Sitting of 9 May 1878

MINUTES.
NEW WRIT ISSUED—For Reading, v. Sir Francis Henry Goldsmid, baronet, deceased.
NEW MEMBERS SWORN—Albert Henry George Grey, esquire, and Edward Ridley, esquire for the Southern Division of the County of Northumberland.
SELECT COMMITTEE—East India (Public Works), Mr. Edward Stanhope, Mr. Pease added.
SUPPLY—considered in Committee—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES, Class II.
Resolutions [May 6] reported.
PUBLIC BILL—Ordered—First Reading—Admiralty and War Office (Retirement of Officers)* [169]; Parliamentary and Municipal Elections (Ballot Papers) [172]; General Police and Improvement Provisional Order (Paisley)* [170]; Public Health (Scotland) Provisional Order (Lochgelly)* [171]; Acknowledgment of Deeds by Married Women (Ireland)* [173]; Local Government Provisional Order (Darenth Valley)* [175].
First Reading—Tramways Orders Confirmation (No. 3)* [174].
Committee—Report—Public Health Act (1875) Amendment (re-comm.) [144].
Third Reading—Customs and Inland Revenue [146], debate adjourned; Local Government Provisional Orders (Abingdon, &c.)* [142], and passed.

NOTICES OF MOTIONS.

  THE EASTERN QUESTION.
  MR. CHAMBERLAINstated, that in consequence of the absence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and in deference to a request received from the right hon. Gentleman, he would postpone his Question as to the Government giving him a day for his Motion on the Eastern Question until Monday.
  SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFFgave Notice, that whenever the hon. Member for Birmingham brought forward the Resolution of which he had given Notice, he would move the following Amendment:—
  "That this House, being earnestly desirous of promoting a peaceful solution of the difficulties now pending with the Government of Russia, is of opinion that the course pursued by Her Majesty's Government is calculated to secure the meeting of a Congress on terms at once consistent with the rights and dignity of the Powers parties to the Treaties of 1856 and 1871, and the due observance of European Law."
  MR. FORSYTHgave Notice that he would move, as an Amendment to the Resolution of the hon. Member for Birmingham, the omission of the words—
  "Condemns the policy of warlike demonstration which Her Majesty's Government has pursued, and."
  MR. FAWCETTgave Notice, that on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply on the Supplementary Estimates for the movements of troops, he would move the following Resolution:—
  "That this House disapproves the action of the Government in summoning Indian troops to Malta without having first communicated their intention to Parliament."

QUESTIONS.

  HERTFORD COLLEGE—UNIVERSITY TESTS ACT, 1871.—QUESTION.
  MR. WATKIN WILLIAMSasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether, having regard to the decision of the Court of Appeal in the case of Hertford College, the Government are willing to bring in or support a Bill to amend "The University Tests Act, 1871," by extending its provisions to endowed offices founded since the passing of the Act, and also to future endowments?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir JOHN HOLKER), in reply, said, that it was not the intention of the Government either to introduce or support any such Bill as that referred to. He might add, that a Bill containing provisions similar to those which were to be found in the University Tests Act, 1871, had been introduced into Parliament in 1870, and when that Bill was before Parliament, on two occasions there were Motions to the effect that the provisions of the Bill should be made to extend to future endowments. One of these proposals was negatived without a division, and the other was negatived on a division by a large majority. Upon the discussion of the Motion thus negatived, the right hon. Gentleman now the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) said—
  "We cannot consent to interfere with the future freedom of persons who may wish to found institutions of this kind;"
  And, further—
  "Our desire is to encourage the foundation of Colleges, and we will not inquire whether they are to be denominational Colleges or not; we claim nothing for them less than absolute freedom."—[3 Hansard, ccii. 1395.]

  INTERMEDIATE EDUCATION (IRELAND).—QUESTION.
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSYasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, If he is aware that a resolution was, during the late Recess, adopted at a meeting in Dublin requesting the Government to lay before the House the measure on Irish Intermediate Education promised in Her Most Gracious Majesty's Speech at the beginning of the Session; if he still adheres to his expressed intention of making the introduction of that measure dependent on the progress of the
  1594
  Irish Grand Jury Amendment Bill; and, if not, on what day he proposes to introduce the Bill; and, whether he will consider the advisability of explaining its main features on the Order of Leave?
  MR. J. LOWTHER: I have received no official communication upon the subject; but my attention has been called, through the ordinary channels of information, to the fact that a meeting was held and a resolution adopted in the sense indicated by the hon. and learned Gentleman. As to whether I still entertain the opinion I expressed upon former occasions—and which I need not repeat now in detail—to the effect that it would be desirable to make some progress with the Grand Jury Bill before entering upon the Intermediate Education Bill, I must say that I still hold the same view; but this and the position of the question generally must, of course, depend upon the state of Public Business generally, which is not at the present moment in such a state as would admit of my entering into any specific engagement as to a day for the introduction of the Bill. With reference to the last part of the hon. and learned Gentleman's Question, as to the advisability of explaining the main features upon the Motion for Leave, I think that it would be advisable, and I shall hope to be able to follow that course.

  ARMY—THE NEW LINE EX-INDIAN REGIMENTS—REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE.—QUESTION.
  COLONEL NORTHasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether the Committee that was appointed some months ago to consider the question of Promotion and Retirement in the 12 new Line or ex-Indian Regiments have sent in their Report; and, if not, when they are expected to do so?
  COLONEL STANLEY, in reply, said, the Report would be presented in a few days; but after its receipt at the War Office, a good deal of correspondence would necessarily take place, and he could not say when any decision could be arrived at.

  SOUTH AFRICA—EXPENSES OF THE BRITISH TROOPS IN THE CAPE COLONY.—QUESTION.
  SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLasked the Secretary of State for War, Whe-

  1595
  ther only the expenses of the British Troops employed in the Cape Colony are now being paid with money advanced by the British Treasury, or if we are also paying the expenses consequent on the employment of the Colonial Forces and Volunteers?
  COLONEL STANLEY, in reply, said, that a short time ago he had answered a similar Question, by saying that the Governor of the Colony had issued his warrant monthly for the military expenditure; that that, in point of fact, admitted the liability of the Colony; that the matter would have to be arranged with them; and that the funds for the moment were being paid on that warrant out of the Imperial Funds. As both Imperial and Colonial troops were acting as one Force, under one command, it had been found practically impossible to deal separately with them as regarded supplies and transport. Such an arrangement was tried, and not only failed, but, by bringing the Colonial Commissariat into competition in the market with the Imperial Commissariat, it had the effect of largely increasing both Imperial and Colonial Expenditure. The whole expenses for supplies and transport of Colonial Forces and Volunteers was, therefore, met, in the first instance, by advances from the British Treasury; but the Colony was repaying that expense by monthly instalments of £10,000, which, it was hoped, would be shortly increased. No pay was advanced from Imperial sources for the pay of such troops.

  ARMY—ARTIFICERS OF THE ROYAL ARTILLERY.—QUESTION.
  COLONEL ARBUTHNOTasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether his attention has been called to the fact that the Artificers of the Royal Artillery are most inadequately paid in comparison with those holding the same rank and discharging the same duties in other corps; and, whether he can undertake to improve their position during the current financial year?
  COLONEL STANLEY: The question of the pay of the artificers of the Royal Artillery has been brought to my notice, and the point is under consideration with reference as well to its own merits as to its bearing on other arms; but the Estimates have been presented, and I
  1596
  fear I can hold out no hope of any change during the current financial year.

TURKEY—MURDER OF MR. OGLE.

  QUESTIONS.
  MR. H. SAMUELSONasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, What is the present condition of the investigation into the murder of Mr. Ogle, the "Times" correspondent in Thessaly, by Turkish soldiers?
  MR. BOURKE: In answer to the Question of the hon. Member, I have to state that Mr. Fawcett, Her Majesty's Consul General at Constantinople, and also Judge of the Supreme Court there, conducted the inquiry into the death of Mr. Ogle. On the 6th of May a telegram was received from Mr. Fawcett, stating that the inquiry had been concluded, and that he was about to return to Constantinople.
  MR. H. SAMUELSON: What I desire to be informed by the Under Secretary is, Whether Consul General Fawcett has reported the result of his inquiry on the murder of Mr. Ogle by Turkish soldiers; and, if so, when his Report will be laid on the Table of the House?
  MR. BOURKE: I said that Mr. Fawcett had conducted the investigation, which I thought was a distinct reply to the Question, and also that on the 6th of this month we received a telegram from Mr. Fawcett that he had completed the investigation. We have not received any Report from him; but when it is received, it will be taken into consideration by Her Majesty's Government. I must correct an observation that has fallen from the hon. Member. He seems to assume that Mr. Ogle's murder was occasioned by Turkish soldiers. That is one of the points Mr. Fawcett was to investigate; but I cannot express an opinion whether it was committed by Turkish soldiers or not.

  RIVERS POLLUTION PREVENTION ACT, 1876.—QUESTION.
  MR. TENNANTasked the President of the Local Government Board, Whether any, and, if so, what steps have been taken by Her Majesty's Government to put in force the provisions of the Rivers Pollution Prevention Act of 1876, and with what results?
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTH: The duty of putting in force the provisions of the Rivers Pollution Prevention Act of 1876, as my hon. Friend is aware, does not devolve upon the Government, but upon the local authorities. So soon as the Act came into complete operation, which was not until August, 1877, a Circular was issued by the Local Government Board, calling the attention of the local authorities to their powers and duties under the Statute, and applications immediately began to come in from various quarters—firstly, for certificates; secondly, for extension of time; and, thirdly, for consent to proceedings being taken. I may mention, to show that the operation of the Act has been widely spread, some of the places where proceedings have been taken—namely, Salisbury, Canterbury, Barnet, Wigan, Grantham, Isle of Wight, Withington, Hereford. But, perhaps, the most important result of the Act has been the prevention of fresh pollution of rivers, as no loan for sewerage works is now sanctioned unless provision is made or the purification of the sewage.

THE MILITARY FORCES—EXPENSES OF INDIAN CONTINGENT.

  QUESTION.
  MR. NEWDEGATE: I beg leave to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, or some other Member of the Government, Whether he can inform the House when the Estimate mentioned by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on Monday last with respect to the removal of troops from India to Malta will be brought under the attention of this House?
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS: In the absence of my right hon. Friend, I can only state what he himself stated to the House of Commons—namely, that he would let the House know at the earliest possible opportunity when he would be able to bring forward that Estimate.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: I have been partly anticipated by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire; but it may be convenient that I should give formal Notice—as I had previously intended to do—that I will on Monday next ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, When the Estimate for the expenses of the removal of Indian Troops will be laid upon the Table, and on what day he proposes that it shall be considered in Committee?

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.—COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."

POST OFFICE—MAIL CONTRACTS.

  RESOLUTION.
  MR. BENTINCKrose to call attention to the Contracts at present existing between the Post Office and the Peninsular and Oriental Company, under which the Company are fined for the non-delivery of the mails at the contract dates, without any allowance being made for fogs or bad weather; and to move—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, the existence and the enforcing of such a Contract leads to incurring great and unjustifiable risks, by inducing, and even compelling, the masters of mail packets to neglect the usual and necessary precautions in such weather, and thereby to endanger life and property; and that in such Contracts the give and take system ought to be adhered to."
  The hon. Member said, he had taken up the question entirely on public grounds, not having the smallest amount of interest in any of the Companies comprised in the Resolution. The manner in which these Contracts were drawn up induced commanders of vessels to run unjustifiable risks, and involved great loss of life and property at sea. A letter, which had recently appeared in The Times, entirely bore out that view, and, indeed, might be accepted as an absolute proof of the correctness of that view; for that journal was not in the habit of inserting letters without having full confidence as to the position of their writers and their means of obtaining information. He maintained, therefore, that the inevitable consequence of holding a Company rigidly to the terms of its Contract under all circumstances was to jeopardize the safety of the steamers, their passengers, and crews. It was not right that such Contracts should contain the clauses to which he referred, as their retention had lately resulted in the loss of a fine mail steamer off Ushant, while attempting to cut off a corner, in order to save time. There was no possible justification for them, and the safest and surest

  1599
  way to all concerned would be to revert to the old system. The hon. Member concluded by moving the Resolution.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "in the opinion of this House, the enforcing of a Contract which makes no allowance for fogs or bad weather leads to great and unjustifiable risks, by inducing, and even compelling, the masters of mail packets to neglect the necessary precautions in such weather, and thereby to endanger life and property; and that in such Contracts the give and take system ought to be adhered to,"—(Mr. Bentinck,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. ONSLOWsaid, he could not concur with the remarks that had fallen from the hon. Member. It was not absolutely the case that no ship of the Peninsular and Oriental Company's fleet had ever been lost; it was a fact that none of them had ever been lost on account of excessive speed in a fog. The case of the Bengal, with which he was himself acquainted, might, perhaps, seem to bear out the assertions of the hon. Member; but the fact was, that the delay was occasioned entirely by the inferior quality of the coal supplied, and was not caused by any danger or risk. He had never heard of any complaints on the part of the Company that the Government had been too hard on them; on the contrary, the Contract was, to some extent, expansive, and allowed a certain margin of time for stress of weather. If it were true that the Poonah had been fined £400, the fine must have been inflicted for reasons other than delay on account of bad weather. It could not be said that the captains of the Company's ships ever ran unjustifiable risks in using a high rate of speed during a fog; no body of officers were more praiseworthy, and they were particularly careful, both as to the discipline and the navigation of their ships—being, in fact, ordered to go at a low rate of speed rather than run into danger. The loss of the European, he would remind the House, was due to bad seamanship, and not to the terms of the Contract with the Government; and it was not in accordance with the practice of the captains of the
  1600
  Company to run risks in order to save fines. He thought that the Motion was rather uncalled for, and that the hon. Member had not made out any case whatever.
  LORD JOHN MANNERSsaid, that he quite appreciated the motives of his hon. Friend who had proposed the Resolution, and he knew that he would, at the same time, do the Government the justice to believe that they did not desire to enforce any Contract injurious to human life. As a matter of fact, he had never before heard it suggested that the Contract had operated injuriously and had been the cause, either directly or indirectly, of any mishap and loss of life. It was a most extraordinary circumstance that, in the whole of the four years during which the contract had existed, no such case had occurred, though the Company's steamers had performed 364 voyages within that period. The matter did not rest there; for another Company—the Royal Mail Company—had a similar Contract with the Government, and their steamers had performed 154 voyages during the same period, without the loss of a single life having occurred through the provisions of the Contract. Consequently, for want of evidence, he was not much surprised to find that his hon. Friend had fallen back upon an anonymous letter published in The Times, which was said to have been written by an ex-captain of a Peninsular and Oriental steamer. He found that the Post Office had no knowledge of what was described in that letter as the "give-and-take system," nor was any information as to the meaning of the phrase to be had at the office of the Peninsular and Oriental Company; and he was consequently at a loss to know what was the system advocated in that letter. The old system was one of penalties on the one hand, and small premiums on the other; but he did not imagine that his hon. Friend wished them to recur to it; for if there were danger to life from the system of penalties, it would be increased by adding the motive of hope as an incentive to the ship's captain, and the House would probably agree with him that a premium for speed was not desirable. He confessed, then, that he thought the present system satisfactory. The Company itself had, in 1874, requested an alteration of the Contract then existing, and the Government, in

  1601
  making the alteration, had thought themselves justified in imposing penalties for undue delay. It was to be remembered that the Contract exacted no immoderate speed; the maximum contract speed was only 11 knots, and east of Suez the minimum fell to 9½ knots; so that the stipulation could not be said to be productive of danger. Since they had entered into that Contract no disasters had been attributed to it, and the European, which had been lost recently, belonged to neither of the two contracting Companies. In short, the existing system worked satisfactorily. Under these circumstances, and especially as there had been complaints from India that the contract speed of these ships did not meet the requirements of the mercantile community, he thought the hon. Member might rest content without asking the House to pass his Motion, which was devoid of all substantial foundation.
  MR. BIGGARconcurred in the opinion expressed by the two last speakers, adding the expression of his belief that the proposed alteration would be injurious rather than beneficial.
  SIR GEORGE ELLIOTsaid, he had in the course of the last 10 or 12 years made 25 voyages in the Peninsular and Oriental ships between this country and Egypt in all sorts of weather, and could bear testimony to the admirable manner in which those vessels were managed, both by officers and men. He had never known an instance of these ships going at an unduly fast speed in order to keep time. The present rate was, in his opinion, too slow; and he hoped the Postmaster General would provide for a material increase of speed when the noble Lord came to consider the renewal of the Contract.
  Question put, and agreed to.

IRISH CHURCH TEMPORALITIES COMMISSIONERS—SALE OF LANDS.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. PARNELLrose to call attention to the sales of land by the Irish Church Temporalities Commissioners. The hon. Member, who was prevented by the Rules of the House from moving the following Resolution:—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, further legislative facilities should be afforded for the purpose of enabling the occupying tenants of
  1602
  the Church lands remaining unsold to purchase their holdings,"
  said, that he should venture to indicate the direction which he thought legislation should take with the view of affording the additional facilities required. He would, first of all, briefly allude to the powers which the Church Act of 1869 gave to the Irish Church Temporalities Commissioners in dealing with the various lands and other properties held by them in trust, and which were formerly the property of the Irish Church; but were, by the provisions of the Act, vested in the Commissioners. With regard to the particular point at issue, the Act empowered the Commissioners to sell the fee-simple of lands held of them by tenants, the right or pre-emption being given to the occupying tenants. The clause which gave this right clearly indicated the intention of the Legislature that every facility should be given to the occupying tenants to become proprietors of these holdings, in order that it might be seen how far the creation of a small class of peasant proprietors would be attended with beneficial results. He was very happy to be able to bear his testimony to a fact well known in Ireland—namely, that the Irish Church Temporalities Commissioners carried both the letter and the spirit of the Act as far as they legally could; they even went beyond the letter. They explained the advantages of purchase which would accrue to the tenants, many of whom were poor, ignorant, and rather suspicious of the introduction of any novelty in the management of these estates. By the Irish Church Act the Commissioners were also empowered to deal with the payers of tithe-rent charges—another description of property. These were principally large landed proprietors, and, by the provisions of the Bill, they were enabled to purchase their charge without paying any cash whatever. The charge was divided into 52 portions, and after an annual payment of £4 9s. per cent for 52 years the charge ceased. Thus, these holders were placed in a very advantageous position, the charge being converted into a sort of annuity, terminable at the close of 52 years. The occupying tenants of Church lands, however, had nothing like such favourable position under the Act of 1869, or any amending Act. They could only purchase their holdings by the payment of

