Sitting of 13 April 1891

QUESTIONS.

  THE IRISH MAILS.
  CAPTAIN M'CALMONT: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he can state the number of letters, exclusive of the American and Canadian mails, received in Ireland from England and Scotland during any one month, say March, 1891; and of such Letters, how many were addressed to persons in Belfast and the district served by that city, and in the rest of Ireland?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES,: According to the latest information possessed by my Department, the letters, exclusive of those for the United States and Canada, received in Ireland from England and Scotland numbered in one week 703,810. Of these 150,811 were addressed to persons in Belfast and the district served from that city, and 552,999 were for the rest of Ireland.

  ST. PAUL'S SCHOOL.
  MR. LAWSON: I beg to ask the hon. Member for Penrith (Mr. J. W. Lowther) whether he is aware that the Governing Body of St. Paul's School have decided to pay £15,250 (or at the rate of £3,300 per acre) for land in West Kensington, Fulham, on the advice of Mr. Daniel Watney, Surveyor to the Mercers' Company, and on the independent corroborative opinion of Messrs. C. & W. Oakley, 10, Waterloo Place; and whether he will state who are the vendors of this land, for which Messrs. Fox & Bousfield are employed to arrange the purchase?
  MR. J. W. LOWTHER: The Governors of St. Paul's School, acting, it is understood, on the advice of Mr. Daniel Watney, the Surveyor to the Mercers' Company, have applied to the Charity Commissioners for their sanction to a purchase of land
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  in West Kensington on the terms mentioned; but no opinion has been obtained by the Governors from Messrs. C. & W. Oakley, who have, however, received. instructions from the Governors to report directly to the Charity Commissioners upon the value of the land. The Commissioners have not yet received that Report. The vendors are Mr. John Leonard Tomlin, of No. 8, Old Burlington Street, solicitor, and Mr. Arthur John Campbell Gwatkin, of Dover Street, Piccadilly. The latter sells as mortgagee.

  ARMY PENSIONS.
  MR. OCTAVIUS V. MORGAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether it is a fact that all who joined the Army under 18 years of age, and have been discharged to pension, as non-commissioned officers, under the Royal Warrant of July, 1881, and subsequent Royal Warrants, have lost pension by continuing to serve beyond 21 years; whether such loss is in accordance with those Royal Warrants; and if, on inquiry, he should find that they have so lost pension, and that such loss is not in accordance with the Royal Warrants, will he cause full and immediate redress to be made them?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. E. STANHOPE,: It is not the fact that any soldier has lost pension as a consequence of serving more than 21 years; nor would such loss be in accordance with Royal Warrant. If the hon. Member can state any case in which a noncommissioned officer has so lost or is supposed to have so lost pension, I will take steps to have it inquired into.

  THE COMMON WOOD AT HOLT,DENBIGH.
  MR. G. OSBORNE MORGAN: I beg to ask the hon. Member for Penrith what is the cause of the delay in the completion by the Charity Commissioners of the proposed scheme for the management of the Common Wood at Holt, in the County of Denbigh; and when such scheme will be finally settled?
  MR. J. W. LOWTHER: The scheme for the management of the corporate

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  property (including the Common Wood) of the dissolved Corporation of Holt, in the County of Denbigh, was sealed on April 3. The reason for the delay in the establishment of the scheme has arisen from the fact that at a late stage of the proceedings a question was raised by the Office of Woods bearing upon certain rights of the Crown, affecting the corporate property to be included in the scheme.

  DELIVERY OF TELEGRAMS.
  MR. COBB: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he is aware that considerable dissatisfaction exists among persons living in country places, at a distance from any telegraph office, at the present high charges for the delivery of telegrams; whether he is aware that, having regard to the rates of wages and of horse hire in country districts, telegrams could, without loss to the Post Office, be delivered on foot at 3d. per mile, and by mounted messenger at 8d. per mile; and whether the subject has beer; or will be, considered with a view of making some reduction in the existing charges at an early date?
  MR. RAIKES: The general question of the charges for the delivery of telegrams has been more than once considered, but I am quite prepared to have further inquiry made in view of the circumstances now existing, and I shall be glad to let the hon. Member know the result in due course. He will readily understand that the inquiry will occupy some time. I should, however, say that I have considerable doubts as to the practicability of establishing a general rural delivery of telegrams at the rates suggested in the question.

  THE LOSS OF THE ROXBURGH CASTLE.
  MR. LENG: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to a statement made before the Collector of Customs at Newport by James Whitelaw, able seaman, Dundee, one of the two survivors of the crew of 24 of the steamer Roxburgh Castle, which was recently sunk in a collision, to the effect that the crew made for the lifeboat,
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  " But could not move her from the chocks, and as a last extremity got into her and waited for her to float,"
  with the result that the boat capsized and all but two were drowned; whether the boats on board the Roxburgh Castle were secured in the manner prescribed by the Board of Trade Regulations, under " The Merchant Shipping Life Saving Appliances Act, 1888," that
  "All boats required by the rules to be placed under davits are to be kept fit and ready for use, and when they are swung inboard and resting on chocks, the chocks are to be so constructed that the boat can be at once swung outboard without requiring to be lilted by the tackles, i.e. it should 'not be necessary to do. more than take the weight off the boat";
  whether he will explain what is meant by the boat's weight being taken without hauling on the tackles; and whether it is the case that, owing to the ambiguity of this Regulation, the Board of Trade officers can do nothing to secure improvement in the method of lowering boats?
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Sir M. HICKS BEACH,: My attention has been called to. the statement referred to, which is to the effect stated in the question, but it is also clear from Whitelaw's deposition that the difficulty in getting the boat into the water did not arise from any deficiency in the means provided for that purpose, but from the boat being fouled by the wreckage caused by the collision. The Board of Trade have received no Report as to the manner in which the boats on board the Roxburgh Castle were secured; but I have no reason to doubt that it was in accordance with the Regulations. The statements in the question do not quite accurately represent the Regulations. There is no ambiguity in the Rule specially referred to, and the Board of Trade officers have no difficulty in securing improvements in the method of lowering boats, if in any case they think them necessary. An official inquiry has been ordered into the loss of the Roxburgh Castle.

  PUBLIC ANALYSTS.
  DR. CAMERON: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board why, in the cases of Dr. Adams, who was nominated Public Analyst for Bolton, and Mr. Charles Henry

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  Southwell, pharmaceutical chemist, of Boston, nominated by the County Council as Public Analyst for the Holland Division of Lincolnshire, he at first refused to confirm the nominations, and afterwards confirmed them both?
  THE PRESIDENT or THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. RITCHIE,: When the appointments of Dr. Adams and Mr. Southwell were reported to the Local Government Board by the Councils by whom they were appointed, the Board did not decline to confirm the appointments, but they considered that the ' information that had been furnished. as to the qualification of those gentlemen was insufficient. When further information had been supplied the appointments were confirmed by the Board.

  COLLIERY ACCIDENT AT APEDALE.
  MR. COGH1LL: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has received any Report of the colliery accident on the 3rd April at Ape-dale, near Newcastle-under-Lyme, when ten lives were lost; whether the use of gunpowder was the cause of the explosion that occurred; and whether he will take steps to so amend the Coal Mines Regulation Act of 1887 as to prohibit absolutely the use of gunpowder in any coal mines, and to make the words of Sub-section (g) (2) of Rule 12, Section 49, the universal rule—
  " Unless the explosive employed in firing the shot is so used with water or other contrivance as to prevent it from inflaming gas, or is of such a nature that it cannot inflame gas"?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOB THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. MATTHEWS,: I have received a Report from the Inspector of the district, who informs me that there is every reason to believe that the cause of the explosion at Apedale, near Newcastle-under-Lyme, was a blown out shot of gelatine dynamite, and not of gunpowder. The circumstances of this explosion will be investigated, not only before the Coroner, but also by the Royal Commissioners on Explosions from Coal Dust in Mines, and I am informed that Professor Dixon has already visited the scene of the explosion.

  EVIDENCE OF TEETOTALERS.
  MR. M'LAGAN: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether his attention has been called to what occurred in a Small Debt Court, at Air-drie, on Friday, the 27th of March, when Sheriff Mair, the presiding Judge, is reported to have said, on a witness declaring himself to be a teetotaler, that he did not believe his evidence, because a teetotal witness always took an extreme view in cases where people who took drink were concerned; whether he has seen the letter of Sheriff Mair in defence of himself, in which he said—
  " What I did say was that their evidence was not so reliable in a question as to drunkenness as that of persons not teetotalers, who did not have such extreme and even perverted views as to whether a man was drunk or sober";
  and whether he is the same Sheriff Mair who, in the same Court in 1888, said to teetotal witnesses, giving evidence as to whether a man was drunk or not, "Go away, I do not believe you;" and, if so, how he proposes to deal with the matter?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON,: If the learned Sheriff had expressed a disbelief in the veracity of total abstainers as a class it is obvious that this would have been a wholly unwarrantable reflection on a most respectable and increasing section of the community. I am happy to find, however, that no such reflection was intended on-either of the occasions referred to. In each case the question was whether a certain individual was or was not drunk; and in the Sheriff's view the abstaining witnesses being presumably less conversant with and more critical of the habits of non-abstainers, he rejected their evidence in favour of the evidence of other credible witnesses with whom they were in conflict. It is quite probable that in the cases in question this. was a correct appreciation of the conflicting testimonies; and it is plain that the feeling which seems to have been caused by the learned Sheriff's observations would not have arisen if his view had been expressed in less absolute and pungent terms. I am happy to learn that the Sheriff has always held that in general there are no better witnesses than teetotalers; and I cannot doubt that he will see the expediency of letting this be manifest in any future judicial

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  criticisms he may find it necessary to make on similar occasions.
  MR. CALDWELL: May I ask whether the Sheriffs of Scotland are capable of being judged in this House in regard to their conduct on the Bench except by an address to the Crown?
  MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: I do not understand the question to have been asked with the view of obtaining a judicial decision, but simply to call attention to statements which have become public in the ordinary way.

  THE TRANSATLANTIC CATTLE TRADE.
  MR. J. E. ELLIS: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Agriculture whether he will lay upon the Table, as a Parliamentary Paper, the Report of and evidence given before the Commission appointed by the Canadian Government respecting the shipment of cattle; and when he expects the Departmental Committee now investigating the Transatlantic Cattle Trade to conclude its labours and Report?
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. CHAPLIN,: The Departmental Committee upon the Transatlantic Cattle Trade are now considering their Report, and I hope that their labours will be completed and that their Report will be presented very shortly. It is proposed to print with the Appendix the Report of the Canadian inquiry into the Export Cattle Trade of the Dominion. The evidence is somewhat voluminous, and I doubt if it will be necessary or desirable to print it in addition to that given before the Departmental Committee, but I will consider that point.

  CUSTOMS CLERKS.
  MR. DONAL SULLIVAN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether the representations of the so-called redundant clerks in the Customs that they have suffered undue loss through the narrowing of the chances of promotion in recent years, and through the non-fulfilment of one of the stipulations in Treasury Letters dated 20th March and 12th May, 1880,
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  have been favourably considered; and, if so, whether he can state why the scheme for amelioration has not yet been promulgated?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON,: The decision of the Treasury will very probably be communicated shortly.

  THE NEW FRENCH TARIFF.
  SIR EDWARD BIRKBECK: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether it is proposed in the new French Tariff to impose a duty upon fish of 10 francs per 100 kilogrammes instead of five as heretofore; whether, in view of the facts that the French covenanted in the Fisheries Convention of 1867 to admit British fish free of duty, and that Parliament, in pursuance of our reciprocal obligation, legislated in 1868 and admitted French caught fish free, the imposition of such [duties in France is a violation of the Convention; and whether Her Majesty's Government have endeavoured to procure the fulfilment of the Convention by the French Government?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir J. FER-GUSSON,: It is proposed to increase the duty upon foreign fish imported into France. Article 31 of the Fisheries Convention of 1867 between Great Britain and France provides that—
  " Fishing boats of either of the two countries shall he admitted to sell their fish in such ports of either country as may he designated for the purpose, on condition that they conform to the regulations mutually agreed upon."
  Full effect was given to the Convention by Great Britain by the Fisheries Act of 1868, and French fishermen sell their fish in British ports free of duty, but in France the Convention has never been put into force. The imposition of duties upon fish forwarded from England as goods is not a violation of the Treaty, but the chief subject of complaint is the failure to admit our fishermen to sell fish on any terms whatever in the ports of France, and generally the failure to give effect to the Treaty. Her Majesty's Government have repeatedly endeavoured to procure the fulfilment of the Convention in this and other particulars, but without success.

  PARCEL POST TO SPAIN AND THE CANARY ISLANDS.
  SIR J. SWINBURNE: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he will endeavour to make arrangements with the Government of Spain for the institution of a Parcel Post between this country and the principal ports of the Canary Islands?
  MR. RAIKES: Correspondence has already taken place with the Spanish Government relative to the institution of a Parcel Post with the Canary Islands, but without success. The subject will not be lost sight of so far as my Department is concerned.

  CROWN LANDS IN SURREY AND MIDDLESEX.
  SIR J. SWINBURNE: I beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works whether he will grant the House a Return of all the Crown Lands in the Counties of Surrey and Middlesex from which the public is excluded, giving in each case the acreage of these lands, and their distance from Charing Cross?
  THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (Mr. PLUNKET,: So far as any lands in the charge of the Office of Works are concerned the hon. Baronet will find all the information I can give him on the subject of his question included in Return No. 54, made to this House in the year 1888, under the heading " Royal Parks and Pleasure Gardens." The distance from Charing Cross of the various lands is not specified in the Return, but the hon. Baronet will no doubt be able to make an approximate estimate on the point himself.

  EXPLOSIONS IN SCOTCH IRONWORKS.
  DR. CAMERON: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether any decision has yet been come to as to the institution of a special public inquiry into all or any of those fatal explosions in ironworks in the Glasgow district to which his attention was called by questions before Easter?
  MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: The information in the possession of the Secretary for Scotland tends to show that there was no connection between the three explosions referred to, except that they all
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  occurred at ironworks in Scotland The propriety of ordering a public inquiry is, therefore, a question for separate consideration in each case. (1) At Blochairn the explosion was a purely mechanical one, caused by heating a closed tube containing water. Steps have been taken to prevent such an occurrence in the future, and the Secretary for Scotland sees no advantage to be gained by further inquiry. (2) At Messrs. Dixons' Works, the explosion occurred in a section of the works which is registered under the Alkali Act. A Report has been received from the Chief Inspector of Alkali Works to the effect that the explosion took place in the pipes or vessels used for separating ammonia from furnace gases, but was the result of accidental ignition, and not of any chemical process connected with such separation of the ammonia. It is not satisfactorily explained how the ignition was caused, but the point is not one, in the opinion of the Secretary for Scotland, which a public inquiry would be likely to further elucidate. (3) The explosion at Gart-sherrie Ironworks has, in common with the other two explosions, been the subject of inquiry through the Procurator Fiscal, but the decision of Crown counsel has not yet been announced, and the Secretary for Scotland will await that decision before pronouncing upon the expediency of holding a public inquiry.
  DR. CAMERON: I beg to give notice that I will call attention to the subject upon the Votes.

  SPECIAL ENLISTMENT.
  MAJOR RASCH: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether it is a fact, as stated in the Times of 6th April, that a boy had enlisted and is serving in the Grenadier Guards at the age of 14½, and whether this case is an example of the "special enlistment" sanctioned by the War Office?
  MR. E. STANHOPE: There is no trace of any enlistment in the Grenadier Guards at the age of 14 1/2 years, except in the cases of boys avowedly enlisted as such.

  CLERICAL ESTABLISHMENT OF PRISONS.
  MR. LAWSON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Depart-

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  ment whether any storekeeper or clerk serving in Her Majesty's prisons was called upon by him, or the Committee of Inquiry appointed by him, to give evidence or to be examined upon the question of the pay and status of the clerical establishment in connection with those prisons?
  MR. MATTHEWS: I referred the question of the pay and status of the prison clerks to a Committee of Accounts, which had originally fixed the establishment, pay, and duties of these officials, and not to the Committee of Inquiry appointed with reference to prison warders. The Committee of Accounts, consisting of a Director of Prisons, an Inspector of Prisons, and a Treasury officer, who had himself been in the Prison Service, had such familiarity with the subject that they did not think it necessary to call any clerk or storekeeper as witnesses.

  POST OFFICES IN LICENSED HOUSES IN SCOTLAND.
  MR. J. WILSON: I beg to ask the Postmaster General when the Return asked for, of the number of Post Offices in Scotland that are in licensed premises, will be laid upon the Table of the House?
  MR. RAIKES: The Return to which the hon. Member refers has been forwarded to the Secretary for Scotland to-day, and will no doubt be laid upon the Table without delay.

  POLLOKSHIELDS POST OFFICE.
  MR. J. WILSON: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he is aware that the postmaster at Pollokshields has resigned his appointment; and whether, considering the hostile public feeling to the late appointment being in licensed premises, he will avoid this in filling up the vacancy?
  MR. RAIKES: I am aware that the Receiver at Pollokshields has resigned his appointment. As I informed the hon. Member in reply to his question on the 29th January last, I have made it a practice for some years past not to appoint licensed grocers in Scotland to such situations, except in cases where the exigencies of the Service render a departure from that practice necessary; and I shall be glad if I find myself able to meet the wishes of the locality in the
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  present instance. The selection of a person to fill this office will, as the hon. Member is probably aware, be made by the Lords of the Treasury.

  VOLUNTEER TRAVELLING EXPENSES.
  MR. SINCLAIR: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether complaints have reached him that the allowance now granted in aid of the expenses of travelling for attendance at inspection and battalion drills of Volunteer Regiments whose companies are widely apart is quite inadequate to defray the actual cost of travelling to united drills for the purpose of efficiency before inspection; and whether, under the circumstances, he is prepared to recommend the payment of a larger allowance to Volunteer Regiments so situated; and as it is understood that country regiments are encouraged and expected to join brigade camps, and by doing so are debarred from receiving allowances for travelling to inspection and battalion drills, will he consider the case of those regiments which are willing to join experimentally a brigade camp, but before it takes place will have incurred the expenses for the year of travelling inspection and battalion drills?
  MR. E. STANHOPE: A change in the system of travelling allowance to Volunteers for attendance at united drills has been made, which is to the advantage of corps widely distributed, though those whose companies are only just outside the five mile radius may possibly receive less. It is not contemplated that country regiments which receive camp allowance for attending brigade camps should also earn the allowance for attending united drills, as all the instruction obtainable at the latter would be included in that given at the brigade camp. Provision is, however, made in certain cases for men who are unable to accompany their corps into brigade camp.

  SHEERNESS DOCKYARD.
  MR. HERBERT KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN: I had intended to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether there are men at Sheerness Dockyard on the books as smiths, who are really doing fitters' work , and, if so, whether they should be classed

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  as fitters; and whether arrangements can be entered into for the forgings of engines which are fitted at Sheerness being made in that Dockyard, instead of, as at present, in private yards? At the request of the noble Lord, I beg to postpone the question until Thursday.

  RAIDS BY LEWIS COTTARS.
  DR. CAMERON: I have put a question on the Paper—to ask the Lord Advocate whether his attention has been called to the fact that at the trial of 12 Lewis cottars, under the Trespass Act, for raids upon Orinsay and Stimrenay, the prosecuting Procurator Fiscal was Mr. John Ross, the private agent of Lady Matheson, proprietrix, and Mr. J. Martin, tenant, of the localities in respect of which the trespass was charged; and whether, considering the repeated declarations of Scottish Law Officers in this House as to the undesirability of Public Prosecutors, where it can be avoided, being allowed to engage in private practice, he will direct regular Procurator Fiscal Mr. William Ross to act personally in any other cases arising out of the recent raids? At the request of the right hon. Gentleman, I beg to postpone the question until to-morrow.

  WRECK OF THE ARISTIDES.
  MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been directed to the wreck of the ship Aristides at Rattray Head on the night of the 5th April, in which seven out of eight men on board were drowned; whether this calamity was in great measure caused by the want of a light on Rattray Head; and whether he will now take steps to have a lighthouse erected there at the earliest moment?
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: The information at present in the possession of the Board of Trade on the subject of the wreck of the Aristides on the morning of the 6th instant, so far as it goes, appears to show that this wreck was not caused by the want of a light on Rattray Head. The Board of Trade have asked the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses to supply detailed estimates and plans of the lighthouse, the establishment of which, as I stated on the 23rd of last month in reply to a question of the hon. Member, has been
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  sanctioned. In the event of these estimates being satisfactory, the work will probably be commenced by the Northern Lighthouse Board during the present financial year.

  CROFTER EMIGRATION.
  MR. WATT: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether the sum voted by Parliament for crofter emigration has been exceeded; and whether he is aware if it is a fact that the company with which the Government arranged their scheme have recently sent out instructions to proceed against certain crofter settlers sent cut previously to recover arrears of interest and loans?
  ME. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: No, Sir; the sum voted by Parliament for crofter emigration has not been exceeded. The Secretary for Scotland informs me that the proceedings referred to in the second part of the question were not taken against any of the crofters sent out under the Government scheme; he understands that proceedings have been taken against some other settlers emigrated through the agency of the Canadian North-West Land Company; but of this, of course, he has no official information.

  THE METROPOLITAN POLICE.
  MR. CAUSTON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what arrangements are made to provide the Metropolitan Police with refreshments when on night duty; and whether it could be arranged to send round from the divisional headquarters supplies of hot tea, coffee, or cocoa?
  MR. MATTHEWS: I am informed by the Commissioner of Police that the practice is that night-duty men have a tin bottle containing tea or coffee, and heated with a small lamp which forms part of the apparatus. This arrangement was recommended by a Board of Superintendents in 1887 as the best practicable under all the circumstances. It would not be practicable to supply refreshments from head-quarters. The hon. Member may feel certain that the comforts and welfare of the men are carefully attended to by their superior officers.

  INFLAMMABLE LIQUIDS BILL.
  MR. MUNDELLA: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether it is the intention of the Government to proceed with the Inflammable Liquids Bill during the present Session?
  MR. MATTHEWS: I informed the hon. Member for East Northamptonshire on March 24th that the Government did not intend to proceed with this Bill this Session, but that I proposed to refer the subject to a Select Committee, whose Report would precede legislation.

  THE YEOMANRY CAVALRY.
  MR. LAWSON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether he can make any such statement as he promised last year as to the position of the Yeomanry Cavalry in case of mobilisation?
  MR. E. STANHOPE: No, Sir; I am sorry to say that I can make no such statement at present. The position of the Yeomanry in such a case is so closely connected with that of the Regular Cavalry that it has not yet been found possible to lay down a definite scheme.

  THE SCOTCH ROADS AND BRIDGES ACT.
  MR. ROBERT REID: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether any power is given to the burgh Local Authorities in the Roads and Bridges Act to borrow money for the making and reforming of footpaths within burghs; and whether the Commissioners of Police have power under the Rutherford Act, 13 & 14 Vic, c. 33, to borrow money for those purposes and to assess for the same?
  MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: The first part of the question must, I think, be answered in the negative. On the other hand, comparing the 210th and the 340th sections of the Act, 13 & 14 Vic, c. 33, the power in question seems to exist under that Statute.

