Sitting of 26 May 1891

Preamble
The House met at Two of the clock.

THE NEWFOUNDLAND FISHERIES.
MR. STAVELEY HILLpresented a Petition on behalf of the Legislative Council and Assembly of Newfoundland, praying that they may be heard by one of their delegation at the Bar of the House against the Newfoundland Fisheries Bill, standing for Second Reading on Thursday next.
The Petition having been read at the Table,
MR. STAVELEY HILLsaid: I beg to give notice, that on the Order for the Second Reading of the Bill being called, I shall move that the delegation be heard by one of their Members at the Bar.

QUESTIONS.

  THE RUBY MINES COMPANY.
  DR. CAMERON: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for India whether his attention has

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  been called to the statement contained in a Rangoon telegram published in yesterday's Times to the effect that
  "The application by the Ruby Mines Company for a remission of the rent of the mines is now under the consideration of the Government of India;"
  whether any change in the position of the mines has occurred since his statement on the 21st of July last, that
  "The Secretary of State was not aware of any ground on which the rent of the Ruby Mines could justly be remitted;"
  and whether he will undertake that no remission of this portion of the Indian Revenue shall be made without previous intimation to this House?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Sir J. GORST,): In reply to the first paragraph of the question of the hon. Member, I have to say that the attention of the Secretary of State has been called to the statement contained in a Rangoon telegram which appeared in yesterday's Times, to the effect that an application by the Ruby Mines Company for a remission of the rent of the mines is now under the consideration of the Government of India. In answer to the second paragraph, I have to say that no change in the position of the mines has occurred since the statement of the Secretary of State on the 21st of July last, that he was not aware of any ground on which the rent of the Ruby Mines could justly be remitted. The Secretary of State in reply to the third paragraph is not prepared to give a pledge that no remission of this portion of the Indian Revenue will be made without previous intimation to Parliament.

  THE OATHS ACT.
  MR. HUNTER: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the refusal by Mr. Wyatt, Coroner, at an inquest held at St. Thomas's Hospital on 2nd April, to allow Mr. F. Robinson to make an affirmation instead of taking an oath, Mr. Robinson having declared that he was a person without religious belief within the meaning of "The Oaths Act, 1889"; and whether some steps can be taken to secure the observance of the Law by Coroners or other Judicial officers?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. MATTHEWS,): I am informed by the Coroner that the facts are not as stated, but that on the day in question a person summoned on the Jury refused to be sworn, but did not ask to affirm, and as his objection did not appear to have been made upon conscientious grounds he was told to sit back. The Coroner is quite aware of the provisions of the Oaths Act, 1888, which are frequently applied in his Court.

  SOUTH AUSTRALIA.
  MR. WATT: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether advices have been received that the Governor of South Australia has reached Adelaide from his trans-continental trip, viâ Palmerston; and whether, having regard to the important bearing of the visit, with reference to the development of the interior of the Colony of South Australia, Her Majesty's Government have any objection to lay the Governor's Report, when received, upon the Table?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. STUART WORTLEY,): In the absence of my right hon. Friend I have been requested to answer this question. The Governor has reported his return to Adelaide on the 23rd instant: all well; and when a Report from is received, the Secretary of State will consider whether it can be presented to Parliament.

  ROYAL COLLEGE OF SCIENCE.
  SIR H. ROSCOE: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether, in view of the proposed allotment of land at South Kensington for the erection of a National Gallery of British Art, any, and if so what, steps have been taken respecting the necessary rebuilding of the temporary physical laboratory and of the other rooms used by the mining and other students of the Royal College of Science situated on the site of the proposed gallery; whether any, and if so what, sums of money are set down in the Estimates for this rebuilding; and whether plans showing

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  the proposed changes will be laid upon the Table of this House?
  MR. ELLIOT LEESalso put a question on the same subject.
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON,): The only building occupied by the Royal College of Science that will be affected by the allotment of land referred to at South Kensington, is the temporary physical laboratory. It will be possible to take down the laboratory, and re-erect it during the Autumn Vacation. As the general scheme was not in contemplation when the Estimates were framed, no sum appears in the Estimates for this Service. As this is the only change, plans do not seem necessary.

  UNESTABLISHED POSTMEN.
  MR. FURNESS: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether his attention has been called to the case of the unestablished postmen who have no Sunday relief such as the established postmen have; and whether he will take into consideration the desirability of placing the unestablished postmen on the same footing as the established postmen so far as Sunday relief and stripes are concerned?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES,): I am not aware of any case in which postmen who are fully employed, whether established or unestablished, have not received Sunday relief. If the hon. Member knows, of any case, however, and will give me the particulars I will make inquiry on the subject. Good conduct stripes are only conferred upon postmen belonging to the establishment.

  THE REPORTED ATTACK ON MAJOR JOHNSTON'S EXPEDITION.
  DR. CAMERON: I had intended to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he had received any information regarding the reported attack on Major Johnston's expedition by a Portuguese force on the Pungwé River; whether he has yet received details of the reported outrage by the Portuguese on the same river on Sir John Willoughby's expedition; whether he has yet received details regarding the seizure of the British steamer Countess
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  of Carnarvon by the Portuguese on the Limpopo River; and whether he proposes to lay Papers on all or any of these occurrences before the House? In the absence of the right hon. Gentleman I will defer the question until Thursday.

  INFECTIOUS DISEASE (NOTIFICATION) ACT.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether any "Local Authority," in pursuance of the power conferred by Section 7 of "The Infectious Disease (Notification) Act, 1889," has passed an order applying the Act within their district to influenza; and whether he is advised that influenza is an "infectious disease" within the meaning of the Act?
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. RITCHIE,): No Local Authority has passed an order extending the Infectious Disease (Notification) Act to influenza. I am advised that influenza is an infectious disease, and therefore within the terms of the Act.

  VOLUNTEER EQUIPMENT GRANTS.
  LORD HENRY BRUCE: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether, having regard to the terms of Army Order dated 17th November, 1890, and to the fact that many Volunteer Battalions were on the 31st October, 1890, below their maximum establishment, the equipment grant prescribed by the Army Order will be paid for those Volunteers who are in excess of the numbers enrolled on the 31st October, 1890, although such members are below the maximum establishment?
  THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY FOR WAR (Mr. BRODRICK,): The grant referred to will be extended to Volunteers within the establishment enrolled up to March 31st, 1891.

  "FOSTER v. KELLAND."
  MR. MORTON: I beg to ask the Attorney General whether his attention has been directed to the case of "Foster v. Kelland," where Mr. Justice Hawkins said a more unreasonable claim had never been made, and described it

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  as frivolous and vexatious, without calling for the defence; and whether he would advise an alteration in the law, so that in such cases the costs as between solicitor and client of the successful litigator should be paid by the losing one?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir R. WEBSTER,): In answer to the hon. Member's question, I have to say that my attention has not been called to the case to which he refers. The question of the desirability of making the unsuccessful party in an action pay full costs has often received consideration, but I am not at present prepared to recommend an alteration of the law in this respect.

  "HANSARD v. KELLAND."
  MR. MORTON: I beg to ask the Attorney General whether his attention has been called to the case "Hansard v. Kelland," "a disputed note having been negotiated the day before it was due;" and whether in such cases he would recommend an alteration in the law, so that the whole merits of the question might be gone into, even as between a third party?
  SIR R. WEBSTER: I have been unable to find any report or particulars of the case referred to. If the hon. Member can furnish me with particulars, I shall be pleased to answer his question.

  PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the Attorney General whether the Director of Public Prosecutions was requested by a Metropolitan Magistrate to take up the prosecution of William Edward Parker, on a charge of fraud practised on upwards of 300 poor persons in different parts of London, and whether he declined to do so, alleging as his reason that it was a case for the County Court; whether Parker has since been convicted at the London Sessions, and sentenced to 10 months' imprisonment; and whether the case received due consideration from the Director of Public Prosecutions when it was submitted to him, and upon what grounds did he base his decision in regard to it?
  SIR R. WEBSTER: In reply to the hon. Member, I am informed by the Director of Prosecutions that he was not requested to take up the prosecution of
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  W. E. Parker, and did not decline to do so. The Magistrate recommended that legal aid should be given to the prosecution, and legal aid was given by the Director to the police sergeant and to the authorities, in accordance with the regulations. Parker was convicted at the London Sessions and sentenced to 10 months' imprisonment. The case did receive due consideration and assistance from the Director.

  RECOVERY OF TITHES FROM QUAKERS.
  MR. MORTON: I beg to ask the Attorney General whether it was lawful, by Section 84 of 6 and 7 Will. 4, c. 71 (an Act for the Commutation of Tithes, 1836), to make distress, where necessary, in respect of any lands in the possession of any person of the persuasion of the people called Quakers, not only upon the goods, chattels, and effects of such person on the premises, but elsewhere, wherever they might be found; and whether this section, dealing exceptionally with Quakers, has been repealed or modified by the Tithe Recovery Act of the present Session?
  SIR R. WEBSTER: In answer to the hon. Member's question, I have to say that Section 84 of the Tithe Act, 1836, is expressly repealed by the 11th section of the Tithe Act of the present Session.

  THE ROSCREA UNION.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Local Government Board of Ireland, of which he is Chairman, had set aside the election of Mr. Alfred J. Ryall to the office of Poor Law Guardian for the Cullenwaine electoral division of the Roscrea Union on the grounds that his nomination was invalid; whether Mr. Thomas Corcoran had not claimed to be duly elected to the office as being the only properly nominated candidate; whether the Board refused to receive Mr. Corcoran as guardian for the said division, and on what grounds have they decided to order a new election; and whether, considering Mr. Corcoran's claim to be the only properly nominated candidate, the Board will reconsider its decision regarding his claims to the office of guardian, and not put the ratepayers to the expense of a new election?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): The facts are as stated in the first three paragraphs of the question. There is no Statutory Authority which would admit of the unsuccessful candidate's claim to the office being received, and the matter can only be dealt with by a new election which will be held in due course.

  LAND DEPARTMENT (IRELAND) BILL.
  MR. SEXTON: I beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the Land Department (Ireland) Bill will be proceeded with this Session; and when the Report of the Land Purchase (Ireland) Bill will be taken?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,): Unless business proceeds at a much more rapid rate during the relatively short portion of the Session which still remains for legislative business than it has during the last few months, the Government see no hope of being able to proceed with the measure referred to. With regard to the second part of the question, I am not able to say more than that the report stage of the Land Purchase Bill will not be taken earlier than on Monday next. The Government Amendments are now ready to be put on the Paper, and hon. Members will have, at all events, nearly a week for the consideration of them.

  LAHINCH, COUNTY CLARE.
  MR. JORDAN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that a protection sea wall at the village of Lahinch, County Clare, and several houses have been swept away; whether he has had any memorial or resolutions from the people of the district in reference to the rebuilding of the wall; whether the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in his recent visit to the West of Ireland, saw the wreck, and if the inhabitants solicited his help in the matter; and whether, under all the circumstances, the poverty of the district, and the nature and purpose of the work, he will grant the aid sought, to rebuild the wall and repair the damage, during the summer months?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The facts appear to be substantially as stated in the first three paragraphs of the question, except that I have no information as to the alleged destruction of houses. No exceptional distress or necessity for relief works exists in the district, and I am unable to hold out any hope that the work is one which should be undertaken by the Government as part of the scheme for the relief of distress. Perhaps the hon. Member will refer to the Treasury as representing the Board of Works.

  IRISH ESTATES OF THE LONDON COMPANIES.
  MR. LEA: I beg to give notice that early next Session I will call attention to the Report of the Select Committee on the London Companies Irish Estates, and move a Resolution.
  MR. SEXTON: May I ask whether the Government propose to take any action on the Report?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I regret to say that I have not yet read it.

  PUBLIC BUSINESS AND THE NEWFOUNDLAND BILL.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: May I ask what business will be taken on Thursday? We have heard a Petition read from the Newfoundland delegates, asking to be heard at the Bar on Thursday against the Second Reading of the Fisheries Bill. That is a prayer which I presume the Government will grant, as it did in the House of Lords. Under these circumstances it is clear, I suppose, that the Newfoundland Bill cannot be taken on Thursday, for the arguments of the delegates would have to be taken into consideration by the Government. I therefore wish to ask what course the Government intend to pursue on Thursday? Unless there is some pressing reason, I would suggest that the Factory and Workshops Bill should be postponed during the absence of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sheffield (Mr. Mundella).
  SIR G. CAMPBELL: Is the Bill now before the Newfoundland Legislature the Bill agreed upon by Her Majesty's Government, or one brought in as a separate and independent Bill by the Newfoundland Legislature on their own account?
  MR. GOSCHEN: With reference to the last question, the Bill brought in by the Newfoundland Legislature differs in one important particular from the Bill which the Government would be able to accept —namely, with regard to the time for which they proposed to legislate. As I understand, the Newfoundland Legislature proposed to legislate for one year, and Her Majesty's Government do not think that such a limitation can possibly be accepted, having regard to the engagements which we have towards France. With regard to the question of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby, I need not say that this House and the Government will assent to the Petition of the delegates to be heard at the Bar. I have not considered the question as to whether the House will immediately adjourn the Debate so as to take the matter into consideration. I believe that is the course which was adopted in "another place," and I am disposed to think that it might be convenient to do so here. In that case we shall proceed with the Second Reading on Friday. On Thursday we should take the Factories and Workshops Bill; we should regret the absence of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sheffield, who takes a deep interest in the matter, but at this period of the Session we could not risk postponing the Bill when there is a day otherwise convenient for its discussion. We should not be able to find another day for the consideration of the Bill until after the Report stage of the Irish Land Purchase Bill. Therefore I am afraid we must adhere to our Resolution to proceed on Thursday with the Factory and Workshops Bill if the House agrees to postpone the consideration of the Newfoundland Bill.
  MR. H. H. FOWLER: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman cannot, after what passed last night, take Supply on Thursday? The Opposition have shown every consideration for the Treasury Bench, and I think we are entitled to some reciprocity in the way of some consideration for the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Brightside Division.
  MR. GOSCHEN: Full notice has been given by the Government that this Bill would be taken on Thursday. I have always stated from the beginning that it would be, and a remonstrance was made
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  at the time by certain Members from Lancashire. I would gladly meet the views of the right hon. Gentleman if I could, but I am afraid I cannot change the Order of Public Business.

  EAST INDIA (MANIPUR).
  Address for—
  "Copies of Translation of the Conditions entered into by Rajah Gumbheer Singh, of Manipur, dated the 18th day of April, 1833;"
  "And, of Correspondence between the Government of India and the Court of Directors in 1S52 as to the relations between Manipur and the Government of India."—(Mr. Donald Crawford.)
  Return presented; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 258.]

MOTIONS.

  ADJOURNMENT (DERBY DAY).
  SIR G. CAMPBELL: Upon a point of order, I wish to ask you, Sir, whether it will be regular for me to object to precedence being given at the commencement of Public Business to a private Member's Motion which is not given to other Motions by private Members?
  MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member would not be in order in so objecting. This is a Motion to which, although made by a private Member, precedence is always given in the same way as it is given to Motions by Ministers at the commencement of Public Business.
  LORD ELCHO: I beg to move—"That this House, at its rising, do adjourn to Thursday, the 28th of May." Although we have lately returned from the holidays, instead of the holiday which the season of the year and our devotion to our duties might have entitled us to expect, we have been given but a miserable apology for a holiday. We have already sat for an abnormally long time. I am told that we are to adjourn late in July, but during the eight years I have been in Parliament not a single Session has passed without that promise being made, although I have never known one in which it has been fulfilled. I may appeal to the House on the ground that we have lately passed through Committee the great Bill of the Session, and that we are all entitled to a holiday in consideration of our exertions. I may

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  further appeal to the House on the ground that our families would see us return to Parliament with greater confidence if the First Commissioner of Works had one day more in which to massacre the microbes of influenza, and to gratuitously advertise some strange-sounding disinfectant. But I make no appeal on these grounds. I appeal to the House solely on the ground that to-morrow is Derby Day, and on the ground that it has always been a time-honoured custom of the House to adjourn over that day. I saw it stated in the papers last year that I was a frequenter of race-courses, that I had backed many winners, and had won large fortunes on the Turf. I only beg to say now that none of these "facts" are true. I regret to say that I have not realised large fortunes on the Turf, and that, although I moved the Derby Adjournment last year, I am one of the few Members of the House who has never seen the Derby run, nor have I the remotest intention of going to the Derby to-morrow. My motives are, therefore, disinterested, and may compare favourably with those of some hon. Members, who, although they were conspicuous by their opposition to the Motion for Adjournment last year, were, I heard with surprise not unmingled with pain, equally conspicuous by their presence on the race course. I do not propose to recapitulate any of the old arguments that are annually brought out, because I take it that they are familiar to the House; but I do wish to say a few words to one class of hon. Members opposite, who think that racing is an evil that ought to be checked, and I wish to show that if they are sincere in their belief it is their bounden duty to support the Motion. No one can have failed to observe that the supply of grievances at the present moment is lamentably deficient when compared with the number of gentlemen who are anxious to redress them. I wish to point out to hon. Members a method by which they may at the same time cultivate a grievance, satisfy their conscience, and vote for this Motion. There are upon the London County Council members who look with great horror on music halls—almost with as much horror as the hon. Baronet (Sir Wilfrid Lawson) and his friends
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  look upon the Derby. What did those members of the County Council do? Did they avoid the objects of their horror? Did they keep themselves aloof from them? No; they did exactly the opposite. Armed with gratuitous passes from unsuspecting managers, fired with single - minded zeal, they went night after night to these music halls. Where the audience was least select they went most frequently; where the performance was most doubtful in character they stayed the longest; and then, when they had piled up mass upon mass of evidence, and when the dreadful day of licensing had come they showed how they could temper justice with mercy, and announced their intention of continuing to tread the straight path of self-sacrifice they had marked out for themselves. I do not ask any hon. Members opposite to make the same self-sacrifice in the cause they have at heart. I do not ask any hon. Members to go to every race meeting in the Racing Calendar; but I do ask hon. Members opposite to go to one Derby in order that they may see for themselves how things really are. If they go to the Derby to-morrow, and are agreeably surprised, if, perchance, they find that the Derby is not a mere carnival of vice, if they spend their time profitably, they will return to town none the worse for having had one prejudice removed. But if they find their worst fears realised, if the picture painted by the hon. Baronet pales before the horrible reality, what a position will be theirs! They can then speak from the vantage ground of personal knowledge, and from the platform, perhaps, of bitter personal experience. And if they do not become rich by backing the winner, they can at least become famous by backing a Bill for the reformation of the Derby. Parliament may be asked to take over the authority of the Jockey Club, and to abolish that institution as ruthlessly as the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board abolished the Metropolitan Board of Works. Parliament may pass laws regulating the Derby. Inspectors may be appointed to inquire into the economy of racing stables, to report as to trials, and to disseminate information of general utility to the racing public. There is

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  no limit to the possibilities that would be open to hon. Members if they would only support my Motion and go to the Derby once. And now I may say one word to the hon. Baronet himself. I am quite sure everybody must admire the sincerity with which he urges his convictions; but does the hon. Baronet think he has done all he might do to check the evil which he believes to be undermining the morals of the country? Year by year he objects to the adjournment, but he does nothing more. I need only remind the House of what Lord Charles Beresford did when he was a Member of this House. He tried to show that we had no Navy, and every year he invited Members of the House to Portsmouth and entertained them there to a champagne luncheon. And the hon. Baronet the Member for Hythe (Sir E. Watkin), when he has a scheme in view, when he has had a commercial scheme dear to his own heart, of possible advantage to his shareholders, but of improbable benefit to the community, entertains the whole House of Commons in a railway cutting or a submarine tunnel. Why, then, if the hon. Baronet is anxious to bring home to the House the horrors of the Derby, does he not invite the whole House of Commons down to the Derby? Why does not the hon. Baronet take the House of Commons down by road, and entertain them to a gingerbeer luncheon on the course? The vans which are such a conspicuous ornament in Hyde Park demonstrations would be available for the purpose, and the spectacle of 600 hon. Members, headed by the hon. Baronet, going in procession to denounce the Derby, would have a far-reaching effect. If some of the 600 who went to curse remained to bless, the responsibility for their backsliding would not rest on the hon. Baronet. Then, will not the hon. Baronet recognise that he would best consult his own interests, not by voting against the Motion, but by acting as a teller in favour of the Motion? There is a Bill on the paper for to-morrow in which the hon. Baronet is interested; and I am sorry that my Motion should interfere with the discussion of that Bill. But I would remind the hon. Baronet that every Wednesday throughout the year there has been a Liquor Bill down for discussion, and probably
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  there will be a liquor Bill on the Order Book of the House of Commons on every Wednesday to come; so that there will be numerous opportunities for the hon. Baronet to speak and vote. But the Derby Adjournment only comes once a year. It is too much to hope that the Motion will pass without discussion. I am quite sure that the House will have a few words from the hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr. Morton). The hon. Member is ever ready to catch the eye of the Speaker, and the House will wait with bated breath to hear his speech on the question of the Derby. Unfortunately the Derby Adjournment is probably the only question before Parliament on which the hon. Member for Peterborough is still in a position to deliver a maiden oration. Since last year I have received gratifying assurances that hon. Members who have opposed the Motion before will now support it. Earlier in the Session I noticed with surprise and joy that no less eminent a person than the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Bridgeton Division (Sir G. Trevelyan) had apparently changed his intentions on the matter, because the right hon. Gentleman strongly advised the promoters of some Bill in which he was interested not to put it down for the Derby Day. The right hon. Gentleman, with his usual readiness to recognise the changed spirit of the times, has come to the conclusion that the game of opposition to the Derby is up; and, therefore, I hope that to-morrow I shall see the right hon. Gentleman finding health and salvation on the question of winners at the Epsom course. It has been the custom, in moving the Motion for the Derby Adjournment, to give the House a "tip." In the improbable event of giving the House the right horse, I should, however, earn less of gratitude than I would earn of ill-will were I to give the wrong horse. Therefore, I will simply recommend the Motion to the House, and express the sincere hope that it will be passed in accordance with time-honoured precedent. I hope that the House of Commons, which is now in its old age, will show that it has not outlived all sympathy with and understanding of the wishes and popular pursuits of its constituents; and that a large majority will declare that the present House is not

