Sitting of 19 August 1921

Preamble
The House met at twelve of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
COUNTY OF LONDON ELECTRIC SUPPLY COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
SOUTH SHIELDS CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
MANCHESTER CORPORATION (GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]
WEST HAM CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Commons Amendments considered, and agreed to (yesterday).

AUTUMN RECESS.
DEBATE ON IRISH NEGOTIATIONS.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE MARQUESS CURZON or KEDLESTON)THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE MARQUESS CURZON or KEDLESTON) had given Notice to Move to resolve—
That the House on its adjournment do adjourn for business to Tuesday the 18th of October, except that if it appears to the satisfaction of the Lord Chancellor that the public interest requires that the House should meet at any earlier time during such adjournment, the Lord Chancellor may give notice to the Peers that he is so satisfied, and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such Notice, and shall transact its business as if it had been duly adjourned to that time.
The noble Marquess said: My Lords, it is my duty to move the Resolution that stands in my name upon the Paper. This Resolution, both in its wording and in its object, is no new thing. I think it is the third time in the last two years that I have been called upon to make a similar Motion, which has been then passed, from this Table. Accordingly, no words of explanation are needed from me as to the general character of the circumstances which render such a Motion as this necessary. It is a familiar and a convenient practice to enable your Lordships' House to be summoned together, should events of importance occur in the course of a recess which may demand your presence in Parliament.
The moving of this Motion to-day does not, of course, mean that the Government have changed their plans with regard to the holding of an autumn session. We may be driven, for reasons to which I will presently refer, to do so, but it was not part of our original, nor, indeed, is it any part of our present, aim. Anybody who knows what is passing from day to day must be thoroughly conscious of the fact that events may occur—we hope they will not—which will render the summoning of Parliament indispensable, and it is for that situation that provision is accordingly being made. The adjournment till. Tuesday, October 18, means nothing so far os the selection of the specific date is concerned, because, under the terms of the Resolution, power is given to the Lord Chancellor, in consultation, of course, with those who are responsible for the business of the House, to summon your Lordships at an earlier date. When October 18 comes, should the moment not be one at which the meeting of Parliament is required, nothing is easier than to arrange for another adjournment, or, should no meeting of Parliament be required in the course of the autumn, for prorogation.
That is all I think I need say as to the character and occasion of the Motion to which I refer, but inasmuch as the moving of this Resolution springs exclusively from the present situation in Ireland, and as it is upon that situation that the thoughts and anxieties of all of us are turned, perhaps your Lordships will permit me to say a word on the circumstances which have led up to the present situation. What is that situation? Within the last week or ten days, there have been published to the World the terms of the offer which has been made for the settlement of the Irish problem by His Majesty's Government to those persons who represent the majority of the population of that country. Nothing has been kept back. There is nothing of which your Lordships and, indeed, the whole world, so far as we are concerned, have not been informed, and this transaction, if it is permitted to go forward, as we all earnestly trust it may, is a transaction that will be conducted not only before the face of Great Britain and Ireland, but before the face of the British Dominions and the English-speaking population throughout the entire world. Therefore, one may say truthfully that we sit, so to speak, in a theatre, in which, in the stalls and in the pit, are ranged the whole of the subjects

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of His Majesty the King, in every part of the world.
As regards the terms of the offer, no one can say, nor has anyone been found to say, that they are not generous enough. The only criticism I have heard in any quarter— perhaps we may hear it to-day—is that they are too generous. Certainly, in framing them we have borne in mind the adage of the poet—
" Give all thou eanst; high Heaven rejects the lore
Of nicely-calculated less or more."
The Government have gone, in this respect, to the extreme limit of concession. They have given all, or rather offered all, that could be given or offered without compromising the safety of the realm, the sovereignty of the King and the unity of the Empire. Many British Governments might have given, or attempted to give, less, but I doubt whether, in the circumstances of the case, You would have found any Government, whatever its political complexion, which would have been disposed to give more.
Secondly, let us look at the moment at which this offer is made. We are all of us rather apt to exaggerate the circumstances in which we are placed. We are apt to talk of speeches as epoch-making speeches, whereas, in reality, they make no epoch at all, and are forgotten almost as soon as delivered. We are apt to talk about the psychological moment for doing this or that, whereas all moments for doing great things are in reality psychological. We are apt to talk about turning points in the history of nations. These are familiar and conventional exaggerations, and yet, I think, it would be no exaggeration to say that upon the manner in which this particular offer is received will depend, to a large extent, the future history, not only of Ireland but of this country. It is on this occasion a great emergency, a great crisis, and it may be a great landmark.
I have been in public life long enough now, in one House of Parliament or the other, to see a long series of attempts made to deal with this intractable Irish problem. I have seen Home Rule Bills, one after the other, introduced, rejected and finally passed. I have seen Irish Land Bills, many of them extremely liberal in character; I have seen Conventions set set up in Ireland to assist in the solution of this problem. Every variety of expedient and attempt has been made by a series
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of British Governments—I give no greater credit to one than to another—for the last half century, to solve this problem. I, believe that the bulk, I might say the whole of these attempts have been sincere. A few of them, notably, the Land legislation, have been successful. The remainder of them, the political attempts, have almost uniformly failed. Whether that has been due to the blunders on our side, as we are always told, or whether it has been due to some failure of receptivity on the other side, I do not pause to enquire. The fact remains that the two parties to the transaction have never been absolutely in contact at the same time and the right moment. When we have been willing, Ireland has not been ready; when Ireland has been willing, we were not prepared. Putting all that aside, taking our share of the blame, taking all the blame you like, can any one deny that here, at last, is offered a great act of renunciation, one may almost call it an act of sacrifice—anyhow, a very broad and liberal and notable concession for a proud country to make.
The third point that I would like to make about these proposals is this. None of us can fail to have been struck by the extraordinary, it would not be an exaggeration to say the unprecedented, unanimity of praise and support with which they have been received. In this country we are not unfamiliar with a type of journalism which daily directs its attacks upon the Government and. the policy of the Government, and yet, over the whole range of our Press, with one notable exception, I have seen scarcely any journal which has not given praise and encouragement to this offer. Extend our gaze beyond these shores, look at what is said in the Press of the Dominions. The Dominions are, of all people in the world, best qualified to judge of what Dominion status means, and the true character and scope of the offer that is now being made. A chorus comes from every land and population owning allegiance to His Majesty the King.
Take the foreign Press; not merely the Press of Europe, but, what is much more remarkable, the Press of America. No one who occupies my position can fail to admit that the task of the Foreign Secretary has, for years, been rendered anxious and difficult in so far as the United States are concerned, in the main, because the Irish question was unsolved. It has coloured, and darkened, and poisoned, the atom-

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sphere, at every stage. But amid the volume of Press notices, which it is my duty in the Foreign Office to read, which come from America in relation to Ireland, and which have caused me infinite anxiety and distress for years, I now find day after day telegrams appearing indicating precisely the same unanimity of tone to which I have referred.
I might quote fifty or a hundred of them, but I will merely quote a couple of sentences which indicate the tone, the novel tone, of opinion there. One paper considers—
Difference between full independence and Dominion status is not a real issue. Moral sentiment of the world will be against Ireland if Dominion offer is rejected. Cannot believe de Valera will take responsibility of refusing offer which satisfies full aspirations of Irish people.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Are these newspaper comments?
THE MARQUESS CURZON OF KEDLESTON: Yes. Another paper finds it"impossible to see more than theoretical difference between Lloyd George and de Valera." It describes the settlement as"best conceivable in this imperfect universe "—possibly a slight exaggeration—and while it attacks the British Government for past outrages it considers this an"honest attempt to bring about peace, and that refusal of Sinn Fein would be short sighted and dishonest." I will not multiply these evidences. I may stun up in a word by saying that I believe, with scarcely an exception (and I hope that exception will not be emphasised or aggravated here), these proposals have been received with satisfaction, with encouragement and with hope, in every part of the civilised world.
What are the omens? If we look at the speeches that are delivered at Dublin I should not like to pretend that I can be over sanguine. Hard things, harsh things, unfavourable things have been said, and I dare say will continue to be said, there. It may be that the spirit which animates those with whom we have to deal may turn out to be too stiff and uncompromising. I am both to build upon that; I am both to believe that, after mature reflection, that can be the case; and for this reason. Looking at the thing from its political aspect, it is difficult to believe that any body of responsible men will reject the particular form and quality of independence, of Dominion
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status, which is more than they have ever had the opportunity to gain. It would really be sacrificing the fruit in order to obtain the rind.
During the last two or three years, since the war was over, a good deal of my work has revolved around the question of endeavouring to set up, in one form or another, independent States—I am speaking of the European scene—and, recalling the condition of many of these States, I ask myself: Is it conceivable. that the representatives of Ireland, if they have, as no doubt they have, a genuine interest in her future, would reject the status of Canada, of Australia, of New Zealand, with all that it means and involves, and leads up to? Is it conceivable that they will reject that status in order to be like Finland or Esthonia, or Latvia or one of the smaller States that have acquired what on paper looks like real independence, but which, in value and status, is not to be compared with the political Constitutions to which I have referred?
Neither can I believe it possible that public opinion in Ireland, any more than here, will willingly consent to a resumption of that cruel, wicked, pitiful and disastrous form of civil war upon which we have been engaged during the last year in that country. It may be, of course, that circumstances will compel the resumption of that struggle. It will not be we who will voluntarily take it up, and if a revival of that issue is compelled, it is scarcely possible to believe that history will not visit with the severest condemnation those who are responsible for beginning again that which we have fortunately for the moment put aside.
Eliminating that, and looking at the case from the point of view of a political forecast as to the future, will these men in Ireland of whom I speak be so ill-advised as to think that, if they reject this offer, they are going to get thereby complete separation, or, if they get complete separation, that they are going to do good business for Ireland? As regards their obtaining complete separation, this country and this Empire stand like a rock, and we all of us know that in no circumstances would either we, or a Government composed of noble Lords opposite, or any Government that one can conceive in this country, take the step of granting complete independence, complete severance from this Kingdom and this Empire to Ireland.

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But let us suppose that these can be regarded as the polemical utterances of the hour—which they are not—is it to be believed that any responsible man in Ireland really conceives that, even were they to obtain complete severance from this country, they would gain thereby? What would it. mean? Infallibly it means civil war in Ireland itself. That would be the first stage and the second stage would be the ruin, political and economic, of Ireland herself. I decline, on this occasion at any rate, to contemplate any development so disastrous. I will only deal with it in one sentence in passing, and say that were we driven to contemplate any such alternative as I have described, we, that is the British Government—and I. am sure we speak here for the British nation—should accept the challenge, and we should not quail before the difficult task that might lie ahead of us.
I need not say much more, but I feel no apprehension myself as to what the general attitude of your Lordships will be in this matter. I have listened to many Irish debates here. There are many noble Lords in this House who speak with a singular knowledge of Ireland, and I have never, even in the days when Home Rule Bills were being dissected and rejected here, failed to notice in your Lordships' House a most kindly and sympathetic spirit in dealing with Irish conditions. A great many of the concessions that are involved in this offer which I am now discussing are concessions for which, a few months ago, noble Lords on that side and noble Lords for Ireland were pleading in your Lordships' House. I therefore speak with some confidence of the reception that they are likely to meet with in many quarters of this House. I would only say this in conclusion. The issue may be truly said to tremble in the balance. It may be affected by rash acts on either side. It may even be affected by rash words. It is for these reasons that, in the few remarks with which I have troubled your Lordships, I have endeavoured to refrain from anything like polemics, and to abstain from saying anything that might provoke controversy. I am sure that your Lordships will, all of you, be in favour of a similar spirit of restraint, and that nothing will be said here, and that you will resent anything if it be said, that is likely either to revive bitterness or to imperil the success for which we all hope.
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Moved to resolve, That the. House on its adjournment do adjourn for business to Tuesday the 18th of October, except that if it appears to the satisfaction of the Lord Chancellor that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time during such adjournment, the Lord Chancellor may give notice to the Peers that he is so satisfied, and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such Notice, and shall transact its business as if it had been duly adjourned to that time. — (The Marquess Curzon of Kedleston.)
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: My Lords, I have no opposition whatever to offer to the Motion of the noble Marquess. There is no man so disagreeable as the one who says:"I told you so," and therefore I do not want to dwell upon the fact that I ventured to prophesy that His Majesty's Government would not be able to prorogue at once, as they announced their firm and decided intention of doing. It. seemed evident to me that, in the Irish crisis, it was almost inconceivable that Parliament should rise altogether without the opportunity of its being summoned, apart from the formal opening of a new session. That is distinct, as the noble Marquess indicated, from the question whether some autumn session for business, which for all I know may yet be held, would not have been desirable in itself. I still hold the opinion that sonic of the measures which we have been considering, under hasty and uncomfortable conditions, would have had more reasonable treatment, and been subjected to useful discussion, if His Majesty's Government had consented to my Motion of August 2; but I need say nothing further about that.
The noble Marquess has taken the opportunity, which was well within his rights, of saying something definite, and most interesting to us, on the subject of Ireland, thereby anticipating to some extent the Question which the noble Marquess (Lord Salisbury) has placed on the Paper. I may perhaps venture to assume that that discussion will now proceed, and that the noble Marquess will be able to carry on the debate initiated by the Leader of the House, and in the course of it, to ask his Question. I can only say, for myself, that I find myself in practically, complete agreement with everything which fell from the noble Marquess. I have rejoiced, as so many have, at the step which His Majesty's Government have taken.

