Sitting of 9 May 1906

Preamble
The House met at a quarter before Three of the Clock.

PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
Southampton Gas Bill, as amended, considered; to be read the third time.
Sutton, Southcoates, and Drypool Gas Bill, Waterford Corporation and Bridge Bill, reported, with Amendments. Reports to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

PETITIONS.
  COAL MINES (EIGHT HOURS) BILL.
  Petitions in favour: from Aspatria Pits; Burslem; East Leeds; East Lothian; Featherstone Main; Hunslet Carr; Llettys Lenkin; Mid Lothian; Rounds Green; Strafford Main; Wednesbury; and Whitehaven Pits Colleries; to lie upon the Table.
  DISEASES OF ANIMALS ACT (1896) AMENDMENT BILL.
  Petition from Forfarshire, in favour; to lie upon the Table.

  EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL (RELIGIOUS TEACHING).
  Petitions against alteration of Law: from Allonby; Armitage Bridge; Benson (two); Bilston (two); Bradley (two); Brightstone; Brownwood Park; Castle-side (two); Chaffcombe (two); Charlton Adam; Chilcomb; Chorley; Crawley; Crawthorne; Earl's Court; Finchley; Flushing; Framlingham and Saxtead; Hamsterley (two); Harvington; Hawke-hurst (two); Heversham; Highgate; Hinkley; Holme Cultram; Holton; Horsington; Hurst; Ingatestone and Fryerning; Kensington; Kingsdon (two); Lawford (three); Llanvihangel (two); London (three); Moordown; Muswell Hill
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  (two); Nash Manor and Lisworney (two); North Cheriton (two); Northfield;. Norwich; Outwood (two); Preston (two); Rusholme; St. Michael at Bowes; Salford; South Shields (two); Spennymoor (two); Stillingfleet; Stoke upon Trent; Stoulton; Stretford (two); Stroud Green; Tewin (two); Tysoe; Waterhead; Willington; Winchester (five); and Winteringham; to lie upon the Table.

  EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
  Petition from South Shields, for alteration; to lie upon the Table.
  FACTORY AND WORKSHOP ACT 1901 AMENDMENT BILL.
  Petition of the Royal Sanitary Institute, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  JUVENILE SMOKING BILL.
  Petition from South Shields, in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  LICENSING (SCOTLAND) AMENDMENT BILL.
  Petition from Corstophine in favour; to lie upon the Table.
  PUBLIC AMBULANCE SERVICE (LONDON).
  Petition from Kensington, for the appointment of a Committee of Inquiry; to lie upon the Table.
  VACCINATION BILL.
  Petition of the Royal Sanitary Institute against; to lie upon the Table.
  VACCINATION ACTS.
  Petitition from Bristol for repeal; to lie upon the Table.
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  ARMY.
  Copy presented, of Interim Report of Anti-Typhoid Inoculation Committee (by Command), to lie upon the Table.
  NAVY.
  Copies presented, of Reports of Departmental Committees appointed to consider certain questions concerning the Extension of the New Scheme of Training for Officers of the Navy, etc., (by Command), to lie upon the Table.
  EAST INDIA (FINANCIAL STATEMENT).
  Return presented, relative thereto [Sir Henry Fowler]; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. (No. 162.)
  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS SECURITIES.
  Return presented, relative thereto [ordered 3rd April; Mr. McKenna] to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. (No. 163.)
  WALNEY LIGHT DUTIES.
  Return ordered, "of the Accounts of the Receipts and Expenditure of the Walney Light Duties as rendered to the Board of Trade, in accordance with Section 20 of the Furness Railway Act, 1894, for each of the last three years."—;(Major Seely.)
  ILLITERATE VOTERS (GENERAL ELECTION, 1906.)
  Address for "Return showing the number of persons who voted as Illiterates at the General Election of 1906 in the United Kingdom."—;(Mr. Crooks.)
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CIRCULATED WITH THE VOTES.

    Examinations for Indian Forestry Service.
    MR. BUTCHER: To ask the Secretary of State for India how many examinations have been held for the Indian Forestry Service since the spring of 1895; how many candidates entered for each examination, and how many passed; and whether any candidates have been taken into the service without examination.
    (Answered by Mr. Secretary Morley) Eleven examinations have been held since the spring of 1895. The following
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    are the figures of candidates who entered and who passed.

    Year.

    Number of Candidates.

    Number selected for Vacancies.

    1895

    22

    6

    1896

    22

    6

    1897

    18

    6

    1898

    16

    6

    1899

    16

    7

    1900

    22

    1901

    17

    10

    1902

    16

    8

    1903

    17

    8

    1904

    21

    11

    In 1905, owing to discussions which were raised as to the method of training probationers in this country, it was impossible to publish the conditions until a very late date; and it was probably owing to this fact that only four candidates presented themselves, of whom two passed. Thereupon, to meet the requirements of the Government of India, thirteen additional men were selected without examination from among candidates who offered themselves in response to an invitation widely circulated among educational institutions. These probationers will, however, like their predecessors, have to satisfy further tests before they are finally admitted to the Indian Forest Service.

  Payment of Irish Education Grants.
  MR. MURPHY: To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can arrange that the annual capitation grant for Irish primary education should be paid immediately on the termination of year, and not three months after date at present.
  (Answered by Mr. Bryce.) I beg to refer to the reply which I gave to the similar

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  Question of the hon. Member for North Westmeath on March 5th. †

  Postmen's Pensions.
  MR. ARNOLD-FORSTER: To ask the Postmaster-General whether postmen of thirty-seven years service and upwards, having an exemplary character, are entitled to any pension on being retired by the Department.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) Yes, if they are established officers.

  Delay in Delivery of Mr. John Nunan's Letters.
  MR. WILLIAM ABRAHAM: To ask the Postmaster-General if he will explain why letters addressed to Mr. John Nunan, M.C.C., who has changed his residence from Johnstown, Glanworth, to Gregg, Fermoy, of which change of address the postmaster at Glanworth was duly notified, have been, in some instances, sent to the returned letter office, thereby causing delay and inconvenience.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) Inquiries are being made with regard to the matter to which the hon. Member refers, and I will communicate the result to him as early as possible.

  Irish Land Purchase—;Stamp Duty.
  MR. O'SHEE: To ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he has given the further consideration promised to the suggested amendment of the Finance Acts for the purpose of relieving tenant purchasers in Ireland from the payment of stamp duty in respect of the redemption value on the loans made to them by the State for the purchase of their holdings; and whether, as it was never intended that such duty should be leviable, the matter will be dealt with by a new clause in the Finance Bill.
  (Answered by Mr. McKenna.) I must refer the hon. Member to the Answer which I gave him on March 28th.‡ I cannot admit that it was never intended that such duty should be leviable.
  † See (4) Debates, cliii., 55.
  ‡ See (4) Debates, cliv., 1288.

  French Barley Duty.
  MR. STARKEY: To ask the President of the Board of Trade whether the temporary admission of barley into France upon which the duty is remitted still continues; and also what amount of French malt was imported into this country last month.
  (Answered by Mr. Lloyd-George.) The system of "temporary admission" under which the import duty on barley is remitted, on condition of an equivalent quantity of malt being exported, is still in operation in France. The quantity of French malt imported into the United Kingdom during the last month was 350 cwts.

  Telegraph Guarantees.
  MR. LLOYD MORGAN: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the proposed alteration in telegraph guarantees in rural districts, whereby the Postmaster-General takes two-thirds of the risk, will apply to existing guarantees or only to those entered into after the passing of the Finance Bill.
  (Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) The concession will apply to all existing guarantees from the 30th of April last.

  Income-Tax Committee—;Methods of Assessment and Collection.
  MR. RIDSDALE: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the reference to the new Committee upon the Graduation of the Income-tax will include an inquiry into the present methods of assessment and collection.
  (Answered by Mr. Asquith.) The reference to the Committee, which has been approved by the House, is to consider the practicability of graduating the amount of the tax and of differentiating between permanent and precarious incomes. It will be for the Committee to determine how far an inquiry into the present methods of assessment and collection is necessary or relevant to the subject of the investigation.

  Transfer of the Sparkbrook Factory.
  MR. MADDISON: To ask the Secretary of State for War if the

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  negotiations for the transfer of the Spark-brook Gun Factory were begun by the present Government.
  (Answered by Mr. Secretary Haldane.) The negotiations for the transfer of Sparkbrook Factory were begun by the late Government.

  Infant Mortality—;Suggested Appoint- ment of Departmental Committee.
  MR. ALDEN: To ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, in view of the fact that the Report of the Registrar-General indicates a serious condition of things as regards infant mortality in certain large industrial towns and areas, he will consider the advisability of appointing a Departmental Committee to investigate the causes of such mortality, with power to call for special Reports from, or institute inquiry into, the towns and areas concerned.
  (Answered by Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman.) I am fully alive to the importance of this question, and, as my hon. friend will see from an Answer which I gave yesterday, the Local Government Board are taking active steps to ascertain the causes of excessive infant mortality with a view to the adoption of remedial measures. I may mention that a conference, which will be attended by a large number of representatives of municipalities, is shortly to be held to consider the whole question, and I understand that it is to be presided over by my right hon. friend the President of the Local Government Board. I do not think that, under these circumstances, it is necessary to appoint a Departmental Committee.

QUESTIONS IN THE HOUSE.

  Devonport Dockyard—;Employment of Women.
  MR. O'GRADY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether it was on the grounds of economy alone that females were introduced to do the work hitherto done by men in the upholstery and polishing departments of the Devonport dockyard; how many men in each trade were discharged as a result of women being employed; what are the average weekly wages of the women,
  1296
  dating from March, 1905, to March, 1906; and what proportion of the women are married.
  THE SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. EDMUND ROBERTSON,): The introduction of female labour at Devonport was largely experimental, and was based on the fact that the class of work on which these women are employed has for some years been performed by women in large private shipbuilding establishments. Economy without sacrificing efficiency was aimed at. No men were discharged from the dockyard as a consequence of the change, but seven men who had been previously employed on upholstering sewing work were found other employment. The average weekly wage of the women during the whole time referred to was 15s. 9d., but this is exclusive of payment of 6s. per week given to the working charge woman since January 22nd last only. Out of thirteen women employed, five are married and eight single or widows.
  MR. KEIR HARDIE: What were the wages paid to the men on the same class of work?
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSONasked for notice of that Question.

  Boys and Naval Construction.
  MR. J. WARD: I bog to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty whether, in view of the order issued by his Department that in future no more apprentices in His Majesty's dockyard at Portsmouth are to be awarded naval construction scholarships, in spite of the results hitherto obtained, he will say whether this order is intended to practically exclude dockyard boys from the Royal Corps of Naval Constructors unless they can obtain admission through the medium of a King's or Whitworth scholarship; and whether, by this order, it is intended to give better opportunities to private students at the expense of the lads in the dockyards.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: No such order as that mentioned has been issued.

  Naval Construction.
  MR. BELLAIRS: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty

  1297
  whether his attention has been called to the fact that the new French naval programme for this year consists of six battleships of large dimensions; and that the German naval programme of two large battleships and two small cruisers has been augmented by the addition of one large armoured cruiser; and whether he has any official information showing that the six French battleships and one German armoured cruiser are additions to the programmes of the Powers since the Admiralty decided to reduce our last year's programme by one armoured cruiser, and framed this year's programme of four armoured vessels as announced in Lord Cawdor's statement of Admiralty policy.
  MR. EDMUND ROBERTSON: The Answer is in the affirmative.

  The Native Rising in South. Africa—; Bambaata.
  MR. J. WARD: I beg to ask the Under - Secretary of State for the Colonies if he can say under what law the native chief Bambaata has been declared an outlaw, and a price placed upon his head; what was his original act of rebellion; if captured, what court will try him for the offences charged against him; and what action the Secretary of State for the Colonies has taken to secure the Imperial reservation lands belonging to the innocent part of his tribe from illegal confiscation.
  THE UNDER-SECRETAEY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. CHURCHILL,): The offer of a reward for Bambaata was, I understand, made as an executive act and not under any law. It has since been withdrawn by the Natal Government. The information the Secretary of State has received from the Governor is that a serious faction fight took place some time ago between two divisions of the tribe of which Bambaata is the Chief. The case was tried in the civil courts, and it was found that Bambaata had been fomenting these disturbances. It was decided to relieve Bambaata of the control of his tribe. Taking advantage of the general disturbed condition of the country, he refused to submit himself to the authority of the Government and declined to leave his kraal when summoned to Maritzburg. I am not in a
  1298
  position to give a definite Answer to the third Question, but the presumption is that he will be tried by a civil court. There is no question of illegal confiscation of any of the land to which the hon. Member refers as "Imperial reservation lands" but which is, I understand, more properly described as land administered under the Natal Native Trust for the use of natives. A new chief was appointed for the main section of the tribe, which remained loyal to the Government, and the rest, 261 huts in all, have been placed under the jurisdiction of other chiefs.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that Bambaata is merely a passive resistor?

  Transvaal Settlers' Ordinance.
  SIR J. DICKSON POYNDER: I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Government will make inquiries as to the technical disabilities under the Settlers' Ordinance of the Transvaal, which the Commissioner of Lands, in his Report of November 1st, 1905, described as practically excluding land purchase and reducing very greatly the scope of the policy of State-aided settlement; and whether, if such disabilities are still in operation, they will cause them to be removed.
  MR. CHURCHILL: The Secretary of State has recently been informed by Lord Selborne that the Land Board has been asked to consider and report upon whether any amendments, and, if so, what amendments, should be made to the Settlers and Crown Lands Disposal Ordinances of 1902 and 1903 respectively so as to facilitate and improve the administration of any funds available for the encouragement of agricultural settlers in the country, and for the settlement of existing Crown Lands.

  Tibetan Indemnity.
  SIR H. COTTON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether, having regard to the fact that the Convention with China does not alter the amount of the Tibetan indemnity in any way, he is now able to give any information regarding the payment of the first instalment of that indemnity which was due on January 1st last.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Mr. JOHN MORLEY,): Now that the Convention with China is signed, early payment of the first instalment of the Tibetan indemnity may be looked for. But I am not yet in a position to give definite information.

  Akabah Railway.
  CAPTAIN FABER: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will state how much of the railway from Smyrna to Akabah is now completed; if there are any breaks in the line, what number; and, if so, of what length each break is.
  THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. RUNCIMAN, Dewsbury, for Sir EDWARD GREY): There is direct railway communication between Smyrna and Eregli. Between Eregli and Hama, a distance of approximately 220 miles, there is as yet no railway communication. There is a line open from Hama to Mudevvere, and from this point to Akabah the railway is not completed, and the distance is about 100 miles.
  CAPTAIN FABER: Are the uncompleted portions nearly finished?
  SIR EDWARD GREY: I must ask for notice of that.

  Vehicular Accidents in London.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will state the number of accidents in the London area during the month of April last from motor-buses and motor cars respectively; in how many instances have personal injuries resulted; and in how many cases have such injuries proved fatal.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. GLADSTONE,): During the month of April, 1906, the number of accidents known by the police to have been caused by motor cars (including motor cycles) within the Metropolitan police district was 433. Of these 134 resulted in personal injury, and nine proved fatal. In the same month 424 accidents were caused by motor omnibuses, of which seventy-six resulted in personal injury, and three proved fatal. These figures do
  1300
  not include accidents caused by electric tram cars.
  MR. ARTHUR LEE: How many accidents have occurred in the same period to horse-drawn vehicles?
  MR. GLADSTONE: I will get the figures.

  Judicial Statistics for 1905.
  MR. BOTTOMLEY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when the judicial statistics for the year 1905 will be issued; and whether, in view of the fact that the only statistics at present available are these for 1904, he will state the number of cases in which sentences were modified at the instance of the Home Office during the year 1905 on grounds affecting the original conviction.
  MR. GLADSTONE: The judicial statistics for 1905 cannot possibly be issued till towards the end of the present year. The number of cases in which the Prerogative of Mercy was exercised on grounds affecting the conviction—;such as doubt of the prisoner's guilt—;was 27.

  Case of Mrs. Eva D'Angely.
  MR. ASHLEY: In postponing my Question to the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that in the case of Mrs. Eva D'Angely, as in that of Messrs. Gerothwohl and Lavalette, the presiding magistrate at Marlborough Street, while acquitting the accused, did not in any way censure the police for the arrest; whether he has received any report from the magistrate on the police evidence; and, if so, what action he proposes to take on it; I beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman a Question of which I have given private notice—;namely whether it is the fact that since Questions have been put down on this subject the lady and her husband have been constantly shadowed by the police; that last Friday there were six detectives outside their house, that last Saturday there were four and last Monday two; whether when they went to their solicitor yesterday they were shadowed by the police, and that on coming home a detective sat by the lady in the omnibus and two others

  1301
  followed in a hansom. I ask, further, whether a lady who has been acquitted by a magistrate is being thus shadowed by the Home Secretary's orders. I also wish to inquire whether it is the fact that a copy of the depositions in the case was refused yesterday by Mr. Denman to the- lady's solicitor; and, if so, why.
  MR. GLADSTONE: The Answer to the last Question is that the magistrate acted in accordance with his usual practice, which is to refuse to give copies of the notes of evidence in a case where there has not been a conviction; but he informs me that if requested by myself he will be glad to furnish them, and I shall be willing to ask for them. With regard to the alleged shadowing, I received the hon. Gentleman's Question only five minutes ago, and I have no information on the subject. It is quite obvious that it was not done by my orders, if it were done at all.
  MR. ASHLEY: I could not have given the right hon. Gentleman more notice, because I heard of the matter only twenty minutes ago. Will the right hon. Gentleman give orders that this nuisance shall cease?
  MR. GLADSTONE: I do not know that it exists. I cannot commit myself to an Answer before I make inquiries.
  MR. SLOAN: Will the right hon. Gentleman make inquiries?
  MR GLADSTONE: Of course I will.

  Settlement Estate Duty.
  MR. RADFORD: I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that in recent cases under The Finance Act, 1894, not covered by the case of In re Campbell or any other legal decision, the Commissioners of Inland Revenue have demanded Settlement Estate Duty on the capital required to produce in perpetuity annuities given by testators in general terms without any special fund being appropriated to provide the same, and that the result of such a demand is to impose an obligation to pay (in addition to Legacy Duty) Settlement Estate Duty not on the capital value of the annuity but on a larger sum, with the
  1302
  consequence that the duty in some cases amounts to 14 and 20 per cent, on the capital value of such annuities; and whether he will give directions to the Commissioners of Inland Revenue to prevent such claims being made in the future in the case of simple annuities.
  THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. MCKENNA,): Where Settlement Estate Duty is chargeable in respect of settled property as denned by the Finance Act, 1894, it is chargeable by the Statute upon the principal value of the property settled and not upon the principal value of the terminable interests whether annuities or life interests. The question whether the property is settled has to be determined with reference to the circumstances of each case. The gift of a simple annuity, neither charged on real or leasehold property, nor directed to be paid out of income, is not held to constitute a settlement giving rise to Settlement Estate Duty. If my hon. friend will supply me with particulars of any case or cases of hardship which he has in view, I shall be happy to investigate them.

  Yarmouth Election Petition.
  ME. STRAUS: I beg to ask Mr. Solicitor-General whether, in view of the evidence and decision of one Judge in the Yarmouth election petition, he will bring in legislation to prevent gross bribery and corruption by amending the Corrupt Practices Acts.
  THE SOLICITOR-GENERAL (Sir W. ROBSON,): I may say that the evidence and proceedings in the Yarmouth petition will of course be considered, but obviously it would be premature at present to state if any or what legislation may follow.

  Queen Victoria Memorial.
  SIR W. J. COLLINS: I beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works if he will state why a considerable portion of land on Primrose Hill, abutting on the Albert Road, has recently been railed off from the public use; what is the nature of the building operations which are now being carried on there; whether the buildings to be erected are of a permanent or temporary character;

  1303
  and if he will undertake that the buildings in question shall be so designed as not to interfere with the picturesque character of the neigbourhood.
  THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (Mr. HARCOURT,): About one-fifth of an acre has been railed off for a studio for Mr. Brock for his work on the Queen Victoria Memorial; the temporary building will be removed when the work is completed. From my knowledge of the elevation I am satisfied that it is not likely to interfere with the surrounding scenery. I will show the hon. Member the drawing, and I will have the building painted any colour the hon. Gentleman wishes.

  Crofters Acts Amendment Bill.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is now in a position to state when the Crofters Acts Amendment Bill will be introduced.
  THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. SINCLAIR,): Preparations for the Bill are under progress, but I am not able now to make further statement.
  MR. WEIR: Then are we to have no crofters legislation this session?
  MR. SINCLAIR: I can add nothing to my Answer.

  Sanitation in the Island of Lewis.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that Dr. Bruce, the medical officer of health for Ross and Cromarty, expresses the opinion, in his report just issued, that the sanitation of the townships throughout the Island of Lewis is so extremely unsatisfactory that the public health problem is quite insoluble unless by a money grant from Parliament, with the expenditure supervised by Government surveyors; and will he state whether this recommendation has been under the consideration of the Local Government Board.
  MR. SINCLAIR: I am aware of the expression of opinion by Dr. Bruce. As the hon. Member is aware, the whole question of the condition of the Lewis is receiving the earnest attention of Govern-
  1304
  ment and a detailed investigation is at present being made. Until it is completed I am unable to indicate what steps it may be possible or necessary to take to remedy the distressing conditions which have for some time been prevalent in the Lewis.

  Western Highlands Excursion Steamers.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if care will be taken that the steamers plying along the coasts of the Western Highlands and the Islands of Scotland, which are largely used during the summer season, are inspected, with a view to ensure the satisfactory condition of the gear and boats.
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE,): Yes, Sir. Every care is, and will be, taken to secure the satisfactory condition of the vessels to which my hon. friend refers, together with their gear and boats.

  Irish Poor Rate Collectors.
  MR. DILLON: I beg to ask Mr. Attorney-General for Ireland whether statutory authority has been conferred on the Irish Local Government Board to prescribe qualifications and disqualifications for poor rate collectors in Irish counties.
  THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL FOR IRELAND (MR. CHERRY,): The 83rd section of the Local Governmment Act, 1898, provides that the Local Government Board shall have the same power as regards collectors of the poor rate appointed by the county council, and their accounts as they would have if these collectors had continued to be officers of the guardians. The question whether this section authorises them to prescribe qualifications and disqualifications of candidates for the office of collector is one of law which, so far as I am aware, has never been decided by any Court, and upon which it would not be in accordance with the usual practice for me to express an opinion in replying to a Question in this House.

  Management of Irish Fisheries.
  MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether, in the present inquiry into the working

  1305
  of the Department of Agriculture, evidence will be taken showing the constitution and working of the Scotch Fishery Board, with a view to placing Irish fisheries under a system of management and inspection such as already prevails in Scotland.
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. BRYCE,): The Question raised is one for the determination of the Committee, to whom I will forward the hon. Member's suggestion.

  Examiners in the Irish Language.
  MR. BOLAND: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland can he state whether any, and, if so, what class of persons are ineligible for holding the post of examiners in the Irish language in the intermediate system; and can he state the reason for this regulation.
  MR. BRYCE: I am informed by the Commissioners of Intermediate Education that the conditions of eligibility for examinerships in Irish do not differ from the conditions which apply to examiner-ships generally. The only explicit ruling upon the subject of disqualification is contained in a decision of the Board that no one who teaches in a school or college in which pupils are prepared for the Board's examinations is eligble for an examinership The reason for this decision is obvious.

  The Royal Canal.
  MR. GINNELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland what explanation have the Board of Control of the Royal Canal to offer for having allowed that canal to be rendered unnavigable by and in the interest of the Midland Railway Company; for example, why do they allow the continuance of such leakage at the Spencer Dock as kept four boats with men idle for several days at Dublin last week for want of sufficient water to get away; will any compensation be made, to these boatmen; and will any steps be taken, apart from the Commission of Inquiry, to compel the Midland Company to restore the canal to the condition in which that company acquired it.
  MR. BRYCE: As regards the first and last parts of this Question, I beg to say
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  that I am making inquiries as to the constitution and powers of the Board of Control of the Royal Canal, and am, therefore, not at present prepared to make a statement on the subject. As regards the Spencer Dock, I am informed by the Board of Works that the leakage referred to arose from damage caused to the sill of the dock by an outgoing steamer. To fully repair the damage it will be necessary to close the dock for three weeks, and the railway company have already arranged for publication of the statutory notices that this will be done on June 1st. Meanwhile the company are making arrangements to keep the level of the water as high as possible. The question of compensation is one which lies between the railway company and the boat-owners.
  MR. GINNELL: Will the Government allow the company, while purporting to carry out the repairs, to stop the traffic and yet not actually execute the work?
  MR. BRYCE: Of course the traffic must be stopped while the repairs are being done, and no longer.