  THE CYPRUS MAILS.
  MR. THORBURN: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he is aware that the mail which left London on 13th February last was not delivered in Cyprus until 18th March; whether it
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  was sent from Beyrout to Smyrna, and from Smyrna to Cyprus; whether the same route has been pursued with the mail which left London on 27th February; and whether, looking to the great inconvenience such delay occasions to residents in Cyprus, it is possible to make arrangements for a weekly mail from Egypt to Cyprus?
  MR. RAIKES: Complaints have-already reached me on this subject, and from inquiries made it would seem that the miscarriage of this mail was. due to some mistake connected with the French service, to which it was transferred at Alexandria. I have always considered it extremely desirable to establish a British mail service to Cyprus; but the prospective expense has hitherto deterred Her Majesty's Government from adopting this course.

  ANGLO-AUSTRIAN PRINTING AND PUBLISHING UNION.
  MR. PITT-LEWIS: I beg to ask the Attorney General whether the attention of the Public Prosecutor has been directed to the Report of the Committee of Shareholders, appointed on the 2nd March, 1891, to investigate the affairs of the Anglo-Austrian Printing and Publishing Union (Limited), from which it appears that this company asked the public for a capital of £750,000, but that, only about £99,280 having been applied for, the Directors nevertheless proceeded to allotment on this latter amount; that, although only £99,280 had been applied for, a cheque for £75,000 was immediately afterwards paid to one Mr. Horatio Bottomley for businesses agreed by him to be conveyed to the company, before he had disclosed any title to the same, and that he never, in fact, became entitled to convey to the company at all many of these; that the company never actually carried on any business at all, but yet paid to the same Mr. Bottomley further sums amounting to about £13,500 for (as he alleged) "working expenses;" that £1,116 was paid to the Directors as fees; that a dividend of 15 per cent. on the ordinary shares, and 8 per cent. on the preference shares, was declared at a Board meeting held on the 25th September, 1890; whether, from the Public Prosecutor having made any inquiry into the

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  accuracy of the above statements, or for any other reason, he can say if they are correct; and, if so, whether, having regard to the fact that the company, having never transacted any business, could not possibly have earned a dividend, but must have paid such dividends as it declared out of capital, it is proposed to take any, and, if so, what, proceedings against anyone connected with the promotion of the company; whether he is aware that a very similar state of affairs exists in the case of the Hansard Publishing Union (Limited), and whether any, and what, steps are contemplated against the promoters or Directors of that Union; and whether a voluntary or other liquidator has been appointed to wind up either of the companies referred to above; what is the name of such liquidator; and is he an independent person?
  MR. COBB: Before the hon. and learned Gentleman answers the question, may I ask him whether the attention of the Public Prosecutor has been called to the connection of the late Lord Mayor and his brother with this company; and, further, if his attention has been called to the recent proceedings in the matter of the Direct Meat Supply Company before Mr. Justice Stirling?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir R. WEBSTER,: I know nothing of the late Lord Mayor; but if the hon. Member will put a question down I will endeavour to answer it. In reply to the question on the Paper, I have to state that the attention of the Public Prosecutor has not been called to the cases referred to, nor is he able to say whether or not the statements of the hon. Member are correct in any particular. He is not at present prepared to take any proceedings in the matter. I would remind the hon. Member that tinder the Companies Acts, and particularly the Act of last Session, there are ample powers provided for the thorough investigation of matters such as those which he describes, and that it is not the duty of the Public Prosecutor to undertake such inquiries. The duties of the Public Prosecutor are regulated by statute and the rules made there-under. I would refer the hon. Member to the Return presented to Parliament this year, which was in the hands of hon. Members on March 12.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: May I ask whether Mr. Horatio Bottomley, like Mr. Harry Marks, is a Conservative candidate for Parliamentary honours?
  [No answer was returned.]

  THE CROFTER DISTRICTS IN THE WEST OF SCOTLAND.
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he is now in a position to make any statement as to the intentions of the Government with regard to public works in the crofter districts of the West of Scotland?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH,: The following statement shows what has already been done with regard to the recommendations of the Commission:—I. Steamer Communication.—Arrangements have been made for the following new or improved services from May 1 next:—(a) A larger and more powerful vessel will be placed on the Strome Ferry and Stornoway route, which is expected to perform the voyage regularly in six hours. (b) A daily service from Oban to Castle Bay and Lochmaddy, calling at certain ports in Skye and elsewhere. (c) A daily service round the Island of Mull, calling at Coll and Tiree four days a week. (d) A service from Portree to Dunvegan and Lochmaddy three times a week, calling at intermediate places and returning on alternate days. These services will involve an expenditure of nearly £7,000 a year in addition to the existing payments for the conveyance of mails. Negotiations are also in progress with a view to obtaining an improvement of the service between Shetland and the mainland. II. Piers and Harbours.— (a) A grant of £16,500 to the Harbour Trustees at Ness, in the Island of Lewis, has been sanctioned for the completion of the existing works and the construction of a new breakwater which will afford additional protection to the entrance of the harbour. (b) A grant of £2,000 has been sanctioned for the construction of a pier at Carloway, in the same island, provided that an efficient Local Authority can be constituted which will undertake to construct and maintain the work. (c) A grant of £8,000 towards the cost of erecting a pier and breakwater at Gott Bay, in the Island

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  of Tiree. The total cost is estimated at .£11,500, and the grant is to be made subject to the condition that some Local Authority or other responsible party-will construct and maintain the works and provide the remainder of the cost. (d) Subject to similar conditions, grants have also been sanctioned for the following purposes:—£3,500 for a pier and breakwater at Talmin Bay, on the coast of Sutherland, estimated to cost £5,000; £4,000 for a steamboat pier at Uig, in Skye, estimated to cost £5,500; £3,000 for a boat harbour at Skerray, on the coast of Sutherland; £3,000 for a boat harbour at Portskerra, in the same neighbourhood; £3,000 for the improvement and extension of the existing works at Scrabster. With regard to the smaller piers and boatslips referred to in the Report of the Commission, the Government are prepared to provide the requisite funds within the limit and on the terms recommended by the Commission; and legislation is being prepared to empower the 'several County Councils or other Local Authorities to undertake the necessary liabilities. The Government have also under consideration the question of a grant to afford relief to the Trustees of Lerwick Harbour, in Shetland, and for the construction of piers in Orkney. III. Lighthouses and Beacons.—Grants amounting in all to £4,500 have been sanctioned for the erection of lighthouses and beacons, provided that arrangements can be made locally for their maintenance when erected. IV. Telegraphic Extension.—The Postmaster General has been authorised to erect telegraph lines from Stornoway to Carloway, in the Island of Lewis; from Durness to Scourie, and from Lochinver to Drumbeg, on the mainland; from Dunvegan to Glendale and Waternish, and from Isle Ornsay to Ardvasar, in Skye; to Westray, in Orkney; and to Whalsay and Bressay, in Shetland. The cost of the erection of these extensions will be about £6,600, and the work will be proceeded with at once. V. Roads and Railways.—A grant of £15,000 has been sanctioned for the improvement of the existing road between Stornoway and Carloway, so as to enable fish and other traffic to pass over it with greater despatch. When this improvement is completed the road will have no gradient steeper than 1 in
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  30. Negotiations for the construction, maintenance, and working of one or other of the railways mentioned in the first Report have been for some time in progress, but are not yet complete; but I anticipate I shall be in a position to inform the House of the decision of the Government on Thursday.
  MR. CONYBEARE: May I ask from what source these large sums are to come, and whether, as money seems to be plentiful, the right hon. Gentleman will consider the propriety of giving a little grant to the fishermen in Cornwall, who have suffered considerably during the winter?
  MR. W. H. SMITH: The hon. Member will see that I have not stated to the House any proposals for assisting fishermen beyond providing piers and harbours.
  MR. CONYBEARE: We have been asking for the provision of harbours of refuge for the safety and profit of fishermen on the coast and the crews of vessels coming up Channel for a great many years. The right hon. Member for Birmingham knows that some years ago a deputation waited upon him upon this subject.
  DR. CLARK: Will there be an Estimate laid upon the Table of this House in the course of the year?
  MR. W. H. SMITH: The Supplementary Estimates relating to the matter will be submitted to Parliament this Session.
  MR. A. SUTHERLAND: Will Sutherland be in the same condition in regard to grants as other parts of Scotland? I understand that two localities in the Highlands have obtained grants on the condition that the money advanced shall be in the proportion of two-thirds of the guarantee, whereas other localities are only to have grants in the proportion of one-third of the guarantee.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: I cannot enter into a discussion in regard to other places than those which I have already mentioned, but it is quite within the power of the hon. Gentleman to raise any discussion he may desire. As regards Sutherland, I have no doubt that any assistance actually required will be forthcoming.
  DR. CLARK: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to bring in any Supplementary Estimates this Session? There

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  can be very little doubt that the money has been hitherto voted foolishly and thrown away.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: As I have said, an Estimate will be presented to Parliament in the course of the present year.

  THE IRISH FISHERY COMMISSIONERS.
  MR. MACARTNEY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the prosecution of Mr. Charles Webb, mill-owner, of Randalstown, was directed by the Inspectors of Fisheries or by the local Board of Conservators; and, if by the latter, under what authority; whether he is aware that Edward Moles, the principal witness for the prosecution, swore that—
  "He was not particularly acquainted with the habits and customs of salmon, or the working of turbine wheels;"
  whether he is aware that Mr. Webb applied to the Inspectors of Fisheries for an exemption under the provisions of the Fisheries Acts, and was informed that the matter would be considered; whether any reply has yet been made to Mr. Webb; whether his attention has been directed to the evidence as to the prejudicial effect the lattices required to be put up would have upon the working of these mills; and whether the recent prosecutions of millowners in County Antrim were undertaken with the cognisance and approval of the Inspectors of Fisheries?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,: The Inspectors of Irish Fisheries report that the prosecution mentioned by my hon. Friend was undertaken by the Coleraine Board of Conservators under the authority of the statute. The Inspectors are not aware of the general evidence given in the case. Mr. Moles is not under the control of their department. Mr. Webb did apply last month to the Inspectors for exemption, saying that he would furnish grounds for demanding it, but up to the present he has not done so. The Inspectors have no control over the initiation of prosecutions of this kind; but they deem it right to observe that they consider no exemptions from the necessity to erect gratings should be given where no injury to the water power of mills would occur if the
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  gratings were kept clear of weeds and debris.
  MR. MACARTNEY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there has been a meeting of the millowners of the County Antrim; that every mill is worked by water power, and that they defend the action of Mr. Webb?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No, Sir; I am not aware.
  MR. WEBB: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that Messrs. Hill, Woollen Manufacturers, and Messrs. Shackleton, Flour Millers, of Lucan, County of Dublin, have been served with notices by the Fishery Commissioners to erect fine wire screens in the fall of their water power; whether he is aware that the wages of several hundred hands depend upon such firms working full power; and whether he will call the attention of the Fishery Commissioners to the general injury which the carrying out of this order would inflict on the above and other industries in Ireland?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The Inspectors of Irish Fisheries report that the mills referred to are worked by turbines; that the 30th section of the Act 26 & 27 Vic, c. 114, requires that during the descent of the salmon, or young of salmon, to the sea, a grating or other efficient means to prevent such salmon or young of salmon passing to the machine shall be provided; and they point out that the requirement being limited to such descent, it is only for a short time in the spring of each year. The Inspectors further report that wire lattices have been erected in many places, which do not injure the water power when properly looked after.
  SIR T. ESMONDE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Act under which these wire screens are required to be erected was passed many years ago, and that it has not been complied with or enforced?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No, Sir; I was not aware that the Act has never been enforced.

  LAND PURCHASE IN IRELAND.
  MR. KNOX: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether any statistics have been collected of the

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  number and acreage of holdings in each county in Ireland which have been let to be used wholly or mainly for pasture, or which have been so used for the last 20 years, and of holdings in each county in Ireland on which the tenant does not actually reside; whether such statistics will be presented to the House before Clause 6 of the Purchase of Land and Congested Districts (Ireland) Bill is reached in Committee; and whether, before Clause 6 is reached, statistics and other information will be presented to the House showing the number of applications under the Land Law (Ireland) Acts which have been refused by the Land Commission on the ground that the tenancies were excepted by s. 58, ss. 3 and 4, of "The Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1881?"
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: There are no particulars in my possession of sufficient authority to warrant my laying them on the Table of the House in the shape of a Return. There has been a collection of figures dealing with Ireland as a whole, but I doubt whether they can be relied upon for each county. If the hon. Gentleman will put down a question for a later date, I will endeavour to give an answer as to the whole of Ireland. With regard to the last paragraph of the question, I am informed by the Land Commissioners that it will be impossible to give a Return in the form asked for.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: Do the figures make any distinction between fields in pasture and for grazing purposes?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No; the figures I have got do not draw a distinction. I have no reliable figures on that subject.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: Will they include the dairy farms of Munster?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I think the hon, Member had better wait until the figures are before him.
  In reply to Mr. M. HEALY (Cork),
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid: No detailed information of the kind desired has ever been attempted to be given. All that has hitherto been done has been to give a general Return.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Land Commission, in ordering the redemption
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  of head rents under Section 16 of "The Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1887," have adopted any uniform scale of price; and what the average number of years purchase has been in the case of any head rents ordered to be redeemed?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The Irish Land Commissioners report that under Sub-section 3 of Section 16 of the Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1887, the redemption price of head rents is fixed as by agreement or by arbitration, and that, therefore, no uniform scale of price exists. The Commissioners are unable to give the average rate at which such redemptions have been made; but they state that the prices appear to have ranged between 18 and 28 years' purchase of the rent.
  MR. CHANCE: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether tenants purchasing their holdings under the Land Purchase (Ireland) Acts become owners within the meaning of Schedule A of the Income Tax Act; whether any allowance is made under that Schedule for the annual instalment payable by the purchasing tenant; and whether the Government intends to propose any alteration in the law in these respects?
  MR. JACKSON: The answer to the first question is, Yes. In regard to the second, it is immaterial whether the purchasing tenant pays the whole price at once or by instalments. No allowance is made. The same practice is adopted throughout the United Kingdom.
  MR. CHANCE: Is the effect of purchasing to subject the purchasers to the payment of additional taxation?
  MR. JACKSON: The hon. Gentleman had better give notice of that question.

  THE ASHBOURNE ACT.
  MR. RATHBONE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he will tell the House what amount, up to the most recent practicable date, of the total sum hitherto advanced or agreed to be advanced, for the purchase of Irish holdings under the Ashbourne Act, has been applied to the purchase of holdings of £30 a year rental and under, and what amount to the purchase of holdings over £30; and if he will give the House the same in-

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  formation as to holdings under and over £50 per aunnm?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The Irish Land Commissioners report that it would take a considerable time to classify the cases (numbering over 15,000) in which advances have been made so as to give the particulars indicated in the question. The Commissioners, however, refer to page 10 of their last Annual Report (House of Commons Paper, No. 6,233 of 1890), in which the advances are classified according to amounts, and which might possibly be of assistance to the hon. Member in respect of the object he has in view.

  POSTAL SERVICE IN WEST CORK.
  MR. MORROGH: I beg to ask the Postmaster General if be has received a resolution, which was passed at the last monthly meeting of the Skibbereen Town Commissioners, setting forth the defective postal day service to Skibbereen and other towns in West Cork; and what attention he is prepared to give the matter?
  MR. RAIKES: The resolution has only reached me to-day. It shall receive careful consideration.

  MILITARY CHAPLAINS.
  MR. MAC NEILL: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether his attention has been directed to a resolution, supported by His Grace Lord Plunket, Protestant Archbishop of Dublin, and passed unanimously on Wednesday last by the General Synod of the Church of Ireland, demanding from the Government a general recognition of the claims of the incumbents of parishes in which military barracks are situate to act as chaplains of the troops in their several parishes; and whether, having regard to the fact that the privilege now claimed by the Protestant clergy has been accorded to the Roman Catholic clergy, he will accede to the request of the Synod of the Church of Ireland?
  MR. E. STANHOPE: There are only three stations in Ireland at which the local clergy do not officiate to the troops. At those places large bodies of men are concentrated, quite sufficient in themselves to constitute a cure of souls, and it is. therefore preferable that a com-
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  missioned chaplain under direct military control should look after the spiritual needs of each place.

  LAND COMMISSIONERS.
  MR. LEA: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland when the Return recently ordered by the House relative to the appointment of Land Commissioners will be furnished to Members?
  MR. A. J. BALEOUR: The Return referred to is being this day laid upon the Table.

  TELEPHONIC COMMUNICATION BETWEEN DUBLIN AND BELFAST.
  MR. THOMAS DICKSON: I beg to ask the Postmaster General if he is aware that Dublin and Belfast are not connected by telephone; and if he will take into consideration the urgent necessity which exists for establishing telephonic communication between these two important cities?
  MR. RAIKES: In reply to the hon. Member, I have to say that no public demand for a telephone service between Dublin and Belfast has hitherto been communicated to the Post Office; but if the hon. Member has reason to think that there is such a demand and will communicate with me, I shall be glad to give the matter my best consideration.

  ILLITERATE VOTERS IN SLIGO.
  MR. WHITMORE: I beg to ask the Attorney General for Ireland if he can ascertain, for the information of the House, what was the number of votes that were polled by illiterate voters in the recent election in North Sligo?
  MR. POWELL WILLIAMS: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can inform the House how many voters at the recent election of a Member of Parliament for North Sligo took advantage of the provisions of the law relating to illiterates; whether the number of such voters is larger than at the last contested election in 1885; whether he has any reason to believe that many electors in Ireland declare themselves to be illiterates who are, in point of fact, able to read the ballot paper and to mark it for themselves; if

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  so, whether such action on their part is a contravention of the spirit of the Ballot Act; and whether, in that case, any steps can be taken to prevent hereafter a misuse of the privileges conferred by that Act?
  MR. WEBSTER: Before the right hon. Gentleman replies, I wish to ask a further question of which 1 have given private notice. I wish to know whether, at the said North Sligo election, it is the fact that owing to the large number of illiterate voters who presented themselves at one time the forms for illiterate voters ran short, and that the polling booth had to be closed for a considerable time; whether some who presented themselves as illiterate voters had no right to do so; and whether frequent discussions did not arise between the agents of the two candidates which removed all the secrecy of the ballot as to certain voters?
  MR. SPEAKER: I think the question of the hon. Member ought to have been submitted to me, or put upon the Paper in the ordinary way.
  MR. WEBSTER: I beg to give notice that I will put it to-morrow.
  MR. KNOX: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the large majority of the votes of illiterates were given in favour of Alderman Dillon, the candidate supported by the Tory Party?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: In answer to the questions on the Paper I have to say that according to the documents returned by the Sheriff at the proper office, the number of persons who voted as illiterates at the recent election at Sligo was 1,366 out of a total of 5,754. The corresponding figures for 1885 were 1,070 and 5,988, so that the proportion in 1891 was both absolutely and relatively higher than five years ago. This does not agree with the unofficial statement which appeared in the Press, and I am making further inquiries into the matter. I have no material for coming to a decisive conclusion as to whether fraud was practised by any of the electors or not. According to the Census of 1881, the percentage of illiterates to the whole male population is somewhat larger than the proportion of persons who voted as illiterates is to the total number of persons who polled. These are the facts. Arguments on both sides
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  can be deduced from them, and I cannot offer to the House anything in the nature of a conclusive verdict.
  MR. SEXTON: I think it will be useful to know whether during the last decade the proportion of illiterates has increased or diminished in the various polling districts of the county.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I presume the information can be obtained if the hon. Member desires to have it, and will put a question down upon the Paper. I have not got the information with me. Seeing the additional educational advantages now provided, the proportion of illiterate voters ought to have diminished.

  DUBLIN SCIENCE AND ART DEPARTMENT.
  MR. MAC NEILL: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, with reference to the case of Mr. Mullen, technical assistant in the Science and Art Department, Dublin, who was promoted (and officially informed of his promotion) by the Lord President of the Council to a new post of assistant, created in the Department of Science and Art in consequence of a Treasury Commission and with the sanction of the Treasury, under the provisions of Clause 7 of Order in Council 4th June 1870, if he can explain why the Civil Service Commission and the Treasury subsequently withdrew their sanction to the application of the said clause on the ground that, as Mr. Mullen was within the limit of age, 30 years, for public competition, he must take part in the competition for the assistantship, Mr. Mullen being over 29 years of age, a Master of Arts of Trinity College, and having filled for seven years his former post to the satisfaction of the Department, and why Mr. Mullen was not apprised of the fact that he must compete for the post to which he had been appointed till the examination had been held; and whether, having regard to the hardship of the case, the Treasury will be able to modify their decision and to lay upon the Table of the House the Correspondence relating thereto?
  MR. JACKSON: I will make inquiry into the matter. The responsibility rests with the Civil Service Commission.

  ATTACK ON A PRISON WARDER.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether it is a fact that a warder named Fitzmaurice, in the Mountjoy Convict Prison, Dublin, was, on the 8th April instant, murderously attacked with a heavy iron bar by a convict of whom he was in charge, and that his life was saved by a prisoner named Daly; and whether Daly's action will be rewarded in any way?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The General Prisons Board report that it is a fact the warder mentioned was attacked, but it does not appear that the prisoner Daly rendered assistance.

  CORK COURT HOUSE.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Attorney General for Ireland whether an Act of Parliament will be necessary to enable the Cork Court House to be rebuilt without delay; and what steps the Government propose to take in the matter?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN,: The subject is under the consideration of the Government at the present moment.
  MR. M. HEALY: When will the right hon. and learned Gentleman be able to give more definite information?
  MR. MADDEN: As early as possible. I only received a communication upon the subject yesterday.

  RELIEF WORKS IN WEST DONEGAL.
  MR. ARTHUR O'CONNOR: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland what steps, if any, have been taken to start relief works in Ranafast, Ranomona, and Loughnanoran, in West Donegal; whether he is aware that there is much fever in these districts; and what means of subsistence there are for the 783 inhabitants from this time till June, and for the women and children from June till the return of the wage-earners from the Scotch harvest in August?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURwas understood to request that the question should be deferred.

