Sitting of 13 July 1909

Preamble
Mr. SPEAKER took the chair at a Quarter before Three of the clock.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
London County Council (Money) Bill,

As amended, considered:-Ordered, That Standing Orders 223 and 243 be suspended, and that the Bill be now read the third time.—[The Chairman of Ways and Means.] Bill accordingly read the third time, and passed.

Ardrossan Harbour Order Confirmation Bill [Lords],

Read a second time: to be considered upon Thursday.

Lune Fisheries Provisional Order Bill [By Order].

Second Beading deferred till Tuesday next.

EXPORTS AND IMPORTS (UNITED KINGDOM).
Return ordered, "showing for the year 1908 the value of our exports to and consignments from France, the United States, Belgium, and Germany, respectively, distinguishing between food, drink, and tobacco, raw materials, and manufactures (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 185, of Session 1908)."—[Mr. George Greenwood.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Affairs in Persia (Russian Military Movements.
  Dr. RUTHERFORDasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has received any representations from the Government of Turkey regarding the military expeditions of Russia into Persia; and whether he can say whether the young Turks are in active sympathy with the Persian Liberals in their struggle for constitutional Government?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Edward Grey): No representation has been addressed to us from the Government of Turkey, and I cannot say what has passed between the two Governments directly concerned, and I cannot undertake the responsibility of expressing the views of political parties in other countries.
  Mr. J. C. FLYNN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether a large Russian force, including artillery and cavalry, have now marched——
  Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise out of this question.
  Mr. FLYNN (for Mr. Dillon)asked the Secretary of State when he will lay upon the Table of the House further Papers on the affairs of Persia?
  Sir E. GREY: Owing to the necessity of referring the papers to His Majesty's Minister at Tehran, it will not be possible to lay further papers on the affairs of Persia for a few weeks, but there will be no unnecessary delay. It has been necessary to communicate with Tehran by despatch about them, and this takes some time.
  Mr. FLYNN (for Mr. Dillon)asked whether the British representative in Tehran expressed any opinion on the terms demanded by the Nationalist leaders; if so, whether His Majesty's Government was consulted before that opinion was expressed; whether His Majesty's Government have condemned those demands as unreasonable; and, if so, on what grounds?
  Sir E. GREY: His Majesty's Minister at Tehran informed the Sipahdar that only two of the Nationalist demands were such as could be pressed by the two Legations on the acceptance of the Shah. His Majesty's Government were not consulted beforehand, but as the hon. Member is aware from the answer which I gave to a supplementary question asked by him on the 8th instant, they share Sir George Barclay's view on the subject. I do not think I have hitherto expressed an opinion upon the demands generally, and I do not see why I should go beyond what has already been said.
  Mr. FLYNN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these demands include the formation of a Liberal Cabinet which would meet with the acceptance of the Persian people?
  Sir E. GREY: They include the formation of a Cabinet, chosen by local assemblies over Persia.
  Mr. FLYNN (for Mr. Dillon)asked whether, in view of the constant communications now passing between the Russian Government and the British Government on Persian affairs, and of the fact that the British Government has by approval made itself jointly responsible for the advance of Russian troops into Northern Persia, he can now see his way to suggesting to the Russian Government the withdrawal of all Russian officers from the service of the Shah; whether Colonel Liakhoff and his fellow officers are still Russian subjects; and whether any injury inflicted upon them would be accounted by the Russian Government as an injury to their subjects, justifying an advance on Tehran?
  Sir E. GREY: The withdrawal of the Russian officers from the service of the Shah is not a matter in which we are concerned. These officers are still Russian subjects, and I am unable to say what view the Russian Government would take of their obligations towards those subjects if the case supposed by the hon. Member were to arise. That is a question for the Russian Government themselves to decide. Nor can I admit that the fact that the two Governments inform each other of the measures which they may think it desirable to take for the protection of their interests in different parts of Persia implies that each is responsible for the actions of the other. Any such assumption is entirely erroneous.
  Mr. FLYNN: Is it not a fact that these are Russian officers on active service, are Russian subjects, and do they not come within the purview of the Anglo-Russian Convention?
  Sir E. GREY: No, Sir; I do not see how they do. Perhaps the hon. Member will refer to the Convention and see under what Article they would come.
  Mr. H.F.B. LYNCH: May I ask whether as the Nationalists have scrupulously refrained from engaging foreign officers, the right hon. Gentleman will represent to the Russian Government the desirability of withdrawing their officers?
  Sir E. GREY: I must confine the action of the Foreign Office as far as possible to British interests.
  Mr. GEORGE GOOCHasked whether the Russian troops now in Persia have been sent exclusively for the protection of the subjects of European Powers; and, if so, why such a large force has been des-patched?
  Sir E. GREY: I can add nothing to the explicit declarations of the Russian Government themselves, which have already been made public. I am unable to state what considerations determined the number actually to be sent, or to express any opinion as to the strength of the force which would be necessary to deal with the situation.
  Mr. LYNCH: Do not the two Governments who are signatories to the Anglo-Russian Convention consult one another as to these military matters?
  Sir E. GREY: I have already stated that communications have passed between the two Governments, who keep each other informed as to the steps they may think it right to take in their own interests, but there is nothing in the Convention that would make one Government responsible for the action of the other. I entirely disclaim any such proposition.
  Mr. LYNCHrose and asked a question which was inaudible——
  Mr. SPEAKER: Will the hon. Member kindly speak up, so that he can be heard?
  Mr. LYNCH: The question I was about to ask was this: The right hon. Gentleman has told us that the two Governments consult one another as regards the despatch of troops to Persia. May I ask whether, when the Russian Government informed His Majesty's Government of the despatch of these troops, any opinion was expressed by His Majesty's Government as to the adequacy or excess of the force in question over those required for the protection of life and property?
  Sir E. GREY: I did not say that the two Governments consulted each other. I said they kept each other informed of the steps that they thought it necessary to take in advance. I expressed no opinion as to the strength of the force required.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Are we to understand that so far as Great Britain is concerned Russia has a free hand to do what she likes in Persia?
  Sir E. GREY: It is very misleading for the hon. Member to attempt to draw from

  1831
  my answers a general statement of that sweeping kind. Our object is to protect British interests in Persia. When we consider these interests are affected we shall take suitable measures. It is quite unfair to draw from any statement I have made a general statement of that kind, which goes far beyond anything I have said.
  Mr. FLYNNasked the Secretary of State if he can state what is the strength of the Russian force now in Northern Persia; has he seen the statement of the responsible Nationalist leaders that their forces are commanded not to fight unless forced to do so, and their desire to secure a real and not a paper constitution; and what is the justification, under these circumstances, of the military occupation of Northern Persia by the Russian troops?
  Sir E. GREY: About 4,000 men are understood to be at Tabriz, and about 1,700 on their way to Kazvin, and about 600 more are distributed at other places in the north of Persia, besides the ordinary Consular guards. The troops are stationed at the various places for the protection of foreign lives and property from the possibility of danger, and are to be withdrawn as soon as that possibility no longer exists. A statement such as that described in the question was addressed from Kazvin to the foreign legations at Tehran, but there have been occasional statements from Nationalist sources of a different character.
  Mr. FLYNN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say that this force which has been reinforced to-day is necessary for the sole purpose of the protection of lives and property of non-belligerents in Tehran; and does it not rather point to its being used against the Persian popular forces?
  Sir E. GREY: I have already stated twice this afternoon that I am not in a position to express any opinion as to the strength of the force that would be required.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Is it not the general policy to make Tehran a little St. Petersburg?
  Mr. J. D. REES: Is the Government in a position to decide who are the responsible Nationalist leaders?

  Greek Bands in Monastir.
  Mr. GEORGE GOOCHasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether
  1832
  he had any information as to the existence and activity of Greek bands in the neighbourhood of Monastir and elsewhere; and, if so, whether he will make representations to the Greek Government?
  Sir E. GREY: The number of murders which Greeks are reported to have committed in Macedonia was five in March, two in April, and six in May. No report has been received of exceptional activity of Greek bands in the vilayet of Monastir during the last three months. The attention of the Greek Government has recently been called to the reported secret landing of three Greek bands on the Gulf of Salonica in April last, but they have denied the truth of this rumour.

  Affairs in Morocco (British Interests).
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State whether he can make any statement as to affairs in Morocco and the safety of British life and interests?
  Sir E. GREY: I have nothing to add to the answer which I gave to a similar Question addressed to me by the hon. Member on the 24th ultimo. From the latest reports which we have received, the country near Fez appears still to be in a disturbed state, but there is no disturbance at the ports.

  Russian Troops at Meshed.
  Mr. HART-DAVIES: I desire to ask the right hon. Baronet whether any Russian troops have been sent to Meshed?
  Sir E. GREY: I beg to refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply just returned to the hon. Member for North Cork.

  Russian Rights in Persia.
  Mr. O'GRADYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that the Russian Consul-General at Resht, in a letter dated 23rd March addressed to the Sipahdar, stated that the road from Resht to Tehran was the property of the Russian Government; will he say if this is the case; and, if so, does any provision exist in the Anglo-Russian agreement giving Russia the right to guard the road by the armed force of her own troops?
  Sir E. GREY: I have no information as to such a letter. The road in question was constructed by, and is the property of, a Russian company. The Anglo-Russian Agreement has been published as a Parliamentary Paper, so that the hon. Gentleman can satisfy himself at any time as to

  1833
  the nature of its provisions. There are numbers of contingencies for which the Anglo-Russian Convention does not provide and was not intended to provide.
  Mr. LYNCH: Is it not a fact that this road is under Persian jurisdiction?
  Sir E. GREY: It was made by Russian money.
  Mr. REES: Is it not a fact that there are only two roads in Persia. One was made by the Russian Government and the other by the hon. Member for Ripon?
  Mr. O'GRADY: Is it not a fact that one of the provisions in the Convention says that it is the special interest of the two Powers to maintain peace in certain parts of Persia itself, and that all this has taken place in parts not provided for by a Convention?
  Sir E. GREY: What parts are not provided for in the Convention? I do not understand the hon. Member's question.
  Mr. O'GRADY: The passage in the Convention I refer to is——
  Mr. SPEAKER: Order, order. That is not a question.

  Persian Nationalist Leaders.
  Mr. O'GRADY: I wish to ask the right hon. Baronet whether he is aware that the Russian and British Consuls-General informed Satar Khan and other leaders of the Nationalists that the Shah had granted an amnesty to all political offenders, and that as soon as the Nationalists attempted to take advantage of such information they were attacked by Cossacks, and had to seek sanctuary in the Turkish Legation; if so, whether the Consuls had the authority of the Shah to so inform the Nationalist leaders; and what steps His Majesty's Government intend taking to see that the Shah will carry out the promise of an amnesty?
  Sir E. GREY: The British and Russian Consuls-General were authorised by their Legations at Tehran to inform the Nationalists that no one, whatever his nationality, would be molested for his share in recent events. I have heard of no reason to suppose that this promise was violated. As to the reasons why some of the Nationalists took refuge at the Turkish Legation, I can add nothing to the answer which I gave on the 8th. My information does not bear out the statement in the question on this point.

  Russian Consul-General's Action in Persia.
  Mr. O'GRADYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware that it has been the practice of the reactionaries in Persia to attach themselves to the Russian post on the road from Resht to Tehran for the purpose of giving information to the entourage of the Shah respecting the disposition of the Nationalist troops in the field; whether, on the Nationalists taking action to prevent these proceedings, they were threatened with armed intervention by the Russian Consul-General; and, if so, whether such threat amounts to an interference in the internal affairs of Persia and is a breach of the Anglo-Russian Agreement?
  Sir E. GREY: I have no information as to the practice or the incident referred to.
  Mr. FLYNN: I wish to ask the right hon. Baronet whether the Persian troops at Tehran have not been received with enthusiasm by the populace; and whether that fact points to any violation of order?
  Sir E. GREY: I have not heard about that.
  Mr. REES: Can the Secretary for Foreign Affairs take any cognisance of anyone known as "reactionaries in Persia"?

  Persian Constitutional Forces.
  Mr. A. H. SCOTTasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he can state which of the demands formulated by the leaders of the Constitutionalist forces surrounding Tehran His Majesty's Government consider unreasonable; and on what grounds?
  Sir E. GREY: This was answered in my reply to the question put by the hon. Member for East Mayo.
  Mr. LYNCH: Can the right hon. Gentleman state which of the demands have been considered unreasonable by His Majesty's Government?
  Sir E. GREY: I said there were only two of the demands which the British Minister at Tehran considered could be made the subject of representation by the two Legations. So far as I am aware I have said nothing at all about the other demands. I do not think it is my business to comment upon it.
  Mr. LYNCH: On what grounds were the demands as a whole thought unadvisable by His Majesty's Government?
  Sir E. GREY: It is not our business to say whether they are advisable or unadvisable. The question is whether we should take any part in supporting any of them. There were only two which came within the cognisance of the Legations.
  Mr. LYNCH: Why were the others not taken into account?
  Sir E. GREY: Because Northern Persia is not British territory.

  Russian Troops in Persia.
  Mr. LYNCH: I desire to ask the right hon. Baronet whether he can state the number of the Russian troops at present in Persia, and approximately their distribution?
  Sir E. GREY: I beg to refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply just returned to the hon. Member for North Cork. I have not included in the enumeration the guards attached to Russian Consular establishments in Persia, except in cases where they have recently been increased.

  Shah's Amnesty Decree (Political Offences).
  Mr. LYNCHasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether the Shah's decree of 10th May, granting an amnesty for political offences, with licence for exiles to return to Persia, has been communicated officially by the Persian Government to the Governments of Great Britain and Russia; and, in view of the fact that similar proclamations from the same source have frequently been broken, can he state whether any and, if so, what guarantees have been given to the exiles that their lives and property will be scrupulously respected upon their return to Persia?
  Mr. REES: Before the right hon. Baronet answers that question I would like to ask him whether the execution of any such guarantees would not be a flagrant breach of the policy of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of Persia?
  Sir E. GREY: The decree in question has been so communicated. No special guarantees have been given, but the two Legations would, of course, use all their influence to see that a promise given through them was not violated.

  Russian Advance in Tehran.
  Mr. PONSONBYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether there
  1836
  is any understanding with the Russian Government that before their troops advance beyond Kazvin the consent of the other party to the Anglo-Russian Convention should be obtained, and that their troops should not advance unless the lives and property of Europeans in Tehran are in imminent danger?
  Sir E. GREY: The Russian Government have explicitly declared that their troops will not advance to Tehran except for the protection of European lives and property against imminent danger. There is no other understanding between the two Governments.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Has the Secretary for Foreign Affairs received any information to-day about this question?
  Sir E. GREY: The information from this district is very confused, and it is very difficult to make any definite statement in regard to it.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Has the right hon. Gentleman received no definite information to-day?
  Sir E. GREY: I have not received information which states definitely whether there is danger or not. I understand that telephonic communication is interrupted, and it is quite possible events have occurred of which we have not heard.
  Mr. MACKARNESS: Is it not a fact that the Cossacks at Tehran are defending the market square?
  Sir E. GREY: I have already answered that question.
  Mr. REES: Are those Cossacks not ordinary Persian subjects?
  Sir E. GREY: I think that is understood.
  Mr. REES: I doubt it.

  Persian Nationalist Leaders (Demands).
  Mr. PONSONBY: I wish to ask the right hon. Baronet whether he is aware that the demands formulated by the leaders of the Nationalist forces in the neighbourhood of Tehran are, in many respects, identical with those presented to the late Sultan of Turkey by the general of the Salonika troops, prior to his entry into Constantinople; and can he state the grounds upon which the representatives of Great Britain and Russia have informed the leaders of the Nationalist forces in Persia that, should they persist in their intention to enter Tehran, a Russian force would also enter that city?
  Sir E. GREY: I have no knowledge of any formal list of demands presented to the late Sultan at the time mentioned. The objects which the Salonika troops had in view appear to me to be dissimilar from those of the Bakhtiaris and Nationalists. The representatives of Great Britain and Russia made no intimation to the leaders of the Persian Nationalists respecting an entry into Tehran. It was stated to those who were threatening Tehran that the best way to avoid foreign intervention was to restore order and give the Constitution as now re-established a chance.
  Mr. LYNCH: I understand that if order is maintained by the Nationalist forces, there will be no excuse for foreign intervention?
  Sir E. GREY: The hon. Member must give me notice of that question.

  Russian Troops in Tabriz.
  Mr. PONSONBYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention has been called to statements made on Russian authority to the effect that the Russian troops in Tabriz have disarmed the population of that city, including the Nationalist force; and will he inquire of His Majesty's Consul-General at Tabriz on this subject?
  Sir E. GREY: My information is to the effect that the commander of the Russian forces at Tabriz originally suggested disarmament, but that the Russian Government replied that only Russian subjects should be disarmed, and I see no reason to address a further inquiry to His Majesty's Consul-General at Tabriz on the subject.

  Portuguese West Africa (Cocoa Plantations).
  Mr. CATHCART WASON: I desire to ask the right hon. Baronet whether, with reference to the conditions of labour on the cocoa plantations at St. Thomé, Portuguese West Africa, any modifications or alterations have taken place in the manner in which such labour is recruited in Angola; and if he will state their nature?
  Sir E. GREY: I understand that new regulations respecting recruitment in Angola are being drawn up, and will shortly be published. From statements previously made in the Cortes it appears that the districts within which recruitment will be permitted will be limited very strictly. The new arrangements will be
  1838
  placed under the supervision and direct control of specially appointed officials, who will be responsible to the Governor-General of the Province. Full particulars of the number of labourers recruited, their place of origin, and a certificate that their contracts have been properly entered into will be periodically published in the official paper. In all cases of future engagements repatriation will be ensured whenever the native desires it, and in Angola measures will be introduced to protect repatriated natives and to facilitate, as far as possible, their return to their homes. I must add, further, that the Portuguese Government have decided that until the new regulations become effective no further recruitment will be permitted in Angola, which is evidence of their intention to prevent abuses.
  Mr. CATHCART WASON: With reference to repatriation, will the regulations ensure that those natives who have been sent to Angola and to St. Thorne will be allowed to return to their own country, and I would like to know whether they will be compelled to return?
  Sir E. GREY: I do not think people should be compelled to return against their will if they wish to stay. What is understood is that if they desire to come back there is an obligation to provide them facilities for doing so. The regulations which have been drawn up are shortly to be published, and then we shall have fuller information about them.
  Mr. H. BELLOC: During the diplomatic conversations on this subject, has the Portugese representative ever alluded to the conditions of labour in British South Africa?
  Sir E. GREY: I am not aware that any such references have been made.
  Mr. BELLOC: Then they have missed an opportunity.

  Russian Military Expeditions into Persia.
  Dr. RUTHERFORDasked whether, in view of the fact that the Nationalists have always protected the lives and property of Europeans and are prepared to continue to do so, the right hon. Gentleman will make representations to the Government of Russia that a large and growing body of public opinion in this country regards the Russian military expeditions into Persia as unnecessary to the safety of Europeans and hostile to the establishment of law and order under a permanent system of constitutional government?
  Sir E. GREY: It is no doubt the case that the Nationalist leaders are prepared to do their best to protect the lives and property of Europeans, but it is difficult to say whether they would under all circumstances be able to control all their followers or the consequences of disturbances. The advance of the Russian force to Kazvin is a measure of precaution which, it is to be hoped, it may prove unnecessary to follow up by any more active steps. The matter does not appear to me to be one as to which representations can properly or usefully be made to the Russian Government.
  Mr. REES: May I ask whether the Royalist leaders have also failed to protect the lives and property of Europeans, and whether the Foreign Office, in communicating with foreign Governments, recognises the hon. Member for Brentford (Dr. Rutherford) as representing a large and growing public opinion in this country?

  Protection of Europeans in Persia.
  Mr. JAMES PARKER(for Mr. Ramsay Macdonald)asked whether the Persian Cossack force which was attacked by the Nationalist forces at Shahabad on 4th July tore to pieces the bodies of some of the attacking force who had fallen in battle; whether the Cossack force was under the command of Russian officers; and, in order to avoid reprisals upon the persons of these officers, involving the safety of Europeans in Persia, are the Russian Government taking any steps to withdraw from Persia the officers in question?
  Sir E. GREY: I hare seen a report to this effect, but I cannot say what the circumstances were. It has also been reported that the maintenance of control of the Russian officers over Persian Cossacks was doubtful.

  Midnapur Conspiracy Case.
  Sir HENRY COTTONasked the Under-Secretary for India whether the magistrate of Midnapur, whose conduct was impugned by the Chief Justice of Bengal in his judgment on the Midnapur conspiracy case, has been appointed by the Government to assist the Commissioner of Burdwan in his inquiry into the facts of that case?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for INDIA (the Master of Elibank): The suggestions
  1840
  made in the hon. Member's question are entirely without foundation. Mr. Weston, the magistrate referred to, has no authority whatever in the inquiry.
  Sir H. COTTON: Does not Mr. Weston cross-examine the witnesses who are produced before the court?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: I understand he has a perfect right to cross-examine witnesses in connection with his own conduct.
  Sir H. COTTON: One other question——
  Mr. SPEAKER: Will the hon. Member kindly put the question down; it has evidently been prepared beforehand.
  Mr. SWIFT MacNEILLasked whether the judgment of the High Court, reversing on appeal the convictions and sentences in the Midnapur conspiracy case, has yet reached the India Office; and whether, having regard to the observations of the judge as to the methods adopted by the subordinates of the Indian Government, the enforcement of confessions, and the opinion that the bomb explosion was the work of the Indian police, that judgment will be laid before Parliament?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The Secretary of State has received a copy of the report of the judgment published in the Calcutta newspaper Press. The full text, having been so published and made accessible, the Secretary of State does not consider that its presentation to Parliament is called for.

  Gazetted Officers in Bombay (House Rent Allowances).
  Mr. REESasked whether house rent allowances have been sanctioned for gazetted officers, in Bombay similar to those which have been drawn for the last three years by officers in the like position in Calcutta?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The Secretary of State has not yet received any proposal from the Government of India for providing house accommodation or house rent allowances for Government officers stationed at Bombay.

  Deportations in India.
  Mr. MACKARNESSasked the Under-Secretary for India whether he has any official information that Mr. Lajpat Rai, who was deported in 1907 without charge

  1841
  or trial by the Government of India for alleged sedition, has brought an action against the "Englishman" newspaper of Calcutta for libelling him by alleging that he had been guilty of sedition in that he had tampered with the loyalty of the Indian sepoys, and that Mr. Justice Fletcher, of the Calcutta High Court, after hearing the evidence of Mr. Lajpat Rai, held the statement to be a malicious libel upon him and awarded him damages to the amount of £l,000?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The Secretary of State has as yet received no official Report on the subject.
  Mr. REES: May I ask the hon. Member whether an appeal lies, and whether he has any information that an appeal has been presented?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: I have no information to that effect.
  Mr. MACKARNESS: Would it not be in the interests of justice, in view of the charge made on the floor of this House two years ago, that the truth should be declared here at the earliest possible moment, if that charge has been disproved and found utterly false by a judge of the High Court?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The Secretary of State has taken into consideration all these matters, and he has asked for a mailed Report of the proceedings.
  Mr. MACKARNESS: When shall we be entitled to know the result?
  Mr. MACKARNESSasked whether the cases of the nine British subjects in Bengal who were deported and imprisoned without charge or trial in December last were reconsidered by the Government of India on 1st July; and, if so, would he state what decision was arrived at and the grounds for that decision?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The Secretary of State has no doubt that the provisions of the Regulation in this respect have been complied with, but he has received no communication on the subject from the Government of India. He will inquire.
  Mr. REES: May I ask a supplementary question?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member has a great many questions to ask. Will he put them down.

  Assassination of Sir Curzon Wyllie.
  Mr. MacNEILLasked whether the Indian Government will, in accordance with the precedent of the pension conferred on the widow of Earl Mayo, confer a pension on the widow of Sir Curzon Wyllie?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The precedents are under consideration, with a view to the best way of dealing with this most grievous case.
  Dr. RUTHERFORD: Will the hon. Gentleman represent to the Secretary of State (Lord Morley) and the Government the wisdom of providing this pension out of British and not out of Indian funds?

  Advocate-General of Bengal.
  Mr. SWIFT MacNEILLasked the hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that Mr. G. R. Kenrick, a barrister of 16 years' standing, practising at the Outer Bar in England, without previous experience in India, has been appointed by the Secretary of State to the position of Advocate-General of Bengal, and thereby becomes chief law officer to the Bengal Government and official head of the Bar in India, with an official salary and precedence of other members of the Bar; what is the date of the last occasion on which an appointment was made from Home to this office; and whether, having regard to the fact that the Advocate-Generalship has been given for a generation to gentlemen practising at the Indian Bar of long experience of the making and administration of courts of law in India, he will state the reasons in this case of the departure from established practice?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: The office of Advocate-General at Madras was filled by an appointment from this country in 1900. The appointment referred to in the question was made by the Crown on the recommendation of the Secretary of State, who is fully responsible. The Secretary of State does not consider it desirable to state the reasons for his recommendation.
  Mr. MacNEILL: I did not ask about Madras. I want to know the date the office of Advocate-General of Bengal was last filled by a gentleman of the Outer Bar of England, who had never been to India and knew nothing about Indian administration?
  The MASTER of ELIBANK: I will make inquiry.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Was not the last occasion in 1874?
  Mr. SPEAKER: Will the hon. Gentleman put that question down?
  Mr. MacNEILL: It is put down in the question.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I must really remind the hon. Member that there are 80 questions on the Paper. It is very easy to put these questions down if the hon. Member will give himself the trouble.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Of course, I will not press it further, but, with great respect, the question is put down.

  Portuguese Native Labour in the Transvaal.
  Mr. STAVELEY-HILLasked the Under-Secretary for the Colonies whether the Portuguese native labourers recruited for the Transvaal mines are confined in compounds?
  The HON. MEMBERalso asked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government, before authorising the Governor of the Transvaal to sign the Convention with the Governor of the Portuguese province of Mozambique, satisfied themselves that the conditions which led the Transvaal Ordinance, 1904, to be described as partaking of slavery would not become operative in the case of the Portuguese native labourers recruited under this Convention?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for the COLONIES (Colonel Seely): The Portuguese native will, when on the mines, live like other natives in a compound, and will require, like other natives, a pass when he wishes to leave the mine. He will not, however, be like the Chinaman, imported under special legislation and subjected to special restrictions, which place him, if he gets outside the Witwatersrand district, practically in the position of an outlaw. Before authorising Lord Selborne to sign the Convention His Majesty's Government satisfied themselves by telegraphic communication with him that no such objection existed.
  Mr. ASHLEY: How long will these natives be kept in compounds, except when they go out on special passes?
  Colonel SEELY: There is no difficulty about their going out whenever they want to. Their presence is not in the least unwelcome in the district in which they are situated, and there is therefore no diffi-
  1844
  culty. The point in the other case, of course, was that there was objection to their going outside, and there had to be a special police cordon to keep them in.

  Chinese Labour in Transvaal.
  Mr. MACKARNESSasked the Under-Secretary for the Colonies whether he can state the number of Chinese labourers still at work in the mines of the Transvaal; and when the next shipload is expected to leave South Africa on the return voyage to China?
  Colonel SEELY: There were 5,378 Chinese in the Transvaal on 30th June; 2,330 were discharged for repatriation in June, but I have no information as to the date of sailing.

  New Submarines.
  Mr. J. T. MIDDLEMOREasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he will state when the D 1 Submarine will be ready for service; and what was her speed on trial?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. R. McKenna): I regret that we have no information to give on this subject.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked whether any more of the type of the D 1 submarine have been commenced; and can the right hon. Gentleman, without making any statements the publication of which would be detrimental to the public interest, give the House some idea of the efficiency and battle value of these craft?
  Mr. McKENNA: I regret that I have no information to give on this subject.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that the Navy Estimates for 1909–10, bearing the date 5th March, 1909, show that two submarines of the D class are under construction, and that the Dilke Return, in which are included ships building on 31st March, 1909, show that only one vessel of this class was under construction; and whether he will say what was the actual number of submarines of this class built, and building, for the fleet on the latter date?
  Mr. McKENNA: The Navy Estimates are prepared some time in advance, and at the time of preparation it was estimated that D 2 would be ordered before the end of the financial year. This anticipation could not be realised. The Dilke Return was corrected up to the last moment, and was correct.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Does the right hon. Gentleman pledge himself to the accuracy of the Return?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, at the moment it was made, it was quite accurate.

  British, French, United States and German Destroyers.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked how many destroyers there are in the British, French, United States and German Navies with a trial speed of 30 knots or over?
  Mr. McKENNA: The numbers are as follows:—

  Great Britain

  …

  …

  …

  67

  France

  …

  …

  …

  9

  United States

  …

  …

  …

  Nil

  Germany

  …

  …

  …

  27

  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: How many of these 07 English destroyers can maintain their speed now?
  Mr. McKENNA: Given a limited distance and smooth water, and I should think the whole of them would. I should not think they would for a long distance.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Does the right hon. Gentleman mean more than 100 yards?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes.

  Coal Depot at Turnchapel.
  Mr. F. B. MILDMAYasked whether there is any intention of proceeding with the work of providing a coal depot at Turnchapel?
  Mr. McKENNA: After full consideration, it has been decided that it is better for the rapid and economical handling of coal to place the depot at the Keyham North Yard instead of at Turnchapel.
  Mr. MILDMAY: Does the right hon. Gentleman feel at liberty to say to what purpose this land and wharf which have been acquired by the Admiralty are intended to be devoted, and whether considerable expenditure had not already been incurred upon this coal wharf before the reversal of policy?
  Mr. McKENNA: I could not say how much expenditure, but certainly some, was incurred. I do not myself know for what purpose the land was to be used, but I will inquire.

  Royal Marines (Establishment).
  Mr. ASHLEYasked whether there is any intention to reduce the strength of the Royal Marines below the number at which they now stand?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have nothing to add to the reply given to the hon. Member for Handsworth on 6th July.
  Lord BALCARRES: Is it the fact that this reply indicates that the right hon. Gentleman has not finally made up his mind?
  Mr. McKENNA: The number of Marines is fixed to meet the requirements of the time. The policy is stated every year when the Estimates are introduced.
  Lord BALCARRES: Has there been no alteration since the Estimates?
  Mr. McKENNA: None.

  Coaling His Majesty's Ships (Accidents).
  Mr. ASHLEYasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he would issue instructions that patients treated in the sick bays for injuries received while coaling should be separately shown in the Returns?
  Mr. McKENNA: The entries on the sick list of His Majesty's ships on account of injury are already divided and sub-divided into various classes, and I do not think that the benefit to be derived from a special Return for coaling injuries would justify giving up the existing forms and making a further sub-division.
  Mr. ASHLEY: In view of the fact that within the last twelve months there were six fatal injuries and a large number of minor injuries from coaling, will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to ascertain what the injuries are? It is a very important matter.
  Mr. McKENNA: I will inquire further into the matter.

  Manning of Navy (Special Service Seamen and Stokers).
  Mr. ASHLEYasked whether the special service seamen and stokers serving in His Majesty's Fleet are distributed over the whole of the commissioned fleets, or whether they are confined to certain fleets; if the latter is the case, to what fleets are they confined; and what is the maximum proportion of special service seamen and stokers borne in any of His Majesty's ships?
  Mr. McKENNA: Special service seamen and stokers are drafted to all fleets. With regard to the second part of the question, it is undesirable in the public interest to give information concerning the complements of His Majesty's ships.
  Mr. ASHLEY: Is the information refused because the special service seamen and stokers are less well trained than the ordinary seamen and stokers?
  Mr. McKENNA: No, Sir, there is no such reason.

  Naval Floating Docks.
  Mr. FELLasked what depth of water is required for the station of a floating dock capable of containing ships of the "Dreadnought" class.
  Mr. McKENNA: About 60 feet of water under the dock.
  Mr. FELL: Would not a large amount of dredging be necessary for these floating docks on the East Coast?
  Mr. McKENNA: It depends on the particular spots chosen.
  Mr. FELL: Are there any harbours on the East Coast where it is possible to find the necessary depth?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, there are certain places in which there is a depth of 60 ft. of water available for such docks.

  Stoke-on-Trent Telegraphic System.
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked the Postmaster-General whether he has received a communication from the Town Clerk of the Borough of Stoke-upon-Trent relative to the defective telegraph arrangements for that district; and, if so, what action dose he propose to take to remove this grievance.
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Sydney Buxton): I have received a communication from the Town Clerk, but I see no reason to think that the telegraph arrangements are defective, so far as the Post Office is concerned. It was the practice, after the closing of the post office at Stoke-on-Trent, namely 10 p.m., to send urgent telegrams viâ Manchester to Stoke Railway Station for delivery by the North Staffordshire Railway Company. The company, however, finding that the number of such telegrams had diminished (the diminution was not due to any action on the part of the Post Office) decided
  1848
  three months ago to abandon the service, except as regards delivery within the station. There is no case for keeping the post office open all night for telegraph purposes, and, of course, I cannot compel the railway company to keep the station open for delivery.

  National Telephone Company's Plant.
  Mr. RENWICKasked the Postmaster-General whether he had now considered the memorial from the Association of Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom in regard to the telephone service; and what steps he intended to take in the interests of users as to the conclusions in the memorial, that the antiquated and obsolete plant of the National Telephone Company was a serious barrier to the efficiency of the service, that the National Telephone Company should be compelled to incur the necessary expenditure of capital to ensure a more efficient service between now and 31st December, 1911, and that the new measured rate is-exorbitant and beyond what is a necessary charge for services rendered to the subscriber, and, consequently places a heavy burden upon the commercial community?
  Mr. BUXTON: I carefully considered the memorial of the Association of Chambers of Commerce referred to in the question and sent a full reply on the 19th ultimo. I am forwarding a copy of the reply to the hon. Member.
  Mr. RENWICK: Has the Government no power to compel the National Telephone Company to keep its service up-to-date?
  Mr. BUXTON: I have no such power, but the condition of the plant when the question of purchase arises is a material one with regard to the amount to be paid for it.
  Mr. P. CURRAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the National Telephone Company is now starving the system in various parts of the country? Is he prepared to let this go on until 1911?
  Mr. BUXTON: Surely that is not the fact? If the company are doing so it will be very much to their detriment when the question of purchase arises. I am in negotiation with the company on the question of an earlier purchase.
  Mr. CURRAN: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the convenience of the community who use the National Telephone Company's service?
  Mr. BUXTON: Yes, of course, and I said the other day it would be to the advantage of telephone users if the two or three years' interval could be bridged over by an earlier purchase. But it is not quite so easy a matter as appears on the face of it.

  Post Office Engineers (Second Class).
  Mr. RIDSDALEasked the Postmaster-General whether, in the examination for second-class engineers in the Post Office, candidates are, after nomination by the university authorities, scrutinised for eligibility before being permitted to compete in the examination; what purpose the nomination serves if there is this subsequent personal scrutiny; and whether he will consider the desirability of allowing all candidates duly nominated by university authorities to compete?
  Mr. BUXTON: Candidates nominated by university authorities are scrutinised for eligibility by a Board of selection before admission to the competition for engineering appointments in the Post Office. The object of the scrutiny is to bring to bear on the selection of candidates a more exact knowledge of the nature of the work, and the qualifications necessary for performing it successfully, than can be possessed outside the Post Office. It is within the knowledge of all candidates that such a scrutiny will take place.

  Telephone Exchange Service.
  Mr. CARLILEasked the Postmaster-General whether he could see his way to publish a Return showing the number of complaints made in the London area by telephone users as to the difficulty in obtaining communication with the exchange, as to the difficulty in obtaining the number asked for, as to the difficulty of obtaining quick communication with the telegraph office, and as to the number of complaints which have been investigated and what occasioned them; and what action has been taken to render the service more efficient?
  Mr. BUXTON: I shall be happy to furnish the hon. Member with any available information he desires as to the working of the Post Office London telephone service or to give him facilities for personal investigation at the exchanges. The number of complaints is small in relation to the volume of traffic; but they are all
  1850
  carefully examined, and any defects in the service thus brought to light are made good. The subject could not be satisfactorily dealt with in a printed statistical Return.

  Athanasian Creed.
  Mr. BOTTOMLEYasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the resolution of the Lower House of Convocation to omit the existing rubric from the Quicunque Vult of the Athanasian Creed; and whether, before such resolution becomes effective, an opportunity will be afforded to Parliament to consider and ratify the same?
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Asquith): Ratification by Parliament would be required before effect could be given to the proposal referred to by the hon. Member.

  P.O. Telephone (Removal Regulations).
  Mr. CARLILEasked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that the officials of the Post Office, in the case of a removal, or a substitution, or alteration to the telephone, insist upon subscribers signing a paper, yet refuse to state what the cost may be for such removal, alteration, or substitution; and whether this is done with his sanction?
  Mr. BUXTON: Subscribers to the Post Office Telephone Service are required to sign an undertaking to pay the cost of removing their telephones. The simple cases of removal, which include about 70 per cent, of the whole, are covered by standard charges, which are always quoted to the subscribers when they are asked to sign the undertakings. In other cases, where estimates of the cost of the work have to be obtained, the information is always given if required by the subscribers.
  Mr. CARLILE: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that the officials give the information when desired, where the standard rate of charges is concerned?
  Mr. BUXTON: The standard charges are always quoted to subscribers. It is only in special cases they are not, but if a subscriber asks for them the information is always given where possible.
  Mr. CARLILE: My information is that it is not so.
  Mr. BUXTON: If the hon. Member will give me a case I will have inquiry made.

  London Telephone Exchanges.
  Mr. CARLILEasked the Postmaster-General whether he will print for the use of subscribers and users of the telephone a list of the exchanges in London and the exchanges in the vicinity of London, showing the areas which each exchange covers?
  Mr. BUXTON: A list of the kind which the hon. Member desires is already printed at page iv. of the Post Office edition of the current London Telephone Directory.

  One and All Assurance Association.
  Mr. THORNTONasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to the recent proceedings in the Court of Chancery in the matter of the One and All Assurance Association, in the course of which it was stated that 200,000 persons had subscribed a total sum of £58,000; that the benefits paid out amounted to £17,030 only, that the association had suspended payment of benefits, and that on the appointment of a receiver by the court no assets but furniture and printed matter were found; whether he was aware of the fact that the association was not registered as a friendly society, and that similar organisations also not so registered had subsequently been established, and were inviting contributions from the operative classes; and whether he will propose the incorporation in the Assurance Companies Bill of such machinery as will effectually regulate organisations of this class, or will take such other steps as may be best calculated to protect the industrial population from unsound schemes of insurance?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Churchill): My attention has been called to the case of the One and All Assurance Association, and to the proceedings in the Court of Chancery. I am advised that the provisions of the Assurance Companies Bill as drafted will deal effectually with associations of this kind, but if any doubt is felt on this point I will readily consider any representations which my hon. Friend may make to the Board of Trade on the subject. I should add, however, that there is very little chance of this Bill passing into law this Session unless there is a general wish on the part of the House to facilitate its progress.

  Railway Amalgamation (Departmental Committee).
  Mr. HIGHAMasked whether the Departmental Committee recently appointed by
  1852
  him to consider matters relating to railway agreements and amalgamation will sit in public; how often they propose to sit; and whether they have arranged for a full shorthand note of the proceedings at each sitting to be taken and to be placed on sale immediately thereafter.
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I understand that the Committee propose to meet about twice a week, but not in public. I have no doubt that they will follow the usual practice of having a full shorthand note taken of evidence, and I will ask them to inform my hon. Friend of any decision at which they may arrive with regard to the publication of the minutes of evidence.
  Mr. VINCENT KENNEDY: Is there anybody on this Committee who in any way represents Irish railway employés?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise on the question.

  Mercantile Marine (Colour Test Examinations).
  Mr. SUMMERBELLasked the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been called to the case of Mr. Trattles, of Stockton, who passed for first mate in colour tests, as well as for other qualifications, in 1906, and who received the examiner's authority for the delivery of a first mate's certificate, but who afterwards received a letter stating that his examination had been cancelled as he had failed to pass a special colour examination in 1905; whether he is aware that since such time he had been at sea as second mate, giving entire satisfaction to the owners and also the captain of the vessel; that the Board of Trade is now demanding the return of Mr. Trattles' second mate's ticket; and, if so, whether he will give the matter full consideration before adopting any such measures?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: My attention has been called to the case of Mr. Trattles and the facts are as stated. The examiners' authority is "subject to the approval of the Chief Examiner in London and of the Board of Trade." In the interests of safety at sea that approval was withheld. I have reason to believe that the owners and the master of the ship on which Mr. Trattles has since sailed have expressed their Satisfaction with his services. In view of his failure to pass a special examination in colour vision on 28th May last the Board of Trade have decided that they I cannot take the responsibility of allowing

  1853
  him to hold a second mate's certificate, and have, therefore, requested him to surrender it. This decision has been arrived at after the most careful consideration and on the best advice obtainable.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: How was it this man did not receive his certificate?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: A very careful examination is made. The examination has to be ratified by the superior authority from time to time, and it happens that, on the second trial by that superior authority, they took the view that the first examination did not have satisfactory results, and that they could not accept the responsibility of giving a certificate which might lead to loss of life.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: May I take it as a fact that candidates are subject to a second examination with regard to vision before they receive a certificate?
  Mr. CHURCHILL:In any instance where the necessity for a second examination exists in the opinion of the authorities a special examination is held, and this is one of those cases.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: How did it come about that this second examination took place, inasmuch as this man had given entire satisfaction to the ship's captain and the owners under whom he served?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I do not think the regular procedure was departed from in any way.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: How came it about that the demand for the second examination was insisted upon, and on what authority was it made?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The process of colour examination is a very extensive and regular process, carried on on a large scale, and I am not aware of any special demand for a second examination, but I will inquire how it was. I have reason to believe that a perfectly regular course has been followed.

  Colonial Representatives and All-Red. Route.
  Mr. FELLasked the President of the Board of Trade if advantage will be taken of the presence in this country of representatives of the Colonies concerned to discuss the question of the All-Red Route, or is that project to be considered to have been definitely abandoned by the Government?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I hardly think that the matter referred to comes within the scope of the Conference about to be held with representatives of the Self-Governing Dominions which is solely concerned with questions of defence, but perhaps some opportunity for informal discussion may occur.
  Mr. FELL: Arising out of that apparently satisfactory reply, can the right hon. Gentleman tell us, what is the real cause which has caused this immense delay?

  Public Elementary School (Eye).
  Mr. NICHOLLSasked the President of the Board of Education whether he is aware that the public elementary school at Eye, in the county of the Soke of Peterborough, was closed on Thursday and Friday, 24th and 25th June, without the consent of the managers or of the local education authority; whether seven days' notice of this closure was given to His Majesty's inspector, as directed by Article 56 of the Code of Regulations for Elementary Schools; and, if not, whether he will, as provided by the article, make a substantial deduction from the annual grant, in order that the scholars and parents may be protected from similar treatment in the future?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. C. P. Trevelyan): Inquiry is being made, the result of which will be communicated to the hon. Member.

  Evening Continuation Schools (Consultative Committee).
  Colonel WILLIAMSasked the President of the Board of Education if he has now received the Report of the consultative Committee on evening continuation schools; and, if so, whether, in view of the public interest taken in the question, he will publish it forthwith?
  Mr. TREVELYAN: The Report of the Committee has just been presented to the Board. The first volume of the Report will be published shortly.

  Small Holdings (Newborough).
  Mr. NICHOLLSasked the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he is able to give the House further information of the progress, if any, made to supply the 30 applicants at New-

  1855
  borough with small holdings; whether the Soke of Peterborough County Council still refuse to ratify the recommendations of the small holdings committee to provide land for the applicants; and whether he can say what steps the Board of Agriculture intend to take to supply such applicants?
  The TREASURER of the HOUSEHOLD (Sir E. Strachey): The county council propose to hold a further inquiry forthwith to consider the applications received. This step should, of course, have been taken long ago, and the delay which has arisen is much to be regretted. But it is an essential preliminary to the provision of land, and until the demand has really been ascertained it would be premature to say what action should be taken to satisfy it.
  Mr. P. MORRELL: Can the right hon. Gentleman say why the demand has not been ascertained before?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The county council has been dilatory; we much regret it. It is because they were dilatory.
  Mr. MORRELL: Is it not the duty of the Commissioners to ascertain the demand, through the county council or otherwise?
  Mr. NICHOLLS: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that these men have been interviewed by the county council committee, and that they were accepted and recommended?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I think the hon. Member is under a misapprehension—not by the county council. The county council have ordered an inquiry themselves.

  Forestry (Ireland).
  Mr. FLYNNasked the Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture (Ireland) if he will say whether any steps have yet been taken by the Department to carry out the recommendations of the Departmental Committee on Forestry in Ireland; if he is aware that paragraph 3 of Part I. of that Report states that an exceptional opportunity, which cannot recur, for acquiring land suitable for forestry purposes in Ireland now presents itself in connection with the Land Purchase Acts; and whether he has taken any action towards acquiring the proceeds of the Irish quit and Crown rents, which the Committee declared would be sufficient to finance a national system of forestry if reinforced by a moderate Treasury grant?
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND (Mr. Cherry): The Department are fully alive to the extreme urgency of the question of preventing the wasteful destruction which, under existing circumstances, is now going on in regard to Irish woodlands, and of thus saving for the country what should be a valuable national asset. The Department have already acquired certain large woods which would otherwise have been cut down. As a result of the Report of the Departmental Committee on Irish Forestry, which was duly submitted by the Department to the Government, the Treasury have provided in the Parliamentary Vote for the current year a sum of £6,000 to enable the Department to purchase by means of annuities under the Land Purchase Acts, suitable areas of woodlands and lands adapted for forestry, comprised in estates in Ireland which are being sold under those Acts. The Department are at present in negotiation with the Estates Commissioners with a view to the purchase of portions of certain estates. All such purchases will be carried out through the Estates Commissioners only. The Department are not in a position to make any statement in regard to the quit and Crown rents, as the general question of reafforestation is still under the consideration of the Government.
  Mr. FLYNN: Has the right hon. and learned Gentleman any knowledge of whether the Vice-President has yet approached the Treasury for the purpose of getting hold of this peculiarly Irish fund for an Irish purpose?
  Mr. CHERRY: I am quite sure that my right hon. Friend has approached the Treasury many times on this matter.

  Coalfields (Ireland).
  Mr. FLYNNasked the Vice-President of the Department of Agriculture (Ireland) whether, in reference to the geological survey of Ireland, referred to in the last Report of the Department, any survey has been made recently of possible coalfields in Munster; is the Department yet provided with a diamond or other suitable borer; and whether the Department will consider the propriety of conducting surveys and boring operations in such districts as Dromagh, near Banteer, county Cork, and the district lying north-west of the River Blackwater, and extending to the confines of Kerry, at Kingwilliams-town, where coal and culm have been raised in considerable quantities in former years?
  Mr. CHERRY: A survey of the coalfields referred to was made some years ago, and the Department are advised that a resurvey is not necessary. The Department do not possess a diamond drill, and do not propose to conduct boring operations for minerals. The Department's economic geologist is familiar with the district mentioned in the last part of the question, and will be prepared to afford any information in his power to intending prospectors.

  Death in Poplar Workhouse (Diana Green).
  Mr. SUMMERBELLasked the President of the Local Government Board if he is yet in a position to report as to the nature of the findings of the Poplar Board of Guardians as to the death of Diana Green in the workhouse, and in regard to whose death the coroner's jury declared it had been occasioned by shock due to fractured ribs and other injuries?
  Mr. COCHRANEalso asked the President of the Local Government Board whether he has now received a report of the inquiry regarding the circumstances attending the death of Diana Green, who was found dead under a bed in Poplar Workhouse, with four ribs and one arm broken, on 18th of June; and whether he can communicate the results of that inquiry?
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Burns): I have received from the guardians a copy of the report made to them by the visiting committee after their investigation of the case referred to in the questions. The committee appear to have taken all the evidence available, but unfortunately the medical officer of the workhouse is seriously ill, and hence they were unable to examine him. They report that they have given very careful consideration to the depositions at the inquest, the report of the master of the workhouse, and the statements of the officers and inmates examined by them, but that they have been unable to elicit any material facts in addition to those contained in the depositions and the master's report. They are of opinion that, until the medical officer is in a condition to be further examined, it will not be possible to come to any definite conclusion as to the cause of the injuries to the deceased. I have requested to be in-formed when the medical officer has suffi-
  1858
  ciently recovered to give evidence, and have promised, in compliance with a request to that effect, that the Local Government Board's senior medical inspector for Poor Law purposes shall assist at any further investigation then held.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: Will the right hon. Gentleman kindly give us the report when the medical officer makes it?
  Mr. BURNS: When the medical officer has attended this investigation and made a report, that will be made public.

  Spirit Tax (Medicinal Use).
  Sir THOMAS BRAMSDONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he can state what would approximately be the loss on the Spirit Tax if a return were allowed of the additional duty on spirits which are largely employed in the preparation of drugs and on brandy prescribed for the use of patients to public hospitals, infirmaries, and dispensaries established and mainly supported by voluntary contributions for the relief of the poor and indigent; and if he has any reason to suppose that the officers of those institutions could not be relied upon to make an accurate return of the spirits so used?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: My right hon. Friend has no data which would enable him to give the information required by my hon Friend. Except in the case of drugs prepared on the premises, he does not see how the officers of the institutions in question would be able to make an accurate return of the amount or strength of the spirits used.

  Ungotten Mineral Tax (Clay).
  Mr. RENWICKasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that clay excavated during the construction of docks and other works is subject to a royalty when used for the purpose of making bricks or cement; whether un-gotten clay will be subject to the Ungotten Mineral Tax; and, if so, in what way will the quantity of such ungotten clay be arrived at?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. As regards the second part, I may refer the hon. Member to the reply given by my right hon. Friend on the 16th ult. to the hon. Members for the Holborn Division and for Darlington.

  FINANCE BILL.

    LAND VALUATION.
    Mr. C. J. O'DONNELLasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, seeing that the double valuation of land under the Finance Bill to ascertain the fee simple value and the site value is intended to supply an elaborate and highly accurate record of every element of value in the land separately, and having in view the want of authority in an unprofessional and interested valuation made by an owner, he will consider a valuation by Government officials; whether he can state what would be the probable cost of such a valuation of the 32,000,000 acres of tillage and pasture land in Great Britain, and of the buildings, timber, fruit trees, fences, drains, etc., in, on, and under its surface; and whether he will explain how such a complicated valuation could be arrived at at a cost, on the average, of less than 20s. per three acres?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: I am afraid that I cannot give my hon. Friend the information for which he asks, but I can assure him that these points have received the careful consideration of the Government.
    Mr. O'DONNELL: Before the scheme of valuation was incorporated in the Finance Bill, was any estimate made as to the cost of that?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: The question was put to me by the Noble Lord the Member for Marylebone. My hon. Friend will find my reply to it the day before yesterday.

    UNGOTTEN MINERAL TAX.
    Mr. DAVID DAVIESasked if building or road stone is to be regarded as mineral, and subject to the ungotten mineral or any other tax?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: I must refer my hon. Friend to the reply which I have just given to the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

    LAND VALUE DUTY.
    Mr. HAROLD COXasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether persons who make a business of buying and selling land are at present charged for Income Tax under Schedule D at 9d. in the pound on the net result of these transactions, which is treated as earned income; and whether, under the Finance Bill of 1909, the same persons will be charged a tax of 4s. in the pound on those of their transactions which show a profit, on the
    1860
    assumption that those are unearned increment; and, if so, whether he will present to the House some typical cases showing how much income will be left to such persons?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative, if the total income of the persons referred to does not exceed £2,000 per annum. As regards the second part of the question, liability to Increment Value Duty on land in any particular case will depend on the circumstances of that case, and has no analogy with the taxation of earned income derived from the business of dealing in land. I cannot undertake to construct "typical cases," but I may remind my hon. Friend that four-fifths of all increment value will still remain in the owners' hands.
    Mr. LANE-FOXasked whether a lease of any separate part of a building will in any case constitute an interest in land; and, if so, whether Increment Duty will be payable upon the determination and renewal of such lease?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: It is not my right hon. Friend's intention that Increment Duty should be charged on the occasion of the determination and renewal of the lease of a flat, or separate offices, etc.
    Mr. LANE - FOX (for Sir Henry Kimber)asked whether, as it is not intended to treat offices, flats, and chambers on the upper floors of a building as an interest in the land, and that no distinction will be drawn between offices, etc., on the ground floor, and the other floors when let separately, it is to be assumed that the ground floor also is not to be treated as an interest in the land?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: The answer is in the affirmative.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: How would the Government propose to deal with the case of a Scotch tenement of which the upper floors were freehold?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: Perhaps the hon. Member will put that on the Paper.

    SITE VALUATION (COST).
    Mr. C J. O'DONNELLasked whether Mr. J. Grant Lawson, Secretary to the Local Government Board, in April, 1905. made an estimate to the effect that a valuation separating the value of the site from the value of the buildings on it would cost

    1861
    for Great Britain at least 18 millions sterling; and whether this estimate included agricultural land?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: I gather that my hon. Friend refers to the speech made by Sir J. Grant Lawson on the Second Reading of the Land Values (Assessment and Eating) Bill of 1905? I have no means of saying what his estimate included or on what it was based.

    SPIRIT DUTIES (REVENUE).
    Sir WILLIAM BULLasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his estimate of an increase in revenue of £1,600,000 from the new Spirit Duties for the current year is corroborated by the trade returns for the month of June?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: Nothing has come to the notice of my right hon. Friend which would induce him to modify his estimate of the revenue to be derived from the additional duty on spirits ending 31st March, 1910.
    Sir WILLIAM BULLasked what has been the sale of spirits during the month of June; and if the figures confirm the estimate that the licensed victuallers are making a profit at the rate of £4,000,000 a year?
    Mr. HOBHOUSE: I have no means of furnishing the hon. Member with the information asked for in the latter part of the question. The amount of duty received on spirits paying duty in the month of June is given in my right hon. Friend's reply to the hon. Member for Inverness on the 7th instant.

  Bank Note Issue (Ireland).
  Mr. FLYNNasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the Banking Return for the average of the four weeks ending 14th November, 1908. in addition to disclosing the apparent excesses in the note issue of some banks in Ireland, also discloses the fact that the actual amount of notes issued by the Bank of Ireland was £734,278 less than its power of issue, which is £3,738,428, and by the Provincial Bank £119,278 less than its authorised circulation of £927,667; and will he say whether steps will be taken to remedy this inequality in the present system of bank-note issue in Ireland?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The effect of the certificate under section 8 of the Banking (Ireland) Act, 1845, is to determine the
  1862
  amount by which the issue of any bank may, under the provisions of that section, exceed the amount of gold and silver coin held by such bank. Such excess was, on the average of the four weeks ended 14th November, 1908, as shown by the Return referred to in the question in the case of the Bank of Ireland, £2,472,156, and in the case of the Provincial Bank £665,130. These figures are less than the maximum amount permitted by the certificates by £1,266,272 and"£262,537 respectively. The power to issue notes in excess of the amount of gold and silver coin held was given to those and other banks in 1845 by way of recognising and stereotyping a preexisting privilege, and the fact that any particular bank or banks do not avail themselves to the full of the privileges accorded to them is no ground for enlarging the privileged issues of other banks. My right hon. Friend cannot, therefore, admit that any inequality arises under the present system.
  Mr. FLYNN: Could not the short issue of the Bank of Ireland and the Provincial Bank be allocated amongst other joint-stock banks by a mere Order in Council?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: It would require legislation, I am advised.
  Mr. FLYNNasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that in respect to the total authorised circulation of bank-notes in Ireland, which stands at £6,354,494, a disproportionately large power of issue is given to the Bank of Ireland; is he aware that if power were conferred on all the Irish banks to issue in accordance with their present capacities their united circulation would not exceed this figure, and there would be no need to alter the total authorised issue but merely to redistribute it amongst all the existing banks according to their ascertained powers of issue; and whether he will consider the advisability of taking steps by legislation or otherwise to enable all Irish banks to issue bank-notes?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The figure quoted represents not the total authorised circulation of bank-notes in Ireland, but the aggregate amount by which such circulation is permitted by the Banking (Ireland) Act to exceed the aggregate amount of gold and silver coin held by the banks of issue. The share of the Bank of Ireland is determined by the terms of section 8 of that Act, and has relation solely to the rights enjoyed by that bank before the passing of the Act. The aggregate average

  1863
  circulation of the six banks of issue for the four weeks ended 14th November, 1908, was £7,487,569, or £1,133,075 more than the aggregate issue authorised by certificate. There would be grave objections to the indiscriminate grant of note-issuing powers to all banks as suggested in the latter part of the question.
  Mr. FLYNN: Could not the redistribution among the banks be carried out by Order in Council without legislation?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I should like notice of the question.
  NEW MEMBER SWORN.—The Right Hon. Herbert Louis Samuel, for the county of Yorkshire (Cleveland Division), after appointment as Vice-President of the Council.

PARLIAMENTARY SEATS (PEERS OF SCOTLAND).
Mr. MacNEILLasked leave to introduce a Bill to enable Peers of Scotland, not being Lords of Parliament, to be elected and returned to sit in the House of Commons.
The Bill has for its object to make gentlemen who are Peers of Scotland, without hereditary seats in the House of Lords, eligible for election and for sitting in the House of Commons. This is not an academic matter. If the law as it at present exists remains it will expose to a very grievous disability and deprivation a gentlemen whom we all greatly esteem. There are 86 gentlemen who hold Scotch peerages. Of these 50 are peers either of Great Britain or of the United Kingdom, and have seats, irrespective of their Scotch peerages, in the House of Lords. Of the 36 who remain 16 are Scotch representative peers, and the remaining 20 are not able to be Members of this House or to represent any constituency, nor have they seats in the House of Peers. They might, no doubt, be elected as representative peers of Scotland. Gentlemen who wish that position, and who are Conservatives, have, of course, a very excellent chance of that, but a gentleman of Radical principles has no chance whatever, inasmuch as it is done on party lines. I wish to give Scotch hereditary peers without seats in the House of Lords an opportunity of sitting in the House of Commons, and of voting there exactly as Irish peers, depriving them during the same
1864
time, of course, of their right to elect Scotch representative peers, and of the ordinary status of the peerage. The Under-Secretary for India is heir-apparent to a Scotch peerage. If he obtained it to-morrow, not having a hereditary seat in the House of Lords, he is absolutely excluded from politics, he ceases to be a Member of this House, he cannot be a Member of the House of Lords, and his career is at an end. He would be in fact blocked out of this House by an accident. I like the hon. Gentleman personally, and I would ask that justice should be done. It would be really very absurd if he were prevented from entering this House for the reason I have stated. The peerage of which he is the heir is an old one, having been created in 1613, and because an ancestor was made a peer more than 200 years ago the moment he becomes possessed of this title, which is in reality nothing but a sound, he is obliged to walk straight out of the House of Commons. I think that is an anomaly which should be corrected, and I hope to get the leave of the House to bring in this Bill. It is backed by Members of all shades of opinion, who desire to do an act of justice not only to one whom we would not willingly lose, but who at the same time wish to clear away a very extraordinary Constitutional anomaly.
Question. "That leave be given to introduce a Bill to enable Peers of Scotland, not being Lords of Parliament, to be elected and returned to sit in the House of Commons," put and agreed to.
Bill presented accordingly, and read the first time. [To be read a second time, 22nd July.]

FINANCE BILL.
Considered in Committee.—[Eleventh Bay.]
[Mr. EMMOTT in the chair.]
(IN THE COMMITTEE.)

FINANCE BILL.

  PART I.—DUTIES ON LAND VALUES.
  Increment Value Duty.
  Clauses 1 and 2 (as amended in Committee) now read as follows:—

  PART I.—DUTIES ON LAND VALUES.

    CLAUSE 1.—(Duty on Increment Value.)
    (1) Subject to the provisions of this Part of this Act, there shall be charged, levied, and paid on the increment value of any land a duty, called Increment Value Duty, at the rate of one pound for every complete five pounds of that value accruing

    1865
    after the thirtieth day of April, nineteen hundred and nine, and the duty or a proportionate part thereof shall become due—

    (a) on the occasion of any transfer on sale of the land or any interest in the land, in pursuance of any contract made after the commencement of this Act, or the grant, in pursuance of any contract made after the commencement of this Act, of any lease (not being a lease for a term of years not exceeding 14 years) of the land; and

    (b) on the occasion of the death of any person dying after the commencement of this Act, where the land or any interest in the land is comprised in the property passing on the death of the deceased within the meaning of sections 1 and 2 sub-section (1) (a), (b), and (c), and sub-section 3, of The Finance Act, 1894, as amended by any subsequent enactment: Provided that in the case of a disposition made by any person purporting to act as an immediate gift inter vivos, whether by way of transfer, delivery, declaration of trust, or otherwise, marriage shall, for the purpose of this section, be deemed to be valuable consideration; and

    (c) where the land or any interest in the land is held by any body corporate or by any body unincorporate, as defined by section 12 of the Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1885, on such periodical occasions as are provided in this Act;

    and on each of those occasions the duty, or proportionate part of the duty, so far as it has not been paid on any previous occasion, shall be collected in accordance with the provisions of this Act.