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If we had to be at all critical, at a time when one does not desire to be critical, some of us would say that the same step might have been taken earlier. As the noble Marquess said just now, it is more than a year since, on the Motion of Lord Monteagle, some of us pleaded for practically what His Majesty's Government are now offering to Ireland. It is true that at that time the suggestion did not receive the unanimous assent of noble Lords from the South of Ireland. It was not likely to be favoured by noble Lords from the North. For instance, I remember that Lord Dunraven, who has always been an advocate of the Federal solution, was not able to countenance the hopes expressed by Lord Monteagle and myself, among others; and there has no doubt been a distinct change of policy on the part of His Majesty's Government, of which, in my opinion, they have not the faintest reason to be ashamed.
I think I may fairly say that up till quite lately it was the policy of His Majesty's Government to fight it out, and to conquer the forces of disorder in Ireland through the police and the military forces. I particularly remember a speech made on May 6 of last year by the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, in which he expressed that determination with his usual vigour, and in considering the merit of the Government offer we have to remember that undoubtedly that could be. done. Nobody could say that it would not be possible, if this country put forth its whole strength, to conquer the South and West of Ireland completely, and to exterminate, if that became necessary in the course of reconquest, all those who have been fighting on behalf of the Irish Republic. But as we all know, that could only he done at an impossible. cost—not merely the cost of life, but it could hardly be done without cost of honour, and without outraging the consciences of the people of this country. To recur to the methods of the wars of religion in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is something beyond the possibility of belief, and yet, the temper of sonic of the Irish being what it is, it might be scarcely possible to carry through the complete subjection of the country without something of that kind.
I most heartily concur in one statement of the noble Marquess, and I only repeat what I said in the debate on Lord Mont-eagle's Motion—namely, that the notion of a separate Ireland, of an Irish Republic,
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is not a matter for consideration, cannot be a matter of consideration, by the Government or the people of this country. That. possibility must be altogether set aside, and the sooner it. is understood by those who are the spokesmen for the Irish Majority, that that is so, the better is the chance of a conclusion of negotiations. The noble Marquess spoke not exactly hopefully, but not hopelessly, of the prospects of a happy end to the Irish negotiations. I feel, too, that it would be altogether wrong to despair of a favourable issue, merely from what has been said, in itself unfavourable, in some quarters in Ireland.
It is difficult not to refer to the analogy of South Africa. After the South African War the prospect of a happy and united South African Dominion did not seem hopeful to many, and to some who hoped for it ultimately it appeared that the prospect must be very remote. The Government of which I was a member, in 1906. gave self-government to the two Dutch Colonies, which, as you are aware, four years later, resulted in the South African Union as we know it. There were many who greatly doubted the wisdom of our action. Anybody who cares to look back to the debates in another place and hens of that year, will see how freely heads were shaken over our action at that time.
If we bad not been permitted to do what we were able to do I think it is quite possible that you might have had an Irish situation in South Africa. Those who were disposed to make terms, like General Botha, General de la Rey, and General Smuts, would either have been outnumbered by the extremists, just as Mr. Redmond and his Party were outnumbered by the Irish extremists, or they might themselves have been driven by force of circumstances definitely to join the anti-British Party. If that had happened, and, if, during the late war, we had been obliged, instead of welcoming the noble assistance given us from South Africa, to keep a garrison there, in order to prevent the junction of the South African Dutch with German South West Africa, there would have been many to say:"How right we were to prevent this grant of freedom to the Dutch Colonies; their present action shows now what a much greater risk it would have been, because their power would have been greater, if we had allowed the Transvaal and the Orange Free State to receive self-

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government in 1906." I do not want to go back upon history, but I cannot but feel more than ever at this moment that chance after chance has been missed—in 1885, in 1892 and. since—because Home Rule for Ireland. has always been made a Party subject in this country, instead of the different Parties coining together and seeing what the necessary limitations of Irish self-government must be.
The noble Marquess behind me (Lord Salisbury) has placed a Question on the Paper. I say frankly that when I saw that Question on the Paper, and knew the noble Marquess's intention, I regretted it. Of all the 700 Peers—I think it must be something like that number in the long Roll of your Lordships' House—there is not one, I am sure, who acts more uniformly by the dictates of conscience than does the noble Marquess. But then one cannot help remembering that many of the most unfortunate things in all history, from the time of the Spanish Inquisition down to the time of the attempted coercion of the American Colonies, and on many occasions since, have been the results of a most fine and careful conscience. And I could not help wishing, therefore, that the noble Marquess had resisted the temptation to discuss from his point of view the Irish question before your Lordships' House rises.
But I do feel that the noble Marquess will respond in the most generous spirit to the appeal made to him by the noble Marquess opposite; that he will not, I am sure, say anything which can tend to exacerbate the feelings, which cannot as et have been altogether merged in the hopes of a new era in Irish politics, and that he will abstain—as I feel certain he will desire to do —from observations which, although in his opinion they must be just and fair, are likely to be in themselves provocative. I feel that the one motto which everybody ought to bear in mind at this critical moment, in dealing with Ireland, is"Patience, patience, patience "; that it is not merely useless to go back on old controversies, but it is also at this moment unwise to point out the undoubted difficulties, or, if you will, the undoubted defects attaching to any such proposals as those which His Majesty's Government have laid before the country. I cannot help feeling that at this moment the less said the better, and that there should be
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a complete abstention from anything in the nature of provocative argument.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY had on the Paper a Notice to call attention to the situation in Ireland, and to ask the Government whether, having regard to the profound dissatisfaction felt by many loyal subjects of His Majesty both in Great Britain and Ireland with the course of the Irish policy of the Government and to the position assumed by Mr. de Valera towards this country and to the Republican Oath of his followers, the Government propose to proceed further with the negotiations.
The noble Marquess said: My Lords, I am in the remarkable position of having had the answers to my speech delivered before the speech itself. That makes it rather difficult for me to do my duty, as I hope I shall do it, before your Lordships to-day. But let me say in the first place that I congratulate the noble Marquess that the Government have taken this last opportunity of making a statement to the country in respect of their Irish policy. I pressed for that statement very often. Your Lordships will forgive me if I say that I have little doubt that if some of us had not been so persistent there would not have been a statement even on this last day. But that is a small matter. We are thankful for what we have received.
The noble Marquess the Leader of the House made a sort of general appeal to the civilised world that they should approve of the policy of His Majesty's Government. No doubt they have the approval of the noble Marquess who sits behind me (Lord Crewe). That is not surprising; because they have, very late in the day, adopted the policy of the noble Marquess. But when I listened with attention to the citations which the noble Marquess the Leader of the House adduced in support of this claim, I was astonished that they petered out into a quotation from an anonymous newspaper. He need not look very far for a public comment upon the policy of His Majesty's Government. In this very place where we stand, in the ancient city of Westminster, there are two Conservative and (if I may use such a word) Unionist candidates before the constituency, and neither of them will defend the policy of His Majesty's Government—neither of them ! One of them absolutely repudiates it in its beginning and in its end. The other, although; he is not prepared to go so far as that, has nothing to say to the

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course of policy which has led up to this situation. He entirely dissociates himself from it. That is to say, that in asking for the confidence of one of the great constituencies of this country, no one can be found to defend the policy of His Majesty's Government.
I will not, especially after the appeal which has been made to me, go on to criticise in anything like detail the celebrated terms which the Prime Minister has offered to Mr. de Valera. I say that because I feel that no good purpose would be served if I did so, and that, indeed, I might do harm. Of course, I feel that. obligation upon me just as much as any of your Lordships whom I have the honour to address. But I must say this in reference to what has just fallen from the Leader of the House. When he speaks of these terms as being more generous—I think those were his words—than any other terms which have ever been offered to Ireland, it is a claim he might easily make. When he said it amounted even to sacrifice, what does he sacrifice? It is not, of course, anything personal to himself. I dare say he thinks that it is not very much of a sacrifice to his Government. What it is, then, is the sacrifice of the interests of this country. People are very glib in using such words as sacrifice, as if the obligation of self-sacrifice extends not merely to one's own individual belongings and interests, but that one has a right to sacrifice the interests of one's neighbours and the interests of the country to which one belongs. I cannot accept that as a defence of His Majesty's Government.
There is only one other observation that. I desire to make upon that passage in the noble Marquess's speech. In defending these terms, he said he could not believe that the Sinn Feiners would not accept a status which was good enough for Australia and New Zealand. I do not want to go into details, but that is a most ominous phrase, because the terms in the Prime Minister's letter are not the status of New Zealand and Australia, and it seems to me to be an intimation of a further advance upon the terms which have already been offered. We have a great responsibility in Parliament, and I plead this before your Lordships because we have in our charge the guidance of the judgment and the conscience of the people. It. is easy to say:"Let us say nothing about it. Let us pass the whole thing over in silence." It. is very easy to say that. That is the prim-
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rose path. The difficult thing is to nerve oneself to bring before the country the exact facts, in so far as they may be discreetly used, and to point out to the people of the country with what wisdom, or with what unwisdom, they are being governed. It is the condition of a democracy that they shall be told what has happened and what is happening; that they should be told what their Government is like, what is the record of their servants and whether they deserve their confidence. And though it is easy, of course, to leave all those things aside and to say nothing, yet we have a duty and an obligation to show to the country exactly what these Ministers have done.
For a long time the terms were secret. There was great reluctance to reveal them. I am not surprised ! When they were revealed I will venture to say they came with something like a shock upon a large number of people in this country. It is easy enough to deal in generalities. If he will allow me to say so, with great respect, the noble Marquess the Leader of the House is a master of eloquent generalities, and although, on the last occasion, the noble and learned Viscount upon the Woolsack used such phrases as:"The genuineness of the desire of this country for a real and permanent reconciliation "—as if that was in doubt in anybody's mind—arid spoke of how the Government had inflexibly adhered to those points which the vital interests and the safety of these islands required, I should have thought that inflexibility was the last qualification that he would have attributed to His Majesty's present Government.
What is their record, my Lords? The Act for the better government of Ireland was only passed last winter. I remember that the noble Marquess told us in a peroration that it held the field. How long did it hold the field? Nine months; after which its authors have torn it to pieces. What has become of all the safeguards which we debated at such length? What has become of the powers of the Lord-Lieutenant and of the Senate? I suppose all that has disappeared. What has become of the provision that Ireland was not to have a separate Army? That was contained in the Act of last year, and the Prime Minister, speaking on the Third Reading of the Government of Ireland Bill, said—
" We cannot consent to anything which will enable Ireland to organise an Army and a Navy of her own."

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He has consented. He has already consented—not to the Navy—that, no doubt, is to come—but he has already consented to the Army.
Then, your Lordships will remember that a great deal was made by the Government, in. constituting their Parliament in Ireland, in the safeguard of the Oath of Allegiance. We debated it at great length. Great questions arose in Committee as to whether the Oath of Allegiance—to His Majesty, I mean—could be looked upon as an effective safeguard, and the Government greatly relied upon it. They said:"We have set up a Parliament in Ireland, but it shall not function until it has taken the Oath of Allegiance to the. King." What has become of that? The Parliament has been set up; it is functioning, and it has taken an oath of allegiance—but not to the King! It has taken an oath of allegiance to the Irish Republic. And so finishes that safeguard.
How can the noble Marquess and his colleagues come to us with an appeal for confidence? Why should we trust them? I do not mean, of course, their honour; I am not speaking of that; but why should we trust their judgment? They have been uniformly wrong. They were, of course, Unionists originally—at least all those whom I am addressing. They have for a long time abandoned that faith. They produced the Government of Ireland Bill, and they have already torn it to shreds. It is not only in the sphere of legislation that they have been totally wrong, and that they have totally misled the country. And this is what I want, if I may, to press upon your Lordships. It is a high obligation upon British statesmen not to mislead the judgment of the country.
What have His Majesty's Ministers done? There was a speech by the Prime Minister ar Carnarvon, on October 9, 1920, in which he said—
" A small body of assassins, a real murder gang, are dominating the country and tyrannising it. It is essential that that gang should be broken up, and, unless I am mistaken, we shall do it. We are not going to quail before a combination of e, handful of assassins in any part of the British Empire."
I really think that comment upon that is needless. That is exactly what the Government have done. The Government have allowed this action to be forced upon them by an organised campaign of assassination. That is not treating the country fairly.
The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has made a great many speeches on this subject, and there was a very notable speech that, he made in answer to my noble friend (Lord Donoughmore) quite recently, in June of this year. This is what he said—
" It is unfortunately the fact that a very great number of the members of Dail Eireann at this moment, if they do not actually belong to the class known as gunmen, undoubtedly belong to a class that is steeped to the lips in the express policy of assassination."
Then, turning to my noble friend, he said—
" It is perfectly obvious then that the noble Earl could not go to any representative of Dail Eireann."
The noble Earl, apparently, could not go, but His Majesty's Government have done so. This is exactly what they have done. although my noble friend most obviously, in the Lord Chancellor's opinion, was debarred from going to Dail Eireann because of their connection with the policy of assassination. Yet that is exactly what the great Government of England, His Majesty's Government, have done.
I hope I am not wearying the House with these extracts, because I have one or two more that I should like to quote. The Prime Minister, in February of this year, made a speech upon the Address. I am not going to read a long extract, but he said—
" After consulting those who are responsible for order in Ireland, and who are personally interested in putting an end to all this murder in Ireland, because they run very great personal risks—every one of them themselves have strongly urged that we should agree to no truce, except upon the express condition that arms should be surrendered. I think the House of Commons will agree that that was a wise decision."
Yet the Government are negotiating, although these Irishmen retain their arms. That was a most formidable decision, because if you negotiate with a body of men who retain their arms—I will not use any harsh language—if you negotiate terms of extreme concession with men with arms in their hands, that is equivalent to a confession of defeat. It makes all the difference in the world whether those with whom you are negotiating retain their arms or not. The Prime Minister went on to develop his attitude, and to show how important it was, before anything was done, that there should be a surrender of arms.
There is, finally, an extract which, if your Lordships will forgive me, I must make