  Untenanted Lands in North Tipperary.
  MR. LUNDON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he is aware that on the townland of Ballinamona, convenient to the town of Cloughjordan, in North Tipperary, 600 acres of untenanted land, which for the past twenty years have been let for grazing purposes on the eleven months system by the late owner, Mr. Edward Kennedy, are now up for sale; and will he give instructions to the Estates Commissioners to purchase these lands, with the view of giving them to farmers' sons and labourers around, so as to help in stopping the tide of emigration.
  MR. BRYCE: I am informed by the Estates Commissioners that no proceedings for the sale of the untenanted land referred to have come before them. If the Commissioners should be furnished with particulars of the property for sale, including the name and address of the owner, they will consider the question whether they should purchase.

  Fitzgerald-Tuthill Estate—;Case of Themas M'Grath.
  MR. LUNDON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland can he say whether the Fitz-gerald-Tuthill estate in Ballyloundaish, Herbertstown, county Limerick, has come before the Land Commission for sale to the tenants; and, if so, whether Thomas M'Grath, evicted tenant, or the planter Devitt from Gashell, has been returned us the tenant under the sale.
  MR. BRYCE: The Estates Commissioners inform me that proceedings for the sale of this estate have been instituted before them. Having learnt that Daniel Devitt, the present tenant of the holding formerly occupied by M'Grath, was prepared to surrender the same to M'Grath on receiving compensation, the Commissioners informed the vendor's solicitor of the course which they were prepared to adopt in the case. The Commissioners have not yet heard whether the parties are prepared to carry out the arrangement suggested.

  Labourers' Cottages in Kerry.
  MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland what is the total number of cottages built, or about to be built, in the different unions in Kerry; the total amount of money raised in each union for this purpose; the total amount of expenses; the average cost per cottage; the rate of interest, sinking fund, and period of repayment at which money is loaned to local authorities; the amount and source of the Government contributions; and the rate per pound at present paid for labourers' cottages in the various unions.
  MR. BRYCE: I am informed that practically all the information asked for will be given in the Return for all Ireland, which was ordered by this House on March 13th, on the Motion of the hon. Member for North Kerry. It was to be made up to March 31st, and is now nearly complete. I would ask the hon. Member to await the presentation of that Return.
  MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: When may we expect the Return?
  MR. BRYCE: It is to be made up to March 31st, but it shall be presented at the earliest possible moment.

  Trinity College, Kerry, Estates.
  MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland what is the acreage and valuation of lands hold in Kerry by Trinity College, either as direct landlords or sub-let to grantees or lessees at the passing of the Land Act of 1903; what was the total annual rental payable to them for such lands at this period; how much has been sold by grantees or lessees; how much by Trinity College; and what price has Trinity College demanded from grantees and lessees for the redemption of their head rents.
  MR. BRYCE: The information asked for in the first two sections of this Question will be found in the Report of the Trinity College Estates Commission. The Estates, Commissioners inform me that no sales have take place under the Act of 1903 of lands in county Kerry of which Trinity College were the direct vendors. I have not been informed whether there have been any sales by grantees and lessees of Trinity College in this county. The Commissioners have no information as to the price which Trinity College may have demanded for the redemption of head rents; but in the absence of an agreement between the parties, the Judicial Commissioner has power to fix the redemption price.
  MR. FLAVIN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the reason these tenants have not bought before is that the College demands twenty-six years purchase.
  MR. BRYCE: I have not heard that.

  Second Term Rents in County Limerick.
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that Patrick Flynn, of Ahalin, Knockaderry, Nowcastle West, in the county of Limerick, tenant to the Hon. Gerald Fitzgerald of his farm, at a yearly rent of £50, went into court to have a second-term rent fixed after a period of seventeen years, and that the rent was confirmed by the Sub-Commissioners

  1309
  Bagot and Faulkiner by order dated 31st March, 1906; and if he can say on what grounds that decision was arrived at.
  I beg also to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he is aware that the Sub-Commissioners, Messrs. Bagot and Faulkiner, in fixing second term rent on the lands of Mrs. Bridget Flanagan, of Cooliska, Castlemahon, Newcastle West, held by her from the Hon. Gerald Fitzgerald, as trustee for Lady Fitzgerald, confirmed the old rent, and if he can say whether in fixing this rent the Commissioners took into consideration the increased cost of labour within the term, and the fall in price of agricultural produce.
  MR. BRYCE: I have referred these Questions to the Land Commissioners, who inform me, as I have already stated in similar cases, that they do not think it right to discuss the result of the judicial decisions of sub-commission courts in reply to Questions in Parliament. The Commissioners point out that if any party to these cases is dissatisfied with the decision, he has the right of appeal. As regards the reference to the Hon. Mr. Justice Fitzgerald, the Commissioners inform me that this gentleman is only one of the trustees of the estate concerned, that he has no beneficial interest in the estate, and takes no part in its management, and that he is not aware that the proceedings in question were pending.
  MR. O'SHAUGHNESSY: Are rents fixed seventeen years ago considered fair rents to-day?
  MR. BRYCE: I had better have notice of that Question.

  Agricultural Organisation Society.
  MR. DILLON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can state specifically all the purposes for which money has been paid by the Department of Agriculture to the Agricultural Organisation Society; the amount paid for each kind of work; what is the method adopted by the Department to satisfy itself that the money so paid is actually devoted to the purpose for which it was granted; what are the other forms of organisation which it has been decided to provisionally include in this year's Estimate; and how
  1310
  much money it is proposed to grant for each of these farms?
  MR. BRYCE: The Department of Agriculture, in the earlier period of its existence, utilized the services of officers of the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society for the purpose of giving expert advice and instruction in respect of agriculture, creameries, flax cultivation, egg packing, poultry rearing, fruit growing, and bee keeping; and also in the organisation of agricultural banks. As county schemes developed, and local authorities succeeded in procuring qualified instructors in the subjects mentioned it became unnecessary for the Department to employ the society's officers in this work. In 1905 the society was employed by the Department to organise co-operative credit societies, live stock insurance societies, and home industries associations, the amount paid for this service being £2,000. The total amount paid to the society up to February 28th last was £18,976. The Department exercised supervision over the work done for it by the society, and the claims for remuneration and expenses were duly vouched and certified. The other forms of organisation to be included this year are the organisation of co-operative flax, agricultural and dairy societies, the estimated cost being £3,700. I have received other details which are too long to embody in a reply to a Question, but which I shall be happy to show the hon. Member if he desires.
  MR. DILLON: Can the right hon. Gentleman circulate a printed reply with full particulars?
  MR. BRYCE: I dare say that can be done.

  Cork County Council and the Fishing Industry.
  MR. FLYNN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he has seen a copy of a resolution passed unanimously by the Cork County Council in connection with the inquiry into the working of the Agricultural and Technical Instruction Department, suggesting the appointment of a representative Fishery Board as in Scotland, with practical and competent experts as inspectors, and establishing a Government

  1311
  brand for mackerel and herrings; and whether steps will be taken to give effect to the recommendations of this representative public body.
  MR. BRYCE: I beg to refer to the reply which I gave to the similar Question of the hon. Member for North East Cork on Thursday last.† It was to the effect that the resolution referred to had been transmitted to the Committee, as I thought the subject fit for their consideration.

  Galway Rate Collectorship.
  MR. CHAELES DEVLIN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary the Question of which I have given him private notice—;namely, whether he has received copies of resolutions and other communications protesting against the action of the Local Government Board in refusing to sanction the action of the Galway County Council in appointing Mr. Michael Hobbs as rate collector; and whether he will say from whom such resolutions and communications were received; and will he state the reasons of the Local Government Board for refusing to sanction the appointment of Mr. Hobbs.
  MR. DUFFY: At the same time may I ask the right hon. Gentleman if it is a fact that the county council of Galway quite recently elected to the position of rate collector for the district of Killimore, a gentleman named Mr. Michael Hobbs; whether Mr. Hobbs, up till a recent date, was a member of the county council and a magistrate of the county; and having regard to the minute passed by the county council at their meeting on April 26th, wherein they state that "no disqualification attaches to Mr. Hobbs," and asking the Local Government Board to sanction his appointment, whether he will ask the Local Government Board to reconsider their decision, with a view to carrying out the expressed wishes of the Galway County Council.
  MR. BRYCEsaid he was very willing to answer the Questions. He would answer both together. Continuing, he said: I have received the resolution of the Galway County Council as well as
  † See col. 738.
  1312
  communications from other persons, the majority of whom are in favour of Mr. Hobbs. It is a fact that Mr. Hobbs was recently elected a rate collector and that he was, up to July of last year, a magistrate of the county Galway by reason of his being chairman of a rural district council. It was also a fact that the Galway County Council expressed the view that in their opinion no disqualification attached to Mr. Hobbs. The Local Government Board pointed out that Mr. Hobbs was actually disqualified by a general order made in 1899. The general order imposes certain disqualifications, and by that order Mr. Hobbs was disqualified and by that order the Local Government Board consider they are bound.
  MR. CHARLES DEVLIN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the case of Mr. William Lowrey, who was chairman of the Birr District Council, who was prosecuted for a speech delivered in August, 1902, was sentenced to five months hard labour entailing disqualification as chairman of the district council, was about three months after his liberation appointed to the position of clerk of the union which had become vacant, that the appointment was first disallowed by the Local Government Board but was immediately sanctioned by Mr. Wyndham, then Chief Secretary.
  MR. BRYCE: No, Sir. I am not aware of that, but I will make inquiries.
  MR, JOHN REDMOND: As I understand, this gentleman was appointed a rate collector, and it is said he was disqualified because he was convicted of taking part in an unlawful assembly. Is there any similar disqualification of this kind in the law of England, and as a matter1 of fact is not the President of the Local Government Board exactly in the same position, having been convicted of a precisely similar offence?
  MR. BRYCE: I have no information as to the latter part of the Question. I do not think my right hon. friend is under any disqualification as regards the law of England, but I cannot tell, I will make inquiry. I believe there is a disqualification as to members of county councils in Ireland.
  MR. JOHN REDMOND: That is not the question.
  MR. BRYCE: Let me finish, please. There was a disqualification in this case. Whether there is such disqualification in the law of England I will inquire.
  MR. REDDY: Where are the equal laws?
  MR. DUFFY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Mr. Hobbs was one of a batch of political offenders imprisoned by the late Government during their term of office—;whose sentences were remitted shortly after the present Government came into power, thereby showing that the Government did not regard Mr. Hobbs as a terrible criminal?
  MR. BRYCE: It is perfectly true that the Lord-Lieutenant released Mr. Hobbs; that does not affect the question of the existence of this disqualification.
  MR. DILLON: Will the right hon. Gentleman withdraw it?
  MR. SLOAN: Does the right hon. Gentleman know why the Lord-Lieutenant remitted the sentence?
  MR. BRYCE: That could not be answered without notice.
  MR. DELANY: I can answer it: because he was convicted by a packed jury.
  MR. JOHN REDMOND: May I ask for a reply to the Question put by the hon. Member for East Mayo. Will the Local Government Board, of which the right hon Gentleman is President, withdraw the Order?
  MR. BRYCE: The question of this Order will be considered and deserves to be considered. Of course I cannot be expected to answer a Question of that kind at once.
  MR. DILLON: I will put down the Question for this day week.
  MR. HAZLETON: Will the right hon. Gentleman say on whose advice the Local Government Board came
  1314
  to the decision not to sanction this appointment?
  MR. BRYCE: This order has been in force since 1899, and therefore they did not require any advice.

  Irish Rural Postmen—;Jeremiah Cronin's Pay.
  MR. MURPHY: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he is aware that Mr. Jeremiah Cronin, a rural postman at Gneevgullia, county Kerry, is in receipt of only 5s. weekly for services that occupy six hours daily, and that he is supposed to commence delivery at seven o'clock a.m., and be back at the office at 9.30 a.m., though this is practically an impossibility; and whether he will give instructions to walkers or inspectors when inquiring as to the time necessary for delivery of letters to select days on which letters have to be delivered to several houses instead of to a few houses in the district; and whether he will direct that Mr. Cronin's wages be increased to enable him to live in his position.
  THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. SYDNEY BUXTOX, Tower): I have called for a report on the subject; and I will communicate with the hon. Member when I am in possession of the details.

  Colonial Marriages Bill.
  SIR H. COTTON: I beg to ask the Prime Minister if he is in a position to state when the Government will be able to introduce the Bill which has been promised for improving the Law regarding certain Colonial marriages.
  THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Sir H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN,): The Colonial Marriages Bill was introduced in the House of Lords on Monday and I believe it is put down for Second Reading for next Tuesday.

  The Estimates.
  MR. BRIGG: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if there is any intention on the part of the Government to appoint a Select Committee, to be called the Estimates Committee, for the purpose of examining and reporting on one class of

  1315
  the Estimates precedent to the Votes being discussed in Committee of Supply, as recommended by the Select Committee on National Expenditure which reported in July, 1903.
  SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: I can only refer my hon. friend to the Answer which I gave to a similar Question last Thursday,† to the effect that in my view the subject is a fitting one for the consideration of the Committee on Procedure

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
MR A. J. BALFOURasked the Prime Minister, with regard to the arrangement for taking the division on the Second Reading of the Education Bill on Thursday, whether, having regard to the special circumstances of the case, the immense number of Members who desired to speak and the relatively small number who had so far taken part in the debate, and the fact that the Bill differed from others of the same kind in being criticised or commented upon from four different quarters, he could see his way to prolong the debate after Thursday.
SIR CARNE RASCH: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will not use his influence as Leader of the House to shorten the extraordinary prolixity of speeches on this Bill, in which case we should not want any more time?
SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNEEMAN: I recognise fully the spirit in which the right hon. Gentleman has asked the Question, and I recognise still more keenly the advice and the opinion given by the hon. Member whom, in the matter of short speeches, I regard as my leader. No doubt he has hit the blot in the whole of the debate. I am afraid, however, that we cannot extend the time. No one knows better than the right hon. Gentleman that when a certain cay has been fixed for a division and that fixture has been corroborated day after day, as this fixture has been, it is almost impossible to change it. I find that for the Bill of 1902, which was certainly a larger Bill, three
† See Col. 741.
1316
and a half days were allowed—;exactly the same time as for this measure—;and that for the Education Bill of 1903 only one and a half days were allowed; so that I do not think anyone can say that the time is insufficient. Whether it has been properly expended is another question, but that is quite beyond my control or that of any individual. I have myself happened to look into the course of the first night's debate, and I find that nine Members addressed the House during seven hours. It is a serious matter to these who have been imperfectly educated to divide seven by nine, but as far as I can think out the matter, and giving to the question all the time at my disposal, it gives from forty-five to fifty minutes as the average length of a speech. I venture to say that it is really absurd; and that is the reason why so many hon. Members on both sides of the House are excluded from participating in the debate, because the hon. Members who have the good fortune to be called upon make such an inordinate use of their opportunities. I do not blame anyone for doing so; but it is undoubtedly the cause—;I regret it as much as the right hon. Gentleman—;why Members who might well enlighten the House on the subject, are excluded, while others who cannot do so much good service occupy so large a share of Parliamentary time. But I am afraid that we must stand by to-morrow night, because of the great inconvenience that would be caused to everyone concerned if at this time we made any alteration. But we can suspend the eleven o'clock rule if there is any desire for it. Indeed, I am not sure that it is not usual, for convenience and to prevent any interference with the last speech, to suspend that rule formally and innocently. But even if more than that was asked for by the right hon. Gentleman and his followers, I do not think we should have much objection; but I am afraid that we must stand by Thursday night.
LORD R. CECIL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that out of the whole of the time available for debate yesterday two of his colleagues occupied more than a fourth and that one of the right hon. Gentleman's colleagues occupied thirty minutes in discussing the financial provisions of the Act of 1902?
SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: If we come to bandying words about the length of speeches, I may remind the noble Lord that there was a speech delivered from behind the Front Opposition Bench which occupied an hour and a half last night.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: What business do the Government propose to take next week.
SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN: The Finance Bill will be the business on Monday.

EDUCATION (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL.
Order read, for resuming adjourned debate on Amendment to Question [May 7th], "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Which Amendment was—;
"To leave out the word 'now,' and at the end of the Question to add the words 'upon this day six months.'"—;(Mr. Wyndham.)
Question again proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. BRYCE,): It might be supposed from much of the language used during the debate that this Bill is a wanton disturbance of the peace which has prevailed in the education world, and an attack on the Church of England. There has not been much indication of peace in the education world during the last few years, and I think that this measure will be recognised to be a necessary complement of the Act of 1902. It was impossible for the Government, after all that has been said at the general election, to have done less than to bring in this Bill. It is a logical consequence of the Act of 1902. Nevertheless, I do not think that any resentment which may exist with regard to the Act of 1902 ought to prevent the House from endeavouring to consider fairly and temperately what is the nature of the opposition to the Bill. I am aware that underneath the great noise which has been raised in the country there exists a real alarm with regard to its provisions. But I believe that it exists almost entirely in the minds of the clergy. That is no
1318
reason, however, why we should not give it fair consideration and strive, if possible, to disarm that opposition, to show what are the motives which underlie the Bill, and which have induced the Government to believe that it is the only possible settlement of the present controversy. The endowment clauses, for example have excited alarm; but I assure the House that they are not intended in any way to interfere with modern endow ments of a distinctly denominational character. It has been supposed that there is some attempt being made of that kind, but I can assure the House that there is nothing of the kind in the minds of the Government The principles of these provisions are principles which have been stated by leading Liberals during the last forty years. When the Bill reaches the Committee stage every desire will be shown on the part of the Government to deal fairly with the question.
The first complaint made against the Bill is that it removes the tests imposed on teachers, or the obligation to secure that the teacher shall belong to a particular denomination. That provision of the Bill is the inevitable result of the introduction of the principle of local option or contro As long as the voluntary schools were under private management it followed that it was easy for them to make their choice on denominational lines and to ask questions with regard to the teacher. Even under the Act of 1902 this might be done, because the denominational majority was secured. But under popular local control, such as the Bill creates, that system became impossible; and, therefore, I submit if there is any logic in the matter this measure is the logical consequence of what was done in 1902 when the late Government established local popular control. By the Act of 1902 the teachers were virtually made a part of the Civil Service, and if that is the case, then the principle that there should be no distinction of creed or denomination, no selection of men according to religious tests, must necessarily apply to teachers also. This fact, however, does not tie the hands of the local authority as to the selection of the men whom they think to be the fittest for the mastership of a school. I regret the loss which these debates now suffer through the absence

1319
of Lord Hugh Cecil, who has declared that chaos in the appointment of teachers must follow the operation of this Bill. But there is a country north of the Tweed where popularly elected local authorities have not applied any tests for the last thirty years or more. They have found no difficulty in procuring competent religious teachers, no difficulty in choosing men to give religious instruction with perfect satisfaction to the people of Scotland. I think, therefore, that the suggestion which has been made that this Bill will create a practical difficulty in this respect is completely negatived by the long and satisfactory experience of Scotland.
The Government have also been accused of overriding trusts. Trusts have frequently been overridden, conspicuously by the Acts for reforming the Universities, and the trusts of these very schools have been altered by the Act of 1902. The commonest of these trusts was one for the education of the poor in the principles of the Church of England. How far will that be affected by this Bill? The children of the poor will continue to receive elementary education, and provision is made for enabling them to receive it in accordance with the principles of the Church of England on two days in the week. The Schoolhouse will be left in the hands of the trustees for all other purposes of the Church; and the trust is benefited to this extent, that the trustees and subscribers are to be relieved of the whole cost of maintenance. It is said that the wishes of the subscribers will be neglected, but that argument has been very greatly exaggerated. Who are the subscribers? Before 1870 a great deal of the money came out of the public Exchequer; and it is a mistake to suppose that the bulk of the money subscribed since 1870 has come from purely denominational sources. A large part has come from persons who are not members of the Church of England and a large part from persons who desired to avoid school boards and the rates which would follow. A great deal, too, has come from these who have bodies but not souls—;corporations like the great railway companies, who cannot have any denominational purpose whatever. It was originally intended in 1870, and for a long time afterwards, that half the cost of these schools should be borne by the subscribers. But of late years the whole
1320
cost has been borne by the State. The denominational element, therefore, given by the funds subscribed to the building has been largely diluted or washed out by the large sums which the State has annually contributed. The clergy of the Church of England say that this Bill gives a preference to Nonconformity—;as if Nonconformity were a species of religion The Cowper-Temple clause did not create any religion or give any preference to any particular form of creed. It was simply a prohibition to teach a creed or formulary in the schools. That is not Nonconformity, any more than it is Anglicanism or Catholicism. It is a direction to avoid doing anything which brings into force the distinctive tenets of a particular denomination. It is a direction to teach, as far as is possible, that which the Protestant bodies hold in common; and it ought to be called not so much undenominationalism as co denominationalism. What is the religion that is so much complained of as being "Cowper-Temple religion?" It is the Christianity of the first three centuries—;the Christianity that existed before any creeds were imposed. The first official creed was formulated in the year 325, before which Christians had not begun to separate themselves into sects. I am often amused to hear the way people talk of that gentle and kindly man, Mr. Cowper-Temple, as if he were some heresiarch, some bold, bad man who wished to destroy Christian peace. He was the very reverse of all these things. What he desired to have taught was that which is held and valued by nineteen-twentieths of the laity of the Church of England. Is there no such thing as what is called "our common Christianity?" It is a phrase sometimes heard in the pulpit, and often on occasions when people of different denominations meet together for objects of social welfare. It is recognised in every case except where the children are concerned, and yet it is for the children, above all, that this common Christianity ought to exist. I am not referring to the Roman Catholics.
MR. T. M. HEALY: We began in 325.
MR. BRYCE: No, you were there from the first, and so were we all. There

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are sentences in an utterance of the Archbishop of Canterbury which will bear repetition—;
"It is almost inconceivable that any Christian man who knows the facts can speak of the Christian teaching given in the London school board as worthless because it is undenominational. Such instruction lays the foundation on which the ampler teaching of the Christian faith can be securely built."
Canon Maurice and the late Archbishop Temple also spoke with approval of such undenominational teaching. We have had this undenominational system in force since 1870 for half the children in the country. Are the children who have grown up in the Cowper-Temple schools any less religious than these in the voluntary schools? The inspectors admit that they are better trained in Scripture knowledge. Will any one say that these children are less honest, upright, and temperate, or loss willing to serve their fellow-men than the children in the voluntary schools? There have been a great many extraordinary statements made, but no one can say that the results of the board school teaching have been unsatisfactory or inferior to these of the voluntary schools. It is said by some that Bible Protestantism is not Christianity at all. Such persons approximate more to the Catholic Church than to the Church of England. The essential points are the existence of the priesthood and the sacrament, to which they attach a higher and deeper value than other Christians do. If that doctrine is held by the great majority, I admit that their feelings may be these which are held by Catholics. I do not deny that the case of the Catholics is different, that they have a special case, and I earnestly hope both sides of the House will endeavour as far as possible to give consideration to their case. But I will go so far as to say that this view is not the official view of the Church of England as defined in the thirty-nine Articles. For whose benefit is this Bill, as all and other Education Acts have been, to be passed? For the benefit of the children, not for the clergy or for politicians. Can a child of twelve benefit by receiving these distinctive formulæ of Christian doctrine which are excluded by the Cowper-Temple clause? [OPPOSITION cries of "Yes, certainly."] I have had experience of the Catechism, and I remember being
1322
asked such questions as "What is effectual calling?" There are many hon. Members who have learned that the sacrament "is the outward and visible sign of inward and spiritual grace." Are these metaphysical and theological definitions comprehensible by the simple mind of a child? The only form of Christian teaching that can properly be given to a child is in these few fundamental truths in regard to which Christians are agreed. These fundamental truths are the goodness and greatness of the Creator, the duty to love Him and keep His Commandments, and the sacred precepts of the New Testament, especially these precepts delivered by Christ Himself—;precepts delivered and expressed in language so simple and beautiful that it touches the imagination and emotions of a child and goes home to his heart. All this can be taught, and is being taught, efficiently and usefully in the board schools of the country. There are many great difficulties with regard to the teaching of theology to a child; but I almost thought while listening to the hon. Member for Cambridge University that no mother could be fitted to give simple Bible teaching to a child at her knee unless she had passed through a course of training at a theological college, so high is the standard that the hon. Member thinks is necessary for these who impart theological fundamental truths to a child. When the Act of 1870 was passed it was said that each teacher would try to instil that particular form of doctrine which commended itself to his own conscience. That has happened in the rarest cases. The testimony of every one who knows the working of the board schools for thirty-five years is that these schools have given simple Bible teaching which has caused no offence and has been very beneficial. That, I believe, is the opinion of the parents of the children. There are hon. Members who send their children to Eton or Harrow, where they certainly used to receive very little definite dogmatic religious instruction. [OPPOSITION cries of "Oh!"] I can speak for my own contemporaries at the University, who tell me of the instruction they have received. Things may be different today. But I appeal to these hon. Members who come from the classes whose children use the elementary schools to say whether they believe the