    CLAUSE 2.—(Definition of Increment Value.)
    (1) For the purposes of this Part of this Act the increment value of any land shall be deemed to be the amount (if any) by which the site value of the land, on the occasion on which Increment Value Duty becomes due, exceeds the original site value of the land.
    (2) The site value of the land on the occasion on which Increment Value Duty becomes due shall be taken to be—

    (a) where the occasion is a transfer on sale of the fee simple of the land, the value of the consideration for the transfer; and

    (b) where the occasion is the grant of any lease of the land, or the transfer
    1866
    on sale of any interest in the land, the value of the fee simple of the land, calculated on the basis of the value of the consideration for the grant of the lease or the transfer of the interest; and

    (c) where the occasion is the death of any person and the fee simple of the land is property passing on that death, the principal value of the land as ascertained for the purposes of Part I. of the Finance Act, 1894, and where any interest in the land is property passing on that death the value of the fee simple of the land calculated on the basis of the principal value of the interest as so ascertained; and

    (d) where the occasion is a periodical occasion on which the duty is due in respect of land held by a body corporate or unincorporate, the value of the fee simple of the land as ascertained for the purposes of the assessment of duty under this Act;

    subject to such deduction (if any) as the Commissioners allow in each case in respect of any part of the value which is proved to be attributable to buildings, structures, or other things of which the land is deemed to be divested under this Act for the purpose of ascertaining its site value, or to any matter in respect of which a deduction may be allowed under this Act in estimating that site value, or to the expenditure of money on any redemption of Land Tax or of any rent-charge as defined in this Act effected after the thirtieth day of April, nineteen hundred and nine, or to goodwill, or to any other matter which is personal to the owner, occupier, or other person interested for the time being in land, and, in the case of agricultural land the value of which is due solely to its capacity for agricultural purposes, also in respect of any part of that value which is proved to the Commissioners to be attributable to works of a permanent character, executed by or on behalf or at the expense of any person interested in the land, or to the good husbandry of any person in occupation of or interested in the land.
    (3) The Commissioners shall record all allowances and deductions made under this section.
    (4) Where, on any occasion on which Increment Value Duty is due in respect of any land, it becomes necessary, for the purpose of ascertaining the original site value of the land on which the duty is to be assessed, to apportion any original site

    1867
    value as first adopted for the purposes of this Part of this Act, that value shall be apportioned between that part of the land on which duty is to be assessed and the remaining part of the land in such proportions as the Commissioners determine. On the application at any time of any person entitled to the fee simple of, or to an interest in any land, the Commissioners shall apportion or reapportion the original site value of the land amongst such parts of the land as may be specified in the application in such proportions as they think just, and shall give a certificate of any apportionment or reapportionment so made. The value attributed on any such apportionment or reapportionment to each part of the land shall, for the purposes of this Part of this Act, be treated as the original site value of that part of the land.
    (5) Where the owner of the fee simple of any land, or any person entitled to an interest in the land, proves to the Commissioners that he, or any of his predecessors in title, has acquired for a consideration, being money or money's worth, the fee simple of or interest in the land within twenty years before the thirtieth day of April, nineteen hundred and nine, and that the total value of the fee simple of the land, as calculated on the basis of the value of the consideration then given, exceeds the total value of the land as first adopted for the purposes of this Part of this Act, after deducting any part of that value which is attributable to works of a permanent character executed since the purchase or acquisition, or where the mortgagee of any land proves that he or any of his predecessors in title has advanced upon mortgage on the land an amount which exceeds that total value, such sum shall be substituted for the purposes of Increment Value Duty for the original site value of the land as the Commissioners determine, having regard to the total value as so calculated of the fee simple or the amount advanced on mortgage as the case requires, was at the time the site value of the land.
    Question again proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
    Mr. G. D. FABER: I feel that so many topics of great importance having been discussed during the last few days——
    Lord ROBERT CECIL: On a point of order, I would like to ask you whether the clause is in order in view of the ruling which you were good enough to give last night? I wish to ask whether the clause
    1868
    does not involve a new public charge? This is the first of the clauses which deal with valuation under this Bill. It provides for a valuation of the increment value, and also for apportionment, and so on. It is provided by Clause 17 of the Bill that the valuation is to be carried out by the Commissioners if they are not satisfied with the returns made by the land-owners. The effect of that is, I submit, that in certain events the Commissioners will have to carry out the duty thrown upon them by this clause, and it will have to be carried out at the public expense, in accordance with the principle which you were good enough to lay down last night. In deciding the question whether the Amendment I moved last night was in order you said:—
    "The point raised by the Noble Lord, as I understand it, is that the Commissioners might have to pay out of their own pocket. That is the point on which I ask the Government to give me information. If it can be said that it is possible that the Commissioners may have to pay, I shall have to allow the Noble Lord to move the Amendment. On the face of it, this is a public charge for which the Commissioners cannot be said to be personally liable. If that is so the Amendment would be out of order."
    I submit that on the principle of that ruling the Commissioners will have to carry out as part of their duties a duty which will fall on public funds, and that is not covered by the Resolution which was passed by the Committee. I have a copy of the Resolution here, but I need not read it. It is clear that it does not refer to valuation in any respect. I submit that since this clause really does add to the charge on the taxpayers a fresh Resolution is necessary before the Committee can be asked to adopt the clause.
    The CHAIRMAN: I do not quite know what the Noble Lord means by his reference to Clause 17. The Question now before the Committee is, "That Clause 2, as amended, stand part of the Bill," and we have nothing to do with Clause 17 at present, because we have not yet arrived at that clause. So far as I can see, the new duties thrown upon the Commissioners are not in the nature of what the Noble Lord calls creating a public charge. The Amendment which the Noble Lord moved last night, and upon which I had some difficulty in deciding whether it was in order, raised the question of throwing on the Commissioners in certain circumstances a fresh charge. When it was altered and made clear that they would have to pay out of their own pockets, I allowed the Amendment. That is a different matter from instructing the

    1869
    Commissioners to perform certain duties. But apart from that the question should have been raised at the beginning of the clause, and not now. There has been nothing put into the clause which involves a fresh charge.
    Mr. G. D. FABER: I should like to have the indulgence of the Committee to make a few observations on the salient points that seem to me to emerge from the discussions we have had on this clause. The first remark I have to make is upon the extraordinary course that has been taken by this clause in regard to the courts of law. The courts of law are not in the picture, or at least only to a small extent. I believe this is the first time that such an evil precedent has occurred in the history of Bills of this kind, and I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman opposite, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who belongs to the legal profession, should have initiated such a dangerous precedent. You are, if I may so say, closing the doors of the temple of justice—a temple which has been more the palladium of the liberties of this country than even the House of Commons itself. You are substituting for the courts of law an autocracy. It is not only an autocracy which you have under this clause, but it is the autocracy of a bureaucracy, and, what is worse, the autocracy of a bureaucracy of the new democracy. I cannot venture to hope that the protests of my right hon. Friend the Member for Dublin University will have much effect on the hardened hearts of the Ministers on the front bench opposite. Perhaps those of the hon. and learned Members for Reading and for Cambridge, sitting behind the Government, may have. The Government have said that they intend to introduce Amendments, but we are always told of the changes that are coming, and we are always put off to the Greek kalends. We shall see. But at any rate, we are entitled to say that this clause has been thought over for months and months, and represents the considered judgment of the Cabinet, and that considered judgment is that in the performance of duties under this clause the courts of law are to have no authority. The Commissioners are to have carte, blanche. They will call the tune, and the millions of land-owners of this country—I believe there are millions—will have to dance to the Commissioners' tune; and if they do not dance it will be worse for them. What is the tune the
    1870
    Commissioners are going to play? Is it the tune to which they have been accustomed? No; it is a new tune altogether. They have never been accustomed to work of this kind; neither have the valuers nor the other experts they will be able to call in. It is a new machine. Hitherto valuers have been accustomed to value land and buildings as a going concern, the land with everything upon it which gives it its value, the fertility of the soil, the buildings, and everything under the earth and above it. They have been accustomed to consider that, and they have no difficulty in arriving at a judgment in the matter. But under this Bill they have to deal not with a going concern at all, but with a mere hypothesis; something that does not exist, an abstraction; something they have got to imagine in their minds. You are putting on them an absolutely impossible task.
    The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition observed with great force a few weeks ago that valuers, of course, say they can value anything. They will value your immortal soul if you give them a chance. It is not a fair task. I remember the story of the blind man who was turned into the dark room to look for the black hat that was not there. The duties which the valuers will have to perform under this clause will be trifling compared with the duty that was cast on the blind man. They had got to deal with what does not exist. I think much more complication was introduced into the matter yesterday in the discussion which we had on the question of the apportionment site value. The original site value, according to the theory I understand of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is to be your datum, your starting point, your rock of ages, through the years and the centuries. Posterity will always have to cast its eye back to what I suppose will be known in remote times as the "Lloyd-George Valuation." He will be immortalised, but I am afraid his immortality will be purchased at the expense of millions of the people of the country. In your apportionment of original site value you forget that the original conformation does not in this changing world in fact remain the same. If the original piece of land were always there, in the same shape, and you could always refer back to it, then it would be complicated enough. But it does not remain the same. Like the pieces of glass in the kaleidoscope, it is always changing its conformation, until after a time it will pass the wit of man

    1871
    to discover the original against which the comparison for all time has got to be made. I do not know on which there would be the more difficulty—urban land or agricultural land. I sat down the other day to try to work out what I should have to do if this Bill became law. Sanity almost left me by the time I had done with the urban land. When I was trying to discover the original site value of a farm I sighed for the sanity of Colney Hatch.
    Why is not agricultural land excluded? We were told under Clause 1 that it was going to be excluded. We were told under Clause 2 that it was excluded. I would venture to say that every Member of the Committee who has listened to the Debate on this clause, whatever view he may take about the Bill, must come to the conclusion that agricultural land is not in effect excluded. If it was intended to be excluded, why did not the Chancellor of the Exchequer accept the Amendment of the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. Pretyman). The right hon. Gentleman has been pressed over and over again by Members upon his own side to exclude agricultural land, but he has not done it. The right hon. Gentleman the Attorney-General tried to maintain the hopeless contention that Clause 2 and Clause 14 combined will have the effect of excluding agricultural land. They will have no effect of the kind. The right hon. Gentleman was a little bit unjust towards one of his ardent supporters last evening, the hon. Baronet, the Member for Louth, who was in despair at the effect that this clause would have upon the many hundreds of his constituents who are small holders. The right hon. Gentleman was a little waspish to the Member for Louth because he showed that small holders will be put to all this trouble. The hon. Member for Louth was only putting the case exactly in the way this Bill will fall out if it becomes law. The small holders will have to apportion their plots, however small they may be, because the Attorney-General warned the Committee yesterday that if the apportionment is not made it may be unfortunate for the persons concerned. As regards valuation, the Attorney-General, while we were discussing Clause 1, said that it was so simple that a man of the most bucolic intelligence could make the valuation. We have gone far away from that. The Attorney-General himself said, in a phrase which has often been repeated, and will again often be repeated throughout the country before we have got to the
    1872
    end of this matter, that valuation is to be elaborate, costly and expensive.
    It will have to be made probably by millions of people. In 1876 there were estimated to be more than a million owners of land in this country. There would be probably many more now, and, in addition, you are now going to treat as owners all those who have leases for more than 50 years' duration. That will add enormously to the number of people who will have to make valuations. You have not done then, because the valuation has got to be made not only of the separate properties of the owners, but of the separate holdings that belong to the separate properties of the owners. It is calculated now that you might get as high as 10 millions of valuations. Each one of them is going to cost not a little money, but very likely a great deal. In these elaborate and extensive calculations the Attorney-General referred yesterday to the expert advice and the machinery at the beck and call of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. We know that. We know that the whole expert forces are behind the Government, and will be behind the Chancellor of the Exchequer if this Bill becomes law. What does it matter to the Government what it costs? They have the national purse to draw upon. That is not so with the millions of people, rich and poor, great and small, who will have to make these elaborate calculations. It is said it will cost twelve millions of money. I should not be in the least surprised. I know nobody can sit down and work out with any degree of accuracy at all what it will cost, but it might easily cost twenty millions. You say yourselves you do not intend agricultural land to come within the purview of the Bill, and that it is not to come within the meshes of your net. But you are going to put this enormous expense in the matter of valuation upon all the agricultural land in this country, and upon your own allegation, at any rate, you do not intend to include them in the burdens of the Bill.
    There is no common-sense in the matter whatever; it is not fair, it is not reasonable. Here we are, not knowing which way to turn for money. This £20,000,000 which valuation may cost owners alone would provide eight "Dreadnoughts." Twenty millions for valuation, and it is going to bring you in only £250,000, but ultimately I do not know what. There lies the danger. When once you establish the machinery under Clause 2 it brings you in £250,000

    1873
    to-day, but by a turn of the screw it is going to bring you in two, three, four, and perhaps many more millions of money hereafter. I do once again appeal to the right hon. Gentleman at any rate to make his course so far clear as to remove the agricultural land of this country from the purview of this Bill. I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman would have had a fellow-feeling for agriculturists, instead of giving them what he called "butcher's treatment." The right hon. Gentleman, I know, used the words in a different connection, but he said, "After all, agriculture is going to get butcher's treatment."
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Lloyd-George): The hon. and gallant Member for Chelmsford (Captain Pretyman) asked me to treat the market gardener as I would treat the butcher, and I said the market gardener was being treated exactly the same.
    Mr. G. D. FABER: In that sense, I do not think agriculture has got butcher's treatment. What the hon. and gallant Member for Chelmsford meant was that the land of the market gardener was his stock-in-trade, as the shop of the butcher was his stock-in-trade. You are going to take increment value from the market gardener in the course of his business, but you are not going to take it from the butcher in the course of his business. The right hon. Gentleman then remarked that the land had got butcher's treatment. From the point of view that I take I am afraid that agricultural land has got butcher's treatment. I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman is so unkind to agriculture, because in one of his genial moments he confided to the Committee that he was once a bit of a market gardener himself. I should have thought he would have had some feeling for his fellow sufferers, and that it would have been the most ardent desire of his heart to exclude the market gardener, at any rate, from this unfair and in some cases ruinous clause. The right hon. Gentleman has forgotten his old friends. Before I conclude, I would say a word about the Prime Minister's windfall theory, because upon that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, as it appears to me, have parted company. On the windfall theory the Prime Minister followed the man, but the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer follows the land, and does not follow the man. The windfall theory has gone, to which the
    1874
    Prime Minister looked, in desperation, to illuminate the darkness of his cause, but it turned out to be only a will-o'-the-wisp, which has landed him almost up to his neck in the bog. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has thrown over the Prime Minister. I think that is rather unkind. The right hon. Gentleman the other day bore testimony to the loyalty of the Prime Minister, and I think he should have returned the compliment by showing more loyalty to him.
    But the Chancellor of the Exchequer has got to think of his Bill, and under Clause 2 he threw over the windfall theory, which, therefore, is gone. The theory of the Chancellor of the Exchequer brings with it the extraordinary injustice of disregarding decrement. A man has a field of half a dozen acres worth £1,000. Half of it is sold for gas works. This is an illustration which has already been given by an hon. Member. Half of the whole is sold for gas works, and what was originally worth £500 becomes worth £l,000, and the Increment Duty of a fifth of £500 is £100. But the very process of increasing the value of one-half of the field destroys the value of the other, as no one would wish to live in the neighbourhood of a gas works; yet the Government only look at the half on which there is a profit, and disregard that upon which there is a loss. Surely that must be absurd. You cannot put on spectacles and look merely at a particular part; in such a transaction you must look, at any rate to a certain extent, to the whole matter. We have been told a great deal about Germany. There they do look at the entirety. In the case of Breslau they do not look simply at the increment but at the decrement as well. There is a limit of three years, during which, if there are transactions in respect to a particular plot of land, the owner is allowed to set off any decrement as regards a part of it against the increment in regard to another part. Surely that is only common-sense. See what immense difficulties arise, and what immense injustice is done under the system proposed by this Bill, where you are dealing with buildings. Building development, like almost every other transaction, has its gains and its losses, and you have to look not only at the gains, but at the losses. The front part of a particular piece of building land may go at a very large profit to the builder; and you take that increment value; but the back part may lie idle for years, and it may result in a grievous loss, yet you pay no regard to that.

    1875
    We really have had no answer, at least I have not heard any, to our allegation that, whatever else this may be, it is not just. The Attorney-General said it was not practicable to allow for decrement. I said at the time that it was the business of the Government to make it practicable; it is their legislation. We cannot leave it in this way, that this Bill should emerge from this House with such a crushing injustice as will and must arise, if you are going to deal merely with the increment in a transaction, and have no regard at all to the decrement. I want to make a quotation from Adam Smith. The right hon. Gentleman rather made game a little while ago of Adam Smith. He said he was too dull for the Member for Dulwich.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I said too "slow."
    Mr. G. D. FABER: I thought, perhaps, the right hon. Gentleman meant to be alliterative, and said that he was "too dull" for the Member for Dulwich; apparently he said he was "too slow" for the hon. Gentleman. However, Adam Smith, in respect of the quotation I am now going to make, is not too slow for me. He appeals entirely to such argumentative capacity as I may possess, and such ideas as I entertain in reference to fair and proper taxation. Adam Smith, in his first canon of taxation, says:—
    "The certainty of. what each individual ought to pay is, in taxation, a matter of so great importance that a very considerable degree of inequality, it appears, I believe, from the experience of all nations, is not nearly so great an evil as a very small degree of uncertainty,"
    This clause introduces not only no degree of certainty, but it introduces as great an amount of uncertainty as it is possible for any man to conceive. This clause traverses the dictum of Adam Smith from beginning to end, and I venture, therefore, to ask that this clause be deleted from the Bill, and I move that be done.
    Mr. JOHN REDMOND: I have risen for the purpose of making an earnest appeal to the Government not to allow the Division to take place on this clause without clearing up some of the obscurities in which the Committee stands at this moment. There has been a very long and a very detailed discussion of this clause, and the right hon. Gentleman certainly has not spared himself in his desire to elucidate every doubtful point, and to assist
    1876
    the Committee in coming to a conclusion, and yet, with reference to what I regard as probably the most important point of all in the clause, the Committee finds itself at this moment in a state of absolute uncertainty and insecurity. My colleagues and I who sit on these benches are in favour of the principle of this tax. We have supported it. We have supported the Government in the Lobby whenever what we regarded as destructive Amendments were moved, and which, in our judgment, were directed against the principle of the tax of which we approve. We stated from the very commencement that our support of this clause was conditional upon two matters. The first was that the yield of this tax should go, not to the Imperial Exchequer, but to the local authorities. The right hon. Gentleman has not gone the full way that we desired, but no doubt we will have other opportunities of pressing our views. But he has made a concession, and no doubt, from his point of view, a large concession. He has promised that one-half of this tax shall be put into a pool and devoted to purposes for which the local authorities are responsible. Therefore, so far as that is concerned, I have not at this stage to make any complaint.
    Our second point was with regard to agricultural land, that it should be excluded and exempted from this particular tax. The right hon. Gentleman spoke on this matter repeatedly, and, as far as I could understand, and as far as I understand at this moment, judging by these public declarations, there is no difference of intention between him and those like myself who have asked that land should be excluded. But the unfortunate position in which we stand is this, that the words of the clause, as they are now being put from the Chair, do not provide for this, and that as they are being put they undoubtedly make agricultural land liable to these taxes. When we began to discuss this matter the right hon. Gentleman told us that when we came to sub-section (2) of Clause 2 that then words would be put forward which would satisfy our anxiety and our uncertainties on this matter. When we reached that part of the clause he made the suggestion that instead of the deduction of improvements, buildings, and so forth, there should be a fixed percentage deducted. I was not here that night unfortunately, but I read most carefully every word of the Debate, and it was perfectly evident that that suggestion of his did not meet with approval, as far as I know, in

    1877
    any quarter of the House. It did not meet with approval above the Gangway or from my colleagues on these benches, or, as far as I can understand, from those supporters of the right hon. Gentlemen on the other side who, as far as I can judge, have shared our anxiety on this question of agricultural land. Therefore the right hon. Gentleman quite naturally withdrew that suggestion, and he withdrew it, I must be allowed to say, as a result of reading the Debate most carefully, on the understanding that the whole matter would be further reconsidered, and that words to carry out the intention which he professed would be forthcoming.
    Yesterday I asked the right hon. Gentleman at Question time why those words had not been put on the Paper in the interval between Wednesday and Monday. He gave me an answer from which I gathered that he had no intention of proposing words on this clause at all, that he was reconsidering the matter, but that it was quite indefinite when his consideration of it would come to the point, when he would be in a position to put the words on the Paper. I say that that leaves the Committee in a state of absolute obscurity and uncertainty on one of the most important issues in this clause. After that answer of the right hon. Gentleman yesterday my colleagues and I felt so uncertain and so perplexed and so embarrassed that we took no part in any of the Divisions last night. We certainly could not possibly vote in favour of this clause, much as I am in favour, as I have said, of the principle of the Increment Tax, if we are left in a position of uncertainty. I have risen only for the purpose of urging the right hon. Gentleman most respectfully to put an end to this uncertainty. I am not, I hope he will not imagine, imputing to him in the smallest degree any desire to break his pledge on this Bill or his pledged word on this subject. Nothing is further from my mind. I am quite sure he is speaking absolutely sincerely and that his intention is the same as that avowed by myself. After all, the declaration of the intention of a Minister is not sufficient when you are dealing with the actual words of the clause of a Bill. If the right hon. Gentleman wants us to take his declaration and act upon it as if it were words in the Bill, then I respectfully say he should put on the Paper the Amendment he is going to move and let us consider its terms and see whether it carries out the promise that he gave.
    1878
    I had hoped, even this morning when I received my Parliamentary Papers, that I might have found the words of some proposed Amendment on the Paper, but they are not there. I do now ask the right hon. Gentleman to put an end to this uncertainty and to tell us exactly what he is going to do and when and how he is going to do it. I do not know whether he has had time to consider the words to carry out these promises, but I think it is unfair to the House of Commons, and that it is unfair to those who take a keen interest on both sides of the House on this point, to let this clause go to a Division until we have some certain and definite declaration as to what the right hon. Gentleman is going to do. Therefore I would ask that words should be put on the Paper as soon as possible to let us see how the right hon. Gentleman is going to translate his intention into the words of an Act of Parliament. We will not go into the other point discussed last night—that is, the question of the exemption of small holdings. The declaration of the right hon. Gentleman, made last night was, I understood, quite satisfactory, but there again I do say we want something more than a declaration of intention. I sympathise with some hon. Members, who said last night it is all very well to promise that you will excuse small holdings, but what do you mean when you say small holdings? That is what I want to know. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman on this point also would put his intentions into words, and let us see those words and consider them, and not go on expecting the Committee to pass a clause of this kind when the most serious points are wrapt in obscurity. I am anxious to support this clause, because, as I have said, I am in favour of the principle of the tax, but I certainly cannot do that if I am left in a state of uncertainty when the Division is called.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I do not propose to follow the hon. Member for York (Mr. G. D. Faber) in his general survey of all the Amendments that have been moved on this particular clause, and I hope he will not think that I am treating him with the slightest disrespect when I say that it would be quite impossible for me to re-enter into all these discussions. At the same time I am not complaining of his having summarised the whole of the case against the clause. I would rather confine myself to two or three practical considerations which have been submitted

    1879
    to the Committee by the hon. and learned Member for Waterford (Mr. John Redmond), because those are the points which I think the Committee as a whole will be especially interested in. I promised the hon. and gallant Member for Essex (Mr. Pretyman) that I would endeavour before this clause passes through the House to make some statement with regard to the position of the small holder and of agricultural land. With regard to agricultural land, I think there is agreement amongst all sections of the House as to the desirability of excluding it from the operation of all these taxes. That I think is accepted as a principle by all Members of the House with the exception of a section, and I do not know what I would call them. I think, on the whole, the House has accepted the principle, and that it was purely a question of the way of carrying it out, or to draw the line. As the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Dublin (Mr. Walter Long) pointed out in a speech yesterday, and very forcibly, it is very difficult to draw the line between purely agricultural land, and land which has got a special value owing to its proximity to towns. That has already been done, it is true, in the Finance Act of 1894, in a provision for which I believe the Leader of the Opposition is responsible. In the year 1894 it was a question of dividing the land of the country roughly into agricultural land, and land which had some special value. The right hon. Gentleman secured for agricultural land the limitation of the value to an amount not exceeding 25 years' purchase, leaving the other land at its market value.
    Mr. PRETYMAN: I think the operation of the Act is this: that where an estate consists of a certain area, and where a part has a building value the whole estate is valued, and then the valuer, in addition to that value, puts the value which attaches to the building part of the estate. There is not, however, any separation of the two classes of land, and it is not defined which part is building land.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: As a matter of practice the hon. and gallant Gentleman is quite wrong, though I believe we are agreed, and that that does not upset the whole proposition which I have urged, that there is a difference between the valuation in the case of building land and other land, and that it is treated as having a special value. These are the words for which I
    1880
    am assured the right hon. Gentleman is responsible:—
    "Provided that in the case of any agricultural property where no part of the principal value is due to the expectation of increased income from such property"—
    these latter words are the definition there of building land—
    "the principal value shall not exceed twenty-five times the annual value."
    There is the distinction drawn between land which has this special value and land of a purely agricultural character. In practice that has been taken to mean that the building value is to be valued at its market value. What happens in practice is that whenever an estate is submitted to the Commissioners there is a map of the estate submitted, and the land which has got a special value is coloured, say, red, and the other is coloured, say, green or yellow; then a special value is placed upon the parts so marked out. What I want is something which will be analogous to that procedure that has worked well. Agricultural landowners have not urged any complaint as to it, and I do not think it can be said any really agricultural land has ever been charged the building price; I never heard that once alleged against the working of the Act of 1894. That is what we really want to discover, but that is not covered by the Amendment of the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Mr. Pretyman). It did not accomplish that purpose. I objected to it, and I suggested an alternative which was objected to on several grounds. One ground, which I recognised probably to be fatal, was that you have got to deal with a large community, and that that it is too complicated. I think it was open probably to the objection of the hon. and gallant Member for Waterford that it was obscure. It would require a good deal of explanation, and at any rate it was not quite clear that it provided an adequate safeguard to agricultural land against the taxes either from Increment or from Undeveloped Land Duty. I have stated that the intention of the Government was not to include purely agricultural land in any of these taxes, and it is entirely a question of the method of carrying out that intention. Several Members have criticised the method adopted to attain that object; they criticised also the alternative which I suggested, and which, on the whole, was not accepted in any quarter of the House as quite meeting the case. As the hon. and gallant Member (Mr. Pretyman) says, it is not enough to merely have a declaration of the Minister; because, after all, an Act of Parliament is

    1881
    interpreted not by what is said by the Minister, but by the words contained in the Act. I think also it is perfectly fair to say that there is a great deal of anxiety on the part of agriculturists as to whether they are included, and the sooner that anxiety is allayed the better. I have been devoting such time as I could to seeing if I could not suggest another formula which would make it absolutely clear that purely agricultural land in the sense of the Finance Act of 1894—the sort of land which is exempted there, and gets special privileges under that Act—should also get the privileges under this Act. That is really what it amounts to. I think it can be done on practically the same lines, namely, by dividing the land of the country into land which is purely agricultural, and to exempt that altogether from all these taxes——
    Mr. IVOR GUEST: And valuation?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I will come to that by and by.
    Mr. G. D. FABER: Hear, hear.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I never had the slightest hope of satisfying the hon. Member for York (Mr. George Faber); that would be too much to expect. All I have said on behalf of the Government is that we will exempt all this land from these taxes. What will be the way to do it? I think the way is to divide the land of the country roughly into land which is agricultural and land which has a special value of the kind I have indicated, either for industrial or for building purposes. I am taking the analogy of the Act of 1894, which has worked very well for a good many years, and I think on the whole it might be adopted. I will put down words —I do not wish to be tied to the exact words—which will have to be moved as a new clause; they could not be included in the present clause. The words I suggest at present are: "Increment Value Duty shall not be charged in respect of agricultural land while that land has for other purposes no higher value than its value for agricultural purposes."
    Mr. IVOR GUEST: Will that apply to undeveloped land?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: There is no intention of charging purely agricultural land in respect of the Undeveloped Land Tax.
    Mr. HAROLD COX: Does it include sporting land?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It includes purely agricultural land. May I call attention to the Finance Act of 1894? They are substantially the same words which have worked so well there, and have effectively protected agricultural land. I do not think anyone can point to a single case where agricultural land has not been protected by these words in the Act of 1894—"Provided that in the case of any agricultural property where no part of the principal value is due to the expectation of an increased income from such property. …" The words I suggest are even stronger, and will completely exonerate agricultural land from any fear of having to participate in any of these taxes. Of course, the moment agricultural land passes from one category to the other, from agricultural land to building land, the tax will apply. I have never heard anyone contend that, if you are to have an Increment Tax, that should not be the case. In a country like ours you may have land which to-day is purely agricultural and in five or ten years may be exceedingly valuable as building land; and in cases of that kind, when it passes from one category to the other, it will be liable to this tax. I propose to put these words on the Paper tonight, but I would deprecate at the present stage a long discussion of them. I have stated the intention of the Government, and if the words require strengthening we can discuss the matter when we come to them. I may say that this proposal will undoubtedly enormously smooth the difficulties of agricultural land with regard to valuation. All that agricultural land will have to do will be exactly what it does in the case of Death Duties —that is, to supply particulars. It will not be liable to any tax; it would only be liable in the case of a town springing up in the neighbourhood, and the land suddenly becoming very valuable as building land. Therefore it will be necessary to have a complete register of agricultural land.
    Then with regard to small holdings, their case has been pressed upon me from all quarters of the House; but when I indicated my intention to meet it there was a disposition rather to withdraw from the invitation which had been given to me. It was regarded as unfair. The case of the small holder had been pressed upon me by the hon. and gallant Member (Mr. Pretyman) in almost every speech he delivered. He said that it was a hard case, especially in the matter of valuation, and that there was no money in it—which is rather true.

    1883
    The hon. Member for York (Mr. Faber) talked about a million people who would be put to this expense, and said that it would cost about eight "Dreadnoughts." That is a picturesque and very effective way of putting it, since we are thinking in "Dreadnoughts." I agree that there is a good deal of expense and very little money in it, and that it would cause a good deal of bother to the small holder. In that case I think it will probably be advisable to follow the example of the Colonies, where small holders have been exempted, very largely on the grounds of the expense and trouble of collection, and also on the ground that it is desirable rather to encourage than discourage these small holders. Therefore, the Government propose to put down another Amendment, which will exempt from all these taxes the small holder in every case where the total value of the holding is under £500, and where the holder is the occupying owner. That is the case in the Colonies. In addition to that, it will probably be necessary, where there is a house, to have another test than capital value, and to convert that capital value into terms of annual value, so that the occupying owner may know from his rateable value or his assessment for Inhabited House Duty exactly where he is, without having to find out whether his house is worth £500 or £550. That will save a good deal of expense and trouble. The appeal which has been made, notably from the benches opposite, to exempt these poor men from all this trouble and tribulation, which would bring no revenue to the Exchequer, has softened what the hon. Member for York called my hard heart, and I shall, therefore, propose this Amendment.
    Lord ROBERT CECIL: The Chancellor of the Exchequer says it would be necessary to convert the capital value into terms of annual value. Does that mean terms of the rateable value as it now exists or some other value?
    Sir BERKELEY SHEFFIELD: Does that mean the small holders under the county council?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Those are not freeholders. This proposal refers to freeholders and to leaseholders who are occupying owners. The case the hon. Member puts is a different one altogether. With respect to the Noble Lord's question, I think what the Government have in their mind is to adopt rather the definition in
    1884
    the Housing of the Working Classes Act taken in terms of the Inhabited House Duty, basing the rateable value on a rental of £26, £16, etc., according to the size of the town. After all, £40 in London may be just equal, and no more, to perhaps £15 and £20 in a rural district. I have been appealed to to make it perfectly clear as to what the attitude of the Government was on these two points. I thought it was perfectly right before we got away from this question that the Committee, the hon. Members, and the country generally, ought to be left in no doubt as to the intentions of the Government. We have made it absolutely clear what our intentions are, but the hon. and learned Member is perfectly right that a matter of this kind should not depend upon any declaration of any Minister. The Committee, therefore, is entitled at the earliest possible moment to have this declaration translated into the terms of the Amendment.
    Mr. BALFOUR: The statement of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer has completely altered the whole bearing and meaning of the clause. We are asked to assent to alterations made at the final stage of the discussion of the clause. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has any more exemptions to tell us of?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Really, that is not quite accurate. I did state perfectly clearly that we are prepared to exempt small holders with regard to agricultural land. I said the other night that I was not wedded to the form in which the Amendment should be put before the House. We are prepared to introduce words that will carry out the purposes of the Government.
    Mr. BALFOUR: I do not want to make any severe comment upon the procedure of the right hon. Gentleman, but what he did while we were discussing the clause was to give us a sort of general assurance on certain new lines of policy, though he was not prepared to give us the intentions of the Government in precise language. He has now done it more or less in precise language, but at a rather late stage. We should have been glad to have had these views before us when we were discussing the clause itself.
    I desire to say only a very few words upon the two promises which the right hon. Gentleman has made. He has been asked to exempt agricultural land, and he has emphatically expressed his desire to

    1885
    do so. I do not know really how that is consistent with Clause 2, line 13, in which the words occur: "the value of which is due solely to its capacity for agricultural purposes." In the second place, let us examine what the right hon. Gentleman proposes to do to carry out the request of the hon. and learned Member for Water-ford, and the appeal which has been made to him from other parts of the House. He has based himself upon the precedent of the Act of 1894. I do not think the analogy holds; nor do I think the wording corresponds. The right hon. Gentleman has made a simple bare exception which refers to land having no higher value than its value for purely agricultural purposes. I do not believe there is a single holding, for instance, in Ireland—or Scotland, or England, for that matter—that has not some additional value for some purpose or another. It may be insignificant, but it would be difficult to prove there was no increment due. There may be a residential value not at all due to neighbouring property. A man may desire to buy a farm because it has an agreeable situation; there may be sporting points about it. You cannot say it is purely agricultural when there is a house upon it. You have two farms absolutely equal so far as soil, neighbourhood, and markets are concerned. Take it that they are equally well equipped. The one is in a sporting country, the other is not. In one there is a certain additional value due to the neighbourhood of the hunting country, and, say, there is a certain amount of game upon the farm itself. One has a good residence; the other has not, although, of course, there must be a residence sufficiently good in order that the man should be able to live in it to be able to carry out his business of husbandry. In the one case the farm has something which is not due to purely agricultural considerations. The land is agricultural land, which has a higher price owing to considerations not purely agricultural. I do not wish to misinterpret the right hon. Gentleman, but I certainly understood the whole purport of his argument to be this: that he would exempt from his Bill land of which you could say with absolute certainty and to the satisfaction of the Commissioners, "this is land only valuable because it raises so much in the way of crops." Very well, if that view prevails, I say that he deliberately brings within the mischief of his Bill land that in any such fashion does raise crops. At any rate, I put the case in all good faith, and perhaps this is not
    1886
    the time to deal with it in detail. The right hon. Gentleman sees the difficulty I have, and I am sure he will endeavour to meet it.
    I come now to another class. There must be in Ireland—I mention Ireland because the Debate has arisen out of the speech of the Member for Waterford—a great many holdings which are going to be used for years to come for agricultural purposes. The holdings have been bought by the tenants as mere agricultural land. They are not very far from towns, from Dublin, Belfast and other places. Although towns in Ireland do not grow as fast as towns in England, unquestionably there must be many of these holdings that have varied in their capital value, and have acquired something additional to their capital value on account of their proximity to the towns. How is the right hon. Gentleman going to deal with them? Does he mean to include or exclude them from his Bill? These are not the cases of market gardens, which are just on the edge of increment. I do not believe the right hon. Gentleman will ever deal satisfactorily with this question until he has found some means of excluding from the mischief of his Bill cases like these. It is not a question of holding up nor of keeping land out of the market.
    There is another point which I wish to put to the right hon. Gentleman in relation to market gardens. The proximity of a market garden to a market has nothing whatever to do with building land: it has to do with the fact that the products of that land find a very easy access to the buyers. Does the right hon. Gentleman mean to exclude that market garden land or not?
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: If its agricultural value is above its building value, although that agricultural value is due to its nearness to a town, it would still be exempt.
    Mr. BALFOUR: I am very glad to hear that reason. I doubted what the policy of the Government was. My hon. and gallant Friend (Mr. Pretyman) moved an Amendment precisely in that sense dealing with Clause 2, and the Government refused to take it. I do not know, as far as I am concerned, until I see the words on the paper, that I can say anything that will be of much assistance to the Committee in dealing with that part of the right hon. Gentleman's statement. There was another part which interested me as much, and that was the part in which he said he was

    1887
    going to exclude small holdings, of which the capital value was under £500. The interest of that statement is that it entirely destroys the whole theoretical process on which the Government have chosen to erect this exceptional taxation. Nobody doubts it is an exceptional form of taxation. The Government have accepted the theory of unearned increment, and that unearned increment is a proper subject for taxation. They profess this in many respects in the same way as the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne and hon. Members below the Gangway. Under this theory it is, of course, quite impossible to exclude small holdings. If your theory is that unearned increment is sufficiently prominent, to which the owner of the land under the existing law has no moral right whatever, if it is a subject of taxation that may be raised to any extent, then I say you have no more right to exclude the man whose holding is under £500 than the man whose holding is over £500.
    Of course, if this tax is impending, and not put on any particular kind of property but on a particular degree of wealth, that is another matter, and upon that I am not going to quarrel with the right hon. Gentleman until I see what his method is in taxing higher wealth, until I see his proposal in its entirety. It is perfectly consistent with the original principles of the Government. It is part of their general principles with which I find myself in the least dissent that the rich must pay their full share of any of the burdens which are thrown upon the country. We agree upon that; but is this intended to be a method of exempting the poor and taxing the rich? Is that the object? If that is the object of it, let us consider it from that point of view. I am quite ready to consider it from that point of view. It is thoroughly indefensible. A man with a large holding is not necessarily a rich man. He may be an absolute beggar. He may have mortgaged that holding up to the extreme limit, and even beyond it. He may not have a shilling. [An HON. MEMBER: "He may have squandered it."] I am not going to discuss the relative morals of different sections of the community. May I put this to the hon. Member who interrupts me? A man may mortgage a property for purposes which he anticipates would benefit himself, and will certainly benefit the community. He may borrow money for what he conceives and hopes to be productive purposes, but he may fail.
    1888
    He may invest in business, and he may fail. Let us take the case of a man who has failed, or let us take the case of a man who inherits acres which are mortgaged. Is it not a gross absurdity that a heavy tax should be placed upon those who, for anything you know, may be extremely poor? And these are not isolated cases. The magnitude of a man's holding is absolutely no guide whatever to the degree of his wealth.
    A millionaire may have a small holding, less than £500, and be exempt from taxation altogether in respect of that holding. Another man next door may have a holding which is over £500, but which is mortgaged up to the extreme limits, yet the millionaire is taxed not in proportion to his wealth, but to what he pays for the land. In other words, your justification of your tax has a bearing on the kind of land a man has and the amount he has paid for it. Then you must justify it, if you can, upon your theory of unearned increment and the action of society I am not going into that argument again. I only suppose, for the sake of argument, it is a sound justification, as it is the only justification ever put forward by the Government, and if this is your justification you cannot exempt small holdings. If, on the other hand, you suddenly reverse your policy, and say, "We will exempt certain land because it is owned by poor people, and include other land because it is possessed by rich people, and make the magnitude of wealth the measure," I say your Bill is an absurdity. The size of a holding has no relation to the size or magnitude of your tax. The small owner may be a millionaire, the other man, the larger owner, may be little better than a pauper, yet you tax them upon principles which are neither intellectual upon original ground nor justifiable on the grounds on which they are going to be justified, in your Sur-tax and increasing Death Duties. It is quite clear the Government have found unexpectantly to themselves that there are a great many more owners of small plots of land than they had any idea or conception of. They have begun to realise that to throw upon these people the cost of valuation in the first and the cost of paying the taxation in the second place would arouse an amount of unpopularity which even the most popular of Governments could hardly be expected to bear. They have discovered, moreover, that the Budget as a whole has so many enemies in the constituencies that it is

    1889
    their business to make friends where they can. They have tried one election upon the original principles of the Budget. They have not found them very satisfactory. They have other bye-elections going on, and they propose to try the Budget on wholly new principles. I do not know whether that is good electioneering or not, but it is certainly excessively bad finance. It is certainly one of the most amazingly unprincipled things that I think a Government has ever done, to bring forward a tax on the ground that unearned increment was a proper subject of taxation; then to discover that a good many people have unearned increment; and then, in order to conciliate them, to throw your taxes, not upon the rich, but upon those who happen to own larger plots of land than you think the majority of the existing freeholders in this country happen to possess. When the right hon. Gentleman brings forward his new clauses we shall be able to discuss them in detail. In the meantime, I venture to point out to the Committee, with all respect, that the whole principle underlying Clause 1 and Clause 2 of the Bill has been abandoned by the Government, and they have not substituted for them any other proposal which have behind them, so far as I can discover, any principle at all, unless you call it a principle, at the moment when it is extremely desirable to attract as many votes as you can, to throw all the burden of the taxation upon the smaller number of people who may be expected not to have so many votes. That is the only principle I can see behind them. They no longer use words about unearned increment, or the action of society to which land owes its whole value. This very point was impressed upon Mr. Henry George over and over again, and he, although I do not agree with his principle, held with rigid consistency that if you exempt the small owners, or the owners of small portions of land, there was not a single principle left by which you could adopt his peculiar methods to the larger holders. Mr. Henry George realised that. The Government had failed to realise it, and I think the gross inconsistency as well as injustice in which they will be involved will add largely to the ever-growing difficulties' which surround their path in attempting to pass this measure.
    Sir J. DICKSON-POYNDER: Before making a few observations upon the clause I should like to say a word with regard to the statement made by the Chan-
    1890
    cellor of the Exchequer. In his desire to meet the appeal made to him from all quarters of the House, the right hon. Gentleman has come down with two alternative proposals to those proposals in the Bill. There has been a general appeal to exclude agricultural land, and it is the fixed determination of the House of Commons that agricultural land, as such, shall be excluded from the purview of the Increment Tax. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has told us that land which is higher in value than its value for agricultural purposes shall be taxed as such. I venture to believe that on closer investigation this will be found to be, I am afraid, one of those hurried proposals which are brought upon the Government in this Bill under the weight and burden of exemption and taxation. I do not believe myself that you can discriminate any agricultural land as long as it is being employed for that purpose. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told us that no agricultural land will come under the increment taxation. I should like to ask him what will be the condition of agricultural land not merely round London and the large provincial towns, but near every single small town throughout the length and breadth of the country. There is not an acre of land round these towns, or even villages, that have not got a value over and above what is, strictly speaking, their agricultural value. Go to any part of the country and you will find if you value land let, perhaps, at £l or £l 10s. or £2 an acre, if sold it will easily bring in something between £300 and £400. That land would not for many years be developed for building purposes, but it has a value over and above its agricultural value due to its prospective building value. This tax is going to affect such land in all the small towns and villages as well as in the large towns throughout the country. This brings me back to my original argument that you cannot include with any justice the Increment Duty on ordinary leases. You can only include it at special times and occasions, and those special occasions are when the land materialises and is being converted to a lease for building purposes. I do not believe that this proposal will bear the weight of discussion in this House, because it must mean that a great deal of agricultural land will come within the tax. We have heard a good deal about small owners, and the Government finds itself in this respect in a some-

    1891
    what ridiculous and anomalous position. The small owner of land is going to be excluded when the land is shown to be under the value of £500.
    Mr. BALFOUR: The site value.
    Sir JOHN DICKSON-POYNDER: Yes, the site value.
    Sir F. BANBURY: No, it is the total value.
    Sir J. DICKSON-POYNDER: I think it must be the total value, but perhaps some Member of the Government will explain which it is. I will take the case of a small holder whose land is valued at £600, which at 4 per cent. produces £24 a year. You can go through the whole list of owners, and you will find an immense number of people will be hit by this tax. As long as you charge this Increment Tax upon the ordinary lease you have to go into these exemptions, which merely reduces the whole matter to a maze of confusion, and when close investigation has been made great injustice will be shown to many individuals in the country. With regard to the clause itself, I fully admit that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has done his very best to meet the suggestions which have been made in all parts of the House, and he has been generous in the concessions which he has made in the course of the Debates during the past week. The clause which we are going to divide upon does not embody anything like the number of undertakings which have been made in the course of the discussion, and it is a great pity that those undertakings have not been embodied in the draft of the Bill. The concessions which have been made have almost reduced the Increment Tax to the vanishing point.
    What have we got left? We have erected alongside this tax a cumbersome and extremely expensive machinery which will not produce revenue, but simply a full catalogue of barren statistics. These Debates have made us almost forget what we are here to discuss and vote for. We are here to vote revenues for the State to meet a very great deficit to the tune of many millions. This tax when brought into operation, far from increasing the revenues of the State, will, by the erection of this costly machinery, create a state of affairs under which I shall not be at all surprised if the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the future has to come down to this House and impose further taxation
    1892
    to meet the expenditure involved by this scheme. Why do we find ourselves in this unsatisfactory position? The reason is because the Chancellor of the Exchequer has made it his determination to establish a new system of valuation in this Bill, and in order to achieve this the right hon. Gentleman is obliged to erect this universal system of taxation for all those different classes and categories upon whom this Increment Duty will be imposed. I say this with every desire to urge upon the Government before it is too late the necessity of recasting this scheme into something of a practical nature.
    I am confident that in dealing with land taxation you can only impose the Increment Duty on two occasions. The first occasion is when the land passes by sale from one owner to another. When it can easily be shown that there is something over and above the actual agricultural value or the capitalised revenue which the owner has enjoyed. Upon the occasion of the sale the difference can easily be taken, and such a tax could be imposed by existing machinery. The second occasion is the time when agricultural land bordering on a town is let upon lease for building purposes. The matter is then a perfectly simple one, because land which was formerly let for agricultural purposes at £2 per acre will probably be producing £30 to £40 per acre for building purposes, and that is a reasonable time for charging an increment tax. That can be done by machinery which exists at the present time. I have tried by Amendments to recast this Bill in that direction, and if I had been successful a reliable revenue would have been procured for the State with a minimum of friction and a minimum expense of collection. Unfortunately, I was not successful, and there still remains in this measure this unfortunate Increment Tax which is being imposed upon general leaseholders, and also at the time of death, which, of course, involves a State valuation.
    Is this proposal of a State valuation satisfactory? I believe when the local authorities in the country realise what this scheme means they will take the greatest possible objection to it. It is proposed that four Commissioners shall be appointed, and they are to be dictators in London who will have to appoint the valuers. Now, what does it mean to value a great county or a great town? One single valuer cannot do it, and he will have to provide himself with a large staff of clerks and accessories, and this new

    1893
    machinery is going to be established in our counties and towns at a time when there has been in existence for centuries a complete system of assessment and valuation throughout the country. The existing system is going to be ignored, and the new one is going to be placed alongside it. I know it would be impossible to include in the Budget Bill a large scheme of reformed assessment and valuation, but I appeal to the Government to withdraw all those proposals which necessitate the setting up of a new system of valuation, and content themselves for revenue purposes by raising their tax upon increment at sale, upon conversion, reversion, on the expiration of leases, all of which can be done by the existing machinery of the Inland Revenue. The whole system of valuation in the country is an overdue reform which must take place with local and Imperial taxation working in harmony. I should like to see the whole of this scheme withdrawn from the Budget Bill, and next year the Government could come down with a well-considered measure for the reform of our valuation system. I am in no way opposed to a valuation upon a capital basis throughout the country, because then you would avoid all this heavy tax upon undeveloped land. I urge the Government to reconsider the situation, and in doing so I am speaking for a very large body of hon. Gentlemen who sit upon the Ministerial side. Many of us look with the deepest apprehension upon this Bill as it lumbers on day by day in the difficult morass in which we find ourselves in the early hours of the morning after a long Debate. This is all due to the fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has insisted upon introducing a scheme of valuation in this Bill and has broadened his Increment Duty in order to bring in a lot of categories of land quite unsuited to the purpose. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer will withdraw those unsuitable categories, and confine himself to those occasions when land materialises in its increment, he can easily collect a large sum for the revenues of the State.
    Mr. J. J. CLANCY: I am desired by the hon. and learned Member for Water-ford (Mr. John Redmond) to express what the Irish party have to say to the Chancellor of the Exchequer on this clause. From the very commencement, the Irish party have insisted that agricultural land should be excluded from the operation of this tax, especially in Ireland, because
    1894
    there is going on in that country a revolution of a most beneficial character, which we think might be stopped and prevented by any burden of this kind being put upon agriculture. We are very glad to learn from the repeated statements of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that it was the intention of the Government to exclude agricultural land from the scope of these taxes. When we looked at the clause in the Bill, I confess we were not quite so reassured as we were when listening to his speeches, and, consequently, at an early stage in the discussion, I expressed the opinion that the proposals in the Bill cut athwart the revolution taking place in Ireland under the Land Purchase Acts. The Chancellor of the Exchequer on that occasion repeated for the second or third time that it was the intention of the Government to exclude agricultural land, and that the fears I had expressed were entirely unfounded. Further discussion ensued, and on Wednesday night last, I must confess, the rejection of the Amendment of the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. Pretyman) was rather disconcerting. I thought the rejection of that Amendment meant that, after all, and notwithstanding everything the Government had said to the contrary, agricultural values were going to be taxed under this Bill. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, however, made another statement which gave hope that he meant what he had said, and that what he said would be carried out. He said the whole question was open, and he would further consider what methods ought to be adopted for carrying out an agreement which, it was evident, had been come to between the various sections of the House. He has produced to-day the particular solution at which he has arrived, and I am instructed, on behalf of my colleagues, that they consider the new clause which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has read out this evening is one which will meet our case. It is even more drastic than has been noticed by either of the right hon. Gentlemen who have just spoken. I would like to call attention to the wording of the clause. "Increment Value Duty shall not be charged in respect of agricultural land providing the land has for other purposes no higher value than the value for agricultural purposes." That means there may be increment value, and yet it would not be taxed. The enactment would be, not that there must be increment, but that the

    1895
    increment must be larger for building purposes than for agricultural purposes. This is of extreme importance from the point of view of the Irish people.
    If I am putting the correct interpretation upon it, it means simply that no agricultural land in Ireland will be taxed unless it is building land. There may be an increment in the value of the land, but that increment must be greater for building purposes than it is for agricultural purposes before there can be any duty assessed. If that be so, I am not alarmed by the remarkable figures given by the hon. Baronet who ha3 just sat down (Sir J. Dickson-Poynder). He imagined the case of a piece of land worth £l per annum per acre, and he assumed that the capital value of it would be £300. That may be the case in England, but I do not know any such case throughout nine-tenths of Ireland. It is an absurd set of figures, and it shows that hon. Members in this House have not that knowledge of Ireland and of Irish conditions which is desirable in anybody speaking upon a measure affecting Ireland. I have myself drawn attention to the fact that it is a familiar practice in fixing the value of land to take into account what is called proximity value. In many cases the value of agricultural land has added to it 50, 60 and 70 per cent. in proportion to its proximity to a town. Those of us who are acquainted with the matter of fixing rents in Ireland and agricultural value know from actual experience that many of these assessments have resulted in crushing burdens being put upon the tenants, and I have no doubt that to pass any enactment which would tax proximity values would double the burdens in the long run on Irish tenants; and, if it involved that, it would be our duty to vote against the clause. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, however, has in the plainest manner stated that it is not intended by these words to tax proximity value. It comes, therefore, to this, that only building land will be taxed, and, for my part, I have no hesitation in saying that for the 24 years I have been in this House I have been in favour of the taxation of such building land, the only difference I and my colleagues intended being that it should go in aid of the local rates. We are now going to get half of it in aid of the local rates, but it is inconceivable that I should be asked to prevent Lord Pembroke, Lord Carysfort, Lord Longford and Lord De Vesci, who have reduced
    1896
    conditions in Ireland to what they are at present, and have made Unionists and Nationalists alike indignant that they should not have long since been stopped from these predatory operations, and from pocketing the proceeds of their neighbour's enterprise, from being taxed.
    We shall certainly vote for this clause, it being clearly understood, as I understand, that proximity value is not being taxed, that agricultural value to any extent is not being taxed, and that the only thing which is being taxed is building value. I have no hesitation whatever in saying I should vote most gladly and heartily for that. The Chancellor of the Exchequer referred to the question of exempting small holdings. I thought the speech of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Balfour) the most amazing deliverance I have listened to for a long time. The demand for the exemption of small holdings came from above the Gangway on this side of the House. The right hon. Gentleman is understood to lead the party above the Gangway on this side of the house. I do not know whether he does or not. He made an ingenuous speech, the substantial effect of which is that it is impossible to devise a scheme to exempt small holdings at all. His reason for thinking you could not exempt them was that you could not separate the small holders from the large ones. He was able, as he always is, to give very effective illustrations of his assertions. There is no doubt, whatever language you take, you will find cases on one side which ought to be on the other, but you must try and lay down some rule. Wherever you draw the line, you will find some hard cases. It seems to me an extraordinary thing to ask on what principle this could be justified in face of the fact that you do it in assessing the Income Tax. Every man who has not an income of £160 a year is exempted absolutely from the Income Tax. It is too late in the day to argue whether you can have an exemption or not or whether you can have a dividing line. It is done, and the only question is whether or not another limit ought to be enacted. I am not prepared to say at the present moment whether the limit selected is too low. I should like to consider the question. The matter has only been mentioned in the course of this Debate, and, of course, it is a very difficult matter, involving not merely questions of law, but also questions of facts and figures. We ought to have an oppor-

    1897
    tunity of considering whether or not another limit ought to be chosen. We want to see whether the words of the clause meet our case, and it is for English Members on both sides of the House to see whether they meet their case. But with the principle of exempting small holdings we are entirely in favour, and if this scheme be carried out we consider that our case will be substantially met, because, if I understand the two proposals which have been made, the exemption of small holders will free nine-tenths of all holders of agricultural land in Ireland from all land taxation; and, as for the remainder, they will be protected, in my opinion. Only building land is to be taxed. Agricultural values will not be taxed at all, and amongst these agricultural values is proximity to a market or town. Under these circumstances we intend to vote for the clause. It remains to be seen whether or not, if this clause is inserted, some alteration will have to be made in the wording. I have not had time to examine it, and there may be some inconsistency between the words of the new clause and the provisions of Clause 2 which we are now considering. I have no doubt, however, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer will make it plain that nothing shall be put into this Clause 2 which will take away the effect of the new clause of which he has given notice to-day.
    Lord ROBERT CECIL: The speech to which we have just listened is an excellent example of the kind of confusion into which this House has been thrown by the conundrum put before it this afternoon by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The hon. Gentleman practically abandons all the principles which he has hitherto advocated providing that the part of the country he represents is freed from this burden. Let me say a word or two in reference to his observations as to the exemption of small land-owners. He said that we on this side had no right to criticise the proposals of the Government in that respect, because we had asked for the exemption of small land-owners. I do not think that that is quite an accurate statement of what has occurred. What has been constantly said on these benches is that it will be a very great hardship on the small land-owner to have to pay this tax. But I think we have all recognised that, if the principle is good for anything, it must apply equally to small and big land-owners, and that the principle of valuation cannot be split up according to the number of acres a man may happen
    1898
    to own. In reference to this clause the hon. Member was strikingly inconsistent. He was very grateful to the Chancellor of the Exchequer for having granted the demand that agricultural land should be excluded from this tax, although its value was a proximity value, and not due to social value. The Chancellor of the Exchequer says that in dealing with agricultural land, and agricultural land only, you are not to have regard to social value, or to the value created by the community, and as long as it is used for the purposes of agriculture that principle does not apply. The hon. Member expressly thanked the right hon. Gentleman for disregarding what he called proximity value. That was because those whom he represents are more interested in agricultural land with a proximity value than in urban land with a similar value.
    Mr. CLANCY: I dealt with agricultural value. The value which these gentlemen have appropriated to themselves is building land value near to the towns.
    Lord ROBERT CECIL: Is there any distinction between a market garden which owes its prosperity and the value of the land to its neighbourhood to large markets like London or Dublin, and land which owes its value—its building value—to the same reasons. These are instances of "proximity value." I think that is an excellent phrase. In my opinion, there is no distinction at all. There is a distinction between the purposes to which the land is applied, but there is no distinction between the causes which bring about the value of the land. Much has been said about the importance of excluding agricultural land. Of course, I think that all land should be excluded from this Bill. I am glad that small holders are excluded. I only wish that large landholders were also exempt. But the provisions of the clause announced by the Government today are absolutely inconsistent with any kind of principle which can possibly be defended. There is another point which arises in reference to the proposed agricultural land clause. The Chancellor of the Exchequer says that this clause will free the agricultural landowners from the worries of valuation. I cannot imagine why he said that. If you take the case of a field deep in the country, miles away from any habitation, then it may well be that it does not much matter what value you put upon the land, because for many years to come it is likely to be used for

    1899
    agriculture only. But there are enormous tracts in this country which will certainly come into use for other than agricultural purposes before very long, and in all these cases you must have the whole apparatus for valuation ready to put into operation. From time to time whenever a change of ownership takes place, or when any occasion arises for a fresh valuation you will have a much more difficult and elaborate valuation to make. First, you will have to value the land for agricultural purposes; then you will have to certify or conceive what other purposes it can possibly be put to, and if you can find a purpose to which it can be put other than agriculture, which is more valuable for employing the land, then this exemption will come in. You will, in fact, have a much more elaborate valuation in a large number of cases than before, and there certainly will be no simplification. That brings me to the great point which has already been made several times, I am afraid, and that is, the enormous difficulty of the valuations which are provided for by this Bill. There are not only the different kinds of land to be dealt with, but there are different kinds of ownership, all involving considerable difficulty. There is the freeholder, the building owner, and the tenant. They will all have different interests, and will require to be heard before the valuer. They will all have different objects in view, and they will complicate the valuation in many ways. There are other enormous difficulties; there is the one which will arise from the use of the words "permanent works." No one knows what constitutes a permanent work. From one point of view nothing is permanent; from another point of view anything which lasts over 30 years may be considered permanent. How the unhappy valuer is going to distinguish between them, I confess I do not know. Then there is provision with regard to the work executed on behalf of the owner or of any person interested in the land. No one knows what that means. Take the case of gas pipes laid by the gas company, or water pipes put down by the water company. Is that expense executed on behalf of the owner? Is it not rather on behalf of the company? Undoubtedly one would expect it to be included among the deductions. But I will not labour this point.
    I wish to press upon the Committee that all this gigantic elaboration of valuation means expense. We have a right to complain that the Government have absolutely
    1900
    declined to give us the slightest assistance in arriving at an estimate of what that expense will be. I cannot understand why. The Government must have formed some estimate; it is quite incredible that even a Radical Government would come down to this House and propose a gigantic scheme to be put in force without having formed some idea of what it is going to cost. Why do they not communicate it to the House? It can only be because they are afraid if they do give the figures they will terrify their own supporters. It may be that they are advised that the cost of the valuation is going to be a very serious item. Still, I think we should have some estimate from the Government. There have been estimates advanced on the part of the opponents, but they have been very vague, ranging between 10 millions and 40 millions sterling. I will take the lowest estimate—10 millions. The Government are going to put a charge of 10 millions upon a certain class of tax-payers in this country; that is what it means. What are they going to get out of it? The original estimate of the Government was that, in this year, it would produce £50,000. Half of that they have given away to the local authorities; that leaves them £25,000. They now announce that they are not going to bring in the small land-owner, and that they are not going to apply it to agricultural land or to small increments. In passing, I should like to say we ought to have some statement as to what is the exact effect of the Amendment in regard to that. It is impossible for a private Member to make any estimate at all of the diminutions these exemptions mean. We have asked for an estimate, but it has been refused. The Government do refuse these things, because they know that they can trample on their own majority as much as they like, and, naturally, they are not very much afraid of the minority. Still, they have refused to give us an estimate. I should be very much surprised if, when all these diminutions are worked out, this tax will bring in to the Exchequer more than £10,000. This is the proposition submitted to this House of Commons which is considering the finances of the year. In order to get that £10,000, we are asked to enact a clause which will involve a scheme of valuation that will cost, at the lowest estimate put before us, 10 millions sterling.
    I ask any hon. Member to consider whether that is a reasonable, business proposition. Then, we are told by the Prime

    1901
    Minister, in his speeches throughout the country, "Oh, it is no use talking to us about the unfairness of this or that hard case. We have got to get the money. We have got to build 'Dreadnoughts' and to give old age pensions, and we want all the money we can get, and we are going to spend ten million pounds in order to get ten thousand." That is the defence which the Government makes as far as the revenue is concerned. With regard to other defences that are made to these proposals, they are rather kaleidoscopic. There is the windfall theory, but undoubtedly this tax is not going to be levied upon it, nor is it going to be levied on great acquisitions of wealth, but on all sorts of things beyond that. I am not going to repeat the argument about the dealer in land. The argument is very clear, and it is that you should, having got men engaged in a particular commercial transaction, tax them 20 per cent, on their incomes, while you are going to tax everybody else less than 5 per cent. We have put that point over and over again to the Government, but have not got a single syllable of reply to it. There is not a single sentence of an answer which the Government or any Member of the Government has made to that case, which has been pressed upon them by the hon. Member for Preston and by other hon. Members on this side of the House. The only answer that has been given has been made by the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald). His reply is coherent, though I think it myself is in the highest degree inconclusive, and it is that it is so wicked to be the owner of land or a dealer in land that you are entitled to take as much as you like from the pockets of a gentleman who is in that position. He is, it is said, a kind of enemy of the human race, and is entitled to no consideration whatever. That, however, again, is not part of the announcement made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and, therefore, no kind of reply has really been offered.
    There is another gross injustice which has never been dealt with at all by the Government. They say that they propose to tax increment, and they propose to levy this Valuation Duty—because it really is a Valuation Duty if you impose this gigantic expenditure upon all those who have to make the valuation. The Government impose this burden, moreover, not only on the people who are going to pay the tax, but on an
    1902
    immense number of people who are not going to pay the tax, including the owners of agricultural land, who were expressly freed this afternoon. How can that be justice? How is it possible in a Finance Bill to justify the creation of a system of valuation evidently not for the purpose of taxing but merely for some ulterior purpose, which is not disclosed? And, be it remembered, all this arises upon the finance of a year, when by the admission of all we have got to raise every penny we can. We have a deficit of 16 millions, and we have to get money for that, and the Government propose, in addition to that 16 millions, to impose for no purpose of revenue what would be an additional tax of 10 millions, which will bring in to the Exchequer £10,000, and they propose for another tax a payment of £100,000. I call that positively ludicrous finance, and one is forced to ask why is this done? Is it finance at all? Is this really a Finance Bill—I am talking of the land clauses—is this really a Finance Bill at all, or is it merely a Valuation Bill in disguise? I confess I have some difficulty in answering that question, but there is a passage in a recent speech of the Prime Minister which makes me think it may be a Valuation Bill in disguise, even in the intention of the Government. The Prime Minister made a speech about a week ago, in which he was dealing with some random talk or rash phrases, about the action of the House of Lords, and said:—
    "All this random talk betrays, to my mind, an uneasy consciousness and an uncomfortable apprehension: an uneasy consciousness that this class of land is at the present moment very much undervalued, and an uncomfortable apprehension that if it ever comes to be valued for these taxes at its true market value that valuation may possibly be taken advantage of for some other purpose."
    Is that really the foundation of the Government policy? Is it the object of the Government and the party opposite to use the Finance Bill in order to pass a Valuation Bill which may be used for some other purpose? At the same gathering, I think it was the National Liberal Federation, there was a speech made by the hon. Member for North Carnarvon (Mr. William Jones), who said:—
    "There was only one way of carrying into effect the popular cause, and that was the establishment beyond dispute of the supremacy of the House of Commons. For that purpose the veto must go. As an emissary of the Budget League he urged them to focus their energies on the Budget, which was a two-power lever to raise democratic finance and undermine the influence of the Lords."
    I wish very respectfully to ask whether that is the policy of the Government? I think both the expressions of the Prime

    1903
    Minister and of the hon. Member are a little obscure, but I think I understand what the hon. Member for Carnarvon, at any rate, means by the phrases which he used. He means this: We will pass a Valuation Bill in our Finance Bill. We will then send it to the House of Lords. If the House of Lords rejects it, we shall go to the country and say, This is a great invasion of the liberties of the House of Commons, and a great aggression on the part of the hereditary Chamber; but if, on the other hand, the House of Lords passes it, it will be a valuable precedent, and can be applied to a great number of other purposes. That is what I understand the hon. Member for North Carnarvon to mean, but is that what the Government mean?
    Is this part of the Government campaign against the House of Lords or not? Is it a Finance Bill or is it a political manœuvre? Do they desire to use this Bill to enforce a conflict on a constitutional question? I very earnestly ask, not the Government this time but hon. Members opposite—the hon. Members of a moderate turn of mind, and, I believe, there are very many of them—whether that is the kind of policy of adventure into which they desire to go? Let me press upon them this consideration. What would be the results of the policy? It means, I will not say a constitutional revolution, because that may be an exaggeration, but it does mean a very grave constitutional change, whatever the result. If you succeed in goading the House of Lords into throwing out the Budget Bill—if you succeed in that policy, and you fail in the constituencies, you will have at any rate started a precedent, which may be of large importance, of enormous importance, in the future relations of the two Houses, and not to the great advantage of this House. ["Question."] It is eminently, I venture to submit, germane to the question of the clause, as this is the first time that we have had an opportunity of discussing the kernel of valuation. If, on the other hand, the House of Lords submits, and you beat them, then it means a material difference in the position of the House of Lords, and it means a great constitutional change, whichever way you take it. I do think it is time that every Member of this House should realise what they are being led up to by a Government, or by certain Ministers, who are absolutely regardless of con-
    1904
    stitutional considerations. The question is, whether you are going to try to utilise a Bill for raising the revenue of the country for this year, in order to force a constitutional conflict upon the country, which, I fervently believe, they have not the least desire to enter into.
    Mr. E. J. SOARES: I do not propose to follow the Noble Lord into the very interesting constitutional question which he has just raised, because, after all, we are not dealing with the whole Bill, as we are only dealing; with Clause 2, but we shall be quite prepared to deal with these constitutional questions when they arise. In the meantime, the hon. Member can rest assured that we are not afraid either of the constituencies or of the House of Lords. I must honestly say that I am astounded at the attitude which hon. Gentlemen opposite have adopted this afternoon. Two very important concessions have been made by the Chancellor. He has excluded agricultural land and has excluded small holdings. Day after day, night after night, the exclusion of agricultural land has been pleaded for, from those benches opposite, by almost every right hon. and hon. Gentleman who has spoken on the other side of the House, and yet, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer gets up this afternoon and proves conclusively that he intends to keep the pledges which he has given before, there is not a word of thanks from hon. or right hon. Gentlemen opposite. Then again, in regard to small holdings, we have heard the woes and sorrows of the small holder pleaded from that side of the House. They have been full of sympathy with the small holder, until he is excluded from the Bill. When he is excluded we are told at once by the Leader of the Opposition that it is altogether against the scheme of our Bill, but it is not against it, because the scheme of this measure is the taxation of wealth and luxury, and therefore the exclusion of the small holder is quite in consonance with the scheme of this Bill.
    Mr. BALFOUR: As the hon. Gentleman refers to me, may I point out that the omission of the small holder has nothing to do with the difference between wealth and poverty.
    Mr. SOARES: I must say I do not agree with the right hon. Gentleman in that contention. In my humble opinion, I think the Chancellor of the Exchequer has kept the pledges which he and other Members of