1015
from the speech of the noble and learned Viscount, because it really sums up the position. This is what the noble and learned Viscount said in August of last year, and I draw your Lordships' attention particularly to this extract—
" My Lords, I speak quite plainly when I say that in my judgment our capacity to maintain the security and integrity of this Empire, and therefore our capacity to retain all the glory, all the security, all the material advantage of which this Treaty affords us a prospect—
I think he meant the Peace Treaty—
" all this will be lost if we are unable to make it plain that we are the masters of our own house in Ireland, and that we will again restore and make effective the King's Courts, and that we will bring murderers and assassins to justice."
The noble and learned Viscount said that the safety of our Empire depended upon restoring the authority of the King in his Courts throughout Ireland, and bringing those he termed"murderers and assassins"to justice. But the King's Courts do not function at all in Ireland now. Perhaps that is overstating it. I will amend the phrase and say that the King's Courts do not function at all over the greater part of Ireland, and that murderers and assassins, or their representatives, are received in Downing Street.
I have a great regard, if he will allow me to say so, for the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack. I cannot but believe that the extracts that I have read reveal his true mind. I am sure he was saying that which he thought was true when he made those statements. It would. be impertinent for me to attempt to pry into the secrets of the Cabinet room, but I cannot help believing that if the conduct of affairs had been in the hands of the noble and learned Viscount, and other members of the Cabinet who agreed with him, a very different course would have been pursued, and a very different history would have to be related.
Let me say again that the fact that the Government made these statements, and that they have not made them good, and that the noble Marquess standing at that box just now had. no apology to make for this deplorable misjudgment, this deplorable mis-direction of the public mind, has a profoundly demoralising effect. How can you expect the people to know what the truth is if their leaders, if their representatives in the Government, tell them these things with emphasis over
1016
and over again, and then, without a word of explanation, tear them to pieces, and in general phrases, like those used by the noble Marquess just now, defend a policy absolutely inconsistent with every word they previously uttered? How can you explain to people that the execution of Nurse Cavell was an outrage, and that her monument should be put up in Trafalgar Square as a testimony for all time that such things were beyond forgiveness, and then leave the murderers of Mrs. Lindsay at large, nay, to shake them by the hand, and negotiate with them? How can you expect the people to arrive at a just conclusion between right and wrong, if you expose them to contradictions. such as I have described?
My Lords, depend upon it, these things are more important than any of your policies. The great thing is to impress upon the minds of the people the sincerity of their Government, to get them to realise, and to know, that there are certain things which a Government will plead for and defend, in regard to which they would rather disappear, as a Government, than give way. With an almost cynical lightness.they sweep aside all these maxims which they have enjoined, all these examples which they have set. Then you have a profound demoralisation of the public mind. The people get to believe that there is no sincerity in public life, that all statesmen, of one Party or another, are to be condemned with the same condemnation.
That is my excuse for my speech. We must tell the people the facts. We must tell the people how they are being governed. We must tell the people what confidence they ought to give to their leaders, the Ministers of the Crown. I do not mean to say that if the Government disappeared to-morrow a wholly different policy could be pursued. Alas ! much of what they have done is irremediable. It is the tragedy of politics that a Government can, in the course of its life, by good administration, do a little good, and, by had administration, an infinity of harm. I admit, because it would be un candid not to admit, that there is no going back from a great deal of what the Government have done, but that makes their responsibility all the greater, that makes the answer which they will have to make to the electors of this country some day, all the more difficult.
I leave the past, and I have one word or two—I am sorry to have detained your Lordships so long—to say of the future. What further concessions are going to be made, if, indeed, they are to be made, I shall not inquire; but there are two points which I would certainly like to bring before your Lordships' notice, one positive and the other negative. I should like to know what, in any arrangement to which the Government can come, they propose to do in order to protect the interests of the loyalists in Ireland? I have a profound feeling for the loyalists of Ireland. I do not know what can be done for them, for I am not in the secret; I am not behind the scenes. But something can be done out of Ireland. Have the Government considered what can be done in giving them terms of migration from the disaffected areas?
I had the other day a pathetic letter addressed to me in the name of the ex-Service men resident in Ireland—that is to say, those men who fought and shed their blood for our country in the late war, and who are.Irishmen, glorious Irishmen. They wrote to me, and said: If we are left under a Sinn Fein Government., our future is obvious. We have served the hated Englishman." Are the Government going to leave the ex-Service men at the mercy of their enemies? I do not want to use extreme language, but it. may very likely be —I earnestly hope it will be—that a wholly different spirit will come over Irish feeling after these terms, or anything like them, are carried into effect; and it may be that the new rulers in Ireland will turn over a completely new leaf. Let us hope, please God, it may be so. But have the Government any right to run any risk? Here are these ex-Service men, and other loyalists too, but especially the ex-Service men because they wore the King's uniform, who ask" Can nothing be done to save us?.. I said,"When the time comes I will do my utmost "—as I am doing this afternoon. That is the positive question.
Then comes the negative question. I was glad to hear what the noble Marquess the Leader of the House said about the claim of Ireland for separation, and the noble Marquess behind me reiterated it. The noble Marquess opposite said it was a rock. How many rocks have there not been on which the Government have founded their policy which turned out to be nothing more than sand? But I do
1018
I believe that they will not give way upon that. Yet what hope have they, if that be so, that they will come to terms with the followers of Mr. de Valera?—because he has left no doubt about his view of the situation. He has said in the first place:"We cannot, and we will not, on behalf of this nation, accept these terms." That is how he has dealt with the terms.
How has he dealt with the Army?
" We do not mean to be helpless. We mean to, arm ourselves to the utmost of our power that we may be able to resist to the utmost of our power."
On the question of secession he said:
"We are not claiming any right to secede, because there never can be, in the case of Ireland, a question of secession; there never has been union."
He claims absolute separation, and that is confirmed in the most solemn manner by all the members of Dail Eireann. This is what they said:
" I do further swear that to the best of my knowledge and ability I will support and defend the Trish Republic and the Government of the Irish Republic, which is Dail Eireann, against all enemies foreign and domestic, and I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same."
That is the oath they have sworn before God.
Are the Government not satisfied? Is there anything more? I do not ask them to break off the negotiations. I am not in their confidence; I do not know their secrets; I do not know the condition of things in Ireland. I do not know their resources, and I cannot, of course, any more, than any of your Lordships, accept any responsibility for them. But I say this: that. they are still the Government of this country and while they remain so I earnestly hope that they will, even at this eleventh hour, remember their duty and will not allow the fair name and fair fame of this country any longer to be dragged in the mire.
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: My Lords, if there is going to be no debate on my. noble friend's Question this is not the moment that I feel it consistent with my duty to keep silent. I shall trouble your Lordships for a few moments only, but there are certain things that I should not consider myself honourable if I did not say from my place to-day. I wish, in the first place, to associate myself completely with all that has fallen from the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury. I think, whether your Lordships agree with what he has said or disagree, you will feel that it was a very notable utterance. I do

1019
not want to touch exactly on the same aspects of the case as he did, but there are certain other matters to which I would refer.
It does not seem to me to be possible to apply the word"rational," in the sense in which that word is generally used amongst civilised people, to the frame of mind of those with whom His Majesty's Government are negotiating in Ireland at this moment. Just think what that attitude is. Mr. de Valera ignores geography and discards all history, except that which suits his own argument. He does not seem to be aware that there is another side to the case. The welfare and safety of Ireland is to be the sole consideration of Irishmen, but the welfare and safety of England is not a matter for consideration by Irishmen at all. In fact, I do not think I should be saying more than the lessons of history teach if I said that moderate counsels, as understood in England, have very seldom any weight in Ireland.
The counsels which have weight are those of the extreme men. The great misfortune, the tragedy of the moment, is that now, as so often before, the extreme men are the gunmen. I know that the authors of the Government of Ireland Act, 1914, believe that if that Act had been in operation when war broke out all would now be well and that we should have been spared the tragedy of the intervening years. I do not believe anything whatever of the kind. I believe if that Act had been in operation, if the gunmen, in the last resort, had the same influence they have now, that they would have taken an opportunity during the war of giving the Empire a far worse stab in the back than they were able to do under the existing circumstances.
The ruling sentiment—and this is what England must remember, however terrible is the thought—the ruling sentiment of the gunmen is not love of Ireland but hatred of England, and it is in the light of that fact, in the light of the influence that these men wield at the present moment., that I feel it my absolute duty to examine the proposals of the Government. I have nothing to say merely against a rebel. If a man thinks his cause sufficiently good, if he has weighed the terrific responsibilities and is willing to take his life in his hands, I say that man often has been, and may be, an honourable man, and one with whom any Government might wisely negotiate. But the question I should not like to answer,
1020
if I were the Government, is—Are they negotiating with rebels or with assassins? Among those with whom they are negotiating, who are those who have the last word and supreme influence—the men who are only rebels, or the, men who are chiefly assassins?
At this supreme moment it is not possible to forget the policy which has led up to this tremendous crisis. The present Government have a responsibility for four and a half years, beginning with the fateful régime of Mr. Duke. I do not think it is possible to exaggerate, nor ought we to forget, the enormous mischief done during the period of office of Mr. Duke as Chief Secretary, a policy which was defended time after time, in the face of the gravest warnings, by the noble Marquess opposite. I am one of the severest critics of the régime, of Mr. Birrell, and we all know how that ended. But the responsibility of Mr. Duke is even greater, arid the responsibility of the Government who supported him is greater because they had before them the example of what the régime of Mr. Birrell had led up to.
Yet it was during those two years, when apparently there was no attempt to govern Ireland, that the Sinn Feiners were allowed to perfect that organisation which has enabled them to put up this tremendous fight in Ireland during the past two years. Then followed that vacillating policy, which is the actual trademark or hallmark of a Coalition Government. Never has there been one consistent policy throughout. Releases to-day, reprisals to-morrow; one day the Prime Minister purred, and another day he roared. The consequence is that the Irish of all shades of opinion have lost all faith in the consistent policy of any Government.
And now the Government make this offer, to certain of the terms of which I most strongly object, and I wish here to-day, in my responsibility as a Peer, to state to what I object, why I object, and upon what experience I base my objection. In the first place. I say that, in my judgment, it is wholly inconsistent with the safety and welfare of the Empire, or of England, that there should be a Sinn Fein Army in Ireland. It is not consistent with our national safety that there should be an Army in the United Kingdom not under the exclusive command of the Imperial Government. I utter my most solemn protest against this wholly unex-

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petted feature of the terms offered. I have been told by friends of mine, again and again, in the last three months, that I should see the Government take this step and offer Sinn Fein an Army. I always said it was impossible. I did not believe that there was any Government, even a Labour Government, that would ever appear before Parliament or before the world and offer a Sinn Fein Army to a Sinn Fein Parliament.
The second point upon which I wish to protest—and here I cut myself altogether adrift from the line of my noble friends, Lord Crewe and Lord Midleton—is this: I believe you are leading up to a tremendous disaster in the future by establishing within these two islands two different sets of Custom Houses. I do not believe that is possible without consequences in the future quite as grave as any that have happened in this horrible tragedy between England and Ireland in the past. You may, by your concessions now, if these are accepted, have a lull in this terrible struggle, but you are laying up nothing but a damnosa hereditas for our descendants. I have had experience in this matter.
Lord Crewe asked your Lordships to remember what had happened in South Africa, and he drew his moral. Let me draw another moral. Why was it that, after self-government had been granted to the Transvaal and to the Orange Free State, the Union of South Africa was brought about within three years? I was right in the middle of those negotiations, and I did all I could to help in bringing then to a successful conclusion. There was only one reason for the Union of South Africa, and it was this: the statesmen of all the four Colonies, statesmen of both races, Boer and British, saw that, if they did not have a Union, there would be civil war. This civil war would arise from two forces only; it would be a war of railway rates and a war of Customs. That is exactly the element of future strife, of bitter strife, that you are introducing between Ireland of the future and Great Britain of the future. After all, in the old days, if my history serves me aright, in the days before the Union, what was the greatest grievance Ireland had? It was the way she was treated by the British Parliament in connection with Customs. That is the whole material for a future strife as terrible as that which we all now deplore. I need nor, tell your Lordships that I desire to see an end of this age-long strife as much
1022
as any human being in this House, or outside it. But it is because I do not believe that this is the way really to end that strife, because I believe that two Armies in the United Kingdom, two Custom Houses in the United Kingdom, are the way to discord and not the way to peace, that I ask leave to-day to record my protest.
In this moment there are only two bright lights in this sombre picture. The first—and for this I thank His Majesty's Government—is that the six counties of Ulster are now secure from the vagaries of Party Government at Westminster. They have their own Constitution and can work out their own safety. But have your Lordships noticed that, in exactly the quarters from which you would expect, it is already being pointed out that, if these negotiations fail, the real fault does not rest with Mr. de Valera or with his friends, but with the Lord Chancellor, with Lord Carson and with Sir James Craig? We have already been told that the true enemies of all well-disposed people are the Ulster Unionists. In the day, of our anguish the Ulster Unionists stood by us, as our friends; the friends of Mr. de Valera stabbed us in the back. And vet the former are already being held up by a certain section of opinion as the enemies of England, and the latter are the subject of all admiration, respect. and assistance.
I do not think it would he possible to pervert morality more than it is perverted in the minds of these men, who adjure us to betray our friends and to give everything to our enemies. I hope it will be remembered that these things are very often written in the newspapers by men Who are themselves Sinn Feiners, and that sentiment, of course, is a natural one from a Sinn Feiner. But in so far as they arc written by Englishmen, I say that they add gross hypocrisy to moral perversity, because there is not any Englishman, of whatever political opinion, who would himself willingly live under a Sinn Fein Government.
The second bright spot is the record of the British Army in Ireland during the past two years. I do not think it is possible to speak about that without emotion, and I have no words at my command sufficient to express my admiration. I am not going to allude to what I believe to be the fact, that they have inflicted tremendous punishment in fair fight upon the Irish Republican Army. But I do speak of their wonderful, their never-failing courage and their never-failing devotion to duty in the

1023
most trying and terrible circumstances, circumstances far worse than any in the trenches of Flanders or in any field of warfare.
Ask any soldier who has served in the Great War and in Ireland which of those experiences he would prefer to pass through again, and he will always tell you that any experience in Flanders was better than his experiences in Ireland, and yet they have served through all this, as I have already said, with the most wonderful courage and devotion, and, above all, with the most magnificent and unfailing discipline. Under the utmost provocation they have never been inhumane, have never got out of hand, and have shown a forbearance which even the greatest admirer of the British soldier could not have believed to be possible. I should have thought myself wrong if I had not, on this occasion, made my protest against certain aspects of the policy of the Government, and expressed my utter dissent from the whole of their policy during the last four and a half years, and if I had not said what I thought about the record of the British Army in Ireland.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (THE EARL OF CRAWFORD):My Lords, may I intervene and say a word as to our arrangements for this afternoon? Several Peers desire to speak, and I am inclined to think that probably it would be most convenient if I now moved the adjournment of the debate on Lord Curzon's Motion, that we should then adjourn for three-quarters of an hour, but that, before we adjourn, we take two formal stages which I will mention in a moment, in order to send Messages to another place, and that upon meeting after the adjournment the debate on Lord Curzon's Motion be resumed. Is that convenient?
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I think so. I presume the noble Earl refers to the Irish Railway Bill.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: No; that will take some time. I referred to the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill, in which it is intended to insert a drafting Amendment, and to the Commons Amendment to the Lords Amendment to the Railways Bill.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: We have been discussing Lord Salisbury's Question, but do I understand that he is not going to ask it? If the debate is going
1024
to take place, there are words in Lord Salisbury's Question upon which I wish to comment.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I am in your Lordships' hands. Of course, the Motion of the Leader of the House took precedence over my Question, and it was therefore impossible for me formally to ask it. As soon as the Motion has been disposed of, I will put the Question, or if it is desired I will put it now, or perhaps your Lordships will take it that I put the Question in the course of my speech.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: I think the House understood that Lord Salisbury put his Question when he made his statement on Lord Curzon's Motion. I beg to move that the debate be now adjourned.
Moved. That the debate be now adjourned.—( The Earl of Crawford.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and debate adjourned accordingly.
[For continuation of debate, see col. 1026 et seq.]

