Sitting of 22 February 1911

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Metropolitan Railway Bill (by Order),
London Electric Railway Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till To-morrow.
Irvine Burgh Order Confirmation Bill,
Paisley Corporation Order Confirmation Bill,
Ayrshire (Loch Bradan) Water Distribution Order Confirmation Bill,
Read the third time, and passed.

AGRICULTURAL PRICES (IRELAND).
Return Ordered, "Showing, as far as practicable, for Ireland as a whole, (1) the annual average prices for each year 1881–1909; (2) the annual average prices for each period comprised in the period 1881 to 1909 of five years, ten years, fifteen years, twenty years, and twenty-five years, and for the period of four years 1906 to 1909; such prices to be compiled from the Returns of Prices of crops, live stock, and other Irish Agricultural products heretofore published from time to time by the Irish Land Commission, or the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland, or from other information in the possession of those departments."—[Mr. Newman.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Naval Construction Abroad.
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, if he would state on what dates the battleships "Texas" and "New York" were laid down for the United States; the "Jean Bart" and "Courbet" for France; and when it was anticipated they would be commissioned?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): According to our informa-
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  tion, the "Texas and "New York" are not yet laid down, and the dates of their completion are not known. The "Jean Bart" was laid down on the 10th November, 1910, and the "Courbet" on the 1st September, 1910. Both ships are to be ready for commissioning on the 1st August, 1913.

  Construction of Destroyers (Basilisk type).
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked whether there has been any delay in the construction and completion of the destroyers of the Basilisk type?
  Mr. McKENNA: Of the sixteen destroyers of the "Beagle" class, eleven were delivered before the contract date, and three on or within a few days of the contract date. One, the "Racoon," was delivered six weeks late, and one, the "Nautilus," met with an accident and is at present five months overdue.
  Mr. BURGOYNE: Does the right hon. Gentleman propose to put into operation the penal clause in regard to the date of the contract?
  Mr. McKENNA: In the case of the "Nautilus," it was an accident. Of course, the point will be carefully examined.

  Submarine Construction (Cost).
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked the total cost of the most recently completed submarine built in Chatham Dockyard, and the total cost of a similar vessel built by contract?
  Mr. McKENNA: It is difficult, if not impossible, to make up the total cost of a vessel built in a dockyard, including a proper allowance for establishment charges, in such a way as to give a basis for an exact comparison with the cost of a similar vessel built by contract. Moreover, in the special case of submarines, the contractors have carried out many experiments at their own expense, and have also supplied the dockyard with the working machinery drawings. These considerations must be borne in mind in drawing any conclusion from the fact that in the dockyard accounts the latest submarine completed at Chatham is returned as having cost £40,270, while the latest vessel of the same type built by contract cost £49,549.

  Cruiser "Chatham" (Turbines).
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked if he will state the means of propulsion of the cruiser "Chatham," on the stocks at the dock-

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  yard of that name; and the number of propeller shafts with which she is to be fitted?
  Mr McKENNA: The main propelling machinery in H.M.S. "Chatham" will be Parsons turbines arranged on four shafts.

  Destroyers (Tribal Class).
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked whether there have been any complaints regarding the sea-worthiness and steadiness in a sea-way of the ocean-going destroyers known as the Tribal class; and, if so, whether steps are being taken to remedy the disadvantages arising therefrom?
  Mr. McKENNA: With a single exception, which has since been remedied, the official trials regarding the sea-worthiness and strength of all the vessels of the Tribal class have been carried out satisfactorily.

  "Royal Sovereign" type of Battleships.
  Mr. BURGOYNEasked whether the eight battleships of the "Royal Sovereign" type, the "Nile," and "Trafalgar," were still considered in official estimates of relative international naval strength?
  Mr. McKENNA: These ships must be taken into account in some sense until they are sold, or their armaments surrendered; but the Admiralty has no desire to exaggerate their fighting value.

  Royal Dockyard Wages.
  Mr. FALLEasked if there is any intention of altering the hours or the wages of the joiners and others in his Majesty's dockyards?
  Mr. McKENNA: The rates of wages are the subject of petitions which have been received from the joiners and other classes of workmen in his Majesty's dockyards. The petitions are at present under consideration and no statement can yet be made as to the decisions that may be arrived at. With regard to hours, the reply is in the negative.
  Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: When may we expect to have the answer?
  Mr. McKENNA: I will inquire.

  Warships (Punishment).
  Mr. BYLESasked whether the First Lord of the Admiralty is aware that he told the House of Commons on 20th September, 1909, that nearly 1,000 young seamen annually were subjected to the punishment of the cane; whether there had been any reduction in the number
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  since that time; whether the difficulty of giving a Return of the number of canings, in the Navy could be surmounted, and records required of every such punishment in such a form as would enable his department to grant the Return which had been repeatedly asked for.
  Mr. McKENNA: The documents from which the desired Return could be prepared are designed for a purpose wholly different from the compilation of statistics of this kind, and the amount of clerical labour involved in collecting the figures would be considerable, but I shall be happy in the course of the next few days-to furnish my hon. Friend with approximate figures as was done on the former occasion referred to.
  Mr. BYLES: Am I to understand that the right hon. Gentleman is not able to say there has been a reduction in the-number since the last report, or whether any record could be kept which would enable the public to know the number of canings?
  Mr. McKENNA: As I have told my hon. Friend, in the course of a few days I hope to give him the comparative figures with those already furnished, and in that way they could be compared. I doubt whether the additional information, or exact record, would be worth the additional trouble.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Has the right hon. Gentleman considered at all the expediency of making an exact Return of the canings, having regard to the fact that these-canings are inflicted by the rich on the-sons of the poor, and the rich are not caned?
  Mr. BYLES: Is it the view of the Admiralty that these young seamen are not amenable to any other kind of influence than that of physical pain?
  Mr. McKENNA: Oh, no; I think my hon. Friend will find that the number of cases is not so large as to leave an impression that it is a very customary form of punishment.
  Mr. MacNEILL: But why are the poor boys and not the rich boys caned? Why are not the midshipmen caned too?
  Mr. McKENNA: I have always understood that on board ship the midshipmen do not go without a certain amount of punishment inflicted by their fellow officers.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Is that a justification?

  Commissioned Warships (Officers and Men).
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked what is the average number of officers and men required to fully man the commissioned ships of war in the whole British Navy?
  Mr. McKENNA: The manning requirements of the Navy are governed by the total complements of ships that would be maintained in commission in war, and the numbers voted annually by Parliament are determined by the average number of officers and men so required.
  Mr. JOHN WARD: Can the right hon. Gentleman give a single figure or indication of the number required?
  Mr. McKENNA: I think I have not made myself quite clear to my hon. Friend. I did not gather from his question whether he wishes to know the number of ships which would be fully commissioned in war or which are now commissioned in peace. He has not put that point to me. I have pointed out to him that the number of men we have on Vote A at any moment is governed by the number of men required in war. I do not suppose that the hon. Member wishes me to give the number of ships that we shall have in war.

  Rosyth Dockyard (Magazine and Ammunition Factories).
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked whether the Admiralty are contemplating advertising for tenders for the construction of magazines and ammunition factories on the site of the naval base at Rosyth; and, if so, whether such contracts will include the new Fair-Wage Clause as decided by resolution of the House of Commons?
  Mr McKENNA: A tender is about to be accepted for the works in question, which are not at Rosyth, but at Crombie. The contract will include the new Fair-Wages Clause.

  Contraband of War.
  Mr. BUTCHERasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in how many cases, if any, in the year 1885 France exercised the alleged right of treating rice as absolute contraband of war; in how many cases, if any, in that year ships of war belonging to the Government of France captured and seized neutral vessels carrying rice to Chinese ports north of Canton; and whether any of such cases were adjudicated upon in a prize court, and with what result?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. McKinnon Wood): Parliamentary Paper, France No. 1, 1885, C. 4359, includes the correspondence which took place at the time between the British and French Governments respecting the rights of neutrals, and was laid in 1885. At the request of the right hon. Member for East Worcestershire, and for the convenience of Members, I propose to lay a paper containing the correspondence on the special point referred to by the hon. and learned Member. I do not think that any case arose in the French Courts, for during the remainder of the war no seizure appears to have been made. It is stated by Mr. Hall in his book on International Law (6th edition, page 659), that shipments of rice appear to have been entirely stopped by fear of capture. The only case of a British ship reported to the Foreign Office was that of the "Amoy," whose owners appear to have postponed the vessel's departure from Shanghai in order to discharge the 5,000 bags of rice which she had shipped. It seems, therefore, that no seizures were made because the threat stopped shipments.
  Mr. BUTCHER: May I ask whether there is any case in the last ten years in which a neutral ship carrying food has been dealt with in a Prize Court on the ground that the food was absolute contraband of war?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: If the hon. Member will give me notice of the question I shall be glad to give him information.
  Mr. BUTCHER: What are the grounds of Mr. Hall's statement to which he has referred?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: I cannot tell you what the grounds of his statement are. Mr. Hall is a reputable writer and I suppose he was informed as to the facts.
  Mr. BUTCHERrose——
  Mr. SPEAKER: A question on international law had better be placed upon the Paper.

  North-Eastern Railway Company (Electric Train Service).
  Mr. HERBERT CRAIGasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention had been called to the type of passenger coach employed by the North Eastern Railway Company on their electric train service on the Tynemouth branch;

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  whether he was aware that on these coaches, which are unattended by servants of the company, the only exit is by means of hinged doors opening inwards into a vestibule which is frequently so crowded with standing passengers that the door cannot be opened or easily reached by persons wishing to alight; and whether, in view of recent railway accidents at home and abroad, where many casualties have been caused through the' inability of passengers to escape from wrecked carriages of a similar type, he will cause inquiry to be made by Board of Trade experts as to the suitability of rolling stock of this character for suburban passenger service?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Buxton): I have communicated with the Railway Company on the subject of my hon. Friend's question and have received a reply of which I am forwarding him a copy.

  Labour Exchange (Athlone).
  Sir WALTER NUGENTasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that a branch of the labour exchange is urgently required in Athlone, county Westmeath, which is the largest industrial centre in the Midlands of Ireland; and when he expects to be able to establish one in that place?
  Mr. BUXTON: Steps are now being taken to secure suitable premises for a Labour Exchange in Athlone, but I am not yet able to say when the premises are likely to be ready.
  Mr. MOORE: Can the right hon. Gentleman state what is the population of Athlone?
  Mr. BUXTON: I am afraid not offhand.

  International Exhibition of Hygiene, Dresden.
  Mr. BYLESasked the President of the Board of Trade upon what grounds the promoters of the British exhibit at the forthcoming International Exhibition of Hygiene at Dresden were refused by his Department the grant which they asked for, although similar assistance had been, given to the exhibition in Turin; and whether such discrimination has been interpreted in any quarter as a slight upon the German nation?
  Mr. BUXTON: At the time when this country was invited to take part in the Dresden Hygiene Exhibition, the Board of Trade had already entered into engage-
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  ments to organise official British sections at International Exhibitions at Brussels, Buenos Aires, and Vienna in 1910, and at Rome and Turin in 1911. In these circumstances and in view of the exacting demands made upon British manufacturers by too frequent participation in International Exhibitions the Board of Trade felt unable to undertake, or to give official support to, the organisation of an exhibit of commercial products at the Dresden Exhibition of Hygiene. I have, however, expressed to the organisers of the Exhibition in London the cordial interest which His Majesty's Government take in the Scientific side of this undertaking. I am convinced that no fair-minded person can possibly have construed the action of His Majesty's Government in the manner suggested in the last part of the question.

  Trade Boards (Scotland).
  Mr. WATTasked the President of the Board of Trade whether separate trade boards have been set up in Ireland under The Trade Boards Act, 1909, to deal with Irish industries; and whether he will adopt the same practice with regard to Scotland?
  Mr. BUXTON: In accordance with the provisions of Section 2 (1) of the Trade Boards Act separate Trade Boards are being established in Ireland for paper box making and ready-made wholesale bespoke tailoring. The Act contains no similar provision with regard to Scotland, and after careful consideration, and after consultation with persons affected, it has been deemed undesirable to set up distinct boards for Scotland in the case of those trades for which Trade Boards have been established.
  Mr. WATTasked how many representatives Scotland has on the Trade Board appointed under the Trade Boards Act of 1909 to deal with the lace finishing trade; and if he will give the names of those appointed to represent the interests of that country?
  Mr. BUXTON: The first Trade Board that has been established in the lace trade is concerned with a branch of the trade which, so far as our information goes, is not carried on to any material extent in Scotland. There are consequently no Scottish representatives on this Board.
  Mr. WATT: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this trade is largely carried on in Ayrshire?
  Mr. BUXTON: If my hon. Friend will bring information to my notice I will give it attention. My information is that this particular branch is not carried on to any very large extent in Scotland.

  Port of London Dock (Men Employed).
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the President of the Board of Trade if he can state the total number of men employed in and about the docks and wharves of London; what number of these are permanently employed; the number casually employed; whether he has received any information as to the conditions now prevailing for calling upon men; and whether it is now the practice to call men for periods of employment lasting not more than one hour?
  Mr. BUXTON: In the Board of Trade Labour Gazette returns are given showing the daily number employed at all the docks, and 110 of the principal wharves. The average daily number in January was 14,384, but I am unable to say how many individuals are represented by this number. As regards the other points in the question, the information in my possession is not quite up-to-date, but I will take steps to supplement it, and will communicate the results to my hon. Friend.

  Railway Clearing House (Irish Traffic).
  Mr. LARDNERasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the through goods and parcels traffic from Ireland to England handled by the Great Western Railway and the Great Southern and Western Railway, viâ Fishguard, is cleared in the Railway Clearing House, London, although passenger receipts on these lines are dealt with in the Irish Railway Clearing House in Dublin; and whether, seeing that steamship companies are by Act of Parliament debarred from being members of the London Clearing House, whilst there is nothing to prevent them belonging to the Irish Railway Clearing House, he would take steps, by legislation or otherwise, to compel these companies and others following a similar practice to deal with this trans-Channel traffic from Ireland to England in the Irish Clearing House?
  Mr. BUXTON: The arrangements made among Railway Companies for clearing their traffic are not within the jurisdiction of the Board of Trade, and as at present advised I do not think I can usefully take any action in the matter.

  Wheat Cultivation.
  Mr. CHARLES BATHURSTasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture, whether, in view of the importance to English bakers of blending the flour of the hard and strong wheats grown in Manitoba and other Canadian provinces with that of English-grown wheats to produce the texture and quality of bread most liked in this country, the certain prospective drain upon the sources of supply of the former as the result of the reciprocity treaty between the United States and Canada, the non-production of flour possessing the same characteristics in other parts of the world, and the successful results of the experiments conducted by the Cambridge Department of Agriculture in breeding wheats combining the baking qualities of the best Canadian with the cropping qualities of the best British wheats, the Board will apply for a special grant out of the Development Fund in order, in the interests both of the producer and the consumer, to promote the production of a much larger quantity of seed wheat of the above newly-established breeds for use by British farmers than the resources of the Department render possible?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Sir Edward Strachey): The Board are fully aware of the importance of the subject to which the hon. Member refers, and in forming proposals for the consideration of the Development Commissioners, the Board have had in view the desirability of giving further assistance to the work now being done at Cambridge.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: Is not this purpose at least as important and as beneficial to farmers generaliy as the breeding of light horses?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: As I have already told the hon. Member we are considering the matter.

  Small Holdings (Kent).
  Mr. MORRELLasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether his attention had been called to the case of John Dean, a gardener of Strood, in Kent, who after applying for a small holding in the year 1908, and being then approved by the Kent County Council as a suitable applicant, was kept waiting for three years without any offer of land,

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  and was at last informed by the council that his application was rejected, no reason being given for this decision; and whether the Board have made any independent inquiry into the case?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The Board have been in correspondence with the county council as to this case, and they have instructed one of their inspectors to make further inquiry into the whole matter at once.
  Mr. MORRELL: Do I understand that the inspector will see this man personally and not merely inquire from the county council?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: If the hon. Member desires I will instruct the inspector to see the man.
  Mr. ROWLANDSasked whether several of the applicants for small holdings in the neighbourhood of Swanscombe, Kent, were approved more than two years ago; and whether up to the present the Kent County Council had submitted a scheme to the Board of Agriculture in order to supply these applicants with land?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative and to the second in the negative. It is right, however, that I should add that there are special difficulties to be overcome in the locality owing to the fact that most of the farms are let on lease, and that the valuations would be heavy. The county council have, however, been offered a farm which will be to let before long.

  Sugar Beet Growing.
  Mr. FELLasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture if he has the particulars of the results of the experimental growing of sugar beet during the past year in various counties in England, Scotland, and Ireland; and if he can state what was the average for each county of the tonnage of beet per acre and the percentage of the saccharine obtained from the juice?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I am sorry that I cannot supply the hon. Member with the particulars for which he asks. The experiments to which he refers were not conducted by the Board.
  Mr. FELL: May I ask if the Board is not going to obtain this information?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I do not quite see how they are to get it. Perhaps the hon.
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  Member will confer with me and make a suggestion.
  Mr. C. BATHURST: May I ask whether and when the Board is going to conduct experiments on their own account in the matter of growing sugar beet on a sufficiently large scale?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise out of the question.

  Bolton Post Office.
  Mr. GILLasked the hon. Member for Southampton as representing the First Commissioner for Works, if he is aware that it is now three years since the erection of the new post office for Bolton was promised; that the present premises are utterly inadequate to meet the growing needs of the town; and whether he intends to ask Parliament for sanction in his next Estimates to proceed with the erection of the new building without any further delay?
  The TREASURER of the HOUSEHOLD (Mr. Dudley Ward): The building programme for post offices is settled in consultation with the Treasury and the Postmaster General. The scope of this annual programme is limited by the sum which the Chancellor of the Exchequer is prepared to allow for the Service; and it has been decided that the case of Bolton, with others, must give way during the next financial year to the even more pressing needs of other places.

  House of Commons (Annunciators).
  Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONasked the hon. Member for Southampton, as representing the First Commissioner of Works, whether he would consider the advisability of placing a couple of annunciators in the tea and newspaper rooms respectively?
  Mr. DUDLEY WARD: The First Commissioner of Works is not convinced that the additional convenience that would be afforded by installing these annunciators would warrant the considerable expenditure involved.

  County Longford Magistracy.
  Mr. J. P. FARRELLasked the Attorney-General for Ireland whether he is aware that two vacancies now exist on the Edgeworthstown magisterial benches, both formerly held by Catholics; whether he is aware that an influentially signed requisition has recently been presented to

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  the Lord Chancellor, requesting him to appoint a local Catholic merchant and farmer to one of these vacancies; whether any steps are about to be taken to fill the vacancies; and, if so, will this gentleman's claim be considered?
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND (Mr. Redmond Barry): I am informed that one magistrate of the Edge-worthstown district died quite recently, and another ceased to be qualified, one it is believed a Catholic, and the other a Protestant. A memorial has been received by the Lord Chancellor in favour of the appointment of a gentleman who is a farmer living near Edgeworthstown, and it is under consideration.
  Mr. J. P. FARRELLasked if he will state the number of Catholic and Protestant gentlemen in County Longford recently appointed to the commission of the peace in that county; whether any and, if so, how many Catholic names submitted for appointment have been rejected by the Lord Chancellor; whether the names so rejected have been refused appointment at the instance of the Lieutenant of the County; and what steps the Government intend to take to equalise the balance on the bench, seeing that Longford County is 91 per cent. Catholic to 9 per cent. Protestant in population?
  Mr. REDMOND BARRY: During the last three years three gentlemen have been, as I am informed, appointed to the County Longford Magistracy. All three were recommended to the Lord Chancellor by the Lieutenant of the County, and of the three two are believed to be Catholics and one a Protestant. During the period mentioned the names of two other gentlemen were submitted to the Lord Chancellor. The names of these two gentlemen were not forwarded by the Lord Chancellor to the Lieutenant of the County. As to one of them the Lord Chancellor did not at the time consider his appointment desirable, and the case of the other is under the Lord Chancellor's consideration. The Lord Chancellor is always prepared to consider any steps that may be suggested with a view to rendering the County Magistracy as representative as possible of all sections.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Is not the Lord Lieutenant of this county, who practically, as my right hon. Friend knows, exercises a veto over these appointments, Lord Long-
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  ford, a very well-known Conservative Nobleman who was twice promoted by a Conservative Government?
  Mr. REDMOND BARRY: The answer shows that the matter was dealt with by the Lord Chancellor himself.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Are they not submitted by the Lord Chancellor to Lord Longford before the appointments are made?
  Mr. REDMOND BARRY was understood to say: It is in accordance with the immemorial practice.
  Mr. FARRELL: May I ask whether, in the case of the two names that were not submitted by the Lord Chancellor to the Lord Lieutenant of the County, it is now proposed by the Lord Chancellor to deal with those two names himself without reference to the Lord Lieutenant?
  Mr. REDMOND BARRY: I am not able to give particulars of the matter, but the Lord Chancellor must have some good reason for the judgment he came to with regard to one man.

  Road Improvements (Ireland).
  Mr. LARDNERasked the Secretary to the Treasury if he was aware that, although the Irish County Surveyors' Association had been requested to prepare a map for the purposes of the allocation of the Road Improvement Fund, the Road Board, without waiting for the surveyors' map, issued their own map; whether he was aware that dissatisfaction had been expressed by several of the county surveyors at the roads selected in their respective counties by the Road Board, mainly on the ground that the Road Board's scheme was devised for the convenience of tourists and that the representatives of several of the counties had intimated that they would not undertake the improvement of the roads on the Board's scheme if it entailed any extra cost on them; and whether he would take steps to arrange for an exchange of views between the representatives of the Road Board, the Irish county surveyors, and the county councils, at an early date and before any scheme for Ireland was finally determined on?
  Mr. PERCY ILLINGWORTH (Lord of the Treasury): Arrangements have been made for an exchange of views between the Road Board and representatives of

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  Irish county Councils and county surveyors before any scheme of road improvement in Ireland is finally determined upon.

  Stationery Office Contracts.
  Mr. JOWETTasked the Secretary to the Treasury if he was aware that contracts had recently been given by the Stationery Department to firms of manufacturers who do not close their factories on Saturday afternoons; and whether he would take steps to prevent Government work being done by such firms in the future?
  Mr. ILLINGWORTH: The question presumably refers to Contracts for the supply of paper. The National Union of Paper Mill Workers of Great Britain and Ireland recently wrote asking that the Stationery Office would confine its Contracts to manufacturers who shut down their mills from Saturday midday until Monday morning. As it appeared, however, that out of 200 paper mills only fifty-five conformed to the practice) and as these did not include the makers of several classes of papers required by the Stationery Office it was impossible to comply with the request of the Society.

  Secondary Schools (Free Places).
  Mr. GOLDSTONEasked the President of the Board of Education what was the total number of secondary schools in receipt of the higher grant of the Board which had been permitted to provide less than the usual 25 per cent. of free places; whether the circumstances under which the variation from the regulations was allowed were reviewed from time to time; and, if so, at what intervals the reconsideration was undertaken by the Board of Education?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Runciman): The normal requirement of 25 per cent. of free places has been reduced, in respect of the current school year, in 125 of the 909 schools in receipt of the higher grant in England and Wales. All cases where a reduction of the normal requirement has been made are reviewed from time to time but there is not a fixed interval common to all. Any change of the conditions under which the reduction of requirement was originally made, and any new circumstances arising subsequently, are taken in consideration as occasion requires.

  Telephone Service (Local Systems).
  Mr. FALLEasked the Postmaster-General if he could entertain the suggestion that municipalities might be allowed to purchase the telephone systems in each of its own towns, while the trunk lines should remain in the hands of the Post Office?
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Herbert Samuel): I regret that I am not at present in a position to make any statement on this point.

  Telephone System (Night Service).
  Mr. FALLEasked the Postmaster-General if he could give an assurance or an undertaking that those towns or cities which now, under the National Telephone Company, enjoyed a day and night service would, when the telephone system was taken over by the Post Office, continue to enjoy that privilege and advantage?
  Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: The places in question will, in general, continue to enjoy the facilities to which the hon. Member refers.

  Suicide of Boy, Little Addington, Northamptonshire.
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the President of the Local Government Board if his attention had been called to the suicide of a lad named William Lawman, aged seventeen, at Little Addington, in Northamptonshire, and the evidence given at the inquest, in which it was stated that the boy had been sent to work for a farmer with no agreement as to money wages, and that no provision appeared to have been made by the board of guardians for the care of the lad after leaving their charge; and whether he would inquire if it is the usual practice of this board of guardians to send lads to work for farmers under similar conditions, and if no steps are taken to see that the lads are properly cared for and brought up?
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Bums): I have seen a report of the inquest and am making inquiries into the matter.

  Coronation Holidays (Feeding of School Children).
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the President of the Local Government Board whether he was aware that many education authorities in the country were willing and anxious to feed necessitous school children during such periods that the schools were closed owing to holidays, but were

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  unable to do so owing to the fact that certain auditors had declared that payment out of the rates for food so supplied was illegal; and whether, under the circumstances, he would issue a circular informing local education authorities that expenditure out of the rates on the feeding of school children during school holidays would, if surcharged by the auditors, be authorised by the exercise of the powers he possessed and which he proposed to use for legalising illegal expenditure out of the rates on festivities in connection with the forthcoming Coronation?
  Mr. BURNS: I am aware that certain local education authorities have incurred expenditure on the feeding of school children during the holidays; but, as I stated in the House on 15th July, 1909, in reply to a question on the subject, I am advised that the authorities are not empowered to defray such expenditure. The question of extending the scope of the Education (Provision of Meals) Act, 1906, is not one for me but for Parliament to decide, and I do not consider that I could properly exercise the powers which I possess under the Local Authorities (Expenses) Act, 1887, in the manner suggested in this question.
  Mr. LANSBURY: Does the right hon. Gentleman's Department consider that it is more important to sanction illegal expenditure on festivities connected with the Coronation than to sanction expenditure for the feeding of hungry school children?

  Unemployment (Stoke-upon-Trent).
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked the President of the Local Government Board, whether he had received any request from the Corporation or Distress Committee of Stoke-upon-Trent for assistance from the Unemployed Grant to carry out schemes for the benefit of the unemployed within their area; and what action, if any, he had taken in the matter?
  Mr. BURNS: Four schemes of work were submitted to me by the Distress Committee of Stoke-upon-Trent, to be carried out partly by means of loans and partly by payments out of the Parliamentary Grant. A loan of £4,150 was sanctioned for recreation ground purposes in connection with one of these schemes, and a payment was made of £200, the amount asked for by the Distress Committee as a contribution from the Parliamentary Grant. As re-
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  gards the three other schemes, no application for sanction to loans has yet been received.

  Public Works and Engineering Bill.
  Mr. JOHN WARDasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he proposed to introduce a Public Works and Engineering Bill this Session?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Churchill): I hope to be able to proceed with this Bill, but in the present state of public business I am afraid I cannot fix any date for its introduction.

  Released Convict (David Davies).
  Mr. BUTCHERasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he would give the names of any persons who were alleged to entertain a suspicion that David Davies, generally known as the, Dartmoor shepherd, had been enticed away for political purposes; and what, if any, were the grounds of such suspicion?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: It would be obviously undesirable for me to make any statement on this subject. I have no doubt the facts, whatever they may be, will ultimately come to light.
  Viscount HELMSLEY: Has the right hon. Gentleman any ground whatever for saying that there was a suspicion that this man had been enticed away for political purposes?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I told the House the other day that it was reported to me that there was a strong suspicion in certain quarters that this man had been enticed away for political purposes. The actual expression used was "political dodge." That was the statement I made, and I have nothing to add to it.
  Mr. BUTCHER: Will the right hon. Gentleman in future abstain from suggesting that anonymous persons entertain unfounded suspicions?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: They may be anonymous persons, but that their suspicions are unfounded I am unable to prove.

  Uniform Marriage Laws.
  Mr. KINGasked the Prime Minister whether his attention had been directed to the advisibility of uniform marriage laws for the United Kingdom, and especially of compulsory civil marriage; whether he would initiate an inquiry or

  1901
  legislation on this subject; and whether, with a view to obtaining uniformity of marriage law and regulations throughout the British Empire, he would consider referring this question to the forthcoming Colonial Conference?
  Mr. MORTONasked the Prime Minister whether he would introduce a Bill to give a system of compulsory civil marriage, uniform for the United Kingdom?
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Asquith): I am aware that this question has given rise to a considerable amount of discussion and has formed the subject of correspondence with the Dominions. Marriage law is not, however, among the subjects mentioned by any of them in connection with the approaching Conference; and, as at present advised, I am not disposed to recommend that it should be brought before the Conference, nor am I prepared to promise legislation on the subject.
  Mr. KING: In view of the fact that he has so greatly curtailed the activities of private Members recently, will the Prime Minister consider whether he cannot give us an opportunity of rendering some service by appointing a Select Committee?

  Payment of Members.
  Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONasked the Prime Minister whether, under a scheme of payment of Members, Members of the Government were to receive a yearly salary in addition to their present emoluments?
  The PRIME MINISTER: I must reserve any statement on this matter until the time comes for the introduction of the scheme.
  Earl WINTERTON: Is the right hon. Gentleman in a position to say when this Bill will be introduced?
  The PRIME MINISTER: No.
  Mr. LEE: Will it be a Bill at all?
  The PRIME MINISTER: I do not say that it will.

  Imperial Conference (Representatives of India).
  Sir HERBERT ROBERTSasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the direct interest of India in the subjects to be discussed at the forthcoming Imperial Conference, any representatives had been
  1902
  or would be appointed to attend the Conference on behalf of the Government of India?
  The PRIME MINISTER: The matter is under consideration.

  Colonial Conference (Subjects for Discussion).
  Mr. FELLasked the Prime Minister if there would be an opportunity for the Associated Chambers of Commerce or for other bodies to bring questions up for discussion at the Colonial Conference which affected the rights and interests of English companies and individuals trading with the Colonies?
  The PRIME MINISTER: Questions can only be brought before the Conference by the Governments represented and through their representatives. As the hon. Member will have seen, the list of subjects for discussion is already very lengthy, but any representations from the Chambers of Commerce to His Majesty's Government would, of course, receive attentive consideration.
  Mr. FELL: May these representations come from the bodies themselves, or must they come through Members of Parliament?
  The PRIME MINISTER: Not necessarily through Members of Parliament.

  International Conventions (Interpretation).
  Mr. BUTCHERasked the Prime Minister, upon what authority the Government relied for the assertion that the Re port of a Drafting Committee appointed by an International Conference, when such Report contains a reasoned commentary elucidating the provisions of a convention signed on behalf of the Powers represented at such Conference, becomes, if formally accepted by the Conference, an authoritative interpretation, binding on the signatory Powers, of the instrument so signed; whether any record of such a practice exists in any State paper or other authoritative document issued by the Government of this country or of any of the Powers represented by the Naval Conference in London"; and whether he was aware that a view on this subject, contrary to that entertained by His Majesty's Government, is held by such authorities as Professor Ullman of Vienna and Professor Fiore of Naples?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: It is obvious that if the delegates who are sent by the respective Governments to attend a conference think it desirable to accompany

  1903
  the instrument which they sign by a commentary, which is described in the meetings of the Conference as an official commentary, which is accepted by the delegates on that footing, and which is formally adopted at a plenary meeting of the Conference, the commentary must be regarded as accepted by the Governments, unless the action of their delegates is disavowed. The object of such a commentary is to explain the meaning of the signed instrument, and to lessen the possibility of such ambiguities arising as are likely to occur subsequently in construing articles which are of necessity drawn up in very concise language; it is in this sense that the commentary becomes an "authoritative interpretation," because it is the explanation of the meaning which the signatories to the Convention have placed upon it themselves. I am not aware of any occasion having arisen for the drawing up of a State paper such as is referred to by the hon. and learned Member. I am not acquainted with the precise, views which may be entertained on this particular subject by Professor Ullman and by Professor Fiore.
  Mr. BUTCHER: If this Conference is authoritative why is the Report, as well as the Convention, not signed by the Powers?
  Mr. McKINNON WOOD: The Reports have never, in similar cases, been signed by the Powers. This Report has been accepted by the delegates. There is no previous instance in which the Report has been signed by the Powers.

  Declaration of London.
  Mr. GRETTONasked the Prime Minister if the Declaration of London will be formally submitted to the Board of Admiralty for approval before it is brought before the forthcoming Imperial Conference?
  The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir; I see no necessity for such reference.
  Mr. LEE: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, in view of the widespread and genuine uneasiness in regard to the effect of the Declaration, he will reconsider his decision, and cause the provisions of the Declaration to be laid before the Board of Admiralty for full examination and formal report?

  Justices' Consultative Committees.
  Sir CHARLES HENRYasked the Prime Minister if consultative committees, recommended in the Report of the Royal
  1904
  Commission on Justices of the Peace, have been appointed; and, if so, will he state the counties where such committees are at present engaged in co-operating with lords lieutenant?
  The PRIME MINISTER: Committees have been appointed in some and will be appointed in the other counties, as necessity arises for the selection of new Justices. There are ninety-five counties or liberties in Great Britain (exclusive of Lancashire) and 216 cities and boroughs, with separate commissions of the peace, and it is not practicable to classify the counties and state at present what stage the work of Committees already in existence has reached. If my hon. Friend desires the information as regards any particular county, I will ask the Lord Chancellor for it and furnish it to him. I may add that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has appointed an Advisory Committee, who are at present engaged for the County Palatine in co-operating with the Lord Lieutenant. He is considering the appointment of other advisory committees in connection with the boroughs.

  Kinvarra Estates, County Galway.
  Mr. DUFFYasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he is aware of the disturbance that was imminent in the Kinvarra district, county Galway, during the past twelve months owing to the attitude taken up by the trustees of the Sharpe estate in respect to the sale of the estate; does he know that an understanding was arrived at last October, as between the agent to the property and the tenants, to the effect that a request would be made immediately to the Congested District Board to acquire the entire estate, including the town; has such a request been made; and what is the cause of the delay in dealing with this estate?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): I am aware that a certain amount of dissatisfaction existed in Kinvarra in connection with the sale of the Sharpe Estate. The estate comprises twenty-five agricultural tenancies and about forty-five houses in the town of Kinvarra. On the 2nd December last the agent of the estate wrote to the Congested District Board stating that the Trustees were willing to sell if a fair price is offered, but that they were unwilling to go to any expense about mapping until they see whether the sale could be arranged.

  1905
  On the 10th December the Board wrote suggesting a way out of the difficulty. No answer has yet been received.
  Mr. DUFFYasked the Chief Secretary if he was aware that the district in and around Kinvarra was one of the most congested in the West of Ireland; had it come to his knowledge that the people for years back had been requesting the various public departments to purchase the available lands in the neighbourhood for allocation amongst them; could he say what time had now elapsed since the Blake-Foster Estate, Kinvarra district, was first offered for sale; was he aware that the agent, Mr. W. E. Holmes, Roscommon, offered the estate to the Congested Districts Board last May; and, having regard to the history of the estate and the conditions which prevail on this property, whether he would direct the attention of the Congested Districts Board to the estate and state the cause of their inaction?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am aware that the district surrounding Kinvarra is poor. The Blake Foster estate was offered to the Congested Districts Board on the 22nd September last, not in May, as alleged, and an inspector has been directed to visit the estate and make a valuation at as early a date as possible.
  Mr. DUFFYasked the Chief Secretary whether the estate of Colonel Lopdell, Athenry, situated at Cappamore, Kinvarra, county Galway, is one of the estates to be dealt with by the Estates Commissioners; has the estate been inspected and purchase sanctioned by the Commissioners seeing that a considerable number of years have passed by since the tenants agreed to purchase their holdings; and, having regard to the quantity of mountainous land on the estate which would become available for allotment if the property came on for settlement, whether he will call the attention of the Estates Commissioners to the delay in dealing with this property?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The estate referred to has not yet been inspected. It will be dealt with in order of priority, but, having regard to its position on the principal register of direct sales, the Estates Commissioners cannot at present say when its turn will be reached. When so reached it will be dealt with as rapidly as possible.
  Mr. DUFFYasked the Chief Secretary whether the Congested Districts Board has been furnished with maps and all particu-
  1906
  lars respecting some grazing lands which Mr. Brady Murray, B.L., Northampton House, Kinvarra, has offered for sale to the Board; and whether, in view of the urgency of relieving congestion in the district, he will make a representation to the Board so that an inspection may be made of the lands with a view to purchase?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Congested Districts Board inform me that Mr. Brady Murray has lodged the necessary maps and rentals to enable an inspection of the estate to be made. The estate will be valued as soon as practicable.

  Major W. L. Belvoir's Estate, County Clare.
  Mr. DUFFYasked the Chief Secretary whether any request to sell his estate in the districts of Durras, Funshin, and New Town has been made to Major Wilson Lynch Belvoir, Sixmile Bridge, Clare, by the Congested Districts Board; and when, and with what result?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Congested Districts Board intimated to Major Wilson Lyneh's agent their willingness to purchase his estate in the county Galway, but they have not yet received any offer to sell. The landlord will now be definitely asked whether he is willing to sell.

  Clonrellick Lands, County Westmeath.
  Sir WALTER NUGENTasked the Chief Secretary if he can state what action the Estates Commissioners have taken with regard to the lands known as Clonrellick, being portion of the Little estate, near Moate, county Westmeath; and whether they have recognised as tenants, and intend to make advances under the Land Purchase Acts to, the nominal occupiers of those lands whose tenancies were created, as was admitted in Mr. Justice Wright's Court, solely for the purpose of obtaining such advances, or if, having investigated all the facts connected with this case, the Estates Commissioners have decided that the lands in question should not be declared an estate under the meaning of the Act?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Estates Commissioners have had inquiries made by one of their inspectors in reference to the purchase agreements signed by the proposed purchasers, and the nature of their tenancies. No advances have been sanctioned in these cases. Pending, however, the result of certain proceedings in another estate, instituted in the High Court in

  1907
  reference to the practice of the Commissioners in declaring or refusing to declare lands to be an estate, the Commissioners do not consider it desirable to make any statement as regards the case referred to in the question.
  Sir WALTER NUGENT: Will not the compulsory clauses of the Land Acts be made applicable to cases such as this outside the Congested Districts?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I will consider that question.

  Estates Commissioners, Ireland (Vacant Office).
  Mr. J. P. FARRELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether, in the matter of the appointment to the vacant office of Estates Commissioner now about to be made, inquiry will be made into the antecedent connection of prospective candidates with landlordism in Ireland with a view to preventing the appointment of a person who is, or has been, connected with the administration of landlords' properties in Ireland, or has at any time been connected with the rent office, whether as a clerk or otherwise; and whether care will be taken that a person of the type of the late commissioner, who is not hostile to the tenant's interests, will be appointed?
  Mr. BIRRELL: When filling the vacant office of Estate Commissioner every effort will be made to secure an efficient successor to the late Commissioner, whose loss I greatly deplore.

  Labourers Acts (Ireland).
  Captain CRAIGasked the Chief Secretary whether it is the intention of the Government to promote legislation with a view to so amend the Labourers Acts that occupiers of property under them may become owners on the same terms as tenant farmers under the Land Purchase Acts, and that local rates may thereby be relieved?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Government do not intend to introduce legislation of the nature indicated in the question.
  Mr. CRUMLEYasked the Chief Secretary if he can state why it is that in Lisnaskea Union, county Fermanagh, a scheme for building labourers' cottages, under the Labourers Act of 1906, has not been proceeded with before this, although an inquiry was held in November, 1909, for the purpose of promoting a scheme; and whether any further action will be taken
  1908
  in the matter, as some of the labourers are at present residing in houses some of which have been condemned as entirely unfit for human habitation?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Local Government Board sanctioned the requisite loan to carry out the scheme referred to on 15th March last, and the arbitrator lodged his award last June. The Board understand from the clerk of the rural district council that titles to the greater number of the plots authorised to be acquired have now been completed, and the council hope to invite tenders for fencing the plots at an early date.

  Road Board (Allocation of Fund).
  Mr. LARDNERasked the Chief Secretary whether he is aware that the Road Board proposes to allocate to Ireland £150,000 from the Road Improvement Fund, the total road mileage of Ireland being upwards of 50,000 miles, whilst it is proposed to allocate £175,000 to Scotland with a road mileage of only 24,000 miles approximately; and whether he will make representations with a view to obtaining equitable treatment for Ireland?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I understand the Grants from the Road Improvement Fund for Ireland and Scotland are as stated. The road mileage of Ireland is 58,330 miles. I have no information as to that of Scotland, but assuming that it is correctly stated in the question, I do not think that the mere difference in mileage is sufficient ground for making representations to the Road Board.
  Mr. LARDNER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the proposal of the Road Board has been very unfavourably received in Ireland, and will he make representations to have a new scheme prepared?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Well, Sir, most things are unfavourably received in Ireland. I will do my best to consider whether there is anything in this particular case. I only pointed out to the hon. Member that a mere difference in mileage is not a sufficient basis for a ground of complaint.
  Mr. LARDNER: Would it not be well to consider the merits of this case?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Its merits, certainly!

  Scholarships in Primary Schools.
  Mr. FFRENCHasked the Chief Secretary if scholarships in England are available to the pupils of primary schools which

  1909
  carry them on to the secondary schools where they have access to other scholarships which bring them on to the Universities; and whether the Government will do anything to link up primary education in Ireland with the national university?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I understand that, in all secondary schools recognised by the Board of Education in England for grants in the higher scale, free places are offered at the beginning of each school year to pupils who have been under instruction in public elementary schools. The question how similar advantages can be provided for pupils in primary schools in Ireland is one deserving of most careful consideration, but I am not at present in a position to make any statement on the subject. It cannot be done by amendment of the Universities Act. It is open to pupils of secondary schools in England or Ireland to compete for scholarships at the Universities.
  Mr. FFRENCH: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the very strong local feeling in connection with this matter?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I know.

  Nugent Humble Ranch, County Waterford.
  Mr. O'SHEEasked the Chief Secretary whether he is aware that several public bodies in the county Waterford have recently passed resolutions renewing their protest with regard to the delay in acquiring the Nugent Humble Ranch for the benefit of the evicted tenants, and against granting public money to enable Mr. Charles Nugent Humble to purchase evicted farms from his brother under the Irish Land Act of 1903; from what public bodies have such resolutions recently been received by the Estates Commissioners; and whether they have yet dealt with the applications of Mr. Charles Nugent Humble for the advances applied for, having regard to the advances previously obtained by him and to his tenure of the evicted farms?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Estates Commissioners have recently received resolutions from the Waterford County Council and the Dungarvan Urban Council. The Commissioners have considered the application for the advance of £2,667 for the purchase by Mr. Charles Nugent Humble of four holdings on the estate of Sir John N. Humble. Mr. C. N. Humble, having already obtained advances amounting to
  1910
  £2,823 under the Land Purchase Acts, the Commissioners have informed the solicitors having carriage of the sale that they are not prepared to advance more than £177 in respect of these four holdings, making the total advances to Mr. Humble under the Land Purchase Acts £3,000. A I have already informed the hon. Member the Commissioners instituted proceedings for the compulsory acquisition under the Evicted Tenants Act, 1907, of certain lands held by Mr. C. N. Humble, but the owner appealed and the High Court decided that the Commissioners could not acquire these lands compulsorily. In these circumstances the Commissioners cannot take any further action with a view to the compulsory acquisition, under the Evicted Tenants Act, of the lands affected by the decision of the High Court.
  Mr. O'SHEE: Is it not a fact that the ground of the decision of the High Court was that the Commissioners only proposed to take portion of the land of Mr. Humble, and will the Commissioners now, having regard to the decision of the court, propose to acquire the whole of the land?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I will put that before the Commissioners.

  House of Commons' Shorthand Writer.
  Mr. MacNEILLasked the Prime Minister whether he is aware that, although the shorthand writer of the House of Commons or his deputy is, under the provisions of the Elections Petitions Act, 1868, Section 24, to attend and take down the evidence given at the trial of an election petition and from time to time to cause the evidence to be written at length, and a copy of such evidence is to accompany the certificate made to the Speaker by the judges, the evidence given at the trial and taken down by the shorthand writer does not include the questions of counsel to which the answers of witnesses are replies nor the remarks of counsel nor the observations of the learned judges, while from the shorthand writer's reports the addresses of counsel to the bench are excluded; and whether, having regard to the fact that circumstances have arisen or may in the future arise under which remarks from the bench, the questions of counsel to witnesses, and the addresses of counsel may be essential to place the Members of this House in full possession of the incidents of such trials, any steps can be taken to render the shorthand writer's reports of the trials of election petitions as complete as the official

  1911
  shorthand writer's reports of ordinary trials, especially on the criminal side of the courts?
  The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Rufus Isaacs): The copy of the transcript forwarded to the Speaker of the evidence given at the trial of an Election Petition does include the questions of counsel as well as the answers of the witnesses and the remarks of counsel and the observations of the learned judges made in the course of the taking of the evidence. It has not been the practice, nor is it required by the Act, to include the addresses of counsel, but steps were taken in May of last year to ensure that in future the addresses of counsel to the bench should also be supplied to the judges if they desired it and forwarded to the Speaker.
  Mr. MacNEILL: Is it only at the desire of the judges? It is very essential that this House should have the report?
  Sir RUFUS ISAACS: There is no provision in the Act for that. It can only be done now by order of the Bench.

