Sitting of 15 March 1910

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Provisional Order Bills (No Standing Orders applicable),—Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, that, in the case of the following Bill, referred on the First Reading thereof, no Standing Orders are applicable, namely:—
Land Drainage Provisional Order Bill.
Ordered, that the Bill be read a second time to-morrow.
London County Council (Tramways and Improvements) Bill.
Read a second time, and committed.
London County Council (General Powers) Bill (by Order)—
Second Reading deferred till Monday next, at a quarter-past Eight of the clock.
Yorkshire Registries and Driffield Navigation Bill (by Order)—
Read a second time, and committed.
Cardiff Railway Bill (by Order)—
Second Reading deferred till Tuesday, 29th March.
Staffordshire Potteries Water Bill (by Order)—
Tipperary Gas Bill (by Order)—
Second Reading deferred till Thursday.
ENFRANCHISEMENT OF WOMEN.
Mr. H. A. WATTpresented a Petition signed by 2,992 electors of the College Division of the City of Glasgow in favour of granting the Parliamentary vote to women on the same terms that it has been or may be granted to men.
Mr. P. SNOWDENpresented a Petition signed by 6,463 Parliamentary electors of the Borough of Blackburn to the same effect.
Mr. H. VIVIANpresented a Petition from 1,341 electors of Birkenhead in like terms.
Mr. J. HODGE also presented a Petition from several hundred electors in the Gorton Division of Lancashire with the same prayer.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION).
Lord HUGH CECILpresented a Petition from the Council and Committee of the British Constitutional Association in favour of the reform of the House of Commons on the principle of proportional representation.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Egyptian Cotton Crop.
  Mr. HARWOODasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he had received any information from the authorities in Egypt explaining the failure of last season's crop of cotton after such a promising opening; and whether any assurances had been given that there was not likely to be a recurrence of such failure?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir E. Grey): I have received a report upon the subject, the importance of which is fully recognised by the Egyptian Government. The causes of the failure are being investigated by two Commissions, one consisting of representative men interested in the production of cotton, and the second of scientific experts. The special subject of investigation will be the best method of dealing with the insects which prey upon the plant, and which last season were exceptionally destructive. The Government are taking steps to mitigate the ravages of these insects, and considerable sums are I being spent annually upon drainage.

  Indian Duties.
  Lord BALCARRES (for Mr. Harmood-Banner)asked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether he will take steps to remove the Excise duty on cotton cloth produced in India now that an agreement has been come to with the Indian Council that it is not desirable, to impose Excise duty on cigarettes and cigars made in India, so as to make the principle in both cases uniform?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Mr. Montagu): No such agreement as is suggested in the question has been come to. The Government of India is considering the question of protecting the revenue by means of an Excise duty on cigars and cigarettes produced in India. It is not proposed to interfere with the Excise duty on Indian cotton mills.
  Sir GEORGE KEMP: If the question is considered again will the hon. Gentleman take steps to take off the Import duty on cotton goods going into India at the same time?
  Mr. MONTAGU: The whole fiscal system of India is designed to produce revenue, and if the hon. Gentleman has any suggestion to make, perhaps he will put down a question.
  Lord BALCARRES (for Mr. Harmood-Banner)asked whether any inquiry has been made as to the incidence of the new duty on silver on producer or consumer; and whether there is any official information showing that the new duty will seriously affect the shipment of Indian cloth to China, and add to the handicap already imposed on Indian cloth producers by the Excise duty now existing?
  Mr. MONTAGU: The Secretary of State has watched the movement of the silver market since the new duties were announced, and he finds that the trade is disposed to think that the slight fall in the price of the metal which at first occurred will not be permanent. The answer to the second part of the question is in the negative. The Secretary of State will continue to watch the effect, if any, of this duty on Indian trade.

  Examination of Trade Lads.
  Mr. NEWMANasked the Secretary of State for War whether he would consider the advisability of instituting at Enfield a local examination for trade lads, having regard to the fact that the obligation to attend for examination at Woolwich has hitherto had the effect of placing an Enfield lad at a disadvantage?
  The SECRETARY Of STATE for WAR (Mr. Haldane): The examination at Woolwich is not confined to trade lads from the Government factories, but is attended by lads from all over the country. Trade lads from Enfield, accordingly, do not suffer any more disadvantage than lads
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  from other parts, and I am afraid that I cannot undertake to arrange for a special examination in the Royal Small Arms Factory.

  Enfield Small Arms Factory.
  Mr. NEWMANasked whether complaints have been made to the superintendent at the Royal Small Arms Factory, Enfield, by those employed in the workshops relative to the temperature at which such workshops have recently been maintained; and whether, seeing that on several recent occasions such temperature has not been below 40 degrees Fahrenheit, steps will be taken to provide for a higher temperature?
  Mr. HALDANE: A complaint was made on 5th March by the secretary of the Employés' Union. A new scheme for steam heating has been in progress for some months and will shortly be completed and meanwhile gas will be used to prevent the temperature falling too low when steam is not available.

  Troops in the Isle of Wight.
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked what was the total reduction in strength of the garrisons manning the forts in the Isle of Wight in February, 1910, as compared with the strength of the garrisons in February, 1906; whether he would give the reason for reducing the strength of these garrisons, in view of the strategical importance of the Isle of Wight; whether the reserve of ammunition and stores in these forts had been reduced, and, if so, for what reason; and whether reports had reached the War Office to the effect that the reserve of ammunition and stores in these forts was below the standard usually maintained?
  Mr. HALDANE: It has been frequently explained in this House that it is highly inexpedient to publish details of this nature connected with our national defences, and I hope the hon. Member will understand that I am not treating him exceptionally in expressing my regret that I am unable to furnish him with the information required. Changes in armaments were carried out on the recommendations of General Owen's Committee. As regards the last part of the question, I may add that no such reports have been received.
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Secretary for War whether his attention.

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  had been called to the difficulty and expense of training the Regular and Territorial troops in the Isle of Wight in musketry owing to the want of a proper rifle range; whether a safe and suitable site had been reported on by a military board; and, if so, whether he would take the necessary steps to provide for the acquisition of that or some other suitable spot?
  Mr. HALDANE: My attention has been drawn to this matter. A suitable site has been reported on by a military board. Steps will be taken for securing a site with all possible despatch.

  Army Veterinary Department (Special Reserve).
  Captain COOPERasked the Secretary for War whether he proposes to take any steps to induce suitable gentlemen to enrol themselves as officers in the Special Reserve of the Army Veterinary Department?
  Mr. HALDANE: The Director-General Army Veterinary Service is using his best endeavours to induce gentlemen of the veterinary profession to join, and it is hoped that before long they will see their way to do so. It is not, however, proposed to take any special steps as suggested in the question.

  Cavalry Changes.
  Captain O'NEILLasked the Secretary for War if he will say whether the changes which are to take place in the Cavalry, namely, the establishment of depots and the increase of men and horses, applies in any way to the Household Cavalry?
  Mr. HALDANE: No, Sir.

  Cavalry Barracks (Windsor).
  Captain O'NEILLasked the Secretary for War if his attention has been called to the insanitary and dilapidated condition of the Cavalry Barracks, Windsor; and will he state how soon it is proposed to rebuild or renovate these barracks, seeing that this question has been contemplated by successive Governments for many years past?
  Mr. HALDANE: Certain sanitary improvements are now being carried out at the Cavalry Barracks, Windsor, and will be completed next month. These will remedy defects pointed out in the medical officer's report. It is not proposed to rebuild these barracks in the near future.

  Territorial Force (Musketry Course and Firing Efficiency).
  Mr. LLEWELYNasked how many of the members of the Territorial Force who were returned as efficient last year did not pass through the prescribed musketry course owing to lack of adequate range accommodation?
  Mr. HALDANE: No detailed figures are at present available.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGHasked whether seven battalions of the Territorial Force have not been on an open range this year; and, if so, whether each of these battalions was returned as efficient?
  Mr. HALDANE: Owing to insufficient range accommodation, seven battalions did not fire on an open range last year. The men of these battalions were not returned as efficient, but the units were specially allowed to receive their grants. I may add that the insufficiency of range accommodation has already been rectified to a large extent, and steps are being taken with a view to provision of the remainder.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: Does not the grant depend upon the efficiency of the unit?
  Mr. HALDANE: In the ordinary course the battalion units could not get this grant unless they were efficient, but as it was not their fault that they did not get their musketry training we thought it was very unfair to deprive the units of the grant. Of course, the men are making up for the instruction they have lost.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: Could not the right hon. Gentleman devise some other word than efficiency for a battalion of that kind?
  Mr. HALDANE: I think that is a very proper suggestion which may be considered, and that the word should be qualified.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGHasked whether a battalion of the Territorial Force is returned as efficient as the result of the number of rounds fired per man or as the result of individual scores?
  Mr. HALDANE: Men are classified as efficient if they pass the qualification standard. If they fail to pass but make three visits to an open, miniature or thirty yards' range and fire at least, fifty rounds

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  of ball ammunition or their equivalent, they are regarded as efficient for the purpose of earning the grant for the association. So far as musketry is concerned, battalions are classified according to the figure of merit which is based on the proportion of men passing the standard to the strength of the unit.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: For the purpose of receiving the grant the individual will have to fire fifty rounds whether he hits the target or not?
  Mr. HALDANE: Yes; but it is not right to put it in that way. The whole system is different from the old Volunteer system. Now the recruit has to fire a certain amount at the beginning—twenty rounds— and if he does that successfully he does it all at once. Then he is at once passed into a class, and is in that sense efficient, and he has the remainder of his ammunition. If he does not fire his first twenty rounds successfully he is put through an instructional course and fires fifty rounds in the course of that instruction.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: Then I may take it that there is no difference between a skilled rifle shot and a man who fires twenty rounds and does not hit the target?
  Mr. HALDANE: All the difference in the world. There is another class of efficients, not recruits, and they are tested every year.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: For the purposes of the grant there is no difference?
  Mr. HALDANE: The grant is given if the battalion is up to a certain standard of efficiency. Ordinarily and under normal conditions, if a battalion is not efficient it would not get the grant, but obviously it is very hard on a battalion if there is no range.

  Kaffir Labour.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies if the Kaffirs working in the various mines in South Africa were working under the conditions to which the Chinese labourers were subject; and, if not, could he state the difference in the conditions of labour?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for the COLONIES (Colonel Seely): Kaffirs working in the mines are not, as the Chinese
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  were, imported into the country under special legislation imposing special disabilities with regard to residence, labour and property, nor are they liable to be treated, if they leave the Witwatersrand district, as being practically in the position of outlaws.
  Sir G. PARKER: Is it not the case that the Kaffirs in the mines in the Transvaal are housed less adequately than the Chinese were and that a great many Kaffirs are now better housed because they are occupying habitations that the Chinese were assigned?
  Colonel SEELY: I have been asked what is the difference in the terms of service, and I have pointed out in reply to the question that the Kaffirs were under the ordinary law and the Chinese were under special restrictive laws. With regard to the houses they occupy, no doubt it is the fact that some Kaffirs are housed where the Chinese used to live before they were sent away.

  British Guiana (Executive Council).
  Mr. POINTERasked whether, seeing Mr. Garnett's connection with certain companies doing business with the British Guiana Protectorate, he was allowed to vote in the Executive Council, to which he was appointed as a temporary member, when questions affecting the said companies arose?
  Colonel SEELY: Matters are not decided by vote in the Executive Council of British Guiana. The Council advises the Governor but, as I stated on Thursday last, he is not bound to accept such advice in any particular case, though no doubt he often finds it valuable in enabling him to form a decision.

  Lobster Fishing Regulations (Isle of Wight).
  Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether he was aware that discontent prevailed among the fishermen resident in the Isle of Wight at the regulations which prevailed in the island with regard to the catching of lobsters on the coast of that island and their sale; whether he was aware that by these regulations a fisherman was liable to be fined £5 for catching and offering for sale a lobster nine inches or less in length, whereas fishermen in the neighbourhood of Selsea, just opposite the island, and

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  who competed with the Isle of Wight fishermen, were allowed by the regulations which existed there to catch lobsters to a minimum length of eight inches; and whether his Department would take steps to make uniform regulations regarding the taking of lobsters for the Isle of Wight and the neighbouring coast?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD Of AGRICULTURE (Sir Edward Strachey): The regulations for the protection of lobsters have received considerable attention from the Board. I will send the Report of last year's Meeting of Sea Fisheries Authorities to the hon. Member. The Board hope in the future to secure greater uniformity. The discrepancy in the regulations for the Isle of Wight and Selsea is due to the fact that they are made by separate Sea Fishery Committees.

  Small Holdings Act (Cardiganshire County Council).
  Lieut.-Col. VENABLES - LLEWELYNasked whether Cwmcynnon farm, in the parish of Llandissiliogogo, proposed to be purchased compulsorily by the Cardiganshire County Council under the Small Holdings Act, 1908, constitutes 43 per cent, of the owners' holding of land; whether, in view of Section 43 (2) of the Act, the Department proposed to sanction the compulsory purchase by this county council of so large a proportion of one owner's or occupier's holding; whether the price this land fetched recently at public auction and the owner's subsequent outlay upon repairs and improvements would be taken into consideration in assessing the sum to be paid for compulsory purchase by the county council; and whether any compensation would be paid to the occupier for compulsory disturbance?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The Board held a public inquiry into this matter, and after carefully considering all the circumstances of the case confirmed the order for compulsory purchase on the 9th November last. The price to be paid for the land will be fixed by an arbitrator who will take all the facts of the case into account. The tenant, who was under notice to quit from the owner, will be compensated in respect of any unexpired interest in the tenancy of the land acquired.
  Mr. BATHURST: In view of the fact that there is agreement on both sides of the House with regard to the desirability
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  of providing compensation in such cases, can the Government see their way to introduce some non-contentious measure this Session dealing with the matter?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: That only applies to the case of the sitting tenant when the sitting tenant is given notice by the owner.
  Mr. PATRICK O'BRIEN: What is the name of the parish where this farm is situated?

  Dog Licence (Exemption) Small Holders.
  Mr. HOLTasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture if he was aware that persons farming small holdings of less than fifty acres, and also carrying on other occupations, were being summoned before the magistrates at Hexham in order that they might be deprived of the exemption from the. Dog Licence, mainly on the ground that they were not farmers; and whether, in view of the hardship imposed on these men by attendance at court, often from a distance of over ten miles, he proposed to take any action to secure that an exemption from Dog Licence should be granted to persons bonâ fide using a dog for looking after sheep and cattle without their being brought to court unless absolutely necessary?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: No, Sir, but I shall be glad to make inquiry if my hon. Friend will supply me with any information which he may have received. The rules made under Section 5 of the Dogs Act of 1906 provide that the appearance of an applicant for exemption shall be dispensed with except in cases where the application is opposed and the Court considers his appearance to be necessary for the proper consideration of the application.
  Mr. WATT: Will the hon. Gentleman use his influence to discontinue this exemption?

  Ordnance Survey (Redhill).
  Colonel RAWSONasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether he could see his way to retain the Ordnance Survey office at Redhill for the present, seeing that there were still nearly seven years more work in the neighbourhood to be completed, and that its removal would mean inconvenience and expense to over thirty households?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The offices at Redhill are in many ways not well adapted for

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  Ordnance Survey purposes, and notice to terminate the tenancy was given in August last. No final decision as to the location for the new offices has yet been reached, and the Board will be glad to consider any representations which may be made to them on the subject.

  Glanders.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked whether the Board of Agriculture had official information showing that no case of glanders or farcy in horses had occurred in Ireland since November, 1907; and whether, in view of the fact that there had been no material diminution during the last few years in the large number of horses attacked by the disease in Great Britain, the Board would confer with the officials of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction in Ireland as to the best methods of eradicating the disease in this country?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The reply to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. No useful comparison can be made between Great Britain and Ireland. Our regulations are more stringent than the Irish. In Great Britain last year there were only 536 outbreaks as compared with 1,066, 854 and 789 in the years 1906–7–8. A comparison of the number of horses "attacked" prior and subsequent to 1908 does not afford any guide as to the prevalence of the disease, inasmuch as "reactors"under the provisions of the Glanders or Farcy Order of 1907 are included in the Returns for 1908 and subsequently, but not previously. The officers of the two Departments are in continuous communication with one another both on this and other matters in regard to which they have similar duties to perform.

  Women Suffragists (Political Offenders).
  Mr. JOHN O'CONNORasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has considered the claim of the several women's suffrage associations that the members of their respective organisations who came into conflict with, the law and the peace officers of the country to be regarded, on conviction, as political prisoners and not as ordinary criminals; whether, in case he has not considered such claim, he will do so at an early date; and will he take into account in so doing the question of motive on the part of such off nders so as to distinguish the nature of the offence?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I have given my best consideration to this subject with reference not solely to the treatment of women suffragist prisoners, but generally to the regulations which govern the treatment of those whom the hon. Member calls "political" prisoners. I do not feel that any differences of prison treatment should be based upon a consideration of the motives which actuated the offender. Motives are for the Courts to appraise, and it must be presumed that all due consideration has been given to them in any sentence which is imposed. It is, however, my duty, in carrying out the various Acts of Parliament, and the regulations made under them, to secure that the treatment of prisoners should not be inappropriate or harmful. I feel, as did my predecessor, that prison rules which are suitable to criminals guilty of dishonesty or cruelty, or other crimes implying moral turpitude, should not be applied inflexibly to those whose general character is good and whose offences, however reprehensible, do not involve personal dishonour.
  I propose, therefore, to give power to the Prison Commissioners, under the direction of the Secretary of State, to mitigate in such cases the conditions of prison treatment which are generally regarded as of a degrading character; and, in order to effect this, I propose to lay upon the Table the following Rule which will acquire statutory force in the ordinary manner:
  "In the case of any offender of the second or third division whose previous character is good, and who has been convicted of, or committed to prison for, an offence not involving dishonesty, cruelty, indecency, or serious violence, the Prison Commissioners may allow such amelioration of the conditions prescribed in the foregoing rules as the Secretary of State may approve in respect of the wearing of prison clothing, bathing, hair-cutting, cleaning of cells, employment, exercise, books, and otherwise. Provided that no such amelioration shall be greater than that granted under the rules for offenders of the first division."
  Mr. JOHN O'CONNOR: Will that involve the making of these classes of persons into a separate class or will they be compelled to take their exercise in the company of persons who have been guilty of offences of a dishonourable character, and will they be given any more comfortable facilities with regard to cells?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I have given a very full answer. Of course, the rule only acquires validity if Parliament assents to it.
  An HON. MEMBER: In whose hands lies the interpretation of the description "serious offence."
  Mr. CHURCHILL: It will lie with the Secretary of State and the Prison Commissioners.
  Sir GILBERT PARKER: Is it intended to give time for the discussion of the rule, and, if so, when?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The ordinary course will be followed. Many Parliamentary Rules have been made from time to time by the Home Secretary and they are laid on the table of the House, and after a certain period, unless they are challenged in the ordinary manner, they pass into the Criminal Code.

  Dinorwic Slate Quarries (Accidents).
  Mr. ELLIS DAVIESasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, in view of the fact that no less than 33 per cent, of the workmen employed inside the Dinorwic slate quarries, Carnarvonsire, were injured in each of the years 1908 and 1909, any special inquiry had been made into the circumstances; if not, would he consider the advisability of having an immediate inquiry instituted by some independent person acquainted with the slate industry?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Churchill): The inspectors of mines have been giving special attention to the question of accidents at these quarries. They point out that a very large proportion of the injuries are of an unimportant character, such as cuts or bruises—the sharp edges of the slate being a very fruitful cause of injury—and that if the serious accidents only are considered, namely, those reported to the inspector, the percentage is small—1 at Dinorwic and 1.96 for the other slate quarries in the same district during 1909. The inspectors have been instructed to report further after an examination of the accident returns for 1909 (which have only just become available), and in view of the approaching inquiry of the Royal Commission into the conditions at slate as well as other quarries, a separate independent inquiry would not, I think, be advisable.
  Mr. ELLIS DAVIES: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that the accidents in slate quarries were 100 per cent, greater in proportion to the number of men employed than in coal mines in 1908?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I have given the information which has reached me in regard to serious accidents. As to a special inquiry having been promised, I am not informed upon that, but, as I have said, the Royal Commission will cover the whole ground. I suppose that would in any case fulfil the pledge which has been made.
  Mr. ELLIS DAVIES: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman when the Royal Commission will be appointed and when it will commence its work, in view of the fact that it has been promised for the last three years, and that about 33 per cent, of the workmen have been injured?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: It is a continuation of the work of the Commission appointed to inquire into the working of coal mines. It is a reconstitution of that Commission so as to equip it for further investigation in a new sphere of the mining industry. I hope it will get to work as quickly as circumstances will permit.

  Labour Bureaux and Alien Labour.
  Captain FABERasked the President of the Board of Trade whether Labour Bureaux managers have been furnished with any instructions in regard to cases where an employer may express a, preference for alien labour?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Sydney Buxton): So far as I am aware no case of the kind has occurred, but it would clearly be improper to give a preference to alien labour.
  Captain FABER: May I ask whether an employer who desired to have alien labour might not have it if he was willing to pay a further tax?
  Mr. BUXTON: That question does not arise out of my answer.
  Captain FABERasked whether applicants at the Labour Bureaux are asked, or required to declare, their nationality; and whether, where an applicant's alien origin is apparent from his speech, he is asked for proof of his naturalisation?
  Mr. BUXTON: No requirements of this nature are at present in force.
  Captain FABERasked whether the divisional officer of the London district, south-eastern division, has engaged Yiddish-speaking clerks for the Labour Exchange?
  Mr. BUXTON: I believe that one of the clerks in one of the London Labour Exchanges understands Yiddish, but no appointments are made on that ground. I consider that employers and workmen who wish to utilise the Labour Exchanges may reasonably be expected to speak the language of the country.

  Seamen's Wages and Food on Merchant Ships.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNE (on behalf of Mr. Bottomley)asked the President of the Board of Trade whether any inquiry has been held into the circumstances attending the death from beri-beri, on 8th October, 1909, of an Asiatic seaman named Sk Alley Sk Esmal whilst serving on the steamer "Glencluny," of Glasgow; whether he is aware that this disease is attributed to insufficient and improper food; whether he can state when the provisions on the vessel were last examined by a Board of Trade inspector; how long the seaman had served on the vessel, and whether he had had any previous sea service; whether any previous cases of death from this disease have occurred on this vessel; what wages the seaman received and the cost per month of the food supplied to him; whether any compensation has been paid to the dependants; and, if not, whether he will take steps to inform the relatives of their rights under the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906?
  Mr. BUXTON: Inquiry respecting the death of the seaman referred to in the hon. Member's question was made by the superintendent of the mercantile marine office at Cardiff, and I am to add that I have under consideration at the present time the preventive measures to be taken against beri-beri on British ships. Certain of the provisions on board this vessel were examined by a Board of Trade inspector on 9th June last. The seaman joined the vessel on 17th July, 1909; he is believed to have had about twelve months' sea service in all. There have been no previous deaths from beri-beri on board this vessel. I have no reason to suppose that the seaman was inadequately paid, or that the provisions supplied to him were insufficient. I am not aware that any compensation has been paid to his depen-
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  dants, and I do not propose to take any action in the direction indicated in the last part of the question.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNE (on behalf of Mr. Bottomley)asked the President of the Board of Trade whether any inquiry has been held into the circumstances attending the death at sea from heart failure, on 1st October, 1909, of an Asiatic trimmer named Ellumdeen Fayaldin, whilst serving on the steamer "Killin," of Glasgow; whether the seaman was on duty at the time; whether he was medically examined before joining; how long he had served on the vessel; whether he had had any previous sea service; how much coal the engine-room hands were required to work each twenty-four hours; what was the temperature of the engine-room and stokehold; whether any previous cases of death from heat stroke or heart failure have occurred on this vessel; what wages the seaman received, and the cost per month of the provisions supplied to him; whether any compensation has been paid to the dependants; and, if not, whether he will take steps to inform them of their rights under the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906?
  Mr. BUXTON: Inquiry respecting the death of the seaman referred to in question was held by His Majesty's Acting Consul-General at Algiers and the Superintendent of the Mercantile Marine Office at Cardiff. The man was not on duty at time of death. He was medically examined before joining. He signed articles on 9th September last year, and died on 1st October. It is probable that he had had no previous sea service. The quantity of Indian coal consumed daily was about twenty-two tons. The minimum temperature of the engine room was about 80deg., and the maximum 117deg. The stokehold and bunkers were about 85 deg. No cases of death from heatstroke or heart failure have occurred on this vessel. I have no information as to the wages paid, and I have no reason to think that the provisions furnished were inadequate. I am informed by the owners that no compensation was paid, as death occurred from natural causes.

  Strike of Miners at Leadhills (Scotland).
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that the lead miners employed by the Leadhills Mining Company, Leadhills, Scotland, have been out on strike for the past fourteen weeks, not on account of

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  asking for higher wages, shorter hours of labour, or improved conditions, but because the company insist upon the men signing an agreement that they will leave the Gasworkers' and General Labourers' Union, and give an undertaking not to join any other union; if he is aware that thirteen men, not miners, have been engaged to take the places of the men on strike through the Labour Exchange at Glasgow, on 7th March, and are now housed in the company's engine-house; if the men were told that there was a strike on, and if he intends taking any action in the matter?
  Mr. BUXTON: I have made careful inquiry into the facts of the case. It appears that the men in question were, in accordance with the Regulations, fully informed of the circumstances of the case, namely, that a labour dispute was alleged to be in progress, and they were also informed of the statements lodged by the local secretary of the Gas Workers Union, as well as the replies of the managers of the mines. The Regulations governing the conduct of the manager of the Labour Exchange were therefore complied with.
  Mr. W. THORNE: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that the man sent along to engage these men was not a representative of the firm at all, but one of the ordinary blacklegs engaged there, and that money was supplied by the firm to go and take the men out of the Labour Exchange, and whether he will insist upon employers doing their dirty work themselves?
  Mr. BUXTON: If the hon. Member will communicate with me on the matter I will endeavour to ascertain the facts. I should certainly say, as a general proposition, that in those cases it is the employer, or a recognised representative of the employer, who should engage the men and not an outsider.
  Mr. W. THORNE: May I ask whether it is a fact that in the case of the statement lodged by the workmen the employers are in a position to get possession of it, while the workmen are not in a position to get possession of the statement lodged by the employers?
  Mr. BUXTON: The statement in the first case is made by the unions, and the employer when he comes to engage men is asked if he has any statement to make. The statement made by the employer is conveyed to the men before the engage-
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  ment actually takes place. The duty of the manager is to give full information to the men before they are engaged.
  Mr. W. THORNE: If an employer sends along a statement to the effect that there is no dispute, who is to be the final arbiter whether there is a dispute or otherwise?
  Mr. BUXTON: The manager puts the men in possession of the information before him. It is obvious that it is not possible for him to come to a final decision. The man seeking employment has to make up his own mind in regard to the matter.
  Sir WALTER MENZIES: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether it would not be better to instruct the managers of the Labour Bureaux not to allow their exchanges to be made the medium of interference in trade disputes, as has been the case in this affair?
  Mr. BUXTON: The intention of the Board of Trade is to take an absolutely neutral and impartial attitude, and that is what they have done in the present case. The bureau officers give to the men the information which was given to them, and after that they cannot be made responsible for the action the men themselves may have taken.

  American Immigrants in British Columbia.
  Mr. NORTON-GRIFFITHSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will make inquiries as to the influx of Americans to British Columbia, and as to whether these Americans are pegging out and securing large tracts of country on the route of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway now being built?
  Colonel SEELY: The matter referred to falls entirely under the administration of the Dominion Government. The Canadian Government make periodical Reports on the subject of immigration, which can no doubt be inspected at the offices of the High Commissioner.
  Mr. NORTON-GRIFFITHS: Has the hon. and gallant Gentleman any reason to believe that the Government of Canada having encouraged this immigration, are taking objection to it now?
  Colonel SEELY: No, I have no reason to think so at all.

  Export of Cardiff Coal.
  Mr. NORTON-GRIFFITHSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether

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  he can inform the House what quantity of Cardiff coal is exported annually for use by foreign navies; and whether the Board of Trade take any, and, if so, what, steps to ascertain whether, and how far, coal exported from Cardiff is used in foreign navies?
  Mr. BUXTON: The answer to both parts of the question is in the negative.

  Foreign Rope and Twine Imports.
  Mr. GOLDMANasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his Department has received any representations as to the importation of foreign rope and twine, which is then repacked and exported as British; and whether he will take steps to punish those concerned in these frauds should any cases come to his knowledge?
  Mr. BUXTON: The Board of Trade have not received any recent representations on this subject. If, however, the hon. Member is in a position to furnish any evidence of the existence of such a practice as that indicated in his question, I shall be glad to consider it, with a view to deciding whether any action can usefully be taken in the matter.

  Beef Trust in United States.
  Mr. HAMILTON BENNasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has any official information as to criminal or other proceedings being taken against the companies forming the Beef Trust in the United States and if so, what charges have been made against them?
  Mr. BUXTON: I have seen statements in the Press with regard to proceedings which are said to have been taken in the United States against certain meat packing companies for infringing the law with regard to combinations. I am taking steps to obtain further information on the subject.
  Mr. HAMILTON BENNasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has any information as to the number of chilling and freezing factories in South America controlled by the Beef Trust (United States) or companies under its control?
  Mr. BUXTON: I have no official information as to a controlling interest having been acquired by United States companies in chilling or freezing factories in South America, other than the two factories in the Argentine Republic referred to in the Report of the Departmental
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  Committee on Combinations in the Meat Trade which was issued last year.

  Importation of Live Cattle (Restrictions).
  Mr. HAMILTON BENNasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, as a result of the restrictions on the importation of live cattle into this country for slaughter the importation of chilled and frozen meat is increasing; and if he will state the total quantities imported during each of the last five years?
  Mr. BUXTON: The imports of chilled and frozen meat have only been separately distinguished from meat imported in an untreated condition since the commencement of 1909, in which year the imports of chilled or frozen beef, mutton, and pork amounted to 10,661,111 cwts. I will have the figures showing the total quantities imported during each of the last five years printed with the Votes. [See Written Answers this day.]
  Mr. WATT: Does the right hon. Gentleman propose to introduce any legislation for the free importation of cattle this Session?
  Mr. BUXTON: No.

  S.S. "Sardinia" (Death of Trimmer).
  Mr. O'GRADYasked the President of the Board of Trade whether any inquiry has been held into the circumstances attending the death from heart failure, on 29th October, 1909, of an Asiatic coal-trimmer named Sk Carallee Callimalla, whilst serving on the steamer "Sardinia," of Glasgow; whether the seaman was on duty at the time; whether he was medically examined before joining; how long he had served on the vessel; whether he had had any previous sea service; how many tons of coal the engine-room hands were required to work each twenty-four hours; what was the temperature of the engine-room and stokehold; whether any previous cases of death from heat stroke or heart failure have occurred on this vessel; what wages the seaman received, and the cost per month of the provisions supplied to him; whether any compensation has been paid to the dependants; and, if not, whether he will take steps to inform them of their rights under the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906?
  Mr. BUXTON: An inquiry into the death of the trimmer referred to was held by the Superintendent of the Mercantile Marine Office at Victoria Docks, when it

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  was found that the man had been invalided on 18th October, 1909, from the steamship "Sicilia," and transferred to the steamship "Sardinia" for passage to India. He performed no work on board the "Sardinia," and was under medical supervision.

  S.S. "Mahronda" (Disappearance of Trimmer).
  Mr. O'GRADYasked the President of the Board of Trade whether any inquiry has been held into the circumstances attending the disappearance at sea, on 15th August, 1909, of an Asiatic coal-trimmer named Ramjanallee, whilst serving on the steamer "Mahronda," of Liverpool; whether he was on duty at the time; whether he was medically examined before joining; how long he had served on the vessel; whether he had had any previous sea service; how many tons of coal the engine-room hands were required to work each twenty-four hours; what was the temperature of the engine-room and stokehold; whether any previous cases of death from suicide, supposed suicide, or disappearance have occurred on this vessel; what wages the seaman received, and the cost per month of the provisions supplied to him; and whether any compensation has been paid to the dependants; and, if not, whether he will take steps to inform them of their rights under The Workmen's Compensation Act. 1906?
  Mr. BUXTON: Inquiries have been held in this case by the Assistant Shipping Master at Calcutta, by the Superintendent of the Mercantile Marine Office at Tilbury, and by a Board of Trade Surveyor. The seaman referred to was just going on duty when he disappeared. He had been medically examined on joining, and had served for about three months. He had had previous sea service. The coal consumption was about sixty-six tons per day, and thirty firemen and trimmers were employed. On 15th August, 1909, the temperature of the engine-room varied from 108 degrees to 116 degrees, and of the stokehold from 116 degrees to 123 degrees. Two other cases of supposed suicide have occurred on this vessel during the last three years. I have no reason to suppose that the seaman was inadequately paid or that the provisions supplied to him were insufficient. I am not aware that any compensation has been paid to his dependants. It does not fall within my province to take
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  action in the direction indicated in the last part of the question.
  Mr. O'GRADY: In view of the fact that these seamen cannot understand the provisions of the Workmen's Compensation Act, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the necessity of making the men acquainted with these provisions?
  Mr. BUXTON: I will consider the point to see if it is possible to take any action.

  Surbiton Urban District (Sewers and Drains).
  Mr. VIVIANasked the President of the Local Government Board whether the attention of his Department has been called to clauses in the Bill of the Surbiton Urban District Council now before this House, which proposes to amend the law relating to sewers and drains as it affects the said district; and whether, instead of agreeing to a piecemeal amendment of admittedly bad law, as proposed in the Bill, he could see his way to introducing a Bill applicable to the whole country?
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Burns): I am aware of the Bill to which my hon. Friend refers, and a Report has been made by my Department upon it. I am afraid I cannot at present promise general legislation on the subject of sewers and drains.
  Mr. VIVIAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this House agreed, without any opposition at all, to my Bill carry-out the suggestions contained in my question, and if there is really no opposition in this House, is there any reason why the Government should not go forward in the matter?
  Mr. BURNS: I should be very pleased to discuss with my hon. Friend the possibility of getting a Bill through. I have my doubts on the point, but hope he may be right.

  Sunday Closing of Cinematograph Theatres.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNE (for Mr. Bottomley)asked the President of the Local Government Board whether his attention had been drawn to the recent action of the London County Council in closing cinematograph theatres on Sundays; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Yes, Sir. I have no power to interfere in the matter.

  Formaldehyde Process (Chilled Meat).
  Mr. HAMILTON BENNasked the President of the Local Government Board whether he has any information in regard to the formaldehyde process, which is largely used in preserving chilled meat in transit; whether his attention has been directed to the Food Report, No. 9, to the Local Government Board, showing its dangerous effects; and whether he is taking any and, if so, what, steps to prohibit its use in connection with meat imported into this country?
  Mr. BURNS: The subject is one which has been carefully investigated by my Department, and detailed information regarding the process is contained in the published Report referred to. That Report showed that the process had been used in such a way as to introduce material quantities of formaldehyde into the meat. To this there is serious objection, but I am advised that it is not essential to the process, and I have been in communication with the importers concerned with a view to a limitation in the amount of formaldehyde employed. Recent samples have shown a marked improvement in this respect. The process remains under careful observation, and in present circumstances it does not seem necessary to take steps to prohibit its use.

  Telephone Company Employés (Pension Service).
  Sir CHARLES HUNTERasked the Postmaster-General if he can state whether men and women employed in the service of the National Telephone Company will be allowed to count the time therein employed towards pension on entering the Government telephone service?
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel): I would refer the hon. Member to a Memorandum dealing fully with this subject which was read in this House on 9th August, 1905, by the then Postmaster-General.

  Canvassing Old Age Pensioners (Wolverhampton).
  Mr. POINTERasked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that the sub-post office, Great Brickkiln Street, Wolverhampton, was used by the Tariff Reformers for the purpose of canvassing the old age pensioners; whether he is aware that this was denied by the postmistress and the Postmaster-General, until proof was produced in the shape of the names and addresses of the old age pensioners
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  who had been canvassed; and whether it is his intention to issue instructions to prevent such an abuse in the future?
  Mr. SAMUEL: The incident to which my hon. Friend refers was investigated when complaint was first made, and it was decided, I think rightly, that there had been no attempt to canvass old age pensioners for votes at the office in question. The sub-postmistress is well aware of the regulations, and it does not appear necessary to issue instructions on the subject.

  Overcrowding of London Schools.
  Mr. WILLIAM THORNEasked the President of the Board of Education if he is aware that there is a shortage of no fewer than 40,000 school places in the London elementary schools and a great deal of overcrowding of classes, and that, in consequence, a number of children are being refused admission to school owing to lack of accommodation; and if he intends taking action in the matter?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Runciman): If by a shortage the hon. Member means a deficiency of school places by comparison with average attendance in the public elementary schools, the answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. I cannot say what is the precise position at the present moment, but the latest completed figures in the possession of the Board show that, taking the London elementary schools as a whole, the excess of accommodation over average attendance was rather more than 100,000 places. I find, however, that in the period to which those figures refer—the year 1908–9—in 153 schools, containing 406 departments, and having an average attendance of 88,895, 211 departments, with an average attendance of 44,886, had deficiencies of accommodation, amounting in all to 2,614 places. I understand that the new Regulations as to the size of classes, incorporated in the Code of last year, will result in some reduction of the effective value of some of the accommodation which has been reckoned for the purpose of the foregoing calculations, but I have not at present any precise information on the point. I have no information on the subject of the refusal to admit children on the ground of lack of accommodation.

  Grants to Local Education Authorities.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked the President of the Board of Education

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  whether the Board will make an additional grant to local education authorities in order to reduce the additional burden thrown upon the ratepayers in consequence of the new regulations with respect to the staffing of elementary schools prescribed by Circular 709 and incorporated in Article 12 of the Code of 1909?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: On the general question I must refer the hon. Member to my replies to the great number of questions on this subject which I answered in the course of the last Session of Parliament. I do not propose to ask my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer for money to be applied specifically to the discharge of any one particular duty of local education authorities. And to assist a local education authority in proportion to the extra expenditure, if any, entailed upon it by the new staffing regulations would be equivalent to giving it a bonus for laxity in the performance of its duties in the past. From the Estimates recently circulated the hon. Member will see that we are about to ask the House to increase the Vote in respect of Public Elementary Schools by about £350,000.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked the President of the Board of Education whether, in view of the additional expenditure thrown upon local education authorities by the national service of the medical inspection of children in the elementary schools, and in order to insure the efficiency and thoroughness of the work of such authorities in this respect, the Board will make such additional grants as will correspond with such additional expenditure, and to that extent relieve the already overburdened ratepayers?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I think my answer to the last question addressed to me provides an answer to this one. I am fully alive to the fact that the due performance by local education authorities of their duty to provide for the medical inspection of school children entails additional expenditure, but any additional pecuniary assistance that may be given to local education authorities will be given to them in respect of their work in connection with elementary education as a whole and not in respect of any particular part of it. I can make no further statement on the subject at present.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURST: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that in this particular matter there is a distinc-
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  tion between the usual service or work for which grants are made and this particular service, which is a national service?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: Yes. I am afraid that that does not vitiate the answer which I have already given.

  Disposal of Illegally Trawled Fish.
  Mr. WARINGasked the Lord Advocate whether fish trawled in Scottish prohibited waters and confiscated for contravention of the Trawling (Prohibited Areas) Prevention Act are sold by the authorities, and whether the proceeds of such sales are placed to the credit of the funds at the disposal of the Scottish Fishery Board?
  The LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. Ure): I am informed that in pursuance of the Act referred to confiscated fish are sold by direction of the Commissioners of Customs, and the proceeds of sale are retained by the Commissioners in terms of the Customs Consolidation Act, 1876?
  Mr. WARING: In view of the fact that the fish are trawled in Scottish waters, is it not possible to allocate the money in the manner suggested?
  Mr. URE: Yes, quite possible if thought desirable.
  Mr. GEORGE YOUNGER: Have there been any cases of confiscation?
  Mr. URE: Yes.

  Admiralty Cement Contractors (Rate of Wages).
  Mr. HUDSONasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he is aware that the Sussex Portland Cement Company, New-haven, contractors for His Majesty's Devonport Dockyard, and who are supplying cement to the contractors for the new lock at Portsmouth, are not observing the Fair Wages Clause of the House of Commons, the pay to their employés being only 4d. per hour without extra payment for overtime and Sunday work; whether the rate per hour paid by other employers in the district is 5d. to 6d. per hour; and what steps, if any, he proposes to lake in the matter?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): Inquiries have been made and it has been ascertained that some of the men concerned are paid at 4d. an hour and that this is below the rate current in the district. A further communication will be sent to the firm at once, and I will inform the hon. Member of the issue in due course.

  Income Tax.
  Sir JOHN RANDLESasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he can now state the result of his inquiry for advice to the Law Officers as to whether persons who have paid Income Tax during the last few months in the mistaken belief that the Government Would carry through the Budget, and so legalise the tax before 31st March, will have their payments refunded, should they so wish, on making application to the Inland Revenue officers; and, in the event of Income Tax not being refunded, will interest be paid thereon at the rate of 2½ per cent, for the period such tax has been deposited pending the decision of Parliament as to the imposition of a tax on income?
  The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Lloyd-George): A case has been submitted to the Law Officers, and I hope shortly to receive their opinion upon it.

  Treasury Bills.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGHasked what was the amount of Treasury Bills outstanding on 1st December, 1909; what was the amount paid in interest on them; what was the amount of Treasury Bills outstanding on 11th March, 1910, and the interest paid thereon; what is the estimated amount outstanding on 15th April, 1910, and the estimated interest thereon; and by what would the amount of bills outstanding be reduced if the collection of Income Tax under the Finance Bill, 1909, were legalised without delay?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: The amount of Treasury Bills outstanding on 1st December, 1909, was £26,000,000, and the amount issued from the Consolidated Fund in respect of interest thereon was £283,126. The a mount outstanding on 11th-March was £31,800,000, and the interest thereon £323,058, of which £73,446 was in respect of bills issued prior to 1st December, and is therefore also included in the amount I have already given (£283,126) for interest on bills outstanding on 1st December. On the other hand, interest to the amount of £40,336 was paid upon bills issued after 1st December and paid off before 11th March, and does not, therefore, appear in either figure. I am not in a position to say what will be the amount of bills which it will be necessary to issue between now and the 15th proximo. As interest upon Treasury Bills is paid in advance in the shape of discount upon issue, the whole of
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  the interest in respect of outstanding bills has been paid already, and any saving of interest which might result from expediting the collection of revenue would be wholly in respect of future borrowing. The figures I have given include the £14,500,000 Treasury Bills issued for Supply under the Act 40 Vict., c. 2, as well as the issues for Ways and Means under the Appropriation Act, 1909, and the Treasury (Temporary Borrowing) Act of the present Session.
  Viscount CASTLEREAGH: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether it is impossible to legalise the collection of the Income Tax, or whether it is owing to the fact that the Government are unwilling to create what the right hon. Gentleman calls a precedent?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I think we have debated that matter on two or three different occasions. The reason is a very adequate one: It is no fault of ours that the collection of the Income Tax is overdue.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLES: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he can, offhand, state what is the average rate of interest per annum paid on the whole of these Treasury Bills?
  Mr. LLOYD-GEORGE: I think the average would be over 2. I know that in several issues it was under 2, but several issues were over 2. I really could not give my hon. Friend the average rate.
  Mr. JAMES HOPE: If the right hon. Gentleman submitted a Resolution authorising the collection of the tax, and that were reported, would it not be possible to collect under it?