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  more degenerate than others in times gone by, who have always been ready to pay a tribute to the great national holiday at Epsom.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House, at its rising, do adjourn till Thursday, 28th May."—(Lord Elcho.)
  MAJOR RASCH: I beg to second the Motion. Hon. Members have various reasons for voting with the noble Lord. Some hon. Members, like the hon. Member for Northampton (Mr. Labouchere), wish to go down to Epsom to inspect the summer solstice, and the moment the Motion is agreed to, they put on white hats and sling field glasses around them. Others wish to spend a happy day among their constituents in opening museums and laying foundation-stones; and others, again, would be glad to escape the thrilling excitement of the Land Bill Committee and Scotch Estimates. I am perfectly certain that nine out of ten of the hon. Members who vote for the Motion will do so, as in the case of the London County Council, referred to by the noble Lord, from perfectly virtuous motives.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSON: I remember that once before when I made a speech in opposition to the Motion for the Derby Adjournment, when I took up the papers next morning the first one I opened commenced thus:—"Sir Wilfrid Lawson made the mistake of dealing with the Adjournment for the Derby too seriously," while the next I opened commenced, "Sir Wilfrid Lawson made the mistake of dealing with the question too lightly." That shows that the question is a very difficult one to deal with; but I think every hon. Member will agree with me when I say that I have never heard anything said on behalf of the Motion except pleasant airy nothings and good-humoured personalities. We have just had a clever speech from the noble Lord, which we have all heard with very great pleasure; but, still, I think the question is rather more important than the noble Lord would have us believe, and I can only regard it in one way. The House of Commons is a National Assembly, and ought not to neglect the business of the nation except
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  for something of national importance. If there are a considerable minority opposed to the Derby Adjournment, the occasion is not one on which the House should adjourn. I do not think that racing is a national affair, although it is sometimes called so; the House does not legislate for races, it has no control over them, and it does not subsidise them. The fact is, the House is asked to adjourn in honour of a great gambling festival. If there were no horse-racing, there would be no gambling, and I do not think it is wise for this House to extend its wholesale patronage to a gambling institution. To do so is inconsistent, because the House has spent much time for generations past in legislating to prevent betting, and from the time of William III. it has been declared to be unlawful, deceiving, and contributing very much to the encouragement of idleness and to the impoverishment of the people. Do hon. Members ever read the reports of the Diocesan Conferences which are held up and down the country? At these meetings the evils of betting are dwelt on more than anywhere else. In a recent letter to the Town Council of Chester, the Bishop of Chester speaks of the races there as an institution which has an evil effect on the moral and social life of the town, and that he could not contemplate them without dismay. Even under the most favourable circumstances, their demoralising influence was direct and deep. What is the use of having Bishops and Deans if their teachings are ignored? There has been a Motion for a Commission to inquire into the prevalence of betting and gambling, and the Home Secretary described the betting agent as following "a dirty and shabby trade," adding that he had a Bill in a box ready to deal with the matter. I presume that he will bring it out some day. For whose advantage are we to adjourn? Only two classes of people will be benefited by the adjournment— those who go to the Derby to make money and those who go for pleasure. The House surely ought not to patronise the profit-seeking and betting class, who in a recent Review article on betting were described as "the most unprincipled and abandoned set of thieves and harpies that ever disgraced civilised society." Will anyone who understands

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  racing say that this class of people has improved since that article was written? I see the Minister of Agriculture on the front Treasury Bench. The right hon. Gentleman is a distinguished sportsman, and I would like to see him get up and tell the House his real, honest opinion of these racing men. If we are to adjourn for the benefit of people who make a profit out of racing it would be discreditable, and if we are to adjourn for the sake of pleasure-seekers it would be rather senseless. Any day would do for pleasure-seekers. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, who supported the Motion for Adjournment last year, has become wiser, and will not do so this time. But what did the hon. Member say? "The last thing people trouble about at Epsom is the Derby. I have been there frequently, and I really believe I have never seen the Derby run in my life." Therefore, I do not see why we should adjourn in the interests of pleasure-seekers on the Derby day more than on any other day. The noble Lord appears to think that I have used too strong language respecting the Derby. As a matter of fact, I never use strong language myself; I always quote it. In 1888 the Daily News—almost as good an authority as Truth—said, speaking of Epsom and the Derby—
  "There are few places on the face of the globe where more sin and wickedness are perpetrated in the course of a week, and this infamous scene is not to be witnessed on the same scale anywhere else."
  Yet this House, this Christian assembly, is called upon to adjourn in honour of an event that can be described in language like that. It is monstrous. As to the holiday argument, it is simply cant. Why, we have only just returned from our holiday. I do not object to holidays, and if the House wants a holiday by all means let it take it, but let it do so at a proper time and in a proper way. I object to a holiday on this particular day, because by choosing this occasion we would seem to give our sanction to gambling. We shall have plenty of opportunities for taking holidays. The Emperor William is soon coming over; we can adjourn then, go into the streets, and wave our hats. There is the Eton and Harrow match; let us adjourn then; or we may take advantage of the great
  1090
  temperance festival at the Crystal Palace Then there is the Queen's birthday, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer's birthday. If the Members of this House are really as devoted to sport as one hon. Member has suggested, let them organise athletic sport amongst themselves on the terrace. I trust that my remarks will be received on this occasion as the hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. R. Power) wished his to be received when he moved the adjournment some years ago, and concluded his speech in the words of a celebrated divine. "Remember, my brethren, this is not a sermon I have been preaching to you; it is only the truth I have been telling you." The decision of this matter is said to be in the hands of the House. The First Lord of the Treasury said the other day that it is always left to the. House; but everybody knows that the Government can carry the adjournment or prevent it. The decision is undoubtedly in their hands, and I hold them responsible for it. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer were to hold up his little finger the adjournment would be negatived. [Cries of"No!"] Yes, it would; and therefore I hold the Government responsible. Last year the Government talked about treating the Motion as an open question, but what happened? Why, 22 members of the Government voted for the Motion. That was their "open question." The Government constantly talk about obstruction. Nothing could be more pathetic than the appeal which the Chancellor of the Exchequer made the other night in regard to obstruction. Well, if they support this Motion on this occasion they will show that their diatribes against obstruction are a sham. The Welsh Liquor Veto Bill stands first on Wednesday's Paper, and I believe that the Representatives of Wales unanimously desire that the measure should pass. The principle of the Bill has been agreed to, and we have only now to settle some of its details The Bill, it is believed, will remove much misery and wretchedness, and it seems to me that it would be very wrong to shelve it in order that some amongst our number may selfishly gratify our tastes for amusement.
  MR. W. BOWEN ROWLANDS: Apart from the general arguments against this monstrous

  1091
  proposition, in which I fully concur, there is a special reason why I think I am entitled to claim the indulgence of the House in opposing the Motion, namely, that the Bill which stands first for Committee to-morrow is the Welsh Liquor Bill, which I had the honour of introducing in this House. I have no desire to say anything now as to the details of that measure, but it is a Bill of very great importance. We have been told that Liquor Bills are frequently put down for Wednesday; but as far as I know it has never occurred before that a Liquor Bill which has passed a Second Reading has been first on the Paper for Committee on a Wednesday. If the noble Lord objects to Bills of this nature being put down for Wednesdays let him unite with us in passing them, so that the Order Book may be no longer encumbered with them. If the Motion is agreed to, the chance of passing the Welsh Liquor Bill this Session will be lost, and next Session the supporters of the measure can scarcely hope to be as fortunate in obtaining opportunities of advancing it as they have been now, at any rate it is a great risk. The great majority of my fellow-countrymen believe that upon the success of this measure depends largely the happiness of the people of Wales. I therefore appeal to the Government to support those who are opposed to the Motion. They are specially bound to do so, I think; when pressed to make the Whitsuntide holiday longer, they told us that the condition of Public Business was Such that it was impossible to accede to the demand, and yet we are asked to sacrifice a day in order that hon. Members may attend a horse race. However elevating and refining the surroundings of a race course may be, it will hardly be contended that they have anything like an equal claim for consideration with an attempt to deal with one of the gravest evils which can possibly affect the well-being of the world.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I wish in a very few words to explain the reasons why I shall vote against the Motion, the best recommendation of which is the extremely clever and amusing speech made by the noble Lord on this as on a former occasion. I do not altogether agree with the noble Lord that
  1092
  persons who vote against the Motion are precluded from going to the Derby. But the point of view from which I regard the question is that the Business of the House is not in such a state that it is desirable that we should take a holiday. I have seen former leaders of the House, on an occasion like this, take up the Order Book and say, "I do not see any important Orders on the Order Book for to-morrow." That cannot be said now. Is there any justification for making this Motion? What is to prevent a great number of Members from going to the Derby? There is one Member who certainly often goes to it, the Minister of Agriculture, and special leave might be given to him now, as it is part of his duty to do what he can to improve the breed of horses. But why should not other Members who are disposed to attend to the Business of the House be allowed to come and deal with the business which is fixed for to-morrow? It cannot be said that the adjournment of the House for the Derby is like the laws of the Medes and Persians, which could not be altered. I agree with the hon. Baronet the Member for the Cockermouth Division (Sir W. Lawson) that this is a matter which is altogether in the hands of the Government. It is a sort of traditional rule that this Motion about the Derby should, contrary to the usual practice, be moved by a private Member. That is a remarkable circumstance connected with the Motion. I look at the Treasury Bench, and I see the Chancellor of the Exchequer is not there. [The Chancellor of the Exchequer was on the Treasury Bench, though not in his usual place.] Oh, I see that the right hon. Gentleman has resigned his seat to the Minister of Agriculture. I thought the right hon. Gentleman had gone away, perhaps, to meet the Leader of the House, in order to discuss the state of business. It is said that the Government leaves this an open question; but every one knows that it rests entirely with the Government whether the House of Commons will sit tomorrow or not; the responsibility lies on them, and they cannot escape it. It concerns the Government a good deal, because, if they are going to take away one of the few Wednesdays which belong to private Members, what will be their position when they come to ask for

  1093
  all the private Members' days, especially now that they are going to take away the opportunity of discussing one of the most important Bills before the House? The special circumstances of the Session, and the condition in which the House finds itself, ought to weigh with the Government. I am not saying anything against the Derby or against anybody who goes to it; but I do not think it expedient, in the present circumstances, that this Motion should be carried. I was almost going to say that it would be an outrageous thing in the present state of Public Business, and it reduces all the declamation, of which the Chancellor of the Exchequer is so fond, about obstruction to a farce and an hyprocrisy. If the Government are going to let the House adjourn over to-morrow they will be responsible.
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. CHAPLIN,): The right hon. Gentleman has been so kind in according to me permission to attend the Derby to-morrow that I can hardly refrain from expressing my gratitude to him. But there is this difficulty in the matter. Although to-morrow is not a Government day, and although I am not now speaking on behalf of the Government, but as an individual Member, it might be held by some people, if the House were to meet to-morrow, that it was the duty of the Minister of Agriculture to attend, and a conflict of duties might arise which would be painful to me, and which I am sure the right hon. Gentleman would desire to spare me. I gather from what the right hon. Gentleman has said that he intends, under any circumstances, himself to go to the Derby to-morrow. [Sir W. HARCOURT: After the dissolution.] "After the dissolution"; but there is no question of a dissolution before to-morrow; and, unless rumour belies him, it is the intention of the right hon. Gentleman himself to be present at Epsom to-morrow, in company with other distinguished Members of the Front Opposition Bench. If that is so, I can assure him that I shall be delighted to use all the influence which I may possess to obtain for him a seat on the stand of the Jockey Club—a seat of vantage from which he could watch the course of the animal which he may
  1094
  fancy most in the race. But, Mr Speaker, I hope, upon wider and on more general grounds, the House will have no hesitation in supporting the Resolution of my noble Friend. This is a Motion which has been acceded to over and over again for years by the House of Commons, and I believe it is thoroughly in accordance with the views of Englishmen in all parts of the country. Sir, I do not wish to detain the House, or to interfere with other business. But if this were a fitting occasion to do so, I could make out an unanswerable case in five minutes to show to the House that in supporting this Motion we are supporting a national object, which is attended by great national advantages, in which the improvement of the breed of horses in Great Britain is directly concerned. And I sincerely trust that the House will not be guided upon this occasion, if he will forgive me for saying so, by the somewhat Puritanical and water-drinking instincts of the Member for Cockermouth, but that it will support by a considerable majority the Motion of my noble Friend.
  MR. MORTON: As the noble Lord who brought forward the Motion has pointed out a defect in my Parliamentary career, I hasten to put myself right in the matter referred to. I shall oppose the Motion for Adjournment as strongly as I can. The noble Lord has stated that he himself does not go to the Derby. [Cries of "Darby," not "Derby!"] You may call it the "Darby" if you like, but I call it a sink of iniquity. If the noble Lord does not want to go to the Derby, why does he move the adjournment of the House? It appears to me that the noble Lord is asking us to make fools of ourselves, and to adjourn the House not to go to the Derby, but to go I know not where. It occurred to me that what might have given rise to this Motion of his was the saying of the celebrated Dr. Paley: "The man that is not a fool sometimes is one always." Now, Sir, I am anxious to know what the Government have to say to this Resolution. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Chaplin) who has just spoken says he has spoken only as a private Member of the House and not as a Member of the Government; but I want to know what the Government intend to do in

  1095
  reply to this Resolution, because it is their duty to give us some guidance in this matter. The House refused to give a day for the consideration of the Women's Suffrage Bill, and yet we are told we are to have a day for what is admitted to be the worst of all evils—a great race. The Government do not propose to take to-morrow for their own business, which is admitted to be very much behind, and it has occurred to me that the real reason why the Government support this Resolution is that they want to defeat the measure set down for to-morrow—a Bill dealing with the drink question, which has already passed a Second Reading in this House. I now charge the Government that they are supporting this Motion not because they want to go to the Derby, but because they are anxious to defeat the Temperance Bill. The question has been put to-day whether some of us have attended the Derby or not. I admit that I have never been there, but 26 years ago I went to the Oaks. I went there because I was told that it was not so bad as the Derby, but I found it so bad that I have never ventured to go to the Derby or any other race since, and I do not want to go. Now, Sir, it is admitted by almost everybody that horse racing, and everything connected with horse racing, is so disgraceful that there is practically nothing worse in this world—I mean more particularly the betting, gambling, and almost every other vice I could mention. We have been told that racing is of use in maintaining and improving the breed of horses, but that has been denied on good authority over and over again. ["No, no!"] I do not mean authorities connected with betting and gambling, but authorities on agricultural affairs, and they say that racing is of no use for such a purpose. Why, Sir, is racing upheld in this country? I say it is simply for the sake of the betting, the gambling, and the other vices attached to it. If we were asked to adjourn the House for the purpose of hearing Mr. Spurgeon preach at the Tabernacle we should, I suppose, refuse to do so. We might even refuse to go and hear General Booth, but we are asked seriously to day to adjourn the House for the purpose of attending backing up and promoting what is admitted to
  1096
  be one of the worst evils of this country. [Laughter.] This is not a matter for laughter. It is more serious than that, because it relates to a great social evil which I ask the House to assist in putting a stop to. The Speaker has told us to-day that this is a Motion which, on the ground of an old custom, he has allowed a precedence to a private Member which is not allowed to private Members in other matters. But I say that it is high time to put an end to this precedent of making Motions with reference to betting and gambling matters. The Bill set down for tomorrow relates to one of the most important questions the country has to consider, and the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Tory Government admitted this last year by offering to pledge the finances of the country to the extent of something like £200,000,000 in order to get rid of the evils of intemperance. By all means let the two or three hon. Members who desire to go to the Derby attend that race meeting, but do not prevent us who are willing to stay here in the endeavour to transact the business of the country from considering a measure of so much importance as the Welsh Liquor Bill.
  (3.37.) The House divided:—Ayes 137; Noes 109.—(Div. List, No. 251.)

  VALUATION OF LANDS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. Edmund Robertson, Bill to amend the Valuation of Lands (Scotland) Acts, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Edmund Robertson, Mr. Campbell-Bannerman, Dr. Cameron, Mr. Buchanan, and Mr. Hunter.
  Bill presented, and read first time. [Bill 343.]

  ALLOTMENTS RATING EXEMPTION BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. Cust, Bill to amend the Laws relating to the Rating of Allotments for sanitary purposes, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Cast, Colonel Eyre, and Mr. Samuel Hoare.
  Bill presented, and read first time. [Bill 344.]

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  CUSTOMS AMD INLAND REVENUE BILL.—(No. 297.)
  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I suppose we may now proceed with the less important subject of the taxation of the people and the financial arrangements of the country. Of course, I cannot suppose that matters of this kind will command that amount of attention which is given to the more important question we have been for some time discussing; but this is a legitimate opportunity of discussing generally the financial arrangements of the year, and upon this Bill, though there is no great novelty in it, the remark arises that in a period of great prosperity and very large revenue we have a Bill for continuing the taxation of the country exactly as it was before. There is no relief to be given to the taxpayer in the course of the present year, and as to the cause of this, which is enlarged expenditure, I will say something presently. But as regards the Bill itself and our financial arrangements, there is something special attaching to the financial arrangements of the present year. Everybody knows that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is a very able financier, but he aspires also to the character of extreme originality. He has set aside all the former practices which have been thought necessary to protect the financial system of this country, and the safeguards which have been set up for many generations have disappeared, and remarkably so in the arrangements for the present year. There is an old saying, "Nemo repentè fuit turpissimus," and the Chancellor of the Exchequer has begun his practice, by degrees, in departing from the old rule that the Expenditure of the year should be covered by the Revenue of the year. On the 4th April, 1889, speaking on the first Imperial Defence Bill, the right hon. Gentleman made this declaration—
  "I shall always adhere to the principle that the needs of the year shall be met out of the Revenue of the year."
  Since that pledge was given the needs of the year have never been met out of the Revenue of the year, but in each successive year a larger sum has been borrowed than in the year preceding. Last year the amount borrowed was, I think, £696,000, and, according to the Papers laid before us, the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes this year to borrow nearly £3,000,000. The Chancellor of the Exchequer used to be a rigid finan-
  1098
  cier, and we remember very well the declaration which he made on this side of the House that he would not draw blank cheques in favour of Lord Salisbury. But now the whole time of the Chancellor of the Exchequer is taken up in expecting us to draw blank cheques for the Government of Lord Salisbury, and never has that been the case more remarkably than in the Budget Bill we are now asked to read a second time. He derives a good deal of his illustrations from cheques, and I was reminded the other day of a speech of the right hon. Gentleman on the subject of free education, in which he said, speaking in 1885, there are some men who have become extremely rich, and think that by their cheque books they can solve all possible difficulties. Well, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has become exceedingly rich; he has an abundant Revenue. He goes on to say, if affection is to be bought, they bring forward their cheque book; if hatred is to be bought off—cheque book; if sorrow is to be assuaged—cheque book.
  "Now I want to know"—
  the right hon. Gentleman is here speaking of free education—
  "from the Conservative Party do they think when they have got the national cheque in their hands that they can, by cheques and simply in that way, buy off hatred or secure affection?"
  That is taken from a speech delivered to the constituency the right hon. Gentleman was then canvassing in Scotland. Now, Sir, the fundamental principle of English finance with reference to taxation and expenditure is that the House of Commons, before voting a tax, should know what is going to be done and how that tax is going to be applied. We have been told that free education is to absorb £1,000,000 or more of the taxation we are asked to vote to-night. How do we know how that money is going to be applied? I have said that the right hon. Gentleman has violated every known principle of English finance. First of all, he has struck at the principle that the Expenditure of the year should be covered by the Revenue of the year, and now he strikes at the principle that taxes are not to be voted until the Commons are informed how they are to be spent. When we are asked to vote money for the Army and

  1099
  Navy we are always told how many men are required, what is to be their pay, and, generally, how the money is to be expended. The same observation applies to the case of the Civil Service, and all the other Departments of the State. In each case the most accurate Estimates are laid before the House. Where are the estimates for the expenditure that will be required under this Bill? No account is given of how much it is to be, or what principle it is to go upon; and, in point of fact, the right hon. Gentleman is asking us to vote the Second Reading of this Bill without affording us any information as to how a sum amounting to £1,000,000 or more is going to be spent. That, I say, is a reversal of all the principles of English finance; and I repeat that this rigid financier has broken down every rule by which hitherto the House of Commons has controlled the Expenditure of the country. And, Sir, what is the excuse? Why, even in the case of Supplementary Estimates, particulars are given before the money is allowed to be applied. Do not let it be said that this is sprung upon the Government by surprise; they have had the opportunity of laying the matter before the country; they put this question into the Queen's Speech last November, and have had abundance of time to settle their plan and determine all its details before coming to the House of Commons. Why have they not given us these details before asking us to vote the money? The only answer they seem able to give us is that the First Lord of the Treasury happens to be ill. That is a testimonial, a compliment, to the supremacy of the First Lord of the Treasury, which is doubtless well deserved; but it is a remarkable thing that that Cabinet which put free education into the Queen's Speech in November should not be able in May to tell us what is their plan of free education. The whole current of Public Business was stopped because the colleagues of Lord Chatham could not do anything unless Lord Chatham was present. I have a great respect for the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, but he seems to me to occupy very much the position in the Government and in the Cabinet as Lord Chatham occupied. It certainly is an extraordinary state of things that the
  1100
  House should be asked to vote this money without being told anything about it. That is a position which the House of Commons never occupied before. It is a position which, so far as the House of Commons—which is supposed to administer the taxation of the people—is concerned, is humiliating and contemptible, and, in my opinion, we are bound to protest against it. We are asked to buy the Chancellor of the Exchequer's pig in a poke. The right hon. Gentleman says, "Give me the money. Open your mouth and shut your eyes and wait until the First Lord of the Treasury comes back, when I will tell you what you will get." That is the position on the Second Reading of the Customs and Inland Revenue Bill, which is supposed to settle the taxation for the year. I say such a position has never been taken up by any Government or any Finance Minister before in the House of Commons. The Government are raising £1,000,000 or more under this Bill, and they do not tell the House how it is to be spent. They do not take the House of Commons into their confidence. They do not show us the methods in which they are going to apply this money. They are preparing for themselves a situation in which, upon no known principle of financial administration, any Government has ever been placed before. The proper course for the House to take is to remonstrate against finance of that character. I do not wish, in the present state of Public Business, to refuse the Second Reading of the Bill, but I think that before the Bill leaves us the House of Commons ought to express an opinion that no such measure ought to be passed until we have a full account of the manner in which the money is to be spent. If nobody else does it on the Third Reading of the Bill, I will raise that question, so as, at all events, to give the House an opportunity of protesting in favour of the ancient principle of controlling the Expenditure of the country. So much for the manner in which the right hon. Gentleman has dealt with the question of education. There is something more I desire to say as illustrating the financial methods of the Chancellor of the Exchequer with reference to the manner in which the House is kept informed of its expendi-

