Sitting of 23 June 1899

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.

  PRIVATE BILLS. [Lords.]
  (No Standing Orders not previously inquired into applicable.)
  MR. SPEAKER MR. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the case of the following Bill, originating in the Lords, and referred on the First Reading thereof, no Standing Orders not previously inquired into are applicable, viz.:

  BROOKE'S PARK (LONDONDERRY) BILL. [Lords.]
  Ordered, That the Bill be read a second time.
  CARDIFF RAILWAY BILL.
    RHONDDA URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
    Lords Amendments considered, and agreed to.
  HASTINGS AND ST. LEONARDS GAS BILL. [Lords.]
  Read the third time, and passed, with Amendments.
  BARTON-ON-SEA WATER BILL. [Lords.]
  As amended, considered; to be read the third time.

  DERWENT VALLEY WATER (CONSOLIDATED) BILL.
  As amended, considered.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Queen's Consent signified.—Bill read the third time accordingly, and passed.

  LANARKSHIRE [MIDDLE WARD DISTRICT) WATER BILL. [Lords.]
  As amended, considered; to be read the third time.

  WORCESTERSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL BILL.
  Ordered, That, in the case of the Worcestershire County Council Bill, Standing Orders 84, 214, 215, and 239 be suspended, and that the Bill be now taken into consideration provided amended prints shall have been previously deposited.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill, as amended, considered accordingly.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill read the third time accordingly and passed.

  IONIAN BANK BILL.
  Ordered, That in the case of the Ionian Bank Bill, Standing Orders 84, 214, 215, and 239 be suspended, and that the Bill be now taken into consideration provided amended prints shall have been previously deposited.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill, as amended, considered accordingly.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill read the third time accordingly, and passed.

  NEW TITLE.
  London, Walthamstow, and Epping Forest Railway Bill changed from "London, Walthamstow, and Epping Forest Railway (No. 2) Bill."
  Ordered, That, in the case of the London, Walthamstow, and Epping Forest Railway Bill, Standing Orders 84, 214,

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  215, and 239 be suspended, and that the Bill be now taken into consideration, provided amended prints shall have been previously deposited.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill, as amended, considered accordingly.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill read the third time accordingly, and passed.

  HARROW AND UXBRIDOE RAILWAY BILL.
  Ordered, That, in the case of the Harrow and Uxbridge Railway Bill, Standing Orders 84, 214, 215, and 239 be suspended, and that the Bill be now taken into consideration provided amended prints shall have been previously deposited.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill, as amended, considered accordingly.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—(Dr. Farquharson.)
  Bill read the third time accordingly, and passed.

  KINGSCOURT, KEADY, AND ARMAGH RAILWAY BILL. (By order.)

    MOTION FOR RE-COMMITTAL.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: Sir, the motion I have the honour to make is an unusual one, and I desire further to say at the outset that, it being an unusual one, I have no intention whatever of dividing the House upon it. I simply bring it forward by way of making an appeal for a further opportunity of consideration being given to it. I feel very much upon this question, and for this reason, that under the system of Select Committees in this House the rules of procedure are admittedly of a very oppressive and difficult kind in dealing with Irish business. If you have a Bill rejected by this House it is final, but if passed by the House the opponents have a further opportunity of opposing it in the House of Lords. Therefore, it is specially hard upon promoters if, for any reason whatever, the Committee
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    consider that a case has not been made out for the Bill, it is thrown out for the whole year, and the promoters have no opportunity of coming again to the House. It is very seldom that the proposal to make a railway in Ireland comes before this House. There has not been for thirty years a Bill to construct a railway, with one exception, unless in the hands of the State. Therefore, when private individuals come forward and propose to lay out half a million of money to construct a line forty miles in length I respectfully say that the proposal is entitled to the generous consideration of the House. Far be it from me to even hint an objection to the composition of the Committee or to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Clitheroe Division who presided over the proceedings. We owe too much to the right hon. Gentleman in connection with the action he took last year as president of the Hybrid Committee on the Rosslare scheme to allow any imputation of unfairness on his general line of action in this matter. I am quite sure that he will not conceive for a moment that in making this motion I am engaged in making any reflection upon him in his character as President of the Committee. On the contrary, if I could imagine that this motion in the slightest degree reflected upon him, I would not make it. Whatever view the right hon. Gentleman takes of the motion, it is not my intention to go to a Division. In the first instance, it will be remembered that, however important a Committee of this House may be in dealing with Irish matters, there are no Irish Members upon it. Whatever be the result of this motion, it must lead us in future years to insist that Irish business shall be so conducted that some infusion of an Irish representative character shall take place in regard to it. We came before the right hon. Gentleman, and he gave a very patient consideration to our case; but before I deal with that, let me state the Irish feeling in regard to the Bill. Forty-five local bodies have declared in favour of this measure, and no single Irish body have declared against it. Trinity College, which owns land in the district—the Provost, Dr. Salmon, and the governing body of Dublin University, have declared themselves in favour of it. My hon. friend the senior Member for Trinity College, if he could have been present in his place,

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    would have supported the motion, and his colleague in the representation of the University has already signed the petition in its favour. Indeed, I may say that more than half the Irish representatives have presented a petition to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Lancashire, asking that an opportunity may be given for the reconsideration of the Bill. I feel that the right hon. Gentleman has cast upon him a great responsibility, and I am quite sure that if, in his wisdom, he chooses to assent to our request it would be a very great favour. However strongly he may feel that he was right in connection with his action, I think he must see that there is something to be said on the other side when so large a body of Irishmen petition in regard to it, and when the unanimous voice of the local authorities and the public appeals to him for a reconsideration of the case. Armagh, through which this railway would partially run, is a county which is not entirely National in its character. It is represented in this House by two Conservatives and one Nationalist, and when I say that all three, the County Council, three-fourths of which are Conservatives, and all the local bodies are in favour of it, then I think there is a very strong case for reconsideration. The line would run through the neighbouring county of Meath, all of which is Nationalist, and the Members and local bodies support the Bill. Then, in the adjacent counties of Monaghan and Cavan the entire local bodies support the appeal for reconsideration. Well, I intervene in the matter, not only because my name is on the back of the Bill, but because I have been appealed to by the local bodies to take charge of the motion. I think that as this appeal to the House is supported by the whole weight of the local authorities, it requires very strong arguments indeed to maintain that the motion should not be entertained. There are precedents for this motion. One was established by the Duke of Westminster in a railway case, and there was another case where a similar motion was successful. Now, it may be asked, on what ground was this Bill rejected, and on what grounds do I ask for its reconsideration? Sir, as I understand, the Committee gave no reasons, and do not now give reasons, for the rejection of the measure. As I understand, they decide in camera, and simply announce to the public that the preamble
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    is passed or is not passed; and of course it is left, more or less, to private speculation to arrive at the grounds for the rejection. Looking to the board of directors, it appears to me to be a very solid board of very solid gentlemen. The High Sheriff of the County of Armagh, Mr. Lonsdale, a Conservative gentleman, was one of the directors; Sir Benjamin Baker, the eminent engineer, whose work on the Forth Bridge and in Egypt everyone is acquainted with, was another; Mr. Charles M. Holland, connected with Brunner, Mond, and Co., was another; Lord Greville, an Irish peer, was another; and Mr. Rose, of Birmingham, another. It may be said that this line could be constructed by the promoters with a view to sell it either to the Midland Railway or to the Great Northern Railway. On that point I would say that as far back as 1837—sixty years ago—this line was recommended by a Royal Commission to be made, and therefore I think that any promoter, be he who he may, who takes it up now, sixty years after, and tries to do the work, ought to be encouraged. You cannot suppose that promoters of railways are merely benevolent persons who wish to spend their time and money for the public benefit. That would be an absurdity. There is an element of public benefit and private gain in every railway speculation. Both motives and interests are always there, and I see no ground for the suggestion that the individual promoters connected with this scheme are actuated by other than the ordinary motives. The second objection is, that if these promoters get hold of the Bill, instead of making the line, they would sell it to the Great Northern Railway Company or the Midland Railway Company. As far as I understand, the Great Northern and Midland Companies have entered into a mutual arrangement by which neither would interfere with the other's spheres of influence or invade each other's territory. But is this line to be regarded as a no-man's line, and is it to be boycotted by both companies, and is it never to be made by reason of this joint agreement? If that be so, then there is surely the greater reason why the private promoter should be encouraged to try and break up this monopoly. If the promoters obtain an Act, I understand that they cannot sell that Act either to the Midland or Great Northern Company without coming

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    to Parliament for sanction; so that both Parliament and either company would have a check upon the sale or barter of the line. Well, then, it might be said that the traffic would not warrant the construction of the line. Now, this line is divisible into two parts—the fat end and the lean end. The fat end is supposed to be from Armagh to Keady, and the lean end from Armagh to Kingscourt. I understand that an undertaking has been given from the Great Northern Railway that they themselves will come to Parliamentary next year and obtain Parliamentary powers to construct the fat end of the line. In other words, the lean end of the line is never to be made. Well, all I can say is, that if the Great Northern Company come to Parliament next year with that scheme, I shall meet it with the most strenuous opposition. We have gone on our knees to the Great Northern Railway Company again and again; our people, both Catholic and Protestant, have crawled to the company and asked them to make this line; and now, because the line has, to some extent, been supported by this Committee, and the conduct of the Great Northern in the past has been exposed, they, in order to suit their through line, say, "We will make this fat end of the line and thereby kill the other scheme." That is not a position which Parliament ought to allow this railway company to take up. While railway companies have rights, they have also obligations. I respectfully say that whoever makes this line, it should be made as a whole. And now we come to the case that was made for reconsideration. It is very remarkable, in connection with the shifts and strategies of the opponents of this line, that I should have received a telegram in Dublin the day before yesterday. I am very glad indeed that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Clitheroe Division is in his place to-day, and I regret that he was debarred by illness from being present last week when I proposed to make this motion. In my innocence I did not know anything whatever of the condition of the right hon. Gentleman except from a private note which I received from him; but on Wednesday last I received the following telegram:
    "Sir Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth too ill to come to the House. Will you be further considerate to him and postpone your motion
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    for re-committal of the Bill until after 4th July? (Signed) DYSON, 9, Great George Street, Westminster."
    I made inquiry, and found that this was the firm of solicitors for the Great Northern Railway, the opponents of the Bill! By this trick of the Great Northern Company, under the pretence of solicitude for the health of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Clitheroe Division I was to be prevented from coining over from Dublin to move my motion, and therefore I would have been too late to get a chance of the Bill being reconsidered this year. That is a specimen of the tricks of the Great Northern Company of which we have had to complain on every matter connected with this line. I would say, if there was no other ground than that telegram, the opponents of this Bill are to be condemned as a set of tricksters. Well, Sir, the right hon. Gentleman who presided over this Committee may ask upon what point it is that we seek the reconsideration of the Bill. What the promoters of the Bill say is that they made a mistake in considering that the Committee was with them. They say that on the question of traffic, which is stated to be the ostensible reason for objection, when the Royal Commission recommended the making of this line 60 years ago, they conceived that, to some extent, it was unnecessary for them to go closely into that question. One of the opponents of the Bill was the Midland Railway Company, and I find, on looking at the evidence, that when the promoters of the Bill sought to cross-examine the managers of the Midland Railway Company on the question of traffic, they were stopped by the Chairman. On page 156, when Mr. Tatlow, manager of the Midland, was about to be examined as to traffic, Mr. Blennerhassett was apparently stopped on the objection of another set of opponents. For instance, at Question 2173, Mr. Pember said:
    "An opponent has no right to give evidence in favour of the Bill—
    "The Chairman: Certainly not.
    "Mr. Blennerhassett: I am not going to call any evidence in favour of the Bill; you are quite mistaken.
    "The Chairman: Mr. Pember is, of course, right in objecting to that. I think you must be careful to avoid that. Keep yourself strictly to the question of this proposal of running powers, and your objection to it."
    In other words, an indication was given by the Chairman—and I respectfully say

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    that that was the impression made on the minds of the supporters of the Bill—that they had no right to examine the Midland manager on the question of traffic. It may have been right or it may have been wrong, but I respectfully say that it would have been desirable if the Midland manager had been examined on that point.
    SIR U. KAY - SHUTTLEWORTH: The objection was raised because the impression was that he was going into evidence arising in support of the Bill, whereas, he appeared as an opponent. The witness was allowed to proceed.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: All I can say is that the impression left on the mind of the promoters was not the same as that left on the mind of the right hon. Gentleman. Well, the right hon. Gentleman made his recommendation, and on page 180 he says:
    "The Committee have decided that the preamble is not proved, but in doing so they take note of the assurance given on behalf of the Great Northern Railway Company, that a railway will be constructed from Armagh to Keady."
    It appears to me that if an alternative line is practically taken note of and sanctioned, a cross-examination should have been allowed. Both on the ground of the mistake made by the promoters, and of the general anxiety and feeling of the district, I think this is a proper scheme for re-consideration, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to accept the motion.
    MR. ARCHDALE: I do not often agree with my hon. friend opposite, but in this matter I am bound to do so, as the whole of the inhabitants of the district are in favour of the recommittal of the Bill and of there being a further hearing. I second the motion for the re-committal.
    Motion made and question proposed,
    "That the Kingscourt, Keady, and Armagh Railway Bill be re-committed to the former Committee.—(Mr. T. M. Healy.)
    THE SOLICITOR-GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. DUNBAR BARTON,): Speaking, not as a member of the Irish Government, but as the re-
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    presentative of a constituency which contains the towns of Armagh and Keady, I support the motion. There are two rival lines put forward at present for this district, and there are influential partisans of both schemes. I have not the materials to decide between the relative merits of these two lines, and I think that the safest guidance under the circumstances is the judgment of an independent Committee of this House. Now, Sir, in this case there has been, I need not say, an absolutely fair inquiry; but there are certainly a large number of people in my constituency who think that in the evidence justice was not done to the traffic facilities, traffic capabilities, and traffic prospects of the scheme. Sir, I think it is most desirable, speaking as a representative of the district, that there should be no feeling that before this matter is finally disposed of something was left unsubmitted to the Committee which ought to have been submitted to them. I understand that the further consideration of this Bill would not occupy more than a day, and I also understand that the promoters are willing to make any reasonable undertaking to provide for the costs of the opponents necessitated by such reconsideration. I therefore suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, who is the Chairman, whether he cannot see his way to give that further consideration to the Bill. There could not have been a better Committee, or one more representative of both sides of the House, and there could not be a more respected or more experienced Chairman than the right hon. Gentleman. I sincerely trust, having regard to all the circumstances, the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to accept the suggestion made.
    MR. DALY: As representing a very large district interested in this railway, I wish to add my voice to that of hon. Members in asking that the Bill should be re-committed. At a representative meeting at Carrickmacross a unanimous desire was expressed that the Bill should be re-committed, and a resolution was passed to the effect that the people of the district were very much disappointed that the Bill was not passed by the Committee. It would take a man living in the district to understand how necessary this Bill is. As coming from the district, my belief is that the Bill is of

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    the greatest importance as affecting a district of some 20 miles, and that importance is recognised by the Irish people generally, by benches of magistrates, district councils, boards of guardians, and other bodies, all of whom are of opinion that the Bill is very much wanted and would prove of the greatest service to this district. It having come to my notice some time ago that the Midland Railway Company were thinking of constructing a line to Carrickmacross, an understanding was arrived at, most unfortunately for the district, between the Great Northern and the Midland, the result of which will be to hit very hard the people in the district, for the arrangement was that there should be no competition in future between two lines of railway, and the result of that, of course, is that we shall have to pay any rate that the Great Northern Railway Company may demand. Sir, I will read the resolution which was passed by the Carrickmacross District Council last Tuesday:
    "That this Council is greatly surprised at the action of the Parliamentary Committee in throwing out the Bill for the Kingscourt to Keady line of railway, and they cannot see how the Committee could possibly come to the decision they arrived at, taking into account how badly this line is needed for the purpose of opening up the country through which it is proposed to build it, and that we call on Mr. Daly, our representative in Parliament, to use his influence in having the matter reconsidered. This Council think that the throwing out of this necessary Bill is another proof of the necessity of having matters of this kind, which are of such importance to Ireland, considered in Dublin, and by Irishmen."
    I hope, before long, matters of this kind will he considered by Irishmen, and not by people who do not understand the necessities of Ireland. The Committee went fully into the subject, but there was a great deal too much weight placed upon the evidence of the traffic-manager of the Great Northern Railway Company, and that in itself is a very strong reason why this Bill should be re-committed. Carrickmacross is 56 miles from Dublin by the new line, and no changes would have to be made, while on doe present route the distance is 70 miles, and there is the trouble and danger of three changes. Castleblaney, to which is being connected Carrickmacross, and Kingscourt are both important towns. At present, if a person wishes to go to the market at Castleblaney, he has to leave Carrickmacross at five minutes to eight in the
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    morning, and does not reach Castleblaney until 18 minutes past ten—two and a half hours to reach a town nine miles away; while by the new line the distance would be covered in 10 or 12 minutes. All Members from Ireland, both Conservative and Nationalist, are in favour of the Bill, and I respectfully ask that it may be recommitted.
    SIR U. KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH: An appeal has been made to me in a memorial signed by a large number of the Irish Members, and supported by the Solicitor-General opposite, and by another hon. Member on that side of the House, to consider whether the Committee would not sit again, after reporting to this House that the preamble of this Bill was not proved, and consider the matter afresh. Being desirous of doing full justice, I have listened carefully—but without success—for any suggestion of new facts or of any mis-statements made before the Committee by which they might have been misled. It is without precedent that a Committee should be called upon by this House to sit again after reporting the preamble of a Bill not proved, except under such circumstances as I have suggested, and circumstances recognised by the Committee itself as being of a character requiring further consideration. It was stated that this line was recommended by a Royal Commission 60 years ago, but the House was not informed that that was before the present railway system of Ireland in that part of the country existed, and before the line which now connects Belfast and Dublin had been built. It might have been good to run a line as suggested by this Bill, but another route was chosen, and this is a proposal to construct another line, 36 miles long, parallel with the other, and only about 10 miles to the west of it. I may say at once that the Committee, if they were convinced that they had not had all the facts before them, would not have any feelings of amour propre or anything of the kind; but I would rather leave it to the authorities of the House to consider whether, when a Bill has been thoroughly considered and no new facts brought forward, a Committee should be called upon to sit again, and the parties put to the trouble and expense of coming before the same Committee again to lay before them the same set of facts as before. We stopped no relevant evidence. The point which has been referred to was a

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    purely technical point, and when the technical point had been decided the witness was allowed to go on and give the evidence he wished to give. The promoters were represented by five of the leading counsel at the Parliamentary Bar—four Queen's Counsel and one junior—but their case was, throughout, a weak one, and the weakness was shown to be fatal when the evidence of the opponents—the Great Northern Railway—was laid before the Committee. This railway was to connect two systems of railways, the Great Northern to the north of Armagh, and the Midland and Great Western south of Kingscourt. In the opinion of many of the witnesses the northern part of the line was really needed, but it was in the wrong place, as it was on the high-level, while what is wanted in that district is a low-level railway passing from Armagh to Keady, which would have supplied places that have no railway at all. As the outcome of the proceedings before the Committee, I have in my hand a formal promise, on behalf of the Great Northern Railway Company, that a Bill to construct such a line shall be promoted in the next session of Parliament.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: You will never get it.
    SIR U. KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH: If they do not get it, it will be because of opposition that may be brought against it. Keady will be served by the railway to be promoted next session. Then comes the question of the rest of the country south of Keady. The line proposed in this Bill will only pass through two places—Castleblaney, with 1,721 inhabitants, and Carrickmacross with 1,175; and besides those two places there is on the route no hamlet, no village, no factory, and no prospect of any mineral traffic. Kingscourt, at the southern end of the line, and these other two places, already have railway stations, while Castleblaney and Carrickmacross have immediate communication with the coast. Keady is the only place on the whole route which has not railway facilities. As to the nature of the country through which the line will pass, from Keady to Castleblaney is a very poor agricultural part.
    MR. DALY: May I ask upon what grounds the right hon. Gentleman makes the statement that this is a poor country?
    SIR U. KAY-SHUTTLEWORTH: That was the evidence given before the Committee, and Members who are more acquainted with that part of Ireland than I am will be able to judge whether or not it is correct. The Committee came to the conclusion that there was no prospect of a financial return on the capital which was proposed to be expended, and that this line would take away from the chance of the promotion or completion of a better line from Armagh to Keady, which would serve the latter. Well, Sir, the Committee saw that the only chance of raising the traffic and making a profit would lie in the geographical position of this line between these two great systems of railway. The line could not have made a profit itself, but it would be possible for the promoters of the line to approach one or other of the great companies and sell the line. The Committee were of opinion that that would be the ultimate use to which the line would be put, and they thought that that was not a thing which the Committee would accept or sanction. They thought it was sometimes beneficial for a railway contractor to construct a line, provided always he could show that there would be a financial return, but in this case there could be no financial return unless by a sale to another company; and, under all the circumstances, the Committee were unanimous in coming to the conclusion that this was not a Bill which they could properly pass, and they consequently came to the conclusion that the preamble was not proved; and I hope their decision will receive the support of this House.
    MR. J. W. LOWTHER: I think that the House would feel that the circumstances would have to be very exceptional before it would reverse the decision of the Committee. If we were to be called upon to reconsider all the evidence and the arguments urged on Private Bills, our work would be endless. On the other hand, the House will naturally desire to preserve its full authority over the decisions of the Committees, and I think the House must concede that circumstances might exist under which the House would send a Bill back to the Committee, though they had not passed the preamble. That, however, would only be done upon the ground that there had been a mis-

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    carriage of justice, and I think that the hon. Member for Clitheroe will vouch that no miscarriage of justice has occurred in this case. He, as the Chairman of the Committee, is as well qualified as any man in this House to direct the consideration of a Committee, and the knowledge he has acquired in Irish matters is a guarantee that he gives attention to all the arguments put forward. All the promoters can allege is that some evidence which the promoters had was not placed before the Committee, but they were assisted by able counsel, and I think there can be very little doubt that they put their best evidence in first. If that did not convince the Committee, I doubt whether any further evidence which the promoters could have brought would be able to throw any light in that direction. Under the circumstances, it seems to me that the House would be taking a most unusual course, and one which I would venture to advise it not to adopt, against the views of the Chairman, in sending this Bill back to the Committee.
    MR. MURNAGHAN: I quite recognise the strength of the argument of the right hon. Gentleman, but I also recognise that there is a unanimous opinion in Ireland that this matter should be reconsidered. A claim has been made that certain evidence which was not before the Committee could now be introduced. As that claim comes from Irish Members on both sides of the House, I submit that it is a case in which the House might give way. It comes from persons acquainted with the needs of the district, and who know that unless something is done the Great Western Railway of Ireland will swallow up everything. I hope that the time is not far off when the existing management of these railways will be changed, and facilities will be given to the inhabitants of this district to send their produce to the great markets of the world on fair and reasonable terms. No less than nine representative bodies of the district are in favour of this Bill, and I contend that the very fact that the representatives of Fermanagh, Armagh, and Tyrone are sent up to this House to advocate the recommittal of this Bill shows that the claim of the district is a strong one.
    MR. T.M. HEALY: Perhaps I may give one reason which the right hon. Member
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    for Clitheroe did not give for the rejection of this Bill, which he now opposes the recommittal of. It only affects a small railway in a small district, but the right hon. Gentleman is such a staunch Home Ruler that he rejects this as an instance of the incompetency of his Party to deal with Irish affairs. I beg to withdraw the motion.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 4) BILL.
  Read the third time, and passed.
  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 14) BILL. (By Order.)

    PROPOSED INSTRUCTION.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: The motion which stands in my name has reference to the Provisional Order which was discussed a few days ago. The Secretary to the Local Government Board seemed rather to challenge the opponents of the Order to appear before the Committee and oppose it. There is a strong opinion in Rhyl that it ought to be fought, but, unfortunately, there seems some doubt as to their locus standi. I have con- consulted sonic authorities on the point, and find that the residents of Rhyl cannot appeal to oppose a Provisional Order unless their property is affected. That is why I make this motion, because there are other things besides property to be considered—there is freedom of speech; and I do not think it is too much to ask the House of Commons to give to this Council, which represents the Nonconformists of the town and the Evangelical party of Rhyl, an opportunity to appear before the Committee to prove their case. Of course a local inquiry was held first of all, but it was conducted by a Commisioner of the Local Government Board, and he came to a conclusion which was adverse to the Council; but this, after all, is the highest tribunal, and when there is a suggestion that there is a Provisional Order passing this House which restricts the liberty of the subject, I think every opportunity ought to be afforded to those interested to present their case to the House. I am afraid if the Bill is sent back to the Committee the progress of

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    the Provisional Order will be delayed, and it will not be able to pass the House of Lords this session. It is obviously impossible for this Bill to go to the House of Lords on Tuesday next, for the simple reason that we must challenge it if it goes through in its present form, for I must move the insertion of the compromise which was arrived at between the parties, and which was afterwards repudiated by the Rural Council. Therefore it is obvious that it is impossible this Bill can go through, and consequently it cannot be a question of time. The House of Lords is constantly asked to suspend its Standing Orders in order to allow Bills which arrive there late to pass through during the session. There is nothing at all difficult about it, and I am sure that my hon. friend will see that my request is a perfectly fair one. We are simply asking for an opportunity for these gentlemen to appear before a Committee of the House of Commons to present their case. If there be no case, the Committee can pass the Bill and leave the expenses to be paid by the opponents. May I put it to the House in this way—that we are simply asking the same freedom for the Free Church at Rhyl as is already accorded at Brighton and elsewhere. What is good enough for Brighton should be good enough nor the Urban District Council at Rhyl. At Brighton meetings are held in the evening on the foreshore. The hon. Member has suggested that there would be no opposition to these meetings being held away from the foreshore, but it is absurd to make suggestions of that kind. There are portions of the foreshore where, if these meetings were relegated to those parts, they might as well not be held at all. At Brighton these meetings are held right in the thick of the crowd. In Hyde Park the meetings are held just at the spot where the crowd is passing backwards and forwards. The question of the meetings in Hyde Park has been discussed in the House time after time. What I am objecting to is that this authority desire to be relieved from any Parliamentary control, and simply wish to frame these bye-laws without any opportunity for discussing them in Parliament at all. The bye - laws are made by the authorities connected with Hyde Park, and if they relegate these meetings in Hyde Park to some spot where the crowd do not congregate
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    we can discuss it on the Estimate; but if this is done at Rhyl there is no remedy, and that is why I am bringing up this matter and appealing to the House of Commons. This is the only chance which the ratepayers of Rhyl have of presenting their case to the House. At Rhyl the foreshore is their Hyde Park, and it is the only open space where these meetings can be held, and these bye-laws are being framed so as practically to prohibit these meetings. That is the suggestion of the hon. Member for West Ham—and it is rather significant that the supporters of this proposal have had to go outside Wales in order to get an advocate for their scheme. If these meetings are held outside the purview of the crowd in any particular district, the result will be that all these temperance and evangelical meetings might as well not be held at all. The hon. Gentleman has given no indication of what his view is with regard to these bye-laws. If it is intended that the meetings are to be held on the western side of the pier, they might as well be prohibited altogether. [AN HON. MEMBER: "Why?"] Because the crowd does not pass that way. I know that in the opinion of my hon. friend the Member for King's Lynn these people should be sent somewhere in the wilderness to preach; but, fortunately, that is not the principle which has been adopted in this country. In England hitherto we have gone upon the principle of allowing everybody to blow off steam. Why not let them address the crowd if they like? If people do not wish to listen to these orators, they need not go there. There is a very wide stretch of sand—there are miles of it—and if the Ritualists do not wish to listen to the Evangelical clergymen advancing their doctrines, there is no reason why they should. It is suggested that the meetings should not be held within 30 feet of the esplanade, but they hold these meetings at Brighton right on the esplanade, and I have never heard any complaints by the Brighton Council that anybody's ears have been offended by anything which has been said there. All we want is the same freedom in Rhyl as has been accorded in London, in Blackpool, in Brighton, and, I believe, in Ramsgate. I think the request I make is a perfectly reasonable one, anal it is that an opportunity should be given to the Rhyl Free Church Council to hold these meetings.
    THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,): The Free Church Council do not represent the town of Rhyl.
    MR. LLOYD - GEORGE: I do not claim that the Free Church Council does represent Rhyl. My hon. friend practically argues that simply because they are in a minority they ought to be "gagged." He came down to a meeting in my constituency where his views were in a minority, but we did not attempt to "gag" him; and I want him to give the same freedom to the minority in Rhyl as was accorded to him when he came to Wales. I want an opportunity for the minority in the town of Rhyl to present their views before the House of Commons.
    MR. J. H. ROBERTS: I beg leave to second this motion. I think it is a very reasonable request to make, that the representatives of the Rhyl Free Church Council should have an opportunity of laying their views before a Committee of this House.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That it be an Instruction to the Committee to whom the Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 14) Bill is committed, to take the evidence tendered by or on behalf of residents in the district of Rhyl upon the question of the powers proposed by the Bill to be given to the Rhyl District Council to make bye-laws in respect of the foreshore and sands."—(Mr. Lloyd-George.)
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: I venture to submit that this proposal is not a departure which the House ought to make, for by a majority of close upon 100 the House has already decided that this Provisional Order Bill should take the usual course, and that it should not go to the Police and Sanitary Committee. That was decided by a majority of close upon 100. Now, what does my hon. friend ask us to do? He asks the House to adopt a Resolution which is wrong as a matter of form, because the Committee to which this Bill must go is the Unopposed Bill Committee, and before that Committee not a single witness can be heard. That is an absolute fact, and so far as the form of the Resolution goes, I say that not one single witness can be examined, because it is a Committee for Unopposed Bills.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: I beg the hon. Member's pardon, but that cannot be the
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    case, because in this Resolution I propose to petition against the Bill.
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: The motion says:
    "That it be an Instruction to the Committee to whom the Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 14) Bill is committed to take the evidence tendered by or on behalf of residents in the district of Rhyl."
    Now, the Committee to which this Bill must be committed is the Unopposed Bill Committee, and before that Committee no evidence can be taken. Let us see what has taken place. My hon. friend has admitted that there has been a local inquiry at Rhyl, where all parties were fairly and fully heard. He does not cast any imputation upon the inquiry which was held at Rhyl. It was a free and full inquiry, and the Free Church Council was heard at length before the Inspector to the Local Government Board. His report was carefully considered, and the result of it is this Provisional Order Bill. I particularly desire to call the hon. Member's attention to the fact that this Bill was read a first time on the 19th of May, and if any person in Rhyl desired to oppose it in the meantime they had their opportunity. It is a fact that no ratepayer in Rhyl can oppose it, because they are bound by the seal of the District Council. In case duly qualified persons desired to oppose they had a right to petition, but they have now lost their opportunity. This Bill has to go to the other House, and there all the rights of opposing it are intact. They can be heard before a Committee of the other House, and I understand that the procedure of the other House is a little more elastic than the procedure in this House. Whatever rights they have they have allowed to go by default here, and they must now go to the other House. Just consider what will happen if my hon. friend succeeds. He is a pretty fair tactician: that I admit. He knows perfectly well what will occur if he carries his motion. This Bill should be in the House of Lords on Tuesday next. He says the House of Lords may suspend their Standing Orders; but I may tell the House, in regard to these Provisional Order Bills, that the House of Lords has absolutely refused to suspend Standing Orders unless the Local Government Board certifies that a question of public health is involved. In a matter of this kind I am certain the Bill runs very great risk in-