1323
working classes desire to have this distinctive sectarian instruction in the schools.
EARL PERCYasked whether these hon. Members were in favour of religious instruction.
MR. BRYCE: There is a difference of opinion. There are some who prefer a secular system, but I believe the larger number of them would prefer what is called the Cowper-Temple system. I think even these who believe that a secular system is the best and ultimate solution of this question will bear testimony to the fact that the parents are well satisfied with the present board school teaching. I should be deeply grieved to lose from the schools of the country what I believe to be a powerful and valuable agency in modelling the characters of the children. One chief reason why we desire that this Bill should pass is because we believe that practically the only alternative is a secular system. I admit that a secular system is more logical, and that the Cowper-Temple system is not logical; but under a secular system hundreds and thousands of children would get no knowledge of the Bible at all. [OPPOSITION cries of "Why?"] Because they do not go to Sunday school. Their parents ought to teach them, but in many cases they do not do so, and in existing conditions if they are not given it in the schools, they will not get it at all. I ask the House to remember how immeasurable the loss would be to children, even of non-Christian parents, if they knew nothing of Scripture history and Scripture literature. They would have no opportunity of being carried back to that far-distant world so unlike our own, and would know nothing of what has formed the basis of thought and poetry for the whole modern world and has been the central force of European history. I admit that the problem is one of extreme difficulty, and I do not say this solution or any other solution is one which can be considered perfectly satisfactory. It is a difficulty which has vexed Europe, our Colonies, and the United States. Broadly speaking, there are two ways in which attempts has been made to solve it. The German system recognises two religions and provides schools for each denomination. But Germany has two established
1324
Churches, the Catholic Church and the Lutheran, or Evangelical, Church, and both are controlled by the State to a far greater extent than would be tolerated in this country. These two conditions do not exist and are not likely to exist in this country. The other solution is that adopted, with few exceptions, by the British Colonies and by the United States. It is a system which is either entirely secular, excluding religion altogether from the schools, or else confines religious instruction to simple Bible reading. It is the general testimony of those who have spoken in this House that the people of this country do not desire secular education. Here are two alternatives; but we could not follow the German example or the example of the United States. Consequently there is only the other method left which has been adopted in this country. I think the noble Lord the Member for Chorley said last night that there was no danger of secularism in this country at the present moment. There may be no danger at present because the people of this country desire to maintain religion in the schools. But it is conceivable that we might come to secularism, and therefore I appeal to hon. Members to pass this Bill in order to prevent that occurrence. We are trying by this Bill to give facilities which we believe will fairly meet such obstacles as exist. We will go into Committee on the Bill with an open mind, and perfectly prepared to consider such changes as may be proposed, with some conformity, of course, to the general principles laid down. I maintain that the Bill as regards, at any rate, the members of the Church of England imposes no burden; it relieves them of an existing pecuniary burden; it offers fair terms to the denominational schools, and makes practically no difference to distinctive denominational teaching, except that it is to be given, not by the regular teacher, but by others who come in. It is to be given on two days a week, and that is as much as is given now.
MR. TALBOT: Will the right hon. Gentleman forgive me? Under the Bill, it may be given (if the local authority allow) on not more than two days a week.
MR. BRYCE: I think if the local authority and the local managers so

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desire it, in the future it may be given on any day. We believe that the local authorities will do it under this Bill. I will tell you why. We believe that the local authorities are in harmony with the religious spirit of the English people. We believe that the local authorities are prepared to carry out what they believe to be the wishes of the English people, and we believe that these bodies are not animated by these sentiments of bigotry against any particular creed which are often attributed to them. Let me give an instance. There is not in this country a more Protestant city than Liverpool—;it is ultra-Protestant. The local authority in Liverpool has been liberal in making grants for instruction to Roman Catholic institutions, and has made no difference between Catholic institutions and others. That I believe to be the general spirit which animates our local authorities throughout England, and it is the spirit which animates local authorities in Scotland, where there has been no attempt to abuse the power to the prejudice of any religious party. This Bill, as it makes no difference in distinctive teaching, gives to all children as much as their minds are fitted to receive. What is it an Education Bill ought to do? It ought to secure symmetry and coordination with elasticity and efficiency. It ought to make the teaching profession an open jirofession—;every post in it equally accessible and open to every man and woman who desires to enter it. It ought to place religious bodies upon an equal footing, and, in particular, to give all the children equal treatment. It surely ought to try to bring up so far as possible in the same schools these children who are afterwards to live together as citizens. This Bill may require some amendment. As I have said we are prepared to consider in a reasonable spirit any amendment. The Bill is an honest effort to accomplish the objects I have stated; to get rid of theological controversy by applying equality; to minimise those ecclesiastical disputes by which our energies have, been divided and wasted, while the interests of the children have been forgotten; and to satisfy that desire to retain the religious character of the schools which animates the great majority of the English people.
MR. DILLON: Of all the speeches delivered in the course of this debate I confess that the one which perhaps interested me more than any other was that of the hon. Member for Leicester, and that for two reasons—;first of all, because for the first time I heard a representative in this House put forward a plea in powerful language for secular education in this country, and, secondly, because the hon. Member for Leicester represents a Party which has come freshest from the constituencies. I confess that the speeches and the opinions of the Labour Members on both sides of the House are more interesting to me in this debate than the speeches of these whom I may describe without offence as old stagers in this controversy. One of the arguments used in the powerful speech of the hon. Member for Leicester struck me particularly, and is, I think, full of ominous meaning for hon. Members on both sides of the House. He used these words—;
"It was a curious fact that every Labour movement was in favour of a system of secular education in public schools. The chief reason was because these who belonged to Labour parties sent their children to these schools. What proportion of the Bishops or of the Members of that House sent their children to these schools."
Well, there is a great deal in this argument. I think hon. Members like the right, hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade and the right hon. Gentleman who has just spoken, who value the maintenance of some form of religious training in the schools, will do well to take to heart and give good weight to the fact that the Labour Members who have come in recently, and who have more than any other Members the right to speak for parents, are all now in favour of a secular system. [Cries of "No."] I am referring now to the only prominent member of the Labour Party who has spoken.
MR. LLEWELLYN WILLIAMS: The President of the Board of Trade sends his children to these schools.
MR. DILLON: That is a very interesting fact, but the right hon. Gentleman would hardly describe himself as a

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Labour Member. I was directing attention to what was stated by the hon. Member for Leicester. While that may be true as regards the general body—;the non-Catholic, the non-Jewish working people of this country—;if the decision of this matter were left to these whose children use the schools it would be rather in favour either of simple Bible teaching, or, I think by a majority, in favour of a secular system. [Cries of "No."] Well, I may be wrong, but if that test be applied to these for whom we as Roman Catholics speak how would the decision go? In regard to the Catholics of the working classes of this country whose children use these schools, there can be no manner of doubt about their view of the matter, and I tell the hon. Member for Leicester that if the members of the Labour Party had been at the Albert Hall the other day, or if they were as well acquainted as many of us are with the sacrifices made week in and week out for years by the poorest Roman Catholics of the working classes of this country to maintain their schools, they would know by the best of all possible tests that they at least desired the maintenance of the Catholic character of these schools. There was just one other point in the speech of the hon. Member for Leicester which struck me as of great significance. We have heard a great deal in these debates on the question of the right of the parent. The hon. Member for Leicester put forward an amazing doctrine. He said he was not a believer in the right of the parents to teach their children the religion which they desired them to receive; on the contrary, he said that in his opinion the children had a right to appeal against the parents impressing upon them their religious creeds or views. Some of us asked at what age. I would say to the hon. Member for Leicester that when he gives expression to such principles as these, he is tilting against a very ancient principle of humanity which is too strong for him. It is nearly 2,500 years since the philosopher Plato laid down the principle in his Republic that every child within a few weeks of birth should be taken from its father and mother. More than 2,000 years have elapsed since then, and even with that great authority that doctrine has not made much progress. No, Sir, in
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my opinion the claim of the parents for reasonable State aid is a claim that no Government and no majority has a right to trample upon.
Before I pass away from the views of the Labour Party, let me draw attention, to one aspect of this case, and I do it with all earnestness and all sincerity. I would ask them to remember how many noble causes have been ruined by the fires of religious controversy. I would ask them to consider in dealing with this Bill in its future stages that the apostles of reaction are seeking to cast into the ranks of the Labour Party in England the apple of discord, and whether the great movement of progress so happily inaugurated at the last election, if drawn into irreconcilable hostility towards this Bill in its final stages, may not receive a fatal set back. It may be said and it has been, said that we are wrong in alleging that this Bill if not altered would amount to religious persecution against the Catholics of this country, but I ask all who hold that view whether, when there is a question of religious persecution or suffering from conscience sake, it is not a fact that the only people who have a right to decide that matter are the people who allege they suffer? Those who persecuted in the past from the religious point of view, and it will be so in the future, will never admit that any wrong is done, and it is only these who suffer that really complain.
I should like to say a word about another subject. A remarkable and most interesting maiden speech was made by the hon. Member for Bath. He appealed very directly to the Irish Members, and asked us to say what has the election decided. I thought the election decided in favour of free trade, and we in this House decided by an overwhelming majority that that was the governing element at the election. I thought also the election had decided against Chinese labour, and while I frankly admit that the majority was a good deal due to and increased by the injustice unhappily done by the Bill of 1902, I would ask the hon. Member to go to the Liberal Members for Liverpool, for Manchester, for Bolton, and ask them about the pledges they gave their Catholic electors who voted for them, and

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to say frankly whether it was part of their wish to destroy the Catholic schools. We Irishmen who speak for the Roman Catholics deny that as regards the great industrial centres, the decision of the election was that the Catholic schools were to be taken from us or destroyed. On the contrary, we assert, and can prove, that in almost all the centres of industrial population, pledges were given by Liberal candidates that they would see that no injustice was done to the Catholic schools. The hon. Member for Bath made an appeal to us on the Home Rule ground, and said to the Irish Members, "Trust the English people." Well, I want to trust them here in the House of Commons. Let the hon. Member for Bath give us proof here, in the House of Commons, that the English people may be trusted not to act unjustly or in a spirit of bigotry in this matter; let it be settled here where we have Catholic representatives, and not in local municipalities where the voice of the Catholics cannot be heard. Let the Parliament of England settle it. Surely this is a great issue which the Parliament of England ought to decide. What is to be gained by throwing this apple of discord into every local municipality? It is idle for the hon. Member for Bath to say that no local body would act cruelly or unjustly. I do not wish to inflame feeling by going into particular instances, but when we have already on record a warning given by some local bodies that they will use the opportunity given under this Bill, in its present shape, to wipe out the Catholic schools—;then, I say, let us settle the matter here in Parliament and secure that this subject will not be made a bone of contention at every municipal election, and thereby mar the progress of public interest in all other local affairs throughout the country.
Let me say a word in regard to a matter which has come before the country everywhere. It is a question which divides our case by an impassible gulf from the case of the Church of England—;and that is the Cowper-Temple clause. I do not think that anything is to be gained in this controversy by using abusive language. This debate has been hitherto characterised by good temper and temperance of
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statement. But it is not true to state I that the teaching in the board schools under the Cowper-Temple clause is a new religion. It is not tyranny. It is simply, as we all admit, what has come to be known in England as Bible instruction; and it is idle to deny that a large section of the Church of England approved of it.
AN HON. MEMBER: As a foundation.
MR. DILLON: Exactly; that is what I am talking about. You may accept it as a foundation. Practically speaking, the Church of England, to a large extent, accepts Bible teaching, and it has not been denied that in most of the counties of England the leading ecclesiastics have taken part in drawing up the syllabuses. Hon. Members here, and members of the Church of England outside, say that largely and in the main they accept it as a good foundation. That is the difference between us and the Church of England. The Church of England at its worst or at its lowest says that the doctrine of the Cowper-Temple clause is a good foundation; but to us it is hostile. We object to it; and I warn hon. Members that if we Catholics are forced to the choice between a purely secular system of education and a purely Bible reading system, we will unhesitatingly accept the purely secular; and if that goes on, as sure as the sun will rise to-morrow morning, we shall have in this country very soon a purely secular system of education. It is quite true that at present the majority of the people of England would not like to see the Bible out of the schools, and it is equally true that there is a party growing up who would say "whatever our own desires may be, rather than see this eternal quarrel we would accept the secular system," and if you force us to choose we will take the secular system in preference to simple Bible teaching. Now you understand what it is that divides us. That is the opinion of all my colleagues. Therefore the simple Bible teaching in the schools is to us Catholics worse than no religion. Yes, it is hostile to our system, and what you are doing is this—;if you persist in carrying

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out this Bill unamended and thereby destroy our schools and drive us to war against this Bill—;and it would be a prolonged war—;the result will inevitably be, in my opinion, after some years of quarrelling and struggle and perhaps another swing of the pendulum, in which the Liberals would be the under dog and the present Opposition the upper, the institution of a secular system in England. The President of the Board of Trade, in his most powerful and eloquent speech, although I disagreed with most of what he said, used these words—;
"Here is one thing on which we are all agreed. We agree that it is the business of the State to train and discipline the conscience."
That is a very remarkable statement coming from the President of the Board of Trade. I was rather surprised at that definition—;
"And I think there is agreement between us that this must be done on the principle of Christian morality."
But what about the Jews? Is that the business of the State? Mark the werds—;
"The duty of the State, we are all agreed we must train the consciences on the basis of morality."
I think the right hon. Gentleman is out in his logic there, and if he thinks he can apply to us any more than the Jews his notion of the proper way to train our consciences, which he declares to be the business of the State—;to train the consciences of our children in the principles of Christian morality—;I warn him he is just as much at sea as in the case of the Jews. I have said before, and I repeat it, that so far as we Catholics are concerned, it is not the teaching of the catechism that is the most important thing to us in our schools. The Chief Secretary for Ireland has pointed out in his speech how impossible it is for little children to understand the catechism. We differ entirely from his view. We think the proper teaching is dogma and specific truth. But that is not the point. What we are struggling and making sacrifices for in these schools is the creation of a Catholic atmosphere, and teaching the child from his earliest years that he is a member of a great Church. I know that idea is quite foreign to hon. Members opposite, but so
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far as I personally am concerned, I attach more importance to have surrounding the child that Catholic atmosphere than I do to the teaching of the catechism, and therefore it is that we are so strongly opposed to any kind of teaching which would allow the teaching of the Church or the Church itself to be ridiculed or belittled in the mind of the child during its school life. Then later on the President of the Board of Trade used this extraordinary language. He said—;
"We have a new doctrine about religious instruction, the doctrine of the right of the parent."
That is a perfectly new doctrine, so far as the general controversy is concerned. Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me to remind him of the language he used in 1902? On July 30th, 1902, he said—;
"Why should a parent not be allowed to dictate to the teachers what doctrine he wished his children to be taught?"
Mark you, not to teach any doctrine, but to dictate what doctrine he wished his child to be taught.
"There were three millions of children in the denominational schools and over two millions of these were in the 8,000 parishes with only one school. What right had the noble Lord the Member for Greenwich to speak on behalf of the parents of these millions of children and say, 'This is the particular doctrine these parents want to be taught?' Why would he not allow the parents of these children to say, 'This is the doctrine we want taught to our children?'"
So that the right of the parent to dictate as to doctrine is not new to the President of the Board of Trade. When I was advocating the right of the parent in England, the chief support I got was from the Radical Party, every man of which came into the lobby with me and voted in favour of the right of the parent to have a substantial voice in the appointment of the teachers. I was denounced in the most unmeasured terms as a traitor to the denominational schools by the then Leader of the Opposition, because he said I was sacrificing the denominational schools. I would like to know would the then Government, if they knew as much as now, have accepted it. They denounced me as a traitor when I got the Radical Party to vote for my Amendment. If they had surrendered and made that concession, then they would, have secured the control of their schools

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for the next twenty-five or thirty years. Let me say a word as to the right of the parents. I think there has been in relation to it gross exaggeration. I have read in the newspapers harangues in which it was declared that the parents had an unlimited right to dictate on this subject. Let me remind hon. Members that there are parents who are anti-Christian. I was reading the other day a well-known book I in which the doctrine is advanced that the greatest misfortune which could befall was the teaching of Christianity—;and that until it was rooted out, humanity would never come into its true inheritance. Well, the advocates of this view would have as good a right as any one else to dictate to anyone else. Then what about the Anarchist? Would he be entitled to insist upon instruction in the theory and construction of bombs? Of course that is not a numerous class of the community—;but there are a good many more of them than we know, probably. The right of the parent we must deal with as sensible men. It must be limited by convenience and a sense of the rights of others. We can not claim that where there are two or three Catholic families they should have schools set up for themselves. We must be guided by convenience, and we only claim that the right of the parent is one which should be recognised by the Government, and that it should be the object of the Government not to interfere with it so far as the circumstances permit. That is all we claim. Let me, with a couple of sentences, say what it is that we want. I must ask to be dissociated from the language used here last night by the hon. Member for Chorley. He spoke as the champion of the denominational schools, and when he elicited from the Minister for Education an important declaration that it is his purpose to secure denominational teachers in these denominational schools, he made use of it in a manner which showed that his object was not to save the schools for the purpose for which they were intended, but to utilise the statement for the purposes of his own Party. The Minister for Education, in his recent speeches, has made observations from which I think that, from our point of view, peace may be secured. I will, for the purpose of clearness, read
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some notes I have made of what I think will settle this controversy. First of all, I think that Clause 4 should be made a reality, applying to all the Catholic schools, so far as that can justly be done. I put in the word justly, because I for one will never be a party to demanding a Catholic school where there is a majority of other denominational sections. I daresay I shall incur animosity by stating that that is the first demand we make. Secondly, I think there should be some machinery which will secure us from the danger and apprehension of having teachers forced upon our schools of such a character as would make Clause 4 a nullity and a farce. These are the words of the Minister for Education himself. I am perfectly confident that the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues never meant that clause to be a nullity and a farce. If they did, why did they introduce it? I am bound to say I will be no party to the attacks which have been made upon the right hon. Gentleman in regard to that clause. I believe that it is his intention to make it a reality, and I do not join with these who abuse him and charge him with ill faith. The third demand is that some provision should be made for future Catholic schools in new centres of Catholic population. That is merely the inevitable corollary and consequence of the previous demands. I say nothing at all about the question of the endowments, because that is a highly technical question, and I understand from the Government that they are prepared to consider any proposal which is brought up. These three demands are not very extravagant; they will not interfere with the general scope of the Bill or its principle, and they are consistent with the principles already accepted by the Radical Party. I make bold to say that if they were conceded and the necessary Amendments, five or six in number, embodied, it would enable us or at least it would enable me to accept the Bill and to appeal to our friends in this country to do likewise.
And now, let me make a strong appeal to the Labour and the Radical Parties. I appeal first of all to the Nonconformists of this country. I personally have never taken part in some of the taunts which have been

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frequently levelled against the Nonconformist conscience. I can never forget that with them we fought shoulder to shoulder against religious tests and for other forms of liberty in this country. But so far as the religious test is in this Bill I will not vote against it. I will never vote for the abolition of religious tests in regard to education, and I will fight against the appointment as teacher to a homogeneous Catholic school of some man who will turn Clause 4 into a farce. [An HON. MEMBER: But that is a test.] The hon. Member does not know what a religious test means the sense in which I use it, and I say that a man who calls that a test merely puts difficulties in our way. I appeal to the Nonconformists) on this ground, that when in 1902, after long debate, it was made manifest to this House what was the chief grievance of which they complained, I myself stood up and on behalf of the Irish Party moved the Amendment, in regard to which the President of the Board of Trade told the House that although it would not be absolutely satisfactory to them it would remove the greater part of their grievance. At that time I was denounced as a traitor by the Tablet newspaper and by many of the leading members of the Catholic Church in this country. I ask the Nonconformists now to be reasonable and to reciprocate and meet me half way. I will ask them to do nothing in this matter which is unjust to them or which will inflict injustice upon them. I entered upon that occasion into the region of prophecy, a dangerous rôle for a politician to take. I prophesied to these who resisted the Amendment that there would be a mighty reaction and that they would suffer. I prophesy to the Nonconformists now that that motto and example of 1902, vae victis, or any measure inflicting injustice will have a similar reaction. I appeal finally to the Labour Party to help us in Committee. I appeal to them because we, the Irish Catholics of this country, threw all our weight to help them to create a Labour Party. They have a long road to travel, with many difficulties, and if at the outset of that road, which I hope will be a glorious one, Labour is thrown back into the arms of reaction, and the floodgates of religious
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bitterness are opened, I warn the Labour Party that it will be a dangerous course to follow. Let us approach this Bill in a spirit of conciliation, and from that point of view I confidently prophesy that it will be easy, at least as far as we Irish Members are concerned, to find a way out of the difficulty. All that we ask for is that our schools should be secured, and for liberty to build new schools for our people as centres of population spring up. I will not, and I cannot, believe that it is the purpose of this Government to take from us the schools which, whatever can be said of any other section of the population, have undoubtedly been reared by the sweat and the labour of the toiling millions of our population.
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: Everybody who has listened to the speech which has just been delivered will agree with me as to its importance and interest, derived not merely from the ability and eloquence of the speaker, but also from the position which he occupies as a representative man with reference to this question. We recognise that his position on this occasion might have been embarrassing to a less practised debater. He desires on other grounds, not here in question, to give a general support to the Government. He is opposed—;conscientiously opposed—;to this Bill. He has, therefore, at the same time to criticise the Opposition, to support the Government, and to destroy the Bill. The hon. Gentleman has put before us the views which, he has explained, represent the present position and the present desires of the Irish Catholic Party. It is very difficult to gauge the full meaning of so important a declaration when it is first brought before the House in this way in the course of a speech, but I think I am not wrong in saying that the amendments which he asks for from the Government are, first, that Clause 4 should be made a reality. I do not know whether he goes quite as far as we do, but if he does, if he is willing to agree with us on that, he must go with us to the extent of saying that Clause 4, as it stands, is a sham and he wishes to make it a reality. He wishes that the Government shall accept amendments which will prevent

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the intrusion of teachers of any other denomination into Catholic schools; in other words, he wishes, as all of us must expect he would, that the Catholic atmosphere of the Catholic schools shall be considered sacred and be continuously preserved. He asks not merely that the position of Catholic schools as it is at present shall be continued, but that facilities shall be given, that full liberty shall be given, to the creed for the creation of new schools on the same principle; and, lastly, he suggests that amendments shall be made in the clause dealing with endowments, although he does not specify what they are. He said, in his eloquent peroration, that these demands were made in a spirit of conciliation, and that they were in his opinion very moderate demands. I am not certain whether I differ from him, but these conciliatory and moderate demands destroy the two principles of the Bill. They absolutely destroy the principle of public control over all elementary schools, and they absolutely destroy the principle on which the Government have hitherto insisted—;the abolition of what they call tests for teachers. I agree with the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down that this talk about tests for teachers is a misapplication of words. This is a matter which is on totally different lines from these tests which we, all of us—;at any rate, these of us who profess Liberal and progressive ideas on whichever side of the House we sit—;have always opposed, and which our ancestors in their time opposed. It may be right to carry the matter further. All I wish to say is that I agree with the hon. Member if he meant to impress on the House that they are not in pari materia with what are called tests for teachers.
Now, Sir, let us consider the moderate and conciliatory demands of the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, speaking alone, as he is entitled to speak, and as necessarily he wishes to speak, for the Irish Catholic Party. So far as they are concerned they will be reconciled by the acceptance of these moderate amendments. But does the House think that it is reasonable to ask us to be satisfied with a concession which is made to only one of the sections which object to the Bill? I am not by any means certain—;I have no right to
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speak for others, but I am inclined to think that if these moderate and conciliatory conditions which are asked for on behalf of the Irish Catholics are granted and extended, as they must be, to every other denomination—;if they are extended, as they must be, to the Anglicans, to all these members of Noncomformist bodies who do not accept the views of the Free Churches, and to the Jews, I am not certain, but at first sight I am inclined to believe, you will settle the whole question. The hon. Member stated the views which are held by a definite section of the House, and he expressed what I may call some indifference for those whom he called old stagers, among whom, I am sure, he will admit himself to be a distinguished member. I also claim that I am a very old stager in this education business. More than thirty years ago I was chairman of the National Education Board. At the same time I was a member of several Noncomformist committees. A short time afterwards I was chairman for three years of the Birmingham School Board, so that I have had theoretical and practical experience upon this question; and in all these capacities it is my pride and my delightful recollection that I was associated throughout with my friend the late Dr. Dale. There must be some here who also enjoyed his friendship. No man, as I think, ever held a higher place as a representative of the Free Churches, and it will be admitted by all that he had most sincere religious convictions. His whole spirit was one of devotion and piety; and at the same time there was not a man who had a broader mind or who attached more importance to absolute justice and equality in dealing with all classes of men—;these from whom he differed as well as these amongst whom he worked and lived. Thirty years ago almost to a month, when I entered this House, I made my maiden speech, and it was upon this subject; and very curious it is to look back and see that the position was exactly the same then as it is now, and that we have not proceeded one step towards a final settlement. The bone of contention is the same; and I say that, until you come to some definite conclusion as to the principles to be adopted in order to do