  1101
  ture and financial proceedings. On a former occasion I raised an objection to the new-fangled system of "carrying over." I pointed out that it has all the vices of foreign finance, and I showed (although it was not necessary for me to do more than quote the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself) the mischief that necessarily arises from a system of that character. You do not know what you are going to spend. You do not know what you are going to borrow; you are absolutely in the dark as to the financial condition of the country. It is not only the public that do not know anything about the Expenditure of the country; the Government do not know. I do not suppose the Government would intentionally lay before the House incorrect information, but there is a Paper before the House which is the most discreditable financial document that was ever placed on the Table of the House of Commons by a responsible Government. That is the Paper which shows the difference between the figures in the Return moved for by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bradford (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) and the facts as they exist. The right hon. Gentleman, with less than his usual courtesy, accused me the other night of being a bad accountant; but it was not my figures that were wrong. The figures that were wrong were those of the Treasury and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. They may regard me as a simpleton for assuming that the document signed by the Secretary to the Treasury and laid on the Table of the House of Commons was reliable, representing the true state of things. I confess that my former knowledge of the Treasury induced me to take that view of the question. I accepted the figures presented in that document and I argued upon them. In the month of June last the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford moved for a Return of the Estimate of the expenditure on the Army and Navy and the provision made for it, and a Return was made by the Treasury on June 4, which showed that the estimated expenditure was £38,000,000, and that £3,442,000 was to be borrowed by the Government. On that the Opposition assumed that the Government knew what they were about, and had returned to Parliament the actual state of things
  1102
  as they were. But, then, the Chancellor of the Exchequer turns round and says, "What idiots you were; you were utterly wrong." Why were we wrong? Because these figures placed on the Table of the House by the Government were wrong, not by thousands or hundreds of thousands, but by millions.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,): No, no.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: Well, we will see whether the figures of the Government were wrong or not. First of all, the Government estimated in the month of June that they would spend £5,279,000 upon shipbuilding. As a fact, they spent £3,280,000. They were wrong by £2,000,000 out of £5,000,000. Is it conceivable that a Department can be conducted in such a manner? What an extraordinary state of things! What wonderful contracts these must be! What reason have we to suppose that the Chancellor of the Exchequer will be more right this year? The Government lay a Paper on the Table which shows that these great preparations for which they took such an enormous credit for the Navy must be carried out with expedition; and then, having entered into the contracts, they fall short of their estimated expenditure by £2,000,000.
  MR. GOSCHEN: The ships have not been delivered.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: That may be. It will be an interesting thing to learn what can be the character of those contracts upon which barely half the money which it was estimated would be spent was actually expended. Then there is this further remarkable fact about the Return I have referred to—that there are two items estimated by the Admiralty on which nothing at all has been spent. There is Dockyard Shipbuilding, £128,728, and not one farthing spent upon it; and there is an item, Purchase of Armour Plates and Stores in Advance, £688,000, and not one farthing spent upon that. Here are these gentlemen, who take such enormous credit to themselves for hurrying on this work, telling the House of Commons in June that they are going to spend £688,000 on that item, and yet they do not spend one single farthing. That shows the difference between the

  1103
  estimates of the Admiralty and their performances. The consequence is that, having stated to the House of Commons in the month of June that their expenditure would be £38,000,000, their expenditure in reality was £36,572,000. What sort of information is that to give to the House of Commons? The Chancellor of the Exchequer says in an airy way, "You never can tell exactly in a matter of contract." If the difference had been a difference of £100,000, I should have said nothing; but when it comes to £2,000,000, no one can place any confidence at all in the way business is conducted. I have here dealt with the expenditure account. I now come to the receipt account, which is more extraordinary still. The estimate the Government made of the provision they would be able to make for the Army and Navy was £38,321,000. It really was £36,572,000—again a difference of nearly £2,000,000. Then they told Parliament that they were going to borrow £3,365,000; as a fact they borrowed £696,000. So when it was said, "You are borrowing £3,365,000," the Government turned round and said, "Oh, no, we are only borrowing £696,000." But how was the House of Commons to know that in the face of the Return laid upon the Table of the House in June last? How did they deal with this money? It is most remarkable. As I have said, they adopted the system of "carrying over"; and when once that system is introduced you can never know where you are, as it leads to confusion. Let us see how this Paper demonstrates that. Now mark this: The Paper which I hold in my hand was delivered in June, 1890, and the unexpended balances mentioned in it relate to the year which expired in the previous April. The Admiralty, therefore, ought to have known how much they had expended and how much was left over, for two months had elapsed since the close of the financial year when this Paper was presented. The Admiralty published this "unexpended balance for the Shipbuilding Votes for the Navy—£128,000;" but by the corrected Return it appears that the unexpended balance was really £380,000—a difference of over £200,000. So that they were wrong to the extent of about £200,000 in an account that was closed. But that is not all. The Admiralty
  1104
  must have known how much or how little they had paid to their contractors, yet they laid on the Table of the House a statement showing that the unexpended balance for the previous year amounted to £278,000, whereas by the corrected Return it appears that the sum was really £775,000, so that they did not know what their unexpended balances of the previous year were within half a million of money. Now, if that is not an instructive lesson as to the evil results of this system of carrying over, I do not know what can be. The fact is, that the system of finance adopted by the Government throws all their accounts into confusion. They not only mislead themselves, but they mislead the country, and then they turn on us when we comment on the condition of things, and say, "What bad accountants you are." Bad accountants? Rather what bad financiers they are to announce one year an unexpended balance of £278,000, and then to come down to the House next year and cry peccavi, and declare that the amount is £775,000. Both their estimates of expenditure and their bookkeeping in respect of unexpended balances are not worth the paper on which the figures are printed. That is what I have got to say on their system of bookkeeping under this new financial system of "carrying over." I say it is absolutely confusing, absolutely destructive of all sound finance; and if the Committee want proof of it, it is to be found in the Papers I have referred to. Now as to the subject of borrowing. The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced last year that he intended to borrow about £3,000,000 this year. How is he going to borrow the money? I confess I do not attach much importance to Treasury Returns under the existing system—not that the Treasury does not do its best, but because it cannot cope with the confusion brought about in the public accounts by the present system of finance. Whether or not the Chancellor of the Exchequer is going to borrow I know not, but I will assume he is. Is he going to borrow on Treasury bills, and to increase the Unfunded Debt? The right hon. Gentleman has been a great borrower during the past 12 months. His Consols are at 2¾ per cent., but what is the rate he has been bor-

  1105
  rowing at on his Treasury bills? I have the figures before me of his Treasury bills since June last. There are none of them under 3 per cent. There are some of them above 4, 4½, and there is one lot at 5. I should say the average is about 3½ per cent.
  MR. GOSCHEN: Under that.
  Sir W. HARCOURT: Well, about 3½. I venture to say that short bills of three and six months have never been under 3½ per cent. So that the right hon. Gentleman is paying on Treasury bills about 1 per cent. more than he pays on his Funded Debt. And the right hon. Gentleman hardly knows what price he is going to pay. Only a short time ago the right hon. Gentleman went into the market for £2,000,000, and cams back with only £50,000 in his pocket. What was the price offered then for his bills? It is not very creditable for a Chancellor of the Exchequer to ask for £2,000,000, and to find that the terms are such that he cannot accept them. That is a thing which happens, no doubt, to less dignified personages, to companies, and even to foreign States, that go into the market to negotiate a loan, but few of us like to see an English Chancellor of the Exchequer placed in such a position. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has, in fact, become a money jobber. He disturbs the markets; for in the critical condition in which the markets are now, it is not a matter of no importance that a man should go into the market and ask for £2,000,000. It is certain to have a very serious effect either for good or evil. The Chancellor of the Exchequer may say that he has been paying off the Funded Debt, but it is a questionable transaction to borrrow money at 3½ per cent. in order to pay off a debt at 2¾. Perhaps the Chancellor of the Exchequer will say that, as Consols are down to 95, he can go into the market and buy his own depreciated securities. There is something in that, no doubt. The right hon. Gentleman says I have been unjust to his great conversion scheme. I have no desire to treat the right hon. Gentleman's great conversion scheme unjustly, and am ready to give him every credit for it, but there are two sides to the question. The effect upon Consols has not been altogether
  1106
  for good, and there is no doubt that people do not take Consols as they used to take them. People dislike the very low rate of interest, and the consequence is that a large quantity of Consols have been thrown upon the market. A gentleman of large financial knowledge and experience recently told me that he believed that this throwing of Consols upon the market had stimulated the unwholesome speculation which has done so much mischief. Consols are not absorbed in the way they used to be. The Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke recently of the great diminution which he has effected in the Funded Debt. It is the depreciation of his own Consols which has enabled him to effect that diminution. When his predecessors paid off the Debt Consols stood at 102, whereas now they stand at only 95. However, I do not object to the right hon. Gentleman taking advantage of his own wrong, as it were—the depreciation of his own Consols. I mentioned the failure of the right hon. Gentleman to procure £2,000,000 on Treasury bills. I would now like to ask from what source the money ultimately came? That is a matter on which I think we ought to have some explanation. He wanted £2,000,000, or he would not have gone into the market. I suppose I shall be told that it came from the balances. Now, what are these balances? The principal part of them form what is called the old Sinking Fund, or the surplus of the previous year. Now, the surplus for the previous year ought to be appropriated to the payment of antecedent Debt. I should like to know from the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has to any extent, and, if so, to what extent, used the surplus of preceding years? That is a matter on which we ought to have information, because if you are trading upon your past surpluses the provision intended to be made is practically destroyed. Though it may seem to the House rather a complicated matter, it is a matter of supreme consequence in sound finance.
  MR. GOSCHEN: Hear, hear.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I am glad to hear the Chancellor of the Exchequer agrees with me. There is another matter to which I must refer—that of the gold coinage. The hon. Gentleman has, on the subject of the coinage, left us too long in

  1107
  suspense. During the short time I was at the Treasury I went carefully into the matter, and I ascertained that a sum of £700,000 or £800,000 would be required to put the coinage right. In 1889 the Chancellor of the Exchequer promised to lay his proposals before the House on the question of the coinage and the currency. What has become of his proposals? Three years have elapsed, and at this moment we know nothing at all about his views on the coinage or the currency. Is he going to deal with them together or separately? Last year he said that he had set aside £600,000 out of the profits of the Mint for the new coinage. What has become of that £600,000? Where is it? What has become of the money? I will tell you. It has been muddled away. How much has been applied to the coinage? This year, without saying what he has done with the £600,000, the Chancellor of the Exchequer tells us that he is going to spend £400,000 on the coinage. Is that in addition to the £600,000? The right hon. Gentleman said in 1889 that he mixed this question up indissolubly with the question of the currency and of the £1 note, but since that time he has also got mixed up with the question of a new gold reserve. Upon that question, which is one of profound interest and importance, I marvel that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has confined himself to postprandial orations in the provinces and at the Mansion House. He has gone there, and has sounded a note of alarm. The right hon. Gentleman has made every person believe that banking in this country is not in a sound position, that it bears an enormous weight upon an insufficient basis; but he has never brought the question before the House of Commons. An alarmist Chancellor of the Exchequer is a very formidable person; but when he cries "Wolf" and stinking fish, he is bound to come forward with some proposal to remedy the dangerous state of things, and to bring the question to the test of Debate in this House. There are in this House great financial authorities, men intimately cognisant with banking and commerce, who would gladly hear the views of the Chancellor of the Exchequer on this momentous subject. What is the condition of this matter? The Chancellor of the Exchequer says that there is no
  1108
  reserve. He has, to a great extent, laid the blame of that upon the private banks. What do they retort? They say, "We keep our reserves with the Bank of England, and the Bank of England, in order to pay high dividends upon Bank Stock, trade with our reserves and lend them out, and, in point of fact, it is the Bank of England that is responsible." For my own part, I am quite incapable of offering an opinion on the subject; but this I will say—if we are to have alarmist speeches made throughout the country from time to time by the Chancellor of the Exchequer upon these matters which seriously affect the public credit, the matters ought to be discussed in this House. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer flies financial kites in the shape of £1 notes, which are to be represented by a second reserve, he ought to fly them in the House of Commons, and not after dinner in the provinces and elsewhere. If I refer to these matters it is because never in my recollection has the Money Market of this country been in so anxious and feverish a condition as it is at present. It does not want excitements, or alarms, or blisters, such as the speeches to which I have referred. There are persons much better entitled to express an opinion than I am who believe that the disaster of last November has not seen its termination. There was, no doubt, a very dire necessity which led to very extraordinary and unexampled measures on the part of the Bank of England. I do not presume to judge that action, but there is one thing which the House of Commons is entitled to know in relation to the Baring guarantee, and that is, what part Her Majesty's Government were called upon to take, and what part they did take? That is a serious matter, because it is a precedent of a most dangerous sort. If you are to prop up one house in this way, why not others? Some say that the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not interfere boldly enough. The right hon. Gentleman will hear no such criticism from me. The less, in my opinion, the right hon. Gentleman interfered the wiser he was. The habit of the Government—it is a foreign habit—stepping into these private transactions is a most dangerous one. I object to the Chancellor of the Exchequer being so much in the market, but it comes of

  1109
  what is called the Government Banking Guarantee. I think it is a most pernicious and dangerous precedent, and I hope we shall learn from the Chancellor of the Exchequer that he has taken no such course. But now, coming back to the Bill, which leaves the Income Tax as it was before, and gives no relief to the taxpayer in a time, if not of unexampled, yet of great, prosperity, we have to ask ourselves what is the cause? It is the profuse expenditure of the Government. However much your Revenue has grown, your Expenditure has grown in still greater proportion; and in a year in which your sources of revenue have been abundant, and even superabundant, you stand in this position: you are not only unable to give any relief to the taxpayer, but are actually going to borrow £3,000,000 to pay your way. The Government endeavour to say this is the fault of their predecessors. On May 6th the First Lord of the Admiralty (Lord George Hamilton), whose absence, and the reason of it, we greatly deplore, went to the National Union Dinner and said that Mr. Gladstone, Sir W. Harcourt, and Mr. H. Fowler were influenced by the "Manchester school," and that dangers to the country were likely to ensue. He went on to say—
  "When Lord Salisbury came into Office the dockyards were in an unsatisfactory condition, and owing to the perilous state of things Lord Salisbury attempted to embark in large plans of naval construction."
  I characterise that statement as absolutely unfounded, and out of the mouth of Lord George Hamilton himself I will prove it to be unfounded. It is the most unjustifiable statement I ever recollect to have been made by a responsible Minister, who ought to know, and must have known, there is not the smallest foundation for it. When the Liberal Government left Office in 1886 I, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, made provision for a larger sum for naval expenditure than had ever been made before. What did this First Lord of the Admiralty, who for electioneering purposes makes statements of this kind, say himself at the Mansion House in November of that year, when he had come into Office? Lord George Hamilton said—
  "The number of ships in commission, armoured and unarmonred, exceed the com-
  1110
  bined force of the three greatest European Powers."
  On December 13, 1888, the noble Lord said—
  "At no period of our naval policy during a time of peace had there been so steady and continuous an increase as in the last three years, but he did not wish to take credit for having completed this large number of ships, the main credit of which was due to Lord Northbrook."
  But deeds as well as words contradict the statement of the First Lord of the Admiralty at the National Union Dinner. When the present Chancellor of the Exchequer brought in his first Budget he stated that the extra charge was due to that which was commonly known as the "naval scare of 1884." He added that—
  "In that year the House agreed to an extra expenditure of £3,100,000 on ships, and £1,600,000 on armaments. The Estimates had been increased by that which had been a temporary and, he hoped, an exceptional outlay. At the end of the financial year they would have arrived at a great diminution of the necessary charge which had been made upon the taxpayer owing to these exceptional circumstances."
  With such admissions as these is it tolerable that men who call themselves responsible Ministers should make such statements for electioneering purposes, knowing that those statements are absolutely untrue? It is necessary that these things should be shown up, and that men holding the position of the First Lord of the Admiralty should be shamed out of such language as this. This is what the First Lord of the Admiralty said in the House of Lords on July, 1887—
  "I have never said that the Navy Estimates could not be reduced, and the Navy Estimates of this year show a reduction of £800,000 as compared with last year. I said in my Memorandum that I was satisfied that for years to come there could be a steady reduction of expenditure and increased efficiency."
  That is the statement of the man who at the National Union Dinner in 1891 said that, in consequence of the perilous condition in which we left the country, it was necessary to embark in large plans of naval construction. The statement is an audacious misrepresentation, for which the noble Lord ought to make some apology to the House. It is well-known that Lord Charles Beresford resigned office because you reduced the expenditure in the Navy. Now, it is

  1111
  this large expenditure which is the real secret of the Government's financial shifts and expedients. What is the course to which this expenditure has driven them? They have sot to work, first of all, to mortgage their future revenue in the Suez bonds for five years hence. They will spend the money, and go about saying they have put the country into a state of defence; but they will leave their successors to pay for it. I call this bad finance; and when I look at the excuse made for it in such speeches as that of the First Lord of the Admiralty, I am disposed to call it shabby finance, covered by still shabbier excuses. The time will come when the Government will have to give an account to the nation in this matter, and I am of opinion that when that account is made it will not, at the hands of the nation, receive an approving verdict.
  THE SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. FORWOOD,): No one can regret more than I do that the First Lord of the Admiralty is not in his place to reply to the comments of the right hon. Gentleman opposite. As I have not read the speech to which reference is made, I am not in a position to reply to the comments of the right hon. Gentleman; but I feel sure that, when the noble Lord is able to be in his place, he will amply justify every word he has uttered. One great difficulty the present Board of Admiralty had when they entered Office was the vast amount of shipbuilding which had been commenced and not completed, representing a value in ships of something like £14,000,000; and, although an addition was made to the Fleet in 1885 by the Northbrook programme, adequate provision was not made in the Estimates for that programme.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: Why did you reduce the estimates?
  MR. FORWOOD: In 1886–7 the estimate for the Northbrook programme was exceeded by £544,000, and in 1887–8 by £313,000. Bat the object I have in rising is to reply to some of the comments of the right hon. Gentleman in the earlier part of his speech. The right hon. Gentleman questioned the bookkeeping and accounts of the Admiralty as rendered to the House. He said that a sum of £2,000,000 had been spent in the year 1890–1 more than was estimated as late
  1112
  as June, 1890; and the right hon. Gentleman based his statement on a Return, moved for by the right hon. Member for Bradford, and laid on the Table of the House in June last. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby has treated that Return in a manner quite foreign to the intentions of the right hon. Gentleman who moved for it. A document was asked for, which should show the estimated Expenditure for the year 1890–1, on the Army and Navy, and the provision to be made for it under certain heads; and although that Return was dated in June, and placed on the Table in print, it undoubtedly had reference solely to the estimates which had been presented to the House in the previous February. I wish the House to bear in mind that these estimates were prepared in the months of November and December, 1889, and contained the figures, practically, for two years. An estimate had to be made of what would be the probable Expenditure of the then current financial year ending on the 31st March, 1890, and, further, an estimate 15 months in advance, of the probable Expenditure of the succeeding financial year or 31st March, 1891. There was undoubtedly an immense difficulty in preparing estimates of the earnings on contract work, because the amount of work which would be done by contractors in any year is always more or less problematical. The Return in question refers to the work on 60 or 70 contracts, and the ordinary difficulties of estimate are increased by unusual conditions. During the last two years the labour market has been very much disturbed; much of the work has been done on the Clyde, where the railway strike for some time stopped all progress, and the severe weather in the winter of the present year has also, to a great extent, hindered shipbuilding operations. The figures over which the Admiralty had direct control, namely, the work done in the Government Dockyards, the Return anticipated an expenditure on work in these dockyards during the year 1890–91 of £2,890,000, and the sum actually expended was £2,736,000. Of the difference of £153,000 no less than £140,000 was money short earned by contractors for engines, so that, as far as the estimates over which the Admiralty have