    1905
    the Government have made with regard to the exclusion of agricultural land, and I am quite satisfied with the clause, which the right hon. Gentleman has promised to put on the Paper in the course of a few days. The Leader of the Opposition gave some criticisms of that clause—and I do not wonder, because at first sight I admit the clause needs a certain amount of consideration—and he alluded to the case of a farm having a certain amount of residential value. We all know that there are many such farms where there is beautiful scenery and in other ways there are many farms which have a residential value. The clause says:—"Increment Value Duty shall not be charged in respect of agricultural land while the land has for other purposes no higher value than its value for agricultural purposes." From that it follows that if it is of more value as a farm than it is as a residence it will not have to pay any Increment Duty at all. The same remark applies also to the criticism which the Leader of the Opposition gave in respect to sporting rights. After the statement which the Chancellor of (the Exchequer has made this afternoon no one can deny that this is a great boon to the agricultural community. Agriculture is absolutely excluded from all these taxes. There can be no shadow of a doubt about that, and we get the Agricultural Development Grant, we get half the money derived from these taxes in reduction of the rates, and we get the improvement of the roads. These are great benefits indeed to agriculture, and the agricultural community recognise it. They believed that the Government were going to keep their pledges with regard to agricultural land. The Government have fulfilled their pledges, and they have received no thanks from hon. Gentlemen opposite, but the agricultural community have never doubted them. The best test of that is what is the opinion of people who are purchasing farms to-day. I have an account of the estate market taken from the "Standard" of last Saturday week. They say:—
    "The succession of good sales under the hammer at the Mart during the past week or two has imported an air of cheerfulness to the precincts of Tokenhouse Yard to which that afflicted region has long been a stranger. It would appear as if investors, disregarding the perils with-which property is threatened are taking full advantage of current prices, assisted thereto by the present ease in money rates. In the country there is much more activity in the property market, while in the offices a deal of private treaty sales are taking place. It must. not be overlooked, however, that the season is at its height, and fixtures unusually numerous. To an extent, therefore, the good business now taking place must be viewed in conjunction with these circumstances and judged accordingly. Taken altogether the
    1906
    transactions in real estate just now are decidedly favourable, and to the investor are of a profitable character."
    Let us see what some of these investments are which to the investor are of a profitable character. There were some Essex farms put up. The first lot, 148 acres, known as Carter's Farm, with good house and the usual buildings, realised £1,900. The rent is £60 5s., that is over 30 years' purchase, and good business for the investor according to the "Standard." The second lot consisted of a freehold occupation farm with the usual premises, area 103 acres, let at £40, and realised £l,450, that is 36 years' purchase, and good business for the investor according to the "Standard."
    Sir F. BANBURY: Because the land is charged at a low rent.
    Mr. SOARES: Landlords generally get the highest rent they can. There is another farm of nearly 207 acres with a fairly good house, let at £100 and sold for £3,250, besides £120 for timber, that is 32½ years' purchase. When you consider these facts you must come to the conclusion that the people who are investing in agricultural land look upon this Budget as good business. Now that the pledge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been put in clear and explicit terms, and will appear in the Bill, I believe agricultural Members, on whichever side they sit, ought to thank the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
    Mr. E. G. PRETYMAN: The hon. Member represents an agricultural constituency and he has repeated what he told us a few days ago that this was good business for agriculturists, and that the agriculturists thought so, especially in his constituency, but he omitted, in giving the opinion of the agriculturists, to read a resolution which was passed a few days ago in his own constituency by a large gathering of farmers, and which I believe was sent to him. It read as follows:—
    "That this public meeting of the men of Braunton, tenant farmers and others interested in the land, held in the largest agricultural parish in the North-West Division of Devonshire, hereby repudiate the statement made by Mr. Soares that we have expressed warm enthusiasm for the Budget Resolutions."
    Mr. SOARES: That was an out-of-door meeting addressed by a peripatetic Tariff Reformer, one of those gentlemen you pay so much a night to, and the chair was taken by a paid agent. So far as I am aware there was not a single tenant farmer present. To call that an agricultural meeting is absurd.
    Mr. PRETYMAN: Of course, I must accept the meeting as the resolution described it. It is for the hon. Member to communicate with his constituents to discover whether his account or that of the meeting itself is the more accurate. I have no doubt he will be able to settle that with his constituents, and there will be another way in which he will have to settle with the tenant farmers of Devonshire, perhaps before very long. My experience of the feeling of the agricultural interest is very much more in accordance with the terms of the resolution than that expressed by the hon. Member himself. The agricultural interest has been very much alarmed by these proposals, and I cannot help traversing, in all kindness, the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that he has never intended to tax agricultural land. How can he reconcile that with the last part of the clause as introduced where it distinctly states that in the case of agricultural land, the value of which is solely due to its value for agricultural purposes, certain exemptions shall be made, thereby implying that a tax is to be imposed upon them. You cannot get away from it. The exemptions could not amount to total exemptions, and in some cases would be no exemption at all.
    I proposed an Amendment which stated definitely that where land was used for agricultural purposes it should be exempt. The right hon. Gentleman refused to accept the Amendment on the ground that there was a kind of agricultural value which he called "accommodation value," or which was due to its proximity to a town, which he most strongly held ought to be taxed. He has now absolutely abandoned that position. He said he objected to my words because they would include that particular kind of land in the exemption. The words of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's own proposal are exactly similar in that respect, and he has admitted it. The only ground for the refusal of that exemption has been definitely abandoned. It would have been a little more candid if the Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted what everyone knows to be the fact, that his views have undergone considerable modification as the result of the discussions in this House, but he obviously intended to include all land within the purview of the Increment Value Duty, and as these discussions proceeded, and as a consensus of opinion has been displayed on both sides of the House that agricultural land cannot, and should not be included, he has gradually brought himself,
    1908
    rather late in the day, and after a great deal of time has been wasted, to the conclusion that agricultural land must be exempted. He has refused the words which would have done it in. accordance with the principles of the Bill, and he has now introduced other words which are going to create new difficulties, which again will have to be met. I understand the Chancellor of the Exchequer to say that the owners of all agricultural land are to send in a valuation, just as they were to do before, and it will have to be a valuation for site value as well as for capital value, therefore, they will have I presume the original site value fixed which will be a very low site value indeed, and if at some future time that land obtains a building value the comparison will be with the very low original site value which now has to be fixed. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why very low?"] Because I am speaking of poor agricultural land. The Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted only a few minutes ago that this site value of agricultural land would in many cases be almost nothing. Is not that very low? My proposal was that where there was agricultural value the land should be exempt to that extent only. That would not have altered the general principle of the Bill at all. What the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes now is that agricultural land, although to be untaxed, is to have its site value fixed as from 30th April last. He has also admitted that that site value is in many cases a negligible quantity. Therefore you are going to start with a site value of very little indeed. The right hon. Gentleman admitted that that was a good ground for abandoning it, because in many cases the buildings were worth nearly as much as the land.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I never said the site value of land was a negligible quantity. There is a great difference between that and saying that the site value on some land was not equal to the value of the building.
    Mr. PRETYMAN: I should have thought it was a stronger statement, because he said that the value of the land in many cases was not equal to the value of the buildings, and that the value is to be arrived at by taking the buildings from the land. The difference between us is this: The Chancellor of the Exchequer says that it is less than nothing, and I say that it is a negligible quantity. The Committee may take their choice between the two.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Surely the hon. and gallant Gentleman does not mean what he says, or at least he cannot have reflected upon it. His statement is that you deduct the value of the buildings from the land. You deduct the value of the buildings from the total value, and that is a very different thing.
    Mr. PRETYMAN: The total value of the unit is less than its original capital value. Certainly the buildings have cost in innumerable cases an amount exceeding the present capital value of the land. That is known to every agriculturist, and, therefore, in that case the site value will either be nothing or a negligible quantity. That means that under this proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer we shall have a site value fixed which will be in many cases—and those cases include the poorest land—a negligible quantity, and that is to be the point of departure as original site value for the calculation of future value. We contend that that is an unfair point of departure. I do not argue this point now beyond pointing out that it is a matter for amendment at a future stage, or before the clause finds its way on to the Statute Book. It will have to be dealt with. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he introduced the words which he said he did not wish to be pinned to, stated that he would be prepared to strengthen them, and it is from that point of view that I put this forward. They will require to be strengthened in order to make the matter perfectly clear. We cannot too often remember that expressions of intention on the part of the Government in this House are of no value whatever to the subject afterwards when the words in an Act come to be interpreted by the courts which have to give effect to them. It is necessary that the referee, or the Commissioners, or, as we hope eventually, the court will have to interpret these words. Even now there is an appeal to the court on points of law when the referee decides to state a case, and, therefore, I think there is an ambiguity which has been obvious in this discussion. There was a difference of opinion between the Leader of the Opposition and hon. Gentlemen on both sides of the House, and the hon. Member who spoke below the Gangway, as to the exact meaning of the words as to land being of no higher value than for agricultural purposes. I think these words will have to be made clear, because there are two interpretations which can be put upon them. Which of the meanings is to be attached to the words is not clear. I think it is obvious
    1910
    that the Chancellor of the Exchequer meant that there should be a value independent of the agricultural value before the tax is leviable. The words would not include sporting, of course. I think the Chancellor of the Exchequer means that they would include increment arising from iudustrial or business purposes. Then we come to the question of the exemption of the small holder. A question was asked while the Chancellor of the Exchequer was out of the House, and none of his colleagues were able to reply to it. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will now tell us whether the £500 limit of value is total value or site value.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Total value.
    Mr. PRETYMAN: Then the £500 limit is the value of the composite subject of land and buildings, the owner occupying. That reduces the concession to a very much smaller proportion. So far as both these exemptions are concerned, I am personally very glad to see that the agricultural interests and the small holder are exempted. Everyone on this side of the House has genuinely appealed for their exemption, because we thought and felt that both of those interests were going to be most hardly hit and seriously affected by this clause of the Bill. I am very glad that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has admitted that the exemption of both these classes is due to the appeals made from this side of the House. That is an admission of which the country will take note. But because you have succeeded in pulling two people out of the fire that is no reason why you should not try to pull other people out as well. We object to the whole of this principle, and we have been for three weeks or more on Clause 2 pointing out its absurdities and its defects. I cannot help thinking that when the commander of a ship begins to jettison the cargo it will not be very long before he abandons the ship altogether. What I want to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer is: What is now left to justify our continuing to spend laborious days and nights in discussing these proposals of which an immense proportion have already been thrown overboard on the first two clauses? We hear constant rumours and suggestions that more is going to be thrown overboard at a later stage. If there is one thing that justifies the time which the Committee have given to the Debates from our side, though it does not justify the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it is the fact that, as a, result of these

    1911
    discussions and the disclosure of the weak points we have shown in this measure, these exemptions and concessions have been made. I think it would have been far better for everybody in and out of this House if the Chancellor of the Exchequer had considered all these difficulties before he introduced the Bill. What we feel now is that it is absurd that the whole agricultural industry and that the whole of the small holders and everybody in the country should be forced to send in valuation after valuation at their own expense, when probably, with these exemptions included in the Bill, three out of four of the persons will be subject to no tax whatever. What justification is there for including a proposal like this in the Finance Bill at all? What has it to do with finance? The Finance Bill is for the year, and the taxes to be raised for the year. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is certainly entitled, in considering a particular tax, to look at its effect in future years as well as in this year, but he is not entitled to include in the Finance Bill of this year a proposal to inflict a valuation upon an enormous number of persons who are not to be subject to any new tax whatever in this year. We ought to get some information from the Chancellor of the Exchequer as to whether his object is to tax them at all in the future. That seems to me to be rather an important point. If he is not going to tax them at all there can be no possible excuse, either now or in the future, for putting them to the expense and trouble of this valuation. If he is going to tax them in the future, what is the value of those concessions given to-day, when it only means that the Government are going to let them off for the present, but that they will be taxed next year, or the year after, perhaps, in a form more onerous and troublesome than the proposals made in the Bill. We are glad to see these concessions, so far as they go, because they will remove anxiety and fear from the minds of Chose particular people, but so far from justifying the tax itself it does exactly the opposite. What has been done so far strengthens the case of those not exempted. It will strengthen the Opposition in continuing to oppose the taxes as they have done ever since the Committee stage of the Bill commenced.
    The UNDER-SECRETARY for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Masterman): The Debate having ranged over rather a
    1912
    wide field, including the possible action of the House of Lords and the Tariff Reform meetings in the country, I may be forgiven if I confine my remarks specifically to one or two points strictly relevant to the clause, and the announcement made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. We all welcome much of the tone of the speech of the hon. and gallant Member opposite (Mr. Pretyman) as to the particular concessions. I think he is wrong when he speaks of these being the jettisoning of the cargo, as I hope to show. I think the Leader of the Opposition was wrong—though no doubt these are the points which are made across the floor of the House—in associating any of those so-called concessions with electioneering movements in the House or the country. I am dealing with facts which the hon. and gallant Member (Mr. Pretyman) is not familiar with as to the way in which these so-called concessions have been discussed during the past few weeks, and even months. There has never been any doubt at all from any declaration made either by the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Prime Minister from the day the Bill was introduced that purely agricultural increment was going to be exempted from this Increment Tax. It was announced on the first clause on the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wimbledon (Mr. Chaplin). It was announced again and again in the discussions on the second clause. Various alternatives were suggested. The Chancellor of the Exchequer stated that he thought agricultural increment was exempted by the last part of the first section of the second clause of the Bill, but he said that if it was shown that it was not fully exempted he would be willing to listen to any other suggestion for it3 exemption.
    Mr. BALFOUR: I never referred to that.
    Mr. MASTERMAN: Then I do not need to amplify the point. The Leader of the Opposition is in agreement with us on that point. One or two suggestions were made to make clear to the Committee the exact meaning of the new clause. The original suggestion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer exempted increment value in agricultural land for all practical purposes in the immediate future. The new clause he has now suggested exempts agricultural increment at all times, unless this House desires to make a modification. Any increase that may be due to good farming, any increase of agricultural value that may be due to agricultural discovery; or new methods which are going to be of ad-

    1913
    vantage to agricultural land, any increase—as was put very fully before the Committee in the speech of the hon. Member for Waterford—which may be caused by land hunger, by people competing for agricultural holdings—all that is henceforth exempted from the tax altogether. The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Mr. Pretyman) gave us a challenge when he sat down. He asked is our object to tax this in the future, and, if not, what is the use of valuation? Our object is not to tax this at all, as far as the Government is concerned; but our object is to impose an Increment Tax if and whenever any portion of the land of this country has an increased value for other purposes than its purely agricultural value. It is quite impossible to tell where that might happen. It might happen in any part of the country at any time. Flourishing towns have now grown up with an enormous building value which a few years ago were merely open country. There are hundreds of examples. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has mentioned again and again the opening of a mine in the neighbourhood, where immediately you get a great building value created in what is a purely agricultural country, and therefore it is necessary to have a normal standard of site value even if that normal standard in many cases may not be used for many years or may never be used at all.
    The other point to which I wish to refer is the question of revenue. The Noble Lord (Lord Robert Cecil), in his usual eloquent fashion, made a considerable point that owing to the various concessions we were making and to the small amount suggested in our first year there would be little revenue raised by this tax; and I think he implied not only little revenue this year, but that the Committee were being asked "to scorn delights and live laborious days," and even nights, in order to produce a tax which would never yield an appreciable revenue at all. That is not the statement of the hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. A. J. Balfour), who stated that we were definitely imposing a very substantial burden not of valuation, but of payment upon men who might perhaps be poor men and not of necessity rich men. But the idea that in imposing any tax we have to consider merely the amount of tax which will be raised this year is an idea altogether alien to the politics of this country. I could mention two examples which have been used again and again in public debates. The first is the Succes-
    1914
    sion Duties, which were passed by Mr. Gladstone in 1853, when no revenue was raised for the year at all; and the second is the Finance Bill in 1894, when Sir William Harcourt definitely stated that only three-quarters of a million would be raised during the year; and Lord Goschen made exactly the same argument which has been used by the Noble Lord: "What on earth is the use of making all this bother and disturbance and loss of quiet for raising just a few hundreds of national revenue?" Yet those duties are now raising something like £20,000,000. Any hon. Gentleman who will just turn his mind back to the past week, and bear in mind every kind of exemption which we have given or which is likely to be given, and consider what will be the revenue to-day if the tax had been imposed 20 or 10 or even five years ago, will not say we are demanding too much from this Committee in asking them to sit day and night in order that this tax may be imposed. Just outside my Constituency there is now a population of 500,000 in what were green fields less than 10 years ago, in which building value has not only doubled but has gone up 10 or 12 times the value that it used to be. And in many parts of England that process is going on month after month, and in this way there would be some appreciable revenue from this tax even this year.
    And now a word in reference to the small freeholder. I have a perfect right to say that from the very beginning of the compilation of this Budget the position of the small freeholder, especially in the town where he is the owner of his own house and the land on which it is and nothing more, has been under the full consideration of the Government. They have not only recognised, but legislation has recognised, that he is in a different position under those circumstances from the general owner outside. It is recognised in the Inhabited House Duty, where he is given a definite exemption. It is recognised in the scheme which the Chancellor has suggested might be taken as a scheme to be applied to this exemption, the scheme in the Housing of the Working Classes Act. There is £40,000 in the case of London, £26,000 in the case of the big towns, and £16,000 in the case of the smaller towns, in the diminishing scale, in order to cut off property in the occupation of working people, and therefore demanding special privileges on account of the fact that you are dealing with a specially poor population, from property which is

    1915
    not in such possession. It has been urged that our proposals disturb the symmetry of our system of Income Tax. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition is perfectly correct in that. Every concession we have given disturbs the symmetry of the Income Tax. You cannot give a concession to a special class or to special hardships in dealing with a general principle without disturbing in some respects that symmetry. That we freely acknowledge. But that is not any reason for not giving the concession. The exemption of incomes under £150 a year disturbs the symmetry of the tax, and no one in practical politics will suggest that that exemption should be altered, except the hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Harold Cox). We believe that these two boons which have been given will not only remove considerable apprehension which have been felt by people of small possessions which we desire to remove in connection with this tax, but will also be a real benefit to those people when the time comes when these taxes are applied. It has been said that they are devised as an electioneering movement. I do not think I need argue that. It is also said it is a question that must be dealt with on its merits. It is on the merits that we are offering both the Amendments, and that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will justify them when the House comes to deal with this Amendment.
    Mr. HAROLD COX: The hon. Member who has just sat down said that these concessions disturbed the symmetry of the Increment Tax. They not only disturb the symmetry of the tax but they deprive it of the whole moral basis which has been put forward to the country. We have been told it is justifiable to tax unearned increment because it is something the owner gets apart from his own exertions. Does not that apply to agricultural land? If the price of corn goes up the price of corn land goes up. Is that due to the action of the land-owner? He has not earned this increased price of corn. On the contrary, he gets this increment, I might almost say, out of the stomachs of his fellow citizens. He is taxing them. He is allowed to get this large increment out of something which the country feels more than anything else—an increase in the price of its most important article of food. Yet we are told he is to be exempt. Now take the contrary case. A man owns a piece of agricultural land which was poor agricultural land. He turns it into build-
    1916
    ing land at his own expense by making roads and sewers, and immediately he is to be taxed on the revenue that arises. I know what the Prime Minister said the other day at the Holborn Restaurant, that nobody was to be taxed except on something which was produced by the energy of the community, and not by his own enterprise, activity, or expenditure. But there are no words in the Bill to safeguard a landowner who will do this. There is nothing in the Bill to prevent a man who has gone to the whole expense of laying out a building estate being charged on the whole of what he himself has created. We had the case the other day of a man who has made the land valuable in front and has added to the value of the back land, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer refused to give him any concession.
    That is the first point which knocks over the moral basis of the tax. The second case is more remarkable. An owner occupying land worth less than £500 is to be exempt. That means that if a man is so rich that he can afford to give himself a small house on his small holding and give himself a residence there he will be exempt from tax, but if he is not rich enough for that, if he is obliged to let his land, then he must pay the tax. The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken took the case of the Income Tax, and said that no tax is charged on incomes lower than £l60 a year. I personally think that it ought to go lower. But why do we make that exemption? We make it because we argue that people with less than a certain income ought not to pay any tax at all, and we leave that margin for the necessities of life. If we go beyond £160 we carefully graduate the tax, so that a man with £170 pays very little, and a man with £180 pays a little more, and so on. But in this tax there is nothing of the kind. If a man owns a piece of land which rises from £400 to £500 he will pay nothing; but suppose the land rises from £500 to £600, then he pays £20. Is that fair, that a man who has a piece of land worth £600 should pay while the man who has a piece of land worth £500 pays nothing at all? Is that a reasonable system of graduation? and then again in reference to my point about a moral basis: if there is something unfair to the community in a man getting an increment of land value, that unfairness exists on land below £500, as well as on land above £500. If it is a crime to make a profit on his land which is worth less

    1917
    than £500, it is equally a crime to make his profit on land which is worth more than £500. The Chancellor of the Exchequer never attempted to touch the question of the expense of valuation. He is committing this country to a vast expenditure, of which no estimate has been given. I would like to draw the attention of the Committee to the contrast between his action in this matter and the action of his colleague the President of the Board of Trade in reference to the Labour Exchanges Bill, in giving a careful estimate of what the proposals were going to cost not only this year but in future years. Why do we not get a similar estimate from the Chancellor of the Exchequer? It is surely within his capacity to give us, at any rate, a vague estimate of what it is going to cost. But I would like to ask him some questions. Has he himself any conception of the site value of the House which he himself occupies? Can he get up in this House and tell us within £100 what that site is worth? How is he going to work to ascertain, and how is the nation going to work to ascertain? It is evident that it is not only the cost of this valuation to the individual landowner, there is also the cost to the nation itself to check the valuation of the landowner. It must be checked. You cannot say to the landowner, "Value the land as you like, and we will accept your valuation." That is our of the question. If you did that many landowners, anticipating a rise, would forestall that rise, and when it came there would be no tax to pay. You must have a State valuation as well as a private valuation. I want to know what it is to cost. I have made inquiries of many valuers, and of people who employ valuers, which is perhaps more important. They tell me that to value the site of a moderately large house costs about ten guineas, and in the country less, perhaps a couple of guineas or a guinea. In the case of a street the valuers would take the average, and they would do the work for very much less. But putting it as low as you can, I would like to know what is the Chancellor of the Exchequer's estimate as to the cost of valuing a site. If he takes it upon the basis of the whole country, the cost of valuation will be 10s. apiece. I am assured that is the very lowest it could possibly be put at. Ten shillings for every site, taking the large and the small together, would be 10s. apiece. Is the Chancellor of the Exchequer aware that there are 10,000,000 houses in this country, which makes £5,000,000 to begin with?
    1918
    Then to come to agricultural land. You have to value not only the farm as a whole, but separate fields and separate portions of fields, because the portion of a field which is next the high road will be more valuable than the portion of land at the back. There must be separate valuations, and to make these valuations there must be clerks employed, there must be a record of the valuations, and when all that is done the cost will not be £5,000,000, but £25,000,000 or £30,000,000. And what are we going to get out of this-tax? The Noble Lord opposite said we were going to get £10,000 this year. I think it is more likely to be 10,000 pence.
    But that is not all. In future years you will get more, conceivably, if the land always rises in value. But why make that assumption? Does land always rise in value? I am informed that at the present time in the City of London and in parts of the West End, and also in a number of provincial towns, land is going down in value. The only land which is rising in value, as far as I can understand, is agricultural land, which is exempt. Therefore, I think in future you will get very little out of this tax, and I am certain you will never get enough out of it to pay the interest on your preliminary valuation. Meanwhile we must keep correcting the valuations. You will have a gigantic staff, a great deal of patronage, and an enormous number of salaries to pay in order to get what will never pay the cost of collection and of valuation. Then I should like the Chancellor of the Exchequer to be a little more definite than he has been about the right of appeal. The other day I believe the right hon. Gentleman made some quasi concession on this point. To me that point seems fatal. We are adopting, I will not say an absolutely new principle, but we are going back on all the best traditions of this country, and the Inland Revenue Commissioners themselves will be the final judges of the taxes they will collect. I said we were going back. I believe there was an earlier precedent. In the reign of Henry VII., our earliest Tudor sovereign, who I think also came from the Principality, an Act was passed which provided that two Commissioners, named Empson and Dudley, should be allowed to collect what taxes they liked from the King's subjects. I will admit that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has made a little improvement on that. He has provided that there shall be official referees, and if you do not like Empson, try Dudley.

    1919
    What is to happen to the man who makes a profession or business of buying and selling land? At present he is taxed under Schedule D. If his income is less than £2,000 a year he pays 9d. in the £l on his earned income, his earned income being defined to be the aggregate of his transactions, taking the profits and losses together. Under this new tax his transactions which alone show a profit are picked out to be taxed as unearned increment, and he is to pay 4s. in the £. I can imagine the Chancellor of the Exchequer saying, "We have been wrong in the past, and we propose to amend the Income Tax and to sweep away this system by which the builder pays Income Tax on earned income and then is taxed on unearned increment." To have these two systems going on concurrently seems to be absolutely indefensible. Take the case of a builder who in three years has nothing but profits, his transactions all turning out well. These profits are all treated as earned income, but under the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Bill the whole are subject to be taxed as unearned increment. The same thing under two separate Acts is to be defined as earned income in the one case, and in the other as unearned increment. There is no possible logical defence for that. I may point out that the Chancellor of the Exchequer will discover that there is very little political defence for it, because he will find that builders and builders' labourers have; votes, and do not want their business to be taxed above the business of other' people. That seems to me generally to apply to the objections brought against; this tax. Hon. Members on this side have been rather apt to taunt their opponents with reluctance to pay their share of taxation. I cannot speak for hon. Gentlemen opposite, but, speaking for myself, I am perfectly willing to pay my share of taxation, and I think that most of my fellow Englishmen are willing to do the same. Englishmen are willing to pay their taxes, but what they do object to is injustice.; They object to this tax first of all because a particular class of persons is picked out to be taxed, and, secondly, and still more, because private people are compelled to pay large sums to land valuers, auctioneers, and so on for no fiscal purpose; whatever. The clause which we are now considering imposes a grave burden upon-a number of people which does not bring: revenue into the coffers of the State; in
    1920
    fact, I am quite at a loss to know for what purpose it is imposed. There is no objection in any part of this House to a fair Valuation Bill. I believe a Valuation Bill was introduced in the last Parliament by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Dublin. I do not know any part of the House in which there is any objection to a fair Valuation Bill.
    Mr. JOHN WARD: You said it would cost £10,000,000.
    Mr. HAROLD COX: Valuation is done in the ordinary way at the present time at the expense of the local authorities. The reason why it will cost £10,000,000 is because you are starting an entirely separate valuation—valuing things, not as they are, but as they are not. You say now that you are going to exempt the small holders; you say you are going to exempt agricultural land, and yet these very people whom you are going to exempt will have to pay, and pay heavily, out of their pockets in order that you may get your valuation. Is that fair? What wrong have these men done that their money should thus be taken from them for no purpose whatever?
    Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: It has been the proud boast of the Liberal party for the last 60 or 70 years that they have on every possible opportunity done something to improve and cheapen the transfer of' land. Here we have in the hands of the present Government a measure which, judging by its methods, will inevitably have the effect of very much hampering the transfer of land in future and making it very much more expensive. My contention is that the boasts of the Liberal party of having cheapened and facilitated the transfer of land is now, at all events for the first time, being set at naught by the present Government. A very curious feature in connection with this Bill, as far as we have got, is that there is not a single word in it to tell us who is to pay the tax. We have had various indications in portions of the Bill as to what certain people may be allowed, but I challenge the hon. and right hon. Gentlemen in charge of the Bill to show me any reference in the first two clauses as to what individual person is liable to pay the tax. The position of the mortgagee in reference to land is one which ought certainly to be taken into very careful consideration when we are discussing the imposition of the new tax. Words have been inserted in the clause referring

    1921
    to the mortgagee. They are in the reprint of the clause. What is the meaning of that clause? The meaning is that there may be circumstances under which a mortgagee will be, or may be, required to come forward and prove something for the purpose of getting a deduction under Clause 2. I wish to point out the radical distinction there is between the Death Duty and the Increment Duty from the point of view not only of the man who has to pay the duty, but also from the point of view of the mortgagee. When an individual who owns property dies, and the Death Duty has to be paid, that duty is only calculated and only demanded to be paid upon the amount which the deceased really owned. That is to say, if there is a mortgage, the amount is deducted in assessing the value of the land. The exact opposite is the case with respect to Increment Duty which has got to be paid irrespective of any incumbrance. Those are the provisions of this Bill. Last night I mentioned a case on this subject, and let me give an illustration of what it is I want answered. I venture to think that the thousands upon thousands of investors in the United Kingdom who have got some money on mortgage will be wanting an answer to this question from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I refer to all the trustees of banks, all the private persons, all the great trade societies, all the insurance companies, all those great companies such as the Liver and Victoria, where working men have contributed their pence and their shillings, and where those societies have got the greater portions of their moneys invested in mortgages. The point is this with respect to mortgages. Supposing a man has bought a property a few years ago, say, at £15,000, and that he dies this year, and that the property is valued at, say, £20,000. There you have an increment of £5,000 and a sum of £l,000 to pay. The man when he died left, we will say, £600 of debts and £500 of furniture. Deeds of the property were deposited at the bank on an equitable mortgage, and he owed more than £20,000 to that bank. There is the £1,000 to pay of duty, and I ask the question, and I want a reply, and I believe all the mortgagees in the country will want a reply, and it is, Who are going to pay that £1,000 of duty? It is perfectly clear that it is charged on the property, and that it has got to be paid by somebody. The mortgagees have done no wrong, and they have had no increment, the estate of the
    1922
    man cannot pay the £1,000, and is the bank, as the mortgagee, to be liable to pay that £l,000? I think we ought to have an answer to that question.
    Trustees in this country have advanced enormous sums of money upon mortgage, and what is their position? Suppose their mortgagor goes away and sells the equity, that would probably not amount to much, and he may receive only a few pounds for it, but the Increment Duty has got to be charged on the full value. The man cannot pay it, the mortgagor has probably not sufficient money to pay it, and then must the mortgagee pay it? If this position cannot be faced straight, and if we cannot get some intelligible reply from the Government the immediate effect will be to cause the greatest possible amount of uneasiness in the minds of all those who to-day have got money invested on mortgages on land in various parts of the country. And, carrying it a step further, it will have the effect of depriving land of that most important quality which it has got to-day, namely, the facility for going and borrowing very cheap money at low rates of interest, the greatest facility which land, above all things, has got today. It will have the effect as well of preventing numerous people from finding, as they have in the past, reasonable and safe investments. I need not enlarge on the further consequences, except to say that if you bring about this state of affairs, and if you intend to divorce capital from land and from the development of land, the ultimate effect will be, and we shall probably see it, if this Bill is passed, at no distant date, all those building trades, joiners, plasterers, bricklayers, all those people who are engaged in those trades will inevitably suffer, and the amount of unemployment and distress that will be indirectly caused by this ill-considered measure will be difficult of calculation. I am moved to get up, not in any way to controvert or to go into the various propositions which have been laid before you to-day, but because no other speaker, so far, has paid any attention to the point of which I have spoken, and has not given it that prominence which it ought reasonably to have.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE rose in his place and claimed to move "That the question be now put."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 266; Noes, 103.

    Division No. 275.]

    AYES.

    [7.35 P.m.

    Acland, Francis Dyke

    Furness, Sir Christopher

    Molteno, Percy Alport

    Adkins, W. Ryland D.

    Gibb, James (Harrow)

    Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall)

    Agnew, George William

    Gill, A. H.

    Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen

    Alden, Percy

    Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

    Morrell, Philip

    Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

    Glen-Coats, Sir T. (Renfrew, W.)

    Morse, L. L.

    Armitage, R.

    Glover, Thomas

    Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

    Ashton, Thomas Gair

    Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

    Myer, Horatio

    Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

    Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

    Napier, T. B.

    Astbury, John Meir

    Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

    Nicholls, George

    Atherley-Jones L.

    Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

    Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

    Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)

    Griffiths, Ellis J.

    Nussey, Sir Willans

    Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

    Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

    Nuttall, Harry

    Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

    Hall, Frederick

    O'Grady, J.

    Barker, Sir John

    Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Barlow, Sir John E. (Somerset)

    Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

    Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

    Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

    Pearce, William (Limehouse)

    Barnard, E. B.

    Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)

    Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

    Barnes, G. N.

    Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

    Pickersgill, Edward Hare

    Barran, Rowland Hirst

    Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-sh.)

    Pirie, Duncan V.

    Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

    Hart Davies, T.

    Pointer, J.

    Beale, W. P.

    Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

    Pollard, Dr. G. H.

    Beauchamp, E.

    Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

    Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

    Beck, A. Cecil

    Haworth, Arthur A.

    Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

    Bell, Richard

    Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

    Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

    Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

    Hedges, A. Paget

    Priestley, Arthur (Grantham)

    Bennett, E. N.

    Helme, Norval Watson

    Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

    Bethell, Sir J. H. (Essex, Romford)

    Henderson, J. McD. (Aberdeen, W.)

    Radford, G. H.

    Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon)

    Henry, Charles S.

    Rainy, A. Rolland

    Boulton, A. C. F.

    Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

    Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (Gloucester)

    Brace, William

    Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)

    Rendall, Athelstan

    Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

    Higham, John Sharp

    Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

    Brigg, John

    Hobart, Sir Robert

    Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

    Brocklehurst, W. B.

    Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

    Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

    Brooke, Stopford

    Hodge, John

    Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford)

    Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

    Holt, Richard Durning

    Robinson, S.

    Brunner, Rt. Hon. Sir J. T. (Cheshire)

    Hooper, A. G.

    Robson, Sir William Snowdon

    Buckmaster, Stanley O.

    Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset, N.)

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Burns, Rt. Hon. John

    Horniman, Emslie John

    Rogers, F. E. Newman

    Burnyeat, W. J. D.

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    Rose, Sir Charles Day

    Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

    Hudson, Walter

    Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

    Byles, William Pollard

    Hutton, Alfred Eddison

    Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

    Cameron, Robert

    Hyde, Clarendon G.

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    Carr-Gomm, H. W.

    Idris, T. H. W.

    Scarisbrick. Sir T. T. L.

    Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

    Isaacs, Rufus Daniel

    Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

    Chance, Frederick William

    Jenkins, J.

    Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester)

    Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

    Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea)

    Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Jones, Leif (Appleby)

    Sears, J. E.

    Cleland, J. W.

    Jowett, F. W.

    Seddon, J.

    Clough, William

    Kekewich, Sir George

    Seely, Colonel

    Clynes, J. R.

    King, Alfred John (Knutsford)

    Shaw, Sir Charles E. (Stafford)

    Cobbold, Felix Thornley

    Laidlaw, Robert

    Simon, John Allsebrook

    Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

    Lamb, Edmund G. (Leominster)

    Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

    Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

    Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)

    Snowdon, P.

    Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

    Lambert, George

    Soames, Arthur Wellesley

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Lamont, Norman

    Soares, Ernest J.

    Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

    Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

    Spicer, Sir Albert

    Cox, Harold

    Leese, Sir Joseph F. (Accrington)

    Stanger, H. Y.

    Crosfield, A. H.

    Lehmann, R. C.

    Steadman, W. C.

    Cross, Alexander

    Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

    Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

    Curran, Peter Francis

    Lever, W. H. (Cheshire, Wirral)

    Strachey, Sir Edward

    Dalziel, Sir James Henry

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

    Davies, David (Montgomery Co.)

    Lewis, John Herbert

    Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

    Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

    Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

    Summerbell, T.

    Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardigan)

    Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Sutherland, J. E.

    Davies, Timothy (Fulham)

    Lyell, Charles Henry

    Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

    Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

    Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

    Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

    Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

    Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

    Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

    Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

    Mackarness, Frederic C

    Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

    Dobson, Thomas W.

    Maclean, Donald

    Thomasson, Franklin

    Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

    Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

    Duncan, J. Hastings (York, Otley)

    Macpherson, J. T.

    Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

    Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

    McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Tomkinson, James

    Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

    M'Laren, Sir C B. (Leicester)

    Trevelyan, Charles Philips

    Elibank, Master of

    M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

    Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

    Esstemont, George Birnie

    Mallet, Charles E.

    Verney, F. W.

    Evans, Sir S. T.

    Markham, Arthur Basil

    Walsh, Stephen

    Everett, R. Lacey

    Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston)

    Walton, Joseph

    Ferens, T. R.

    Marnham, F. J.

    Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

    Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

    Massie, J.

    Wardle, George J.

    Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter

    Masterman, C. F. G.

    Waring, Walter

    Fuller, John Michael F.

    Menzies, Sir Walter

    Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

    Fullerton, Hugh

    Micklem, Nathaniel

    Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

    1924

    1925

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

    Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

    Waterlow, D. S.

    Wiles, Thomas

    Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

    Watt, Henry A.

    Wilkie, Alexander

    Winfrey, R.

    Whitbread, S. Howard

    Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

    Wood, T. M'Kinnon

    White, Sir George (Norfolk)

    Wills, Arthur Walters

    White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

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

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

    White, Sir Luke (York, E. R.)

    Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

    Whitehead, Rowland

    Wilson, J. W. (Worcestershire, N.)

    NOES.

    Anson, Sir William Reynell

    Guinness, Hon. W. E. (B'y St. Edm.)

    Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

    Arkwright, John Stanhope

    Haddock, George B.

    Pretyman, E. G.

    Ashley, W. W.

    Hamilton, Marquess of

    Randles, Sir John Scurrah

    Balcarres, Lord

    Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

    Ratcliff, Major R. F.

    Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City, Lond.)

    Harris, Frederick Leverton

    Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

    Banbury, Sir Frederick George

    Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

    Renton, Leslie

    Baring, Captain Hon. G. (Winchester)

    Hay, Hon. Claude George

    Renwick, George

    Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

    Heaton, John Henniker

    Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

    Beckett, Hon. Gervase

    Helmsley, Viscount

    Ronaldshay, Earl of

    Bignold, Sir Arthur

    Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert

    Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert

    Bowles, G. Stewart

    Hill, Sir Clement

    Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

    Bridgeman, W. Clive

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Rutherford, Watson (Liverpool)

    Brotherton, Edward Allen

    Hunt, Rowland

    Sandys, Col. Thos. Myles

    Bull, Sir William James

    Joynson-Hicks, William

    Sassoon, Sir Edward Albert

    Butcher, Samuel Henry

    Kennaway, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

    Carlile, E. Hildred

    Kennedy, Vincent Paul

    Sheffield, Sir Berkeley George D.

    Cave, George

    Kerry, Earl of

    Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, E.)

    Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

    King, Sir Henry Seymour (Hull)

    Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

    Cecil, Lord R. (Marylehone, E.)

    Lambton, Hon Frederick William

    Stanier, Beville

    Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

    Lane-Fox, G. R.

    Stanley, Hon. Arthur (Ormskirk)

    Clyde, J. Avon

    Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

    Starkey, John R.

    Cochrane, Hon. Thomas H. A. E.

    Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

    Stone, Sir Benjamin

    Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

    Long, Rt. Hon. Walter (Dublin, S.)

    Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

    Courthope, G. Loyd

    Lowe, Sir Francis William

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. J. G. (Oxford Univ.)

    Craik, Sir Henry

    Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

    Thornton, Percy M.

    Dalrymple, Viscount

    MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

    Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

    Doughty, Sir George

    Marks, H. H. (Kent)

    Walrond, Hon. Lionel

    Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

    Mason, James F. (Windsor)

    Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

    Du Cros, Arthur

    Mildmay, Francis Bingham

    Williams, Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

    Faber, George Denison (York)

    Morpeth, Viscount

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

    Faber, Captain W. V. (Hants, W.)

    Morrison-Bell, Captain

    Winterton, Earl

    Fardell, Sir T. George

    Newdegate, F. A.

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

    Fell, Arthur

    Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

    Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

    Forster, Henry William

    Oddy, John James

    Gardner, Ernest

    Parkes, Ebenezer

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir

    Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

    Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

    A. Acland-Hood and Viscount

    Goulding, Edward Alfred

    Percy, Earl

    Valentia.

    Gretton, John

    Question put accordingly, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 302; Noes, 114

    Division No. 276.]

    AYES.

    [7.45 p.m.

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

    Brace, William

    Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

    Acland, Francis Dyke

    Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

    Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

    Adkins, W. Ryland D.

    Brigg, John

    Crosfield, A. H.

    Agnew, George William

    Brecklehurst, W. B.

    Cross, Alexander

    Alden, Percy

    Brooke, Stopford

    Cullinan, J.

    Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

    Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs, Leigh)

    Curran, Peter Francis

    Armitage, R.

    Brunner, Rt. Hon. Sir J. T. (Cheshire)

    Dalziel, Sir James Henry

    Ashton, Thomas Gair

    Bryce, J. Annan

    Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

    Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

    Buckmaster, Stanley O.

    Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardigan)

    Astbury, John Meir

    Burke, E. Haviland-

    Davies, Timothy (Fulham)

    Atherley-Jones, L.

    Burns, Rt. Hon. John

    Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

    Baker, Sir John (Portsmouth)

    Burnyeat, W. J. D.

    Delany, William

    Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

    Buxton, Rt. Hon Sydney Charles

    Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

    Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

    Byles, William Pollard

    Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

    Barker, Sir John

    Cameron, Robert

    Dobson, Thomas W.

    Barlow, Sir John E. (Somerset)

    Carr-Gomm, H. W.

    Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

    Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

    Duncan, J. Hastings (York, Otley)

    Barnard, E. B.

    Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

    Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

    Barnes, G. N.

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

    Barran Rowland Hirst

    Clancy, John Joseph

    Elibank, Master of

    Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

    Cleland J. W.

    Esslemont, George Birnie

    Beale, W. P.

    Clough, William

    Evans, Sir S. T.

    Bell, Richard

    Clynes, J. R.

    Everett, R. Lacey

    Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

    Cobbold, Felix Thornley

    Ferens, T. R.

    Bennett, E. N.

    Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

    Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

    Bethell, Sir J. H. (Essex, Romford)

    Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

    Flynn, James Christopher

    Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon)

    Condon, Thomas Joseph

    Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter

    Boulton, A. C. F.

    Colbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

    Fuller, John Michael F.

    Fullerton, Hugh

    Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford)

    Furness, Sir Christopher

    Lundon, T.

    Robinson, S.

    Gibb, James (Harrow)

    Lyell, Charles Henry

    Robson, Sir William Snowdon

    Gill, A. H.

    Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

    Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

    Rogers, F. E. Newman

    Glen-Coats, Sir T. (Renfrew, W.)

    Mackarness, Frederic C.

    Rose, Sir Charles Day

    Glover, Thomas

    Maclean, Donald

    Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

    Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

    Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

    Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

    Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

    MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

    Macpherson, J. T.

    Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

    Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

    MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

    Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

    Griffith, Ellis J.

    MacVeigh, Charles (Donegal, E.)

    Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester)

    Haldane, Rt. Hon. B.

    M'Kean, John

    Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

    Hall, Frederick

    McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Sears, J. E.

    Halpin, J.

    M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)

    Seaverns, J. H.

    Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

    M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

    Seddon, J.

    Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

    Mallet, Charles E.

    Seely, Colonel

    Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

    Markham, Arthur Basil

    Shaw, Sir Charles E. (Stafford)

    Hardy, George A. (Suflolk)

    Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston)

    Sheehy, David

    Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

    Marnham, F. J.

    Simon, John Allsebrook

    Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-sh.)

    Massie, J.

    Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

    Harrington, Timothy

    Masterman, C. F. G.

    Snowden, P.

    Hart-Davies, T.

    Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim N.)

    Soames, Arthur Wellesley

    Harvey, A, G. C. (Rochdale)

    Menzies, Sir Walter

    Soares, Ernest J.

    Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

    Micklem, Nathaniel

    Spicer, Sir Albert

    Haworth, Arthur A.

    Molteno, Percy Alport

    Stanger, H. Y.

    Hayden, John Patrick

    Mooney, J. J.

    Steadman, W. C.

    Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

    Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall)

    Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

    Hazleton, Richard

    Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen

    Strachey, Sir Edward

    Hedges, A. Paget

    Morrell, Philip

    Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

    Helme, Norval Watson

    Morse, L. L.

    Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

    Henderson, J. McDd. (Aberdeen, W.)

    Murphy, John (Kerry, E.)

    Summerbell, T.

    Henry, Charles S.

    Murphy, N. J. (Kilkenny, S.)

    Sutherland, J. E.

    Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

    Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

    Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

    Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)

    Myer, Horatio

    Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

    Higham, John Sharp

    Napier, T. B.

    Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

    Hobart, Sir Robert

    Nicholls, George

    Thomasson, Franklin

    Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

    Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

    Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

    Hodge, John

    Nolan, Joseph

    Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

    Hogan, Michael

    Nussey, Sir Willans

    Tomkinson, James

    Holt, Richard Durning

    Nuttall, Harry

    Trevelyan, Charles Philips

    Hooper, A. G.

    O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

    Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

    Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset)

    O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)

    Verney, F. W.

    Horniman, Emslie John

    O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

    Walsh, Stephen

    Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

    O'Dowd, John

    Walton, Joseph

    Hudson, Walter

    O'Grady, J.

    Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

    Hutton, Alfred Eddison

    O'Kelly, Conor (Mayo, N.)

    Wardle, George J.

    Hyde, Clarendon G.

    O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N.)

    Waring, Walter

    Idris, T. H. W.

    O'Malley, William

    Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

    Isaacs, Rufus Daniel

    Parker, James (Halifax)

    Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

    Jenkins, J.

    Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Jones, Sir D. Brynmon (Swansea)

    Pearce, William (Limehouse)

    Waterlow, D. S.

    Jones, Leif (Appleby)

    Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

    Watt, Henry A.

    Jowett, F. W.

    Philips, John (Longford, S.)

    White, Sir George (Norfolk)

    Joyce, Michael

    Pickersgill, Edward Hare

    White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

    Kavanagh, Walter M.

    Pirie, Duncan V.

    White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

    Kekewich, Sir George

    Pointer, J.

    White, Patrick (Meath, North)

    Kennedy, Vincent Paul

    Pollard, Dr. G. H.

    Whitehead, Rowland

    King, Alfred John (Knutsford)

    Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

    Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

    Laidlaw, Robert

    Power, Patrick Joseph

    Wiles, Thomas

    Lamb, Edmund G. (Leominster)

    Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

    Wilkie, Alexander

    Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)

    Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

    Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

    Lambert, George

    Priestley, Arthur (Grantham)

    Wills, Arthur Walters

    Lamont, Norman

    Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

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

    Lardner, James Carrige Rushe

    Radford, G. H.

    Wilson, John (Durham, Mid.)

    Law, Hugh A. (Donegal, W.)

    Rainy, A. Rolland

    Wilson, J. W. (Worcestershire, N.)

    Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

    Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (Gloucester)

    Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

    Leese, Sir Joseph F. (Accrington)

    Reddy, M.

    Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

    Lehmann, R. C.

    Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

    Winfrey, R.

    Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

    Redmond, William (Clare)

    Wood, T. M'Kinnon

    Lever, W. H. (Cheshire, Wirral)

    Rendall, Athelstan

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

    Lewis, John Herbert

    Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

    Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

    Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

    NOES.

    Anson, Sir William Reynell

    Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

    Bull, Sir William James

    Arkwright, John Stanhope

    Beck, A. Cecil

    Butcher, Samuel Henry

    Ashley, W. W.

    Beckett, Hon. Gervase

    Carlile, E. Hildred

    Balcarres, Lord

    Bignold, Sir Arthur

    Cave, George

    Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City, Lond.)

    Bowles, G. Stewart

    Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

    Banbury, Sir Frederick George

    Bridgeman, W. Clive

    Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)

    Baring, Captain Hon. G. (Winchester)

    Brotherton, Edward Allen

    Chance, Frederick William

    1928

    1929

    Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

    Hunt, Rowland

    Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

    Clyde, J. Avon

    Joynson-Hicks, William

    Ronaldshay, Earl of

    Cochrane, Hon. Thomas H. A. E.

    Kennaway, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert

    Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

    Kerry, Earl of

    Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

    Cory, Sir Clifford John

    King, Sir Henry Seymour (Hull)

    Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

    Courthope, G. Loyd

    Lambton, Hon. Frederick William

    Sandys, Col. Thos. Myles

    Cox, Harold

    Lane-Fox, G. R.

    Sassoon, Sir Edward Albert

    Craik, Sir Henry

    Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

    Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

    Dalrymple, Viscount

    Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

    Sheffield, Sir Berkeley George D.

    Davies, David (Montgomery Co.)

    Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

    Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, E.)

    Doughty, Sir George

    Long, Rt. Hon. Walter (Dublin, S.)

    Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

    Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

    Lowe, Sir Francis William

    Stanier, Beville

    Du Cros, Arthur

    Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

    Stanley, Hon. Arthur (Ormskirk)

    Faber, George Denison (York)

    MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

    Starkey, John R.

    Faber, Captain W. V. (Hants, W.)

    Marks, H. H. (Kent)

    Stone, Sir Benjamin

    Fardell, Sir T. George

    Mason, James F. (Windsor)

    Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

    Fell, Arthur

    Meysey-Thompson, E. C.

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. J. G. (Oxford Univ.)

    Forster, Henry William

    Mildmay, Francis Bingham

    Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

    Gardner, Ernest

    Morpeth, Viscount

    Thornton, Percy M.

    Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

    Morrison-Bell, Captain

    Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

    Goulding, Edward Alfred

    Newdegate, F. A.

    Walrond, Hon. Lionel

    Gretton, John

    Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

    Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

    Guinness, Hon. W. E. (B'y St. Edm.)

    Oddy, John James

    Whitbread, S. Howard

    Haddock, George B.

    Parkes, Ebenezer

    William, Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

    Hamilton, Marquess of

    Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

    Wilson, A. Stanley (Yorks, E.R.)

    Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

    Percy, Earl

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

    Harris, Frederick Leverton

    Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

    Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

    Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

    Pretyman, E. G.

    Hay, Hon. Claude George

    Randles, Sir John Scurrah

    Helmsley, Viscount

    Ratcliffe, Major R. F.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir A.

    Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert

    Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

    Acland-Hood and Viscount

    Hill, Sir Clement

    Renton, Leslie

    Valentia.

    Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

    Renwick, George

    CLAUSE 3.—General Provisions as to Collection of Increment Value Duty.
    (1) On each occasion on which Increment Value Duty is collected on the increment value of any land, such an amount of duty shall be deemed to be due as the Commissioners determine, having regard to the amount of duty paid on previous occasions.
    (2) Where Increment Value Duty is collected on the occasion of the transfer or passing on death of the fee simply in possession of any land, or on any periodical occasion in the case of land held in fee simple in possession by a body corporate or unincorporate, the whole amount of the duty which is determined to be due shall be collected.
    (3) When Increment Value Duty is collected on the occasion of the grant of a lease, or on the transfer or passing on death of any interest in land, or on any periodical occasion in the case of an interest in land held by a body corporate or unincorporate, such proportionate part of the amount of the duty which is due shall be collected as may be determined by the Commissioners to be payable in respect of the interest in land created, transferred, passing on death, or held, in accordance with rules made by them for the purpose.
    (4) Increment Value Duty shall be a Stamp Duty collected and recovered in accordance with the provisions of this Act.
    The CHAIRMAN: The Amendment in the name of the hon. Member for West
    1930
    Edinburgh (Mr. Clyde) is similar to an Amendment already negatived.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: Is it not in order to move the omission of section (1)? The point I should urge is that the ground is already covered.
    The CHAIRMAN: I think it would be in order to move its omission on the ground that the section is unnecessary. As I understand it, to take out section (1) would make nonsense of the clause; but if the hon. Member wishes seriously to urge that it is not required that will be in order.
    Mr. JAMES HOPEmoved to leave out section (1).
    It seems to me that these words come in rather strangely in view of what has been done on Clauses 1 and 2. For instance, Clause 1 says,"…there shall be charged, levied, and paid on the increment value of any land a duty, called Increment Value Duty…"; it proceeds to say when the duty shall become due, and then says, "and on each of those occasions the duty, or proportionate part of the duty, due, so far as it has not been paid on any previous occasion, shall be collected in accordance with the provisions of this Act." Then Clause 2 defines increment value in explanation of Clause 1. Reading the last lines of Clause 1 and the exegesis of increment value in Clause 2, one would think the matter had been sufficiently defined; but when you come to Clause 3, it states, "On each occasion on which Increment Value

    1931
    Duty is collected on the increment value of any land, such an amount of duty shall be deemed to be due as the Commissioners determine, having regard to the amount of duty paid on previous occasions." Those last words occur also at the end of Clause 1, and would appear to cover the point. Now, after we have laboriously gone through Clauses 1 and 2, section (1) of Clause 3 would seem to give the Commissioners an overriding authority to alter and perhaps reverse what the Legislature has already decided by Clauses 1 and 2 shall be done. I suppose that these words are not mere surplusage; they must have been put in for some definite reason, but it is not apparent on the face of it what that reason is, and in order to get an explanation I beg to move the omission of the section.
    The CHAIRMAN: I really do not quite understand the proposal of the hon. Member. If he wishes to amend the section he should move to amend it.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: I wish to move to reject it as unnecessary, and, pending an explanation from the Government, I beg to do so.
    Sir W. ROBSON: It does seem quite clear that the hon. Member's Amendment would reduce this clause to nonsense. By the observations which have just been made he shows that he does not understand——
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: That is exactly my point. I want to understand.
    Sir W. ROBSON: Clause 1 says that Increment Value Duty shall become due on certain occasions. Clause 2 defines Increment Value Duty. Clause 3, which is a clause that the hon. Member says is surplusage, says that the Commissioners are to fix that value. That is not provided for in Clause 1 nor Clause 2. It is only provided for in this sub-section to Clause 3. Unless that direction be given somewhere in the Bill—and this is the place to give it —you cannot get anyone to fix your Increment Value Duty. This is an essential subsection, and, being essential, it is out of order for its deletion to be moved.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: On that point of order, may I call attention to the fact that the first clause says "there shall be charged, levied, and paid."
    Viscount HELMSLEY: For the general guidance of the Committee, may I in-
    1932
    quire whether we are to understand that an Amendment is in or out of order according to the sense in which it is argued?
    The CHAIRMAN: If I were always to rule on what I understand to be the strict meaning of the words, I should vlery often have to rule Amendments out of order that I allow to be argued in a certain way. In my opinion this is convenient to the Committee. It is absolutely indispensable in regard to matters of this kind that there should be some discretion left in the hands of the Chairman. I certainly cannot lend myself to allow discussions on these subsections simply to ask what they mean. It is a habit which I think is very detrimental to our work. I therefore cannot take this Amendment.
    The CHAIRMANruled out of order the Amendments standing in the names of the hon. Members for Brighton (Mr. Rids-dale) and Barkston Ash (Mr. Lane-Fox).
    Mr. PRETYMAN: On a point of order, the Chancellor of the Exchequer agreed in principle to accept the Amendment of the hon. Member for Brighton. It was withdrawn on that understanding.
    Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I appealed to the hon. Member to withdraw it, on the ground- that it was trenching upon later ground, and that it would be quite impossible to raise the same issue again if the Committee decided it. He wished to withdraw it, but hon. Members on the opposite side of the House refused to give him leave and divided upon it.
    The CHAIRMAN: I find that in Clause 8—that is the reversion part of the Bill—there is a retrospective statement dealing with the effect of increment value, and the Reversion Duty being paid. That being the case, it was quite evident that an Amendment on the lines of the hon. Member for Barkston Ash can be moved when we come to the Reversion and Un developed Duty, and so on. In Clause 8 there are provisions for dealing with the interaction of the Increment Value and Reversion Duties. When we come to the Undeveloped Land Duty part of the Bill, then we can have Amendments dealing with the interaction of the Undeveloped Land Duty and Increment Value Duty. The Amendment of the hon. Member for Brighton raises the same point as the Attorney-General, and is in order.
    Sir W. ROBSON Sir W. ROBSON moved to leave out the words "having regard to" ["having regard to the amount of duty paid on previous occasions"], and to insert "after giving credit for." This is a verbal change. The words as they now stand are somewhat vague. They are not explicit or categorical enough.
    Question put, "That the words 'after giving credit' stand part of the clause."
    Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: I should like to point out that the words already in the clause are better words than those proposed, because, if you give credit for the whole amount of the duties that have been already paid, it is quite obvious you will get into a serious difficulty at once. There may have been duties paid upon all kinds of occasions, and on altogether different pieces of land. I have given some study to these particular words, and I thought they were uncommonly well chosen.
    Sir W. ROBSON: The hon. Member rather anticipates difficulties that are not likely strictly to arise out of these words. If any question arises on the question of apportionment of the amounts, I think it can be raised by subsequent Amendment. I intended to deal with it myself when I came to it.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: You did not say so.
    Sir W. ROBSON: I propose to insert words dealing with this very question of apportionment. I think when we come to the Amendment of the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. James Mason) that will be the proper place for some such words to be inserted.
    Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: The explanation of the hon. and learned Gentleman is all very well as far as it goes, but I am perfectly certain of this, that if you put in further words here about apportionment, having already passed a set of words with regard to apportionment, and discuss the merits of these words on the basis of a manuscript Amendment, which we have not seen, but which is going to be proposed three or four lines further down, it is leading us to a very difficult position, out of which I can scarcely see my way. With considerable trouble I took this section, and tried to make some reasonable provision in the English language for words which adequately met the different kinds of apportionment, which it would be required to
    1934
    have some regard to. I gave it up as a bad job. But the Attorney-General has advantages of draftmanship and advice, and, I have no doubt, a great deal more leisure than I have got. He has designed the set of words which he has told us he is going to move at the end of section (4). I can only follow with very great difficulty. I appeal to the hon. and learned Gentleman to leave the words alone that are in this section, and to withdraw his Amendment.
    Mr. JAMES HOPE: Will the Attorney-General tell us why, in view of the concluding words of Clause 1, these new words are necessary at all? Those concluding words are: "On each of these occasions the duty, or proportionate part of the duty due, so far as it has not been paid on any previous occasion, shall be collected in accordance with the provisions of this Act."
    And it being a quarter-past Eight of the clock, and there being private business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means, under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed without Question put.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  METHWOLD AND FELTWELL DRAINAGE BILL [Lords].
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  Motion agreed to.
  Mr. R. WINFREY Mr. R. WINFREY moved, "That it be an Instruction to the Committee to substitute for the General Drainage Tax provided for in Clause 23, and the additional tax in Clause 24 of the Bill, a scheme of taxation graduated according to the value of the land to be taxed such as the Committee may think fair."
  This Bill is being promoted by certain gentlemen who have recently acquired considerable acreage of land within this drainage district or within the borders of the district, and these gentlemen have successfully obtained seats upon the board which consists of 14 members. The new board decided, by the casting vote of the chairman, to promote this Bill. Seven voted for the promotion of the Bill and seven against. The Bill is very hotly opposed

  1935
  by the other half of the board, who represent some 50 or 60 of the smaller owners and occupiers, chiefly of the poorer land within this drainage area. Being my Constituents, they appeal to me, and it has been my duty to go very carefully indeed into all the circumstances and facts of the case.
  The powers under which this area is now drained have been in operation since 1881, and if the system is not a perfect one the majority, counting heads and not acres, infinitely prefer the present system to the new proposals as they stand in this Bill. The main proposal to which my Instruction is directed is the proposed method of taxation. At present the drainage rate is raised in this area by assessment according to Poor Law valuation. The land is assessed for Poor Law purposes, and the drainage rate is levied in exactly the same way, so that the better land pays a higher rate than the poorer. This Bill proposes to alter that entirely, and to create an acreage tax, which is to be equal per acre over the whole of the area.
  The Bill takes power to raise a maximum ordinary drainage rate of 7s. per acre, and it further takes power, under certain conditions, to raise an extra tax also of Vs. per acre, making 14s. in all. Now this land in this area varies very widely in quality. Some of it, not a large proportion of it, lets at something like 20s. to 30s. per acre, and a great deal of it lets at 5s. per acre. It will be seen that the owners of this poorer land feel that, in the first instance at any rate, if they are to have an acreage tax, there must be some graduation. It is asserted by the promoters of this Bill, who, I say, have recently made purchases in this district, that the land is of equal value if properly drained. To disprove that contention, I may say there is another area of drainage competing with this area, and there they have an equal acreage tax, and yet there is no evidence that the land is of equal value. On the contrary, just recently 400 acres of that land has been let at a very small rent, and not sufficient to pay the tax. It is asserted, of course, that there has been a considerable fall in prices in this land. That is true, but what is true of this land is also true of the land in the neighbouring district. There has been practically an equal fall in the value of land. Under the present scheme of rating the house and building, etc., are not rated for drainage purposes. So far as these improvements
  1936
  are concerned there is no tax at present upon them. It is asserted, and I think rightly, by the objectors to this Bill that the land divides itself into three classes. I have here a report of the meeting held at which no less than 48 of the small owners and occupiers were present, and from that meeting they petitioned me to move this Instruction, and it was unanimously resolved that three classes of land should be created within the area—(a) best land, some 900 to a thousand acres, with the tax not exceeding 10s., (b) 900 or a thousand, a tax not exceeding 7s., and (c), poor land, 2,700 acres, considerably more than half, a tax not exceeding 3s. My Instruction, it will be seen, authorises the Committee to deal with this problem in this way, or in some such way, but it does not limit the Committee to the scale of graduation although I make that suggestion. There is nothing in my Instruction that limits the form of graduation.
  If, as the promoters assert, the land will be gradually improved, then it is quite competent for the Committee to provide that at the end of a given term of years-say five years—the drainage board shall have power to reassess land according to the improved value, that is to say, some of the B land may be moved up into the A category and some of the C land moved up into the B category. But to give this drainage board power now to increase the acreage tax until it might amount to 14s. would make it impossible for the small owners and occupiers, who have no spare capital and whose borrowing powers of course are very limited. What would happen if this Instruction were not carried, and the Bill passed in its present form? According to Clause 29 the promoters take power to sell them out if at the end of 12 months the drainage tax is not paid. If at the end of 12 months the 14s. tax is not paid—and I submit it is impossible for men rated as low as 5s. an acre to pay that tax—the land can be sold away from them. I have had some negotiations with the promoters of the Bill, and they have given way to a certain extent upon that clause; and now if the drainage Commissioners do not get their tax, they are to have power to let the land and take the rent towards the paying of the drainage. At the end of three years' time, if the land is still unredeemed, it can be sold. With regard to representation, as the Bill stands, every owner of over 50 acres is to have a seat upon the board, and every owner of 150

  1937
  acres is to have one representative on the board for every 100 acres he possesses over and above 50 acres. I have worked that out, and it means that the four owners who are the chief promoters of this Bill would obtain 23 seats upon the board.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not in order in discussing that principle at this stage.
  Mr. WINFREY: I was only going to say that the reason why I did not oppose the second reading was that I had arranged this matter, and the promoters gave way. I am now pointing out how far they have given way. These four owners get 23 seats, 16 other owners will get 16 seats, and, as the Bill stands, 80 small owners are left out entirely. They are going to be taxed, but they will not get any representation. I have got a concession, which induced me not to move my Motion for the rejection of the second reading, under which these small owners get nine seats on the board. They are not, however, content with that representation, and they prefer it should remain as at present, a board of 14 members, each man having one vote for every £50 assessment. That shows the spirit in which this Bill was conceived, and I think it justified me in making this attempt to do something to safeguard the interests of the small owners and occupiers. The expense of promoting this Bill, which I understand is considerable, falls upon the whole of the drainage district. Those who want the Bill and those who do not want it have to pay alike for the promotion of this measure, while the small owners who do not like it have in addition to find the necessary costs to get themselves heard before a Committee. Under these circumstances I feel bound to ask the House to safeguard their existence up to this point. There are many hon. Members in this House who know me well enough to recognise that I have always tried to encourage and promote the interests of the small owners and occupiers of land, and I ask them on this occasion to give me their support in carrying this Instruction.
  Mr. GEORGE NICHOLLS: I rise to second this Motion, and I desire to emphasise what has been stated by the Mover. The question of representation has been settled, and the purchase clause has also been settled. The issue at stake is entirely centred on the question of graduation, and the House will recognise that that is no new principle. Other
  1938
  drainage Bills have that principle embodied in them, and, as has already been mentioned by the previous speaker, the land in this particular area varies in quality. You find some of it let for over 30s. an acre, some probably for 15s. an acre, and some as low as 5s. an acre The whole of this area lies in what you may call a basin. The outside land is the most valuable, and it is a better quality, because the water from it drains to a lower level, and it does not seem fair that the same average rate should be put on the low part of the land as is put upon the best quality of land. The Committee ought to have the power asked for, and the Instruction ought to go from this House urging them to put in this scheme of graduation so that the smaller men should not be squeezed out. Evidently the land that is only worth 5s. an acre cannot bear in the first case 7s., and probably later on a 14s. tax. It is only reasonable that these men at least should be heard, and I think we are indebted to the hon. Gentleman opposite for calling the attention of the House to this matter. I am as anxious that the land should be drained as those who are promoting this Bill. The people living in the area are also anxious, but it is only fair that the smaller men who-will be hit very hard should have the protection that is embodied in this Instruction. I beg to second this Motion.
  The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS (Mr. Emmott): I must apologise for intervening at this particular moment, but as a matter of fact I have been otherwise occupied, as the House knows, and a certain amount of time for leisure must be allowed even to the Chairman of Ways and Means. I take the liberty of rising now in order to say the very few words I have to say about this matter. The hon. Member who has just seconded this Instruction said he wanted the Committee to have power to deal with this matter. I must point out to the House that the Committee already has that power. The reason I oppose his Instruction is that it ties the hands of the Committee too much. A suggestion has been made that there should be put in the Instruction an Amendment to the effect "That it be an Instruction to the Committee, that they have power to consider, and, if they think fit, to substitute for the General Drainage Tax," etc. As far as I am concerned, if such an Amendment were put in I should not materially object to the Instruction, but personally I do not think

