid on the Table in the course of a few days. He should have no objection also to lay on the table, if the hon. Member desired it, the Correspondence between the Treasury and the Post Office, having reference to this extension of contract, which would show all the particulars and the reasons which had led to its acceptance. Previously to the conclusion of this contract no offer was made by, nor were tenders asked for, from any other company for the performance of this particular Mail Service, but subsequently to the acceptance of the offer by the Treasury, a tender was made by another company to carry the Mails upon terms which were less advantageous than those which had been virtually accepted. It was a voluntary proposal on the part of the Union Steam Shipping Company, to double the amount of their Service for a lower amount of subsidy than they were authorized to receive under their existing contract.

EGYPT—CLAIMS ON THE VICEROY.

  QUESTION.
  MR. FREVILLE-SURTEESsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether any Correspondence has taken place between the Foreign Office and Her Majesty's Consul General in Egypt relative to the claims on the Viceroy of the shareholders of the Société Agricole et Industrielle d'Egypte; and, if so, whether he would have any objection to present the Correspondence?
  LORD STANLEYreplied, that a Correspondence had taken place on the subject referred to in his hon. Friend's Question. It had not yet been concluded, and though, as far as the Foreign Office was concerned, there was no objection to its production, he did not think it would be in the interest of the parties concerned to publish it in its present state.

PARLIAMENT—THE GENERAL ELECTION.—QUESTION.
MR. SANDFORDsaid, he would beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether Her Majesty's Government intend to bring forward any Measure, and, if any, what Measure, for the purpose of shortening the period which, under the existing Law, must intervene before a General Election can take place under the

925
provisions of the Reform Act psssed in the late Session of Parliament:
MR. DISRAELI: The subject, Sir, to which the hon. Gentleman refers is now, and has been for some time, under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government. I am bound to say that the difficulties connected with it are greater than were at first contemplated; but I trust these difficulties may be overcome.

DESPATCHES FROM VICTORIA.

  QUESTION.
  SIR ROUNDELL PALMERsaid, he wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether he will lay upon the Table of the House the Despatches from the Governor of Victoria brought by the last Mail?
  MR. ADDERLEYsaid, in reply, that the Despatches which had been received would be presented to the House in the course of a week.

THE DERBY DAY.—ADJOURNMENT
MR. DISRAELI: In rising, Sir, to move that the House at its rising do adjourn till Thursday, I wish to recall to the recollection of the House that I gave Notice a few days ago of the intention of the Government to propose on Friday a Vote of Thanks to Sir Robert Napier and the Army in Abyssinia. At that time we had received no despatches from Sir Robert Napier, and owing to various circumstances the Government were under the impression that the despatches had been lost. The Notice had already been delayed on this account, but within the last forty-eight hours information has arrived which leads us to believe that these despatches in a few days may reach the Government. It must be obvious to the House that it would be far more convenient and satisfactory that the thanks of the House should be founded on the Despatches of the Commander-in-Chief, and therefore I propose to postpone this Vote until after the holidays. I now move that the House at its rising do adjourn till Thursday.
MR. GLADSTONE: There can be no doubt, Sir, of the judicious nature of the course which the right hon. Gentleman proposes with regard to the Vote of Thanks. But I wish to say one word upon a subject to which a Question put just now referred. I am not surprised that the Government should take time to consider what measures they may have to propose
926
for shortening the period which must intervene before the General Election is held; but I shall be glad to know whether the right hon. Gentleman can tell us when he thinks he will be able to make known the views of the Government on the subject. I wish also to say that an idea has suggested itself to several hon. Gentlemen that it might be well to appoint a Select Committee of the House to inquire into the question. I do not wish to press this suggestion further than to intimate that, if the Government should think it likely to conduce to the satisfactory settlement of the matter, there would be a disposition on the part of hon. Members on this side of the House to welcome such a proposal. The question has already been inquired into by several Members of the House, and a conversation was held on a former night, in which the Solicitor General and the hon. and learned Member (Sir Robert Collier) took part, and which contributed a good deal to elucidate the question. The question is one of a strictly practical character; on both sides of the House the object must be a common one; and the plan I have mentioned might be the best way of arriving at a satisfactory conclusion Time is, of course, of value in the matter, and I should like to know from the right hon. Gentleman when he will be in a condition to communicate the views of the Government on the subject?

METROPOLITAN POLICE.—QUESTION.
MR. AYRTONsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether he will be good enough to take care that the Accounts and Estimates connected with the Metropolitan Police are laid on the Table before he proceeds with the Second Reading of the Bill with reference to the Metropolitan Police Act, which has only been in the hands of Members a very few days?
MR. GATHORNE HARDY: Sir, the accounts have been laid before the House, and will be printed shortly. The inquiry to which the hon. Gentleman refers has no relation to anything contained in them, and, therefore, the Papers relating to it will not facilitate the discussion of the measure. I shall put the Bill down for second reading for a day after Whitsuntide.

WHITSUNTIDE RECESS.—QUESTION.
MR. BOUVERIEsaid, he would beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman the First

927
Lord of the Treasury to state, What he proposes to do about the Whitsuntide Recess, and until what day he proposes that the House should adjourn?
MR. DISRAELI: We propose on Friday evening to adjourn to the following Thursday.

RIOTS AT ASHTON, STALEY BRIDGE, BIRMINGHAM, &c.

  PERSONAL EXPLANATION.
  MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, he wished to correct a misapprehension arising out of what he was supposed to have said last evening. He did not say, referring to a friend of his, a late Member of this House, Sir John Tyrrell, that a Romish Priest attempted "to convert a female member of his family by placing in her hands a book referred to in the work known as The Confessional Unmasked." What he had said was that the book was based upon the authorities whose doctrines the work called The Confessional Unmasked was intended to expose.
  Motion agreed to: House at rising to adjourn till Thursday next.

DIPLOMATIC SERVICE.

  RESOLUTION.
  MR. LABOUCHEREsaid, he rose to move—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, all sums required to defray the expenses of the Diplomatic Service ought to be annually voted by Parliament, and that Estimates of all such sums ought to be submitted in a form that will admit of their effectual supervision and control by this House."
  This Resolution was precisely similar in its terms to one which had been proposed in 1853 by the hon. Member for East Sussex (Mr. Dodson), who then went to a division, but failed to obtain a majority in favour of his Resolution. As he understood that the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary intended to oppose the present Resolution, he should briefly reply to the reasons which he presumed would be advanced against it. The late Lord Palmerston seemed to have been under the impression that the less the House of Commons had to do with foreign affairs the better—particularly in regard to all matters of detail. It was said that the statement of the sums spent in the Diplomatic Service was, to a certain extent, brought before the House in the financial accounts. The object he had in view was to bring all the expenses
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  of the Department before the House in the Estimates, to enable any hon. Member to ask for explanations. There appeared to him to be no reason why hon. Gentlemen should not be afforded the same facilities with respect to the Foreign Office which they enjoyed with respect to the other Departments. An objection urged to the Motion by the hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Layard) was, that if it were carried it would produce a greater expenditure than now existed; but it was a strange doctrine that the control exercised by this House would produce an increased expenditure. If the hon. Member was right, then they ought to introduce a system of contracts, and say to the head of each Department that they would give him so much for the payment of salaries. The sum allowed was £180,000; and, if the Foreign Secretary contracted to pay all the diplomatic expenses with that sum, it might produce economy; but there was no such contract, for when any further sum was wanted the Foreign Secretary asked for and obtained it. The right hon. Member for South Lancashire said in 1853 "that all his prejudices and prepossessions were in favour of such a Motion;" but he did not vote for it, because he considered that the salaries of these gentlemen should, like those of the Judges, be placed beyond all uncertainty. Now, he contended that the present system produced the greatest uncertainty, and therefore he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would support his Resolution. The salaries of the Judges were charged on the Consolidated Fund; but there the analogy ceased, because the Home Secretary was not given a sum of money and told to pay such and such a Judge as he liked; but the Foreign Secretary was given a sum en bloc, and told to spend it on the Ministers abroad. So far from the salaries being certain, the noble Lord would bear him out when he said that applications were being constantly made to the Foreign Office for an increase. The Foreign Minister was entirely dependent upon an irresponsible body at the Foreign Office, and surely that House was a more independent and responsible body than the permanent officials at the Foreign Office, who practically settled the whole matter. Another objection urged by Lord Palmerston was, that that House might be actuated by some sudden impulse, and might withdraw a mission from a Foreign Court. But any Government which might be in