  Land Purchase Acts (Sales of Land).
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he will state the number of cases in which proceedings for sale of land under the Land Purchase Acts were begun in January and February, 1910, compared with the number of cases in which similar proceedings were begun in January and February of the three preceding years?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): The number of estates in regard to which proceedings for sale were instituted in January and February of each of the years mentioned in the question was as follows:—224 in 1907, 169 in 1908, 35 last year, and four this year.

  Congested Districts Board.
  Mr. GINNELLasked how much of the money authorised for this year by the Land Act of 1909 to be placed at the disposal of the Congested Districts Board has been so placed; when will the remainder be made available to the Board; and whether the Treasury imposes any condition that money shall be expended impartially in the several congested counties or only in some particular counties, or as to whether it is on the application of the congested people or only on that of landowners the Board are to act?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am not yet in a position to say how much cash will be at the disposal of the Congested Districts Board for land purchase during the financial year 1910–11. No conditions, such as are indicated in the question, have been imposed by the Treasury. The Board have received, and are considering carefully, sixty-one representations from landowners and upwards of 800 from tenants, or persons on their behalf. As regards the provision of money for the Board under Section 49 of the Irish Land Act, 1909, I would refer the hon. Member to the Supplementary Estimate recently presented to Parliament.

  Gurteen Station (Police Inquiry).
  Mr. CONDONasked whether the Chief Secretary can state the result of the police inquiry at Gurteen station in January?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The acting sergeant whose conduct was the subject of the inquiry was reduced to the rank of constable and transferred to another county.

  Old Age Pension Case (Clonmel).
  Mr. CONDONasked, with reference to the pension granted on 12th February to Mrs. Annie Mantle, of Summerhill, Clonmel, whether the Chief Secretary is aware that she has not yet received her pension book; and whether, as no appeal was entered against the pension, he will direct it to be paid as from the date of the pension committee's decision?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hobhouse) (for the Chief Secretary): A pension was granted, as stated, on 12th February last to Mrs. Annie Mantle, against whom there is a debt due to the Crown under Section 9 (2) of the Old Age Pensions Act, and delivery of the pension order book is being deferred
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  until the amount of the debt is recovered by deduction.

  Beetroot Sugar (Ireland).
  Captain COOPERasked whether the Department of Agriculture considers it possible to establish the manufacture of sugar from beetroot in Ireland; and whether it will take any steps to assist in the creation of such an industry?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Department made very full inquiry into this matter some years ago. They do not consider it possible under existing conditions to establish in Ireland, on a remunerative basis, the manufacture of sugar from beetroot.

  German "Dreadnoughts."
  Mr. LOUGH: I wish to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty a question of which I have given him private notice, whether he can state, with regard to each of the completed German "Dreadnoughts," what length of time elapsed from the issue of the official order to the date at which it was completed, and what is the number of men provided for in the Naval Estimates of Germany, France, and the United States respectively?
  Mr. McKENNA: It is not possible to-answer the question as to the date when the official order was given for each of the completed German "Dreadnoughts," as no information on the subject has been communicated to the Admiralty. The dates which I stated yesterday to my right hon. Friend are the dates of the laying down of the ships in August, 1907. Having regard to the novelty of the design of the ships, I do not think that the official orders-could have been given very long previously to that time. The number of men provided for by" the Naval Estimates in 1910–11 in the following countries is—Germany, 57,391; France, 58,595; and the United States of America, 62,487. None of those numbers have been yet agreed to in the several Houses of Parliament. I should also add that the figures standing by them selves might be misleading, as in some of the countries named greater reliance is placed on the reserve than is done in the United Kingdom.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLES: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman could not obtain the dates of the laying down of the vessels through His Majesty's Ambassador at Berlin.
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes; we have the laying down dates.
  Mr. BOWLES: I mean the dates of the issue of the orders.
  Mr. McKENNA: I assume the official orders correspond to the dates of the laying dawn of the ships.
  Mr. LOUGH: Would it be possible that any ship could be laid down at the date of the official order, and will my right hon. Friend try to find out the dates of the official orders?
  Mr. McKENNA: With regard to these four ships my right hon. Friend will remember that they were of an entirely novel design, and the orders for the ships have been delayed for a long time through the fact that the designs were not ready.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether those vessels did nòt belong to the previous year's programme, 1906, and were laid down in 1907.
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes; they belonged to the 1906–7 programme. As I have stated, they were not laid down until August, 1907, as the design was an entirely novel one, and they could not have been laid down on that design in the year 1906–7.
  Mr. LOUGH: Then there was no acceleration?

NOTICES OF MOTION.
Mr. J. KING: To-morrow fortnight to call attention to the question of the rating of Land Values, and to move a Resolution thereon.
Mr. ANEURIN WILLIAMS: To-morrow fortnight, to call attention to the need for the more perfect representation of the electors in this House and in other representative bodies, and to move a Resolution thereon.
Mr. LEES SMITH: To-morrow fortnight, to call attention to the question of submitting the more important conflicts between the two Houses of Parliament to the Referendum, or the People's Veto, and to move a Resolution thereon.

BILLS PRESENTED.
The following Bills were presented and read the first time:—
Mr. ALEXANDER HAEVEY — Education (Conditions of Grant)—Bill to regulate
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the conditions on which public money may be applied in aid of Education in England and Wales, and for other purposes incidental thereto. (To be read a second time upon 29th March.)
Mr. WILLIAM THORNE—Shop Clubs—Bill to amend the Shop Clubs Act,. 1902. (To be read a second time upon 1st April.)
Mr. ALDEN—Plumage (Prohibition of Sale or Exchange of)—Bill to prohibit the Sale or Exchange of the Plumage and Skins of certain Wild Birds. (To be read a second time upon 1st April.)
Mr. DICKINSON—Town Tenants—Bill to improve the position of Tenants of certain houses, shops, and other buildings in Great Britain. (To be read a second time upon 21st March.)

SUPPLY [3rd Allotted Day].

  NAVY ESTIMATES, 1910–11.
  Considered in Committee.
  [Mr. EMMOTT in the Chair.]
  (IN THE COMMITTEE.)
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That 131,000 officers, seamen, and boys be employed for the Sea and Coastguard Services for the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1911, including 17,324 Royal Marines."
  Mr. E. G. PRETYMAN: According to long established practice in this House we shall, I believe, continue the general discussion which has already taken place on the Motion that the Speaker do leave the Chair. I think the practice has been that that general discussion can only be continued on the Vote which you have just put from the Chair, and that when we get to Vote 1 the discussion is confined to that particular subject.
  The CHAIRMAN: The general discussion can be continued on the second Vote if the arrangement is made with the consent of the Chair.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I think it is important for the right hon. Gentleman opposite to understand that there will be no objection on this side of the House to his getting Vote A and Vote 1 at the conclusion of the business to-morrow night. That being distinctly understood, it is immaterial to us whether the general discussion is continued on Vote A or Vote 1, or whether such an arrangement as you indicated is substituted for it. That would be a matter

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  of convenience as long as this is what is desired on both sides of the House, so as to continue the general discussion both, today and to-morrow.
  Mr. THOMAS LOUGH: Was it not understood on the part of the Government that Vote 1 was not to be taken for some time?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): No, Sir. The Prime Minister said that in view of the representations made to him by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, he would put down Vote 1 to-day. It is understood, and I believe that was the agreement, that the general discussion will be taken both today and to-morrow, and that we shall get both the Votes to-morrow.
  The CHAIRMAN: It is always customary to have the general discussion on the first Vote. If it is a matter of general convenience for the Committee to continue that discussion, with the consent of the Chair that can be done.
  Mr. LOUGH: I have an Amendment on the Paper. Will I be allowed to move it on this Vote?
  The CHAIRMAN: There is no reason why the right hon. Member should not move his Amendment if he catches my eye.
  Mr. LOUGH: I was not present when the Vote was put from the Chair, but I understand it is not Vote A.
  The CHAIRMAN: It is Vote A.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I think everyone will agree that it is the general wish, which has been expressed constantly from both sides of the House, that Naval Debates should as far as possible be non-party. May I say, and I do not think that this can be disputed, that the only condition upon which Naval Debates here can be treated from the non-party point of view is that the Government and the Admiralty, who are in charge of the Estimates, should prepare those Estimates, not with the view to meeting criticism delivered against them by advocates of any policy from either side of the House but should have regard only to the safety and requirements of the country, and that they should put that consideration only before the House of Commons. Had the Government done that, I venture to say that there would have been no party discussion, and no
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  party note from this side of the House, certainly, in the Debates on the Naval Estimates. May I remind the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord or the Admiralty that the very note with which he began his speech in the first sentence, showed his view to be that his duty was to steer between two points of criticism. That was the impression made upon me by the right hon. Gentleman's speech. He came here and told us that he had on one side critics who objected to heavy expenditure on the Navy, those known is the Little Navy party; and, on the other side, criticism from the Opposition, who were never satisfied, however high his expenditure might be. What does the history of the last few years show; I mean the history of Naval Debates in this House? I remember very well when it was my duty to defend Estimates on the other side of the House, and when the then hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Robertson) never ceased criticising the size of the Estimates, the dimensions of the Estimates [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] That is endorsed, and I am glad to have that confirmation. He constantly advocated great reduction of armaments, and that naturally inspired hon. Members on the other side of the House, when the Government, for whom the hon. Member spoke, succeeded to office, to anticipate the fulfilment of those criticisms, and that those criticisms should be reflected in the policy of the new Government.
  What was the attitude of the Opposition? For the first three years for which this Government was in office, not during the Administration of the right hon. Gentleman, but in the time of his predecessor, although I was not in the House, I am only stating what is known to everyone who was in the House, and who studied the Debates, when I say that there was practically no party discussion whatever from this side of the House—no party attack whatever made on the Government beyond warnings, serious warnings, from this side as to the inadequacy of their proposals. What happened? Did the Government then come to the House of Commons with a single eye to the safety of the country, or did they yield to political pressure, and where did it, come from? It did not come from this side of the House, but came from their own supporters. They yielded to that political pressure, and certainly did reduce the naval expenditure of this country to a point below the margin of

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  safety. The criticism and pressure directed upon them was to reduce taxation at the expense of naval expenditure,and they did so. What was the result? In March last the Government reaped the fruits of their policy, and had to come down in March and at one and the same time to make alarmist statements, and to make inadequate proposals to meet the situation which they then displayed to the House. Then and only then, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman cannot contradict me, did the Opposition find it to be their duty, and a necessity of the situation, to make an attack upon the policy of the Government, and to insist and to do their best to rouse public opinion throughout the country to the necessities of the situation. The reason they had to do so was that from the course of events which I have been recapitulating, it was perfectly obvious that political pressure was necessary to force the Government to do their duty. That being so, we may say that the Estimates of the current financial year and of the next financial year are certainly not party in this sense: that, so far as concerns the change of policy which the figures of those Estimates indicate, it is quite as much due to the action of the Opposition as to the action of the Government.
  Mr. McKENNA: Then why complain of them?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I do not complain of them in that sense. Have I complained of them?
  Mr. McKENNA: I withdraw. The hon. Gentleman has not complained.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I may have some criticisms to make; but my purpose is not so much to complain as to the adequacy of character, as to point out that the reason why we are obliged to have discussions of a party character on this subject is that the Government, in framing their Estimates, instead of considering only the safety of the Empire, have shown that political pressure and the pressure of public opinion is necessary to keep them up to the mark. Another reason why these Debates are rather more party in their character than they ought to be is that both the First Lord of the Admiralty and his colleagues in the Debate yesterday adopted a line of defence which is neither true nor sound when their policy is attacked. When their proposals of this year and next year are criticised they
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  seem to think it an adequate defence if they can point to some particular figure, some particular number of ships, or tonnage of ships, in this particular programme, and show that it compares favourably with the expenditure or tonnage proposed under totally different conditions by their predecessors. Is that a line of defence which can inspire confidence in the right hon. Member and his administration? [An HON. MEMBER: "Yes."] I am glad to find that there are quarters in which it inspires confidence, but I do not think it will do so among those who look to national safety first. Such a line of argument is really puerile. How is it possible to say that because the Government, three or four years ago, proposed to spend £1,500,000 or £2,500,000 on new construction under the conditions which prevailed then, it cannot be necessary for the Government to spend any more under present conditions? Does the right hon. Gentleman maintain that that is a consequence? Does he maintain that because we did not spend on new construction more than a certain amount in the year 1902–3 that therefore proves that the Government are right in not spending more now?
  Mr. McKENNA: I did not say it.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Then what does the argument amount to? The right hon. Gentleman used an argument of a very similar character.
  Mr. McKENNA: I used no such argument.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The right hon. Gentleman used an argument which, in my belief, is exactly of that character. He made a close comparison of the tonnage—
  Mr. McKENNA: I was only answering the statement of the Leader of the Opposition that we had lived upon ships provided by our predecessors. I could only answer that by showing we had provided more ships than our predecessors. That is the only way of answering such a statement.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I cannot agree.
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Gentleman may think that we did not provide enough, but there was no means for me to show that we had not merely lived on the ships of our predecessors except by showing that we had provided new ships of our own.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I think the right hon. Gentleman's defence is very wanting in efficiency in itself. If the figures are examined, how does the expenditure compare? He took the expenditure of the last four years of Unionist Government. I hate these comparisons; I do not think they have any value; but I am bound to point out an enormous proportion of the expenditure in the last four years, of which the current year forms one, is in this particular year. How much was spent in the first three years? Very little. It was only after agitation and after public opinion had been aroused that this money was spent. So that even taking the actual comparison it is of no value for the right hon. Gentleman's purposes. The only sufficient answer to the criticisms of the Leader of the Opposition will be for the Government to show that every year since they have been in office they have spent the money required to maintain the Navy at its proper strength. If they can show that, what criticism will be of any avail? If the right hon. Gentleman can show that the Government have done that, I think he will satisfy every critic on the Opposition side of the House.
  Another argument the right hon. Gentleman is constantly using is that we have actually gained by the postponement of the expenditure. Is not that a very narrow view to take? How have we gained? According to the right hon. Gentleman himself, we have gained in only one particular, and that is that the ships having been built at a later date there have been introduced certain improvements which made them slightly more efficient than they would have been had they been built a year or two earlier. As far as I am aware, that the is the only advantage claimed. If you push that to extremes, I suppose it would be an advantage if we never built any ships at all, because there are constantly improvements being made. The argument is really of no value at all. On the other hand, what harm is done? Are not sound finance and continuity of effort most important factors of naval strength? Are they not at the root of all construction? We cannot afford to drop building ships for three years, as we did, to reduce taxation which is really required for the Navy and then to have to make up in succeeding years by enormously increased taxation the leeway and the deficiencies which ought never to have existed if the Government had acted on the information at their disposal. If one
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  takes a wide horizon and looks over the whole ground, no man can deny that our naval strength has not gained, but has most seriously suffered, and has only just escaped serious disaster, owing to the laches of the Government in the matter of shipbuilding during their first three years of office.
  4.0 P.M.
  Now I would, on that question of finance, just make this observation. The hon. Gentleman the Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Gibson Bowles)—I have great sympathy with his view—stated that all the reforms in the Navy initiated by the Service itself were good; those initiated by civilians were bad, or mostly bad.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLES: By the Government.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: By the Government; that is the same thing. I will go rather further than the hon. Member, and I will say that I do not know of any naval reform of recent years which has not been initiated by the Service.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLESmade an observation inaudible in the Gallery.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Well, that carries us further still. Can the hon. Gentleman tell us of one? No ! These reforms are all were bad, or mostly bad.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLES: Some of them are real, and others are only apparent.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I do not know. I go further than the hon. Gentleman, and I do say, and I think it must be so really— because how would it be possible for any civilian Member of the Government, or for any number of Members of the Government, to go and propose the kind of reforms which have been made in the Navy and carried out in that great Service by the Admiralty in the last few years. It is evident that the only people who can really know what changes are required are those who have a practical life knowledge of the Service of which they are members. And I am convinced of this, whether in the Army or Navy, all true reforms must come from those who are in the Service; and that is the character of the reforms which have been executed in the; last few years. But there is one kind of change, one kind of reform, which cannot come from within, and which must come from without. It is a matter peculiar to this House, a peculiar charge on a Government of civilians, and that is the financial

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  arrangements which govern the conduct of Admiralty business. In this matter changes cannot be initiated by the Service. They must be initiated here. In yesterday's Debate the right hon. Gentleman referred to the fact of the difficulties created by taking an Estimate for fifteen months ahead. These difficulties are very real—and that was only half the question, because not only had the Admiralty and its officials to estimate the exact cost for the Service for fifteen months ahead; they have not only to make their prophecy for the next year, but they have also, at the same time, to justify the prophecy made fifteen months ago. You have officers brought into the Admiralty from the sea service whose time is of the utmost value, whose knowledge is even of greater value, and an immense proportion of their time is, I will not say wasted, but is occupied in calculations on a particular point, not as to what work is going to cost, not as to what the construction of a ship is going to cost, but as to exactly what amount, to a small definite sum, will be spent upon work fifteen months ahead. Where the expenditure is in the Civil Service, on a regular scale of salaries, where you know pretty well how many people you are going to employ and what you are going to pay them, there the Estimate can be made with very little difficulty and considerable accuracy. In the sea service, however, you have constantly changing requirements and constantly changing conditions, and I do venture to suggest to this Committee that this is a handicap. And we are handicapped now in a most serious struggle for naval supremacy! We have never since the great war ever found ourselves face to face with a situation when any other Power, taking all the facts and the widest horizon into consideration, was really running us a close race for naval supremacy. Never! I am taking all into consideration, and looking over the widest horizon and looking, not only to today, not only to to-morrow, but looking to the future, and looking not only at the Dumber of ships and men we possess, and not only at the number of ships and men we shall possess in four or five years' time, but looking at the resources behind those ships, looking at the population, at the manufacturing capacity, and at the future of the Empire, so far as it can be foreseen. For surely it is our duty to look at the widest horizon for the future as well as the present, and in the changes which
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  are made see that they are changes which are not going to compare with to-day or to-morrow, but with the future. I say, looking at the question from the widest possible point of view, we cannot, with an eye to the future and to what may be before us, afford an handicap of any sort or description in our naval administration. My hon. Friend in his speech yesterday referred in words, with which I most cordially agree, to the great advantage which Germany has in the elasticity of her financial system. Surely there is clearly an enormous advantage in a business firm, whether it be responsible for managing a Navy, or for managing an industry, that it should have an elastic financial system, which shall cause the minimum waste of time with the maximum of efficiency, and also the maximum of sound financial control. I do not for one moment advocate any relaxation of any reasonable control of this House, and I speak with great diffidence on this question of great importance. I know it is a matter more perhaps for the Treasury than the Admiralty, but I think it is a proper question to raise on a naval Debate, because I do not think any change will be initiated by the Treasury. I think the Admiralty will not only have to ask for it, but show its necessity in the interests of successful and efficient administration.
  Mr. McKENNA: What is the elasticity to which the hon. Gentleman refers?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The elasticity to which I refer is, as I understand it, that the German Admiralty is not tied, I think, to an exact estimate of what expenditure is going to be made on any particular item, on the Estimates on a given date.
  Mr. GIBSON BOWLES: Would you abolish the Appropriation Act?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The subject is one of very great difficulty, but is that any reason it ought not to be discussed? Are we not here to solve problems of this kind? I do not pretend to come down here with any solution of it. All I do is, with great diffidence, to call the attention of the House to what I believe is the disability under which we are suffering, and which we cannot afford to suffer under if it can be avoided. All I suggest is that the Admiralty should consider the question, and should examine the systems which exist in other countries—the matter should also be considered by the Treasury—and all efforts should be made by some means or other, by grouping—something has been done in that

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  direction in these Estimates—to alter the thing. I notice that the amounts to be spent, for instance, on particular ships in this programme are calculated down to the actual pounds.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: No, but that is the figure to which the Admiralty are bound in their expenses for the year.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: You are bound to it strictly.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: No, the programme is not voted.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: But we are voting money for these ships up to a certain amount to be spent during the current year. The Admiralty expect to spend that particular sum. Can the hon. Gentleman really tell us that they know exactly that that is the sum that will be spent?
  Mr. McKENNA: I stated yesterday we could not.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Is that a satisfactory arrangement?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: Yes.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: It does not seem so to me, because it is obvious that time has been wasted in making calculations that have been of no value, and which they say will not be realised. I confess that that is not a satisfactory state of things. I am not speaking at haphazard, because after six years spent at the Admiralty I know what amount of time was taken up in the most conscientious way to frame, the exact figure which was estimated to be the expenditure during a particular year, and the immense trouble which had to be taken afterwards to verify that expenditure, and to arrange the necessary interchange of money, with the Treasury sanction, from one item to another. I will not labour the point. I only indicate it as a matter which I do believe deserves serious consideration. If any reform is possible it cannot, like the reforms referred to by the hon. Gentleman the Member for King's Lynn, be initiated by the Service. It must be initiated here, and that is my excuse for referring to it.
  The right hon. Gentleman will remember that during last Session a point to which I attached most importance—and I did so because I was fully aware that it
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  was a point on which naval opinion was most anxious—was the question of our construction of destroyers—about the adequacy of the number of destroyers possessed by the British Navy. I would like again to refer to the matter. There again the right hon. Gentleman seems to admit that during the first three years, or the first two years at any rate, of the holding of office by the present Government the programme for destroyers was wholly insufficient. It was pointed out, I am aware, on this side of the House, that when the battleship programme was being produced the opportunity ought to have been taken to add more largely to the number of destroyers, especially in view of the weakness of pre-River class of destroyers. What actually happened? I think I am right in saying that the 1906–7 programme, which was-the first programme for which the predecessor of the right hon. Gentleman was responsible, contained only two destroyers of the "Tribal" class. The 1907–8 programme contained only five destroyers, so that only seven destroyers of the "Tribal" class were constructed during those two years—or, rather, were laid down during those two years. That was a very insufficient programme. In addition to that, what has been even more unfortunate, has been the rate of completion attained by the destroyers. The right hon. Gentleman told us yesterday—I think there is a misreport here, and perhaps he will desire to correct it—but he says:—
  "The period allowed for construction of our destroyers is eighteen months, and the order will be given in June next. By the end of June, 1911—"
  That requires correction. It is obvious that it should be by the end of 1911. When we look into the present year's estimates you will see the "Mohawk" and "Afridi" class entered for expenditure under this year's Estimates. They were in the Estimates for 1905–6, and this fact must make us "furiously to think." I believe they are both afloat, but they ought to have been afloat many months before they were. Here we have destroyers in programmes of four years ago actually figuring in the Estimates for 1910–11 ! We have also two destroyers, the "Saracen" and the "Amazon," in the Estimates for 1906–7. Are they completed? Are they commissioned?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, I think both of them.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: They are only just completed. Then we come to the pro-

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  gramme of 1907–8—the "Nubian," "Crusader," "Maori," "Zulu," and the "Viking." I would like to know if any of these are completed yet.
  Mr. McKENNA: All are in commission at this moment except one.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The right hon. Gentleman will admit that there has been a most unfortunate delay in the course of construction.
  Mr. McKENNA: Oh, certainly.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I hope that unfortunate chapter of delays is at last closed. I must call attention to it, because we have not yet had a period of anything like eighteen months. We have now sixteen destroyers of the 1908–9 programme.
  Mr. McKENNA: They will be completed in August or September this year.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Therefore, we have a period of twenty-one months. While the right hon. Gentleman has told us that the German rate was only twelve months, is it not a fact that the whole of the German 1908–9 programme are now commissioned?
  Mr. McKENNA: I will not say the whole of them are.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I believe they are all commissioned. The statement has been made over and over again that the German destroyers of the 1908–9 programme are now completed and commissioned, while none of our destroyers of the 1908–9 programme will be ready until September or October next; that is unsatisfactory.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: June or August?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I think September is more likely. I think the right hon. Gentleman will agree with me.
  Mr. McKENNA: I see now that all the German destroyers will not be completed?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The greater number? I believe the German programme is twelve months.
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Arising out of that it is pretty clear that the German system of construction of destroyers has been brought to a point of extreme perfection. One cannot help looking at that as an illustration of what may happen in regard to battleship construction. What they have succeeded in doing in regard to destroyers they may also succeed in doing on
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  a different scale in regard to the construction of battleships, and that is of great importance to us if we are to prevent our rate of completion and output of battleships falling into a similar comparative position with the Germans in regard to their output of destroyers. The right hon. Gentleman told us the figures in the Estimates make it perfectly plain that we shall have 102 destroyers, or, with the "Swift," 103, when the whole of the destroyers in these Estimates are completed. Germany will then, I take it, have eighty-four— that is, she will have seventy-two to our eighty-two, but with this year's programme she will have eighty-four to our 102. I think that represents the position. That is exclusive of the pre - river destroyers.
  Mr. McKENNA: No, Sir. It will include all destroyers before the river destroyer period.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will tell us when he replies how many we will have. I wish now to make some comment upon the statement which the right hon. Gentleman made when he said that there were destroyers which should be available for service under all conditions, and also pre-river destroyers which would not be fit for service under all conditions. What men does the right hon. Gentleman propose to put into destroyers not fit for service under all conditions? Surely it is impossible to foresee what kind of work destroyers may be called upon to perform in the North Sea. Are highly-trained crews to be put into destroyers not fit for service under all conditions? Is that the object of the Admiralty?
  Mr. McKENNA: I said these destroyers could not be used so far from their base and for so long a time as the later destroyers.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Does the right hon. Gentleman suppose that when a crew is on the destroyer, finding there is work to be done at a certain distance from their base, that they would not do their best to carry it out without other considerations? Are you not imposing limitations which are impossible in war? The right hon. Gentleman must realise the truth of what the Noble Lord (Lord Charles Beresford) said as to the arduous nature of service on destroyers, even when these destroyers are absolutely efficient so far as construction and seaworthiness is concerned, and

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  to put men into destroyers not fit for service in the North Sea under all conditions would be madness indeed. I think plenty of work might be found for these destroyers. The right hon. Gentleman is aware that suggestions have been made for the employment of these destroyers in coast defence work, and the organisation of that immense body of men which is now available on our coast—men engaged in coastal work—and who will be perfectly willing to offer themselves to the Navy for that kind of service. If an organisation of that kind were procured, we have in our coast population an asset of immense value in war. It is not available at present, and unless some organised effort is made to train it in time of peace, it will not be available in time of war.
  There are one or two other matters which have been discussed in this Debate to which I should like to refer. One is the matter of the scrapping of ships. I think there was some slight misunderstanding on this matter as between the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth and the hon. Gentleman the Secretary for the Admiralty. The Noble Lord said in his speech that the Admiralty had scrapped 154 ships, and that for that policy the Unionists were also responsible. I do not think that anybody will be able to point to one of these ships which have been scrapped that would have been of any value in war, and I, being in favour of the whole of the policy which resulted in the swapping of those ships, feel sure that a great service was rendered to the Navy when these ships were brought home. But that does not in any way reduce the value of the Noble Lord's criticism that you cannot safely denude our foreign stations of these vessels which are necessary for police work. My Noble Friend has not, I think, suggested that the ships that were there were suitable for modern service in that direction. These two points are entirely separate—the scrapping of inadequate ships and the policing of foreign stations, and the furnishing of those stations with the necessary protection. And what is necessary now is not to send back to these foreign stations the inadequate ships that were very properly scrapped, but to build a sufficiency of small cruisers of moderate speed and sufficient offensive power to do the very necessary work which my Noble Friend has pointed out should be done.
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  That is the lesson which I hope the Government will lay to heart.
  With regard to the question of stores, that is a question which the House is in very great difficulty in dealing with. In regard to shipbuilding, it is quite true that public opinion in this House largely shares the responsibility with the Admiralty. Details can be gone into here and public opinion formed upon them, but in the matter of sufficiency of stores details of that description cannot, I admit, be given. It is absolutely impossible with regard to the interests of the Service that details of that kind could be discussed on the floor of the House. The result is that the absolute responsibility rests with the Board of Admiralty. I do not like to differentiate between the Members of the Board, but I feel quite justified in saying that none of the Sea Lords would feel justified in continuing to hold office if the necessary stores for which they were responsible were not provided by the Government. They have no other safeguards, and, indeed, no other safeguards are possible. We might ask questions and we may criticise, but we should always be met, and properly met, with the statement that accurate particulars and details cannot, in the public interest, be given.
  I am bound to say in that matter I have some little anxiety on the question of cordite. Very distinct particulars have been given to me and I should like the right hon. Gentleman in reply to give me some definite assurance that there are adequate reserves of cordite in this country, and that the manufacturing capacity of the firms which supply cordite, and especially of acetate—which is absolutely necessary to the manufacture of cordite— is sufficient and that in all these particulars the Admiralty is amply safeguarded. The right hon. Gentleman will bear in mind that the capacity of output under the old conditions is quite different from the capacity of output under the new conditions. The cordite required to-day is almost all cordite for the single big-gun ships. I need not go into the details, but the right hon. Gentleman is fully aware that the output which was possible of any cordite firm a year or two ago under the old conditions is wholly illusory as a guide as to what would be the possible output under the present conditions, when cordite of a larger size is required, and which takes up 1,500 hours to dry. I do not want to go into more particulars, but I shall be glad if the right hon. Gentleman can give us satisfactory assurances.

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  I have only, in conclusion, to say that I most fully endorse the well-deserved eulogy which the right hon. Gentleman pronounced upon Lord Fisher for his work at the Admiralty. There is no doubt of the immense ability and energy and atmosphere of work which Lord Fisher carried with him all through his service at the Admiralty, and I feel quite sure that history will recognise, as the country has recognised, the value of the work he has done. No great reformer has ever been able to carry through his work without some friction, and may I say that if in the carrying out of these great reforms any mistakes were made by any man, I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will agree that these mistakes should not be charged against Lord Fisher or against any naval member of the Board of Admiralty, but that they should be borne upon the shoulders of the Government of whatever period that was responsible for the changes and reform. Lord Fisher is credited with initiating a kind of reform referred to by the hon. Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Gibson Bowles). That credit will always be his, and I am sure if there has been in the carrying of them out any friction, every great sailor, such as my Noble Friend behind me (Lord Charles Beresford), will be the first to recognise the value of the great and the immense work done by Lord Fisher, even if all sailors do not see eye to eye with him in regard to that work. There is no more generous man than my Noble Friend, and I am quite certain that he, as well as every Member of the House, will recognise the immense value of the work done, and that the country has never been better served or more honourably served than by the Admiralty when guided by Lord Fisher.
  Mr. THOMAS LOUGHmoved to reduce Vote A by 3,000 men.
  With regard to the Committee which watches over the expenditure on our armaments, I desire to say that I should have been very glad if my hon. Friends had seen their way to take up this question of the increase of the Navy Estimates. The Committee to which I allude numbered 144 Members in the last House of Commons, and I think there must be quite 100 hon. Members in this Parliament who sympathise with our views. It is only natural that under the circumstances we should look with grave misgivings upon these Navy Estimates. We have been told that the Government have
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  a great constitutional task in hand, and that it would be better for us not to perplex them by raising other difficult questions at this moment. I fully acknowledge the weight of that argument, and no man is less desirous of hampering the Government by raising side issues that might draw attention from those other important questions than I am. If, however, the Government desire that course to be followed they should themselves observe the law which they impose upon their followers. I am bound to say that this great increase in the Navy Estimates might have been postponed to a more convenient season, and then it would not have been necessary for us to strike a note of discord at the present time. The Government have, however, decided otherwise, and I feel that no other opportunity will occur for those of us who feel very strongly on this matter to raise this question. Under these circumstances I ask the House to bear with me while I give a short account of the situation as it occurs to me.
  My object in moving a reduction of this Vote by 3,000 men is to raise the whole question of the increased expenditure upon the Navy, and to give reasons why it is not necessary at the present time. I think everyone admits that the situation is extremely grave. The Government in power are pledged to economy, and they are pledged against any increase of armaments, and yet we find them suddenly departing from the principles which have been followed in this matter for several years by both parties. This is one of the numerous mistakes which the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth made yesterday when he assumed that it was only the Liberal side of the House that had practised economy in regard to the Navy. May I remind the Noble Lord that the Conservative Government between 1904 and 1905 made a greater reduction in the Navy Estimates than ever the Liberal Government have made in one year. Therefore, a reduction in the Navy Estimates was a common policy adopted by both parties for many years. For some reason or other the present Government have chosen to break away in the opposite direction, and they have this year made the most extraordinary increase in our armaments that has ever before been made in a time of peace. I am not a Little Navy man, and I agree with every proposition that my hon. Friend the Member for King's Lynn put forward yesterday. I say we want a large Navy adequate to the full

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  protection of our shores and commerce, but my claim is that we have such a Navy, and I would ask the House to follow me while I attempt to justify that position. It has been suggested, I regret to say, on the Government Bench—although it has been put forward with greater vehemence by hon. Members opposite—that we are in a great crisis, and that there is something wrong with us. I deny it absolutely, because our nation was never in a stronger position than it was at the beginning of this year in relation to other countries. We have fortunately disposed of all the wicked and false statements made about our position, but, notwithstanding all that, the Government, after the scare of last year had been exploded, instead of turning back in this matter went on twice as rapidly at the time when the whole justification for such a proceeding had vanished.
  I want to look for a few moments at two periods in our naval progress. The first period I will take is from 1904 to 1910, because it is within the last six years that the crimes which have placed us in this alleged insecure position must have been committed. I say that period was the most glorious in our naval annals. There never was an epoch in which so much was done that excited the admiration of the whole world than was accomplished during those six years I will summarise the facts. In the year 1904 we turned over a new leaf, and resolved that the Admiralty should depend upon brains rather than brawn. The result was that four great new principles were adopted. In the first place the Admiralty avoided a great deal of the expense wasted in this country over our Reserve by adopting the nucleus crew system. This enabled us to have a far greater number of ships in constant readiness, and we were enabled to do with a smaller number of men and be in a better state of preparation than we were before. The nucleus crew system was a complete revolution. I will not labour that point any further, and I only mention it simply to recall it to the mind of the Committee. The second great step we took was the redistribution of the Fleet. In the year 1904 our Fleet was distributed in the same way as it was at the time of the American War, but we have altered all that now. We have ceased to waste our money in the West Indies and other places, where too much money is being spent now in connection with the Army, and we concentrated
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  our Fleet in the place where it might be required, with the result that we have now the strongest and most powerful Fleet that has ever been brought together in home waters.
  The third great reform was the scrapping of those ships which were said to be practically useless. The Admiralty fixed its eye on those ships which were said to be neither strong enough to fight nor to run away, and every ship of that character has been scrapped. We want all our ships to be good fighters, and the result of this reform has been that we have made a Navy, which was before largely a sham, into a reality. I now come to the fourth, and what I consider to be the greatest reform of all. We invented a big-gun type of battleship, and that was the greatest triumph of all. The Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth seems to think that got us into all our trouble because we advertised our invention too much. I agree with him to a great extent; there is a great deal of common sense in some of his asides, and if he only would throw away his party bias I am sure the Noble Lord would get a good deal of sympathy on this side of the House. Such a great invention as the big-gun type of battleship could not possibly be concealed, and it attracted the attention of the whole world. The result was that no battleship was built in Europe until they saw how our invention was going to turn out, and then they determined to follow our example. This was a great alteration. I think I may say that no other Department at Whitehall has ever carried out in so short a period a more useful programme of great reforms than the Admiralty during those six years. I want to sum up the result of all this in strength, because, after all, that is what we have to talk about here. In 1904 we had sixteen battleships, but at the beginning of this year we had forty-four. In 1904 we had fifteen first-class cruisers, and at the beginning of this year we had thirty-seven. In 1904 we had thirty small cruisers and gunboats, and now we have got fifty-six. We had twenty-four destroyers in 1904, and now we have 121.
  Mr. McKENNA: Are those the total figures?
  Mr. LOUGH: Yes. We then had sixteen torpedo boats, and now we have eighty-eight. Of submarines we then possessed none, but now we have fifty-nine. [An HON. MEMBER: "What document are

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  you quoting from? "] These figures were published in a well-known paper during the last fortnight. It is a paper which the First Lord of the Admiralty respects more than any other paper—it is the "Nation."
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Does the right hon. Gentleman say that we had only sixteen battleships in the year 1904?
  Mr. LOUGH: No, no.
  Mr. McKENNA: Does the right hon. Gentleman mean sixteen battleships in commission in home waters in the year 1904?
  Mr. LOUGH: Perhaps my figures will bear a little discounting, but I am sure the general conclusion to be drawn from these statistics will not be questioned by any person who knows the facts. In the year 1910, as compared with 1904, which is the last of the six years I am comparing, we put the greatest ships on the sea we ever had. An inquiry took place as to the principle the Admiralty had been working upon all that time, and the principle was this: a system of economic administration had been adopted by both sides, and had been carried out consistently. I will give some figures. I got them out myself, so I think they will be accepted as perfectly accurate. In 1904 the Navy Estimates, including the expenditure on works, amounted to 40.6 million pounds; in 1905 the total was 36.6 millions, and that reduction took place when the Conservative Government was in power. Therefore, the full responsibility for that reduction ought to be shared by hon. Gentlemen opposite, and these attacks on the present Government on that score are most unseemly. In 1906 the Navy Estimates were 34.3 million pounds; in 1907 32.9 millions. These figures show that we had a steady reduction for four years. In 1908 the total went up to 33.5 millions; last year there was an increase of nearly three million pounds, and this year another immense increase has been, proposed. What then was the principle of this period? The reduction of expenditure— economy. The moment the Department became economical it became intelligent, and all these splendid achievements and strengthening of the Navy which have excited the admiration of mankind were accomplished with a steady reduction of estimates approved of by all parties in this House and approved of by the whole nation outside. We had the reduction of
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  expenditure, and we also had greatly improved efficiency and an immense accretion of strength.
  I am convinced that that short review will not be damaged. It shows that splendid work can be done without increasing the expenditure beyond £30,000,000 or £32,000,000. I refuse to be classed as a little Navy man, but where I differ from hon. Gentleman opposite is that I try to realise what £33,000,000 and what £40,000,000 are. That is a most difficult thing to do, and it seems to me that no nation should lightly spring up from one figure to the other. I would like also to allude to the period immediately before 1904, to the period between 1894 and 1904. In those ten years we increased our annual expenditure on the Navy from about £17,000,000 to £40,000,000. There was extravagance, and we scattered out the millions in a panic. No Department was equal to looking at whether it got the best results or not. Strength will not be secured merely by the wild expenditure of money. You want to practise the same system and the same policy that we have carried out during the last six years.
  I appeal to the Government with some confidence upon this point, because all the right hon. Gentlemen, from the highest to the lowest, are pledged to economy and to the reduction of expenditure on armaments. I will take the First Lord of the Admiralty (Mr. McKenna) first. We always regarded my right hon. Friend as the hopeful child of the Ministry so far as economy was concerned. I believe in the year before he went to the Admiralty he pondered over the Navy Estimates night and day, and even went so far as to write memorandums to show what great economies might be effected. It is rumoured, and I give it with all reserve, that one or two months before he became First Lord he delivered such a speech on economy to the Cabinet that everyone said he was the man to be First Lord of the Admiralty— "Put him in, and then we will have economy." I daresay he saw in that room these principles marked up—"Reduction of expenditure, efficiency, strength." What has he done? He has blotted them all out and substituted extravagance, and, I am afraid I must add, incompetency and risk of disaster. It is far better for us to pursue those safe methods to which we all pledged ourselves in our quiet moments than to make wild experiments of this kind. I want to allude to another Member of the Ministry who dealt with this matter.