  Secondary Schools, Ireland.
  Mr. DUFFYasked whether the Government intend this year making any provision in the direction of enabling students of national schools matriculating into the universities; and is it proposed to assist such students by establishing secondary schools throughout the country?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I would refer the hon. Member to my reply to a similar question asked on the 20th instant by the hon. Member for Cork City. There is no necessity for the establishment of additional secondary schools, the difficulty is to enable pupils in primary schools to profit by those that exist.

  Land Purchase (Ireland).
  Mr. LYNCHasked whether the Congested Districts Board has under consideration the estate of Mr. Wilson Fitzgerald, Tarmon West, near Kilkee, West Clare, in respect to which an application was made by the tenants in March, 1910; and whether proceedings in connection with this estate will be expedited?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The Congested Districts Board received an application in March, 1910, from the tenant on the estate referred to. They were in communication with the agent before his death, but failed to obtain a definite reply as to whether the owner was willing to enter into negotiations
  1912
  for the sale of his estate. The Board will now communicate direct with the owner.
  Mr. LYNCHasked the Chief Secretary whether he can give any information as to what the Estates Commissioners contemplate doing with regard to the Westby estate, Kilballyowen, West Clare, the division of which is being awaited by the tenants who would be eligible under the provisions of the Land Act of 1909?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The purchase agreements in this case were not lodged until May, 1908, and, having regard to prior claims of other estates, it will not be reached for inspection for some time; meanwhile, the Estates Commissioners are not in a position to make any statement in the matter.
  Mr. LYNCHasked the Chief Secretary whether his attention had been called to the delay in putting into operation the provisions of the Land Act of 1909 in West Clare; whether he is aware that the suspense is injurious to the whole agricultural community; whether he can state what estates in West Clare have been considered, and what has been the attitude of the landlords with regard to selling; and whether it is proposed to make the compulsory clauses operative in those cases where the delay has been caused by the landlords' unwillingness to sell?
  Mr. BIRRELL: No unnecessary delay has taken place in putting into operation the provisions of the Land Act of 1909 in the congested districts of county Clare. The Congested Districts Board have in a large number of cases invited owners to negotiate for sale. Eighteen estates have been offered for sale, including a few small ones transferred from the Estates Commissioners, and the Board have come to terms for the purchase of seven of these estates. The Board are in negotiation for other properties, and have decided to institute proceedings for compulsory purchase in some cases. As regards the proceedings of the Estates Commissioners, 124 purchase agreements in direct sales in the county, representing a purchase money of £33,440, have been lodged with them under the Act of 1909. They have also received memorials requesting them to acquire under the Act untenanted land on seven estates. In one case they are not prepared to take any action unless on the request of all parties. In another case it has been ascertained that the land is tenanted, and

  1913
  in two other cases they have decided to take no action. In the remaining cases the Commissioners have directed inquiries to be made.
  Mr. LYNCH: Would it be possible to give the names of those cases where it has been decided to put the compulsory clauses into force?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I do not think there would be any objection.
  Mr. JOHN ROCHEasked whether, upon the Lahiffe estate, in the parish of New Inn, county Galway, there are only nine tenants, six of whose holdings range from £1 7s. to £4 10s. rental; and whether he will direct the Estates Commissioners to refuse to sanction the sale unless 105 acres grazed by Messrs. Dooly and Treasey are acquired by the Commissioners for the purpose of enlarging the holdings of small tenants, it being the only grazing land upon the estate?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I have nothing to add to the reply which I gave on the 13th instant to the question on this subject addressed to me by the hon. Member.

  Crofton Estate, County Roscommon.
  Mr. HAYDENasked the Chief Secretary whether he will state when arrangements were made by the Estates Commissioners for the purchase of the Crofton estate, at Clooncellan, Ballymurry, and Ballybeg, in the county of Roscommon; whether these townlands formed one estate, and if any other townlands were included in it; whether Ballybeg consisted of untenanted land and the other town-lands of uneconomic holdings; whether Ballybeg has been given to graziers not formerly on the estate; whether it has been vested in them; if so, when; and whether, at the same time or since, the tenants' holdings have been vested in them?
  Mr. HAYDENalso asked the nature and value of the tenancy, formerly held by a man named Payne, in a farm on the Pollock estate, now in the possession of the Estates Commissioners; what was the price agreed to for its surrender; and whether he will publish the correspondence which has taken place between the former tenant and the Estates Commissioners or their inspectors, on the one hand, and between the Commissioners and the Congested Districts Board, in regard to this matter and to the farm at Ballybeg, on
  1914
  the Crofton estate, now in the possession of Mr. Payne as a joint occupier with his brother?
  Mr. HAYDENfurther asked whether the farm of Ballybeg, on the Crofton estate, was purchased by the Estates Commissioners as untenanted land; that on this estate there is a number of small holdings; that it was understood between the Commissioners, the landlord, and the tenants that this farm would be used for the enlargement of these holdings; and that the landlord has stated he agreed to a reduction in the price at first arranged on the representation that money would be required for making roads and fences through it; whether he is aware that, in face of all these facts, the land has not been so used but given to a migrant grazier and his brother; and whether he will state why the brother of this man has been included in the arrangement?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The lands on the Crofton Estate purchased by the Estates Commissioners in July, 1910, consist of 360 acres at Clooncraft and Clooncellan, occupied by twenty-two tenants, and 330 acres of untenanted land at Ballybeg and Toomona allotted by the Commissioners to Messrs. John and James Payne, who surrendered 523 acres on the Pollock Estate for the relief of congestion on that estate, on which there were about 200 uneconomic and congested holdings. The Paynes held their land on the Pollock Estate under a lease for twenty-one years from 1902, and were offered by the owner £3,000 to surrender, which they refused. Of the twenty-two tenants on the Crofton Estate, six occupy holdings with a valuation of between £5 and £10, and thirteen occupy holdings under £5 valuation. The lands sold to the Paynes are a considerable distance from these holdings, and there is untenanted land much nearer, which, when acquired, can be utilised for enlarging them There was no understanding that the lands of Ballybeg would be utilised for the enlargement of holdings, nor was the price cut down on that account. The only condition made by the owner was that the Commissioners should advance to the tenants of Clooncraft and Clooncellan the amounts at which they had already agreed to purchase, and the Commissioners accepted that condition. The Estates Commissioners, when applying under the Act of 1909 to the Congested Districts Board for their consent to the purchase, informed the Board of the purposes for which they required the Bally-

  1915
  beg lands There was no correspondence with the Messrs. Payne; the matter was arranged at interviews with them. The Paynes and the other purchasers on the Crofton Estate are in possession of the lands acquired by the Commissioners which will be vested in them in due course. The correspondence between the Estates Commissioners and the Congested Districts Boards is confidential and cannot be laid on the Table of the House.
  Mr. HAYDEN: Is this land now actually vested in the Paynes and is the tenanted land vested in the tenants? And is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is a large number of uneconomic holdings in the immediate vicinity of this land, and that the giving of the land to the Paynes deprives these tenants of any chance of making their holdings economic?
  Mr. BIRRELL: I am told there is other untenanted land much nearer to the present holders of these uneconomic holdings than the land now allotted to the Paynes.
  Mr. HAYDEN: I do not mean the tenants on the Crofton estate, but in the immediate vicinity of the land, but not on the Crofton estate?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The question is a very important one. It really comes to this: Whether, in order to relieve economic pressure in other parts, it is lawful to introduce these Paynes into the county Roscommon. The Estates Commissioners, being most anxious to settle the Pollock estate, and to provide for people upon that estate, thought this was a case in which land might be taken, without injury to Roscommon, in that county, and let to the Paynes. They adopted that course, and I hope they may not be discouraged from pursuing, after most careful consideration, a similar course in the future. Otherwise the whole question of uneconomic treatment in Ireland becomes wholly impossible.
  Mr. HAYDEN: This matter is really so important that I must press the right hon. Gentleman for a further answer in regard to it. Is he aware that there is very considerable congestion in the immediate vicinity of this land, and, if so, how can he hold out any hope that this congestion will be relieved unless by the use of the land in the district, and whether any account was taken of the local opinion in this matter before the land was given away from the use of these people?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Most certainly! That point was most carefully considered, and the Estates Commissioners believed there was untenanted land in this neighbourhood which could be used, and sufficiently and properly used, for the relief of persons in that neighbourhood whose holdings were uneconomic. Unless some discretion is left to them in this matter, the whole matter is one that can never be dealt with at all.
  Mr. HAYDEN: I wish to give notice that at the earliest opportunity I shall draw attention to the whole facts.

  Territorial Force (Adjutants' Pay).
  Mr. CAMPIONasked the Secretary of State for War if he will state for what reason Regular officers appointed adjutants of Territorial infantry prior to 12th July, 1910, are excluded from the receipt of 2s. 6d. per day additional pay?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Haldane): Will the hon. Member be so good as to refer to a similar question put by the hon. and gallant Member for Bodmin on the 16th instant to which I have nothing to add.
  Mr. STAVELEY-HILLasked what is the rate of additional pay for Regular officers appointed as adjutants of yeomanry, artillery, infantry, and engineers in the Territorial Force before and after 12th July, 1910; and whether the new uniform rate will mean different scales of pay for officers holding similar appointments, and a decrease in the case of yeomanry adjutants?
  Mr. HALDANE: Officers of the Regular Forces appointed adjutants of yeomanry before the 12th July, 1910, draw 5s. a day additional pay; those appointed on or after that date draw 2s. 6d. a day. Officers appointed adjutants of artillery, engineers and infantry before 12th July last draw no additional pay: those appointed or extended on or after that date draw 2s. 6d. a day.
  Mr. STAVELEY-HILL: Will this apply to all applicants?
  Mr. HALDANE: Yes; to all those I have mentioned. They are all of the same scale.

  Army Special Reserve (Charge of Desertion).
  Mr. FELLasked the Secretary of State for War if his attention had been called to the case of A. V. Connelly, who came

  1917
  before the magistrate for West London on a charge of desertion from the 6th battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, but who was stated to be only 15 years and 9 months old, and whose ease was in consequence remitted by the magistrate to the children's court; if he can state when and where the boy was enlisted, how he came to be enlisted, and if he passed a medical examination; and what satisfactory assurance he can give that there are no other boys of a similar age enrolled in the Army?
  Mr. HALDANE: This recruit was enlisted for the Special Reserve at Hounslow on 25th January, and was duly passed by the medical officer and the approving officer. He gave his age as 17 years 10 months and his late employer, to whom reference was made for character, and in whose employ he served for twelve months, made no exception to this statement. He is up to the physical standards now in force.
  Mr. FELL: Is it not a fact that but for the accident of this case coming before the court the boy's age would never have been discovered, and that this is but one of many similar cases?
  Mr. HALDANE: The boy's appearance was such that this case would have been discovered. I hope there are not many such cases.
  Earl WINTERTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the latter part of the question, "What satisfactory assurance he can give that there are no other boys of a similar age enrolled in the Army?"
  Mr. HALDANE: Only that we take all the pains we possibly can to make sure.

BILLS PRESENTED.
  LABOUR EXCHANGES (ALIENS) BILL.
  "To secure that the Labour Exchanges established in pursuance of the Labour Exchanges Act, 1909, shall not provide an additional incentive to Aliens to enter the United Kingdom," presented by Mr. GEORGE GIBBS; supported by Sir George Agnew, Mr. Bridgeman, Mr. Hicks Beach, and Mr. Rice; to be read a second time upon Tuesday next.
  CONVEYANCE OF CYCLES BILL.
  "To provide greater facilities for the conveyance of Cycles," presented by Mr. ALDEN; to be read a second time upon Monday next.
  COUNTY COURTS (IRELAND) BILL.
  "To amend the Law relating to County Courts in Ireland," presented by Mr. BRADY; supported by Mr. Kelly, Mr. MacVeagh, Mr. Healy, Mr. Horner, Mr. Moore, and Mr. Radford; to be read a second time upon Friday, 10th March.

PLUMAGE BILL.
Mr. ALDENasked for leave to introduce a Bill "to prohibit the sale, hire, or exchange of the plumage and skins of certain wild birds."
The character of this measure is known to the House, because I brought in forward last year. Practically in its present form it has been before the Select Committee of the House of Lords, and it was passed unanimously. I have found on all sides of the House a common agreement as to the importance of this measure. The fact is, there are only two hon. Members who are not in favour of it, and I hope I shall be able to obtain the consent of all Members of the House to the introduction of this measure, in view of its urgency. There are twenty-one of our Colonies and possessions in favour of taking some immediate steps to prevent the sale or importation to this country of the skins and plumage of certain rare and beautiful birds. These birds are likely to become extinct in a very few years, in fact we may say that for the last ten years one or two species of rare birds have become extinct every year, and looking at the urgency of this question, I hope hon. Members will forgive me if I keep them for two or three minutes.
There is a Committee at present sitting considering this question with regard to colonial birds. The twenty-one Colonies and Possessions to which I have referred all have laws preventing the exportation of the plumage of certain birds, and the Committee at present sitting is considering the possibility of preventing the importation into the United Kingdom of the plumage of those special birds. All we ask is that in addition we shall consider the question of preventing the importation into England of certain other birds which are likely to become extinct during the next few years. We have already done something in Parliament in regard to this question. I think it was in the year 1898 that the Secretary of State for War prohibited the use of aigrette plumes in certain regiments of the Army, and when we remember that only last year 49,000 ounces of osprey plumes were placed on the London

1919
market, representing 297,000 white herons, I think it is high time this House interfered with the importation of these plumes. Otherwise we shall certainly, in a very short time, exterminate these beautiful birds. The London Chamber of Commerce, or rather a very small section of it, is absolutely the only obstacle to united action. Other Chambers of Commerce are in favour of this measure, and only one small section of the London Chamber of Commerce says "No, we will not stop the importation of the plumage of these rare birds." Only a short time ago the textile section of the London Chamber of Commerce made representations to India. There is an Indian Plumage Bill, and the textile section I allude to made representations to the Bombay Chamber of Commerce to repeal their measure on the ground that these birds were pests to the natives. The answer given by the Bombay Chamber of Commerce was that the birds were not pests at all, but relieved the country of pests in the shape of insects, and therefore they thought it was desirable to preserve the birds. That alone would be a sufficient argument for this House taking action. Anybody who has any sense of what is beautiful in this world, and who cares for preserving what is beautiful, ought to be on the side of this Bill. On the one hand you have a small section of the London Chamber of Commerce against this measure, and on the other hand every right-thinking person throughout the length and breadth of the kingdom. I do not see why a few traders who make money out of this business should be allowed to inflict this injury and harm, not only on our Colonies and Possessions, but also on other countries who are strongly in favour of such legislation. It is absolutely impossible for us to prevent this illegal importation into England unless we can pass this measure. I hope that not only will the leave of the House be given to introduce this measure to-day, but that at no very distant date the House will give this measure a Second Reading. I feel certain that if this Bill were referred to a Committee there would be a unanimous decision in favour of immediate action, just as was the case before the Select Committee of the House of Lords.
Mr. CARLILE: I rise to oppose the introduction of this Bill. The hon. Member who introduced this measure has used very much the same argument as he did upon a
1920
previous occasion. He has appealed to sentimentality with reference to the preservation of these birds, and he is perfectly justified in doing so, because as a result he gets a large amount of support for this mischievous Bill. I oppose this measure on the ground that it is perfectly useless for this country alone to attempt to deal with this great question. It is not a matter which can be dealt with by a single country, more especially when that single country is the great centre of this traffic, and the country where this particular trade is concentrated. If our own country is called upon to take this step, then the injury to trade and industry in this country will be very serious, and the benefit supposed to be derived from such a course in the direction of the preservation of birds will not be brought about at all. If this plumage trade does not find its way into this country, it will be diverted to Antwerp, Berlin, and Paris, and will result not in any preservation of these birds, admirable and beautiful as they are, but merely in the transference to our foreign competitors of an industry and trade which is of very important dimensions. The hon. Member says that no right-thinking man can oppose this, but I think any man with common sense who knows what the circumstances are will oppose it. I could refer to such an authority as the head of the Department of South Kensington Museum, and one of the greatest authorities of ornithology in the world at the present moment. He has written most strongly against this Bill, showing it would not in any circumstances bring about the conditions alleged to be desired. Why should we at such a time as this take a step towards the destruction of a trade which is perfectly justifiable, and which, on the showing of the highest authorities, is in no way injurious to bird preservation. I do most earnestly hope the House will not grant this leave, and that this Bill will not be read even a first time. The textile department of the London Chamber of Commerce is entirely justified in the attitude it has taken up upon this Bill. It is endeavoured to forward the Bill merely on the ground of sentimentality gone wrong. It will be useless for the preservation of birds and will be destructive of an important form of industry and commerce in our country.
Question put, "That leave be given to bring in the Bill."
The House divided: Ayes, 317; Noes, 48.

Division No. 19.]

AYES.

[3.53 p.m.

Abraham, William (Dublin Harbour)

Edwards, Enoch (Hanley)

Lowther, Claude (Cumberland, Eskdale)

Acland, Francis Dyke

Elibank, Rt. Hon. Master of

Lundon, Thomas

Adamson, William

Elverston, H.

Lynch, A. A.

Addison, Dr. Christopher

Esmonde, Dr. John (Tipperary, N.)

Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. A. (Hanover Sq.)

Adkins, W. Ryland D.

Esmonde, Sir Thomas (Wexford, N.)

Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. (Droitwich)

Ainsworth, John Stirling

Essex, Richard Walter

Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

Esslemont, George Birnie

Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

Anderson, A.

Falconer, James

MacGhee, Richard

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Farrell, James Patrick

Mackinder, Halford J.

Ashton, Thomas Gair

Fell, Arthur

Maclean, Donald

Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

Ffrench, Peter

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Astor, Waldorf

Field, William

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Baird, J. L.

Fitzgibbon, John

M'Callum, John M.

Baker, H. T. (Accrington)

Flavin, Michael Joseph

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

Baker, Joseph A. (Finsbury, E.)

Fleming, Valentine

M'Micking, Major Gilbert

Balcarres, Lord

Forster, Henry William

M'Mordle, Robert

Baldwin, Stanley

France, G. A.

Manfield, Harry

Banbury, Sir Frederick George

Gardner, Ernest

Marshall, Arthur Harold

Baring, Captain Hon. G.

Gastrell, Major W. H.

Martin, J.

Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

Gelder, Sir W. A.

Mason, David M. (Coventry)

Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick, B.)

Gill, A. H.

Mason, James F. (Windsor)

Barrie, H. T. (Londonderry, N.)

Glanville, H. J.

Mathias, Richard

Barry, Redmond John

Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

Meagher, Michael

Barton, William

Goldstone, Frank

Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.)

Bathurst, Charles (Wilton)

Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough)

Meehan, Patrick A. (Quean's Cs.)

Beale, W. P.

Guest, Hon. Frederick E. (Dorset, E.)

Mildmay, Francis Bingham

Beauchamp, Edward

Guiney, P.

Molloy, M.

Beck, Arthur Cecil

Guinness, Hon. W. E.

Molteno, Percy Alport

Beckett, Hon. W. Gervase

Gulland, John William

Money, L. G. Chiozza

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

Hackett, J.

Montagu, Hon. E. S.

Bentham, G. J.

Hall, D. B. (Isle of Wight)

Morpeth, Viscount

Birrell, Rt. Hon. Augustine

Hall, Fred (Dulwich)

Morrell, Philip

Black, Arthur W.

Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

Morrison-Bell, Major A. C. (Heniton)

Boland, John Plus

Hardie, J. Keir

Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

Bottomley, Horatio

Hardy, Laurence

Muldoon, John

Bowerman, C. W.

Harris, Henry Percy

Munro, R.

Boyle, D. (Mayo, N.)

Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

Munro-Ferguson, Rt. Hon. R. C.

Brady, P. J.

Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, W.)

Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C.

Brigg, Sir John

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

Needham, Christopher T.

Brunner, J. F. L.

Harwood, George

Neilson, Francis

Burgoyne, A. H.

Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

Newdegate, F. A.

Burns, Rt. Hon. John

Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry

Newton, Harry Kottingham

Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas

Haworth, Arthur A.

Nicholson, Wm. G. (Petersfield)

Butcher, J. G.

Hayden, John Patrick

Nield, Herbert

Buxton, Noel (Norfolk, N.)

Hazleton, Richard (Galway, N.)

Nolan, Joseph

Byles, William Pollard

Helme, Nerval Watson

Norman, Sir Henry

Carr-Gomm, H. W.

Henderson, Arthur (Durham)

Norton, Capt. Cecil W.

Cassel, Folix

Henderson, Major H. (Abingdon)

Nugent, Sir Walter Richard

Cave, George

Higham, John Sharp

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Cawley, Harold T. (Heywood)

Hill, Sir Clement L.

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

Chambers, J.

Hill-Wood, Samuel

O'Doherty, Philip

Chancellor, H. G.

Hope, Harry (Bute)

O'Dowd, John

Chapple, Dr. William Allen

Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

Ogden, Fred

Clynes, J. R.

Horne, C. S. (Ipswich)

O'Grady, James

Collins, Godfrey P. (Greenock)

Hudson, Walter

O'Kelly, Edward P. (Wicklow, W.)

Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

Hughes, S. L.

O'Neill, Hon. A. E. B. (Antrim, Mid)

Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hen. Sir J.

Hunter, Sir C. R. (Bath)

O'Neill, Dr. Charles (Armagh, S.)

Condon, Thomas Joseph

Illingworth, Percy H.

Orde-Powiett, Hon. W. G. A.

Corbett, A. Cameron

Isaacs, Sir Rufus Daniel

O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

Cotton, William Francis

John, Edward Thomas

O'Shee, James John

Cowan, W. H.

Johnson, W.

O'Sullivan, Timothy

Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea)

Parker, James (Halifax)

Craig, Captain James (Down, E.)

Jones, Edgar R. (Merthyr Tydvil)

Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

Crawshay-Williams, Eliot

Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth)

Pease, Rt. Hon. Joseph A. (Rotherham)

Crichton-Stuart, Lord Ninian

Jones, Leif Straffen (Notts, Rushcliffe)

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

Croft, H. P.

Jones, W. S. Glyn. (T'w'r H'mts, Stepney)

Peto, Basil Edward

Crumley, Patrick

Joyce, Michael

Phillips, John (Longford, S.)

Cullinan, J.

Keating, M.

Pirie, Duncan V.

Dalziel, Sir James H. (Kirkcaldy)

Kellaway, Frederick George

Pointer, Joseph

Davies, E. William (Eifion)

Kelly, Edward

Pollard, Sir George H.

Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

Kerry, Earl of

Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

Davies, M. Vaughan. (Cardigan)

Kilbride, Denis

Power, Patrick Joseph

Dawes, J. A.

King, J. (Somerset, N.)

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

Delany, William

Lambert, George (Devon, S. Molton)

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

Denman, Hon. R. D.

Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

Primrose, Hon. Nell James

Devlin, Joseph

Lane-Fox, G. R.

Pringle, William M. R.

Dewar, Sir J. A. (Inverness)

Lansbury, George

Radford, G. H.

Dickinson, W. H.

Lardner, James Carrige Rushe

Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

Dillon, John

Law, Hugh A.

Reddy, M.

Donelan, Captain A.

Leach, Charles

Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

Doris, W.

Lee, Arthur H.

Redmond, William (Clare)

Duffy, William J.

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Redmond, William Archer (Tyrone, E.)

Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

Rendall, Atheisten

1922

1923

Richards, Thomas

Spear, John Ward

Watt, Henry A.

Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

Spicer, Sir Albert

Weigall, Capt. A. G.

Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

Stanier, Beville

White, Major G. D. (Lancs., Southport)

Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

Stewart, Gershom

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

Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)

Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

White, Patrick (Meath, North)

Roche, John (Galway, E.)

Summers, James Woolley

Whyte, Alexander F.

Roe, Sir Thomas

Sutherland, J. E.

Wilkie, Alexander

Rose, Sir Charles Day

Sutton, John E.

Williams, J. (Glamorgan)

Rothschild, Lionel de

Taylor, John W, (Durham)

Williams, P. (Middlesbrough)

Rowlands, James

Tennant, Harold John

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

Rowntree, Arnold

Terrell, H. (Gloucester)

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

St. Maur, Harold

Thorne, William (West Ham)

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

Sandys, G. J. (Somerset, Wells)

Tobin, Alfred Aspinall

Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

Scott, A. M'Callum (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

Touche, George Alexander

Winfrey, Richard

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

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Wolmer, Viscount

Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

Wood, Hon. E. F. L. (Ripon)

Sheehy, David

Verney, Sir Harry

Wood, John (Stalybridge)

Sherwell, Arthur James

Wadsworth, J.

Wood, T. M'Kinnon (Glasgow)

Simon, Sir John Allsebrook

Walsh, J. (Cork, South)

Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

Smith, Albert (Lancs., Clitheroe)

Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince)

Young, Samuel (Cavan, E.)

Smith, Harold (Warrington)

Walton, Sir Joseph

Smith, H. B. (Northampton)

Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Alden and Mr. Whitehouse.

Snowden, P.

Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

Soares, Ernest J.

Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

NOES.

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

Grant, J. A.

Ronaldshay, Earl of

Archer-Shee, Major M.

Gretton, John

Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood)

Bagot, Lieut.-Colonel J.

Hambro, Angus Valdemar

Sanders, Robert A.

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

Henry, Sir Charles S.

Schwann, Rt. Hon. Sir C. E.

Banner, John S. Harmood.

Hinds, John

Scott, Leslie (Liverpool, Exchange)

Barnston, H.

Jardine, E. (Somerset, E.)

Sykes, Alan John

Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

Kirkwood, J. H. M.

Tullibardine, Marquess of

Booth, Frederick Handel

Lawson, Hon. H. (T. H'm'ts, Mile End)

Walker, Col. William Hall

Brassey, H. Leonard Campbell

Locker-Lampson, O. (Ramsey)

Ward, Arnold (Herts, Watford)

Burn, Colonel C. R.

Macmaster, Donald

Waring, Walter

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Oxford University)

Malcolm, Ian

Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay

Clive, Percy Archer

Meysey-Thompson, E. C.

Willoughby, Major Hon. Claude

Clough, William

Morrison-Bell, Capt. E. F. (Ashburton)

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

Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.)

Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

Worthington-Evans, L.

Gibbs, G. A.

Paget, Almeric Hugh

Gilmour, Captain J.

Pearce, William (Limehouse)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Carllie and Viscount Helmsley.

Goldsmith, Frank

Quilter, William Eley C.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Alden.
PLUMAGE BILL.—"To prohibit the sale, hire, or exchange of the plumage and skins of certain wild birds," presented accordingly, and read the first time; to be read a second time upon Monday next.

PARLIAMENT BILL.
Order read for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [21st February], "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision with respect to the powers of the House of Lords in relation to those of the House of Commons and to limit the duration of Parliament."—[The Prime Minister.]
Question again put. Debate resumed.
Dr. J. ESMONDE: I trust the House will give me its attention while I continue the remarks interrupted by the operation of the Eleven o'clock Rule last night. One of the arguments which has been adduced by the Opposition Leader is that the Prime Minister has only a Coalition majority
1924
But no party, no matter how large or how influential, has anything but a Coalition majority because every party consists of a Coalition of individual Members, and it is quite impossible for all the members of any party, no matter how loyal, to see eye to eye on every measure the party may adopt. Are the Opposition themselves absolutely clear from the charge of having had coalition Governments? I do not know whether the Liberal Unionist party is dead or not. I have heard it asked whether the Liberal Imperial League is dead. Are we to understand that the Liberal Unionist party is dead, or has it managed to swallow up the Tory party altogether? Then, again, there are other parties outside the official Opposition in this House. We have a party which I may call the Ecclesiastical Free Trade Tory party, which is so ably led and kept in such good order by the Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University. Then we have what I hope I may call—without being thought offensive by the Unionists from Ireland—the Little Ireland party. I do not think they will object to that description when their un-

1925
doubtedly ablest Member compared in this House the other day the nation to which he belongs with Quebec.
I support this Bill for three reasons: First, because I think it is a good thing for my country that we shall obtain Home Rule; secondly, because I believe it clears the decks for those crying reforms which are so necessary for the Democracy of Great Britain; and thirdly because I believe if this Empire is to go on and improve you must acknowledge that there are many nationalities inside the Empire, and you must keep them inside, instead of trying to exclude them and depriving them of the opportunity of using any spirit of nationality they may possess for the common good of the Empire. We on these Benches recognise that the first question put before the electors of the United Kingdom at the last election was the Veto Bill, and for this reason there is no other measure which the Liberal party at the present time propose to bring forward in the present Parliament that has not already been submitted to the people and approved of by them. I maintain that it is absurd and ridiculous for any hon. or right hon. Member to say that the people of this country were not equally aware, with every Member of this House, that if the Veto Bill got through the very next thing that would happen would be the introduction of a measure of Home Rule for Ireland. I believe the electors are equally intelligent with the Members of this House. They read their papers, and I am quite prepared to admit that there may be many people who, while they are in favour of the Veto Bill, are against Home Rule. That is the reason why there are so many Members sitting on the Opposition Benches to-day. But it makes the case for Home Rule all the stronger. It is one of the disadvantages of putting our question before the country mixed up with other questions that we do not obtain as large a majority as undoubtedly we would have if it were put to the country by itself. Hon. Members may not agree with that, but, in my opinion, the vast majority of the people of this country have made up their minds that the only possible solution of the Irish question is to bring the people of Ireland into loyalty with the Empire. They have further made up their minds that active and loyal support in the progress of this country will never be forthcoming until the Irish people receive that measure of justice which the country at the polls decided they should have. We who sit on these benches sympathise most
1926
thoroughly with the masses of the people of Great Britain because, although they have the franchise they have no opportunity of exercising it, seeing that the House of Lords has either stopped, rejected, or mutilated every Bill for the advantage of the working classes. I speak from some experience of this country, in which I have been engaged for twenty-five years as a professional man, and I unhesitatingly say in this House that I have seen hundreds of people suffering from disease brought on by absolute want and starvation. I say it is a desperate thing to think that in this country we should have laws to compel people to feed cattle, horses, and dogs under which they will be sent to gaol if they do not do so. It is a scandal to the greatest Empire in the world that there are thousands of people in this country who lack the bare necessaries of life. I look forward to the day when the Veto of the House of Lords is abolished, and when these thousands of men in the country and their wives and children will have sufficient to eat. I look forward to the day when legislation will be brought in to do away with some of the crying wrongs from which the British democracy are suffering. Furthermore, in this Bill I see the regeneration of my country and the burying of the hatchet between England and Ireland. I see the two countries working well in harmony together, and I see Irishmen, when they have obtained Home Rule, vying with the Scotch and Welsh people in their loyalty to the British Empire. I think the democracy of a country have a right to rule it, and I look forward with every satisfaction and confidence to the day when the people of this country will really see the liberty and justice which they demand. I consider that this Empire, great and prosperous as it is now, has not yet reached its zenith, nor can it do so until the mass of the people of this country are entrusted with its future destiny.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: The hon. Member who has just sat down did not establish as clearly as I should desire the connection between the number of destitute patients of whom he spoke and the action of the House of Lords in the last few years, but I hope he will not think me discourteous if I postpone any comments upon the interesting speech he has just delivered until I approach the Irish question and the Irish attitude in relation to the Parliament Bill of the Government. I listened, as other hon. Members did, to the Debate in

1927
the House yesterday, and I confess that what surprised me more than any other subject was the levity with which it was assumed by hon. Gentlemen opposite that, for some reason insufficiently explained in their speeches, these proposals, the importance of which no one in any part of the House denies, are necessarily, and within a short period, to become law. Some sixteen years ago, when the House of Commons dealt somewhat more scientifically with these questions, a Liberal Government, of which the Prime Minister was also a Member, directed a Report to be presented to the House of Commons showing what constitutional steps were necessary before great changes—changes of the character under discussion here—could be taken under the various Constitutions of the great countries of the world. I do not propose to ask the House to follow me in any details of that Return, but I may at least appeal to them to consider, if only for a moment, some of the lessons which are taught by the terms of that Return. If you take the case of Austria, a two-third's majority of the Chamber is necessary to carry such a reform. If you take the case of Belgium a two-third's majority would be necessary after both Chambers had been dissolved, and dissolved on the particular reform-In Germany fourteen hostile votes in the Federal Council would defeat the proposal utterly, and in the United States of America, before Congress could even propose such an Amendment in the Constitution as we are considering to-day, it would be necessary that two-thirds of both Houses should make a requisition that there should be a requisition by two-thirds of the legislatures, and after these precautions had been taken, it would be necessary that the change should be ratified by two-thirds of the legislatures which compose the union.
We are to-day the only first-class country in the world where a Single Chamber could attempt to destroy the Second Chamber by bare majority, and let me here observe that of all the astonishing features of the Debate last night the most astonishing of all was the complete failure of any speaker from that side of the House to assail the position laid down by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, that, whatever else this Veto Bill does, it introduces into the Constitution of this country Single-Chamber Government. No speaker directed himself to controverting that statement, while
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many speakers openly and undisguisedly based their support of these proposals on the ground that they will set up Single-Chamber Government. How did the Prime Minister deal with that. The Prime Minister with the exception of his illuminating sentence as to the considerations influencing Members immediately before and after an election made one reference and one reference to it only. He said that Members of the House of Commons in recent times considerably underrated the likelihood under changed conditions of legislation being introduced into a new House of Commons destroying the legislation of its predecessors. That is the point to which the modern statecraft has carried us. I have always understood that it was a salutary and wholesome rule in the main acquiesced in by both parties, that where legislation had received the sanction of both Chambers and passed into law that that legislation should be maintained, and that there should be some degree of continuity established in respect to the changes and vicissitudes of parties. The Prime Minister tells us to-day that in the new heaven and earth which is to be put before a grateful country under the terms of this Parliament Bill, we shall spend the activities of a new Parliament in correcting the activities of its predecessor. I wonder whether the Prime Minister would suggest that that consideration is applicable to Home Rule, and let no one entertain the least doubt that supposing a demand were made on the Prime Minister that for instance the very securities in this Bill on which so much insistence is laid—the security in other words that the House of Lords may delay legislation for two years—does anyone doubt that if a powerful representation were made to the Prime Minister either by the Labour party or by the Irish party that this power of delaying on which so much stress is laid should he corrected—does anybody doubt that the Prime Minister would give way.
It is clear that if the support of a section of his supporters who applied to the Prime Minister to correct the period of two years delay were necessary to the life of the Government, the Prime Minister would immediately give way. We know his career in the Trades Disputes Bill. We observed his career last January on the subject of the relative precedence of the Budget and the Veto, and there can be no doubt at all in the mind of anybody who has analysed the political psychology of the right hon. Gentleman that because he

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happens to be in the unfortunate position in which he is not the master of his own destiny, but the plaything of one of the groups which support him, that if a preemptory demand were presented to the Prime Minister that it should be altered this safeguard would immediately go. Therefore we are face to face with this, and I hope the Home Secretary will deal with this point and address some of his arguments to it, that this is a Bill which sets up Single-Chamber Government pure and simple; it enables the House of Commons to deal, not only with the Monarchy, but with the very instruments of Government which we are told is to be the only security left in the Bill. Such a proposition is absurd to those of us who know the conditions under which business is carried on in the House of Commons. We know perfectly well that it is only a form and a a name when we say that these decisions are arrived at by the House of Commons. They are not arrived at by the House of Commons; they are left to the Cabinet of the day, and only to the Cabinet of the day. The Home Secretary attempted to draw a distinction the other night. He said that the Cabinet exists, and exists only, by the support of the private Members; and he added this significant observation that a breath from the House of Commons would blow the Cabinet away. An entire fallacy underlies that observation. It is quite true that if the Cabinet are lagging much behind the views of extreme party men at the moment—if the Cabinet are behind the full tide of party feeling—that the House of Commons by the failing of the party majority can blow the Cabinet away. We all saw that process in full blast last year.
We saw Minister after Minister—the most attractive rhetoricians on the Front Government Bench—come and address persuasive and impassioned harangues to a stone cold audience night after night. That is perfectly true if you are lagging behind the party spirit of your own side. It is not true if you are at the head of a party. If, in other words, the Government is in advance of the party feeling of the day and holds strong and unanimous views, then the Cabinet, as every Member of this House knows, is the supreme master of the destinies of the House. It is therefore not true that these powers are given to the House of Commons, but they are given to a small oligarchy, which decides what the Cabinet is to do. We all know that the days of the private Members of this House have gone, never to re-
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turn. There is nobody who has followed the changes in our procedure, even in the comparatively short period that I have been in the House, who does not know that the influence of the private Member has become a thing of the past, and it has progressively declined as the strength of the caucus has progressively grown. I remember on the great Budget the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Spen Valley—a very independent and influential Member of this House—described the Chancellor of the Exchequer who introduced it as the devil going about with his pitchfork and attacking every industry. In the space of a few months such was the power of the caucus in this House and in his Constituency he was supporting the Budget, and I think he stood upon it at the election. I remember another case in which a Member for a Derbyshire seat joined what was called the cave after the Budget was introduced, and he went to the extreme limit of independence by writing a letter to the "Daily Mail" expressing his dislike of the Budget. A week later I went down to speak at a by-election in the High Peak Division of Derbyshire, and I saw that hon. Member addressing an open-air meeting, and at the conclusion of his speech I saw him waving his hat while he gave three cheers for the Budget. As the power of the caucus has grown the power of the Cabinet has grown, and the growth of those powers has made constantly growing demands upon the independence and strength of private Members. Whatever else the Veto Bill does, it gives uncontrolled power over every branch of legislation to that small oligarchy which is known as the Cabinet. The Home Secretary made an observation the other day more or less in this connection. He said it would be the fault of the Opposition if this discussion or this crisis were not ended by the date of the Coronation. That statement was inaccurate, and also extremely' ungenerous. Did not I understand the right hon. Gentleman to say that if this crisis was not ended by the date of the Coronation the responsibility would rest with the Opposition?
The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Churchill): No. I did not say that at all. I said if there was a crisis the responsibility would rest with the Opposition.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: I really, strange as it may appear, did not mean that the responsibility for the crisis would rest with the Opposition if there was not a crisis, and I

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have only to add that that statement in its modified form is not only a demonstrably inaccurate, but, under all the circumstances of the case, is an extremely ungenerous one. I may point out, in the first place, that the Government chose the time of the Election to suit themselves. When they chose it, they knew perfectly well the date of the Coronation, they knew what was the necessary financial business, which, owing to their arbitrary conduct, had to be got through before the Coronation, and now they have chosen to take the Parliament Bill in the few months which intervene before the Coronation, the impossibility being obvious of working for ten weeks in order to correct the accumulated anomalies of a thousand years. If the Government think that under these circumstances we shall be deterred from any defensive step which would otherwise be open to us, I can only say that the progress of this Debate, and what will follow this Debate, is likely to afford very considerable disillusionment to the Government. It is very much as if the revolutionary committee in France said to the victims of the guillotine, "We beg of you to expire with tact, and even, if possible, with gaiety, in order not to cloud a day of national festival which happens to synchronise with your funeral." The really serious arguments of the Prime Minister were founded entirely upon the supposed mandate which has been given to him by this last Election, and the position is most perfectly clearly stated in the House and stated in the Liberal Press in the country, and they ask the question, "Do elections mean anything or do elections mean nothing." As I understand that is the point of view upon which great reliance is placed by hon. Gentlemen opposite.
I have tried to understand the precise claim which is put forward in connection with the Veto Bill, and, as I understand it, it can be stated in something like these terms. An appeal was made to the country at this last election, following upon previous elections, so exclusive in its terms and directed to this one single issue, that we, the Government, are entitled to say that we come back with a clear mandate to deal with it, whatever other mandate we may have. I hope I do not state incorrectly the view put forward by the Prime Minister and other speakers. May I point out in the first place that the more a Government exaggerates the singleness of their mandate the more do they attenuate the claim put forward by the hon.
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Gentleman (Dr. Esmonde) that a mandate is also given to the Government to deal with Ireland. My right hon. Friend (Mr. Balfour) dealt with that yesterday. It was assumed by hon. Gentlemen opposite that it was a very subtle and fanciful method of dealing with General Elections and analysing the various mandates. Whether my right hon. Friend's classification of the value of elections is sound or is unsound, whether it is fanciful or the reverse, he was not the author of it. The Liberal party was the author of this view that it is not treating the democracy fairly to place before it, in order to elicit a man date, two issues of overwhelming importance, and the Prime Minister, more than any other man, is responsible for that view. What did he do in 1906? The right hon. Gentleman in those days, apart from his many activities in connection with the Liberal League, was the protagonist of Free Trade. I cannot say how he stood at that moment in relation to Home Rule, but, at any rate, he was the protagonist of Free Trade, and he expressed himself immediately after his then Leader's (Lord Rosebery) speech in Cornwall, as being extremely desirous that a simple and single mandate should be given by the country upon the fiscal question. How in the judgment of the Prime Minister was it necessary that a mandate should be given? What was the condition, and the only condition upon which, according to him, a single mandate could be so obtained from the people? It was by saying. We will not submit Home Rule as an issue to the constituencies at this election, because, if we did submit it, we could not obtain from them a clear mandate on the fiscal question. If it be true that in 1906 it was impossible to obtain at one and the same election a mandate for Free Trade and Home Rule, how could it possibly be constitutionally sound law that a mandate can co-exist in 1911 for Home Rule and a revolutionary constitutional change? I do not imagine the answer would be possible to the right hon. Gentleman—I am sure no admirer of his would accept it—that in 1906 he was not dependent upon the Irish vote, and in 1911 he was.
What is the effect of the mandate that has been given, such as it is? I do not suppose anyone will put it so high as to claim that we are not entitled to analyse the nominal face value of the majority. I do not suppose anyone will put the result of the election high enough to make the contention necessary that on the mere figures which have been obtained, without

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any examination of the circumstances under which they have been obtained, a statesman will be well advised to base a great constitutional change which he hoped would be permanent in its character. What is the great dominating fact altogether ignored by everyone on those benches? It is that in these proposals you are outraging the convictions of nearly one-half of your fellow-countrymen on a matter which can never be settled except by consent. There is actually, if I am not mistaken, at the present moment, an English majority which is opposed to your proposal. What does this mean? We are told that we are on the eve of happy devolutionary days and that Wales and Scotland and Ireland will each attend to their own affairs. It is not contemplated, so far as I know, under that happy state of things that the House of Lords shall be given any power of vetoing the legislation of the Welsh, Scotch and Irish Parliaments which are to be harmoniously established. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Haldane), indeed, intimated that the House of Commons would possess such a power, but, as far as I know, no one has suggested that such functions are to be committed to the House of Lords. If that be so the future holds out the prospect that the legislative activities of the House of Lords, whatever they may be, are to be confined to dealing with English measures, and the last swan song of those who are going to leave us for Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, is to take away from the House of Lords, in dealing with our business, functions which the English people by a majority at the election have shown they desire the House of Lords to retain. I will undertake to say that few aristocracies in history have ever perpetrated so great an outrage on democracy as you are contemplating in the name of democracy.
It is very necessary to observe, for the information of some speakers, that this difficulty is not solved by using the term people, even if you spell it with a capital "P." I may ask the question, and it is very necessary after listening to two or three hours of speeches from that side of the House, what is the people? A little definition would appear to be necessary on the point. The Labour party appear to have taken the people under their special wing, and I gather that they identify it with the relatively small section of the electorate which sends them to the House of Commons. Three hon. Friends of mine who come from Lancashire, one
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the present Member for St. Helens, one the present Member for the Newton Division, and one the present Member for Wigan, were fortunate enough at the last election to displace Gentlemen who previously sat in this House as representing the Labour party. The gentleman who formerly sat here for the Newton Division was not infrequently in the habit of speaking about the "people" and about mandates. I want the House to consider what has become of the "people" in these three constitutiencies. Are they attending consolation banquets at Socialist Clubs in these constituencies, or is it to be supposed that their voice is still entitled to be considered as the voice of the people? If that be true, I hope we shall have little more of the monopoly of the term "people" in this controversy, and certainly I hope we shall hear little more of its crudest manifestations in the shape of that placard which was very familiar at the General Election: "Shall 600 Peers rule 6,000,000 electors?" I do not suppose there is a Member opposite who did not use it in his constituency, and I hear that some are still bold enough to cheer it. They did not think it necessary to inform their constituencies that there were nearly 3,000,000 of the electors who took the opposite view. Hon. Gentlemen opposite will not have solved the very elements of the question until they realise that the "people" does not inhabit a pigeon hole at the National Liberal Club, and that nearly half the people of this country will support us in any resistance, however desperate, to your proposals.
But let me do more justice to the it is put forward by hon. Members themselves. I understand from the speech of the hon. Member (Dr. Esmonde), and I understood also from a speech made by a Welsh Member yesterday, that their view is something like this. True, the Leader of the Irish party said, "Don't trust Asquith," true the hon. Member (Mr. Keir Hardie) is never tired of bespattering the Liberal party with contempt. He said, not long ago, that the Liberal party was a rich man's party, organised and financed by rich men—an opinion which his senior colleague (Mr. Edgar Jones) may usefully notice, because he seems to entertain a higher degree of the solidarity of the coalition than the view of his colleague would altogether justify
"I understand however much we despise one another's fundamental aims and the honesty with which we pursue them, we are agreed at least on this, that we have a majority of 120 for the Parliament Bill."