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  power had, as a rule, a majority upon the Estimates, and the case must be a very strong one indeed when a private Member was enabled to defeat them upon such a question. He believed that, if the Motion were carried, it would promote a greater economy. He had taken extracts from a list of Ministers who received pension, which had been published by the Foreign Office, and he found in many instances they were not old men, but gentlemen who had not the slightest objection to being employed. The Foreign Office, however, had got into the way of putting Ministers upon the retired list when they wished to put some one else forward or entertained any personal dislike. There were, for example, Sir James Hudson, with £1,300 a year; Sir Henry Bulwer, with £1,700; Mr. Christie, with £900, and several others in the position of retired Ministers who were very anxious to be employed. Out of the £180,000 taken out of the Consolidated Fund, £40,000 was charged to pensions. There were a great many Legations which, with great advantage, might be suppressed—for instance, that of Wiirtemberg, which had cost the country for several years £3,050; the Netherlands, which cost £4,700; and Switzerland, £3,800. He had been at n great many of those Missions; he knew what was done in them; and he could assure the House that it was absolutely nothing. It was supposed that a Minister did a great deal of good by asking important personages to dinner; but at those wretched German Courts where we kept Missions it was not important personages, but some chamberlains, that were asked to dinner. Let the noble Lord only look into the archives of the Foreign Office and say when he had received an important despatch from Wiirtemberg. He had asked a friend of his who was Minister at one of those Legations, one time, what he was doing? And the reply was, "Doing? what do you think is to be done in such a place as this?" Another reason why the present system should be done away with was because, as some portions of the expense were charged in the Estimates, and some taken out of the £180,000 granted to the Foreign Secretary, the House was never able to know what was really spent upon any particular Mission, and, not having the facts before them, no proposals for reduction could be effectually made. Among the items of expenditure last year were, for Embassy houses, £64,920 in China and
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  Japan, £8,000 in Teheran, and £2,135 in Paris. Then there was an item of £26,500 for messengers and couriers, which might be very much reduced. Half of the foreign messengers were sent abroad simply because they had been sent in past years. There was another item of £6,000 for Telegrams, and an item of £56,000 for Extraordinary Expenses, and £15,000 for Special Missions, which might be put a stop to. Now, when it was thought well to give a foreign Sovereign the Gaiter he did not see why some nobleman politically unknown, but socially very important, should be sent out at considerable expense when the thing might be done as well by our Minister on the spot. He had made inquiries, and found that when the Toison d' Or or other foreign order was conferred it was not usual to send Special Missions for that purpose. There had recently been some newspaper attacks upon the Foreign Office, which were rather unfair and greatly exaggerated. That Office was well conducted in the main, and it contained honourable, hard-working, painstaking men. The noble Lord at the head of the Department should answer such attacks by giving the greatest publicity to everything done in the Office, because at present there was an impression that the Foreign Office was not subjected to the same control as the other Offices. One cause of those attacks was the abominable system of agencies. The gentlemen employed in the Diplomatic Service were paid by the head clerk of the Foreign Office, and all of them were virtually obliged to appoint a clerk in that office as their agent, and to give him a percentage of 1 or 2 per cent. Some of the clerks received as much as £2,000 a year from this source. He did not accuse those gentlemen—who were wise to profit by the system; but a certain number of permanent officials who were allowed to levy this species of blackmail ought not to be permitted to pot up a claim to control the Estimates—and the mode in which the money was spent and the salaries received by our Ministers abroad. The head clerk had to decide whether any extra expenses were legitimate or not, yet he was allowed to receive a percentage in order to urge the claims of any gentleman against the Office. He could see no reason why the Foreign Office should be exempted from the control exercised over other Departments; and he hoped the noble Lord (Lord Stanley), who had done his best to keep down the expenses, would exercise his own judgment in this matter, and would

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  not be influenced by the permanent officials. He hoped also that his Resolution would be supported by the Secretary to the Treasury, who, on a previous occasion, spoke in favour of the proposal. The House, as the guardian of the public purse, ought to have the control of this expenditure, and ought not to hand it over to gentlemen who, though highly honourable, were prejudiced in favour of every sort of abuse, and being a kind of administrative Brahmins believed that everything which existed was right.
  MR. BAYLEY POTTERseconded the Resolution.
  MR. W. LOWTHERsaid, he thought the hon. Gentleman the Member for Middlesex (Mr. Labouchere) had rather exaggerated the abuses of the Diplomatic Service. Having been long connected with the Foreign Office himself, he might state his conviction that no Department was better or more efficiently administered. The evidence given in 1861, before the Diplomatic Committee, by Mr. Cunningham, the then chief clerk, and Mr. Hammond, permanent Under Secretary, showed that this sum of £180,000, fixed in 1832, was admirably administered, there having frequently been a surplus, while the amount had never been exceeded. Were the control transferred to the House, he believed the expenditure would be considerably greater, for the House was excessively amiable in money matters. Would any gentleman's private garden of the same extent cost £7,138, as was the case with the garden at Hampton Court? If the Foreign Office had any fault it was in being too stingy. Ministers, for instance, were sometimes removed to a different post after two years, and were thereby put to great expense, in some cases losing a great deal of money which they had expended on their houses, in the expectation that they would be permanently located there. Their successors felt themselves under no obligation to compensate them, and if they applied to the Foreign Office, the noble Lord and the Under Secretary not having time to attend to such details, the matter was probably decided by some crusty, gouty gentlemen, who objected to paying anything which they could avoid. It was true Ambassadors had an allowance for outfit; but this did not meet the expenses of removal, since they could not travel about with a carpet-bag or portmanteau. He thought the longer a system which worked so economically was continued the better.
  LORD STANLEYsaid, the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Labouchere) in his by no means unfair, but somewhat desultory observations, had travelled over a wide range of subjects, fully to discuss which would require considerable time. The first point he had touched upon was the subject of Diplomatic pensions; and he had said that those pensions amounted to £40,000. If the hon. Member would look at the list, however, he would find that instead of £40,000 they were only a little over £24,000.
  MR. LABOUCHEREexplained that what he meant to say was, not that £40,000 was paid for pensions, but that that sum was set apart for the purpose, and it encouraged the giving of such pensions. Even £24,000 was too much to give to gentlemen who were capable of active service.
  LORD STANLEYsaid, a large number of those upon the retired list were of a very advanced age. One of them was Lord Stratford de Redcliffe—another, a gentleman who retired thirty years ago. Similar allowances were given under various names in all branches of the public service; and he did not think the rate exorbitant. Only the last three names upon the pension list, however, had been placed there by him; and those, supersessions rendered necessary by the recent alterations and amalgamations in foreign countries. With regard to the question of agencies, that was a large and important subject; and he had not concealed his opinion that the system was not, in principle, a satisfactory one, nor one which ought to be continued in any public Department, though he did not believe it had led to much abuse. It was, however, not correct that any gentleman could make £2,000 a year by the percentages he received. The gentlemen concerned had accepted the agencies which they held with the full sanction and knowledge of their superiors in office, and in his opinion it would not be fair to take those fees away without granting compensation. Referring to another subject, the House would recollect that nearly all the German Missions—about which so much was said a few years ago—had been abolished, and that we had at present only the Embassy at Vienna, that at Berlin, and minor Missions at two other South German Courts. Those Courts were now in a state of transition, and the present would not be a favourable moment for withdrawing the Missions. There might be cases where

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  Missions became vacant, in which they might be reduced in rank or in pay, or possibly in which they might be suppressed altogether; but the time, he thought, for considering cases of that kind was when vacancies actually occurred. Nor did he believe that any considerable saving could be effected by those means. He was much struck by the fact that every one of those points in which the hon. Member complained of the expenditure of the Foreign Office came under the direct control of that House; while it was precisely in that portion of the Foreign Office expenditure which did not come under the direct and minute supervision of that House that the greatest degree of economy had been practised. He hoped, however, no one supposed that question ought to be regarded as a matter of controversy between the House on the one side and the Foreign Office on the other—the one desiring to obtain greater control over the expenditure, and the other desiring to evade it. That was not, in the slightest degree, the state of the case. He admitted—and he believed that every one who held his Office would be prepared to admit—the full and indisputable right of the House to cheek, control, and supervise the expenditure of the Foreign Office. There was no doubt upon that point. The House found the money, and the House had a right to know what was done with it. It was only a question of means; and it was for the House to decide, for its own convenience, in what form and to what extent that supervision should be exercised. There was no need to go back to the origin of the present system. The House was aware that the Diplomatic expenditure was formerly defrayed out of the Civil List; and it was in the year 1831 the present arrangement first came into operation. That arrangement was not made on the sole responsibility of the Government; it was made on the recommendation of a Committee of the House of Commons sitting at a time when zeal for economy and reform was stronger, perhaps, than at any subsequent period. That Committee recommended—he presumed upon grounds of economy—that there should be a lump sum of £180,000 provided for the Diplomatic Service, rather than a number of separate items placed in the Votes. That question had been again and again discussed in subsequent years, and the arrangement had invariably been supported by the highest authorities among the
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  Liberal as well as the Conservative party; and he was not aware that an unfavourable opinion had ever been expressed upon it by any considerable petition of the House. They all knew that the cost of the various branches of the public Administration had greatly increased within the last thirty or forty years. That increase was owing partly to an augmentation of business, and partly to the fact that the value of money had diminished during that period. The pound sterling did not go us far, in the way of purchasing power, as formerly; and he believed they would not find a single branch of the public service, except the Diplomatic Service, in which the expenditure had not of late years increased. He had gone over the items of that expenditure more than once, and he would venture to say that they would not find it easy, as a matter of general policy, to effect in it any reduction. He sometimes heard it said—although the hon. Member had the candour not to avail himself of such an argument—that under the arrangement of the year 1831, the mode of disposing of that money was wholly removed beyond the knowledge or control of that House. That was, he believed, a common impression out of doors; but it was one which was wholly unfounded. Any one who referred to the financial accounts which were published yearly, might see in the minuted detail how that money was expended; and it was competent for any hon. Member, who thought that the Diplomatic expenditure was too great, to point out the particular items to which he objected. The hon. Gentleman had drawn a distinction between that Diplomatic expenditure and that precisely parallel case of the expenditure on account of judicial functions. He (Lord Stanley) was bound to say that he did not think the distinction drawn by the hon. Member, however ingenious it might be, could be practically sustained. The basis on which the hon. Gentleman rested his argument was that all public expenditure should come into the Estimates, so that it might be criticized item by item in that House. But if they laid down that principle, he did not see upon what possible ground they could refuse a similar investigation into judicial salaries. He did not attempt to decide whether such an arrangement would be right or wrong. He had not himself that horror of investigation which seemed to exist in some minds. He did not believe that it would