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  I am going to make a quotation from an article in the "Nation," by the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Lloyd-George). I would not quote a speech of my right hon. Friend, because his speeches are so delightful that perhaps they are not always considered with such care as a written article. He wrote:—
  "The mistake made by the Liberal Government of 1894 will not be repeated. Sir William Harcourt's great financial proposals raised a large revenue, but it was nut hypothecated to ańy specific purpose."
  The Liberals raised a great revenue in 1894, and then the wicked Tories came in and applied it to an increase of armaments. That will not be done again. He said:—
  " What was left after the landlords had enjoyed the first cut was frittered away over futile expenditure on armaments. I predict that another concerted effort will be made to raise a fresh naval or military panic so as to rush the Government into the criminal extravagance of unnecessary armaments on laud and sea."
  This was on 30th October, 1909, and here we have the scare upon us, and are asked to vote £1,000,000 extra for the Army and £6,000,000 extra for the Navy. We are asked to vote it sub silentio, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who wrote that article above the name "David Lloyd-George," in capital letters, requests us to do it. The right hon. Gentleman added:—
  " Liberals will have themselves to blame if they lack the perspicacity and firmness to resist these manufactured cries of national danger."
  Is not that a justification for my action? Can anyone blame me? As late as 30th October, 1909, the Chancellor of the Exchequer was crammed full of all those noble sentiments, which I must say do him the greatest credit. They are in accordance with all his past professions, both in this House and in the country. He is the man who endeared himself to the hearts of all Liberals by his resistance to that criminal expenditure in connection with the South African War. He largely occupies the place he does both in the Government and in the minds of all Liberals because he was relied upon to fight all expenditure on armaments. The previous Chancellor of the Exchequer had reduced the cost of the Army and the Navy. Then there comes the right hon. Gentleman, who is so deeply pledged to pursue the same policy, and within less than one year he has tuned up the Army Estimates by £1,000,000 and the Navy Estimates by £8,000,000 or £9,000,000. It is extremely difficult to reconcile that procedure of the Cabinet with the professions they made both to the party and the House before
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  they took high office. So far as many of us are concerned, we, at any rate, stand firm. We think excellent results were obtained when economy was practised. We are not ashamed of the days of economy, and, whatever the Government may do in the way of changing those principles, we think it would be far safer at the present time to consider the matter with some little care before any change is made.
  I said a moment since that I would also show that the nation approved of these reductions in both our Naval and Military expenditure. The two last General Elections show that the country approved of every step that was taken in the direction of greater economy. The late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman put this forward as the chief part of the programme on which the election of 1906 would be fought. Nobody was alarmed, and the country, which was tired of the waste and extravagance and all the evils that go along with it, did not hesitate to send him to this House with the greatest majority any Minister has ever enjoyed, and to the end of his life he tried to carry out the principles he had announced. But we had another Albert Hall speech. Nothing was said in that speech of an increase of £5,000,000 on the Navy, and wherever Members of the Government went they still preached the doctrine of economy. The Ministry ought to consider carefully whether this pursuing of the expenditure of the scare after all the statements on which the scare was based have vanished, will not bring the Liberal party into great disrepute before long.
  It may be asked what my policy would be. It is perfectly clear. Even if we want to accomplish the object the Government have in view, they have gone the wrong way about it. My right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty last year said the Estimates were precautionary Estimates, and were intended to keep the country safe. This is a bad spirit of precaution. The Estimates have been based on statements which my right hon. Friend cannot prove to be true when they are brought up here a few months after they were made. We cannot now induce right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Bench to use the word "seventeen." They will not use the expression. Yet our Liberal books were last year full of the statement that there would be seventeen "Dreadnoughts." The whole thing has vanished, and, instead of the policy of waste and extravagance vanishing also, the Government are

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  going on with it when all the reasons alleged for it have disappeared. The true policy would be to reduce the outlay, and to concentrate on necessity within the broad limits of an expenditure of £30,000,000 or £32,000,000. You could within those limits find any particular kind of armament that you require, and could, without disturbing other nations, make your defences perfect. The Noble Lord opposite (Lord Charles Beresford) yesterday said we had fallen beneath the two-Power standard.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: In units.
  Mr. LOUGH: When I repeat his statement the Noble Lord begins to qualify it. Any impartial person, when speaking of the two-Power standard, would look at the situation all round. Are we as strong as any two Powers together, taking everything into account? That is the true two-Power standard with which we ought to be content. Hon. Gentlemen opposite first concentrate on "Dreadnoughts," and say, "We are not two to one." They fuss a good deal, and we say, "All right, we will have more 'Dreadnoughts.'" As soon as they get their "Dreadnoughts," they want cruisers. Then, when they get them, they turn round and say, as the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, they are unhappy about destroyers. I say these are details. If we could devote a year or two to the big ships it might be wise to give ourselves fully to that work. We could look to the smaller questions afterwards.
  The Noble Lord, when speaking of the two-Power standard yesterday, took expenditure. He said that America would spend £28,000,000 and Germany £22,000,000, making £50,000,000 together. We only spend £40,000,000; therefore we are beneath the two-Power standard. What wretched nonsense this is ! That was based on the supposition that they can get in America as much in proportion to their millions as we can get here, and, of course, they cannot. I do not know how much the £28,000,000 must be discounted, but at any rate it must be largely discounted. I know on my visit to America everything cost me twice as much, including my bed and breakfast, as I would have had to pay in this country, and, of course, the same thing applies in a greater degree to the Navy. The whole basis of the Noble Lord's comparison is perfectly unsound.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that America has got a contract for building two Argentine battleships because they can do them at a less cost than any other nation in the world?
  5.0 P.M.
  Mr. LOUGH: Hon. Gentleman opposite had better take my advice and be very careful in arriving at any conclusion about American contracts. I hope the hon. Gentleman will rest in peace. I was dealing with the Noble Lord, who talked about the £22,000,000 being spent by Germany.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: I never mentioned anything about that expenditure.
  Mr. LOUGH: Then I apologise. I understand it was the hon. Member for the Fareham Division who said that Germany was spending £22,000,000. Let me point out the fundamental difference. Germany, whether rightly or wrongly, is building on loans; we are building upon revenue. Supposing we were to adopt the principle of building by loans, and take loans for a year or two in order to build a greater Fleet, we should then have to stop: we could not go on with loans year after year. It would be nonsense to adopt that policy; we might just as well provide the money out of revenue, as we are doing. Therefore we are measuring a revenue expenditure against a loan expenditure. We are measuring the steady progress we are making in, this country from year to year against the occasional gigantic efforts which Germany puts forward. I do not want to labour that point, but I give it as an illustration of the weak and rotten arguments submitted to the House when statements are made to the effect that we are falling below the two-Power standard. In order to get at the real truth I occasionally put questions to my right hon. Friend, and to-day I asked him how many men there were in the respective Navies. I got an intelligent answer from him—he told me we are providing for 131,000 men, while-Germany and France together are only providing for 115,000 men; therefore, so far as men are concerned, we have a considerable advantage over the two-Power standard. I remember a speech which the Chancellor of the Exchequer made at Reading; he was speaking about our men and our material in the Navy, and he said, "When we point out that we have got three to one in men and three to one in matériel, all the answer the Tories

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  make is, "What ! only three to one? Only three Britishers to one German? Why, we shall be ruined !" That is the sort of answer we get. I think we ought to be satisfied if our numbers are twice as great and our strength is twice as great as that of any other nation. I think it more desirable, seeing we have such a great advantage, for us to go a little more slowly.
  I come back to the subject of advertisement. I think we ought not to advertise so much, and on that point I venture to offer hon. Members opposite a humble word of advice. It does not seem to be very patriotic to ask so many detailed questions of the Government with regard to these matters. I believe that if another Government were in power the Liberals would not do it. [Cries of "Oh."] They never did it so far as the Navy is concerned. A public Assembly like this, where everything is reported, is not the place to drag out every detail and to publish failures, if there be failures, with regard to our ships. I have a White Paper which illustrates this point. The Paper gives details as to the shooting in the Navy. It is Greek to me, but I do not understand why such things should be published. Why should not the Admiralty itself deal solely with the shooting of our ships? There is too much advertisement dragged out in this House—certainly in the printed Papers. The Government think it is a feather in their cap because it shows every little step gained. I think they should do all sorts of good things and at the same time hide their light under a bushel. I have been saying this much in support of the Noble Lord (Lord Charles Beresford). Let us get rid of this advertisement wherever we can, and let hon. Members opposite, so far as is possible, restrain their desire for information on delicate and difficult points.
  The chief suggestion I have to make is one which I need not elaborate. I think the time has come when we should seriously consider our position with regard to the principle of the immunity of commerce in time of war. I do not know whether it is generally known in this House that the German Navy League bases on the fact that we are not willing to agree with them in this matter the reason for the work of that League in Germany. They always say: "We do not want equality in the matter of the Navy, but we seek for a strong Navy to protect
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  our commerce. Our commerce is developing with great strides, and in many seas it exists in greater strength than even British commerce; but as long as the British claim the right to destroy our commerce and sweep it off the sea in time of war it is absolutely necessary for us, at whatever cost, to develop a great Navy." I think if we could seal a treaty of friendship with Germany by a concession on that point we might abridge our Estimates of expenditure, and it would be an advantage cheaply gained. I say the scare, so far as it has gone, has not helped the Government. I should like the Government to lay it to heart that, though they may carry things through the House, owing to our reluctance to oppose them in any way, in the long run these things will appeal to the working men of this country, who will not approve of this wild extravagance of this throwing additional millions, in connection with this matter, into the sea. Our financial position is in a very strained state at the present moment. We have not yet got the Budget through. We often use very hard words when another country shows a deficit of £28,000,000 at the end of the year. I agree with my Friends on this side of the House in putting all the blame for the present financial straits on the Lords; but, while that is true, we ought to be very careful about incurring additional expenditure of £6,000,000 or £8,000,000, as is proposed. At the General Election we Liberals spoke of nothing but social reform and the mighty expenditure to be made upon it. I stand as one of the greatest of culprits in this matter. I stated that out of the first Budget £18,000,000 would have to be devoted to social reform and to dealing with the question of unemployment. I am told that a leading Member of the Government made a statement to that effect. What are we doing? Social reform was not mentioned in the Speech from the Throne, and all the money has been thrown into this wasteful expenditure upon armaments. This will give a great shock to the friends of progress, and if it is not too late I would like to suggest that the matter should be reconsidered. It has not been argued out in the way it should be. We do not appear to be very much pressed for time. Hon. Members around me agree with me in looking with profound alarm at the step the Government is taking. I say it is not wise to take these doubtful steps, and in the hope that even at this last moment the Government may be able to reconsider the matter I propose to move

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  the Amendment which stands on the Paper in my name, and to reduce the number of men by 3,000.
  Mr. EYRES-MONSELL: I only venture to take a small part in this Debate, because I happen to be one of the very few naval officers in this House. I want the Committee to understand that I do not in any way whatsoever pose as an expert. I am giving simply the views and wishes of a very humble sailor. I am afraid I am a long way from having found my House of Commons legs, and I only hope that some Members of this House have themselves felt a little bit at sea while visiting some of our ships, for then perhaps they may be able to extend a little sympathy towards one very much out of his own clement who has been brought up in a Service which strictly discourages talking. The only point I want to raise in connection with the Estimates is the question of the destroyers. I have some slight experience of destroyers and working them at sea, and I consider that our position in regard to them is perhaps the weakest part of our naval programme at the present moment. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Islington (Mr. Lough) suggested that destroyers were really details, but I am afraid he will not find many people in the Navy who will agree with him in that. It is unanimously admitted in the Service that destroyers will play a very important part indeed in modern naval warfare. Some people outside, and I am afraid also some people in this House, seem to think only of "Dreadnoughts." They talk only of ''Dreadnoughts," as if "Dreadnoughts" were the only things we want, but "Dreadnoughts" without a proper and adequate complement of small craft and destroyers are only half the use they might otherwise be.
  I am going to compare our destroyers with the German destroyers. I am going to assume that we are engaged in operations with Germany—not out of any disrespect to that country, but simply in order to arrive at our fighting value. In any operations with that country, the North Sea is bound to be the seat of action, for destroyers at all events, and the North Sea is almost invariably rough. I think it is essential that the destroyers called upon to work in the North Sea—to do sustained work there—should only be those which are absolutely capable of maintaining themselves in all sorts of weather, and under all conditions. For
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  that reason we must count on no destroyers earlier than the River class—that is for sustained work. I have had some experience of the type before the River class. I have been in three different ones, the "Dove," the "Spitfire," and the "Success."; they are very good boats as far as they go, but they are not big enough to work in the North Sea. I think you will find nearly everybody in the Navy admits these facts. I myself have been in one of these vessels when we had to go back to harbour because of bad weather, and that was only in the Channel, not in the North Sea at all, where you get a much nastier sea. These so-cálled coastal destroyers are only destroyers in name. They are really only torpedo boats, and cannot be counted on for this work in the North Sea.
  The destroyers which we have, which are absolutely suited for work in the North Sea, are thirty-two of the river class, twelve of the Tribal, and two which we have recently purchased, making a total of forty-six destroyers. They are absolutely ready, and then, beside that, we have thirty-seven in the course of construction, and I think if all of these are pushed on a little more rapidly than the usual time taken for the completion of destroyers in this country, which I think is about eighteen or nineteen months, these could all be ready by July, 1911. With these thirty-seven and the forty-six now ready, we should have eighty-three in July, 1911, and they are all boats really capable of working in the North Sea. I have taken the date, July, 1911, because the First Lord of the Admiralty has himself said that Germany will have seventy-two destroyers ready by that date. These seventy-two destroyers of Germany are all less than seven years old, all good sea boats tested in the North Sea, where they have to work, whereas ours are only tested in the Channel, and they are comparable to eighty-three of ours. The number eighty-three to seventy-two is not a very wide margin; even when these destroyers are worked under similar conditions. I should like to explain, however, very briefly indeed, that the conditions under which these destroyers will have to work—if, unhappily, they should have to work—will be entirely different conditions, and those conditions will operate in our disfavour. Our destroyers will have to go over to the German coasts. They will have to go, first of all, as a flying squadron to act as a screen, because they will go to the German coasts and watch the egresses to

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  the North Sea. On the other hand, while these destroyers of ours are far from their base, or pretty far from their base, the German destroyers will be actually on their base.
  The utility of the destroyers depends, not only upon their engines which are suddenly called upon to work at the highest pressure at the shortest possible notice, which must entail breakdowns, but also upon the condition of their officers and crew. I do not know whether many members of this House have ever been to sea in a destroyer and experienced any of the discomforts, but if they have they will not need to be told that a destroyer is not very well fitted up with what are called home comforts, and what I want to emphasise is this: that you must rest your crew and you must rest them adequately in action, because no one will be able to stand for long the stress and strain of war being waged in hostile waters. Our destroyers will have to come back from hostile waters first of all for coal. The Japanese carried out very complete arrangements for coaling under which they had during the war the coal bags ready to be hoisted from the shore on to the vessel, and they had shore men there ready to handle the bags and take them on board, so that immediately the boats came in the crew went off at once to rest. If some arrangements of that sort are not made we shall find that the crew are the only men available for this work. In addition to the opportunity given to the destroyers to obtain coal, the men must have time to clean their furnaces, and the crews must be given a thorough rest, and I think it is clear that if we are going to have a thorough system of rest we can only count on keeping half of these eighty-three boats, that is forty-two on the enemy's coast. That reduces the number of our destroyers to forty-two, as against seventy-two of the other destroyers which is getting perilously near to two to one to our disfavour.
  Besides that, German's present programme—this year's programme—may be finished by this date of July, 1911, and that will add a large number to the seventy-two destroyers which they possess, and which I have not included in my calculations. I must say that I think it is a very good thing indeed that the destroyers in our programme are going to be pushed on a little more quietly than they have in the past. I think it is a very good thing, also,
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  that more money is put into this year's programme for destroyers, but even if this is the case I do humbly submit to the Committee that our destroyer programme for work in the North Sea is inadequate, and I do think we ought to have more than two to one, and more than twice the number of destroyers capable of working in the North Sea than the other Power has. I may be called a wild man for saying this, but if I am you will have to include in that name every destroyer officer in the Navy that I have ever come across. We are told that this shipbuilding of ours is insane competition. But is it insane? Surely it is not insane for us, whose very existence depends upon our having the supreme sea power, that we should maintain it. I think we ourselves have been very largely responsible for encouraging this competition, because of our spasmodic shipbuilding, and I do think that this House this week has a very excellent opportunity, in view of its rather complacent attitude at present towards a big Navy, of laying down a definite programme that will insure continuity of shipbuilding. I say, first of all that continuity of shipbuilding would raise this question of the Navy above party politics. The Navy dislikes intensely this question being made one of party politics, and it is doing the Navy no good. Secondly, I believe it would very largely stop this competition, because it would show the world that all parties in this House—not one party—are determined to maintain and secure that unassailable security which alone will guarantee peace in the future.
  Mr. HENRY TWIST: Perhaps the House will allow me to say, when, for the first time I crave its indulgence, that I cannot, on the subject that is now under Debate, bring any expert knowledge to bear; neither can I presume to have the same knowledge of details which a naval officer, speaking as a Member of this House, can claim a but I rise to speak against these Estimates from a standpoint which I believe need not be described as that of an extremist, although I stand quite opposite in my view of what is essential and necessary in this matter to the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth (Lord Charles Beresford). The Noble Lord is an extremist of extremists, and it seems to me that if the Chancellor of the Exchequer budgetted for nothing else than the Navy, he could not do more than justice to the Navy from the Noble Lord's point of view. It does seem to me-

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  an extremely strange thing that as civilisation advances the cost of armament increases. One would have hoped that the cost of all the engines of war would have depreciated and been reduced as Christianity and civilisation advanced and as man realised something more of the spirit of brotherhood; but it does seem, from the Debate proceeding now in this House, that while a great many in the course of an election talk about matters of this sort like archangels, they talk on a level of barbarism when they come here to discuss the question of armaments. I heard with very great surprise a short time ago the Noble Lord the Member for Hornsey (Earl of Ronaldshay) make this statement:—
  "That the primary duty of n nation, and the largest occupation of a nation should be the use of arms."
  I am sure that that is a very inept piece of philosophy. I have always been taught to believe that the first duty of any rational, sane and civilised nation is to provide the essentials of healthy, happy life for all its inhabitants and all its citizens. When we are being called upon to increase the expenditure upon the Navy I am bound to confess that it seems to me that both the Estimates and the speech of the First Lord of the Admiralty introducing them to this House were framed to propitiate the Opposition and to try to stifle criticism upon that side of the House rather than to save the Government from what they might deem to be an approaching dilemma. During the election the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Dover (Mr. Wyndham) came to the constituency which I have the honour to represent. He came with a flourish of trumpets as a sort of Empire missionary, and he there made a speech which I will not say was classic, but it has become notorious. He said:—
  "We want eight and we won't wait."
  I confess there was some element of truth in that prophecy, for the Opposition are not waiting very long before the completion of it. He declared that we were passing through a historical epoch, but I submit it was a hysterical epoch, and one which was created for a purpose. A Noble Lord declared yesterday that the reason for the increase of this expenditure was false economy in the last four years, but I have a suspicion that it is not that economy that hon. Members complain of in their hearts, and that what they are opposed to most of all is the expenditure of money on social reform
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  during the last four years. When one bulwark of their policy does not save them from having to pay for some amelioration of the sufferings of the poor, then they rely upon swollen armaments to absorb the money with which any well-disposed Government might do something to meet the desires and the interests of the poor of this country. The House of Lords, on the one hand, and swollen armaments, on the other, form the eternal Scylla and Charybdis between which the best aspirations of social reformers come to grief. Hon. Gentlemen opposite, it has always seemed to me, prefer to waste money upon armaments rather than spend it upon social reform.
  Last year the First Lord made a statement in this House comparing our new construction with that of Germany, and he said he thought Germany would possess seventeen battleships of the "Dreadnought" type by the end of 1912. I think he himself will now admit that that Estimate of the acceleration of German building was not well founded, the statement having been made, which we have no right to discredit, in the German Reichstag, that Germany will only possess thirteen ships of the" Dreadnought" type at the end of 1912. Yesterday we were told that this country will possess at least twenty by the end of 1912, and, including the Colonial ships, twenty-seven by the end of 1913. If, on the First Lord's own showing, this twenty at the end of 1912 is a satisfactory state of superiority over the seventeen German ships which he then supposed they would possess, it seems to me that the four contingent ships provided for last year were unnecessary, and that the increased Estimates this year are all the more unnecessary. On the Government's own showing, they might have been dispensed with, and that standard of superiority of twenty to seventeen might have been maintained. I believe the reason underlying all these claims for increased armaments is that, somehow or other, it has got into the heads of Englishmen, some of them, at any rate, that it is the duty of England to hold the balance of power amongst all the nations in the world. That is a policy which cannot be pursued without running this nation into bankruptcy. It seems to me a proposition the reasons for which have passed away. We are informed that £13,250,000 are to go this year for new construction, as compared with £8,750,000 last year. But the most important point in these Estimates is

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  that £1,500,000 are being subscribed for beginning new work, and that the completion of those ships which are begun by that instalment will cost the country from twenty to thirty millions. We need not look for any reduction in the Estimates for many years to come, and that which was in 1880 ten millions, in 1890 fifteen millions, in 1900 thirty millions, and in 1910 forty millions, may very easily be forty-six or forty-seven millions next year. Therefore the old watchword of retrenchment inscribed upon the Liberal flag has shrunk to the measure of a figleaf, with which they cover the nakedness of their extravagance. What is the relative strength of the Navy of Germany compared with our own? England to-day has, all told, 411 ships against Germany's 203. She has a peace strength, with reserves, of 188,000 men at her disposal, as against Germany's 117,000.
  This plea has been pub forward, that it is essential for England's safety that she should maintain the two-Power standard. I should like to ask where this proposal had its birth? I understand this two-Power standard to mean equal to the two strongest naval Powers plus 10 per cent. Behind this proposal there is the assumption and the supposition that if ever England goes to war on the sea there will be a combination of nations against her and she will not be permitted to fight any other nation single-handed. Are we to suppose that England would have no nation in the world supporting her? Would England have no allies if, as was suggested yesterday, there was a combination between Germany and America, which is to me unthinkable. If it is logical to argue that there is almost certain to be a combination of two Powers, in the event of war, against England, it is equally logical to assume that all the rest of the world will be against England and that we should arm sufficiently to meet the whole world. I cannot understand the argument of those who argue for a big Navy from this standpoint. They argue that every different ship which we build, every additional gun we construct, every addition to our armaments, is a message of goodwill, and assurance of peace and a safeguard against war, but directly they hear of a ship being built in Germany they conclude that it is a token of ill-will, and that it is the intention of that country to go to war. The Germans are as civilised as Englishmen are. I believe they have no more intention of doing harm to England than England
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  has of doing harm to her. Any conclusion arrived at upon such a hypothesis seems to me totally illogical. Those who urge an increased expenditure are not peacemakers but pacemakers, and pacemakers ultimately will ruin this country in the realm of finance.
  I agree with the Mover of the Amendment that one of the great reasons for the increase in the naval construction in Germany is the attitude that this country took up at the Hague Conference in 1907 in refusing to subscribe to the policy of immunity of merchantmen in. time; of war. The Noble Lord (Lord Charles Beresford) said last night, very bluntly, that one of the great reasons why we require a big Navy was because we had been the bully of the seas, and I assert that the spirit of the bully was manifested on that occasion, in that we did not extend our hands to those nations which were willing to agree that trade routes and the streams of food supply should be left untouched in time of war. Germany is approached by the seas by a mere lake, and she must inevitably keep her trade routes free from attack. Are there no methods of maintaining the peace of the world other than by huge armaments? Is there no other method of living at peace with your neighbour than by holding a bludgeon over his head and by perpetually clenching your fist and putting it in his face? I believe safeguards are growing every year which will ultimately render huge armaments unnecessary. Financial interdependence, the trading relationships between nations are becoming so complex that it seems to me it will not be profitable for any one great nation to seek the destruction of another. If Germany should destroy England in a fit of passion or because of swollen ambition she will destroy at least some of her best customers and some of her debtors. And there is also the knowledge that Germany, by attacking us, would create financial havoc and disorder to her own condition, and the opposite would be true if we were to attack Germany.
  I oppose these great armaments from another standpoint. I hold that so long as this country spends the huge sums it is spending upon armaments we can hope for very little amelioration for the suffering millions of this country. We are too poor to spend money upon matters which I believe are infinitely of greater importance than that of extending the so-called defences of our shores. I remember,

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  during the lifetime of the present Government, a Commission sitting to inquire into accidents in mines and asking for a grant of £10,000 for the purpose of experimenting as to whether coal dust would or would not create or accelerate explosions in mines. The Government was too poor to grant £10,000 and private individuals had to subscribe the money, and now it is accepted by every expert that not only will coal-dust accelerate explosions, but even an explosion may be created by coal-dust itself if the initial stages are produced. On the other hand, we can only get a paltry £200,000 for the relief of unemployment. Forty times the salary of the President of the Local Government Board is all we can get for nearly 1,000,000 men and their dependents tramping about and becoming unemployable because of the fact that they are unemployed. For education we can find £11,000,000. Eleven millions for putting brains in and £70,000,000 for blowing them out. You say England is in peril. I know a greater peril than either a shrinking Navy or a shrinking Army. I know a greater peril than reduced armaments, and that is the poverty of her toiling millions, out of whom all this money is to come as a contribution of blood drawn from their veins. But the poverty of these people is a greater peril to the supremacy of our country than reduced armaments. To continue starving your people and go on spending money, in new armaments which should be spent" for their relief is like a knight of old starving himself to buy a coat of mail which he had not the strength to bear on his shoulders.
  Of what use are ships unless you have men? A great deal of this Debate has turned on personnel. I ask you to pay greater attention to the personnel than you have done in the past by seeing to it that the social and industrial life of the people is such that they will have something to love in the country they live in, and something to fight for if they are called upon to fight.
  I oppose these Estimates and swollen armaments because, it seems to me, they are not only organised and proposed, but that they put us, in effect, on the very level of barbarism itself. In one direction we are asked to abolish feudalism, and in another direction we are asked to go towards barbarism. I am thinking what even a tithe of these millions would do for the aged poor, the hungry children, and the unemployed people of this
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  country. It seems to me to be quite true that the nation will perish which continues to build great ships, to construct guns, and to spend money in this way, without due consideration for the social and industrial well-being of the people. That nation will certainly perish, as past empires have perished, which does not bring into its civic and political life the influence of the great moral law, and which is eternally talking about its supremacy and what it is going to do. I want to see a rational Navy as well as a national Navy. I do not look to hon. Gentlemen opposite, or the party to which they belong, and I am afraid I shall have to cease to look to the Liberal party for any hope of peace, retrenchment, and reform. It is said that "The love of money is the root of all evil." It is if you spend it on armaments. I do not look to crowned heads, or Cabinets, or political parties to ultimately evolve the peace of the world. I look to the growing solidarity of the democratic movement, to the good feeling which is growing up between the working classes of all nations, and to international understandings which, believe me, will grow from year to year, and which, in the end, will be more powerful than crowned heads or Cabinets in settling this evil and wicked question of war. In saying this I am breathing the spirit, the desire, and the aspiration of millions of my fellow creatures, not only in this country, but in every civilised country in the world. As a lover of my country, I say that England has led the way in a great many humanitarian causes which have resulted in the uplifting of humanity. She is, perhaps, the greatest colonising Power in the world; she has expanded and consolidated her Empire, and I look to my country to lead in the grand procession of nations towards international peace. I trust these Estimates will be opposed—I could hope successfully opposed. I say that whatever it might cost me personally, politically, socially, or in any other way, there is no Vote on which I would more like to vote against any Government than this, and I shall go into the Lobby with the same conviction as that with which I speak and vote against these Estimates, wicked and wasteful as I look upon them to be.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: I think the best answer to this speech of the hon. Member (Mr. Twist) is to refer him to the German shipbuilding programme, and also, perhaps,

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  to the preamble of the German Navy Bill of 1900. We on this side of the House value social reform and the improvement of the well-being of the people as much as the hon. Member, but there will be no social reform, or old age pensions for the poor, and the dividends of the rich will be imperilled if we suffer a single defeat to our Navy. I am dissatisfied with these Estimates, and for a reason precisely the opposite of that expressed by the hon. Member who has just spoken. I believe they are inadequate, in consequence of the steady curtailment of our programme between 1906 and the present day. I believe we cannot put ourselves in a safe position with anything less than a loan. I do not see why the Government should object to a loan. They are dealing with a good many now, and I do not see why we should not have a loan to protect the safety of our country as much as a loan to protect the dignity of the Government. Let me test what I say as to the need of a loan, and as to the inadequacy of the present programme. What did Lord Cawdor and Sir John Fisher, as he then was, say in 1905? The responsibility of the whole of the Board of Admiralty, the right hon. Gentleman says, is involved in the statement. They said:—
  "While they [the Board of Admiralty] anticipate at present that an output of four large armoured ships a year should suffice to meet our requirements, there will to no difficulty whatever in increasing this amount to whatever extent may he necessary in consequence of any increase in naval power abroad. The public cannot rely on this reduction being continued in future years if foreign countries make developments in their shipbuilding programmes which we cannot now foresee.?"
  That was their minimum programme in 1905—four capital ships of the "Dreadnought "class. That was their minimum programme before the Germans had extended and accelerated theirs. What have we and the Germans been doing in regard to the capital ships since this Government came into office? We have provided, in 1906, three aganst three; in 1907, again three against three; in 1908, two against four; in 1909, eight against four; but no money was provided for the eight with the exception of something in the Supplementary Estimates. In 1910 we are providing five against the German four, but the money is so inadequate that this provision can hardly be reckoned upon. The Government have not provided twenty-one ships against eighteen. They have only a programme for eight of them, and it seems to me that as regards the two-Power standard the Government have three times
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  failed to provide for its being maintained. The First Lord of the Admiralty said the other day the whole Board were responsible for the programme. They were responsible for the programme which they declared was the minimum one in 1905.
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Member is mistaken. What he is quoting from is Lord Cawdor's statement, which has nothing to do with the programme of the year. What I stated was that the Board of Admiralty were responsible for the Estimates to which they appended their names. They did not append their names to Lord Cawdor's statement.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: They did not append their names to the statement, but the estimates were founded upon the statement. They are one and the same. Well, the same Board that gave us the 1905 programme gave us also the 1908 programme of two ships. Which was right? Is not the explanation of the discrepancy between the 1905 and the 1908 programme that the Admiralty were subject to pressure? Mr. Robertson, now Lord Lochee, when he sat on the Treasury Bench, admitted when he was challenged by the hon. Member for Fareham (Mr. Arthur Lee) that the Estimates of 1908, after they had been submitted to the Admiralty and put before the Cabinet, had been subjected to considerable reduction. Of course, the striking feature in these Estimates is the extremely small sum Voted for a considerable programme. Thirteen and a half millions have been Voted as a total sum for shipbuilding: £1l,750,000 applies to contract work and £1,400,000 for the new programme, and £600,000 only is devoted to the five armoured ships and five cruisers. Surely that is preposterous. Surely it is playing with the country to vote only one-twenty-fourth or one-twenty-fifth of what is required for these ships. I think it would have been better and honester to have had one armoured ship and one protected cruiser, and to have spent that money on them, than to have distributed it over ten ships, and more or less to have humbugged the country in doing so. I think it would have been franker with the country to have done so.
  6.0 P.M.
  I wish to say a word about destroyers. That subject has been most admirably dealt with by the hon. Member for South Worcestershire (Mr. Eyres-Monsell). What has the Government done since 1906 except promise? The road to a very bad place

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  is said to be paved with promises. They promised sixty-three ships against the German sixty between 1906 and 1910, and they have only given us seven up to a few days ago These are sixty-three promises and only seven performances. Now Germany has completed all her 1908 programme.
  Mr. McKENNA: She has completed it all?
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: I am informed so. Does the right hon. Gentleman dispute it?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes. You say her whole programme.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Her 1908 destroyer programme. She has completed it all, and pressed into the service forty-two destroyers against our seven. That is, she has beaten us by six to one. Out of 187 destroyers built, building, or programme, eighty-six were launched before 1900, and are getting old and worn out, and the days of their usefulness are rapidly passing away. Of these eighty-six there are thirty-eight which were launched between 1895 and 1897, and these are done for. The Admiralty are afraid of taking them at full speed. I remember asking the right hon. Gentleman if he was willing to order a certain number of these destroyers to be taken at full speed. He shuddered, and said "No." I asked him if they could go full speed one hundred yards. He gathered himself together then, and said he thought they could, or perhaps more. They are done for. A large number of these destroyers ought no longer to be on our lists. It seems to me that the Government have been running the Navy on theories supplied to them by "Little England" Members of this House. You cannot protect the shores of this country "by theories, or by paper programmes. You can only protect them by hard, floating facts and by realised programmes.
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken has recommended as a panacea for all our naval difficulties that we should raise the necessary money by loans.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Part of it.
  Mr. McKENNA: I do not understand how borrowing the money for our annual requirements, instead of finding it out of our annual revenue, is going to assist us in determining how many ships we ought to build, or how, in the long run, it is going
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  to assist us in maintaining an adequate Navy. I would remind the hon. Gentleman that though he could find a precedent in the case of Germany for the system of borrowing in order to meet annual expenditure on the Navy, yet if he carries his investigations into German finances a little further he will find that Germany does not borrow for the maintenance of her Army. Germany recognises that the maintenance of the Army is a permanent interest for the German Empire, and I hope we shall also recognise that the maintenance of the British Navy is of permanent interest for the British Empire. Akin to this subject of loans is the subject which was referred to by the hon. Member for Evesham (Mr. Eyres-Monsell), who in a most excellent maiden speech spoke of the desirability of our having a definite programme. No doubt it would be convenient in many ways, and certainly it would be very convenient for me, if Parliament were to lay it down once for all how many ships were to be built for a certain period of years. But let me point out to the House the difficulty in which we might find ourselves under that system. We build solely for the reason that we have to maintain a standard of supremacy over any construction that may be undertaken by any foreign nation. We cannot lay down in advance that three ships a year, or four or five or six ships a year, will be an adequate provision for the British Navy, for say a period of ten years to come, because if any foreign nation were to build more we should have to build more. But equally we should hold ourselves at liberty if any foreign nation builds less that we, too, should build less.
  I rather fear, therefore, that a definite programme would really amount to this— that we should always build the number of ships contained in the definite programme as a minimum regardless of what foreign nations did, and if they increased their programme we should find it incumbent on us to increase our programme also. I hope that the Committee, tempting as this method appears to be, will not be misled by it, but decide that we should also this year, as we did last year, frame our Estimates in accordance with the requirements of the coming year. That is what we have to meet—what Navy will be in existence in the coming year or in the years 1911–12 and 1912–13? Those are the years for which our present provisions are made, and we can only judge of the amount we ought to undertake by what we know is being done, or will be done, by foreign

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  nations during that period. My hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Mr. Twist) expressed an earnest desire that we should have a rational Navy. I am entirely in sympathy with the views expressed by my hon. Friend as regards the urgent need for social reform and as regards the necessity of cutting down expenditure upon armaments so far as it can be done with safety; but I did not gather from my hon. Friend that he laid down any standard of Navy which he would regard as rational. Let me say at once that the only standard we would regard as rational is a standard which would ensure our safety against any probable combination of enemies, and I submit to the Committee that that is the standard which the Government have solely in view in framing these Estimates.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Would the right hon. Gentleman make no provision for improbable combinations?
  Mr. McKENNA: I confess I should not. All nations have got to run their risks. No amount of provision we could ever make would be sufficient against the improbable, or, I might say, the impossible. Improbable as it may be, it is conceivable that the whole world might be joined in alliance against us. If it is, we must take our risk. What we have to do is to foresee—I will not say all possibilities—but all possibilities which come within the region of probabilities. I would not be understood by that as saying that I conceive it probable that we shall be engaged in war. I do not conceive it probable, but in estimating the probable combination of foreign Powers that might be brought in line against us, we must consider probabilities, and not what is really only a practical impossibility. The hon. Member for Evesham spoke with considerable knowledge and interest to the House upon the subject of destroyers. In one respect, although I do not quarrel with the figures he gave, I think I can reassure him. He said that the recent German destroyers from the year 1903, taken from the same period as our River class of destroyers, can be compared in power with the British destroyers. I do not think that that is an inference which can fairly be made.
  Mr. EYRES-MONSELL: In sea power, sea worthiness.
  Mr. McKENNA: The type of German destroyer is a type which is suitable for the North Sea, but I do not think it is
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  reasonable to suppose, and I do not think it is true, that the twelve early German destroyers, from the tonnage of 413 tons or the next with 418 tons, or the next twelve up to 520, are to be compared with our destroyers of the River class, the smallest of which are 550 tons, and which run up as high as 1,000 tons. The very largest German destroyers are only 670 tons. There are twelve up to 670 tons, twelve to 637 tons, and the remainder of their destroyers only range from 413 to 520 tons, and are considerably smaller and less powerful than the later British destroyers. With regard to the actual figures, there will be at the end of 1911, when the whole of the present German programme of destroyers for the coming year is completed, seventy-eight destroyers in Germany dating from the year 1903—that is to say, dating from the same time as the British River class. That figure seventy-eight has to be compared with the figure 102, not including the "Swift," which we shall have of all classes of destroyers, from the River class onwards. The hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. Pretyman) asked me what the number would be, and I think he stated it was eighty-four. As a matter of fact the figure is seventy-eight.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The answer given by the right hon. Gentleman was that there would be seventy-two German destroyers, and I added twelve for the present year's programme.
  Mr. McKENNA: The right hon. Gentleman must have asked me the question for the 1902–3 programme: that was before the River class. The earliest River class was laid down in 1903, but all the earlier German ones were very much smaller and less powerful than the British boats of the same date. Let me turn to the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington (Mr. Lough). He complained that the Government have departed from the principles of economy which they have always advocated on the platform and in this House in earlier years, and in particular my right hon. Friend stated that he always regarded me, and that my actions in the past justified him in regarding me, as an advocate of economy. Is it not possible that I may not have changed my character? Can the right hon. Gentleman conceive it to be the fact that I am still as strong an advocate of economy as ever I was, and may it possibly enter the limits of his imagination that I have been

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  impressed by facts and by the necessities of the British Navy which have induced me to make myself responsible in this House for Estimates of this kind? It really is conceivable, if the right hon. Gentleman will believe me—
  Mr. LOUGH: Oh, yes.
  Mr. McKENNA: It is conceivable that, with an earnest desire to save the taxpayer from all unnecesary expenditure upon armaments—feelings which I share to the full—nevertheless my right hon. Friend, if he had found himself in the same place as I find myself, and if he had placed upon him the responsibility of securing the safety of our country and of maintaining a Navy adequate for that safety, would have felt himself under the necessity of doing exactly what I have done. I would ask him to believe that it is possible that Gentlemen, whom my hon. Friend the Member for King's Lynn humorously describes as "placemen," may yet retain exactly the same feelings, views, and ideals as they had when they sat on the Back Benches; and it is only the circumstances with which they are confronted and the knowledge that they have which compel them to make themselves responsible for Estimates which are necessary for the security of the country.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I have found the quotation—it was on 3rd August last. The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Admiralty, speaking then, said:—
  "The twenty destroyers in this year's programme will be completed in July, 1911, so that the figures I have quoted relate to the period covered by the present programme, which will be completed by July, 1911, and at that time, on the dimensions we have given, we shall have eighty-four against Germany's seventy-two."
  Those are exactly the figures I gave.
  Mr. McKENNA: What are the dimensions?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The same as the right hon. Gentleman has just given.
  Mr. McKENNA: If we take the period stated by the right hon. Gentleman himself—that is to say, if we take the date at which the first destroyer of the River class was laid down—from that period Germany will have seventy-eight at the end of 1911, and we shall have 102.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: These are the dimensions—seventy-three destroyers of over 400 to 670, a mean of 530 against our mean of 770.
  Mr. McKENNA: Oh, yes, Germany had six destroyers of 430 laid down in 1902, six more in 1903, and onwards, and Germany will have at the end of 1911 seventy-eight against our 102.
  Mr. LEE: Has the right hon. Gentleman counted the twelve German vessels in this year's programme.
  Mr. McKENNA: I have counted the twelve in this year as well. The actual figures are six in each year from 1903–4, 1904–5, to 1905–6, and in 1906–7, 1907–8, 1908–9 and 1910–11 there have been twelve in each year. Therefore it is only in recent years Germany has laid down twelve in each year, and in the earlier years she laid down six in each year. My right hon. Friend referred in particular to the number of men. We have asked this year for an additional 3,000 men. I think I have already stated the whole of the circumstances to this House as regards the additional number of men. They are actually required in order to make up the existing complements of existing ships. The remainder of the men enlisted this year will, by the time their training is completed, be ready to form the complements on the new ships which are now being built. I can assure my right hon. Friend, on the subject of the personnel, that the numbers have been examined with the closest attention, and I think yesterday I gave him reasons for thinking that, at any rate in this particular matter, the greatest regard has been had to economy. That is to say, that we have cut down the men to the mimimum in every case where they were meant to be employed in service which was not war service, or potentially war service. We think it necessary that our numbers should be adapted to all requirements, and, as I explained yesterday, by this process of cutting down the number of men not necessary in time of war, we have been able to effect a saving of 3,000 men, who, added to the men we are asking for now, are the men required to serve on the new ships as they are completed. Last year Parliament sanctioned a programme of a certain size. These ships are now being built, and when they are completed men must be found for them, and I am asking this year only for what is indispensably necessary in order to find complements for our new vessels. I hope that my right hon. Friend will not find it necessary to go to a Division.
  Mr. LOUGH: May I point out to my right hon. Friend that I have practically raised the whole question of this increase and not merely this handful of men. I wanted to raise the main question of the increase from £35,000,000 to £41,000,000.
  Mr. McKENNA: On the subject of the total amount of the Estimate, on what principle would my right hon. Friend wish the Board of Admiralty to act? Would he lay down any standard of shipbuilding? Would he agree that we ought to build in accordance with the two-Power standard, not the two-Power standard as viewed in some quarters, but the two-Power standard as defined by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister? If he agrees with that standard of construction as that no which we ought to conform, then I challenge him to show that in these Estimates we have gone beyond it. I may say that the distinction at this moment between the two-Power standard as defined by the Prime Minister and the two-Power standard as denned by the right hon. Gentleman opposite is merely an academic distinction, because the two next Powers, or the three next Powers, to Great Britain are so nearly equal that it makes very little difference which you take. Still, using the term two-Power standard in the sense in which it is used by the Prime Minister, I ask my right hon. Friend if he agrees that we ought to build up to that standard, or whether he will continue his opposition to Estimates which do not go beyond that standard?
  Mr. R. HARCOURT: America?
  Mr. McKENNA: My hon. Friend mentions America, but it makes no difference whether we take America or any other Power, because the distinction is an academic one. If we are not to take the two-Power standard, I am entitled to say to my right hon. Friend, when he objects to these Estimates, what standard would he take? How far should the Government go? What is the standard of safety which you consider satisfactory when we are are taking the men? Like everybody else, I am not particularly anxious to find money for the Navy. I am sure we should all greatly prefer if we could have an expenditure of £10,000,000 instead of £40,000,000; but when you are responsible, and when you have got to decide what Navy you will have, you must accept some standard up to which you will build. You must have some view as to what your policy is to be, and satisfy yourselves that the country
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  is safe. My right hon. Friend did not assist me there. He set a value on some kind of ships and lets go others, but any naval expert will tell him that we must have a Navy in its entirety. We could not have a surplusage of battleships without the necessary smaller ships. You must have each part of the Navy supplied with a view to its being in proportion to the whole, and unless my right hon. Friend is prepared to adopt some other standard, and those who agree with him are prepared to put their fingers upon the particular parts, and say that the Government have exceeded the principles with which they avow themselves to be actuated, I do not think they will have made out a case for opposing this Vote. The increase is due, of course, to the number of ships, and to their very great cost. What would my right hon. Friend do? Would he build ships of less power than are being built by foreign nations? Would he say, when ships of a certain size are being built by other nations, that our ships shall be smaller, with weaker guns and less armour? If the standard is fixed by other Powers at a certain size and at a certain cost, are we to fall below that cost and size? If not, there is no alternative but to accept the condition. What are we to do? Are we to drop behind? My right hon. Friend did not say that for one moment. He is in favour of the supremacy of the British Navy, but if he be determined on that, I know of no way of doing it except to find out what foreign nations are doing, what the power and size and cost of their ships may be, and to build ships of at least equal power and size. I know no other way of securing our supremacy at sea. I maintain that the Board of Admiralty are thoroughly well informed.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: Not last year.
  Mr. McKENNA: On what does the hon. Gentleman make that statement?
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: I make the statement on the confession of the right hon. Gentleman himself.
  Mr. McKENNA: Will the hon. Gentleman read the statement?
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: I will. The statement of the right hon. Gentleman is as follows:—
  "The difficulty in which the Government finds itself placed at this present moment is that we do not know, as we thought we did, the rate at which German construction is taking place."
  Mr. McKENNA: Will the hon. Gentleman read the next sentence?
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: I have not the whole quotation here. I wish to be quite fair. I happened to have that quotation in my hand, and I did not know I should be challenged.
  Mr. McKENNA: I have got it here. The next sentence is:—
  "We know that the Germans have a law which, when all the ships under it are completed, will give them a Navy more powerful than any at present in existence. We do not know the rate at which the provisions of this law are to be carried into execution."
  How could we know what is going to happen in the future? We do not know at this moment, and nobody could know, not even the hon. Gentleman himself, the rate at which the German law is to be carried into execution.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: I am not responsible for the Navy.
  Mr. McKENNA: Even if the hon. Member were responsible he would still not know the rate at which the German law is to be carried into effect. What I have stated the Admiralty do know, and did know, is that they knew what had actually taken place. That is the only thing we could know. No Government and no Admiralty can know what the intentions of a foreign Government may be as regards the future, and it is that I say the Government do not know. It is quite true, inasmuch as the German Navy Law ascribes to each year certain annual expenditure, that we assumed, and everybody assumed, that their system of expenditure was similar to ours, and that the money ascribed to any one year would be spent within the year. We have since learnt that is not so, and that money may be held from year to year, or spent in earlier or in later years. Consequently, at what rate the German law will be carried into execution—
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: Surely there was something more. It was told to this House that the Government had made the discovery that the Germans had the power to turn out ships at a much higher rate than our Government.
  Mr. McKENNA: There was no such thing.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Here is the Prime Minister's statement.
  Mr. McKENNA: I am not the Prime Minister.
  Mr. J. F. REMNANT: Does the right hon. Gentleman throw over the statement of the Prime Minister?
  Mr. McKENNA: I speak on behalf of the Admiralty, and I challenge the hon. Member to produce the statement I stated that the Admiralty were informed and had been informed. The hon. Gentleman stated the Admiralty did not know.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: Did the Prime Minister speak on behalf of the Admiralty?
  Mr. McKENNA: How absurd. When I am challenged on behalf of the Admiralty I answer on behalf of the Admiralty.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: The very same night the Prime Minister made his statement.
  Mr. McKENNA: I will deal with what my right hon. Friend (Mr. Lough) has said. I can assure him that we have not proceeded, in the Estimates we have presented to the House, one inch beyond the requirements of the year. Let me remind him that, no matter what his desire might be to cut down these Estimates, that, as to the great bulk of them, he is committed. Parliament has authorised the Admiralty to enter into all the necessary contracts for building the four contingent ships of last year. Consequently, the House of Commons is committed to that. The only thing the right hon. Gentleman is not committed to is the new programme for the ensuing year. Under the new programme we asked the House to authorise us to build five large ships, five small cruisers, and twenty destroyers. I ask my right hon. Friend whether he considers that to be an excessive amount in view of the fact that one country alone is authorised under its programme to build four large ships, two small cruisers, and twelve destroyers?
  Mr. LOUGH: We have had four large ships and four extra ships, and that programme was to take us to 1915.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to give any estimate of how many the Germans will have in March, 1913, the date carried by the present Estimates?
  Mr. McKENNA: It is so difficult to name the precise date or the period that a ship will be ready, and when my hon. Friend says how many will Germany have in 1912, or 1913, or 1914, it depends precisely on what he means. If he means what they can have, and if, as an hon. Member suggests, construction should be accelerated, and the period of six months is not spent in trials, and the opening up of machinery, and that the ship is put into commission