  THE LABOUR COMMISSION.
  MR. CONYBEARE: I beg to ask the First Lord of
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  the Treasury whether, in view of the very widespread public interest taken in the questions referred to the Royal Commission on Labour, the desirability of forming and educating public opinion upon them, and the impossibility of the evidence becoming generally useful unless published de die in diem as the Commission proceeds, he will advise Her Majesty to command that the sittings of the Commission be held with open doors?
  MR. FENWICK: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, having regard to the evidence given before the Lords' Committee last year, as to the extent of the evil of sweating in the cabinet making, upholstering, clothing, and boot and shoe trades, and the fact that there are 10 employers of labour on the Commission to seven Representatives of labour, he will advise Her Majesty to consider the advisability of adding additional names representing the industries concerned?
  MR. W. H. SMITH: The Commission was constituted so as to secure, in the judgment of Her Majesty's Government, a full and complete consideration of all the important questions to be submitted to them. It is not contemplated that every trade and every grievance shall be represented, and it must be obvious to the hon. Member and to the House that if the Commission were largely increased, as it would have to be if the suggestion of the hon. Member were adopted, the probability of a satisfactory result from its deliberations would be considerably diminished. As to the question of the hon. Member for Camborne (Mr. Conybeare), I have to say that whether the Commission will sit with open doors or not depends entirely upon the discretion of the Commissioners themselves. The Government will not interfere, and it has not interfered with the full discretion of the Commissioners in such matters.

  THE BUDGET.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he can now state on what day the Budget will be taken; and will he state when the Papers relating to the extraordinary expenditure under the Naval Defence Act, and the manner in

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  which that expenditure has been made, will be presented?
  MR. GOSCHEN: The Bridget statement will be made on Thursday week. With regard to the second question of the right hon. Gentleman, the figures which he desires are already in type; and I hope they will be in his hands in a very few days—certainly in good time for the Budget.

  SCOTTISH FORESHORE RIGHTS.
  MR. KEAY: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether he is aware that Messrs. Alexander Wood, James Flett & Sons, Murdo Morrison, and others, fish curers, who hold portions of waste and uncultivated land within 100 yards of high-water mark on the foreshore at Castlebay, Island of Barra, for which they pay a yearly station rent, and on which they have built sea walls, curing stations, and landing stages at great cost, have received from the agent of the landowner notice to quit on 1st May next, no compensation being offered for the disturbance or for the large outlay which they have incurred; whether he is aware that the notices of removal were not served till after these fish curers had all engaged boats and crews for the forthcoming fishing season at bounties of £50 per boat, the result being a large additional loss to them if they have to quit their stations; whether he is aware that the reason for serving the notices is that these persons, while willing to pay the rent of their stations, have refused to collect from the fishermen certain fees charged by the landowner for net drying done by the fishermen upon the foreshore, which fees they have discovered constitute an illegal demand on the fishermen, which, if made, would subject them to heavy penalties; and whether it is in accordance with the law of Scotland that a landowner can expel these persons from their stations at two months' notice under the circumstances stated without any compensation for disturbance and for the loss of all their outlay?
  MR. J. P. P. ROBERTSON: I have received a mass of information about this question, both as it originally stood on the Notice Paper and as it stands at present, with the result that almost every single statement or suggestion is
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  said to be more or less inaccurate. I am the more inclined to believe that these denials are well founded, because several of the persons named by the hon. Member disclaim all sanction of or sympathy with those statements. But the whole subject matter of the question is purely one of private right and contrast, and it does not fall within my duty to express any opinion on the subject.

  FRIENDLY SOCIETIES IN FRANCE AND BELGIUM.
  MR. HOWARD VINCENT: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if any Reports have been received from Paris and Brussels as to the State contribution and guarantee towards voluntary provision for old age among the people through Friendly Societies (Sociétés de Secours Mutluels); and, in the contrary case, if he will cause inquiry to be made on the subject?
  SIR J. FERGUSSON: We have received no Reports, but we have a copy of the Report made by the Select Committee of the French Senate to that body upon the Bill in regard to Friendly Societies, which I shall be happy to show my hon. Friend. Reports will be asked for at Paris and at Brussels as to the law and practice in France and Belgium, if my hon. Friend will move for them.

  THE EMBASSY AT CONSTANTINOPLE.
  MR. W. LOWTHER: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether it is true that Mr. Curwen, honorary attaché to Her Majesty's Embassy at Constantinople, had lately died there of typhoid fever; whether there have of late years been frequent oases of typhoid fever at the Embassy at Constantinople; and whether he contemplates having a Report made upon the sanitary condition of the Embassy?
  SIR J. FERGUSSON: The lamented death of Mr. Curwen was due to typhus fever, not typhoid. As regards the sanitary condition of the Embassy, the system was reconstructed in 1878, and all discharge-pipes removed to the exterior of the building. In 1883 a thorough and independent examination was made, with the result that the efficiency of the sanitary arrangements

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  was found to be thoroughly satisfactory. Since then further improvements in ventilation have been introduced. Though there is, therefore, no reason to attribute Mr. Curwen's death to any defect in those arrangements, instructions will be given to have the pipes and drains tested.

  LORD STALBRIDGE AND THE COMMITTEE OF SELECTION.
  MR. SEXTON: I beg to ask the right hon. Baronet the Member for the University of Oxford a question of which I have given him private notice. It relates to a published correspondence which has been read by many hon. Members with surprise and great dissatisfaction. It was published in the Times of Friday last, and the correspondence has passed between Lord Stalbridge, Chairman of the London and North-Western Railway Company, and the right hon. Baronet. A Joint Committee of both Houses was constituted for the purpose of considering the question of railway rates, and five Members of the House were nominated by the Committee of Selection. I have no complaint to make of the right hon. Baronet's action or of that of the Committee of Selection. The right hon. Baronet commands the respect of all Parties in the House. Judging from the facts, I should say that both the right hon. Baronet and the Committee of Selection have in this matter rightly vindicated the liberties of Members of the House of Commons. But an attempt has been made to influence the Committee of Selection, and I wish to ask the right hon. Baronet whether it is admissible, or in accordance with usage, for a Member of the House of Peers to interfere in the internal economy of the House of Commons in regard to the functions of the Committee of Selection. I should like to know also whether it is admissible, or in accordance with usage, that a gentleman in the position of Lord Stalbridge, a promoter of a Bill to be considered by a Committee, should endeavour to influence the Chairman of the Committee of Selection. In his letters Lord Stalbridge objects to three hon. Members who were nominated to serve on the Committee of the right hon. Baronet—Mr. Colman, Mr. Hunter, and
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  Mr. T. Dickson, who were nominated to serve in place of Mr. Colman, who voluntarily withdrew. But from a passage in one of the letters the public would infer that Mr. Colman had been discharged from attendance in consequence of the letter of Lord Stalbridge. I wish to ask whether it is not the case that Mr. Colman first learned that he had to serve on the Committee late on the night of Tuesday, March 17; that on the next day Mr. Colman communicated with the right hon. Baronet in the House and with the Committee Clerk, informing them that he was a Petitioner against one of the Bills, and therefore it was impossible for him to serve; and that the matter having been considered by the Committee of Selection, Mr. Colman was discharged? Lord Stalbridge objected to Mr. Hunter as a Member of the Committee on the ground that he had taken the side of the traders in a book which he had pub lished. It is absurd to suppose that the action of any man, either as an author, practitioner at the Bar, or Member of this House, should debar him from serving on a Committee; and I ask the right hon. Baronet to state that it is not true that Mr. Hunter has given advice to any of the Petitioners against the Bill. No statement has been made by the Committee of Selection with reference to Mr. Dickson, but Lord Stalbridge said the hon. Member was practically in the same position as Mr. Colman. I ask the right hon. Baronet to say that there is no truth in the suggestion. I ask whether the Committee of Selection has not determined to maintain Mr. Dickson in his position, and whether there is anything to prevent the hon. Member from discharging his duties in a disinterested and impartial spirit?
  SIR J. MOWBRAY: There are so many questions involved in the statement made that it is somewhat difficult, not having a paper to refer to, and having only had private notice that a question not specified would be put to me, to follow them. But I will endeavour to answer the questions as fully as I can. It seems to me that the first two questions involve considerations of Constitutional Law. As to the suggested action of Lord Stalbridge, I should say that it would be most unconstitutional if any-

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  thing of the kind occurred, but I apprehend that Lord Stalhridge acted, not as Member of the other House, but as Chairman of the London and North Western Railway Company. I do not think, therefore, that the question can be magnified into one of a Breach of Privilege between the two Houses. I am glad that the hon Member has afforded me an opportunity of stating in the House the circumstances that guided the Committee of Selection in the constitution of this Committee. On the 17th of March a Committee, consisting of five Members, was formed. One of the Members was the right hon. Member for the Epping Division of Essex. The following morning a letter was received from the right hon. Gentleman saying that he would be unable to serve on the Committee owing to the state of his health. Another of the Members, the hon. Member for Norwich sent a letter stating that he was appearing as a Petitioner against one of the Bills, and he was therefore discharged from the Committee. The action the Committee of Selection thus took was quite independent of Lord Stalhridge's letter. The hon. Member for Norwich spoke to me in the House next day after receiving notice of his nomination. I told the hon. Member then that a mistake had been made, and that the Committee of Selection had not known the hon. Member's position. The moment it was known, however, the hon. Member was discharged, and this took place before the receipt of Lord Stalbridge's letter. The hon. Member for Norwich was replaced by the hon. Member for the St. Stephen's Green Division of Dublin, who has sat for 17 years in this House, and is well known and much respected. The only possible objection in his case is that on some occasion he gave evidence before the Railway Commission that railway rates in Ireland ought to be assimilated to railway rates in England. We thus filled up those two places the hon. Member for Norwich being replaced by the hon. Member for the St. Stephen's Green Division of Dublin. The Committee of Selection thought it rather a strong measure that the Chairman of the London and Northwestern Company should address a remonstrance to us in respect to our action in this House. We have dis-
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  charged our duties to the best of our ability; at the same time, if there-were substantial reasons for questioning what we have done, we could not object to our attention being called to the facts. The Committee of Selection knew, before they adopted the name of Mr. Hunter, that he had been connected with the Board of Trade and with railway matters; but, personally, I took special means to inform myself that Mr. Hunter's connection with the Board of Trade had ceased. The hon. Member had practised as Counsel before the Railway Commission, and it does not appear that that fact should necessarily constitute a disqualification to serve on the Railway Rates Committee. The hon. Member has also published a book on railways which is, I am told, an ordinary text-book, and not containing any special views. Mr. Hunter has not sent me a copy of that book; but the Committee of Selection have had sent to them a good many books and pamphlets which it has been impossible for them to read. Indeed, it would be a very serious thing if it were regarded as a duty of the Committee of Selection that they should read every book sent to them. Hon. Members of this House, who have been desirous of being placed on certain Committees, have frequently sent books for me to read to show that before coming to this House they had distinguished themselves in connection with this or that subject. But I have never read any of them. The Committee did not purpose to send any answer to Lord Stalhridge, but, meeting Lord Stalhridge, his Lordship asked me what we had done, and I told him that we had! discharged Mr. Colman, but that we saw no reason to interfere with the nomination of Mr. Hunter. Lord Stalhridge intimated that I should hear of it again7 and I expected that a question would be addressed to me in this House. An hour afterwards I was surprised to receive a telegram from Lord Stalhridge— it was addressed to me from the House of Commons, not from the House of Lords—and said " Please send me a letter in reply to mine irrespective of conversation, Stalhridge." I sent his Lordship a guarded letter, which explained nothing more than he knew already, stating that I had no objection to repeating what I had said in the Lobby as one friend

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  speaking to another, but not as Chairman of the Committee. I told the noble Lord what was notorious—that the Committee had discharged Mr. Colman and had retained Mr. Hunter. I only wish to add that the Committee have acted throughout with absolute unanimity. For 18 years I have had the honour of presiding over the Committee, and during that time we have not had a single division, but have been one and all responsible for the selections we have made. Our duties have been growing every year; we have acted with perfect unanimity, and I trust we have discharged our duties to the satisfaction of the House.
  MR. HUNTER: I wish, Sir, by way of explanation, to add a few words in reference to a paragraph in Lord Stalbridge's letter which has not been referred to. I regret that before sending his communication to the Committee Of Selection, Lord Stalbridge did not communicate with me, because he makes statements in that letter as to which he could personally have had no knowledge whatever, and it would have been desirable on his part to have ascertained beforehand whether those statements were correct or not. Had he done this he never would have sent that letter to the Committee, because in it he stated that I had committed myself to certain definite views in the matter of railway charges; that statement is absolutely incorrect. I had expressed no opinion on these charges whatever, for the simple reason that I had not any opinion on the subject, and I have no opinion on the subject, for the equally good reason, that up to the present time I do not know what those charges are. I have not had time to study the charges nor do I know what are the points in dispute between the Railway Companies and the Board of Trade. Therefore that statement of Lord Stalbridge is founded on absolutely incorrect data.
  MR. W. B. GLADSTONE: The position of the Committee of Selection is one of very great importance, and the Committee is entitled to know whether it has the support of the House. The leader of the House in his own person is competent to give expression to the general feeling of the House upon that
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  subject, and I should think it presumptuous if I were to undertake that duty. A question has been raised in the House impugning the conduct of the Committee of Selection, and the Chairman has given the House a detailed and lucid statement which appears to have met with the decided approbation of the House. I think, on the whole, it would be desirable, if the right hon. Gentleman does not think it superfluous, that he should give expression to the sentiment of the House, as his doing so would strengthen the hands of the Committee in the discharge of their duties.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: I have no hesitation in responding at once to the invitation of the right hon. Gentleman, although any observations on my part may be considered to be superfluous. Really, Sir, I feel, after the statement of my right hon. Friend behind me that any remarks on my part would be superfluous in order to express, as far as I am concerned, and I think I may speak for the House too, the complete confidence which we all possess in the discretion and perfect fairness with which the Committee of Selection discharge their duties. It has fallen to me more than once to express this confidence on the part of the House. I should have risen at once when my right hon. Friend behind me sat down if it had appeared to me that the slightest doubt existed in the mind of any hon. Member as to the course the Committee pursued being one which would receive the unanimous support of the House. I hope my right hon. Friend behind me will feel that there is no lack of cordiality in the expression of the complete confidence which, I believe, is felt by every Member of the House.

  THE INDIAN OPIUM TRAFFIC.
  MR. M'DONALD CAMERON: I wish to ask the First Lord of the Treasury a question, of which I have given him private notice, namely, whether, in view of the result of the vote of last Friday night on the opium traffic in India, and the strong feeling which that vote manifested against the traffic, both in this House and the country, he is prepared to give effect to my proposal for the appointment of a Royal Commission to inquire into the whole subject and thereby furnish to this House

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  authentic data, which will guide its legislative action.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: I may say that, from my point of view, that proceeding is incomplete at the present moment. The hon. Baronet the Member for the Barnard Castle Division, who moved the Motion on which the vote was taken, expressed his willingness to accept the proposed addition to his Resolution, but on that proposed addendum the Debate stood adjourned. That addendum was moved by my right hon. Friend the Member for the City of London (Sir R. Fowler). But, unfortunately, no decision of the House was come to upon it. I hardly know whether it is practicable now to take a decision upon the whole question in the form in which it now stands, and in reference to the addendum moved by the hon. Baronet; but certainly the Government are of opinion that the sense of the House has not been expressed upon the whole question, and until that sense has been expressed, I do not think the Government could take any proceeding in the way of making any communication to the Indian Government upon the subject. No doubt the Government of India will take their own course upon the matter; but, as far as we are concerned, we feel that the question is not in that complete state in which we are called upon to take any proceedings.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: Perhaps, Sir, with your permission, I might be allowed to put a question to you, namely, whether it is in your power to state to the House what is the exact position of the Motion of the hon. Baronet the Member for the Barnard Castle Division of Durham, and the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of London. I see that the Motion still remains on the Paper as attached to the 16th Order of the day on the Motion for the Order for Supply in Committee. I presume, however, that even if that Order can be reached to-night the Adjourned Debate, which was not concluded on Friday night, could not be continued; and I presume that you would leave the Chair without any Question put. I desire now to ask whether the Motion to which I have referred would remain for an indefinite time attached to the Order for going into Supply; and, if not, in what form it will remain on the Order Book,
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  and in what manner it is possible, if the House desires to do so, to resume the discussion on the Motion and the Amendment of the right hon. Gentlemen opposite?
  ME. SPEAKER: In reply to the noble Lord I will state the exact position in which the matter stands. Upon the question that I now leave the Chair, which was submitted to the House last Friday, the hon. Baronet the Member for the Barnard Castle Division moved an Amendment. On a Division all the words of the Motion that I now leave the Chair were negatived, except the first word, " that;" the words of the Motion of the hon. Baronet were added, and his Motion then became the Substantive Question. To that Motion an Amendment was moved by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City, and by the lapse of time the Debate on the addition to the Motion became an Adjourned Debate. It will therefore be observed that the House passed no definite decision either on the first Amendment as a Substantive Question, or upon the Amendment which was moved as an addition to the Substantive Question, in consequence of the lapse of time. On coming to the Order I shall have again to propose the Question—the Substantive Resolution and the Amendment that has been moved to it—and, if the Amendment be carried, I shall have to put the whole Resolution with the addendum attached to it; and then the House will express its opinion upon the Substantive Motion amended by the addendum, or, if the addition of the words be negatived, on the Motion alone. If Supply is taken on Monday or on Thursday I am obliged to leave the Chair without Question put, and therefore I should not be able to propose the Question on the Resolution of the hon. Baronet the Member for Barnard Castle. If I am asked what 1 should do on Friday next I must reply that I should then have to put, not the Question of the hon. Member for Barnard Castle, but the Question that I do now leave the Chair, upon which the Amendments on the Paper specially put down for Friday would take precedence of any other Amendment. Therefore, I know not what would become of the Amendment to the Motion of the hon. Member for Barnard Castle on Friday next. But it would, of course, be open to the Go-

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  vernment to offer facilities for treating the subject as a Motion and by giving that Motion a place among the Orders of the Day on a Government night. That lies altogether in the discretion of the Government. I do not think any other question arises which I am called upon to answer.
  SIR J. PEASE: I would ask my right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Treasury whether he proposes to make that Motion that this Resolution be an Order of the Day? With the leave of the House I should like just to say that my right hon. Friend opposite has hardly correctly represented my view with regard to the Motion in the Amendment moved by my hon. Relative and Friend the Member for the City of London. I said I was quite prepared to accept the principle employed in his Amendment, but I was not prepared to accept his exact words, and I also read to the House the words I was prepared to accept as an addition to my now substantive Resolution.
  MR. J. M. MACLEAN: Before the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury replies I should like to ask him whether the Government intend to take the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City seriously? I should like to ask them if they propose to place this unjust and intolerable burden on the English taxpayer?
  MR. W. H. SMITH: The question now assumes an entirely new character, and I am not prepared to state to the House whether or not the Government are prepared to adopt the Motion of the hon. Baronet as an Order of the Day, or put it on the Paper with that object. I may state generally our view, that this Resolution is a matter which requires further consideration before it is accepted by the House. We shall on a later day state whether or not we can offer facilities to the hon. Baronet by making progress with his Resolution.

  PUBLIC ENTERPRISES IN SERVIA.
  MR. P. STANHOPE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that applications are being made for capital in the London Money Market for public enterprises in
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  Servia, founded on concessions from the Servian Government; whether it is not the fact that cases have been brought officially under the notice of the Foreign Office showing grave irregularities in the administration of justice, and total disregard of the rights of foreigners in Servia; and whether, having regard to the insecurity of property thus manifested, and the apparent unwillingness of the Servian Government to give reasonable satisfaction and protection to the just claims of foreigners, he will, in the public interest, communicate Papers on the subject to the House?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS(Sir J. FERGUSSON,: I am aware that certain enterprises in Servia, founded on concessions from that Government, are being submitted to the public here. I do not know of any case affecting British subjects, except one in which my hon. Friend is interested, in which it can be said that—
  "Grave irregularities in the administration of justice have occurred, and a total disregard of the rights of foreigners in Servia."
  Several cases have been reported in which monopolies have been conceded and cancelled during their currency, on the alleged ground that the concessionaires had failed to comply with the conditions of their contracts and had made inaccurate returns. In these cases, on the representation of Foreign Ministers, payment was made for the plant of the companies and pecuniary compensation. In the case in which the hon. Member and others are interested, and which concerns the refund of moneys advanced by them many years ago without any desire for gain, but to save the credit of the Bank of Servia, and incidentally of the Servian State—for years these gentlemen have been subjected to postponement, but in 1890 the Servian Government undertook to take the debt upon themselves. Up to this time,- I regret to say that, in spite of the constant representations of Her Majesty's-Minister at Belgrade, no settlement had been obtained. According to a Despatch just received, the Servian Ministry states that the matter will be immediately considered by the Cabinet, and I earnestly hope that, in view of its importance to Servian credit, it may be settled without further delay.

  SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).
  Sir JOHN MOWBRAY Sir JOHN MOWBRAY reported from the Committee of Selection: That they had added Mr. Coghill to the Standing Committee on Law, and Courts of Justice and Legal Procedure.
  Sir JOHN MOWBRAY Sir JOHN MOWBRAY further reported from the Committee: That they had discharged Sir James Corry from the Standing Committee on Trade (including Agriculture and Fishing), Shipping, and Manufacture; and had appointed in substitution, Mr. Macartney.
  Report to lie upon the Table.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.
  REGISTRATION OF CERTAIN WRITS (SCOTLAND) BILL [LORDS].—(No. 272.)

    SECOND BEADING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON,: This is a purely Departmental measure relating to the General Register of Sasines in Edinburgh; but it is somewhat urgent, as it ought, if the House approves, to come into operation on the 15th May. The matter stands thus: In Scotland titles in land are registered according to counties. Now, the Boundary Commissioners are at present altering the boundaries of counties, and their orders affect registration in this way—that any new titles to land which are changed from one county to another would have to be registered in the Register of the county to which those lands have been transferred instead of in the Register of the county to which they formerly belonged. It is found that the. public and the conveyancers have not become sufficiently acquainted with the Orders already made by the Commissioners, and some are yet to be made. By the 15th May, 1892, matters will be mature; the changes of boundaries as affecting all counties in Scotland will take place simultaneously, and agents will be in a position to make conveyancing descriptions easy and accurate. As certainty and security in matters of titles are matters of vital moment, we think
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    it best to postpone the date of this change accordingly, saving at the same time the validity of all writs already registered. Two minor departmental matters are also made definite, although they were scarcely in doubt—the fusion of the Registers of Orkney and Shetland, and the maintenance of the coincidence of teind titles with land titles so far as regards the county division of the Register. After this explanation I hope the House will allow the Bill to pass its Second Reading.
    MR. J. B. BALFOUR: I do not rise for the purpose of opposing or throwing any obstacle in the way of the progress of this Bill. I entirely approve of the object to be attained by it, but I wish to ask a question as to a matter germane to the Bill in regard to which a good deal of anxiety is felt, particularly among the legal profession in the West of Scotland, as to the effect of the Local Government Act of 1889 upon the existing legislation in regard to the boundaries of certain localities, and in particular upon the boundaries of the Barony and Regality of Glasgow for purposes of registration?
    THE LORD ADVOCATE: I am glad the right hon. Gentleman takes the view he has expressed as to the Bill itself. As regards the point he has raised, I have considered the question, and there is really no ground for doubt on the subject. The special Act of 1871 declares that the barony and royalty of Glasgow shall be deemed to include certain parishes, and not to include any part of another parish, which is named. By the Local Government Act of 1889, any change made by order of the Boundary Commissioners in the boundaries of, a parish, alters those boundaries for all purposes. It is thus clear to demonstration under these two Statutes that writs will be registered in the royalty of Glasgow, or not in the royalty of Glasgow according to the legal contents of the parishes at the date of the registration, and therefore, after a change by the Boundary Commissioners, according to that change.
    Bill read a second time, and committed for to-morrow at Two of the clock.

