Sitting of 29 July 1904

Preamble
The House met at Twelve of the Clock.

UNOPPOSED PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
Barnet District Gas and Water Bill; Strabane, Raphoe, and Convoy Railway Bill; Surrey Commercial Dock Bill: Thames River Steamboat Service Bill: Torquay Tramways Bill. Lords Amendments considered, and agreed to.
De Trafford Estate Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; to be 'read the third time.
Great Yarmouth Corporation Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered. Two Clauses added; Amendments made; Bill to be read the third time.
King's College Hospital Bill [Lords]: Leeds Corporation (Waterworks) Rail-
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way Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; to be read the third time.
Manchester Corporation (General Powers) Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; Amendments made; Bill to he read the third time.
Manchester Corporation Tramways Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; to be read the third time.
Manchester Ship Canal Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; Amendments made; Bill to be read the third time.
North Wales Electric Power Bill [Lords] (by Order). As amended, considered; a Clause added; Amendments made; Bill to be read the third time.
Kirkcaldy Corporation Order Confirmation Bill. Read the third time, and passed.
Hamilton Gas Order Confirmation Bill [Lords]. Read the third time, and passed, without Amendment.
Glasgow Corporation (Tramways, etc.) Order Confirmation Bill [Lords]. Considered; an Amendment made; Bill to be read the third time upon Tuesday next.
Greenock Corporation Order Confirmation Bill [Lords]. Considered; to be read the third time upon Tuesday next
Gas and Water Orders Confirmation Bill [Lords]. As amended, considered; to he read the third time upon Monday next.
Stretford Urban District Council Bill [Lords]. Reported, with Amendments, from the Police and Sanitary Committee; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
That they have agreed to—Glasgow Corporation (Police) Order Confirmation Bill: Felixstowe Gas Bill; Radcliffe Tramways and Improvement Bill: London and India Docks Company Bill: South Shields Gas Bill, with Amendments.
PETITIONS.

  LICENSING BILL.
  Petitions against; from Broughton Moor; Coton in the Elms; Kirkham;

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  North Cave; and South Shields; to lie upon the Table.

  VALUATION BILL.
  Petition from Farnworth, against; to lie upon the Table.
  VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS ACT, 1897.
  Petitions from Morecambe, for alteration of Law; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  HISTORICAL MANUSCRIPTS (ROYAL COMMISSION).
  Copy presented, of Report on American Manuscripts in the Royal Institution of Great Britain. Vol. I. [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  POLLING DISTRICTS (COUNTY OF HERTFORD).
  Copy presented, of Order made by the County Council of Hertford redividing the Mid or St. Albans Parliamentary Division into Polling Districts [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  POLLING DISTRICTS (COUNTY OF HERTFORD).
  Copy presented, of Order made by the County Council of Hertford redividing the Eastern or Hertford Parliamentary Division into Polling Districts [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  CORPORAL PUNISHMENT.
  Return presented, relative thereto [Address 21st July; Mr. Lloyd Morgan]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 288.]
  DEATHS FROM STARVATION OR ACCELERATED BY PRIVATION (LONDON).
  Return presented, relative thereto [Address 3rd March; Mr. Talbot]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 289.]
  COUNTY AND BOROUGH LUNATIC ASYLUMS.
  Return presented, relative thereto [Address 13th June; Mr. Charles Hob-house]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 290.]
  SHOPS.
  Return presented, relative thereto [Address 13th June; Sir Charles Dilke]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 291.]
  MOTOR CARS (LICENCES).
  Return presented, relative thereto [Address 28th April; Mr. Scott Montagu]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.[No. 292.]
  WOOLLEN, WORSTED, AND SHODDY FACTORIES (INSPECTION).
  Return presented, relative thereto [Addresss 2nd May; Mr.Wanklyn]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed_ [No. 293.]
  COMMITTEE OF IMPERIAL DEFENCE.
  Copy presented, of Treasury Minute, dated 4th May, 1904, as to Secretariat [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  STATISTICAL ABSTRACT (FOREIGN COUNTRIES).
  Copy presented, of Statistical Abstract for the principal and other Foreign Countries in each year from 1892 to 1901–2 (Thirtieth Number) [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  METROPOLITAN GAS (DEPARTMENTAL COMMITTEE).
  Copy presented, of Report of the Departmental Committee appointed to inquire and report as to Gas Testing in the Metropolis. Part II. Evidence and Appendices [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  TRAMWAY ORDERS.
  Copy presented. of Report by the Board of Trade of their Proceedings under The Tramways Act, 1870, during the Session of 1904 [by Command]; to lie upon the Table.
  MERCHANT SHIPPING, 1903.
  Return presented, relative thereto [ordered 27th July; Mr. Gerald Balfour]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 294.]
  COAL TABLES, 1903.
  Return presented, relative thereto [ordered 27th July; Mr. Gerald Balfour]; to lie upon the Table. and to be printed. [No. 295.]
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CIRCULATED WITH THE VOTES.

  Vote for National Gallery of Scotland.
  SIR J. STIRLING-MAXWELL: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, in view of a

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  general desire on the part of Scotch Members to discuss the recent Report of the Committee on the Board of Manufactures, he will put down the Vote for the National Gallery of Scotland for an early day.
  (Mr. A. J. Balfour.) I hope there may be a further opportunity for taking Scotch Estimates, when the Vote in question will be put down.

  Suggested Appointment of Additional Judges in the King's Bench Division.
  SIR THOMAS DEWAR: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, seeing that the present number of Judges in the King's Bench Division leaves no margin of reserve whatever for illness or temporary absence, the Government will consider the advisabilty of increasing the number.
  (Mr. A. J. Balfour.) I am advised that the power which is exercised whenever required of appointing Commissioners of Assize, affords just such relief as the Question suggests, and such a Commissioner is acting at the present time. I also understand that the state of business does not call for any other help.

  Thames Barrage Scheme.
  MR. HENNIKER HEATON: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, in view of the impossibility of carrying the Port of London Bill. he will now accede to the request of the Corporation of the City of London and the Thames Conservancy Board for a Departmental inquiry into the practicability of the Thames barrage scheme, to be carried on during the recess, so that a decision may be arrived at and the views of engineers ascertained before further legislation is undertaken during next session of Parliament.
  (Answered by Mr. A. J. Balfour.) I fear I can only repeat what I have already stated, namely, that there does not appear to be sufficient expert support for the project in question to justify the inquiry suggested by my hon. friend.

  Contracts in Connection with London Telephone Service—British v. Foreign Firms.
  SIR THOMAS DEWAR: To ask the Postmaster-General if he will state the value of the contracts given to British and
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  foreign firms respectively, during the last five years, for plant required in connection with the London telephone service, and the nature of such plant.
  (Answered by Lord Stanley.) The value of the contracts placed with British and foreign firms respectively for plant required in connection with the London telephone service could not be given without an analysis involving much time, labour, and expense. Since 1st April, 1902,orders amounting to about £109,000 have been issued for the equipment of exchanges in London. These exchanges are worked on the central battery system, and most of the orders had to be given to a foreign firm who held numerous patents for such apparatus. The circumstances are gradually altering, and 1 hope it will before long be possible to obtain telephones for the use of subscribers from British makers only.

  Establishment of a Post Office in Wapping west of Wapping Bridge.
  SIR THOMAS DEWAR: To ask the Postmaster-General, having regard to the fact that the Wapping post and telegraph office, situated at Old Gravel Lane, east of Wapping Bridge, is not available to firms in business west of the bridge on the occasions when the bridge is open, will he state whether it has yet been found possible to secure premises suitable for the establishment of a post office in Wapping west of Wapping Bridge.
  (Answered by Lord Stanley.) I regret to say that it has not vet been found possible to secure suitable premises for the establishment of a post office in the locality to which the hon. Member refers.

  Withdrawals from Post Office Savings Bank.
  MR. WEIR: To ask the Postmaster-General if he will state the number of withdrawals from the Post Office Savings Bank for the year ending the 31st December last, and the total amount of such withdrawals.
  (Answered by Lord Stanley.) The number of withdrawals for all purposes from the Post Office Savings Bank for the year ending the 31st December last was 6,180,419, and the amount £42,786,025. The total amount standing to the credit of depositors at the end of the year was £146,135,147, as against £144,605,088 at the end of the previous year.

  Post Office Savings Bank—Deposits of Small Amounts,
  MR. WEIR: To ask the Postmaster-General, in view of the determination to abolish the practice of sending out from the head office acknowledgments for deposits in the Post Office Savings Bank under £1, will he state how many deposits of 15s. and upwards, and how many of 10s. and under 15s. were received during the year ending 31st December last, or any previous year; and will he state the number of Post Office Savings Banks in the United Kingdom conducted at shops or other places where the clerks are not in the pay of the Postmaster-General.
  (Answered by Lord Stanley.) There are no statistics available to enable me to reply to the fist part of the hon. Member's Question; and the compilation of such statistics would involve a very large amount of labour. As regards the second part, Savings Bank business is conducted at about 12,800 post offices where the stall employed, other than the sub-postmaster or mistress, are not in the direct pay of the Postmaster-General.

  Delay in Introduction of Electric Traction on Metropolitan and Metropolitan District Railways.
  MR. WEIR: To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will state the

  Countries

  Duties on imported Wheat per cwt.

  Average prices of wheat per cwt.

  Basis and of price.

  Approximate percentage of home-grown wheat to total supply (five years 1899–1903).

  s.

  d

  s.

  d

  United Kingdom

  Nil.

  6

  2

  Gazette average price of British wheat (last week in June)

  22½

  6

  10

  Average price of imported wheat (June)

  Germany

  1

  9¼

  8

  7½

  Berlin official market price at June 30th

  66

  France

  2

  10¼

  8

  2¾

  Paris official price at June 25th

  98*

  Italy

  3

  0

  9

  7½

  Mean market price June19th

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  Home-grown wheat appears to be included in the average prices published by all the above foreign countries.
  * Average of four years 1899–1902.
  cause of the delay in introducing electric traction on the Metropolitan and Metropolitan District Railways; and by what date these lines will be working under the new system.
  (Answered by Mr. Gerald Balfour.) I have communicated with the railway companies concerned on the subject of the hon. Member's Question and have received replies, of which I am sending him copies.

  Duties and Prices of Imported Wheat in the United Kingdom and on the Continent.
  DR. SHIPMAN: To ask the President of the Board of Trade what were the duties on imported wheat in the United Kingdom, Germany, France, and Italy, respectively, at the end of June, 1904; what were the average prices of wheat in each of these countries at that time; whether these average prices include the home-grown as well as the imported wheat; and, if so, what are the estimated percentages of imported and home-grown wheat in the total wheat supply of each of these countries.
  (Answered by Mr. Gerald Balfour.) The following gives the information desired by the hon. Member so far as available:—

  Ventilation of House of Commons— Firms Invited to Tender for New Plant.
  MR. WEIR: To ask the hon. Member for Chorley, as representing the First Commissioner of Works, if he will state the names of the firms invited to tender for the new ventilating plant required for the better ventilation of the House of Commons; and, seeing that the recommendations given by James Keith and Company before a Parliamentary Committee have been largely adopted, will he say why this firm was not invited to tender.
  (Answered by Lord Balcarres.) The type of inlet fan selected for the work now in progress is that manufactured by Messrs. Matthews and Yates of Manchester. Whatever recommendations may have been made by Mr. Keith, they do not govern the question of the exact type of appliances to be used in giving effect to the Committee's independent decisions. The order for the extracting fan has not yet been placed owing to certain structural difficulties which have arisen. The remainder of the appliances have been designed in the Office of Works and it is not proposed to apply to manufacturers of specialities in this connection.

  Erection of New National School at Hatfield.
  MR. CORRIE GRANT: To ask the Secretary to the Board of Education whether he is aware that the Hertfordshire County Council has voted £750 towards the cost of building a new national school at Hatfield on the understanding that certain rooms will be available for higher education; whether this method of aiding elementary education was adopted after consultation with the Board of Education, as required by Section 2, Sub-section (1) of the Education Act, 1902; and if so, what advice or directions did the Board of Education give to the Hertfordshire County Council in the matter.
  (Answered by Sir william Anson.) If 1 understand the Question rightly, it suggests that the Hertfordshire County Council are assisting to provide premises for a voluntary school, and moreover that they are doing so out of funds which should be devoted to secondary education
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  A local authority which contemplated such an infraction of the law would be unlikely to consult the Board of Education as to the course which they were adopting. The Board are aware that rooms for technical instruction are included in the plans for a new voluntary school at Hatfield, but they have no reason to suppose that these rooms are not being provided by the managers. The Board will, however, inquire into the matter.

  Money due to the Commissioners of Public Works by the Irish Society.
  MR. O'DOHERTY: To ask the Secretary to the Treasury how much money is at present due by the Honourable the Irish Society on foot of the mortgages held by the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland on their Irish estates, the dates upon which the various amounts were advanced, the rate or rates of interest payable therefor, the original sum advanced in each case, and the purposes for which the advances were made.
  (Answered by Mr. Victor Cavendish.) A sum of £13,000 was lent by the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland on the 6th December, 1888, to the Irish Society in aid of the erection of a town hall in Londonderry. The interest charged is 4 per cent. and the amount of principal at present unpaid is £5,200. In the absence of detailed particulars of the lands, etc., comprised in the estates of the society, it cannot be stated whether there are any other loans outstanding upon them.

  Legal Assistance under the Poor Prisoners' Defence Act.
  MR. MARKHAM: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been directed to the remarks of the Lord Chief Justice, when charging the grand jury at Warwick on Saturday last, that prisoners who desired legal assistance, under the Poor Prisoners' Defence Act, 1903, ought, when before the magistrates, to disclose their defence, so that the same could be duly investigated; and, if so, will he draw the attention of the magistrates, through the usual channels, to the direction of the learned Judge, seeing that magistrates do not generally adopt this course.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Akers-Douglas.) 'I have seen a report of the

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  Lord Chief Justice's charge to the grand jury at Warwick, and I propose to have it printed and circulated to magistrates throughout the country. I may add that I have already given directions that placards explaining the provisions of the Poor Prisoners' Defence Act shall be posted in all prison cells where persons are confined on remand or committal for trial.

  Suggested Increase of Wages for Unskilled Labour in Devonport Dockyard.
  MR. BENN: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether, in view of the rise in rents in the town of Devonport and the increased cost of food, he will consider the desirability of raising, in proportion, the minimum wage of unskilled workers in the Dockyard services.
  (Answered by Mr. Pretyman.) This question, with others, will be carefully considered, and a decision conveyed to the men in answer to their petitions through the usual official channels.

  Petitions of Devonport Dockyard Workers.
  MR. BENN: To ask the Secretary to the Admiralty if he will explain why certain petitions sent in last October by workers in the Dockyard services at Devonport still remain unanswered, notwithstanding a promise that they should receive attention early in the present year.
  (Answered by Mr. Pretyman.) As far as I am aware no promise was made that the petitions would receive early attention this year. The petitions referred to remain unanswered because the mass of evidence taken by the Board upon the Dockyard workmen's petitions requires to be carefully digested and considered. This is being done with as little delay as possible.

  By-laws made by Irish Local Authorities under the Employment of Children Act.
  MR. HUGH LAW: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland what local authorities have made by-laws under the Employment of Children Act, 1903; and whether, in any cases, the sanction of the Lord-Lieutenant has been withheld; and, if so, upon what grounds.
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  (Answered by Mr. Wyndham.) The municipal councils of Dublin and Cork. The by-laws made by the Corporation of Cork have been confirmed by the Lord-Lieutenant; those made by the Corporation of Dublin have not yet been finally submitted for confirmation. These are the only two cases in which by-laws have been made, so far as the Government is aware.

  1st Battalion Lancashire Fusiliers—Prolonged Service Abroad.
  SIR LEES KNOWLES: To ask the Secretary of State for War if, in consideration of the fact that the 1st battalion Lancashire Fusiliers after being stationed at Malta and Gibraltar, is now under orders to return to Malta, he will state whether there is any special reason why it should be continually stationed in the Mediterranean, where it has been since August 1899; and whether he can so vary the published programme of moves as to prevent this battalion from a prolonged sojourn abroad.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) The 1st battalion Lancashire Fusiliers went abroad in 1899, and it has been found necessary to retain it in the Mediterranean up to the present; but every endeavour will be made, as regards this battalion, as is done in the case of others, to give it its fair proportion of Indian as well as of Colonial service. The South African War has necessarily caused a certain dislocation in the ordinary relief arrangements. There is no intention of keeping this battalion abroad for more than its normal period of foreign service.

  Constitution of New Army Finance Department.
  MR. MOON: To ask the Secretary of State for War whether, in view of the circular letter sent to officers on probation for the Army Pay Department which modifies the conditions of service hitherto prevailing, he is now in a position to announce the constitution of the new Army Finance Department, and the position of the officers of the Army Pay Department in relation to it.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary ArnoldForster.) The circular letter referred to does not modify the conditions of service, but merely draws attention to the fact

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  that in future, under the new organisation, the duties to be performed by officers of the Army Pay Department will be somewhat extended, and will include accounting for stores as well as cash. I am not yet in a position to announce the constitution of the new Army Accounts Department; but there is no intention of altering the status of the officers of the Army Pay Department.

  Number and Cost of British Troops Stationed in South Africa—Colonial Contributions to Cost.
  MR. RUNCIMAN:To ask the Secretary of State for War what is the total number of British troops now stationed in South Africa; what is the total annual cost of these troops, and what contribution, if any, is made by the Colonial Governments to that cost.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) The total number of British troops in South Africa is 21,500, and their annual cost amounts to £3,100,000. No contribution is made by the Colonial Governments, except in the case of Natal, which pays £4,000 a year.

  Number and Cost of British Troops Stationed at Canadian Ports— Canadian Contributions to Cost.
  MR. RUNCIMAN: To ask the Secretary of State for War what number of British troops are stationed at Esquimault and Halifax, Nova Scotia, or at other Canadian ports; what is the annual cost of these troops, and what contribution, if any, to that cost is made by the Canadian Government.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) There are 362 British troops stationed at Esquimault. Their annual cost (including non-effective charges) is about £44,200, and of this sum half (£22,100) is paid as a contribution by the Canadian Government. There are 1,785 British troops stationed at Halifax, Nova Scotia. Their annual cost (including non-effective charges) is about £205,000. No contribution is made in respect of these troops.

  Powers and Duties of Secretary of State for War proposed to be Transferred to the Army Council.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: To ask the Secretary of State for War whether he can lay
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  before the House a Memorandum showing the powers and duties of the Secretary of State for War which it is proposed to transfer to the Army Council under the Army Council Bill introduced into Parliament on Tuesday last.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Arnold-Forster.) The various Acts containing provision for the statutory powers and duties of the Secretary of State for War are so numerous that it would not be practicable to draw up an intelligible Memorandum of the nature desired by the hon. Baronet other than a complete series of extracts from the Acts in question. These Acts (i.e., the unrepealed portions of them) are set forth in a small hook prepared for Departmental use, which commences with an Act of 1552 and includes the Acts of 1900. I will send copies of this to the library, and I think this will give all the information required.

  NEW WRIT.
  New Writ for the Borough of Reading, in the room of George William Palmer, Esquire (Manor of Northstead).—(Mr. Herbert Gladstone.)
LICENSING BILL.

  THIRD READING.
  Order for Third Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the third time."
  *MR. ASQUITHin moving that the Bill be read the third time upon this day three months, said—In asking the House to take the strong step of rejecting at this stage what I suppose is the principal piece of Government legislation of the session, I justify myself on the double ground of the character of the measure and of the method by which the power of effectual and fruitful discussion of many of its most important provisions has been withdrawn from the House of Commons. No one disputes—certainly no one on this side of the House—that legislation upon this question is urgently needed and long overdue; nor do I believe that those who are called temperance reformers, after something like

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  thirty years of almost unrelieved barrenness of legislation, would have shown any indisposition to receive in a conciliatory and, indeed, n a welcoming spirit any reasonable change, however modest its scope, which seemed to offer even a faint prospect of real advance. It is true that this Bill originated under circumstances which might well warrant a certain amount of preliminary suspicion. Its birth was heralded by rather strange portents. As far as I know, it is the first measure of so-called temperance reform which has ever been introduced in Parliament, not only at the instigation but under stress of the menaces of the trade, by whom—to judge by the evidence one sees around one—throughout its progress and down to this moment it has been received with a warmth of favour which, though judiciously restrained in expression, and sometimes for a few moments altogether disguised, is, I am certain, both fervent and genuine. But although we should not have been prone at the first blush to expect any large instalment of reform from that quarter, yet I can honestly say that, if this Bill had seemed to us to indicate even the line towards a proper solution of the question, we should have been perfectly content not only to judge it on its merits, but to accept what we could get out of it. But the unfortunate fact about the Bill is that the more closely it was examined the more it became apparent that it was a step not forward, but backward, and a step which was attended by this great and formidable disadvantage—that it created, I will not say an insuperable obstacle—of course the power of Parliament backed by public opinion ould overcome any obstacle of the kind—but certainly a crop of new interests and of new claims which must in the future seriously embarrass those who approach the solution of the problem in a different spirit. These were the general grounds on which we opposed the Bill on the Second Reading, and it is appropriate at this stage to ask how far the objections which were then taken have been met or mitigated by subsequent changes.
  One concession I am very glad to be able to make. I do think the fourth clause, dealing with new licences, has been substantially improved. I welcome that
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  clause because it places in explicit and emphatic terms upon the Statute-book a Parliamentary declaration that as regards all new licences the monopoly value which is created by the public is to be reserved to the public. At the same time I must point out that new licences are but a mere fraction of those with which a licensing measure has to deal, and under the state of things created by this Bill, when every old licence will be incapable of extinction except by payment, the proportion of new licences to old will be smaller than it has ever been. Again, the very improvement which the clause effects in the status of the new licensee—who will have no claim to any pecuniary consideration when the term of his licence expires—brings into more startling relief and exaggerates the invidious contrast between him and the holder of an old licence which cannot be got rid of without paying value for it.
  While I gladly acknowledge that Clause 4 has been improved, the two main defects of the Bill still remain—I mean, first, its administrative provisions, and next, the method with which it deals with the problem of the renewal of existing licences. As regards the administrative provisions, there are two serious objections which no attempt whatever has been made to meet. The first is that, quite apart from the question whether it is desirable to transfer the authority from the licensing justices to quarter sessions, you have under the new arrangement created by the Bill a splitting up of authority which must from the administrative point of view lead to friction and inefficiency. In the future it will be impossible for either of the authorities to act upon a combination of grounds. The licensing justices may think that the man's record by itself is not bad enough to justify them in taking his licence away, although the interests of the neighbourhood require that it should be taken away. On the other hand, quarter sessions may think that the interests of the neighbourhood alone are not sufficient, though a very little more would suffice to enable them to act upon that ground; and that splitting up of jurisdiction is almost certain to lead in practice to the retention of licences which ought to be abolished, or at any rate to increase the difficulty of dealing with them. That is

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  a practical point which does not raise any question of principle. But behind and beyond that is the much larger objection to the whole of this transfer of jurisdiction that it is a retrograde step. It is taking away the original jurisdiction from a body which has close interest and direct knowledge, and transferring it to a body which has a remote interest and an indirect knowledge. I call it retrograde because it is flying in the face of the whole tendency of legislation in this matter. As far back as 1835, when the Municipal Corporations Bill was before this House, Lord John Russell, who was in charge of the Bill, proposed that the licensing powers should be vested in the borough councils, and the House of Lords alone presented that change from taking place. To come to more modern times, as recently as 1888 the predecessors of the present Government made a similar proposal when they were creating their county councils. The right hon. Member for Croydon, who was in charge of the Local Government Bill, said—
  "It may be asked whether we do not propose some means whereby the locality shall have some voice in the decision of such an important question as that of licensing. We propose that the county councils shall divide their area out into licensing divisions, and that they shall form a licensing committee for each division to consist of every member elected to the county council for the division, together with an added proportion of selected members from the council."
  As far as this Bill goes the proposed transfer from a local body to a more remote body is opposed both to the proposal made in 1835 and to the spirit of the proposals of the right hon. Member for Croydon in 1888.
  Then as to the question of policy, which is summed up in the problem of compensation, there are, in my view, only two possible theories of compensation. I can quite understand the position of those who say. like my hon. friend the Member for Camborne, "You ought not to deal with compensation at all." That is a perfectly logical position. But for those who think, as I myself have often said, that for facilitating the solution of this problem the question of compensation must be entertained, there are only two possible theories. The first is the theory that compensation is due to the man
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  whose licence you take away—or rather, to speak more accurately, whose licence is not renewed—as a matter of justice. That is so if a licence can be regarded as a property, I will not say in any intelligible, but in any intelligent sense. If a man's licence is a property, and if it is taken away in the public interest, then on grounds alike of precedent and principle he ought to be compensated for tile loss he has sustained. But he ought to be compensated not out of a particular fund earmarked on the ground that it comes from the trade, but compensated, like everybody else whose property is taken away on public grounds for public purposes, out of public funds. That is a perfectly logical view, but it is not the view of the Government. It is quite true that the Prime Minister constantly speaks of licences as if they were property. Yet when he comes to the real test he has not the courage of his convictions, and he will not propose, as he ought to propose, if this is property in the real sense of the word, that the public and the public alone should be burdened with the liability of compensating the owner when it is destroyed. That is the theory of justice. The other theory is the theory of what is sometimes very loosely called equity—a very chaotic and misleading term—and what I prefer to call the theory of expediency. What is the argument for compensation founded upon expediency? It is that in point of practice, although there was no property in a licence at all, there has been an expectation that a licence once given would be from time to time renewed unless there was misconduct, and that there has been consequently a reluctance on the part of the licensing justices to interfere with that expectation and to do their duty to the public. It is upon that ground—the existence of that expectatiott—and upon that ground alone—that I am prepared to assent to some form of compensation.
  But what are the logical consequences to those who take that position? Surely they are these. First of all that you can determine the expectation by reasonable notice in point of time. The expectation is created by the existence of circumstances which raise a belief in the minds of the persons interested that it will be realised. But the moment

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  Parliament steps in and says, "We give you full warning that after a certain time you are not entitled to entertain such an expectation," the whole foundation disappears. Therefore, it follows that after a reasonable time you should put an end to it. It follows also that your scheme of compensations should be a graduated scheme—that is to say, it should be on a diminishing scale towards the end of the period as compared with what it was at the beginning. If these two conditions are satisfied I will add a third which, to my mind, is equally important, and that is that the fund from which the compensation is to be drawn should be a national and not a local fund. I am perfectly satisfied that a large number of the difficulties which will attend the practical administration of this measure, should it become law, will arise from the fact that you have divided the compensation fund into a set of water-tight compartments, apportioned to each locality, and that it cannot be treated as a whole.
  Let me now deal with the only argument which I have yet heard against the justice in theory and practice of the time limit. The Prime Minister says that when we come to the end of the period we shall have precisely the same set of hardships which make it so difficult for the licensing justices to reduce licences as now. Hardship! The publican will have ample notice that his licence may not be renewed, and he will have time to insure himself, if necessary, against that contingency. But it is said that he will have contributed to the compensation fund. As I have said, any logical system of compensation will make it a diminishing contribution, so that in the later years it will be almost nothing. But, apart from that, I say the publican will have got a quid pro quo. In the first place, if the Act is to succeed in what is said to be its main purpose—namely, the reduction of redundant licences—it is quite clear that at the end of the period, if reasonably long—say, fourteen years—there will be such a reduction in these licences that redundancy will be a rare thing, and, of course, as redundancy ceases the risk to the publican of losing his licence is small, and it is a risk that
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  could be insured to-morrow in any insurance office in the country. Moreover, the reduction in the amount and stress of competition must surely enhance the value of licences, not only at the end of the period but during the whole period that the process of reduction is going on. I find that, even without any change in the law, between 1900 and 1903 the number of on-licences in London decreased by 7 per cent., although both the population and the consumption of alcohol largely increased in those years; and it is obvious that there must be a greatly enhanced value in the licensed premises which remain. If there was that normal and natural process of reduction during those years, the process ought to be quickened by the compulsory reduction which will come into operation under the Act; and it stands to reason that the publican will be in a much better position, even if there was no compensation fund at all. Besides, there is the material consideration that you will be leaving him in the possession of a valuable interest which the public creates, which exists now only on sufferance, and which by adequate taxation could at any moment be put an end to. We are raising now by the duty on public-house licences in England and Wales the ridiculously inadequate sum of £1,500,000 a year. I find that in the City of New York alone they raise half a million sterling more from the same source of revenue. In England the average rate of licence duty is only £38 a year, while in New York it a mounts to £240 a year. Is it not obvious from those figures that we leave to the unfortunate publican who has to contribute to a compensation fund, and whose hard lot excites such sympathy in the bosom of the Prime Minister, a large margin of profit which does not belong to him in equity at all, and which the State has a perfect right to appropriate to itself at any moment? I hope I have made that perfectly clear.
  I have one more argument to advance for the rejection of the Bill, and that is derived from the method in which the measure has been handled by its promoters. I have in my hands a printed copy of the Bill, which I hope will be printed and circulated throughout the country. It shows graphically, but by the very simple method

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  of compartments, what parts of the Bill were discussed in Committee or on Report and what remained undiscussed at either or both of those stages. It further shows how many Amendments have been introduced at the instance of the Government without any discussion by anybody at all. I will just summarise the results. There are 264 lines in the Bill as it appears after consideration on Report. Of these 264 lines 54 only have been discussed either in Committee or on the Report stage. That is to say, 210 lines out of 264, or four-fifths, of the Bill have been left entirely undiscussed, and in these 210 lines Government Amendments have been introduced, without consideration or debate, to the amount of 105 lines—exactly one - half. Let me add as to the two schedules that they have been carried without discussion at any time or by any one. The points covered by the undiscussed parts of the Bill include the right of the justices and others to appear before the licensing committee; the basis of compensation; how the amount of compensation is to be ascertained; the division of the compensation, when settled, between the parties interested; who are the parties interested; what appeal there should be; what is to be the amount of compensation levied; on whom it is to be made; what are the proportions to be paid by owner and tenant; over what area; what are to be the borrowing powers of the authorities, and what is the character of the rules to be made by the Home Secretary. These are all points of considerable importance and neither in Committee nor on the Report stage have we had an opportunity of considering them. I do not suggest they may not have been incidentally alluded to in the course of the debate, but substantially they are points covered by the undiscussed parts of the Bill. I do not complain in the least of the manner in which the Bill has been conducted within the limits which the Prime Minister has allowed. The Solicitor-General has shown in the conduct of it uniform courtesy, unfailing lucidity, and, I must add, inexhaustible resource. It is not the fault of my right hon. friend that he has not had a more extended field for the display of these admirable Parliamentary qualities in connection with this Bill. I think the Bill
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  is a bad Bill; but whether it is a good Bill or whether it is a bad Bill, surely it ought to be a sufficient reason for its rejection that, good or bad, it is not the handiwork of the House of Commons. It is—to a degree which is wholly unprecedented in a measure which if it once passes this House is reasonably certain to take its place upon the Statutebook—the exclusive and uncorrected composition of the Government and their draftsman, and this House in, being asked to read this Bill a third time, is being invited to perform the function not of a Parliament but of a registry. If I ask the House, as by my Amendment I do, to reject the Bill on Third Reading, I do so because it marks at one and the same time the capitulation of the State to a powerful and organised interest, and the surrender by the House of Commons of its power to mould the law of the land. I beg to move.
  Amendment proposed—
  "To leave out the word 'now,' and at the end of the Question to add the words 'upon this day three months.'"—(Mr. Asquith.)
  Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  THE SOLICITOR-GENERAL (Sir EDWARD CARSON,): For the references made by the right hon. Gentleman to myself with regard to the conduct of the Bill I must express my obligations. I received uniform courtesy from both sides of the House, and for that and for many valuable suggestions made by hon. Members I desire to express my warmest thanks. Of course the Government anticipated that the right hon. Gentleman would base the main portion of his speech upon the fact that the discussion has been curtailed. That is always an eloquent topic, and it is always a very unpleasant kind of procedure for Members of this House. I myself have a very vivid recollection, when I was not a very old Member of the House, and when I sat on the Opposition side, of the hardships of the guillotine not upon a question of whether publicans should be allowed to be compensated, but as to whether my own country should be separated from this country. But the truth of the matter is that everybody who has followed these