RAILWAYS BILL.
Message from the Commons: That the Commons agree to the Amendments made by the Lords to the Railways Bill without amendment and have made a consequential Amendment to the Bill to which they desire the agreement of the Lords.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I beg to move that the Commons Amendment be now considered.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I can explain in two minutes the effect of the Amendment, which, although verbal and small, is not purely drafting. In Clause 3 of the Bill the Great Western Railway Company is made into a new company, and it is authorised to create new stock and to allocate that stock among the stockholders of the new company, but if the whole is allocated, there is nothing left for the constituent companies, and therefore, consequent upon accepting one of your Lordships' Amendments, the Commons propose to omit the word"the," and so power is given, instead of raising"the "

1025 Auturin
additional capital, to raise additional capital. I therefore beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons Amendment.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion a geed to.

EXPIRING LAWS (CONTINUANCE) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD HYLTON: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Hylton.)
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived:
Then (Standing.Orde r No. XXXIX having been suspended), Bill read 3a
LORD HILTON: My Lords, I have a purely drafting Amendment to move, in the Schedule, page 8, lines 32 and 33, third column, to leave out"and twelve"and insert,"twelve, thirteen and fourteen."
Amendment moved—
Schedule, Part IV, page 8, lines 32 and 33, leave out ("and twelve ") and insert (" twelve, thirteen and fourteen ") —(Lord Hylton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.
Bill subsequently returned from the Commons, with the Amendment, agreed to.

SUPREME COURT OFFICERS (RETIREMENT, PENSIONS, ETC.) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT BIRKENHEAD): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be given a Second Reading. It is a purely Departmental Bill.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2a; Committee negatived:
Then (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended), Bill read 3a, and passed.
[The sitting was suspended at ten minutes before suspended at ten minutes before two o'clock until half past two.]

AUTUMN RECESS.
RESUMED DEBATE ON IRISH NEGOTIATIONS.
Debate on the adjournment Motion, made by the Marquess CURZON of KEDLESTON, resumed (according to Order).
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, I wish to trespass on your Lordships' time for two or three minutes only in order to make a couple of points which, if they have been referred to, have not, I think, been fully developed. I quite appreciate that whilst we are discussing the Motion of the noble Marquess who leads the House, we are taking the debate on the Question which is later on the Paper standing in the name of my noble friend, Lord Salisbury, and I notice at once that in the Question he asks whether the Government propose to proceed further with the negotiations which they have initiated. The noble Marquess, of course, had made his position perfectly plain before this afternoon, in the short conversation which took place last night, and I am sure he will not be surprised to hear that, in one way or another, I have had a number of communications from people living in the neighbourhood of my home in the South of Ireland as regards the noble Marquess's attitude—communications couched, of course, in perfectly respectful language, as my neighbours realise fully what the noble Marquess's position is.
But, curiously enough, I have had several communications in almost the same words, all saying:"If only Lord Salisbury would come over and see us, we believe we could bring home to him, in a way that probably no non-Irishman can understand, the awful times we went through during the three months before the present truce; and we believe we could persuade him, at any rate, to do nothing at present that would in any way put us in danger of a return of those times." And there is no doubt still a belief there that if the negotiations quickly broke down now those times would come back, possibly even in greater intensity, though the intensity was very great, I can assure your Lordships, during the months of May and June.
I am glad, therefore, to note that though the Notice of my noble friend does suggest, though it does not actually say so in words, that these negotiations should be terminated, in his speech I do not think the noble Marquess laid such stress on that point as I was afraid he might, and I am very glad of it. The noble Marquess, of

1027
course, attacks the Government for changing their policy, and it is for that very reason that, had there been a Division this afternoon, I expect I should have been able to vote with them. But I am glad there is no Motion, because one appreciates that the negotiations are not yet dead, and though the position is very delicate, one's first impulse is to say nothing as regards the terms that have been offered. That is impossible, however, and one must do so, though I hope to do so in very few words and. with the same caution that has already been shown in the debate.
The terms offered do go very far beyond anything that His Majesty's Government have offered before. To that extent I welcome them, and as the noble Marquess the Leader of the House pointed out, they meet many points that we have advocated from this Table and against which His Majesty's Government have argued equally powerfully. I thank them for changing their attitude.I say, with the, noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition, that I am sorry this attitude was not undertaken earlier, and I hope that the. optimistic view of the Leader of the House, that one moment is not really much more important than another, will be borne out in this case, though I confess I have rather thought the opposite, and that, in Ireland especially, we must strike while the iron is hot.
I do not comment on the terms in detail because there is so much in them that I welcome. There is one point for which, I confess with Lord Selborne, I am sorry. I am sorry that power is to be given to the Irish Parliament to have what I will call their own Militia. I say that for another reason than that expressed by Lord Selborne. In making the Militia a local force I think you are going to lose a very valuable Imperial asset. Like so many of your Lordships, I had the privilege of serving for a short time in the Irish Militia, and, in so doing, one was a member of an Imperial Army, a member of a battalion of a distinguished Irish regiment which had served all over the world; we were officers in the British Army. I think it would be a great pity if, in the future, the Irish people lose that privilege—and I call it a privilege in every sense of the term.
There is another danger that I foresee. I presume that this offer of a local Militia mill not only be made to the Southern Parliament; I presume that it will be made
1028
to the Northern Parliament also. I think it will be a pity, if not a danger, if the two Parliaments in Ireland are allowed to stand facing each other in defiance, each with its own force. It would be very much better that the force in the country should continue to be an Imperial force, and I confess that in my recollection of old Home Rule controversies I do not remember any very great stress being laid on the desire of transferring a force like the Militia to the local Parliaments. For the reasons I have stated, I am sorry that the subject appears in the present offer.
I should. also like to mention another point, more for the purpose of making my position clear than for any other reason. I do not think your Lordships all realise, perhaps, what I certainly claim—that there will be a far greater desire in the minds of people in Ireland for 'the maintenance of the Imperial connection than the circumstances of the moment make evident. Most opinions in Ireland are now inarticulate, but I hold strongly that the maintenance of the Imperial connection is not only necessary for reasons that have been referred to this afternoon, but- for the sake of Ireland herself. I will not elaborate the point, but we have, as members of the British Empire, privileges in Ireland which a great many more people value than any returns at Elections show. I was sorry, therefore, to hear the question asked by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, whether His Majesty's Government had in mind"terms of migration," I think he said, for loyalists.
He spoke of the ex-Service men and of the difficulties with which they meet in Ireland at the moment. Those difficulties I do not minimise; they are great, but I sincerely hope they can be dealt with in Ireland itself and not by migration, because I have no use for any loyalist whose mind is set on deserting Ireland in her hour of trial. We do not want facilities for migration. We may be turned out, but at present for Heaven's sake let us make up our minds to stay at home and do out best, claiming that we have, as is the fact, the same affection for our country as ally Republican or any Home Ruler. I sincerely hope that His Majesty's Government are not contemplating a large scheme which will enable loyalists to leave Ireland.
There is only one other point that I wish to make. If we welcome the terms that His Majesty's Government have at last published, it must not be thought that we

1029
welcome the way in which His Majesty's Government have published them. But, as I have said, I believe now that there is a majority in Ireland, a vast but inarticulate majority for reasons that I need not elaborate, who would prefer the Imperial connection. But there is no method in which they can express their view. What we have asked the Government all along, and what they have absolutely refused to do, is to mould their policy so as to build up public opinion in Ireland on their side. The advice has been rejected, and, of course, we do net complain. It is the Government's responsibility and not ours.
But what happened? The Government terms have been published after being kept secret until, at any rate, they had received a preliminary rejection from those to whom they were communicated. To whom were they communicated? They were communicated to those most likely in all Ireland. to reject them. Public opinion, therefore, has had no chance—no big enough chance yet—of gathering itself up behind them. No one knows what will happen in the immediate future in the negotiations. Before I sit down I desire to express a hope that there will he no full stop; that there will be no cutting off of the offer by His Majesty's Government; no withdrawal of it until public opinion has had a full chance of realising what the offer is and of organising itself behind it.
That, cannot be done in a. few days in the present circumstances in Ireland. I reecho as warmly as I call the expression of the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition. What we want is patience, patience, patience. It is our only hope. But there is something that His Majesty's Government can do. As has been said before in the course of debate this afternoon, your Act of last year. blocks the way. and although I do not for one moment question that His Majesty's Government are in earnest in announcing the new terms, which I presume, when we come to consider them here, will take the form of an amendment to the Act of last year, the Act being on the Statute Book, I hope His Majesty's Government will make no secret of the fact that they are losing no time in drafting the Bill which will amend the Act of last year.
You may even come to this. You may get a settlement in Ireland by passing your amendments into law, even before you have got a formal agreement from those to whom you have now submitted the terms. I admit it will be almost a last
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straw at which to clutch, but 'that last straw may save my country. For that reason, I hope I am not going beyond my duty in suggesting that time may become the essence of the position, and that if His Majesty's Government have their proposals in legislative form they may get more support for them than they receive even in the important form in which they have been laid on the Table of this House.
LORD HEMPHILL: My Lords, as one of the few members of this House who protested. against the present Act for the Government of Ireland, I desire to say a few words. I and my family before me have been consistent advocates of a broad policy of national Government for Ireland, a position somewhat different to that occupied. by most of the noble Lords who have spoken. in this and other debates. I venture to congratulate His Majesty's Government on their courage in putting forward a proposal which, at all events, is a basis for negotiations and which, for the first time, lays before the Irish people a definite proposition for a settlement. I should advise my friends in Ireland to hesitate for a long time before they reject these proposals. There are, I think, a large number of people in that country who are thinking, no doubt, that some of these proposals will have to be modified, but no useful purpose would be served at the moment by discussing what those modifications should be.
Many people who belong to what has often been referred to in this House as the moderate opinion in Ireland have desired that His Majesty's Government should place a definite proposition before the country. His Majesty's Government have done so, but, unfortunately, like all English measures of reform, it has been delayed almost too long. It is an unfortunate characteristic of the English race, I think, that they require a great deal of shoving and pricking and urging before they come down to a definite basis of what is the right policy. In no case, I venture to say, has that phase of the British character been more emphasised than in dealing with Ireland. I do not wish to detain your Lordships at any length, but I deplore to some extent the speeches which have been made by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, and the noble Earl, Lord Selborne. I confess I agree with the noble Earl who has just sat down that they were comparatively moderate in their senti-

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ments, and I fancy that if the speeches had. been made some time earlier they would have been more strenuous and more violent. But even moderate as they are, they represent an intransigient attitude. All the world has changed since the war, but the noble Lords, and the very few friends behind them, have not changed in their attitude. They live in the past, and not in the present. I think that a policy such as theirs, a policy which never concedes anything, never learns anything, and never forgives anything, cannot be a successful policy.
We want peace in Ireland, and we want peace in England. The policy of the noble Lords will never arrive at that. We want to do what we have been told to do—forget and forgive. The Irish people have much to forget and much to forgive, and English people probably have the same. The position in Ireland at the present moment is a very difficult one. The Dail Eireann, which is now sitting in Ireland to consider what answer will be given to the British Cabinet, is sitting under peculiar difficulties. Most of the members of the Dail Eireann have recently come out of gaol. Some of them have been released from prison after having been sent there on heavy sentences by Court-Martial. Others were awaiting trial, and many of their relations and friends, have been shot. I need not say that I am not a Sinn Feiner, and I do not support the policy of the Sinn Fein Party, but many of their friends and relations have been, as they think, wrongfully and illegally shot. What you have to consider is not altogether the opinion of your Lordships—probably that opinion is a much sounder and a much wiser opinion—but that you are dealing now with Irish opinion, and that there is a great difficulty in the Dail Eireann arriving at a decision which will be an entirely satisfactory decision. For that reason, I would venture to join in the plea which the noble Earl, Lord Donoughmore, made a short time ago, that this question should not be decided hastily, but that plenty of time should be given to consider whether they will accept or reject the proposal that has been made to them.
It was said by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, that this represented a defeat of the Government policy, and, in a subsequent sentence, he said there was no going back. Too many of us in Ireland
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will thoroughly agree with what the noble Marquess says. It is a defeat of the policy of the Government. I have heard many noble Lords who, more or less, represent Liberal views, saying that this represents a defeat of the Government policy. If it is, surely it is no discredit to acknowledge that your policy has been wrong? Least of all can the noble Marquess and the noble Earl accuse the Government, because they, in every debate in this House, have urged the Government forward in their policy of repression and tyranny, such as has prevailed in Ireland for the last two and a half years. It has been said that they have not been to Ireland lately. I do not think they have. If they lived in Ireland, and if they knew the conditions under which the ordinary people have had to live in Ireland, they would not take quite the same view as that which they have expressed this afternoon.
Surely there can be no going back. We are not going back to shooting men on every possible occasion. We are not going back to a terrible policy, an unjustifiable policy, of assassination. Surely no remark the noble Marquess made is more true than that there can be no going back. We cannot go back to the state of affairs which has existed until quite recently. I think the majority of Irishmen will agree with the noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, when he said that one question it was not possible to consider was the question of a Republic, and the total separation of Ireland from England. I think there are very few Irishmen who would, in course of time, support the view that Ireland should be an independent Republic. There may be many Irishmen at the present moment, who, from their hatred of England, due to the misgovernment of the country during the last few years, have again and again said that the only way to obtain peace in Ireland is to have a Republic. But I would like to point out to your Lordships that that opinion, which may temporarily prevail in Ireland, is one which has grown up only within the last year or two, and that previous to the Irish Rebellion there was no large number of people —there might have been five thousand, but I should say it was improbable there were so many as ten thousand—who were openly declared advocates of a Republic in Ireland. I do not believe that the declaration of policy with regard to a Republic, which is of such recent creation, can be a permanent one, and a fixed one, in the Irish