  1603
  one-fourth in cash, and the payment of the balance by half-yearly instalments spread over 22 years, with interest of 4 per cent on the unpaid portion. Last year, he had introduced a Bill with the intention of redressing this inequality, and placing the tenant desirous of purchasing the fee-simple on the same footing as the purchasers of the tithe-rent charges. That Bill provided that the purchase money might remain outstanding, and be terminable in 52 years, with an annual payment of £4 9s. per cent. The Bill made some slight differences between the positions of the two classes, and fixed the purchase money of the holdings at a rather lower rate, and three objections to the Bill were taken by the Government and Members from the North of Ireland. It was complained that the action of that Bill was retrospective, and proposed to place the tenants who had already purchased their holdings upon the same position with those who would do so after the passing of the Bill. Secondly, it was said that the advantages of the Bill would not be solely confined to occupying tenants, but that others would step in and share them; and, thirdly, it was objected that the purchase price was placed too low. In the Bill of this Session he had yielded to all these objections; but, strange to say, the very converse objections to those of last Session were made to the Bill, and it was complained that the Bill was not retrospective. Thus, in endeavouring to please everybody, he had failed. There were still a considerable number of holdings remaining unsold, notwithstanding that the Commissioners made every effort to carry out the letter and spirit of the Act of 1869, and the tenants had shown an anxious desire to purchase their holdings. Half of the tenants had done so; and, after these sales and others in the Landed Estates Court, there remained some 700 or 800 farms unsold. Owing to the property of the Commissioners being broken up by small sales, it was not likely the land would find any purchasers but the occupying tenants. But, however, the people were quite unable to find the quarter of the purchase money necessary; and, therefore, he asked the Chief Secretary to bring in a short Bill, which would not interfere with Government Business and occupy but a very short discussion, to meet this difficulty. The
  1604
  last Report of the Irish Church Commissioners showed that while the lands sold to tenants were purchased at 23¾ times the amount of the annual rent, those sold to persons other than tenants produced only 22 years' purchase of the annual rent; and former Reports also demonstrated that a considerable profit arose from the purchase of their holdings by the tenants. The Commissioners also bore testimony to the desire on the part of the tenants and to their exertions to improve their holdings from the moment they became proprietors of them. If, in the case of these remaining 700 or 800 tenants, the purchase-money was allowed to become a sort of annuity, terminable at the end of 52 years, it would, in fact, assist in closing the account of the Irish Church Commissioners; for the value of an annuity it was easy to ascertain, and the value of these Church lands could thus be easily estimated. He did not think there was any special way of settling the Irish Land Question. There were a great many ways; but the sale of lands to tenants was not an unimportant branch of the settlement. In Ireland, as elsewhere, there existed the natural desire on the part of a man to own the soil which he lived on; and he asked the House and the Government, as responsible for the well-being of the people of Ireland, to say that some further legislative facilities were necessary in order that the remaining tenants of the Irish Church Commissioners might be enabled to purchase their holdings.
  MR. FAYexpressed a hope that the Chief Secretary would give his attention to the subject. From experience, he knew the efforts that families had made in order to raise the necessary fourth of the purchase money, and evidence of a strong character had shown this before the Committee now sitting on the Bright Clauses of the Land Act. These tenants were really some of the poorest in the country, and the fourth to them was a large amount. He hoped the Government would bring in such a measure as would promote love of Constitutional rule among a class of peasant proprietors.
  MR. MELDONsaid, he hoped the Government would seize this opportunity of making an experiment as to whether the creation of a peasant proprietary could be carried out. A Committee was now con-

  1605
  sidering the question upstairs; but, in this case, the Government had an opportunity, on a small scale, of bringing the matter to a practical test. It was most desirable to remove the obstacles which at present hindered the tenants of the Church lands from purchasing their holdings. The large sum which had been paid by the tenants under the present system showed how complete would have been the success of the experiment if greater legislative facilities had been given to the tenants to purchase their holdings. It was the more desirable to give these facilities, because the fact of enforcing the payment down to one-fourth of the purchase money of their farms tended to exhaust the capital which the farmers had for the cultivation and improvement of their holdings. The Commissioners' Report bore the strongest testimony to the manner in which the acquisition of the ownership of land had stimulated the improvement of the land by those who acquired it. He was satisfied that great advantage would arise from the establishment of peasant proprietors in Ireland. Nor would the State run any risk by advancing the whole purchase money to the purchasers. When a sum was to be repaid by annual instalments, the security would, after the payment of two or three instalments, be more than adequate. Indeed, even if no part of the purchase money was to be repaid immediately, the Land Act would be a sufficient security for the repayment to the Government of the sum advanced for the purchase by the tenants of their holdings. He did not think there was any objection in principle to the facilities which he desired to afford to the tenants for the purchase of their own holdings. The only objection related to matters of detail. But he did not think that these need or ought to stand in the way. Indeed, he believed that if the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland would take up the subject, he could easily pass a short Act on the subject, without inferference with the progress of any other Business.
  MR. J. LOWTHERsaid, the hon. and learned Member who had just spoken had supplied him, he thought, with an answer to the speech of the hon. Member for Meath. The hon. and learned Member had referred to the fact that this subject was being inquired
  1606
  into, not in a limited aspect of the question, but in its entirety, by a Select Committee; and the Government would hardly be justified in anticipating the Report of the Committee, whatever it might be, by embarking in experimental—for that was what it was admitted to be by hon. Gentlemen opposite—legislation which might or might not conflict with the recommendations of the Select Committee. Hon. Members had talked as if there were nothing to do but to pass a measure through Parliament without discussion. He hoped he might be allowed to transfer that immunity to some other measure which he might be in a position to introduce. The hon. Member for Meath was hardly justified in drawing from the Reports of the Church Commissioners the inference that they had not succeeded in applying their powers in a successful manner. He thought he was bound to point out that those powers had been exercised in a very full manner, and the results were more than the most sanguine had anticipated. They might, therefore, well wait for the recommendations of the Select Committee before making any alteration in the law. He wished to reserve any opinion he might hold as to the general principle of peasant proprietors; but he could not endorse the eulogy which had been passed on that principle by hon. Members who had addressed the House. It was a large subject, on which many opinions existed. The question before the House was a purely Irish one, and might be considered without reference to the larger one. The hon. and learned Member for Kildare (Mr. Meldon) seemed to infer from the success which had attended peasant-proprietorship in other countries that it would also succeed in Ireland; but he thought that the hon. and learned Member might bo content to wait for the Report of the Select Committee. Its recommendations, he had no doubt, would contain many valuable suggestions, and he did not think they ought by legislation to anticipate them.
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSYsaid, that, whatever might be the view of the right hon. Gentleman as to the subject of peasant proprietors in general, he was glad to see that the right hon. Gentleman did not dispute the applicability of peasant proprietorship to Ireland. He

  1607
  must complain, however, of the manner in which this Motion had been met by the Government. Here was an indirect effort to improve the peasantry by means which did not involve any deviation from established principles; but merely carried out the wishes of the Legislature as they were embodied in the Statute Book. But it met with just the same answer as other Motions on the subject of Irish affairs. They were told that the subject in its entirety was before a Committee, and it would be wrong to deal with it in a fragmentary manner; and then, when other Irish Business was brought forward, they were told that other Business stood in the way. That was the way in which, ever since he had been in the House, every attempt by Irish Members was met when they tried to bring forward practical measures dealing with the practical affairs of the people. He must remind the House, that while they were waiting for the Report of the Committee, as the Chief Secretary for Ireland recommended, the Commissioners were selling the land at their disposal. If, therefore, the House listened to the recommendations of the right hon. Gentleman, the intention of the Legislature, when it disestablished the Irish Church, would be defeated; and the lands which were intended to fall into the hands of the tenants would fall into the hands of the adjacent proprietors. He must say that he thought the House and the Government ought to listen favourably to a proposition to deal with the Land Question indirectly, and without deviation from the ordinary law of proprietorship.
  Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed, to.

  SUPPLY—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES, CLASS II.
  SUPPLY—considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  (1.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £141,612, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Committee of Privy Council for Trade and Subordinate Departments."
  SIR ANDREW LUSKsaid, he wished for some information with regard to the Marine Survey Department of the Board of Trade. The officers engaged in this work were, for the most part, if not entirely, officers who had been engaged in Her Majesty's Navy, and were in receipt of pensions on account of the services which they had so rendered. There were many officers engaged in the Merchant Service who would be as well, if not better, fitted for the surveying of merchant ships, by reason of the nature of their employment; but they were almost entirely ignored, and they felt this to be a grievance of which they had a just right to complain.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, the officers in question were chosen because their long experience fitted them specially for the work they were called upon to perform. The fact referred to by the hon. Baronet, that many of them were in receipt of pensions earned by lengthened service in the Navy, showed that they were men of experience.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYsaid, there were, to his mind, many reasons why officers from the Royal Navy should not be appointed surveyors in connection with the Mercantile Marine. One of the strongest of these was that surveyors so appointed went from a Service in which everything was done regardless of expense, to another, and a trading branch, where economy was bound to be practised, if success could be attained. Naval officers were accustomed to a different standard from that required in the Mercantile Marine, owing mainly to the fact he had referred to; and he therefore thought it clear that ex-Royal Navy officers were not, and could not be, the best-fitted persons for Board of Trade surveyors of merchant ships.
  MR. WHITWELLsaid, this Vote presented, in a very marked manner, the importance of the Motion which had been made by the hon. Member for Swansea (Mr. Dillwyn), for a nominal roll of those gentlemen in the Government employ who were in receipt of pensions under Government, or were deriving their total income from two or more branches of the Government Service. There were many officers who came within this description, and he thought Parliament was bound to require that information should be af-

  1609
  forded on the subject. If on no other ground, it was important in order to the proper classification of the expenses of the different Government Departments under their proper heads. This was particularly the case in reference to the relations existing between the Customs Department and the Board of Trade, relations which had become so interwoven and involved that it was next to impossible so to separate them as to accurately classify and apportion the expenditure of each. One easy way of remedying this particular difficulty would be to amalgamate the two Departments, and he hoped the day was not far distant at which this would be done.
  SIR HENEY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, he would carefully consider the suggestions of the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Whitwell), and in another year endeavour to have the accounts of the different Departments kept entirely separate. It was too late to make any alteration in the accounts for the current year.
  SIR ANDREW LUSKsaid, he did not wish to make idle complaints, or unnecessarily to occupy time; but he did not think a sufficient answer had been given to the complaints of officers in the Mercantile Marine as to their exclusion from employment in the Survey Department of the Board of Trade. They were men of ability and experience; they desired a fair share of the appointments, and they did not think it fair that they should be almost entirely shunted to make way for members of another branch of the Naval Service of the country. Another point on which he wished to make a remark was the large amount of the law charges incurred by the Department in connection with the stopping of vessels supposed to be unseaworthy. He hoped the largeness of the amount was not due to the fact that ships were stopped unnecessarily; because it would not look well for a Government to be engaged in "harassing trade" —to use a mode of expression which had become historical—by taking steps which would unnecessarily prevent a large body of men from pursuing their calling. It was a very serious matter for the owners of merchant ships, or, indeed, for traders of any kind, to find themselves in the hands of the Law Officers of the Crown.
  VISCOUNT SANDONreplied, that the Merchant Shipping Act of 1876 provided for the payment of a compensation to the owners of ships which might be improperly stopped from going to sea, and he could assure the hon. Baronet that the utmost care was used to avoid unnecessary interference with the Mercantile Marine of the country.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYpointed out the largeness of the amount which was paid by the Mercantile Marine of the country in the shape of survey fees. Last year it was no less than £35,633, and thus formed a heavy tax upon a single branch of commerce. The small shipowners, especially, complained of this. In many cases, the owner was himself the master; and, it sometimes happened that these charges for surveys amounted to a considerable percentage upon the total value of the small craft which he owned.
  MR. BIGGARthought there could be no doubt that the amount of the Vote was excessive; and, in order to test the opinion of the Committee on the point, he would move to reduce it by £900, the salary paid to the Registrar General in the Register and Record Department. He found that the gentleman who held the office also received £100 a-year from the Mercantile Marine Fund, and £550 per annum as Auditor under the provisions of the Metropolis Water Act, 1871. He should have thought that the last appointment he had named would be sufficient to occupy any one man's time. Referring, in this connection, to the speech of the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Whitwell), he thought it most important that the names of all officials holding more than one appointment should be given to Parliament. There might, in this particular instance, be special reasons for the appointment of the Registrar General, whose name he did not know; but, on the first blush of the thing, it looked as if a gentleman had been appointed to a sinecure office—and, in saying this, he was bound to admit that the appointment did not seem to have been made by the present Government, which was a fact in their favour.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £140,712, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending

  1611
  on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Committee of Privy Council for Trade and Subordinate Departments."—(Mr. Biggar.)
  MR. PARNELLalso hoped that the names of gentlemen holding two offices would be furnished, and in such a form as that the whole of each gentleman's connection with Government Departments could be traced without the inconvenient cross references which were at present necessary.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, he had already stated that he would give every information in his power, both with regard to the amounts paid and the names of the holders of the different offices; but he could not hope to do so in reference to the accounts of the present year, which had been drawn up in the form which had been customarily employed in the past.
  MR. BIGGARsaid, the answer of the hon. Baronet was satisfactory up to a certain point; but he should like to know, further, whether the appointment of Auditor of Waterworks, held by the Registrar General, was a Government appointment, or was held independently of the Government? If this last suggestion were the correct one, it seemed clear that the gentleman held a professional appointment, outside the Government, which ought to take up the whole of his time, and also held one or more appointments under the Government in addition.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, the appointment as Auditor was held under Statute, and independently of the Government.
  MR. BIGGARsaid, as it would be useless to press his Amendment, and as the answers of the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury had been, on the whole, satisfactory, he would ask leave to withdraw his proposal to reduce the amount of the Vote.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (2.) £27,156, to complete the sum for the Charity Commission.
  MR. GOLDNEYobserved, that he had every year to say something with regard to this Vote, which he hoped soon to see removed from, the Civil Service Estimates. This expense ought to be borne by the Estates themselves,
  1612
  and not by the nation. The Charity Commissioners had issued 2,600 orders, appointing new Trustees and making other arrangements, the cost of which should be borne by them, and would amount to a very small percentage on the value of the Charities. He hoped that the Secretary to the Treasury would look upon this as a matter which the public was fairly entitled to consider. At present, it had no control whatever, but had to bear the whole expense of the Commission. He should, therefore, unless some indications were given of an intention on the part of the Government to consider this subject, move on a future occasion that the expenses of the Charity Commission be borne by the Estates themselves.
  MR. RYLANDSsaid, the Committee was indebted to the hon. Member for Chippenham (Mr. Goldney) for having called the attention of the House to this subject.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONreplied that the subject was an important one; and, should he continue to hold his present appointment, he would certainly endeavour to bring about some further arrangements.
  MR. GOLDNEYwould give the hon. Gentleman one fact, which was that the income of the Charities passed through the hands of the Secretary to the Commissioners. A very small percentage on the cheques signed by this officer would be sufficient to defray the expense of the Commission.
  SIR ANDREW LUSKremarked, that the Committee ought to be strong enough to say that the Charities should bear the expense of having their business managed for them, and it was but fair that the Government should act upon this suggestion. It would be a very easy way of dealing with the question to impose a small charge by way of commission.
  MR. BIGGARthought, that if the system were in operation, that the expenses of the Commission should be borne by the funds of the Charities, the Commissioners might in time come to regard themselves as masters, and beyond the control of Parliament. He had heard that some of these Charities were not managed in accordance with the intention of their founders, and it was desirable that Parliament should not be deprived of its power to investi-

  1613
  gate the manner in which they were administered. There was no doubt that these Trusts all required a very careful scrutiny. He thought that if Parliament exercised the power of investigating the way in which the intentions of the founders were carried out by the Commissioners, some reform might be effected. In this case the sum asked for, which was by no means a large one, would be well spent. He, however, doubted much that this object would be attained by doing away with the Vote, and making the expense a charge upon the funds of the Charities.
  MR. RAMSAYsaid, he had no fear that Parliament would lose its control of the Charities. It was extremely desirable that fees or a percentage should be charged for the work that was done, and that the public should be relieved from the expense of the Commission.
  MR. BIGGARadmitted the feasibility of calling upon the Charities, which required schemes of re-organization to contribute towards the cost of the Commission. At the same time, he hoped that nothing would be done to interfere with the power of Parliament to criticize the conduct of the Department whenever the necessity arose.
  MR. PARNELLbelieved that a considerable saving could be effected in the Vote. Two sets of Commissioners, Assistant Commissioners, and Secretaries were charged for—one set for Charities, and another set for Endowed Schools. He was aware that the two Departments could not be merged into one, because they were created under different Acts of Parliament, possessed different powers, and had different duties to perform. But, judging from the list of subordinate officers, the duties of the Endowed Schools Commissioners were comparatively light; and, in his opinion, it was most unreasonable that out of £9,500—the total cost of that Department—£7,300 should be absorbed by the salaries of the Commissioners. When those gentlemen came to retire, it would be well to make some attempt at economy.
  MR. W. H. JAMESwould like to be informed by the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury whether the noble Lord (Lord George Hamilton), who had recently been appointed fourth Charity Commissioner, would receive a salary in
  1614
  that capacity, in addition to his salary as Vice President of the Council?
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONreplied, that the noble Lord the Vice President of the Council would be an unpaid Commissioner. In answer to the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell), he might state that the Endowed Schools Commission was first appointed in the year 1869, and was provided for by a distinct Vote until a few years ago, when its powers were transferred to the Charity Commission; so that the Endowed Schools Commission, as such, no longer existed. Although the work of the late Endowed Schools Commission was now performed by the Charity Commission, the Departmental officers of the former still remained, it having been deemed advisable not to merge the two sets of officers; inasmuch as while the one Department would altogether cease to exist in 1879, the other was intended to be permanent.
  MR. M'LARENagreed with the suggestion that a moderate fee should be charged to the Charities to which new schemes were granted. The plan had been adopted in the Register House Department, Edinburgh. The total cost of that Department, as indicated by the Vote which would be asked for, was about £36,000 per annum; whereas the amount realized by fees was £44,000. To his mind, the fee system was as sound in principle as it was profitable in practice.
  Vote agreed to.
  (3.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £22,519, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Civil Service Commission."
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSYmoved the reduction of the Vote by £2,000, the salary of the First Commissioner. Since the year 1875–6, the cost of the Commission had been gradually increasing. In that year the amount of the Vote was £20,483; whereas, in 1876–7, it was £22,000 odd; in 1877–8, £24,780; and this year, nearly £27,000—that was to say, during the last five years it had increased nearly 25 per cent. In the business of the Department, there was nothing whatever to justify such an extraordinary increase of expenditure;

  1615
  but something occurred in the year 1875, which would probably, to some extent, account for what had happened since. In that year, there was perpetrated a proceeding which was sufficient to demoralize any public Department, no matter how sound was the principle on which it was founded, or how well it was conducted. In 1875, Sir Edward Ryan, the Chief Commissioner, retired. Other Commissioners were appointed, and Lord Hampton, a statesman who had done excellent service in almost every Department of the State, except this particular one, was appointed Chief Commissioner at the age of 76 years. That was not all. It became necessary to strengthen the Department, in order to remove the element of weakness, which the appointment of Lord Hampton made apparent. A third Commissioner was appointed, but at an inferior salary, and the selection fell upon a gentleman who ought to have been chosen in the first instance; for he was perfectly competent to discharge the duties, having for a considerable period filled the post of Secretary—he alluded to Mr. Walrond. The Chief Commissioner, who had had no experience in connection with the operations of the Commission, received a salary of £2,000 a-year, and Mr. Walrond, the other Commissioner, one of £1,200. The appointment of Lord Hampton was discussed in the House, and was severely condemned, though the Government of the day gained their point—as, indeed, they could almost anything. But the proceeding had borne fruit in constantly increasing Estimates. He was sorry to have been obliged to assume his present position. He wanted to maintain a great principle, and when he saw that principle abused, he had no alternative but to defend it. It had been deemed advisable to have the Department represented in Parliament. The Representative was in the House of Lords; but, if the expenditure of public money was likely to go on increasing at such an extraordinary rate, the sooner a Representative was had in the House of Commons the better. There was another feature in connection with the Department, which, he regretted, he was compelled to refer to, and that was that while they were expending public money in the manner he had described, they were exacting enormous sums, in
  1616
  the shape of fees, from young men who sought to obtain employment in the Civil Service. Each young man was obliged to pay a fee, first of £1 and next of £5, for the privilege of being allowed to present himself for examination. Those fees really represented an enormous sacrifice to young men of that class, and it was hard that they should be enforced while money could be saved by the abolition of a sinecure office. He thought there was no necessity for further attempting to justify his Amendment for the reduction of the Vote by an amount equivalent to the expenditure incurred by the appointment of Lord Hampton.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £20,519, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Civil Service Commission."—(Mr. O'Shaughnessy.)
  MR. DILLWYNsupported the Amendment. He knew it would be quite useless to do so; but it was incumbent upon him to assume the position, as a protest against an expenditure for which there was not a shadow of excuse. The proceeding to which the last speaker (Mr. O'Shaughnessy) had alluded was admitted to be one of the worst political jobs perpetrated of late; and he felt shame that in an Assembly, the especial duty of which was to protect the public purse, it should be allowed. He could not understand how any person, whether Liberal or Conservative, could vote for the continuance of such a monstrous job.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONcertainly could not follow the hon. Member for Swansea (Mr. Dillwyn) in his exaggerated views with regard to the Vote. It was said that the expenses connected with the Commission had jumped from £20,000 to £27,000 during the last few years; but he would call the attention of hon. Gentlemen to the fact that the increase was entirely due to the system of open competition, the adoption of which was unanimously recommended by the House. It had been found necessary to strengthen the staff, and that really accounted for the increase complained of. The remarks of the hon. Member who raised the discus-