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  at the earliest possible moment when it would be available for war, then they will have in 1912 seventeen such ships in the course of the year 1912.
  An HON. MEMBER: They can have?
  Mr. McKENNA: There will be seventeen ships in such a condition that they can be made available in 1912.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: And twenty-one in 1913?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes. That would be only by not going through the customary period of trials and the opening up of machinery and other things.
  Mr. LOUGH: But they are not laid down. Germany has not laid down more than thirteen.
  Mr. McKENNA: At this moment. But she may lay down four more early in the current financial year, and those four can, if required, be completed in the course of the year 1912. That is my information. My hon. Friend may take it for what it is worth. It is information founded on what has been done in the past. I do not know that Germany will have seventeen commissioned in 1912. I have no means of saying, but I do say that the power of construction is such that she is capable of having seventeen ships so far advanced as to be available for war in the course of the year 1912. Consequently I say she will have on the same footing twenty-one similarly available in the course of the year 1913. Happily for our Estimates after that year the German programme is confined to two ships per year. We then can have a prospect of being able to reconsider our own programme.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: Does the right hon. Gentleman think the Germans may not reconsider their own programme?
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Gentleman knows as much about that subject as I do. What the Germans will do in 1911 is open to everybody to conjecture. I ask if the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Lough), in view of the programme on the law of Germany for the year 1910–11, of four large armoured ships, two large cruisers, and twelve destroyers, whether our programme is excessive, of five large armoured ships which will be laid down in January 1911, that is to say, under the terms of our contract those five large armoured ships will be completed in January, 1913. Play has been
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  made on the amount of money which is being taken for these ships, and we are pressed to take more money, and apparently with the intention of laying the ships down earlier. In our view of the progress of foreign navies, we do not want those ships before January, 1913. If that be the case, why should we spend money on them earlier? Let hon. Gentlemen opposite bear this in mind, and I am sure they will agree with the truth of it; you never require to have your ships earlier than you need. Delay the ships to the last moment you require them, because the later a ship is laid down, the better it is. Equally it is true you must lay down your ships in time to have sufficient. Surely the Board of Admiralty are the best judges of the time?
  The right hon. Gentleman said with great truth that there are certain questions upon which the House must rest upon the authority of the Naval advisers. He said with perfect truth that there are questions upon which it would be contrary to public policy to obtain information in this House, as the First Lord of the day will always be bound to reply that he is unable to give reason for his action because it will be contrary to the public interest that he should do so. It is necessary that the House must rely upon the expert advice which the Board of Admiralty receive. He challenged me to lay my hands on my heart and tell him in all sincerity whether I could say that my Naval advisers were satisfied with the supply of cordite. There are a great many questions like that on which I cannot go beyond my advisers. It would be contrary to the public interest to do so, and in these matters I ask the House to accept the assurance which is conveyed by the signature of the Estimates by the Board of Admiralty. That is why I speak of the signatures, since they convey to this House the assurance that in the opinion of the Board as a whole those Estimates are adequate. As I said yesterday, I can well understand hon. Members from entirely opposite points of view criticising the Estimates and saying they are excessive, but it is not legitimate so long as it is not possible to open up the whole grounds upon which the Board of Admiralty act. It would necessarily imply giving information of a kind which ought not to be given. The House must accept the assurance which is conveyed to them when these Estimates are signed by the whole of the Board of Admiralty. I think I have given my right hon. Friend a satisfactory answer. I have given him the best

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  answer I am capable of. I would endeavour to give him a better answer if he would define more precisely what is the exact standard the Government ought to maintain.
  Mr. LOUGH: My right hon. Friend has left out three-quarters of a million on submarines.
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, we are building submarines. We have a great many of them, fifty-five, and are laying down a certain number each year. It is necessary to complete those submarines which are already under construction. I confess my right hon. Friend is justified in calling attention to this. I observe in all the discussion about destroyers no mention has been made of submarines. I know that it may be said destroyers and submarines serve a different purpose, but they also serve a similar purpose. They both carry the same weapon, and I am not so sure that hon. Gentlemen will find themselves, should ever war unhappily occur, justified in their refusal to consider the submarine as an element in estimating your total destroyer strength. The hon. Member for Chelmsford said that I seemed to have framed the Estimates with a desire to steer between two classes of critics—on the one hand, those who always complained that the Estimates were not enough and, on the other, those who complained that the Estimates were too large. I can assure the hon. Member that in framing these Estimates I have not had regard to criticism. When I say "I" I speak in the name of the whole Board of Admiralty. We have had but one object in view, and that is to find out what is necessary, and to present to the House the programme which in our judgment we conceive to be required. It is true that I mentioned that I should have to meet criticism of both kinds, and I think the Committee will agree that I have had to do so; but such criticism was not the ground of the Estimates of the year. The hon. Member complained of the action of the Liberal Government over a period of four years, and said that we had not maintained any steady standard of expenditure. It is extraordinary how short memories are. If I had not the figures in front of me I could scarcely have believed that the hon. Member had ever been at the Board of Admiralty or had been a Member of a Conservative Government which itself reduced the Naval Estimates to a level within £200,000 of the lowest figure at which they have stood in these years.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: The right hon. Gentleman has misapprehended my criticism. I hope I did not say one word about the actual level of expenditure being maintained. What I said was that expenditure must be Maintained equal to the necessities of the year; and I particularly said that the necessities of one year vary very much from the necessities of another.
  Mr. McKENNA: That is exactly the principle on which the Government have always acted. We have never built ships before they were needed, and we will not do so; we will never willingly lay down a ship in excess of the requirements, but we will lay them down when they are necessary. The hon. Member said that we must take a wide horizon with regard to the expenditure on the Navy. In 1904 the Estimates were nearly £37,000,000. In 1905–6 they were reduced to £33,000,000; the hon. Gentleman himself reduced them. In 1906–7 they were £31,472,000, and the hon. Gentleman and his Friends took credit for issuing a statement showing a reduction of £1,500,000 on the Navy Estimates.
  Mr. LOUGH: It is the only creditable thing they did.
  Mr. McKENNA: These Gentlemen say that you ought to maintain an even level of expenditure. What did we do? For two years we kept the expenditure at practically the same amount. It was the hon. Gentleman and his Friends who reduced it to that level. We kept it at the same figure in the ensuing year; it was raised by close upon a million the year after, and since then, I regret to have to say it, and it is in no boasting spirit that I make the statement, we have steadily increased the expenditure on the Navy.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: Did not the right hon. Gentleman drop a ship each year from the Cawdor Programme?
  Mr. McKENNA: There is no such thing as the Cawdor Programme. Lord Cawdor, in the month of November, when his Government knew that they were about to go out of office, and that they would not have to pay for what was suggested, issued a statement, in the course of which he said that it would be a desirable thing that four ships should be laid down each year. But what was more material than the statement was the fact that that Government left behind them certain

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  estimates of expenditure. The Liberal Government adopted those Estimates, and spent the money. When it is said that they dropped a ship from the Cawdor Programme, they dropped an expenditure of perhaps £50,000, because in the Cawdor Programme the ship was to be laid down so late that there was practically nothing to be spent on it. When it is said that they dropped a ship, I say that they maintained the proposed expenditure. The expenditure is what governs the Navy, and that in 1907–8 was only £200,000 below the Estimates which we inherited from Lord Cawdor. Since then the Estimates have steadily risen. I only state these facts in the interests of truth, and not in the least because I am glad that the Estimates are high. I hope, the facts being as they are, that we shall hear no more from right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite about the Liberal party having starved the Navy.
  The hon. Member also spoke about the German elasticity of finance. In many ways no doubt, if you desired to build up a Navy in a hurry, it would be an advantage if you had not to pay within the financial year for the expenditure of the year. But the argument which is good against a loan is also good against this elasticity. Our annual system is the safeguard both of economy and of future Parliaments. We dare not commit the future as regards the Navy. If we borrowed or had this elasticity of finance, which amounts to the same thing, if we did not pay our way within the year or so nearly within it as to enable us to catch up at any moment, our naval requirements and commitments are necessarily so great that the time would come when the accumulation of debt would overwhelm us. The elasticity of German finance, as I understood the hon. Gentleman, was that they need not meet within the year the expenditure of the year.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: I never suggested anything of the kind. What I suggested was that it is unnecessary, as regards each particular detailed item, to estimate exactly what will be spent upon it within the year. At any rate, I suggested that it caused great difficulty and great waste, both at the time of estimating and in the year after, if the expenditure on each detailed item had to tally with the Estimate. The last thing I should wish would be to depart from the system, certainly as regards ordinary expenditure, under which
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  during the year the money for naval expenditure must be paid out of revenue. If a great naval programme was required, some special measure might be necessary, but as regards the ordinary programme, I should be the last to desire that we should leave any part of the expenditure of one year over to another.
  Mr. McKENNA: I am glad the hon. Member has made this statement, as I misunderstood what he said. I am entirely at one with him. But let me remind him that what he desires does in fact largely obtain now. With Treasury consent we can transfer from one Vote to another within the Navy Estimates, and without Treasury consent we can transfer from one sub-head to another within the same Vote. Every year, while the total Estimates which we present to the House are maintained, there are necessarily large transfers within that total from one Vote to another. I am glad to say that the Treasury do not hold us strictly to the precise estimate on each item presented to the House, but allow us to transfer surpluses on one Vote to make up deficiencies on others.
  The hon. Gentleman asked me for an assurance that our reserves of cordite were satisfactory. In the course of the election it was stated that our cordite reserves were inadequate. As the matter was new to me, I felt the greatest alarm, and took the earliest opportunity to make inquiries from our authorities at the Admiralty. When the statement was made so boldly on the platform, I thought there really must be some danger. But I am happy to be able to assure the Committee that the statement was absolutely devoid of foundation. Our cordite reserves are quite satisfactory. We do not anticipate any difficulty whatever in meeting all the naval requirements. I trust, as I give this assurance on the authority of the experts, the hon. Gentleman will be satisfied.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Does that apply also to the power of output? I heard nothing of any statement during the election. My question was founded on information to which I attach great importance, and was entirely apart from any statement that may have been made in the course of the elections. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to give me an assurance that there are ample reserves, and that the capacity of output is at least equal for supplying the year's requirements of cordite within the year.
  Mr. McKENNA: As I have said, I am able to answer the question without consulting my experts expressly on the point, because the question was raised during the election, and I then made inquiries. I was told that there was not a shadow of foundation for the charge, and that in all the respects to which the hon. Member refers there was an adequate supply. The manufacturers have means of supplying all the cordite we require for the large guns, and our reserves are complete. On all these points I am able to give the hon. Member the most complete assurance.
  In conclusion I should like to clear up a misunderstanding which may exist in the minds of some hon. Members with regard to a statement made yesterday by the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth (Lord C. Beresford). The Noble Lord, referring to some proceedings in which he was greatly concerned, before a Sub-Committee of the Defence Committee, stated— I have refreshed my memory by "The Times" report—that evidence was given before that Committee that German tramp ships carried guns. My only reason for making a statement now is that I should not like it to go out that it was even considered by the Committee whether the German tramp ships did or did not carry guns. I refreshed my memory this morning by reading the minutes of the Committee, and I can assure hon. Members that no evidence was given on that subject. It was not a subject of inquiry before the Committee, and the Noble Lord's memory is entirely at fault on the subject.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: What I said was that the evidence before the Committee pointed out that the trade routes were not properly defended. I myself made the statement about the German tramp ships having guns. The evidence before the Committee was the two letters to which I referred as having been sent to the Committee, stating that the trade routes were not adequately defended, and to that I adhere.
  7.0 P.M.
  Mr. McKENNA: I thought my answer had met the point of the Noble Lord. He knows that the evidence given before the Committee was confidential, and, of course, I cannot go into it. I will only say again that, having refreshed my memory this morning and looked through all the correspondence, that no letters were produced upon the point he puts before the Com-
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  mittee. The point he mentions was not before the Committee, and I do not want to go into it because it has no interest except to the Noble Lord himself.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: I cannot understand what the right hon. Gentleman means. I tell him distinctly that a letter came before the Committee. He knows I cannot say what it was, because it was secret. But there was evidence given by another officer on the question of trade routes that they were not properly defended. I make that statement again, as strongly as ever I can make it.
  Mr. McKENNA: The Noble Lord is mistaken. He stated yesterday that one admiral had sent a letter—
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: I did not say "Admiral."
  Mr. McKENNA: One officer had sent a letter, and in consequence of that he-had been sent abroad. There is not the smallest foundation for any such charge.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: I maintain it.
  Mr. McKENNA: And another statement, was that another officer had sent a letter which had been presented to the Committee. We have the letter which was referred to, but it was never produced before the Committee.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: I should not have intervened in this discussion or taken a part in the Debate, which has been very largely carried on between the right hon. Gentleman and his own Friends, if it were not for the fact that in the course of his speech the right hon. Gentleman has aroused on this side of the House, at all events, some considerable doubt as to what he means the position really to be in regard to the two-Power standard, and also in regard to what took place in the Debates last year, where, as I will endeavour to show very briefly, the Committee were left in some very considerable doubt. The First Lord of the Admiralty, at the end of his speech yesterday, expressed himself somewhat strongly as to the desirability of these Naval Debates being conducted in a non-party manner. I entirely agree. He expressed the hope that the Navy should not be, and ought not to be, a party question. I entirely agree. Yes, but if that is the real desire, I submit that the First Lord is not adopting a course which is likely to lead to it when he suggests that the Memorandum which my

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  right hon. Friend below the Gangway called attention to, namely, the Cawdor Memorandum, was issued by a Government which knew they would not have to build the ships. If that statement is to have any importance at all attached to it, it can only be that it is intended to convey the suggestion that we being in office took advantage to issue a Memorandum which we only issued because we knew we should not be called upon to carry it out. That statement coming from the First Lord of the Admiralty is, I think, especially unfair, because, although I have never had the great privilege of serving in the Admiralty, I know from those who have that the preparation of this Memorandum and the preparation of the programme which the Board of Admiralty put forward for use, was commenced a long time in advance. I have not the smallest doubt that this particular programme was prepared in the ordinary way, and, therefore, it can not be said—
  Mr. McKENNA: Oh, no, it was not. It is a question of fact. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman his statement is not correct.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by that?
  Mr. WALTER LONG: I do not know what the right hon. Gentleman means. I am here between two of my hon. Friends who were members of that Board of Admiralty. The right hon. Gentleman was not a member of that Board of Admiralty. He succeeded at a considerably later period. He now tells us that he knows that this Cawdor Memorandum was not prepared in the ordinary way. Well, I think he ought to tell us what he means.
  Mr. McKENNA: I will. A Memorandum is usually prepared by the First Lord, and accompanies the Statement given to this House—given at the opening of the Session. This Memorandum was issued in the month of November, an absolutely unprecedented proceeding. It could only have been undertaken in anticipation of the General Election.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: The right hon. Gentleman tells us what he knows of this Memorandum. Then he goes on to give reasons why this was done. I venture to submit that he has no authority to estimate the reasons which actuated Lord Cawdor; but, at all events, if this was a
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  mistake, an irregularity committed at the time, it was that that particular Cawdor Memorandum was issued very much earlier than the present Lord tells us is the practice of the Admiralty to issue their Memorandum and programme. I am told by both my hon. Friends that the Memorandum in question was a special Memorandum, and that it was issued in a perfectly regular way. There is no justification whatever for the statement that it was issued merely as a shop-window dressing, to be an advertisement of a policy which it was not intended to carry out. Even supposing the First Lord has a justification for his view, even supposing he really believes that this was not a deliberate declaration of policy by the responsible First Lord and his advisers, and by the Government, is he adopting tactics which are likely to put the Naval Debates on a non-party platform, when, at the conclusion of a Debate which has been conducted, as everybody who has listened must admit, in a perfectly fair way and from a general point of view, and not in any sense from a party point of view, he launches this sudden charge? The charge may be a perfectly good one. It may be very effective as a matter of party tactics. The right hon. Gentleman may be entitled to make it, but he cannot tell us he does not want tactics of that kind, and then turn upon us and say that we are making the Navy part of our ordinary political platform.
  There are two matters, in which we have been left in doubt. It may be that I am more than usually stupid. If so, my failing must be shared by many of those around me, because we were absolutely unable to make out what the intention was the right hon. Gentleman desired to convey to the Committee and the country in regard to the two-Power standard. One of my hon. Friends behind me asked the right hon. Gentleman when he was dealing with the two-Power standard whether he intended that that power should be equal to two Powers that might probably be against us, and the right hon. Gentleman would not take that. The right hon. Gentleman then came back ultimately and told us—and I hope that is the position he means to assume, because I do not think it is possible to exaggerate the importance of it—that he stands where the Prime Minister stood. The Prime Minister's declaration was perfectly clear. The Prime Minister said that the naval power of this country should be equal to that of the two next

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  strongest Powers whoever they may be and wherever they might be. That is the standard for which we contended through last year. That is the standard which I hope—though I am not quite clear—the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Admiralty on behalf of the Government now adopts and is prepared to maintain. May I assume that?
  Mr. McKENNA: The right hon. Gentleman puts the question to me seriously?
  Mr. WALTER LONG: Certainly.
  Mr. McKENNA: He has put that because of what the Prime Minister said?
  Mr. WALTER LONG: Yes.
  Mr. McKENNA: And he is prepared not only to accept the answer of the right hon. Gentleman to a question across the floor of the House, but the considered statement of the Prime Minister made in the course of a subsequent Debate.
  HON. MEMBERS: Ah !
  Mr. McKENNA: Why "Ah"? If the Prime Minister has made a considered statement, which is very well known to the right hon. Gentleman, is it reasonable to put to me as the policy of the Prime Minister an answer to a question made on the spur of the moment at a previous time? The right hon. Gentleman knows it is unfair to put it to me that that answer represents completely the policy of the Prime Minister, when he knows that in the considered statement in the course of Debate the Prime Minister laid down the exact words in which he denned the two-Power standard.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman. I did not make myself clear. I quite see where I have misled him. He went on in the speech he has just delivered to deal with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Islington (Mr. Lough). He told him he was quite alive to the fact that it was the case of America which was being raised. He told the right hon. Genlteman that it was perfectly immaterial which country you take. He said that between the two sides of the House there was no real distinction — the difference was only an academic one.
  Mr. McKENNA: I said that it did not matter which definition you take in the present year, inasmuch as the first three Powers were all so nearly equal that you
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  might take any two. [HON. MEMBERS: "Academic."] Therefore the distinction is academic.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: Very well, then. Does the right hon. Gentleman mean by that that for the present, so far as we can foresee—and nobody expects that we should go into the limitless future—or foresee the things which are hidden from us—does the right hon. Gentleman mean us to assume that the two-Power standard rests now where it has been put—as I have endeavoured to put it? Or does the right hon. Gentleman desire to limit it? We ought to know. We are entitled to know whether the Government have deliberately adopted a position that the strength of the Navy must be to-day what it last year was held to be by all parties, irrespective of which side of the House they sat, that the two-Power standard strength of this country should be equivalent to any other two Powers; or are we to understand that that position is to be abandoned, and that there are to be limits to it which we would regard as involving possibly very dangerous consequences to this country?
  Mr. McKENNA: The definition given by the Prime Minister was in the course of Debate on 26th May, 1909. The right hon. Gentleman knows very well the well-known definition which the Prime Minister gave. [HON. MEMBERS: "Read it."] It is this:—
  "In dealing with the two-Power standard and the question as to whether or not we in this country have a naval force which is adequate to satisfy that requirement, you must, of course, not merely take into account the number of 'Dreadnoughts' and 'Invincibles,'but you must take the total effective strength for defensive purposes as compared with the combined and effective strength of any two other fleets for aggressive purposes."
  Mr. WALTER LONG: As the right hon. Gentleman knows, there was an element of vagueness in that language which caused a very considerable amount of agitation in the minds of those who desired to understand what it really meant. To-day, when I listened to the First Lord of the Admiralty, I thought that time, which had led him to make very considerable changes in his opinion, and in his policy, in regard to Admiralty matters, might have also led to the adoption by him of the view that it is necessary that there shall be no misunderstanding as to what is meant by this two-Power standard. I now gather that, after devoting a considerable portion of his speech to this part of the case, that we are back to where we were. The language is very cloudy and very difficult to understand, but I understand that we are

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  not in a position to say that the Government to-day holds the view that has hitherto been held by British Governments—that the only security for this country is to be found in a power that is equivalent to the next two strongest Powers. If that be so, all I can say is, while I rejoice, as we all do, at the improved Navy Estimates which are now before the House, I none the less profoundly regret that the Government should see any reason to abandon a position which has hitherto been held to be inseparable from the safety and security of the country. With regard to another matter the First Lord of the Admiralty made an interruption that I was astonished to hear, and so were many other people. He was challenged by the hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. H. S. Foster) as to the statement made by him that there had been no confession of ignorance on the part of the Government last year, because we could not separate the First Lord of the Admiralty from the statement of the Prime Minister. We are talking of the whole Government, and it is to their utterances we are entitled to call attention when dealing with this Question. On this matter surely there can be no misunderstanding.
  Mr. McKENNA: I hope the right hon. Gentleman is not going to make the point that I separated myself from the Prime Minister on this Question. The hon. Member for Lowestoft referred to something which I had said then referred to something that the Prime Minister had said. I had not got the Prime Minister's words before me, and I only replied, "That is not what I said."
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: Surely the right hon. Gentleman will do me the justice to say that, in reply to his challenge, I did quote him, and then I quoted the Prime Minister.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: I do not want to make any unfair use of any language which the right hon. Gentleman used or may have used without realising the obvious interpretation that might be placed upon it. He quoted his own language, and I regret that when later on the Prime Minister came to deal with the subject he appeared to us to say, "I have nothing to do with that. I stand upon my own words." I do not want to make any unfair use of that, but whatever may have
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  been the right hon. Gentleman's reference in that speech, he will not deny he professed himself very much disturbed and rather indignant when it was said that the Government made a confession of want of knowledge in these Debates last year. Surely there can be nobody in this House or out of it who heard the Debates at that time—I was in South Africa —or who read them in the newspapers as I did who formed any other impression than that the Government had to come down here in sack-cloth and ashes and make a confession of ignorance and tell the country that they had been mistaken.
  Mr. McKENNA: Quote the words.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: I am going to quote them, and I think nobody will deny who reads the quotation that it justifies the statement that the impression derived by all who read these Debates was that the Government had been misled, that they had suddenly acquired fresh information, and in face of it were compelled to adopt a different policy. As I say, I was in South Africa and I did not hear the Debates, but I read them with the greatest possible care, and I discussed them with many others who read them also, and unquestionably in all quarters the one impression was derived that the Government had suddenly become possessed of knowledge of a most serious character, and many people wondered that they had not got hold of it before, which made it obligatory on them to come down to the House and to make a confession and an announcement that they would have to take certain action in consequence. The right hon. Gentleman challenged me to quote something which the Prime Minister said. I will do so. On 16th March, 1909, the Prime Minister said:—
  "I was not of course committing myself precisely to the number of months, but I did maintain that we had a substantial advantage in the rate of construction which would always enable us to quickly overtake them (the Germans) when the event occurred. I am sorry to say that that, is not the case."
  And a little further on the right hon. Gentleman said:—
  "I will venture to say this without attempting to excite anything in the nature of unnecessary alarm in this country, that there has been such an enormous development as to he so serious a development from our national point of view that we could no longer take to ourselves, as we could a year ago with reason, the consolation and comforting reflection that we have the advantage in speed and the rate at which ships can be constructed."
  Mr. McKENNA: That is not an admission of ignorance. He said a year ago we had the greatest speed. Where is the exhibition of ignorance?
  Mr. LONG: I withdraw the word ignorance without the slightest difficulty.
  Mr. McKENNA: That is the whole point.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: Not at all. The whole point of the statement was that the Admiralty last year made that announcement to the House, that they were compelled by circumstances to tell the House and the country that they had suddenly acquired information which induced them to change their plans.
  Mr. McKENNA: No, they never made such a statement. They stated that the change was quite recent.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTER: That they made a discovery.
  Mr. WALTER LONG: Then where do we stand? I listened yesterday to the speech of the hon. Member for Blackfriars Division of Glasgow (Mr. Barnes). I do not agree with the hon. Member; he knows that, but I feel that he puts his view before the House with courage and earnestness, and knows what he is talking about. Why did he make that speech yesterday? Has there been no change in the Admiralty policy and in the attitude of His Majesty's advisers? Is it not well known that the policy of to-day differs materially from the policy at the time before these speeches were made from which we have quoted, and does not everybody know that from the time when the Prime Minister and the Government made these statements in this House twelve months ago the whole situation has changed with regard to the position of this country, and that that change in the situation was forced upon the Government? It is that change in their naval programme which has been attacked and criticised by hon. Members below the Gangway, who tell us in perfectly plain terms that they rebuke the Government for going back upon their old plans and statements, and they tell us there was no necessity for doing so. Where, I ask, do we stand? The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Admiralty says there has been no admission of want of knowledge and no change. What, then, is the meaning of the speeches we have had, and what is the meaning of the announcement made by the First Lord yesterday that he felt the immense responsibility of coming to this House and moving Estimates of the vast character for which he himself is personally responsible as head of the
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  Admiralty? I will not chop words as to whether there has been a change or not; I, for one, as we all do on this side of the House, rejoice that the Government have seen fit to adopt a bolder and a more patriotic policy than that which prevailed previously. I confess I think they have made a wise change, and I hope they will continue to progress along the same path as they have taken now. Some hon. Members opposite suggest that we on this side of the House are neglectful of social reform, and are ready to spend large sums of money upon the Navy while we are unwilling to find money for other purposes. That is a charge for which there is no justification. We do believe that the maintenance of the Navy is essential not merely to the greatness of the country, but to the prosperity of the people. We do believe that without a strong Navy to do our work in all parts of the Empire social reform would have no real effect upon the people, and it is for these reasons that we advocate the policy for which we stand to-day; and while we rejoice that the Government has given, signs of a policy of greater wisdom and greater strength than that for which they have been hitherto responsible, we naturally desire that they should not limit their operations to their present commitment, but that they should realise that the strength and the safety of this country depends upon the maintenance of the Navy as a two-Power standard, and we also hope that they will not pass by with contempt the suggestion made by my hon. Friends behind me, and my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire in that admirable speech to which everybody listened earlier in the afternoon with interest and attention, showing in various ways that there is still much to be done if the Navy is to be made sufficient for its duty. We hope that the Government will listen to these recommendations coming from well-informed and experienced quarters, and if they are responsible for these Estimates again that they will give effect to many of them in their new proposals.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: I have ventured to interrupt the First Lord of the Admiralty, I hope only with his courteous permission, on several occasions, and I am going, as briefly as I possibly can, to endeavour, as far as an inexperienced Member is able to do, to respond to the challenge he threw out to those of us who think these Estimates are excessive, as I do, to give some reason for the faith that is in them. I am not in favour of a cheap

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  Navy, and I am perfectly prepared, as the right hon. Gentleman invited us to do, to show what standard we shall keep up to. As far as I can understand these grave and complicated matters, I should say the standard which the Government themselves, in their Estimates of last year, propounded for the country was a right standard, but that the anticipations upon which they were based have not been realised. My right hon. Friend the Member for Islington and my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Mr. Twist), in a most eloquent first speech, covered a good deal of the ground with facts and figures which I should have found it necessary to put forward. I think there has been a great deal of controversy between the First Lord and my right hon. Friend beside me (Mr. Lough) as to the special point of the German seventeen. In a question which he put in this House, upon the same date as the First Lord produced his Supplementary Estimates, my right hon. Friend suggested that the German seventeen in March, 1912, was the reason, and the only reason, which justified the British total of twenty on that date. I think the right hon. Gentleman the First-Lord of the Admiralty denied that this was the specific reason—I do not think it would be wise to waste the time of the House with long quotations, but I will just quote three lines from the Debate of 16th March last year, which, I think, justifies the contention of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Islington. On that occasion the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Admiralty said:—
  " We shall be prepared to meet the contingency of Germany having seventeen of those ships in the spring of 1912 by our having twenty."
  And the Prime Minister, speaking in the same Debate, said:—
  " It is because seventeen is a possibility that we are taking this power, otherwise we should not take it all."
  And, therefore, the House will recollect that there has been very great distinction between the Debate of last year and the Debate of this year. I saw in "The Times" of 12th January, 1910, a very brief but I imagine accurate, extract from a speech of the First Lord of the Admiralty. He is reported to have said in that speech:—
  " By the time Germany will have thirteen we will have twenty."
  As I understand it, that is our case. We regard it that the reply to the German thirteen is sixteen. The First Lord of
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  the Admiralty is here reported as saying that the proper answer to the German thirteen is twenty, therefore we are going four beyond what we were being at that time invited to support. Now as to four German "Dreadnoughts" in the 1910–11 programme. I ventured yesterday to interject a question, and the answer to my question, I think, is the fullest statement we have on the subject. I understand that those four vessels in the 1910–11 programme are not laid down or ordered at the present moment, although an order may be given as early as 1st April. We are now in March, 1910, and we are still contemplating the date of March or April, 1912. What did the First Lord of the Admiralty say yesterday? He said that:—
  "From the date of the official order or the date of laying down, the ships take two years and two months to complete."
  That is the minimum estimate for German construction which the right hon. Gentleman has put forward. It is perfectly obvious from the answer which the right hon. Gentleman gave yesterday that these four German ships cannot be completed by March, 1912, and the completion must be at a considerably later date in the year. May I say a few words in regard to the two-Power standard, and the general question of German acceleration in construction, because I want to understand clearly whether there has been any change of policy. All the fuss and excitement in the country arose on the special question of the acceleration of the earlier ships of the four vessels belonging to the 1909–1910 programme. As for the "Ersatz Frithjof" in the Debate of 16th March last year the First Lord said:—
  "I know one ship has actually been laid down."
  On 26th July the First Lord said that the Germans laid down five ships in the year 1908–9, but only four of them belonged to the programme of the year, and the fifth was laid down in 1908 under the programme of 1909–1910. That, he added, was an acceleration of which the only possible explanation that could be given is that it was desirable in the opinion of the German Government to have the ships completed as early as possible. The deduction I draw is that the First Lord asserted in this House last year that a particular German vessel, the "Ersatz Frithjof," had been actually laid down before 1909—I believe he said some time in the autumn of 1908. As official information is rather limited this year in

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  this House I turn to what the right hon. Baronet the Member for the Forest of Dean has called in this House "the ordinary sources of information," namely, an excellent article in "The Times" newspaper, in which it is stated that with regard to the "Ersatz Frithjof" and the Cruiser H, they were not laid down until April, 1909.
  Mr. McKENNA: One was.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: The right hon. Gentleman stated on 3rd March in answer to a question that the date of the official order was 8th April. Do I understand that there is a distinction between the official order and the laying down of the ship?
  Mr. McKENNA: The "Ersatz Frithjof" was laid down very early in the year, long before 1st April; the cruiser was not laid down before 1st April, but in each the official date of the order was 8th April. The "Ersatz Frithjof" was under construction when the official order was given.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: I am not in a position to judge whether what the right hon. Gentleman says is the same as he stated last year.
  Mr. McKENNA: I am not stating anything which the German Minister has not stated. He has said that the "Ersatz Frithjof" may have been laid down earlier by the contractor. The German Minister stated that the reason for this was that although the order was not officially given until later, notice was given that the order "was coming, and the reason why the work was proceeded with earlier was in order to find employment for the men. The fact that it was laid down earlier I do not think is disputed.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: I understand the First Lord generally adheres to the view that there has been a very great German acceleration. Now, on Supplementary Estimates, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Islington (Mr. Lough) threw out the proposition that the Germans could not build in less than thirty-six months, and he was contradicted by the First Lord. But last night the hon. Member for King's Lynn, whom I at any rate have always regarded as an authority, said exactly the same thing. Therefore, ignorant persons like myself, who imagine this acceleration has been rather exaggerated, have got some slight excuse for our
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  opinion. As for the two-Power standard, my right hon. Friend (Mr. Lough) was taken to task for mentioning the "Nation." I will quote from the "Observer," which I understand is not a Little Navy organ, but a paper which distinguished itself not long ago by saying that Germany in this matter had committed an act of moral treachery which would justify armed reprisals at once. The "Observer" took Germany as having thirteen, and not seventeen, of these vessels, and they took the United States as having six, and that would make the right hon. Gentleman's programme in "Dreadnoughts" alone twenty, not counting the "Lord Nelsons," to nineteen possessed by Germany and the United States together in March, 1912. I maintain that that is a two-Power standard largely in excess of any declaration which the First Lord of the Admiralty or the Prime Minister has ever made, because it included the United States and counted the two-Power standard in "Dreadnoughts" alone. The "Observer" newspaper thinks there will not be seventeen until April, 1913. In that case it would mean twenty-five British to seventeen German. But, ex hypothesi,according to the statement of the First Lord last year, we were to be satisfied with a margin of twenty to seventeen. I am glad that in the course of this Debate the hon. Member for Fareham has definitely thrown over the standard of two keels to one, and we may take that question as settled. The Secretary to the Admiralty subjected the hon. Member to an amusing cross-examination by quoting some remarks he made in July, 1908—
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: It is not a question of throwing over a standard at all. All along I have said that two keels to one is a good standard, but the only standard officially adopted, not only by the Unionist Government, but by Liberal Governments, has been the two-Power standard, and that is the standard which I support.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: I was a little surprised "when I saw the hon. Member intervene upon the Supplementary Estimates. When the Secretary to the Admiralty was accusing him of being a wild man, in favour of two keels to one, he rose and said, "I have not said anything of the kind." Therefore he threw it over. What we require is an interpretation by the Government of the two-Power standard. I have been in a position of

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  some little difficulty as to what that interpretation was. I remember that the hon. Member for Fareham was the originator of the first definition in a conundrum he propounded to the Prime Minister in the form of a question, and it was laid down as giving us a 10 per cent, margin in capital ships. I was a little curious to know what "capital ships" meant, and I put a question to the First Lord asking him to give me an official definition of the term. The answer I got was that the Board of Admiralty have never sanctioned the official use of the term "capital ship," and they do not think it expedient to do so. That was the definition given by the Government.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: The term "capital ship" is an old eighteenth century term applying to a ship which is capable of lying in the line of battle, and it was used and accepted in that sense by the Prime Minister.
  Mr. ROBERT HARCOURT: But that would not mean "Dreadnoughts" alone, although the hon. Gentleman's friends last year always interpreted it in that sense. As for the two-Power standard, my historic knowledge is not very great, but I think I am right in saying that the two-Power standard used to mean France and Russia, and nothing else. Now it seems to be accepted that the two-Power standard may mean anything you like, except Germany and the United States. The First Lord of the Admiralty was quoting—I fully admit it is the proper authority—the Debate raised on a private Member's Motion on 26th May of last year. The definitions there are not very quotable, but I can certainly quote from the Debate of 1904 on very large Estimates—they were apologised for at that time, but there is no apology in the First Lord's statement this year—repudiations by the right hon. Gentleman the present Secretary of State for War (Mr. Haldane), by the present Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Sir E. Grey), and also by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Forest of Dean (Sir Charles Dilke), saying in varying terms that you must leave the United States out of account in this two-Power standard as being in a very special position. There is a quotation I have here from the First Lord of the Admiralty, which, I think, may be of interest to right hon. Gentlemen opposite. This is a general summary of the First Lord of the Admiralty with regard to that special point.
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  On 26th July, 1909, he said, in answer to an interruption:—
  "Tile Prime Minister lists repudiated, on behalf of the Government, the idea that, this country can or ought to build ships numerically equal to those that may be built by Germany and the United States."
  I was interested to see in an excellent magazine called "The Navy"—an organ, I believe, of the Navy League and destined for the special confusion of the "Little Navy" party—an article on the two-Power standard by Rear-Admiral Sir S. Eardley-Wilmot, in which, any hon. Member can see that he selects as a two-Power standard two European nations, and therefore France, and not the United States. I think we are fully justified in making a general reference to-this enormous growth of expenditure. If any hon. Member will read the very eloquent and temperate speech which the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs made on the Vote of Censure last year, he will see a reference to this excessive expenditure as being "a satire and a reflection on civilisation." The right hon. Gentleman added that if it went on to this extent "it would sooner or later submerge that civilisation and must lead to national bankruptcy." With that high authority, I think those of us who criticise these Estimates are fully justified in rising in our places and calling attention to this terrific growth of expenditure.
  Mr. A. BURGOYNE: I would plead for the special indulgence of the House. In the first place, the subject before the Committee is one of peculiar difficulty and one which requires both experience and age. In neither of these can I claim to excel, but I take comfort in the thought that "out of the mouths of babes and sucklings," etc. Again, I chance, and perhaps it is a misfortune, to be the editor of a Naval Annual, and I am given credit, I fear without justification, for possessing a certain knowledge in naval matters. I find considerable diffidence in consequence of this in speaking in front of my hon. Friend the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth (Lord Charles Beresford), and I trust any criticisms I may make will be received in the spirit in which they are intended. I realise that criticism is very easy. I realise that it is far easier to obstruct than it is to construct, and I realise, too, that it is easy to criticise when the Estimates have risen to an amount that has never before been reached, but I do lay down as an axiom that because the Estimates have greatly increased this year upon last year, and because they are large

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  this year, they are not therefore necessarily sufficient for the needs of the nation. That surely is the right way to regard things.
  Turning to the two-Power standard, which has been largely discussed, I would be glad if I might reply for one second to the hon. Member who has just sat down. He has suggested in unmistakable terms that he does not intend to include the United States in computing the standard of two Powers. Again, I think the hon. Member for Wigan (Mr. Twist) said he did not know whence the two-Power standard has arisen. If he goes back to the days of Lord St. Vincent he will find that the two-Power standard was then accepted, and that in the time of that small Committee of three admirals that sat in the late eighties it was definitely laid down that the two-Power standard should be the next two strongest Powers, and that we should be strong as against those two Powers in ships of the line with a 10 per cent, superiority. The two-Power standard has been brought forward so that we might have some standard easily understood of the people. We are not desirous, therefore, of creating enmity with this Power or that. Our desire is to set up something so that the least learned in these matters may come forward and, by a, short perusal of the Dilke Return or some other authoritative paper, decide whether we are up to the standard of efficiency. Why should we leave out this or that Power when definition is really at the root of the standard? We leave out the United States because they are friendly and speak our tongue. Nobody will believe that the United States and ourselves are going to war, and therefore we cut them out. We come next to Germany, and we are told they are building a fleet to maintain that amity of nations in which we all delight, and so we cut out Germany. Then we come to France, and the entente cordiale has made the possibility of war with France no longer to be thought of. So bit by bit we find the only two possible Powers with which we are likely to go to war are Tahiti and Peru. The standard to be set up is not one of hostility; it is purely one so that the people may know that to which we build.
  We know well that public criticism centres generally round the "Dreadnought," but it is unwise to believe that "Dreadnoughts" alone constitute our full strength. At the present moment we have ten "Dreadnoughts" completed, or practically completed, and there are but seven
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  "Dreadnoughts" in the, whole of the rest of the world ready for purposes of war, four belonging to Germany, two to the United States, and one belonging to our ally Japan. We are, therefore, in a peculiarly strong position to-day; but, under the provisions of this new programme, we find, if we accept the definition of the two-Power standard that I have just given to the Committee, that we shall in January, 1913, have twenty-five ships. Germany at the same time will have seventeen ships, and, if we add the United States ten "Dreadnoughts," we find that we shall be in a minority of two ships as compared with the next two strongest Powers. If we add the two Colonial "Dreadnoughts" we shall be exactly equal to the next two strongest Powers. But are we to take the two "Dreadnoughts" from our Colonies to maintain the supremacy of the fleet? Are we to add them in? Were they given that we might meet the embarrassments of an Exchequer? I do not think so. Surely they were put forward as a token of good friendship at a time when the Colonies thought we were embarrassed by the attacks of possible enemies from without.
  There is one little point that I approach with very great diffidence, by reason of the fact as I have just said that I happen to be the editor of a certain naval annual. I receive letters from various countries in which details are given that should not always come to light, and I received from a foreign country details that would not have been given by the First Lord of the Admiralty had I questioned him on the subject. I bring up, therefore, this question of the secrecy of our naval subjects with considerable diffidence. It has been said that it would be well to give details of new vessels to be built to the Press, because they are easily learnt, but I submit with all deference that if foreign Powers desire to discover the plans we are making, we should not make it easier for them so to do. The "Neptune" was laid down on l9th January last year, and within a month of that time I received details as to the disposition of her guns. If I were to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty the disposition of those guns, he would tell me, and quite rightly, that it was not in the interests of the country to give them. Are there not some means whereby we could so hide the various details of our naval construction that they could not come out to a foreign Power before we in this country are able to learn them?