  PURCHASE OF LAND AND CONGESTED DISTRICTS (IRELAND) BILL.—(No. 111.)

    COMMITTEE.
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Clause 1.
    MR. SMITH-BARRY: I rise to propose the Amendment that stands in my name. It is one that can be very easily understood, and I do not think I need occupy the time of the House at any length. It is proposed to purchase land from the owners and to pay them in paper. The result is, that they will have to convert it into cash in the first instance so as to be able to pay off in cash their mortgages, their family charges, and any other charges there may be on the land. As far as I can understand the Bill, they will also have to pay in cash the Government charges on the land, such as the tithe rent-charge, the drainage charges, and so forth. The unfortunate proprietors may have to sell out their Land Stock at a loss for these purposes. I suppose the Chancellor of the Exchequer hopes that the Stock 'will stand at par. It may or it may not, but there is a probability that, at any rate, it will very largely fluctuate. During 1890 Consols fluctuated between 92-93 and a fraction, and 98 and a fraction, while Indian Three per Cents. during the same period fluctuated between 94½ and 101↻. We may expect that the Land Stock will also fluctuate very considerably; and if the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. Gladstone) comes into power again, the probability is that the Stock will go down very rapidly, as all Irish securities did when he was last in Office. We know that during that right hon. Gentleman's last administration the Bank of Ireland Stock went down from about 330 to 269. The landlords have suffered pretty considerably up to this. A great number of them purchased their estates under State guarantees, buying under the Landed Estates in open Court, under the authority of a Judge sitting on the Bench, and upon the understanding that the rents amounted to so much and were punctually paid. They found afterwards another set of officials coming in and reducing the rents very considerably. And this is not all, for the right of re-
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    occupying the ands has been taken away from them. This may be right or wrong, but, at any rate, it is not just to the Irish landlords, and I hope the Government will at this last moment, when the Irish landlords are going to sell out, see that they are paid in a currency which is not depreciated. The effect of paying in Stock which may considerably fluctuate will undoubtedly be that the landlord will be compelled to sell to the tenant at a higher price than he would otherwise be prepared to take. I hope that, under these circumstances, the Government may see their way to accept my Amendment.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 10, to leave out " nominal amount," and insert " value."—(Mr. Smith-Barry.)
    Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
    ME. SEXTON: I do not wish to follow the hon. Member into the irrelevant portion of his speech; but, if he is to be taken as the spokesman of the Irish landlords, those landlords have proved themselves to be a most ungrateful body. It might surely have been expected that they would have been grateful to the present Government, and not have taken up a critical attitude in reference to the Bill. Does the hon. Member forget that this is the Bill of a Government, that by its previous measures has made land in Ireland a saleable article? The hon. Member spoke as if it were in the power of the Irish landlord any day to take his land into the market and get a price for it. The landlords are told by the Bill that they will be paid for their land in a Stock which, as far as I can judge, is a better Stock than that held by the public creditors of the country—by the men or the representatives of the men who lent their money to this country in a time of need. These public creditors lent their money to the State at 3 per cent., but very recently the Chancellor of the Exchequer gave them short notice that they must accept 2 3/4. and that after 12 years more they must either accept the re-payment of their principal or be content with 2 1/2 per cent. Is it not extreme audacity that in the face of such a state of public finance a representative of Irish landlords should rise

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    and express discontent with 2¾ per cent. Stock? It must be remembered that the Irish landlords can obtain legal and financial advice, and that any landlord selling his estate will be perfectly well able to appreciate the fact that he is to be paid in Stock. He will, of course, make his arrangements accordingly. If the hon. Member's Amendment were accepted, the only effect would be to enable frauds to be committed on the tenants. The tenants are illiterate men, who have not the benefit of legal or financial advice. Suppose the case of a man selling his farm for £500. This is what will happen: The landlord would get Stock to the cash value of £500. If the Land Stock stood at 96, the landlord would, of course, get £520 worth of Stock instead of £500, and the tenant would find himself liable for the larger figure. In the same way, the tenant would have to pay 4 per cent. interest on the £520 instead of on the £500. Certainly, if the Government desire this Bill to work efficiently, they will reject the Amendment.
    THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EX-CHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,: I think my hon. Friend is under some misapprehension with regard to our proposal. We have endeavoured to propose a just measure as between the landlords on the one side, and the tenants on the other; and it must be borne in mind that this is a case in which the State is mainly concerned. We consider that we have made a very fair offer of the credit of the State, and I am sorry to tell my hon. Friend that we certainly do not see our way to accept his Amendment. One of the main reasons why we cannot do so is that we cannot pledge ourselves to grant funds for the purposes of this Bill without knowing what those funds will cost us. These operations will extend over a very considerable period of years, and no Chancellor of the Exchequer would be likely to assent to unlimited demands being made upon him for amounts which he could not foresee when he had no means of knowing how he would be able to raise money to meet them. I wish, also, to point out to my hon. Friend that the Bill is not compulsory. It would not be right that the Government should be forced to raise money, perhaps at 3 or 3½ per cent.,
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    when they receive only 2¾ per cent. on the annuities. We have endeavoured to create Stock which might fairly stand at par. The hon. Member for Belfast (Mr. Sexton) has pointed out that, while the interest on the Land Stock will be 2¾ per cent., the interest on Consols 12 years hence will be only 2½ per cent. I do not pretend that if the interest were exactly the same, the Stock would stand on precisely the same footing as Consols, because the large bulk of Consols generally places them in a somewhat better position than would otherwise be the case. We have thought that 2¾ was as far as we could reasonably go without loss, and 1 trust I have made it clear to the Committee what are the strong financial reasons why we cannot meet the view of my hon. Friend.
    SIR W. HARCOURT: Of all proposals ever made in Committee this is, I think, about the coolest. Here is " Oliver," in the shape of an Irish landlord, asking for more. The Irish landlords ask this—the very people for whom this Stock is created, which is eventually to-be more valuable than Consols, which is to be guaranteed by the English taxpayer, and over a term of 30 years at 2¾. I can scarcely find a Parliamentary term to characterise the demand. The Chancellor of the Exchequer says in a mild manner, " We have given you a Stock guaranteed for 30 years at 2¾ per cent.," but what, I ask, would be the value of that in the market to-morrow? The right hon. Gentleman knows it will be worth a good deal more than his Consols. He knows that perfectly well, and anyone familiar with the Money, Market is-a ware that Consols stand a good deal below par, very much to the disappointment of the gentlemen who, on the advice of their bankers, for 1s. 6d. were induced to believe the Chancellor of the Exchequer when they were told that they would be worth £100 or more. People who took the right hon. Gentleman's Stock when they might have had £100 can now only get £96 or £97. What is the reason of this to a considerable extent? People who are acquainted with these matters tell me it is the knowledge that these 2¾ are at a future period to fall to 2½, and people do not like Stock which is to fall in its interest value in the future. This has had the effect of making Consols a good deal less.

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    popular with investors than in former times. Now, what does the Chancellor of the Exchequer give to Irish landlords? He gives them a guarantee of 2¾ for 30 years. I do not pretend to put a value on this Irish Land Stock, but no doubt the brokers in the City will tell you how much more this Stock will be worth than Consols. Yet, with this Stock offered for their land, the typical Irish landlord comes here and moves an Amendment asking for more. It is very well that at this early stage of the proceedings we should understand both the spirit in which the Bill has been originally framed by the financial advisers of the Government and the spirit in which the Irish landlords desire to expand it.
    COLONEL WARING: I do not wish to prolong this discussion further, but I would ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to consider between this and the time when we reach Clause 7 the parallel question of less wide extent which I propose to raise by the Amendment of which I have given notice. I think he will see the reasonableness of this, which does not involve an expenditure of public money.
    MR. KNOX: I do not wish to detain the Committee on an Amendment which finds no favour, but I would observe that if during the progress of this Bill the hon. Member intends to bring forward many Amendments like this it would be better for the Government to give him his peerage at once. To adopt such a proposal would render the Act quite unworkable. The effect would be that no tenant would know what he had to pay when he contracted to buy a farm, and the Land Commissioners would not know how much of the advance could be made without fear of the farm not providing enough security. The whole Act would be rendered unworkable.
    MR. CHANCE: Under the proposal of the hon. Member for South Hunts the landlord would know the advantages of his position, but the position of the tenant is an exceedingly difficult one, because he has to pay his annuity of £4 for 49 years, and for this he receives £100 as a loan, but still he has to pay into the Sinking Fund a sufficient sum to amount at the end of 49 years to £100 cash and 4 per cent. in
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    the meantime. In exchange the Treasury floats off on him Stock worth 98½ now, and which may be worth less hereafter. Having got his £100 cash for something worth £98 10s. in the open market, there is nothing to prevent the National Debt Commissioners going into the Sinking Fund and buying up the Stock. So that really the Treasury, by issuing this Stock for £100, sweats the tenant to the extent of 30s. or 40s. That is to be dealt with by a subsequent Amendment; but this view of the case has been passed over by the hon. Member for South Hunts.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: One remark of the Chancellor of the Exchequer I take notice of, that it is the duty of the Government in this business to hold the scales evenly between the landlord and tenant. But while he thus poses before the House, the fact is these arrangements have been arrived at between the landlords and the Government, not a single Representative of the Irish Party being consulted, or even asked a question as to his view of the point. All through the winter the Irish Landlords' Committee have been holding meetings, and they have succeeded in effecting enormous changes to the prejudice of the tenant, getting the Government to cut down their Bill of last year, and bring forward this plan, and then the Chancellor of the Exchequer gets up and, in his balmiest manner, assures the Landlord Party that a Conservative Government must hold the scales evenly between them and us, between those whom he has had ear-wigging for the last six months, and the tenants who now have the first opportunity of saying a word on this point. In this state of facts, it is a very mild suggestion for the right hon. Gentleman to make. What is more, I do not believe we have got to the end of this business yet. We have had experience of the action of hon. Gentlemen opposite, and I believe that, bad as this Amendment is, it will yet be swallowed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman shakes his head; but you jump before you come to the stile. There is still the House of Lords to reckon with. We shall see the result when the Marquess of Waterford and others assemble their forces to attack the Government.

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    We have seen their influence on a Liberal Ministry, and à fortiori they have greater chance with a Tory Government. The Bill, as it stands, contains a distinct grievance to the people of this country. Yon issue this Stock at 2¾, and though I do not like to pose as a financial prophet, and do not know much about these matters, I think the effect of this coming on the market will be to depress Consols another point, for it stands to reason a man will prefer Stock at 2¾ for 30 years to Stock at 2¾ reduce-able to 2½ in 15 years. The Government by assenting to this proposal to create this Stock are making a further inroad on the pockets of confiding people who consented to lease their money out two or three years ago at the suggestion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. And now the Irish landlords are attempting further pressure. I might mark our sense of what this Amendment means by moving that the question be now put, but that perhaps would be too strong a course to take. I think the hon. Member for South Hunts and his friends would be well advised to take what they can get and make the least possible noise about it.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: I am afraid we cannot accept the Chancellor of the Exchequer as that guardian of the public purse he claims to be, because I think if he fulfilled that position we should not have this Bill at all. Allusion has been made to the astounding greed of the Irish landlords, but nothing they could ask for would surprise me, though I am considerably surprised by the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman said that this Stock was issued at 2¾ for a lengthy term of years, because it would not be so valuable as ordinary Consols, owing to it being in small quantities, I presume. Well, I ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer why we are to be done out of this ¼ per cent. The object is to get this money, and surely the primary duty of a Chancellor of the Exchequer is to issue his paper in such a way that it will produce the greatest amount. If he were issuing ordinary Consols we should be gainers not losers; if the view of the Chancellor of he Exchequer is correct that 2½ Consols are to be at par with the condition that in 30 years—
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order! The hon. Member is anticipating a later question.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: Yes, Mr. Courtney, but I was only answering the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I thought he was out of order when he was advancing his argument. The hon. Member for South Hunts was good enough to tell us that this was an Irish security, and he said if the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian were to come into office, Irish securities would fall because they did fall when last the Liberal Party came into power. Now, the only reason why this is called an Irish security is that certain Irish guarantees are attached to it; the fact is, this thing is tainted with these guarantees, and it would be infinitely better if those guarantees did not exist. I urge this upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and perhaps he will put an end to these guarantees. The right hon. Gentleman made another mistake. He said that landlords ought to have their money in cash because if Consols fell they would be losers. The reason why Consols fall is because of the general condition of the country; when the country is not supposed to be so prosperous they fall, but then all securities fall, and if you get 92 in bad times, that represents what 100 is in good times—92 would be an equivalent for securities that in bad times would pay 100. I only point this out to show that the landlords in their reckless greed do not take the trouble to look into the question, but just call out, " More, more," no matter what comes, and I believe if they were offered 200 for 100 they would clamour for 300, and there is no hope of satisfying them.
    MR. CHANCE: Is it not true that under the Ashbourne Act the tenant will have to repay to the Sinking Fund £100 for each £100 nominal Stock, and if this is not worth £100, will not the difference be a profit to the Treasury?
    MR. GOSCHEN: There will be no such profit, the £100 goes into the Sinking Fund for the repayment at the end of 49 years.
    MR. CHANCE: But cannot the National Debt come in before that time and buy in the open market?
    MR. GOSCHEN: Yes, just the same as they can buy up Consols.
    MR. CHANCE: And thus make a profit?
    MR. SMITH-BARRY: With the general feeling of the Committee against the Amendment, and with the Government opposed to it, I wish to withdraw my Amendment. [" No, no!"]
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I think we cannot allow the Amendment to be withdrawn.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Is it your pleasure the Motion be withdrawn? [Cries of "No!"]
    Question put, and agreed to.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The next Amendment standing in the name of the hon. Member for Elgin is applicable to the 6th clause.
    MR. KEAY: I presume, Sir, you were speaking of the first of my two Amendments, and I will propose the second of these. Before moving it I desire to call attention very briefly to the conduct of the Chief Secretary in this Committee with regard to two Amendments which have already been considered, and to put myself in order I will conclude with a Motion. You are aware, Sir, that up to Friday only two Amendments had engaged the attention of the Committee, and one of these was that of my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee; and on moving that my hon. Friend charged the Government with concealment and pursuing a tortuous policy, and the Chief Secretary replied. Then, when I ventured to press him for an answer in reference to the Guarantee Fund, he would not give a word of explanation. I do not complain much of that. But then, on the Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, the right hon. Gentleman very complacently said that he had already fully answered in detail all the representations which my hon. Friend had submitted. He also stated that he had last year produced certain figures to prove the solvency of his Guarantee Fund, and that the contingent portion, therefore, would not be touched; and he fearlessly stated that these figures had not been and could not be controverted. I followed him, and just as he was leaving the place I ventured to call his attention to the fact that he had omitted to answer an all-important part of my hon. Friend's speech, that part where my hon.
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    Friend showed by distinct figures that instead of the Guarantee Fund being solvent there would be an enormous deficit at the end of 40 years. The Chief Secretary came back to his place and interrupted me—an interruption to which I do not in the least degree object, but I mention it because after the interruption he left his place again. He said it was true he had omitted to reply to that most important point—the deficit in the Guarantee Fund at the end of 40 years; but still he made no reply except that it would be more convenient to speak upon it at a later stage. I then proceeded to traverse the allegation he had made that his figures had not been contested. I went over these figures in detail, and if I may say so, I tore those figures to tatters. I do not know if I should be in order in going over these figures, but if I may I will do so.
    MR. GOSCHEN: I rise to order. Is it in order for an hon. Member to go over the whole discussion of the other day. Is it possible for an hon. Member to go over his argument again on the ground that he has not been answered?
    THE CHAIRMAN: Undoubtedly the hon. Member cannot re-state his argument and get it discussed again. If he complains that his argument has been unanswered he may make a statement to that effect, but he must confine himself to that. Attempts have been made to arrest the progress of a Bill on the ground of neglect to answer an argument, but have never been favourably regarded by the House.
    MR. KEAY: I felt I was in danger of transgressing, and was saying as much when the right hon. Gentleman rose to order. I simply confine myself to a statement of the error the right hon. Gentleman has made when he credits himself for having a fund of £1,300,000 when he will only have £229,000. I showed the importance of this, and invited the Chief Secretary to give the Committee an explanation. And what happened? The Debate proceeded, and just when I was again about to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he adhered to his figures or whether he recognised the mistake he had made in them, he stood up, and I thought was about to make an explanation; but he moved the

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    Closure, and the result was that on Friday evening the Committee divided destitute of any information from the Government, and at this moment the Committee is destitute of information from the Government as to whether the Guarantee Fund, which the right hon. Gentleman says will amount to £1,600,000 will not amount only to £229,000. On this ground, I think, I am justified in calling the attention of the Committee to the conduct of the Chief Secretary, and I trust he will give the Committee that explanation which may be fairly expected from him. To put myself in order, I now move that you, Sir, do report Progress.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."—(Mr. Keay.)
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOB IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,: I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is in order; but certainly I do not think he leaves me an opportunity of being in order in replying to him. So far as I can make out the singularly inopportune statement with which he has interrupted the progress of the Committee, he refers to a reply he gave on Friday, as, I think, an inappropriate and absurd reply, not to my speech in answer to that of the hon. Member for Northampton, but in answer to a speech I delivered on a motion for the Second Reading of the Bill in the Spring of last year.
    MR. KEAY: The right hon. Gentleman is slightly mistaken. The whole foundation of my argument, which otherwise would not have been in order, was that words fell from him in his reply to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, on Friday, when he alluded to the figures he had given to prove the solvency of the fund, adhered to them, and said they had not been controverted.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: It appears that I am correct—the complaint the hon. Gentleman makes is of a speech I delivered a year ago, and he now attacks me for not defending that speech which was not before the Committee on Friday, and figures, which by a long and elaborate process I put before the House on the Second Reading. My reference on
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    Friday was not specially to these figures to which I adhere, but to the general argument by which I defended the security of the fund. I do not know that I am in order in going so far as this in explanation, for I believe I am right in the supposition that on a Motion to report Progress we must confine ourselves to that Motion.
    MR. KEAY: My only object was to try and secure some assurance from the Government that they would studiously endeavour to guide the deliberations of this Committee on a very difficult subject in a more satisfactory manner. If we are to understand the right hon. Gentleman is giving us that assurance, I have not the least desire in the world to obstruct the proceedings. I therefore ask leave to withdraw my Motion.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
    MR. KEAY: I now wish to move the second Amendment which stands in my name. Originally that was in a different form, a form which I understood you (the Chairman) to intimate was not admissible. Its object was to secure that after the tenant had paid all the instalments of principal and interest, he should still be subject for a given number of years to an annual charge; you were good enough to inform me that that overstepped the point of order in regard to this Bill, and in consequence, I have so altered it as to secure that an irreducible minimum shall, for the benefit of the community, be paid to the Treasury for a period of 60 years in respect of every holding purchased by means of advances made under this Act. The annuity is to be at the rate of £4 for every £100 so advanced, and so in proportion for every less sum, the residue of which after payment of the principal and interest on the advance shall be applied in relief of Imperial and local taxation in Ireland. I need hardly say that the object of this Amendment is to obtain for the State and for the community some form of quid pro quo for the immense advantages which are conferred by the use of British credit The form of the Amendment follows as closely as possible the provisions of the Ashbourne Act of 1885, in which a similar alteration was made in the terms

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    of repayment of advances under the Irish Land Act, 1881. So much for the form of it. And now with regard to the substance of it. I may remark at the outset it is universally understood in the Committee that the State gains nothing out of this transaction for the first 49 years, for the tables which regulate the amount of the annuities have been so framed as to produce a net interest of 2¾ per cent. for the discharge of the public obligation to the bondholders, and 1 per cent. accumulating for 49 years, which goes to the payment of principal. I do not think it necessary to speak about the remaining ¼ per cent.—the county percentage—for it is a very trifling matter. Now, why have I fixed the time at 60 years? I have done so on this principle: The Sale of Land Bill, 1886, was framed, although in a different manner, with the same object as is aimed at by this Amendment. It was framed so that while the tenant had to pay the capitalised gross rental, the landlord only received the capital sum on the net rental. Thus about one-fifth part of the purchase money was retained for the benefit of the community as a quid pro quo for the vast saving effected by the use of British credit. I have been told that an enactment of this kind would give rise to political considerations; but I find that in all matters in which landlord and tenant are concerned "political considerations" do arise, and that the term is simply a substitute for " pecuniary considerations." Another objection which has been advanced is that the Ashbourne Acts, which are in full force, have given the tenant an absolute property in his holding after 49 years, and it would be unjust to spread the charge over 60 years in the case of tenants under this Bill. I cannot see that there is very much weight in that objection, because the drafting of this Bill is a confession that the tenants under the Ashbourne Act got too good terms, and that Act now having, for all practical purposes, ceased to operate by reason of the exhaustion of funds, it is impossible to say that the tenant is wronged by making purchasers under this Act pay for 60 years instead of 49 years. I should like to draw the attention of the Committee for a moment to the enormous boon which is given by the use of
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    British credit. Let me put it into figures, so that hon. Members may have clearly before them the nature of the gift they are making, apparently to the tenant, and assuredly to the landlord. I consider it is a fair way to estimate the pecuniary value of British credit if we take first the rate of interest at which landlord and tenant could themselves borrow in order to carry out this operation. I assert it is very moderate indeed to say that they could not borrow at less than 5 per cent. Therefore if we take a loan of £30,000,000 at 5 per cent. for 49 years and contrast it with a loan raised at 2¾ per cent., we see at once the difference due to the use of British credit. It is enormous; it represents a saving of £213,000,000 sterling on a transaction of £30,000,000. I admit that these figures represent a gross transaction, whereas this may be said to be a net transaction, because the whole of the money is not outstanding for 49 years. I accept the position that the instalments are payable back every year. Even then this use of British credit represents a direct and actual pecuniary saving to these persons on a £30,000,000 transaction of £67,000,000 sterling. That is the boon you are conferring on them, and to how many persons will this sum of £67,000,000 go. Calculated on the same ratio as that on which £10,000,000 was distributed under the Ashbourne Acts, you will find that the whole of this £67,000,000 will in 49 years have gone into the hands of only about 70,000 tenants. I Bay it is not fair that this enormous boon should be conferred on so small a number of tenants, and I think it would have been wiser when we were dealing with Irish land in this Bill to have secured the fee simple of the land for the State. But as we cannot do that I am proposing a very small irreducible minimum of advantage which might be obtained for the community. I hope my Irish friends will support this. I know they do not like to minimise the burden on the British taxpayer, but I ask them to support it because it is not an attempt on my part to take away from Ireland any part of the boon of which I am speaking; it is simply an endeavour to distribute the boon more fairly than it will be under this Bill as it stands, for the 70,000 persons I have referred to only represent

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    1 in 66 of the Irish population. Lastly, I do not propose that the additional payments shall be devoted to British purposes. I ask that they shall be applied to the relief of Imperial and local taxation in Ireland. I think, Mr, Courtney, you—a great authority on economic questions — have expressed yourself in favour of the principle for which I am contending, for I find that in one of your speeches you declared for the solidity of the principle, and, after describing how it would act, added, that the locality in which the purchased estate was situated would receive a lay revenue after the debt had been paid off. Again, this principle was adopted by the Committee of this House which sat on the question of small holdings. The Chairman of that Committee was the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, and in the Report I find it stated that as the Local Authority would borrow from the State at less than 4 per cent. it would have a margin after paying the interest to the Loan Commissioners which would constitute a Sinking Fund, so that in about 50 years the loan would be repaid, and the community, represented by the Local Authority, would then have an income from the land due to the use of its superior credit, in the shape of a perpetual quit-rent free of all charges and expenses. Now on this Small Holdings Committee there were nine supporters of the Government and six Members of the Opposition, and, therefore, I think that that doctrine having been laid down so recently by such a high authority, I may consider this Amendment of mine to be somewhat of the nature of a Government Amendment. I ask the Government to accept it, inasmuch as it gives to the tenants much easier terms than the Select Committee itself recommended with regard to small holdings in this country.
    Amendment proposed
    In page 1, line 11, after "advance," insert, ." With respect to advances to be made under this Act, or to be made under the Land Purchase Acts, the provisions of Section 4 of ' The Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act, 1885,' shall be amended as follows: There shall be paid to the Treasury, for 60 years, in respect of every holding purchased by means of an advance made under this Act, an annuity of £4 for every £100 of such advance, and so in proportion for every lees sum, the residue of which, after payment of the principal and interest of
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    the advance, shall be applied in relief of Imperial and local taxation in Ireland."—(Mr.Keay.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Gentleman is quite mistaken if he supposes that it is my desire or intention to dispute his figures. I understand his view to be that by lending the Irish farmers £30,000,000 I give them £67,000,000 without depriving the taxpayers of that sum. If there is any accuracy in those figures, the Bill is a very much better one than even I myself had supposed, and I should be very sorry to take away that boon.
    MR. KEAY: I say the Government are giving that boon to the landlords, whereas it ought to go to the people generally. The Government profess that they are giving it to the tenants.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: But there is one argument which is conclusive against the hon. Gentleman's proposal. Unless the Irish tenant is very different from all other men, he will very strongly object, after the debt has been paid off, to continue to pay 4 per cent. on the original amount for another 11 years. I assume, from what he said, the hon. Member will have the support of the Irish Members.
    MR. KNOX: That statement was made without any authority from us.
    MR. KEAY: I said I hoped to have their support.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: "Hope springs eternal in the human breast." The hon. Member is very sanguine if he thinks that those who represent the Irish farmers will support such a proposal as this. The Amendment is not one which the Government can ask the Committee to accept.
    MR. J. MORLEY: There is considerable force in the objection of the right hon. Gentleman. But I must say that the Amendment points to what in my judgment is one of the most serious blots in this Bill. I have never been among those who have repudiated all resort to British credit, but since 1886 I have always made it a condition that some advantage should accrue to the community at large in Ireland, and should not be exclusively reserved for the privileged class of tenants and purchasers.