  1113
  direct control are concerned, there was only a difference of £13,000 or £14,000 in the total estimate of nearly £3,000,000. With regard to the contract work, the estimate prepared in December, 1889, anticipated that contractors would earn in 1890–91, on the new shipbuilding programme, £3,595,000. In point of fact, they earned only £2,600,000, owing to the circumstances which I have enumerated. The figures in the Estimates were given by the contractors and revised by experienced officers at the Admiralty. Then the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby has asked a question with reference to the £688,000 entered on the Return for the purchase of armour plates. This matter has already been explained by the First Lord of the Admiralty. At the time the estimate was made it was thought that the reading of the National Defence Act would allow the sum mentioned to be borrowed; but it was subsequently decided that the Act would not allow any money to be borrowed for the purpose of purchasing armour plates until £2,650,000 had been expended in the dockyards during the year. Consequently, a Supplementary Estimate was presented, and £300,000 of the money so obtained was spent on armour plates, the balance required being obtained by savings on other Votes. The right hon. Gentleman further complains that not a penny has been spent on dockyard shipbuilding of the £128,000 savings shown in the Return. This sum was made up from the savings from the previous year, and could not be drawn upon until the dockyard shipbuilding in any year amounted to £2,650,000. As to the armament of contract ships, in November, 1889, it was anticipated that guns and ammunition to the value of £866,000 would have been manufactured for the vessels under construction. Instead of that, the Admiralty was only able to obtain guns and ammunition to the value of £492,000. Then there is a difference on the credit side of the account, because the statement is an estimate dealing with two years. There is the unexpended balance for the year then current covered, and the estimate of the probable savings for the year not arrived.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: The unexpended balance was the balance remain-
  1114
  ing on the 31st of March, and that could not have been altered at all. How is it that the Admiralty were ignorant in June, 1890, of how much unexpended balance there was on April 1 of the same year?
  MR. FORWOOD: I am sorry I have not been able to make myself clear. The Admiralty, in the Return, did not attempt to tell the House the amount of the actual unexpended balance. They simply filled in a Return in the form asked for by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford. That Return is practically a replica of the Estimates for 1890–91.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I beg the hon. Gentleman's pardon; the Return asked for estimated expenditure, and asked also for the provision made to meet it. But the provision, as far as it was unexpended balance, was an ascertained amount on the 1st of April, and, consequently, there was nothing in the nature of an estimate about it.
  MR. FORWOOD: The Return simply asked for the estimated expenditure of 1890–91; and if there has been any misapprehension as to the meaning of the right hon. Gentleman who moved for that Return, that will explain how the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby has mistaken the meaning of these figures. I wish to make it clear that these figures were not actual results, but estimates placed before Parliament, and made up three months before the actual Returns for 1889–90 could be obtained, and 15 months before the actual expenditure for 1890–91 could be ascertained. It is, therefore, quite clear that the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman have been founded on a mistake as to the figures called for by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I really cannot accept that; a balance is not an estimate, but a fact. There is nothing about unexpended balances; the question is whether the Admiralty at the end of the financial year knew how much they had actually spent.
  MR. FORWOOD: At the end of the financial year the Admiralty knew exactly what their actual balance was, but in the previous December they could not be aware what the balance would be on the 31st of March following. The right hon. Gentleman has missed

  1115
  another point. Under the Naval Defence Act we had to state what our estimated unexpended balances were, and in the Estimates for 1890–91 the right hon. Gentleman will see that the estimated unexpended balances of 1889–90 available for 1890–91 were stated. We have been dealing in this matter entirely with Estimates. The right hon. Gentleman has commented upon the system of carrying over, and desires the House to believe that it is an innovation which is unsatisfactory, and in a certain sense misleading. This question of carrying over unexpended balances is a matter of serious public concern, and I should like to be permitted to say a few words with regard to it, and to point out how these very Estimates prove the desirability of the system. If the Naval Defence Act had not provided that the balance unexpended in one year should be carried over and be available for expenditure in another year, the result would have been that, on the figures which we are now discussing, the House in 1890–91 would have raised £2,000,000 by taxation more than could have been expended, which would have gone in reduction of Debt. I think the House will admit that if it is anticipated that the contractors will require a certain sum of money, it is the bounden duty of the Government to come to the House and ask the House to provide that money. I say it is wrong finance to underestimate your probable expenditure. It is a very intricate matter, but I submit that the statement laid before the House shows that as far as expenditure under the control of the Admiralty is concerned the estimate was wonderfully accurate and close, and that the estimate relating to contract vessels was disturbed by abnormal circumstances which no one could have foreseen. Fortunately, the power of carrying over has enabled us to save the taxpayer a large sum of money.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I must take exception to the statement of the hon. Gentleman respecting the Return I moved for last year. He has endeavoured to hide the mistakes of that Return by misrepresenting its objects. He said my object in moving for the Return was to show that the estimates made by the Admiralty with respect to the Navy were incorrect.
  MR. FORWOOD: I did not say that was your object. I did not know what your object was. I simply said we thought the Motion for the Return meant a reproduction of the Estimates in another form.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: There was nothing in the Return which in the slightest degree indicated that that was the object of it. The reason which led me to ask for that Return originated in a discussion on the Budget last year, when I said that in my opinion the Government ought to have stated what the actual expenditure of the country was, both with regard to the Army and the Navy. I ventured to form an estimate of what the real expenditure was likely to be, and challenged the heads of the two Departments to say whether I was right or not. I was followed by the First Lord of the Admiralty and the Secretary for War, who both stated that my figures were entirely wrong. Accordingly I moved a few days later for a Return for the purpose of showing what was the estimated expenditure and what was the actual provision made for it within the knowledge of the Government at the time the Return was made. The Return was the subject of a good deal of discussion between myself and the Treasury officials, and at last I obtained it. Certainly no human being, I should have thought, would have supposed I intended by the Return merely to obtain an estimate of the provision likely to be made for the expenditure in the previous November. There can be no question that the Return is entirely misleading. In June 1890, that is to say three months after the completion of the previous financial year, and at a time when the actual expenditure of the previous year must have been within the knowledge of the War Office and the Admiralty, a Return was presented which entirely misstated the expenditure of the previous year, and made an entirely false estimate of the expenditure of the coming year. It showed that the estimated expenditure of the year was £38,300,000 whereas the actual expenditure was £36,500,000. My right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt) has pointed out that the Return is also misleading with regard to the unexpended balances

  1117
  under the Ship-building Vote and the Naval Defence Act. I think the House will consider that the attempted explanation of the Secretary to the Admiralty, in reference to the statement made by the noble Lord the First Lord of the Admiralty, has been wholly unsatisfactory. The Secretary to the Admiralty hardly ventured to defend his chief in this matter. All he could say was that he hoped the noble Lord, whose absence we all regret, would be able when he returned to the House to give a full explanation. He went on to say that the late Government when it left office did not make adequate provision for the naval expenditure of the year. But he did not attempt to answer the question put by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby as to why the present Board of Admiralty, when they came into office in 1886, reduced the Estimates for the Navy by no less a sum than £1,000,000. The First Lord of the Admiralty has made a statement in the provinces which is most audacious in its character, and for which there is no justification whatever. The noble Lord has endeavoured to throw the responsibility on his predecessors in office for the great expenditure recently adopted in the Navy, and has entirely forgotten the fact that for two years after he assumed office he was continually reducing the expenditure on the Navy, on the ground that when he came into office ample provision had been made by his predecessors. That is the charge which the Secretary to the Admiralty has totally failed to meet, and I venture to think that when the First Lord of the Admiralty returns to the House he will find it impossible to meet that charge, or to give an explanation of the character of the language he has used in the provinces. I read the noble Lord's statement with great surprise. No language ever used by the head of the Admiralty with regard to his predecessors was more completely unjustifiable, and all the facts mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby have thoroughly exploded the statements of the noble Lord, and have shown that they are the opposite of what is true.
  VISCOUNT LYMINGTON: To turn from Imperial questions to a matter of con-
  1118
  siderable importance to a large number of the poor in towns, I should like to call attention to the incidence of the Inhabited House Duty. By his Budget of last year the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer granted an exemption from that duty in the case of all houses whose gross assessment does not exceed £20. But this extraordinary anomaly or injustice has arisen, that whereas the artisan or working man who lives in a cottage outside London under £20 pays no Inhabited House Duty, the same class of tenant, or rather a poorer class, living in a town, who is obliged from the nature of his work to live in a block building, occupying a separate tenement, separately assessed for poor and other rates, has to pay the duty—or rather the Inland Revenue Office is claiming it from him. It seems to me that a mistake has arisen. I can not suppose that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he granted the exemption to meet the case of the poorer householders in the country, wished to impose a greater injustice on the poor in the towns. Until the present time it has been the custom of the Inland Revenue Department not to press for the Inhabited House Duty, even before the right hon. Gentleman made the remission; but the attempt is now being made by the Inland Revenue Department, in cases either of tenement lodging houses or blocks of buildings occupied by poor people in London, to lump the whole value together. Although there may be in a block of buildings 100 or 130 tenements, which are regarded as separate dwellings for other purposes, under £20 gross annual value, the fact that there happens to be one tenement above that value causes the Inland Revenue Authorities to lump the whole together, and thus the poor people are compelled to pay. The tax is thus made to fall "upon even poor working women who pay half-a-crown for a room. I am aware that the right hon. Gentleman attempted to meet the views of certain Members of this House by imposing in the Budget Bill of last year a limit of 7s. 6d. What I contend is that the working-men in towns who are obliged to inhabit tenements of less than £20 gross annual value should be placed in precisely the same position as their fellow labourers who live outside towns.

  1119
  The right hon. Gentleman may say that some of the building companies in London should lower their rents. It is impossible for the company with which I am connected to do so. We pay our shareholders at the price of our Stock 4¼ per cent., and the whole of the rest of the money is purposely and obviously devoted towards keeping down the rents. The cost of building in London is in all cases very expensive, and it is absolutely necessary that in some cases the rent of your tenements should be higher than others. All we press for is that the tenants of rooms, which are assessed at a sum not exceeding £20 a year, should have the same advantage as the working man in the country, and be exempt, and that all tenements whose gross value is over £20 but under £60 should pay the reduced duty of 3d. instead of 9d., as is the case in the country. It is clear to me that as the matter stands now, it is taxation either by a trick or by a blunder. I believe it to be the latter.
  MR. BARTLEY: I should like to emphasise the argument of the noble Lord by quoting two instances which have come within my own knowledge. There is a block of buildings in Great Eastern Street which, under the old system, paid Inhabited House Duty of 13s. 6d. per annum. Under the new system a claim has this year been made at the rate of 9d. in the £1, making the duty claimed £10 12s. 3d. There is another block in St. John's Square which paid under the old system £4 0s. 3d. This year a claim has been made for £1 6s. 9d. at the rate of 3d. in the £1. Both blocks of buildings are within half mile of each other, and are practically of the same character and accommodation. I think the right hon. Gentleman will see that we who are interested in these dwellings of the poor have a cause of complaint, and if he can do something to put the matter on a reasonable footing we shall be extremely indebted to him.
  MR. GOSCHEN: In reply to the remarks made by my two hon. Friends who have spoken last, I may say that it is the District Commissioners who administer the Act, and it was not my intention that in the case of tenements where the rental is only 7s. 6d. or under, the Inhabited House Duty
  1120
  should not be charged. I will see that my intention is carried out in that respect. In the case of tenants in block buildings who pay 10s. a week and over, the House Duty should be charged the same as in houses over and above £20. I think the House will feel that, when we come to a rental in a block of 10s. a week, that is a very high rent for an artisan earning weekly wages to pay, and it will be agreed that in such cases the duty should be charged. With that exception I will endeavour to meet the views of the hon. Gentlemen.
  MR. BARTLEY: At the 3d. or the 9d. rate?
  MR. GOSCHEN: At 7s. 6d., they will be exempted altogether from the House Duty. If my hon. Friend the Member for Islington will supply me with particulars, I will look into the question he raises.
  VISCOUNT LYMINGTON: Seven and sixpence only represents practically about £12 a year, and our contention is that all under £20 should be exempt.
  MR. GOSCHEN: I cannot overrule the Act passed last year with regard to the 7s. 6d. limit; but I am prepared to give a concession that seems to me to be within the spirit of the Act. I pass now to the speech of the Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt), and I will also say a word on the speech of the Member for Bradford (Mr. Shaw Lefevre). The latter right hon. Gentleman has, if I may say so, got his own Return on the brain. The right hon. Gentleman has been complimented by the leader of his Party as an industrious-minded man, and he deserves that compliment for the industry with which he has followed up this subject. My hon. Friend the Secretary to the Admiralty explained that the authorities at the War Office put a different construction on the wishes of the right hon. Gentleman from those which he now expresses. It is very unfortunate that a misunderstanding should have arisen, but to say that the whole Return has been muddled is a most gigantic exaggeration. The two right hon. Gentlemen have contended that the Government has made a fearful failure in administration because, whereas they were expected to expend £38,000,000, they spent only £36,500,000.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: It is a question of £4,000,000 out of £5,000,000.
  MR. GOSCHEN: That is how the right hon. Gentleman puts it. But, taking it at that, where is the fault? Time after time we have pointed out to the House the reason why the contractors were not up to time as regards the instalments. The right hon. Gentleman says we shall not be able to complete the work within the time anticipated. That does not at all follow, because it is highly probable that during the remaining years the contractors will fetch up their work. If they do not they will be subject to penalties. There is, therefore, only a displacement of figures or charges. The fact that this matter is brought forward only serves to show that the right hon. Gentleman is driven to poor expedients to make up a case. I think it is better to show in the Return what has not been done than that we should be in the position in which the Admiralty frequently used to be—not having accomplished the work by thousands of tons, and yet not showing that result in the Estimates for the year. I say ours is the right system. The Admiralty is now compelled to refrain from devoting any money voted for shipbuilding to repairs, and consequently this year, I will undertake to say, we have reached an accuracy in the Return of the amount of work performed in the dockyards which has never before been reached. If there is any difficulty in understanding the accounts, that is a difficulty which will be removed, I think, in the second year, and when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford is less industrious in showing us how the accounts ought to be made out. It is incredible that right hon. Gentlemen opposite should go on repeating that we are always having recourse to new devices, when we have quoted over and over again their own precedent with regard to the localisation of forces. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby, complained that we are substituting new devices in the place of the old way. I think it strange that such a charge should be made by the Member for Derby, who was a Member of the Government of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian, whose scheme for the localisation of the Forces
  1122
  has entailed on the present Government debts so incurred. We are actually paying at the present day a charge put on the taxpayers by the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues in 1883. I do not complain of that, but I do complain that with that precedent before him the Member for Derby should complacently repeat to the House over and over again that the present Government are always having recourse to new devices. He wished to represent it was a new device to advertise Treasury bills, but during the short time the right hon. Member for Derby was Chancellor of the Exchequer he was not without experience in that direction.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I did not say it was a new device; I said it was extraordinary the Government could not get the money.
  MR. GOSCHEN: I am coming to that presently. If finding money as my predecessors found it for the localisation of Forces is not a new device, what are the new devices? I will make a confession where I have introduced something new, but what I wish the House and the public not to be misled about is, that in the main there has been no change in the principles of finance which the Government has adopted. There is one thing that is new, and, whether right or wrong, I plead guilty to it, and that is pledging of the Suez Canal bonds. The other point as to which there is a novelty, no doubt, is the Naval Defence Act. Those are the two points, and the two points only, in which I admit there is something new, and these I defend on grounds which I have more than once explained and again indicated to-day. That is the whole sum of my offending in relation to the charge brought against me to-day—the charge of novelty. I must once more allude to the phrase he used, the "needs of the year." The question is whether building barracks, for instance, is a "need of the year." I hold it that the needs of the year ought to be paid for in the year, but the phrase does not mean, and has not meant, even with our most critical opponents, that where an expenditure, approaching a capital expenditure was being incurred, there should be no borrowing at all. Now, the last novelty is that the right hon.

  1123
  Gentleman complains that, having stated in the Budget we intended to deal with education, the Government has not yet introduced the Bill.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: Or produced an Estimate. My point is that a public Bill which involves taxation should be based on an Estimate showing how much money is going to be spent.
  MR. GOSCHEN: I will give the right hon. Gentleman a precedent from the time he himself was in office, and the right hon. Member for South Edinburgh was Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Member for South Edinburgh was referring in his Budget to the reduction of telegrams to the minimum charge of 6d., and, after mentioning that he had commenced a careful inquiry as to the cost of the change, he said—
  "I cannot anticipate the result of such an inquiry, but I propose to set aside £170,000 out of my balance to enable me if possible to carry out the change in the course of the present year."
  I, on my part, propose out of my balance to set aside a sum of about £800,000 to enable me, if possible, to carry out the views of the Government with regard to education in the course of the present year.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: The two instances cannot be compared.
  MR. GOSCHEN: I think they can. [Sir W. HARCOURT laughed.] I do not know whether the hilarity of the right hon. Gentleman is the hilarity of conviction, or whether his heart rejoices to discover that after all the Chancellor of the Exchequer has not the originality upon which he so delights to compliment him. On the occasion which I have cited the House was not informed of the particulars of the change, and, nevertheless, the Chancellor of the Exchequer set aside a sum out of his balance. Doubtless there are many other precedents; it frequently happens that charges are imposed by Parliament upon the country, and the Budget makes provision for these before the Bills have been passed. Though the Government will do their best to inform the House at the earliest possible moment of their intentions, I maintain there is nothing unconstitutional or new in our having set aside a portion of the balance for the
  1124
  purpose. The right hon. Gentleman says we are not able to give any information because the First Lord of the Treasury is not here, and he is very merry, according to his wont, upon that point. It is not that the Members of the Government present are not able to give the information desired, but, as is well known, the Leader of the House is the person to determine in what order various measures shall be taken, and it is an exaggeration on the part of the right hon. Gentleman to suggest that we are in any doubt as to our plans, or that the absence of the First Lord of the Treasury is in any way delaying the progress of business in the House. The right hon. Gentleman has made a mistake, and others have made a mistake, as to the present condition of the Funded and Unfunded Debt, He read the House a disquisition upon Treasury bills in general, and ventilated his favourite theory—in which there is a great deal of force—with regard to the objections to Treasury bills, but when he came to his proofs it appeared how little the right hon. Gentleman seems to appreciate the situation. The right hon. Gentleman was not intentionally unfair, but there was great injustice indeed in the manner in which he represented the bad finance in having to pay 3½ per cent. on Treasury bills, while Consols were 2¾. The point is this: The country has saved ½ per cent. on £500,000,000, while it is paying a somewhat larger price for about £6,000,000 or £7,000,000 of Treasury bills, and that is the point on which the right hon. Gentleman is so unjust. Here is an operation which involved the conversion of from £400,000,000 to £500,000,000. A very large portion of that was converted by the holders themselves, but there remained a sum of upwards of £40,000,000, and that sum it has been my duty to face. I faced it, and we have succeeded in reducing the Treasury bills, by which a portion of the operation was carried out, really to an insignificant item compared to the enormous magnitude of the whole transaction. No doubt there are more Treasury bills out than I myself like to have out; but what is the inconvenience compared to the fact that by the conversion we have saved to the taxpayer £1,400,000 for the next 14

  1125
  years, and £2,800,000 afterwards? It is because the right hon. Gentleman has failed utterly to appreciate that part of the case that I have said he has not dealt with this great transaction in a manner which I think just.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: You need not have raised it by Treasury bills.
  MR. GOSCHEN: How then?
  SIR W. HARCOURT: There were Consols.
  MR. GOSCHEN: No; because Consols were not at par at that time. Here is a right hon. Gentleman, an ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer, of a few months' standing, I admit, who thinks we can put 40,000,000 of Consols on the market, when they are not at par, and get the money at par. Consols at that time were at 98, I think.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: You did not borrow £40,000,000.
  MR. GOSCHEN: I think it was about £24,000,000. When I heard the views of the right hon. Gentleman as to standing on the ancient and orthodox lines, I sometimes rejoice, that, after all, the right hon. Gentleman is not in a position to throw 24,000,000 of Consols on the market at a moment's notice, because the consequences that might ensue are too dreadful to contemplate. What would have ensued? I should have increased—permanently increased—the capital of the Debt; but instead of that I raised the money mainly by Treasury bills, and largely by resources in the hands of the nation, with some little inconvenience I admit, but I was able to effect the object without throwing any large amount of Consols on the market. The amount of the Treasury bills will rapidly decrease, notwithstanding the fact that we shall have to borrow £2,000,000 or £3,000,000 in this year through the operation of the National Debt Commissioners. They have money in their hands by which they can take the bills and diminish the amount, so that, after all, the inconvenience which the right hon. Gentleman fears will be of only short duration. If the right hon. Gentleman and his Friend will only give me time enough, I hope that before he again resumes office as Chancellor of the Exchequer he will find the Treasury bills reduced to a very low amount, and
  1126
  will not be exposed to the inconvenience he deplores. The right hon. Gentleman asked why we withdrew the £2,000,000 the other day, and said the failure to get it was a humiliation. There is no more humiliation attaching to it than to the Indian Office Council bills. I think it is perfectly right that if the Money Market is too dear, and there is no need to buy at that particular moment, then we should not accept tenders. The tenders, I believe, would have been about 4¼ per cent., and I consider—and rightly so—that if I do not accept the tenders made, and deferred, I could get the money at a cheaper rate. Surely there is nothing humiliating in that. I am, in truth, rather glad that it happened, for it shows that we are not obliged to accept whatever offers or tenders are made to us, and, therefore, such a course is not without its advantages. Then the right hon. Gentleman asks where we got the money. Well, at this time the balances in the hands of the Government were large. I purposely asked for £2,000,000 of bills, because if I had not put out tenders at that time we should have had to pay a higher rate. I accept the right hon. Gentleman's theory, and have been acting upon it by endeavouring to reduce the amount of the Treasury bills on the public, and we shall continue to do so, notwithstanding the increased amount we have to borrow. Whatever inconvenience we are exposed to is one more of sentiment than reality; but that inconvenience, whatever it may be, is of little moment when we considered it in the light of the sequel, to the great operation of which I have spoken. Those tenders are necessary, not for the purpose of the £2,000,000 or £3,000,000 that have been borrowed, but as the sequel to the redemption of the debt. The difference now between the right hon. Gentleman and myself is reduced to this—that the right hon. Gentleman would have forced sales on the market to the tune of £25,000,000, while I proposed Treasury bills over a time, and took them up without any loss whatever. As to the question of the Sinking Fund, I believe and hope that the old Sinking Fund will not be used for any deficiency of bills in the course of the year, but for the purpose of diminishing debt. The