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  discussions knows perfectly well that the main principles and the main details of the Bill have been discussed ad nauseum. The right hon. Gentleman enunciated a certain number of questions which he said had never been touched upon. Why? Because there are a certain number of other questions which have been argued and divided upon five, six, and seven times over. If the House of Commons selects a number of provisions in the Bill as being the main provisions both as to principle and procedure, they can hardly expect, if they discuss these time after time, to leave adequate Parliamentary time for the discussion of the less important matters in that Bill. I noted two admissions of the right hon. Gentleman. He has admitted that for the last thirty years there has been an almost absolute barrenness of effort to deal with this public-house question, and in addition to that he said that this question was quite urgent. That, at all events, is some justification for the Government making an effort to deal with the question.
  The right hon. Gentleman said that the genesis of the Bill was what made it so suspicious. I venture to think that there never was a Parliament more pledged to a settlement of this question and upon the lines on which this Bill proceeds than the present Parliament. I am told that out of the total number of Members of this House at least 400 gave pledges at the last election that they would support legislation for preventing licences from being taken away without cause without compensation. The Leader of the Opposition himself in his election address put forward the same idea, limited, I think, to compensation from the trade. That is exactly what this Bill does.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I do not accept the right hon. Gentleman's version of any address.
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: I have not the exact words, but I think that is it substantially.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: That was an element in it. It was part of a great measure for compulsory reduction of licences throughout the country.
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  With a view to such a reduction I was willing that Parliament should recognise that certain consideration should be given out of their own funds to the dispossessed licensees.
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: Certainly the right hon. Gentleman has called "compensation" "consideration," but I do not find any substantial difference between my statement and what he has now said. Let me take up the objections which have been made to the Bill itself. The right hon. Gentleman's first objection was to what he called the administrative provisions. He said that in the past the justices had been able to refuse, and, indeed, had only refused licences on more than one ground, and that they would not be able to do that in future. I join issue entirely with the right hon. Gentleman. What is to prevent justices joining any of the grounds mentioned in the first section?
  *MR. ASQUITHwas understood to say that they could not consider the question of non-requirement, because Parliament did not enable them to do so.
  Sin EDWARD CARSON: Oh, Yes; indeed they can. That is a matter they are to consider, and if they think the requirements of the neighbourhood will be best met by taking away a licence they can take it away, and the licensee will get compensation. That is the very matter that hitherto the justices have in reality not been able to do, because of the unfairness which they felt they would be inflicting upon the licence-holder. But I think that what the right hon. Gentleman meant was that very often in the past magistrates, not being satisfied with the evidence as to any one ground, had put two grounds together and professed themselves satisfied with the composite ground. That, in my opinion, is a very improper proceeding. Either there is a ground or there is not, and you cannot salve your conscience by saying that there was partly one ground and partly another, and that by adding the two together you obtained one good ground of refusal. The right hon. Gentleman then said that we were taking away from the local magistrates the original jurisdiction and transferring it to quarter sessions. I

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  absolutely deny that proposition. So far from taking away the jurisdiction of the magistrates this Bill actually increases it. Is there any jurisdiction taken away from the magistrates in county boroughs? On the contrary the whole jurisdiction under this Bill is transferred from quarter sessions to the local justices. That will affect 25,000 licences in the country, or one-fourth of the whole. Then there were 33,000 licences which before this Bill were not under any magistrates, but by this Bill the magistrates are given jurisdiction in regard thereto. In the counties there are 20,000 licences, and those added to the 25,000 to which I have referred will make 45,000 out of a total of 99,000 in regard to which the local justices will have far more jurisdiction than they have ever had before. Then take other licences. The right hon. Gentleman says that the power exists in the local magistrates, and that the power is being transferred to quarter sessions. The power never has been with the local justices. They had the power to select particular licences for adjudication, and to adjudicate upon them, but the matter always went to quarter sessions.
  MR. WHITTAKER: Not always. There was one last year.
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: I defy hon. Members opposite to produce a single case in which a licence was taken away and the licensee did not appeal to quarter sessions. Why should a man allow his property to be confiscated or his licence taken away without testing the justices' action by an appeal to quarter sessions? What has happened now? The right hon. Gentleman says the original jurisdiction is given to quarter sessions. No such thing. They have no original jurisdiction whatsoever. The local justices will select the houses and send them up to quarter sessions, they being the body who have to administer the compensation fund, and that is the sole reason why the matter is sent to them. But they have no original jurisdiction; that remains with the magistrates.
  *Mr. ASQUITH: To do what?
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: To select the licences which they think ought to
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  be taken away, and it is only with the licences they select that quarter sessions can deal. I do not call that original jurisdiction. But we have done something more which the right hon. Gentleman entirely overlooked. In these cases of licences refused on the ground of redundancy, with an appeal to quarter sessions, the non-county boroughs with separate commissions of the peace have never had representation. They have been given a representation at quarter sessions which they never had before. Is it a fair description of the Bill, then, to lay down the proposition which the right hon. Gentleman has done that we are now transferring the whole power of the local justices to quarter sessions. A proposition in the opposite direction would be far nearer the truth for never before has so much power been given to the local justices.
  Passing from the first clause the right hon. Gentleman referred to the question of compensation. I find sonic difficulty in following what he really thought ought to be done with regard to compensation. He admitted that there must be some compensation some day or other—I think last year he called it indemnification. [An HON. MEMBER: No, solatium.] Yes, he called it solatium My own view is that the only solatium to a publican whose licence is taken away in the public interest is compensation. The right hon. Gentleman said that if there was a licence taken away in the public interests compensation ought to be paid out of public funds, but that the Government had not the courage to do that. I notice that in a later part of his argument he said that the insurance under the Bill was really public funds. I do not agree with his view as to what is the proper way to set up an insurance fund. If the right hon. Gentleman is logical in his argument I do not think he has any reason to quarrel with us or our courage. He went on to say that he based his view upon equity.
  *MR. ASQUITH: No; upon expediency.
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: I thought the right hon. Gentleman said he preferred equity.
  *MR. ASQUITH: No, I rejected the word "equity."
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: Then the right hon. Gentleman prefers "expediency," and the proposition is that there is an expediency for doing something for the publican so as not to allow his licence to be taken away from him with-out an effort being made to give him something in return. There is an expediency in that because, as the right hon. Gentleman says, you cannot possibly expect that any system will be looked upon as a system of justice, even assuming that there was no question of compensation at all, where a number of men having public-houses side by side, under exactly the same conditions, all well behaved and carried on, came up and the magistrate had to make a selection as to which of them he was going to destroy. Nobody could ever pretend that any such system can be considered as a system of justice. Well, what is the question of expediency? I will put it on the ground of expediency. If there is expediency, can there be any fairer or more statesmanlike course than to solve that expediency at the expense of the trade itself? Can you suggest any fairer way than by giving such security as will enable the trade to insure against the non-renewal of licences when the public interest demands that the licence should no longer be granted? But whether you put it upon the ground of expediency or upon any other ground, how much do we gain by chopping words in this way when in reality we come to this compromise—that the trade give up all right to say that they ought to be compel-sated out of public funds, and are willing that an insurance should be exacted from them to the amount of £1,250,000 a year? In this compromise, upon the one side the allegations which existed even up to last year that compensation ought to come out of public funds is given up, and upon the other side the trade are given the security that an insurance fund is set up against the hardships and the injustices that would be done if a licence were taken away in the public interest.
  The right hon. Gentleman went on to say that the proper solution of this problem would have been to give notice to determine such expectancy as the publican had. I never disputed that at
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  all nor have the Government ever disputed it. We have said over and over again that there were two ways of taking away these licences. There is either the method the Government have adopted of allowing the trade to insure, or the method of giving absolute security over a certain number of years, but the two things cannot be put together, and I would like to know what any member of the Opposition would have said if we had brought in a Bill to provide that for the next fifteen years no publican should have a refusal of the renewal of his licence. What we want, and what is the aim, I think, of every man in the House who considers temperance reform in connection with the suppression of public-houses at all, is to deal with the immediate question and to get rid of as many public-houses in the immediate future as possible. I noticed that the right hon. Gentleman in another portion of his argument said that after the time limit—which it was suggested in Committee should be fourteen years—probably the greater number of redundant houses would have been_ got rid of.
  *MR. ASQUITH:I did not say that. I said that was the assumption of the framers of the Bill.
  SIR EDWARD CARSON: The right hon. Gentleman based an argument upon it. Well, what is the good of basing an argument upon an assumption that he does not believe. The right hon. Gentleman's whole argument as to the reason why the time limit would be a proper method of solving the question was mixed up with the insurance fund, because he said that at the end of the time limit there would be a greater value attached to the remaining houses and the redundancy would be a smaller risk. If that is the true foundation of any argument it is a justification of the Bill, because it shows that within a comparatively small period of fourteen or fifteen years—a very short period in the history of a country—we shall really have solved that question of the redundancy of licences. Then the right hon. Gentleman said that at the end of that period the publican who remains will have a better property and greater value in his house. He may have greater value

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  if you frame the scheme in the way the right hon. Gentleman has suggested, but he would have less security for the greater value, and therefore, when he was deprived of it he would have the greater hardship, and I cannot see what solution that would be to tell a man that at the end of fifteen years he will have greater value in his house, but it is quite true that that value can be put an end to at the mere ipse dixit of the magistrates. The truth of the matter is that no alternative has been suggested to the scheme of the Government which will hold water. [Cries of "Oh."] Nobody has attempted in Committee to bring in the time limit, which the right hon. Gentleman suggests. If they had I have always said it was worthy of consideration whether You should not carry out your scheme of getting rid of these redundant licences without an insurance, and in that way give compensation to the individual, but you can never run the two systems together. A time limit gives no compensation unless you give security for that time; and if a man is insuring at his own expense you are not giving him security, but he is paving for it out of his own pocket. That seems to me to be almost the whole of the argument of the right hon. Gentleman.
  For my own part, I have never suggested that the cutting down of the number of public-houses was any very great step in temperance reform, but many hon. Members on both sides of the House think it is. If it is, I then this Bill is a great advance in the direction of temperance reform. I should like any Member of this Home to read as I read this morning once more the description of the 1869 beerhouses given by the hon. Member for Spen Valley. I should like them to read petition after petition presented to this House asking Parliament to do something to enable the justices to take these houses under their jurisdiction, with a view either to their suppression or improvement. The hon. Member for the Spen Valley, who knows this subject perhaps better than any Member in the House, made an eloquent speech pointing out that it would be a real advance in temperance reform if we could get rid of the evils of the 1869 beerhouses, which constitute one third of the whole of the existing licences
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  in this country. If all that is true, have we not made a great advance in what the right hon. Gentleman has admitted to be a burning question? Again, what has been happening all these Years past since this question of the suppression of public-houses has become more or less a burning one? Notwithstanding the difficulties of getting rid of these houses, no Government has hitherto attempted to put new licences on a different basis which would prevent the very difficulty increasing with which we are met when we come to solve that question. I think it is something that hon. Members on both sides of the House do accord to our proposal for a change in the system of granting licences some meed of praise as doing something to make a fresh start in order that we may not be met with the difficulty in the future.
  The right hon. Gentleman opposite said that as regarded new licences the objection would be that the Bill would exaggerate the invidious contrast with the old licences. We cannot help that. We must make, a start some time, and make it without any fears, invidious comparisons or anything else, and having solely in our eye the interests of the public which are entrusted to our charge. The right hon. Gentleman also made one other observation, and it is the only one with which I should like to deal for a moment. He said that one of his objections to this Bill was that it placed obstacles in the way of remedial legislation. I have heard that more than once in the course of these debates. It will certainly place no obstacles in the way of new legislation, if that new legislation is just. Hon. Members may say there is an obstacle because we have admitted the principle that these licences ought not to be taken away, or the renewal refused, unless compensation is paid. If that is the obstacle, I am glad we should place that obstacle in the way, because I think it is founded on the most elementary principles of justice. If you want to do injustice—and that is really what the proposition comes to—you can do injustice if von can get the country to endorse your intention. If the only obstacle we have placed in the way of new legislation is the one I have suggested, I think we may rest satisfied that in doing justice to a trade which perhaps,

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  more than any other trade in this country, has been legislated against, we are doing that which will not only enable them to feel that they have been dealt with fairly by this House, but will enable the justices, at the same time to carry out those high duties in the interests of the public which we all know they desire to carry out and which we believe this Bill will facilitate.
  *MR. CHANNINGsaid they all acknowledged the uniform courtesy and consideration the Solicitor-General had given during the discussions on the Bill to those who differed from him. He ventured to say, however, that the speech which the hon. and learned Gentleman had now delivered in his official position would arouse deep dissent and dissatisfaction on the Opposition side of the House. The right hon. Gentleman had expressed doubts, as the Prime Minister had done, as to whether a reduction in the number of public-houses would necessarily result in a great diminution of drunkenness. He also said that this Bill, which would deal with the question promptly, did not create any obstacle to further legislation regarding the evils which existed in connection with the liquor traffic. The speech of the hon. and learned Member, like many others front the Government side of the House, and some from his side, seemed to deal only with the interests of those who were engaged in this traffic. Hon. Members talked of wishing to do justice to the trade. What ought to be present to the mind of every Member of Parliament in giving his vote was not so much what was just or unjust to those engaged in the trade, but what was urgently wanted in view of the visible condition of the people. It was a singular coincidence that on that very morning when the House had to come to a vote on this vitally important issue there had been distributed the Report of the Committee on the Physical Degeneration of the People. One of the most striking paragraphs in the Report was the following—
  "Next to the urbanisation of the people and intimately associated with it, as the outcome of many of the conditions it creates, the question of 'drink' occupies a prominent place among the causes of degeneration. The close connection between a craving for drink and had housing had feeding a polluted and
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  depressing atmosphere, long hours of work in overheated and often ill-ventilated rooms, only relieved by the excitements of town life, is too self-evident to need demonstration, nor unfortunately is the extent of the evil more open to dispute."
  He wished these words had been rung into the ears of the Prime Minister at an earlier stage of this Bill. The right hon. Gentleman had talked of the drunkenness of the people as their own fault, and not the fault of the circumstances by which they were surrounded. The magistrates by their past conduct, and many of the great landlords of the country, were responsible for the presence of the innumerable sources of temptation in the midst of the people. Was it not the plain and obvious duty of Parliament before considering even the question of justice—he was as fond of justice as most men—to place in the forefront the question what they ought to do to check and limit the temptations in our great towns which, as they all knew, worked the ruin of many people in this country? Some of the hon. Members opposite who had spoken in the debates on this Bill had referred only to the interest of those who had invested their money in this traffic. It seemed to him if they would think of the poor wretches, the gin-and-beer-soaked, greasy, ragged wrecks of manhood and woman- hood around every public-house, and of the pale, half-starved children who were the victims of this trade, they would take another view of this question from that merely of justice or injustice to those who had realised a gigantic profit generation after generation out of the miseries and the degradations of the poor. He said frankly that he detested the Bill, which, he believed, would not lessen the great sources of moral and physical mischief to which those connected with the trade had consecrated and devoted their wealth to the fatal work of debasing their fellow-citizens. That might seem a strong expression, but let hon. Members consider how the great beer interest had been organised during the past few years, and the way in which they had endeavoured to extend the trade in every possible way. He did say he was right in using strong expressions in the face of these facts.
  They were asked by the Bill to consecrate the trade as a vested right, and to give it a permanent endowment

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  representing £300,000,000, which by the provisions of the Bill would be increased year by year. They knew perfectly well that the compensation fund was absolutely insufficient. The machinery of the Bill was directed not to the mitigation of the great national curse of intemperance but to the putting of handcuffs and fetters on the only means of national emancipation. He denounced the Bill as a conspiracy against the national life. It did not contribute anything to the national health, vigour, mental and manual skill, in the great combats of industrial competition. It would not increase the national wealth. It was estimated that one-sixth of the wages of the working classes was thrown away on beer and gin. Even half of that money would be sufficient to transform England into a sort of garden city from end to end. He doubted whether this Bill would have the effect of reducing the number of licensed houses. It seemed to him to offer little or no inducement for the refusal of renewals on anything like an adequate scale, and they would go on increasing in value year by year until that increase formed a prohibitory barrier against reduction. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Ripon Division, in referring to Clause 4, had stated that it would tend rather to the multiplication of new licences and that it would be a source of temptation to obtain relief of local taxation from the proceedt of these licences. He thought very great weight ought to be attached to thas observation, because the Government had refused in any wav to put the funds provided by the high licences into a national fund. The devoting of these high licence charges to a fund for local purposes constituted a genuine danger. The principle of high licence, beneficial as it was for intercepting the monopoly value, had the grave danger that it might multiply facilities for physical and moral debasement. It had been said that the Bill might diminish the chances for improvement which were associated with the trust public-house system. He did not look to Lord Grey's scheme as a solution, but accepted the trust system only as an alternative less undesirable than the private profit system. The effect of Clause 4 might be that that form of mitigating the drink evil might be discouraged and under the influence of these motives the whole of the new
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  licences might be placed more at the mercy of the brewers than they had been before.
  The Bill was bad from the results which had obviously flow from its operation. It was also bad in respect of the source from which it came. They knew perfectly well the origin of the Bill. They knew where this Bill came from. In substance it came from the board-rooms of the great brewing companies. They had dictated the silencing of discussion in the House. They held the Government in their hands, and said to the Government, "We must have our way, or you will suffer for it." The brewers and distillers were the last friends of this decrepit Ministry, which had stripped itself of every principle, and which had been stripped by the country at the by-elections of every vestige of national mandate or approval. The trade held the fate of the Government in their hands and had thrust their proposals down the throats of a discredited Ministry. He and his friends had listened with much satisfaction to the speeches from the other side of the House inviting the Government, at the last hour, to place a time limit or some restriction on the principle of compensation. They all knew—it was admitted by the Solicitor-General himself—that there was not the shadow of a claim, either legal or equitable, for compensation. The licence-holder and the trader had known it all along. They knew what would be the decision in the Farnham case. It was plain from that decision that it was not only the right but the duty of the local justices to frame a scheme dealing with the whole of the circumstances of the district and to fearlessly reduce the licences to what, in their opinion, was the right measure that should be provided for the district under their supervision. He had always been opposed, in the strongest way, to the principle of compensation. It seemed to him that there could be no right of compensation for a licence granted not for the benefit of an individual, or a class, or a trade, but in the supposed interests of and on the supposed demands and requirements of the people themselves. That was a point which had been absolutely forgotten by many hon. Members in the course of the debates. Any form of compensation whatever, except in the very limited form

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  suggested in the Report of the Peel Commission, was wholly inadmissible. In the words of the Leader of the Opposition that was obviously the only form of compensation that could conceivably be given. He had always said that even that was, on principle, undesirable and improper. The thing would take care of itself by a limited form of insurance under which the licence-holder would get all that he could legitimately look for, but the trade would not have that.
  They had been assured, again and again, that this money was the money of the trade. That he utterly traversed. This vast misbegotten and absolutely unsound mountain of wealth which had grown up in the absence of sound legislation and administration, was not theirs to play with at their pleasure. Under the fiction of this law it was meant to give them for the first time the right to use this money, which they now considered was their own property, and to deal with it in their own way, and to use it for mutual insurance to mitigate any losses which they might incur by being deprived of their licences. But this was a national asset. It was open to national taxation at any time, and one of the most obvious evils of the Bill was that there was an attempt to withdraw from the control of the proper financial authorities, the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, the collection of this money which was national money, and to which the country was entitled to look for the relief of taxation. By transferring the power from the local magistrates to the quarter sessions it was meant to strengthen the position of the trade by setting up bogus claims which he sincerely hoped would be taken from them by a courageous and honest Treasury and converted into a proper relief for the taxpayers who were now groaning under burdens of taxation for the sake of the privileged classes. He felt very strongly about this Bill. He did not know that there was a single Bill ever introduced in the House of Commons in his nineteen years experience which had excited such a profound feeling of indignation in the constitutency which he represented, and he had felt it his duty to enter his emphatic protest against the policy of the Bill, and to express his determination to do his
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  utmost to defeat not only the policy but the whole provisions of the measure.
  MR. CRIPPSsaid he did not want to travel over the whole ground in connection with this Bill, but there were two or three points in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife to which he would like to refer. The true purport of this Bill was to provide a fair and just method by which they could get rid of a large number of redundant public-houses which existed at the present time. That was, he submitted, a true principle of temperance reform. No one could suppose that by one measure they could bring about all that they desired as regarded temperance reform, but no student of this question who desired an improvement in our social laws relating to the drink question would deny that the first and necessary element of a real advance was the diminution of the number of redundant public-houses. The purport of this Bill was to make that possible, which could not be done at the present time. It had been pointed out more than once, though the argument had never beer answered, that this Bill, for the first time, enabled the magistrates to deal with what lie called the plague-spot of the present licensing system—viz., the beerhouses under the Act of 1869. That was a most important question in every country district and was the main obstacle to securing a real system of reduction of public-houses, especially in the northern country towns. These beerhouses in Manchester were a crying evil. There were 2,000 of them which could not be touched at the present moment. If any Member opposite was really sincere in his desire for temperance reform, he must admit that no such reform could be carried out on a satisfactory basis until these 1869 beerhouses were attacked. That, in itself, he thought, would justify this measure. There were 33,000 of these beerhouse licences in England or a third of the whole number, and therefore, to bring them under the scope of the Bill was a very large and just measure of temperance reform—although it could not be done without compensation. That would enable the licensing magistrates, under the powers in the Bill, to deal

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  with the worst. plague-spot—as regarded drunkenness—in the country.
  His second point was—he was not for a moment taking the county boroughs into account—that the great difficulty in regard to the due reduction of the number of public-houses was that the power of the magistrates, in the petty sessional divisions, was exercised on a too small area. Now, any one who had considered and worked the existing licensing system practically had no other feeling than that in order to bring about a proper system of temperance reform in regard to public-houses. there must be a large area. By this Bill they were increasing the jurisdiction of the local magistrates, giving increased powers to every small borough which jurisdiction at the present time, and bringing into the purview of the magistrates the ante-1869 beerhouses, which, hitherto, whatever abuses attached to them, could defy the law.
  A more important point in the Bill was in regard to the compensation provisions. The absence of any fair and just proposal for compensation did, in fact, stand in the way of the magistrates taking any measures of temperance reform as regarded the reduction of public-houses where they were redundant. He did not care on what ground that disinclination to reduce public-houses was based—whether on the moral sense of the country or on the question of expectation on the part of the licensees that their licences would he renewed. Whatever the basis might be there was that feeling that they could not take away a large number of these redundant public-houses without giving a just measure of compensation to the owners and the existing licence-holders. That was expressed, as a matter of fact, in what was going on. Except in county boroughs the advocates of temperance reform never could get the number of these redundant houses reduced. Occasionally a spasmodic effort was made but it always roused friction. If the country was taken all over, the conditions, as they stood, were an absolute bar to any substantial reduction in the number of public-houses. What were the compensation proposals under the Bill? They had been, he would not say misrepresented, but misunderstood, through-
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  out the whole course of the debates on the Second Reading, in Committee, and on the Report stage. To begin with, the fund, as they knew, was an insurance fund derived from the trade itself. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman for East Fife that there was all the distinction in the world between a compensation fund derived from public money in the ordinary sense, and that contributed by the trade. He thought that anyone who in that House had proposed to raise the compensation fund direct from the National Exchequer would not have been listened to for a moment [OPPOSISTION cries of "Hear, hear!"], and the person who would have denounced it most of all would have been the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife. He had held, for the last twenty years, that the proper way in which to deal with compensation was on the insurance principle, and not by direct contribution from public funds. The measure of compensation in the Bill was not the trade loss which the licensee might suffer. It was not as if it were a compensation case in which the public-houses were taken for public purposes. It was compensation on a limited scale, being only the difference in value of the house licensed and unlicensed, just as if the Act had not been passed. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife talked about enhancement. Nothing of that kind was contemplated under the Bill. The Bill would not compensate the owner of the premises as though he had a permanency or a freehold. It would only compensate him on the basis that the enjoyment of his tenure would be narrowed. He challenged any hon. Member to suggest a more moderate measure, or a measure that would give a less amount of compensation to the person injured than would be given under the Bill. Not only that, but there was a special provision which protected the position of the licensee. Under the existing law, if the licensee were only a manager, he would not get any compensation at all; but under the Bill the licensee would receive compensation even though he were only a manager. That was just; and to his mind, if there was to he compensation at all, it could not be put on a narrower or more concentrated basis-

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  With reference to the time limit, the right lion. Gentleman seemed to misunderstand the principle of compensation as attached to the time limit. He said "there was an expectancy." But all property was expectancy more or less secure; and, according as it was more or less secure, it was more or less valuable. The right hon. Gentleman said that the time limit would destroy that expectancy. Of course, if all property were thrown into a hotch-potch in ten Years, in that sense the expectancy would be limited to the ten years. But having regard to justice and fairness, why should the expectancy here be more limited than it was at the present time? That would be the effect of a time limit. At present, the expectancy was more or less secure according to the conditions. All they asked was that compensation should be assessed on the basis of expectancy. In some cases the expectancy would be worth a large sum, because it was good; and, in other cases, it would be worth only a small sum, because it was bad. What would be the result of a time limit? A man who had a poor and badly conducted house would be given a larger amount of compensation than he would be justly entitled to; and where a man received more than he was entitled to that was confiscation, just as it would be confiscation if he received less than he was entitled to. Again, a man in an admirably conducted house, which the magistrates for some reason or other desired to remove, would be given less under a time limit than he would be naturally and properly entitled to if the real basis of his claim were considered. Therefore, a time limit would result in too much compensation in some cases and too little in others. The only true principle was to take the property as it stood, giving less to property which was insecure and more to property which was secure. There was really no other basis of compensation.
  There was one other aspect of the time limit which was very much disregarded by hon. Members opposite. Under the Bill, it was desirable to get as large a fund as possible in order to reduce, as quickly as possible, the number of redundant public-houses. Under the Bill there would be ample funds to reduce the number of public-
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  houses to the number mentioned in Lord Peel's Report. What hon. Members would not appreciate was that the houses it was desired to suppress were houses in which a small measure of compensation would be sufficient. In his own district they wished to get rid of the ante-1869 beerhouses; and they found that the compensation was almost nominal in amount, because the value of the houses was little more than if they had not been licensed. Therefore, without a time limit, the Bill would be able to bring about even the measure of reduction mentioned in Lord Peel's Report. But if a time limit were introduced, the fund would be immediately diminished and crippled, although, from the temperance point of view, it ought to be as large as possible. He had never seen any answer to that argument. The truth was that so many hon. Members disliked the idea of any compensation at all that their minds were entirely on the compensation question; and they did not see that the more they got out of the trade under the head of an insurance fund, the greater would be the fund for the reduction of redundant public-houses. Why, therefore, should they, under the guise of a time limit, reduce the fund on which temperance reform in the future would mainly depend? As regarded new licences, the provision was an important but minor part of the Bill. The main principle of the measure was the reduction of the number of redundant public-houses; and that would not be possible without having a compensation fund on a fair basis. On these grounds, he was a very strong supporter of the Bill. He believed that under it they would get justice and that reduction in the number of public-houses without which they could not have any satisfactory system of temperance reform.
  MR. ELLIS GRIFFITHsaid that the hon. and learned Gentleman had contributed a very clear and valuable speech to the discussion with reference to the time limit. The hon. Gentleman supported the Bill because it would lead to a reduction in the number of redundant public-houses. They, on that side, were in entire accord with that object. He did not, however, follow the hon. Gentleman when he said

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  that a time limit would reduce the compensation fund. The view on that side was that the contributions should continue during the period of the time limit; and that, at the end of it, the magistrates should have an absolutely free hand.
  MR. CRIPPSsaid that if the fund were capitalised for fifteen years instead of for perpetuity the hon. Gentleman would see the difference.
  MR. ELLIS GRIFFITHsaid his idea was that the fund should cease at the end of fifteen veers. The hon. Gentleman referred to the county areas as being too small, and he, therefore, thought the quarter sessions would deal better with the matter. That was not his experience. Every village was a separate entity for this purpose, and quarter sessions would not know the needs of a village fifteen or twenty miles distant. His contention was that every village should be looked at separately, in order to ascertain whether the facilities were sufficient or in excess of the requirements. What would happen under this Bill was that where a licence was taken away partly owing to improper conduct on the part of the holder, and partly because the house was not wanted, full compensation would he given. The Solicitor-General had tried to assure the House that the licensing justices' powers were augmented under this Bill. Speaking generally, in the last twenty-one years the total number of licences refused on the ground of non-requirement had been 1,540. In each case there was a right of appeal to quarter sessions. but in 1,131 of the 1,540 no appeal was lodged. That was to say, that in 1,131 cases the applicants were satisfied with the decision of the licensing justices and did not appeal against it. Therefore, in 80 per cent, of the cases of non-renewal the last word lay with the licensing justices. In future, in similar cases, where under the old condition of things there would have been no appeal, the licensing justices would not be able to decide the matter at all: they would not hove a word to say upon it except to report. Was it not quite clear that the work done by the justices in the past without an appeal could not be done in the future?
  With regard to the ante-1809 licences, he might say that one of
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  the most urgent reasons for temperance reform was to deal with these licences, which could not be taken away on the ground of non-requirement. It would be convenient to remember what had happened with regard to those licences since 1869. In that year there were 49,000 odd licences of that description. now there were 27,000. They had been reduced by almost half, which was perfectly satisfactory. The real blot on this Bill was that it did not provide an adequate sum for compensation for the licences to be taken away. His own view was that the levy ought to be made proportionate to the demand upon it. If a licence was not required it should be taken away and the demand upon the remaining licences should provide proper compensation. That was not done in this Bill. Under this Bill there was no compulsory levy at all. Then under Clause 7, Sub-section 3, the City of London was set apart as a separate entity, which meant that a contribution of £25,000 annually was put down outside the London area. It was a very curious thing that there should be a separate rule for London. It was as well for the Liberal Party to remember that, so far as the time limit was concerned, they had the Bishops with them and, therefore, they might hope that in another place something might be done to put the Bill on a proper footing.
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fife had pointed out that this was the handiwork of the Government. That was true to an extent, but the genesis of the Bill was very well known. The beginning of this Bill—and it was a temperance measure—was started at a meeting of the Leicester Licensed Victuallers' Society in June, last, when the chairman of the society said—
  "No one appreciated temperance more than the trade."
  which he could quite understand, because, they lived out of it. The secretary went further and stated that the Parliamentary Committee of the retail trade took the final step to bring about the Bill, and that the Bill was the result of a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee with a Committee of the Government.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. AKERSDOUGLAS,): There is not a shadow of foundation for that statement.
  MR. ELLIS GRIFFITHwas sorry to hear the right hon. Member's contradiction, because he feared that he had been giving away the trade too much. He could not discard the statement of a gentleman occupying the responsible position of a secretary so easily, and it would be interesting to know who the Government representatives were on this Committee, and who it was that discussed it with the Government, and how the Government held out, as it always did, and finally, being a weak Government, gave way in the end. They had tried to find out where the compensation was going—it was not clear now as to where it was to go. Most of it no doubt would go to the brewers, and those who actually held the licences would get very little. When making his final protest against the Bill he could only say that he believed it was a bad Bill, hut remembering the sources from which it came he believed it was the final act of compensation on the part of the Government. They had compensated all sections of their supporters, and therefore he assumed they had completed the Work they had come into power to do. He voted against the Bill in the hope that, as it was the completion of the work of the Government, it also meant the completion of the present Parliament.
  *SIR JOHN ROLLESTONsaid the last speaker had referred to an incident which he said had happened in his (Sir John's) constituency; but he thought the hon. and learned Gentleman had formed an erroneous impression of what took place. He (Sir John) could remember, when the text of the Bill was first published, that the secretary of the Licensed Victuallers' Association denounced the Bill in strong terms. He had not adhered to that position, but the fact that he did so at the outset proved, he thought, that there was no collusion between the Government and the publicans.
  MR. ELLIS GRIFFITHsaid what he read was taken from the Leicester Evening News.
  *MR. JOHN ROLLESTONreplied that the report of the proceedings which he read was in another paper. Continuing, he said he could not let this Bill pass through the House without expressing on behalf of those he represented his appreciation of the action of the Government, and especially of the services of the Home Secretary and the Solicitor-General, in having introduced and piloted through a rather tempestuous passage in that House this most useful measure. He had not intervened much in the debate; but he did not suppose there was any Member who had endured more outside on account of the Bill than he had, and his humble exposition of its provisions in answer to protests of his constituents had been both detailed and laborious. He thought it was fair to say that a very large number of petitions which he had presented and resolutions and letters which he had received had been violently hostile to the Bill. Most of them he believed were genuine expressions of opinion. Some were clearly prepared before the introduction of the measure; others were machine-made. Mainly, however, he believed they were genuine expressions of opinion. He could well imagine an unsophisticated Member of Parliament with an easy and an unopposed seat thinking, if he were in his place, that the whole force and power of his constituency would be directed towards unseating him if he dared in face of such representations to lift a finger or utter a sound in defence of this Bill. He had no such fear, nor did he anticipate any such results. An hon. Member became accustomed after many years of diagnosis to feel with some degree of accuracy the pulse of his constituency, and was able to gauge the apparent force which a minority assumed to have behind it when it placed itself in opposition to any great Bill or measure, and he also learned to appreciate the real power and the quiet strength of that great body of people, the majority of whom were never heard or seen in these controversies. It was this great class who would give this great measure dispassionate consideration and would apply to it a logical mind, and who would prefer to seek out for themselves and follow the interests of justice and truth rather than the noisy battle cries of political Parties.