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    I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman has thrown away the opportunity of asserting this very wise principle in regard to the employment of British credit, and has also neglected the opportunity of reconciling to some extent the community in Ireland to the risk and liability which the Bill imposes upon the ratepayers in Ireland, and which constitute one of the gravest objections to the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman claims that he confers a great boon on Ireland, but that is a mistaken description. Undoubtedly the right hon. Gentleman confers a great boon on a certain class of tenants. To the ordinary Irish citizen he gives no boon, but merely imposes a serious liability. The right hon. Gentleman argues that the risk is limited to the contingent portion of the Guarantee Fund. I think we shall find as we get further on in discussing the Bill that that is not the limit. Granting, for the sake of argument, the policy of the Bill, it would have been just to accompany the risk and liability with arrangements that would have conferred an advantage on the whole community of Ireland. This plan would not only have been just, but it would also have been in an enormous degree politic, because if any movement for repudiation should arise, the Local Authorities, to whom an interest had been given, would stand as a bulwark and barrier against the spread of such a movement. It was a fatal flaw in the Bill that the opportunity has been lost of enlisting in favour of the maintenance of the bargains made by the purchasers with the State the interests of the bulk of the people of Ireland. That is not a peculiar view of the matter. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham has strongly insisted on the necessity, as well as the expediency, of this. It may, indeed, be said that the general community is interested, because the ratepayers will be out of pocket if the annuities are not paid. But that is just the sort of interest which people would be likely to resent, because it is an unjust penalty imposed upon them for the default of persons in whose transactions they have no interest of their own. I think the Government lost a valuable opportunity of strengthening their own policy and of asserting the wholesome principle that British
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    credit is never to be used for these or other operations unless the advantage to be derived from its use is to be distributed over the whole body of those who incur the risk. Although I cannot support the Amendment I am not sorry that the question has been raised, and the protest entered. The Bill of 1886 did not carry the principle I am advocating, as far as I should now like it to be carried, but it did put the principle into effect for a period of 49 years. I think now that a riper consideration would induce me, if any proposal of that kind were made either in relation to Ireland or any other part of the United Kingdom, to resist any resort to State credit unless accompanied by some benefit to the portion of the community which bore the risk.
    MR. A.J. BALFOUR: I think probably the Committee will agree with the right hon. Gentleman that it would be desirable to associate the Local Authorities in Ireland specifically with the advantages of this Bill. It must be noticed that to the not insignificant or contemptible extent of 5s. per cent. that has been done. If more were done in that direction, it must be at the expense of the tenant, to whom the advantage given is not so extraordinarily favourable that it can be greatly diminished. The right hon. Gentleman seems to be running together the different and not quite consistent principles that the Local Authorities should share in the benefits conferred by the Bill, and that British credit should not be given without some benefit to those who take the risk—that is, the British taxpayers in general.
    MR. J. MORLEY: My position was that under our Bill of 1886 it was an Irish authority that would have got the whole of the benefit of the increase in the security.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes; I see the advantage of associating the Local Authority with the action of the tenants-in giving security, but I do not see the equity of giving more to Ireland, as a whole, than the Bill now gives. If you are to travel outside the principles we have laid down in the Bill you should give the benefit to the British people at large. I cannot for one moment admit that the benefits of that Bill are confined! to the Irish occupiers who purchase under

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    it. It is because I believe the Bill is a benefit to Ireland as a whole, and applies an effective and efficient remedy to some of the most grievous evils under which Ireland has groaned for years past, that I defend the use of British credit at all. I do not think the criticisms the right hon. Gentleman has passed on the Bill are well deserved.
    MR. J. MORLET: I do not wish to prolong this part of the discussion, but I think the right hon. Gentleman is misusing words when he says he would not be a party to the Bill unless he thought it would confer a benefit on Ireland as a whole. The Bill will confer all the pecuniary benefits on a casual privileged class. The right hon. Gentleman says this is a matter of Imperial concern. If it is, why is there not Imperial risk? If it is a matter of Imperial concern, the whole risk of the operation ought not to fall on localities in Ireland, bat upon the Kingdom as a whole.
    MR. D. CRAWFORD: I think this Amendment has raised one of the most important points in the Bill, although I agree with my right hon. Friend (Mr. J. Morley) that it has not, perhaps, done so in the most appropriate form. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary has said that if this money is to be given for the more general purposes of Ireland it must be taken from somebody who would otherwise be benefited, that that somebody would be the tenant, and that the tenant would not be prepared to part with any advantage he gets under the Bill. That may be true, but we Representatives of the taxpayers of Great Britain are not bound to throw ourselves exclusively into the point of view of the tenants, and I think perhaps we are able to take a more impartial view of it even than the right hon. Gentleman himself, because he may have reasons for conciliating the tenant and striking a bargain unduly favourable to the tenant. The right hon. Gentleman said the other day that there were many cases in which the annual payment from the tenant would be reduced 40 to 60 per cent., and he would be transformed at the same time from a tenant into a proprietor. These cases might be cases in which a fair rent had recently been judicially fixed. Probably my hon. Friends below the Gangway will
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    not agree with me on this point, but I say that there can be no legitimate motive for making a present to the tenant of from 40 to 60 per cent. of his rent if that rent has recently been fixed by a judicial tribunal. If the county can afford to give these terms, the benefit ought not to be given as a present to the tenant, but ought to be given to the Local Authority in the district for public purposes, and I hope this point, if it is not properly raised now, will be raised on some future occasion during the passage of the Bill through the House.
    MR. KNOX: I agree, to a large extent, with what has fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle—that is to say, I agree there is a great deal to be said in favour of giving some greater advantage than the Government propose to give to the Irish Local Authorities as a result of these transactions. The Local Authorities, and especially those classes in the different counties who are not directly connected with the land, will run very great risk in order to make a certain number of the tenants of Ireland peasant proprietors, and, therefore, I think it is only fair that ultimately some profit should come to those classes for the involuntary sacrifice they are now making on behalf of the tenants of Ireland. But I cannot support the Amendment of the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn. The hon. Gentleman proposes that the tenants shall get no relief whatever immediately after the expiration of the 49 years, but shallgo onfor a short time paying the same as they have hitherto paid by way of the repayment, both of principal and interest. I venture to think that if anything ought to be put on the holding after the expiration of the 49 years, it ought to be put on permanently. The tenants will, after the 49 years, get a permanent advantage. If their position, as compared with that of other tenants, is so favoured whatever is put on ought to be put on for ever. Then I object to the proposal of the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn, because it will have a most injurious effect upon the working of local government in Ireland. The proposal is that a casual addition should from time to time be made to the income of each Local Authority. Land purchase cannot go on equally over the whole country. The large estates

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    may be dealt with in one year in one county. When the 49 years come round a very large additional income will fall to the Local Authority for 10 years. [An hon. MEMBER: In relief of Imperial taxation.] If the proposal is that it shall not go to the Local Authority, who have borne all the risk, my objection to the proposal is very considerably increased. But if, as I assume, a large additional income will fall to the Local Authority for 10 years, there will be as bad a system of local finance as it is possible to imagine. The consequence will be we shall have grants in the nature of grants in aid which will vary very largely from year to year. The proposal will not commend itself to Irish Members on the ground that it gives relief from Imperial taxation 50 years hence. I and my hon. Friends hope that at all events in its present form the Imperial taxation levied on Ireland 50 years hence may be of such a nature that it is not worth while considering now. Speaking generally, I say that I object to the proposal, because by it the Imperial Parliament is asked to determine a question which ought to be left for an Irish Parliament 50 years hence -when the question will actually arise. Fifty years hence this specially favoured class will begin to exist, and then it will be time enough for whatever Parliament is charged with the duty to deal with the matter. I trust it will be an Irish Parliament, and I confess I heard with some astonishment the statement of the hon. Member for Lanarkshire (Mr. Donald Crawford) that he, as a Scotch Liberal and not specially connected with the Irish tenants, is better able to judge impartially of this matter than an Irish Authority will be. What is the effect of the hon. Member's proposal? It is, as the Chief Secretary put it, that we take from one class of Irishmen in order to give to another. I conceive the Authority which is to determine whether we should take from one class of Irishmen and give to another should be an Irish Authority, and it will be time enough for an Irish Authority to deal with the subject in the 20th century.
    MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: Although I cannot agree with the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn in the exaggerated figures he
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    has given of the measure of the benefit which will accrue to the tenants of Ireland, I agree that the benefit will be very great. There cannot be a doubt that if Irish credit alone had been employed, the transactions could not be carried out at less than 5 per cent., or, including provision for the Sinking Fund, 6 per cent. as compared with 4 per cent. as at present. I am with my hon. Friend in saying that some of this enormous benefit ought to go to the general taxpayers or ratepayers of Ireland. I cannot agree with the Chief Secretary for Ireland that the whole of this benefit will accrue to the tenants of Ireland. On the contrary; a considerable portion of it will accrue to the landlords. The tenants will get the benefit of paying considerably less than their former rent, and they will be enabled thereby to give a greater number of years' purchase than they otherwise would be. The landlords get the benefit of this, and if I were to hazard an opinion I would say that the landlords get three or four years additional purchase than they would if the transactions had been carried out at a higher rate of interest. I believe the Government would have done wisely if they had associated with the Bill the proposal to give a larger benefit to the ratepayers of Ireland generally. If the example of the Bill of 1886 had been followed, a very considerable boon would have been given to the general ratepayers of Ireland, and a great deal done to enlist their influence in the direction of the ultimate repayment of the enormous advances contemplated by this Bill.
    MR. E. ROBERTSON: It must be obvious to the Committee that the discussion in which we have been engaged is too large for the Amendment under which it has arisen. The Amendment strikes at the main principle of the Bill. The principle is that by the aid of British credit, the land of Ireland shall be handed over absolutely for nothing to the tenants who are now the occupiers. So far as principle is concerned, I am entirely with my hon. Friend. Indeed, I go further than he does. I was glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle admit that part, at least, of the benefit of these transactions ought to be secured for the

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    public. I do not know it matters much whether it is the Local Authority or the people of Ireland or Great Britain; but the public interest of some sort should be reserved as part of the price at which we engage in these transactions. I enter my strenuous protest against the principle of handing over the money of Great Britain to one class of the people of Ireland. It seems to me that everything that was said by the Chief Secretary on this subject was marked by fallacy of the most elementary kind. The right hon. Gentleman spoke of the tenant paying off his loan. Paying off his loan, forsooth ! The right hon. Gentleman said— "How will the tenant be satisfied if, after he has paid off his loan, you tax him for 20 years more." How does he repay it? He does it in the most Hibernian fashion—by paying 20 per cent. less than he did before. Then, again, the Chief Secretary says, "If you are going to secure this benefit for the public it can only be at somebody's expense: it can only be by taking it away from the tenant." I assert that that is not so. I cannot admit that the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn has chosen the best mode or time for submitting this question to the House. I do not know what his Amendment means. He says the provisions of Section 4 of the Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act should be amended, and then he provides how it should be amended. Does my hon. Friend mean that his provisions should be substituted for the whole of Section 4 or for a portion of it, and, if so, what portion? It seems to me that the Amendment is not in a shape in which it can be conveniently discussed, and having secured his purpose by obtaining this discussion I suggest he should withdraw the Amendment, in the hope that the point may be raised at a more convenient opportunity.
    MR. CHANCE: I think there is some misapprehension as to the precise scope and effect of this Amendment. This Bill, unlike the Ashbourne Act, does not enable the tenant to make terms with his landlord. The tendency of the Insurance Clause will be that only the tenant who sees some very considerable saving in the reduction of 20 per cent., will buy under the Bill. The clause will lead to the sale of the better lands, and leave on the hands of
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    a future Irish Government the duty of dealing with the poorer lands in the congested districts. It must be recollected that under this Act the cream of the tenants get the advantage, and the poorest tenants get none. Under those circumstances, I think it would be only prudent that the richer and better class of tenants should in some way be made responsible to provide funds for the Local Authorities, and thus enable those authorities to deal with the con gested districts and the poorer tenants. The Chief Secretary says if you diminish the benefit to the tenants you stop land purchase altogether. Never was there a greater fallacy. If. the benefit to the tenant is diminished, that will not affect land purchase, but simply the price which the landlord puts into his pocket. It is absolutely incontrovertible that if the tenant, instead of paying 4 per cent. by way of annuity, was only called upon to pay 2 per cent., the tenant would not be one sixpence the better. The sole effect would be that, instead of paying 14 or 15 years' purchase, he would pay double that. Anyone who knows anything about the work of the Land Commission knows this: that in a large number of cases the Commissioners refuse to advance the sum for which the tenant has bargained with the landlord, and no wonder, because the landlord has the benefit of the advice of his solicitor, the assistance of the Sheriff, and all the advantages of his position, while the poor tenant has nobody to assist him. The tenants are not even allowed to combine, and it is apparently a criminal offence to give a. tenant advice as to land purchase, and the price is fixed by reference to one consideration only, namely, what can the tenant pay. If it is a shade less than his present rent, and the Government will lend it, that he will pay, no matter what it represents in capital value. It must be recollected that it is the landlord who gets the benefit of the total cessation of payments at the end of 49 years. If the tenant, instead of paying £20, pays £15, he does not care whether it represents a capital sum of £500 or £5,000; it is £5 a year less to him, and all the ultimate benefit goes to the landlord. This point will arise on a subsequent Amendment, but meantime I ask the Committee to recollect that in

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    this matter the tenant is merely the cats-paw to rescue this chestnut for the landlord, and that it does not matter a sixpence to the tenant whether he pays 2 per cent. or 20 per cent.; that the price he pays for the land is measured simply by the annuity the Government thinks he can pay, and has no connection whatever with the capital money advanced. Therefore, I trust that in these discussions we shall not have much said about the advantage to the tenant. There is absolutely no benefit to him except a certain reduction he gets if the landlord can induce him to unlock the Treasury for the advantage of the landlord.
    MR.R.T. REID: A technical objection, among others, is taken to my hon. Friend's Amendment, but the Bill is so framed by reference to a variety of Acts that it puzzles the most astute lawyer to construe many of its provisions, and to pronounce an opinion upon the form of an Amendment without very careful examination. The hon. Member for Cavan seemed to assume that it was almost an impertinence for my hon. Friend the Member for Lanark to put in an oar on this subject at all in reference to the dispersion of the funds among classes in Ireland, and that it is only a question to be regulated according to the wishes of Irish Members. For my part, I should be content to leave the whole solution to Ireland; but if we are to be concerned in giving these benefits, I think we ought to extend them to those who are in most need in Ireland. The Amendment, however, brings out a most important flaw in the Bill, and that is, that it is simply for the benefit of one or two classes—a selected number of landlords and a selected number of tenants. For these is the powerful instrument of British credit to be used. The purport of the Amendment of my hon. Friend is this: that inasmuch as an advantage is gained by tenants, and a greater, I agree, by the landlords, but by no others than these, that after they have enjoyed this for 49 years some equivalent should be gained by the Irish public at large. Now, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle has laid down in his too short speech one of the most important propositions I think we have heard from him or from anyone for a considerable time, for he announced, as I understood, that
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    upon any future advance of British money or credit for land purchase or cognate purposes, he would require the condition of a perpetual reservation of some rental or sum of money to be payable to the State or Municipality—that is to say, municipalisation of the land as laid down by its most recent expositors. I agree with that view of the right hon. Gentleman, but I desire to point out that the hon. Gentleman who moved this Amendment originally had on the Paper an Amendment exactly carrying out that proposal; but, unfortunately, it was discovered that it was out of Order and inconsistent with the scope of the Bill, and thus it is that this Amendment in a more moderate form is proposed for the consideration of the Committee, and the hon. Member is obliged to restrict his Amendment to a term of 11 years. I do not know whether it could be arranged that a quit rent in perpetuity should be paid in lieu of a period of 49 years. As has been pointed out, the proposals in the Bill are for the benefit of a restricted class, and for the benefit of a certain portion of a restricted class. British credit is being invoked for a special section of a class. The Bill as it stands forms a most important precedent for advanced politicians, and a most dangerous precedent from the point of view of hon. Gentlemen opposite, because it is quite certain that if the thin end of the wedge is introduced of using British credit not for the relief of distress, but for the benefit of a particular section of a particular industry, the principle will be extended. In that sense, I think the Amendment of my hon. Friend is an eminently Conservative Amendment.
    COLONEL NOLAN: I am astonished at the approval the Amendment has met with, and at the strange suggestion of the hon. and learned Member for Dumfries. What is the proposal of the hon. Member for Elgin in its naked simplicity? That for 11 years beyond the term this Bill provides the tenant shall continue to pay 4 per cent., or 44 per cent. on the purchase money. [Cries of " No, no !"] Four per cent. for 11 years— four times 11 equals 44. Taking the actual value at the present time, it is less than they will pay at the end of the term, but, practically speaking, it is a simple matter of arithmetic. The tenant

    415
    may make a better or a worse bargain, but it is an outrageous proposal that the unfortunate tenant should continue to pay for at least 11 years after the term in the Bill. Then the hon. and learned Member for Dumfries threw out a suggestion for a perpetual quit rent. But we have been told ever since the time that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) initiated this subject that the object should be to turn tenants into proprietors. But this Amendment amounts to a total abandonment of this principle. A quit rent might be an advantage, and something might be said in its favour if you reduced the tenant's payment to 3 per cent.; but the proposal of the hon. Member for Elgin gives no possible advantage to the tenant of any kind or description, but simply taxes him for 11 years more for the benefit of every section of the community. It would be a great mistake to introduce anything of the kind. If you want to benefit other sections of the community do so by another Bill; this Bill is for the benefit of tenants. There are, for instance, labourers who are well entitled to such assistance; but to tax small tenants to the extent of from £5 to £15 for any other sections of the community is an absurdity. If such a proposal were included in a Bill introduced by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian it would be considered Tory and reactionary. But I am afraid there are some Members who, instead of trying to make this the best possible Bill, are trying to make it the best possible Bill for Party purposes. Now, I want to make it the best possible Bill for Ireland. There are some hon. Members, I am afraid, trying to run between the two. But I would urge every Irish Member to cast other views aside and simply vote on this Bill, as the Bill may be better for the Irish tenants.
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: It seems to be conceded upon all hands that the question of public benefit cannot be discussed under the proceedings now going on. I have not heard one single Member say that he is prepared to vote for the hon. Member for Elgin's Amendment. It cannot now be fairly discussed, and why, then, should we waste these precious hours upon it? Why should
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    we be discussing an Amendment which refers to what may or may not be done 49 years hence? I think it is folly, for nobody now cares what may be done 49 years hence by those who succeed us. [An hon. MEMBER: 49 years in the Bill.] Yes, but the hon. Member proposes that after 49 years a sum should be continued to be paid to the Treasury in respect of holdings of a certain amount, and I say it does not matter what we now decide to do; those who come after us, 49 years hence, will decide the question for themselves. Then, I ask, why should the Local Authority get this advantage? I entirely concur with the hon. Member" for Galway (Colonel Nolan) in what he says. I agree with the hon. and gallant Gentleman, and I should like to point this out, that there is one great Liberal principle in danger of perishing to-night —that Liberal principle of which we have heard so much—the government of Ireland according to Irish ideas. That Liberal principle has been in the past very loudly asserted from those Benches. There is, I say, a great danger of its perishing to-night. Irish Members represent the Irish local authority as well as the Irish farmers, and this is an Irish as well as an English question; this is Irish as well as English money. If it be English money, why should the Local Authority be benefited? The Irish Local Authority does not run the risk; but the Imperial taxpayer does, and if you. are going to give the-benefit on account of this risk, then the Imperial taxpayer should have it. But if this question is to be raised at all, I submit that it cannot be raised upon this Amendment; so let us, then, proceed to the next Amendment, which is of greater importance.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I hope that the Committee will now allow this discussion to drop. It is admitted that the Amendment finds no supporters, and in no shape can this Amendment bear fruit in relation to the very interesting question raised by the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle. I hope, then, we may now proceed to another Amendment.
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: The hon. Member on my right has asked two questions: Why, he said, should we be discussing what shall be done at the end of 49 years, and