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Whatever else may be said about heads they count all right. This majority, repeated at the second election, dominates the whole political situation, and I understand that the hon. Member pledges the Government to submit the Bill, unaltered in essentials, to the House of Lords, and pledges the Lords constitutionally to pass it unaltered. That, I understand to be the view. Having regard to the admitted subordination of the House of Lords to the constituencies—a subordination which, in matters other than those affecting the lawmaking power, has been well settled since the memorable letter written by the Duke of Wellington to Lord Derby in 1846—I assert that that is a powerful argument which requires careful treatment and consideration on the other side of the House.
Is it true on the merits of the Parliament Bill that the Government can claim a majority of 120? Let me deal with the observation made by the hon. Member for North Tipperary (Dr. Esmonde). He spoke as if all sections of the Coalition—the Labour party, Liberals, and Irish Nationalists—entertained one general and common grievance against the House of Lords. Let me admit in the most candid manner possible that if it were true that the Labour party, the Irish party, and Liberals entertain an identical grievance against the House of Lords, and that on the merits of that grievance they were all equally determined to end the House of Lords, I agree at once that you are entitled to deal with the majority so obtained as you are entitled to deal with a homogeneous Liberal or Conservative majority. But suppose—and I take an extreme ease—your majority is composed of three groups, suppose that each of these groups has supported for many years the legislative policy of the Lords on every subject but one, suppose that all these groups are prepared to destroy the general legislative prerogative of the Lords, acceptable in the main to them in order to carry through the House of Lords, thus rendered impotent, each its own Bill to which the House of Lords has been the obstacle—is it not true that such a majority would afford no real security for the will of the people? What is your policy? Your policy is Veto abolition coupled with future reform. Let it be observed that this is a complete, self-contained, inter-dependent, and complementary policy. Veto abolition and future reform! I will not insult the Government—I will not, at any rate, at present insult them—by supposing that the
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Preamble of the Bill is not honestly and sincerely meant. I do not entertain the slightest doubt that the Prime Minister means the Preamble with great sincerity and honesty, but the difficulty with him is that he has meant so many things with sincerity and honesty which he has been wholly incapable of carrying out. It must be perfectly obvious that it would not be honourable to make the use which the Liberal party deliberately made of the Preamble at the last General Election unless they recognise an honourable and peremptory obligation to carry out that Preamble in the House of Commons. Observe how grossly dishonest any other view would be. It would mean that you are to appeal for the support of moderate men on the assumption that having dealt with the abolition of the Veto of the House of Lords, you are going to set in its place a new Chamber "breathing the new spirit of modern times"—I quote that phrase from one of the Ministers—"and in harmony with the needs of the present generation." It would mean that, having obtained the votes of the electors for that purpose, and having used the Foreign Secretary as a sort of decoy duck in order to, persuade the electors that reform is imminent and is contemplated by you, then, when in the House of Commons, you may indicate with great vagueness when the change is to be made. I would point out to the Prime Minister that it goes even further than this, and that it is dishonest to indulge in a single invective against the hereditary principle, and against supporting the hereditary principle, unless you can show that you can do something to correct that principle when you have come into office. If the Government have any mandate at all, it is to abolish the Veto. I hope I have made it clear that this policy is complete, self-contained, and interdependent. I am not going to ask how far you have got a mandate for that interdependent policy. Let me add this. It is abstractively very intelligible that men may favour the conversion of the absolute veto into a suspensory veto, if that is to be followed by reform, and that otherwise they would not have been in favour of it.
The hon. Member has indicated that many people are in favour of the Veto Bill who are not in favour of Home Rule. Let me ask, have you a majority of 120 for the twin heads of this interdependent and publicly declared policy? That is the only point, if you assent to the view that the obligation of the Preamble is an obligation which no honourable man can repudiate

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What is the position of the Labour party on this point? I will not say that their election pledges are made for everybody but themselves, but I would point out that they repudiate that Preamble altogether. The Leader of the Labour party (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) spoke yesterday, and he made it perfectly clear that his party are not only not in favour of the Preamble, but are in favour not only of nominal but actual Single-Chamber Government. They support the first part of the Government policy not because it will lead up to the second, but because they believe that it will destroy the second. That is to say, forty of your supporters—and the Government are not in a position to despise forty supporters—utterly repudiate an integral and fundamental portion of your declared mandate. They are here to destroy the House of Lords, and they are not here, according to your own showing, to reform that Chamber. There is not a Labour man in the House of Commons who would not rather destroy the coalition than strengthen the House of Lords by reforming them. No one will contradict the view that they would not vote for the Government if they thought that would enable the Government to strengthen the House of Lords. That means that you can dismiss the moral strength of this majority in a sentence. You cannot carry out what is an honourable obligation without the support of the Labour party, and the Labour party will not allow you to carry out that honourable obligation. Let me ask whether the Government are likely to be more fortunately circumstanced in the future? When is the happy day coming when the Liberal party will be strong enough to carry out the Preamble? Have you strength enough to do that after the elections which took place in January and December last year? Both of these battles took place at times, happily selected to secure for the Government successful polls—I mean after the latest issues of their declarations on class hatred. If they have not been returned with a majority to enable them to carry the Preamble now, I will leave to the imagination of others to define the precise period at which they will be able to do so.
The hon. Member (Dr. Esmonde) has spoken of the position of the Irish party. Let me push the analysis further, and ask how far the Irish party are entitled to be considered as supporters of the mandate? Hon. Members speaking on the other side of the House do not appear to recollect
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that for twenty-five years the Irish party has been openly and unashamedly in the political market. There has not been one moment in twenty-five years in which the Irish party would not have made a deal with the House of Lords on the basis of foregoing as regards this country every legislative view they have got, if the House of Lords would undertake to pass Home Rule. They do not care a brass farthing about your reforms, or rather their interest in them is contingent upon one point and one point only. They do not mind how much reform you have, provided you postpone what is an honourable obligation to reform the House of Lords to such a period as will make it impossible for the House of Lords to take the sense of the constituencies on the Home Rule Bill. Let this be observed, that the Irish party has never troubled even to pretend that they have the slightest sympathy with your alleged grievance against the House of Lords in the last ten years. Let me take the list of grievances with which the Prime Minister dealt last night. He complained that after the war election of 1900 the House of Lords had passed our Education Act and our Licensing Act, and he stated that no impartial Second Chamber would have passed either of these measures.
The PRIME MINISTERindicated dissent.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: I understood that the Prime Minister said that.' I certainly understood the right hon. Gentleman to complain of the apathy of the House of Lords during that period. I have a quotation from a speech he made to that effect. How does the Irish party stand on that matter? When our Education Act was introduced the present Chancellor of the Exchequer appealed to the Irish party to vote against the Second Beading. What happened? The Irish party supported the Second Reading and never gave a single vote against it. They were the valuable and the voluble bulwark of the Government. When the Licensing Act went through the House what happened? Speaking at Gloucester, the Prime Minister said that the votes of the Irish party enabled the Conservative Government to pass the measure. Therefore, it would appear, that the Irish grievance is that the Lords would not assist in rejecting Bills for which they voted in this House. What happened in 1906? When my right hon. Friend was speaking yesterday the Home Secretary interposed and complained that the House

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of Lords had also interfered with the Education Bill of the Liberal Government, and stated that that was the first quarrel they had with the House of Lords, It is interesting to inquire how the Irish party stood in relation to that measure. They voted against the Second Reading of the Bill, they also voted against the Third Reading of the Bill, and when it left the House of Commons, when the House of Commons had altogether lost saison of the Bill, when the late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman declared that the Bill was saturated with concessions, and when Lord Crewe said that, but for the action of the House of Lords, the Government would never have altered Clause 4, the Leader of the Irish party, speaking in this House, said:—
"Let me say in conclusion that it is my firm belief that this Bill in its present shape, will never pass into law. I and my colleagues will say that we repudiate it as a settlement, and condemn and resent it as an injury."
The hon. Member (Dr. Esmonde) said that the Irish party stand side by side with the Liberal party and the democracy of England in their great grievance against the House of Lords. There is not one of the great controversies of the last ten years with the exception of Home Rule—or I hardly recall one at present—in which the views of hon. Gentlemen from Ireland, where they were not bargained, were not in sympathy with the House of Lords. [An HON. MEMBER: "What about Plural Voting?"] The hon. Gentleman asks me about Plural Voting. I have never suggested that it was not possible to combine in a homogeneous body all sections of a coalition if they believe the change would have a deciding influence in their favour in an election contest.
5.0 P.M.
Let me take a further illustration if the hon. Gentleman is not satisfied. Take the Licensing Bill, which was beautifully described by a Nonconformist paper as the trumpet note of the people's morality. That trumpet note has awakened no echo in the Nationalist party. They rather gravitated towards what is aggressively, but a little inconsiderately, called by their present allies the party of bung. Many Nationalists voted against the Bill, and neither the Leader of the Irish party nor the hon. Member for East Mayo voted for either the Second or Third Reading of the Bill, so that the position of the Irish party and the House of Lords, always setting on one side Home Rule, is that the House of
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Lords delayed an Education Bill which was an insult to Ireland and a Licensing Bill for which the Leader of the Irish party would not cross the House of Commons to vote. It is wholly unnecessary to pursue this controvery in relation to the Budget. We know the position perfectly clearly. The Leader of the Irish party said in Liverpool:—
"The question of the Veto is supreme because it means Home Rule, and to it we are willing to subordinate any number of Budgets, and any conceivable issue that can be raised."
They do not dissent from that. They have always been perfectly frank in the expression of their views. We have analysed the moral strength of your support from the Labour Bench, and now if you take the Irish party there are seventy odd votes, supporting you on this Mandate which you claim from the people, not in the least on the merits of your proposal, but on a collateral branch which they do not hesitate to voice by their cheers in this House? The Prime Minister spoke of the backwoods men last night. These backwoods men in the House of Lords who have been so stupid and reactionary in all the great controversies. But at least they have been in respectable and democratic company below the gangway. On the subject of backwoods men may I respectfully suggest to the Prime Minister that that very threadbare taunt might now be left in hands inferior to his, both in dignity and authority. The taunt is as offensive as it is unjust. These gentlemen live on their estates, for which they were thanked last year by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. They do their duty to the best of their ability, a fact which was also recognised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and they are not conspicuously inferior to those who jeer at them, either in breeding, education, or public honour. If they lived in London, hon. Gentlemen opposite would brand them as idle rich, or absentee landlords. As they live in the country, they sneer at them as backwoods men, except when they want them to preside over their county associations; and then the Government slobbers over them with unsolicited flatteries.
At a certain stage in the last two Elections, when the Home Secretary found that the results were not quite consistent with his always sanguine expectations, he delivered the same speech in which with lyrical enthusiasm he compared the present majority which supports the Government to one of Mr. Gladstone's great majorities, and said they were about the same, and

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he saw no reason why they should not hold office as long. But after all, all of Mr. Gladstone's majority wanted the same thing, and wanted it for the same reason. You want the same thing, and you want it for different reasons. If the Government were to pass the Parliament Bill with a majority so obtained, does any reasonable person in this House believe that they can ever hold it? Does anyone believe that if as a result of the coalition majority, you pass the Parliament Bill now it would survive the next House of Commons? It may be that some people suppose that the Unionist party will always be out of office. I can only say I do not address myself to the persons who hold that view, but to those who hold the view that they may one day come back; and I ask anyone who supposes that the Unionist party will not be always out of office, whether they really suppose that we shall come back to office not pledged to deprive the Commons, or the oligarchy which rules it of unrestricted control over legislation? It is absolutely certain that if this Bill became law it would be altered the first Session in which we came into power. Do not let me put it too high. I do not gather at what point hon. Members quarrel with my view, that at some period or another we shall come into power. Let us suppose it takes the country twenty years to weary of your Excellencies, it may reasonably be anticipated if accumulated human experience teaches us anything, that at some time or other, as remote as you like, the people will desire a change, and when that the comes, whenever and wherever that change does take place, I cannot conceive that this will not be one of the very first things which will be corrected by the new administration. If that is so, will three years' legislative supremacy, however used or however abused, compensate the Government for the ground that they would have lost in this controversy? Let me be the first to make this admission unreservedly. Hon. Gentlemen have carried this controversy, a controversy which has now lasted at intervals for sixty years, to a point of success to which it has not hitherto been carried by the Liberal party, to a point at which the vituperative genius of O'Connell and the compelling eloquence of Gladstone failed to place it. I own that freely. Is it wise, the Government having fought so long to obtain the ground which they hold, to compromise what they have gained by a success which it is absolutely
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certain they can never permanently retain? Would not a success less extreme, but permanently tenable, be more profitable, even on the lowest grounds of party?
Let the House observe how little divides the two sides of the House at the present moment. The right hon. Gentleman says that the Preamble is to come hereafter. We say that reform is to come, and ought to come now, and I am at least entitled to remind the House on that point, that I wrote a letter to the Press about a year or so ago which I see many hon. Members have read, in which, after expressing the opinion that it must be remembered that a change was urgently needed in the Constitution of the House of Lords I said that it ought to be a change which would not stereotype existing inequalities under a less assailable form, and I added that it ought to be a change which would give Liberals as good a chance, or as bad a chance, of carrying their legislative proposals as Unionists. I adhere to every word I wrote then. What is wanted, in my humble judgment, is not merely a Second Chamber, a Legislative Assembly, of which we should be able to say that it consists of men who have been put there by us to carry out our views, or of which you should be able to say that it is made up of men put there by you to carry out your decree. What is wanted, in my humble judgment, more than anything else is an independent Second Chamber. If that principle be once conceded, then a mere slight discrepancy of numbers matters very little indeed; the moment one accepts the principle of joint Session, because if there is a joint Session of the two Houses, a smaller accidental discrepancy in the numbers' of the Second Chamber is far less important. I daresay the House has read some proposals made by my Noble Friend, Lord Curzon, elsewhere. I can quite conceive somebody saying of these proposals, which I know were made with very great sincerity as a contribution to this discussion, that they would give Unionists rather too many Members in the Second Chamber. It may be so. I think that the objection is quite honestly made. But the reply is twofold. If you think so, then make it the basis of your objection. Point out that in your opinion it would have that effect. But remember also, in correction of your opinion, that if you adopt the principle of joint Sessions, which is a principle that I believe certainly found support on the Front Bench during the election, if there is anything wrong with the numbers of your Second Chamber it would produce

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consequences which would modify that opinion.
If your Preamble is sincerely meant, why not carry it out now, and it would found your reform strongly and thoroughly upon the bedrock of national consent rather than upon the shifting quicksands of party triumph. Such a reformed Chamber could not be divorced from legislative functions, nor would many Members of this House, if we had a Second Chamber of that kind, wish to see it divorced from legislative activity. I anticipate one principal objection from Members of the Coalition. I may be told that they have no mandate for such a change, that whatever mandate they have is for this Parliament Bill. I do not think that that argument can really be pressed too far. Hon. Gentlemen claim two elections. I think the Home Secretary has gone the length of claiming that he has a mandate based upon three elections. In spite of the first two mandates, the Government held a Conference. I do not think anyone will contend that in holding that Conference they did not commit a breach of trust, if as the result of two mandates it was possible for them to discuss proposals. I find it difficult to understand the contention that because another election has intervened, not altering the relative strength of parties, it is impossible for them to consider the proposal which I make. The secrets of the Conference were well kept, but no one supposes that the Members of the Conference spent six months discussing the Parliament Bill. It does not require any betrayal of their secrets to realise that if the members of the Conference found fruitful topic for discussion during those six months, ground so fruitful, so full at one period of hope that the Prime Minister issued a notice in which he said that all the members of the Conference were agreed that it would be wrong prematurely to suspend and determine the Conference—if that is so, after some months' proceedings, what futility it is for the Government to come forward to-day and say that the last word of human wisdom on the constitutional question is contained in the four corners of the Bill.
If the Government refuse to consider the arguments put forward, and the indications given by my right hon. Friend last night, what question would inevitably be asked? The Prime Minister would be asked, I think, "To when are you post poning the Preamble?" He is a master of lucid speech; no one can tell more
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clearly in a single sentence what the intentions of the Preamble are, if he knows them. His difficulty is not in expressing them; his difficulty is that he does not know them. I can remember reading years ago, when many right hon. Gentlemen who now sit on the Front Bench earned reputations for themselves by inquiring, night after night, of my right hon. Friend what he was going to do in the contingency of Tariff Reform, with two Houses of Parliament in the way. What has become of their interrogative gifts when we have furnished to us the reasonable question as to when this Preamble is to come in. If there is to be a Preamble, what time could be so fit for it as the present? You have at your disposal the unexhausted energy of a youthful Parliament, fresh from contact with the constituencies, which have given you authority to reform it. Why are the Government not disclosing it? Will it not be said, and truly said, that the Government is guilty of chicanery when it is using the Preamble as a sort of soporific for moderate men while postponing it at Irish dictation in order to smuggle through Home Rule? The Government, in former days, were very fond of accusing my right hon. Friend of tactics These are tactics pure and simple, and observe how bad the tactics are. The Government, it is to be presumed, and the House of Commons, want to get the Bill, and they want it to be passed. If I were a Peer, while I might surrender my own quarrel after two elections, I would never surrender knowing that the surrender was to be used to place upon the Statute Book a Bill abhorrent to millions of my fellow subjects, a right to decide which has been filched from them by a trick. I ask, and I do not ask in an unconciliatory spirit, are the Government wise to put such a conflict upon such a plane. I venture to warn them that they would be wise not to underrate the capacity for resistance of an ancient Chamber, strong in the support of half the nation. There is much loose talk of revolutionary peerages. I think it will be found that the debauchery of a great assembly is a more difficult undertaking than hon. Gentlemen imagine. I would invite those who would not agree with me on that point to consider that the roots of the House of Lords, good or bad, date back for a thousand years in our national history. You cannot divorce yourselves from its past any more than you can that House from its illustrious history. What man knows that when he uproots a

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tree centuries old, how far its roots have spread, with how many growths they are woven and intertwined, and how many un-contemplated destructions may follow its uprooting? Let the Prime Minister hesitate before he drives to an extreme the defenders of an ancient institution. Last night the Prime Minister quoted Burke, of whom he is a great admirer. Let me remind him of another passage from Burke:—
"No Constitution can defend itself; it must be defended by the wisdom and the fortitude of men. These are what no Constitutions can give; they come from God, and He alone knows if we shall possess such gifts at the the time we most need them."
Mr. J. M. ROBERTSON: The hon. and learned Member who has just sat down has introduced into this Debate what I may term a system or test by which the merits of many of the proposals of the Bill are to be gauged, and he said that a measure of this kind has never been passed save as a matter of general and national consent. That proposition seems to me to mean that no measure of reform introduced by a Liberal Government dealing with the structure of the Constitution can ever become law until hon. Members opposite, as representing the Opposition in the country, agree to accept the measure. We have heard many extravagant and preposterous propositions in the course of this Debate, but surely that is the most extravagant and preposterous of all. On what principle are we asked seriously to admit the suggestion that measures of reform or change brought in from this side, shall never be permanent, cannot possibly be permanent until hon. Members opposite not only consent to let them pass this House, but agree to let them stand afterwards. The hon. Member put forward something in the nature of a threat. He told us his party would be backed in their resistance, no matter how desperate, to this particular measure. I do not know what the hon. Member meant by that "how desperate." Perhaps he will permit me to suggest, if it means anything at all, which is doubtful, that it is not an expression which should be used in this House. It either means he is going to appeal to physical violence, or it does not. If it does not, it is a stroke of rhetoric grossly extravagant. He need not have resorted to that, because he has quite sufficient command of vocabulary without introducing gross extravagances. But this question of national consent has been introduced. Let me ask how this test of the relative importance of
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legislative measures is to be applied, and to what extent must you have the consent of parties, and to what extent you need not. The hon. and learned Member, in the course of the last two elections, made a number of predictions. In connection with the second and last election, he made the prediction—at least it was so quoted in the Press—that before a few weeks were over, not only would a Tariff Reform Government be sitting on these benches, but Tariff Reform would be in operation. So the hon. and learned Member is prepared, and his conscience backs him up, to impose on the people of this country a tariff within a few weeks, without their consent; without the consent either of the districts or of this House, or of parties, or any one else ever being considered.
We do look to the other side on such an occasion as this to rise above the atmosphere of mere taunts. The hon. and learned Member is certainly an authority upon taunts and upon vituperation, and he seemed to share the not uncommon uneasiness on that side of the House when taunts are used against his own side. His party seem to claim a monopoly of taunts. But if on such an occasion as this he would set aside his taunts, and come to something like constitutional principles, we might expect him to listen to the answer to his claim that there should be national consent to a great measure. The hon. and learned Gentleman used the argument which is so constantly used on that side by the party who flaunt the principle of Union. He used the old argument of the English majority—that is to say, the Unionist party treat the phrase of the "United Kingdom" as a mere geographical expression, while pinning their faith on England. The Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University (Lord Hugh Cecil), said the other night that we are one nation, that there is no division, and that he who scratches a Scotchman or an Englishman makes an Irishman bleed. These are the statesman like declarations introduced ad hoc for a particular argument, and for particular purposes at a particular moment. The hon. and learned Member opposite, whose main weapon in this Debate is to bring charges of collective inconsistencies against Members on this side, should really devote a little attention to the development of consistency on his own side. He spoke of the English majority, but what is it? Why should England be treated as a mere geographical expression?

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Does he think that we are really going to allow our destinies to be settled on a statistical analysis, according to districts and the number of people in the counties and divisions?
There is such a thing as the North of England and the South of England, and the next step in this political analysis will be that those who mainly represent the South of England, the non-industrial and feudalist South of England—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, oh!"]—I am forced to introduce this point, and should never have attempted to raise it if not forced by what is said on the other side—the next step will be, if the analysis is to be made a means of flouting and frustrating the declared wish of the majority of the people of the United Kingdom that this analysis will be carried a little further than hon. Members opposite carry it by the industrial North, if you tell them that you are going to force a tariff upon them without their consent. I have followed and read the whole of the Debate in this controversy on the Parliament Bill. My great difficulty is to discover what are the real grounds of the general opposition to-day. Hon. Members opposite charge Members on this side of the House with a certain difference in the mode of advocating this question. The hon. and learned Member quoted all those taunts, and his speech largely consisted of accusations against Members on this side of the House of desiring to carry the Parliament Bill for different purposes. That taunt comes very badly from Members of a party which, by its very name, was a coalition party; which even altered its name at a certain crisis because it was a coalition party, and which then proceeded deliberately to carry legislation to which the majority of its own Members had been opposed—legislation which they abhorred and repudiated—merely for the purpose of establishing themselves as a coalition. If we approach this matter from the point of view either of political science or of common sense I do not think there is any value at all in those taunts, though I am retaliating to show hon. Members how little worthy they are. I do not see any point in an Assembly like this—in raising the question of what is the composition of the majority at a given moment, and turning our backs on the broad and essential fact that this House is representative of the people of the United Kingdom, and that the means of parties have relation to people outside.
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We here are the council of the nation, and vote according to our conscience. I see no point in raising the question of what is the composition of the majority or the minority at a given moment. If hon. Members want to try the Bill on that case how do they stand?
The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition opened the Debate yesterday on his side by an argument to the effect that a General Election can practically give no mandate for anything at all. If you raise more than one question, then you are lost, and you have got no right to bring in any Bill in particular, from which he deduces that under certain circumstances he would have the right to bring in Bills for anything in general. Let me do him the justice of saying that he would. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition took occasion, in his speech, to justify his own historic policy in the Parliament of 1900. He affected to justify it by the argument used by the Prime Minister to prove that there was no reason for alarm as to what would be done by say a Liberal Parliament after the carrying of the Parliament Bill. The Prime Minister had said, that a Liberal majority in this House, fresh from the constituencies, would introduce Bills which the constituencies wanted, and that when it was near the time of returning to the constituencies, it would not be likely to introduce Bills which the constituencies would regard as outrageous. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition on that point suggested that his Bills in the Parliament of 1900 were practically justified, because the first was introduced within two years of coming in, and the second of them was introduced within two years of going out. But what was the history of those particular Bills? The hon. and learned Member for Kingston (Mr. Cave) yesterday had the courage to warn us that if we carried this Parliament Bill, measures might be carried through this House which the country would absolutely repudiate, if it had the chance of deciding upon them. He had the courage to say that, when his own party, when last in power, notoriously and admittedly introduced Bills, not only that the country had not asked for, but which that party had promised to the country, would not be introduced at all. We have actually had that experience, we have lived through it we have seen Bills of that kind which the Leaders of that party told the country would not be introduced, we have seen those Bills introduced and carried through

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this and the Upper Chamber without the slightest attempt on the part of that Upper Chamber to defend the rights and the liberties of the people of England. We have seen all that, and still hon. Members come and tell us of what a dreadful risk we run of uncontrolled despotism by one Chamber.
If we take the operation of the Parliament Bill in the simplest possible way it comes to this, that under the operation of that Bill, when a Liberal Government is in power there will be some approximation, but a very slight approximation, to the state of things that subsists when a Conservative Government is in power. If that state of things is all right when a Conservative Government is in power, how can they argue that there is anything seriously wrong when, under a Liberal Government, there is only a little less freedom of operation? The utter insincerity of the Conservative case as against this Bill is pretty clear when you face this clear issue. The main charge against the supporters of the Bill, and against the Bill, is that it is supported for different reasons. The Leader of the Opposition tells us that we have no mandate for anything in particular. That, however, he does not make any argument against this Bill, as I understand it. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Edinburgh and St. Andrew's Universities declared that we could not possibly, and that we were not justified in proceeding after this Bill with the Home Rule Bill because, he said, that Bill had not been before the country. The Home Rule question, he even alleged, had not been before the country. The statements made by the hon. and learned Gentleman on that head are a startling illustration of the extent to which a man can get out of touch with public opinion by becoming a Member for a University. If the hon. and learned Gentleman had had any occasion to be in real touch with the people of this country he never would have made an assertion like that. He seemed to think that it was a relevant thing to say that if a Member had not put a certain point in his address that therefore he had not consulted his Constituents on that point. I do not know that I can recall the words of my own address. I know that I made it as brief as possible. My recollection is that I confined it to the one point of putting down the Veto of the House of Lords. Then I should be told by the hon. and learned Member that I have no mandate
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for Free Trade, if it had not been put in my address, although I had it before the constituency for seven years. This kind of argument is absurd. How does it work out when it is confronted by the argument put forward by the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool (Mr. F. E. Smith). That hon. and learned Gentleman would actually have the Government introduce a Bill which he almost pledges his party to support, a Bill that has never been before the country, and as to the question of details upon which he knows it is very hard to get agreement.
It is very hard to discover any principle from the Opposition on which a Bill should be introduced. I take it the principles on this side are pretty simple. You introduce, first, the most pressing measure, the measure for which you got the largest and most nearly unanimous support. Then the second Bill would be one for which you would have the nearest approach to that support. Tried by those principles a new Second-Chamber Bill could not possibly be either the first or the second, if it could be the third Bill. The question of the constitution of the Second Chamber that is desired to be set up in place of the House of Lords—and I will not use the phrase "reform of the House of Lords"—though this Parliament Bill is a Bill reforming it, and very seriously reforming it, the Second-Chamber Bill that must be introduced afterwards must be to have a Second Chamber in substitution of the House of Lords. The details of that Chamber, the nature of that Chamber, the reasons for which you want the functions of that Chamber, those are questions that would have to be discussed for a long time in this country before you could pretend that the people are properly informed or able to give a mandate to any party about details. The hon. and learned Member for Kingston actually invited us last night, when joining in the denunciation of bringing in measures for which we had no mandate, to introduce a Referendum measure. To what extent has the Referendum been before the electorate? In my own last Election I made the experiment at a number of meetings of asking all present, irrespective of their party politics, all of them who could recollect having ever heard the Referendum discussed, or who had read a discussion upon it setting forth the arguments, to hold up their hands. I never found a single person able to hold up a hand as having had that experience. I

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make bold to say, I do not think that in the electorate of the country generally, the proportion of electors who had heard the Referendum discussed would be any larger than among the Constituents I have the honour to represent.
The hon. and learned Member for Kingston seriously argued that the Referendum is a matter as to which we have abundant knowledge. He said that the ignorance on the subject is pretended. You might, of course, claim that every Member here ought to know what is meant by the Referendum, but to suggest that the electorate of the country has discussed or considered the Referendum and is prepared to give a voice on the Referendum the hon. and learned Gentleman knows is to grossly misrepresent the facts of the case. The Referendum was suddenly fired, as from a gun, by the Leader of the Opposition. Hon. Members opposite, who tell us that the Home Rule question was not adequately before the constituencies, are perfectly well aware that the Referendum proposition was introduced by the Leader of the Opposition in connection with the Home Rule Bill. What was the object of it but to enable his party to capture votes which were withheld from it for fear of Tariff Reform, but which might be given to it on the question of Home Rule. It was in that particular connection that the Referendum was mentioned. As regards the attitude taken up by the hon. and learned Member for Kingston on the Referendum in general, I would respectfully invite hon. Members opposite, who appear to be so touchy on appeals to the sense of honour, consistency, and sincerity, to consider the position in which their party was placed last night by the hon. and learned Member for Kingston. He suggested that we should adopt, and that there would be no opposition from his party and no question of mandate, a Referendum measure. His view of a Referendum measure is that the Referendum should only be put when there was a deadlock between the two Chambers.
Mr. CAVE: I did not say that; I said the normal use of a Referendum was in the case of a deadlock, but where it was desired to refer special questions to a Referendum vote that might be done by a special Bill or clause.
Mr. J. M. ROBERTSON: Then there is really no policy on the part of the hon. and learned Member, and I apologise for
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having assumed that he had put a definite policy before us. He was inviting us to agree with some measure on which even he had not made up his mind. He has just said, he was going to leave it in a perfectly fluid condition. If his mind was in that condition, in what state could the mind of the electorate be? The one thing that emerges clear is that hon. Members opposite are perfectly prepared, by their own declarations at least, to carry through this House any particular measure on which the electorate has never been consulted. The only test is, that those measures should be advantageous to them as a party. That is all that emerges from the whole of the discussion. The hon. and learned Member for Walton spoke very strongly on the point of honour. The Preamble to the Bill involves, as he understood it, the introduction of a measure for the creation of a new Second Chamber. It involves nothing of the kind. The natural obstacles to the introduction of any such measure are so obviously great that they alone would prevent the immediate introduction of a Bill of this kind. For what purpose do hon. Members opposite put forward these suggestions? Is it with the object of curtailing the power of the House of Lords or of making more easy the passing of Liberal legislation? We know very well that any proposal that they put before us is supported by them in the hope that it will make impossible the legislation which the majority of the Nation desire. What is their final position in regard to the House of Lords? They have now all given it up. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition declared that the House of Lords has practically gone by, and that there must be a sweeping change. What was he doing with the House of Lords a year ago, when the body which he now admits to be utterly discredited, which he admits to have been unfit to exist, which he admits to be indefensible, which he admits to be merely cumbering the ground? A year or two ago, he was using that very body, with the entire support of his whole party, in the destruction of one of the constitutional principles. Hon. and right hon. politicians who thus play fast and loose with every question of principle, and who are willing in one year to use an old institution for the purpose of blocking the path of their opponents come forward now and say: "We quite admit there is nothing to be said for it, it is totally unfit to be preserved, but you will not expect us to give it up."

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The very use made of the House of Lords within the year by the party opposite, and by the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, is in itself abundant justification for even far stronger measures than are now being taken. They talk now about sweet reasonableness after having gone to the very verge of unscrupulous unreasonableness. The democracy, if we may use the term at all, has sent the hon. Members who sit on this side to do certain things. One thing we are to do is to make an end of the powers of the House of Lords as they at present exist. To that we have nothing in the nature of a clear proposal from the right hon. Gentleman the leader of the Opposition, but the suggestion to the effect that we should preserve something of the hereditary Chamber. An extraordinary fact with the party who take up what may be called a fighting attitude, is that there is no general conviction on the other side as to what a Second Chamber ought to be. They may perfectly well make such a charge on this side. We admit there is no general agreement on this side. That a number do not believe in the Second-Chamber principle is notorious, and is not denied; but what belief is there on the other side as to what a Second Chamber ought to be? Hon. Members opposite are perfectly prepared to adopt into their political creed any view of the Constitution that may be put before them in the course of an election by their Leader. Until the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition had fired his shot on the Referendum, how many hon. Members opposite had ever said a word about the Referendum? Within a week—nay, the next day—that principle has become one of the planks of the Conservative party. With that ready adaptability to new views and to new propositions, I can understand why hon. Members opposite should expect us instantly to adopt a new policy, and to rush a Bill through before we have consulted our constituents or obtained any mandate on the subject at all. But on this side of the House there is a fair share of what rational conservatism is left in this country. I mean conservatism in the real meaning of the term—the unwillingness on the part of practical men suddenly to pledge themselves to a principle that they have never thought out. Twenty years ago that would have been regarded as conservatism; to-day the Conservative party is the last place where you need look for any such prudence or any such avoidance of rash pledges and promises.
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I was suggesting a few minutes ago that the view of the Referendum put forward by the hon. and learned Member for Kingston seemed to me to be in direct antagonism to the view of the Referendum put forward by the Leader of the Opposition. The right hon. Gentleman had given us a pledge of his own to the effect that a Referendum would be given in the matter of Tariff Reform. As I understood the proposals of the Leaders in the other House the Referendum was to be a matter which should come into force when they gave the signal; it was to lie with the other House when the Referendum should be applied. But the Leader of the Opposition says, "I promise you that the Referendum shall be given. Talk of dictation from a Minister! Talk of arrogant assumption! Here is a Leader, not yet in office, promising, in defiance of the declarations of the other Chamber as to the conditions under which the Referendum should be applied, that at his single will the Referendum shall be given to the nation. If he can make such a promise, and I have no doubt he made it in all sincerity, what does it mean? It means that he has the House of Lords in his pocket. I put the position summarily in that fashion, because the proposals in the other Chamber were to the effect that they should determine when the Referendum should be given. If that promise meant that he could dictate when the Referendum should be given it follows that we are asked to live under the domination of a Second Chamber which acts at the dictation of the right hon. Gentlemen opposite. From every point of view the situation has become intolerable for Members on this side of the House. The hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division has admitted that. He has written to the Press stating in effect that the situation under which the House of Lords plays an absolute party part, a one-sided rôle, letting through all Tory measures and checking many Liberal measures, is intolerable from the point of view of general common sense. But he was perfectly prepared to let things go on on that footing until there was an absolute revolt on the part of us who claim to represent what he will not allow us to call the people. The hon. and learned Member himself admits that the position has become intolerable.
What are the suggestions and proposals that are made to us by the party opposite? They say to us: "Yes, it is true that your

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position is intolerable; you have suffered in a way that no political party ever ought to have been expected to suffer; you are in that position, and you must be got out of it; but we will not give our sanction to your getting out of it until you bring forward a scheme of reform that we are prepared to accept, and you can carry your plan with the consent of the nation." Will hon. Members opposite, and not merely the right hon. Gentleman, pledge themselves that no measure which they introduce into this House should be passed until they have our consent? Until they give us some such undertaking as that, the principle of national consent, which the hon. and learned Member has introduced, must be regarded as the last extravagance of the party with which he acts. It is a deplorable thing that there could be no consent even in such a private council as the Conference of last year; it is extremely unfortunate, but inasmuch as the deliberations were secret nobody on either side is in a position to pass a critical judgment. The hon. and learned Member for Walton has said, however, that it is quite clear that the members of the Conference were not discussing merely the particular matter which they sat down to discuss; and I suppose that, with that lead, I may go further and say that it is quite clear that they were discussing the question of Home Rule. I think that inference is as clear as the inference of the hon. and learned Member.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: I must not be taken as assenting to it.
Mr. J. M. ROBERTSON: No; but I do not think the hon. and learned Member will venture to dissent from it, and that is quite enough for my purpose. The inference that he drew he was entitled to draw, and I also am entitled to draw my inference. See where that leads us on the principle which he has put forward. Inasmuch as Members of the Government were discussing Home Rule with leaders of the Opposition at the Conference, the Government are not only entitled but bound to bring in a Home Rule Bill. [Several HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] The hon. and learned Member's argument was that the Government cannot come down and say that they are not properly prepared to bring in, or justified in introducing, any such Bill for the constitution of a new Second Chamber. He says that they cannot say that, because they were discussing
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the question of a new Second Chamber in the Conference last year.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: My argument was that it was ridiculous to pretend that the last words of wisdom on this constitutional question rested with the Parliament Bill, when the Government, by irresistible inference, must have been discussing for some months quite another method of dealing with it.
Mr. J. M. ROBERTSON: If there is anything in that proposition, I gave a fail-statement of it. The phrase about "the. last words of wisdom is, I take it, so much verbiage. The point is the point that I put. The contention is that the Government have no right to plead any disability; that, having discussed the matter at the Conference, they must have gone further than discussing the mere details of the Parliament Bill; that, having actually discussed the matter with the leaders of the Opposition, there is no real bar to their bringing in a Bill for the constitution of a new Second Chamber. That is the argument, if there is any. I take it that it is equally clear to the outsider—we are all on the same footing in that respect—that the members of the Conference were discussing Home Rule. On that principle, therefore, I submit that the Government are perfectly justified in bringing in their Home Rule Bill as early as they can. The very last argument brought forward against the introduction of a Home Rule Bill is shattered by the argument put in our hands by the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division.
But I do not want to rely on a mere dialectical device for a justification of the introduction of a Home Rule Bill. What did the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition tell us not very long ago in a speech which he for once, to the great gratification of us all, detached himself from party considerations? I refer to the speech in which he discussed the principle of Woman Suffrage. On that occasion, when he was really detached for once from tactics, he declared that the governing principle of democratic legislation is more and more coming to be the principle of government by consent. But not in the sense in which the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division puts it, not that government by consent is to mean that you must get the consent of the Opposition to every measure you introduce; but that you are to have regard in your statesmanship to the obtaining of the consent

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of the people whom you govern. That is the ground upon which we justify the introduction of a Home Rule Bill for Ireland. That is our answer to appeals which have been made to us on serious grounds—appeals as distinguished from the mere taunts which are so large a part of the stock-in-trade of politicians, I will not say only on that side of the House, though they are very actively employed there, where the great objections to cheap food are supported by cheap arguments. The Leader of the Opposition has given us, as perhaps from his point of view the most fundamental political principle for the guidance of our actions, the principle of government by consent. I think, therefore, we can claim to have him in respect of his political philosophy on our side when we support the Government in following up their great Parliament Bill as early as possible with a Bill for giving Home Rule to Ireland, for the creation of a real United Kingdom, which apparently does not yet exist even in the consciousness of Members of the Opposition, since they are always discounting every principle of union by their statistical analyses. We may hope that after that Bill is introduced and carried there will be a union so well worth holding to and defending that even Members opposite will no longer hold out threats of what they will do in the way of undoing our work when they come back to office.
I greatly regret that that threat should have been made. If such a practice is to be a feature of our Debates it will not be easy to preserve their dignity. The Leader of the Opposition, if he did not make a threat, came very near it when opposing the Death Duties introduced by Sir William Harcourt in 1894. At least, he declared the proposal to be a revolutionary piece of legislation which was bound to work ruin to half the landed interests of the country. The right hon. Gentleman came into power the next year, and never made the slightest attempt to undo that legislation. I am not taunting him for that; I am merely objecting to the introduction of this new method of threats—of saying, "If you pass this Bill, as soon as we come back to power we will undo it." It would be an easy matter for us to reply, "If you undo it, woe betide you; your work will also be undone." That, surely, is not the line upon which our Debates ought to be conducted. I trust that the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division, who made an appeal to the Prime Minister to abstain from the use of
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threats, will himself endeavour to abstain from the use of threats which ought never to be introduced into the Debates of this House.
6.0 P.M.
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: In the sweetly reasonable speech which the hon. Member for Tyneside has just delivered he has made one or two charges against Members on this side of the House. He has complained that we have used words which ought not to be used—such as "desperate." In the course of his speech I noticed the words "arrogant," "lack of principle," "last extravagance," "despotism," and other similar expressions. He has adjured us not to use threats. If I remember aright it was Members of the present Treasury Bench who, on the occasion of the Unionist Licensing Act, used threats of repeal. If I remember aright, it was the same Members who, on the occasion of the Education Act, loudly used threats of repeal. If I remember aright, it was the Prime Minister who, speaking not long ago, said that it could not be reckoned wholly unparliamentary to consider the possibility of the repeal of an Act with which the nation might not agree. The hon. Member for the Tyneside Division does not like taunts, but he has said that the proposal of the hon. and learned Member for Kingston with regard to the Referendum was fluid. He said that we on this side of the House committed ourselves to principles that we had not thought out. What about the Preamble of the Bill now under discussion? Is that Preamble fluid? Does it not commit hon. Members opposite to the principle of a reformed Second Chamber, which, on the hon. Member's own hypothesis, they have not thought out? Really and truly, the hon. Member, I think—I do not wish to say it with any offensiveness—might take his own speech as an example of some of the characteristics which he has deprecated as obtaining on this side of the House. He has asked, on the other hand, what are the real grounds of our opposition to this Parliament Bill. With many of us our opposition does not arise from any mere spirit of negative criticism at all; it is that we have a perfectly positive desire for a reform of the Second Chamber. The hon. Member does not seem to think it possible because the present Constitution of the Second Chamber is in favour of the Conservative side of the House that, therefore, out of fairness any of us can think from a wider statesmanship that it might be desirable

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to alter it. We oppose the Parliament Bill because we think it bad in itself, and because it is one-sided in dealing with a question that has two sides. We oppose the Bill because it postpones and prejudices real reform which both we and Members opposite no doubt freely confess we have at heart. Here we have a question that admittedly has two sides—two sides which are distinguishable but inseparable, just as the reverse of a coin is inseparable from the obverse. There is the question of powers—that is to say, the relations between the two Houses: the powers of the Second Chamber in relation to this, and the question of its composition. Indeed, so closely are the two related that the hon. Member for the Tyneside Division fell into a contradiction himself. He said that it would take a long discussion throughout the country in order to settle properly what should be the functions of the Second Chamber. Yet it is the functions of the Second Chamber, and not its composition, that are being dealt with at present by the Parliament Bill. I think I am entitled to ask if there is really any Member on the other side of the House who has any doubt that if there is to be any lasting or permanent reform of the Second Chamber which is to satisfy the nation, however broadly taken, that you will have to get the concurrent treatment of both sides of the question—both the powers and the composition of the Second House. I know quite well that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Leicester (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) has upheld the position that you ought to first of all settle the functions of the Second House. Mark you, he looks upon the Parliament Bill as settling the functions of the Second Chamber. The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken (Mr. J. M. Robertson) says that these functions ought to be the subject of further great discussion throughout the country.
Mr. J. M. ROBERTSON: The future Second Chamber.
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: It was the hon. Gentleman who represents Leicester who said that you ought to settle the functions of a future Second Chamber by this Bill.
Mr. ARTHUR HENDERSON: No; the functions of the present Second Chamber.
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: Not in his speech yesterday, but in a speech before,
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the hon. Member said you ought to settle the functions of the Second Chamber before you proceed to define its composition. That was an apparently logically-worded speech. When it is analysed it has really got neither real fact nor true logic in it. When you are going in for a water supply you cannot settle the diameter of the pipes for the supply until you have settled the pressure. If you are devising electric light of a certain brilliancy you cannot settle what the voltage is to be unless you settle the amperes also. The two have got to be settled together. So it is perfectly true, and perfectly palpable also, that you cannot settle what the functions of the Second Chamber are to be until you have settled its composition. Functions which any one on either side of the House would freely admit may be improper for the Second Chamber constituted as it is at present, may be perfectly fit, suitable, and proper for the same Second Chamber to exercise if it is remodelled according to speeches of hon. Members opposite, on a new and democratic basis. Those of us who respect the power of mind—as I do—of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Leicester realise that he could not really imagine the proposition he put forward, and that probably what was really at the back of his mind was something different. He confesses that he himself is for a Single Chamber. He realises, as he has stated in public, that while he is for a Single Chamber, the country is for Two Chambers. And it occurs to one irresistibly that in his support of the Parliament Bill that he is getting, under cover of it, as near to what he wishes himself, and as far as possible from what he conceives the country really wishes. If it should be conceded that, at any rate, for any lasting reform, that both the powers and the composition of the Second House should be settled together, what is the defence for bringing forward the present Parliament Bill? We have been told, and I think the Prime Minister was one who laid stress on the fact that it was the Parliament Bill that was alone, or at any rate principally, before the country for their mandate at the last Election. If, indeed, it was so, then surely to place before the country a merely one-sided thing is really unworthy of true statesmanship. At the same time, do not let us for a moment charge our opponents with being unworthy in that respect, because, as a matter of fact, it is not a fact that it was the Parliament Bill that was principally, or

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solely, before the country at the last election. No one can uphold that on the proofs. Go through speech after speech of Members of the Front Bench, of Leaders of the Government, throughout the country, and see what they contain. Was it the powers of the Second Chamber, namely, this Parliament Bill, that they chiefly placed before the electorate, or was it the composition? What they condemned was not the powers; it was the composition, the hereditary principle. Take for a moment the speeches of the moderate men upon the Front Bench opposite. We are sometimes told—as we were in a high eulogy of the Foreign Secretary in the House of Lords—as we were by the Foreign Secretary himself—that he was in favour of a Two-Chamber system of Government. "Therefore, I think," said the ex-Chief Liberal Whip, "in any measure we can leave any discussion on that point one one side." It was not even "trust Asquith," or "trust Mr. John Redmond," but "trust the Foreign Secretary." On this side of the House we have been only too ready to do so. Now we are led to believe—and it seems a pity—that, however admirable their sentiments, they are strangely unable to have effect given to them in the policy of the party to which they belong. What point was it upon which the Foreign Secretary laid stress? He said:—
"The root of the mischief is——"
Not in the powers,
"in the hereditary principle. … It is to me unthinkable that the Liberal should fight that election tied up to the hereditary principle, unwilling to undertake the destruction of that principle which has been at the root of so much mischief."
Right throughout, the emphasis was on the composition of the Second Chamber and not on its powers. Go from the moderate to the "wild men" on the Front Bench opposite. Their attitude is precisely the same. What was the object of the criticism of the Home Secretary throughout the country. Was it the powers? Again it was not the powers, but the hereditary principle. He said:—
"We do not require a number of respectable and superior personages who have either succeeded to their positions by having had the foresight to be born of distinguished parents (laughter and applause)——"
I think, perhaps, it was that type of sentence which the Chief Secretary for Ireland had in mind when he said: "It is not in the human nature of some persons not to make fun of the hereditary principle. It is the easiest thing to do in the world. It
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is a form of wit within the reach of the meanest."
"or else who have got into a nice idealised house by some process of test, in which their personal position is to count for a good deal. We do not require these people to come to our rescue and govern us."
Again, may I just emphasis the fact that the speakers are not laying stress on what is in the Parliament Bill, but in the composition of the Second Chamber. It is not fair to mention one great twin brother without the other. The Chancellor of the Exchequer was also making a speech. He made it in what I think the sporting papers would probably call "his own inimitable style. "He said:—
"Now we are asking these gentlemen——"
Meaning the Peers
"who sent you there? ('Nobody'). Quite right. Well, we do not require 'nobody' in this country. (Applause). We are going to ask them who signed the certificate and the patent that put you there?'—' By what authority have you got there?' (Applause). We have come to the conclusion that these gentlemen represent nothing but themselves."
And so, ad infinitum. That speech was received with very great applause by all the audience. It was written up by all the papers and emphasised. Indeed, I remember one description of the speech which struck me forcibly. It said:—
"He had stood that day on Penylan Hill, and from that Pisgah he had seen the land of promise. Beyond the mists the sun was shining over the fair city of Cardiff, and for the poor the day of happiness is not far off."
This was apparently a very fair way of putting it, because the city was won the next day by the Unionist candidate. Still leaving the question of the election, the emphasis again right through was laid on the composition, not on the relations of the two Houses, as contended in the Parliament Bill. Lastly, the Prime Minister is among the prophets. In the general promulgation that he gave at the National Liberal Club he said:—
"When I am asked what we are fighting for, I answer two things. Fair play for Progressive legislation and the establishment in all its fulness of representative government."
Mr. ARTHUR HENDERSON: Hear, hear.
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: Perhaps hon. Members will give vent to their sentiments by doing something to get established here and now in all its fulness representative Government, meaning both in the other Chamber and also in this. But there are only two other defences which can conceivably be given for the introduction of a Bill of this kind under these circumstances. What are those defences? I can conceive of two, and two only. The

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first is that the composition, the reform of the Second Chamber, can wait. The second is that it would take up too much time to be brought forward at present. Can the question of reform, on the showing of the hon. Member opposite who has just spoken, and in the speech which he has just made, really wait? He says we are the object of an uncontrolled despotism by the Second Chamber. He asks what is the ground of our objection to the present Bill? We have been told, "Oh, our side is under an uncontrolled despotism when the Conservative party is in power." That is not a reason for continuing it for the Liberal party. What naturally occurs to anyone who wishes to take a broad view of the situation on both sides is that it should be curtailed for both sides, and not perpetuated for both. Even so, we are spared all necessity of further proof as to the need for having reform quickly, for again we have the highest authority, the authority of the Prime Minister himself. He said:—
"But the problem will still, after the passing of the Parliament Bill, remain a problem calling for a complete settlement, and in our opinion that settlement does not brook delay."
The settlement did not brook delay on March 29th of last year. Through last year, there is no question, business was interrupted by the lamentable death of the late King. But all through last year the attention of the Prime Minister and his colleagues was directed, not to other maters, but principally and predominantly to the question of this reform. The problem even then, the final settlement, did not brook delay. Why, we ask, if it was urgent then, should not some attempt be made to deal finally with it now? The matter is urgent, therefore, there is no time. The only other possible defence—here again we are spared the necessity of any proof—is as to whether there is time. Again we have the authority of the Prime Minister saying:—
"To rebuild the House of Lords and to rearrange the relations of the second chamber, if that work is to be thoroughly done, will need one or perhaps two Sessions."
Those are the Prime Minister's words. For a complete and final settlement that does not brook delay there would be required one or perhaps two Sessions. A whole Session of last year was wasted, and here we have another Session this year being wasted, and that on a settlement that the Prime Minister himself has said is neither adequate nor final. Yet we are told that there is justification for the
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Parliament Bill being brought in. There is one other type of excuse. That is that which was urged by the hon. Member who has just sat down. If I may say so, he has really made an excuse rather than a defence, and really more an appeal to prejudice than to reason. That is that no scheme has been suggested on this side; or that no scheme has been suggested that, in the words of the Home Secretary, is not one which will entrench a solid Tory majority in the Second Chamber. Surely it is a sufficient answer to say that hon. Members on this side of the House are not in the position to bring forward a scheme for the acceptance of the House. [An HON. MEMBER: "Not in the House of Commons."] I may remind hon. Members that we are dealing at the present moment with the House of Commons, and that the Prime Minister has taken away all the time from private Members, which if he had not done so we might have brought it forward. There was an Amendment to the Address calling for a positive solution upon which this question might come up. Had the Government wished it brought forward by Members on this side they could easily have found an opportunity for it if they had wished. For many of us I do not think any shield or defence of that kind is needed. The Home Secretary has no right to charge us with being unwilling to accept any scheme which would entrench a Tory majority in the Upper House. Speaking for several people on this side of the House, I say we are perfectly willing and anxious and ready to support any scheme which may be brought forward by which a popular or elective element is introduced into the House of Lords. While we are all willing to support that, many of us here, and I myself for one, would give our support to the Government for what would go a good deal further if they would come forward with their scheme. There is a large and growing amount of opinion which, while ready to support the introduction of an elective element, would be willing and ready to see the absolute abolition of the hereditary principle in the Second Chamber and that that principle should no longer be a qualification or of part of a qualification for the right of sitting and voting in that House. I hope I make myself quite clear—we would be ready and willing to support such a scheme for a purely elective Second Chamber, with or without a nominated element, if it would prove feasible, which I myself rather doubt.

