Sitting of 12 July 1900

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.

  SPALDING URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL (WATER) BILL, (BY ORDER.)
  Order read for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [5th July], "That this House doth agree with the Lords Amendments in page 6, line 21, to leave out from '1889,' to end of Clause 9."
  Question again proposed.
  Debate resumed.
  .MR. RECKITT: Before this Bill goes through, I should like to state that the matter raised in this House last week with regard to the position of two of the employees of the company has been settled. The engineer is to receive £340 as compensation from the water company, while the collector is to continue in his post and become the servant of the urban district council. This being satisfactory to both parties, I think it light to put the House in possession of the terms of settlement.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Subsequent Amendment agreed to.

  EXMOUTH URBAN DISTRICT WATER BILL [Lords].
  Read the third time, and passed, with Amendments. [New Title.]
  FALKIRK CORPORATION BILL [Lords].
  A Verbal Amendment made; Bill read the third time, and passed, with Amendments.
  FISHGUARD AND ROSSLARE RAILWAYS AND HARBOURS BILL [.Lords].
  Queen's consent signified. Read the third time, and passed, without amendment.
  RHYMNEY RAILWAY BILL [Lords].
  Read the third time, and passed, with Amendments.

  LONDON (ST. MARYLEBONE) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
  Reported, without amendment [Provisional Order confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time Tomorrow.

  ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL. ORDERS (No. 6) BILL [Lords].
  Reported, without amendment [Provisional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time Tomorrow.

  ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL. ORDERS (No. 8) BILL [Lords].
  Reported, without amendment [Provisional Orders confirmed]; report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill to be read the third time Tomorrow.

  GAS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 1) BILL [Lords].
  Reported, with Amendments [Provisional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.
  Bill, as amended, to be considered Tomorrow.

  DEARNE VALLEY RATLWAY BILL [Lords].
  Reported, without amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
GREAT GRIMSBY STREET TRAMWAYS BILL [Lords].
  BURY AND DISTRICT WATER (TRANSFER) BILL [Lords].

    MERSEY RAILWAY BILL [Lords].
    RAWMARSH URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL (TRAMWAYS) BILL [Lords].
    Reported with Amendments; Reports to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

WESTGATE AND BIRCHINGTON WATER BILL [Lords.]
Reported, without amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
Bill to be read the third time.

MUIRKIRK, MAUCIILINE, AND DALMELLLNGTON RAILWAYS (ABANDONMENT) BILL [Lords].
Reported, without amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
MARGATE PIER AND HARBOUR BILL [Lords].
Reported with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
PRESTON CORPORATION BILL [Lords].
Reported from the Select Committee on Police and Sanitary Regulations Bills (Section A), with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

MESSAGE EROM THE LORDS.
That they have agreed to the Gas Provisional Order (No. 3) Bill, with an Amendment.
That they have agreed to the North Metropolitan Railway and Canal Bill and the Lee Conservancy Bill, with Amendments.
That they have passed a Bill intituled, "An Act to confirm certain Provisional Orders made by the Board of Trade under the Tramways Act, 1870, relating to Ashton-under-Lyne Corporation Tramways, Garston Tramway, Gorton Urban District Council Tramways, Plymouth Corporation Tramways, Taunton Tramways, and Warrington Corporation Tramways." Tramways Orders Confirmation (No. 4) Bill [Lords].

TRAMWAYS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 4) BILL [Lords].
Read the first time; referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 292.]
PETITIONS.
  SALE OF INTOXICATING LIQUORS TO CHILDREN (NO. 2) BILL.
  Petitions in favour, from Blaby; and Kirkdale; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  NATIONAL EDUCATION (IRELAND).
  Copy presented, of Extracts from forthcoming Code of Rules and Regulations of the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland for the year 1900–1901 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.

  NAVY (ADDITIONAL ESTIMATE, 1900–1901).
  Estimate presented, of the Further Amount which will be required during the year ending 31st March, 1901,
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  beyond the Sum already provided in the Grants for Navy Services for the year [by Command]; referred to the Committee of Supply, and to be printed. [No. 270.]

  NAVY (STATEMENT EXPLANATORY OF ADDITIONAL ESTIMATE).
  Copy presented, of Statement of the First Lord of the Admiralty explanatory of the Additional Estimate for Naval Services for the year 1900–1901 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  NAVY (BOILERS).
  Copy presented, of Memorandum respecting Water-Tube Boilers in Her Majesty's Ships [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  TRADE REPORTS (MISCELLANEOUS SERIES).
  Copy presented, of Diplomatic and Consular Reports, Miscellaneous Series, Nos. 532 and 533 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
QUESTIONS.

  CHINA—ANTI-FOREIGN OUTBREAK— LATEST NEWS.
  SIR; H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANasked whether there was any fresh news from China.
  *THE UNDER SECRETARY FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. BKODRICK,): We have no news from Peking, nor have we any confirmation of the various reports which have reached us through native sources. We have received the following message from the Commander-in-Chief, viâ Chefoo:—
  "Tientsin, July 7—Chinese continue sniping, often shelling the settlements. 'They are extending their lines along Lutaian Canal, to the north-eastwards, and appearing in greater force to the west of the city. Yesterday we bombarded city and immediate suburbs, which stopped Chinese gun tire for some time. French settlement and railway station most subjected to attack. To-day another bombardment will take place as yesterday. Am steadily getting more guns up. Ten thousand troops now here, more required, but both Russian and Japanese expected."
  SIR, E. ASHMEAD - BARTLETT): Is the edict published in this morning's papers, purport-

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  ing to be issued by the Chinese Government, authentic or not?
  *MR. BRODRICK: I have stated that I have no fresh news from Peking.
  MR. MONK: Is it not possible for the Government to obtain authentic information from the Chinese Minister at this Court?
  [No reply was given.]
  MR. JAMES LOWTHER: When will the Financial Vote with regard to China be taken?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): I am afraid that I cannot give any promise at present.

  COMMAND OF THE ALLIED FORCES —COMMAND OF THE BRITISH FORCE.
  SIR E. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether Her Majesty's Government have arranged for a British officer of rank and experience to command the allied forces in China; and when General Sir A. Gaselee will arrive at Ta-ku.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Sir A. Gaselee, who is to command the forces sent to China, is an officer of experience and ability, and he will have the local rank of lieutenant-general. He is expected to arrive at Ta-ku about the 23rd of this month.
  SIR E. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT: The right hon. Gentleman has not answered the last part of my question, as to who is to command the allied forces.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I have no answer to give to that question.
  SIR E. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT: Has any decision been come to as to the command? It is very important.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I have told my hon. friend that I have no information to give him on the subject.

  ANGLO-JAPANESE UNDERSTANDING.
  MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if he
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  can state whether an understanding or agreement has been come to between Great Britain and Japan in connection with the situation in China.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The communications which have passed between Her Majesty's Government and Japan relate only to the prompt despatch of troops, arid those communications will be laid on the Table with the Papers.
  MR. MACLEAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say who is going to pay the expenses of the Japanese troops?
  *MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! Notice of that question should be given.

  ORIGIN AND WARNINGS OF THE OUTBREAK—SIR CLAUDE MACDONALDS DESPATCHES.
  MR. MACLEAN: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether Sir Claude MacDonald called the attention of the Foreign Office to statements in the Chinese papers regarding an organised agitation to extirpate foreigners in China which was expected to break out this year; and whether he advised that adequate precautions should be taken to meet such an emergency.
  *MR. BRODRICK: Sir Claude MacDonald did not call the attention of the Foreign Office to any such statements in the Chinese papers, but he reported upon the existence of various inflammatory placards, to which he had drawn the attention of the Tsung-li-Yamen. The only precaution he advised previous to the outbreak was the despatch of a guard to the Legation and a man-of-war to Ta-ku. Both of those steps were taken.

  BRITISH EXPORTS OF AMMUNITION TO CHINA.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether he has any know lodge of the number of guns and the quantity of ammunition which has been since 1895 exported from this country to China by Kynoch's Ammunition Company and by the Birmingham Small Arms Company, Limited.
  *THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. WYNDHAM, ): As I have already stated, there is no objection to a Return showing the total quantity of guns and ammunition of various kinds sent to China from firms in this country; but I do not think it is desirable to publish the figures for any particular firm. I may say, however, that neither of the firms named by the hon. Member manufactures guns.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: On Monday † last the hon. Gentleman told us exactly how much ammunition was furnished by a German firm; on Thursday he declines to give the same information about a Birmingham firm.
  *MR. SPEAKER: Order, order!
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the chairman of this firm is a gentleman called Arthur Chamberlain?
  MR. WARNER: Has the importation of arms into China been stopped even now?
  *MR. WYNDHAM: I must ask for notice of that. Whether we have the power to stop it involves an abstruse point of international law. As far as I know, we are not at war with China.

  INDIAN TROOPS FOR CHINA—COST.
  MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India what provision is being made to recoup the India Exchequer for the initial expenditure on transport and similar purposes connected with the despatch of the Indian contingent to China.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE TOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON,): An approximate estimate of the initial cost of the force that is being sent from India to China has been obtained from the Government of India, and forwarded to the War Office. When a Vote has been passed by the House, application for the amount will be made to the War Office.

  INOCULATION AGAINST ENTERIC OF SOLDIERS ORDERED ABROAD.
  MR. BARTLEY: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether his attention has been
  † See page 945 of this volume.
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  called to a report from Dr. Conan Doyle on the Langman Hospital, South African Field Force, Bloemfontein, in which he states that there had been no death from enteric up to 5th June from among the inoculated; whether the War Office has yet any official statistics on the results of inoculation; and whether any further efforts are being made to increase the number inoculated in men now going out to South Africa and China.
  *MR. WYNDHAM: As I have already explained to the House, the statistics at present available are not sufficient to enable me to give a reply to the first and second paragraphs of the question. Inoculation is offered to all men embarking from home for a country, such as South Africa or China, where enteric is prevalent; but such inoculation is purely voluntary.

  SOUTH AFRICAN WAR—COST OF THE WAR—CONTRIBUTION FROM THE TRANSVAAL MINES.
  MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps are being taken to secure payment of an indemnity for war expenses from the Transvaal mines.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Sir M. HICKS BEACH,): I presume the hon. Member's question refers to the contribution towards the cost of the war which we hope to obtain from the Transvaal. I do not think it would be accurately described as an indemnity from the mines, but it would be quite premature at present to make a statement as to the precise manner in which such a contribution should be obtained.
  MR. BUCHANAN: Will the Government take steps, when the British authorities at Johannesburg allow the general resumption of mining operations, to see that such conditions are imposed upon them as to take security for the payment of a part of this money?
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: That is not our idea of the matter. Our idea is that the contribution to be provided by the Transvaal should be provided by the taxation of the country, which, of course, must necessarily fall to a large extent on the mines; but that is a different matter from what the hon. Member suggests.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Does the right hon. Gentleman remember that on 23rd October he promised that the mines would be expected to pay for the war?✶
  SIR. M. HICKS BEACH: I did not say that.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Then what did you say?
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: I said exactly what I have stated to-day.

  HOSPITAL AND MEDICAL ARRANGEMENTS—COMMITTEE OF INQUIRY.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he is aware that Professor Cunningham, who is to have a seat on the South African Commission to inquire into the charges brought against the administration of the Army Medical Department, has for many years acted as examiner in anatomy at the examinations of candidates for the Army Medical Department, for which service he received remuneration from the Army Medical service; and whether, under these circumstances, he will reconsider his decision to appoint this gentleman as a member of the inquiry into the Department with which he was formerly connected.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I think the hon. gentleman has asked this question under a misapprehension. He seems to think that because a gentleman is an examiner of medical candidates for the Army Medical Department he is associated in some way with the Department and is connected thereby with the administration of the War Office. That, Sir, is an entire misapprehension.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: Who appointed him?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I cannot say; nor do I think that that question is at all material. I understand that those examiners are appointed for four years at a fixed salary, and have nothing to hope or fear from the War Office. They are not in the remotest way connected with the War Office administration, and the suggestion that a man who examines
  ✶ Refer to The Parliamentary Debates [Fourth Series], Vol. lxxvii. p. 515.
  1310
  figures—because he only knows the candidates by numbers—is a person whose judgment is likely to be influenced is altogether preposterous. It might as well be suggested that men like the late Professor Huxley or Matthew Arnold, or the present Bishop of London, or any other of the distinguished men who have been sometimes called in to examine candidates, would be incapable of acting on a Commission dealing with administrative points which never came under their notice.
  MR. LABOUCHEREWill the right hon. Gentleman be good enough to state whether these examiners are to be reappointed?
  MR. WARNER: Who pays these examiners? Is it the War Office?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I think that these questions are very inopportune. I do not believe it is the practice, as a matter of fact, to reappoint them. I shall next expect a question as to whether Dr. Church, as he is not an examiner, may not be corruptly influenced by the hope of becoming one.
  MR. DILLON: Is it not a fact that Professor Cunningham was appointed to this post by the head of the Army Medical Department, on which he is called upon to sit in judgment?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: It is not so.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: I want to know not whether Professor Cunningham has been appointed in his official and administrative capacity by the Secretary of State for War, but whether the Secretary of State for War did not appoint him ministerially on the advice of the head of the Army Medical Department, who is Dr. Jameson?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I believe that the Secretary of State for War did appoint him.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: Do I understand that he will sit in judgment on Dr. Jameson, who has appointed him?
  MR. WEIR: What is the salary paid to this gentleman?
  CAPTAIN DONELAN: Is it in the power of the War Office to remove or retain Professor Cunningham in his appointment?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I believe not.

  BLOEMFONTEIN — ADMISSIONS AND DEATHS FROM ENTERIC.
  SIR WALTER FOSTER: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War if he can state the number of admissions for enteric at Bloemfontein, and the number of deaths from that disease for the six weeks ending 22nd June.
  *MR. WYNDHAM: No complete Returns for the three weeks ending 22nd June have yet reached the War Office. For the three weeks ending 1st June the figures are as follows:—First week: 684 admissions, 120 deaths; second week: 269 admissions, 108 deaths; third week: 227 admissions, 93 deaths. If the hon. Member will add these figures to those which I gave him on the 3rd inst. for the previous weeks he will find that the total percentage of deaths is about nineteen.

  SETTLEMENT OF SOLDIERS IN SOUTH AFRICA AFTER THE WAR.
  SIR JAMES RANKIN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if the Government have come to any decision as to the question of affording assistance in the way of free or assisted passages from England to South Africa to the families of soldiers who desire to settle in South Africa; and whether, when the Government have come to a decision on this matter, they will communicate their intentions to the Emigrants' Information Office, 31, Broadway, Westminster, so that the information may be properly diffused.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: As my hon. friend is probably aware, a statement has already been made in the House, and the matter has been referred to a Departmental Committee, That Committee has not yet reported. I have no doubt that the suggestion contained in the last part of the question is one that will not be lost sight of by the Colonial Office.
  MR. DILLON: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that no steps will be taken until the House of Commons has had an opportunity of expressing its opinion?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No, Sir, I do not think I can give such an assurance.

  CHAPLAINS IN VOLUNTEER CAMPS.
  MR. LEES KNOWLES: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether, having in view the possibility of sickness and accident, and in order that the ministrations of religion may be accessible to such as may need them, the Secretary of State will be prepared to sanction the appointment, in Volunteer brigade camps where no Army chaplain or clergyman, acting as such is available, of a brigade chaplain, who shall be responsible for the care of the sick in hospital during the week and for all services that may be necessary on Sundays, the said chaplain to receive the daily pay of his rank at Army rates during the camp, together with the usual allowances, but no further remuneration for Sunday services; and whether he will be prepared to allow the brigadier to have the appointment of the chaplain without reference to seniority, and to empower him at his discretion to appoint for the denomination next in numerical strength to that of the chaplain, a second brigade chaplain, whose pay shall be the same as that of the chaplain.
  *MR. WYNDHAM: The Secretary of State has approved the appointment by the officer commanding a Volunteer brigade camp where no Army chaplain or acting Army chaplain is stationed, of a brigade chaplain with pay for Sunday duty at £1 1s. a service up to £2 2s. a Sunday. The officer commanding may also appoint a second brigade chaplain for the next most numerous denomination, on similar terms. The duties of a Volunteer chaplain differ so greatly in amount and variety from those of an Army chaplain, especially on week-days, that there does not appear to be any reason for granting Volunteer chaplains continuous pay at Army rates. Their services are only required on Sunday. It is unlikely that the cases of serious sickness could be such as to necessitate special spiritual provision.

  PAY OF MILITIA MAJORS.
  MR. BOSCAWEN: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War whether he is in a position now to state if the senior majors of embodied Militia who have been doing the same

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  work as seconds in command of Line battalions are to receive the extra pay given to the seconds in command of Line battalions; and, if so, if this additional pay will be given as from the respective dates of embodiment.
  *MR. WYNDHAM: Yes, Sir. The additional 1s. a day will be granted for the period of embodiment.

  BRITISH WAR SHIP OFF ZANZIBAR,
  MR. J. A. PEASE: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether a war ship is now stationed at Zanzibar; if not, what steps have been taken to carry out the intention of the Government in regard to this matter.
  THE CIVIL LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN,): The third class cruiser "Barrosa" was sent to Zanzibar in May last with orders to remain during the monsoon months, which last from May to the end of September. There is no intention of removing her at present.

  ABYSSINIAN BOUNDARIES—EXPEDITION TO LAKE RUDOLPH.
  *SIR CHARLES DILKE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether an Abyssinian expedition to Lake Rudolph, under the command of the Russian Leontief, reached Lake Rudolph in August last, and whether a boundary with Abyssinia, north of Lake Rudolph, has been arranged.
  *MR. BRODRICK: An expedition which started from Adis Ababa, under Monsieur Leontieff, in July last, is reported to have reached Lake Rudolph. The question of boundary with Abyssinia is still under discussion.

  NEW PACIFIC CABLE.
  *SIR EDWARD SASSOON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Pacific Cable Board have now definitely decided to commence the laying of their cable.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. J. CHAMBERLAIN,): The various Governments interested have accepted the recommendations of the Pacific Cable Committee, and tenders for the establishment of the cable will be called for immediately.

  INDIAN TELEGRAPH TARIFF.
  *SIR EDWARD SASSOON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India if he would state to the House when the reduction in the Indian telegraph tariff, as promised by the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, will be announced; and, whether any difficulty has arisen in the negotiations to account for the delay.
  LORD G. HAMILTON: I cannot as yet state when the proposed reduction in the telegraph rate to India will take place. The consent of various parties has to be obtained, and for this time is required; but I am not aware that any difficulty has arisen in the negotiations.
  *SIR E. SASSOON: Arising out of that answer, will the noble Lord say if it is intended to wait until the assembly of the International Telegraphic Conference next year, when Great Britain will have the high privilege of meeting on equal terms the representatives of Venezuela and Patagonia?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: I do not think that question arises.

  INDIAN FAMINE—LOAN BELL.
  MR. BUCHANAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether he intends to introduce an Indian Loan Bill; and if so, for what amount; and will it be in whole or in part for the purposes of famine relief.
  LORD G. HAMILTON: There is no intention of introducing an Indian Loan Bill.

  WALTHAMSTOW PETTY SESSIONS.
  MR. WOODS: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that the District Council of Walthamstow have been endeavouring for some time past to get a weekly court of petty sessions established at Walthamstow; and whether, having regard to the fact that the population of Walthamstow now amounts to 90,000, and is increasing, that the court house at Stratford is three miles from Walthamstow, and that the police and others interested suffer inconvenience by travelling this distance, which entails loss of time, he will advise the establishment of a weekly petty sessions court at Walthamstow; and, if

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  not, would he be prepared to meet a deputation, in order that the question might be fully considered.
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir M. WHITE RIDLEY,): The establishment of a new petty sessional court is a matter for the discretion of the magistrates in quarter sessions, and with their discretion I have no authority to interfere. I do not, therefore, think that any useful purpose would be served by receiving a deputation.

  G. P. O.— REMOVAL TO MOUNT PLEASANT—OVERTIME PAY.
  MR. STEADMAN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, if he is aware that in consequence of the removal of the Inland section to Mount Pleasant, necessitating as it has done protracted deliveries, some of the men have been working two or three hours in excess of their proper time daily, and will he state whether they will receive pay for the overtime thus worked.
  THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. HANBURY,): The Postmaster General would be glad if the hon. Member would state to what body of men his question refers. No deliveries are made from the Inland section at Mount Pleasant. The general practice is that whenever postmen are for some special reason detained at the office and thus prevented from starting on their deliveries at the usual hour they shall be paid for such detention, provided it is not less than half-an-hour and the full normal attendance for the week is given.
  MR. STEADMAN: Is it not a fact that some of the men have been working as many as twenty hours a week overtime in order to meet the extra work entailed upon them by the removal from St. Martin's-le-Grand to Mount Pleasant? They want to know if they are to be paid for that overtime.
  MR. HANBURY: I understand that there are no deliveries at all from Mount Pleasant.
  MR. STEADMAN: Then I will furnish the right hon. Gentleman with the names of men who have been doing the work.

  POSTMEN'S STRIPES.
  MR. STEADMAN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, if he will lay upon the Table of the House a copy of the Treasury Minute or Minutes orginally issued regulating the grant and withdrawal of postmen's stripes.
  MR. HANBURY: There is no Treasury Minute on the subject. The award and forfeiture of good conduct stripes are now regulated on the recommendation of the Tweedmouth Committee.

  E. C. DISTRICT POST OFFICES —REFRESHMENT ARRANGEMENTS.
  MR. MADDISON: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether he is aware that, although the Treasury authorised the employment of cooks to prepare the meals of the male staff in the Eastern Central District Post Offices some months since, the arrangement has not been carried out because of the lack of accommodation and insanitary condition of the post offices; and whether the Postmaster General will take steps to carry out the necessary alterations that the staff may have the benefit of the improvements.
  MR. HANBURY: The Treasury authority has not been given nor sought for the employment of cooks to prepare meals for the male staff' in the Eastern Central District Post Offices; nor is it the case that the arrangement has not been carried out because of the lack of accommodation or insanitary condition of the offices. A committee has already inquired into the matter, and expects to be able to formulate a scheme shortly.

  INCREASES OF POST OFFICE STAFF— CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT.
  SIR J. W. MACLURE: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury what applications have been made during the current financial year by the Post Office to the Treasury for an increase of numbers, or pay, in connection with the Post Office staff; when they were made; and whether they were granted.
  MR. HANBURY: I have not been able, with so short notice, to ascertain the as to the whole of the Post Office

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  staff everywhere, but as regards the Circulation Department of the General Post Office, in which, I think, my hon. friend and the House are most interested, I find that no request for increase of numbers or pay has been refused. So lately as last Monday, for instance, an application was received for extra staff in that department alone involving an extra expenditure of £20,000 a year, and was immediately granted. Funds have, I believe, never been so freely granted to this department as during the last five years.

  ELECTRIC LIGHTING ORDERS— TRANSFER FORMS.
  MR. LOUGH: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade will he explain why the Board of Trade insist on all transfers of electric lighting orders to companies being in a standard form, and refuse to allow variations required by local conditions, also on what grounds they refuse to allow the insertion of agreed provisions for the reduction of the maximum price either for public or private lighting; and whether he will consider the desirability of relaxing these departmental rules.
  MR. HANBURY (for Mr. RITCHIE): The Board of Trade do not consider that deeds of transfer under electric lighting orders should contain any provisions other than those which are consequential on the substitution of a company for a local authority as undertakers. To go beyond this is to provide, under the colour of a mere deed of transfer, for matters which really require the approval of Parliament. Transferees are accordingly placed in exactly the same position with regard to price as they would have been had they obtained the order originally. The price for public supply is left to agreement, or, failing agreement, to arbitration. The price for private supply is not specifically fixed, but is left, as in the order, subject to a maximum, which may be revised periodically by the Board of Trade on the representation of the local authority. I see no reason for altering the existing practice of the Department.

  RAILWAY BYE-LAWS—NEW CODE.
  MR. WEIR: I bog to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether the New Code of Railway Bye-laws, which was submitted to the Board upwards of two years
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  ago, and remitted to the Railway Companies with certain modifications and suggestions, has again been submitted to the Board for confirmation; and, if not, will he state the general tenour of the replies given by the railway companies to the Board's repeated requests for the adoption of a satisfactory Code of Railway Bye-laws.
  MR. HANBURY (for Mr. RITCHIE): No, Sir; the revised bye-laws have not yet been submitted. When the Board of Trade receive them the Department will act on a suggestion which has been made that a conference should take place between the railway companies and those —notably the London County Council— who have criticised the proposed bye-laws. The hon. Member is, no doubt, aware that the Board of Trade cannot themselves propound bye-laws—they merely confirm such bye-laws proposed by the companies as, in their judgment, merit approval.

  DISMISSAL OF SCHOOL TEACHERS— RIGHT OF APPEAL.
  SIR JOSEPH LEESE: I beg to ask the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education if he is prepared to place upon the Table of the House a minute of the Board giving a right of appeal to teachers in cases of their alleged wrongful dismissal by managers of schools (both Board and Voluntary) which receive grants under the Day School Code.
  MAJOR RASCH: I beg also to ask the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education whether he has considered the universally expressed desire of the school teachers that no sentence of dismissal passed upon them shall be valid without the approval of the Board of Education.
  THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir J. GORST,): The matter is still under the consideration of the Board of Education, but I hope to be in a position to make a definite statement on the subject before the end of the session.

  SEA-GOING TRAINING SHIPS—VISITS TO SCOTTISH COASTS.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether arrange-

  1319
  ments can be made for a training ship to visit Stornoway, Ullapool, and Invergordon during the summer.
  MR. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: The arrangements for the forthcoming cruise of the sea-going training ships will not admit of a visit to the places named. I may remind the hon. Gentleman that the "Calliope" was at Ullapool in June last.

  GLASGOW P. O.—PROMOTIONS.
  SIR J. STIRLING-MAXWELL: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether he is aware that the late postmaster of Glasgow, a few days prior to his retirement, secured the promotion of his private clerk from the second to the first class of assistant superintendents, thereby passing over the only officer senior to him, who possessed the necessary technical certificate; whether in making that promotion the usual method of local procedure was departed from; whether the officer so passed over was refused information when he asked the postmaster whether a superior appointment was under considertion, being thereby prevented from laying before the Secretary his claims to the appointment; and whether, in view of the fact that the officer in question has placed his present appointment in the hands of the Postmaster General, with the request that an inquiry may be granted him, and that the officers of the local branch of the Postal Telegraph Clerks' Association have intimated to the chief superintendent that the general body of the staff resent the indignity placed on the assistant superintendent so passed over, the Postmaster General will grant the inquiry demanded.
  MR. HANBURY: Shortly before the retirement of the late postmaster of Glasgow a promotion was made to fill a vacancy on the first class of assistant superintendents, but the officer promoted was not the postmaster's private clerk. An assistant superintendent of the second class was certified to be the best qualified for the vacant post, and he accordingly passed over the heads of four of his seniors. The proper course was taken by the postmaster in making the recommendation. It is not the practice to communicate to the staff the fact that the question of filling a superior appointment
  1320
  has arisen, nor is such a course necessary in order to ensure the proper weight being given to the claims of any officer. One officer only has appealed to the Postmaster General respecting the promotion, namely, the officer third on the list of second-class assistant superintendents. He was reported to be not capable of performing the duties of the higher post; and as his record is in many respects unsatisfactory, there does not appear to be any reason for making further inquiry.

  FOREIGN TRAWLERS IN MORAY FIRTH.
  SIR WILLIAM WEDDERBURN: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether he is aware that foreign trawlers, after making catches in the Moray Firth, do not ordinarily leave the Firth for periods sufficient to reach foreign ports; whether he will inquire into the allegation that they deliver their catches during the night to carrier boats which convey them to Aberdeen, and other Scottish ports; and whether he will take steps to stop this practice if it is found to exist.
  *THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. A. GRAHAM MURRAY,): I am. informed by the Fishery Board that they have no reason to suppose that such a practice is followed, nor do they think it could be carried out, except in very favourable weather, and in daylight. From information furnished to them by the commanders of their cruisers, it would appear that foreign trawlers do certainly remain away from the Moray Firth sufficiently long to convey their catches to English or foreign ports, as during the past eighteen months the majority were not seen in the Firth on more than four or five separate occasions, and at the present time there are only two foreign trawlers seen occasionally fishing in the Firth.

  DRIFT NET FISHING IN THE RIVER FORTH.
  MR. WASON: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether he has any funds at his disposal out of which he can make compensation to the salmon fishermen who have been prevented by the recent decision in the House of Lords from carrying on the drift net fishing in the River Forth, which has been practised from time immemorial.
  *MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: If the hon. Member will refer to the Fishery Board's Annual Report for 1889, Part II., he will find that it is not correct to say that drift net fishing has been practised in the River Forth from time immemorial. I may add that the Secretary for Scotland has no funds at his disposal for any such purpose as is referred to in the question.