  1939
  that any instruction is needed. The Committee has power to deal with the whole question, and further, it is eminently a point which the Committee can decide infinitely better than the House as a whole. The Committee can readily ascertain the value of the first class, the second class and the third class land about which we have heard, and they can decide for themselves on the evidence presented to them whether any substantial injustice will be done to the poor land owing to an equal rate being levied as opposed to a rate divided according to rateable value; and having heard all the evidence they can, they will be able to come to a decision which I am perfectly certain would be much wiser than the House is able to arrive at to-night upon the ex parte statement of the mover of this Instruction. I say this without any reflection upon the hon. Member (Mr. Winfrey), who is acting on behalf of a body in his own Constituency. We all know the great interest he has always taken in matters connected with small holdings, and the House always listens with the utmost respect to anything which he has to urge on behalf of any body of small holders. Having heard what he has to say, and having myself, as it happens, had the advantage of two previous interviews with the hon. Member who moved this Instruction and with the promoters of the Bill, I have come to the conclusion that this is a matter which cannot be decided except after the perusal of maps and the hearing of evidence. It is because I am satisfied this is a Committee point which is likely to be more satisfactorily decided by a Committee which has heard evidence that I ask the House not to accept this Instruction—at any rate, in its present form.
  Mr. E. B. BARNARD: I was going to oppose the Instruction, but after the speech of the Chairman of Ways and Means I hardly think it is necessary for me to take up the time of the House. The Bill does not propose or seek to do anything unusual. Through accidental circumstances they find themselves obliged to come to Parliament to ask for certain powers, and that which they are asking for is simply to be able, as far as I understand it, to apply what is more or less the universal method in dealing with these matters. I am perfectly certain it is essentially a matter of business detail for the Committee to discuss rather than for the House to go into. It is not more than six
  1940
  weeks ago that my right hon. Friend the President of the Local Government Board (Mr. Burns), with very good reason, refused to accept an Instruction I was asking to put forward on the Derwent Valley Water Bill. My Instruction dealt with a point of principle, and there may be some ground for moving an Instruction when a point of principle is involved, but here it is a matter of business dealing solely, and is surely a subject to be discussed by a Committee. It is not like a Bill which has not been considered by anybody. It comes here having the full sanction and approval of a House of Lords Committee, which has passed it and presents it here in its present state. I therefore hope the right hon. Gentleman will be able to tell us that, so far as his Department is concerned, they prefer that the Bill should go to a Committee unclogged, so that they can decide what they think most suitable.
  Mr. CLOUGH Mr. CLOUGH moved, after the word "Committee" ["that it be an Instruction to the Committee"] to insert the words "to consider and, if deemed advisable, to." That reduces the Instruction from its present mandatory form, and will ensure that in the Committee upstairs my hon. Friend's Instruction will receive every consideration. This Amendment will be acceptable to the Chairman of Ways and Means, and I beg leave to propose it.
  Mr. HALLEY STEWARTseconded the Amendment.
  Mr. WALTER GUINNESS: I do not think this Instruction is necessary. There is no doubt whatever from the preamble of the Bill that the House of Commons Committee will be in a position to insert any taxing arrangement they think fit. I think they should be left to use their own discretion in the matter after they have heard the evidence of those interested; the hon. Member who moved the Instruction (Mr. Winfrey) stated that the Bill had been promoted by those who had recently bought land in the district. It is, of course, being promoted by the Drainage Board. He stated that that board were apparently of two minds on the subject. The matter was before those concerned at the election last September; it was the one question on which the election was decided, and I think, therefore, the House can safely rely on the opinion of those directly interested as thus expressed. The real question at issue is whether this land varies in quality or not? The hon. Member said it varies, and he gave figures to show the difference

  1941
  between the best and the worst land. I cannot check those figures in any way, but it is just possible some land is more valuable than the rest, because some of it is now being used by turf diggers, who have skinned the land and have taken away the whole of the surface, the land now being under water. Obviously, that land cannot have the same value as land used for agricultural purposes. It has had a large amount of its capital value already realised. These turf diggers have had their cake, and I think it is only reasonable in the future, when they are to have a further opportunity of either cutting turf or of cultivating their land that they should in some measure contribute to the cost.
  The hon. Member stated that in the neighbouring fen of Feltwell No. 2. 400 acres were recently let at a price no higher than in the fen under discussion. I am informed 400 acres were not recently let, but only 60 acres, and that the price realised was 10s. an acre, whereas the average in the fen we are considering at the present time is only 5s. There are no precedents, I am informed, for a system of taxation of this kind in the fen. The hon. Member who seconded the Instruction stated that there were precedents, but I think he will find they apply to those districts where floods are being prevented by embankments and other means, and not to those where drainage is being carried out to make agriculture possible. There is no doubt there are precedents for certain forms of graduation—I should prefer to call them differentiation. Under that system the lowland which gets the greatest benefit pays higher than the skirtland and the highland. That is perfectly reasonable, and there might be something to be said for it, but it is clearly a Committee point. There is certainly no precedent for the proposal the hon. Member has put forward. This land steadily decreased in value from 1755 to 1881. Owing to a mistake the board got a Provisional Order, under which they were not able, as they believed they would, to levy an equal acreage tax, and since then the land has steadily gone down. It has been quite impossible for poor farmers to improve their land, because they knew if they did they would have to pay on a heavier assessment for the purpose of drainage. For these reasons I think, in the interests of husbandry, an equal acreage tax is by far the best system. There is another point. The hon. Member's proposal will lead to a great deal of litigation and cost. There is to be a valuation not according to
  1942
  the benefits received, but simply of the value of the land. It is not to be considered whether it derives any benefit from the drainage, and if it should be more valuable because it is on higher ground, although it derives but little or no benefit from the drainage, it is to be taxed higher. This is a matter which must be discussed in the Committee. It is impossible for us here to get at the real root of the matter I do hope the Committee will be left with an unfettered judgment in dealing with it.
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. John Burns): I heartily associate myself with the speech delivered by the Chairman of Ways and Means. If this were an ordinary dispute which the House of Commons could settle on the lines on which I trust it may be settled, the Debate might have ended very properly with the speech of the Chairman of Ways and Means. But this is a matter which will have to be settled, not altogether by the House of Commons, not by the Committee upstairs, but subsequently, after this Bill has passed, by the various interests concerned in this drainage Board. We have had evidence showing that these are sharp divisions, not only on the point of principle, but in regard to the question whether the tax shall be levied by graduation, differentiation, or in any other way. I would suggest that the Instruction be accepted with the Amendment which has been moved. That will not fetter the hands of the Committee, which will have power to take evidence, and will have before it all the maps and details I believe, when they do come to consider it, they will decide that the Instruction is unnecessary. The object of this Bill is to reclaim four thousand acres of fen lands in variable occupations, large and small. Everyone is agreed that the object of the Bill is excellent, in the interests of agriculture and in the interests of the district, for the employment of more labour, and for the betterment of the whole locality. To carry the Bill into effect £8,000 will have to be borrowed, and it stands to reason that cultivators, large or small, who derive directly or indirectly any advantage by this expenditure should pay their proportionate contribution towards the cost of reclaiming the land and improving their holdings, be they large or small. But the various interests concerned are sharply divided. We are told that on a board of 14 Members seven were for one proposal and seven were for another, the Chairman having to give

  1943
  a casting vote. That indicates a sharp division. It indicates inharmonious relationship, it indicates an unnatural feeling which will have to be got rid of if these 4,000 acres are to be satisfactorily reclaimed from fen, water, and wilderness for the benefit of all concerned. I believe the promoters of the Bill are prepared to accept the Instruction, plus the Amendment, and, that being so, it seems to me this is one of those reasonable compromises which will tend to adjust the differences between the various interests and will make for peace among all concerned. It will also tend to economy; it will enable the Bill to be passed through its various stages with greater rapidity. I hope the suggestion I have thrown out will meet with the unanimous approval of this House.
  Mr. JOHN MOONEY: May I ask whether the Instruction, as amended, would be in order. Is it not an Instruction to the Committee to do something which is already provided for in the preamble of the Bill, namely, to consider "the more effectual draining of certain lands"? The mandatory instruction having been opposed by the ex-Chairman of Ways and Means, may I ask whether this Amendment now suggested does not simply restore to the Committee the powers it already possesses?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The rule with regard to Instructions on matter of private Bills differs somewhat from the rule with regard to Instructions on public Bills. There is a good deal more latitude in the former case than in the latter. The effect of passing the Instruction with the Amendment would be to leave the Committee in exactly the same position as now. They have power at the present moment to deal with this matter, and the only difference which can be urged would be that the attention of the Committee would be specifically directed to this point, whereas if there were no such Instruction it is possible that the Committee would not particularly have their attention directed to it. I cannot say it is out of order.
  Mr. MOONEY: May I point out that certain matters contained in the petition against this Bill are contained also in this Amended Resolution before the House. I wish to ask whether it is usual for the House to pass an Instruction which really embodies the prayer of a petition already laid before the House. Is it not rather
  1944
  prejudicing the position of the promoters of the Bill to pass an Instruction which is really in the terms of the petition presented by the opponents?
  Mr. SPEAKER: Supposing the petitioners do not appear on the petition, then this Question would not be raised, whereas if this Instruction is carried it will specifically call the attention of the Committee to the matter.
  Mr. J. F. P. RAWLINSON: May I venture to respectfully protest against the attitude taken up by the President of the Local Government Board on this Amendment, constituting, as it may do, a precedent for future private Bills. Are not Instructions from this House to be regarded seriously? It is true there is a much wider latitude in regard to private Bills than in the case of public Bills, and such a course, I have no doubt, as is now proposed, would be out of order on a public Bill. But is it not turning our Instructions into a farce to simply direct a Committee that they shall consider, if they think fit, that which they already have full power to consider? We ought to guard most jealously the powers of these tribunals which sit upstairs to deal with private business of this kind, and, so long as these Committees do-exist, we should think twice before we offer them what amounts almost to an insult by giving them an instruction of this kind—not a mandatory Instruction, but one simply asking them to pay attention to a matter which has already been threshed out before a Committee of the House of Lords, and which is likely to be threshed out again by counsel before themselves. Is it not rather intended to in some way indirectly influence their opinion? The House is not strong enough, and is frightened to take the line of giving a mandatory Instruction, and we are, therefore, placed in the position of saying to the Committee, "Please to do your duty. This matter has already been brought before the attention of the House of Lords, and you are to do your duty now, and pay attention to it when it comes before you." It appears to me, under those circumstances, that the Amendment, in its present form, is really unnecessary, and turns the Instruction into a ridiculous farce. This is purely a Committee point, and nobody can doubt that there is a very keen conflict of evidence as to the value of the land to be taxed. One hon. Member says that all the lands are of the same value,

  1945
  while another said that they were of different value, and if the Committee come to the conclusion that the latter contention is wrong, and that all this land is of equal value, then they will probably pass the Bill in its present form, which indicates that an equal sum shall be paid, and that is by no means an unusual form of raising rates where drainage schemes are concerned. This being so, I say it is altogether a matter for the Committee upstairs, and if we agree to this Instruction in an amended form the effect will be to form a precedent which is open to abuse.
  Mr. G. H. ROBERTS: As those who are responsible for the Instruction have evidently satisfied themselves in their own minds that it is desirable to accept the modification of it, although I, for my own part, differ from them, I will defer to their better judgment and give them my support. I always feel that the House of Commons has a right to pass a definite Instruction of this character, because there may be cases occasionally, as in this instance, where the interests of a number of small holders are likely to be jeopardised. If the House of Commons sends a definite Instruction to the Committee it is better, hut certainly the mere fact of this consideration having been given by the House to the Question will have the effect of drawing the attention of the Committee to it, and it may be that the interests of the people concerned will receive full consideration as the result of the discussion which has taken place this evening. That these men have, in some cases, cause for apprehension I think has been made perfectly clear. As has been stated, the present board is thoroughly divided on this question, several members of it having voted for the promotion of the Bill and several against it, and the matter being determined by the casting vote of the chairman. I believe if we cared to analyse the votes in favour of the Bill we should find that the small holders have even greater cause for apprehension than is represented to this House, because I believe five of the seven who voted for it are closely related, or, indeed, are largely members of one family, and they are all representative of the large holders of the locality, and therefore we can quite understand the frame of mind which has induced some small holders to take action in order to protect their interests. I hope when the Bill emerges from the Committee that it will there have been proved that the contention of the small holders that the
  1946
  assessment ought to be placed upon value as at present and not upon acreage is the correct one, because if the Bill is passed in accordance with the present proposal it will have the effect of driving a great many small holders out of occupation, and means that the land will lapse into an unsatisfactory condition. That the small holders have great cause for apprehension was explained by the hon. Member who moved the Instruction, because the Bill gives powers to enable the Commissioners, if a small holder is twelve months in arrear with the rate, or tax, to sell him up entirely. We understand that the promoters of the Bill have agreed to modify this to the effect that the land shall be let by the Commissioners for three years, and then give the holder the opportunity of paying, but for my own part that does not remove my objection to that provision of the Bill, and I hope this Debate will have the effect of drawing the attention of the Committee to these objectionable points, and it may be that some more satisfactory solution will be found. I heartily associate myself with the sentiments expressed by the President of the Local Government Board in regard to the Bill. We all desire to see the land improved in value, but that it will not prejudice the rights of the small holders. I should have been prepared to support the original Instruction, but as the promoters accept the modification I am quite ready to agree to their wishes and throw in my lot with them.
  Amendment put, and agreed to.
  Instruction, as amended, agreed to

FINANCE BILL.
Considered in Committee.—[Eleventh Day].
(IN THE COMMITTEE.)

FINANCE BILL.

  CLAUSE 3.
  Postponed Proceeding resumed on Amendment [Sir W. Robson],o leave out the words having regard to," and to insert the words after giving credit for."
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: When we were interrupted [at a quarter-past eight o'clock] I was putting a question to the Attorney-General as to the need of the words either as they stood in the Bill or as he proposes to amend them. At the end of the first clause these words are found: "And on each of those occasions the duty, or proportionate part of the

  1947
  duty, due, so far as it has not been paid on any previous occasion, shall be collected in accordance with the provisions of this Act." Then when we come to the present Amendment on the first sub-section of Clause 3: "On each occasion on which Increment Value Duty is collected on the increment value of any land, such an amount of duty shall be deemed to be due as the Commissioners determine, having regard to the amount of duty paid on previous occasions." I should have thought on the face of it that the words at the end of Clause 1 covered this point, and that neither the words of the Bill nor the Amendment were necessary.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The words in Clause 1 deal simply with the levying of the duty. The words of section 1 of Clause 3 deal with the duty of the Commissioners in fixing the amount of the duty, and it is necessary in this case, precisely as it was in Clause 1, to have regard to the amount of duty paid on the previous occasion. This is not repeating what was in Clause 1, but giving the same direction in relation to a different matter.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I think there is a good deal to be said for the Attorney-General's words, and, from the point of view of those who have spoken from this side of the House, "giving credit for" is a more distinct direction than "having regard to," which may mean anything; but at the same time it again raises the same difficulty of the extraordinary results which will follow to people who own exactly the same kind of property, because what this enacts now clearly and distinctly, when these words are inserted, is that whenever Increment Value Duty becomes due any amounts previously paid on the same property will be deducted and credit will be given for them. Then Increment Value Duty is not always paid by the same person or by the same interest. Where you have a building lease granted on the property, and the two interests run concurrently, one waxing and the other waning you will have a tenant liable to pay the Increment Value Duty on a part of the interest, and then eventually that part of the interest on which the tenant has paid will pass to the owner, and the owner will then have to pay the balance of the duty. Therefore, the owner in fee simple of property of that description will, when the lease falls in, find that the Increment Value Duty which he has to pay not only depends upon whether
  1948
  there has been an increase in the value of the property during the currency of the lease, but will depend even more largely upon whether the leasehold interest of the property has happened to pass from hand to hand once or more than once during the currency of the lease, circumstances over which he can have no possible control, because an ordinary condition of such a lease is that the consent of the owner has to be obtained to any transfer, but that such consent shall not be unreasonably withheld. That being so the lease can be transferred from hand to hand without any action on the part of the landlord. He cannot prevent it. Yet these transfers are going in some cases to entirely absolve him, and in those cases where there has not been a transfer the whole duty will fall to be paid on the termination of the lease. That will involve very great inequality in the levying of the duty upon persons who are exactly similarly circumstanced as regards their relation to their own property and to the State. By the action of a third party, who is in no way concerned as between the State and the owner of the land, the amount of duty payable is going to be very largely affected, and I think we ought to have some further information and some statement from the Attorney-General as to what line the Government propose to take about it.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I think the difficulty is not really germane to this Amendment. I quite appreciate the point which was put that conceivably it may arise, and I have already dealt with the point. I have stated that what the hon. Gentleman calls an inequality will arise in the circumstances to which he refers, but I do not regard it as an inequality in the sense of its being an inequity. It seems to me a natural and not an unreasonable consequence, that where a lessee transfers his interest several times he pays whatever Increment Duty arises in respect of his interest. We have decided that that Increment Duty shall be credited against the Increment Duty which may arise in respect of any interest in the land, that is to say, it shall go to frank the fee simple to that extent. I thought this was a proper and rather a generous thing to do, that we would not take the duty in respect to the same increment on both interests, and we adopted what we thought the more merciful and certainly the more generous alternative. But I do not think that gives rise to any inequity, because after all a reversioner when

  1949
  he comes into the increment does not take charge of the unearned amount which another reversioner would enjoy owing to the frequent changes of transfer on the part of the leaseholder. That is an inequality, but not in the sense of its being a hardship. It simply means that one leaseholder has mad3 many changes of interest, and on each change has paid quite justly and properly upon his increment. That has gone on for years, to the benefit not only of the leaseholder but of all other interests, and therefore he is exceptionally fortunate in the matter. There is no injustice to the reversioner. I need scarcely tell the Committee, what I have always been anxious to explain, that there is not the same exact incidence in all these cases, because in some cases, according to the circumstances, the reversioner is able to escape the full burden of the increment. A question arises which I do not think is germane to this Amendment at all. It is to be raised afterwards by the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. Mason), and I think when that Amendment is reached will be the proper time to deal with certain observations as to how the division is to be made.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Mr. J. F. MASON: I desire to move the insertion at the end of section (1) of the words "and where apportionment of site value is necessary after Increment Duty has already been paid on any land as a whole, then the increment upon which duty has been already paid shall be apportioned in the same manner, but not necessarily in the same proportions, as the original site value." he point raised in this Amendment is one which I think it is certainly necessary to bring forward, because it follows upon something which is practically admitted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and which I think has received some consideration. I am not at all sure whether the deduction is adequately met by the words which have been inserted. I think I can best explain the meaning of the Amendment on the Paper by taking an imaginary case. In that way it will be easily demonstrated that the apportionment of the increment is not provided for in any part of the Bill. Suppose the owner of four acres of land of which the original site value has been declared to be £2,000; he leaves that land in exactly the same condition, and a few years later dies. Owing to various causes that land has increased in value, and on his death is declared to have an increment value
  1950
  beyond the £2,000 or £1,000, so that it is worth at the date of his death £3,000. Increment Duty will be paid on £1,000, that is to say, £200 will be paid. His successor holds the land for some time, and after that develops it. He begins by selling one acre, presumably the most favourable acre, for £l,000. It is clear, therefore, that the £l,000 again shows an increment on that one acre, and the duty has again to be paid on the sale—that is to say, duty is paid for the second time, duty having already been once paid on the death of the owner. The question arises how much Increment Duty is due? Sub-section (3) of Clause 2 provides that in a case of this kind original site value will be apportioned to various parts of the original four acres, so that one acre will be given an apportionment of the original site value, but not necessarily one-fourth. The sub-section (1) of Clause 3 provides that credit is to be given for duty paid on previous occasions. But how much is the duty paid on previous occasions on this particular acre? It is true that £200 has been paid in respect of the four acres, but it is natural to suppose that the acre, which has now been developed, has an advantage over the other three acres, and it is quite evident that it would not be fair to say that that acre had merely appreciated by one-fourth of £l,000. That is to say, the acre in question, which is now sold, will have accounted for more than one-fourth of the first increment of £1,000, and consequently, if that is so, it is absolutely necessary to apportion the first increment of £1,000 between the three acres, which are left in somewhat the same manner in which you apportioned the original site value over the various parts of the total area. I think this is a case which shows beyond doubt that some apportionment of the first increment is absolutely necessary where land is subdivided after one Increment Duty or two Increment Duties have already been paid. I am aware that in Clause 19 there is an occasion mentioned of apportionment, and a great deal of that clause would deal with cases of this kind, but I think it is necessary to point out that arrangement is made for apportionment only where it is necessary for purposes of assessment. Under Clause 2, as it now stands, after the alterations of yesterday and the Amendment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the owner has a right to ask for an apportionment of the original site value, for the purpose, as I gather from the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, of

  1951
  getting some indication, for himself to guide him in the policy of development. That is to say, the owner under Clause 2 has the right to ask for an apportionment before he begins to work his land, in order to see bow much original site value is put on any particular plot, and it seems to me particularly important for the owner for the same reason also to know how much of the increment which already has been declared, and on which duty has been paid, has also been apportioned on plots and sub-divisions. To sum up: When sub-division of various lots of a given area is necessary after Increment Duty has already been paid once, or more than once, then that increment should be apportioned in the same manner, but not necessarily in the same proportion as the original site value had been apportioned.
  Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
  Sir W. ROBSON: I am inclined to think, as a matter of fair construction, that the words just added, namely, "after giving credit for," would be construed by the court so as to have the effect desired by the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. J. F. Mason), and which he seeks to achieve in this Amendment. But I quite agree after considering the hon. Member's Amendment that his words certainly make the matter more expressive. I think it is desirable not to leave to mere implication the apportionment of Increment Duty as well as the apportionment of increment value. That is what the hon. Member has brought out by his Amendment in his very useful point. But the words which he has chosen, I think he himself will agree, are not quite satisfactory. For instance, he said, "where apportionment of site value is necessary after Increment Duty has already been paid on any land as a whole": the words "as a whole" are not very convenient, and I am not very well satisfied with them, and I shall be glad if he will allow me to put in words indicating what both the hon. Member and myself are striving for, and to insert "where for the purpose of giving such credit," that is giving credit for the Increment Value Duty that has been paid "it becomes necessary to apportion any Increment Duty previously paid, the Commissioners shall make such apportionment of that duty as they may determine to be proper." The hon. Member has reached the same end by saying that the apportionment is to be made, of course, by
  1952
  the Commissioners, but it is not to be necessarily in the same proportion as the original site value. That is clear. The apportionment of the increment will, of course, not necessarily follow the apportionment of the site value; quite the reverse. So it should be left more or less in general terms. Personally, if the Committee desired the words to be inserted now, I should certainly do so, but I am bound to say that I think the better plan would be—and I shall be guided by the Committee in this matter—to leave the matter over until the Report stage, with an explicit pledge that the object sought to be achieved by the hon. Member shall be met by the Government in some well-considered form of words.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Do we or do we not vary the unit of valuation? You get the original unit of valuation of four acres. That is split up into a dozen different ownerships. You have got to go back in every case to the original unit of valuation, and you have a dozen different owners all at once of different parts of the property on which Increment Value Duty has been paid.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I do not think it touches the unit of valuation. The case was put by the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. Mason) where you have an increment value of one particular acre, that acre has to have allocated to it not merely its proportion of the original site value, but its proportion of the Increment Duty which has already been paid. That would be entirely a question of value. If it is paid as one interest there is no difficulty at all. Anyhow, the hon. and gallant Gentleman's warning shall not be lost sight of. It is quite understood that words are to be brought up at the Report stage which are to give effect to the hon. Member's Amendment, and also to take into consideration the suggestion of the hon. and gallant Gentleman.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: On the question of apportionment I venture to point out that if they had in the previous clause inserted words to say that upon each occasion upon which Increment Duty became payable such apportionment should be made as the Commissioners might determine and in the manner in which they might determine, then there would have been an end of these difficulties. That opportunity was lost, and we passed the clause in the shape in which it now appears

  1953
  on the Paper. The consequence is in dealing with the present clause we have been, by the Amendment we have passed a few moments ago, placed in the difficulty of having to consider these words of apportionment. I think it the most desirable course to leave the whole of these difficult words over to the Report stage, because it would be undesirable to frame in. a hurry or without mature consideration the words which are intended for all times to guide the Commissioners in this very difficult question, when two or three Increment Duties have already been paid on a piece of land in which all sorts of interests arise. The astounding difficulty of dealing with that question would be brought home to the Government more if they sat down to try to draft sensible words which would adequately meet the various occasions that may arise. Not only will they require to apportion the original value—that obviously must be apportioned to the new site—but they will require to apportion that original site value again when it is part of a piece that has already been apportioned, and, where anything has happened, they will require to do that over again to apportion the site value of a piece perhaps in quite a different way——
  The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Caldwell): If the Amendment is to be withdrawn, I do not see any need for going into this discussion.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: Then we should oppose the Amendment being withdrawn. I am prepared to say that unless we are to have some intelligible machinery to carry out this. Bill, it would be our duty to stop at this point and insist on knowing how this is going to be done. At all events, I think we are entitled to insist upon trying to find out whether the Government have realised the astounding difficulties which may arise in almost the most simple transaction, and to meet which they are not making the faintest effort. It is all very fine to come here and alter this clause at the last moment with manuscript Amendments, while they actually tell us that they are not satisfied with those Amendments, and propose, therefore, to get rid of the difficulty for perhaps twelve months until this clause is taken on Report. I do not think that is a satisfactory position for the Government to take up. Whilst I for one would be prepared to admit that the wisest course the Government could take 5s to adjourn this difficulty as long as they
  1954
  possibly can in the hope that people will have forgotten it when it comes to be dealt with again, at the same time I think it is not treating this Committee fairly to put this most important question of machinery off to a remote date, and not to deal with it in Committee in some practical shape.
  Mr. J. F. MASON: In view of what the hon. and learned Gentleman has said, I think it well to ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Viscount HELMSLEY Viscount HELMSLEY moved to add at the end of section (1) the words "and after giving credit for the amount of Death Duties and Income Tax paid in respect of such amount." I think that is a very important point to bring before the notice of the Government, and I am supported in my view on this subject by a speech the Prime Minister made not long ago, in which he argued about the Increment Tax and the allegation made against it that it was a tax imposed on a particular kind of increment and not on other kinds of increment. He said that other kinds of increment were undoubtedly subject to Estate Duty and Income Tax. The object of this Amendment is to bring this class of increment into the same category, and, therefore, no more increment should be taken in the case of land than would be taken in the case of other increment—that is, allowing for the amount of the Death Duties and Income Tax which may have already been paid. I am sure it is perfectly obvious that this is a fair proposal. It cannot be justified by any argument whatever that you could tax a man twice upon the same increment. I maintain there are a great many cases where this Increment Duty is to be imposed, in which, as a matter of fact, the increment has already been taxed in the shape of either Death Duties or Income Tax. We have never had any argument whatever to show up to now why there should be this exceptional taxation, this Increment Duty, over and above those two taxes. Hon. Members opposite say: "This is all very well, but land is in a different category from other kinds of property." Granting for a moment that may be so, it may still be an argument for putting on an Increment Tax over and above the existing taxes, but it is not an argument for putting on an Increment Tax and not making any allowance for the existing taxes that have been paid. It is a well-estab-

  1955
  lished principle of our taxation that we do not tax a man over and over again on the same property. Indeed, some of the exemptions and Amendments carried on this Bill already show that it is not intended by the Government to tax a man more than once on the same property. Therefore, I cannot help thinking that the Government will be inclined favourably to consider this Amendment. Look at the position. In the case of Increment Duty being payable at death. Nobody will deny that if an estate has gone up in value when it passes at death, the person who succeeds will have it valued on the basis of that improvement in value, and he will pay Estate Duty on it. Therefore, it seems to me that whatever he pays in the shape of Estate Duty should be set off against what he may be asked to pay in the shape of Increment Duty, because, otherwise, it would be asking him to pay twice on the same description of property. I suppose, even if this Amendment were carried, there would still be other cases where Increment Duty would be payable when no Death Duties or Income Tax had been paid on that particular income. From the Government point of view I understand that is a case which they are anxious to tax, but I do not see that it is in the least fair to tax the whole increment again when it has already been tapped in the shape of Death Duties or Income Tax. I hope the Government will seriously consider this Amendment, and see whether they cannot accept it either in this form or some other, because I am quite certain that if they want to do anything approaching justice in this matter they are bound to make this allowance for what has been paid.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The Noble Lord must see that this is a deduction not from the increment value, but from the Increment Duty itself. Death Duties are paid on the whole estate, and Increment Tax is paid on the increment, so that when it comes to making deductions in respect of the Death Duties and the Increment Taxes——
  Viscount HELMSLEY: In respect of that land.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The Noble Lord has drafted this Amendment rather hastily, but when you come to deduct all those sums Increment Value Duty has disappeared. When you have got to the end of your deductions you have entirely disposed
  1956
  of it, that is the consequence. On the merits itself there is no reason why, granting this to be a fair tax—and that is the assumption on which the Committee is proceeding—for deducting Estate Duties. There is one point which I think might fairly be considered, and we shall consider it. I think it arises on some later Amendment. We ought not undoubtedly to aggregate for the purposes of Estate Duty until we have deducted the amount of Increment Duty before we begin the aggregation of Estate Duties.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: That is obvious.
  Sir W. ROBSON: Estate Duties are paid on the whole value, the capital value and Increment Value Duty is taxed on a particular value for the reasons that have been urged so often in the course of this Committee stage This is a tax no doubt additional to the other taxes already existing on land and upon land-owners, just in the same way as you have Settlement Estate Duty, a tax which is additional to the ordinary Death Duty, and Succession Duties, which are additional to the Estate Duties. You have a great many taxes which are on different interests in land, and it would not be fair to say you are taxing the same thing twice over. You are taxing different interests in the same thing, but not twice over. We are adding Increment Value Duty to the burdens which fall on the land.
  Mr. JOHN GRETTON: As far as I can make out the argument of the right hon Gentleman, it is that the Government, by existing taxation, are going to already appropriate the increment value and then for the purposes of this clause they are going to tax the estate for the money which has been already extracted from it. It appears to me that any proceedings of that kind is a complete condemnation of the whole process of taxation which they propose on the occasion of the death of the owner. I may have misunderstood the argument, but it occurs to me we really want some further explanation. A more amazing and astonishing argument from those benches opposite on the whole collection of arguments we have heard against the proposals we have made to improve the Bill we have not heard than that we have just listened to. It is an abominable injustice in many cases to tax the same property over and over again, and again on death, with an accumulation of taxes. I could understand that argument if it were urged by hon. Members sitting below

  1957
  the Gangway on this side, but advanced by the Government it amounts to a complete revolution of the whole policy which has hitherto directed taxation in this country. It is so remarkable that I think we should have a more clear and definite explanation than that given by the hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir W. Robson).
  Mr. G. R. LANE-FOX: It is obvious this Amendment has been drafted rather hastily, but my Noble Friend did not ask the Attorney-General to accept the absolute words, but to accept the principle. It was not quite fair of the right hon. Gentleman in reply to say that the Amendment as drafted would not carry out the purpose. The argument of my Noble Friend was that, as the Prime Minister said that the reason for not taxing other increments was that they were already taxed in another form, then land should be treated exactly with the same degree of fairness as all the other forms of property. The answer of the learned Attorney-General is what does it matter; we have already two or three forms of Death Duties, and therefore why should we not put on another? If the Prime Minister's words are to be carried out, then some such Amendment as this should be accepted, and the Government ought to give the matter consideration.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I moved an Amendment to Clause 2 on this particular point, and there is a rather curious disagreement between hon. Gentlemen on the Front Bench, because the Chancellor of the Exchequer agreed to accept my Amendment, but in this form, that he would make the deduction in Part III. of the Bill, and that he would allow Increment Value Duty to be deducted first. The Chancellor of the Exchequer on July 7th said ["Official Report"]:—
  "It is a case which I have been looking into, and it is one which I have to deal with, and I frankly admit that I am more favourable, in a sense, to the owner in my view than the hon. Gentleman himself. But I think he had better leave it to me, and I propose to deal with it on Part III. of the Bill, and I give him a promise that I will deal with it there."
  The point on which the right hon. Gentleman said that he was more favourable to the owner was a mathematical point, and on looking into the matter I find it makes absolutely no difference which you take first. I proposed, as does this Amendment, that the Death Duties should be taken first, and that Increment Duty should only be levied on the residue. The hon. Gentleman must be aware that Death Duties are not now levied on the same
  1958
  sum. There is, first, Estate Duty on settlement on the residue, and Succession Duty on the residue. It is obviously just that you cannot levy Increment Value Duty which is paid from the estate in Death Duties. It is quite immaterial, mathematically and financially, which you deduct first. The Chancellor of the Exchequer having given his definite undertaking that he would accept that principle, and that he would make the deduction when we come to Part III. of the Bill, and as he prefers to let the Increment Value Duty be paid first and the Death Duty afterwards, we shall raise no objection to that course. I regret I did not observe this sooner, and ask my hon. Friend to withdraw his Amendment, as the point is met by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: I am not certain that the point is quite the same; but if it is, of course I will withdraw my Amendment.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Not Increment Tax?
  Viscount HELMSLEY: There is that point in addition, and there is also the question whether it is the same to deduct the amount paid in Death Duties from the amount to be paid in Increment Duty as to deduct the amount paid in Increment Duty from the amount to be paid in Death Duties. It seems to me that my Amendment would produce a rather greater deduction than the Amendment which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has promised to accept. We have also had from the Attorney-General to-night the admission that he was prepared to deduct from the amount payable in Death Duties the amount paid in Increment Duty. I do not quite see that that is the same as I am proposing, and I should like some explanation as to what the Government really propose to do before I withdraw the Amendment. The criticism of the Attorney-General that my Amendment was too widely drawn has a certain amount of weight. It does cover rather more ground than I intended. I did not mean to deduct the amount of Death Duties payable over the whole estate, but the additional amount due to the increment; and if the Government can see their way to adopt the principle, there will be no difficulty whatever in adjusting the words.
  The SOLICITOR-GENERAL for SCOTLAND (Mr. A. Dewar): I am afraid that all the information I can give the Noble

  1959
  Lord, and all that he can possibly expect from me is this. If it be that his Amendment comes within the promise made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it will be given effect to. On the other hand, if it does not, for the reasons stated by the Attorney-General, it will not be given effect to.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: I think we ought to be deeply grateful to the Solicitor-General for Scotland for the exceedingly logical method in which he has discharged the trust reposed in him during his temporary occupancy of that illustrious Bench. The Attorney-General has three methods of dealing with Amendments. The first is to give us a highly technical legal disquisition. He has spared us that on this occasion. His second method is to give us a paternal lecture as to how we ought to read the Bill, and where we shall find things, which, when we look into the clauses referred to, we are unable to discover. No doubt they are really there if only we could see them. His third method is, in a speech altogether apart from the real object of the Amendment, to make on behalf of the Government a most damaging admission. That is the method he has adopted on this occasion. This Amendment says that on the payment of Increment Duty there shall be deducted an allowance for the payment of Death Duties and for the payment of Income Tax. I cannot follow my Noble Friend in regard to an allowance for Income Tax, because I do not see that Income Tax has anything whatever to do with Increment Duty. But the Attorney-General made the astonishing admission that if the Government allowed Death Duties and Income Tax to be deducted there would be no Increment Duty to pay. That is a most damaging admission, because it means that the Government, in asking for this Increment Duty, are asking for a tax which they have already collected under other names. I do not think that is what they intended, but that is what the Attorney-General actually said and gave as his reason for rejecting the Amendment. I listened very carefully to the Chancellor of the Exchequer last week upon an Amendment to the same effect as this, and if I understood him aright he distinctly promised that there should be a deduction with respect to the two duties where they fell upon the same object. That is to say, if increment accrued to a property and Increment Duty became payable, no Death
  1960
  Duties should be collected in respect of that increment or in respect of that duty—I am not quite certain which. My Noble Friend has explained that he does not wish to go quite so far as the actual words of his Amendment. If the Amendment were carried so as to say that the same property should not pay two taxes it would be absurd; I think my Noble Friend would have to modify the words in some way so as to make them reasonable under the circumstances; but what he really desires is, I think, perfectly just.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: I understand from the hon. and gallant Member below me (Mr. Pretyman) that the substance of this Amendment has been promised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I gave a very definite promise to deal with it, and my recollection is that I gave a promise much more favourable than the hon. and gallant Member was trying to extract from me.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Take a pencil and a piece of paper; the two sums work out exactly the same. Take off 20 per cent., and afterwards 10 per cent. on the residue, and it is exactly the same as if you took off 10 per cent. and 20 per cent. off the residue. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] I should not make a statement to the Committee if I had not tried it. Therefore that underlies the fact of our insistence on the point. This Debate has arisen because the Attorney-General, on behalf of the Government, has been refusing this suggestion.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEOGE: I myself gave a definite promise on Part 3 of the Bill.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I stated so, and asked the Noble Lord to withdraw his Amendment.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: There still remains the question of the Income Tax, which is not covered. I maintain that if Income Tax has been paid in respect of this particular increment this ought to be adopted. It is obviously fair, and it is putting into formal words the argument which was raised by the Prime Minister at Southport. I hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will consider that point of view as well. As I understand from the Government there is a pledge that really the substance of this Amendment will be met—although no one would have gathered so from the Attorney-General—I withdraw the Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Mr. J. F. MASON Mr. J. F. MASON moved to leave out "transfer or" ["of the transfer or passing on death of the fee simple"]. The reason I have put this Amendment on the Paper is that section (2) states that in certain cases, namely, the transfer or the passing on death, the whole amount of the duty shall be collected, which I take to mean shall be collected at once, and in one sum. On the other hand, section (3) dealing with another class of cases says "such proportionate part of the amount of the duty which is due shall be collected as may be determined by the Commissioners." The point is that in a certain category of cases you propose to collect the whole sum at once, and in another category of cases you give facilities for collecting the money, presumably by instalments. The case of the transfer of land is not always one on which there is any reason to demand summary payment of the whole duty. I think it has been put forward in the course of the earlier parts of our Debates that the sale of land is a particularly opportune moment to collect the whole of the duty, because there is a certain sum of money which can be taken for the purpose. What I particularly want to call attention to is that in many cases land may be mortgaged, and, as under this part of the Bill there, is no allowance for disregarding mortgages or encumbrances, it is quite possible that a piece of land may be sold for only just sufficient to pay off the mortgage. In that case, presuming there is no other property, there is no sum from which the whole of the duty can be easily paid, so that the object of the Amendment, as in the case of transfer or the sale of land. is that the facilities of payment by instalment shall be given the same as in the other category in section (3). Of course, in the case of the Death Duties you have the deduction on the mortgage, but also in the case of Death Duties you have facilities for payment by instalment. I think it will be worth comparing sections (2) and (3) to see whether the division can be fairly dealt with between the kind of occasions named in section (2), which enjoins summary payment, against the sub-section where payment is by easier methods. In the meantime, I beg to move.
  Question proposed, "That the words 'transfer or' stand part of the Clause."
  Mr. A. DEWAR: We have made arrangements on the lines suggested by the hon. Gentleman for the collection of the debt. What the hon. Member intends
  1962
  will be a fact. It is a short point, and I do not think I need go into it further.
  Mr. CLYDE: As the hon. Member puts it the purpose of section (2) and even of section (3), but particularly section (2) is to provide the machinery for collection, but there is not a single bit of machinery either in section (2) or (3). It has got nothing to do with machinery. I admit that the hon. and learned Gentleman will find that in section (4) but section (3) has to do with something else altogether. Accordingly it would not do to say that there is no inconsistency in the words proposed under section (2), and what the Committee have determined in the preceding section. On the contrary it seems to me that if the analogy to which appeal has been made so frequently is of any value at all, the exact analogous position of the Act of 1S94 is section (6). After all what section (6) was dealing with was the duty, and a heavy duty moreover, payable on death. So is this. I submit that if the analogy of 1894 has any value, it ought to be followed. My answer is it is nothing to do with machinery at all; it relates to the case of the passing on death, as under the Act of 1904. Surely it would be reasonable to treat them both in the same way? I agree you cannot confound the case of sales with that of passing at death, and therefore I submit that the reasons advanced for not accepting this Amendment are wholly insufficient, and that the Amendment is fully justified.
  Mr. LANE-FOX: The answer given by the hon. and learned Gentleman does not meet the point at all. The whole point of my hon. Friend's argument was that in the clause as it stands it does not provide for mortgages. I submit to the Government that they ought to give some answer to these points, raised very clearly and very properly. It is quite obvious that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-General for Scotland did not appreciate the point that was made.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: After listening very carefully to the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Clyde), I would like him to explain what payment by instalments has to do with the omission of these words. I confess I am unable to follow his arguments so far.
  Mr. CLYDE: As I understand, the present Amendment involves as a sequel to

  1963
  it the Amendment lower down on the Paper, which seeks to insert "at such times and in such instalments as the Commissioners may think fit."
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: You mean a consequential Amendment?
  Mr. CLYDE: Yes. I am sure the Chancellor of the Exchequer sees that that could not be applied to sale, and therefore could not be applied to transfer.
  Mr. J. F. MASON: There seems to be some difficulty about the meaning of these words. The reason for desiring to remove the words "transfer or" is that in the case of mortgage which amounts to the whole of the amount of the sale there would be some difficulty in paying the whole of the duty at once, and I desire to get transfer put into the same category in sub-section (3). It seems to me that my object might be equally met by my other Amendment, and if at the end of sub-section (2) you put in the words "at such times and in such instalments as the Commissioners may think fit," I would withdraw my Amendment for the omission of the words "transfer or," the object being that the duty should be paid in instalments instead of at once. I might point out in case of land passing on death it is only reasonable that it should be paid in instalments, because already the duty at death is paid in instalments.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I think the hon. Member will find this is provided for by the Act. This Amendment is only the first of a series by the hon. Gentleman opposite
  which would provide payment by instalments. That is provided for in section 5 already.
  Mr. J. F. MASON: I do not think the right hon. Gentleman has been dealing with the same point. I propose these two Amendments as one alternative to the other, and my hon. Friend (Mr. Clyde) took them as consequential one on the other.
  Mr. RAWLINSON: My hon. Friend was not dealing with Death Duties at all, but with the question of transfer on sale. The Amendment is to leave out "transfer or." The proposition is to exclude the occasion of the sale of land from section (2), which makes the duty collectable in one lump sum. The case given in support of this Amendment has not been dealt with at all. The point was that in the case of a mortgage which had exhausted the whole value of the estate, it would be exceedingly inconvenient for the person liable to find the whole of that duty at that particular moment, and it is only fair that it should come under section (3). That point has not been answered by the Solicitor-General for Scotland.
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: The Chancellor of the Exchequer has referred the Committee to Clause 5. Is it not a fact that in that case the payment would be spread over eight years?
  Question put, "That the words 'transfer or' stand part of the Clause."
  The Committee divided: Ayes. 259; Noes, 86.

  Division No. 277.]

  AYES.

  [10.25 P.m.

  Abraham, William (Rhondda)

  Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Brigg, John

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Adkins, W. Ryland D.

  Bright, J. A.

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Agnew, George William

  Brocklehurst, W. B.

  Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Brooke, Stopford

  Cowan, W. H.

  Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

  Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

  Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Crosfield, A. H.

  Armitage, R.

  Buckmaster, Stanley O.

  Cullinan, J.

  Astbury, John Meir

  Burke, E. Haviland-

  Curran, Peter Francis

  Atherley-Jones, L.

  Burnyeat, W. J. D.

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Byles, William Pollard

  Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

  Barker, Sir John

  Cameron, Robert

  Dewar, Sir J. A. (Inverness-sh.)

  Barlow, Sir John E. (Somerset)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

  Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

  Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

  Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

  Barnes, G. N.

  Cawley, Sir Frederick

  Dobson, Thomas W.

  Barran, Rowland Hirst

  Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Clancy, John Joseph

  Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

  Beale, W. P.

  Cleland, J. W.

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Beck, A. Cecil

  Clough, William

  Elibank, Master of

  Bell, Richard

  Clynes, J. R.

  Esslemont, George Birnie

  Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

  Cobbold, Felix Thornley

  Evans, Sir S. T.

  Boulton, A. C. F.

  Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Bowerman, C. W.

  Condon, Thomas Joseph

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

  Brace, William

  Cooper, G. J.

  Flynn, James Christopher

  Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter

  Mackarness, Frederic C.

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

  Freeman-Thomas, Freeman

  Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Fuller, John Michael F.

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

  Samuel, S. M. (Whitechapel)

  Fullerton, Hugh

  Macpherson, J. T.

  Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

  Furness, Sir Christopher

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  MacVeigh, Charles (Donegal, E.)

  Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester)

  Gill, A. H.

  McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

  Seaverns, J. H.

  Glover, Thomas

  M'Micking, Major G.

  Seddon, J.

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Mallet, Charles E.

  Shaw, Sir Charles E. (Stafford)

  Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

  Markham, Arthur Basil

  Silcock, Thomas Ball

  Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

  Marnham, F. J.

  Simon, John Allsebrook

  Greenwood, Hamar (York)

  Massie, J.

  Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

  Hall, Frederick

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  Snowden, P.

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  Meagher, Michael

  Soamos, Arthur Wellesley

  Harcourt, Bobert V. (Montrose)

  Micklem, Nathaniel

  Spicer, Sir Albert

  Hardle, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Molteno, Percy Alport

  Stanger, H. Y.

  Hardy, George A. (Suffolk)

  Montgomery, H. G.

  Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

  Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

  Mooney, J. J.

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Harmsworth, B. L. (Caithness-sh.)

  Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall)

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Summerbell, T.

  Harwood, George

  Morrell, Philip

  Sutherland, J. E.

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Morse, L. L.

  Taylor, John W. (Durham)

  Hayden, John Patrick

  Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

  Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

  Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

  Murphy, N. J. (Kilkenny, S.)

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Hazleton, Richard

  Myer, Horatio

  Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Napier, T. B.

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetiaw)

  Thomasson, Franklin

  Henderson, J. McD. (Aberdeen, W.)

  Nicholls, George

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)

  Nolan, Joseph

  Verney, F. W.

  Higham, John Sharp

  Nussey, Sir Willans

  Walsh, Stephen

  Hodge, John

  Nuttall, Harry

  Walters, John Tudor

  Hogan, Michael

  O'Brien, K. (Tipperary, Mid)

  Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

  Holt, Richard Durning

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Hooper, A. G.

  O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)

  Wardle, Gecrge J.

  Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset, N.)

  O'Dowd, John

  Waring, Walter

  Horniman, Emslie John

  O'Grady, J.

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Hudson, Walter

  O'Kelly, Conor (Mayo, N.)

  Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

  Hyde, Clarendon G.

  O'Malley, William

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Idris, T. H. W.

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Waterlow, D. S.

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Watt, Henry A.

  Jackson, B. S.

  Pearce, William (Limehouse)

  White, Sir George (Norfolk)

  Jenkins, J

  Pearson, Sir W. D. (Colchester)

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Jones, Leif (Appleby)

  Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

  White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

  Jowett, F. W.

  Pickersgill, Edward Hare

  White, Patrick (Meath, North)

  Joyce, Michael

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Kavanagh, Walter M.

  Pointer, J.

  Wiles, Thomas

  Laidlaw, Robert

  Pollard, Dr. G. H.

  Wilkie, Alexander

  Lamb, Ernest H. (Rochester)

  Ponsonby, Arthurr A. W. H.

  Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

  Lambert, George

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Wills, Arthur Walters

  Lamont, Norman

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

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

  Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

  Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

  Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

  Lehmann, R. C.

  Radford, G. H.

  Wilson, J. W. (Worcestershire, N.)

  Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

  Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

  Winfrey, R.

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

  Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

  Lundon, T.

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  Lyell, Charles Henry

  Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford)

  TELLERS FOB THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Robinson, S.

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  NOES.

  Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  Anson, Sir William Reynell

  Cave, George

  Gretton, John

  Arstruther-Gray, Major

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Cecil, Lord B. (Marylebone, E.)

  Hamilton, Marquess of

  Balcarres, Lord

  Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

  Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City, Lond.)

  Clyde, J. Avon

  Harris, Frederick Leverton

  Banbury, Sir Frederick George

  Courthope, G. Loyd

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Baring, Capt. Hon. G. (Winchester)

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Hay, Hon. Claude George

  Beckett, Hon. Gervase

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Helmsley, Viscount

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert

  Bowles, G. Stewart

  Du Cros, Arthur

  Hill, Sir Clement

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Faber, George Denison (York)

  Hills, J. W.

  Brotherton, Edward Allen

  Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.)

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Bull, Sir William James

  Fardell, Sir N. George

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Fell, Arthur

  Kerry, Earl of

  Butcher, Samuel Henry

  Forster, Henry William

  King, Sir Henry Seymour (Hull)

  Carlile, E. Hildred

  Gardner, Ernest

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  1966

  1967

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Powell, Sir Francis Sharp

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

  Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

  Pretyman, E. G.

  Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

  Lonsdale, John Brownlee

  Randles, Sir John Scurrah

  Stanier, Beville

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

  Starkey, John R.

  Marks, H. H. (Kent)

  Renton, Leslie

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Mildmay, Francis Bingham

  Renwick, George

  Valentia, Viscount

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

  Morrison-Bell, Captain

  Ronaldshay, Earl of

  Walrond, Hon. Lionel

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert

  Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

  Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

  Oddy, John James

  Rutherford, Watson (Liverpool)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. J. F. Mason and Mr. Lane-Fox.

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Sandys, Col. Thos. Myles

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Mr. J. F. MASON Mr. J. F. MASON moved to add at the end of section (2) the words "by the Commissioners in accordance with rules made by them for the purpose." This is an alternative suggestion.
  Mr. J. F. HOPE: On a point of order: Do I understand you to rule the whole question of instalments out of order. I thought my hon. Friend the Member for Windsor (Mr. Mason) proposed first the omission of the words "transfer or" with the intention that, if that were rejected, the question of the instalment might be dealt with as a second alternative.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Two or three speeches were delivered on that specific point during the discussion on the last Amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Emmott): I certainly thought that point was disposed of.
  Mr. J. F. MASON: I think the difficulties likely to arise in the case of passing on death of the fee simple in land might to a certain extent be met if the Commissioners had power to make rules in the same way as is provided in section (3). It appears to me that it is necessary to do something to avoid having laid down hard and fast rules in these particular cases, that the whole amount of duty shall be collected in one sum. I fail to understand what objection there is to giving some facilities for paying in a more convenient manner. I take it if the Commissioners were able to make rules for the purpose it would include the power to make arrangements for payment by instalments, or otherwise, and such rules would to a certain extent facilitate the working of the section. I beg to move.
  Sir W. ROBSON: Of course rules are not so necessary in this case as they are in the following section (3), but at all events it may be desirable that the Commissioners should lay down any regulations which they may think necessary to deal with cases of death or sale.
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: I am not sure that my hon. Friend is altogether wise in moving this Amendment, because he is giving the Commissioners a very large discretion in admitting these rules, and when he spoke of the analogy of the next section I may say that I take very strong objection to it, because of the powers given to the Commissioners there, and Amendments have been put down providing that the rules to be framed by the Commissioners in that section shall not take effect until they have been reviewed by Parliament. I do not know that the occasion on this section is so important, but I view with some suspicion the readiness of the Attorney-General to accept this Amendment, and if these words are passed I would submit that very likely the same reference to Parliament, and hanging the rules up until the assent of Parliament has been given, will be necessary in this section, as we above the Gangway hold that it will be necessary in the section to come. Therefore I am not disposed to vote for the Amendment.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Would not the objection of my hon. Friend be met if we understood from the Government that any qualification introduced in section (3) as to rules to be laid down by the Commissioners shall also be applied to section (2). I think it would be inconvenient to discuss this question of whether the rules should be laid on the Table, but if that Amendment is introduced in section (3) I have no doubt the Government will be prepared to introduce it on Report in this section.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I quite accept the view taken by the Leader of the Opposition.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I object to leaving these powers to the Commissioners. Am I to understand that the right hon. Gentleman will limit the power of the Commissioners to make rules in a manner to be discussed later on?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: That is not the point. That point is raised specifically, on

  1969
  the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for St. George's, Hanover Square (Mr. Lyttelton). The only undertaking is that whatever limitation there is would apply to these rules as well as to the others. That is the point put by the Leader of the Opposition, and to that I assented.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD moved to omit section (3). In section (2) we have passed that where there is a transfer or passing on death of the fee simple, that is to create a case in which the money is to be paid in full. I do not understand why that clause was put in at all, unless it was to mark the occasion when the duty should not be paid by instalments, but should be paid in full. Section (3) goes on to say that there are to be certain occasions where duty may be paid by instalments. But we were referred just now by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to Clause 5, and when we get to Clause 5 we find that on every occasion of death, at any rate, the duty is to be collected exactly in the same way as if it were an Estate Duty. Then says the Chancellor of the Exchequer you can pay that by annual instalments. This is one of those points in which the soul of the Attorney-General delights, and which he will be able to dispose of in a few moments. Why put a clause in the Bill under which duty is not to be paid by instalments, but in full, and then refer to a subsequent clause under which it is provided that the duty need not be paid in full, but by instalments? Why not say at once that this duty may be paid on every possible occasion by instalments? On reading the sections two or three times over, with any little intelligence I have been able to bring to bear upon them, I have entirely failed to grasp the subtle distinctions involved in a position like this. I wish the Attorney-General to explain the inconsistency of the different clauses.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I think the hon. Member underrates his intelligence in dealing with the clause, and very much overrates my delight in explaining such a point as he has raised. I have difficulty in connecting the point raised by the hon. Gentleman with the Amendment in any shape or form.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: I thought you would.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I will make some observations with the object of satisfying the
  1970
  hon. Gentleman on the question of payment by instalments. Under section (2) we have payment upon sale when the whole amount is being received by the vendor. Why should he not pay the whole amount subject to the Amendment which I have accepted as to rules which the Commissioners may make as to collection. In section (3) we are dealing with payments which will be of a periodical character For instance, the duty upon the grant of a lease will be assessed under this section. The consideration for a lease may well consist of periodical payments, and it is convenient therefore in such a case that there should be power given to the Commissioners to collect by instalments. That power is given by section (5) of Clause 4. When we come to deal with payments on death under Clause 5, we provide that the powers contained in the Finance Act of 1894 shall apply. I think I have made the point clear.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: It has been made so clear by the Attorney-General that the two clauses are inconsistent that if he wishes to put them in the Bill I think we had better consider it. I would therefore ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Mr. JAMES HOPE Mr. JAMES HOPE moved, in section (3), after "such" ["such proportionate"], to leave out "proportionate."
  The object is to get rid of the arbitrary power of the Commissioners to make apportionments under this sub-section and to substitute for it the proper proportion payable, having reference to the site value of the land. The site value is the basis on which Increment Duty is to be assessed, and the occasions referred to in this subsection is the granting of a lease. That is covered by the words "interest in land on the transfer or passing by death of any interest in land." Therefore the duty payable would be proportionate to the whole of the Increment Duty on the whole site value, and the only way of getting the thing is to insert the proportion between the value of the interest and the whole of the site value. That having been once determined, the proportion between the whole of the Increment Duty and the duty payable under this will naturally be determined. I take it that it is the intention of the Government that this should be so. The words of the section are extremely vague and indeterminate, and I submit that the action of the Commissioners in

  1971
  the matter should be determined by the instructions of Parliament, and the definite instructions in this case should be to ascertain the exact proportion between the value of the interest and the site value of the land, which is the basis of all the duties under the first six clauses of this Act.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I gather that the intention of the hon. Member really is to introduce a suhstantive Amendment?
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: That is so. I thought it necessary to omit the word in order to bring in the substantive Amendment.
  Sir W. ROBSON: That hardly is a matter that arises subsequently.
  The CHAIRMAN: As I understand, the two arguments substantially arise now.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The substantive Amendment is "to leave out from 'collected' to the end of section (3), and to insert (so far as it has not been paid on any previous occasion) 'as bears the same proportion to the whole amount of the Increment Value Duty on the land as the value of the interest bears to the site value of the land.'" That is the substance of the hon. Member's Amendment. I think it is founded upon a mistaken conception of how the duty will be calculated in such a case. The hon. Member denies that the increment shall be assessed in the same proportion as the value of the interest appears to be to the value of the land. I think there are instances where that will not be the case. Take a long leasehold interest at a time when the leaseholder's interest is five-sixths of the increment value and the reversioner's interest one-sixth. Let us suppose that the leaseholder makes a claim, there being then an interest. The leaseholder has then made up five-sixths of the interest, leaving one-sixth which has been allocated to the share of the reversioner. Later on—the increment not altering: I am keeping it at the same figures—the increment will remain stable when the leaseholder's interest is down to one-sixth and the reversioner's has become five-sixths, because the reversion may have fallen in. The result of the hon. Member's words if adopted would be that the leaseholder would pay the whole of the increment, appropriating his share when the sale would be brought into this fresh apportionment, because if the reversioner sold when his interest was only one-sixth
  1972
  of the increment he would claim under the hon. Member's words an allocation of part of that one-sixth of the increment in the leaseholder's interest. He would say, "You are only to put against me exactly the proportion of the value of the increment which, in my case one-sixth, it bears to the site value of the land," the truth being that there ought to be put against him the whole of the one-sixth increment which had been registered and appropriated as his share when the leaseholder's interest was five-sixth. I hope the hon. Gentleman will take my assurance that the words he desires to add would introduce a proportion into the case where no such proportion would be equitable as between the parties concerned. The proper sum to be paid by the reversioner when he ceases his interest towards the end of the lease, would be at least the proportion which he ought to have paid if he had paid at the time of the original appropriation.
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: I confess I have not absolutely followed every word the hon. and learned Gentleman has said with full appreciation. It arises from the extraordinary method of including the site value where the interest passes under Clause 2. The Amendment is perfectly logical as applied to Clause 2. It sheds a rather lurid light on the way in which increment value is computed under Clause 2. Under that clause the site value is got by certain deductions from the fee simple, and the fee simple is got at by calculating the value of the interest passing. It was argued then, and not disputed, that that was often an exceedingly fallacious way of calculating the value of the fee simple, and, consequently, a fallacious way of calculating the site value. If that method be adhered to, my Amendment follows logically. If my Amendment results in injustice it only follows from the extraordinary way in which the fee simple, and therefore the site value, is arrived at in Clause 2 (c) of the Bill, and that the whole method is entirely wrong.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: The amendment is an attempt to introduce mathematical accuracy into the calculation where it is not possible, as the learned Attorney-General has explained for a variety of reasons, with any justice. When you come really to look at the, facts, to introduce any mathematical accuracy whatever, or to get any real sensible relation. As the learned Attorney-General has pointed out in certain cases of leases what

  1973
  is the position? The lessor and the lessee are the two persons interested in the property at the moment. Their respective interests as between one another are constantly changing from the very first year when the lease is made. Suppose the lease is for 75 years, from the very first year right down to the end of it the proportion of ownership as between the lessor and lessee is constantly changing. The lessee at the beginning especially has got a very considerable interest in the property. If the lessee dies or assigns his interest, there is a very large proportion of the Increment Duty payable at that moment. Supposing, after ten years passes along, the owner of the fee simple dies, there again his interest is quite a different proportion at that date from what it would have been if he happened to die two years earlier or if his life had been prolonged for three or four years more. There is not only that difficulty, but the uncertainty of the increment, which is also continually altering. The land may have risen in value owing to a variety of circumstances, which may affect one corner of the property and not the rest. I could give numerous illustrations showing this to be the case. Then, again, you have got almost every other factor in value and in increment which attached to the original site attaching to the new site, or proportionate part. It is practically impossible to draft any clause which would adequately describe the maze of calculations and of apportionments into which this Bill is bound inevitably to lead. Therefore the learned Attorney-General was perfectly right when he said it was not possible for him to accept an Amendment to make mathematical or arithmetical sense of the position. Even with regard to one illustration which he gave he very carefully guarded himself, and stipulated that you must not have any variation in any of the other interests affected, because, if you have, you would make confusion worse confounded. I do not think we could have a better illustration after all these days and nights of discussion on this Bill of the utter impracticability and impossibility of the machinery by which this Bill is sought to be carried out than the illustration we have brought about by this Amendment, and the admissions of the Attorney-General himself.
  Mr. BALFOUR: I think the point is really an important one. My hon. Friend (Mr. Rutherford) seems to regard the case as so complicated that no simple arith-
  1974
  metical statement will do justice as between the parties. That may be true, though I am not sure, that it is. But if it is true, we ought, before we leave the section, to know on what principle the Commissioners are to act. The suggestion of my hon. Friend (Mr. James Hope) is that when, in the case of a property which belongs in part to the freeholder and in part to the lessor, Increment Duty has to be collected it should be collected in proportion to the interests of the various parties concerned in the property. That seems quite simple and, on the face of it, quite just. The Attorney-General made a speech, which I am sure he endeavoured to make clear, and tried to prove that to make each person pay in proportion to his interest in the property would not be fair. Did anybody in the House understand the Attorney-General's argument? I am sure he made it as clear as it could be made, but I did not understand it, and I do not believe a single Member who listened to him understood it. I do not believe the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself understood it. The Amendment we do understand, and it seems to be perfectly just. But the matter is so complicated, that I may be wrong. There may lurk behind this apparently simple and just Amendment some fallacy which at present I do not see. Does anybody see the fallacy? If it is unjust—as it may be; the matter is so complicated—we ought to be told why it is unjust, and to have from the Government some indication of how the unfortunate people concerned are to discover what they have to pay to the State on account of Increment Value. That should be explained by the Government, unless they plead guilty to having brought forward a Bill which, perhaps from the nature of the case, or through faulty drafting, is of so incomprehensible a character that the vast interests it affects will be as little able to understand what they have to do and why they have to do it, as this Committee is able to understand the provisions it is endeavouring to, and I suppose will, pass, without the smallest conception of upon what substantial grounds the policy is based.
  Sir W. ROBSON: Let me try, if I can to put in a somewhat simpler form, why I think the Amendment of the hon. Member is unnecessary. He says, that under his Amendment, whenever he comes to collect increment value you must collect it. You must, he says, collect it in such proportion

  1975
  as the value of the interest appears to the site value of the land. I take the ease of where there is a leaseholder who made a sale at an early period of his lease, when he had the greater part of the value. His value, of course, is a waning value; the reversioner's interest is a waxing value. The increment attached to the site value remains, in my hypothesis, the same. The leaseholder makes a sale of his interest, of which, at the time, he has five-sixths. The Commissioners say: "You have five-sixths of the interest at this moment, if you sell your land you will get five-sixths of the value and there will be one-sixth left for the reversioner." Years roll on. For the purpose of the illustration, the increment remains exactly the same, but the leaseholder's interest gradually diminishes. The reversioner's interest gradually increases. The reversioner still remains liable. Nothing has occurred to alter his liability for the one-sixth of the increment value. That is the way in which the increment value was understood: that was the proportion in which it was divided—five-sixths and one-sixth. Nothing has happened to alter the amount of the increment. But something has happened to increase the reversioner's interest. The reversioner sells. How much ought he to pay? On one-sixth, which is the interest against him all the time. The hon. Member says: "No; that one-sixth which is to be collected shall be collected in the proportion in which your interest appears to the complete site value of the land at the time of the collection." By this time the reversioner has got five-sixths interest, and so he will not pay the whole of it. Part of it will be turned over to the leaseholder, who has paid his full share a long time before. Under these circumstances it is not a wise plan which compels the Commissioners every time they collect the duty to have regard, not to the amount of duty which has actually accrued against each particular interest and ought to be paid as soon as the occasion arises, but to have regard only to the proportionate value of that particular interest to the whole site value at that time. It is right when you are taking the increment on a transfer or a sale to then treat the proportion between the interest and the site value as the amount which ought to be collected; but it is quite wrong to do it in this particular case. It is quite wrong to take the test as suggested by the hon. Member's Amendment, because it would
  1976
  put upon every leaseholder a part of the Increment Value Duty that he ought not to bear. He has paid the full five-sixths——
  Mr. BALFOUR: He paid nothing!
  Sir W. ROBSON: The payment was made by the leaseholder. I am treating one person as representing the increment. It is clearly unfair to throw over the leaseholder's interest which has paid its full share of increment.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The Attorney-General has left out one very important consideration, namely, that on the first occasion five-sixths of the Increment Value Duty would have been paid. That clears it to that extent upon the whole property. There are two separate occasions, and when the second occasion comes the five-sixths previously paid will be deducted from the amount upon the second occasion, and there will be only one-sixth payable. Under my hon. Friend's Amendment, whichever interest has to pay by transfer or by death, would pay its proportion not of the whole Increment Value Duty, but of the residue, which in that case would only be one-sixth, which appears to me to be perfectly fair and just. Upon every successive occasion that Increment Value Duty becomes due you have to make two calculations—first, to calculate which is the particular interest and what proportion of the duty is leviable, and secondly, what amount of the duty has previously been paid by other interests or any interest, but for that purpose the Increment Value Duty is treated as a whole. And whenever the Increment Value Duty on any unit falls due you have to deduct the duty previously paid by the owner on any interest whatever. That being deducted you arrive at a certain residue. This residue is chargeable to the whole property if it all passes. If it does not pass my hon. Friend contends the residue on that occasion should be deducted in proportion. That seems to be a reasonable proposal, and the only proposal upon which on equity you can possibly value. I cannot see how the explanation given by the Attorney-General alters our view upon that point.
  Mr. STEWART BOWLES: One word in regard to the question raised by the Leader of the Opposition. We are dealing here with the amount of taxes which vast numbers of people and bodies in this country will have to pay. Everybody

  1977
  must agree that in such a matter it is of the first importance that they should be certain so far as possible as to the amount which will be due upon the incidence of this duty upon any occasion. The Government has chosen to say that this duty is to be charged upon all these enormously different and varying interests upon these particular occasions. How is that duty to be levied and assessed? It is not to be done haphazard. It is to be done according to rule, and the question is whether this Committee is justified in leaving these rules to be made by the Commissioners, or whether it is not clearly part of our duty to the taxpayers of this country, having chosen to say duties are to be levied upon these people, to lay down plainly upon the face of the Bill for the information of all persons who may be liable to this duty, what it really is they will have to pay, and the conditions under which they will have to pay it. It appears to me to be a most extraordinary thing that the House of Commons should say taxes are to be levied upon certain persons, but what the amount is to be or how the total is to be allocated as between different interests, are matters which we admit will have to be the subject of very careful rule under a great scheme of taxation, but that these rules are to be made by Commissioners of Inland Revenue in their discretion and judgment. That appears to me to be an abdication on the part of the Committee of their responsibility to the taxpayer in regard to the amount of this charge. It is another instance of what appears to me to be the usual manner in which this Government gets out of almost insoluble difficulties.
  Mr. BALFOUR: I will put a question to the Attorney-General which will enable us to understand what the mind of the Government is if they have really thought this question out. The hon. and learned Gentleman took the case of a freehold let for a long term of years, and then took the occasion when the interest of the leaseholder was five-sixths of the whole and the owner one-sixth. He also suggested other hypotheses that might happen. I will stop at that point, and I ask the Government what proportion at that point is to be paid by the freeholder on the one side and the leaseholder on the other. According to the Attorney-General the leaseholder owns five-sixths and the freeholder one-sixth. One of them dies, or there is an occasion under this subsection when the duty has to be paid. In
  1978
  what proportion in that case has the increment value to be paid? That is a very simple question, and it would help us if we were given that information.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The leaseholder would pay five-sixths and one-sixth would be left over, which would be appropriated to the share of the reversioner. Later, the reversioner sells, and he sells at a time when the lease is nearly up. Then there remains only one-sixth of the Increment Value Duty to pay, but he has by that time got five-sixths of the interest. Under those circumstances I say he should pay his one-sixth, but this Amendment says to the reversioner, "You have not to pay your one-sixth, but you have now to apply the proportion between the land owner's interest and the site value." That is not the proper occasion on which to apply that proportion, and he ought to pay one-sixth.
  Mr. BALFOUR: You have one principle on the first occasion and another principle on another occasion, and surely that cannot be right. It must be determined according to the relative interests of the various owners, leasehold or otherwise, in the property. The ratio must be the same throughout the whole of the lease. You cannot apply one principle at the beginning and another at the end.
  Sir W. ROBSON: The only difficulty arises from our anxiety not to take the duty twice. That is really what we are endeavouring to avoid. When the leaseholder has paid the greater portion of the increment, we do, I dare say, what is illogical, but at all events it is not a matter of which hon. Members opposite should complain. We say that has franked the whole. Later on, when the reversioner comes to sell, you do not need the precaution suggested. There is only one-sixth to be paid, and that is the one-sixth attributable to his interest when the leaseholder sold. Assuming the increment has remained stable and his interest has not diminished, then he pays the whole one-sixth.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Take two leases both of 50 years. In one case the leaseholder sells quite early in his lease. He has got five-sixths of the property, and he pays five-sixths of the tax. In the other case the leaseholder does not sell until the last few years. Again, I suppose he pays his proportion, one-sixth. The freeholder has been exactly in the same position all through. He has had nothing whatever

  1979
  to do with the selling of the lease, and yet in one case he has to pay a one-sixth, and in the other five-sixths. That is accepted by the Government. Are these things to be embodied in the rules of the Commissioners to be laid upon the Table? What principles are they going to embody? Is it going to be a rule of thumb? The owner who is unfortunate enough to choose a young leaseholder who sticks to his lease will pay everything, and the man who gets a tenant who is going to sell his leasehold in the next few years will pay nothing. No wonder the Government call their system illogical, though why they say we should not complain of it I do not know. If there is to be a competition in want of appreciation between the two sides of the House, it is not this side which will win.
  Mr. BOWLES: The learned Gentleman has told us what in his view would happen in the case he has put before the Committee. What security has he that the Commissioners will take his view? It is all very well for the hon. Gentleman to tell us what he thinks the Commissioners will do, but he will have no control over them. This Committee will have no control over them. When the hon. Gentleman tells us that all that will remain will be one-sixth that is only his opinion, right or wrong, of the view the Commissioners may take, and the question for us is
  whether the view of the hon. and learned Gentleman, or the view of my right hon. friend (Mr. Balfour), will accord with that the Commissioners will take. The question is whether the authority who is to make the rule is to be the Commissioners or the House of Commons. I say we are the people and not the Commissioners who ought to make these rules. The Attorney-General takes a particular case and says such and such will be the duties payable. What security has the Committee or any man in the country that the Attorney-General's views will be shared by the Commissioners when it comes to the point? If this section is passed as it stands, it will not be the Attorney-General or the Government, but those gentlemen of the Inland Revenue upon whom the decision will depend. I do not know whether the Committee is prepared, merely on the chance that the Commissioners will take the view of their duties which is foreshadowed by the Attorney-General, whether it is prepared on that security to rest the amount of taxes to be paid under that section. It seems to me a most extraordinary proceeding. The effect is to leave the taxation of the subject not to the interpretation of an Act of Parliament, but to the discretion of Commissioners.
  Question put, "That the word 'proportionate' stand part of the Clause."
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 251; Noes, 91.