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What are the principles upon which we press the Government to take a scheme such as this in hand at the earliest possible instant. The reason we urge the entire reconstruction of the Second Chamber, and would be willing to support it, is based upon a principle analagous to some of those which animate my Noble Friend the Member for Oxford (Lord Hugh Cecil) with regard to the Anglican Establishment. We believe absolutely and entirely in the value of the hereditary principle in all that instinct given by long tradition. But we believe in it with sufficient sincerity as to be convinced that it can stand and stand best upon its merits against all comers instead of on the advantage ground of any privilege whatever. Moreover, we are convinced that the essential feature of any successful reform is that for the British Constitution you ought to put new wine into old bottles. Great as the change may be we believe that the continuity might be preserved with such measure of reform, if only it would be brought in. The Second Chamber in its. ultimate origin was anything but hereditary. And lastly we urge this reform instead of the Veto Bill, because many of us are convinced of the need for reform which will be really fair to all parties.
Sometimes hon. Members opposite have jeered at the sincerity of people who are really anxious for constitutional reform, but who would leave to Parliament a Second Chamber as well as a First that should be fair to all parties. The reason we say, that is we think, on the one hand it is the truest statesmanship and the wisest foresight for the party that is willing to adopt it. Put this Parliament Bill to any test whatever that hon. Members would prefer! Let them test it by any rule known to the Constitution. Let them test it by the opinions that would be formed about it by the class of statesmen they respect themselves. Take the long list right down from the virile Walpole to the forcible Chatham, to Disraeli, with his imagination, or Gladstone, with his fertility. Would any one of these statesmen have consented to let his name be allied to a measure of this kind when the whole of the Constitution was not under consideration in a scheme of comprehensive reform. If we are asked what our position is, those of us who wish for entire And complete reform——
Mr. ESSEX: How many are you?
Mr. STEEL-MAITLAND: The hon. Member asks how many are we? Well, if he will introduce proposals in the first place he will find out, and in the second place it will give him a little more courage, because it would give him sufficient support to make him independent of the Labour party in their desire to abolish the Second Chamber. If we are asked what our own reasons in asking for such a reform would be, I think the answer can be summed up best in the words put into the mouth of Disraeli in regard to his Second Reform Bill—words put into his mouth by probably one of the most endowed of modern political thinkers, and they perfectly express the whole of our opinion:—
"Through this great forest of fact, this tangle of old and new, these secular oaks, sturdy shrubs, beautiful parasitic creepers, we more with a prudent diffidence, following the old tracks, endeavouring to keep them open, but hesitating to cut new routes till we are clear as to the goal for which we are asked to sacrifice our finest timber. Fundamental changes we regard as exceptional and pathological. Yet, being bound by no theories, when we are convinced of their necessity, we inaugurate them boldly and carry them through to the end. And thus it is that having decided that the time had come to call the people to the councils of the nation, we struck boldly and once for all by a measure which I will never admit to be at variance with the best and soundest traditions of Conservatism."
These are the words that really guide our principle. They guide us to support a sound reform, but they guide us also to offer the most uncompromising hostility to a measure not adequate and not final, in the words of the Prime Minister, and which must prejudice any sound reform to be carried in the future.
Mr. SPENCER LEIGH HUGHES: This very interesting and important Debate was renewed to-day in a speech which, if I may say so, was worthy of the occasion by the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool (Mr. F. E. Smith). I was very much interested in one point that he made. It was pleasing to know that he took some objection to the use of offensive language. He even rebuked the Prime Minister for making a little slip in taste and using the word "backwoodsman" in regard to a peer. I maintain there was no slip in taste in that, for I myself heard a peer saying in his place in the House of Lords in a most manly style, "My Lords, I am a backwoodsman." If this word may be properly used by noble lips in that serene atmosphere, surely the Prime Minister, who, distinguished though he may be, is only a Member of the House of Commons, may use it without offence. The hon. and learned Member also treated us to a series

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of proposals of conciliation alternating with threats. Something has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for Tyneside (Mr. J. M. Robertson) about these threats. I do not think too much attention need be paid to them. They are rhetorical devices heard here many and many times. I remember the days of the Harcourt Budget in 1894. When that Budget was going through the House the Opposition threatened night after night that directly they got back to power they would alter and repeal those duties. I believe they did alter them—they increased them. I noticed that the hon. and learned Member said if this Bill went through the repeal of it would be one of the first things the party to which he belongs would devote themselves to when they came into power. So, apparently, there are going to be a series of repeals.
There were twenty speeches delivered yesterday in this Debate and there was the very important speech to-day from the hon. and learned Member. We have heard so much said about present-day depreciation of the House of Commons compared with other days that it is consoling somewhat to find that a Debate can be carried on in so high a tone at the present day. I learnt from the Leader of the Opposition a very interesting fact about the General Election. He said that since 1832 no General Election has meant anything in particular. It may have had some effect, he said, but it is really only a matter of comparing the merits of Mr. X with Mr. Y, or Mr. Y with Mr. Z. Yet there have been General Elections since 1832 which, while they may not have decided anything in particular encouraged the right hon. Gentleman himself to do some particular thing. In the General Election of 1900, when the wind up of the South African war was placed before the country, the electors were told Radicals could support the Unionist party and Nonconformists could vote for the Unionist party, because nothing would be done that would in any way outrage their feelings. A year or so later the Nonconformists were rewarded with an Education Bill they did not want, and the British Temperance people with a Licensing Bill that they did not like. One thing I have to complain of is even if you accept the theory that the General Election is only a series of inquiries, whether X is better than Y, or Y is better than Z, when we turn our attention to the House of Lords we are denied the pleasure of that humble inquiry. There X, Y, and Z are
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all the same. You cannot pick and choose. There is no way of testing their comparative merits. They are all assumed to be perfect, or they were until a few months ago, but now we hear some talk about reform. This passion for reform was not so evident at the end of 1909 or the beginning of 1910. I have listened to these proposals, and although I am certain they are sincere, they are rather perfunctory. The promises of reform are toned down to a low key while glowing eulogies of the peers are given at concert pitch. When we hear from hon. Gentlemen opposite that the House of Lords is the envy of other nations we know they are speaking from their hearts, when they say they see some room for improvement, no doubt they mean it, but they do not say it so heartily. I understand the enthusiasm of some Members of this House who sit opposite, for the House of Lords. There are about twenty-one Noble Lords in this House, and they all sit upon the benches opposite. Some of them are heirs to peerages, and it would be idle to expect, indeed it would be inhuman on their part, if they did not sympathise with their future home. They are gorgeous birds of passage now; they will become birds of paradise one day. I can understand them praising the House of Lords, but it must be rather hard for hon. Members on the opposite side who are no more connected with the Peerage than I am—and they could not be less—to have to run about the country enlarging upon the inferiority of this assembly—perhaps bringing it home to the audience by their own speeches—as compared with the other. There are plenty of people who will run down the House of Commons. I have heard many tales told about this assembly. There was a time when I attempted to tell tales myself, not altogether respectable, about this great assembly, but let us leave the telling of tales to the stranger. A stranger the other day was in the Lobby before the sitting of the House watching the procession go through the Lobby just before the sitting, and he had his son with him. The son asked who this and that was, and he pointed to the Chaplain. The father replied: "That is the Chaplain." The son further asked: "Is he the gentleman who prays for the Members?" The father replied: "No; it is not exactly like that; he gets up and looks at them, and when he has seen them, he prays for the country." That is the sort of thing that should be left to the stranger to say. I

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am glad to notice that the Leader of the Opposition has a good opinion of this House, and always has had. The right hon. Gentleman said it ought to be the dominating assembly, and that declaration may have offended some of the right hon. Gentleman's democratic friends behind him. I know there was a time when the sympathy of the Leader of the Opposition with this House was in doubt, for Sir William Harcourt used to say of him: "He thinks we are a vulgar lot." I do not think that correctly represents the right hon. Gentleman. The attitude of the Leader of the Opposition to this House has sometimes been one of serene detachment, but I think he has always taken a friendly interest in our proceedings. It is very different when you come to the Noble Lord, the Member for Oxford University. He said only last night that this House was little better than a talking club. If that be so, the Noble Lord has done a good deal to make it so, because there is scarcely a topic that has been debated this Session on which he has not had something to say. [An HON. MEMBER: "Except Tariff Reform."] Well, perhaps that was an exception for a reason. While the Leader of the Opposition takes a sort of friendly interest in our proceedings, nothing of the sort can be said of the Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University, whose air of pitying condescension is so pronounced that he makes me wonder why he ever came here at all. Possibly he is inspired by that exalted spirit of self-sacrifice which induces, nay even compels the finer souls to go as missionaries to the heathen to try and elevate them. I notice the Noble Lord generally tries to protect himself from anything in the nature of pollution by sitting in a position in which he is bounded by the free air of the Gangway on the one side, and he is generally buttressed and protected by two Noble Lords on the other. I understand that the Noble Lord himself advocated some reform or improvement in the House of Lords, but we may be sure that any scheme that will meet with his approval will not leave the House in too democratic a position, and he will not overdo it in that direction. I saw in a Conservative paper to-day that it was necessary to bring the House of Lords into conformity with the aspirations of the new democracy. It will be rather a pathetic spectacle, if ever Noble Lords are required to toe the line with the new democracy. What I want to know is why hon. Gentlemen opposite want to reform the
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House of Lords? When has it done wrong? Again and again I have heard from the opposite side of the House that the House of Lords has never stood in the way of the will of the people, and that it has always carried out the will of the people. Some hon. Members have gone further, and said that the House of Lords know better what the people want than this House, and others have said that the House of Lords know better what the people want than the people themselves. Then why not let them alone? We do not often come across perfection in this world, and when we do encounter it why seek to alter it? Why endeavour to smooth the ice or paint the lily? I wonder if this passion for the reform of the House of Lords would have been heard of if the party of the Leader of the Opposition had won the last election? After a general election circumstances do alter cases. I am not quite sure how far the promise of reform from within in the House of Lords will be carried out. When the discussion took place on this question in the House of Lords before the January General Election, Lord Halsbury, who has the merit of being outspoken, said that some of these reform proposals were only electioneering business, and would be dropped when they had served their purpose. Whether they have served their purpose or not is known only to hon. Gentlemen opposite, and if they are satisfied we are. I think the House of Lords would do well to drop its proposals for reforming itself because they do not impress the man in the street. The man in the street does not like a penitent peer, because he is unimpressive. He prefers them impenitent, and I think I do, and they are certainly more impressive. It is said, when Lord Milner made his famous pronouncement which I need not repeat, the verdict of the man in the street was, "Now he's talking." I should like to know when the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition talks about reforming the House of Lords whether he has any guarantees from the backwoodsmen? I think I can say that without offence, because the Noble Lord opposite has used the word himself. I do not think the right hon. Gentleman has those guarantees. I sympathise with their Lordships because I know they put in a lot of hard work at the General Election. One of them—Lord Willoughby de Broke—came down to my Constituency, and he came to support Mr. Jersey de Knoop. The Noble Lord said that what they were engaged in was no-vulgar intrigue. Certainly not. No one

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would say anything vulgar about Lord Willoughby de Broke supporting Mr. Jersey de Knoop. It was amusement without vulgarity. I am not sure that these energetic peers will submit to being improved cut of existence. I doubt if they will. It has been said that this subject was not properly discussed at the last Election. The doctrine of mandate is always bandied about from one side to the other. I put the subject prominently in my election address. I cannot remember the precise words I used, but I can candidly say that no fair-minded reader, looking at what I said about the House of Lords, would say that I was a devout worshipper of that Institution. I made that point clear at any rate. I also made it clear what it is we are after. I said that we must have it down in black and white, in statutory form, that this House is not only to be supreme, but the sole authority with regard to finance. I believe that has been conceded by the other side and in another place. Then we want to make it certain that when we are in office we shall have the same right to carry our legislative proposals into law as hon. Members sitting opposite when they get into office. That is an appeal to the fair-play instincts of the nation. The Leader of the Opposition last night said it would be absurd if you had a Radical majority in this House to have another Radical majority in the other House. I do not know that it would be absurd, but it would be a new vision in the other House. In my opinion the only cure for these deadlocks when our party is in power is the removal of the absolute Veto, and after that has been done the House of Lords will be left with very considerable powers indeed—some people think too considerable. There is one remark made by the Leader of the Opposition with which I thoroughly sympathise. The right hon. Gentleman towards the end of his speech said:—
"This Bill contains proposals as to which there can be no compromise."
There are two ways of introducing Bills of this sort. One is to ask for a great deal more than you want, and then you gain a reputation for magnanimity by a series of concessions, although you get all you want in the end. The other way is to make a minimum demand and stick to it. I think the Government has made that minimum demand, and I hope they will stick to it
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If they will, I feel sure that this Bill will go through and become law before this year is out.
Mr. PAGET: I am one of those hon. Members who has sat through the whole of one Parliament and failed to "catch the Speaker's eye" up to now. Speaking in the light of recent events in the House of Commons, I say, with all respect, that I do not bear any ill-will on that account. We have heard a very amazing speech from the hon. Member who has just sat down. He has given the House many opportunities to laugh, and perhaps some of us are inclined to think that such a style on such a serious question is somewhat flippant. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I trust the House will permit me to speak for a few minutes in a somewhat more serious vein. It is not denied that the questions contained in the proposals of the Government are of great fundamental importance and seriousness to the Government of the State. If I may use a metaphor from the sea, I would say that one set of officers come along and they have a great deal of canvas on the ship, and when the next watch comes on that set of officers may think it advisable to reduce the canvas.
I ask in all seriousness if it is imaginable that any set of officers would give orders to take out the rudder and sink the ship? It is my view that this Veto Bill is practically the unshipping of the rudder of that ship of State. The Government have made constant protestations of their belief in a Second Chamber. It is obvious, however, that if this Bill goes through it can have but one possible effect, and that is to enormously increase the power of the Executive or of the Government of the day. One could quote any number of instances in history, from the time of Cromwell down to the time of Lord Rosebery, to show the bad effects of too much autocratic power in the Government of the day. I do not believe anyone would for one moment consider that either of those men could be called Conservatives. I would like to take an instance from the Constitution which the Government have given to South Africa. I am the last to wish to detract from the good work they have done in having granted that Constitution, though, perhaps, we have not heard the last word upon it. It is perfectly obvious that our own Dominions have had the most ample opportunity of learning from the history of the past what ought to be the best Constitution to set up. While they have had internal dissensions, they have

1973
been perfectly free from outside interference so long as they have been under the æegis of this country. I do not believe that any of our Dominions in considering their Constitutions would ever have entertained such a Bill as this. I might take two instances—one of this country in the seventeenth century and another in France a century later—to show that no great nation has ever made a success of government by a Single Chamber. Then, if I might turn to the Continental nations of to-day, I would take the case of Greece. Greece is not a shining example of a country governed by a Single Chamber. Greece is considering at the present time some kind of an auxiliary Chamber. Another Continental country that I might take is Italy. Italy at the moment is considering how it can further strengthen its Second Chamber. It is obvious that in this and other countries there is a need for a check on hasty impulse and waves of popular passion. As in the case of individuals, so in the case of nations, second thoughts are often best. I would like, in support of the House of Lords, to make a very short quotation from the hon. and learned Member for Waterford (Mr. John Redmond), who, speaking, I think in 1894, said:—
"The House of Lords have no power to withstand the declared will of the people; they have never done so. Let the popular will be once emphatically declared in favour of any popular reform and the House of Lords must, as they have always done in the past, bow to the popular will."
Hon. Members opposite are often inclined to believe that if they can only legislate sufficiently they will change human nature, and that if they can only legislate enough they will bring contentment and comfort to everybody. But in their passion to advance legislation, they cannot always expect to advance the national welfare; on the other hand, they may do it infinite harm. There is an old and well worn quotation, which seems to me applicable:—
"A thousand years scarce serve to form a State,
An hour may lay it in the dust."
History shows over and over again that uncontrolled power is demoralising to the very strongest. If the whole of the Front Bench were all archangels, and I think I saw someone who, the other day in his speech, almost suggested that one of them at least was an archangel, the danger would still be as great, and their fate would be that of Lucifer. The chief characteristic of the British Constitution seems to be in its complicity of checks and balances. The Constitution has grown in
1974
the course of some 800 years. It seems to me our race has a genius for compromise and a profound reluctance to give uncontrolled power to any individual or body of individuals. It is a part of the national strength of the country and a chief source of the stability of our institutions, that they have grown up in the period of the past. The Constitution is rooted and grounded in the traditions of centuries, and its very bringing out has been some part of the creation of our national character itself. It has been suggested that very possibly there would be no permanency about this Bill. One could hope that some reasonable compromise and some ground upon which both sides could stand could be found, because I do not think any of us believe it is best that succeeding Governments should go in for reprisals and counter reprisals. I am not going into the question of what constitutes a majority. After all, there is 10 per cent. of voters who have not long certainly belonged to either party. It is apparent that in this particular election they have supported the Government upon the questions that were before the country, but I question very much whether they have thoroughly understood what the Veto means in the destruction, as I believe, of our Constitution. It is perfectly obvious a certain percentage of these voters have been influenced by other reasons, by fiscal theories they may hold, by religious differences and by class prejudices. The Prime Minister himself about eighteen months ago when defining revolution, said:—
"A revolution describes a change which in principle has never been approved of or even adequately discussed before the people, and which is being carried into effect, if not by an actual violation of the Constitution, at least by some process which transcends and which sets at defiance its normal operation."
It seems to me that is exactly what the Government imitates in this Bill. It was Mirabeau who said:—
"Pigmies can destroy, but it takes giants to build."
I think the nation recognises fully the need for reform. Speeches have been delivered all over the country by Members of the other House and by leading Members of this House, and the nation thoroughly understands the need for reform. Sooner or later the nation will stand by the party which stands for reform, and not for the party which, however good their intentions may be, have in mind legislation which is very injurious to the Constitution of this country. Whereas a single stone in itself may not

1975
be a thing of beauty; stones builded one upon another may create a beautiful edifice, a beautiful bridge, a cathedral, and so on, and be a thing of beauty and of joy for the people of this country, an edifice that may last for centuries; and I would only suggest that, though an individual peer may be a very poor edifice, yet the body, the House of Lords itself, is a great institution that has grown up with the growth of this country, is an institution which has been of infinite credit to the country, and is one which I hope may last for a great many generations to come.
Mr. ST. MAUR: As a new Member, I venture to hope that I may receive that kindly and generous indulgence it has always been the graceful custom of this House to extend to those who venture to address it for the first time. It has been with the greatest diffidence that I have risen to address this House, the diffidence arising partly from a knowledge of my own deficiency and of my ignorance of the custom and temper of this Assembly, but to an even far greater extent from the consciousness of the far-reaching and enormous importance of this present occasion, one which it appears to me will be pointed to by generations to come as one of the greatest political landmarks in the history of this country, and perhaps also—as we on this side think—as the beginning of a new era of greater happiness, greater prosperity, greater political freedom for the great majority of the people in this country. It is now some centuries since that form of Constitution was instituted which we now, after it has been subjected to many alterations and modifications, possess. The Leader of the Opposition referred to the composition of that Constitution, but he did not inform us as to how, after years and generations of opposition and of strife, that Constitution was originally wrung from the hands of unwilling monarchs. He did not remind us of the tremendous difficulties that had to be overcome before this House emerged in something like its present form and with something of its present powers and dignity, which it has, and with good reason and just cause, always so stoutly maintained and so jealously guarded. What was the chief obstacle that blocked its road in the past as well as the path of domestic peace and progress? That obstacle was the absolute power and prerogative of the Crown. Both Houses struggled against it, and finally succeeded in setting due limits
1976
to the exercise of those powers which were based upon armed force and upon the arbitrary will of a single person.
7.0 P.M.
And what has been the result? Not only have the powers of both Houses, their dignity, their importance, greatly increased since that period, but the influence, the dignity, the strength of the Crown have increased also. Whence does it derive these? How are they applied? They are applied no longer in keeping in subjection a half-enslaved populace, but in furthering the cause of humanity and peace throughout the world. And they are derived, not from a glittering background of sparkling arms, but from the loyal hearts of a whole people in whom it has unreservedly placed its confidence and trust. As our forefathers worked and strove to limit the absolute powers of past sovereigns, so now we have to strive to limit those of the House of Lords, which has taken so many of the prerogatives that formerly belonged to the Crown. I can understand and sympathise with the thoughts of those who view with regret any alteration of an ancient and historic edifice. We on this side may regret the necessity as much as they. It was not we who desired the alteration or desired it without due cause. We have been driven to it by the actions of those in the other Chamber, assisted by hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite. Had we received, I will not say the same treatment, but anything even approaching that treatment, that is meted out to the party opposite, we should not have spent our time and energy in demanding that which would then have been unnecessary. The question is no new one. It has been before the country for years, and it has become more and more necessary that a final, complete, and satisfactory solution should be found. I venture to say that it has been found. It has been submitted to the nation, and the nation has approved of it. It becomes now our duty to initiate legislation to carry out the nation's will, and the duty of the other House to submit to its verdict.
There has been a good deal of speech from benches opposite as to a reform of the House of Lords preceding or, at any rate, conjoining with the measure now before us. It has even been discussed, in a somewhat languid manner it is true, in the other Chamber, and it has been suggested that some kind of reform, so far but dimly adumbrated, would be more acceptable than our proposals.

1977
There are two kinds of what is termed reform. There are those initiations and applications of new methods designed to improve existing conditions in certain respects or to render the path of progress more easily to be traversed; and there are those changes which, under the guise of reform, are intended to set up, or would have the effect of setting up, machinery which would impede the passage of progressive measures. There would appear to be a great difference between what we term reform and that which is often so-called by hon. Members opposite. But it is too late for reform alone. That might have been accomplished by the other Chamber at any period during the last eighty years, and it would have come more gracefully from within. It is not so much with reform, though that, no doubt, will come in time, that we are here more immediately concerned. What is of far greater importance to the country is that the dignity, authority, privileges, and power of this House should be maintained in their fullness and entirety. This being the seat of legislative, executive, and financial power; being necessarily in close touch with the people's will—by whom it is elected and to whom it is responsible—it is right and proper that this should remain the premier Chamber. I do not think any one here will dispute that. Let us by all means retain, as this measure does retain, due and proper safeguards against any possible hasty or ill-considered legislation, or the chance—a very shadowy one—of highhanded action by any would-be autocratic Government. These safeguards are mainly comprised in the limitation of the duration of Parliament, in the method governing "elections to this House, and in the powers of a suspensory Veto to be exercised by the Lords. These are amply sufficient. Governments in the future will have to keep in still closer touch with the people when they find that they may have to face the country, not only as at present with suggestions for a further development of their particular policy, but also perhaps with the responsibility for measures, completed in every detail, that may have been placed in the pillory by the other House, exposed there in all their attractiveness or unpopularity, and upon which the nation will calmly judge.
I think it will be found that you cannot place the Constitution upon a firm and popular basis and adjust the relations between these Houses upon fair and equitable terms, without a considerable effect
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being felt in this Chamber, without to a considerable extent removing the fetters from that bashful and retiring individual who has recently been dragged forth into the glare of publicity—the private Member—and without at the very least loosening the bonds created by the present party system. We shall have gained a House of Commons more truly representative than we have ever had, more free to express its thoughts, more able, within proper limits, to discharge those functions with which it is entrusted and for which it is responsible. This is an age of progress. Some has been achieved, more has become due, and still more will be demanded and will have become necessary in the near future. This has entailed, and will entail, a vast amount of skilful planning, careful execution, laborious and ungrudging work. You cannot carry out that delicate task with the clumsy and rusty implements of the Middle Ages. You cannot maintain the quantity and quality of your work with an antiquated machine, some of the wheels of which refuse to move. Picturesque as many old customs may have been, interesting as are the relics of a former age, they have now ceased to be of any practical utility and must give place to new. So it is with that portion of our Constitution which has failed to carry out, perhaps even rightly to comprehend, what is required of it in this new and bustling age. We are a patient people. And it is marvellous to think of how we have succeeded hitherto in carrying on our business with the same machinery that served us in the feudal ages. But this could not continue. Arrears of work undone, much more but half-completed, are what "we see around us now on every side
We may cherish old memories, have a kind thought for bygone customs. But this is no time for sentimental regrets at the final abandoning of the ways of a past age. How different are the conditions existing between then and now. A teeming population at home, containing in one city alone more human beings than were to be found in the whole country when our Parliament first saw the light. A population requiring every kind of legislative and administrative protection and assistance, presenting daily new problems to be solved, new and just demands to be met. A kind of armed truce existing throughout the world between nations whose only real desire is for peace, but who, in mad, panic-stricken fear, are crowding armaments upon arma-

1979
ments to the general ruin of all. An enormous expansion of territory. Where once we had but to administer the affairs of this little island, and not even the whole of it, now we have vast possessions in all quarters of the globe. Our race is spread even to the farthest corners of the earth. And while vast areas, comprising lands in every clime, peopled in part by almost every known race, gladly and loyally acknowledge our sway—our advice is often sought, our influence is felt, our example is looked up to, by almost all civilised nations, and extends even far beyond into distant places where a state of savagery still exists. And all the threads of Government, of negotiation, of Imperial defence, of the greatest commerce in the world, are gathered in this House whence they radiate to the farthest limits of the earth. It is to this spot that the weaker races look for protection—the stronger for guidance. And it is here—here in the real centre of the world—that we should have, what I am convinced we shortly shall have, the most ideal, but practical, form of sober, reflective, and popular Government that the world has ever seen.
Mr. BAIRD: The last speaker has made it quite clear that he, at any rate, is satisfied with the provisions of the Bill, but I may ask, what is the burden of complaint that hon. Gentlemen opposite have against the present system? They complain that the House of Lords is unfit to discharge the functions of a Second Chamber, and they have brought in a Bill to restrict the Second Chamber to its proper functions. But how are they going to be discharged? There is no mention of altering the composition of the House of Lords, and therefore these functions, which according to hon. Gentlemen opposite are proper ones for a Second Chamber to have, are to be discharged by the Noble Lords in the House of Lords to-day. The senior Member for Merthyr Tydvil (Mr. Rees Jones) informed us that he belonged to an imaginative race, and no one certainly after listening to his picturesque speech would question the accuracy of his description. But there is another right hon. Member for Wales, who I think is entitled to claim a greater degree of imagination than the hon. Gentleman who spoke last night. Not long ago that right hon. Gentleman was reported as having made a speech down at the East End—very well chosen ground, because up to the present, at any rate, Peers are somewhat rare there—and in
1980
that speech he drew a very imaginative picture of an imaginary interview between himself and an Australian, in which he gave an imaginary description of an imaginary House of Lords. After his description of the House of Lords had been concluded he made his friend the Australian say that sooner than have a Second Chamber of that kind in Australia, they would prefer a Chamber of Kangaroos. It is on a Chamber worse than kangaroos, therefore, that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite propose to confer the functions which they say are the proper functions of a Second Chamber. The Prime Minister dilated yesterday at great length on the usefulness of the functions left to the House of Lords, and the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down more or less repeated in eloquent terms what the Prime Minister said. And there it remains—that these functions, however useful they may be, are to be discharged by men whom a very prominent Member of the Government has described as worse than kangaroos.
It is quite easy to understand that hon. Members below the Gangway opposite are delighted with this Bill and swallow the Preamble, although they do not like it, quite readily. They do not like the Preamble, but they recognise that it is a dead letter, and that it has been inserted with a view to salving the consciences of orthodox Members who sit immediately behind the Front Bench, and who are inspired by the soul-stirring watchword "Wait and see." There is no doubt that many of these Gentlemen are perfectly delighted and contented to wait until the happy day comes when they can step down the passage and join the Kangaroo Chamber. They have the delightful feeling that as long as hon. Gentlemen have their way little Kangaroos whom they have begotten will succeed them in the House of Lords, because, according to the hon. Gentleman, the hereditary principle is to be kept in full vigour. That may be all very fine for hon. Gentlemen opposite who want to sit in the House of Lords, but there is no denying that the effect of this Bill will be to introduce a Single-Chamber system of Government, and the reason why hon. Members below the Gangway so strongly support it-is because they are in favour of the Single-Chamber Government, and because they are the tail that wags the head of the Government dog. The party opposite claim that they have a mandate for this particular Bill, but do they claim that they

1981
have got a Mandate to alter our Constitution from a bi-cameral Constitution into a Single-Chamber Constitution? It is futile to pretend that the functions which are left to the House of Lords are functions which are of any value whatever in the work of legislation. I do not suppose that hon. Members opposite will deny that there is a solid feeling among all men of all parties in favour of the reform of the Second Chamber in this country, and it is a pure affectation to say that we on this side are not in favour of reform. Anybody who took the trouble last Session to go into the House of Lords and listen to the Debate which took place there must realise that the Members of our party there were prepared to make very drastic changes in the constitution of the House, and that they passed Resolutions in favour of reform, either without a Division or by an enormous majority.
You may say that our proposals for reform are not adequate—that is a different matter—but to pretend, as hon. Gentlemen are accustomed to do, that we are not in favour of reform is, I think, a misrepresentation of the facts of the case. That being so, in regard to a fundamental question dealing with the reorganisation of the Constitution of the country, you are bound to admit that moderate men of all parties are in favour of the reform of the Constitution, and it would have been open to you to have come to some understanding for the purpose of reforming it. Many crocodile tears are being shed by hon. Members opposite with regard to the Conference, but I must say that I venture to think that the Conference amounted to nothing but a trick. My reason for saying that is this: You had a Bill before the last Parliament representing what were then the views of the Government, and the mere fact of consenting to go into a Conference surely indicated that the Government were prepared to discuss the matter. It cannot be pretended, however, that after discussing the matter for twenty odd sittings, nothing came out, which it was possible for the Government to introduce into their Bill with a view of meeting the wishes of a very large number of people. [An HON. MEMBER: "The Members of the Conference said so."] The Members of the Conference have said nothing on our side. I do not know what they have said on your side. I do not doubt the honesty of the light hon. Gentleman opposite, or of any other party, but all that we have got to go upon is this, that nothing was done. Those of us who are in favour of the re-
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form of the Second Chamber, as expressed in this Preamble, may well ask what possible chance is there of the Government being able to give effect to it. They will have to meet the determined opposition of hon. Members below the gangway opposite, who honestly are opposed to any kind of Second Chamber, and the bargain which they will make with hon. Members below the gangway here, goodness only knows. It is clear, however, that they will never be in a position to put into practice the "Wait and see" policy which is contained in the Preamble, and they will only deal with proposals conferring what they consider proper functions on a Second Chamber.
I suppose they consider that that point is settled—the functions which the House of Lords will discharge after this measure becomes law, if unhappily, it ever does, which I doubt. The functions which the House of Lords will then discharge will be those which the Government declare belong to a Second Chamber. These are functions which they have not dared to insult any of our self-governing Colonies by offering to confer them upon their Second Chambers, and it does seem to me rather hard that we should have to put up with a system at home which they have not proposed for our Colonies. What is another, and main burden of complaint against the House of Lords? It was, that as long as the Conservatives are in power, we enjoy practically a Single-Chamber system of Government, and they say that is a bad thing. What does this Bill do to remedy that? This Bill perpetuates that system, and secures not only when the Conservatives are in power, but when any party is in power, that we shall have a Single-Chamber system of Government. I do not quarrel with hon. Members below the Gangway, who argue on straightforward lines that they are against two Chambers. This Bill gives them a Single Chamber, and that is what they want. I quarrel with those hon. Gentlemen who go up and down the country saying that the system is bad which obtains when the Conservative party are in power, and yet perpetuate that system, and say it is going to work better when the Radical party are in power. I do not understand the arguments from the opposite benches on this point because that must be the effect of this Bill if you carry it into law.
Other hon. Members say do not we represent the will of the people? If we do not, who does represent it? We have been elected by the people, and surely we know

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what it is that the people want. I think a very short experience of this House would convince anyone that circumstances are constantly arising which make it impossible either to give effect to the clearly expressed will of our Constituents or to prevent a measure being passed into law which is in direct opposition to the clearly expressed will of the electorate. There is no perfect system for meeting that difficulty I admit, but certainly a Two-Chamber system affords an opportunity of delaying and the people of the country, after all, may be given an opportunity of saying whether they want a measure or not if there is doubt about it. Hon. Gentlemen opposite say that is very fine. It works when Radicals are in power, but not when Conservatives are in power. The action of the House of Lords has laid it open to that imputation. Last night an hon. Member made a very curious remark. He almost complained that the House of Lords did not throw out the Workmen's Compensation Bill, not on the ground that it was a bad Bill at all, but that it was a revolutionary proposal. There are different degrees of revolutionary proposals. Surely it is fair to say that was a Bill which did no one any harm at all, but did a vast deal of good. If you come to consider the measures which the House of Lords threw out which had been passed by the Radical Government you will find it difficult to deny that a very large portion of those measures was directed to doing harm to a vast section of the population of the country. The Education Bill was designed to do a considerable amount of harm to a very large section of the population, and the Licensing Bill was equally designed to do harm. So that I think there is a fundamental difference in the character of the measures which were thrown out by the House of Lords under the two last Administrations. However that may be, surely you admit that it is desirable that the people at any rate should have the last say when there is any doubt on the subject. But they are not going to have the last say. It was clearly proved last night that these so-called safeguards which are to enable the people to express an opinion which will carry weight with the Government are entirely fallacious. The right hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir R. Finlay) made that perfectly clear.
That opens up another aspect. As a relatively young Member of the House I am probably treading on delicate ground,
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but, if so, I hope the House will clearly understand that I have no wish whatever to be in any way disrespectful. We have in prospect a measure for the payment of Members, and I do not think you can possibly consider that, in view of the alteration which it is bound to effect in the character of the House, except in conjunction with this proposal for dealing with the House of Lords. If you pay Members, Membership of this House ceases to be what it is at present—an occupation and an honourable career and becomes a profession, and you will open the door to a large number of glib-tongued, inexperienced men who will come into the House before they have had any experience of the world at all. It seems to me that even at the present day we are very short in this House, of experts on matters connected particularly with the great public services of the State, and from the nature of things it is quite impossible for a man, except in very rare circumstances—certainly we have a few brilliant exceptions, but very few—to serve long enough to obtain a position of eminence and distinction in one of the public services, and then to come in here, serve his apprenticeship again, and acquire a position of eminence here. Surely it must be admitted that in any Legislature, but particularly in the Legislature of the metropolis of a world-wide Empire, it is essential that we should have at our disposal, when measures are being discussed which are bound to have a far-reaching effect on the oversea Dominions, the advice and experience of men who have earned distinction in the public service. I do not know whether hon. Members noticed a very curious thing that happened on Friday. The question of the horse supply of the Army was being discussed, and the Secretary of State for War mentioned that that was a question which was in a more chaotic state even than other things connected with the Army, and a few moments afterwards he announced the intention of the Army to buy three-year-old foals. Even a right hon. Gentleman who is in charge of an important department of the State should make himself more acquainted with the details of a horse than to describe the winner of the Derby, for instance, as a foal. It seems to me there is a great need for expert opinion on subjects of that kind.
With regard to these matters, Members of the Legislature who are entitled from experience to speak on such subjects, will now be altogether excluded for practical

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purposes. The Prime Minister said something about this House being turned into a talking club. There is not the slightest doubt that the proposals of hon. Members opposite would turn the House of Lords into nothing but a talking club, and I do not think that such men as Lord Roberts and Lord Milner and others who have served with great distinction will waste their time by going there to talk at this new-fangled talking club, which is to take the place of the House of Lords. Consequently we shall be without the services of these men, and I think that, though at any time that will be a very great disadvantage, especially in view of the changed character which is likely to be introduced into the composition of this House by payment of Members, it is desirable that we should have an Upper Chamber maintaining an effective power, not dependent on the will of the Government for the time being, but with an effective power of right to express an opinion in legislation before it is put on the Statute Book. I oppose this Bill because it introduces into this country a Single-Chamber system of Government and nothing else. The Government may say what they like; they have not got a mandate for a Single-Chamber system of Government. I do not know how they think they obtained a mandate of that kind. I can only give my experience in my own division. The country-side was plastered with posters asking whether they were going to vote for the peers or the people. None of the peers voted for me. I believe one peer did vote in Ireland, and there was trouble about it; but no peers voted, and anyone who has voted against this measure has done so deliberately not to support the peers, but to support a Two-Chamber system of Government, and that is what I will do to the utmost of my ability; and I do not think it possible to give better reasons for holding that view and for determinedly opposing the policy advocated by hon. Gentleman opposite than those given by Disraeli in the year 1834. He said:—
"I will allow for the freedom of the Press. I will allow for the spirit of the age. I will allow for the march of intellect, but I cannot force from my mind the conviction that the House of Commons concentrates in itself the whole power of the State, and might. I should say rather would, notwithstanding the great antagonistic forces to which I have alluded, establish in this country a despotism of the most formidable and dangerous character."
These are my reasons for opposing this measure. Hon. Gentlemen opposite have it in their power to place themselves at the head of a great constitutional movement
1986
They have decided not to take advantage of that opportunity. They have decided rather to remain what they have been all along, partisans, and only partisans, and, to use the opportunity which now presents itself to pass legislation which, when we come into power we shall have to do the best we can to take off the Statute Book.
Mr. RICHARD LAMBERT: Hon. Gentlemen opposite do not yet seem quite to understand the position which we on this side take up in this matter. Our position is that the present state of things is altogether intolerable, because we do not get fair-play when we are in power. We are merely asking that when a Liberal Government is in office we should have equal opportunities for passing Liberal Bills that Conservative Governments have when they are in office. The hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. F. E. Smith) admitted very frankly that he considered that some reform of the House of Lords was necessary. I thought he went so far as to say that he was in favour of some reform which should give the Liberal party an equal chance with the Conservative party when they were in office, but has he considered what that involves? The great difficulty, as I understand, with hon. Members opposite is that they are afraid that by agreeing to this Bill they will bring about Home Rule. They are afraid that this Bill will be followed by a Home Rule Bill, but if the scheme of reform which hon. Gentlemen opposite advocate is to give an equal chance to a Liberal Government to carry its measures as a Conservative Government has, that must necessarily mean, surely, that when there is a Liberal majority here there shall also be a Liberal majority in the House of Lords, and, if so, where is the obstacle for carrying Home Rule? If a Home Rule Bill will pass this House it will pass equally through the House of Lords. You will get discussion, as you can get discussion at the present time. There is no difficulty about that. A Bill passes here and goes to the House of Lords and is discussed there, and we know what its fate is if it is a Liberal Bill. The difficulty which we have to face is that under no conceivable scheme of reform can a measure be introduced which will give an equal chance to a Liberal Government unless you limit the Veto of the House of Lords. Personally I rejoice to think that this Bill will be followed by a Home Rule Bill. Home Rulers are not to be found alone on the benches opposite. Speaking