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mind. The policy which we have to observe is to forget and forgive—forget and forgive on both sides.
THE EARL OF MAYO: My Lords, I did not intend to say anything on this subject, but there are words at the end of the Question of the noble Marquess which cause me to make a few remarks. The noble Marquess asked if the Government proposed to proceed further with the negotiations. I hope they will. We have got the proposal now in black and white, and as plain as possible, and it is no good the noble Marquess, although his speech was really moderate, saying that the noble Marquess the Leader of the House is a master of generalities. There are no generalities in the Paper which I hold in my hand. There is the status of Dominion Government clearly and definitely stated. That is what the Government have put. before the country, what the Government have to stand by, and what, I think, we in Ireland are prepared to accept fully, with certain conditions. One condition that I should like to mention is this—that the safeguards which were put into the Government of Ireland Bill with regard to a Second Chamber should be carried out as far as possible in the arrangements that are made when this matter comes to be put before Parliament, and eventually, I suppose, goes upon the Statute Book. I consider that a Second Chamber is absolutely essential for Ireland. The more Moderate people state—I call them loyalists, because they are loyalists—that they must have a say in the government of their country, as they had a say in the Convention, and, on many points, agreed with the more advanced opinions.
Haying said that, I should like to refer to what the noble Marquess the Leader of the House said. He said that Land legislation was successful. The word"land"is mentioned in the Paper which I hold in my hand, and I must draw the attention of the Government to one fact. It is this. There are about £25,000,000 owing to those tenants and landowners who have signed agreements, and those agreements have not been carried out. I hope it will be borne in mind that that money is owed by the Government, and if there is one thing we fight about in Ireland, it is land. Whether it be turf bog or green fields, that is the one thing we fight about. And when there is whisky in the Irishman's stomach he fights still more about it, and more bitterly.
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I have always pressed that upon this House and the Government, and I consider it a most serious question which must be dealt with.
I would now say something about a very delicate question. I will deal with it as delicately as I possibly can. The noble Marquess complained of the great danger if Ireland were to be given a right to raise its own Army. It has been pointed out to me by a very wise legal authority that supposing they were to raise their own Army, it would be quite easy for them to have a secret Army. The Germans have had that in the form of what they called a police force. It is easy for people who are saturated with a sort of patriotic idea that they must be prepared to defend themselves against every imaginative enemy, to have a secret Army. The Republicans have a great many arms now and very good arms, including machine guns. I say that it is much better to have this force a permitted force. You know what they are; you know the roll call of the different companies, and you know who the officers are. At all events they are out in the open and that is much safer than having a secret sort of Militia which is sure to occur unless this plan which the Government have put forward is carried out.
I do not complain in any way of the noble Marquess's speech, but I make that remark with regard to the Question he has put. I hope the Government will go on steadily with their policy, but it must be done quietly and patiently and they must be given time for a complete change, not only a change in the Government of Ireland but a change in the Constitution. You have repealed the Union. You have more than repealed the Union; you have made Ireland a colony. I do not know whether people have any idea of the extreme seriousness of this, but I give my personal opinion with regard to the matter.
If you are going to give Ireland a Colonial status, I say at once that the Constitution will have to be written, because if it is not written what will happen will be this. Any alteration that is made will emanate from the Imperial Parliament. I say that if any alteration is made it should come from Ireland first, and then be sent over here to be agreed to in the usual manner, and the King's authority given to it. That is the only way to avoid the irritation that would be caused in the future. I am talking about the future, but many of us

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are very old and we shall not see this plan brought to a complete conclusion and happiness restored to Ireland. I say that if it is for this country to say what Ireland is to do, there will always be irritation. It is for Ireland to say what she wants to do, and then for her to send the proposal over here. I have said what I have to say and I beg to thank your Lordships for having listened to me.
THE EARL OF MIDLETON: My Lords, I would much sooner have abstained from speaking at this critical moment on this subject, but those with whom I am associated have a certain responsibility for the fact that the Government have made overtures at this moment. Although that responsibility is a limited one, I should not like the speech of my noble friend behind me to go as containing the whole view which is taken, by many members on this side of the House, of the present negotiations. I not only am not going to attempt—in fact, I should be quite incapable of doing so— to account for the numerous changes of policy on the part of the Government to which my noble friend has alluded. But I. would look at the position at the point at which we have now arrived. Easy as it would be to trace consecutive or nonconsecutive action on the part of this country for some years past, we have tried to induce your Lordships for the last year to recognise the facts as they are—that Home Rule, however much you may not have desired it, has become a certainty. But the amount of Home Rule, the power that we offered to the new Parliaments in Ireland was, as we endeavoured to show nine months ago, insufficient and absolutely useless as a means of terminating the disorder and unrest with which Ireland was racked.
I cannot help feeling that if the Government, instead of taking action shortly after the Motion was submitted by my noble friend, Lord Donoughmore, seven weeks ago, had done so last November, a long period of misery and trouble might have been avoided. But it is no use going back on that. What we feel at present is that the Government have now taken the step which, in principle, we asked them to take nine months ago, and it is due to us that we accept before your Lordships some responsibility for the principle of that action. But perhaps I may be permitted to say that our responsibility goes no further. Those of us who were invited to
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meet in conference in Dublin last month were not consulted in any way as to the terms which would be made with those who were in arms against the Crown. We were strongly pressed on both sides to do our best to induce the leaders of the Republican Party to accede to the invitation which the Government had sent them on behalf of this country—namely, to meet and consult as to the possible termination of these troubles—and we were earnest in believing that that consummation could not be obtained and would never be obtained so long as murder, outrage and retaliation were going on at the moment of the negotiations.
For that purpose we did our best. to secure a truce, a truce which would never have been asked for by the authorities of this country, but which any Conference might have a right to put down as a preliminary to possible negotiations. I believe that that action of obtaining a truce and a period for consideration of the questions between this country and those who are insurgent in Ireland, was an unmitigated blessing and one which the whole of public opinion in Ireland, and the greater part of public opinion in this country, has unhesitatingly supported.
Then we come to the terms which have been strongly assailed by the noble Marquess behind me, in a speech on which I offer him my congratulations for his restraint on a matter on which I know he feels very strongly. We have always asked, since these discussions assumed their present phase—nearly forty Irish Peers went into the lobby consistently last November—that a clean cut should be made; that all things local should be left to Ireland and all things Imperial reserved to this country. I do not propose to examine the terms exhaustively in order to see how far these conditions have been complied with; but it will be obvious that everything that has been asked for by the more moderate men in Ireland, much of it in the nature of sacrifice on their part, has been asked for in the hope that a united Ireland aright be found to administer it.
My noble friend, Lord Selborne, if I understood him correctly, touched a very important point when speaking of his dissent from the views held by some of us in regard to Customs. He mentioned that in South Africa the effect of the

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establishment of Customs as a link had been a great forwarding agent in the promotion of union.
TEE EARL OF SELBORNE: What I said was that four different Customs systems within the area now known as the Union of South Africa were considered to constitute such a dangerous state of affairs, and pointed so clearly to future civil war, that statesmen of all Parties agreed to the Union in order to have one Customs.
THE EARL OF MIDLETON: That is the way I intended to state it. One of the greatest difficulties the Government will find is that the giving of fiscal power to the North alone and the South alone, will undoubtedly tend to much further trouble and difficulty. One of the matters we would gladly have. settled is the question of the means by which the North and South of Ireland could be combined in order to use this power, which cannot properly be given to one alone.
Then there is the question of the Army on which much stress was laid by both my noble friends. There are two points of view, and neither of them is very favourable to the contention of the Government. The first is this. A number of those who have been most anxious to see a settlement in Ireland will feel that the statement of the Prime Minister (with regard to which I think we must press for an answer from the Lord Chancellor), the categorical statement made in December last, that. that particular point would never be conceded, has to be explained. I do not want to acid fuel to the flames, but can any one conceive anything more dangerous to the future of Ireland than these two Assemblies, apart, towards the union of which not one step has been made, each raising forces through fear of the other, and each with all the sense of alienation brought about by the events of the last few years? That is a heavy responsibility, quite apart from the Imperial point of view. The necessity for the most careful treatment of this subject, in whatever instrument is finally necessary for putting these terms into force, I commend to the notice of the Lord Chancellor. There is nothing which may tend more to render nugatory the whole of these proposals or the action of those who have tried hard to produce a settlement, than the fact that rival forces—Artillery, machine guns,
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Cavalry—should he one of the first questions arising in the two Parliaments.
The point raised by my noble friend, Lord Mayo, will not, I hope, escape the notice of the Government when, if ever, they get to the point of putting these terms into concrete form. There is a clear pledge by the Government that before any Home Rule measure is finally passed the question of the land should be settled. I make the suggestion that it should be part of the general settlement of finance when it would be very easy, though it would be very difficult afterwards. I notice that in all these questions the Government take care directly to safeguard the interests of the minority in Ulster, but not one word is inserted. with regard to the 350,000 minority in the Southern provinces. My object. is to suggest that every safeguard passed by this House, accepted by the Government, and incorporated in the Act, should also be contained in any instrument which may put these more extended terms into force. Otherwise there would be a dire breach of faith with those who, at great difficulty, have been doing their best by concession to obtain a settlement.
The future, indeed the present, is very dark for the moment in Ireland; some of it is dark, and all of it is doubtful. I am not myself so unhopeful as sonic of those. who have spoken. I do not believe that the mass of the people in Ireland will ever, if they have an opportunity, reject terms similar to those which have been offered. My noble friend said that time may be wanted. Those who have been most actively engaged in this struggle up to a few weeks ago may, perhaps, take a much more severe course, but the vast mass of the Irish people desire peace. Throughout the country, the mere institution of a truce was the opening of a new life, and I believe, if the Government deal with the subject tactfully and firmly, make it perfectly clear that they are not prepared to consider any proposals which from the Imperial standpoint are dangerous or troublesome, that we shall yet win through a settlement, despite the speeches which have been made within the last few days.
I hope it will be clearly understood that nothing will be gained by the Government holding out ideas of concession on points which they cannot concede. I believe that, in the offer which they have made, the Government have gone to the farthest point which any Government

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will be supported in going for may years to come; I believe that that offer, subject, of course, to the criticism which I have ventured to pass upon it, is one which the vast mass of Irishmen will undoubtedly accept; and I have some confidence that if the matter is well dealt with, we shall not see a renewal of that unhappy state of disturbance in which the country found itself before the well-known letter, written by the Prime Minister and published some six weeks ago.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, the debate has now ranged over a variety of topics, and it has been pursued. I admit readily, without any of the mis-chiefs which the Government had anticipated from a discussion taken at this moment. That circumstance is largely due, it should be plainly said, to the moderation with which Lord Salisbury indicated a point of view which was entirely out of sympathy with the past and present policy of the Government.
The noble Marquess has not put down a Motion for debate. He has indicated point of view interrogatively, and he has adopted a course, I think, both inconvenient and indirect. The form of his question is—
To call attention to the situation in Ireland, and to ask the Government whether, having regard to the profound dissatisfaction felt by many loyal subjects of His Majesty both in Great Britain and Ireland with the course of the Irish policy of the Government and to the position assumed by Mr. de Valera towards this country and to the Republican Oath of his followers, the Government propose to proceed further with the negotiations.
The necessary, and indeed the stated, implication of that Question is that there exists a profound dissatisfaction among many loyal subjects of His Majesty with the course of the Irish policy of the Government. A Question is usually asked, in sophisticated company, with the object of eliciting information. It is not usually felt that the obvious or the primary object of a Question is to express or convey an unfavourable view of the conduct of him whom you question, and certainly, as a Parliamentary method, as was once pointed out by the late Mr. Gladstone, the practice is objectionable of indicating, under the guise of a Question, an unfavourable conclusion, which ought to be put down in the form of a Motion or a vote of censure, which could be made the subject of a Division, in order to discover how
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many of your Lordships are supporters of the censure so obliquely conveyed in an indirect form by the noble Marquess.
When the noble Marquess intimated his intention, a few days ago, of raising this matter in a sense hostile to the Government, I made it known to him in the plainest manner that was at my command, that, while in our judgment such a debate at this moment could serve no useful purpose, it was one from which we should not shrink and, on the contrary, one which we courted, if our known policy was definitely to be challenged. I did certainly hope that if the noble Marquess intended to raise a debate upon this subject in a sense unfavourable to the Government, he would put it upon the Paper in a form and in circumstances which would enable us to challenge it in the Division lobby. In existing circumstances, Lord Salisbury assumes that there is profound dissatisfaction with the policy adopted by His Majesty's Government. On that assumption, I have two observations to make. This widespread and profound dissatisfaction has found, in all your Lordships' House,.two mouthpieces, and two mouthpieces only—Lord Salisbury and Lord Selborne. In relation to the general opinion held throughout the Empire and held in these islands—
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: In Westminster, for example?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: If the noble Marquess will not be so anxious to enjoy in the retrospect what he regards as the stronger weapons in his arsenal, he will find that I am coming to Westminster. I do not share his view as to the strength of that argument, for reasons which I shall presently explain. I was attempting to point out, however, that the assumption that this dissatisfaction is universally, or even in a very large measure, shared by the inhabitants either of this Empire or of these islands, is grotesquely inconsistent with the known and established facts of the case. It has been already pointed out by Lord Curzon that in the political recollection of us all no single step has been taken on a much vexed public question by any Government with such an overwhelming measure of public support, if, and so far as, you attach the slightest importance to that which the Press says, if in particular you attach the slightest importance to what those sections of the

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Press have said which, on other and more general grounds, have been almost invariably unfavourable to His Majesty's Government.
I know at present only of one paper in the whole of this country, a paper notoriously hysterical, and admittedly without the slightest influence, which has attacked in any way the step which has been taken by His Majesty's Government in initiating the recent negotiations. To talk of widespread dissatisfaction, when papers, which have hitherto regarded it as either their interest or their duty to attack the Government whenever they have an opportunity, should now rally unanimously is its support, is to ignore facts which, though they may be exaggerated, may as easily be underrated in their importance. It is also somewhat striking, if there is this profound and general dissatisfaction, that Lord Salisbury should have found himself marooned as he has been in the course of this debate. He was good enough to inform us, on an earlier occasion, that in putting this Question lie.was acting not on behalf of the many Peers who are guided by his advice, but that he was acting on his own behalf alone, and Lord Salisbury is, I suppose, well aware of the inference which all are entitled to draw that, in putting this Question, he does not, and did not, command the support of those of whom he is ordinarily the mouthpiece in, this House. I for one imagine that the noble Marquess would have been astounded at the poverty of the response which his arguments would have met had he afforded us the opportunity of applying the test which, unfortunately, will not be forthcoming.
The policy of tin noble Marquess is, indeed, a very simple one. As I have said, it has no support here, but it is, at least, a simple one. He begins by an expression of the most far-reaching and general contempt for members of the Government. I collected some of the choicer flowers of his rhetoric while he was indulging your Lordships with his views upon this point. I cannot remember how often the word"morality"came in the course of his strictures. He rhetorically points to my colleagues, who sit upon that bench, and. myself, protected from these gestures, and speaks of them as"these Ministers.""What are we to expect from these Ministers, with their
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inconsistency, and their lack of political morality?"is the subject, in effect, of the noble Marquess's repeated invective. I cannot help sometimes wishing that Lord Salisbury would recollect one of the better known sayings of Oliver Cromwell, extorted from him too under the stress of Parliamentary discussion. He said,"I would beseech you by the bowels of Christ to remember that you may sometimes be wrong." And indeed, that is a possibility which the noble Marquess would do well to bear constantly in mind, if only for the purpose of correcting a somewhat dogmatic method of affirming his belief in the imperfections of others.
We may be as wrong as he thinks. It is to me a somewhat surprising circumstance that men, of whom in private life, so far as I know, Lord Salisbury has no particularly unfavourable impression, a Cabinet which consists to a very considerable extent of his own friends, his own political associates, most of whom learned their views of public affairs in the same school, and who were until recently proceeding along confluent lines to a similar goal, have so suddenly and completely lost all balance in this matter. May it not be possible that, after all,the Cabinet are right in the view that they have taken, and that Lord Salisbury is wrong in the views which he has taken as the subject of his scoldings?
Let there be no mistake as to the consequence of Lord Salisbury's views. Here no controversy is possible. He says, in bitter language, that we are wrong and in substance that we are immoral in having undertaken these negotiations at all. These matters are entirely matters of alternatives. What was the alternative which was present to the mind of. Lord Salisbury? I cannot ask what was the alternative expressed by him in his speech, because Lord Salisbury was strangely oblivious of the necessity of expressing any alternative in his speech. There is, of course, no other alternative than that of force, and Lord Salisbury must therefore be treated as putting forward the proposition that the Government, instead of initiating these negotiations, ought to have continued more successfully to have attempted to apply coercive measures to the South of Ireland.
On that I have only one or two observations to offer. Up to a point that policy had not been successful. I have never