    417
    for answer to that question he should ask the Government why we have this term in the Bill. Now, the point raised by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle, upon which the attention of the Committee has been occupied for some time, is one of great interest and importance. The hon. Member reminds us of the Liberal principle, that Ireland should be governed according to Irish ideas; but the Government have brought in this Bill with an Imperial guarantee, and those who might be prepared to consider this as an Irish Bill must, so long as the English taxpayer is called upon to back it, take an interest in the Bill from beginning to end. With all deference to my hon. Friends the Members for Lanark and Dundee, I think in their forcible remarks they forgot one thing, which furnishes an answer to the question propounded— Who gets the benefit under this Bill? They forget the circumstances of Ireland at this moment, and what the Government have been doing for the past five years. The question before us is a similar one to that we have often had to consider in relation to the incidence of local taxation, and on whom does the incidence of local taxation fall? Where the supply is greater than the demand by the tenants the landlord has to pay the local rates, and where the demand is greater than the supply for houses then the tenant has to bear the taxation. So it is in Ireland. We know there is a land hunger, and that the tenant is in that position forcibly represented by the hon. Member for South Kilkenny, that he cares nothing for the amount his payment bears to the capital sum provided; it opens to him a way for preserving possession of the holding, the value of which he has himself created. Now, the Government have during the last five years to the utmost of their power suppressed the right of combination among the tenants; they have placed the Forces of the Crown at the disposal of the landlords, and they have destroyed freedom of contract so far as land purchase is concerned. Therefore, undoubtedly, the benefit of the Imperial guarantee, that is, the benefit of raising money for purchase at a low rate of interest, is appropriated in Ireland by the landlords. I think, too, we have had an indication of this in the very frank speech of the
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    hon. Member for South Hunts, that if the Government did not accept his Amendment the landlords would take another way of securing the fruits of it.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: The Chief Secretary did not consult us before inserting in his Bill the proposition for engaging the public credit for one particular class; and yet when, on consideration of this Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Elgin and Nairn proposes a valuable Amendment, up rises the Chief Secretary, and says he does not quite approve of the Amendment, thinks it has been quite sufficiently discussed, and advises the Committee to proceed to something else. Now, with all respect to the right hon. Gentleman, we really cannot accept his views either as to the Amendment or the time we should take in discussing it. Upon this, as upon most Amendments, I daresay we shall occupy more time than he would mete out to us. On the first Amendment the right hon. Gentleman moved the Closure. Let him do that when he objects to the course we are taking, but do not let him waste his time in giving us advice which we are not in the least likely to accept. Without going into details, I may say that the effect of the Amendment is simply this My hon. Friend thinks that certain persons do derive considerable advantage from the use of the Imperial credit, and that this advantage should in some sort of way be distributed so that all may have a share in it. My hon. Member has a specific plan with which I cannot say I entirely agree, though I shall support him if he carries his Amendment to a Division, because I should regard this as a sort of Second Reading decision, the acceptance of a general principle which we may afterwards modify in various ways. The advantage of the Imperial credit is as 6 ½ to 4; that is to say, that 2 ½ per cent. is gained by the use of Imperial credit. Of this a large portion of the benefit goes to the landlords, but unquestionably the tenants will derive large advantages. And why should all the gain be with these? My hon. Friend, in effect, says by his Amendment, leave it to those who succeed us 49 years hence to say whether the advantage shall be shared by the locality or by the Kingdom generally. Some such Amendment is necessary for the

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    purpose, else the tenants will be left absolute freeholders, and therefore cannot be called upon to pay in any way for the benefit conferred upon them.
    MR. KEAY: I would like to make a few remarks in regard to the observations that have fallen from various hon. Gentlemen. The hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Colonel Nolan) says that 44 per cent. more would be charged if this Amendment were passed. I do not think the hon. and gallant Gentleman's arithmetic is in order. The increase is one of 20 per cent., and not of 4 per cent. The Amendment is so framed as, roughly speaking, to provide for a 20 per cent. increase of the aggregate instalments. The hon. and learned Member for Dundee (Mr. E. Robertson) said my Amendment struck at the root of the principle of absolute ownership of land which is offered by this Bill. I quite admit that; and I am very sorry to say that the Rules of this House made it impossible for me to go further than I did. My hon. and learned Friend beside me said he did not know the meaning of the wording of my Amendment. All I can say is, that it is strictly modelled on the clause of the Ashbourne Act. The hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Knox) objected to the form of my Amendment, but did so principally on the same score as others have done, namely, that it was impossible to insert in this Bill, as a matter of Order, an Amendment which would carry out the views we have at heart. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary adopted his usual cynical vein in dealing with us mere private Members on this side of the House, and seemed rather to pride himself on the fact of how little he had got up the subject. I understood that the right hon. Gentleman was in charge of the Bill, and, therefore, was the proper referee on any point raised in the measure. He said practically that he had never read the Amendment at all, because he said I was proposing to impose not 11 but 20 years' annuity on the poor tenants, and he playfully alluded to the main argument I put forward, that the actual amount of hard cash which constitutes the boon of British credit given to those to enter into these transactions, amounts to £67,000,000. Well, I say with all
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    humility, that if I were in the right hon. Gentleman's place in charge of this Bill, I should not come forward until I had carefully calculated for myself the magnitude of the pecuniary boon offered. I assert, in face of the right hon. Gentleman's ignorance, that the boon is proved to amount to nothing more or less than a gift of £67,000,000 as compared with the amount which the tenants and landlords could otherwise perform the transactions with. There are interest tables in the library, and I should strongly, if I might humbly venture to do so, advise the right hon. Gentleman to realise whether it is a fact or not, that this is the pecuniary boon.
    SIR J. M'KENNA: It is not the fact.
    MR. KEAY: I shall be delighted at any time to argue the question with the hon. Member. The Chief Secretary said he was convinced that the tenant would not elect to pay the increased 11 years' instalment. 1 am glad to find the right hon. Gentleman taking up so openly the wishes of the tenants, as this is the most egregious flaw in the Bill, if he has the wishes of the tenants at heart. That, however, is not an argument against my Amendment. It is quite irrelevant to consider whether the Irish tenant wants a boon to the amount of £67,000,000 or £100,000,000. The question is this—is. it a boon or is it not? If it is, the givers have a right to regulate its incidence in what they believe a just and proper manner. Before I sit down I would remind the right hon. Gentleman of what he said in bringing in the Bill Isst year. He told us to what extent the Irish tenant would be benefited by this British boon. He said—
    "If you have a tenant who now pays £170,. reduced to £100 by the landlords arrangement in the matter of taxes, he will be able to have his holding for £68 instead of £100."
    That is the extent of the pecuniary boon to be given to these tenants individually; and I say, that according to the argument of the right hon. Gentleman himself, the tenant was to live and thrive and be very happy when he got his rent of £100 reduced to £68. The right hon. Gentleman's Bill provides that that arrangement shall take place in 49 years. Why should the tenant be able to comfortably | live and thrive on paying £68 perannum

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    for 49 years only? Why should he not pay it for 11 years longer? To that question the right hon. Gentleman has furnished no reply whatever, and, therefore, I say he has opposed absolutely no argument to the Amendment now on the Paper. However, as the Amendment is so ill worded, so far as the carrying out of my own wishes is concerned, and as it was only put down for the purpose of raising a discussion, and of doing good not only in the Committee but in the country with regard to the great question decided by the Report of the Select Committee on Small Holdings, and as that object has been effected, I beg leave to withdraw the proposal.
    COLONEL NOLAN: I object to the Amendment being withdrawn. It is one of those absurd and silly Amendments that ought to be put down. I think that when such an Amendment as this is brought forward, the hon. Member proposing it should stick to it.
    SIR J. M'KENNA: I also object to the withdrawal of the Amendment, seeing that the greatest possible cruelty is shown to those interested in Ireland in raising and discussing such Amendments.
    DR. CLARK: I hope the Committee will allow the Amendment to be withdrawn, because there is an alternative to the plan proposed, and that is reducing the rents still further, and making them perpetual. The question might be determined on principle in that way so as to save the necessity of moving Amendments to the Ashbourne Act. If we are forced to go to a Division we shall have to consider whether the Government are not proposing to create a new class of landlords altogether—whether they are not seeking to get rid of one injustice by establishing another. Then I should have to support the Amendment. I think we should have the Amendment raised on other grounds. I trust that under the circumstances the hon. Member will be allowed to withdraw the Amendment.
    MR. M. J. KENNY: As the Amendment is not for the purpose of amending the Bill, but is brought forward for the purpose of ventilating a question of abstract politics, I think it should not be withdrawn. It is distinctly hostile to the interests of Irish tenants, and
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    therefore it ought to be either adopted or definitely rejected. Speaking as a Representative of the Irish tenants, I ask the House to definitely reject the Amendment. I pay no attention to the motives suggested to us by some hon. Members, including the hon. Member for South Monaghan, who spoke here not so much as a Representative of the Irish tenants as a Representative of other interests.
    SIR J.'M'KENNA: I did nothing of the kind.
    MR. M. J. KENNY: The hon. Member speaks for that portion of Irish landed property which at the present time is under the jurisdiction of Mr. Justice Munro. But I need not in any way lengthen this discussion. I will only characterise the Amendment as a mischievous one, which the Committee should not allow to be withdrawn.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Is it your desire that the Amendment be withdrawn?
    COLONEL NOLANand several hon. MEMBERS: No.
    Question put, and negatived.
    MR. P. STANHOPE: I beg to move an Amendment providing that—
    " A Report setting forth the amount and ful particulars of every such advance provisionally assented to by the Land Commission under this Act, shall be presented to Parliament by the said Commission, and such report shall lie upon the Table of the House for 30 days before the said advance shall receive the final sanction of the Treasury."
    In spite of our protests below the Gangway, the House has decided that the Imperial credit is to be made use of, and the question arises how this House, having regard to that fact, is to retain its full control over the financial arrangements instituted under the Bill? I would point out that, under the Act which has given rise to this Bill, no less than £9,000,000 have been expended, and though Reports have been laid on the Table of the House by the Land Commissioners or the Lord Lieutenant for Ireland containing a summary of the disposition of that amount and of the general working of the Land Acts in Ireland, most of us will agree that those Reports have been extremely meagre in detail, and give us little or no information whatever With respect to the particular estates that

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    have been dealt with by the Commissioners. It is only indirectly and by questions put in this House that we are able to obtain information of the working of the Commission, and of the particular direction in which the public money is being expended. Now, it is in order to remedy that state of things that I have put this Amendment down on the Paper. The object is that the House should continue to discharge what after all is its primary duty, namely, to control, and efficiently superintend the expenditure of public money. As, unfortunately, an Amendment to a previous Bill—an Amendment moved by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wolverhampton, which would have brought the salaries of the Land Commissioners under the control of this House—was rejected, we must seek by some other means to effect our object. I therefore propose that the Commissioners, instead of making the rather meagre Reports they present to the Lord Lieutenant, should make more elaborate Reports, giving fuller details as to their action, which Reports should be laid on the Table of the House for 30 days, during which it should be competent for Members to offer criticisms and suggestions. The necessity for such Reports is shown by the disparity between the four provinces in respect of the purchases effected in them and the circumstances that call for such transactions. Ulster, which does not appear to be very much in need of a measure of this character, has received the largest benefit under the Ashbourne Act. In Ulster 9,379 applications have been dealt with by the Commissioners in the last five years, and £2,751,000 has been advanced; in Leinster 2,088 applications have been dealt with, and £1,794,578 advanced; in Connaught 1,725 applications, and £433,431 advanced; and in Munster 3,564 applications and £2,327,999 advanced. Consequently, Ulster has received by far the largest portion of the public money devoted to land purchase in Ireland. Proceeding on the same lines, I would point out that many of the estates that have been purchased are estates on which there was no urgent need for interference. There was no special necessity for the purchase of the properties of the Duke of Aber-
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    corn, the Duke of Leinster, the Marquess of Bath, the Marquess of Waterford, and the great London Companies. My own belief is, and I think it is shared by hon. Members around me, that nearly all these purchases could have been effected without the intervention of Imperial credit. Public money, if used at all, ought rather to have been used in less fortunate parts of Ireland, such as the Clanricarde, Olphert, and Pon-sonby estates, which we all know have been deplorable centres of public disaffection and public disturbance. I do not Say the Commissioners could have controlled these matters, because it is not for them to initiate transactions; but it would be a distinct public advantage if this House could criticise the arrangements that are made, and stimulate intervention where it seems to be most required. In some instances purchases have been made under coercion, and there have been numberless transactions and purchases forced on the tenants at prices higher than the circumstances of the cases warranted. The other day an account was given of three estates of the Duke of Leinster. On two of these estates the agents were unable to exercise pressure on the tenants to purchase. But in the case of one of these estates where there were arrears they distinctly desired to force the tenants into an arrangement, and I understand the number of years purchase, 22 years, I think, was glaringly in excess of what would have been the case had there been absolute freedom of contract. These are cases which it seems to me will properly come before this House on the occasion of the Reports being presented for sanction. I believe that on the whole a very large number of transactions, which at present escape criticism, would, in view of publicity, be modified or never brought about. I have no doubt the Chief Secretary will say that this proceeding would involve considerable delay. But already the Com-missionersallow time to the parties to make investigation of the title of the vendor, with the result that the number of loans provisionally sanctioned, is far in excess of the number issued. Consequently, it does not seem to me that the effect of my proposal would be to delay the work of the Land Commission, and the delay of 30 days does not justify the criticism

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    that it would cause confusion in the work of the Commissioners. But I come to the principal argument in favour of my Amendment. The State is going to become a great landowner in Ireland, and it does seem to me a fundamental' principle of business that the State should have an account of the transactions effected in its name, and should be in a position to examine them before they become definitive. If by the decision of the majority of this House we are to give the Imperial guarantee to the amount' of £30,000,000, and probably larger sums in the future, and if we are obliged to tell our constituents that we were unable to defeat the proposal, it appears to me that we ought to be in a position to tell them that we have, at all events, provided that the Representatives of the public shall have constant supervision of the expenditure of the money, so that some of the greater evils to which this Bill will lead may be mitigated, if not altogether avoided. It is a sound constitutional maxim that the public expenditure shall be always under-public control, and, in order that such a principle may be incorporated in this Bill, I venture to move my Amendment.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 11, after the word "advance," to insert the words "and a Report, setting forth the amount and full particulars of every such advance provisionally assented to by the Land Commission under this Act, shall be presented to Parliament by the said Commission, and such Report shall lie upon the Table of the House for 30 days before the said advance shall receive the final sanction of the Treasury."—(Mr. Philip Stankopt.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Member appears to be under the impression that his Amendment carries out the ordinary conditions of Parliamentary procedure. But no doubt the hon. Member is aware that this is by no means the first Bill which has sanctioned loans in either Ireland, England, or Scotland, and in no single case has it been the practice to include a provision like this in dealing with those transactions. The transactions under this Bill will be in the nature of loans, and it is proposed to trust to the machinery which has already been instituted to see that the loans are properly made and carried out. A very large
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    number of loans have been made under the Ashbourne Acts, 52,000 I think, and I ask what possible powers this House would have of making an investigation worth anything. The Land Commissioners make the loans on the spot, the holdings are examined, and opportunities are afforded of examining all the facts of the case. For instance, the House might be asked to disallow a loan of £20 to a tenant in the wilds of Connemara, but it would be quite unable to form an adequate judgment on the point. If the House is to be asked to take into consideration the propriety of the loans made by the Commissioners it would have nothing else to do but to discuss every night after 12 o'clock an enormous mass of small transactions. The Representatives of the tenants would raise cases in which they thought there lurked a grievance, and the same course might be followed by the Representatives of the landlord interest, and the selection of cases would be discussed, not in the interest of the Treasury, but from the point of view of rival political Parties. Of course, I agree that the House should know what is being done, and the Commissioners will be ordered to make full Reports of their transactions, and the House will thus have an opportunity of seeing what is done.
    MR. J. MORLEY: I am glad to hear that the Commissioners are to be asked to furnish fuller and more detailed accounts than has hitherto been the practice. More detailed Returns will not give the Land Commission much more trouble than at present, and a very slight additional expense will be entailed. If those Reports are laid before Parliament, say, once every fortnight, they will be found of great advantage, and Parliament will be placed in the position of keeping its eye on the general run of the transactions. The present Reports are meagre, and it is almost essential, if Parliament is to exercise any real supervision, to have Returns pretty constantly available of all the transactions.
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: I will not anticipate my Amendment on the Paper, but I am very glad to hear from the Chief Secretary admission of the fact that there ought to be further information.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I admit that this House is entitled to the information it desires, and to enforce that desire, but that is a different matter to putting accurately into a Statute what information is required. But that is a matter reserved perhaps.
    MR. MACNEILL: There is necessity for some Amendment on this point, though, perhaps, not precisely on the line of that of my hon. Friend, with a view of obviating such a transaction as that which occurred under the Ashbourne Act, where five landlords, among them the Duke of Abercorn and the Marquess of Waterford, had £1,000,000 divided between them. Perhaps the Government will consider the question, confining the Returns to purchases above £5,000. We are going to advance no less than £30,000,000, but if we are to enable every tenant who wishes to purchase, we will require not thirty, but ninety millions. These Commissioners, who are entrusted with the machinery, will have to exercise a considerable amount of selection among the tenants who apply for loans. Now, it may reasonably be suspected that this is simply an attempt to buy out landlords who are supporters of the Government, inducing the tenants to acquiesce by giving them 20 per cent. under their purchase money. If that be so, and having regard to the administration of the Ashbourne Act, the House should clearly have the opportunity of requiring that full publicity should be given to these transactions, by laying Reports upon the Table of this House for discussion. I think, therefore, that some such Amendment as this is necessary. Why do I support the Bill? Simply because I have regard to the fearful poverty which exists in Ireland, and feel bound to assist to the best of my power in alleviating the condition of the Irish tenant. If I can do so by getting his house rent reduced by 20 per cent. I must do my best to facilitate that object by supporting the Bill.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order! These remarks are outside the Amendment.
    MR. CHANCE: I support this Amendment, and I am not at all
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    surprised that the Chief Secretary I objects to it. All through he has shown the strongest objection not only to the control of this House, but to-publicity in this House. The control proposed by this Amendment would not be a very difficult one. It would be a sort of negative control, and so long as things were going on well the House would not interfere. The Returns-would be in much the same position as Provisional Orders used to be. The reason why I support the Amendment is that the House might find it necessary at some stage or another to make a selection between two estates of two landlords. The amount which can be advanced in each county seems to be strictly limited. It might very well be that wealthy tenants of a landlord who had got on very well with them, and the poor tenants of a bad landlord were willing, the one to sell and the other to buy. Now, if the House had any means of selection, it is obvious that it would give money to the poorer class of tenants, and where the quieting influence of the Act was most needed. I can quite understand that the Government, in its anxiety to aid a section of disturbing landlords in Ireland, would bring pressure to bear on the Commissioners to induce them to make grants to tenants who would prove bogus tenants. The landlord would put the money in his pocket and the bogus tenants would disappear, probably to act as catspaws in other districts and on other estates. If such matters came before the House, I do not believe that any Party, I do not believe the bulk of the Conservative Party would tolerate the grant of money to landlords in perfectly bogus transactions, and simply for the purpose of carrying on a land war in Ireland. It is said that the Amendment, if adopted, would lead to a waste of the time of the House. I confess I do not think so. The public control, and the light of day, ! would have the effect of stopping these transactions. The Land Commissioners would know that they would be landed into trouble by them; whereas if the Amendment be not carried, money will be advanced on certain estates which I could name, and the money will afterwards have to be paid by the county because the bogus tenants will walk away as soon as they have been paid.
    COLONEL NOLAN: I do not at all class this Amendment with that moved by the hon. Member for Northampton. I look upon it as in some respects reasonable, though injudicious. Thirty days is asked for, but I would point out that Parliament might not sit for six months, and it would be that period plus 30 days. The completion of a transaction might be delayed seven months, and the Amendment would lead to wrangles between the parties, and to a great many law suits. I cannot see how bargains can possibly be completed, if afterwards they are to be made the subject of political discussion in this House. I think the Bill would be better without the Amendment than with it.
    MR. M. J. KENNY: The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Chance) has exemplified the course attributed to us, namely, that of sailing on an even keel. He is going to vote for this Amendment; but I do not think it will secure the object which the hon. Member has in view. There is nothing in it which would stop any sale of which the House disapproved. Still, I think, it would be an exceedingly useful thing that the House should know what the Land Commissioners are doing. We want to know why the Land Commissioners should not be responsible to this House. We are to have no means of calling their conduct into question, and that is a reason why I think the House should retain some control over the matters with which they will have to deal in Ireland. I understand that an Amendment, further down, practically meets the requirements of the case. I attach no importance to the surmise of the hon. and gallant Member for Galway that the Bill might be repealed at a future date. I do not think there is any danger of such a reversal of public policy, for the principle of land purchase has been adopted by both Parties in the State. While agreeing that' the House should be fully informed of what is being done by the Land Commissioners, in the same way as was secured under the Land Act of 1881, I do not think that there is any real necessity for this Amendment. (8.32.)
    MR. PHILIPPS: The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary told us that under Lord
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    Ashbourne's Act there have been already something like 2,000 cases of sale and purchase, and that if this Amendment had been law the House might have debated every one of them. Even if one does not go as far in admiration of the House of Commons as the noble .Lord the Member for Paddington (Lord R. Churchill) it is hardly to be supposed that the House is going to waste its time unnecessarily in discussing the Reports of Commissioners after 12 o'clock at night. Hon. Members who raise Debates after 12 o'clock always have great difficulty in keeping a House together, and I do not think it need be feared that such Debates will be of very frequent occurrence. The hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Colonel Nolan) seemed to think that bargains might be unduly delayed. I think that that would not be so, but that ordinary cases of bargain would be merely laid on the Table. We have heard a good deal in Irish Debates about sales conclude d under Lord Ashbourne's Act by the exercise of undue pressure and intimidation on the part of the landlords, and about the Coercion Act being used for the purpose of forcing tenants to buy at an unduly high price. It is cases of this kind that would be influenced by this Amendment, if it were passed. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary seemed to think no one would benefit by the Amendment except advocates of the landlords and tenants, who would bring the interests of their respective clients before the House. I think the taxpayers would benefit also, and it is because I think this power would be a beneficial power to have, although I think it is one that would probably have to be exercised very seldom—perhaps only once a year —that I intend to support the Amendment.
    MR. P. STANHOPE: The-right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary's principal objection to this proposal was that if the Return were made to the House the comment and criticism would be so abundant that a great portion of the time of the House would be wasted, and he went on to say that there was no precedent for a proposal of this kind, and that in every case where an advance was made by way