1987
for myself, at the recent election, and on the eve of the poll, I issued a letter to every elector, in which I clearly placed before him the fact that I was a Home Ruler, and, if elected, I should press forward Home Rule in this Parliament. So far as I am concerned, I have no qualms at all about the matter, and I believe that the fact that this Bill will be followed by a Home Rule Bill is one of the chief reasons why it commended itself to the electors of this country. We were told last night by the hon. and learned Member for the Kingston Division (Mr. Cave) that if this Bill were pressed forward it would be resisted by the Opposition with all their strength and at all costs. Very well, we on this side are equally determined that the Bill shall pass into law, and we are determined to press it forward with all the strength we have at our command. We are backed up in that determination by the knowledge that we have behind us the united democracy of the United Kingdom—a unity which hon. Members opposite are always ready to acclaim when it suits their purpose, but which they decry when they think they have a party advantage to gain in the matter.
Mr. W. R. CAMPION: Like the hon. Gentleman who has just spoken, I claim the indulgence of the House for a maiden speech. I have been very much interested in listening to this Debate during the last two days and in reading the report of it, and one thing which has particularly impressed itself on me is the remarkable discrepancy between the way in which the case is put before the House here and the way in which I have heard the case of the Government put before the country. We have seen and read leaflets, we have read and heard a number of speeches, and we have seen a number of remarkable posters, all arguing against what is known as the hereditary principle of the House of Lords, and all criticising the present composition of the Second Chamber. That being the case, one would have thought that the most important duty of a Government on this occasion would have been to have made some present and immediate practical suggestion for reforming the constitution of the Second Chamber. We know that there is no immediate and practical suggestion before us. We have read a Preamble which holds out the hope that on some future occasion, in the dim and distant future, there may be a possibility, I am afraid not a probability, of some re-
1988
form of the constitution of the Second Chamber. There being no real practical suggestion at the moment, I would like to put three questions to the Government. In the first place, I should like to ask them why it is that they have not at present been able to evolve any policy for reforming the constitution of the Second Chamber? If they have a policy, why have they not embodied it in the Bill now before us? If they have not a policy, what have they been doing and thinking about since 1906, and, indeed, since times considerably before that year? We have been told by speakers on the other side constantly that this is not a new question which has arisen. We have been told that it was acute at the commencement of last Session when we heard a great deal of the policy of "filling up the cup." We were told last night by the hon. Member for the Stirling Burghs (Mr. Ponsonby) that this question was the inevitable evolution of our social and Parliamentary system during the last hundred years. If that is the case, if this is such an old question, why is it that we have not got any practical solution put before us at the present time for the reform of the Second Chamber? The fact of the matter is that at present one has the suspicion, which amounts to a moral certainty, that the Government have not been able to formulate any practical policy for reforming the constitution of the Second Chamber. In other words, this Preamble is no more than the mere expression of a pious hope for the future, but there is no probability of the promise in the Preamble ever being fulfilled, and it is in effect to a great extent a sham and a delusion. If that is the case, what becomes of the theory so often adumbrated by the other side that they are supported by the people? I maintain that the principal argument constantly put before the voters was the argument that you had to deal with the hereditary system. If there is no probability and no suggestion of abolishing that system, what becomes of the argument of hon. Gentlemen opposite that they have the support of the people of this country? Though many hon. Members opposite will not agree at all with what I am about to say, I do think that very often the complaints that have been made against the House of Lords in the past by hon. Members opposite have been very much exaggerated. I would go further and say that, to a great extent, the House of Lords has been really the friend of hon. Members on the other side of the House. Indeed, it is exceed-

1989
ingly doubtful whether a great many of them would be sitting there if it had not been for this question of the House of Lords. I will give two reasons. The first is that it has given hon. Members opposite such an excellent cry in the constituencies. "Down with the Lords! Peers versus people!" may not express the actual contest accurately, but at any rate it does appeal very well to sentiment, and it does appeal to the setting of class against class, and so winning votes in the constituencies. Some complaint has been made against the House of Lords because they amended the Education Bill of 1906, and because they rejected the Licensing Bill of a later year. I venture to think that if both of these Bills were now the law of the land—remembering how at the time the Licensing Bill was before the House the party which I support won by-election after by-election in the country—it is very unlikely that hon. Members would be keeping their seats on the other side of the House. I oppose this Bill firstly because, as I have stated, it does not suggest any practical and immediate reform of the Second Chamber, although in the constituencies the reform of the Second Chamber has been inferred as necessary. Secondly, I oppose the Bill very strongly because I believe it will establish a system that will make it possible for Governments in the future to absolutely ignore, if they desire to do so, the wishes of the people. Most of us—all of us on this side of the House—believe in the necessity of a Second Chamber. I believe in the necessity, not only of a Second Chamber, but of one of sufficient strength and efficiency to enable the People's will to be expressed in this House whether the Government may be willing or not. We want a Second Chamber reformed, perhaps, on democratic lines, and brought more into touch with modern day requirements, possessing more thoroughly the confidence of the people, one of efficiency and strength, and one which will be strong enough to see that the People's will prevails by referring measures of importance to the judgment of the electors.
8.0 P.M.
Sir JOSEPH WALTON: I approve of the course the Government has taken in dividing the question of the reform of the House of Lords into two parts. In the Parliament Bill which they now ask leave to introduce they have chosen in the first place the most urgent part—the limiting of the powers of the House of Lords in order to secure fair play, or at any rate
1990
an approximation to fair play for Liberal legislation. I question whether any Member of the House does not hold the view that an Upper Chamber possessing unlimited power to reject or mutilate a legislative measure sent up from this House is wholly inconsistent with the principles of representative government of which we have boasted as a nation for generations past, and especially when the other Chamber is composed entirely of non-representative peers. We have only to recall briefly our political history of the last ten years to realise that a drastic limitation of the Veto powers of the House of Lords is absolutely essential if we are to have progress made for legislation, at any rate under a Liberal Government. In 1900 we were told by the Tory party that the one issue in the election of that year was the question of finishing the South African war, and that Liberals and Radicals might without hesitation vote for Conservative candidates, because that was the one question which the Conservative Government was going to deal with. But what followed? We had an Education Bill, a Licensing Bill, and other Bills passed by the Conservative Government during the Parliament elected in 1900, for which they sought no mandate whatever from the electors. When these measures went up to the House of Lords, as at present constituted, did the Lords say, "You have not consulted the people on these questions and we must refuse to pass these Bills until you have had an appeal to the country." No. Practically every legislative measure that has been sent up to the present House of Lords by the Conservative party for the last fifty years has been passed by them unquestioned. When we contrast that with the action of the House of Lords since 1906—when a Liberal Government was returned to power with an unprecedented majority of 350, when, fresh with the mandate of the people, they passed an Education Bill, a Licensing Bill, a Plural Voting Bill, and a Scotch Land Bill, we find that all these measures when they went up to the House of Lords were either rejected without any consideration at all, or were so mutilated that they were not acceptable to the Liberal party in this House. Therefore, it is that the urgency has been created for the first step taken in connection with the great constitutional question, the step of at once limiting the power of the Veto of the House of Lords so that Liberal legislation will have some sort of fairplay.

1991
The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. Baird) has said that we propose a One-Chamber Government; I will tell the hon. Member what we have had. For the last fifty years, whenever a Tory Government has been in power we have had One-Chamber Government, because the other Chamber always has passed unquestioned every Bill sent up to them by a Tory Government. The Government Bill gives large powers to the House of Lords, and I do not understand how anyone can say that it establishes a Single-Chamber Government when the other Chamber has a power of rejection of every measure sent up for three Sessions. True, we take finance out of their hands, and we do that by general consent, but in regard to ordinary measures of legislation, when you consider that the duration of Parliament is limited to five years, and that they have these large powers of rejection and revisions for a period during which bye-elections will be fought and a political propaganda will be carried on in the country, if any measures are being pressed forward against the will of the country, they could not be proceeded with. The fact is that these proposals are so moderate that we on the Liberal side of the House will still suffer from unequal conditions in regard to ability to pass legislation, for after this Parliament Bill is passed, any measures sent up by a Conservative Government to the House of Lords will be passed by them the first time, while the Liberal party will too often, I fear, have their Bills rejected three times over, and a delay of more than two years in passing these Bills. Let me give one illustration of the unfairness of our constitutional question as it at present exists. From Yorkshire we sent to this House twenty-six Members, elected by a vast majority of electors, to pass the Education Bill, at the election of 1906. They worked on that Education Bill for months in this House, only to have the whole of their work destroyed by seven Peers who came from Yorkshire, representing, in the House of Lords, no one but themselves. I consider that that must be admitted, irrespective of party politics, to be an intolerable situation, and, indeed, it is a situation which hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House could not condemn in strong enough language if they bad been placed in the same position as the Liberal party has been placed in since 1906—since which date we have been practically more than half our time ploughing the sands,
1992
promoting and passing through this House measures for which we had a distinct mandate from the people. I support the introduction of this Bill.
Captain MORRISON-BELL: The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has taken the line which hon. Members opposite are so constantly taking, He has been finding fault with the composition of the House of Lords, and he has also been finding fault with them for the measures which they have not thought fit to pass. I do not know whether he heard the speech made by the hon. Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool (Mr. F. E. Smith) this afternoon. If he had he should have realised the fact that, as was shown most conclusively, one of the wisest things the Government did for their own sake was to allow the House of Lords to reject these two Bills, the Licencing Bill and the Education Bill, because it is quite obvious that that gave them a good chance to go to the country with a very useful cry. I feel quite confident myself that the result of throwing out these particular measures was to give them a considerable number of votes, because they are not particularly careful how they deal with these particular subjects. I have fought four elections in five years, so I know a considerable amount about the methods they use. These methods are somewhat exaggerated, to say the least of it. The ideas which they introduce into their party politics on the platform are somewhat different from what they introduce, as a rule, into this House. [An HON. MEMBER: "Both sides."] That, of course, is a matter of opinion. I could, if I thought it worth while, give some instances which occurred in my own Division, which I would have been very sorry to have anything to do with, if they were on my side. However, we are not discussing that at the present moment. But they always choose this whip to beat the House of Lords with, knowing full well that it has been a great advantage to them to go to the country with the cry, which I admit has been fairly popular, especially in those districts which have not much knowledge of the real benefit that comes very often from the fact that a Member of the House of Lords happens to live in a particular part of the country. I daresay some hon. Members do not agree with that. But we have been told constantly by right hon. Gentlemen on the Treasury Bench, when it suits their own convenience, that Members of the House of Lords have helped in a most splendid

1993
way to carry on the institutions of the country and the work in the country districts. I remember myself listening two years ago to the Secretary of State for War (Mr. Haldane), who told us quite honestly, and I may say somewhat to my surprise, that he considered that the Members of the House of Lords were doing a splendid work, supporting his own particular pet scheme—the Territorial scheme. The hon. Member for the Walton Division referred to-night to the fact that even the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself, who has such a very graphic method of describing the peculiar habits of the House of Lords, when it suited his convenience praised them, and praised them very considerably indeed. Having listened very carefully to this Debate, I have come to the conclusion that the real danger lies in the fact that there are others besides the Members of the Labour party who are anxious to see a Single-Chamber Government as the result of passing this Bill into law.
For my part, I am absolutely and entirely against any system of government by the House of Commons alone. It was mentioned last night by the hon. Member for Stirling Burghs (Mr. Ponsonby), and very rightly, that the House of Commons as at present constituted does not voice the divine will of the people. The hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley) two years ago told the Government that if they went down to their constituencies and told the electors that the House of Commons represented the divine will of the people, they would talk with their tongues in their cheeks. Anyone who has considered the question for five minutes knows that this House of Commons does not represent the divine will of the people, and never will really represent it, but it could represent it very much more fully if there was a system of redistribution. For myself, I should like to see a system of proportional representation. But the point is that at the present moment they do not represent the divine will of the people, and therefore I have some anxiety when I see hon. Members not only on that side of the House, but also on this side of the House below the Gangway, supporting Single-Chamber Government. I know very well why, at the present moment, there is so little talk about the reform of the House of Lords, and why we have this extraordinary Preamble. Obviously it is meant to keep the Moderate party quiet. At the same time we know perfectly well that
1994
the hon. Members to whom I have referred will do all that they can to prevent any reform of the House of Lords when they have once taken away their powers. Consequently, the danger will be very great. It is quite obvious, when the Nationalist Members attain what they desire, that is separation from England—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] We will call it Home Rule——
Mr. MEAGHER: That is not separation.
Captain MORRISON-BELL: The hon. Member may have different ideas of what separation means from what I have. When the Nationalist party have obtained the separation they desire—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—they will not care twopence whether you reform the Second Chamber or not. Are we going to have two Chambers in Dublin?
Mr. MEAGHER: Wait and see.
Captain MORRISON-BELL: I shall wait and see with great interest, if you ever get Home Rule at all. I would certainly like to know what the plans of Nationalist Members are with regard to a Second Chamber, because I cannot conceive even this Government allowing Ireland to be controlled only by a Single Chamber.
I should rather like to see the formation of a Second Chamber, and it seems to me very ridiculous that, while we insist upon our Colonies and Dominions having two Chambers, we should be found here, in the great centre of all, talking about a Single Chamber. The hon. Member for Stirling Burghs referred to Costa Rica and other small States for purposes of comparison. But we do not want to compare ourselves with such States, because we have more at stake than a place like Costa Rica, and we need more control than we are likely to possess if the present Government obtain a Single Chamber, and there is no check upon what it chooses to do. The Prime Minister last night claimed that his side has the whole of the people at its back. One thing certainly it has not, and that is the voice of the people of Devonshire, because in that county we turned out no less than five Members who used to sit in the House on the other side. The voice of Devonshire, therefore, cannot be said to be at the back of the Prime Minister in seeking to destroy the House of Lords. The hon. Member for Exeter (Mr. St. Maur), who happens to be a constituent of mine, but who did not vote for me, made to-night a maiden speech, on which I congratulate him. He seemed to

1995
be quite contented with the way in which the Government is carrying out this great change in our Constitution. He made one remark which I thought rather curious. He said that the people had wrung their privileges from the monarchs of old. Yes, but he must have forgotten that they won their privileges with the help of the House of Lords when he made that statement. I absolutely oppose this Bill, because I sincerely believe, if it become law, that we shall be going forward on a path leading to we know not where, and I think we shall be putting ourselves far too much in the power of those who, we know perfectly well, will work for their own ends. I am exceedingly gratified that the leaders of the Conservative party, backed up by a united following, have made it quite clear that they will be in no way a party to this unstatesmanlike measure.
Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS: The hon. Member who has just spoken, like every other hon. Gentleman who has taken part in this Debate, sought to interpret various elections to the advantage of his own particular party. He made one more interesting statement, wherein he claimed that certain Lords have performed certain duties in connection with Territorial Associations, and have received the commendation of certain Ministers. The idea underlying his observation seems to me to be this: that if a lord does his duty it is something remarkable. Certainly we expect Lords, as well as everybody else, to do some duty or other, but, if a man does the ordinary duty of a citizen, in our opinion that does not entitle him to the special privileges which he possesses as a Member of the House of Lords. The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. Baird), in his interesting speech, suggested that we on these benches were under an obligation to the House of Lords because that august body allowed the Trades Disputes Bill to pass through. Evidently he had not followed the proceedings of that time very closely; but we on these benches did, and we know very well that the Leader of the Conservative party in that House designated the measure as wicked and pernicious, that it was pregnant with great disasters, and that his party would very much like to reject it, but that he did not regard it as suitable ground for a conflict with the people. Here we see that they were not taking a dispassionate view of that legislation, and that they were not coming to a determination according to
1996
their conscience and their convictions, but that they were moved purely by expediency and a desire to avoid conflict with the people themselves.
I am one of those who have long contended that the controversy in which we are engaged at the present time was inevitable. As soon as the people were enfranchised they learned that after all the possession of political power is not an end in itself, but simply a means whereby they are to work out their economic salvation. That means they must challenge the privileges and vested interests of other classes. When hon. Members on the other side speak of the necessity of having a Second Chamber to restrain hasty legislation, I apprehend that they are more concerned to restrain the desires of the working classes for a greater measure of justice in our time. It certainly does help us to perceive that the particular interest which is overwhelmingly represented in the House of Lords is one which must recede as the working classes press forward. There is no other method of establishing social right and justice, and I interpret this present struggle as meaning that the working classes are claiming equal political power with any other class in the land, and that means that the special privileges now enjoyed and exercised by the House of Lords must cease as early as possible. We the practical politicians on these benches have to recognise, of course, that although the present Bill will not assure that the whole of our desires will be fulfilled, nevertheless it does take us in the direction that we would move; hence we have good reason for the support we are giving to the measure. We are told by the other side that they must have this restraining influence; nevertheless, it seems to me that there is a greater necessity in the land: I want to see a Chamber in existence that will stimulate and facilitate progress. Hon. Members opposite seem to regard the function of the House of Lords as always to be a drag on progress I am one of those who believe we have suffered far too long from this restraint, and that the real need of the people demands that we shall have protection against reaction in the land, and that the great social laws with which we are all acquainted shall receive full and ample consideration. There has been a great deal of controversy as to what really happened at the last General Election. Of course, each Mem-

1997
ber is entitled to speak of his own experience. I am bound to admit that this question was the primary question that was submitted to the electors of the city I have the honour to represent. The Opposition were anxious to trail other questions across the track, but, nevertheless, this question undoubtedly did emerge as the one issue of that great election. At the same time I made it perfectly clear that I was supporting this Parliament Bill, because I recognised that it would help to clear away the great obstacle and barrier to the larger aims that I had in view. I have never burked consideration of the Home Rule question or other great issues. I advocated the Parliament Bill in the course of my election because I wanted to see the Irish people realise their ambitions, and because I desired that we of the Labour party also should be able to realise the aims that we have placed before the country. I am perfectly satisfied, so far as my experience went, and it was not confined to the city I contested, as I visited a number of other constituencies in different parts of the country; everywhere I found this question occupying the primary attention of other candidates. And I believe that they may every one of them claim that the constituencies they represent gave an emphatic determination in favour of the general principle of this Bill. The questions that I submitted were these. First:—
"Do you desire that the House of Commons shall prevail over the House of Lords?"
That is clear and understandable enough. I argued, of course, the reasons why the popularly-elected Assembly should have supreme control over finance and legislation, and the constituency in very solid fashion affirmed that principle. I put the question also to them:—
"Do you agree that those should be effected in finance without limitation?"
That need not be argued any further, because I believe the party opposite now recognise that the Lords' action on the Budget was not to be defended, and the Lords themselves have even abandoned that claim to the power they exercised on that occasion. It is perfectly obvious that in my own particular case, and with the others with which I am familiar, that it was the question of the relation and not the composition of the two Houses which was put to the people.
Personally, I candidly confess I wish the Government had not persisted in their adhesion to the Preamble. We on these
1998
benches have made our attitude perfectly plain. We are opposed to a Second Chamber. I cannot contemplate any Second Chamber that will not be of a statutory reactionary character. Of this I am certain, that all the schemes that have been foreshadowed by hon. Gentlemen or right hon. Gentlemen representing the party opposite, would fulfil that idea of theirs of having a statutory established Second Chamber with a permanently reactionary majority simply reflecting their own views and purposes. I do not know how it would be possible to set up a Second Chamber that would give fair representation to even the varied interests represented in this House of Commons. We are supposed to be a democratic people, and we claim that all the forms of Parliament ought to be open to the common people, provided they have the character and quality for Parliamentary representation. I do not suppose it is proposed in any of the schemes which have been set forth by hon. Gentlemen opposite that say the Labour party should have representation in their revised Second Chamber. At any rate, you may count upon it that any form of Constitution which would restrict the right of the Labour party, to which I belong, would have our consistent opposition. It is suggested that the Government are unfair in their intention to have this question settled this side of the Coronation. I believe that the Government are wise in their action. They have a mandate from the people to settle the question. I believe it is a remarkable experience in British politics to find one party returned at three consecutive elections when the same question was prominently before the electors. Certain it is that we have to look back along history before we are able to find anything to parallel that. Therefore we believe that the Government are perfectly justified in declaring that the people desire that this should be a fight to the finish. I am certain of this, that if the Government were to withdraw from this matter now in response to the appeal made to them from the other side, they would get short shrift when they were compelled to go to the country again, because the people would claim that they had proved false to the promises and the trust which they had reposed in them. We object to all the reform schemes which have been foreshadowed. Under the existing system we can always when a crisis arrives call in the aid of the Crown's Prerogative. I know everybody admits the advisability of keeping the Throne out

1999
of political controversy as long as and as far as it is possible to do so. Nevertheless in this dilemma when it seems impossible to peacefully adjust the relationship of the two Houses, and when the House of Lords display a disinclination to yield to the clearly expressed will of the people, then it is competent for the Prime Minister to call upon the King to exercise his Prerogative by appointing peers to help them out of their difficulty. We contemplate in a written Constitution that this statutory reformed House, which hon. Gentlemen opposite seem so anxious to set up, that this Prerogative will be destroyed. If my apprehension is true, a Second Chamber on the lines so far suggested must be of a permanent reactionary character, and there will then be the alternative between stagnation and revolution in the country. Therefore I venture to suggest it will require far more consideration than we have hitherto been able to give it in order that we may have anything like general agreement upon the constitution of a reformed Second Chamber. I am glad the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald), speaking yesterday, declared that we would in no way acquiesce in any Conference being set up on this matter. We were opposed to the original proceeding. We regarded it as unconstitutional, and certainly we entered our protest against the Front Benches entering into compact on this matter. We believe that the differences between us are fundamental and irreconcilable, and we believe there is no possibility of any agreement that would be acceptable to all sections of this House emerging from any such Conference. In the last resort the people, through their declarations at the polls, have given determination in this matter, and we trust that the Government will recognise it, and that they will not be trapped into a further Conference, although the hon. Member for Rugby seemed to think his leaders were trapped when they entered into the Conference last year. We heard a great deal during the election about the Referendum, but we have not had much explanation of this new-fangled idea from speakers on the other side. I can remember the time when it was very attractive to me, but in those days I looked upon it as a possible alternative to a Second Chamber, and I know there are a considerable number of reformers in the country who are in favour of the Referendum, but not the Referendum with a revised Second
2000
Chamber, or the House of Lords as we understand it to-day. In 1894 Lord Curzon contributed to a symposium in the "National Review," when he set forth very emphatically one of the objections that I have to the Referendum as now proposed. He said:—
"Is not the Referendum in the hands of the Lords equivalent to the prerogative of forcing a dissolution whenever they please."
I believe that if we were to assent to the setting up, or the embodying of, the Referendum in our Constitution it would so work, as far as we are able to conceive it that the Lords, or a revised Second Chamber, would refer to the country only such measures as were objectionable to them. They would not be able or competent to take a dispassionate view of matters, and those interests which must inevitably be overwhelmingly represented in that Chamber would simply determine what should be remitted according to their objection, or otherwise, to the particular measures. We may at any rate claim for the House of Commons that it has the virtue of having to go to the people every now and then. The people themselves may rapidly and easily change the constitution of this Chamber. That seems to me to emphasise our demand that the popularly elected Chamber shall be the supreme factor in our Constitution. Now that we have a proposal to limit the duration of Parliaments, I think we may claim, with greater emphasis than ever, that this Chamber which represents the people is the real Chamber, and that this is the Chamber which must prevail, both in finance, as is now admitted, and, as we trust it will also be admitted by the passing of this Bill, in schemes of legislation.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: I certainly think, after the speech of the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. G. Roberts), there will be very great difficulties in the way of the Government if they are in favour of any sort of compromise on this Bill. Of the three parties composing their composite majority, two are absolutely opposed to any Conference. As to the Irish Members, if I were an Irish Member and wanted Home Rule for Ireland, I should be as uncompromising an opponent of any sort of compromise as they are to-day. Now that we have had this definite declaration from the Labour Members as well I confess I do not understand the position of those moderate Liberals—and they are very moderate indeed, who are supporting this Bill still in the hope that some sort of arrange-

2001
ment will be come to between the two parties. Another point which comes out of the speech to which we have just listened is that the Preamble, of which we have heard so much, is mere waste paper. The hon. Member opposite declares that he does not want any sort of change in the composition of the Second Chamber. He is, in fact, a strong supporter of the hereditary principle. He does not want to alter it in the least. He is ready that it should go on.
Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS: I never admitted that.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: The hon. Member admitted it inferentially.
Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS: I admitted it only so far as the result of the last election was concerned. My point was that it was simply the question of the relationship of the two Houses, and not the constitution of the Second Chamber, that was submitted to the people, and that reform proposals would need to be further convassed before we could reach any line of agreement.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: Anyhow, the hon. Member is so far a supporter of the hereditary principle that he wishes it to remain unimpaired in the Second Chamber until there is some further Conference or arrangement, which is, no doubt, relegated to a very distant future.
Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS: I have no objection to a Second Chamber as an ornamental body, but I object to it so far as it possesses legislative power.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: The hon. Member wishes the Second Chamber to be an ornamental body, and I think he expressed a faint regret that Labour Members were not to be admitted into it. I would only hope that that might be done, and that the hon. Member should find a seat, say by the Bench of Bishops. So far as this question has been discussed by hon. Members opposite, I have been greatly struck by the purely party attitude that they have taken up. The speech of the Prime Minister himself, following the example of his followers, entirely considered the matter from the point of view of the sectional interests of which for the moment he is at the head. In the whole of his long and very carefully-balanced speech I did not hear a single argument dealing with the question whether a Second Chamber, or what sort of a Second Chamber was the
2002
proper Constitution under which the people of this country should live. He considered the matter purely from the party point of view, and not at all from the point of view of whether for the present and' for the future some sort of bi-cameral system was the best for the citizens of these islands. Moreover, he considered the matter from a very short historical point of view. After all, whatever you may say about the Second Chamber, it has existed for 600 or 700 years. Having, therefore, a long history, it might at least have some sort of long historical consideration. The review of the Prime Minister was entirely confined to the last ten or fifteen years, and his objection was confined to their dealing with two or three Bills in the last six or seven years, and to the fact that the Second Chamber during the ten years of life of the late Conservative Government had not shown sufficient activity in throwing out the Bills of that particular Administration. From that I am led to infer that, supposing the House of Lords had been active in throwing out the measures of the Conservative Government, there would have been no objection on the part of hon. Members opposite to its existence as a Second Chamber.
I was trying to consider what sort of Second Chamber hon. Members opposite wanted. They object to the Second Chamber because it passes measures promoted by the Conservative party. They apparently want a Second Chamber which will do two things—first of all throw out the measures of the Conservative party, and, secondly, pass the measures of the Liberal party. [Several HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I think that was the ideal Second Chamber at which they aimed. I have heard nothing from hon. Members opposite about a fair Second Chamber, which would hold the balance equally between the two parties. I am inclined to think that in the present state of thought in this country such a Second Chamber is almost an impossibility. Such being the state of the case, I find it is very difficult to forecast what the Second Chamber is which the Government really wish to set up. I am quite certain that the Prime-Minister himself looks forward dimly to set up the Second Chamber, but at the same time he tells us that the Second Chamber that he wishes to set up is to be purely an elected body. So far as the elective principle is concerned I have nothing to say against it. Great admirer as I am of the hereditary principle, know-

2003
ing how in ordinary life and in science what a latent force is to be attached to it, I am not going to say a word against it. At the same time, I am one of those who think that possibly, so far as the Second Chamber is concerned, the hereditary principle has for the present served its purpose. If we are to have a Second Chamber at all it had better, on the whole, be largely elected. There I agree to some extent with the Prime Minister. But I am at a loss to consider what sort of an elected. Second Chamber the Prime Minister is really going to decide upon. Is that Second Chamber when elected going to have a sort of illusory power, or is its power to be real? One feels after all that if these gentlemen are to be elected to the Second Chamber that Chamber probably will contrast their own wisdom with the narrow wisdom of the old hereditary Chamber. They will say: "If these powers were good enough for an hereditary Chamber, what powers ought we, elected of the people—and also elected by a larger number of the people—to possess? I should like to ask the Prime Minister this question: Is he then going to restore larger powers to the Second Chamber when that Second Chamber is at some remote date put up? Is the present curtailment of power only to extend over the short period, the interregnum, which must exist between the death of the present Chamber and the birth of that new and glorified Second Chamber? If so, I am afraid he will find himself in great difficulties, for he will have this alternative to face: the elective Second Chamber, indignant at being given the same paltry powers that were good enough in the hereditary Chamber, or the Second Chamber demanding, and perhaps asserting, powers and influence as an elected Chamber which will come into very severe conflict with this House of Commons itself! I have some sympathy with hon. Members below the Gangway in that they are stern, unrelenting supporters of a Single Chamber system. They see its difficulties, and having the frankness to say that they are absolutely opposed to a Double Chamber system, place all their hopes and all their chances in the future on the powers and existence of a Single Chamber. I always like, when party passions are high, and struggles are going on in the country, and violent statements are made, to hear a man like the Prime Minister get up, and in his philosophic fashion point out that all that is
2004
really being done is to bring the practice of the State into line with theory. It makes one feel that one is in a pleasant philosophical area of discussion, where heated passions have fallen away, and we are able to consider matters from a detached and purely philosophic standpoint. He told us that the fact that the Lords had thrown out the Budget made it absolutely necessary to define the legal situation. I hate exaggeration, even when it is made use of by my opponent; but I have never been able to see how sincere and honest men—because I credit my opponents with sincerity and honesty—could suggest that the fact that the House of Lords on one single occasion, in referring the Budget to the people—once only in the history of Budgets—could possibly have constituted by that a claim or an assumption that the House of Lords were going to usurp for themselves powers which they had never before had in the Constitution, or overturn the whole balance of the Constitution? Talking not in the atmosphere of this House, but in any practical atmosphere—such as the smoking-room of this House—is there anybody who really supposes that by that reference of the Budget to the people the House of Lords really meant again and again to throw out Budgets, and thereupon assume a power of control over the finances of the country which they did not possess? It is quite impossible that any sane practical man could ever imagine anything of the kind.
Mr. CHANCELLOR: They established a precedent.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: That precedent was also an exception. The fact that they had only done it once in fifty years was pretty fair evidence that they were not going to do it regularly. Unfortunately, perhaps they made a mistake in their calculations. The Prime Minister says that this was "the most signal example of political blindness in the history of this century.—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] Quite so. What the Prime Minister—and his supporters who lead him so effectively—seem to think is that the House of Lords were actuated by perfect party tactics. They seem to think that the calculation of the House of Lords was that they could claim further powers in the State by referring the Budget to the people. May I suggest one other consideration to hon. Members opposite? It is that the House of Lords was actuated by a sense of duty. Duty is

2005
perhaps a strange word nowadays in political conflicts. I am afraid hon. Members opposite belong to the school which attributes bad motives to all those who differ from them in opinion. [An HON. MEMBER: "Oh."] I do not accuse all of them of doing it, but I do accuse a section. I am certainly convinced of this: that considerations of party advantage had nothing whatever to do with the action of the House of Lords. I do think they would have been neglectful of their duty if they had not referred that Budget to the people. I am quite convinced that that Budget contains matters extraneous to a Budget, and if that principle had once teen allowed to pass, you would have had Budgets gradually curtailing, swallowing up, and absorbing the legislation of the country. Afterwards the Liberal party, or the Labour party, would have turned round on the House of Lords and said, "Your House has admitted the principle of non interference for tactical reasons, and you cannot turn round now and say tacking is not to be permitted in the Budget." There was one observation made by the hon. Gentleman opposite which I fully agree with. He said after all it is only an incident and only part of a general campaign against the House of Lords. It seems to me most shallow political philosophy or history to maintain that the action of the House of Lords on the Budget really had very much to do with the general campaign. After all if the House of Lords had not acted in the way they did they would have been discredited and dishonoured as well as, perhaps, destroyed. If the House of Lords was to be destroyed it could not, in my opinion, do better than stand by those tactics, principles, and constitutional rights, and act up to principles which, I believe animated these Noble Lords. If you want any evidence that the House of Lords was going to be attacked and its constitutional rights were to be taken away, if possible, by the Liberal party, you have only got to look at the contradictory criticisms that are made by that body. I remember perfectly well; in connection with the Trades Disputes Bill, the "Westminster Gazette," the great organ of the Liberal party, nearly went into hysterics because the House of Lords did not throw out the Bill, and because the House of Lords acted upon its self-imposed principle of passing measures upon which the will of the people was taken. The House of Lords was appealed to on the Licensing Bill to act upon higher principles, and the
2006
Chancellor of the Exchequer appealed to them on most astonishing grounds. He said:—
"This is the greatest opportunity that had ever been offered to the House of Lords to rise to the dignity of its great pretentions as an independent institution far removed from the passions of the multitude"
Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: That was a joke.
Mr. W. R. PEEL: I do not think it was a joke, and I will tell the hon. Member why. Because the same observation was made by the Lord Chancellor, who is a Scotchman, and the Lord Chancellor said that the subject was very unpopular, and on that ground he urged the House of Lords to face it; so that when the House of Lords gets this advice from men of every nationality and opinion, I think it is quite clear there was a general attack upon the establishment itself. The House of Lords is attacked on the ground that they are unrepresentative. I am not myself, I am afraid, so absolute a believer in the representative system as all that. I believe it is perfectly possible for persons not directly affected themselves to form a very good idea as to the popularity or unpopularity of a particular measure. I have myself seen measures passed by this House about which Members did not entertain the slightest doubt that they were unpopular. Nevertheless, they were passed in the hope that they might be dealt with by the Upper Chamber. The Prime Minister declared himself strongly in favour of a Second Chamber, and he also declared that the powers he left to the Second Chamber were considerable powers, and that they established and maintained the principles of a Second Chamber. Now, if that is so, I should like to ask him how is it that he is going to leave these powers in the hands of a hereditary Chamber? It is quite true, he told us, that in the future a change was to be made, but at the present there was going to be an interregnum and millenium, so to speak.
9.0 P.M.
There is going to be a sort of land of saints, when every Nonconformist will sit down with every Churchman, and when different sections of the Liberal party will be able to obtain all they desire. We heard reference made also in somewhat contemptuous tones to the Referendum. First of all, the right hon. Gentleman made a general attack upon the Referendum. He told us that the Referendum in Switzerland had reduced Ministers to mere clerks, and that with it Parliament would be a

2007
mere registering body. He did not tell us to what the party system has reduced the House of Commons, but he made a curious reservation when he told us that, for certain purposes, the Referendum might be a wise way of dealing with the question. I hope the Home Secretary will elaborate that point still further, because in some of his speeches he expressed himself in favour of the Referendum as applied to certain questions. He is not in agreement with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on that point, for the Chancellor of the Exchequer drew a terrible picture of the expenses of the Referendum, showing the first care for economy which I have ever known him to display since he occupied the position of Chancellor. But, although the Referendum may be revolutionary, surely from this point of view it ought to commend itself to the Labour party. How far do you trust the people at present? You trust them to select a candidate placed before them by the party caucus. That is a certain degree of trust, but are you going to limit your trust to the extent of saying, "We trust the people so far and no further?" You trust them to select between certain candidates, but you do not trust them to decide upon some great question which is put before them. You say, "We are going to have a General Election, which we claim to be a Referendum, but we will not put a specific question before them after the General Election is over. "I am myself a strong supporter of the Referendum principle. I believe there is a certain vagueness, say what you will, about proposals put before the country at a General Election. I am sorry to say I found audiences, which had been addressed by some of the most eloquent Radicals, totally ignorant about the Parliament Bill, and when I tried to explain it they thought I was inventing the details out of my head. I found they would scarcely believe in the details until I had an opportunity of putting them before them. That shows there is a great difference between a sketch of a Bill and the details of it in black and white. That is why I myself am a very strong supporter of the Referendum, because at least you have a discussion in Parliament, and you give an opportunity to the country of knowing what the details of the Bill are, and you leave very little excuse to electors for not understanding the details of the Bill after its discussion. I am not, I
2008
am bound to say, an out-and-out supporter of the Referendum. I am only a supporter of it in this sense—I would rather have a strong Second Chamber, but if you are going to have a Single Chamber then I am bound to say you must have some corrective in the shape of a Referendum. These are the days when Second Chambers are really more necessary than ever. These are the days when a full discussion in a Second Chamber is far more necessary than it used to be thirty or forty years ago. One reason given for passing this measure into law before the Coronation is that it will give great satisfaction to those representing the Colonies when they come here if they are told that the House of Lords has been done away with. As far as that is concerned, it will not make much difference at the Coronation, because the whole pomp and circumstance of the peerage will be the same. Therefore, as far as the Dominions are concerned, there is no reason why they should be gratified with this Bill. On the contrary, if they find that we are reduced to Single-Chamber Government, if they find there is no opportunity for the representation of themselves and their interests in a Second Chamber, they will not be so gratified as some hon. Members opposite seem to think. On this side of the House we have laid it clearly down that if this measure passes in the form in which it is intended to pass, we are not at the end, but really at the beginning of a great constitutional struggle. Whatever the time may be when we come back to power, "we shall reserve to ourselves the right of altering, reversing, or changing these proposals. It is a most unfortunate situation in which we find ourselves. At a time when it is most necessary that we should be considering social reforms, proposals for the strengthening of our national defences, and closer union with our Colonies and Dominions, we find ourselves starting upon a long and desperate constitutional struggle from which I believe we shall emerge not stronger, but weaker. If there was only the disposition shown on the other side which has been so clearly shown on this to arrive at some fair and reasonable compromise, we might have been free to consider and settle those vast and important questions affecting our future welfare which are now so strongly pressing for settlement.
Mr. ESSEX: It is not possible at this stage of the Debate to add much that is new to the discussion before us. I wish to utter one little complaint against most

2009
of the speakers we have listened to from the other side of the House. My complaint is that hon. Members opposite have treated this question very largely as though the Government's proposals affected the whole Constitution of the Upper House. There is certainly nothing in the proposals of the Government that would introduce as large a change into the Constitution of the Second Chamber as many proposals which have been put before the country by the Conservative party. After listening to the discussion during the last two days, I have begun to wonder whether there is not a deep spice of ancient wisdom in the phrase that we have bandied one with the other in the use of the term a Second Chamber. The contention seems to be that the House of Lords should not be the Second Chamber but the First. We desire that the House of Commons shall always be the first Chamber. I would like to ask hon. gentlemen opposite, in all fairness and candour, whether it is not a fact that the Liberal party, the Labour party, and the Nationalist party have had for many years a very real grievance against the Upper House which has long called for redress. Will they not at least grant us that point. The nearest approach to conceding that was reached when the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool (Mr. F. E. Smith) spoke of the accumulated anomalies of a thousand years. May I say that this subject of the House of Lords was the first question that brought me into public life thirty years ago, and I have looked for the coming of the day, with a warm passion that has never abated when we might come to grips with the people's foes across the floor of this House. Some hon. Members have spoken as if the Liberal party had no right to complain of its treatment by the House of Lords. What are the things of which we complain? We cannot take the remark of the hon. Member opposite seriously, that all we want is a House of Lords which will let our Bills through and fling the measures of our opponents out. What we want is just as much for our opponents as we want for ourselves—that is, absolute fair play. How many hon. Members opposite have got up and in all candour frankly stated that there is a real grievance which the Liberals may well bring before the country. The people outside have recognised that, and they have returned us in large and overwhelming numbers because of it. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, oh."] At any rate, a solid majority of 126 will want a lot of
2010
getting over. Our party is as solid as the party of hon. Gentlemen opposite. We are solid on a Second Chamber. The party opposite is a composite party. There are Liberal Unionist Tariff Reformers. There are Liberal Unionist Free Traders, Conservative Tariff Reformers, and Conservative Free Traders, and I need not multiply them. We have a right to complain when our measures have been thrown out year after year whilst the measures passed by the party opposite have been passed into law. Do hon. Members opposite urge that all the measures passed by the Conservative party are always good?
Sir F. BANBURY: Yes.
Mr. ESSEX: Well, that is courageous, coming from the hon. Member for the City of London, but perhaps we shall be forgiven if we differ from him. It cannot be denied that a lot of our best and most important measures which we have fought out on the platforms of the country have been indignantly thrown aside by the House of Lords. It is not only what they spoil, but it is a fact that many of our measures are begotten under a fear of what the powers of the House of Lords are. Even a Member of this House who has only been here a few years, as I have, knows that when a Bill is before the House which embodies points of great interest, and he goes to his party Leaders and says he thinks it should be strengthened in this or that detail, it is the common experience for his Leaders to say: "I agree with you, but we have now in the Bill more than we think we shall get through the other House." I consider that is a scandal. We can see what has been lost to us by the mutilation and destruction of our Bills, but what the country has lost by this fear we shall never probably know.
It has been said we want to institute Second-Chamber Government. Is that charge true? It undoubtedly is not. We want a Second Chamber, and we want to keep the first Chamber in closer touch with the people. We have proposed that there shall be a succession of "sendings," if the phrase will be allowed me, to the Upper House of any measure that is the subject of dispute between the two Houses, that we shall go through, without any curtailment whatever, the needlessly long drawn-out debates, as some of us think, of any Bill in this House, that all the Committee work shall go on with all the deputations and the rest of the machinery, and that

2011
then the Bill shall go up to the other House, and there receive in unstinted measure the same amount of treatment it receives to-day. If there is a difference between the two Houses we propose a conference. The Bill will then again come back to this House, and if the Government have not been convinced by that time by what has happened elsewhere that they are on the wrong track, the Bill goes through all this tedious process and again goes to the other House. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] Well, with some abbreviation in this House. It will go to the other House and be again considered. There is a succession of these passages. Between twenty and thirty years ago John Bright said he would only allow a double reference to the House of Lords, and that thereafter the Bill should pass over their heads. We have given extended terms of favour in this matter. Is not that a sign of our desire to be conciliatory? Will it mean any hardship to hon. Gentlemen opposite when they are in power? Will they have any cause to complain of the existence of a rule of that kind? It will never be used against them. If they were in power for the next fifty years, you would never hear of these powers in the Parliament Bill, and a generation might rise which had never dreamed they were on the Statute Book. We are voluntarily proposing things which will only affect, and which will only be used as an hindrance and an obstacle to our own legislation. We are therefore voluntarily entering into a one-sided arrangement that will affect us and will not affect you.
The tyranny of this House is spoken of. Whence comes this tyranny? Do we not all know that we are very susceptible to the opinions of our constituents. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] Well, the majority of us. There are some of us with large majorities behind us who can afford to do what we like, but the majority of us are susceptible to any movement of disapproval in our constituencies. These Bills held up in the House of Lords in the eyes of the whole country, year after year—for two years at least, at any rate—are exposed to all the fire and criticism of the public press, public meetings, and every little gathering wherein you find people talking over public affairs. No measure with inherent weaknesses could stand the fire and criticisms of those months and years without harm and peril, and, when it had emerged substantially undamaged from exposure during those two years, at
2012
least, to public criticism and consideration, it might safely then be carried over the heads of my Lords, or anybody else. Some of us on this side of the House hail the coming of this struggle with high courage and abundant hope. We have waited for it, and we have prayed for it for years. We were told last night that there was to be no compromise. I would we could have come to the consideration of the matter in a more temperate way. I would we could have come to an agreement, and that we might have laid the laurels of that agreement on the bier of the late King. It seems, however, that this thing is to be fought out. Well, let it be so; and, if in this struggle the unthinkable should happen, and we should have a set back, I trust it may yet be given to us not to have to sing out Nunc Dimittis before this injustice is remedied and wiped away as a thing that all men shall soon learn to forget.
Captain CRAIG: Perhaps no part of the United Kingdom is more affected by the proposed changes than the Province of Ulster. We have heard a great deal about the democracy and the people. We represent the democracy and the people, and we have successively fought out battles in the past because they have been open and above board. Perhaps the Home Secretary, when he comes to his speech, will answer one of the questions that we Members from Ulster desire to put to him. The coupling of Home Rule with this Bill has now been announced by the Prime Minister and practically by every Member on the other side of the House, although I discover by a carefully prepared return, which was sent to me, that out of all the Radical Members only eighty-four submitted the question of Home Rule in their election addresses. Who can say that a vital question has been submitted to the electors of this country when even a majority of the majority in this House have not placed it in their election addresses? Not even the Prime Minister, or the Home Secretary, or the Chief Secretary for Ireland mentioned it. Therefore, we see clearly that what the Radical party have failed to get by a straightforward issue they are now striving to get by a back door. We think it right to let it be known from the outset that it will meet with our strenuous opposition. This is not a question, as some people seem to think, of a Bill. They say, "Oh, well, if the Parliament Bill goes through; if, after that a Bill has been sent up to the House of