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  be attended in that case with the advantage which some persons anticipated from it; but, at all events, he saw no reason why a distinction should be drawn in reference to that subject between the salaries of Judges and the salaries of members of the Diplomatic Service. It was not true, as some persons appeared to suppose, that the salaries of individual diplomatists were, or according to usage could be, arbitrarily cut down by the Secretary of State. There was no such thing in the service as cutting down salaries without notice, and without assigning a reason. He was not aware of any such case. There was, undoubtedly, no legal security for the permanence of Diplomatic salaries any more than of the salaries of officers of the Civil Service; but who ever expressed fear lest these latter should be arbitrarily reduced? They were regarded and treated as permanent, though not made so by law. He objected to the Motion of the hon. Gentleman, because he did not believe that if it were adopted it would lead to greater economy. Every one knew that there was nothing more popular in that House than advocating economy in general term, while there was nothing more unpopular than carrying out the principle of economy in detail. He did not remember an instance in which any material reduction had been effected in the Estimates by discussions upon the separate items; and he believed that these discussions had often rather contributed to an increase of expenditure. He believed it was becoming pretty well known, as a matter of Parliamentary experience, that if any one thought the expenditure in a particular branch of Administration was too high, the only chance of getting it diminished was by insisting on some general reduction, and then leaving it to the Minister of the Department to decide in what manner that object was to be attained. He had stated briefly his reasons for opposing the Motion; but he did not pretend to speak of it as one in which the interests of the Foreign Office were deeply interested. He believed that the House of Commons, if called upon, would be ready to vote the money that might be wanted. The question was really one for the House itself to settle with a view to its own convenience. During the last forty years they had supported the present system under which a lump sum was placed in the hands of the Foreign Minister, and he was told that he must do
  936
  the best he could with it, but that he must not exceed it. The practical working of the system, in his opinion, had been to keep down the expenditure. The House, in taking that course, had imposed upon the head of the Foreign Office a certain responsibility of which he had no right to divest himself, except upon a deliberate intimation of the judgment of Parliament. He should have no great fear of the result if that Motion were carried; but he saw nothing to induce him to believe that the House was dissatisfied with the present arrangement; and it was therefore his duty to support it. Before he sat down he would once more remind the House that nearly every one of those items of expenditure to which the hon. Gentleman had referred as subjects of criticism were items not included in the £180,000 a year which, were placed at the disposal of the Foreign Office, but were items which passed the scrutiny of the House, and with respect to which, therefore, if any extravagance had been committed, the House must be considered not to have exercised the power placed in its hands.
  MR. CHILDERSsaid, he was rather disappointed at finding that the noble Lord did not feel himself in a position to accede to the Motion, and the more so as he had understood from the statement of the noble Lord last year that he was in favour of that change. The Foreign Office expended annually about £640,000, and out of that amount £180,000 was the sum for Diplomatic salaries and pensions, which formed the subject of his hon. Friend's Motion. What he wished the House to consider, and what the noble Lord had not justified, was this—why that £180,000 should be handed over as a lump to the Foreign Minister to be used in that particular way, whereas all the rest of the £640,000 was included in the regular Estimates laid every year on the table of the House. If the whole of the Foreign Office expenditure were placed in the hands of the Minister, and he were tied down as to its amount, there might be some sense in laying that charge on the Consolidated Fund. But that was not what happened. What practically occurred was this, that a certain part of the Foreign Office expenditure was taken out of the usual review of Parliament; whereas if the expenses connected with foreign affairs fluctuated up and down that fluctuation appeared in the Estimates. The services for China and Japan appeared on the Estimates; but our

  937
  Ministers for those countries were in much the same position as our Ministers elsewhere; and he could not see why the salaries of our Ministers for China and Japan should be put on the Votes of that House, while those of our Ministers in South America were not. So with regard to many of the appointments which were half Diplomatic, half Consular. It had always been matter of controversy whether a particular class of public servants abroad were to be called Diplomatic agents performing Consular functions, or Consular agents performing Diplomatic functions; the salaries of those that belonged to the one class coming upon the Votes of the House, and the salaries of the other class being charged upon the Diplomatic fund and not coming upon the Votes. Then there was the special case of the third Secretary, whose case nobody would contend was on a different footing from that of any other of the attachés. There was not a sufficient balance to charge the salary of the third Secretary on the Diplomatic fund, and therefore a Vote for it was annually taken in the House. Again, while a Minister's salary was charged on the Diplomatic fund, the expenses of his outfit and his establishment were placed upon the annual Votes. The truth was that £180,000 was put at the disposal of the Foreign Office within certain limits to use as they liked; if they wanted more they came down to the House for it; if they saved anything, which they rarely did, the House did not hear much of it. Therefore, the noble Lord's argument broke down. Then the noble Lord had said that the Judges were in one respect placed in a parallel position to that of our Diplomatists; but he (Mr. Childers) did not think there were any grounds for that statement.
  LORD STANLEYsaid, that what he had stated was not that the individual Judges were in a parallel position, but that the sum appropriated to the payment of the Judges was in a parallel position.
  MR. CHILDERSsaid, he did not think that the cases were at all parallel. The Judges of the Superior Courts held their offices during good behaviour, and it was perfectly right that their salaries should not be cut down by the vote of the House, but should stand in the same position as persons whose salaries were charged on the Civil List. But Her Majesty's Ministers abroad did not hold their offices during good behaviour, and there was no reason
  938
  why they should not be dealt with in the same manner as the Secretary of State or a permanent Under Secretary in the Foreign Office. It was very unfortunate that when they were year by year getting rid of the idea that any of our public servants required to have their salaries kept out of the view of the House, the Government were not in a condition to accede to the adoption of the same rule as regarded the Diplomatic Service. Precisely the same objections as those urged by the noble Lord had been urged for many years past against every successive step that had been taken for transferring from the permanent fund to the Votes of the House the salaries of public officers. The expenses connected with the Courts of Justice, excepting the Judges' salaries, were now charged on the annual Estimates, and the other evening a question arose as to a particular appointment. A Vote was brought before the House, and after an explanation from the Attorney General as to that appointment, the House naturally criticized the rate of the salaries of that particular class of officers. But they could not have done that a few years ago, because those salaries did not appear in the Estimates. He entirely dissented from the opinion that no good was done by discussing the Estimates. Every discussion in Supply on a particular item of expenditure, though it might have no immediate effect, afterwards stirred up the Department that was concerned, and also the Treasury; and in the following year the result of the Motion made the year before was seen. On these grounds, he did not think sufficient reasons had been given for refusing that Motion; and he hoped that next year the whole of the Diplomatic expenditure would be borne on the Estimates, and not a part of it merely.
  MR. DARBY GRIFFITHsaid, he was glad to hear the noble Lord (Lord Stanley) express himself in terms which did not imply an intention of offering any serious resistance to the views of the House on this subject. The existing system was a direct infringement of the constitutional maxim that the public purse was in the hands of the House of Commons. The noble Lord, he might; remark, was not responsible for the system, which on former occasions had been most strenuously supported by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire, and also by the late Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, with his

  939
  usual warmth of temperament. Under the circumstances, he trusted the noble Lord would agree to the Motion of the hon. Gentleman.
  MR. KINNAIRDsaid, he could bear witness to the great care with which the noble Lord watched over the expenditure connected with his Department. A great principle was involved in this question, and nothing whatever had been said to prove that this particular item ought to be withdrawn from the immediate control of Parliament. He believed that the noble Lord had defended the system in such a manner as he would have done if he had entertained very strong convictions on the subject; and he hoped, therefore, he would accede to the Motion before the House.
  MR. ALDERMAN LUSKsaid, that as the salaries of Ministers of the Crown came before the House in the Estimates, he did not see why those of the Diplomatic Service should not also be stated clearly in the Estimates.
  MR. LABOUCHERE, in reply, observed that both the present and former Secretary to the Treasury—who might be supposed to know what was the best for economy in conducting the finances—were in favour of his proposition. He hoped the noble Lord would not put the House to the trouble of a division.
  Motion made, and Question put,
  "That, in the opinion of this House, all sums required to defray the expenses of the Diplomatic Service ought to be annually voted by Parliament, and that Estimates of all such sums ought to be submitted in a form that will admit of their effectual supervision and control by this House."—(Mr. Labouchere.)
  The House divided:—Ayes 76; Noes 72: Majority 4.

COLLIERY ACCIDENTS.

  MOTION FOR A COMMISSION.
  MR. GREENE, in rising to move "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, that She will be graciously pleased to issue a Royal Commission to inquire into Colliery Accidents," said, he might be asked why he, who had no connection with mines, should bring such a subject before the House. His answer was, that he, in common with others, deeply felt the calamity of accidents in coal mines, and considered it a subject well worthy of the Legislature. Even should the debate be unproductive of any practical good, the
  940
  country would at least feel that Parliament was not neglectful of the lives of the people. He considered that the very fact of 2,468 lives having been destroyed during the year 1865–6 was a sufficient reason for endeavouring to arouse public attention upon the subject. He had carefully read the Report upon Accidents in Coal Mines, and had come to the conclusion that, although the Committee had paid the most careful attention to what they had investigated, there still remained a great deal to be done, and the progressive discoveries of science must always be suggesting improvements in the management of coal mines. He need not draw a harrowing picture of what occurred when 200 or 300 lives were lost in a colliery; but the man must be lacking in Christian feeling who could look into a blazing fire, remember that so many tons of coal cost a life, and refuse to do anything in his power to prevent accidents in future During a long connection with working men he had experienced many accidents, but he never had a second accident from the same cause, and similar vigilance would prevent many colliery accidents. There were colliery inspectors appointed by the Government, but they went to collieries after accidents, when all was made ready for inspection, and it was therefore difficult for them to ascertain what might have been the particular causes of them. In the Report of the Committee there was a petition of miners, which set forth that the fearful sacrifice of life in mines abundantly proved that the legislative measures hitherto taken were totally inadequate to secure the personal safety of miners; that the Staffordshire practice of working thick coal in more than one place was highly dangerous; and that the loss of life in ironstone and coal mines proved the necessity for more extended legislative supervision. It had been said that if sub-inspectors were appointed the owners of pits would be too much relieved of responsibility. Legislative interference, however, was no new matter. In his opinion sub-inspectors ought to be appointed, and he was told that their appointment would be acceptable to the owners of collieries if it were made by the inspectors, under whom the sub-inspectors should act, and to whom they should report. It was said that men were fatalists; but why should they be exposed to such risks that at last they became hardened and were careless whether they lived or died? There were

  941
  pitmen who had left mines which they believed had become dangerous, and he desired so to improve the working of coal mines that the men generally should cease to be fatalists. In the petition of the colliery workers the appointment of sub-inspectors was asked for; and on this point he was at issue with the Committee, who said that they did not think it right to recommend such appointments. What he complained of with regard to the Report of the Committee was that nothing practical had come of it. With regard to the proposed examination of overlookers, the Committee suggested that no examination would afford so good a test as the personal knowledge of their qualifications which the owner of a mine might be expected to have; but he believed that the Chairman of the Committee thought the overlookers should pass a proper examination for the office. Then the Committee said that it would not be well to diminish the responsibility of owners and managers of mines by any action on the part of inspectors; but it could not be said that this result would follow if the visits of the inspectors were more frequent than they now were. Ac present the inspectors rarely went down a mine at all, and they visited the mines at wide intervals, often allowing two years to intervene. [Mr. JACKSON: No.] He referred to the evidence of Mr. Dickenson, and the Report of the Committee, in support of his statement with regard to inspection. He knew it was held that mine-owners ought to continue free from liability for accidents to work-people which were the result of the negligence of fellow-workmen; but, in his opinion, a heavy deodand should be levied on every pit where an accident had occurred through negligence. Under the present system, inspectors did not think it their duty to visit mines unless they were summoned to an accident, or were informed of impending danger. During 1867 there were 500 more accidents than there were in the previous year; and that being so, Parliament could not say that all had been done which ought to be done. He hoped that colliery owners would not think him antagonistic to them; he had no interest either for or against them; but it certainly was for their interest that the mines should be safely worked. The great point was to secure adequate ventilation. He believed that there had been some important inventions for the discovery of gas, and he hoped
  942
  that the Government would assent to the appointment of a Royal Commission, composed of scientific men, who should carefully, and without prejudice, examine into the merits of these tell-tale inventions. The Oaks Colliery had not been inspected for some yours before the accident. He held, therefore, that the present inspection of mines was not sufficient. The number of Government Inspectors was only twelve; there were 3,000 pits; and who would allege that twelve inspectors, without; any sub-inspectors to aid them, were sufficient for the purposes of inspection? Mr. Thomas Wynne, a Government Inspector, had testified to the number of accidents which occurred owing to bad management, and added that in every case where a good manager was got he found that the accidents immediately decreased. Well, then, if the owners of coal mines failed to get good managers, he held that it was high time that means should be taken to secure them. Mr. Wynne, in his description of a good manager, said that he was a man who thoroughly understood the working of mines, and who had served a proper time under a proper mining engineer. Mr. Wynne also said that he thought it would have a very good effect if, in certain cases, the inspector should say to the owner, "I think you must take the responsibility on yourself unless you get a better manager." He hoped the circumstance of his calling attention to this subject would produce a good result on the owners of coal pits, for unless they managed their business better, and accidents became much fewer, it would be the duty of every right-thinking man to press for further legislation. Parliament had legislated with regard to sanitary and other matters, and yet they were told that they must leave things alone in a case where accidents were so numerous and terrible. But though the accidents from explosions formed far the largest proportion of those which occurred, there were many also which took place from the falling of roofs. He thought he had shown, from the evidence of Government Inspectors, that many precautions which could be taken were neglected, and that a Royal Commission ought to be allowed to decide whether anything further was to be done. In the Oaks Colliery case the jury came to the conclusion that the deceased had met their deaths by an explosion of gas; they believed that the explosion had occurred in consequence of the great accumulation of

  943
  gas, which they attributed to the negligence of the manager and his subordinate officers, and they recommended that mines should be inspected once in three months by competent persons, and that they should be provided with scientific instruments for registering the quality and quantity of the air that passed through them. The jury were, no doubt, men thoroughly acquainted with the working of the pit. It was to be feared that colliers were too regardless of their lives, and often continued working in pits long after they were known to be dangerous. Some outbursts of gas might arise from unavoidable circumstances; but he believed such cases were not so frequent as those where the accumulation of gas might have been prevented by better management. As to the safety lamp, many practical men held that it had been a curse rather than a blessing, it being apt to put men off their guard, while any little accident which opened it led to an explosion. Mines, moreover, were now worked which but for the safety lamp would have been abandoned. Now, he maintained that workings should not be continued where the use of naked lights was inadmissible. Not only the prevention of accidents, but the health of the colliers ought to be considered, for who could tell how many lives were shortened by inhaling foul gas? If a naked light could not be used, a pit could not be in a proper sanitary condition, the right use of the safety lamp being to detect the presence of foul gas. Whether the single shift or the double shift system was the best he would not discuss, since the question would be better considered by a Commission, as also would the question of a third shaft. Only a few years had elapsed since two shafts were rendered compulsory, and this regulation had already effected much good. A third shaft, according to a calculation with which he had been furnished, might involve a cost of an extra halfpenny a ton on coal; but the country, having willingly paid 2d. in the pound income tax for the liberation of thirty of our fellow-subjects in Abyssinia, would not think this a consideration when the saving of 2,000 lives a year was at stake. He had himself no interest in mines; but he hoped pit- owners and other interested persons would co-operate with him in obtaining the appointment of a Commission. The Commissioners, it had been suggested to him, might, like the Boundary Commissioners,
  944
  appoint barristers and civil engineers as their assistants, so that the mining districts might be visited, and all possible information elicited.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, that She will be graciously pleased to issue a Royal Commission to inquire into Colliery Accidents."—(Mr. Greene.)
  MR. W. JACKSONsaid, he did not rise to oppose the Motion, for there was not a single well-considered suggestion for the safety of their mines that, the coalowners of the district with which he was connected were not most willing to comply with. He agreed that the present inspection was not sufficient. Many new collieries had been opened in his district, but no new inspectors had been appointed. The present inspectors were overworked. He did not think the remedy was in increasing the number of sub-inspectors, but in dividing the present districts, which were too large, and appointing an additional number of inspectors. He regretted that the hon. Member who had brought forward this subject was not better acquainted with it; but on behalf of the colliery owners he would say that there were no measures of safety and precaution which the Government could devise which they were not most anxious to adopt. The pecuniary loss of an explosion was so great that if the coalowners had to pay for the inspectors themselves it would be a cheaper thing than the liability to accidents without inspection. He had not been a member of the Select Committee; but he had read the Report and the evidence, and he trusted that the Government would carry their Resolutions into effect.
  MR. POWELLsaid, that as a Member of the Committee of Inquiry into the nature of a colliery district, he wished to offer a few observations on the Motion. At present there was a unanimous feeling throughout all acquainted with the subject that the number of inspectors must be increased. Every one who had read the evidence would admit that many accidents might have been prevented if the inspection had been adequate. It was stated before the Committee that complaints were often made by workmen to the inspectors which brought them to the mines, and one of the inspectors stated that when the mines were visited the reports of the workpeople were usually more than borne out by the facts. The Committee came to a strong and unani-

  945
  mous recommendation that the number of inspectors should be increased, and he was much disappointed on taking up the Estimates for the present year to find that no provision had been made for an increase in the number of inspectors. Although, however, the condition of things might be improved by better inspection, that improvement would be limited in degree unless they secured a better class of managers. Colliery owners were agreed that one great cause of accidents was the want of skill in the managers, and it frequently happened that persons who invested their capital in collieries with no sufficient knowledge of the business occasioned disaster to themselves and others 05' an injudicious selection of unskilled and careless managers. But even this would not be sufficient without a like improvement in the whole class of subordinate officers and underground viewers. A great change of opinion had taken place lately amongst the owners of collieries on the subject of inspection, and it was felt that this was of the highest possible importance, and that the chances of accident and loss would be materially lessened if there were a number of efficient sub-inspectors under the control and direction of the inspectors who would be engaged in the function of viewing and making suggestions as to the better management and more complete provision for the safety of the workmen.
  Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
  House adjourned at halt after Seven o'clock till Thursday,

MINUTES.
SELECT COMMITTEE—On New-Forest Deer Removal, &c. Act, 1851, nominated.
PUBLIC BILLS— First Reading— Local Government Supplemental (No. 2)* (119); Pier and Harbour Orders Confirmation, &c * (120); Unclaimed Prize Money (India) * (121); Reformatory Schools (Ireland) * (122); Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Court* (123).
Second Reading— Artizans' and Labourers' Dwellings (93); Stockbrokers (Ireland) * (105).
Referred to Select Committee— Artizans' and Labourers' Dwellings (93).
Committee— Religious, &c. Buildings Sites * (77); Conservation of Churchyards Act (1867) Amendment (16); Sea Fisheries (96–125); Cotton Statistics (102–126); Documentary Evidence * (88).
Report— Religious, &c. Buildings (Sites) * (77); Consecration of Churchyards Act (1867) Amendment (16–124).
Third Reading— (£17,000,000) Consolidated Fund *; Alkali Act, 1863, Perpetuation * (114), and passed.

ABYSSINIA— THANKS TO THE ARMY.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURY: My Lords, I wish to inform your Lordships that the Government think it better to postpone the Vote of Thanks to the army in Abyssinia till after Whitsuntide, inconsequence of our still remaining without an official despatch from Sir Robert Napier.
CONSECRATION OF CHURCHYARDS ACT (1867) AMENDMENT BILL.— (No. 16.)
(The Bishop of Oxford.)
CONSECRATION OF CHURCHYARDS ACT (1867) AMENDMENT BILL.— (No. 16.)

  COMMITTEE.
  House in Committee (according to Order.)
  Clause 1 (Giver of Land may reserve exclusive Right to the extent of One-Tenth),
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY moved an Amendment, of which he had given Notice, to assimilate the law to that existing in Ireland, where the burials of Roman Catholics and others objecting to the rites of the Church of England might be performed in Church of England burial-grounds (on notice being given to the
  898
  minister) according to the form of the religion to which such person had belonged.
  THE BISHOP OF OXFORDsaid, he could not acquiesce in the Amendment of his noble Friend, which would introduce a change into the general law of England. He could not agree with the noble Lord that allowing ministers of different denominations to come into churchyards, and to perform therein different and various services, would tend to peace—he believed it would have a very different result, and would, moreover, be subversive of the very principle of an Established Church. The noble Lord, moreover, was mistaken as to the state of the law in Ireland. It was necessary to obtain the permission in writing of the clergymen in Ireland before any service other than that of the Church of England could be performed in the churchyard; but the Amendment of his noble Friend proposed that the right to come in should be absolute, subject only to a time to be fixed by the clergyman.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, the Amendment proposed by his noble Friend was exceedingly desirable. If adopted, it would have the effect of putting an end to some very scandalous exhibitions which now occurred when clergymen happened to possess more zeal than discretion.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY, in reply, was understood to express a hope that the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of Oxford), upon reflection, would be able to look favourably upon the principle embodied in the Amendment which had been admitted in Ireland and not refuse a similar concession in England. He would not trouble their Lordships to divide.
  Amendment negatived.
  Bill reported, without Amendment.
  LORD REDESDALEmoved the omission of "one-tenth," with a view to substitute "200 square yards" as the amount of land which a donor might reserve for himself and family.
  THE BISHOP OF OXFORDsaid, he had no objection to allow "one-sixth" to be substituted for "one-tenth;" but decidedly objected to limit a donor's reserved ground to 200 square yards. His object was to induce persons to make as large grants of land as possible.
  Word "One-tenth" struck out; "One-sixth" inserted instead thereof.
  Clause, as amended, agreed to.
  Another Amendment moved, and negatived.
  Bill to be read 3a on Thursday next, and to be printed as amended. [No. 124.]

ARTIZANS' AND LABOURERS' DWELLINGS BILL—(No. 93).
(The Lord Chelmsford.)
ARTIZANS' AND LABOURERS' DWELLINGS BILL—(No. 93).

  SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  LORD CHELMSFORD, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that although he had consented to take charge of the Bill in their Lordships' House, he feared he should be unable to do justice to the subject. The intention of the Bill was to improve the comfort of the labouring classes of the community in respect of their dwellings; and the magnitude of the evil with which it proposed to grapple was forcing itself daily more and more upon public attention, and, in the language of a petition recently presented in favour of the Bill, legislation on the subject was not only desirable but had become absolutely indispensable. The measure he now submitted to their Lordships had been thrice read a second time in the House of Commons without a division; and on the first occasion, in 1866, it was referred to a Select Committee, which reported upon it favourably. In that year, however, the pressure of Public Business prevented its passing that House sufficiently early to give hopes of its becoming law; and last year, having been read the second time, and gone into Committee, it was withdrawn for a similar reason. This year, however, it was introduced in the other House very early in the Session, and came up to their Lordships unanimously recommended by the House of Commons; its main provisions had been agreed to by both Bides of the House; it was under discussion in Committee on three days, and various Amendments were introduced, but no division took place, except one on an insignificant proposition with regard to the Metropolitan Board of Works and the City of London. Hitherto, however, all attempts to remedy the evil by legislation had proved abortive. The measure which he now submitted to their Lordships had been under the consideration of the other House during the last three Sessions. The Bill thus came to their Lordships' House recommended by the unanimous sanction of the other House of Parliament. It was not, however, to be expected that a Bill of this description, which must necessarily be of a compulsory character, as it would interfere with the rights of private property,
  900
  would be unopposed; it would, of course, meet with opposition from owners of the poorer descriptions of property, which he had heard was daily increasing in value, owing to the wholesale destruction of poor dwellings by the construction of railways and other improvements in the metropolis. The unhappy tendency of the present wholesale destruction of small dwellings in the metropolis, and the consequent overcrowding of poor families, could not be more forcibly illustrated than by an instance which lately occurred. A working man and his family, seven in number, were last autumn flung out of the lodging where they had previously lived, the house being doomed to make way for one of the new metropolitan improvements—the erection of the new Courts of Justice. The work by which the man gained his living required that he should not go far in search of another dwelling; but the neighbourhood being already greatly over-peopled, he was glad to get a single room in u house in an adjacent street, the windows of which overlook one of our great Inns of Court. He had, of course, to pay what to him was a high price for huddling-room in so good a situation; but he had no choice, and thought himself lucky to get in there. What happened? There were then in that house fifty seven human beings, eating, drinking, and sleeping, cooking and washing, sickly and well, all stowed together during the sweltering days of autumn. Typhus scented its prey too quickly, and marked the wretched man for its own. While he lay ill his wife and six children had to inhale his pestiferous breath, and communicated involuntarily the contagion to the other inmates of the house. The victim had not a chance for life; and when he sunk in death his widow and six children were removed to the workhouse, while his corpse was interred at the expense of the parish. This was not a solitary, but rather a representative instance of a very large class of sufferers. Many parallel instances could easily be produced. Those of their Lordships who had not attended to the subject could have no conception of the large extent to which filth, disease, and pestilence prevailed, and the commonest decencies of life disregarded. But he would not shock their Lordships by many details; he would refer to as few as he could consistently with the necessity of proving that such a measure as the present was urgently required. He would therefore merely give

  901
  some illustrations drawn from the three principal towns of Liverpool, Manchester, and London. The Report of the Medical Officer of Liverpool for 1867 stated—
  "It has been mentioned that at the nightly visits the inspectors are required to take notice of the arrangements as well as of the number of the persons in a family occupying a single room. The law does not give us any power to interfere in this matter, except in the case of the rooms of the registered common lodging-houses; but the following facts will show the magnitude of the moral evil belonging to the present single room occupation; and the facts will also disclose, however repulsively, the canker which threatens to blight the most sacred bonds of the family and social system. In 62 instances adult sons and daughters slept in the same room with their parents, and in three instances in the same bed. In 152 instances adult daughters slept in the same room, and in 56 instances in the same bed with their parents. In 99 instances adult sons slept in the same room, and in 37 instances in the same bed with their parents. In 214 instances adult sons slept in the same room, and in 158 instances in the same bed with their mothers. In 37 instances adult daughters slept in the same room, and in 27 instances in the same bed with their fathers. In 59 instances the mother with her adult sons and daughters slept in the same room, and in 21 instances in the same bed together. In 12 instances the father with his adult sons and daughters slept in the same room, and in six instances in the same bed together. In 7 instances a mother, adult eon, and a female lodger slept in the same room, and in two instances in the same bed together. In 64 instances a man, his wife, and a female lodger slept in the same room, and in three instances in the same bed. In 12 instances a man, wife, and male lodger slept in the same room. In 39 instances adult brothers and sisters slept in the same room, and in 20 instances in the same bed. The overcrowding which we find in sub-let houses is generally connected with, or caused by, these bad arrangements of a family. Thus, for example, in one room of the cubical dimensions of 900 feet, a mother and her two sons, aged 18 and 20, were in one bed, and a man, his wife, and his daughter, aged 18, in another bed."
  The space allotted to each person was 150 cubic feet, or less than two-fifths of the measurement allotted to the inmates of our prisons—
  "In another room, of the cubical dimensions of 800 feet, there were found sleeping a father, two sons, aged 18 and 20, a daughter, aged 22, and a female lodger, aged 30. In another room, of the cubical dimensions of 800 feet, there were found sleeping in one bed on the floor two brothers, aged 24 and 26, and four sisters, aged 28, 20. 18, and 16."
  The Medical Report for Manchester furnishes similar instances—
  "Paradise Court, 40 yards by 30, contains 43 families, and consists of back-to-back houses, and on one side back-to-back cellars; contains seven privies, situated in the centre of a court, in a very filthy condition, with large ashpit between."
  902
  In one place in Manchester, with an area of about 3,000 yards, there were 106 houses and cellars containing 154 families, and 546 persons. One district alone had furnished 200 cases of typhus during a period of nine months. Turning from Manchester to the metropolis, a similar state of things would be found to exist. The Rev. Mr. Andrews, incumbent of St. Luke's, King's Cross, said—
  "At the last Census my incumbency contained a population numbering 8,050. The Midland Railway Company have demolished 275 houses, and in consequence the population, which was 8,050 at the taking of the Census, has been reduced to 3,800, a reduction of more than 4,000."
  In Old St. Pancras and the adjoining parishes not less than 750 houses have been pulled down, whereby an estimated population of 18,000 have been ejected. Mr. West, the district missionary, stated that, in consequence of the curtailment of supply, the rent of rooms in the neighbourhood had risen 20 per cent; overcrowding, as a natural result, was intensified, and nine-tenths of the families whose circumstances required residence in the neighbourhood, and who had therefore taken refuge in the surrounding districts, were said to live in one room. Mr. Eldridge, the missionary of the Clare Market district, said that 206 houses, inhabited by the labouring classes, had been demolished for the site of the new Law Courts. These houses contained 1,120 families. Out of 1,000 families in his district, four-fifths live in one room, generally very small. The effect of this was very shortly and strongly described by the incumbent of Trinity, St. Giles's, who said—
  "You have no conception of the state in which people are living in part of my district. They are crowded together, and live like vermin."
  And, almost in the same words, the curate of St. Peter's, Regent Square, says, "Part of our district is greatly overcrowded, and the people live like animals." The Registrar of the Evicted Tenants' Aid Association, in his Report referring to the block of buildings between Cow Cross and Peter's Lane, in the East Central district, said—
  "The whole of these rookeries, inhabited principally by the lowest characters, are in every respect totally unfit for human occupation, and for this reason I believe they have been already condemned; if so, the eviction should be proceeded with at once; for, besides the dilapidated state of the whole, the pest-breeding stench arising from the accumulated filth and the overcrowded state of every house are such that it is no wonder that cholera and fever reign supreme. In Broad