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    of loan out of the Treasury, that advance passed entirely out of the control of the House. I say that that is an unsound system, although it is unfortunately one recently largely adopted by the Government in connection with the Naval Defence Act and Barracks Act. The Government have in their Bill designedly kept outside the purview of Parliament a largo sum which we think ought to come under annual criticism. As soon as this money has passed out of the control of Parliament it will be used just as the Land Commissioners please. I think we ought to keep the working of this Act constantly under our control, and I do not believe that the plan I suggest will give rise to inordinate criticism or Debate. When the Return was laid on the Table, gentlemen who were specially conversant with the cases dealt with might raise a Debate on it, in the same way as can now be done in the case of any Provisional Order. We have reason to think that the working of these Acts hitherto has been largely in the interest of the great territorial magnates, and very little in the interest of the email owners. On the grounds I have mentioned we intend to insist on the Amendment.
    MR. ISAACSON: There is one point which requires clearing up. An hon. Member has stated that the Duke of Leinster will only treat with tenants who are in arrear in order that the arrears may be merged in the amount of money paid. I hope the hon. Member is mistaken; if not, I think there is good:and just cause for an inquiry by a Committee of the House. It is undoubtedly the fact that the prices obtained for these properties are unusual, and could never be obtained if the properties were put up at public auction. At the same time it has been shown that such transactions as are contemplated by this Bill confer a vast amount of good upon Ireland. We are, however, guardians of the public purse, and I feel that every care should be taken that cases of the kind stated should not be permitted—indeed, if they do occur, the purchases ought to be rendered null and void. I trust the Attorney General for Ireland will be able to assure the Committee that such
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    cases have no existence in fact. From what I know of the Commissioners I am persuaded they would not permit anything so unbusinesslike if they could prevent it.
    MR. CHANCE: I may assure the hon. Member I have never known cases of land purchase in Ireland in which arrears of rents were not merged in the purchase money. So long as tenants are paying a solvent landlord at all punctually it is better for the landlord to go on than to sell, because in 99 cases out of 100 landlords, if they sell, find their income very considerably reduced, although they have increased security. But the usual process is this— Tenants fall into arrear; the landlord says, " This is bad business: I can not make the estate pay." He employs a man who sells estates on commission, and invariably the first inducement held out to the tenants is that if they sign an agreement, not only will their future rent be reduced, but they will also be freed from all arrears. So well aware are the Land Commissioners of this fact that lately they passed rules requiring certificates to be given by landlords showing that all arrears had been actually extinguished.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN,: My hon. Friend the Member for Tower Hamlets seems to think that there is some danger that a sum in addition to the amount which may be safely advanced as purchase money may be added in the shape of arrears. There is no foundation for any such alarm. We are all agreed that the interests of the taxpayer should be safeguarded, but I ask whether that will not be more effectually done by a body like the Land Commission, whose duty it is to see that a holding is sufficient security for the advance, than by the House of Commons debating the matter after twelve o'clock at night without the necessary information. There has been no appreciable loss to the taxpayer as yet, and I contend that under the existing system there is complete protection.
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: I am afraid that if the right hon. and learned Gentleman thinks he has disposed of the question of arrears he is rather sanguine. If the hon

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    Member (Mr. Wootton Isaacson), whose speech we were glad to hear, will walk into the Library—
    THE CHAIRMAN: The question of arrears does not arise on the Amendment before the Committee.
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: I was merely adverting to the observations of the Attorney General for Ireland, and, perhaps, I may finish the sentence. If the hon. Gentleman will walk into the Library and refer to the Report on Irish Estates he will find a good deal about the question of arrears; he will find the Land Commissioners have been actually unsuccessful in preventing the practice to which he referred. The Amendment provides for control by this House, and such control is so essential that I shall be obliged to support the Amendment.
    MR. CHANCE: There seems a complete difference of opinion upon the question of arrears.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I have already pointed out that the question of arrears does not arise on this Amendment.
    MR. CHANCE: I am not going to discuss the question of arrears.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The hon. Gentleman must wait until the question of arrears arises.
    MR. CHANCE: I do not propose to discuss the question at all. I merely rise to say that the difference of opinion, to my mind, affords the strongest possible argument for the Amendment before the House, because, if the Amendment were carried, this information would be before the House in each case. And yet, what do we see? One supporter of the Government asks for information. I stated specifically one thing, and the Attorney General for Ireland specifically contradicted my statement. That shows an absolute necessity for the Amendment, because it shows that while we are here discussing a Bill to get rid of £30,000,000, there is a complete difference of opinion as to what is to happen with the money.
    MR. CONYBEARE: If nothing else did, the great discrepancy of opinion on the important point raised by the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Wootton Isaacson) would induce me to vote for this Amend-
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    ment. I understand the Government to argue that there is no precedent for a proposal of this kind. There may be no precedent, but so far as I am aware, there is no precedent whatever for a Bill of this particular nature. There have been Bills to advance sums of money to the tenantry of Ireland, but there has been no Bill to land this country in what I think is pretty certain to be a dead loss of £30,000,000 sterling. There is no guarantee worth the name; all the guarantees are simply guarantees in name and not worth the paper they are written on. Therefore, I maintain it is very material in the interest of the taxpayers of this country that there should be Parliamentary control, such as is indicated by the Amendment. It is a pity the Government do not practice a little more frequently what they preach. If this Bill is an indication of the way in which they propose to protect the interests of the taxpayers of this country, the less we have of Tory protection the better. By a series of Resolutions passed a few days ago, all the salaries of the men who will have the working of the Act have been placed on the Consolidated Fund, and therefore the House of Commons will have no control over them. What opportunity shall we have of discussing the administration of this Bill? If any job is perpetrated by one of these gentlemen and we raise the question in the House we shall be told, "Oh! these gentlemen are Judges, and then Judges do not come within the purview of the House of Commons." I think when the Government claim to hold the scales fairly as between these two claimants, they should be very careful before they pose in such a way to show us that they carry out the principles that they preach. There is a further reason why such control should be secured in future Sessions by the House of Commons. There would no doubt be considerable opportunity arising under the administration of this Act to throw some enlightenment upon the abominations that may be practised under the Act, and to bring home to the people of England the disastrous position in which they have placed themselves by putting a Tory Government in office —a Tory Government pledged against a

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    Bill of this character—pledged against the use of the British credit to secure a high expenditure for the benefit of Irish landlords. All their election pledges have been broken, and I think it is well to enlighten the country upon this point, and hence it is that we wish to push an Amendment of this kind which will secure the free criticism of the House of Commons. Then the Attorney General for Ireland says, " But how much better off will you be if you only have an opportunity of raising a discussion after 12 o'clock at night, and such questions will then only be decided upon side issues, and by Members who will probably not be in the House itself while the discussion is going on." Well, there are Members on this side who certainly have studied these matters, and who perhaps might be able to convey instruction and information even to Her Majesty's present advisers. These it may be hoped, would be able to influence the judgment of the House upon any land question raised, and to point out acts of jobbery transacted for the benefit of the landlords. If we are unable to compel the Government to allow such discussion to be taken earlier, well, then we must take it after midnight. And I may also remind the Attorney General for Ireland that the existence of a Tory Ministry is not a matter of perpetuity, and probably the changes that will occur after the next General Election may induce him and his friends, when out in the cold shades of Opposition, to thank us if we had secured such an opportunity as this.
    MR. SEXTON: I am in favour of full Particulars of all transactions under the Act being put before the House, and nothing but good could result from such a practice. But when the hon. Member goes on to propose that the Report shall lay upon the Table for certain days, there, I think, we reAch a point of policy very much open to question. The effect will be to expose the Act to perpetual review and also to what I may call fragmentary repeal, putting it in the power of a Parliamentary majority at any moment to cancel a particular operation under the Act. Of course, we cannot be certain but that at any particular hour a majority might occupy these
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    benches opposed to the Act as a whole, and might indulge that policy under cover of an objection to any particular transaction under the Act. It would be an evil, and, I feel, a dangerous thing if every farmer or landlord were liable to have his bargain reviewed not only by the Land Commission, but also by the House of Commons. This would introduce an element of uncertainty very likely to impede transactions, and I am desirous that every facility shall be offered and every cause for delay removed. But suppose a transaction completed in the month of August, and the House having risen in July, then, under this Amendment, it would be necessary to wait until the House met again in the January following, and then to wait for a further period of 30 days. In point of fact, the whole transaction would be kept in suspense for a period of half a year, and I cannot but think that that would be prejudicial to the working of the Act. Of course, I recognise that such an Amendment might be a protection against duress to one party in these transactions, but that I think should be secured in quite another way, and I hold that there would be ample security if the salaries of the land Commissioners were put upon the Votes and subjected to the control of this House, and that these Financial Commissioners should not be treated in the matter of salaries as if they were Judges, under this Bill.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The hon. Gentleman is anticipating a future question that may arise under the Bill.
    MR. SEXTON: I will not argue it. I only wish to indicate that that is one way of meeting the objection. This, I think, is the wrong method of doing so, and for the reasons I have stated I cannot vote for the Amendment of my hon. Friend. When the time comes, however, I shall be prepared to support a proposal for keeping the Commissioners' salaries upon the Votes before the House of Commons.
    MR. A. O'CONNOR: I agree with the remarks of my hon. Friend as to the latter part of the Amendment, bat I think that the earlier portion of it well deserves consideration at the hands of the Committee, and especially in view of the light of our

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    experience, for we have had some experience under the Purchase Act. I refer especially to one case which has been put before us, namely, that of a large landed proprietor in a particular county of Ireland, who had three different estates in that county. Upon one estate the rents had been paid with remarkable punctuality, but on the other two the rents were generally in arrears. The tenants who were in arrear were allowed—I will not use a stronger term —were allowed to purchase. The tenants on the estates where they were not in arrear applied to be allowed to purchase, and they were not allowed to do so at all. The tenants who were in arrear found it to their advantage to come to terms with their landlord, whatever may have been the inducement, to bring about that conclusion. The Return which has been presented to the House shows us this result. This is the kind of thing which results from purchase, that the holdings of the tenants in arrear are purchased at 22 or 23 years, the purchase money covering the arrears. When there are no arrears, there is no means of purchase. This is how the Land Purchase Act is worked, and this is how it may be expected to work in the future. Under the circumstances, it does not appear to me unreasonable that Parliament should be furnished with information of the most detailed kind of the transactions that are allowed to take place from time to time. If a Division is taken, I shall support the first part of the Amendment, but I quite agree with my hon. Friend that the second part is one that we cannot support.
    MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I quite agree with the hon. Member for Belfast that it is hardly desirable that we should adopt an Amendment of this character, which, undoubtedly, would throw an impediment in the way of business, and make the working of the Act almost impracticable. At the same time, I do think that information should be laid on the Table of the House as to completed transactions. There is an Amendment later on in the name of the hon. Member for the Rushcliffe Division, and it seems to me that this should recommend itself to the Government, and probably it might shorten the discussion
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    if the right hon. Gentleman expresses his willingness to accede to this.
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: He has done so.
    MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I was not aware of that; but, upon that understanding, I shall vote against the Amendment now before the House.
    ME. P. STANHOPE: I regret that the right hon. Gentleman should take that view. He seems to misconceive the object of the Amendment, which is to secure the continuous criticism of the House of Commons, and continual control over the distribution of these £30,000,000. Notwithstanding the comments of my friends from Ireland, I shall persist in my Amendment. I can quite understand the position of hon. Members from Ireland. They are anxious to secure in a positive and final manner this large grant of money for land purchase. They are afraid perhaps that at some subsequent period, possibly a Radical majority may be returned, and some of us may be inclined to say that we have gone far enough. That we think the book should be closed, and that we should re-consider our position. Our Irish friends are anxious that an eventuality of that sort should not occur. Now, I admit that they have claims in a financial sense upon Great Britain. There is an open and unsettled account between Great Britain and Ireland in financial matters, and I should be willing to make them a free gift of any sum which may be proved to be owing in consequence of unfair financial arrangements in the past. But I do object to this system under which Parliamentary control is to be withdrawn, and a large sum of money is to be expended upon Irish land in such form as to create a tributary charge from Ireland to England. With great respect, therefore, I must insist in submitting my Amendment to the judgment of the House.
    (9.48.) The Committee divided:— Ayes 52; Noes 159.—(Div. List, No. 128.)
    MR. CONYBEARE: The reason why I move this Amendment is because it seems to me that the landlords should share in the risk that these transactions would involve. So far as I have studied this complicated measure, the one class of individuals which Her

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    Majesty's Government seem anxious to protect are the landlords of Ireland. Now my object is to try and make them share the loss, for probably there will be a very large loss inflicted upon the taxpayers of the country. I presume, if the Amendments were accepted, that in certain cases the landlords would find themselves out of pocket, at any rate to the extent of the interest upon their guarantee. Now, considering the history of a great many of these landlords, it is really absurd that they alone should be protected, for it is entirely through their conduct in the Past that the necessity for a Bill of this kind has been brought about, and in common fairness we must question their claim to pocket the advantages this Bill offers without let or hindrance. I object to that principle altogether. It is because the tyranny of some landlords has put them outside the rule of consideration that I propose this Amendment.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 11, after the word "advance," to insert the words " the guarantee to be a first charge upon such advance."—(Mr. Cony-beare.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I find some sort of difficulty in dealing with this Amendment, because I do not understand the purport of it. Subsection 1 refers to Guaranteed Land Stock, and the guarantee there is, of course—the guarantee of British credit. How that guarantee is to be made a first charge on the advance I cannot see, nor bow the operation is to be carried out, or what effect it will have if carried out. I am hardly in a position, therefore, to reply to the hon. Member.
    MR. CHANCE: The thing is very simple. If the tenant makes a default of payment the Treasury has to pay up, and then what the Treasury has spent in paying up is made a first charge in respect of the Stock that has been paid up. Having paid up 2 ¾per cent., that 2 ¾ per cent., if it is not paid by the tenant, has to be the first charge on the Stock itself. The House has already decided that there should be some sort of guarantee, and it appears to me that
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    the effect of the Amendment, if it is carried, will be to nullify that decision.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I think it would be better if the hon. Member for Camborne were to explain his Amendment.
    MR. CONYBEARE: I am exceedingly unwilling to trespass unnecessarily on the time of the House, but as I cannot help obeying the Chair— your command I may say, Sir—I will endeavour to explain my Amendment to the best of my ability. There are some Members of the Committee who under stand the mysteries of finance better than I can pretend to do, and I believe that those who enjoy that distinction—
    THE CHAIRMAN: I must invite the hon. Member to proceed with his explanation at once. Without an explanation his Amendment cannot be put.
    MR. CONYBEARE: I will do so. In these cases a Preamble is sometimes useful; but if the Committee does not desire to hear my Preamble, I will proceed with my explanation, though it appears to me that the explanation I gave just now was ample for the purpose I had in view. Under the Bill as it stands the only party protected is the landlord. That I object to, and I wish to introduce words into the Bill which will make the landlord bear a share of any loss. So little attention was paid to my remarks when I first addressed the House that I think it is rather hard that I should be called on to repeat my arguments.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is under a misapprehension. He is not called upon to repeat any arguments, but merely to state what he means.
    MR. CONYBEARE: If I did not convey my meaning before, I am bound to say that my intention has just been so admirably put before the Committee by the hon. Member for South Kilkenny that I should be only further obscuring the issue were I to mix up my thoughts with those of the hon. Member, and to attempt to penetrate the skulls-and minds of hon. Members opposite. THE CHAIRMAN: I call on the hon. Member to resume his seat, and I call on the hon. Member for the Rushcliffe

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    Division of Nottingham to propose his Amendment.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 11, after the word " advance," to insert the words " Quarterly returns shall he made up to the end of the months of March, June, September, and December in each year, and as soon as practicable laid before Parliament, giving the following particulars respecting such advances:—(1.) Province and county; (2.) Landlord's name; (3.) Number of holdings; (4.) Area in statute acres; (5.) Tenement valuation; (6.) Rental (whether judicial or non-judicial); (7.) Purchase amount; (8.) Advance sanctioned; (9.) Name of purchaser."—(Mr. John Ellis.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: We had. a previous discussion on the matter, and I explained the intentions of the Government in substance. I do not know that this is the most convenient place for the Amendment; but as we have already discussed the matter, I do not see that there is any reason why we should not settle the matter at once. I accept the Amendment.
    MR. SEXTON: I think that in No. 6, after "rental," the word "showing" should be inserted.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Hear, hear.
    MR. CHANCE: I have a previous Amendment in No. 3. It seems to me that the information given in this form would be useless. What we want to know are the particulars of each purchase. I move, therefore, to omit the " s " from the word " holdings," so that it may cover particulars so far as each individual tenant on the estate is concerned. I think the word should be put in the singular.
    THE CHAIRMAN: To strike the word out altogether would be the proper way to proceed.
    MR. CHANCE: I move to strike it out.
    Amendment proposed to the proposed Amendment, after " number of " to omit " holdings," in order to insert " holding." —(Mr. Chance.)
    Question, " That' holdings ' stand part of the proposed Amendment," put, and negatived.
    Question, "That the word 'holding' be there inserted," put, and agreed to.
    MR. SYDNEY BUXTON: I would make a suggestion to the Committee. We were not aware that the Government were prepared to accept the proposal of my hon. Friend in reference to this Return. It seems hardly in the competency of the Committee at a moment's notice to amend this Amendment so as to make the Returns perfect. I would suggest that the Government should prepare what they think a suitable Return, and bring it up on Report. We should then be able to consider it on duo notice.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I cannot accept that suggestion. The hon. Member seems to think that the Government made up their mind to accept the Amendment at the last moment, and that when they do that the Committee should be allowed time to consider the decision arrived at. That is not the way to discuss these matters. We are prepared to amend the Amendment, and I think we should now follow that course. The Amendment to No. 3 has been agreed to. I think we should now agree to the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for West Belfast, which would give all the particulars the Committee desire as to each holding.
    MR. MACNEILL: I think you should also include the number of cases where the Land Commissioners refuse purchase. I find that since the Ashbourne Act came into operation there have been 3,426 applications for purchase refused.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not think it desirable to make statutory orders on too large a scale when arranging for a Parliamentary Return. The Committee is of opinion that the Returns should include the particulars already specified. In addition we shall have annual or biennial Reports, and in those Reports all other information not included in the Returns will be given.
    MR. CONYBEARE: I do not see in the particulars any reference to arrears. I think it would be important that we should know the arrears outstanding in each case. I do not know if that occurs to the mind of my hon. Friend, but I think the matter is important, and I hope he will accept the

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    suggestion, or, if not, that the Chief Secretary will state whether or not he sees any objection to embodying the proposal in the Return.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: We shall know what the arrears are when the transaction takes place.
    MR. CONYBEARE: We should know it before.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Before proceeding to suggest further additions we should deal with the Amendments on the Paper.
    Amendment proposed to the proposed Amendment No. 6, after "rental," to insert " showing."—(Mr. Sexton.
    Question, " That the word ' showing be there inserted," put, and agreed to.
    Amendment agreed to, to omit the word " amount" in No. 7, in order to insert the word " money." — (Mr. Cfiance.)
    MR. KNOX: I beg to move after No. 7, to insert " The amount of arrears due six months before the agreement of purchase." I think this will meet the difficulty suggested by the Chief Secretary in reply to the hon. Member. If we ' take arrears due immediately before the date of the agreement it will be easy for the landlord to dodge the Return by giving the arrears due just before the signing of the agreement. I have heard of a case where that was done. If we say " Arrears due six months before the date of the purchase," we shall provide against that, and shall be able to provide in a later clause of the Act that a statutory declaration shall be made giving the amount of the arrears.
    Amendment proposed to the proposed Amendment, after the last Amendment, to insert the words " 8. Amount of arrears due six months before agreement."—(Mr. Knox.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be inserted in the proposed Amendment."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I think that, after all, the amount of arrears is not a matter of which the Land Commission can be officially cognisant. The Commissioners do not possess the machinery to make the Return suggested. If there are any
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    questions of duress having been exercised on the purchaser, the exact amount of the arrears is immaterial, because a year's arrears would be as effective for purposes of duress as arrears for a much longer period.
    ME. KNOX: My Amendment is strictly germane to the business of the Land Commission. The Commissioners have to inquire into the security for the advance afforded by the holding, and, therefore, it is necessary to know whether the tenant has or has not been able to pay the rent previously exacted. It is perfectly easy to provide by a distinct clause the machinery for obtaining this information. In the agreement the landlord and the tenant have to make certain statutory declarations, and in these declarations can be included the amount of arrears due six months previously. It is true that arrears may have accumulated merely from laxity in the administration of the estate, but even then it has always been understood between landlord and tenant that such arrears can be exacted, though in ordinary times they are not called up.
    SIR G. TREVELYAN: There is another reason why it is desirable that the Chief Secretary should assent to the hon. Member's Amendment. The right hon. Gentleman undoubtedly referred to one motive—perhaps the governing one— which induced the hon. Member to press this Amendment, namely, that we should have some indication as to whether or not these sales are conducted under duress. I do not say that the answer of the Chief Secretary did not, to a certain extent, meet that reason, though I still think 'it important that we should have this information. I gather that the general object of the hon. Member for the Rushcliffe Division in his proposal is not quite the same as that of the hon. Member who moves the present Amendment. The hon. Member regards himself as a Representative of the country, and the country at large has a right to know what sort of estates the Government are buying for a period of 49 years. There is no single head in the suggested Return which could throw more light on the nature of the purchased property than that which shows what amount of arrears was due six