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    deed. This is not a Bill containing one Order alone—it not merely affects Rhyl, but it also affects Ramsgate and Reading; and are their interests to be imperilled because of the dispute between the Free Church Council and the Rhyl Urban District Council? I am not going here to argue the question of the foreshore. Nobody desires to prohibit free speech there or anywhere else. All that the Provisional Order does is to confer power on the Rhyl Council—a body largely composed of Nonconformists—to regulate speaking on the sands and foreshore. The Council wrote to the Local Government Board as late as the 15th of this month, begging us to push this Bill through so that they may be authorised by bye-law, not to prohibit free speech, but to regulate the speaking on the foreshore. There is no want of sympathy on the part of the Local Government Board. But other people have rights as well as those who desire to speak on the sands. The people of Rhyl have rights, and they have determined to ask for these bye-laws. I do not think the House ought to refuse them. After all, those who oppose the Bill have their rights intact in the other House, and I therefore hold that we should allow the Bill to go to the Lords' Committee, there to be dealt with in the ordinary way.
    MR. McKENNA: The hon. Gentleman, no doubt unwittingly, has misquoted the facts of this case. His argument was directed to the general law of the country, enabling local authorities to make bye-laws. But what is suggested in this particular place is that that there should be an alteration of the general law, and I have to submit to the House considerations for not allowing it, unless special circumstances are shown to exist. My hon. friend has not been discussing the merits of the general law; he asks that a Committee of this House should be informed what are the special circumstances in Rhyl which justify giving these strong and exceptional powers to its Council. If the hon. Gentleman's argument has any force, why does he not introduce a Bill giving these powers to all councils? No doubt to a majority of the hon. Members present public speaking in the streets or on the sea shore is very disagreeable; no doubt speeches on philosophical and religious topics, delivered in raucous tones, interfere with the
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    cultivated leisure of the upper classes; but that is no reason why we should put a stop to the cheap amusement of the lower classes. I appeal to hon. Members on both sides of the House to allow this question to be judged on its merits, and not by a hasty vote deprive the poorer classes of the visitors to Rhyl of their one inexpensive amusement. I am quite sure that if a Committee of this House hears the evidence, it will come to the same conclusion as the Police and Sanitary Committee have done in similar cases during the last three or four years. They will act as the Local Government Board and the Home Secretary have advised in numerous other cases, and allow reasonable freedom of speech on the sands; and if the urban authority is allowed any liberty to make bye-laws it will be strictly on the evidence, and the power will be confined to particular parts of the sea shore, so as not to deprive those in the lower ranks of life of the liberty which they now enjoy.
    MR. JAMES LOWTHER: The hon. member who brought forward this motion is, I believe, in favour of Home Rule for Wales, and in fact I imagine of Home Rule all round, but would it not be a setting our faces entirely against the most elementary principles of local self-government if we deny to the elected representatives of a locality a right which has been conceded to almost every applicant who has come to Parliament? When the Parks Regulation Bill was introduced in this House in the Parliament of 1868, I, as a member of the Select Committee, moved the insertion of the words:
    "That no person shall deliver, or invite any person to deliver, any public address in a park, except in accordance with the rules of park."
    That clause, although at first opposed, was eventually embodied in the Bill and unanimously adopted by the House. The hon. Member has told us we have the power to raise this question on the Estimates every year; but I would point out that, although hon. Members are often hard set to find topics for discussion on the Estimates, this subject has never once been mentioned. In many of the Royal parks speaking is absolutely forbidden, while in others it is subject to regulations, and it must be remembered that the

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    London County Council exercises its powers in this respect with very great rigour, and quite rightly so, in the open spaces under their control, and I, for one, cannot see why a freely elected representative body such as the Rhyl Urban District Council should not have power to make bye-laws regulating the proceedings on the foreshore. This House cannot undertake any inquiry into the circumstances of each particular locality. London already possesses the rights which are claimed under this Bill, and I certainly think that Rhyl, in common with other towns in the United Kingdom, should be granted the right to make reasonable regulations for the control of open spaces.
    MR. COURTNEY: I am afraid we are in some danger of coming to a hasty decision on this matter. The question we have to consider is whether it shall be open to certain persons who object to the Order drawn up to go before a Committee of the House and oppose its terms, either in toto, or have it amended so that the powers conferred on the Rhyl Council shall be subject to some restrictions; that is the question, and not whether the Rhyl Council shall have a voice in regulating the sands there. My right hon. friend says that if we do that we shall strike at the very root of self-government; but my right hon. friend will remember that what is proposed is in absolute accordance with the principle of Parliament, which provided that power was to be given to freely elected representatives to lay down regulations such as are now obtained by a Provisional Order; but Parliament found it necessary to interfere with the power so given, and it was taken away. Let us have no venom against irregular religious exercises. They, no doubt, influence vast multitudes of our countrymen, and we should not lay down the principle that Members of this House are not to be allowed to consideration what terms they should be regulated. I appeal to the House to let this matter go to a Committee of four. We have been engaged this session in legislation affecting Scottish Private Bill legislation, and under the scheme of that Bill, as it now stands, we are to have local inquiries, it possible an inquiry by Members of Parliament; but it has been carefully preserved that if the result of that inquiry does not give satis-
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    faction, it can be reconsidered in the House. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board says what is now asked for cannot be done, that we have lost our opportunity, that we cannot reopen an Unopposed Bill, and all that kind of thing. But if this House passes a Resolution admitting petitioners it becomes an Opposed Bill, and the Committee of Selection will have no kind of right to consider it as an Unopposed Bill. The whole question is, Shall four Members, in whom we place confidence, decide these questions, which involve matters of such interest and importance; and I appeal to the House, and to my right hon. friend the Chairman of Ways and Means, to allow this matter to go forward, as it can go forward, and not to allow any prejudice against preaching to interfere with it.
    MR. ASQUITH: I desire to associate myself with the appeal which my right hon. friend has just made to the House, that it should accede to this most reasonable request. He has discussed—and discussed with an authority second to none in this House—the technical objection raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board, that the House has in some way or other lost control over this Bill. I do not think that objection is worth a Moment's consideration. How do we stand in reference to this matter? We have two circumstances which differentiate it from ordinary cases. First of all, it is admitted that the power proposed by this Provisional Order is exceptional and unusual, and one which, if my information is correct, is hardly ever given by the Police and Sanitary Committee where the procedure is by Private Bill, and from my own experience at the Home Office it is a power which I should be very sorry to see conferred. When it is given it is not used, and if it were we would have in large towns what we had a few years ago at Eastbourne—a state of things almost bordering on civil war, which continued until this House interfered, and took away from the Corporation its powers in that respect. It is now proposed by this Provisional Order to confer powers which the larger municipal corporations do not possess. The other circumstance which differentiates it from ordinary cases is that there is a body of local opinion—I do not know whether it is large or small, but, at

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    any rate, it is entitled to be heard—which is strongly opposed to this exceptional procedure, and does not wish to see the local authority invested with these powers. It has not been given a local opportunity of making itself heard in the ordinary way, and the Provisional Order has not been considered by a Private Bill Committee, which could consider arguments and local arrangements, and come to a deliberate conclusion. This is not a Party question in any sense, and obvious considerations of common-sense and justice are quite sufficient to enable the House to accede to this motion.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. CHAPLIN,): I entirely agree that this is in no way whatever a Party question, and ought not to be decided on that ground. If I may express my own individual opinion, it is more a question of procedure in this House than anything else. My right hon. friend the Member for Bodmin made an appeal to the House on the ground that he was afraid we should come to a hasty decision on this matter, and that we would arrive at that decision mainly by prejudice. What are the facts of the case? The motion of the right hon. Gentleman is simply a repetition of a motion which has been made on two or three previous occasions with regard to this very question.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: That is not so. The present motion is for locus standi, the other was for a reference to the Police and Sanitary Committee.
    MR. COURTNEY: I discriminated so far that I did not vote for the other motion.
    MR. CHAPLIN: The purport and purpose of this motion is that the matter should go before a Committee, and that evidence should be taken, and therefore I am literally accurate in saying that the motion of the hon. Member is practically the same as has been already discussed on three similar occasions. What, then, becomes of the ground on which my right hon. friend appealed that it was likely we should be led into a hasty discussion? What are the arguments which have been adduced in order to persuade the House to accept the motion of the hon. Gentleman? I am bound to say,
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    with all respect to the ingenuity which the hon. Member has often displayed, that I do not think he has made out a reasonable case. He says he wishes to give an opportunity to the minority. The right hon. Gentleman opposite says that there is a body of local opinion against the Bill, but neither he nor anyone else appears to know what it is composed of. On the other hand, we have the opinion of the representative body at Rhyl conveyed to Parliament in the clearest and most distinct manner, first by an appeal to the Local Government Board, and then by a total absence of opposition. Supposing there was this large body of local opinion, it had an opportunity of opposing this Bill by lodging a petition. If there were any doubt as to whether it had locus standi or not, that would be a matter which could and would have been decided by the Court of Referees in the usual manner, Hon. Members seeking to carry this Motion now say, "Let that body of opinion get an opportunity of making this an opposed Bill, in order that its views may be thrashed out and discussed"; but if this large body of opinion exists, will the hon. Gentleman explain why, when it had the opportunity, it did not come forward.
    MR. WALLACE: Does the right hon. Gentleman say that ratepayers have a locus standi?
    MR. CHAPLIN: No, but the urban district council which they elect has, and it is through that that the ratepayers express their opinion. My hon. friend also pointed out that this Provisional Order affects other interests in addition to those of Rhyl. If this motion were to be carried now it would render the passing of this Bill during the present session impossible, and not only the interests of Rhyl, but the interests of two other places—Reading and Ramsgate—would also be affected in a very important way. That is the simple issue before the House. The opponents of the Provisional Order had every opportunity of petitioning against the Bill, and they chose not to do it. So far as my experience goes, a motion of this kind is most unusual; and certainly a very serious departure from the ordinary recognised practice of the proceedings of the House of Commons in regard to these matters; and I therefore

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    urge the desirability of opposing the motion of the hon. Member.
    MR. PERKS: I think the right hon. Gentleman, with his long experience of this House, must have listened to plenty of discussions where people have sought by this machinery a general locus. That is the sole object of our discussion; if these objectors had had the ordinary locus as landowners or in some other capacity, they need never have come here——
    MR. CHAPLIN: Landlords would have had a locus.
    MR. PERKS: The right hon. Gentleman was not listening to what I said. I said that if these people had been landowners they would have had an ordinary locus, but here were large bodies of ratepayers and residents who do not happen to be in the position of landowners, and who have no means of putting their views before the House upon the questions raised by these Provisional Orders, unless the House thinks proper to give them a general locus. I know that the Secretary to the Local Government Board said the other day that these people could have petitioned if they liked. I think when the hon. Gentleman said so he must have known that they had no claim to be heard unless the House gave them an opportunity by this machinery. And therefore it comes to this, that whenever a Provisional Order under the Local Government Board or the Board of Trade is promoted by some local authority, and the Provisional Order does not provide for taking land, or giving outside people the right of being heard before the proposed Committee, the local authority can work in collusion with the Departmental office, and they can prevent any inquiry being made at all into the proposal, except the inquiry made in their Department. Well, the Secretary said in an earlier part of this discussion that this motion cannot be carried out because the subject cannot be dealt with by an Unopposed Committee. But that hallucination has been absolutely disposed of by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bodmin, who pointed out that the effect of giving a general locus to the people of Rhyl would be to take the Bill away from the Unopposed Committee and put it before an Opposed Committee,
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    selected in the ordinary way. That Committee would take the part of the Bill relating to Ramsgate and Reading, and treat it as absolutely unopposed; and then they would consider the views put forward by a very considerable number of ratepayers and residents in the town of Rhyl, treating the Rhyl Provisional Order as an opposed one. This is a subject which ought not to be settled in this family way, between the local authorities and the Board. The questions between the Local Government Board and the Council of Rhyl ought to be threshed out in the light of day by a Committee, where the voice of this very important minority in the community can be thoroughly considered. I am afraid that the Under Secretary to the Local Government Board, since he has been in office, has shown very little sympathy or consideration for the wishes of the Dissenting communities of this country. Liberty seems to be almost a forgotten word in his Department.
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: The hon. Member has no right to make any such observation. Since I have been at the Local Government Board I have endeavoured to do my duty impartially.
    MR. PERKS: In tins particular issue we have no practical illustration of the sympathy which the hon. Gentleman professes for these very large sections of the community. It is idle to say that this is an unimportant subject. It is a subject of the utmost importance—namely, the question of liberty of speech, and I trust that the House will see their way to allow this matter to be dealt with as suggested in the motion.
    VISCOUNT CRANBORNE: I do not think anyone would suspect me of being prejudiced in favour of hon. Gentlemen opposite on a matter of this kind. I do not know what these people of Rhyl may be, or whom they represent; but I confess that I think the House should approach this subject from a more serious point of view than was contemplated by the speech of my right hon. friend the Secretary to the Local Government Board. The House of Commons has always been extremely careful in dealing with religious susceptibilities, and for my part I think there is no policy more ill-judged than that which would give to

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    the public the impression that this House is not anxious that everybody should have a voice on all religious issues as freely as possible, and with as much liberty as can be afforded. Moreover, there is no time when such a policy could be more ill-judged than at the present time. I think it would be a very wise course for the House to decide, not the issue, but whether the issue has been tried by an impartial Committee of the House of Commons. Now, my right hon. friend will forgive me if I do not pay much attention to the technicalities which have been put forward. He says that the people can speak only through their elected representatives. That is all very well, but I do not think I have ever paid much attention to a technical point of that kind. The question is whether there is, or whether there is not, a certain body of men who desire to be heard upon their rights on the foreshore of Rhyl, and which they believe they are not to be allowed to exercise. To tell me that they might have spoken through the District Council may be a very good official argument, but——
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: My contention is that these people could had got a locus three or four weeks ago, when a motion could have been made.
    VISCOUNT CRANBORNE: The motion might have been made, but it would have been equally rejected by the right hon. Gentleman. My argument was not directed to the point of time. My hon. friend used a phrase in his speech very likely to mislead the House. He spoke of the foreshore being the property of the Urban District Council of Rhyl. It is not the property of the Council, it is the property of the public; and the public have a right to it, not merely the majority, but the minority, which this House, above all other assemblies in the world, is bound to protect and say they shall be heard. We are not capable of hearing evidence in this House, but we have the power of appointing a Committee, and the power of allowing these gentlemen to appear before the Committee, and I think that would be the wise course to adopt. It has been said that what these gentlemen demand might be given under regulation. Of course; but the regulations might be of such a kind as to amount to prohibition, and this is just
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    one of the questions that ought to be tried by an impartial body. My right hon. friend encouraged me to speak because he told us that this was not a Party question. Her Majesty's Government were perfectly right in putting forward the official views of the Local Government Board, but this is a matter on which the feeling of the House of Commons ought to be heard. Having in view that you are dealing with matters of religion, about which people's susceptibilities are acute, and legitimately acute, I think the very greatest care should be taken. When I hear hon. Members say in this House that all these matters are vanity, and the fads of peculiar people, and other things of that kind, that language offends me; for I know that these things depend upon ideas and thoughts which move the opinion of the people most deeply. By all means let us treat them with the greatest care and consideration, and I, for one, will not be a party to abuse these people here.
    SIR H. H. FOWLER: I would recall the House to previous experience of matters of this description. This is not the first time that such a question has arisen. Hon. Members who were here from 1886 to 1892 will recollect a very crucial case which arose out of hasty legislation of this kind in reference to Eastbourne. My hon. and gallant friend the Member for Eastbourne on that occasion championed the cause of the local authority, the Eastbourne Corporation, which claimed to represent the people of Eastbourne. Parliament, however, decided that they did not represent the people of Eastbourne, and reversed their action. The Committee upstairs, without having heard the people who, as the noble Lord so wisely said, ought to have been heard on this question, by a majority of one imposed restrictions against which public opinion was roused. The peace of Eastbourne was broken: rioting resulted; and the state of affairs became so great a public scandal that the matter was brought before this House. My hon. and gallant friend will remember that that was the only occasion during that Parliament in which the Government, as a Government, was defeated in this House. The House took the matter into its own hands, and would not allow a question affecting the religious liberty of the people to be made a Party question.

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    The Conservative Party, which was then in a large majority, defeated the Government on that question. The result was that a Special Committee had to be appointed, and the whole case had to be reheard. Eventually an Act was passed by mutual arrangement, specially with the great assistance of the Duke of Devonshire, who was largely interested in Eastbourne, and Eastbourne has never been disturbed from that day to this, and the religious opinions of the Salvation Army have never been offended. I most respectfully urge the House not to forget that precedent, and that we should not be bound by a rigid adherence to red tape regulations. The Bill would not be imperilled by the acceptance of this motion; and I am sure the House would act wisely, if it is only in the interest of public peace and of civil and religious liberty, if they allow these people to be heard before a Committee of this House. The Committee will protect, on the one hand, the rights of the Urban District Council and those of its members who wish to maintain order, and, on the other hand, it will protect those who believe that their rights are being infringed.
    MR. J. W. WILSON: I rise to support the motion made by my hon. friend. The clause objected to has been inserted, I will not say by oversight, but without an appreciation of the gravity of the case. It is a clause that usually comes before the Police and Sanitary Committee, and which is only granted after special evidence has been given, and with certain restrictions to well-defined areas. I do not wish to argue that the Bill should be referred to the Police and Sanitary Committee, but only to point out that it has been the custom to limit these powers very strictly to certain areas. I think the House should retain in its own hands the power of making restrictions of this kind, and that that power should not be handed over to an inspector of the Local Government Board.
    MR. DALZIEL: No one who has listened to the Debate can but come to the conclusion that the arguments have been all on one side. It is very seldom that we have a situation in this House where every speaker outside the front bench is in favour of a particular proposal. Every Member has
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    supported the motion except the hon. Gentleman opposite, who, in this matter, represents Ramsgate. I would call the attention of the House to the fact that the motion is supported by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bodmin, whose high authority no one can dispute; by the noble Lord the Member for Rochester, who certainly is not prejudiced in favour of the mover of the motion; and by several independent Members. No case has been made against the proposal. It has been said we cannot do it from the point of view of procedure. But there is a precedent for it. Hon. Members will remember that, by order of this House, on a London and North-Western Railway Bill, permission was given for ratepayers to be represented before a Committee on that Bill, who would not otherwise have been represented. Then as to the wisdom of this policy. The hon. Member the Secretary to the Local Government Board said that if there is a local council we are bound to respect the views of that council. But I appeal to the hon. Gentleman that, if a county council were in favour of a certain railway scheme, would this House deny the right of individual ratepayers to oppose that scheme? That is the position we are in now. We contend that an inspector of the Local Government Board ought not to be supreme over this House, but subordinate to it; and if the inspector takes evidence this House should review it and decide upon it. Public feeling in Rhyl is very strong on this matter, and if this motion is not adopted there is an immense danger that we shall have similar scenes to those which occurred in Eastbourne a few years ago. In view of all these facts, I would appeal to the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board whether, even at this late hour, he should not reconsider the position he has taken up, and whether, after consultation with my hon. friend, a course might not be found which would meet the views of my hon. friend, and at the same time not sacrifice the dignity of the Council and of the Department. Perhaps the Debate might be adjourned to admit of consultation.
    MR. CHAPLIN: I have already pointed out that in the opinion of the Department it is very important that the interests of the other two places which are affected by this Provisional Orders

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    Bill should not be sacrificed by the loss of the whole Bill. I believe I am right in saying that if the course suggested by the right hon. Gentleman opposite were adopted by the House it would be fatal to the Bill as a whole for the present year. As, however, there appears to be a very strong feeling on the part of a very considerable body of people at Rhyl, and as I apprehend there will be some feeling on the subject otherwise, I will endeavour to get over the difficulty by moving, myself, an Instruction to the Committee, of which I shall have to give notice, which will have the effect of dividing the Bill into two parts. This will allow the part affecting Reading and Ramsgate to go forward without further delay, leaving the question of Rhyl to be further considered. Then, I will accept the Resolution with regard to Rhyl, which will have the effect of giving the people at Rhyl the necessary locus standi.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: I would ask whether, if I withdraw my motion now, it would be competent for me to move it, with reference to Rhyl, afterwards?
    MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. Member withdraws the Instruction, and has the assent of the House, he can set it down again, but he will have to give notice of it.
    SIR H. H. FOWLER: The understanding is that in the Instruction which the right hon. Gentleman will move for the division of the Bill into two Bills, he will also give the necessary authority for a locus standi being granted to the people of Rhyl on the Rhyl Bill.
    MR. CHAPLIN: Yes.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 4) BILL.
  Reported, without Amendment [Provisional Order confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time upon Monday next.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 12) BILL.
  Reported, with Amendments [Provisional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill, as amended, to be considered upon Monday next.

  EDUCATION DEPARTMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER CONFIRMATION (LIVERPOOL) BILL. [Lords.]
  Reported, without Amendment [Provisional Order confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time upon Monday next.

  LONDON UNITED TRAMWAYS BILL.
    CHURCH STRETTON WATER BILL [Lords.]
    Reported, with Amendments: Reports to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

  HAMPSTEAD CHURCH (EMMANUEL WEST END) BILL. [Lords.]
  Reported, without Amendment; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time.

  GROSVENOR CHAPEL (LONDON) BILL [Lords.]
  Reported, without Amendment; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time.

  STRETFORD GAS BILL. [Lords.]
    COBHAM GAS BILL. [Lords.]

      GREAT YARMOUTH CORPORATION BILL. [Lords.]
      BURY CORPORATION BILL. [Lords.]
      BURY CORPORATION WATER BILL. [Lords.]
      Reported, with Amendments; Reports to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

PETITIONS.
  METROPOLIS MANAGEMENT ACTS AMENDMENT (BYE-LAWS) BILL.
  Petition from St. Giles', London, in fauour; to lie upon the Table.
  POOR LAW AMENDMENT (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1845.
  Petition from Stornoway, for alteration of law; to lie upon the Table.
  SALE OF INTOXICATING LIQUORS ON SUNDAY BILL.
  Petitions in favour;—From Rushden;—Deal;—and South West Lancashire; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, &c.
  ARMY (LENGTH OF SERVICE AND AGES OF MEN IN EACH UNIT).
  Return [presented 22nd June] to be printed. [No. 240.]
  ARMY (LENGTH OF SERVICE AND AGES OF MEN IN NEW BATTERIES OF ROYAL ARTILLERY).
  Return [presented 22nd June] to be printed. [No. 241.]
  PILOTAGE.
  Copy presented of Abstract of Returns relating to Pilots and Pilotage in the United Kingdom (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 284, of Session 1898) as furnished by the various Pilotage Authorities [by Act]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 242.]
  EDUCATION DEPARTMENT (GENERAL REPORTS).
  Copies presented, of General Reports to the Education Department by the Chief Inspectors of the Eastern and North-Eastern Divisions [by command]; to lie upon the Table.
  FISHERIES (IRELAND).
  Copy presented, of Report of Inspectors of Irish Fisheries on the Sea and Inland Fisheries of Ireland for 1898 [by command]; to lie upon the Table.
  DUBLIN HOSPITALS.
  Copy presented, of forty-first Report of the Board of Superintendence, with appendices [by command]; to lie upon the Table.
  AGRARIAN OFFENCES (PROVINCES) (IRELAND).
  Copy presented, of return by provinces of agrarian offences in Ireland for the year ended the 31st of December, 1898 [by command]; to lie upon the Table.
  PEACE PRESERVATION (IRELAND) ACT, 1881 (ORDERS).
  Copies presented, of two Orders in Council, dated 17th June, 1899, with respect to the importation into Ireland of Arms and Ammunition [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.

  TRADE REPORTS (ANNUAL SERIES).
  Copies presented, of Diplomatic and Consular Reports, Annual Series, No.
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  2295 [by command]; to lie upon the Table.

  LOCAL AUTHORITIES IN SCOTLAND (TECHNICAL EDUCATION).
  Return ordered, "showing the extent to which, and the manner in which, Local Authorities in Scotland have allocated and applied funds to the purposes of Technical Education during the year ended 15th day of May 1899, under the following Acts: Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Act, 1890; Education and Local Taxation Account (Scotland) Act, 1892; Technical Schools (Scotland Act, 1887; Technical Instruction Amendment (Scotland) Act, 1892; and Public Libraries Acts."—(The Lord Advocate.)
  MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
  That they have agreed to—

  BRYNMAWR AND WESTERN VALLEYS RAILWAY BILL
  with Amendments.
  Amendments to—

  MID-KENT GAS BILL [Lords.]
  without Amendment.
  That they have passed a Bill, intituled., "An Act to enable Courts to suspend the Certificates of Trawlers convicted of Illegal Trawling." Trawlers Certificates Suspension Bill. [Lords.]
  Also, a Bill intituled, "An Act to amend the Law with regard to Reformatory Schools." [Reformatory Schools Amendment Bill. [Lords.]
  And also a Bill intituled, "An Act to confirm certain Provisional Orders made by the Board of Trade under the Electric Lighting Acts, 1882, 1888, and 1890, relating to Arbroath, Hawick, Kirkcaldy, and Musselburgh." [Electric Lighting Provisional Orders (No. 13) Bill. [Lords.]

  ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 13) BILL. [Lords.]
  Read the first time; referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 250.]

  CHAIRMEN OF BOARDS OF GUARDIANS.
  Bill to constitute Chairmen of Boards of Guardians ex-officio Justices of the Peace, ordered to be brought in by Sir James Fortescue Flannery, Mr. Arnold,

  435
  Mr. Lloyd-George, Mr. D'Arcy Wyvill, Mr. Walter Rothschild, Sir Walter Foster, and Sir Charles Dilke.

  CHAIRMEN OF BOARDS OF GUARDIANS BILL.
  "To constitute Chairmen of Boards of Guardians ex-officio Justices of the Peace," presented accordingly, and read the first time; to be read a second time upon Wednesday next, and to be printed. [Bill 251.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  QUESTIONS.

    CAVAN MILITIA.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the under Secretary of State for War whether any complaint has been made to him of the change of training ground for the Cavan Militia; whether it is intended to incorporate this battalion with Monaghan or Fermangh; and whether, as Cavan is a large and central county, he will see that the listing arrangements are left intact.
    THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. WYNDHAM,): No complaint has been received by the Secretary of State as to the place of training for the 4th Battalion of the Royal Irish Fusiliers; and there is no intention of incorporating that battalion of Militia with any other.

    NORTH-WEST FRONTIER CAMPAIGNS.
    MAJOR RASCH: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether the regiments which were on active service on the North-West Froniter in 1897 and 1898 will be permitted to bear on the colours and appointments the names of the engagements in which they took part.
    MR. WYNDHAM: No recommendation to this effect has as yet been received from the Commander-in-Chief in India.

    RECRUITING STANDARDS.
    GENERAL LAURIE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War what disposal is made of such recruits specially enlisted as do not on re-measurement reach the full standard; and whether they are retained in the service as effective soldiers, or whether they are discharged as physically
    436
    unfit for service; and, if the latter, how long they are retained before discharge.
    >MR. WYNDHAM: Recruits enlisted under standard are reported on by the medical officer once a month for the first three months of their service. If the report is favourable they are retained; if unfavourable, they are brought before a medical board. That board decides whether they are to be discharged or retained as likely to become efficient soldiers. The decision of the board is acted on without reference to the standard.
    GENERAL LAURIE: Arising out of that answer, am I to understand that these undersized striplings are to be retained in the Service?
    MR. WYNDHAM: I do not think the description of the hon. and gallant Member is at all applicable.
    GENERAL LAURIE: They do not come up to the standard at any rate.

    TROOPS FOR THE CAPE.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether the Government has decided upon reinforcing the troops at the Cape to a total of 40,000 men, of which number 15,000 would go from India, and the remainder from this country.
    MR. WYNDHAM: No, Sir.
    MR. DAVITT: Has the hon. Gentleman's attention been called to statements to that effect in several London newspapers recently, and is there any foundation for them?
    MR. WYNDHAM: We see a great many things in the papers. There are obvious objections to inviting the representatives of the War Office to correct the rumours that are published.

    IRELAND AND THE MILITARY WORKS BILL.
    MR. CRILLY: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War what portion of the sum of £1,422,000, which the statement laid upon the Table of the House on Monday night last informs us is to be spent during the coming financial year under the Barracks Act of 1890 and the Military Works Act of 1897, will be devoted to military purposes under these Acts in Ireland; in what

    437
    localities will the money, if any, allotted to Ireland be spent; and what special works are in contemplation in those localities.
    Mr. WYNDHAM: It is expected that about £170,000 will be spent during the present financial year on barrack services in Ireland. The largest items are for the reconstruction of barracks at Dublin and the Curragh.

    CRIMEAN VETERANS.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether he is aware that Patrick Hennessy, whose regimental number is 1,780, enlisted at Tralee, County Kerry, in January, 1846, for service in the 95th Foot (Derbyshires), and served with his regiment all through the Crimean War, and was engaged in all the battles under the command of Colonel Smith, and was wounded at the battle of Inkerman; that he also served all through the Indian Mutiny under Colonel Hume, taking active part in all the battles; that he was specially noted for his bravery in action by General Sir H. Rose; and that he also served in China for four years, also in Egypt, Malta, and Africa; and whether, seeing that Patrick Hennessy is now aged 76 years, and was discharged in 1868 with only a pension of 8d. per day after over 21 years' active and foreign service, the War Office authorities will take into consideration with a view to an increased pension the condition of this man.
    THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE WAR OFFICE (Mr. J. POWELL-WILLIAMS,): This case has been considered by the Chelsea Commissioners on several occasions. As Hennessy failed to earn any good conduct badges it is not possible to increase his pension.
    MR. FLAVIN: What did he do in the Crimean War? He served England, and is not thanked for it.

    CORK MILITARY CANTEENS.
    MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that the military canteens in Cork are supplied by a London co-operative society, thereby shutting out all local trade; whether, before the arrangement was made, local firms were given an opportunity of ten-
    438
    dering for the contract; and whether steps will be taken to change or modify a system so injurious to the trade of the locality.
    MR. J. POWELL-WILLIAMS: The canteens in Cork are supplied by contractors selected by a board of officers representing the several regiments, with the approval of general officer commanding. Local firms had every opportunity for tendering; a large number did so, and three of the four successful firms were local. The Secretary of State does not propose to interfere with the discretion of the officers on the spot.
    MR. FLYNN: May I ask whether it is the fact that the contract has been given to this canteen society at a price in excess of that quoted by the local contractors?
    CAPTAIN DONELAN: Has any contract been entered into with this society in the Cork district previous to this year?
    MR. J. POWELL-WILLIAMS: I can not say without inquiry.

    LAND REVENUE IN INDIA.
    SIR H. H. FOWLER: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India what is the acreage of land in India paying land revenue; what was the amount payable in 1898 and in 1899; what was the extent of land under sugar cane in those years, and what was the amount of land revenue paid in respect of such land; and was there any difference in the rate of land revenue payable in Bengal.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON,): (1) The acreage in British India assessed to land revenue was, according to the latest returns—for the year 1896–97–307,000,000 acres. (2) The amount of land revenue payable in 1897–98—actual accounts—was Rx.25,684,000, and in 1898–99—revised estimate—Rx.27,679,000. These figures do not include the revenue credited to the Irrigation Department. The receipts of 1898–99 were swollen by the payments of revenue suspended during the famine year. (3) The area under sugar cane in British India during 1897–98 was 2,675,763 acres. I have not yet received the sugar area figures of 1898–99. The

    439
    returns do not give separately the amount paid in respect of this area, but the latest approximate estimate by the Government of India puts that amount—independent of irrigation returns—at 640,000 tens of rupees. (4) There is from year to year no material change in the amount or rate of the land revenue payable in the Province of Bengal, where most of the land is permanently settled.

    WAZIRI RAIDS.
    MR. HERBERT ROBERTS: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether he has received any information as to the reported raid on Sunday last of a force of Waziris upon cattle in the Lower Kuram, and as to the encounter which took place between these tribesmen and a pursuing party; and whether any further developments are expected to arise out of this incident.
    LORD GEORGE HAMILTON: I have received no official information on the subject of this incident, and am therefore disposed to believe that no political importance is attached to it. The conditions of this part of the Indian frontier are such that raids of this kind are not an unusual occurrence.