  1617
  sion would induce the Committee to believe that the candidates who presented themselves for examination suffered a great hardship owing to the fees which they had to pay. It was said that they had to pay something like £6, and that that was a severe tax. But £6 was the outside limit paid by candidates under the first-class examinations. The fees payable under the different other examinations varied according to the requirements expected from the candidates, and they could not in any sense be deemed excessive. With regard to the attack which had been made upon the First Commissioner, he felt bound to say that Lord Hampton occupied an exceptional position, and that there was hardly any public servant who devoted more time and attention to the duties of his office. True, his Lordship was advanced in years; but a good many right hon. Gentlemen who had done service to the State were in the same position, and he was convinced that there were few public servants who brought so much power to bear upon the performance of the duties of his office as the noble Lord.
  MR. DILLWYNdisclaimed all intention of personally attacking Lord Hampton. His charge was, that, without any justification, a Nobleman had been put into an office for which he was not especially fit, over the heads of others who were especially fitted for it; and that, in addition to this, the salary of the office had been increased for his benefit.
  MR. RYLANDSwas sure that nobody entertained anything but feelings of respect for Lord Hampton, who had done public service for many years. There could be no doubt that a gentleman already in the Department might most properly have been selected as Chief Commissioner, and equally little doubt that he would have accepted the appointment at the salary previously paid, £1,500 a-year. The scandal was this—that a noble Lord of advanced years, who did not find himself in Office after the last General Election, was thrust, just to suit the convenience of the Premier, into an appointment. A salary of £2,000 was given when there was a gentleman, admirably qualified, who would have been happy to have accepted promotion at £1,500, so that £500 had been positively wasted. He
  1618
  had no doubt whatever that the transaction was a political job.
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSYquite admitted that he had been in error on the subject of the fees; but he did not consider it necessary to retract anything he had said respecting Lord Hampton, though he had not been actuated by the slightest personal hostility towards the noble Lord.
  MR. BIGGARsaid, that in spite of the explanation which had been given, the fact still remained that the applicants for Civil Service appointments, who took considerable trouble to qualify themselves for examination, were obliged to pay a substantial fee before they could be examined. That was a form of taxation which he hoped would not be perpetuated. The expense of education was so great, that it was an intolerable hardship to unnecessarily impose fees upon the candidates who presented themselves for examination—indeed, it would be wise for the Government to consider, by the time the next Budget was introduced, whether the pressure on a very deserving class could not be lessened. As to the appointment of the First Commissioner, he considered the explanation of the Secretary to the Treasury most unsatisfactory. He did not see that a Chief Commissioner was wanted at all. The experience of the House was that the Assistant Commissioners did all the work; and, therefore, he did not see why they should be called upon to vote so large a sum as £2,000 a-year to pay a Nobleman now 80 years of age. It would be much better to utilize this sum in lessening the taxes laid upon young men who came up for examination, and who had undergone all the preliminary risks, labours, and anxieties, than to give the sum as a pension to a Nobleman.
  MR. WHITWELLwas not going to draw the attention of the House to the salary paid to the noble Lord the Chief of the Civil Service Commission; but he did ask the serious consideration of the Secretary to the Treasury to one fact, and that was that out of a certain number of persons employed 16 were receiving salaries of £200 a-year, whereas no less than 11 received salaries of something like £1,000 a-year. The proportion of highly-paid salaries exceeded that to be found in any other Department. To show that when the First

  1619
  Commissioner was appointed, the two Assistant Commissioners might have done all that was needed, he might mention that one of the Assistants was now engaged, for part of his time, in the work of translation; and he contended, that if one of the Assistant Commissioners could give up his time to the work of the Record Office of so abstruse a character as the translation of Hindoo and Sanscrit books, it was unnecessary to appoint a Chief Commissioner at a salary of £2,000 a-year. He did not wish to make any remarks antagonistic to the Nobleman who now held the office; but he thought the whole matter needed revision.
  MR. MACDONALDsaid, he objected to the appointment of the First Commissioner when it was made, and he objected now to this form of out-door relief to aged statesmen by giving them a living out of the public funds. He hoped that the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. O'Shaughnessy) would take the sense of the House upon the question.
  Question put.
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 50; Noes 60: Majority 10.—(Div. List, No. 113.)
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (4.) £14,141, to complete the sum for the Copyhold, Inclosure, and Tithe Commission.
  (5.) £6,830, to complete the sum for the Inclosure and Drainage Acts, Imprest Expenses.
  (6.) Motion made and, Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £43,325, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of the Comptroller and Auditor General of the Exchequer."
  MR. PARNELLsaid, he noticed that one of the clerks in the office received £200 a-year as Auditor to the Duchy of Lancaster. He could not see how this gentleman could at the same time perform duties in the Exchequer Audit Office and in the Office of the Duchy of
  1620
  Lancaster; and, therefore, he wished to know whether any duties in respect of the latter office were performed, or whether the position was a sinecure?
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, the duties of Auditor of the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster were performed by a gentleman who was a clerk in the Exchequer Audit Office; but they did not interfere with his work in that office.
  MR. WHITWELLdesired to be informed why a special sum should be voted for Chancery auditorage?
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, the audit of the Chancery accounts was a separate thing, as ordered by the 35 & 36 Vict. c. 34.
  SIR ANDREW LUSKthought the whole principle bad. Here was a clerk in the Exchequer Audit Department having £200 a-year to audit the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster. They all knew that the Exchequer Audit Department was well managed, and he had the greatest confidence in it; but, if one of the clerks were taken away to audit the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster, he could not have time to do his own work. He did not find fault with the gentleman who held the two offices; but what he found fault with was the pluralist system, by which one must suffer, and, therefore, he hoped his hon. Friend the Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) would discountenance such a system.
  MR. BIGGARsaid, he had heard the explanation of the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson), and the remarks of the hon. Baronet the Member for Fins-bury (Sir Andrew Lusk), and he was not at all satisfied with the explanations regarding this clerk who audited the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster. That gentleman got £200 a-year for that work, and he supposed he received £800 a-year from his office in the Exchequer Audit Department. It was, however, clear that he must neglect his work in one office during the year. If a good salary were given a man for a particular office, he should attend to it, and should not be allowed to have another Department to look after. Therefore, he moved that the Vote be reduced by £200, the sum which was paid to this chief clerk for auditing the Duchy of Lancaster accounts.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £43,125, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of the Comptroller and Auditor General of the Exchequer." —(Mr. Biggar.)
  MR. PARNELLasked why the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster should not be audited by the Audit Department? They had a full staff of seven Inspectors or principal clerks, excluding a chief clerk, all of whom received good salaries. Then there was a large number of first and second class clerks, so that there was a sufficiently large staff to audit the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster. Instead of that, the accounts were audited at the Office of the Duchy—if there were any—or they were brought into the Audit Office and examined by this gentleman, who received £200 for the work. No one could understand why this should be done, and it seemed to him very like what was called in and outside that House a "job."
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster were kept distinct; and, therefore, they were audited in their own offices. The hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar) seemed to think that the Auditor of those accounts received an extra salary for neglecting his work in the Exchequer Audit Office; but this was not so. The work of his Department had always to be done, and the audit of the Duchy accounts had to be performed in his own time—either in his holidays, or after his ordinary work was concluded. Therefore, the payment was for extra work, and he would remind the Committee that it was only a short time ago, at the express wish of the House, that the sum was put in the Votes. In no case could it be shown that this money was earned by doing the work in the time which ought to be devoted to the Exchequer Audit Department.
  MAJOR NOLANthought it would be much better for the officials of the country to do the work, than to allow the Duchy of Lancaster to have its own auditors. It would be much better to have someone to audit these accounts who was paid by the Government, than to have one paid by the Duchy; because, by the latter course, they at once put a
  1622
  man in the pay and service of the Duchy. He did not think that was a position in which an auditor, no matter how perfectly he did his work, should be placed.
  MR. MELLORsaid, the auditing the accounts of the Duchy was separate work, and should be paid for separately, the expense being borne by the office employing the Auditor.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, these were Royal Revenues, over which Parliament had no control; and, therefore, the audit was that of the Duchy itself. The Duchy had desired, in selecting its Auditor, to get someone of experience from the Audit Office, who in his spare time should do their work at a salary of £200 a-year.
  MR. MACDONALDobjected to a man holding two offices. Either he had no work to do in one place, and, therefore, his services might be dispensed with, or he should be kept at work in his Department, and not be allowed to take the second position for the sake of getting an extra £200 a-year.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYwished to know why, if the work of auditing the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster Office was done in the time of the clerk, the Vote appeared in the Papers at all? It seemed to him that this system was altogether wrong. If the Duchy of Lancaster desired to have a responsible audit of its accounts by one of the clerks of the Exchequer, it was right that it should be so; but the £200 a-year ought to be paid to the Treasury. Therefore, if the hon. Member took a division on this matter, he should be happy to support him.
  MR. RAMSAYwould like to ask the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) what was the course pursued with respect to the audit of Chancery accounts? Were there any fees exacted from the persons whose estates were under the Court of Chancery; and, if so, where did these funds go? Because, if the fees were applied to pay the cost of audit, in that case it was right that a similar practice should obtain here; but he did not hear that there was anything of that kind. If fees were exacted from the Estate for the audit, the country would be saved the sum of £8,000. He did not wish that the country should make any profit from those persons who were in Chancery,

  1623
  but he did think it reasonable that those persons should bear the expense of the audit.
  MR. M'LARENsaid, that the £200 addition to salary involved a very important principle, and he should like to state in a sentence or two the view which he took. There were seven of these gentlemen whose services were paid for at £800 or £900 per annum; and one of these clerks received £200 in addition from the Duchy. It was quite plain, that if one of these clerks, whose time was worth £900 a-year, was employed for three months in doing the business of the Duchy of Lancaster, then the Audit Office lent their clerk to the Duchy of Lancaster. Who should receive payment?—not the clerk, but the Audit Office. It should be put among the fees they received, that £200 a-year was received by the Treasury from the Duchy of Lancaster. He altogether objected to a man coming in for a second salary by neglecting part of his work, as he necessarily did in this case.
  MR. PARNELLwould certainly vote with the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar), unless he received some assurance from the Government that the time the clerk spent for the Duchy of Lancaster was his own time. Of course, when he gave his own time, it was an entirely different question. The hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) knew the hours the Departments were employed—or, he presumed the hon. Baronet knew—and what were the duties the clerks had to perform. He received the considerable sum of £200, and it was reasonable to suppose that the duty must take up some time; and, of course, if any portion of the time the clerk ought to spend at the office was employed in auditing these accounts, he was not entitled to receive salary from an outside body. It ought to go to the Audit Department. They were told that the auditing of the accounts of Greenwich Hospital would be recovered from that body, and paid into the Exchequer. That was a business-like way to go to work. If the Duchy of Lancaster wanted its accounts audited by the Audit Office, let the Audit Office undertake it, and be paid for it as they were paid by the Church Temporalities Commission in Ireland and by the Board of Trade. They ought to have some assurance from the hon. Baronet on this question.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONknew it was a rule in the Public Service that clerks should give to the Public Service a certain number of hours; and that for any extra work they did, they were entitled to receive such emolument as was shown in the foot-note was given in this case. Such work was done in the clerk's own private capacity. The auditing of the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster did not require the time the hon. Baronet had suggested. If a clerk devoted a certain number of hours to the Public Service, his time after that was at his own disposal; and if he was auditing the accounts of the Duchy of Lancaster, as private work, there was no regulation against his doing it. There was one thing which was brought into view by this discussion, and that was that the Departments gave as much information as could possibly be obtained with respect to extra remuneration obtained by public servants. They had means of knowing when public servants received extra remuneration, and they put that information in the Estimates. But they had no control over a man's private time. When he had given his time at the office, that was all that the office could exact from him. It was when he received extra pay from a public office that the public were made aware of it. That would have to be multiplied enormously if they could put down the money gained by clerks from other sources. All the Department had done was to put down the amounts the clerks received from other public offices during the time they were not in their own offices.
  MR. H. SAMUELSONhad no doubt the hon. Baronet had spoken to the best of his knowledge; but he must remember that there were private secretaries who were at the same time clerks in public offices, and who did not give their time at their offices at all; such as the Private Secretary of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and others about whom there had already been discussion. He did not mean to draw the inference that the hon. Baronet knew the case of this particular clerk to be of that kind. If the House objected to all the extra emoluments these clerks earned in their spare time, they would have a great task before them. They would have to look to the great trading establishments which were carried on in

  1625
  London—and he thought rightly carried on—by public clerks at a time when they were not employed in public offices. But that did not apply to the case of private secretaries who did not give their time at their office at all.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONsaid, that in the case of private secretaries the work done was equally official work, and was different from the work done by one office for another.
  MR. H. SAMUELSONsaid, he saw the distinction the hon. Baronet made.
  MR. BIGGARwas unwilling to give the Committee the trouble of dividing; but, at the same time, he was not satisfied with this explanation. The hon. Baronet had stated what was the general rule in a public office, but he went no further. He must say he had no fault to find with the statements the hon. Baronet had made, so far as the general principle was concerned; but he had not stated what was done in this particular case. He thought the point raised by the hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. M'Laren) really met the case. That was, that if the Duchy of Lancaster required that its accounts should be audited by a Public Department, it should be done by the Department and not by a private member. This Duchy of Lancaster property was of a peculiar nature. It was partially private Crown property, and was partly of a public nature. One Member of the Government, who had a seat in that House, and was, he believed, paid by a Vote of Parliament, was in charge of the Duchy of Lancaster property. The Chancellor was a Member of the Government, and had a seat in that House, and if he did not sit in that House he could not hold Office. It was only right that these auditors who divided their time should give all their time to the duties of their office, and should charge a reasonable sum for doing so. If this gentleman worked all night on the Duchy of Lancaster accounts, he would be less qualified next day to perform his duties to the Government. If he were in his own office a certain number of hours, and then gave a certain number of hours to other work, he would be more or less embarrassed, and would give less to the Public Service.
  MR. WHITWELLhoped the hon. Member (Mr. Biggar) would not divide on a sum which was not covered by these
  1626
  accounts at all. He hoped the hon. Member would be satisfied with what the hon. Baronet had stated.
  MR. PARNELLtrusted the hon. Member for Cavan would not take the trouble to divide the Committee on this question. He hoped the hon. Baronet would take the trouble to see how the duties of this office were performed. One part of it was an office held under the Crown, and another part of it an office held under Parliament. He did not believe the hon. Baronet wished to make inquiry as to the extra work that the clerks performed, but he had told them to the best of his belief that these were extra duties; and he, therefore, hoped the hon. Member would not put the Committee to a division. He trusted the hon. Baronet would inquire into the matter so as to give fuller explanation on the next occasion.
  MR. O'DONNELLwished to say a word as to what was said by the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Whitwell). As the Vote stood at present, it came to this—it was a sort of injustice to other clerks who were presumably earning, and fully earning, the salaries appointed to them. Unless next year, the hon. Baronet who had charge of the Department, could assure the House that the office hours for the Duchy of Lancaster only began when the office hours of the other Department ended, it would be open to the suspicion that one of the principal clerks obtained a salary of £900 a-year, and had £200 a-year from another office, and earned this during the public time, while the other clerks only got £900. One of their colleagues got £1,100 for neglecting his business to the tune of £200 per annum. Unless some investigation was made next year, this was likely to continue.
  MR. BIGGARwas very unwilling to differ from his Colleagues, and was disposed for that reason to ask the Committee for leave to withdraw this Motion. At the same time, he must say he was not at all convinced that he was right in doing so. He believed his duty was to take the opinion of the Committee on the question. Hon. Friends of his were disposed to differ from that opinion, and he was willing to take their opinion, and to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (7.) £5,085, to complete the sum for Friendly Societies.
  MR. PARNELLnoticed that there was considerable difference between the salaries of the Assistant Registrars in England and those in Scotland and Ireland. The salary of the Assistant Registrar in England amounted to £900, including a personal allowance of £800. The paragraph did not state what the personal allowance was for. He should be glad to have some explanation on that point. The salary of the Assistant Registrar in Scotland and Ireland only amounted to £300 a-year. He was aware that the duties of this office were more numerous in England than in Ireland. He could not speak of Scotland. In Ireland he knew that the Assistant Registrar had as much as he could do, and had only one assistant at £100 a-year. This was part of a system, which he was sorry to see was very much practised in the preparation of these accounts, of starving the Civil servants in Ireland. In no cases were they given equivalent salaries to those in England. In former times it was much worse; but attention had been called from time to time, and the salaries had been raised in some Departments. They had an example in the National School Teachers, for whom they agitated five or six years before they obtained the same salaries that were paid to English and Scotch National School Teachers. He did not know whether the Government intended to starve them out in Ireland. If they had those intentions, they would not succeed, because they had tried it two or three times before and had not succeeded. It did seem strange that there should be this difference. It might be said that living was cheaper in Ireland than in England. He knew he could live cheaper in London than in Dublin. Therefore, that was no reason for giving less in Ireland than in England. The duties in Ireland were very great, though, of course, not so great as in England. But in England, the Assistant Registrar had two clerks, four copying clerks, and an actuary; so that it was evident the office in England was not undermanned, whereas the office in Ireland was very much undermanned, and there was only £400 for clerk and assistants.
  SIR ANDREW LUSK, before the hon. Baronet the Secretary to the Treasury
  1628
  answered, wished to ask him how the Friendly Societies Act was working? The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer took great pains to frame that Act, and they in the House of Commons took pains to get it to work well, and it would be interesting to know how it worked. If the hon. Baronet would tell them that, they would be glad to hear that they had been instrumental in promoting the well-being of these societies throughout the country.
  MR. MACDONALDdiffered very much from the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) in his estimate of work done by the Assistant Registrars in Ireland and in England. The hon. Member for Finsbury (Sir Andrew Lusk) asked how the work had been done. He would recommend him strongly to examine the Reports prepared by the Chief Registrar. He ventured to say that no more interesting Reports were ever issued by the Government. The Chief Registrar had brought such knowledge and skill to bear on the subject as had rarely been exercised by any one Department in this country. As one who took an interest in the matter, he felt bound to say that the money spent on this Department was exceedingly well spent. The Registrar had shown an amount of vigour and industry which was highly creditable to him.
  MR. WHEELHOUSEbelieved the system now in vogue had given the greatest possible satisfaction. Probably few people knew more of the work in the large towns of the North of England than he did; and, having given much consideration to the subject, he was prepared to say that, probably with certain modifications, which he hoped to see, there was no Act of Parliament at any time, or under any circumstances, which had been of greater service to the wage classes of the country than this Act had been. Most assuredly, that which the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald)—from whose views he often felt bound to differ very widely—had said as to the industry and care which had been shown in the working of the Act, he could emphatically endorse. In fact, the whole of the arrangements, so far as they had been carried out up to the present time, afforded strong evidence of the strenuous exertions used to make the Act work well. There must necessarily, under all