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justice to all, you never will approach anything in the nature of a solution of this problem. Looking at this speech—;it was a short one and, I think, imperfectly reported—;I find I made two statements. I said that if the priest and the parson, and of course by that I did not mean to speak of particular denominations, but meant that if all clerical and ecclesiastical influence were withdrawn, there would be no religious difficulty. That was my view then, but I am not certain, when we come to examine it, that that statement has helped us or will help us much. My second statement was that the true principles of justice must De observed, and that the principles of the three Nonconformist Committees and of the Birmingham School Board which I represented—;and which were the principles, remember, of Nonconformists as able and as distinguished as Dr. Dale and Mr. Henry Richards—;that these principles, which involved no sectarian instruction—;that is a different thing altogether—;but an entire separation between the work of the State and the work of the individual or denomination, offered then, as they seem to me to offer now, the only foundation on which to establish a fair and impartial system. Now, what has struck me in this debate is its essential unreality. We are arguing each from our own side, in opposite directions, but in parallel lines which never meet. I can afford to admit a very great deal of what was said this evening by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Aberdeen, for instance, and it would not in the slightest degree be relevant to the objections I take to this Bill. Each side has put forward its own views and argues that its own views are absolutely reasonable, that they are not unjust and do not interfere unjustly with anybody's conscience, and that there is no desire to interfere unjustly with anybody's conscience. They argue in, I will say, a reasonable and absolutely correct manner, and it would be absolutely satisfactory if we were dealing with a purely secular subject. But, as the hon. Member who has just sat down has well pointed out, when you come to matters of conscience, you cannot dispose of them by reasonable arguments. If you prove to the satisfaction of the whole House, instead of to the satisfaction of only your own side,
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that the system you are imposing generally under this Bill is absolutely reasonable, after all, you will have to how to the House upon what principle you intend to impose it compulsorily on someone who does not accept it. You may try and convert your opponent and to show him that he is wrong, but when you come to these matters of conscience, at the end of the discussion he tells you you have not converted him. Then you have to see how, consistently with your own principles of justice and religious liberty, you can impose your Bill on him. I would like to give some examples. I will take them from two Bills, the Bill of 1902 and the Bill now before us. The Bill of 1902, as we all know, and as many of our friends on this side of the House have found to their disadvantage during the last election, raised passionate opposition. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wolverhampton said it had resulted in a. mandate, and he defined the mandate. I do not agree with his definition. If there was any mandate at all I do not think it was in the form in which the right hon. Gentleman believes it was. I cannot help recalling what the hon. Member for East Mayo said just now, when he pointed out how many mandates are supposed to have been given at the general election; there is nothing that anybody who was successful attaches, importance to which he does not designate-by the sacred name of a popular mandate. Let us grant it. I have always maintained that there were a great number of mandates, almost an infinite number, as many mandates as there are Members of the House. Do not let us hear any more of there having been a conclusive popular decision upon any one particular subject. But I complained of the definition of the Member for Wolverhampton. I should have said it was not a mandate from the country about education at all. So far as it was a mandate, it was a mandate from the majority of the Dissenters that Parliament should relieve them of what they felt to be a burning, grievance. They did not prescribe the method; they honestly believed they had a grievance, and they asked that it should be removed. Could not we, could not the supporters of the Act of 1902 at any rate, make a perfectly good argument

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to show that their claim was an extremely unreasonable one? Let us take two points. What was the grievance of the Nonconformist? That he was compelled to pay rates for religious instruction of which he disapproved. Yes, but he paid taxes for I do not know how many years. Logically he ought not to have objected to the imposition of a rate. That might justify the promoters of the Act in thinking that no grievance would arise; but the grievance did arise, and our answer did not convert any single Dissenter that I am aware of. We had a much more serious argument than that. The promoters of the Bill might have said "You complain of grievance in that you are made to pay taxes and rates for an opinion of which you disapprove. On the other hand, you are compelling a great number of others—;Catholics, Anglicans, and Jews—;to pay rates and taxes for opinions of which they do not approve." If you talk about fairness, about equality as regards different sects, there was a scheme in that Bill of 1902 of what may be called concurrent endowment. If, on the one hand, the Anglicans had their schools, the Catholics theirs, the Jews theirs, for which the Nonconformists were called upon to pay, so the Nonconformists had the Board Schools, at which the religious education given satisfied them, and was paid for by the people who did not approve of that form of religion. I say that that was a very good argument, just as good as any we have heard to-night in favour of this Bill; but from the point of view of the House of Commons we must bear in mind that it did not convert the Dissenters. I have never made any concealment of my personal view that, although I think the Dissenters very much exaggerated their grievance, they had a grievance when the Act came into operation. At any rate, for my purpose it is sufficient to say that they thought they had a grievance, and in these circumstances it was the duty of any Government, whether the present Government or our Government if we had been fortunate at the general election, to endeavour as statesmen and on political grounds to remove the grievance, if possible. We are agreed. Indeed I am striving not to argue this matter in an unnecessarily controversial manner. I say the Government have attempted to
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remove that grievance. They were called upon to make the attempt. I do not complain of the attempt—;I complain of the way in which they have made it. They have attempted to remove the heavy burden the Nonconformist felt upon his shoulders by putting it on the Catholic or Anglican. I defy them to say that that is their mandate. I defy them to show that the great bulk of the Nonconformists desire not merely the removal of their own grievance, but that it should be placed on the shoulders of somebody else. So much for the Act of 1902. Both side shad a good case. What remained at the end of the discussion was that there was a considerable number of people who thought they had a conscientious grievance. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Aberdeen, following the right hon. Gentleman for Wolverhampton, gave us an admirable description, a most impassioned panegyric of the system at present adopted in a board school. He spoke in a way which I think commanded the assent of the majority of the House. Let me incidentally, by the way, correct myself. The Member for Wolverhampton, I think, complained of some words I let fall incidentally. I had spoken of the present Bill as the endowment of a new religion. I withdraw that description. It is inaccurate. What I meant, what I do say, is that it is a new endowment of a special form of religion which is already largely endowed. The million a year which is now to be taken from the pockets of the taxpayers is a further endowment in addition to what is already given to the support of this board school teaching, which is so praised—;so rightly and justly praised—;by the two right hon. Gentlemen to whom I have referred.
SIR HENRY FOWLER: That is paid to denominational schools in rent and repairs. There is no endowment of anybody.
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: Pardon me. Surely the right hon. Gentleman does not deny that if he did not propose to deal with the denominational schools, it would not be necessary to find this million, and that the object is to change the religious

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teaching now given in a denominational school to the teaching now given in a board school? There is no other object in the Bill—;no substantial object. I have no personal complaint to make against this board school religion. I have seen the syllabus of the Birmingham Board to which the Member for Wolverhampton referred; I approve of it. But I can go a great deal further. There has not been, to my knowledge, in all the board schools of Birmingham, a complaint from any parent sending his child to these schools of the religious instruction which has been given. Does it never strike the right hon. Gentleman that that argument tells on the other side? How many children of Nonconformists are there who go to Church schools, how many Protestants who go to Roman Catholic schools? Clearly there is a considerable number. What is very much rarer, but that also exists—;how many Roman Catholics go to Protestant schools? I might take other denominations. How many complaints can you establish from the parents in any one of these cases? If you assert that the parents would be satisfied with the board school religion in any case, because they have not hitherto complained, on the same ground you may say the parents would be satisfied with the Church of England Catechism because they have not complained. There is no general or substantial complaint on the part of the parents in any of these cases. It seems to me that that justifies the statement which I made, and which I quoted from my maiden speech, in which I said that if the sects would stand aside there would be no religious difficulty. But that does not help the Government; the sects will not stand aside. Neither the Nonconformists, nor the Cathelics, nor the Church of England are prepared to accept that position of entire neutrality, and accordingly we have the religious difficulty always with us. Now, I say, what is the use of all your argument, of the argument of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Aberdeen? I am not denying its force; I am not saying I do not agree with it; it may be most unreasonable for the Member for East Mayo to refuse to accept as thoroughly satisfactory the education given in the London Board Schools; it is open to the right hon. Gen-
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tleman to think the Church of England are excessively unreasonable in rejecting the school board religion as not being satisfactory to them, and in not voluntarily introducing it into their schools. All I point out is that the right hon. Gentleman has not converted them, that they remain unconvinced, and that just as firmly and sincerely as any Nonconformist believes that his conscience was injured by the Act of 1902, the Anglican believes his conscience will be injured by the Bill of 1906. ["No."] An Hon. Gentleman opposite says "No." That is the old doctrine of intolerance, of which I am sure the hon. Gentleman opposite would make a most admirable representative: that the conscience of any man is only known to these who are prepared to persecute him, that it is for somebody else to declare either what his conscience is or what it ought to be. No reasonable man on the other side will, I think, doubt that it is true to say that in these matters of conscience there is only one judge, and that that is not the man who makes the law, but the man who suffers from the law. However admirable or reasonable the argument you use, there remains the fact that there are a large number of people who would regard the system you desire to establish as a system of religious persecution. I say that the mandate given was a mandate to relieve a grievance, and not to impose one. And there is a difference between a Bill which, I believe, would have been unanimously supported in this House, and a Bill of this kind which merely transfers the difficulty.
How do you attempt to deal with this religious difficulty? The right hon. Gentleman just now—;as, indeed, other speakers from that side also—;seemed to think that in absolute defiance of logic or justice they can make exceptions, that they can treat a great political Party, supporting them in other things, differently in religious matters to everybody else. I say they cannot do it. But they have tried to do it by Clause 4. I am not complaining of the attempt to satisfy the Roman Cathelics—;let me be clearly understood—;I only complain that they do not try and satisfy others. But in order to satisfy the objections of the Roman Catholics, which they must have anticipated, whose views on this

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subject have been always clearly express pressed, they introduced Clause 4. But they surrender absolutely the whole principle of the Bill, surrender absolutely these irreducible minima of which they talked so bravely on the introduction of the Bill, if they maintain the exception in favour of the Catholics. I said at the beginning of my speech, and I repeat, that in order to pacify the Catholics you will have to give more, I am inclined to say I hope you will give more—;but you will have to give it to us. [MINISTERIAL cries of "Who is 'us'?"] "Us" in this House means the Party with which I am associated and for which I am speaking, that is the Unionist Party. Now what did you mean, what did you intend, when you said that the principles of your Bill, to which you attach great importance, are the principle of public control and the abolition of tests? What do you mean by public control? Do you mean public control of secular instruction? With some natural consideration of special cases, that is a principle we are all ready to accept. We, the Unionist Party, have no difficulty. The late Government, by the Act of 1902, wished and intended to advance that principle of public control of secular education. We always held that very large advances had been made in that direction, and if you want now to go further we have no objection. But that is not the Bill as it stands. The Bill provides for the control of religious instruction, and that is a totally different thing. What I want to point out, in specially considering the large number of Dissenters who are in this House, is that the principle of control of religious instruction by the State is in total opposition to every principle that the Free Churches have ever laid down. When I think that these are the descendants of Mr. Henry Richards, of Dr. Dale, and Mr. Miall! What is the principle of the Liberation Society? Probably many Members on the other side belong to that society—;do they know what the indefeasible principles of that society are? We are told—;I have not examined for myself, but I give it, believing it to be correct—;that, according to the Free Church Yearbook, one of the essential principles of that society is: "To oppose any
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payment for religious purposes out of public funds compulsorily exacted from all classes of the community." I appeal to members of the Liberation Society on the other side, at any rate, can you approve conscientiously of a Bill which throws all this additional cost, which maintains the existing cost of religious instruction, "out of public funds compulsorily exacted from all classes of the community"? I say, if you are false to your tradition and your faith, then you are thrown back to the other position—;I venture to quote from my maiden speech—;and you must assent to the separation between religious and secular instruction. Suppose we accept this extraordinary demand of a Liberal and a Nonconformist Party to control religious instruction. The Bill not only claims it, but it proposes to exercise that control in the most unfair and most partial manner, to exercise it in a way which, although it may not have been intended, must inure to the disadvantage of Catholics, Jews, and Churchmen, and to the advantage of the Free Churches, and the Free Churches alone. ["No!"] We have heard something of the Cowper-Temple clause, but curiously enough the right hon. Member for South Aberdeen, generally accurate in all these matters of detail, did not accurately describe that clause, although I do not differ from him much in the practical application of it. The clause prevents, not the teaching of doctrinal religion, but the use of any religious catechism or formulary which is distinctive of any religious denomination.
MR. BRYCE: I meant to say that, at any rate.
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: But you observe there is a difference, at all events, in the possible use of the clause, although I do not think there has been a great difference in the practical use of the clause.
MR. BRYCE: I admit that.
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: It would be perfectly possible for the teachers to give doctrinal instruction without the use of any formulary distinctive of the sect.
MR. BRYCE: I intended to imply that, but my argument was that that had not been done.
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: We agree on that, then. Now under that Cowper-Temple clause, what has been substantially the effect? The effect has been that, owing to the prohibition, boards which are not able, even if they wish, to give this doctrinal instruction by means of the ordinary catechism and formularies, have as an alternative the form of religious instruction which I do not intend to call the Nonconformist religion, but which has been entirely satisfactory to Nonconformists generally, almost without exception [MINISTERIAL cries of "And to Churchmen"], and not to Churchmen ["Oh"], not to Churchmen universally. You measure a grievance by the number of people who feel it. "If you are in a minority we burn you at the stake if you do not agree with us." I assert that in the knowledge of everybody there are great numbers of distinguished Churchmen, both ecclesiastics and Church laymen, who entirely repudiate this teaching, and refuse to accept it as satisfactory. Even these who have praised the teaching have always declared that, from their point of view, it is altogether insufficient and inadequate. But now contrast the treatment of the denominationalist, the effective teaching of whose view is prohibited by law, with the optional facilities which are given in order to enable the denominationalist to give the teaching he desires. In the one case it is compulsion; in the case of this Bill it is only optional. What authority has anybody who cares for this denominational education to believe that in all cases, at all times, and in all districts the local authorities will concede the "facilities" the responsibilities for which are thrown upon them? The right hon. Gentleman has said he believes in the sense of justice and fair play of the local authorities, which will induce them to give these facilities. Well, I suppose the Government have a sense of justice and fair play, but that has not induced them to give these facilities. Their Bill is all directed against the denominations, and then they say, "Oh, but do not think of that, we have got a loophole and we trust to the local authorities to be more considerate, more generous, more
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liberal-minded than we have been ourselves."
What is this Bill? The title is, "To make further provision for education." Surely that is an absolute mis-description. What further provision does it make for education? It is one thing of which the promoters of the Act of 1902, and especally my right hon. friend, may well be proud, that the principal part of his Bill—;too much lost sight of, but by far the larger part—;was directed to the unifying and improvement of secular instruction, and was deliberately framed in the interests of the children; and with regard to these new provisions no alteration, no addition hardly, has been suggested. This Bill, however, ought to be called one to settle the religious difficulty. The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, getting into a flame of histrionic indignation, denounced my right hon. friend the Member for the City because, apparently, he had said the intention of the Bill was to injure the Church. We judge from the terms of the Bill, and in all matters of life most of us from the written word judge the intention. The right hon. Gentleman gave an assurance that it was not intended to injure the Church. That is the opinion of the right hon. Member for Welverhampton and probably some of his colleagues; but is that the opinion of the President of the Board of Trade, whom I am sorry not to see in his place? Many cooks went to this broth. What did that right hon. Gentleman say last night? One sentence that will remain in all our minds for a long time to come was quoted from a great Frenchman. He said, "Clericalism is the enemy." [MINISTERIAL Cheers.] And Nonconformist religionists of different denominations cheer that. The Frenchman who used that expression had a different situation altogether to deal with. He had to deal with a clericalism which threatened the law, which was considered to be opposing the law, and interfering in politics. Clericalism at that time was thought to be hostile to the State, and for these reasons it was declared by this great statesman to be the common enemy. We have got your definition of clericalism—;those who interfere in politics: have you ever heard of political Dissenters; those who oppose the law: have you ever heard of passive resisters?

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Do not make the mistake of thinking that you can identify clericalism, or the declaration that clericalism is the enemy, with one sect, with one denomination. If it is the enemy, I think, on the definition which I have extracted from your assents it is much less the enemy than certain Nonconformists sects which I will not name, which it would be invidious to mention. No, Sir, clericalism is not in this country the enemy. I hope it never will be. With all our religious dissensions I hope we shall retain our respect for all who are ministers of religion and who honestly and sincerely preach and teach the things they believe. But, no doubt, it is impossible to doubt, the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade, when he used that expression, had not the innocent intentions towards the Church which are proclaimed so loudly by his colleague the Member for Wolverhampton.
I do not pause to dwell on the object of the promoters of this Bill. If I have been able to make myself understood in the arguments I have put before the House, I ask you now, as politicians, do you think that this Bill will be a final settlement of the question with which it undertakes to deal? Are not you wasting your time? [Cries of "No!"] Do you think you are advancing our common object? I ask you, as politicians, to look at the practical situation. You have a majority so large that in defiance of all the minorities—;the minority here, the minority there (pointing to the Nationalist Benches), and the minority there (indicating the Labour Party)—;you can, if you like, carry this Bill through the House of Commons without the slightest amendment. According to our constitution it has got to go elsewhere. ["Oh!"] I am dealing with the practical situation. You do not deny that it has to go elsewhere. When I think of the circumstances, I do think there may be some peculiar incidents in that House. I can conceive of the very difficult position in which a certain noble Lord, whom we all respect very much, but whose religious opinions differ from these of the majority, will be placed if he has to introduce this Bill. Anyway, it has to be considered that the Bill may be amended. I ask you, what-
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ever its fate in another place—;whether it is ultimately destroyed there or destroyed by your refusal to accept Amendments which may be put into it—;what do you think you will gain if there is another appeal to the people? One thing I say. In this House we are in a minority, but on this question there is not the slightest doubt that practically, at least, half the people of this country are opposed to this Bill. [Cries of "Oh."] You profess to think not. Wait for the election and we shall see. We are equally confident, and nothing but an express test will finally settle any difference of opinion between us. But, although you may say not, for the purpose of cheering your spirits in this House, there is not a man amongst you who knows anything whatever of political agitation in this country who does not know in his heart that whatever happens, if you went to the country on this Bill, you would come in with a smaller majority and you would justify any action that may have been taken against you. But I go further. Suppose, on the contrary, that the people of the country are so enamoured of this Bill that when it becomes the sole issue—;when Chinese slavery and the big and. little loaf are all forgotten—;they give you a majority bigger than ever and we are reduced to some half dozen, almost solitary, individuals on these benches [Cries of "Seven"]—;I accept the compliment. I will answer for seven. But when that occurs, again I say, do you think that a settlement of this kind, which will leave behind a rankling in the hearts of a very large proportion of the people of this country, can be final? One fears that you will force the Party here, waiting, as we have to wait, for the swing of the pendulum, which you all know must come, to inscribe the repeal of this Bill upon their banners, and you will leave the religious controversy where it was—;tossed from side to side without any better chance of settlement than it has ever had in the past.
There is only one way in which you can settle this question. You must settle it by some measure which will be recognised by the people of this country—;I am not now speaking of clericalism—;as inalienably just. You must adopt the principle—;a principle which appears in times past to have been

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accepted by the President of the Board of Education and the President of the Board of Trade; I have quotations from their works and speeches which show that there was a time when they accepted the principle—;of the right of the parent. Of course I agree with the hon. Gentleman the Member for East Mayo that you must not carry that right to an absurd extent. The right of a parent, for instance, certainly does not extend to brutalising his child or to depriving his child of advantages which the State intended he should have. But we all know what we mean; and we say, most of us at any rate, that a parent has an inalienable right to be consulted, or, at all events, to secure, in some form or another, substantially the religious education which he desires for his children.
THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (MR. ASQUITH,): At the cost of the State?
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: I will answer that at once. If anybody gets it at the cost of the State, then it is the inalienable right of everybody. There are two ways of doing it. Everyone knows that the State can provide, in every case, what the parent wants. That is what is done in some other countries. I think the hon. Member for Louth the other day rather elaborately argued that it was impossible. It is not impossible. It is done now in this country. It is done in the industrial schools and in the workhouse schools; and I do not wonder that somebody has wittily said that, in order that a parent may be secured in the exercise of his inalienable right to have his child taught the religion of which he approves, either the parent must die or the child must commit a crime. That is one alternative. I do not believe that, with good will, it would not be possible to carry out that alternative. After all, that is the alternative at which the old system aimed. That was the object which was, roughly, carried out by the Bill of 1870, which allowed of provision being made, side by side, for children of very denomination. The fault of that system, that which has given rise to most of the sense of grievance, is that it is not adequately distributed throughout the
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country. In certain places, no doubt, there is not sufficient choice; but, if you take the towns, I do believe the system at present is substantially fair. But that is not the alternative which I ventured to press on the House thirty years ago, and which, holding the same opinion, I press upon the House this afternoon. I say the most logical, the fairest, the most reasonable and the most easily attainable of all systems is the system which separates the duty of the State from the duty respectively belonging to the parent and the sect. We are told by Members of the Government that really one of the main objects of this Bill has been to prevent that system which they describe as a secular system, which they call turning the Bible out of the schools, and bringing up the children in atheism or irreligion. There is nothing whatever of substance in that cry. Like all other cries with which we were familiar at the last election, it has gone to the bourne from which no political cry ever returns. What we propose, we who advocate this system, is not secularism. I can conceive that there may be earnest Agnostics or Secularists, who aggressively desire the teaching of their views; but I am aware that they are absolutely insignificant in number, and what we, who talk of this separation, all desire is not secularism, but a division of duty and of conscience.
THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Sir H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN,): Will the right hon. Gentleman forgive me for interrupting him? He says, "What we desire." On a previous occasion in his speech, we had to ask what he meant by "We." He said of course it was the Unionist Party for which he was speaking. Does "We" still mean the Unionist Party?
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: On the present occasion "We", means those who agree with me. When the right hon. Gentleman intervened I was about to say that in the practical application of this principle I admit there are serious difficulties. We tried three years ago in the board schools of Birmingham an entire and absolute separation; but that experiment, under the conditions in which it

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was tried, was not a success. If you attempt to make a separation; if you allow any child to be absent who pleases at the time that religious instruction is given, you offer a premium either to the child to stay away or to a selfish parent, who wants the work of his child, to keep him from school. In my opinion, therefore, the religious instruction must be given within the compulsory school hours, although all parents who desire that their children should not attend the religious instruction would, as a matter of course, have their children instructed in secular work during the period of religious instruction. I am perfectly certain that you would demoralise the school if you tried to bring in a certain number of children, say, at 9 o'clock for religious instruction and the remainder at 9.45. You must have all the school assembled at 9 o'clock, the opening hour. That is part of the facility which I and we—;again on the same definition—;would desire to give. I am totally unable to understand the logic or the justice of these who pretend to lay a prohibition on the teachers against teaching religion. That they should not be compelled to teach it, of course, we all agree. That no test as to their religious opinions should be exacted from them at the time of their first appointment I think we all agree. [MINISTERIAL cries of "Oh" and "We?"]
SIR H. CAMPBBLL-BANNERMAN: Will the right hon. Gentleman say again which particular "we" is it this time?
MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: I have just consulted with my right hon. friend the Member for the City of London, and I believe that during the whole of this debate no one on this side of the House has expressed anything inconsistent with what I have just said. If that is so, on this occasion I may claim that "we" represents the Unionist Party. Let me make the position quite clear. I say that when a teacher comes forward to enter a great State service there is no more reason, no more justice, in exacting from him a profession of any particular religious opinion than there is in doing it in the case of more important servants of the State. [MINISTERIAL cheers.] Why hon. Members opposite should display such
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boisterous exhilaration at the statement of a fact which no one has ever denied I cannot for the life of me see. Let us take a practical case. Here is a school to which teachers who have made no profession of any religion are appointed. There is desired by so many Nonconformists religious teaching in accordance with the board school syllabus. There is desired by so many Churchmen religious teaching in accordance with the Church. There may be others who will make similar demands. These teachers being there without any previous test, what is there to prevent them—;if there is general knowledge on their part that such religious teaching is desired, and that they would be favourably received if they offered to give it—;what possible reason is there for interfering with their liberty in time which is not the State's, but their own, and in refusing to permit them, if they choose, to come forward voluntarily and say, "I should like to give board school instruction"; or "I should like to teach the Church Catechism"? That is not a test. Supposing they offered to give their services for secretarial work out of school hours, who is to prevent them, and who is to say it would be unreasonable, in such a case, to inquire as to their ability to give this secretarial assistance? I desire—;to avoid all possibility of further intervention by the Prime Minister—;I desire that the teachers should have full opportunity to offer themselves to be taken on and paid by the denominations, or the representatives of the parents in a particular case. I therefore claim that the facilities afforded to any endeavours to secure separation between religious and secular instruction should include liberty to the teacher to offer himself to give religious instruction, if he is willing and desires to do so. I suppose we are all convinced that a great number of the teachers would so offer themselves if such an opportunity were given. We tried in Birmingham, quite lately, to give denominational teaching by the help of the different denominations who sent in their own teachers. The school teacher was not obliged to attend, but every teacher in every board school did attend. Why? They said that, if they were away during the time of religious instruction, it would take them