    BANDAR ABBAS.
    SIR MANCHERJEE BHOWNAGGREEI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether Her Majesty's Government have any information, official or otherwise, confirmatory of the statement that the Governor of Bandar Abbas had received a letter from Teheran, intimating that that port was to be ceded to or otherwise placed in possession of Russia; whether the island of Karagh, or Karak, 30 miles north-west of Bushire, which was once under British occupation, is still in our possession; and whether the British Government retains any lien on the port of Bassadore, formerly a station of the Indian Navy, situate at the northwest extremity of the Island of Kishin, near Ormuz.
    THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. BRODRICK,): (1) The answer is in the negative. (2) British troops were withdrawn from the Island of Karak after the conclusion with Persia of the Treaty of Paris of 4th March, 1857. (3) Since the withdrawal in 1883 of the
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    Indian troops stationed at Bassadore, the Indian Government's buildings at that station have been maintained under the charge of a British Indian subject paid by the Government of India.

    YUSSUF YUNNAN.
    MR. HEDDERWICKI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the murderers of Yussuf Yunnan, the agent of the British Armenian Relief Fund, have yet been punished.
    MR. BRODRICK: It is understood that the fresh trial of the murderers of Yussuf Yunnan resulted in five of the accused being condemned to penal servitude for life and the remainder for nine years, but no confirmation of this report has been received.

    BRITISH VICE-CONSUL AT JOHANNESBURG.
    MR. LABOUCHERE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, before a person is appointed by a foreign Government a consul in a town situated in a self-governing British colony, and after the approval of the representative of the local government of that colony has been asked and obtained, it is usual to ask the Imperial Government whether there are objections to the appointment before it is made or before an exequatur for the person appointed is asked for; if so, whether the application is made to the Governor of the colony or to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; and whether the British Consul at Johannesburg was appointed after a mere notification, or whether the approval of the Government of the Transvaal Republic was first asked.
    MR. BRODRICK: (1) When a consul is appointed in Her Majesty's dominions, the representative of his government at this Court makes a formal application to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs for the issue of the Queen's exequatur to, empower the consul to act in his official capacity. If he is in the regular consular service, steps are at once taken to prepare Her Majesty's exequatur. If he is not a member of the regular service, and is resident at the post to which he is appointed, the fecal authorities are first asked whether there is any objection known by them to the appointment.

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    (2) In the case of the appointment of the present Vice-Consul at Johannesburg, the Government of the South African Republic were asked whether they had any objection to him, and no objection being made he was appointed.

    SAMOAN COMMISSION.
    MR. HOGAN: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has received an official telegraphic summary of the Repot of the Samoan Commission; and, if so, whether he can give a general indication of the constitutional changes recommended.
    MR. BRODRICK: Telegraphic reports have been received from Mr. Eliot, the British Commissioner, giving information with regard to the labours of the Commission, but their full report must be awaited and considered before any communication can be made on the subject.

    EXAMINATION OF RAILWAY PLANS.
    MR. MOSS: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether it is the practice of his Department to refuse any application made by the public to inspect the plans and sections of railways deposited with the Board of Trade unless the railway company concurs in such application; and whether in future, in order to avoid the expense of a special survey involved by such refusal, he will allow the same to be inspected for the purpose of valuation by persons duly authorised to do so on behalf of public representative bodies.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. RITCHIE,): The plans are deposited with the Board of Trade for Departmental, use and not for the purposes of public inspection. Under the Standing Orders plans are deposited at certain places where they may be seen on payment of the prescribed fee. The Board of Trade have no machinery for the public exhibition of the plans deposited with them, and I regret that I cannot meet the wishes of the hon. Member with regard to this matter.

    H.M.S. "JACKAL."
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether the Secretary for Scotland is aware that between the 1st January and the 29th April the crew of H.M.S. "Jackal" were
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    allowed twenty-three days' leave of absence; and, having regard to the fact that the vessel is employed on sea police duty for the Fishery Board, will he state whether this leave was granted with the sanction of the Board; and will he state the number of days' annual leave granted to the crews of Fishery Board cruisers.
    THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. A. GRAHAM MURRAY, Buteshire): Leave of absence on board H.M.S. "Jackal" is regulated by the Admiralty without consultation with the Fishery Board. I am informed by the Fishery Board that there is no definite period fixed for annual leave to the crews of their cruisers, it being left to the discretion of the commanders thereof to give such leave to members of their crew as they may be able to arrange without interference with the duties of the vessels under their command.

    MINOR LIGHTS IN THE CONGESTED DISTRICTS.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether the Congested Districts Board have yet arrived at any decision in regard to the points where minor lights are to be fixed in the congested area.
    MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: The Congested Districts Board cannot at present submit a complete scheme of all the points at which mirror lights are required in congested districts. The various applications for such lights are receiving the anxious consideration of the Board in relation to the important questions of cost, suitability, and priority of treatment. Within the last few years 17 minor lighthouses have been erected in these districts at a cost of £8,350.
    MR. WEIR: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware there are no minor lights off the coast of Ross-shire?
    No answer was given.

    NEW FISHERY CRUISER.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate if he will state when the Board propose to advertise for tenders for the new fishery cruiser, and will he say what is to be her tonnage and cost.
    MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: I am informed by the Fishery Board that they have not yet decided as to when they will advertise for tenders for a new

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    cruiser, nor as to her tonnage or cost. I may add, however, that all these matters will receive attention in due course.

    EDINBURGH CASTLE AND HOLYROOD PALACE.
    MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works if he will consider the expediency of extending the hours for closing Edinburgh Castle and Holyrood Palace on Saturdays during the summer months, so that the public may be afforded better opportunities than at present for inspecting these places of public interest on Saturday afternoons.
    THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (Mr. AKERS DOUGLAS,): Yes, Sir, I think the proposal a reasonable one; and with regard to Holyrood Palace, I will see that it is carried out experimentally during the present summer. I will endeavour to secure a similar arrangement at the Castle; but other authorities have to be consulted.

    COLCHESTER BOARD SCHOOL.
    SIR WEETMAN PEARSON: I beg to ask the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education will he explain why, notwithstanding recent legislation on the vaccination question, the Education Department has refused to sanction the apprenticeship of Emma Merry as pupil Oil probation at Stockwell Street Board School, Colchester, on the ground that she has not been properly vaccinated, she being over the age of 16.
    THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir J. GORST, Cambridge University): The girl was refused admission as a pupil teacher on the grounds stated. The Committee of Council are advised that the vaccination of teachers is desirable in the interest of the children who attend the elementary schools. They are not aware that recent legislation has affected the matter.

    CARBOLIC ACID POISONING.
    SIR JOHN LENG: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the large number of painful deaths by poisoning from carbolic acid; whether he is aware that coroners have repeatedly urged that carbolic acid
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    should only be sold as a scheduled poison, and that the Pharmaceutical Society has, in accordance with Section 2 of the Pharmacy Act of 1868, applied to the Privy Council to add it to the list of poisons controlled by that Act, but without effect; whether in Ireland carbolic acid has been scheduled as a poison, and can only be sold by qualified persons, and if he can explain why the Privy Council has refused to schedule carbolic acid; and whether it is proposed to deal with the subject in any other way.
    THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir M. WHITE RIDLEY,): I am aware that a considerable number of deaths yearly are due to carbolic acid poisoning, and that it has frequently been suggested that the sale of carbolic acid should be placed under restrictions such as apply to poisons named in the schedule to the Pharmacy Act of 1868. Some years ago the Pharmaceutical Society did apply for the insertion of carbolic acid in that schedule; but it was considered that the gain to the public would not be commensurate with the inconvenience arising from the restrictions, and the application has not been recently renewed. I believe that the Irish Government have scheduled carbolic acid, but that was done under an Irish Act and without consulting the Privy Council in this country. I understand that the objections to scheduling this poison in England have now been lessened by the fact that regulations for the keeping, dispensing, and selling of poisons within the meaning of the Act of 1868 have now been prescribed, and that the Privy Council are prepared to consider whether carbolic acid can advantageously be dealt with in some way, but they cannot take any action except upon a resolution of the Pharmaceutical Society.

    CASE OF THOMAS GILHAM.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware that Thomas Gilham was transferred by the Guardians of the Strand Union, London, to the Listowel (County Kerry) Workhouse, of which he is now an inmate, at the expense of the ratepayers, although he spent almost his whole life of 64 years in England; whether the removal of Gilham was illegal inasmuch as his removal warrant was not signed by two magistrates, and the date of

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    transfer also omitted; and whether the Local Government Board will order the removal from the Listowel Union of Thomas Gilham to the Strand Union, London, at the expanse of the Strand Guardians.
    THE SECRETARY OF THE LOCAL GOVERNM ENT BOARD (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,): I am aware of the case referred to in the question. But I am informed that the warrant of removal was in fact signed by two magistrates, and that the date in it was correct. The Local Government Board would not in any case be empowered to order the removal of the man from Listowel to the Strand Union; but I am not aware of any ground for considering that the removal to Ireland was illegal. It appears that the man stated on oath that he had on a previous occasion, in the year 1889, been removed to the parish of Listowel in the Listowel Union, and was then acknowledged as a legally settled parishioner of that parish and union.
    MR. FLAVIN: Will the right hon. Gentleman introduce legislation which will make it impossible—as it is now with regard to Scotland—for a pauper to be thus deported to Ireland!
    MR. T. W. RUSSELL: I must ask for notice.

    ART BRANCH, SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM.
    MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury why the Civil Service Commissioners, in the case of the examination held in December last to fill the place of assistant in the South Kensington Museum (Art Branch), departed from the usual practice of announcing the result of the examination in the Gazette.
    THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. HANBURY,): On the occurrence of the vacancy in question notice was given that an open competitive examination would be held, and two gentlemen entered their names as candidates. One of these subsequently withdrew. The other presented himself for examination, and, as at two similar competitions he had passed in the obligatory subjects, the Commissioners decided to regard him as the successful candidate. No actual ex-
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    amination was held, and therefore no result was announced; but the issue of a Civil Service certificate was duly recorded in the London Gazette of the 6th January last.

    INSPECTORS OF POSTMEN.
    SIR JOHN LENG: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representint the Postmaster-General, whether the rule of the Post Office when inspectors of postmen are on their holidays is to appoint capable postmen, irrespective of seniority, as their substitutes; whether he is aware that the Inspector of Postmen at Dundee is at present on holiday leave, and a second-class telegraphist is acting as substitute for him, and why the general rule is not followed at Dundee; and, whether future vacancies in the class of inspectors will, as in other towns, be reserved exclusively for postmen.
    MR. HANBURY: No fixed rule exists. No such officer as second-class telegraphists now exists. Otherwise the answer to the second paragraph is in the affirmative. This practice has been followed at Dundee for many years in consequence of none of the senior postmen being qualified to act as inspector. In case of a vacancy ill the class of inspectors the claims and qualifications of all the postmen would be considered before those of sorting clerks and telegraphists.

    KNOCKNINNY POST OFFICE.
    MR. JORDAN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster-General, if he is aware that some time since the postal authorities removed the sub-post office and parcel delivery service from the premises of the Knockninny and Lough Erne Hotel, County Fermanagh; if so, could he state on what grounds; and has he had any communication on the matter from the owner and local landlord, J. G. V. Porter, Esq.
    MR. HANBURY: There never has been a sub-post office at knockninny or at the hotel mentioned.

    TELEGRAPHIC WITHDRAWALS FROM THE POST OFFICE SAVINGS BANK.
    MR. TUITE: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster-General, whether any arrangement can be made by which the immediate withdrawal of

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    money by a Post Office Savings Bank depositor could be effected by a service message without imposing the cost of a telegram on the depositor.
    MR. HANBURY: The Savings Bank does not pay its way already, and there seems no reason why the cost of the telegrams should be borne by the Post Office instead of by the depositor who desires to withdraw money without waiting to give notice in the usual way. Since the arrangements were made in 1893 the withdrawals on same or next day have risen from 49,000 to 152,000.

    HASSETT'S ESTATE.
    MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can state the date on which the request issued by the Land Judge under s. 40 of the Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1896, in the matter of Hassett's estate, was lodged with the Land Commission; whether the valuer appointed by the Land Commission to inspect the lands completed his inspection early in January last; whether the Land Commission have since furnished their report to the Land Judge, and, if so, when; and, if not, will he explain why, and what has been the cause of the delay; and whether the Receiver has meanwhile stopped the abatement of rent always hitherto allowed to the tenants, and is availing himself of the delay to take proceedings for rent.
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. G. W. BALFOUR,): The request of the Land Judge in Hassett's estate was lodged with the Land Commission on the 29th of July, 1898, the eve of the vacation. The report of the inspector was received on the 26th of January, and the report of the Land Commissioner was transmitted to the Land Judge on the 19th of June. The character and circumstances of the estate, which comprises about 3,700 acres in the occupation of about 75 tenants, much of the land being held in undivided shares, and many of the holdings being sub-divided or sublet, interposed many difficulties in the preparation and making of the report prescribed by the 40th section, while the intervention of the vacation and the pressure of business arising under the Land Purchase Acts necessarily delayed the completion of the report. I am informed there is no Court
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    Receiver over this estate. I have no knowledge of the matters referred to in the last paragraph.

    IRISH ROAD CONTRACTORS' SURETIES.
    MR. DALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that great inconvenience to road contractors and expense to ratepayers has been caused owing to road contractors having to attend before a meeting of the county council with two sureties to perfect their bonds for the smallest job; whether he is aware that Carrickmacross is 22 Irish miles from where the county council hold their meetings, and that it would take under the new rule £1 8s. to take a contractor and his two sureties to perfect his bond before the county council for building a gullet which the county surveyor allows £2 for completing; and whether he will direct in future that the district council have power to perfect contractors' bonds as the magistrates did at road sessions under the grand jury.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: Under the provisions of the Procedure Order the bonds of the contractor must be entered into with the county council, but there is nothing in the Order as to the place at which these bonds must be signed. The Local Government Board are of opinion that the contractors should be allowed to enter into their bonds at the office of the rural district council, and it is only necessary that some accredited officer of the county council should attend for the purpose upon a date named to enable this to be done.

    CARRICKMACROSS FEVER HOSPITAL.
    MR. DALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that an election of medical officer for the fever hospital of Carrickmacross will take place on the 27th inst., and that the County Council of Monaghan will have to contribute about two-thirds of the funds to maintain the fever hospital of Carrickmacross, although they have not any representation on the committee of the fever hospital of Carrickmacross; and whether he will prevent the election of a doctor to the institution mentioned until the County Council have a voice in the selection.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The Local Government Board are not yet in possession of sufficient information to enable me to reply to the second portion of the first paragraph. The Board, however, have already written to the secretary of the hospital stating that they consider that no permanent appointment should be made to the vacant office of medical officer until the constitution of the governing body under Section 15 of the Local Government Act has been determined, and the newly appointed committee have taken over the management of the hospital. The Board also stated that they thought that temporary arrangements could be made for the performance of the medical officer's duties pending a permanent appointment.
    MR. DALY: Seeing that the meeting is fixed for the 27th inst., will the right hon. Gentleman see that the appointment is not permitted to be made? Will the right hon. Gentleman direct the Local Government Board to take action accordingly?
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I am not quite certain the Local Government Board have any power to do so, but I will inquire.

    LAND COMMISSION AT LONGFORD.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that a Land Commission Court was to have held a sitting in Longford, beginning its cases on Monday last, but at the last moment the sitting was postponed; could he explain why it was postponed; is he aware that much dissatisfaction exists in County Longford over the delay in hearing these cases; and can anything be done to expedite them.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The proposed sitting at Longford was postponed for the reason notified to the parties interested, viz., that the services of the lay Assistant Commissioner who had been allocated for duty in Longford were urgently required for pressing work in connection with the Land Purchase Department. The Commissioners will arrange for the taking up of the list referred to at as early a date as the existing arrangements of the sub-commissions will permit of.

    LAND CASES AT CAVAN.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieute-
    450
    nant of Ireland whether he can state the number of cases now listed for hearing before sub-commission and county courts in the Unions of Cavan and Bawnboy; and whether there have been complaints made to him of the delay in having these cases disposed of.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: There are 552 applications to fix fair rents from the Union of Cavan, 129 from that portion of Bawnboy situate in County Cavan, and 124 from that portion of the same union situate in County Leitrim, that have not as yet been listed for hearing. A Sub-Commission has been engaged almost continuously for nearly two years in the disposal of lists containing cases from the Union of Cavan, and a sitting was held at that town on the 20th, 21st and 22nd instant, for the further hearing of cases from that union. As regards the disposal of cases from the Union of Bawnboy, a Sub-Commission was working in the district from the beginning of last December till the middle of May, and it is probable that a new list for that district will be issued in the course of the next couple of months. I am in communication with the Clerks of the Peace as to the number of applications pending in the county courts of Cavan and Leitrim.

    IRISH TENANTS AND RATES.
    MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that grave dissatisfaction exists in Ireland amongst a large section of the population over that portion of the Local Government Act, 1890, which compels tenants rated under £4 to pay rates in future; and whether he can hold out any hope for a change in that portion of the Act in this or next session.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The Local Government Board have not heard through any sources of information open to them that grave dissatisfaction exists among the occupiers rated under £4, who will now become primarily liable for the poor rate. It is to be borne in mind that these persons will receive a reduction of rent equal to the appropriate standard amount. The answer to the second paragraph is in the negative.

    LAND APPEALS IN NORTH KERRY.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ire-

    451
    land whether he is aware that great inconvenience is caused to a very large number of people in North Kerry by the hearing of appeals in fair rent cases in the county of Kerry at Killarney by the Appeal Commissioners; and whether representations will be made to the Land Commissioners to hold their Appeal Court at Tralee, which is the most central place in Kerry.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: Lists of appeals for hearing at Killarney invariably contain cases from the County Kerry generally, as well as cases from North West Cork. Killarney is selected as the place of sitting owing to its central position, which renders it the most convenient place for the parties concerned, as well as for the Land Commissioners, whose public duties do not permit of their holding sittings for the hearing of special cases in each of the towns within the area from which the cases for hearing have been listed.
    MR. FLAVIN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that tenants from this district cannot get home the same night?
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I cannot say if that is so.

    RAILWAY GUARANTEES IN IRELAND.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that the ratepayers of the baronies of Irraghticonnor, Trughenackmy, Corkaguiny, Magunihy, Clanmaurice, Iveragh, Glanerough, North Dunkerron, and South Dunkerron, in the County of Kerry, have contributed between the years 1875 and 1897 in railway guarantees the sum of £215,068; and whether, owing to this continued heavy taxation on the ratepayers, some relief will be given to them in the form of a free grant in aid of the guaranteed lines of railway.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I am informed by the Secretary to the County Council that the sum of £165,451 was levied in respect of railway guarantees on the baronies named, which comprise the entire County of Kerry, between the years 1875 and 1897 (inclusive). The Treasury contributions in the same period amounted to £26,790. As regards the second paragraph, considerable relief will be afforded to the county in respect of
    452
    railway charges under Section 58, Subsection 4, of the Local Government Act of 1898.

    CONVICT THOMAS COLLINS.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that Thomas Collins, a prisoner now confined in Maryborough Jail, was convicted at the Munster Assizes, 1891 (with two other men), and sentenced to ten years' penal servitude; and, whether, seeing that the prison doctor has reported in the early part of 1897 that Thomas Collins was mentally afflicted, that the other two men were released in February 1897, and that a Petition largely signed by magistrates and others was presented praying for the release of Thomas Collins, he will consider the desirability of giving Collins his liberty.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: This convict was released on licence in the ordinary course about a month ago.

    DOWNPATRICK DISTRICT COUNCIL.
    MR. RENTOUL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland is he aware that the Rural District Council of Downpatrick, on the 29th of May, by a majority of 41 to four, asked the Local Government Board to authorise the Council to appoint one of the two branch banks in Downpatrick as treasurer to the Council; will he explain why the Local Government Board refused to comply with this request and whether the wishes of the great majority of the council can be complied with.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The answer to the first paragraph of this question is in the affirmative. The Local Government Board did not feel warranted in depriving the treasurer, transferred to the Rural District Council, of the advantages secured to him by the provisions of the Act, which preserve the rights of this class of existing officer. Under Section 85 (1) the treasurer of the union becomes the treasurer of the rural district council, and by Section 101 (1) the powers of the Local Government Board as to the treasurers of unions and rural sanitary authorities is preserved. The treasurer of the Rural District Council of Downpatrick must, therefore, remain in office until he "dies, resigns, or is removed by the Local Govern-

    453
    ment Board." He refuses to resign, and as he is willing to give the Council every facility that any other bank will, and has in no respect failed in his duty, the Local Government Board cannot remove him from office merely for the purpose of allowing him to be supplanted by a rival banker, who has, I understand, been actively canvassing for this position.

    DOWNPATRICK POOR LAW LOANS.
    MR. RENTOUL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the residue of money borrowed for the use of certain defined areas in the poor law union of Downpatrick, and expended in those areas, has been ordered by the Local Government Board to be levied on the entire rural district, although the Downpatrick Board of Guardians is stated to have disapproved of the proposed order and the Rural District Council has protested against it; whether it is possible to meet the wishes of the Council in this matter; and whether in future similar expenditure may or must be levied 0ff the entire rural districts.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: In answer to this question I would refer my hon. and learned friend to the reply given by me yesterday to a similar question put by the hon. Member for South Donegal respecting the area of charge in respect of the Bundoran Water Works.

    RULES OF THE CIVIL SERVICE.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in view of the fact that the Local Government Board have informed inquirers that they do not possess the rules of the Civil Service, referred to in Section 115, Sub-section (6) of the Local Government Act, 1898, and the seventh schedule thereof, will he explain how are local authorities and officers claiming compensation to obtain these rules, as no bookseller can supply them; and will he order them to be printed and furnished to local authorities, or in some way made available for reference.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: Information as to pensions and compensation payable in accordance with the scale provided by the Acts and Rules relating to Her Majesty's Civil Service is supplied, not by the Local Government Board, but by the Treasury, to whom all inquiries in the
    454
    matter should be addressed. I have forwarded to the hon. and learned Member a copy of a statement which is sent out by the Treasury to local authorities, or interested individuals, in reference to compensation under the Local Government Acts in force in England and Scotland. Local authorities in Ireland will be informed by the Local Government Board that any information required by them respecting this matter will be supplied by the Treasury, to whom, as I have said, application should be made direct.

    INISKEA POLICE.
    MR. CRILLY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland how many policemen are stationed on the Island of Iniskea, off the coast of Mayo; and what length of service on the island has each policeman now stationed there.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: There are three policemen stationed on Iniskea. One of these, the acting sergeant in charge, has had two months' service on the island, and the two constables have had six and eleven months' service respectively.

    BELMULLET COASTGUARD STATION.
    MR. CRILLY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland what were the special reasons, if any, which existed for sanctioning the new police station, recently established at Elly Bay Coastguard Station, Belmullet; whether the new station is meant to be permanent or temporary; and how many police have been drafted to Elly Bay.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The police-station referred to, consisting at present of four men, was formed in December last for the better protection of life and property in this district. The station will remain at Elly Bay so long as it is considered necessary by the authorities responsible for the peace of the locality.

    AUGHNACLOY DISPENSARY DOCTOR.
    MR. MACALEESE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that Aughnacloy, where Dr. Phillips resides, is twelve miles from portions of the dispensary district of which that gentleman has charge; can any cases be cited in England where the poor needing medical relief have to travel twelve miles in order to obtain it; and if the Local

    455
    Government Board cannot see their way to adopt the proposal made by the Rev. Father Callan, P.P., to have the five divisions of Truagh erected into a dispensary district, with a resident medical officer, will they devise some other scheme to mitigate the hardships now endured by the poor of the locality.
    MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The fact may be as stated in the first paragraph, though, I believe, the distance in a direct line from the doctor's residence to the most remote points in the district is not more than nine miles; and this distance is not so great as in many other districts in Ireland. I have no information as to the second paragraph. The district of Aughnacloy was formed many years ago; no complaints have hitherto been received as to the distances to be travelled by the sick poor of the district, and the Local Government Board do not consider that any inconvenience is inflicted on the poor by the continuance of the existing arrangements, the more especially as a new medical depôt is to be opened in the district.

    SALE OF FOOD AND DRUGS BILL.
    MR. STRACHEY: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he can promise not to take the Report of the Sale of Food and Drugs Bill this month.
    THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR, Manchester, E.): There is no probability of this Bill being taken in the course of the present month.

    LUNACY BILL.
    DR. FARQUHARSON: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether it is the intention of the Government to proceed with the Lunacy Bill during the present session.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I can make no statement at present.

    CELTIC GOLD ORNAMENTS.
    SIR THOMAS ESMONDE: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury what steps have been taken with a view to the restoration to Ireland of the Irish gold ornaments recently reported on by a Treasury Committee; and if he can inform the House as to the approximate date on which the restora-
    456
    tion of these objects to Ireland will be made.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: As legal questions are involved in this matter which will shortly come into court, I cannot, until they are decided, give the information asked for.

    SCOTTISH BILL.
    SIR JOHN LENG: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury when the next stage of the Private Legislature Procedure (Scotland) Bill will be taken; and if time will be allowed to the corporations of cities and burghs in Scotland to consider its proposal to place them under the English Municipal Corporations (Borough Funds) Act, 35 and 36 Vic., c. 91.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: With regard to the first paragraph of the question I am unable to say when we shall be able to take the next stage of the Bill. With regard to the second paragraph, I think the hon. Member for Dundee must be under some misapprehension, for there is no intention, so far as I am aware, to extend the Municipal Corporations Act, which applies to England, to Scottish municipalities.

    UNDERSIZED FISH BILL.
    MAJOR RASCH: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, having regard to the necessity of legislation for the protection of immature fish, he will give facilities for the discussion and passing of the Undersized Fish Bill during the present session.
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I shall be very glad to see this Bill referred to a Select Committee, which, I think, has been suggested by my right hon. friend in charge of the Bill, as mentioned by the hon. Member for Grimsby in the question lower down on the Paper, and I hope there will be no opposition from any part of the House.

    LAKES OF KILLARNEY.
    MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether his attention has been called to a large meeting, presided over by His Grace the Duke of Westminster, comprising representative people of different religious and political opinions, held at Grosvenor House, on Thursday the 22nd instant, in connection with the sale of the Herbert Estate, which includes a very large portion of the far-

    457
    famed Killarney scenery; and whether, owing to the unanimous expression of opinion of the meeting and in different parts of the United Kingdom, the Government will further consider the advisability of securing Killarney as a national park for the people, as the Falls of Niagara have been secured by the joint action of the United States and Canada.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURI do not think I can add anything on the question of the Government's policy to what I said in answer to a similar question put to me by the hon. Gentleman and by other hon. Members on a previous occasion. I see, by the question of the hon. Gentleman, and by the report which I have seen of the meeting to which he refers, that the subject is engaging the public interest, and it seems to be eminently a question on which the benevolence of private individuals might be properly exercised.
    MR. FLAVIN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that several speakers at the meeting expressed the opinion that the Government ought to step in and purchase this estate for the nation?
    MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes, Sir; they did express that opinion.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
SIR CHARLES DILKE: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury what will be the business on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday?
SIR H. CAMPBELL - BANNERMAN: Before the right hon. Gentleman answers, I wish to put a question with regard to the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer last night that the Tithes Bill would be taken on Tuesday. I wish to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will not postpone the Second Reading to a later date, considering that it was only introduced on Thursday.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman thinks the time too short. I think the interval between this morning, when the Bill was circulated, and Tuesday next, is really sufficient both for the House and the country. It is a very simple proposition, right or wrong, we have to make, and I
458
hope the right hon. Gentleman will not object to the course we propose to take.
SIR CHARLES DILKE: If the Clerical Tithes Bill Debate is not finished on Tuesday, is it intended to proceed with it on Wednesday?
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: If the Debate is not finished on the Tuesday it will be continued on Wednesday.
MR. BRYCE: Will the Secondary Education Bill be the first Order on Monday?
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The Bill will be, as I have already said, the first Order on Monday.
SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: What Supply will be taken on Friday?
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I think, probably, it will suit the convenience of the Irish Members if we take Irish Supply again on Friday.

SUPPLY. [16th ALLOTTED DAY.]
Considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)

CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES, 1899–1900.