  Division No. 278.]

  AYES.

  [11.30 p.m.

  Abraham, William (Rhondda)

  Brooke, Stopford

  Curran, Peter Francis

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

  Dalziel, Sir James Henry

  Adkins, W. Ryland D.

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Agnew, George William

  Buckmaster, Stanley O.

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Burke, E. Haviland-

  Dewar, Arthur (Edinbugh, S.)

  Alden, Percy

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Dewar, Sir J. A. (Inverness-sh.)

  Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

  Burnyeat, W. J. D.

  Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

  Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

  Armitage, R.

  Byles, William Pollard

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Duncan, J. H. (York, Otley)

  Astbury, John Meir

  Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

  Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

  Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury, E.)

  Chance, Frederick William

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

  Elibank, Master of

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

  Esslemont, George Birnie

  Barlow, Sir John E. (Somerset)

  Cleland, J. W.

  Evans, Sir Samuel T.

  Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

  Clough, William

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Barnes, G. N.

  Clynes, J. R.

  Ferens, T. R.

  Barran, Rowland Hirst (Leeds, N.)

  Cobbold, Felix Thornley

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

  Fuller, John Michael F.

  Beale, W. P.

  Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

  Fullerton, Hugh

  Beauchamp, E.

  Condon, Thomas Joseph

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  Beck, A. Cecil

  Cooper, G. J.

  Gill, A. H.

  Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

  Bennett, E. N.

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Glover, Thomas

  Boulton, A. C. F.

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Bowerman, C. W.

  Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

  Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

  Brace, William

  Cowan, W. H.

  Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

  Bramsdon, Sir Thomas A.

  Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

  Griffith, Ellis J.

  Brigg, John

  Crosfield, A. H.

  Gwynn, Stephen Lucius

  Bright, J. A.

  Crossley, William J.

  Hall, Frederick

  Brocklehurst, W. B.

  Cullinan, J.

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

  Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)

  Silcock, Thomas Ball

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Massie, J.

  Simon, John Allsebrook

  Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r.)

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-sh.)

  Micklem, Nathaniel

  Soames, Arthur Wellesley

  Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

  Montgomery, H. G.

  Stanger, H. Y.

  Harwood, George

  Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall)

  Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire)

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Stewart, Halley (Greenock)

  Hazel, Dr. A. E.

  Morrell, Philip

  Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Morse, L. L.

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Murphy, N. J. (Kilkenny, S.)

  Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

  Henderson, J. M. (Aberdeen, W.)

  Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Henry, Charles S.

  Myer, Horatio

  Summerbell, T.

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Napier, T. B.

  Sutherland, J. E.

  Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)

  Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

  Taylor, John W. (Durham)

  Higham, John Sharp

  Nicholls, George

  Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

  Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

  Nolan, Joseph

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Hodge, John

  Norman, Sir Henry

  Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)

  Hogan, Michael

  Nussey, Sir Willans

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Holland, Sir William Henry

  Nuttall, Harry

  Thomasson, Franklin

  Holt, Richard Durning

  O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)

  Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

  Hooper, A. G.

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Hope, W. Bateman (Somerset, N.)

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Tomkinson, James

  Horniman, Emslie John

  Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Hudson, Walter

  Pickersgill, Edward Hare

  Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

  Hyde, Clarendon

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Verney, F. W.

  Idris, T. H. W.

  Pointer, Joseph.

  Vivian, Henry

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Pollard, Dr.

  Waldron, Laurence Ambrose

  Jackson, R. S.

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Walsh, Stephen

  Jenkins, J.

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Walters, John Tudor

  Jones, Leif (Appleby)

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

  Jowett, F. W.

  Radford, G. H.

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Joyce, Michael

  Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (Gloucester)

  Waring, Walter

  King, Alfred John (Knutsford)

  Reddy, M.

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Lamont, Norman

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Waterlow, D. S.

  Lehmann, R. C.

  Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton)

  Watt, Henry A.

  Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

  Ridsdale, E. A.

  Whitbread, Howard

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  White, Sir George (Norfolk)

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  White, Sir Luke (York, E. R.)

  Lundon, Thomas

  Robinson, S.

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Robson, Sir William Snowdon

  Wiles, Thomas

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Wilkie, Alexander

  Mackarness, Frederic C.

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

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

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift.

  Rose, Sir Charles Day

  Wilson, J. W. (Worcestershire, N.)

  Macpherson, J. T.

  Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  MacVeigh, Charles (Donegal, E.)

  Samuel, S. M. (Whitechapel)

  Winfrey, R.

  M'Laren, Rt. Hon. Sir C. B. (Leices.)

  Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

  Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde)

  M'Micking, Major G.

  Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester)

  Mallet, Charles E.

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

  Markham, Arthur Basil

  Seddon, J.

  Marnham, F. J.

  Seely, Colonel

  NOES.

  Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

  Du Cros, Arthur Philip

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  Anson, Sir William Renell

  Faber, George Denison (York)

  Lee, Arthur H. (Hants, Fareham)

  Anstruther-Gray, Major

  Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.)

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Forster, Henry William

  Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

  Balcarres, Lord

  Foster, Philip S. (Warwick, S.W.)

  Long, Rt Hon. Walter (Dublin, S.)

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City Lond.)

  Gardner, Ernest

  Lonsdale, John Brown lee

  Banbury, Sir Frederick George

  Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Baring, Capt. Hon. G. (Winchester)

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  Marks, H. H. (Kent)

  Beckett, Hon. Gervase

  Gretton, John

  Mason, James F. (Windsor)

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

  Morrison-Bell, Captain

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Guinness, Hon. W. E. (Bury St. Edm.)

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Brotherton, Edward Allen

  Hamilton, Marquess of

  Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

  Oddy, John James

  Butcher, Samuel Henry

  Harris, Frederick Leverton

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Carlile, E. Hildred

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Hay, Hon. Claude George

  Pretyman, Ernest George

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Helmsley, Viscount

  Randles, Sir John Scurrah

  Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)

  Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert T.

  Ratcliffe, Major R. F.

  Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

  Hill, Sir Clement

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Clive, Percy Archer

  Hills, J. W.

  Renton, Leslie

  Clyde, James Avon

  Hunt, Rowland

  Renwick, George

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Kennaway, Rt. Hon. Sir John H.

  Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert

  Doughty, Sir George

  Kerry, Earl of

  Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

  1982

  1983

  Sassoon, Sir Edward Albert

  Talbot, Rt. Hon. J. G. (Oxford Univ.)

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

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Valentia, Viscount

  Younger, George

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

  Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

  Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

  Walrond, Hon Lionel

  Stanier, Beville

  Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid.)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. James Hope and Mr. Bowles.

  Starkey, John R.

  Williams Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Amendments made, to leave out "of the Amount," and to leave out "which is due."—[Sir W. Robson.]
  Mr. J. F. MASON Mr. J. F. MASON moved, after "Commissioners" ["as may be determined by the Commissioners"] to insert "after hearing all reasonable evidence submitted to them in that behalf by or on behalf of the holder of the lease or of the interest in the land." This is designed with the object of giving anyone who is interested in the land a right of access to the Commissioners in case they have any evidence to lay before them which might influence their decision, and in order to save them the expense which would occur if the Commissioners were left first of all to make this apportionment and then afterwards the evidence had to be brought before the referee.
  Sir W. ROBSON: I think these words are unnecessary. I can scarcely believe it possible that the Commissioners would refuse to do under this Bill what they do under every other taxing Bill committed to their administration. They not only willingly hear but are careful to require information which will enable them to make a just assessment, and they will do so all the more when they are subject to appeal. Any refusal to receive information would be so much against them on appeal that they would be very unlikely to do so.
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: I think the Government might accept these words. The speech of the Attorney-General seems to be in favour of the Amendment. I am bound to say that my experience of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue has not been quite on the line indicated by the hon. and learned Gentleman. It is sometimes difficult to get a hearing from them. They ask that cases to be put before them should be stated in writing. The point of the Amendment is that they should be required to hear all reasonable evidence. Without these words in the clause it will be possible for the Commissioners to say, "Send your statement in writing. We have no time to hear you personally." If you could get behind the closed door at Somerset House, you would be able in nine cases out of ten to settle matters without putting the persons concerned to the expense and worry of an appeal.
  Mr. LANE-FOX: There can be no harm in putting in the words proposed in the Amendment. In view of the enormous amount of work which will be cast on the Commissioners, there will be great temptation not to give a hearing. If these words were inserted in the clause, the taxpayer would have an absolute right to have evidence heard by the Commissioners.
  Question put, "That those words be there inserted."
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 84; Noes, 215.

  Division No. 279.]

  AYES.

  [11.50 p.m.

  Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Kerry, Earl of

  Anstruther-Gray, Major

  Du Cros, Arthur

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Faber, George Denison (York)

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  Balcarres, Lord

  Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.)

  Lee, Arthur H. (Hants, Fareham)

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City, Lond.)

  Forster, Henry William

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Beckett, Hon. Gervase

  Faster, P. S.

  Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham)

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Gardner, Ernest

  Long, Rt. Hon. Walter (Dublin, S.)

  Bowles, G. Stewart

  Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

  Lonsdale, John Brownlee

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Brotherton, Edward Allen

  Gretton, John

  Marks, H. H. (Kent)

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Carlile, E. Hildred

  Hamilton, Marquess of

  Morrison-Bell, Captain

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Harris, Frederick Leverton

  Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

  Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Oddy, John James

  Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

  Hay, Hon. Claude George

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Clive, Percy Archer

  Helmsley, Viscount

  Percy, Earl

  Clyde, J. Avon

  Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert

  Ratcliff, Major R. F.

  Coates, Major E. F. (Lewisham)

  Hill, Sir Clement

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Hills, J. W.

  Renton, Leslie

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Renwick, George

  Doughty, Sir George

  Hunt, Rowland

  Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

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

  Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

  Valentia, Viscount

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Sassoon, Sir Edward Albert

  Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

  Younger, George

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Walrond, Hon. Lionel

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, E.)

  Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. James Mason and Mr. Joynson-Hicks.

  Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

  Williams, Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

  Stanier, Beville

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Starkey, John R.

  NOES.

  Abraham, William (Rhondda)

  Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

  Pointer, J.

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Griffith, Ellis J.

  Pollard, Dr. G. H.

  Agnew, George William

  Gwynn, Stephen Lucius

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Hall, Frederick

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

  Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

  Radford, G. H.

  Armitage, R.

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Reddy, M.

  Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

  Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury, E.)

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-sh.)

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Harwood, George

  Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Ridsdale, E. A.

  Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

  Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Barnes, G. N.

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

  Barran, Rowland Hirst

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Henderson, J. McD. (Aberdeen, W.)

  Robson, Sir William Snowdon

  Beale, W. P.

  Henry, Charles S.

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Beauchamp, E.

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

  Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

  Higham, John Sharp

  Rose, Sir Charles Day

  Bennett, E. N.

  Hobhouse, Rt Hon. Charles E. H.

  Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

  Bowerman, C. W.

  Hodge, John

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Brace, William

  Hogan, Michael

  Samuel, S. M. (Whitechapel)

  Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

  Holland, Sir William Henry

  Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

  Brocklehurst, W. B.

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  Brooke, Stopford

  Hooper, A. G.

  Seddon, J.

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

  Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset, N.)

  Seely, Colonel

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Horniman, Emslie John

  Silcock, Thomas Ball

  Burke, E. Haviland-

  Hudson, Walter

  Simon, John Allsebrook

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Hyde, Clarendon G.

  Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

  Burnyeat, W. J. D.

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Stanger, H. Y.

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Jenkins, J.

  Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire)

  Byles, William Pollard

  Jones, Leif (Appleby)

  Stewart-Smith, D. (Kendal)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Jowett, F. W.

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

  Joyce, Michael

  Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

  Chance, Frederick William

  Lamont, Norman

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

  Lehmann, R. C.

  Summerbell, T.

  Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

  Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

  Sutherland, J. E.

  Clough, William

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Taylor, John W. (Durham)

  Cobbold, Felix Thornley

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

  Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

  Lundon, T.

  Thomas, Abel (Carmarthen, E.)

  Cooper, G. J.

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Mackarness, Frederic C.

  Thomasson, Franklin

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

  Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Macpherson, J. T.

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Cowan, W. H.

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Tomkinson, James

  Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

  M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Crosfield, A. H.

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.J

  Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

  Crossley, William J.

  M'Micking, Major G.

  Verney, F. W.

  Cullinan, J.

  Mallet, Charles E.

  Waldron, Laurence Ambrose

  Dalziel, Sir James Henry

  Markham, Arthur Basil

  Walsh, Stephen

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Marnham, F. J.

  Walters, John Tudor

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Massie, J.

  Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

  Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

  Meagher, Michael

  Waring, Walter

  Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

  Micklem, Nathaniel

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Montgomery, H. G.

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

  Morgan, J. Lloyd (Carmarthen)

  Waterlow, D. S.

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Morrell, Philip

  Watt, Henry A.

  Elibank, Master of

  Morse, L. L.

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Esslemont, George Birnie

  Murphy, N. J. (Kilkenny, S.)

  White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

  Evans, Sir S. T.

  Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

  White, Patrick (Meath, North)

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Myer, Horatio

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Ferens, T. R.

  Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

  Wiles, Thomas

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

  Nicholls, George

  Wilkie, Alexander

  Fuller, John Michael F.

  Nolan, Joseph

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

  Fullerton, Hugh

  Norman, Sir Henry

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  Nuttall, Harry

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Gill, A. H.

  O'Dowd, John

  Winfrey, R.

  Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

  O'Kelly, Conor (Mayo, N.)

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  Glover, Thomas

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

  Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

  Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

  Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Question, "That the word 'duty' be there inserted," put, and agreed to.

  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE moved to insert, at the end of section (3), the following:—
  "(4) For the purpose of the collection of duty on the increment value of any land under this section, the increment value shall be deemed to be reduced on the first occasion on which increment value becomes due under this Act by an amount equal to ten per cent, of the original site value of the land, and on any subsequent occasion by an amount equal to ten per cent, of the site value on the last preceding occasion on which Increment Value Duty has become due, and the amount of duty to be collected shall be remitted in whole or in part accordingly.
  "Any duty which by reason of this provision is remitted on any occasion shall not be collected and shall be deemed to have been paid.
  "Provided that no remission shall be given under this provision on any occasion which will make the amount of the increment value on which duty has been remitted during the preceding period of five years exceed twenty-five per cent of the site value of the land on the last occasion on which increment value became due prior to the commencement of that period or of the original site value if there has then been no such occasion."
  I have already explained this Amendment to the House. It deals with the 10 per cent. instalment. The only part of the Amendment which I have not quite explained is this: I did indicate that it would be necessary to safeguard this exemption, otherwise it might be possible, with the 10 per cent. instalment, to get rid of the increment of 50 per cent. or even 100 per cent. I think this was pointed out on the discussion of the Amendment of the hon. Member for Stepney, on which first of all I promised this Amendment on the part of the Government. Therefore, it should be accompanied by a safeguard of this kind, otherwise it would be followed by transactions preventing an increment of 50 per cent. That obviously is not the intention, and therefore, I move this section.
  Mr. BALFOUR: The Chancellor of the Exchequer has stated perfectly accurately what he has already told us—exactly what it is he means to give, but he has not told us to this day the proviso by which he means to accompany it. This really shows, I think, how impossible it is to make any change in this tax without introducing every kind of absurdity and
  1988
  difficulty. Take the case, which certainly occurs, of a bit of land which is sold, and on which the increment value is just under ten per cent., and on which no duty is paid. Then it is sold again with the increment under ten per cent. and no duty is paid. Then there may be an increment of four per cent. again and no increment is paid. The land may then be held for a very long time and there may be a change with the increment over twenty-five per cent., and the last man who holds it has to pay the whole increment since the original site value. I think that is the case, I may have mistaken the purport of the last paragraph of the Amendment.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The idea is whatever is over twenty-five per cent. shall be liable to Increment Duty, but it certainly will not be liable for the whole twenty-five per cent.
  Mr. BALFOUR: I am supposing a series of transactions and all the people engaged in the earlier transactions are franked up to 24 per cent. Then when the land is sold to the next person, if the land only increases one per cent., has the duty to be paid on the 25 per cent.? That is what puzzles me. I should have thought if land increased but one per cent., the man in whose possession the land was when that additional one per cent. increase occurred had to pay the whole of the increment value since the original site value was fixed.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: No.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Does he only pay one per cent., and does the 24 per cent. escape?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Yes; it is franked up to 25 per cent., and it is what is over that.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Then the new period begins?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It is franked up to 25 per cent.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Then the last man only pays one per cent.? It seems to me quite clear either the Government will lose the whole of the Increment Duty when the transaction takes place, if there is less than 25 per cent.; or, if they do not lose the Increment Duty, then the whole of it must come on the last possessor at the end of the five years' period. I do not see any way out of it, and I am putting the question in all sincerity.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: This provision of the third Clause which is before us, does it really mean that Increment Value of 24½ per cent. can accrue within five years, and not a halfpenny to Toe paid to the Exchequer on it?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It means this, that the maximum which you can frank in five years is 25 per cent. That is to prevent a series of transactions of 9 or 10 per cent. running up to 100 per cent. It is really to prevent a method of eluding the tax and having a series of conveyances which, although representing increment of 9 per cent., would in the aggregate represent transactions totalling to 60 or 70 per cent. In order to prevent that it is provided by this sub-section that you can only frank 25 per cent. of increment within five years. Any excess over that will have to bear Increment Duty, whether it is great or small.
  Mr. BALFOUR: Surely I am right in saying that land might have increased by 25 per cent. in five years during a series of five years—in other words, 100 per cent. in 20 years—and no duty would be paid at all.
  Mr. LEVERTON HARRIS: Should not the word "duty" come in after the words "on the first occasion on which increment value"?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Yes.
  Mr. LEVERTON HARRIS: Then we clearly understand that it is only when the increments on these various transactions aggregate 25 per cent. within five years, that any Increment Duty will be payable?
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: Supposing in the course of five years there are four transmissions of property, with an increase of 6 per cent. on each occasion, those will all be franked. If a fifth person sells, and makes another increment of 6 per cent., is he to pay the tax?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: On 5 per cent.
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: What justification is there for taxing this man rather than the other four? What has he done that he should be taxed, while the other four men who have made exactly the same profit go scot free? Why in a series of years should the fifth man be taxed while the four preceding and perhaps the four succeeding him escape? There can be no justification for such an extraordinary method of taxation.
  Lord ROBERT CECIL: I desire to move the omission of this proviso, which appears to have been somewhat ill-considered.
  The CHAIRMAN: Before the Noble Lord moves, I understand the word "duty" is to be inserted.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE moved, after the words "on which Increment Value," to insert the word "duty."
  Lord ROBERT CECIL: I propose to move the omission of the proviso, for the purpose of understanding the matter. I do not desire to make any unnecessary complain against the Government, but it is rather hard that an Amendment of this character should be on the Paper for the first time to-day. This case was, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer will remember, raised more than a fortnight ago, and it was understood that an Amendment would be put on the Paper without delay. It appears to me very doubtful whether the wording of the proviso will carry out the stated intentions of the Government. Under this section the whole amount of the Increment Value Duty is to be paid only if you get beyond the 25 per cent. line. Even if the proviso does carry out the intentions of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it seems to me a very clumsy way of carrying them out. The Government desire to prevent an evasion of this tax by colourable transactions that keep just within the margin allowed. I should have thought that words could be found to say that these transactions should be bonâ fide. I do not see any answer to the point put by the hon. Gentleman the Member for North-West Manchester. Why draw the line at 25 per cent.? All increment beyond that amount is to be taxed, whereas increment up to that amount has not to be taxed, however many transactions have taken place. The proviso appears to me to be indefensible, and I move its omission.
  Mr. JEREMIAH MacVEAGH: I would just like in one sentence to appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to accept the Amendment which has been proposed by the Noble Lord. It has been made abundantly clear by the speeches of the Leader of the Opposition, by the hon. Member for North-West Manchester, and by the Noble Lord who sits for Marylebone, that Members above the Gangway do not

  1991
  want the proviso. Nobody else wants it. The Chancellor of the Exchequer will, therefore, satisfy everyone by accepting the Amendment.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It might better meet the case of some if the whole of the Amendment was left out. It is quite possible for a series of colourable transactions to take place whereby the Revenue might be—I will not say defrauded—but deprived of increment. It is purely a matter of adjustment between the different parties. Therefore this proviso is absolutely necessary. As to the bona fides of the transactions, I think the Noble Lord will realise that it is wholly impossible for the Commissioners to enter into questions of that kind. At any rate, it is infinitely better to avoid it, if it can be done arbitrarily by a method of this kind. How can the Commissioners investigate each transaction and say this is a bonâ fide transaction and that is not. It is better to put in a proviso of this kind, which will safeguard the revenue against the possibility of anything in the nature of a fraud. I agree with the hon. Member for North-West Manchester it would have an apparently illogical effect. It franks the transaction in regard to the first three or four men, but it does not in regard to the fifth, but he knows perfectly well if he is going to sell he will have to bear that proportion of the Increment Duty. There is no unfairness. It is very rarely you get a series of bonâ fide transactions such as four or five sales in four or five years. There will be exceptional cases, but I am perfectly certain unless there is a proviso such as this it would be possible for the revenue to be defrauded.
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: The whole argument against leaving the proviso out appears to be the question of a colourable transaction taking place. But the Chancellor of the Exchequer has left it open; the whole of his argument cuts against the 25 per cent.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: For the Chancellor of the Exchequer or anybody else to presume that it would be possible in these transactions for a number of persons to conspire together to have conveyances drawn and stamped in order to make a transaction apparently bonâ fide is, to my mind, absurd. I cannot imagine that there is the slightest ground for supposing that the circumstances
  1992
  which this proviso is apparently designed to meet can possibly arise, and for that reason I join in the appeal to the Chancellor that if he is going to give relief to transactions where there only is a comparatively small increment in value, he would do well to leave the proviso out, because he is providing against a series of elaborate frauds which might possibly happen, but which really in practice could not take place.
  Mr. KEIR HARDIE: May I point out to the right hon. Gentleman that this proviso does not safeguard the clause against frauds which have been mentioned. As soon as the value approaches 25 per cent. it can be sold and no duty is payable, but on the next occasion, when it is near 25 per cent., it can again be sold and no duty will be paid. The consequence is that in 20 years you may have four sales, one every five years, with an increment value of £96, on which not a single penny is payable. Therefore the proviso does not safeguard you against fraud. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will take warning by this concession, which has not been received with much grace. I would suggest that the right hon. Gentleman should leave the decision of this clause to the free choice of the House. There is no reason why the Government Whips should tell. If the proviso had been to the effect that 25 per cent. should be the limit of the concession upon all transactions it might have safeguarded the position, but to allow 25 per cent. on these transactions is simply no safeguard at all against fraud. I hope the whole clause will be left to the free decision of the House.
  Mr. LANE-FOX: The proviso with which we are dealing in no way represents a concession. Under it fraud can be practised.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: On this proviso the Government have given a distinct pledge, and we must stand by it.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: The pledge given was in connection with small transactions. With regard to this proviso, I wonder if the Chancellor of the Exchequer has thought out what its effect is going to be. Take the case of land which has passed from agricultural to building land within the last year or two. I know of a piece of land in Buckinghamshire which used to be part of an agricultural area where fields were under cultiva-

  1993
  tion in the ordinary way. That land has now become building land, and what was the process? The fields were sold in large areas to certain persons. They were sold, and within 12 months they had changed hands in smaller parcels with an added increment value. The other day certain sections of the property which had been subject to a second sale again changed hands. I know the property very intimately, and it has changed hands three times within the last three years, and with each transference an increment has been bought and sold. I do not know at what price these transferences have taken place, but I shrewdly suspect in every instance they would come within the proviso, and that increment the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to put his hand on would altogether escape. A grave injustice will be done to the Exchequer by allowing this proviso to go through.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The hon. Member and some of his friends confuse the proviso with the Amendment. The proviso is to safeguard the Revenue, but the Amendment is a totally different matter, and the question is, given the Amendment, is there going to be this proviso to safeguard the Revenue?
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: The proviso does not fulfil the object of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. His object is perfectly clear, and we are quite prepared to vote for a proviso which will do what he wants, but this proviso, as a matter of fact, will play into the hands of those who want to do the Exchequer.
  Mr. YOUNGER: It seems to me that in each of these transactions there would be an expensive valuation, and there would not be very much chance of doing the Exchequer. The hon. Member below the Gangway (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) in the case he put left us in doubt whether there was any profit or any increment at all.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: I do not know the correct figure, but, as a matter of fact, the transfer on each occasion was accompanied by an extra increment.
  Mr. STEWART BOWLES: Might I ask one question as to the real meaning of this proviso? It is very definite and quite mandatory. It says no remission shall be given under this provision, that is not only under the proviso, but under the whole new section. Take the case of land
  1994
  worth £100 site value at the beginning and reaching £126 within five years. What would be the amount of duty payable on an occasion occurring within those five years. Would it be on the whole of the increment from the beginning or only on the increment from the last step?
  Mr. KEIR HARDIE: Will it be possible under this proviso for four sales to take place within 20 years, and for there to be an increment of 24 per cent. on each occasion, representing £96 altogether, without a penny being paid to the Exchequer?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The hon. Member is dealing with the proviso and not with the Amendment. The proviso is a limitation of the possibilities of the Amendment. It may not be adequate, but it is perfectly clear that no man would enter into a fraud which it would take 100 or even 20 years to bring to an issue, therefore it is a case that is not likely to arise.
  Mr. KEIR HARDIE: My question is plain: Can there be four transactions in the course of 20 years, each sale showing an increment of 24 per cent., and will these escape duty under the proviso exempting all transactions under 25 per cent. for five years?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The transaction which is franked must be a 10 per cent. transaction and not more. A 25 per cent. transaction is not franked. It is only one aggregate transaction and that is dealt with in this manner.
  Lord ROBERT CECIL: I quite recognise this is a concession, although I doubt if it is the best way of carrying out the object in view. I do not desire to put the Committee to the trouble of dividing, and will ask leave to withdraw my amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Question put, "That at the end of section (3) the following words (as amended) be inserted:—?
  "(4) For the purposes of the collection of duty on the increment value of any land under this section, the increment value shall be deemed to be reduced on the first occasion on which Increment Value Duty becomes due under this Act by an amount equal to 10 per cent of the original site value of the land, and on any subsequent occasion by an amount equal to 10 per cent. of the site value on the last preceding

  1995
  occasion on which Increment Value Duty has become due, and the amount of duty to be collected shall be remitted in whole or in part accordingly.
  "Any duty which by reason of this provision is remitted on any occasion shall not be collected and shall be deemed to have been paid.
  "Provided that no remission shall be given under this provision on any occasion which will make the amount of the incre-
  ment value on which duty has been remitted during the preceding period of five years exceed 25 per cent of the site value of the land on the last occasion on which increment value became due prior to the commencement of that period or of the original site value if there has then been no such occasion."
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 209; Noes, 36.

  Division No. 280.]

  AYES.

  [12.35 a.m.

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Elibank, Master of

  Morrell, Philip

  Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

  Evans, Sir S. T.

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

  Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

  Faber, G. Denison (York)

  Nicholls, George

  Anson, Sir William Reynell

  Faber, Capt. W. V. (Hants, W.)

  Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Ferens, T. R.

  Norman, Sir Henry

  Armitage, R.

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Balcarres, Lord

  Forster, Henry William

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J. (City, Lond.)

  Foster, P. S.

  Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Fuller, John Michael F.

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington).

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Gardner, Ernest

  Percy, Earl

  Baring, Capt. Hon. G. (Winchester)

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Barlow, Percy Bedford

  Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

  Pollard, Dr. G. H.

  Barran, Rowland Hirst

  Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John

  Pretyman, E. G.

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Beale, W. P.

  Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Beck, A. Cecil

  Gretton, John

  Radford, G. H.

  Bennett, E. N.

  Griffith, Ellis J.

  Ratcliff, Major R. F.

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Bowles, G. Stewart

  Hamilton, Marquess of

  Renton, Leslie

  Brace, William

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  Renwick, George

  Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

  Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Hardy, Laurence (Kent, Ashford)

  Ridsdale, E. A.

  Brocklehurst, W. B.

  Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs.)

  Brooke, Stopford

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

  Robinson, S.

  Brotherton, Edward Allen

  Harris, Frederick Leverton

  Robson, Sir William Snowdon

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs, Leigh)

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

  Burnt, Rt. Hon. John

  Hay, Hon. Claude George

  Rose, Sir Charles Day

  Burnyeat, W. J. D.

  Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

  Rutherford, John (Lancashire)

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

  Byles, William Pollard

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Rutherford, Watson (Liverpool)

  Carlile, E. Hildred

  Helmsley, Viscount

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Higham, John Sharp

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

  Hill, Sir Clement

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

  Seely, Colonel

  Cecil, Lord R. (Marylebone, E.)

  Hogan, Michael

  Silcock, Thomas Ball

  Chance, Frederick William

  Holland, Sir William Henry

  Simon, John Allsebrook

  Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Smeaton, Donald Mackenzie

  Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

  Hooper, A. G.

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, E.)

  Clive, Percy Archer

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Stanger, H. Y.

  Clough, William

  Hope, W. Bateman (Somerset, N.)

  Stanier, Beville

  Clyde, J. Avon

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire)

  Coates, Major E. F. (Lewisham)

  Jones, Leif (Appleby)

  Starkey, John R.

  Cobbold, Felix Thornley

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

  Kerry, Earl of

  Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

  Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

  Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Cowan, W. H.

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Thomasson, Franklin

  Crosfield, A. H.

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

  Crossley, William J.

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Tomkinson, James

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Mackarness, Frederic C.

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Dalziel, Sir James Henry

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

  Valentia, Viscount

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Mallet, Charles E.

  Verney, F. W.

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Marnham, F. J.

  Waldron, Laurence Ambrose

  Dowar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

  Mason, A. E. W. (Coventry)

  Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

  Dickson-Poynder, Sir John P.

  Mason, James F. (Windsor)

  Walrond, Hon. Lionel

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Massie, J.

  Walters, John Tudor

  Du Cros, Arthur Philip

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

  Montgomery, H. G.

  Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Waring, Walter

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Williams, Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Younger, George

  Watt, Henry A.

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

  White, Sir Luke (York, E. R.)

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  Wiles, Thomas

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

  NOES.

  Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

  Jenkins, J.

  Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

  Barnes, G. N.

  Jowett, F. W.

  Seddon, J.

  Bowerman, C. W.

  Kennedy, Vincent Paul

  Summerbell, T.

  Clynes, J. R.

  Lamont, Norman

  Sutherland, J. E.

  Cooper, G. J.

  Lardner, James Carrige Rushe

  Taylor, John W. (Durham)

  Fullerton, Hugh

  Lundon, T.

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Gill, A. H.

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Walsh, Stephen

  Glover, Thomas

  Macpherson, J. T.

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Gwynn, Stephen Lucius

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Wilkie, Alexander

  Hall, Frederick

  Nolan, Joseph

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Hodge, John

  Pointer, J.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES—Mr. G. Roberts and Mr. C. Duncan.

  Hudson, Walter

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Mr. LYTTELTON Mr. LYTTELTON moved to insert at the end of section (3):—"Provided that the rules made by the Commissioners under this section shall be laid before each House of Parliament for confirmation for a period of not less than thirty days during the Session of Parliament, and if neither of those Houses presents an Address to His Majesty within such period against the draft or any part thereof such rules shall be deemed to be confirmed, and prior to such confirmation of such rules no Increment Value Duty shall be charged."
  I thought I had a very strong case for the Amendment before the discussion which took place an hour ago, and I entirely agree that the principle of the tax ought to be laid down on the face of the Act of Parliament, and the Commissioners ought to be instructed to act according to those principles. It is, however, very evident now that the Government were not able to set forth the principles upon which this tax should be paid. Taking the very simplest case which could be taken, the Attorney-General was occupied for some half hour in endeavouring to explain the incidence of the tax. It was not due to his fault, but to the complexity of the conundrums which arose under the section. The Government have treated the matter as insoluble, and have not unnaturally laid it upon the back of the Commissioners by a code of rules to do that which they have been unable to do themselves. It is quite manifest, I think, that you cannot give the Commissioners legislative power by a code of rules—power to do that which the Government have failed to do, namely, to state the principles on which the tax is to be levied. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer thinks for a moment of the concessions already made with regard to
  1998
  appeal, he will see that it would be vain to give an appeal from the Commissioners to the High Court on questions which might or might not be of importance, while at the same time leaving them legislative power by a code of rules to determine the nature of the tax to be levied. You cannot say that there should be the right of appeal to the High Court, and at the same time give to the Commissioners the power to legislate on their own behalf. I, therefore, submit that these rules should be laid on the Table for thirty days, and that they should be subject to review in either House of Parliament.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I quite recognise the force of the right hon. Gentleman's contention that the Houses of Parliament ought to have an opportunity of criticising these rules and of altering and amending them, but I could not accept the Amendment in this form for a reason which he will realise is a very practical one. He proposes that the rules and regulations should not come into operation until they have lain on the Table of the House for thirty days and been confirmed by Parliament. The effect of that; would be that the Increment Duty would not come into operation at all within this financial year. That, at any rate, is not what the right hon. Gentleman has in view in moving the Amendment in this form. Are we to suppose that Parliament would sit for thirty days after the Finance Bill has been passed? I do not think it would be right to inflict that penalty on Parliament even for the purpose of discussing these rules and regulations, and as Parliament would not be asked to sit for thirty days they could not be discussed this Session. Next Session, if they were laid on the Table of the House immediately Parlia-

  1999
  ment meets, still they could not be confirmed for a whole month after the meeting of Parliament. Meanwhile nothing could be done with the view of bringing the Bill into operation. The end of the financial year would arrive and the tax would not be a tax at all for the present year. I propose, therefore, that the Amendment should take the alternative form, which is to be found in many Acts of Parliament, namely, that the rules shall be laid on the Table of the House, and that, if an Address is presented within thirty days praying that the rules should be annulled, that could be done by the method prescribed in such cases. That would enable Parliament to discuss the rules and even to amend and alter them.
  Mr. GEORGE WYNDHAM: It is apparent from what the Chancellor of the Exchequer has said that Parliament is to have an opportunity of reviewing and revising these rules after these rules to which Parliament might take exception have been in operation. The only reason that could be urged for what the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes is that the amount of money to be raised in the first year is a matter of real importance. That argument can hardly be urged by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Prime Minister, although he has not for reasons quite adequate taken a very great part in the Debates in this House, did last Friday, at Southport, give a general explanation of the whole of this Budget, and he said that by the very nature of the case no great revenue could be expected from these taxes for the first year, and even for the first few years, so that, according to the Prime Minister, there is no question of urgency from the financial aspect of the matter. And, since the proposal of the Government admits that revision by Parliament is a desirable object, it would be better that that revision should come into operation at the beginning rather than at a later stage. I cannot see what the Government have to gain by making what may be a false start. They are not in need of the money, and in their interests and in the interests of the proper working of the Act the review by Parliament should come into operation before and not after a serious mistake has been made.
  Mr. G. H. RADFORD: I wish to thank the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the concession which he has made a moment ago in the direction of allaying anxieties
  2000
  that might be felt as to the very large powers given to the Commissioners under this Bill. But there is one question which I wish to ask. Is the Address, which I understand it is suggested may be made on the subject of the rules submitted to Parliament to be an Address of this House, or is it also to be possible for the other House to present an Address? Because, while wishing to treat the other House with all respect and courtesy and to have the rules laid before them for their information, I do not wish to give them any opportunity of presenting an Address on the subject of taxation—a subject with which I think they have no concern, and as to which I think they make no claim to interfere with this House.
  Mr. HENRY CHAPLIN: I do not understand why the Chancellor of the Exchequer has that right to depart from what, to the best of my recollection, has been the ordinary and regular practice in almost all legislation that I remember. This Bill was presented without any clause whatever requiring that the new rules to be made by the Commissioners should be laid on the table at all. It is strange that the ordinary practice was not observed in this case. No doubt there have been some exceptions for special reasons, but there are special reasons in this case why the ordinary practice should have been observed and why this Amendment should be accepted to-night. The first of them is this difficulty. We all perceived on the part of the Government, not an hour and a half ago, that they showed clearly they were not in a position to explain the course which ought to be pursued by the Commissioners, and they were still less able to insert anything in the nature of an Amendment in the Bill. That is one reason why I think we ought to be more careful than ever in inserting some provision in the nature of the Amendment of my right hon. Friend. It was pointed out only last night by my right hon. Friend, although not the smallest notice was taken of it by the Chancellor of the Exchequer or by any Member sitting on that side of the House—the only notice taken of it being to move the closure—it was pointed out by the Chancellor's predecessor in office, and by myself, that in two cases, two very remarkable cases, taken from the law reports of "The Times" only yesterday, the Commissioners had been guilty of making most serious errors. In one case the Court of Appeal said there was no

  2001
  shadow of foundation for the case of the Commissioners, and in the other the Court was absolutely unanimous against them. It may be very unfortunate that these discussions should be going on when we have two such remarkable cases in which—what shall I say?—there was want of sufficient care. That is the least I can say. The question arises, therefore, whether or not the rules to be made by the Commissioners should be laid on the Table of both Houses, and should not be valid until there has been thirty days' notice, and Parliament shall not have petitioned against them. I am bound to say that I am surprised, in a Bill of this extreme gravity, that what I believe to be the ordinary rule should not have been observed, still more that we should have had so unsatisfactory a reply from the right hon. Gentleman on the present occasion.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The right hon. Gentleman has forgotten the precedent which he himself set in the Agricultural Eating Act. I have followed exactly the form of that Act almost in so many words. That Act was for expending £2,000,000; this Bill is to raise money. At any rate, I followed exactly the precedent which the right hon. Gentleman now denounces as unequitable, unconstitutional, and every other form of iniquity which his very inexhaustible vocabulary can command.
  Mr. CHAPLIN: The difference between the two cases is, as the right hon. Gentleman said, that the Agricultural Rating Act dealt with two millions of money. This Bill deals with property amounting to something considerably over, I believe, four thousand millions of money.
  Mr. ALFRED LYTTELTON: I do not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer has met me as fully as I am entitled to be met in this matter. I put again to him this position, whether it is really possible to give appeal to the referees and then to the Courts on any point of valuation by the Commissioners, and in the same Act of Parliament give them power to set up a code of rules to make a subsequent precedent for taxation. The two things are absolutely inconsistent, and I would submit to him that it is an absurdity to grant such a power in one case, the present, and to withdraw it in another. There is, again, great force in the statement made that the Government anticipates no revenue, or scarcely any revenue, from this tax in the present year, and, therefore, they would be losing nothing by getting their code in
  2002
  proper shape before it finally becomes law. I understand that the Amendment which the right hon. Gentleman proposes is that these rules should only have effect until that time when, after review by the House of Commons, they shall be annulled, and that all proceedings shall be good up to that time, without prejudice. If these rules were afterwards annulled by the House of Commons as clearly wrong it would be a manifest injustice that the taxes that have been paid under them should be retained by the revenue. If the right hon. Gentleman will insert in his Amendment, provision as to the taxes which are paid under these rules that may since have been annulled, I would accept it.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I quite see the justice of the point put by the right hon. Gentleman, and I will give the words favourable consideration.
  Mr. LYTTELTON: On that understanding I will withdraw the Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The Amendment I propose to move will, I think, meet the points raised by hon. Members. It is as follows:—"That every rule under this section shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament as soon as may be, and if an address should be presented to His Majesty by both Houses of Parliament within the next subsequent thirty days during the Session of Parliament in which the rules are made, His Majesty may annul the rules, and it shall be void without prejudice to anything done under it."
  Mr. R. D. HOLT: Am I right in understanding that if this House wishes to annul the rules, and if the other House refuses to agree, then the rules will stand? In other words that under this Amendment it would be impossible for this House alone to disallow acts of which we disapprove, and that we should be in the power of the other House who could prevent us disallowing rules.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: If the House of Commons passes any rule of the kind, it has complete control of the Executive, and therefore the Executive would have to take steps to put the matter right. But I wish to make it perfectly clear that I am simply using the ordinary constitutional forms. I do not wish to raise any great constitutional issue merely upon a Motion of this kind dealing with rules,

  2003
  and I do not think it is desirable to do so. The interests of the House of Commons are amply safeguarded by this proposal. I put it in the form of an address by both Houses of Parliament, as otherwise it would be in the power of the House of Lords, by simply moving an address to His Majesty praying for an alteration, to make nugatory the whole of our taxation. Therefore, I make it perfectly clear that it must be by both Houses of Parliament, and therefore the privileges of the House of Commons are amply safeguarded. I put it in this form because I do not want to raise any embarrasing constitutional issues merely upon a Motion of this kind dealing with rules. I am following the course followed by the Government in regard to all their rules and regulations. This is the precedent invariably followed, and the only precedent that could possibly be followed in a matter dealing with taxation.
  Lord BALCARRES: I submit that it is not according to precedent to use the words "next subsequent thirty days." Thirty subsequent days means the next calendar month. If Parliament adjourned on the 1st and did not meet again until the 30th it would have no opportunity of discussing the matter, although technically it would have been laid on the Table thirty days.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It is the "subsequent thirty days during the Session of Parliament."
  Lord BALCARRES: Last year this House adjourned for three weeks and three days in the middle of the Session. It might have been four weeks and three days, and under those conditions it might easily happen, the rules having been deposited, that neither House would be able to discuss them. That would be "during the Session of Parliament." The words used are usually simply thirty or forty days, as the case may be, and not the "next subsequent" days. Will not the right hon. Gentleman call it 30 days, as he says he is acting according to precedent?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: This is taken out of an Act of Parliament—the Old Age Pensions Act.
  Lord BALCARRES: The precedent of the Old Age Pensions Act provides for the subsequent 21 days on which the House has sat. That vitiates the state-
  2004
  ment of the right hon. Gentleman. Will the right hon. Gentleman therefore reconsider the point and make the Amendment read: "The subsequent 30 days on which either House has sat"?
  Mr. LYTTELTON: I think in view of the objection that has been justly made by my Noble Friend we ought to see this Amendment on the Paper before we assent to it.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: If the right hon. Gentleman does not like the Amendment I will withdraw it. I have offered two or three very substantial concessions to the Opposition to-night, and every concession has been made the occasion, not merely for a prolonged Debate but for something that is really of the nature of an acrimonious dispute. That is not very encouraging. If the precedent is not in the Old Age Pensions Act—the book was put into my hand—it was taken out of an Act of Parliament. I have gone as far as I can to meet the right hon. Gentleman, and have give him the opportunity he desires for Parliament to discuss these regulations. If he cannot see his way to accepting the Amendment I will withdraw it.
  Mr. WYNDHAM: The right hon. Gentleman said that in discussing a Finance Bill we have to be careful, but he seems to limit that need to himself and his friends. I do not think I am going too far when I say that the constituencies who returned Members who sit on this side are also bound to exercise some care in discussing the provisions of a Finance Bill. How do we stand? The Chancellor of the Exchequer has made a concession, and my right hon. Friend raises an objection, in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer found so much substance that he at once said he would consider it at a later stage. Is it not difficult, without seeing an Amendment, to speculate on the chance of a further concession which the right hon. Gentleman will give to meet the objection raised by my right hon. Friend? It seems to me that the point of my right hon. Friend has not been met. This is a complicated matter, and the Government might just as well take the Amendment of my right hon. Friend and place the matter on a clear basis.
  Mr. J F. REMNANT: I do not understand where we are. My right hon. Friend (Mr. Lyttelton) withdrew his Amendment subject to being satisfied. I

  2005
  do not know what the present Amendment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer means. These manuscript Amendments are constantly being handed in——
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: It has been read from the Chair.
  Mr. REMNANT: I could not take it all in. I should like to know whether my right hon. Friend's Amendment is still before the Committee?
  The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Caldwell): No.
  Mr. REMNANT: IE my right hon. Friend is not satisfied surely his Amendment is now before the Committee?
  The DEPUTY-CHAIRMANproceeded to put the Amendment.
  Mr. REMNANT: Surely, Mr. Caldwell, I am entitled to be satisfied on the point I have raised? May I ask you whether my right hon. Friend's Amendment is before the Committee now?
  The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: No. The Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Lyttelton) has been, by leave, withdrawn, and another Amendment is now before the Committee.
  Sir H. CRAIK: We are bound as Members of this House to consider what is really in accordance with precedent. I have acquired considerable knowledge in drafting Acts of Parliament, and I say there is no precedent for this Address of both Houses of Parliament on such a Minute or Order in Council. If the right hon. Gentleman (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) is sure that his draftsmen tells him that there is such a precedent, I am bound to accept what he says. I know of none. We are establishing a precedent now which will limit the power of both Houses. An Address by the House of Commons, unless supported by the House of Lords, will now have no effect whatever. Orders in Council and Minutes of various Departments have to be laid upon the Table of the Houses of Parliament. An Address of either House of Parliament acts as a check to such an Order in Council. You are establishing now a precedent which is quite new, you are limiting not only the power of the House 'of Lords, but of this House also.
  Mr. LYTTELTON: I do not think the position is satisfactory. I have a suggestion to make. The Chancellor of the
  2006
  Exchequer asserted more than once that the purpose of my Amendment was an exceedingly reasonable one. I withdrew my Amendment on the face of his promise that he would insert an Amendment which would meet my case.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Which I read.
  Mr. LYTTELTON: I think the right hon. Gentleman must recognise that what I said bears upon the point, and I am sure the criticisms are worthy of consideration. My suggestion is that as, there are numerous other rules to be dealt with in this Bill, this matter should be adjourned till that subsequent stage in order that the rules may be dealt with at once. That, I think, is a reasonable suggestion. Meanwhile, we should see the Amendment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer upon the Paper, and have time to consider the validity of the criticism. At this hour of the night it is not fair to expect us——
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I simply offer this as a concession to the Opposition. If the Opposition tell me to withdraw it, I shall certainly do so [Cries of "No, no."]
  Mr. LYTTELTON: That really is not a handsome way of getting over this matter. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has admitted that my Amendment is a reasonable one, and he has brought forward an Amendment which he says will meet the reasonableness of my case. It is not fair or just to us that he should refuse a reasonable time to examine his Amendment.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I do not object to a reasonable time. I could do anything of this kind on Clause 3.
  Mr. LYTTELTON: Bring your Amendment up again.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The right hon. Gentleman wants us to consider the whole rules and regulations. I could not give an answer as to the whole of these. We shall consider them later on.
  Mr. LYTTELTON: If this subject is dealt with when the other rules come up for consideration it should do. The right hon. Gentleman could take the matter into consideration when he comes to other sections which deal with these rules.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: Certainly.
  Mr. H. W. FORSTER: Supposing it is impossible for the right hon. Gentleman

  2007
  to produce the rules on the subsequent clause, he could, at any rate, bring up his rules again on the Report stage of the Bill in a form that was satisfactory to my right hon. friend and fully meet the case that he desires to be met.
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: There are regulations in the very next clause.
  Mr. J. MacVEAGH: I desire to ask whether there is any precedent for inserting a clause in the Finance Bill giving the House of Lords power to disapprove of the Finance Bill 1 I doubt whether, if the House of Lords adopted such action, it would not be considered as a breach of the privileges of the House of Commons.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD moved to add after section (4). ["Increment Value Duty shall be a Stamp Duty collected and recovered in accordance with the provisions of this. Act,"] the words "but shall not be a charge on the land so as to affect any subsequent bonâ fide purchaser for value." I venture to think the sense of justice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer will lead him to think this Amendment should be adopted. If this Amendment were not accepted, the effect of leaving the Bill as it stands would be that every occasion on which the Increment Duty may become due would necessitate the production amongst the title deeds of a deed bearing a denoting stamp to show whether there was any duty payable and whether in fact the duty had been paid. If any death happened or any transfer of lease in connection with the property during the preceding 30 or 40 years, the fact of not producing the denoting stamp upon the document would be that there would be a blot upon the title,
  which will create great difficulty in connection with the transfer of property and perhaps a difficulty which in many cases would cause the proposed transaction to go off entirely. The Amendment is that each occasion should be judged on its merits and that the duty is to be a sum collected in the way indicated in the Bill, but that is not to be a subsequent blot upon the title if it is found impossible to produce a deed bearing a denoting stamp for subsequent purposes. It is especially to relieve all conveyancing in the future that I move the Amendment.
  The SOLICITOR-GENERAL for SCOTLAND (Mr. Arthur Dewar): Generally speaking, throughout the Act there is no kind of blot upon the title. As the hon. Member knows, it cannot arise except on two possible occasions by inference. One is in the transfer by death and in the case of a corporation if it is sold to a purchaser without notice. In no case where a purchaser has notice will he be liable. I do not think the hon. Member's Amendment. is necessary. When a purchaser has not notice he is not liable. When he has notice, of course, he is liable.
  Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD: I only moved the Amendment to give the Government an opportunity of stating their views upon it. I understand they intend to insist upon leaving this very serious difficulty of a possible blot upon every subsequent transaction relating to land. I ask leave to withdraw the Amendment, and must leave them to stew in their own juice.
  Amendment by leave withdrawn.
  Question put, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 148; Noes, 57.

  Division No. 281.]

  AYES.

  [1.35 a.m.

  Acland, Francis Dyke

  Burnyeat, W. J. D.

  Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.)

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

  Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

  Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

  Byles, William Pollard

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

  Armitage, R.

  Chance, Frederick William

  Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

  Esslemont, George Birnie

  Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

  Clough, William

  Evans, Sir S. T.

  Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

  Clynes, J. R.

  Everett, R. Lacey

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Cobbold, Felix Thornley

  Ferens, T. R.

  Beale, W. P.

  Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace

  Bennett, E. N.

  Cooper, G. J.

  Fuller, John Michael F.

  Bowerman, C. W.

  Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

  Gibb, James (Harrow)

  Brace, William

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Gill, A. H.

  Bramsdon, Sir T. A.

  Cowan, W. H.

  Glover, Thomas

  Brocklehurst, W. B.

  Crosfield, A. H.

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Brooke, Stopford

  Crossley, William J.

  Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

  Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

  Dalziel, Sir James Henry

  Gwynn, Stephen Lucius

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Hall, Frederick

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

  Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

  Montgomery, H. G.

  Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire)

  Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Morrell, Philip

  Strachey, Sir Edward

  Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worcester)

  Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard.)

  Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

  Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

  Strauss, E. A. (Abingdon)

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Nicholls, George

  Summerbell, T.

  Hazel, Dr. A. E. W.

  Norman, Sir Henry

  Taylor, John W. (Durham)

  Hedges, A. Paget

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire)

  Helme, Norval Watson

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Henry, Charles S.

  Pearson, W. H. M. (Suffolk, Eye)

  Thomasson, Franklin

  Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon. S.)

  Pirie, Duncan V.

  Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.)

  Higham, John Sharp

  Pointer, J.

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

  Pollard, Dr. G. H.

  Tomkinson, James

  Hodge, John

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Hogan, Michael

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Verney, F. W.

  Hooper, A. G.

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Walsh, Stephen

  Hope, W. Bateman (Somerset, N.)

  Richards, Thomas (W. Monmouth)

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Hudson, Walter

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Waring, Walter

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

  Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

  Jenkins, J.

  Robinson, S.

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Jones, Leif (Appleby)

  Rogers, F. E. Newman

  White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

  Lamont, Norman

  Rose, Sir Charles Day

  White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

  Lehmann, R. C.

  Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

  Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Scarisbrick, Sir T. T. L.

  Wiles, Thomas

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

  Wilkie, Alexander

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

  Seddon, J.

  Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

  Lundon, T.

  Seely, Colonel

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

  Sheehy, David

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon

  Macpherson, J. T.

  Silcock, Thomas Ball

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah (Down, S.)

  Simon, John Allsebrook

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton.

  M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.)

  Stanger, H. Y.

  Masterman, C. F. G.

  NOES.

  Arkwright, John Stanhope

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Renton, Leslie

  Balcarres, Lord

  Hay, Hon. Claude George

  Renwick, George

  Baring, Capt. Hon. G. (Winchester)

  Helmsley, Viscount

  Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

  Bignold, Sir Arthur

  Hill, Sir Clement

  Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

  Bowles, G. Stewart

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Smith, Abel H. (Hertford, East)

  Bridgeman, W. Clive

  Hunt, Rowland

  Stanier, Beville

  Carlile, E. Hildred

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Starkey, John R.

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

  Clive, Percy Archer

  Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred

  Walrond, Hon. Lionel

  Clyde, J. Avon

  Mason, James F. (Windsor)

  Warde, Col. C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Coates, Major E. F. (Lewisham)

  Meysey-Thompson, E. C.

  Williams, Col. R. (Dorset, W.)

  Dalrymple, Viscount

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

  Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

  Newdegate, F. A.

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

  Du Cros, Arthur

  Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Forster, Henry William

  Parkes, Ebenezer

  Younger, George

  Foster, P. S.

  Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

  Gardner, Ernest

  Pretyman, E. G.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES—

  Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

  Ratcliff, Major R. F.

  Sir Alexander Acland-Hood and

  Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Viscount Valentia.

  Hamilton, Marquess of

  Question put, and agreed to.

  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I beg to move, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."
  Committee report Progress; to sit again this day (Wednesday).
  Adjournment,—Resolved, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Joseph Pease.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Seventeen minutes before Two o'clock.

  Metropolitan Police (Expenditure).
  Metropolitan Police (Expenditure).
  Prescriptions Containing Poison.
  Prescriptions Containing Poison.
  Accidents at Shepherd's Bush Exhibition.
  Accidents at Shepherd's Bush Exhibition.
  Anglo-French Convention.
  Anglo-French Convention.
  Customs Service (Established Officers).
  Customs Service (Established Officers).
  Motor Vehicles (Return).
  Motor Vehicles (Return).
  Desertions from Royal Navy (1902 and 1908).
  Desertions from Royal Navy (1902 and 1908).
  Navy Courts-Martial.
  Navy Courts-Martial.
  Indian Medical Service.
  Indian Medical Service.
  Indian Telegraph Department.
  Indian Telegraph Department.
  Irish Universities Committee.
  Irish Universities Committee.
  Massey Estate, Kinlough, County Leitrim.
  Massey Estate, Kinlough, County Leitrim.
  Captain Barton's Estate, Tullaghan, County Leitrim.
  Captain Barton's Estate, Tullaghan, County Leitrim.
  Turkey and Persia.
  Turkey and Persia.
  Duty Paid on Spirits, Wines, and Beer.
  Duty Paid on Spirits, Wines, and Beer.
RAVENGLASS AND ESKDALE RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
Commons Amendments considered, and agreed to.
LONDON AND NORTH WESTERN RAIL WAY BILL.
Reported, without Amendment.

OXFORD AND DISTRICT TRAMWAYS BILL.
DERWENT VALLEY WATER BOARD BILL.
SWINTON AND MEXBOROUGH GAS BOARD BILL.
PONTYPRIDD WATER BILL.
TORQUAY AND PAIGNTON TRAMWAYS BILL. [H.L]
Reported, with Amendments.

ELECTRIC LIGHTING PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 1) BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, without Amendment, and recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.
PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 2) BILL.
Reported, with Amendments, and recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.
LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (MONEY) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read la; and referred to the Examiners.
GAS ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 1) BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
SOUTH STAFFORDSHIRE WATER BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendment: The said Amendments Considered, and agreed to.
GAS AND WATER ORDERS CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.]
(Coatbridge Gas Order.)
TRAMWAYS ORDERS CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.]
(Whitworth Urban District Council Order.)
NORTHALLERTON WATER BILL.
Report from the Committee of Selection, That the Earl of Stamford be proposed to the House as a Member of the Select Committee on the said Bills in the place of the Marquess of Zetland; read and agreed to.
SMALL HOLDINGS.
Moved, That there be laid before the House and circulated copies of instructions issued by the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries as to the interpretation of the words "will themselves cultivate the holdings" which occur in Sections 1 and 7 of the Small Holdings and Allotments Act, 1908 (The Lord Ebury); agreed to, and ordered accordingly.
MOVABLE DWELLINGS BILL. [H.L.]
The evidence taken before the Select Committee from time to time to be printed, but no copies to be delivered out, except to members of the Committee, and such other persons as the Committee shall think fit, until further order. (No. 104.)
JUSTICES OF THE PEACE.
LORD JAMES OF HEREFORD: My Lords, I beg to give notice that on Wednesday, the 21st instant, I shall call attention to the present methods of selecting and appointing Justices of the Peace, and move "That a Select Committee be appointed to consider and report whether any and what steps should be taken to facilitate the selection of the most suitable persons to be Justices of the Peace irrespective of creed and political opinion."