2013
Lords and they say they cannot pass it; if that operation is repeated in another year, then it comes back again and automatically becomes law." But Home Rule is not a Bill. Hon. Members who think it is must imagine that they are talking about some Corporation Bill, some Drainage measure, or some small trifling affair of that nature. This, however, is a question affecting the whole inner life and existence of 1,300,000 people who are loyal to the Crown and Constitution and have no desire to be separated from the Empire or from this kingdom. Yet, forsooth, for party purposes, without consulting the good of the country, without considering what it means to the people of Ulster, but as a party move, and at the bidding of hon. Members below the Gangway, this is the only measure which is mentioned as the immediate consequence of this Parliament Bill becoming law. How is it no other measures are mentioned? Not a single other subject is pledged beforehand, but we have the certainty that Home Rule is to be thrust on Ulster at the dictation of hon. Members below the Gangway. I say that, having knowledge of the feeling that exists against this trickery and dodgery—and it has been open knowledge to all who have studied the course of events in Ireland—they at any rate have not been humbugged by the procedure of the Government. Then the Prime Minister, in order to slur over the thing, gave an assurance yesterday that there was no intention of smuggling into law measures which were condemned by popular opinion and that there would be ample opportunity for the reconsideration and revision of hasty or slovenly legislation. That is absolutely absurd. It is ridiculous to suggest to the country that if they pass a measure of Home Rule it will be possible for the Unionist party to reverse it in a year or two. Such an argument should only be addressed to children. It may be taken by some as an assurance of generous treatment by the Radical party, but you must remember that if once a Home Rule Parliament is established in Dublin, which God forbid, and the whole machinery for carrying on the administration is set up it would be impossible for the succeeding Government to reverse it in view of the fact that the institutions which would have been established would be so gigantic. Once you have the establishment created for carrying on the government of the country, once you have the Ministers in office, how, I ask, could you abolish them? [An HON
2014
MEMBER: "We will give you a post."] That is only trying to draw me on to a side issue. The Civil Lord of the Admiralty, I think it was, who declared that if Ulster-men would not take Home Rule they would be made to have it. But the only leakage "which has occurred with regard to that measure has been the few words of the hon. and learned Member for Water-ford, the leader of the Home Rule party, who said that under the scheme of Home Rule—and seeing he has now got his thumbs up we may take it that the Government will have to swallow what he says whether they like it or not—under the proposals for the creation of a new Parliament in Dublin. Ireland will still have its representatives in this House, although it may be a reduced representation. But with this Parliament Bill passed, and with the power nominally in the hands of the Front Bench, but in reality in the hands of the hon. Members below the Gangway, I would like to ask in all seriousness how that reduction of representation in this House is to take place, and if it is not clear that Ulster would be deprived of any representation whatever here, because the whole power would be in the hands of hon. Members below the Gangway, and such a minority as we should form in Ireland could not by any possibility hope to carry any suggestion against the majority. We should, therefore, in future have no representation in this House, and hon. Members here would only have placed before them the Nationalist side of questions; they would never hear a voice from the loyal part of the country.
Mr. GEORGE WYNDHAM: As it is desired to give the Home Secretary a full opportunity for replying on behalf of the Government I shall refrain from criticising one set of arguments which have figured very prominently during the discussion, and which have been put forward with great force by the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Essex). Those arguments embodied a retrospect of the political events of the last four or five years—a retrospect which enables the hon. Gentleman to discover that the House of Lords has acted, if not uniformly at any rate very generally in opposition to the wishes of the people. I feel justified in not attempting to reply to criticisms of that kind because they were disposed of by the very brilliant and convincing speech of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool, and we are quite-ready to let that part of our case rest

2015
where he left it. I shall only invite the House to consider two matters. The first is, why do you ask us to acquiesce in your proposals, and the second is what is the nature of the proposals you ask us to accept? I think it convenient to divide the subject under those two heads, because I have been unable to discovere any real connection between the two arguments that you have urged and the proposals you ask us to assent to. In the first place then I would ask the House to examine the grounds which justify you in your opinion in advocating a change, the magnitude of which I freely admit you have not sought to disguise. Some speakers like the last speaker from the Government Benches before the right hon. Gentleman seemed to think that this was a measure of a very normal character, but the Prime Minister and his colleagues on the front Government Bench have not attempted to minimise the gravity of the innovation which they contemplate. After all it is unprecedented in the whole course of our history. We are asked to substitute a written for an unwritten Constitution, and we are asked to destroy the independence of one of the estates of the realm, and by destroying its independence to destroy its function of securing what no other part of the Constitution does the decisive voice of the electors of the country on grave measures which effect their interest, and it may be the honour and safety of their native land. That is a large question.
We have heard two classes of argument with which I must deal. Some, I say it with all respect, are inappropriate to that view, and even irrelevant to it. We are asked by some to acquiesce in the view that this is a normal and almost inevitable development of the situation—in fact, I should not be putting it too high if I were to say that some of the supporters of this Bill charge us and, contingently, another place with unconstitutional action if we venture to refuse, as we do, to take any part in the proposals of the Government. I would instance two arguments of that kind. One is, to put it briefly but, I think, quite fairly, that there have been two elections upon this measure, and that two elections constitutionally ought to decide any issue. I may first admit that that argument would be proper and relevant to a Bill even of a very revolutionary character, but it is not appropriate, and it is not relevant to a measure which changes the law-making machinery of the country. The
2016
Prime Minister yesterday did not in any way attempt to justify what the hon. Member for Leicester urged, that one election is sufficient to justify this Chamber in altering the Constitution, and as I think he will agree with me that I am not overstating my case if I say that under those circumstances the Constitution would cease to exist, because it is obvious that any majority, however narrow and however composite, would be in a position to make further changes in the Constitution if we assent to that doctrine that one election or two elections would justify one Chamber in altering the Constitution. It would then become impossible for the authors of this Bill ever to fulfil their Preamble, and it would become impossible for them or anyone else to set up a substitute for the Chamber whose functions they are now attempting to destroy. Therefore, that argument is, I say with all respect, inappropriate and irrelevant to an issue of the magnitude of that by which we are now confronted. There is another argument of the same character which has been used by the Prime Minister. I am referring to the words of the speech made last year to which he alluded. Speaking last year he said the absolute Veto of the Lords must follow the Veto of the Crown. He seems to think there is some inevitable succession of events, and if the Veto of the Crown disappeared for all practical purposes 200 years ago, now is the time that the Veto of the House of Lords should follow suit.
I am not going to call into question the historical assumption that underlies that argument, but I think it is very questionable indeed whether the Veto of the Crown when it was a reality was uniformly or generally exercised in a manner which was opposed to the will of the people. I do not think that is true historically, but I waive that to say that because the Royal Veto has become obsolete that is no reason why the Veto of the Second Chamber should follow. On the contrary, it is a reason for preserving the only portion of the Constitution by which grave questions can be referred to the people. If very properly we think acquiescing in the views of our forefathers that the Royal Veto should become obsolete we are the more bound to preserve the only part of the Constitution remaining which safeguards that right of the electorate in this connection Indeed, the Prime Minister sees that that is the crux of the whole question which we

2017
are now discussing. When the Prime Minister comes to the most formidable obstacle in his course he always develops a most impressive manner and endeavours to dismiss from the minds of those who differ from him all fears which they may entertain. When he came to this point in his speech yesterday he was kind enough to say that he did not challenge the sincerity of those who believe—as we do sincerely believe—that this measure will erect a despotic Single Chamber rule, and becoming more and more impressive in his manner he wound up that portion of his speech by saying that this was the most unsubstantial nightmare that had ever affected the imagination. As his manner became more and more impressive so did the matter which he was unfolding become less and less convincing. I pricked up my ears and listened with the closest attention to the argument with which he sought to dispel our fears upon this point, and I have studied his speech very carefully in the Official Report. But although, in speaking yesterday, he deviated somewhat from the track of his argument in order to meet a point put by my right hon. Friend when I read his arguments I found that the only substantial ones that he addressed to the House on that point were two. The first was that under this Bill the duration of Parliaments was to be shorter, but that is an argument on our side. With shorter Parliaments the despotic power of the Cabinet becomes greater, and not less. With shorter Parliaments also comes the too great power of the caucus, and that is another great danger with which our Constitution is threatened, because rich people who can pay for General Election after General. Election become more powerful, and the general type of elector and individual candidate becomes less and less powerful as the despotism of the Cabinet or the caucas becomes greater. What was the second argument—an argument to which he apparently attached very great importance. May I quote his words?:—
"Lastly, and this is as clear as daylight, in ninety-nine cases out of one hundred the new House of Commons both could and would reverse legislation which had been shown by the General Election to be opposed to the will of the masses."
Suppose the hundredth case should be a Home Rule Bill. Is his argument really relevant to the situation which the Government have themselves contrived, in which, if this Bill passes into law, the "lectors of this country are to have no say whatever upon so far-reaching, and, as we think, so disastrous a proposal as one
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which would loosen the bonds between Great Britain and Ireland. I hope I have made good, at any rate, a primâ facie case for saying that arguments of that character, that two elections in succession authorise a fundamental change in the Constitution, and that the Veto of the Lords ought to follow the Veto of the Crown—and arguments of that character have been very freely used throughout the country—are quite inappropriate and irrelevant to the proposal of the Government, and to the situation which those proposals will create.
I pass on, then, to another class of arguments which are indeed relevant and pertinent to the constitutional issues we are considering, but of which no trace can be found in the Bill which the Government are asking us to accept. We have heard arguments against the hereditary character of the Second Chamber, but that is to be preserved. The country has rung for two years with denunciations of the Second Chamber, because it is a hereditary body. That charge is receding gradually into the background. Even during the General Election the Prime Minister spoke, almost with tears in his voice, of our ancient, venerable, and historic Second Chamber, and last night, to my intense astonishment, I heard a defence of the hereditary character of the Second Chamber from the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) who is the Leader of the Labour Party. I will do him no injustice. It is quite true that he would prefer to have no Second Chamber, but if we are to have a Second Chamber let it be hereditary, said he. It is because you want to have a sham Second Chamber, which is a greater danger than a Single Chamber, if I may venture to read your thoughts, that we have the Prime Minister talking about the ancient, venerable, historic institution, and the hon. Member (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) dwelling upon its æsthetic value. He now discovers a picturesque charm in these very senators whom some on the Front Bench have been denouncing up hill and down dale throughout the country. Positively the hon. Member wishes the backwoodsmen to be preserved as a separate breed for ceremonial occasions, like the cream horses that draw the royal coach. Yet another argument which is pertinent indeed, to the constitutional issue, but which finds no reflection in the Bill is the argument against the unfairness of the present composition of the Second Chamber. Then we have had the argument

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against the evil of friction between the two Houses, and much insistence has been laid upon deadlocks between them. What is there in this Bill to diminish friction? What is there to find a convenient solution for a deadlock? Nothing at all. I need not develop that. I do not wish to restate arguments which so far have not been answered. Until some answer is made to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman (Sir R. Finlay) we may say that your Bill, so far from diminishing friction increases, and must increase, friction between the House of Lords and the House of Commons, and, incidentally, because of that friction, place this House, no less than the other House, in a derogatory position which all who love this House ought to withdraw.
Passing on to an argument of the same character, which is very pertinent to the constitutional issue, but which is not reflected in the Bill, we have the great argument that the will of the people is to prevail. What chance is the will of the people to have on the question of Home Rule if this Bill goes through? Look back, if you please, to the General Election of 1895 which followed the Home Rule Bill of 1893. Then, according to your own canonical description of what a General Election means, the electors of this country did then decide that they would not have Home Rule. Look forward, and what opportunity are you going to give them under this Bill of ever taking such a decision again? I think I may say with all fairness that the arguments of the Government have been in favour of greater fairness in the composition of the Second Chamber, they have been in favour of diminishing friction between the Second Chamber and the First Chamber, and in favour of. giving a decisive voice to the people of this country, and the Bill contains not a single line which is even remotely relevant to any one of them.
I will now pass to the only other matter to which I shall invite the attention of the House. I pass from the arguments which will not support the Bill to what it is that this Bill will impose upon our country. You are inviting us in this Bill to sanction a Second Chamber, which is wholly hereditary, which is too large for the purpose of joint sittings between the two Houses, and which excludes many men who, in our opinion, ought to sit in the Second Chamber, because no one can sit in our Second Chamber, as at present con-
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stituted, unless he is either the son of a peer or unless, with rare exceptions, he has devoted some twenty or twenty-five years, of his life to that party business, infected as it is by the machinery of the caucus, which leaves many of us less efficient Members of this House than we might otherwise be. Any Second Chamber which this country ought to have ought, in our opinion to include men who are neither party hacks nor hereditary peers. I do not believe anyone who has gone through two General Elections in one year, and seven or eight General Elections in the course of his membership of this House, will deny that it will be a good thing if there were places in this Constitution for eminent men willing to serve their country but unwilling to serve it as the nominees of a party caucus, who have to endure all that we have to endure. I pass on to say that you invite us to keep a Second Chamber, which includes many men who would be the first, nay, I may say with knowledge, who will be the first, to recognise that, ready as they are to serve their country as they have served it, fighting for it abroad, and working for it at home, they have no special mission for a political life. That invitation to keep a Chamber of that kind is made, although it is common knowledge, and it is not denied, that there is a large majority in this country in favour, as we are in favour, of a far-reaching reform of the House of Lords. Another invitation which is offered is that we shall divest the House of Lords of the function which alone justifies the existence of a Second Chamber in the long run—the function which secures the ultimate voice of the electors of the country. You invite us to divest the House of Lords of that function, although you are unable to agree upon any substitute to be put in the place of the House of Lords, and although the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Ramsay Macdonald) speaking yesterday, frankly admitted that there is a large majority in the country in favour of two Chambers. I do not think he will deny that those who are in favour of two Chambers in this country mean two effective Chambers, and not a sham, disguise, and illusion. A great part of his speech was devoted to proving that the electorate cannot consider the details of measures, and that they take a broad view of questions. If a majority of the electors say that they want two Chambers they mean two Chambers, and not a specious disguise, for the fact is that under the Government proposal, there is to be one Chamber and not two Chambers.

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These two invitations, which are sufficiently striking, are accompanied by something in the nature of the grotesque. You avow that you are not agreed upon a substitute. I think I may say so if I go back to the Debates of last year. What the Foreign Secretary and the War Secretary say is something very different from what you desire, and something differing appreciably from anything he himself would propose. You are agreed that you are not agreed on a substitute, and you avow that, pending that agreement, you intend to pass one measure—perhaps two measures—which upon your own doctrine of what a General Election decides the electorate of the country have already refused to entertain. It is impossible for us to accept your invitation. I know that on the first reading of a Bill it has been customary to assent to its introduction, even if there were grave differences of opinion, but we cannot assent even to the introduction of a Bill of this character brought in under these circumstances. Yet this is the First Reading Debate, and on the First Beading of the Bill I do not desire, and I am sure no one desires, to adopt a militant tone, and certainly I do not wish to adopt a provocative tone; and, therefore, in all sincerity I would ask the Government and those who support them to consider whether it is impossible for them to accept, at any rate provisionally, our invitation. Your invitation is one that cannot be entertained. We stand as a party for settlement by agreement. Will not anyone desire settlement by agreement if for no other reason than that a settlement which is not by agreement cannot be a lasting settlement. Is it impossible to agree? One feature of the reforms which we advocate is joint sittings between the two Houses. What has the Prime Minister said to make it impossible for him to consider that proposal? Speaking at the outset of the last General Election he said:—
"I have always thought and have more than once said that given a Second Chamber moderate in size and constituted on popular lines, I would not exclude, and I certainly would not brush aside, procedure by conference and joint session."
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Why do you now exclude them and brush them aside? Why do you not discuss that matter and see whether a lasting settlement, which is in other terms a settlement by agreement, cannot be arrived at The Prime Minister paused in his speech yesterday—I do not know whether it was to elicit information or to embarrass his opponents—and asked us for our views upon
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the Referendum. I have never denied that there were rare, but quite conceivable, occasions in which some such proceeding must be resorted to. I thought it sufficient to say that, and the Prime Minister thought it sufficient to say that. He admits that there are occasions upon which recourse to the Referendum must be had. Why does he refuse to discuss the Referendum in this House of Commons, and press on in a course in which it is impossible for us to acquiesce or hold out any hope of ultimate surrender.
The fact of the matter is, I think, the real root difficulty is to be found in the alleged unfairness of the present Second Chamber. I can find nothing in the speeches of the Prime Minister which would prevent him from discussing a lasting settlement, but for the views he entertains. The speech we heard from an hon. Member indicated what he thinks as to the size of a Second Chamber. I do not know what he meant by "party fairness." If you really believe that your party always is for progress, and that ours is always for reactionary measures, I say that no Second Chamber could be composed which could meet the hon. Member's view of "party fairness." The Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. Birrell) last year, in one of those breezy phrases for which he is famous, said that we were no longer a stick-in-the-mud party, and he instanced measures which cannot be described as of a reactionary or stolid character, but if by fairness you mean a Second Chamber which will register within forty-eight hours different decisions on such a measure as the Trade Disputes Bill, I agree that it is hopeless to pursue the discussion. If you do refuse the invitation which I put forward in all sincerity, and if rather than attempt a lasting settlement we are to discuss these questions of vital interest, and you wish to rush into regions of unknown constitutional expediency—for which there is no example in the whole history of the world of a great country and still less of a great Empire being governed by such a Chamber as you propose, there is no analogy to be found in the contemporary history of the world for anything of that kind—if you wish to rush into the unknown and along a path which has not been explored, I do not suppose that you would advocate the antiquated courses which you will find in the reign of Queen Anne—if you wish us to embark upon a revolution the goal of which you have not been able to ascertain for your-

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selves, then I must say, not as a threat—it would be most improper, and it is far from my desire to use any language of menace, and I hope no language of menace will be used at this stage in our controversy—but it is my duty to say that the simple and inevitable consequence of proceedings so rash must sooner or later, and probably sooner rather than later, be the reversal of the proposals which we are now asked to adopt.
There is no known ease of a revolution being proposed except upon one of two pleas, and generally upon both. Either it has been urged that it will increase the strength and stability of the State on the one hand, or else it has been urged that it will enlarge the liberties of the people on the other. Take the classic case of a revolution. The French Revolution effected that great change, and produced both those results. It made the country far more powerful and made the people more free. This revolution which you propose does not achieve either of those results. On the contrary, you have only to read the impression which your proposals have made on foreign observers and among sister States to see that they view with alarm the effect of this revolutionary change upon the power and stability of the Mother country. How can you urge that you increase the liberties of the people when part of your design is to withdraw from their cognisance so great and important a change as a measure of Home Rule? If you are no longer to allow this House the opportunity which the Members of the Conference have had, then there is but one course remaining to us, and that is to fight unflinchingly against the destruction of the independence of the House of Lords, and to labour no less assiduously at the reform of our-Second Chamber, not in order to buy off your revolution, but because it is an end that is desirable, and indeed necessary in itself. We shall not cease from that combat, nor from that effort, until we have once more re-established the Constitution of our country as a model for all nations who seek a sound adjustment between Imperial power and popular liberty.
Mr. CHURCHILL: The right hon. Gentleman has delivered a speech with the tone and temper of which no one on this side of the House would be disposed to quarrel. He has addressed to us a succession of reasonable statements and appeals,
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and I say now, speaking not only for myself but for many on this side of the House, that if this question is from the beginning of these Debates to be approached in the mood and temper which he has exhibited, we should be earnestly desirous of removing the anxiety under which he appears honestly to be lying. The right hon. Gentleman said, at the outset of his speech, that it divided itself into two parts, each of which was represented by a question. The first part was, why it is that we asked the Opposition to acquiesce in our proposals; and the second was, what are those proposals themselves? I will endeavour in the course of my remarks to give the right hon. Gentleman some answer on both points. Let us take the first one to begin with. Why is it we ask hon. Gentlemen opposite to acquiesce in the proposals of this Bill? We ask them to acquiesce in the proposals of this Bill because they are the first and necessary steps to meet a disastrous conflict which has long been proceeding. Who provoked that conflict? The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition told us yesterday that the Liberal party came back in 1906 resolved to pick a quarrel with the House of Lords. I do not believe that that is true a bit. The Liberal party came back in 1906 after ten years' exclusion from office and twenty years' exclusion from power, with a desire to pass a number of measures which were earnestly needed, and demanded by that immense section of your own fellow countrymen whom they represented; and one would have thought that after such a long reign of power, and plenitude of power, the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition would have been ready and would have been even anxious to see another governing force place its imprint upon the legislation of the country, and would have been anxious to see the redress of grievances which had been accumulating all these years from another distinctly different point of view. But the very first Bill which the new Parliament brought forward, which occupied a whole Session, which was not a violent Bill, which was a Bill of compromise, which was a Bill recommended to the House of Lords to be passed, by no less a statesman than the late Duke of Devonshire, was cast out, wrecked and destroyed by the House of Lords, and the whole work of the first Session of the House of Commons was brought to nothing.
That was the first incident in an altogether new method of political warfare.

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We saw the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition beaten at the polls, dismissed from Government, by a majority unequalled for many years, hurled from power in a manner in which no other Minister has been ejected in recent times. We saw him reappear immediately, and before a year was passed, although in a minority in the House of Commons, we saw him, through the exercise of his influence over the House of Lords, master of the political situation in all essential points of the case. What was the modus operandi of which we were the victims? It was held that the House of Lords had the right to veto any Bill which the Conservative Leaders advised them to veto, no matter how large was the majority by which that measure had been passed in this House, or how greatly the subject had formed the matter of discussion on the public platforms at Elections, or how recent was the commission of the Parliament which sent it up. If the Government objected to this treatment they were told they had their remedy; if they did not like it they could dissolve, and if they did not dissolve, they were told it was because they did not dare to dissolve. By-elections occurred here and there, and all of them gave one party or the other cause for cheers, and when they went against the Government we were immediately told that they had lost the confidence of the country, that the House of Lords was perfectly right in the use which had been made of its Veto, and that we were clinging to office, although we were impotent to give effect to any of the pledges on which we had been returned. That was the modus operandi of the new form of political warfare. Why, within eight or nine months of the General Election of 1906, which was a considerable event, the right hon. Gentleman himself, who says that the Liberals have picked this quarrel, and that they came back, animated with a desire to pick a quarrel with the House of Lords, went to the Junior Constitutional Club, and this is what he said:—
"We are to have, it seems, a fight between the two Houses on this subject—the Education Bill—and when that is over I suppose we shall some day have a fight in the country. I say some day because I think better of the wisdom of the Government than to regard them as so hopelessly lost to all perception of what their fellow countrymen are thinking, as to have the folly to dissolve on a question on which the whole sense of justice of the country is against them. They will not dissolve, gentlemen, they know better."
I only quote that as one of the more moderate instances of the kind of language which was beginning to be used at the
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end of 1906 as to a Government which had been only a few months before returned by the people at the polls by a majority of nearly 300 available, and a Government which presented an absolutely unbroken front in the House of Commons, which had met with no Parliamentary disaster, and which had experienced no differences in its own ranks: [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, oh."] If there were differences then they have been marvellously concealed. This was the sort of language which was being used about us before we had been in office a year. What course did the Government take? They took a very moderate course. They proceeded by the much derided method of Resolution. They brought forward in 1907, in answer to this ill-usage what no doubt will go down in history as the Campbell Bannerman Resolution. The Resolution brought forward in 1907 expressed the same proposals for dealing with the House of Lords which had been put forward by Mr. Bright a quarter of a century before, and that expressed the same proposals which we make to the House of Commons to-night. The party opposite scoffed at our Resolution. The House of Lords replied very effectively by rejecting the Scottish Land Bill in 1907, and afterwards the Licensing Bill, by which the whole of the Session of 1908 had been consumed. On every platform we were again derided for not possessing the power to carry our legislation and for being unable to fulfil our pledges. And we were taunted with being impotent by the very men who had made us so. We were accused of clinging to office without the confidence of the country or the support of the electorate, in order to continue filling up the cup and drawing our salaries until the moment of our dismissal. I quite understand the satisfaction with which hon. Gentlemen opposite contemplate this memory of their vanished triumphs. I quite understand that they now, in the lean years of disaster, look back with pleasurable emotion to the rollicking days of their triumphs. We quite admit that their tactics were terribly effective. We do not deny that they reduced a powerful Government to the verge of ruin. We do not deny that they inflicted on every Member who spent his life in tramping through the Lobbies, and on Ministers who brought forward legislation, humiliations which they will never forget as long as they live. If to-day you see in the ranks of your opponents hon.

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Gentlemen beside me on this side of the House imperturbably united on this occasion, if you see there is a solid consensus of opinion which cannot be disturbed, if you see all your appeals to moderate men fall on deaf ears, it is to the experience of those bitter years that you are to look for the explanation. I said the tactics were terribly effective. I quite agree they would have been successful but for one fact—it is always very difficult to know, when you embark on the path of wrong-doing, exactly where to stop.
The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition had travelled far upon that path, but, flushed with success, he went further, and the further he went the worse he fared. I do not expect for a moment that this retrospective survey which I have ventured to take will induce hon. Gentlemen opposite to agree with our views. And I do not even expect to induce them to sympathise with our views, but it would be a genuine advantage if at the outset of this Debate on the Parliament Bill they tried to understand us. If they did so they would, I think, see that the abolition of the Veto, the absolute Veto, of the House of Lords is vital to all of us. The right hon. Gentleman asked me to say why it was we should expect them to acquiesce in the abolition of the Veto. Let me ask him a question. Is the maintenance of the Veto of the House of Lords vital to the Conservative party? I do not think so. I am not here to sound the praises of hon. Gentlemen opposite, but I think they have much more strength and existence in the country than is to be gathered by the mere retention of the Veto of the House of Lords. Great as were the advantages which they derived from the illicit use of the weapon in the first three years of the Parliament of 1906 they are not all comparable to the disasters which have come upon them by the use which they made of it in the fourth year. The Conservative party had gathered together, and they had the opportunity now of witnessing an unusual spectacle. They are confronted with a Government—unusual did I say, almost unprecedented, I think, the unprecedented spectacle in British Parliamentary history, they are confronted with a Government—which has been three times returned to power. That is a remarkable fact, and ought to excite the deep reflections of their more imaginative Members. "Gouverner c'est mécontenter." In this country we have a phrase, the expression, "The swing of the
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pendulum," which embodies the same idea. What has happened, and what is the cause why the swing of the pendulum is not operative at the present time? I put it to the right hon. Gentleman who appealed to me for a reason why they should acquiesce, May not some of the misfortunes which you have suffered in the country be attributed to your reliance on the Veto of the House of Lords?
The forces by which Conservatism is recruited do not depend on the Veto of the House of Lords. They are the result of profound social and political movements which are at work in every community in the world, and which are at work in every town and village throughout the land. The prime main force which recruits the strength of the Conservative party is wellbeing and the redress of grievances. It is the mission of the Liberal party to redress grievances and to carry measures of reform. It is an unending task to which we are bound. Let no one suppose that the process of redressing grievances does not often exhaust the strength of a Government and an Administration. Where grievances are redressed the opponents of the party are not conciliated. Some of the supporters of the party who redress the grievances are satisfied, others are disappointed, others are offended, and for all those causes there is always a diminution, a decline of the strength of the Government that is carrying on a policy of active, effective, and beneficial reform. After every great series of reforms, of enfranchising measures, of reform measures which have laid broad and wide the foundations of the State there are new classes reconciled to the fundamental institutions of the realm. At every such period of active reform there has been a process, I frankly admit it, of reaction which has very often carried a Conservative Administration to power. That was the fortune of Mr. Gladstone's great Government of 1868. Are you quite sure that your use of the Veto has not robbed you of some harvest which you might have reaped by the natural working of ordinary constitutional forces? The right hon. Gentleman and his Friends have used the Veto of the House of Lords to prevent the redress of grievances. Thus they have arrested the ordinary process of pacification and reaction which might in time have inured to their benefit. Grievances have accumulated; they have been long left unredressed, and they have grown bitter by the constant denial of justice. Fires have been banked up; safety valves

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have been screwed down; with the result that energy has been directed with a blast upon the Veto of the House of Lords. You have been the prime movers in that wonderful series of events.
Let the right hon. Gentleman and his Friends look round the House on this question of grievances. What do they see? Irishmen, Welshmen, Scotchmen, English Nonconformists. What have they offered any of these bodies of opinion but the Veto of the House of Lords? There are strong conservative elements in all these great sections of public opinion. I quite recognise that the party opposite could not have redressed the grievances themselves, because their principles and conscientious differences would have prevented their doing so. But if they had allowed the ordinary process of the Constitution to apply the remedy to the disease in the ordinary way, they would themselves have benefited also. But they have forbidden the redress of grievances, and have added a new grievance. They have added the great grievance of an attempt to control the affairs of this country through the arbitrary decision of an unrepresentative Assembly. As the nation advances, as the democracy becomes more numerous, and more educated, as culture and comforts spread more broadly, as the structure of our civilisation becomes more complex, it is absolutely necessary that the influence and control of the Peers of the Realm should he-come less and less, and not more and more. But at the moment when the whole movement and spirit of the age is marching in one direction, the right hon. Gentleman and his Friends have chosen to lead the House of Lords to make assertions of privileges which they had abandoned generations ago, and to state their claims year by year higher than they had ever stated them before. The Conservative party by so doing have committed the folly of embroiling the aristocracy in an attempt to govern a modern State; and after some advantages which they gained at the beginning, they have conferred upon their political opponents the new and prodigious tactical advantages of being at once in certain aspects a Government and an Opposition—a Government for all the purposes of the control of affairs and the direction of policy; an Opposition for all the purposes of protesting against the maintenance of arbitrary power. It is by these methods, and these methods alone, that the right hon. Gentleman has
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succeeded in doing what no other party leader in history has ever succeeded in doing, namely, marching his army down, with drums beating and flags flying, for the third time in succession to total disaster.
The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Walton (Mr. F. E. Smith), who made a very valuable contribution to the Debate this afternoon, dwelt upon the narrow margin of our majority. He devoted his caustic and acrimonious tongue to an examination—not in any very friendly spirit—of the composition of our majority and the moral weight—he is a great judge of such matters—which we have a right to claim for it. He analysed our composition. He ruled out Labour; that does not count. He ruled out Ireland. He said, discourteously, that the Irish Members had been in the market for twenty-five years. He might have added that they had been fighting side by side with the Liberal party to secure a measure of self-government for twenty-five years. He said our majority was not a "homogeneous" one. We could also, if we chose, analyse the minority. We could ask what deductions should be made on the head of plural voting, of University representation—which, professedly impartial, always comes down on one side? We could point to the curious spectacle of Free Traders and Tariff Reformers together. We could point to the still more remarkable spectacle of the two great forces upon which the Conservative party so largely depends—I mean the Church and the Licensing trade! Is my hon. Friend the Noble Lord (Lord Hugh Cecil) who has just come into the House—are they—the party—quite sure that the Church and the Licensed trade, are entirely homogeneous; that they are marching step by step on a common mission? There is, of course, an explanation that hon. Gentlemen are entitled to make: they are entitled to say, "although these many forces which compose our party are different and divergent in their character, yet they are joined together by common interests, and by common principles," which may be called, we will say, a defence of property, or a dislike of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, or some other equally general and important proposition. Have we not got common principles uniting all sections of our party?
Why, Sir, in the great Gladstonian tradition we have a treasure which all sections of what hon. Gentlemen opposite are pleased to call the "Coalition" hold

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in common? In the assertion of the equality of all citizens under the law, in the desire to remove privileges which tell against the mass of the common people, in the desire to see freedom and self-government accorded to nationalities within the British Empire, we all have principles which unite us, at least as respectably as those that join the other side—"that strong and homogeneous minority." The hon. Gentleman the Member for Walton proceeded in his speech to speak of the absolute power of the House of Commons—the uncontrolled power which the House of Commons and the Cabinet would have over every branch of legislation. That was also referred to by the right hon. Gentleman who has just addressed us. He spoke of the "despotic power of the Cabinet." At the General Election the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Walton put this point in a more coloured form. He brought forward what is called the "Patrick Ford argument." It was this: that the House of Commons is held in the grip of the Cabinet; the Cabinet is held in the grip of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Waterford; the hon. and learned Member for Water-ford is held in the grip of Mr. Patrick Ford, and Mr. Patrick Ford has therefore acquired the mastery of the British Empire for the expenditure of what must be regarded as a comparatively moderate sum of £40,000. The hon. and learned Member found that argument very consoling at the election. No doubt the power of the Ministry of the day appears to be very great, and in minor matters and as against personal claims it is undoubtedly very great; but what is the power of the Ministry as against the House of Commons, as against the party which supports it. Surely there is a great deal of exaggeration in the language which the hon. Gentleman the Member for the Walton Division and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Dover (Mr. Wyndham) have used upon that point. I submit to the House, which considers these matters maturely and leisurely, that Ministers are powerful only within strictly circumscribed areas, and those areas are defined by the position, character, interests, influence, and traditions of their party, and are particularly defined at the moment most recent to the elections. All excursions beyond are perilous. The hon. Gentleman the Member for the Walton Division said only lagging behind
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was a subject of correction and pressure. Has he not read the modern political history of this country? Does he not know that in 1886 Mr. Gladstone went further than his party were prepared to go, and that, consequently, his Administration was broken, and his party was defeated? Does he not remember the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, in conjunction with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, trying to alter the policy of the Conservative party in 1903–4–5 on the fiscal question? Does he not remember that the right hon. Gentleman although he proceeded with caution, knowing well the dangers which beset party Leaders who make excursions of that character, could do nothing but reduce his Government to impotence and nullity for the rest of his tenure and conduct his party to disaster at the polls?
There sits the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Dover. Is he going to say that the House of Commons is impotent against the tyranny of the Ministry? I remember the day when he went a little beyond the mark in defence of the party programme, and what was the result? Although the right hon. Gentleman had a. record of substantial achievement in Ireland, and although he was genuinely popular on all sides of the House, he was forced to leave the Government, and he has had to stand in a white sheet at Canossa ever since. If to-night this Government, which we are told has despotic control of the House of Commons, were to announce that we accepted the amiable invitation sometimes thrown out to us from the benches opposite, and that we were going to suspend the prosecution of the Parliament Bill till the year after next, and were going to enter into a conference on reform with hon. Gentlemen opposite, we should not have fifty supporters. [Cheers.] Those cheers are very inconsistent with the argument that we are the dictators of the House. If it be true that Ministries are held within very strictly defined limits, as it undoubtedly is true, by the House of Commons, is it not also true that the House of Commons—and each of the great parties—is held within strictly defined limits by the country? We have heard from speaker after speaker in the course of this Debate of the uncontrolled power of the House of Commons and of the unchecked power of a Single Chamber. The House of Commons is not an absolute power, its power is not unchecked. There never was a more sensitive body in the

2033
whole history of the world. I can understand it being criticised for being too sensitive sometimes. There are 670 Members in touch with as many constituencies, differing one from another in character and complexion, sitting here month after month in touch with their constituencies, in touch with public opinion, in touch with the criticisms of the Press, in touch with each other, in touch with reason, in touch with reality. [Laughter.] I readily admit that the right hon. Gentleman who laughs is not in touch with reality. To say that such a body is unchecked when it is under the constant, ceaseless operation of subtle and powerful checks from hour to hour and operating in every quarter is to make a statement which every single Member of the House of Commons knows to be utterly fallacious. So much for the unchecked power of the House of Commons.
Then we had another argument from the Benches opposite. We are told that our proposals would not merely set up the uncontrolled domination of a Single Chamber, but that they are violent and revolutionary in themselves. This was the argument of the hon. and learned Member for Aberdeen and Edinburgh Universities (Sir R Finlay. Two Universities contributed towards the learning and force of that scolding harangue. Let me tell them that our proposals are characterised by great moderation when viewed by themselves and on their merits, but when compared with the proposals of the party opposite, when compared with the Referendum, they become the veriest Toryism itself. I can quite understand—the Leader of the Opposition having proposed the Referendum at the election—it was necessary to have something that would confuse the naked issue of the charge that the Conservative party were standing for the House of Lords against the mass of electors. I also saw that the right hon. Gentleman might easily have another purpose. He might wish, by means of the Referendum, to rid his party of the incubus of Tariff Reform on the principle that one poison is used to expel another from the system. After the election is all over, after the shouting has died away and the placards have mouldered on the walls, I thought the Referendum would accompany the "Dollar Dictator" with other discarded political trash; and yet here, at the beginning of a great controversy, down comes the right hon. Gentleman, and we find him actually bringing this amazing proposal forward. I am
2034
surprised at his bringing it forward as a regular system of resolving deadlocks between the Houses of Parliament as the Leader of the Conservative party. I noticed the hon. and learned Member for the Walton Division of Liverpool, in his long speech, never mentioned the word. He was very careful to choose his ground in that respect.
I quite agree with many that a system of Referendum would not prevent all forms of democratic legislation. I think there is a large class of measures dealing with the redress of great inequalities in the distribution of property in this country, particularly of property in the land, on which a Referendum might be very effectively used. A large Bill for Land Nationalisation might be submitted with great confidence, and I should not at all demur to the introduction of the system on the ground that it would prevent Radical legislation. And if we on this Bench were the demagogues you are never tired of calling us, do not imagine we should find any difficulty in marching forward successively from one Referendum to another. We believe that the system of a Referendum is a vicious system in itself, that it is bad as the basis of the system of Government in any country, but especially unsuited for this country. The mass of the people under the Referendum are forced to take a decisive part in a continuous process of lawmaking. Every Bill would have to be framed as if it were the campaign platform of an immediate General Election. Every clause would have to be drafted to secure an immediate popular vote. You ought to consider these matters. Nothing would be included that would not make sure of that. We should live in an unceasing stream of electioneering prejudice and abuse. Parliamentary Debate would be swept aside for a series of organised electoral struggles. Ministers would be expected to retain office after the measures to which they had pledged their faith and honour had been rejected by the country. Governments would be expected to appeal to the country on one policy, and to remain in office to carry out the reverse. The stable foundation from which this House has so long been able to administer the affairs of the Empire would be exchanged for a tossing sea of frenzied electioneering. Parliamentary and representative institutions which have been the historic glory of these islands would be swept away, and, in their places, we

2035
would have the worst forms of Jacobinism, Cæsarism, and Anarchy. That is the point to which the right hon. Gentleman, with the assistance of the Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University (Lord Hugh Cecil), has conducted the Conservative party, and that is the crowning blunder to which they have been led after the eight years of disaster which have followed the resignation of Lord Salisbury.
Let me state in a word our position on that subject. We believe in democracy, we believe in representative institutions, we believe in democracy acting through representative institutions. We believe that Ministers should back their convictions by their offices. We believe Members of Parliament are representatives, and not delegates. We believe that Governments are the guides as well as the servants of the Nation. We believe that the people should choose their representatives, that they should come to a decision between men, party and policy, judging their character and judging the circumstances of the hour; that they should choose their representatives and then trust them and give them a fair chance within the limits of their commission for a period which should not be unreasonably prolonged; then these representatives should be summoned before their constituents, who should judge them in relation to all the circumstances proper to be considered, and in relation as well to the general effects of their policy, and should either confirm them in their places as representatives or choose other men to take their place. That is our view, and we are prepared to stand firm by that view against all the changing varieties in constitutional revolution to which we are treated week after week—in almost speech after speech—by the Conservative and Constitutional party.
We are told that our proposals would constitute Single-Chamber Government. I do not believe the bi-cameral system is necessary to the stability of the State. I think it is necessary for the passage of good laws. But we do not propose Single Chamber Government; it is not in our Bill, it is not in our Preamble; it is not in our policy. We propose that the absolute Veto of the House of Lords shall now cease and be determined for ever, and that in the place of that absolute Veto they shall exercise a delaying power over all legislation which will give ample time for fair consideration by the country
2036
and full opportunities for revision as well as for the exercise of a certain bargaining power between the two Houses. We do not say this is the final settlement. Among the legislation which we shall submit to the delaying powers of the Lords will be included, if it be the general wish, a measure for creating that fair and evenly constituted Second Chamber of which the hon. and learned Member for Walton spoke.
Mr. F. E. SMITH: Can the right hon. Gentleman give us any idea when? Will it be within a year?
Mr. CHURCHILL: How can I make a statement as to the Government's intentions in reply to a chance question of that nature? It must suffice for me to say that we shall endeavour to move forward with the whole of our policy and to submit to the House of Lords under the delaying powers which they will still exercise proposals for establishing that fair and evenly constituted Second Chamber as to which the hon. and learned Member suggests there is no difference between us. The Parliament Bill is not necessarily the last word. I never said it was. But it is the first, and it is an indispensable condition that the Veto of the House of Lords should go.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir R. Finlay) told us last night that he would have no compromise. Who spoke of compromise? It is a very fine thing to refuse an invitation, but it is a good thing to wait till you get it first. Two policies of change are before the House at the present moment. The policy of the party opposite involves a revolutionary change. That is not denied. It involves the uprooting of the Constitution concerning which the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. F. E. Smith) this afternoon invoked the Deity. It involves the destruction of the House of Commons as we have known it and as we have been proud to belong to it. And yet it does not remedy the grievance. It does nothing to remove the unfair advantage which we complain the party opposite have used against us in the last five years. On the contrary, it seeks, in the wreck of every other institution for which this island has been famed, to preserve the ugly, sinister Veto of the House of Lords intact. Our policy is the policy of the Bill which we now ask permission to introduce. It has been long matured, it has been searchingly examined, and it has

2037
never been departed from in any respect. This is the third Parliament which will have affirmed it, and it is now brought forward, after it has been submitted directly and in a specific form to the electorate. It makes the smallest change in the existing position. It makes the least possible break with the historic past of the country. But it touches the point. It meets the difficulty. It deals with the grievance. It gives, not indeed an equal Constitution. We recognise that while the House of Lords remains unreformed, it will always leave you possessed of exceptional advantages. But it gives us, if
not an equal Constitution, at any rate a tolerable and workable Constitution for all classes of His Majesty's loyal subjects. We shall neglect no steps which may be necessary to carry this Bill swiftly into law.
Question put, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision with respect to the powers of the House of Lords in relation to those of the House of Commons, and to limit the duration of Parliament."
The House divided: Ayes, 351; Noes, 227.

Division No. 20.]

AYES.

[10.59 p.m.

Abraham, William (Dublin, Harbour)

Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

Acland, Francis Dyke

Cory, Sir Clifford John

Hardle, J. Keir

Adamson, William

Cotton, William Francis

Harmsworth, R. Leicester

Addison, Dr. Christopher

Cowan, William Henry

Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

Adkins, W. Ryland D.

Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth)

Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, W.)

Agar-Robartes, Hon. T. C. R.

Crawshay-Williams, Eliot

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

Agnew, Sir George William

Crean, Eugene

Harwood, George

Ainsworth, John Stirling

Crumley, Patrick

Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

Alden, Percy

Cullinan, John

Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

Allen, A. A. (Dumbartonshire)

Dalziel, Sir James H. (Kirkcaldy)

Havelock-Allan, Sir Henry

Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

Davies, Ellis William (Eifion)

Haworth, Arthur A.

Anderson, Andrew Macbeth

Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

Hayden, John Patrick

Armitage, Robert

Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardiganshire)

Hayward, Evan

Ashton, Thomas Gair

Dawes, James Arthur

Hazleton, Richard (Louth, N.)

Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry

Delany, William

Helme, Nerval Watson

Atherley-Jones, Llewellyn A.

Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas

Henderson, Arthur (Durham)

Baker, Harold T. (Accrington)

Devlin, Joseph

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

Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

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

Henry, Sir Charles S.

Balfour, Sir Robert (Lanark)

Dickinson, W. H.

Higham, John Sharp

Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

Dillon, John

Hinds, John

Barran, Sir John N (Hawick B.)

Donelan, Captain A.

Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H.

Barran, Rowland Hirst (Leeds, N.)

Doris, William

Holt, Richard Durning

Barry, Redmond John

Duffy, William J.

Horne, Charles Silvester (Ipswich)

Barton, William

Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

Hudson, Walter

Beale, William Phipson

Edwards, Allen C. (Glamorgan, E.)

Hughes, Spencer Leigh

Beauchamp, Edward

Edwards, Enoch (Hanley)

Isaacs, Sir Rufus Daniel

Beck, Arthur Cecil

Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

Jardine, Sir John (Roxburghshire)

Benn, W. W. (Tower Hamlets, S. Ceo.)

Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid)

John, Edward Thomas

Bentham, George Jackson

Elverston, Harold

Johnson, William

Birrell, Rt. Hon. Augustine

Esmonde, Dr. John (Tipperary, N.)

Jones, Edgar R (Merthyr Tidvil)

Black, Arthur W.

Esmende, Sir Thomas (Wexford, N.)

Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

Boland, John Plus

Essex, Richard Walter

Jones, Leif Stratten (Notts, Rushcliffe)

Booth, Frederick Handel

Esslemont, George Birnie

Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea)

Bottomley, Horatio

Falconer, James

Jones, William (Carnarvonshire)

Bowerman, Charles W.

Farrell, James Patrick

Jones, W. S. Glyn. (T'w'r H'mts, Stepney)

Boyle, Daniel (Mayo, North)

Ferens, Thomas Robinson

Jowett, Frederick William

Brace, William

Ffrench, Peter

Joyce, Michael

Brady, Patrick Joseph

Field, William

Keating, Matthew

Brigg, Sir J.

Fitzgibbon, John

Kellaway, Frederick George

Brocklehurst, William B.

Flavin, Michael Joseph

Kelly, Edward

Brunner, John F. L.

France, G. A.

Kilbride, Denis

Bryce, John Annan

Gelder, Sir William Alfred

King, Joseph (Somerset, N.)

Burke, E. Haviland.

Gilhooly, James

Lambert, George (Devon, S. Molton)

Burns, Rt. Hon. John

Gill, Alfred Henry

Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas

Glanville, Harold James

Lansbury, George

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

Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford

Lardner, James Carrige Rushe

Byles, William Pollard

Goldstone, Frank

Law, Hugh A.

Carr-Gomm, H. W.

Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough)

Lawson, Sir W. (Cumb'rld., Cockerm'th)

Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich)

Greenwood, Hamar (Sunderland)

Leach, Charles

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

Greig, Colonel James William

Levy, Sir Maurice

Chancellor, Henry George

Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

Lewis, John Herbert

Chapple, Dr. W. A.

Griffith, Ellis J.