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  It was this great class, he felt, who would support the action of the Government in this matter, who would recognise the measure as one of justice and progress and as calculated to remove one of the greatest obstacles in the path of temperance reform. On behalf of those he represented he desired to give it earnest support.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSONsaid he hoped that the hon. Member who had just resumed his seat would not meet with very bitter disappointment on the occasion of the next election, and would not find that the petitioners against this Bill had really experienced the feelings set forth in their petitions. Personally, he could not understand why people who petitioned did so unless they believed in their action.
  *SIR JOHN ROLLESTON: A great many of the petitions were printed and machine-made.
  MR. EMMOTT: They were not legal if they were printed.
  *SIR JOHN ROLLESTON: They were sent to me.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSON: Then they ought not to have been presented. Continuing, the hon. Baronet said he was reminded of a very trite saving by Mr. Disraeli in one his novels. He laid down as a political watchword the fact that it was the duty of politicians to provide for the social welfare of the people. If this Bill did provide for the social welfare of the people it was a good Bill, if it did not—and in his opinion it failed to do so—then it was a bad Bill. Throughout the long discussions which had taken place upon it one satisfactory element had been notable and that was the admissions as to the great evil of drinking that went on in this country. The Royal Commission appointed by the Government had admitted that to be a gigantic evil which no effort should be spared to endeavour to eradicate. The Government tried to deal with the evil in their Bill of 1902, and they did something to restrict the sale of drink, but still that Bill did not go far enough. This measure was spoken of as a great measure of temperance reform, and
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  it was very curious that a measure of temperance reform should fail to ensure the support of temperance reformers. He did not believe there was a single Bishop in the country who supported this Bill as it stood; there was hardly a clergyman who did so. He had seen letters in the Press trying to make out that the clergy were in favour of the measure, but he did not think they were quite so bad has that. He did not believe, also, that there was a magistrate in the country who supported the Bill as it stood. They would not oppose it, but they did not think it wag what it ought to be in many material respects. And, finally, he might say that, in his opinion, there was not one person among the great body of temperance reformers, who had spent their lives in trying to grapple with the evil, who could honestly support the Bill. It seemed to him that compensation was the be all and end all of the Bill. The head and front of the offending of the measure was contained in the first two or three lines which set forth that licences ought not to be taken away without compensation. That was the spirit of the Bill, and that single fact condemned it most entirely in his opinion.
  The hon. Member for Stretford had explained that the Bill would allow the trade to insure. What on earth prevented the members of the trade insuring at the present time in the same way as any other trade or business was insured. He would like to read a short extract from the Spectator which was not an extreme or extravagant paper, but was the very essence of respectability. It said—
  "Another curious perversity of view exhibited by Mr. Balfour is to be found in his assertion that the compensation is not to be given out of public funds, but is to be provided by the trade. That is, of course, a pure paradox. The State has hitherto given the publican free or almost free a valuable property. Under the Bill it is stipulated that a small portion of this annual gift shall be returned to the State. But this does not make the compensation fund a private affair of the trade. The Bill merely takes partial possession of a great national asset which has hitherto been wasted. It is not the trade which provides the compensation fund but the State, which has created the value attaching to licences owing to its system of monopoly. The money goes into the public Treasury and is public money like all other money collected by aw. Its quality cannot be altered by calling it a

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  fund provided by the trade any more than the money paid out of A's waistcoat pocket differs from the money paid out of A's trouser's pocket."
  That was the doctrine he had preached for many years past. It was not right to talk of this being the money of the trade—it was public money and that fact would not be altered. The money was being paid in order to give a locus standi and permanency to the public-house. The Bill in fact was intended to establish for ever the public-houses of this country, and it was being done not by the trade but with public money. The hon. Member for Bolton had described the public-house as a necessary adjunct to civilisation. He had declared that it was a great social need in our life. When he (Sir Wilfrid) heard that he was reminded of the expression used at a great banquet at which lots of champagne was served. A visitor put down his champagne glass and said. "I do love civilisation." He had another quotation he would like to read, and that was from The Times—he was in fact quoting now from all respectable papers. The Times said years ago that the public-house was a huge misery and nuisance that degraded, ruined, and brutalised a large portion of our population, yet here they had a Bill to establish an institution which did all those things. It seemed to him that there never was a worse object underlying any Bill. He had listened to all the debates on the measure as to the arrangements for magistrates, etc., but that was all leather and pruneila—compensation for the publican was the real essence of the Bill, and that was why he was opposed to it.
  There were only three courses that could be taken by the State with regard to the liquor traffic. The first was free trade. There might be supporters of that policy, but he had never met them. The second was prohibition of the sale of liquor—a course; which, when given a fair trial, had never failed to stop drinking. It was a most extraordinary theory that you could prevent people becoming intoxicated by supplying them with intoxicating liquor. The only way was to stop the supply. The third course was that of regulating the traffic. That had been tried for
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  400 years, and it had always failed, and this "great temperance measure" would doubtless share the same fate. What the people had demanded was not fresh rules and regulations, but the power to keep the nuisance out of their own district if they thought fit. Temperance reformers had demanded nothing outrageous; they did not want to interfere with the magistrates, but surely if the people did not want a licence in their locality no bench of magistrates ought to be allowed to thrust a licence upon them. If the power of local option were given, people would be able to live in what were sometimes called "uncontaminated zones." It was most extraordinary that Parliament should be spending night after night in arranging how the people were to have drink. Why could they not be allowed to do without it? Surely English working men were as good as the Kaffirs and Zulus, and yet a liquor law had been passed in South Africa such as was refused in England. There was something amazing and pathetic in the present position. Everywhere throughout the world the people were rising up against the liquor curse. The movement was spreading in all English-speaking countries. In America 30,000,000 of people lived under the system of local option. And yet here in England nothing was being done except to consolidate our shame and to perpetuate our misery.
  The Bill was going to another place where it was possible, though not probable, that it would be improved. The Prime Minister thought he had done a great stroke of business in introducing and carrying through the House this measure. Nobody appreciated more than he the superhuman skill, ingenuity, dexterity, ability, and agility of the Prime Minister; they were unequalled in history. The right hon. Gentleman had accomplished an unequalled task in keeping his Party together, which was considered a man's one great duty in politics, but it was doubtful whether, on looking back, he would derive any lasting satisfaction from this legislative achievement by which he had riveted the chains of this curse upon his fellow-countrymen, and introduced Tammany Hall into English politics. If the Liberal Party did not make it their first and foremost duty when they came into office to repeal this wild and wicked

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  legislation all their organisation, declarations, declamation, and demonstration would have been nothing more than a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal. The opponents of the Bill could do nothing more; they had resisted its progress as long as they had the power; it would now go to another place where it would doubtless be passed; but he still had confidence that this atrocious measure would arouse temperance reformers, the Liberal Party, and the nation, to the ultimate overthrow of the system which was, to the people of this country, their heaviest burden and their greatest curse.
  MR. CORBETTsaid the Bill had been described as a measure to enable licence-holders to insure themselves, but that was a thing that licence-holders had always been able to do, and, as a matter of fact, one company alone insured £60,000,000 of this class of property, undertaking to insure licensees against all risks beyond their own control. This Bill did something very different, in that it set up a vested interest, and gave Parliamentary recognition to a permanent right in licences which had never before been acknowledged. The Solicitor-General had stated that this trade had been legislated against more than any other. So far from that being the case, it was the one trade which, beyond all others, had been financially favoured by Governments. It had enjoyed the fruit of a public monopoly to such an extent that, when a brewery secured a new licence, it obtained from the public something which it could immediately sell for many thousands of pounds. In the financial relations between the nation and the trade, the trade had been favoured at the expense of the nation, not the nation at the expense of the trade. It had been claimed that for the first time the ante-1869 beerhouses were being brought under control. But under what sort of control? The complaint against these "plague-spots" had not been altogether with regard to their number, but to the absence of control, due to the lack of power on the part of the justices to hold out any threats which would give weight to their instructions. The only
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  threat they would be able to hold out in future would be that, unless they conformed to the instructions given, the licence would be taken away, but that full compensation would be paid. That would mean in many cases an enormous profit to the owner, because not only would he receive compensation, but the remaining houses owned by him would benefit by the increased trade which would accrue to them.
  As to the contention of the Solicitor-General that greater powers were being given to the justices, what had they done in the past, and what would they be able to do in the future? Putting aside Birmingham and Liverpool, which had been frequently referred to, what had happened in Manchester? In the year 1903 the justices refused the renewal of forty licences; under this Bill, the total fund at their disposal being only £34,000, they would be able to refuse only seventeen. In Exeter, where the reduction had been thirteen, they would now be able to refuse not more than two, as the compensation fund at their disposal would be only £2,342. In Canterbury, instead of being nine, the reduction would be less than two. In Swansea, the reduction would not exceed five, whereas it had formerly been sixteen. It was sometimes stated that in large areas, where the annual value of the public-houses was low, and the amount of the compensation fund would therefore be small, the capital value would be proportionately light, and that consequently the possible reduction in licences would not be so small as might appear probable at first sight. A few days ago figures were given relating to the last six licences which came under the review of the Inland Revenue authorities for death duty purposes. The smallest values were £3,500 and £3,200. But what was the assessment? One was assessed upon an annual value of £50, and the other upon an annual value of £60. So that even with a very low annual value for assessment purposes, the capital value for compensation under this Bill would not be less than £2,000. So far as the reduction of licences was concerned, in 1903, renewals were refused in 480 cases, and 350 licenses lapsed, making a total reduction of 830 under the existing law.

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  It might be said that that was an exceptional year, but it should be borne in mind that those who demanded this legislation had put forward their claim, not only on account of the reductions in 1903, but especially because the reductions were likely to be still larger in the future. In the face of these facts how could hon. Members represent this Bill as one to reduce the number of licences? As a matter of fact, it was a Bill to limit the reduction.
  It had also been said that the Bill placed a fund of £1,250,000 at the disposal of quarter sessions for compensation purposes. But the Bill did not compel quarter sessions to levy this amount; they might levy the full amount, or a smaller amount, or even make no levy at all. If the Government had really desired that this sum should be devoted to the reduction of licences, they would have made it obligatory upon every Court of quarter sessions to levy the full sum, and that when in any case the whole of the fund was not required for the particular district, the surplus should be transferred to the Board of Inland Revenue, to be used in districts where the fund was found to be insufficient. Throughout the debates there had been an entire absence of any recognition, on the part of the Government, of the magnitude of the evil. In the Report just issued on the degeneration of the population, it was stated that drink was a most potent and deadly agent of physical degeneration, and that the craving was appallingly hereditary in its character. When one turned from the speeches of the Prime Minister to the Report, even of the majority of the Royal Commission, one would think that different trades were under discussion. The Majority Report realised that there were connected with this matter evils of which the Prime Minister appeared from his speeches to be unconscious. It was true that in one of those speeches reference was made to drunkenness, but it was merely that the drunkard might be denounced and scorned. The House ought to hesitate to use terms of blame and scorn to these unfortunate individuals, the extent of whose temptation they were powerless to measure. Politicians would be better engaged in bracing themselves to resist their own temptations, than in casting scorn
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  upon those who yielded to temptations to which they themselves were strangers. He knew of a poor man who spent a whole week of his annual holiday without venturing to cross the threshold of his home, because of the special temptations which awaited him at the time. He wished they could have heard during these debates that the Prime Minister had been able to refrain for a whole week from communicating with those who were endeavouring to tempt him by the promise of their votes or the threats of their withdrawal. The Prime Minister had denounced these poor men who had yielded to temptations, the strength of which he could not measure, but taking the whole history and character of this Bill, it was doubtful whether the right hon. Gentleman's own temptations had been wholly overcome.
  MR. WHITTAKERreminded the House that, on the First Reading of the Bill, he pointed out that every man who had invested a penny in the trade had done so with a full knowledge of the law; that during the alleged "reckless attack" upon the trade last year brewery securities on the London Stock Exchange had fallen less than most securities, that the profits of the trade had been exceptionally large upon a very inflated capital, and that men had gone into the trade taking the risk, in order to get a large profit. Those facts constituted a refutation of the Home Secretary's case for the Bill, and not one of them had been disproved. The whole case which the Home Secretary made in introducing the Bill had collapsed, and neither the right hon. Gentleman nor anybody else had made the least attempt to defend it. A Return recently issued to the House showed the whole of that ease to be ludicrous to an extreme that would scarcely be credited. According to that return, the number of licences refused renewal at the brewster sessions of 1904 was greater than in any year during the last twenty years, and what did it amount to? Simply that seventy-three on-licences were refused on the ground of non-requirement. That was the reckless attack which this Bill was required to stop! Three of those cases were pending on appeal; and thirty-five never went to quarter sessions at all. That disposed

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  of the Solicitor-General's statement that every case of refusal on the ground of non-requirement went to appeal. But of the remaining thirty-five cases, on appeal twenty-four were allowed, and the refusal confirmed in eleven only. Therefore, in the whole of England and Wales, of the on-licences to which this Bill would have applied, only eleven that dared face an appeal court had been refused renewal. He was now dealing with the necessity fur the Bill as a protection against the justices. The insecurity was one per thousand. Those who dared to face an appeal numbered only one in 2,000; and those who lost their licences after appeal were only one in every 7,000 licences. Any impartial man would say that those eleven cases ought to have lost their licences.
  That was the whole case for this Bill, and it was ludicrous to pretend that a great trade had been placed in jeopardy, that property had been made insecure, and that they could not get men to invest money in the trade simply on account of those cases. And for this the whole licensing system was to be upset, and Parliament was to be dragooned as it had never been dragooned before, in order that the liquor trade should be entrenched in a stronger position, and the whole of the moral forces of the country were to be flouted and ignored. He might be told that if only eleven cases were affected then it was only a small matter. His objection to the Bill was that it destroyed the power of the magistrates. The Government had been entirely misled in this matter, and there had been too many of those consultations to which his hon. friend had referred. He had read a paragraph stating that the Prime Minister had refused to meet a deputation of magistrates from the city of Manchester with the Lord Mayor at their head, although the right hon. Gentleman represented one of the divisions of Manchester. It looked as if the Government had closed their ears entirely to the voice of the magistrates. To this hour they had had no information as to the probable value of licences. Surely that could be obtained. When time Government fixed this levy, surely they had sonic idea of the value of licences, and the figures ought to be put before the House. A good many statistics were being put forward privately, which were not being put for-
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  ward in this House. The Government had been misled by information brought to them privately which they dared not bring under discussion in the House. The value of licences could be magnified enormously by the trade when it suited them. This was nothing more or less than a half-baked Bill. A more abominable, unjust. and cruel suggestion was never made in any Bill, than one of the clauses contained when it was first introduced. it amounted to this, that no tied house tenant would have got a single penny of compensation, while tied house tenants would have had to pay the whole of the levy. He challenged the Home Secretary to deny that. A more unjust proposal than that could not be suggested. But that proposal had been entirely altered and recast now, and it had been recast without discussion. He wished to ask the Home Secretary, did the Government, when they drafted that Bill, know what the result of their proposal would be? Was it their intention that the tied house tenant should get nothing and pay everything? If they did know this, and if that was their intention, then they deliberately made a most un-just proposal. Why did they alter their proposal?
  When he was down at the Devonport election he happened to look through the Order Paper, and he found that there were Amendments down by thirty hon. Members to alter that provision, and not a single one of those Amendments came from the Ministerial side of the House. Afterwards the true inwardness of it became known because the publicans came into the Lobby. There was another crack of the trade whip, and the Government altered their proposal at once, when the publicans took the matter up. If it was not the deliberate wish and intention of the Government to make that proposal, how was it that such a clause was put in the Bill? One explanation was that the suggestion came from somebody else. He thought the whole of the Bill came from somebody else. The whole of the compensation was intended for the brewer, and the tenant was to pay the levy. Where did that proposal come from if it did not come from the brewers? If that was not the source, then they put it in without knowing what they were

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  doing, and it showed the incompetency of the Government to deal with the question at all. Either they were hopelessly incompetent, because they put in a proposal which they could not defend or justify, or else they made a most unjust proposal. In either case they were totally unfit to deal with a question like this. They were like children playing with matches in a powder magazine. [An HON. MEMBER: But they do not blow themselves up.] A Canadian who visited the House recently, upon leaving remarked, "Do you call that a Government? I call it a kindergarten." The clerks to the justices of this country had drawn up a memorial showing how complicated the working of this measure was. There were words in the original Bill which laid down that compensation was to he calculated as if this Act had not passed, and now the compensation was to be calculated as though the licence were subject to the same conditions of renewal as were in force immediately before the passing of the Act. In ten or fifteen years time, when a licence came to be refused, what mortal being could tell what would have been the value of the licence at that time if the law had not been altered? It was a preposterous suggestion, and that was one of the clauses which they had not been allowed to discuss.
  Take the case of a non-county borough. The local justices were to recommend the refusal of the renewal of licences. A committee of quarter sessions was to consider that renewal, but whether they could give effect to the refusal would depend upon the amount of money at their disposal. It would largely depend upon the value of the licence the renewal of which had been refused. But they would not have the value of that licence before them, and they could only ascertain the value after they had decided, and therefore how could they say whether the amount would fit in? The committee of quarter sessions would not necessarily fix the amount of the levy, but the whole body of quarter sessions would fix it, and they might not agree with the committee. There was a complicated machinery before the publican received his money, and the question arose as to when he would receive it. It had been said that
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  the money could be obtained by borrowing, but what would be the security? If the security was to be the licences, they would have to be kept in force. The fact was that the situation amounted to this, that all licences of the "on" kind would be put in the same position as the 1869 beerhouses, which everybody declared should be got rid of. They could make no substantial reduction of licences without borrowing, and that reduction would be very dearly bought at the price of the loss of control by the justices. They wanted absolute freedom for the justices to deal with these licences, and that was going to be prevented by borrowing. The Solicitor-General said there had been a great increase of power given to local justices under this Bill. He had great respect for the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman, and he wished to pay his tribute to him for the manner in which he had assisted in carrying this Bill through the House; but nevertheless he preferred the opinion of the clerks to the justices upon this subject. What did the clerks to the justices say? It was their declared opinion that if the justices were deprived of the power of refusing the renewal of licences on the ground that they were not required, that would have a most serious effect upon their control over licensed houses. The clerks to the justices were men of experience and knowledge, and that was their opinion. Whatever might be the opinion held on this subject in county boroughs, he knew that in the non-county boroughs of this country there was no public body more disliked than quarter sessions, and there was no bode less competent to deal with the question, because they had no knowledge of the wants of the districts which they supervised. Before the Royal Commission plenty of evidence was given as to quarter sessions being the great hindrance to licensing reform, and by this Bill an enormous amount of power was to be put in their hands.
  The amount of reduction in the number of licences would be limited to the amount of the levy, so that houses which the local justices would have got rid of would continue in the district against the will of their authorities simply because Parliament would not enable them to provide money enough to buy them up.

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  Why not give them full powers? This Bill was exacted from the Government by the liquor trade and was applauded and supported by that trade; but it was bewailed and denounced by almost every social and temperance reformer in the country, and by ministers of religion, including bishops and clergy of the Church of England. He contended that where a number of houses belonged to the same owner, and the licences were taken away from some of them, full compensation should not be given in respect of the others, because if it were, the owner would get compensation twice over. This Bill practically was only defended by the liquor trade itself and by chairmen of quarter sessions. There was one basis for the contribution and another for compensation. That made the brewer interested in keeping the value down for contributing purposes and up for compensation. Surely a little commercal instinct would have shown that the basis of both ought to have been the same. Take, for an example, a village where every house belonged to the same owner. Supposing they reduced those houses by one-half, they would double the value of the others. Therefore the owner ought not to be compensated for having the value of his property increased. Take the case of six small public-houses yielding £400 a year gross profit. Suppose half of that went in rent, licence fees, and working expenses, and £200 a year was the net profit. The owner of those six houses would get a net profit of £1,200. Supposing they abolished three of those houses, and the trade was reduced by one-fifth, and the remaining trade went to the other three houses. Assuming that the working expenses would be reduced only by 20 per cent., what would be the result? The net profit of the remaining three houses would be £1,440. That was a distinct case where the total profit to the owners would be increased by reducing the number of licences, and yet he was to be compensated for haying his profits increased by 20 per cent. Under the closure they were not allowed to discuss this point. A great deal had been said about these licences being property, and a good deal of confusion of ideas and difficulties had arisen. If he were asked whether a licence was property as against another man he should say "Yes;" but if they asked him if it was property as against
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  the nation he should say "No." Licences were the property of the nation. The nation granted a licence to a privileged person for twelve months, and whilst he held that licence he had the expectation of a renewal, and that was his property as against any other man, but it was not a property as against the original grantor of the licence. The nation had always reserved full power to resume possession of its property in licences, and that was the position which they were really dealing with. This Bill was taking away some of the property of the nation in this respect and handing it over to the trade. If there was any property in a licence as regarded the owner as against the nation, then they had no right to make this levy upon the trade. If this was property as against the nation, then the trade were entitled to be compensated by the nation. It was all very well for the Solicitor-General, as a mere superficial debating point, to say that the trade would pay. That was the contention of the Government.
  THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): What is your contention?
  MR. WHITTAKERsaid his contention was that the trade would pay. What he urged was, that if this were property as against the nation, the proposal that the trade should pay was most inequitable and unjust. Making the trade pay was an admission that this was not property in the ordinary sense. The Solicitor-General had stated that no alternative to the scheme of the Bill had been proposed that would hold water. When that assertion was made one of his friends said that no alternative had been made that would hold beer. He had no objection whatever to compensation from the trade to the trade. He thought it was reasonable and expedient that the loss should be spread over the whole trade, but it was not reasonable to limit the power of the magistrates and tie them up in such a way that they could not deal with the licensing problem in the same way as they had done in the past. If the funds were insufficient they could put a further levy upon beer and spirits. If the Government, in the first instance, had made the

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  levy a national one, they would have got rid of the whole difficulty. The Solicitor-General said that this was a compromise. it was a very curious compromise which give compensation to the trade and deprived the public of their share.
  He wished to say a word or two on the time limit. If they gave a public-house a substantial time limit, an opportunity was given to set up a sinking fund to redeem the capital value of the licence. His point was that the additional value they would give to public-houses which remained after the operation of the compensation fund in reducing the number would be more than would enable them to set up a sinking fund. The additional value which would be given to the house by the reduction in the number of his competitors would more than enable him to set up a sinking fund, and supply the levy to the compensation fund. The position was really this. Say that fourteen years time notice were given, and that at the end of that time they resumed absolute possession of the licence; but they wanted to get rid of some licences in the meantime, and, therefore, they called on the licensees to make a contribution to the fund. The House had been told that at the end of the time the licensee would get nothing if the licence should not be renewed. It should be remembered that during the fourteen years he had what he paid for. He had the security that his licence would not be taken away without compensation, and he had the advantage of the improvement in trade by the removal of competitors. The hon. Member had never been able to reconcile the position of the Government on this matter with the proposal made with regard to new licences. If seven years were sufficient as a maximum to give to new licence-holders to enable them to recoup themselves the cost for alteration of buildings, for fittings, and all that kind of thing, and if, as the Bill provided, the new licensees were to pay a very much larger sum for their licences, why in the world was perpetuity required for the old licences, every one of which that would be abolished had had a long way more than seven years existence. Nobody would imagine that the licences taken away by the reduction process
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  would be recent ones. But they were to have perpetuity in the future, though paving a much smaller sum than the new licences. The whole position seemed to him unreasonable, and he submitted that the new proposal of the Government destroyed the logical consistency of their contention against the time limit. While he was one of those who were willing to consent to some form of compensation, he held that there was no right to perpetuity. There was no legal right in the licence of any kind. There was an expectation. but however they might define it, he maintained that it was something less than a perpetual freehold. The fact that there was a levy on the trade proved that it was something less than a perpetual freehold, and, therefore, he thought that could be met by a time limit. The Bill had never been discussed. The Solicitor-General had said that the details were discussed ad nauseam. One important point which had never been discussed was the basis of the amount to be paid for compensation. He defied anybody to give n definition of that phrase. The division of the compensation between owner and tenant, the payment of the levy, and the two schedules were matters that had never been discussed at all. The second schedule was entirely new and not a word of explanation of it had been forthcoming from the Government. This Bill was not a compensation Bill. The object of the Bill was to fetter the action of the magistrates. The hon. Member for Salford. when he described the genesis of the Bill. did not talk of compensation. It was a Bill to deal with benches of prejudiced magistrates.
  MR. GROVESwas understood to say that the action of the magistrates in refusing renewals had reached an acute stage.
  MR. WHITTAKERsaid the acute stage was that eleven licences had been got rid of on the ground that, they were not required. They were told that the Bill would bring about a great reduction in the number of licences. It was not brought, in in response to any pressure of that kind. The pressure that brought in the Bill was the deputation from the brewers for protection against the benches

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  of magistrates. The Government did not believe in reduction. They did not attach any value to it. They did not think any evil resulted from temptation. The Prime Minister poured out the vials of his wrath on criminal self-indulgence. Then why in the world had they any licensing laws at all? Why not let pubic-houses remain open all night? Why interfere with gambling-hells at all to protect anybody from temptation? He thought another Prime Minister in this House adopted a sounder doctrine and took a higher moral tone when he said it was the duty of the Legislature to make it easy to do right and difficult to do wrong. There were some persons concerned beyond the mere victims of intemperance. There were the wives and children who suffered. Had Parliament no duty towards them? This Bill had been forced through the House indecently and needlessly by a majority which was only held together by the fear of a general election. They knew their fate. They knew what was before them when they went to the country. The split in the Party on the fiscal question placed them at the mercy of the brewers. The brewers saw their opportunity and ever since that occurred, as had been said by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose, they held their office on a servile tenure, and the wages of ignominy was contempt. They were sacrificing the interests of the people to those of a trade, and it would be as disastrous to them as it would be discreditable.
  MR. PIKE PEASEsaid the hon. Member for the Spen Valley Division had quoted a statement which was made by Mr. Gladstone with reference to the duty of the Legislature. He should like to give a quotation from Mr. Gladstone with reference to compensation to publicans. Mr. Gladstone, speaking in the House of Commons in 1880 on Sir Wilfred Lawson's temperance Motion, used these words—
  "I should have been better pleased with it if it had included some reference to the principle of equitable compensation. I want a frank recognition of the principle that we are not to deny to publicans as a class the benefits of equal treatment. Considering the legislative title they have acquired, and the recognition
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  of their position for a long series of years, they ought not to be placed at a disadvantage on account of the particular impression we may entertain as to the mischiefs caused by the licensing system as now carried on."
  MR. WHITTAKER: Quote what he said in 1888.
  MR. PIKE PEASEsaid an hon. Member who spoke earlier in the debate did not admit that the money which was going to be paid to the insurance fund was coming from the trade. The hon. Member who had just sat down admitted that it did come from the trade. He thought some hon. Members opposite did not realise that many supporters of the Government honestly believed that this measure was a great temperance reform. Many of them had spent a considerable amount of time in dealing with the question of temperance and had very strong feelings in regard to it. One of the greatest evils in connection with drink was the custom of "treating."
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Hear, hear!
  MR. PIKE PEASEsaid three or four men would go into a public-house, and perhaps they did not want more than one drink, but they had three or four before coming out. Mr. Gladstone was not the only great figure in the Liberal political arena who had been in favour of compensation. Mr. Bright was also in favour of it. Speaking at Birmingham in 1880 he said—
  "It would be unjust to close these houses without compensation. I could not agree to the proposition. I should say that if the magistrates close public-houses on other grounds then their infringement of the law, as a matter of course fair compensation should be paid to those so dealt with."
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Berwick said the other day that if this Bill were passed it meant good-bye to temperance reform in England. He thought the right lion. Gentleman had hopes that in the future there might be sunday closing, and other measures which he believed were true temperance reforms. He himself could not see that this Bill, dealing with the question of compensation, was likely to prevent some of those