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an hour afterwards to get the school into good order. Their experience was that, although they took no part in the religious instruction, their presence at the time was necessary for the general discipline of the school. I conceive that on either of the two lines I have submitted to the House you may have a permanent settlement. I have expressed my preference for the line I mentioned second. But you will never have a permanent settlement on lines like these of the present Bill, which are palpably unfair to a very large section of the community, which are opposed to their sincere convictions, and which they, in accordance with their conscience, can never agree to accept.
MR. AUSTIN TAYLOR: In the speech of the right hon. Gentleman to which we have just listened there was less opposition to the main principles of the Bill than in the majority of the speeches to which we have listened from that side of the House. When I listened to the right hon. Gentleman it occurred to me that no great effort would he required, so far as the right hon. Gentleman and these who agreed with him are concerned, to arrive at some general settlement, not upon the lines of resistance to the Bill, but of amendment and modification. I have been struck by the variety and incongruity of the elements which are opposed to this Bill. We have on the one hand the English Church Union, headed by Lord Halifax; then you have the Anglican Bishops and a considerable proportion of the Anglican Church, which, though not prepared to follow Lord Halifax, are yet prepared to stand in with him in opposition to the Bill. Then we have the Roman Catholic Church, which of course from its own point of view opposes the Bill, and finds among the Irish Nationalist Party advocates to whose views we can listen with respect. Then we have the Unionist Party, who on this occasion are prepared to go into the same lobby with the Irish Party. Then we have the Labour Party who are prepared to vote for the Second Reading, but are not satisfied with anything but secular education pure and simple. Lastly, we have the right hon. Member for West Birming-
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ham, in a class apart as a champion of the Church of England and the protagonist of voluntary schools, or perhaps better described as the consistent opponent of all established and endowed religions, and particularly of the further endowment of any special form of religion. The variety and incongruity of the opposition to the Bill almost inclines one to accept the suggestion that, our differences upon religious matters being irreconcilable, we should adopt the alternative of suppressing them in this House and agree to banish religion from the schools, falling back, as the last speaker was almost inclined to do, upon limiting the function of the State to purely secular instructions in our elementary schools. I do not propose to follow that course. I approach this Bill from a frankly Protestant point of view, while hon. Members below the gangway opposite approach it from a frankly Roman Catholic point of view. What does this Bill aim at? It aims at establishing one universal system of popular control under which, as far as possible, teachers shall not be debarred because they are members of a particular religious creed. Then we have to face the question which has already been dealt with by the hon. Member for Leicester and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, and that is whether the State is to take any responsibility for religious instruction at all, and, if so, for what kind of religious instruction it is to take responsibility. I hope and trust that the kind of religious instruction which is proposed under this Bill will meet with general acceptance on behalf of the Protestant sentiment of this community. I am aware that members of the Church of England are not, some of them, prepared to accept what is called undenominational teaching, unless there is attached to it a system of dogma and sacramental instruction, which for my part I think the minds of young children are altogether unfitted to receive. But, in any case, I hope that we shall frankly face the situation and, as members of a Christian community, agree that the State must undertake responsibility for religious instruction of some kind, and that the only question before this House will be, for which kind of

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religious instruction we are prepared to accept responsibility. The doctrine of parental rights is one for which I have a very great sympathy. I believe that in the first speech that I made in this House I did emphasise the rights of parents in the matter of the religion of their children, though I think in its application the principle is to be dealt with in the same way as the application of all other general principles, and you cannot be severely symmetrical or logical. But I am quite certain of this, that if the State seeks to build a general system of religion in our schools upon the basis of parental right, inalienable or otherwise, it is building upon a foundation of shifting sand. We cannot get rid of our responsibility in this House by devolving it upon local authorities, nor by devolving upon parents the decision of whether they will or will not have religious instruction and which kind of religious instruction they are going to have. Let me recall what was recently said on this point by the Bishop of Birmingham. The Bishop of Birmingham in a pamphlet upon this Bill said—;
"Some thirty years ago there was a sort of a Protestant religion with a doctrine of the Trinity, of heaven and hell, of atonement and judgment, of resurrection and eternal life, which for good or evil could be more or less assumed. Such a standard has gone. I seriously doubt whether nearly one half of the grown men of the country could seriously say that they believed that Christ is God, or that he really rose on the third day from the dead. It is not that they have become Unitarian, but it is that their religious opinions are in a state of chaos."
That is the solemn utterance of an English Bishop upon the condition of faith among the adults of this country. What is to become of the children of these people? Are you going to ask these parents which kind of faith they want their children brought up in? I must say that if this is true—;I think it is an appalling though exaggerated picture—;but if there is any truth in it, it is simply monstrous to suppose that you can leave the religious destinies of the children of this country in the hands of parents who are not prepared to accept even the elements of Christian faith. The clause of the Bill which has excited most opposition is that clause which says that no attendance at religious instruction shall be required. This clause has met with
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the most determined opposition on the other side of the House, an opposition in which I fully join, and yet I am bound to recognise that, after all, it is only the principle of parental rights pushed to an extreme, because if you say that the parent has a right to dictate in which form of religious faith his children shall be educated it is only one step further—;or perhaps it is only an equivalent step—;for him to say whether his children shall have any religious instruction at all. That is a position which I for one decline to accept. I hope that this Bill will undergo substantial amendment in Committee, and I hope that one Amendment upon which this House will insist, unless it is prepared to accept the secularist solution, will be that this clause shall be deleted from the Bill. I cannot conceive how any one who is not prepared to accept the secularist solution—;to adopt the suggestion either of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham or these of the hon. Member for Leicester, between whose ideas there appears to be only the very thinnest wall of partition—;can fail to join with all on either side of the House who hold that if the State is to be responsible for religious instruction at all, it must make it part of the ordinary course of the school and not treat it as something attendance at which is a mere act of option on the part of the parents. Then I hope that we shall not in this House be confronted with a painful position as between these who adhere to and welcome in this Bill the principle of simple Bible teaching as the basis of religious instruction and the Churches who reject and oppose it and are not prepared with an alternative. Surely, Sir, the worst thing that could happen in this country would be that the State, with the Bible in its hand, should confront the Churches and that the Churches in response should say, "We reject the Bible and we have no solution which we can offer and which you can accept." I think that would be disastrous to the future of religion in this country, and I earnestly trust that some means may be found by which, accepting Bible teaching as the basis of our authorised instruction, for which the State pays and is responsible, adequate facilities may be found for these who think that

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this is insufficient and requires to be supplemented.
I do not propose to take up the time of the House by going at any length into the debatable point as to whether the facilities offered in this Bill are or are not sufficient. I quite agree with these critics who have said that they make such large concessions to the denominational principle that they do in effect vitiate the main principles of the Bill. I do not think that is any drawback to practical men desirous of settling a thorny question. I am perfectly certain that those who attempt to worship the goddess of logic at the expense of reason and conscience and practical suggestion will find that they are only unsettling instead of settling this question. Therefore, Sir, it is no objection to me, and I think it ought to be no objection to any reasonable man, that while this Bill does embody certain cardinal principles of popular control and of freedom for all teachers to rise to the highest ranks in their profession and also a standard system of religious instruction based upon the Bible, it is no drawback that the Bill gives additional facilities to these who are not satisfied with the religious education which the State is prepared to give.
Criticism has been directed against the clause which deals with the fixed majority of four-fifths of the parents, and upon which depends the continuation of denominational schools. I would ask for my part what majority hon. Members think should be allowed to trample on the rights of minorities. Surely there must be in such matters give and take. If you insist on four-fifths of the parents in the schools being in favour of a particular form of denominational teaching there is even then a hardship to the one-fifth which is not in sympathy with them. If this particular vulgar fraction is not acceptable then we shall in Committee have suggestions of another kind, but I am convinced of this: that whatever exceptions are made the difficulties of dealing with minorities of parents will still continue and it will be extremely difficult to find facilities which will be satisfactory all round.
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So far as I am concerned I am prepared, to give this Bill a Second Reading vote because it embodies certain principles which I believe were affirmed at the general election, and because, frankly speaking, from the Protestant point of view it does recognise the obligation of the State to give religious instruction. I hope before we have done with it to make it recognise it far more, and to recognise in that instruction that this, after all, is a Protestant country. I leave myself perfectly free in Committee to move or support such Amendments as will make it more fair, as I think it can be made, and make it more emphatic, in all its details, in the matter of the great principle of preserving the religious character of our elementary schools.
One word more, before I sit down, on the position of the Church of England. I assert without fear of contradiction that as regards the Church of England the appeal she makes is that the Bible is the rule of faith and final standard of authority. Everybody who knows the Articles of the Church of England knows that nothing is required from any member of the Church that cannot be proved by the certain warranty of Holy Scripture. That is the position of the Church of England. I understand that that is not the position of the Church of Rome, but it is fair and consistent for the members of the Church of England to welcome the appeal to the Bible which is the basis of the reform of his Church. And when we consider what is going on to-day in the Church, I will only say there is much disquiet to these who desire to adhere to the Reformation standards, in our schools, on which the Church is based. I hold in my hand the particulars of services in a church in a southern diocese for Easter week. The whole of these services are made up of low masses, sung masses, processions, stations of the Cross, and what is called Catechism Mass. This is not in a Roman Catholic Church, but a Church of England, and it is common notoriety that these things prevail. What I desire, and what I have desired for many years, is that in the elementary schools which belong to the Church of England this kind of thing should not be allowed. Whatever they may be in other places, they

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are not in their lawful place there, and for my part I welcome any Bill, if it is just in other directions, which will put a stop to these illegalities and vagaries which have done so much to weaken the confidence of the Protestant population of this country in the Church of the Reformation.
Now I desire to say, in conclusion' one word as regards this Bill, and the possibility of a final settlement of our differences. I have spoken quite frankly from the Protestant point of view. I hold Protestant opinions strongly. I sometimes notice in the public Press that they are described as narrow-minded, bigoted and vulgar. It is the fashion in a Protestant country to talk in this way, whilst the utterances of our Roman Catholic colleagues in this House are described as conscientious and devout. I object to that. I think we ought to give to every school of thought respect for the conscientious convictions which it possesses, and in the matter of education try to find a solution; and it can be done, with due consideration to the always admitted fact that this, after all, is a Protestant country and the centre of the Protestant forces of the world. I should be only too glad to join in any efforts to arrive at a peaceful, final and lasting solution. I read occasionally something of the triumph of Parties and of policies. I say nothing of political Party triumphs, but I do say that in the matter of religion triumph of Parties, and policies, and persons should be accepted with fear and trembling. I am old enough to have learnt that in controversies of this kind the victories which come even to righteous principles may be pushed too far. I recognise that it takes all creeds to make a nation, and I trust that this Bill may be so modified before it finally receives the signature of the Monarch that, instead of having for twenty years still to battle over what is called the religious difficulty, it may prove the means of equitably and satisfactorily adjusting the differences in what is, after all, a Christian country.
MR. F. E. SMITH: I listened with some surprise to the speech of the hon. Member for the Toxteth Division of Liverpool in which he
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set forth the grounds upon which he supported this Bill. he told us he was a Protestant. He told us also that he contemplated the present position of the Church of England, so far as its Protestant condition is concerned, with great disquiet. Of course everybody knows to what the hon. Member was referring; he was obviously referring to the forthcoming Report of the Royal Commission. But with great respect to him, whatever may be the effect of that Report of the Royal Commission on the matters with which it deals, it has about as much to do with the Bill before the House today as the question of King Charles' head. I believe I am largely in agreement with many of the views the hon. Gentleman has expressed to-day. If it be established as the result of that Royal Commission that there are cases of illegality with which it will be proper to deal, then they must be adequately treated, but I am utterly at a loss to fathom the intellectual attitude of these who put before the House the view that, because there may be five or six—;or twelve or more persons if you like—;who disobey the law of England, therefore they will support a Bill which will or may be unjust to all these members of the Church of England who have no desire at all to disobey the law. I conceive that this question of Protestantism is a mere red herring drawn across the trail of this Bill, and I venture to say that it comes with very little grace from a Member of this House who is going to support the Second Reading of a measure in respect to which there is every reason to apprehend that special concessions to Roman Catholics are about to be given. I do not say myself that I would view with anything but satisfaction the concessions asked for by the hon. Member for East Mayo and his coreligionists on the lines of his speech; but I do suggest that if these concessions for which the hon. Member for East Mayo asks are not rendered impossible by a cast iron wall of principle—;if that be not so, then these who on these benches represent the Church of England are equally entitled to claim them. To deal with the converse of that proposition, if there is some cast iron wall of principle which prevents you making these concessions to the Church of England, then you are guilty of a pusillanimous repudiation of this principle if you extend such

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concessions to hon. Gentlemen sitting below the gangway in derogation from everything said at the time of the election and of the principle upon which we are told the vote of the country was given. Many claims have been put forward as to the ground upon which we are asked to support the Second Reading of this Bill. The Minister for Education has told us that it embodies two great principles; first, he says it will effect and bring about a national settlement, and, secondly, that it will make for simplicity in the schools.
I do not think the most sanguine Member of this House will attempt to say that this measure is likely to effect a national settlement. I suppose if there is one circumstance which must have prevented this measure being accepted as a settlement it is the deplorable speech of the President of the Board of Trade, who told us—;and the phrase was dealt with by the right hon. Member for West Birmingham—;that democracy had pronounced clericalism to be the enemy. I wonder whether Members in this House recall the utterance of a gentleman of whom I speak with respect—;Dr. Clifford—;when he said that he was minister at Westbourne Park for the same reasons and principles that lie was president of the Paddington Radical Association. I do not suggest that that may not be true, and that the claim may not be well-founded; but I do suggest that if you sit in this House, as so many do, as the result of oratorical efforts on the platform by battalions of Noncomformist ministers, it is not wise, it is not decent, and surely it is not grateful to tell the House that the enemy democracy has to fear is clericalism. When the hon. Gentleman puts himself forward in this House as being authorised to tell the House what it is democracy wants, and suggests that democracy has given an opinion on the subject of clericalism, I would ask him and also others who sit in this House whether they suggest that they were returned on a basis of anti-clericalism. I hold in my hand an Answer that interests me because it was given by the Attorney-General for Ireland, who sits like myself for a Division of Liverpool. He was asked by a man of Roman Catholic faith whether, if returned, he would support a Bill upon the lines which we
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are discussing to-night. Did he answer or did any who sit on the Ministerial side of the House answer and say, "We are following the democracy, and the democracy has said that clericalism is the enemy." Let me read what he said—;
"I am in receipt of your letter of the 9th inst. in which you have submitted to me a question as regards the right of Catholic parents to have their children educated in the elementary schools in conformity with their religious opinions. I have already, I think, answered the question in my election address satisfactorily to Catholics, and I need only repeat here that I shall do all I can to preserve for Catholics in any Education Bill which the Government may introduce, the right to have their children educated in their own faith, and by teachers of their own faith. I think that is all they ask for, and every reasonable person of any religious conviction must admit the reasonableness of that demand."
It is carrying cynicism too far for one Member of the Government to come down to this House and to tell us that what democracy says is that clericalism is the enemy and for another member of the Government when he wanted to get into the House and to conciliate the feelings of these who were likely to be his constituents to protest that no reasonable person could dispute the right of Catholics to have the Catholic religion taught in their schools by persons of that persuasion—;a claim very unlikely, if conceded, to diminish the influence of clericalism.
This Bill, so far as it is put forward as a national settlement, will fail, and it will fail so far as it is put forward as a measure of simplicity, for you must remember that you found in existence two schools and you are, leaving by this measure four schools. You are leaving, in the first place, provided schools; in the second place, facility schools; in the third place, special facility schools, and in the fourth place, the excluded schools in cases where they are either the subject of a private ownership or are held under trust which permits of exclusion. Do not let the House think for a moment that the fact that you are going to leave four classes of schools will make no difference to your educational machinery. It all means complication and proves the impossibility of that simplification of machinery

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which was put forward by the Minister who introduced the Bill as one of its chief merits. The Bill will fail not alone on these grounds, but on grounds which go deeper still, because it is not a compromise nor a concordat, but a mere brutal dictation of terms. ["No."] Hon. Members say "no." I venture to think that when the clauses of this Bill are examined and when the principles are tested, not in the light of what was said below the gangway on the Opposition side or in the light of what I and my friends say, but in the light of these who have been held entitled to speak for the Liberal Party in times past—;judged I say by that test it is a brutal dictation of terms. You must re-write the old reflection and say "Thus conscience doth make bullies of us all." Let me remind the House of what was said by the Minister for War, than whom there is no greater authority on education, and who has worked for education while others have shrieked. I will remind the House of what he said in 1902 when the Bill was introduced. He wrote deliberately and away from the heat of debate—;
"If the Liberal Party came into power tomorrow, and tried to establish a general school board scheme, it would find itself in even a more serious position than that in which Mr. Gladstone was in 1870, when with a huge majority he failed to accomplish this very thing."
This is the view which the Minister for War took. I would ask hon. Members opposite whether there is no justification for saying it is an imposition, a brutal dictation of terms, when I remind them, as has already been said in the debate, that it is not in controversy between the two sides of the House that dissenters get, under this Bill, what they are conscientiously satisfied with for the education of their children. I do not say, and it does not in the least matter whether you use the expression, that dissent is endowed. I am willing to avoid the term if any hon. Member thinks the term offensive, but when you penetrate beneath the words to the substance, no one can deny that you are getting by the assistance of the rates the form of religious education for your children in the schools which satisfies your conscience. You are getting what Mr. Gladstone called the popular injustice of undenominational instruction, and what he called
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elsewhere the glaring partiality, so far as it appeals to the rates, of undenominational instruction. If Mr. Gladstone was right in saying it was a glaringly impartial application of the rates, is it not possible that there may be some ground for the grievances seriously felt on this side of the House? The hon. Member for North West Ham in an interesting speech said that the Government had no mandate to stamp on the country one form of religious teaching, and that to attempt to deal with it in this Bill was to load the dice. Do not hon. Gentlemen think that when one of their number, returned to this House to support them, describes their policy as a loading of dice, that there may be ground for saying that it is dictation of terms? If we go below the gangway we find the hon. Member for Blackburn saying that Nonconformists in their joy at having Nonconformity established as a State religion are embracing a measure which will inflict an outrage on the majority of this country. Is that right or wrong? If it is true, is it to be suggested that there is no grievance? If it is well-founded, surely you can realise that you are imposing by Act of Parliament on the majority of this country and forcing them to pay for a creed which is not their creed. Surely these observations from their own ranks might make hon. Members a little more tolerant when we attempt to place before them the view which is held by the majority of the clergy and the laity of England. I would ask hon. Members in dealing with the opposition of the Church of England not to dismiss it with the curt statement that it is merely a matter of the bishops' agitation. I think they realise as well as I do that from the moment the bishops of the Church of England cease to have behind them the laity of the Church in the protests they are making you may deride their opposition. If hon. Gentlemen think that in this matter the bishops have not the support of the vast majority of the Church of England behind them they are likely to have a very rude awakening. And when we are told that Nonconformists under this Bill are securing no special advantage, I will merely ask some subsequent

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speaker who has a right to speak on behalf of Nonconformists to tell us of one fundamental article of his particular creed which is excluded to-day from that national system which you are putting on the rates. I ask him to call attention not merely to some point of collateral teaching, but to some point of doctrine which goes down to the foundation of his belief and is taught in the Sunday school of his own providing.
MR. LEIF JONES: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us of any fundamental doctrine of the Church of England which is excluded?
MR. F. E. SMITH: It is obvious that I could give the hon. Member half a dozen. I need only mention the Sacrament. Although the opposition of the Church of England in this matter is in principle the same as the opposition of the Church of Rome and of the Jewish Church, if you are going to contend that the principle on which you won this election does not preclude you from making concessions to hon. Gentlemen from Ireland or the Jews, how are you going to differentiate a principle between the Jews, the Roman Catholics, and the Church of England? Does the hon. Gentleman wish to discriminate at all? He is by no means so ready to intervene in the debate now as he was a minute ago. If it is his object to introduce such differentiation between the Jews, Roman Catholics and the Church of England, what becomes of his principle that under no circumstances will he have what have been described as religious tests for teachers. The right hon. Gentleman who introduced this Bill said that in this matter he relied upon the moderation and good sense of the local authorities. If you are going to give that special treatment you are face to face with the inexorable necessity which you cannot avoid of consenting, and you will have imposed these very same inquiries which have been described as tests by hon. Gentlemen in the country. ["No, no."] If they were not tests perhaps someone will explain why they were abused on every platform as being tests. If they were, then you are going to reproduce and perpetuate them in this
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Bill. The right hon. Gentleman who introduced the Bill has not the courage to impose them himself, but he encourages the local bodies to do it. When I am told that I do not do justice to the views of Dissenters when I say that they have all the religious teaching they want from the rates, I reply that this position is not one which has ever been put forward by the great Parliamentary Dissenters in the past. Have hon. Members on the Ministerial side ever read one of the most able presentations of the Nonconformist case in an education discussion—;I refer to the speech of Mr. Miall who said—;
"The Bible is our only Book; no creed, catechism, or liturgy is its rival with us."
[MINISTERIAL Cheers.] I note with great satisfaction that approval. If the Bible is your only book, then you are getting your only book at our charge for the purpose of the religious education of your children. ["No, no."] Hon. Gentlemen cannot have it both ways. They cheer the declaration of Mr. Miall and when I retort that they are getting at our charge the only Book they want for the purposes of religious education, it is idle to meet that statement with clamour. If hon. Members opposite are not satisfied with Mr. Miall's view, let me recall a statement made in the same debate by one who had at least as great a claim to speak with authority. Sir William Harcourt. He said—;
"What is the doctrine of religious equality? If I understand the doctrine it is this: that the State in its relation with its citizens is absolutely indifferent to all forms of religious teaching, and as regards any funds raised either directly by the State or indirectly under its authority, one form of religious opinion has as full a right to share in the appropriation of such funds as another."
Those were the views of the old Liberal party, and we ask to-day whether you adhere as a broad declaration of principle to the view that so far as the appropriation of public money is concerned, one religious denomination should benefit equally with another, that the creed which demands special books and formulæ shall be in no worse a position so far as public money is concerned than the creed which, like your own, is represented by the Bible without any liturgy or catechism. That is the simple demand which has received the high