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  The question of secondary armaments has not been brought up. It is a detail point, and one rather of a technical nature. We have studiously avoided putting secondary armaments in our "Dreadnoughts." We started putting in 12-pounder guns, and then we went on to the 4-inch weapon. From that, so far as I can learn, we have not yet departed. Every other Power has retained as a secondary armament guns of 5-inch, 6-inch, or 6.7-inch calibre. I am sure the Noble Lord (Lord Charles Beresford) will agree with me. Possibly the Admiralty will say they have the highest information which has led them to believe they are upon the right track. Are we entirely right, and are they all on the wrong track? I do not suggest it would be in the interests of the country for the Admiralty to disclose every new feature they put into the ships, but if we could have a definite assurance that the principle we have adopted of all big-gun ships without secondary armament is the correct one, then a certain number of us who take a deep interest in the detail construction of the Fleet would be a little more happy.
  Now I come to the matter of armoured cruisers. The First Lord of the Admiralty was rather pleased at the idea that during the first four years of the Liberal Government they laid down in every type of ship a superiority in tonnage as against the four previous years when the Conservatives were in power. He mentioned battleships, armoured cruisers, protectors, and destroyers. He would be the first, I feel convinced, to accept the "Invincible" class of armoured cruiser or battleship amongst the "Dreadnoughts." We have an immense superiority of armoured cruisers proper—thirty-five to fifteen of America, and nine of Germany, or thirty-five to twenty-four of those two Powers. But not one of those armoured cruisers was laid down, ordered, or constructed by the present Administration. We have at the present time in figures a great superiority in protected cruisers, but the protected cruiser, to fulfil her work, must have an adequate speed, and I think the Committee would accept twenty-two knots as the adequate speed, and as the only speed that would be accepted by a scout to-day.
  8.0 P.M.
  I do not know whether that will be accepted by the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth, but twenty-two knots is the minimum, and of protected cruisers of that
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  type ordered, or built, or building, we have twenty-eight as against: twenty-one for Germany. Of these eight are of the "Scout" class, and carry no guns larger than 12-pounders; their business, therefore, would be not to fight, but to run away, and, in running away, they would be faced by the fact that their speed of twenty-five knots depends on triplicated engines, and they would, in all probability, be run down by cruisers driven by turbines belonging to a hostile Power. Therefore the provision for protected cruisers cannot be said to be adequate to our needs. Of destroyers we have thirty-six of twenty-seven knots, and I suggest that of those thirty-six you will not find half a dozen that can steam four hours on end at the rate of twenty-two knots, the speed of our latest battleship. Then again we have sixty destroyers of thirty knots. I wonder whether ten of those could maintain the speed of the "Invincible" class of battleship? Of what value will they prove to be if they have not sufficient speed to reach the vessels which they have to attack? The situation pleases no one. I can quite understand it would be difficult for any First Lord of the Admiralty to frame a programme which would meet with the absolute approval of every Member of this House. But, because the programme is based on the necessities of the situation, I cannot see that, therefore, it necessarily meets every demand that we have made, with the knowledge of the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth to support us. What I would like to see would be the two keels to one standard. I would gladly see our Fleet placed in a position of such safety and superiority that none could challenge it. But that could only be attained by means of loans, and that, of course, is bad finance. That being so, we must be content with matters as they are. I am afraid I have wearied the Committee, but it is a very difficult thing for a young Member getting up for the first time to address a House like this. I am extremely grateful for the kindly hearing the Committee has given me, and I would like to conclude with a few words from the late Poet Laureate:—
  "The fleer of England is her nil in all;
  The fleet is in your hands,
  And in her fleet her fate."
  Mr. OGDEN: I am in a peculiar position in addressing the Committee. When I came into this House a few weeks ago I had the fullest desire to support the proposals of the Government. Indeed, I felt

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  myself to be an ardent supporter of the policy of the Government, as far as I understood that policy, as enunciated at the General Election. I am still an ardent supporter of it, but I confess frankly that during the course of the election I never heard, and so far as I know none of my Friends heard, of it being the intention of the Government to propose an increase of £5,500,000 in the already great expenditure on the Navy sanctioned by the Estimates of last year. On this point I agree with the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth—it is one of the very few points on which I do agree with him—that if this had been made perfectly clear at the General Election to the electors of this country it would have profoundly modified public opinion in regard to the claims of the Government to continued support from the electors. Here we have an appaling increase in the demand made on the country for naval expenditure, and I submit that nothing but imperative and overwhelming necessity could justify such a demand. I listened with very great interest to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for the Blackfriars Division of Glasgow (Mr. Barnes) yesterday, and I have not yet heard any answer to it. It seems to me to be perfectly clear and undeniable that the grounds on which this House granted the enormous amount which was voted last year to the Navy proved to be absolutely unsubstantial, and that events have shown that those grounds have vanished into thin air. That being so, one would have imagined that the necessary and logical consequence would have been that a programme following upon that would have shown some diminution. What, then, is the justification for this great expenditure and this enormous increase in expenditure which is desired this year?
  It is well within the knowledge of hon. Members of this House that a progressive increase in Naval expenditure has taken place during the last few years. In 1907 £3,500,000 was asked for the Navy as an addition. In 1908 an increase of £1,000,000 was asked for. In 1909 it sprang up nearly £3,000,000 sterling, and the consent of the House, as it appears to me, was obtained by rather panic statements, that were made on both sides of the House on that occasion, and this year we have an enormous and almost unprecedented demand for an increase of £5,500,000 even upon the large demand of last year. The First Lord of the Admiralty, in introducing the Estimates yester-
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  day, indulged in a classification which appears to me to be by no means complete. He said he expected criticism from two classes, from two different points of view. One was that this very large expenditure on the Navy was excessive, and the other was from hon. Members to whom no expenditure on the Navy was sufficient. I submit that I do not belong to either of those classes. I am quite willing where the necessity is clearly shown to exist to support an expenditure, however reluctantly, which I consider to be demanded by the clear and undisputed necessities of the case. I should like to say on this point that I dissociate myself entirely from the cheap sneers of want of patriotism which are made in this House upon hon. Members below the Gangway. It does not appear to me that they have given any evidence of a want of desire to maintain the integrity of the Empire or the adequate demands of the Navy. But what they ask, and what we all ask and have a right to be told, is that we ought to have it clearly demonstrated that the necessity exists.
  There has been some discussion in the course of this Debate as to what has been the origin of this mad race in armaments between the different Powers of the world to-day. The hon. and gallant Member for Portsmouth (Lord Charles Beresford) attributed the origin of this race to what he described as the absurd advertisement of the "Dreadnought" vessel. I am bound to say that I agree with him to this extent, that every advertisement of that vessel was absurd in the interests of our own Navy and was absurd also, having regard to the inevitable effect which such an advertisement would produce among other nations, and if anybody said that the introduction of one "Dreadnought" was sufficient in itself to secure the sinking of the German Fleet at the beginning any outbreak of hostilities, I can only say that it appears to me to be a very foolish and ill-advised remark to be made on a subject of that kind. But I do not agree with the hon. and gallant Member for Portsmouth that that was the real origin of this race in armaments. I think the real cause was anterior to that. It has been suggested earlier in the day in Committee, and I cordially agree with the suggestion that probably the real cause of the immense race in armaments existing between the different Powers to-day is to be found in the Foreign Secretary's refusal to grant immunity to merchant vessels in time of war. We had a proposal by our greatest

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  naval competitor that merchant vessels in time of war should be immune, and I cannot for the life of me understand how it is that this country should refuse a suggestion of this kind.
  It would appear to me that we have everything to gain from the immunity of merchant vessels in time of war. We have more of them to defend than any other nation, and if any advantage accrues to one of the belligerents because of the immunity of merchant vessels in time of war, it appears to me that much the largest part of that advantage must necessarily belong to the nation with the largest number of vessels and the greatest property to defend. The reply was an uncompromising refusal of this suggestion. What then would a patriotic German necessarily say to himself? He would say: If our German vessels, which are increasing in number, and if our merchant trade, which is growing, is not to be immune from attack in time of war, it becomes an absolute necessity that we should have the naval power necessary to protect them. The Germans, therefore, began to set about the large increase of their naval strength that we have witnessed during recent years, and the great advance of German naval construction really dates from that time; and I do not see how patriotic Germans could adopt any other attitude than they have adopted in response to what is an undoubted challenge from this nation, having reference to their merchant fleet in time of war. Therefore, the terrible responsibility of this great increase of armaments appears to me to lie at the door of the British Government. This crushing burden, which is scarcely less than the expenditure on a war, is a responsibility which we must carry; and I do not think it is possible for us to divest ourselves of the responsibility so long as we maintain a hostile attitude towards proposals for immunity of merchant vessels in time of war.
  The most effective preventive to the growth of armaments would be the evidence of a conciliatory disposition on the part of the British Government to foreign Powers, and I have not the slightest doubt that from the time that we really and earnestly and honestly display the desire to show a conciliatory spirit towards our great naval rivals that we shall see a diminution of those terrible and crushing burdens of increasing armaments. What is to be the end of it? We have the action of Germany in reply to our refusal to con-
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  sider her request in the increase of her naval construction, and that, necessarily, because of the maintenance of the two-Power standard in this country, means that we must increase ours to an even larger degree. Their response to that is to make another large addition to their Navy, and we must reply to that by another large construction also. There is action and reaction, to which there appears to be no finality. What can the end of a policy like that be if it is going to be pursued by the great Naval Powers for an indefinite period? It does not require any power of prophecy to see that a catastrophe of an appalling kind must overtake the nations of the world if we continue in that way. My hon. Friend referred to the weighty remarks of the Foreign Secretary:—
  " If it goes on at the rate at which it is increasing, sooner or later, I believe, it will submerge civilisation."
  Those are the words of a responsible and a calm statesman, and I venture to say that they are worthy of the most serious attention on the part of all those who really desire to see a condition of improvement in the condition of affairs in this and other countries.
  So far from the rate of increase on armaments being maintained it is patent from the Estimates which we are considering that that rate is increasing and accelerating, and, therefore, the approach of that disaster is sensibly nearer because of these very Estimates than it was at the time the Foreign Secretary made that very weighty utterance in this House. In the meantime what becomes of Social Reform? I must say I cannot dissociate the question of Social Reform from the consideration of expenditure on armaments. I am not disposed to believe, at any rate, that the public with which I am most familiar— that portion which I have the honour to represent in this House, will permit an indefinite postponement of Social Reform merely in order to provide the sinews of war for this great and unnecessary increase in the armaments of this country. I believe strongly and seriously that the indefinite postponement will produce a social revolution in this country, and that society itself may be submerged. In the interests of stability at home, as well as all over the civilised world, it is highly necessary there should be some cessation of the increase in this expenditure on armaments. To the toiler who has to find the money for the expenditure, and who has waited with marvellous patience for the cessation

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  of these demands, there is something of tragedy in. the position which makes all these discussions academic and unreal. I do not think we should be justified in passing these Estimates unless a much better case is made out for the expenditure of this large sum of money. If a sufficient case can be found, then with the very greatest reluctance some of us will vote for this enormous expenditure of money, but unless it can be shown—and I am far from satisfied that a case has been made out—we shall be quite unable to give our support to the Estimates before the House.
  Mr. LEVERTON HARRIS: The very interesting subject of immunity of property at sea from capture in time of war has been referred to already. It is a subject which has been discussed several times, and not at all on party lines. There are Members on both sides of the House who hold the opinion, and I myself have given expression to it, in favour of the policy of making merchant shipping and property at sea immune from capture. The hon. Member who last spoke referred to the aspect of the case so far as it concerned the toilers of this country in the matter of expenditure. I think there is another point of view in which the interests of the toilers may well be looked at, and I propose to deal with that particular aspect. I happen to be one of those unfortunate persons who are engaged in the shipping industry, and I often ask myself, How would it be with our shipping in time of war? Will the Admiralty be able to give that ample protection which will be necessary to protect our oversea trade and safeguard our great trade routes? As a shipowner I must confess that the two-Power standard never seems to be complete or entirely satisfactory. I say, as a shipowner, because the two-Power standard deals entirely with capital vessels—vessels that go into the line of battle in time of war, and it leaves out of account the number and size of our Mercantile Marine and the great length of the ocean routes which have to be protected and kept open in time of hostilities. To me it is an incomplete standard, because it neglects altogether the effect which will be produced upon British trade and commerce and the consequent great industrial upheaval of commerce by the destruction of the shipping of this country by commerce destroyers. I am well aware that the supporters of the two-Power standard tell us that, provided we have a Fleet large enough and strong
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  enough to defeat the combined forces of any two enemies we may have to meet, all will be well with our oversea trade, and we shall be masters of the sea and able to regulate the commerce. In my opinion this is a profound delusion. Exactly the same opinions were held one hundred years ago. There were sanguine people then as there are to-day, and it is very interesting to observe how the opinions which they expressed were falsified. At the commencement of the war with America in 1812 we had on the American station eighty-five effective fighting ships against sixteen or eighteen belonging to our opponents. Some time ago, in a commercial newspaper, I came across a very interesting note, which I propose to read. Hostilities were commenced in the year 1812, and this was published in the year 1813. This note said:—
  "The public will learn, with sentiments which we shall not presume to anticipate, that a third British frigate has struck to the Americans. This is an occurrence which calls for serious reflection, this and the fact stated in one paper yesterday that Lloyd's List contains a list of upwards of 500 British vessels captured in seven months by the Americans—500 merchantmen and three frigates."
  Then the note went on to say that anybody who had predicted such a result of the American War a year previously would have been treated as a madman or a traitor. If a similar fate were to befall British shipping carrying the rich cargoes it does at the present time I venture to assert that a great social and industrial upheaval would be produced in this country. Yet there will be a most profound temptation to our enemies in the event of war to indulge in tactics of commerce destruction. Take the case of Germany. It is well known that a policy of commerce destruction forms part of the organised programme of Germany should that country go to war. I was interested in the remarks made by the First Lord in answer to the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth with regard to the equipment of German merchant vessels for the purpose of commerce destruction. Last Session the right hon. Gentleman was asked whether it was a fact that German merchantmen were fitted, or ready to be fitted, with gun-mountings so that in time of hostilities they might take the sea as commerce destroyers. The answer given on that occasion does not, I think, tally with the answer given to a similar question by the Noble Lord. It was to the effect that it was against the public interest to make any declaration on that point, and that is

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  practically equivalent to saying that such a position existed. If it be true, and should we go to war with any great naval Power, we may depend upon it that no money will be spared, and no effort will be wasted in order to produce very grievous effect upon this country by attacking and destroying our commerce. The harm which can be done is not confined to our shipping alone. The shipowner is very well able to lake care of himself. He can insure against war risks, he can lay his vessel up in dock till the war is over, and his interests are almost negligible, compared with the interests of people who depend for their food and employment on the corn and raw material which we import into this country. Let me take the cotton trade as an example. I do not know how many people there are who depend for their livelihood upon the cotton trade, but I imagine that if I put the number at 3,000,000 I should be pretty near the mark. It is often forgotten that these 3,000,000 and millions of other persons who are employed in our other great staple trades will depend in time of war for their wages and their employment upon the protection which the. Navy will be able to give to the shipping that brings the raw material to our ports. Upon the measure of protection which the Navy will be able to give to our shipping rest the premiums of war risk insurance. If the Admiralty fails to give sufficient protection to allay the feelings of panic and of alarm in the minds of the underwriters— and I speak as an underwriter of twenty years' experience—it is no exaggeration to say that the majority of those 3,000,000 people and the others engaged in our great staple trades will be thrown out of employment, and we shall have a state of starvation and unemployment in our great industrial centres comparable only to what would exist in a city in a time of siege and famine. It is upon commerce defence, then, that depends the desperate problem of having to deal with immense masses of starving and unemployed people, a situation which would be bound to have the gravest bearing upon the successful conduct or happy termination of any war.
  For instance, if the cotton manufacturers of this country had to pay for their raw materials 15 or 20 per cent, more than the competing cotton manufacturers in other countries had to pay for their raw material, our great export trade to neutral countries would absolutely cease, and some two-thirds of our mills would be thrown idle, and enormous masses of starving
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  people would be turned out into the streets. It is a very small rise in war risk insurance which will produce a very large increase in the cost of raw materials coming to this country, because the cargo that the ships carry has to bear not only the insurance on the cargo itself, but the insurance on the ship which carried it, which is added to the freight. In 1905 I gave evidence before the Food Supply Commission, and I put in a table to show what the effect would be of a 5 per cent, war risk insurance upon the price of iron ore imported into this country. The figure of 5 per cent. was given by one of the expert witnesses as the probable figure which would be paid on the cargoes of ships crossing the British Channel. I showed, I think conclusively—the figures have been used since by authorities—that a mere premium of 5 per cent, would double the price of iron ore imported into this country. That was five years ago, and since then the dangers, which were very great even at that time, have been immensely increased by the provisions of The Hague Conference and by the Declaration of London. With some sort of childlike innocence, we have become the easy victims of foreign diplomacy. In a sort of mad hunger for reduced armaments we have been persuaded to give away ancient principle after principle connected with our property at sea which we have upheld in the past in the face of all nations for many years, and these concessions which we have given have, instead of reducing the large sums of money which have to be spent on naval armaments, rather increased them. What are these principles which have been abandoned at The Hague Conference and the Declaration of London? I think principally they are four in number, and each of them either prejudices and weakens our strength at sea or imposes new, heavy and costly responsibilities upon the Navy. The first of these is, that we have in recent years legalised commerce destruction at sea. The second is, that by the Declaration of London we have permitted the sinking of neutral prizes, and thereby given away what the Foreign Secretary called, in his despatch to our representative at The Hague Conference, "our ancient doctrine of the prize courts of this country for two hundred years." Thirdly, and this is the most important of all, we have enlarged the conditions under which food becomes contraband of war, and, lastly, by the abandonment of the doctrine of continuous voyage, we have allowed other nations to

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  make their food supply secure from any interference from us.
  What are the facts? Under the Declaration of Paris of 1856 privateering was absolutely abolished, and my opinion is that nothing could have been better for this country. There are other points in the Declaration of Paris which I do not agree with, and which I think are great disadvantages for us, seeing that the shipping of no other country offers so large an area for commerce attack. Out of every two ships at sea of over 100 tons one flies the British ensign. We trade with every country in the world, and in every ocean of the two hemispheres, and really there is no other country which, to the same-extent, depends upon its shipping for its food and raw material. In fact, I do not think there is any country that depends absolutely upon its shipping at all except possibly Japan, since every country that we are likely to be at war with can obtain everything she requires, whether food or raw material, by means of the rivers or the railways of the friendly nations which surround her. Germany, for instance, can get everything she wants through the Belgian ports of Antwerp or Rotterdam, through Holland, France, Austria, Switzerland, Russia, or Denmark. We have none of these advantages, so that whilst privateering or commerce destruction might possibly be some inconvenience to our opponents, it could not possibly do the same profound amount of harm that it might do to the food supply and trade of this country. The abolition of privateering by the Declaration of Paris was a very great advantage to this country, but in 1907 we attended, in the interests of peace, The Hague Conference, and there we were persuaded to agree to terms and conditions which practically meant the re-institution and legalisation of privateering, if not in name, at all events in fact. By a process of very simple rules and regulations every nation now is able to commission and put on the high seas in any part of the world any number of commerce destroyers, and all that is required is to give a commission to the officer in command, to have a piece of bunting flying at the masthead, and to have on board a gun which will throw a projectile 200 or 300 yards. With such an equipment the most profound damage—almost as great as can be done by a battleship—can be done to the shipping belonging to this country, and to neutral shipping engaged in time of war to carry
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  goods or food to this country. To show how much damage could be done, I had taken out for me, some time ago, the number of vessels that pass a given point between Cape Town and Plymouth. Assuming that the Suez Canal were closed in time of war, the whole of our Eastern trade would be diverted round the Cape. It would appear that there would be two ribbons or streams of British shipping sailing between Cape Town and this country, and vice versa, the individual units of which would be only separated one from the other by an average distance of one hour. That is to say, a person stationed at a given point on that route would see one British vessel pass him in the space of half an hour. [An HON. MEMBER: "One hour."] No, there are two streams, so that there would be a vessel passing a given point every half hour. I give that statement simply to show the incalculable amount of damage, not only actual but moral, in the markets of this-country, the Stock Exchange and Lloyds, which could be produced in the mere space of two or three hours by a commerce destroyer of one of our opponents who happened to get on that great trade route. No one can estimate the damage that might be done, or the effect this might have on prices in this country, and I feel that the legalising of commerce destruction by this easy and simple process, which we have agreed to at The Hague, has enormously added to the great obligations that rest upon our Navy.
  I pass on to the Declaration of London, because it appears that foreign countries, not satisfied with having obtained our concurrence to the creation of commerce destroyers, next proceeded to make their operations more deadly and more effective. In that what I may call precious document, the Declaration of London, signed last year, and which the First Lord in his Statement mentions as likely to be ratified before very long, we have abandoned one of our most ancient principles which under international law we have always maintained in this country, namely, that no neutral ship can be sunk. It is a point that we have constantly raised. Most Members of the House will remember the Debates which took place on the case of the "Knight Commander," where we made a protest against the action of Russia during the Russo-Japanese War. The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs said in his letter to our representative at The Hague Conference,

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  which I have already mentioned, that this is a principle of international law which this country has upheld for at least 200 years. It will be evident to everybody that if a commerce destroyer is enabled, when she finds she is inconvenienced, to sink a prize which she has captured, instead of taking it into port, the range of operations is very much increased. She has not to leave her course to conduct these vessels into port; and, consequently, in giving way as we did in the Declaration of London, and in admitting that the sinking of a neutral prize, when the taking of the vessel into port would be inconvenient, and would involve danger to a warship, or the success of the operations in which she is engaged at the time, which means anything, because the officer in command of a warship can always say that the success of war operations is in danger by taking prizes into port, we have added enormously to the responsibility of our Navy to protect our food supply in time of war.
  There is one other direction in which the Declaration of London has immensely increased our responsibilities. Hitherto in this country we have always held that under no circumstances, except in the case of supplies which are being sent to a beleaguered city, can food be contraband of war. Referring, again, to the instructions sent to Sir Edward Fry at The Hague Conference, I find that the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs clearly laid down the principle, so far as this country is concerned, that we must insist that food and provisions are to be considered non-contraband except in the case of supplies going to a beleaguered city. In the earlier part of the remarks I have addressed to the Committee, I pointed out how much more greatly this country depends on shipping for its food supply than other countries which can obtain their food across frontiers, and, of course, any legislative arrangement we have come to which makes our food more likely to be contraband must Ht this country more than any other. On several occasions we have given expression to the principle that food cannot be contraband of war. It might be expected that the considered decisions we have laid down as to what constitutes contraband in the case of two countries at war with each other would be insisted upon in any international treaty in which we might be concerned. In the Declaration of London we have departed from this principle, and we
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  have agreed to conditions which make food to be presumed to be contraband of war, and as such liable to be seized if that food is sent to any merchant—commercant is the French word employed—resident in the country of the enemy and supplying the enemy, and also that all food going to a port that is a base of supply of the armed force of the country is to be considered contraband. I would like to ask what port there is in the United Kingdom which, in time of war, will not impose the taint of contraband upon all the food that goes into it. Any foreign enemy could say that a bushel of wheat sent through Liverpool to a regiment of Territorials at Lancaster constituted Liverpool a base of supply. That, perhaps, is too narrow a definition, but at the same time when we are engaged in hostilities there is no doubt at all that the enemy would put the widest interpretation upon the term "base of supply."
  The strange thing is that in this same Declaration of London, whilst we prejudice and imperil the food that comes to this country, we make more secure the food that goes to the country occupied by our enemy. The reason is that we have departed from the principle of continuous voyage, and that instead of looking to the ultimate destination of food supplies, we now look to the port at which the food may have to be discharged. We have laid down in the Declaration of London that food going into a neutral port, whatever its destination may be, whether it is destined for an enemy or not, is not to be considered contraband; and consequently cannot be touched by us. The situation is that Germany could obtain all the food required in war through Antwerp or Rotterdam or any other neutral port, and we could not lay a hand upon it; whereas all the food coming into any ports in this country, if those ports were interpreted by Germany as ports of supply, would be presumed to be contraband of war, and would be liable to be seized. Anyone who realises how intensely grave are the consequences which hang upon the proper defence of our shipping must have very disquieting feelings about the very small and entirely inadequate protection which is being provided for it. I think the First Lord appreciates the gravity of the situation as much as anybody, as was shown by the very ominous words which he used last year, which, I think, reflected the misgivings of the Navy Intelligence Department and the Committee of Imperial De-

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  fence. He said, addressing the Committee of this House on Naval Estimates:—
  "There is no tuition in the world which has anything like the same dependence on foreign trade that we have. Its loss to us would he a vital blow; to any other nation it would be merely an inconvenience. Our commerce, if unprotected in remote seas, would be open to attack by foreign armed merchant vessels, specially commissioned for the purpose as ships of war Victory at sea in home waters would not necessarily protect our foreign trade, nor would it necessarily bring the war to a close. On the other hand, defeat in the home waters would certainly end the war. and would he the surest means of protecting the antagonist's foreign trade. I make these observations merely by way of a brief explanation of our special need of cruisers, and to show that calculations of battle strength in which they are all reckoned as available in home waters, are based on an incomplete appreciation of their true functions."
  We want to know definitely how many suitable vessels there are of sufficient speed and sufficient coal capacity to remain long at sea, to protect half the tonnage of the world, which we own, and at least 50,000 miles of great trade, routes in time of war. In a paper published, I think, last year, Admiral Sir Edmund Fremantle put the number at fifty. When you come to deduct from these the vessels that necessarily must be in port undergoing repairs, or refitting, or coaling, I think the numbers will be reduced to a point which raises very grave consideration. In the evidence given before the Food Supplies Commission a rather startling answer to a question was given by the Secretary to the Board of Admiralty on behalf of the Board. He said:—
  "If any portion of the naval force at the disposal of the Admiralty were deflected from the main operations of the war for-any purpose of whatever kind, the general conduct of the operations must of necessity suffer, and the entire course of the-war might be injuriously affected."
  So we know perfectly well we cannot look to any help from our fighting fleets, and that we shall have to depend on those ships that are specially put aside for the protection of our commerce; and I trust that when my hon. Friend replies, as I hope he will reply, he will give us an indication of the actual number of vessels that can be specially appropriated for commerce defence. This is the situation in which we are placed to-day. In the efforts for peace and to reduce armaments, hon. Gentlemen opposite, I think, have very gravely aggravated the danger to which we are exposed and the responsibilities which rest upon our Navy. Other nations, it is quite true, sympathise with our aspirations for peace, as long as they have got everything to gain by the concessions which we make. At The Hague and in the Declaration of London we have abandoned our over-sea trade and we have opened the door for its destruction. We have imperilled our food
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  supply while securing that of foreign countries, and we have greatly added to the responsibilities which rest upon the Navy, and which we have not given it the means to meet.
  Sir WILLIAM GELDER: I rise not so much to offer any criticism on the Government building programme. I and many others regret the necessity for this increased expenditure. It does seem to be somewhat of a reflection upon modern times that in the twentieth century we are found spending excessive sums upon the Navy when the money could be far better appropriated for social purposes. It does seem to be a sad commentary upon the programme of the Peace Conference at The Hague, in which many of us took part. And I am not sure that we, as a nation, are altogether free from censure in this matter. We claim to look abroad and to blame the Germans and other nations for their efforts to increase their naval strength. I think if we went back into history we should find possibly that we first set the example of moving forward in this direction. I am sure that even at the present day it is not beyond the wit and the intelligence of Statesmen to devise some means whereby this race for supremacy in maritime matters will be stayed and to provide some limitation to our armaments. I have very considerable sympathy with the attitude which the hon. Member for Glasgow took up in this particular. At the same time I do not see what the Admiralty could have done in the immediate present position, having regard to what Germany has done, save to go forward with the programme; and I think if it is necessary to strengthen our Navy at all it should be strengthened in all its parts. That is the reason why I have risen to offer one or two remarks at the present time. All these adjunct's of the Navy, as well as the ships themselves, should be considered; and I note here in the Estimates that there is one most important factor which has been left out. The First Lord of the Admiralty is reported to have said on 9th July, 1909, that there was a serious want of docks on the East Coast, and I find in the evidence that no provision is made to meet that serious want. If it was serious a year ago, with the increased shipbuilding programme that we have in hand to-day it must be more serious than it was then. There is no attempt made in this programme to make any provision for a naval base or for a

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  floating dock anywhere from the Medway up to the Firth of Forth. The whole of our East Coast is absolutely exposed and undefended. This is a most serious matter, and should not be overlooked by those who are responsible for the Navy. I note that the hon. Member for Plymouth yesterday said there is general confusion about the docks, it being supposed that we want them only in the case of war. We want docks for ships before war breaks out to get their bottoms and bows, etc., cleaned, in order that the ships of the Fleet may have the same speed. If you have one ship out of dock fourteen months and another three months there is a difference of four knots in speed, and that will mean a difference of four knots to the whole fleet. If this be correct, does it not point to the fact that we ought to have the greatest efficiency in the provision of dry dock or floating dock accommodation at the nearest point where our Fleet is for the time centred? I suppose that our Fleet more than ever will manœuvre about in the neighbourhood of the North Sea. In that case I conclude that it will be perhaps 250 miles further to send any of the disabled Fleet to the Medway or to Rosyth. Therefore I want to impress upon the First Lord the necessity of considering some provision for dock accommodation upon the Humber. We have just listened to a very cogent and closely reasoned speech from the hon. Member opposite, in which he pointed out very clearly our isolated position in case of war with respect to our food supply.
  9.0 P.M.
  That is a matter of very serious moment. If our bases are so far removed our Fleet in the North Sea cannot possibly have that security that it would have if we had some naval centre in such a position as the Humber. There is all the great shipping on the East Coast to preserve, bringing in greater food supplies than to any other part in the Kingdom. Our bread grain is brought to the neighbourhood of Hull and Grimsby for the supply of the whole of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Lancashire, and the Midlands. Therefore, if our food supply is likely to be at all threatened, we should have provision made in the centre of the East Coast for a naval base and also for a repairing dockyard. The reason I specially rise at the present time is that surveys have been made on the Humber. It has been reported as a suitable place for a naval base and dockyard. They have
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  deeper water there than at any other place, I believe, on the East Coast. At the present time the Great Central Hail-way are making a dock at Immingham— the only place where the deep water is to be found for this dock. Within the next year or eighteen months—and no provision, is made for any naval centre or dockyard— the cost of making such a dockyard will be very much increased, if not rendered impossible, by the fact that the railway company has monopolised it all for mercantile purposes. Therefore I would urge upon the First Lord of the Admiralty the necessity of not further delaying this very essential work—a work admitted by himself to be a serious one—on the East Coast. If the want was great a year ago, with our increased Navy that want must be greater at the present time. These things are net carried out in a year or in two years. The estimates have to be prepared, and the work takes a considerable time. But this is a matter of urgency, and it is closely identified and connected with our naval programme. We spend increased money on our ships. I regret very much that we have to spend it, but we ought to provide them with suitable and convenient naval bases in the nearest neighbourhood to where the ships are placed.
  Sir CLEMENT KINLOCH-COOKE: It is with considerable diffidence that I rise to intervene in this present discussion, but, representing as I do one of our great dockyards, I may perhaps claim the indulgence of the House to make a few observations on the Naval Estimates. First of all, I should like to offer my congratulations to His Majesty's Government, on what may not altogether be inappropriately called a deathbed repentance. The security of the country, or, as I prefer to call it, the security of the Empire, as it has been during the last rive years, is now, I understand, to be restored, and as an earnest of future watchfulness we are informed by the First Lord that the Estimates for 1910–11 are designed to fulfil the pledge given by the Prime Minister with regard to the two-Power standard and the 10 per cent, margin. For myself, I have my misgivings as to whether these expectations will be realised. Indeed, after listening to the Debate this afternoon, I think I shall have to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty if he will kindly give me some definition of what the Prime Minister means by the two-Power standard. If the First Lord is able to assure us that the Government intend at all hazards to

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  accept and to maintain the two-Power standard, as we understand it, that is a standard with regard to the next two strongest Powers, whatever they be and wherever they are, then I think we on this side of the House have something to congratulate ourselves upon. For it cannot be denied that we have never ceased to remind the Government of the risk they were running in refusing to heed the warning note of the Cawdor statement, a statement drawn up, I would remind him, in consultation with the same naval adviser, whose services to the State the First Lord has not failed to eulogise. For what reason the Government desired to effect the savings they have effected since 1905 in the Navy Estimates I have never been able to understand. Handicapped they have been no doubt by the, fact that a considerable section of their own party have recorded their vote against the extension of armaments. Be that as it may, those savings were effected at the expense of security. That is admitted by the First Lord himself.
  "We do not know, as we thought we did, the rate at which German construction is taking place."
  That was said by the First Lord in introducing the Estimates last year. When we had that state of things brought home to us it was a great surprise to us, said the Prime Minister. I now supply the reference the First Lord asked for this afternoon. If those words do not imply that the Government had done things they ought not to have done, or left undone things they ought to have done, I confess I myself do not know what they mean. The anxiety of the First Lord for saving had assumed such proportions that even the First Naval Lord was obliged to remonstrate.
  " There has been a saving of £19,000,000 effected in the Estimates of 1904–6."
  I remember reading in a very excellent article that appeared in "The Times" of last year.
  "Six millions in Estimates, six millions in works approved of and in hand, seven millions at Rosyth. He did not spur a willing horse."
  Those statements were credited to Lord Fisher, and I should be glad if the First Lord is able to deny the authenticity. So grave had the position become, that following on the statement of the Prime Minister and the First Lord, and the still more startling statement of the Foreign Secretary on 29th March, that the great Oversea Dominions of the Crown became alarmed, and as in the case of the South African
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  War, they at once came forward with offers of aid. Then followed the outcry in this country, and the Imperial Press Conference, which largely occupied itself with discussing the defences of the Empire and the serious nature of the Navy situation, a situation I would venture again to remind the Government his Majesty's Ministers were themselves the first to lay bare. Forced by the feeling in the country, the four contingent "Dreadnoughts" were at length laid down, just in time to save the Government from experiencing the full effect of their supineness when the appeal to the country came. Throughout the General Election supporters of the Government did not hesitate to say on Liberal platforms, and the statements were never, so far as I am aware, contradicted by any Ministers of the Crown:—
  "They want eight and they won't pay."
  When it was self-evident that not a penny of the new taxes imposed by the Budget was allocated to ship construction. [HON. MEMBERS: "Yes."]
  Dr. MACNAMARA: The hon. Gentleman is referring to the four contingent ships.
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: Very tardily the Government have seen the errors of their ways and repented, and although hon. Members below the Gangway on opposite benches do not appear to approve of this repentance I think I may say that we on this side of the House entertain no such bitter feeling. We rejoice to think that at last the Government has made and brought forward these Estimates, which, if they do not meet all we have asked for, at any rate go far in that direction. So far as I understand, no direct opposition is to be expected from those hon. Members who do not share the views of the First Lord; and, so far as I have been able to read, the Liberal organs of the Press are likewise content with a slight remonstrance. Even the "Daily News" dismisses the Navy Estimates with, I think, what is called a leaderette, and excuses itself from further attack on the ground that in the tense position of the public mind it is to be feared the Estimates will pass almost unchallenged. The real meaning of all this silence time alone will reveal. I do not for a moment suggest that it has anything to do with party tactics. No doubt the result of the last election has been accepted by the Government and the Small Navy party, as well as the Liberal Press. The country, however,

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  is determined at all hazards to have a strong Navy, and His Majesty's Government have at last grasped the fact.
  Much, however, as the new Estimates are, £321,114 is to be expended on the new armoured ships, or less than one-fifth of the cost of one ship, and less than the amount expended last year on the four contingent "Dreadnoughts." This seems to show, I think, that the five capital ships will not be laid down until the end of the financial year. As regards the new cruisers the amount voted is only £120,000, less than that provided in the last year's Estimates. We come to the personnel. The number of seamen is to be increased we are told by 3,000. I am inclined to agree with the Noble Lord the Member for Portsmouth (Lord Charles Beresford) that this number is inadequate, and that an increase of at least 5,000 should have been provided for. If I remember rightly, the First Lord has on more than one occasion said that no increase in the personnel was required, because in the new ships fewer men were necessary. But I see in the Memorandum that this increase in the personnel is necessary in part to meet the requirements of the new ships, and I take it the First Lord has changed his views in this respect. I find that since 1905 the Navy has been decreased by 1,000 men, so that it would seem that the net increase is 2,000, and not 3,000. I am altogether against the short service system. It takes six years to make a sailor, but if a sailor, as soon as he is of any real value, is to be allowed to leave the active service, I submit that that cannot make either for the efficiency of the Navy, or for our preparedness in time of war. Moreover, these men find it very difficult to get civil employment. Their training at sea does not fit them for work on land. Hence they go to swell the ranks of the unempleyed. So much for the general question.
  I now come more particularly to Devonport. In the Navy Estimates for 1909–10, provision is made for the expenditure of £267,767 on new ship No. 2, now being built in Devonport Dockyard and called the "Lion." In the Estimates for 1910–11 provision is made for the expenditure of only £96,723 on new ship No. 2, a difference of £171,044. This amount is so considerable that it would appear to indicate that the slip on which the "Lion" is being constructed, and which is one of the largest and best equipped slips in the Royal Dockyards, will be vacant for several months
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  when the "Lion" is launched. My fears are corroborated and intensified by a local report which has reached me that the "Lion" will be ready to go off the slip in July next. I understood the First Lord to say the other day that we should find the date of laying down the new ships in the Estimates. I have been unable to find the reference, but I believe the First Lord subsequently gave 11th January as the date for laying down ship No. 2. If that date is correct, according to my information the large slip at Devonport is likely to be vacant for six months. This will mean that a considerable number of workmen in Devonport will be unemployed from July to January. I shall be exceedingly glad if the First Lord will give me the date at which the "Lion" is expected to be launched, and the date when the new ship will be laid down.
  I see from the 1909–10 Estimates that £l,717,191 is allowed for expenditure on new construction, and that the sum for repairs and refits is £141,417. If you look at the Estimates for 1910–11, you will find that the corresponding amounts are £1,752,570 and £111,113, respectively. So that the total sum provided for new construction, repairs, and refits during 1910–11 appears to be only £5,000 above the total for the-year just closing. If this be correct it does not seem that Devonport Dockyard will benefit much from the very large increases in this year's Estimates, while there is considerable risk of thousands of skilled workmen being thrown out of employment during the autumn and winter months. There are two slips at Devonport, but only one, so far as I know, has been occupied since the last of the "King Edward" class was launched. I would ask the First Lord if it is not possible to utilise the second slip when certain necessary alterations have been made. I quite admit the advisability of giving a certain amount of Government work to the private yards, but at the same time it should not be forgotten that private yards can always secure work by private competition, whereas the Admiralty have always refused, and I have no doubt rightly refused, to allow the Royal dockyards to extend themselves commercially.
  I should like also to call the First Lord's attention to the condition of things in the Keyham extension. At present the basins appear to be used only for reserve ships to lie up in, and these ships are only lying up because there are no men to man them. The workshops are silent and some of the-