  903
  Yard, which consists of 17 houses, inhabited by 45 families, eight persons sleeping within a yard of the only closet in the court were attacked by cholera; of these eight but one recovered. In Rose Alley, where 32 families dwell in 14 small houses, having again but one closet for the common use, Nos. 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 are full of fever—5 cases were taken this week to Bartholomew's Hospital; other cases at home. Fryingpan Alley, containing 12 houses, with but one closet for the whole, is inhabited by 28 families. Pit Alley, having 12 houses, and, as usual, but one closet for the whole, shelters 26 families. The water in all these tenements is supplied through a hole in the wall for one half-hour daily. There is one house where the water has been entirely cut off for the past two years. On the authority of the missionary consulted by me, and who most kindly gave me every facility for obtaining information, I have to state that the whole of this property belongs to only two persons—one a most influential vestryman of the parish, and the other a lunatic. The missionary solemnly assured me that these places were never entered by either a clergyman or a policeman; the only visitors to these wretched domiciles being the doctor and himself."
  He could multiply indefinitely those cases, and he trusted their Lordships would consider those he had given as merely specimens of what was too general; because, even if they considered them all that could he adduced they would have but an imperfect idea of the wretchedness and demoralization which existed in all those places where this terrible overcrowding existed. It would be a reproach to the Legislature and to the country if no attempt were made to remedy, or at least to mitigate, such an evil by legislative interference. Their Lordships would naturally ask whether there was in existence no legislation calculated to carry out in any degree the object of this Bill? In 1851 the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Shaftesbury) introduced a Bill empowering the local authorities to exercise certain powers with regard to lodging-houses for the poor. It was unnecessary that he should state the details of that Bill, as it was merely a permissive measure, and had failed in carrying out the object in view. By the provisions of the Public Health. Act of 1866, the Secretary of State might empower the nuisance authority of any city or town of not less than 5,000 inhabitants to make regulations—
  "1, for fixing the number of persons who may occupy a house or part of a house which is let in lodgings or occupied by members of more than one family; 4, for enforcing therein the provision of privy accommodation and other appliances and means of cleanliness in proportion to the number of lodgings and occupiers, and the cleansing and ventilation of the common passages and staircases; Penalties not exceeding 40 s. for any one offence, with an additional Penalty not exceed-
  904
  ing 20 s. for every day during which a default in obeying such regulations may continue."
  Where two convictions for overcrowding a house, or the occupation of a cellar as a separate dwelling-place occurred, two justices might direct the closing of the premises for such time as they might deem fit, and in the case of cellars permanently close the same. He believed that Act had not answered the purpose for which it was passed, chiefly because the Local Boards of Health shrunk from putting its provisions in force; and it was in consequence of the necessity being strongly felt for the passing of an effective measure upon this subject that he had been induced to lay this Bill before their Lordships. The Local Boards had shrunk from applying the regulations of the Act with stringency, because the effect of doing so would have been to render homeless multitudes of families who were compelled to find shelter in these unhealthy dwellings. The general provisions of the present Bill were these—Its operation was limited to the City of London, the Metropolis, boroughs not within jurisdiction of Local Boards, towns under Commissioners constituted by local Acts, and places with Local Boards under Public Health Act and Local Government Act. The Bill provided for the appointment of an Officer of Health in any place where none already exists. If the Officer of Health (whether on representation or otherwise) found any street or premises unfit for human habitation, or in a condition to be injurious or dangerous to health, he was to report to the Local Authority. That body, designated in the schedule as being the Local Authority, was to send a copy of the Report to the owner of the premises, together with plans and specifications of the works necessary. The owner, within fourteen days after notice, might state objections to the plan, &c., which the Local Authority might alter. An appeal would lie to the Quarter Sessions. Within three calendar months after the order was made, within one month after determination of the Quarter Sessions, the owner was to state, in writing, whether he would execute works or not. If he elected to execute the necessary works and did not do so, the Local Authority might order the premises to be closed, or execute the works themselves. If he did not elect to do so, the Local Authority might shut up the premises or purchase them; and if the purchase money were not agreed upon, a valuation was to

  905
  be made of the market value of the property as being unfit for human habitation; where the Local Authority was entitled to acquire premises they might empower a building company to act on their behalf, on terms and conditions as to the payment of the compensation, and as to executing the works under the superintendence of the surveyor to Local Authority. The owner, instead of effecting the improvements, might take down the buildings, but might not re-build on the site any house injurious or dangerous to health. If the lessee refused to execute the works the landlord might do it, but the lease would be forfeited, and the value of interest must be paid. The Local Authority was to hold all property acquired under the Act upon trust to provide, by the construction of new or repairing of existing buildings, the labouring classes with suitable dwellings; and for opening out enclosed, or partially enclosed, alleys or courts inhabited by the labouring classes, or otherwise leaving such open spaces as may be necessary to make them healthful. The Local Authority was every year to present, in the form required by the Secretary of State, an account of what had been done and of monies received and paid. The expenses incurred by the Local Authority were to be defrayed out of the local rate. The Public Works Loan Commissioners might make loans for the purposes of the Act, to be secured by mortgage of the buildings erected or to be erected, and by mortgage of the local rate. The Local Authority was not empowered to increase the local rate for the purposes of the Act beyond 2d. in the pound. The Bill applied equally to Scotland and Ireland. Having laid before their Lordships the principal provisions of the Bill, he would proceed to state some of the objections which had been raised against the Bill—their Lordships were no doubt already aware of some of these through the printed papers that had been circulated. In the first place, it was said that this was the first time an attempt had been made to take from private owners compulsorily their property when not required for any public purpose. He did not know in what restricted sense this objection was to be taken; but for himself he could hardly conceive a more important public purpose than that which this Bill was intended to effect. Let them by all means respect private property; but to what species of property did this measure relate? To
  906
  houses unfit for human habitation, and which were therefore likely to engender disease. Such houses were unfit for human habitation, either by reason of originally improper construction, or from want of proper repair; and in either case, the fault being in the proprietors or lessees, who had promoted an evil which was beyond the power of the law, it would be monstrous that there should be no power to abate the nuisance. Objection had been made by the Vestry of Marylebone to the substitution of the Metropolitan Board of Works for the vestries of the different parishes. Now, he must say the whole of a town was interested in weeding out those nurseries of disease and pestilence, which might spread themselves over the community, and that was of infinitely greater importance to the town itself than even the providing parks for the health and recreation of the people. It was not at all improbable that vestrymen of parishes might themselves be the owners of property of this description—and he had read to their Lordships a remarkable instance where this was actually the case—and therefore he felt very strongly indeed that it was infinitely better that the Metropolitan Board of Works, against whom no such imputation of interest could be alleged, should be placed in a position to control this important matter rather than the vestries of the different parishes. Another objection had been made by the parish of Marylebone with regard to the local rate not to exceed 2d. in the pound for carrying out the provisions of the Act; but as to this great misunderstanding prevailed. It was not a building rate, as seemed to be supposed—it would not be called for unless where the Local Authority undertook the works and required a loan from the Public Works Loan Commissioners—the property would afterwards be sold to reimburse the expenditure, and the rate would only be required to make up any deficiency between the amount borrowed and the sum realized by the sale. This measure was one of essential importance to the comfort, health, and, he might add, decency of thousands upon thousands in the metropolis. It was only the other day that he read a paragraph in a newspaper, which was by no means complimentary to their Lordships, with reference to this Bill. Thu Observer of the 24th of May, said—
  "The Bill of Mr. Torrens to provide suitable dwellings for the working classes has gone up to

  907
  the Lords, and it is already beset with perils. The great property owners of London, more especially those who have seats in the Upper House, are opposed to the measure. A vast area of London belongs to eminent Members of the peerage, and if such noblemen obstruct the passage of the Bill in their own supposed interest, or that of the leaseholders, it will probably be lost and the evils which so much require remedy will not only continue but increase, until once more pestilence will assail us and all classes, under the alarm that will be excited, will begin again to talk of doing something to mitigate overcrowding and the habitation of unhealthy houses."
  LORD PORTMAN: Why do not you read the conclusion of the paragraph? It was in these words, "Do this at your peril."
  LORD CHELMSFORDsaid, he did not know whether any of their Lordships were unhappily owners of property of this description, but if they were, he was quite confident it would not influence them in the slightest degree; their only desire would be to enter into the consideration of this measure as they would to any other measure. This he was quite sure of—that if they were to "do it at their peril," they would never be deterred from discharging their duty by such a threat as that; but that they would discharge their duty with respect to it as they did on every other occasion which was for the benefit of the country. He now asked them to give the Bill a second reading. The other evening his noble Friend at the table (Lord Portman), rather irregularly, had made some observations with regard to the Bill, and pressed on him the necessity of sending it to a Select Committee. He thought it undesirable that the Bill should be sent to a Select Committee, because he might be unable to attend the Committee, being engaged in hearing appeals; but he knew very well when suggestions of this kind were thrown out, and with an apparent assent from some of their Lordships, it would not be very hopeful for him to struggle against the proposal. If therefore the noble Lord made a Motion to that effect, he should consent to it and would attend the Committee, and he was happy to add he had secured the services of his noble and learned Friend opposite with the same view. He moved that the Bill be now read a second time.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a"—(Lord Chelmsford.)
  THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURYsaid, he could endorse, with great sincerity and truth, all that had been said by his noble
  908
  and learned Friend as to the evil condition of things both in London and many large towns in the country. The Bill proposed was open to many objections, no doubt; but they were not of such a character that they could not be easily amended, or altogether removed in Committee. He thought it most desirable that the House should give a second reading to the Bill, because it really was an honest and a wise endeavour to remedy one of the most terrible evils that ever afflicted any large community. The evil was growing rapidly in all parts of London, and in all the large towns throughout the kingdom. In London, particularly, where the work of demolition was going on at a very great rate for railways and improvements, there was an influx of from 60,000 or 70,000 persons every year, all coming into competition for houses with the displaced families, and the consequence was a great increase in house rents, a necessity for overcrowding, and an increase of rent into the bargain. It was quite true that the Bill directed attention to only one part of the evil—houses unfit for human habitation—but those who were acquainted with the nature of these dwellings, as he had been for thirty years, would readily understand that such a description involved every evil arising from disrepair, from filth, from want of air, want of light, want of water, and from every other noxious influence. The noble and learned Lord had referred, in reference to Liverpool, to the admirable Report of Dr. Trench, who showed how great were the physical and moral evils of overcrowding. He was, however, afraid that overcrowding would be in some measure the consequence of the present Bill. Demolitions would occur without sufficient preparation being made for the displaced population, as Boards of Guardians would probably be disinclined to incur an expenditure which was to be defrayed by a rate. Nevertheless, the state of things in London had become so serious that he was exceedingly anxious that their Lordships should give a second reading to the Bill, as such a proceeding would prove their Lordships' sympathy for the object in view. He was, however, sorry to confess his apprehension that the powers given by the Bill were so extensive and the means of action so limited, that he feared it would remain a dead letter on the statute book. He was anxious, however, that it should be considered by a Select Committee, who might be able to make such alterations as