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belonged to the number of those who affirm that if it became necessary to resume those measures they would ultimately be unsuccessful. I have never thought so little either of the greatness or destiny of this country as to take that view, but I recognise plainly that in spite of great sacrifices, of constant and growing losses, of a deepening and universal sense of the tragedy of estrangement between the two islands, those efforts had not, up to a certain point, succeeded. Noble Lords from Ireland who have spoken in the debate, and whose utterances I deeply welcome, because they are living in the midst of these anxieties, and many of them from day to day have been sharing the perils of life in that island, have revealed in a flash how far aloof is Lord Salisbury from everything that is contemporary to, and vital in, the situation in Ireland. Those noble Lords however, or some of them, have intimated that in their opinion the Government have made mistakes and been guilty of inconsistencies.
When events change constantly, in shifting and dynamic circumstances, consistency may very easily become a mediocre quality; but I am one of those who do not in the least agree with the general impeachment that the Government have in this matter been guilty of inconsistency. I am conscious of no inconsistency, and, speaking for myself, I claim that during the twenty years in which I have devoted myself to studying Irish politics, I have never swerved either to the right or to the left from the view that I have consistently maintained. That view was that he had not even begun to understand the Irish situation, who did not realise the complete and unbridgeable gulf that separated the North of Ireland from the South of Ireland. If anybody ever wasted time in reading speeches of mine, made over a period of twenty years, he would. find that the whole of my opposition to Home Rule during that period was founded upon the special circumstances of the position in Northern Ireland. I was never one of those who took the view that, if the case of Ulster was once met, there was not a most formidable matter that required to be dealt with in the claims adhered to for so long by Southern Ireland.
I do not, indeed, belong to the number of those who were, or are, seduced by that mischievous word self-determination; but I never thought that if once the case of
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Northern Ireland was provided for, and adequate protection secured to the North, you could for all time say to the overwhelming majority in the South:"Although you no longer make that claim for the coercion of the North, we will deny you that to which, as a majority, you are on the face of it entitled." That is a case to which I have never committed myself, and of which I have never been an advocate. When the Irish Home Rule Act was placed upon the Statute Book, when, once for all. the just and indefeasible case of Ulster had. received protection, and for all time had become entrenched in an Act of Parliament, it depended thereafter upon the honour and protection of the British Parliament, That position, secured for Ulster, will never be abandoned, at least. by any Government of which I am a member, and I am sure that there is nothing more remote from the minds of those responsible for the passing of that Act than that there should be any- surrender of the recognition now universal of the individual position and rights of Ulster.
In those circumstances we had, of course, to apply ourselves to the case of Southern Ireland, and Lord Donoughmore, among others, has spoken of the inconsistency of the Government. It was, indeed, somewhat of a revelation of the Parliamentary seas among which we have to attempt to navigate our helpless barque that even Lord Donoughmore, who openly stated in the course of this debate that he thought it right to initiate these negotiations, but said that had we initiated them at an earlier stage he thought the prospects would have been brighter—that even he thought it necessary to point out, lest we should be unduly elated by support which is a little remarkable, that had Lord Salisbury gone to a Division he would probably have found himself able to vote for him becaus—
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: Able to vote for the Government.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The statement of the noble Earl greatly reassures me. I misunderstood. The graver case of inconsistency remains. We may have been right or we may have been wrong in all those early stages, but, believe me, we were never inconsistent. I have been the most unwilling mouthpiece, now for nearly three years, in Irish debates in this House, and whenever Lord Salisbury,

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whose industry and memory in these matters are deserving of the highest admiration, appears with a summarised schedule of my poor observations, I am, I confess, filled with some anxiety as to that which he may have unearthed; but I confess, when I read those fragments of these unhappy oratorical efforts of mine which were all that could be produced at the end of three years—
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Oh no; there are lots more.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Am I wrong in assuming that the noble Marquess selected those which he thought useful for his argumentative purpose? Then I imagine the House will not be interested in the others. These being disinterred, what do they come to? At the time I was defending myself—I believe with a good deal of sympathy from Lord Salisbury, though it was not as frequently expressed in debate as I should have desired, but I know with much sympathy—against accusations that the Government had been guilty of undue violence, through some of their agents or instruments. We are all well aware of the general atmosphere of more than one of those debates in which my noble and learned friend Lord Parmoor, or someone holding similar views, was the protagonist, and in those debates I have attempted to vindicate the Government against the attacks of those who said we were making excessive or unwise use of our coercive force.
Many a time I should have been greatly strengthened in the course of debates, which it was almost invariably my fortune to support single-handed, had I had the countenance of those who take the view that the policy of force was the one and only resource open to us at this moment. But we said throughout, when invited to make an offer, as we were by Lord Donoughmore a few weeks ago, and by other Peers:"We will not make any offer at all unless and until we have the right to believe that there is some person to whom we can make that offer who, if he approves of it, has the power to make good that to which he assents." I have said that over and over again. I said it on the Second Reading of last year's Bill for the better government of Ireland. I said it in answer to Lord Donoughmore, in the plainest and most explicit terms, and I still assert to-dlay, in the clearest manner, that the
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answer which I made to Lord Donoughmore was an answer which was founded on the most elementary principles of common sense.
At the present moment I do not share the optimism winch has pervaded so many of the speeches that have been made. It may or it may not be true, that we are to discount much that has been said in the fiery and inflammatory speeches which have recently filled the papers. I do not assert my claims in competition with those of noble Lords who come from Ireland, to appraise the dialectical methods which are found opportune in such circumstances as those which exist at present. But I should myself certainly have thought that to have waved torches after a long drought in the proximity of arid cornfields was a course far too fraught with danger to have been expected of men who had in their minds the object to attain a settlement, and to adopt means which might make that settlement easy. I greatly hope that those who have taken the more sanguine view in this matter may be justified by the event. But it would, I think, be wrong to found the whole of this discussion to-day upon the sanguine view that this offer which has been made is an offer which, in its tenor and contents, will be accepted.
And here it is right that I should make a specific answer to one question. We were asked whether this document contained the last terms which the Government intended to offer. My Lords, we had two courses open to us. We very carefully considered both of them. We might have made a general statement, admitting perhaps of extension, in order that a settlement might be attained, if in the first place difficulty emerged; or we might frankly and plainly, before the whole world, state once for all how far we were prepared to go, and beyond what point we were not prepared to go. We adopted the course, which, I am sure, all your Lordships will most warmly approve, of putting everything forward, and it would, indeed, be disastrous if it were not plainly realised by those to whom that offer was addressed that it contained our last word in the direction of concession and of compromise.
If this fails the prospect which remains is well known to all of us. It had better indeed be plainly realised. Lord Salisbury thinks that the intervention of this offer ought not to have prevented the process proceeding continuously, but the process, as we knew

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it, will undergo very great. modification—must undergo very great modification—before it should be renewed, if, unhappily, it proves necessary to renew it. If the events of the last year have proved anything they have made it plain that the resources, in soldiers and in police, with which we addressed ourselves to this task were inadequate. Let no one blind himself to the conclusion that, if this attempt at negotiation breaks down, we shall find ourselves committed to hostilities upon a scale never heretofore, in my recollection of history, undertaken by this country against Ireland.
Let us plainly understand what the nature of the sacrifices involved will be—sacrifices in respect of life, sacrifices less grave, but grave enough in our present situation, in respect of treasure. We shall find ourselves bound to take—and, in the unhappy contingency indicated, we shall not shrink from—whatever measures may be necessary in order to prevent the secession of a constituent part of these Islands from the British Constitution. And with immense depression, if we be forced to adopt that course, we shall apply ourselves to it in the same spirit, and with the same determination with which the Northern part of the United States protested and struggled against the secession of the Southern States.
But will anybody say that we were wrong to attempt to postpone and, it may be, even to avoid this terrible necessity altogether? Is there anybody besides the' noble Marquess who does not realise it to be an unmixed advantage that for sonic five, or six, or ten weeks this constant and horrible toll of slaughter, and outrage, and destruction has been utterly suspended, and afforded—how certainly we do not know—but at least some slight prospect that it may be permanently arrested?
Only one specific complaint has been made of the terms contained in this offer, and I do not think it would be convenient to discuss those terms, or their meaning, in any detail here to-day. It is not any special term that is impeached by the Question; it is rather the spirit which underlay and dictated the making of an offer at all. If this offer is not accepted, it will, indeed, be ancient history when next our discussions on these matters are resumed. If, on the other hand, this offer should be favourably considered, or should be the subject of later discussion, of course
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every single term which is contained in it will be the fit and necessary subject for Parliamentary debate, and will ultimately be decided as the result of a vote in each House of Parliament.
There was one point regarded by the noble Marquess as his argumentative piece de resistance—the state of public opinion upon this matter—on which I had intended to say a word in passing, but, unfortunately, it escaped me. The noble Marquess referred your Lordships, and indeed, lie brought it forward as an argument in justification of what he understands to be the profound dissatisfaction felt by many loyal subjects of His Majesty, to what is now proceeding in an election at Westminster. Never did a politician in a difficulty or a swimmer swimming in a stormy sea clutch at a more exiguous and inadequate straw. What are the circumstances under which that election is taking place? There is not only one Anti-Waste candidate to whose attentions we are becoming accustomed, even though we are not edified by the experience of our intercourse—there is not only one Anti-Waste candidate, but a second Anti-Waste candidate has emerged, who, I understand, occasionally supports the Coalition standard and occasionally the Anti-Waste standard, whichever is the more suited to the necessities of his campaign at the moment. In the next place, there is a third gentleman who, if I may accept what appears in the newspapers, is bringing a libel action against another of the Anti-Waste candidates because he has publicly said that the third Anti-Waste candidate is not an Anti-Waste candidate.
In those circumstances, nobody considers that election to be anything except an attempt at extracting the last ounce out of the last vulgar anti-Government stunt. There having been no discussion or any pretence of any serious discussion upon any political subject under the sun, the noble Marquess, who really has enough political experience to know better, gets up and, confronted with the opinion of the whole of the British Empire, confronted with an almost complete unanimity amongst the British people, confronted with the state of opinion in this House, gives as an illustration the Westminster election. The bankruptey of argument in this matter could not have been more fitly exposed than by that point in the noble Marquess's speech, to which he was so

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much attached, that he deemed it worth while to direct my special attention to it. I am not one of those, who think, nor, indeed, do any of my colleagues think, that our conduct of the Irish developments of the last three years has been attended by any large measure of success.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY:Hear, hear.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Nowhere does that statement excite more enthusiasm than in the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury. During that time we have fairly and frankly indicated to Parliament what our difficulties have been. So far as I am aware, we have suppresed nothing during those three years, except the terms of this offer to Mr. de Valera. Those were suppressed at his express desire, and in consequence of his opinion that the purpose of the negotiations would be best served. by the suppression of the terms until the period when they were to be laid before the Dail Eireann. No one who thinks we ought to have undertaken the negotiations will suppose that, having undertaken them, we should have insisted on the publication of them in circumstances which the other negotiator declared to be disastrous for our purpose and for what we understood to be his purpose. With that exception we have taken this House completely into our confidence for three years. In the whole course of those three years we. have invited suggestion and help from any noble Lord to whom suggestion or possible help occurred. Many in this House have, from time to time, given great help. Many have made suggestions which have been adopted by the Executive. Many have made suggestions which have been most carefully considered. But during the whole of those three years during which the noble Marquess constituted himself a bitter and almost contemptuous censor of that which we have done and that which we have left undone, I do not recall one helpful suggestion made by him in the course of those repeated Irish debates.
Ought not some feeling of doubt to arise in the mind of anyone who has been made aware from clay to day of the pressure, the reality, and the character of our difficulties and yet has contributed nothing in the way of constructive help? I have heard the noble Marquess say nothing at all in the three years, except that there
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ought to be a closer co-operation between police and military, or that the Government were generally incompetent in the way in which they handled these matters. The only answer one can make to such an one is:"If you are not prepared to make a positive and special indictment of that which has been done wrong, a little less carping and a little more charity would be more becoming in those who are critics."
I cannot tell the House at this moment whether our proposals will succeed or whether they will fail, but I feel a sure and certain confidence that the view plainly held by the overwhelming majority in these Islands and of the British Empire over the seas, that we were right to make the attempt, is well founded, and that it will prove to have been well founded whether we succeed or fail in that attempt. The issue is removed from our hands. So far as we are concerned, we stand or fall by that which we have offered. The word is now with others as to whether it will be accepted or rejected.
THE EARL OF DESART: My Lords, I have no intention, after all that has been said in the course of this debate, to trespass on your Lordships for more than a very few moments, but I make no apology for the few words I propose to say because I feel that, in a discussion of this gravity, my position gives me the right to state publicly my attitude towards the proposals of the Government and the negotiations into which they have entered, and to state openly that I rejoice that negotiations have been undertaken, and that I hope ultimately they may meet with a measure of success which will at last give poor suffering Ireland a chance of rejuvenation, a chance of sanity, and a chance of that which at the present moment is more urgent than anything—of obtaining peace, through which alone those objects can possibly be attained.
During the eloquent, the restrained, and temperate speech of my noble friend, Lord Salisbury, I listened with agreement on many points, with a full understanding of the feelings and the motives which prompted much of what he said, but I then brought myself back to what seemed to be the realities of the situation, and which I think are apparent. Are there more than two alternatives in the actual situation of Ireland at the persent time? There was