  1127
  right hon. Gentleman next complains that I have not stated what has become of the £600,000 which was set aside in the Budget of last year for dealing with light gold. The fact is that the matter has slipped my memory. The sum of £400,000 is to be applied this year. As to the £600,000, as it has not been employed in expenditure, it remains in the old Sinking Fund, and has been used for the repayment of the debt. With regard to the £400,000, a sum taken from the profits on silver, I propose to apply it to the withdrawal of light coins. The sum is reduced from £600,000 to £400,000 this year, because, according to the latest researches and the opinion of some of the ablest statisticians, the estimates of the amount of gold in circulation are much too large. It has, therefore, been possible to make a reduction in the old Estimates, which ranged up to £90,000,000 or £100,000,000. That has been confirmed by the experience we have had of the pre-Victorian coin; and, therefore, we have not thought it necessary to take more than £400,000 for the withdrawal of light gold coin. The right hon. Gentleman has further complained that I have not placed before the House my views with regard to the banking system of the country and any reforms in the currency. I deeply regret that the right hon. Gentleman should have used the expression—not a very dignified one—that I have "cried stinking fish" with respect to the banking institutions of the country. It is not true, but a gross exaggeration. I have never failed in all my public utterances to pay what I believe to be a well-deserved tribute to the manner in which the banks, in most respects, have been conducted. But I have put my finger on one point which I believe to be a source of considerable weakness in the banking system, and in that I think nine out of ten men, including the right hon. Gentleman himself, will agree with me—I allude to the absence of a sufficient reserve. The right hon. Gentleman rightly thinks that the banks have not held sufficient reserve, but I am glad to say—as I have been invited to speak on the matter—that the London Joint Stock banks have consented, at my instance I may fairly say, to monthly publication of their accounts, showing the
  1128
  amount of money in their possession and in bank bills as distinguished from their other assets, and I believe this publication will have a considerable effect in increasing the reserves of the banks. The country banks have undertaken to publish quarterly. I therefore think I have obtained something—and without the aid of legislation, too—by what the right hon. Gentleman calls my "flying my kite." I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that the banking institutions of the country ought not to lean too much on this House or the Government, and it has been a great satisfaction to me to find that the banks are willing to adopt this step, though there was considerable doubt about it, without my having recourse to Parliament to pass an enactment enforcing a more frequent publication of accounts. Moreover, I have thoroughly threshed out the subject with the managers and directors of the great London Joint Stock banks. I have given weekly attention to this matter in conference with many who could best advise me. I am glad to be able to state that the guarantee for Barings' house was undertaken by the great banking institutions of this country without any undertaking or guarantee by the Government directly or indirectly. I do not deny that great pressure has been put upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer and upon the Government with regard to it; and there was a time, in that memorable week, when it was believed that without the assistance of the Government it would be impossible to carry through the saving of that great house and all those other houses which might be imperilled by its fall. Although, curiously enough, there had been a precedent in 1795, when a house of business was saved by the issue of Exchequer bills, yet the Government declined to enter upon such a guarantee. They held that the City of London was strong enough to carry the matter through by individual efforts, and in that way the situation has been saved. It is a great credit to the banking institutions of the country that in two or three days they took the necessary steps to save the crisis. It now only remains to me to deal with the final passages of the right hon. Gentleman's speech. Summing up his charges against the novelties of the

  1129
  Government, the right hon. Gentleman said they were due to the profuse expenditure of the Government. Then the right hon. Gentleman, while charging us "with profuse expenditure, informed us that he had spent more on the Army and Navy in one year than any other Government.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: Out of the Estimates for the year.
  MR. GOSCHEN: At any rate, out of the Estimates there is one thing which the right hon. Gentleman did not do. The right hon. Gentleman did not pay for the ammunition for the guns which he ordered. On the contrary, the Government — and I suspect that the right hon. Gentleman had a great hand in it—struck out the ammunition, although the guns had been ordered. It was certain that the taxpayers, since I have been Chancellor of the Exchequer, have had to pay heavily for the ammunition struck out by our predecessors. I do not know how right hon. Gentlemen opposite can justify their putting themselves in such a position. At all events, the right hon. Gentleman said the present Government have been profuse in their expenditure. I do not know to what extent the right hon. Gentleman has voted against that expenditure. Hon. Members opposite at their public meetings are very fond of speaking of the confused accounts of the Government without telling their audiences that the right hon. Member for Bradford was responsible for the confusion in the accounts. However, in the speeches addressed to public meetings by the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir W. Harcourt), I have not observed that the right hon. Gentleman made the expenditure on the Navy one of the main grounds of his rhetoric.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I both spoke and wrote on that subject.
  MR. GOSCHEN: But in none of the splendid speeches addressed to the public by the right hon. Gentleman have I seen a word in which he made the expenditure of the Navy one of the main points of his attack. If I recollect rightly, the right hon. Gentleman never said naval expenditure was too large, but was rather opposed to the means by which we met it.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: I made a strong speech on the Naval Defence Bill, which is reported in Hansard, and to which I would refer the right hon. Gentleman.
  MR. GOSCHEN: Does the right hon. Gentleman mean to say that we have been building too many ships? This is a very interesting point. Here is a right hon. Gentleman with influence that cannot be exaggerated in the councils of his Party. Here also is a matter deeply affecting the vital interests of this country, namely, the strength of the Navy. The Government have decided on their own responsibility that the Navy ought to be of a certain strength. Now, does the right hon. Gentleman hold that we are making the Navy too strong? Does he believe that we might cut down a certain number of ships at the present time? The right hon. Gentleman, who has made some good-humoured interruptions, is silent when I ask him if he thought the Navy is too strong.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: If the right hon. Gentleman will read the admirable speech which I made on the Naval Defence Bill he will know exactly what I mean.
  MR. GOSCHEN: A single word from the right hon. Gentleman as to whether he thinks the Navy is too strong would be a better answer to the public than a reference to a speech of which I may have an easy command, but which the electors over whom the right hon. Gentleman exercises his influence may not be able to refer to. I hope I have now referred fully to the charges brought by the right hon. Gentleman. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that I feel deeply conscious—as deeply conscious as any of my predecessors—of the immense responsibility of not only finding the necessary means for the defence of the country and for the expenditure, but also of the responsibility of upholding proper principles of finance. I do not feel that we have been guilty of the charges brought against us by the right hon. Gentleman. I have endeavoured to reduce them to their proper dimensions, and I leave it to the country to judge whether I have been in any way unworthy of the trust imposed upon me, not only to get in the necessary amount of taxes, but also to maintain the finances

  1131
  of the country unimpaired, and to keep the financial ways of the country orthodox and correct.
  MR. PICTON: Considering that so large a part of the afternoon has been wasted on a Debate relative to a horse race, I cannot but regret we have not more time for discussing this important question. I do not believe that the oldest Member of the House can recall a more formidable attack than that which has been made on the finance of the Government by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby. The reply which has been made to it is weak in the extreme. I have not risen, however, for the purpose of adding any criticisms to the Debate, for I do not feel competent to do that. But there are one or two small points to which I should like to allude. For instance, the Chancellor of the Exchequer cited precedents for voting sums of money for purposes not sufficiently defined, and he referred particularly to the Budget of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Edinburgh, in which £170,000 was set apart for the purpose of reducing the telegraphic charges. But surely that is not a strictly analogous case, for then only £170,000 was set aside, while here £800,000 is to be set aside, with the certainty of an annual expenditure of £2,000,000 in the future for a new system of education, without the slightest explanation being vouchsafed as to the nature of the Government proposal. It must be remembered that in the case of the Budget of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Edinburgh everyone knew the lines upon which the reduction of the telegraph charges would go. Under the circumstances, I hope the Debate will not be concluded this evening.
  MR. MORTON: I wish to move the adjournment of the Debate. It is impossible in the short time at our disposal to consider all the questions we desire to raise.
  DR. TANNER: I beg to second the adjournment.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Morton.)
  MR. GOSCHEN: I hope the hon. Member will not press this Motion, seeing that on subsequent stages the questions raised can be further considered. I can assure him opportunity shall be taken on another stage to renew the most important part of this discussion. I hope, therefore, the House will allow this stage to be completed to-day.
  MR. J. E. ELLIS: I very much regret that the right hon. Gentleman has not at once consented to adjourn this Debate. This is an extremely important Bill. We have only had a few hours discussion on it, and I think the right hon. Gentleman will admit that points are involved to the discussion of which a whole evening might well be devoted. I trust, therefore, he will re-consider his determination.
  MR. CONYBEARE: Past experience has taught me that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and with all respect for the promises and pledges of the Government, I very much prefer that the important questions raised in this Bill should be discussed on this stage, and not left to future stages. The Government have chosen to waste time in a Debate as to the Derby adjournment, and they have thrown away a whole Sitting, after having first inspired paragraphs in the newspapers that it was not to be treated as a Party question. Even a Member of the Government spoke in favour of the adjournment. That being so, it is not right for the Government to seek to shorten a Debate on a Bill dealing with most important matters. Several hon. Members have shown a desire to take part in the discussion.
  Mr. CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERrose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put," but Mr. SPEAKER withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.
  Debate resumed.
  It being ten minutes to Seven of the clock, Further Proceeding stood adjourned till this day.

  SUPPLY.
  Resolution [25th May] reported [see page 979), and read a second time.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
  MR. SEXTON: At question time to-day I asked the Secretary to the Treasury a question as to an important matter which directly concerned my constituency and the whole of the community of the Province of Ulster in regard to postal matters. The Secretary to the Treasury, going as I think beyond the rights of his position, refused to give any information to the House on the matter, and I was obliged to give notice that I should raise a Debate upon it upon the Report of this Vote. I refrained from discussing it in Committee, although I had a perfect right, and it would have been convenient for me to do so; but I did not anticipate that any Minister would have kept absolute silence on a matter of this kind. I did think he would have been sufficiently civil to inform me that we might look forward to a satisfactory settlement of it. Since I put the question the Postmaster General has been in the House, in conference with the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury, and I should now like to ask him whether it is convenient that I should proceed at once with the Debate, or whether he will agree to an adjournment.
  MR. JACKSONmade no sign of reply.
  MR. SEXTON(continuing): As the right hon. Gentleman has made no indication of agreeing to the adjournment, I am compelled to raise the question at once. In the month of June last year the Postmaster General received a deputation from Ulster—a deputation which was entitled to speak with authority for the City of Belfast—and they laid before the right hon. Gentleman some important facts as to the wretchedly inadequate character of the postal service in the Province of Ulster. I was present when the deputation waited upon the right hon. Gentleman, and heard his reply, and that reply
  1134
  certainly entitled us to believe that prompt attention would be given to the matter. The right hon. Gentleman admitted the grievance, and indicated his intention, and, indeed, I think he gave a very emphatic promise, to provide a remedy. But since then we have heard nothing upon it. At the end of last Session the hon. Baronet the Member for Wigton informed me, in reply to a question, that nothing had been done, and that no offer had been received from the Companies concerned, with a view of providing a remedy; but surely when the Postmaster General admitted the existence of a grievance, and undertook that he would provide a remedy, the initiative should rest with him to open negotiations. During the Recess I engaged in correspondence with the Postmaster General, and several letters passed between us. I pointed out that whenever there was a fog in the Channel between Holyhead and Dublin, the mails were delayed and letters reached the North of Ireland two or three hours late. Indeed, it sometimes occurred that merchants were compelled to send letters to England before they received the English mails, upon which their correspondence to a great extent depended. Surely that was a great absurdity—that the outward mail should be despatched before the inward mail was delivered.
  It being Seven of the clock, Further Proceeding stood adjourned till this day.

EVENING SITTING.
  MOTION.
    COUNTY COUNCILS (ELECTION OF WOMEN.)

      RESOLUTION.
      MR. STUART: I rise, Sir, for the purpose of moving the following Resolution:—
      "That, in the opinion of this House, the law ought to be so altered as to enable women to be elected to, and to serve on, County Councils."
      The object of the Motion is to permit women to be elected for, and when elected to serve on, County Councils,

      1135
      whether elected by the ratepayers directly or chosen by the County Councils themselves in accordance with the Act. When the Local Government Act of 1888 was passed it was understood that women were enabled to sit on County Councils. In consequence of that view two ladies contested seats for the London County Council, and at the poll were elected by substantial majorities in the constituencies of Brixton and Bow. The members of the County Council were not only favourable to the idea of women being elected to serve on County Councils, but were also confident that the Act permitted them to sit and act, and in this belief the Council, in selecting certain additional County Councillors as aldermen, selected Miss Cons, whose fitness for dealing with many questions was in no way second to the qualifications of the ladies who had been elected directly by the ratepayers. Mr. Beresford-Hope claimed the seat at Brixton, and the question being taken to the Law Courts it was declared that Lady Sandhurst had not a right to sit because she was a woman, and she was, therefore, unseated in favour of the unsuccessful candidate. But the other lady candidates remained members of the County Council. A year afterwards the ladies again took their seats, but a member of the County Council brought an action against them. The question was debated in the Law Courts, and the Court of Appeal decided last April that the ladies had no right to be elected. Unless an Act is passed, therefore, women are not eligible to sit or serve on County Councils. The question was raised on the Scotch Local Government Bill in 1889; and one of the arguments used by the Government to prevent the election of woman was that unless the contingency was specifically provided for, there might be the same difficulty in Scotland as had been created in England. But women now sit on School Boards, on Boards of Guardians, and their work as representatives on these Bodies has met with the approval and appreciation of the general public. On Boards of Guardians the number of ladies elected is much larger than it was 10 years ago;
      1136
      and with regard to the School Boards, the facts are these—that whereas in the first year of the School Board elections there were only eight women elected, there are now no fewer than 80. In making this proposal, I am, in addition to the arguments already used, supported by the fact that I am asking for a reform which is not altogether new, because the ladies I have named have not only served on the London County Council for a period of about six months, but in the case of Miss Cons and Miss Cobden they have served under the restrictions of a severe penalty for nearly three years. Not only have they served on the County Council, but on many of the Committees. So much so, that when the last election of Committees took place in the London County Council Miss Cons was elected to no fewer than six of those Committees, besides being appointed to 11 sub-Committees. In the work of County Councils there is a great deal by which those Bodies and the public generally must be benefited by being enabled to have the assistance of women. Take the case of the pauper lunatics. The London County Council has charge of an enormous multitude of these people, among whom the women number no fewer than 4,500. Surely, the presence on the Asylums Committee of ladies accustomed to deal with such matters must be of great advantage to the community at large; and the very men who at present form these Committees are those who have petitioned this House by enormous majorities to allow them the assistance which female County Councillors can render, feeling" as they do their own inefficiency, and knowing the great value attaching to the experience and co-operation of ladies such as I have mentioned. The same observation is applicable to the case of the industrial Schools, which are also under the County Councils. Every one who has had practically to do with these Schools must know how advantageous it must be to have the aid of ladies, not only in dealing with the girls, who come specially within their province, but also with the boys. Take, again, the case of the Infant Life Protection Act, the County Council has the licensing of persons and places under this Act and the selection of persons

      1137
      competent to nurse children. At present these duties are relegated to committees consisting entirely of men; whereas, the assistance of ladies would necessarily prove to be a distinct advantage to the public. Take, again, the housing of the poor, in reference to which there are to be great reconstructions such as those about to take place at Bethnal Green. This is a matter in which also the assistance of women would be of practical utility. In London we have the advantage of such ladies as Miss Octavia Hill and Miss Cons, and the experience of such persons ought to be available to the State in dealing with such questions as I have indicated. From considerable personal experience I have no hesitation in asserting that in the matter of technical education for girls the assistance to be rendered by experienced ladies is a thing which the State ought to encourage rather than to discourage and disallow. The argument against women, founded on the magnitude of the financial operations of the County Councils, is of the most flimsy character, and such as it is it is thrown to the winds by their presence on the School Board and the Boards of Guardians, whose work involves an expenditure equally important. I have brought before the House several important duties of the County Councils, and upon which the services of women would be peculiarly useful to the State, but I place the argument for my Motion' upon wider ground than this. It has been constantly reiterated by the President of the Local Government Board, and it is the truth, that there is a difficulty in finding the due supply of fit persons, if I may use the phrase, for constituting Local Boards, and we on this side of the House have always argued that you must not minimise the duties, and not too much curb these Local Bodies, because to do so would restrain able men from coming forward to take seats on these Boards. We must avail ourselves of the best material we can afford for the purpose, and we cannot afford to neglect any talent for this object which the State might utilise—we cannot afford to shut out and disfranchise any group of capable persons such as are found among those women who have education, competence, and leisure for such work.
      1138
      There are two or three arguments brought against us, and one of these is that women will become involved in politics. I quite admit that. We have always urged that County Council elections should be conducted on political lines, and no doubt women will, if they stand as candidates for election to County Councils, be constantly brought into contact with politics. But it ill becomes either side of this House to pretend to a desire to keep women free from politics. Why, it is only to-night to-morrow, and the following day that Women's National Federation meet, and women are encouraged to take part in political discussion; and upon the other side of the House, as the solitary occupant of the Government Bench and his few Friends behind him know, women form a very active section of the Primrose League, a powerful and excellent organisation in the interest of hon. Members on the other side of the House. On either side of politics positions of influence in relation to politics have been delegated to women; and yet when we propose that this position shall be suitably recognised, then we find objections started and fears expressed lest women should follow lines that may lead them into political controversy. Why, the argument is ridiculous. The Chancellor of the Exchequer knows that, for he is as willing as anyone to encourage women to take part in the proceedings of the Primrose League as we are to encourage the National Women's Federation. Then there is another favourite argument used, that if we allow women to sit as County Councillors then we must allow them to have seats in this House. That is the most extraordinary argument I ever heard. You might as well say that because you allow women to vote for members of a County Council therefore you must allow women to vote in Parliamentary elections; the two arguments are identically on the same lines. The advocates of woman's suffrage have been endeavouring from time to time to impress upon their friends that because women vote for municipalities therefore they ought to vote for Members of Parliament, and remarkably unsuccessful they have been. The fact is, the English nation is no more influenced than is the House of Commons by

      1139
      this argument by analogy. There is the greatest difference in the functions of a County Council and this House. In the former we have a wholly Administrative Body, and in the latter a Legislative Body, and we have passed the Rubicon of admitting women to Administrative Bodies. We have them on the School Board and Boards of Guardians, and on those two Bodies, especially the former, performing functions of the utmost value and importance, and we cannot argue that because they have a place on those Bodies therefore women should have a right to sit in this House. But there are a number of politicians, more especially on the Liberal side of the House, who are in terror of anything that may for a moment look like coming near the fringe of allowing women a vote for this House, that they at once up with this bogey, and run away like children from a turnip lantern, when anything is proposed that will place women in a position of greater responsibility, or secure to the State the advantages of women's ability and experience. These are theoretical politicians, these are the gentlemen who will not for a moment be guided by practical experience. We who urge today the placing of women upon County Councils do so wholly without consideration, wholly without endeavour to argue out the question of Women's Suffrage upon this. The question of Women's Suffrage is not arguable on this basis. We see the advantages of women being allowed seats on similar Bodies, we see there is work for them to do on County Councils, and we see that they have shown on the London County Council that they can do that work successfully, and we therefore ask the House to permit the State to get the advantage of these services. There is an idea that the moment you permit women to sit on any Body you are practically compelling them to sit on that Body. The answer we get is that because there are 1,000 women who have no wish or desire for such a position, therefore we are bound to exclude the 10 women who may have that desire. It seems to be imagined that if the legislative change I advocate were carried out, a crowd of women would be seen taking possession of local institutions, and even invading the
      1140
      sacred precincts of this Chamber; but it is forgotten that women could only so enter the service of the State or the locality because constituencies are willing they should do so. That constituencies do wish to avail themselves of the services of women on Local Boards is evident from the facts I have given in relation to the increase of the number of lady members of School Boards. Not only for the sake of the County Councils and of the discharge of those duties for which women are specially fitted, but on behalf of those constituencies which desire to be represented by women, I urge this Motion on the House, and hope that it will be accepted. I beg to move the Motion standing in my name.
      SIR R. TEMPLE: As this is not a Party question, I rise to second the Motion.
      Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members being found present,
      SIR R. TEMPLE: As this is not a Party question, and will not, I hope, be made a Government matter, I will briefly second the Motion. I trust that the House will kindly dissociate the question from domestic, Imperial, or Parliamentary politics, and to look at it merely as a question of municipal administration. After the allusions made to me by the hon. Mover, indeed, I could hardly give a silent vote. As rightly stated by him, my experience on the London School Board has impressed upon me the value of the services rendered by women as members of that Board, and the great advantage of the attention and experience which they contribute to its affairs. I regard the County Council as a Body of exactly the same character and status as the School Board. They are, indeed, sister institutions. The question whether ladies should sit on such Boards is not a question of to-day. It was decided 20 years ago, in the days of Mr. Forster, that ladies should be eligible as members of School Boards, and why should they