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  reforms which the right hon. Gentleman thought the nation required. Shortly afterwards the right hon. Gentleman said that on account of the guillotine it would be the duty of the next Liberal Government to put back the clock and alter this measure. Even on his own showing, therefore, if the measure was passed into law there would be a chance of temperance reform. The question of the alteration of the power of the magistrates was of very little importance indeed. It appeared to him that under this measure there would, in the future, be the same power exercised as there had been in the past, the only difference being that the appeal would come from the aggrieved party instead of from the trade. It was stated in a recent letter to The Times that the Government were handing over an enormous amount of money to the trade itself, and giving it a vested interest. He was one of those who at first was inclined to go in for a time limit. He thought if the hon. Member for the Spen Valley Division would look at a paragraph which appeared in The Times the other day on Stocks and Shares, he would see that in the vast majority of instances brewery shares, from 2nd January, 1903, to 19th July, this year, had fallen very remarkably.
  MR. WHITTAKER: So have all others.
  MR. PIKE PEASEsaid it was perfectly true that a good many others had fallen, but if the enormous amount were being handed over to the trade that was alleged the shares would have risen. He believed the Bill would do a great deal towards reducing licences, and that the average amount of compensation would not be more than £500. Though hon. Members opposite did not appreciate the measure at the present time he hoped they might be led to do so in years to come.
  MR. CROOKSsaid he wished to take the opportunity while the Prime Minister was in the House to say a few words on the question of temptation, because the impression left on his mind by the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman was that every man who indulged in drink was capable of taking care
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  of himself, and refusing to drink altogether if he were so inclined. He held that there were thousands of our fellow-countrymen and countrywomen who could not resist temptation, and who, when the opportunity was put in their way, were incapable of standing up against it. If everyone had the moral fibre and character of the Prime Minister there would be very little need for a measure of temperance reform at all. Those hon. Members who attended prayers at the opening of the proceedings of the House listened to the words, "Lead us not into temptation." He asked the Prime Minister whether he had thought of the thousands of people in the United Kingdom who were chargeable to the rates because they were in asylums. Were they there because they were capable of looking after themselves? No, it was because temptation was too much for them, and did that not involve an obligation to take temptation out of their way? There was no assurance that by this Bill they would get rid of a single licence. The circumstances under which the measure had been brought in reminded him of one of Æsop's fables. The lion, the fox, and the ass went hunting, and the ass, being asked to divide the spoil, apportioned it in three equal parts. The lion, which was the brewer in this case, was so angry with this distribution that he fell upon the ass and killed him. He then tarried to the fox, which was the Government, and asked him to make the division. The fox put the whole in one heap and placed the donkey on the top. "Where," said the lion "did you learn to make such a just division?" "From the fate of my poor friend on the top," replied the fox. The Government had not the moral courage to stand up against the people with whom they had been associated, people who had brought them nothing but disgrace. To introduce a Bill like this and call it a temperance measure was playing it low down with the intelligence of the British public. The speech made by the Solicitor-General to-day was worthy of a better cause. Fancy exercising his great talent to defend a thing like this Bill, which was called a temperance reform measure! The Bill was designed solely in the brewers' interest. Supposing a man with £500 wished to take the "Pig and Lion." The brewer would say the value was £5,000, and would ask the applicant

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  to sign an agreement to pay 5 per cent. on a loan of £4,500. It was true that for assessment purposes the house was valued at only £1,000, and he maintained that that ought to be the value for compensation purposes. But the chances were that the Inland Revenue, in fixing the amount of compensation, would take half the brewer's valuation, or £2,500. In that case what was to prevent the brewer from Commencing an action for the recovery of the other half, which was covered by the agreement signed by the tenant? This Bill was almost as delightful a Bill for the lawyer as the Workmen's Compensation Act, under which it was thought, when first introduced, that all that was necessary for a workman to do was to put a penny in the slot to get compensation. A better Bill than this could be framed in any workmen's club. This was a Bill for the endowment of the brewers, and to make the men in the public-houses bigger slaves than ever. It was said that if they had one firm supplying all the houses in the district the beer would be of a better quality. In a free house if the beer supplied by the brewer was flat it was returned; but the man in the tied house dared not send it back. He hail to work it off on the public somehow, although the beer was so sharp as to give one the belly-ache to look at it. The public had to suffer in consequence. Really and honestly there were hundreds of houses belonging to brewers which were not worth keeping open, but were run at a positive loss. These houses were used as a confidence trick for taking advantage of a saving man. No matter how bad trade was, the brewers could always get people ready and willing to take these houses. They could always get men who thought that if only they had a licensed house, they would get paradise; but too often, when they did get it, they found it was hell. This Bill did not remove in the slightest degree the temptation of drink from a weak, erring brother or sister's way. He maintained that the time of the House had been wasted on this Bill, when it have been used to better purpose in doing something for the hundreds of thousands of poor people who were living under conditions of which they should be ashamed. He deeply re-
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  gretted that Gentlemen on the Treasury Bench had not devoted their abilty and their energy to doing something which would benefit the poor of the country, instead of passing a measure to make the rich brewer richer, and the poor poorer.
  MR. TALBOTsaid that the hon. Member who had just sat down had allowed his enthusiasm to run away with him in his arguments about temptation. The hon. Gentleman was associated with those who maintained that this Bill was being passed in the interests of a single trade. That was an assumption which had been audaciously made even by people in high position, and had come to be believed. He had no connection with the brewery trade, nor had his constituents; indeed, the great bulk of them were not on the brewer's side, but on the other side. He deliberately said that this Bill was really the first honest attempt that had ever been made by the House of Commons to move out of the way of the working classes, whom the hon. Gentleman opposite represented in a great measure, a great source of temptation. He insisted that it was the duty of Parliament to remove, as far as it could be done without injustice, any temptation from those who had not the courage to resist it. One of these temptations was the redundancy of public-houses. The right hon. Gentleman opposite had denounced the Bill, but what had his friends ever done to remove this great temptation to drink? This Bill was an honest attempt to diminish the number of public-houses, but what alternative proposal had hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite to offer? Whether the Government happened to be at the present moment in high, or low water, he cared not; his contention was that they were doing a great public benefit for the time being. He supported that by the argument of the hon. Member for Spen Valley, who absorbed so much of the time of the House. That hon. Gentleman said that with all their efforts and attacks upon the trade, only seventy licences in the whole of England and Wales had been refused on the ground of non-requirement; and that after appeals had been considered, only eleven licences that dared to face an appeal had

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  been refused. Therefore the hon. Gentleman out of his own mouth admitted that the present system had absolutely failed. The reason why it had failed, and why the discretion of the local justices was to be interfered with, was that these local justices, as a body, had said they would not remove a licence, the removal of which would be an injury to an individual. The hon. Member for Woolwich appeared to think that the magistrates in quarter session, or petty sessions, would not take any advantage of this Bill; but that was an imaginary danger which he was sure would not be realised. He believed that a very determined effort would be made by the magistrates to take full advantage of the powers given them under this Bill. He sympathised with much that had been said as to the unsatisfactory way in which the latter part of the Bill had been considered by the House. The Leader of the Opposition made a sensational remark about its being a farce. They could estimate that remark at its proper valuation. If the Opposition had discussed the Bill in its initial stages in the way in which they had discussed it since the closure was applied, there would have been no closure. Anyone who looked at the Order book would see that the enormous number of irrelevant Amendments put down to the first clauses of the Bill made it clear to the Government that if they wished to deal with this question at all they must deal with it under conditions which he admitted were deplorable. For those deplorable conditions it was the Opposition and not the Government that were responsible.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I do not know that the right hon. Gentleman has made much of a case for the Government in regard to the guillotine. He says these Amendments were all irrelevant. If they were, Mr. Speaker would not have allowed them, and they would not have occupied a moment of the time of the House. It is a poor compliment to the intelligence of the right hon. Gentleman and the Government to suggest that they could not distinguish between the good and pertinent Amendments, which were few, and the iterated Amendments which arise from the fact of the same
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  idea occurring to half-a-dozen Members with reference to the same point and therefore the same Amendment occurring in different places with reference to the same point. The right hon. Gentleman and the Government cannot get over the fact stated by my right hon. friend who moved the rejection of the Bill to-day, that as a result of the manner in which the Government have controlled the discussion—if discussion it can be called—that four-fifths of the Bill have never been discussed at all, either in Committee or on Report, and of the part of the Bill which has not been discussed a half consists of Amendments put into the Bill by the Government which there has never been an opportunity even of being fairly considered by the House. I suppose we are now seeing, I hope we are seeing, for this session the last of this remarkable Bill, but we are not hearing the last of it, for I fear that both in visible and audible form we shall have it put before us again year after year until it has been completely altered from its present shape. It will be like what is supposed to happen in actual life—I cannot say I am much of a believer in that respect—that just as the ghost of some misdoer is supposed to haunt the locality in which his misdeeds were committed, I am afraid this Bill will haunt the House for years to come, until an effort has been made by Parliament, with the approval of the country, to modify the vices which it contains and to develop and extend what modicum of good it may be found to have within itself. The Bill makes the most revolutionary changes in the system of licensing which has prevailed in this country for 300 or 400 years. It affects the procedure in licensing and makes other alterations which must deeply affect the welfare of the community.
  The Bill making such revolutionary changes was introduced without any semblance of authority from the country, and persisted in against a great movement of resentment and indignation, which has swelled and increased from week to week as the country realised better the true scope and purpose of the Bill. And, lastly, it has been forced through the House by the suppression of discussion. We inquire very naturally what is this

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  Bill which has been so introduced and so dragged through the House? The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-General, to whose speech I listened with admiration and a certain degree of amusement—proper and respectful amusement—and who has earned our thanks and admiration throughout the course of these discussions, not only by the manner in which he has treated the House and conducted the case placed in his hands, but also by the skill and completeness with which he had evidently mastered what must evidently have been to him a new language—the right hon. and learned Gentleman seemed determined to make out a tremendously strong case for the Bill, and he indulged in the process, which is often very effective, of over-trumping your opponent's cards. He took all the cards in which he found we were attacking the Bill, and he claimed for the Bill every possible excellence in respect of these particular points. It was a temperance Bill! [OPPOSITION ironical laughter and MINISTERIAL, cheers.] Yes, we have heard over and over again that it was a temperance Bill. It has two objects. One is the reduction of licences, the other was for subsidiary purposes which were of comparatively slight consequence. The real object of this legislation, from beginning to end, was the reduction of licences! Compensation was not the essence of the Bill, according to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that another way of dealing with the difficulty would be by fixing a certain time during which the licensee would not be disturbed. There might be, said the right hon. and learned Gentleman, a good deal to be said for that. But the main thing he dwelt upon was that that could not be combined in this Bill, which was a Bill of compensation. A time limit by itself, compensation by itself, or insurance by itself might, according to the right hon. and learned Gentleman, be arguable and defensible methods of dealing with the difficulty, but not all in this Bill. This is a Bill which, according to the right hon. and learned Gentleman's view, is for the reduction of licences, and it was introduced because, in the opinion of the brewers and the Prime Minister, the licences were being reduced faster than necessary. We cannot forget that. Why does the right hon.
  146
  Gentleman condescend to speak to us in this way? We cannot forget the deputation that came to the Prime Minister last year. We cannot forget what they said to him and what he said to them—the pledges with which he met their demands in redemption of which this Bill has been introduced. We remember the speech of the hon. Member for South Derbyshire at the dinner of the Manchester and Salford Licence Victuallers' Association, in which he congratulated the trade on being
  "In a better position to fight their cause than ever before, for they had recently gained a most important ally to their cause. They would remember the deputation which Waited on the Prime Minister during the last session of Parliament to put the ease for compensation before him, and the response of the Prime Minister was in every respect satisfactory, and that the Government of the day were pledged up to the hilt to deal with their case in the coming session."
  [MINISTERIAL cheers.] Hon. Members opposite endorse that view. I am glad to have them on my side, because I was saying that that was the origin of the Bill, and all the talk about this being a temperance Bill and a Bill for the reduction of licences is an afterthought brought in to cover the original and underlying and essential intentions of the Bill. If the intention and purpose of the Government was really to reduce licences. why did not they set about it in a more direct way? Why did not they lay down a rule by statute prescribing the number of licences that must not be exceeded in different classes of the community? Why did not they bring the licensing authority into closer touch with the people concerned, and give the people a more direct voice even than they have at present in settling a matter so vitally concerning their comfort and wellbeing, instead of removing the licensing authority further and further away from the influence of local opinion? If they had done that, we should have viewed in a very different spirit anything they proposed by way of easing the process by a system of insurance. That is what I said in my election address, which has been quoted to-day. I never advocated anything like this measure. I said—
  "Let us reduce licences; let us have a general system of compensatory reduction broughout the country."

  147
  What I recommended was the main lines of the Minority Report of Lord Peel's Commission. If that implies a favourable view of the Government measure, I would ask is that the opinion of Lord Peel, or of the member of Spen Valley, or any other Member for that minority? The Solicitor-General, not content with showing to his own satisfaction that this was a temperance Bill for the reduction of licences, devoted himself to proving that it was also a Bill for extending and increasing the powers of the local magistrates. He takes the bull by the horns. The Prime Minister associates the claim of the brewers with the principles of eternal justice. But by whom is this Bill demanded? Is it demanded by any of the great bodies who are likely to have an authoritative voice on the subject—by the licensing authorities, temperance workers, or the local councils? I have not heard a single bench of magistrates or of any local authority or temperance society petitioning for this Bill. As far as I have seen the latest returns, petitions against it have been signed by 380,462 signatures, and for it there have, been two petitions with 285 signatures But there have been on the other side strongly-worded remonstrances and trenchant criticisms from magistrates, and an unbroken volume of dissent from all people who are keenly interested in the cause of temperance. Reference has been made to the fact that the Prime Minister, who had a memorable interview with the brewers, has actually declined to receive a deputation representing the Manchester magistrates. He sees the brewers and invokes eternal justice on their behalf, but the magistrates are beyond the pale; the magistrates have been guilty of rash conduct and have offended against justice by seeking to carry out their plain duty.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: When did this happen?
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: It is a matter which has been published in the newspapers. I do not know when it is supposed to have happened. I read it in the newspapers. Then the right hon. Gentleman has never been asked by the magistrates of Manchester, headed by the Lord Mayor, to receive them on this subject and has never refused?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not remember it.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I am glad to hear it. I withdraw at once that part of my allegation. It did seem to me rather strange.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Was it this year?
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: Yes.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: After the Bill was introduced?
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: Yes. Then the right hon. Gentleman does not dispute it? I admit that the right hon. Gentleman has so many applications of this kind that he may very well forget at the moment, but it was a significant application to be made to him, and I should have thought that it must have remained in his memory. All the claims put forward for the Bill, that its one object and tendency is to promote temperance, is dust thrown in our eyes which shall prevent us from seeing the truth. The principle of this Bill is the conversion of a year-to-year concession into a perpetual freehold. That is at the root of it. It involves the final alienation of the right of the public to control the liquor trade, to define the conditions under which it is to be exercised. For that statement I appeal to the hon. Member for South Derbyshire, who speaks with great candour. He says that the Bill lays down the great principle that a licensed owner's property is his own. Unfortunately it is not his own property; it is the property of the community. The whole point turns upon that; but it is a refreshing acknowledgment on the part of the principal advocates of the measure that this is the main principle of the Bill. That being the main principle of the Bill, there is no question of our attitude. I found it to be my duty when the Bill was introduced to meet it with a maledictory welcome, and now as it is parting from us I have to say that no compromise which involves that principle can be accepted by us. Sooner or later, and probably soon rather than late, as

  149
  opportunity may offer, we shall not be content until some strong steps have been taken to remedy the evil that is in the Bill and to modify what we believe to be the injury that it will inflict on the people.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The right hon. Gentleman in his last words uttered a statement with perfect accuracy when he said that he received the Bill on its first introduction with a maledictory address. It is true, but I think that not one of the numerous hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House had the smallest conception of what the nature of the Bill was going to be.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: The Home Secretary explained it.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Having not the smallest conception of what the Bill was going to be, the right hon. Gentleman and his friends came down admirably armed cap-à-pie to deal with a Bill framed on entirely different lines. Some, including no doubt the right hon. Gentleman, altered their speeches so as to make them decently applicable to the exposition made of it by the Home Secretary. Others were not so fortunate. But the question to which he has recalled my memory is only useful because it shows, that this Bill has been met with prejudice from the first. Through every stage of it hon. Members opposite have been occupied more in finding out what evils it might be supposed to contain than in making any fair acknowledgment of the great merits which, even on their own principles, it can be shown to demonstration to possess. The right hon. Gentleman would have been violating the invariable tradition of every
  150
  speaker on the other side of the House if he had not dragged in again the old friend the deputation from the trade, not of the brewers, to me last year, and if he had not based upon it, in language which was courteous in form but not complimentary in substance, the accusation that in framing this Bill we were animated solely by the desire of pleasing a particular class at the cost of the public. Wealth in the attribution of motives is a great qualification of some hon. Members opposite, and we have had some most remarkable instances in these debates. There is no principle of this Bill which I have not advocated through the whole of my political life. I have always desired temperance reform. I have always said that a publican dispossessed of his licence through no fault of his own should be compensated. Those are the two principles of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman seemed to think that I was converted to the principle of compensation or solatium or consideration—I forget the wealth of alternative epithets suggested by the deputation from the trade. If this Bill is in accordance with the principle which I held before the deputation came to me, why all this talk about it? if these are not merely the views of my constituents, but the traditional principles of the Party to which. I belong, why is it suddenly supposed that I should be converted by a nefarious electoral interest in the adoption of a Bill which, after all, only carries into effect the opinions which I have long expressed in public and private? I am not the least ashamed either of having received that deputation or to have said what I did say. I refreshed my memory the other day by reading the speech I made. With every word of it I agree this day, and there is not a single syllable that I see any cause

  151
  to withdraw. For my own part shall always think it a proud moment in my life if I am able to do anything for any interest, be it what it may, to preserve it from unjust attack. I do not share the view of hon. Members opposite that the brewer and the publican are outside the pale of ordinary citizenship, that they are to be subjected to principles which you would not think of applying to any other class of the community. The hon. Member for Spell Valley and the hon. Member for Woolwich have taken up a phrase which let drop in the earlier speeches on the Bill to the effect that in my judgment the principal criminal in connection with the evils of drink was the man who criminally yielded to temptation. Of course I never meant to suggest by that that we should not do what we can to diminish temptation.
  MR. CROOKS: That is better.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Ah! yes; but I venture respectfully to repeat my remarks. I think that a great laxity is introduced into our notions of morality if we habitually transfer the gravamen of the crime from the man who commits it to the man who tempts it. It is not sound, it is bad morality; and I have never withdrawn in the smallest degree from the position I have laid down, which I believe to be fundamentally connected with all that is virile in citizenship and sound in private morality. Of course these are deplorable and criminal cases where the publican in attempting to drive a better trade gives deliberate temptations to a man to drink; but the publican as an individual is not responsible for the mere fact that he has a place where alcohol is sold and some man comes in and buys it. It is not fair to charge
  152
  him with faults of which he is not guilty, unless you hold the view that liquor is so abominable a thing in itself that the man who has anything to do with it is really exercising an illegitimate trade. It is not our view. The hon. Member for Spen Valley would not try to stop the manufacture or the sale of alcohol. He dare not. As long as the manufacture and the sale are legal, put such restrictions as you can upon it which you think will prevent temptation, but will give the legitimate consumer a fair opportunity of exercising what he has a right to do, and do not attack the morals or the property of a man who is carrying on what you must yourself admit to be a legitimate trade. The perverted moral view to which. I have referred is the parent of the fallacy, which crops up again and again through these debates—namely, that nothing can be good for temperance which is not bad for the brewer and the publican, and that everything which is bad for the brewer and the publican must be good for temperance. Hon. Gentleman seem to think that they do the great cause of temperance a service when they are doing something to injure the trade.
  MR. WHITTAKER: Nonsense! Rubbish!
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Member interrupts me in a not very civil way, and he will permit me to say that I have listened in a solute patience to at least ten long speeches from him in which he has accused me individually of being the slave of a particular interest. Let him, then, listen to me with patience when I make this very moderate and modest retort. The right hon. Gentleman opposite has perpetrated for the hundredth time the gross fallacy that

  153
  this Bill creates a freehold. It does not create a freehold. I am sure that if the right hon. Gentleman would give his attention to what that statement involves he will see that it cannot be so, and the mere fact that the interest does not come to an end does not constitute a freehold. You can have a permanent interest which is much less than a freehold. All that this Bill does is to recognise the interest in existing licences until that interest is extinguished by fair compensation. As it is the last time that the general principle of this Bill can be discussed in this House, I will make three observations. Can any Gentleman opposite mention a single Bill which has been passed, either by his own Party or by any other Party, winch does provide in a practical fashion, as this Bill does, for the diminution of licences? They cannot. Can they mention a single Bill introduced but not passed which they think would deal more equitably with this situation? At any rate, the name of the Bill is not on the tip of their tongue. [An HON. MEMBER: Sir William Harcourt's Bill.] Oh, that is the equitable method—local veto without even the compensation which the right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Opposition Bench think ought to be given in the form either of "a solatium" or "a consideration." I ask another question. The freehold tenure of the beerhouses has been in operation now for more than a generation. Can anyone suggest the name of a Bill which would have dealt with these houses, or a Bill which has even tried to deal with them? Can anyone deny that this Bill does deal with them? This Bill provides the funds for dealing both with the beerhouses and with the ordinary licensed houses. We have had extraordinary divisions of opinion on the other side as to who pays for those funds. The Opposition Front Bench thinks they are
  154
  paid by the public. The hon. Member for Spen Valley thinks they are paid by the licence-holders. That difference runs to the root of all temperance reform, and it is one they will have to reconcile before they set to work to carry out that Amendment of this Bill which they have promised us. It is truly astonishing to find in one speech, as in that of the right hon. Gentleman, first the statement that we have created a perpetual interest with which Parliament would never meddle, and then the statement that the first thing Gentlemen opposite mean to do when they come in is to remodel this Bill. I do not know which to accept, but I rather think both are false. I am sure the power of Parliament is not checked or throttled in the direction Of legitimate licensing reform by this Bill; and I am tolerably certain that this Bill will not be fundamentally altered by hon. Gentlemen opposite when the responsibility of dealing with it is thrown upon them.
  One more question I will put. Has any measure ever been introduced into Parliament within the recollection of living men or within the recollection of history which endeavoured to put future licences upon a reasonable ground? The same mournful silence as when I asked the other questions! If this Bill does, as is admitted, deal with all the four great problems that I have mentioned, is it not folly to say that it is one that should be resisted as they have resisted it, and one which the true temperance reformer ought to regard as other than a great help in the cause to which he has devoted himself? I am aware that great prejudice exists on this subject, and that the debates in this House, or many of the speeches in those debates, have done everything to increase that prejudice; but I am perfectly convinced that when the Bill is working, and

  155
  when it is seen that by this Bill, and by this Bill alone, you can without gross injustice and discontent really diminish the number of licences in this country, all parties, forgetting the differences which have unhappily divided us for the last three months, will admit that this is the
  greatest contribution ever made to the cause of temperance reform.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes, 217; Noes, 129. (Division List No. 289.)

  AYES.

  Agnew, Sir Andrew Noel

  Cust, Henry John C.

  Kenyon, Hn. Geo. T.(Denbigh)

  Anson, Sir William Reynell

  Davenport, William Bromley-

  Keswick, William

  Arnold-Forster, Rt. Hn. Hugh O

  Devlin, Joseph (Kilkenny, N.)

  Eimber, Sir Henry

  Arrol, Sir William

  Dickson, Charles Scott

  King, Sir Henry Seymour

  Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John

  Disraeli, Coningsby Ralph

  Knowles, Sir Lees

  Aubrey-Fletcher, Rt. Hn. Sir H.

  Dixon-Hartland, Sir Fred Dixon

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow)

  Bagot, Capt. Josceline FitzRoy

  Doogan, P. C.

  Lawrence, Wm. F. (Liverpool)

  Bailey, James (Walworth)

  Dorington, Rt. Hn. Sir John E.

  Lee, A. H. (Hants., Fareham)

  Bain, Colonel James Robert

  Doughty, Sir George

  Lees, Sir Elliott (Birkenhead)

  Balcarres, Lord

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage

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

  Duke, Henry Edward

  Lockwood, Lieut.-Col. A. R.

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

  Durning-Lawrence, Sir Edwin

  Long, Rt. Hn. Walter (Bristol, S.)

  Balfour, Kenneth R. (Christch.

  Faber, Edmund B.(Hants, W.)

  Lowther, C. (Cumb., Eskdale)

  Banbury, Sir Frederick George

  Farrell, James Patrick

  Loyd, Archie Kirkman

  Beckett, Ernest William

  Ferguson, Rt. Hn. Sir J. (Manc'r

  Lucas, Reginald J.(Portsmouth

  Bhownaggree, Sir M. M.

  Finch, Rt. Hon. George H.

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne

  Macdona, John Cumming

  Bigwood, James

  Fisher, William Hayes

  Maconochie, A. W.

  Bill, Charles

  Fison, Frederick William

  M'Arthur, Charles (Liverpool)

  Bingham, Lord

  FitzGerald, Sir Robert Penrose-

  M'Hugh, Patrick A.

  Blundell, Colonel Henry

  Fitzroy, Hn. Edward Algernon

  M'Iver, Sir Lewis(Edinburgh,W

  Bond, Edward

  Flannery, Sir Fortescue

  M'Kean, John

  Boscawen, Arthur Griffith-

  Flower Sir Ernest

  M'Killop, W. (Sligo, North)

  Boulnois, Edmund

  Forster, Henry William

  Manners, Lord Cecil

  Bousfield, William Robert

  Gardner, Ernest

  Massey-Mainwaring, Hn. W. F.

  Bowles, T. Gibson (King's Lynn

  Garfit, William

  Maxwell, RtHn. Sir H. E (Wigt'n

  Brassey, Albert

  Gordon, Maj. E. (T'r Hamlets)

  Melville, Beresford Valentine

  Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John

  Gore, Hon. S. F. Ormsby-

  Meysey-Thompson, Sir H. M.

  Bull, William James

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  Molesworth, Sir Lewis

  Burke, E. Haviland-

  Gray, Ernest (West Ham)

  Montagu, G. (Huntingdon)

  Butcher, John George

  Greene, Henry D. (Shrewsbury)

  Moon, Edward Robert Pacy

  Campbell, John (Armagh, S.)

  Greene, W. Raymond (Cambs.)

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edw. H.

  Gretton, John

  Morrell, George Herbert

  Cautley, Henry Strother

  Greville, Hon. Ronald

  Morton, Arthur H. Aylmer

  Cavendish, V.C.W. (Derbyshire

  Groves. James Grimble

  Murray, Rt. Hon. A. C. (Bute)

  Cayzer, Sir Charles William

  Hall, Edward Marshall

  Murray, Charles J. (Coventry)

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Halsey, Rt. Hon. Thomas F.

  Murray, Col. Wyndham (Bath)

  Cecil, Lord Hugh (Greenwich)

  Hamilton, Marg. of (L'nd'nderry

  Nannetti, Joseph P.

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J.A (Worc.

  Hare, Thomas Leigh

  Nicholson, William Graham

  Chamberlayne, T. (S'thampton)

  Harris, F. Leverton (Tynem'th)

  Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South)

  Chapman, Edward

  Harris, Dr. Fredk. R. (Dulwich)

  O'Brien, K. (Tipperary, Mid.)

  Clancy, John Joseph

  Haslett, Sir James Horner

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  Clare, Octavius Leigh

  Hayden, John Patrick

  O'Brien, P. J. (Tipperary, N.)

  Coates, Edward Feetham

  Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert T.

  O'Connor, James (Wicklow, W.)

  Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E.

  Hoare, Sir Samuel

  O'Dowd, John

  Coghill, Douglas Harry

  Hogg, Lindsay

  O'Malley, William

  Cohen, Benjamin Louis

  Hope, J.F.(Sheffield, Brightside

  Palmer, Sir Walter (Salisbury)

  Colomb, Rt. Hon. Sir John C.R.

  Horner, Frederick William

  Parker, Sir Gilbert

  Colston, Chas. Edw. H. Athole

  Houston, Robert Paterson

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington

  Cox, Irwin Edward Bainbridge

  Howard, Jn. (Kent, Faversham

  Peel, Hn. Wm. Robert Wellesley

  Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.)

  Howard, J. (Midd., Tottenham)

  Percy, Earl

  Cripps, Charles Alfred

  Hozier, Hn. James Henry Cecil

  Pierpoint, Robert

  Cross, Herb. Shepherd (Bolton)

  Hudson, George Bickersteth

  Platt-Higgins, Frederick

  Crossley, Rt. Hon. Sir Savile

  Hunt, Rowland

  Pretyman, Ernest George

  Cabitt, Hon. Henry

  Jeffreys, Rt. Ron. Arthur Fred.

  Pryce-Jones, Lt.-Col. Edward

  Cullinan, J.

  Jessel, Captain Herbert Merton

  Pym, C. Guy

  Randles, John S.

  Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

  Warde, Colonel C. E.

  Reid, James (Greenock)

  Skewes-Cox, Thomas

  Webb, Colonel William George

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Smith, Abel H.(Hertford,East)

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

  Ridley, Ron. M.W. (Stalybridge

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

  Wentworth, Bruce C. Vernon

  Roberts, Samuel (Sheffield)

  Stanley, Edward Jas.(Somerset

  Whiteley, H.(Ashton und.Lyne

  Robertson, Herbert (Hackney)

  Stanley, Rt. Hon. Lord(Lancs.)

  Whitmore, Charles Algernon

  Robinson, Brooke

  Stone, Sir Benjamin

  Wilson, A. Stanley (York, E.R.

  Rolleston, Sir John F. L.

  Stroyan, John

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

  Rollit, Sir Albert Kaye

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Worsley-Taylor, Henry Wilson

  Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert

  Talbot, Rt.Hn.J.G(Oxf'd Univ.

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

  Round, Rt. Hon. James

  Thornton, Percy M.

  Wrightson, Sir Thomas

  Royds, Clement Molyneux

  Tomlinson, Sir Wm. Edw. M.

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

  Tuff, Charles

  Yerburgh, Robert Armstrong

  Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

  Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward

  Sackville, Col. S. G. Stopford-

  Tuke, Sir John Batty

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Sir Alexander Acland-Hood and Mr. Ailwyn Fellowes.

  Sadler, Col. Samuel Alexander

  Tully, Jasper

  Sandys, Lieut.-Col. Thos.Myles

  Valentia, Viscount

  Sharpe, William Edward T.

  Vincent, Sir Edgar (Exeter)

  NOES.

  Abraham, William (Rhondda)

  Grant, Corrie

  Rea, Russell

  Asher, Alexander

  Griffith, Ellis J.

  Reid, Sir R. Threshie(Dumfries

  Ashton, Thomas Gair

  Guest, Hon. Ivor Churchill

  Rickett, J. Compton

  Asquith, Rt. Hn. Herbert Henry

  Gurdon, Sir W. Brampton

  Roberts, John Bryn (Eifion)

  Atherley-Jones, L.

  Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

  Roberts, John H. (Denbighs.)

  Bell, Richard

  Harwood, George

  Robertson, Edmund (Dundee)

  Benn, John Williams

  Hayter, Rt. Hon. Sir Arthur D.