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  machinery is unpacked. Millions of money have been expended on the Keyham extension, but so far it seems to have proved of little practical value to the nation. When does the First Lord expect that a different condition of things will prevail in the Keyham extension?
  Next I come to the question of establishments. Provision is made in the Estimates for the employment in all the Royal dockyards of 32,539 established and hired men, as against 29,951 for the year just closing—an addition of 2,588. So far, so good. But on examining the establishment numbers I find that whereas in last year's Estimates provision was made for 6,245 men, this year provision is made for only 5,928. That moans that for the ensuing year the establishment will be reduced by 317. When told by the First Lord a week or so ago that the establishment would be opened forthwith I did not understand that a reduction in numbers was contemplated. I fear that the decision of the Admiralty will not make for efficiency or assist in attracting to the Royal dockyards, much less maintaining in them, the best skilled labour in the country. The whole object of the establishment is to have ready in case of emergency a body of workmen skilled in all the technicalities of naval shipbuilding, on whom the Government may call at a moment's notice to execute any work that may be required.
  True, at present you can obtain sufficient labour from outside, but this was not always so. In the more prosperous times it was no easy matter to obtain the labour necessary for building a battleship. I am told on reliable authority that when we started building battleships at Devonport in 1896 sufficient men were not available, and in order to construct the "Ocean" resort had to be made to an advertisement. No doubt, in these days of less prosperity and chronic unemployment, that position would not probably arise; but it must be remembered that in time of emergency all the private yards will be working at full time, and when that happens I need not remind the House that you cannot count on a glut of skilled men ready and willing to enter Government yards at Government rates of pay. On the other hand, the hired man, seeing his chance, if not upon the establishment, will quickly transfer his labour to the private yard where higher wages are paid. You must have a sufficient reserve of workmen in the Royal dockyards, just as you must have a sufficient reserve of sailors in the Royal
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  Navy. The bigger the Navy the bigger the establishment should be. I need not remind the House that the Navy of this year is larger than the Navy of last year, and that in quite recent times its size has doubled and even quadrupled. Meanwhile what has been the position of the establishment? Has it increased in proportion? I am afraid not, and yet logically this is what one would have expected to be the case. But, setting aside the question of increase for the moment, surely nothing appears on the Estimates to justify the decrease in the establishment. It cannot be justified on the ground of a decrease in the Navy, nor do I think that it can be justified on the ground of security, although we were told some little while ago that we all might sleep peacefully in our beds. Certainly the alarming speeches of the Prime Minister, the First Lord of the Admiralty and the Foreign Secretary last year rather point to the possibility of increased anxiety. I must therefore, I think, press for some statement from the First Lord as to the reasons which have led the Admiralty to decrease the establishment. For myself I believe that in a time of national crisis we shall want a much larger permanent staff of workmen in the Royal dockyards than it is possible to maintain under existing circumstances. If we are to have peace we must be prepared for war, whether at sea or in the dockyard. Surely, then, the business of the Admiralty should be not to lower the establishment, but rather to increase it. Consider what is wanted: men thoroughly acquainted with all the technicalities of shipbuilding, men that the private yards when in full work are always on the look out for Surely these men should be encouraged by all possible means to remain in the Government employ. In this way, and in this way only, can we be certain of retaining their services in the hour of the nation's need. I most earnestly, therefore, appeal to the First Lord to reconsider the decision to reduce the establishment.
  Closely connected with the question of the Establishment is that of pensions. I was pleased to hear from the First Lord that the case of those workmen who since the suspension of the establishment in 1907 have passed the age of pension eligibility will in no way suffer from the Government policy in respect to suspension. In regard to pensions, I think I am correct in saying that half the period of hired time is allowed to be added to the period of established time when the established

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  workman reaches the pensionable age. For some years it has been the custom in Devonport Dockyard to establish shipwright apprentices two years after they have served their time in the yard. Of late this custom has fallen into disuse, and, as may easily be imagined, a hardship is thereby inflicted on a set of responsible and absolutely necessary workmen who entered the yard and served their apprenticeship in the belief that this custom would be continued. Here, then, I submit we have a very just grievance, and one which not only affects the men themselves, but affects the efficiency of Devon-port Dockyard. Let me recall to the First Lord's memory a speech made in this House, I think, as long ago as 1882 by Sir George Trevelyan, then Secretary for the Admiralty. He said:—
  "The shipwrights of the dockyards appreciate being Government workmen, and the Government encourage them in that view, because— to speak quite plainly—it is a matter of life and death to the country to have in crisis of a war a great body of skilled workmen on whose services the nation may count as it counts on the service of its bluejackets and marines."
  So it is with the shipwrights of to-day. They, too, appreciate being Government workmen, but, alas! the policy of the Admiralty and the policy of the Government do not encourage them in that view. So that it is possible—to speak quite plainly—that in a crisis of the country we may not have a sufficient reserve of shipwrights in the Royal dockyards to meet the emergency.
  Again, I would draw the attention of the First Lord to the small number of skilled labourers borne on the establishment, and to the practice prevailing in the Devonport Dockyard to substitute other branches when filling vacancies caused by retirement in the ranks of skilled labour. Perhaps the First Lord will allow me to suggest that a better state of feeling would be created if, when vacancies occurred in the establishment, they could be filled by men selected from the same class as that in which the vacancies occur. With regard to writers, I notice in the First Lord's Memorandum—
  The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Whitley): I think to enter into that subject when there is a special Vote is perhaps a little away from the point. The hon. Gentleman should keep to the general character of the Debate—the size of the Navy.
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: I was under the impression that I could speak on the
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  point on the subject of dockyard matters, otherwise I should not have ventured to trouble the House. I regret very much I have exceeded the limit, and perhaps I may have another opportunity of speaking on this subject.
  Mr. A. G. C. HARVEY: My object in rising is simply to put my own position and the position of several of my Friends who are supporters of the Government before the representatives of the Government. I want to make my position clear. The First Lord of the Admiralty, when he came down to the House yesterday to make his opening statement, conjured up before the House two sorts of critics he would have to meet. In the first place, he expected to be criticised by those, he said, who might think he was spending too little upon naval construction, and again he remarked he anticipated criticism from those who would say he was spending too much. I think before the First Lord of the Admiralty almost began his speech he must have felt convinced that by the munificence of these provisions he had won the warm admiration of the first class of his critics. At any rate, I have noticed that there has been very pleasant amity between the Front Benches upon this point, and it has been very little disturbed by criticism. I do not grumble. I like to see both Front Benches in the highest good humour, even though it costs something to the country. Then I think he felt well convinced that the criticism would not be serious, but, in any case, I think we can assure him that he demolished any possible criticism in the easiest possible manner.
  But now we turn to the other class of critics—those whom the First Lord expected would complain that he had been unduly extravagant in the demands he was about to make upon the National Exchequer. The First Lord made absolutely no attempt to convert this class of critics, and I myself belong to that class. I think it is all the more strange that the First Lord should have taken this course, because this class of critics, who think that the Estimates are unduly extravagant, is really represented almost entirely on this side of the House. It is represented in these parties who usually act with the Government, and it is largely representative of that political party to which the Government itself belongs.
  I would like to assure the First Lord of the Admiralty that in the part of the

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  country which I represent and in which I know these Estimates are much disliked, I would like to assure him that they are putting upon their party loyalty a severe strain, and that for many of us it is only the exceptional circumstances of the time that prevent us taking a very extreme course indeed. I have often wondered why this Government attach so little importance to the opinions of its own followers. Of course, that occurred several times, to my astonishment, during the last Parliament, but I venture to think that in the new circumstances under which this Parliament exists it would be wise for the Government to pursue some more cautious course. I want to ask the House, if I may, to hark back for a moment to what occurred last year. I particularly wish to recall the right ton. Gentleman's attention to the plain position as it existed for many of us on this side of the House.
  Last year the First Lord of the Admiralty came down to this House, and he asked permission to build, as that year's programme, four large battleships, being an extension of the programme of the years that had gone before. But he was not content with that, and he made a demand of a most extraordinary character. He asked the House to consent, should certain contingencies arise, to the preparation of four additional ships to be laid down upon the 1st April this year The conditions upon which lie made that demand were most clearly defined, and I wish to refresh the memory of the House, reading briefly from what was said upon that occasion. He said:—
  "We shall in the course of lid I have sixteen of these ships of the 'Dreadnought' type against thirteen for which Germany have already made provision. The German law- provides four more ships to be laid down in 1910–11."
  And then he goes on to say that the construction of these ships were to be accelerated; that the four ships of the 1910 programme would be built in April, 1912, and on that day Germany would have seventeen "Dreadnoughts" and "Invincibles," and he says:—
  "It is against such a contingency that they ask the House to provide these four additional 'Dreadnoughts."
  I wish to remind the House of what the Prime Minister said. He said:—
  "We have taken power if the necessity should arise that is if the acceleration of the German programme goes on, to lay down on the 1st April four additional ships."
  It is perfectly obvious from the answer the First Lord of the Admiralty gave in this House only yesterday, and the statement he has made that this acceleration
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  has not taken place, at any rate it has not taken place in the German dockyards. Notwithstanding that the First Lord of the Admiralty has taken these four additional skips, and he is now asking us for five more in this year's programme, an immense addition on anything which has taken place in recent years, and what I complain of is this that he has taken this course without any attempt to justify himself in the opinion of this House, and without any adequate explanation to us. No explanation has been made. There has been a great deal of doubt as to the number of ships which Germany and Great Britain will possess at certain periods, but I must say, frankly speaking, I cannot reconcile the two statements that the First Lord of the Admiralty made yesterday—one in answer to a question from the hon. Member for Birmingham—and one in answer to a question from the hon. Member for Montrose. They seem to me to be two contradictory statements. But I take the larger figure that the First Lord gave in answer to one of these questions. He said that Germany had laid down thirteen vessels, and four would be laid down this year. That makes seventeen ready and in preparation.
  How does our position compare? We shall have, against seventeen, twenty-seven vessels if we include the two Colonial vessels, and that appears to me to be an enormous and unnecessary surplus. I really must inform the First Lord of the Admiralty that unless he can fully justify the programme before this Debate is over I shall feel myself obliged to put down an Amendment to reduce the Shipbuilding Vote of this year. The right hon. Gentleman appears to be nervous about raising naval scares, but I think this is a somewhat belated repentance. I do not desire another scare—Heaven forbid! —but I do ask the First Lord to take the House of Commons a little more into his confidence. I, for one, feel very uneasy at certain expressions I hear let fall from time to time concerning the Board of Admiralty, composed largely, I fear, of men dominated by gentleman who, in the words of the First Lord of the Admiralty, do not go out of power, and do not hold their positions on political grounds. I have a restless feeling coming over me that the growing power of these extra-Cabinet officials may, perhaps, dominate the Cabinet that it ought only to advise. If that is so, I venture to prophesy that at no distant date a great difficulty will arise in the public service which will have to be met with

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  a very strong hand and a very strong man. I am aware that the great naval Department of this country must have at its disposal the best expert advice; but I am a business man, and I know, how good as servants experts may be, and how bad and extravagant masters they make if you let them have too much rein.
  We have on this Question a lack of information. I cannot account for the course which the Government are pursuing, and a question of this sort comes over my mind. We hear a great deal about treaty arrangements entente cordiales,and things of that sort, but I am beginning to ask myself whether these arrangements do not fasten upon us some of those enormous burdens which are very difficult to bear. We are openly building in this country against the German programme, and if this course is carried on with proper discretion I, for one, make no quarrel; but I would urge the Government to take great care lest they should be suspected of building against the German people. I am quite certain that neither side of this House bear the German people any ill-will. I am glad to know that, and I thoroughly believe it. I venture to remind the House that in their present frame of mind the German people may do much to assist us in our peaceful desires if we take a temperate course at the present moment. I desire, above all things, that no suspicion of enmity should come from our proceedings on these Estimates—I mean enmity between us and the great German nation. The German nation at the present time are resentful of the burdens that then-rulers are placing upon them, but if enmity should arise between nation and nation the Germans are a very proud and patriotic nation, and we might possibly before we know where we are drive them into the arms in Germany of those who may possibly be favourable to rivalry with us at sea. The friendship now growing up between these two democracies fills me with hope for the future. I believe it will be fruitful of lasting good, and I believe it is a natural and useful alliance. For these reasons I do hope we shall act cautiously and do nothing to endanger the growth of that amity which makes so much for the public weal.
  Mr. FORDE RIDLEY: I rise as the representative of a Division on the Medway which is affected by these Estimates in order to call attention to one matter,
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  and question the First Lord of the Admiralty upon it. I consider the right hon. Gentleman skated very lightly over this question when he made his statement on these Estimates. I wish to refer more especially to the case of the floating docks which it is proposed to provide at Portsmouth and on the Medway. I find myself entirely in accord with the hon. Member for the Brigg Division of Lincolnshire on this point, and I wish he had pressed his point home more than he did. Upon referring to the statement which the First Lord of the Admiralty placed in our hands, I find that he says:—
  "After careful enquiry as to the best means of meeting the docking requirements for the immediate future two large floating docks, capable of taking in war vessels now building or likely to be designed, have been ordered, and will be completed during 1911."
  I call the attention of the Secretary to the Admiralty particularly to the word "immediate future," and I would like to remind him that although we have heard a very great deal in this Debate about the building of "Dreadnoughts" and "Invincibles" and destroyers, all of which are essential to a fleet, still I think he will agree with me when I contend that it is equally necessary we should have adequate accommodation in the way of dry docks and floating docks, in order that these "Dreadnoughts" may be of any use whatever in time of war. If there are not sufficient docks placed in such a position that they can be used by the "Dreadnoughts'' which are at any time engaged in action, we should very soon find that these big ships are useless, or worse than useless, because if they go into action, they will require in all human probability to go into dock after being in action, and if they cannot get to some place of refuge, where they can be docked, they may fall into the hands of the enemy and be used against us in time of war.
  I should like to point out that in this statement we are informed that only £10,000 of the £30,000 voted last year for floating docks has been expended. I ask the First Lord of the Admiralty why it is that the full amount has not been expended on the construction of these docks? It rather looks as though there has been delay in the construction, and that they might have been proceeded with at a much more rapid rate than they have. I also find that there is no reference in this statement to what the total cost of these floating docks is likely to be. No figures appear in the Estimates on this point, or at least I have not been able to find them.

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  I should like to know from him, when he replies, what is going to be the total cost of those floating docks. I should also like to ask him whether he has made any provision for the accommodation of the floating dock to be provided for the Medway. That seems to me to be an important and pertinent question, and one on which we can rightly ask for some information. In this statement to which I refer hon. Members will note that he says the floating docks will be completed during 1911. What does he mean by "during 1911 "? Does he mean in the early part of that year or at the end of that year? That is another question I should like to ask him, and I am sure it would be to the satisfaction of this Committee if he would give us a plain and straight answer.
  With regard to the docks upon the East Coast to which the hon. Member below the Gangway on the other side of the House referred, he has pointed out that there is only one dock to be constructed upon the East Coast of England. If the Government are providing so much money for extra ships and destroyers, as well as for big ships, why is it they have not found it necessary to provide more dry dock accommodation upon the East Coast? It is admitted by themselves that the probable sphere of action for those big ships would be the North Sea. May I point out to the right hon. Gentleman that at present we have only one dock upon the East Coast, whereas Germany has one already in existence and has two at present building. Those are points to which I am sure the First Lord will be ready to give us answers. They are simple and straightforward questions. There are other points "which one might raise. I do not propose, however, to occupy the time of the Committee any longer at this late hour, but I will ask him, when he replies, to give us an answer to those questions.
  Mr. PHILIP SNOWDEN: Like the last two speakers, I do not intend to detain the Committee more than a few minutes. Anything I might have said in an earlier stage of this Debate has already been stated by speakers with far more ability than I can command, but I feel so strongly upon this question that I can hardly bring myself to give a silent vote upon it. I should like to state, therefore, the few reasons why I shall go into the Lobby with the right hon. Gentleman who has moved the Amendment should he press it, as I hope he will, to a Division, I have listened to nearly all the speeches
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  which have been made during the last two days, and especially the speeches from the Government Benches, with an earnest desire to discover some justification for the enormous Estimates which the Government are now submitting to the House, Estimates which impose an appalling burden upon the country, and are a violation of Liberal principles and of Liberal pledges.
  10.0 P.M.
  If there was one thing more than another -which we were promised when they took office four years ago it was a reduction of expenditure on armaments. The text of every speech delivered by the late Prime Minister (Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman) in the country was the need for retrenchment in that direction. During the first two years of tenure of office of this Government undoubtedly a serious attempt was made to try and prevent this waste of millions, but when Liberal Imperialism obtained control of the Cabinet then Liberal principles and Liberal pledges were thrown to the winds, and the Radical element in the Cabinet proved too weak to prevent this surrender to jingoism. It had not the courage to dissociate itself from the new Liberalism. I would ask, Is there a Liberal living who, five years ago, would not have laughed to scorn the suggestion that any Liberal Government would propose Navy Estimates to the extent of over £40,000,000? I venture to say no Tory Government would have ever dared to make such a proposal, for if it had done so the Liberals would have raised such a howl of protest in the country that the proposal would have been defeated. I want to know the ground upon which these proposals are defended. We have had no satisfactory explanation from the Front Bench up to the present. The First Lord of the Admiralty has not attempted to justify these demands; he has assumed the character of the "Bogey Man." He says: "Whist, whist, whist. I could tell you things, but I dare not."
  But there really has been no justification for this request for the authority of this House to spend more than £40,000,000 sterling on one branch of the service. Of course, I can imagine a number of reasons which may have induced the Government to embark upon this cruel and wasteful expenditure. It may be that they have come to the conclusion that a Great Navy cry is good electioneering. That has been the electioneering monopoly of the Tory party in the past, and I venture to assert quite seriously that if the Liberal

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  party think it is going to serve their party-ends, and that they can defeat the Tories in Jingoism, they are making a very great mistake. The result of the last General Election proves that the Navy scare had no effect whatever, except in one or two naval towns like Portsmouth, where the people, for selfish interests, desire to plunder the taxpayer's pocket. If the Liberal party think they can conserve the interests of their party by taking up this Big Navy cry I can assure them in all sincerity that they are taking up a cry which is likely to bring their party to a speedy and well-deserved ruin. There is another reason which might be advanced to account for this departure from everything which we associate with Liberalism, and that is that in spite of the humiliation that has been heaped upon the First Lord and the Prime Minister for their speeches made last year they may have been impressed by the "Daily Mail" latest naval expert, and that they believe in the menace of the German invasion. I do not think that anything could be more deplorable, anything more criminal, than the writings and speeches of certain people in England and in Germany during the last few years. Granted that Germany was building a Navy against this country, I think that any unprejudiced person must admit that she had ample justification for her anxiety. For years a section of the British Press have been openly advocating war against Germany. It is not long ago since a Civil Lord in the late Administration opposite boasted of Rosyth as a pistol aimed at the heart of Germany.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: That statement is absolutely and entirely without foundation.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: The hon. Gentleman's contradiction is a very belated one.
  Mr. LEE: It is the first time that the charge has been made to my knowledge.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: There is an old saying, "If the cap fits, wear it." I made no reference to the hon. Gentleman. I spoke of a Civil Lord in the last Tory Administration.
  Mr. LEE: I was a Civil Lord.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: And the only Civil Lord? [Several HON. MEMBERS: "Who was it?"] I did not make the statement as regards the hon. Gentleman, and of course I accept his denial, but I will
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  make a charge quite as serious as that against him. Twelve months ago the hon. Member made the statement that Krupp's factory had nearly doubled the number of men they had employed, and they had increased in a short period the number of their men by 38,000, and the inaccuracy of that statement has been repeatedly pointed out to the hon. Gentleman twice within the present week, but he has so far refused to withdraw it. Everybody is perfectly familiar with what has been going on with regard to this matter during the last two or three years. As I said just now: we have a class of newspapers in the country who have been openly advocating, a war with Germany. Then, again, it is not long ago I saw that one of our leading daily papers issued a placard on which, in large letters, were the words, "The Coming War with Germany." In addition to this, by our own foreign, policy, by our alliances and understandings with Russia, Spain, Italy, and Portugal, we have given Germany the impression that we wanted to isolate her, so that we might attack her at a favourable opportunity. It is no wonder, therefore, if there does exist in Germany a feeling of distrust of this country, because we have led the way in this cruel competition for armaments. An Admiralty paper published last year showed that in the preceding ten years we had spent £318,000,000 upon our Navy, whereas Germany had spent less than one-third of that sum.
  I am not saying for a moment that Germany is blameless in this matter. There is in Germany, as there is in this country, a Jingo party trying to foment strife between the two countries, but the self-interest of the people of both countries is opposed to such an idea. They look upon the prospect of war between these two people not only as a moral crime, but as an act of insane folly from a commercial point of view. There is, I know, in Germany, a widespread belief that this country begrudges Germany her commercial prosperity, and that we are anxious to cripple her nationally, to ruin her commercially. I had a conversation not long ago with one of our Consuls in Germany, and he said that it was almost an everyday occurrence for terrified Germans to come to his office and ask if it were really true that England was about to invade Germany. Count von Buelow was right when he said there are no two countries in the world which depend so much upon

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  each other for national labour as do England and Germany. Nearly 10 per cent, of our export trade goes to Germany, and England is Germany's best customer, and two countries which have such valuable trade connections have no other interest but to live together in peace and amity. But suppose Germany is building a navy for the purpose of self-defence, she is justified in so doing. Germany is a great commercial nation, with a foreign trade which is large, and which is growing, she imports one-third of her food supply and enormous quantities of raw materials for manufacturing purposes, and with the existing rules of naval warfare a large navy is absolutely essential to Germany as a means of national defence. Therefore, when there are reasons so obvious and so satisfactory to explain the naval programme of Germany, why should we resort to jealousy and suspicion and to the imputation of vile and sinister motives? Every Member of the House must have read the speech of Prince Henry of Prussia two or three days ago— a speech which breathed nothing but the kindliest motives towards this country. The late Imperial Chancellor, the present Imperial Chancellor, and the German Ambassador to this country have all recently given expression to similar sentiments. I want, therefore, to ask the Government if they believe those expressions of sympathy and good intentions on the part of Germany. If they do, there is no justification whatever for the Naval Estimates which are now proposed. If they do not believe them, it will be more honest to put an end to the mockery of the profession of friendly relations and to bring the matter to an issue at once.
  There is one other reason that I might suggest in explanation of these gigantic Navy Estimates, and that is that the Government have decided upon a policy of beggar my neighbour. That is a very risky and a very expensive and dangerous game to play. Twelve years ago the Colonial Secretary tried that policy and it cost this country hundreds of millions of treasure and tens of thousands of lives, and it is no more likely to be successful to-day. A policy like that must end in the impoverishment of both parties to the contest. That is a game from which both sides suffer. Therefore I can see no sensible or satisfactory reason at all for these Estimates. Much as we who sit on these benches oppose war, I am sure we should not hesi-
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  tate for a moment to vote any sum, however large, if we were convinced that it was absolutely necessary for the defence of our own shores; but surely the only way of maintaining national and international peace is not by means of armaments. Are there no other courses open to the Government? Is diplomacy helpless in the matter? I know it requires considerable courage to suggest that moral principles should be applied in matters of international diplomacy, but it is the first duty of the Government, and especially a Liberal Government, to do everything it can by undertakings and understandings with foreign countries to lessen the need for large armaments. What have the Government done in that direction? They have done nothing. Reference has been made by one or two speakers to the question of the immunity of maritime commerce during the time of war. Why have they not done that? We are alone among the great Powers of the world in insisting on the right of capture, and so long as we do take that position we give Germany justification for a large navy. If we would only put ourselves into line with other nations in that matter, and if after that Germany were to continue to build her navy, then I admit there would be some justification for assuming that it was intended for other purposes than those of national defence.
  I oppose these Estimates on the old-fashioned Radical ground of economy. I do not associate myself with the position taken up by some Radicals that a huge expenditure on armaments must be regarded as a substitute for expenditure on social reform. I will not excuse the Government from costly schemes of social reform because money has to be spent on the Navy. I will not betray the poor in order to protect the property of the rich. If there is money for "Dreadnoughts" there shall be money for the unemployed, or we will make every hall in the country ring with our condemnation of the Government. I oppose this expenditure because I know that the fact that there is this expenditure on the Navy will be used by this Government, or succeeding Governments, as an excuse for the moderation and insufficiency of the reform proposals they put before Parliament. We who were in the last Parliament know that every defect in the Old Age Pensions Bill was excused on the ground that there was not money to make the pensions bigger. We are asked to vote £5,500,000 for more "Dreadnoughts," which, if handed over to

  307
  the Development Commissioners, would almost temporarily solve the unemployed problem and would be a national investment of a remunerative and profitable character. I oppose these Estimates also because I know that a good part of the additional taxation will have to be paid by the working classes of the country. Those who are powerful enough to force this policy upon the Government are powerful enough and selfish enough to see that no part of the cost is paid by themselves, and I warn the Government that by the line they are pursuing they are likely to strike a very serious blow at our Free Trade policy. They are playing into the hands of the Tariff Reformers. They have come back after an appeal to the country, partly on the Budget, with a small majority. That shows the difficulties of getting a right and just incidence of taxation. They are playing into the hands of Tariff Reformers, because Tariff Reformers will be able to go before the electors in the country villages, in the cathedral cities, and in the University constituencies and make out that we could construct as many ships as we like, without a single penny of cost to this country, by the simple device of taxing the foreigner to pay for the ships. And, finally, I protest against this expenditure on behalf of the International labour movement. Our Socialist comrades in the German Reichstag are at one with us in opposing these naval forces as being a barrier in the way of the promoters of International peace.
  We know that hon. Members who sit on those benches sneer at our claim to speak on behalf of the workers of other lands. I know that there is a regrettable amount of misunderstanding and antagonism still among the workers in different countries. But I tell this House that every year these barriers are being removed, and that a better understanding and a kindlier feeling are springing up among the democracies of all lands. And in that lies the hope of peace. It is not in the courts of kings nor in the chambers of diplomacy that the war problem is going to be solved. The workers of all the lands are increasingly recognising that militarism and that capitalism are the common enemies of the workers of all lands. Thirteen millions of men in Europe to-day are enrolled under the red flag of Socialism, and in that fact you have a stronger safeguard of peace than in all your battleships and all your armed camps
  308
  Do you know why the peace of Europe has been maintained during these long years? The chief reason is that the great Powers of Europe dare not trust their armies and their navies because of the growth of Socialism and internationalism among the rank and file; and we would not have it assumed, because we believe in the spread of a spirit of internationalism that we are unmindful of the fact that our own country has the first claim upon our attentions and our devotion, and upon our affection. Like the late Prime Minister I would like to see this country at the head of a great international league of peace. I would like to see my country heading the nations of the world along that road which leads to the flowery realms of peace. I know that that ideal is far from realisation, but I would rather cherish that ideal and work for it within my present opportunities than support proposals such as those which we are now asked to endorse. I shall oppose these proposals because I believe that they are not necessary, and I believe that they are opposed to the promotion of international goodwill, and I shall oppose them because I believe that they violate those eternal moral principles which should guide the conduct of statesmen and of nations.
  Mr. PRETYMAN: On a point of Order. Will the hon. Member be good enough to substantiate or withdraw the statement he made just now? I ask him in all friendliness, because it is a statement which might do considerable harm to a Gentleman who had held an official position on this side of the House, who had been a Civil Lord of the last Administration. It must have referred either to my right hon. Friend the Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Austen Chamberlain) or my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham (Mr. Lee), or myself. The hon. Member made the statement that Rosyth was a pistol held at the head of Germany. Will he either substantiate or withdraw that statement?
  Mr. SNOWDEN: So far as it applies to the hon. Gentleman who interrupted me I did withdraw it, and when he has withdrawn the statement to which I referred I will do so again.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): Before I reply to the eloquent speech which we have just heard, I desire to answer the questions asked by the hon.

  309
  Member for Rochester (Mr. Ridley) in respect of the very important matter of docks. We have at the present time in home waters thirteen docks, and eight are being built, making twenty-one in all. Two of these are floating docks. We have five Government docks—one at Portsmouth and four at Devonport, and five building and projected; a dock and lock at Rosyth, to be completed in 1916 at latest; a dock at Haulbowline, to be completed early in 1911; the dock at Portsmouth, to be ready in 1913; and a dock at Portsmouth, in addition to the present scheme, to be ready in 1913 or 1914. There are two floating docks, in respect to which the hon. Gentleman asked me the precise time. They will be ready in 1911, but I am afraid that I cannot answer at the present time. There are, in addition to the Government docks, eight docks capable of taking "Dreadnoughts." On the East Coast there is the Hebburn Dock, although the ship probably would have to be lightened in that case. And there is the provision, as the hon. Gentleman knows, of the dock and lock at Rosyth. Of the two floating docks proposed, the estimate in 1909–10 was £30,000. The hon. Member asked why we are not going to spend more than £10,000. These floating docks are all on a scale capable of lifting anything afloat or likely to be afloat. They are something on a very much greater scale than we have ever attempted before, and there have been delays in the design. The hon. Gentleman said he could not find in the Estimates anything for the coming year in regard to these two docks. I think that is because they are treated as ships, and not as works. In the case of the first the estimate is £170,400, and in the case of the second £164,900.
  Mr. RIDLEY: I asked the hon. Gentleman also to tell me what had been estimated in addition for the floating dock for "Dreadnoughts." Will the hon. Gentleman give me an answer to that?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: There is a sum of money—I cannot say off-hand what amount —taken in the Supplementary Estimates provided for the necessary dredging at Portsmouth.
  Mr. RIDLEY: I asked the hon. Gentleman a question particularly in regard to the Medway. I am convinced in my own mind it is not possible to accommodate a floating dock in the Medway. No doubt there will be great difficulty to find accommodation in that dock, and what sum
  310
  is estimated to be provided for the accommodation?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: There is no sum. I was referring to the dredging at Portsmouth to make the berth. We are quite satisfied we can find a proper site in the Medway, but at the present time we have come to no definite arrangements in respect to it.
  Mr. RIDLEY: No sum provided?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: No sum provided in respect of that particular case.
  Mr. LEE: Then the dock will not be ready for use in 1911.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: I think it will.
  Mr. LEE: But no money is provided?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: Money is provided for the dock.
  Mr. LEE: But there is no accommodation?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: We hope accommodation will be provided and that the dock will be ready in 1911, though I cannot say at what time it will be ready in 1911. With regard to this proposed reduction, it is perhaps desirable that I should say a word or two in response to the speeches which have been made. I listened to those speeches, one or two yesterday, and several to-day, with the greatest possible respect. They have been speeches which breathe the greatest possible depth of conviction and intense sincerity. It is very curious that, although my name is at the foot of these Estimates, I entirely share the feeling of dismay which those speeches indicate, and I take leave to say that there is no man in this House, either on this side or the other, who views this rapidly progressing expenditure on armaments with greater misgivings than I do. I have got a very special reason for misgivings. I sit day after day in my present office, and have been for two years endorsing expenditure upon instruments of war, which become more costly every day, and become more rapidly obsolescent and obsolete as they become more costly. Here are forty millions proposed, and the hon. Member for the Blackfriars Division (Mr. Barnes) was quite right yesterday when he said that there will not remain in twenty years' time, of this particular expenditure, a single ship fit to take her place in the line. I have no doubt whatever we shall dispose of a good deal of the fruits of this expenditure at something like 1 per cent.

  311
  of its original cost, and we shall scrap a great deal of the rest. I quite agree that the hon. Member for Blackfriars Division was quite right, and the hon. Member for Montgomery Boroughs (Mr. Rees) was quite wrong, when the hon. Member for Blackfriars said that certainly, from an economic point of view, this was, I think he said, wholly unproductive expenditure. I agree it is almost wholly unproductive expenditure.
  Mr. REES: Are not a great many British families provided for by their construction?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: Certainly, and if the hon. Gentleman were to engage in laying out a railway he would give employment to a great many British families that would be continuous in productive expenditure. It gives employment, of course, to British labour, and to that extent it is productive. I did not say wholly unproductive, I said almost. It is productive, certainly, but not productive in the sense of the illustration I am giving. After all, what are we to do? In national defence we are bound to take the world as it is; we cannot afford to take it as it ought to be. You must certainly work towards ideals, but I think that at the same time, and I am sure that at the same time, you must keep your eye very closely on existing facts. It is not necessary to repeat what has been said so eloquently. There is nobody here and nobody outside this House who harbours any ill-feeling at all against any of the peoples of the world anywhere. Their prosperity is reflected in ours, and we wish to see with all of them friendly relationships strengthened and cemented; and all of us, I have no doubt whatever, wish to see the settlement of International differences take the form of peaceful arbitrament more and more as time goes on. Of course, that is our most ardent desire. I associate myself entirely in the expression of the hope of the Labour Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) that we should associate ourselves with any and every endeavour to call a halt in this deplorable burden which, unquestionably, civilised countries put upon themselves. Notwithstanding that, I am bound to point out that there are several vital considerations that we have always to remember. We are an island people. We depend enormously for our daily existence and our daily occupation upon seaborne food
  312
  and raw material. The great sea highways, as I see them, are really the arteries of our national existence. Intercept our food supplies for a week, and where should we be? A penny increase in the price of the quartern loaf means an increase of £13,000,000 a year, eighty per cent, of which would be borne by the working classes, many of whom have little or no reserve, and some of whom, I am sorry to say, have always between them and absolute destitution the thinnest possible partition. Therefore I view the British Navy as a sentinel under whose guardianship the people of this country go to their daily work and earn their daily food free from any reasonable anxiety as to the possibilities of successful attack. The hon. Member for Rochdale referred in terms of cordial affection to the late Sir Henry Camp-bell-Bannerman. We have had some quotations from the "Nation "; perhaps I might give another. The late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, writing in the "Nation," in March, 1907, said:—
  "If our fleets be invulnerable they carry with them no menace across the waters to the world, but a message of the most cordial goodwill."
  Mr. SNOWDEN: He said the very opposite at the Albert Hall.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: I have quoted his statement from the "Nation," of March, 1907, and I entirely endorse that view. It has been said that these Estimates are costly. They are horribly costly. The Member for Wigan suggested that they were framed with a view to propitiate the Opposition, and other Members have said that we have been pushed into +hem by the pressure of what are called "hotheaded patriots." Those Members are quite wrong. The hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) also is wrong. We have not taken up these Estimates in order to lead tie country into Tariff Reform. Quite the contrary. Nor are we actuated in what we have done by the new naval correspondent of the "Daily Mail." Those who say that we have produced Estimates beyond the actual needs of the moment in consequence of pressure are quite wrong. We have framed these Estimates for a single purpose, and there is not a man in the House, wherever he sits, who would not have done exactly what we have done if he had all the facts before him. We have framed these Estimates, serenely oblivious of pressure from whatever quarter it might come, with one single purpose. We have framed them, as our duty compels us to do, simply for the purpose of making

  313
  national safety amply secure. It is said that it is very costly. That is true. The Member for Blackburn justified the German expenditure on armaments on the ground of her commerce and merchant shipping. I agree that that does not wholly cover the ground of the case he put; but if the hon. Member will make that sort of contrast in regard to these Estimates, and compare them with our merchant shipping, he will find that a very much larger sum than we are asking might be justified.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: I urged that there was reasonable justification for Germany's naval expansion, because we refused to be a party to the new principle of friendship.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: I do not want to refer to Germany, except, of course, in the friendliest way possible. The hon. Gentleman was instituting a comparison between Germany's right to build up a great navy because of her commerce and merchant shipping. But carry that comparison into our merchant shipping and our Navy. There are 13,250,000 tons of merchant shipping belonging to this country— more than all the rest of Europe put together. There are £1,000,000,000 worth of food, raw material, and manufactured goods brought on the high seas to and from this country in the course of the year. The hon. Member should consider this expenditure in the light of an insurance on that £1,000,000,000 worth of goods and that 13,250,000 tons of shipping. I think he will find that, comparatively speaking, these Estimates come out pretty moderately after all from that point of view.
  I do not want to push the matter too far. Like the hon. Gentleman the Member for Blackfriars, I want this £40,000,000 for old age pensions, for unemployed insurance, for better education, better housing, and the colonisation of this country by getting more people back on the land. But people should not say that so long as you spend this money you cannot have it for social reform. It is necessary to have national safety, and social reform cannot be proceeded with unless you proceed with it under cover of national safety. Therefore, I make this fundamental proposition: Having secured national safety, we must have the money for these pressing, urgent matters of social reform. We must protect this country just as much against the ravages of decay from within as well as against the possibilities of successful attack from without. What I say is this:
  314
  it is no good halting between two opinions. You have either got to scrap the lot—I can understand that whilst I cordially disagree with it—or we have got to see that our Navy is absolutely all-powerful. I do not understand the man who comes without any standard at all to me, and says, '' I will agree that £35,000,000 or £36,000,000 should be spent, but not £37,000,000. [An HON. MEMBER: "Who said that? "] I am using it for the purpose of illustration. But the right hon. Gentleman who says the amount is too much does not give us an idea of what he would spend.
  Mr. LOUGH: I did give you a standard, and pointed out that in men you have got a great margin over any two Powers. I quoted twenty illustrations.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: I am bound to say that I may be very obtuse, but I did not follow the right hon. Gentleman. But may I say that it does not seem to me to be any good whatever halting between two opinions in this matter. You want to make perfectly sure that what you are spending your money on is up to the standard of your requirements. I do not quite see the logic or the wisdom of the position taken up by those who protest without giving us any specific ground upon which we could work. It seems to me if you take any other course than this your course is ridiculous, it is dangerous, it is wasteful, and it may be disastrous. I do not pretend to represent the working classes of this country any more than any other man. I represent a very poor constituency, and I believe honestly that the temper of the poorest of our people upon this matter is that they share the sentiment which I have tried very imperfectly to express. That is my experience with reference to this matter. They resent the charges which have recently been made against the efficiency of the Navy—[HON. MEMBERS: "By whom?"]—by those who ought to know better. They know that the Navy is all powerful, notwithstanding what may be said to the contrary. I say that the working classes know that, and they rejoice in it.
  An HON. MEMBER: How did they find it out?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: I hope the hon. Member will concede some little intelligence to the working classes.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: They were told that the Navy was unassailable a very few months ago, and now they have got to pay £40,000,000. They now know it.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: As a matter of fact a few months ago they were told they had a Navy the like of which the world had never seen, and when the display took place at Spithead Tory journal dictionaries were ransacked for superlatives of admiration to describe the wonderful efficiency and the all-powerful strength of the British Navy.
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: Was that the Admiralty Press?
  Dr. MACNAMARA: Did the Noble Lord say that?
  Lord CHARLES BERESFORD: I did say it.
  Dr. MACNAMARA: The Noble Lord should not have said it. The Noble Lord ought to calibrate his facts. I say the working classes, us I understand, share the sentiments I express. They know the Navy is all-powerful. They resent the charges made against it, and they intend it shall remain all-powerful as a great protecting arm, and, grievous as the
  burden is, it seems to me they recognise they have no alternative—admitting fully the needs of social reform—they recognise that, and they are glad and cheerful even with their small means and the heavy demands upon them to bear this burden, and I believe the vast majority of them will bear these charges cheerfully and patriotically.
  Mr. H. S. FOSTERrose to continue the Debate.
  Mr. McKENNA: Will the hon. Member move to report Progress after the Division, and then he will have first place tomorrow?
  Mr. PRETYMAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to carry out to-morrow the arrangement we have arrived at?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes; that is the understanding.
  The CHAIRMAN: I will now put the Amendment.
  Question put, "That 128,000 officers, seamen and boys be employed for the said Services."
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 34; Noes, 225.

  Division No. 9.]

  AYES.

  [10.50 p.m.

  Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Rowntree, Arnold

  Barnes, George N.

  Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

  Snowden, Philip

  Brunner, John F. L.

  Jowett, Frederick William

  Sutton, John E.

  Byles, William Pollard

  Luttrell, Hugh Fownes

  Thomas, James Henry (Derby)

  Clough, William

  Martin, Joseph

  Thorne, William (West Ham)

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

  Mooney, John J.

  Twist, Henry

  Gill, Alfred Henry

  Nolan, Joseph

  Wardle, George J.

  Glanville, Harold James

  O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

  White, Sir George (Norfolk)

  Glover, Thomas

  O'Connor, John (Kildare, N.)

  Hackett, John

  O'Grady, James

  Hall, F. (Yorks, Normanton)

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr

  Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

  Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

  T. Lough and Mr. Keir Hardie.

  Hazleton, Richard

  Roberts, George H. (Norwich)

  NOES.

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

  Beckett, Hon. William Gervase

  Colefax, Henry Arthur

  Adam, Major William A.

  Benn, Ion Hamilton (Greenwich)

  Collins, Godfrey P. (Greenock)

  Addison, Dr. Christopher

  Bentham, George Jackson

  Compton, Lord Alwyne (Brentford)

  Ainsworth, John Stirling

  Beresford, Lord Charles

  Compton-Rickett, Sir J.

  Allen, Charles Peter

  Bird, Alfred

  Cooper, Richard Ashmole (Walsall).

  Arbuthnot, Gerald A.

  Bowerman, Charles W.

  Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow)

  Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

  Brigg, Sir John

  Corbett, T. L. (Down, North)

  Atherley-Jones, Llewellyn A.

  Burdett-Coutts, William

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Baker, Harold T. (Accrington)

  Buxton, C. R. (Devon, Mid)

  Courthope, George Loyd

  Baker, Sir Randolf L. (Dorset, N.)

  Buxton, Noel (Norfolk, North)

  Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.)

  Balcarres, Lord

  Buxton, Rt. Hon. S. C. (Poplar)

  Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Carlile, Edward Hildred

  Craig, Captain James (Down, E.)

  Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

  Carr-Gomm, H. W.

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Banbury, Sir Frederick George

  Castlereagh, Viscount

  Crawshay-Williams, Eliot

  Barclay, Sir Thomas

  Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich)

  Croft, Henry Page

  Barnston, Harry

  Cawley, H. T. (Lancs., Heywood)

  Crossley, William J.

  Barry, Redmond J. (Tyrone, N.)

  Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor)

  Dairymple, Viscount

  Bathurst, Charles (Wilts, Wilton)

  Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

  Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

  Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

  Cleland, James William

  Davies, David (Montgomery Co.)

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

  Lambert, George

  Randles, Sir John Scurrah

  Dawes, James Arthur

  Lane-Fox, G. R.

  Rees, John David

  Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas

  Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich)

  Remnant, James Farquharson

  Dilke, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

  Lawson, Hon. Harry

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Duke, Henry Edward

  Layland-Barratt, Sir Francis

  Ridley, Samuel Ford

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-In-Furness)

  Leach, Charles

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Duncannon, Viscount

  Lee, Arthur Hamilton

  Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Eyres-Monsell, Bolton M.

  Lehmann, Rudolf C.

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Fenwick, Charles

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Ferens, Thomas Robinson

  Lewis, John Herbert

  Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Fletcher, John Samuel

  Llewellyn, Major Venables

  Rutherford, William Watson

  Foster, Harry S. (Lowestoft)

  Lloyd, George Ambrose

  Salter, Arthur Clavell

  France, Gerald Ashburner

  Lloyd-George, Rt. Hon. David

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

  Gelder, Sir William Alfred

  Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury)

  Sanderson, Lancelot

  Gibbs, George Abraham

  Long, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Sandys, G. J. (Somerset, Wells)

  Gibson, James Puckering

  Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. (Wor. Droitwich)

  Seddon, James A.

  Gilmour, Captain John

  Mackinder, Halford J.

  Seely, Col., Right Hon. J. E. B.

  Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

  Macmaster, Donald

  Shortt, Edward

  Goldman, Charles Sydney

  Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

  Simon, John Alisebrook

  Goldsmith, Frank

  M'Arthur, Charles

  Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

  Goulding, Edward Alfred

  M'Kenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton)

  Gretton, John

  M'Laren, F. W. S. (Lincs., Spalding)

  Soares, Ernest Joseph

  Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

  Mallet, Charles Edward

  Stanier, Beville

  Gulland, John William

  Manfield, Harry

  Stanley, Hon. G. F. (Preston)

  Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington)

  Marks, George Croydon

  Steel-Maitland, A. D.

  Hancock. John George

  Meysey-Thompson, E. C.

  Sykes, Alan John

  Harris, F. L. (Tower Hamlets, Stepney)

  Middlebrook, William

  Tennant, Harold John

  Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

  Millar, James Duncan

  Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.)

  Harvey, W. E. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

  Mills, Hon. Charles Thomas

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

  Mitchell, William Foot

  Tobin, Alfred Aspinall

  Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry

  Montagu, Hon. E. S.

  Toulmin, George

  Haworth, Arthur A.

  Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall)

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Hayward, Evan

  Morpeth, Viscount

  Tryon, Capt. George Clement.

  Hemmerde, Edward George

  Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

  Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

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

  Munro, Robert

  Valentia, Viscount

  Henry, Charles Solomon

  Murray, Capt. Hon. Arthur C.

  Verney, Frederick William

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

  Nellson, Francis

  Vivian, Henry

  Higham, John Sharp

  Newton, Harry Kottingham

  Ward, A. S. (Herts, Watford)

  Hills, John Walter (Durham)

  Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

  Ward, John (Stoke upon Trent)

  Hindle, Frederick George

  Paget, Almeric Hugh

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Hoare, Samuel John Gurney

  Palmer, Godfrey Mark

  Wheler, Granville C. H.

  Hodge, John

  Pearson, Weetman H. M.

  Whyte, Alexander F. (Perth)

  Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy

  Pease, Rt. Hon. Joseph A.

  Wiles, Thomas

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Peel, Capt. R. F. (Woodbridge)

  Williams, Penry (Middlesbrough)

  Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

  Peel, Hon. W. R. W. (Taunton)

  Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.)

  Hughes, Spencer Leigh

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Wilson, T. F. (Lanark, N.E.)

  Hunt, Rowland

  Pete, Basil Edward

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Hunter, William (Lanark, Govan)

  Pickersgill, Edward Hare

  Wood, T. M'Kinnon (Glasgow)

  Illingworth, Percy H.

  Pretyman, Ernest George

  Worthington-Evans, L. (Colchester)

  Isaacs, Rufus Daniel

  Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

  Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

  Jardine, Ernest (Somerset, East)

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

  Young, William (Perth, East)

  Johnson, William

  Primrose, Hon. Nell James

  Younger, George (Ayr Burghs)

  Jones, Edgar R. (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Pringle, William M. R.

  Jones, William (Carnarvonshire)

  Proby, Col. Douglas James

  King, Joseph (Somerset, North)

  Radford, George Heynes

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Master

  Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

  Raffan, Peter Wilson

  of Elibank and Mr. Fuller.

  Knight, Caption Eric Ayshford

  Rainy, Adam Rolland

  Original Question put, and agreed to.

  And, it being after Eleven of the clock, the Chairman left the Chair, to make his report to the House.
  Resolution to be reported to-morrow (Wednesday); Committee to sit again to-morrow.

  DISEASES OF ANIMALS BILL.
  Order for Second Reading read, and discharged.
  Bill withdrawn.
  Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Master of Elibank.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Five minutes past Eleven o'clock.

  Revision of Postal Sub-Offices.
  Revision of Postal Sub-Offices.
  Stornoway Post Office.
  Stornoway Post Office.
  Stornoway Mail Steamer.
  Stornoway Mail Steamer.
  Employment of Children.
  Employment of Children.
  SECTION 1.—EMPLOYMENT OF CHILDREN.
  SECTION 1.—EMPLOYMENT OF CHILDREN.
  SECTION 2.—STREET TEADING.
  SECTION 2.—STREET TEADING.
  Metropolitan Police Recruiting.
  Metropolitan Police Recruiting.
  Operative Stonemasons.
  Operative Stonemasons.
  Imports of Chilled and Frozen Meat.
  Imports of Chilled and Frozen Meat.
  School Statistics.
  School Statistics.
  Old Age Pensions (Ireland).
  Old Age Pensions (Ireland).
  Application for Holding (Mrs. Davin).
  Application for Holding (Mrs. Davin).
  Small Holdings (Agricultural Rents).
  Small Holdings (Agricultural Rents).
  Infection of Anthrax.
  Infection of Anthrax.
  Beef Prices.
  Beef Prices.
Preamble
Several Lords Several Lords—Took the Oath.
CITY OF DUBLIN STEAM PACKET COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, with an Amendment.
STRATFORD-UPON-AVON AND MIDLAND JUNCTION RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, with Amendments.
MERSEY RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, with an Amendment.
BANKERS GUARANTEE AND TRUST FUND INCORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, with Amendments.

SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE BILL. [H.L.]
[SECOND READING.]
Order of the day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD LOREBURN): My Lords, I shall not occupy any time in moving the Second Reading of this Bill. I explained, in moving the First Reading, the reasons why it was brought in, and gave notice that I would move the suspension of the Standing Order to enable it to be passed through all its stages to-day. The Bill is not controversial, and there is only one small Amendment, which in substance I am ready to accept.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a.
Then Standing Order No. XXXIX considered (according to order) and dispensed with, and Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House forthwith.
House in Committee accordingly.
Clause 1:
Power to appoint two additional Judges.
1.—(l) It shall be lawful for His Majesty to appoint two judges of the High Court in addition to the number of judges of that court authorised to be appointed by the Judicature Acts, 1873 to 1902.
(2) The judges so appointed shall be attached to the King's Bench Division of the High Court subject to such power of transfer as in the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, 1873, mentioned, and the law relating to the appointment and qualification of judges of the High Court, to their duties and tenure of office, to their precedence, salary and pensions, and otherwise, shall apply to any judge appointed under this section.
It shall be lawful for His Majesty, after the appointment of the said judges, to fill any vacancy occurring among the puisne judges of the King's Bench Division, provided that where the whole number of such puisne judges amounts to upwards of fifteen such vacancy shall not be filled unless and until an address is presented from both Houses of Parliament representing that the state of business in the King's Bench Division requires that such vacancy should be filled.
EARL CAWDOR EARL CAWDOR, on behalf of Lord ALVERSTONE, moved to omit from the second paragraph of subsection (2) the word "where" ["King's Bench Division provided that where"] and to insert the words "whenever after the first day of January one thousand nine hundred and twelve."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, there is an Amendment on the Paper in the name of the Lord Chief Justice, who is unable to be present to-day, and as Chairman of the Joint Committee appointed to consider the condition of the business in the King's Bench Division, to whose Report the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack referred in introducing the Bill, I beg to move the Amendment in Lord Alverstone's behalf. The object of the Amendment is to provide that in the event of a vacancy occurring after the appointment of the two now Judges of the King's Bench Division it should be filled up forthwith at any time up to January 1, 1912, whether Parliament be sitting and its consent obtained or not. As the clause stands it would be impossible to fill up the vacancies unless Parliament was sitting and the assent of Parliament could be obtained. This might lead to inconvenience and delay, and therefore Lord Alverstone has suggested this Amendment, which I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
"Clause 1, page 1, line 18, leave out ('where') and insert ('whenever after the first day of January one thousand nine hundred and twelve')."—(Earl Cawdor.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, as I have said, I agree in substance with the Amendment, but I hope the noble Earl will not mind substituting the year 1911 for 1912. The point is to make it possible for a certain time to have vacancies filled,

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and if my suggestion is adopted no difficulty would arise, as Parliament would be sitting in the ordinary course from the beginning of 1911 until the following August. If the noble Earl will accept that, I think we might close the transaction.
THE EARL OF HALSBURY: My Lords, I think it would be reasonable that we should assent to the Lord Chancellor's suggestion. It seems to me, in the position which he occupies, that it would be impossible for him efficiently to arrange the Judicial business unless he is given by us a free hand.
EARL CAWDOR: I agree.
On Question, Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining Clause agreed to.
Standing Committee negatived: Amendment reported: Bill read 3a, and passed., and sent to the Commons.

MOVABLE DWELLINGS BILL. [H.L.] [SECOND READING.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGH: Your Lordships will, perhaps, remember that this Bill was read a second time in the last session of the last Parliament and referred to a Select Committee. That Committee sat and took evidence, but did not report. The object of the Motion standing in my name on the Paper is to put the matter back in the position in which it was at the end of the last Parliament, so as to enable the Committee to report. I therefore move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and referred to a Select Committee; the Lords following were named of the Committee—

D. Northumberland.

M. Salisbury.

E. Russell.

E. Liverpool.

L. Zouche of Haryngworth.

L. Clifford of Chudleigh.

L. Farrer.

The Committee to appoint their own Chairman.

REFORM OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
Debate on the Motion that the House do resolve itself into a Committee to consider the best means of reforming its existing organisation so as to constitute a strong and efficient Second Chamber resumed (according to order).
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, I think none of your Lordships will dispute what was said by the noble Earl, Lord Cawdor, last night in the opening of his weighty speech as to the far-reaching importance of the discusion in which we are taking part. The Motion before us, and the Government proposals which are, throughout this discussion, in the background, raise issues, I suppose, as grave as any which Parliament has for many years had to face. It will not be thought unnatural that, sitting where I am called to sit, I should wish to say something on so great a theme.
We heard last night about the antiquity of the hereditary tenure in this House. The office which I hold had already been in active occupancy for some six centuries or more when the ancestors of noble Lords who sit here by the oldest tenure took their place some 700 years ago in the Legislature of the country. If you want to find out when the Archbishop first took his place in what may be called Parliamentary affairs you must investigate the germs and origins of Parliamentary or conciliar life in the days of the Saxons. In the earliest, in the most embryonic Witenagemote he had his place, and when, as we were reminded last night, the scene took place at Runnymede, wherein the Archbishop led the Barons to exort their Charter from King John, the Archbishop was already the forty-second of his line. Therefore I offer no apology for asking to be allowed to say a few words on this subject now.
I do not know whether your Lordships have noticed on what day it is that we meet. To-day, my Lords, we have reached the Ides of March. You will interpret the omen variously, according to your bent. The position as I seem to see it is this. The Government of the day is about to invite us to take a step for crippling, and for crippling by Statute—and I emphasise that point—the power of one of the Houses of Parliament. It is hardly necessary to point out that, with the single exception of the brief and troubled Commonwealth years, such an act, such a step, is absolutely without precedent or parallel in the constitutional history of this country. An occasion may

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arise in a nation's story when something has taken place grave enough to justify a complete breach with the past: a sweeping departure from immemorial usage, but to justify it I suppose that the situation must be not merely grave to the point of peril, but that the peril must be actually within sight, and all other means of bringing about a remedy must be barred.
For some six or seven centuries of our history Englishmen have been able to effect in their constitutional system changes and reforms and adaptations of a far-reaching kind without, so far as the Legislature is concerned, any violent breach with the historical past. Changes have been as frequent as were naturally to be expected in the long development of a living, growing organism. Nothing in our public life or our great institutions corresponds to-day to what it was 500 or even 300 years ago. The Crown itself; the status and modes of action of the House of Commons; the position of the national Church; the growth and character of our municipalities; the condition of our judicature; the mode of trial by jury; the question of the freedom of the Press—to name but a few—every one of these has changed and changed again by means of quiet common-sense developments, and processes rather than by cataclysms or violence.
With regard to the Legislature we may go further. In no instance, speaking roughly (or rather speaking almost with precise accuracy), has either House of the Legislature been interfered with by Statute during the whole history of England as regards the mode of doing its work or as regards its relation to the other House. There are trifling exceptions as regards the internal workings of either House. There was some years ago a change, which I believe was obtained with characteristic perseverance by the Scottish members, for abbreviating the procedure in reference to Scottish private Bills in the House of Commons. That is the only example unless we go back to the reign of Henry VIII, when there was a Statute to regulate the order in which my right rev. brothers the Bishops of London and Durham and Winchester should sit on this Bench and the relative precedence that should be observed. I hope that they are observing that statute carefully this evening! But the rule is unvarying that changes with regard to Parliamentary action and life have in either House been made by the action of that
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House and not by statutory enactments. It has been Mos pro lege. It is an example of the difference to which our attention was drawn in weighty and far-reaching terms by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack when he called our attention a few weeks ago to the difference between constitutional and legal action.
It is said that some change is now necessary in the Constitution or procedure of the House of Lords, and that we must amend things considerably. Well, so be it. But how? Is it to be done by the processes hitherto universally adopted or by a new process for the first time in our history introduced for a purpose of this kind? The House of Lords has already amended and modified its arrangements a great many times in recent centuries. I do not need to go back 400 years, to the times that were referred to in the great and memorable speech of the noble Earl, Lord Rosebery, to which we listened last night, the days when the hereditary principle was not dominant as regards the majority in this House, for the majority was frequently, if not invariably, ecclesiastical, and, whatever the shortcomings or inadequacies of ecclesiastics, the ecclesiastical position was not an hereditary one.
In more recent times the contrasts between the House of Lords to-day and the House of Lords of a century and a-half ago are manifest. There were, I think, 149 effective Peers—I am leaving out minors and Peeresses—in the year when George III came to the Throne. Throughout the eighteenth century the balance of power between the two Parties in this House was, of course, fairly equal, contrasting very markedly with what it has been in our own day. Again, down to the year 1868 the whole position and action of this House was affected by the use of proxies, which were only then abolished. All these changes, my Lords, came about, I think, incidentally. No one of them can be described as a deliberate attempt to do something for the bettering of the position or the workableness of the House. They were rather incidental to something else that was taking place, independently of the question how we were to conduct our business.
I think the position is a different one now, and I for one believe and desire to say as strongly as I can that we ought to go to work deliberately, with definite

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intent, and with unflinching courage, for amending that which needs amendment with regard both to the composition of the House and to the manner of our procedure. But it is we ourselves who ought to do it instead of letting it be forced upon us from outside. But to say that we are to do it courageously does not mean that we are to do it violently. The unwritten Constitution which we possess is a heritage which is venerable in a sense that very few things even in this old country are venerable. It is venerable not least by means of the respect, the reverence and the self-restraint with which it has been handled by successive generations of reformers during the last 250 or 300 years. The Shakespearian words apply—
"We do it wrong, being so majestical
To offer it the show of violence."
The value of an unwritten, as contrasted with a written Constitution, is a matter on which it is quite unnecessary to trouble your Lordships.
Any writer you choose to refer to who has dwelt upon the story of the growth of English constitutional life tells us the same thing of the gain that has ensued from our having an unwritten Constitution, and how that value consists in no small degree in the claim and demand such a Constitution makes upon public men for restraint and tact and carefulness, in the true sense for statesmanship in dealing with or handling that living thing. It contrasts at every turn with a written Constitution embodied in specific enactments. Its elasticity gives a wider sweep, and enlists and evokes in the conduct of affairs a far greater variety of powers. If any of your Lordships is unfamiliar with that subject, I would ask him to refer to the chapters written by one who sat not long ago on the Government benches in another place, and who is certainly not to be regarded as a bigoted Tory, the present illustrious Ambassador to the United States, Mr. Bryce. If you read the chapters in which he develops, with extraordinary vividness and skill, the growth of the American Constitution in its first days, and the way in which it has been worked since, you find, not necessarily expressed, often unexpressed, but always there, the sense he has of the value of the unwritten Constitution of our own country, upon which so much was based when that wonderful American Constitution was drafted and put into shape by Alexander Hamilton and his colleagues. The marks of our unwritten Constitution were stamped
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indelibly upon the pages of the written one across the Atlantic. The contrast between the two systems is great. It is the contrast between a living, pulsing organism and a formulated table of artificial enactments, however excellent these may be.
As I understand, what is now proposed is to introduce into that living, breathing thing that we have had in this country for so many centuries a perfectly new feature. The Government propose to thrust into it by formal statutary enactments something hard and unmalleable, something that will be a foreign element in an organism such as ours, laying down in specific terms precise questions of detail as regards the internal mechanism of our machine in a manner that must run counter to the whole manner and principle on which that machine has been handled during the centuries that are past. I believe this to be all wrong. But our difficulties at the present juncture are not small. For, my Lords, to keep that living thing, if I may go back to the parallel, fresh and strong, you must beware lest you strain any of its nicely-balanced parts. One of these overstrained, and persistently overstrained, may throw the whole very easily out of gear. It is because we have been able for centuries to avoid that kind of overstrain, or, if it occurred, so to relieve matters that the strain was not persistent, that we are able to look with thankfulness and pride to the continuous life and adaptableness of the Constitution, of which we are the inheritors.
But we are now told that that is exactly what has happened, that we are standing now in a position where there has been that overstrain, and that the whole life has suffered or must necessarily suffer. So we are told. We are told that the House of Lords has so acted that it has strained the organism to breaking point, that it has over-balanced the Constitution. I fully admit that the events of last year do bid us consider afresh how we stand. I think most of your Lordships would agree about that. They will agree that there has been overstrain, but they will differ as to which set of men were responsible. Those who sit upon the Benches beside me [the Government Benches] will say:—"My Lords, you have yourselves to thank for the position in which we stand. It was you who violated the unwritten rule, who upset the balance of our Constitution. By your act in rejecting the Finance Bill of

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the year and in forcing a dissolution of Parliament, whether you call that one act or two, you called attention inevitably to the hopelessly anomalous and out-of-date composition of this House. We must amend that forthwith. Such a thing can never be allowed to happen again. It is an outrage in a country professing to be governed in accordance with the people's will." I think I have not unfairly put the way in which that matter has been presented both in this House and outside by those who take that view. But then they are met by those who throw the blame exactly upon the opposite or opposing shoulders. "Not a bit," they reply. "You produced a Budget which the country had not asked for. You desired mischievous, irritating and unfair things to be done. You devised a plan which was outrageous in its inception. It was still more outrageous in the way you thrust it upon this House with the imperious demand, 'Pass it forthwith or reject it, if you dare,' and the House refused to take that course until the country should declare its mind." That is the other side. So the controversy goes on and the recriminations are bandied to and fro on either side.
I do not know how many of your Lordships will agree with me, but my own firm conviction is that, if a thoughtful and really competent observer from another land were now summing up the situation in the light of what has happened in the last twelve months, or if we could imagine one of the statesman-soldiers of the seventeenth century, one of the men who had borne a part in the really great and tremendous emergencies in the English life of that period, rising from his sleep to watch us in the last six months, such observer would be lost in amazement at our supposing that anything has really and truly occurred big enough to justify the suggested sweeping departure from the whole usage of English life for centuries as regards the manner of constitutional reform. He would say:—"There has been the grossest exaggeration on either side. It may be quite true, it is true perhaps, that the House of Commons' proposals did not correspond with those of former years. They were legitimately open to criticism, to censure, if you will, but there was nothing in them so appalling, so disastrous, so necessarily mischievous and terrible in character as to justify the epithets with which the Houses of Parliament and the country outside are familiar respecting that measure." And, on the other side, granted that the
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House of Lords did depart from precedent, that it did, by rejecting that Bill, and by forcing an appeal to the people themselves throw big questions on the carpet, to say that what it did "reduced the House of Commons for the future to a mere dummy" or "trampled contemptuously on the people's rights"—I quote the words actually used by responsible men—that is a misuse of language which verges on the grotesque.
Nothing has, in my belief, so far gone wrong in our public life as to be incapable of reasonable adjustment if it be approached in the right way. We are invited so to approach it by the noble Earl, Lord Rosebery. We are invited to look afresh at the composition—and be it always remembered that the composition affects the action and conduct—of a House of the Legislature, and to consider whether it needs amendment now and, if it does, what that amendment ought to be. The composition of this House has not only been open to challenge and criticism for a great many years, but, as we have constantly been reminded, it has been challenged and criticised within these walls. The memorable speech to which we listened last night was a natural sequel of speeches equally remarkable delivered in 1884, in 1888, and on other occasions, and we have to remember—every one who has studied the subject does—the weighty words that were spoken from the Government Bench by the late Lord Salisbury not many years ago. What we have now to do, as it seems to me, is to get these proposals into shape. It is possible to do it, it is worth while to do it, and, in my belief, the result will be to produce the adjustment that we need. At all events, surely, we ought to find by experience that it has failed to do so before we manufacture, under the plea of readjustment and reform, a brand new constitutional system unlike any that exists in any great nation in the world.
For it is, surely, nothing less than the manufacture of a new and untried single-Chamber place that the Government invites us to undertake. That is the alternative set before us. I listened last night with great care to the speech of the noble Viscount the Secretary of State for India, and if I understood him aright he told us that it was wholly wrong to speak of the Government's proposal as a single-Chamber plan, and further, he reminded us that at present we did not know what the plan really is. Well, had it been any one else than the noble Viscount, who is

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incapable of anything but the most straightforward and lucid utterance, I should have said that that was really trifling with us. We may not know—I do not know—what the Government's plan is to-night on the Ides of March; I do know what it was a fortnight ago. The Prime Minister then used these words:—
"The Resolutions will affirm—I am speaking now in general terms—the necessity for excluding the House of Lords altogether from the domain of finance. They will ask this House to declare that in the sphere of legislation the power of veto at present possessed by the House of Lords shall be so limited in its exercise as to secure the predominance of the deliberate and considered will of this House within the lifetime of a single Parliament. Further, it will be made plain that these constitutional changes are without prejudice to, and contemplate in a subsequent year, the substitution in our Second Chamber of the democratic method of representation. If this House should assent to the Resolutions, a Bill to give effect to them will without delay be introduced."
If these words do not mean that a Bill on any subject may become an Act by the action of one House of the Legislature against the will of the other within the lifetime of one Parliament, I do not know what English words mean. And if it does mean that, then it is simply and explicitly a single-Chamber system, disguise it as you may.
I am absolutely in favour of a large and liberal readjustment of the composition, and possibly in some ways the work, of this House. It is a very difficult task. It will take time, and will involve controversy. It is merely childish, in my judgment, to taunt those who want reform with the fact that they cannot readily agree upon all details. Of course they cannot. There must be patience, there must be controversy, and there must be time. It is impossible for any large body of men to take up a subject so complex and arrive at an agreement at once as to exactly what they want, but there is no reason for doubting that, if the proper steps are taken, that agreement will ultimately be arrived at. I believe that result to be obtainable, but it needs patience. In effecting such readjustment we Bishops are perfectly ready to take our part, both in the work and in the outcome. It would be out of place to go into detail now, but without professing to represent the opinions of every member of the Episcopal Bench—that I have no means of doing—some such plan as is suggested with regard to the Bishops in the Report of what is known as the Rosebery Committee, if it be part of a great whole, and consistent with that whole, would certainly, I think, not find obstacles or difficulties proceeding
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from the Episcopal Bench. More than that it is difficult to say now, but personally I should not imagine that any practical difficulties would be found to arise to the production of a wise and well-considered scheme.
I would end as I began. In what we do we have to bear in mind the venerableness, the historic worth, the proved workableness of the House of Lords, and its place in the National life. It is vain at any time, and especially in our own, to rest and to trust only to the traditions of the distant past. I entirely agree in the desire to amend whatever is inadequate or inappropriate or amiss, but we are called upon to remember too that what we are handling is a unique possession balanced in all its parts, and were we to tear lightly its unique records or rend one of its limbs, we should make ourselves deservedly the scorn of the civilised world. Your Lordships will remember, and most of all the noble Viscount, Lord Morley, will remember, how the greatest political thinker of our land, or, perhaps, of any land, spoke on that subject in eloquent terms 140 years ago, and surely his warning has lost nothing of its weight and force to-day. I quote his words—
"Our Constitution stands on a nice equipoise, with steep precipices and deep waters upon all sides of it. In removing it from a dangerous leaning towards one side there may be a risk of oversetting it on the other. Every project of a material change in a Government so complicated as ours, combined at the same time with external circumstances still more complicated, is a matter full of difficulties in which a considerate man will not be too ready to decide; a prudent man too ready to undertake; or an honest man too ready to promise."
My Lords, those words were never more needed than they are to-day. I give my support to the Motion of the noble Earl, believing that we shall thus be led to the best kind of remedy for admitted needs, be they great or small. That by that process we shall at once secure all that we want neither I nor any of your Lordships can imagine; but that we shall be on the right path towards securing it I most firmly believe; and I hope your Lordships will give effect to the Resolutions.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I think your Lordships will all agree that in the speech to which we have just listened the most rev. Primate has approached this subject in a spirit which is worthy of him. He recognised, as we all recognise, the great gravity of the crisis at which we have arrived, and yet he urged your Lordships, and, indeed, I think his voice was intended to go far beyond your

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Lordships' House, to counsels of moderation—moderation of statement and moderation of policy—which we shall do well to follow. And, lastly, he reminded your Lordships that such matters of moment as we are now discussing cannot be decided without difficulty.
We listened last night to one of the great speeches which are from time to time delivered in this House by the noble Earl on the Cross Benches. I think that he, if he will allow me to pay him what little compliment I am capable of paying, has added one more reason to the many reasons for which your Lordships and the country have to be grateful to him. I know that my noble friend Lord Ribblesdale, speaking last night, expressed the opinion that the opportunity was not well chosen for these debates. I recognise that there may be legitimate difference of opinion upon that point, but, for my own part, I think that the noble Earl on the Cross Benches has judged rightly that this is not a case upon which we can remain silent; that we are bound—the House of Lords is bound—to have a policy of our own, and to take an early opportunity of considering that policy. Beyond that, I venture to express the hope that the treatment which the noble Earl gave to the single-Chamber policy of His Majesty's Government may have far-reaching effects.
I do not think, if I may say so, that the noble Viscount opposite seriously attempted to deal with the arguments of the noble Earl. It is quite clear from what the noble Earl said last night, and from what the most rev. Primate has just uttered, that the policy of the Government is nothing more nor less than a single-Chamber policy, and it is also true that, if both Houses of Parliament should agree on the present occasion to destroy your Lordships' Veto and to postpone till hereafter the changes and improvements which are foreshadowed by the Government in the composition of this House, though the first may have an effect, the second will never be heard of again. The most rev. Primate spoke very properly of the exaggerated language which was used with respect to the action of your Lordships' House last winter. The expressions used in criticism of what we did were, in my belief, entirety undeserved, but undoubtedly the step we took was a strong step. Any candid controversialist would admit that. The justification for that strong step was the great change in the circumstances with which we had to deal—the most rev. Primate
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has reminded you of it in very moderate language—the very striking nature of the Finance Bill which was submitted to this House and the very remarkable manner in which that Bill was passed through the House of Commons.
Upon this point I should like to trouble your Lordships for a few moments regarding the great change which in our time has taken place in the House of Commons. I desire, of course, to speak of the House of Commons with all the respect which is due to that great Assembly. If I required any other motive, I might say that for seventeen years I was a member of the House of Commons, and I suppose that I took as much interest in its proceedings and was as devoted to its great traditions as any member of that honourable House; and it was with a feeling of growing disappointment that one watched all through those years what I cannot but describe as a certain slow process of decay—decay not only in the procedure of that House, with which, of course, the public and your Lordships are all familiar, but, as I believe, in the reputation which the House enjoys amongst the people of this country. I do not wish to use any extreme language; it still remains the greatest representative Assembly in the world, but undoubtedly there was, even in my time, a marked change, which was to me, and must be to anyone who values our great institutions, a matter of profound regret.
In the first place, the attitude with which the people of this country regard the House of Commons has changed. Your Lordships have recently had an opportunity of judging from a very close point of view the conduct of a contested election in this country. A great many of the noble Lords who sit behind me, and a few who sit in front—though not so many there—took part in the General Election, and did their utmost to persuade the electors to adopt the views which they entertained. The noble Earl last night reminded your Lordships of the condition of things under which a modern election is carried out. Speeches, leaflets, and placards of every kind and degree of inaccuracy—I am afraid even a stronger word must be used to describe them—are the constant feature of modern General Elections. I do not know whether one has any right to say that that is altogether avoidable. Mendacity, no doubt, should be avoidable, but inaccuracy is almost inevitable. I believe that if an archangel addressed an election meeting he would be bound to be inaccurate. The truth is that in explaining political

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policy and in defending political conduct to a public meeting a certain amount of largeness and looseness of expression is absolutely requisite. If all the qualifications which correspond to the precise truth were put into a public speech they would not be understood; and any speaker who was so sincere as to do so would probably be set down as belonging to the other side. Inaccuracy, therefore, I am afraid one must make up one's mind to; but when the operation is entrusted, not merely to accomplished speakers, but to all the supporters of a candidate and is reduced to leaflets and placards, that inaccuracy degenerates, of course, into something much more grave than that.
Why have I ventured to trouble your Lordships with this description of public meetings, with which in other times we were not so closely familiar? It is because I believe the result has been to create in the minds of the electors much less satisfaction with their representative institutions than used to be the case. There is a certain disbelief in politicians in the present day, which is a very serious symptom. On the top of this has come the modern political organisation. I am speaking, of course, of what is commonly known as the caucus—the Conservative Association, the Liberal Three Hundred, or whatever it is called. The noble Viscount opposite is familiar with other such organisations. My Lords, that has a double effect. It affects, in the first place, the freedom of the electors, for there are only practically two doors to the suffrages of the electors. Either you must go through the door of the Conservative Association, or you must go through the door of the Liberal Three Hundred, so that the choice of the electors is very much limited. Therefore it is a very inaccurate phrase to speak of the freedom of election. It is a limited freedom. It is a freedom only between one or two candidates who are submitted to the electors, candidates who are very strictly controlled as to how they shall be submitted to the electors. And, my Lords, this close political caucus affects Dot only the choice of the individual candidates who are submitted to the electors, but controls the independence of the candidates when elected. Everybody is familiar with what. I am describing, and knows how a member of Parliament, when he is elected, is affected and controlled by the political organisations of
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his constituency. This subject forms a topic which has been dealt with by many speakers, but by none more eloquently and strikingly than by the noble Earl who is the author of this Resolution in a speech which he delivered a few weeks ago in the City. In that speech he was describing what I have ventured to describe in much less felicitous terms—the effect of the Party system upon the House of Commons, and he said—
"It has crashed out almost all independence from the House of Commons."
These blemishes are, to a large extent, inevitable in any electoral system. I do not mean, of course, that the great representative House of this country could get on without any electoral system. An electoral system, of course, is of its essence, and therefore we must make the best of it. It has enormous advantages. It is a great method of governing a free people, but it has its great blemishes. But, my Lords, the noble Earl upon the Cross Benches in this same speech went on to compare the House of Commons, in which he had said the Party system has crushed out almost all independence, with another Assembly, and this is what he said—
"But there is another institution which I will hardly venture to name at this time and place, which is recognised by the Constitution as an integral part of Parliament, and which has this advantage, at any rate, that it is the only political Assembly that I am acquainted with in this country where it is possible to utter, with perfect freedom, perfect ease, and perfect sufferance, unpalatable truths."
The noble Earl was speaking of your Lordships' House. The, noble Earl is specially entitled to make that observation, for I have heard him more than once utter unpalatable truths in your Lordships' House. Sometimes I did not quite agree that they were truths, though I am quite certain the noble Earl thought they were, but I am quite sure they were very often unpalatable.
Now, my Lords, if it be true that almost all independence has been crushed out of the House of Commons, and if in that respect the House of Commons forms a marked contrast with your Lordships' House under the present system and with all the supposed evils of hereditary right, are we to be expected to discard hereditary right without a sigh and without a groan? I cannot take that view. I share the noble Earl's appreciation of the contrast between

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the two Houses of Parliament, but it does not seem to me to load to the conclusion that we ought to totally and at once, abolish the hereditary right. Hereditary right was treated with a certain amount of disdain by the noble Earl last night. Yet hereditary right is the system under which the greater part of the world is governed. Hereditary right relies not on controlling a man by turning him out if you do not agree with him, but in trusting a man because of his sense of public duty and his determination to do right. The hereditary principle means that a man reverences the example of his father. It means that he is determined not to prejudice the position and prospects of his son. I believe that to rely upon those things which are dictated by Nature, and to enlist thereby all the security which Nature itself helps to provide, is, in the main, a far more reliable source of confidence than any other. But it might be said, if so, am I in favour of no change? Not so, my Lords. I venture to think that a change—a considerable change—is called for in the present position to which our affairs have arrived. But I should like first of all to draw two conclusions from what I have laid before your Lordships. In the first place, having regard to what I call these blemishes in the; reputation of the House of Commons, we ought to be all the more determined to resist the single-Chamber solution of the present difficulty; and, secondly, in determining the changes which ought to take place in our House we ought to profit by what has happened in the House of Commons.
It may be that those who propose an elective system are satisfied that a certain element of elective Peers would be a good thing, and that you could rest at that point. Well, my Lords, I hope before we decide upon admitting an elective element we shall be quite sure that that conclusion is just. Is it reasonable to believe that, having admitted a certain electoral element, we could stay there and go no further? I think there is grave reason to doubt that. I do not read in that way the teaching of history. Take the question of Parliamentary reform in another place. There were reformers in the early part of the Nineteenth Century who believed they could go a certain distance and no further. They believed in finality; but events proved them wrong. They had to go from step to step.
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First they had to reduce the franchise in the boroughs, and then they had to reduce it in the counties, in order to fit the franchise in the boroughs. That is a good example of how difficult it is to draw an arbitrary line and to say you are going a certain distance and no further. For my part, until I am quite satisfied that a line can be not only drawn, but can be maintained, I should be very loth to consider an elective system.
But I am in favour, as I said just now, of considerable modification in the constitution of this House, and for this reason. In the first place, the loss of reputation in the other House of Parliament throws greater responsibilities upon your Lordships' Houses. Their procedure—I will not dwell upon it, because it has been often discussed here—under which Bills are sent up for your consideration large parts of which have hardly been discussed at all, throws a great responsibility upon this House. And, secondly, the more extreme doctrines which prevail among certain sections of opinion in that House, and which seem to have a very formidable influence upon the counsels of the Party to which His Majesty's Government belong—that also throws an additional and very grave responsibility upon your Lordships' House. Are we, then, fit to bear this additional responsibility? There is, as it were, a new situation. It is not as if we had to go on in the old hum-drum way. We have to meet a new state of things—a Government largely in the hands of the extreme Liberal and Socialist Party; a Government acting by a procedure in the House of Commons which is really the very negation of a deliberative method. Those conditions do throw a very grave responsibility upon this House, and make it necessary that we should fit ourselves to receive and to bear that responsibility.
Well, my Lords, what line should we adopt? I have ventured to express my feeling of appreciation for the hereditary principle, but, of course, it has its weakness. My noble friend Lord Onslow and other noble Lords have called attention to it. There are a certain number of your Lordships who have not the aptitude, not the interest which fits them for the discharge of their important duties. Perhaps there are some even who are not worthy to discharge them. Undoubtedly such a state of things

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does call for a diminution in the numbers of your Lordships' House; it calls for some process of selection by which those, and those only, who are fitted to discharge such duties should, if possible, be left. Greatly as I value the hereditary principle, in the words of the Resolution of my noble friend "by itself" it is not sufficient. To my mind the importance of those two words have not been done quite justice to in this debate. If I vote, as I hope to vote, for the Motion of the noble Earl, it is not to condemn the hereditary principle, but to condemn the hereditary principle "by itself." That appears to me to be of the very essence of the Motion.
There must be some process of selection by which there will be a personal guarantee of the fitness of a particular Peer; not merely that he is the son of his father, but that he also is fitted for the discharge of these functions. There have been many suggestions with this object. There is the well-known suggestion that your Lordships should select a certain number of your own body to be the Lords of Parliament. By all means let us consider such a solution as that. It will achieve a great deal if Peers are selected by their own brethren, just as the Irish Peers are now selected. That would be a very valuable method of reducing the numbers of your Lordships' House and preserving as Lords of Parliament those who are qualified to perform that important function. But perhaps it may be said that selection of a certain number of your Lordships by the whole body of the House is not sufficient; that the great democracy may desire to have some guarantee over which they would have some control. I certainly should not exclude some arrangement with that object, so long only as the independence of your Lordships' House is preserved. By independence I mean that your Lordships should be able to act and speak and vote according to your consciences, without feeling that the result of indulging in your conscience would be the loss of your seat on the next occasion when your appointment came to be made. That appears to me to be the one thing above all others which we must avoid. Above all things, we must preserve the independence of your Lordships in the exercise of your duty. Is it impossible to combine a democratic influence over the appointment, say, of a certain section of your Lordships with this independence?
The independence of this House does not depend so much upon its hereditary charac-
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ter as upon the fact that your Lordships, once appointed, are irremovable. We are in the same position, for example, as the Judges. The Judges are irremovable, and therefore they are independent. It is the same with the Law Lords—those members of your Lordships' House who are Lords of Appeal. They are not hereditary, but they are irremovable and therefore they are independent. I do not doubt that that was the reason above all others why the Judges were made irremovable—in order that they should be independent. But both in the case of the Judges and of the Lords of Appeal the great democracy certainly does have a voice, and a most emphatic voice, in their appointment, for who appoints them? Why, the Crown; and the Crown is advised in these matters, as every one knows, by the Minister who is the elect of the people. The Minister represents the majority of the House of Commons. He is the man who is chosen by the process of election in the House of Commons and the votes of its members to enjoy the confidence of the great democracy of this country. He is the greatest democratic influence in the country, and in his hands lie the recommendations to the Crown which determine who are to be the Judges or who are to be the Lords of Appeal in your Lordships' House.
If, then, there is to be a democratic title as well as a hereditary title in your Lordships' House, let it be by means of appointment through the Crown—that is, upon the recommendation of a Minister. But, above all things, let the House remain independent. Your Lordships are aware that this suggestion of appointment by the Crown finds a place in a great number of the constitutions which are proposed for your Lordships' House. There is what is called the proposal of life Peerages; that is, of course, appointments by the Crown to your Lordships' House for life. For life, be it remembered! That is to say, they are irremovable, and therefore they are independent. That is a very good proposal, but it lacks one thing. It lacks the hereditary element. They are life Peers appointed from outside your Lordships' House. Why not combine the two? Why should you not have a system under which members of the hereditary Peerage would be nominated for life to serve as Lords of Parliament? I do not say that the whole House should consist of Lords of Parliament appointed in such a manner, although personally I would be

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prepared to go a long way in that respect; but if you do wish to go further on what I may call the Irish model then I submit that the proper direction in which to look for a solution is towards the appointment of members of the hereditary Peerage for life by the Crown. Your Lordships will observe that such a proposal would be perfectly fair as between the two Parties.
The point has been made—I think it was made by the noble Viscount, Lord Morley, last night—that in no solution which has been proposed was there any attempt to strengthen the Liberal Party. I am not sure that we ought to go about with the express purpose of strengthening the Liberal Party in your Lordships' House, but I would ask the noble Viscount to observe that such a solution as that, entrusting as it does in the case of these particular Lords of Parliament their appointment to the Minister of the day, places the Liberal Party in precisely as good a position as the Unionist Party. The Minister, if he happens to be, as he is at this moment, a Liberal Minister, would have the opportunity of recommending to the Crown hereditary Peers of his own political complexion and thought to serve as Lords of Parliament. The effect which such a system would have upon the composition of your Lordships' House would be not only fair but gradual; it would be gradual, step by step, as vacancies occurred, and it would preserve what, above all things, I believe to be essential to the proper conduct of a Second Chamber—the independence of the members who composed it.
I was grateful to the most rev. Primate for the counsel which he gave that any reforms which we or the country undertake should be of a moderate character. I have no desire for the vast revolutionary changes which find favour upon the other side of the House. Moreover, I do not desire, any more than my noble friends who sit behind me, any fundamental change in the powers of your Lordships' House. I do not want to see them diminished. I do not want to see them increased. We took a strong step in the winter of last year, but, so far as I am concerned, any counsel which I ventured to give to your Lordships on that occasion was not with the view of increasing the power of your Lordships' House. It was because I believed that the policy of the Government in the Finance Bill struck a fatal blow at the power of your Lordships' House that I was anxious that it should be rejected. So far
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as I was concerned, the rejection of the Finance Bill was essentially defensive and not aggressive. I do not wish, and do not suggest, that there should be any increase of powers in your Lordships' House. I do not want it to have more influence over the finances of the country than was the case in the years which have preceded the one in which I am now speaking; but I do think that to diminish the powers of your Lordships' House, to allow the other House to ride rough-shod over our decisions, would be to destroy, and destroy absolutely, any use there may be in a Second Chamber. Therefore let us, so far as we are able, adhere to our powers, but let us give a hearty welcome to the Motion of the noble Earl upon the Cross Benches, so that we may make ourselves more fit even than before to discharge the great and important functions of the State.
[Lord STANMORE, Lord NEWTON, and Lord SHEFFIELD rose together to address the House, but the two first-named gave way.]
LORD SHEFFIELD: My Lords, two speeches on that side have been heard this afternoon, so I think it is only fair that somebody should be heard on this side. The debate, so far, has been conducted almost entirely by noble Lords who are more or less in complete sympathy with the Motion before the House, and subject to certain criticisms in detail the speech we have just listened to seemed to be a speech that the House might have heard when it had gone into Committee upon the Resolution rather than a speech upon the Motion itself. I gathered that it was not the wish of the majority of this House to discuss the details of a scheme on the first Resolution. I am perfectly willing to fall in with that view and I do not propose to discuss the details of a scheme, but to discuss the point of view of those who are advocating the proposal of the noble Earl as a solution of the present political difficulty.
I wish to direct my attention more specially to the speech of the most rev. Primate. He dwelt with great force upon the fact that in the history of this country changes have come rather by acquiescence than by statutory enactment, and he pointed out, with perfect truth, that this informal method of quietly modifying the Constitution required great tact and great judgment on all sides, and that if an assertion of right was made upon privilege and custom, it strained the situation,

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and might strain it almost to the breaking point. The most rev. Primate took us back to ancient history, and very suitably referred to the action of a great predecessor of his own in the Chair of St. Augustine, and the part he took at Runnymede. Runnymede is more remote than Oliver Cromwell, of whom we heard a great deal yesterday, but it bears more on the present question, and I do not think we should be wrong to pause for a moment and think what was the action of the people through the prelates and chief nobles who had the principal power in the country in dealing with the rudimentary Constitution of this country and amending it. In the time of the Norman Kings and the earlier Plantagenets the prerogative of the King was everything, and the rights of the subject were very minute. If we could call it a Constitution, it was a Constitution of custom. The custom was found insufficient in the time of King John, when these prelates and Barons had no hesitation in bringing in a Statute and enacting a Magna Charta for the rights of the people. But the danger to the rights of the people has been more from the Crown than from the House of Lords, and therefore if we study history we find that statutory modifications of the Constitution have been directed against the power of the Crown. This country has never hesitated to modify its Constitution by Statute whenever it thought it necessary.
Let me give your Lordships an illustration. No doubt the power of the Crown was very high in the time of the Tudors, but Queen Elizabeth had enough sense, although she had a great clinging to power, to use that tact to which the most rev. Primate referred, and to adjust her difficulties with her subjects without straining things to the breaking point. The Stuarts, unfortunately, seem to me to have borne a greater resemblance to the House of Lords. They took advantage of the letter of the law; they strained the law, and brought about such a conflict as ended in the greatest clash of rights and powers that the history of this country has ever witnessed. Your Lordships have been talking now as though the great object was to make some modification of the constitution and composition of the House which would apparently satisfy the public without sacrifice of the real essence of your power. But your Lordships make a great mistake if you suppose that at the present moment the questions which the
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people up and down the country are concerned in coming to a settlement with you upon are merely those of your constitution and not the powers that you exercise. I do not deny that both are main questions, but in the whole of this debate you have talked only of your constitution, and if you have mentioned your powers it has been with the demand that you should not see them diminished.
But in the opinion of a great many people outside this House this is a question which will not go back. Whatever may be the political vicissitudes for the next ten or fifteen years, this question which has been raised has come to stay; and the great question is whether what was believed by everyone to be the custom and rule of the Constitution, that the representatives of the people should be supreme in finance, should still remain the law and custom of the nation. Until that question is settled and until you acknowledge that you overstepped the limit last autumn when you threw out the Budget and refused the Supplies necessary to carry on the Government, there will be no settlement of this question however you may tinker at your composition. The most rev. Primate told us a good deal of what other people said; he gave us a graphic description of what the friends of the House of Commons and the friends of the House of Lords say. But he told us very little of what he himself would say, and I could not help feeling that his speech to-day was rather an echo of his action in November, when, seeing that there was a great chasm, he took one look at the precipice and walked away in the opposite direction. But the most rev. Primate did, notwithstanding, drop one word. It came very incidentally in the course of his speech. Perhaps some of your Lordships hardly noticed it; but he said he was in favour of some readjustment of the Constitution and also to some extent of the work of the House of Lords. He did not amplify it. We do look to the successor of Prelates who have been prominent in vindicating public rights against usurpation for a lead. I did think that perhaps in the Twentieth as in the Thirteenth Century, we might have had some indication and lead in guiding us to a decision. But we got nothing but a hint. There is a great advantage in constitutional custom as long as that custom is observed. I suppose there is no greater example of custom in directing and caring

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for and governing also a legislative body than the history of the Roman Republic. There the great officers of State had many and conflicting rights, and if they had used them to the utmost chaos would have come; but by their tact and experience they had the sense for centuries to see that no person pushed his rights to the extreme. But when that political tact fails, then you have to define the positions of various bodies by law; and I am no more unwilling to define the rights of either House of Parliament by law than our forefathers were unwilling to define the rights of the Crown by law.
The most rev. Primate seemed to speak as though the rights and constitution of either House were entirely within its own purview and consideration; but surely we must; all see that, whatever the outcome of the proposal of the noble Earl on the Cross Benches may be, no change can come about in the constitution of this House without an Act of Parliament. You cannot by Resolution turn out Peers who have a right to sit here. If once you begin to think that you can meddle by Resolution of this House with those rights, recollect that none of you sit here except by the Royal Writ of Summons, which is also a matter of centuries of custom, as are many other parts of the government of this country. Therefore I say if you begin to touch the constitution of this House you cannot keep clear of an Act of Parliament. I quite agree that all through the Middle Ages the rights of the people through their representatives were asserted as a matter of privilege, and I do not know that they were put on any Statute Book. But the right of the House of Commons to have control of finance is not set out in any Statute; it is to be found in the immemorial common law of the Constitution. But, of course, if you are determined to re-open those questions, I do not know that anyone could take a point of order against you. If you were to introduce a Money Bill, the only thing that would happen to it would be that it would be flung contemptuously out of the House of Commons when it reached that Assembly. The moment you break away from custom you will have to be regulated by law.
I wish to say one word on a point made by the noble Earl on the Cross Benches regarding the Constitution of other countries.
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I do not wish to go into details, but I think we have to study the practice of the United Kingdom and its customs and institutions in settling our own political difficulties, and We shall get very little, profit from looking at the customs and habits of other nations. The Senate of the United States, for example, has no relation to what we call the Upper House in the United Kingdom. It is of the essence of the government of the United States, because it is a Federation of States and not a separate government. The Senate represents the rights of the several States as distinct from the rights of individual citizens, and belongs to an entirely different set of considerations. As to the British Colonies, I would like to know whether, if any colony were offered, in place of its present Second Chamber, a body of hereditary legislators like the House of Lords, it would not at once say that, sooner than have such a Second Chamber, it would forfeit the advantages of a Second Chamber and have single-Chamber government.
People have thrown out challenges to us as to whether we are Second Chamber men. I may say that I am very strongly a Second Chamber man, for many reasons. I do not believe, with the complicated responsibilities in connection with foreign and colonial affairs that with the weight of centuries have come down upon us, we can do without a Second Chamber. I will go further and say that it should be a good, capable Second Chamber that could command the respect of the country and speak with authority. But you must have supreme power lodged somewhere. You cannot divide supreme power. Whether you like the word "predominant" or not, the fact remains that you are trying at this minute to steal away from the House of Commons some of the predominance that must remain with it if this country is to be properly governed. If you use your legal right to paralyse the whole administration of the country and refuse to provide funds necessary to support the Army and the Navy, what is that but attacking the House of Commons? If you once begin to use your legal rights not for the purpose of criticising legislation in the true sense but for paralysing the administration of the country, you will have to give way before that body which, being chosen by the people, must be the supreme and dominant power in the country.