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last year an approach to British Government asking what they were prepared to give—the uttermost they would give. I never, I think, committed myself to the form in which those. proposals should be made. In July, 1920, there were many of us in Ireland who thought a favourable moment—a much more favourable moment in our judgment than the present one—had come for the putting forward of some propositions of that character. At that time, things were not nearly so bad as they have since become, and what we desired was that what we termed a firm offer, whether in the shape of the draft of a Bill or a conmunication in public or in Parliament, of what the British Government were prepared to give —of the things they were prepared to give, and no more—should be made.
Had that been done at that time, I believe it would have had a chance of response. Negotiations would have followed—they were not the first step of necessity. That suggestion was not favourably received. People from Ireland were told they must make a firm offer, that they must show that they had Ireland behind them. How could they? How could anybody? That really adjourned that suggestion indefinitely. I do not think I ought to enter into any detailed criticism of the past, but I should like to say, in so far as I shall criticise it, that it has nothing to do with what the Lord Chancellor said as to the consistency of the present Government. It goes back further than that—I will not go back further than 1914—and it refers to lost chances and lost opportunities which, had they been taken, might have prevented the terrible incidents that we have witnessed for so long. I think those incidents never would have arisen, and the terrible and difficult problem before us would not have had to seek a solution.
Negotiation is one alternative. Is there any other except force, except fire and sword? That, in a sense, would succeed. That, if the Government were driven to adopt it, could, in the end, have only one result. Ireland would be firmly placed under the Government, military or other, of this country. But at what cost? Extremists, loyalists, peaceful people, would be involved 'in one common ruin. The whole of Ireland's economic existence would be destroyed. Briton would kill Irishman, Irishman Briton, and Irishman Irishman. I believe that I should be false to the
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interests of the Empire and false to Ireland, and should belie what I have said if I did not at this stage say plainly and openly that I support the Government in entering on negotiations with a view to obtaining I the peace which, however some may regard the approaches to that peace, everyone surely must desire.
In a debate in this House in which I took part on June 21 I advocated this course. I may be right or wrong in my prophecy. What I said was—
" If you go as far as you can in the offer of self-government to Ireland, I believe there will be a response. And if that offer were refused, how much better would be your position in the eyes of the world and in the eyes of our own Colonies. You would not lose any prestige in so doing. You would stand before the world as having offered to Ireland the best terms that in your position you could give, and would lie able to say that they had been refused. You might have a discouraging response at first, but ultimately the leaven of such a proposal would work through Ireland, and I believe firmly that, though it may yet take time, it is in that direction, and I fear I must say in that direction only, that you are likely to obtain peace."
I think part of that has been justified. I cannot speak with a knowledge with which a member of the Government can speak, but I hope the prospect is somewhat less gloomy than that indicated by the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack.
I hardly like to express my own opinion on a matter of such magnitude and such danger, but I find it very difficult to believe that it is so gloomy if you regard what I know exists — and almost universally exists—a feeling, a prayer, a. desire for peace, and a determination, if possible, that Ireland shall not go back into hell. I believe that hardly any men, or body of men—however much you talk beforehand, however long you are in approaching it—can finally refuse such terms as have been offered by the Government to-day. On that I pin faith. I must not be taken to approve of every detail and of everything that appears in the negotiations. I am not going to repeat them, but I share the views which have been expressed as to the creation of two armed forces in two parts of. Ireland. It is in my opinion a sad necessity that there should be partition, a sadder necessity that partition should take religious lines, and if the formation of these two Armies results as a consequence of that, I am not

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sure that it is not the most regrettable of all the consequences that have arisen.
I can mid nothing to what has been said on that subject, but I hope noble Lords who feel that this offer has involved humiliation will hear in mind, as I suppose the Government have borne in mind, the voiceless multitude in Ireland who are now terrorised, and who have suffered perhaps more than my class has suffered, perhaps more than anyone has suffered, and who cry out daily for one thing and one thing only—Government protection and peace. They will not forget either those loyalists who, as Lord Donoughmore has said, desire to remain and intend to remain in their homes, and, so long as they can, intend to do their duty. They will not only consider those who wish to leave Ireland, but those of their friends and supporters who desire to remain in Ireland. If, unhappily, force should become a horrible necessity I am sure you know—and that Lord Salisbury knows—that all your loyal friends would disappear, and mist disappear. Therefore, I think, any man should hesitate before he condemns the Government for having, in principle, endeavoured to obtain what, unless I am wrong, is the only alternative to force red ruin and horror in Ireland—that is an arrangement of negotiations which may lead to the acceptance by Ireland of such a form of Government as may afford at least a chance of amicable relations with Ireland, and thus give us a union of this kind to replace that which has irretrievably disappeared, to the regret of many of us.
LORD SUMNER: My Lords, I should not trouble your Lordships at this time of the afternoon with ally observations if it had not been for something that was said by the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, to the effect that those who do not, at some stage in this matter, by their voices as well as by their presence, indicate some support of the noble Marquess, should be counted as belonging to the body which he suggested to consist of the great majority of your Lordships who in all respects approve of the course which the Government have taken. In order that there should be no misapprehension, I think it right to say that my silence hitherto upon this subject must not be taken as representing anything more than this; that until we knew what the terms
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offered to the Irish representatives were it would have been, in my view, useless to debate them, and, matters having gone as far as they have gone, when the knowledge of those terms was made public it would have been useless at that moment to endeavour to intervene in any organised way until we knew further how the matter was going.
The suggestion that, the terms having been made public last Saturday, it would have been practicable at this period of the year to move a vote of censure in your Lordships' House, appears to me to be more a barren gibe on the part of the noble and learned Viscount than a serious and effective political argument. I am sure that to introduce a discussion upon the subject in the form in which the noble Marquess has introduced it, by means of a Question, was the most temperate, and, I think, most discreet way in which it could be done. I am sure that even the noble and learned Viscount has little to complain of in the way in which, in the course of a political controversy, the matter has been brought before your Lordships by the noble Marquess.
One thing, I think, has been achieved which is of very great importance, as the result of this discussion. The noble and learned Viscount has made it clear—and the noble Marquess the Leader of the House did so also on one of the points—first of all, that the Government has said its last word; secondly, that it is a case of"Take it or leave it and thirdly, that the course to be pursued is according as the deliberations of Dail Eireann, which at this moment may be of the most fateful kind, constitute an acceptance or rejection. if that answer constitutes an acceptance, the noble and learned Viscount recognised in explicit terms—as indeed he could not but recognise—that the last word rests with Parliament; that it is in the two Houses of Parliament, and not elsewhere, that the final conclusion of this matter must rest; and that, as it certainly cannot be carried except by elaborate legislation, your Lordships' House and the other branch of the Legislature remain, as they necessarily must remain, free to be the final arbiters of the form which those terms shall take in legislation, and the extent to which effect will be given to them.
He has also made it quite plain that if the answer is"No," then, again with the

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sanction of, and after an appeal to, the Legislature, graver measures must be taken than have been taken hitherto. As to that, I have nothing to say, beyond the hope that it may not conic to that, but this: that I cannot believe that the Legislature would face a situation like that except with the determination that this time the measures taken should be effectual. I must say that when I read the correspondence that was published last week, I had a good deal of apprehension which arose out of a term which your Lordships will find on page 3 of the Command Paper. After setting out in serial form those principles which constitute the offer, the latter proceeds—
" In accordance with these principles, the British Government propose that the conditions of settlement between Great Britain and Ireland shall be embodied in the form of a Treaty, to which effect shall in due course be given by the British and Irish Parliaments."
The language, I think, was infelicitous, because that sentence conveys, certainly sufficiently clearly to excite a good deal of apprehension, that the negotiations were being carried on in the forms and upon the principles which are suitable only to negotiations between Powers which are already independent Powers; that they were negotiations between Great Britain and Ireland upon such a footing and upon such an assumption that when the negotiations, which at that time were secret, resulted in a Treaty, then effect should in due course be given by British legislation to that Treaty.
That is exactly the same course as is pursued, and legitimately pursued, in the case of negotiations with foreign Powers, but it is absolutely inadmissible in the case of an exchange of views which is to result in a new change in the legislative and constitutional position of a portion of His Majesty's hereditary Dominions. I am much relieved by what the noble and learned Viscount has said, because it shows that the form of language, corroborated though it was by the form of the proceedings themselves, is not intended in any way whatever, as I understand him, to alter what is the true constitutional position; that it is not intended, when the arrangement has been come to, whenever it is come to, and which is here called a Treaty, that Parliament shall be presented with a fait accompli, and be told that a Treaty has been made, that the honour of the country has been pledged, that the gravest responsibility rests with
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those who criticise the terms, and that nothing remains but to implement the bargain which has been made in the country's name.
"Ours not to reason why!" Such a course as that would naturally have been of the very gravest consequence because, whether it be wise, or not wise, with regard to Ireland—as to which I do not propose to express any opinion now—it would certainly have been one of the gravest possible attacks upon the authority of Parliament that could be made. It would virtually have meant that the whole controversy that has been going on since 1855, and has convulsed Parliament again and again, would be quietly resolved behind closed doors by the action of the Executive, who would arrange, in consultation with representatives of Ireland, terms that would eventually become the final Home Rule legislation. However, it is clear now that that is not the intention of the Government, and I dare say that if any representatives of the Government continue this debate I shall be told it never was, and perhaps never could be supposed to be, their intention, all of which assurances I shall gladly welcome.
The suggestion that I make is this. The terms are out now, and the only field for discussion is precisely what is meant by the language, which, although it may be as precise as it could be made in a document of this kind, is nevertheless somewhat less definite than it will ultimately have to be. There may be, even in case of acceptance, some period of discussion as to what is meant by"necessary facilities for the development of defence and of communication by air," or the essential rights and liberties"essential for naval purposes." I suggest to the Government that the wisest course is to take the nation, through Parliament, into their confidence at every step in these negotiations, to have no more private exchanges, but let the whole world see, step by step, the crystallisation of those terms as the parties get nearer and nearer together, so that Parliament may be consulted throughout the whole of the proceedings. What I am most anxious to see is that when next, if ever, your Lordships are called upon to consider and express an opinion upon our relations with Ireland, it shall be impossible for your rights to be restricted or prejudiced in any way by decisions that have been already and hastily come to, and that, above all things, you who have to bear so

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much responsibility may effectively insist on also wielding your fair share of the power.
On Question, Motion made by the Marquess Curzon of Kedleston agreed to.

IRISH. RAILWAYS (SETTLEMENT OF CLAIMS) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (THE EARL OF LYTTON): My Lords, this Bill. affects a settlement of the claims of the Irish railway companies in respect of the period of Government control. It provides for the payment of £3,000,000 to these companies in three instalments at the dates stated in Clause 1. Clause 2 provides for the distribution of that sum of money and for a full discharge to the Government by the companies of its liabilities to them. Clause 3 places the worked lines, of which there are fifteen, in exactly the same position as they are dealt with in the English Bill, and continues the existing provisions relating to amounts payable to the owning companies, temporarily, until the Council of Ireland makes further provisions.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
Then (Standing Older XXXIX having been suspended), it was moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee. —(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The EARL OF DONOUGHMORE in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.
Clause 3:
Continuance of provisions of agreement as to worked lines.
3. Clause twelve of the agreement between the Government and the Irish railway companies, as confirmed by, and set forth in the Schedule to, the Irish Railways (Confirmation of Agreement) Act, 1919, which regulates the amount payable to owning companies under working agreements, shall continue in force until the Council of Ireland otherwise provide, as if in that clause after the words"during each year of Government control"there were inserted the words"and thereafter until further provision is made by the Council of Ireland."
LORD KILLANIN LORD KILLANIN moved, at the end of the clause to insert the following proviso:
" Provided always that this section shall not apply to the Loughrea and Attymon Light Railway or to the Ballinrobe and Claremorris Railway, or to any other light railway worked by any company other than the owning company for a percentage of the gross receipts:"
The noble Lord said: This Amendment is somewhat different to the one I forecasted yesterday. It is different, because I have had some discussion with the noble Earl in charge of the measure, who pointed out that my original Amendment would perhaps do more than I intended. Accordingly I have altered it somewhat, and confined it explicitly to the two light railways in Ireland which may be adversely affected by the clause as it stands. I had an opportunity yesterday of making a case for these light railways and I will not repeat what I said then. I have also had the advantage of discussing the matter with the officials at the Ministry of Transport, and, of course, one sees that there are different aspects of the case that can be taken. The net result of my conversations is this. I think it is a great pity that the Ministry of Transport did not consult and discuss this matter with representatives of the ratepayers who are going to be affected by this legislation. Their agreement has not been secured, nor have they been consulted.
If this Bill passes exactly as it is, without any modification at all, I shall consider that the contracting rights of the ratepayers and the equity of their position have not received that consideration and protection which they should receive. These ratepayers, years ago, undertook a financial liability. That liability, unfortunately, became a reality, and for thirty years they have suffered from the fact that they have had to tax themselves in order to supply dividends for these railways. The ratepayers fulfil their portion of the contract, and a number of small farmers in the West of Ireland have suffered immensely owing to this liability becoming a reality.
Now a big change is being made by the Bill in their position. The noble Earl will admit that. These ratepayers think that this change should work somewhat to their benefit. It is notorious that the position in the past has worked to their detriment, and they look naturally, and I think rightly, to their position being considered by the Government, and that at any rate they should be more protected from the