  909
  would render it a better working measure, be as to some extent at least to confer a benefit on that class of the population whose condition demanded immediate consideration.
  THE DUKE OF SOMERSETsaid, he thoroughly concurred in the principle embodied in the Bill, and had long thought some such measure necessary; and he was therefore sorry to hear the noble Earl (the Earl of Shaftesbury) say that, after all, the Bill would remain a dead letter, He, on the contrary, hoped that, when it came out of the Select Committee, it would be found to be an effective measure. It should be borne in mind that two of the great requisites for constructing new and improved dwellings for the poor were cheap materials, and the exercise of strict economy in the employment of those by whom the work was to be performed. Now, during the last twenty years Parliament had done everything in its power to reduce the cost of constructing houses for the labouring classes, having taken off the duties on bricks, timber, and glass. But what had the labouring classes themselves done? The noble and learned Lord had described the state of the dwellings for the poor in Manchester as being most objectionable; but what builder would attempt to build houses there, when it appeared from the Report of the Trades' Unions Commissioners, that the moment a man tried to make bricks cheap, workmen in the trade destroyed 100,000 of his bricks in a night, and shot and murdered him. When the noble and learned Lord spoke of the grievous sufferings of the poor from want of proper habitations, it should be remembered that the evil arose, in no slight degree, from the oppressive conduct of others of their own class. Persons in Manchester were not allowed to obtain bricks made in another district. A brick-making company, which proposed to make better and cheaper bricks than had previously been manufactured, were obliged to give up their business altogether. He mentioned these things because, when considering the state of the labouring classes, it was right to bear in mind how far their condition was due to their own conduct. They did all they could to raise the price of materials, and objected to cheap work and to the multiplying of workmen. It was impossible that the benefits, which it was desired to confer on the poor by this measure, could be enjoyed by them unless they themselves had the good sense to
  910
  assist in rendering the construction of dwellings cheap.
  THE BISHOP OF LONDONsaid, from the view he took of its bearing on the moral and spiritual welfare of the crowded population of the metropolis, his earnest desire was that this Bill might pass. There was always some danger besetting a Bill which was referred to a Select Committee; but he hoped that if this Bill were sent to a Select Committee its details would be considered with a full determination that it should be made an effective measure. The details which had been mentioned by the noble and learned Lord who moved the second reading of the Bill were very similar to those which had been furnished from various parishes in his diocese, and they showed a state of things which was a disgrace to a civilized country. If such a state of things continued to exist he thought that all efforts to improve the spiritual condition of the population and to extend education among the masses must to a great extent be rendered powerless. He had been told that in one of the metropolitan parishes a person who was questioning the owner of some dilapidated cottage property as to his gross and net returns from the property, found it difficult to make the landlord understand the difference between net and gross, the owner stating that during the six years he had been possessed of the property be had never laid out a penny in the repair of his wretched tenements. There was no doubt, as had been pointed out by the noble Duke opposite (the Duke of Somerset), that the state in which the labouring classes were too frequently found was partly due to their not endeavouring to rise to a better condition; but it should, at the same time, be remembered that the very fact of their living in the wretched dwellings provided for them in London and other large towns was one of the causes that tended to demoralize them. In many parts of the metropolis the existence of these miserable dwellings was to be accounted for by the difficulty of making out good titles for the sites on which they stood. In the parish of St. James, in the very centre of the metropolis, there was a person recently living on a piece of ground, where he had erected a miserable one-story house, and there was no one to eject him on account of the difficulty of making out a good title. If some power could be devised by the Select Committee for securing the titles of persons who should erect good dwellings for the

  911
  labouring classes a great service would be done. He hoped the Bill would be so dealt with by the Select Committee that it would prove an effective measure, in which case he was sure it would be of incalculable advantage in the metropolis and elsewhere.
  LORD PORTMANsaid, that as his noble and learned Friend (Lord Chelmsford) had consented to the Bill being referred to a Select Committee, he did not feel it necessary to trouble their Lordships with many observations on the subject of the measure; but after the remarks which his noble and learned Friend had read from a newspaper to their Lordships, he felt it would be cowardly of him not to at once state that, as a large owner of house property, he was prepared "at his peril" to oppose in its present form a great deal of the Bill, which, in the paper quoted for the House, was described as "a most salutary and necessary piece of legislation." He would, however, do his best to make a good Bill of what was at present the most crude and dangerous piece of legislation that had for a long period come from the other House of Parliament. He might observe that it would be impossible by any reduction they might make in the cost of materials, and by checking the power of raising wages exercised by trades unions, so to reduce the cost of buildings as to repay in seven years the expenditure which the Bill stated was to be repaid in that time. Then there was this defect in the Bill, that on the ground acquired nominally to build houses for artizans, and on which a vacant site had been made by pulling down dilapidated houses, there was no necessity, according to the terms of the Bill, to erect dwellings suitable for artizans. The requirement was the erection of "human habitations;" but a "human habitation" might be a house suitable for the residence of one of their Lordships. Again, the Bill as it stood would oblige owners who had taken proper care of their houses to pay for the laches of persons who had allowed their houses to get into a state of dilapidation, and become centres of disease. Moreover, the attempt to charge Greenwich, for example, to a rate in aid of St. Giles' could not be defended in such a Bill. He had also to observe that there was no provision enabling tenants for life to charge the estate with the cost of improvements. Now, he submitted that it would be very important to have a clause giving such a
  912
  power brought before the Select Committee for careful consideration. Then, what was the proper definition of the word "owner" as used in the Bill? If claims to ownership were to be made by perhaps some half dozen parties having different interests, was it to be left to the magistrate to decide which of them was the owner for the purposes of the Act, if this Bill should become law? It is very novel to give the Local Authority power to take the freehold to build houses at a loss, for no such house can pay an adequate interest for the expenditure; but what is even worse power is taken to create building companies. He threw out these few suggestions to show how much the Bill needed careful examination; but he believed that if it were sent to a Select Committee, a good measure to meet the evils which the Bill was intended to check would be the result of the Committee's deliberations. The speech of the noble and learned Lord was much applied to the overcrowding of houses; but in the Bill there is not one word that applies to that part of the subject; it is already provided for by law. He (Lord Portman) believed that the Bill had not been framed with due care, and he asked the House to refer it to a Committee of Peers who really understood the subject, and above all to disregard the threats of the writer in the Daily Telegraph.
  THE DUKE OF MARLBOROUGHtrusted their Lordships would read the Bill a second time. Whatever were the faults of the measure in detail it had received the strongest commendations from parties who took interest in the question and who hoped the measure would become law. He had heard numerous statements corroborative of those which had been made by the right rev. Prelate and the noble and learned Lord who moved the second reading of the Bill, as to the condition of the dwellings of the poorer population in London and other large towns. One of the chief merits of the Bill was that it took up the matter where the Sanitary Act of 1866 left it. Under this Sanitary Act there was no power to remove those nuisances which frequently arose from dilapidated buildings in the centres of large populations. The present measure would therefore, he thought, be a great advance upon existing legislation. There were, on the other hand, some objections of considerable weight which had been urged to the details of the Bill, which

  913
  ought to be taken into consideration, but which could be best dealt with in a Select Committee. When a similar Bill was introduced two years ago the parishes were constituted the "Local Authority" for the purposes of the Bill. Under the present Bill it was proposed to extend the area of taxation to the whole of the Metropolis (exclusive of the City of London, the Local Authority of which was the Commissioners of Sewers), and to intrust the whole control to the Metropolitan Board of Works. He must say that that arrangement appeared to him to be the first step to the equalization of the rates generally over a large and extensive area. That was a point which would require careful consideration. Another reason for referring the Bill to a Select Committee was the necessity of making its details harmonize with the working of private Acts, Acts which had been passed in order to enable particular localities to effect some of those results which it was sought by this Bill to do for the country generally; and it would be but fair to hear the representatives of those places if they had any objections to urge against the measure. He believed that the Bill was capable of being rendered a most effective and valuable one; and he trusted that when it came back to them from the Select Committee it would be in a shape that would render it much more practical in its operation than the noble Earl opposite seemed to anticipate. He (the Duke of Marlborough) thanked his noble and learned Friend for the extreme attention he had given to the measure, and he hoped it would become, if not a perfect piece of legislation, at all events such a measure as was really needed, in order that those dilapidated and unhealthy dwellings in the centres of large populations might be removed.
  THE EARL OF DERBYsaid, he did not think there was any difference of opinion in their Lordships' House as regarded the principle of the Bill. He cordially supported the second reading; but he thought his noble and learned Friend exercised a wise discretion in consenting to have it referred to a Select Committee, because all his (the Earl of Derby's) experience in that House convinced him that when there was a general desire on the part of their Lordships to effect a particular object, that object was much more likely to be attained by the consideration of the details of any measure for the purpose by a Select
  914
  Committee, composed of persons really interested in the subject, than by any attempt to deal with it in a Committee of the Whole House. It struck him that one great defect in the Bill was its not dealing with the case of overcrowding in dwellings. The Bill proposed to deal with, dwellings that were unfit for human habitation. There were, however, a great many habitations perfectly fit for the occupation of three or four persons, but utterly unfit for the occupation of twenty or thirty. And that was a great and serious evil not touched by the Bill. Whatever, therefore, the merits of the Bill—and he did not deny that it possessed great merits—is failed to deal with one most serious point, depending not so much on the owner as on the occupier of property. Every one at all interested in cottage or small house property of any description knew the great difficulty of preventing the introduction of lodgers. For example, in a cottage built with three bedrooms and a kitchen—and no cottage ought ever to be built with less—they constantly found the occupier, though having a large family of his own, taking in one, two, or three lodgers, and so overcrowding his own family to the disregard of all decency, and in spite, it might be, of the utmost efforts of the landlord. Another point to which he hoped the Select Committee would give their serious attention was the ownership of house property of this particular class. In the Bill the word "owner," in addition to the definition given in the Lands Clauses Act, which was incorporated with this Act, was to mean "all the owners, if more than one, of any premises, or estate, or interest in any premises required to be dealt with under this Act." The definition was important, because the owner, under the Bill, was to be called upon to do certain repairs, and if be failed to comply his property might be taken. Take the commonest case in the world, of the owner in fee granting a building lease. His noble Friend (Lord Portman) had considerable experience of this nature in London, as he himself had in other great towns. Suppose that a long lease were granted—as in some places for seventy-five years, or as in others for ninety-nine years—and that shortly before the expiration of the term it appeared that the property was going to rack and ruin, and that the houses were becoming unfit for human habitation. Under the terms of the Bill the Local Authority would call upon the owner to re-