Logan, John William

Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

Guest, Hon. Frederick E. (Dorset, E.)

Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

Clough, William

Guest, Major Hon. C. H. C. (Pembroke)

Low, Sir Frederick (Norwich)

Clynes, John R.

Guiney, Patrick

Lundon, Thomas

Collins, Godfrey P. (Greenock)

Gulland, John William

Lyell, Charles Henry

Collins, Stephen (Lambeth)

Gwynn, Stephen Lucius (Galway)

Lynch, Arthur Alfred

Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

Hackett, John

Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

Condon, Thomas Joseph

Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B.

Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

Corbett, A. Cameron

Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

MacGhee, Richard

Maclean, Donald

Parker, James (Halifax)

Snowden, Philip

Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

Pearce, Robert (Staffs., Leek)

Soares, Ernest Joseph

MacNeill, John Gordon Swift

Pearce, William (Limehouse)

Spicer, Sir Albert

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Pease, Rt. Hon. Joseph A. (Rotherham)

Stanley, Albert (Staffs, N. W.)

M'Callum, John M.

Philipps, Col. Ivor (Southampton)

Strachey, Sir Edward

M'Curdy, Charles Albert

Phillips, John (Longford, S.)

Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

M'Kean, John

Pickersgill, Edward Hare

Summers, James Woolley

M'Kenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

Pirie, Duncan V.

Sutherland, John E.

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

Pointer, Joseph

Sutton, John E

M'Laren, Walter S. B. (Ches., Crewe)

Pollard, Sir George H.

Taylor, John W. (Durham)

M'Micking, Major Gilbert

Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

Manfield, Harry

Power, Patrick Joseph

Tennant, Harold John

Marks, George Croydon

Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central)

Thomas, James Henry (Derby)

Marshall, Arthur Harold

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

Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

Martin, Joseph

Priestley, Sir Arthur (Grantham)

Thorne, William (West Ham)

Mason, David M. (Coventry)

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

Toulmin, George

Mathias, Richard

Primrose, Hon. Neil James

Trevelyan, Charles Philips

Meagher, Michael

Pringle, William M. R.

Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.)

Radford, George Heynes

Verney, Sir Harry

Meehan, Patrick A. (Queen's County)

Rainy, Adam Rolland

Wadsworth, John

Menzies, Sir Walter

Raphael, Sir Herbert H.

Walsh, J. (Cork, South)

Middlebrook, William

Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (South Shields)

Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince)

Molloy, Michael

Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

Walters, John Tudor

Molteno, Percy Alport

Reddy, Michael

Walton, Sir Joseph

Mond, Sir Alfred

Redmond, John E. (Waterford)

Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent)

Money, L. G. Chiozza

Redmond, William (Clare, E.)

Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

Montagu, Hon. E. S.

Redmond, William Archer (Tyrone, E.)

Wardle, George J.

Mooney, John J.

Rendall, Atheistan

Waring, Walter

Worrell, Philip

Richards, Thomas

Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay

Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

Richardson, Albion (Peckham)

Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

Muldoon, John

Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

Munro, Robert

Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

Watt, Henry A.

Munro-Ferguson, Rt. Hon. R. C.

Roberts, George H. (Norwich)

Wedgwood, Josiah C.

Murray, Capt. Hon. Arthur C.

Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs.)

White, Sir George (Norfolk)

Needham, Christopher T.

Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford)

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

Neilson, Francis

Robertson, John M. (Tyneside)

White, Patrick (Meath, North)

Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

Robinson, Sydney

Whitehouse, John Howard

Nolan, Joseph

Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

Norman, Sir Herry

Roche, John (Galway, E.)

Whyte, A. F.

Norton, Capt. Cecil W.

Roe, Sir Thomas

Wiles, Thomas

Nugent, Sir Walter Richard

Rose, Sir Charles Day

Wilkie, Alexander

O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny)

Rowlands, James

Williams, John (Glamorgan)

O'Brien, William (Cork)

Rowntree, Arnold

Williams, Llewelyn (Carmarthen)

O'Connor John (Kildare, N.)

Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

Williams, Penry (Middlesbrough)

O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool)

St. Maur, Harold

Williamson, Sir Archibald

O'Doherty, Philip

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

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

O'Donnell, Thomas

Samuel, S. M. (Whitechapel)

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

O'Dowd, John

Scanlan, Thomas

Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

O'Grady, James

Schwann, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles E.

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

Ogden, Fred

Scott, A. M'Callum (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

O'Kelly, Edward P. (Wicklow, W.)

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

Winfrey, Richard

O'Kelly, James (Roscommon, N.)

Sheehan, Daniel Daniel

Wood, J. M'Kinnon (Glasgow)

O'Malley, William

Sheehy, David

Young, Samuel (Cavan, East)

O'Neill, Dr. Charles (Armagh, S.)

Sherwell, Arthur James

Young, William (Perth, East)

O'Shaughnessy, P. J.

Simon, Sir John Allsebrook

Yoxall, Sir James Henry

O'Shee, James John

Smith, Albert (Lancs., Clitheroe)

O'Sullivan, Timothy

Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Master of Elibank and Mr. Illingworth.

Palmer, Godfrey Mark

Smyth, Thomas F. (Leitrim, S)

NOES.

Aitken, William Max.

Benn, Ion Hamilton (Greenwich)

Chaloner, Col. R. G. W.

Anson, Sir William Reynell

Bennett-Goldney, Francis

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

Anstruther-Gray, Major William

Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish-

Chambers, James

Archer-Shee, Major Martin

Bigland, Alfred

Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry

Arkwright, John Stanhope

Bird, Alfred

Clay, Captain H. H. Spender

Astor, Waldorf

Boscawen, Sackville T. Griffith.

Clive, Percy Archer

Bagot, Lieut.-Colonel J.

Boyle, W. Lewis (Norfolk, Mid)

Callings, Rt. Hon. J. (Birmingham)

Baird, John Lawrence

Boyton, James

Compton, Lord Alwyne

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

Brassey, H. Leonard Campbell

Cooper, Richard Ashmole

Balcarres, Lord

Bridgeman, William Clive

Courthope, George Loyd

Baldwin, Stanley

Bull, Sir William James

Craig, Charles Curtis (Antrim, S.)

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

Burdett-Coutts, William

Craig, Captain James (Down, E.)

Banbury, Sir Frederick George

Burgoyne, Alan Hughes

Craig, Norman (Kent, Thanet)

Banner, John S. Harmood.

Burn, Colonel C. R.

Craik, Sir Henry

Baring, Captain Hon. Guy Victor

Butcher, John George

Crichton-Stuart, Lord Ninian

Barlew, Montague (Salford, South)

Campion, W. R.

Cripps, Sir Charles Alfred

Barnston, Harry

Carlile, Edward Hildred

Croft, Henry Page

Barrie, H. T. (Londonderry, N.)

Carson, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward H.

Dalziel, Davison (Brixton)

Bathurst, Hon. Allen B. (Glouc. E.)

Cassel, Felix

Doughty, Sir George

Bathurst, Charles (Wilts, Wilton)

Castlereagh, Viscount

Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers.

Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

Cautley, Henry Strother

Eyres-Monsell, Bolton M.

Beckett, Hon. William Gervase

Cave, George

Falle, Bertram Godfray

Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

Cecil, Lord Hugh (Oxford University)

Fell, Arthur

2040

2041

Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey

Lane-Fox, G. R.

Rothschild, Lionel de

Finlay, Sir Robert

Larmor, Sir J.

Royds, Edmund

Fisher, William Hayes

Lawson, Hon. H. (T. H'm'ts, Mile End)

Rutherford, John (Lanes., Darwen)

Fitzroy, Hon. Edward A.

Lee, Arthur Hamilton

Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

Flannery, Sir J. Fortescue

Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury)

Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood)

Fleming, Valentine

Locker-Lampson, O. (Ramsey)

Sanders, Robert Arthur

Fletcher, John Samuel (Hampstead)

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

Sanderson, Lancelot

Forster, Henry William

Lonsdale, John Brownlee

Sandys, G. J. (Somerset, Wells)

Foster, Philip Staveley

Lowther, Claude (Cumberland, Eskdale)

Scott, Leslie (Liverpool, Exchange)

Gardner, Ernest

Lyttelton, Rt. Hn. A. (S. Geo., Han. Sq.)

Scott, Sir S. (Marylebone, W.)

Gastrell, Major W. Houghton

Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. (Droitwich)

Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

Gibbs, George Abraham

Mackinder, Halford J.

Smith, Harold (Warrington)

Gilmour, Captain John

Macmaster, Donald

Spear, John Ward

Goldman, Charles Sydney

M'Mordie, Robert

Stanler, Beville

Goldsmith, Frank

Magnus, Sir Philip

Stanley, Hon. Arthur (Ormskirk)

Gordon, John

Malcolm, Ian

Stanley, Hon. G. F. (Preston)

Goulding, Edward Alfred

Mallaby-Deeley, Harry

Starkey, John Ralph

Grant, James Augustus

Mason, James F. (Windsor)

Staveley-Hill, Henry

Greene, Walter Raymond

Meysey-Thompson, E. C.

Steel-Maitland, A. D.

Gretton, John

Mildmay, Francis Bingham

Stewart, Gershom

Guinness, Hon. Walter Edward

Mills, Hon. Charles Thomas

Swift, Rigby

Haddock, George Bahr

Moore, William

Sykes, Alan John

Hall, D. B. (Isle of Wight)

Morpeth, Viscount

Talbot, Lord Edmund

Hall, Fred (Dulwich)

Morrison, Captain James A.

Terrell, George (Wilts, N. W.)

Hall, Marshall (Liverpool, E. Toxteth)

Morrison-Bell, Capt. E. F. (Ashburton)

Terrell, Henry (Gloucester)

Hambro, Angus Valdemar

Morrison-Bell, Major A. C. (Honiton)

Thomson, W. Mitchell- (Down, N.)

Hamersley, Alfred St. George

Mount, William Arthur

Thynne, Lord Alexander

Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington)

Neville, Reginald J. N.

Tobin, Alfred Aspinall

Hardy, Laurence

Newdegate, F. A.

Touche, George Alexander

Harris, Henry Percy

Newman, John R. P.

Tullibardine, Marquess of

Harrison-Broadley, H. B.

Newton, Harry Kottingham

Walker, Col. William Hall

Helmsley, Viscount

Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield)

Walrond, Hon. Lionel

Henderson, Major H. (Abingdon)

Nield, Herbert

Ward, A. S. (Herts, Watford)

Hickman, Colonel Thomas E.

Norton-Griffiths, J. (Wednesbury)

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

Hill, Sir Clement L.

O'Neill, Hon. A. E. B. (Antrim, Mid.)

Weigall, Capt. A. G.

Hill-Wood, Samuel

Orde-Powiett, Hon. W. G. A.

Wheler, Granville C. H.

Hoare, Samuel John Gurney

Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

White, Major G. D. (Lanes., Southport)

Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy

Paget, Almeric Hugh

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

Hope, Harry (Bute)

Parker, Sir Gilbert (Gravesend)

Willoughby, Major Hon. Claude

Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

Parkes, Ebenezer

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

Horne, William E. (Surrey, Guildford)

Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington)

Winterton, Earl

Horner, Alfred Long

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

Wolmer, Viscount

Houston, Robert Paterson

Peto, Basil Edward

Wood, Hon. E. F. L. (Yorks, Ripon)

Hume-Williams, Wm. Ellis

Pole-Carew, Sir R.

Wood, John (Stalybridge)

Hunt, Rowland

Pollock, Ernest Murray

Worthington-Evans, L.

Hunter, Sir Chas. Rodk. (Bath)

Quitter, William Eley C.

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

Jngleby, Holcombe

Ratcliff, Major R. F.

Wyndham, Rt. Hon. George

Jardine, Ernest (Somerset, East)

Rawilnson, John Frederick Peel

Yate, Col. C. E.

Jessel, Captain Herbert M.

Rawson, Col. Richard H.

Yerburgh, Robert

Kebty-Fletcher, J. R.

Remnant, James Farquharson

Younger, George

Kerry, Earl of

Rice, Hon. Walter Fitz-Uryan

Kimber, Sir Henry

Roberts, S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir A. Acland-Hood and Viscount Valentia.

Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

Rolleston, Sir John

Kyffin-Taylor, G.

Ronaldshay, Earl of

Bill ordered to be brought in by the Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd George, Mr. Churchill, Mr. Haldane, Mr. J. A. Pease, and the Attorney-General. Bill presented accordingly and read the first time. To be read a second time upon Monday next, 27th February
Adjourned at Thirteen minutes after Eleven o'clock.

  Latouche Estate, County Leitrim.
  Latouche Estate, County Leitrim.
  Supervisors of Works (Ireland).
  Supervisors of Works (Ireland).
  Reinstatement Application, Ballingarry, County Limerick.
  Reinstatement Application, Ballingarry, County Limerick.
  Government Officials (Ireland).
  Government Officials (Ireland).
  Army Manœuvres (Area).
  Army Manœuvres (Area).
  Army Boots.
  Army Boots.
  London Veteran Reserve.
  London Veteran Reserve.
  Children's Courts.
  Children's Courts.
  Police (Weekly Rest-Day) (Scotland) Bill.
  Police (Weekly Rest-Day) (Scotland) Bill.
  Town-Planning Schemes.
  Town-Planning Schemes.
  Submarine Signals (British and Irish Coasts).
  Submarine Signals (British and Irish Coasts).
  United States (Wages and Conditions of Labour).
  United States (Wages and Conditions of Labour).
  Trade Boards Act (Irish Railway Workers).
  Trade Boards Act (Irish Railway Workers).
  Post Office Savings Bank (Withdrawal of Deposits).
  Post Office Savings Bank (Withdrawal of Deposits).
  Postal Superannuation Papers.
  Postal Superannuation Papers.
  Small Holdings.
  Small Holdings.
Preamble
Several Lords—Took the Oath.
UNIVERSITIES (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1889.
University Court Ordinance, No. 33 (Aberdeen, No. 4). Regulations for degrees in medicine: Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), and to be printed. (No. 19.)
REFORM OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I beg to give notice that on an early day I shall lay on the Table a Bill for amending the constitution of your Lordships' House.

MOVABLE DWELLINGS BILL. [H.L.]
[SECOND READING.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGH: My Lords, I have introduced this Bill this session in the form in which it left the Select Committee to which your Lordships referred it. The Bill came back from the Committee considerably altered one or two points. The whole question of registration was struck out by the Committee, although a careful perusal of the evidence will show that nearly every witness whose opinion was asked on the subject spoke in favour of registration, or in no way disapproved of the principle. I think, therefore, that I might be justified in saying that the Committee came to the conclusion adverse to registration more than anything from an objection on their part to the trouble and inconvenience always attendant upon every system of registration. Personally I have always attached considerable importance to registration, because the difficulty throughout has been not with regard to the powers which existed for coping with the evils so much as the difficulty of putting those powers in force on account of these dwellings being able to be moved constantly from place to place, and by that means to evade the ordinary rules which have been adopted for the regulation of dwellings of a more fixed nature. I think it would have been very useful in many
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other ways, and for police regulation generally, that these movable dwellings should be registered and known, and that there should be some means of following them up. Your Lordships will remember that when this Bill was first introduced in your Lordships' House it contained much more than it did when it was last here, for it at first contained regulations with regard to the education of children in movable dwellings. Those provisions were, of course, dropped when the Children Act passed giving very large powers to local education authorities for enforcing the education of these children. In enforcing the law under the Children Act the local education authorities have found that it was more or less necessary for the ordinary working of the Act to make a list of movable dwellings which were habitually within their area, and I conceive that it would have very much facilitated the dealing with this question had some system of registration been introduced by which it might be clearly known to what persons the regulations wit h regard to movable dwellings applied, rather than leaving the matter vague and uncertain. But the question of registration has, as I have said, been set aside by the Select Committee to whom the consideration of the Bill was referred. I have, therefore, introduced the Bill this session in the form in which it recommended itself to the Committee, feeling sure that that was the feint in which your Lordships would give it the most favourable consideration.
The provisions of the Bill as so amended are really confined to what was originally Clause 5 of the Bill, which gave power to the county council, or whichever was the registering authority in the area, to prohibit certain places as unfit for encampments, either on sanitary or health grounds, or because they were in other ways unsuitable. That principle, with a limitation, is the foundation of the Bill as it left the Select Committee. Clause 1 lays down that where it appears to any county council that the presence of movable dwellings on any specified place or places within the county would be dangerous to the public health, the council may by by-law prohibit any movable dwelling from being on such specified place or places. Clause 2 enables a county council to prohibit the encampment of a movable dwelling upon any common or roadside waste or upon any land in private occupation, provided the persons who proposed to encamp there had

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not the necessary permission; and the clause further gives power to the county council to prohibit camping even upon private ground where it appears that it would constitute a nuisance to the neighbourhood. Then there is this very important provision with regard to the exercise of these powers, that they must be under rules to be laid down by the county council and approved by the Local Government Board, and before the powers are made use of the county council must have already provided suitable camping grounds. Thus the effect of their restrictions will not be open to the objection that was urged against the original Bill—that if put into force without any such provision as this it would have the effect, first, of driving dwellers in movable dwellings into counties where such restrictions did not exist, and, when those counties had in turn made similar protective provisions, of driving them, as the expression went, "off the face of the earth." This has, we hope, been prevented. I think it was the admitted view of the Select Committee that such provisions as are in the Bill would only be put in force in places where movable dwellings had become an aggravated nuisance and danger to the district, and would be left to lie dormant wherever it was found that the existence of the movable dweller was not an aggravated inconvenience to those who lived around him.
I have in the course of my connection with this Bill received a large number of letters and appeals from admirers of the wild and free life of the gipsy, in favour of preserving his freedom. But I am afraid they overlook the fact that the habits of the gipsy are not altogether suited to the refined and elaborately regulated state of community life in which we live. No doubt we all of us, particularly, perhaps, when we are bothered with the variety of returns which we have to fill up and the inquisitions into all our private affairs, wish sometimes that we were left with the old freedom to do very much as we liked without the careful and parental supervision of Government; but I am afraid we must admit that in the highly-organised state of society in which we live such is impossible, and that the free and romantic life of the gipsy must be sacrificed somewhat to the well-being of the crowded community in which we live. I ask noble Lords to give the Bill a Second Reading, and I trust that if there are objections to any of its provisions they will
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be allowed to stand over until the Committee stage.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.)
LORD ALLENDALE: My Lords, the noble Lord who moved the Second Reading has reminded your Lordships of the Parliamentary history of this Bill, and has referred to some of the changes which were made by the Select Committee on which he sat. When the Bill was before your Lordships' House for Second Reading two years ago there was, I think, a general feeling that, if not a universal nuisance, still a distinct nuisance was caused in certain parts of the country by these movable dwellings which called for a remedy by legislation if one could be found, but your Lordships appreciated the fact that the Bill as then introduced was not quite so simple as it appeared to be at first sight, and consequently it was referred to a Select Committee. That Committee, as your Lordships are aware, gave a considerable amount of time to the Bill and endeavoured to meet the objections that were entertained to it, and in the course of doing so they to some extent transformed the Bill. Though the Committee may not have succeeded in meeting all the objections, they are to be thanked for their labours. For myself I can express appreciation of their work disinterestedly, because although originally appointed to serve on the Committee I was unable to attend owing to indisposition and absence abroad.
I can say at once that it is the view of the Local Government Board, which Department I represent in your Lordships' House, that the labours of the Select Committee should not be thrown away, and that the Bill should be amended in Committee with the view to making it a more workable measure than it would seem to be at present. Besides the Department which I represent, the Home Office would have something to do with the administration of this Bill if it became an Act. They, I believe, foresee some greater difficulties in the administration of the measure than do the Local Government Board; but my noble friend Lord Beauchamp, who represents the Home Office, is here to deal with the objections from their point of view and that of the police. I am glad that the registration proposals which appeared in the former Bill have been abandoned. That was a very much

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more difficult matter than appeared at first sight. The principle of registration seemed easy enough, but when it came to putting it into practice and to registering every little tent, and perhaps a tarpaulin on two or three sticks, it would have been found quite unworkable. Other objections were stated by the Committee in their Report, and I think there will be a general feeling of satisfaction that the principle of registration has been abandoned.
The Bill as amended embraces three chief purposes. There is, first, the prohibition of encampments on specified places on the ground of public health; secondly, the provision of camping grounds by county and county borough councils, with certain provisions ancillary to that; and, thirdly, the transfer from district councils to county councils of the powers and duties under Section 9 of the Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1885. With regard to the prohibition of encampments, Clause 1 of the Bill in its present form will enable a county or county borough council to prohibit by by-law any movable dwelling from being on any specified place where its presence might be dangerous to the public health. In regard to that, I may say that it appears somewhat doubtful whether prohibition by by-law is a suitable procedure. A resolution oft lie county or county borough council, approved by the Central Department and published by means of notices throughout, the area, would, I think, be a more appropriate procedure. As to the provision of camping grounds, Clause 2 of the Bill would enable county and county borough councils, with the approval of the Local Government Board and by agreement, to purchase or take on lease land. for camping grounds. I have no wish to raise any difficulties in that matter, which would be one for the county councils or whatever authority the power is given to in the various counties; but as the object of the Bill seems to be to some extent to restrict the use of grounds, I think that in the counties where legislation on these lines is desired it may be found somewhat difficult to acquire land, and though some landowners may be willing to sell or let land for the purpose yet their neighbours would very likely find considerable grievance in the encampment of gipsies close to their dwellings. But that, as I say, is a matter for the county or county borough councils concerned.
It will have been noticed that in their
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Report the Committee express the opinion that no legislation is called for with respect to showmen, or entertainers as they are called, and I think some provision might be made for eliminating this class altogether from the Bill. It may be rather difficult to draw a strict definition of what is meant by "showman" or "entertainer," but if no legislation is to be better that they should be eliminated altogether from the provisions of the Bill. As to the encampments, it is places should be subject to approval by some central authority, probably the Local Government Board, otherwise a council might use the power to exclude gipisies from their area altogether. These are several of the directions amongst others in which the Bill might be usefully amended. It seems to me that Clause 3 is quite unnecessary and should be omitted.
THE MARQUEES OF SALISBURY: Which clause does the noble Lord suggest should be omitted?
LORD ALLENDALE: Clause 3,which refers to the amendment of the Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1885.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The point of Clause 3 is that it transfers the powers to the country councils. It is only a question of changing the authority which has the power of enforcing the provisions under the Sanitary Act.
LORD ALLENDALE: That is a matter which can be dealt with when the Bill is in Committee, but the view is strongly held that the clause is unnecessary. As the noble Marquess has said, Clause 3 would transfer to country councils the powers and duties of sanitary authorities under the enactment so far as they relate to movable dwellings. As to cost, considerable expense would no doubt be incurred in regard to requisitions for obtaining camping grounds. This is a point which probably the Committee did not fully appreciate. Still, if the ratepayers in a district demand legislation of the character proposed in this Bill and are willing to have a charge placed upon them for the purpose, it is, of course, their affair. The Local Government Board and His Majesty's Government are very anxious that the labours of the Select Committee should not be thrown away, and therefore I join in hoping that your Lordships will give the Bill a Second Reading.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISEURY: My Lords, may I say first, on behalf of the Select Committee of which I w s a member, that we are very grateful to the noble Lord who has just sat down for the kind way in which he has received the result of our efforts, and for the promise which he has given on behalf of His Majesty's Government that they will not in any way interfere with the Second Reading of the Bill. The noble Lord, in the course of his speech, went into a good deal of detail, of w rich I do not in any way complain, but he will forgive me if I do not follow him into that detail because some of the matters with which he dealt are more appropriate to the Committee stage.
I should like to call attention to one or two points which emerge from the Report of the Select Committee, a id which, I think, arc of public interest. The Report, in the first place, will help t he public to realise what the dimensions of the problem really are. There was a vague, idea that it was a vast and grievous problem which had to be dealt with. Speaking for myself, I carried away from the evidence which we heard the conviction that that was an error, and that the grievance is not of a very large character. The areas to which the grievance applies are relatively small and rare. That is the first consideration. The second is that the mischief which those who live in movable dwellings are accused of doing has been greatly exaggerated. This erroneous view of the public is largely due to the fact that the gipsy van-dwellers have been confused with ordinary tramps. That is not surprising. Where, in districts where there are both, an unwashed person of a violent character intimidates somebody or other the victim does not accurately distinguish whether the aggressor is a tramp or a gipsy, and probably does not know the distinction between the two.
It is important for the public to realise that, so far as major crime is concerned, gipsies came very well out of the inquiry. As far as we could make out, they are not any more criminal—in any extreme sense of the term—than persons of a corresponding class who live in ordinary houses. No doubt they belong to a low class and are not strictly orderly- in their behaviour, and there is a good deal of petty pilfering and taking of rabbits which do not belong to them; but, taken in the bulk, and considering crime of an important kind, we
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had very strong evidence before us that they were not responsible for it. Nor can it be said that they are more immoral or dirty than other people as poor as themselves in this country. It is very important, I think, that that should be realised, and that we should recognise that no amount of legislation with respect to movable dwellings will reach the most extreme form of the evil which is associated with the tramp and vagrancy, and which urgently requires attention as soon as His Majesty's Government have finished meddling with the Constitution.
The next point is this, that the actual condition of the law is not deficient. The difficulty is in its enforcement. Take the sanitary law, for example. The sanitary law extends to movable dwellings, but the difficulty is to apply it, and it was with a view of a more general application of the sanitary law that the Select Committee proposed to transfer the authority from district councils to the county councils, because as a movable dwelling is exhypothesi moved from one district to another it ought to be under the jurisdiction of the larger authority. The criminal law, too, applies to movable dwellings, but there is a difficulty in enforcing it in the case of small crimes such as cutting sticks out of hedges, leaving the gates of fields open whereby cattle stray on the public roads, and mild poaching in the sense that they poach not to sell but to eat. There is a great deal of difficulty in enforcing the law in regard to these offences, for the police cannot be ubiquitous and keep in touch with the vans. It was for that reason that the Committee made the important proposal which is inserted in the Bill. If you cannot keep the police in touch with the van-dwellers by putting a policeman wherever there is a camp, then the better method is to limit the places where there can be camps so that the police can exercise adequate supervision. It was with that object that Mr. Justice Bray suggested that, in the few areas where the gipsy difficulty is an important one, the proper remedy was to set aside certain places in which gipsies could camp and where they would be conveniently under the supervision of the authorities. We did our best to put Mr. Justice Bray's proposal in drafting form, and it appears in the clauses in the Bill.
I ought, perhaps, to notice what Lord Clifford said on the subject of registration.

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May I interject the observation that I think your Lordships have every reason to be grateful to my noble friend for the trouble he has taken in connection with this Bill, both for having brought it before the House and for the exceedingly conciliatory way in which he allowed us to deal with it in the Select Committee. The Committee were not agreed on the question of registration. Although my noble friend was, in fact, overruled, he was overruled by a small majority, and it is clear, after the statement of the noble Lord who spoke last, that His Majesty's Government agree with the majority of the Committee. Therefore it is pretty certain that the original provision with regard to registration will not be reinserted. I may say I still doubt the value of the registration proposal, and thought, as the noble Lord said, most of the witnesses were in favour of it, there is some limitation to be added to that general statement. For instance, Mr. Justice Bray was not in favour of registering vans, but he was in favour of registering the individuals who live in the vans—a very different proposal. I do not think there was any great enthusiasm for registration on the part of the official witnesses, and that is confirmed by the speech of the noble Lord who spoke on behalf of the Local Government Board.
The noble Lord, Lord Allendale, asked us why we deal with showmen if it is our opinion that showmen ought not to be included in this legislation. We intended in the Amendments which we inserted in the Bill to exclude showmen. That was the object which the Committee had in view, but there was this difficulty, that there is no definition in law of a showman. We turned all sorts of authorities on to search for a definition, but could not find one. Therefore we did not like, in so many words, to say that the Act should not apply to showmen, because we thought that afterwards the great profession over which the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack presides would make mincemeat of our Act of Parliament. Consequently we adopted the only other device open to us, and made clear our intention of leaving to the authority whose business it would be to enforce the law discretionary power to interpret our wish according to the spirit in which it was made. The Local Government Board are not to agree to any regulations which interfere with showmen. That was, in effect, tine method by which we tried
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to get round the difficulty. I see that the Lord Chancellor thinks that our amateur efforts were not worthy of very much respect. No doubt when we get into Committee the noble and learned Lord will be able to show us how it ought to be done, and we shall gladly accept his advice. I speak on behalf of the whole Committee. We are entirely in the hands of the Departments in this matter. We have no wish to enforce upon them legislation which they tell us is unworkable, and we are in the position of accepting anything which the Government suggest by way of amendment.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (EARL BEAUCHAMP): My Lords, I am sure the noble Marquess who has just sat down recognises how much the police authorities of this country are interested in the subject before your Lordships. I therefore venture to intrude upon the House for a few moments in order to say something upon this Bill from the point of view of the Home Office. If Lord Camperdown will allow me, I should like on this occasion to drop a tear over the disappearance of the Standing Committee. It seems to me that a Bill of this kind, when everybody is agreed that something should be done and the difficulty is really one of administration, is a measure which might have been discussed by a Committee of that kind somewhat more easily perhaps than can be done in your Lordships' House. The Bill which is now before us is based, as the noble Marquess has said, very largely on the recommendations of the Select Committee. In that way it differs from the Bill first introduced into your Lordships' House.
I should like, in order to make the position of the Home Office quite clear, to quote some of the evidence which was given before the Select Committee. The view of the Home Office is that what is needed is a more effective enforcement of the existing law in cases where gipsies are guilty of offences. I would refer your Lordships to the evidence given to the Select Committee by Mr. Pedder, a Principal Clerk in the Home Office. In reply to a question [p. 49, Q. 1029] Mr. Pedder said—
"I think our information does go to show that it is a failure to enforce which is at all events largely responsible for failure of effect, for this reason—that for many years complaints have come to us from different counties, mostly the Home Counties, that new powers were wanted, and so on and so on. When inquiry has been made, when the Home Secretary has written back to say, 'Please

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direct your attention to these powers and tell me what you have done with them,' the answer Las been extremely vague, and sometimes none at all, and the matter has dropped."
Clause 5 of the last Bill tried to deal with the matter by giving local authorities practically an unrestricted power to prohibit movable dwellings by by-law. That is not found in the present Bill. Clause 2 of this Bill endeavours to deal with the matter in a different way, and, in the opinion of the Home Office, it is open to some objections, though necessarily not the same objections.
THE MARQUESS OF. SALISBURY: Although Clause 5 of the original Bill does not reappear, a great deal of it does. Clause 1 is, in its essence, a large part of Clause. 5.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I agree; but I was only dealing with it in so far as the police are concerned. It is Clause 2 of this year's Bill with which the Home Office are more particularly concerned. Your Lordships will notice, in the first place, that the noble Lord below the Gangway (Lord Clifford of Chudleigh), who speaks, I think, on this occasion on behalf of the County Councils Association, proposes to add to the powers of county councils various powers which will enable them to spend more money out of the rates, because by the first part of the clause county councils are allowed to purchase or take on lease land for the purpose of camping grounds. But it is not so much the addition to the rates with which I am concerned, but the effect which the provision must have upon the police. The proposal in the latter part of Clause 2 places on the police the duty of removing from commons and private land persons who encamp there without authority. That, in our opinion, involves a wide and rather questionable extension of the functions of the police. At present it rests upon private owners to remove trespassers; and the duty of the police is confined to seeing that there is no breach of the peace. The Home Office think it undesirable to make an exception from the ordinary law of trespass in respect of one particular class—namely, van-dwellers—and to subject that class alone to prosecution for trespass.
The effect of Clause 2, it is thought, might in certain cases lead to considerable difficulty. If the facilities for camping are reduced the feuds and fighting between gipsy families, which are already not uncommon, are likely to be more numerous, as
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hostile gipsies would then find themselves compulsorily encamped side by side. The Chief Constable of Surrey takes the view that the policing of camping grounds would he necessary, and he says lie is not able to undertake that duty with the present staff under his command. So your Lordships will see that in that wav a still further burden might be thrown on the rates. It would be a question whether the county council should not appoint a special staff of men for this purpose. At any rate, a special staff would be necessary to collect the fees referred to in Clause 2 (3) (d). Then we find some difficulty with regard to another matter. The policeman or other officer finding more than the prescribed number of movable dwellings upon a particular ground would often be unable to discover who was the last coiner responsible for the excess, and, even if he were discovered, it might be that his horse was in a condition which would not enable him to get further. Again, it is not clear whether the provision in Clause 2 (3) (b) is intended to enable councils to authorise certain gipsies to encamp in certain places, or whether it is only intended for holiday makers in caravans. The provision is unsuitable to gipsies who would find it hard to understand such regulations and would not know where to apply for the written permission. As your Lordships will have seen, there is no matter of principle on which I have had to criticise the measure, and perhaps, with the assistance of private negotiations before the Committee stage, we shall be able to put down Amendments which will be agreeable to all parties.
LORD FARRER: My Lords, I should not have risen to address your Lordships were it not for the fact that the noble Marquess opposite seemed to make more light of the difficulties with regard to van-dwellers than we who live in the Home Counties think is the case. As a member of the Select Committee who considered this matter, I certainly came to the conclusion that these people were increasing largely, and were a great danger to the health and the safety of the public. Even this short debate has shown the extreme difficulty of dealing with the question at all, but as a resident in the Home Counties I must say that the evil has reached a pitch which really demands that some action should be taken on the part of the administrative authorities. I seldom take up a local paper without finding some reference to this subject. In a report,

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in a Surrey paper last week, of a meeting of the Reigate Rural Council I read that
"Mr. B. W. Parsons, in accordance with notice of motion, moved that the Surrey Standing Joint Committee should be again urged to make arrangements at once for a police constable to be domiciled at Irons bottom, as the nearest constables were at Henley (3½ miles distant), Salfords (4 miles), and Reigate (4 miles), and continued complaints were made as to the insolence of gipsies and the destruction of property, and annoyance caused by the nuisance Of filth and by dirty clothes exposed on the hedges of the highways. The mover said that at the present time there were fourteen vans by the side of the road, and in each there were 110 fewer than four or live people. There were absolutely no sanitary arrangements. People were in the habit of giving gipsies water, and if they were unable to get it they would not stop in the place. He did not know whether the water company could help them, as people had no right to give the company's water away, Gipsy people were like beggars, they were always on the "cadge." He thought it was very hard that if a poor man in the borough were to beg he would get a month, but yet these people were free, because there was no policeman to look after them.—Mr. Garland said that in the district in which he lived they never saw a policeman.—Mr. Hallett said it was certainly a matter of urgency, and if their request was not acceded to, lie would suggest a deputation being sent to the county council. They had to pay a heavy police rate and they wanted protection for their property.—The Chairman said he entirely sympathised with what the speakers had said. A nuisance of an unspeakable character undoubtedly existed. He would he only too glad if the resolution was also sent to the Home Secretary.—The proposition was carried."
Then, again, at an inquest held at Kingston on the eighteen-months-old son of wandering parents it was shown that the child had been badly burnt in the kitchen of a lodging-house; but, in spite of medical advice, the parents dragged the child about with them until it ultimately died from the effects of the burns and exposure. At the inquest Inspector Parry, of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, said the father kept a diary of the places visited, which showed that since last October they had stayed in forty-one different towns in all parts of the country. The Coroner, Dr. M. H. Taylor, said that—
"If anybody wanted to move a pig from Surrey into Middlesex, he would find all kinds of restrictions placed upon him. Yet people like these could go anywhere and take with them a sick child needing the most careful treatment, and nobody interfered. It seemed to him that property was far more valued in this country than human life."
I could quote other evidence as to the extent of the evil, but I will only- add that these nomadic vans are a very real part of the vagrancy problem.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGH: My Lords, I do not wish to detain the House, but I desire to thank your Lordships for the reception you have given to this Bill. I have no doubt that many improvements in it will be able to be made in Committee, and I hope that, with the assistance of the Local Government Board and the Home Office, the Bill may be brought into a form in which it will prove of great use. I should like to say a word regarding Clause 3. The whole purport of that clause lies very much in the evidence of Mr. Pedder, which has been quoted by the noble Earl. It was clearly shown, in the course of the evidence which the Committee took, that it is not so much powers that are wanted as the getting of some body who can and will use the existing powers. For instance, Mr. Pedder said that there were about 1,800 authorities who might have made by-laws but only 216 had made them, and that the best use had not been made of the by-laws even in those 216 cases. Therefore there is something wrong in the distribution of the powers. We came to the conclusion that for these wandering and movable people the area of the sanitary authority is too small, arid that the powers should be confided to larger authorities. As regards the noble Earl's statement that I am endeavouring to increase the charge on the county rate, I can only say that this is a permissive power. What county councils complain of chiefly is the increase in the rates caused by matters in regard to which they have no option. If every increase in the county rate was entirely on the initiative of the county council, as this would be, they would have comparatively little cause for complaint. With regard to the police, I admit that in some cases the Bill might increase their work, but we had evidence to show that if the system of camping grounds was adopted the labour cast on the police would be very much decreased, inasmuch as they would know exactly where to find the people whom they would have to look after. As to the further stages of the Bill, I will not put it down for Committee until I have consulted with the noble Earl. I agree that a great deal may be done by private consultation with the Local Government Board and the Home Office, and 1 hope that when the Committee stage is taken there will be a set of Amendments which will render the Bill a more workable measure than it is at the present moment.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

THE ARMY.
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: My Lords, I rise to call attention to—

1. The numbers of the Regular Army and Regular Reserve.

2. The numbers required to complete the Expeditionary Force of six Divisions.

3. The number of troops left in the United Kingdom in event of the departure of the Expeditionary Force on foreign service.

I am not surprised that at present the prevailing opinion is that our military forces are fully adequate for the requirements of home and Imperial defence. That impression has been produced upon public opinion by the Government constantly and continuously assuring us that we possess armies on a scale quite unprecedented in our history. For instance, the Secretary of State for War told us in 1908 that so far from having reduced the Regular Army he had added 90,000 men to its strength. In January, 1909, when addressing his East Lothian constituents, he told us that—
"He could now mobilise four Divisions of the Expeditionary Force by touching a button, and he had the weapons, stores, and men to mobilise all six Divisions and have a surplus over."
In explaining the Army Estimates in 1909 the right hon. gentleman promised us a Regular Reserve of 200,000 men. In October, 1910, at the Cutlers' Feast at Sheffield, he announced that the Expeditionary Force would mobilise at about 180,000 men, and on the same occasion the right hon. gentleman added—
"What we get at home is a Force that would compel the enemy to come in such large numbers that the Fleet would either destroy them, or, if they come in small numbers, our Territorial Force and a very considerable number of Regular troops, Which in any event we should have at home, would be able to fall upon them and crush them by their weight."
Finally, in December last at Grimsby we were informed that we had 580,000 troops organised in twenty Divisions of ten Army Corps.
It is interesting to compare the numbers of officers and men shown as available for national defence by War Office Returns and Army Estimates with the figures mentioned by the Secretary of State for War in the speeches to which I have referred. It is necessary to remember that the policy of reducing the Regular Army initiated by the Government in 1906 will not be fully
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realised until 1913. Consequently all calculations regarding the numbers of the Regular Army must be based on the strength of the Regular Reserve, not as it now is when a diminishing quantity, but as it will be in 1913 when the reductions have touched bottom. We were assured in 1908 that 90,000 men had been added to the strength of the Regular Army. If that had been the ease these men would have passed in due course from the Colours into the Regular Reserve, and would have remained available in the first class Army Reserve till 1920. War Office Returns, such as the Army Annual Return, 1906, and the Army Estimates of 1910-1911, and the Army Reserve Return of March 31, 1909, show that the Regular Army, with the Regular Reserve and the Militia, if it had remained at its strength as in 1905, would have been 87,626 men stronger than the Regular Army and the Regular and Special Reserves will be in 1913. The addition of 90,000 men in 1908, therefore, results not in an increase in numbers in 1913 but in a diminution of 87,626 men. We ought to have 90,000 more men available, according to the Secretary of State for War; but according to War Office Returns we shall have nearly 90,000 men less—a difference of some 180,000 men.
I next take the case of the Regular Reserve of 200,000 men, which was promised to us by the Secretary of State for War when introducing the Army Estimates for 1909. This Reserve in 1913 will be made up of the three following groups: Of the first class Army Reserve, with a strength of 106,372, as estimated by Lord Erroll's Return; of Section D of the Regular Reserve, hitherto known as the second class Army Reserve, with a strength estimated by the Under-Secretary of State for War at 24,985; and of the Special Reserve, with an establishment of 70,000 non-commissioned officers and men. These three separate groups, when added together, will give a gross total of 201,537. But this number of Regular Reservists can only be obtained by assuming that the Special Reserve will always be up to its full establishment of 70,000 men, which it is not now and never yet has been. It is also necessary to ignore the fact that the Special Reserve depends for its existence on the enlistment of boys of 17, and that War Office Returns show that one-third of our Special Reservists—that is, 20,000—must always be boys of under 20, and not available for foreign service. Let me give

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your Lordships an instance as to the age of these promised Regular Reservists. Last week at the West London Police Court a deserter from a Special Reserve battalion was brought up. His age proved to be 15 years and 9 months. The magistrate said—
"This is a more child dressed up as a soldier. As ho is tot16 years old I cannot deal with him. He must go to the Children's Court at Westminster."
But that child on mobilisation is counted—this is an absolute fact—as a Reserve soldier of the Regular Army!
As regards Section D, hitherto known as the second class Army Reserve, this section of the Reserve is composed of those men who, on completion of twelve years of Colour and Reserve service, can be persuaded to re-enlist for a further period of four years. The number of 24,985, the estimated strength for 1013, must be pure guess-work, because the re-enlistment is voluntary. The men may re-enlist or they may not, according to the circumstances of the moment. Last July the Under-Secretary of State for War hoped to get from 15,000 to 20,000 of these men by 1913. Now the noble Lord reckons on almost 25,000. It is the abnormal outflow from the great Reserve created by the noble Viscount, Lord Midleton, which alone justifies any such expectation. When that extraordinary outflow ceases, then Section I) must dwindle, because there will be far fewer time-expired Reservists eligible for re-enlistment. The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War has told us that the men in Section of the Army Reserve will be required for instant, service with the Expeditionary Force. I should like to ask the noble Lord if he can tell us any good reasons for considering these men fit for this duty, because I can quote excellent reasons to prove the contrary. To do so, I must refer to the evidence given by General Sir T. Kelly-Kenny and Lord Methuen as to the value of Section D men during the South African war. The evidence is lengthy, but my excuse for quoting it is that it bears upon a point of extreme importance—namely, the adequacy or the inadequacy of the Regular Reserve provided by the Government for the requirements of the Expeditionary Force. If the Regular Reserve is wholly insufficient to complete the Expeditionary Force, then that Force becomes impossible, and the whole military edifice of the Government collapses
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and must be reconstructed from the foundation.
The question, then, is, Would these 25,000 men—whom, by the way, you have not yet got, but in the event of your getting them—would they be fit to go on service with the Expeditionary Force? The evidence which I ask your Lordships to allow me to read supplies the answer. The following questions were put to Sir P. Kelly-Kenny by Sir G. Taubman Goldic—
Q.—Did you see much distinction in quality between Reservists and the men who had been serving up to date?
A.—I think there was a distinction in the older Reservists, the Section D, but in the case of the others who had not left the ranks long I did not see very much.
Q.—You did not bear of any difficulties as regards discipline?
A.—I did with regard to Section D—in fact, I experienced them myself; when they came up they grumbled a great deal.
Q.—Dut the other sections were quite up to the mark of the soldiers who were in the ranks before?
A.—I think so.
Q.—They bad not lost their military habits.
A.—No, they had not; I could not trace anything against the Reservists I had.
Q.—Except Section D?
A.—That is so.
Then I come to the evidence given by General Lord Methuen. He was asked by the Chairman (Lord Elgin) as to the marching, and Lord Methuen replied—
"As soon as the weak men were weeded oat and the troops were in condition there was no question as to the men marching well. I cannot ever recollect the men not being ready to do more than I asked them to perform. I gladly include the Militia and the Volunteer companies in this statement. As long as the men are well fed and taken care of by their officers one need not fear stragglers. I except, as a rule, the men of Section D from the above remarks, as they fell out, and we left a good many behind at different places."
Lord Methuen was further questioned as follows—
Q.—What does that mean with regard to Section D?
A.—They are men having special qualifications. I was going to say they are more or less veterans who go into Section D.
Q.—And he [a Section D man] is a man who has gone through the Reserve and is allowed to conic back?
A.—-Yes, and only for special reasons ho is allowed to go on.
Q.—He may have fallen out because he was physically unfit?
A.—That is so, I think, because he was more or less a cripple.
Lord Methuen is more than satisfied with the marching and willingness of the men in