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losses they have suffered in the past. The noble Earl is anxious to do justice in this matter. He referred in our conversation to the fact that if the change I propose is made the railways would suffer unfair losses, but he has not, I think, sufficiently considered the losses of the ratepayers.
Under the Bill as it now stands what was formerly a liability is going to be stereotyped into a fixed and permanent charge. In the past the liability became a reality, I admit, and they had each year to contribute their share of taxation. But, at least, it was only a financial liability, and in any year it may not have occurred. But now, under this Bill, the liability becomes a fixed and permanent tax on the ratepayers. I would point out to the noble Earl that, so far as I can see, it will remain a fixed charge upon them, no matter how prosperous the railway line becomes in the future. I put that to him, because he knows that in the past this liability depended upon the traffic and prosperity of the railway. Should this line become more prosperous in the future than it has been in the past, the ratepayers will derive no benefit whatever, but will still have to contribute this permanent tax. I consider that the change is very unfair to the ratepayers and, above all, it is unjust that the ratepayers have not been consulted.
I gather from what I saw yesterday at the Ministry of Transport, in the course of our conversation, that had the representatives of the ratepayers been consulted —and they repeatedly asked by correspondence that they should be consulted, and I think they ought to have been invited to a consultation—had those interests which are now at variance and which are liable to be greatly misunderstood been duly consulted, they might have been reconciled. That is my view of the position, and I think it is most unfortunate that the Government did not follow that course. The representatives of the taxpayers not having been consulted, action has been taken over their heads. It may be the right action, but they ought to have had an opportunity of stating their case.
I had a communication yesterday from the official of the Galway County Council who is concerned with this matter to say that he had not yet even been able to see the Bill. In these circumstances I fear that this matter will not be worked smoothly in Ireland. I believe this clause will be
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opposed. The Galway County Council inform me that they will resist the imposition of this tax, not merely on its merits alone, but on the just ground that they were in no way consulted in the matter, although their rights under the contract, which the. noble Earl admits, are being changed. Such a result as that they should resist this imposition would be most unfortunate. I think it could easily have been avoided, and I deeply regret that the Government did not take into consultation the parties concerned. In that case I believe they could have come to a satisfactory agreement with them before they finally reached a decision. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Clause 3, page 5, line 11, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Killanin)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Your Lordships will remember that the main case for this Amendment was made in your Lordships' House yesterday afternoon by my noble friends, Lord Killanin and Lord Shandon. I was not then able to deal with the point in detail, but I assured Lord Midleton, who made an appeal to me, that I would very carefully consider the matter, and if I were not able to meet Lord Killanin, I should at least state the case of the Government to your Lordships. Though I am afraid I have not been able to meet my two noble friends, they will, I think, admit that I have given a good deal of time and consideration to the point which they have placed before me. I cannot help thinking that I really did go a long way to convince my two noble friends, in the conversation which took place between us yesterday, that there was more substance in the Government's case than they were aware of, and that less injustice was going to be done to those in whom they are interested than they thought. I am disposed to that view, because the main contention of the noble Lord who has just spoken is that it was very regrettable that those on whose behalf he is speaking—namely, the County Council of Galway—were not also present at that interview, and I took that really to mean that, had they been present, they would have been equally convinced of the justice of the case which, as they were not present, it is now my duty to submit for approval to your Lordships.
What is this case which my two noble friends have brought forward? It is the case of a small company which owns a

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light railway in Ireland, and of another company which works this line for them under an agreement made, I think, in 1886. The company is mentioned in the noble Lord's Amendment, and the agreement provides that. the working company shall pay to the owning company 45 per cent. of the gross receipts of the. line. By another arrangement, in any year in which.such proportion of the gross receipts falls short of 5 per cent. on the share capital of the owning company, that deficit is made good to the owning company by the Galway Comity Council. This proportion of the gross receipts of the company has never, from the beginning; paid the necessary 5 per cent., and the Galway County Council, in carrying out this guarantee, has always had to pay a sum of from £1,000 to £1,600 to the owning company. That, I thin, correctly states the position up to the time of the war.
What happened during the war? The Government took over the Irish railways, as it took over the railways in England, and, as in England, it said to the Irish railways:"For the period of control we will guarantee to von your net receipts of the year That was recognised in Ireland, as well as in England, as a satisfactory arrangement, because the year taken as the datum was, on the whole, a good year for the railway companies. For the first few months, I think even in the first year or two of that arrangement, it was not a bad bargain for the Government. Then came the period when the rise in the cost of labour and materials was so great, in Ireland as in England, and the expenses of the railways were so enormously increased, that they could not pay. Then, by virtue of the Government guarantee, the deficit on the working of the railways had to be paid by the general taxpayers of the country.
In the case of these two companies, the owning company and the Galway County Council were not affected, because, under their guarantee, they were entitled to a proportion of the gross receipts. Had it not been for the guarantee of the Government, the work of the company could not have been carried out under the new conditions, but for a time the working company was able to meet its increased expenses by virtue of the Government guarantee. Then the Government shifted the burden from the general taxpayers to the railway-using public, and authorised the railway companies to increase their charging
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powers, but it was distinctly understood that that increased charging power was only to meet the increased cost of running, and. was not to give the railway companies a margin for increased dividends and profits. The only effect, therefore, was that the increased working expenses of the company were met no longer by the general taxpayers, but, in the form of increased charges, by the railway users.
Now, what had been the effect of that arrangement upon the two parties who are the subjects of my noble friend's Amendment? —an arrangement which he thinks has unjustly interfered with the contract or bargain between them. The working company has received, in the form of increased charges, a payment to meet its increased running expenses due to the war, and no more, and the owning company now says:"You must give to us 45 per cent. of this increase which has come to you, because it is part of your gross receipts and therefore., under our contract, we are entitled to 45 per cent. of it." See what the effect of that would be in actual figures in this particular case. If my noble friend's contention were admitted, and this Amendment were carried, and 45 per cent. of these increased receipts from extra charges were to go to the owning company, which has done nothing whatever, the owning company would get not 45 per cent. on the basis of the 1913 traffic, but a sum equivalent to the whole receipts of the line on the basis of the 1913 traffic, and the working company would be over £1,600 out of pocket. That is an arrangement which they say would be fair. I think it would be demonstrably unfair.
The noble Lord said that I had not considered the loss to the Galway ratepayers, but there is nothing in this Bill which increases the loss of the Galway ratepayers, or imposes any loss upon them except in so far as it denies to them a right to share in something in which, from the explanation that I have given to your Lordships, they have no right to share.
LORD KILLANIN: Does the noble Earl not consider it a loss to put a fixed charge upon them for the remainder of the contract?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am coining to that point. I only wish to make it clear that the Government are not causing any loss to the Galway ratepayers. The Government, by this Bill, are temporarily

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stabilising the 1913 position, a position which was, when it was made, fair to all parties. In England they have stabilised the arrangement until the amalgamation between the railway companies provided for under the English Railway Bill comes into operation. In Ireland they are stabilising it until the Irish Government, whatever form it may take, makes some other provision. Obviously, this arrangement cannot be satisfactory as a permanent arrangement, and it is only intended as an interim arrangement.
It was impossible for the British Government to include the Irish Railways in the Bill which has just passed. The arrangements for the Irish settlement now rests with the Irish people, and all the Government can do is to say that the interim arrangement shall continue until such time as it is superseded by a Bill on the lines of the English Bill, or some other Bill which the Irish Parliament may decide to introduce. Those are the facts of the case, and I submit that the arrangement, as a temporary one, is fair to all parties, and that the Amendment, if carried, would, according to the figures that I have submitted to your Lordships, not be fair. I hope, therefore, that you will not accept it.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Remaining clauses agreed to.
House resumed.
Bill reported without amendment, read 3a, and passed.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (APPROPRIATION) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD HYLTON: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read 2a.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. —(Lord Hylton.)
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived:
Then (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended), Bill read 3a, and passed.

SHOPS (EARLY CLOSING) ACT (1920) AMENDMENT BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURY: My Lords, I do not desire to detain you for more than a very few minutes while I explain the object of this Bill. It is introduced in consequence of a measure now, on the Statute Book—the Shops (Early Closing) Act (1920)—and it is very innocent in character, very brief, and perfectly innocuous in every way. It covers a matter which is for the convenience of the public, and I hope that your Lordships will not consider that I am making too heavy a demand upon you if I ask you to give the Bill not only a Second Reading but to pass it through all its stages. It is merely intended to permit the sale of chocolate, sweets and mineral waters until a later hour than their sale is now permitted by the existing law, and I believe it will be warmly welcomed by the public as getting rid of another of those restrictive regulations from which they have suffered.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.— (The Earl of Malmesbury.)
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH (THE EARL OF ONSLOW): My Lords, this Bill was introduced into the House of Commons in pursuance of an arrangement effected in connection with. the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. An attempt was made to give these facilities in that measure, but it was found that it was not a convenient course, and the Amendment was withdrawn, on an understanding that the Bill should take its place, and that the Government would do what it could to further the passage of that Bill into law during the present session. The Bill, as it comes before your Lordships' House, is a little extended in comparison with what it was when originally considered, but nevertheless the Government hope that your Lordships will pass the Bill, as it will meet a great desire among certain parts of the population for the extension of facilities to acquire sweets and similar articles. I therefore hope that your Lordships will agree to my noble friend's proposal.
On Question, Bill read 2a.
Then (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended), Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House forthwith: House in Committee accordingly: Bill reported without amendment, and read 3a, and passed.

EXCHEQUER AND AUDIT DEPARTMENTS BILL
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD HYLTON: I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. —(Lord Hylton.)
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived:
Then (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended), Bill read 3a, and passed

SALE OF CROWN LANDS.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE had given Notice to call attention to the case of two ex-Service men, tenants on the Crown Lands at. Stagsden. Bedfordshire, whose holding is advertised to be sold by auction on September 1, 1921; and to ask how many acres of the Crown Lands proposed to be sold are occupied by ex-Service men.
The noble Marquess said: My Lords, I have to ask the indulgence of the House while I bring forward a matter which seems a trivial thing, but is really one of considerable importance, and also one of urgency. An announcement. is published, of which I have here the particulars of sale, about the Crown estate of Stagsden, a considerable area of land extending to 3,360 acres. There are fourteen large farms, small holdings, accommodation land, cottages, allotments, anti gardens. Among these small holdings there are two which are occupied by a man and three or four of his sons, two of whom have served in the great war, one having been seriously wounded, and having lost his leg. These two small holdings are for sale and the sale is to be held at the Town Hall at Bedford on Thursday, September 1; that is to say, in a fortnight.
I have had a letter from one of the tenants of these two holdings, in which he says:
" My object in writing to you is to suggest that something really ought to be done so that the ex-Service men need not be turned out of their homes and holdings through the action of the Crown, for which only a short time ago they were fighting and bleeding."
On that I have only to say that the Crown Lands are now not the property of the King or of the Crown, but are managed by a Government Department, and that
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it is through no action of the Crown that tins unfortunate eviction is to take place. It is really the fault of the present Government, and the policy was, I believe, introduced by the late Minister of griculture, Lord Lee of Farehani. The man goes on to say:
"The position of ex-Service men was especially drawn attention to in a Petition sent to the Commissioners of His Majesty's Woods, but this point has either been overlooked or not considered to be of any consequence, so far as the sale of the estate is concerned."
I am not aware whether that is a filet or not, but I feel certain that there must have been an omission and an unfortunate oversight on the part of the Department.
What it really collies to is tins. Here is an instance, and it is not one of the worst instances, I believe—I have got some particulars, but I cannot bring them forward because I cannot substantiate them—but it is not the worst instance of interfering with the holdings of men who fought for the country. It is a very serious thing, and if it is understood that. on the Crown Estates, 10,000 acres of which are to be sold, these men are going to be dispossessed, I am afraid that a. very ugly feeling will grow up, and one which would not at all redound to the credit of the Government. I most respecfully hope that His Majesty's Government may, if possible, withdraw this shall amount of land out of this large estate which was put up for sale, or, at any rate, make some sort of arrangement which will not necessitate the removal of men who, of their own accord, went, to fight for the country and the Crown.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (THE EARL OF ANCASTER): My Lords, I do not think you want me to enter into a long statement as to the policy of selling the Crown Lands. I. can only say, generally, that no fewer than 9,000 acres have been found on the Crown Lands for ex-Service men, and in addition to that the Government have done an enormous amount in placing ex-soldiers on the land. I cannot to-day deal with the whole matter as to whether it is a wise policy for any portion of the Crown estates to be sold. As a matter of fact, I. understand that some of these outstanding estates cost a. great deal of money and bring in very little revenue, and it is a debatable policy whether it is wise or not to hold all this land.

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On this particular matter. without going into full details, I may say that all that the noble Marquess has said is practically correct. It is only right to add that to a large extent this is a family matter. As I understand, these two small holdings, Lots 20 and 21, are at the present moment in the occupation of a certain Mr. Biddy and his four sons. Apparently, one son is occupier of one part, Mr. Biddy and another son are occupiers of another portion, and two other sons, who fought in the war, are in occupation of another portion. It has been the effort on. the part of the agents to the Crown Estates to do their best to partition this laud, and to try to get the family to conic to some suitable arrangement, and it is believed that. they would be willing to purchase their estate. Unfortunately, up to the present time, the family appear to have been unable to agree among themselves how far the land should be divided up, and how they should share the land among them, but after what the noble Marquess has said I should be very pleased to represent the case to the Ministry.
Of course, I have had very little time and I am not all-powerful with the Ministry. I can only give the noble Marquess my assurance that I will do my best as far as these two people are concerned to see whether the matter cannot be considered, whether the family cannot be brought together and induced to heal their differences, and whether they can he kept on as tenants or the land sold to them under the favourable terms which are always offered in cases of this description whenever it is found possible. As regards the latter part of the noble Marquess's Question, in addition to the land I have already mentioned, there is Lot 7 of 176 acres and there are Lots 3 and 51, consisting of 25 acres, which are held by ex-Service men.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: That is not quite an answer to the Question that is on the Paper. The Question is, How many acres of Crown Lands proposed to be sold are occupied by ex-Service men?
THE EARL OF ANCASTER: Referring to the Stagsden estate, I have had very little time in which to obtain the necessary information. I expect it will take a certain amount of research to get at the particulars. I thought the noble Marquess's Question referred only to this particular holding.

ROYAL COMM1SSION.
The Royal Assent was given to the following Bills—

Consolidated Fund (Appropriation).

Education (Consolidation).

Exchequer and Audit Departments.

Expiring Laws Continuance.

Shops (Early Closing) Act (1920) Amendment.

Trusts (Scotland).

Criminal Procedure (Scotland).

War Pensions.

Corn Production Acts (Repeal).

Telegraph (Money).

Public Works Loans.

Railways.

Supreme Court Officers (Retirement. Pensions, etc.).

Irish Railways (Settlement of Claims).

Safeguarding of Industries.

Aberdeen Corporation (Electricity Works Railway) Order Confirmation.

Bridge of Allan Water, etc., Order Confirmation.

Ministry of Health. Provisional Order (Barnsley Extension).

Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (Aberavon and Neath Extension).

Ministry of Health Provisional Order (Stoke-on-Trent Extension).

Pilotage Provisional Orders (No. 5).

Stirlingshire and Falkirk Water Order Confirmation.

Dumbarton Burgh (Water) Order Confirmation.

North British Railway (Burntisland Harbour Transfer) Order Confirmation.

Airdrie and Coatbridge Tramways Trust Order Confirmation.

Grangemouth and Stirling Water Order Confirmation.

Rhymney and Aber Valleys Gas and Water.

Leicester Corporation.

Metropolitan Water Board (Various Powers).

North Staffordshire Railway.

Batley Corporation.

County of London Electric Supply Company.

South Shields Corporation.

Manchester Corporation (General Powers).

West Ham Corporation.

Adamson's Divorce.

Hamilton's Divorce.

House adjourned at twenty minutes past five till Tuesday, October 18, 1921.