  1629
  circumstances, be particular sections of an Act of Parliament which would be found not to work—especially, perhaps, at first—satisfactorily in the case of those for whose benefit they were passed; but, so far as the actual machinery of this Act was concerned, he apprehended that there never had been a greater example of fidelity to the intentions of the Government than had been shown in the working of it. Knowing the immense care which had been taken by every one of the officers of the Friendly Societies—whether they were the United Order of Oddfellows, or smaller Burial Societies—to make the Act do its work as well as possible, he did not think it would have been right on his part had he not added his testimony to that of the hon. Member of Stafford, with whom on this question he was in complete accord.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYremarked, that the point raised by the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell) was the difference which existed in the salaries given in the three countries to a similar class of officers; and he hoped the hon. Baronet (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) would be able to inform the Committee upon what principle these salaries were settled. Leaving out of account the salary of the Chief Registrar in England, he observed that the Assistant Registrar had a salary of £700 a-year, his maximum income being fixed at £800, and that the Chief Clerk had £500, while the Assistant Registrar for Scotland had only a maximum salary of £300. Surely, the latter might have before him the prospect of attaining to as good a position as the Chief Clerk in England, with a maximum salary of £500 a-year. He had himself no doubt that the duties in Scotland and Ireland were quite as onerous and responsible as those which were discharged by the Assistant Registrar in England.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONexplained, that it was not until the passing of the 18 & 19 Vict. that any salaries were fixed with reference to Scotch and Irish Registrars, and the maximum then decided upon was £150 per annum. The Act passed in 1876, to which reference had been made, raised the salaries all round. It raised the salaries of the Assistant Registrars in England to the point at which they at present stood in the Estimates, and
  1630
  those of the Assistant Registrars in Scotland and Ireland from £150 to £300 a-year. The relative proportion which the salaries paid in England bore to those paid in Scotland and Ireland seemed to have been carried out in the different Acts which had been passed from time to time. The amount of work performed in this particular Department in England was very much larger than in the sister countries, and that really accounted for the difference in the salaries.
  MR. BRISTOWEobserved, that the hon. Member for Meath (Mr. Parnell)— whose industry in all these matters everybody must recognize—had referred to one matter which the hon. Baronet had omitted to notice. The hon. Member had referred to the actuarial charges, and suggested that they were considerable. Now, his (Mr. Bristowe's) notion was—and he should be happy to be corrected if he was wrong—that the actuarial charges, although put under the head of England, applied to the three Kingdoms.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON: I believe that is so.
  MR. BIGGARsaid, that speaking generally of these charges, he thought there was no Department of the Public Service in which it was more desirable that the work should be efficiently done. They knew, from the evidence given before the Commission which made inquiry into these Friendly Societies, that their affairs were carried on in such a manner that parties who had insured ran very great risk of losing their money. He thought, therefore, that the Committee should not be too severe in its scrutiny of the expense of examining the affairs of those different Societies, with a view, as far as possible, of keeping them in a solvent and honest state.
  Vote agreed to.
  (8) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £320,193, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1879, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Local Government Board, including various Grants in aid of Local Taxation."
  MR. O'DONNELLsaid, that on looking over the details of the Vote, he saw that there were three junior legal as-

  1631
  sistants with salaries ranging from £300 to £450 a-year. He should like to know who were these gentlemen, and what was the character of their duties?
  MR. MELLORremarked, that there was another item respecting which he should like to have some explanation. He observed that there was an architect with a salary of £600 a-year, and two assistants with salaries of £400 and £280 respectively. He could not see what they had to do with the relief of the poor. It might be that they were called in to advise the Board occasionally; but, if that be so, all he had to say was that, speaking from practical knowledge of his own Union, whenever these gentlemen had been called in they had led the Guardians grievously astray.
  MR. O'CONNOR POWERsaid, that before the hon. Baronet rose to answer the Questions that had been put, he would express his regret, in the first place, that the right hon. Gentleman who presided over this Department was not in his place. [Mr. SOLATER-BOOTH was here seen to take his seat on the Treasury Bench.] He was very glad the right hon. Gentleman had put in an appearance while somebody was asking on his behalf for the modest sum of £384,000. He did think it strange that the President of the Local Government Board had not favoured them with his presence until then; because, of course, it was a very large sum, and naturally Questions would arise upon the Vote, which only the right hon. Gentleman himself would be competent to deal with. Now, he (Mr. O'Connor Power) noticed that under the head of "Travelling Expenses" there was a sum required of £6,300. That was a very large sum, and what he would like to know was whether that included the expenses which were involved in the deportation of Irish paupers from England to Ireland? That was the subject to which he would just for a moment wish respectfully to invite the attention of the Committee; for the state of the law was such in this respect that young Irishmen who came to England and laboured there for a lifetime were in their old age, when unfit for further work, sent back to be supported by a country to which they had rendered no service. Visiting one of the workhouses in the county which he represented, some time ago, he was brought to see
  1632
  an old man, a man of about 80 years of age, who had spent 40 years of his life in England, and who had married an English wife and brought up an English family. Many members of his family, although not in a position to support him were, nevertheless, contributing in their own humble, but very successful, way towards the wealth of this great country. Well, when this poor man had been reduced, by the effects of a life of toil in England, to such a position as to be utterly unable to gain a livelihood, he was sent back to Ireland to be supported by Irish rates. He failed to see that such a system could be considered just. To him it appeared a gross injustice, and he would like to know whether this sum of £6,300 was intended to cover travelling expenses of that kind. If so, he was decidedly of opinion that Ireland ought not to be called upon to pay them, and certainly Irish ratepayers ought not to be called upon to support paupers of that class. He might be asked, what was the remedy? Well, he would not alter the law so that any number of Irish people might be sent from Ireland indiscriminately and placed upon the rates in England; but what he would do was this—he would fix a term of years which would give a man all the rights of naturalization in England, if he might colloquially use that word. They could fix it at five or 10 years; but really, as he understood the law at present, it was in the power of English Guardians, or Scotch Guardians for the matter of that, to send Irish paupers back to Ireland under the circumstances which he had described. He thought it was a matter that they should protest against, and that they should invite the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board to give some explanation in regard to it before they consented to pass this Vote.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHwas sorry that he was absent at the moment when this Vote was called on, but he had been in his place since 5 o'clock. He could scarcely think the hon Gentleman could have been serious in the Question he had put. He had asked whether the travelling expenses which appeared in the Vote had anything to do with the removal of Irish paupers back to Ireland? He (Mr. Sclater-Booth) need hardly tell the Committee that the item

  1633
  referred exclusively to the travelling expenses of the Inspectors of the Local Government Board in connection with the duties which they discharged for the Department; whereas the travelling expenses incurred in the removal of paupers were defrayed by the localities removing them in accordance with the provisions of the law in that respect. The hon. Gentleman would do him the justice to remember that it was not two years since he made a proposal that there should be a certain term of years after which an Irish pauper should not be removed to Ireland; and he might add that when objection was offered to the details of the plan he then propounded, the Irish Members made common cause with English Members in opposing them. The result was that they were considerably modified by the House.
  MR. PARNELLsaid, he was sorry there was no item in the Vote under consideration upon which he could raise an important objection. As he understood the President of the Local Government Board, they were now asked to pass a Vote which applied to purposes of removal of Irish paupers from England and Scotland to Ireland, but not specially so in any one item. He understood that to be the fact, and he was sorry for it; because he was compelled by it to take a step which he felt exceedingly unwilling to take, and which, under different circumstances, he certainly should not have taken. If they had a special item in the Vote, they could object to its being employed for purposes incident to the removal of Irish paupers from England and Scotland, and would have something to lay hold of in connection with the question at issue. Unfortunately, however, they had to look to a higher quarter. The President of the Local Government Board had detailed the exertions he made some years ago to pass a Bill through the House of Commons to remove the objections which Irish Members had always felt to the removal of these paupers, and which would remove the hardships now felt under the law as it existed. But the right hon. Gentleman was mistaken in supposing that the Irish Members in any way made common cause in that House to oppose the passing of that Bill. He remembered when it was introduced,
  1634
  and that their attention was directed by the late lamented Member for the city of Cork (Mr. Ronayne), and other hon. Members, to the cruelty of the Bill as it stood. They pointed out that the clauses as they stood, though they went, to a certain extent, in the direction they desired, did not at all fulfil the wishes of the Irish Members, or meet the necessities of the case. The Irish Members assisted the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board on that occasion as far as they could. They made no common cause with anybody inside that House with respect to the question; but it was the selfishness of the English and Scotch Members that prevented him from carrying out his intentions. So far from his giving effect to them, he went back from them, and allowed the Bill to be modified by the selfishness of the English and Scotch Members: and he (Mr. Parnell) said that, so far from the Irish Members being responsible for the defection of the right hon. Gentleman, they would have supported him if he had not yielded to a pressure brought on him, not in that House, but outside it, to modify the clauses in Committee. When the Bill came before the House in Committee, they found that the clauses, which were passed in the usual way—about 1 o'clock in the morning—did not satisfy their expectations, nor fulfil the conditions which the Irish Members thought necessary or desirable to meet the requirements of the case. The right hon. Gentleman had modified them, and, against his own sense of right and justice, they were made practically inoperative. Now, whom had they to look to, to see that a grievance of that kind should be remedied? The one they should look to was the responsible originator of legislation on the subject, who was responsible to the greatest and highest extent for imperfections in the legislation, and for the removal of hardships in carrying it out. It was the President of the Local Government Board, and it was useless for him to mislead himself or the House by the assertion that the Irish Members, or any portion of them, connived at the changes made in the Bill by the English and Scotch Members. The law was as bad as it ever was. Horrible and heartrending cases of hardship occurred, and no one could have any sympathy

  1635
  with, such an iniquity, for it was nothing else. Children came over—very little children—their parents died; they grew up, and worked for many years; their services were of the greatest benefit to the community; they were hewers of wood and drawers of water; they made their railways and built their cities; and then, when they were worn with age or infirmity, they gave them a third-class ticket and sent them home again, giving them a kick at the same time, and saying to them—"Get back to your dirty country, and die there." That was practically what they said. It was a scandal which he wondered should have continued as long as it had; but he held the President of the Local Government Board responsible for it, and as he could not take any other step to mark his sense of this injustice, he should now move to reduce the Vote by the amount of his salary—by £2,000.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Item of £2,000, for the Salary of the President of the Local Government Board, be omitted from the proposed Vote."—(Mr. Parnell.)
  MR. O'CONNOR POWERsaid, that while he endorsed every word that had fallen from his hon. Friend the Member for Meath, with respect to the iniquity of the present law, he rose to remove from the mind of the right hon. Gentleman that he meant to show him any discourtesy. He frankly acknowledged that he did not see the right hon. Gentleman in the House; and not being there, as he conceived, he could only deal with the question as it rose at the time. He was glad they had the right hon. Gentleman with them to discuss that important subject as it should be discussed. Of course, the right hon. Gentleman had given his practical explanation of the causes that had operated to preserve this odious law in its present form; but probably he might be able to say, for the satisfaction of the Irish Members of the Committee, whether there was any chance of initiating a Bill that would lead to more satisfactory results. The hon. Member for Meath had given some fair reasons for fixing the responsibility on his shoulders. He did not himself say he was responsible; but there was no doubt that Irish Members were under a distinct moral obligation to denounce this system, and
  1636
  to express censure on those whom they conceived to be responsible for it. The grievance was a great one, and it fell on a class of Irish people not represented in that House. They spoke on the subject for the very reason, and with the most perfect disinterestedness. He did trust the right hon. Gentleman would make some statement that would satisfy the just and reasonable expectations of the Irish Members on that question.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHexplained that he had only spoken briefly just now, as he did not consider it necessary to enter into the subject of removal on that Vote; but the responsibility for the law as it stood could not be said to rest with him, but with Parliament, as he had not had the sole charge of the question. He must correct the hon. Member who spoke last but one, when he assumed that the measure to which he alluded was passed at 1 o'clock in the morning, and that the arrangement then come to was effected by means of pressure from outside the House. The real fact was that the measure came on at a Morning Sitting, and the particular proposal he made, and which he thought was a fair and reasonable proposal, to annul the grievance to which the Irish Members drew attention, was a proposal which attracted a great deal of interest in the House, and was the subject of discussion for several hours. The Irish Members objected to a provision which had reference to Ireland only. He would not go into the matter now; but the effect of the representations then made to him was to change that provision from one having a special application with regard to one part of the Kingdom to a provision of an entirely different character, applying generally to removals from one part of the Kingdom to another. The Amendment was a reasonable one, and it worked extremely well; but it was not what he had intended. The hon. Member for Cork had taken great interest in the subject, and he might observe that that hon. Member had given Notice that he meant to call attention to it during the present Session; and he would further submit that it was not usual or expedient, on a Vote to provide for the expenses of a public Department, to raise questions of administration which the Government was not competent to vary, and which the Com-

  1637
  mittee could not enter into with advantage. He only referred to what he proposed at the time to show that he had been anxious to prevent cases of hardship arising under removal. They did not occur, however, so often as was supposed; and when they did occur, whatever could be done to mitigate them was done. It was impossible, however, by means of general enactments, to modify the law of removal, without introducing difficulties and injustice on the other side, which could not be obviated. He could assure hon. Members that he had every desire that these removals should be as few as possible; and, as far as he could, he had endeavoured to accomplish that object in the way best calculated to mitigate the evil. The law was, however, a weapon in the hands of local authorities to guard against abuse, and in that way afforded a great security to the public. He should be very glad, some of these days, to endeavour to make further improvement in the matter when it was before them.
  MR. PARNELLobserved, that his attention had been most attracted by the right hon. Gentleman saying that the Irish Members had agreed to, or connived at, a perversion of the Bill introduced some three years ago, and more especially a clause he introduced with a view to prevent the hardships of the removal of Irish paupers. The right hon. Gentleman stated that the hon. Member for Cork County agreed to an alteration of the clause he introduced originally, and that the effect of that alteration, urged on him by the English and Scotch Members, was to render nugatory the intentions he had formed with regard to the removal of Irish paupers. He was sorry the hon. Member for Cork was not in his place, as he thought he would at once repudiate the statement that he had in any way sanctioned the alteration of the clause in question in the direction he had said. That was, in fact, evident from the Motion which stood in his name on the Paper. The right hon. Gentleman had shown, however, that he was actuated by a great desire to improve the condition of affairs; and as the Motion of the hon. Member for Cork County was to come before them shortly, when they would have an opportunity of hearing the views of the President of the Local Government Board at greater length
  1638
  with respect to this question, he did not desire any further to forestall the discussion that must take place on that occasion, and he should ask leave to withdraw his Amendment.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYnext called attention to a foot-note at page 110 of the Estimates, to the effect that the Poor Law Auditors derived additional remuneration from the local rates for auditing the accounts of school boards and other local authorities. The hon. Member said, he did not object to those officers doing that work in their own time; but he thought it was another thing for the House to recognize, that those officers were doing that work. They were travelling over the country, and he did not think there could be any adequate supervision of their work. He could not but think that their doing this other work must be some hindrance to the proper control which the Department should exercise over the Inspectors. He wished to draw the attention of the Committee to the undesirability of recognizing the fact that these public officials were doing private work in their own time; because he did not see where it was to stop. This doing private work, in addition to their official duties, and the House recognizing that they did so, must, as it seemed to him, be some hindrance to discipline.
  MR. WHEELHOUSEsaid, that as he understood this particular arrangement, it was made some years ago at the request of the House itself; and he thought that, if they would only consider the great advantage which would arise out of it, and had undoubtedly arisen out of it, they would see no reason to find fault with the way in which those accounts were presented to them. He must not be told that the time of these officials was fully occupied by their auditing of the Poor Law accounts; and he could say, from his own experience, in West Yorkshire, in Lancashire, and in Cheshire, where the time of the Poor Law officials was as fully occupied as it was anywhere, they still had time at their disposal for other work. And, if there was one class of men more fitted for this work than another, it was that class who for years had been engaged in auditing the Poor Law accounts. The same kind

  1639
  of calculations necessarily occurred in each district; and when they found that Parliament, in its wisdom, made this arrangement, that the Government acceded to it, that it was an arrangement that was wished for, and that those who did the work were those best fitted for it, he really did not see what more was to be desired.
  MR. MELLORthought that, looking at the growing expenses of the Audit Deartment ever since these gentlemen were engaged in auditing the accounts of Poor Law Unions and other local bodies, no consideration should be paid them for auditing the accounts of school boards, or in computing their pensions on retirement.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHexplained that the salaries paid to the Poor Law auditors were according to their duties. The arrangement had been found convenient; but he agreed that it was very desirable—and he hoped in another Session to be able to accomplish it—to place the system of audit on a more satisfactory basis. It was not satisfactory that officers of the Government should supplement their salaries by means of fees.
  MR. BRISTOWEsaid, he observed that £1,170 was allowed for clerks to assist the auditors. In his opinion, it was much better that the responsibility should rest with the auditors. A large sum was paid for clerical assistance, and that assistance was not responsible. If the money were applied in getting an increased number of auditors, they would have, also, responsible officers for the money. There might be some technical reasons with which he was not acquainted for the plan at present adopted; but, otherwise, he thought it better that the Government should obtain a larger number of responsible officers.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHreminded the hon. Member that £1,170 was not a large sum to pay for those clerks, and many of the auditors did not require them.
  MR. WHITWELLsaid, he desired to ask three Questions of the right hon. Gentleman. The first had reference to experimental investigations in Medical Science—£3,000 was voted for that purpose last year—and he wished to ask whether the Report of the gentlemen who spent the money would be laid before Parliament? His second Ques-
  1640
  tion was this—great attention was now given to vaccination. It seemed that £3,000 was voted for it last year, and £3,000 more was to be voted under the Vote now before the Committee, for lymph, ivory points, &c. He wished to ask whether care was taken to obtain the lymph from the best sources, whether from England or from abroad, and whether the Government had any difficulty in procuring it? He thought it would be satisfactory to the country to be informed on those points. His third Question was of a very different character, having reference to the Inspectors of Roads in South Wales, for which they were still paying £300 a-year. He hoped the people of South Wales were now able to inspect their own roads, and he thought they could do so very well; and, as Rebecca had been long ago forgotten, he thought they should have the pleasure and gratification of inspecting them.
  MR. BIGGARthoroughly agreed with the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Sclater-Booth), that it was of the utmost importance that school boards and local boards generally should have their accounts checked by the best auditors; and he would be disposed to agree that those who performed the duty in connection with the Poor Law were the best men available for the purpose. At the same time, the point raised in connection with the present Vote was this—that the gentlemen who now occupied the position of auditors for the Poor Law Board, who travelled from place to place in that capacity, and who were in receipt of a fixed salary, also received payments from local authorities for services performed during the time they ought to be working for that Board. [Mr. SCLATER-BOOTH: No.] He begged the right hon. Gentleman's pardon; but he maintained that he had been speaking correctly. In the case of those who were employed in the Government Offices, the Public Service did not suffer if they were engaged in other work after official hours; but the case of the Poor Law auditors was entirely different. Those gentlemen had no specified time during which they were bound to work, and all that they really did was to see that certain things were done strictly in accordance with law. But if a Poor Law auditor were occupying his time in connection, for instance, with the school