RUSSIA AND PERSIA.
LORD LAMINGTON: My Lords, I wish to ask the noble Earl the Secretary of State for the Colonies a Question of which I have given him private notice—namely, whether it is true that the British and Russian representatives in Teheran notified the two leaders of the Persian Nationalist troops that should the advance of those troops be continued beyond a certain point intervention by the armed troops of Russia would take place; if so, what justification there was for interference in the internal affairs of Persia; what justification there was for His Majesty's Government in sending Mr. Churchill and Major Stokes to the Nationalist leaders asking them to stop their advance on Teheran; whether the attention of the Russian Government has been called to the inaccuracy in their Note of July 3 describing the Enzeli-Teheran road as "our" road, and whether such road is not under Persian jurisdiction; whether the occupation of Azerbaijan by Russian troops may not lead to complications with the Turkish Government; whether the Indian Government have made any representation in regard to the position in Persia, and if so whether such communication will be laid on the Table; and further, with reference to to-day's intelligence from Teheran, whether, in the event of the Constitutionalists occupying and maintaining order in Teheran, His Majesty's Government will invite the Russian Government to stay the further advance of their troops and not enter the city.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF CREWE): The Russian and British representatives told the Nationalist leaders that the only way to avoid foreign intervention and to restore order was to give the Constitution as now re-established a fair chance. Mr. Churchill and Major Stokes were sent to the Nationalist leaders in the interests of peace and to avert any possible danger to foreign life and property in Teheran. There are still, it is believed, about 4,000 Russian troops at Tabriz, which were about to be withdrawn when the present movement by the Nationalists and Bakhtiari began. The noble Lord asks whether the attention of the Russian Government has been called to the inaccuracy in their Note of July 3 describing the Enzeli-Teheran road as "our" road. The statement is not in itself an inaccuracy. The
356
road was made by a Russian company with Russian money, and in that sense it is their road. It is not accurate to say that there is a Russian occupation of Azerbaijan. The Russian troops have been reinforced at Tabriz for a specific purpose, and will be withdrawn as soon as that purpose no longer requires their presence. We do not know of any reason why the Turkish Government should resent the presence of the Russian troops at Tabriz. No representations have been received from the Indian Government.
LORD LAMINGTON: The noble Earl has not answered my last Question.
THE EARL OF CREWE: With regard to the noble Lord's last question, I must ask for notice. I have not seen the telegram in to-day's papers.

NATIONAL SERVICE (TRAINING AND HOME DEFENCE) BILL. [H.L.]
Debate on the Amendment moved by the Duke of Northumberland to the Motion that the Bill be now read 2a, viz., to leave out all the words after "That" for the purpose of inserting the following Resolution: "This House fully recognises the need of a Home Army amply sufficient to secure the country against all risk from invasion, and the advantage of giving to as large a part of the population as possible a sound groundwork of military training, but it is not prepared to proceed further with a measure which, while involving unknown demands upon the national resources, would supersede the system accepted as sufficient by the military advisers of His Majesty's Government"; resumed (according to order).
VISCOUNT MILNER: My Lords, in rising to give my support to the Motion for the Second Reading of this Bill I shall do my best to avoid trespassing unduly on the time of the House by going over ground already covered by previous speakers on the same side. And that will, I hope, be easier for me, because my point of view is in some respects rather different from that of many of the supporters of this measure. For one thing, my strong attachment to the principle of a citizen Army is independent of immediate apprehensions—apprehensions of danger from a particular quarter, which are so prevalent at the present time. I felt it before those

357
apprehensions arose. I should continue to feel it if they were, happily, dispelled. I regard the adoption of national training and service as the only means of removing a permanent weakness in our organisation, a permanent handicap, under which we labour, as compared not with one, but with all the great European nations who are our rivals. The effects of that handicap will, I believe, make themselves felt more and more, and that in many directions in which we do not as yet always recognise its influence. And they make themselves felt in the competitions of peace almost as much as they would in war.
On that side of the question—that is to say, on the great physical, moral, educational value of military training and discipline for the youth of the country—I will not dwell at length, because it has already been so forcibly urged upon your Lordships. I will only say this. So strongly am I convinced of the value of such training, the benefits which it would confer on those who went through it, the improvement it would effect in the stamina and morale of the nation generally—as it has done in the case of other nations—that, even if we were never to have another war, I believe the country would be richly repaid for the expense of its adoption. But, while I hold that belief strongly myself, I fully admit that, as a matter of practical politics, a proposal like that of the noble and gallant Earl, or any other proposal on more or less similar lines, involving as it does, not only fresh expense, but a considerable change in the habits of the people, and in all our social and industrial arrangements, can never be adopted unless the nation is convinced that it is essential for national safety. Its indirect effects for good may be its most important effects, but its first introduction is only possible if public opinion is aroused to its direct necessity for purposes of defence.
Now what is our contention on this point? Broadly speaking, and putting aside for the moment all technicalities and details, we rest our case on two main considerations. The first is that, looking at the position of this country and the Empire as a whole, having regard to all that we have got to defend, we need to be strong enough at home, in the United Kingdom, to defeat or deter any possible invading force, without having to retain any substantial portion of the Regular
358
Army for that purpose, and without crippling the Navy in the discharge of its main duties by turning it, or the bulk of it, into a sort of coast-guard of these islands. That is our first argument. And our second is that, in order to attain this degree of security at home we require a military force superior in numbers, in training, and in immediate readiness for use, to any that we can ever hope to get under the voluntary system. Any Member of this House who agrees with these two main propositions ought, I venture to think, to give a vote for the Second Reading of this Bill, even if he holds that it is capable of considerable improvement.
I should like, my Lords, to say a few words on each of these, in my view fundamental, propositions. And first as to the necessity of having such a defensive force in these islands as to render invasion, even in the absence of the Regular Army, a hopeless enterprise. It is possible to believe in that necessity without holding that the invasion of these islands is the most likely form in which danger may first arise to our Empire. The idea of a sudden attack on the United Kingdom by some foreign Power, while we were otherwise disengaged, may not indeed be a chimera, for there is such a thing as picking a quarrel, and the experience of 1870 shows how rapidly war may spring up, even in the midst of profound peace. It may not be a chimera, but it is, I venture to think, a most unlikely contingency. And, in such a contingency, we should have the protection of the Navy, concentrated as it now is in European waters, and of the whole Expeditionary Force, which would still be in this country, to say nothing of the Territorial Army, which, especially in conjunction with a large body of Regulars, would certainly not be a negligible quantity.
But the case would be very different if the whole Expeditionary Force had been called away to deal with some serious trouble in one of our distant possessions. And surely, my Lords, there are such dangers present to all our minds—it is not necessary or desirable to specify them— to meet which we should, or at any rate we ought to, send out all the fighting men we had got to send. But it is just at a time when we might have our hands full in some distant quarter of the Empire that European complications would be most likely to arise for us. The revolt of the

359
American Colonies was originally just such a local affair, yet before it was over we found ourselves embroiled with half Europe. And it will be within the recollection of many of your Lordships that there was more than one moment during the South African war when a repetition of that experience did not seem out of the question. And if a European war did come upon us, with the whole of our Expeditionary Force abroad, then certainly, under present conditions, an invasion, and an invasion in force, would become a very imminent danger. Would our Territorial Army as at present constituted be able to deal with it? The Secretary for War himself tells us that it would not, at least not till after it had been embodied for six months, and it is obvious to everyone that six months or even six weeks, might not be given to us. And all this applies equally to the case, perhaps not such a probable case, but certainly not a wholly improbable one, the case of a war breaking out in Europe itself, in which we might through our Treaty obligations, or by obligations of honour, become involved and be called upon to send our last available man to the assistance of a foreign ally.
But it may be said we never should send the whole of our Expeditionary Force. I am afraid that is only too true. And that is just where the shoe pinches. The Expeditionary Force is small enough, in all conscience, for the work which it might any day be called upon to perform at a distance from these islands. But small as it is, should we ever venture to use the whole of it? One cannot but feel a doubt, and more than a doubt whether any Government would risk employing the whole fighting strength of our Regular Army abroad, if by so doing it exposed these islands to an attack which might be successful. Our military weakness at home, the insecurity of our base and the sense of that insecurity, will always hamper the free use of that Army for the purposes for which we ought to be in a position to employ it to the fullest possible extent. Yet it is absolutely in our power to put an end to that insecurity if we choose. We have only got to do what other nations do, and indeed much less than most other European nations. The advocates of universal military training are often told that they forget that this Kingdom is an Island Kingdom. But that is not at all the case. If these were not islands, the proposals of the Bill would be
360
quite inadequate. We do take into account the undoubted advantages of our insular position. What we contend is that our present system of national defence presumes too much upon these advantages.
My Lords, I have been contending that the measure now proposed is necessary to set free the Regular Army for the discharge of its proper duties. The same is true, and even more true, of the Navy. No doubt the commonest form of objection to the creation of a strong Army for home defence is that it is a waste of money and effort, which had better be devoted to strengthening the Navy. My Lords, what we contend is that by adopting the measure now before the House we should be strengthening the Navy. You may strengthen the Navy in more ways than one. You may strengthen it by increasing the size of your fleets. The only objection to that is, that you cannot prevent other nations increasing the size of theirs pari passu, and so the relative position remains unaltered. Incidentally I may observe that this objection does not apply to the increase in our total strength, which would result from developing our latent military resources by training the manhood of the country to arms, for other great countries have already done this, and they are practically at the end of their tether in that direction.
But to return to the Navy. I say you may strengthen it by adding to the size of the fleet, but you may also strengthen it for the discharge of those duties which it alone can perform by relieving it of responsibilities which can be placed on other shoulders. It may sound heretical, but personally I cannot admit that the primary duty of the Navy is to prevent any foreign enemy setting his foot on these islands. Invasion ought to be an unprofitable business in any case. And the Navy surely has enough to do without being expected to watch every shore on which an enemy could land, or to block every port from which he could sally. It seems to me it is not fair to the Navy, it is not giving it a chance of using its strength to the best advantage if in the discharge of its vast duties, including the duty of keeping open communications throughout the Empire and protecting our commerce, it is hampered and distracted by constant anxiety about the security of its base.
The object of this Bill is to remove that anxiety. It has been argued that it does

361
not effect that object, and even that it would not afford us any greater, or indeed as great, security as that afforded by the Territorial Army as at present constituted. My Lords, if that proposition could be established, the proposition, I mean, that we should be no better off under this Bill than under the present system, it would, of course, be fatal to the Bill. It might not be fatal to a belief in the principle of national service, but it would certainly put an end to the present proposals for giving effect to it. And so I naturally listened with close attention to the argument of the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State in support of that proposition. But while the noble Lord undoubtedly made some good points against the Bill, and points to which in Committee most careful attention would have to be given, his attempt to compare the scheme of the Bill with the present system to the advantage of the latter seemed to me nothing but a brilliant piece of special pleading, only marred by the attempt to prove too much. I could not help feeling all the time what a pitiful exposé the same able advocate, with the same experts behind him, would have been able to make of the Territorial Army, if he had happened to be briefed on the other side.
I do not think your Lordships, of whom so many are practical soldiers, would wish a civilian like myself to engage in a controversy about military details, but I should like to say this. The noble Lord in the opening of his speech tried to dissociate the noble and gallant Earl from the proposals of his own Bill. He tried to discredit it as only the Bill of the National Service League, a body, as his tone seemed to suggest, of irresponsible civilians. My Lords, the principles of civic duty and of patriotism, which are the mainsprings of the National Service League, are not the exclusive property of any profession however honourable. But we are not guilty of the levity of bringing forward practical proposals like these without careful consultations with military experts. Apart entirely from the high authority of the noble and gallant Earl, we have had the advice of soldiers, just as the noble Lord has, and of soldiers as able and experienced as the excellent men, and I should be the last to disparage their capacity, whose services he commands at the War Office. But doctors differ. Unfortunately it is not only always possible to quote military
362
expert against military expert, but it is often possible to quote the same military expert against himself. But it would not be fair to the National Service League to let it be supposed that it was acting in a matter of such gravity without much deliberation or without careful consultation of the most competent authorities.
Some of the criticisms directed against this Bill seem to assume that we are absolute children! One noble Lord, speaking late last night took exception to our allowing only seventy-five non-commissioned officers for the training of 150,000 men. He failed to observe that it was seventy-five for every 1,000 of these 150,000 which we propose. It was, I think, the same noble Lord who made the remark that he could not see much difference between the Territorial Army under the present system and the same Army as we propose to recruit it, except the four months initial training. But, my Lords, that makes the whole difference. It is a fundamental point. We absolutely reject the idea that you can leave the serious training of the Home Defence Force to be begun when war breaks out. We do not want to pass any man into the Home Defence Force who has not had from four to six months initial training. That is our starting point, and, if we are told that that amount of training is of little value, then what becomes of the training of your Special Reserve? The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State said the 1,000,000 men whom the noble and gallant Earl declared to be necessary had disappeared in the present scheme, and that we are left with 400,000, or, so he makes out, 320,000, as against 315,000 under our present system. I should prefer even 320,000, every one of whom had had some substantial military training, to 315,000 of whom an indefinite number might have had virtually none at all.
But it is not true to say that the million men have disappeared under this scheme. By the time it has been in operation for ten years there will be, besides the 400,000, or, if the noble Lord pleases, 320,000, men to be first embodied, 800,000 or 900,000 men in this country, all having had this substantial amount of training, all liable to service in case of need. The noble Lord says we have not provided for their rifles, ammunition, or equipment. That may be, and I think is, a good criticism of the estimate which has been circulated in

363
explanation of this Bill. But it is no criticism of the Bill itself. The Bill provides for the training of these men and it provides for their liability to service. When the Bill is in full operation there will be nearer one and a half millions than one million trained men in this country, liable to service for home defence, capable, if they choose, of serving their country anywhere. It is impossible to blow away a fact like that as of no importance or to make out by any logical juggle that it is not a great advance upon the present position.
It is said we shall have difficulty about officers. I know we shall. The officer difficulty is the greatest difficulty we have got to confront. But it is the greatest difficulty of every scheme. Is anyone prepared to say that it does not beset the present Territorial Army? As far as the present shortage of supply of Regular officers is concerned, I believe it can only be removed, or mitigated, by a revival of confidence in the Army as a career. Something has got to be done in any case to get over the existing feeling of distrust and make the career more attractive. If that is not done, we shall be in trouble any way, and if it is done, the comparatively small addition which the scheme involves to the number of our Regular officers will not, I think, be found seriously embarrassing. And as for the supply of non-professional officers, I think it is rendered a great deal easier by the adoption of the principle of general liability to service. Having to serve in any case there will be rather too many than too few men ready to devote the extra time, and take the extra trouble, necessary to qualify them to serve as officers. You will be able to insist on a high standard of qualification.
My Lords, not to detain you too long, it seems to me that the improvement in our Home Defence Force, which would be effected by the Bill, is made up of two main factors—the greatly increased number of men, and the thoroughness of the first grounding which they would all have received in military duties. I am the last to say that with regard to the question of the period of training, or to other essential details of a most intricate problem, we have, at this the first attempt, found a complete solution. What I do say is that when once you have crossed the real Rubicon, when once you have imposed
364
liability to service for home defence on every able-bodied man, you have broken the back of the problem, and the question of the proper period of training for men of the different arms, and all questions of organisation, will become infinitely easier of solution. For you will then have got over the radical difficulty of numbers, which is bound to undermine every scheme based on the voluntary principle. Once assured of an adequate number of men, you can afford to consider all questions of organisation with a sole regard to military efficiency. Under a voluntary system you cannot afford to do that. You are in constant danger of not getting the necessary number of recruits, and in order to make sure of reasonable numbers, you have to sacrifice efficiency at every turn. Does anybody suppose that the Secretary of State or the Army Council fixed fourteen days annual training, reducible to seven, because they thought it sufficient, or that they would not have preferred to fix a longer period. They fixed it because they thought it was the maximum they could ask if they were to get a sufficient number of men to make any sort of decent show at all. And I have no doubt they were right. And it is the same with all the other demands made upon the Territorial soldier. They are based on the principle of getting as much out of him as you can hope to get without driving him away.
I trust that nothing that I have said will be regarded as said in any spirit of depreciation of the admirable work which has been done, either by the military authorities, or by the County Associations in connection with the Territorial Army, still less of the admirable zeal and patriotism shown by the members of that Force. Having regard to the weakness of the principle on which it is recruited, the attempt to create a National Army by persuasion—you might just as well try to collect the National Revenue by persuasion—I think it is perfectly wonderful how much has been achieved. I am sure there is no other country in the world in which it would have been possible. It is just because we can do so much more than any other people on the voluntary system that we go on trying to do impossibilities by it.
In saying what I have done about the Territorial Army I think I faithfully

365
represent the views of that large body of people who are represented by the National Service League. They are the last in the world to decry the work of Mr. Haldane, as he has given them at least the framework of a Home Army such as they desire to see. Neither have they, in fact, taken up a hostile attitude to the Territorial Army or failed to do their duty as good citizens in joining, or otherwise supporting it. On the contrary, some of those who have worked hardest for the Territorial Army are also out and out advocates of the principles of the League, and I have no doubt the success of that Army, such as it is, is due in a large measure to the vigour with which the propaganda in favour of National Service has been carried on in all parts of the country. Moreover in the continual struggle, which is certain to be waged in future between the enthusiasts of the Territorial Army trying to make that Force as efficient as possible, and the spirit of parsimony, dictated by political considerations, which, as soon as the present excitement on the subject has subsided, will begin to starve it—in that struggle the Territorial Army will have no stouter allies than the followers of the noble and gallant Earl. But it is one thing to be willing, and, indeed, eager, to make the best of the system actually in existence, quite another to desist from pointing out its radical and incurable defects and trying to remove them. The Amendment of the noble Duke speaks of this Bill as trying to "supersede" the present system. The object of the Bill is not to supersede, but to underpin it.
One word in conclusion on the question of expense. The Government profess to be terribly alarmed at the expense which the adoption of this scheme would involve. I do not think they can be quite serious in that. For as far as I can make out, from a careful study alike of the finance of this scheme and of the present Budget, it appears to me that the amount involved in Lord Roberts's proposals is just about equal to, and if anything a little less than, the amount which the Government are now trying to raise by taxation, over and above what is needed for our public expenditure. Well. Here is an excellent use for the extra money. The Government cannot pretend to think that it would be an intolerable burden to the taxpayers, since they are themselves proposing to impose it, just for fun. If we can so well afford
366
these extra millions, merely to supply the Government with pocket money, we surely can afford them for national defence. But, my Lords, even those of us who do not contemplate additional burdens on the taxpayer with equal gaiety, do I think feel this. We do not believe there is one man on either of the Front Benches who does not know in his heart that, great as has been the growth of national expenditure for defence in the last few years, we have not yet seen the end of it. Under whatever Government, in whatever form, that expenditure will go on increasing at any rate for many years to come. It is only a question of the comparative value of different forms of expenditure. Certainly there is no room for waste. If the cost of training the ordinary able-bodied citizen to arms is a waste of money, then it is just as unjustifiable to spend £500,000 on it as to spend five millions. But if we are right in holding that of all forms of expenditure on defence it is the cheapest, the form in which you get most for your money, and furthermore that it will stop a gap, will strengthen our system of national defence in that respect in which we are at present weakest, and will not only guard against invasion and scares of invasion, but will increase the striking power of our Regular Army, increase the mobility of our Navy, and give us a large reserve of trained men, then I say it is not four, and it is not eight millions which will be allowed to stand in the way of so great an addition to our national security.
THE EARL OF CREWE: My Lords, I cannot help thinking that this is in more respects than one the most paradoxical discussion to which I have listened since I have been a Member of this House. The Bill itself appears to me to be something of a paradox, and it is supported, with the single exception of the noble Viscount who has just sat down, in a spirit of paradox by those who will, I assume, vote for its Second Reading. That is not of necessity to condemn the measure, but I think it may be worth while to point out the singular lack of logic which can be remarked both in the Bill itself and in the speeches of those who have spoken in support of it.
This Bill is a Bill to abolish voluntary service in an important department of our national life, and to substitute compulsory service. I think it is probably true that in all other departments of civic activity

367
noble Lords who will vote for the noble and gallant Field-Marshal's Bill would say they prefer the results of voluntary effort to those of State action. In other departments of life free service is given to the State and contributions are given to public objects, such as hospitals and charities of all kinds. In all these matters the noble Lords who are going to support the Bill uphold voluntary effort, and maintain that the interference of the State is mistaken. That is the first paradox. Coming to the second paradox, I take the Bill as it stands, and the speech and known opinions of my noble and gallant friend on the Cross Benches, not the speech of the noble Viscount who has just sat down, because his point of view, as he frankly himself admitted, differs in some material respects from that of others who have supported the Bill.
This Bill then is, I take it, founded on the invasion theory which was promulgated by the noble and gallant Earl last year, which was discussed before the Defence Committee, and which was the subject of a debate in your Lordships' House last November. The Army which is to be created under this Bill is exactly the kind of army, whatever its merits may be on other grounds, which is the least suited to meet that particular theory of invasion which the noble and gallant Earl has put before us. Then, again, this Bill is to apply to Ireland. We have heard a great deal from the Benches opposite at various times about Irish disloyalty. So far it has not been attempted, except on a very small and tentative scale, to institute Irish Volunteers. This Bill will train, arm, and habituate to the use of arms the whole of that particular part of the Irish population which you are fond of describing as disloyal. That is the third paradox.
Let us consider for a moment what the invasion theory of the noble and gallant Earl really is. Last night I ventured to interrupt the noble Viscount opposite because he seemed to me not to indicate quite accurately what our position was in regard to that matter. I understood him to say on this question of invasion that we were all upon something like common ground. That is not so. We do not agree that the noble and gallant Earl in bringing forward his suggestion as to the possibility of a sudden invasion by a very large force had proved his case. On the contrary, we
368
hold, and it is held not only by civilians but also unanimously by the military and naval advisers of the Crown, that the case which was put forward to prove that it was possible for a foreign Power to land, practically without any notice, a very large force—150,000 or even more men—had broken down in several important particulars.
The noble Viscount who has just sat down spoke with great moderation on this question of invasion, and in a manner which I think cannot be altogether palatable to noble Lords who are supporting the noble and gallant Field-Marshal. My impression is that if they had to describe his speech they would apply to it that epithet which we all occasionally hear applied to our own speeches, and which we consider the most disparaging that can be applied—namely, that it was statesmanlike. The noble Viscount who has just sat down considered that a sudden invasion, the bolt from the blue, was an improbable contingency, but he indicated the possibility of what might no doubt be a greater danger, that of an invasion in force at some time when the greater part of the strength of our Army was engaged in operations in a different part of the Empire. But in 1857 and again in 1900 we were in the position that the noble Viscount described—that is to say, almost the whole strength of our Regular Forces was abroad and yet, whether owing to the good will of our neighbours, or the fact that they did not think the enterprise practicable, we were not attacked, and if we were not attacked we are entitled, I think, whatever we may think of the good will of other nations, of which we may hope in the future to receive the same measure as we have received in the past, to ascribe our immunity to the strength of the Navy.
This question of invasion is to a very large degree a naval question. I entirely agree that we must not assume that the fighting Fleet is to be perpetually tied to these shores in order to prevent an enemy landing here. But that is not the same thing as to say that the Navy is not the principal machine for preventing invasion, and I think this can be shown by the fact that this particular demand for compulsory service on land has never been made by the responsible naval advisers of the Crown, so far as I know, under any Government

369
and has not been made for the obvious and good reason that they know that if we are to be told that the Navy is not the prime defence against invasion and that a large sum must be spent on land defence, there is a prospect that the country will insist on taking some part of those funds out of the amount now spent on our naval services.
Supposing that the theory of this very large hostile force arriving unexpectedly in this country is accepted, are the proposals of the Bill as they stand the best means of spending that amount of money for meeting that particular contingency? The proposal of the noble and gallant Earl seems to create a very large force of very partially trained men. That might be the right kind of force to create if you were looking forward to a long and rather irregular resistance of the type which our troops encountered in South Africa. But according to the noble Earl, what we have to meet is a coup de main, and the mere fact that you have got in the country a number of men who some years before had four months training would not, it seems to me, affect the success or failure of that coup de main, and that is why I call the Bill a paradox looking at it in connection with the well-known views of the noble and gallant Earl.
What is the exact military value for this purpose of the man in his eighth or tenth year of this compulsory service who has had four months training in his first year and a fortnight's training for three years more? It has been said over and over again that it is the duty of every man to defend his country. And every time that observation has been made it has been received with the applause which an honourable platitude always commands. But in connection with compulsory service, if adopted in this country, several matters have to be borne in mind. It has been said with greater truth, I think, than can be generally found in an epigram that while an Englishman loves liberty and does not care for equality, a Frenchman loves equality but does not care for liberty. This scheme of compulsory service obviously infringes the liberty of the individual. I again remind noble Lords opposite that in all other arenas of activity they are for the voluntary as against compulsion.
LORD NEWTON: Education is compulsory.
THE EARL OF CREWE: Education is compulsory, but a very large slice of it, which I fancy the noble Lord does his best to support, remains voluntary.
LORD AMPTHILL: What about taxation?
THE EARL OF CREWE: The most important form of compulsory public service which is demanded of the British citizen is that of serving upon a jury, and it is one which I believe is regarded as a bore by most of the citizens of the country. It is true that this principle of compulsory service enforces the principle of equality. I do not deny that the intensely democratic nature of this measure will cause it to have attractions for many, but the noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland, pointed out in this connection some facts which seem to me to have no little force.
I do not say that it is right or reasonable, but it is the fact that the ordinary British parent of the middle classes and also of what might be called the respectable working classes would not like the idea of their sons being put into camp for a period of some months with those whom they would consider the riff-raff of the country. I do not say that the feeling is a worthy one, but I do not think any noble Lord opposite will deny that it exists; and when one noble Lord said that after all this was what everybody had to go through at Eton and Sandhurst, he seemed to me to be travelling wide of the question, nor did the right reverend Prelate who spoke yesterday of the boys' camps at the seaside appear to me to touch this side of the question. The fusion of classes carried out in this sort of way is not a popular thing with any class in this country. Every one knows that there are a great many working men who dislike sending their children to particular Council schools because there they may have to sit on the same benches with those whom they describe as gutter children, and when it comes to fusion with this class somewhat later in life I think the difficulty will be found to be still more pronounced.
The advantages of this training have been eloquently spoken of, and I am not concerned to deny that there are a great number of cases in which a lad may be

371
infinitely the better for training of this kind. My noble friend Lord Lucas pointed out that at any rate only half the nation would be affected, and the noble Viscount who has just sat down combated that argument on the ground that taking the average of the national physique it would be greatly improved by this training. But if you are to have forty-eight per cent. of exemptions and rejections, there will be a very great number of those who most need this training who will not get it. I think that is beyond dispute. Again, you must remember that you will catch practically the whole of the rural population, while you will get a smaller proportion of the urban population; and from the point of view of those who desire to see the younger generation of the rural population remaining on the land and settling down I do not think that this universal sweeping into your military net will do anything but operate somewhat adversely to that hope. The difficulty as to officers must multiply as you multiply your total numbers, more particularly if all this great reserve of men in the later period of their twelve years have to be formed into some sort of organisation and to have skilled officers ready to lead them if need should arise.
I pass for a moment to the question of cost. I think that the controversy as to the estimate of £20,000,000 has been disposed of. When we named that sum it is quite true that we were speaking not of the proposals contained in this Bill, but of an Army of a million men, which is a different matter. The noble Viscount who has just spoken very good humouredly chaffed us about the large sum of money which we were supposed to have at our disposal, and said that a saving of £4,000,000 could not be better employed than in this way. I dispute that statement. If I wanted to spend £4,000,000 more on defence I should not spend it in this way. But when the noble Viscount talks about £4,000,000 I read his statement in connection with another in which, in almost an apologetic manner, he alluded to some of the proposals of the Bill, and spoke of them as Committee points. If it be a Committee point to substitute a longer term of service, which is very likely to be one of the points which he has in his mind, that obviously means a very great increase in the cost. Surely when the noble Viscount said, what I believe to be and regret to be true, that our expenditure on the Navy is
372
not likely to diminish in coming years, for reasons with which we are all acquainted, we return to the question whether this £4,000,000 of which Lord Ampthill speaks so lightheartedly could, even if the case is proved, be regarded as bearing a proper proportion to the necessary expenditure on the Navy.
Yesterday afternoon my noble friend dwelt on the historical circumstances which have existed in connection with scares as to invasion in former years, and told us how in the early years of the Great War, when this theory of home defence was carried out in the fullest degree by the immense multiplication of Militia, the Regular Army certainly did not add to the glory of its annals. Your Lordships know very well how in the last years of that century millions of money and many thousands of men were wasted in inglorious campaigns in the West Indies and the Low Countries, until the honour of the Army was redeemed from something very like disgrace by Abercromby and Moore. There were other invasion scares in 1852 and in 1859. Anybody who will read the speech made by Lord Lyndhurst in initiating a debate just fifty years ago might imagine that it had been made in the course of this debate. A certain melancholy interest attaches to that debate because the Government reply was made by Lord Ripon, then Under-Secretary for War, whom we are all now lamenting. All the points which the noble and gallant Earl who has introduced this Bill urges were advanced by Lord Lyndhurst, who said also that the invention of steamships had entirely altered the conditions relating to invasion. Lord Lyndhurst went on to say that the national security could not be maintained unless there was in this country a sufficient force of Regular troops to meet an enemy who might land on these shores. There, I think, Lord Lyndhurst had the courage of his opinion, because he demanded Regular troops.
If all the statements which we hear from time to time are true, what we really want is not military training of this kind, but a conscript army. Mr. Arnold-Forster, whose name, somewhat strangely I think, has not been mentioned in the course of this debate, was not prepared for a conscript army—at least, I do not know that he was. But the proposals which I understand he favoured were for a short-

373
service army for home service and a long-service army for foreign service. That is a logical proposition. Its only defect, so far as I know, is that in the conditions of this country it is impossible to combine it with voluntary service. That army would be something very different indeed from the army or force which it is proposed to create by this Bill.
Once more I find myself in agreement with the noble Duke who moved the Amendment. He said, and I think very truly, that you would not be able to stop here, that if you are to have a compulsory force sufficiently well trained to meet Regular troops who may land on your shores you must go a little further. You might draw a distinction between home and tropical service, and make your conscript troops liable, at any rate, for service on the continent of Europe. If you are to have universal service that is a proposal which I think will not unreasonably be pressed upon you. These are reasons why I assert that this Bill raises tremendous issues, which are obscured by all this talk about social advantages and boys' camps. The issue must be taken to be one between voluntary service and compulsory service, which I do not believe you will be able to limit. Therefore in giving our vote against this Bill we are giving it against the principle of compulsory service for this country.
With regard to the Amendment, I do not know exactly what the noble Duke who moved it means in this connection by military training. I should prefer to see the Amendment somewhat amended for this reason. There is a tendency both in our schools and in the training of recruits to substitute in an increasing degree physical training for what is called military training. It is believed that Swedish exercises and exercises of that kind are of greater permanent advantage to recruits and to schoolboys than purely military training would be. To that extent I would rather see the Amendment modified.
But in other respects I cordially agree that it is only fair to give a reasonable chance to the scheme of my right hon. friend. That scheme, sanctioned by the vote of your Lordships' House, has met with a greater measure of success than any military change which has been made in the memory of anybody now sitting in this House. It has only been in operation for
374
little more than a year, and it does seem unreasonable in the absence of any proved emergency, to ask your Lordships to register for all time an opinion that the scheme has broken down. If the scheme proves to be inadequate, change it if you will, spend more money upon it if you like; but do not, I beg you, embark lightheartedly upon the plan proposed in this Bill, which is by the admission of its advocates costly, which many people think would be infinitely more costly than those advocates are prepared to admit, and which at the same time does not, as I think we have shown, give any measure of real security against the particular danger which it proposes to meet.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I find myself in the somewhat unusual position of having to reply, not to any attack delivered from the opposite side of the House, but to some rather heavy batteries of artillery which were unmasked during the course of last night's engagement, and which have been supported this afternoon in a very telling manner in the eloquent speech delivered by the noble Viscount who now sits on the Cross Benches.
There is one point in the attack about which, although it is a comparatively trivial point, I should like to say just one word. More than one noble Lord has taken exception to the fact that we had invited the presence of those noble Lords who generally act with us by means of an Opposition whip in the usual form, and Lord Ampthill in particular posed as a martyr suffering under the scourge of my noble friend Lord Waldegrave. I think my noble friend rather overrates the potency of a House of Lords' whip. I have never had the honour of a seat in the other House of Parliament, but I am under the impression that there a whip means a good deal, and that a member who is habitually refractory and disregards these intimations is very likely to experience a certain amount of inconvenience perhaps when he again seeks election.
But my noble friend Lord Waldegrave has no such engines of oppression at his command, and really all we can do on occasions of this kind is to call the attention of our friends to the fact that a very important debate is going to take place and to intimate to them the line which we

375
ourselves propose to take. Rightly or wrongly, that is the immemorial custom in this House. Lord Waldegrave can call up "spirits from the vasty deep"; sometimes they come, sometimes they don't, and when they do come they occasionally flit into the wrong Lobby. I go further—I think there are one or two Members of this House—it would be improper to name them—who almost as a matter of principle disregard gentle intimations of that kind. I know one or two noble Lords who if they were asked the old question "Where shall wisdom be found, and where is the place of understanding?" would reply, we do not know exactly, but on no account look for it on either of the Front Benches. Well, we sent out this intimation because we do regard this debate as a very important one, and we think the Division to be taken this evening is one which may very seriously affect the position of your Lordships' House.
Perhaps I ought first to say what, in my opinion, our support of the noble Duke's Amendment does not imply. I say unhesitatingly, it does not imply any desire to snub or discourage the National Service League, with which the noble and gallant Field-Marshal is so honourably connected. On the contrary, I think every one of us recognises that a debt is due to the League on account of the successful efforts they have made to rouse in this country a feeling of patriotism and sense of civic duty. I can assure my noble and gallant friend, with whom I have so often been associated under different circumstances, that it gives me real pain to oppose any proposal made by him. But he does ask this House to take a very serious step. It has been said that, after all, this Bill cannot become law, and that we can therefore not do much harm by voting for it. I cannot accept that view. In my humble opinion, if your Lordships vote for the Second Reading of a Bill of this kind it means that you approve of it, and that you are ready, if the opportunity offers, to take it up yourselves; and I for one am not able to say that that is the manner in which I regard the measure on the Table.
This Bill, remember, is not merely an attack upon the Territorial system instituted by Mr. Haldane; it is an affirmation
376
that the voluntary system has been tried in this country and has failed. It is an affirmation that we desire to substitute for that voluntary system a system based upon compulsion, and compulsion in the particular form in which we find it in the clauses of this Bill. And we are invited to do this at a time when a brand-new military system, introduced by a powerful Government, backed by one of the largest majorities we have known in the history of this country—a system based upon an Act of Parliament, for which every one of your Lordships, unless I am mistaken, voted—a measure which has been cordially supported throughout the country, and by no one more effectually and energetically than by Members of this House who hold the high office of Lord Lieutenant of their county, is still in the experimental stage. We are asked, while that system is on its trial, to take upon ourselves to say that it has failed, and that its failure has been demonstrated, and to ask the country to accept in lieu of it a wholly different system—a system which, as I shall endeavour to show, is not in accordance with the Territorial system of Mr. Haldane, but which is described, and properly described, by representatives of the War Office as entirely antagonistic to it.
Well, my Lords, my noble friend the Duke of Northumberland meets this Bill with an Amendment, about which a good deal has been said. That Amendment asks your Lordships to record an opinion that a Home Army of sufficient strength to resist invasion is indispensable, that a sound ground-work of military training for as large a part of the population as possible is a desirable thing, but it adds to that a refusal to inflict upon the country at this moment a new measure, admitted by its authors to be extremely costly, and intended to supersede the plan which is now upon its trial, which is believed by those responsible for its administration to be achieving an unexpected measure of success. I put it to your Lordships whether an Amendment which can be so described deserves to be characterised, as it was last night, by my noble friend Lord Ampthill, as equivocal, evasive, ignorant, and fatuous? Those were four epithets which I collected from a single sentence of his speech last night. May I venture as an old friend to suggest that those are not epithets which we usually apply to those with whom we act in political life, and it

377
does not seem to me that his argument was very much strengthened by their use?
I want at the outset to make two admissions. In the first place, I am not going to say anything to challenge the absolute right of the State to demand of every member of the community military service in any shape or form in which that service may be found to be necessary for the public welfare. I do not care whether it is military service at home or over-seas. In the next place, I am bound to say that I think my noble and gallant friend is correct when he tells us that the dislike with which compulsory service is now regarded in this country is much less than it was. I think that is due in great measure to the strenuous advocacy of my noble and gallant friend and those who act with him. I think, too, that more and more people are coming to hold the view expressed by Lord Meath last night and by Lord Milner this evening that what I might call the subsidiary advantages of military training —its effect upon the character and physique of the people of this country—are far more valuable than they used to be considered.
I may be asked:—"If that is your feeling, why do you not support the Bill on the Table?" I will give my answer with absolute, frankness. I do not believe public opinion in this country is ripe for such a change as we are asked to make, and I do not believe that the proper way to ripen it is to pass this Bill through the House of Lords. The enthusiasm exhibited at public meetings requires to be a good deal discounted. You have to reckon with a great deal of inarticulate opposition to compulsion. Compulsion to many people—people perhaps who do not express their opinions very loudly—is hateful, and I believe that if this Bill were to become law, and if it were to be studied and the attention of our people called to the heavy pains and penalties which are to be found in some of its provisions, there would be a very strong feeling of reaction against it, a feeling which in my belief might go very far to check the progress and impair the usefulness of the many measures which are now in force for the advancement of military efficiency in this country.
Again, I entirely agree with the noble Earl Who leads the House in believing that it
378
would be an extremely serious thing to apply a measure of this kind to Ireland. Curiously enough the case of Ireland was never mentioned until the noble Earl mentioned it, but it is a serious obstacle in my view to the application of this Bill to other parts of the United Kingdom.
I venture to suggest that if a measure of this kind is to be seriously put forward it should be upon the responsibility and on the initiative of the Government of the day and of the people who will have not only to pass the Bill into law but to put it into operation when it has found its place upon the Statute Book.
Something has been said on the question of the cost involved. Lord Ampthill treated that matter rather lightly. "What does it matter?" he said. I think it matters a great deal. I will not now pursue the controversy as to whether four millions or eight millions or twenty millions is to be the figure taken. But I am inclined, being an old War Office man, to back the War Office accountants, and I suspect that the eight millions of the Under-Secretary are nearer the mark than the four millions of the noble and gallant Earl. But whatever be the sum, of this I think we may be certain, that if it be taken for the purposes of this Bill out of the pockets of the taxpayers an attempt will be made to get some of it back by starving either the Regular Army or the Navy, and I for one should be very sorry to see that result.
There is another by-product of this measure which I regard with the utmost apprehension. I mean its effect upon recruiting for the Regular Army. It seems to me impossible that a Bill of this kind should come into operation and not very seriously affect recruiting for the Regular Army. In what way it would do so may not be very easy to foretell, but that it would have an effect of that kind I for one have no doubt. But then what about its effect on the Territorial Force? The supporters of the noble and gallant Earl recommended this Bill to us on the ground that it fits in with the scheme of the Government and is calculated to promote the success of the Territorial system. I cannot believe that that is the case, and I must say that on a point of that kind I think we must to some extent at any rate defer to the opinion of those who invented the

379
Territorial system, and who are now carrying it into operation, and they tell us in the most unambiguous language that the adoption of this Bill, far from promoting the success of the Territorial system, far from being helpful to it, would on the contrary be destructive and injurious to that system.
Then I cannot put on one side the statements made by the Under-Secretary last night when he told us that after all this measure would only increase by, I think, 7,000 men the number of those actually available for the purposes for which this force is required. Nor can I disregard his announcement that in the view of his military advisers these men would be trained in the wrong way, and that the General Staff altogether objected to the plan on which the Bill proceeds. That leads me to say one word with regard to the position of the military advisers of the Government. I entirely agree with what was said last night to the effect that it was very unfair to those military advisers to put upon them the whole responsibility for everything that is done by the War Office. It is quite true that they have to advise within certain limitations. I have no doubt a great many of them would be delighted to have compulsory military service and I daresay a great many of them would like to add twenty millions to the Army Estimates. But they have to cut their coat according to the cloth that is given to them. His Majesty's Government have, however, in this case gone out of their way to explain to us, not once, but many times, that what they are doing does satisfy and has the entire support of the General Staff and of the Army Council, and, therefore, I think my noble friend who moved the Amendment was within his right when he dwelt on the fact that we have reason to suppose that the military advisers of the Government are behind them in the fullest sense in the policy which they now favour.
But I am led to ask myself whether, after all, putting these considerations on one side, this Bill really would give us that which the noble and gallant Earl and his friends are so anxious to obtain—a strong Home Army available at a moment's notice for the purpose of repelling a powerful invasion. There are two contingencies we have to consider. There is the contingency
380
of invasion, and there is the other contingency of the supply of wastage in time of war. Let me say one word as to the contingency of invasion. I am not one of those who ridicule the idea that this country might be exposed to serious risk of invasion. I have never believed that there was such a thing as an out-and-out supporter of what is sometimes called the Blue Water school. And I make another admission. I am ready to admit that the risk of invasion is a risk which does not diminish but rather increases; that the conditions have changed in recent years and have changed to our disadvantage. We have no longer, I am sorry to say, the two-Power standard for our Navy. We know that the facilities for the concentration, for the ferrying over, and for the disembarkation of an expeditionary force are now much greater than they formerly were. And I am afraid I must add to that, that we are painfully conscious that the Regular Army of this country—upon which in my view we shall always have to depend largely for opposing an invading force—has been very considerably diminished during the last two or three years, and that that reduction of the Regular Army carries with it a corresponding reduction in the Reserve. Therefore I gladly associate myself with those who demand that we shall have an adequate and sufficient Army for home defence, as well as a Navy of unchallengeable superiority.
But while I say that I am bound to add that I can never bring myself to believe that we are so absolutely and completely at the mercy of the invader as the noble and gallant Earl would have us believe, I observe that three conditions are always assumed— (1) that the whole or virtually the whole of our Regular Army has gone abroad, (2) that our Fleet has been decoyed away or disabled, and (3) that the Territorial Force has not yet had time to undergo the training necessary to render it efficient. I find it difficult to believe that the whole of these conditions are likely to present themselves simultaneously at the very outbreak of a war. If I may sum up my view I would say that while I am ready to go the full length in insuring against all reasonable risks, I do not want to lay upon the country the burden of insuring against risks which do not seem to me to be reasonable. But I admit there is a great danger, particularly for a civilian, in endeavouring to treat these questions as

381
general propositions. We are concerned, not with invasion in the abstract, but invasion by a particular Power and under particular circumstances. The Power may not always be the same and the circumstances may be different. We cannot deal with these matters across the Table of the House; and I therefore assume that these problems which, remember, are not military problems merely, but composite problems depending on naval as well as military considerations, have been thoroughly considered not only by the military, but by the naval advisers of His Majesty's Government.
We certainly have received from Ministers of the Crown distinct assurances that this is the case, and that they are themselves satisfied with the precautions that have been taken. Only a few months ago the Secretary of State for War, in introducing the Army Estimates in another place, explained to the House that under the directions of the General Staff the whole coast line of the country had been surveyed, that troops had been allocated so as to be ready to oppose a landing, and that besides that there was a central force which was to be despatched at a moment's notice, a force consisting partly of Territorial troops with a stiffening of Regulars, for the purpose of meeting and "overwhelming" the invader. Last night also the Under-Secretary gave us a general sketch of a somewhat similar plan which he said had been fully developed at the War Office for the purpose of dealing with an attack at the very out-break of war. We cannot, of course, conceal from ourselves that there is the vulnerable period of six months before the Territorial Force has undergone the necessary training when we shall be at our weakest; but are we to assume that during that period there will not be a ship of war of any kind near home to engage the invading flotilla and not a Regular battalion available to stiffen the Territorial Army? Both of these seem to me to be very extreme assumptions.
But even if we are wrong on this point, would this Bill give us a Territorial Force sufficient by itself at the outbreak of war to cope with that invading force, which is variously estimated at between 70,000 and 150,000 men? Would it give us a force so efficient that it would release the Expeditionary Army from its liability to
382
remain at home? Would it give us a force so powerful and so well organized that we could afford to say to our Navy, "Depart for foreign waters; we shall depend for the security of these islands on the Territorial Army left behind"? I am by no means convinced that it would do anything of the kind, and I am bound to say that the speech of the Under-Secretary, to which we all listened with interest, made that abundantly clear. What is there in this Bill, or what is there that arises out of the Bill, to show that this larger force of Territorial troops which would be collected if the Bill became law would have any organisation, that it would be made up of fighting units ready to take the field? What is there to show how they are to be trained? What does the noble Lord the Under-Secretary tell us as to that? He says that it is the considered opinion of the General Staff that a force so trained will not be fit to set free the Expeditionary Force at the outbreak of a war, and a fortiori not fit to set free the Navy.
Then there is the question of officers and of housing. I think that the Under-Secretary made an interesting point when he reminded the House that if these men were trained under canvas during the summer months you would be taking away 150,000 men at a time when the labour market was expanding, and sending them back to private life in the autumn when the labour market was a contracting market. This to my mind is a serious consideration. It is said that these are mere paltry details and that we need not occupy ourselves with them. Believe me, it is on points of detail of this kind that our military schemes get shipwrecked, and I am afraid that I see in this scheme a great many points on which it stands a fair chance of being shipwrecked.
Then as to the effect which the Bill might have in enabling us to deal with the question of wastage in time of war. I confess that I am much more perturbed at the prospect of what might happen in the event of a prolonged war, and at the problem of how we should supply our Regular Army when it is employed away from this country, than I am by this other problem of the risk of invasion. We had painful experience of that at the time of the South African war. Our Army Reservists left nothing to be desired in

383
point of quality, nothing to be desired in the manner in which they responded to the call made upon them. But in point of numbers they were miserably inadequate, and I confess that if I were Secretary of State for War I should be inclined to spend my last shilling in endeavouring to set what we call the Cardwellian Reserve fairly on its legs again. I regard some of the proposals of the Government with special dislike, because they must inevitably have the effect of diminishing the strength of that Reserve. I am afraid that we on this side of the House at any rate feel that the new Special Reservist is a very poor substitute for the old seven and five years man. What does the Bill of the noble and gallant Earl do to supply the needs of the country in the event of a prolonged war? It has been emphatically explained that this Bill carries with it no suspicion, however remote, of eventual liability to serve beyond the shores of this country. I am glad that is said, because I am sure that nothing would so much increase the suspicion with which the policy of the noble and gallant Earl is regarded as the idea that men were to be first compelled to serve in the Home Army and then afterwards to serve abroad.
These are all considerations which render me unable to support my noble and gallant friend. I recognise, however, that his policy has one great advantage —an advantage which appeals to me very much. It would have the effect of largely increasing the number of trained men in this country. That is a great advantage, because I am convinced that if you could induce a large part of the population to submit to military training, the men who have undergone that training will, when the emergency arises, come forward of their own accord. I ask myself whether, if, as I believe, the proposal of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal is not one which we can accept, there is no other way of attaining what he and I desire—I mean a large increase in the number of men who have, at any rate, some rudimentary knowledge of the soldier's profession, men who might be called one-half or one-third manufacured soldiers. I venture to think that there is something to be done in this direction. I listened with great interest and approval to what was said on that point by Lord Meath last night. I believe that it should be possible as part of our system
384
of education to give to the whole of the boys of this country at school, and perhaps during the first year or two after they have left school, a certain amount of military training. Let us teach them discipline, how to hold themselves, how to use a rifle if we can. Depend upon it, a training of that kind would have incalculable advantages both from the military and from the civilian point of view. From the military point of view, because every man who had undergone this kind of training in his boyhood would be so much to the good when he came forward to serve his country in the field. But most of all, perhaps, from the social point of view. I believe there is a growing dissatisfaction in this country with the kind of education which we are giving to our boys in the elementary schools of the country. We teach them a great number of useless things, and we leave untaught a great many things which they might very well learn. I am afraid that our present system stands convicted of turning out a great many hobbledehoys who do not know how to dig, or how to fight, and who have very little idea of earning a decent livelihood.
If your Lordships want evidence on that point I would ask you to consider the Report of the Committee appointed by the Board of Agriculture last year on the question of the teaching received by children in the elementary schools in agricultural districts, and I would also ask you to consider what is said in the Report of Lord George Hamilton's Commission on the Poor Law. There you will find a pronouncement, which would probably have been much more emphatic if it had not been desired to secure the unanimity of a large body of Commissioners, in favour of physical or military training as the corrective of a great many of the troubles from which society is now suffering in this country. And if you care to pursue your researches further I commend to you what will be found in the Appendix to that Report written by Mr. Cyril Jackson, who was specially deputed to inquire into the question of boy labour. Mr. Jackson establishes a connection between the question of unemployment and the uselessness of the teaching at present given in the schools, and he recommends that the teaching should be more practical and should include compulsory physical or military training, so that our youths may have a chance of

385
something more than that kind of "blind alley" employment with which so many of them have to be content.
I gather from what was said by the Leader of the House that he does not greatly differ from me on that point, although he would like to alter the wording of the Amendment so that it should refer, not to military, but to physical training. I am not very particular about the wording. What I am more concerned about is the substance, and I entreat the Government to consider whether by moving in the direction indicated they cannot do something to meet the views pressed upon them in connection with compulsory service. I believe that if the War Office and the Education Department would take up this question they would find that public opinion was entirely on their side. It has been moving in that direction and is moving in that direction at this moment. What else can we gather from the manner in which the Territorial system has been taken up all over the country? What else can we gather from the manner in which rifle clubs and boys' brigades are springing into existence?
Is it impossible for His Majesty's Government to graft on to the Territorial scheme some excrescence of this kind? I certainly hope they will consider the matter. I ask them not to forget that when they first produced their Territorial scheme the Bill, as originally drafted, contained a clause enabling the Government to establish cadet corps in connection with the Territorial system; but, I suppose under pressure from those who regard all military training with suspicion, the clause was dropped. I ask now whether it would not be possible to resuscitate that clause. I believe that a moderate expenditure for purposes of this kind would do a great deal more for the physique of the lads of the country than any amount of fining them for smoking cigarettes. I think all these possibilities should be exhausted before we go to the length of agreeing to compulsion in any form. I cannot help believing that on foundations of that kind it might be possible to build up something, not, perhaps, reaching the ideals of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, but something in the nature of a "nation in arms." But if I am asked what I think of this Bill, I have to say frankly to your Lordships that I doubt very much whether it would increase the military
386
efficiency of this country, that I am very much afraid that if it were passed into law it might produce a very dangerous reaction, and that I am also very much afraid that by passing it your Lordships will not greatly add to the reputation of this House.
LORD GRENFELL: My Lords, this is a late period in the debate and most of the arguments which I should naturally use in support of the Bill have been already used by previous speakers, much more capable than myself. But I think this discussion will be a great advantage in many ways, chiefly because it will clear the air and demonstrate to the public what exactly are the ideas of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal and of those who act with him. I am glad that in his speech and in the speech of my noble friend Lord Milner any sort of criticism or attack upon the Territorial scheme was deprecated. Anyone connected or having been connected with the Army must see and acknowledge that the organisation of the new force is an enormous improvement on anything we have ever had before. The energy and determination of the Secretary of State have captured the County Associations, and though many of those serving on County Associations like myself are critics of the scheme, yet every member of the County Associations is working hard and doing his level best to make this Territorial scheme the success which it deserves.
I noticed in the description of the duties of the Territorial Force the Secretary of State and the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State did not quite agree. Lord Lucas told us yesterday that the duty of the Territorial Force in repelling invasion should be shared by the Army. The Secretary of State, in explaining the original scheme, said that the duty of the Territorial Force was to free the Army from remaining in these islands to fulfil the functions of home defence, and to permit greater freedom to the Navy. That is a very striking difference. If this Territorial Force is to fulfil the conditions imposed upon it by Mr. Haldane, very great care must be exercised. The large number of officers who are now wanted must be made up, and a much longer period of training must be arranged for. The Under-Secretary of State yesterday twitted the promoters of this Bill upon the fact that we were considering

387
too much the defences of this island and not the question of offence—that is to say, that we would spoil our Force by confining it merely to the defence of this island. And he spoke of "the ignominious panic of failure," confirmed no doubt by the author whom he quoted, which existed in 1805, just before the Battle of Trafalgar. But there was some reason for that panic. At that period Napoleon, with what he himself described as the finest army he had ever commanded—the Army of Austerlitz—was in force at Boulogne. His Admirals were engaged in making rafts for the invasion of this country, and I think the inhabitants of this island were justified in that panic. Was there not another reason in the fact that the defences of these islands had been neglected? The Under-Secretary of State also told us that we were neglecting Imperial defence for home defence. As regards Imperial defence, the safety of this island is the first necessity for any Imperial defence which is undertaken.
I do not wish to enter into the financial part of this scheme, but I had the opportunity this morning of seeing and hearing those who made this scheme, and who had answered the last War Office criticism, and there is one item which is very difficult for us to understand. The whole of it has been gone over carefully and those connected with this scheme adhere entirely to their original statement. The item we want explained is the cost of the Territorial Force as regards their training. The whole calculation of this Army is based on the statement that each man in the Territorial Force is estimated to cost about £10 annually, of which £4 10s. goes to a fortnight's camp and hire of horses and £5 10s. to clothing, equipment, ranges, and buildings. Now we are told that in that £10 is included the cost for the staff. Added to that, we know not why, is the sum of £3,000,000. Our accountants have gone carefully into it and I mention it so that if Lord Lucas or any other noble Lord on the Governemnt side replies, I hope we shall be told why this is so framed.
Various noble Lords have mentioned the want of officers, and we are now in a very critical time. A few years ago, when I was at the War Office, there were five or six applicants for every commission at Sandhurst, and, I believe, Woolwich. There are much fewer applicants now,
388
and those who enter those institutions I believe will enter them without a qualifying examination. I believe that one reason for the great deficiency of officers is the want of confidence on the part of parents and guardians of young men who might enter the Army, by reason of the reduction which has taken place and the reductions which we are told may take place in the future. Of the ten battalions that were reduced, two were serving under my command, and I cannot forget the dismay and the difficulties that those reductions caused. A large number of officers were cast out of their regiments; they waited for a long time attached to other regiments, and then they were placed with battalions who did not desire them and in which they did not wish to serve.
The noble Duke who proposed the Amendment, was, I think, rather hard upon the reputation of the military forces. He mentioned that probably the moral influences of those forces would do great harm to those youths who would be attached to them. The noble Duke must be thinking of an Army of a different period. At present army life is one which the youth of the day can enter without any harm to himself, both as regards the officers and the men. I am certain that if the noble Duke could view more intimately the life which the British soldier lives in his battalion, he would say that those who joined any branch of the service would, instead of suffering any depreciation, receive advantages which would be of great value to them in after life.
I wish to corroborate most strongly the statement of the noble and gallant Field. Marshal as to the advantages of the various boys' brigades and other semi-military institutions which are growing up. I have the honour to act as commandant of a large lads' brigade, and we heard last night the eloquent speech of the Bishop of Bath and Wells, who pointed out the great advantages that accrued from service in those brigades to the lads in this country. Together with the noble and gallant Field Marshal I have noticed that every organisation of the sort is a success, and I think it is only a success if the semi-military element is attached to it. The particular corps of which I am commandant numbers 66,000. There is another brigade in which Lord Meath is interested, which numbers

389
nearly as many. There are in all two or three hundred thousand, taking the various other organisations of these lads, coming under a sort of semi-military education, and I do not believe you would catch them or get this great moral influence over these lads but for the fact that there is a military organisation.
I echo the words of the noble Duke, the Duke of Norfolk, whose excellent speech will have a very great effect upon this House. We sat on his Commission for many months; we examined many witnesses; and reluctant at first no doubt, as most of the members of that Committee were, to come to the conclusion which we eventually came to, in the end we came to the unanimous conclusion that no proper defence force could be obtained except by means of compulsion. You cannot get the officers and you cannot get the men. As an old Inspector-General of Recruiting, I am fully aware of the great difficulties which you have in obtaining recruits after a certain time. I fear that the Territorial Force when it arrives nearly at its maximum will experience very great difficulties in recruiting. I trust that this Bill may eventually, not now, perhaps, but in the future be passed and become law. Only by such a Bill or some system of compulsion can we ever obtain an adequate number of officers and men for the proper defence of this country.
LORD LOVAT: I want to ask Lord Crewe a question on a statement he made on the subject of invasion. He stated that the case of invasion which was put by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal Lord Roberts before the Defence Committee, that the possibility of invasion by 150,000 men, had broken down in the evidence given before that Committee. I would like to call the noble Earl's attention to a statement made by Mr. Haldane in the House of Commons on the subject of invasion, to the following effect—
"You would have to consider what was the size of the invading force. That is a problem you cannot answer with exactitude, but much investigation and consideration makes it pretty plain that somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 men is the force you must guard against by keeping your Home Defence Army sufficiently strong to prevent the enemy coming in large numbers."
I would ask the noble Earl if that statement is accepted by the Front Bench in this House?
THE EARL OF CREWE: I confess I do not see anything incompatible between what
390
I said and what my right hon. friend said. What I said just now was that the idea of an absolutely sudden invasion within a very limited number of hours by 150,000 men had not, in our opinion, been proved to be a possibility. If the noble Lord dislikes the word "broken down" I will change it for that.
LORD LOVAT: Then you accept the particular statement that 100,000 men could, at any given moment, invade this country?
THE EARL OF CREWE: No, not in the least.
LORD LOVAT: Then I do not know what to understand, because in one House the number of 70,000 to 100,000 is accepted as the number which could possibly execute an invasion, but here it is not accepted. And it becomes still more strange when we look at another statement made by another Minister, Lord Pentland, on the same subject. He said that the people of this country did not believe in invasion. Of course that is a matter of opinion. But he says that the landing of a considerable force on these shores would be a difficult operation, and it was difficult to see how the necessary conditions could arise unless our sea-power had been broken. It is necessary to arrive at the real opinion of the Government on this point, because the defence of this country must. Obviously depend upon two questions—first, on the number of invaders from abroad; and, second, on the number of defenders we have at home. We have tried to get the opinion of the Government on either question and as yet we have signally failed.
The reason, I think, a good many on this side of the House are supporting the Bill, although many do not agree with it in all its particulars, is that we feel that we want more definite information about the military situation of England to-day. We have had from both Front Benches in this House a great deal of criticism of detail, but we have failed to get any statements as to whether the total number of men is or is not sufficient. But this total number of men is a matter of the first importance. First of all, with regard to the Expeditionary Force, as far as one can learn from the statements of noble Lords opposite the Expeditionary Force can only sail at all under a series of hypotheses. It is admitted that only a portion of the force can go abroad, because the Territorial Army have to wait for the period of training

391
before they can take over the defence of the country. If a crisis arose in India another Power might give indication that an invasion was possible, although there might be on the surface friendly relations between us. That would put us in the position, as Lord Newton says, of having our Expeditionary Force mobilised and ready to sail, yet by inadequacy of home defence "tied like a goat" to these shores. I do not know if that is regarded as a satisfactory condition.
We have, according to Lord Crewe, the possibility of invasion by a number not absolutely decided. We have individual opinions by Members of the other House as to the possibility of an invasion by 100,000 men. Let us see what we have to put against them if the Expeditionary Force is over-seas. We have, according to Lord Lucas, 101 battalions mobilised yet immobile, consisting of the relics of half-drilled boy Regulars, Reservists unfit for active service, and Special Reserve. After the wants of the fixed defences had been satisfied we would have to depend for our central force upon the Territorial Army. I ventured to prove with figures the other day that we could not get for this force, on whom the brunt of the fighting would fall, 100,000 men. But suppose I am wrong and we could actually get 200,000, would that be sufficient to meet the number of troops that Mr. Haldane has admitted are able to come across? It is stated here that, even with four months training, these men would not be equal to men trained on the Continent. I agree, but how much less so will they be if they have not had this four months training at all?
May I compare for a moment the training which a man would get under Lord Roberts's scheme and the average training of the Territorial Army to-day A certain portion of the Territorial Army camp out for fourteen days and others for seven days. Look for a moment how those fourteen days are spent. One day for going into camp, one day for coming out; no work is ever done in those two days from a military point of view. Then there are two Sundays, which makes four days, and one afternoon for regimental sports. Then from the fact that these men join every year you have to brush up a certain number of recruits, and the first three or four days are taken up with preliminary drills and those exercises which cannot be got through at other times. The
392
result is that the commanding officer and the other senior officers of the unit only have three or four opportunities a year of training men in any numbers. Compare that with the conditions under the noble and gallant Field-Marshal's scheme. These men would come into the Territorial Army on the same day. There would be no waiting for casual recruits, and, still less, waiting for those seven days men who come in after the camp has been opened and go out before it is over and confuse the whole thing. Compare the results which you would arrive at with these two methods of training. I think no one would deny that under the noble and gallant Field-Marshal's scheme you would get a very much more efficient force. It is over the question of numbers that I regret I am unable to agree with what has been put forward by either of the Front Benches. I think that we are not within 300,000 men of adequate home defence, and this constitutes a definite danger. I do not say if we sent our Expeditionary Force away we are 300,000 men short. If our Expeditionary Force stays here, of course, we shall not be invaded; but then if our Expeditionary Force cannot expedition we must abandon the idea of defending our Colonies or of being a world-Power at all.
Frankly, I do not like this Bill. I do not think it is a good Bill. In the first place it is a mistake to take men to train as early as eighteen years. What is wanted is to be ready for immediate action, and the men should be taken at a time when they would be fit immediately to take the field. The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State asked, in a previous debate, what was the difference for home defence between a man of eighteen and one of twenty years of age? There is a great difference. At twenty they are men and can carry a man's burden. The troops who would come over here would be men of twenty-one years of age and over; they would all carry three days rations and part of their tent and cooking utensils. That may seem a detail, but that gives the General commanding the Force something like three days away from his supplies, and that, cœteris paribus, might make the difference between victory and defeat. There are other points I do not care for in the noble and gallant Field-Marshal's Bill. If we are going to abandon the whole idea of voluntary service, I would like to see a Bill which would give

393
longer training and provide for a greater length of training for officers and noncommissioned officers.
On the other hand there are many points in Lord Roberts's Bill which get us out of our difficulties. He gets over the question of officers. If you have compulsion you can always compel officers to go into training before they come into camp which would render them efficient. At present they come into a volunteer force totally inefficient; they are bundled out with men who know very little themselves, and the result is that your junior officers of the Territorial Army are not nearly up to the standard they ought to be. Once you get conscription or compulsion—I do not see much difference between the two terms—you can say to a man when he joins, "Unless you are qualified, either by your University or public school course, or otherwise, to command men, in you go into the ranks." And, as has been found in France and Germany, this has acted as a deterrent, and officers have, by passing examinations, fully qualified themselves to command troops.
There is another thing I like about Lord Roberts's scheme. He supports Territorial principles which Mr. Haldane has put forward. I do not think anyone can overestimate the magnificent work for the country which Mr. Haldane has done, and the splendid organisation he has established; and anything which progresses on the lines Mr. Haldane has laid down must be on the right lines. We have altered our schemes so often that we do wish for continuity as far as it can be obtained. It has very often been asked, What is the difference between four months continual training and that amount of training dotted about during a year? There is first, and most important of all, discipline. If men are together in camp for four months they very soon get to know that an order given has to be obeyed. There is no "please" at the end when an order is given, but it is carried out instantly; and when you get Regular officers, as there would be under Lord Roberts's scheme, at the head of the training of the regiments you would get discipline maintained, and the junior officers, knowing what discipline is, would keep it up themselves. If the principle of voluntary service could be followed. I would follow it, but I regard the question
394
of the safety of this country and of remaining a world-wide Power before any personal predilection for voluntary as opposed to compulsory service, and for that reason I shall follow the noble and gallant Earl into the Lobby.
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: My Lords, I beg to ask the Government if it is really impossible for them to tell us the precise purpose for which their Territorial Army is designed. Let me remind your Lordships of the many and various uses which in the imagination of its creators the Territorial Force during its very brief existence has already served. In December, 1907, the Secretary of State for War, speaking in Staffordshire, is reported to have given the warning that—
"We may not be able in days to come to depend wholly and absolutely upon our Navy with the completeness of to-day, and should that time arrive, it would be upon the Home Defence Force that we should have to rest our trust."
How on earth the Territorial Army can retrieve a disaster on the high seas is a point for the Government to explain. However, two years ago, in order to reconcile the country to the great changes and sacrifices we were called upon to make for the sake of the new Home Defence Army, it was necessary first to convince public opinion that too much reliance should not be placed upon the Navy, and, moreover, that in the event of any naval failure, the situation could be retrieved by the proposed new Territorial Force.
Two years elapse, and in that interval we see the Regular Army and the Regular Reserve diminished by more than 40,000 men, the Militia abolished, the attempt made to substitute for the reductions in the Regular Reserve a new Force, the Special Reserve, and it is upon the uncertain result of this experiment that the future of the Regular Army depends; finally, the abolition of the Volunteers, and the appearance of the Territorial Army—a Force confined by Act of Parliament to the United Kingdom, but limited in its recruiting area to Great Britain, and, unlike the old Militia which it replaced, incapable of recruitment by compulsion. Then on January 28, 1909, the First Lord of the Admiralty announced that the Navy was to be maintained—
"at such strength as would secure, beyond question or doubt, our shores from invasion and the freedom of the great highway of the sea."
That announcement destroyed for the

395
moment the perilous situation pictured by the Secretary of State for War, which he had met by creating a new purely Home Defence Force but at the expense of the Regular Army reduced.
The view of national defence expounded in 1907 by the Secretary of State for War cannot be reconciled with that held last January by the First Lord of the Admiralty. It is, therefore, not surprising to find the Admiralty and the Army Council at loggerheads over the details of national defence. We know the naval view—namely, that the Navy can prevent the landing of 3,000 men with just as great a certainty as they can prevent the landing of 300,000 men. To their view of invasion the Admiralty has given practical effect as follows. When they took over the charge of our submarine defences, which had been brought at great cost to a pitch of elaborate perfection by the Royal Engineers, they destroyed them all, because from the naval point of view of national defence they were useless. Then at our naval bases, such as Portsmouth and Plymouth and Chatham, the landward forts are maintained by the Army Council for the purpose of defending our great dockyards from attacks coming over land. But in deference to the Admiralty view these forts have been dismantled of their permanent armament. In the end we find the Army Council allotting on mobilisation half-trained units of the Territorial Force to garrison forts from which the fixed armament has been removed in order to resist attacks, which, according to the Admiralty, are impossible. On the other hand, if the Army Council is right and the Admiralty is wrong, then the present condition of the great dockyard towns is an intolerable danger. If the Army Council is right and our great dockyards are likely to be attacked from the land side, then they ought to be made secure. This cannot be done by first depriving the landward forts of their permanent armament and then attempting to defend the whole fortress by a semi-trained field force armed with an antiquated mobile equipment.
Nor is the Territorial Army a mystery to the Admiralty alone. I note with interest but not surprise that distinguished Generals on the active list have arrived at opposite conclusions regarding its use in war. Last October General Baden-Powell lectured at the Royal United Services Institution on "Training for Territorials," with the Secretary of State for
396
War in the chair. The Territorial soldier was held to be beyond all question a First Line man. In view of that fact, the problem considered was how to ensure that the Territorial Infantry should after the inside of a week's work in camp be able to defeat at a moment's warning the very best Continental troops, because it is certain that these are the only description of troops against which the Territorial Army can ever be employed. The solution arrived at was to give the Territorial companies when in camp a course of "battle practice," but to dispense with all other training, no time being available. I understand that "battle practice" means that every man fights his own battle on his own plan. In the new model Army of the Government every man will be his own commanding officer when in action, thus solving the problem of the dearth of officers by providing a positive plethora. But I am not now concerned with the question of officers.
My point is that the Territorial soldier was held by certain distinguished military authorities to be so essentially a First Line man, and required for battle in such a terrible hurry, that he has not even time to learn during his annual training the elements of drill, discipline, and musketry, the practice of such antiquated military details being relegated to odd moments during the non-training period. Then comes the Inspector-General of the Forces, Sir John French, who tells us that—
"The Territorial Army is now the Second Line of the great national Army, and the only difference between the Second Line and the First Line is that whereas the former has to meet the first onslaught of war and is therefore continually employed, the Second Line has to meet the waste of war and to furnish reinforcements after the war has gone on for some time and to begin its training after the war has broken out."
It is clear from these words that Sir John French considers the use of the Territorial Force to be to supply drafts to the Regular Army during the progress of a lengthy campaign, and a lengthy campaign can only take place abroad. This view quite agrees with that expressed by the Secretary of State for War in July, 1906, when the right hon. gentleman said—
"Some of them [the Volunteers or Territorial Army] would have to form that big national Reserve out of which an Army must be fed and expanded when the great emergencies come in a national crisis."