      1141
      not be equally eligible as members of County Councils, which are bodies of a similar character? As they serve with advantage in the one, it is difficult to deny their claim to serve on the other. It is said that the work of the County Councils is extensive and arduous, but so is that of the School Boards. The financial and administrative work of some of the School Boards is enormous. For instance, in the London Board ladies sit on the School Management Committee, which controls some 9,500 teachers drawing salaries of nearly £1,000,000 sterling annually. There are matters which come before the County Councils in which women are specially interested, such as reformatories and the dwellings of the poor, the care of pauper lunatics, the protection of infant life. And it should be borne in mind that the ladies who come forward as candidates are few; but those few who do present themselves are persons who have special qualifications and predilections in these matters. They direct their energies to the work with an assiduity, a constancy, and a sympathy not to be surpassed and seldom equalled by men. As regards public opinion, a man would be rash to say what is the opinion of the majority of the ratepayers of this vast Metropolitan area; but a large section of the ratepayers is in favour of this proposal. I do not know whether that section is the majority, I suspect it is. Certainly a section of the ratepayers desire to be partly represented by women where suitable ladies present themselves as candidates. And if the law were altered so as to allow of ladies being elected to County Councils several constituencies in the Metropolis would, I believe, be found to avail themselves of the opportunity thus afforded. I earnestly hope that the House will give a favourable reception to this Resolution, which, with great pleasure I second.
      Motion made, and Question proposed,
      "That, in the opinion of this House, the Law ought to be so altered as to enable women to be elected to, and to serve on, County Councils."—(Mr. James Stuart.)
      MR. LABOUCHERE: I am afraid I shall not be speaking to a very appre-
      1142
      ciative audience this evening. It seems to me that I, and I trust the Chancellor of the Exchequer and one or two others, are the only persons here at present who are prepared to defend the cause of man. I confess that for my part I do not regard this question as within the arena of practical politics, and the best proof of that is the state of the House at the present time. I took the liberty, Sir, of calling your attention to the fact that not 40 Members were present to listen to the eloquence of the hon. Baronet opposite, and I am sure that on any other occasion Members would have hurried to hear what the hon. Baronet might have to say. I am not sorry, however, that this should be the case; I am not sorry that we are going to have a Division under such circumstances, for I think we may fairly hold that every Member who does not vote in favour of this Motion is opposed to it, for a very strong Whip has been sent out by the advocates of the proposition of my hon. Friend, but no Whip to summon opponents; and hon. Gentlemen have stayed away because they do not think the subject is worth the trouble of their attendance here, and because this evening with the coming event of to-morrow casting its shadow before, it was expected our proceedings would end in a count-out. This Motion proposes to enable women to sit on County Councils, and reference is made to the fact that women at present sit on Boards of Guardians and School Boards. But there is a great distinction between the limited duties of these latter Boards and the functions of County Councils, which are local Parliaments, and which we Radicals hope will more and more become Parliaments of each county with enlarged powers. Now, my hon. Friend has laid great stress on the fact of women being elected to Boards of Guardians and School Boards, and I can understand that. I will not say that if a Motion were now before the House to make women eligible as

      1143
      members of these Boards, that I should be strongly in favour of it; but still, I can recognise the difference between the limited duties of a School Board or Guardians of the Poor, and the large and widening duties of a County Council. My hon. Friend has pointed to the fact that women have been elected to the County Council of London. My hon. Friend is an Alderman of the Council, and, of course, exhalts his office and his Council, but there are many County Councils, and it is to be observed that not one lady has been elected throughout the rest of the Kingdom. Therefore, we have the experience throughout the entire country, with the exception of London, to show that the country does not hold that ladies ought to be eligible or are desirable as members of the County Councils. Although I think my hon. Friend will admit the wide distinction between the position of Guardians of the Poor and School Boards and members of a Parliament, local or Imperial, I cannot understand how anyone could oppose, if he votes in favour of this Resolution, the entrance of women into these sacred precincts. You give them the rights of man; this is our old friend the thin end of the wedge, and if you induce the House to assent to the principle that women may be members of County Councils, it will be easy to carry the principle one step further and point out how well women had conducted themselves, how useful they had been, &c., &c., and go on to claim their admission to seats in this House. I put the whole thing together—female franchise and the election of ladies either to the Imperial Parliament or to the Local Parliaments; and I am opposed root and branch to the whole thing. I consider, if you allow women to elect, you must allow them to be elected, it seems to be a logical consequence. We are sometimes told that only women of property and an independent position will be elected, but we know what that means. It is against the Radical principle that such a right should be accompanied with a property qualification; and once break down the barrier between the sexes in this way, and you are bound to give the franchise to all, and it will be out of your power to prevent women coming into this House. Women will be in a
      1144
      majority, and men may thank Heaven if they are allowed to sit in this House. We may have a kingdom of the Amazons and all that sort of nonsense. There are some advantages peculiar to the male sex and others peculiar to the female sex, but on the whole, I think the women have the best of it in this world. We place them on a social pedestal, and I object to bring them down into the sordid arena of politics. We should, thereby, destroy all the amenities of existence. The domestic angel would become a very undomesticated I will not say what, but the reverse of the angel. For 6,000 or 7,000 years every intelligent man has held the views which I entertain, but now my hon. Friend, with 40 or 50 followers, comes down to the House to change what has been the rule for ages. I do not believe the majority of women are in favour of this proposal I believe that 99,999 out of every 100,000 do not desire the franchise.
      MR. J. STUART: I may remind my hon. Friend that they have the County Council franchise.
      MR. LABOUCHERE: I am sorry for it, and I am sure they do not want it. The demand for this is part of the "woman's rights" idea, which means "man's wrongs" and the cry is entirely fictitious. There are certain ladies of very great intellect, no doubt they are women by accident, and they want to assume the position of men. Now, I object to legislating for what, with all respect to the ladies, I may call freaks of nature. It might be said in favour of allowing women to enlist, that some women have the muscular strength of the average man, and there are such, but they are exceptions. Women are the exceptions who have the intellectual mind and nature to enable them to take a prominent part in politics. Some children are precocious, and you may find lads of 15 or 16 capable of thought beyond the average man; but would you legislate for such exceptions? Each sex must accept the position nature has assigned to it. It is as absurd for women to whimper because they cannot be Members of Parliament as it would be

      1145
      for Members of Parliament to whimper because they cannot suckle children. Women, by entering into politics, will lose the charm of their own sex without acquiring the qualities of the other. For my own part, I shall oppose all attempts, direct or indirect, to break down the barrier which nature has placed between men and women; and I believe that in taking this view I am supported by the vast majority of the women in this country.
      THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. LONG,): I feel that those, who with myself, share the views of the hon. Member who has just sat down are in a minority at the moment; but I quite agree with the hon. Member that the state of the House, and the fact that Members have not come down in large numbers to listen to the discussion, encourages rather than discourages those who are opposed to the proposal that women should be admitted as members of County Councils. The hon. Member for Shoreditch apparently has at present on his side a certain number of dumb supporters. On the other side we have a limited number of supporters, whether dumb or not remains to be seen. At all events, the hon. Member cannot boast that the interest taken in this question has been sufficiently great to bring down a large proportion of Members to the House. Whereas at present the government of London rests in the hands of men, it is proposed that it should be shared equally by men and women. Those who are opposed to the proposal think it is better that men should retain the power which they at present possess. The Mover of the Resolution has told the House that the matter was never discussed while the English Local Government Bill was under consideration. Well, that is practically the fact; but I can bear testimony to the fact that, although the question was not raised in this House, it was frequently mentioned in the discussions which took place in the Lobby in connection with the Bill, and the view always held was that women would not be eligible under
      1146
      the English Local Government Bill. It is very remarkable that during the long discussion on that Bill nobody thought it necessary to move an Amendment to carry out the present proposal. In the case of the Scotch Local Government Bill the circumstances were still more peculiar, for an Amendment was introduced to make it clear that women should not be eligible. Then the Front Opposition Bench took part in the discussion through the person of the late Secretary of State for War, and the right hon. Gentleman made this strong remark—
      "The true analogy to the County Council is the Town Council. Has any public desire been expressed that ladies should become members of the Town Council?"
      The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Campbell Bannerman) made a strong speech and voted against the proposal. I am sorry he is not here to-night. Allusion has been made to the somewhat sparse attendance on this Government Bench, but it is equal in numbers—I do not presume to say in quality—to the attendance on the Front Bench opposite. I do not know whether either of the occupants of that Bench intend to favour us with their view; but so far as there has been an expression of opinion from that Bench, it has been against this proposal. After all, as a matter of common sense, why is it that the hon. Gentleman asks the House to legislate on this question. The hon. Member says that the County Council has work to do in which women would be useful, and he instanced the care of pauper lunatics. That is perfectly true, and no one is more anxious than I am myself that pauper lunatics should be cared for in the best possible way. But the London County Council is not the only body which has the care of pauper lunatics, and they have not discovered that they cannot fulfil that duty without the assistance of woman. The hon. Gentleman throws an unnecessary slur on his own sex when he says that County Councils cannot take care of pauper lunatics unless they have women on their Councils. But suppose that the position of pauper lunatics would be better if there were women to look after them, has my hon. friend opposite any charge to make against the boroughs

      1147
      which are charged with the care of those lunatics? My hon. Friend behind me has said that it would be an advantage to have women take part in the management of industrial schools. But is there any allegation that the lads in those schools are not properly cared for? The fact is that both hon. Members think that women should have a share in the government of this country, and should rank with men up to a certain stage.
      MR. J. STUART: I am prepared to say that, as a matter of fact, I did not.
      MR. LONG: No; I did not say the hon. Gentleman said it; he gave certain reasons for his Resolution; but beyond these is the motive he now admits that women should share with men in the Government of the country. The hon. Gentleman now asks only that women should be admitted to the County Council. But does any hon. Member believe in his heart that, if this House endorses this Motion, it will not be followed by a demand that women should be admitted to this House? The hon. Member has based his contention on the fact that many subjects come before the County Council in which women are particularly interested, and upon which they ought to be allowed to express an opinion. I fully admit that; but is it not equally the case that there are scores of subjects the House has to discuss and decide, in which the interests of women are as closely associated, as any subject which may engage the attention of a County Council? The hon. Member referred to a remark of my right hon. Friend as to the difficulty of finding fit representatives for these Local Bodies, and, therefore, he said we should not discourage the influence of women. Nor have we any such desire, but we believe that that influence can be usefully exercised, and more usefully exercised than by making women members of County Councils. I am bound to say I heard one remark from the hon. Gentleman with unfeigned satisfaction, and perhaps it was a sort of apology from the Party of which he is a distinguished representative. For years hon. Gentlemen opposite have never restrained the energy of their language in abuse of the
      1148
      Primrose League, and Primrose Dames, a name of which I think I am not saying too much when I say it has "stunk in the nostrils" of hon. Gentlemen opposite. But to-night the hon. Member has told the House that the Primrose League is not only a useful and active organisation, but that it is a most excellent organisation.
      MR. J. STUART: Most seriously dangerous opponents.
      MR. LONG: That I know, but I think the hon. Gentleman said it is a most "excellent organisation"?
      MR. J. STUART: Possibly.
      MR. LONG: Well, we have had tonight from the lips of the hon. Member an acknowledgment that the Primrose League is a most excellent Body, and we are prepared to forget hard words used on previous occasions. The right hon. Gentleman says it is ridiculous to compare the admission of women to the County Council with their admission to Parliament, and that the people do not like argument by analogy. But the whole of the hon. Gentleman's speech was an argument from analogy, and he began by saying that what had been done in School Boards and Boards of Guardians ought to be done in County Councils. So also the speech of my hon. Friend (Sir R. Temple) was an argument by analogy. He spoke of the County Council and the School Board being sister institutions. But the London School Board is as different in its character and constitution from the London County Council as one body can be from another. I am addressing Members of the House who are also distinguished members of County Councils. Are they prepared to admit there is an analogy in the functions of these Councils to those of the School Board? Surely not; for the School Board has but one function—the education of the children of the district. I have no hesitation in saying that that is a subject on which women can give the benefit of their experience and knowledge, but it is a totally different thing to the municipal government of a large town. The hon. Gentleman said that it is ridiculous to

      1149
      compare the admission of women to the County Council with their admission to Parliament. After all, what is the London County Council? It has the control of the health and the daily comfort, and in many respects the daily existence, of 5,000,000 out of the 30,000,000 of the population of this country. What is the distinction between allowing women to sit on the London County Council and allowing them to sit in this House? When anybody is extremely anxious to carry a proposal they no doubt believe that the matter will go no further than they desire it to go, but how are they going to prevent people saying in the future, "Women have been allowed to sit on your great County Councils; why not admit them to Parliament?" Many hon. Members on both sides of the House are in favour of the powers of County Councils being largely increased. One of their solutions for the delay of business in this House is a great delegation of work from this House to the County Councils. Hon. Gentlemen opposite have denounced the Government time after time because they were not prepared when the Local Government Act was passed to hand over to the London County Council the control of the London Police. If hon. Gentlemen are going so to extend the powers of County Councils as to give them far greater influence than they have at the present moment, they will make them in time Bodies only second in importance and in their power to do good or evil to the House itself. I ask hon. Gentlemen whether it would not be thought well to allow women to do that for the country which they had already been allowed to do for their own district or county. If this proposal for the extension of the right of women to sit on County Councils be agreed to, hon. Gentlemen opposite will be justified in saying to Her Majesty's Government, "Parliament has affirmed the principle that women shall be allowed to sit on County Councils, and therefore you ought to legislate to enable them to do so." So far as my experience goes, it shows me that on Tuesdays and Fridays many Resolutions of this kind are brought forward, and when by some accident a Member carries his fad by a Division
      1150
      taken in a House like the present, he proceeds to denounce the Government if they do not follow it up by legislation. If this Resolution is carried to-night the hon. Member will no doubt denounce the Government if they do not bring in legislation. Yet we all know that this Motion has been brought forward because three ladies—Lady Sandhurst, Miss Cobden, and Miss Cons—were elected to the London County Council, but have been proved by the Courts not to be entitled to sit there. It would be absolutely impossible for the Government to transact their own business if they were to take up all the various proposals which come from hon. Gentlemen opposite. [Mr. J. STUART: What proposals?] I think the hon. Gentleman himself has tried to secure the passing of a measure dealing with rates. [Mr. J. STUART: That was not passed.] That was not the fault of the hon. Member. If the hon. Baronet the Member for Cockermouth (Sir W. Lawson) had his way, he would have us bring in a measure in regard to temperance. We know there are other hon. Gentlemen opposite who, if they could, would have various proposals carried into law. If the Government were to attempt to carry out one-half or one-tenth part of all the proposals made, it would be impossible to get through the work. The hon. Gentleman talked as if all County Councils have to do is to manage industrial schools and pauper lunatic asylums. There are a vast number of subjects which come under the control of the various County Councils. There is, for instance, assessment and the levying of rates, the management of police, the management of main roads, the repair of bridges, and a score of other matters. I think it would puzzle even the most earnest advocate of women's rights to prove that women could with great advantage be brought in to aid in the transaction of this business. The whole argument in defence of this proposal is based upon the experience of the London County Council. The London County Council is almost the youngest of the great municipal Corporations in the country. The great Corporations of Birmingham, Liverpool, and other places have carried on the work of their various towns with the

      1151
      utmost credit to themselves and benefit to the community, and they have never suggested that they could do their work better if there were women on the Councils. The Local Government Act, which created the London County Council and the other County Councils in England and Wales, was passed only as far back as 1888. The Scotch Local Government Act was passed a year later. During the passing of the English Act no suggestion was made that this privilege should be conferred on women. During the passing of the Scotch Act the suggestion was made and negatived, and by a most remarkable accident the champion of this right of the ladies did not even take the trouble to vote in the Division. Why should we be asked now, without any fresh circumstances having arisen, without any fresh evidence having been adduced why the persons of women on the County Councils would be advantageous, to go back on the legislation of 1888 and 1889 and give to women power they have never yet possessed and alter altogether the conditions under which our County Councils are elected? I sincerely hope the House will reject the proposal of the hon. Gentleman. I do not consider he has made out his case, and the condition of the House shows that if there is apathy amongst the opponents of the proposal, it excites very little interest amongst those who support it.
      MR. TOMLINSON(who was received with cries of "Divide"): I cannot help saying that that those who cry "Divide" seem to have entered into a conspiracy of silence. I supposed that when Members come down to the House to make a Motion which they regard of great importance, they wished that all the arguments in favour of it should be stated. What do we find on this occasion? The Mover of this Motion made a speech, and he was seconded at no great length by my hon. Friend (Sir R. Temple). I see hon. Gentleman who take great interest in the question of the rights of women with notes of speeches in their hands. Why do not we hear those speeches? Why do not we have this question put forward in a manner worthy of its importance?
      1152
      Why this conspiracy of silence? The reason is quite obvious. It is that they find that the hon. Members who are opposed to the alteration of the law proposed, in the belief that the distinguished men who are in favour of the Motion would be ready with some arguments in support of it, and that the discussion would occupy some time, have not as yet come down to the House in large numbers. Now, the hon. Gentleman who moved the Resolution did not even touch upon the principle which is involved. It appears to me that the first point we ought to consider is what are the limits within which the position of women ought to be altered, if their position is changed at all. But instead of dealing with that point the hon. Member told us that the London County Council have to deal with certain matters, in dealing with which the assistance and advice of women would be of great advantage. The hon. Gentleman told us, for instance, that the Council had the management of lunatic asylums and technical schools. Surely every possible advice and assistance that women can give in regard to such institutions can be obtained without having women members of the Council. Have hon. members realised what it is they propose? I do not know much about the work of the London County Council. I can speak as to Lancashire. The County Council for Lancashire meets at Preston. Some of the members come long distances, as long as 30 miles. They have to leave their homes early and to return late. They sit for hours transacting the business of the county, and have to adjourn for refreshment in the middle of the day to the railway station, and frequently to return to their work. Day after day they are required to attend committees. They have not only to do this in fine summer weather, but all through the stormy and cold months of the winter. These facts seem to me to create a practical difficulty in the way of laying on women work which ought properly to belong to men. It is said women do good work on School Boards. I am not prepared to deny that; but, at the same time, I doubt whether the experience of those who are practically acquainted with School Boards is that they can get from

      1153
      women the same assistance that they derive from a similar number of competent men. I challenge some of the hon. Members opposite who have not yet addressed the House to get up and grapple with the real principle. Unless they do so, the question will certainly not stand well before the country. I should also like to know to what this Motion is to lead. Is it to be an end or a step? Are women to continue to be excluded from Parliament after being admitted to County Councils? The question of female suffrage is in a chaotic condition at present. Some persons support it only to a limited extent: they will only grant it to certain women. Others would grant it to the sex generally; and in that case the limits of the question are boundless. Is the admission of women to County Councils to be limited, or is it to extend to all women whatever their legal status? I have spoken generally of County Councils; but I happen to represent a borough which is a county borough. It is a borough with a very ancient constitution. Is it desired to alter that constitution? I am satisfied of this, that there is hardly a single one of my constituents who desires to have the ancient constitution altered in the way proposed. I shall have no hesitation in giving the most strenuous opposition to the Motion.
      MR. CREMER: At the risk of being considered by some of my Friends a reactionary, I shall vote against the Motion of my hon. Colleague. The chief argument in favour of the Motion appears to be that women already sit on School Boards, where, according to the hon. Baronet the Member for Evesham, they exercise a very beneficial influence. There have been other Members of the School Board for London quite as distinguished as the men now sitting on that Board. In the early years of the Board's existence, when it had to struggle with very many more difficulties than it has now to contend with, and when its policy was being shaped, there were giants on the Board who were most self-sacrificing in their efforts in the cause of popular education in the Metropolis. It was my privilege to be acquainted with some of these men, and I
      1154
      know that the prayer they sent up was—"Do not send us any more female members of the Board, but rid us as speedily as possible of those we now have." I prefer the opinion of the gentlemen to whom I allude to the opinion of the hon. Baronet (Sir R. Temple), however distinguished a member of the School Board he may be. It is a moot point then as to whether women have rendered such distinguished services to the cause of education as the hon. Baronet has described. What will be the effect of this Motion? In a very short time it will be urged on the House that because women have been admitted to County Councils, they must necessarily be qualified for seats in the House of Commons, and it would be only natural and consistent in those who support this proposal to vote for the admission of women to the House of Commons. The hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Tomlinson) has asked whether this is to be a step, or to be an end of the subject. I think those who have watched the movement on behalf of female suffrage for years past must be well qualified to answer that question for themselves. It is not an end. It is simply the means to an end. It is another step, not forward but backward, and I am not prepared to join my hon. Friends in taking that step. I am perfectly certain that every step taken in the direction my hon. Friends desire would be used as an argument for taking another step, and this process would be continued until all the females in the United Kingdom would find themselves enfranchised and some of them sitting in this House. According to the last Census, there are at least half a million more adult women than men in the United Kingdom. The country is now within measurable distance of manhood suffrage, and if women were enfranchised it would mean adult suffrage, and the handing over of the government of the country to women. Are we, then, prepared to allow the manhood of the country to be swamped by women, a majority of whom neither toil nor spin? ["Oh, oh!"] That is the fact, for women are not the great breadwinners of the family. ["Hear, hear," and dissent.] A few women may be, but I am not on that account prepared to

      1155
      jeopardise the Constitution of the country —to hand over its destinies to a class the vast majority of whom have no political thought, or aspiration, and the great bulk of whom it would be found, if they were polled to-morrow, are perfectly indifferent to the possession of the suffrage. There is apathy and indifference enough on great public questions in the country and in this House already, and I do not wish to see it increased by introducing into our political life an element such as is sought to be introduced by the somewhat artful proposal now before the House; and if I had a hundred votes I should cheerfully record them against the Motion.
      MR. T. H. BOLTON: I do not know that I should have spoken on the question but for what appears to me to be a conspiracy of silence on the part of hon. Members on this side of the House. In my candidature I went so far as to say that I thought women who are householders and pay rates and taxes ought to have some direct voice in the election of Members of Parliament. In consequence of making that admission I have been pestered to vote for this Motion, and for what is called equal right between men and women. I promised to attend the Debate to hear what could be said in favour of the Motion.
      An hon. MEMBER: You did not come.
      MR. T. H. BOLTON: Yes; I have been here during most of the discussion I came down to hear what was to be said, but I have found that there is no disposition on the part of many Members on this side of the House to fully and fairly deal with the subject. It opens up much larger considerations than any that have been put forward in support of the Motion, and I cannot conceal from myself that those considerations are looming in the distance. The proposition is that women should sit on County Councils. The Courts of Law have decided that under the present law they are not eligible to do so, and therefore the onus of proof rests on those who support the Motion to show that there is a necessity for the change, especially having regard
      1156
      to the much larger considerations behind. The duties of County Councils are largely municipal, and have always been regarded as such as men can more satisfactorily transact than women. The London County Council has much more important matters to deal with than those to which the Mover of the proposal has alluded. There are, for example, the questions of the main drainage of London, the gas and water supply, the public improvements, and the great financial affairs of the Metro-polis. The London County Council is only second to the Government and to the Treasury as a great financial body. It raises loans and undertakes large financial matters; in fact, grants loans to all the Local Authorities of the Metropolis, and I ask whether those are subjects which would ordinarily be relegated or entrusted to women to manage? It is true we have had three women on the London County Council who were discreet enough to give their attention to matters which women can well attend to, but you might have women on the Council who would insist on interfering in all the larger concerns to which I have referred, and we should not be able to prevent it, if this Motion were passed and carried into effect. Once on the Council women could take an active part in all its work, and exercise by their votes a direct influence in all its proceedings. I say that unless you are prepared to carry out this proposed enfranchisement very much further than the proposal of the hon. Member for Shoreditch, you cannot vote for the Motion. In the country also the County Councils have large duties to perform, nearly all of a municipal and financial character; including control over the police. Town Councils are in many cases County Councils, and if women are admitted to County Councils, they must be admitted to Corporations also, and to take part in all municipal work. Is this suggested or contemplated? Is it desirable that we should make this great change without more consideration than has been given to the question? It is contended that there should be a great devolution of work from this House to the County Councils, and that the County Councils should be created small

      1157
      legislative as well as administrative Bodies. Are you prepared to have women on the Councils to take part in discharging duties of this character? I can understand your voting for this proposition if you are prepared to go so far as that, and if you are prepared to go so far as that you must go still further, even to the extent of admitting women to this House. I agree with the hon. Member who spoke from the Treasury Bench that this is a question which ought not to be decided until it has received the very fullest consideration and the very fullest argument, and it is because I believe that the advocates for this large change have not yet made out a sufficiently satisfactory case that I shall vote against the proposal. I did not come here to-night to speak, but the circumstances of to-night are such that I should be wanting in courage if I did not say what I think, even at the risk of offending some of my friends who I know take a very strong view as to the claims of women to participate in public work. I feel bound to support the view presented by the hon. Member for Haggerston, and to vote against the proposition.
      MR. LEES KNOWLES: I wish, if he will allow me, to congratulate the hon. Member who has just spoken, on the pluck and spirit which he has exhibited. I, too, came here to-night without the slightest intention of saying a word. I try, as a rule, to do my duty in Parliament by working outside rather than inside the House, and my anxiety always is to save the time of the House; but I feel that it is the duty of some of us to speak out now, because, unless we do—unless some of us who are in the habit of holding our tongues do take part in this Debate—a snatch vote will be taken and the country will be deceived, and will think that the Division reflects the true opinion of the House. The hon. Member for St. Pancras justly complains that there has been a conspiracy of silence on the part of the friends of this Motion, and I think that an explanation is due from them to some of us who are opposed to the proposal. Hon. Gentlemen who have
      1158
      supported the Motion have spoken for the briefest possible time, in order, I presume, to take an early Division, and to carry the Motion with as large a majority as possible, before hon. Members are able to return to the House. On this occasion, and perhaps on this occasion only, I agree generally with the views of the hon. Member for Northhampton. The hon. Member who introduced the Motion contended that the London County Council was an administrative, and not a legislative Body. Well, I hold that Women's Suffrage is not a domestic and administrative, but a political and legislative question. I should like the hon. Gentleman who introduced the Motion to say whether or not he considers the County Council of London merely an administrative Body? If he replies in the affirmative, I ask him what he says to the fact that the London County Council have dealt with numerous political and legislative questions? They have, for example, discussed abstract Resolutions dealing with the liquor question, the taxation of ground rents, &c. Then, if it is really desirable that women should be elected to County Councils, their election should be made compulsory—so many women should be elected to each Council. But, in my opinion, it is not desirable. It is possible that women may be able to look after children, and the inmates of workhouses, and after the interests of pauper lunatics: but, we must view the duties of County Councillors as a whole. The hon. Member for Hoxton said that there are 23 baby farms in London. But, in London there is a population of more than 5,000,000 persons. Women may be able to deal with babies and children: are they able to deal as effectively as men with grown-up men and women, and with all the questions that come before County Councils? Would a woman elected to a County Council be able to do as much work as a man? If not, then I say this Motion ought certainly not to be carried. We must not look so much to the individual duties as to the general work—to the duties as a whole. Let us remember that for every woman elected, a man, with greater working power, must be kept out. If the duties are such as a man can do, a loss would occur

      1159
      on the election of a woman On that account alone it would be a disadvantage to have women elected. A Motion of this kind was, if I remember aright, rejected during the consideration of the Scotch Local Government Bill. The Scotch are a hard-headed and longsighted people, and if they were opposed, so lately as in 1889, to allowing women to have seats on County Councils, and if the Law Courts have determined that, according to the interpretation of the Local Government Act, 1888, women have no right to sit on County Councils, I hold that we ought not now to reverse a decision at which the House has on two occasions recently arrived. The proposal contained in this Motion appears to me to be the insertion of the thin end of the wedge. If we were to grant women the right of election to County Councils, we should inevitably be compelled to take a further step and to give them the right of election to Parliament. Then all kinds of difficulties and complications would arise. If women were elected to Parliament, we might at no distant future have, instead of a Minister, a "Ministress" of War, and I can imagine, on the occasion of some nice international question arising, the Leader of the House apologising for the absence of the lady Minister for War, who at that particular moment was much more interested in a domestic than in a political question. The hon. Member for Northampton, who in so warm and enthusiastic a manner opposed this Motion, alluded to the subject of the property qualification. He, as a Radical, is opposed to property being the basis of qualification for election. I know that there are hon. Members of this House who are in favour of widows and spinsters, who are ratepayers, having votes. It seems to me, however, that if you give widows and spinsters votes you must go a step further, because surely it is unjust that when a woman has obtained the honourable estate of matrimony she should not have equal privileges with, if not greater privileges than, other women. The Motion to-night is the insertion of the thin end of the wedge. I do not see that the County Councils would be improved by the election of women, in fact, I can conceive that
      1160
      such elections would be a disadvantage. For these and other reasons, I certainly shall record my vote most heartily in opposition to the Motion which is now before the House.
      THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. RITCHIE,): I should very much like to know from the hon. Members who are promoting this reform whether they regard it as a mere farce or whether they regard it as a great constitutional change, which it really would be? I am prompted to ask the question because, from the conduct of the supporters of the Motion this evening, one would really imagine that they were engaged in some light and trivial, almost farcical, matter. Very important and weighty speeches have been made against this proposal. [Cries of "No."] Hon. Gentlemen do not think so, but we have a right to our own opinion of the speeches that have been made. Very important speeches have been made against the Motion, one by the colleague of the Mover of the Motion, and another by the Secretary to the Local Government Board, and not one word in reply to them has been vouchsafed. If a Division in favour of the Motion were to be the result of to-night's debate it would be absolutely worthless, having regard to the tactics encouraged by hon. Members opposite; it would be a Division which could not possibly carry with it the smallest weight. Are hon. Members really desirous of treating this subject seriously, and of promoting the reform which they advocate in a constitutional way? If they are, they are certainly not taking the proper means to further their object. This Resolution possesses in more than the ordinary degree all the vices and faults of abstract Resolutions; because hon. Gentlemen opposite have had at least two occasions within the last three years, on which they might have given legislative effect to the principles they now advocate. They made no attempt to do so during the passage of the Local Government Act, 1888. Again, in 1889, the hon. Member for Shoreditch, who now poses as the

      1161
      champion of women as County Councillors, did not favour the House with any proposal on the subject in connection with the Scotch Local Government Bill. Did any one ever hear of a great constitutional change such as is now proposed being brought forward with less public opinion behind it? There has not been a single woman returned as a County Councillor except in London, which is, of all places the one in which it is least desirable to have women on the County Council, because the County Councils in other parts of the country are of a rural character, and are charged with duties of a more or less rural character, whereas the duties of the London County Council are more like those of a great borough. Let us understand the position of hon. Gentlemen who support this Motion? Are they prepared to extend the principle to Municipal Boroughs? If not, why not? In the Debate on the Scotch Local Government Bill the right hon. Member for Stirling, who admittedly is a man of very broad views, took up the position that if women were to be County Councillors they ought first to be Town Councillors. No doubt, this question has arisen solely out of the fact that certain ladies, in defiance of what was stated to be the law, put up as candidates for the London County Council, and were elected. I am bound to say I do not think that that is a sufficient reason why we should alter the law. Something has been said as to the nature of the duties with which County Councils are entrusted. But may I point out that many City and Borough Councils are entrusted with the same duties, as also are Justices of the Peace in rural districts; and, I may ask, is that a reason why ladies should be elected on County Councils, or appointed as Justices of the Peace? No argument has been brought forward to show that the questions in which women are interested are not properly discussed by County Councils, consisting of men. This Motion is an endeavour to forward the cause of woman suffrage, but this attempt to connect woman suffrage with representation will do incalculable injury to the cause its advocates have at heart. May I also point out that there is nothing to prevent County Councils appointing ladies on Committee which have to deal
      1162
      with matters in which women are especially interested. Hon. Gentlemen opposite are endeavouring to snatch a Division upon a question with regard to which the House and the country are profoundly indifferent, and I trust that the House will not come to a Resolution winch would be absolutely valueless for all practical purposes.
      MR. W. M'LAREN: We are charged with not having taken any part in the Debate. I deny that there has been any desire on our part to snatch a Division. We were anxious to know what arguments could be brought forward against this Motion, and I have not the slightest hesitation in saying that the speech of the hon. Member who moved the Resolution has not been answered. We have been told that speeches of great weight and importance have been delivered in opposition to it, but it seems to me that every speech has been but a repetition of its predecessors, and hon. Members who have spoken have candidly admitted that when they entered the House they either had not made up their minds, or had had no intention of speaking. Therefore, I think we need not attach much importance to their speeches. And when we are taunted with not having raised this question when the English Local Government Bill was under consideration, I can only say that a great number of us believed that the law would enable women to sit as County Councillors. We have been told it was declared again and again that the law would not do so, but one of my colleagues says—and I agree with him— that the point was never raised. We are now endeavouring to reverse the position under the Scotch Local Government Bill, because experience has proved, in the case of the London County Council, that lady members have achieved conspicuous success. Take the case of Miss Cons, who, although only elected by a narrow majority,

      1163
      has since been chosen to serve on various Committees by an overwhelming majority. The hon. Member for North St. Pancras has been moved to indignation by requests sent to him to support this Motion. But he did not disdain the help of women in his own election. He was willing to send them into the slums for canvassing purposes, and why, I should like to know, does he object to their services on the County Council. We are confronted with the argument that women would replace good men on the County Council. Now we know that the Brixton constituency elected Captain Verney and Lady Sandhurst. Would it have been a loss if Lady Sandhurst had occupied the seat to which Captain Verney was chosen? We believe that the majority of the people would prefer to see women elected on the County Councils; and if the electors of Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, or other large towns choses to elect women on the Town Councils there could be no objection to it. As to the argument that the acceptance of this Motion means the thin end of the wedge being inserted and the ultimate election of women to this House, I deny that it is well founded. While I am in favour of women suffrage, I deny that a vote in support of this Motion would mean such an extension of the principle, and I ask the House to set aside that argument altogether.
      (11.30.) The House divided:—Ayes 2; Noes 78.

    INTOXICATING LIQUORS (IRELAND) BILL.—(No. 34.)

      ADJOURNED DEBATE.
      Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [15th April], "That the Bill be committed to the Standing Committee on Law, &c."—(Mr. Lea.)
      Question again proposed.
      Debate resumed.
      MR. LEA: I said all that was necessary on the previous occasion when this Bill was under consideration, and I will only now add that the promoters of the Bill will be quite willing to accept any reasonable Amendment in Committee. I intend to
      1164
      move that the Bill be referred to the Standing Committee on Law.
      DR. TANNER: I notice that there are on the Paper two Instructions to the Committee, one of which deals with the question of reducing the Licensing Duty proportionately with the reduction in the number of hours for business. Seeing that Ireland is deprived of many of the advantages which accrue to this country in the shape of manufactures, and seeing that the manufacture of spirits is—
      MR. SEXTON: I rise to a point of order. The Motion before the House is that the Bill be referred to the Standing Committee on Law, and that certain Instructions be given to the Committee. I wish to ask whether the Committee to which the Bill is to be referred should not first be decided on before any Instruction is moved?
      MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! The House must decide what Committee the Bill is to go to before it gives an Instruction, and the Motion now before it is to refer the Bill to the Standing Committee on Law.
      MR. SEXTON: I have but just entered the House, and misapprehended the nature of the Motion. What I object to is a Bill of this nature, affecting Irish interests only, being referred to a Grand Committee on which there are only seven Irish Members, especially when the opinion of Members representing Ireland has been so very evenly divided on the question of the Second Reading My experience has been that when Bills relate to only one of the three countries they have been either dealt with by the House itself or referred to a Committee, on which the Representatives of that country can exercise a material, if not a preponderating, influence. For instance, on the Committee dealing with the Irish Estates of the City Companies, out of 11 Members four or five were Irish.

      1165
      Again, in regard to the Bankruptcy (Ireland) Bill, the Committee was composed almost entirely of Representatives from Ireland. But this Bill is to be withdrawn from the cognisance of the House in the Debates in which the 100 Members from Ireland might have considerable influence, and it is to go to a Grand Committee, in which the Irish Members will be, by reason of their infinitesimal representation, placed at a grievous disadvantage. I believe it is a fact that all the Irish Members on this Standing Committee are with but one exception in favour of this Bill; and, therefore, I say it is an absolute injustice to refer the Bill to that Committee. The Bill was supported by 25 Irish Members, and opposed by 31. With the majority so small it is a mockery to refer the measure to a body of 80 Members, of whom seven only are Irish Members, all but one being in favour of the Bill. It may be said that the Committee of Selection have power to add Members. They have power to add 15 Members. I do not suppose they would add 15 Irish Members. At any rate, I am unwilling to abdicate my function as an Irish Member in favour of the Committee of Selection. I claim my right to discuss this Bill here. It is a Bill of details, and not of principles. If you are to discuss it at all effectively you must do so in Committee; and, as far as I can prevent it, I must decline to allow any stage of the Bill to be removed from the purview of the House, and handed over to a body which is at present most un fitted by its composition for the discussion of such a Bill. The Bill strikes particularly at certain cities in Ireland. Those five cities are Belfast, Dublin, Cork, Limerick, and Waterford, and they are represented in this House by 16 Members. Surely it is absurd to suggest that this Bill can be properly considered by a Committee on which not one of these 16 Members has a seat. Surely it is reducing legislation to a mockery to suppose that this is a fair or intelligent method of proceeding by the Bill. I represent an important body of
      1166
      opinion in the City of Belfast; and I decline to be a party to such a novel and unjust proposal as the reference of a Bill concerning the interests of many of those for whom I speak to a body of which the Members from Ireland form a contemptible and helpless minority. I move that the House resolve itself into Committee on the Bill on this day month I name this day month, because it appears to me from the state of Public Business that there is no probability that the House will be able to spare time for the subject at any earlier period. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has many weighty matters deserving his attention. He has thrown some things overboard, but has still an amount of cargo on board which he cannot dispose of before this day month.
      MR. SPEAKER: As a point of order, I do not think the hon. Gentleman can move to put the matter off for a month. If he will name an earlier day the Amendment can be put.
      MR. SEXTON: Of course, Sir, I will move the Motion in any form you consider in order. This day week.
      Amendment proposed, to leave out from the word "That," to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "this House do resolve itself into a Committee of the whole House on the Bill upon Tuesday next."—(Mr. Sexton.)
      Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
      THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN): I do not think the hon. Member for West Belfast has made out a case. He has argued that a Bill relating exclusively to Ireland should be referred to a Select Committee; but I would remind the House that the Light Railways Bill of 1889, which related exclusively to Ireland, was referred to the Grand Committee on Trade.
      MR. SEXTON: That Bill concerned the Imperial Treasury.
      MR. MADDEN: There was a grant of public money, but that question was

      1167
      decided by the House. It was not that question, but the details of the Bill, which were referred to the Standing Committee on Trade. It is an answer to the argument of the hon. Gentleman, which was that a Bill relating to Ireland was always referred to a Select Committee and not to a Standing Committee. The case I have cited is an exact precedent for dealing with the present Bill in the way proposed by my hon. Friend opposite. I must say I think, speaking not only on behalf of the Government but also for myself, this is a Bill which may with great advantage be referred to the Standing Committee on Law. The law relating to licensing in Ireland is rather intricate, and the details of the Bill require to be dealt with with extreme care. I think that it is extremely desirable that the Committee to which the Bill is referred should be the Standing Committee on Law. It is true there are not many Irish Members on that Committee; but in the case of the Light Railways Bill a large number of Irish Members were added to the Grand Committee, and I have no doubt that precedent will be followed on the present occasion by the Committee of Selection.
      MR. J. NOLAN: I wish to direct the attention of the House to the manner in which a very important interest in Ireland is being treated. It has been made perfectly clear that the overwhelming majority of Representatives of three at least of the provinces of Ireland are opposed to this Bill. The measure is pressed forward in this House day after day by two gentlemen, one of whom I believe is an Englishman and the other is a Scotchman, and they are supported by a number of Members who, broadly speaking, represent only one shade of political opinion. To-night a very important step is proposed to be taken in connection with this Bill, and it is proposed to be taken at the fag-end of an
      1168
      Evening Sitting. The hon. Member in charge of the Bill moved the Motion in a speech of a few words, and he only had the opportunity of doing so by some arrangement with an hon. Member on the opposite side of the House. I wish to assure that hon. Member that when he gets another chance of pushing forward the Bill about which he has recently been making appeals to hon. Members he had better avail himself of it, because we shall remember that it was—what I suppose it would not be Parliamentary to call a trick, but—the arrangement between himself and the hon. Member in charge of this Bill that led to this Bill being taken at the fag-end of an Evening Sitting, in the absence of a large number of the Representatives of Ireland who take an interest in the question and have Motions down in reference to it. I am prepared to endorse what the hon. Member for West Belfast has said about the undesirability of referring this Bill to a Committee constituted as is the Standing Committee on Law.
      (11.59.) Mr. LEA rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put;" but Mr. SPEAKER withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.
      Debate resumed.
      MR. J. NOLAN: There are only seven Members from Ireland on the Committee, and only one who may reasonably be assumed to be in favour of the trade whose interests are affected by this Bill.
      Mr. SINCLAIRrose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put; "but Mr. SPEAKER withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.
      Debate resumed.
      It being Midnight, the Debate stood adjourned.
      Debate to be resumed upon Thursday.
      House adjourned at five minutes after Twelve o'clock till Thursday.

NEWFOUNDLAND FISHERIES BILL.
  OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD DENMAN: My Lords, on the 11th May I gave notice that on the Motion for the passing of the Newfoundland Fisheries Bill I should move an Amendment that it be passed that day four weeks, which would have been the 8th June. I believe a little delay would be extremely useful, and although, from my deafness, I was not able to hear when the question was put, yet if I had been both deaf and dumb, somebody should have been deputed to watch how the business of the House was going on. It is objected that we ought not to be in the position of waiting for the passing of a Bill in the colonies, but it is not, I think, beyond the pale of the Constitution to say that if Her Majesty chooses to withhold her Royal Assent until a Bill passes in the Legislature of Newfoundland, it would be more likely to produce peace than any hasty measure that could possibly be passed.

EVIDENCE IN CRIMINAL CASES BILL. [H.L.]
SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this Bill, which seems to me to be one of very serious importance indeed, has been approved, so far as I know, by every one who has discussed the matter. The object of the Bill is to enable accused persons to give evidence in their own behalf in criminal cases as well as in civil cases, and, although it has not passed into law, it has several times been before your Lordships' House as well as the other House of Parliament. I do not believe that any person, unless he were to look into the Statute Book for the purpose, could have any idea how very absurd, incongruous, and even, I may say, ridiculous, is the present state of the law in regard to giving evidence in criminal cases. Many years ago, as your Lordships are aware, the old illogical theory of the law was carried
1058
out to so great an extent that, in civil cases even, parties who had any interest in the subject-matter of the suit were not permitted to give evidence; but that has been changed, and for some years past now the persons concerned in such cases have been allowed to go into the witness box in their own behalf, and it is generally admitted that the change has had beneficial results. Speaking from my own experience, over a very considerable period, during the greater part of my professional life, I am convinced, and I feel sure that the experience of most Judges on the Bench will have convinced them that that was a great improvement upon the state of the law as it stood before that time. In fact, when one considers how cases are tried now, one is often at a loss to know how they could have been tried formerly with any regard to doing justice. It is difficult to understand how, under the old state of the law, it was possible to arrive at the truth. No doubt there was great skill shown in the management of causes at Nisi Prius, and people were fascinated with the great art displayed; but the result was not always in accordance with justice, though persons skilled in intellectual exercises might be interested in seeing how justice could be arrived at in certain cases without calling the parties most interested. That has long since passed away; but to the general alteration of the law in that respect an exception was made. When the law was altered in regard to civil cases it was provided that the alteration should not extend to criminal cases. It was, I presume, thought too great an alteration of the old principle of the law to be applied to them. But since then there have been alterations and departures from the original theory of the law, though it is still in the incongruous, and, as I have said, even ridiculous, condition that you may have the same tried, practically at the option of the accuser, either in a form which will allow the mouth of the accused to be open, or in a form which will shut his mouth and prevent his being examined as a witness. The Legislature has intervened to some extent, and has given accused persons and their wives, in certain cases, the right to give evidence, particulary in regard to sexual cases. Before I conclude I will give your

1059
Lordships a list of the exceptional cases in which the Legislature has enabled persons to be examined, and I cannot conceive anyone being content with such a system of law, and one so utterly incongruous as the present law of evidence. A great many treatises have been written upon the subject, and, as far as I know, in later years there is hardly a person who has adhered to the view that the old illogical principle of Common Law should be maintained. Conspicuously, a distinguished member of the Bench, Sir James Stephen, wrote a treatise on the subject not very long ago, referring to his experience of cases in which prisoners can be examined. He described it as undoubtedly a most successful experiment, and one which ought to be carried further. The notion that by so doing we might gradually fall into the Continental method of examining prisoners was, as far as his opinion is concerned, an entire delusion. His opinion was that prisoners were cross-examined rather too little than too much, and that the same tenderness which the law has always fixed towards accused persons would continue to be observed with regard to everybody charged criminally who was capable of being examined as a witness. In 1885 a very serious departure from the then state of the law was made not only as applicable to the particular offences treated by that Statute, but referring back to Statutes passed 25 years before, with reference to a certain class of crime, I believe one reason why it is almost impossible to appreciate the great difficulty existing in the administration of the law in this respect is the nature of the cases. The Statute to which I have referred deals with a class of topics which is not a desirable subject of public discussion, and, therefore, people have avoided talking of them. I mean offences against women and children. The result, however, is that, while the right of a person charged to be called as a witness has been extended to a certain number and class of cases, it is denied in a great number of cases in which justice essentially demands it. If a person is accused of the gravest offence against a woman's chastity, he has now, by the operation of the Act of 1885, to which I have referred, the right to be called as a witness. By the 20th section of that Act the right to
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be called as a witness applies to a considerable number of crimes which it is unnecessary to specify, but which may be comprised under the general description of sexual offences. The result of the present system is that in respect of a great number of them you have the absurd anomaly to which I referred in the first instance. In a case in which the gravest offence is imputed the accused might be called and examined as a witness, but if he is charged with an assault—with an intent to commit that offence—he cannot be called. It would, I think, be difficult for anybody to suggest the sense or reason for such a distinction. But it does not rest there. There is a variety of other offences in respect to which a similar anomaly exists, of a distinction being made between an offence being committed and its not being attended by the most serious consequences. For instance, under the Explosives Acts, if a person is accused of having explosives in his possession, he can be called as a witness; he is made a competent witness, and can be examined accordingly. But supposing that in consequence of the improper guarding of those explosives somebody is killed, and the person who had charge of them is indicted for manslaughter, that person cannot be examined. So that whether he has the right to be examined as a witness or not may depend upon what is in one sense an accident—whether or not he is found with the explosives in his possession before they have gone off, or whether they have gone off and killed somebody while he had them in his possession. In the same way as regards equipping ships and sending them to sea in an unseaworthy condition. That is a specific offence for which a person may be indicted, and upon the indictment he would be entitled to be called as a witness. But if, in the same circumstances, somebody lost his life by the commission of the offence, and the person committing it was charged with manslaughter, he could not be called as a witness, and would not be competent to give evidence. I might multiply cases of the kind to almost any extent: and when it is borne in mind that, according to the system of administering criminal justice in this country, any person may prosecute in the name of the Queen, and

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that it may, therefore, practically be in the hands of an accuser whether the person accused shall be examined as a witness or not in a variety of cases, it must be apparent that such a system of law ought not to be permitted to continue. I have thought it right to bring this matter before your Lordships at greater length than I should otherwise have done, because my attention has been lately called to one or two examples of cases in which the law does not allow the accused to be examined—that result depending upon the form of the indictment—and in which it would be the feeling of every right-thinking man, supposing that, as possibly may be the case, the charge is false, that the accused should be allowed to go into the witness-box and give his own explanation of his conduct subject, of course, to cross-examination. A case in point, to the particulars of which I need not refer at this moment, occurred recently where a false charge was made; and it was one of those cases in which the only thing that could console the person accused under the charge brought against him was the fact that he was able to go into the box and give his explanation to the jury. Notwithstanding that four persons gave testimony against him, he was thus able to establish his innocence of the charge, which if it had been established, would not only have subjected him to heavy punishment, but would for ever afterwards have ostracised him from society; and the question whether or not he was capable of being examined depended upon the form of the indictment. That charge might have been made under other circumstances which would have prevented his being examined as a witness and establishing his innocence, as he did to the satisfaction of the Judge and jury by whom he was acquitted in spite of the evidence given by the four accusers who presented themselves against him. As I have said, whether a man can be called as a witness or not in his own behalf depends often on the particular form of the indictment; and if the charge I have referred to had been made under those particular circumstances, the accused could not have been examined. That was a case which makes one almost tremble to think that he is living in a country where such accusations may be
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made, and where the man against whom they are made may be denied the ordinary reasonable means of answering them, because at the option of the prosecutor the charge may be so framed (and if framed as an indictment for conspiracy the right would not have been applicable in this case) as to deprive the accused of the right of giving evidence. I have consulted many eminent and experienced legal men on this subject, and all of them have spoken strongly in condemnation of the existing state of the law and in favour of an alteration. Among other persons with whom I have communicated I have been in correspondence with my friend Mr. Poland, whose great experience and the value of whose opinion in such matters your Lordships will readily appreciate; and he writes to me in the most earnest way advocating a change in the law, which he says is absolutely and imperatively demanded at the present time, for this among other reasons: that Judges now have to do what they had not to do formerly, that is, to explain to juries at Assizes that no prejudice should be entertained against an accused because he might not have been called as a witness, because his not having been examined was simply the result of the mode in which the indictment was drawn. Is that a reasonable condition for the law to be in? I cannot help thinking that the existing state of things works the most grievous injustice in many cases, and I am very anxious that your Lordships should give an opportunity to the other House to pass a Bill dealing with a crying and serious evil. I have, therefore, thought it right to re-introduce a Bill on the subject which was introduced before by my noble Friend Lord Bramwell, the evil being one which I think requires to be dealt with as early as possible. Under these circumstances, I ask your Lordships to read this Bill a second time.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."
LORD DENMAN: My Lords, this Bill is the counterpart of a measure which passed your Lordships' House without much consideration. It appears to me that the old law shutting out interested witnesses from the temptation to perjure themselves was far better in principle than any of the innovations which we have seen attempted. My noble and

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learned predecessor wrote an article in the Edinburgh Review, in which he advised that persons accused of forgery should be allowed to give evidence on oath in civil causes. Certainly the temptation to deny handwriting is so very great that I think it is clear in the late Parnell case, for instance, the person accused, if he had not been corroborated by some very extraordinary evidence, would not have been believed. Under the old law, if a man was sued for debt, he was allowed to swear he was not indebted. The temptations to commit perjury are very great. In the County Courts there is an idea that a great deal of perjury is committed. I do not know as a certainty that it is so; but in France, before the Juge de paix, the parties to a case are all examined, and a gentleman connected with the counsel to the Embassy at Paris told me that the opinion of the cleverest men there is in accordance with the old Common Law practice in this country, under which, if a plaintiff in a case was not called, he was nonsuited. I will refer to a case which happened a few years ago. Patrick O'Donnell, the executioner of Carey, wished to swear that Carey fired the first shot. At that time the Judges had decided that no statement of a prisoner's evidence should be made public; but, fortunately, my learned Brother admitted the statement for so much as it was worth. I wrote asking him whether, if Patrick O'Donnell had sworn to the truth of his statement, he would have escaped punishment, and he replied that the expression of intention, "I will shoot him," had been proved against the accused, and that was considered a proof of malice prepense. I wrote also to Sir Charles Russell asking him whether he thought that O'Donnell's swearing to the truth of his statement would have saved his life, and he replied that he did not think it would. This Bill, in my opinion, only multiplies temptations to perjury. Why should you tempt an unfortunate man to commit perjury as well as the crime of which he is accused? If his explanation or defence be true, it will be corroborated by witnesses; if it be untrue, it is of no value, and it had much better not be supplemented by perjury. I believe these innovations are all contrary to common sense, and
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that the change proposed in this Bill is a departure from those principles of prudence which have caused our law to be so respected as it is. I may further remark that in that article in the Edinburgh Review which I have mentioned, it was suggested that a wife should never be examined because she is always so much under the control of her husband, who could not himself be trusted to give evidence. I am one of those who oppose a Bill at every stage if I am against it. Formerly we could oppose Bills by proxy, and a great deal of useless discussion was avoided. I do not wish to go back to old cases, but there have been instances in which I have opposed Second Readings without a single supporter. I was requested by the Earl of Derby on one occasion to attend on Third Reading; and after Lord Malmesbury had moved the rejection of a Bill for 28 years, we threw out the measure. I denounce this Bill as most unconstitutional and un-English, and as long as I live I will do my utmost to prevent its passing. I move that the Bill be read a second time this day 10 months.
Amendment moved, to leave out ("now"), and add at the end of the Motion ("this day 10 months.")—(The Lord Denman.)
LORD HERSCHELL: I need not now trouble your Lordships at any length, because I have on more than one previous occasion indicated that my views are favourable to such a change in the law as this Bill proposes to introduce. I have never concealed from myself that there are dangers in the change; but, at the same time, it is impossible to shut one's eyes to the fact that the existing law, which prohibits an accused person from giving evidence, has been from time to time eaten into by one Statute after another; and I think it is a very significant fact that almost all the Acts creating new offences have provided that an accused person and his wife shall be allowed to give evidence. It is, I think, impossible to deny that that fact indicates a change in public opinion on the subject; and I do not know that there is any instance in which that has been done where any regret has been subsequently expressed, or any evidence has been brought forward to show that the

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change has worked ill or created any prejudice. I can myself bear testimony as regards one Act to which my noble and learned Friend on the Woolsack has referred, namely, the Explosives Act. On one occasion I conducted a prosecution for an offence under the provisions of that Act. Two persons were charged, and they expressed their desire to give evidence. I could not help regarding that as a somewhat crucial test, because, as it happened, each of the prisoners in his evidence reflected to some extent upon the other. Their respective defences were not by any means united, indeed they were to some extent inconsistent, and in some respects disadvantageous to one another; and yet, after hearing their evidence, I came to the conclusion that it was better for both of them they had given it. In the result, they were most properly, as I think, acquitted, and to that acquittal I think the power of giving evidence by the prisoners themselves may have contributed. It is impossible for oneself not to be impressed with such an illustration as that. No doubt there is a feeling of danger that a change of sentiment at the Bench or Bar might lead to undue pressure on accused persons through this power of giving evidence; but I have confidence that the same spirit of extreme fairness which I am quite sure ought to be shown in the trials of all accused persons, and which now animates the Bench and Bar, will continue to animate them in the future, and that the possibility of danger which I recognise will thus be avoided and mischief prevented. One great element of strength in the case for this Bill consists in the fact alluded to by the Lord Chancellor, that practically for the same offence a prisoner may or may not give evidence, according to the form which the indictment against him takes. Nobody can, I am sure, for a moment stand up and suggest that that is a satisfactory condition of the law, and that in itself constitutes a strong argument for the Bill. It is not creditable to us that the law should exist in that condition. I do not advocate it; but I think it would be better, if it were thought advisable, to make some distinct exceptions from the power given to accused persons to tender their evidence rather than that they should only have the power to give it or not, accord-
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ing to the form of the indictment. Under these circumstances, I heartily support the proposal of my noble and learned Friend. I have no doubt he will propose that the Bill should go to the Standing Committee, in order that its details may be considered, and to see whether it is desirable in any way to alter or amend it.
LORD ESHER: My Lords, I will only venture to say that I am not prepared to oppose the Second Reading of this Bill; but as I look upon the proposed alteration with considerable alarm, I hope that in the Grand Committee, if it is to go to the Grand Committee, safeguards against the dangers which I foresee may be added to it.
LORD COLERIDGE: I need not trouble your Lordships with many observations, but I should like, holding the office I do, to say why I support this Bill. I support it with the greatest pleasure. To some extent I share the feeling of my noble and learned Friend opposite (Lord Esher), but this is one of the cases in which, it seems to me, there is really no good ground for opposing the Bill, and for this reason: that the old method of treating criminal cases has been considerably altered. I quite understand the difficulty. Formerly criminal trials used to be conducted on a principle entirely different from that followed in the trial of civil cases. They were more like arguments between party and party, as far as might be, in which the prosecution was not to act as a hostile party to the prisoner, but rather as a sort of Minister of Justice, and was obliged, where the prisoner could not be heard, to make out a case "beyond all reasonable doubt," as the phrase is, and to show that he was guilty of the offence with which he was charged. But I cannot help feeling—it is impossible, I think, to help feeling—that the old view of the administration of the law has, step by step, been done away with. I am old enough to remember the time when prisoner's counsel would not be heard except in cases of high treason. It was not in all cases that counsel for a prisoner could be heard, and that must sometimes, of course, have led to great injustice being done. That which is the rule at present could not be done in the way of defending a prisoner, except by ingenious half-speeches, which led to

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very unsatisfactory results. The Prisoners' Counsel Bill was passed when I was a young man, and I can remember the prophesies with regard to it, and the suggestions which were made as to the danger of allowing counsel for prisoners to be heard, and the anticipated certainty that criminal trials would become mere struggles between advocates instead of being a calm judicial investigation into the guilt or innocence of the parties accused. It is impossible to say that, to some extent, that has not been found to be true. It is true that in such cases prosecuting counsel do now, in reply, speak with a force and energy, and with a partisanship against prisoners which formerly, when there were no speeches by counsel for prisoners, they were not in the habit of doing. Still, one cannot doubt that, on the whole, the Prisoners' Counsel Bill has been a most useful measure, and that justice is more easily done than it was when no statement on behalf of a prisoner could be made. So in civil cases, too, the examination of interested parties was unknown, though the examination of parties in criminal cases was, under particular circumstances, permitted. I will take the class of cases which my noble and learned Friend has alluded to, going to the very life and soul of the matter, in which, if they were tried in a Criminal Court, the parties would not have been allowed to be heard. It was held, and very rightly, that under the words of certain Acts of Parliament, a person accused could always be heard. I do not pretend to any special amount of experience in these things, but I had experience enough when I was at the Bar to know that unless one had had the power of calling one's client, and explaining the circumstances through his mouth the consequences would have been most serious to him, and in many cases directly the reverse of what happened. Again and again it has occurred in the course of my experience that clergymen have been triumphantly acquitted of serious accusations going to their character which, if they had not been able to be examined, would most undoubtedly have had a different result. As my noble and learned Friend on the Woolsack has stated quite truly, there are anomalies existing in the law in this respect which it is quite impossible for
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any man to justify. Take the cases which he has put of committing a rape and attempting to commit a rape. How can anyone say it is reasonable that a man should be allowed to give evidence upon an accusation against him for a graver offence, and not in a case of the commission of the lesser offence? It is said that an accused ought not to be allowed to himself give evidence in a case of the graver crime, but in these things there is no going back. It is out of the question to think of bringing back the law to the state in which it was 30 or 40 years ago, even if it were desirable to do so; and that being so, considering that in certain cases accused persons are at present allowed by virtue of Acts of Parliament to give evidence on their own behalf, where, on the whole, it does not work badly, it seems to me to be impossible to refuse a Second Reading to a Bill which merely carries into other and more important matters principles which your Lordships have established over and over again in matters of less importance.
LORD MORRIS: My Lords, I will entreat your Lordships' indulgence for a few moments, because I think, as few persons have had longer experience than I have had in criminal trials, it would be right, entertaining the opinion I do, that I should express my entire acquiescence in the Bill which has been introduced by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack. The object, I presume, of all criminal trials is to ascertain the guilt or innocence of the prisoner—to ascertain the truth; and I believe, from my own long experience, that that object has been very much impeded in many cases by the fact of the prisoner not being entitled to depose and give evidence on his own behalf if he so wished. The Bill of my noble and learned Friend does not compel him to do so: he gets the option. I admit, however, that it will remove a great part of the stock-in-trade of counsel defending, who are always impressing on juries that "the prisoner's mouth is closed, and that he cannot be examined as a witness for himself;" but that if the prisoner could have been called, he would have been able to give an explanation which would have cleared up the whole matter. This Bill will, I admit, prevent that being

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urged in defence, but is it not very desirable that it should be removed? Is it not a very proper solution of the difficulty to remove what is, in many cases, a great obstacle in ascertaining the guilt or innocence of the prisoner, so far as my experience in Ireland has gone. I can only express my entire concurrence in the Bill as introduced by the noble and learned Lord, and state my opinion that it will have that effect whatever its other values may be, an opinion derived from long experience, I may say almost second to none, in Ireland.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR OF IRELAND: My Lords, having regard to the position I hold in reference to the administration of the law in Ireland, I do not wish the Debate to close upon the Second Reading of this Bill without expressing my entire concurrence in the resolution which your Lordships are, I hope, about to arrive at. As far as I am aware, the Judges in Ireland hold the views which my noble and learned Friend who has just addressed your Lordships—and no one is entitled to speak on the subject with more authority—has expressed. It is obviously an anomaly and an absurdity that in a trial the object of which is to find out the guilt or innocence of the person who is accused at the Bar, the one person alone, who is no tat liberty to give evidence, should be that person on whose evidence it might depend whether or not the jury were to be satisfied as to his guilt or innocence. That is an anomaly and an absurdity so patent that if there was not a long course of practice the other way one would be astounded to find that it could be defended in any shape or form, or that any suggestion could be made for its being maintained; and every Amendment that has taken place in our law modifying that anomaly by permitting in certain cases persons charged with certain offences to give evidence in their own behalf, renders the survival of that anomaly in the case of other prisoners more indefensible, I therefore welcome the introduction of this Bill by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, and I am very pleased to think it is likely to go down at an early date to the other House, accredited, I hope, by the unanimous approval of your Lordships.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I certainly have no reason to complain of the reception which this Bill has received at your Lordships' hands, and I have but few observations to make in reply to what has been said. Really the only objection to the Bill is that it will be likely to produce perjury. I do not undervalue the objection; but the same objection might be urged against the examination of all parties who have any pecuniary interest in the result of a trial. One would have thought that a man's father or mother, or brother, may well have deeper interests than even the accused person himself. It is dependent upon the accident of the form of procedure in many cases, and is not a result of the crime itself, that the prisoner is disqualified from being called as a witness, and I confess I do not think that is very logical. But I should like to say why the objection seems to me unreasonable. At present the mode in which a new trial is obtained, or an attempt made to give another account of a criminal transaction, is very clumsy, that is, by a very different form of procedure, an indictment for perjury against the witnesses upon whose evidence a prisoner has been Convicted. I could not help being reminded forcibly of that by the speech of the Lord Chief Justice. I once was counsel for a clergyman who had previously been convicted of an offence on the evidence of two girls. The clergyman turned the tables upon them by indicting them for perjury. They were convicted, and the clergyman received a pardon, and was relieved of the sentence which he had received on their testimony. That is certainly not a course which one would like to have to follow. The question of perjury was raised, but it could only be done in the form I have mentioned. I cannot help recalling that during the last two or three weeks I have seen wholesale accusations of perjury against a number of witnesses who had been called to give evidence against a particular person. That person has now obtained processes against the witnesses on whose testimony he was convicted. The case will be tried in due course, and I hope justice will be done in the result, whatever the result may be. But that is an illustration of the importance of such an

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alteration of the law as your Lordships are invited to make to-night. If, instead of it being necessary to bring a charge of perjury against the witnesses after conviction, as in the case of the clergyman I have mentioned, the accused had himself been capable of giving evidence at his own trial, there would have been no necessity for the second performance. I cannot help thinking it is a most unsatisfactory state of things that in that way the trial of the same question, the guilt or innocence of an accused person, should be referred to two different juries with the possibility of having conflicting verdicts inconsequence of that particular form of procedure. Then, again, on the second occasion the mouths of the witnesses who were capable of being examined on the first trial would be shut when the tables were turned, so that two different juries would have practically to try the two sets of persons in the absence in each case of the proper evidence in the form of explanations by themselves. As I have said, this is a question which seems to me not to admit of argument upon the present state of the law. I should like to add, what I forgot to mention before, that the late Mr. Russell Gurney, one of the ablest criminal Judges who ever sat on the Bench, was strongly in favour of the change in the law proposed by the present Bill, stating that, in his opinion, it was only justice that persons accused should be capable of giving evidence. With regard to the observation which was made by my noble and learned Friend Lord Herschell, I should be very glad that the Bill should be referred to the Grand Committee, and that any alterations or provisions should be introduced into it which the Master of the Rolls thought necessary to guard against the inconveniences which he feared might arise from this proposed change in the law. I will only say, however, that, so far as I am aware, none of the inconveniences hinted at have arisen in those cases, arising out of some 30 or 40 offences, where prisoners are allowed to give evidence, although no such precautions or safeguards are imposed, and Judges, in those cases where the accused persons have been capable of giving evidence, have not been impressed unfavourably with the result of the power thus given. Under those
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circumstances, I will now ask your Lordships to read this Bill a second time.
On Question, whether ("now") shall stand part of the Motion, resolved in the affirmative.
Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.

EVIDENCE IN CRIMINAL CASES BILL. [H.L.]
  BRINE PUMPING (COMPENSATION FOR SUBSIDENCE) BILL.
  Brought from the Commons; read 1a, and to be printed.—(No. 131.)

PHYSICAL EDUCATION IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS BILL [H.L.]—(No. 30.)
Order for the Second Reading on Thursday, the 18th of June next, discharged.
House adjourned at twenty minutes past Five o'clock, to Thursday next, a quarter before Eleven o'clock.