  915
  build. But the owner might not be the owner in fee; and even if he were, he would have no right to enter upon the property till the expiration of the lease. On the other hand, it would never be worth the while of the lessee, with only ten or fifteen years unexpired interest, to rebuild. Under these circumstances, the Local Authority might take possession, because the owner did not do what he had no power to do, and what had been rendered necessary by the default of the lessee, Then the Local Authority themselves, supposing they took possession of the property, could be in no better position than the lessee—they could not re-build for the short term unexpired. He did not at all mean to say that if houses fell into utter want of repair, and became unfit for human habitation, there ought not to exist a power of compelling them to be put into decent tenantable condition, or, failing that, of enabling the Local Authority to pull them down and re-build them. All he suggested was, that the Select Committee, in dealing with this measure, should look carefully at the position of the owner, and see that the definition given in the Bill corresponded with what in practice would be found judicious, and also with an equitable distribution of the burden of responsibility. He did not propose to trouble their Lordships by moving any Instructions to the Committee; he contented himself with calling attention to the two points which seemed to him most to require careful consideration. And he felt certain that the measure would receive, at the hands of the Committee, that patient investigation which its importance so eminently deserved.
  EARL FORTESCUEdesired to say that having taken a deep interest for twenty-five years in subjects of this class, he was unspeakably gratified at the spirit with which a reform so invaluable had been approached by all the speakers. The speech of the noble Earl who had just sat down afforded probably the best measure of the important labours which the Select Committee would be called upon to undertake. If they could not deal effectually with overcrowding, they might still turn their attention to measures which produced this evil. Railways had an immense influence in this matter; and he was of opinion that if the companies were more liberal in reference to workmen's trains, a great deal of the difficulty of overcrowding might be got rid of. Unless the labouring poor
  916
  were better lodged school instruction would be insufficient to promote the well-being of the people.
  Motion agreed to: Bill read 2a accordingly.
  LORD PORTMAN LORD PORTMAN moved that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee.
  Motion agreed to: Bill referred to a Select Committee.
  And, on Friday, May 29, the Lords following were named of the Committee:—

  Ld. Privy Seal

  L. Bp. London

  D. Somerset

  L. Sundridge

  D. Beaufort

  L. Foley

  E. Derby

  L. Portman

  E. Shaftesbury

  L. Chelmsford

  E. Carnarvon

  L. Westbury

  E. Cadogan

  L. Meredyth

  E. Kimberley

  L. Penrhyn.

SEA FISHERIES (IRELAND) BILL.
(The Duke of Richmond.)
SEA FISHERIES (IRELAND) BILL.

  (No. 96.) COMMITTEE (ON RE-COMMITMENT).
  Order of the Day for the House to be again put into Committee on the Bill (on, Re-commitment) read.
  THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDE presented a Petition of Frank T. Buck-land and others praying for Amendment of the Bill, and that it may be referred to a Select Committee, and expressed his opinion that it would act most prejudicially in reference to the prosperity of the Irish oyster fisheries, especially as the present system of dredging was very destructive. At all events, he did not see why the Convention should not be suspended for a year, to give time to make arrangements.
  House in Committee accordingly.
  THE DUKE OF RICHMONDstated the course he proposed to adopt with a view to meet the case of the Irish fishermen. He understood the grievance to consist in a fear that fishermen would flock from the English Channel during the close time to the coast of Ireland, where the close time was shorter. He therefore proposed to insert a clause after Clause 68 enabling the Queen in Council to give powers to the Irish Fishery Commissioners to make bye-laws over that portion of their waters beyond the three-mile limit, and providing that the close time in the English Channel should correspond with the close time beyond the three-mile limit on the Irish coast. He also proposed to extend the powers of the Commissioners, enabling them to make bye-laws operating over

  917
  twenty miles between two points on the coast of Ireland. He believed this would satisfy the requirements of the Irish fishermen.
  After a few words from Lord STANLEY of ALDERLEY,
  THE DUKE OF RICHMONDexpressed his belief that the very worst thing that could happen to the oyster fishermen in Ireland would be that this Bill should not pass, because if it did not the close time would be the same as that under the old Convention. It was a mistake to imagine that the French Government were anxious for the change; because that Government believed that in entering into this Convention they were giving up everything and gaining nothing. They had, however, consented to shorten the close time by six weeks.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, that if Her Majesty's Government would endeavour to negotiate with the French Government a supplementary Convention to enable bye-laws to be made applicable to French subjects fishing in the seas between Ireland and England, then the Irish oyster banks would be placed in precisely the same position as the oyster banks dealt with by the Convention for the Channel.
  THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, the clause conceded to the Irish fishermen all that they required. The Irish fishermen were anxious that there should be some jurisdiction to protect the oyster beds on the high seas along the coast of Ireland. A jurisdiction had been supposed to rest in the Irish Fishery Commissioners which, in fact, they did not now possess. The Bill proposed that the Irish Fishery Commissioners might submit to the Queen in Council the form of bye-laws which they would recommend. Her Majesty in Council might approve those bye-laws, and, as they might affect both English and French subjects if future Conventions should be made, the bye-laws ought to be subject to the approval of the Queen in Council. There would also be a proviso that the close time for those oyster beds should not be shorter than that enacted by the Irish Fishery Commissioners for the oyster beds within the three-mile limit.
  After a few words from The Marquess of CLANRICARDE, the proposed clause was agreed to with verbal amendments.
  Amendments made.
  The Report of the Amendments to be received on Friday next; and Bill to be printed as amended (No. 125).

COTTON STATISTICS BILL—(No. 102).
(The Marquess of Salisbury).
COTTON STATISTICS BILL—(No. 102).

  COMMITTEE.
  House in Committee (according to Order).
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that considerable opposition existed to the Bill, and asked what course the Government intended to take upon it?
  THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMsaid, that many objections had been taken to the Bill, which, he believed, was opposed by noble Lords opposite, and Her Majesty's Government was not prepared to sanction its further progress. The regulations proposed would entail considerable expense, nor could he see why statistics should be applied to cotton alone.
  THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYcomplained that in this as in other matters the Government did not seem to know its own mind. The second reading of the measure had been assented to in that House; it had passed the other House without opposition, and he was certainly astonished that the noble Duke should now object to its further progress. Of course, if noble Lords opposite co-operated with the Government in opposing the measure, it would be useless for him to divide the House. But he desired to remind their Lordships that the Bill was one of great importance; and was entirely approved of by those whom it concerned. At present there was a large amount of dangerous and prejudicial speculation in consequence of the uncertainty as to the amount of cotton in the country; and manufacturing labour was disarranged by the same cause. He understood that within the last few weeks the computation of the quantity of cotton in this country had varied to the extent of a million bales.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYsaid, that on the second reading some Members of the Government voted for the Bill, some against it, and some did not vote at all; but he would recommend that there should be no further opposition to the Bill at this stage of it.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEYsupported the measure, as being necessary to prevent false returns and frauds at Liverpool and other ports.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid., he was not satisfied that such a Bill ought to be sanctioned by the House. It would be dangerous to enter upon any attempt to check speculation.
  LORD EGERTON OF TATTONsupported the Bill, and trusted the noble Marquess would persevere with it.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYobserved that he should be very sorry if his noble Friend had any reason to complain of having been taken by surprise. He therefore recommended that opposition should be withdrawn at the present stage, and if necessary it might be renewed on the Report or third reading.
  Amendments made; The Report thereof to be received on Thursday next; and Bill to be printed as amended (No. 126).

POOR RATE (SCOTLAND).

  MOTION FOR A PAPER.
  THE EARL OF AIRLIErose, in pursuance of Notice, to call Attention to a Return made to an Order of the House, dated March 27, showing the Deductions allowed to Occupiers before assessing for the Poor Rate in various Scotch Parishes, and the Amount of gross Rental required to give a rateable Value of £12 in those Parishes respectively, and to move for Copy of any Letter or Instructions addressed by the Crown Agent to the Inspectors of Poor in reference to that Return. It would not be necessary for him to enter upon any lengthened statement with regard to the Motion. The necessity for any lengthened statement had been obviated by what had taken place in the other House with regard to the question of the county franchise; but he was anxious, in calling attention to the Return, to show how inexpedient it would be to have the franchise in Scotland placed upon rating. There was reason to believe the Return was inaccurate and calculated to mislead, and it was alleged that the inaccuracy of the Return was owing to the nature of the Instructions given by the Crown Agent to the persons whose duty it was to supply the required information; and the Government had admitted that this Return did not show the real state of the case, and did not show the amount of deductions allowed to occupiers in various Scotch parishes before assessing for the poor rate. In several parishes no deductions were allowed, while it appeared that the parochial bodies and the inspectors of the poor had made deductions to the extent in some instances of 75 per cent. The Returns with respect to parishes showing the amount of gross rental required to give a rateable value of £12 disclosed similar anomalies—the gross
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  rental in some cases being set down at £12, whilst the return of the value showed it to be £48. There ought to be a classification in these cases, not as regards the rental, but in respect to the rate; because, suppose a rate of 1s. in the pound was levied, instead of levying the whole rate at 1s. in the pound, it ought in certain cases of classification to be reduced to a rate of 6d. in the pound. What the parochial officers did instead of reducing the rate was to enter the rental at a reduced valuation—which seemed very much the case of a distinction without a difference. The fact was, the whole question of rating in Scotland was one of those things which nobody could understand; and it was well worthy the consideration of any Government that might be in power, whether they could not remodel the system of rating in Scotland, and place it in a way of working justly and equitably.
  Moved, That there be laid before this House, Copy of any Letter or Instructions addressed by the Crown Agent to the Inspectors of Poor in reference to a Return made to an Order of this House, dated 27th March, showing the Deductions allowed to Occupiers before assessing for Poor Rate in various Scotch Parishes, and the Amount of gross Rental required to give a rateable Value of £12 in those Parishes respectively,—(The Earl of Airlie.)
  THE EARL OF DEVONsaid, there was no objection to grant the Return.
  Motion agreed to.
  House adjourned at a quarter before Nine o'clock, to Thursday next, half past Ten o'clock.