  Robson, William Snowdon

  Blake, Edward

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Bolton, Thomas Dolling

  Hemphill, Rt. Hon. Charles H.

  Rose, Charles Day

  Brigg, John

  Henderson, Arthur (Durham)

  Runciman, Walter

  Broadhurst, Henry

  Higham, John Sharpe

  Samuel, Herbert L. (Cleveland)

  Brown, George M. (Edinburgh)

  Horniman, Frederick John

  Samuel, S. M. (Whitechapel)

  Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson

  Hutchinson, Dr. Charles Fredk.

  Schwann, Charles E.

  Bryce, Rt. Hon. James

  Jacoby, James Alfred

  Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford)

  Burns, John

  Jones, D. Brynmor (Swansea)

  Shaw, Thomas (Hawick B.)

  Burt, Thomas

  Jones, William (Carnarvonshire

  Shipman, Dr. John G.

  Buxton, Sydney Charles

  Joyce, Michael

  Slack, John Bamford

  Caldwell, James

  Kilbride, Denis

  Sloan, Thomas Henry

  Cameron, Robert

  Labouchere, Henry

  Stanhope, Hon. Philip James

  Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H.

  Lambert, George

  Sullivan, Donal

  Channing, Francis Allston

  Lawson, Sir Wilfrid (Cornwall)

  Tennant, Harold John

  Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

  Layland-Barratt, Francis

  Thomas, D. Alfred (Merthyr)

  Craig, Robert Hunter (Lanark)

  Leese, Sir Jos. F. (Accrington)

  Tomkinson, James

  Cremer, William Randal

  Leigh, Sir Joseph

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Crombie, John William

  Levy, Maurice

  Tritton, Charles Ernest

  Crooks, William

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Ure, Alexander

  Davies, Alfred (Carmarthen)

  Lough, Thomas

  Wallace, Robert

  Delany, William

  Lundon, W.

  Walton, John Lawson(Leeds,S.)

  Devlin, Chas. Ramsay (Galway

  Lyell, Charles Henry

  Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)

  Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

  Wason, Eugene (Clackmannan)

  Donelan, Captain A.

  McKenna, Reginald

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Douglas, Charles M. (Lanark)

  McLaren, Sir Charles Benjamin

  Weir, James Galloway

  Duncan, J. Hastings

  Mansfield, Horace Rendall

  White, Luke (York, E.R.)

  Elibank, Master of

  Mappin, Sir Frederick Thorpe

  Whiteley, George (York, W.R.)

  Ellice, Capt E.C (SAndrw'sBghs

  Mitchell, Edw. (Fermanagh,N.)

  Whitley, J. H. (Halifax

  Emmott, Alfred

  Morley, Rt.Hn. John(Montrose

  Whittaker, Thomas Palmer

  Evans, Sir Fran. H.(Maidstone)

  Moss, Samuel

  Williams, Osmond (Merioneth)

  Eve, Harry Trelawney

  Moulton, John Fletcher

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

  Fenwick, Charles

  Norman, Henry

  Woodhouse,Sir J.T(Huddersf'd

  Ferguson, R. C. Munro (Leith)

  Norton, Capt. Cecil William

  Yoxall, James Henry

  Fitzmaurice, Lord Edmond

  O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

  Flynn, James Christopher

  Paulton, James Mellor

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. Herbert Gladstone and Mr. William M'Arthur.

  Freeman-Thomas, Captain F.

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Goddard, Daniel Ford

  Power, Patrick Joseph

  Question put, and agreed to.
  Adjourned at five minutes before Six o'clock till Monday next.

POST OFFICE BILL.
Considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
Mr. JEFFREYSin the Chair.]
MR. GIBSON BOWLESasked what was the object of the measure.
THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL (LORD STANLEY,)said, as he had previously explained, the object of the Bill was to avoid the present accumulation of poundages in Post Office orders which were not presented within the proper period, and also to make new regulations in reference to embossed stamps. Legislation was necessary; and he had promised to introduce it. The change would be for the benefit of the community generally.
Bill reported, without Amendment.

UNIVERSITY OF LIVERPOOL BILL.
Considered in Committee.
(In the Committee).
Mr. JEFFREYSin the Chair.]
SIR WILLIAM TOMLINSONasked what privileges would the Bill confer.
SIR JOHN BRUNNERsaid that the graduates of the Liverpool University would obtain the same advantages as were enjoyed by the graduates of other Universities in the United Kingdom.
Bill reported, without Amendment.

REGISTRATION OF CLUBS (IRELAND) BILL.
Lords Amendments considered, and agreed to, with an Amendment.
LEEDS UNIVERSITY BILL.
Read a second time, and committed for Monday next-

ADJOURNMENT.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—(Sir A. Acland-Hood.)
SIR FREDERICK BANBURYasked if the Government had any further information in reference to the negotiations with Russia. He also wished to know when there would be a statement in reference to the Bills on the Order Paper, and especially whether the Bishoprics of Southwark and Birmingham Bill would be taken.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY (Sir A. ACLAND-HOOD)said he was not in a position to give the House any further information in regard to the subject of negotiations with the Russian Government. With reference to Bills, a statement would be made on Tuesday by the Prime Minister on the subject.

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS
The LORD CHANCELLOR The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House, That the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificate from the Examiners that no Standing Orders are applicable to the following Bill:—Pier and Harbour Provisional Order (No. 3).
The same was ordered to lie on the Table.
Rotherham Coporation Bill. Reported, with Amendments.
Selby Urban District Council Bill. Reported from the Select Committee, with Amendments.
London County Council (General Powers) Bill. Reported from the Select Committee, with Amendments.
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 13) Bill; Electric Lighting Provisional Orders (No. 8) Bill. Report from the Committee of Selection, That the Lord Emly be proposed to the House
2
as a member of the Select Committee on the said Bills in the place of the Lord Armstrong; read, and agreed to.
Swindon Corporation Bill. Read 3a with the Amendments; further Amendments made; Bill passed and returned to the Commons.
Saddleworth and Springhead Tram, ways Bill. Read 3a, with the Amendment, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
Aberdeen City Improvements Order Confirmation Bill [H.L]. A Bill to confirm a Provisional Order relating to Aberdeen City Improvements—Was presented by the Lord Kintore (E. Kintore); read 1a; to be printed; and (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899), deemed to have been read 2a (the Lord Kintor (E. Kintore)); and reported from the Committee. (No. 168.)
Ayr Corporation Tramways Order Confirmation Bill [H.L.] (No. 169). A Bill to confirm a Provisional Order relating to Ayr Corporation Tramways; and
Glasgow Corporation (Sewage) Order Confirmation Bill [H.L.] (No. 170). A

3
Bill to confirm a Provisional Order relating to Glasgow Corporation (Sewage)—Were presented by the Lord Kintore (E. Kintore) (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, Sections 8 and 9); read la; and to be printed.
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 9) Bill; Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 10) Bill; Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 11) Bill. House in Committee (according to order). Bills reported without Amendment. Standing Committee negatived; and Bills to be read 3a on Monday next.
Pier and Harbour Provisional Orders (No. 2) Bill. House in Committee (according to order). Amendments made. Standing Committee negatived. The Report of Amendments to be received on Monday next.

RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.

  TRADE REPORTS (ANNUAL SERIES).
  No. 3240. United States (Savannah).
  No. 3241. Paraguay.
  No. 3242. Japan (North Formosa).

  IMPERIAL DEFENCE COMMITTEE.
  Treasury Minute, dated 4th May, 1904, as to Secretariat.
  Report by the Board of Trade of their proceedings under the Tramways Act, 1870, during the session of 1904.
  METROPOLITAN GAS COMMITTEE.
  Report of the Departmental Committee appointed to inquire and report as to gas-testing in the Metropolis. Part II. Evidence and Appendices.
  Report of the Astronomer Royal to the Board of Visitors of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich.
  WAGES AND HOURS OF LABOUR, BOARD OF TRADE (LABOUR DEPARTMENT).
  Report on changes in rates of wages and hours of labour in the United Kingdom in 1903; with comparative statistics for 1894–1902.
  STATISTICS.
  Statistical abstract for the principal and other foreign countries in each year from 1892 to 1901–1902 (as far as the particulars can be stated). Thirtieth Number.

  HISTORICAL MANUSCRIPTS (ROYAL COMMISSION).
  Report on American manuscripts in the Royal Institution of Great Britain. Volume I.
  Presented (by Command), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  LUNACY,
  Return to the Lord Chancellor of the number of visits made and the number of patients seen by the several Commissioners in Lunacy during the six months ended the 30th June, 1904.

  POLLING DISTRICTS (COUNTY OF HERTFORD).
  Orders made by the County Council of the county of Hertford, re-dividing into polling districts—
  The Eastern or Hertford Parliamentary Division; The Mid or St. Albans Parliamentary Division.
  Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  FINANCE BILL.
  Brought from the Commons and read 1.
  Standing Order No. XXXIX. considered (according to order).
  Moved, "That the said Standing Order be suspended for this day's sitting."—(The Marquess of Lansdowne.)
  *EARL SPENCER: My Lords, last night I thought it my duty in the very few words I then addressed to the House to protest as strongly as I could against the action of His Majesty's Government in bringing up a Bill of this great importance at so late a period of the session, and in compelling this House, or trying to compel this House, to pass it through all its stages in the course of an hour or two. I said that I should repeat my protest to-day, and I think that this is the proper

  5
  time, when the suspension of the Standing Order is moved, that I should do so. This is not the first time that I have protested against Bills being brought up from the other House for your Lordships' consideration at the very fag end of the session, but the present is one of the greatest scandals in this respect that I can recollect.
  Let me just describe what has occurred. We came here to-day without having any intimation on our Votes that we were to discuss this Bill. We had it foreshadowed in two facts. First, there was the fact that we were to meet at the unusual hour of three o'clock instead of a quarter past four; and, secondly, there was the fact that the Standing Order which prevents the several stages of a Bill being taken the same day was to be suspended. That was the only notice we had on the Votes of the House as to this Bill being brought before your Lordships' House to-day. After our arrival this afternoon we observed some communication going on at the Bar between the Clerk at the Table and a gentleman whom we know represents the House of Commons, and presently a Paper was brought to the Table tied up in green silk. We subsequently learned that this was the Bill which has lately been passed in the House of Commons—the Finance Bill; and, thereupon, the noble Marquess the Leader of the House moved that it be read a first time. Now, my Lords, that is a very strong order indeed. Your Lordships are obliged to discuss a Bill of the greatest national importance without having notice of it on your Votes. Peers who look at their Votes to see what is coming on in your Lordships' House would not know, unless they learned it from another source, that this Bill was to be brought up.
  We all know that we in this House cannot amend a Money Bill, but we have a perfect right to discuss it, and a full right to throw it out if we so will. I need hardly say that I am not going to propose that the Finance Bill should be thrown out, but I do claim the right of this House to discuss a measure of this great importance. Why is it that the Government have taken this course and placed your Lordships in this most undignified position? It is stated that the Bill must become law before 1st August, and there-
  6
  fore, as the House of Commons does not sit to-day later than half-past five or six and does not sit on Saturday. the Government wish your Lordships' House to pass it through all its stages, if possible, within one hour, so that the Commons may be summoned to hear the Royal Assent given to it. I very much doubt the pressing necessity for passing the Bill through your Lordships' House in this hurried manner. I have in my hand a "Manual of Procedure in the Public Business of the House of Commons," prepared by the Clerk of that House, and in Article 239 I find these words—
  "When the Chancellor of the Exchequer has made his annual financial statement, he moves, in Committee of Ways and Means, the Resolutions required for continuing, imposing, remitting, or reducing taxes, or otherwise regulating the collection of the revenue. These Resolutions require confirmation by Parliament, but when any such Resolution is to take effect at once it is, by usage, brought into operation as soon as it has been passed by the Committee of Ways and Means."
  These Resolutions, as a rule, name 1st August as the day to which they refer, but I find that has not always been the practice.
  Though 1st August has been named as the day when the Resolution comes to an end, and when it requires confirmation by Parliament, that has not always been followed by the immediate passing of the Finance Bill. By Section 1 of the Finance Act, 1895, the tea duty was continued till 1st August, 1896. By Section 1 of the Finance Act, 1896, the tea duty was continued from 1st August of that year to 1st August, 1897; but the Finance Act of 1896 did not receive the Royal Assent until 7th August. I would ask His Majesty's Government to explain why, in face of that fact, it is now necessary to force this Bill through by 1st August. I submit that there is no case for such action. If, however, the contention of the Government that the Bill must receive the Royal Assent before 1st August is correct, then I think they are open to very grave censure for not having arranged their business in such a way as to allow of this measure coming before your Lordships at an earlier period, so that we might have proper time to consider it. It certainly strikes me that the system of conducting business in the other House must be exceedingly careless

  7
  when such a thing as that against which I am protesting can happen.
  I would remind your Lordships that it was not always so. In 1894, when the Liberal Government was in power, the Finance Bill was read a first time on 19th July, and a second time on 26th July. It was committed on 27th July, and read a third time on 30th July. And that Bill, it should be remembered, embodied the great system of death duties with which the name of my right hon. friend Sir William Harcourt is so intimately connected. In 1895 the Bill was read a first time on 27th May; the Second Reading was on the 28th and the Royal Assent was given on the 30th. In 1896 the Finance Bill was read a first time on 30th July; it was read a second time and passed through the remaining stages on 4th August without discussion. In 1901 the First Reading was taken on 18th July; it was read a second time and the Committee negatived on 23rd July and the Bill was read a third time on the 25th. In 1902 the Bill was read a first time on 26th June—a much earlier period; the Second Reading was taken on 3rd July, and the Third Reading on 4th July. In 1903 the Bill was read a first time on 25th July, and on 29th July it went through its remaining stages. The Government have managed their affairs in the House of Commons in what I venture to think is an exceedingly slovenly way, and in a way that has placed your Lordships' House in a very difficult and serious position. It is impossible for this House to debate a great measure of this kind in the circumstances in which we stand, and I strongly protest against the suspension of the Standing Order as proposed.
  The LORD CHANCELLOR (The Earl of HALSBURY): My Lords, I sympathise with a great deal that has been said by the noble Earl. It has been the subject of debate more than once that Bills come up from the other House in circumstances which make it impossible for your Lordships to discuss them. I do not feel as strongly as the noble Earl does on this particular occasion, because, although I agree that three stages were taken as a matter of form on the occasions to which he has referred, I doubt whether the noble Earl will find that there was much debate.
  *EARL SPENCER: On one occasion I made a speech of considerable length, and other noble Lords on this side have spoken.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURY: I was speaking of what has been the common practice. On a great many occasions it has been a mere matter of form. I lament it very much, and I think the noble Marquess the Leader of the House will lament it too. There are times when there are great debates in the House of Commons, and it is impossible to hurry them; and it has been with great exertions and at some cost to health that even now this Bill has been brought before your Lordships. I quite understand that if the Resolution had been reserved to a later period the difficulty would not have arisen, but the Resolution limited the period to 1st August.
  *EARL SPENCER: It did the same in 1896.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURY: All I can say is that, apart from that Resolution, I do not know what power there was to collect any taxes whatever after 1st August. That is one of the problems which I confess I cannot solve. If there was no real power to do it, no one knew anything about it, and the taxes were collected in the ordinary course; but they had no right to do it after the determination of that period. That is the condition in which we are, and I think this House is not responsible for it. It is a state of things that does sometimes occur, and I have very often expressed the feelings which the noble Earl has given utterance to on occasions when there really was something to discuss. and when, at the end of the session, we were informed that, although there were some matters in a Bill which were obviously erroneous, its going back to the Commons would be fatal to it, and we have been compelled to accept the Bill. I have more than once thought that it would be much more convenient if some of the Bills of a public character were initiated in this House. I hope the noble Lord will not himself take a course which could only result in public inconvenience or encourage his followers to do so. Whatever has been

  9
  done on previous occasions, when nobody knew anything at all about it, now that the noble Lord has called attention to the determination of the period on 1st August, somebody will find out that he need not pay any tax on that date. I ask your Lordships not to resort to extreme measures on this occasion, and I hope the difficulty will not occur again.
  LORD JAMES OF HEREFORD: My Lords, I do not wish to enter into the question as to this Bill becoming law before 1st August. Whatever questions may arise in consequence of this being a. Finance Bill, I hope your Lordships will think that we are justified in taking advantage of this opportunity to make a clear and distinct protest against the way in which this House is treated. As my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack has said, he has been very emphatic in his condemnation of this practice, which is really having a most serious effect. I would remind your Lordships of what occurred recently in the case of the Factory Bill. That Bill effected more than 100 amendments in the law, and there were Members in your Lordships' House most qualified and most anxious to deal with that subject; yet Lord Belper, who had charge of the Bill, had to announce that if this House made one single Amendment in it, there was not time for the House of Commons to consider it, and the Bill would be lost. There were some Members of your Lordships' House who were prepared to say that, in the circumstances, the Bill should not pass; but my noble friend on the Woolsack and I made a most pressing appeal to your Lordships not to punish the operatives who would be affected by the rejection of the Bill. The Bill was passed, but your Lordships' hands were so tied that you were unable to make the slightest Amendment. The late Lord Salisbury, who had the honour of this House at heart as much as any man, joined in deploring this state of things—a state of things which I venture to think ought never to exist. The majority of the House of Commons desire to see this House continue in its strength; but if we submit to be treated as if we were nobodies, if we are not to bear an equal responsibility with the House of Commons in legislation, the
  10
  time will come soon enough when others will think of us as we allow ourselves to be thought of, and the country will tell us that we are a Chamber without utility and without influence in the country.
  This is not a question affecting this Government only; it is a habit that has grown up. Although the difficulties that exist in the House of Commons in carrying business through may drive a Minister to take a course which he cannot always control, surely some effort should be made to allow us to take a greater part in the responsibility of legislation. Why is it that in this session not one measure of the slightest importance has been initiated in this House? Why should we be treated as if we were incapable of dealing with these questions? By the action of the other House there has been taken from us the possibility of our doing anything. I do not blame this Government particularly, or individual members of it; but surely everyone who desires to see this House honoured and its utility maintained ought to take every opportunity of protesting against the course that has been pursued towards it.
  The EARL OF CAMPERDOWNMy Lords, I venture to associate myself with the protest which has just been made by the noble and learned Lord. I speak not so much with reference to this Bill, because I do not suppose there is any noble Lord likely to move its rejection, but with reference to the precedent which is created, and because, so far as I know, it has never before been stated in this House that a Bill brought in at three o'clock must be passed through all its stages by half-past five.
  A NOBLE LORD: By four o'clock.
  The EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: It is perfectly true that in the Orders of the Day the Commission is announced to sit at four o'clock to give the Royal Assent to this Bill; but, as a matter of fact, your Lordships are given till half-past five—namely, two and a half hours—in which to discuss this Bill. This is the strongest practical illustration that I can imagine of the necessity for the protest which was raised by Lord Newton last year, and which has been repeated

  11
  this year, with reference to the management of the business of this House, and the way in which this House is treated during the last fortnight or three weeks of the session. When the noble Lord opposite (Lord Newton) introduced his Motion I added a few words, giving my own experience of the last three weeks of the session in this House. If any noble Lord attends this House at all, the last three weeks of the session is the time for him to attend. There is very little business to transact before then. Shoals of Bills are presented to this House during the last three weeks of the session, and with regard to them appeals are made, such as the noble and learned Lord opposite told us were made in the case of the Factory Bill, and noble Lords are implored to withdraw all opposition.
  The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack has to-night made a speech of a very apologetic character. He agrees with a great deal of what was said earlier by the noble Lord who leads the Opposition, and I believe he agrees with a great deal of what I am saying now, and with what Lord Newton has said in former debates; but it is not merely sympathy that we want. Sympathy is a very fine thing in its way, but what we want is some practical illustration of that sympathy. During the remaining two or three weeks of the session Bills will be brought up here, and we shall be adjured to pass them without being given any opportunity whatever of amending them or even of considering them. This House has before now postponed the consideration of a Bill on the ground that there was no time to take it into consideration. Such a Motion was made by the late Lord Redesdale. It was a Scottish Education Bill or something of that sort which originated in this House. It was largely altered in the other House, and was brought up again to this House about the 9th or 10th of August. Lord Redesdale moved that it was then too late to consider those Amendments, and the House affirmed his opinion by, I think, a majority of something like twenty votes. I hold that with regard to Bills which may be brought up to this House during the remaining weeks of the present session, noble Lords who really wish to show that they attach some practical
  12
  value to the independence of this House, and to its taking a proper part in legislation, would be acting perfectly within their rights in moving to postpone the consideration of the Bills then brought up. I cannot understand why it is not possible to introduce more Bills in this House. The noble and learned Earl on the Woolsack said it would be a good thing if that were done.
  LORD NEWTON: The Licensing Bill, for instance.
  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: I was going to ask the noble and learned Lord whether he would not intercede with the noble Marquess the Leader of this House, and get some Bills initiated here. It is not sufficient to say one wishes to see them introduced; some practical steps should be taken to get them introduced. I believe the Licensing Bill, which has just been referred to by my noble friend Lord Newton, was eminently a Bill for consideration by this House. It would have been wholly unnecessary to interfere with any part of the compensation or money clauses, but I venture to say that in this House most valuable debates would have taken place with regard to the principle of the Bill. If the Bill had been introduced in your Lordships' House, I believe it would have been almost as forward in the House of Commons as it is at the present time, and your Lordships would have had ample time for its consideration. I wish to renew my protest against the way in which your Lordships' House is treated during the last three weeks of the session, and this is going to be one of the very worst sessions in that respect. I cannot remember a Bill ever being forced down our throats in a period which may be an hour, and which must not be more than two and a half hours. It is the most practical application of the guillotine that I ever remember. I hope the noble Marquess, who has at heart the honour and the dignity of this House, and who leads the House with such universal approval, will bear in mind the rights and privileges of this House, and will in the next session of Parliament, at all events, set a better example than has been set during the

  13
  present session in the way of introducing Bills in this House.
  *LORD COLERIDGE: My Lords, your Lordships' House is in rather a peculiar position, because we are asked to pass a Bill which no Member of this House has ever seen. What mischief may lurk under that green silk band I know not, but at any rate, until the Bill is seen we cannot reasonably be asked to pass it. Let me remind the House of the manner in which matters have been conducted by His Majesty's Government. The Committee stage of the Finance Bill began in the other House on 20th June. The Prime Minister said it was absolutely necessary—and I presume he did not say that without some grounds—that the Bill should be taken on 20th June, and no later, and that it should be discussed de die in diem. It was discussed on the 20th, 21st, and the 22nd of June. Then, my Lords, there was a gap, and the House of Commons heard no more of the Bill until 18th July. Now, with what face, speaking respectfully, with what excuse can the noble Marquess come to this House and plead for urgency when His Majesty's Government have not used the expedition that might have been used in the other House?
  One of the weeks during which there was this suspension of discussion on the Finance Bill was occupied with Ascot. Will the noble Marquess say that that was an adequate reason for suspending any discussion on the financial business of the country? Another week or fortnight of that period was occupied with the Licensing Bill. Now that Bill is a very important measure; but, after all, no Bill is so important as the Bill which enables the Government to levy taxes. I have no doubt that the Prime Minister, if the truth were known, felt that he was more secure of his majority on the Licensing Bill than he was at that particular time on the Finance Bill, because the Licensing Bill affected great interests, and the interests of the many are apt to be overlooked in the interests of the few. The noble Marquess cannot say that the Government have shown that despatch of business which entitles him to come and ask us to pass through all its stages a Bill we have not seen.
  14
  I do not know what the awful consequences to the Government will be if we do not pass this Bill through in the allotted time. The noble Earl on the Woolsack thinks no taxpayer need pay in the interval between the ceasing of the operation of the Resolution passed by the House of Commons and the coming into force of the statutory measure authorising the levying of the tax. I do not know how that would be; but there is one simple way out of the difficulty. The Government have a vast majority in the House of Commons and a still larger majority in this House, and no delay need accompany the passing of a Bill of indemnity. I have no doubt it would be carried by acclamation in both Houses. When, for instance, in South Africa acts were done under martial law which the civil law did not recognise, it was found necessary to pass Acts of Indemnity, and these were passed without opposition. That is an excellent precedent for this country; and it seems to me that the difficulty might be got over in that way, and that, therefore. the need for this speedy passing of the Bill is not so urgent as the noble Marquess would lead us to believe.
  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: My Lords, I cannot understand why the noble Marquess, in asking us to suspend the Standing Order, did not give us reasons why this is necessary, because it does seem to me that in taking the course proposed His Majesty's Government are establishing a precedent. My noble and learned friend behind me has reminded the House that we have not even been permitted to see the Bill which we are asked to pass through all its stages to-day. His Majesty's Government appear to have taken the view that as this Finance Bill is introduced with the authority of a Conservative Government, therefore it is one which does not excite any question of public interest. Reference was made by the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition to what took place in regard to the Finance Bill which introduced the death duties: and I cannot help thinking that if this House acts on the principle involved in this Resolution it would be perfectly possible for any Government, a Liberal Government perhaps, to introduce proposals of a most stringent and radical

  15
  character into a Finance Bill, embodying principles opposed to the view of the predominant Party in this House, and by deferring the date demand the rapid passage of such a Bill through all its stages to avoid the disorganisation of the financial arrangements of the country.
  I, with all deference to what has been said, very much doubt if any serious financial disturbance would arise through not acceding to the proposal of His Majesty's Government. It is absurd to suppose that the Bill now before the House has not in it great questions of principle. If it did not contain such questions, on what conceivable grounds did the House of Commons debate it at such length? It is said that the opposition in the House of Commons was purely obstructive; but I would point out that upon the question of protection—which I hope I and others will have an opportunity of discussing later this afternoon when the Second Reading is moved—a great deal of the opposition to the Bill came from the Ministerial side of the House. I do contend that if your Lordships' House is to be considered an independent Second Chamber, it is desirable that we should take some stand to maintain our rights. If this Assembly is to be looked upon merely as a sort of adjunct to the Carlton Club it is perfectly intelligible, and in itself intelligent, that Bills of this kind should be brought up when introduced by Conservative Governments, and that we should be asked to accept them without any discussion or deliberation at all. In moving that the Standing Order be suspended, the noble Marquess did not say a single word in explanation of, or justification for, that Motion. It is presumed that your Lordships will do exactly as the Government ask, that you will suspend the Standing Order without debate, and pass the Bill through all its stages, so that it may receive the Royal Assent before the adjournment of the House of Commons. Although it may seem somewhat strange that noble Lords on this side of the House should stand up in defence of the rights of this Assembly, yet it does seem to me that so long as the House of Lords exists, and so long as the members of the Opposition are obliged to sit in an Assembly in which they are in a considerable minority, they
  16
  should be treated with a semblance of respect and consideration.
  LORD NEWTON: My Lords, it is with some gratification that I have heard from noble Lords who have spoken this afternoon sentiments which I have myself expressed on previous occasions, but I confess to feeling considerable regret that these sentiments have not been expressed earlier. When on a recent occasion I drew attention to the state of business in this House, not only did nobody say a word in support of my contention, but the Leader of the House, amid the plaudits of the Assembly, pointed out to me that there was practically no hope of ameliorating the condition of things, and that we must be content to exist in our present circumstances. I rise more for the purpose of endeavouring to show, if I can, that the Prime Minister is not so much to blame as he is supposed to be. I will admit that at first blush it looks as if this House had been treated with extreme contempt, I might almost say contumely, by the Prime Minister, because he has left the discussion of the Finance Bill over until the last possible date, and if the contention of the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack is correct, has left us with at the most two and a half hours for discussing this Bill, and passing it through all its stages. I cannot help wondering what would have been said by our Party if we had had to endure this at the hands of the Party opposite.
  But, as I say, I am anxious to make the best case I can for the Prime Minister, and to prove, if possible, that he is not so black as he has been painted, and I will do it by asking the Leader of the House whether it is not the case that under the old Finance Act power is taken to levy duties up to 1st August, and that it is not absolutely necessary for the present Bill to become law at this sitting. 1st August is next Monday, and, so far as I am aware, the old Finance Act as in operation until 1st August. The new Bill will come into operation on 1st August, and there will be no interval between the two. I wish to ask the noble Marquess the Leader of the House whether I am correct in this assumption; and, if I am, there is obviously no neces-

  17
  sity for passing the Bill through all its stages during the present sitting.
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (The Marquess of LANSDOWNE): My Lords, the only reply I am able to give to the noble Lord is that we are advised that the course he suggests is not one which could be adopted consistently with the provisions of the Act of Parliament. I rise really with the object of adding my expressions of regret to those of the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack at being obliged to ask your Lordships to take so unusual a course with regard to this Bill. There is a consensus of opinion on this subject and I do not dissociate myself in any way from what has been said as to the inconvenience of passing Bills of this importance so hurriedly through your Lordships' House. I should, however, like to notice for one moment the remark of the noble Earl opposite that this result might have been avoided, if it had not been for what he called the slovenly manner in which business had been conducted in the House of Commons. I find that the discussion of this Bill occupied seventeen days in the House of Commons, or three and a half weeks of Parliamentary time; and although I feel that I am scarcely in a position to carry the war into the enemy's country, I would ask him whether some of the delay that has taken place may not be attributed to the extreme anxiety shown by the noble Earl's friends to discuss not only this measure, but other measures which have been simultaneously before the House of Commons.
  As to the position of your Lordships' House in reference to money Bills I do not think there is any controversy. It is open to us, if we like, to throw out a money Bill. It is, I believe, even open to us, if we choose, to amend it. I believe there is a case on record where an Amendment was actually inserted; but as a matter of practical politics we all know that the insertion of an important Amendment in a money Bill by this House would lead to the abandonment of the measure when it went back to the other House. Therefore we may regard the insertion of an Amendment as equivalent to the rejection of the Bill. The case is different when we come to the question of discussion. When the noble Earl claims for this House the right
  18
  of discussing a money Bill at length, it is rather interesting to recall cases when we on this side of the House have upheld this doctrine, and it has been disputed by noble Lords opposite. The noble Earl referred to a debate which took place in 1894 on the Finance Bill of that year. If he will refer to that debate he will see that Lord Rosebery deprecated altogether the idea that the House of Lords should have anything to do with money Bills. In those days, therefore, noble Lords opposite took a different view, and we appeared as champions of the rights of the House of Lords. I have no doubt some allowance must be made for the different conditions under which the subject is approached according as we sit on one side or other of the House. I am not familiar with the precedent to which the noble Earl referred, but it certainly is the case that, in the Act of last year, it is clearly and distinctly laid down that certain taxes shall continue to be charged, levied, or paid until the first day of August this year, and in our view that does render it necessary that the new legislation should come into effect before the arrival of that day.
  *EARL SPENCER: August was also mentioned in the Act of 1895, but the Act of 1896 did not become law until 7th August. The same conditions obtained then.
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Even assuming that that was so, it does not follow that the transaction was regular, or that it is desirable to repeat it on the present occasion, There is one suggestion which I would make to the noble Earl. I quite admit the desirability of discussing in this House the financial position of the country, and the great problems which arise in connection with it. But is it quite clear that it is only upon the introduction of the Finance Bill that discussions of that kind can take place? It always seems to me to be rather astonishing that we in your Lordships' House, whose time, after all, is not so fully occupied, should not avail ourselves of the opportunities which are within our reach for raising what it seems to me would be extremely useful discussions upon such questions as the financial position of the country. I have heard it said, very recently, that it is only in