  SCOTCH FEE GRANT.
  MR. CALDWELL: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether any part, and if so, how much of the £5,000 voted last year from Imperial funds as required to maintain the Scotch fee grant at 12s. per scholar was required for that purpose, and whether the same or any part thereof has been surrendered; and if he can explain how it comes about that in 1897 he estimated that a sum of £26,000 annually out of Imperial funds would be necessary to keep the fee grant up to 12s. per scholar, whilst this year no sum whatever is borne on the Imperial Estimates for that purpose.
  *MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: Of the £ 5,000 voted last year to maintain the Scotch fee grant at 12s. per scholar, £2,763 was required for that purpose. The remainder (£ 2,237) will be surrendered at the close of the year 1900-1. The explanation of the fact referred to in the last paragraph of the question is that the amount receivable by the Department for 1899-1900 from the local taxation account was so much in excess of that anticipated, that no further sum will be required from the Vote to maintain the 12s. rate. Also, the average attendance has not increased so rapidly as was expected.
  MR. CALDWELL: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate if he can explain how it comes about that for the year ending 31st March, 1898, when the average attendance on which the Fee Grant was paid under Section 1 of the Education and Local Taxation (Scotland) Act, 1892, was 614,616, the amount paid to counties, etc., in relief of rates was £145,625; that for the year ending 31st March, 1899, when the average attendance was 621,405, the amount paid was £161,912; and that for the year ending 31st March, 1900, when the average attendance had risen to
  1322
  626,341, the amount paid was £149,073; and whether, to the extent of upwards of £20,000, there has been an over payment to the counties, etc., to the detriment of the Fee Grant Fund, which under the Act of 1892 is entitled to the residue.
  *MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAY: Under the Education and Local Taxation Account (Scotland) Act, 1892, Section 2, the grant to counties and burghs in relief of rates (which now includes the amount previously deducted under the Diseases of Animals Act, 1894) is the difference between the total—namely, £165,000—of grants fixed under Section 2 and the amount of the fee grant. An increase of the fee grant therefore causes a corresponding increase of the grant to counties and burghs, and consequently a corresponding decrease of the residue payable as an addition to the fee grant under Sub-section 6 of Section 2. The estimate for the fee grant is framed with reference to the estimated number of scholars, but does not necessarily correspond exactly with the actual average attendance. In the estimate for 1898-99 it included a sum of £21,000 for arrears of fee grant in previous years. If this £21,000 had not been included in the Vote the grant to counties and burghs would have been less, and the residue available as an addition to the fee grant would have been increased by the same amount. There has accordingly been no over-payment under the terms of the Act to counties and burghs to the detriment of the fee grant fund, as the whole payments are automatically adjusted over a period of year's.

  IRELAND-ENGLISH POLICE IN DUBLIN.
  MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether any members of any English police force are kept on duty in Dublin for the purpose of arresting absconding criminals or recovering stolen property; and, if so, from what source are they paid.
  *SIR. WHITE RIDLEY: The answer is in the negative.

  IRISH POLICE AT HOLYHEAD.
  MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can say

  1323
  how many absconding criminals have been arrested, and what amount of stolen property has been recovered, by the member of the Royal Irish Constabulary stationed at Holyhead since he went on duty there.
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (MR. G. W. BALFOUR,): Ten absconding criminals have been arrested at Holyhead by the member of the Constabulary since he went on duty there in March, 1895, and stolen property of the value of £500 has been recovered by him.

  COUNTY DOWN POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS.
  MR. SAMUEL YOUNG: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, with reference to the postal districts of Ballyroney and Katesbridge, county Down, whether he is aware that letters from England and Scotland do not reach these districts under two or three days, and letters from Bembridge, only nine miles distant from Ballyroney railway station, take nearly two days in transit, and that letters there from have to be sent through Rathfriland post office, and reach there too late for the cross-channel mails on same evening; and whether he will reconsider the desirability of making new arrangements by train for the accommodation of these two districts.
  MR. HANBURY: AS there is no second post in the day to or from Ballyroney and Katesbridge, letters sent from England and Scotland by night mail do not reach those places until the second day after posting, and letters from those places are not received in England and Scotland in time for delivery on the following morning. Returns are being taken with the view of ascertaining whether there is enough correspondence to warrant the establishment of a second post to and from Ballyroney and Katesbridge. The existing night mail service to Ballyroney and Katesbridge is performed by foot postman from Rathfriland, which in turn receives its mails by car from Newry. There are no trains by which Ballyroney and Katesbridge could be served in the morning. At present the mails reach Ballyroney at 7.5 a.m. and Katesbridge at 8.5 a.m., and are despatched from Ballyroney at 5.55 p.m. and from Katesbridge at 5 p.m. Letters
  1324
  posted at Banbridge (which is presumably meant, not Bembridge) in time for the mail leaving that town at 9.30 p.m. are delivered in Ballyroney and Katesbridge on the following morning.

  DUBLIN SORTING OFFICE.
  MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether the attention of the Postmaster General has been called to the condition of matters in the Dublin sorting office, where, owing to the small numbers employed, there is pressure of work, and between 6,000 and 7,000 letters, etc., the correspondence of the merchants and citizens of Dublin, are mis-sent each month; whether he is aware that, owing to the present postal arrangements, the English parcel mail via Holyhead, reaching North Wall about 6.45 a.m., does not arrive in the parcel sorting depot until 9 or 9.30 o'clock, thus occasioning delay in delivery; that sorting clerks working under pressure and against time, in consequence of insufficient evening staff in the letter sorting department, notwithstanding, are punished with extra work if they mis-send thirty-one letters per month; and that a similar course is not followed with regard to all offenders, an official found guilty of supplying wrong records against a postman (the postman thereby being deprived of his increment and a stripe) only losing a contemplated promotion; and whether he will cause an inquiry to be made into the alleged grievances.
  MR. HANBURY: The Postmaster General has ascertained that there is nothing unsatisfactory in the condition of the Dublin sorting office. Extra staff is provided whenever it can be foreseen that pressure of duty may require it, and arrangements are contemplated for making a small permanent addition to the numbers employed in the evening. It is not the case that anything like 6,000 or 7,000 letters a month are mis-sent. In administering punishment every case is considered on its merits, and suitable allowance is made if the conditions under which the work is done are abnormal. The Postmaster General is aware of the want of punctuality in the receipt of the morning parcel mail viâ North Wall, and he is at the present time in communication with the railway company on the subject.

  COUNTY KERRY TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION.
  MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether he is aware that inconvenience is caused in and around Cahirdaniel, county Kerry, owing to the want of telegraphic communications; and that a guarantee has been given in connection with the proposed telegraph office; and whether, in view of the fact that the fishing industry, which is of importance to that district, will be in operation during next month, immediate steps will be taken by the Post Office authorities to give the required telegraphic communications to Cahirdaniel.
  MR. HANBURY: The Postmaster General is sorry that any inconvenience should arise from the lack of telegraphic communication with Cahirdaniel. He has given instructions for the extension of the telegraph to be put in hand; but the engineering staff is working under considerable pressure, and he fears he cannot promise that the work shall be completed at once.

  INCOME TAX—RENTS OF LABOURERS' COTTAGES IN IRELAND.
  MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the income tax authorities claim from the Callan Rural District Council and the Slievedaragh Rural District Council payment of income tax on the rents receivable from labourers' cottages erected under the Labourers (Ireland) Acts; and whether, as the outlay on these cottages is a loss, or at least an unprofitable investment for the time being, and that a number of years must elapse before the invested capital is recovered and any profit can accrue, he will see that the demand for income tax will not be pressed.
  SIR M. HICKS BEACH: I understand that the Inland Revenue Department is quite prepared to admit that if, in the cases referred to, the interest paid to the Board of Works on money borrowed to build cottages exceeds the rents payable to the rural district council, the assessment to income tax may properly be limited to the ground rents payable by the council to the landlords, on whom the charge will fall. But before the Depart-
  1326
  ment can authorise this reduction of the assessments, they must have all the facts properly laid before the Surveyor of Taxes, and up to now the clerk to the rural district councils has failed to supply the necessary information. If he will remedy this omission, the matter can, I hope, be satisfactorily arranged.

  CO. CORK ROAD MAINTENANCE.
  MR. WILLIAM ABRAHAM: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that no tenders for the maintenance of five roads in the Mallow Rural District (including the streets of Mallow) have been accepted by the District Council or the County Council of Cork; in view of the fact that no moneys can be spent on the maintenance of these roads until a proposal is formulated by the district council at a quarterly meeting to be held on the 19th inst., and approved of by the county council at the quarterly meeting of that body in October next, will he state whether these roads can be handed over to the charge of the county surveyor, under Article 24 of the Procedure of Councils Order, 1899, to be maintained in the interval pending the formulation and approval of a proposal.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I understand that the failure in this case arose from the fact that a sufficient number of members to constitute a quorum was not present at the adjourned meeting of the county council on the 17th May. The Local Government Board do not consider that under the circumstances the county council can hand over the works in question to the county surveyor, as suggested.
  MR. WILLIAM ABRAHAM: In the event of the next meeting having to be adjourned, which would then necessitate the matter going over till October, will the right hon. Gentleman make an order similar to that he issued last February?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I must ask for notice of that question.
  CAPTAIN DONELAN: May I ask whether, in view of the fact that this difficulty would not have arisen if the councils had possessed the power to employ direct labour on the roads, the right hon. Gentle-

  1327
  man will consider the desirability of conferring such power on them?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I replied to a question of the hon. Member on this subject on the 9th instant.✶

  WEIR ESTATE, CO. FERMANAGH.
  MR. MACALEESE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he can state the cause of delay in completing the sale of the Weir estate in the county of Fermanagh; is he aware that Mrs. Alice Brown signed an agreement for purchase of her farm on this estate in April, 1896, and that, although she has several times made application to the Land Commission, and also to the solicitors for the vendors, she can get no satisfactory reply as to when the sale will be completed; and seeing that Mrs. Brown was in a position, before signing the agreement, to enter the Land Court and have a fair rent fixed, and is now paying £12 a year as interest on the purchase money without any part of the principal being paid off till the sale is completed, will he cause inquiry to be made in this case.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The estate referred to appears to consist of three holdings. The contract for the sale to Mrs. Brown of her holding was lodged in February, 1897. The advance was conditionally sanctioned in May, 1897, but the abstract of the vendor's title was not lodged until March, 1898, and in July of the same year the title was ruled defective. The defect in the title was not remedied until January last. It will be ruled and the sale completed in the usual course.

  STEAMBOAT COMMUNICATION WITH GLIN, LIMERICK.
  MR. AUSTIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, as President of the Local Government Board, if he has received a resolution from the Board of Management of the Glin (county Limerick) district school, calling attention to the urgent necessity for a means of communication by steamboat to Glin, in order to secure a proper attendance of the members who are required to come from the different unions, and to give facility
  * See page 966 of this volume.
  1328
  to the various unions for the transit of the children, as at present they have to travel long distances by road in open cars; and whether the proposed extension of the Government steamer service from Tarbert to Foynes could be arranged so that the steamer could call at Glin, where there is a deep-water quay, to meet this requirement.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The reply to the first paragraph is in the affirmative. The Commissioners of Public Works are already in communication with the board of management of the district school on the subject, and it is hoped that arrangements may be made to effect the object in view.

  IRISH LANGUAGE IN IRISH SCHOOLS.
  MR. FLAVIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that a feeling exists in many portions of Ireland owing to the fact that the teaching of Irish is not a compulsory subject in national schools; and whether, seeing that the Kerry County Council unanimously passed a resolution asking that Irish should be made the general medium of instruction, representations will be made to the National Board with a view of giving effect to this resolution, so as to make the teaching of Irish a compulsory subject within the regular school hours.
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I have received a good many resolutions from public bodies in Ireland on this subject. The matter is one for the consideration of the Commissioners of National Education, and not one for the intervention of the Executive.
  MR. FLAVIN: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the last paragraph of my question?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I have received no representations on the subject.
  MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: Have the National Commissioners under the new rules altered the conditions as to the teaching of the Irish language in Irish elementary schools?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The hon. Gentleman had better await the issue of the rules.
  MR. FLYNN: Is there any "Commissioner of National Education'' this House?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: The Commissioners have no direct representative in this House.
  MR. SWIFT MACNEILL: When will the rules be issued?
  MR. G. W. BALFOUR: I am informed it will not be possible to issue them tomorrow, but a few copies will be available in the Vote Office for Irish Members.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman what his prospects are with regard to the Estimates on Friday.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I had announced that after the Home Office Vote the Local Government Board Vote would be taken. I find that is now impossible, because my right hon. friend in charge of these Estimates is unable to be present. The Board of Trade Vote will therefore stand second. The Navy Estimates will be taken on Tuesday.
  SIR HENRY FOWLER: Will that be an allotted day?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes. The reason for taking them on Tuesday next week is owing to the very great interest i which is evinced in the subject of water-tube boilers. My right hon. friend the First Lord of the Admiralty has not been able to furnish the Memorandum for the use of hon. Members so early as he expected, but he thinks that no long delay in discussing the question should take place.
  MR. GIBSON BOWLES: When shall we have the Memorandum?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I cannot say in the absence of my right hon. friend.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: What will be the business for Monday?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: On Monday I will make a statement about Ministerial business, and I shall then ask the House to suspend the Twelve o'clock rule for the
  1330
  remainder of the session. [An HON. Member: After wasting time on a garden party.] The Tithe Bill will be the first Order on Monday.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: As to the notice of motion standing on the Paper with reference to the Money-lending Bill, may I suggest that proceeding with that motion should be deferred until after the right hon. Gentleman's statement on Monday.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not know that there is any reason for that. I understand that the Bill, now that the schedule has been dropped, meets with universal acceptance on both sides of the House. [Cries of "No, no!"] That is the impression I gather.

  MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
  That they have agreed to the Land Registry (New Buildings) Bill, without amendment.
  That they have passed a Bill intituled, "An Act to amend the Law relating to Lunatics in Ireland." Lunacy Regulation (Ireland) Bill [Lords].

MONEY-LENDING BILL [Lords].
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Order [26th June] that the Money-lending Bill [Lords] be committed to the Standing Committee on Trade, etc., be read, and discharged; and that the Bill be committed to the Standing Committee on Law, etc." — (Sir William Walrond.)
MR. DILLON: Being a member of the Standing Committee, I would like to know whether there is any intention on the part of the Government to pass this Bill this year? If not, why should we be kept in the Committee Room dealing with it?
THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): It is my hope that the Bill will pass. I have already stated that I understood the opposition to the Bill had to a very large extent been modified by the removal of the schedule.
MR. GIBSON BOWLESsaid he thought the right hon. Gentleman was wholly mistaken in his estimate of

1331
the opposition to this Bill. He could not understand this motion. On the 26th June, sixteen days previously, a member of the Government, whom he saw sitting on the Front Bench, moved that the Bill be committed to the Standing Committee on Trade. If he remembered rightly, the first idea was that it should go before the Standing Committee on Law, but, after consultation presumably with other members of the Government, the Secretary to the Local Government Board decided to ask that it be sent to the other Committee. There was thus a deliberative consideration on the part of the Government of the claims of the two Standing Committees to either of which the Bill might be sent, and the claim of the Standing Committee on Trade was considered to be superior. Now, there had been no attempt to explain the reasons which prevailed with the Government to induce it to refer the Bill to the Standing Committee on Law. He had, therefore, set himself to discover some reason. His first impression was that the object was possibly to save the Government from having to make the distressful announcement on Monday that this was one of the Bills which would have to be sacrificed, as undoubtedly it would have to be sooner or later this session. Then another reason which suggested itself to his mind was that the Committee on Trade had got more than it could do, while the Committee on Law had not sufficient work before it. But surely, if that were the case, it must have been known to the Government on the 26th June. He did not know whether as a matter of fact the Committee on Trade had yet entered on the consideration of the Bill. Even if it were transferred to the Committee on Law, was there any probability that it would become an Act of Parliament this session? He did not think there was, and the only effect, therefore, would be the unnecessary withdrawal from the service of the House of Members belonging to the Committee. Believing the Bill to be a bad one, he did not want to see it passed, oven although the schedule was taken out of it. He therefore proposed as an Amendment that all words after "discharged" be omitted.
*MR. SPEAKER: I do not think that is a motion which ought to be made, seeing that its object is to destroy a Bill
1332
which has passed its Second Reading in this House.
MR. GIBSON BOWLES: My real intention was to elicit some explanation from the Government of the action they are taking. I should like to know whether the reasons I have advanced are correct or not. Still, if the Amendment is not in order I will not move it.
THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,): The fact is the Bill was originally referred to the Standing Committee on Trade under the idea that the Companies Bill would not take so long as it has done. The Committee, however, has. only got to Clause 12 of that Bill, whereas the Law Committee is practically clear for work; and there is no reason why the latter should not take up the Money-lending Bill, and so give the Bill a chance which it would hardly have if it remained before the Committee on Trade.
MR. MACLEAN:. I protest strongly against the extraordinary want of consideration shown by the Government for the Standing Committee. Why was not this motion made a week ago? The Standing Committee was actually called together to discuss a measure about Sunday Closing in Wales which the First Lord of the Treasury had previously announced to the House to be as dead as mutton. Then the Committee had another meeting, at which no work was done. I do think that more consideration should have been shown by the Government. These Committees do admirable work; in fact they do the greater part of the work of the House by knocking Bills into shape, and they are, therefore, entitled to have some consideration shown them.
SIR. H. CAMPBELL BANNERMAN: I merely rise to point out a matter which seems to be escaping the attention of the House, namely, that these two Committees are not merely co-ordinate Committees, but according to the Standing Orders they are appointed and constituted to deal with distinct branches of legislation. One is called into existence to deal with Bills which relate to law, the Courts of Justice and legal proceedings, while the other has to deal with trade, shipping, manufac-

1333
tures, agriculture and fishing. Therefore, although the line of demarcation may sometimes be very narrow, the House must not get into the habit of moving Bills indifferently from one Committee to another according to the chances of success.
MR. DILLON: As a point of order, may I ask whether the effect of the Amendment of the hon. Member for King's Lynn would not really be not to destroy the Bill, but to leave the Bill in the position it occupied before the Motion to refer the Bill to the Committee on Trade was passed?
*MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is quite right. I was for the moment misled by the observation of the hon. Member for King's Lynn himself when he said that to stop the further progress of the Bill he would move this. The true effect would be to leave the Bill to the Committee of the whole House. I quite agree, therefore, that, strictly speaking, it is not out of order, and that being so, I will accept the Amendment.
MR. GIBSON BOWLES: Then I will move it. I do not think that I need repeat what I have said in support of it.
Amendment proposed—
"To leave out from the word 'discharged,'
to the end of the Question."—(Mr. Gibson Bowles.)
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
*MR. JAMES LOWTHEE: I should be sorry to find myself compelled to go into the opposite Lobby to my hon. friend, and I therefore hope he will be satisfied with the discussion which has taken place and with the explanations that have been given, and will withdraw his Amendment. I think that this is one of the few non-mischievous Bills which this House has had an opportunity of considering, and it. would be a pity if, on the grounds he has stated, it should not have a fair chance of passing. I feel some difficulty in supporting the reference to a Standing Committee, because I think such committees are most objectionable institutions. I have always opposed them, and I originally did so in conjunction with un-political friends, who now take the opposite course. As my hon. friend appears to have very slight hope of this Bill passing under any conditions, I would suggest that he should not press, the matter to a division.
The House divided:—Ayes, 228; Noes, 61. (Division List No. 211.)

AYES.

Abraham, Wm. (Cork, N. E.)

Burt, Thomas

Donelan, Captain A.

Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

Caldwell, James

Doogan, P.C.

Allison, Robert Andrew

Campbell, Rt. Hn J. A. (Glasgow)

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Allsopp, Hon. George

Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

Doxford, Sir Wm. Theodore

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

Drage, Geoffrey

Arrol, Sir William

Causton, Richard Knight

Dyke, Rt. Hn. Sir Wm. Hart

Ashmead-Bartlett, Sir Ellis

Cavendish, R. F. (N. Lancs.)

Elliot, Hn. A. Ralph Douglas

Ashton, Thomas Gair

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbys.)

Emmott, Alfred

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Cayzer, Sir Charles William

Fardell, Sir T. George

Bailey, James (Walworth)

Cecil, Evelyn (Hertford, East)

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edward

Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manc'r.)

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

Fergusson, Rt. Hn. Sir J. (Man'r)

Balfour, Rt Hn Gerald W. (Leeds)

Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J. (Birm.)

Finch, George H.

Banbury, Frederick George

Chamberlain, J. A. (Worc'r.)

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Hartley, George, C. T.

Chelsea, Viscount

Fisher, William Hayes

Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire)

Coddington, Sir William

Flannery, Sir Fortescue

Bench, Rt. Hn. Sir M. H. (Bristol)

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Beach, Rt. Hn. W. W. B. (Hants)

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Forster, Henry William

Bethell, Commander

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Foster, Sir Walter (Derby Co.)

Biddulph Michael

Colomb, Sir John Chas. Ready

Fowler, Rt. Hon Sir Henry

Blundell, Colonel Henry

Cook, Fred. Lucas (Lambeth)

Fry, Lewis

Bonsor, Henry Cosmo Orme

Cooke, C. W. Radcliffe (Heref'd)

Galloway, William Johnson

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Cornwallis, Fiennes Stanley W.

Gedge, Sydney

Boulnois, Edmund

Crilly, Daniel

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

Bowles, Capt. H. F. (Middlesex)

Cripps, Charles Alfred

Giles, Charles Tyrrell

Brassey, Albert

Crombie, John William

Gilliat, John Saunders

Brigg, John

Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)

Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert J.

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Dalrymple, Sir Charles

Godson, Sir Augustus Fredk

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Bullard, Sir Harry

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Gordon, Hon. John Edward

Burdett-Coutts, W.

Dillon, John

Gorst, Rt. Hn, Sir John Eldon

Goschen, George J. (Sussex)

M'Ghee, Richard

Savory, Sir Joseph

Goulding, Edward Alfred

M'Iver, Sir Lewis (Edin. W.)

Seely, Charles Hilton

Gull, Sir Cameron

M'Killop, James

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Gunter, Colonel

Malcolm, Ian

Smith, Jas. Parker (Lanarks.)

Gurdon, Sir William Brampton

Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

Smith, Samuel (Flint)

Hamilion, Rt. Hn. Lord George

Martin, Richard Biddulph

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Hanbury, Rt. Hn. Robert Wm.

Mellor, Colonel (Lancashire)

Souttar, Robinson

Harwood, George

Mellor, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Yorks.)

Spencer, Ernest

Hayne, Rt. Hon. Chas. Seale

Melville, Beresford Valentine

Spicer, Albert

Hazell, Walter

Middlemore, J. Throgmorton

Stanley, Hon Arthur (Ormskirk)

Helder, Augustus

Milbank, Sir Powlett Charles J.

Stanley, Edward Jas. (Somers t)

Hemphill, Rt. Hn. Charles H.

Monk, Charles James

Stanley, Sir H. M. (Lambeth)

Hoare, E. Brodie (Hampstead)

Moon, Edward Robert Pacy

Steadman, William Charles

Hoare, Sir Samuel (Norwich)

More, Robt. Jasper (Shropsh.)

Stewart, Sir Mark J. M 'Taggart

Howard, Joseph

Morrison, Walter

Stock, James Henry

Jacoby, James Alfred

Morton, Arthur H. A. (Deptford)

Strachey, Edward

Jebb, Sir Richard Claver house

Mowbray, Sir Robert Gray C.

Thomas, A. (Glamorgan, E.)

Jeffreys, Arthur Frederick

Murray, Rt. Hn. A. G. (Bute)

Tollemache, Henry James

Johnson-Ferguson, Jabez E.

Myers, William Henry

Tomlinson, W. E. Murray

Johnstone, Hey wood (Sussex)

Newdigate, Francis Alexander

Tritton, Charles Ernest

Joicey, Sir James

Nicholson, William Graham

Tuke, Sir John Batty

Jones, Wm. (Carnarvonshire)

Nicol, Donald Ninian

Wanklyn, James Leslie

Kay-Shuttleworth, Rt. Hn. Sir U

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Kennaway, Rt. Hon. Sir J. H.

O'Connor, Arthur (Donegal)

Wedderburn, Sir William

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. William

O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.)

Welby, Lt. -Col ACE (Taunton)

King, Sir Henry Seymour

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Welby, Sir C. G. E. (Notts.)

Kitson, Sir James

O'Kelly, James

Whiteley, H. (Ashton-under-L.)

Knowles, Lees

Oldroyd, Mark

Whitmore, Charles Algernon

Labouchere, Henry

O'Malley, William

Williams, Colonel R. (Dorset)

Langley, Batty

Pease, Herbert P. (Darlington)

Williams, Joseph Powell-(Birm)

Lawrence, Sir E. Durning- (Corn)

Pease, Joseph A. (Northumb.)

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Lawson, John Grant (Yorks.)

Percy, Earl

Wills, Sir William Henry

Lea, Sir Thomas (Londonderry)

Pilkington, Rich (L'ncs Newton)

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Lecky, Rt. Hon. Wm. E. H.

Pilkington, Sir G A (Lancs. S. W.)

Wilson-Todd, Wm. H. (Yorks)

Llewelyn, Sir Dillwyn- (Swns'a)

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Wodehouse, Rt. Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Loder, Gerald Walter Erskine

Powell, Sir Francis Sharpe

Woodhouse, Sir J. T. (Hudders.)

Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Liv'pool)

Purvis, Robert

Wylie, Alexander

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Rankin, Sir James

Wyndham, George

Lopes, Henry Yarde Buller

Reckitt, Harold James

Wyvill, Marmaduke D' Arey

Lowe, Francis William

Richardson, J. (Durham, S. E.)

Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

Lowther, Rt. Hon. James (Kent)

Rickett, J. Compton

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Ritchie, Rt. Hon. C. Thomson

Young, Samuel (Cavan, East)

Lucas-Shadwell, William

Rothschild, Hon. Lionel Walter

Macaleese, Daniel

Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltenh'm)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Russell, T. W. (Tyrone)

Sir William Walrond and

M'Arthur, William (Cornwall)

Samuel, Harry S. (Limehouse)

Mr. Anstruther.

M'Ewan, William

Sassoon, Sir Edward Albert

NOES.

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Kearley, Hudson E.

Stevenson Francis S

Austin M (Limerick W)

Lawson, Sir Wilfrid (Cumb'l'nd)

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Bainbridge, Emerson

Lewis, John Herbert

Tanner, Charles Kearns

Barlow, John Emmott

Lough, Thomas

Tennant Harold John

Beaumont, Wentworth C. B.

Maclean, James Mackenzie

Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)

Billson Alfred

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Thomas, David A. (Merthyr)

Buchanan, Thomas Ryburn

Molloy, Bernard Charles

Trevelyan Charles Philips

Cameron, Sir Chas. (Glasgow)

Morgan, W Pritchard (Merthyr)

Wallace, Robert

Cameron, Robert (Durham)

Moulton, John Fletcher

Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S.)

Cawley, Frederick

Norton, Capt. Cecil William

Walton Joseph (Barnsley)

Courtney Rt. Hon. Leonard H.

Nussey, Thomas Willans

Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

Dalziel, James Henry

Paulton, James Mellor

Weir, James Galloway

Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

Philipps, John Wynford

Wilson, Charles Henry (Hull)

Farquharson, Dr. Robert

Pickersgill, Edward Hare

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

Fenwick, Charles

Price, Robert John

Wilson, John (Govan)

Flynn, James Christopher

Provand, Andrew Dryburgh

Woods, Samuel

Fox, Dr. Joseph Francis

Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

Yoxall, James Henry

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

Hedderwick, Thos. Charles H.

Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES— Mr. Gibson Bowles and Mr. Lloyd Morgan.

Horniman, Frederick J.

Sinclair, Capt. J. (Forfarshire)

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Jones, David Brynmor (Swans'a)

Stanhope, Hon. Philip J.

Main Question put, and agreed to.

Ordered, That the Order [26th June] that the Money-lending Bill [Lords] be committed to the Standing Committee on Trade, etc., be read, and discharged; and that the Bill be committed to the Standing Committee on Law, etc.