  1641
  boards of the Corporation of Birmingham, it was obvious that he could not at the same time be engaged upon that for which he received a salary from Government. If the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. J. W. Barclay) had not moved to reduce the Vote, he hoped he would do so; and, if he did so, he would follow him into the same Lobby. There could be no more immoral principle than for officials who received fixed salaries—and not only fixed salaries, but liberal salaries—to occupy a great part of their time with other duties for which they were paid in fees.
  MR. J. W. BARCLAYshould like to hear from the right hon. Gentleman whether the Poor Law auditors were Civil servants or outside professional gentlemen, who undertook to audit a certain number of Poor Law accounts for a certain sum annually.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, the Poor Law auditors were Civil servants, who were required to devote their time, as far as was necessary, to the Public Service. The practice was that each auditor had a district assigned to him, and went on circuit twice a year—at Michaelmas and Lady Day—when the accounts were made up. The time required for the discharge of an auditor's duty under the Poor Law would, as a rule, be from four to five months. Parliament itself had imposed on the auditors certain further obligations; and, in virtue of these obligations, the officers referred to also audited the school board and local board accounts in the districts to which they belonged. No salary had been fixed in the latter case; and for the present the auditors were allowed to accept fees, which, of course, could not be paid into the Exchequer unless corresponding sums were allowed in the shape of salaries. He hoped that by-and-bye the whole of the remuneration would be paid by way of salary; and no persons would be better pleased with that than the auditors themselves; because they experienced at present, in many cases, great difficulty in recovering fees from school boards. With regard to the supply of lymph for the purposes of vaccination, it was essential to satisfy the public mind that the lymph furnished to the vaccinators was of the best possible quality; and he had to state that the whole of the public vaccinators came
  1642
  to the Local Government Board for the lymph which they needed for the purpose of the primary vaccination which the law required, but not for re-vaccination, or for the vaccination of the general public. The whole of the lymph sent out from the Office for the purpose of primary vaccination was subjected to a most minute microscopical examination; and, wherever the slightest impurity was discovered, the matter was at once rejected. Complaints had sometimes been made by private practitioners that there was a difficulty in obtaining supplies of lymph; but it ought to be recollected that it was not the duty of the Establishment to furnish lymph for all classes of the community. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Whitwell) had referred to experimental investigations in Medical Science, for which £2,000 had been voted last year, and had asked whether the Report made by the gentlemen who expended that money was to be laid before Parliament? There would, in due course, be presented to the House a Report of the transactions which had taken place, under that Vote.
  MR. GRAYcomplained, that while a sum of £13,000 was expended for Medical Inspectors in England, no such sum was expended in Ireland. In England, if any infectious disease broke out, one of those gentlemen was immediately sent down to make inquiry on the subject. The result was made public, and general attention was at once directed to the matter; but in Ireland there was no such Department of Medical Inquiry. The result was that sanitary matters were very much worse in Ireland than they were in England.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, he had accidentally omitted to answer the third Question which had been put to him by the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Whitwell). He referred to the inspection and management of the roads in South Wales. He believed that the existing system in South Wales answered very well; and he should only propose a repeal of the existing Act when a better Road Measure could be proposed for the country generally.
  MR. DODSONasked, whether, in the event of the existing South Wales Act being repealed, the Inspector appointed under it would be entitled to compensation for the loss of his office?
  MR. MACDONALDsaid, there were two items of the accounts on which he should like an explanation. In the one case there had been an addition of £4,000, and in the other an addition of £5,000. No one was more desirous than he was that energetic sanitary efforts should be made to preserve the health of the people; but he thought the Committee was entitled to know whether the increase which had taken place in the expenditure was an increase in the salaries of those who were last year acting as Inspectors, or whether it was owing to the number of the officers having been increased? He also thought that some explanation ought to be given as to the large amount of travelling expenses which appeared in the Estimates.
  MR. BRISTOWEsaid, he observed that in the Engineers' Department there had been an Assistant Inspector appointed at a salary of £400 a-year. He should like to know why this additional expense had been incurred under that head?
  MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he should like to be informed as to what were the duties of the junior Legal Assistants. He thought that the salaries paid to those gentlemen were rather too high for persons who were not barristers.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTH,replying to the Questions which had just been addressed to him, said, that with regard to the point as to whether there would be any claim for compensation if the office of Inspector under the South Wales Act were abolished, he did not think there could be any such claim; but, if there were, it must be a small one. As to the salaries of the Medical Officers of Health, and the question of travelling expenses, it was quite obvious that these salaries and expenses must vary from time to time. Last year an Estimate had been taken for the former service, which had been found to be rather short. The whole of the travelling expenses were most carefully watched, and a separate account was rendered by every Inspecter on his return from his different journeys. An effort had been made to commute these travelling expenses for a fixed amount; but this had never been found to work satisfactorily. The expenses, no doubt, amounted to a large sum; but what would be the use of an Inspector, if he was not to be travelling in discharge
  1644
  of the duties which were assigned to him? As to the Question of the hon. Member for Newark (Mr. Bristowe), the appointment of an Assistant Inspector to Mr. Rawlinson had been found to be absolutely necessary on the Rivers Pollution Act coming into operation; and, with regard to the junior Legal Assistants, the appointment of these gentlemen had been made by the late Government, and was found to be necessary in consequence of the enormous mass of legal business which had to be dealt with. So far from the legal strength of the Local Government Office being in excess of what was required, he sometimes thought that further strength was needed. Hon. Gentlemen who were acquainted with the administration of that Office must be aware of what an immense mass of legal subject-matter there was to be disposed of, and how important it was that accurate information should be at the disposal not only of the Office itself, but of the numberless persons who came from various quarters seeking advice and assistance. He believed that there were no salaries better earned, or smaller in proportion to the services rendered, than the salaries of the Legal Assistants.
  MR. H. SAMUELSONsaid, the total amount for travelling expenses in connection with the Department was £16,344. That was a very large sum, and a great deal of travelling must have been done with it.
  MR. RAMSAY,with reference to an item of £35,000 for the salaries of teachers in workhouse schools, said, he thought there should be a corresponding grant in favour of the education of the poor in Scotland, where there was much difficulty in providing for the education of the children of parents who might not be thought by the Parochial Board so poor as to render it necessary that the education of their children should be paid for from the rates. He hoped that when the Education (Scotland) Bill was before the House, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be prepared to insert a provision making a corresponding grant in aid of education in Scotland. The Boards of Guardians in Scotland were in the habit of refusing to pay the children's fees from the rates, although the law said they might do so. If £7,000 or £8,000 were distributed for that purpose in Scotland, it would be most beneficial;

  1645
  and, so long as money was so given in all other parts of the United Kingdom, he thought Scotland was entitled to claim the same consideration from the House. It would be a step in the right direction. He agreed with a remark which had been made—that, instead of providing for the perpetuation of workhouse schools, it would be better to educate the children in the schools most convenient for them, the Guardians, of course, retaining their guardianship over the children. He felt sure that if this amount of assistance were given to education in Scotland from Imperial Funds, the State would, in the long run, be the gainer.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHpointed out to the hon. Member who had last spoken, that the only amount granted, or proposed to be granted, under the Vote now being considered, was to apply to children in workhouse schools, who were necessarily inmates of the workhouses, and who had to be maintained, as well as educated, out of the rates and under the management of the Poor Law Guardians. It had been found convenient to have a certain number of Inspectors appointed in view of this state of things.
  MR. RAMSAYthought there could be no mistake on the point. In the Estimate a certain sum was set apart for the payment of Poor Law School Teachers, and there was no corresponding grant for Scotland; which was the very thing of which he complained on behalf of the Scottish poor. In Scotland, the Poor Law Guardians refused to make any grants in aid of the children of the poor, unless the parents were so poor as to be virtually paupers. In England, grants in aid were made from the Imperial Funds. All he asked was that Scotland might receive grants similar to those given to England and Ireland. The amount asked for was small; but, if granted, it would remove a sense of wrong which was strongly felt.
  SIR WALTER B. BARTTELOTwished to say a few words in reference to workhouse schools, the education given in which could not be compared with that given in other elementary schools set apart for the children of the poor. He had, on former occasions, called the attention of his right hon. Friend to this point; because he thought it monstrous that if the State educated the children of the poorer classes, an infe-
  1646
  rior education should be given to those who had the misfortune to be the occupants of workhouse schools. In most of the workhouse schools the class of education given was inferior, owing mainly to the inferiority of the teachers, to that afforded in public elementary schools; and, in other respects, with which he would not then detain the Committee, the system pursued was far inferior. He commended this matter to the further consideration of his right hon. Friend, who, he believed, had already some intention of dealing with it, if they might judge from a provision which he had inserted in the County Boards Bill with reference to schools in workhouses. It would be well, in the case of workhouses where the number of children was small, to educate them in schools outside the workhouses, so as during a short, but highly important, part of their lives, to remove them from direct contact with workhouse life and its influences. Pauper children were necessarily poor helpless creatures, and those who had charge of them were bound to see that the best possible course should be taken to arm them for the battle of life when they left the workhouses. At present, he feared it was too much the custom of the Guardians to get the education of pauper, children seen to at the lowest possible rate, with results which no one of right feeling could possibly approve.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, he understood that in Scotland no obligation was laid on the workhouse or parochial authorities to provide schools for the children; and it was in face of that fact that the grants were made in England and Ireland where demands of the kind were made. With regard to what had fallen from his hon. and gallant Friend behind him (Sir Walter B. Barttelot), he was bound to admit that in many workhouses the education of the children was, of necessity, inferior to that given in the public elementary schools; but he could not admit that the observation or the admission were of universal application. On the contrary, it was not unfrequently complained that children in workhouse schools were over educated as compared with those in the public elementary schools. In those workhouses where the number of children was small, it was difficult, almost to impossibility, to keep up a thoroughly

  1647
  efficient school system; and, in those cases, there was a growing disposition on the part of the Poor Law Guardians to send the children to the parish schools, though it must be remembered that the Guardians were not only responsible for the education of the children, but also for the care and maintenance of them out of school hours. This made the subject one not very easy to be dealt with; but, at the same time, he was free to admit the importance of encouraging the creation of district schools, and it was with regard to that fact that he introduced into the County Boards Bill a clause to enable the county authorities to provide such schools for workhouse children.
  MR. RAMSAYsaid, there was no obligation in Scotland upon the parish authorities to provide schools within the workhouses for the education of the children; but they had to educate such children as came under their care, and this they did by sending them to the common public schools. He quite agreed with the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for West Sussex (Sir Walter B. Barttelot), that this was a plan preferable to that of educating the children within the walls of the workhouses, in that it could not fail to exercise an elevating effect upon them. The fact that this step was in contemplation was an argument in favour of his contention that Scotland was as well entitled to receive grants in aid of the education of pauper children as either England or Ireland. He hoped the Government would insist upon the parochial authorities seeing carefully to the education of the children.
  MR. MACDONALDthought the confession contained in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board was the most satisfactory, and, at the same time, the most painful, explanation that could have been offered of a state of things which everyone must deplore. He knew, from personal inquiry and observations, that certain occupations were at the present moment being flooded with children from workhouse schools who were almost useless, from the poor education they had received, as compared with children who had passed through the public elementary schools. He sincerely hoped the right hon. Gentleman would proceed
  1648
  in the direction he had indicated, and raise the standard of the education given to children who had the misfortune to belong to the pauper class.
  MR. O'CONNOR POWERsaid, he should be glad to know the ages at which boys and girls in workhouses were taken out of the schools and put to work? There were farms attached to many workhouses, and it often happened that the boys were sent out to work in the fields at a very tender age. The results mentioned by the hon. and gallant Baronet the Member for West Sussex (Sir Walter B. Barttelot) and the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Macdonald) might arise from the fact that the children in workhouses were not allowed to be at school for so long a time as the children in public elementary schools, and were not due to the inferiority of the education given.
  MR. PARNELLwished, before the hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury replied, to say a word or two on the question of vaccination—a question with regard to which it appeared to him that neither the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board nor the Medical Profession had, as yet, realized their position. He had often thought that much of the agitation got up against vaccination was due to the neglect, on the part of the Government authorities and the Medical Profession, to procure pure lymph for use in vaccination; and he was sorry that the right hon. Gentleman had given no indication that he had as yet come to view the question in its proper light. Last Session the right hon. Gentleman said he was directing his attention to the question of vaccinating with lymph taken direct from the calf; but, on the present occasion, he had said no single word as to the progress he had made in his examination of the subject. He had told the Committee something about microscopical examinations of lymph, having probably, although he did not say so, given up the question of the calf as unsatisfactory; but he feared that any microscopical examination would be equally useless with the inquiry which the right hon. Gentleman set himself to make a few years ago, and the result of his investigations generally into the question of vaccination. He (Mr. Parnell) knew but little on the sub-

  1649
  ject; but he believed that small-pox was propagated from the human subject, and that neither microscopical examination nor chemical analysis could prove clearly whether lymph contained, or did not contain, any of the germs of disease which anti-vaccinators ascribed to it. The only way of getting a pure lymph, was by seeing that its original source had not been contaminated in any way during the progress of the lymph through its various stages and changes, and through the bodies of the persons upon whom it had been used. He did not know whether this could be done; but, if it could not, vaccination, to his mind, stood condemned, notwithstanding the number of benefits that might be said to have been derived from it.
  MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he had no doubt that, under the present system of compulsory vaccination, an immense amount of disease might be propagated by means of lymph that was apparently pure. Only a few weeks ago, the Allgermeine Zeitung, a newspaper published in Augsburg, published an account of a very remarkable case, which was tried in the Law Courts, as a result of the use of diseased lymph. The facts were, that about a year and a-half ago, some 18 school children were vaccinated by a public vaccinator in the ordinary manner, with lymph taken from an apparently healthy child. The result was, that every one of the children was attacked by a most deplorable disease, and were left in most wretched case. Various attempts were made to have the matter thoroughly investigated, but without success, and the parents at length brought an action against the public vaccinator. The trial took place, and resulted in an acquittal, on the ground that the lymph might be diseased without the public vaccinator being able to detect the fact. He, therefore, hoped the Government would pay more attention to this question than they appeared to have given up to the present; and, if possible, to see that only lymph taken direct from the cow or the calf should be used.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  Resolutions to be reported To-morrow;
  Committee to sit again To-morrow.

  CUSTOMS AND INLAND REVENUE BILL.
  (Mr. Raikes, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson.)
  [BILL 146.] THIRD READING.
  Order for Third Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."—(Mr. Raikes.)
  MR. RITCHIErose for the purpose of moving that the Order for the third reading be discharged, and that the Bill be re-committed, in order to amend it, so as to establish a difference of 2s. per lb. between the duty on unmanufactured tobacco and cigars, instead of 1s. 10 d. as provided by the Bill. He regretted that he was obliged to trouble the House again on this question, as he had already had opportunities of raising a discussion upon it on two previous occasions. When he brought the question under the notice of the House before, he had hoped that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be influenced by the representations he made on the subject. But, although he must thank the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the courteous manner in which he had invariably received his representations, yet he regretted to find that the right hon. Gentleman had not yielded to his appeal. If he had had the opportunity, on previous occasions, of taking the opinion of the House on the subject, he should not have thought himself at liberty again to trouble the House with it; but, in consequence of a private Member not being able to move any Resolution which would have the effect of increasing taxation, he had hitherto been unable to take the opinion of the House. This Amendment, however, was drawn up in such a way as to enable him to do so, and he would endeavour to lay his arguments as clearly as possible before the House. In the year 1863 a re-settlement of the tobacco and cigar duties was made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone), who, after full inquiry, established a difference in the duties on unmanufactured tobacco and cigars. The relative duties which he introduced, were 3s. 1⅘;d. on unmanufactured tobacco and 5s. on cigars, leaving a margin between the two duties of 1s. 10⅕d. The pro-

  1651
  posal made by the present Bill was that 4⅕d. should be added to the duty on unmanufactured tobacco, and that 4d. should be added to the duty on cigars. Thus, the duties would be respectively, 3s. 6d. on unmanufactured tobacco and 5s. 4d. on cigars, leaving a margin of 1s. 10 d.—the margin which was deemed sufficient under the plan of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich. But what was a sufficient margin on 3s. 1⅘d. and 5s., was obviously not sufficient when the duties were raised to 3s. 6d. and 5s. 4d. The exact ratio, to correspond with the increase of duty, was 3s. 6d. and 5s. 6d., as proposed by his Amendment. If that Amendment were carried, then it would be the duty of the Government to increase in Committee the duty on cigars by 2d., leaving the duty on unmanufactured tobacco the same as they now proposed. He was afraid it would be necessary for him to trouble the House at some length, because this would be the last opportunity he should have of presenting his case; and it was also, he regretted to say, a matter of figures to some extent. He understood that the position taken up by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on this matter was that he had no desire to interfere with the basis fixed by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich in 1863; that on that basis the manufacturers of cigars were only prejudiced to the extent of about one-third of 1d. per lb. by the proposal of the Government; and that the stalks were now worth 4d. per lb. more than they were in 1863, which would more than compensate the manufacturers for the loss they sustained in other respects. As to the basis of 1863, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had himself stated in the House that the calculations of the right hon. Member for Greenwich were very carefully made. They were discussed at great length, not only in that House, but in all parts of the country. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer said he accepted the basis established in 1863. Well, he (Mr. Ritchie) was also prepared to accept and to argue upon that basis. He maintained that that basis ought not to be disturbed, until after full inquiry by some tribunal which would hear all the parties who were interested in this matter. He was not surprised that the Chancellor of the
  1652
  Exchequer proposed to rest his case on the basis of 1863; because, if the right hon. Gentleman had done otherwise, he should have been able to quote from a speech delivered by him in 1863, and show that even at that period the right hon. Gentleman objected to the settlement which was then made, because sufficient inquiry had not been instituted; and, if he was not mistaken, the right hon. Gentleman voted for the proposal brought forward by Mr. Ayrton, to the effect that before the duties were fixed, the subject should be investigated by a Committee of that House. The cigar-making trade now courted such an inquiry, because they believed they would be able to show that the settlement of 1863 was not in their favour, but against them, and too much in favour of the foreign importers. Whatever might be the result of the division which he should take that night on his Amendment, he would suggest to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that a Committee of the House should, before the next Budget, inquire into the subject, and see whether the basis fixed in 1863 was satisfactory or not. It was desirable for him to point out that, in the opinion of many people, in 1863, the basis then established was one which told against the manufacturers of cigars in this country. From the report in Hansard, he found that, in a discussion in that House, Mr. Ayrton said—
  "He accepted the principle that there was to be a duty equivalent to that imposed upon the imported article, and that there was to be a surcharge by way of compensation for the increased expense put upon the English manufacturer by reason of his working a highly-taxed commodity under a most oppressive system of combined Customs and Excise; but he denied that the application of that principle in the present instance was either just or honest towards the English manufacturer and English workman."—[3 Hansard, clxix. 1613.]
  The hon. and learned Member for Sheffield (Mr. Roebuck) also said—
  "In this town 10,000 persons were employed in making cigars, and he was told that the effect of the plan of the right hon. Gentleman would be to bring the home maker of cigars into unfair competition with the foreign maker, as the former worked with an article paying a very high duty, while the latter worked with an article which paid no duty at all."—[3 Hansard, clxix. 954.]
  He would now adduce a still higher authority. The right hon. Gentleman