397
But it is for home service only that the Government have enlisted the Territorial Army. They cannot, therefore, send the men abroad without their own consent. For my own part I have always disliked the plan of enlisting men for one service and then, at a moment of national crisis, when refusal is practically impossible, asking them to volunteer for another. Such a form of volunteering contains more than a spice of compulsion. It is well described by that very able exponent of the new model Army of the Government, the Military Correspondent of The Times, in a lecture delivered before the Aldershot Military Society. He says—
"Imagine the Regular Army at grips with a formidable enemy abroad. Imagine fourteen strong Territorial divisions of all arms embodied at home and trained continuously up to the point of efficiency. Imagine an appeal to them to succour the Regular Army in its need. If the Territorial Army should be deaf to that appeal the only resource will be to shut them up in our gaols, for nowhere else will they be safe from their women-kind and from the insults of the infants of the streets."
The Territorial Force describe themselves as Home Guards serving Pro aris et focis. The Army Council think that with the aid of a national crisis they can easily make that motto read Ubique. I infer that the Territorial Force and the Army Council do not exactly understand each other on this most important of points—namely, foreign service for the Second Line Army in place of the Militia abolished. It is true that the Government has very distinctly told the Territorial Army that they are to be our only Second Line and consequently to discharge all the duties of the defunct Militia, the most important of which was the expansion of the Regular Army overseas. It is idle for the Government to expect us to believe that their new model Second Line Army in any way carries out the recommendation of the Royal Commission concerning the expansion of the Regular Army. All they have done for Imperial defence is to reduce the Regular Army and Reserve by 40,000 men, and then to rely on the casual volunteering of men to perform exacting duties from which they have expressly contracted to be free. As a matter of fact, it is impossible for the General Staff or for the Imperial Staff or for any other Staff of honest men to work out even the simplest schemes of expansion of the Army abroad when there is no certainty of the number of regiments and battalions and batteries which will volunteer
398
for foreign service or of the number of men in any one unit who will do so.
It is, of course, from the Volunteers that the Territorial Infantry has been formed. As to their capacity to undertake foreign service, let me quote the opinion of the Director-General of the Territorial Army. In his evidence before the Royal Commission, General Mackinnon was of opinion that—
"The whole of the Volunteers of London could not be relied upon to provide more than two regiments for a foreign war."
I believe that when that view was expressed there were about 35,000 Volunteers in London. An attempt was made in 1900 to establish Volunteer Service Companies —that is, a company in each Regiment who would agree to serve abroad in time of war. But, according to Sir Alfred Turner's evidence before the War Commission, the scheme was abandoned owing mainly to the opposition of the Volunteers themselves. An enrolled Volunteer so long as he was a member of that Force was not allowed by the Volunteer Acts to serve outside Great Britain. Thus he was absolutely protected from every form of compulsory volunteering for service abroad. So long as he served under the Volunteer Act he could never find himself, as the Territorial soldier will find himself, in the position of belonging to a battalion which on parade is called upon by its commanding officer in time of national emergency to volunteer for foreign service, and all men not willing to do so ordered to fall out on the reverse flank. It seems to me that you must restore to the Territorial soldiers the same protection against foreign service which was accorded to the Volunteers by Act of Parliament before recruiting the Second Line by compulsory methods. The Bill places no liability for foreign service upon Territorial soldiers, but it does not confer any immunity similar to that given by the Volunteer Act to members of that Force.
In considering universal compulsory military service for the Territorial Army it is only fair to remember the greatly increased liabilities which must devolve in time of war upon the soldiers of the new Second Line in comparison with those of the Volunteers of the old Third Line. It is true that the peace training of the Territorial soldier is even less exacting

399
than was that of the Volunteers. That is due to a notable discovery recently made by the Army Council—namely, that a few Saturday afternoons, Easter Sunday, Good Friday, and a Bank Holiday or two, with a week-end or so in a seaside camp—in short, precisely the amount of time which patriotic civilians striving to earn their daily bread can spare for military training—will suffice to convert them into soldiers so sure to beat the pick of Continental troops that the Regular Army may be safely reduced and the Militia abolished.
When the Territorial Force was first explained to us we were informed in an Army Memorandum on the military forces in the United Kingdom that—
"The Territorial Force will be one of support and expansion, to be at once embodied when danger threatens, but not likely to be called for till after the expiration of the preliminary period of six months."
This gave rise to what became known as the six months of close time for the Territorial Army. The Secretary of State for War himself endorsed that view when speaking at Workington in July, 1908. He is thus reported—
"It was said that they were only preparing their Force to become operative after six months of the enemy's invasion. No, they had arranged to keep command of the sea in the early days of the war, and they would not allow the Regulars to leave these shores until the Territorials were hardened sufficiently to resist any foe."
But if on the outbreak of hostilities you are to keep the Regular Army, including the Expeditionary Force, at home until the Territorial Force is hardened sufficiently to be sure to beat Continental invaders, you lose indefinitely the power of offensive action on the part of the Regular Army. Again, if the Regular Army should be sent over-seas by any sudden call to double the white garrison in India, to which no Government could be deaf, before the country has absolute confidence in the hardness of the Territorial Force, then the sphere of action of the Fleet must be limited by its retention in home waters as a coastguard. It soon became apparent for the success of the Territorial scheme that this particular feature of the new model Army—namely, its incapacity to take the field until six months after the day it is required, that day being the declaration of war, must be made to vanish. And so it has. The Secretary of
400
State has advised the Government that the Territorial Infantry can be relied upon at a moment's notice to defeat the foreign invader.
The reality of this readiness is a serious issue. It is directly raised by a most important statement on home defence which was made on November 30 last at Cambridge by the Secretary of State for War. It was made in consequence of a debate which had taken place in your Lordships' House. The right hon. gentleman is reported to have said that in the case of invasion—
"the Home Defence Force would be of three kinds. There would be a local force all along the coast for the purpose of delaying and hindering an invading force. Then behind those there would be a swiftly moving central force which would consist of Regulars and Territorials in combination, and next there would be the garrison force. All this had been worked out months ago, and the work of the War Office had passed the stage of being talked about."
We see here the Government and their expert advisers are agreed amongst other matters upon a swiftly-moving central force composed of Regulars and Territorials in combination, acting behind local Territorial forces. I propose to consider only the quantity and quality of the Infantry arm. Of course, as regards the Territorial Artillery they must have a period of close time, because they have neither horses nor ammunition.
The Secretary of State is preparing to crush a possible raid. A raid must be secret and sudden. It cannot be anything else. Its descent would be one of many opening moves in a great game to be simultaneously played by land and sea in many different places, and one of the first tricks would be played for here in Great Britain. This particular trick would be won or lost for what it is worth in less than forty-eight hours. Twenty-four hours to disembark and another twenty-four hours to strike the point aimed at would be all the time the raiders would require to achieve their object.
Now let us first see what Regular Infantry there are available for this central force. The average strength of an Infantry battalion of the Regular Army at home, according to a Return laid on the Table of the House last year, was 580 men. The average number of men in each battalion

401
of under twenty years of age was 247. I read in the last Army Medical Report that—
"Average British recruits are on enlistment the youngest and in the poorest physical condition of those in any civilised Army. They cannot stand work which would not injure well-fed conscripts of twenty years of age."
Since that was written the immaturity of the Line at home has been increased by lowering the standard of age by one year—namely, to seventeen instead of eighteen—by means of enlistment through the Special Reserve. Eliminating all boys and all the unfit, a Regular Infantry battalion at home would not average, after the Indian and foreign service drafts had just gone abroad, more than 300 men for the fighting line. That is to say, a brigade of four battalions would, as regards numbers, represent the equivalent of one battalion at full war strength.
There were in Great Britain by the last Army Annual Return forty-nine battalions of the Line and eight of the Guards—fifty-seven in all. It would not be possible, owing to the many other demands for defence in the rest of the country, to put more than half of the whole Infantry battalions at home into the swiftly moving central force. Taking the strength of a Line battalion for the field at 300 men, and that of a Guards battalion rather more, we should get thirty battalions giving a field strength of less than 10,000 men. I believe the most reliable plan of securing victory in war is to have troops at least equal in quality with those of the enemy and very superior in quantity. If our Infantry is to be equal in quality to that of the invaders you must eliminate boys under twenty. The invasion of this country will not be carried out by cadet corps. But—and this is more important—this central force has not yet been concentrated. The Government, with the full support of the Army Council, propose to begin to concentrate their central force after the enemy has landed. At one time they meant to begin to train their Home Defence Army after war had broken out, but now, at the dictate of convenience, they use it at once and dispense with that training which they formerly said was essential. Pending the concentration of the central force and its subsequent transport to the scene of action—an operation not of hours but days—the enemy has been delayed by local forces all along the coast. In other words—it is better to
402
put these matters plainly—he has been winning a succession of easy victories over hastily collected driblets of our military forces, an inspiring and useful exercise for the invader which must have a disastrous effect on the morale of our Territorial Army. Assuming that it is possible to concentrate and then to convey the central force to the scene of action within forty-eight hours, then we may be able to oppose the invader with 10,000 Regular Infantry before he has attained his objective.
But if we are to be superior in quantity as well as equal in quality we must rely on the enemy not landing more than 8,000 Infantry. You can for the moment bring all these home battalions up to 1,000 men or more apiece, thanks to the Regular Reserve formed by Lord Midleton which the Government have inherited but not created, and which they are proceeding to destroy. You must have time to get the Reservists back to the Colours. Are you justified in assuming that that interval of time will be allowed you? If you admit, as the Government do admit, the possibility of surprise, then you ought to be ready to deal promptly with that situation. If the surprise came when Parliament was not sitting, then constitutionally Parliament must assemble before the Reserves can be called out and the Territorial Army embodied. Under any circumstances, whether Parliament be sitting or not, or whether the Secretary of State for War acts with or without the sanction of Parliament, the Reservists must be summoned back from civil life by letters sent through the post from the different depôts to the men's last address. Every man after receiving his summons and railway warrant must travel to the depôt of his regiment to draw his kit and equipment and for medical inspection. There are plenty of men here in London whose kits are in the north of Scotland or south of Ireland. They must go and get them. After that, if communications were stll open, Reservists must be dispatched from the different depôts to seek their several battalions wherever they might be. Then what of the fighting efficiency of the battalions as the Reservists come flocking in? There will be two or more Reservists, just called back from civil life, in the ranks for every young serving soldier. Battalions so composed can be no match in quality for the battalions which have been trained on a war footing for a considerable time. So much

403
for the Regular Infantry before and during mobilisation.
Now let us consider the Territorial Infantry. First I note that the Army Council by advising the Government that the Territorial Infantry is fit to be used in the swiftly moving central force at a moment's notice flatly contradict the finding of the Norfolk Commission which they emphatically endorsed in 1907. In an Army Memorandum issued in 1907 the following paragraph occurs—
"Military opinion is unanimous in holding that the Militia, Yeomanry, and Volunteers, as at present constituted and serving under existing conditions, are quite unlit to take the field against European troops. This was the view adopted by the Elgin and Norfolk Commissions after taking a mass of evidence."
It may be interesting to refer to the views expressed by two witnesses before the Norfolk Commission—Sir John French and Sir Ian Hamilton. The Inspector-General of the Forces stated, in evidence, that it would be very risky to attempt to meet Continental troops with our Auxiliary Forces, even after they had received a full year's training, which is rather different from a short fortnight's training. The Adjutant-General was then of opinion that six months recruit training and two months of annual training would produce troops which he would prefer to use to relieve Regular battalions in garrisons and coaling stations rather than to trust to in the field.
This opinion completely condemns the Special Reserve, whose annual training is three weeks instead of two months, for the purpose which that force is designed by the Government—namely, as a substitute for the Reserve of the Regular Army. Let me remind the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War of his words in the debate of May 18. The noble Lord then said—
"The only thing you can hope to do is to mobilize your battalions on the peace establishment. You may have a few hundred or a few thousand men over, but, practically speaking, whatever is left over is a negligible quantity."
The present strength of the Regular Reserve is 135,000. The total number of men required for the Expeditionary Force from the Regular Reserve, according to an Army Memorandum of April, 1907, is 85,023, leaving a margin of 50,000 Regular Reservists at home. That is the result of
404
Lord Midleton's Reserve, but the policy of the Government will reduce that Reserve to the negligible quantity described by the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War. Then in place of these 50,000 Regular Reservists reduced you employ Special Reservists, and hence it is quite clear that the Special Reserve is a substitute for the reductions in the Regular Reserve. But the Special Reserve, when the men who were obtained by bounties from the Militia become time-expired, will itself become a negligible quantity. In three years time, not now, if the Expeditionary Force should be sent abroad, then there would be nothing left behind except the unfit from the Reserve and the immature from the Colours. Then we must rely both for Home Defence and for the maintenance of the Army abroad on the Territorial Army.
Under these circumstances it is indeed fortunate that since 1907 the opinion of the Army Council and of the great officers of the Army has entirely changed—I regret that we have never been told the reason—and that Territorial soldiers with no more training than the Volunteers and far less than the Militia can now be relied on to defeat the best of Continental troops. Are the Government prepared to assure us that that which they held to be true of the Volunteer Infantry in 1907 is untrue of the Territorial Infantry in 1909? Are we to believe that the change of name, for there is no change of training, plus an admirable paper organisation, has worked this miracle in efficiency? The Territorial Army do not profess to have time to acquire either drill or discipline. It is impossible to have discipline without the authority of the officers and non-commissioned officers having been fully established by long and constant association. The habit of discipline in a battalion can only be acquired by process of time, and time in the case of the Territorial Force is not available. The fighting value of the Territorial Infantry would, therefore, reside in the superiority of their skill with their rifles, their patriotism, and their courage. I am sure of their patriotism, and I do not doubt their courage any more than I doubt the patriotism and courage and devotion to duty of the men to whom they will be opposed. The difference will be that the invaders are all of them grown men and trained soldiers, and that the large majority of the defenders are neither.

405
On the point of superiority in skill with their rifles over their opponents, let me tell your Lordships the musketry training of the Territorial Infantry. The training of the recruit consists of two parts. The first part is to fire forty rounds, which need not be fired on a rifle range but can be fired in a shooting gallery with Morris tube ammunition, and this, being far more convenient than losing time and money by visits to the rifle range, is the course followed. The time necessary is two afternoons. The second part of the recruit's course is to fire twenty rounds of ball ammunition at distances between 100 and 500 yards. A recruit's course, therefore, consists of forty rounds of Morris tube ammunition which takes two afternoons, and twenty rounds on the rifle range which takes one afternoon—a total recruit's musketry course of three afternoons, necessitating one visit only to the rifle range. The trained Territorial soldier's annual musketry course is divided into three parts. Parts 1 and 2 may be fired in a shooting gallery with Morris tube ammunition. Part 3 is to be fired with ball cartridge, and consists of twenty-three rounds at distances of from 100 to 500 yards. The annual musketry course of the trained Territorial soldier is, therefore, two or three attendances in the shooting gallery and twenty-three rounds on the rifle range to be fired in one day. If the Territorial soldier makes thirty points out of a possible ninety-seven on the day when he fires with ball cartridge on the range he is said to have reached the "qualification standard." I quote the following paragraph from the Musketry Regulations for the Territorial Army—
"An efficient soldier, as regards musketry, is a soldier of the Territorial Army who has reached the 'qualification standard,' or, having failed to reach the standard is certified by his commanding officer to have made at least three visits (including standard test) to an open, miniature cartridge, or thirty yards range, and fired at least fifty round of ball ammunition or their equivalent,"
which is 445 rounds of Morris tube ammunition. Now that paragraph and the words "ball ammunition or their equivalent"—the equivalent being Morris tube ammunition—allow men who have failed to qualify in making an easy score on the range to be classed as "efficient soldiers as regards musketry" by firing a certain number of rounds of toy ammunition out of a service rifle. To ask us to rely for the defence of our country upon the skill of Territorial
406
marksmen who are returned year after year as non-efficient with their rifles would have been an obvious absurdity, so these men can be returned as "efficient soldiers as regards musketry" on the plan and according to the standard I have just explained. A Regular soldier fires an annual musketry course of 225 rounds of ball ammunition. The trained Territorial soldier fires an annual course of twenty-three rounds, with which he never need hit the target and yet can be classed as an efficient soldier as regards musketry. It may be better to have fired twenty-three rounds and missed than never to have fired at all. But that is all that can be said on behalf of this standard of musketry efficiency. I ask the Government whether they will not arrange that during this or the next training at least half the Territorial Infantry, instead of going to a seaside camp, which is pleasant and the mainstay of recruiting, or carrying out "battle practice" with rifles which they cannot use, which is futile, should be put as battalions through the musketry course of the Line, under the supervision of the Musketry Staff of the Regular Army, and publish the results compared with the musketry of the Regular Army. Then, but not till then, the country will know what kind of riflemen the mass of the Territorial Infantry really are.
By the Return of July 7 there are now in the Territorial Infantry 674 officers and 67,087 men who have never fired a recruit's course of musketry. There are 1,805 officers and 53,367 men who have not fired a trained soldier's course. That is a total of 2,479 officers and 120,454 men who have not yet completed their annual musketry course of one afternoon. I also ask if the Territorial Force could not be medically inspected by Army surgeons during the course of their annual training. The Militia on the day of assembly were always inspected by Army surgeons and unfit men discharged. Surely it is not asking too much to be informed if men drawing pay to defend their country are really physically fit for that duty, and how their skill with their weapons compares with the standard of that of Regular troops, for to none other will the Territorial Army ever be opposed. If the result of these two tests was recorded in the next Report of the Inspector-General of the Forces on the Territorial Army, that Report would be of much more practical interest than the one now before us. At present the

407
Territorial Army is 41,371 men below its establishment—that is, below the minimum which we were told was consistent with safety. There are 98,335 non-commissioned officers and men below twenty years of age, and 162,341 men of twenty years of age and over, and out of that number of men 62,506 are serving on a one year engagement.
It is incomprehensible to me, but I know it to be a fact—the Army Council know it to be a fact and they take every advantage of it—that if the Territorial Army can be recruited up to ninety per cent. of its establishment, then public opinion will consider the success of the scheme complete, our military problem solved, and the safety of the Empire assured. I am quite aware that not to be satisfied with mere numbers on paper but to ask for tests simple but searching, such as I have done, is held to be the mark of an unpatriotic and of a narrow mind. I admit that on one point my mind is of the narrowest. I can never consider any military force designed for instant use against a foreign invader save from the point of view of its immediate fighting efficiency. Whatever may be the other purposes served by the Territorial Force we are assured that it stands between the country and compulsory service. Towards this question the attitude of the Government is most obscure. If the Government were genuinely opposed to all forms of compulsion, why were they in such a hurry to destroy those forms of voluntary service which existed amongst our military forces, and which, in spite of many imperfections, none of them incapable of remedy, enabled us to maintain an Army of 300,000 men over-seas during the South African war?
The statement, or rather the threat, contained in the Proclamation to the men of London issued last December that—
"the only alternative to voluntary is compulsory service,"
shows no objection in principle to the adoption of that alternative. It also supplies one of the strongest arguments that can be used to destroy the principle of voluntary enlistment. I cannot myself conceive any better argument for keeping men out of the Territorial Force than telling them that they ought to join in order to save others from the burden of military service. A certain business company lately decided to insist on all their new employées joining the Territorial Army.
408
This decision did not find favour with the leaders of the Labour Party, but the Secretary of State for War, when interrogated by them upon the subject, expressed his approval of the course which had been adopted. Why is compulsion by an individual employer more justifiable than compulsion by the State? The question I ask the Government is, Do they approve of recruiting the Territorial Army firstly by threats of compulsory service if recruits are not to be obtained by voluntary enlistment, and secondly by encouraging compulsion to enlist on the part of individual employers? If they do approve of such a system, surely they must see that they are supporting compulsory methods. If they do not approve, they ought to repudiate at once a recruiting system of this kind, instead of profiting by its results.
The Government started by proclaiming that the whole aim of their new organisation was to bury deep deep down compulsory service. Yet as a matter of fact they are getting nearer and nearer to compulsion every day. For instance, the Secretary of State for War, in addressing the London Rifle Brigade in January last, is thus reported—
"The question increasingly put to him was, 'Why don't you ask Parliament to impose an obligation on all to serve for home defence?' He had sympathy with that question. He thought most people agreed that the slacker, who simply amused himself and did nothing for his country, was a poor creature, and if the time of need came the country would no doubt show what it thought of him. In all probability he would find a short and sharp Act of Parliament passed if war broke out, compelling hint to train himself and do it in some inconvenient and unpleasant part of the country where he would not have the prominence of the undoubted popular esteem which was given to the man who trained himself as a Volunteer for the defence of his native land."
Here the Government express their conviction that when war comes a short and sharp Act of Parliament will be passed applying compulsion to that military organisation with which they have just endowed us. I observe that Sir John French, on March 22, in a speech at West Bromwich, advised all those in favour of compulsory service to support the Territorial Army—
"because if ever their views came to prevail compulsory service could be brought about with the present force by a mere stroke of the pen."
The Government warmly approve of compulsion on the part of the individual

409
employers of labour, although they condemn it on the part of the State. They anticipate a short and sharp Act of Parliament to compel men to serve on emergency in their Territorial organisation. They specially devise a plan which shall bury deep deep down all compulsion, but the plan is yet so ingeniously contrived that by a mere stroke of the pen compulsion can be applied. Yet that stroke of the pen, according to the Secretary of State for War, will destroy the Regular Army. The right hon. gentleman, in introducing the Army Estimates, insisted—
"that a compulsorily-raised Army at home is incompatible with a voluntarily-enlisted foreign service Army."
The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War informed us, in an address on the Territorial Army which he delivered on May 14 at the City Liberal Club, that—
"He thoroughly believed that conscription was the only alternative, because the present scheme was the last word that would be said, and the last that could be done, for the voluntary system."
But the Secretary of State for War has told us that a compulsorily-raised home Army is the destruction of the Regular Army. And, my Lords, the disappearance of the Regular Army is the end of the Empire.
This then is the blind alley into which we have been led by His Majesty's Government after four years of clear thinking about military problems. Absolutely apart from all military organisation I strongly support a universal compulsory system of physical training for both sexes. But that is an entirely different question from the one raised by the Bill now before us. If the time has really come when perforce for the defence of our homes we must rely, like Continental nations, on universal compulsory military service, then we must also perforce adopt Continental methods. If not, we must assume that we can obtain better results by training eighteen-year-old boys for four months than Continental Powers secure by training twenty-year-old men for two years. Any increase in the training period beyond four months would entail an expenditure which must cripple the Regular Army, and might even affect our spending power on the Navy.
I do not admit that the failure of the Special Reserve and of the Territorial
410
Army must entail resort to compulsion. There is an alternative. The Secretary of State for War, in introducing the Army Estimates, said—
"The old Auxiliary Forces cost £4,400,000. The Special Reserve and Territorial Army may cost £4,900,000, but, on the other hand, the Regulars will be cheaper."
And so they ought to be, for there are 40,000 less. Take these five millions now wasted on the Territorial Army and the Special Reserve—wasted because no adequate return is obtained in national safety—spend these five millions on the Regular Army in keeping part of the Army always on a war footing, in obtaining a sufficient supply of officers, in increasing your Regular Reserve, and in being more generous in the way of pensions to the men who have been invalided and have lost their health in the service of their country. Then you will indeed have made a substantial addition to our national defences.
The First Sea Lord told us eighteen months ago to—
"sleep quiet in our beds and not be disturbed by those bogies of invasion which are being periodically resuscitated by all sorts of Leagues."
My own state of mind as regards the bogies referred to by the First Sea Lord is much the same as that of the man who said he did not believe in ghosts but was always afraid of them. I do not believe in "bolts from the blue," but I am afraid of them. Never would I be unprepared to meet them, and never would I meet them on the lines proposed by the Government, lines which concede initial success to the raider and entail great subsequent slaughter of patriotic but untrained men in desperate attempts, which may or may not be successful, to smother quality by quantity. In my opinion there is but one method of dealing swiftly and successfully with raids—namely, to keep part of the Regular Army always on a war footing, that is to say, ready for instant action, without calling up a single officer, man, horse, or gun from any Reserve. A force of that kind was in process of formation by His Majesty's late Government, but was at once abandoned by the present Government.
We read in the last Report of the Inspector-General of the Forces that some of the factors acting adversely to an entirely

411
satisfactory training of the Infantry of the Regular Army are—

(a) Numerical weakness of many of the companies, especially in the early part of the training season.

(b) The deficiency of subaltern officers in many units during company training often owing to their absence on other duties, such as Mounted Infantry, signalling, musketry, etc.

The men are not there. The Officers are absent employed on duties away from their regiments. The surprise, admitted to be possible by the Government, comes, and what then? Mobilisation ensues, and we are not allowed to know anything about mobilisation. The time has undoubtedly come when the choice must be made between an increase of our Regular Forces, such as I have indicated, and universal compulsory service, but on the Continental method. We are not, however, a Continental country, but an island; and I, for my own part, believe you will find it sounder, more efficacious, and certainly in the end more economical, to pay for the skilled labour you require for a Regular Army with a Regular Reserve sufficient to set your minds at rest concerning national defence, rather than to attempt universal service.
I appeal to the Government to abandon ambiguities and to tell us plainly and once and for all what is the use of the Territorial Army. Is it to compensate us for maritime failure? Is it a mere paper inscription of the names of all sorts and conditions of men ready to assemble on mobilisation and commence systematic training for war with the units on whose rolls their names are borne? Is it an Army upon which we must rely to defeat at a moment's notice the best of Continental troops who have effected a surprise landing upon our shores? Is it a big national Reserve out of which to supply the waste of war for the Regular Army serving over-seas? All these uses have been assigned to the Territorial Army by the Secretary of State for War in speeches made in his place in Parliament, on public platforms, and in the many Memoranda issued from the War Office on military matters.
I cannot give my vote for the Bill introduced by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, because I agree with the Secretary of State for War that a compulsorily-raised home service Army is incompatible with a foreign service Army on a voluntary basis. I cannot follow the noble Duke into the Lobby, because that would be to give a vote
412
in favour of a Territorial Army, to which, in my opinion, for the reasons I have given, it is hopeless to look for the solution of the problem of defence insular and Imperial. But immediate action is required. I agree with the view expressed by Mr. Arnold-Forster in the last book he ever published, that our first duty is to strengthen the Navy; our second duty is to strengthen the Army; the rest may wait.
VISCOUNT HARDINGE: My Lords, I desire to associate myself with the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, who, in introducing this Bill has, in my opinion, shown the necessity of having the Territorial Army far more efficient than it is at the present day for the purpose for which it has been formed—namely, national defence. He has, I think, very clearly proved that this can only be done by universal service in some form, thereby putting the military fabric of this country on a sounder basis than it has ever been before. If there is one man in England at present who may be regarded as best qualified to speak with authority on military questions, that man undoubtedly is the noble and gallant Field-Marshal Lord Roberts. The scheme as set forth in this Bill will enable the people of this country to concentrate their opinion and realise the nature of the proposals. When the principles of the Bill are better understood, I have little fear as to what the verdict of the people will be, for I am not one of those who believe that the Englishman of the present day is lacking in Imperial instincts. I have always contended, in fact felt quite sure, that if some great leader would come forward and teach the people that the first duty of an Englishman is to learn to defend his country, whilst to shirk this duty is to jeopardise its existence, such an appeal would be readily responded to by the nation as a whole. Time will prove whether I am right or not in this contention.
My excuse for taking part in the debate is that I was one of the original members of the National Service League, and therefore cannot be regarded as a recent convert to the question of universal service. Had I not been already convinced, I think, after hearing the very sound arguments laid before us by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, and also by Lord Milner, my conversion on this occasion would have been complete. Having also been connected

413
with His Majesty's Forces for over thirty-two years, I know only too well what the opinions of the officers of the Army are on this question. They are of opinion that unless the people are taught to realise the necessity of universal service, the security of this country cannot be assured.
What possible objection can be urged against the principle that every able-bodied man shall be called upon, not only throughout the United Kingdom, but throughout the Empire, to fulfil the first and most fundamental duty of citizenship—that of the defence of his country? At the present time I regret to think it is a matter of individual goodwill rather than one of universal sacrifice. It has often been mentioned that if we had universal service recruits for the Regular Army would not be forthcoming. The Spectator company showed direct proof against that argument. I contend that if we had universal service we should get far better noncommissioned officers and officers than we have ever had before, and in cases of emergency we should be able to put our hands upon a far larger number of men for active service abroad than we have ever been able to before. Under our present voluntary system can anyone say that we are getting the pick of the manhood of the nation. Can anyone believe, too, that if we had had universal service in this country prior to the South African war we should have lost so many valuable lives and so much money? In my opinion the war would probably never have taken place.
There is another very important aspect of the case which has been referred to by a member of the Episcopal Bench. The moral welfare of the nation would undoubtedly be greatly improved and there would be produced qualities of discipline, self-control, and obedience, whilst at the same time the physique and the health of the nation would be improved. When the people of this country realise the many hard facts that have been adduced in the discussion in your Lordships' House, I believe they will recognise the advantages of compulsory service and thereby dispel the argument that has often been used that the people of this country would not stand it. A more unpatriotic sentiment was never uttered, and to my mind it is most unjust, for the question has never been put to them.
What, then, is the alternative to compul-
414
sory service for home defence? I suppose the answer would be the present Territorial Army. But only last week the Under-Secretary of State for War said that at the present time it was not capable of meeting an invasion, but was likely to be so at some future date. If that is so I venture to think that the proposal which the noble Duke, myself, and others brought forward about eighteen months ago in your Lordships' House—that until the Territorial Army actually came into being, it was folly to abolish the Militia— was a legitimate one. It is quite evident, from the War Office Return laid on the Table of your Lordships' House, that the main object for which the Militia were done away with and transferred to the First Line under the name of the Special Reserve was to make the people believe that there are more trained men in the country available for active service than there had ever been before. Therefore I was not in the least surprised when on putting a Question a month ago to the Under-Secretary of State for War with regard to the Expeditionary Force, he was obliged to give me an evasive answer on the plea of public interests. When tactics such as these are pursued it is, in my opinion, nothing more or less than endeavouring by a juggling of figures to hoodwink the people of this country as to the real state of affairs. I think that is one of the strongest arguments in favour of compulsory service. My Lords, I shall have great pleasure in supporting the Bill brought forward by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal.
LORD ELLENBOROUGH: My Lords, the noble Earl who leads the House referred to a speech made by Lord Lyndhurst in this House about fifty years ago. I well recollect reading that speech and the interest that it caused right through the country. He was an old man of eighty-seven, and his "Væ victis" speech, as it was called, was quoted and re-quoted on every platform and by every paper in the country. That scare of 1859 did one great thing for Great Britain. It gave us the Channel Fleet and it gave us the Volunteers. I hope that this scare will not pass away until it has left us definitely with a two-European Power Standard for the Navy and universal service for the Home Army.
The Under-Secretary of State for War remarked yesterday that no authoritative statement had been made on the naval

415
question and of the view of the Navy in this House. I think it would be very difficult to get an authoritative statement. In the first place, there is no real representative of the Admiralty in this House. There is no one, failing the Master of the Horse, to represent the Government, and he is so busy in attending to matters connected with the performance of his Court and other duties that he cannot do it thoroughly. No Member of this House has ever commanded a Fleet, and I believe only one Member of this House has ever commanded a battleship. I refer to the Marquess of Bristol, who I understand does not intend to address the House to-night. When this House has been reformed, and all First Sea Lords and Admirals who have commanded our chief Fleets in home waters are made Life Peers on ceasing to hold office or while holding office, then this difficulty will, as a matter of course, be removed.
I have studied the question of invasion for years. My first acquaintance with the embarkation and disembarkation of troops was in bringing our Army back from the Crimea. I have been First Lieutenant of two troopships, and have been personally responsible for the details of the embarkation and disembarkation of thousands of men. Lord Lucas declares that the enemy's coast must be our frontier. I hope that it may be so, but we must recollect that underwater warfare has revolutionised naval tactics. If we keep our battleships close to the enemy's coasts they will run a great risk of being sunk by mines and torpedoes. If we had a day or two of ill-luck, and these tactics were adopted, the command of the sea might pass away from us. If an enemy could hold the North Sea for four or five days it would be a case of Good-bye England. It would be of little use to recover the command of the North Sea after a large force had landed in this country. Look at the islands with which the coast is studded from Jutland to the mouth of the Scheldt, and see how far superior it is for strategical and embarkation purposes than the French coast which is opposite the Channel. A great deal of our success over the French has been due to that magnificent natural harbour behind the Isle of Wight, for which the French have no equivalent. Torpedo vessels can pass along nearly the whole of the German and Dutch coasts, issue from whence they please, and it would be impossible to
416
know at which particular point of the coast they might be assembling. If an enemy's fleet got into the open sea our natural course would be to follow it, if necessary, across the Atlantic and strike it wherever we could. If it evaded us, which is quite possible—our fleets do miss one another at naval manœuvres, and we may miss an enemy's fleet in time of war—we shall have no second fleet to beat the enemy in the North Sea as we are giving up the two-Power standard. We should therefore remain for some days open to invasion. If to avoid this we kept our Fleet in home waters, the enemy's ships in the Atlantic would intercept our food supplies and in a fortnight high prices and famine would probably ensue.
There are very exaggerated ideas about the amount of transport that troops require for a journey. One ton per man and sufficient deck space for the man to lie down in is all that the Board of Trade allow passengers between Hamburg and the Thames. As troops are under discipline they would require even less. I do not think an enemy would bring many stores with him except ammunition and harness for his artillery. Horses, provisions, and wagons are to be found by the thousand in England. Any moderate-sized farm could feed an enemy's regiment for a day or two. There would be sheep and oxen, potatoes and roots for the rank and file, and ducks, turkeys and geese for the officers. The half a dozen different patterns of carts and wagons found about our farms would be soon organised, classified, and put into their respective categories. The difficulty of embarking and disembarking increases more in proportion than the size of an army. I think it would be five times as difficult to bring 100,000 men across as to bring 50,000. We made an experiment in disembarking troops two or three years ago at Clacton-on-Sea. That was our first attempt to disembark a trained army on the beach, and you can draw no conclusion from it unless such an experiment is repeated sufficiently often for the men to learn their work. Then the transports were at anchor all night, and it was said that that was a very dangerous position. So it was, but in war they would probably have been run ashore to avoid being sunk by torpedo boats. In a war the loser would have to pay for the transports; therefore a country risking the invasion of England might risk a great deal with the

417
idea that we might have to pay for those transports.
The fact that seventy Admirals belong to the National Service League is, I think, sufficient proof that some of them believe invasion to be possible. I will touch on one non-nautical matter. It has been asked where we are to get officers for this force? If we have compulsion a large number of the men who otherwise would have to serve in the ranks will prefer serving as officers, and the well-educated and well-to-do parents in this country will send their sons to the officers' training college at the University. When once you have the power to make them serve in the ranks you will get a considerable rise in the number and in the standard of officers. I was well acquainted with the French Army many years ago. Before 1870 I met them on service in China, and saw them at several places when my ship was on the coast of Mexico when war was proceeding on that shore. Before 1870 conscription was avoided by a money payment of about £60, and the result of that was that there were very few officers in the French Army belonging to what we call in England the well-to-do, well-educated classes. After the Republic was established the French proceeded to democratise the Army, and insisted upon universal service regardless of the size of the purse. They made all youths liable to conscription on reaching a certain age. Many of the sons of the educated classes preferred to enter the French Army as officers, a thing that had not happened before, and the result is that the French Army is very much better officered than it was in the time of the Second Empire. It has been said that we are putting an intolerable burden on the shoulders of the people liable to universal service. It may be heavy, but it is lighter than the yoke of the foreigner. I hope that this debate and the Division which will shortly take place will do much towards advancing public opinion in the direction of compulsory service.
THE EARL OF MAYO: My Lords, what we have to vote upon to-night is the noble Duke's Amendment. It is a very clever piece of political strategy which does not commend itself to my ideas with regard to this great question. I do not know whether it will commend itself to the country, but I am certain it does not com-
418
mend itself to a great many noble Lords in this House. At no period in our history were the doings of this House so carefully watched as they are now. Everybody is asking, "What will the House of Lords do?" And in view of that I take very strong exception to the Amendment proposed by the Duke of Northumberland. This House is quite capable of voting, yea or nay, upon a Bill of this sort, and not on a Resolution which practically sidetracks the gallant Field-Marshal's Bill.
I also take exception to the Amendment on the ground that it puts us into the Lobby with the present Government. I would like to remind the noble Duke of what he said about the Secretary of State for War at the end of his speech, when he referred to Mr. Haldane in no unmeasured terms. He said—
"It was absurd to say that his Motion was a vote of confidence in Mr. Haldane and his military advisers. He did not believe in Mr. Haldane or any of his works. But their Lordships passed the Territorial Army Bill, and although he was a thorough disbeliever in the system he felt that the Government had a right to ask that it should have a fair trial. He protested that the last thing he would think of doing would be to move a vote of confidence in the Government."
But the noble Duke asks us to-day to go into the Lobby with the Government who are supporting Mr. Haldane's scheme, and I take exception to that. I do not wish to be a passenger in the Government's boat, or to take an oar and help row the boat even for a short while. Therefore I shall not give my vote for the noble Duke's Resolution.
But the question is a much larger one than one of momentary political expediency. Do we think it necessary, in the face of the enormous armaments which the Powers of Europe are now creating, especially one Power, to have compulsory military training or a voluntary system? This Bill has been called by the noble Lord the Under-Secretary for War conscription. It is not conscription. Conscription is when a man is forced to become a soldier, and also forced to leave the country and fight in a foreign land. That is just the difference between Lord Roberts's Bill and conscription. This Bill is not conscription; it is, as the noble Lord will admit, compulsory military training. I noticed that the Leader of the Opposition, Lord Lansdowne, rather advocated that every youth

419
in a school should be trained to hold himself up straight and to shoot with a rifle. That is something to have gained from my noble leader, who is going to vote for the noble Duke's Resolution.
When the critics begin to attack the noble and gallant Field-Marshal's Bill they attack it in detail. That is done to every Bill, and when it becomes an Act we are then told that a coach and four can be driven through it. But the critics take it for granted that we are to swallow the whole Bill and nothing but the Bill. There are other stages at which the critics of the Bill can bring in any Amendments they think fit. The principle of compulsory military training, not conscription, is one that no one need be afraid to put before the rising generation of this country, the young men who will govern and fight for their country in the future. I will make one remark upon the criticism of Lord Midleton, who said in the debate yesterday—
"He submitted that it was not sufficient to prove that this system was useful or advantageous. All the facts as to the situation in which we found ourselves in the late war were well known to the noble Earl when he became Commander-in-Chief, and he could not help asking what had occurred since the noble Earl vacated the post in the last five years to make it necessary to adopt this great change."
What has occurred? Lord Lansdowne himself admitted that the two-Power standard had been given up. And the noble Lords in office now and the Prime Minister have admitted that the armaments of one great Power have advanced much more quickly than we ever gave them credit for. Therefore the situation has completely changed. That change has taken place since the noble and gallant Field-Marshal was Commander-in-Chief of the Army; hence the reason for bringing forward this measure.
With regard to Ireland, I know my country pretty well. Ireland has been treated separately with regard to other measures, and with regard to this she will have to be treated in a separate manner if you impose compulsory military training upon her. There is that difficulty, but I set off against that the extreme popularity of the Yeomanry both in the North and South of Ireland. The difficulties that have been put forward and used as arguments against Lord Roberts's Bill are not so insurmountable as one imagines. I
420
would like to say a word on what the noble Lord on the Front Bench said with regard to the voluntary system killing the power of the Regular Army to go and fight in a foreign country. Lord Lucas said—
"The noble and gallant Field-Marshal had quoted the experience of this country during the long period which followed the French Revolution but had ignored the earlier experiences of the Army during the same war. During the period before Trafalgar there was what was called 'an ignominious panic of invasion.' A parallel of the system which was now advocated was then in force."
The noble Lord, I suppose, has read history. Let me remind him that there was nothing ignominious about the panic. It was a very serious question. On October 2, 1804, Napoleon had assembled 160,000 men at Boulogne, with 10,000 horses and a flotilla of vessels and 17,000 sailors, to invade England. A really serious crisis had arisen.
LORD LUCAS: They are not my words; they are Mr. Hallam's.
THE EARL OF MAYO: Yes, but you quoted those words in order to support the argument that if we went in for strong home defence the Regular Army could not be detached to go abroad. But there is no analogy in the situation whatever. I do not care a brass farthing what Hallam said. I only give the facts quoted in history. I cannot see why Lord Lucas mentioned that very great national danger. If there had been fine weather these flat-bottomed boats might very easily have got across. What happened? Trafalgar came. Napoleon felt that he had no power to protect his troops coming over, and then came the battle of Austerlitz. Then we were quite free from the terrible force at Boulogne, and our Army was free. I take exception to the noble Lord reading history in the way he did. There was a real danger then and that is why the Volunteer movement of those times took place. The people could almost see the Frenchmen on the opposite side. I will not give my vote to the Duke of Northumberland's Resolution, but shall vote for the principle of the Bill. I admit that the Bill is open to criticism, but I should not be the least afraid, and a great many on this side are with me, to go to public meetings in this country and say that I consider a situation has arisen on the Continent, admitted by both political Parties, which would justify compulsory military training in this country.

421
I admit that a little blow was given to the scheme in regard to Ireland and that special arrangements would have to be made in regard to that country. But we in Ireland do not want to be invaded any more than you in this country do. There are plenty of very loyal people over there like there are here. You hear a great deal of irresponsible talk, and, I am sorry to say, what is called disloyal talk, but when the crisis comes there will be no difficulty. An illustration is given by the north and south Yeomanry in Ireland; they were, at first, laughed at but they have been a great success. I came here with an open mind, but I shall not vote for the Duke of Northumberland's Resolution. I think it is not a right way of dealing with the matter, and I shall, as I have said, vote for the principle embodied in the Bill.
LORD RAGLAN: My Lords, the noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland, said this was an entirely new departure. I venture to say that this is nothing like a new departure. Compulsory service for the defence of this land has been the law ever since there was a law. It is at this moment in force, although noble Lords opposed to this system always conveniently forget it, and it would only require the omission of a certain Act from the Expiring Acts Continuance Bill to put the ballot once more into force.
In asking the House to affirm this principle, we are not bringing any new departure before your Lordships, or springing upon the country any system to which they have not hitherto been accustomed. As recently as the year 1831, which, after all, is within the recollection of many members of your Lordships' House, the Militia was composed entirely of balloted men. Therefore the fact that compulsory service was in existence a comparatively short time ago proves that this is no new departure.
There are one or two points to which I regret the noble Duke should have alluded. One is the extraordinary line he took up with regard to the deteriorating influence of soldiering on those people who are called upon to do it. If the noble Duke was serious in regard to that it is the very strongest possible argument against having any military force at all. That deteriorating influence would affect men serving voluntarily equally as much as it would
422
influence men serving compulsorily, and therefore these deteriorating influences must be having a very serious effect upon those men who are now in the Territorial Forces of the King. I think that the noble Duke, when be comes to think over and to read the words he has spoken, will be ashamed of them, and will not attempt ever to use that argument again.
Another point to which the noble Duke alluded was that of passive resistance. There are plenty of ways of dealing with the passive resister. There are many duties connected with an army which can be performed with perfect safety by any man who objects to shedding blood. He can join the Medical Corps or the Army Service Corps. The number of passive resisters, I assume, will not be very great, and there would be very little difficulty in dealing with them. One other point which has been brought up repeatedly in this debate is the question of the drill of boys at school. The noble Duke suggested that it was a great pity the National Service League did not confine themselves to advocating the drill of boys at school. The noble Earl opposite devoted a large portion of his speech to advocating that subject, and even the noble Earl, Lord Meath, devoted the greater part of his speech to that particular subject. I am very anxious about this point, because it is one of a series of continual and repeated attempts to sidetrack the National Service League. The object of the National Service League, the object of our agitation and of this Bill, is to provide the country as far as possible with a military force which is capable of defending it. I entirely deny the possibility of doing one atom towards producing a military force of any description by drilling little boys at school whom you lose sight of at fourteen years of age. Then again, drill is not the extraordinary and abstruse kind of thing people seem to imagine. I would undertake myself, having had some considerable experience of soldiering, to take any ten men out of the street and to teach them within ten days or a fortnight amply sufficient drill to enable them to take their place in any well-organised force—that is, as far as drill is concerned. Personally, I do not consider accuracy of drill is everything. It is something, but it is not in itself discipline. Discipline is an essential to an armed force, and discipline can only be obtained by mutual training. That a boy drilled at school by an instructor five or six years ago, when drill may be

423
very different from now, would be an efficient substitute in any way for a trained soldier I entirely deny.
The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War made a very interesting, and, from his point of view, very admirable, speech with regard to our proposals. He dissected our subject into little pieces, picked a great many holes in it, and argued that forces trained as we suggest would be absolutely useless for the defence of the country. He said that men after four months preliminary drill would be no use at all. If that is so then the noble Lord is bound to deduct the whole of his Territorial Force, because most of them have not done anything approaching four months drill. We arrive at this extraordinary position from the noble Lord's speech, that 500,000 men who have done four months drill to start with, and will do a fortnight for two or three years, are not sufficiently well trained to defeat an enemy, whereas 250,000 men trained for a fortnight a year are. That is perfectly absurd on the face of it, and only shows to what shifts the noble Lord was driven to find fault with our scheme.
There is one other point to which the noble Lord drew attention. He jeered at us for reducing our million men to 300,000. I should like to point out to the noble Lord that the Secretary of State of War reduced his 900,000 men to 300,000 men, whom he has not got. The noble Lord who spoke afterwards pointed out to the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War that in our scheme we should have something approaching a million and a half of men who at least would have received considerably more training than the 250,000 men in the Territorial Army. The noble Lord the Under-Secretary made one most excellent pronouncement, for which I thank him. He laid down in the clearest and most unmistakable manner that the truest form of defence was to be in a position to take the offensive. The noble Lord then proceeded to point those remarks with certain facts and fancies taken from the old French war. He said that in the old French war the nation spent very vast efforts and a considerable sum of money in raising local forces for local defence, and that that had not only done no great good to the country, but had prevented the Regular Army from being sufficiently recruited to enable it to carry on its work across the seas. He also quoted
424
the words of Mr. Windham. I take it that the noble Lord has not got a very large amount of time for reading, but I would most earnestly commend him to read the Parliamentary debates that took place in the early years of the last century. The complaint of Mr. Windham and his party was not that the Government had reformed this or that, or done too much or done too little. What they said was—
"Not only have you failed to raise an Army such as the country requires, but you have taken the most effectual possible steps to prevent that Army being raised."
What was it they did? The Government went half-heartedly into the question of national defence. They thought they were going to effect national defence on a voluntary system. They had their Regular Army, the Regular Militia, whom they kept up by the ballot to a certain fixed figure, generally between 60,000 and 80,000, and they thought they would encourage the formation of an immense force of Volunteers. Those Volunteers arrived at this pitch. They clamoured continually for more money, they refused to do the very smallest modicum of training, and they absorbed the entire available manhood of the nation. It was only when the country frankly accepted the view of personal and universal liability for service by raising the Local Militia and compelling everybody to serve in it that they were enabled to raise a sufficient Army to make a respectable appearance on the continent of Europe. It was only when that was done, when the Volunteers practically disappeared in the formation of Local Militia, that we were enabled to produce a sufficient Army to make an effectual diversion in a European conflict.
There is one point which has been more than once alluded to. We are told that this is going to interfere with the Army and with the Navy. I wish to echo most emphatically what has fallen from many friends of the movement that our chief object in these proposals is to free the hands of the Regular Army and of the Navy. We all know, and His Majesty's Government have said so over and over again, that such is the state of our military forces that the whole of our Regular Army must be tied to these shores for an indefinite period in the event of a war. I think very possibly a large portion of our Navy will be in the same position. What does that

425
mean? Imagine a war declared. The Government of the day may be very strong. Well, I have sat a great many years in this House, and my experience is that as Governments get more strong so they get more timorous. The country will practically have no respectable local force for defence. Very possibly political pressure will be brought upon the Government of the day not only to send no Army abroad or any troops abroad, but to keep the Navy within sight of these shores. Every watering place around the coast will be clamouring to have something it can see in the shape of a fleet. The Government may be strong, but it will find it very difficult to resist pressure of that sort, and I cannot help thinking that what you will see will be a sort of wild attempt at stringing over a large stretch of coast little wretched weak squadrons trying to defend the country everywhere and being unable really to defend it anywhere. So strongly is this felt by naval officers that the National Service League includes among its numbers over seventy flag officers of the Navy. I think that is a very strong point.
The noble Earl the Leader of the House alluded to the fact that the naval advisers of His Majesty's Government had never asked for compulsory service in any shape or form. I dare say that is the case. I do not know that naval officers in the present state of things are likely to be very free with their advice on any important subject, but every naval officer of any standing has most strongly felt the absolute necessity of compulsory service for the Army in order to free the Navy. It is a matter that admits of no doubt whatever. I can assure the noble Earl that every naval officer I have ever spoken to, unless he happened to be for the moment inside the Admiralty, was even more strongly in favour of a scheme of this description than any soldier I have ever come across.
There is a point with regard to the Territorial Army which I think has not been touched upon in this debate, and about which I myself feel very strongly. It is the danger, I think I can say the absolutely certainty, of the embodiment of the Territorial Force being put off until it is too late. I have a memory. I can remember nine years back. There was a war going on in South Africa. The country was in a state of very considerable
426
—I will not say panic, because that is a word we are not allowed to use—but of very considerable uneasiness with regard to its armed forces and its state of protection in the event of further complications. The Volunteers as they then existed were asked to do a month's training. They refused. I do not blame those men for refusing. They said it was impossible for them to carry out that month's training. His Majesty's Government, a strong Government with a large majority in both Houses of Parliament, with the country thoroughly behind them clamouring to have its military forces put in order, were afraid to insist upon any portion of the force going out and doing a month's training. If the Government under those circumstances were afraid, how will any Government in the future be able to deal with the Territorial Force? Necessarily the same thing will happen. The Territorial embodiment will be considered advisable by the military advisers of the Crown, the Government of the day will send for the commanding officers of the Territorial Force and say, "We consider it necessary to embody you at once." Everyone will immediately begin to make excuse. They will say, "Our men cannot do it, they cannot give up their situations." The result will be that the embodiment of the Territorial Force will be put off to the very last possible moment, and the famous six months training, of which we have heard so much, will under no circumstances take place.
The Under-Secretary of State for War also alluded to Mr. Cardwell's scheme. I would like to remind the noble Lord that one of the most fundamental principles of the whole of that scheme was the revival of the ballot for the Militia. It was dropped and it knocked the bottom out of the scheme. When one of the greatest War Ministries we have ever had set to work to reorganise the forces of the Crown one of the first points which he considered absolutely essential was the filling up of the Militia Forces for home defence by compulsory service.
The Secretary for Scotland is the only person I have ever come across in any class who says that it is not the duty of an able-bodied man to defend his country. The noble Lord is the only man I have ever heard of who has said that. He practically said that it was not a particular duty

427
of a man to defend his country. He used the expression "an assumed duty." I will leave the noble Lord on that lofty eminence in a minority of one, except to add one word. The noble Lord says invasion is impossible. Then why does he belong to a Government which keeps up the Territorial Army? Why spend money on a Territorial Army? Why not disband the Territorial Army, divide the money between the Regular Army and the Navy, and so save money which, if he is correct, can only be spent on an unnecessary luxury?
Then as to the Navy I quite agree with the sentiment that the Navy is the only thing that, under God's good providence, defends this country. How long is the Navy going to be in a position to defend this country? Only to-day, for all I know to the contrary, an airship may have crossed from Calais to Dover. You may say that is a toy. The first locomotive was a toy, and the first steamship was a toy. It may be a toy now; it may be a toy for six months, for one year, or for five years, but sooner or later it will cease to be a toy; and when dirigible airships are able to cross the seas what is the value of a Navy? That is a point on which I feel very strongly. At any moment your great Dreadnoughts may become, I will not say useless, but their value may be enormously depreciated. The moment that occurs this country ceases to be an island and becomes, for all practical purposes, a Continental nation.
There are many of your Lordships who have seen war; there are many who have seen a great deal of war; but there are not many of your Lordships who have seen a Continental war. We all know that war is a most appalling thing. I suppose war is one of the most awful things that can befall a nation, but we in this country know nothing about war. There is hardly an inhabitant of a Continental country who cannot remember, or at any rate whose grandfather cannot tell him of, the time when his country was overrun by a foreign foe. Those people know what war really means. Nobody on the Continent of Europe has to walk more than a certain number of miles to see a frontier, and to see on the other side of the frontier, men in a strange uniform, speaking a different language, and possibly potential enemies of his country. We have not
428
that here, and the people of this country have forgotten to all intents and purposes what war is like. War is a horrible thing even for a victorious army, but for that army it has its compensations in the fact of the glory and success of their cause. To the defeated army war is a much more horrible thing, although they may have the consolation of having done their duty and struggled against impossible odds. To the inhabitants of a country in which war takes place there are no words in our language that can adequately convey the appalling results. The Englishman is the one man in the whole of Europe who cannot defend his hearth and home, his wife and children, against a foreign foe; he is the only male creature in Europe that cannot do it. Not only can he not do it, but, according to the laws of warfare, if he attempts to do it he will be shot down by the foreign foe. It is because I feel so strongly the appalling results of even a temporarily successful raid that I urge most strongly on your Lordships that the moment has come when this country should take up the same burden that lies on every other country in the world.
VISCOUNT HAMPDEN: My Lords, being an absolutely convinced believer in the necessity of some form of compulsion for home defence, I feel it my duty to say a few words in support of the principles of this Bill. I regret very much that I cannot follow the lead of the noble Marquess who told us that it would not be either to the credit of this House or of the country to vote for the Bill. I believe that this measure, or some such measure, would be for the good of the country. I wish, first of all, to approach this measure entirely from a military point of view. I think that most of your Lordships will agree with me that from military and naval questions Party element should be, if possible, eliminated. I do not lay any claim to expert opinion, but I have for a certain number of years served in the Regular Army both regimentally and on the Staff, and I have also been in the Volunteers, the Militia, and the Yeomanry, and for a short time in the Australian Horse, and I am now on the Staff of the Territorial Army. Therefore I think I may claim that at any rate I ought to have some military knowledge.
The first thing we have to remember is that this problem of national service cannot

429
be viewed by itself. We must take it in conjunction with all the difficult naval and military problems that are before the nation to-day. The first question we ought to ask ourselves is what are the duties of our sea and land forces. I think the answer is a very simple one. A short time ago we were given an excellent and concise description of our foreign policy. The duty of our land and sea forces is to make it absolutely certain that that policy can be carried out. I do not think that in present circumstances this result could be arrived at. The groundwork of the whole system is that we should be strong at our heart; that the heart of the Empire should be absolutely secure. Without that no schemes of defence are really sound. We hear a great deal in these days of Imperial general staffs and Imperial armies. I believe thoroughly in such things, but we are beginning at the wrong end. It is no good making your arms and your legs strong if the heart is not strong. You must begin at the right spot, and I believe that home defence is the groundwork of the whole thing. I notice that the same argument was used by the noble Lord the Under-Secretary for War, but with the difference that we arrive at exactly opposite conclusions. He thinks that by having a really strong home defence we kill our powers of offence. I think, on the contrary, that by having a really strong home defence we free our Fleets and allow our Expeditionary Force to be sent abroad.
There is no question that the first line of defence is our Navy, but I would rather describe the Navy as the first line of Imperial defence than the first line of national defence. I think that the power which would be given to the Navy to be able to strike hard and to strike quickly would be a far greater asset than a mere increase of Dreadnoughts. It would be far better, and the interests of the peace of the world would be further increased by giving this power to our Navy. If other nations realised that we were able to use the instrument of our Navy in such a way the prospect of peace would be much greater. There is only one safe and sound way to insure the security of our homes and that is by personal sacrifice and personal service. I do not believe that is possible under a voluntary system. I understand that the position of noble Lords opposite is that a period of six months is going to be allowed us to train our Home Army on war being
430
declared. Of course that may be a good argument from a political point of view, but from a military point of view it is not an argument at all. It is simply an impossibility. The noble Viscount, Lord Midleton, told us we should be taking a great responsibility if we passed this Bill against the opinion of the trusted advisers of His Majesty's Government, and he went on to say that if the Government told him, on the authority of their military advisers, that there was no prospect of meeting the needs of the situation under a voluntary system he would be prepared to vote for the Bill. A short time before he had described the position of affairs in 1900. He said the Expeditionary Force was then out of the country, and he added—
"It would be no indiscretion on my part if I told you that my military advisers informed me that the position in this country was highly dangerous."
Why should we require any further information from the military advisers? Is the position in this country in the event of war any better to-day than it was ten years ago? The position in 1900 was highly dangerous, and if our Expeditionary Force were away from this country to-day the position would be even worse.
The noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland, said "Why don't you find out what the opinion of the people is?" Why should the people wish for national service? The leader of neither Party takes it up. Why should they wish to serve if they are not told they ought to serve? We often hear that there is an analogy between sport and war. We have had a very interesting lesson in the victory of the Americans at polo lately. In the friendly rivalry of sport these mistakes can be rectified, as this one no doubt will be rectified. But in the serious business of war a small mistake of this kind means the destruction of the Army. I am very strongly in favour of this system of compulsion, and shall certainly vote for the Bill.
VISCOUNT GALWAY: My Lords, I do not like to give a silent vote on an occasion like this. We have before us now the alternative of voting for the Second Reading of the Bill or for the Amendment of my noble friend the Duke of Northumberland—the alternative of either expressing satisfaction with the present state of