AGRICULTURAL HOLDINGS BILL.
As amended (by the Standing Committee), further considered.
*MR. MOULTON: The Amendment which I am now moving must be considered with three others which follow and which are consequential. The purpose of the Amendment is to save this very useful and important clause from becoming, I fear, an absolutely dead letter. I am quite sure that as it stands, it will be impossible to obtain any useful result from it, and I am oven doubtful whether the language I am proposing is sufficient to meet the difficulty. According to the doctrine of Chancery penal rents cannot be enforced when they appear in the form of penal rents. But, unfortunately, by a series of decisions so firmly fixed for years that it is hopeless to attempt to disturb them, that doctrine has been practically nullified. If the penal rent, for instance, is expressed in the form that the rent of £200 shall become £300 in the last year of the tenancy, if the way-going crop is sold off' the farm, it may well be that Chancery will not enforce it. But if the lease provides that the rent in the last year of the tenancy is to be £300 to be reduced to £200 if the way-going crop is not sold, that great Court allows itself to be hoodwinked by the form of the clause and fails to see that it means precisely the same as the clause I first referred to, and I regard it as a valid and enforceable clause. This form of provision in a lease will not be touched by the Bill if the clause we are discussing stands in the form it is at present, so that it will be open to any conveyancing clerk, in drawing a contract of tenancy, to avoid the provisions of the clause, and make penal rents just as much enforceable as at present by merely using the affirmative form rather than the negative. By that simple turn of a sentence, the whole action of the clause can be avoided. In order to escape the incidence of these decisions, it will of course be necessary to draft the
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clause very carefully to show that it is the intention of the Legislature that by no form or device of conveyancing can penal rents be enforced. The language which I propose, and which is contained in this and the subsequent Amendments is as follows—
"Notwithstanding any provision or exception in a contract of tenancy relating to the payment by the tenant of an increased rent or liquidated damages or any other penal consequences for a breach of a covenant or non-compliance with a condition,"
the landlord shall not be entitled to recover any sum in excess of the damage actually suffered by him. I do not think that the words I propose are too wide. We have not to consider forfeiture for breach of conditions. This class of penal provision, which is the most important, was settled by Earl Cairns' Act in 1881. All we have now to consider is that the clause should prevent exaggerated money payment for a breach of conditions. In other words, we have to make this clause adhere to the great English principle that if a man makes a breach of contract, the other party is adequately compensated by the full damages following on that breach. This principle is a most just one. The clause does not take from the landlord the power to recover full and ample damages for breach of contract; all it says is that a contract of tenancy shall not be based on the principle that a man may get a profit out of a breach of contract—that is to say, that he can recover damages out of all proportion to the damage that he has suffered. I cannot but think that the object of the Amendment will be sympathised with on both sides of the House. The presence of the clause in the Act shows that the Government have the intention not only in form, but in substance, to get rid of these penal consequences. For the reasons which I have given to the House it is necessary that the clause should be drafted in a very wide way. I have no special affection for the language I propose, but it appears to me that if we adhere at all to the form of that clause, that language is the best. Of course if the Government acknowledge that their object is the same as mine, and that it is their intention that penal rents in any form shall not, be enforceable, I have no desire that these particular words should be accepted. If I may express my own opinion, I think that the point being one of great diffi-

1339
culty, the best course for the Government to pursue would be to have a new clause drawn up with due regard to the decisions which have been given. I beg to move.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 4, line 1, after the word 'provision,' to insert the words 'or exception.'"— (Mr. Moulton.)
Question proposed, "That the words 'or exception' be there inserted."
THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir ROBERT FINLAY,): I am sure the House will thank the hon. and learned Gentleman for the great clearness and the temperate manner with which he has dealt with this question. The principle which the hon. and learned Gentleman has in view is one to which the Government have no objection. At the same time, I share the misgiving of the I hon. and learned Gentleman as to whether the words on the Paper are quite adequate to carry out the purpose intended. The words which are on the Paper as to "any other penal consequences" might be held to include—at all events it might be argued that they included, the right of re-entrance. Is is perfectly true, as was pointed out by my hon. and learned friend, that the provisions of Lord Cairns' Act limited the right of re-entry, and it might be said that these words would put an end to the right of re-entry altogether. Under these circumstances the Government will carefully consider the matter before the Bill reaches Committee stage in another place.
*MR. STRACHEYhoped that the Attorney General would make it clear whether the Government, in accepting the Amendment of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Launceston, meant to make the penal clauses in regard to breaking up permanent pasture, grubbing underwoods or felling, cutting, lopping, or injuring trees, inoperative.
SIR ROBERT FINLAY: If the hon. Gentleman will allow me to say so, I never stated that I would accept the Amendment in reference to the concluding words; of the clause.
*MR. STRACHEYsaid that when the Government introduced the Bill it did not
1340
allow the landlord to introduce any penal clauses in their contracts of tenancy; and it was necessary to have a distinct understanding on this point, because, while it was quite right to enact that only certain penal rents should be operative, it was not right to give permission in certain cases to impose penal rents, and then by insertion of certain words to make those rents voidable, as the Amendment would do. The Government were playing fast and loose.
*THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. LONG,): The hon. Gentleman has shown clearly that he does not understand the clause as it stands, the Amendment of my hon. and learned friend, or the Bill as introduced by the Government. He has entirely misrepresented all three, and has stated broadly to the House that it was intended by the Government to sanction the breaking up of permanent pasture.
*MR. STRACHEY: The right hon. Gentleman entirely misrepresents me.
*MR. LONG: If that is not what the right hon. Gentleman intended to say, then I do not understand the point of his reference to penal clauses.
*MR. STRACHEY: What I said was that the Government in the first place, by their Bill as introduced, prohibited all penal rents, even for breaking up permanent pasture. In the Standing Committee on Trade the Government, under pressure, had to move, and carried, an Amendment allowing penal rents in the case of breaking up permanent pasture without consent of the landlord. Now the Government, if they accept the Amendment of the hon. Member for Launceston, will be undoing what they did in the Standing Committee, for the hon. Member, in moving his Amendment, stated that its object was to make the penal rents inoperative.
*MR. LONG: The view the Government took was fully explained in Committee upstairs. It was that the landlord,. | in the case of permanent pasture being broken up, could recover from the tenant as for an act of waste, and that the insertion of a penal clause did not strengthen his position. It was pointed out by the

1341
hon. and learned Member for Launceston that the effect of the clause in the Bill as it stands would not be such as the Government desire, that a coach and four might be driven through it, and that a penal clause might be made outside it. In order to prevent that the hon. and learned Gentleman proposed words which my right hon. and learned friend the Attorney General has accepted in spirit, in order that the words in the clause may do exactly what the Government desire them to do, neither less nor more.
*MR. MOULTON: I am quite satisfied with the assurance given, and ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD HUGH CECIL: I would hardly have ventured to trouble the House with the Amendment standing in my name on the matter of penal rents were it not that in this clause there is a rather vicious principle which deserves consideration. On the face of it, the clause would appear to intervene in contracts of tenancy now existing, and which have still seven or eight years to run. If that is so, it would break up these contracts and set up a new state of things. I think that is rather a dangerous principle to introduce into an Act of Parliament. The purpose of my Amendment is to safeguard existing contracts, and leave the operation of the clause to contracts made after the passing of the Act. I hope my Amendment will be accepted. I think it would be a great pity if the progress of the Bill, which, on the whole, has proceeded on very moderate lines, should be arrested by embarking on a principle of a revolutionary character, and which would subvert the rights of property, which the President of the Board of Agriculture should be the very first person to safeguard.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 4, line 1, after the word 'tenancy,' to insert the words' made after the passing of this Act.' "—[Lord Hugh Cecil.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
*MR. LONG: I do not at all wonder that the noble Lord has found it necessary to call attention to the operation of the clause. It is undoubtedly true, as he
1342
has stated, that it makes a serious breach in the existing law in regard to contracts already made. I hope I shall be able to show the House some good grounds for the course the Government have adopted, and I trust that my noble friend and others who, like myself, attach great importance to the preservation of existing contracts, will acknowledge that except in name and in a technical sense it can hardly be said that this clause will involve the serious results which my noble friend fears. What are those so-called penal rents which the Government wish by this clause to abolish? First, let me point out that by the exception to which reference has already been made those penal clauses which are abolished refer only to what I may call the tenant's cultivation of the soil as opposed to any act of agriculture which would interfere with the character of the holding. We have separated these two matters' in all that we have proposed in the Bill. At the present time in regard to a great many of these penal clauses, we find, from the evidence of the most experienced valuers, that they are disregarded by the valuers because they consider them inoperative and unjust. What is the object of these penal clauses? It is not, I submit, to give the landlord power to recover against the tenant, but to enable him to prevent the tenant from indulging in certain practices which the landlord believes and probably rightly, will result in great permanent damage, or at any rate in a serious change in the character of his property. Now this result has followed— that although the land has been maintained in proper condition, and damage has been avoided, when the ultimate settlement between landlord and tenant has to be made, these penal clauses have been suddenly dug out of obscurity, as it were and have been held against the tenant in such a way as has led the tenant not only to lose the compensation for the improvements which everybody admits he has made on his farm, but to his actually being mulcted in damages over and above his own claim, because he has been guilty of a breach of contract covered by a penal clause. There was a case the other day in which the tenant had so far improved the value of his holding that the rent was actually raised from thirty-five shillings to £8 per acre, but by doing so he had brought himself within the law because he had broken a

1343
penal clause. The result was that, although the land was improved in value to the extent I have named, not only did he lose the compensation due to him for unexhausted improvements, but he was mulcted in heavy damages besides. In the first place these penal clauses are very often discouraged and disregarded by the valuers, and not only are they disregarded, but when their validity is admitted, they very frequently result in manifest injustice to the tenant. What would be the result if this Amendment were carried? It would lull the landlord into a false sense of security by giving him protection which is protection only in name. It would not protect him against the injury done to his property by the tenant. In all these discussions upon the question of land legislation proposals have been made from each side of the House pressing for drastic reforms. On both sides of the House reasons have been adduced to show that great and permanent injury would result to the land unless those proposals were admitted; but one claim has been universally admitted, and that is that the tenants within proper limits should have absolute freedom in the cultivation of his land. There is no freedom to cultivate the land if these penal clauses are retained and held in terrorem over the head of the tenant, who knows that if he indulges in freedom of cultivation he will have to pay for it when he leaves. I submit that the Government have been justified in the course they have taken in regard to this particular question, and I hope the House will support us.
*EARL PERCYsaid that this was not a point upon which he felt very strongly, but he thought the fact that these penal clauses were now in abeyance, because the arbitrators did not think fit to enforce them, was no argument for doing away with them. The precedent of changing the law because people did not pay attention to their statutory obligations was a very bad one, and ought not to be made. He thought the argument that the penal clauses were not essential to the interests of the landlords, and they did inflict an injustice on the tenants, was true, and it was a good argument against penal clauses, but no argument at all for breaking contracts which the tenant had entered into with
1344
his eyes open. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Agriculture was rather severe on the hon. Member for East Northamptonshire a few days previously because he explained that tenants, as a rule, were people who were not capable of looking after their own interests, but it was only on that principle that this clause was defensible or excusable. He did not think where a tenant entered into a contract with full knowledge it was desirable to allow him to break it. The right hon. Gentleman might very well accept the Amendment, because, after all, it dealt with a very small number of cases. Of all the decisions given upon agricultural questions only 5 per cent. came under the operation of this Bill, and of that 5 per cent. there was a considerable number of yearly tenancies which would not be affected by the operation of this clause. Under those circumstances, he thought the right hon. Gentleman might have accepted the Amendment. At the same time, having regard to the attitude of the right hon. Gentleman, he should advise his noble friend to withdraw it.
*MR. MOULTONsaid he could not help feeling great relief when he heard that the Government were going to insist upon the clause. Upon the defence of the clause he did not intend to add a word to what had been already said. All he desired to do was to say a word as to the course the right hon. Gentleman proposed to follow. So far from his proposal being revolutionary, as some hon. Gentlemen had suggested, it was simply a continuation of a process which had been going on for centuries, by which the English law was shaking itself free from the odious task of enforcing penal clauses. Gradually all these penalties and forfeitures were being done away with, a great many of them by the Conveyancing Act of 188V, passed by Earl Cairns, who was too conservative ever to be revolutionary in the least degree. With respect to this clause being applied to existing contracts, of which the noble Lord seemed to be afraid, he desired to point out that in every step taken up to the present the change had been made to apply to existing contracts. It was so in Earl Cairns Act, and in this case they need have no fear in so doing.
COMMANDER BETHELLthought it was rather

1345
difficult for hon. Gentlemen who were now urging the passage of the Money-lending Bill through the House to com plain of this principle being applied to existing contracts. He was not a very earnest advocate of the Money-lending Bill, but many of those who sat around him were anxious to see it passed into law, and he had not heard any of them express a regret that that was to apply to existing contracts. In the part of the country from which he came they did not know much of those penal rents, but he was inclined to think it was better not to interfere with existing contracts when it could be avoided, and if it were true that these penal clauses in agreements were so exceedingly rare that nobody knew very much about them, he thought the Amendment might have been accepted.
*SIR W. HART DYKEsaid the discussion showed that there was little need for harsh legislation, and he trusted the noble Lord would not press the matter to a division. It was the evil days through which agriculture had passed which had rendered such legislation unnecessary. But, as the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill had pointed out, only 5 per cent. of the agricultural tenants would come under this Amendment, and the majority of those would not require to be dealt with. He knew of no landlord who would interfere with a good tenant, and he did not believe such a man existed; but he went further, and said if such a landlord did exist he ought to be relegated to the county asylum.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
MR. LOPES: In moving the Amendment which stands in my name, perhaps I may be allowed first of all to remind the House what took place in the Standing Committee on this question. On that occasion an Amendment was moved by the hon. Member for South Somerset which would have had the effect of increasing the limit of the law of distress from one to two years. That Amendment was withdrawn, and an Amendment was proposed by the Member for South Kensington similar to that which I now propose. My right hon. friend the Minister for Agriculture, speaking to the Amendment, said that he had a perfectly open mind upon the question, and that
1346
he would be prepared to accept the decision of the Committee. The Committee divided on the question, and there were fifteen who voted in favour of the retention of the clause and fourteen against I can only hope that the small majority of one which my right hon. friend obtained on that occasion will not hermetically seal his mind with regard to the question, and that he will be prepared if possible to accept my Amendment and, at any rate, I think it will be a justification for me in bringing the matter up. The Amendment I propose is obviously to amend the law as it at present exists under the Act of 1883. Prior to that the law of distress was a considerable bone of contention throughout the country. It was frequently discussed in the House, and a Select Committee was appointed in 1882. The result of that Committee was that Section 44 of the Act of 1883 was passed. Under that, section the landlord's power regarding distress was limited to one year, but there was a proviso to this effect— that where in the ordinary course of dealing between the landlord and the tenant of a holding the rent of such holding had been allowed to be deferred until the expiration of a year or half of a year, the law would be that the rent of that holding should be deemed to have become due at the expiration of that quarter or half-year, as the case might be, and not the date at which it became legally due. It is easy to lose one's self in the intricate maze of Parliamentary phraseology, but I do not think there can be any doubt as to what the intention of the Legislature was at that time. It meant to safeguard the landlord's interest where it was the custom to allow three or six months grace to the tenant in the payment of his rent. That has been the practice ever since that Act was passed, and the present Bill proposes to do away with that compromise for it was a compromise, which was arrived at by both parties in the State on that occasion, and if this clause becomes law it will only allow the landlord to distrain for one year's rent. I must say that it does not seem to me very difficult to understand why this clause has found its way into the Bill. It is impossible to say at the present time that the law of distress embodies any principle of injustice. It is used with the greatest toleration, the greatest forbearance, and the greatest discretion by landlords and their

1347
agents, and although it may be said that it is very seldom made use of, to admit that is not to admit that it is either useless or unnecessary, because, while at the same time it allows a landlord to give the greatest possible latitude and the greatest credit to a good tenant, it also enables him to deal with a tenant who cannot be so described. I would say at once that I do not consider this to be at all a landlords' question. It is simply and entirely a tenants' question, and it is as such that I venture to press it upon the attention of the House. The exercise of the law of distress at the present time, when it is exercised at all, is chiefly in the direction of giving relief to the tenant, and I venture to say that a large body of tenants throughout the country would be dismayed at any limitation of the landlord's power of distress, because such limitation would mean that it would limit the landlord's readiness to give them credit at the time when they require it. Although it may be said that if you diminish the law of distraint you will increase the power of the tenant to get credit from tradesmen, my answer to that is that the law of competition itself will enable him to get reasonable and fair latitude in this direction from trades people, and it is far better for him to borrow money from his land- lord than to apply to a bank or any other source whatsoever. I believe that, so far from simplifying the relations between landlord and tenant, the effect of this limitation would be to promote discord between the two parties. It would tend to create an unnecessary revolution in the arrangement that at present exists between them which would be prejudicial to both of the parties concerned. I do not want to weary the House by giving very many instances of what might arise if this clause was passed as it now stands, but I should like to point out three cases at least in which it would inflict very serious injury upon the tenant. Let me take the instance of a farmer who pays £100 a year in rent to his landlord by half-yearly payments—in December for the Michaelmas rent and in June for the Lady Day rent. Supposing that, at the June collection for Lady Day, he is £75 in arrear with his rent, it is obviously impossible that the landlord could allow the tenant to go on another six months if this clause was passed, because then he would have exhausted the limit under
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which he would be allowed to recover, and, therefore, to obviate such a risk as this it would be necessary to make the rent audit close up to the term day. This in many parts of the country would have a disastrous result on the tenants themselves, because rents are collected at such times as to permit the tenants to have the opportunity of attending the local fairs which are held in their neighbourhood. To make any alteration in the arrangements for the payment of their rents would, therefore, have a most injurious effect upon them. Then, upon every property there are instances of tenant farmers who have been occupying their farms for upwards of thirty or forty years on what are known as yearly tenancies. It has been the custom with them——
MR. LONGsignified to the hon. Member that he would accept the Amendment.
MR. LOPES: I am told that my right hon. friend is prepared to accept the Amendment, and that being so, I shall not continue my remarks.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 4, line 11, to leave out Clause 7." —(Mr. Lopes.)
Question proposed, "That the words of the clause to the word 'more,' in line 12, stand part of the Bill."
*MR. LONG: I should like to toll the House why I propose to accept this Amendment. My hon. friend has asked why it is that the Government should put this Amendment in the Bill. The question of the law of distress is a complicated and difficult one. I have no doubt my hon. friend's interpretation of the Act of 1883 is correct, but it certainly was understood at that time that the power of the landlord to recover under the law of distress was to be limited to a year's rent. When it was discovered that a year's rent meant in reality practically eighteen months rent, it was still held that that was intended by the Act of Parliament to mean a year's rent, and that the landlord was entitled to recover for that period. There have been several suggestions made on the subject. The Royal Commission recommended that it should be limited to a year, and therefore the Government thought it right to put this clause in the Bill, but since doing so we

1349
have received representations from many quarters, and many of them from hon. Members sitting on the other side of the House, pointing out to us that the effect of this change in the law would be distinctly injurious to the tenants themselves, especially in cases where the properties are held not by single individuals in their own right, but where they are held by trustees on behalf of charities, colleges, and other institutions. It was stated that the result of any such change in the law would be distinctly injurious to the tenant farmers. My hon. friend opposite who represents one of the Divisions of Somerset proposed in the Grand Committee upstairs not that the law should remain as it is, but that the period should be definitely extended to two years. As my hon. friend the Member for Grant-ham has pointed out, the cutting out of this clause was only defeated by a majority of one. I voted for the retention of the clause, but I loft it entirely to the Committee to decide it as they liked. Since then I have been assured in many quarters that the retention of this clause would be injurious to the tenants, and that being so, I advise the House to accept the Amendment my hon. friend has moved for the dropping of this clause out of the Bill.
Question put, and negatived.
Remaining words of the clause omitted.
MR. JEFFREYSsaid the Amendment he desired to move dealt with Clause 8, and its effect was to make Section 28 of Part III. of the Schedule retrospective.
*MR. LONGrose to a point of order. Clause 8, to which the Amendment was addressed, dealt only with the method by which compensation was to be obtained. He submitted the Amendment should properly come on the schedule itself.
*MR. SPEAKERruled that the Amendment was in order and in its proper place
MR. JEFFREYSsaid the point was that compensation was given in the schedule for temporary pasture, and the farmer would like that to be retrospective. That was the only question he desired to raise, and for that purpose he moved the Amendment.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 4, line 20, after the word 'Act,' to insert the words 'provided that, in the ease of an improvement such as is described in paragraph twenty-eight in Part III. of the First Schedule to this Act, where any such improvement has been carried out within three years before the determination of the tenancy, compensation may be claimed and obtained under the provisions of this Act.' "—(Mr. Jeffreys.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
*MR. LONGhoped the Amendment would not be pressed. There was not an argument in support of making the Bill retrospective in regard to this particular point which could not with equal force be advanced in regard to many other improvements. There was really not much importance to be attached to the inclusion of temporary seeds. As a matter of practice, the farmer who laid down pasture did so knowing, in the first place, that as the law stood he had no right to compensation, and, in the second place, that if he quitted while that temporary pasture was in it would be to the advantage of the owner of the land to take it over rather than to allow the farmer to break it up, as he would have full right to do if the owner would not take it over. There-fore the point was not so great as it at first sight might appear. It would not be fair or wise to make an exception in any particular instance; if the measure was made retrospective at all it ought to be made generally retrospective, and that the Government could not agree to.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Another Amendment made.
MR. BUCHANANsaid that in putting down the motion to omit Clause 10, he desired to call attention to a matter which had been brought up on several occasions—namely, the position in which Scottish agriculturists were placed by the way in which this measure applied to them. This was a totally new departure. Hitherto, in regard to this important subject, Scotland had had its own system of legislation perfectly separate from the English sys-tem, and it was desired that in the future they should proceed upon the same lines as in the past, having separate legislation on this subject, so that Scottish agricul-

1351
ture could continue to develop on the lines which had led to such marked progress since the beginning of the century. He did not say that the Scottish legislation should not be on the same lines as the English. The progress of agriculture must necessarily move very largely upon the same principles and the same lines in both countries. But as a matter of good administration and good legislation, the Government, in this Bill, and particularly in the clause under discussion, were taking a retrograde step. Instead of making legislation easier and simpler for the ordinary person to understand, and for the Scottish tenant and landlord to have their grievances remedied and their differences settled, it became more difficult and expensive, because, in addition to their own Acts, this Bill under discussion would come in, and that had to be interpreted by means not only of Scottish Acts but also of English Acts. By this measure the Government were taking a retrograde step both as regards legislation and administration, and for that reason he moved the omission of Clause 10.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 4, line 26, to leave out Clause 10." —(Mr. Buchanan.)
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."
*MR. LONGsaid he was not overwhelmed by the charge which had frequently been made in the course of the debates that the action of the Government was either retrograde or injurious to the best interests of agriculture. Nobody admired more than those on this side of the Border the energetic and enlightened manner in which Scottish agriculturists had carried on their busi-
ness; but at the same time there was a place called England in which were a large number of competent agriculturists who could hold their own in competition even with Scotchmen. The views expressed by the hon. Member were entirely at variance with the views held by those who had some claim to represent Scottish agriculture—by such a body, for instance, as the Scottish Chamber of Agriculture. That body was probably quite as much entitled to consideration on this question as the hon. Member, and he (the speaker) was justified in putting their views forward in answer to those of the hon. Member. The Scottish Chamber of Agriculture had petitioned Parliament in favour of the Bill; they had held a, meeting at which they welcomed the Bill as one of much importance, containing provisions calculated to give more effective force to the compensation principle; and oddly enough, the provision empowering the Board of Agriculture to appoint an arbitrator, which had been condemned by the hon. Member, was one of the parts of the Bill to which they attached special importance. It therefore did not look as if that body shared the rather peculiar views of the hon. Gentleman in regard to the Board of Agriculture. It was not desirable or necessary to debate on this Amendment the whole question of whether or not the Bill should apply to Scotland. The object of the Government was so far as necessary to amend the law as applied to both countries, and gradually to consolidate the whole of the agricultural laws into one Act, so that it would be easy for anyone, whether in England, Scotland, or Wales, to ascertain what the law was and how it stood.
Question put.
The House divided:—Ayes, 222; Noes, 105. (Division List No. 212.)

AYES.

Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir Alex. F.

Bethell, Commander

Butcher, John George

Allsopp, Hon. George

Bigwood, James

Campbell, Rt. Hn. J. A. (Glas'w)

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Bill, Charles

Carlile, William Walter

Arrol, Sir William

Blundell, Colonel Henry

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Cavendish, R. F. (N. Lancs.)

Bailey, James (Walworth)

Boulnois, Edmund

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbysh.)

Baird, John George Alexander

Bousfield, William Robert

Cayzer, Sir Charles William

Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Man.)

Bowles, Capt. H. F. (Middlesex)

Cecil, Evelyn (Hertford, East)

Balfour, Rt Hn Gerald W. (Leeds)

Bowles, T. G. (King's Lynn)

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

Banbury, Frederick George

Brassey, Albert

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. (Birm)

Beach, Rt. Hn. Sir M. H. (Bristol)

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Chamberlain, J Austen (Wore'r)

Beaumont, Went worth C. B.

Bullard, Sir Henry

Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

Beckett, Ernest William

Burt, Thomas

Charrington, Spencer

Chelsea, Viscount

Heaton, John Henniker

Pease, H. Pike (Darlington)

Coddington, Sir William

Hedderwick, Thos. Charles H.

Peel, Hon. W. R. Wellesley

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Helder, Augustus

Percy, Earl

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Henderson, Alexander

Perks, Robert William

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Hoare, E. Brodie (Hampstead)

Pilkington, R.(Lancs Newton)

Colomb, Sir John Chas. Ready

Hoare, Sir (Samuel (Norwich)

Pilkington, Sir G. A. (Lancs S.W)

Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

Houston, R. P.

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Cooke, C. W. Radcliffe (Heref'd)

Howard, Joseph

Pretyman, Ernest George

Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasg'w)

Howell, William Tudor

Pryce Jones, Lt-. Col. Edward

Cornwallis, Fiennes Stanley W.

Howorth, Sir Henry Hoyle

Purvis, Robert

Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

Hozier, Hon. James Henry Cecil

Rankin, Sir James

Cripps, Charles Alfred

Jackson, Rt. Hon. Wm. Lawies

Ridley, Rt. Hon. Sir M. W.

Cross, Alexander (Glasgow)

Jebb, Sir Richard Claverhouse

Ritchie, Rt. Hon. Chas Thomson

Cross, Herbert S. (Bolton)

Jeffreys, Arthur Frederick

Robertson, Herbert (Hackney)

Cruddas, William Donaldson

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Rothschild, Hon. Lionel W.

Dalkeith, Earl of

Kennaway, Rt. Hn. Sir John H.

Round, James

Dalrymple, Sir Charles

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. William

Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltenham)

Davies, Sir Horatio D. (Chatham)

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Samuel, Harry S. (Limehouse)

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Knowles, Lees

Savory, Sir Joseph

Dorington, Sir John Edward

Lawrence, Sir E. Durning-(Corn)

Scoble, Sir Andrew Richard

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Lawson, John Grant (Yorks.)

Seely, Charles Hilton

Doxford, Sir William T.

Leeky, Rt. Hn. William Ed. H.

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Dyke, Rt. Hn. Sir Wm. Hart

Leighton, Stanley

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

Elliot, Hn. A. Ralph Douglas

Llewelyn, Sir Dillwyn-(Sw'nsea)

Simeon, Sir Harrington

Faber, George Denison

Lodor, Gerald Walter Erskine

Smith, J. Parker (Lanarks.)

Fardell, Sir T. George

Long, Col. Chas. W. (Evesham)

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edw.

Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Liverp'l)

Spencer, Ernest

Fergusson, Rt. Hn. Sir J. (Man.)

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Stanley, Hn. Arthur (Ormskirk)

Finch, George H.

Lopes, Henry Yarde Buller

Stanley, Ed Jas. (Somerset)

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Lowe, Francis William

Stanley, Sir Henry M. (Lambeth)

Fisher, William Hayes

Lowles, John

Stewart, Sir M. j. M'Taggart

FitzGerald, Sir R. Penrose-

Lowther, Rt. Hon. J. (Kent)

Stone, Sir Benjamin

Fitz Wygram, General Sir F.

Lloyd, Archie Kirkman

Strauss, Arthur

Flannery, Sir Fortescue

Lucas-Shadwell, William

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Flower, Ernest

Maclean, James Mackenzie

Sturt, Hon. Humphry Napier

Forster, Henry William

M. Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Sutherland, Sir Thomas

Foster, Harry S. (Suffolk)

M'Iver, Sir L. (Edinburgh, W.)

Talbot, Rt. Hn. J. G. (Oxf'd Un.)

Fry, Lewis

M'Killop, James

Tennant, Harold John

Galloway, William Johnson

Malcolm, Ian

Thornton, Percy M.

Garfit, William

Maple, Sir John Blundell

Tollemache, Henry James

Gedge, Sydney

Mellor, Colonel (Lancashire)

Tritton, Charles Ernest

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

Mellor, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Yorks.)

Vincent, Sir Edgar (Exeter)

Gibbs, Hn. A. G. H. (C. of Lond.)

Melville, Beresford Valentine

Wallace, Robert

Gibbs, Hon. V. (St. Albans)

Meysey-Thompson, Sir H. M.

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Giles, Charles Tyrrell

Middlemore, J. Throgmorton

Welby, Lt.- Col. A. C. E. (Taunt.)

Gilliat, John Saunders

Milbank, Sir Powlett C. John

Wellby, Sir Charles G. E. (Notts)

Godson, Sir Augustus Freder'k

Monk, Charles James

Whiteley, H. (Ashton-under-L.)

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Moon, Edward Robert Pacy

Whitmore, Charles Algernon

Gordon, Hon. John Edward

More, R. J. (Shropshire)

Williams, Colonel R. (Dorset)

Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John E.

Morgan, Hn. F. (Monm'thsh.)

Williams, J. Powell. (Birm.)

Goschen, George J. (Sussex)

Morrell, George Herbert

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Morrison, Walter

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Graham, Henry Robert

Morton, A. H. A. (Deptford)

Wilson-Todd, Wm. H. (Yorks)

Gray, Ernest (West Ham)

Mount, William George

Wodehouse, Rt. Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Green, W. D. (Wednesbury)

Mowbray, Sir Robert Gray C.

Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

Greene, Henry D. (Shrewsbury)

Murray, Rt Hn. A Graham (Bute)

Wylie, Alexander

Gull, Sir Cameron

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

Wyndham, George

Gunter, Colonel

Myers, William Henry

Wyvill, Marmaduke D'Arcy

Haldane, Richard Burdon

Newdigate, Francis Alexander

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Hamilton, Rt. Hn. Lord George

Nicholson, William Graham

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Hanbury, Rt. Hon. Robert W.

Paulton, James Mellor

Hanson, Sir Reginald

Pease, Alfred E (Cleveland)

NOES.

Abraham, Wm. (Cork. N. E.)

Billson, Alfred

Crombie, John William

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Bramsdon, Thomas Arthur

Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)

Allison, Robert Andrew

Caldwell, James

Dalziel, James Henry

Ashton, Thomas Gair

Cameron, Sir Charles (Glasgow)

Dilke, Rt. Hn. Sir Charles

Atherley-Jones, L.

Cameron, Robert (Durham)

Dillon, John

Austin, M. (Limerick, W.)

Carvill, Patrick George H.

Donelan, Captain A.

Bain bridge, Emerson

Cawley, Frederick

Doogan, P. C.

Barlow, John Emmott

Clark, Dr. G. B.

Dunn, Sir William

Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire)

Colville, John

Emmot, Alfred

1354

1355

Engledew, Charles John

Maddison, Fred.

Stanhope, Hon. Philip J.

Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

Mappin, Sir Frederick T.

Steadman, William Charles

Evans, Sir Francis H. (South'ton)

Mather, William

Stevenson, Francis S.

Fenwick, Charles

Mendl, Sigismund Ferdinand

Strachey, Edward

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Molloy, Bernard Charles

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Flynn, James Christopher

Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

Thomas, Abel (Carmarth'n., E.)

Fox, Dr. Joseph Francis

Morgan, W. Pritchard (M'rthyr)

Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, E.)

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Norton, Capt. Cecil William

Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr)

Gurdon, Sir William Brampton

Nussey, Thomas Willans

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Harwood, George

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Walton, John Lawson (Leeds, S.)

Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Charles H.

O'Connor, Arthur (Donegal)

Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)

Horniman, Frederick John

O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.)

Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Wason, Eugene

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Oldroyd, Mark

Weir, James Galloway

Jacoby, James Alfred

O'Malley, William

Whiteley, George (Stockport)

Johnson-Ferguson, Jabez E.

Philipps, John Wynford

Wills, Sir William Henry

Jones, David Brynm. (Swansea)

Pickard, Benjamin

Wilson, Charles Henry (Hull)

Jones, William (Carnarvonsh.)

Pickersgill, Edward Hare

Wilson, Henry J. (York, W. R.)

Kearley, Hudson E.

Power, Patrick Joseph

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

Lewis, John Herbert

Price, Robert John

Wilson, John (Govan)

Lough, Thomas

Provand, Andrew Dryburgh

Woods, Samuel

Luttrell, Hugh Fownes

Reckitt, Harold James

Young, Samuel (Cavan, East)

Macaleese, Daniel

Reid, Sir Robert Threshie

Yoxall, James Henry

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Richardson, J. (Durham, S. E.)

M'Dermott, Patrick

Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. Buchanan and Si rWilliam Wedderburn.

M'Ewan, William

Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

M'Ghee, Richard

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Souttar, Robinson

*MR. SPEAKER: The House having just affirmed the machinery for applying the Act to Scotland, the next Amendment, standing in the name of the hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire, providing that the clause shall not apply to Scotland, is out of order.
SIR WILLIAM WEDDERBURN: The Amendment which stands in my name is to encourage the construction of cottages for agricultural labourers. In the district which it is my privilege to represent there is a very great want of accommodation for agricultural labourers; in fact, it has become a social scandal that there is no proper accommodation for them. I think the Member for East Aberdeenshire brought before the House a number of cases of very great hardship which had happened in both his constituency and mine, where the sanitary inspector, having visited the cottages of agricultural labourers, finds that they must be condemned on sanitary grounds. But the sanitary inspectors are in a great difficulty, because the cottages, if condemned, would probably be pulled down, and no others put in their place, in which case the position of the labourers would be worse than before. This is not only a very great scandal, but a very serious obstacle to good farming throughout the district.
1356
The labourers very often have to walk many miles to get to their work. It must also be remembered that an agricultural labourer cannot be made in a day, for he must serve his apprenticeship, and those hardy crofters make the very best material for agricultural labourers. In the Report of the Royal Commission on Agriculture various reasons were given why farmers are not able to contend with farmers abroad, and one of the principal was because of the increased cost of production, and because they could not get good labour. Farmers are perfectly willing to pay for good labour, but they cannot get it, one of the chief reasons being that there is no adequate accommodation for labourers. What I therefore propose is chat cottages for agricultural labourers should be taken out of Part I. of the schedule of improvements which require the consent of the landlord, and put into Part II., in which the farmer is only required to give notice. It must be remembered that a great many of these farmers have leases for twenty-one years, and it is perfectly certain that no farmer would spend money in building cottages unless they were absolutely necessary for the conduct of his farm. We have been told by the right hon. Gentleman and others that the farmers are very capable of knowing their true interests, and I do not see how their true interests in this matter differ from the true interests of the landlords.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 6 (First Schedule), line 5, after the word 'buildings,' to insert the words 'except cottages for agricultural labourers.'"—(Sir William Wedderburn.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
*MR. LONG: I can hardly imagine that the hon. Member will insist on this Amendment, because I am convinced it is not in the least desired. The first great demand—probably a stronger and greater demand than any other—which the labourers make is that that they should hold their cottages independent of farmers and direct from the landlords, and that their cottages should not be part and parcel of the farms on which they are engaged. I should like to ask the hon. Gentleman how he proposes to carry out the Amendment. Supposing a labourer does not desire to live in a cottage on the farm, is the farmer to bear the cost of that cottage, which no one will occupy, and is the landlord to be compelled to buy it without having been consulted in the first instance as to the number of rooms, the site and whether it was wanted or not. From the point of view of the landlord and the labourer, I cannot conceive that there would be any advantage in this proposal. As for the farmer I think it will be found that he is not inclined to lay out capital when he can only expect a return of 1½ per cent, at the utmost. I hope, therefore, that the hon. Member will not persist in the Amendment.
MR. BUCHANAN: With regard to the argument on behalf of the landlord, surely if the cottages which a tenant puts up do not add to the letting value of the farm, then there would be no claim for compensation. The right hon. Gentleman says that they may be useless cottages and not wanted, but in that case he tenant would not be entitled to compensation. The substance of the Amendment of my hon. friend is to provide for the cottage accommodation which experience has shown exists in many parts of Scotland. Very often in Scotland, especially where the tenants are a more enterprising body of men than the landlords, they are quite willing to put capital into the development of their farms, and one way of developing a farm is to provide
1358
accommodation for labourers. My hon. friend in his Amendment wishes to remove a restriction on enterprising tenants who desire to improve their farms in that way.
Question put, and negatived.
*EARL PERCY: I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name, and will do so very briefly, as I have already stated my views on the subject. This Bill for the first time proposes to allow a tenant to make gardens, orchards, and osier beds not exceeding three acres in all without the consent of the landlord. I propose to leave out the words "exceeding one acre" in order to bring the law back to the state in which it now exists. The principle of the Act of 1883 was that improvements for which the tenant might gain compensation without the consent of the landlord were to be strictly limited to those absolutely necessary for the cultivation of the soil. The tenant has entered into a legal obligation to farm the soil to the best of his ability, and he can only do so if allowed a certain amount of latitude in the selection of appliances which his experience tells him are best fitted for the capacity of the soil. But in this Bill the principle is adopted that a tenant is to be allowed to convert an agricultural holding to other purposes, and in that manner to try experiments. You are introducing a principle which is wholly indefensible and which lends itself to indefinite extension. The tenant has entered on the holding with full knowledge of its character and the conditions attaching to its cultivation. If he does not like that character and those conditions he is at perfect liberty to go elsewhere. It might be said that this is a small point. Of course, it is a small point in itself. It may also be said that in one or two parts of the country we may have cantankerous landlords, who will refuse to allow a small indulgence to their tenants, and that it is therefore the duty of the Legislature to step in and remove that hardship. It is these hard cases which, in my opinion, make bad law. I do not see why you should stop short at legislation which would deprive the landlord of all control over his land once he has leased it to a tenant. It may be said that three acres are a very small slice

1359
out of an ordinary farm, but the right hon. Gentleman must remember that many of the farms dealt with under this Bill are farms of five, ten, fifteen, or twenty acres, and three acres is a considerable slice in such cases. It is a monstrous thing that we should allow tenants who have only a temporary interest in a holding to convert it from an agricultural holding to purposes for which the soil may be absolutely unfitted, and for the produce of which there might be no local sale, and then to come to the landlord and ask for compensation. What would be thought if we were to apply this principle to the ordinary practice of letting houses? What would be said if the right hon. Gentleman were to let his house to me at an ordinary rent and I were to convert his drawing-room into a gymnasium and his dining-room into a theatre, and then ask him for compensation on the ground that the theatrical entertainments had added to the value of the house. That is precisely an analogous case. If you allow these tenants to make these gardens and osier beds why confine them to one acre; why place any restriction upon them at all? Personally, I think the whole proposal is ludicrous and unnecessary. If the gardens are likely to increase the value of the holding, then clearly the landlord, who has not merely a temporary interest in the land, will give facilities to the tenant to make them. The proposal in the Bill is therefore unnecessary. If you are going to introduce this principle where are you going to stop. It is practically certain that when you propose to confine this new licence to tenants to one acre the party opposite will certainly propose to extend it still further when they come into power. I must point out to the right hon. Gentleman that it is not contended that there is any great demand for this proposal. It is admitted it has been framed to meet possible or casual cases of hardship: it would bring no popularity to this side of the House, and it has nothing to do with the simplification of procedure which is the main object of the Bill. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will think twice before he introduces a principle into the Bill which in future will enable the party opposite to claim an acceptance of a development of that principle for which the right hon. Gentleman or any of his colleagues would not have any sympathy at all.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 6, line 8, to leave out the words 'exceeding one acre.'"—(Earl Percy.)
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."
*MR. LONG: It is useless to deny that the proposal to give this power to the tenants is a limitation in some degree of the principle that has been more than once laid down—namely, that the right should be preserved to the landlord to deal with any ultimate change in the character of a farm as he thinks best. What my noble friend has said is undoubtedly true, but I am bound to say, when he expresses inability to draw a distinction between one acre and ton acres, I am doubtful whether he has not studied more carefully the logical aspect of these cases rather than their practical aspects. I can assure my noble friend that farmers fully realise why a distinction is drawn at one acre. Logically, from my noble friend's point of view, the limitation may be a very improper one, but from the general point of view, it is a very proper and sensible proceeding. It is the limitation in Part I. that leads to the absence of limitation in Part II. of the schedule. My noble friend moves to omit these words in order to follow up his Amendment by moving to omit other words in the next part of the schedule. Therefore it is necessary that i should point out to the House that the power which it is proposed that the tenants should acquire under Part II. is limited in this way. If the tenant desires to do this work, he must give notice to his landlord, and if the landlord desires to do the work himself, he has not only the right to do it, but has statutory power to charge the tenant 5 per cent. That is a great protection to the landlords. I entirely agree with my noble friend that this is a very small matter indeed, and that there is not a very great demand for it. So far as I am aware, no great interest is taken in it by landlords or tenants outside the House of Commons. It has been recommended by the Central Chamber of Agriculture and also by the Royal Commission. Supported an it is by these two recommendations, I do not think it can be regarded as a, dangerous power to confer on the tenants. I cannot help hoping that the House will

1361
retain these powers, because they will he useful to farmers who desire to exercise them, and I do not think there will be any danger in giving them.
Mr. JAMES LOWTHER: The question we have to consider is whether a tenant farmer to whom land is let for the purpose of cultivation should be allowed to take a considerable portion of the holding and apply it to purposes not contemplated when his agreement was entered into, and which I think it is impossible to argue would be in the interests of good farming. Can my right hon. friend say that agriculture will be improved or the tenant's position amended by speculations of this kind? It is absolutely a new business—business which I undertake to say tenant farmers know nothing about, and in my opinion it would be a very foolish thing for them to embark on it. I do not know whether my right hon. friend can tell me of any case in which a farmer has done well by dabbling in such speculations. I think the principle we are now asked to establish is most mischievous and undesirable. As regards the general subject, ray right hon. friend has not noticed my noble friend's strongest point—namely, that the relative proportion of these experiments to the area of the holding is not defined. I can imagine anyone saying that three acres would be a mere nothing on a farm of 1,000 acres; but how about small farms? Three acres would be, relatively speaking, a large portion of a small holding, and it is a very strong proposal to divert it from the purpose for which the land was let. An acre of land is a great deal to till as a. garden. Of course if a tenant intends to go in for market gardening he ought to apply to the landlord as a market gardening tenant. As for orchards, I have some slight experience of them, and I can only say it is a very wearisome thing to have to wait until the trees grow. I say we are doing an ill turn to the tenant farmers by inviting them to embark upon speculative enterprises of this kind. I do hope, especially, that my right hon. friend will not commit himself to the osier beds. He will see that there is a vital distinction between a farmer wanting a few rows of potatoes or a small quantity of fruit for home consumption and the planting of osier beds. he should remember that osier beds, unless protected by fences, would be of
1362
serious injury to the farm. Perhaps a portion of a field may be unduly moist, and the farmer, instead of taking any trouble to relieve it of its waterlogged condition, would decide under the Act of Parliament to plant osiers. He would get over the trouble of making the land drier, and could also claim compensation. That would be most mischievous. Has my right hon. friend contemplated what the estimated cost would be of planting an acre of osiers and fencing the same? I think it would be found that quarrels would arise in the exercise of this power, and as to whether osier beds would add to the letting value of the holding, that would be a moot point. It cannot be seriously considered that the planting of these beds is likely to benefit the tenant farmers of England, and I hope my noble friend will take the sense of the House on the proposal.
MR. JEFFREYScould not see that the planting of an orchard could injure a farm. As a matter of fact, if it did not turn out a success the only man who would be injured was the man who had taken the risk. It was absurd to say that a farmer could not even plant an acre of fruit trees without getting the consent of the landlord. It should be remembered that this was only in the second schedule, and the tenant could not do the planting without giving notice to the landlord, when the landlord might prevent him from carrying out the alteration. This modest proposal was made by the Royal Commission, and he thought it would be very wrong not to pass it. He lived in a dry country, and did not know much about osier beds, but if a farmer planted osier beds on soil which was not suitable or damp enough, and they turned out a failure, he would get no compensation.
*CAPTAIN PRETYMANhoped his noble friend would press his Amendment to a division; for, after all, there was an important principle at stake—namely, the alteration of the permanent character of a holding without the consent of the landlord. His hon. friend said that drainage was more important than this particular class of improvement; but the question was, did the improvement alter the character of the holding? Now, draining did not alter the character of the

1363
holding, and, what was of more importance, it was beyond dispute a class of improvement which would be of equal use to the succeeding as to the present tenant. On the other hand, if osiers were planted it would probably be done by a man who was a basket maker. But the successor might not be a basket maker, and could not make use of the osiers, and he would go to the wall. But there was another important point, the landlord might be an extremely poor man himself. In the case of large farms, cultivated by large tenants, an acre taken up for an orchard or an osiery would not be a matter of great importance. But in the case of a small holding a comparatively large sum of money might be spent in laying out two acres of land as a fruit garden and an osiery. These might not be of any great value to the succeeding tenant, and payment of compensation for them might be a very large charge on a small owner. Why should a great principle be departed from, and the small owner be subjected to what might be a very great risk for a thing his tenant did not particularly want? The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Agriculture had conducted the Bill with such moderation that he felt very 10th to ask his noble friend to divide, but he hoped he would divide, as the point was a most important one. When he looked at the schedules it occurred to him that this proposal had been inserted into Part II., because it looked so very meagre when it only contained the item "drainage," but he would remind his right hon. friend if he thought the second part too thin, that a bit of good thin ham was preferable to a bit of thick bad bacon in a sandwich. He hoped that the question at issue would not be made, on division, a Government question.
MR. WALLACEthought the hon. Member who had just spoken must have forgotten the very terms of the Bill which he had criticised. He took as an illustration a tenant who planted an osier bed which would be of no use to the succeeding tenant, and yet the landlord would have to pay compensation for the bed, on the determination of the tenancy. Now, the express words of the compensation section were that where a
1364
tenant had made an improvement on his. holding he was to be entitled—
"At the determination of the tenancy, on quitting his holding, to obtain from the landlord as compensation under the said Acts for the improvement, such sum as fairly represents the value of the improvement to an incoming tenant."
Therefore, if the improvement was of no value to the incoming tenant there was no compensation. His object in rising was to make a most earnest appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to stand by this clause as it was. After all, this schedule was something of a compromise, for Amendments had been moved from both sides suggesting to leave out and to add to. He intended to support the Government, not because the Bill was all that he wished it to be, but because it was the best possible that they could get. If the right hon. Gentleman stood by this schedule he would very soon get the Bill through.
MR. VICARYGIBBSsaid one of the objections he had to the Bill was that it would embark the landlord in investments of a speculative character. It was bad to allow a man to. obtain a temporary hold on property on one representation, and then to deal with it afterwards differently from that representation. Take an illustration. A private house was let to a man who spent a great deal of money in converting it into a theatre, from which he made a large profit. At the determination of the lease was the landlord to. pay compensation, although the theatre was of no value to the new tenant? That was exactly the case with either fruit trees or osiers, the market for which was limited. His hon. friend the Member for North Hants spoke as if it were an immense advantage that notice had to be given to the landlord; but he could see none. A man was asked to spend money on the principle of "heads I win, tails you lose." For instance, a man incurred heavy expenditure on fruit trees, and before they became mature he came upon the landlord for compensation for those trees, which might be perfectly healthy and strong, but which were of no good, because the local market had either ceased to exist or was dying; and on the landlord would fall the loss of that speculation. He could not approve of the line taken by the right hon. the President of the Board

1365
of Agriculture. he understood him to say that he was not afraid of the extension of the principle of the measure. Personally, he was afraid of it; hut whether right or wrong, he objected to a principle which could not be logically extended in practice. The right hon. Gentleman had given no explanation of how the extension of the principle could be logically opposed, and it might be that in the fulness of time, when the right hon. Gentleman crossed the floor of the House he would be found saying that what was perfectly right now would be perfectly wrong then, he opposed the whole thing ab initio. A man to whom property was handed over by a landlord temporarily and for a specific-purpose had no light to use that property for another purpose without the landlord's consent. If it were in the public interest that orchards and osieries should be made without the consent of the landlord, there should be no limitation to an acre. The man should be entitled to turn the whole holding into a fruit garden or osiery. It was ludicrous to make a limitation. The truth was that the right hon. Gentleman, in his general desire to moot certain views, had fallen into an error of principle, capable of immense extension. While the thing was yet small it could be stopped, and he begged the right hon. Gentleman to listen to those on his own side of the House and withdraw a proposal containing what was a most mischievous principle.
*MR. PERKSsaid he represented a large agricultural constituency twelve hundred square miles in extent. Many of the tenant farmers in Lincolnshire had asked for the assistance of the Legislature to protect them from the unreasonable and unrestricted conditions imposed on them by the landlords who refused to give full freedom to tenants in carrying on their business. It was contended in the course of this debate that the land was the property of the landlords to do what they like with. But he ventured to suggest that there was a co-partnership in the products of the property between the landlord and the tenant. The farmer provided the intelligence, the capital, and the labour, and the landlord supplied the land. He trusted the Government were going to maintain this clause, which would certainly give to the tenant, though on a
1366
small scale, a latitude he ought to have, and which had not hitherto been his. In one part of Lincolnshire stiff clay land had been largely used for growing roots, but it was ultimately used with great profit to both landlord and tenant for trenching and growing celery. For many years, however, the same arguments used to-day had been employed to prevent the tenants cultivating celery instead of roots;, but the landlords had at last come to see that it was for their mutual interest to give the tenants liberty in that particular direction. "What was true of celery was true of osiers, fruit gardens, and orchards. Surely a tenant, who was a man of intelligence, and who had to watch the outgoing of every penny, would not spend money in the conversion of an acre of his farm into an osier bed or a fruit garden without an intelligent forecast of a return for the outlay of his money. If the garden or osier beds were of no value to the incoming tenant there would be nothing for the landlord to pay. The clause was a very moderate concession to farmers, who ought to be encouraged rather than obstructed in making experiments on small portions of their holdings; and he hoped the Government would adhere to it.
MR. HARDYhoped the right hon. Gentleman might yet see his way to accept his Amendment in regard to osier beds, which stood on a ditto rent ground entirely from orchards or fruit gardens. he wished to ask the right hon. Gentleman one question as concerning the words proposed to be loft out. In the Grand Committee considerable doubt was expressed as to whether it might not be possible as the section now stood to make several small osier beds on a farm which in the aggregate would cover a considerable number of acres. It was very likely that a farmer might take several small plots separate from each other on the banks of a stream, and that these collectively would be far greater than the limitation proposed in the schedule. In Grand Committee the right hon. Gentleman undertook to introduce qualifying words if he were advised that there was any doubt on the subject. He would like to know whether the right hon. Gentleman was satisfied that the words "not exceeding one acre" would obviate the difficulty which had been raised.
*MR. LONG: I did carefully consider that point, and I have boon assured that the clause as worded would limit the farmer to planting one acre in all.
SIR J. STIRLING-MAXWELLsaid the Government might well agree to accept this Amendment without any fear of losing the Bill as a whole. The Government might rest assured that very little interest was taken in this question, which was a very small one in itself, but, as a matter of principle, of very great importance. If this schedule was passed, although it would not do much in the direction desired for the benefit of the tenant, it would be used in the future to deprive the landlord of the right to decide as to what use his land should be put. The result might be that the landlord would have to pay compensation for what had actually made the holding of less value than before.
MR. JOHNSON-FERGUSONsaid if the Amendment were accepted it would strike at the real principle of the Bill, as laid down by the right hon. Gentleman, and a tenant would not be able to plant an osier Led without first obtaining the permission of the landlord. If an improvement was to change the character of the farm, he could very well understand that it should be necessary to obtain first the consent of the landlord; but if the improvement was a mere adjunct to the amenity of the holding, then that consent should not be necessary. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would adhere to the clause as it stood.
LORD HUGH CECILsaid he had listened with great interest to the debate, and he could not congratulate his right hon. friend the President of the Board of Agriculture on having received very much support from his own side of the House. The only speech in his favour came from the hon. Member for North Hampshire, who relied mainly on his great faith in fruit farming for the benefit of the country. One of the ablest speeches made upon the Amendment was founded on a ground all those who supported the Bill regarded as most dangerous. One hon. Member regarded it as a compromise because it was supported from both sides of the House; another, with a perfectly open mind, argued on one side and formed his
1368
conclusions on the other. The right hon. Gentleman having, to judge by his speech, an eccentric love for doing what is practically useless and logically pernicious, proposed to adhere to the Bill as it stood. There were hon. Members who had not an unreasoning zeal in favour of want of logic; they preferred what was logically sound and sensible, and therefore they intended to divide the House.
MR. PHILIPPSsaid the noble Lord who had just sat down appeared to think the landlord would be robbed because a tenant was going to be given a discretion with regard to the way he might cultivate one acre of his farm. No one could read the papers for a week without finding articles deploring the amount of eggs or other produce we were importing, and moralising on the want of energy of our agriculturalists, who allowed this importation of articles which they might produce themselves. What the Government proposed to do was to say that with regard to one acre of his holding the farmer shall be allowed a discretion, so that he might be able to move with the times if he had the capacity to do so. A variety of arguments had been urged against the clause. The hon. Member for Woodbridge did not like it for thy reason that though it would not much affect the large landowner, it might bear very hardly on the small landlords, who were poor men, if they had to give compensation for these improvements. People were always lamenting that more money was not put into the land, yet hon. Members like the hon. Member for Woodbridge objected to the tenants putting their money into it.
CAPTAIN PRETYMAN: Not at all. I only objected to their spending the landlords' money.
MR. PHELIPPSsaid that in this case the tenant spent his own money in improving the land, and if objection was now to he raised to his spending his own money as regarded improving an acre of land, how was capital to get into the land and farming to progress at all? The right hon. Member for Thanet said that fruit farming up to an acre ought not to be allowed, because a farmer in the North of England might plant an acre—which was not adapted to the purpose—with fruit trees. But as regarded one acre, which

1369
was a moderate enough proposal, it was absurd to say that a farmer should not plant fruit trees because some stupid person might plant them on unsuitable land. Two principles had been discussed on this Amendment. One principle was that somebody unconnected with agriculture and who did not understand it should teach the farmer his business; the other principle was to leave the farmer a free hand in order that he might try and do something to promote progress in his business. The Government had not gone very far in that direction, but their proposal was a right one and he should support it.
MR. GRANT LAWSONpointed out that the Amendment before the Committee was not so much directed against those who wished to make an orchard or a garden as it was to the question of whether, if a man did so on another man's land without the owner's consent or against his will, the owner should pay him compensation when he gave up his tenancy. He rose for the purpose of suggesting a compromise. The Amendment appeared to apply more particularly to osier beds than to orchards and gardens, and it was argued that the change in the character of the holding was much more serious in that case. He thought, therefore, an agreement might be arrived at by giving way on the question of osier beds, and allowing the clause to stand as at present with regard to orchards and gardens.
MR. HEYWOOD JOHNSTONEsaid that, whatever might have been the case, the proposals of the Bill had been given away by the hon. Member for Louth, who appeared to look upon the relation of the landlord and tenant as that of a partnership, and he desired that one partner should have power to break the articles of partnership and make experiments in his own interests. But a partnership was generally governed by articles, one of which forbade one partner engaging in speculations or experiments. Yet that was the relationship which it was suggested to apply between the landlord and the tenant. But, apart from that, he thought that
these proposals required more consideration than had been bestowed upon them. They appeared to have been pitch forked into the Bill without any consideration as to how they would work out in practice. There was no proportion about them; however small or however large the holding, the acre multiplied by three might be taken off'. So that on a holding of seven acres, nearly half might be taken for experiments, and when another tenant took the holding he might take another three and leave only one acre. Those were matters which should be guarded against, and which ought to have been foreseen, and in his opinion it would be better to withdraw the present proposal, and bring it forward in some other form which would deal with those objections. Arguments were often urged that when there was no permanent value in the improvements to the holding, the tenant would not be paid for them. He distrusted such arguments, because if the arbitrator had power to give compensation he would always look with a kindly eye upon the man who had laid out his money. The man might have laid it out unwisely, and in a manner which would bring no permanent return, but so long as human nature remained as it was, the arbitrator would see some possibilities of good to the incoming tenant. What the House had to consider was whether the proposals were good in themselves, and whether sufficient provision had been made to guard against those difficulties and possible differences which he had drawn to the attention of the House.
COMMANDER BETHELLthought it would be only just and fair after what had been said on both sides of the House if the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill would allow the division to be taken without the Government tellers, and not attempt to coerce the party, but leave it free and let them by their votes give the true sense of the House upon the Amendment.
Question put.
The House divided:—Ayes, 231; Noes, 53. (Division List No. 213.)

AYES.

Abraham, Wm. (Cork, N E.)

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Balfour, Rt. Hn. G. W. (Leeds)

Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir A. F.

Austin, M. (Limerick, W.)

Banbury, Frederick George

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Bailey, James Walworth)

Beach, Rt. Hn. Sir. M. H. (Bristol)

Arrol, Sir William

Balfour, Rt. Hn. A.. J. (Manch'r)

Beaumont, Wentworth, C. B.

Bhownaggree, Sir M. M.

Goddard, Daniel Ford

O'Malley, William

Biddulph, Michael

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Paulton, James Mellor

Bigwood, James

Gordon, Hon. John Edward

Pease, A E. (Cleveland)

Billson, Alfred

Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John Eldon

Peel, Hn. Wm. Robt, Wellesley

Bolton, Thomas Dolling

Goschen, George J. (Sussex)

Penn, John

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Perks, Robert William

Bramsdon, Thomas Arthur

Graham, Henry Robert

Philipps, John Wynford

Brigg, John

Gray, Ernest (West Ham)

Pickard, Benjamin

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Green, W. D. (Wednesbury)

Pilkington, Sir G. A. (Lancs S W)

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

Greene, H. D. (Shrewsbury)

Power, Patrick Joseph

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

Haldane, Richard Burdon

Price, Robert John

Buchanan, Thomas Ryburn

Hamilton, Rt. Hn. Lord George

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edwd.

Bullard, Sir Harry

Hanbury, Rt. Hon. Robert W.

Purvis, Robert

Burns, John

Hanson, Sir Reginald

Reid, Sir Robert Threshie

Burt, Thomas

Harwood, George

Rickett, J. Compton

Butcher, John George

Hayne, Rt. Hn. Charles Seale-

Ridley, Rt. Hn. Sir Matthew W

Buxton, Sydney Charles

Hedderwick, Thomas C. H.

Ritchie, Rt. Hon. C. Thomson

Caldwell, James

Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Chas. H.

Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

Cameron, Sir Charles (Glasgow)

Henderson, Alexander

Robson, William Snowdon

Cameron, Robert (Durham)

Hoare, Sir Samuel (Norwich)

Russell, T. W. (Tyrone)

Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

Hogan, James Francis

Samuel, Harry S. (Limehouse)

Carlile, William Walter

Hornby, Sir William Henry

Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

Horniman, Frederick John

Savory, Sir Joseph

Causton, Richard Knight

Houston, R. P.

Seely, Charles Hilton

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derb'shire)

Howard, Joseph

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Cawley, Frederick

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Simeon, Sir Barrington

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J (Birm.)

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Sinclair, Capt. J. (Forfarshire)

Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc'r)

Jacoby, James Alfred

Smith, Abel H. (Christchurch)

Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

Jebb, Sir Richard Claverhouse

Smith, J. Parker (Lanarks.)

Charrington, Spencer

Johnson-Ferguson, J. E.

Smith, Samuel (Flint)

Chelsea, Viscount

Jones, D. Brynmor (Swansea)

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Clark, Dr. G. B.

Jones, William (Carnarvons.)

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Coddington, Sir William

Kearley, Hudson E.

Souttar, Robinson

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. William

Spencer, Ernest

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Spicer, Albert

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Knowles, Lees

Stanley, Hon. A. (Ormskirk)

Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

Lawrence, Sir E Durning-(Corn.)

Stanley, Edward J. (Somerset)

Cook, Fred. Lucas (Lambeth)

Lawson, Sir Wilfrid (Cumb'd)

Stanley, Sir H. M. (Lambeth)

Cooke, C. W. Radcliffe (Heref'd)

Lewis, John Herbert

Steadman, William Charles

Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

Llewelyn, Sir Dillwyn-(Swan'a)

Stewart, Sir M. J. M'Taggart

Cornwallis, Fiennes Stanley W.

Loder, Gerald Walter Erskine

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Crilly, Daniel

Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Liverp'l)

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Crombie, John William

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Sutherland, Sir Thomas

Cross, Alexander (Glasgow)

Lough, Thomas

Tennant, Harold John

Cross, Herb. S. (Bolton)

Lowe, Francis William

Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.).

Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)

Lowles, John

Thomas, A. (Glamorgan, E.)

Dalziel, James Henry

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Thomas, David A. (Merthyr)

Davies, Sir Horatio D (Chatham)

Lyttelton, Hon. Alfred

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Macaleese, Daniel

Tritton, Charles Ernest

Donelan, Captain A.

Macdona, John Cumming

Wallace, Robert

Doogan, P. C.

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Walton, J. Lawson (Leeds, S.)

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Wanklyn, James Leslie

Doxford, Sir William Theodore

M'Arthur, Wm. (Cornwall)

Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

Dunn, Sir William

M'Dermott, Patrick

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Dyke, Rt. Hon Sir Wm. H.

M'Ewan, William

Wason, Eugene

Emmott, Alfred

M'Ghee, Richard

Wedderburn, Sir William

Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

M'Laren, Charles Benjamin

Weir, James Galloway

Fardell, Sir T. George

M'Leod, John

Williams, Jos. Powell- (Birm.)

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Ed.

Maddison, Fred.

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

Fenwick, Charles

Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Mendl, Sigismund Ferdinand

Wilson, John (Govan)

Firbank, Joseph Thomas

Middlemore, J. Throgmorton

Wilson-Todd, W. H. (Yorks.)

Fisher, William Hayes

Monk, Charles James

Wodehouse, Rt Hon E. R. (Bath)

FitzGerald, Sir R. Penrose-

More, R. J. (Shropshire)

Woods, Samuel

Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

Morgan, J. L. (Carmarthen)

Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

Flannery, Sir Fortescue

Morrell, George Herbert

Wylie, Alexander

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Murray, Rt. Hn. A. G. (Bute)

Wyndham, George

Flower, Ernest

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

Wyvill, Marmaduke D'Arey

Flynn, James Christopher

Myers, William Henry

Young, Samuel (Cavan, East)

Fowler, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

Nicholson, William Graham

Yoxall, James Henry

Galloway, William Johnson

Nussey, Thomas Willans

Garfit, William

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES:—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Gedge, Sydney

O'Connor, J. (Wicklow, W.)

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Gladstone, Rt. Hn. Herbert Jn.

Oldroyd, Mark

1372

1373

NOES.

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Gibbs, Hn. Vicary (St. Albans)

Quilter, Sir Cuthbert

Baird, John George Alexander

Godson, Sir Augustus Fredk.

Rankin, Sir James

Bethell, Commander

Hardy, Laurence

Remnant, James Farquharson

Bill, Charles

Heaton, John Henniker

Round, James

Bowles, T. Gibson (King's L.)

Helder, Augustus

Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltenham)

Brassey, Albert

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

Cecil, Evelyn (Hertford, East)

Lawson, John Grant (Yorks)

Sidebottom, William (Derby.)

Cecil, Lord Hagh (Greenwich)

Leeky, Rt. Hn. Wm. Ed. H.

Stirling-Maxwell, Sir John M.

Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

Lopes, Henry Yarde Buller

Stock, James Henry

Cripps, Charles Alfred]

Lowther, Rt. Hn. James (Kent)

Talbot, Rt. Hn. J. G. (Oxf'd Un.)

Cruddas, William Donaldson

Lucas-Shadwell, William

Tollemache, Henry James

Dalkeith, Earl of

M'Killop, James

Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

Donkin, Richard Sim

Malcolm, Ian

Welby, Lt.- Col. A. C. E. (Taunt'n)

Dorington, Sir John Edward

Milkank, Sir Powlett Chas. J.

Welby, Sir C. G. E. (Notts.)

Elliot, Hon. A. Ralph Douglas

Morgan, Hn. F. (Monmonthsh.)

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Faber, George Denison

Morrison, Walter

Fergusson, Rt. Hn. Sir J. (Manc'r)

Mount, William George

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Earl Percy and Mr. Pretyman.

Forster, Henry William

Pilkington, R. (Lancs. Newton)

Foster, Harry S. (Suffolk)

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Question put, and agreed to.

*EARL PERCYsaid he would formally move the next Amendment, though, after the overwhelming support given to the Government by the Opposition in the lobby, he would not take a division for the purpose of asking a question which perhaps the Attorney General would answer. Under the Bill a tenant would be allowed to make a garden to the extent of an acre without the consent of the landlord; but in the case of a yearly tenancy and the tenant going out at the end of the year, would the new tenant be free to add another acre to the tenancy?
Amendment proposed—
"In page 6, line 10, to leave out the words exceeding one acre.' "—(Earl Percy.)
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."
SIR ROBERT FINLAYsaid the amount of compensation would arise out of the whole tenancy, and the limit in the schedule would apply to the one tenancy.
*EARL PERCY: But the next yearly tenant, and the next, and the next again?
SIR ROBERT FINLAYsaid he should certainly road the Bill as applying to one tenancy, and the next tenant would have equal right with his predecessor.
MR. JAMES LOWTHERsaid the Attorney General told them distinctly that if a new tenant came in or a son took up his father's tenancy, he might set to work
1374
on other three acres. In the previous discussion he was opposed by his hon. friend the Member for North Hampshire, who was the only Conservative Member who supported the Government by speech. His hon. friend said that if a tenant experimented by planting osiers he would get no compensation from the valuer. he ventured to differ entirely from that. He was sorry to say that he had tried the experiment of planting osiers, and he had been fool enough to plant an orchard. he could assure the House that he had deeply regretted both experiments. An hon. and learned friend of his was, he knew, a great authority on gardening, and he had been so good as to afford some valuable information in a publication which he could only hope his tenants had never read. According to the hon. Member for Hereford, the way to make money was to plant orchards and embark in fruit cultivation. That might be true in his case and his neighbourhood, but in his own it was disastrous.
*MR. SPEAKER: Order, order I understood that all these three Amendments about osiers, gardens, and orchards were to be discussed in the first, but if there are to be separate debates on each of those Amendments the right hon. Gentleman cannot go into the question of orchards now.
MR. JAMES LOWTHERsaid that in the previous debate he did not touch on the question of orchards, while his hon. friend, in moving this Amendment, never alluded to osiers at all. Of course he drew a great distinction between osiers and other experiments of

1375
that kind. He was endeavouring to show that gardening, as distinguished from osier beds and fruit trees, was a very doubtful speculation indeed. Certainly in his own neighbourhood, if any farmer were to suggest to him—he never had a tenant who would do it—that he wanted to devote his attention to gardening, he would advise him, if he wished to retain any portion of his capital, to keep out of the gardening business. It now appeared that the entire character of a holding might be speculatively altered without the consent of the landlord, and he hoped that in another place common sense would amend the Bill in this respect.
LORD HUGH CECILsaid it was necessary to comment upon what the Attorney General had told them. It would be remembered that the President of the Board of Agriculture relied very largely on the fact that one acre was the limit. The explanation of the Attorney General disposed of the statement that this improvement or injury would be limited to one acre. They now learned as a matter of fact that if one tenancy succeeded another, acre after acre would be liable to be so treated. The question was left in a substantially different position from that in which they approached it when the discussion commenced. He believed it to be a pernicious principle to extend to one acre, but they now knew that it might be extended to a great many acres. A more ridiculous conclusion and a greater piece of absurdity it would be impossible to imagine. He hoped the Government would amend this in the other House.
COMMANDER BETHELLsaid he had the impression that his right hon. friend the President of the Board of Agriculture had no suspicion of what was buried in the close of this Bill, and he saw the look of surprise that came over his face when the Attorney General made this painful discovery of the extent to which these proceedings might be carried in the course of a few years. He suggested that something should be done to meet this difficulty when the Bill went to a place where common sense could be applied to it.
*MR. LONG: Nobody can have any doubt whatever of the conditions under which compensation will be payable to a
1376
tenant. I am bound to say that it did not occur to me that the objection now raised was a very important one, because I think it is not likely to occur frequently.
SIR WILLIAM WEDDERBURN: My Amendment refers to item twelve of Part I. of the schedule, which requires the consent of the landlord for the reclaiming of waste land. The effect of that will be practically in the north of Scotland to-veto all the reclamation of land which is. now going on day by day. We ought rather to encourage the labour by which people make one or more blades of grass grew where none grew before. My right hon. friend the President of the Board of Agriculture does not claim to have special knowledge of the north of Scotland, but I am glad to say that the Attorney General has that knowledge, and I would appeal to him in regard to the correctness of my statement and the reasonableness of the small concession I now ask for. I think as the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill has refused to give us a separate Scotch Bill, he will feel himself bound, as far as he possibly can, to meet any particular grievance pointed out to him as arising from the different circumstances of Scotland, and especially the north of Scotland, to those of England. My proposition is that if the improvements which take the form of reclaiming the waste land require the consent of the landlord practically the improvements cannot go on. As the right hon. Gentleman does not claim special knowledge of the north of Scotland, I will very briefly explain what the circumstances are. very frequently an arrangement has been made with a large proprietor holding a great amount of waste land, as well as fertile and cultivable land. The proprietor often settles industrious cultivators on the land. I would instance the case of the Duke of Fife, who holds a large estate in Banff-shire. His predecessor settled a great number of people on these terms. He said to them, "You must not look to me for money to assist you in your improvements or your reclamation, but I will put moderate rents upon the ground, which is now very unproductive, and you will get the whole benefit that arises from building your houses, reclaiming he land, draining it, and the like."

1377
That was the understanding under which these industrious small holders have reclaimed very large tracts of country and very much improved all that district. But it is quite evident that these are small operations. How is it that one of those small holders proceeds to reclaim? It is perhaps by digging an open trench, by removing boulders, by digging up heather, and by putting down a spadeful or two of lime when he has the opportunity. He does not undertake great reclamations, but he is at it from day to day, constantly at work, and the ultimate result is that a very valuable new tract of cultivated land is brought within the proprietor's domain. If he had to get the consent of the landlord for each of these operations it would be impossible. Distances are great, and he cannot go away miles and miles to the proprietor or his agent to get his sanction for these small improvements. What I would really be glad to see would be that the reclamation of waste land should be taken out of the hands of the landlord altogether and handed over to the tenant. I cannot see how the landlord's interest can in any way be affected by a change from heather into grass. Therefore, in imposing this restriction, you are really putting a difficulty in the way of carrying out improvements by an industrious and enterprising people. In fact I think I may say that a great part of the land now under cultivation would never have been brought under cultivation if a difficulty of this sort had existed. Therefore I should be glad to see this restriction removed altogether, but I know there is no use in pressing opposition on the matter and asking very much. I have only suggested that land for reclamation, not exceeding an acre, should be left to the discretion of the tenant. I have referred to the Duke of Fife's estate rules. As long as the Duke of Fife owns that land the tenant is perfectly safe in making the reclamation, but then, unfortunately, it sometimes happens, as has happened in the case of the Duke of Fife, that the landlord sells a considerable portion of the land, and then the estate rules cease to operate, and people who have been working on the faith of those rules, find that there is no protection for their improvements at all. I beg to move.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 6, line 19, after the words 'wasteland,' to insert the words, 'exceeding one-acre.'"—[Sir William Wedderburn.)
Question proposed, "That those words; be there inserted."
*MR. LONG: It is obviously impossible to discuss the Amendment under consideration without reference to the one that follows it, and is consequent upon it. I have considerable sympathy with the hon. baronet in his desire that some concession should be made to tenants who-find themselves in the circumstances described, but I do not think the change he suggests is one that is desirable. He has no doubt in his mind a particular class of tenants effecting a particular kind of reclamation, but the term "reclamation of waste land" is one which is applied in various ways in different parts of the country, and while it might be quite fair to enable this work to be done without limitation in some parts of the country, under his conditions it would be unfair and unwise to permit it elsewhere. While the reclamation of waste land is of the utmost importance as affecting the future value of the land it may be land which some people consider it is altogether undesirable to improve and reclaim. There are many kinds of waste land. There is waste land over which not only the owner but particular persons, have certain rights, and it is conceivable that in such cases difficulties might arise if tenants were empowered 10 reclaim the land without the consent of the landlord or his agent. Under these circumstances I will ask the House to resist the Amendment of the hon. Baronet.
MR. HEDDERWICK: I venture to express the hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be open to persuasion on this point. I think it has sometimes accelerated the progress of a measure if the Minister in charge of it gives way gracefully occasionally. I cannot help thinking that he has somewhat exaggerated the importance of the Amendment moved by my hon. friend. I do not for one moment dispute that there may be very good reasons for inserting the item in the first schedule applying to the reclamation of waste land generally, because it is quite obvious that there may be cases where money would be thrown

1379
away in reclaiming land which would never be of profit to the owner. If the reclamation of land is carried to a large extent, I think the consent of the landlord ought first to be obtained. The Amendment moved by my hon. friend is strictly limited to the reclamation of waste land to the extent of an acre. I do not want to exaggerate the importance of the Amendment—I do not know that it is of so much importance as to justify the right hon. Gentleman in refusing to consider it; and certainly in those cases to which my hon. friend more particularly referred—small holdings in the Highlands—I do believe it might have some beneficial effect. I cannot conceive a case in which a landlord would refuse his consent to the reclamation of an acre of land where it was manifest that the reclamation would improve the value of the land. Considering how very little the right hon. Gentleman has been asked to give way, he would do a good thing if he would be persuaded to change his mind.
MR. VICARY GIBBS: I have very considerable sympathy with the hon. Baronet's object. Every argument the right hon. Gentleman used against the Amendment might be used against himself in other matters. I said some time ago that the Bill was faulty in principle, and before five months have passed we have an illustration of that fact. There is no reason whatever why, if it is right to give compensation for an orchard cultivated without the landlord's consent, it should not be right to give it for the reclamation of an acre of bog land. I can see no distinction between them. Both are good objects. The question is whether that should be done at somebody else's expense. I merely wish to point out how very quickly the effect which I ventured to prophesy has been fulfilled.
Question put.
The House divided:—Ayes, 60; Noes, 126. (Division List No. 214.)

AYES.

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Hogan, James Francis

Rickett, J. Compton

Billson, Alfred

Horniman, Frederick John

Samuel, J. (Stockton on Tees)

Bolton, Thomas Dolling

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Sinclair, Capt. J no.(Forfarshire)

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

Hutton, Alfred E. (Morley)

Smith, Samuel (Flint)

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

Jones, David Brynmor (Swans.)

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Burns, John

Lawson, Sir W. (Cumberland)

Souttar, Robinson

Burt, Thomas

Lewis, John Herbert

Spicer, Albert

Caldwell, James

Macaleese, Daniel

Steadman, William Charles

Causton, Richard Knight

M'Ghee, Richard

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Cross, Alexander (Glasgow)

M'Leod, John

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)

Maddison, Fred.

Tanner, Charles Kearns

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Mendl, Sigismund Ferdinand

Thomas, Alfred (Glamorgan, E.)

Donelan, Captain A.

Middlemore, J. Throgmorton

Thomas, David Alfred (Merthyr)

Doogan, P. C.

O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.)

Weir, James Galloway

Fenwick, Charles

O' Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

Oldroyd, Mark

Wilson, Jos. H. (Middlesbrough)

Flavin, Michael Joseph

O'Malley, William

Woods, Samuel

Flynn, James Christopher

Perks, Robert William

Yoxall, James Henry

Gladstone, Rt. Hn. Herbert J.

Philipps, John Wynford

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Wedderburn and Mr. Hedderwick.

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Pickard, Benjamin

Hayne, Rt. Hon. Charles Seale-

Reid, Sir Robert Threshie

NOES.

Arrol, Sir William

Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbysh.)

Dalkeith, Earl of

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Cecil, Evelyn (Hertford, East)

Davies, Sir Hor. D. (Chatham)

Bailey, James (Walworth)

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Balfour, Rt. Hn. A J. (Manch'r)

Chamberlain, Rt. Hn J. (Birming)

Donkin, Richard Sim

Balfour, Rt. Hn. G.W. (Leeds)

Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc'r)

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Beach, Rt. Hn. Sir M. H. (Bristol)

Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

Doxford, Sir William Theodore

Bethell, Commander

Charrington, Spencer

Dyke, Rt. Hon. Sir Wm. Hart

Bhownaggree, Sir M. M.

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Fardell, Sir T. George

Biddulph, Michael

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edw.

Bill, Charles

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Field, Admiral (Eastbourne)

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Colston, Chas. Ed. H. Athole

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Bowles, T. G. (King's Lynn)

Cooke, C. W. R. (Hereford)

Firbank, Joseph Thomas

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Corbett, A. C. (Glasgow)

Fisher, William Hayes

Bullard, Sir Harry

Cornwallis, Fiennes Stan. W.

Flannery, Sir Fortescue

Butcher, John George

Cross, Herb. Shepherd (Bolton)

Flower, Ernest

Carson, Rt. Hn. Sir Edw. H.

Cruddas, William Donaldson

Forster, Henry William

Galloway, William Johnson

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltenham)

Garfit, William

Lopes, Henry Yarde Buller

Russell, T. W. (Tyrone)

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

Lowe, Francis William

Samuel, Harry S. (Limehouse)

Gibbs, Hon. Vicary (St. Albans)

Lowles, John

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Godson, Sir Augustus Fred.

Lowther, Rt. Hn. James (Kent)

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Sidebottom, William (Derbysh)

Gorst, Rt. Hn. Sir John Eldon

Macdona, John Cumming

Smith, Abel H. (Christchurch)

Goschen, Rt. Hn. G. J. (St. Geo.'s)

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Smith, James P. (Lanarks.)

Goschen, George J. (Sussex)

M'Killop, James

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Gray, Ernest (West Ham)

Milbank, Sir Powlett C. J.

Spencer, Ernest

Hamilton, Rt. Hn. Lord George

More, Robert J. (Shropshire)

Stirling-Maxwell, Sir John M.

Hanbury, Rt. Hon. Robert Wm.

Morrell, George Herbert

Stock, James Henry

Hanson, Sir Reginald

Morton, Arthur H. A.(Deptford)

Tomlinson, Wm. Edw. Murray

Hardy, Laurence

Mount, William George

Wanklyn, James Leslie

Heaton, John Henniker

Murray, Rt. Hn A Graham (Bute)

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Hornby, Sir William Henry

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

Welby, Lt -Col. A. C. E. (Tauntn)

Houston, R. P.

Myers, William Henry

Welby, Sir C. G. E. (Notts.)

Howard, Joseph

Percy, Earl

Williams, Joseph Powell-(Bir.)

Jebb, Sir Richard Claverhouse

Pilkington, R. (Lanes, Newton)

Willougby de Eresby, Lord

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. William

Pretyman, Ernest George

Wilson-Todd, W. H. (York)

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Wylie, Alexander

Lawrence Sir E. Durning- (Corn)

Purvis, Robert

Wyndham, George

Lawson, John Grant (Yorks.)

Ridley, Rt. Hn. Sir Matthew W.

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Llewelyn, Sir D. (Swansea)

Ritchie, Rt. Hon. Charles T.

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Loder, Gerald Walter Erskine

Robertson, Herbert (Hackney)

Long, Rt Hn. Walter (Liverpool)

Round, James

Another Amenment made.
*MR. SEALE-HAYNEsaid the Amendment which he had to propose was a very simple one, which he thought the right hon. Gentleman would he able to accept. Its object was to place the tenant farmer in precisely the same position as the Bill placed the market gardener. At the end of Part III. of Schedule I. there appeard the words—
"(v.) Erection or enlargement of buildings for the purpose of the trade or business of a market gardener."
If the market gardener was entitled to that provision a fortiori the farmer ought to have a similar proviso. His proposal was to insert the words at the end of line 24, "erection or enlargement of buildings for the purpose of the trade or business of a farmer." To keep a large number of cattle it was necessary that shelter should be provided for them, and the farmer, to his mind, should be protected in his expenditure upon such things as shelter for his cattle, sheds for machinery, pigsties, houses for poultry, and such-like erections. It so happened that landlords were very often impecunious, and unable to provide these buildings. Under such circumstances it was only fair that the farmer should have the opportunity of putting up such accommodation for himself, and obtaining compensation. He need hardly say that he did not sympathise with those hon.
1382
Gentlemen on the opposite benches who looked askance at everything which would directly benefit the tenant, and which in their view was an infringement upon the landlords' rights of property. He had the misfortune of being a landlord himself, and he could only say that he was perfectly convinced that the greater security they gave to the tenant's property the greater would be the value of the tenancy, and the higher would be the rent which the tenant would be willing to pay for his holding.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 6, after line 26, to insert the words, '(16) erection or enlargement of buildings for the purpose of the trade or business of a farmer.'"-(Mr. Seale-Hayne.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
*MR. LONGsaid the object was to confine Part I. to the "erection, alteration, or enlargement of buildings." He could not accept the Amendment, because the intention was to limit the power to the erection and enlargement of buildings where the consent of the landlord was required. The right hon. Gentleman had based his Amendment very largely upon the assumption that in the Market Gardeners' Compensation Act that power existed. He was not prepared at present to express any opinion upon that point, but he held very strongly that it was

1383
most desirable that in these eases the work should be done by the landlord. Buildings erected for the purposes of agriculture ought to be so erected as to be of a permanent and enduring character. He fancied that at the present moment there was really less justification for the Amendment than probably there ever was before. Therefore he was not prepared to accept the introduction of an Amendment which was entirely contrary to the intention of
the powers of the Bill. It might be that they had not quite succeeded in exactly carrying out their intentions, which was to limit their power to the erection of large buildings which required that the consent of the landlord should be given.
Question put.
The House divided:—Ayes, 45; Noes, 112. (Division List No. 215.)

AYES.

Allan, William (Gateshead)

Lewis, John Herbert

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Billson, Alfred

Macaleese, Daniel

Souttar, Robinson

Broadhurst, Henry

M'Ghee, Richard

Spicer, Albert

Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

M'Leod, John

Steadman, William Charles

Burt, Thomas

Maddison, Fred.

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Caldwell, James

Mendl, Sigismund Ferdinand

Tanner, Charles Kearns

Cross, Alexander (Glasgow)

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Thomas, A. (Glamorgan, E.)

Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Thomas, David A. (Merthyr)

Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

Oldroyd, Mark

Weir, James Galloway

Doogan, P. C.

O'Malley, William

Williams, John Carvell (Notts.)

Fenwick, Charles

Perks, Robert William

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Philipps, John Wynford

Wilson, Jos. H. (Middlesbro')

Foster, Sir Walter (Derby Co.)

Pickard, Benjamin

Yoxall, James Henry

Goddard, Daniel Ford

Rickett, J. Compton

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Mr. Seale-Hayne and Mr.Hedderwick.

Horniman, Frederick John

Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

Humphreys-Owen, Arthur C.

Sinclair, Capt. J. (Forfarshire)

NOES.

Allhusen, Augustus Hy. Eden

Flower, Ernest

Percy, Earl

Arrol, Sir William

Forster, Henry William

Pilkington, R. (Lancs., Newton)

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Garfit, William

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Bailey, James (Walworth)

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Balfour, Rt. Hon. G. W. (Leeds)

Gibbs, Hn. Vicary (St. Albans)

Pretyman, Ernest George

Bethell, Commander

Godson, Sir Augustus F.

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Biddulph, Michael

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Purvis, Robert

Bill, Charles

Gordon, Hon. John Edward

Robertson, Herbert (Hackney)

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Gorst, Rt. Hn. Sir John Eldon

Round, James

Bullard, Sir Harry

Goschen, George J. (Sussex)

Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltenham)

Carlile, William Walter

Hanson, Sir Reginald

Russell, T. W. (Tyrone)

Cavendish, V. C. W (Derbyshire)

Heaton, John Henniker

Samuel, Harry S. (Limehouse)

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

Hornby, Sir William Henry

Sharpe, William Edward T.

Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J. (Birm.)

Houston, R. P.

Shaw-Stewart, M. H. (Renfrew)

Chamberlain, J. Austen (Worc.)

Howard, Joseph

Sidebottom, William (Derbysh)

Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex)

Skewes-Cox, Thomas

Charrington, Spencer

Kenyon-Slaney, Col. William

Smith, Abel H. (Christchurch)

Clare, Octavius Leigh

King, Sir Henry Seymour

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Coghill, Douglas Harry

Lawrence, Sir E. Durning- (Corn)

Spencer, Ernest

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Lawson, John Grant (Yorks.)

Stock, James Henry

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Liverpool)

Stone, Sir Benjamin

Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley

Cooke, C. W. Radcliffe (Heref'd)

Lopes, Henry Yarde Buller

Tuke, Sir John Batty

Cornwallis, Fiennes Stanley W.

Lowe, Francis William

Vincent, Sir Edgar (Exeter)

Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

Lowles, John

Wanklyn, James Leslie

Cross, Herbert S. (Bolton)

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Warr, Augustus Frederick

Cruddas, William Donaldson

Macdona, John Cumming

Welby, Lt.-Col. A. C. E. (Taun'n)

Davies, Sir H. D. (Chatham)

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Welby, Sir Charles G. K. (Notts)

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

M'Killop, James

Williams, Joseph Powell- (Birm.)

Digby, John K. D. Wingfield-

Mellor, Colonel (Lancashire)

Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

Donkin, Richard Sim

Middlemore, John T.

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Milbank, Sir Powlett Chas. J.

Wylie, Alexander

Doxford, Sir Wm. Theodore

More, R. Jasper (Shropshire)

Wyndham, George

Fardell, Sir T. George

Morrell, George Herbert

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edw.

Morton, A. H. A. (Deptford)

Field, Admiral (Eastbourne)

Mount, William George

TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

Murray, Rt. Hn. A. G. (Bute)

Firbank, Joseph Thomas

Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

Fisher, William Hayes

Myers, William Henry

A formal Amendment agreed to.
*MR. SHAW-STEWART: I put this Amendment on the Paper in order to meet the views of persons interested in agriculture in Scotland who think that the definition of temporary pasture laid down in the Bill is rather wide. As it is at present interpreted, it would be quite possible to lay down temporary pasture and to take off a hay crop and then to claim compensation for the remaining pasture, the value of which might have been taken out in the hay crop, or by artificial manure of an exhausting character having been used on the land. I do not ask the right hon. Gentleman to accept the Amendment as it is, but I would be very glad if he would consider a closer definition of temporary pasture before this Bill passes through the other House. I think he will see on consideration that the definition is of such wide character that it might open the door to unnecessary legislation, which I am sure we are all anxious to avoid, and that it would lead to disappointment on the part of tenants making claims for laying down pasture for three years, according to what we call in Scotland the rules of good husbandly, for the purpose of resting the land. When pasture is laid down for resting the land it is not of very much value. I should be very glad if the right hon. Gentleman would see whether a better definition could not be found to meet the case of Scotland, and especially to meet the case of pasture laid down to rest the land.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 7, line 12, to leave out paragraph 28 of Schedule 1, and insert the words, 'Laying down pasture with clover, grass, lucerne, sainfoin, or other similar seeds, which shall not have been sown more than three years previous to the termination of the lease, from which no hay crop shall have been taken, and which shall not have been treated with exhausting artificial manures.'"—(Mr. Shaw-Stewart.)
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."
*MR. LONG: The Government are entirely at one with my hon. friend in his desire that there should be no confusion as to the definitions of temporary and permanent pasture. I confess I do not altogether share the fears of my hon. friend that there would be any difficulty on the part of an arbitrator as to what constitutes temporary pasture and what constitutes permanent pasture. On the other hand it is possible that in Scotland and in some parts of England where permanent pasture is almost unknown there may be some doubt in the mind of an arbitrator, but my hon. friend will, I am sure, see that the words he suggests would not meet such a case. With reference to taking a hay crop off, I think it would be a hardship if in a dry summer a farmer found himself forbidden from taking hay from his sainfoin under the penalty of being deprived of getting compensation for an agricultural operation which would otherwise entitle him to it. If there is any doubt whatever in the definition as to what is permanent and what is temporary pasture I will take care on behalf of the Government to see that in another place the words are, if necessary, made clear.
MR. HUMPHREYS-OWEN: I should like to direct the attention of the right hon. Gentleman to another matter, and that is the limit of three years. It is within my own knowledge that temporary pasture is frequently allowed to ran on for more than three years, at all events in the part of the country with which I am best acquainted. I hope, therefore, the right hon. Gentleman will consider the matter very carefully before he adopts the apparently narrow limit of three years. I speak with personal knowledge of the subject, because it has been, within my own personal experience, a matter of discussion among agriculturists.
*MR. LOYD: In my own constituency there is a little fear that some hardship may arise out of

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this question of temporary and permanent pasture. A certain amount of pasture for which no consent has been obtained may. be laid down, and under this Act no claim for compensation for it can arise, and the remedy of the tenant if the landlord refuses to take it off his hands at a valuation at the termination of the tenancy is to take a white crop off' before the tenancy is concluded. There is a feeling among; farmers in the country—derived, no doubt, from reading text-books and other works on the law of agriculture— that permanent pasture depends on the time the pasture has been laid down. I have often seen these statements myself, and I know how likely they are to create that impression, not without reason, on the minds of farmers. A farmer is afraid, having laid down pasture without obtaining the previous consent of the landlord, that it may have remained down too long to be lawfully ploughed up again, and that he will lose all claim to compensation by not having obtained consent and also lose the right to plough it up because it has become permanent pasture within the meaning of his covenant not to plough up permanent pasture by lapse of time. If my right hon. friend will consider the matter, I think he will see that it is a question well worthy of his consideration.
*MR. LONG: I do not think that the difficulties to which my hon. friend refers are likely to arise. I will examine into the matter, and if I find there is any necessity to make such a provision, I will take care that words are introduced to carry out the object the House has in view—namely, that there should be no confusion whatever as between temporary and permanent pasture.
*MR. SHAW-STEWART: I have every reason to be perfectly satisfied with the undertaking of my right hon. friend, and I will ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
MR. HEYWOOD JOHNSTONEsaid the Amendment he desired to move was one which followed the existing state of the law as far as possible. He should
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like, in the first place, to clear the air by saying that the Amendment did not ask that the arbitrator should give his reasons. He did not suggest that, and he did not wish it. He was thoroughly in agreement with the good old maxim that the wisest judge or the most competent arbitrator gave no reasons whatever for his decision, and therefore he wished to state that it was not his desire, in moving the Amendment, that the arbitrator should be compelled to give his reasons. It had also been suggested that the effect of the Amendment would be to facilitate appeals. He did not desire to facilitate appeals, and he thought it was very desirable that the procedure under the Act should be so simple and precise as to discourage rather than encourage appeals. There would be an appeal as the Bill stood on questions of law, and the effect of the Amendment, if accepted, would not be to facilitate or increase the number of appeals. There could be no appeal on questions of amount which had been once referred to an arbitrator, and that would be the principal part of the work under the Act. There might possibly be an appeal on a question of fact—as, for instance, if an arbitrator awarded a sum in respect of a matter which was not in the original claim; but that would be a case quite apart from the Amendment. His object in moving the Amendment was that the incoming tenant or the landlord might know exactly what it was he was paying compensation for. Was it unreasonable or unnatural that the landlord or the tenant should like to know what he was paying for under the several items which might make up a very considerable award? It had been stated that in commercial cases referred to an arbitrator the award was given in the shape of a lump sum, and no details were given. He did not think that that was an analogous case at all, because in such cases the arbitration took place after the parties had come into a court of law. At all the events, the courts were open to them, and any person resorting to the courts as plaintiff was subject to the liability of having to give particulars of his claim. As regards the cases which would be dealt with by the Amendment, the parties were not able to enter the ordinary courts of law, but would have to go straight to arbitration. Therefore these cases were widely different from commercial cases, in which arbitra-

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tion was voluntary. As the Bill stood not only might the tenant make a claim, but the landlord might make a counter claim, and yet there was nothing to compel or induce the arbitrator even to show two lump sums, one to be awarded to the landlord and the other to the tenant. It would be perfectly possible in such a case for the arbitrator to strike a balance and award a lump sum, without giving the slightest indication to either of the parties as to how it was arrived at. He would ask the House to consider a further argument. The tenant was to be put into a position to claim compensation for improvements mentioned in the first schedule of the Bill. The schedule itself was divided into three parts, which wore sub-divided into thirty-four different items. There were fifteen items in Part I., for any of which a tenant might make a claim for compensation. It was not reasonable to suppose a tenant would make a claim under every one of these heads, but he might very well make a claim for the enlargement or alteration of buildings, for the laying down of permanent pasture, for road making, and for embanking. Such ordinary improvements might very well be included in a claim for compensation, and was it unreasonable to ask the arbitrator to state in making his award how much he gave in respect of the enlargement or alteration of buildings, how much for permanent pasture, how much for road making, and how much for embanking? He thought it only fair and reasonable that the incoming tenant or the landlord should know what he had to pay under each item. Again, in Part II., in addition to the matters to which the attention of the House had been already directed, there could be five further claims. Drainage was a very important and expensive matter, and the man who wanted to keep his estate books properly might very reasonably ask the arbitrator to state what part of an award represented drainage. There were fourteen different heads of improvements under Part III. which were in a somewhat different position, because neither consent nor notice was required. They might be carried out by the tenant on his own motion without the knowledge of the landlord, and the claim for them at the expiration of the tenancy might be the first time they were brought to the landlord's attention. Such improvements included artifi-
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cial manures, laying down permanent pasture, food stuff's, and fertilisers, and was it unreasonable to ask what amount had been awarded in respect of these different items? If the award was made in a lump sum it must be made up of items. He did not ask for the number of years purchase, but the arbitrator must have the items from which the grand total of the award was made up, and he asked that that should be specified. That laid no particular burden upon the arbitrator. he asked for nothing which the arbitrator had not before his mind to make the award satisfactory to himself, having regard to the interests of the person who had to pay and the person who had to receive. He must know what he had given compensation for, and how much he gave in respect of each item. It was in the interest of the arbitrator also, because nothing would clear his mind more than the fact that his award had to be made up of certain items, and that he must have the details and the amount of each particular item making it up. Nothing helped a man more in a case of that sort than to know that he had to deal with definite figures which he must obtain for himself. It would, moreover, give confidence to the awards of the arbitrator, because each party would be able to go through the awards and test them, and it was greatly to the interest of all concerned that the awards should be looked at in that way, and nothing would be more likely than such a thing to popularise the Act in the country. He desired also to call attention to the fact that the law used to be far more drastic than he now asked that it should be made. For the last twenty years the law had been that the award should not give a sum generally for compensation, but should, as far as possible, specify the items upon which compensation was awarded. That was much more drastic than his proposal, and he had never heard any complaint made with regard to the working of that law. He therefore felt that he might fairly ask the House to accept the Amendment he proposed.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 8, to insert, as a new paragraph, before paragraph (10)—
"'(10) The award shall, so far as possible, specify the several improvements, acts, or things in respect of which compensation is awarded, and the sum awarded in respect of each.' "—(Mr. Heywood Johnstone.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
*MR. LONGsaid the object the Government had in introducing the Bill was to further the recommendations of the Royal Commission; one of the recommendations was that the award of the arbitrator should be final, but the Government thought it right to vary that recommendation by giving a right of appeal in regard to matters of law; but they also sought to avoid the expense and difficulty attendant on a detailed form of award, and the expense and delay attendant on litigation which invariably arose on an appeal from an award to a court of law. In earlier proposals made by the hon. Gentleman to amend the Government proposal there appeared to be a risk of litigation, and an Amendment which might give rise to litigation was one the Government must always strenuously oppose, because one of the advantages of the Bill was to make the award of the arbitrator final. The hon. Gentleman had put the case fairly to the House, and it would now be necessary to detail the reasons why the Government were not prepared to accept the Amendment. There were a number of suggestions dealing with the same subject but not in exactly the same way, and the course the Government proposed to take was to accept the Amendment standing next in the name of the noble Lord the Member for Kensington, the Amendment of the hon. Member for North Hampshire, which proposed to limit the time in which payment was to be made, and also that of the hon. Member for Shropshire, which imposed upon the Board of Agriculture the obligation of providing a compulsory form to be used by the arbitrators in making their award. He accepted the general desires which had been expressed by the hon. Member for Horsham, that there should be such a statement by the arbitrator as would enable the parties, if they so desired, to know what the grounds were upon which the award was given. He did not think the duty should be made obligatory on the arbitrator unless the parties desired it, nor did he at the moment think it desirable to suggest the form that the declaration should take, but it would endeavour to secure that the arbitrators should have a simple way of giving their awards, and at the same
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time there should be no risk of their being upset upon a technical ground. he hoped that would meet the views of the hon. Member for Horsham, and perhaps he would now withdraw his Amendment, so that a single proposal might be brought before the House.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment proposed—
"In page 8, line 21, at the beginning of paragraph (10), to insert the words, The arbitrator shall on the application of either party specify the amount awarded in respect of any particular improvement, and."—(Earl Percy.)
Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
MR. PERKSasked whether the application had to be made during the course of the arbitration or after the award had been made.
MR. HEYWOOD JOHNSTONEsaid he did not know w other the right hon. Gentleman would accept an Amendment to add after the word "improvement" the words, "or improvements." It would not alter the substance of the clause, but would have a very considerable effect upon the effectiveness of it.
MR. HEDDERWICKdesired to congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the wisdom and discretion he had shown in accepting the Amendment. The object of the right hon. Gentleman was to facilitate proceedings as much as possible, to avoid litigation, and to make the whole course of the Act, when the Bill became an Act, as inexpensive as possible. There was a great deal of force in the argument urged upon the Amendment just withdrawn, because, if the arbitrator was not to specify, or did not specify upon application, the items upon which his award was made, it was quite clear that the parties might be induced, whore the sum of the award was large, to embark in expensive litigation in the hope that part of that sum had been awarded wrongly by the arbitrator under the first schedule. Had the award been final, as was pro-

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posed by the Royal Commission, there would have been an end of the matter, but the right to appeal had been reserved on a point of law, and there were no fewer than three points of law in the first schedule which might be raised by either party in the hope of discovering a mistake in the award. He thought the right hon. Gentleman had shown a wise discretion in accepting the Amendment of the noble Lord.
*MR. LONGsaid it was clear that the arbitrator could not listen to an application for details until after the award was made. The award could not be delivered until the amount was fixed. With regard to the next Amendment of the hon. Member for Horsham, he did not think it would have any effect.
MR. HUMPHREYS-OWENpointed out that the arbitrators before whom these cases would come would be men unaccusomed to legal documents, and that they might be upset upon purely technical points.
MR. RADCLIFFE COOKEsaid the words suggested by the hon. Member for Horsham made the matter a little more clear than at present, and he hoped the Amendment would be accepted. With regard to the application to be made to the arbitrator, the correct thing would be to make the application when the arbitration took place. It was extremely undesirable that a hard-and-fast rule should be made, and after the award had been taken up the parties ought to be allowed to refer back to the arbitrator, in order that he should specify how the award was arrived at.
COMMANDER BETHELLjoined in appealing to the right hon. Gentleman to agree to the addition, after the word "improvement" of the words "or improvements."
SIR ROBERT FINLAYsaid the Interpretation Act of 1889 provided words which covered this clause, but as the additional words did no harm the Government were prepared to accept them.
Amendment amended, by inserting' after the word "improvement," the words "or improvements."
Words, as amended, inserted.
Other Amendments made.
Bill to be read the third time upon Monday next.

HOUSING OK THE WORKING CLASSES ACT (1890) AMENDMENT BILL.
THIRD READING.
Order for Third Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
MR. STEADMAN: I rise not for the purpose of obstructing the Third Reading of this Bill, but for the purpose of informing the House that the Housing Committee of the London County Council or some of its members waited on the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board in the form of a deputation, and the result of the interview was that the right hon. Gentleman could not see his way to adopt any of their recommendations as to the extension of the time for the repayment of loans to one hundred years. He said he thought that there was something to be said in favour of the suggestion that the land should be made an asset off the building, but I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman did not see his way to adopt it. It is quite true that he adopted one suggestion in that regard, but that will not materially alter the present condition; it is a mere manipulation of figures—taking a penny out of one pocket and putting it into another. I quite admit that what was in the Bill as it was originally introduced was good, but the right hon. Gentleman assumes, because he is going to enable municipalities to purchase land outside their own boundaries, that that is going to solve the housing problem. He might just as well say, "We enable you by this Bill to purchase all the land in England if you desire so to do, and you can have workmen's trains, cheap trams, light railways,

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etc., to carry the workman from his employment to his home." I speak upon this question not from a theoretical but from a practical point of view and the workman's point of view, having lived the whole of my life among the workmen, and knowing the social conditions under which they live. And I want to know what is the right hon. Gentleman going to do with the, half a million workmen living in the County of London to-day, whose average wages do not exceed 15s. a week. Is it possible—build as many houses as you like outside the County of London—for those men to remove their goods and chattels, and pay fares to and from their employment, when they are fortunate enough to have any, out of such a scanty wage? There is another point with reference to working men residing outside the county—men occupying the same position as myself when I was at work. I was a riverside worker, and I had to be at my employment at six o'clock in the morning. Does the right hon. Gentleman assume, oven if I could get a house outside the county that I could get into, that I should live in a place which would entail upon me the hardship of having to get up at four o'clock in the morning in order to get to my employment at six? There are thousands of people in that position, and therefore, though the county council buy as much land as they please outside the county and build as much as they like, there will always be the same demand as now for houses inside the county. Go east to Walthamstow, Upton Park, and other places, and you will find that private enterprise has built hundreds of houses outside the county, and the working man who has not to get to his employment until eight or nine o'clock in the morning has been for years availing himself of the advantages offered by that private enterprise, and has moved into the suburbs. In twelve years in Stepney, where I reside, half the population have removed to the suburbs, and in consequence of the demand for accommodation the landlords there have increased their rents. While I am prepared to accept the advantage that we, as a municipality, shall have under this Bill, I say it will never solve the housing problem. I am sorry to say that in my opinion the Bill will pass its Third Beading in a far worse form than when it was originally introduced, because the
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right hon. Gentleman has accepted an Amendment moved by the hon. Member for Chelsea which is going to enable municipalities to buy land and lease it, if they think fit, to the jerry builder, and any other speculator who comes along. That is the most dangerous principle that could be inserted in the Bill. I am not a supporter of Her Majesty's Government, I have been a Radical all my life; but, at the same time, I may say there is a right hon. Gentleman in this House who, during the short period I have been a Member, I have learned most highly to respect. I allude to the First Lord of the Treasury.. Hon. Gentlemen laugh, and my respect may not be worth much to him, but he is above all things a gentleman, and a workman can appreciate a gentleman when he meets with one; at the same time I notice that the right hon. Gentleman has a charming manner of avoiding arguments put forward on this side of the House. I well recollect on the Second Reading of the London Government Bill of last year how in winding up the debate he taunted Members on this side of the House for putting forward as he considered no remedy, and we have had a repetition of that attitude on the Second Reading of this Housing Bill. Again he taunts us with criticising a measure and putting forward no remedies, and waives away as. with a magician's wand all arguments adduced from this side of the House upon this subject. He takes credit to himself and to the Government for the fact that all these Bills which have been introduced and have become law have been passed by Conservative Governments I do not deny it. [Cheers.] Yes, but stop a moment; I do not know whether hon. Gentlemen who cheer that remark have ever visited a fair; if they have, they have seen shows where the audience is admitted for a penny or twopence, and on the platform outside which the showman exposes the whole of his wares. The man outside is induced to go in, and thinks he is going to see a good show, but finds after all that the show for which he has paid is not so good as that which he saw outside for nothing. And it is the same thing with a Tory Government so far as we are concerned. Their labels are good. The Bills of past years and the Bill of this year are labelled all right, but so far as the contents of the Bill are concerned, I say, in the interests of my class, they are absolutely

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worthless. That has been proved; if the Bill of 1890 had solved this problem we should not be in the fix in which we are to-day, a difficulty ten thousand times worse than the question that the Bills of ten years ago were supposed to have solved. That proves that these Bills are worthless. [A VOTCE: Why not vote against it?] Because there may be a little good in it. If I am hard up and want a shilling and somebody offers me a penny, I take it because it is better than nothing at all, although it would not do me the good that a shilling would. The reason why these Bills are worthless is because the Government do not tackle the question from the proper point. It is really a land question. What is required is a fair rent court. But the First Lord of the Treasury denounced the establishment of a fair rent court. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board must know that there are what are known as assessment committees. They assess the rateable value of houses; when the assessment goes up the tenants have a right to appeal and in most cases the assessment is lowered. In the case of the gas companies also the Government says they shall not go above a certain price per 1,000 feet for gas. That is a principle adopted to protect the consumer from the monopoly, and it is a good one for that reason. We want now protection for the workpeople against the slum owners. We have no fair rent court, and the slum owner goes on in his own sweet way, and the municipalities who want to clear him away have to compensate him heavily. We get no extension of time, and we do not get the land as an asset off the building. The day will come when this evil will have so spread that the Government then in power will have to take up the matter from the proper standpoint. The workman is often condemned, and if he has a bad quality there are thousands ready to pick him to pieces; but they forget that for the one bad quality he has ninety-nine good qualities. How can anybody expect the workman of to-day to be a bright and good citizen, living as he does in the slums, where the very atmosphere which he breathes is evil, and when you take into consideration his miserable surroundings? A workman may be crushed, heart-sore, sick and sorry, and walking the streets seeking employment, but a good Samaritan comes along and takes
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him by the hand and gives him a lift and alters his entire surroundings. What we have to do, if the Government want to turn out bright citizens, is to level up the employees more nearly to themselves, instead of keeping them down as they do. to-day. Put them into decent dwellings, so as to improve their social conditions, because while they remain in the slums they will remain as they are. Alter the surroundings of the working man and you alter his disposition. The workmen are accused of spending their time in public houses. Visit the shims to-day, and it will be found there are more public-houses there than in any other part. Is it any wonder that a man who lives and sleeps with his wife and family in one room, where everything has to be done, if he has a penny in his pocket should be tempted to spend a few hours in the glare and glitter of a public-house, rather than go to the miserable hovel he calls home? In conclusion, I certainly trust that sooner or later some Government will deal with this question in a practical manner. The reason the present Government are unable to deal with it is because they are above all the upholders of the sacred rights of property. But when those rights have gone to the extent that they have to-day in London, extortionate rents on the one hand and untold misery on the other, it is time for the Government to step in and say they have gone too far, and that they must be attacked and destroyed in order to save the nation.
*MR. COHEN: The hon. Gentleman opposite has come forward on I he present occasion because this Bill does not deal with the housing problem in a particular manner. He complains that the measure before us does not solve the housing problem. I have followed the debate through the various stages of this Bill studiously, and I am not aware that the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board, still loss the Leader of the House, have ever claimed that it did solve the problem, but I venture to claim for it that it is a most practical and solid contribution towards the solution of the most difficult problem that the House has had to face for ten years, and I venture to tell the hon. Member that the Utopian Government which he hopes is going to solve the question will never succeed in doing so

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by one Act of Parliament alone. It can only be done by gradual legislation. It could never be done by one Bill, because in the course of one session the House would never get through more than six or seven clauses of the Bill. My hon. friend referred to the efforts of the London County Council. It has been my pleasure to be a member of the body long before my hon. friend joined us, and I should be the last to say a word against it: but as for their efforts they have not only failed to find a solution, but absolutely and hopelessly failed to offer even any practical contribution towards the solution; they have suggested patting obligations on the railway companies to run cheap trains to carry people who do not exist to places where houses have not been erected, and it is in that way that many well-meaning people have approached the solution of this difficult question. Not being able to carry out their Utopian and ideal schemes, their policy has resulted n nothing being done, and although some of us do regret that this Bill does not go a little further, we nevertheless consider that it contains a substantial and concrete contribution to the solution of this problem. I believe we shall not only have a diminution of the pressure which exists at the present moment, but a cessation of the rapacity of the slum landlord, with whom nobody has any sympathy and to whom we want to put an end. You cannot do away with him while the tenants are compelled to pay the rent he asks, but if you erect cheaper houses elsewhere the trade of the slum landlord will disappear. I earnestly hope that my hon. friend, with whom I seldom have the honour to agree, will take some profit from the experience of this effort, and will see that by tackling this problem systematically and gradually we shall offer a substantial contribution to the solution of a problem which is almost the plague of London, which is acknowledged to he pressing, but which some of our philanthropists have failed to solve, because they preferred to have nothing if they could not get everything. I desire to thank my right hon. friend for the Bill before the House.
*MR. ROBSON: I think the hon. Gentleman who has just addressed the House, although we recognise in him one who, as much as ourselves, has the wel-
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fare of the masses at heart, entirely misses the force of the argument addressed against the Bill by the hon. Member for Stepney. The Government is perfectly right to proceed by steps; but all that we asked, and ask still, is that the step should be a real, genuine, and efficient step—in fact, that it should be a step forward; and our complaint against the Bill is that it is nothing of the kind. Instead of being a real and effective step forward towards the solution of the problem, it is a title and a name, and nothing more. Now that we have the Bill before us in its final form we are better able to appreciate how far we were justified on this side of the House when we pointed out that the limited scope of the Bill would be fatal to its efficiency. Ministers said when the Bill was before Committee that they were anxious to hear and accept all the Amendments that might make the Bill more workable or make it more acceptable to the local authorities invited to adopt it. That took the edge off a good deal of the criticism on the Second Reading; but it has, happily, no place on this stage of the Bill. The Committee has done its best, and the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill has, with great courtesy and ability, done his best to make the Bill what it is. But according to us it remains what it was on the Second Reading—an absolutely futile measure. I say nothing against the three clauses added to the Bill. My hon. friend the Member for Stepney has made some pungent and just criticism on the clause added by the hon. Member for Chelsea. I do not stop to criticise that at all. If anything I am disposed to approve of it. The three j minor clauses added to the Bill must make it a little more effective; but they do not touch the objection we urged on the Second Reading, and urge still— namely, that the Bill as it stands is not acceptable to the local authorities, and is not likely to be adopted by them. Speaking in a general sense, it will be wholly useless for the purpose for which it is in- tended. There are some exceptional cases, such as the offer of land made by my hon. friend the Member for Whitechapel to the County Council of London, where the Bill may be of service; but, speaking generally. [venture to say that it will be of no service at all. It is put forward as being a measure to enable local authorities to relieve their slums and congested areas by transferring the population out-

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side. That is an excellent object. It is an object in which, I am quite certain, all those on this side of the House are extremely desirous to assist the Ministry to the utmost of their ability, but it is idle to suppose that this can be carried into effect by simply telling the local authorities that they may adopt this Bill if they please. The local authorities are conscious, and justly conscious, of the great number of difficulties in their way. These difficulties ought to be as obvious to the central authority as to the local authorities. For instance, there is the question of communication, raised on the Second Reading, between the overcrowded district and the new settlement. There is the question of jurisdiction —namely, whether the new settlement shall be placed under the jurisdiction of the district founding it of the district in which it is placed. All these are difficulties which at once occur to the mind of any local authority desirous of considering this Bill; but all these questions have been excluded—I say deliberately excluded—by the Government themselves. Without treating the Bill as one covering the whole ground, but simply as a step, each of these matters is essential in considering the efficiency of that step; but the Government have prevented us considering it entirely, because they have chosen a title so restrictive, limited as it is to a mere fraction of another Act, that any proposal, to make the Bill workable and acceptable is necessarily beyond its scope, and therefore cannot be considered by the House at all. That is the complaint we make about the Bill. In the last clause there is a statement to the effect that it may be cited as the Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1900. That title meets with the approval of the hon. Member for East Islington. That is a platform title, and I daresay we shall see it on electioneering leaflets in time, but it is not the title of the Bill. It is not the title which is placed at the head of the Bill, and decides whether any particular proposal is or is not within the scope of the Bill. We desired to enlarge its scope on the Second Heading, and it is very important to the House and the country to see how the Government met that suggestion, because that marks the difference—if this be a party question at all—between the two parties in regard to the Bill. What did
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we propose on the Second Reading? We pointed out—and I have not heard anyone seriously controvert the proposition—-that you could never get the local authorities to deport their population to districts outside their areas unless you give them some guarantee as to cheap communication between the old district and the new settlement. That is a vital question to be considered in approaching this Bill. How did the Government approach it? The right hon. Gentleman, the First Lord of the Treasury rose at the end of the debate, and, dealing with the proposal in the Amendment I had the honour to move, he made a statement I listened to with rather more astonishment than I sometimes feel when I hear statements made in this House. He did not take the trouble to controvert the proposition that cheap train communication between the overcrowded district and the new settlement was essential; but he said, speaking on the advice he received from the Department, that the Cheap Trains Act of 1883 already provided whatever was fair and necessary in the way of communication between the overcrowded district and the proposed new settlement. The right hon. Gentleman is entirely mistaken. I do not wish to reproach him for the mistake. He is obliged to make statements upon the information he receives, but this I will venture to conjecture. I will venture to say that the Law Officers never told him that the Cheap Trains Act was sufficient for getting communication as between the overcrowded district and the proposed new settlement. Let me remind the House of what my proposal was, and how the failure to meet it was fatal to the Bill. I pointed out that the Cheap Trains Act of 1883 is applicable only as between already settled districts. The Cheap Trains Act is not intended to apply to a measure of this kind at all. It is only intended to apply where, as between two or more districts there is already an existing deficiency in the supply of cheap train facilities to meet the already existing demand. That is the Cheap Trains Act. In the case of this Bill, any local authority proposing to adopt it finds itself faced with this dilemma: On the one hand, it cannot avail itself of the Cheap Trains Act of 1883 until the new district is fully settled; but, on the other hand, it cannot settle that new district until it is able to promise to the popula-

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tion going there that they shall meet with proper facilities for cheap train communication. In order to remove that dilemma, I ventured to ask the Government to extend the scope of their Bill by adopting the proposal which I put before the House, and which met with approval from a very substantial number of hon. Members opposite. My proposal was to enable the municipality to go before the Railway Commissioners or the Board of Trade, and to ask for an Order under the Cheap Trains Act in advance of the population—that is to say, an Order to anticipate the settlement of the population, so that a cheap train service should be laid on for the people who go there either contemporaneously with the settlement of the people or in advance of the people. That is not possible under the existing Act, but it seems to mo so small an extension that was asked that the Government might very well have made it. When the First Lord of the Treasury said that the already existing law was adequate for the purpose he made a very serious mistake. Mark the significance of such a mistake on the part of the right hon. Gentleman. He is in this House the head of the Government, and he showed with regard to a paramount necessity in order to make this Bill efficient, that he and his colleagues were wholly uninformed or misinformed as to the existing state of the law. It shows that the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have not considered this question as a whole, or else they would at once have been struck, as anybody is who approaches the question, that the first difficulty standing in the way is, How are you to deal with the question of communication? I must say that although the First Lord of the Treasury spoke last in the debate on the Second Reading he was, I believe, the first to import into that debate anything in the nature of party recrimination, for he certainly dealt in that wholesale. One is accustomed to it. I suppose it is a staple Parliamentary product, but I confess I was somewhat surprised that he should seek to import party recrimination into the debate while unconsciously revealing that neither he nor his colleagues had considered the initial difficulty of the question. I pass to another point which has a most important bearing on the application of the Bill. This Bill is an invitation or suggestion to the local
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authorities that they should part with some of their population, with the result, of course, that they would thereby diminish their rateable value. At the same time as they are called upon to part with some of their population and to diminish their rateable value they are invited to assume a somewhat substantial financial risk. They are also to be under the obligation of incurring all the trouble and anxiety which is involved in the formation of a new settlement. I tell the House as a practical man that these are all substantial and formidable impediments in the way of the adoption of this Bill. A local authority does not wish to see its population diminish, but it is apprehensive, with perhaps much better reason, of any elimination of the rateable value on which they rely for the obligations they have to moot. At the very time that they are called upon to diminish their population and their rateable value they are also called upon by this Bill to assume a new and indefinite liability in the purchase and laying out of a new building estate. These considerations would make a corporation hesitate before it undertook to carry out a scheme for the erection of workmen's dwellings. If they had been able to go to the ratepayers and say that they saw no risk attaching; to such a scheme, because they would buy laud at the agricultural value and give it suburban value by means of the Cheap Trains Act, that itself would practically have removed the financial risk of adopting this measure, but in the absence of any such provision the local authorities would be extremely chary before they ran the financial risk which would undoubtedly be involved, especially when it means that under existing circumstances the better part of their population will be removed and the more casual class remain. A local authority in considering whether it should apply the Act will see that if they apply the Act the ratepayers they will lose will be by no means the least remunerative class. That is an additional reason why they should hesitate to apply the Act. This Bill as it stands is opposed to the financial interests of the local authorities who are invited to adopt it. [An HON. MEMBER: No, no!] An hon. Member says "No, no!" I have no doubt that in time he will be able to deal with the arguments I address to the House, but he

1405
will see that to invite a local authority to diminish its population and its rateable value, and to undertake a new liability without any guarantee whatever of cheap communication between the new settlement and the old district, is undoubtedly opposed to the financial interest of the local authority. I venture to say that the conflict between those corporate financial interests and the philanthropic motives by which the Bill is inspired is wholly unnecessary; for if the Government had consented to enlarge the scope of their Bill so as to admit a clause enabling the Local Government Board, upon representation from the local authority concerned, to place the new settlement under the jurisdiction of the old district, the local authorities, seeing that they would then be exchanging an artificial, unhealthy rateable value in an overcrowded district for a healthy rateable value in a new and growing district, would have been stimulated to deal with this overcrowding question drastically. If a clause with this object were embodied in the Bill, it would turn what is now a futile measure into a great measure of social reform. As to compelling the local authority to exercise this power in respect of overcrowding, as in the case of insanitary dwellings—to talk of such a thing is to talk absolute nonsense. I hope that the debates on the Bill may be of more use than the Bill itself, for if it has thereby been made clear what is the real difficulty standing in the way of local authorities they will have done some service. As the Bill stands, I see no reason why we should vote against it. We have not the slightest objection to the addition by the Government of ornamental titles to the Statute-book, if that is the desire of the Government. We venture, however, to make our protest. It may be that the right hon. gentleman in charge of the Bill, when he sees that it is inoperative at a later stage, may bring in a measure to make it operative. When he does that he may depend upon it that he will meet with no inconsiderable support from Members on this side of the House.
*MR. WYLIE: Perhaps I may be allowed to say one or two words in reference to the question of communication, to which the hon. Member for South Shields has referred as
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being of vital and paramount importance, and also in support of the Third Reading of this measure. Much of the success of the Bill will depend upon the travelling facilities afforded to the working classes. Some hon. Members opposite have expressed the conviction that the working classes, and especially the labouring classes, will not be able to afford the fares necessary for conveying them to and from the urban districts. The county which I represent has probably the cheapest service of workmen's trains in this or, as far as I know, any other country, and it affords a very good illustration of what can be done by energetic and intelligent railway enterprise. In Dumbartonshire hundreds of workmen travel to and from their work every day. For this they are charged 1s. per week, or 2d. per day for a double journey of about twenty-four miles, which is equal to 1d. per twelve miles of comfortable railway travelling. The trains run at convenient hours in the morning, and are waiting for the men when their work is finishes at night. Owing to these great facilities hundreds of working men are enabled to enjoy the advantages of much cheaper and better situated houses than would be possible in the manufacturing districts in which they are employed. A largo percentage of these working men are labourers—not perhaps on the small wages of 10s. or 12s. per week, referred to by the hon. Member for Stepney, but receiving 16s. or 20s. per week. A great many of this class avail themselves of these admirable facilities, because they find it more advantageous to pay the 1s. per week in fares than to pay the highly increased expenses in manufacturing districts. I can assure the House that these cheap rates pay the railway companies. When the competing company which secured these advantages was being promoted in Parliament it was stated before the Committee of the House of Commons that the then sole existing company, the North British, which was conveying workmen not at such a low rate as that to which I referred, but still at a very cheap rate—about eight miles per day—was earning by its service of workmen's trains at the rate of 10s. 4d. per train mile, while the average over their whole system was only at the rate of 3s. 9d. However this may be, I can assure the House on undoubted authority that the very low

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rate does pay the railway company, and I think this is a very good object lesson to railway directors, because it shows that if they are willing to encourage large numbers of working men to travel morning and evening by the introduction of low fares and convenient trains it will be advantageous to their companies. It is also a very good illustration of what can be done under existing conditions and by one mode of travelling only. But the facilities for travelling are rapidly increasing. New modes are being invented; old methods are being improved. The Lord Provost of Glasgow told me that by good management of the tramways they are now able to carry ordinary passengers one and a half miles for a penny, which they expect soon to be able to increase to two miles; whilst workmen they carry at the minimum rate of three miles for a penny, and that, too, will probably soon be improved upon. Thousands of tradesmen now travel to and from their work by means of bicycles, and I believe before very long thousands more will be conveyed by motor cars. Under this aspect of the question and inasmuch as I believe this measure will probably take out of the hands of land speculators and jerry builders much of the work which has hitherto been very badly performed, I think the Bill opens up a brighter future for the working classes and for the teeming masses in our large cities and towns who are cooped up in the most unhealthy manner in respect of their homes and their surroundings, upon which so much of their physical and moral welfare depends. I think we may congratulate the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board on having introduced this unpretentious but very useful measure, and on the able and conciliatory manner in which he has conducted it through its various stages. I give my cordial support to the third reading.
*MR. JONATHAN SAMUEL: When the Second Reading of this Bill was before the House I ventured to offer a few observations upon its shortcomings, and I desire to do the same tonight. Although the measure has passed through various stages it is still very defective, and in my opinion will be of no practical use to the corporations throughout the country. The practical
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and eloquent speech of the hon. Member for Stepney shows that what is wanted in reference to the housing of the working classes is not a Bill enabling local authorities to do that which they never will do, namely—to invest-their money and run the risk of speculative property outside their boundaries, but some practical measure which shall give to the local authorities power to deal with the slum property which exists in every town. The hon. Member for Stepney, with his practical experience, has. shown that this measure cannot deal with the slum property. An argument used by the hon. Member for East Islington about the London County Council desiring to have facilities for cheap railway fares outside the presort area admits of that argument for this reason. The London County Council have found from experience that they cannot go on pulling down slum property in London under Part 1 of the Act of 1890 without an enormous cost to the rates. I have said before there is a possibility of this Bill being applied to London. It may be; but I cannot understand that the County Council should go on spending money outside its own area to provide houses for the working classes living in the inner parts of this great city. What I do say i is, that unless a measure is brought in by this or some other Government altering the existing law you will never deal with the question of the housing of the poor in the manner in which it should be dealt with—namely, by doing away with slum property. I have had some experience in this matter. In the town which I have the honour to represent we have a slum property, and I have sat on a Committee for a considerable time trying to effect some improvement in this property, but it is. impossible under the complicated Sections 6, 8, and 9, of the Act of 1890, for any local authority to deal with such slum property except at an enormous cost to the rates. I heard the speech on the Second Reading of the President of the Local Government Board. The right hon. Gentleman pictured in glowing terms the powers which exist under the Act of 1890; he showed what could be done and how to do it. I ask him, has he had any experience on any local authority in dealing with this slum property? That is a practical question, because it is impossible to carry out this work if the

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interests of existing ratepayers are to be safeguarded. I should like to call attention to how this Bill will apply to some of our large municipalities. The power under this Bill is to enable local authorities to purchase land outside their boundaries. Take Leeds. There the housing of the working classes is as difficult as in London, but there is no want of land. The area of Leeds is 21,552 acres; it is equal in area to the ten new boroughs on the north side of the Thames —Islington, Hampstead, St. Pancras, Marylebone, Paddington, Kensington, Hammersmith, Greater Westminster, Chelsea, and Fulham. What is the use of passing a measure to permit Leeds to buy land outside its own area when it has crying evils within its area that it cannot deal with because of the existing law? Then take Sheffield. Sheffield has 19,000 acres, and there the same difficult problem exists. Sheffield is also equal to ten of the new London boroughs; Liverpool is equal to eight; Birmingham, Nottingham, and Bristol are equal to five. Therefore there is plenty of land within these boroughs, but the councils will not go on spending money in costly schemes at the expense of the existing ratepayers. I do not wish to make this a party question, but it is no use citing the number of Bills the Conservatives have brought in. What we, as representatives of the local authorities, want are practical measures of a tangible character which can be put into force and at a cheap rate. I quite agree with the hon. Member for South Shields that you cannot get the small boroughs of 3,000, 4,000, or 5,000 acres to undertake to spend money outside their areas. They will not buy land for building at a cost of thousands of pounds, with the risk of a cost to the rates, unless they can get complete control and jurisdiction over that area. All the money now spent in our boroughs is for the purpose of inducing people to come into the boroughs, and not to send them outside. This measure simply permits the boroughs to buy land outside, and, therefore, there is no chance of it being put into effect. There is only one other matter to which I wish to refer, and that is in reference to the compensation question. At a meeting to-day of the municipal corporations there was a strong feeling expressed that it was unfair that corporations should have to compensate landowners to the extent of
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10 per cent. beyond the valuation. The Government refused to accept an Amendment moved from this side of the House limiting that compensation, and I contend that if they really wished to make this measure practicable they should have accepted some of the important Amendments which would cheapen the cost in the event of the local authorities putting the Bill into operation. I hope the time will soon arrive when there will be a Government in power which will deal with this question in a manner which will be effective and a lasting boon to the community, and by which the matter will be settled for a great many years to come.
MR. JOHN BURNS: I have not ventured to address the House on this Bill either at the Committee stage or on the Second Reading, and I rise to-night only to make one or two practical suggestions in addition to those which have been offered not alone from this, but also from the other side of the House. Before I deal with the points in which I am specially interested I want to say this: The country has been agitated during the last four or five years with the housing problem on its moral, social, and physical sides. In the village as in the town, and especially in London, we have hoped that the Government, face to face with this agitation, would bring forward a Bill grappling with the problem much better than this Bill does, and when the country hears, as it will hear, especially after the Bill has been in operation a year, that all this agitation and the sentimental articles in the papers, from The Times downwards, have resulted simply in this elementary measure, which goes only a little way on the right road, it will come to the conclusion that the Government's mountain has laboured and produced a ridiculous mouse. I venture to think that the Government, face to face with the need for better housing, face to face with the demand for wider powers on the part of local authorities, could have done better than they have done, even accepting the Bill as they originally brought it in. They might have accepted several Amendments from the bon. Member for South Shields, and they ought not to have refused some of the Amendments moved by the hon. Member for Stepney, with whose practical know-

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ledge, sympathy, and speeches in regard to this question I entirely associate myself. But the Government have resolved to restrict this Bill to the simple question of allowing local authorities to go outside their municipal jusisdiction for housing purposes. That, on the face of it, seems a plausible, practical, and remedial thing to do, but when we know that this new power is circumscribed by the adoptive and optional character of the Bill, a considerable amount of the plausible benefit which we at first thought this Bill might confer is removed. My objection to the Bill is that it is optional in its adoption, and unless a local authority is compelled by the indignation of the inhabitants to adopt the Bill there will be very little improvement effected by this measure. The Bill is very limited in its scope, and In practice it will be found to apply to a very limited area. Unless the personnel of parish, district, and county councils is considerably altered, I do not expect to see rural elysiums cropping up in bricks and mortar for the ideal lodging of agricultural labourers. I am positively convinced that unless some of the landlords who dominate parish, district, and county councils are forced to abandon their hidebound objections to agricultural labourers being better housed, this Bill will be a dead letter in rural districts. The Bill and the speeches of the right hon. Gentleman ignore the salient fact that some of the worst slum-ridden districts in the provinces and in London are governed by the worst of slum-owners, who, on the local authorities who have to put this Act into operation, will do everything within their power to keep the poor people in the slums, because a bigger profit can be made out of them there than in a district two or three miles outside the City jurisdiction. This Bill will not force the slum-owner, who is also a parish, district, or county councillor, to depart from his own interest, and that will make against the extension of the Bill. There is no compulsion which the central authority can apply to the local authority which neglects its duty in regard to the housing of the poor, and the net effect of the measure spread over the next few years will be about as great in the rehousing of the poor as that of the Workmen's Dwellings Acquisition Bill of two years ago—it will be practically nil. Let me go a bit further. The Bill applies to very few local authorities, as the bulk of them
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do not want to go outside their own areas for land for housing purposes. Some of the worst slums are in districts which have not yet reached the maximum of their municipal expansion, and this Bill will not touch those places to any appreciable extent. In a word, with the exception of a few cities such as Sheffield and Birmingham, and perhaps Leeds to some extent, this Bill applies to London in the main. Let me deal with its application to London. Although this Bill mainly applies to London, its beneficial features will be absolutely inoperative unless the Government follow up this Bill by an immediate alteration—I would suggest the revocation—of the Standing Orders that prevent the London County Council, the housing authority, having that free hand in the extension of municipal electric traction which the County Council ought to enjoy. Unless by an alteration of the Standing Orders of this House the veto is removed by which the vestries prevent the London County Council going from the centre of London to the area outside where this Bill can apply, the measure so far as London is concerned for the next five years will be a dead letter. How do I prove that? Supposing the London County Council were to buy 100 acres at Mitcham for artisans' dwellings. Suppose further the Council, not being the road authority between Westminster and Mitcham, want to get the people who are congested at Westminster to the artisans' colonies which the light hon. Gentleman thinks under this Bill the Council will be able to erect at Mitcham. That thought of the right hon. Gentleman is ideal, it is optimistic, for the facts are these: Unless you make the London County Council, which is the tramway and housing authority, also the road authority, the respectable people of Wandsworth, who do not want the poor to come between the wind and their nobility, will veto any proposal the Council may make for electric traction through their area, with the result that the Bill will be hung up, the housing schemes suspended, and this measure will be waste-paper. I respectfully suggest to the House of Commons and to the President of the Local Government Board that if this Bill is to do any good—and it will do most good to London if anywhere—that good cannot be accomplished unless the road authority in London is also

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the housing and the traction authority. If the veto of the vestries is not removed we shall have the respectable retired grocer of Balham, the respectable coal-merchant of Tooting, and the company-promoter who lives on the borders of Mitcham saying, "We do not want Mr. Chaplin's Bill; we do not want these colonies of workmen outside. But we will not object to it on the merits of the housing scheme. We will put up our friends on the local vestry to say that traction is not wanted in this neighbourhood; we will not pay the sum necessary to widen the streets." They will have no end of factitious and fictitious excuses, and the result will be that the Council will be unable to achieve the objects of this Bill. I agree with the remarks of the hon. Member for Stepney as to the effect of the environment of working men on their character, and the effect of better houses upon men, women, and children. I agree that Part I might have been amended, and Part II. could have been improved almost beyond recognition. This Bill could have been stiffened if the government had desired it, because the House was ready to accept anything which the Government was willing to put forward. But, notwithstanding this, I still think that so far as London and many big cities are concerned the solution of the housing problem, to a great extent, will be found less in rehousing the dishoused poor in insanitary areas than it will be found in throwing the responsibility upon local authorities of providing cheap and rapid electric traction in order to distribute the poor themselves over a wider area than that congested area in which they now live. Dealing with this problem is like dealing with manure, which is no good in heaps, but is very beneficial spread over a lot of ground. I believe that relief to these congested districts will come to a great extent from cheap and rapid electric traction. The President of the Local Government Board must realise that, concurrently with his desire for this Bill to allow local authorities to deal with this problem outside their own area, there is growing up a strong objection to localities — and especially municipal authorities—getting quicker and better electric traction in their hands. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to help the housing of the poor he will have to take no notice of this spurious agitation against municipal
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trading in regard to electric traction. If he desires to deal effectively with this question he must take no notice of the gentlemen who have caused the two Houses of Parliament to institute a joint Committee, the object of which is to get electric traction in the hands of companies and monopolies, when, if it were placed in the hands of local or municipal authorities, with the necessary control over the roads, it would do more good in one year in the way of settling the housing problem than this Bill will do in nine or ten years. The hon. Member for Dumbartonshire made an admirable and excellent speech, but it had very little relevance to this Bill or to the housing problem. I think his speech would have been more appropriate when the Cheap Trains Bill was before the House. The hon. Member has stated that the railway companies in Scotland had been compelled to carry people twenty miles for twopence, and what is good enough for Dumbartonshire is good enough for London. [An HON. MEMBER: It is done now in London.] Yes, I know that the Great Eastern Railway do it, but they have done it more to take colonies of workmen to help them to pay for their line. The Great Eastern Railway was then almost bankrupt, and they paid their dividends by giving cheap trains. But one swallow does not make a summer, and all the other railway companies do not do the same as the Great Eastern Railway have done. The Government did a great deal to prevent the success of this Bill when they asked their supporters to throw out the hon. Member for West Islington's Cheap Trains Bill, which was the necessary complement to any Housing Bill whether under Part I., Part II., or Part III. The President of the Local Government Board has given us the power to go outside, providing the local authorities are willing; but by the rejection of the Cheap Trains Bill the Government have denied the workmen, whom they expect to benefit, the opportunity of that cheap and rapid transit which ought to precede the passing of this Bill. What the Government have given with the left hand they have taken away with the right by not giving the facilities to compel railway companies to provide these cheap fares, which they ought to have done. I wish to say a word or two with regard to one portion of London in particular. I allude to Chelsea. If we

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have to have landlords I would rather have a big landlord than a small one. The most objectionable sort of landlords I know are those who belong to the retired grocer class with religious proclivities, who have invested their money in bricks and mortar in which the poor live, and who now grind the faces of the poor. If I am to choose a good landlord, I would rather have a large one, and one of the best is Lord Cadogan, or the Duke of Westminster, or the Duke of Bedford. But what happens in these cases? Lord Cadogan has converted Chelsea during the last twenty years from being a working class district into a sort of South-Western Belgravia and a middle and upper class flatland. He has turned all the workmen out of Chelsea for the improvement and betterment of his property, and his dominion over Chelsea, benevolent though he may think it, has been a positive curse to the labourers and the artisans and the men who previously lived in Chelsea and near to their work. It seems to me that the day is not far distant when you will have to apply to the Dukes of Westminster and Bedford and Earl Cadogan, who are improving the poor off the face of this earth for the benefit of their property, the same provisions as are now applied to railway companies, and which you are now seeking to apply to the County Council, and which you impose upon the School Board when they pull down houses for the building of polytechnics, and thus displace the poor. You are going to segregate this vast city into parishes of the poor and parishes of the rich, which, from the point of view of housing, is a mistake, and from the point of view of social development will be a disaster. By this policy you are bringing about a division of the classes, which you have always pretended that you are anxious to avert, and thus you are bringing about in London one of the worst social characteristics that it is possible to conceive. I sincerely trust that my hint to my friend Earl Cadogan will be conveyed to him by his friends in the spirit it which it is given, and that we shall no longer see the Duke of Westminster and Earl Cadogan displacing the working class of Chelsea, and compelling them to go into portions of Fulham and into my constituency of Battersea. [An HON. MEMBER: But they are Radicals.] That is not so, for they are of the very
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poorest class, and the very poor are almost always more Tory than the rich; they are chloroformed by the publicans, and by beer and blankets, and they are the dependents of South African millionaires, who tell them that it is their business to support gentlemen who have made their money in Africa and who come over here touting for a coronet, while if they asked for such a thing in their own land they would be put in prison instead. This Bill brings no pressure to bear upon the rich landlord, nor upon a reluctant local authority, It does not deal with a reluctant district council dominated by a landlord. What remedy does it bring to the dock labourer and the casual worker in the East End of London? Why, none at all. My hon. friend the Member for Stepney asked for the establishment of a fair rent court, but that was refused. There are hundreds of foreigners who are exacting more money out of those who reside in small tenements in the East, and inflicting greater hardships upon the poor, than ever Isaac Gordon made out of his clients. This kind of thing has to be stopped, because if it is not stopped we shall see the beginning of such an agitation that I trust we never shall witness in the East End of London. The last thing I have to say is in regard to that infamous clause which provides that local authorities may buy land at the ratepayers' expense, and when the money has been captured, the landowners get on the district council and lease the land bought at the ratepayers' expense to traffickers in land, who will make a profit out of it without incurring the responsibility of purchase. That is a mischievous blot on this Bill. This measure was said to be brought in to help the costermonger, the dock labourer, and the poor men who had to labour about Covent Garden and Drury Lane, but it will not help them at all. They cannot go to live at Tooting, Richmond, or Kingston. This Bill is another instance of that vicious class of legislation which the Government have in more than one respect introduced. It is another instance of giving to him that hath and taking from him that hath not. It helps the clerk and the higher paid workman, who feel less the pressure of congestion than the stevedore, the waiter, and the footman in the West End. [An HON. MEMBER; It makes more room.] Yes; but

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it is to such a very small extent, that is hardly worth the trouble of drafting a Bill to provide it. This measure does not grapple with the difficulty, and does not provide the remedy which some of us thought it would provide. It enables local authorities to go outside their areas to do what they have not the power to do inside. That is precisely what provincial districts do not want, and, so far as London is concerned, this provision is rendered useless by the fact that the London County Council will not be able to go out of their district unless this Standing Order is revoked. I wish to make a final suggestion. I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman if he intends proceeding with the revocation of the Standing Order, and, if he cannot do that, will he promise to bring in a Bill next session to enable the county council to be the road as well as the housing authority? This Bill whispers housing reform to the ear and breaks it to the hope of every poor workman.
THE PEESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. CHAPLIN,): The hon. Member for South Shields has complained that this Bill is a title and a name, and nothing more. He also says that every Amendment which would have made the Bill a reality has been excluded. I doubt very much whether the points raised by the hon. Member could have been inserted in the Bill even if its scope had been altered in the manner he suggested. Why did the hon. Member for South Shields not try to move some Instructions upon these points? There was at least a possibility that he might have succeeded, and these questions could have been raised. All I have to say is that no Instructions of any kind were moved, and I doubt whether any single Instruction, if so placed upon the Paper, would have achieved the object which hon. Members opposite have in view. The hon. Member for Battersea says the Bill could have been stiffened if we had been willing to accept some of the various Amendments which were put down. We heard a good deal upon the Second Reading of the Bill about a num-
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ber of comprehensive Amendments which were to be moved in Committee, but why were none of them moved? I waited in daily expectation to hear what those comprehensive Amendments were which were going to transform this Bill into a great and comprehensive measure, but they never came. I can count on my fingers the serious suggestions which have been offered by hon. Gentlemen opposite. One of them was the extension of the period for the repayment of loans. But if that had been carried it would have been absolutely trivial. The hon. Member for Hoxton admitted that the Amendment which I accepted at his hands would do ten times more to assist the local authorities in giving effect to this measure than any other Amendment—than if I had accepted all the Amendments which were moved for extending the period of the loans. But even on that point hon. Gentlemen must remember that their proposals were opposed and objected to by all the greatest financial authorities sitting upon their own side of the House. With regard to the question of locomotion, the hon. Member for South Shields has said that what is wanted is a change in the law. My right hon. friend the President of the Board of Trade and myself had the pleasure of receiving a deputation from the County Council upon this subject not many days ago. The President of the Board of Trade explained to that deputation the provision made by the existing law. I think he made out a convincing case that all they required could be obtained without any changes in the law under the present law, and he gave them assurances which, as far as I can judge, were received with satisfaction and wore considered sufficient by the members of the County Council who formed the deputation. The hon. Member for Battersea has raised another question which is of even more importance than the question of cheap trains. he has pointed out what is the fact, that under Standing Order 22 very great difficulties may be placed in the way of the County Council in London in case they wish to make a tramway beyond their own area. The effect of that Standing Order is that the consent of any outside authority is an absolute condition before any Bill upon this subject can be introduced. My right hon. friend and myself have considered this

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question most carefully, and, after a conference with the Chairmen of Committees in both Houses, I am in a position to say that the Government are willing to make such alterations in that Standing Order and propose them in due course as will modify those restrictions and allow the question to be brought before Parliament and leave to the Committee the decision as to whether the matter should go forward or not. I do not know that there are many other questions with which I ought to deal in reply to what has been said. I am very strongly of opinion myself that when these questions were first discussed upon the introduction of the Bill, when it was stated so freely by many hon. Members opposite that this was a small, inadequate, futile, and absolutely ridiculous measure as an amendment of the law, nine-tenths of the hon. Gentlemen who made those statements were in entire ignorance—or, if not, they were singularly ill-informed—as to the existing state of the law. I have endeavoured, to the best of my ability, since these discussions began to make public and bring home to the minds of those interested in this question how immense, how wide, and how enormous are the powers which are already vested by law in the local authorities. I am pretty certain in my own mind that the real reason why, during the passing of this Bill through Committee, we have had none of those comprehensive Amendments which were foreshadowed was that the more hon. Gentlemen opposite made themselves thoroughly acquainted with this subject the more difficult they found it to frame any Amendments which were not already dealt with under the existing law upon this subject, or which were not provided for by the changes made by the present Bill. As regards London, to which the hon. Member for Battersea has referred, I hope for much from the new boroughs which are about to be constituted. With regard to districts outside the metropolis, I hope that the publicity which has been given to this question by the discussions in this House may lead to greater activity upon their part. Say what you will upon this question, and do what you will to try and extend the law, it is, after all, upon the action of the local authorities and the way in which they perform their duty that we must rely. It becomes daily and hourly more apparent that what really is wanted in regard to this question is a
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more effective administration of the existing law, rather than new measures of legislation.
SIR WALTER FOSTER: I am very sorry to have to rise to discuss the Third Reading of this Bill at so late an hour, but I hope we shall have a further opportunity of considering this measure before the Third Reading is taken. I think that would be a convenient course to the House for this reason if for no other reason, that the Bill as it is before us at present is imperfect and incomplete. Moreover, the Bill has never been reprinted since those clauses were added to it on the Report stage, and it is very inconvenient at this stage of the Bill to have before us an imperfect transcript of the Bill which the Government propose to place upon the Statute-book. When I went to get a copy of this Bill I was surprised to find that the clauses added on the Report stage were not added. I hope, therefore, we shall have an opportunity of considering the Bill in its complete form before the Third Reading is carried. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board, in the speech which he has just made, has referred to the absence of certain action on the part of hon. Members on this side of the House with reference both to Instructions and Amendments, and he suggested that if we desired very large powers to be added to this Bill we should have taken more opportunities of putting down Instructions. The right hon. Gentleman seems to forget that the opportunity of putting down Instructions was limited, because that stage of the Bill was not expected to be so short. I remember one evening we were not expecting this Bill to be taken at all by the House, and when I came back I found that one stage of the measure had been taken unexpectedly. Of course that shut out the possibility of putting down certain Instructions which would otherwise have possibly been put

1421
down. I do not say that this was designedly done, but it put us at a disadvantage with reference to the addition of further Instructions which might have been put down to extend the Bill, as was desired by many hon. Members on this side of the House. There were many Amendments of substance which we desired to move, but which were unfortunately shut out by the narrow title and narrow purview of the Bill itself. Hon. Members of considerable position in the party to which I have the honour to belong, men of most moderate views, have declared that this evil is so great, and that the difficulties and dangers of bad housing of the people are becoming such serious questions affecting the social condition of the people, that they are prepared to take even revolutionary steps to amend the present condition of things. When that spirit exists, it is more than disappointing, for it is absolutely disheartening to have a measure brought in and discussed, and which is described as a Bill for housing the working classes, which, by its very title and drafting, prevents Amendments of a large and generous character being put upon the Paper. Then we come to the question in connection with this Bill of what can be done under it. There were several points that I wished to raise myself, and I am sorry to have to say, with reference to the Bill itself, I regard it with great disappointment. It does not answer the expectations I had formed of the measure that would be introduced. The Bill has not met, after all, the great difficulty we have to face in this matter in order to take poor people out of bad and insanitary houses. There are plenty of powers on
the Statute-book for turning people out of bad houses and for shutting up those houses; but what we want is power to re-house the people, and this Bill does not give us that power to any appreciable extent in the rural districts, and it gives us that power under very unfortunate conditions even in large cities and in London. I am very anxious that we should consider this Bill fully and thoroughly before it passes to another House, and I think it is advisable that we should discuss it at much greater length. The right hon. Gentleman says it is desirable that the public outside should understand the Bill thoroughly; but for that purpose so far we have had very small opportunities of discussing the measure. With reference to the re-housing difficulty in London the Bill gives the local authorities opportunities of re-housing by taking them outside their area. But the taking of them outside the present areas under, existing conditions is almost impossible You cannot take people outside the areas of these local authorities——
It being Midnight, Mr. SPEAKER proceeded to interrupt the Business, whereupon—
MR. CHAPLINrose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
Question put, "That the Question be now put."
The House divided:—Ayes, 108; Noes, 38. (Division List No. 216.)

AYES.

Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir A. F.

Balfour, Rt. Hn. G.W. (Leeds)

Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

Allhusen, Augustus Hy. Eden

Banbury, Frederick George

Brassey, Albert

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Beach, Rt. Hn. Sir M. H. (Bristol)

Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

Arrol, Sir William

Bemrose, Sir Henry Howe

Bullard, Sir Harry

Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

Bethell, Commander

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H,

Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (Manch'r)

Blundell, Colonel Henry

Cavendish, R. F. (N. Lanes.)