  Class IV.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum not exceeding £2,450 be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1900, for a Grant in Aid of the Expenses of the Queen's Colleges in Ireland."
  MR. DILLON: I propose to move a reduction of this Vote, because I think that it is a great waste of public money to continue to vote sums for a system of university education in Ireland which is not acceptable to the great bulk of the people for whose use these colleges were originally set up. This Vote is an aggravation of the great grievances under which Irish Catholics have suffered so long, and while all remedies for those grievances have been set aside, Ireland is called upon, year after year, to provide funds for a system of education against which she has all along protested. The grievances of the Irish Catholics are in-

  459
  creasing as year after year passes over, and the hopes of a remedy being found, which had recently been raised much higher, are now growing weaker and weaker, and the chance of their being realised appears to grow less every day. I desire to call the attention of the Committee to the recent history of these grievances. On the 22nd of January, 1897, which is rather more than two years ago, this question was raised upon the Debate on the Address, and the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury, in the course of that Debate said:
  "We have got so to contrive a university that it shall meet with the general approval of those classes of the Roman Catholic population who have refused to take advantage of the existing institutions."
  That was a very strong statement, and, proceeding, in the course of his speech he went on to say that the Government required information and assurance as to the views of the Irish Catholic bishops and laity on this question. That was a direct invitation to the Irish Catholic bishops and the Catholic laity to lay before the Government their views on certain points which had been raised in the course of that discussion as points of difficulty, and in view of the character of that language which I have just quoted I think the bishops and the Catholic laity were justified in supposing that if they responded to such an invitation the Government would feel themselves under an obligation to remove those grievances. It will be within the recollection of the House that the Irish bishops on the 28th June, 1897, published a statement dealing with all the points which had been raised in the Debate on the Address in that year. I need not read that statement now, because it has already been quoted and read in full to the House, and hon. Members can find it printed in full in Hansard, vol. 53, page 767. I will only quote one short passage from that very important declaration of the bishops. At the conclusion of that declaration they used these words:
  "These are our views, and we trust that they will be considered clear and frank enough upon the fundamental principles which, so far as we can gather, leading statesmen on all sides regard as the governing factor in the problem. Should Her Majesty's Government require any further statement from us, we shall at all times be quite ready to make it."
  On the night of July 9th, 1897, the Catholic University question was again
  460
  raised on this very Vote, and in the course of the Debate the First Lord of the Treasury, referring to the declaration of the bishops of the 28th of June in that year, used the following language:
  "Everybody must feel that the Roman Catholic bishops have, on this occasion, made a declaration of the utmost importance, showing that a great change has come over public opinion in Ireland on this question; that they are not only ready, but anxious, to have a university which Roman Catholics might not only attend, but one which would harmonise generally with the views of Roman Catholics, and which would have its doors open as widely to the members of all denominations as any university in the land."
  That is an extract from the speech of the First Lord of the Treasury commenting upon the declaration of the bishops, and in the course of that speech he told the Committee that he did not require any further information from the bishops, because they had declared that they were willing to clear up any other point, and therefore the Irish bishops and the Catholic laity of Ireland were entitled to assume from the speech of the First Lord of the Treasury upon that occasion that the statement of the bishops had removed all doubts or difficulties which had been indicated in the Debate at the beginning of the session from his mind, and that their assurances were thoroughly satisfactory. That was the history of this question in the year 1897, and I think it will be admitted, from the very brief outline which I have given of the year 1897, that from what occurred the Irish bishops were entitled to expect that the question would be dealt with by the Government in the coming session, because the Leader of the House of Commons would not address his invitations publicly to men like the Catholic bishops of Ireland to state their views on this great question unless he thought the Government were prepared to deal with it. I pass over the last session of Parliament, when the subject was again debated, and there was a remarkable expression of opinion not only from the First Lord of the Treasury, but from the leaders of opinion on both sides of the House. What was most remarkable in the discussion that took place on the Address was that while the leading Members of the House on all sides strongly supported the proposal to deal with the grievances of the Irish Catholics in a generous spirit, not one

  461
  single commoner or influential Member of the House of Commons during the two nights of that Debate said one single word against this policy. I pass over the remainder of last session, and I come to what occurred in connection with the Conference of Conservative Associations at Bristol. At that conference a resolution was proposed condemning the establishment of a university for the Catholics of Ireland, and after some discussion that resolution was withdrawn. There is a remarkable incident which occurred in connection with that meeting which is worthy of notice. A gentleman from the City of Cork named Hall, who professed to represent the Unionists and Protestants of Cork, protested strongly against the establishment of a university for Irish Catholics and against the policy proposed by the First Lord of the Treasury. On the 8th of December, shortly after that, another resolution was moved at the Cork Board of Guardians in favour of the establishment of a university for Irish Catholics. That was seconded by Mr. Townsend, who is a Protestant, and it was supported by several Protestant ex officio members of the Board, and was passed unanimously. In the course of that discussion Mr. Townsend made the following observations, which I think are worthy of being brought under the notice of the Committee. He said:
  "If they put the Protestants in the position of the Catholics what would they find? Suppose in Trinity College they had twenty or thirty professors Catholics, and suppose that Mass was celebrated each day as the Protestant service was celebrated at present, would Protestant gentlemen be anxious to send their children there? He, for one, would not care to do so; and why should they ask the Catholics to do what they would not do themselves?"
  That is the unchallenged language of a Protestant gentleman in Cork, and I have not heard any protest from the people of Cork against this speech of Mr. Townsend. No grosser error can be made than to suppose that you have only got to face the Catholic opinion of Ireland, for you have to face, I believe, a majority of the Protestants and Unionists of Ireland, who feel warmly in regard to the appeal which we are making that justice should be done to the Catholics of Ireland. They support this appeal because they honestly believe that there is a grievance, and secondly because they are convinced of what is unquestionably true, that apart
  462
  altogether from religious feelings they recognise that the cause of the Catholics in educational matters is inextricably bound up with their own, and they desire to see that their Catholic fellow-countrymen are better educated than they are at present, and they also recognise that the only means which can be adopted to effect this great object is the establishment of a Catholic University. The next incident in the curious history of this question is the speech of the Lord Lieutenant made in Belfast on the 18th of October, 1898, which excited a great deal of interest. The Lord Lieutenant went to Belfast to lay the foundation stone of the new City Hall, and at a banquet which was subsequently held he used these words: For ninny years he had sympathised entirely with the views of the First Lord of the Treasury on the question of a university for Irish Catholics. The Lord Lieutenant said:
  "I cannot hope immediately to receive any support for that view; but the First Lord of the Treasury explained in his speech in the House of Commons that nothing but the education of his Party could possibly bring his ideas to perfection. But, as I have said, I am entitled to stand here and say that if that Party can be so educated, and if any of you gentlemen can come to change your minds on that subject, or come to look on it from a more patriotic point of view, and, if I might say so, with wore toleration and more sympathy, a way may be found out of the difficulty which, depend upon it, will remain a difficulty and a grievance as long as this country lasts."
  That language created a good deal of excitement and doubt in the minds of the Irish people, because they saw in that speech an indefinite postponement of the settlement of the question, while others thought that the Lord Lieutenant had boldly taken up his stand in favour of a settlement of the question by declaring that he was a strong supporter of the establishment of a Catholic University, and sympathised with the views of the First Lord of the Treasury. But there was this great ambiguity, which undoubtedly did excite a good deal of uneasiness in the minds of many of the Catholics in Ireland, that he not only spoke of the necessity of educating the Tory Party on this question, but he said also:
  "If any of you gentlemen can come to change your minds on that subject, or come to look on it from a more patriotic point of view, and with more toleration, and with more

  463
  sympathy, a way may be found out of the difficulty."
  That was introducing a condition which, so far from indicating any progress, seemed to indicate an indefinite postponement of the question. I do not know myself what is the correct interpretation to put upon that language. I now come to what is infinitely more important—indeed, I think, it is the most important event in the history of the university question in Ireland since it was last discussed in this House. I allude to the letter written to Mr. Orrell by the First Lord of the Treasury on the 23rd of January last. In referring to that letter there are two preliminary points in connection with it which I feel bound to allude to. First of all, while, in common with all Irish Catholics, I admire the courage of the First Lord of the Treasury in publishing that letter and making the speech in which he subsequently defended it before his constituents, I do not think that, as a member of a powerful Government, responsible for the government of Ireland, he was entitled to take up the position that a reform in the university system of Ireland is demanded by the most vital interests of the people of that country—by the overwhelming majority of the people—and that in his own judgment it is expedient and just that it should be granted, and nevertheless go on to say:
  "The question divides opinion so deeply, yet so little in conformity with ordinary Party distinctions, that it cannot be treated with ordinary Party methods, nor its development furthered by the ordinary Party organisation."
  These words filled me with consternation, because in this language there is no limit of time, and I confess that there seems to be no hope of this question being settled on satisfactory lines unless some great Party in this House does take it up and push it forward with all the strength of Party organisation, getting what support they can from the other side of the House, or unless the Government definitely declare that they are unable to settle the question, and themselves remit it to some body in Ireland for settlement. I think that this dictum, coming from so high an authority, is a curious illustration of the evils Ireland is subject to by being governed by this Parliament. I confess that it is my conviction that, after the strong feeling expressed
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  by all the leaders of public opinion in Ireland, it is the duty of the Government to undertake to find a solution of this problem without delay, and they are bound to deal with this question. The second point in that letter which strikes me is that the First Lord of the Treasury distinctly went a step further in laying down conditions than he had ever gone in his previous declarations or than had been taken up in any of the prominent speeches in the Debate on the Address in 1898, when he said:
  "No public endowment would be given to chairs in philosophy, theology, or modern history."
  We all agreed that no public endowment should be given for any chair in theology, or for the teaching of any religious opinion in a public university, but to say that there should be no chair given in philosophy and modern history is a different matter. Speaking on my own responsibility I see no insuperable difficulty in the way of this proposal, unreasonable as it may appear, provided always that the endowment for the Irish Catholic University should be such as to place it on a footing of equality with the institutions intended for the benefit of Protestants. There is one other point to which I must allude in that letter, for it marks a great and important epoch in the history of this controversy and this question. The First Lord of the Treasury made it a prominent condition in his letter, and we all recognise that this is one of the most knotty and difficult questions. He said:
  "Professors would have a right of appeal against dismissal, and the number of clergy on the governing body would be strictly-limited."
  Those were the conditions mentioned by him as essential for the carrying out of this question. This subject of the tenure of professors is one of the greatest importance, because it is manifest to everybody that some machinery must exist for removing a professor who persistently sets at defiance the principles of decency or morality, or who becomes utterly unfitted for his duty. Upon this point I refer with confidence to the declaration of the bishops to which I have alluded. They dealt with this very point at the invitation of the right hon. Gentleman, and they said:

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  "We think that both conditions—namely, absolute security for the interest of faith and morals in the university, and at the same time, all reasonable protection for the professor—may be met by submitting such questions to the decision of a strong and well-chosen board of visitors in whose independence and judicial character all parties would have confidence."
  That is the proposal to meet the difficulty. It is hard to imagine how the bishops could be asked or expected even by the most zealous opponent to go beyond this; and I fancy that in dealing with this most difficult question of the security of tenure of professors in a university the machinery indicated in the resolution of the bishops is that which is best adapted to work satisfactorily in any great university, apart altogether from religious considerations. It is manifest that, putting aside religious differences, cases must arise when, in view of persistent breach of fundamental and universally recognised principles of morality and public decency, some means must be available for the removal of professors, and it appears to me that in this resolution of the bishops is to be found a perfectly satisfactory way of dealing with this difficulty—the question of the composition of the board of visitors being a question of adjustment and detail, and the bishops say specifically that the board of visitors ought to be a strong board of such a character as would satisfy everybody concerned. I lay special emphasis on this question, because I know it is one of the difficult questions which have, in the minds of men honestly anxious to remove our grievances, given rise to much doubt and hesitation. I think in these words and in that resolution is indicated a perfectly satisfactory solution of the difficulty, and one which I find it hard to imagine that any Member of this House, whatever views may be, would find it possible to object to. It is not necessary to deal with the suggestion of the First Lord of the Treasury that a Northern university should be established in Belfast to meet the needs of Presbyterians. We have asked for justice for Catholics, and, as regards the Presbyterians of Belfast, we have no objection whatever, if they desire a university in Belfast, to the gratification of this desire. On the contrary, we should heartily welcome the suggestion, and give it our warmest support. I can assure the Presbyterians of Belfast that they
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  would find amongst the Irish Catholics who sit on these benches no disposition to be hostile if any plan is brought forward for the scientific development of the University of Belfast, for which such urgent appeals have been made. As regards the proposed scheme we have nothing to say, except that if it is found to meet the difficulty and to remove the grievance felt by the Northern Presbyterians, we shall give it our heartiest support, because we do not desire to deny to any considerable section of the Irish people the rights and advantages we claim for ourselves. Now, what was the reception given to the proposals contained in the remarkable letter and speech made by the First Lord of the Treasury at Manchester? I claim that there never was a more remarkably unanimous response given to a proposal on a somewhat contentious subject by the Unionist papers of this country. I have made it my business to examine a very large number of the leading newspapers of England and Scotland for the two days following the announcement of the First Lord, and I have discovered the most extraordinary unanimity of opinion in welcoming these proposals. Even such a newspaper as The Times is not hostile, nor are such great Liberal newspapers as the Scotsman and Manchester Guardian. I believe that the Scotsman and Manchester Guardian represent a large body of Nonconformist opinion.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: The Scotsman does not.
  MR. DILLON: It represents an important section of Scottish Protestant opinion, which might be supposed to be hostile.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: No.
  MR. DILLON: Well, at all events, it is the organ of the Liberal Unionists of Scotland. The great majority of the leading newspapers are favourable to the proposal. On Thursday, February 2nd, a large conference of Irish Catholics was held in the Mansion House, Dublin, at which several Roman Catholic bishops, a very large body of Roman Catholic priests, and a large number of laymen were present. At the conference the following resolution was unanimously passed:
  "That we express our disappointment and regret that the Government have not taken

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  steps to settle the important and urgent question of university education for Irish Catholics."
  Nothing, however, was said in the course of that conference calculated to convey the impression that the proposals of the First Lord of the Treasury at Manchester were looked upon in a critical or carping spirit by Irish Catholics. I quote from a speech delivered by Dr. Healy, the Bishop of Clonfert, the only Catholic prelate who spoke at that meeting:
  "As Mr. Balfour had shown himself to be animated by a sincere and earnest desire to settle this question in a satisfactory way, so he thought that the public declarations of the Catholic bishops of Ireland afforded ample proof that they also were animated by a sincere and earnest desire to settle this question on a satisfactory basis. When there were two people anxious to meet each other and anxious, each in his own way, to go as far as he possibly could to meet the other, there was every ground for a reasonable hope that the hour of their meeting would not be long delayed."
  That is the spirit in which the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman was received by the Catholics of Ireland. Now, Sir, I turn to another very remarkable fact. I said that The Times represents the opinion of this country which we should naturally expect to be hostile; but in an article on the 3rd of February, commenting on the meeting in Dublin, The Times made use of this remarkable language:
  "The practical question of the moment is whether or not the demands of the Roman Catholic Church in regard to university education in Ireland can be brought into harmony with the conditions laid down by Mr. Balfour in his letter to Mr. Orrell and in his speech in reply to the deputation on Tuesday."
  That is a very remarkable declaration, because, if it means anything, it means that if the Irish Catholics can make their demands fit in with the conditions laid down by the First Lord of the Treasury the time has come when the problem ought to be dealt with. When a body of opinion so strong has been evoked by the declaration of the First Lord as to bring The Times to that point, I think the Irish Catholics are certainly entitled to expect that the question would be taken up in earnest. The position of the question at this stage cannot be put better than it was in a leader in the Spectator, which, strongly Unionist as it is, has for years consistently advocated the policy of setting up a university for Irish Catholics. Commenting on Mr. Balfour's letter and
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  speech on the 6th of February 1899, the Spectator says:
  "Is the Government going to take up Mr. Balfour's Irish University scheme? That is the question, naturally enough, everyone now is asking. It is clear that the Government must come to a decision in the matter; and on that decision we believe depend issues of far graver moment to the Unionist Party than are apparent on the surface.… Therefore it is with the strongest sense of the gravity of the situation that we press upon the Government the duty of taking up the matter. The Tory Orange Press is noisy, but not formidable. The Irish will be on the side of the Government, and so will be the moderate Liberals."
  Now, Sir, that, in my opinion, gives a very good description of the situation at the beginning of this session. The Irish Party did not desire to press the Government to a premature decision, and certainly they did not desire to embarrass the position of the First Lord of the Treasury, who for many years had shown himself to be a very consistent friend in this respect, and they accordingly decided that they would not raise the question on the Address this year, trusting that the extraordinary circumstances of the situation would impress upon the Government the duty of attempting, without further delay, to deal with this great question. But, on Saturday, March 4th, a statement appeared in the Standard newspaper, bearing all the appearance of being semiofficial and inspired, to the following effect:
  "Though communications are still going on with reference to the question of a Roman Catholic University in Ireland, it is practically certain that nothing will be done this session. The support of the leading men on both sides might have been secured for such a scheme as was sketched by Mr. Balfour, but it bas been found that it would be impossible to obtain for it the votes of the rank and file of either of the great parties."
  This statement was accepted in Ireland as a kind of semi-official announcement of the Government. Mark, there is no indication or hint that any difficulty arose among the Irish Catholics, nor is there any indication or hint that any difficulty arose among the leading men in the parties in the House of Commons. On the contrary, it is stated that the support of the leading men on both sides might have been secured, but that it was impossible to get the support of the rank and file—a proposition which I very seriously doubt. Now, this statement was followed by a speech from the

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  Duke of Devonshire of the most extraordinary character. Speaking to the Liberal Unionist Council on Thursday, March 16th, the Duke of Devonshire said, specially referring to Mr. Balfour's pronouncements:
  "I should be extremely surprised if, dining the existence of the present Government, any practical measure dealing with this subject is brought forward. I acknowledge, Gentlemen—perhaps I ought to be ashamed of so acknowledging—[the Duke has some cause]—that this is a subject to which I have not given any close study or attention. I admit that the arguments put forward by Mr. Balfour sometimes appear to be extremely difficult to answer. But the experience which I attained on the question, which now, I am sorry to say, goes back as far as 1873, when I was a member of Mr. Gladstone's Government, which proposed to deal with the question of university education in Ireland, has led me very much to doubt whether, as a measure of practical politics, it is possible either for a Liberal or a Conservative Government to make any proposals on this subject, which shall not be limited by conditions and restrictions which will fail to make it a satisfactory solution of the problem to Roman Catholic opinion. I have never looked upon the question as one of immediate practical importance."
  That is a strange declaration after the statements of the First Lord of the Treasury. Now, since the letter and statement of the First Lord of the Treasury and the passage in The Times saying that
  "the practical question of the moment is whether or not the demands of the Roman Catholic Church in regard to university education in Ireland can be brought into harmony with the conditions laid down by Mr. Balfour,"
  nothing had occurred which could in the least degree justify these extraordinary pronouncements in the Standard and by the Duke of Devonshire. Never, I think, in the history of Parliamentary Government in this country has a Minister in the position of the First Lord of the Treasury been treated by a colleague as the First Lord is treated in this speech by the Duke of Devonshire. Over and over again, speaking with all the earnestness of deep conviction, the First Lord of the Treasury has declared that this question is one of vital importance to Ireland, and that on its capacity to settle it depends in large measure the moral claim of the British Parliament to rule Ireland. And yet we have the Duke of Devonshire declaring, at this time of day, that he has never looked upon the question as one of
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  immediate practical importance, and is convinced that it is impossible for any British Government to solve it in a manner satisfactory to the Irish Catholics. It must certainly make the Irish people despair of ever getting justice from this Parliament. But let me turn for a moment to another aspect of the case, which has been somewhat overlooked. I allude to the general interests of higher education in Ireland, and the mischief that is being done thereto by the unrest and uncertainty which now exist, and which are paralysing and sapping the energy of all those, even in Protestant institutions, who are responsible for higher education. In that connection desire to draw attention to the most significant and important declaration published yesterday by the bishops of Ireland, a declaration to which I most earnestly invite the attention of our Protestant friends. For the first time the bishops have indicated that they practically despair of getting justice from this House. No wonder they despair. They say that the cries of bigotry have once more been allowed to stifle the voice of justice, and for the first time in recent years they have put forward this most important declaration, that if this question is not settled an agitation must be started to divide the revenues of Trinity College so that the whole population may avail themselves of them. I should deeply regret any such solution as that. I think it would be a misfortune to Ireland and to generations yet unborn if a settlement was to be sought by the destruction of great institutions, instead of by the building up of others which are badly wanted; but if you will deny, absolutely and doggedly, to the Catholics of Ireland any justice in this matter, you will inevitably arouse an agitation which will put Trinity College itself in danger of some great revolution. When we remember the liberal attitude of the bishops hitherto towards Trinity College, this declaration of theirs must be regarded as both significant and important. But, Sir, I do not confine my remarks to Trinity College. What is the condition of Irish university education? It is as bad as bad can be. I abstain from giving my own opinion in any detail on this question, because I am anxious to draw attention to tire most remarkable letter of Dr. Hamilton, who was for many years President of Queen's

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  College, Belfast. What did Dr. Hamilton say in the Belfast News-Letter on the 9th of February last? He said:
  "As regards myself, it ought to be known that so strong is my feeling as to the defective provision for university education in this country, and of the hopelessness of looking for any marked improvement until a radical change is introduced. Two years ago, in my annual report presented to Parliament upon the condition of this college, I used there much stronger words on the subject. 'I consider that I shall fail in my duty, and be untrue to my convictions did I not state in this report that in my opinion the present condition of university education in Ireland is unsatisfactory in the extreme.'"
  And then he goes on to say:
  "I bitterly lament the fact that for the larger part of the youth of Ireland, both in north and south, the only university available is one of the lowest type, a mere board of examiners, created for a special purpose, and never destined to be permanent. I speak of the Royal University with all due respect. I am a member of its senate, and can say that it probably does its work as well as any body of the kind could. But its cardinal principles are vicious, and the conditions under winch it is obliged to work render it impossible for it to be the alma mater which one expects a university to be. In many ways its systems are doing serious damage to the higher education of the country."
  Then he goes on to elaborate his views in the strongest language, declaring that old Queen's College should be restored and established in Belfast, and that provision should be made for the Catholics. Dr. Hamilton makes one further observation with which I will trouble the Committee, because he deals with a very important point, and one which has been frequently alluded to, and about which a difference of opinion exists. He uses this remarkable language:
  "I observe that in certain quarters the idea is still being pressed forward that a better solution of the problem would be the affiliation of this College to Dublin University. This I regard as wholly utopian. I further very strongly hold the view that the policy of having only one national university is not the best policy for Ireland, or for any country."
  I heartily endorse that view.
  "Such a policy, indeed, is directly in the teeth of all the best modern ideas. For example, if any country in the world might be expected to be anxious to concentrate all its academic life in one or two centres it would be England, the possessor of two ancient and unrivalled seats of learning. But instead of this what do we find? Why, that, so convinced is England that this would be a mistake, that university after university has been provided—first Lon-
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  don, then Victoria then Wales; and now Birmingham, under the enlightened lead of Mr. Chamberlain, is moving for another."
  That is the opinion of a man in Ireland who is one of the best qualified to speak on the subject, a man who represents the academic life of Belfast, and he declares that, altogether apart from questions of religious differences, the present system is destroying and degrading the higher character of the youth of Ireland. Now, let me turn to the character of the opposition, which, I say, is based on the most narrow and bigoted opinion. So far as Ireland is concerned, it is confined to a fraction of the Protestant population. I will give a few examples of the ignorance which prevails amongst the opponents of these proposals. First of all, I will take a resolution passed at a meeting of the delegates of the South Tyrone Unionist Association. And what did they say?
  "Whilst fully recognising Mr. T. W. Russell's great services on the land question and in opposing Home Rule, this meeting expresses its deep regret at his continued advocacy of a Roman Catholic University, and therefore cannot place any confidence in a Member who promises to support the expenditure of public money for the establishment of denominational education in any form."
  Yet the gentlemen representing this Association had not a word to say against the hon. Member for South Tyrone when he supported the grant to denominational schools, a large proportion of which went to Catholic schools. But I will not confine myself to Ireland. I will take Scotland, the country from which the First Lord of the Treasury himself comes. I have myself received a flood of literature on this subject. In one document, which emanates from the United Presbyterian Synod's Disestablishment Committee in Edinburgh, the following paragraph occurs:
  "It is unhappily obvious that the money proposed for Ireland in this matter is to confirm denominational interests, to leave Dublin University to the Episcopalians, to reconstruct the Presbyterian Colleges into a university for Presbyterians, and to found a new university for Roman Catholics. Roman Catholics have already all to themselves the Royal University, with, of course, access to Trinity and to the Queen's Colleges."
  And yet it was only yesterday that the Chief Secretary for Ireland, in answer to my hon. friend the Member for Galway (Mr. Pinkerton), was obliged to admit that the Senate of the Royal University

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  as now constituted, consists of 19 Protestants and only 16 Catholics. And yet this body of Presbyterians in Scotland give as a reason for opposing our demands that we have it all to ourselves in the Royal University! It is a had university, it is condemned by all the soundest judges in Ireland, and could never survive a total change in its constitution, even if it were governed by Catholics. What we are asking for is a good centre for university teaching. I have denied the charge before, and I deny it again, that this is the demand of a sect for a sectarian institution, because though I for my part place a very high value on the atmosphere of religion, I place a far higher value upon the atmosphere of rationalism and the independent spirit of the people, which has been abolished from our centres of learning for the last three centuries. We are a Roman Catholic people, and the university would be mainly Roman Catholic because of that fact; but I look at it from a far wider view than that. I say it should be a university where the ancient literature and archæology, and the ancient spirit and language of our people would not be banned and boycotted as they are to-day in every institution of the country. We want a university where the soul of Ireland can freely move and make itself heard. We ask for the masses of the Irish people a free and equal university, which shall be pervaded not only by a Roman Catholic, but by a national, atmosphere, and which shall truly represent the sentiment and the feelings of our people. We have all heard recently of men who, in pursuit of gold, have fixed their homes in a distant land—in South africa—a catalogue of whose grievances have been set up and detailed in Blue Books. Amongst those grievances is one with regard to education. These men have gone into an alien land, and as aliens claim rights which are being supported by this Government but we, a Catholic people, who have inhabited our own land from time immemorial, whose forefathers inhabited the land for centuries, before you came and tried to force upon us a new religion, against which the people have been in revolt for the last 300 years, are still crying for the justice which to us is denied. You speak of the Uitlanders—an alien people in a foreign country—as being treated as helots; but we in our own beloved country, so dear to our
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  hearts, have been treated as helots, and we to-day are helots in Ireland, and in vain we call for justice here.
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): Agreeing as I do with much that has fallen from the hon. Member, I am sorry that he should, from my point of view at all events, have spoilt a good case by that kind of rhetorical exaggeration, contained in the last words of his speech, of which I have on many previous occasions had some complaint to make as a defect in the hon. Member's style. Does he seriously think that the cause of education in Ireland can be benefited by so monstrous an exaggeration as that which draws a parallel between the position of the Uitlander in the matter of education in the Transvaal and the position of the great body of the Irish people in Ireland? We spend—I do not say more than we might or ought—but we do, in fact, spend vast sums annually in Ireland upon education in which the priests of Ireland have in a large measure the controlling voice. We do our best—as far, at all events, as primary and intermediate education are concerned—to meet the wants of the Irish people. We do so at great cost to the British taxpayer; and is it tolerable that our conduct towards Ireland should be compared to that of the Government which compels Englishmen at the cost of Englishmen to be educated at schools where only Dutch is taught? I leave that point, which I regret the hon. Member has introduced into his speech, and I go with satisfaction to that portion of his remarks with which I am more closely in agreement with him. I do agree with the hon. Gentleman that Ireland has in this matter of higher education a grievance, and that this Rouse and the country ought to set themselves earnestly to work to remedy it. The hon. Member appears to think that the fact that the grievance has up to this time remained unremedied is due to the inherent, to the ineradicable, desire on the part of the great masses of Englishmen and Scotsmen not to do justice to their Irish fellow - countrymen. That is not the case. I shall have some comment to make on the views which prevail on this side of St. George's Channel on this matter, but that the cause of the difficulty under which we labour is to be found in any desire on the part of the British public not to do

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  what they can to help Ireland, I am sure the general tenor of the legislation of this House, however much hon. Members may object to certain parts of it, is there to disprove. If there be a grievance, as I think there is, and if this country is anxious to remedy the grievance, we naturally ask ourselves, Why is it so difficult to get this question settled once and for all? I attribute that difficulty to three causes. The first is the indifference, I will not say to higher education, but an imperfect realisation on the part of great bodies of public opinion as to how essential the highest education is to the true development of any community. That is a truth which may seem to be a commonplace to a large number of gentlemen whom I am now addressing. It is a truth which may receive verbal assent from any public meeting, either in England, Scotland, or Ireland; but it does not come home with that mark of earnest conviction to the great body of the public that an education which must necessarily be restricted relatively to a few is nevertheless an integral and essential part of all well-organised national life. I am sure if that conviction were held with that earnest faith with which I hold it—with that earnest faith with which I believe the majority of this House hold it—then there would be a consensus of opinion in all schools of thought in the country that somehow or another the wretched condition of higher education in Ireland, as far as regards a large portion of the population of that country, must be remedied without a long delay. That is the first reason. The second reason may be roughly, though not very accurately, described as the strong Protestant objection to anything which, in the opinion of the objectors, seems to promote the cause of a form of Christianity with which they do not agree, and to whose indirect effects they strongly object. I agree with the hon. Member that a great degree of this prejudice is really due to ignorance—due to an ignorance of the meaning of what we are actually doing in Ireland in the question of denominational education.
  MR. T. P. O'CONNOR: And in England.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: And in England, too. But let us confine ourselves to Ireland, and let us consider to
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  what it is this House devotes money in the way of denominational education, and without the smallest objection from any quarter. In the first place, we have a system of primary education which, by whatever name it may be called, is practically denominational education under a conscience clause. It is a system of primary education in which the priest or the parson, whichever it may be, for the most part, is the manager of the school entirely supported out of public funds. In that school, at certain periods, dogmatic teaching may take place. If we pass from the ordinary primary education and take the secondary education, Parliament annually votes or provides year after year large sums of money for purely denominational schools. If you leave that system of secondary education and go to the singular development of education known as the industrial and reformatory schools in Ireland, you have a sum of £90,000 out of £103,000 used in the form of denominational education. There is no conscience clause, none of the limitations we put on the system of education in our primary and secondary schools. It is denominational education pure and simple, and Roman Catholic denominational education pure and simple; and on that Roman Catholic denominational education we spend every year more than twice as much as would be required for the establishment of a university for Roman Catholics in Ireland. This is done without protest, without comment. Neither Anglicans nor Nonconformists in this country ever raise a word of protest against it; and yet, when the suggestion is made that, instead of dealing with the classes for whom these reformatory schools are intended, or at all events used, you should attempt to provide the highest and, in some respects, the most important form of education in that country, apparently all these passions are at once aroused. In secondary education this House tolerates, and Protestant feeling and the country tolerate, a use of public funds for denominational education which certainly never could take place in any scheme of higher or university teaching which I should ever recommend or sanction, but which takes place under the system which we have set up. I do not know whether the majority of the House are aware—I am quite sure the majority of the country are not aware—that, in fact, a good many thousands a year devoted to the Royal University of Ireland go

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  directly without disguise to the support of the Roman Catholic College in St. Stephen's Green, which is denominational in a sense in which no university I have ever desired to set up can be alleged to be. I confess that if you could bring home to the knowledge and imagination of the great body of my fellow Protestants in this country and in Ireland what is the actual Irish system it would seem the most absurd. The tale is so long it is almost impossible to exhaust it. There are the training colleges, which are avowedly denominational. Of those training colleges two are Roman Catholic and one is Protestant. I knew a great deal about the subject once, but the details have escaped my memory, and at the moment I cannot say with certainty whether we pay nine-tenths of the cost or the whole at the present time. We supply the buildings, and I believe, in fact, we practically cover the expenses; but, however that may be as regards a fraction, the broad case remains as I have stated, that we have got denominational primary education, denominational secondary education, the strictest form of denominational education in the industrial schools and also in our training colleges, and we have got it also, so far as the State is concerned, in the college on St. Stephen's Green. All those are supported out of public funds, and if these facts were brought home to the heart of the country the people would see that to refuse to crown the edifice by founding a university which is no more properly to be described as denominational than the Royal University is, or Queen's College, Belfast, is, is the height of ignorance. I therefore agree that ignorance is largely at the bottom of the difficulties we experience. If it be ignorance, surely there is some hope that this is a question which can be settled once and for all. Ignorance may be dispelled; prejudice may be invincible. But, where it is not so much prejudice as ignorance, I do believe that the study and persistent discussion of this question, the explanation of what actually is going on in Ireland at the present time and of what it is that Ireland wants, will, and must, have their effect on public opinion in this country, and the time must come when, by the common consent of men of all shades of opinion, we shall do for Ireland what has already been done so adequately for the rest of the United Kingdom. That is the
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  second difficulty which to my mind stands in the way. There remains one more, and that is the difficulty based upon the actual constitution of the kind of hybrid university which I desire to see established. The hon. Gentleman has expressed regret that, in the sketch I put forward of what such a university should be, I excluded from any share of public grant professorships of philosophy and modern history.
  MR. DILLON: I did not express regret. I drew attention to it.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I will tell the hon. Gentleman why such an exclusion is absolutely necessary. It is because I do not believe that this House or this country would ever sanction the setting up of such a university for Roman Catholics in Ireland, unless there were professorial freedom secured in that university. I do not wish to trespass on any matters of controversy, but it must be well known to all hon. Gentlemen who take my interest in this question that there have been strictly Roman Catholic universities set up in certain parts of the Continent; and the machinery has worked so badly, as we think, that professorial freedom of teaching has not been secured, to the great detriment of sound learning and the great injury of those universities when compared to universities of freer growth and more natural development. I quite agree it will be very hard to expect a university of the kind I desire to see set up to tolerate a professor of philosophy or a professor of modern history who should base the whole scope of his lectures on those two subjects, so that they were an attack, covert or open, upon the cherished theological beliefs of the great mass of the students. Yet it would be perfectly legitimate to treat both philosophy and modern history in a denominational spirit, and, therefore, I feel that in regard to those chairs those who asked for aid out of public funds would be in this dilemma—either they would have to use public funds to set up professorships where there would not be absolute freedom of teaching, and that would be intolerable from an educational point of view, or we might be in a position of forcing upon the university teaching in philosophy and modern history which was practically nothing short of a direct attack upon the religious views of the students. Therefore, though I quite

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  agree that such professorships should be instituted, I do not think it should be on the Imperial taxpayer that those interested in the university should come for their establishment. Perhaps some of my friends may say this is too great a concession to what they would describe as Roman Catholic prejudice, and that you ought to insist that there should be professorships of philosophy and modern history, and that, when you have got them, they might teach doctrines as contrary to the theological views of the students as they might in any other establishment. Let me remind the Committee that when we set up the Queen's Colleges the most elaborate precautions were taken to prevent such a result, and therefore there is nothing novel in the views I have ventured to express on the subject of those two chairs. Leaving philosophy and modern history, we come to a class of study where, in my judgment, freedom is as absolutely necessary, and where I am not sure that it would not be freely accorded—I mean some of the scientific chairs, such as biology. I do not think that, so long as he confined himself strictly to the subject matter, the teacher of biology should be limited in his teaching. I do not think it would be right to exclude him simply because the tenor of his strictly scientific teaching did not happen to commend itself, perhaps, to certain members of the hierarchy or others interested in the direction educational efforts should take in Ireland. I, therefore, hold strongly that there ought to be every precaution taken outside the chairs of which I have spoken; freedom of teaching in this university should be the rule. I am convinced that those who really have the interests of higher education at heart must feel that the opinions I have ventured to express are really vital to the healthy growth of any university in any part of the world, and not least where that university would have to meet such rivals as Trinity College, Dublin, and the Queen's College, Belfast. Those are the three difficulties that stand in the way of the scheme. I have spoken so often on the subject that I may be absolved from anything more. But I must say one word with regard to a criticism made by the hon. Gentleman upon the position I have taken up. He said that my position was without parallel in the history of political parties in this country—meaning, I sup-
  480
  pose, that it was without parallel that a Member of the Government should express upon matter of public importance views to which the Government as a whole were in no sense bound. That is no novelty. It has been adopted on more than one occasion, and it must be adopted, I think, where questions of religion come in. There was a far more notable case than any which is likely to arise, or could arise, upon the subject of education in Ireland, and that was the great controversy about Roman Catholic emancipation. There was the spectacle, Parliament after Parliament, session after session, of Ministers getting up on this bench and making the most powerful speeches respectively for and against the proposal then before the House. That is, indeed, a rare spectacle in modern days, but I think it is perfectly in accordance with our best political traditions that certain questions should be left open. There remains only to be considered whether it was or was not right that I should attempt to take a leading part, or a prominent part, in this controversy without having secured the assent of my colleagues on this bench, or of the friends who sit around me, and with whom in general politics I am proud to be associated. Well, Sir, my course has not been made either easier or more pleasant by the line I have taken in this controversy, but it seems to me that if Party politicians are on every subject to be precluded front expressing an opinion, and trying to guide the forces of public opinion inside and outside this House—if they are to be precluded front doing that in every case unless they have the formal and official assent of those with whom they act in other questions—a great limitation, and, I think, a very unfortunate limitation, will be placed upon our activity. It would be easier for me to take the advice given me, as I understand, by the hon. Gentleman, and withdraw from the missionary effort, which I admit has not met with any very great measure of success up to the present time——
  MR. DILLON: It is hardly fair to say that. The right hon. Gentleman misquotes what I said. What I said was unparalleled in the annals of Parliamentary Government was the action of the Duke of Devonshire, and the comment which the Duke of Devonshire made upon the right hon. Gentleman's speech. All I

  481
  said in regard to his own speech was that, I thought the Government was bound, in view of what he said, to take up the question. But I said nothing in the nature of hostile criticism of the efforts which he has made in our cause, and for which I warmly thank him.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Gentleman will see that if the Government are bound to take up as a Government every question on which I express an opinion, I must ask my colleagues, before I express that opinion, whether they are prepared to take it up. That independence, which, no doubt, should be used with discretion, but which I think is very valuable outside the ordinary Party work of politics, would be entirely destroyed if any such canon of action as the hon. Gentleman desires to establish were forced upon those who sit on this bench, or on the bench opposite. I take a different view of my duty. I repeat now, as I have said persistently ever since this question came up, that until a change takes place in public opinion which has not as yet taken place this cannot be made a Government question, and wheat I make that assertion it must be accepted that I say exactly what I mean. I do not mean that I have some covert commission from my colleagues to sound public opinion, or to announce by a ballon d'essai the future policy of the Government; I say exactly what I mean. This is not a Government question, I do not see how it can be made a Government question; but I, nevertheless, shall endeavour in the future, as I have in the past, to remove one by one the difficulties in Ireland and in this country, arising possibly out of the prejudices of those whom the hon. Gentleman himself represents—arising out of the ignorance, as I think it, of those whose other views, religious and political, I share; difficulties which can be met, which time I think will enable us to meet, but which cannot as yet be met by that apparatus of Party organisation and Party machinery by which we rightly trust to carry on so much of the legislation of this country.
  MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER: It certainly is not for me to comment upon the view the right hon. Gentleman takes with regard to the cause he has followed, but there is a manifest in-
  482
  convenience in the plan which he has thought it his duty to adopt. I quite accept the view that he has a right to plead this cause apart from the Government to which he belongs, but I cannot see any great public advantage arising therefrom, and I do see great confusion and a considerable amount of disadvantage likely to accrue to the Party of which he is the distinguished leader. There ought certainly to be a little modification of the form of address which he reserves for those who do not agree with him; it is a little hard that the opposition which some of us conscientiously offer to this proposal should be put down to ignorance.
  Mr. A. J. BALFOUR: I certainly never suggested that in reference to the hon. Member. I was talking of the great mass of public opinion outside.
  MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER: Notwithstanding the explanation of the right hon. Gentleman, I cannot help feeling that the only excuse he made for those who oppose this proposal was a want of appreciation of the facts. I cannot altogether accept that position, and I take it the right hon. Gentleman does not deny the view of the hon. Gentleman opposite that the opposition is due to the obscurantism and ignorance el those who object to the foundation at this time of the Christian era of this particular institution. It would he exceedingly wrong, out of taste, and altogether contrary to my desire to say anything about the Roman Catholic faith as a doctrinal religion, but it is not outside the capacity or the right of Members of this House to hold and occasionally to express their view in regard to the Roman Catholic religion as a matter affecting the life of the State and the people in it, because as a matter of history the Roman Catholic religion has played and always has claimed to play a very large part in political matters. That claim has not been abandoned, and there are many who think, as I do, that we can see in the history of this country, and of all countries, very conspicuous marks of the effect of that political participation of the Roman Catholic religion in the fate and fortunes of those countries. We think we have some ground for the belief that those countries in which the Roman Catholic religion has played a prominent part in the direction of politics have been

  483
  in our view unfortunate, and we are not desirous to put ourselves in the same position. Where exactly do we stand? Some time ago the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose laid down, with regard to the university which he thought might be established in Ireland, five conditions which seemed eminently reasonable, all of which he thought were essential before we could fairly ask Parliament to sanction the foundation of such a university. I will not trouble the House with those conditions, which were very simple and obvious, but what was the result of laying down those propositions? A very eminent Roman Catholic prelate, the Bishop of Limerick, has said with regard to them:
  "It must be evident to the least informed person that an institution constituted under these five conditions (of Mr. Morley's) cannot be regarded as a Catholic University in the true sense of the word. … In a Catholic University the authority of the Pope would be supreme, and reach directly and indirectly every part of its organisation, and pervade and inform its operations. He would grant its charter and sanction its degrees. All its intellectual life would be carried on under ecclesiastical supervision and control."
  That is the definition given by the Bishop of Limerick of a real Catholic University. In connection with that I would cite one more quotation from the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury. He says:
  "The first condition is that what we propose to those desiring higher education in Ireland shall be cordially accepted by them as the solution of their difficulties."
  Where have we it in evidence anywhere that what is proposed by the right hon. Gentleman is accepted, or can be accepted, as the solution of the difficulties of the Roman Catholics in Ireland? He has himself said to-night that he has received no such intimation from the Roman Catholic hierarchy, and I say that no such intimation can ever be given. If they, in synod assembled, were to give us the most positive assurance that a university under these, or any other limitations would satisfy them and meet their view, I could not possibly accept that as a final solution of this matter. For this reason: If we are dealing with a man who is a trustee, we ask what is the nature of his trust. If he has absolutely no right to divest himself of the condition of that trust, but, in a moment of anxiety to please those whom he
  484
  respects or with whom he wishes to co-operate, departs from the letter of that trust, we must suppose that the time will come, if he is a right-minded man, when he will be compelled to go back to the strict words of the trust which he is administering. The trust which is administered by the Roman Catholic hierarchy is the trust which is imposed upon them by the Roman Catholic religion, and I have no hesitation in saying that no university under any such limitations as have been hinted at this evening by the right hon. Gentleman has ever been or will be regarded as a real Roman Catholic University in the view of the Roman Catholic Church. It is not to the synods of Dublin that you will go to find out what is the true doctrine upon this matter. I was interested and amused by what the right hon. Gentleman said with reference to this university. He said, "We have already endowed every form of Roman Catholic teaching in Ireland," and he cited elementary schools, reformatory schools, secondary schools, and I was astonished to hear him cite the trick by which the endowments of the Royal University have been used for the creation of the Jesuit College, which I think is an exceedingly unfortunate institution, now existing in the City of Dublin. There is this distinction to be noted. What is a university as opposed to these institutions? In the curricula of these institutions you want to include only certain subjects of study; but the very essence of a university is that it should be universal in its teaching, and embrace the latest developments of human knowledge and be, in the true sense of the word, a "university." The parallel at once ceases between any of these subsidiary organisations and a university such as we are referring to. What is this university to consist of? I really do not know what the right hon. Gentleman would dare to trust to this university when it is founded. He will take no responsibility for the chair of theology, the chair of philosophy, or, most important of all, the chair of biology. It is a most serious thing when we are founding what we call a modern university that we fear to entrust the chair of biology to the governing body of the university without taking special precautions such as have been suggested. I do not wonder that the right hon. Gentleman

  485
  dwelt upon the necessity of taking these precautions, for it is not so very long ago since a doctor of biology was discharged from a Roman Catholic University so called, simply and solely, as far as I am aware, upon the ground that he taught what modern knowledge has enabled men to acquire with regard to the science of biology.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: What is the case?
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: In the Dublin University.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Which Dublin University?
  MR. T. M. HEALY: Will the hon. Member give us the name of the doctor?
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: I think the name was Dr. Klein, in the Royal University College, Dublin.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: There is not one word of foundation for the statement. I know the case, and the less said about it the better.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: You had better take care of yourself.
  MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER: If the hon. Member has any doubt about the value of my instance, I will only go to my general argument.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: He was a priest who got married.
  MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER: I will only call attention to the obvious danger which exists when the right hon. Gentleman has thought it absolutely necessary at this stage to lay down as an almost essential proposition that the ordinary science of biology, which is at the bottom of all medical teaching, should be safeguarded by taking it out of the hands of those who, I suppose, are to be the normal governing body—the ecclesiastical personages who are to rule this university.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not think the hon. Member quite understands what I may call my scheme. No doubt the university will be under a governing
  486
  body, but there will be in this university a visiting body, to whom there will be an appeal. And certainly, no person, in my judgment, ought to be dismissed merely because he exercises on his own responsibility the liberty of teaching in that subject in which he is engaged.
  MR. ARNOLD - FORSTER: What I gathered was that there was a probability that when this question of biology came to be taught we should be faced with the difficulty which has always confronted those who desire to see this subject taught in Roman Catholic Universities, and that it may arise in the interference of the dogmatic theology of the Church, with the teaching of biology for medical purposes, which modern science has made absolutely essential. In what country in the whole civilised world has this step been taken which we are reproached and called fanatical and bigoted for not taking? In what country in the world has a Roman Catholic University, conforming to the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, been founded and endowed in recent years in response to the demand of the Roman Catholic hierarchy? My proposition is entirely different: it is that there was a period, not so very remote in history, when every country in Europe as a matter of course possessed an endowed, State-controlled, Roman Catholic University, but one by one every nation in Christendom has divested itself of that possession—has found such a university to be incompatible with the progress of civilisation, and has discarded it. There are survivals, I admit. The right hon. Gentleman spoke of the necessity of improving higher education. I agree. But does he wish us to imagine that the foundation of a Roman Catholic University in the centre of the community is admirably calculated to stimulate higher education? Such a view is certainly not supported by any information that I have ever received. The University at Freiburg has been referred to. That university was set up with the object of having a Roman Catholic University fully equipped going into competition with modern university instruction. It was founded by very able and competent men, and I believe it was their honest intention that that university should, as far as a university of that kind could, give as liberal an education as could be obtained. What happened?

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  The whole professoriate was immediately grasped by an outside body—the Dominican clergy—and all the Catholics who had been selected to teach philosophy and other modern subjects in the university found their tenure so impossible under the régime which was instituted that they left in a body and never returned. We are told that all sorts of precautions will be adopted to make all that sort of thing impossible in Ireland. I trust it may be so, but we who have not the same confidence that some hon. Members have would like to be told what is to be the nature of those precautions. We could never reconcile two absolutely irreconcilable things; we should never reconcile the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church with regard to the education of the young with the view taken by the majority of the civilised world with regard to university education at the present time. We may have some compromise which will satisfy the requirements of the moment, but I have too much respect for the ability and consistency of those who are responsible for the ordering of the secular and the religious affairs of the Roman Catholic religion to suppose that they will ever go one step back upon the claims which they make now and have always made, and which I believe they always will make with regard to the education of the young. We cannot reasonably be asked to accept the charge of being illiberal when we express our belief that a university of this kind will not be in accordance with modern civilisation and modern views. I am honestly open to conviction if the First Lord of the Treasury can influence my reason and move my judgment, but I shall not budge an inch from my position until I see exactly what the proposal is to which we are asked to assent. I shall want to know how this is to be distinguished from other universities, and what are the privileges of a modern university which we are asked to forego in order that this university may be created. I shall want to know also what is the nature of the compact which is to be arrived at with the Roman Catholic hierarchy in Ireland, and I shall want to know what is the assurance we have that that compact is in full and entire satisfaction of the demands of the Roman Catholic Church, not as representing temporarily the views of the Dublin or other
  488
  synods in Ireland, but as representing the entire body of the Roman Catholic Church as constituted in that country. When we have had an answer to these questions—and a satisfactory answer—I shall be in a more malleable frame of mind than I am at present. I do, however, protest against this matter being brought up upon a side issue in this manner in our discussion of the Irish Estimates in an empty House, because it should be the subject of a serious Debate. I quite understand the strength of the feeling on both sides, but I do think it would be a good thing for us on all sides upon this question to realise exactly where We stand, so that if this matter is to be settled we may prepare ourselves for its settlement.
  SIR J. BRUNNER: I desire to say a word or two about the allusion made by my hon. and learned friend the Member for North Louth to Dr. Klein of Liverpool. Referring to that gentleman he said "the less said about him the better," and those words were spoken in a tone to be heard all over the House. But a moment later in tones much lower, which could only be heard by those hon. Members sitting near him, he said "Dr. Klein is a Catholic priest who got married."
  MR. T. M. HEALY: I said it openly to the House.
  SIR J. BRUNNER: I do not wish to convey that there was any trick intended by the hon Member's action. What I desire to do is to repeat those words so that all should hear that the fault he finds with Dr. Klein is that he was a Catholic priest who got married. It is true that Dr. Klein has been a Roman Catholic priest, and that he is to-day happily married; but he did not get married until a considerable time after he had ceased to be a Catholic priest. Dr. Klein holds to-day a very honourable position, and I should be absolutely disloyal if I did not repudiate the insinuations made by the hon. Member for North Louth in regard to that gentleman.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: The hon. Gentleman the Member for West Belfast gave an instance of a Roman Catholic college which he was pleased to call the Dublin

  489
  University, where a cher of biology was discharged on the ground that he taught what modern learning had taught in regard to the science of biology, and he has trotted out Dr. Klein as a victim of Roman Catholic persecution. In regard to that matter I did say that in my judgment the least said about Dr. Klein the better either upon that or any other subject. [AN HON. MEMBER: "Why?"] Well, I should not think it fair without notice to the gentleman to discuss here the case and history of Dr. Klein; but if it should ever be desirable to do so, in defence of the action of the Dublin University College, I should be prepared to defend that action, for there is not a shred of foundation for the statement made by the hon. Member for West Belfast. I should like to put this question to any hon. Gentleman present—if you were a Catholic sending your children to a college and there they were being taught by a priest, and ou found that instead of coaching the Catholic tenets in reference to the celibacy of the priesthood, that priest had broken his vows and married the young lady of the family to which he had been appointed tutor. I do think it is rather hard to say that he was dismissed from his position because of his teaching of biology. I do not think that Dr. Klein was ever dismissed, and my recollection of it is that he alleged conscientious scruples, and became a Unitarian minister Liverpool. I have often noticed in connection with every priest who leaves the Roman Catholic Church there is always a woman at the bottom of it. The lady comes first, and the conscientious scruples of the priest in regard to his faith come after I have not introduced this an attack upon Dr. Klein, but is made a charge against the Church that he wad dismissed grounds it will be my business at case arises to discuss the entire the case. In this instance I only the purpose of making that cor I do not intend at this moment into the general topic; but when
  490
  painful story attached to it then it is not our fault. What I say is that the whole matter illustrates the readiness with which hon. Gentlemen are willing to believe the worst of those who differ from them either in politics or religion. I have often heard and read the speeches of the hon. Member for West Belfast, and I have sometimes speculated as to what would have happened if he had been born a Catholic, as to how many persons he would have burned at the stake—especially if, besides his belief in the infallibility of the Pope, he had also added the belief in his own infallibility. I can only ask now that he will give us some measure of the pity of his heart for those who have had the terrible misfortune to be born in the depths of superstition which attach to being Catholic. We all appreciate the toleration with which Protestant nations treat the humbler nations, whether at Omdu an or Majuba Hill. I should like to say one or two words upon the more immediate subject. The right hon. Gentleman thé First Lord of the Treasury used some very remarkable language, and I agree with everything the hon. Member for East Mayo said with regard to the fairness, ability, and frankness with which the First Lord of the Treasury has addressed himself to this question. But the right hon. Gentleman to-night has used words of hopelessness and despair the like of which I have not heard him use before in connection with this question. He said two things; firstly, "It is not Government question," and secondly, I do not see how it can be made a Government question."
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: As far as I remember, said that I did not see how it could be made a Government question until there was a change in public opinion, which change has not yet taken place.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: That is a dictum which does not appear to me to be very encouraging, and I do not know that it carries us much further. As far as the life of this Parliament is concerned, the right hon. Gentleman says it is not question within the range of practical politics, and he does not see how it can be made a Government question. Is it for the Catholic bishops of Ireland to show how it can be made a Government question? Whether in this House or out of it, I have always held the view that until the Irish

  491
  Catholic bishops are prepared to make themselves inconvenient to the Government in Ireland this will never be made a Government question. The Catholic bishops in Ireland are some of them of extreme moderation in politics, but all of them will read with very considerable emotion the statement of the right hon. Gentleman that he does not see how this is to be made a Government question. Sir, we have again and again brought forward the question in this House, and time after time we have been met by accents of despair; but in no speech that has ever been made by the right hon. Gentleman have we ever heard such a statement from the Government, coupled and preceded by this statement, which I also took down, "that this House ought to earnestly set itself to work out a remedy for the grievance". This has not been made a Government question, because it is considered not to be of sufficient importance. There are other matters which have been made Government questions, such as questions like the Undersized Fish Bill, and that measure is of sufficient importance to become a Government questions, and it has actually got a Select Committee appointed to deal with it; but the question of the stunted education of the Irish Catholics is considered altogether unworthy to be made a Government question. That reduces this House, so far as Irishmen are concerned, to a position of absolute absurdity. Only to-day Ireland was refused a little railway 36 miles long, which was supported unanimously by 46 public bodies in Ireland, and which the majority of the Irish Members had petitioned in favour of. We cannot even have a little railway in Ireland, because i cannot be made a Government question, and there is no means of making it a Government question. To-night we are told, upon the question of nniversity education for Ireland, that it is of far less importance than the question of undersized fish. What is the inevitable conclusion that Irishmen of all grades of opinion will come to after such treatment? Only yesterday, without notice, the right hon. Gentleman connected with the War Department—and his success in that Department I certainly look upon with great satisfaction—introduced a Bill for £4,000,000 for extra military works. The question of founding a Roman Catholic University involves only about £1,000,000, or the price of one battleship. That Bill to spend
  492
  £4,000,000 ranges and a few things of that kind this House without a word, and nobody asks even for the details of it. hon. Member for West Belfast is going to ask for the details as to the expenditure of this £1,000,000, although are to vote the £4,000,000 for works in Wei-hai-wei, Hong-kong, and Zululand, and now there is to be an Antarctic expedition, and Ireland is to pay her share of that. The First Lord of Treasury has also announced that some substantial sum is to be voted to spread civilisation in Victoria Land, and for all these things the Irish Catholics are to see Irish money voted, while the things that are dearest to their hearts are to be treated in this House with contempt, and sneering references to their faith and to their nation by gentlemen in the position of the hon. Member for West Belfast. How is it possible to tolerate treatment of that kind? If Government is to be a thing done with the of the governed, the logical outcome of government of that kind on the part of the people whose feelings either in religion or any other matter are outraged is to throw bombs. I see no other course. You wonder at the want of loyalty on the part of the Irish people, and their want of affection for the English nation and I may add want of affection for the hon. Member for West Belfast, who is, after all, a born Briton; and we are supposed to be able our bosom the nation of which he is the representative, although he thinks no more of crushing the views and sentiments of four millions of Irish Catholics than if he were to walk on a cockroach going through the hall. Why does the hon Member for West Belfast not go and preach soldiers and sailors and tell they are idolaters? Why do and take idolatrous taxes The next time the British tax calls I will plead to him that I idolater. But this question real not only merely a sentimental sid has also a practical side. Th Gentleman the Member for is willing to

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  teaching even of an obscurantist professor than none at all; and yet that is the alternative which is placed before them if this just demand is refused. The hon. Gentleman read out a statement to the effect that the Catholic university should have the approval of the Pope. For my own part I would rather be in a university that had the approval of the Pope than the approval of the hon. Member for West Belfast, because from all I have read about him and heard from the hon. Gentleman I do think that the opinion of the Pope on this matter is preferable to his own. As I understand it, we are asking nothing from you at all, for we are asking only for a share of our own money to be distributed amongst ourselves in our own way, and if you are unable to give it to us, then your system of government in Ireland is doomed. You tell us that all the high positions in the Army, the Navy, the Volunteers, and other Government Departments, are open to us, but at the same time you keep the Irish people in a condition of educational servitude, with the result that the children of the Irish people are unfitted to pass the degrees required for any one of the prizes in connection with those splendid institutions of your Empire. What is this but another form of penal laws? Such laws are fair and frank, and they are, as a matter of fact, far franker than the hypocritical state of things which now exists. Take the case of men at my time of life who have to begin to consider what to do with their children. They have to part with their religion and give up the creed in which they were reared, and to which their fathers belonged, if they desire to compete for these great national prizes. They have either to do that, or else allow their children to be condemned to remain in that ignorance which the hon. Gentleman opposite contends for. It may be a terrible state of mental degradation upon our parts that we prefer our children to be brought up in ignorance rather than they should go to institutions where their faith will be attacked; but surely it ought to be a problem of statesmanship to give the Roman Catholics a chance of education, not in religion or philosophy, but in other higher subjects, which would enable them to gain some of those worldly prizes to which you admit they are entitled, without, at the same time, doing any violence to their religious feelings. That is one
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  of the problems to be solved by English statesmanship. You have solved this question for the French in Canada, and why not try to solve it for the Irish in Ireland? I should like to know what the Canadian French have done for you. Is it because of their race, for they do not pay a shilling of taxes to the Empire, and they protect themselves against your imports coming into Canada. You cannot send any of your goods from Birmingham or Sheffield without the French put a tax upon them. And yet Ireland is not to be allowed to have the poor satisfaction of being voted the £1,000,000, which is all that is required for the solution of this great question. From the English financial point of view this is not a great question, for it is a very moderate question—for what is £1,000,000 to you when you squander £100,000,000 every year? It will only take the price of a single battleship in order to bring about this great satisfaction to the feelings of four millions of people. Just because you differ from us upon certain forms in religion, are our children to be condemned to ignorance? What has the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury just done? He has brought in a Bill, which is to be read a second time on Tuesday next, dealing with the tithe rent-charge, which is to enable the clergy of England to get something like £80,000 or £90,000 a year in relief of their taxes. Now, we Irish Catholics will have to contribute our share to that. ["No, no."] Well, I have my own suspicions about your system of book - keeping. You won't allow us to keep the purse or examine the books, and I have a very strong suspicion that your calculations include us in your charges. You make no bones about this grant to the clergy, who have already large salaries, and who belong to the richest Church in the world, and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Belfast will have no hesitation in voting for that Bill on Tuesday next. Let the right hon. Member try to abolish the Divinity School in Trinity College, and he will very quickly get his answer from the Protestant party. So long as you maintain the essentially Protestant character of Trinity College, I say that it is a monstrous thing to pretend that we can have equality or freedom in our educational establishments, or that there is anything like justice in asking us

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  to send our children to a college where the Divinity School is kept up and where the essence of its teaching is that the Catholic faith is essentially a superstition.
  MR. CHANNING: I regret that the hon. Member for North Louth is not in his place, as I wish to make a few remarks—I gave him notice of my intention to do so—in regard to one passage in his speech of which I am bound to take cognisance. I cannot but believe that the hon. Member will, on reflection, regret that he was betrayed into a personal attack, and I must say, a series of personal insinuations, against a man so much beloved and respected in Liverpool by many of my personal friends, and whose case was referred to by my hon. friend the hon. Member for West Belfast. The name of Dr. Klein was deliberately demanded from the hon. Member for Belfast, with, I must say, some discourtesy and more than usual Parliamentary persistence. I think it my duty to say that only within the last few days I have had assurances from Liverpool friends, one of whom formerly held a seat in this House for many years, of the high esteem and warm regard in which Dr. Klein is held in Liverpool. I am sure I am right in repudiating on their behalf in the strongest possible terms of condemnation the insinuations against the character of that gentleman because he had divested himself of the position of a Roman Catholic priest, and because he had married a lady to whom he was attached, and also because he had come to hold other views than those he had formerly held. I have thought it my duty to say so much, and to condemn emphatically the attack made on a man worthy of the respect of everyone in the country and in this House. The hon. Member for North Louth has achieved many brilliant successes in this House, but he has never achieved a more conspicuous success than in showing how impossible it is to establish a Catholic University in Ireland. He has exhibited a spirit of intolerance in making these insinuations without proof or warrant, and if we unfortunately assent to the creation of a Roman Catholic University Ireland, we see the spirit to which the professors in that university would be exposed, and it seems to me a lamentable——
  MR. PINKERTON: What has this to do with the Queen's College Vote now before the Committee?
  THE CHAIRMAN: I think it is well that this incident should close. I understand that it has been fully discussed, and it does appear to me very remote from the Vote under discussion.
  MR. CHANNING: The question under discussion is the advisability of the creation of a Roman Catholic University in Ireland. I was alluding to the remarks of the hon. Member for North Louth as showing the sort of temper to which the occupants of the chairs of the university to be created would be treated, and before the hon. Member for Galway raised his point of Order I was about to make the remark that this gentleman, Dr. Klein, was engaged as a teacher of biology in the Catholic University College of Dublin, and that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for North Louth seemed to think that the University College should get rid of him because——
  MR. ARTHUR J. MOORE: I object, Mr. Grant Lawson, to the hon. Member for East Northamptonshire persistently evading your ruling.
  THE CHAIRMAN: I understand that the hon. Member only wishes to finish the sentence in which he was interrupted, and then to go on with a new point.
  MR. CHANNING: I was entitled to use an illustration in this House as to the state to which the professors of a Roman Catholic University would be reduced by the governing body of such a university. One remarkable interruption made by the right hon. the First Lord of the Treasury to the hon. Member for West Belfast was singularly significant. The professoriate that was contemplated by the right hon. Gentleman in the scheme which he has laid before the country, as I understood it before he interrupted the hon. Member for West Belfast, was that theology, modern history, and philosophy are to be excluded from the control of the governing body of the Catholic University. But now the right hon. Gentleman apparently gives the House to understand that these professors would be absolutely responsible to the governing body, and that the only

  497
  remedy, in case the governing body dealt with the professors in the spirit to which I have alluded, in the case of Dr. Klein, would be an appeal to the visitors to the university. Now I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether the professors of science, history, and philosophy, to be appointed by the Crown, are to be so appointed on the ground of their qualifications to teach these subjects, or whether his proposal would be to endeavour to meet the views of the Roman Catholics in Ireland by introducing the question of religion in the appointment of these chairs. That is the essential point. Although I absolutely dissent from the view taken of this question by the right hon. Gentleman, I wish to say that I honour him for the courage with which he has put his views before the country, and for the claim to complete independence of view with which he has asserted to-night in putting the matter before the House. His views, I think, have fortunately been overruled by his colleagues in the Cabinet, as they have been on the question of silver and on the question of woman's suffrage. His colleagues have been wise, I think, in rejecting these views. As an old university reformer I have always been against religious tests and sectarianism in all its forms So far as I understand the argument of the First Lord of the Treasury, it amounted to this, that as there is so much denominationalism in Ireland at present, in the primary schools, reformatories, and secondary schools, we ought not to criticise too closely a suggestion that we should have a great deal more denominationalism. I absolutely dissent from that point of view and from the facts. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose, when responsible for Irish affairs, persistently refused to consent to the new rules suggested by the National Education Commissioners, which would, in practice, have turned the Irish educational system into a denominational system. I do not understand that the First Lord of the Treasury, or the present Chief Secretary for Ireland, or the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, or the Solicitor-General for Ireland, have agreed to the changes in the rules as suggested by the National Education Commissioners; and therefore in Ireland we have now, in principle, the separation of religious teaching and the union of secular teaching in the schools of Ireland. Therefore we are still in the position of having
  498
  rejected the compromise suggested by the Powys Commission some years ago. The argument of the hon. and learned Member for Louth is that the Roman Catholic youth in Ireland are denied a fair chance of education. I absolutely deny that. The hon. Member for East Mayo, with many parts of whose speech I was much more in sympathy, said that the only university open to Catholics in any sense whatever was Trinity College, but that the Divinity School and the other branches were so permeated by a Protestant atmosphere as to make it impossible for Catholics in Ireland to send their sons to that splendid college and avail themselves of its privileges and advantages. I absolutely challenge the whole of that statement from beginning to end. So far as I understand the constitution of Trinity College, it is practically the same as that of Oxford and Cambridge. Catholics are perfectly free to go to Trinity; no tests are imposed upon them, and they are not required to attend any religious ceremony. It is perfectly notorious that Catholic students who attend Oxford and Cambridge return to their families just as good Catholics as they went. I happen to know the arrangements at Oxford, and to know also the Catholic Canon who is appointed there to look after the interests of the Catholic students; and it is perfectly impossible to assert that these Catholic students are placed in any position of disadvantage whatever. They have the glorious privileges of a great university; they acquire a breadth of mind by mixing with other students; they are not cramped in their ideas; they are brought in contact with men of other conceptions, and that is the best way of making men of them, men of broad sympathies. I say where that is the case it is absurd to allege that the sons of Catholic parents cannot obtain the fullest advantages of university training, and yet remain loyal to their religious opinions. My main objection to sectarianism in university teaching would apply just as strongly to an Episcopalian, a Unitarian, or an Agnostic University. I do not want to see any of these dogmatic principles put ahead of education itself. I say it is a monstrous thing that we should judge professors from the point of view of their being either Catholic or Protestant. They ought to be judged from the point of view of whether they are the very best

  499
  men that can be obtained to teach the subjects they are called upon to teach. We have seen the temper of the hon. Member for North Louth, and the sort of spirit in which the professors in a Catholic university would be selected and treated if that sort of spirit was applied to the working of a Catholic University in Ireland. We should have a sort of Index Expurgatorius, and any man who ventured to have an opinion of his own would not be judged as to whether he was the best man for a chair of biology, or geology, or chemistry, classics, or history, but whether he was up to the shibboleths of the Catholic hierarchy. It is this that I wish to protest against. The hon. Member for Mayo complained that there was not better provision for the higher education of Catholics in Ireland, and that the Queen's Colleges were poor. What is the reason they are poor? Why do not the Irish Catholics send their sons, with their young, and strong, and vigorous intellects, to till these colleges and thus develop them? That would be better for the colleges, and better for the young men, too, to be brought in contact with others and learn to take broad and generous views. It is because of the bigotry and narrowness and tyranny of the Roman Catholic priesthood. It is because of the bigotry and narrowness and tyranny of the priesthood, which deny the right of the parents to send their sons to these Queen's Colleges. It is because these colleges have been denied pupils that they are not as fully developed as we would like to see them. I, for one, insist on having freedom, and on having the teaching institutions divested of religious bigotry and tyranny, and that is the spirit in which we should approach the university question for Ireland.
  MR. RENTOUL: After the manner in which the First Lord of the Treasury has described his own followers in Ulster, I naturally speak with considerable pain, because we were described as densely ignorant and grossly prejudiced. Well, the right hon. Gentleman cheered that, and I merely want to define at the very start the position in which I stand. There are a certain number of people in Ireland who entertain strong views on this matter of university education, entirely apart from political or religious prejudices. I shall try to state what these views are, and
  500
  why these views are held. The First Lord has referred to those who opposed a Catholic University as ignorant or prejudiced. Well, the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church has been frequently referred to to-night, and, I think, with entire respect. I beg to refer to the governing body and clergy of the Church to which I belong, namely, the Presbyterian Church of Ireland. The General Assembly of the Church is, as far as I know, to a single man, strongly opposed to the Catholic University scheme, and in favour of the principle of mixed education. If there is one man who is not so, he has not come out in public and made his views known. That assembly is not ignorant, if university degrees are any test of education, for about nine-tenths of the ministers of the General Assembly hold university degrees, and a very large number of them with very high honours and university distinction. Therefore, they are not incapable of forming a good strong opinion on any university question; and, with the utmost respect for the First Lord of the Treasury, they are quite as capable of forming an opinion on a matter of this sort as the right hon. Gentleman himself. They have formed their opinion, and have stated it again and again. What is the reason they are attached to undenominational education? Is it believed by any gentleman opposite that they take the line they, do simply to spite the Roman Catholics? Do these gentlemen remember the old days of struggle, when, throughout the whole of Ulster, and, indeed, throughout the whole of Ireland, Presbyterian ministers and Catholic priests were side by side fighting the same battle? Do they forget that in all reforms called for by the Roman Catholics in Ireland they found their backers very generally, and very strongly, amongst the ministers of the Presbyterian Church? These Presbyterian ministers take the stand they do because they believe that a mixed education is best for the social life of Ireland. They may be entirely wrong, but that is their firm conviction, and the firm conviction of all of us who have gone through a mixed education. It so happens, if I may be permitted to say so, that I was educated in three different schools, colleges, and universities, and I believe that I never had a single class in school, college, or university in which there were not Roman Catholic students amongst my best and most

  501
  efficient class-mates. What dreadful and diabolical injury I did to them I cannot say but I can assure the House that they did me no harm whatever. I think, in fact, they did me one good, and that is, if I call judge myself at all, that they rendered me incapable of any bigoted dislike to any man for continuing in the religion in which he happened to be born. I emphasise the word "happened." That being so, I am one of those who look on a mixed education as very beneficial. We are extremely sorry that we are not able to see eye to eye on this question with a large number of our fellow-countrymen, but we wish to ask them to give us as much credit for honesty of purpose and intelligence, and a desire to do what we believe to be right, as we give them. In this matter of university education we frankly say we will beat them if we can, and if they are successful we shall take our beating as best we can. Believing as we do, however, that mixing with those of other denominations in schools and colleges and examination halls, instead of being injurious, is beneficial to the whole of us, that is one of the reasons why we adhere to the present system. I have already referred to the First Lord of the Treasury. Everybody gives him the highest credit for sincerity of conviction and honesty of purpose in this matter, but we desire similar credit at the same time. Some of us, moreover, think we know Ireland quite as well as the First Lord of the Treasury, but we do not wish in the slightest degree to attribute a feeling of prejudice to him for the line he has taken. We only admire him for the fact that what he does he does with all his force, whether he happens to be on the right side or the wrong side. The first speech to-night was that of the hon. Member for East Mayo. It was a most gratifying speech. There has not been a speech for a long time which has done more service to the side which I advocate than that, because the hon. Member put his points quite clearly and let us see exactly where he stood. He told us, in the first place, that it was not merely a Catholic university that he wanted, but a national university. Secondly, he plainly put before us that he means a university entirely in sympathy with himself, not merely in religion, but in politics and everything else. Therefore he was frank and clear in expressing the hope that one of the
  502
  political parties alone should have a university of its own religion and of its own political creed. Then he went on to say that he would deplore any hand being laid on Trinity College, Dublin, or on Dublin University. In that respect he is turning his back on Archbishop Walsh, for that reverend prelate has said that no university would satisfy Catholic demands so long as Trinity College in Dublin remains untouched. I think the Archbishop is perfectly right. If you endow a university with a million a year it would I not equal Dublin University, nor have the same life, standing, and dignity for 100 years to come. That being so, to leave Dublin University to one small section of the community, with all its history and all its prestige, and to start a gingerbread university, no matter to whom it belonged, would be no fair play to those who claim to be a large proportion of the inhabitants of Ireland. Therefore, no settlement of the Irish University question is possible unless a hand is laid on Trinity College, unless the divinity school and the theological professorships are removed, and the place made in every respect equal for all the people of Ireland. One thing is generally lost sight of by hon. Gentlemen opposite, who undoubtedly I have the interests of the rising generations of Ireland at heart, and that is the value of these degrees if you get a university. In Ireland they may be valuable enough, but the case is different when you come to England or Scotland. Even the ad eundem degree of Durham University is not acknowledged as equal to the same degree at Oxford or Cambridge, and the holder of that degree from the Royal University in Dublin would be looked upon with scorn and contempt in England. Upon one point in erroneous idea has got abroad. It is said that if a university is granted to the Roman Catholics, the Presbyterians would be satisfied with Dublin University. I can assure the House, in the name of the Presbyterians of Ireland, that they would have nothing whatever to do with Dublin University or Trinity College as it is constituted now. We would immeasurably rather send our young people to the new Catholic university than to Dublin University.
  Mr. WILLIAM JOHNSTON: No, no.
  MR. RENTOUL: The hon. Member for South Belfast says "No."
  MR. WILLIAM JOHNSTON: I say it is nonsense.
  MR. RENTOUL: The hon. Member makes that statement with a want of caution which is characteristic of him, and I entirely deny his right to give an opinion on this question.
  MR. WILLIAM JOHNSTON: Go to Belfast and say it.
  MR. RENTOUL: The hon. Member says, "Go to Belfast and say it." I say it in the face of Belfast now. I say that the hon. Member for South Belfast is a Dublin University man, and is not a member of the Presbyterian Church. On that account he is not the man to give an opinion, even through he may be returned for a division in which there are a large number of Presbyterians. I am speaking for those for whom I have authority to speak, and I say that if a university is granted to the Roman Catholics of Ireland it would be absolutely necessary for the Presbyterians to have a university, not under that name, but a Northern university under the name of a Belfast or Ulster University. ("No.") The Member for North Belfast or the Member for South Belfast may make any statements they like. I have made my statement, and that statement I stand by.
  MR. PINKERTON: The hon. and learned Member who has just sat down said that the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church declared against denominational education. That is absolutely true. But I ask him to contrast their teaching with their practice. It is a well-known fact that in every school in the North of Ireland they insist on their teachers being in full accord with their religious views. I agree with the First Lord of the Treasury that we are fighting against what is practically an accomplished fact in Ireland. We have denominational education in every Corner of it. The First Lord of the Treasury also spoke of rhetorical exaggeration, and when I contrasted the speech of the hon. Member for East Mayo with that of the hon. Member for West Belfast, I could not help thinking that all the rhetorical exaggerations could be traced to the
  504
  speech of that gentleman. The First Lord said that an imperfect realisation of the benefits of higher education was one of the drawbacks in Ireland. Now, there is no city in Ireland where the imperfect realisation of the benefits of higher education is more evident than in the City of Belfast. If you go to the Queen's College, Belfast, you will find the students all representing the wealthy middle classes. They are all drawn from the agricultural districts, while it is notorious that all the money-grubbers of Belfast, the moment their sons obtain a certain amount of knowledge, pitchfork them into their offices, and never dream of sending them to the Queen's College. The hon. Member for West Belfast spoke about the prejudicial influence of Catholicism and the broadening influence of Protestantism. The broader ring influence was so well illustrated by the Belfast Members a few days ago that the hon. Gentleman should have been ashamed to mention Catholicism in the same breath. I wish to draw the attention of the Committee to the condition of the Queen's Colleges in Ireland. Owing to the policy that has been adopted, each student in Queen's College, Galway, costs the Government £369 14s. 2d. a year, as compared with about £24 for each student in the Queen's College, Belfast. The derelict condition of Queen's College, Galway, is due to the failure of successive Governments to redeem the pledges they have made. In 1888 I put a question to the then Chief Secretary for Ireland dealing with the position of Catholic professors in the Queen's College, Galway, and I asked whether it was not the fact that Sir Robert Peel, when the colleges were founded, gave a distinct pledge, that so far as was in his power Catholic professors would be appointed to the colleges of Cork and Galway, The First Lord of the Treasury, who was then Chief Secretary for Ireland, replied in the affirmative. I put a further question to the present Chief Secretary on the subject yesterday. But what has happened? The senior Catholic professor at Queen's College, Galway, who is senior for promotion, has been recently passed over, and a Protestant, junior by many years, is appointed. Dealing with the contention of Sir Robert Peel that the best men should be appointed, I will take the liberty of reading a testimonial

  505
  in favour of the senior Catholic professor from Professor Moffett. He said:
  "Doctor Pye needs no testimony from me of his professional ability, which is well and widely known; but having known him from the time he was a first year's student of this College up to the present when he has been for 14 years an esteemed I professor, I gladly take the opportunity of stating, from intimate knowledge of his character, that it would be impossible to speak too highly of his integrity, his conscientiousness, ant his devotion to his duties."
  Instead of recognising the claims of the senior professor, the Government have yielded in the most abject fashion to the pressure of the brand-new association which has been started in the North of Ireland. And I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that so far from the senior professor having taken part in political contests he has never made a political speech in his life.
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. G. W. BALFOUR,): I may say that neither religious nor political views have anything to do with these appointments.
  MR. PINKERTON: Then I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman has not acted up to the professions of Sir Robert Peel.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: May I ask the hon. Gentleman to give the reference in Hansard where Sir Robert Peel made that statement?
  MR. PINKERTON: The last time this matter was mentioned the First Lord of the Treasury pointed to the fact that Mr. Starkey, a Catholic, had been appointed; but this House must remember that Mr. Starkey was only appointed for nine months. What I so much object to is the sectarian character given to the Queen's College, Galway, under which it has become very nearly derelict. It is of no use to the persons whom it was built to benefit, and it is no wonder that Catholics should raise the question of higher education when great institutions like that are locked and the doors barred against the Catholics of the country. It struck me that a good solution of this question would have been to hand over the Queen's Colleges of Galway and Cork to Catholic management, but these colleges have been used for the overflow of the Belfast College. Ulster sends 30 students to the College where Connaught
  506
  sends 33. It is downright robbery to the South of Ireland that all these endowments should he filched away by the North of Ireland. It is evident that the Lord Lieutenant is trying to pave the way to a Catholic university, but to do that he must alter the management of the Queen's Colleges.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The remarks of the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down call for some explanation from me. Since I have been Chief Secretary he has twice asked me whether Sir Robert Peel did not pledge himself to appoint Catholic professors to the Galway College. He has never given me the reference to the speech in which Sir Robert Peel is supposed to have done so, and I have been unable to find it. I think he refers, not to the speech Sir Robert Peel, but to that of Sir James Graham, who did on one occasion say:
  "I am bound to state, although it is the earnest desire of Her Majesty's Government to meet the reasonable wishes of the great body of the Catholic subjects of Ireland, I cannot conceive it possible that any Government advising Her Majesty as to the nomination of professors would not in the first place endeavour to secure in the different colleges those who by their learning and abilities are the most competent; and, beyond a doubt, on the part of many of the professors, an adherence to the Roman Catholic faith would be an additional recommendation."
  The Committee will see that the opinion given by Sir James Graham there does not represent anything like the pledges which the hon. Gentleman represents were given by the Government of that day. He laid it down distinctly that the most competent persons should be appointed to the post. In the appointments that have been made since the present Government came into office that is the precedent that has been followed. If two equally competent persons were found, one of whom was a Roman Catholic, I personally should prefer that the appointment was given to him. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that religious or political considerations do not weigh with the Irish Government in regard to these appointments.
  MR. HEMPHILL: Though I am in favour of the argument of the hon. Member for East Mayo, and intend to vote with him if he carries this matter to a Division, I think I am bound to state the grounds for doing so; I only speak for myself

  507
  and have no authority to speak for the right hon. and hon. Gentlemen who sit on these benches. I speak as a Protestant, and having had the inestimable advantages of an university education at Trinity College, Dublin, I am bound to say I believe an university education is essential, and I shall do everything in my power to achieve the object of affording that advantage to my Roman Catholic fellow countrymen. I fear that the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury to-night will be productive of much disappointment when it is read all over Ireland to-morrow. The First Lord of the Treasury, the highest but one of Her Majesty's Ministers, in a Government which is the most powerful in numbers that has existed during the present century, both by his speeches outside and within this House, and by that historic letter of the 23rd of January, 1899, in language of which he is so eminently the master, in the philosophic vein which gives an interest and a force to every argument he advances, makes out the strongest case for this university as being only a common act of justice to Ireland; and having for two or three years, ever since this Ministry has been in power, dangled as it were before the people of Ireland the hope of this Catholic University, he comes forward at this period of the session and abandons all hope for the present of the Government being able to make such a concession in our favour. That is grievously calculated to disappoint the people of Ireland. While I have no mandate to speak for the bishops and archbishops of Ireland, I can very well understand the feeling which they will entertain when they read the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, and when they find that, after all their negotiations and conferences and public pronouncements as to concessions having been made, the cold shoulder is turned upon them. I think a great mistake is entertained on both sides of this House, and I heard with regret the speech of the hon. Member for East Northamptonshire. It is with the utmost pain that I differ with any hon. Gentleman who sits upon this side of the House, but I feel the hon. Gentleman must have forgotten that this was one of the concessions which were given in Mr. Gladstone's Home Rule Bill of 1893. There was a clause in that Bill expressly empowering the Irish Parlia-
  508
  ment when constituted to establish a Catholic University with certain checks and conditions. I am now addressing my remarks to the hon. Member for East Northamptonshire and to those who agree with him, and I ask them with what show of consistency can they reconcile their vote on the occasion of that Bill with this negation of an act of common justice. But that, as I have said, was to be done subject to checks and conditions. I say the mistake is in supposing that we, and those agreeing with us—that is to say, the Catholics and Protestants of Ireland who agree with the Catholics on this question—are demanding what is called a Roman Catholic University. We demand a university for the Catholics, which is an altogether different thing. We do not ask for a university which is governed by the Roman Catholic hierarchy; we only ask for a university where the Catholics are not likely to have their religion sapped and undermined by long intercourse with young students of a different faith. It cannot be pretended for a moment that Dublin University is anything but a Protestant University. It is perfectly true that since the Test Act in 1873 the professorships and other emoluments have been thrown open, but the fact remains that upon the senate of the richest University in Europe there is not a single Catholic. The language of the hon. Member for Down is rather calculated to confuse the minds of English Members who do Hot understand the working of our universities. He spoke of the university as an old university, no doubt forgetting that the charter of the Queen's Colleges was only granted in 1849. It is not so old when we remember that Mr. Gladstone reminded the House that there were universities in Ireland in the sixth and seventh centuries, and that they existed in some form or other right up to the date of the Reformation. I think it was only in 1863 that these colleges were made into a university, and they ceased to exist as a university in 1879. One of the great things which we think might rise from this new university is that it will enable the talented young men of Ireland of the humblest rank to obtain that education which is at present beyond their reach, and begin the world with this evidence of their fitness. If I do not weary the House I should just like to quote upon this subject the words

  509
  of Dr. Healy, the Bishop of Clonfert, a report of whose speech at the meeting at the Free Trade Hall on the matter appeared in the Freeman's Journal of 24th January last. I will only quote one passage. Dr. Healy said:
  "I have no doubt the call fur a Catholic University endowed by the State has somewhat roused their ire, and led to a very grave mistake. The university that we seek is not a Catholic university in their sense of the word, nor in any strict sense of the word. The proposed university would be an un-sectarian university; it would have no endowed theological chairs; its endowment would not be the endowment of the Catholic religion, nor of distinctively Catholic teaching in any shape or form. The Bishops of Ireland, when these questions were raised in the House of Commons, gave solemn and repeated assurances of the fact. We recognise the difficulties of the Government. We have sympathy for the tenderness of the Nonconformist conscience, as well as for our own. We do not want the ecclesiastical authority to be predominant on the governing body. On the contrary we are prepared to accept a majority of laymen. We seek no endowment for theological teaching. We shall impose no religious tests for admission to our halls, or degrees or offices or emoluments. Our lectures shall be open to all comers, and professors shall enjoy all reasonable fixity of tenure, and shall not be liable to dismissal at the caprice of any man or body of men. What more do they want? In these respects the new university would be as free and open as Trinity College itself; only as Trinity is Protestant in its tone, its atmosphere, its spirit, so the new university would be Catholic exactly in the same sense."
  That is the language of a very eminent prelate who speaks with great authority, and it is vain for anybody to go into the lobby against this proposal, and hug to himself the idea that he is saving the country from some Catholic institution worthy of the days of Torquemada. I would next refer to a passage in a speech by the Rev. Dr. O'Donnell, in my opinion one of the most high-minded prelates that ever adorned any Christian Church. The speech was delivered on the 25th of November, 1898. I quote from the Freeman's Journal of the 26th. These are the words of Dr. O'Donnell:
  "We only ask an endowment for the highest kind of secular instruction, where we can avail of it with safe consciences. That Irish Catholics are to be left just where they are in want of facilities for Catholic education scarcely anyone contends. (Hear, hear.) There is not a post, from tilling a university chair to managing a railway, or planting a garden, or directing an industrial project, for which Scotchmen cannot be found of exceptional qualifications. Is anything similar true of
  510
  Ireland, or would anything similar be true of Scotland, if the great bulk of the Scotch people had been excluded from university education? (Applause.) Well, if the non-Catholics of Ireland want the maximum of advantages to themselves, and to the State, from any provision to give university education to Catholics, they would be well advised to advocate the highest facilities of education for us in connection with our own principles. In any case, really those who would give us no facilities, except on lines that please themselves and displease us, have scarcely Hampden's reason for asking the tax-gatherer to call again. (Applause.) But we ace told that our whole project is concerned with the idea of extending clerical influence. Well, if any clergyman thought that the extension of clerical influence in the daily affairs of the people was likely to be enhanced by the establishment of a university for Catholics, he is in for a serious disappointment."
  Have the great bulk of the Scottish people been excluded from university education? No; for years they have enjoyed the advantage of it, and I understand that men of the humblest farming classes attend universities. They have technical education and agricultural schools; they are taught the arts and sciences too. In every part of Germany also for years university education has been open to every class of society, and consequently Germans, as a whole, are beating in the industrial race almost every other country, thanks to the advantages acquired in their early training. Switzerland, Sweden, France, and Italy enjoy the advantages of university teaching. Why, then, should not Leland also enjoy these advantages? On the ground of mere policy why hesitate to make this concession? We are sometimes asked why it is that Ireland, possessing some natural advantages far in excess of those of any other country in Europe, should have the poorest, worst clothed, and worst fed population of all. Well, one reason is the neglect of education. Trinity College is pervaded by an atmosphere of Protestantism, and no one will deny that that is not a suitable centre for the general education of the inhabitants of a country three - fourths of whom are Roman Catholics. Archbishop Walsh, writing in the Freeman's Journal of the 30th of December, 1898, says:
  "I have here to refer only to the first of those questions. It was this: What, in our view, should be the proportion of laymen to ecclesiastics on the governing body of the projected Catholic University?
  "Our reply to that important question was as definite as the question itself. It was that,

  511
  so far from laying claim to any 'exclusive control' to be vested in our Episcopal body or in any members of it, we did not think it reasonable to claim that there should be on the governing body of the new University any 'preponderance,' not to say of bishops, but even of ecclesiastics, and that, moreover, so far from seeking any such 'preponderance,' we did not look for even an 'equality' in number as between laymen and ecclesiastics, but were prepared to accept a university having upon its governing body 'a majority of laymen.'
  "The declaration in which our views were thus expressed was widely published, through the leading Press agencies and otherwise, in the newspapers at the time. It is strange how, notwithstanding all this, we still so frequently find it taken for granted that no University for Catholics would satisfy the claims of the bishops unless it were placed under their own exclusive control."
  I thank the House for the indulgence it has extended to me, and I again say my firm conviction is that the foundation of a Catholic university would open up a new era of prosperity to my poor country. I would remind hon. Members that "they laugh at scars who never felt the wound." There was a meeting at the Mansion House, Dublin, in February, 1899, the Lord Mayor presiding, and I would like to quote some of the resolutions passed. Lord Emly proposed, and Mr. Edmund Dease, Deputy Lieutenant, seconded:
  "That this Conference re-affirms the following declaration of Irish Catholic laymen on the subject of university education, which was adopted at the public meeting held in the Mansion House last year:—
  "'That it is the constitutional right of all British subjects to adopt whatever system of collegiate or university education they prefer.
  "'That perfect religions equality involves equality in all educational advantages afforded by the State.
  "'That a large number of Irishmen are at present precluded from the enjoyment of university education, honours, and emoluments, on account of conscientious religious opinions regarding the existing systems of education.
  "'That we therefore demand such a change in the system of collegiate and university education as will place those who entertain these conscientious objections on a footing of equality with the rest of their fellow-countrymen as regards colleges, university honours and emoluments, university examination, government, and representation.'"
  The next resolution, which expressed disappointment and regret that the Government had not yet taken steps to settle this important and urgent question, was moved by Lord Powerscourt and seconded by the hon. Member for East Mayo, while a third was moved by the
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  Most Rev. Dr. Healy, Bishop of Clonfert, and seconded by Sir Henry Bellingham, Bart. The House will see how all classes support this movement. Let it, then, divest itself of prejudice and not turn an open ear to the contentions of those who have been brought up with the idea that there is nothing good connected with the Catholic religion, and that the best thing would be to hunt all Catholics out of Ireland.
  MR. YERBURGH: As one of the rank and file of the Conservative. Party, I feel we owe a great deal of gratitude to the Leader of the House for the part he has played in advancing the cause of Catholic university education in Ireland. This is a subject which demands our serious consideration. The right hon. Gentleman has said that the most difficult matters he has to meet on the subject are ignorance and prejudice. As to prejudice, I do think we have it well exemplified to-night in the person of the hon. Member for West Belfast. I do not think I ever heard a speech which showed a greater sense of bitter religious prejudice than the speech of the hon. Member. And as to want of knowledge, I am bound to confess that I did not know until to-night that the educational system of Ireland was so very largely denominational. I had before to-night been in favour of granting a Catholic University to Ireland on board and general grounds, but after hearing that the educational system of Ireland is largely denominational I feel my position very greatly strengthened. What are the objections to the proposal? In the main, as far as I can gather them, they are that the educational facilities in Ireland are sufficient, and all that is required is that the Roman Catholic population should make use of them. But Trinity College and the other colleges have been condemned by the priesthood and by the higher power in Rome, and therefore it is perfectly evident that Roman Catholics cannot make use of those institutions. What are the facts as to those who do use these institutions? Out of 1,500 students at Trinity College and at Queen's College, Belfast, only 100 are Roman Catholics.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: 6 per cent.
  MR. YERBURGH: And that shows that they do not consider that they can

  513
  safely go to these colleges. If further proof be wanted, I think it is to be found in the fact that they have some colleges at which excellent work is done—work which compares in a most favourable light with what is done in the Queen's Colleges. Only two years ago my right hon. friend the Chief Secretary admitted that it was a reproach that these educational advantages were not shared equally between Roman Catholics and Protestants. While I have always held that there is no necessity for a separate Parliament for Ireland, I do believe that Catholics are sincere in their objection to the present colleges, and in the interests not only of Ireland, but also of the Empire, I shall vote in favour of Ireland's claim for a Catholic university.
  MR. SHARPE: I am proud to associate myself with the noble speech of the First Lord of the Treasury on this subject, and especially with the pathetic words in which the right hon. Gentleman vindicated his right as a Minister of the Crown to exercise his independent judgment on such far-reaching questions as that of a Roman Catholic University for Ireland. The right hon. Gentleman recognises the difficulties of carrying a large Cabinet with him on this question, but he is justified in saying that he has a right to do what he can to educate the Party he leads so well in this House; and that the right hon. Gentleman will succeed in educating his Party in favour of a Roman Catholic University in Ireland there is not the slightest doubt. We have thrown over the Irish Church, we have dealt with the Irish land question and with the government of the Irish counties, and in order to do justice in all respects we have redressed real and legitimate grievances. It now only remains for us to deal with what may be called the sentimental grievances. If the Irish people desire a Catholic University why not let them have one? Speaking as an Irish Protestant and as a graduate of Dublin University, I am glad the right hon. Gentleman has taken up this position. There is much narrow and bitter sectarian feeling in the country, especially among the Party opposite, but public opinion on this question is ripening, and I hope that during the life of the present Government—I do not say the life of the present Parliament—the legitimate aspirations of the Roman
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  Catholic majority of the Irish people in this matter will be satisfied.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: The hon. Gentleman is a hopeful man if he thinks we shall get a university which Catholics can accept in the lifetime of the present Parliament. I would have liked to see the two representatives of Dublin University present, for I am bound to say, having regard to the speech of the First Lord of the Treasury, the position of Dublin University is as incompatible with justice as was the position of the Irish Church before Disestablishment. He wound up that speech by saying that the granting to the Irish people of a Catholic University would help to keep up the union as far as Ireland was concerned. So we have it, according to your own confession, that Ireland now is governed not for her own interest, but is made subservient to the interests of another people. There is a jealousy in giving us education. You do not want the Irish people to cultivate the intellects God has given them, because they would take advantage of those intellects to do the best they could for their country, and that is exactly what you do not want. I protest in the strongest way against the denial of justice to Trinity College, because the position of Trinity College is henceforth indefensible. Trinity College is a sectarian institution. Eight years after the Bill of 1873 the Provost of Trinity College died, and there was the greatest desire to appoint a certain Doctor. But he was a layman, and it was decided to have a clerical appointment. The Provost then appointed was followed by Dr. Salmon, one of the greatest theologians——
  MR. SHARPE: One of the greatest mathematicians.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: And the greatest controversialist against the Church of Rome of the age. It is an astonishing position the First Lord of the Treasury has taken. He has a majority of 135, and a strong position in the Cabinet—in fact, he is the keystone of the Cabinet; he has enormous influence in the country; and yet he tells us he is unable to carry a Catholic University. I cannot believe that to be so. He says this is not the first time that the Leader of the House of Commons has been unable to carry measures that he

  515
  personally likes, and he cited one ample in the case of Mr. Pitt; but I will give him three. In 1781 Mr. Pitt raised the standard of Reform, as a pious opinion, but Reform was not carried till 1832. Mr. Pitt was also very much in favour of the emancipation of the slaves, but although he was practically in power from 1773 till his death it was not carried until many years after, and it would never have been carried then if we Irish Members had not got in here and carried it in spite of you. Then there is the cardinal example cited by the right hon. Gentleman. The First Lord of the Treasury, if he went out of Parliament to-morrow, could certainly lead fields of thought in six or seven departments; but his mind, though so beautifully constructed, is not very good for details, and a more unfortunate example than Mr. Pitt's inability to carry Catholic emancipation on account of the opposition of the Cabinet could not well be found. The person who opposed Catholic emancipation was not one of his own colleagues; it was the same person who lost this country America—King George III. The idea of trying to draw a parallel between 1899 and 1801 is simply absurd. If the right hon. Gentleman would put down his foot as Mr. Pitt ought to have done he could carry this question instantly. The matter is not even in so good a position as on the 28th August, 1889. The First Lord gave a definite promise to do his best to introduce a Catholic University Bill. A few days before that he had said that the intermediate education system had many defects, but the higher education system was suffering from a great runny more defects, and should be taken in hand first. No doubt he intended to do it, but he should have the courage to face the music with reference to his own opinions. If he resigned the leadership through it he would come back more powerful than ever; but, even if he lost the office, he has many countervailing resources. He is a great historian, a great metaphysician, a great philosopher—and if he left office tomorrow for the sake of a Catholic University in Ireland we might possibly forget some of the hard things we have said of him and that he has said of us. But he seems to have made the great refusal. He has had a wonderful opportunity of doing good to hundreds of thousands of young men, of giving them a chance in life to
  516
  rise to an elevated position, of giving them the inestimable blessing of a university education. It is not because he cannot that he does not do this, but because there are difficulties in the way. In the wish that justice should be done and learning advanced, I ask the First Lord not to allow himself to be swayed by the ignorance or prejudices of persons for whom he must have a profound intellectual contempt, but to rise to the situation, and to lead not merely the House of Commons but public opinion in England upon this question, and if he falls he will rise again and rise more gloriously.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: This is a question which excites a good deal of interest in the North of Ireland. The First Lord of the Treasury has no more loyal supporters than the Conservative Members for Ulster, but in this matter we are, and I say it with regret, with one exception, entirely at issue with him. Since the First Lord made this a part of practical politics we have had four elections in Ulster, at each of which there was a Conservative candidate. Three of those candidates were returned, each pledged to resist this proposal, and it is with profound regret that we Ulster Members cannot follow the First Lord. There seems to be a difference between the right hon. Gentleman's attitude on this question and his attitude on any other. In any other matter he seems to recognise that his opponents—generally on the other side of the House—may have reasons for differing from him, but in this case he appears to assume that the only reason why we differ from him is our ignorance.
  Mr. A. J. BALFOUR: Perhaps my hon. friend will allow me to say that the ignorance I referred to was the natural ignorance of the average Englishman of the details of the educational system as it obtains in Ireland.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: No one is more ready than I am to accept at once any disclaimer on the part of the right hon. Gentleman of a general allegation of ignorance against his most loyal followers, and I am exceedingly glad I misunderstood him. But whether it is ignorance of general principles or ignorance of details, his Irish supporters are largely com-

  517
  mitted to it, and that ignorance, as he terms it, instead of diminishing, is increasing every day, and not only in Ireland but also in Lancashire and other parts of England. As to the treatment which we receive from the other side, there appears to be no room in their vocabulary for any word to apply to those who differ from them on Irish questions except "bigots" and "bigotry." I am not a member of the Presbyterian Church, nor of the Roman Catholic Church, but assuming that the governing body of each church equally desires the welfare of their congregations as well as of the country, I feel bound to treat at least with equal respect the decisions of the Roman Catholic hierarchy to those of the Moderator and heads of the Presbyterian Church. An Englishman, looking at the matter impartially, will find that the heads of one Church meeting at Maynooth support the proposal, while the heads of the other Church meeting in Belfast oppose it. Can a charge of "bigotry" be fairly made against the opponents of the movement when the educated leaders of one of the Protestant churches in the country in equally solemn conclave Object to its terms? If the Roman Catholics style their opponents as bigots, the Presbyterians have an equal right to call their opponents bigots also. There may be bigots on both sides, but there certainly are also reasonable men on both sides. It has been made a subject of reproach by the hon. Member for North Tyrone that the Member for East Northamptonshire was proposing to vote against the establishment of a Roman Catholic University in Ireland, whereas he and his leader supported identically the same proposition when they voted for Home Rule, one of the grounds why the North of Ireland was solid and steadfast against Home Rule.
  DR. COMMINS: The North of Ireland was not solid.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: I am talking of the twenty-three Members who are generally called the "North of Ireland" Members. One of the reasons why that part of Ireland voted against Home Rule was the apprehension which they entertained that the Roman Catholic Church, under a Home Rule Parliament, would be endowed. If this leads in anything like the same direction, the same apprehension
  518
  would arise. The cry of hon. Members opposite is that we must have in Ireland religious equality. Under the existing state of affairs there is religious equality, and if there is reasonable ground for assuming that the endowment of a Roman Catholic University would destroy that religions equality, we are entitled to object to this proposal. In 1870 there was the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, not established; the Episcopalian Church, which was established; and the Roman Catholic Church. In order to give religious equality the Church of Ireland was disestablished, leaving the three churches in precisely similar positions. Each was independent and left to shift for itself. In order to put the universities on the same footing as the Churches, and so as to prevent one Church having any superior claim over another, Queen's Colleges had been originally founded and were then continued. The complaint against them is that they are universities in which there is no religion, and for that reason they are objected to. It is argued that Roman Catholics have no facilities for obtaining university education. Why? The universities are there—they have had the Queen's Colleges; they have had Trinity College; but the difficulty arises from their own spiritual advisers, who say, "You shall not cutter here." The facilities are there, supplied by the Government, and if they are not made use of it is not the fault of the British taxpayer. It is believed that this proposed university is to be one primarily open for the encouragement of learning among Roman Catholic students. It may be you will let others in; I have no doubt you will be very glad to get them if you can. But the fundamental thing is that, while it is for Roman Catholic students, it is to be governed exclusively by the Roman Catholic bishops and clergy.
  Several HON. MEMBERS: No, no!
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: They are to have the controlling voice in the government, and I understand that otherwise they will not accept it. I may be wrong——
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: You are wrong.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: I understand that the only question of difference is as to what the proportion of lay representatives on the governing body is to be to the clerical representatives. There is no mistake but that, whether lay or clerical, they are all to belong to the Roman Catholic Church. The popular conception is that this institution is to be one governed and controlled by the Roman Catholic bishops just as it is alleged Trinity College is now governed and controlled by the Protestants.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The last thing that occurred to me was that the university I desired to see established was to be one under the control of the Catholic hierarchy.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: I am exceedingly relieved to hear that, but at the same time, with my ordinary knowledge of what is happening, I do not think I am going too far when I say that the Roman Catholic hierarchy will accept nothing else than I have described.
  MR. DILLON: The hon. Member is absolutely wrong. The Roman Catholic hierarchy, by a unanimous resolution, stated two years ago that they were content that there should be a majority of laymen on the Senate.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: Who must be Roman Catholics.
  MR. DILLON: That was never stated.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: Then I cannot understand what is the objection of Roman Catholics to the Royal University.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: It is not a teaching University at all.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: If they only wanted to add a teaching staff to the Royal University I would support them, but that is a very different thing from setting up a Roman Catholic University according to the popular conception.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: You persist in keeping on the Senate of the Royal University a majority of Protestants, as there are at present.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: I do not know what the constitution is at present.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: The numbers are 19 to 15.
  MR. WILLIAM MOORE: One of the objections to Trinity College is the Protestant Divinity School. Speaking for myself, and being anxious to see Trinity College, as it is intended to be, the national university, I would not regret to see that Divinity School less closely connected with it. But at the same time I do not think the Divinity School at Trinity College can be said to stand in any different position from the Divinity School at Maynooth. If it is said that the Divinity School at Trinity College is endowed, it will be in the recollection of the House that the State paid to Maynooth £326,000 in a lump sum in the year 1871, equivalent to £12,000 per annum, on which presumably Maynooth is supported. The great mistake of English statesmen is that they think they can govern Ireland by compartments. You have a Roman Catholic compartment and a Protestant compartment. You will give no satisfaction to the whole of Ireland if you give one of those compartments superiority over the other. It will be the greatest possible mistake if you are going to provide for the Roman Catholic section, which, however large, is still but a section of the entire population, by State money in a manner you would not for the other. It is a misfortune for Ireland that every child is to be labelled from birth as a Protestant or Roman Catholic. We want to know each other better, and have our religious differences and asperities softened into mere religious individuality by mutual intercourse in the other paths of life with each other. I began with an expression with reference to the Irish Bar, and I come back again to it. At the Irish Bar there are men of very different education, and every form of religion, and all round they are the most charitable, and on the best terms with one another, because they mix with one another. That we should not have with a separate university.
  MR. DOOGAN: The hon. and learned Member who has just sat down disclaims all intention of being narrow

  521
  or bigoted, but still he argues strongly that the great majority of the people of Ireland should be deprived of a university education which they can use consistently with their religious convictions, and that the rest of the community in Ireland should hold all the emoluments. How he can reconcile such an idea with justice, fair play, and equality is beyond my comprehension. The hon. Member says that there is religious equality in Ireland. It is true that the Established Church was disestablished in 1870, but it was left all its emoluments, and its immense endowments are now available for the education of its members. But the Catholics of Ireland have no endowments. He also argues that the establishment of a Catholic university would be an endowment of the Catholic religion, and therefore a denominational endowment. I have the honour of being an Ulster Member myself as well as he, and I think that the majority of the population of Ulster are in accordance with my view that the redress of this long-standing grievance should be pressed strongly on the justice of the House of Commons, and the pressure continued till the just demand be conceded. This question has been before the country for half a century, and still it makes very little headway. I daresay the hon. and learned Member was not in the House when the First Lord of the Treasury referred to the amount of public money which is given as a practical endowment of religion in Ireland. The primary system of education in Ireland is practically denominational, and there is scarcely one Protestant attending a school in Ulster in which the teacher is a Catholic and a priest the manager where the Protestants can get up a school of their own. Not only is primary education in Ireland denominational, but the same remark applies to the intermediate system and also to the Royal University, and there is practically no way out of the difficulty except to establish a university in Ireland which will be Catholic in the sense that Trinity College is Protestant. That would not be a Catholic University, and the majority of its senate would be laymen. The hon. and learned Gentleman seemed very much afraid that the Roman Catholic bishops would have control, and he apparently would prefer to have the Catholics of Ireland remain in ignorance for all eternity, yet he claims that his
  522
  intercourse with his colleagues at the Irish Bar is always harmonious, and that theological questions never arise. I am glad to hear that, although the sentiments he has enunciated in his speech do not bear it out. But I will give the hon. and learned Member this credit, that there was a marked difference in toleration between his speech and the one delivered by the hon. Member for West Belfast. He was dissatisfied with the First Lord of the Treasury for stating that one of the obstacles to his success with regard to this university question was the ignorance and obscurantism which prevailed. The hon. Member for West Belfast stated that the influence of a Catholic University had a bad effect in all countries where they were established, and he stated distinctly that if the First Lord of the Treasury were entering into an agreement with the people of Ireland on this question he objected altogether to chairs of theology, philosophy, history and biology being endowed. I do not see why chairs of biology, philosophy and history should not be endowed, but as a matter of fact, it has never been proposed that a chair of theology should be endowed by public money. The hon. Member wound up his speech by telling the First Lord in a bland, calm, composed, and self-sufficient manner that he should have no confidence in Catholic bishops, and that they would find an opportunity of evading any compact that might be entered into with the Government by their Synod. That was a monstrously unjust statement to launch forth in this House concerning such a body as the Catholic hierarchy. I do not wonder at the First Lord of the Treasury stating that the great obstacles against forming public opinion in favour of this question were ignorance, prejudice, and bigotry. The right hon. Gentleman said that he would continue in his missionary work. His speech was, to my mind, sympathetic, and he acknowledged the justice and necessity of the demand, although he added that it was not expedient to make it a Government question. But if the Catholic claim is right and just it ought to be given effect to. The right hon. Gentleman held out much hope, but "hope springs eternal in the human breast," and to me it appeared as if his speech was delivered for the purpose of building a golden bridge to retreat from the promises and pledges he had given. All through the penal times education

  523
  was practically denied to the people of Ireland, and we heard to-day from an hon. and learned Member about the price which was put on the head of a schoolmaster, a priest, and a wolf. These laws were ingeniously constructed with a view to exterminate the people of Ireland, or failing that to bring them up in ignorance, so that they might remain for all time "hewers of wood and drawers of water." Sixty years ago the National system of education was introduced into Ireland. This was the first grant of public money for education since the penal days that Catholics could avail of under that system there was no endowment whatever for Catholics as such, and in comparison with the amount of money lavished in Scotland and England in primary schools, evening schools, technical schools, and colleges, the education of Ireland is in every department starved, especially when it cannot be denied that Ireland has been deprived by over-taxation of an immense sum of money. It does seem to me a very reasonable request that Ireland should claim a share of her own money to establish a Catholic University. Much restitution is due to the people of Ireland for the cruel wrongs done to them in the past, in being not only deprived of all opportunities for education at home, but debarred from seeking it abroad, and also for the many millions which she has undoubtedly paid in over-taxation. That view is held not only by the Catholics of Ireland, but by every intelligent Protestant throughout the country and by the principal Ministers and ex-Ministers in the House. The only objection comes from the north-east corner of Ulster. I fear that the First Lord will have a great deal to do before he converts this small section of the community. There are only fifteen Ulster members in this House who oppose this demand, and that is a very small following to induce the right hon. Gentleman to abandon his pledges through motives of political expediency. We on this side of the House and the people of Ireland confidently expect from the right hon. Gentleman something more substantial than a hope. The people of Ireland are suffering from that sickness of the heart which arises from hope deferred. I hope, therefore, that the First Lord of the Treasury will take a more active part in pressing on his colleagues in the Government the justice of this demand, and that hence-
  524
  forth he will make it a Government question, as no reform has ever been won by academic "hope" and pious intentions. If he does he will earn the gratitude of the people of Ireland, and he will go far in giving the Irish Catholics a chance of putting themselves in a position of equality, of equipping themselves for the battle of life, and of removing the shackles of inferiority from their necks.
  MR. JORDAN: I would like, as an Irish Protestant, to say that I sympathise strongly with my Catholic fellow-countrymen in their earnest efforts to obtain university education through a medium they can approve of. I am not merely a Protestant, but a Nonconformist of the staunchest type. Not even to the hon. Member for the Louth Division of Lincolnshire would I lower my colours in the matter of Nonconformity or the tenderness of the Nonconformist conscience. And yet as such I most earnestly desire, in the interest of education itself, as well as in the interests of Catholic Irishmen, to see this difficult question settled on some basis satisfactory to all parties. They demand such a settlement. Representative men of all parties in England are agreed that their demand is both reasonable and just, and should be conceded. I cannot therefore see how it is that some plan cannot he devised to settle this matter. The longer it remains unsettled the worse for education and all parties concerned. I hold that Roman Catholics have a right to equality of treatment with Protestants; and specially no minority, as the Protestants of Ireland are, should have exceptional endowments, rights, and privileges which are denied to the majority. I know it is said that Dublin University is open to Catholics. But suppose it is—and I admit it is—that, I say, is not equality of treatment. The whole trend, and tendency, and tone and atmosphere of the Dublin University are Protestant or set to Protestantism, and I freely confess that, unless some other arrangement could be arrived at

  525
  than now exists, were I a Catholic I would be slow to enter such an institution. Unless compelled by absolute necessity, I freely admit I, as a Protestant, would not go to a Catholic University similarly conditioned to Protestantism as the Dublin University is to Catholicism. And although I think I am as liberal and free from bigotry as any man in the kingdom, yet it I had sons to be trained I would assuredly not send them to a Catholic university. Not that I would dread the companionship of Catholic boys, but I would not on any account wish them to imbibe Roman Catholic principles. I can therefore deeply sympathise with Roman Catholics in their desire to obtain proper facilities for the training of their youths, and I shall support them in any reasonable demand for that purpose, and the sooner these facilities are granted the better. Were I asked which I would prefer—the grafting of a Catholic college on the Dublin University, or the establishment and endowment Of a brand new Catholic University, as a Protestant I distinctly prefer a new university, and if the new university be even a gingerbread one, as the hon. Member for East Down described it, and if the Catholics accept it, and are unable to hold their own with the older university, it is their own loss and to the gain of the Protestants. The solicitude of the Member for East Down as to the value of the respective degrees is useless under those circumstances. Let the Protestants retain the old. Let the Roman Catholics get the new, with which they will be satisfied, and end this unhappy state of affairs.
  MR. MURNAGHAN: The hon. and learned Member for North Antrim is one of the ascendency party in Ireland which possesses all the privileges and advantages, and he therefore does not like that his fellow-countrymen should share them, because he thinks if they had a chance equal to his own his present advantages would be less open to him and his class. I must say that the statement
  526
  of the First Lord of the Treasury to-day is strangely at variance with his expressions on former occasions, and I doubt if ever in this House there was such a retreat on the part an important Minister as that which we have witnessed. I would wish to direct the attention of the Committee to expressions used on this subject by Ministers of the day on previous occasions, who were not afraid to pledge their Governments to action. In 1885 the then Chancellor of the Exchequer said:
  "If we be in office next year I hope that we shall be able to advance some proposal which will be a satisfactory settlement of this important question."
  How different are those words from the words that fell from the lips of the right hon. Gentleman today. He could not speak as a member of the Government at all. His missionary labours admittedly have been a failure, and he now tells the people of Ireland that they may have to wait for many a day for the realisation of their hope of having higher education for their children. The Leader of the House in 1889 used these words with reference to this subject on the Appropriation Bill:—
  "We have no alternative but to try to devise some means by which the wants of the Catholic population will be met."
  In 1889—ten long years ago—a Minister of the Crown had no alternative but to settle this matter——
  It being midnight, the Chairman left the chair to make his Report to the House.
  Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.

SUPPLY [22ND JUNE].
Resolution reported.
CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES, 1899–1900.

  CLASS III.
  "That a sum, not exceeding £39,895, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete

  527
  the sum necessary to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1900, for Criminal Prosecutions and other Law Charges in Ireland."
  Resolution agreed to.

LINCOLNSHIRE CORONERS BILL. [Lords.]
Considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
Clause 1:—
Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.

TELEGRAPHS (TELEPHONIC COMMUNICATION) BILL.
On the motion for adjournment:—
MR. DALZIEL: As I see the right hon. Gentleman the Secre-
528
tary of the Treasury in his place, perhaps he would tell us when the motion for referring the Telephones Bill to the Standing Committee will be taken.
THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY (Sir W. H. WALROND,): It is down as third Order for Monday.
MR. DALZIEL: Will it be taken on Monday?
SIR W. H. WALROND: I hope so.
Adjourned at five minutes after Twelve o'clock, till Monday next.

PRIVATE BILL BUSIXESS.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House that the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificates from the Examiners that the further Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have been complied with:
DERBY CORPORATION TRAMWAYS, ETC.
  WALKER AND WALLSEND UNION GAS (ELECTRIC LIGHTING).
    LOWESTOFT PROMENADE PIER.
    Also the Certificate that no Standing Orders are applicable to the following Bill:
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 5).
Also the Certificates that the further Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have not been complied with:
GODALMING CORPORATION WATER.
  BRADFORD TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMENT.
    BEXHILL AND ROTHERF FELD RAILWAY.
    And also the Certificates that the Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have been complied with—
ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 18).
  ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 19).

    PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 1).
    LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (MONEY).
    The same were ordered to lie on the Table.

BEXHILL AND ROTHERFIELD RAILWAY BILL.
  GODALMING COEPORATION WATER BILL.

    BRADFORD TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMENT BILL.
    Examiner's Certificates of non-compliance with the Standing Orders referred
    370
    to the Standing Orders Committee on Tuesday next.

GREAT WESTERN AND GREAT CENTRAL RAILWAY COMPANIES BILL.
A witness ordered to attend the Select Committee.
FISHGUARD AND ROSSLARE RAILWAYS AND HARBOURS BILL.
The Chairman of Committees informed the House that the opposition to the Bill was withdrawn.
GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY BILL.
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill, the opposition thereto having been withdrawn; read, and ordered to lie on the Table; the Orders made on the 9th of May and Thursday last discharged; and Bill committed.
MILTON CREEK CONSERVANCY BILL.
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill, the opposition thereto having been withdrawn; read, and ordered to lie on the Table; the Orders made on the 8th of June and Thursday last discharged; and Bill committed.
CENTRAL LONDON RAILWAY BILL.
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill, the opposition thareto having been withdrawn; read, and ordered to lie on the Table: the Orders made on the 9th of May and the 12th inst. discharged; and Bill committed.
FISHGUARD WATER AND GAS BILL.
Reported with Amendments.
STOCKPORT CORPORATION WATER BILL.
Reported from the Select Committee with Amendments.
BELFAST AND NORTHERN COUNTIES RAILWAY BILL.
The Queen's Consent signified, and Bill reported without Amendment.
SOUTH EASTERN AND LONDON, CHATHAM, AND DOVER RAILWAYM COMPANIES BILL.
Reported with Amendments.
FYLDE WATER BOARD BILL [Lords.] BARRY RAILWAY BILL.
  LANCASHIRE AND YORKSHIRE RAILWAY (NEW RAILWAYS) BILL.

    LANCASHIRE AND YORKSHIRE RAILWAY (VARIOUS POWERS) BILL.
    AIRE AND CALDER NAVIGATION BILL.
    Reported with Amendments.

WEST GLOUCESTERSHIRE WATER BILL.
Reported with an Amendment.
TRAMWAYS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 2) BILL. [Lords.]
Reported from the Select Committee without Amendment, and committed to a Committee of the whole House.
TRAMWAYS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 3) BILL. [Lords]
Reported from the Select Committee with Amendments, and committed to a Committee of the whole House.
GOOLE URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
Leave given to the Select Committee to adjourn over Monday next.
DARWEN CORPORATION BILL.
  BLACKPOOL IMPROVEMENT BILL.
    DUBLIN CORPORATION BILL.
    Read 2a, and committed; the Committees to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE RAILWAY BILL. [Lords.]
  GREAT EASTERN RAILWAY (GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [Lords.]
  Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
EDINBURGH CORPORATION BILL.
  WETHERBY DISTRICT WATER BILL.
    SOUTH-EASTERN RAILWAY BILL.
    Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 4) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; Read 1a; to be printed; and referred to the Examiners. (No. 144.)
DERWENT VALLEY WATER BILL.
  HARROW AND UXBRIDGE RAILWAY BILL.

    IONIAN BANK BILL.
    LONDON, WALTHAMSTOW AND EPPING FOREST BILL.
    WORCESTERSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL BILL.
    Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and referred to the Examiners.

ABERDEEN CORPORATION BILL. [Lords.]
Returned from the Commons agreed to, with Amendments: The said Amendments considered, and agreed to.
ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 18) BILL.
  ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 19) BILL.
    PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 1) BILL.
    To be read 2a on Monday next.—(The Earl of Dudley.)
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES) BILL.
  LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (POOR LAW) BILL.

    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (GAS) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 2) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 5) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 7) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 8) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 9) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 11) BILL.
    To be read 2a on Tuesday next.—(The Lord Harris.)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDER (No. 1) BILL.
  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS No. 2) BILL.

    LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 3) BILL.
    LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS (HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES) (No. 2) BILL.
    To be read 2a on Tuesday next.—(The Earl of Denbigh.)

EDUCATION DEPARTMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER CONFIRMATION (LONDON) BILL. [Lords.]
House in Committee (according to order); the Amendments proposed by the Select Committee made; Standing Committee negatived; the Report of Amendments to be received on Monday next.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 3) BILL.
  HOSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES PROVISIONAL ORDER (BORROWSTOUNNESS) BILL.
  House in Committee (according to order); Bills reported without Amendment; Standing Committee negatived: and Bills to be read 3a on Monday next.
PETITIONS.
  MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS (BOROUGH FUNDS) ACT, 1872.
  Petition for Amendment of, of Corporation of Colchester; read, and ordered to lie on the Table.
  LONDON GOVERNMENT BILL.
  Petition for Amendment of, of Vestry of St. James's, Westminster; read, and ordered to lie on the Table.
RETURNS, REPOPTS, &c.
  EDUCATION DEPARTMENT—EASTERN DIVISION.
  General Report for the year 1898, by W. E. Currey, Chief Inspector.

  TRADE REPORTS, 1899.
  Annual Series: No. 2,295. United States (States of Oregon, Idaho, and Washington).
  Presented (by command), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  PILOTAGE.
  Abstract of Returns relating to pilots and pilotage in the United Kingdom (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 284, of Session 1898) (as furnished by the various pilotage authorities), for the year ended 31st December, 1898. Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), and ordered to lie on the Table.
QUESTIONS.

  LAND TENURE IN WALES.
  EARL CARRINGTON: My Lords, rise to call attention to the subject of land tenure in Wales and Monmouthshire, and to ask whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to initiate any legislation on the subject. I think my first duty is to remind your Lordships that in 1892 the Welsh landlords asked for a Royal Commission to inquire into the subject which I have the honour to bring before your Lordships, but this Commission was refused by the noble Marquess at the head of the Government. In 1893 a Liberal Government came into power, and one of the first things which Mr. Gladstone's Government did was to appoint a Royal Commission to inquire into the conditions and circumstances under which the land in Wales and Monmouthshire was held, occupied, and cultivated. It was generally considered to be a very fair Commission. Lord Kenyon and Sir John Llewellyn, two of the best land-lands in Wales, represented the landlords' interests. Mr. Griffiths, of Pembrokeshire, and Mr. Richard Jones, of Montgomeryshire, two of the most respected farmers in Wales, represented the tenant farmers. The remaining members were Mr. Brynmor Jones, Q.C., M.P., a Welshman and a county court judge, well acquainted with Welsh life generally; Mr. Groves, chairman of the Monmouthshire County Council; Principal Rhys, of Jesus College, Oxford; Mr. Seebohm, the well-known writer. I was appointed Chairman, and we all took our coats off to the work we had in hand. The Commissioners were occupied in their labours for three years, during the whole of which time we worked very harmoniously and very hard. We sat 80 times in Wales and 19 times in London for the purpose of hearing evidence, and on 23 occasions the number of witnesses who were anxious to appear before us was so large that we had to sit in two Courts. On several occasions we sat from 10 o'clock in the morning until 9 o'clock at night.—In London we sat in private 45 times, and we examined in all 1,100 witnesses. Two landlords' protection societies, to watch the landlords' side of the case, were instituted under the management of Mr. Vincent, a barrister, a writer for The Times, and a gentleman supposed to have great influence on that

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  journal. No tenants' organisation for the whole of Wales was formed, but local committees of tenant farmers were formed in most districts, and they had the sympathetic assistance of the vernacular Press. Everywhere we found the truest loyalty towards the Queen and all the Royal Family, and everywhere we received the greatest kindness, civility, and hospitality, and we were at once struck with the good management and liberality of many of the big Welsh landlords, pre-eminent amongst whom, without a single exception, were the Welsh Members of your Lordships' House. Our Report, which has been criticised as being too voluminous, is divided into parts. Book I presents a general view of the conditions and circumstances under which land in Wales and Monmouthshire is occupied and cultivated, with a history of land tenure in Wales. This portion of the Report was compiled and signed by all the Commissioners, and is, I venture to think, a valuable description of the customs of the Principality in matters relating to agriculture and the farm, and is, as a matter of fact, accepted as a great authoritative work, and will, I believe, as time goes on, become more and more appreciated. Book II. contains the conclusions and recommendations of the Commissioners as to legislative and administrative action. There is first the Report of the majority, then the separate Report of the minority, and, lastly, a summary of recommendations signed by all the Commissioners, which, therefore, constitutes the unanimous Report of the Commission. It is only of this unanimous Report that I wish to speak, and I only need trouble your Lordships with four of the eleven recommendations which it contains. The first of these is more of a statement than a recommendation, and it is to the effect that Wales requires separate legislation. The words of the Report assented to by all the Commissioners are these:
  "We think that the circumstances disclosed in regard to Wales by our inquiry urgently call for legislation … and it would be expedient to deal with the case of Wales in a separate Bill."
  Again, in another paragraph, the minority say:
  "We are fully sensible that there may nevertheless be economic differences between the agricultural problems of the two countries requiring careful consideration."
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  This has been denied, but I can only say that those who deny that Wales differs from England are divided into two classes—those who have very small powers of observation, and those who have lived in England and not in Wales, or vice versa. The second recommendation is:
  "In cases of the death of the owner of an estate, or of the sale of an estate, the tenant should be protected by law in the occupation of his farm at the old rent for three years, instead of one year as at present, provided he fulfils certain conditions."
  Of course, the conditions winch must be observed are the punctual payment of rent and the proper cultivation of the land in a husband manlike manner. There may be objections to this recommendation, but I should like to call your Lordships' attention to the manner in which estates are sold in Wales. When it has been decided to put an estate into the market, one year's notice to quit to every tenant is invariably given, and often the estate is revalued, with a consequent increase in the rents. Notice is given to quit at Michaelmas, and the estate is generally put up for sale in the following June, when the auctioneer is able to say to intending parties:
  "If you purchase you have a perfectly free hand You may allow the tenants to remain at the old rent, you may raise the rent if you please, or you may get rid of the tenants within three months and put in your own men, or farm the land yourselves."
  Then the tenant must go, and all the compensation he would get would be under the Agricultural Holdings Act, which is generally acknowledged not to be worth the paper it is written on. Our proposal was that when an estate owner died, or when it is necessary that an estate should be sold, the tenant should be entitled to remain on his farm for three years from the date of sale at the old rent, so as to give him time to look round to provide himself, if necessary, with a new occupation, and so avoid losing the entire fruits of his good industry. This proposal, you will find, was recommended by the whole of the Commissioners. The third recommendation to which I would call your Lordships' attention was:
  "In the event of the tenant giving notice to quit, with the view, say, of getting his rent reduced, though he might afterwards make arrangements with his landlord to go on with the farm, or in cases of readjustments of rent

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  by the landlord, these should be constituted fresh lettings, and the tenant should be compensated for the improvements up to that date under the Agricultural Holdings Act."
  This recommendation, which was also agreed to by the Conservative members on the Commission, would secure the reform for which tenant farmers through- out Great Britain have fought so long—namely, compensation to the sitting tenant; and on any re-arrangement of the terms of the tenancy all that the tenant had done would be allowed for before the new rent was fixed. The other recommendation of the unanimous Report, which was intended to prevent capricious evictions, was:
  "Notice to quit should be given for specified reasons only, such as non-payment of rent and non-compliance with the terms of agreement, and if given for any other reason the tenant should receive compensation for disturbance, in addition to compensation for his improvements."
  It is generally asserted that in Wales there are no such things as evictions, but I will quote one instance that struck me very forcibly. A Mr. Jones stated the following case. His father, Elias Jones, of Tan-y-Castell farm, was the occupier of a farm within sight of Snowdon, in the parish of Dolwyddelan, which his family had occupied for over 500 years. He altogether held three farms, on one of which there stood the old castle of Dolwyddelan, a picturesque spot, in which tradition says Prince Llewellyn himself was born. It was acknowledged that the farmer had built the house and all the walls, and had reclaimed land on the mountain side. Mr. Elias Jones happened to be a Nonconformist, and he happened also to be a Liberal. He was unfortunate enough to fall foul of the parson—he voted in the Liberal interest in 1868, and was promptly given 12 months' notice to quit by his landlord, who turned him out of his house and home, and consequently compelled him to seek a resting place elsewhere. I do not think there is one single Member of your Lordships' House who would not admit that this is a sad and shameful story, but it is absolutely true. And after the man had recited this story he pointed across the table and said to me:
  "Mr. Chairman, the man who did this cruel thing was your own uncle, Alberic, Lord Willoughby De Eresby."
  Your Lordships laugh, but I do not think Mr. Elias Jones saw anything to laugh at
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  in it. I say, without fear of contradiction, that it is a monstrous thing that a man who is the owner of an estate should not be prevented by law from doing such a cruel thing as to evict a man without compensation, at 12 months' notice, whose family has been 500 years on the ground. My uncle inherited the Welsh estate which came into the family in the 14th century. Since that time the old house on the estate in which he lived, and which, by a generous arrangement with my cousin, Lord Ancaster, is now in my possession, has never been sold or let to a stranger. The owners of the estate took a great pride in maintaining the most friendly relations with their tenants, and I may mention, as an instance of the good feeling which existed, the fact that when my grandfather, who was universally known throughout North Wales as "the good Lord Willoughby," paid his annual visitor to Gwydyr he was invariably drawn from Bettws, a distance of three miles, by the tenantry on the estate. That feeling has been kept up, and now exists in a marked degree in the case of Lord Ancaster, my cousin, who, under our grandfather's will, inherited the vast estates in Lincolnshire and Scotland, as well as in Wales, which were added to already very large property in Lincolnshire. Lord Ancaster has kept up the traditions of the family, and is well known as one of the most generous and practical landlords in the whole of the United Kingdom. In the same year (1868) tenants of a whole district in Cardiganshire were evicted for voting contrary to the wishes and proclivities of their landlord. It will probably be said that some of these evictions happened years ago, and are now forgotten. It may be true that the landlords have forgotten, but not so the evicted tenants, who never forget their feelings on being evicted. But is it true that tenants have not been cleared off their farms during more recent times? In Denbighshire a Mr. Pochin bought a property 20 years ago when there were 25 tenants on the estate, but at the present moment, out of these 25 he has only four of them left. Only those with a knowledge of Welsh customs and conditions of farming can estimate the state of feeling which exists in consequence of these occurrences. I think I have said enough on this point, but if necessary I could give many more instances of people being turned

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  out of their farms unjustly. There is one further point to which I should like to draw your Lordships' attention—a point referred to in the minority Report of the Commissioners. In case of something like a general dispute on an estate between the landlord and the tenants as to the rents or the conditions of tenancy, the minority recommended that the Board of Agriculture should appoint a mediator to bring about, if possible, a friendly settlement. But, according to their proposal, he was not to have any compulsory powers, so that, after taking immense trouble in the matter, his advice might at the last moment be rejected by either party or by a few refractory tenants. This in reality meant an optional land court. These suggestions, coming as they did from Conservative landlords, made it very plain that the necessity for an inquiry as to how land was held and occupied in Wales was very urgent, and that drastic changes in land tenure were imperative. On the question of the land court I should like to say a word. I have made it a practice on my estates, when any dispute arises as to rents, to refer the question to an independent arbiter agreed to by both parties, and his decision is final. This custom, I believe, is also adopted on Lord Kintore's estates in Aberdeenshire, and works with the happiest results. I have a tenant whose father began farming our estate 50 years ago, and who has succeeded so well that he now spends £5,000 a year in wages, and occupies four or five farms in North Bucks. He complained of his rent, and said it must be materially reduced. The question was referred to an eminent valuer at Bedford, who went carefully into the matter, and reduced the rent by £100 a year. This the tenant cheerfully accepted, and he went on with his farms. In the south of the County of Bucks another tenant who farms about 800 acres also complained of his rent being too high. We agreed upon an independent valuer, who went through the farms, and in that case the rent was increased by exactly the same amount as the previous decrease. These instances show that landlords need not be afraid of independent arbitration, for there are honest firms of high standing who will do their duty in such cases fearlessly and honourably without seeking to do injustice to either landlord or tenant. My Lords, I have, with great respect, to thank your
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  Lordships for having given me this opportunity of laying before you the unanimous recommendations of the Royal Commission, and I have only one more word to say in conclusion. When I mentioned my intention of bringing this matter before your Lordships I was asked over and over again what was the use of doing so. People said: "The best you can expect is that the matter will be dismissed with contemptuous indifference; if you bring in a Bill it will be thrown out by an enormous majority, and at the same time will afford an opportunity for opponents of any land reform whatever to hold up the Royal Commission to ridicule and to misrepresent it as an ignorant, unfair, and partisan body created for the sole purpose of attacking property in general and Welsh landlords in particular." My Lords, I have no fear of this, for thirty years' experience of your Lordships' House has taught me that the great majority of Peers are always disposed to treat any proposals for the uplifting of the community with patience and consideration, however distasteful or unpopular they may be to some members of this House. Besides, public opinion on land questions is advancing by leaps and bounds. Every Member on the Opposition front bench in the House of Commons two years ago voted or paired in favour of Mr. Vaughan Davies's Bill to establish a Land Court, and, what I think is more important still, the Conservative candidate for East Denbighshire at the bye-election, having the support of the whole Unionist Party, of every parson and of every squire, publicly pledged himself, if returned, to bring in a Bill embodying the unanimous recommendations of the Welsh Land Commission. In a letter published in The Times on January 26, 1898, he said:
  "The portion of the Report which was unanimous contains little or nothing to which a Tory could object."
  I honestly believe that these recommendations, if carried into law, would do no harm to landlords, while they would give security and confidence to hundreds of farmers whose families have for many hundreds of years been building houses and walls, and reclaiming land higher and higher up the mountain side, and whose only prayer and hope is to be allowed to remain in peace in their old homes, in the land of their fathers, the land they love so well. I beg leave to