  1653
  the present Chancellor of the Exchequer said, in the course of the same debate—
  "If the reduction (so as to allow of foreign cigars entering into competition with English) went too far, they might be injuring the English manufacturer, without benefiting, but rather injuring, the Revenue."
  And the right hon. Gentleman went on
  to say—
  "The Chancellor of the Exchequer had told them that it was necessary to make a distinction between the manufactured and the unmanufactured article, in order to place the British producers on a fair footing with foreigners; but the question whether the protection given was adequate could not be discussed properly in a Committee of the Whole House without further inquiry."—[Ibid. 985.]
  He thought these quotations showed generally, that there was some ground for doubting whether the settlement which took place at that time was sufficiently favourable to the English manufacturer to enable him to compete in our own market with the foreign manufacturer. He might also point out, that from the other point of view the settlement had certainly secured one of the desired results, inasmuch as it had enabled German manufacturers to send their cigars into this country, and to compete with the English manufacturers. Before 1863 there was no importation of German cigars at all; but, since 1870, the following were the figures:—573 cases were imported in 1870; 1,060 in 1871; 1,555 in 1872; 1,969 in 1873; 1,986 in 1874; 2,381 in 1875; 2,980 in 1876; and 3,118 cases in 1877. All these importations were from Germany. It was evident, therefore, that if one of the objects of fixing the ratio of these duties in 1863 was to secure competition in our markets, and enable foreign manufacturers to sell their cigars here, that end had been attained. They ought, surely, to take very great care, in putting any additional duty on tobacco, that the condition under which the English manufacturer had been competing with his foreign competitors should not be altered so as to tell more against the English manufacturer than the settlement of 1863 did. He should prove, presently, that although the Chancellor of the Exchequer had expressed a desire not to interfere with the basis of 1863, he did actually propose very seriously to interfere with it, and to interfere with it without a full and proper inquiry—
  1654
  a course which the right hon. Gentleman deprecated so strongly in 1863. The right hon. Gentleman told the House, when this matter was last discussed, that the manufacturer was not more than one-third of a penny worse off than he was before the imposition of the new duty. This was not the first position which had been taken up in the matter by the right hon. Gentleman. The first position taken up by the right hon. Gentleman was, that if they added 4d. per lb. all round, the manufacturers would be in exactly the same position as before. But the second position which was taken up now—namely, that the manufacturer was only damaged to the extent of one-third of a penny, was as erroneous as the first contention. What he proposed to do was to take from Hansard the exact figures and examples given by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) in 1863, and to compare them with a calculation at the new rate of duty on exactly the same basis. By means of this comparison, he should prove that under the proposed new system the manufacturer would lose not one-third of a penny but 1¾d. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich, when he imposed this differential duty, said he would illustrate the case of cigars by two examples. He said—
  "He would take the number of pounds of cigars which the manufacturer could make out of 100 lbs. of tobacco, and divide the total amount of duty paid, directly or indirectly, by the number of pounds of cigars made out of the 100 lbs. of tobacco, and that would give the amount of countervailing duty. Now, 100 lbs. of Havannah leaf, of a somewhat dry quality, yielded 17 lbs. of stalks, which, though not worth anything for entering into cigars, would sell for 2s. 4d. a-lb. in the market. There would be 14 lbs. of refuse and moisture from such an amount of this tobacco. Deducting 17 lbs. of stalk and 14 lbs. of refuse, or 31 lbs., from 100 lbs., there would remain 69 lbs. of cigars to be got from 100 lbs. of tobacco. Now, the duty paid, including the allowance for interest on the duty between the time when the article was imported and the time when the duty was received back from the consumer, and other contingencies, was £16 1s. 9d., deducting from that the sum of £1 19 s. 8d., the value of 17 lbs. of stalks, there remained £14 2s. 1d. Dividing this by 69 lbs. of cigars, it would be found to represent a payment in duty of something like 4s. 1d. per lb. He proposed to allow 5s., in order that the labourers who were employed, in the manufacture, amongst whom were women and children, might be well looked after."—[3 Hansard, clxix. 1619.]

  1655
  This left a margin of 11 d. per lb. Following precisely the same lines, he (Mr. Ritchie) would now state the result of the calculation at the new scale of duty. The duty paid, including allowance for interest, on 100 lbs. of tobacco, would be £17 17 s. 6d. Deduct from that the sum of £2 5s. 4d., the value of 17 lbs. of stalks at the increased rate of duty, and there remained £15 12 s. 2d. Dividing this by 69 lbs. of cigars, it would be found to represent a payment in duty of something like 4s. 6¼d. The proposed new duty on cigars was 5s. 4d., thus leaving a margin to the manufacturer of 9¾d., instead of 11 d. per lb. under the old rate of duty; or a disadvantage, as compared with the previous settlement—which the Chancellor of the Exchequer said he had no desire to disturb—of 1¼d. per lb. on this comparatively dry tobacco. Let them now take the other example given by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) in 1863—
  "He would now take the extreme example of Havannah tobacco. This might be stated to contain about 23 per cent of moisture.…. 100 lbs. of this leaf contained 23 lbs. of moisture, 18 lbs. of stalks, and 2 lbs. of refuse, smalls, and waste. It followed that there were 43 lbs. to be deducted from the 100 lbs., which left 57 lbs. of cigars to be got out of the 100 lbs. But then the 18 lbs. of stalks sold for 2s. 4d. the lb.; and, making the calculation and allowances as before, the result showed that the duty which the manufacturer paid on 57 lbs. of cigars was £13 19 s. 9d., or 4s. 10⅞;d., or say, in round numbers, 4s. 11 d. per lb."—[Ibid. 1620–1.]
  The result of the calculation on the new basis was as follows:—The duty paid, including allowance for interest, would be £17 17 s. 6d. Deduct the 18 lbs. of stalks at increased duty, £2 8s., and there remained £15 9s. 6d. Divide this by the product of cigars—57 lbs.—and it would be found to represent a payment in duty of something like 5s. 5⅛d. The proposed new duty on cigars was 5s. 4d.; thus, on this example, there would be a balance against the manufacturer of l⅛d. per lb., instead of in his favour, under the old system, of l⅛d. per lb.—being, in comparison with the old system, a difference of 2¼d. per lb. against the manufacturer. Thus, on the first example, he lost 1¼d. per lb., and on the second example, 2¼d., or an average of 1¾d. Now, his Amendment proposed to establish a difference in the duty between unmanufactured tobacco and cigars of 2s. per lb.
  1656
  instead of 1s. 10 d. as proposed by the Bill, an increase of 2d., which would just about place the manufacturers on the same footing as they were under the old system. He would, in half-a-dozen words, state another mode of calculation which he thought hon. Members would understand. The moisture stated by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich to be in 100 lbs. of leaf was 14 lbs. on one example, and 23 lbs. on the other, or an average of 19½ lbs. The product of cigars was 69 lbs. on one example, and 57 lbs. on the other, or an average of 63 lbs. The manufacturer would now have to pay a duty of 4d. per lb. on the moisture, which on 19½ lbs. would give a loss of 6s. 6d. In addition, there was the initial loss of one-fifth of a penny on 100 lbs. of leaf, which came to 1s. 8d., and there was the loss of interest on duty, which came to 9d., making altogether 8s. 11 d. Dividing that by the average product of cigars, it would be found to give exactly 1¾d., which the manufacturer would be to the bad. He thought he had shown that his calculation was the correct one, and that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his calculation of one-third of a penny, must necessarily be wrong. He could clearly see where the right hon. Gentleman had made the mistake. He had omitted, in his calculation, to take account of any loss arising to the tobacco manufacturers from having to pay duty on moisture. The cigar importer only paid duty upon the dry cigars and not upon any moisture, whereas the tobacco importer paid duty upon the moisture. When the right hon. Gentleman made the admission that the manufacturer might be prejudiced to the extent of a third of a penny, he said—" Oh, but the stalks have risen in value since 1863 to the extent of 4d. per lb., and that will more than compensate the manufacturer for the loss." He would show that the right hon. Gentleman, or rather he presumed the Customs' authorities, who had supplied him with his figures, were also wrong in saying that the stalks had increased in value. But, even if it were otherwise, he should still maintain that what was now proposed was to interfere with the settlement of 1863, and to do the very thing which the Chancellor of the Exchequer professed he had no wish to do, and that without proper inquiry.

  1657
  With respect to the question of stalks, he would ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he thought that this duty ought to fluctuate with the changes in the value of stalks? He should presently show, however, that the ground upon which he based that assertion was not correct. But he wished to make this further observation with reference to stalks—that, seeing that this question about the stalks was not relied upon on either of the two occasions when the matter was brought before the House, or upon the occasion when he had the honour of introducing a deputation to the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the subject, he thought he was justified in saying that it was altogether an afterthought. It was clear, from the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman on the occasion when he was waited upon by the deputation, that he never took the question of stalks into his calculation. He then said—
  "Let us first of all assume that the difference was properly fixed in the year 1863. Why should there be, if it was properly fixed, any additional hardship upon the English manufacturer of cigars from adding 4d. all round? Then, of course, comes the other question, whether it was properly fixed at that time, which is a question always open to be raised, but one which I did not expect would be raised."
  Mr. Freeman, a member of the deputation, remarked "that 4d. added to 3s. 2d. was a larger percentage than added to 5s." The Chancellor of the Exchequer then said—
  "If the difference in cost between making the cigar in England and the cost of the cigar as imported is 1s. 10 d., supposing you raise the duty to 4d. on cigars, you get the 1s. 10 d. difference."
  That, the House would now see, was an entire fallacy; but he had quoted it to show that certainly the element of stalks did not enter into the right hon. Gentleman's mind at that time, and that he was under the impression that the addition of 4d. all round would leave the manufacturer in the same position as he was before. He had now shown that the calculation of the right hon. Gentleman was wrong, so far as the third of a penny was concerned, and he would also show that he was mistaken as to the value of the stalks. He was inclined to agree with the opinion which the right hon. Gentleman himself expressed in 1863, that the calculations
  1658
  of the Customs and Excise were not always to be implicitly relied upon. The right hon. Gentleman, in 1863, was reported to have said—
  "When a mistake in the calculations of the Treasury and Customs on one point was thus admitted, he thought that their conclusions might be fairly challenged on other points. The House was told that the right hon. Gentleman only wished to give fair play to the home manufacturers; but with every wish to do that, he might have made some mistake in the figures, as had been done in the instance he had just mentioned. For these reasons, he thought it desirable that the question should be considered in a Select Committee."—[3 Hansard, clxix. 986.]
  It would seem that the right hon. Gentleman was now disposed to place more faith in the figures of the Customs and Excise than he was at that time. He had said that the stalks were only worth 2s. 4d. in 1863, and that they were now quoted in brokers' circulars as worth 2s. 8d. Now, when he had brought this question before the House on the former occasion, he produced a circular from very large tobacco brokers in the City, showing that the price of stalks in April, 1863, was precisely that quoted in their last circular of April, 1878. Moreover, he had found that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich, in 1863, quoted Messrs. Grant, Hodgson and Co., as being his authority for many statements which he made. Now, he happened to have a letter from that firm, in which they stated that—
  "From April, 1863, to the time of the recent alteration of the duties, our quotations for mixed stalks generally ranged between 2s. 7d. to 2s. 8d. and 2s.8d. to 2s. 9d. per lb.—the chief exception being in 1871, when, for nine months, our quotations were 2s. to 3s. per lb. On the 1st April last, the quotations were from 1s. 8d. to 2s. 9d. per lb., at which prices they had remained for eight months without change."
  In 1863, notwithstanding that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) had information before him that the stalks were quoted in the market at 2s. 8d., he estimated them, in his calculations, as only being worth 2s. 4d., and the Chancellor of the Exchequer now, seeing that the stalks were quoted at 2s. 8d., immediately jumped to the conclusion that they had risen in price; but he (Mr. Ritchie) thought he had successfully shown that that was not the case. The question was why the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich

  1659
  took the stalks as worth 2s. 4d. if they were worth 2s. 8d. in the market? It was impossible for anyone to say what was present in the mind of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich; but he (Mr. Ritchie) had no doubt whatever that the right hon. Gentleman had very good grounds for estimating the value at 2s. 4d., although that did not apply to all the statements the right hon. Gentleman made. Seeing that the right hon. Gentleman was in correspondence with large brokers in London, and seeing that the question was discussed all over the country, there was no doubt that he had very good reason for making the margin of 4d. per lb. upon the price of stalks, as quoted in the market. There was one thing which might have induced the right hon. Gentleman to make that difference. There was an article of refuse in the manufacture of cigars called "shorts," and the right hon. Gentleman made no allowance whatever in his calculations for these. Therefore, he (Mr. Ritchie) was led to suppose that he might have had that in his mind when he made the difference in the price of stalks compared with the market price of the day. At any rate, it was no part of his duty to prove that the right hon. Gentleman's calculations in 1863 were correct. If he (Mr. Ritchie) proved—and he contended he had—that there had been no advance whatever in the price of stalks since the calculations made in 1863, he maintained that no difference should now be made in any of those calculations without full and proper inquiry—an inquiry where all interested could represent their case. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the Bill before the House, proposed to alter the position of the English manufacturers of cigars—a position occupied by them for many years—to the extent, at least, of 1¾d. per 1b.; and, that being so, he would be giving the foreigner an advantage to that extent over the home manufacturer. The last time the question was before the House, the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to make a concession to the English manufacturer. There was a portion of refuse in the manufacture of cigars on which "drawback" was allowed; but this question of drawback could not be entertained, unless the stuff was ex-
  1660
  ported. The consequence was that this stuff had to be exported to the Channel Islands, or to Hamburg, and destroyed, in order to get this drawback, and a cost of about 30 s. a-ton had to be incurred for exporting. The Chancellor of the Exchequer now proposed to relieve the manufacturers to that extent, by destroying the stuff at the Custom House free of charge; but that relief was infinitesimal. This subject was one on which he (Mr. Ritchie) felt he could appeal to both sides of the House. It was not a question of Party, but simply one of justice to the home manufacturers—whether they were to be loaded with additional duties to the extent of 2d. per lb., as compared with the Continental manufacturer, and thereby imperil their large trade. All that was claimed was that the settlement of 1863 should not be disturbed, or certainly not without a full and fair inquiry. What the Government proposed was to disturb the settlement of 1863, not in favour of the public, but in favour of the foreigner. When the matter was last before the House, and when every hon. Gentleman who spoke, with one exception, strongly advised the Chancellor of the Exchequer to yield the proposition which he (Mr. Ritchie) made, the right hon. Gentleman said that no doubt hon. Members had been in correspondence with their constituents, and that in some cases it was a constituents' question; but the Government had the consumer to consider in the matter. So far as constituents were concerned, he (Mr. Ritchie) acknowledged it was his duty, in any case where his constituents were injured, if their complaint was founded on justice, to bring the subject before the House. At the same time, he must say, however strongly he might be urged to represent a constituents' grievance, he would not do so if the proposals would be unfavourable to the country generally. The hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Fawcett) had also urged the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give way upon this question of tobacco duties; and he was sure the hon. Member, who enjoyed so high a reputation as an admirer of free trade and as an exponent of the true principles of political economy, would not have imperilled that reputation by advocating anything which was in any way of the nature of protective duty in favour of our home manufac-

  1661
  turers. But yet, if he were not much mistaken, he believed the hon. Member for Hackney would again be found advocating the cause he (Mr. Ritchie) had brought before the House. The Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke about the consumer. He (Mr. Ritchie) would like to know where he was injured. How was the consumer injured if 6d. a-lb. was added to an article worth from 10 s. to 50 s. a-lb., when 4d. was added to tobacco worth 4s. a-lb.? Could they be said to injure the consumer by adding 6d. a-lb. to a very expensive article, when they added 4d. to tobacco sold at 4s. a-lb.? He hoped they would hear nothing more about the consumers of cigars; but there were consumers of the necessaries of life who, if this trade were destroyed in London, would lose their employment and bread, and those were the consumers for whom he pleaded. He spoke strongly upon this question, because he felt strongly. To his constituents this matter was one of vital importance, because it was a question as to whether the trade should continue in the land or not. They knew in the East End of London the effects likely to be suffered by unfair foreign competition, as already shown in the sugar refining trade. It was but a few short years ago since the East End of London was covered from one end to the other with large sugar refineries, employing many thousands of hands and hundreds of thousands of capital. What had become of that capital, and of those employed in the refineries. The capital had been entirely lost, and employment had been taken from thousands of persons. He trusted the House of Commons would prevent such a result taking place with regard to the tobacco trade, and not allow it to be utterly destroyed, as it might be if the Bill of the Chancellor of the Exchequer passed in its present shape.
  MR. SAMUDAseconded the Motion of his hon. Friend and Colleague (Mr. Ritchie), and said the matter was by no means so small a one as it seemed. Under the present Bill, there would be an entire change in the relations of the manufacturers of cigars as to the tobacco duties, compared with the arrangement made in 1863, when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) so carefully estimated the amount that should regu-
  1662
  late the duties on the manufactured and on the raw material; and he would remind the House that the importation of the manufactured article had kept on increasing from that time to this. It had been clearly shown, in the statement of the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down, that the price of stalks had not at all varied since 1863, and this was not extraordinary; for he supposed the only value they possessed at all was that obtained in the shape of drawback. True, the cigars manufactured in England were of an inferior quality to some of foreign importation, and it was a class of cigar which the hon. Members of that House might not care to smoke; yet they must consider the welfare of those persons employed in the manufacture, and be careful that the trade was not injured by the action of the Customs authorities. It was clear that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been misled—unintentionally misled, he thoroughly believed— as to the effect of this altered duty; and he appealed to him, not only as a gracious, but also as a fair act, to rectify such mistake, which, if adopted, would greatly injure the manufacturers of cigars in England. He knew that the right hon. Gentleman had one reply in reserve, and that was that he intended to change the mode of paying for "drawback." The right hon. Gentleman said, and said truly, that he would decrease the cost which manufacturers were now put to in respect of the drawback, by having the tobacco stalks destroyed at the Custom House, instead of putting them to the expense of sending them abroad. But, by such a process, the manufacturers would only be benefited to the extent of ⅛d. per lb. He hoped the House would be saved from going to a division on the question, and that, having listened to so elaborate and clear a statement from the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Ritchie), hon. Members would accept the carefully-obtained figures he had put before them, showing the radical mistake which existed in supposing that there was now any difference in the value of stalks from that existing in 1863; and that, therefore, the proposals of the Bill now before the House were untenable.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out the words "now read the third time," in order to add the words "re-committed, in order to amend it, so as to establish a differ-