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authority of Sir William Harcourt. When we are told that the position is a new one, I would ask hon. Members to recall the decision of 1870 and the compromise which was then entered into by all parties. The State was then called upon to repair years and decades of educational neglect. You had then to establish a universal school board rate, and you had to rate Roman Catholics and Jews, who would rather die illiterate than use your schools, and you had to rate Anglicans, who rightly or wrongly, have raised millions of pounds with the intention of avoiding Cowper-Temple instruction. Hon. Members opposite should remember that the measure of 1870 could not have been carried in face of the opposition of the Church of England and the Church of Rome if it had not been on the perfectly well understood terms of a permanent compromise with both these Churches. If that proposition is doubted, I would remind hon. Members of the words of Mr. Forster, who said—;
"If the Conservative party had used Party tactics to oppose the Bill it never could have passed."
There you have the fact that the Bill introducing a universal school rate would never have been passed without the support of the Church of England, and the consideration you then gave was that voluntary schools, whether Catholic, Church of England, or Jewish, should be permanently incorporated in the educational system of the country. This is no mere matter of inference of mine from chance words uttered in the debate. Let me remind you of what Mr. Gladstone said on this very point. He said on the Second Reading debate—;
"The machinery of voluntary schools we found not only existing in this country but overspreading it, and on every ground, but particularly on the ground of what is due to the promoters of these schools and their benevolent and self-denying labours—;"
That is a higher note than clericalism, the common enemy—;
"We adopted as the fundamental principles of the Bill that we would frankly employ voluntary schools, but because we cannot do with voluntary schools alone we proposed to fall back on the rates and fill up the gap which we saw."
When the Leader of your Party and the Minister who introduced your Bill
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in 1870 said to these who had built and supported voluntary schools, "If you will also consent to a rate, if you will assist us to pass this Bill which we cannot pass without your support, we will only treat the new machinery as a means of filling gaps in your system," is it suggested that it is just or honest to come to the House of Commons in 1906 and say to these who represent these schools, "Although these were the terms which were made, we will now—;I will not use the word confiscate—;appropriate by forms of law the schools which we were only going to supplement when we extorted from you your assent in 1870?" Between 1870 and 1902 £23,000,000 were raised by these who supported voluntary schools for the purposes of their maintenance. I give the hon. Member for North Camberwell all the credit he is entitled to for the industrious energy with which he has shown that some of this money was subscribed by railway companies. Making all allowances for that, it is sufficient for my proposition that in these thirty-two years millions of pounds have been subscribed by these who feel that denominational teaching is in the interests of the children. I think it was an Under-Secretary who said a week or two ago in this House in another connection that wrongs may be forgiven, but anything in the nature of a trick or chicane will always rankle. I say for these who were induced to consent to that settlement in 1870 that you are not entitled to say they were induced to give that consent, without which you could not have passed your Bill, without something in the nature of a trick or chicane.
It is suggested now, on grounds which I have never been able to understand, that in 1906 a new principle came into play. I would like to ask hon. Gentleman opposite what single circumstance existed in the year 1906, so far as the position of voluntary schools is concerned which did not exist in the year 1870, when the compromise was made? [MINISTERIAL cries of "Rates."] Hon. Gentlemen tell me that since 1870 the rates have come. Let me ask them to think for a single moment what is involved in that contention. Let me ask how high you can put the conscientious objection which depends on the

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rate. No one can put it higher than this, that you must not impose a public burden on a man in order to make him pay for a religion which affronts his conscience. Will any hon. Member say it matters whether the public burden is collected by the municipal or the national tax collector? The grievance, if there be one, is the same in both cases. I contend that the ground of principle was conceded once and for all in 1834, when the State granted £20,000 to the voluntary societies, and it was again conceded in 1839 when £30,000 was substituted as the amount of the grant. I say to those hon. Gentlemen who tell us in 1906 that their consciences are affronted, that their predecessors in the Nonconformist world were not men who objected less than they do to pay for religious education which was not theirs, but they did not seek for the tolerance of the auctioneer or jostle into a well-advertised prominence at the police court. Were they less righteous than hon. Gentlemen, or were they merely less intolerant? If the position is put before me as one hon. and learned Gentleman put it, as being a distinction in the nature of a rate, if it is going to be seriously contested that it matters whether it is a tax or a rate, I would ask him whether he has ever considered the circumstances under which we are rated for religious instruction in the workhouse? I do not know whether he is aware that to-day in the workhouse, denominational religious education is being given at his and my charge. It appears that in the effort to understand this conscience, with which we are told we must not jest, we must draw a distinction which goes even deeper. We must not draw merely the distinction between a rate and a tax. It appears that sometimes you may pay a rate in support of denominational education without affronting your conscience, but you may withhold the rate, and pray in aid of your conscience to violate the law, if by doing so you can injure the Church of Rome or the Church of England, or the Unionist Party. Sir, though we may not jest with these consciences we may perhaps point out that they jest with themselves. I have only to add that when
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we are told that the real remedy for one at least of the grievances which have been felt in the past is that children shall not be compelled to go to school during the hour in which religious instruction is given, then I would remind hon. Gentlemen of a sentence in which that suggestion was once and for all dismissed by Sir William Harcourt, who said—;
"You tell us on the one hand that religion is the basis of all education, and we accept that statement and establish religious schools. You say it is the greatest, the most important part of education, and then you give effect to your declaration by telling the children when they come to school, you must not fail to attend to reading, writing, arithmetic and geography, but there is one subject you should entirely neglect, if you please. When religious instruction is about to be imparted, if you object to the teaching, you should go out and play at marbles in the gutter."
The President of the Board of Trade said that simple Bible teaching alone stands between the country and secular education. What is the value of this barrier so long as you allow any child who would rather play in the playground to avoid religious instruction to do so. I would ask the House to consider the advice given by the President of the Board of Trade in 1903 to the Welsh Councils in an interview given to the rep e-sentative of the Manchester Guardian—;
"Let all the children go out for a few moments and then let these who prefer the catechism to play return to the religious instruction, while their playfellows are free to continue their play. He had no doubt that the children would have such a regard for the apostolic succession as would draw them back to the school while the wicked went away bird-nesting."
If that is the spirit in which you are going to work, the less you talk about the value of the barrier against secularism which you are erecting by this Bill and the sacrifices you are thereby making the better it will be for your reputation for sincerity.
It has been pointed out that the expropriation clauses of this Bill are among the most objectionable. Here again the President of the Board of Trade said—;
"In the main the expense of building these schools fell upon Churchmen. For my own part, I would no more rob the Church of property that is legitimately hers than I would rob my own little chapel of its property."
I have not heard that the triumvirate is going to deal with the little chapel,

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but if it were, perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would have a little more regard for the feelings of these whose property is going to be placed in the hands of that triumvirate. The Government have proposed to offer a partial bribe to one section, and they have undergone the unspeakable humiliation of seeing that bribe despised by these to whom it is offered. [Laughter.] If these who laugh think that the four-fifths clause is going to be accepted in its present form, I venture to say they will be rudely undeceived by speakers who will follow below the gangway. Let me close with another quotation from Sir William Harcourt—;
"What becomes of the minority? They are offered religious education which does not suit them. It must not be said that they can get secular education. I presume that the minority require religious instruction as well as the majority and you offer them a form of education paid fur out of the rates that they cannot use. Do you tell me that is political justice or religious equality?"
I say, speaking for the rank and file of the Party to which I belong, that we shall offer to this Bill, at every stage, a sustained resistance both in principle and in detail. We shall address, so far as we can, a larger, audience than that we are addressing within these walls, and we shall look forward to an ampler division lobby than that which is about to register your fleeting triumph.
MR. YOXALL: I am sure that the House listened with admiration to the speech of the hon. Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool—;a speech of great brilliancy, and cogency, expressed with remarkable modesty, which is quite proper in a new Member, and dealing with affairs of the past as though he were an old Member of thirty-five years ago. We must object, however, to be tied down to the plans, the ideals, or even the expedients of thirty-five years ago. I would remind the hon. Member that much water has run under Westminster Bridge since then. Compromises and arrangements which were made then and which then were practicable and far have ceased to be practicable and fair now. One essential part of the arrangement made in 1870 was that a good share—;a considerable share—;of the cost of
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maintaining the voluntary schools should be provided by voluntary subscriptions. In 1902 that essential part of the compromise was withdrawn by the action of the Government of that day, and the very basis of the arrangement of 1870 has ceased to exist. I did not object to the decision of 1902 to equip financially all schools to the same extent and from the same sources, and to transfer the maintenance of the voluntary schools to the local authority. But I pointed out then—;as others did—;that before very long that change in the compromise of 1870 would bring about the complete transfer of voluntary schools to public control. The Government has been returned by a huge majority to bring that about, and I believe the means by which they propose to bring it about are fair and wise. I note that throughout the debate there has been no opposition brought forward to the removal from the hands of the clergy man and his three fellow foundation managers of the power of managing the voluntary schools. That point of the Bill appears to be generally conceded. You must have popular control. The next leading principle of the measure is that teachers who are public servants renumerated by public money shall not be subjected to any denominational tests. At present, a Nonconformist teacher does not apply for the head teachership of a non-provided Church of England school because he knows that, no matter how well qualified he may be in other respects, he will not be appointed. Similarly a Protestant teacher never applies for an appointment in a Roman Catholic school. The Bill, however, says that the local authority shall not in future inquire into the religious faith of teachers in making appointments; and that teachers may claim the benefit of a conscience clause in regard to the giving of religious instruction. I believe that in future Protestant teachers will not apply for appointments in schools which under the four-fifths provision are distinctively Roman Catholic, and every applicant for employment in a Catholic school will be a Catholic. The fears of Catholics that Protestant teachers will be foisted on Roman Catholic schools are groundless. In the same way, I believe that no teacher will apply for an appointment in an Anglican school unless

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he be a member of that communion. That is how it will work out in practice, although by the Bill all teachers are theoretically and practically freed from all denominational tests and placed on the same footing. In the third place, the Government has been instructed by the majority of the country to prevent as far as possible the compulsory teaching at the public expense of denominational religion to children whose parents do not wish them to receive it. In the past it was the case that the children of Nonconformist parents sometimes attended Anglican schools and that Protestant children attended Catholic schools. The Government propose that in all these schools the teaching of religion shall not be compulsory upon the local authority, and that no child shall be compelled to receive religious instruction where it is given. On two days in the week volunteer teachers of the same denomination as the children may come in and give dogmatic teaching. At present, not one-fifth of the time of the children is spent on religious teaching in the Anglican schools. I understand from the hon. Member for the Walton Division that there should be a right to give instruction in the Catechism. They will have that right by the Bill through the clergyman or curate or amateur teacher on two days per week. I understood the hon. Member to say that the children might withdraw from that instruction, and he blamed the President of the Board of Trade because that right hon. Gentleman had said that the children might remain in the playground during the hour of religious teaching. Does the hon. Gentleman not see that if a parent wants to have religious teaching given to his child he will see to it that it is given; but what right have we, or the local authorities, or the school managers to compel a child to attend religious instruction which his parent does not require for him? There is a great amount of nonsense talked about religious atmosphere, and about the parental demand for dogmatic teaching. I am bound however to recognise that that exists among Roman Catholics, and teachers tell me that Roman Catholic parents earnestly desire that their children should receive in Roman Catholic schools instruction in the Roman Catholic faith. If that is the case in schools where four-fifths of the
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parents are Roman Catholics that instruction can be given. That is to say, the teachers in such a school would be Roman Catholics, for no Protestant teacher would apply for an appointment in a Roman Catholic school, and even if he did, no local authority would appoint him. With the four-fifths majority the scheme of the Bill is perfectly fair. In the one school area children are to have on three days in the week undenominational teaching, and on two days in the week there will be denominational teaching, so that in that way religious instruction in the district is safe-guarded. In urban areas, that is in places with a population of 5,000 and over, speaking from practical experience, I firmly believe that in the working out of Clause 4 by the four-fifths majority, parents will get all that they desire either as Roman Catholics or Jews. My right hon. friend the Minister for Education has been told hundreds of times during this debate that this is not to be a final settlement; that this Bill is not the olive branch of peace. I do not suppose that he ever expected that it would be. In the long, slow, painful process of the evolution of a national system of education from a system of clerical control, many proposals have been made, many schemes of development have been passed, and some of them have proved abortive. As the Act of 1902 was the parent of the present Bill, so this Bill will be the father to its successor. Principles on either side have to be considered, both by the Anglican and Catholic Party, and by the Free Churches, who have stood up in the past for freedom of judgment. Concessions have to be made in order to effect a working arrangement, and I submit that this Bill does that. It is a singularly clever and workable Bill. I would warn my right hon. friend opposite that in the Bill there is a certain balance of concession, and a certain equilibrium of justice to all parties, which must not be lightly disturbed. He must not lean too much to one side or the other. What will be the safeguard of this Bill in the country? What is now the governing influence to prevent the extension of the agitation against the Bill by Anglican ecclesiastics? Hon. Members know that behind that agitation and outcry there is no real backing from the laity. [OPPOSITION cries of

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"Oh, oh!"] And why? It is because the laity are never too anxious for definite dogmatic teaching, and are not prepared to sacrifice the training of their children for this life to preparation for the next under clerical management. I listened with interest to the most eloquent and pathetic speeches from the Members for Ireland. I would like to contrast these speeches with the speeches of the official Opposition. In tone, spirit, knowledge, fairness in controversy, the Irish speeches were all that could be desired, and I would assure the hon. Members that on this side of the House we are willing to go a long way, as far as may be, with them, but I maintain that it will not be possible to claim for ever a continuance of the clerical system. We on this side of the House cannot at the present moment present an unbending front, we may make concessions with safeguards; but I believe that this Bill will make for the progress of education throughout the land. There are two points I wish to press on the Minister for Education. There are Roman Catholic and Anglican teachers who would like to impart the religious instruction in their schools. My right hon. friend says that no teacher should be compelled to become a religious teacher, but it might be provided that there should be full liberty to do so so long as the "volunteer" was not compelled and became a "pressed man." Again, in the case of non-provided schools the Minister for Education has made arrangements in the Bill to the effect that a teacher shall not suffer by the transfer; but he has not inserted in the Bill anything in the way of compensation to a teacher who is displaced because the trustees and the Local Authority cannot agree to continue the school. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will find means of dealing with that question.
MR. WILLIAM O'BRIEN: I an very far from desiring to depart from the tone of good temper and moderation which has prevailed generally during this debate, and of which I think we have had a very admirable example in the speech to which we have just listened. It is a good omen for the ultimate shaping of this Bill that hon.
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Members opposite have been fair-minded enough to recognise, that if Irish Members have felt it to be a duty to intervene, and to intervene actively in this debate, it is because we in a very special manner are the representatives, and with very few exceptions, the direct representatives in this House, of Catholics in England nine-tenths of whom are of our own blood and kin. They have never deserted us in the hour of necessity for Ireland and it would be a base desertion indeed if we deserted them in regard to a Bill which has alarmed them in regard to their consciences, more actuely than any other Bill which has been brought forward during the last thirty years. The point of conflict, or of anything like irreconcilable conflict between us as representing the Catholics and the Government, is really rather circumscribed. From all the speeches that I have listened to from the other side of the House, I believe that there is not a man on the opposite benches who really desires to force Protestant teachers, or Protestant teaching, upon the Catholic schools. I was very glad to hear the declaration made upon that subject by the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, and that is the very essence of the matter which threatened a division among the forces in this House and between us and these who in regard to other matters we may be in sympathy. If the assurances of the hon. Gentleman opposite can only be worked out legally and in a way which will protect the Catholics of England against caprice or mere ebullitions of local fanaticism, I do not think it would be beyond the power of fair minded and far sighted statesmanship to find a solution which would pave the way to the settlement of other points which are in difference. The Minister who is in charge of this Bill has displayed a spirit and a disposition to recognise frankly the altogether exceptional necessities of the case in reference to Catholic and Jewish schools, and in such a way as really not to leave very much to be desired on our part, unless it is that his words and intentions should be embodied in the Act itself. As to the right hon. Gentleman himself, I do not think any one of us have any difficulty in believing in and recognising his perfect sincerity, but unfortunately it is not his words, but

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those contained in the Bill which govern this matter. It is the legal powers given to the local authorities to deal with the parents of over 250,000 Catholic children that we have to look to, and we have had some wonderful experiences in Ireland, during the working of the Land Purchase Act, of how often even the most flattering promises and the most generous intentions of a Minister in this House can be bedevilled by the bodies, who after all, will have devolved upon them, the carrying out of the intentions of Parliament. The hon. Member for Bath made an appeal to us to trust the English democracy as they were willing to trust us. I quite agree. I am a sufficient believer in popular institutions when controlled by a large public opinion to believe that the local authorities in general will accept in a generous and magnanimous spirit the provisions to be applied to Catholic and Jewish schools, as distinguished from these which are to be applied to the different sections of the great Protestant body who are united in the belief that the Bible is the sole depository of dogmatic teaching. I quite agree in that. But it is the minority of cases that we have to guard against, where these local authorities, under the chances of an election, may fall under the domination of some noisy and intolerant local clique in some rural parish, where there would be no opportunity of arguing with them, and no public opinion to set them right. I venture to say that this Bill does not provide a shadow of a safeguard for the Catholics of England if once they were to surrender their rights in their schools. The right hon. Gentleman himself alluded to the pig-headed and obstinate forces which at any time in any civilised country may break out, and he freely confessed that these local authorities were not the easiest to handle. If they are not easily handled by a powerful Minister with all the power of the Education Department at his back, how does he suppose that they are going to be handled by the members of a very small and perhaps despised Catholic minority in a backward-district in England, where it may come within, the power of any single headstrong bore or bigot who wishes to overrule it? It seems that the right hon. Gentleman himself has a secret intuition that not merely abstract utterances but definite
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provisions are necessary if this Bill is to succeed in quieting the consciences of large masses of the people whose children attend these schools. It is clear that the utterances of the right hon. Gentleman are not intended to be merely platonic, and I do not think any one in this House will suspect the right hon. Gentleman of duplicity, but why not say in the Bill the way in which these schools are intended to be worked? The right hon. Gentleman tells us that he shrinks from applying coercive measures against these bodies; but, really, are they so sacrosanct that they cannot be dealt with? For what does the Local Government Board and the Education Department exist if they are not able to restrain these local bodies from a larger and broader point of view? This Bill, however, does not provide an appeal of any sort from the decision of these narrow tribunals in the matter of all others—;that is to say, local sectarian prejudice—;where they stand most in need of some appeal. You find it necessary to constitute a Court of Appeal against the highest and best trained judicial intellects in the country, and yet a poor Catholic minority in some backward district in England has no appeal of any sort against an act of oppression which may be inflicted upon it, by narrow-minded parochial bodies, in direct contravention of the spirit professed, and I have no doubt sincerely entertained, by the Minister in charge of this Bill. The right hon. Gentleman, in his speech to the Jewish deputation, stated that it was his intention that the schools should be carried on just as they are carried on now, and that it was his intention that the schools and teachers should remain as they are. Why not give it incontrovertible legal efficacy by translating his words into a few plain sentences in the Bill itself? So far as I know there is no objection to the principle of public control as to everything relating to the material efficiency of the schools. We welcome every test of efficiency that can satisfy the ratepayers that they are getting sound value in the way of secular education for their money. But no man of enlightenment will contend that popular control has any business to interfere between a man's conscience and his God. Popular control would destroy the right of the parent to

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transmit to his children the possession which he values more than any other, and which he would not part with for any consideration on earth. We must not have other creeds forced on us in the Catholic schools. The Nonconformists of England themselves have exactly the same traditions of suffering for their belief, and they have shown the same consistency in adhering to their belief. We admire them and respect them for it. The hon. Member for Louth, I think, last night reminded us—;he need not have done so, for we are not in the least danger of forgetting it—;of all that Ireland in the days of O'Connell owed in its splendid struggle for civil and religious liberty to the Free Churches of this country. I hope the hon. Member and his friends also have not forgotten either that in the days of O'Connell the representatives of Ireland did something to repay their debt in days when the Dissenters of England were struggling to get rid of shackles, which to some extent reduced them to something like the position of an inferior race. And the hon. Member will scarcely deny that even in our own day the representatives of Ireland, by their votes, have had some share in bringing about these great social reforms which are the ornaments of Nonconformist history. It would be with anything but a light heart that I should see the temporary severance in any working of these forces which have so many common interests and ideals. It would be all the more lamentable because our quarrel is with the words of this Bill rather than the intentions of the right hon. Gentleman. We are claiming absolutely nothing which is not of the essence of religious liberty, namely, that the religious instruction which this Bill concedes ought to accompany secular instruction shall be religious instruction conformable to our own faith and not the teaching of other faiths, however good and sacred they may be. Without going into the data of Catholicism and Protestantism, all the world knows that the difference between our belief and that of the different Protestant communions of England is that theirs is a belief which believes in the Bible as the sole source and foundation of dogmatic belief, whilst in the other case its interpretation is not left
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to be a matter of common judgment, and the Bible does not stand alone as the sanction for our faith. It is not with any desire to introduce the odium theoligicum into this debate that I mention that fact, but to remind the House that while Biblical teaching may and ought to form the common ground of the Protestant communions, and therefore must be the logical basis of religious teaching in the Protestant schools, that teaching would be antagonistic to the principle which is the very foundation of our faith. It is the principal barrier, the insurmountable barrier, between us, and upon this there can be no possible compromise. The right hon. Gentleman recognised that when he stated that the schools should be conducted in the future as in the past and that it was the statutory obligation of the local authority to carry that out. I think it would be ten thousand pities, when we have come so very near a common standpoint, for the sake of the larger interests of this Bill, and the great work that is before this Parliament, if some effort were not made to put down in black and white a legal recognition of what in the abstract is now recognised as the just claims of the Catholics of Ireland. It would be not candid, and worse than idle, for me not to insist on that particular point, that the teaching in every Catholic school shall continue to be Catholic and shall not be of any other faith. On that point the whole Catholic body of England and Ireland is as absolutely and unchangeably united as it is possible for a million of men to be. They have not for centuries faced disabilities and suffering, they have not made incredible sacrifices out of their poverty and nakedness, to build up these schools in England in order to hand over the fruits of their struggles in the shape of these schools to persons other than of their own faith. And I say in conclusion that the more the Catholic claims and attitude are examined by the right hon. Gentleman the Minister for Education the more inevitably he will recognise that in the firm and temperate attitude the Catholics have taken up they are making a stand for conscience' sake to which every generous friend of liberty, than whom

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there is no greater than the right hon. Gentleman himself, will honour and do justice.
Motion made, and Question, "That the debate be now adjourned "—;(Mr. John Redmond)—;put, and agreed to.
Debate to be resumed To-morrow.

PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.
MR. VIVIANsaid he desired to call attention to public expenditure and to move, "That this House is of opinion that the growth of expenditure on armaments is excessive and ought to be reduced; such expenditure lessens national and commercial credit, intensifies the unemployed problem, reduces the resources available for social reform, and presses with exceptional severity on the industrial classes; and it therefore calls upon the Government to take drastic steps to reduce the drain on national income, and to this end to press for the inclusion of the question of the reduction of armaments by international agreement in the agenda of the forthcoming Hague Conference." It seemed to some of his hon. friends a proper time to press the consideration of this question upon the attention of the House. The Resolution was brought forward in no spirit of antagonism to the Government; indeed, quite the reverse. They felt confident that they had in connection with this Resolution the hearty sympathy and support of His Majesty's Government. This was a new Parliament returned after a great campaign in which the importance of a reduction in non-productive expenditure was one of the issues. They realised that the Government had only been a short time in office, and that it would have been very difficult for the Government to remodel the Estimates which they inherited from their predecessors, but during the next twelve months both the House and the country would expect the Government to do something in the direction of a reduction of expenditure in order to carry out the pledges of the Party, and it was partly with a view to strengthening the hands of the
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Government on this question that he pressed the Resolution on the attention of the House. It must be obvious that a declaration by an overwhelming majority of the House was of value as a moral support to the Government in their task of retrenchment. He also ventured to say it would have great effect on the other Parliaments of the world in considering the question of bloated armaments. Practically the Liberal Party had not been in power for twenty years, but they now had an enormous majority behind them, and he believed he spoke for the majority of the Party in this House when he said it was expected that as soon as possible they would reorganise the spending departments of this country on lines that would keep up the great traditions of the Party. Few Members believed that the abolition of armaments was practicable, but they believed it possible greatly to limit this expenditure. The Resolution incidentally mentioned the importance of the question from the standpoint of the burden on industry. Unless some step could be taken to reduce expenditure substantially a demand would be made that the burden should be apportioned in a different way from that in which it was at present proportioned. The burden fell too heavily upon the great mass of the badly paid and these who had an insufficiency of this world's goods. Those, therefore, who believed it was essential to keep up the present expenditure on armaments would have to face the alternative of shifting the burden from the industrious to the idle. Roughly speaking, we were spending 100 millions a year in preparation for coming wars or in interest on the capital cost of past wars. Such a sum seemed discreditable to a so-called Christian nation. The sum mentioned, if capitalised, represented little short of 2,500 millions of money. But the most remarkable figure in connection with this matter was the enormous increase during the last ten years. Including loans for naval and military works, we had added during the last ten years about forty millions a year to our expenditure. He was glad to hear from the Chancellor of the Exchequer the other day that these loans were to be stopped, for the expenditure should at least come out of revenue so that the country should not

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be misled. The capital sum represented by £40,000,000 was £1,000,000,000. Was it realised that in ten years these responsible for the finances of this country had for all practical purposes more than doubled the National Debt? Our burdens would have been no greater if £1,000,000,000 had been borrowed, and we were paying an interest of £40,000,000 a year on it. These who were connected with business had known during the last few years what effect this enormous expenditure had had in depreciating our credit. Further, it had deprived the country of funds which could have been otherwise used to carry out social reforms. The guarantee of £40,000,000 a year would represent the housing of 4,000,000 people at £250 a house. He merely mentioned that to indicate the enormous bearing this subject had upon social and economic reform. But they could not have it both ways. If they went on in the present lavish way with regard to armaments, the money could not be available for building up the happiness and prosperity of the people of this country. He would cite one or two facts to show the close relationship between expenditure and the condition of the people of this country. The statistics of crime and pauperism followed the lowered credit of the country which sprang from wasteful expenditure. During the period in which our credit had been going down as a result of this excessive expenditure, pauperism had increased by 10 per cent. Beggars had increased by 30 per cent. What to him was of even greater moment was the fact that whereas before this crisis in our financial position our people were able to increase their savings at the rate of more than £9,000,000 a year, since our credit had been depreciated the increase had dropped to £3,000,000 a year. Whatever was the condition of the people, one would have to admit that if this expenditure were needed for the defence of our country and homes, it would have to be borne, but those who demanded a reduction of the expenditure contended that the increased expenditure had not been accompanied by increased efficiency. The cost of the Army was now nearly double what it was in 1894, and he asked, had that increase been
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accompanied by double the increase in the strength of the fighting force. They had poured out money too lavishly to this Government Department, and they had not had that check upon extravagance which ought to have been exercised. He could give the evidence of expert after expert showing the inefficiency of our fighting forces. It was the duty of this House to see that public expenditure was properly checked. Recently in the Far East a new power had come into being, and fortunately this country was on the best terms with it. He was also pleased to note that we were on the most cordial terms of friendship with France. The race with regard to armaments which had been going on between this country and France for a good many years could now, to a large extent, be regarded as unnecessary. There was no need for them to continue to keep up that keen competition with regard to the relative strength of armaments that used to exist before the conditions changed. With regard to Russia, her Navy was practically no more. He submitted that these were facts that should cause them to consider expenditure in this direction with a view to pulling up the credit of the country. They should nurse their commercial strength in order that they might be able to command the sinews of war for any struggle in which they might be engaged. This was not the time to be wasting our resources. He submitted to these of a warlike tendency that this Resolution was one which should commend itself to them. Then there was a question of a limit in this race. We had increased our expenditure by £40,000,000 during the last ten years. What guarantee was there that there would not be another £40,000,000 increase in the next ten years? Were we to continue in this mad race without any attempt to check it. He thought there was want of strength and character in the demand that we should always have sufficient fighting strength to overwhelm everyone else. The House must have more confidence in the people to rise to the occasion, should an emergency arise. He had confidence in these who lived in the British Empire to meet any such emergency. The object of the fighting force of this country should be a defensive and not an aggressive

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one. If we were going blustering all over the world in connection with an expansive policy, then there would be no limit to the expenditure that would be required to satisfy the demands of experts. If we confined ourselves to the defence of territories which we had already acquired, then there would be no need for the immense annual burdens which were now being placed upon the country. He ventured to suggest with regard to the power of defence that there were two things which were occasionally overlooked in connection with preparation for war. One of them was the power to borrow £500,000,000 quickly and cheaply, and in his opinion that was worth an Army corps. If the country continued to waste its resources and keep its credit down, the difficulties of meeting an emergency would be enhanced by the policy which it was now pursuing. If only to get the credit of the country up, the House ought to take the course suggested by the Resolution. Then there was something in having a contented population. Speaking from the artisan's point of view, he might say they had no intention of encouraging or even permitting, if they could stop it, the continuance of the race in which this country had been engaged in regard to armaments. He realised that these burdens must fall upon these who worked for daily wages. As the Chancellor of the Exchequer had said, it was practically impossible absolutely to arrange the finances of the country in watertight compartments. Any wasteful expenditure must fall with bad effect upon these engaged in daily toil. If it were put upon the income-tax payer he might go short of some little luxury, but it would be found that he would curtail the employment of some kind of labour. They could frequently connect large dismissals in trade with the increase in public expenditure, notwithstanding the fact that that expenditure might be coming directly out of the pockets of the class that might not be described as the working-class. Indirectly, however, it found its way down to the pockets of the poor, and in the long run any extravagant expenditure fell on the great mass of the working classes of this country.
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If this expenditure was to be maintained they would have to demand that the burden should be placed in some direct way upon the gambler and the speculator. The people had stood too long the present method of taxation, and he hoped the Government would so arrange taxation that it would fall upon these who got rich while they slept and not upon these who got poor while they worked. That was the line he and his friends intended to follow up. It was unreasonable to expect that the great mass of the working people were going to tolerate the burdens that had been imposed upon them without some protest. With regard to the Hague Conference, he learned with regret that the Czar had left out in his notice the question of the reduction of armaments, although at the first Conference that question was considered. He hoped at that Conference that the representatives of the British Government would be instructed to press for the inclusion, amongst the subjects discussed at the Conference, of the question of the reduction of the armaments by international agreement. Some years ago Lord Goschen expressed his willingness to consider that question, and perhaps he would be permitted to read his Lordship's words. Lord Goschen said—;
"I have now to state on behalf of His Majesty's Government that similarly if the other great European powers should be prepared to diminish their programme of shipbuilding we should be prepared on our side to meet such a procedure by modifying ours. The difficulties of adjustment are no doubt immense. Our desire that the Conference should succeed in reducing the tremendous burdens which now weigh down all European nations is sincere, and if Europe comes to no agreement, and if the hopes entertained by the Czar should not be realised the programme I have submitted to the House must stand."
All that was asked on this particular point was that the House of Commons should renew that appeal, as it were, to the other nations of Europe, and to express here and now their willingness to discuss the possibility of a reduction of armaments by international agreement. He hoped that a representative of the Government would be able to tell the House that they viewed this proposal sympathetically, and that they were prepared to accede to the recommendation, in the Resolution. In connection

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with the expenditure for warlike purposes there was a tendency for vested interests to perpetuate their existence. An increased expenditure of about £40,000,000 a year brought within the zone of vested interests a vast number of human beings, and if hon. Members thought of that for a moment they would see how dangerous it was to continue along that line. He viewed with alarm the enormous extension of our arsenals and our yards of a Royal character. After the necessity for them had ceased they had officialdom and other interests all determined to perpetuate themselves at the expense of the industries of the country. It was the duty of the House to see that they did not intensify that evil—;that they did not create more than was absolutely necessary. He was glad to note the other day that Lord Tweedmouth referred to the value, in the case of a crisis, of the private yards, and of private methods of producing the things which were required. It was practically impossible, except at an intolerable expense to the people of this country, to keep up the Royal yards and methods of production which would give us in time of war, or in time of danger, all that we required. If that was attempted, a burden would be created in time of peace which the people would not tolerate. What was the result of a policy of that sort? Fits of economy were followed by fits of expenditure, and nothing was worse for efficiency than that method of going on. He urged, therefore, that a watchful eye should be kept on the growth of the permanent non-productive expenditure. The political influence represented by £40,000,000 was enormous, and it had its effect on the House. When speaking of the enormous increase in expenditure during the past ten years, he should like to say that it took over a century of wars and preparation for wars to get our expenditure up to between £36,000,000 to £37,000,000 annually on armaments. During that period, which embraced the time of Napoleon, England had been engaged in some of its greatest conflicts from which she had emerged with some amount of honour and glory—;certainly rather more than she got in her latest straggle—;yet in the last ten years we had run the expenditure on armaments up to
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£76,000,000, or more than double. The explantaion of the increase was that those responsible did not exercise sufficient check on the experts who recommended the expenditure. He was always willing to consult experts on technical details, but it was for this House to say how much in the aggregate it was prepared to spend on matters relating to the defence of the Empire, after consultation, of course, with the responsible Ministers of the Crown. He denied that it was wise to allow generals, captains, and other officers to decide how much should be spent in these directions. He believed the present Government were prepared to stand boldly out for economy. Parliament would not deny them the money required for securing efficiency. He and his friends were as anxious to defend the interests of the Empire as these who were in favour of this lavish expenditure, but they said that efficiency was not necessarily obtained by wasteful expenditure which threw an enormous burden on the taxpayers. The Resolution did not call upon the House to do anything of a revolutionary character. Most hon. Members were pledged to economy when they were returned to the House. He saw no reason why hon. Members in all parts of the House should hesitate to support the Government in any effort they might make to have this question of armaments considered by the different nations of the world when they met at the Hague Conference. They were all proud of what England had done in the past in the cause of progress; they would love her more if she would take her proper place in regard to this great question of lessening the horrors and evils of war. We had an enormous responsibility in connection with the question raised in the Resolution. We were an island, and had natural means of defence that many other nations had not got. We ought, therefore, to be prepared to risk something and to take the first part in bringing about conditions that should make it possible, not only to reduce the cost of armaments in our own country, but also to make the burden lighter for the artisans and labourers in every country in Europe. He begged to move.
MR. FENWICKsaid his duty in seconding the Resolution was considerably lightened by the exhaustive and able speech of the hon. Member for Birkenhead. The Resolution asked the House to declare that the expenditure on armaments at present was excessive; that being excessive it weakened our national credit; and that, in so far as it reduced our credit, it tended to intensify and aggravate the problem of finding employment for the people at home. This expenditure also tended to reduce the resources which ought to be available for the carrying out of great projects of social reform, and it fell with greatest severity on the industrial classes. No one would deny that our expenditure on armaments had been growing with alarming rapidity. It might be that he was getting into the reminiscent stage and was inclined to review the work they had accomplished, or attempted to accomplish. He would like to point out to his right hon. friend that when he with himself entered this House for the first time a good many years ago, our expenditure upon the Army and Navy was only £30,382,000. In the present financial year the estimated expenditure on these services was £62,345,000. Our entire national expenditure at that time was only a little over £89,000,000. To-day the cost of the Army and the Navy, with the interest on the National Debt, amounted to over £5,000,000 more than the entire national expenditure at the time the right hon. Gentleman and himself entered the House. He wished that we had received satisfaction for that expenditure in the way of necessary and legitimate reforms or in the way of honest value for the proportionate increase in the national expenditure. Had we to-day the sense of efficiency and security which we ought to have for the money we were expending? He maintained that we had not that security; that the Empire was in no better position to-day though the expenditure on the Navy and Army had more than doubled during the last twenty years. If they were to take the authority of Lord Roberts, expressed in the other House, it was doubtful whether the security of the Empire
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was as good to-day as it was at that time. No one would deny that this excessive expenditure ought to be checked. He believed that it was the deep intention of the present Government to reduce the growth of that expenditure. Nobody would deny that the national credit to-day was not what it was ten or fifteen years ago. We could not borrow money now so readily and cheaply as then. Anything which tended to weaken the nation's credit made it more difficult to raise money cheaply, and to intensify the problem of dealing with the question of the unemployed. When money was cheap public bodies were induced to put into operation great constructive works necessary for the comfort and convenience of the people; but when money was dear these great constructive works were left undone and the nation was made to suffer thereby. If we went on wasting our national resources, we could not hope to see these great problems of social progress, which we all had at heart, carried into effect. He had always understood that the Empire was run in the interest of the whole, and not in the interest of only a portion of it; and he believed that there were others outside the United Kingdom who might reasonably be asked to share the expense of the Empire. He regretted that there had not been a free offer of such assistance in the cost of running the Empire. To-day we were in receipt from the whole of our Colonies and Dependencies of less than £500,000 towards this heavy burden. He anxiously looked forward to the time when some Minister or some Government, even at the risk of diminishing his or their popularity, would face this question boldly and courageously and seek to bring about an international agreement for the reduction of expenditure on armaments. Any Minister or Government who undertook that duty would in his judgment command the eternal gratitude of the industrial classes of the country. Nobody rejoiced more than he when such a proposal was put before the last Hague Conference. He thought that at last an honest attempt was going to be made to reduce the cost of armaments all round. That hope, however, had only been raised to be

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disappointed. He knew that the mind of the Foreign Secretary ran in that direction, and he trusted that the right hon. Gentleman would be able to tell the House that night that so far as he was concerned, and so far as this Government were concerned, they would do their level best to have a proper discussion with the view of arriving at some amicable international arrangement by which these huge armaments should be reduced to reasonable proportions. What was the relative advantage derived from this increased expenditure on armaments? When we built a "Dreadnought" at a cost of £1,000,000, the United States decided to build a battleship which would be larger and more efficient and cost not £1,000,000, but £2,000,000. If the nations went on in this mad way what was to be the end of such foolish expenditure? It was far better to come to some common arrangement whereby these huge armaments should be reduced to more rational and reasonable proportion. For these reasons he seconded the Motion presented by his hon. friend.
Motion made and Question proposed, "That this House is of opinion that the growth of expenditure on armaments is excessive and ought to be reduced, such expenditure lessens national and commercial credit, intensifies the unemployed problem, reduces the resources available for social reform, and presses with exceptional severity on the industrial classes, and it therefore calls upon the Government to take drastic steps to reduce the drain on national income, and to this end to press for the inclusion of the question of the reduction of armaments by international agreement in the agenda of the forthcoming Hague Conference.—;(Mr. Vivian.)
MR. BELLAIRSin moving an Amendment to the effect that the House relied on the Government to maintain British Naval supremacy, and that it was inadvisable for this Government to initiate a discussion concerning the armaments which foreign Powers deemed necessary for the defence of their territories, said he could not hope to rival the eloquence of the mover and seconder of the Motion. These hon. Gentlemen,
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however, had no monopoly of the hatred of war or of bloated armaments. He did not believe that any Member in the House was not in favour of efficiency and economy. The whole question was a question of means. The Resolution stated that the expenditure had not been accompanied by efficiency. If that meant that the "Dreadnought" battleship was not a good substitute for the "Royal Sovereign," that argument was fallacious, because one "Dreadnought," although it cost £1,800,000, could blow ten "Royal Sovereigns" out of the water though the latter each cost nearly half as much as the "Dreadnought." Therefore there was a greater increase of efficiency. His hon. friend had taken the House back to the expenditure on the Navy a hundred years ago, but his answer to that was that the British Empire would not be in existence at the present moment if the expenditure on armaments had not increased. The Empire would have been distributed among more powerful foreign nations. In his opinion the one hope of reduction of armaments was in an Anglo-American alliance by which each Power would guarantee to come to the assistance of the other if attacked by two Powers. On the ground of continuity of policy he also contended that it was undesirable that this country should press for a reduction of armaments, and pointed out that, as far as the late Government was concerned, the then Prime Minister, with the advice of an excellent Defence Committee, refused to pledge himself, and always refused to pledge himself, to take any steps to initiate such a movement. The policy of the speech of Lord Goschen delivered in March, 1899, to which the mover of the Resolution and his hon. friend referred, essentially differed from what was now being pressed for. If the Motion had merely embodied what Lord Goschen said, there was not a man in the House who would oppose it. Lord Goschen said—;
"I have now to state on behalf of His Majesty's Government that if the other great naval Powers should be prepared to diminish this programme of shipbuilding we should be prepared on out side to meet such a procedure, by mollifying ours."
It would be seen that the noble Lord expressly stated that the initiative as

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to the reduction of armaments must come from foreign Powers. [Cries of "Why?"] Because we regulated our armaments by these of foreign Powers, and because our naval armament was vital to us. It was kept up solely for defence, and we could not carry on great operations against foreign Powers by means of our Army. If once the Navy was defeated we were "done," as our food supply was cut off. But though our Navy was vital to us, theirs was not vital to foreign Powers. He would point out that, as the mover stated, the Hague Conference was especially summoned to bring about this reduction of armaments. They passed an amiable resolution in favour of the reduction of armaments; but since that there had been an increase of armaments by every Power. Germany gave effect to the resolution by building in the next seven years fourteen battleships to our seventeen, which latter figure was not out of the way having regard to the margin of safety. France also had increased the number of her battleships. Last December Lord Cawdor, referring to the large reductions which had taken place in British naval expenditure, said—;
"The public cannot rely on this reduction being continued in future years if foreign countries make developments in their shipbuilding programmes which we cannot now foresee."
The reply of the Emperor of Germany shortly after the utterance of Lord Cawdor was contained in his speech from the Throne this year, in which he said—;
"Our continually growing economic intercourse with all countries beyond the seas demands now urgently a stronger naval representation of the Empire abroad. For this purpose there will be laid before you a Supplement to the Navy Law, and it will provide for the increase of the number of ships on foreign service by the addition of six large cruisers. Moveover, the allied Governments find themselves compelled to propose to you a considerable increase of the battleships and large cruisers which were asked for in the Naval Budget of 1905 so that our German warships shall not be inferior in fighting strength to the ships of other nations. Finally, you will be asked to grant money towards bringing about a greater power of readiness to strike on the part of our torpedo-boats. I cherish the confident hope that the German Reichstag is prepared to increase our naval defences."
It was also a significant fact that the German torpedo flotilla had been sta-
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tioned in the North Sea opposite Great Britain since Lord Cawdor's statement of Admiralty policy. In view of that he thought the best thing we could do was to remember Napoleon's declaration, and that our obvious reply as to policy was contained in his werds—;
"The only way to prevent the Continental Powers from bridling you is for England to proceed in her proper sphere as an insular Power possessing the command of the sea."
That was, he thought, good advice to-day. When Lord Palmerston instructed our Ambassador to remonstrate with Napoleon III. on the increase of armaments, the answer was the snub which we were still liable to receive to this effect. "Let each look after his own business; you ought to be twice as strong as I am." That was sound advice. Cobden originally urged that free trade and commercial intercourse would make nations so dependent on one another that war would be impossible. That prediction had been falsified. [Mr. VIVIAN: We have not got free trade.] Cobden, as he got older, however, became disillusioned. In other words, in 1836 he was a Manchester doctrinaire on the defence question, but in 1856 he was a blue-water school man, and had abandoned all fanciful ideas about disarmament in our time. Mr. Cobden would have been still more convinced if he had lived to-day and saw how the only economists who had achieved anything were the blue-water school. There was no critic who deserved praise more than Mr. Courtney for the sincerity of his intentions. He had the courage of his convictions. Mr. Courtney, forgetful of the fact that his policy cost the Northerners, through want of preparation, in the Civil War 320,000 lives, said—;
"He admitted that it wanted some courage to face the risk of reducing armaments. Were they prepared to run that risk? In the matter of military preparations, as in the matter of free trade, they had better not wait for the co-operation of other nations, but they must run the glorious risk in leading the way."
Hon. Gentlemen cheered that statement, which was logical from their point of view, but he would remind them of some recent history. The Afghan frontier incident in 1885 cost us £12,000,000. It was a panic expenditure which had been wholly wasted, and arose because we had allowed the Navy to run down.

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A few years afterwards there was the Fashoda incident, when the country was prepared. There was no panic on the Stock Exchange, and it cost only £13,000 in Admiralty expenditure. If at that time the Navy had been allowed to run down there would have been a financial crisis in this country. During the South African War there was a reasonable chance of attempted coercion of this country by a combination of European Powers. There was no panic, but had the Navy been allowed to run down there would also on that occasion have been a great financial crisis. Our wisest policy was the policy of Chatham, who said in 1770—;
"The precaution that meets the disorder is cheap and easy; the remedy which follows bloody and expensive."
We had given proofs of pacific tendency; we had given up Heligoland and made a reduction in our Navy Estimates of £7,086,000 in two years, as compared with Germany's, without exercising any perceptible influence on German feeling, which was obviously one of great antagonism to us. ["No, no." | That was the fact, however much we might regret it. It might be due to misrepresentation. He thought it largely was; but it existed during the South African War, and through the influence of the German Navy League, which had a membership of 600,000, as compared with the Navy League membership of a few thousands; in this country, it existed very much now. He would echo the words of the French Minister two years ago, who said—;
"Other nations can follow our example; acts are worth more than idle words."
So far from following our example, France had recently laid down six battleships, compared with our two, and Germany two battleships every year. He thought that disarmament was proceeding at present in respect of the guns in our battleships, as we were not replacing obsolete guns or providing a sufficient reserve of heavy guns, while not long ago thirteen battleships and sixty cruisers had been put aside as obsolete, six battleships and about ten cruisers only taking their place. This surely showed a considerable reduction in armament. But let them suppose that an agreement
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were made to reduce armaments, no force existed by which the agreement could be carried out. There existed only public opinion, and nations had violated public opinion before now. Again, what standard were hon. Members going to adopt? Was it to be a money standard? If so, then the voluntary services in the navies of Great Britain and the United States could not be compared with the systems of enrolment elsewhere. If trade, shipping, colonies, or coast-line were the standards then either the British Navy was already too weak, or the French and German too strong. If the standard of the number of battleships were adopted it could be easily got over by an increase in tonnage among the other powers, and if armoured vessels were not built the torpedo power might be increased. Then as the armoured ships became through obsolescence less and less able to defend themselves, the little torpedo - craft world become more and more developed and dangerous. The final result might be that Great Britain would find herself placed in the position of having lost her naval supremacy. In his judgment the Navy preserved peace, and history had shown that the Navy had preserved the liberties of the country throughout the centuries, protecting us at the same time from invasion. He probably spoke with a more sentimental interest in the Navy than hon. Members generally would care to show.
MR. MOKTON: Nothing like leather.
MR. BELLAIRS: But he did not think that the British Navy was a thing to be bartered about among the foreign powers. At present a committee of foreigners regulated the sugar policy of this country, and he would certainly think twice before he entered into any agreement by which foreigners should be allowed to regulate the maritime policy of this country. The Government should not go beyond an expression of their readiness to enter into a conference provided the initiative came from foreign powers, who were not so dependent on their navies as Great Britain undoubtedly was upon hers for the preservation of liberty and peace. He begged to move.
CAPTAIN HERVEYsaid he rose to second the Amendment of the hon. Member for King's Lynn. He thought, however, that a Member of this House other than a naval officer might with advantage have risen for this purpose. He agreed entirely with the hon. Member when he said that he did not think it would be a good thing that the naval policy of this country as a whole should be discussed and decided by a committee of foreign naval experts. That was the line he took upon this question and that was the reason he had risen to second the Amendment. The House should consider what duties our Navy had to perform and what duties foreign navies had to perform. We were in a different position from any other country in the world. It was true that we had the biggest navy in the world, but then we had the largest responsibilities in the world for our Navy to carry out. We had to protect 54 per cent. of the whole merchant service of the world with our Navy, and in addition to that to protect the coasts of a world-wide empire. If we were to sit round a board and discuss the Naval necessities of each country with a foreign committee we could not take ship for ship with any one country or with any two countries and say we were in a position to carry out our responsibilities. The real reason why we were not in a position to discuss our naval affairs with the representatives of foreign countries was that in order to make it clear to these people that it was necessary for us to have any particular number of ships, we should have to disclose the plans of action, which obviously determined the extent of our armaments, and that was a thing which we must necessarily keep to ourselves. We should always be pleased to meet other countries and do all in our power to reduce the armaments of the world, but we could only do that with safety by having regard to what our necessities were. Let the other nations propose a reduction of armaments; we would consider that proposal in a most conciliatory spirit, but such proposals must in the first instance come from them. On these terms we could meet them and still occupy the position it
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was necessary for us to occupy—;namely of being able to determine the armament we considered sufficient to protect what we possessed, and to protect our commerce. The building programe of this country as now laid down was only a programme that would in a few years time bring us to a simple equality with the next two naval Powers. The programme as laid down was no more than was absolutely necessary, and to go below that would be to go below the margin of safety, which no one would for a moment tolerate. He was quite ready to admit that we were at the present time in a slightly better position than under normal conditions we should be, owing to the disaster which had overtaken one of the great naval Powers of Europe, but that was not the fault of the Admiralty. The Admiralty had their eye glued on the results of the war between Japan and Russia, not only as it affected the ships themselves, but also in the way in which it affected the building programme of this country in the future. These considerations determined our present policy of building four armoured ships every year. If that were not continued, if it were dropped for only one year, there would be a hiatus which, though it might not be evident now, yet when our ships began to get obsolete we should find some time in the future one year when we had four obsolete ships passing out of our Navy and no new ships to take their place. All objected to building our ships with borrowed money, and therefore the object of the Admiralty's programme of building at the present time was to ensure that, as each year some ships became obsolete and went out of commission, others should be built annually to take their place. Believing the policy he had referred to was the right policy he was very pleased to be able to second the Amendment of his hon. friend.
Amendment proposed—;
"In line 6, to leave out all the words after the word 'income,' and add the words 'but this House relies on the Government to maintain British naval supremacy, and is of opinion that it is inadvisable for the Government to initiate a discussion concerning the armaments which Foreign Powers may deem necessary for the defence of their territories,' instead thereof."—;(Mr. Bellairs).