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The noble Marquess who last spoke told us that he had sat for seventeen years in the House of Commons, and that during his lifetime—and he went in there as a young man—he had witnessed a steady deterioration in that House. I am not prepared to agree with him; but I think he might have recalled that during most of that period you had a Tory Government and a Tory majority in the House of Commons. But in spite of that, I do not think the House of Commons has deteriorated, although its composition has not been always in harmony with my views. I do not know whether the House of Commons or the people of this country will quite like the suggestion that because the House of Commons is growing more and more out of touch and out of sympathy with your Lordships therefore this House must assert itself more resolutely than ever, must put on some appearance of popular constitution, in order to conciliate the bourgeoisie of the country, and then in order to exert greater power in the government of the country must put a check on legislation from this House of Commons which you think is deteriorating. I do not know whether that contention of your Lordships will commend itself to the people of the country. The noble Marquess spoke, towards the close of his speech, of "the terrible day," when the Labour Party and the Socialists formed the Government of the country, and said that then this House was to be a bulwark. I feel perfectly certain that when the Labour Party and the Socialists constitute the Government of the country they will make very short work of your Lordships and you will not be able to stand against them. It is because of the general moderation of the country and the reforms which have been carried that the Labour Party and the Socialists are not governing the country. They are citizens of this country and have a right to be heard like everyone else; they have to take their place in the conflict of politics and be represented according to their powers. You will not prevent their coming into power by assuming to yourselves arrogant pretensions which have not belonged to you in the past, or posing as bulwarks of society against their inroads. The noble Marquess said that last Autumn he and the House took a strong step. I beg to differ entirely from him. The step then taken was a violent one, but that it was not a strong one experience has shown.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, the noble
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Lord who has just sat down warned us in what was intended to be impressive tones that we are about to attempt what is an impossibility—namely, to carry out the purposes and the objects of the noble Earl on the Cross Benches by means of Resolutions. Surely everybody knows that an Act of Parliament is necessary, and I presume that these Resolutions, which no doubt will shortly be adopted, are merely preliminary to a Bill, and that Bill, if it is not accepted by the present Government, will in all probability be accepted when a Unionist Administration comes into power again. Listening to the various speeches which have been made during the last two days, I could not help being reminded of my experience three years ago, when, with perhaps unjustifiable temerity, I brought certain proposals before this House, not my own proposals at all but the proposals of other people put together in the shape of a Bill. I am bound to say my modest efforts were not received with much enthusiasm in any quarter. I may observe that they were received with less enthusiasm from the Front Opposition Bench than almost anywhere else. My noble friend Lord Cawdor, who was put up to move what was humorously described as a "friendly Amendment," displayed so little friendliness towards my proposal that I was under the impression he had mistaken his instructions and was about to embark upon the task of moving the rejection of the Bill. And therefore it was all the greater gratification to me afterwards to observe the gradual process of conversion on the part of the noble Lord, and to see him vote consistently in the Committee of which he and I were members for proposals which he had previously denounced in this House.
There has, I admit been some advance in opinion towards Lord Rosebery's proposals. The noble Marquess who spoke just now made use of the expression that he extended a kindly welcome, what he called a warm welcome, to those proposals. It did not strike me as being a welcome of a particularly warm nature, but, at all events, it was an advance on previous performances. Looking round the benches on this side of the House I am again conscious of a certain inclination in favour of the proposals for the reform of this House, and I attribute this advance in opinion largely to the experiences which were acquired by numerous noble Lords who sit around me during what was termed by the Liberal Press "the campaign

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of wild Peers "which was productive of so many incidents. But there are two parties in this House which throughout this controversy have remained perfectly consistent. One is the party represented by the noble and learned Earl below me, Lord Halsbury. I do not know how many followers he can count, but the noble Earl still continues, if I do not mistake him, to present an adamantine front to all these revolutionary proposals, and I do not for a moment think that one General Election, or even several, would alter his views upon the subject. And the other party which is equally consistent in its attitude in regard to this question is, of course, the Government. We have had two speeches from the Government Front Bench since the debate began, and I hope I shall not be accused of disrespect if I assert that they were not of a particularly illuminating nature. The only tangible fact that I was able to gather from the speech of the noble Earl the Minister for Agriculture was that he was closely related to a high dignitary of the Church—a fact which does not seem to bear very closely upon the present controversy.
The attitude of the Government remains precisely to-day what it was three years ago. Their object is to prevent any kind of improvement in this place, whether by change or otherwise. The only change which they contemplate and favour is to turn this place into a kind of elaborate sham, a sort of hybrid between a registry office and a debating society, and a place which is to fulfil the double function of serving as a reward to deserving members of the Liberal Party, and at the same time to afford a horrible object lesson to the electorate. This somewhat contradictory course is one which calls for some ingenuity, though not, perhaps, for more ingenuity than the Government possess. It is not uncommon to hear the policy of the Government with regard to this House described as fatuous. I do not look upon it as fatuous at all. On the other hand, I look upon that policy as being from their own point of view essentially a common sense policy, provided you do not seriously attack this place, provided that the House of Lords question is skilfully handled by a Liberal Government. When I say Liberal Government I wish to distinguish the Government from their Irish allies and the Socialists who masquerade as Labour Members, and so forth. From the point of view of a purely Liberal
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Government an unreformed House of Lords is a perfectly invaluable asset to them in some particulars, and I cannot help thinking that many of them must be well aware of it and must be deeply regretting the campaign in which they are now involved.
Consider for a moment the advantages which an unreformed House of Lords offers from a tactical and wire-pulling point of view, which is, of course, the only point of view from which the Government would regard it. It has enabled all moderate men in the Party, and I suppose even now there are still some moderate men in the Liberal Party, to vote steadily for measures in another place which they feel confident will be rejected when they, reach here. It has provided an excellent excuse for not dealing with questions which are highly favoured by the Party but which are not so popular in the country. I think the majority of people have at length realised the somewhat important fact that the Liberal Party and the people of this country, with a big "P," are no longer the same thing. The third advantage, not an inconsiderable one, is that if by any chance a member of this House shows himself to be an unsatisfactory or a foolish kind of person it has always been open to Radical orators to maintain that the whole of the House of Lords consists of persons of that description. Lastly, it has been the means of rewarding estimable gentlemen for valuable and substantial services which they have rendered, in the past to the Liberal cause. The bestowal of a Peerage upon a deserving Liberal gentleman always seems to me to be accompanied by a phenomenon which we do not observe in connection with other forms of dispensation of honours. It is a sort of double-edged business. On the one hand, you confer an honour upon a man, but on the other hand you exact a substantial sacrifice from him, because it must be perfectly obvious that there is considerable sacrifice involved in the case of a gentleman who enters an Assembly which he has been abusing during the whole course of his previous years. There is a certain amount of martyrdom involved, but the curious thing is that there always appears to be a large number of public-spirited Liberal gentlemen who are ready to undergo this particular form of martyrdom, of which the coronet is not an inappropriate symbol. It stands to reason that when

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these gentlemen enter this place they are subjected to an almost intolerable strain, and very often it is more than they can stand. Something snaps, their political equilibrium gives way, they desert their posts and come over to the enemy.
Well, my Lords, in spite of the determined opposition which was offered by the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, and by the Government to any proposals of reform with regard to this House, three years ago a Committee was appointed to consider the various proposals put forward, and for my part I feel profoundly grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Rosebery, that he has at last forced this question to the front, and that we have got to express an opinion upon those proposals. Although I never found anyone who agreed with me, it always seemed to me highly desirable that the findings of that Committee should have been considered long ago. I confess it always appeared to me that if you openly admitted something had got to be done and appointed a Committee to consider what ought to be done, when that Committee made certain recommendations the obvious course was to consider those recommendations without delay. It would have been a more dignified and courageous course to discuss this question earlier rather than wait until the wreckers in another place have produced their programme. It is no use, I know, repining over lost time; but with regard to this particular Report I observe that the prevailing tendency at the present moment is to regard it as totally inadequate. Inadequate is the word which is used. And yet part of its proposals is that between 200 and 300 members of this House should be excluded from it. I hardly think that two years ago anybody would have used the word inadequate with regard to the recommendation of this Committee. As a matter of fact I contend that it only requires alteration in one important point in order to extract all the reforms which any reasonable person can desire. At the same time it seems to me that recommendations of this Committee, which have been carefully considered by members of this House, are worthy of a great deal more attention than the innumerable schemes which are being put forward by constitution-makers who are so vastly enjoying themselves.
I am not a particular respecter of persons, but I do maintain that the composition of
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this Committee entitled its Report to most careful consideration and respect. Let me recall to the House the persons who took part in those proceedings. It was presided over by an ex-Prime Minister, and its members included an ex-Foreign Minister, an ex-Lord Chancellor, the most rev. Primate, an ex-Speaker, ex-Viceroys, and several ex-Secretaries of State. In fact, with the exception of myself and two or three inconspicuous persons whose names, of course, I will not mention, the Committee consisted entirely of distinguished persons, and for my part I do not anticipate that I shall ever move in such distinguished political circles again. The appointment of this Committee was a landmark in the history of the House. It was the first serious attempt that had been made to deal with the question of reform. But owing to the policy that the Government pursued of ignoring the existence of this Committee we are still, to a great extent, in the dark as to what are the feelings of the House generally with regard to it. I must admit that when this Report appeared it was received with what amounted to little short of absolutely stony indifference. I hardly heard an opinion on the subject, excepting in the case of one noble Lord, a very infrequent attendant at the House, who was so indignant at the recommendations that he announced his intention of at once cultivating rhetoric for the purpose of overwhelming the proposer of the recommendations when they appeared.
The reason the Committee's recommendations did not receive the treatment to which they were entitled is perfectly plain. This Report came out with an absolute and complete disregard of what I may term political scenic effects. It was brought out at a time when people were thinking of entirely different things. It came out almost simultaneously with the withdrawal of one of the Education Bills of the Government and immediately after the rejection of the Licensing Bill, and that is one of the reasons why sufficient attention has never been paid to it. If anybody will take the trouble to read the Report he will see at once that the members of the Committee, as was pointed out by the noble Earl yesterday, recognised frankly and immediately the more glaring defects of this House. As for those defects, I think I can crystalise them in three or four words. I will put it shortly in this way—We are too numerous and we are too one-sided. By a strange and curious paradox we are now about to penalise ourselves

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for what appears to be somewhat inadequate reasons. It really is not our fault that we are too numerous. That is the fault of successive Governments in consequence of the number of Peers they have created from time to time.
As for the other fault, the so-called fault of being too one-sided—that is to say, being too Conservative—that is the greatest possible tribute to the honesty of this Assembly, because I have not the smallest hesitation in asserting that of all the temptations which beset the politician by far the strongest is to join the Party of noble Lords opposite. It is the one profession in the world, where greatness is deliberately thrust upon you, and you can hardly avoid it however hard you may try. Noble Lords opposite rise almost automatically to dizzy heights of grandeur, and they are invested at the same time—by the Liberal Press only, I must admit—with all the attributes of genius and the graces of oratory, whilst we who languish here upon the Back Benches are represented as a mass of inarticulate yokels, probably with vicious instincts into the bargain. Not only do noble Lords opposite enjoy these advantages in the present, but they are guaranteed to them in the future, because, under every scheme that I have seen put forward for the reform of this House, the future existence of these noble Lords is most carefully provided for. In spite of this, an unjust world refuses to recognise the rugged honesty which animates the great majority of the members of this House. Instead of crediting us with rugged honesty, the belief prevails—encouraged by Home Secretaries and Chancellors of the Exchequer—that we are a partial Assembly which exists for the purpose of destroying or mutilating beneficent Liberal legislation.
We may wish to be impartial, and we are impartial much more than people commonly suppose; but at the same time it must be candidly admitted, though I do not like doing it, that appearances are against us. That is really the strong point of our adversaries' case. There is in this House no clear and evident appearance of impartiality, although it does exist; and, though it is very wrong of me to do so, I cannot help sympathising for once in a way with noble Lords opposite in the position in which they find themselves. Their contention, and the contention of their followers in the country, is that this House never interferes with Conservative legislation, but destroys and mutilates
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Liberal legislation. They complain, with some justice, that they labour and toil in the wilderness for years, and that when they come into power with an enormous majority they are liable to see their measures upset by the permanent majority which is encamped here. As I say, I do sympathise with them, and I confess that if an umpire habitually decided against me I should perhaps entertain some doubts as to his impartiality before I had finished. No doubt the Government feel deeply the rejection of their measures, but I suspect that the people who feel more deeply still are those ardent and convinced Radicals who have set their heart upon some particular project which, when it conies up here, is defeated by noble lords who, they believe, skip up from Newmarket or Monte Carlo or some place of the kind where Peers are habitually supposed to dwell, and who come here only for the purpose of destroying those beneficent measures.
What is the real grievance against this House? I do not think it has been clearly pointed out in the debate yet. The real grievance against this House is not that it is unrepresentative—that is not really the grievance at all—but that it is not sufficiently Liberal. If it treated the legislation of both sides equally we should hear nothing whatever about the unrepresentative character of this House, and the Radical Party would be content to put up with whoever the members of this House were, provided they did their bidding. I remember in the debate which took place three years ago that the noble Earl the Leader of this House, when we were discussing the question of excluding unworthy members, members who have been described as "black sheep," explained that the colour of the sheep did not worry him at all. He did not mind what the colour of the sheep was, but what he objected to was their gregarious habits. In other words, the noble Earl and his friends apparently do not care much who the people are who constitute this House provided they will vote with them. Here is where the difficulty of the reformer comes in, and it lies at the root of the question. What you want to do, when all is said and done, is to convey not only an appearance but a character of impartiality, and that is the aim to which the efforts of all reformers are directed.
Up to a certain point there is very little difficulty in coming to an agreement. I

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hink I am justified in assuming that every one, or practically every one with the exception of the noble and learned Earl below me (Lord Halsbury), will accept the proposition that the hereditary principle must be modified. Everybody, I suspect, will also agree that the hereditary principle is to be retained in some shape or other. They will also agree that a number—I do not know whether a large number or not, but a certain number—of persons will have to go; and, of course, the persons who will be pricked upon on paper as having to go will be the 250 Peers who during the course of last session attended here fewer than ten times. All this looks very well upon paper, but, as I shall show presently, it is not quite clear that you will be able to get rid of these undesirable people. I think I may go further and say that the methods by which it is proposed to carry out this winnowing or sifting process, that of qualification and of election from inside this House, are also approved in principle. As I am on that point, I should like to be allowed to express my strong preference for the former system. I believe that every noble Lord who took part in the electoral campaign must have found when he was defending the House of Lords that the argument which was applied with the greatest force and met with the most approval from audiences was that nobody should sit here unless he had done something to deserve his seat. When we were discussing the Budget last year the noble Earl upon the Cross Benches, Lord Rosebery, made a proposal that 150 people should be delegated to represent the majority in this House, and I have often been rather curious in my own mind as to how that suggestion would have been carried out if it had been adopted. Whatever people may say, I expect everybody in his heart considers he is just as good as anybody else. I know, speaking for myself, that I should certainly have voted for myself as one of the noble Earl's nominees, and I venture to say that every backwoodsman who bad come up on the occasion would have voted for himself and have got, so to speak, his political money's worth.
If we are going to embark upon the principle of election these difficulties will occur. There will, first of all, be extreme difficulty in carrying out the election. It is proposed that the Peers should be elected upon the minority system, therefore everybody would have, let us say, 200 votes. If 200 persons were to be elected, the prospect of
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200 backwoodsmen armed with 200 votes apiece might produce some rather remarkable results. Does it follow, as is confidently assumed, that if this plan were adopted—and I have no doubt it will be adopted because it is the best compromise that has been suggested—that the best men would be elected? The best men are not necessarily the most popular men in an Assembly. Very often the most useful are the most boring members of an Assembly. What really would happen, of course, everybody knows perfectly well. It would be that the election would ultimately fall into the hands of the Whips. For myself, I have the most profound distrust of Whips—in their official and not in their personal capacity. What is the object of the Whip? The object and the duty of a Whip is, I take it, to provide gentlemen who will come here when they are wanted, and perhaps, what is more important still, who will keep away when they are not wanted. A Whip does not want people to come here and talk about all sorts of awkward subjects and put the Front Benches in a hole. The result will be that the election will fall into the hands of the Whips, and anybody who shows traces or originality and is likely to cause trouble will be scrupulously left out. They will concentrate their energies on obtaining a docile body of men who can be counted upon to go anywhere and do anything at the command of the Government of the day.
A short time ago these proposals to sift this House by a system of qualification and by a system of inter-election, added to the principle of making life Peers, would have been considered not only adequate but almost revolutionary. Now I gather it is looked upon merely in the light of a friendly family arrangement. It is very curious what a remarkable effect the election experiences have had upon many members of this House. Considering that the Election resulted in the drawn battle, it can hardly be said to justify, logically, the extreme kind of reform which has been proposed by some people. Take, for instance, the question of election from outside. When I was a member of the Committee of which I have spoken I own to having voted against this proposal, but I have become a convert since. It appears to me that what was good enough two years ago is not good enough now. For my part, I am entirely in agreement with the noble Earl on the Cross Benches with regard to this question. What I think has been borne in upon those noble

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Lords who took part in the recent Election is that the present state of things is indefensible in theory, that you cannot defend it in principle, and that, therefore, you can hardly represent it to the voters as being tenable in practice. There is one tangible thing which you certainly cannot recommend, and that is the absolutely hopeless and almost futile position in which noble Lords opposite are placed in the House by reason of the small and permanent minority which they represent.
While I entertain the idea that reform should proceed, if possible, on historic lines so as not to make too great a breach with the past, I have come to the conclusion that an elective element will have to be provided as well if we are going to retain the confidence of the democracy and of the country. What I feel strongly is that it is no good making a sort of half-hearted sacrifice at the present time. I do not think it would be the slightest use to throw 100 or 200 "backwoodsmen" to the democratic wolves. There would not be much self-sacrifice involved in that. Besides it does not even follow that you would get rid of them. Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret. You might expel the backwoodsman by the front door, but he might reappear down the chimney or through the window. I would like to urge—and I urge it with great respect upon noble Lords—that the time has come when we really must show that we are prepared to make a substantial sacrifice. Hitherto we have not been called upon to sacrifice much beyond our convictions. We are now going to be called upon to sacrifice our privileges, and as far as I am concerned one of the privileges which I valued most highly has already been taken away because we no longer enjoy that immunity from taking part in contested elections which I always estimated to be one of the great advantages of being a member of this House.
I apologise for having detained the House. What I desire to say in conclusion is this. If the changes proposed by the noble Earl take place this House will certainly be a much less agreeable place than it is at the present moment. It will probably be filled with a large number of assertive and self-satisfied persons who will completely alter the tone of this Assembly, and honestly in my own mind I greatly doubt whether its real efficiency will be much improved. I
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entertain a very strong suspicion amounting almost to a certainty, that the decisions which a reformed House of Lords will arrive at will be precisely the decisions that are arrived at in the present day. But at all events we shall, if these changes are carried out, speak with an authority which we do not possess at the present moment; and instead of constituting what I am afraid is a somewhat frail barrier I think we shall form a solid and substantial defence against those dangers which threaten not only the Constitution but the liberties of this country.
THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND: My Lords, my noble friend on my left is a difficult man to follow, because he is possessed of a wit to which I can lay no claim. But he has dealt, I think, rather with the question of what shape any reform of this House should take than with the main question which was submitted to us by the noble Earl on the Cross Benches—namely, the desirability of reform and the reason why reform is necessary. It struck me very much that in the whole course of this debate, until the noble Marquess on the Front Benches rose to-night, scarcely anything was said about what I believe to be one of the main reasons why some change in the constitution of this House is necessary, and that is the condition of the Lower House. It has been the custom until lately of one House to speak of the other with respect, and with a certain amount of restraint. I cannot say that that good custom has been of late altogether preserved in another place, or by those who belong to another place. The noble Earl the Leader of the House told us the other day that there was something very like a state of war existing between the two Houses. I do not know whether the noble Earl quite appreciated the gravity of that statement. We have heard it more than once referred to. The only time in the history of this country when there was war between the two Houses, what were the consequences? I will not further refer to that, but I must remark that you cannot have a war of this kind fought in gloves, and it will be necessary, if this war is to be fought, that we should speak plainly. I desire for one moment to call attention to the state of the House of Commons. The noble Lord, Lord Sheffield, told us just now that he did not see any change in the House of Commons in his experience. He did not tell us why. He did not give any facts to show that the

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House of the present day is similar to the House of the old days.
LORD SHEFFIELD: I did not say that. I said I did not think it had deteriorated.
THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND: The noble Lord did not give us any facts to show that it had not deteriorated. The only reply of the noble Lord was that easy argument which is, perhaps, one of the comforts of the period of life to which he and I have arrived—to say we remember times before the speaker and that we have an experience which the speaker has not got. I was in the House of Commons for a good many years; I am not quite sure whether I was there before Lord Sheffield, but certainly I was with him a good many years, and I am quite astounded that he should say that the House of Commons has not deteriorated since those days. The real truth is that the House of Commons has deteriorated steadily ever since the Reform Bill of 1867, and it has deteriorated with still more celerity since the Reform Bill of 1884. I do not speak merely of the manners of the House; that is no affair of ours; but I speak of the powers of the House and of the way it transacts its business, and of its independence. When I first entered the House of Commons private Members could speak when they liked; they could bring forward Resolutions necessary for discussion, and many of them forced Bills through the House. There are many important measures on the Statute Book which bear the names of private Members who forced those Bills through the House.
Now, what is the condition of the present House of Commons? I will not describe it in my own words, because I might be prejudiced. I will take the words of Professor McKechnie, who published a book on the question of the reform of the House of Lords a short time ago, and who is, I may inform the House, lecturer on Constitutional History in Glasgow. Speaking of the functions of this House to check hasty legislation, he says—
"That such a function is at times useful and necessary hardly admits of doubt. The exact direction of its usefulness has, however, somewhat changed in recent years in consequence of the encroachments made by the modern Cabinet on the independence of the House of Commons. The House of Lords, which once stood guard over the action of a too powerful House of Commons, now stands guard over a too powerful Cabinet. In
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these days of inflexible Party organisation, enforced by threats of Dissolution and by the habitual use of such expedients as the guillotine, it is the Ministry of the day, not the Lower Chamber of the Legislature, which threatens to become omnipotent. The House of Lords is the only barrier, a frail one it may be, that offers resistance to the supremacy of the Cabinet unrestrained and uncontrolled."
Does the noble Lord tell me that that was the case when he and I entered first the House of Commons?
But I confess that this statement requires some modification. It can hardly be said that the supremacy of the present Cabinet is unrestrained and uncontrolled, but the fact that the Cabinet is at the present moment under the lash of Mr. Redmond does not make the matter any better from a constitutional point of view. The events of the last few months have shown that it is possible for the House of Commons, which ordinarily speaking is under the power of the Cabinet, to become, in certain circumstances, under the power of absolutely irresponsible members of Parliament who can fetter its freedom. That is a state of things which I think necessitates some change in the general constitution of Parliament, and when I say of Parliament I mean of both Houses. The only remedy that noble Lords opposite have to suggest is to emasculate this House, to weaken it altogether. If the House will allow me, I will quote again from the author to whom I referred just now. I make these quotations because I think it desirable that we should know what thoughtful, trained intellects, what men whose minds have been given to this Constitutional question, think of the situation, quite apart from the turmoil of politics or any interest that any one of us may be supposed to have. By the way, we do not know what the proposal of the Government is, but it is to weaken the House in some way, and we will assume, for the sake of argument, that it is the Resolution foreshadowed by the late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. Mr. McKechnie says of it—
"It would leave the House of Lords unreformed in the enjoyment of its purely ornamental and ancient privileges, but deprived of all legislative power. The Commons, after tolerating for a few months the futile criticisms of the Lords, would be empowered to ignore the existence of the Second Chamber and would proceed to pass Statutes on their own authority like the Ordinances of the Long Parliament in the Civil War."
I cannot believe that noble Lords opposite, or the Government, seriously mean to put

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before the country such a proposition as that.
What is going to be the position of men whom they delight to honour and whom we are all glad to see honoured? I will take an instance in the late Home Secretary. The late Home Secretary bears an honoured name. He is the son of a very distinguished father, so distinguished that if a Peerage had been conferred upon him simply because of his father's services and not of his own merits it would have been only following a precedent which has often been followed in former years. But he has himself held high office, he has been for a great number of years in Parliament serving his country, and he has just been chosen for a high post abroad. The reward you give that right hon. gentleman for his services is a Peerage which will land him, when he comes back to this country, in a House whose duties would be merely ornamental; he will have no functions of any sort or kind worthy the name, and he will be utterly debarred by the fact of being in this House from ever serving his country as a member of the other House. I cannot believe that any man who has performed such services as these will expect such a degradation as that implies. I cannot believe that any Cabinet or any Government would offer to one of their own trusted colleagues a position which means utter disfranchisement, because I have heard Scotch Peers pitied on account of their not being able to get a seat in the Lower House, and they are the only individuals in the country who are utterly disfranchised. You are going to reduce the right hon. gentleman I have named to practically the same position. All one can say is that this is a curious proceeding on the part of the Government. It is a curious idea they have of solving their difficulties, and it reminds me of nothing so much as the account of the Red Queen in "Alice in Wonderland," who went about saying "off with his head" to every difficulty that confronted her. They are going to the House of Lords saying "Off with his head," and that is all they have to say regarding the problem which faces them, and a grave problem we know it is.
I want to say a word upon what I believe to be the real necessity for reforming this House—the defects which are supposed to exist in this House. I do not wish to set out my own imagination, but the
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opinion of one outside. There is an article this month in the Fortnightly Review, which lays down, I think very clearly, what is supposed to be the view of the outside public, on what the writer evidently supposes are the faults of this House. One obvious blot in the position of this House is said to be the indiscriminate application of heredity. That is the very proposition which the noble Earl on the Cross Benches has laid before your Lordships, but I must make one remark with regard to it. I am entirely in favour of some change in that respect. I should not like it to go to the country that we believe in the existence of certain members of this House whom I will call "undesirables." I do not mean to use this word in the least offensively; I use the word for shortness. But I should like further to say I can conceive many reasons which a member of this House may have for not attending which are positively worthy and admirable. A man's private affairs may be such as to make him think quite properly that he is the only man who can direct them, and he may think it more important that he should be in attendance upon his own affairs than that he should be one of a large body of this kind. As I say, I do not use the word "undesirables" in an offensive sense. But he is a man who is, as far as Legislation is concerned, undesirable because he cannot attend to it. Can any noble Lord give me two instances in which the votes of what I call the "undesirables" have ever determined one of your Lordships' decisions? I do remember one. It was on the Deceased Wife's Sister Bill, not, of course, the last time it was in the House, because it was passed then by the deliberate intention of the regular attendants of this House. But I speak of former years. I remember one occasion when the Second Reading was passed by, I think, ten votes, when I did see a great number of persons in the House whom I had never seen before. But even then it did not secure the passing of the measure, and for this reason, that there is no staying power in these "undesirables." You cannot get them up the second time. You can whip them up on one occasion, but you can never get them twice, and ever since I have had the honour of being a member of this House I do not remember any decision of your Lordships being carried by the votes of the "undesirables." All those decisions in which the "undesirables" have figured would have been

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the same if they had not been there. True, I think that this is enormously exaggerated.
The second objection is as to political partizanship. We all regret that, but on a former occasion I had the honour of asking who it was who spoiled the proportions of this House. I can remember the time, as can many noble Lords, when this House was fairly equally divided, and when there was no complaint of a preponderance of Conservative votes. But the Party opposite adopted the most unstates-manlike act that had ever been perpetrated by a Party in the acceptance of Home Rule. They revolted the feeling of the whole country. They revolted the feeling of this House and this House showed that it accurately represented the feeling of the country by throwing out that Bill by a large majority. From that moment the balance of the House has changed. Why has it changed? Because, speaking with reference to a period of twenty or thirty years, the balance of the country has changed. There are those who talk as though the country were Radical. How many years in the last twenty has a Radical Government had a majority in this country? Why, they have not got one, except of a very adventitious kind, even now. They have not been able to keep their majority such as it was for four years! The real truth of the matter is that this Home Rule Bill has been a weight around the necks of the Radical Party ever since it was first proposed, and the whole feeling of the country has, in consequence, been on our side of the House. The preponderance of the House of Lords is really the deliberate preponderance—not, I admit, the transient preponderance that we saw four years ago, but the deliberate preponderance—of the feeling of the country. But, my Lords, alter it by all means. I wish very much that we could see some change in the proportion of the two Parties in this House. Let me say, however, that I cannot congratulate the Party opposite on their efforts to improve matters.
There is another objection, and that is the enormous character of this House; the objection that we are too large a body. Well, the Government has added some thirty odd new Peers since it came into office. That is the Government's remedy for an overcrowded House. And those noble Lords are, I have no doubt, possessed
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of all the talents and the experience which fit them to be members of this House. We have welcomed them gladly, but I cannot say that they have added much to the strength of their Party in debate. We have waited for the support which this large contingent was to have afforded the minority in this House. I am afraid, however, that the Government's efforts in making this addition of a large number of Peers have not been calculated to redress, even in a small degree, the disproportion which exists in the fighting power and the debating power of this House.
There is one other charge that is made against this House, and that is its aloofness from public opinion. That, again, my Lords, I greatly doubt. I have already shown how in the case of the Home Rule Bill there was no aloofness from the opinion of the country on the part of this House. In these days members of Parliament very much more frequently than used to be the case have no connection whatever with the constituencies they represent. They are what are called in vulgar language "carpet-baggers," and I doubt whether these gentlemen do know very much about the feeling of the country. I doubt extremely whether they know very much about the feeling of their constituents, and, were it necessary, I think I could give reasons from my own experience for having that belief. I think your Lordships who live amongst your own people and have done so all your lives, who constantly mix with them, have a much better knowledge of their ideas and opinions than many of these "carpet-bagging" members of Parliament who profess their knowledge of the feelings of the people.
I have only one other observation to make with regard to the defects of this House. There is one very gross defect in the eyes of the people, a defect which makes this House very unpopular in certain quarters. It is the fact that when the Law Lords sit in this House and adjudicate upon the most intricate legal questions they are referred to as "the House of Lords." I have been quite amazed at the belief held on this subject by the public. In regard to such questions as the Taff Vale dispute and the property of the Free Church in Scotland, questions of the greatest intricacy, it was the belief that we laymen, sitting in this House, had decided those very difficult and intricate questions. The sooner we

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disabuse the public mind of that the better. But we go back to where we started. These are defects which do not really touch the efficiency of this House. They are defects which touch it in one sense, no doubt. They touch it indirectly because they are supposed to affect the House and its ability to perform its functions very much more than they really do. By all means let us address ourselves in an intelligent manner to removing all misunderstandings between this House and the country. Let us remove every excuse—and I believe it can easily be done—for supposing that this House is not as fully able to perform its duties as we really know it to be. If that is done, I cannot help thinking that we shall strengthen the Constitution. I cannot help thinking that even some of those who sit on the opposite Benches, and who now, with a light heart, are supporting a Government which wishes to tear up the old Constitution of England and to destroy some of its main features, will be very grateful when they are saved from the intolerable tyranny which any single-Chamber system would impose upon them, and the intolerable tyranny of that which would most certainly follow, as it has always followed, on an unfettered democracy—the strong personal tyranny of one individual man.
LORD STANMORE*LORD STANMORE had given notice to move, as an Amendment, to omit from the Motion the words "Second Chamber" ["so as to constitute a strong and efficient Second Chamber"] and to insert the words "Upper House of Parliament." The noble Lord said: My Lords, this Amendment is not proposed in any spirit of hostility to the Motion for going into Committee which has been moved by the noble Earl. On the contrary, so far from being moved in any spirit of hostility its object is to obtain for that Motion votes, which otherwise in many cases possibly, and in some cases certainly, would be given against it. Unless some such modification of language as that which I have proposed is adopted, there are those who would otherwise gladly vote for the Motion who will have to withhold their support. There are those who think, as I do, that the language of a formal Resolution of this House is a subject of the gravest importance, and that it should be couched in terms strictly and technically correct.
There are, no doubt, some who will say that if the general sense of the Resolution is understood exact accuracy of nomenclature
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is of no importance. From that opinion I beg leave to differ. It matters very little what others call us, but it matters a great deal what we, in a formal Resolution, call ourselves. In those days of unceasing hurry, constant movement, and perpetual platform talk, there is hardly time for men in public life seriously to think, still less is there time for them to read, and therefore I am not surprised that some noble Lords should have learned little from the lessons of the past. But the noble Earl who moved the Resolution is not one of these. As a diligent student of history, he is well aware how important a part words and names have played and must play whether rightly applied or misapplied, and how they have affected events in great crises. We have an instance before us just now of the way in which words which are inaccurate can, by process of usage, be generally adopted, and practically make the older and more correct designations mean what they do not mean. In the last few months we have heard a great deal about the Veto of the House of Lords, as if there was such a thing. There really is not anything of the kind; but, from repetition, it is becoming the fact that this word "Veto" is being used to signify the concurrent legislative power of the House of Lords, which is going to be utterly obscured under this inaccurate label. That is an illustration of what I mean as to the use of words which are inaccurate often being of importance.
The words which I propose to omit from the Resolution are distinctly inaccurate, ambiguous, and misleading. They are inaccurate in relation to the present position of the House of Lords. It is quite true that in common parlance, in ordinary familiar language, we talk of the House of Lords as a Second Chamber, In a broad, general sense so it is: but that term is not strictly or formally accurate. It is not the case that we are a Second Chamber only. This House has the same power of initiation as the other, and although no doubt, generally speaking, the measures we have to consider here have been first considered and passed by another body, that is by no means invariably the case. Every session numbers of Bills—obscure, if you will, but most useful Bills—are brought in first in this House. We read a second time a score of them a few days ago, and last year one of the most important Acts of the year—the India Councils Act—passed through this House before it went to the House of Com-

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mons. It is not correct to describe this House as it now exists as a "Second Chamber," and, when you apply that term to the Chamber which you are proposing to constitute, it is ambiguous, and, I think, misleading.
The words of the Resolution are that we go into Committee to consider, among other things, the construction of an "efficient Second Chamber." In the ordinary plain sense those words mean that we are asked to constitute a Chamber which is to be a Second Chamber and a Second Chamber only—a Chamber which will merely have the power of considering measures sent to it from another place; a Chamber which will have no active initiative of its own. That power of initiative I believe all your Lordships would be most unwilling to part with. Therefore I say that strictly and in technical language to speak of this House as a Second Chamber is inaccurate. In regard to formal Resolutions which, if passed, are placed on the records of this House, we ought to take care to confine ourselves to language which is strictly accurate and precise. Let me point out that if the words "Second Chamber" were placed in any formal Motion or document they would be so used for the first time. Therefore I venture to propose that instead of words which are unprecedented, inaccurate, ambiguous, and misleading, we should substitute words which are well known and have been formally authorised, viz., "the Upper House of Parliament." I cannot conceive why any one should have any objection to that change. We know from what the noble Earl on the Cross Benches has said that it is not his intention to propose anything like a Second Chamber which shall be a Second Chamber only. We know that his purpose is to propose a real and a strengthened Upper House of Parliament. Then why not use words which will conciliate those who, with the present wording, feel themselves, however reluctantly, unable to support the Motion. Depend upon it, if the House by a formal Resolution determines to consider the construction of a "Second Chamber." it will be pressed on us from without that we have of our own accord voluntarily surrendered all claim to initiate measures in Parliament.
I refrain from any comment on the constructive proposals that have been before us. Whether this is a good time to bring them forward or not is a matter of opinion, but I hope that in discussing this Motion to go into Committee we shall confine ourselves to the general principles laid down, and that we shall not attempt at present to go into details which are sure to create innumerable difficulties and give rise to an enormous diversity of opinion, which will be ruinous to the real success of the great principles which we hope to lay down in the Resolutions which the noble Earl has outlined. I cannot conceive that the noble Earl himself would have any objection to the substitution of the words I have proposed. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
To leave out the words "Second Chamber" and to insert the words "Upper House of Parliament."—(Lord Stanmore.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOE: According to the rule this Amendment ought to be disposed of now.
LORD STANMORE: The noble Earl who moved the Motion is absent, and from what he said to me before he left the House I rather believed he was going to agree with it.
THE EARL OF GALLOWAY: I was talking with the noble Earl before he brought forward these Resolutions, and he told me himself he did not mind what the name was, so that certainly he has no objection to the Amendment.
LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON: I move the adjournment of the debate.
Moved, That the debate be adjourned—(Lord Curzon of Kedleston.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Debate adjourned accordingly till Tomorrow.
House adjourned at half-past Seven o'clock, till To-morrow, a quarter past Four o'clock.