  19
  the House of Lords that full opportunities are really given for such discussion. I do not see why the noble Lord or any of his friends should not at any moment, had they desired it, have initiated a debate on the general financial prospects of the country. I did not, however, rise for the purpose of disputing what was said by the noble Lord opposite as to the inconvenience complained of. On the contrary, I may assure your Lordships that we shall make it our business to prevent a recurrence of a state of things similar to that which we are discussing this evening. We have taken already one step which, it seems to me, is a practical one in that direction, because in the Bill of this year we have substituted for the date of the 1st of August the 1st of July, so that there will at any rate be a little more elbow room another year. I can assure your Lordships that I am deeply concerned for the honour of your Lordships' House, and that I should be the last person in the world to desire that any slight or indignity should be offered to it.
  LORD BURGHCLERE: My Lords, I shall only interpose for a few minutes in this discussion. I have heard a rumour that some of my friends are proposing to take a division on the Motion now before the House. On an ordinary occasion I would be the last man in the world to register my vote against a request by the responsible Government of the day to suspend certain Standing Orders in order to enable them to carry on the Government, but if there is an occasion in which we ought not to take the situation in which we are placed lying down I think this is the occasion, and if my noble friends go to a division I shall certainly join them in the Lobby. It is perfectly true that your Lordships have no power to amend a money Bill, but we have the power to end it, and if we never attempt to exercise that power it seems to me that it would be better that Finance Bills should never be referred to this House at all. That would make the course of the Government a great deal easier, and I think it would place us in a position of greater dignity than we are in on the present unfortunate occasion. I do not rise for the purpose of making a speech on this subject, but
  20
  only to explain my own position in regard to the matter. In order to register my protest against the position in which we are continually being placed year after year at this period of the session, when it is quite impossible for your Lordships to discuss the various Bills that are sent up with a proper sense of your own dignity, I shall, if my noble friends divide upon this Motion, follow them into the Division Lobby.
  EARL CARRINGTON: My Lords, I should like to be permitted to say a word or two on this subject, on which I feel very strongly. I am certain every noble Lord on this side of the House will receive in the way in which it was meant the expression of regret which emanated from the noble Marquess the Leader of the House on account of the impasse in which your Lordships find yourselves. As I understand this matter, if this Bill is not passed by Monday next the taxes which are now being levied under the Resolutions passed by the House of Commons will be illegally levied, because the old Act of 1903 only gave the Crown power to levy the taxes sanctioned by the Resolutions of the House of Commons up to 1st August. If, therefore, the Government continued to levy these taxes without the Resolutions having been confirmed by the Bill before the House, they would have to have recourse to a Bill of Indemnity.
  When I first landed in New South Wales in 1883 the Government were turned out within seven days; another Prime Minister and Government were elected, but they only remained in office a fortnight. Then there was a third Government which lasted six weeks. These changes had one advantage, inasmuch as they made the Governor acquainted with almost every politician of any standing in the colony; but they had this great disadvantage, that very little public business could be done, and one result was that the different Oppositions had a playful habit of refusing supplies. The Leader of the Opposition in each case did the best he could to obtain supplies for the Government, but miserably failed in that laudable endeavour, and the result was that all the Ministerial salaries and the different salaries I in the colony were paid by monthly

  21
  Supply Bills. Of course, that was illegal, and it had to be remedied, when the staple Government came in, by Bills of Indemnity. Therefore, if this Bill is not passed by next Monday I take it that the taxes that will be levied will be illegally levied, and the Government will have to have recourse to a Bill of Indemnity. No doubt that would take some time to pass the House of Commons, and it would delay public business, but it would not be the fault of the Opposition. The Government ought to have thought of that before.
  I submit that it is not respectful to this House to bring in a Bill at the last moment, and, as it were, to force it down the throats of your Lordships. The noble and learned Earl on the Woolsack spoke of the public inconvenience that would be caused if the Government did not get this Bill by 1st August. He concluded with a most pathetic appeal to your Lordships not to say anything this time, and he was good enough to assure us that such a thing should not happen again. With all respect, I submit that the procedure of the Government in the case of this Bill is not an isolated case. It is part of the systematically contemptuous manner in which this Government has treated Parliament, relying on the support of a majority which was elected on a false issue. That is the real reason why the House of Lords is placed in the present position. This majority, I repeat, was elected on a false issue, and they have received abundant proof of the displeasure of the constituencies in the country. As I believe this is the real reason of the present deadlock, perhaps I may be allowed to say a word or two on these false issues. They have a distinct bearing on this Bill and on the finances of the country. I would remind the House that Mr. Balfour said in Manchester in 1900—
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: May I venture to remind the noble Earl that the Motion before the House is that the Standing Order be suspended for this day's sitting? I think my noble friend's observations are scarcely germane to that Motion.
  EARL CARRINGTON: I am entirely in the hands of the House, but I do most
  22
  respectfully submit that this is a matter of the gravest importance. Seeing how small numerically is the band of Liberal Peers in this House, I do think that some little consideration and some little latitude might be allowed to us when we are standing up, not only for the rights of this House, but for what we think are the rights of the country at large.
  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: I rise to a point of order. I gathered that my noble friend was showing that we are in this position owing to the incapacity of the Government to administer the affairs of the country in the House of Commons. He was giving instances to show their incapacity in that direction. Surely that is in order.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURY: The noble Earl is mistaken. The topic was the false issues raised before the constituencies at the last election, and I think it will require some ingenuity to bring that within the present discussion.
  EARL CARRINGTON: It is, I contend, these false issues whieh have brought about the present deadlock; but, as I said a moment ago, I am entirely in the hands of the House, and if the House wishes for some reason that this debate should not go on, I will bow to that decision. But I do, at the same time, enter the strongest possible protest against not being permitted to go into this subject, which I consider, though I may be wrong, to be entirely germane to the matter before the House. The position in which we are now placed is, perhaps, the last instance of the systematic dictation of His Majesty's Government to both Houses of Parliament. I understand that the original proposal was that we should have met last night at midnight as soon as the Bill had passed through the House of Commons. I suppose that some noble Lords would have been sent down at half-past twelve or one o'clock in the morning, armed with a big revolver, to point it at the devoted heads of the few members of the Opposition who were present, telling them in plain language that they were to pass the Bill. Owing, however, to the protest made not only by noble Lords who sit on this side of the House but by the noble Lords who generally support the

  23
  Government, that course was not persisted in. I ask whether it is right, whether it is decent, to ask the House to rush this Bill through all its stages in the course of a few minutes? There is one great reason why this particular Bill should have fair and proper discussion.
  Standing Order No. XXXIX. having been suspended, Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Marquess of Lansdowne.)
  *LORD COLERIDGE: My Lords, I desire to say a few words on the Motion now before the House. The occasion is one on which I think it is not immaterial to draw some attention to the growing expenditure of the country. The figures are somewhat startling. There are two reasons why I think attention should be drawn to the Budget—firstly, because of the growing expenditure of the country, and, secondly, because, as my noble friend Lord Carrington in his concluding words told us, for the first time for fifty years the Budget discloses taxation of a protective character. Without going any further into reasons, that is sufficient reason of itself why we on this side of the House at any rate think it right to draw public attention to the nature of the Budget of this financial year.
  The expenditure to which I would draw attention is of a most alarming character. In 1894, when the Liberal Government were last in power, the expenditure upon the Navy and Army together did not
  Earl Carrington.
  24
  It is the first Budget savouring of protection which has been introduced into Parliament for the last fifty years.
  On Question,

  equal the expenditure on either one of those branches now; that is to say, the present expenditure on either of these services exceeds the total expenditure on both branches demanded by the Government in 1894. Now, my Lords, does that correspond with either the increase in the population or the increase in the wealth of the inhabitants of the country? It corresponds with neither. It is an enormous advance in the weight of taxation upon every individual member of the community. To show how this expenditure has been growing, I may mention that between the years 1894 and 1899, the first five years of the Conservative Government, there was an increase in the annual expenditure of the country of £15,000,000 sterling. That was a large increase and one calculated to make every man who had financial economy at heart pause and reflect; but it was as nothing compared with the corresponding increase, since the year 1899. From 1899 to 1904 in addition to that £15,000,000, we are now faced with an extra expenditure of £35,000,000 a year. Every financial authority on either side of the House, of whatever economic or political opinion, is agreed that this is a dangerous state

  25
  of affairs and cannot be permitted to continue without risk to the financial stability of the country.
  I am discussing a Bill that I have never seen, but Iassume, from the form in which the Finance Bill was reported to the House of Commons after it had been amended in Committee, that there is an increased tax of 2d. placed upon tea. Let me first deal with the question of tea, which is, after all, one of the most innocuous and essential elements of food. It is a drink that everyone must wish well to, that everyone must desire should be shared as largely and as economically as possible by the whole population. It is an article of necessity which everyone who has the interests of the poorer people at heart would desire to relieve as far as possible from any burden of taxation which would tend to increase its price. The tea duty was increased from 4d. to 6d. by Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, and it was increased, as he stated at the time, not as a permanent tax. He thus described the reasons for its imposition—
  "This extra 2d. is purely, in my opinion, an exceptional tax levied for the purposes of the present war."
  Therefore, my Lords, the financial authority for the time being of His Majesty's Government, in asking the House of Commons and the country to accept his Budget, admitted the grave result of putting an extra tax of 2d. a lb. on such an article of necessity as tea. He excused it on the ground that it was a temporary tax imposed for a temporary purpose, leaving everyone to infer, as this House and the House of Commons did infer, that when that temporary necessity had passed away the temporary tax would be remitted.
  The war is over and we are in times of peace, put this year His Majesty's Government, instead of not remitting the 2d. in the £ that was imposed by Sir Michael Hicks-Beach for the purposes of the war, are actually adding another 2d., bringing the tax upon tea up to 8d. per lb. Having regard to the price of tea in the market, that is an extraordinary proportion. It is 75 or 80 per cent. of the whole price of the tea in the market. I need hardly say that that is a great burden upon the people, and for such a tax some unusual
  26
  and unprecedented reason ought to be forthcoming. Take the income-tax, which is felt by the rich, and particularly by those persons who are between rich and poor, viz., the professional classes who are hoping to put enough money away to provide for old age. The income-tax was 8d. in the £. It was raised during the war in the same circumstances, the same reasons being given for its increase, to the amount of 1s. 3d. Mr. Ritchie, after the war was over, remitted 4d. of that tax. The income-tax then stood at 11d.—a high rate, but still a substantial reduction as compared with the 1s. 3d. that had been imposed as a temporary war tax. Now, what does the present Chancellor of the Exchequer do in regard to income-tax in the Budget before us? This is, as I say, a time of peace. Not content to permit the income-tax to remain at 11d. he adds another 1d. to it, with the result that the income-tax now stands at 1s. Altogether the taxation of the country since the year 1894 has increased by 57 per cent.
  Now, if I take the ten years between 1892 and 1902 I find the following figures most eloquent of the state of things to which a long course of His Majesty's Government has reduced the financial condition of the country. The increase in expenditure has been more than four times the increase in population; that is to say, we ought to be four times as rich as we were ten years ago if the taxation of the country is to be borne with equivalent sacrifice on the part of the taxpayer. The normal expenditure of the country has increased by £49,000,000 a year since the Conservative Government came into office in 1895. I do not pretend to be a financier, but I am sufficiently acquainted with figures to understand these, and I ask noble Lords whether they do not think these figures disclose a state of things at which every lover of his country ought to feel somewhat alarmed. Will the noble Marquess, when he responds in this debate, reassure us on this point and give us some hope of a relinquishment of taxation in future? Is this to go on in a sort of arithmetical progression, or what is to be the end of the growing discrepancy between the wealth of the country and the amount of taxation that is imposed on the people?

  27
  I have said enough, I think, to show the seriousness of these figures. But there is another reason why I think this particular Bill ought to be fully considered and discussed. For a period of over fifty years every Budget that has been introduced into this country has been, as far as possible, free from any imputation of protection. There are some people who suspect—I do not know whether rightly or wrongly—that the particular tax upon tobacco which has been the subject of considerable debate in the other House was not introduced so much for the purpose of balancing expenditure and revenue as for the purpose of introducing a new principle into the taxation of the country, and we cannot overlook the fact that it is imposed by the son of the head of the protectionist movement in this country.
  Let me examine for a moment into the incidence of this tax on tobacco. Originally there was the same duty upon the importation of tobacco whether stripped or unstripped, viz., a duty of 3s. A duty was then imposed of 3s. 3d. upon stripped tobacco, so that the man who imported stripped tobacco had to pay 3d. more than the man who imported unstripped tobacco. Clearly, my Lords, the effect of that tax must be to restrict trade, and any taxation, the object of which is to restrict trade and not enhance it must, I submit, be of a protective character. It was imposed so that the man who stripped tobacco here should be protected against the importation of stripped tobacco from abroad. Therefore, my Lords, it amounted to a protective tax of 3d. per lb. on stripped tobacco. Of course, from that 3d. there must be deducted the cost of stripping tobacco in this country, which we are told is a trifling amount—about per lb.; therefore the remaining 2½d. is clearly in the nature of a protective tariff.
  At first the Chancellor of the Exchequer denied with some heat that there was anything of a protective character in this tax; but the case which was made against its imposition by persons who had imported tobacco of the particular character in question into bond, and bought it, therefore, at a higher price, was so strong that the Chancellor of the Ex-
  28
  chequer conceded by way of rebate a certain proportion, I think it was 1½d., on the existing stocks of stripped tobacco. That concession is a very significant one. because it amounts to practically an admission that, so far as it goes—and I admit it does not go very far—the tax is clearly of a protective character. Why, in spite of the strong opposition which it encountered in the House of Commons, this tax was maintained for the admittedly miserable results to the Budget which will now be found to accrue, is hard to conceive, unless there is some important reason at the back for the maintenance of this tax. It could not have been in order to balance revenue and expenditure, and therefore my conviction is that it was the protective character of this impost which tempted the Chancellor of the Exchequer to adhere to it in spite of all the arguments that were used against it. If that is so, it is a very significant fact; and it is quite right that those of us in this House who have always been free-traders should draw public attention to the nature of the year's Budget.
  Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 31; Not-contents, 11.

  CONTENTS.

  Halsbury, E. (L. Chancellor.)

  Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

  Clonbrock, L.

  Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.) (L. President.)

  Harris, L.

  Lauderdale, E.

  Hatherton, L.

  Salisbury, M. (L. Privy Seal.)

  Lucan, E.

  James, L.

  Waldegrave, E. [Teller.]

  Kilmarnock, L. (E. Erroll.)

  Argyll, D.

  Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.) [Teller.]

  Colville of Culross, V.

  Macnaghten, L.

  Bath, M.

  Cross, V.

  Oxenfoord, L. (E. Stair.)

  Lansdowne, M.

  Hutchinson, V. (E. Donough more.)

  Raglan, L

  Camperdown, E.

  Sid mouth, V.

  Robertson, L.

  Cawdor, E.

  Balfour, L.

  Windsor, L.

  Cromer, E.

  Belper, L.

  Wolverton, L.

  NOT-CONTENTS.

  Beauchamp, E.

  Portsmouth, E. [Teller.]

  Coleridge, L. [Teller.]

  Carrington, E.

  Emly, L.

  Chesterfield, E.

  Gordon, V. (E Aberdeen.)

  Hawkesbury, L.

  Crewe, E.

  Burghclere, L.

  Shuttleworth, L.

  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I am sure the House will not expect me to make a financial statement analogous to that which the Chancellor of the Exchequer makes in the House of Commons, but I think it due to your Lordships that I should follow in a few words what has been said by the noble and learned Lord who has just sat down. He has pointed to what I think we must all of us regard as a danger—I mean the great growth of our national expenditure; and he will forgive me for saying that he has made, with reference to that subject, the very kind of speech which I suggested a few minutes ago might be made at any time during the session by any noble Lord desiring to call the attention of this House to that most important subject. The noble and learned Lord, I understand, was alarmed to find that although the war had come to an end the large expenditure which followed upon the war had not terminated, but surely he must be aware that expenditure of that kind is not expenditure which you can suddenly shut off at a few weeks' notice. For example, there is one permanent item

  29
  of increase growing out of the war expenditure. I refer to the interest on the large increase to the public indebtedness which was occasioned by the war itself—an addition, if I remember rightly, of something approaching £150,000,000.
  As to the other items of increase, it is quite true that in the last ten years all the principal items of expenditure have risen rapidly; but there is a great deal to be said in explanation of the circumstances under which that increase has taken place. For example, I see that the expenditure on the charge of the public debt has increased during that period by £4,000,000, That is partly interest on the new war debt, and partly interest on those large public
  loans which have lately been contracted for military and naval purposes and also for various important public works. Then there is the increase in Army expenditure. That has risen in ten years by no less than £11,000,000. I agree with the noble and learned Lord that we should spare no effort to diminish that expenditure, and it is with this object that my right hon. colleague the Secretary of State for War is endeavouring to discover some means of giving this country a cheaper but also not less efficient Army, and he has, I think, a right to appeal to both sides to assist him in bringing about that most desirable result.
  The principal cause of increase of expenditure is. however, the Navy. The expenditure on the Navy has in ten years increased by very nearly £20,000,000, or by no less than 111 per cent. I admit that that is an augmentation which may well alarm us, but who is going to propose that the naval strength of this country should be reduced? It is interesting to turn for a moment to see what other nations are doing. I see that in the same period of time our naval expenditure has increased by 111 per cent. the naval expenditure of Germany has increased by no less than 140 per cent., that of Russia by 143 per cent. and that of the United States by 174 per cent. Well, my Lords, that at any rate is, I think, a prima facie explanation of the increase of the expenditure on the Navy. Take one other item—the increased expenditure upon education. That has risen in ten years by £5,500,000, but I am sure the noble and learned Lord would be
  30
  the last person in the world to grudge the expenditure incurred on that most important subject.
  The noble and learned Lord referred to the increase in the tea duties. It is much to be regretted that an article which is almost a necessary of life to our fellow-countrymen should be taxed, or that the tax should be increased. but we always endeavour to divide increased burdens as equitably as possible between direct and indirect taxation, and it seemed to us that a moderate increase on the tea duties was upon the whole a most reasonable way of obtaining additional revenue from indirect taxation. The only other item referred to was the tobacco tax. I will not follow the noble and learned Lord into the mysteries of the tobacco trade, but at any rate we are firmly of opinion that the tobacco duties are no more protective in their object and character than the old tobacco duties which, I believe, were imposed for the first time by Mr. Gladstone. I do not know that I can usefully detain your Lordships with further remarks on this subject, but I certainly do admit that the noble and learned Lord is justified in calling attention to the rate at which the national expenditure is progressing, and I can assure him that there is no matter which His Majesty's Government have more at heart than that expenditure should be kept within reasonable limits.
  *EARL SPENCER: My Lords, I am in rather a peculiar position to-night: I have not taken part in the division, and I will explain why. The noble Marquess, with his usual courtesy, sent to me two or three days ago to ask whether I would agree to this arrangement of having the debate at three o'clock, and the subsequent Commission the same afternoon. I rather hastily, perhaps, assented to the proposal, but I took care however, to explain to the noble Marquess last night that I was not responsible for more than my personal action. I support my noble friends, however, in dividing against the suspension of the Standing Orders. Now, as to speaking on this question, I had intended to have spoken earlier and to have gone into the whole subject with which this great Bill deals,

  31
  but I was not able to because I had exhausted my right of speech in discussing the question of the suspension of the Standing Orders. I am rather diffident now about saying anything on the general subject, but I confess I feel so strongly on the point that I most gladly support the views which have been put forward by Lord Coleridge and other noble Lords as to the gigantic growth of the national expenditure. It is very serious indeed when we reflect that the expenditure of the country, though we are at peace, is increasing; and it is not only the expenditure of the country which is increasing, but the national credit which is decreasing.
  No one more desires to see a strong Navy than I do, but the time has come when we must seriously consider the great yearly increase in the Naval Estimates. A great effort should be made to reduce them, or to prevent their increasing at the rate at which they have been increasing of late years. I believe I am right in saying that the naval expenditure of this country exceeds by £6,000,000 the naval expenditure of France, Germany, and Russia. These are very alarming figures, and I cannot help thinking that without really diminishing the effectiveness of the Navy some check on the growing expenditure might be made. I notice one remarkable fact in regard to the finance of the Governments of Lord Salisbury and Mr. Balfour. They have proposed three taxes, all declared in turn to be simply revenue taxes, while each in its turn has been proved to be protective. I refer to the corn tax, the sugar tax, which was consequent on the Sugar Convention, and the tobacco tax. The last-named has already changed the current of trade in the tobacco business. For the past five years the average amount of stripped tobacco imported in the month of June has been 2,459 casks, but in June of this year, after the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was made known, it fell to 344 casks. I maintain that that, therefore, is a distinctly protective duty. While maintaining the importance of our having adequate time for the discussion of a Bill of this magnitude, I thank the noble Marquess for his statement with regard to the earlier date at which the similar Bill
  32
  of next year will have to be passed; and I, for my part, am satisfied with making the urgent protest which I made last night and which I have repeated in the two speeches I have delivered this evening.
  EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, the exceedingly brief and, if I may say so, unsatisfactory nature of the reply made by the noble Marquess to the cogent remarks of my noble and learned friend Lord Coleridge make me anxious to press His Majesty's Government for some further reply to the Questions which have been addressed from this side of the House. The noble Marquess, I believe, would be one of the first to admit that there was little in the way of justification of, or excuse for the growing expenditure of the country in the remarks which he addressed to your Lordships. The enormous increase during the past ten years of no less than £48,000,000, a sum of money which, so far as we can see, and so far as we have received any assurance from the other side, shows no sign of decreasing in the future, is a matter which demands debate and consideration at your Lordships' hands.
  There is one aspect of the matter which has not been touched upon in the course of the debate this afternoon to which I may be allowed to allude. Your Lordships will no doubt remember that when the first intimation of the tobacco duties became public some remarks were made by Members in another place with regard to the way in which the knowledge that this tax was going to be imposed by the Government seemed to have leaked out. The Chancellor of the Exchequer and, I think, in concert with him, the Prime Minister indignantly repelled any attack on their personal honour. No attack on their personal honour had been made by anybody, and it seemed to me exceedingly weak for any member of His Majesty's Government, when attacked for what was, at the worst, perhaps, only an indiscretion on the part of the Minister or of some clerk in his office, to take refuge in a plea of personal honour. I can assure your Lordships that for myself, having the pleasure to recognise in the Chancellor of the Exchequer a native of my own county, and having known him for many years, I feel it would be impertinent on anybody's part to make

  33
  any kind of accusation against his personal honour. At the same time we say that it does seem, having regard to the imports of tobacco this year compared with last year, that some inquiry ought to take place into this matter. Your Lordships may need to be reminded of the fact that the imports of tobacco during March and April of this year were, I think, more than double the imports of similar goods during March and April of last year. If that is so, it surely is some reason why inquiry should be made into the matter, and it would, I think, be wise on the part of His Majesty's Government if they appointed some Departmental Committee to inquire into the matter and report to your Lordships.
  With regard to the growing expenditure on the Army to which reference was made by the noble Marquess, I am sure I may say, on behalf of the large majority of people throughout the country, that they would not grudge the growing expenditure upon the Army if they were sure that the country was getting an adequate return, but they are forced at the present time to conclude, having regard especially to the speech which was made in another place last night by the present Secretary of State for India, that not even His Majesty's Government have complete faith and confidence in their own Army reorganisation scheme. In view of the exceedingly surprising attack which was made by the Secretary of State for India upon his colleague, we are, I contend, fully justified in asking His Majesty's Government for more information with regard to their scheme for the reorganisation of the Army.
  The noble Marquess made reference to the expenditure upon the Navy in other countries. It is a familiar device of some noble Lords on the other side to use percentages, but percentages by themselves are not conclusive. I may remind your Lordships of certain percentage statistics with regard to teetotal soldiers. A Return was moved for and obtained with regard to the numbers of soldiers in a certain campaign who wore the blue ribbon and how they fared, and the Return came back that 50 per cent. had died of wounds and 50 per cent. of disease. That was an alarming Return, but a closer examination of the figures showed
  34
  that there were only two soldiers to whom the Return referred at all, and, therefore, while only one soldier had died of wounds and one of disease the alarming Return was made to Parliament of 50 per cent. dying of wounds and 50 per cent. of disease. I say, therefore, that we are entitled to ask from the noble Marquess something more than mere percentages in this matter.
  The figures the noble Marquess gave us were that the expenditure of this country upon the Navy had increased £20,000,000, I think, in the last ten years. But what we complain of is that the total expenditure of the country has gone up no less than £48,000,000, and we have in this way only £20,000,000 accounted for. Some ten years ago, although some doubt was expressed with regard to the preparedness of the Army by noble Lords on the other side and by their colleagues, no doubt that I know of was expressed with regard to the efficiency of the Navy; and if the Navy was efficient ten years ago, we need some explanation as to why it should have required another £20,000,000 to be spent upon it during the last ten years. The question of education is one on which I find myself in hearty agreement with the noble Marquess. who said that the £5,500,000 on education was an additional sum to which noble Lords on this side would not take exception. I only wish that we spent still more money upon education. We should not then hear so much of the ruin of British industries nor of the way in which our exports were declining in neutral markets.
  Turning for a minute or two to the question of the tea duty, I should like to emphasise what was said by my noble and learned friend beside me with regard to the incidence of taxation in this matter. The increase in the income-tax and the increase in the tea duty as compared with one another do not, in the opinion of noble Lords on this side of the House, constitute a fair distribution of the burden. The proportion of the expenditure of the working classes which is spent upon tea makes them contribute to a far higher proportion than those who have to pay the extra penny on the income-tax. Therefore it is that we see in this addition to the tea duty one more sign of the desire of His Majesty's Government to favour

  35
  certain sections of the community at the expense of the community as a whole.
  Now, my Lords, let me turn to the question of South Africa, for, after all, we had expected to receive in the relief of the taxation of this country a large sum of money from South Africa. Noble Lords opposite have probably conveniently forgotten that only twelve months ago we were told that South Africa would be in a position to pay back large sums of money to this country before very long. The amount which was, I think, to be paid at the beginning of this year was £10,000,000. I do not think that we have received any sufficient or adequate explanation for the non-payment of that sum, and meanwhile the taxpayers of this country are obliged to go on paying the interest upon this £10,000,000 instead of this as a lump sum being added to the Sinking Fund.
  The Sinking Fund, again, demands urt her consideration than was given to it by the noble Marquess. It is, after all, one of the best barometers of the prosperity of the country. If large sums of money are available year by year for the Sinking Fund then we may be sure that the country as a whole is in a prosperous condition. We regret that His Majesty's Government have not seen their way to do something more for that fund. The noble Marquess made mention of the public works which had been carried out during the past ten years. I should like to ask the noble Marquess, or some other representative of His Majesty's Government, a Question with regard to the fund out of which these public works are paid for. As I understand it—and if I am wrong some noble Lord opposite will, no doubt, be able to correct me—large numbers of these public works are paid for out of the moneys of the Post Office Savings Bank. If that is so, and imagining, without wishing for one moment that such a thing should happen, that the Post Office Savings Bank were obliged to realise their assets, the unhappy people who had deposited their money in the Post Office Savings Bank would find themselves presented with a quarter of a mile of the Uganda Railway or some equally useful article, because the deposits are used by His Majesty's Government in order to carry out various measures of public usefulness. I think that is an
  36
  expenditure of the public money to which attention should be directed. I am not at all sure that it is in accordance with the soundest finance that such large sums of money should be spent in public works all over the world instead of being applied to the purchase of Consols in this country; if any noble Lord on the other side of the House believes that the finances of this country have prospered under His Majesty's present Government, I think the price at which Consols now stand in the market ought to disabuse his mind.
  It was only a comparatively short time ago that the late Marquess of Salisbury mentioned Spain as being one of the decaying nations of Europe. It was a shorter time ago that we found that the public funds of this country had gone down below the public funds of that decaying nation. That seems to me to be a matter which demands the earnest attention of His Majesty's Government. There was another aspect of the matter referred to by the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition. I refer to the Sugar Convention, which, of course, arises under the Bill now before your Lordships' House. I could wish that a discussion on this measure and a defence of it had been undertaken by noble Lords opposite on some occasion when Viscount Goschen could have participated in the debate, for there are many people who regard the Sugar Convention, not only as being a measure of dangerous finance, but also as being a working model of protection. I think we are entitled to know in what way the Convention which was passed last year has benefited the people of this country. The price of sugar to the ordinary consumer has gone up, but it does not seem that the sugar producers of the West Indies have reaped any advantage from the enhanced price of sugar to the people of this country. We even find that less sugar from the West Indies has come into this country during the last few months than previously. Therefore we are entitled, I think, to ask His Majesty's Government whether, under such circumstances, they do not see their way to promise that in another year at least some remission shall be made in the sugar duties.
  One of the most important reasons why noble Lords on this side look on this

  37
  Bill with hesitation is the doubt which we feel with regard to the financial views of His Majesty's Government. Time after time discussions have been initiated in this House, with the idea of eliciting from the noble Marquess some definite profession of faith with regard to the fiscal system of this country. In the absence of clearer and more definite statements we are obliged to draw our conclusions from the provisions of the Finance Bill for this year, and it is indeed difficult for some of us to reconcile the professions of noble Lords opposite with the taxation which is imposed on the country during the current year. We have the noble Marquess declaring that he is against any taxation of food, and yet we find an increase in the tea duties. We ask whether it would not have been possible to find some other source from which the necessary money might have been drawn. Although I am afraid it is no use expecting at such a late period anything more definite from the noble Marquess than we have had in the past, still I would urge him, if he can see his way to do so, to say something more definite with regard to the taxation of the food of the people than we have yet been able to extract from him.
  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: My Lords, I did not happen to be in the House when the noble Marquess the Leader of the House was speaking, but I understand that he alluded to the question of the growth of the military services of the Crown. Well, my Lords, that seems to me to be a matter which really does demand the most serious consideration. The military services of the Crown ten years ago cost £35,500,000, and now they have reached the appalling figure, which has to be provided out of revenue alone, of over £66,000,000. My noble friend Lord Beauchamp referred to the remarks made by the noble Marquess opposite in regard to education. We entirely endorse the views he expressed, and heartily rejoice at any wide expenditure on education. But I would remind your Lordships that while the total expenditure on the Army amounts now to the enormous sum of over £66,000,000, the sum which we spend upon education does not amount to £15,000,000.
  38
  Reference has been made to the state of the National Debt. The National Debt has been increased through the policy of the Government in South Africa by over £159,000,000, and not one penny of that Debt is covered by the Bill now before your Lordships. On the other hand, are still have what is a most serious and cruel imposition upon the middle classes—a war income-tax in times of peace. As my noble friend has said, we have also to face the fact that Consols, which represent the credit of the country, have fallen in a greater ratio than the leading securities of any other nation. I look upon that as a very serious matter, because Consols represent the credit of the country. They represent the rate at which the country can borrow, and our great strength in regard to the war in South Africa was not so much our military preparedness as the credit of this country which, owing to careful and prudent administration of its finances, stood so high.
  I wish to call attention to the statement made by the noble Lord and others to the effect that this Budget contains the germs of protection. There can be no denying that that is the case. You cannot have a more clear and visible proof of this than the portion of the Budget which deals with the duty upon cigarettes. There is no Excise duty placed upon cigarettes; it is an import duty only. Now, what is the position of affairs as regards cigarettes? A new duty of Is. per lb. has been imposed upon all foreign cigarettes. This brings in as additional revenue the paltry sum of £20,000 a year. But who pays 90 per cent. of this duty? Ninety per cent. of this duty is paid by the consumer. That is a distinct, a clear, and a definite protective duty, and it is a most remarkable illustration of what protection means. It only brings into the country a revenue of £20,000 a year, which is hardly worth considering, but the consumer is taxed 90 per cent of the duty. It has also raised the price of home-made cigarettes. These, you may say, are not in themselves large matters, but they are interesting now when the whole question of protection and free trade is being considered We feel on this side of the House that

  39
  it is most important that every opportunity should be taken to show that this Budget introduces a totally new system of taxation.
  My noble friend Lord Beauchamp referred to the £30,000,000 promised to be paid to this country as the contribution from the Transvaal. Lord Milner told us that the finances of the Transvaal were in such a condition that the taxpayers of this country must abandon their claim for this £30,000,000, but more recently I read a report of a speech by Lord Milner, in which he alluded with cynical contempt to the crocodile tears that had been shed over the condition of affairs in the Transvaal. He went on to say that affairs in that Colony were not half so bad as they were represented to be. if that is so, I should like to ask, when is this £30,000,000 to be repaid to the taxpayers of this country?
  I do not think it is possible to exaggerate the anxiety which exists throughout the country respecting its finances. We. have had figures as to the enormous increase inArmyexpenditure—yet I venture to say there is no one in your Lordships' House, not even the noble Marquess who leads it, who dares avow what the proposals of the Government are with regard to the Army. In addition, it must be remembered that we have an automatic
  Bill read 2a accordingly.
  Moved, That the Bill be committed.—(The Marquess of Lansdowne.)
  The Earl of Portsmouth.
  increase in the Navy Estimates. It may be said that your Lordships have no right to interfere with the details of Finance Bills. Your Lordships are some of the largest taxpayers in the country, and it really is monstrous to say that we have no right to consider this question of taxation. Any unwise and wasteful expenditure of money chiefly falls upon the owners of real and personal property; and there is a very strong feeling that while we have on the one hand this growing and enormous expenditure, we have not received from the Government any definite basis or system for confronting or dealing with it. This is merely a makeshift Budget. We have no proposals treating seriously the very grave increase in the National Debt, or the growing expenditure of the country. I do not know whether noble Lords will wish to divide the House on this Bill, but it seems to me a grave question whether some of us on this side ought not to enter our protest, not only as to the conditions under which we are asked to consider this Bill, but as to the Bill itself, considering its totally novel and mischievous principles.
  On Question,
  Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 42; Not Contents, 8.