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Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
MR. CHARLES WILSONsaid he should like to support the Amendment because he thought that the country ought to keep up its Navy, whatever it did about the Army. He should like, however, to call attention to the fact that it would be a long time before there was a homogeneous squadron of ships of the "Dreadnought" class under the present proposals. He considered it would have been better policy to put off building some of the smaller vessels in the present programme in order to have started the building of four "Dreadnoughts," so as to get ahead of other Powers in this matter in a year or two. As it was it would be three years before we had three "Dreadnoughts." He thought it would have cost even less than the programme before the country. He would also like to suggest that before the Admiralty decided on the question of turbines for these ships, some information ought to be laid before the House to show the grounds on which the Government based their preference for this type of engine. It was a question very much debated by marine engineers—;[Cries of "Order."] He would bow to the wishes of the House and not proceed further with the subject than to ask the Government to consider whether they were doing the right thing in regard to turbines.
MR. HUGH LAWsaid he rose to support the Motion from an Irish point of view. He should like first of all to say, however, that his hon. friend who moved the Resolution had under I estimated the growth of expenditure. According to evidence before the Committee on National Expenditure the amount had grown from £53,000,000 in 1883–84 to £109,000,000 in 1903–04. Out of that increase £38,000,000 were due to the Army and Navy, leaving £18,000,000 for all other services. This was to be remembered when Members were frequently told that they were responsible for increase in expenditure by pressing for outlay in different directions. All these items—;many of which, small though they might be, were of vital importance to the people concerned—;
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were but flea-bites, as an hon. Member had said, to the expenditure on the Army and Navy. Both as regarded this country and Ireland they could not leave out of sight the question of the growth of local taxation. This advanced pari passu with national expenditure, and the two together had become in many parts of the United Kingdom perfectly crushing. Especially was that the case in Ireland where there were boards of guardians which found it impossible to meet the most necessary demands of common decency and humanity. Allowing Sir Robert Giffen's figures of £12 per head for mere subsistence, Great Britain was left, after paying taxes, with £1,000,000,000 of money for all other purposes. If they allowed £12 per head in Ireland there was only left £15,000,000, from which they had to take £9,000,000 in taxation, leaving £6,000,000 for other purposes, compared with £1,000,000,000 in this country. It could be imagined how heavily a comparatively trifling increase of taxation weighed upon Ireland. Unhappily there were evidences on every side that Ireland was a dying nation. His hon. friend the Member for East Clare had recently obtained a very interesting Return giving monthly statistics of emigration since 1885, and it would probably surprise the House to hear that of the 30,000 emigrants who left Ireland last year Ulster sent most, namely, 10,000. In two months of the present year 10,000 people had left Irish shores. They were sometimes told that Ireland ought to rejoice in its British connection. All he could say was that to the mass of the Irish people the effect of the Union was chiefly visible in a steady increase of taxation. For the sake of the people of both countries, and for the sake of Christendom he hoped the Government would accept the Motion and take the steps suggested, with the honourable position of being the first to move in the direction of universal peace.
MR. J. M. ROBERTSONsaid the last speaker had usefully recalled the debate to a point in the Resolution which had been rather ignored by previous speakers, namely, the urgent necessity for a reduction of our military expenditure, having regard to the present social condition of

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the people. The hon. Member for West Donegal had drawn an impressive picture of the economic misery which Ireland suffered, and he wished to emphasise the fact that a large part of this House was profoundly concerned about the general question of a reduction of our expenditure upon armaments. He hoped they would have some assurance from the Government that they might look for some saving in the military expenditure of the country during the present year. Many of them looked to the Government to spend considerably less than their Estimates upon the Navy and Army; and if there was not a considerable saving the House and the country would feel that the promises that were given had been practically disregarded by these who gave them. He should have been more pleased if the Resolution of his hon. friend had asked the Government to return to the standard of expenditure set in 1898, for that would have been something definite to work upon. The arguments put forward by the hon. Member for King's Lynn offered no suggestion of the standard which he considered necessary. He wished to say a few words in regard to the attitude the hon. Member took up when he claimed that his studies of naval matters had given him a special insight into these problems. He would like to ask whether the mere study of the mechanics of naval warfare and maritime affairs and the relative fighting power of the different nations gave the hon. Member any special qualification for pronouncing upon the civic wisdom of such expenditure. The hon. Member for King's Lynn was no doubt an expert, and the House owed a great deal to him for the manner in which he had handled the statistics of foreign trade in the recent controversy. He wished to state that it was with no disrespect to the hon. Member that he ventured to challenge his special qualification to pronounce upon a question which was not merely one of naval strength or of the best kind of ship, but of the line upon which civilisation should go. He would remind the hon. Member that there were other naval experts who were absolutely at issue with him on naval questions, and therefore even experts could not be regarded as infallible. All the great empires that ever fell had been
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led to ruin by experts. He was only stating historical facts. With regard to what had been said about Holland in a recent debate by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Croydon, that country was taken by surprise because she put too much faith in the word of a faithless English king, not because of any tendency on her part to abandon her military system. No nation in European history had ever done so. All the great empires that had fallen had been ruined by internal disease and economic decline, in which senseless military expenditure had played a part. The explanation was that great military experts always seemed to lack civic judgment. From what had been said one would suppose that the Roman Empire fell for lack of military preparation and military skill; but that was not so. To the very last the empire had captains who could easily out-general these of the barbarians; but the empire fell for lack of men who could fight. It fell because the very entrails of the State were gone; and the disappearance of this source of strength was the result of eternal military strain. At one time he had a great admiration for the heroes of antiquity, and he remembered that at a tender age he translated a life of Hannibal for his own satisfaction. When he arrived at years of discretion he saw his great hero was able to fight but not able to maintain a State in peace, and he had no insight into the conditions that made an empire strong from within. It was the same with Alexander and Cæsar, for they were wreckers of civilisation, and none of them were builders up. The hon. and gallant Member for King's Lynn had told them that he detested war and deplored the necessity for armaments. They were told that by every supporter of militarism. If the hon. and gallant I Member felt as some of the rest of them did, he would be glad to take the initiative in a movement for disarmament. But the hon. Gentleman and his friends refused to join in any such movement, and found something having the nature and semblance of argument for opposing it. When Mr. Gladstone in the last Liberal Administration was called upon in a similar way to take some steps towards inducing other naval Powers to reduce armaments, he answered that the time was not propitious. That answer was a matter of regret to

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many of his followers. No one would venture to give that answer to-day. If ever there was a propitious time it was the present. Would the naval experts give the House the reasons why we should not take the initiative now? An hon. Member opposite had said that proposals should come from the other Powers. Was it likely that other Powers, feeling themselves outnumbered, would come to us with a proposal for reduction? Surely the Power which would have the best hope of being listened to was that with the greatest naval strength. Nobody had ever proposed that we should go below even the two-Power standard. While recognising the madness of this eternal competition in armaments, we were maintaining practically a four-Power standard. We could make enormous reductions and still maintain our two-Power standard. We ought to take the initiative at the Hague Conference in striving for a proportional reduction by all nations. Our perpetually increasing naval expenditure saved us nothing from the demands of the army men for more Army expenditure. We were in the hands of experts whose one idea was, not to know what the nation could bear, but simply to create the largest mass of fighting power in each respective arm that they could plan. With Russia wiped out we found our naval experts asking for additions to the Navy, and army experts asking for additional expenditure to defend our India frontier, which Russia could not now attack if she would. Russia, who had just been overthrown by Japan, had been ruined by her exports. The same had been the case with Austria and France. Experts never had a glimpse of the necessity of retrenchment. We had had treaties of arbitration in recent years, and that was the most hopeful aspect of the foreign policy of the late Government, though Lord Lansdowne was led into a regrettable backward movement in regard to the Treaty with Japan. That Treaty had induced Japan to say to us. "You must arm more if you are to be our ally."
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir EDWARD GREY,: She has never said that.
MR J. M. ROBERTSONsaid he was glad to receive that assurance. When
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he made the statement he was proceeding on what he had read in the public Press. We had all these arbitration treaties, and yet we were getting no advantage from them whatever in the lightening of our military burdens. What was the use of treaties of arbitration if all the while the nations were making their armaments stronger than ever? There was something in the nature of madness in all this growth of armaments. The truth was that vast vested interests had got hold of this matter; and if the cause of democracy was to go forward there must be something in the nature of a battle between democracy and these capitalist interests whose enrichment lay in the direction of the perpetual increase of armaments. The hon. and gallant Member for King's Lynn had told them that we alone among the nations thought solely of defence, and that the other nations of Europe were at all times lying in wait to attack us at a disadvantage. It was time that their discussions were delivered from these imbecilities. If there was one species of human nature which was British, and another sort for all other nations, no rational international politics would be possible. He asked the hon. and gallant Gentleman to reconsider the doctrine he had laid down about the unpreparedness of the United States for war. That was a civil war, and bad as that war was, it would have been much worse if the United States had then been armed to the teeth and had used all their forces for mutual destruction. He deprecated warmly the contention of the hon. and gallant Gentleman that the hopes of the lovers of peace depended on an Anglo-American alliance. A declaration like that would go forth to toll the French people that the entente cordiale was unreal, and that we were looking forward to an Anglo-American alliance which could overwhelm all the nations of Europe. The nation demanded a reduction of expenditure. If the world would spend in one year, for peace, a hundredth part of what had been spent for war in every year of the Christian era, universal peace would be visibly nearer. Government had had no difficulty in finding £220,000,000 for the abominable project of destroying two republics, but no Chancellor of the Exchequer could ever find means to pay old-age pensions. The people had at length realised that they must reverse the

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practice of the past and set up a policy of construction in the place of the policy of destruction.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I am not sure that the moment which the hon. Gentleman has chosen for his onslaught on armaments is very happily chosen; for, if I understand the situation, we have presented an ultimatum, the terms of which have not yet run out, to a great military power, and a large fraction of the naval forces of this country are now concentrated in the Eastern Mediterranean with the view of seeing that the rights of this country are maintained. I do not know if the hon. Gentleman thinks that we should be more likely to obtain a peaceful settlement of the controversy between this country and that Power if we had no Fleet and no Army [LABOUR cries of "Oh"] or a smaller Fleet and Army. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman thinks we should be more likely to bring to a peaceful solution the difficulty in which his Majesty's present advisers and the country find themselves if our naval and military forces were not in that state of preparedness which as a matter of fact they have reached. If they were not, I do not think that one could have that confidence in a peaceful solution of the controversy which I for my part look forward to, and which I have no reason to doubt, simply because our forces are in the prepared condition in which they are. The hon. Gentleman spent a great deal of his eloquence on the military exports, and he prefers what he calls experts in sociology. He thinks we ought to take experts in sociology and consult them on this question of military armaments.
MR. J. M. ROBERTSON: I said nothing whatever about experts in sociology.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Or at all events people who talk about sociology without being exports. I rather agree with the hon. Gentleman. I have no great confidence either in naval or military experts or in sociological experts, taken by themselves, except under the cross-examination of these who have to do with the daily work of public affairs. Whether the hon. Member approves of the policy of the late Government or
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not, I can assure him they did not take that policy from the opinions or obiter dicta of experts, but did their best to arrive at what was the real truth as to the military and naval necessities of the country. The hon. Gentleman cannot accept so extravagant an account of our work. He has a different explanation of the magnitude of the Army and Navy. He thinks it was due to the vested interests of capital in keeping up a large Army and Navy. I do not know whether that is sociology, but it strikes me as being nonsense. What possible interest have the capitalists of the country in keeping up a large Navy and Army? They have got to pay a shilling duty in income tax. I do not underrate, and I never have, the burden which these armaments throw on the country; but the burden is largely, indeed chiefly, borne by the capitalist—;[An HON. MEMBER: The workmen.]—;by the very classes who the hon. Gentleman thinks have a vested interest in maintaining the1 Army and Navy at a high level. If armaments have the unexpected effect of stimulating industry in all its branches, the workman benefits as well as the capitalist, and I fail to see how this is a conspiracy of the capitalists any more than of the workmen. The hypothesis of the hon. Gentleman is one which no sober thinker could conceive for a moment would govern the policy of any Administration in this country. The interest of every Administration is to cut down expenditure and to diminish taxation, and if they do not do so, it may be because they are stupid or because they do not thoroughly understand the interests of their country; but it cannot be, and never has been, except in the days of corruption and bribery, that they were animated by self-interest. There is nothing an Administration more keenly desires than a successful Budget, a large surplus, and an increasing revenue. And if naval and military expenditure grows, as it undoubtedly has in recent years, it is partly because we pay our soldiers at a much higher rate than we did before, and partly because we have had to construct permanent works for the benefit of the soldier; but in the main because it was necessary, as we believed, for the defence of the country. The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down seems to think it altogether absurd that we should pose as if we framed our armaments on a defensive system alone, when we do

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not admit that other nations do the same. I do not wish to attack other nations, and I do not suggest that they are less patriotic or virtuous than ourselves; but is it not perfectly obvious that a great Fleet is necessary to these islands in a sense in which it is not necessary to any other nation in the world? It is necessary on purely defensive lines, and would be as necessary if it were impossible, and I believe it to be undesirable, that we should ever add another square mile to the territories we already possess. For my part, the last thing I want to see is any extension of the British Empire. I want to see its strengthening and consolidation. I want it to be unshaken in any circumstances by the fear of hostile aggression, safe not merely within the four seas, not merely Scotland, Ireland, and England, but safe in our colonial possessions and safe on the north-west frontier of India. The hon. Gentleman opposite has told us that it is folly to consider the north-west frontier, because the only country that can threaten that frontier has suffered defeat and is in the throes of a great social revolution. Has the hon. Gentleman's historical study not convinced him that nations in the throes of a great social revolution are capable at the same time of foreign aggression? The greatest wars we have known have been carried out by nations in that condition; and though I firmly believe that the last thing the Russian Government contemplates or desires is an attack on this country—;I believe that the relations between Russia and England at this moment are of a most friendly description—;I fail to see why we should on that account not keep ourselves in a state of preparation against conceivable contingencies of policy on the part of a great and friendly neighbour, just as Germany and France and Italy and Austria keep themselves in a state of preparation against similar contingencies.
MR. J. M. ROBERTSON: I said that there had been extra expenditure on the Indian frontier.
MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not admit that. The whole question of the expenditure on the north-west frontier of India is a matter which has not been, indeed, could not have been, adequately completed by the Committee of Defence,
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and at this moment it is under consideration, as it was when I ceased to be a member of that body. The truth is that this country has in the main to consider two great problems. We have to maintain an Army adequate for home defence, which need not be on a very large scale, and an Army adequate for the defence of the north-west frontier of India. We ought also to have some power of military expansion which would enable us to deal with a great war, and a Fleet which would make us absolutely secure against any possible combination against our shores. Is there anything aggressive in that policy? We have to protect our coasts at home and abroad and also the great commerce which comes and goes between our home ports and our Colonial ports. If foreign nations are ready to diminish their armaments let them begin and we will follow suit. [Cries of "Oh, oh," and laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen laugh, but this is a subject upon which I really venture to think they know less than I do—;of the questions of principle which govern naval considerations. I am not venturing to enter into competition with them with regard to the sociological aspect. The principle of this country has always been to watch what is being done by foreign countries, not to anticipate them, but to follow them; and foreign countries have only to diminish their fleet building, and they will find under this Government, as they would have found, I believe, under the last, that we should follow suit. But as our Fleet is for defensive purposes and their fleet is not for defensive purposes alone—;["Why not?"] Because their shores are unassailable, partly for geographical reasons and partly for the reason that they have great land armies which would make invasion by any Maritime Power absolutely ludicrous and futile. Therefore their navies are not needed to defend their shores—;not wholly or mainly needed to defend their shores. They are in an essentially different position from what we are; and if there is to be a diminution of armaments—;which all, not merely the sociologists, must desire—;it must begin with these whose armaments are kept up for purposes not merely defensive. There is no foreign nation who supposes we should invade them. Putting friendship apart, conceive as a military enterprise

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invading France, Germany, or Russia. Of course, you cannot; the thing is absurd; and their fleets are not maintained in order to prevent a great sea power invading their territory. That is not their purpose, and cannot be their purpose; and I would beg the hon. Gentleman before he asks us to diminish the securities of these territories to consider what is the true military and naval problem this country has to face. Whilst I agree with him that the armaments of the world might with enormous advantage be diminished, abolished if you will, that policy is one which cannot be carried out by one country; it is a policy which must be initiated by nations who, absolutely secure at home, so far as naval operations are concerned, may, if they will, diminish their fleets.
In regard to military operations, as I think our danger is not within these islands at all but on the frontier of India, there are other considerations which it would not be proper for me at this time to dwell upon. I would only ask the House to consider one more question. The hon. Gentleman said the Roman Empire sank under the amount of its military obligations. I believe that to be wholly unhistorical. I am certain that this country, at all events, heavy as the burden of its military expenditure is, is not sinking under it. On the contrary, whenever hon. Gentlemen opposite think they can make a point against my right hon. friend the Member for Birmingham, they say the country was never so flourishing, trade was never increasing by such leaps and bounds, the wealth of the individual, the well-being of the community, the prosperity of capital, and the healthy character of enterprise never were so marked. Whether all these good things be true or not, this country certainly is not sinking under its armaments. Nobody would rejoice more than I in seeing those armaments reduced; but I tell the House with all solemnity, after an experience extending now over many years, that my belief is that, if you mean to have peace in Europe, if you mean your diplomacy, while unaggressive, to be successful, if you want your Foreign Minister to carry out your negotiations with some chance of success, if you want to avoid one of those catastrophes which, in spite of great armaments, have been less frequent in recent years than they were
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in the days when armaments were small, not to neglect that military and naval backing without which national diplomacy is bound to fail, and national security itself may be threatened. This is the warning I give to a hostile audience, I am afraid; but I give it in all sincerity. If we, the late Government, erred by having too large armaments, we erred in the patriotic belief that these armaments were necessary. If it can be shown by the present Government, after considering all the circumstances of the case, that these armaments may be diminished, well and good. But do not in answer to abstract reasoning, based on no consideration of the real necessities of the case, plunge into a reckless course of diminishing the forces, naval and military, on which your dignity and security ultimately depend.
SIR EDWARD GREY: The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City has at the end of his speech, given us some counsels of perfection which still leave me in doubt as to what view he takes of the actual Resolution before the House. His last declarations were entirely abstract declarations, with which I shall not find fault, because they were simply to the effect that you must have an adequate Army and Navy if you are to have an effective foreign policy. That ignores what to my mind is the whole point of the Resolution, which is that these things are a question of degree, and for the same reason I think it was not relevant to the particular Motion before the House to bring into the question the dispute with the Turkish Government. With regard to that question the right hon. Gentleman asked what chance we should have of bringing it to a successful conclusion if we had no Fleet and no Army. But that has nothing to do with the Resolution. He went on to say that we had every prospect of bringing that to a successful conclusion because of the efficiency of our Army and Navy at the present time; but that condition is one coming after considerable reductions in the Navy Estimates which have been made by his own Government. There have been considerable reductions in the Navy Estimates last year, yet we are able to deal satisfactorily with such an incident as that of the Egyptian frontier. Is the right hon. Gentleman able to say that the reductions which his Government

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made before leaving office are the only reductions that would not jeopardise the national policy of this country? Our whole policy is that national expenditure has grown enormously in the last few years and that now we have reached the turning-point and there is a prospect that the expenditure can be considerably reduced without sacrificing national safety. I admit we may not be able to do all that we wish, and the limitation must be national safety. But the particular point, and the most interesting point, I think, in this Resolution is whether it would not be possible to increase the amount of reduction which can be made, compatible with national safety, by doing all we can to influence the policy of other countries in the same direction. Well, a good deal, no doubt, does depend on the policy of other countries, and when I say the policy of other countries I mean the general feeling amongst the peoples in Europe. And I do hold that a declaration of this kind from a British House of Commons is something that is worth having, if only for the effect it may have on other Governments. It is true that in this country there is a very strong feeling in favour of reduction, but it is not in this country only; in other countries, too, the burden is felt; and anybody who reads the Press of foreign countries will see that year by year in different contries of Europe there is growing a national consciousness of the enormous burden of naval and military expenditure. That is a tendency which we welcome abroad as we welcome it amongst ourselves. I do not believe that at any time has the conscious public opinion in the various countries of Europe set more strongly in the direction of peace than at the present time, and yet the burden of military and naval expenditure goes on increasing. If it be true that that is the direction in which the conscious public opinion of the peoples is tending, that ought to be realised sooner or later in the reduction of that expenditure. When The Hague Conference meets, what will be its object? To promote peace, to diminish the horrors of war. No greater service could it do than to make the conditions of peace less expensive than they are at the present time. To all the horrors of war which are commonly known there are, no doubt, certain off-sets on the other side. You may set triumph against physical suffer-
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ing, the fine qualities of courage and self sacrifice against wounds and loss of life in war; but against the expenditure which war entails you have no set-off of that kind. That remains, after all the excitement and passion of war is over, as a heavy dead-weight pressing on the national life, lowering the standard of vitality in the country. Nowadays the expenditure in Europe on armies and navies is so great that in a sense every year we suffer that depression of national life which, though we are at peace, is in itself one of the worst conditions of war. Now, there is no more profitable task to which any such thing as The Hague Conference might aspire than to produce some such practical result of agreement amongst nations as would lead to reduction of this unproductive expenditure. It is true there are difficulties about coming to any settlement. I will not dwell on these difficulties. They are there, and they make themselves easily felt without my dilating upon them. But it was the original object of the first Hague Conference to do something to reduce expenditure, or, at any rate, to stop the increase of expenditure. The reason for doing that is not less urgent now than it was then. On the contrary, it is more urgent. It is said we are waiting upon foreign nations in order to reduce our expenditure. As a matter of fact, we are all waiting on each other. Some day or other somebody must take the first step. I think it was the hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite who said that our naval policy was dictated by the building policy of other nations. I am sure that, when we are all met together at The Hague Conference, if our policy is so inter-dependent on the policy of other nations, the possibility of reducing expenditure should be one of the subjects which should be discussed. As to the Amendment which has been proposed, I would suggest, with all deference to my hon. and gallant friend, that he should not press it to a division, for this reason. The last part of his Amendment would preclude us from taking any initiative at The Hague Conference in suggesting a reduction of armaments. We ought not to be precluded in any way. Before we can say in what form the question will be brought forward, we must know the wishes and opinions of other Powers. It may be that there is some other Power ready

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and anxious to take the initiative; but we certainly must not be precluded from taking that initiative. We must be there to do all in our power to encourage its coming forward in the most practical form. Therefore, I cannot in any circumstances accept the last, part of my hon. and gallant friend's Amendment. With regard to the first part, relating to naval supremacy, I would sugest that there never was a time when it was less necessary to insist upon that than at the present moment. I believe there never has been a time when the relative and comparative supremacy of the British Navy was greater than it is now, and that at the present moment it is at least as sure as it ever has been in our history. If that be so, surely we can, at any rate for one evening, devote our attention to pressing upon the House and upon public opinion generally, the need for economy. And, so far as the Government is concerned, though I cannot extend the promises which have been made by the Prime Minister and others of my colleagues as to specific reductions, and though what we can do with regard to The Hague Conference must depend on the response from other Governments—;which in turn will depend partly on the interest which other Parliaments take in the matter—;I do, on behalf of the Government, not only accept but welcome such a Resolution as this as a wholesome and beneficial expression of opinion. And just as in the time of the late Government Lord Goschen, then First Lord of the Admiralty, issued a public invitation on behalf of the Government to other countries to respond to the feeling of this country for a reduction of naval armaments, so I trust this Resolution may be taken as being an invitation from the British House of Commons to respond to their feeling in favour of encouraging a reduction of armaments.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Main Question put, and agreed to.
Resolved, That this House is of opinion that the growth of expenditure on armaments is excessive and ought to be reduced, such expenditure lessens national and commercial credit, intensifies the unemployed problem, reduces the resources available for social reform, and presses with exceptional severity on the industrial classes, and it therefore calls upon the Government to take drastic steps to reduce the drain on national income, and to this end to press for the inclusion of the question of the reduction of armaments by international agreement in the agenda of the forth coming Hague Conference.

MARKET GARDENERS' COMPENSA- TION BILL.
Order for Second Reading read, and discharged. Bill withdrawn.
MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS BILL.
Read a second time, and committed for To-morrow.
SALMON FISHERIES (IRELAND) (No. 2) BILL.
Read a second time, and committed for Monday next.

MILITARY MANŒUVRES (ORDER IN COUNCIL).
Resolved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying His Majesty to make the Order in Council under The Military Manœuvres Act, 1897, a draft of which was presented to this House on the 21st day of February last.—;(Mr. Secretary Haldane.)
To be presented by Privy Councillors and Members of His Majesty's Household.
Adjourned at three minutes after Eleven o'clock.