  1663
  ence of two shillings per pound between the Duty on unmanufactured tobacco and cigars, instead of one shilling and ten pence, as provided by the Bill,"—(Mr. Ritchie,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, there was no doubt that this question, though not one of very great magnitude, was one of some complication, and which involved a great deal of arithmetical calculation. His hon. Friend the Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ritchie) had given, in a very clear form to those who took the trouble to follow him, the calculations upon which he rested his case, and he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) was bound to say that with regard to nearly the whole of those calculations he had no fault to find. His hon. Friend took the calculations which were made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) in the year 1863; he took the same figures, and he altered them to apply to the present rate of duty which was proposed under the Bill now before the House, and he derived from that comparison the conclusion that the difference in the duty on the cigars imported from abroad and the cigars manufactured at home would be 1¾d. per lb.—that the duties on the home manufactured cigars would be increased by 1¾d. in consequence of the changes made. He was not prepared to dispute the fact that he had made out a case; but, on the other hand, he wished to compare the propositions of his right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich with the actual state of the case as it would stand if the Bill before the House should be adopted as it now stood. His right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich went through a series of calculations, in order to ascertain at what point he ought to fix the duty on foreign cigars in order to give adequate protection and do justice, and no more than justice, to the manufacturer at home; and he made the calculation in this way—he took certain qualities of tobacco, and he ascertained as best he could what quantity of cigars could be made out of 100 lb s. of tobacco, and what the duty upon 100 lb s. of tobacco was. Then he took the quantity of
  1664
  cigars made out of the 100 lb s. of tobacco on which duty had been paid, and he endeavoured to calculate how much the manufacturer could make out of the residue, calculating the price which he would get either by disposing of the stalks or by the drawback upon the stalks; and, having made that deduction, and then having ascertained what the total amount was which the manufacturer would have paid as the net result for duty on the cigars produced, he divided the result by the number of pounds of cigars which could be made out of 100 lb s. of tobacco, and so he found what the cost of the duty was on 1 lb. of cigars, and he considered what the difference ought to be between that and what was charged. In the first place, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich took the case of tobacco which would yield 69 lbs. of cigars for 100 lbs. of tobacco; and he arrived at the conclusion that, after allowing all the duty paid on the 100 lbs., and after deducting the value of the stalks which remained, the charge against the British manufacturer should be 4s. 1d. per lb.; and then, fixing the charge against the foreigner at 5s. per lb., he left the British manufacturer with a difference of 11 d. in his favour. The right hon. Gentleman considered that an adequate sum to leave, and that it would be sufficient to compensate the British manufacturer for all the loss and all the inconvenience to which he might be put in carrying on his manufacture at home. That was the system upon which the trade had been carried on for the last 15 years, and certainly it had not been injured thereby. His hon. Friend the Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ritchie) said the measure had produced the result which it was intended to produce, that it had allowed of the importation of a considerable quantity—and an increasing quantity—of foreign-made cigars, and that was perfectly true. But it was also true, that while the foreign cigars had been imported, as it was intended they should be, and as it was desired they should be, in order to provide a healthy competition against the British manufacturer, it was also true that the quantity of unmanufactured tobacco which had been consumed in this country had also largely increased; and there was no evidence whatever to show that the

  1665
  cigar-making business in this country had been a sufferer, or that it had in any sense suffered, in consequence of that change. Well, then, taking the case, and looking at the same quality of tobacco as that which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich took into his calculations—the 69 lbs. of cigars made out of 100 lbs. of tobacco—he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had endeavoured to estimate what, in the present state of things, as proposed under the Bill before the House, would be the position of the British manufacturer. And by following out that calculation, he arrived at precisely the same result as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich intended to arrive at by the settlement which he made in 1863. That was to say, taking the price of the article and deducting the charge recovered for the stalks, he found the difference would be exactly 11 d. on the pound. What was the explanation of that? because there was undoubtedly a difference between the circumstances which existed in 1863 and what would exist to-morrow, if his Bill passed. The whole thing depended on the difference in the price of the stalks, and that was the point upon which attention must be concentrated. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich rested his calculation upon the value of the stalks at 2s. 4d. per lb.; in the calculation he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had made, the value of the stalks—and he ascertained that from the prices of the day—was taken at 3s. per lb. His hon. Friend had said that it was not easy to understand why the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich should have taken the price at 2s. 4d., when, in fact, it was quoted at 2s. 8d. He (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) was not able to explain that; but he certainly did say that the price was now taken at the figure that he had stated, and that, taking the calculation, upon that figure, the result was arrived at of a difference of 11 d. in favour of the British manufacturer. It appeared to him obvious that, previous to the settlement of 1863, the advantage that was given in the shape of drawbacks was really not one that entered into the consideration of the question. The effect of the drawbacks now given had been to make that valuable, which formerly was thoroughly valueless, because
  1666
  everything in the nature of stalk was capable of being ground into what by courtesy was called snuff, and a drawback was allowed upon it, whatever its value might be; and, in many cases, it appeared that the substance, as so presented, before the system of drawbacks, was of no value at all. That was proved by the fact that the manufacturer to whom it belonged found that the best thing to do with it was to incur all the expense and trouble of sending it across the sea, either to the Channel Islands or to Hamburg, there to be destroyed. That, no doubt, had given a fictitious value to the stalks, and the result had been that the manufacturer had gained a considerable amount of advantage from the arrangement. Well, he proposed to make that real which had hitherto been fictitious. In point of fact, with regard to much of this offal, it might be said that the Government, in giving the drawback as they had done, had been giving compensation to the manufacturer, and he proposed that that should be done without rendering the circumlocution necessary of sending it abroad at considerable expense. That was the real state of the case. The proposal of his hon. Friend (Mr. Ritchie) was one that would not, of course, be injurious to the Revenue. On the contrary, it would lead to an increase of duty; but it was one that he did not think it was desirable that they should adopt. It seemed to him that the matter was of very small moment, and he did not believe that it really could make the smallest practical difference to the home manufacturer. They might hope that the addition to the duty would not be for ever and ever; but he believed that the settlement the Government had proposed was a better settlement than that suggested by his hon. Friend, as being one that made the addition to the duty simple and uniform. He trusted that the House would support him in maintaining the lines of the Budget as it had been voted. It would be very inconvenient, indeed, to make changes in its arrangements, and he did not see really that any practical case had been made out for taking such a course. There was, no doubt, a small addition made to the difference, or rather a small diminution made in the difference, which had existed of late years between the duty on the foreign cigars and on the British

  1667
  manufactured cigars; but, on the other hand, the difference which he proposed now to establish would be exactly that which was intended to be established by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1863. Therefore, while regretting very much that it was not in his power to accede to the proposal of his hon. Friend, he hoped the House would support him in maintaining the Budget in its present form.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 184; Noes 82: Majority 102.—(Div. List, No. 114.)
  Main Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time," proposed.
  MR. DILLWYNsaid, he understood there were many hon. Members who, on this Motion, wished to address the House at some length upon a very important point; and he, therefore, begged to move that the debate be now adjourned.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Dillwyn.)
  MR. ASSHETON CROSSthought the Motion of the hon. Member for Swansea (Mr. Dillwyn) was one which the House would not assent to. It was only 10 minutes to 12 o'clock, and there was ample time to discuss any question which could fairly be raised. He must impress upon the House, in view of the debates that were pending, the necessity of taking the third reading of the Bill at the present time.
  SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLsaid, he had a Motion upon the Paper with regard to this Bill which the Forms of the House would not allow him to move; but he must say that he had hoped that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, upon a candid consideration of the whole matter, would have thought it right to concede its substance. The ground upon which he had founded his Motion was simply that it was right and necessary that they should make due provision for honestly paying their way, and finding Ways and Means to pay the expenses for the year. If this Bill had been one of several Money Bills which would come before them, he should not object to proceeding with it that night; but upon this
  1668
  measure their whole Ways and Means for the year were founded, and if they passed it that night they would put themselves out of court—they would have no further taxation to fall back upon. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had told them that they were not to burden posterity with the expenses of this year, but that they were honestly to pay their way. That was all he asked the right hon. Gentleman to do. It had now become known to the House that they were to have heavy Supplementary Estimates for certain military charges which were not mentioned in the Budget Statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman said the other night that he told the House there would be Supplementary Estimates. That was true; but he had also told them at the time what those Estimates were to consist of, the result being, from his own showing, a Supplementary Estimate for certain specified military charges which might amount to £1,500,000. The expenses still due on the lapsed Vote of Credit were £700,000. The Chancellor of the Exchequer estimated the charge for Reserve Forces at £600,000, and for additional Navy expenses at £400,000, making the full £1,500,000 without any margin. But he (Sir George Campbell) ventured to submit to the House, the other night, that the expenses of the Indian troops before they were got back to India would be very large indeed. The Chancellor of the Exchequer could not tell yet what they would be. Nor could he (Sir George Campbell), but he ventured to repeat that they would be very large, and his humble advice to the right hon. Gentleman was that he should frame his Estimate in this way. He should take care to include every possible detail, allowing a margin for a liberal sum for contingencies; and, having done that, he advised him to double his Estimate—and, if he wished to be very prudent, to double it again. He would then, perhaps, arrive at something like the cost of the movement of their Indian troops before they got back to India. Therefore, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to follow out his own plan of honestly paying his way, he must re-cast his Budget in order to provide for this large additional expenditure, which he had in no way provided for, but left wholly outside his Budget. But

  1669
  this Indian military expenditure was not the only expenditure looming in the distance. This country was carrying on a large war in South Africa, the expenses of which must be taken into account. They had been told early in the evening that the whole of the expense was being met at present by advances from the Imperial Treasury. He would ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether he had satisfied himself that there was any security that these advances would be repaid? Apparently, the money was being spent by our Government without any authority from the Cape Legislature—that Legislature, in fact, not having been called together. Upon these grounds, he would put it to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether, in pursuance of the honourable principle which he had laid down of honestly paying their way, it was not desirable that they should delay the final passing of this Bill, and thus not shut themselves out from further resources? That would be the result of the Motion now before the House, and upon that ground he would support it.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: Sir, I am afraid that, if the Government do not give way, the only effect will be that we shall have two discussions when one only, if taken at an earlier hour, would be sufficient. It must, I think, be admitted that the Motion for Adjournment is a very reasonable one. This is the last stage of the last Bill on which the House will have an opportunity of considering the financial proposals of the Government as a whole. Those proposals have, no doubt, already been discussed fully, and at considerable length; but I wish to point out to Her Majesty's Government that all the discussions which have hitherto taken place on those proposals have taken place with insufficient knowledge on the part of the House. Since the last discussion of the proposals of the Government, a fact—a most important fact—has come to the knowledge of the House. It has certainly not been communicated to the House in any way; but it has come to the knowledge of the House that Her Majesty's Government propose to despatch a considerable Force of Indian troops from India to Malta. That will involve considerable expense, and there are two questions for the House to consider. In the first place, whether the Government were aware—as they neces-
  1670
  sarily must have been when their financial proposals were submitted—of the intention to send these troops, and whether they ought not to have included this financial charge in their proposals? The other consideration is, whether, having this knowledge, we can now pass the financial proposals of the Government as such as are adequate and proper under the circumstances of the case. I think the Government cannot but admit that these are circumstances which we have not yet had an opportunity of discussing, and which are fully worthy of being discussed by the House. It is quite impossible that the discussion can take place at this hour of the evening, and I really think the Government would save time by consenting at once to the proposal for adjournment. I will only add that the right hon. Gentleman agreed the other night to report Progress at 10 o'clock, or as near 10 o'clock as possible, with a view of having a general discussion on the Budget Resolutions. No doubt, it was not the fault of the Government, but Progress was not, as a matter of fact, reported until half-past 10, and the time which has elapsed since has been occupied in discussing a purely technical point. It is, therefore, quite impossible that questions which still remain, and which are of very great importance, can be discussed at the hour we have now reached.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: Sir, I cannot think the hour is at present too late for such a discussion as might be raised on the third reading of this Bill. If, indeed, we were in the position the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy (Sir George Campbell) says we are in—and which the noble Lord opposite seems to favour—that this is the last occasion on which a discussion of the financial proposals of the Government could take place, and if we were to accept the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy's notion, that if once this Bill is passed, there can never be, in the course of this Session, any further financial proposals, I admit that the case must be very different from what it is. But that is not at all the real state of the case. Any hon. Member who has attended to the Business of the House for the last few years must know that it is always the duty of the Government, if circumstances render it necessary to make further financial pro-

  1671
  posals, to make them. And, of course, if circumstances should arise—I do not say they will—to render it necessary for other financial proposals to be made, they will be made. But, with regard to this particular question, so far as it relates to the expense of moving the troops from India to Malta, that must be made the matter of a Supplementary Estimate, and when that Supplementary Estimate is laid before the House, it will be perfectly open to the House—and, indeed, I apprehend, the natural inclination and duty of the House—to canvass the proposals so made, not only on the merits of the particular expenditure that may be recommended, but also in reference to the general financial position of the country. The House could do that whether this Bill was passed or not, and the only opportunity in which the matter can be properly discussed, with a full knowledge of the subject, will be when we are in a condition to present a Supplementary Estimate to the House. If it were two or three, or even five, hours earlier than it is, we are not able to prepare such an Estimate of the probable expense of the movement as would enable us to make such a statement in its proper connection with the financial proposals of the year. But in the meantime, there is this Bill, which, to a certain extent, affects various interests in the country. The proposals of the Government have been, so far, accepted by the House, by the stages of the Bill having been allowed to pass; and, in point of fact, we are acting upon them—the income tax, for instance, being levied at the rate proposed in the Bill. But all that is beyond strict law, and it is very undesirable that any postponement of this measure should take place. It has been fully discussed and considered, and any further postponement would be highly inconvenient to the public service. The noble Lord has remarked that there may be a question whether, if the Government knew at the time the Budget Statement was made, that this expenditure was to be incurred, it was not their duty to state it to the House. Now, I must act frankly with the House in this matter. The Budget Statement was made on the 4th of April, and at that time the principle of bringing Indian troops to Malta had been under the consideration of the Government, and had been accepted in
  1672
  principle by the Government; but the details had not been gone into at the time. No orders had then been given, nor, indeed, until a week after the Budget Statement was made, and it would have been impossible to make any statement in regard to that matter at the time the Financial Statement was made. I may also draw attention to the construction of the Budget of this year. It was in several respects peculiar, and peculiar in this respect, that we did not attempt, in the one financial year, to bring about an absolute balance between Income and Expenditure. We proposed to provide for the ascertained deficit in the year, apart from our special military service, of about £1,500,000. We desired to provide for such Supplementary Estimates as we were then able to foresee, and we proposed to pay off as much of the loan raised for the Vote of Credit as we might be able to do out of the Ways and Means we asked for. The Estimates which I then presented were necessarily of a tentative and uncertain character; but the general result was, that I proposed to provide Ways and Means sufficient to cover the estimated deficit in the ordinary Expenditure, to provide for £1,500,000 of possible Supplementary Estimates, and to provide about £750,000 towards the reduction of the Debt, leaving a certain amount due to be paid off next year. That was altogether a Statement which was evidently incomplete, because the outcome of it must depend on the unascertained quantity of the Supplementary Estimates; and, undoubtedly, it would be the duty of the Government, in the course of the Session, to present to the House as full an account as possible of the Supplementary Estimates which were to be expected, including what the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy has referred to—namely, the expenditure at the Cape—and of any other matter on which an expenditure of money may be necessary. It will be the duty of the Government, of course, to present such Estimates as these to the House, and, at the same time, to state what proposals they have to make. These proposals will be shortly laid before the House, and will have to be canvassed, of course, freely and fully. We shall in no way shrink from the discussion of them. I think it would be for the convenience of the House—not a question merely of convenience to the Government—that

  1673
  some time should be allowed to elapse before we are called on to enter upon a discussion which, perhaps, might after all, have to be renewed again, and might last a considerable time, when we have the means of giving fuller information than we can give at the present moment. Under these circumstances, I hope the Motion for Adjournment will not be pressed; and if there are any further observations to be made, I hope we shall not be led into a full discussion of the whole of the financial policy of the Government at a moment when we have reached, as it were, the conclusion of the Budget Resolutions proper, and the Government is not in a position to give the full information which will be necessary before we can have a full and satisfactory discussion of the new points which have been raised, and the new events which have transpired.
  MR. DODSONsaid, it appeared to him that the right hon. Gentleman in his observations had furnished a very good reason why they should adjourn the debate. The right hon. Gentleman said they stood now in the position of discussing the whole financial proposals of the Government. Now, that was exactly what they wanted to have the opportunity of doing. The right hon. Gentleman added, that they would have an opportunity of discussing the movement of the Indian troops when the Supplementary Estimates were laid before them. No doubt, when the Supplementary Estimates were submitted, the House would wish to discuss them very fully indeed; but he thought the House would also wish, before parting with the Budget Bill, to have an opportunity of discussing the financial arrangements of the Government as a whole, and it was upon that Bill that they could have that legitimate opportunity. In the Budget Speech, the right hon. Gentleman stated the amount of his deficit, and the amount he intended to provide for by the taxation of the year, and he informed the House that he was prepared to leave a remanet which might amount to £1,500,000 or £2,000,000, to stand over until next year. Since that Statement was made, and since the House adjourned for the Recess, the circumstances had materially altered. They knew now that there would be a further deficit. They did not know the amount; but they knew that there would be a farther de-
  1674
  ficit, and they wished to have an opportunity of discussing the change in the circumstances which had taken place. He contended that that change was one of a very important character. The right hon. Gentleman told them now that at the time the Budget was introduced, the Government had come to a decision to summon these troops from India. Then, he (Mr. Dodson) thought the House was entitled to have a full explanation from the right hon. Gentleman, and a full discussion of the reasons which had induced the Government, knowing that that change was determined on, not to include it in the Budget of the year, nor with the analysis of the deficit the right hon. Gentleman looked forward to.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: The right hon. Gentleman is not quite accurate in his statement or recollection of what I said. What I did say was that the movement of the troops from India to Malta had been decided upon in principle, but that the matter was under consideration at the time of the Financial Statement, and that no orders were given in reference to the matter until a week after the Budget was introduced.
  MR. DODSONsaid, that, at any rate, the movement was decided upon in fact, while the discussions on the Budget were proceeding; for the House adjourned for the Easter Recess on the 16th of April, and on the 17th it was announced in the papers in London that the troops were coming. It would appear that the matter had then been fully decided upon, because the telegram from Calcutta mentioned what regiments were coming and under what circumstances. The right hon. Gentleman himself told the House the other night that the matter had been decided some time ago. Therefore, although the matter had only been decided upon in principle on the 4th of April, still it was decided upon, as a matter of fact, while the Budget Resolutions were being discussed; and the House would require a full explanation from the Government why the expenditure was not provided for in the Ways and Means of the year. He would remind the House, in connection with the matter, of another circumstance which just occurred to his mind. On the last evening before the House adjourned for the Recess, after consi-