    445
    months before the date of purchase. The right hon. Gentleman opposite, I think, says that in some cases a large amount of the arrears comes from the fact that there is lax administration of the estates. Now, be it remembered that when the State takes over the estates it cannot afford to be as lax an administrator as the landlords. It is bound absolutely, by the conditions of the bargain, to exact the rent. It is quite useless to say that the Land Commission is not in a condition to inquire into the question of whether there are arrears or not. The Land Commission is bound to fix in each case the number of years' purchase, and the main point governing the decision is whether the rents on the property can or cannot be easily exacted. For instance, property in West Galway or Kerry will not sell for the same amount as property of the same nominal value situated in Wexford, for the reason that the nominal rental is got in with much greater difficulty in West Galway and Kerry. Therefore, it is to enable Members of Parliament, for the county which they represent, to gather whether or not these bargains are good ones, and such as they ought to sanction, that this information is asked for. There can be no information for this purpose more important than whether or not the rent has been regularly paid. I must say that these seem to me reasons why Irish Members, and still more, perhaps, Scotch Members, ought to vote for the Amendment of the hon. Member.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I would suggest a way ont of the difficulty for the Chief Secretary, who no doubt finds it hard to grant the Return in the form asked for, for the reason that the Land Commissioners may say, " We do not know the extent of the arrears." His argument is that perhaps there are estates where large amounts of arrears are allowed to accumulate, but that the arrears must not be taken as a mark of pressure, but rather of condescension, on the part of the landlord. What I would suggest is this: Omit the question of arrears, but if within 12, 15, or 18 months, or any reasonable period, the tenants have been served with writs of ejectment or any legal processes of that kind previous to the agreement, that might be stated on the Return. Because
    446
    from that it would be possible to see what is the actual amount of the arrears. That, I think, is a reasonable way out of the difficulty. Very often a tenant does not know how much he is in arrear, and 1 myself have known scores of cases in which landlords have made it a regular practice to refuse to give receipts.
    MR. CONYBEARE: I think that the addition it has been proposed to make to the Return would be a valuable one, because it would show who are the tolerable and who are the intolerable landlords, although I do not think it would fully meet the difficulty. We require to know whether we are investing our money in a profitable speculation, and I must say that as far as I understand the Bill, I do not know a single instance in which we should be able to make a profitable investment. In answer to what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary, I would point out that under the Arrears Bill of 1880,which I have in my hand, sufficient powers are given to the Commission to obtain all the information we require. By the first section of that Bill it is provided that if it be proved to the satisfaction of the Commissioner that the yearly rent has been paid or that antecedent arrears are due, and the tenant is unable to discharge such arrears, then the Land Commissioner may make an order, and so forth. Therefore, it is perfectly competent to the Commissioners to ascertain the particulars we are asking for.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Of course, it would be the duty of the Land Commission to inquire into the solvency of the tenant who proposed to purchase his holding. I have no doubt that the relations existing between landlord and occupier and the amount of rent due are matters which will be inquired into. What I wish to point out to the Committee is that the amount of arrears due is perhaps the least important matter from the point of view of future solvency of a tenant. There are many other matters which have to be ascertained. There is the amount of stock which a man has on his farm, the amount of shop debts, and his indebtedness to others than the landlord. I feel, therefore, that I shall certainly adhere to the advice I gave to the Committee not to assent to this proposal, which, I think, has been adequately discussed.
    MR. CHANCE: Why could not the Government assent to this arrangement, when the landlord and tenant have signed the contract and put an affidavit on the back of the document, certifying certain particulars, which the tenant is bound to give. One of these particulars might be that the tenant should also state the arrears of rent in addition to the encumbrances which are already provided for. In that case, no further inquiry would be necessary. This being so, I ask whether there is anything to be gained by carrying on this discussion.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: I wish to point out in answer to what the right hon. Gentleman has just said that we are not considering the question of the solvency of the tenant at the present moment. What we want to know is whether the price paid for the guarantee is a fair and legitimate price. A private person wishing to make a purchase of land in Ireland would send his agent to ascertain whether the price asked represented a real or a fictitious rent — whether, in fact, the money had been paid or not, that being an essential element in the transaction. We have a duty to perform to our constituents, who, being the taxpayers, constitute the guarantee in the purchases proposed. We want these Returns in order that we may have some sort of control over these transactions, and if we find that the rent-rolls returned to us are sham rent-rolls, we have a right to protest against the action of the Land Commissioners.
    MR. MACARTNEY: I would put it to the House whether the information asked for by the Amendment would enable us to form a better judgment on the matter under discussion? I maintain that the statement of the arrears of rent on any particular property would not help us in the decision as to whether the price to be paid is too large; to render that information of any value you would have to enlarge it considerably by stating when the arrears began to accumulate, how much they amounted to in each year, what was the condition of agriculture during those years, and many other things which would render the inquiry almost interminable. All the Land Commissioners really have to
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    satisfy themselves about is as to whether the land about to be purchased is a good security for the purchase money. That is a far more important question for this House and the country than the question of the solvency of the tenant, because the value of the land is the security for the payment of the money advanced by the country and not the position of the tenant. It is, moreover, absurd to say that the question of arrears has anything to do with the question whether the rent is a fair rent or not. I have only to add that I think the tendency of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bridgeton (Sir G. Trevelyan) would be to induce those who intend to become purchasers of land in Ireland to accumulate arrears, so that they might be enabled thereby to cut down the number of years purchase they would be asked to give for the property.
    MR. M. J. KENNY: I wish to point out that by Rule 5 the Commissioners before deciding any question relating to an agreement for purchase or making any advance are to be satisfied that the tenants' rent up to the last gale day has either been paid, satisfied or released; that Rule throws the onus upon the landlord of showing what is the amount of arrears due, and I should point out further that the servants of the Land Commission are bound to inquire what arrears are due. Therefore the Commissioners have the means of supplying the House with the information asked for. This being so I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to accepting the Amendment of my hon. Friend.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Gentleman will see that Rule 5 only provides that the Commissioners shall be satisfied that the rent has been paid, satisfied or released. But does not go on to say that the property shall be un-burthened by any arrears of rent.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I would ask the Chief Secretary seriously to re-consider his decision. I think it hardly fair that he should . treat our arguments in the purely dialectic manner he assumes, whereby he evades the entire point of the discussion. The right hon. Gentleman assumes that the only question the State has to consider is the solvency of the tenant

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    and his ability to pay the instalments. I say that that is not the only question. The main question is, do the contracting parties enter into the bargain with free minds? Take the case of leases in Ireland. It was declared, I believe, in 1870 by Lord Selborne that the lease in a case before him had been carried out under such duress that if taken into any Court of Equity, the document would have been set aside at once. Now what is this case? It is one in which the State advances public money to the landlord, who may take himself off next morning, having got the money in his pocket, not caring a rap what becomes of the tenants, and after that the tenant is to be saddled on to the estate for 49 years, the only thing the State has to consider being whether he is able to pay the annual instalments during that period. I should have imagined that in a matter of this kind the Government would be prepared to provide the House of Commons with the fullest means of forming the best judgment. But instead of this, the right hon. Gentleman shows that he is merely directing his attention to the best means of procuring that which the landlords, on whose behalf he is now acting, shall procure the money they require.
    SIR J. COLOMB: I do not see that the fact of having information as to the arrears of the tenant proves anything whatever. The real question is as to the simple value of the land, and whether the bargain is good and fair. It is not as to the character of a particular tenant, or as to the amount of his arrears. I do not think it is advisable that we should have an accumulation of Returns to this House. It will not assist hon. Members in arriving at a clear decision on the question.
    MR. CHANCE: Earlier in the evening I went into the question, and I showed that in the negotiations whichpre ceded purchase the first thing done was to ascertain the normal value of the land, and then to make additions according to the number of years arrears owing by a tenant purchaser. I think it would be very easy for the Commissioners to obtain Returns of the arrears owing, and I would appeal to the Attorney General for Ireland to say whether the Commissioners will have any difficulty in
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    obtaining them. Surely there is nothing in the world to prevent the Land Commission adding to the contract Schedule a statement showing what the arrears are, and there is no reason why the tenant should not answer upon oath any question which the Land Commission may desire to ask of him.
    MR. MADDEN: No doubt they can obtain it, but the question is whether the information is material to the issue with which the House has to deal.
    MR. CONYBEARE: When I originally proposed this Amendment I thought it was a point of which everyone in this Committee would admit the importance. The questions raised are first as to the placing the tenants under duress, and, secondly, as to the solvency of the tenant. Both of these points are connected with material safeguards under this Bill. Enormous sums of money are being voted, as is supposed for the benefit of the tenantry, and certainly they will go to the benefit of the landlords, and we shall have no right to complain if the House is ultimately placed under duress in having to evict tenants who cannot pay instalments based upon arrears as well as upon value. I should like to know what would be the value of these Irish estates if there were no tenantry to cultivate them, and if the landlords were compelled to cultivate their own acres. It appears to me that the question of the solvency of the tenant is an absolutely new element in this matter. I put it to the hon. Members opposite who seem to think this is mere nonsense, whether any reasonable landlord in considering the letting of a farm to a tenant, either here or in Ireland, would not bear in mind the question whether or not that tenant was solvent and able to fulfil the obligations which he thus took upon himself. Now this question of arrears, raised as it is on this point, must result either in the tenant being unable to pay, and therefore the land constituting a bad security, or a man being plunged hopelessly into debt by some means or other. It appears to me that the arguments against the Government on this point are absolutely unanswerable. I believe there is something behind all this. I am convinced that this is an important Amendment, and I hold that

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    it is desirable in the interests of the British taxpayer that we should make our views known. I hope hon. Members will insist on getting from the Government a more satisfactory explanation on this point.
    MR. KEAY: I think the proof of the desirableness of making known the magnitude of arrears may be found in the Return recently presented to this House on the Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe. According to the Return, the average rate of purchase under the Ashbourne Acts is about 19 years' purchase of the Poor Law valuation, but looking at the tenants now in default, and whose holdings have become worth-leas to them and dangerous to the British taxpayer, it is found by the capitalization of the arrears that the average purchase-money exacted from the poor men amounts to no less than 25 years' purchase on the Poor Law valuation. I hold that that is an instructive fact. I know the right hon. Gentleman claims that under his scheme the tenant will only have to pay £68 for each £100 value, but I venture to suggest that this high value is based mainly on the arrears.
    MR. KNOX: We do not ask for anything but information; the Land Commission has to satisfy itself whether or not the arrears have been paid, and in order to do so must know when the arrears have been paid. The facts are, therefore, clearly within the cognisance of the Commission, and, even if they are not, all this information can be obtained by inserting another column in the description of the holding, which is sworn to by the tenant when he signs the agreement. I think we have a right to demand this information.
    Sir JOSEPH M'KENNArose in his place, and claimed to move " That the Question be now put;" but the CHAIR-MAN withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question, because it was unnecessary, inasmuch as the Committee was willing to come to a decision without Closure.
    (11.16.)The Committee divided:— Ayes 123; Noes 197. — (Div. List, No. 129.)
    Amendment amended, by inserting after the word "sanctioned," the words,
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    " 9. Guaranteed Deposit." — (Mr.Chance.')
    Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
    MR. KNOX: I beg to propose the Amendment which stands in my name. I take it to be the intention of the Government that in every case the Stock shall be sufficient to satisfy the purchase money up to its nominal amount, and I think it would be well that this should be distinctly stated,.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 11, to insert after the words last inserted, " and such Stock, as between the landlord and tenant of the holding purchased, shall be accepted by the landlord as equal in value to the nominal amount thereof."—(Mr. Knox.)
    Question proposed, " That those words be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not believe the Amendment is necessary, but it is quite in accordance with the intentions of the Government, and I accept it.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    MR. KEAY: The Amendment I have now to move is in line 13, to leave out " fifteen" and insert " ten." I desire that there should be. such an arrangement effected by this Bill that no one class of holders of public funds created in the present day shall have an undue advantage over any other class. I am pleased on this occasion to feel thoroughly at one with the opinions which I know have been entertained by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman in 1888 carried out what we all know was a very excellent and successful scheme of conversion. He succeeded in converting something like £500,000,000 of the National Debt practically from 3 to 2 ½ per cent. What was the reason why the right hon. Gentleman entered into that scheme? I assert fearlessly that there was only one reason, and that was that he believed as a matter of financial prophecy—and I think with the little experience I have I can thoroughly join in the prophecy—-[Cries of " Question ! "] I am speaking directly to the question; Gentlemen who call out " Question " do not understand the Bill. I say the right hon. Gentleman rightly gauged the future. His

    453
    sense of justice would have been revolted if he had not believed that the country would be able to borrow money, say for the next 50 years, at 2½ per cent. —in other words that the 2½ per cent. securities of the Government would stand at about par. It is of no use whatever for anyone to come forward now, as gentlemen have done to-night, and point to the fact that what are practically 2½ per cent. Consols are now at 96. The right hon. Gentleman was legislating for the century, or, at all events, for the half-century to come, when he converted the Stock, and I say that this Bill likewise makes provision for the coming half-century. I am very curious to hear what the Chancellor of the Exchequer will say to justify his creation of a higher Stock at the present moment than that which he has recently so successfully dealt with. The right hon. Gentleman knows that the effect of his proposal will be that the Land Stock will steadily rise until it reaches from 6 to 8 per cent. premium. The right hon. Gentleman is going to present the landlords with the most enormous privilege under his Bill in allowing them to fix their own price for the land. Say that a landlord fixes £100 as the price of a certain plot of land, the right hon. Gentleman puts a bit of scrip into the landlord's pocket which will sell in the market for £106 or £108. He is deliberately putting a premium of from 6 to 8 per cent. on the top of the landlord's valuation of his own land. There is, to my mind, no equity in that. Luckily for my contention the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill and the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer have shut the door upon an argument they might otherwise have brought forward. They might have argued that Land Stock, being an uncertain and unknown Stock and a new Stock, might not become a favourite in the market, and consequently it was desirable that there should be something to tempt the public to take it up. They have, however, provided that the landlords shall have the option of exchanging it at par for Consols. I say this is a most unjust and outrageous provision. It is playing against the English nation the game commonly known as "heads I win, tails you lose." What does it mean? Let us take a case: Suppose that 10 or 20 years hence the
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    Land Stock is in great favour; that the land purchases have been very successfully carried out; that the tenants are paying up very well; that this 2¾ per cent. is supposed to be as secure as Two and a Half per Cent. Consols. The result is evident. The Land Stock will be at a premium of from 6 to 8 per cent., and the landlords will not exchange for Consols. But suppose, on the other hand, that the operations of this Bill result in conclusions dangerous to the State—in tremendous political convulsions and social upheavals; what will happen then? The Land Stock, although it may bear a higher interest, will go below par, and the landlords will take advantage of this clause and exchange the Stock for Consols. I think I have said quite enough. [Ministerial cheers.] I understand those cheers; they come from the landlords sitting below the Gangway opposite. I understand what the hon. Gentlemen want. They do not want to be informed, but simply to hasten the stream of British gold into their pockets and those of their landlord friends. I have explained my Amendment as briefly as I can, and I commend it specially to the favourable consideration of the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the two separate reasons I have given.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 13, to leave out the word "fifteen," and insert the word "ten."—(Mr. Keay.)
    Question proposed, "That the word 'fifteen' stand part of the Bill."
    THE CHANCELLOR or THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,: The hon. Member assumes that this side of the House is composed of landlords.
    MR. KEAY: I said below the Gangway.
    MR. GOSCHEN: If statistics were prepared on the subject, I think it would be found there are quite as many landlords on that side of the House as on this. The hon. Member suggests that this Stock should be reduced from £2 15s, percent. to £2 10s. He seems to think that Two and Three-quarter per Cent. Stock of this kind is sure to rise Very much above par.
    MR. KEAY: If 2½ per cent is par.
    MR. GOSCHEN: There is at present Stock guaranteed as this Stock is,

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    and charged on the Consolidated Fund, and which bears interest at the rate of 3 per cent., namely, the Local Loan Stock. That Stock stands at 102. If the Local Loan Stock at 3 per cent. stands at 102 I think the hon. Member and the Committee will see that Two and Three quarter per Cent. Stock is not likely to take the position the hon. Gentleman assigns to it. What we desire is that the landlords should get par for their Stock. This Stock will stand between Consols and the Local Loan Stock. As regards the other points raised by the hon. Gentleman, he will bear in mind it is only within limits fixed by the Treasury that this Stock can be exchanged for Consols.
    MR. KEAY: I have no doubt the right hon. Gentleman thinks he has traversed my remarks; but, in sitting down, I specially asked him to reply to two points. He has not replied to them. Of course, when he takes the present value of the Two and a Half per Cent. Consols at 96, we all know that Three per Cent. Consols would be 102. That is just exactly [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER rose to intervene.] I beg the right hon. Gentleman's pardon. [Ministerial cheers.] I do not think the statement is of such a character as necessarily to elicit that cheer. How does he justify his statement that he must take the present market price when his whole conduct for years past proves that, in his judgment, the legitimate price of Consols for the next half century will be par at 2½per cent.? I call upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer to say if it is not the case that he believed in 1888, and still believes, that in the grand future par is to be found as the measure of 2 1/2 per cent. interest on the National Debt.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I expected the Chancellor of the Exchequer would make some statement to-night as to why he invented this Stock, practically giving the Irish landlord a better bargain than the taxpayers. The landlords of Ireland have done nothing whatever except bring misery to the country, and yet he gives them a far better bargain for clearing out than he gives to the fund-holder who has invested his money with the State. I trust the fund-holding classes, who are largely Conservative,
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    and who really do not owe very many thanks to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, will take into view the different treatment the Chancellor of the Exchequer has meted out to that deserving class, to that he has meted out to a class of gentlemen who have nothing to show except a few worn-out crowbars and battering-rams.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: If the right hon. Gentleman were to issue Consols as suggested by the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wolverhampton at 3 ¼ per cent., reducible in 15 years to 2 ½ per cent., in all probability it is reasonable to suppose they would stand at par. The object of the Chancellor of the Exchequer surely is to get this money as cheaply as he possibly can. Will he explain why on earth he does not issue Consols?
    MR. GOSCHEN'Sreply was inaudible in the Gallery.
    MR. KEAY: Will the right hon. Gentleman kindly answer my question?
    MR. CONYBEARE: The right hon. Gentleman said just now that the Government are anxious to give the land lords Stock at par. I am not anxious to do anything of the kind. I have not the slightest sympathy with the object of the right hon. Gentleman-
    It being midnight, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow, at Two o'clock.

  MAIL SHIPS BILL.—(No. 163.)

    COMMITTEE.
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Clause 4.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again." — (Dr. Tanner.")
    THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir J. FERGUSSON,: May I appeal to the hon. Member to allow this Bill to proceed? It is of importance to the public interest that legislative sanction should be given to these proposals without delay.
    DR. TANNER: I would suggest to the right hon.

    457
    Gentleman that if it is necessary to proceed with the measure he should put it down as first Order of the Day. I really must object to measures being rushed through after midnight.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  LONDON (CITY) TRIAL OF CIVIL CAUSES BILL.—(No. 269.)

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir R. WEBSTER,: I hope the House will take the Second Reading now. It is simply a Bill to remove doubt whether civil cases can be taken in the City of London. There is in fact no alteration of the law. The question has been raised whether nisi prius trials can take place in the City of London at the, Guildhall.
    DR. TANNER: I object.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I notice on the Paper a series of little Bills of this character such as are usually made the subject of barter and arrangement between ourselves and the Government towards the end of a Session. Now, if we allow these Bills to go through now, we lose all the advantage of these Autumn manoeuvres, sometimes very useful to us. The Government seem to be prematurely delivered of a number of these Bills, and it is unusual to attempt to rush them at this period of the Session. I think the City of London, having waited so long for this Bill, can well wait a few weeks longer.
    MR. CONYBEARE: A little time ago, in the course of the Debate, a Member of the Government pointed out as an objection to certain proposals made from this side of the House, that the House would be under the necessity of discussing Returns and approving transactions under the Land Purchase Bill after 12 o'clock at night. Upon the same grounds we may object to Bills being taken after midnight.
    Second Reading deferred till to-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  LOCAL REGISTRATION OF TITLE (IRELAND) BILL.—(No. 189.)

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN,: I hope the House will allow this Bill to be read. Its object is useful and necessary, and it is accepted on both sides of the House.
    MR. CONYBEARE: The right hon. and learned Gentleman used the 12 o'clock argument, to which I just now referred, and that argument is tenfold stronger against a Bill of this kind.
    Second Reading deferred till tomorrow, at Two of the clock.

    INFLAMMABLE LIQUIDS BILL. (No. 193.)
    Order for Second Reading read, and discharged.
    Bill withdrawn.

  PRESUMPTION OF LIFE LIMITATION (SCOTLAND) BILL.—(No. 248.)

    COMMITTEE.
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Motion made, and Question proposed, " That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again." — (Dr. Tanner.)
    MR. BUCHANAN: I hope we may be allowed to proceed. This is a small Bill of a technical character, and is urged from both sides of the House on behalf of those interested. There is no real opposition to the Bill on its merits.
    DR. TANNER: I much regret that I cannot give way at the solicitation of the hon. Member.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  FISHERY BOARD (SCOTLAND) BILL [LORDS].—(No. 259.)

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    MR. MARJORIBANKS: On this I venture to ask a question. The principle and many of the details of the Bill resemble

    459
    those of one I have in charge, and I wish to ask if the right hon. Gentleman will consent to both Bills being sent to the same Select Committee?
    THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON,: I will consider this, and will communicate with the right hon. Gentleman when I have consulted with my advisers on the subject.
    Second Reading deferred till Thursday.

    PRIVATE BILL PROCEDURE (SCOTLAND) [SALARIES, &c.]
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    " That it is expedient to authorise the payment, out of moneys to be provided by Parliament, of any salaries, remuneration, and expenses, which may become payable under any Act of the present Session to amend the Procedure in regard to Private Bills relating to Scotland."—(Mr. Jackson.)
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow at Two of the clock.

  SHERIFF CLERKS DEPUTE (SCOTLAND) BILL.—(No. 235.)

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    MR. PHILIPPS: May 1 ask whether the Government see their way to allowing this Bill to be read a second time?
    THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON,: I am not prepared to assent to the Second Reading.
    Second Reading deferred till Thursday.

  COMMISSIONERS FOR OATHS ACT (1889) AMENDMENT BILL.—(No. 244.)

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    DR. TANNER: I object.
    SIR ALBERT ROLLIT: I hope the objection will not be insisted upon. The Bill is introduced by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for. Wolverhampton and myself at the request of the Incorporated Law Society. Its object is to remove the necessity in certain cases for declarations to be made in London.
    MR. CHANCE: I would join in the appeal to my hon. Friend not to persist in his objection.
    DR. TANNER: I must persist.
    Second Reading deferred till Thursday.

    LAW AGENTS (SCOTLAND) BILL. (No. 69.)
    Considered in Committee, and reported; as amended, to be considered upon Thursday.

    CHARITIES' RECOVERY BILL.—(No. 247.)
    As amended, considered.
    Bill read the third time, and passed.

    SOLICITORS AND APPRENTICES (IRELAND) BILL.—(No. 87.)
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Clause 4a.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow.

    DRAINAGE AND IMPROVEMENT OF LAND (IRELAND) BILL—(No. 66.)
    Considered in Committee.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again to-morrow.

    HERRING BRANDING (NORTH UMBER. LAND) BILL.—(No. 236.)
    Bill read a second time, and committed for to-morrow.

    RANGES COMMITTEE.
    Select Committee on Ranges nominated of, —Mr. Brodrick, Mr. Cross, General Sir William Crossman, Mr. Duncan, Sir Henry Fletcher, Mr. Leveson Gower, Mr. Seale-Hayne, Colonel Laurie, Colonel Malcolm, Mr. Marjoribanks, Colonel Nolan, Mr. Philipps, and Mr. Howard Vincent.
    Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records.
    Ordered, That Five be the quorum.—(Mr. Howard Vincent.)

  MOT10N.

    SHERIFF COURTS (GLASGOW) BILL.
    On Motion of Mr. Baird, Bill to amend the Law regulating the Sheriff Courts in Glasgow, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Baird, Dr. Cameron, Mr. Caldwell, and Mr. James Campbell.
    Bill presented, and read first time. [Bill 276.]
    House adjourned at twenty-five minutes after Twelve o'clock.