Cavendish, V. C. W (Derbyshire)

Goschen, Rt. Hn. G. J. (St. Geo.'s)

Peel, Hon. Wm. Robert W.

Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J. (Birm.)

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Penn, John

Chamberlain, J Austen (Worc'r)

Greene, Henry D. (Shrewsb'y)

Pilkington, R. (Lancs, Newton)

Chaplin, Right Hon. Henry

Greville, Hon. Ronald

Platt-Higgins, Frederick

Charrington, Spencer

Hamilton, Rt. Hn. Lord George

Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

Cohen, Benjamin Louis

Hanbury, Rt. Hn. Robert Wm.

Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse

Henderson, Alexander

Purvis, Robert

Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

Hermon-Hodge, Robt. Trotter

Rentoul, James Alexander

Cross, Herbert S. (Bolton)

Hoare, Sir Samuel (Norwich)

Richards, Henry Charles

Curzon, Viscount

Jebb, Sir R. Claverhouse

Ritchie, Rt. Hon. Charles T.

Dalkeith, Earl of

Keswick, William

Robertson, Herbert (Hackney)

Dalrymple, Sir Charles

Knowles, Lees

Round, James

Davies, Sir H. D. (Chatham)

Lawrence, Sir E Durning-(Corn)

Russell, T. W. (Tyrone)

Dickinson, Robert Edmond

Lawson, J. Grant (Yorks.)

Sinclair, Louis (Romford)

Digby, J. K. D. Wingfield-

Loder, Gerald Walter Erskine

Smith, A. H. (Christchurch)

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

Long, Col. C. W. (Evesham)

Smith, J. Parker (Lanarks)

Douglas-Pennant, Hon. E. S.

Long, Rt. Hon. W. (Liverpool)

Smith, Hon. W. F. D. (Strand)

Dyke, Rt. Hon. Sir W. Hart

Lowe, Francis William

Thornton, Percy M.

Faber, George Denison

Lowles, John

Tomlinson, W. E. Murray

Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edw.

Loyd, Archie Kirkman

Tuke, Sir John Batty

Finch, George H.

Lucas-Shadwell, William

Warde, Lieut. -Col. C. E. (Kent)

Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

Welby, Lt -Col A. C. E. (Taunton)

Fisher, William Hayes

M'Killop, James

Willox, Sir John Archibald

Flower, Ernest

More, Robt. Jasper (Shropshire)

Wilson, John (Falkirk)

Gedge, Sydney

Morgan, Hn. Fred. (Mon'mths)

Wodehouse, Rt Hn. E. R. (Bath)

Gibbons, J. Lloyd

Morrell, George Herbert

Wylie, Alexander

Gibbs, Hn. Vicary (St. Albans)

Morton, A. H. A. (Deptford)

Wyndham, George

Godson, Sir Augustus Fredk.

Mount, William George

Young, Commander (Berks, E.)

Goldsworthy, Major-General

Murray, Rt Hn A Graham (Bute.)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.

Gordon, Hon. John Edward

Nicholson, William Graham

Gorst, Rt. Hon. Sir John Eldon

Pease, Herbert P. (Darlington)

NOES.

Bramsdon, Thomas Arthur

Hedderwick, Thos. Chas. H.

Reckitt, Harold James

Brigg, John

Horniman, Frederick John

Robson, William Snowdon

Broadhurst, Henry

Jones, W. (Carnarvonshire)

Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

Buchanan, Thomas Ryburn

Kearley, Hudson E.

Sinclair, Capt. J. (Forfarshire)

Caldwell, James

Lambert, George

Smith, Samuel (Flint)

Cawley, Frederick

Lawson, Sir W. (Cumb'land)

Soames, Arthur Wellesley

Dalziel, James Henry

Lough, Thomas

Spicer, Albert

Dillon, John

Macaleese, Daniel

Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

Doogan, P. C.

MacNeill, J. Gordon Swift

Thomas, David A. (Merthyr)

Evans, Samuel T. (Glamorgan)

M'Leod, John

Williams, John Carvell (Notts)

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Maddison, Fred.

Foster, Sir W. (Derby Co.)

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

TELLERS FORTHE NOES—Mr. Herbert Gladstone and Mr. Causton.

Goddard, Daniel Ford

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Hayne, Rt. Hn. Charles Seale-

Oldroyd, Mark

Bill read the third time, and passed.

COUNTY AND BOROUGH FRANCHISE ASSIMILATION (LONDON) BILL.
Read the third time, and passed.

Adjourned at a quarter after Twelve of the clock.

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
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:—
Newcastle-upon-Tyne Electric Supply.
Newry, Keady, and Tynan Light Railway.
Also the Certificates that no Standing Orders are applicable to the following Bills:—
Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Housing of Working Classes) (No. 2).
Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (No. 4).
And also the Certificates that the Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have been complied with:—
Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (No. 3).
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 10).
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 15).
The same were ordered to lie on the Table.

GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY (IRELAND) BILL.
A witness ordered to attend the Select Committee, and to produce documents.
OLDHAM CORPORATION BILL.
  BRADFORD CORPORATION BILL.
    GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY BILL.
    Reported with Amendments.
BRAY URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
Reported without amendment.
MIDLAND RAILWAY BILL.
The Queen's consent (in right of Her Duchy of Lancaster) signified, and Bill reported with Amendments.
GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY BILL.
Report from the Committee of Selection, That the Viscount Frankfort de Montmorency be proposed to the House as a member of the Select Committee on the said Bill in the place of the Lord Monckton (V. Galway); read, and agreed to.
PLYMOUTH, STONEHOUSE, AND DEVONPORT TRAMWAYS BILL.
  CUMBERLAND COUNTY COUNCIL (BRIDGES) BILL.

    CROYDON TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMENTS BILL.
    LONDON COUNTY TRAMWAY'S (No. 1) BILL.
    SCARBOROUGH CORPORATION BILL.
    Moved, That the Order made on the 12th day of March last, "That no Private Bill brought from the House of Commons shall be read a second time after Tuesday the 26th day of June next," be dispensed with, and that the Bills be now read 2a; agreed to; and Bills read 2a accordingly.

PLYMOUTH, STOREHOUSE, AND DEVONPORT TRAMWAYS BILL.
Committed. The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
CROYDON TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMETS BILL.
  LONDON COUNTY TRAMWAYS (No. 1) BILL.
  Committed. The Committees to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
WELLINGBOROUGH AND DISTRICT TRAMROADS BILL.
  NOTTINGHAM CORPORATION BILL.
  Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
GREAT INDIA, PENINSULA RAILWAY COMPANY BILL.
  SOUTHPORT CORPORATION BILL.
  Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and referred to the Examiners.
AIRDRIE AND COATBBIDGE TRAMWAYS BILL.
  AIRDRIE, COATBRIDGE. AND DISTRICT WATER TRUST BILL.

    BRIGHTON CORPORATION BILL.
    READING CORPORATION (TRAMWAYS) BILL.
    WOLVERHAMPTON GAS BILL.
    Returned from the Commons with the Amendments agreed to.

    VALE OF RHEIDOL LIGHT RAILWAY BILL.
    Returned from the Commons with the Amendment agreed to.
BURNLEY CORPORATION BILL, [H.L.]
  EDINBURGH DISTRICT LUNACY BOARD BILL [H.L.]
  Returned from the Commons agreed to, with Amendments.
LONDON UNITED TRAMWAYS BILL.
Message from the Commons giving leave to Thomas Skewes Cox, Esquire (a member), to attend the Select Committee (pursuant to message of Tuesday last).
GREAT SOUTHERN AND WESTERN AND WATERFORD, LIMERICK AND WESTERN RAILWAY COMPANIES AMALGAMATION BILL [H.L.]
  MIDLAND GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY OF IRELAND BILL [H.L.]
    GREAT SOUTHERN AND WESTERN AND WATERFORD AND CENTRAL IRELAND RAILWAY COMPANIES AMALGAMATION BILL [H.L.]
    Leave given to the Joint Committee to report from time to time.
MIDLAND GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY OF IRELAND BILL [H.L.]
Reported from the Joint Committee with Amendments.
GREAT YARMOUTH PORT AND HAVEN BILL.
Commons Amendments to Lords Amendments considered, and agreed to.
LONDON (ST. LUKE) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL. (No. 180.)
  LONDON (SOUTHWARK) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL. (No. 181.)
  Both from the Commons; read 1a; to be printed; and referred to the Examiners.
LONDON (CLERKENWELL AND HOLBORN) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
  LONDON (POPLAR) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
  Moved, That the Order of 12th March last, "That no Provisional Order Confirmation Bill brought from the House of Commons shall be read a second time after Tuesday, the 26th day of June next," be dispensed with, and that the Hills be now read a second time; agreed to; Bills read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the whole House.
  TRAMWAYS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 3) BILL [H.L.]
  Amendments reported (according to Order), and Bill to be read 3a To-morrow.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC..

  TRADE REPORTS (MISCELLANEOUS SERIES).
  No. 532. United. States (Mining Industry of Colorado).
  No. 533. Russia (Trans-Siberian Railway).

  NAVY.

    I. ESTIMATES.
    1. Estimate of the further Amount which will be required during the year ending 31st March, 1901, beyond the sum already provided in the Grants for Navy Services for the year (Parliamentary Paper No. 41, Session 1900) to meet additional expenditure arising on the under-mentioned Votes.

    2. Statement of the First Lord of the Admiralty explanatory of the Additional Estimate for Her Majesty's Navy for the year 1900–1.

    II. BOILERS.
    1. Memorandum respecting Water-tube Boilers in Her Majesty's ships.

    2. Statement of the First Lord of the Admiralty respecting Water-tube Boilers in Her Majesty's ships.

  NATIONAL EDUCATION (IRELAND).
  Extracts from forthcoming Code of Rules and Regulations of the Commissioners of National Education, Ireland, for the year 1900–1
  New Rules and Regulations in operation for the year 1900–1.
  Presented (by Command), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  PETITION.
    VIVISECTION.
    Petition for restriction of the practice of; of meeting in London; read, and ordered to lie on the Table.

  MERCHANT SHIPPING (LIABILITY OF SHIPOWNERS AND OTHERS) BILL.
  [SECOND HEADING.]
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  *LORD HENEAGE: My Lords, this is rather an important Bill, although we have the advantage of the fact that it conies up from the House of Commons with the unanimous support of that House, it having passed through all its stages there without a division. The object of the Bill is to limit the excessive amount of liability to which shipowners and dock-owners and others are subject under the present law. It has been under the consideration of all those who are interested for a considerable period, and the outcome of a conference between all the parties practically and financially interested is the present agreement, which has been carefully considered, and has been embodied in the Bill. The Bill has not only been before a Standing Committee of the House of Commons, but it has been thoroughly thrashed out in that House, with the assistance of the Solicitor General and the Board of Trade. The whole question, therefore, comes before your Lordships with very good credentials. It has the unanimous approval of the House of Commons and of the whole body of shipowners and dock-owners, harbour authorities, and other conservancy bodies throughout the United Kingdom. Under those circumstances it is not necessary for me to argue to your Lordships at any length upon the necessity of the measure. I could give your Lordships a number of instances to show that great hardship has been imposed upon both dock-owners and shipowners in respect of the unlimited liability to damage at present imposed
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  upon them. Both parties desire that their liability shall be limited, and this Bill represents the agreement they have arrived at. The object of the Bill is, in the first clause, to limit the liability of shipowners in relation to "fixed objects"; and, in the second clause, to give a corresponding reciprocal relief in regard to liability for damages to dock-owners, harbour authorities, and others. The Bill does not interfere in any degree with the question of damages in respect of loss of life at sea. It does not put forward any new liability whatever. It asks, in the first clause, that the Section 503 of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1894 shall be extended to "fixed objects." Under the law as it now stands, the liability of shipowners for damaged one to "property at sea" inflicted accidentally is limited to £8 per ton. It does not appear to men of common sense, and those interested in the; trade, and others that there is any reasonable objection to that limitation being extended to "fixed objects." I will read to your Lordships a few words from the section to which I have alluded. Subsection (1) of Section 503 of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1894 enacts, that—
  "The owner of a ship shall not be liable to damages beyond the following amounts:—'In respect of a damage to vessels, goods, merchandise, or other things, whether there be in addition loss of life or personal injury, or not, an aggregate amount not exceeding eight pounds for each ton of their ship's tonnage.'"
  But, my Lords, no such limitation exists by law for damage to "land, fixed piers, docks, canals, wharves, or landing stages," and, as I have said, there does not appear to men of common sense any reason against such limitation. It is a very difficult thing to know what the value of docks and harbours and canals are at the present time. You cannot assess them by tons as you do ships. Now, this is not a new limitation, because I am informed that it actually exists in France at the present moment, and that legislation is in progress in other countries in the same direction. By the first clause of the Bill it is proposed to extend this provision of Section 593 of the Act of 1894 to the "fixed objects "I have mentioned. It is not a referential clause: it is perfectly plain and clear. It enacts that the limitation shall
  "extend and apply to all cases where (without their actual fault or privity) any loss or damage is caused to property or rights of

  1291
  any kind, whether on land or on water, or whether fixed or movable, by reason of the improper navigation or management of the ship."
  I believe that as a matter of fact no one takes exception to that clause. The only difficulty that arises is that whilst the dockowner and the harbour authorities and the conservancy boards are willing to grant that limitation in the case of shipowners, they ask for some reciprocal legislation on their own account, on the ground of the large size and tonnage of the vessels now being built. Mr. Me Arthur, who had charge of the Bill in the House of Commons, speaking on the Second Reading,✶ said—
  "We recognise that the contention is a reasonable one, and therefore shipowners not only assent to that contention, bat they are willing to assist in every way the action of the dock authorities to have a clause to that effect inserted in the Bill in Committee. We are willing to concede to the dock authorities a corresponding limitation to that which we claim for the shipowners."
  The second clause of the Bill is the unanimous result of the deliberations of the shipowners and dockowners and others interested, and of a very useful discussion both in the Standing Committee and in Committee of the whole House, in which, although several Amendments were moved and some few were accepted, there was no division of opinion whatever and no division took place. The first clause of the Bill is very easy to follow, because it is simply an extension of the principle of the Act of 1894. The second clause is rather technical, and it may appear at first sight to be rather illogical; but I am bound to say that, having looked into the question myself before I took charge of the Bill, and having had some considerable knowledge of merchant shipping legislation during my connection with the Humber ports for twenty years, I believe that it is a good working agreement and is quite practicable. Under Clause 2, the "aggregate liability" of dock and harbour authorities and other conservancy boards will not exceed £8 per ton; but I wish to point out distinctly that the maximum liability will not be based on the damage done to any individual vessel or on the damage done to any dock, but on the tonnage of the
  ✶ For Second Reading Debate in the Commons, see The Parliamentary Debates [Fourth Series], Vol. lxxx., page 1366; for Debate on Bill as amended by Standing Committee, see Vol. lxxxiv., p. 1226.
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  largest ship which has been within the area over which such dock or other authority has jurisdiction within five years previous to the accident. This sum would be apportioned in any accident between one or more vessels that might be damaged, the damage being assessed on the actual value of the vessels and of the cargoes on board of them. I have here some instances of how that would work, but I do not think it is a wise thing on the Second Reading to give figures, because it is impossible for anyone to discuss them at the moment, and I therefore content myself with saying that in Committee I shall be perfectly ready to give the cases, and to show that whilst this provision may not seem very logical, we know exactly what are the results that will be incurred by the Bill, and we are perfectly prepared to meet them. There is one other point with regard to the second clause to which I should like to call your Lordships' attention. It is not thought fair that the maximum liability should be increased because some vessels of a very large size may have been within the area which do not usually come into the port; it is not considered reasonable that the measure of liability should be fixed by the fact of some very large vessel having accidentally come within the area for shelter, or just to load mails and passengers. Therefore there is a proviso to this clause that a ship is not to be deemed to be within the area
  "by reason only that it has taken shelter within or passed through such area on a voyage between two places both situated outside that area, or has loaded or unloaded mails and passengers within the area."
  These latter words were expressly put in in the House of Commons to protect the port of Queenstown. My Lords, this agreement, as I have said, is the result of the unanimous decision of the men of business and practical common sense, men who alone are interested financially and practically in the limitation of liability, either as receivers of damages or as payers of damages, and they ask your Lordships to join with the House of Commons in giving it Parliamentary sanction. Before I leave this subject I should like to tell your Lordships what was the opinion of Her Majesty's Government by their authorised spokesman before the Bill left the House of Commons. Sir Edward

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  Carson, speaking in Committee on the Bill as Solicitor General, said—
  "Certainly the proposal to which exception is taken is not a logical or ideal proposal. The Board of Trade, however, have endeavoured to obtain as far as possible the views of the great shipowners and associations represented, and in the same way they have the opinion of the dockowners, that the proposal as to limitation is the only one they can agree upon; and it has been embodied. If the Hill is not passed there will be no limitation at all."
  And in replying later to a suggested Amendment, the Solicitor General said—
  "The Government would not depart from their attitude of agreement with what was acceptable to all parties concerned."
  and I venture to hope that the Government will not depart from it in this House. Your Lordships will bear in mind that this Bill has nothing to do with loss of life at sea and imposes no now liability which does not exist under the present law. The second clause was submitted to the closest examination by the officials of the Board of Trade and by the Standing Committee on Trade in the House of Commons. It was thoroughly discussed in Committee of the whole House, and no division was taken upon the Bill. The Bill is based on mutual reciprocity and the terms of the agreement are in the Bill; and having regard to the credentials of the Hill and its unanimous adoption by the House of Commons, I feel fully justified in recommending the principle and clauses of the Bill to your Lordships' favourable consideration.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Lord Heneage.)
  LORD MACNAGHTEN: My Lords, I do not rise to object at all to the Second Reading of this Bill. I think that, as the shipowners and the dock authorities have come to an agreement that the liability of the dock authorities should be limited, your Lordships will be disposed to carry out that agreement. I only rise to mention a very small matter. I am speaking now in the interests of the dock authorities of Belfast. As I understand, the measure of liability is to be the tonnage of the largest vessel which in ordinary normal cases trades to a port. Your Lordships may perhaps know that in Belfast very large vessels are built, which, as soon as they are built and fitted out, go away and trade to other ports,
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  and their tonnage is very much in excess of the tonnage of the ordinary vessels going to Belfast. Now, I should hope that as the House of Commons has made exception in favour of vessels which only unload mails at Queenstown, a similar exception may be made in favour of the docks of Belfast in regard to those enormously large vessels which are built there but do not trade to the port. I propose to submit to your Lordships an Amendment to carry that out, and I hope my noble friend will give it his favourable consideration.
  *THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Lord BALFOUR of BURLEIGH): My Lords, I rise to state to the House what the attitude of the Board of Trade will be in regard to the proposals now contained in this Bill. The noble Lord, I think, stated accurately the history of the circumstances under which this Bill is presented to the House in the form in which it now appears, and he told your Lordships that it had come to this House without a division in the other House of Parliament. I think that is accurate, but it will be entirely a mistake to suppose that the Bill as now presented to this House is in the same form or anything like the form in which its promoters introduced it into the other House of Parliament. The fact is that for a short Bill of the kind, it has, I think, been as much if not more changed and been the subject of more different changes than almost any other Bill of a similar length of which I have had experience. As introduced in the other House of Parliament it contained a clause limiting the liability of shipowners for damage to "fixed property"—and in fact, I think I may say all Kinds of property whether the property was on land or on water, whether it was fixed or movable—to the amount of £8 a ton. To that clause the then Attorney General —now known to us here as Lord Alver-stone—offered no opposition, but he did. on behalf of the Government oppose the second clause of the Bill, which altered the mutual liability for damage as between British and foreign shipowners, and that clause in consequence of the opposition of the Government was withdrawn in Grand Committee. When that stage had been reached the owners of docks put in their word and thought that, if there was to be this further limit of

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  liability of shipowners to damage in regard to their property, there ought to be some reciprocity in the matter, and that they ought to have a limit of damage for which they might be made liable in the event of damage by the action of their servants to the property of the shipowners. To that principle the late Attorney General gave a general assent, but it is not easy to see the logic of the clause which has been devised. The noble Lord who introduced the Bill said quite frankly that when you look at it at first sight it seems to be illogical. I venture to suggest to the House that the more you look at it the more illogical it is likely to appear, and I think the remarks which the noble and learned Lord below the gangway has made show that this is a clause in the nature of a compromise, and when there is take going (so to speak) everyone wants to have a slice. Queenstown has protected itself by an Amendment in the other House; now there is a plea on behalf of Belfast; and, if the plea of Queenstown was logical and to be admitted, it seems to me it will be rather difficult to find a distinct principle against the suggestion made by the noble and learned Lord. But, my Lords, the real case for this Bill is not I think the soundness or the logical nature of the provisions which are contained in it; the only case there is for it I think is that it is a matter of agreement as between the parties chiefly interested as the noble Lord says. Whether that is a sufficient reason for placing upon the Statute-book a Bill which even its own parents do not, I think, regard as perfect, and which they have been fully warned is a Bill which, as a matter of legal interpretation is full of doubt and full of difficulty, is a matter upon which I certainly expected that some of the legal talent in this House might have something to say. My Lords, the history of Clause 2, which is the clause to which I more particularly refer, is this. As I have said, when the liability of the shipowners to the dock-owners was being limited, the dock-owners asked that their liability to the shipowners should also be limited, and it was suggested, and, in fact, at one time agreed, that the liability of the dockowners should be fixed at a rate not exceeding—
  "£8 for each ton of the tonnage of the largest registered British ship which, at the time of such loss or damage occurring, is, or within
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  the period of five years previous thereto has been within the area over which such dock or canal owner, harbour authority, or conservancy authority, performs any duty or exercises any power."
  That was found not to be satisfactory, and the clause was amended by the Grand Committee so as to confine it to the largest ships which had traded to or from the port. But the clause was again amended by the House so that as the Bill now comes up to your Lordships it provides that the damage is to be based—
  "On the tonnage of the largest ship which has been within the area over which such dock or other authority has jurisdiction within live years previous to the accident,"
  with a proviso excusing vessels taking shelter or merely passing through the area. That last proviso is the one to which the noble and learned Lord alluded in his remarks to the House. I am sure the noble Lord in charge of the Bill did not intend to give an erroneous impression to the House, but he quoted some words of the present Solicitor General, as if the Government had in any way made themselves responsible for the Bill. That is not so, and so far from that being so, the present Attorney General, Sir Robert Finlay, remarked in Grand Committee "that the clause as it now stands would give a great deal of work to the lawyers," and "that he knew nothing analogous to it in law." In spite of that, as I have said, it is an agreement between the two chief interests principally concerned—the dock owners and the shipowners. It is a matter of compromise between them, a matter with which, as I have said, not only are they satisfied, but apparently, from the communications which have reached the Board of Trade, they are clearly desirous of seeing passed into law. And under those circumstance—as the legal profession contains many estimable men —if the dock-owners and the shipowners like as between themselves to run the risk of the litigation which they are warned will ensue, it does not seem to the Board of Trade that it is necessary for the Board of Trade to interfere and prevent this agreement being carried out. Therefore, I am instructed to say, on behalf of the President of the Board of Trade, that as he is perfectly aware that there would be considerable, in fact, I may say bitter, disappointment in shipping circles if this Bill were not passed, on the whole the Board of Trade are inclined to recommend the House to pass the Bill.
  THE LORD CHANCELLOR (The Earl of HALSBURY): My Lords, I am very reluctant to interpose for a moment where everybody seems to be so harmonious, but I am bound to say that it seems to me that the second clause which has been referred to is both illogical and absurd, and I should think in practice it is hardly susceptible of being administered without a degree of litigation which, however profitable to those engaged in it, I should have thought would not be of advantage to those persons who are principally interested. Your Lordships, I think, can hardly take in—no one, I think, would be able to take in without considerable reflection on the subject—the sort of proposition which is to be laid down in order to limit liability. The question of so much per ton is, of course, not very easy to apply to docks or harbours. They are not weighed, and you cannot tell what their tonnage is, which is the proposition with which you have to deal. Then, in order to get rid of that difficulty the reciprocal advantage by the dock or harbour authority is that they are to have when the accident occurs a calculation about what is the largest British ship that has been there within a period of five years. I can imagine a great many interesting controversies arising upon that. Then somebody suggested that if you take five years and find out all the ships that have ever gone in and out of the docks during that period, and then consider which was the biggest of them, and take that as your standard, some huge ship which came into the docks simply through stress of weather would be included. Then comes this interesting compromise, "Well, although it has been within the area during the five years, you must consider that it has not been within the area during the five years," and so on. That is the sort of legislation which your Lordships are asked to pass. As I say, I do not like to interfere when everybody is so harmonious, but I can only say that there is one class of Her Majesty's subjects who do not appear to have been considered in this compromise—namely, Her Majesty's judges, who will have the administration of this piece of legislation. It is therefore not without protest that I abstain from moving the rejection of such a clause as this. It seems to me to be an extremely absurd clause, extremely difficult to administer, and I cannot help thinking that it is not
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  a particularly good precedent to say that because two interests in the country are agreed upon it the Houses of Parliament should be induced by reason of that agreement to pass legislation which nobody can venture to say is either reasonable or profitable.
  On Question, agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the whole House to-morrow.

  COUNTY COURTS (IRELAND) BILL [H.L.]
  [SECOND READING.]
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  THE LORD CHANCELLOR OF IRELAND (Lord ASHBOURNE): My Lords, the Bill which I have asked your Lordships to read a second time is a Bill proposing to improve some details of county court administration in Ireland, and I think it will be found very useful in practice. It has been brought to my notice for some years by deputations and correspondence and references in the press that there are many matters in which there might be some advantageous changes made in Irish county court procedure, and my attention has been directed to the circumstance that there are many provisions of the English county court procedure that might be adopted with advantage in Ireland. The result of my consideration is found in the present Bill, which, of course, largely deals with details. I may say we propose, among other things, to make provision for the service of default summonses and for the enforcement of decrees in a better way, also for giving a seal to the county court; and there are provisions with regard to the attachment of debts and for the facilitating and cheapening of proof and various other matters of important detail connected with administration. I am ready to explain any of those matters when we get to the next stage, but I think your Lordships will be satisfied on the present occasion with this short statement, and accord the Bill a Second Reading.
  Bill read 2a (according to Order), and committed to a Committee of the whole House To-morrow.

  CRUELTY TO WILD ANIMALS IN CAPTIVITY BILL.
  House in Committee (according to Order).
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORDexplained that, in order to carry out the statement he made on the Second Reading of the Bill, he had drafted and now proposed certain Amendments to Clause 2. That clause was not intended to interfere with any sports; and to make the matter quite clear, he moved Amendments which would result in Clause 2 reading as follows:—
  "Any person shall be guilty of an offence who, whilst an animal is kept in close confinement, or is maimed, pinioned, or subjected to any appliance or contrivance for the purpose of hindering or preventing its escape from such confinement, shall by wantonly or unreasonably doing or omitting any act, —cause or permit to be caused any unnecessary suffering to such animal; or shall cruelly abuse, infuriate, tease, or terrify it, or permit it to be so treated."
  The Amendments were agreed to.
  Bill recommitted to the Standing Committee, and to be printed, as amended. [No. 182.]

  COLONIAL STOCK BILL [H.L.]
  Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.
  RAILWAYS (PREVENTION OF ACCIDENTS) BILL.
  Amendments reported (according to Order), and Bill to be read 3a To-morrow.
  ECCLESIASTICAL ASSESSMENTS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.
  IMITATION OF COUNTY COURT PROCESS KILL [H.L.]
  Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.
  CHARITABLE LOANS (IRELAND) BILL.
  House in Committee (according to Order); Bill reported without amendment; and re-committed to the Standing Committee.
  COPYRIGHT BILL [H.L.]
  Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.

  THE PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES— FREE DISTRIBUTION TO PEERS.
  *LORD HAWKESBURY: My Lords, I rise to ask the Prime Minister whether arrangements can now be made by which Peers may be supplied with copies of The Parliamentary Debates in the same way as Members of the House of Commons. I should like to explain that I am not asking that these papers should be circulated to Members of this House, because it is obvious that if, as is possible, many Members may not care to have them, a request for 600 more copies to be printed would be asking for a very unnecessary and wasteful expense to be incurred. I am only asking that Peers may be placed in the same position as Members of the House of Commons, and may be able to obtain the Debates on application. I understand that in the House of Commons Members may obtain the Debates in daily parts by filling up a request for them upon the Pink Paper which is issued to them, or by giving a general order for the bound volumes to be sent them as they are completed. When I put this question to the noble Marquess at the head of the Government a year ago, his reply was that it was impossible to make any change in the arrangements during that \rear, because no Estimate had been voted; but as he was good enough to say that the matter should receive consideration during the recess, I have ventured to repeat the question now, in the hope that the authorities of the Treasury, who have no doubt considered the matter since that time, have been able to consider it favourably.
  THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (Viscount CROSS): My Lords, it will be satisfactory to the noble Lord to hear that I am authorised by the Prime Minister to say that if any Peer will apply for The Parliamentary Debates to the Printed Paper Office, he will receive them.
  House adjourned at a quarter-past Five of the clock, till to-morrow, half-past Ten of the clock.