  CONTENTS.

  Halsbury, E. (L. Chancellor.)

  Feversham, E.

  Harris, L.

  Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.) (L. President.)

  Lauderdale, E.

  Hatherton, L.

  Northesk, E.

  James, L.

  Salisbury, M. (L. Privy Seal.)

  Selborne, E.

  Kilmarnock, L. (E. Errol.)

  Waldegrave, E. [Teller.]

  Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)

  Argyll, D.

  Lawrence, L. [Teller.]

  Devonshire, D.

  Colville of Culross, V.

  Lovat, L.

  Cross, V.

  Methuen, L.

  Bath, M.

  Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore.)

  Newton, L.

  Lansdowne, M.

  Oxenfoord, L. (E. Stair.)

  Sidmouth, V.

  Raglan, L.

  Ancaster, E.

  Robertson, L.

  Camperdown, E.

  Armstrong, L.

  Sherborne, L.

  Cawdor, E.

  Balfour, L.

  Wemyss, L. (E. Wemyss.)

  Cromer, E.

  Clonbrock, L.

  Windsor, L.

  Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

  Colchester, L.

  Wolverton, L.

  Glenesk, L.

  NOT-CONTENTS.

  Beauchamp, E. [Teller.]

  Portsmouth,E.

  Emly, L.

  Carrington, E.

  Shuttleworth, L.

  Chesterfield, E.

  Coleridge, L. [Teller].

  Sudley, L. (E. Arran.)

  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: We have been told that a change has been made, and that 1st July has been substituted for 1st August next year. I would ask the noble Marquess to explain at what part of the Bill and in what clause 1st July is substituted for 1st August.
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: As I understand, it is intended to substitute 1st July for 1st August as the date up to which taxes may be continued.
  EARL CARRINGTON: I should like to ask the noble Marquess how this will affect the income - tax. There is no mention, so far as I can make out, of any change such as that proposed, in Clause 7, Part 2, of the Bill.
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: In the Act of 1903 the wording is that the taxes shall continue to be imposed, levied, and paid till the 1st day of August. It is the presence of these words which, in our opinion, obliges us to finish these proceedings before 1st August. In the Bill now before your Lordships the provision is that the taxes shall be continued, levied, and paid till the 1st day of July. It is quite clear that the words "1st of July" will give us more elbow room.
  EARL CARRINGTON: There are no such words in Part 2 with reference to income-tax. I ask, Does this apply to the income-tax?
  *THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (The Earl of SELBORNE): I am sure it will be a source of satisfaction to the noble Earl to know that it does not apply to income-tax. In regard to income-tax the date remains the 6th of April; it always has been so.
  *LORD COLERIDGE: As I have never seen the Bill, I desire to ask the noble Marquess a Question. As I understand, there has this year been appropriated £1,000,000 from the unclaimed dividends account. Now that money clearly does not belong to the Government. It is unclaimed money belonging to some persons unknown. I understand that the majority of it is now to be devoted to current expenditure. I may, of course, be speaking inaccurately, but the noble
  42
  Marquess has given me no opportunity of studying the Bill in all its details. Not having seen the Bill, I ask whether it contains any authority to the Government to take this £1,000,000, which is the property of some persons unknown, or, at any rate, not the property of the Government, and whether there is any authority in the Bill to devote that money to current expenditure? I presume that that would want the authority of Parliament just as much as the levying of the tobacco tax, the tea duty, or any of the other taxes.
  THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (The Marquess of SALISBURY): It is perfectly true that £1,000,000 is taken for current purposes, but I can assure the noble and learned Lord that we do not intend to defraud anybody. A charge for that sum will be maintained on the Consolidated Fund under a separate Act of Parliament which has already been passed.
  On Question, Motion negatived.
  Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a."—(The Marquess of Lansdowne.)
  *EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, I ask your Lordships whether the silence on the other side of the House tends to the dignity of this Assembly. The occasion is one which demands something more in the way of reply than we have yet received from the Government. We have attempted to put before your Lordships the serious condition of the country's finances. At the most the noble Marquess has occupied ten or fifteen minutes in his justification of the increased taxation. I cannot imagine that in regard to an important matter of this kind His Majesty's Government can think they have given enough time for its consideration. Here is the House of Lords asked to consider a Bill which has not even been circulated. Although I know well enough the constitutional position of this House with regard to the Money Bill, still I cannot think it is in accordance with the dignity of your Lordships' House that We should be asked to read a Bill and pass it through all its stages when it has not even been printed and circulated. If the noble Marquess will not answer the Questions

  43
  which have been addressed to him, perhaps he will be good enough to explain from what source is drawn the money for the expenditure on the Uganda Railway of £67,000, on the Land Registry Buildings of £16,000, on the New General Buildings of £162,000, and also the expenditure on the Public Offices in Dublin. There are other items upon which I should like information, but I have no wish to waste the time of your Lordships. I would ask the noble Marquess to explain from what sums the amounts I have quoted are to be spent.
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEThe points which the noble Earl has raised are no doubt very interesting ones, but they relate to questions of detail. If the noble Earl will ask me the Question on any other evening I shall be glad to provide him with an Answer.
  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: Perhaps the noble Marquess will be good enough, if not on the present occasion at any rate in the near future, to tell us whether we may hope for some definite promise as to the payment of the £30,000,000 which the Government have undertaken shall be paid over to us by the Transvaal.
  THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: My Lords, I rise on a point of order. I should like to ask whether the date on which this money may or may not be paid has any bearing on the question of the Third Reading of the Finance Bill.
  THE EARL OF PORTSMOUTH: The noble Earl seems to have constituted himself a sort of master of the ceremonies of your Lordships' House. He is a very mournful one on this occasion for he rose with a most mournful countenance. My question is quite pertinent because the finances of the country are necessarily dependent upon the contributions which are promised. A contribution of £30,000,000 from the Transvaal is certainly not a negligible asset in considering the question of the debt of the country; and it is a question which, if we cannot discuss it now, we can never discuss. When we are dealing with the finances of the country we should know what the assets are. I demur to the
  44
  suggestion that the question of the contribution of £30,000,000 from the Transvaal cannot appropriately be discussed on the: Finance Bill.
  *LORD COLERIDGE: My Lords, I am the last person to wish to obstruct the business, but I would appeal to the noble Marquess for a reply to the pertinent Questions raised by my noble friend Lord Beauchamp. Many questions of detail involve most important principles; and the fact that they are details does not exonerate the noble Marquess from the obligation cast upon him by his position as Leader of the House of answering Questions pertinent to the Bill before us. My noble friend has pointed out that there are certain items of expenditure amounting in all to the sum of £7,305,000. Naval works are accountable for £3,318,000; Military works for £2,950,000; telephones for £780,000; the Uganda Railway for £67,000; the Land Registry Buildings for £16,000; the New General Buildings for £162,000, and the Public Offices in Dublin for £12,000, the total being £7,305,000—which, if a detail, is a very considerable detail. My noble friend has asked the Leader of the House whether or not that sum of money is forthcoming from the Savings Bank deposits—a most material question; and I should have thought the duty would have been cast on the noble Marquess of answering it now. He says he will answer it on some future occasion if the Question is put to him. Surely that is not the way in which the noble Earl should be treated. I entirely associate myself with the Questions put by the noble Earl, and I respectfully ask the noble Marquess for a reply.
  *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I understand that the whole of these items of expenditure have been authorised by various Acts of Parliament. I make no apology for not being able to reply offhand to these Questions. I cannot give the information now, but if the noble Lord will ask me for it on Monday, I shall probably be able to give it.
  EARL CARRINGTON: My Lords, I submit with great respect that when Questions are asked by noble Lords in this

  45
  House as to the expenditure of millions of public money, it is scarcely courteous to them to put them off and say an Answer shall be given on Monday, after the Bill has become law. This is one of the most important Bills that can come before this House. We are a commercial nation; our commerce and trade are everything, and we are naturally anxious to know how these millions are being spent. Millions of public money are at stake, and are being voted as if they were twenty-five shillings or half-a-crown. This is a proper protest to make, and I ask the noble Marquess whether he cannot answer the very pertinent Questions asked by my noble friend.
  On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed.

  LICENSING BILL.
  Brought from the Commons; read 1a; to be printed; and to be read 2a on Monday next.—(The Lord Belper.) (No. 171.)

  THE MILITIA FORCE.
  *The EARL OF WEMYSSrose to move to resolve—" That, in the opinion of this House, any scheme of Army reorganisation that does away the Militia force is contrary to sound policy, destroying as it does the ancient constitutional foundation of our existing military system." He said: My Lords, as I believe this will be the only opportunity which will present itself of calling attention to the very important matter to which this Resolution refers, perhaps your Lordships will allow me to do so even at this late hour. The Militia, so far as we are able to judge from what has passed in your Lordships' House, is about to be abolished. That was the view of the position taken by my noble friend Lord Burghclere in his speech on the Army reorganisation scheme. The same view was taken of it by Lord Spencer; and I got from Lord Donoughmore, the able exponent in your Lordships' House of the views of the War Office, a clear and distinct affirmation of the fact that it is intended to absorb the whole of the Militia force. When the noble Earl the Under-Secretary was speaking, I asked him distinctly whether
  46
  the intention was to absorb the whole of the Militia. He replied "Yes;" and my noble friend Lord Burghclere seemed so pleased at getting that admission that he kissed his hand to me in thankfulness.
  My Lords. this is a very important question and had time permitted I should have gone more fully into it than I feel justified in doing to-night. I should have referred to the history of the Militia, and have endeavoured to show that it is the foundation of our military system, embodying as it does the right of the Crown compulsorily to force men to serve for home defence. But I shall not go into that further than to say this, that the present Act dates from the year 1852, when Lord John Russell brought into the House of Commons a Local Militia Bill. Lord Palmerston took exception to the Militia being localised, and moved to strike out the word "local," and in doing so he struck out the Government as well, for the Government thereupon resigned. The first act of the succeeding Government was the bringing in by Mr. Walpole of the Bill that became the present Act. I should like to call attention to the great services rendered by the Militia to the country at various times. In 1803, 15,000 Militia Volunteers joined the Army; in 1808, the Local Militia was, in addition, established; 20,000 Militiamen volunteered then for the Army for twelve months. In 1812, three strong battalions joined the Army. During the ten years from 1803 to 1813, 100,000 Militiamen passed into the Regular Army. In 1815, Militiamen in great numbers joined the Army and served at Waterloo. In 1854 we had the Crimean War, during which fifty battalions of Militia volunteered for service; ten were sent to the Mediterranean as garrison, thus freeing the Regular troops for service in the Crimea. In all, the Militia sent to the war in South Africa, 1,691 officers and 43,875 men, and we know that every year the Militia gives 14,000 recruits to the Army. Besides that, up till a quite recent date there was the Militia Army Reserve. In this Reserve there were 30,000 men up to last year, when the Reserve was abolished by the late Secretary of State for War. That abolition means this, that if you were engaged in war to-morrow you would have 30,000 men less to count upon to fill the rank

  47
  of the Army than you had when you entered into the South African War.
  I now come to the avowed intention to absorb the Militia force into the Regular Army. I have never heard of such a proposal until it was made by the present Secretary of State for War. Against the view of the right hon. Gentleman I could quote the views of many high authorities, but I will content myself with opinions expressed by Mr. Pitt a hundred years ago, by Lord Palmerston in the fifties, and, finally, by the Duke of Wellington. What did the Duke of Wellington say in his last speech in your Lordships' House with reference to the Militia? He said—
  "I recommend you to adopt this measure (Mr. Walpole's Bill). It will give you a constitutional force. It will not be at first or for some time forward what we could desire, but it will become what we want—an efficient auxiliary to the Regular Army."
  I am quite content, in defence of the Militia and its continued existence, to cite these authorities. What have we to weigh against them? Nothing, so far as I know, except the authority of the present War Minister. I feel sure that weighed against these in the balance of public opinion Mr. Arnold-Forster's reasons would kick the beam. It is in these circumstances that I venture to ask your Lordships to pass the Resolution which stands in my name.
  My Lords, I have received numerous letters approving of this Motion from persons whose opinions cannot fail to have great weight in your Lordships' House. The noble and gallant Lord the ex-Commander-in-Chief, Lord Roberts, writes that he is very sorry he cannot be present, as he has to be at Lancaster to-day. But your Lordships heard the noble and gallant Lord quite recently, and it was evident that his speech was directed strongly against any haste in dealing with this question. He prayed your Lordships to be cautious in dealing with this important force. I have also in my hand a letter from the Duke of Somerset, who regrets that he cannot be present, and says—
  "Instead of destroying the Militia, which is evidently the intention of the Government, the country should see that every effort is made to increase it in numbers and in efficiency."
  48
  Lord Penrhyn writes me a short and pithy letter, in which he expresses regret that he will not be able to record his vote in favour of my Motion against the destruction of the Militia. He adds—
  "I have been brought up to believe that the Militia is the backbone of the Army, and I am still of that opinion."
  Lord Wolseley also writes regretting that he cannot be here to-day, but condemning in the strongest possible terms what is proposed to be done by His Majesty's Government in regard to the Militia force. Lastly, I have in my hand a letter from Sir Alfred Turner, who was at the head of the Auxiliary Forces at the War Office. He writes—
  "Dear Lord Wemyss,—We ought all to be grateful to you for taking up the defence of Great Britain's old constitutional force against Mr. Arnold-Forster, who clearly means to abolish it if he can, in spite of the really splendid services it did during the war. when, in addition to the numbers who went abroad, the whole of the remainder were embodied for very long periods. If the numbers of the Militia have fallen away, and if its efficiency is not what it should be, the reason is the utter stupidity with which it has been treated by the War Office. It has been sent year after year to unpopular camps and away from its counties, which has been the chief cause of its falling away."
  The noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition spoke the other day in the highest possible terms of the importance of the Militia, and he added—
  "It is the force which, during the late war, furnished such an enormous number of men to the Army in South Africa. The country would be much staggered if it thought this force was to be shortly destroyed."
  I think these quotations clearly point to the importance of this force, and to the desirability, instead of destroying it, of making it as efficient as we can.
  I know not what course the Government will take with reference to my Motion, nor what course your Lordships will take. So far as the Government are concerned, they do not seem to be quite at one on this subject. We had, on the one hand, an able exposition from the noble Earl the Under-Secretary of State for War, but, on the other hand, we had a speech from the Leader of the Government in this House, Lord Lansdowne; and I cannot believe that the noble Marquess in his heart desires to do away with a force on which he said he relied, even by compulsory service, in

  49
  case of emergency. The noble Marquess said—
  "Let me say frankly that the Paper which your Lordships have before you does not represent what can be described as the final conclusion of His Majesty's Government."
  This Paper is Mr. Arnold-Forster's Memorandum, and the Leader of the Government in this House says that it does not represent what can be described as the final conclusion of His Majesty's Government on many of the subjects to which it has reference, and one of the most important subjects with which it deals is, as your Lordships know, the Militia. I do not know whether His Majesty's Government are going to resist this Motion, which is simply a statement of fact. It is, after all, only a truism. But, if the Government do resist it, I ask your Lordships to take an independent and patriotic line. If your Lordships often did that on questions of principle that come before you, you could govern England, and save our country from many a measure which we would be much better without.
  There are two courses open to your Lordships—one is to stand by the old Militia force, which is the foundation and the basis of our military system; the other is to substitute for it, assuming that the Militia is to be done away with, this territorial mongrel begotten by the present Minister of War. I feel, however, that Mr. Arnold-Forster's scheme will only add some fragments to the War Office administrative wreckage that floats and eddies round the base of Lord Herbert's statue in Pall Mall, and on which, with bowed head and sorrowful mien he continuously looks down, and I am bound to say from my experience of the War Office that it is practically the Goodwin Sands of political Army administration. I say "political" because, unfortunately, one always sees that in these matters politics enter largely, and the safety of the politician is on the whole placed before the safety of the nation. Be that as it may, I ask your Lordships to affirm a Resolution which in your heart of hearts I am sure everyone of you must feel to be right. And certain I am that if the Opposition were to propose the abolition of the Militia force, the foundation of our military system, such a proposal would be rejected by your Lordships by a very large
  50
  majority. I beg to move the Motion standing in my name.
  Moved to resolve, "That, in the opinion of this House, any scheme of Army re-organisation that does away with the Militia force is contrary to Sound policy, destroying as it does the ancient constitutional foundation of our existing military system."—(The Earl of Wemyss.)
  *EARL SPENCER: My Lords, I rise early in this discussion, because I am anxious to draw attention to a particular part of the subject, on which up to the present there has been absolute and complete silence, in the hope that the noble Earl the Under-Secretary will be able to give us some information upon it. But before I come to that, I wish to say that I entirely adhere to the remarks I made the other day about the Militia, and which the noble Earl near me has quoted. 1 certainly understood from the noble Earl the Under-Secretary that the Government were in favour of a homogeneous plan, and of welding, as he called it, the Militia into the territorial forces.
  THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOE WAR (The Earl of DONOUGHMORE): I used the word "we." I Meant the Army Council, and not the Government.
  EARL. SPENCER: Then I ask the noble Earl, Is the Army Council to be considered as a separate and independent body? I should be much surprised to hear that the Board of Admiralty was independent of the Cabinet, and that its particular views on a question of policy might be distinguished from those of the Government. I have a right to complain of the noble Earl putting upon the Army Council the desire to absorb the Militia into the territorial system. Bat what I rise particularly to call attention to is this. In former years I had considerable experience of the very large body of men constituting the Irish Militia. In my first Viceroyalty, I found that the Militia had not been called out for exercise for a considerable number of years on account of Fenian troubles. I rather think that at that time the transfer of the Militia from the Lord-Lieutenant to the War Office had not taken place. At all events, I had a great deal to do with the Irish Militia, and I recommended, and the

  51
  Cabinet agreed, that they should be called out for exercise.
  A NOBLE LORD: It was Lord Cardwell who made the transfer.
  *EARL SPENCER: I do not remember whether or not the transfer had taken Place at that time, but I think they were under the Lord-Lieutenant, and this was just previous to Mr. Cardwell's transfer of their control to the War Office. I may be wrong, but that is immaterial. The Militia were called out, and I had the opportunity of seeing nearly every Militia regiment in Ireland. I took great interest in them, and was struck with the fact that they were a particularly fine body of men. Moreover, they had more officers than the English Militia. In Ulster there were a great many regiments which drew numbers of men from Scotland. These men, who belonged to Ulster, were at work in factories and other places in Scotland, and they invariably came over during their holidays to do their training. That showed, I thought, a spirit which ought to be commended. I am ready to admit that a considerable change may have taken place in regard to the Irish Militia since then, but I am rather inclined from what I have heard to believe that very much the same state of things exists now as existed then. Ireland is in a totally different position with regard to the Auxiliary Forces from either England or Scotland, for there are no Volunteers in Ireland. The only defensive force is the Militia. Therefore, I think it is very important that this point should be considered—namely, what do the Government propose to do with regard to the Irish Militia? I admit that the Militia force is not now in a satisfactory state, but I am strongly opposed to the idea of destroying it. I am much inclined, therefore, to support my noble friend's Motion, but I must not be supposed to endorse all his views on the Militia, especially on the subject of the Militia ballot, of which he is such a persistent advocate.
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSS: I have said nothing about that to-night.
  *EARL SPENCER: No, but the noble Earl's name is so bound up with that subject that I wish it to be clearly under-
  52
  stood that, in supporting my noble friend's Motion now before the House, I do not endorse his views on the subject of the Militia ballot. I rose chiefly, however, for the purpose of calling attention to the case of the Irish Militia, because that is a point on which we have not heard a single word, and 1 think it is an important element in the consideration of this question.
  *LORD HARRIS: My Lords, I am not prepared to say at this moment whether I can support the Motion of the noble Earl opposite or not. It depends rather upon what the Government have to say to-night or at some future time on the subject. At present it seems to me we are very much in the dark as to what are the intentions of the Government with regard to the Militia. At present their proposals are entirely inchoate. We have not heard any explanation either from the Secretary of State for War or from the noble Earl the Under-Secretary which would lead us to be certain what is the system which it is proposed to introduce in substitution for the present one so far as the Militia is concerned.
  Some years ago when I had the honour to serve at the War Office I took a great deal of interest in the Militia, and was chairman of a Committee which took a great deal of evidence upon it; and one conclusion I came to from the evidence we had before us, and it has remained fixed in my mind ever since, was that the Army has got no more useful recruiting agent than the Militia. And for this reason. There are many lads in the country who are bitten with the idea of military service but rather dread tying themselves down for what was in those days eight years with the colours and four years with the Reserve, and the Militia gave them the opportunity of seeing what military service was like. I believe that large numbers of young men went into the Militia with that object in view. I think it must be most discouraging for Militia officers to see lads come into their corps and get trained, and then for the best of them to pass into the Army. I sympathise very much with Militia officers in regard to that, but at the same time I recognise that the Militia is the most successful recruiting agent the Army has had for some considerable time. Therefore, I do trust

  53
  His Majesty's Government will consider very gravely from that point of view the policy of so changing the Militia service or so reducing its strength as to endanger its recruiting power. The Government may say that the new period of service which they propose to introduce is so short that it will serve in place of the Militia to enable a lad to make up his mind whether or not he cares for military service. I am a little doubtful about that. It seems to me that two years is too long a time, and that the lad will think he has had enough military service after that time, and will not be inclined to join the general-service Army for the nine years. Therefore, I do hope the Government will, before they present their scheme to the country, seriously consider this point.
  I understand from the Secretary of State that he is going to consult the Militia colonels during the autumn. I assume, therefore, that the Government scheme, whatever it is, is not complete. I do trust that before they present their complete scheme to the country they will bear in mind the great advantage it is to give these young fellows the opportunity of putting in a few months service to see how they like it. It is suggested in the Secretary of State's speech that there is a portion of the Militia which is redundant, which cannot be fitted into any scheme for the defence of these shores. I should be quite prepared to support the Government, if they think it necessary, in lopping off unnecessary limbs. The illustrious Duke the late Duke of Cambridge said to me once, after a War Office meeting in which he had struggled long against a reduction of numbers—
  "I made the best fight I could, but, of course, if there is not money enough, the numbers must be cut down."
  He added—
  "I have often submitted to a reduction of numbers, but I have never submitted to a reduction of cadres."
  His late Royal Highness thought this most important, because while you have the cadres you can fill them up in case of emergency. That is an important point which ought not to be lost sight of, and it was that which was done in the case of the Yeomanry regiments sent to South Africa.
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  The other night I asked the noble Earl the Under-Secretary what length of time he considered the general-service regiments would have to put in abroad, and he replied that he was hopeful that they would not have to serve as long abroad as they do now; but I cannot see how he worked that out on the figures he subsequently give us. As I understand, there are to be about 105 general-service regiments. There are now, I think, seventy-nine on foreign service Our recent experience shows that the demands of the Colonial Office and the Foreign Office go on increasing. The result is a greater demand on the English Army abroad, and I think it most unwise if the War Office authorities are calculating on a considerable reduction of numbers for foreign service. There are at present seventy-nine regiments on foreign service, and there is a proposal to reduce the number of battalions in the general-service regiments to 105. I work out the figures in this way, that regiments will have to put in something like twenty-two or twenty-three years on foreign service out of a tour of service of thirty years, the tour at present being eighteen years abroad and twelve years at home. The Secretary of State for War expressed great interest in the terri-torialisation system and in the history of regiments. Now, I ask what connection can possibly be maintained between a county battalion and its county when that battalion is to be abroad for three-fourths of its tour of service, and is to put in three years of the remaining period at Aldershot? The connection between the county and the regiment, will, I fear, be very much diminished. I deplore that as much as anything in the many intricacies of the scheme that has been presented to us. I think that the interest of a county in its regiment, an interest which has grown up by degrees, but which was enormously increased and intensified by the war, is a most valuable element in arousing enthusiasm for military service; and, therefore, I do hope that the Government and the Secretary of State for War will consider the matter very carefully before they finally decide upon so reducing the number of battalions as to necessitate such a long tour of foreign service as that to which I have referred.

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  The speech of the noble Marquess the Leader of the House, the other night, filled me with the greatest apprehension. I could not detect one note of enthusiasm for this scheme. If that is so, and if I have correctly construed the noble Marquess's attitude, I ask the Government: Is it fair on their supporters in this House and in the other House to present the scheme to us and lead us to suppose that it is a scheme in which the Government believe tie safety of the country rests? I do not think I am exaggerating the case when I say that the noble Marquess either damned the scheme with faint praise, or praised it with faint condemnation. I hesitate to support my noble friend's Motion to-night because I believe the Government must have something more positive to say with regard to a scheme upon which the safety of these shores as well as the Empire at large rests.
  LORD RAGLAN: My Lords, like my noble friend who has just sat down and the other noble Lords who have addressed the House to-night, I am bound to say I have the same doubt as to what the scheme of His Majesty's Government really is. I have endeavoured to find Out what it is. I asked my noble friend the Leader of the House certain definite Questions, and he said to me, Wait till the debate on Friday next, and in the meantime carefully study the Memorandum of the Secretary of State for War." My Lords, I have very carefully studied that Memorandum, and I can assure your Lordships I am no further advanced than I was before. I should have put this down, perhaps, to my want of intelligence, but I find that every other person to whom I have spoken is in the same nebulous state of mind as to what the Government proposals really are. Then I come to what has been said in the course of the military debates that have taken place in your Lordships' House. First of all there was the statement of the noble Earl the Under-Secretary in which he said positively that the entire Militia were to be abolished or welded into a territorial Army, which is an expression I do not understand myself, and I very much doubt if His Majesty's Government understand it. Then the noble Marquess the Leader of the House said he did not
  56
  think it was going to be done like that; at any rate, commanding officers of Militia were going to be consulted in the autumn. If it has been decided that the Militia are to be abolished, what are commanding officers to be consulted upon in the autumn?
  With regard to the position of the Militia, I think noble Lords on the Front Bench will bear me out when I say that I have been a most persistent advocate for the improvement of the Militia for many years. I do not think anyone has clamoured more for reform and efficiency than I have, and I have endeavoured to make myself thoroughly acquainted with the condition of that force. No doubt it will be said that if the Militia is in a bad condition, why object to its abolition? Well, my Lords, I have long believed that the Militia could, by the exercise of a very small amount of what I might call "sympathetic administration," and the expenditure of a certain amount of money, be put into such a position as to be able to be brought thoroughly up to date and to carry out the duties for which hitherto it has perhaps been incompetent. The want of men I put down to the loss of the agricultural population, and I do not believe it is possible to make any very large additions to the numbers in the Militia by anything short of some system of universal service. But I do think this, that you could perfectly well maintain a Militia force of something like the normal establishment at a small expenditure of money and by sympathetic administration.
  As to officers, that I am sure is entirely a question of money. There is not a large leisured class in this country prepared to take commissions, but if the War Office would pay a certain retaining fee they would get a fair number of officers. Of course the larger the fee the more officers they would get. I believe that if they gave, say, £100 a year to every Militia officer, they would get a large addition in the number of officers. The position of commanding officers is an extremely difficult one. The commanding officer is of no account at all during the non-training period. If he were given a free hand a different state of things would obtain. For a short time there existed a most excellent body called the Militia Advisory Board. They may not have possessed any very great

  57
  weight with the authorities at the War Office, but that Board was a channel through which we were able to make our wants known to the Secretary of State for War. That is the great difficulty I have always felt as a commanding officer—the difficulty of making our wants known to the Secretary of State for War. I do not know why the Advisory Board was abolished. It was not extravagant, and I think it did a very great deal of good. It certainly gave the force a greater amount of confidence than it had hitherto possessed in the War Office administration.
  Your Lordships may ask, If the Militia is unsatisfactory, why not abolish it? I reply, Because I believe it can, at a very small cost, be made most efficient. The chief point about the Militia, to my mind, is its remarkable cheapness. Even at an additional cost it would be by far the cheapest force serving the Crown. I will put into pounds, shillings, and pence, the cost of the Auxiliary Forces that went to South Africa. Before the war the cost of a Militiaman was £14 a year, the cost of a Yeoman £10 a year, and the cost of a Volunteer £4. I am speaking, of course in round figures. Something more than half the Militia served in the War—some 43,000 rank and file, as units, and some 14,000 as Militia Reserves. That works out that every Militiaman who served in the South African War cost the country £28. I turn to the Volunteers, and I find that only about 20.000, all told, served in the war. That is somewhere about 8 per cent, of the strength. Therefore every Volunteer who went to South Africa had cost the country £50 a year for a considerable time. About 20 per cent. of the Yeomanry went to South Africa, and there, again, the cost of each Yeoman was £50 a year. That was not the only direction in which the Militia proved a cheap force, because the remaining 50 per cent. of the Militia were all embodied in this country. Therefore the Militia showed that they were not only a cheap force, but a force that the country could rely upon.
  The noble Earl the mover of the Motion now before the House spoke of the services of the Militia in the past. The Militia have been tried over and over again and found to be absolutely reliable,
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  and their reward is that they are to be abolished. What is to be substituted for this force? We are told that we are to have a new sort of territorial Army. We have had absolutely no figures, no information of any sort as to what this territorial Army is to be, or what it is to cost. We have had nothing but the barest possible generalities. I am informed that it will cost considerably over £10,000.000 to build barracks for this force. So far as I am able to judge, it will mean in any case a large reduction in numbers and an entirely new force which cannot be very much more highly trained than the Militia are now. It is to be enlisted for two years. It is true that they have two years service in Germany, but is the War Office prepared to give their recruits the same training as recruits are given in Germany? If so, I can tell the War Office that they will not have many recruits to train. More than that, it is to consist of small battalions of 500 rank and file, of whom 100 are to be long-service and 400 short-service men. Out of those 400 men, I am prepared to prophesy that at least 250 will be recruits of under one year's service. Wastage you must have, and nothing short of increasing the pay of the Army to a gigantic figure would give you anything but a large mass of recruits about the age of eighteen.
  It is imagined that the same class of men who have joined the Militia will go into this territorial Army. My noble friend Lord Harris has expressed doubts on that point. There is another class of men, and a very valuable class, which I regret has disappeared largely from the Militia, but which does still exist in certain corps. I refer to the old civilian Militiamen, the men who never were soldiers, but who went into the Militia because they liked a certain amount of soldiering, and became a most valuable element in the regiment. I do not believe for one moment that that class of man will enlist any more for two years than he is at present prepared to enlist for three years. Therefore you will wipe out that class of man altogether unless he goes into the Volunteers. But in Ireland, as the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition has pointed out, there are no Volunteers, and, therefore, if the Irish Militia is abolished, those men will be

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  lost altogether to the Crown. As to officers, as far as I gather, all the senior officers, myself included, I presume, are to be abolished, and no Militia officer is to exist any longer above the rank of captain.
  THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Major.
  LORD RAGLAN: That will deprive the country of the services of a great number of gentlemen whose services are exceedingly valuable. I refer to those old soldiers who, having served a certain amount of time in the Army, have transferred their services to the Militia. You will completely wipe out from the forces of the Crown that class of officer, and I am also firmly convinced that you will wipe out a great number of other officers who will refuse to go into Militia regiments where they never can be regarded as fit to rise to a position of command. In any case, as far as I can make out, there must be a very large reduction in the number of officers. To each of these proposed new battalions are to be added ten officers who are to do a month or six weeks training every year. I very much doubt whether a very desirable class of officer will join when there is no possibility of rising above the rank of major, and the class of men who now officer your Militia regiments will disappear altogether.
  This is a matter on which I feel most strongly. I have the honour to command a Militia regiment, and, perhaps I may be allowed to say, not one of the worst regiments in the service. I have at this time thirty-one out of my thirty-six officers, and 960 out of my 1,000 men. I should have had more than my thousand men had not my recruiting been interfered with. I and my family have served in that regiment for 240 years; it has been commanded by a member of my family for more than one hundred years. But, putting sentiment on one side, I should be willing that that regiment should be swept away if it was incapable of being brought up to date, or if something better was going to be substituted for it. I do not, however, believe that those conditions exist.
  This remarkable proposition has been sprung upon us very suddenly at
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  the end of a long session. The remarkable thing about it is that it is quite at variance with the earlier speeches which were made by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War. One of the very early speeches he made after taking office was at Liverpool, in the course of which he particularly alluded to the Militia as a force which wanted assistance and sympathetic management, and a force which should be looked after. His way of doing that is like curing toothache by cutting off a person's head. I trust that His Majesty's Government will defer these drastic changes, at all events, until those of us who sit on this side of the House and usually support His Majesty's Government have had a chance of hearing what their actual suggestions really are. The Militia has never failed the country in a time of need, and I ask the Government to think twice and even thrice before they attempt to tamper with it.
  *THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, I have been asked a number of Questions this evening extending very widely over many parts of the scheme which has been outlined by my right hon. friend the Secretary of State in another place, and I do not know that I should be in order in referring to all of them, more especially to those which were raised by my noble friend Lord Harris. He asked two Questions in particular, both with reference to the foreign-service Army. I am sorry that in the few sentences in which I attempted to reply to him on the last occasion on which your Lordships discussed this subject I did not make the matter clear, but if, at any time in the near future the noble Lord will give me five minutes I can explain the matter fully and, I hope, satisfactorily to him.
  LORD HARRIS: I shall be happy to hear what the noble Earl has to say privately; but we are accustomed to wander rather wide in our discussions, and I cannot see why the noble Earl cannot now give me an Answer to my Question.
  * THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: The Motion before us protests against the abolition of the Militia, and I think I should be detaining your Lordships at too great length if I entered into those other subjects now. I do not wish to

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  complain, but I think I have a right to say that the attitude of His Majesty's Government towards the Militia has been misunderstood. I think that my right hon. friend the Secretary of State for War made perfectly plain in his speech in another place his exact attitude in respect to this question. I know it would not be in order for me to quote from that speech, but I am perfectly in order in referring to the Memorandum which has been circulated to your Lordships. There are some three or four paragraphs on pages 11 and 12 dealing with this question. My right hon. friend says most distinctly that no sweeping change in the general position of the Militia force, or in the strength of its units, is at present contemplated; and your Lordships must be perfectly aware that nothing in the nature of large organic changes can be carried out until the Estimates for next year have been presented to Parliament. At the same time we do regard the position of the Militia at the present moment as serious. I do not for a moment depreciate what the Militia have done in the past, but the Report of the Royal Commission recently presented to your Lordships' House shows how very serious the position of the Militia now is. The Commission stated in their Report that the average strength of 104,000 yielded only 82,000 Militiamen fit as regards age to take the field. In Continental armies (the Commission pointed out) men are not taken before the age of twenty, and if we adopted that age as the lowest for field service, and deducted the men who had not reached that age, the effective total was reduced to 69,000 men, out of an establishment of 130,000. The Commission also stated that the evidence which they had received satisfied them that the drill and training at present undergone by the Militia force was insufficient to fit its units, at short notice, to meet trained troops in the field.
  LORD RAGLAN: There have been no classes held for several years to which Militia officers could go. You close the classes to them, and then tell them they are untrained.
  * THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I think the noble Earl will find a great many other reasons in the evidence given
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  before the Commission. The reason I have quoted is not the sole reason. I am not claiming too much when I say that the evil is an organic one more than accidental, as the noble Lord seems to suggest. Indeed, there is no more convincing proof of the bad condition in which the Militia find themselves at the present moment than is to be found in the speeches of the noble Lord himself. I read very carefully this afternoon the speech which the noble Lord made on the occasion of the debate raised by my noble friend Lord Newton, in which he advocated compulsory service, and 1 find complete corroboration of almost everything I have just quoted from the Report of the Royal Commission. The position is a very serious one. The chief evils, as we believe, arise from the fact that the Militia competes with the Line for recruits, a competition which the noble Lord, Lord Harris, does not very much deprecate because he thinks it is a very useful thing to have the Militia as a feeder for the Line. But I venture to say that a Militia at £1,800,000 supplying 19,000 recruits for the Line, though perhaps an excellent thing, is a luxury which we ought to try and cheapen if we can.
  Again, we are confronted with the fact that the Volunteers compete with the Militia for recruits. Militia colonels are complaining to us that a great many officers and men find their way into the Volunteers instead of, as they did in former times, into the Militia. We also recognise as an evil the want of trained officers and non-commissioned officers. My noble friend Lord Raglan suggested that we could get a large number of officers for the Militia if we give them a retaining fee of £100 per annum. If we did that I cannot imagine any officers going into the Army as subalterns at £120. We are also confronted with the fact that the Militia are in no way organised for war. It is necessary to find some alleviation for this state of affairs. The Army Council have decided that it is necessary to at once raise the physical standard of the Militia to the level of the Line. We also feel that we should be doing wrong if we attempted to continue in existence or unamalgamated, if I may use the phrase, certain units which are at the present moment absolutely redundant; but we cannot blind ourselves to the fact that

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  these expedients may only prove to be palliatives, and that some large organic change may be found to be necessary. But it has never been suggested that in any organic change which may be made it will be necessary absolutely to abolish the Militia. For that reason I can assure the noble Earl that I have no objection to the Motion.
  The question of the Irish Militia has been raised in the course of the debate. That is a very important question, and I can assure the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition that it will be kept in view in connection with the consideration of the whole scheme. As to the point raised by Lord Raglan with reference to the future position of commanding officers, he will, of course, remember that it was suggested in the evidence before the Norfolk Commission that the position of the commanding officer is at present very unsatisfactory. He has no power to command except while the regiment is out training. It has been suggested that commanding officers should be allowed to give attention to their regiments all the year round. which would not separate them very much from the position of commanding officers of one of the home-service battalions if the recommendations of my right hon. friend are carried out.
  LORD BURGHCLERE: My Lords, I am unwilling to trouble your Lordships with any remarks at this late hour, but as I had the honour of initiating a debate a week or so ago on the Army scheme, and as I have been particularly invited into this discussion by the noble Earl, Lord Wemyss, I hope your Lordships will allow me for a few minutes to address you on this subject. My noble friend, in inviting me to take part in this debate, said that on a previous occasion I had at a point in my speech kissed my hand to him. I do not remember, my Lords, that I ever took such a liberty with my noble friend; but I must admit that I never hear him address this House in his strenuous and vigorous fashion without wishing to take off my hat to him. I have only risen to endeavour to elucidate the rather hazy condition in which, if I may say so, the Under-Secretary has left the question, and to elicit from the Government some definite statement as to what really are their opinions with re-
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  gard, not to the abolition of the Militia, but to the absorption and amalgamation of the Militia.
  The Under-Secretary told us just now that we had entirely misunderstood the Secretary of State as to his attitude with regard to the Militia. I would venture to draw my noble friend's attention to the Secretary of State's Memorandum which has been circulated in this House. We find in it the deliberate statement of the Secretary of State to this effect—
  "There will be an improvement in the Militia, and, if public opinion will allow, the amalgamation of the Militia with the Line for the purpose of forming a true territorial Army."
  I think it is quite clear, from the speech of the Secretary of State for War and from this document, what is in the mind of the Secretary of State with regard to the future of the Militia. I do not think the Under-Secretary will deny that the plan of the Secretary of State is to create a territorial Army. Having accepted the theory of the blue water school, the Secretary of State proposes that the Army shall be smaller than hitherto, but we hope it is to be more efficient; and in endeavouring to form that Army the Secretary of State proposes to absorb, I think. thirty-three battalions of the Militia, and to abolish the remaining Militia battalions in order that he may effect a certain economy. What that economy is was referred to just now by the noble Earl the Under-Secretary. It is the £1,800,000 a year, which is the present cost of maintaining 91,000 members of the Militia force in order, as he put it, to give to the Regular Army 19,000 recruits per annum. The noble Earl insinuated that that was a very large sum to pay for these recruits.
  If the Secretary of State proposes to absorb these thirty-three Militia battalions, and to abolish the rest, it is quite obvious that, in accepting this Motion, the Under-Secretary of State is not carrying out the plan of his chief, nor the plan which he himself was good enough to give to your Lordships the other night, and which he strangely said proceeded from the Army Council and not from the Cabinet. I do not speak with any experience of these high offices; but, in the case of the Admiralty, it would seem

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  a most extraordinary doctrine if the Lords of the Admiralty were to initiate a policy of a far-reaching nature and of vital importance to the very existence of this country, and then, when it came before Parliament, we were to be told by His Majesty's Government that it was not they who were responsible for it, but the Admiralty Board. That is a doctrine which has never before been placed before your Lordships or the country.
  I venture to say, with all respect to His Majesty's Government, that the official acceptance of my noble friend's Motion is the last phase in the decline and fall of that great scheme of Army reorganisation which appeared before the country with such a flourish of trumpets a short time ago. When I last spoke, the noble Marquess, with great good nature, twitted me because I had said that the basis of this plan was the acceptance of the doctrine of the blue water school. The Government having accepted this Resolution, I hope I shall not offend the literary susceptibilities of the noble Marquess when I say that the scheme of the Government is now many fathoms deep below the blue water, and is likely to remain there, and I do not think in any effective form it will float on that blue water again.
  The noble Earl the Under-Secretary told us the other night that the amalgamation of the Militia and its absorption with the Line was part of the Army scheme. Shortly afterwards the Leader of your Lordships' House told us that this was not the final scheme of the Government, Then, I ask, with all respect, what on earth was this Memorandum circulated to Parliament for? We do not want to hear from His Majesty's Government what they are not agreed upon. We want to hear from them what they are agreed upon. Yet by the confession of the noble Marquess, and the position in which that scheme is now placed, it is obvious that it represents what the Government are not agreed upon, and in no sense what they are agreed upon. I should like to know how the noble Marquess explains that position. The noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition said he would support my noble friend if he went to a division. Luckily for us we are not to have a division. For myself, I am bound to say I feel some difficulty in giving an un-
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  qualified assent to the Motion now before the House. At the same time, I fully associate myself with what has been said with regard to the past services of the Militia, and the way in which they behaved from Waterloo to the Crimea, and more recently in South Africa. The noble Lord opposite, Lord Raglan, would tell us that our proper territorial Army is the constitutional force, the Militia.
  LORD RAGLAN: Hear, hear!
  LORD BURGHCLERE: It is obvious that the territorial Army will be mainly composed of the Militia. We know that at present recruiting for the Militia is not what we desire it to be, and it does not follow that in the future more recruits will be forthcoming. It is quite possible that recruiting will he more difficult. You will have a small territorial Army mainly composed of the Militia, and when Your recruiting falls off, what will happen? Why, those noble Lords who favour conscription will come forward and point to the depletion of your only territorial force, and when some scare occurs, they will at once urge, that the Ballot Act should be put in force; thus will come in the thin end of the wedge of conscription. I, for my part, being an opponent of conscription, do not wish to see such a result. By the admission of the noble Earl. the Under-Secretary, it is obvious that the Militia force will have to be strengthened and improved, and if you strengthen and improve it, it may be that you will have to alter its constitutional position, especially as regards service abroad. I think it would be very difficult to constitute the territorial Army largely of the Militia without imposing the obligation to serve abroad. You will thereby alter the whole constitution of the Militia force, and if you tie yourselves down to an abstract proposal like the one now before the House, you will find it difficult to explain your position when the difficulty arises.
  *THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (The Earl of SELBORNE): My Lords, I trust you will allow me to say a few words in reply to my noble friend. I desire to speak in a double capacity—as

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  First Lord of the Admiralty and therefore a responsible member of His Majesty's Government, and also as a Militia officer. First of all, may I say a word for myself as a Militia officer? I have served twenty-five years in the Militia, and although my active career in that force is closed, I have still the great honour to be hon. colonel of the regiment in which I served, and my attachment to the Militia is not less than that of my noble friend. Lord Raglan, who has addressed the House with such consummate knowledge of the subject. Having made quite clear what my personal attitude towards the Militia is, I feel bound to say, as Lord Raglan would say, that the condition of the Militia at the present moment is profoundly unsatisfactory. I must allow myself a little licence on this occasion. I do say, with a full sense of my responsibility, that the condition to which the Militia has been brought has been the work of the War Office and nobody else—not the particular War Office existing at the present moment, not the War Office of any one Government, but the War Office as I have known it throughout my Militia service of twenty-five years. The Militia is what the War Office have made it, and the War Office alone is responsible for all its failures and shortcomings.
  In the whole of my service, with the exception of one or two officers I could name, I have never found, be it Liberal Government or Conservative Government in power, any sympathy at the War Office for the Militia except from the civilians. The military officials at the War Office knew nothing about the Militia; the conditions of service in the Militia were so different from those to which they had been accustomed that they never seemed able to exercise their imagination; they never seemed to realise that there could be a force whose conditions were different from those of the Regular Army, or that any force other than Regular soldiers could be of any value. They regarded the Militia as if it never could be anything else than a recruiting ground for the Line. I do think that successive military administrators at the War Office have, in all their dealings with the Auxiliary Forces, been most short-sighted. They have been unable to raise their
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  eyes beyond the immediate needs, as it seems to me, of the Regular Army, and they have grudged for the Auxiliary Forces any money that they could get for the Regulars.
  Now, my Lords, that is the past. What about the future? The Army Council have devised a scheme which has the complete acquiescence and cordial approval of the Government, and for which the Government are absolutely responsible. It is the division of the, Army into a general-service Army and a home-service Army. What part in that reorganisation is the Militia to play? That is the question. Nobody can doubt that that part must be played in the home-service Army, and, whatever particular method of adaptation to the home-service Army you may favour for the Militia, the changes that must come will be drastic. My noble friend who spoke last put his finger on the most drastic change of all, and one which, speaking as an individual Member of your Lordships' House, seems to me to lie at the root of the whole question. Whether the scheme described in the Memorandum of the Secretary of State for War or any other scheme is adopted, the Militia of the future in the home-Army must be a force bound to serve abroad in a defined case of national emergency—a voluntarily raised, not a compulsorily raised, force.
  The days have gone by, I hope, for enlisting men for home service and expecting them to volunteer in time of war for foreign service. That has been done time after time, century after century almost, and I think it is full time that that fraud should cease. The Militia always have been required for foreign service in great wars and always will be. The question is how to adapt them for the home-service Army. The Army Council have adopted a wise attitude, and one for which the Government wholly accept responsiblity. They have said—
  "We are dealing with a force of immense historical antiquity, as old an institution as exists in this country, except perhaps Parliament, the Church, and the Monarchy. It is a force that has done national service in war after war, and in emergency after emergency, and we cannot deal with such a force as that hastily."

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  They have, in fact, adopted the advice which the noble Earl the Leader of the Opposition and the noble and gallant Field-Marshal Lord Roberts gave the other night; they have not acted hastily. They have put the conditions before the Militia force and before Parliament and the whole country, and they have said, "These are the conditions—We must have a home Army; the Militia must be in the home Army." And they might have added that the Militia must be available for foreign service; how are you going to adapt the Militia to these conditions? They adumbrated a plan of their own, a plan which, if successful, would give a very valuable body of men and officers, and their contention is that it does not amount to an abolition of the Militia. They admit, of course, that the career which has been such a pleasure to my noble friend and to myself, to rise through one's regiment as a county gentleman to command it—they admit that that will be closed. Up to the rank of major thee say the career would still be open, and they believe that in time of war there would be full employment in the battalions that will have to be improvised for those senior Militia officers for whom permanent employment had not been found in time of peace. Therefore, the view that this is really the abolition of the Militia force is not the view that the Army Council admit, and those who want fairly to discuss this question must remember that that is the point of view of the Army Council. Not only do they say it is not proposed to abolish the Militia, but they say that the Militia is necessary to make the territorial Army what they hope to see it. They say they cannot with a few Line regiments spread the territorial organisation over the country. They want the historical and territorial prestige of the Militia to help them in striking even deeper and fuller the roots of the territorial system.
  LORD BURGHCLERE: How mane battalions of the Militia do the Army Council propose to abolish? They propose, I understand, to amalgamate thirty-three battalions. How many do they propose to abolish?
  THE EARL OF SELBORNE: I frankly admit I cannot tell you. A large number
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  would disappear as units. The Army Council say that whatever they do they will have to amalgamate many of the existing units, because they have fallen below the numbers necessary to enable them to maintain them as separate units. Whichever plan they adopt they will have to do a great deal of amalgamation. The Army Council say to the Militia, "Can you show us any better plan which, for the same money, will give us an equally valuable force of Militia, or which, for less money, will give us a larger force of Militia, adequately trained for the needs of the country"? That is the problem which they put before the Militia and the country, and there is no shirking of responsibility on the part of the Government. It is with their full and entire sanction that the Army Council have come forward and taken the public into their confidence. That is the problem which we have all got to discuss. It is not and never can be a Party question. It is a national question. How, without losing any of the great historical value of the Militia, are we to weld that force into the new home Army so as to get the fullest possible value for our money, and supply the country with the largest possible number of men?—that is the problem before us, and the contributions we have had to-night from noble Lords, and which we shall have more of in the future, are of the greatest assistance in elucidating this problem.
  *THE EARL OF WEMYSS: I gathered from the speech of the noble Earl the Under-Secretary that the Government accept my Resolution declaring that it would be contrary to sound police to get rid of the Militia, which is the foundation of our military system. While defending the Government from any intention of abolishing the Militia, or of absorbing the whole of it, he spoke of organic changes that will have to be made. What I wish to ask the noble Earl is this—Will Parliament have an opportunity of expressing an opinion upon those organic changes before they are made? I venture to think that anything which makes an organic change in the Militia force ought to be brought before Parliament in the early part of

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  the session, so that Parliament and the public may have full opportunity of expressing their opinion upon it.
  *THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: The noble Lord will realise that it is impossible to make any important organic change in any part of the Army without having authority in the Estimates. We cannot do anything in connection with this part of the scheme until next year's Estimates.
  On Question, resolved in the affirmative.

  ARMY COUNCIL BILL [H.L.]

    SECOND READING.
    Order of the day for the Second Reading read.
    *THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (The Earl of DONOUGHMORE): My Lords, it may be in the recollection of your Lordships that when I had the honour of addressing you a month ago on the Report of the Esher Committee, and explaining the terms of the Order in Council which would be submitted to your Lordships, I also explained that there were certain statutory powers of the Secretary of State which it was intended to transfer by Act of Parliament to the Army Council. This is a Bill to carry that out. There are a number of statutory powers, mostly enumerated in the Army Act, the Reserve Forces Acts, and the Militia Acts. They are chiefly small but very important powers. There are also statutory powers which were until lately vested in the Commander-in-Chief and the Adjutant-General, the principal one being the power to reduce a non-commissioned officer to the ranks. The operative part of this Bill is to be found in Clause 1, Sub-section 1,while Sub-section 2 of Clause 1 vests property that has hitherto been vested in the Secretary of State for War in the Army Council. We are in this Bill following the precedent of the Admiralty.
    Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Earl of Donoughmore.)
    *EARL SPENCER: My Lords, I think this is a Bill of greater importance than appears from the statement made by the noble Earl in moving it. It apparently places the Army Council on something
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    like the same footing as the Board of Admiralty, but there is a great distinction between the two, and I believe there will be very great opposition to the proposal to remove these powers from the Secretary of State. It is impossible at this late hour of the evening, aid in the present condition of the House, to go into details; but there will be considerable opposition to diverting powers from the Secretary of State, who is responsible to Parliament, to the Army Council, for we know very little about the Army Council at the present moment. The Army Council, so far as I know, stands on a perfectly different basis from that of the Board of Admiralty. The latter are not appointed for a fixed time. When the Government go out the whole of the Board of Admiralty cease to hold office; but I am told that by the Patent constituting the Army Council the military members of that Council are appointed for four years.
    Another question which has never, to my mind, been quite cleared up, is the relative position of the Secretary of State and the members of the Army Council. There is no doubt whatever as to the First Lord of the Admiralty and the members of the Board of Admiralty. The First Lord can, if he chooses, overrule the majority of the Board. It may be so with regard to the Secretary of State and the Army Council, but I have heard it distinctly stated by those who have studied the subject that the Secretary of State, and the Under-Secretary of State, who is also a member of the Army Council, are merely equals with the other members, and that the Secretary of State cannot overrule, if necessary, the remainder of the Army Council. There is also the question as to the number of members of that Council who may be in Parliament. There is no Act of Parliament dealing with that in the case of the Board of Admiralty. In the old days nearly all the members of the Board were in Parliament, but of late years that has not been so, The only person on the Board of Admiralty who cannot be a Member of Parliament is the Controller. Though it may be advisable sometimes to have members of the Army Council and the Board of Admiralty in Parliament, I think it would lead under modern circumstances to a very grave and serious difficulty.

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    It would be an extremely awkward position, but it is one which, considering the constitution of the Army Council and the fact that the members have a tenure of four years, might arise if a new Secretary of State of a different political complexion suddenly found himself confronted in the House of Commons with military members of the Council who were opposed to him and the Government. I feel that this is a very serious matter. My copy of this Bill only arrived yesterday morning, and I have not had time to properly look into the question; but friends to whom I have mentioned the matter have expressed their astonishment at the proposal, and I am certain there will be in another place, even if we pass the Bill here, serious opposition to it, particularly as it greatly affects the position, which has long been defined, of the Secretary of State and his responsibility to Parliament. I therefore greatly depreciate the Bill being passed in this hurried way, at this late period of the session, and I should be disposed to divide against it if the noble Earl presses it to-night.
    *THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (The Earl of SELBORNE): My Lords, I sincerely trust the noble Earl will allow this Bill to be read a second time, because I think I can satisfy him on every point he has raised. It is my happiness in this class of question always to agree with the noble Earl. The intention has been to follow the practice of the Board of Admiralty in every particular and down to the smallest detail. The difference is this. The constitution or the powers of the Board of Admiralty are not to be found in any Act of Parliament, but there are a series of Acts which devolve special responsibilities and special duties upon some of the members of the Army Council, particularly upon the Secretary of State, and that is why this Bill is necessary. The Bill must be read with the Army Patent and the Order in Council which is shortly coming out. In that Order in Council it will be found that the responsibility of the Secretary of State is absolutely defined and insisted upon. He will be as solely responsible to the Sovereign and to Parliament as the First Lord of the Admiralty is at the present moment, and he will be in a
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    position to overrule, in a last resort, all his colleagues on the Army Council. I think all the points to which the noble Earl has drawn attention will be found to be met in the three documents on which the constitutional basis of the Army Council will henceforward rest—this Bill (if it passes into law), the Patent, and the Order in Council. In regard to the provisions limiting the number of members of the Army Council who may at one time hold seats in the House of Commons, that is a departure from the practice that obtains in connection with the Board of Admiralty, and we shall be ready to reconsider it in Committee. Each successive Government will have the power at any moment of issuing a new Patent and having a new Army Council, just as it has the power of issuing a new Patent and having a new Board of Admiralty. Therefore the case will not arise, where you can have members of the Army Council in the House of Commons at variance politically with the Government of the day.
    *EARL SPENCER: Am I correct in saying that under the Patent, the military members of the Army Council are appointed for four years?
    *THE EARL OF SELBORNE: I understand that you are incorrect. There is no limit at all. The Esher Committee recommended it, but it was not put into the Patent. That accounts, no doubt, for the misconception. We shall be prepared to reconsider in Committee the provision limiting the number of members of the Army Council who shall sit in the House of Commons, in order to bring it on exactly the same lines as the documents that prescribe the proceedings of the Board of Admiralty. I hope that after this explanation the noble Lord will at any rate allow the Bill to be read a second time.—
    On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the whole House on Thursday next.

  WILD BIRDS PROTECTION ACTS AMENDMENT (ST. KILDA) BILL.
  House in Committee (according to order). Bill reported without Amendment. Standing Committee negatived; and Bill to be read 3a on Thursday next.
  DEAN FOREST BIIL.
  Read 3a (according to order), with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

  COUNTY COURTS BILL [H.L.]
  Amendments reported (according to order).
  *LORD COLERIDGEexplained that the object of the two Amendments standing in his name was to leave the option perfectly free on the part of plaintiffs to bring their actions in the County Court or in the High Court, in cases where the jurisdiction of the County Court was enlarged from £50 to £100. If the Bill remained as at present the plaintiff would be forced into the County Court, possibly against his will, in actions between £50 and £100, and he would be penalised because if he recovered less than £100 he would not be entitled to any more costs than he would have been entitled to if he had brought his original action in the County Court. He could not conceive that it was intended to penalise plaintiffs in this way. The object of the Bill was a very salutary one, namely, to enlarge the jurisdiction so that plaintiffs should not be precluded from bringing actions in the County Court in claims for more than £50; and he hoped the noble and learned Earl on the Woolsack would see his way to accept the Amendments, which would greatly improve the usefulness of the measure.
  Amendments moved—
  "In page 1, Clause 1, line 12, after the word 'eighty-one,' to insert the word 'and'; and in line 13, to leave out the words 'and one-hundred and sixteen.'"—(Lord Coleridge.)
  THE EARL OF HALSBURYsaid he did not intend to resist the Amendments, as he thought the application of the section to which the noble and learned Lord had referred was the result of an error. He therefore accepted the Amendments.
  On Question, Amendments agreed to.
  Drafting Amendment agreed to.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURYproposed the insertion of a new clause to meet the case of deputy high bailiffs.
  Amendment moved—
  "After Clause 6, to insert as a new clause the words, 'Section thirty-one of the principal Act as to the appointment of deputy registrars shall apply to the appointment of deputy high bailiffs, with the substitution of the words 'high bailiff' for the word 'registrar.'"—(The Earl of Halsbury).
  On Question, Amendment agreed to.
  Drafting Amendment agreed to.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURYmoved to add to Section (1) of Clause 11, which provided that—
  "A person liable to be fined under Section forty-eight of the principal Act shall be liable to be imprisoned, with or without hard labour, for any period not exceeding two months if so ordered by the Judge or on summary conviction."
  the words contained in his Amendment.
  Amendment moved—
  "In Clause 11, page 5, line 4, after the word 'conviction' to insert the words 'and the said section shall apply to any case in which any officer or bailiff of any Court or any person put into possession of goods seized under any process of the Court by a bailiff of any Court is assaulted or obstructed while in the execution of his duty, and to any case of rescue or attempted rescue of any person arrested under process of the Court.'"—(The Earl of Halsbury.)
  On Question, Amendment agreed to.
  THE EARL OF HALSBURYexplained that his next Amendment was necessary owing to the City of London Court not being technically a County Court.
  Amendment moved—
  "After Clause 12, to insert as a new clause, 'The extended jurisdiction exercisable in County Courts under this Act shall be exercisable in like manner in the Cy of London."'—(The Earl of Halsbury.)
  On Question, Amendment agreed to.
  Bill to be read 3' on Monday next; and to be printed as amended. (No. 172.)

  POOR LAW AUTHORITIES (TRANSFER OF PROPERTY) BILL [H.L.]
  House in Committee (according to order).
  Clauses 1 to 4 agreed to.
  Clause 5.
  EARL WALDEGRAVEsaid the Amendment which he had to move to Clause 5 explained itself. Its object was to make it clear that the Bill did not apply to Ireland.
  Amendment moved—
  "In Clause 5, page?, line 36, to insert as a new sub-section, '(1) This Act shall not extend to Ireland.'"—(Earl Waldegrave.)
  On Question, Amendment agreed to.
  Standing Committee negatived: The Report of Amendment to be received on Monday next; and Bill to be printed as amended. (No. 173.)

  WHALE FISHERIES (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
  A Bill to regulate Whale Fisheries in Scotland—Was presented by the Lord Kintore (E. Kintore); read 1a; and to be printed. (No. 167.)
  House adjourned at five minutes past Eight o'clock, to Monday next, a quarter before Eleven o'clock.