  1675
  dering the Budget Bill, the right hon. Gentleman proposed that the House should take the unprecedented course of passing two stages of a Money Bill in the same Sitting, although the right hon. Gentleman knew that this charge was coming, and that no explanation had been offered to the House. He regarded this movement of the Indian troops as a very serious matter. He would not enter into the question whether it was Constitutional or not; but he did say that, politically and financially, it was a very serious innovation both as regarded our position towards India and our position towards Europe. It was a serious innovation as regarded our position towards India, if it were to be understood that it was to be possible that the Government should, at the expense of India, maintain a surplus Army in India which was to be at their beck and nod, available for service in Europe; and it was a serious matter as regarded our position towards Europe, owing to greater facilities and temptations it afforded to any Government to commit the country to wars in Europe, or elsewhere, by using an Army, the men belonging to which were not voted by Parliament, and the money for maintaining which was not voted by Parliament. ["No, no!"] It very clearly was so. This would materially increase the facilities of the Government to go to war, because what would be the position? There was an Army ready, maintained at the expense of India, without the control of Parliament either as to men or as to money. The Government could bring that Army over by an order whenever they pleased; and then, by Act of Parliament, the troops having been brought out of India could no longer be charged upon the Revenues of India. The House of Commons had then no option but to pay the Bill presented to it, and it was idle to talk of its financial control. That was the position the House of Commons and the country were placed in, and he contended that it was a serious innovation, and one that, whether right or wrong, ought not to be assented to without discussion. Let it be ever so much an act of wise and great statesmanship—he, for one, offered no opinion on the point—but, at the same time, it was a great innovation in our mode of dealing with the Indian Army, and it was a matter which the
  1676
  House was entitled most fully to discuss, and to receive the fullest explanation from Her Majesty's Government why no provision was made for such a step in the Ways and Means of the year. He therefore thought it would only be graceful and fair on the part of the Government towards the House, under the circumstances, to accede to the Motion for Adjournment. He would remind the right hon. Gentleman of what was mentioned by the noble Lord the Member for the Radnor Boroughs (the Marquess of Hartington), that the right hon. Gentleman consented to report Progress at 10 o'clock, in order that there might be a full discussion upon the Bill. From an accidental circumstance, the discussion in Supply went on until half-past 10, and then the Amendment of the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ritchie) took up considerable time, and led to a division. The result was that the House had now arrived at a period when it was impossible to have a satisfactory discussion.
  MR. NEWDEGATEremarked, that early in the evening he inquired when the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer would produce his Estimate to provide for the expense of moving the troops from India to Malta? The right hon. Gentleman early in the evening was elsewhere engaged—whether in opening a debating club at Oxford or not he did not know—but the right hon. Gentleman was certainly not in his place. He scarcely thought, when important Business demanded attention, that the time of the Leader of the House should be occupied in regulating a debating club. ["Oh, oh!"] He would remind hon. Members on that side of the House that it was 25 years since he was one of those unavowed officers whose business it was to make a House, to keep a House, and to cheer their Leader when he was wrong. He wished now to call attention to that which was admitted by the Leader of the Opposition to be an innovation and an anomaly; because it was now declared by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the Government intended to make provision for the importation of Indian troops into Europe—for to say Malta was not in Europe was a geographical quibble—which had never hitherto been the case,

  1677
  there to be used and commanded as though they were a portion of the Regular Forces of Her Majesty. Under the Act for the Government of India, such powers might be exercised; but that which was unprecedented was that Her Majesty's Government should undertake to exercise that power without having previously informed the House of Commons, and obtained the sanction of the House of Commons to that proceeding, not only by the production of an Estimate, but in anticipation of such a requirement. When it was proposed that we should undertake the Abyssinian War, the Leader of the House came down and informed Parliament that it was part of the policy of the Government, for the first time in the history of this country, to use that which had always been considered the local Force of Her Majesty's great Dependency for Imperial purposes. He thought the noble Lord the Leader of the Opposition was only fulfilling his bounden duty in calling attention to the circumstances of the case. He was justified, as the Leader of the Opposition—and, therefore, as one of the two Leaders of the House—in requiring that, before this innovation should proceed further, the House should be afforded a regular opportunity of discussing the question in connection with the whole of the financial proposals of the Government. All that was asked was that the financial measures provided for in the Ways and Means of the year should be postponed until this, which was called a Supplementary Estimate, but which was treated as one of the Regular Estimates for the first time by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was submitted to the House. He hoped the Government would feel that they were not taking an unprecedented step, and he hoped the House of Commons would agree that it was an occasion on which they ought not to deprive themselves of their legitimate power to control the Expenditure of the country.
  MAJOR NOLANobserved, that two Cabinet Members had spoken in this discussion, deprecating adjournment; but English county Members had got up on the Ministerial side of the House, and their example had not encouraged the Opposition to fall in with their view. His remarks might not be listened to; but he felt it his duty, nevertheless, to make them. He was not going to raise
  1678
  any novel ground of objection to the Budget. It was an old ground taken against it, but he felt it strengthened somewhat by communication with his constituents, who approved of his resistance to every attempt of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to carry a tax which would peculiarly affect them—the tobacco tax. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in introducing the Budget, made a remark which had very much struck him. He said they had to make a choice between direct and indirect taxation, or a combination of the two. Now he wished to raise his protest against indirect taxation being applied for war purposes, until there was a sufficient amount of direct taxation imposed to make the indirect taxation equitable as between the rich and the poor. He never heard the Chancellor of the Exchequer say that the rich paid the proportion of their incomes in taxation as the poor. Not one attempt had been made to argue that the rich at present paid the same proportion of their incomes as the poor. In Ireland, the expenditure of the poor in taxation amounted to about £1 per head per annum, being about £3 or £4 for a family, and representing about 7 or 8 per cent of their incomes. The whole taxation of the rich, direct and indirect, did not exceed 3 or 4 per cent. He intended to divide the House, therefore, on the third reading of the Inland Revenue Bill—not that he objected to granting the money the Government asked for, but that he objected to indirect taxation being applied until the rich were taxed to the same extent, in proportion, as the poor.
  MR. CHILDERSsaid, that the object of the few remarks he intended to address to the House, was to show the strange anomaly of the position taken up by the Government with respect to the Supplementary Estimates of this year. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought in the Budget, he mentioned that besides the ordinary expenditure it would be necessary to provide £1,500,000 for certain additional charges, which he enumerated under five heads; and he had told them that night that the Supplemental Estimate for those charges would not be laid before them for some time to come. He had also told them that night that at the time the Budget was prepared the Government contemplated the

  1679
  sending of troops from India, and that they should have in a few days a Supplemental Estimate of the expenditure for that purpose. The Budget was thus constructed for changes for which they had not, and would not have for some time, the Estimates; but, at the same time, the Government had been contemplating an expenditure not included in the Budget, and the details of which they had been promised should be placed before them in a few days. The House could not be too careful as to how it acted in such an extraordinary state of things. After that statement made to them by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it was absolutely necessary that they should have a full opportunity of discussing the subject, and to elicit full explanations concerning it, if they wished to keep up that financial control of which the House was so jealous. Otherwise, they would go before the country as adopting a Budget of which they were not to have the details for some time; while details of expenditure were to be laid before them in a few days, which had not been included in the Budget, though it was contemplated when the Budget was laid before them. Now that question of the Indian expenditure being, or not being, included in the Budget was an extremely serious one. He would only remark that the last occasion on which troops were sent from India for war purposes was when they were despatched in support of the Abyssinian Expedition. On that occasion the same question arose as to whether the Government had taken Parliament into their confidence as early as they might have done. And what was the difference in the two cases? In the first of these cases, and speaking in "another place," the late Lord Derby, then First Minister, stated that the Government came to the decision to send the troops on the 19th of August, and that on the 21st of August Parliament was so informed. When, in the following November, the Question was asked—"Why did you not give the Estimates in detail at that time?"—the answer was—"We took Parliament into our confidence the very moment we could do so. Supply was closed, the Appropriation Act had left the House, and Parliament would have objected to being kept together longer. If Parliament had been sitting a few days longer, a Vote would have
  1680
  been taken at once; but Parliament was called together as early as it could be in the Autumn." In that case, the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, on the part of the Government, made it a great merit, and took great credit, for having taken Parliament into its confidence, within two days of its having come to that resolution, and offered the most humble apology, and solicited condonation, for not having actually obtained a Money Vote. The House was bound, therefore, to insist on satisfactory reasons being given for the high-handed proceeding now adopted; and, as this could not possibly be debated after half-past 12 o'clock, the debate should certainly be adjourned.
  COLONEL PARKERthought his hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) had fallen into an error, and that that error should be corrected. The hon. Member was wrong in saying that Indian troops had never been employed for Imperial purposes. It must be in the memory of many hon. Members there present, that in the early part of the century Indian troops were often employed for Imperial purposes. They were so employed in Egypt. Who was there that did not remember with what honour Indian troops served for Imperial purposes under Abercrombie? And, again, when Java was in the possession of the Dutch, and it was thought desirable for Imperial purposes that it should be occupied, Indian troops were for that reason landed in the Island. It was not right that it should be said, therefore, that they had not been employed for Imperial purposes; and if it were said, what he had stated should be borne in mind. Whenever the services of those troops were again needed, he had no doubt they would be rendered as freely and as efficiently as they had been before, and he hoped they would receive the reward which a generous and kind country could bestow.
  MR. NEWDEGATEasked leave to explain that he stated, not that Indian troops had never been employed by Her Majesty's Government for Imperial purposes—because they all knew they had been so employed in the China War—what he stated was, that they had never been used for Imperial purposes, whether in Africa or, he believed, in China, without a previous communication being made to Parliament.
  MR. WALTERobserved, that they had already passed an hour in discussing the question—whether they should proceed with the discussion of the Bill that night. Having sat in that House during 30 years, he might say he had always found such discussions extremely unprofitable; and he would appeal to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether it was worth while to refuse to accede to the request preferred by the Leader of the Opposition, probably with the support of the majority of Members on that side of the House. What would be the consequence? On a division, he would, no doubt, get a majority; but would he be any nearer gaining his end than if he conceded the request at once? He would find that they had only been carrying on a useless discussion, with a loss, perhaps, both of time and of temper. He did not wish to express any opinion whatever adverse to the policy of Her Majesty's Government with regard to the despatch of troops from India; but, looking at the attitude of the front bench of the Opposition, and to the general wish that there should be a fair discussion of the question, he would appeal to the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give way, as a matter of good feeling.
  MR. PAGETthought it desirable the House should understand what was the reason of their being asked to adjourn the debate. Was it because it was necessary now to discuss the principle of that movement of the Indian troops? ["No, no!"] It was not? then let them put that aside, and let that be agreed by all. Let them agree that it was a question to be discussed, but to be discussed at the proper moment, when, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer had just told them, he would be in a position to furnish them with all the details, and all the figures; and, when alone, the House would be in a position to enter into the discussion of the subject. But if they could not do that now, he wanted to know of what use was the discussion? The right hon. Member for Chester had spoken of this measure as an instance of great and wise statesmanship. ["No, no!"] Well, if he had not expressed that opinion, at any rate he had said that he could not say it was not; and he hoped that when the right hon. Member came again to the discussion of the question, he might have made up his mind on the matter. The right hon. Gentleman the
  1682
  Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers) had endeavoured to make a strong point out of the fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had stated that when he introduced his Financial Statement, the Government had, as a matter of principle, determined on this step; but, as a matter of fact, it was more than a week afterwards that any definite resolution was taken as to what was to be done. The Financial Statement must be brought forward in each year at a given time. It was impossible to delay it; and it was impossible that it could include any provision for an expenditure, the extent of which was unknown. There was, in fact, no means of dealing with this expenditure which had arisen except by a Supplemental Estimate; and was it because they were told that there was to be a Supplemental Estimate, that the whole of the Budget, and all its necessary arrangements were to be delayed until the Supplemental Estimate was brought out? He apprehended that the Budget for the present year was prepared under very exceptional circumstances; and if, from any exceptional circumstances, occasion arose for increasing the expenditure, it would have to be met by a Supplemental Estimate. There could be no reason, therefore, for further adjournment. The whole financial policy of the Government was before the House, and had been assented to by it; and as the House had agreed to the financial policy of the Government, let them settle it now, and decide on the question of the movement of the Indian troops when the Estimate relating to those troops was before them.
  Question put.
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 85; Noes 170: Majority 85.—(Div. List, No. 115.)
  Main Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time," again proposed.
  MR. HUSSEY VIVIANsaid, he had sat in the House for a quarter of a century, and had never yet moved the Adjournment of the House. If he made such a Motion now, therefore, it was not likely that it could be called a factious Vote. He must say that, in his opinion, it was most improper to attempt

  1683
  to pass the Bill that night without any discussion or any allusion to what he believed to be an un-Constitutional and illegal proceeding on the part of the Government, in bringing Indian troops to Malta without making any provision for the consequent expenditure, with no materials for forming an opinion in their possession, and with no knowledge of what was going on, they were called on to read the Budget Bill a third time at midnight. He said, decidedly, that the House should not be called on to do so. He appealed most earnestly to his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer not to press the question at that moment. When he saw the desire that the measure should not be pressed at that time, he begged of him to respond to the appeal which had been made to him, and not to press the measure that night, but to allow it to stand over, and be gone fully into on an early day. He thought the question of so much importance, that he begged now to move the Adjournment of the House.
  MR. MITCHELL HENRYseconded the Motion. As the Government had denounced it as an un-Constitutional proceeding on the part of the Leader of the Opposition, to oppose the third reading of the Budget Bill at 1 o'clock in the morning, they might be content with having made that remarkable declaration, and allow them to adjourn. The country did not know what was to come. Another friendly Force might be employed by the British Government, to come from another part of the world. They might require the services in Europe of a number of Fingoes without the consent of Parliament. That was a principle and a policy which could not be characterized in too serious terms, and which the country would be glad to see discussed. Before the financial policy of the Government became law, the House should be fully informed upon it in order that the policy of the Government might be considered from the point of view stated by the Leader of the Opposition as to the altered circumstances brought about by the knowledge of expenditure of which they had been kept in the dark. He trusted that their resistance was not going to be a mere brutem fulmen—that they were not going merely to discuss, and not to insist on their views after all. If they
  1684
  were led by the front Opposition bench as gallantly as they had been hitherto in this matter, and if they should be backed by the noble assistance that had unexpectedly come to them from the other side, they might still hope that their objections would not have been urged in vain.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn"—(Mr. Hussey Vivian.)
  MAJOR O'GORMANobserved, that if this Motion had been brought forward originally at half-past 12 o'clock, he could better have understood the course that had been taken. He certainly thought they might have continued the debate on the third reading of the Bill until half-past 12 o'clock, or even up to that moment (1 o'clock), and then have considered the question of the Adjournment of the House. It would have been perfectly competent for any hon. Member to move the Adjournment at the later hour; and, no doubt, hon. Members on that (the Opposition) side of the House would have been glad of the opportunity to speak against the third reading of the Bill. He had voted against the Adjournment and should do so again, as he considered the Government were clearly entitled to the hour that had been lost.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: I earnestly hope that the Government may, at some time or other, come by its rights, and I shall be much obliged to my hon. and gallant Friend if he will tell us by what process we are to gain them? I think, at all events, if we cannot get them at a late hour, we must consider what will be the most economical arrangement with regard to a future occasion. I am utterly at a loss to understand what is the precise object of the Motion for Adjournment, or what is the precise nature of the discussion to be raised. I cannot, however, fail to see that it is to the convenience of the House that we should accede to the Adjournment when it is desired by 85 Gentlemen, and when the Motion, after being once rejected, is again pressed. Of course, in that case, the Motion will no doubt be withdrawn; but when we agree to the Adjournment, I think there should be some understanding, after what has been said, as

  1685
  to the time to which the Adjournment is to be made; because, if I comprehend matters aright, the question is, not whether this Bill is, in itself, a proper Bill or not, but what the financial arrangements of the Government ought to have been, and what our foreign policy ought to have been? I do not quite understand how we are to discuss that question until we have arrived at such a development of the position generally as will enable us to come forward with exact statements of all the Supplementary Estimates, if any, that may be required in the course of the Session. I am prepared to agree to put down the third reading of this Bill for Monday; but I should like to know from the noble Lord opposite, and some of the Members on that side of the House, whether they think, by our placing the Bill as the first Order on Monday, they will attain their object; or, whether we shall then be asked again to adjourn the debate upon the third reading until we shall have placed on the Table a Supplementary Estimate, which we may not be able to present for some little time?
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: So far as I am concerned, I do not wish to dictate to the Government as to what time their Budget Bill should be postponed. All I desired, when I rose before to address the House, was to obtain from the Government a fair opportunity for hon. Members on this side, to consider the new information that has reached them during the last few days, and to consider its meaning before the original financial proposals of the Government are finally disposed of. I have, therefore, no objection to the suggestion of the Government that the debate should be adjourned to Monday. The Government may probably have further financial proposals to make in the course of the Session; but still, if they are in a position to submit them to the House, with the knowledge that these troops are to be despatched from India, I think the House will be prepared to discuss those proposals; and all I ask for, is that the discussion should take place at a becoming hour.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Main Question, "That the Bill be now read the third time," again proposed.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERmoved that the debate be adjourned until Monday.
  Motion agreed to.
  Debate adjourned till Monday next.

  SUPPLY.—REPORT.
  Resolutions [May 6] reported.
  First two Resolutions agreed to.
  Resolution 3.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSONtook that opportunity of fulfilling a promise he had made to the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Whitwell), by explaining that, practically, the numbers of the Supplemental Civil List clerks were identical. It had been found necessary to alter the number of clerks in one particular branch, but the total was the same as before; and, at the present moment, the salaries of some of them were below those of their predecessors.
  Resolution agreed to.
  Subsequent Resolutions agreed to.

  PUBLIC HEALTH ACT (1875) AMENDMENT (re-committed) BILL.
  (Mr. Alexander Brown, Mr. Playfair, Mr. Ryder, Mr. Joseph Cowen.)
  [BILL 144.] COMMITTEE.
  Bill considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  On the Preamble.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHproposed to make an alteration in its terms, in order to meet an objection which had been raised, that some of the words in the recital were not supported by facts. He, therefore, moved to leave out those words in order to insert these—"It is expedient to amend the provisions of the Public Health Act of 1875."
  Motion agreed to.
  Bill reported; as amended, to be considered upon Monday next.

MOTIONS.
  PARLIAMENTARY AND MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS (BALLOT PAPERS) BILL.

    LEAVE. FIRST READING.
    SIR CHARLES W. DILKE, in moving for leave to bring in a Bill to assimilate the Law of England, Scotland, and Ireland, with regard to the marking of Ballot Papers, briefly explained that its intention was to carry out a most important suggestion of a Select Committee, which sat in 1876, and of which he had the honour of being Chairman.
    Motion agreed to.
    Bill to assimilate the Law of England, Scotland, and Ireland, with regard to the marking of Ballot Papers, ordered to be brought in by Sir CHARLES W. DILKE, Sir HENRY JAMES, Mr. MARK STEWART, and Major NOLAN.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 172.]

    ADMIRALTY AND WAR OFFICE (RETIREMENT OF OFFICERS) BILL.
    On Motion of Sir HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON, Bill to facilitate improvements in the organisation of the Admiralty and War Office by the retirement of Clerks from certain of the Civil Departments thereof, ordered to be brought in by Sir HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON, Colonel STANLEY, and Mr. WILLIAM HENRY SMITH.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 169.]

    GENERAL POLICE AND IMPROVEMENT PRO- VISIONAL ORDER (PAISLEY) BILL.
    On Motion of The LORD ADVOCATE, Bill to confirm a Provisional Order under "The General Police and Improvement (Scotland) Act, 1862," relating to the burgh of Paisley, ordered to be brought in by The LORD ADVOCATE and Mr. Secretary CROSS.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 170.]

    PUBLIC HEALTH (SCOTLAND) PROVISIONAL ORDER (LOCHGELLY) BILL.
    On Motion of The LORD ADVOCATE, Bill to confirm a Provisional Order under "The Public Health (Scotland) Act, 1867," relating to the burgh of Lochgelly, in the county of Fife, ordered to be brought in by The LORD ADVOCATE and Mr. Secretary CROSS.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 171.]

    ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF DEEDS BY MARRIED WOMEN (IRELAND) BILL.
    On Motion of Mr. MELDON, Bill to remove doubts concerning the due Acknowledgment of Deeds by Married Women in Ireland in certain cases, ordered to be brought in by Mr. MELDON and Mr. O'SHAUGHNESSY.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 173.]

    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (DARENTH VALLEY) BILL.
    On Motion of Mr. SALT, Bill to confirm a Provisional Order of the Local Government Board relating to the Darenth Valley Main Sewerage District, ordered to be brought in by Mr. SALT and Mr. SCLATER-BOOTH.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 175.]
    House adjourned at half after One o'clock.