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  ask Her Majesty's Government the question which stands in my name.
  THE DUKE or ARGYLL: My Lords, with the permission of my noble friend at the head of the Government I rise to intervene for a few moments between the noble Lord opposite and the answer which he expects to get from the Government. I can assure the noble Earl opposite that nothing which he has said or could say on this question would be received with contumely by any Member of this House. We are all desirous of treating this question earnestly and seriously. I think it possible that, burdened as my noble friend beside me is with his enormous work as Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, he may not be aware of all the facts which bear on this question. In the first place permit me to remind the House that the question of the noble Earl amounts to nothing less than asking the Government whether they are prepared to bring in a new Irish Land Bill for the Principality of Wales and the County of Monmouth. Just think what a question this is to put at this time of the session! We have now reached nearly the end of June, and the noble Earl must have known that the answer, so far as a promise of immediate legislation is concerned, must be in the negative. Perhaps the noble Earl wishes to know whether the Government will introduce a measure in a future session, but he surely cannot expect such an answer from my noble friend now. That is impossible. I will, with your Lordships' permission, place before the House some facts connected with the Welsh Land Commission which have struck me very much. The noble Earl has dwelt very much upon the excellence of his Commission, and upon the distinguished, at least excellent and worthy, men who were upon it. And he has represented it to your Lordships as being a body whose opinion must carry great authority. In one sense I fully agree, but in another sense I venture to disagree. and I take this opportunity of protesting against the system which is growing of legislating by Commissions—not merely governing by Commissions, but legislating by Commissions. What happens in a case of this kind? A Liberal Government is in difficulty. They wish to summon up their resources and to add to
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  them. They hear of some great portion of the community who are anxious to get something from their neighbours by the help of Parliament, which the Government are not quite prepared to give them. What is the result? They say, "Oh, we will issue a Commission to inquire." The result of that Commission is foreknown. It is generally composed of a majority of men of extreme, or, at least, of strong opinions. There are interspersed a few who have more moderate leanings, and one or two landlords are generally put in just to give the Commission an appearance of impartiality. Then comes the Report, not dealing with facts—that would be legitimate—but dealing with recommendations of the most fundamental character to alter, perhaps, the whole constitution of society. For that work such men, I venture to say, are not competent. It would require such men as the framers of the American Constitution to reconstitute society and rearrange the fundamental laws of property. The gentlemen upon this Commission were no doubt excellently qualified for ascertaining facts, and not one fact, I am sure, would they misrepresent for the purpose of their opinion, but they are not the men to whom I would trust such a great and fundamental question as this. On that Commission, with the exception of the noble Earl opposite, whom we all respect and regard, for he has discharged every public duty to which he has been called in an admirable manner, there was but one gentleman who, I venture to say, has ever been heard of, or probably ever will be heard of, outside the Principality of Wales, and that is Mr. Seebohm. With great respect to the noble Earl opposite and to all his colleagues, I contend that this is not a body to which we can safely trust recommendations of a character such as those to which he has alluded. I should like very much to know how many members of your Lordships' House have ever read the Report, which, with the evidence, extends to some 700 closely printed pages. I have never met a single noble Lord who has read, learned, and inwardly digested that Report. I do not say there is not a great deal of very useful information in it, but it is a most miscellaneous Report. For instance, there is a most entertaining chapter on the wild birds and wild beasts of Wales in the 10th century, and being interested in natural history I was delighted to read it, but I cannot see what

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  this has to do with the question of land tenure. I have picked some salient facts out of the Report, but I do not think they tell in the direction of the recommendations. In the first place, the Commission found that Wales had been less affected by agricultural distress than either England or Scotland; and, in the second place, that improvements in Wales are, as a rule, made by the landlord and not by the tenant, as in Ireland. The noble Lord shakes his head, but I take this from his own Report, and that fact alters the whole state of the case. A good many of your Lordships were very much exercised about despoiling Irish landlords of a great part of their birthright, and we always salved our consciences by saying that in Ireland all the improvements were carried out by the tenant. You cannot say that of Wales. There is another fact brought out in the Report which I regard as most striking, because it goes far to show that there has been very little distress in Wales, and that, on the whole, the condition of the country is good. It is this, that there are no vacant farms and no derelict farms in the whole of Wales. The noble Earl (Earl Carrington) says "Hear, hear." Very well; but what is the case in England and in some parts of Scotland? There are to be found farms which cannot be let because agricultural distress is so great that no profit can be made, and others which are worked by the owner with no profit at all; but in Wales there is an eager competition for farms, which forces up the rents. Who are the competitors for these farms? In England and Scotland we suffer from the competition of strangers and foreigners, who bring in produce and undersell us; but are they foreigners who go in to compete against the natives in Wales? Oh, no. The Commission does not say so; it does not even hint it. The high price of Welsh farms is entirely due to the competition of Welshmen among themselves. Does that look like a very unhappy condition of things? The alleged insecurity of tenure, at all events, does not prevent Welsh people competing against themselves. They wish for the farms in order to establish their sons and grandsons in a healthy and, on the whole, a desirable occupation. It seems to me a monstrous proposition to say that this is a state of things which requires revolutionary agrarian legislation. There is another element which increases
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  the competition for these farms—namely, the fact that they are mostly small farms, to which the working classes can aspire. I very much wonder who is the writer of the Report.
  EARL CARRINGTON: I ought to have explained that, having seen the disadvantage of a Report being written by the secretary at the dictation of the chairman, and thrown at the heads of the Commission, I asked the whole of the members to write what portions they would select themselves, and they did so. It is not, therefore, written by one individual, but piecemeal by the whole. It was put together and talked over line by line, and in that way the Report expresses the unanimous opinion of the Commission.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLL: Well, all I can say is there must have been some gentlemen on the Commission who had very strange notions of intelligent and logical propositions. I confess that I have never read a Report so full of bombast and empty phrases, and I certainly have never read a Parliamentary Paper which was in some parts so utterly unintelligible. Here is a specimen:
  "With reference to the general economic management of an estate, we think that the influence of the landlord should be exerted towards emphasising its solidarity as an economic unit upon which a particular industry is to be carried on."
  I recommend my noble friends who own property in Wales to remember that that is the principle on which they ought to manage their estates. How an estate, especially a Welsh estate, which often extends from the top of a mountain to the bottom of a valley, and in which the principles of farming and everything connected with the land varies, can be "an economic unit," I cannot understand. The sentence I have quoted is nonsense. Let me mention to the House a circumstance about this Commission which happened to myself. I saw in the papers that a certain Scotchman, whom I shall not name, had gfven the most absurd evidence about Scotland before the Commission, and accordingly I wrote to the secretary and asked to be allowed to appear in order that I might answer some of the statements made by this gentleman. After some correspondence had passed I appeared before the Commission and gave evidence.

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  They were good enough to be struck with a principle I laid down, which I have often emphasised in this House in connection with the Irish Land Acts—namely, that if the State undertakes to take away a portion of a man's property for public reasons, the principle should be laid down upon which the land is valued or assessed. The noble Earl opposite and his colleagues agreed, and they proposed that the court should be guided by general rules and principles. I looked with great anxiety to see what these general rules and regulations were, but this is what the Commissioners say:
  "The first principle which should be laid down is that the court should separate the value of the land in its improved condition from its value in its unimproved condition—that is, its prairie value."
  I ask your Lordships if any one of you can tell me what prairie value is. I have tried, but have failed to get an explanation. I am not certain about the origin of this clap-trap word, but my belief is that it had an American-Irish origin, and that it means, practically, land which has no value at all. Prairie land may be the richest land in the world, and very often is, but the value of everything is in the demand for it, not in its own qualities. A prairie is a country where there is no settlement, where there is no population, and therefore where there is no demand for the land; and consequently what the Commission meant when they said its "prairie value" was absolutely nothing, as it would have no value. That is the first principle which this Commission says is to be considered by the new Land Courts when they are erected. All this is most miserable clap-trap. I am not going to follow the noble Lord in detail, but I contend that at the present moment no foundation has been laid, in fact, in argument, or in principle by the noble Lord's Commission for any revolutionary Land Act for Wales. That is what I say, and what I hope we shall heat from the noble Marquess is the conclusion to which the Government have come.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: My Lords, the noble Earl who presided over the Welsh Land Commission did well in altering the date which had been fixed for his notice, because if the notice had, as was originally intended, followed Lord Inchiquin's notice with reference to the Irish Land Acts, the noble Lord, after
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  that discussion, could hardly, I venture to think, have proposed legislation of the same sort for Wales. Neither the Commission nor the noble Earl has shown any reason why Wales should have different legislation to England in this matter; if any place could claim exceptional legislation, it would be Essex. Wales neither requires it nor demands it. The noble Earl stated that the Commission was a very fair one, but my recollection is that it was considered a packed one at the time, and was composed almost entirely of Gladstonians with a set purpose before them. Several of the members of the Commission had fads, and did nothing but put questions which had no reference whatever to land tenure. If the noble Earl had been in his place last Monday he would have heard a lecture on the evils of irrelevancy, deserved by a speech of May 16th, but perhaps not on that occasion, and a statement to the effect that Her Majesty's Government had no time left this session for initiating any legislation, and that the noble Marquess at the head of the Government had a very poor opinion of Royal Commissions; and I certainly think the Welsh Land Commission has done more to bring Commissions into disrepute than any other Commission I can remember. The members touted for Land Courts and for complaints against landlords, and the noble Chairman touted with such efficiency that he had a complaint made against his own action in selling machinery belonging to his tenant along with a flour-mill. I hasten to say that he was completely cleared of this accusation, but that did not prevent him from encouraging others equally fabulous. Professor Rhys was also accused of harsh action, when Bursar of Jesus College. So far as I can see, the only purpose for bringing forward this question to-day is to cause agitation in Wales, and therefore it is a most mischievous motion.
  THE PRIME MINISTER AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (The Marquess of SALISBURY): My Lords, I have not many observations with which to trouble your Lordships. I am afraid that I must plead guilty to the charge in which both the first speakers enveloped the House of not having studied the whole of the Report of the Royal Commission. Your Lordships will appreciate the nature of

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  the task which would have been imposed upon any Peer who attempted to do that when I tell you that if that Report was placed before me now I should not be able to see any of the noble Lords on the opposite benches.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: You are including the voluminous evidence; the Report is not so large.
  THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The evidence is by far the most valuable portion of the Report. I only wish to say, in answer to the noble Lord, that we have not the slightest intention during the present session of attacking the Welsh agrarian question, and I do not venture upon any prophecy as to the date when the desire will seize us. I do not myself think that it is desirable to have an agrarian measure for Wales. When the Irish question was put before us we were always told that Ireland was a highly exceptional country, and that the precedents which were created then would not be employed to the injury of property in this island. I am afraid that I always thought this too sanguine a view, but, at all events, such reasons as there were, to which I never attached great value, for the Irish Act, in no way applies to Wales. The proposal of the noble Lord was, I think, enveloped in unnecessary complications. He tried to persuade us that he was simply the mouthpiece of his Commission at the moment when it became unanimous; but he gave us a speech which, if it hail any meaning or object at all, must have pointed—and I do not think he will deny it—to the erection of a Land Court with compulsory powers. That is, to give to some persons a right to take money out of the pockets of the landlord and to put it into the pockets of the tenants. To legislation of that kind I certainly feel no inclination whatever, and I believe it would do nothing but harm. The noble Lord read us a summary of the recommendations of the Commission, and reading them over with some skill, I think, he tried to persuade himself and the House that the minority of the Commission had reported in favour of a compulsory Land Court. The compulsory Land Court is the whole kernel and gist of the matter—if it is not compulsory it is nothing—whether this power is to be given to any person, however selected, to take the money from
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  the landlord and give it to the tenant. To this legislation certainly the Commission, when it became unanimous, had not committed itself. Whenever a serious proposal of that kind comes before the House then we may deal with it in detail. I can only say now that the whole of the noble Lord's argument appeared to rest on the fact that the rights of property had been occasionally, it may be frequently, abused. But the same argument may be applied to all rights of property in all countries and at all times, and with reference to property of every sort. It is quite as forcible—in- deed, it is more—in respect of personal property as between the creditor and the debtor, whose proceedings constitute a great part of the business of the courts of this country. There are numberless cases of gross hardship where the creditor by enforcing his rights has reduced the debtor to misery and despair. But we have not yet been asked on that account to put an end to the right with which the debtor himself has invested the creditor, because it is known that if we did that we would shatter the progress and prosperity of the country and bring all commercial action to an end. There is no other ground than these occasional, and I believe very occasional, abuses of the rights of property, which existed to a much greater extent 30 or 40 years ago than they do now. This House, at least, has never accepted the principle that because of such abuses rights of property should cease. If a compulsory Land Court were erected all independent rights of property in land would cease, and therefore I do not believe that under any circumstances the legislature of this country would adopt so dangerous a principle in the Statute Book as far as it affects this island. I am afraid, therefore, that I can give the noble Lord no hope of an agrarian Bill. He mentioned some other matters that were recommended by a unanimous Commission; they did not seem to me matters of very great importance, and whether they are worthy of legislation I do not know without more careful examination, but the essence of the whole matter is a compulsory Land Court, and to a compulsory Land Court I am entirely opposed.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: My Lords, the noble Marquess in the last few remarks he made, admitted that there

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  might be, though he did not say that he in any way accepted them, recommendations in the Commissioners' Report apart from the question of the Land Court which might deserve consideration. With regard to the noble Duke, he is undoubtedly well acquainted with the land question, and has paid great attention to it, but he has always seemed to me to look at it from a single point of view—that no concession that can be avoided should be made to tenantry; that the extreme rights of landlords are in accordance with the principles of free contract, and ought to be maintained. He was always a consistent, conscientious, and able opponent of the legislation for which we on this side of the House were responsible in regard to Irish land, and the fault I find with the attitude he has assumed is this, that he has a set of economic principles which are to be applied, like the bed of Procrustes, to all and every situation, whatever it may be. If the tenant does not fit into the bed upon which he has to lie it is his fault, and he must suffer the consequences. I dare say he would say that applies equally to landlords, but I do not believe it is wise or safe to deal, especially with land, upon what I may call cut-and-dried principles. Of course, it does not follow that every proposal for reform of the land laws must be a wise one, but the general and steady and, as I think, undiscriminating opposition of the noble Duke to any reform is not wise, and, I think, is dangerous and injurious to the welfare of the State.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLL: That is not my position. I have supported several Amending Acts.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: That is my view of the noble Duke's position; it is my general deduction from the many very able and very interesting speeches I have heard from him on the subject. With regard to the Report itself, I do not think it is open to the criticism of the noble Duke, though he is a master of language and composition; but when he throws so much obloquy on the expression "an estate an economic unit," I venture to differ from him, and to ask him for a precise definition. I take it in its ordinary acceptation, and I do not see why an estate cannot be an economic unit. No doubt the noble Duke will say it is not an economic unit in this sense, that there must be variety of soil and
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  situation on a large estate; but that also applies to a farm. The soil and situation are not the same all over a farm, but I think the expression is sufficiently intelligible, and it seems to me not open to serious rebuke. For the rest of the Report, the noble Duke dismisses it with the words "miserable clap-trap." There is nothing so easy as to treat a matter in that way. I do not think the grievances of the Welsh tenants can be regarded as miserable clap-trap. My belief is that the Welsh tenants have grievances, and that the case for Wales consists in this, so far as I know—I do not profess intimate acquaintance with the Principality—the general condition of agricultural tenants differs materially and seriously from the condition in England. That would be my answer to the noble Marquess. I do not contest the view of the noble Marquess as to the danger of disturbing a system upon which we have for generations rested in this country; but if there is in one portion of the island a particular position, and a state of things very different from that to which we are accustomed, I do not think it is always wise or safe to apply a principle that may be safely applied to other parts of the country, simply from fear and dread that we may be introducing some economic principle not entirely in accordance with our general views in regard to land. I confess I am not thoroughly acquainted with the evidence given before the Commission, nor do I think it is necessary as a qualification for speaking on the Report unless the evidence comes within moderate compass. I content myself with reading the Report and verifying any particular part of it by reference to the evidence. But I remember on one occasion reading the whole of the evidence taken before a Commission. That was a Commission on Currency, a subject with which it is not safe to deal unless one goes thoroughly into it. Therefore I made an exception in that case. Though I have not read the evidence taken before the Welsh Land Commission, I have read the Report, and it is very remarkable. I sincerely trust that, whether it is dealt with by the present Government or afterwards, we shall not put aside contemptuously as unworthy of attention the grievances of the Welsh farmers. That they have grievances I am convinced, and these arise from a state of things we are not familiar with here, and I do not think we should lay it down that no remedy can

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  possibly be applied. The noble Duke said with perfect accuracy that the Report is founded on no allegation of agricultural distress, and that in that respect Wales differed from Ireland. It is founded on the grievances of tenant farmers, who hold their land under tenure they consider extremely insecure, and under extreme competition, and these facts show the peculiar position in Wales. The noble Duke asked me if it was usual in Norfolk for tenants to receive notice to quit when an estate was sold. I have never heard of such a thing there. Such a thing being done would probably result in there being no purchaser for the estate. Unlike Wales, we in Norfolk have extreme difficulty in keeping tenants, and it is still more difficult to find new tenants. The whole question deserves careful attention; how far it would be wise to go can only be determined with legislative proposals before us; but I think my noble friend is well justified in bringing the matter forward.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLL: The noble Earl has mistaken my object in referring to the extreme competition in Wales. I quite agree with him that it differentiates the two cases, but the existence of that competition does not tend to prove distrust on the part of the Welsh people of that for which they are competing.

  QUEEN'S BIRTHDAY IN CEYLON.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: My Lords, I rise to ask the Under Secretary for the Colonies what notice the Government has taken, or intends to take, with respect to the proceedings of the Bishop of Colombo in opposition to his Metropolitan, the Bishop of Calcutta, in regard to prayers for the health of Her Majesty the Queen on the occasion of her eightieth birthday. I am perfectly well aware of the fact that the Colonial Office cannot take the same notice of a Bishop's action as they could of the action of a civil servant; but I earnestly hope that the Under Secretary will be able to say something, on behalf of the Government that will in some way remove the bad impression and the discontent which have been caused by the Bishop of Colombo's letter. The facts are these: On May 27th the Bishop of Calcutta wrote the following letter to the Bishops of his province—
  "My dear Lord Bishop,—On the 24th day of next month Her Majesty the Queen,
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  Empress of India, if her life be spared until then, will complete her eightieth year. I desire to suggest to your Lordship, as to the other Bishops of India and Ceylon, that special services should be held on that day in the churches of the Metropolitan Province. It is a day when the hearts of all Christians who are subjects of the Queen-Empress will naturally turn with devout feelings to Almighty God. The occasion is rather personal, perhaps, than official; but it will be none the less impressive if the services, without much form or ceremony, assume the simple character of thanks giving for a unique reign, and of intercession for a beloved and venerated Sovereign, under whose sway India and the whole British Empire have enjoyed a singular felicity. If my suggestion approve itself to your Lordship, you will, no doubt, issue such instructions as are necessary to the clergy of your diocese. I have no right to speak for others than members of the Church of England, but the desire for a religious commemoration of Her Majesty's birthday is already felt, as your Lordship knows, in many quarters, and it seems but natural that I should take this opportunity of expressing the hope that the other religious bodies in India, whether Christian or non-Christian, may be willing to unite with the Church in the manifestation of loyalty to the Queen-Empress, and of gratitude for the manifold blessings of her long and illustrious reign. The fact that prayers should ascend simultaneously in her behalf—not front churches only, but from temples, mosques, and synagogues, and other places of religious worship throughout India and Ceylon, will in itself be a striking instance of that unity for which we all, amidst many grave external differences, do yet in our hearts most earnestly long and pray."
  I will now read to your Lordships the full text, taken from the Reis and Rayyet of May 20th, of the Bishop of Colombo's letter, expressing that dignitary's view of non-Christian prayers, and why Christians cannot join with non-Christians at the celebration by prayer of the Queen-Empress's eightieth birthday:
  "Colombo, May 10, 1899.
  "Rev. and Dear Brother,—I have received, as you may already have learned from the newspapers, an important letter from the Most Rev. the Metropolitan. His Lordship suggests to us a loyal observance of Her Majesty the Queen's eightieth birthday, and expresses a hope that the occasion may be observed also by other Christians and by non-Christians throughout India and Ceylon. In accordance with our Metropolitan's suggestion I request you to notice the eightieth birthday of Her Most Gracious Majesty on the 24th of this month by the use of special prayers and thanks giving. These may be adopted either from the form of prayer for the 30th of June, or from the form used at the Jubilee in 1897. Whether our Christian brethren who are not of the Church of England make any special observance of the day or not, we are perfectly sure that their loyal and religious prayers for our beloved Queen will be acceptable to Almighty God. I must briefly state why I do

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  not ask you to join in hoping that, simultaneously with the prayers of the Church, prayers may be offered in non-Christian places of worship. The letter reached me on Sunday evening the 7th of May, and seeing that the Standing Committee of the Diocese was to meet on Tuesday, the 9th, I welcomed the opportunity of consulting its members about the Metropolitan's suggestion, as I have done in many similar cases. The following resolution was then unanimously carried in a meeting of our clergy (besides myself) and seven laymen, on the motion of the acting archdeacon:—'That this Committee, as representing the Synod of the Diocese of Colombo, while leaving to the Lord Bishop the question of holding special services on the eightieth anniversary of Her Majesty the Queen's birthday, as suggested by the Most Rev. the Metropolitan, respectfully but earnestly deprecate any action intended to imply unity with non-Christian systems in religious worship or prayer.'"
  I omit the remainder of this letter, as it refers to matters that it is not usual to discuss in your Lordship's House. I would observe that the Bishop appears to screen himself behind what he calls a Synod and seven laymen. Was one of them the Colonial Secretary? The Reis and Rayyet concludes:
  "If this be Christianity, what intolerance and how ill suited to the occasion! It is, according to the insular Bishop, Christian blasphemy even to hope that other nationalities will, simultaneously with Christians, offer prayers for Her Majesty. All other prayers are idolatrous and unacceptable to God, who made the Christian, the Jew, the Mussulman, the Hindu, the Parsi, the Jain, the Buddhist, and everything."
  Commenting, on May 28, upon the letter of the Bishop of Colombo, the Indian Spectator said:
  "We have no right to inquire into what is so entirely an affair between a man and his Maker as his religious beliefs. But the Bishop of Colombo's comments on the Metropolitan's suggestion, which, we are glad to say, has been in a sense abundantly carried out—namely, that the professors of non-Christian faiths in this country should join in offering prayers to the Almighty on the Queen's birthday—seem to us to be so opposed to all that is holy in human nature that we may be pardoned for betraying some curiosity as to the Bishop's notions of the Divine Being. 'We believe,' he writes, 'these acts (the acts of Buddha) to be dishonouring to God, and to be in themselves—whatever may be the ignorance of the worshippers—acts of sin.' For the sake of the Bishop, we earnestly hope he wrote in ignorance of the life and work of him whom he denounces in these terms. The Bishop is much mistaken in thinking that God is dishonoured by the acts of Buddha; his sublime
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  self-sacrifice, his fearless pursuit of truth, his boundless compassion for the whole universal nature—if these be sins, we had rather sin with Buddha than shine with 'R. S. Colombo.'"
  I will conclude by reading to your Lordships the telegram which was sent by the Viceroy at Simla to the Queen-Empress, dated May 24th, 1899:
  "The Viceroy begs leave to transmit to your Majesty his respectful sincere congratulations on the happy anniversary of your Majesty's birthday, as well as those of the English officials of your Majesty's service, of the British community in India, and of the vast native population. No such number of human beings has ever before joined in tribute of devotion to a single Sovereign as will be the rejoicing to-day in India over your Majesty's continued welfare and long and blessed reign."
  Her Majesty replied to the Viceroy in the following terms:
  "I am deeply touched by the loyal expressions and good wishes of yourself, my officials, the British community, and my native subjects in India."
  The Reis and Rayyet, in an article on this subject, says:
  "The Bishop of Colombo would not allow Christians to join with non-Christians in their prayer's for Her Majesty. The manner of acceptance of their good wishes by Her Majesty is indeed touching. That truly queenly message to the Viceroy of India is an answer to the narrowness of the Ceylon Bishop, and we hope that prayers sent up by the Hindus, the Mussulmans, the Jews, the Armenians, the Parsis, the Jains, the Sikhs, the Buddhists all have, equally with those of the Christians, reached the Throne of the Most High, the King of Kings."
  The feelings of everyone in India have been very much hurt by the conduct of the Bishop of Colombo, and I hope the noble Earl the Under Secretary will not simply smile it away, but will find some words of regret for it.
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (The Earl of SELBORNE): My Lords, the attention of the Secretary of State has been called to the letter of the Bishop of Colombo on the subject referred to by the noble Lord, and which has appeared in the Ceylon papers. Her Majesty's Government, however, do not propose to take any action in regard to it.

  ELEMENTARY EDUCATION (DEFEC TIVE AND EPILEPTIC CHILDREN) BILL. [Lords.]

    SECOND READING.
    Order of the day for the Second Reading read.
    THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (The Duke of DEVONSHIRE): My Lords, although I do not anticipate that any opposition will be offered to this Bill, it may be desirable that I should make a somewhat fuller statement of its objects than that which is contained in the memorandum which I have circulated with the Bill. The details of the Bill are based upon recommendations of the Departmental Committee which was recently appointed to consider the subject. Its object is to give to the local educational authorities power to make provision for a class which is, happily a small, but a most unfortunate class of children, who are termed defective, and who are incapable of receiving any benefit from the ordinary education in elementary schools. This class includes those who are feeble-minded, and by that term is meant not those who are merely dull and difficult to teach, nor, on the other hand, those who are incapable of receiving any instruction in school and who are absolutely imbecile, but a class which is somewhat between these two extremes. It has been found by experience that these children are capable of considerable improvement and of being made useful members of society by means of special classes, which have been in some places provided, so as to enable them to live with their parents and not to be taken away from the surroundings in which it is holed they will ultimately be able to earn their own living. The Bill follows the lines of the Elementary Education (Blind and Deaf Children) Act, 1893 (56 and 57 Vict. c. 42), and applies, permissibly and mutatis mutandis, the provisions of that enactment to defective and epileptic children. In order to make these classes of greater advantage to the children it is necessary to extend the school age to 16, and the Bill provides for this. Classes of this description are exceptionally expensive, and in order to, justify the State in giving special grants to help to meet these expenses it is necessary that the Education Department should be authorised to approve the arrangements under which they are con-
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    ducted. The Department is by this Bill empowered to make special grants, but only upon such conditions as it may direct, and it is proposed that one of these conditions should be that children should have a proper portion of manual instruction, which those conversant with this question believe to be particularly beneficial in their case. Special day classes are the principal means intended to be provided to meet the case of these children, and it is obviously only possible that they should be established in large centres. For isolated eases of defective children in other parts of the country special classes, of course, cannot be provided. There are two alternative ways of dealing with them—one is to send them to board in town near to one of the special classes, and the other is to send them to a residential home for such children, a considerable number of which have already been established by voluntary agencies. The Bill gives facilities to local authorities to adopt one of these methods, and whichever they adopt will be subject to the recommendations of the Educational Department, which require considerable care and supervision in order to be successful. There are certain disadvantages in taking children of this kind away from their own surroundings, where their parents and friends are able to help them, and it depends very much upon the circumstances of individual cases whether it is better to leave them at home or send them away to be taught in one of these special classes. The school authorities are, by the Bill, given discretion in the matter, and the consent of the parents is a necessary condition for the removal of the child. In the case of boarding-out the Bill enacts that the district from which a child comes shall bear the cost of his education. As regards the institution, the school authorities may either start residential homes of their own or contribute in support of those already started by voluntary agencies. The Education Department would not look with favour upon very large institutions, and would very strictly limit their numbers. Besides feeble-minded children, the term "defective" includes those who are only prevented by some physical defect front attending an ordinary elementary school, and the Bill gives power to school authorities to provide guides and conveyances for such children. With regard to epileptic children, the Departmental Com-

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    mittee came to the conclusion that, unless they were also feeble-minded, the epileptic ought not to be taught with the feebleminded, and that an occasional fit of epilepsy is not a sufficient reason for keeping a child away from ordinary school. There is, however, a small class whose epilepsy is so severe that they are unfit for ordinary schools, and these children, unless they are properly cared for and trained, are likely to grow up to be useless, if not dangerous, to society. For such children proper training is recommended in a small residential home under medical care. The Bill gives power to the school authorities to provide for the children in that way. It also gives to any court of summary jurisdiction the power to compel the parents to send the child to such a home. The case of epileptics, as probably your Lordships are aware, is receiving an increasing amount of attention from many philanthropic bodies, and there is reason to think that suitable provision of this kind will, to a large extent, be made by voluntary agency. School authorities are enabled by the Bill either to provide these homes themselves or to contribute to the support of those that are provided by other means. The Departmental Committee considered that the special provision prescribed should be provided compulsorily: that is, that the Education Department should have power to compel the local authorities to make universal provision. The Department, however, feel that there would be great difficulty in applying such compulsion, and in some cases the expenses would be too great. Consequently this is an enabling Bill, and not compulsory. In all other respects, I believe, it follows the recommendations of the Departmental Committee, and I beg to move that it be read a second time.
    Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."
    LORD REAY: My Lords, I merely rise to give my hearty support to this Bill, and to thank the noble Duke the Lord, President of the Council for having introduced it. I hope it will be possible for the Bill to be passed into law this session. The results which have been obtained from the teaching of these children, when trained agency is used, are, I am informed, very satisfactory, and
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    any money which is spent in this direction will, I believe, yield a very satisfactory return.
    EARL EGERTON: My Lords, as this question came before the Departmental Committee on Blind and Deaf Children, of which I had the honour to be Chairman. I should like to be allowed to make a few remarks on this Bill. My noble friend the Lord President of the Council has mentioned that this Bill is founded on the Report of the Departmental Committee, but I think the labours of the private and philanthropic societies which have during the last ten years made investigations into these cases should be in some way recognised. The evidence given before the Committee was based on the results of the examination of 150,000 children. At least 1 per cent. of all the children of school age are mentally or physically unfit to be taught. In London alone there are 8,000 defective and epileptic children, and 42,000 throughout the country. I recently had the honour of presiding over a Conference of Poor Law Guardians on this subject, and a Bill founded on the lines of the Elementary Education (Blind and Deaf Children) Act was recommended as the best means of dealing with these children. I therefore beg to thank the noble Duke for having introduced the Bill, and to express the hope that your Lordships will give it a Second Reading.
    LORD KINNAIRD: My Lords, on behalf of a number of voluntary institutions I beg to thank the noble Duke for having brought forward this Bill this, session. Many of the voluntary institutions would be only too ready to make arrangements to take in the children for whom the Bill will provide if they receive some financial help, and I think the experience of the Continent shows that many epileptic children, if taken young and dealt with properly, can be made useful members of society, whereas they would, if neglected, become complete idiots. I am connected with an institution in France where the results are most satisfactory and many epileptics have been permanently benefited by scientific and kind treatment, and I sincerely welcome this Bill.
    On Question, agreed to.
    Bill read 2a (according to Order), and committed to a Committee of the whole House on Monday next.

  FINE OR IMPRISONMENT (SCOTLAND AND IRELAND) BILL.
  House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment; and re-committed to the Standing Committee.
  House adjourned at twenty-five minutes past Six of the clock, to Monday next, a quarter before Eleven of the clock