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the Regular Army, the Militia, and the Volunteers, but he specially excepts the men in Section D of the Regular Reserve. Sir T. Kelly-Kenny also emphatically puts Section D men in a class by themselves. The fact is that men in Section D—that is, the second class Army Reserve—have been far too long away from the Colours. They must have been nine years, and may have been thirteen years, absent from the Colours. Now a Cavalry soldier, who has not been on a horse for twelve years and weighs several stone heavier than when he left the Regiment, would be what is termed a "little out of practice" when he first starts riding, and that in the presence of the enemy. Your Lordships may rest assured that there is no Commanding Officer in the Regular Army who would not far rather take his Regiment on instant active service without Section D men in the ranks than with them.
Last November the noble Lord told us that—
"Section Section D is not the second class of the Army Reserve; it is now always classed in the first class of the Army Reserve."
It is always open to the Secretary of State for War to call black white and white black, and the Army Council must agree with him, but that is the only plan on which the second class Army Reserve can he converted into the same value as the first class Reserve. It is a case of mixing up the second class with the first class and calling the blend first class. As regards the service strength of Section D, the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War allows on the mobilisation of the second class Army Reserve the same ten per cent. rate for wastage as he does for serving soldiers. Men with the Colours live under the eye of the surgeon, under the very best of sanitary surroundings. Men in Section D are some twenty years older than the men with the Colours and have had to shift. for themselves for many a long year without food, clothing, and medical attendance provided by the State. Moreover they have often been engaged for years in work and trades which impair both eyesight and hearing. I accept the ten per cent rate, because I am calculating strictly on War Office data, but at the same time I cannot refrain from pointing out that it is clearly contrary to all common sense to allow the same rate for unfitness with men of the second class Army Reserve as for men serving with the Colours.
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To sum up our promised Regular Reserve of 200,000 men. First you begin by reducing the Regular Reserve from 137,000 to 106,372—a reduction of 30,628 noncommissioned officers and men. Then you suppose that all Special Reservists are of the same value as Regular Reservists, and that you have got 70,000 men in the Special Reserve, although you have not got that number. Next you assume that 20,000 boys in the Special Reserve are old enough for instant foreign service, although they are not. Finally you reckon that 24,985 men, whom you have not yet got, in the second class Army Reserve—that is Section D—are fit for active service abroad, although the experience of the South African war has proved that they are not.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD LUCAS): May I ask the noble Duke who assumes all this?
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: You assume it because you promised a Regular Reserve of 200,000 men. I am suggesting to the noble Lord how he gets them. The noble Lord will admit that the Government promised a Reserve of 200,000 men?
LORD LUCAS: Hear, hear.
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: I next come to the numbers required to form the Expeditionary Force, which, according to the Secretary of State for War, is to mobilise at about 180,000 men and have a surplus over. By the War Office Table of April 8, 1907, and by War Establishments, 19091910, the total strength of officers and men, including two Mounted Brigades since added, is 171,095. The Secretary of State, in his speech at Sheffield, mentioned 180,000 men, but that figure includes the Special Contingent, which ought to number 15,173 men. Last November the noble Lord informed us that the deficiency in the Special Contingent amounted to 6,622. I take the numbers of the Army of 1909 as given in the Army Annual Return dated 1910 as a standard of comparison, because that is the last complete Return now available. I refer to Table 1 of the Army Memorandum of 1907, which gives the composition of the Expeditionary Force, and to answers given by the Under-Secretary of State for War last November. I find Section A and B of the Regular Reserve—that is, the body of men hitherto known to us as the first class Army Reserve—would

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in 1913 be 15,637 men deficient of the requirements of the Expeditionary Force. But assuming that mobilisation takes place in or after the month of May—that is, after all foreign drafts have gone abroad—then, by the answers of the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War last November, an additional 13,603 men over twenty years of age would be required from the Regular Reserve to complete the numbers of the Expeditionary Force. This makes a total deficit of 29,240 men in the first class of the Regular Reserve for the requirements of the Expeditionary Force. The deficiency of 29,240 men is met to a limited extent on paper, but cannot be overcome in any way in the field, by the 22,100 men, the estimated strength of Section D less ten per cent. allowed for casualties. The result, then, is that all sections of the Regular Reserve, including 22,400 men of Section D, will not suffice for the requirements of the Expeditionary Force after the drafts have gone abroad by 6,834 men.
In this connection I would venture to remind the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State of his statement on July 7 last year, when he said—
"In 1913, when the Regular Reserve will be at its lowest, we shall require no Special Reservists to bring the Regular battalions up to the full war establishment. We shall only require them subsequently for drafts and a successive series of drafts so that there will be time to mature."
I hope the noble Lord will disclose to us the source front which he draws these Regular Reservists upon whom he relies with such confidence to more than complete the Expeditionary Force, because the Returns supplied to Parliament show, not a surplus, but a deficit of nearly 30,000 men in the first class Army Reserve, and of nearly 7,000 if Section D men are added. But common sense tells us that men who have left the Colours for twelve or thirteen years must be quite unfit to take their places in the ranks, some serving as non-commissioned officers, in the First Line and go into action within a few weeks of mobilisation. Now this deficit must be met by the Special Reserve and by the men in the Territorial Army who have agreed to serve abroad on mobilisation. I assume that the whole six Divisions of the Expeditionary Force are to go abroad made up to a strength of 180,000 men, and will leave a surplus over.
LORD LUCAS: I am sorry to interrupt the noble Duke again, but would he mind telling me what figures he takes when he makes that calculation as to the number of serving Regulars available on mobilisation?
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: They will be found in War Office Table of April 8, 1907. Now for the surplus. First of all, it is recognised that if the Expeditionary Force is to be of full value in a great emergency it must proceed abroad as a whole within two or three weeks of the outbreak of war. It is obviously essential that the whole weight of the striking force must be thrown into the scale of battle at one moment, or the opportunity will be irretrievably missed. To dribble the Expeditionary Force abroad by slow degrees because you want it for home defence is to ensure the defeat of the Expeditionary Force in detail overseas. Besides, to retain the striking force for home defence is a breakdown of all our military machinery and a confession of inability to take the offensive overseas. The Secretary of State for War has informed us that we have 580,000 men organised in twenty Divisions of ten Army Corps. Six Divisions go abroad. How many would be left at home? This simple sum worked out by War Office figures gives the following answer. On the departure of the Expeditionary Force we shall be left with seven Regular Infantry battalions, three regiments of Cavalry, and some 15,000 men of the Royal and of the Special Reserve Artillery. These numbers are easily obtained by subtracting the number of battalions and regiments tabled to go abroad with the Expeditionary Force from the total number serving in the United Kingdom, as shown by the Army Annual Return. In the same way it is easy to calculate the number of Regular Infantry officers available for duty at home by subtracting the total tabled to go abroad with the Expeditionary Force from the total serving at home, as shown by the January Army List. It is, of course, necessary to deduct all Infantry officers shown in the Army List as filling Staff appointments and seconded—for instance, a large number required for Mounted Infantry duties, then a large number employed with the Territorial Army, from which they cannot be withdrawn on mobilisation. The result is startling. It is this. If the Expeditionary Force went abroad, taking with it every officer belonging to the seven home battalions, then the Expedi-

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tionary Force would still be 150 Regular Infantry officers short of its requirements, and not a single Regular Infantry officer would be left with any Regular battalions at home. According to the War Office Returns the plan won't work.
On the departure of the Expeditionary Force the lesser half of the home Regular troops must be sent at once to garrison Ireland—that is, 7,000 Artillerymen, three battalions, and one regiment of Cavalry for the whole of Ireland, leaving in Great Britain one Regular Infantry Brigade of four battalions, two Cavalry regiments, and some 8.000 Artillery details. So much, or rather so little, of the Regular Army is left for home defence according to the War Office Tables, but referred to by the Secretary of State for War as a—
"very considerable number of Regular troops which in any event we should have at home."
Now the words "in any event" must include the event of the departure of the whole Expeditionary Force. It is true that on mobilisation all Special Reservists become, not by virtue of any efficiency but by magic of a War Office order, of the same fighting value as Regular soldiers. It is the intention that the Special Reserve shall receive all the unfit from the Line and all the unsound from the Regular Reserve. You may go on adding the unfit to the immature and the untrained to the unsound as much as you please and call them Regular soldiers if you like, but you cannot improvise Regular officers. Neither can you hastily change a drafting depot into a battalion of the Regular Army and use it as such in action against the pick of Continental troops without meeting with (lire disaster. I am glad that this fact has now been recognised by the military authorities.
The Secretary of State for War definitely stated, on June 27 last, that the Special Reserve is not for mobilisation. We need go no further. But until that statement was made, I had always assumed that the 27 fourth battalions of the Special Reserve were to be used as battalions. It seems, however, that the Secretary of State for War has consigned them to the general drafting pool. I am not surprised, for this is their condition. Their establishment is only 530 men, and many battalions are not up to establishment. By the Army List for January, 1911, out of an establishment of 28 officers per battalion every single battalion is at least 10 officers
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deficient, one is short by 20 officers, and two more are each 18 officers deficient. By Appendix VI of the Army Order of December 23, 1907, each of these 27 battalions must send on mobilisation four subalterns to the Regular battalions to help meet the deficiencies of the Line, thereby reducing the number of subalterns available for service with the 27 fourth battalions of the Extra Special Reserve to 12. That is a fraction less than half a subaltern to each battalion. These battalions have no Reserve. On mobilisation their numbers are not even augmented by the unfit and the useless from somewhere else. They have no Brigade organisation and they have no transport. They are mere nucleus battalions, but nucleus battalions without any provision for the addition of men on mobilisation although ample for the subtraction by drafting to the Line. It is certain that, owing to the great shortage of men in the Regular Reserve and to the great shortage of officers in these Extra Special Reserve battalions, that they must be absorbed into the general drafting pool. By the last War Office Return the whole Special Reserve Infantry is 1,357 subalterns deficient from an establishment of 1,915; that is to say, there are 558 subalterns where there ought to be 1,915.
So I pass from the Special Reserve, which by the decision of the Secretary of State for War and by the necessity of its composition can be used for drafting purposes only and not for mobilisation, to the Territorial Army. The Territorial Army, although it is our second line in time of peace, will become in time of war our first and only line of military defence after the Regular Army has gone abroad. On the departure of the Expeditionary Force a part of the Territorial Army must be at once sent to garrison Ireland. The present garrison in Ireland, when brought up to war strength—and I am dealing with war conditions—would be about 36,000 Regular troops. But it would be only reasonable when replacing Regular by Territorial troops to increase that number. At least 45,000 men of the Territorial Army would be required on permanent duty as a garrison for Ireland. This suggests the possibility of the employing of the Territorial Force in aid of the civil power. I understand that under no circumstances can the Territorial Army be employed for this duty. The Secretary of State for War, in answer to a Question on March 16 last, stated that—

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"The Territorial Force cannot be called out or embodied in whole or in part in aid of the civil power for the purpose of putting down riots or disturbances."
The seven Infantry battalions and three regiments of Cavalry left at home are certainly inadequate by themselves for the duty of aiding the civil power throughout the whole of Great Britain and Ireland in time of war. Last year the Government used troops in aid of the civil power in considerable numbers and for a considerable period. Quite recently troops fired 500 rounds of ball cartridge down the streets of London, again in aid of the civil power, and this time in the presence of the Home Secretary himself, and all this in time of profound peace. So it would seem idle to deny that the military force which replaces the Regular Army in the United Kingdom during the stress and strain of war may be required for this very difficult duty.
As 45,000 men of the Territorial Army would be required to garrison Ireland, we should be left with 212,257 Territorial soldiers in Great Britain, according to the present strength of the Territorial Army. But that strength is a diminishing strength, as I shall presently show. Moreover, in 1913 the whole batch of recruits who joined the Territorial Army when enlistment was first opened for that force in 1909 will become time-expired. But of this gross total of 212,257 men a portion only can be made available to act as the swiftly moving central field force described by the Secretary of State for War as ready at any moment to crush the Continental invader by sheer weight of numbers. Deductions must be made for men who are physically unfit, for absentees at home and abroad, for men who have emigrated, for recruits untrained, for boys of tender years, of whom there are a vast number in the Territorial Army, and, lastly, for men who have agreed to serve with the Army Reserve on mobilisation and have consequently been absorbed by the Expeditionary Force, thus depriving the Territorial Army of some of its keenest and best soldiers. Then large numbers—I cannot give figures, because these are the secrets of mobilisation—must be allotted for coast defences and for garrison duties in Great Britain, from which it is obviously impossible to remove them in time of war. Take the case of the garrison of London. We have only four Regular Infantry battalions left in Great Britain, two Cavalry regiments, and some 8,000 Artillery details.
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Are you going to leave London without a single Regular regiment? We know by experience that we have in our midst a hostile alien population armed with the most deadly weapons, and very ready to use them. We know that the ranks of the civil police will be depleted by calling out the Army Reserve, because many policemen are Army Reservists. We know that the Territorial Force cannot be used in aid of the civil power: neither is it fitted for that duty. Of course, garrisons cannot hastily abandon their posts and go flocking haphazard to any expected points of invasion. I suggest to the Under-Secretary of State for War that, after making all these inevitable deductions—and the noble Lord cannot deny that they are inevitable—the famous swiftly moving central field force cannot exceed 50.000 men, including Regular troops if any are available.
Now the Imperial Defence Committee has told us that the Territorial Army should be in the proportion of four to one against an invading force in order to ensure success. Sir John French has told us—it is in his evidence before the Norfolk Commission—that—
"You must have an enormous preponderance in numbers to overcome deficiency."
According, then, to the opinion of the Imperial Defence Committee and to the evidence of Sir John French, our available home Field Army of 50,000 men would have no chance against a force of 15,000 Continental invaders, because we should not have the necessary superiority of four to one. Sir Ian Hamilton, in his last book, writes as follows—
"If defeated the Territorial Force would go absolutely to pieces for a time."
What is going to happen in this interval of time? I presume the occupation of London would be one of the incidents. If you send abroad the six Divisions of the Expeditionary Force, as you claim to be easily able to do, then by War Office Returns and by the opinion of the Imperial Defence Committee you cannot hope to deal successfully with 15,000 Continental invaders in Great Britain. In Ireland a force of 10,000 men would be certain of success. This would be the state of affairs according to War Office Returns and the opinion of the Imperial Defence Committee; but the Secretary of State for War tells us—
"I think between these three lines of defence, the first and second naval lines and the military line—

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behind this triple line of defence we are pretty well protected, and it is a nervous person, I was going to say a cowardly person, who gets into a state of blue funk over these things."
If we consider for a moment the state of the Territorial Army I think we shall understand the reasons which have induced the Imperial Defence Committee to advise us that the proportion of four to one is essential for safety. We know that in the Territorial Force last November there were 83.346 boys of less than twenty years of age, and that among them there were thousands of boys less than seventeen years old. In April, 1910—that is the last complete Return rendered to Parliament of the musketry of the Territorial Army [Cd. 5018]—there were 100,000 officers, noncommissioned officers and men not qualified in musketry. We must remember that a Territorial soldier can qualify in musketry without ever having fired upon a full distance range. The question has often been asked but never yet answered by a plain "Yes" or "No," Can a Territorial soldier qualify in musketry by firing a certain number of rounds without ever hitting the mark? As far as I can make out from the Regulations, the answer is "Yes." It would be interesting to know how many of these marksmen are now in the Territorial Army. I do not consider these facts discreditable to officers and men of the Territorial Army in the least. They are inseparable from the nature of the Force. The Territorial Army consists of a mass of patriotic citizens who soldier as much as they can in their spare time on the go-as you please and do-as-you-like plan. For instance, last summer 1,321 officers and 24,000 men did not attend camp at all, so there is sonic latitude allowed in the matter of training. I asked the noble Lord how many officers and men had missed two trainings out of three. The noble Lord explained that to ascertain this number would entail laborious research. I am not surprised that no record is kept at the War Office of officers and men who miss two or three trainings, and are, therefore, scarcely trained at all, because the authors of the Territorial Army never contemplated the Force beginning to carry out military training with any strictness till after war has been declared. General Cowans, the present Director-General of the Territorial Force, said on January 19 last that—
"The Territorial Force was what the Secretary of State himself had called it, a half-baked Force."
Anyhow, the present state of the Territorial
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Army is a source of sincere satisfaction to its authors. Indeed, it is exactly what they desired. At least the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War is reported to have said on December 16 last—
"The Force was slowly and steadily going forward and was fulfilling the best expectations of the best critics at the present time."
The Territorial Force was 1,514 officers and 44,106 men deficient on January 1 last. That is a drop of very nearly 12,000 men since last April.
The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War is not the least disturbed by the fact of a diminishing intake now and the certainty of an extraordinary outflow in two years time, because on December 16 last he said—
"They had this year felt so encouraged that they were prepared to spend considerably more money on the Territorial Force than they had spent previously."
These increased grants are, no doubt, designed to check this wasting of the Force. But any effect they might have had in that direction wilt be cancelled by the recent declaration that invasion is impossible. If officers and men have good reason to believe that they will be required to defend their hearths and homes, those who are patriotic will honestly try to make themselves efficient for the expected day of battle. Tell them to sleep quietly in their beds and not to be disturbed by bogies of invasion, tell them that an invasion on even the moderate scale of 70,000 men is practically impossible, and then you will very soon take the whole heart out of the Territorial Army. The Territorial Force deprived of any serious purpose will be regarded, and rightly, as a play-about Army. Yet for all that it seems likely that we are to see a further financial starvation of the Regular Army in order to keep the Territorial Force alive. The financial position is this. War Office Returns and Army Estimates inform us that if half a million more money is spent on the Territorial Army the result will be that in 1913 we shall have Army Estimates as high as in 1905, but 87,676 men fewer amongst those forces which were then available for foreign service. The only setoff against this reduction of nearly 90,000 men in our foreign service line would be the number of men in Section D of the Army Reserve, re-opened for enlistment last year.
I cannot refrain from expressing a hope that there will be no more reductions in the

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Regular Army for the sake of the Territorial Force. For my own part I have always regretted, and I have always opposed, the sweeping reductions made in the Regular Army and the total destruction of the Regular Militia in order to create a force which does not begin professional training till after war has been declared, which cannot be used in aid of the civil power when embodied at home during the absence of the Regular Army, which is forbidden by law from operating in an enemy's country, and whose use, since invasion on even moderate scale has just been declared by the highest naval authority to be impossible, is most obscure. But additional grants have been definitely promised to the Territorial Army. The Government must contemplate higher Array Estimates than in 1905 with the certainty of nearly 90,000 men fewer in the foreign service line, or else they must still further reduce the Regular Army in order to finance the Territorial Force.
My Lords, I have dealt with these questions of numbers entirely according to the Returns of the War Office, taking the greatest care never to travel beyond them or to use any figures except those supplied by the Government. In no respect do these War Office Returns support the confident anticipations of the Government, least of all in regard to the Expeditionary Force. War Office Returns show that this Force will be absolutely impossible in the numbers represented to us by the Government. I know no greater boon to a commercial nation than a well-founded sense of security. But assuredly no evil is more dangerous than a false sense of security which rests, not upon facts and upon figures, but upon promises and predictions.
LORD LUCAS: My Lords, this debate certainly marks a milestone in the progress, or perhaps I should say in the understanding of Army Reform in this House. Though the noble Duke does not praise us for what we have done, there is for the first time in his speech to-night, and in the form in which he has put the Notice on the Paper, a tacit admission on his part that we are carrying out what we set ourselves to do—namely, the organisation of an Expeditionary Force of six Divisions, with its Cavalry Division and lines of communications. If five years ago anybody had discussed an Expeditionary Force of that size, lie would have been considered mad. Had you conducted
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this debate five years ago you would have been discussing, not the possibility of mobilising six Divisions, but the bare possibility of mobilising three, and you would have had great difficulty in doing that and giving them their proper complement of all arms. [Viscount MIDLETON dissented.] The noble Viscount shakes his head. We have discussed it so often. There was a large superfluity of some arms, but the whole difficulty from the point of view of mobilisation on the outbreak of war was that you had not got sufficient of the more requisite arm of all—Artillery. We have got it now.
The noble Duke based his case, not upon our present position, but upon what the position would be in the year 1913. I gathered from his speech that that is the year which he brings under review. It is the year which he referred to in those articles of Iris which we read during the summer, and it is, we understand, the year in which, in his opinion, we are going to be put to the test. I should like first to say something about our military position in the year 1913. That position will not have been caused by us. It will be one of our inheritances. The reductions which we have made in the Infantry will not in the slightest degree affect our position in that year. If we had not reduced tire battalions and they had continued to exist, not one single man who would have been enlisted into them after the time when they were, as a matter of fact, disbanded could have passed into the Reserve, and it is the condition of the Reserve in 1913 that constitutes, as I understood the noble Duke's speech, the position of danger.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Why? Will the noble Lord explain what he means?
LORD LUCAS: For the reason that all the men who were in those battalions were absorbed into other battalions, and no man enlisted in 1906 could have affected the Reserve in 1913.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Surely the men who would have enlisted in these battalions in 1906 would have been passing into the Reserve in 1913.
LORD LUCAS: But that is after the critical moment. The position with regard to 1913 is this. We have at the present time—I confine myself to the Infantry, because it is only in the Infantry that the

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position is difficult—we have in the Infantry men serving under three different terms of service. From 1002 to 1904 men were enlisted for three years with the Colours, with the option of extending to eight years, and nine in the Reserve. All the three-years men who are now with the Colours are, therefore, the men who have extended and may be called eight-years men. From 1904 to 1906 the terms of service were nine years with the Colours and three in the Reserve, and there are a considerable number of nine-years men. After 1906 we returned to what I think has been the best all-round 'term of service—seven years with the Colours and five in the Reserve; and ever since then we have had none but seven-years men in the. Infantry. The men who pass into the Reserve in the years 1910, 1911, and 1912 are the eight-years men who enlisted in 1902, 1903, and 1904. The difficulty about the three-years system was that you did not get enough men to extend. Therefore we find that the eight-years men who will be passing into the Reserve during the three years previous to the critical moment of 1913 will only average 5,500 instead of from 10,000 to 12,000, which is about the normal annual outflow of men into the Reserve. Then in the year 1012 comes the end of the eight-years men who enlisted in 1904, and it is not until 1914 that the nine-years men begin to conic in in any numbers, so that you have a gap during the year 1913 between the end of the eight-years men and the beginning of the nine-years men. The result is that in 1913 the total number of men who pass into the Reserve will be only 2,677, and consequently the Reserve drops to 106,372. Then in 1914 the nine-years men who enlisted in 1905 begin to pass to the Reserve and also the seven-years men who began to come in in 1906. The result is that you get a double flow of men into the Reserve.
I should like, having explained that, to call the attention of the House for one moment to the way in which the noble Duke makes up his figures. I think I am right in saying that he takes the normal number of men serving with the Colours as being available on mobilisation. He takes the lowest point which the Reserve ever reaches, and he adds those two together to show that there would be a deficiency. But I should have thought it would not require a very profound student of military matters to realise that when you have the tap which allows men to pass from the Colours to the
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Reserve practically turned off, you will have a very much larger number of seasoned men available with the Colours than at any other time. It is true that in 1913 the Reserves will be low, and it is because the men who in normal circumstances would be with the Reserves will be with the Colours. Therefore the position, if you look at it only from the Reserve point of view, is not half so bad as it looks, because you have a much larger number of matured men serving with the Colours than at ordinary times. Then in order to complete his figures, although the noble Duke is discussing the year 1913, he takes the Territorial Force in 1910, and he takes their musketry standard of 1909. He pays no attention whatever to what may be the outcome of the Territorial Force Reserve, the Veteran Reserve, then, when, as we think, the Territorial Force will be much nearer its establishment than it is at the present time.
The position in 1913 is going to be extremely abnormal, though even if it were left as it is there would not, from the point of view of mobilising the Regular Army, be any danger, and we could do it perfectly well. But, of course, these unevennesses are things that one wants to get rid of if one possibly can, because if you are only to pass 2.600 men to the Reserve in one year and 16,000 men the next year, it is going to knock all your recruiting to pieces, and you will be below establishment. So we are going to do what has been done before with success, namely, allow men who are with the Colours—we are not going to put any pressure upon them—to go to the Reserve prematurely. That is to say, some of the 16,000 men who will be passing out in 1914 and some of the 21,000 men who will be passing out in 1915 will be allowed, if they wish, to go into the Reserve in 1913. That was done in the time of the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, and met, as I have said, with success. By that means, if we can stimulate the flow into the Reserve it will not affect the general position on mobilisation, but it will help us to equalise the number of recruits who are wanted, and the drafts to India, and other matters of that sort.
We have also taken steps of another kind. We have increased the additional numbers, or the pool, considerably. It is already very nearly double what it normally is, and we shall probably, before we have done, treble it. This is a second string to our bow if we

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do not get sufficient numbers to transfer. I will explain the pool. It is allowing the establishment of the Infantry battalions at home to be exceeded, to recruit beyond their establishment, and it really will have the same effect as raising the establishment of the Infantry, and it is clone with the object of tiding us over the bad time and of meeting the big outflow of men into the Reserve. Therefore the position in 1913, as far as we can see, will not be so bad as the noble Duke makes out, and, in the next place, we shall probably by these means approach to something about the normal.
Now I come to the question of the general position of this country both in regard to the mobilisation of the Expeditionary Force and our position after the Expeditionary Force has left these shores. As to that I state what the position was in June, 1910. We have, as a matter of fact, got later figures, but sonic of them are not checked, and I prefer to give figures that have been checked throughout. The position last December was a little different from this, but not different in essentials. In June, 1910, we had 124,129 Regulars. Of those there would be detailed to the Expeditionary Force 68,141, leaving at home 55,988. Then comes the Regular Reserve, the strength of which at that time was 136,663. You have to deduct from that ten per cent. for wastage and unfitness. The noble Duke challenges that ten per cent., but it is the actual deduction which we have found by experience it is necessary to make. You have also to deduct further, some 7,000 odd Reservists who are serving abroad and not available on mobilisation. That brings down the numbers to 116,811. Some 81,000 of these men are required, leaving 34,871. Then there is the Special Reserve, consisting of 65,106 men, and there would be required 5,691 of those men already enlisted, leaving a total of 59,455. Then you have the Territorial Force, 260,981 men; the Militia and Militia Reserve, 4,076; and the Regular Reserve from abroad, who would not be available on mobilisation but would be thrown in as the war proceeded, 7,225. That gives you your Expeditionary Force, and it gives you also 422,596 men, of whom 98,084 would be Regulars and Regular Reservists—that is, after deducting the ten per cent. It will be seen, therefore, that for the purpose of the mobilisation of the Expeditionary Force last June there was an ample margin in every particular. The
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55,988 Regulars do not by any means all represent men under twenty years of age. Similarly with the Regular Reserve, there are 34,000 men left over. That is the figure which will be altered when we come to the normal in that respect. The position last June was abnormal. When we come to the normal, the Regular Reserve instead of being 136,000 will, according to our calculations, be 126,000, and that will make the surplus left at home 24,000 instead of 34,000.
The noble Duke asks me about Section D. We have had some discussion upon that before. It is impossible to say how many men of Section D will be employed, for the reason that the requirements of different Infantry battalions vary so much. It may be possible that the gross total of Section A and Section B men may be quite sufficient to mobilise the whole of the Regular Infantry, but it is possible that there will be a certain number of battalions which will have to fall back on Section D again, because Section A and Section B may, for the reasons I have given, be abnormally low. Therefore it is impossible to say what the position would be in regard to Section D, but under normal circumstances Section D will number 26,000 men. The surplus of the Regular Reserve not absorbed by the Expeditionary Force, after deductions fir men abroad, will give you 24,000 men left over, which is within 2,000 of the figure required for Section D. I think that shows that our position with regard to the mobilisation of the Expeditionary Force both now and when we reach the normal is perfectly secure. We could at the present moment mobilise the whole of the six Divisions, and, with a certain amount of improvisation in arms which are not; the fighting ones, we could get the Cavalry Divisions and the lines of communication complete. Our chief difficulty is in the Army Service Corps, but our needs there are being decreased every day by the introduction of mechanical transport. Really the only important thing in which we should have to make a certain amount of improvisation is in the matter of the Royal Army Medical Corps, where we should want 1,000 men.
On the question of the Reserve, it is perfectly true that we have stated that we have 200,000 men at the present moment who are liable by their terms of service as a reserve for the Regular Army, but, after

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all, the basis of our scheme has not been that they should be immediately available. The reason why we converted the Militia into the Special Reserve was that they should give us the means of replacing wastage, and that the supply should last over a considerable period. There lies the crux of the whole thing. Out of the 98,000 Regulars left at home when you mobilise, a number of those men will be Section D men, who, to take the worst estimate, would not be men whom you would desire to have until, at any rate, you had given them a certain amount of training. There will be the immature soldiers and the Special Reservists. Those men are not intended to be immediately used on mobilisation. They would not be used until they had had a certain amount of training on embodiment. The result is that you have a very large reservoir there which will be gradually ripening, and which will enable you in three months, six months, or in a year or two years, as you want them, to maintain your Expeditionary Force in the field. We have never thought that a great part of those men would be immediately available, and we have not intended that they should be.
I pass to the question of the Special Reserve. The noble Duke occasionally when he lets himself go, gets quite lurid on the subject of the Special Reserve. I remember a good many things that he said in his article in the Morning Post on the subject of the Special Reserve. However, he has not said very much about them this afternoon. It has always been the contention of the critics of the Special Reserve that that Reserve was simply a funnel through which men passed on their way into the Regular Army. All that we have said was that it was impossible to say at the time exactly what was going to be the effect, but that, as far as we could see, there would be a certain number of men who would remain and serve out their time as Special Reservists. We have now available a certain basis of calculation—though it is not very much—upon which some comparison of the Special Reserve with the old Militia can be made. The average number of men of the Militia who used to pass on and enlist in the Regular Army was 42 per cent. In the last two years 47 per cent. of the Special Reserve have passed on to the Regular Army, so that there is only a difference between the two of 5 per cent. It therefore looks as if the
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old conditions under the Militia are, in that respect at least, being reproduced under the Special Reserve. Another satisfactory point is that the result of another year's work shows that the percentage of men under twenty years of age has decreased. Last year I think it was two per cent. over what it used to be in the Militia. This year it is just about the same as in the Militia in 1905—namely, twenty-seven per cent.
This is the crucial point with regard to the Special Reserve: If we do not get a sufficient number of men of the Special Reserve to stay on, and if the contention of the noble Duke and other critics should prove to be true that it is simply a funnel, then we will frankly admit that the Special Reserve will have failed in the purposes for which it was intended. But, as far as we can see, the position as it was in the old Militia is being more or less reproduced. We do not consider that satisfactory, and when my right hon. friend the Secretary of State for War makes his statement in introducing the Army Estimates in another place, he will take the opportunity of announcing certain modifications and alterations which we are going to make in the Special Reserve for the coming year. But, generally speaking, according to the reports which we have received about them, the Special Reserve is a success. There is no doubt that it is a much better Force compared with the old Militia. Of course, they are the same in a great many particulars. The age of enlistment is the same, the physical standard as regards measurements is the same, the percentage under twenty is about the same, and the percentage who join the Regulars is about the same; but, on the other hand, the Special Reserve men are longer and better trained. We find, as a result of last year's training, that it is those battalions which have the smallest number of old Militia men in them which are best reported upon from the point of view of efficiency. Again in the very severe test that we put them to by calling them out for the last Manœuvres and making them do work which they would not have to do on mobilisation because we brought them straight up and made them march the day that they joined, which could not happen to them on mobilisation—they acquitted themselves well, and were favourably spoken of by the officers who had to do with them.

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There is one point in particular as to which a considerable improvement is noticeable—that is, the general physical soundness of the Special Reserve. The physical standard as regards measurements is the same, but, having regard to the liability of the men to serve abroad, great care is taken to ensure a higher standard of health as well as greater efficiency. The noble Duke is in the habit of saying that the Special Reserve is an altogether inferior force. I would remind him that we insist on their bringing references when they join, which was not done in the Militia. Nevertheless, I have seen them described by the noble Duke as being the "conscripts of hunger," as being drawn from a lower strata of humanity, and as being the unemployed or the unemployable, whereas the Militia was said to be the only force which was capable of carrying out the arduous duty of reinforcing the Regular Army abroad. Be that as it may, the Militia was not without its faults. I was told a story which I think will be of interest to the noble Duke because it concerns his battalion. In 1893 there was a Brigade of Militia, training at Aldershot. In that Brigade was the noble Duke's battalion, as well as the battalion now commanded by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury. At the end of the training, out of this Brigade 140 men decided to volunteer for enlistment in the Regular Army, and they were sent up to undergo medical examination. Fewer than six of those men were accepted, the others being rejected. Another interesting point is this, that last summer during the three training months we were rather surprised to observe that there were more men being invalided out of the Special Reserve than were joining it. On inquiring the reason we found that, owing to the strict medical test now applied, a very large number of the old Militiamen who had transferred had to be invalided out of the service. There is no question at all that the Special Reserve is better trained, that the physical health of the men is better, that the standards are altogether higher, and that the Special Reservists are in a far better position to fulfil the important role that we have assigned to them than the old Militia ever were.
I pass from that to the question of officers. I never have, I hope, held out any very rosy picture with regard to the supply of officers. It has always been a
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very difficult problem, and there is no doubt that we have not solved it yet. We have sufficient officers for the purpose of mobilising the six Divisions, but we have not got anything like the number on the scale of supplying wastage over a considerable time. There is one satisfactory feature, and that is the working of the Officers Training Corps.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Will the noble Lord state the deficiency in officers in the various branches of the Service?
LORD LUCAS: For what purpose?
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: For the information of the country.
LORD LUCAS: I did not mean that. When the noble Marquess speaks of the deficiency of officers in the different branches of the Service, does he mean for the Expeditionary Force?
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: We understand that there are not sufficient officers. I am anxious to find out the extent of the deficiency—whether the Regular Army is deficient in officers, and, if so, how many; whether the Territorial Force is deficient in officers, and, if so, how many; and also whether the Special Reserve is deficient in officers, and, if so, how many.
LORD LUCAS: I can give a certain number of the figures, but not all. In the Regular Army there is, practically speaking, no deficiency; in the Territorial Force, the deficiency in June last was 1,514; and in the Special Reserve the deficiency, though I have not got the figures, is very considerable, especially in the subaltern ranks, which is where we most want them
LORD AMPTHILL: May I ask the noble Lord whether he is counting the Regular officers who are serving in the Special Reserve twice over?
LORD LUCAS: I do not quite under stand.
LORD AMPTHILL: Are these officers counted for the purposes of the Regular Army as well as for the purposes of the Special Reserve? They appear twice in the Army List.
LORD LUCAS: No; we are not counting them twice over.
LORD AMPTHILL: Are you counting one officer as two officers?
LORD LUCAS: No; certainly not.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Under the present Regulations there are a large number of Regular officers attached to Special Reserve units. I have reason to believe that in many cases they are deficient in numbers; that is to say, the full establishment of such Regular officers has not been secured. If that be the case, then that ought to count as a deficiency in the Regular Service as well as a deficiency in the Special Reserve.
LORD LUCAS: I understand that the point now is the counting of the deficiencies twice over. But, whichever it is, I think the deficiencies, if any exist now—and of that I am not quite certain—in the supply of Regular officers for Special Reserve battalions will shortly be made up. There is one satisfactory feature, and that is the working of the Officers Training Corps. It is of considerable size now, and the movement is being taken up with the greatest keenness in the public schools and Universities. Ninety-six officers have already taken commissions in the Special Reserve, and 242 in the Territorial Force. Another satisfactory feature is that, partly through the existence of the Officers Training Corps, the Universities have taken more interest in the Army than they used to do, and the supply of University candidates for the Regular Army has increased considerably.
I do not wish to go into a long and detailed exposition with regard to the Territorial Force. I maintain absolutely the truth of my previous statement which the noble Duke quoted, that the improvement which the Territorial Force has shown during the past year has been very marked indeed. It has been remarked upon by all the very distinguished Regular Officers who command it directly, or under whose command it comes, or who have had the opportunity of seeing it and inspecting its work in the field. As I have said, we are perfectly satisfied with the improvement that is being made. The system is by no
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means complete yet. We are still at work devising fresh means for improving its efficiency and its training, but there can be no question that it is fulfilling the purpose for which it was originally designed. We should have in this country, therefore, during the early period after mobilisation, the time when the Territorial Force would be at its weakest, 422,000 men, of whom 98,000 would be Regulars. When we reach the normal that will be reduced by 14,000, but again may well be increased by the Territorial Force, and that will give you, not what the noble Duke said was required by the Committee of Imperial Defence, a Force of four to one, but of six to one, as compared with that which any possible invader might bring against it. There are not, therefore, on these figures any grounds for saying that our provision for home defence, in the event of the Expeditionary Force leaving these shores, is in any way inadequate.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: My Lords, the difficulty one feels in following the noble Lord is not that he has not conscientiously endeavoured to meet the very detailed criticisms of the noble Duke behind me. If I may venture to say so, I think the noble Lord makes a mistake in attempting to defend every item of the indictment that has been made against him. In the first place, I do not think he can satisfactorily do so, and, if your Lordships will pardon me, I will endeavour to draw together the figures in the noble Duke's elaborate and admirable statement which have not been shaken in the slightest by the noble Lord's reply. In discussing the position in 1913 the noble Lord tried to prove that if the men of the battalions which were disbanded by Mr. Haldane seven years before had not been disbanded there would not have been a larger Reserve than there would be after they had been disbanded. No amount of elaborate argument can possibly prove that, if you disband nine battalions of 700 men apiece, even if you distribute those men among other battalions, the men you would have enlisted in those battalions, at the rate of 300 a year, would not have passed into the Reserve.
LORD LUCAS: My point was that they would not be in the Reserve in 1913, which is the year the noble Duke has laid stress upon in his criticism as being the dangerous period.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: The noble Duke's point was that by 1913 all the three-years men would cease to pass into the Reserve, and that all the men who would have passed into the Reserve if Mr. Haldane had not broken up those battalions would not be forthcoming. But I do not wish to elaborate that point. I protest against the tone of exaggeration in which the noble Lord imitates the Secretary of State for War in statements which he cannot possibly make good, which do not deceive anybody who knows the facts—though I am sure the noble Lord genuinely believes them himself—and which are entirely at variance with all the figures which can be culled from official documents. I will give an instance. The noble Lord congratulated the noble Duke on having made a step forward and on having treated as a serious matter the probable power of the country to send six Divisions abroad. I do not intend to be drawn into a duel as to what it was possible to do a short time ago and what it is now possible to do. What we want to be assured is that the six Divisions which are spoken of can be sent abroad, and that when they have gone there will be at home a force which can be mobilised. I challenge in every particular the statement that the noble Lord has advanced a single man on the numbers who could be mobilised five years ago, except with regard to the Reserve which was then being made up but which could not be made up fully until the men enlisted by the noble Marquess could have gone to the Reserve. I throw that out as a challenge, and I will make it good on any occasion and against any competitor. I say that His Majesty's Government have not advanced one single Regular since that time, except in regard to those whom we enlisted but who had not then become effective. But that is not the point which I rose to make.
The noble Duke's figures as to what the strength of the Expeditionary Force could be have not been disproved in any single particular by the noble Lord. The noble Duke took for his text the statement of the Secretary of State that we are 90,000 men stronger now, and that we can, therefore, send 160,000 men abroad. That number has lately been advanced to 180,000. The noble Duke proved by figures that, taking into consideration the Special Reserve, you are not 90,000 men stronger, but 87,000 men weaker. You cannot have it both ways. You have reduced the Army Reserve by
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31,000 men. You say you are going to make that up to some extent by taking in Section D men of more than twelve years' service. It was equally open, with an Army Reserve of 136,000 men, to take in Section D men and make that number up to 160,000. Therefore, in so far as you make a comparison you are weaker by the 31,000 men you have knocked off than you were when you came into office.
To place against the reductions shown by the noble Duke there is the fact that the Special Reserve is now available for foreign service. I was very much struck with the account which the noble Lord gave of the increased care now being taken to secure the medical fitness of the Special Reserve as compared with the old Militia. I by no means desire to pass any sort of stricture on the usefulness of that Force. But I would point out that the noble Lord, while he was eloquent as to the power of the country to send these six Divisions abroad, did not deal with any of the points I am now going to mention. In the first place, the noble Duke alleged that when the Expeditionary Force had been sent abroad, every Infantry Regular officer in the country would have been taken, and that you would have left at home a large body of heterogeneous troops, men serving with the Colours who were unfit to go abroad, some Reservists who had been abroad and had come back, and others—98,000 in all. I ask, Is the noble Duke correct when he says that every Infantry Regular officer would have left the country and that these troops would remain without a Regular officer to command them?
LORD LUCAS: No.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Then I would suggest to the noble Lord that he should give us distinct figures in support of that. If the noble Duke is correct, it is a most serious statement. It is one that requires to be refuted, because it involves the whole question of the usefulness of the force left at home. Again, we ought to be told what number of boys enlisted at seventeen are included in the estimates of 200,000 for the Regular Reserve, and what number of the 426,000, after you have taken the Special Reservists you mean to send abroad, are men whom you really can turn out for service at home. Then, again, what about the officers of the Special Reserve? The noble Marquess asked a question on that

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point, and I think we ought to have been told whether it is true that the Special Reserve is so deficient in officers that it could not be mobilised in case of invasion. It is a serious error that we should be told that there are 200,000 men in the Regular Reserve when the figures include boys of seventeen belonging to the Special Reserve who could no more be employed as Regular Reservists than if they had never joined. The citation of these large figures, such as 426,000 troops remaining in England, is misleading. We ought to know how many of that large force have got officers, and for how many there would be Artillery left in the country. Not a word was said about Artillery—a most important point. I do not ask how many would have transport and equipment, but on the occasion when the noble and gallant Field-Marshal Lord Roberts brings forward his Motion I shall press for an answer to the question—What is the military composition of the troops that will remain after these six Divisions have gone abroad, and how many of the 426,000 could be mobilised to-morrow as an organised force with proper officers?
I do not wish to say a word to-night to depreciate any of our forces, but I do ask your Lordships to remember that, even in the elaborate answer prepared by the Under-Secretary, he has not for a moment disputed the great reduction in Regulars, the great reduction in the Army Reserve, the great reduction in the Artillery, and the fact that corps which you cannot organise in a hurry have been reduced below the level at which they were left in 1905, and lie has by no means shown us that this great heterogeneous body of troops which he mentions exists except on paper, because we do not know that they have the requisite number of officers and scientific corps. When we return to this matter, as we must do, I hope we shall be told whether there is an adequate defence force after the six Divisions have gone. I hope the noble Lord will not mind my pressing him on a subsequent occasion to release us from this mass of figures and show us perfectly clearly what is the military force available in the country after the six Divisions have gone, taking only into account those men who could really be paraded and for whom officers and the proper equipment of scientific corps could be found.
LORD AMPTHILL: My Lords, when I asked the noble Lord the Under-Secretary
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if he was counting officers twice over lie replied in the negative, but I thought his answer was given rather hesitatingly. I would ask the noble Lord to give his careful attention to this point when he returns to the War Office. You cannot open a single page of the Army List on which Infantry regiments appear without finding that the officers are counted twice over—namely, under the Regular battalions and under the Special Reserve battalions. At any rate, it would seem to the ordinary observer that they are counted twice over, and I would ask the noble Lord to look into the matter when lie is again verifying figures which are supplied to him.
LORD LUCAS: I venture to think that so simple a mistake as that could not be made by anybody who had the faintest knowledge of the Army List. I think the noble Lord will see against the names the figure 3 to show that they are serving with the third battalion.
LORD AMPTHILL: There are also the figures 2 or 1.
LORD LUCAS: Some distinguished officers appear a dozen times in the Army List, but they are not counted a dozen times.
LORD AMPTHILL: I am referring to officers whose names appear twice over under the heading of the same regiment.
LORD HAVERSHAM: My Lords, a question has been asked as to the deficiency of officers in the Army at the present time. I can give the information from page 27 of the Annual Return of the Army. In the Cavalry of the Line there ought to be 752 officers; there are 732. In the Artillery there ought to be 1,128; there are 1,070. In the Infantry of the Line there ought to be 4,682; there are 4,550. The noble Duke referred to the men in Section D and quoted the words of two General Officers who had had Section D men under them. Let me ask him to look at this return. He will there see that in the whole strength of Section D there are only 111 men—a mere bagatelle of the whole—over 40 years of age.
THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: The expected strength of this Section in 1913 is upwards of 25,000. It is hoped to raise it to that number. It was closed for one year, but it has since been re-opened for enlistment.
LORD HAVERSHAM: I am taking the last Return, and the figures I have given represent the state of affairs at that time. What is going to take place in the future it is impossible to foresee. I would observe, further, that it is incorrect to designate the Territorial Force as one composed of immature boys. The Territorial Force is 260,000 strong. Of that Force those under seventeen only number 2,079. It is impossible correctly to designate the Force in the way the noble Duke did because there happens to be a small percentage under seventeen. The noble Duke, and the noble Earl, Lord Portsmouth, are continually asking questions as to how many of the men are under twenty years of age. The fact of a man being under twenty does not make him an inefficient soldier. There were thousands of soldiers under twenty who fought in the Battle of Waterloo, and numbers of soldiers from eighteen to twenty
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were sent to the Crimea. Even to-day, if you look in The Times, you will see that at Sydney the Government there have passed a law by which every man after the age of eighteen shall be enlisted for the defence of his country and properly trained. These young men do just as well as men much older. I cannot follow the noble Duke in his elaborate attack on the Territorial Force. Who would suppose that if we were likely to have an invasion of this country we should send an Expeditionary Force of 180,000 men abroad? According to the noble Duke, we are to assume, not only that we should send 180,000 men abroad, but that the Fleet would be pierced and that we would be left without anything but the Territorial Army to rely upon. Such a supposition is absurd.
House adjourned at a quarter past Seven o'clock, till To-morrow, half-past Ten o'clock.