431
affairs as given by His Majesty's Government—because I prefer to put the responsibility on the Government and not on their military advisers—or of approving of the Bill brought in by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal. I do not admit that in giving this vote for the Second Reading I am supporting all the details of the Bill, because some of them may need altering, but I feel that there is a principle involved in it in which I have the very strongest belief. That principle is that every man is bound to defend his own home.
I think it is most essential that this measure should be brought forward now, because I do not think the people of this country realise the position they would be in if the country were invaded. Of course they say that if an invasion came they would all be ready to rise en masse and try to shoot anybody with any wretched gun they happened to have to scare crows with. The people of this country do not realise that that is not allowed in civilised warfare, and that under the laws of the civilised world the civilian who did that would be taken out and shot at his own garden gate. I hope and trust the National Service League will endeavour to make the truth known to every Englishman, and then there will be a very different view taken with regard to the necessity for some measure of this sort.
I am very sorry to have to differ from the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition, but he will, I know, give me credit for my strong belief in the principles I hold. It is not so much against the principles as against the details of the scheme that the critics carp. One thing which they, and especially the Under-Secretary of State for War, have attacked so much is that under the noble and gallant Earl's scheme of compulsory training there would be a perfectly inadequately trained force in the field. I think that is a condemnation of the training of the Territorial Forces by the Under-Secretary himself, because if, as he says, the four months training advocated in this Bill is not enough, how can he justify the training now allowed to the Territorial Forces? Still more do I feel myself justified in voting for the Bill of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, because, as the Under-Secretary himself said, the Territorial Forces are unable, without six months notice, to meet a foreign invasion. To my mind that does not
432
imply security to this country, and I think the sooner this country realises, as the Under-Secretary says, that the Territorial Forces without this extra training are not able to meet the enemy, the sooner will come the absolute necessity of some Bill like the present one.
In saying this I hope it will not be for a moment thought that I am disparaging the work that is done by the Territorial Forces or their zeal. It is my pleasure and my pride to have been connected with the Yeomanry all my life, and I have been glad to see the way in which the Yeomanry has been recognised and the way it has come on. I do not quite agree with what was said by Lord Willoughby de Broke about the Yeomanry. I think an enormous change has come over it. There were, no doubt, a great many individually good men in the Yeomanry in the old days, but the Yeomanry as a whole was in a different position altogether from what it is now. I attribute the change a great deal to the longer Yeomanry training of the last few years. I hold that it is most essential for the training of men that you should have them in camp, where you can get hold of them, keep them thoroughly in hand, and teach them every detail. The men like it, and it is proper that it should be done. I most deeply regret the remarks of the noble Duke about young men of all classes being thrown together, and, although I do not think he meant it, I think it was rather an undeserved slur on the Army and the Yeomanry to say that a large number of recruits could not be brought together without doing harm.
THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND: If that interpretation is put on my words, which I do not think is wholly justified, I ought to explain. I did not say one word, so far as I know, against the ordinary training that has hitherto been in vogue in the Yeomanry, Militia, and Volunteers, where you divide officers and men and look somewhat to the character of the men you enlist, and where you certainly do not take men entirely away from all their surroundings; I was speaking of a system under which there would be a hotch-potch of all classes and characters, who would be taken right away from their surroundings. You cannot expect that that would have no influence on the morals or conduct of those subjected to it.
VISCOUNT GALWAY: I am very glad to hear the noble Duke make that statement, because I am quite sure the last thing he would wish to do would be to disparage the Army. I hope he will not think me unkind for alluding to the matter and giving him the opportunity of denying any such intention. But what I do think with regard to this Bill is that it is absolutely essential that the whole country should realise the duties they have to do. As to what the noble Marquess has said with regard to compulsory powers never having been used, will he allow me to remind him that at the time of the South African war a Bill was brought into this House for making the Ballot Act compulsory, and I think the measure was introduced by the noble Marquess himself. As time went on, however, it was not deemed necessary to press the Bill, unfortunately, in my opinion, because I think that if it had been carried then a great deal of the present trouble would have been avoided, and we should have had in working order an Act which would give a sufficient number of men to defend this country.
I do not think that at the present moment we have got, in spite of the zeal of the Territorial Force, sufficient men to repel an invasion. I cannot quite take the optimistic view of the noble Earl on the other side, that invasion is practically impossible. I am afraid nothing is impossible nowadays, and I am sure there would not be this general feeling all over the world if there were not a great deal in it. What I feel very strongly is this. Here we have a Bill recommended to us by the noble and gallant Earl, whose experience of war nobody can rival, and to whom the whole country looks as a great military adviser. We have from him the admission that the present state of defence of this country is not satisfactory. He proposes a remedy, and asks us to read this Bill a second time. Against that we have the political expediency of the present time, and I prefer to trust those who know what war and military defence is rather than the mere question of political expediency. I shall, therefore, have the greatest possible pleasure in giving my support to the Second Reading of the Bill, because I believe it will bring home to every Englishman the absolute necessity of enrolling himself in some force or other, so that whenever the time comes he may be able to defend his country. At any rate, I shall be free from the accusa-
434
tion that I, in my time, did not do something to prevent "Too late" being said.
LORD REDESDALE: My Lords, I confess that my sympathies are entirely with the noble and gallant Earl who has introduced this Bill. The noble Field-Marshal speaks with an authority which is probably unique, and when he sounds a note of alarm it should not fall upon deaf ears. He spoke weighty words, doubtless with a full sense of the responsibility which rests upon him and which must attach to every utterance of his upon any military subject whatever. The question to my mind is simple. Are we at the present moment in the position of the strong man armed who keepeth his palace and whose goods are at peace? Is there no danger lest a stronger than we should come upon us and overcome us, taking from us the armour in which we trusted, and dividing our spoils?
My Lords, the armaments of the whole world now are in such a condition that per, haps we stand in a worse position as regards our Army than we ever did before in the history of the nation. Great nations are arming in every direction, and even the smaller nations are turning their attention to military matters in a way they never did before. Even the countries which were known in the old days as the Danubian principalities have their great armies, and I am told on high authority that even Roumania has an army which, so far as its numbers go, is second to none. What can be the object of all these armaments? It is not for pleasure or amusement, it is not idly, that the countries of the world spend large sums upon these bloated armaments. To us they must be a danger. At the present moment we are happily on terms of friendship with the whole of the rest of the world. We hope that it may long be so. But friendship among nations is apt to be fickle. We had an instance of the suddenness with which war begins in 1870.
It is no new matter this alarm of sudden invasion of this country. That great soldier, Lord Wolseley, speaking before a Committee of the House of Commons upwards of thirty years ago, foretold that the wars of the future would be quick in their inception, short in their duration, and woe be to those who were not prepared. The noble Duke in the speech in which he introduced his Amendment, foreshadowed a

435
state of things in which it might be necessary for all men to take up arms for the defence of the country. He said that if the safety of the country depended upon universal service, that service must be given at whatever cost. It will be too late then, my Lords. We must be prepared beforehand. It is no use beginning to prepare when we are attacked. It will be too late unless, indeed, the country that proposed to attack us should have the considerate courtesy to give us six months notice of its intention.
It was my luck some three years ago to see something of what perhaps is now one of the best and most formidable armies in the world. Of course, my opinion of that army was worth nothing, but I was in the company of those who were experts in military matters, and they were absolutely astonished—taken aback—by the perfection to which the Japanese Army had attained. At a place called Hiroshima a review was held in honour of Prince Arthur, and General Kelly-Kenny, who certainly must be regarded as an authority in such matters, told me he was quite astonished at the steadiness and the precision of the drill of the men he saw there. To my inexperienced eyes they seemed to be veterans. Yet these men had only joined the Colours in the month of December, and we were then in the early days of March. That shows what preparedness can do. Throughout Japan the whole of the schools have a system of physical drill which is probably second to none in the world. The boys, and even the girls, are drilled in such a manner that when the boys join the Regular Forces half their lesson has been learnt. The system which the Japanese have adopted for their army is based upon the German model. Service is compulsory. A man serves for the first three years continuously with the First Line. Then he has four years and four months in the Reserve—two periods of service of sixty days each. Then comes the Second Line corresponding to the Landwehr, in which they have two trainings of sixty days. Then come two years and eight months in the Kokumin, which is the Home Defence Army, or Landsturm, completing twenty years service. In the Reserve, which is for making good the war waste, the men perform a service of seven years and four months, which means one training of ninety days and two trainings of sixty days each. They then enter into the Kobi, or Landwehr, for ten years, and finally into the
436
Kokumin for two years and eight months, making twenty years service.
It is impossible to conceive an army which has been more scientifically organised or better prepared for war than that of Japan. During the few years which preceded their great war with Russia they were always prepared. Nothing was left to chance. Not only their fighting men but their medical staff, their nurses, their hospital staff, were brought to a pitch of perfection which made them ready to take the field at any moment. Every gun was numbered, with its carriage, ammunition, and transport, and was in an absolute state of readiness. Nothing was left to hazard. Even in such a small matter as lint, the ladies of Japan were engaged for many months in making piles of it for the hospitals. The consequence was that when the Japanese Army took the field it was in a state of preparedness such as probably no Army has previously enjoyed. Could this have been effected by any other means than compulsory service? I venture to think not. The feats which that Army performed are one of the marvels of the world's history.
Now, my Lords, what do we who believe, at any rate, in the principle of conscription, ask? It may be extremely difficult, it may not be possible, for you to bring that principle into operation at once, but at any rate you can affirm the principle, which is so simple, so straightforward, so absolutely intelligible, that I cannot imagine any man objecting to it. It is simply the principle that every citizen should be ready, as he should be willing, to bear arms for the defence of his country. It is not sufficient that he should be willing. The most willing men in the world, if not drilled and trained, will simply hamper the action of the Generals. But if you have a system of national service you will have something which I venture to think is more valuable than any voluntary service that can be established by means of this Territorial Army or in any other way. Surely it is better to trust to the whole-trained manhood of the country than to any voluntary system whatever. Nay, more, is it absolutely impossible that these two systems should walk hand in hand? It seems to me that if you have the compulsory system you will have a bank upon which to draw cheques for your Regular Army and for your Territorials. You will have a great

437
fund of military power in reserve which will make you formidable indeed. We have occupied, and thank heaven we still occupy, a very proud position among nations, but that position was won by the enthusiasm, perhaps I might say even the imprudences, of youth. If we lose that position it will be because we have allowed ourselves to sink into the decrepitude of a slothful old age. I hope that that day is far distant. I do not know whether your Lordships will give a Second Reading to this Bill, but I hope you will. Even if it should never become law, you will have asserted a great national principle. You will have asserted that it is the duty of the man to fight for his country, and that it is the duty of the country to teach the man to fight to the best advantage.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, I have on this and on previous occasions derived a certain amount of mild enjoyment from observing the attitude taken up by noble Lords on the two Front Benches, first of all with regard to my noble and gallant friend Lord Roberts, and, secondly, with regard to the proposal which he advocates. I have observed that their estimate of my noble and gallant friend varies in the most extraordinary degree. When he is in agreement with the Government he is treated as a sort of military pontiff to doubt whose opinion is akin to blasphemy, but when he disagrees with the views of the Government he is airily dismissed as holding early Victorian notions, and those notions are consigned with other archaic opinions to that lumber-room which is supposed to exist in the political world.
What I have observed with regard to the attitude of official politicians to these proposals is that behind the keen discomfort which is felt in having to form an opinion upon questions of this kind there has been equally keen anxiety on the part of both sides to fix responsibility for taking this step upon the other; but on this particular occasion there has been no cause for anxiety at all, because my noble friend has come forward to relieve them from taking any unpleasant action of that kind. In fact it has been quite unnecessary to indulge in that elaborate and solemn stage fight to which we are by this time so well-accustomed, when ex-Secretaries of State and Under-Secretaries pound each other for hours together, it being understood that no real damage
438
is to be inflicted. In place of this theatrical combat we have witnessed noble Lords on the two Front Benches falling upon each other's necks. The Leader of the Opposition has been so warm indeed in his commendation of the Government's military policy that I have doubts whether he will ever be able to criticise it in an unfriendly manner in the future. And it is a matter of extreme pain and surprise to me—in fact, it has inflicted a greater shock to my belief in human nature than I have ever experienced before—that the Duke Of Northumberland should have come to the rescue and built for these embarrassed politicians a bridge by which they can simultaneously retreat. This is a profound shock to me, because I candidly admit that I have the most sincere admiration for my noble friend. I have always looked upon him as a singularly sane politician, and I have endeavoured to imbibe wisdom from his utterances. One thing which is impressed upon me more frequently than anything else is that whenever the two Front Benches are in agreement they are invariably wrong, and it is the duty of every right-minded man to vote against them.
A word with regard to my noble friend's Amendment. I understand he rather resents the suggestion that this Amendment represents a vote of confidence in the Government; but, after all, the proof of an Amendment lies in the Division afterwards, and I gather that noble Lords opposite are going to vote with alacrity for the Amendment. How under the circumstances can the noble Duke pretend that it is otherwise than a vote of confidence in the Government? I understand he repudiates the idea of expressing confidence in the Government, but he desires to express confidence in His Majesty's military advisers. In my opinion that comes to exactly the same thing.
THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND: I would remind the noble Lord that I have not the slightest confidence in His Majesty's Ministers. What I said was that I thought the House of Lords, having adopted the Territorial Bill upon the authority of the Government's military advisers, was bound to give that experiment a fair trial.
LORD NEWTON: After all, it comes to this: we are to vote for this Amendment which represents confidence in the military

439
advisers. These military advisers, I was about to observe, are a remarkable race of men. Every soldier I am acquainted with and nearly every officer in the Territorial Army is a pronounced adherent of our proposals. With regard to military advisers, it is an extraordinary thing that the Government are always able to obtain the services of gentlemen whose opinion can be quoted in their favour. I do not like to be disrespectful to these advisers, but they remind me in some respects of the class of officials who exist in Turkey and whose business it is to agree with their superiors. They are known as men who say "Yes." Without being disrespectful to members of the Army Council it does seem to me that it is the business of these gentlemen to say "ditto" to the Secretary for War, and they form a kind of human zareba, or fortification, into which the Secretary for War may retire when hardly pressed by his political opponents.
In spite of the touching unanimity which has been shown by official politicians on both sides with regard to the beauties of the voluntary system I cannot help thinking that any impartial person who has followed the debate must realise that this most boasted system is almost on its last legs. Only a short time ago its great champion—I was going to say that great blusterer—the Secretary for War, announced that the nation was never so near conscription as it was last December. What saved the country from relapsing into this horrible conscription which inspires the official Opposition with horror? I am not exaggerating when I say that the collapse of the Territorial Army system was averted by a sensational play, and the remarkable thing is that the play was written by an innocent, simple-minded soldier who desired to advocate compulsory service. With almost superhuman ingenuity this was seized hold of by Lord Esher and the Secretary of State for War and converted into an advertisement of the Territorial Army. The noble Viscount and the Secretary for War sat in the stalls and recruited from the pit and gallery for their Army, with the assistance of anonymous benefactors and of the Daily Mail. I sometimes wonder whether the Daily Mail will not be authorised one of these days to issue a special decoration for the Territorial Forces. It seems to me obvious that it will be necessary to work up this hysteria again in four years time and get people to write sensational
440
plays or the equivalent, discover anonymous persons who will give large sums of money provided the Chancellor of the Exchequer permits their existence in this country, and utilise those means which usually commend themselves to advertisers of patent medicines and to circus proprietors in order to keep your numbers up. It is hoped that by means of these various devices the Territorial Force will amount some day to rather more than 300,000 men, but nobody but a Secretary for War has had the hardihood to maintain that 300,000 men represents what he is pleased to call a nation in arms. That number works out at something between 1/150th and 1/160th part of the population, and I do not think there is a man living with the exception of the Secretary of State for War who will take that fraction as representing a nation in arms. When it comes to the expansion which the right hon. gentleman claims to have obtained the numbers really are not any larger than the figures of a few years ago, and it is really much the same thing as if a man bought a new kind of cheque book and then said he was enormously richer whilst at the same time his balance at the bank remained the same.
I am not going to waste your Lordships' time by going over the arguments. I only desire to summarise our objections to the Territorial Army as it exists at present. We consider that it is deficient in numbers and deficient in training. Anybody who suggests that the training of the Territorial Army is deficient, or who ventures to hint that because a Volunteer has been changed into a Territorial that therefore the man has not suddenly assumed all the military virtues, is looked upon as a sort of traitor, unfit to consort with ordinary human beings. One is rather apt to measure standards by oneself. Let me take my own case. Look at me. I am in my person a deplorable object lesson of the failure of the voluntary system, for, although I was for many years an officer in one of the Auxiliary Forces, passed through two special courses at Aldershot, rose to comparatively high rank, and was even reported upon favourably by simple-minded inspecting officers, some of whom I think I recognise here to-night., yet in spite of all this I know perfectly well in my own heart I was in a military sense a fraud. And I venture to make the admission that what influenced me chiefly in leaving the Yeomanry Force was

441
not so much advancing years as the intuitive knowledge that I was unfit for high command. I cannot help thinking that, notwithstanding the change of name of the forces, there must be a number of people in the same position as I was in that respect.
I must say that I agree with what I have heard expressed by some of the speakers to-night that, considering all things, the results we obtain under the voluntary system are quite extraordinary considering that the whole system, the whole theory, is built upon an evident fallacy—the fallacy that all that is required to make a really efficient soldier is the amount of time which an ordinary individual can give without personal inconvenience to himself. That is the fallacy, and it is a fallacy which I have no hesitation in saying does not prevail in any country except this. Let me deal with one point, the point which is always dwelt upon as the crowning weakness of the Territorial Force—namely, that the serious training for war is not to begin until hostilities have actually been declared. My own view is that it is hardly worth while attaching much importance to this particular point of view, because I am quite convinced that under a voluntary system no Government would ever venture to call out the Territorial Forces as a whole. I will give two reasons for it. In the first place there are a large number of gentlemen belonging to the Party opposite who, if we were involved in hostilities with another Power, would be most distinctly in favour of the other Power as against ourselves, and who would object to any preparation on our part as a kind of blood guiltiness. This is a minor objection. But the unanswerable objection which occurs to me is that under a voluntary system the calm proposal that you should ask a certain number of men to go out for an indefinite period whilst the great mass of the population do nothing at all is absolutely unthinkable, and I do not believe any Government would ever do anything of the kind.
One thing has impreessd me very much in this debate—I refer to the speeches made by noble Lords upon the Back Benches who are now serving either in the Territorial Force or in the Special Reserve. Those are the men who are honestly doing their best to make your scheme a success,
442
and who come here and tell you in all honesty that they cannot do it without compulsion. Their plain and unvarnished tale carries a great deal more weight with me than do the more elaborate utterances of more distinguished persons. In the course of this debate we have had many culogies pronounced on the voluntary system. The noble Earl the Leader of the House is so fanatical an admirer of the voluntary system that he actually posed this afternoon as the defender of class and privilege. He objected to everybody being treated alike—a somewhat curious position for a leading Liberal politician.
THE EARL OF CREWE: I was not objecting to people being treated alike. I said that there were a very large number of people in this country who objected to being treated alike. That is a very different thing.
LORD NEWTON: The impression made upon me by the noble Earl's speech was that he objected very much to the idea of what he called "riff-raff" being associated with the middle classes.
THE EARL OF CREWE: No, no.
LORD NEWTON: If the noble Earl repudiates it, of course I accept his repudiation. We have had an even stronger eulogy from the Under-Secretary of State for War. But the Under-Secretary is a pronounced optimist. I rather think he undertook last year to turn out a first-rate horse artillery battery in a week provided he were given intelligent civilians. We had an almost equally enthusiastic eulogy from the noble Lord, Lord Pentland. For my part I can see no beauty whatever in the voluntary system when it is applied to home defence. What is it, when you look at it sanely and calmly, but a sort of conspiracy on the part of nine men to induce the tenth man to do the duty which they ought to do themselves, and which they probably would be much better for doing.
What I detest more than anything else about the voluntary system is the hypocritical, nauseating appeal which is constantly being made to employers of labour to come forward and save the situation. Why should the employer of labour be more liable for the defence of his country than anybody else? That is, I know, the view of the Socialists. The

443
Socialists are quite logical people. They hold that nobody except a capitalist or an employer of labour has got anything worth protecting, and that therefore capitalists and employers of labour ought to do the fighting. But the Government is not Socialist yet in name whatever it may be in practice, and I should like to know what arguments can be advanced in favour of, say, a colliery proprietor, or a railway director, or anybody of that kind being penalised for the purpose of defending his country rather than, let us say, a stockbroker, or an artist, or a dentist, or anybody you like to think of who employs next to no labour at all.
The duty of national defence is not the duty of a particular class. It is the duty of the community, and I do not think it is any argument to say that employers of labour ought to take Governments and public bodies as their examples. The Government if they choose, can make it a condition of labour that their employés should enter the Territorial Army. The Government have got the taxpayer behind them, and local authorities have got the ratepayer behind them. There is no sacrifice whatever involved in the practice in their case. But when it comes to asking an employer of labour to go and do this work, then you are deliberately asking a man to penalise himself. It is a contemptible practice which prevails only in this country, and I wonder we are not heartily ashamed of it by this time.
Two years ago I went on a sort of pilgrimage with my noble friend Lord Ampthill to Switzerland in order to follow the Switzerland manœuvres. We were accompanied by a large number of gentlemen, some of whom were Liberal Members of Parliament, some of whom were Labour Members of Parliament, and some of whom were Socialists. Many of them spent their time quite ineffectually in endeavouring to discover some objection to the system of compulsory service prevailing in Switzerland. We inquired into this question and the effect upon employment. According to noble Lords opposite, if a young man in this country is taking four months military training it will create the most fearful havoc in British industries. The conclusion to which we came, after inquiring into the matter, was that there were no objections whatever on the part of either employers or men. As a matter of fact
444
both had been, so to speak, through the mill, both regarded it as a perfectly fair thing, and there was no complaint of any kind. But they said—
"If this were optional, and if one employer were called upon to send out his men in order that somebody else might escape, we should consider that a gross injustice, and it is not a thing we should agree to at all."
That was one of the lessons which we learned from the pilgrimage. But we learned something else besides. We realised not only the extraordinary patriotism which prevails in Switzerland, but we were able to realise the equally remarkable pride, and, I might almost say, affection which is felt by a free people in a really national force, a feeling which I venture to think does not exist in this country. I must say that, although I am not of a particularly sentimental disposition, when, at the conclusion of those manœuvres, I saw thousands of these unassuming-looking men in their unpretending uniforms marching past, it crossed my mind that this, perhaps, in its way, was a finer and a nobler spectacle than the more gorgeous military pageants to which we are accustomed in this country, and an equally uncomfortable thought crossed my mind that if it were ever our fate to have to contend with a Power more or less equal to our own, victory was hardly likely to rest with the country which put its faith in money and machinery rather than depended upon the higher ideals of national sacrifice and personal responsibility.
I have only one word to add. I feel some small measure of responsibility for this debate, because it was at my instigation that our proposals were put into this Bill and brought before your Lordships' House; and I would venture to make a very respectful, but, at the same time, earnest, appeal to all who are in favour of this principle, not to be dissuaded from giving their vote in support of it in consequence of what has fallen from the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition. We have many times been challenged to put our proposals before you. It has now been done. They are now before you in a concrete shape, and you are asked to vote for the principle. This is not a Party question, but until we are in earnest and until we really show what we want neither Party is going to take up this question. This is a unique opportunity. This is an

445
opportunity, I venture to say with great submission, on which noble Lords might well decide the question for themselves, and vote in accordance with their convictions. When my noble friends say that the country is not ready for this great change, and that if we pass this Bill it may create a prejudicial feeling in the country, I cannot help feeling that if we are really to gain the esteem of the country we shall be more likely to do it by voting independently upon this great question rather than by waiting for a mandate which may possibly never arrive at all, or which, even if it does arrive, may arrive too late.
LORD LAMINGTON: My Lords, Lord Ampthill said he regarded this Bill as being a reconnaissance in force. It is a reconnaissance in force on the part of those whom we may term the rank and file, or the men in the street; and I do not think that noble Lords sitting on the Front Benches are quite entitled to decide a matter which is really of a non-party character. But there have been very few noble Lords who have really endorsed the Bill as a Bill, though they have approved of the general principle; and we can hardly expect either Front Bench to commit themselves to a Bill which does not meet with their approval or with the general approval of the House. I think the two objects which the noble Lord, Lord Newton, said this Bill proposed to effect were, first, to secure that those who are serving in the Territorial Force, or who would have to serve, should have more efficient training; and, secondly, that there should be a greater supply of men. I quite agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Milner, who said you cannot expect men to continue year after year so zealously engaging in military duties. You cannot expect those who are now in the Territorial Force to give up so much time, and to sacrifice, perhaps, so much of their money, whilst the rest of the population do nothing to secure the defence of the country. As an officer in the Territorial Force I believe that that is very true, and also that the training is undoubtedly insufficient. I do not see how we are to get a longer period of training except by some form of compulsion.
There is one point which those who are the advocates of this Bill seem to have lost sight of, and that is the great diffi-
446
culty of enforcing any compulsory system. It means an absolute change in the whole social life of our country. It means that you must put every man under police supervision. Anybody who has resided for any length of time on the Continent recognises the truth of what I say. A man would not be free to wander about this country in the course of his employment. Every time he did so he would have to leave his address. That means a revolution in our social system. Therefore I see great difficulty in enforcing any such principle as is now advocated. Some less stringent process would probably meet with greater success, to start with at all events. Hence I was very much impressed by the speech of the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition, and was also very glad to hear—and I think those who are responsible for this measure may take credit to themselves for getting such a strong pronouncement—that he does advocate some form of compulsory training for youths; that there should be some training given to the youth of this country. As being the least complicated system I suggest that no man should be allowed to exercise the franchise without having passed through some compulsory service, of course with the necessary exemptions extended in every country, such as for weakness of health and other reasons.
I gladly associate myself with the noble Viscount, Lord Milner, in being a total disbeliever in any idea of invasion at the present time. I think if we really feared that a great powerful Continental nation was strengthening itself with the idea of invading this country, no Government, however little we might think of them, would allow for a moment that Power to be increasing in strength day by day without having taken some step to prevent that growth of strength. But what I am anxious to see is a prevention of the scares and the state of panic that this country is liable to get into. I regard it as vitiating our foreign policy in different parts of the world, and to it is largely due our weakness at the present time and what is going on in Persia. Absolute believer as I am in the strength, both political and military, of the Empire as a whole, I recognise that the people of this country are in a state more or less of scare or panic and will not be assured until they feel their shores are properly defended. The Secretary of State for the Colonies mentioned as a paradox

447
that we on this side are always declaiming against State intervention in every department of life. We say that the first department in life in which every citizen should be interested is the defence of his country, and although other instances of State interference in the various activities of life are offensive and harmful, nobody can deny that in this case it is absolutely essential for the good and prosperity of this country. In the past it has been said that property has its duties as well as its rights. In these more advanced days surely we can say that democracy also has its duties as well as its rights. We who support this Bill believe that the democracy will be only too anxious, when it is put before them, to accept responsibility for the exercise of their duties in the defence of their country.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords. I desire to pay my tribute of sincere admiration to the astuteness with which this Bill has been recommended in the speeches of its supporters. I welcome the Bill. We have been waiting for this Bill a long time. The National Service League has been active for years, and it has been very difficult indeed for anybody who desired to criticise the League to realise effectively what the League was formed to advocate. If ever you quoted a speech of one member of the National Service League to another member of the League my experience has been that he invariably repudiated the opinion that that speech expressed. But here for the first time we have a definite proposition made in the Bill. This, I take it, is in future to be regarded as the official propaganda of the National Service League, and as such it will doubtless very often receive examination in your Lordships' House.
But I do complain that hardly any advocate of the Bill who has addressed us in the course of this debate told us anything about the Bill at all. The noble Lord, Lord Newton, summarised his highly entertaining and delightful speech in one sentence. He said—
"I am going to summarise my objections to the Territorial Army."
The noble Lord's speech was a continual stream of criticism formed upon the Territorial Army. He made no attempt to prove that the proper remedy for the evils which he believes exist in the Territorial Army is to be found in this Bill. I think my noble
448
friend was extremely wise to follow the course he took. Destructive criticism is always far easier than the defence of creation, and nowhere is that seen more often than in connection with the War Office.
The noble Duke, the Duke of Norfolk, evidently recognised from the first that it was desirable that there should not be too close examination of the provisions of this Bill, and he furnished an extremely astute excuse for avoiding that criticism. He said they all recognised that in the present state of affairs, quite apart from the merits of the Bill, it was impossible for it to pass into law, and therefore he suggested that it was desirable that we should discuss the general question and not trouble very much about the details of the scheme now before us. I wish to remind your Lordships as earnestly as I can that it is impossible to vote for the Second Reading of this Bill without approving, not only the principle underlying it, but also the details of the scheme which is to be found in its pages.
We are not discussing a general principle such as we have often had to discuss in the course of the last four or five years. We are discussing definite proposals, put forward on the very, highest authority, that deal with evils which noble Lords who support the Bill evidently believe exist in far greater intensity than we believe they exist. But, however that may be, every vote given for the Second Reading of this Bill is a vote not only for the provisions of the Bill, but in favour of the system which the Bill itself sets out. That being so, I think an obligation lay upon the promoters of the Bill to prove to us three things. They should have proved that the country desired this change, that some such change is necessary, and that, some such change being necessary, the provisions in the Bill provide a system which will constitute the best change that could be made under the circumstances.
My noble friend Viscount Midleton, at the very beginning of his speech, threw out a challenge. He challenged noble Lords to deal with the first of those questions—the question as to whether there is any demand in this country for a Bill of this kind; and your Lordships will have noticed that except for the reference by the noble Lord, Lord Ampthill, that challenge, like most of the challenges in the speech of my noble friend, has been absolutely

449
ignored. Lord Ampthill, if he will permit me to say so, gave the usual reply, "but the country have never been asked." It is true that the country has never been definitely asked in the form of a referendum or of a general election. This question on the whole, perhaps, like the question of invasion, has to be decided on the opinion of experts; that is to say, on the opinion of people who are in closer touch with the constituencies than we are. But there have been slight indications that might help us to judge, and I think noble Lords, if they had liked, could have given us more opportunities of judging. Why do you not give us a few more National Service League by-elections? Why not give us a few more by-elections like Stratford-on-Avon? In Stratford-on-Avon there was a candidate who adopted from beginning to end the programme of the National Service League. It is true it was repudiated by the League, and I am quite ready to argue with noble Lords as to whether that repudiation did not do him more good than harm. The fact remains that there was a by-election fought on the programme of the League.
LORD REDESDALE: The Stratford-on-Avon election was really fought on Tariff Reform.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I was going to say so, but the fact remains that there was one candidate who had nothing whatever to do with Tariff Reform or Free Trade—the candidate who adopted the programme of the National Service League, he obtained five and a-half per cent. of the support of the electorate who went to the poll, although the noble Earl, Lord Roberts, and the noble Viscount, Lord Milner, gave him the benefit of their moral support. I think it would be too much to throw in the face of noble Lords the fact that Captain Kincaid-Smith did not win that election, but not too much to say that if there had been any great 'weight of opinion behind the National Service League, he might have been expected to get more than five and a-half per cent. of the support of the voters who went to the poll. Whether noble Lords dislike that reference or not, the fact remains that my main proposition is established. No attempt whatever has been made in this debate to prove to us conclusively that the country desires some such change as this Bill would bring about.
450
The obligation certainly lay upon noble Lords to prove to us that some change is necessary, and here I admit that Lord Newton did keep within the requirements of the debate. Here I may say that these debates illustrate how nothing exceeds the contempt of a person who advocates compulsory service for a person who does not advocate it. Noble Lords who advocate compulsory service claim, of course, a monopoly of patriotism. We are unpatriotic because we oppose it. [A NOBLE LORD: No, no.] I am very glad to hear that contradiction from one quarter of the House, but I did not notice it coming from the headquarters of the League just behind me. It is obvious. We have had scores of these debates in the last four or five years, and I ask your Lordships, Have you ever heard any statement made by an opponent of compulsory service, or conscription, as I prefer to call it, when there has not been an audible growl of dissent from Lord Newton? There has certainly been a continuous series of these audible growls during the present debate. I am not in the least complaining. I have now got well accustomed to these growls, and should miss them if they were absent. But they do illustrate the fact that there has been a cock-sureness, in the course of these discussions, as to the necessity for some change, which I do not think treats us quite fairly because noble Lords who express that cock-sureness do not trouble us as we should like to be troubled with detailed argument.
I desire to refer for a moment to one remark that was made by the noble Viscount on the Cross Benches who initiated the discussion this afternoon. I do hold strongly to the view that we must look to the Navy as our first line of home defence. But I do not think it is fair to represent those who hold that view as desiring anything that would have the effect of crippling the Navy by turning it into a coastguard," as the noble Viscount said. I entirely concur that we must do no such thing. So far as I know nobody has ever suggested that we should. But I think the mere fact that those remarks can be made show that noble Lords do not fully realise what we mean when we say that we desire to look to the Navy as our first line of defence.
I hesitate to go into this argument very deeply. It is an argument that would be

451
much better expressed by some naval expert, but unfortunately we are not in the position of having any naval experts to take part in these debates. But noble Lords seem to think that the only way of defending the country through the medium of the Navy is to have the Navy in a string, so to speak, right around our coasts. They seem to forget that the Navy is not a single unit but that it is rather a conglomeration of very different units. Nobody expects our battleships to lie in a row around our coasts waiting to be attacked. It is obvious that our line-of-battle Fleet must be expected to go wherever the enemy is, and to search out the enemy's Fleet and to sink it at the very first opportunity. I submit that that in no way minimises their effect upon the problem of home defence, because, even with the battleship Fleet away, occupied, as I assume it should be occupied, with the battleships of the enemy, there is no reason why the duty of dealing with the transports in which an invader might be expected to come should be in any way neglected. That duty might safely be left to the cruisers, torpedo boat destroyers, and submarines told off for that particular purpose. As I have said, nobody expects our battleships to lie in a row around our shores waiting to be attacked. They must go and seek out the enemy's Fleet, and those auxiliaries to which I have alluded can safely be depended upon to deal with an unconvoyed fleet of transports. We had many proofs of this in the recent Russo-Japanese war. A noble Lord said he could not admit that it was a primary duty of the Fleet to defend our shores. I agree with the bald sense in which that statement is made. The primary duty of the Fleet is to maintain the unquestionable command of the sea, and if that unquestionable command of the sea is maintained the subsidiary duties of the Fleet are performed at the same time.
Noble Lords who intend to vote for the Second Reading of this Bill must, in order to make their case, believe in the danger of invasion, not merely of a raid, but of serious invasion. It has not yet been explained in the course of the debate how far the scheme in the Bill would provide a system equal to dealing with the danger of a serious invasion. Is it a complete scheme? Has it been carefully thought out in all its aspects, or even in all its military aspects? The noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland, asked the question, "What will you do with the
452
passive resister?" and that question was not answered. The noble Earl, Lord Crewe, and the noble Marquess behind me, asked what you are going to do about Ireland, and no answer has been vouchsafed to that question. I hesitate to think what the answer can possibly be. The scheme depends upon the Territorial system, and whoever drafted this Bill seems to have forgotten that the Territorial Army system does not apply to Ireland. It would be absolutely necessary, if you started this system in Ireland, to institute county associations there, and I should like to know from members of the National Service League whom they would find to be members of those associations. I am quite certain they would be extremely stormy bodies, and I should myself, without hesitation, follow the lead already given by my noble friend Lord Newton and carefully abstain from joining any association in the neighbourhood where I live.
Has the cost of this scheme been carefully thought out? I do not desire to enter into details as to the question of cost, but I desire to repudiate one suggestion made by the noble Viscount who spoke first this afternoon upon the subject. He said that an argument used by the Under-Secretary of State for War affected only the estimate of the promoters of the Bill, and did not affect the Bill. I desire to repudiate that suggestion. If the argument is good against the estimate it is obviously equally good against the Bill. You cannot dissociate the estimate from the Bill, at least if the estimate is correct. But I do not, as I have said, wish to go into details with regard to this question of cost. I only desire to make one protest against what Lord Ampthill said in regard to the War Office estimate. In comparing the two estimates, those of the War Office and the National Service League, he said one thing which I heard with the very greatest regret. Referring to the officials at the War Office who prepared this estimate the noble Lord said that their brief was to make the estimate as near £20,000,000 as possible.
LORD AMPTHILL: I did not say that. I think I said "as much as possible."
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: That is quite sufficient for my purpose. I had the privilege for two years of working in the closest touch with the distinguished

453
official at the War Office who prepares these estimates. I know that Mr. Harris is incapable of cheating in the way the noble Lord has suggested. He is a very high principled, a very able, and a very devoted public servant, and if he were asked to produce an estimate he would produce one which was low or high according as he found the facts warranted, and nothing in the world would induce him even to colour an estimate he was preparing. I think the suggestion that such a thing is possible by any public servant is most unfortunate, and with my special knowledge of the facts of the particular case I thought I should be failing in my duty if I allowed that remark of the noble Lord to pass without my most earnest protest.
I was asking questions about this scheme. Is the scheme a complete one? Has it been thought out? My noble friend Lord Midleton asked another question, "Will this scheme endanger recruiting for the Regular Army?" and my noble friend Lord Ampthill again gave what I may call with all respect, the stock answer that once give men a taste of the Army in some form or another and a great many of them will accept it in another form. It is not necessary for me to go into that because it has already been answered by Lord Midleton. The experience of the three years enlistment showed conclusively that if you give men an experience of the Army at home the unfortunate result is that the vast majority of them do not show that alacrity to extend their services and to go abroad as it was hoped they would.
I can only see one way in which the danger of doing harm to recruiting for the Regular Army can be avoided. It is quite true that a great many recruits, as many of your Lordships have often complained, used to be got for the Militia by a system roughly described on several occasions as the depôt press gang—that system under which in a depôt the lot of the Militiaman was made so uncomfortable as compared with the lot of the Line man that a great many of them were encouraged to join the Line with the greatest alacrity. It was a system which in my opinion had a great deal to do with bleeding the Militia to death. It is quite true that under the scheme which the Bill proposes you might extend that depot press gang system and so benefit recruiting for the Line. You could make
454
it very much less pleasant for the conscript under your Bill as compared with the comfort given to the long service soldier who enlists in the Regular Army, and so you could counteract what I believe, especially after the experience we have had of the three years enlistment, would be the great difficulty in getting recruits for the Line as a result of this system. That that could be done where it is desirable that it should be done is, I think, a very moot point, and I should regret very much if any such expedient as that were called for by any system approved by your Lordships' House.
I know I may be told that these are questions of detail, and that we have been asked to discuss this matter on the ground of principle. Very well, my Lords, let us discuss it on the ground of principle, and let us give our votes on that ground. What are the principles, for there are more than one, that underlie this Bill? In order to vote for this Bill you have first to accept the principle that invasion is possible in spite of our Navy. Secondly, you have to accept the principle that to meet such an invasion compulsion is necessary. I do not admit either of those two principles; but let us admit them for the sake of argument. If you accept those two principles, you have also to accept a third one, which is that four months training is required for the condition of affairs which the Bill presupposes. Now, as I have said, the Bill presupposes that serious invasion is possible, and I submit to your Lordships that, if that is so, we must be prepared to resist it with troops every bit as efficient as those which would take part in the invasion. This Bill presupposes an invasion by picked troops from the Continent—I do not care what country they come from—who will have had at least two years service with the colours, and against those picked troops this Bill tells us it is sufficient to put conscript soldiers with four months training. That is the third underlying principle in this Bill, and in order to vote for the Second Reading you have to accept it. Has any soldier ever said that troops who had received four months training would be fit to meet troops who had had two years training? It is not necessary to trouble your Lordships with quotations, but I have quotations from almost every soldier of distinction who has held office in the British Army in the last ten years, and every one of them says that at least a

455
year, and most of them say two years, is necessary in order to prepare British troops to fight on equal terms with Continental troops.
I think the only Member of your Lordships' House intending to vote for this Bill who dealt with this point was the noble and gallant Field-Marshal who is fathering the Bill, and I am bound to say that he treated it extremely gingerly. He explained to us why he had agreed to this four months training. I understood that he agreed to this short period for two reasons—first, because he thinks it is best suited to the country; and, secondly, because his connection with the City Imperial Volunteers convinced him that men of intelligence could be made good soldiers in four months. That opinion expressed by the noble and gallant Earl was a revelation to me. I have been looking up lately the evidence which Lord Roberts himself gave before Lord Elgin's Commission, and there I find almost the same words used in order to justify a training of two years, or, in some very special cases, one year. Will the House allow me to read what the noble and gallant Earl said? I quote it in extensor—
"Question 13,160. SIR GEORGE GOLDIE: What would you put as the shortest time in which an Infantry soldier could be really trained under severe discipline?—LORD ROBERTS: It depends. In a conscript army like the German Army two years are considered enough. We think it requires three years with the ordinary class of recruit.
"Q. And in France it is one year?—A. I think those are Volunteers.
"In France they have one year to enable them to pass the examination?—A. Yes, for educated people. That makes all the difference. If we had conscription or educated troops to deal with one year's training would suffice."
In reply to Question 13,290, Lord Roberts said—
"If I had a thousand well-educated men of the stamp of the C.I.V.'s I think in one year I could be quite satisfied that they would be thoroughly well trained. If I had the ordinary recruit I should say he wanted two or three years. Education and intelligence make all the difference in the world to my mind."
Well, my Lords, that opinion I have always accepted as one of the cardinal canons of military training, and I have the gravest difficulty in deciding which to follow—the opinion of the noble and gallant Earl as Commander-in-chief, supported by unanimous military opinion, or the opinion of the noble and gallant Earl the advocate of four months training and the father of this
456
Bill. I confess that with the weight of military opinion the other way I feel the very greatest difficulty in believing that anybody, granting the danger of invasion in large force by efficient foreign troops, can maintain that four months training, as proposed under this Bill, is adequate. This, then, is the position in which we find ourselves. As I have said before, we are not now concerned with pious opinions, or with a general discussion. We are concerned with concrete proposals. We have no proof of a desire for them by the public. We have had little or no attempt to prove that the system is necessary. We have proof that the scheme is unthought out and that it provides a system of training almost in the teeth of expert opinion. I think it would be a lamentable thing if your Lordships approved of any scheme on any such subject under such circumstances, and never more lamentable than when that scheme refers to the defence of the nation.
LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON: My Lords, the noble Earl, in the rather scornful speech which he has just delivered, has propounded an entirely novel Parliamentary doctrine. It is this, that every vote given for the Second Reading of this Bill is a vote not merely for the principle upon which the Bill is constructed but for every detail contained in the measure. I venture to say there is no Member of your Lordships' House, whatever may be the practice of this assembly, who has served in the House of Commons, who would not repudiate such a doctrine as absolutely fantastic.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I do not want to interrupt the noble Lord, but that was not my doctrine.
LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON: I am sorry to say it was. I took down the noble Lord's words as they fell from his lips. They were—
"Every vote given for the Second Reading is a vote for the details of the Bill."
As everyone knows, even Governments have voted in the House of Commons over and over again for the Second Reading of a Bill while carefully dissociating themselves from any approval of a large number of its details. I do not mean to repudiate the details of the Bill now before us. I only mention the matter in the hope that none

457
of your Lordships who are in favour of the principle of compulsory service will be prevented, by the kind of argument to which I have referred, from giving on the first occasion open to you your approbation to the general principle on which it is founded.
The advocates of this Bill have been attended, if I may say so, by some disadvantage in this debate. In the first place, we have had against us the combined authority, I might say at times even the tender embraces, of the two Front Benches. The Bench opposite has had behind it all the departmental knowledge and information always at the disposal of the Government of the day, and on this side, in spite of what the noble Marquess so graciously said early in the evening, there has been the silent pressure of the official whip. Over and over again we have been confronted with the opinion of the military advisers of the Government. I do not desire to speak with the slightest disrespect of that opinion, but I venture to say that there is an increasing and an undesirable tendency in our public life to shelter our selves and to shelter the Government behind the opinion of the military advisers. The responsibility rests not with the military advisers but with the Government, which acts or declines to act on their advice. For my own part, I am not much impressed by the factor of military opinion, because in my own experience it has not been always a consistent, and it is sometimes a malleable, factor. I am not quite certain that its malleability is not sometimes in direct ratio to the opinions of the Government which it serves. Anyhow, as has already been pointed out to-day, it is frequently contradictory in character, and when we are confronted, as we have been over and over again in this debate, with the alleged opinions of the military advisers of the Government, is it not open to us to reply that we have behind us the opinion of a commander who may legitimately be called the military adviser, not of the Government, but of the nation? I do not envy the courage or the optimism of the man—I doubt if any such exists in your Lordships' House—who can ignore the warnings which have on so many occasions been addressed to us by the noble and gallant Field-Marshal, speaking with an authority and experience greater than that of any commander during the last half century of our history, and detached to a degree
458
unparalleled in our public life from the slightest suspicion of personal or Party feeling or prejudice.
Although I shall incur the sharp disapproval of the noble Earl who has just spoken, I avow myself an unhesitating advocate of national service. I believe that the case for it is not one that will arise only in the dim and distant future, but that it exists now. Until some such system has been adopted by the people of this country I believe that our national integrity and the safety of our shores cannot be secured. With the tremendous armaments that are now being developed by great Powers, with their navies increasing in a ratio, equal, if not superior, to our own, I say that the integrity of this country cannot be permanently insured under the voluntary system. I cordially accept what the noble Earl opposite described as the honourable platitude that every able-bodied man is bound in the last resort to assist in the defence of his country. But I should like to amend that proposition and to say that every man should regard it as his duty, not in the last resort but in the first resort, and that if he is not prepared to undertake it—and in this idle and self-indulgent age, it is too much to expect that the burden, will be voluntarily borne—there is no resort but compulsion, and if compulsion is carried sooner or later, as I hope it may be, I cannot for my own part doubt that the nation will reap enormous benefits in every department of public, civic, and social life and action.
There is one thing which I think has perhaps been insufficiently recognised in this debate, and that is the great change of opinion that is proceeding with regard to this matter. I think there have been not insignificant symptoms of it in this discussion itself. I do not know how many of your Lordships are going to follow us in the Division Lobby. I hope it will be a goodly muster, but anyhow we cannot forget the fact that last night we had two right reverend Prelates for the first time pronouncing definitely on the side of compulsory military training—not in any spirit of military ardour, but with due regard to those necessities of the moral and physical welfare of the people which are specially committed to their charge. But this change in the House itself is nothing to the change which is taking place outside. This question is being debated

459
and discussed everywhere in this country. I do not venture to say what is the opinion of the man in the street—that mysterious and inscrutable phenomenon who is always brought up to support policies and measures which are in need of it; but whatever may be the attitude of the man in the street, the man in the railway carriage, who represents, perhaps, rather a superior grade of society and intelligence, is, if I may judge from my own experience, becoming an increasing convert to these proposals. Several leading organs of the Press are in its favour. Eminent writers and thinkers, strongly tinctured with Radical views, write letters to The Times and announce their conversion. You have Labour Members of Parliament openly expressing their advocacy. Across the seas you observe great democratic communities of our own race voluntarily bending their minds to the idea of compulsory citizen service. Everywhere people are beginning to ask themselves the question, "Why should we be the only great Power in the world to dispense with a system which is found so indispensable by our neighbours?" And still more are they asking the question, "Is our present Army, about which we hear so much, adequate to guarantee the safety and integrity of our homes?"
My Lords, another factor has been introduced into the case to which the noble Marquess, with his habitual fairness, alluded to-night. Surely an immense change has been produced in the situation, and an immense impression has been left upon the mind of the people, by the discovery that our naval supremacy, hitherto a matter of such complete reliance, even if it still continues to exist, is no longer unchallenged, and that if measures are not taken to maintain it—and there seems a strange reluctance about taking some of those measures—it may in no short time slip away from our grasp. When, therefore, we are told, as we have been told over and over again in this debate, that the country is unalterably opposed to these proposals, that they conflict with the liberty-loving instincts and inclinations of the British people, I take leave to doubt that statement altogether. I believe the wish is father to the thought. For my own part I am inclined to believe that there is an enormous reserve of patriotic ardour and a keen sense of national duty amongst our people. I doubt very much if the Under-Secretary would have been in a position
460
last night to offer that beautiful panegyric upon the labours of his chief if Mr. Haldane had not been able to appeal to this patriotism. To my mind the attitude of the people of this country, if one can form an opinion about it at the present moment, is not one of hostility or alarm but one of hesitancy, of expectation, of waiting to see what its leaders will say and do. There is the noble and gallant Earl. He is not afraid to lead, but in the political custom of this country it is from politicians that the lead has to come; and in my view the moment the politicians make up their mind on this matter and give the lead—although I do not detect many symptoms of it to-night—the country will be ready to follow, and opinion will mature upon the question of national service with a rapidity which you can now hardly conceive.
The noble Earl who preceded me very rightly pointed to the fact that the real pivot of this debate is the question of invasion. That question, somewhat ignored yesterday, has very properly come to the front this evening and it is upon the whole question of invasion and our capacity to meet it that our case depends. We have in this country for so long been immune from anything like invasion that the whole thing is unintelligible to us. I have no desire to paint any lurid picture of what invasion might mean, but yet I think when we talk about it your. Lordships ought to realise that supposing our Fleet were disabled or destroyed, and supposing an invading force of any considerable number were to effect a lodgment on our shores, the consequences to this country would be such as we can scarcely imagine or describe. An enemy with his hold upon this capital would be able to exact what indemnity and to impose what conditions he chose, to disable our dockyards and arsenals for years to come, and to cripple the whole future development of our Fleet. Then think, too, in a country of old and ordered civilisation like this what would happen, if the forces of crime and disorder were suddenly unchained. The successful invasion of this country would mean not only the destruction of all our material resources but the crumbling and collapse of society itself. It would mean the utter subversion of the old order of things to which we are accustomed.
The question is, of course, Is there any

461
risk of such a contingency? On this point also public opinion has sensibly advanced. Ten or twelve years ago we were in what may be described as the Dinghy period, the time when the popular belief was that even a boat's crew of the enemy could not be landed on the shores of our country. Then we passed to the period of what I may describe as the petty-raid period, when the idea was that the utmost we might have to meet would be a sharp and sudden incursion of 5,000 or 10,000 men. But we have advanced since then. We now hear statesmen and spokesmen of the Government talking about a contingency in which a force of 70,000 men or more may have to be contemplated, and there are—the noble and gallant Earl and other military authorities in this House will correct me if I am wrong —great military authorities both in this country and in the intelligence departments of foreign countries who believe that it would be a perfectly easy thing for a particular foreign Power, possessed as it is of great resources in the shape of railways, quays, transports, and other appliances, provided it could only secure uninterrupted command of the sea for seventy-two hours, to land a force of 150,000 soldiers on our shores.
Lord Crewe in his speech to-night, without denying this proposition, took consolation from the fact that in 1857, the year of the Mutiny, and in 1900, the year of the Boer war, when this country was relatively helpless and when its Army was engaged in foreign parts, no advantage was taken of this position by our rivals and enemies; and his argument was that if we were thus generously treated before we might hope to be so treated again. I am not certain that in 1900 there were not those who, if they had been able to carry out their desires, might have made such an attempt as that to which the noble Earl alludes; but, whether that be so or not, surely the great difference in the position is this, that on all previous occasions our Navy has held the incontestable command of the sea. That position is at an end, and do you mean to say that on a future occasion, whether you are having a Mutiny in India or a war in South Africa or anywhere else, your enemies, if you have enemies, possessing as they do military forces incomparably superior to your own and a fleet which may even exceed your own, are going in a spirit of false and spurious generosity to abstain
462
from attacking you? Surely the idea is one which cannot be entertained by responsible men.
Then I come to the question, If invasion is conceivable and possible in one of these various forms, have we the Army with which to meet it? We have the Regular Army, and not one word shall fall from my lips in disparagement of that branch of the service. I believe at the present moment it touches a higher point of efficiency that at any time during the last twenty years. You have the Special Reserve, about which not a single person in the course of this debate has been found to speak in any language except that of polite contempt. In the third place, you have the Territorial Army. Now, my Lords, I must congratulate the Secretary of State for War upon the manner in which, by efforts on his own part which are beyond praise, he has induced people to accept and applaud that organisation. It is true that most of the noble Lords who have spoken of it qualified their language, and described it as a framework, a skeleton, or a scaffolding, and that, of course, a little modified the eulogy. At the same time the Secretary of State has received a testament from many of your Lordships which must be very gratifying to him.
But yesterday the crescendo of enthusiasm reached its climax in the speech of the Under-Secretary for War. A speech more loyal to a chief was never delivered. The noble Lord said that the Territorial Army had struck its roots deep into the heart of the nation; that it was a perfect organisation, which admitted of no modification whatever. As I listened to the ample rhetoric of the Under-Secretary I could not help recalling the well-known passage of Don Quixote, in which that gallant knight asked—
"Dost thou not hear the neighing of the steeds, the braying of the trumpets, the roll of the drums?"
to which his faithful squire responded—
"I hear nothing but a great bleating of ewes and sheep."
It would be far from my wish to institute so invidious a comparison; but when we hear this stream of undiluted panegyric poured upon the Territorial Army it is necessary to remind the House that of its 270,000 heroes as many as 100,000 are

463
under twenty years of age, and to ask whether a single independent military critic in this House or in the country will say that that Force, whatever its merits, is adequate in physique, in training, and in numbers for the objects which it may be called upon to perform, or will deny that it is hopelessly unreliable for purposes of serious war. It may be the very finest raw material in the world, but nobody could dream for a moment of calling it a finished product.
Then we come to the point which is really the gist of this debate. It is all very well to deride or depreciate the Territorial Army, but the question may fairly be put whether this Bill is likely to provide you with a better, force for the purpose for which it is required. I have been very much astonished that almost all the speakers have thrown very great doubt upon this. There has been a much greater inclination to disparage the Army proposed by the noble and gallant Earl, Lord Roberts, than there has been to analyse or expound the merits of the Territorial Army. But let us look at the point. Surely there can be but one opinion about it. Under your Territorial Army scheme, as I understand, your recruits are supposed to have fifteen days, but as a matter of fact most of them only have seven days training. That is not a training in any serious or practical sense, but is merely recruit drill. It is accompanied by no shooting. It is a sort of holiday performance in uniform. Under this Bill your recruits will have four months in camp under competent officers, receiving rifle instruction throughout that time, and benefiting by practical training. The four months in the first year are to be followed by fifteen days in each of the three succeeding years; so that you will get a total of 165 clays in the period of four years devoted to the business-like training of the soldier. It is quite true that at the end you will not get a finished soldier, but you will get a half or a two-thirds finished soldier—at any rate, you will get a very different sort of product from the Territorial Army man who has merely had his seven days training and is supposed to defend his country against the trained soldiers of Germany upon the strength of that contemptible preparation.
May I be allowed here to notice the two somewhat curious pictures that have been
464
drawn in the course of this debate of the life that the recruits are expected to lead under this scheme? The Duke of Northumberland drew a really pathetic picture, with a touch of parental anxiety in it, of the youth of this country being drawn at an impressionable age away from their homes, huddled in barracks and canteens—why barracks and canteens I have no idea, seeing that the training is to take place in camp—losing the virtues that they have imbibed from their fathers and acquiring all sorts of faults and vices in their place. That may be a true picture of the life of a conscript in France or Germany, but it has nothing whatever to do with the life of the recruit under the Bill of the noble and gallant Field-Marshal.
Then the noble Earl the Leader of the House gave an extraordinary description of what is to take place in these camps. We learn that the working classes will not like to go into them because the fusion of classes is not popular. I drew the conclusion that what he was going to point out was that the working classes would not like to associate with people like ourselves. Not a bit of it. The working classes would not like this admirable scheme because they would have "to associate with the riff-raff." That is surely a strange doctrine to emanate from that Bench. Then the noble Marquess (Lord Lansdowne) spoke of the 150,000 first-year recruits as though they would be agricultural labourers and artisans, and he spoke of the danger to industry that would ensue if they were taken away in the summer months. Well, the 150,000 men will not all be agricultural labourers, or all artizans, or all riff-raff, or all democrats, but they will be a mixture of all the elements of society. I should hope that the upper and educated classes will be largely represented in the training camps. I can imagine nothing better for all classes than the discipline of the camp, nothing more democratic than that all these persons, the aristocrats, the middle class, the lower class, and even the "riff-raff" should be drawn together to take their training side by side, nothing more patriotic than that this national duty should be undertaken by all instead of being devolved upon the shoulders of a small minority more self-sacrificing or less indolent than their neighbours.
The next point is this. We have been told

465
that this force would be no more ready to take the field than the present Territorial Army. Now we know that the Territorial Army will have to wait for six months before it can take the field at all. It is hoped that its numbers will reach 313,000, but so many will be occupied upon garrison duty and other necessary avocations that it has been calculated that not more than 40,000 or 50,000 would be available to enter the field against the invader. On the other hand, compare with this the scheme of the noble and gallant Earl. Of course the number produced by his scheme would depend largely on the time it had been in operation. The total would increase year by year, but in any case you must get an enormous advantage as regards numbers. The majority of them, or, at any rate, a large number of them, would be drawn from a good class of people. They would be a highly educated and respectable class of men, and above all, they would have had a real and serious military training. Of course it is quite true to say that man for man they would not be fit to set against the professional soldiers of a European army. But what they lacked in individual quality, they would make up in numbers, and, in any case, they would be sooner ready for their work than the soldiers of the Territorial Army could possibly be. Above all this force would set free the Expeditionary Army for service outside the country and the Navy for its operations in any other part of the world.
There are only two other arguments which have been used of a general character to which, with your Lordships' permission, I will allude. They have been endorsed by the highest authorities. The first is that if this money is spent on the Home Defence Army the effect must be to reduce the amount available for the Regular Army. But the expenditure on the Army is not a fixed sum, so that if something is added at one end it must be taken off at the other; and there is nothing therefore to prevent the Government from increasing the expenditure upon any one branch of the forces if it finds it necessary to do so. Any Government that attempted to stint or jeopardise the Regular Army with a view to buttressing up the Home Defence Army would speedily be taken to account by the constituencies. For my own part I believe the people of the country would be the last to use any such argument. I think they expect both the Home and the foreign Army
466
to be kept up to a proper state of efficiency; and all the arguments used in this debate about the intolerable burden of £4,000,000 or £8,000,000 a year for a particular branch of the service are arguments which, I believe, would not appeal at all to the constituencies at large. What the people want is to be certain that the country and their homes are safe, and they will not quarrel about four or eight millions, but will be ready to give much more provided they can be assured of security.
The second argument is one to which I should not have been disposed to attach very great weight if it had not been used, and seriously used, by the noble Marquess. It is the argument that compulsory service would injure recruiting for the Regular Army. Is that the case? The argument has more than once been employed, but is it anything more than a speculation? Is it possible to pronounce upon the matter so definitely as some noble Lords have been disposed to do? Surely all military experience is to the contrary. When you had the old Militia is it not well-known that men were always being drawn away from the Militia to the Regular Army, and it was one of the complaints made by Militia officers that they could not keep their men because of the rival attractions of the superior branch of the service; and why a man should be driven away from a military career because he has been put through four months compulsory training I cannot for the life of me understand. It would seem to be much more likely that his preliminary experience would arouse the dormant martial instincts that lie hidden in him, and that you would find your Home Defence Army acting as the best recruiting sergeant in the world for your Regular Army.
The hour is getting on and I must bring my remarks to a close. The only concluding argument to which I would draw attention is one upon which great stress has been laid, particularly from the Front Opposition Bench, and that is the argument that the introduction of a Bill like this is the business of a responsible Government. It is true that a Bill introducing compulsory military service can only be introduced and passed on the initiative and authority of the Government of the day, and, further, that no Government is likely to take this action unless it is con-

467
vinced that it has the sanction of the country behind it. That we all accept. We introduce this Bill not in the least because we expect it at this moment to be carried into law, not even because we expect it to pass its Second Reading in this House. We know that the attitude of the noble Marquess has rendered that impossible. The present Bill has been introduced as the recognised way of bringing our proposals before the public. So long as we were content with resolutions people said, "You indulge in generalities; let us have concrete proposals." Now that we put them in the form of a Bill everybody says "How very inconvenient! Do you really mean that you are going to ask the House of Lords to pass this Bill, and if they do so are you going to have a conflict with the other House?" We contemplate nothing of the sort. We have introduced our Bill because we think it is the best way of submitting to the public a more detailed scheme than anything we have before put forward. Some day, perhaps, a responsible Government will be willing to take up a measure of this sort. In the meantime it is for irresponsible persons to push it forward. A good deal of spade work will, I daresay, be required on our part, but you may be perfectly certain of one thing, that as soon as the country gives any general indication of a willingness to take up this matter, a responsible Government will be found to take it up also.
My Lords, we are not dissatisfied with the reception which has been accorded to
our Bill in this debate. It is true that many useful and valuable criticisms have been passed upon details of the measure. By those criticisms we shall, I hope, profit in the same degree as I trust the country will benefit by a more clear understanding of the principles which we advocate. For my own part, I believe that whatever be the fate of this immediate Bill, or of its successors, there is no shadow of a doubt that this country will ultimately be driven to the acceptance of some form of compulsory military service. It will be driven to it, if it does not accept it of its own free will—and you may be right in thinking that it will be reluctant—by the sheer force of necessity, and the necessity will arise because you cannot permanently stand the strain and cost of the effort to keep up your naval supremacy. You cannot expect to do so, viewing the competition you have to face, the resources and the spirit of the countries with whom you have to compete. Your naval supremacy is already wavering. In years to come you will find it has slipped away altogether from your grasp, and when it has gone, then you must have an Army for home defence, and after you have realised that you must have such an Army you will have no alternative but to resort to compulsion.
On Question, whether the words proposed to be left out shall stand part of the Motion?
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 103; Not-contents, 123.

CONTENTS.

Norfolk, D. (E. Marshal.)

Londesborough, E

Oxford, L. Bp.

Argyll, D.

Malmesbury, E.

Richmond and Gordon, D.

Manvers, E.

Abinger, L.

Rutland, D.

Mayo, E.

Ampthill, L.

Somerset, D.

Onslow, E.

Barrymore, L.

Wellington, D.

Portsmouth, E.

Blyth, L.

Westminster, D.

Powis, E.

Castletown, L.

Radnor, E.

Chaworth, L. (E. Meath.)

Abercorn, M. (D. Abercorn.)

Roberts, E.

Clements, L. (E. Leitrim.)

Hertford, M.

Shrewsbury, E.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L.

Stamford, E.

Collins. L.

Bathurst, E.

Curzon of Kedleston, L.

Brownlow, E.

Colville of Culross, V

Dawnay, L. (V. Downe.)

Cairns, E.

De Vesci, V.

Dunboyne, L.

Carlisle, E.

Falkland, V.

Dunleath, L.

Carnwath, E.

Goschen, V.

Ebury, L.

Coventry, E.

Halifax, V.

Ellenborough, L.

Dartrey, E.

Hampden, V. [Teller.]

Elphinstone, L.

Denbigh, E.

Hardinge, V.

Faber, L.

Devon, E.

Hill, V.

Gage, L. (V. Gage.)

Gainsborough, E.

Hood, V.

Grenfell, L.

Haddington, E.

Milner, V.

Harris, L.

Howe, E.

Ridley, V.

Hothfield, L.

Kilmorey, E.

Tredegar, V.

Kenlis, L. (M. Headfort.)

Kenry, L. (E. Dunraven and Mount-Earl.)

Monteagle of Brandon, L.

Sandys, L.

Mostyn, L.

Seaton, L.

Kilmarnock, L. (E. Erroll.)

Newton, L.

Sherborne, L.

Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)

Ormathwaite, L.

Shute, L. (V. Barrington.)

Lamington, L. [Teller.]

Penrhyn, L.

Silchester, L. (E. Longford

Leconfield, L.

Playfair, L.

Sinclair, L.

Leith of Fyvie, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Southampton, L.

Lovat, L.

Raglan, L.

Tyrone, L. (M. Waterford.)

Michelham, L.

Ranfurly, L. (E. Ranfurly.)

Vivian, L.

Monck, L. (V. Monck.)

Rathmore, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L.

Monckton, L. (V. Galway.)

Rosmead, L.

Wynford, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Saltoun, L.

Zouche of Haryngworth, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Canterbury, L. Abp.

Stradbroke, E.

Glantawe, L.

Loreburn, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Strange, E. (D. Atholl.)

Granard, L.(E. Granard.)

Wolverhampton, V. (L. President.)

Waldegrave, E. [Teller.]

Grey de Ruthyn, L.

Westmeath, E.

Grimthorpe, L.

Crewe, E. (L. Privy Seal.)

Hamilton of Dalzell, L.

Althorp, V. (L. Chamberlain.)

Hastings, L.

Devonshire, D.

Churchill, V. [Teller.]

Hatherton, L.

Marlborough, D.

Cross, V.

Haversham, L.

Northumberland, D.

Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore.)

Hemphill, L

Portland, D.

Herschell, L.

Morley of Blackburn, V.

Hindlip, L.

Ailesbury, M.

Portman, V.

Holm Patrick, L.

Bath, M.

Selby, V.

Kenmare, L. (E. Kenmare.)

Camden, M.

Killanin, L.

Lansdowne, M.

Peterborough. L. Bp.

Kinnaird, L.

Salisbury, M.

Lawrence, L.

Acton, L.

Lucas, L.

Beauchamp, E. (L. Steward.)

Airedale, L.

Ludlow, L.

Albemarle, E.

Allendale, L.

MacDonnell, L.

Ancaster, E.

Allerton, L.

Manners, L.

Ashburnham, E.

Alverstone, L.

Marchamley, L.

Bandon, E.

Ashbourne, L.

Middleton, L.

Camperdown, E.

Balfour, L.

Monk Bretton, L.

Carrington, E.

Basing, L.

Monson, L.

Cathcart, E.

Belhaven and Stenton, L.

Newlands, L.

Chesterfield, E.

Belper, L.

Northcote, L.

Chichester, E.

Bowes, L. (E. Strathmore and Kinghorn.)

Nunburnholme, L.

Craven, E.

Pentland, L.

Cromer, E.

Brancepeth, L. (V. Boyne.)

Pirrie, L.

Dartmouth, E.

Brassey, L.

Ravensworth, L.

Graham, E. (D. Montrose.)

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

Revelstoke, L.

Halsbury, E.

Clinton, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Hardwicke, E.

Clonbrock, L.

St. Davids, L.

Jersey, E.

Colchester, L.

St. Levan, L.

Kimberley, E.

Colebrooke, L.

Sanderson, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Cottesloe, L.

Saye and Sele, L.

Leicester, E.

Courtney of Penwith, L.

Shaw, L

Lichfield, E.

Crawshaw, L

Shuttleworth, L.

Liverpool, E.

De Mauley, L.

Stalbridge, L.

Lytton, E.

Denman, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L.

Morley, E.

Desart, L. (E. Desart.)

Stanmore, L.

Morton, E.

Egerton, L.

Swaythling, L

Northbrook, E.

Eversley, L.

Weardale, L.

Scarbrough, E.

Forester, L.

Welby, L

Resolved in the negative accordingly.

Then the said Resolution agreed to.

House adjourned at Twelve o'clock, till to-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock.