Sitting of 16 December 1921

Preamble
The House met at Twelve of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  PEACE TREATIES.

    BURGENLAND.
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the plebiscite in the Burgenland is being taken with the consent of the Austrian Government; and whether the date of the plebiscite has been advanced so as to assist a Hungarian solution with the approval of His Majesty's Government?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Cecil Harmsworth): The Austrian Government have protested against the holding of the plebiscite on 14th December, though, under the strict terms of the agreement signed at Venice by Austria and Hungary, it was due to be held by that date. I need hardly say that any suggestion that the date has been fixed in order to assist a Hungarian solution is altogether unjustified. His Majesty's Government are of course only concerned to see that the plebiscite should take place in circumstances which ensure to the utmost the maintenance of order and the freedom of the vote.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is it not a fact that Hejjas and the White Terror troops were still in occupation of the Burgenland when the plebiscite was taken?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: I should like a notice of that question.

    GERMAN REPARATION.
    Mr. SPOORasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if the amount of reparation received by Britain to date from
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    Germany exceeds the cost of our Army of Occupation on the Rhine; and, if so, by what amount?
    Mr. YOUNG: The amount received up to the present by the British Empire from Germany under the Reparation and Financial Clauses of the Treaty of Versailles is not yet sufficient to cover the cost of the British Army of Occupation on the Rhine.
    Mr. SPOOR: Does the amount to which the hon. Gentleman refers include the shipping which comes to this country from Germany, and which has had the direct effect of causing unemployment in the shipyards of this country?
    Mr. YOUNG: It includes the amount under the Reparation and Financial Clauses. I am afraid that if I were required to give a further analysis of that amount I should have to ask for notice.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY(by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister whether a Note has been sent by the German Government to the Reparations Commission declaring its inability to pay the next two instalments of the indemnity; what action His Majesty's Government proposes to take in the matter; and whether the position will be explained to Parliament before further sanctions are agreed to?
    Mr. YOUNG: I understand that a Note has been received from the German Government by the Reparation Commission asking for a partial postponement of its January and February instalments. The position created by the Note will be discussed with the Allies, but in view of the urgency of the question, I cannot undertake to postpone a decision until the House meets again.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: May I ask the Leader of the House whether further sanctions, such as occupying the Ruhr, are not equivalent to a fresh declaration of war, and should not this House be informed and consulted before such a grave step is taken, or is it only to be discussed with the Prime Minister in his private room, and this House ignored in the matter?
    Captain W. BENN: Do we understand from the hon. Gentleman that the Government might consent to further military sanctions without consulting this House?
    Mr. YOUNG: I cannot add anything at all to the answer I have given, or warrant any implication from it.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: On the constitutional point, may I ask the Leader of the House whether what are virtually new declarations of war should be embarked upon before an explanation is given to the House.
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN (Leader of the House): I think it is unnecessary and inexpedient to answer hypothetical questions.

  ASIA MINOR.
  Mr. A. WILLIAMSasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the French have now completely evacuated Cilicia; whether it has been reoccupied by the Kemalist forces; whether the threats of the latter have produced panic among the non-Turkish inhabitants; and what is the present position of those refugees whom the British authorities caused to return there after the Armistice and of the other elements in the population who supported our cause in the War and to whom we in return promised freedom from Turkish government?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: Although His Majesty's Government have no definite information on the subject, it is believed that the administration of the Turkish Nationalists has replaced French military authority in Cilicia; in any case, the French troops were, under the terms of the Agreement, to have been withdrawn by 20th December. By agreement with the Angora Government, M. Franklin Bouillon was himself to supervise the conditions of the transfer of authority, and he was to be assisted by three French representatives residing at Adana, Mersina and Aintab. His Majesty's Government are not aware of any threats emanating from the Turkish Nationalist authorities or forces against the non-Turkish inhabitants; the French Government have, indeed, informed His Majesty's Government of the adoption by the Angora Government of certain decisions favourable to the minorities and indicating, according to the French view, a disposition on the part of the Nationalist authorities loyally to fulfil the
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  obligations assumed under the agreement; these decisions include abrogation of the law of requisition, suspension of conscription, organisation of a mixed Franco-Turkish Commission to safeguard the property of refugees and to prevent looting; assurance of freedom of person and respect of property; and an immediate and total amnesty.
  The latest information about the refugees is that there are at Mersina 10,000 workless Armenians in a miserable state. I cannot, however, accept the statement that His Majesty's Government caused the refugees to return to Cilicia after the Armistice; those who returned, did so after the French had taken over from the British the duties of military occupation and the responsibilities deriving therefrom. Nor have His Majesty's Government ever promised autonomy for Cilicia.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that I have in my possession a letter from the War Office stating that they have sent back refugees from Aleppo to Cilicia, and that refugees who wished to go to the South were not allowed to do so?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I am not sure that I am aware that my hon. Friend has such a letter, but, even so, I do not think that it upsets the truth of my answer.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: How does the hon. Gentleman maintain his statement that these people were not sent back by the British authorities.
  Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR: Were not many of these people sent back by the French authorities; and, further, may I ask if the information and experience, unfortunately, of the Armenians in Cilicia, as to the effect upon their future of Turkish control, has not already been vindicated by the plight of thousands of refugees?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I am not at all sure that the Armenians have been well advised to fly from Cilicia.
  Mr. G. BARNES: Can the hon. Gentleman say how many of these people have now left Cilicia; and has there any reply been given on their behalf, in a collective sense, to the Proclamation a few weeks ago of the French Commander-in-Chief?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I cannot say. I have no definite information as to how

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  many Armenians have left Cilicia, but it is obviously only a small proportion of the total number.
  Mr. BARNES: Then has the Government no responsibility for those who have now left Cilicia?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: The right hon. Gentleman appears to understand more than I do where the responsibility lies.
  Mr. A. HERBERT: In the interests of minorities and for the sake of our own great interests in the East, will the Government consider the advisability of adopting an entire new policy towards Turkey?
  Lord ROBERT CECIL: May I enquire whether the Government do not recognise that they are bound by the strongest possible obligations to do everything they can to protect the Armenians?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I need hardly say that the Government have done everything within their power in the circumstances.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Will the hon. Gentleman say any one thing the Government have done effectively, and does he mean to say that the British Government is impotent and unable to carry out its promises?
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHYasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can give any information regarding the military situation in Asia Minor of the Turkish and Greek forces; what steps His Majesty's Government are taking to bring about a cessation of hostilities in these regions; and whether any conversations are taking place or have recently taken place between representatives of His Majesty's Government and of the Angora Government?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: There is no change in the military situation in Anatolia. Active hostilities appear to be virtually in suspense. A meeting will take place early in the New Year between the Allied Foreign Ministers to discuss methods and terms of a general settlement. No conversations are taking place, or have taken place, between representatives of His Majesty's Government and the Angora Government.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that this situ-
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  ation has existed for many months, and in the meantime British trade is adversely affected, together with our relations to our Mohammedan subjects and fellow subjects of the King in India, and cannot he do something more expeditiously than these continual conversations which lead nowhere?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I have already stated that a meeting will take place in Paris in the first week of the New Year to discuss these things.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: What is the use of that?
  Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR(by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister if the policy of the Government to maintain the provisions of the Sèvres Treaty in relation to Greece and to the protection of the Greeks, Armenians and other Christian communities from massacre will be steadily adhered to?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The policy of this country in respect of the protection of the Christian populations of Asia Minor has not changed and has been made the subject of unremitting representations to the Governments principally concerned. As to the Treaty of Sevres, further discussions are about to take place between the Allies, and it would not be desirable to make a statement at this stage.
  Mr. O'CONNOR: If this Session is not going to be ended to-day in view of the very strong feeling which exists in the country on this question, could the right hon. Gentleman manage to give us a few hours for discussion?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Parliament was summoned in this extraordinary Session solely to deal with the Article of Agreement signed by the Irish representatives and by His Majesty's Government, and I should rather deprecate the introduction of other subjects which would lead to a prolongation of the Session of quite uncertain but of considerable length.
  Mr. O'CONNOR: I did not suggest that that small space of time should be given until the Irish business is disposed of. It is not for me to stand between Ireland and the Treaty. I should be glad if the right hon. Gentleman—[HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] I have not the smallest doubt

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  that the reactionaries object to anything which will strengthen the hands of the Government.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is making a speech.

  >KENYA COLONY.

    TAXATION AND FRANCHISE.
    Mr. ALLEN PARKINSONasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the white settlers in Kenya are refusing to pay Income Tax because they were not consenting parties to the tax; whether the Income Tax law was passed in 1919 and never yet enforced; how much direct taxation is levied upon settlers, Indians, and natives, respectively, in Kenya; and whether he will consider the advisability of widening the franchise to Indians and natives in order that all parties may be consenting parties to the taxation they bear?
    Mr. RHYS DAVIESasked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government endorse the recommendation of the recent Conference of Premiers respecting equality of status for British citizens, whether Indian or European; and whether any steps have yet been taken to carry out this new doctrine in British Crown Colonies and especially in the matter of the Kenya franchise and segregation?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Churchill): I understand that a motion for the removal of the Income Tax in Kenya has been moved in the Legislative Council and defeated, and that further opposition to the tax on constitutional grounds has been raised and will probably be tested in the Courts. I have no other information on this part of the hon. Member's question. The Income Tax Ordinance was passed on 7th December, 1920. It was not found possible to complete the necessary arrangements within the financial year 1920–21, and, as there would have been hardship in collecting two years' tax in one year, it was decided not to proceed with the levy of the tax for the financial year 1920–21. I have no information as to the direct taxation of Europeans and Indians separately, but taken together, the estimate for 1922 is £169,442, representing about five pounds per head. The
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    direct taxation on natives is expected to bring in £656,070, representing about 5s. per head. The question of the Indian franchise is engaging my careful consideration. I am not satisfied that any form of elective representation of natives is necessary or would serve any useful purpose.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Does not the constitutional objection to paying taxes for which they have not voted also extend to the native Indians in the Kenya collieries?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I think that is a question which, if answered at all, would require to be answered with very considerable modification.
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he will lay Papers or inform the House as to the present position of the franchise and segregation question in Kenya Colony, including his instructions to the Governor and the correspondence with the India Office?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I will consider the question of publication in connection with the presentation to Parliament of next year's Estimates.

    LAND REVENUE.
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he is aware that the annual rent or tax paid by the settlers in Kenya for the land they occupy is reckoned at so many cents per acre; that the change in the Kenya currency has not halved the value of the cent in relation to the florin, and that the result of the change has been to halve rents paid by the settler when cents were 100 to the florin; and how do the Government expect to make good the revenue so lost?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: Article 5 (3) of the Kenya and Uganda (Currency) Order in Council, 1921, provided that
    "Where any contract entered into or instrument made before the commencement of this Order provides for the making of any payment in terms of cents, the contract or instrument shall have effect as if for references to any number of cents there were substituted references to twice that number of cents of a shilling."
    The difficulty which the hon. and gallant Member anticipates will not, therefore, arise.

  CEYLON (CONSTITUTION).
  Mr. RHYS DAVIESasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether any report has yet been received from Ceylon as to the desirability of a reform of the constitution of the Colony or the lines which any such reform should follow?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I have not yet received such a report and, so far as my information goes, the matter has not yet been debated in the Legislative Council.

  SOUTH AUSTRALIA AND TASMANIA (GOVERNORS' RESIGNATIONS).
  Major-General Sir N. MOOREasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether both the Governor of South Australia and the Governor of Tasmania have resigned their appointments, and have assigned as the reason that this step was taken as a result of the heavy taxation now levied in England?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Both the Governors mentioned have, to my regret, found it necessary to resign their appointments. I cannot say whether or not the consideration referred to influenced their decisions.
  Sir N. MOORE: In future appointments, may I ask whether such guarantees will be obtained from Governors-General-designate that will prevent a repetition of such an unsatisfactory position?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The question is a very difficult one in view of the heavy expenses of these appointments, and the difficulty of finding suitable persons who have independent means to fill them.
  Sir N. MOORE: Have the conditions altered since the appointments were made, that is the point?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: They have altered in the same way as all conditions have altered lately, to the detriment of everybody.

  FARM DISPUTE (WEST NORFOLK).
  Mr. G. EDWARDSasked the Minister of Agriculture what action he proposes to take to bring about a settlement of the West Norfolk farm dispute,
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  since the employer concerned refuses to agree to the terms decided on by the County Conciliation Committee under the Corn Production Acts (Repeal) Act?
  The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Sir A. Boscawen): I have been anxiously watching the position in this county, but it does not appear that I can usefully intervene. The matter is one which should be dealt with by the County Conciliation Committee. The Corn Production Act (Repeal) Act provides that if an agreement as to wages arrived at by the Conciliation Committee is confirmed, the terms of the agreement become an implied condition of any contract of service and can be enforced accordingly. The Norfolk Conciliation Committee has not, however, agreed up to the present to the confirmation of its agreement.
  Mr. G. EDWARDSasked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he proposes to take with regard to the students employed on the farms in the West Norfolk area, where a dispute has taken place because the employer refuses to comply with the decision of the County Conciliation Committee, as these students, being subsidised by public money, are now performing the work of the men locked out?
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: I have ascertained that there are no students in receipt of Government aid who are in training on the farms in question.

  ROYAL NAVY.

    NEW CONSTRUCTION (SUSPENSION).
    Captain WEDGWOOD BENNasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty what will be the total charge in connection with the four new battleships whose construction has now been abandoned?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Amery): I regret I cannot give figures of the total charge which will be incurred in the event of the contracts for the four new battle cruisers being cancelled.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Does the hon. Gentleman not wish that he had taken our advice to postpone the construction of these ships until after the Washington Conference?
    Mr. NEIL MACLEAN: Considering that this House has voted these sums to be spent on shipbuilding, cannot the hon. Gentleman see his way to adopt some alternative scheme of spending the money in order to alleviate unemployment in the shipbuilding districts?
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEE: Is it not a fact that two of these ships have to be built, and that this news is in the paper to-day?
    Mr. AMERY: I have no information on that subject. As regards the other supplementary question, the only shipbuilding I can deal with is Admiralty shipbuilding.
    Captain BENN: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us whether the four ships are to be proceeded with or not?
    Mr. AMERY: The construction of the four battle cruisers for the present is in suspense. What will ultimately be done will depend on the outcome of the Washington Conference.
    Mr. G. BARNES: Has anything been done by way of compensation to the shipbuilders who are going to lose money on these contracts; and if so, will anything be done correspondingly with regard to the workmen who will lose wages?
    Mr. AMERY: My right hon. Friend's question raises a point of detail with reference to the contracts. Questions of that sort may arise, but I do not think it would be in the public interest to go into them now.
    Captain BENN: Will the House be informed how much money has been thrown away owing to this mistake?
    Mr. AMERY: Certainly the House will be informed.

    WARSHIPS (BREAKING-UP).
    Mr. N. MACLEANasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether the Admiralty has signed a contract for the breaking up of a number of British warships in Germany; and, if so, whether he can give to the House the reasons for this action when there are so many men unemployed in Britain who could do this work?
    Mr. AMERY: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. This step was taken after every effort had been made to dispose of these ships
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    for breaking up in this country. I should explain that the facilities in this country for breaking up old ships—especially large vessels—are fully occupied for some time to come, in consequence of the special measures taken by the Admiralty during the last few months to distribute vessels for breaking up to various ports in Great Britain in order to relieve unemployment. There can, therefore, be no question of the action of the Admiralty having prejudicially affected the employment situation, as is suggested in the second part of the hon. Member's question.
    Mr. N. MACLEAN: Surely the unemployed men in the shipbuilding places who have constructed those vessels are equally able to destroy them, and facilities are there in the yards for the destruction of any vessels? Why is it, therefore, necessary that the Government, which is supposed to be giving money to the unemployed, should not give work to these men instead of doles, and permit those vessels to be broken up in those yards, although it may cost a little more money than in Germany?
    Mr. AMERY: We have approached a number of firms to see whether they could not possibly take part in ship-breaking, but they all found it impossible to do so because, for one reason, they are overstocked with scrap, and there is already over 1,000,000 tons of surplus vessels being broken up in this country at this moment.
    Mr. T. GRIFFITHS: Is it not a fact that you have transferred the breaking up of these ships to Germany because they are paying lower wages than we are?
    Mr. AMERY: That certainly is not the case, because we have offered and disposed of a very large volume of ships for breaking up in this country at far lower prices than the particular block which has gone abroad, and we did this in order to relieve unemployment to the fullest extent.
    Mr. N. MACLEAN: Is the Government prepared to make an offer to the trade unions affected, giving them the option of finding men to break up the ships in this country?
    Mr. AMERY: I am ready to consider any practical suggestion which the hon. Member can make.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Do you expect Germany to pay for these ships?
    Mr. SPEAKER: We are now having a debate.

  SAFEGUARDING OF INDUSTRIES ACT.

    CZECHO-SLOVAK GOODS.
    Mr. KILEYasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, seeing that the Czecho-Slovak currency had no pre-War standard, did not in fact exist before February, 1919, and that therefore it has not depreciated to an extent of 33⅓ per cent. therefrom, and that the Government of the Dominion of Canada has officially recognised this to be a fact, and is in consequence admitting Czecho-Slovak goods free, of duty, he will state why under Clause 2 (b) of the Safeguarding of Industries Act an application has been referred to a committee of inquiry for the imposition of an import duty of 33⅓ per cent. on certain types of Czecho-Slovak glassware?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Baldwin): There appears to be no doubt that the Czecho-Slovak Government adopted the currency unit of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire as its official unit, since the paper currency issued by the Austro-Hungarian Bank was given official currency in Czecho-Slovakia subject to being stamped by the authorities of that country. The parity of exchange, with reference to which depreciation is to be calculated in accordance with the provisions of Section 2 (1) (b) of the Safeguarding of Industries Act, is clearly the parity of the krone, the currency unit of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire. I am unable to agree that, in charging duties on goods from Czecho-Slovakia, based on the conversion of their values in kronen at the current rates of exchange, the Government of Canada has expressed any opinion as to the existence of depreciation or its measure.

    INCANDESCENT GAS MANTLES.
    Sir W. BARTONasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to the decision of the referee appointed by the Lord Chancellor under the Safeguarding of Industries Act that incandescent gas mantles, in so far as certain materials
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    used in the manufacture of the same are concerned, are liable for duty; and whether he intends to apply to the referee for his assistance, as he did in the case of santonin, to test this decision in a court of law?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I am carefully considering the position created by the decision in question, but I am unable to make any statement at present.
    Sir W. BARTON: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that in fact these articles have "lost their identity" when they become part of those gas mantles, and will he define the meaning of "loss of identity" for the purposes of this Act?
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEE: Is it not a fact that last month Germany doubled the import duty on incandescent gas mantles in order to prevent mantles manufactured in this country from going into Germany?
    Sir RYLAND ADKINS: Is it not a fact that this House deliberately decided against the inclusion of gas mantles in the first part of the Schedule?
    Mr. KILEY: When does the right hon. Gentleman expect to be able to give some information on this subject considering the confusion which undoubtedly exists in the trade?
    Sir J. REMNANT: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the gas mantles imported into this country from Germany in 1920 exceeded by 15 times the number imported in 1919, and that according to the "Times" Trade Supplement the imports this year equalled the total consumption of gas mantles in this country?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Perhaps it would answer all the questions if I say that I only had the official decision yesterday. I am carefully considering that decision, and I hope it may be possible to arrive at a conclusion at a very early date. I quite recognise it is essential to this industry that this should be done at once.

    CELLULOID.
    Mr. NEWBOULDasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, in view of the decision of the referee that gas mantles which contain certain dutiable materials are liable to an import duty of 33⅓ per cent. on parts of the mantles, he proposes to give instructions that a duty of 33⅓ per cent. is to be levied

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    on imported celluloid containing, as it does, dutiable synthetic camphor; and, if so, will these instructions also apply to all other imported manufactured articles of which dutiable commodities form a part?
    Mr. BALDWIN: The answer to both parts of the question is in the negative.

    DUTIABLE GOODS (SCHEDULE).
    Mr. NEWBOULDasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is satisfied that the procedure of his Department in placing substances, such as menthol, amongst the commodities which are liable as fine chemicals to a duty of 33⅓ per cent., and afterwards attaching the letter R to the names of these substances, thereby exempting them from duty, is not calculated to create considerable confusion; and is he prepared to give an undertaking that no such action will be repeated without public inquiry, of which notice has been previously circulated in the public Press instead of in a weekly journal published by the Board of Trade, of whose existence few traders are aware?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Certain Amendments have been made to the lists as originally issued under the Safeguarding of Industries Act, but all the Amendments so far made restrict the scope of the original lists. It is obvious that in lists such as those in question it must be necessary to make some corrections, and I see no reason to modify the procedure adopted. I should add that I do not accept the statement at the end of the question as being correct.

    APPLICATIONS (PROCEDURE).
    Mr. C. WHITEasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will inquire into the great dissatisfaction that exists with regard to the procedure being adopted before the Committee appointed by him to consider applications under Part II of the Safeguarding of Industries Act; whether he is aware that evidence is not given under oath, and that therefore no penalty can be imposed for wilful false evidence; that cross-examination of witnesses is not permitted to objectors to the granting of applications; and that, in view of the fact that particulars of the evidence in support of an application are not furnished to objectors before the hear-
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    ing by the Committee, no sufficient opportunity is provided for producing rebutting evidence?
    Mr. BALDWIN: The Safeguarding of Industries Act confers no powers on Committees to take evidence on oath. The Statutory Rules of Procedure, a copy of which I am sending to the hon. Member, provide that no witness shall be examined or cross-examined except by the members of the Committee. This limitation, which was decided on by the Board of Trade after full consideration, applies of course to all witnesses, whether they appear in support of or in opposition to an application. With regard to the last part of the question, this is a matter within the discretion of the Committees themselves. I have no doubt that they will afford all proper facilities to witnesses to enable them to present their cases.
    Mr. WHITE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in practice the truth is disregarded and there is no remedy?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I should be sorry to assent to the proposition of the hon. Member. I have no reason to believe that people tell lies when they come as witnesses before these Committees, and, having regard to the class of men chosen to serve on these Committees, I imagine that they are quite capable of distinguishing between the truth and fiction.
    Major MACKENZIE WOOD: How can evidence be tested if the right of cross-examination is not given?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Of course, the word "tested" needs definition, but I think the procedure is quite sufficient for the purpose.

    DELAYS.
    Mr. KILEYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware of the congestion and confusion prevailing and the consequent difficulty in obtaining delivery of parcels from Germany owing to the collection by His Majesty's Customs of the duties under the Safeguarding of Industries Act and the German Reparations Act; that certain parcels which arrived in this country for Christmas trade on the 21st and 24th October, could not be delivered by the Post Office until various forms had been filled up and duties paid; and that, though those formalities were duly completed and a receipt obtained on the 16th November, 1921, a part of the consignment is still

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    undelivered; and whether, in view of the continual complaints made by traders as to the delays, he is prepared to modify the procedure or appoint a larger staff so as to prevent this hindrance to trade?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hilton Young): The centralisation at one depot of the examination of the parcels, the scrutiny of invoices, and the assessment and receipt of levy and duty in respect of all parcels arriving in London from Germany, has now been effected in conjunction with the postal authorities, and if the addressees will carry out the instructions given on the form of advice sent on arrival of the parcels, they should not experience any delay in delivery beyond such as is inevitable in collection of the levy or duty. As regards the third part of the question, if the hon. Member will give me particulars of the case referred to, I will have inquiry made.
    Mr. KILEY: Seeing that the complaints are increasing in number every day, would not the hon. Gentleman appoint a small committee of City men to investigate and do something to clear up this tremendous delay?
    Mr. YOUNG: No, Sir. I think the facts of the case are not as suggested by the hon. Member. The complaints are not increasing, and I very much trust and believe that the measures to which I have referred in the answer will lead to their diminution and disappearance.
    Mr. KILEY: Then why object to having a committee to investigate?

    PERFUMES.
    Mr. KILEYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that many hundreds of packages of perfume which are mixtures of natural essences and synthetics that have lost their identity are lying at the docks and at the Post Office Customs Department, and cannot be obtained except on payment of a duty improperly demanded; and will he direct the Customs officials to release such parcels?
    Mr. YOUNG: No, Sir, I am not in possession of information to this effect. If, however, the hon. Member will give me particulars of any actual cases which he has in mind, I will cause inquiry to be made into the facts. I may, however, remind him that, in a case such as he
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    suggests, delivery can be obtained on deposit of the duty demanded, pending settlement of the question of liability.

  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.

    FOOD DEPARTAIENT, BOARD OF TRADE.
    Sir J. REMNANTasked the President of the Board of Trade how many regional transport officers are still employed in the Food Control Department; what are their duties; what pay do these officers receive; and when he proposes to dispense with their services?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Notice has been given to terminate the engagement of the regional transport officers of the Food Department at the end of the present month. It will be necessary, however, to retain some of these officers during the month of January for the disposal of papers, the winding-up of accounts and other work connected with the termination of their branch. By the abolition of the regional transport staff a saving of about £31,000 a year in respect of salaries will be effected.
    Captain TERRELL: How many of these officers will be retained permanently?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Oh, permanently? None, or very few. Speaking from memory, I think the expenditure for January will be about £1,500.

    OFFICE OF WORKS.
    Viscount WOLMERasked the Prime Minister whether the attention of the Economy Committee has been directed towards the swollen staff of His Majesty's Office of Works and the increase in the cost of that Department?
    Mr. YOUNG: The provisional Estimate for the Office of Works for 1922–23 has been referred to the Committee on National Expenditure in the same way as other Departmental Estimates.
    Viscount WOLMER: When may the Report of this Committee be expected to be published?
    Mr. YOUNG: I cannot say.
    Viscount WOLMER: Why should it not he published at once?
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Can the hon. Gentleman give an assurance that it will be Published?
    Mr. SPEAKER: There is another question on that point.

  OPIUM TRADE, INDIA.
  Mr. GILBERTasked the Secretary of State for India what is the acreage in India now under cultivation with the opium poppy; how many chests of Indian opium are now exported annually; what are the destinations of this exported opium; and whether any and, if any, how much is converted into prepared opium for smoking?
  Colonel GIBBS (Treasurer of the Household): The total area under poppy cultivation in British India amounted to 156,435 acres in the year 1919–20. 9,823 chests of opium were exported in that year. The countries which imported this opium were the Straits Settlements, Dutch East Indies, Siam, French Indo-China, Japan, United Kingdom, Hong Kong, British North Borneo, Ceylon, Mauritius and the Fiji Islands. My right hon. Friend is not in a position to state how much of the raw opium exported from India to other countries is there converted into prepared opium for smoking.
  Mr. BARNES: Can the hon. and gallant Gentleman say if the Government are working in full harmony with the organisation under the League of Nations for the reduction or suppression of this trade?
  Colonel GIBBS: I am not in a position to state that myself, but I will tell my right hon. Friend what the right hon. Gentleman says.
  Mr. BARNES: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman make inquiries on the matter?
  Colonel GIBBS: Yes, Sir.

  IRELAND.

    LAND PURCHASE.
    Colonel NEWMANasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he has received communications urging that the pledge given by the Government that a Bill to complete land purchase in Ireland would be introduced and proceeded with pari passu with the Measure consti-
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    tuting a part of Ireland a Free State should be observed; and what answer has he been able to make?
    The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Colonel Sir Hamar Greenwood): I am not in a position to make any statement at the present time on the question of the completion of land purchase.
    Rear-Admiral Sir R. HALL: May I ask whether it is the policy of the Government that the British taxpayer should be further taxed to provide the benefits which they cheerfully provided for united Ireland for those who advocate separation?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: I can add nothing to the answer.
    Mr. MOLES: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether, if the Imperial Government does not deal with the residue of the Irish land question in so far as the Irish Free State is concerned, it will deal with it in so far as Ulster, which will remain in this Imperial Parliament, is concerned?
    Colonel NEWMAN: Does it mean that the pledge given by the Government in regard to the 1920 Act is now dead?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: I must ask the hon. and gallant Member to accept the answer that I have given as the best that I can give.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Will my right hon. Friend, in considering this matter, bear in mind that under the proposed settlement the position of Irish landlords will be one of intense danger and that they are entitled to the protection of this Parliament?

    MALICIOUS INJURIES (COMPENSATION).
    Sir J. BUTCHERasked the Chief Secretary what provision is being made for the payment to owners of destroyed police barracks of the compensation awarded to them by the courts; whether he is aware that in some cases these owners have been left without rent or compensation for nearly two years; and whether he will take steps to remedy this hardship as soon as possible?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: I would refer the hon. and learned Baronet to the reply that I gave yesterday to a private notice question on this subject asked by the hon. and gallant Member for Finchley (Colonel Newman).

    NAVY AND ARMY AND AIR FORCE INSTITUTES.
    Viscount WOLMERasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether orders have been issued to Navy and Army and Air Force institutes in Ireland that in future only Irish goods are to be sold; and, if so, on what grounds this has been ordered?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Lieut.-Colonel Sir R. Sanders): The reply to the first part of the Noble Lord's question is in the negative; the latter part does not therefore arise.
    Viscount WOLMER: Is not my hon. and gallant Friend aware that a circular has been received by the depots of the institutes in Ireland instructing them to boycott British goods and to deal only in Irish goods, and is he not aware that a copy of this circular has been sent to the War Office?
    Sir R. SANDERS: The answer is in the negative.

    PRISONERS (RELEASE).
    Lieut. - Colonel SPENDER CLAYasked the Prime Minister whether it is the intention of the Government to release all Irish political prisoners?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The question of an amnesty will be considered if the Agreement is approved on both sides.
    Viscount WOLMER: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking to exclude murderers from that?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir. I will not go beyond the statement which I have made.

    IRISH FREE STATE (FLAG).
    Mr. ESMOND HARMSWORTH(by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister whether he proposes to communicate with the Sinn Fein negotiators as to whether the flag of the Irish Free State will not be the present Sinn Fein flag, but the Union Jack with such minor alterations as local patriotism requires, as in the case of all other self-governing Dominions within the British Empire, before the proposals of the Treaty are embodied in a Bill to be placed before this House?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: As far as I know, no condition as to the flag was imposed
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    in any other Dominion, and the Government have followed the precedent of the earlier cases.
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: Will not the Government communicate with the Sinn Fein negotiators on this question of the Flag, which no doubt will excite considerable interest in the country and in this House?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That is the same question again.

    CONSTABLE-MECHANICS.
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEEasked the Chief Secretary whether he has any further information with reference to the summary discharge from Gormanstown Camp of 19 constable-mechanics of the Royal Irish Constabulary, on the 14th and 15th of December, without notice, and without their fares being paid to their homes?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: I understand that a number of constable-mechanics, on completion of their engagement, were through inadvertence discharged from Gormanstown Camp on the dates stated in the question without being given return railway warrants. As soon as this mistake was brought to notice, steps were at once taken to prevent its recurrence and to rectify it as far as regards the men who had not been given warrants on discharge.

    MURDER AND OUTRAGE.
    Lieut. - Colonel ARCHER-SHEE(by Private Notice) asked the Chief Secretary whether he has any information other than that which has appeared in the Press, with reference to the murder of Sergeant Enright, R.I.C., and the wounding of Constable Timmoney, and whether he has seen the report that a man named Joseph Cahill has just been released from Waterford Gaol, and that prior to his release he was taken to the office of the Governor of the prison, where a military officer was waiting with two telegrams in his hand, one of which said that Cahill had been sentenced to penal servitude for life, and the other ordered his immediate release; and what is the explanation of this extraordinary procedure?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: I regret to state that Sergeant Enright was murdered and Constable Timmoney wounded on the 14th instant, as stated in the question. Steps

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    have been taken to secure the co-operation of the responsible leaders of Sinn Fein with a view to the arrest of the miscreants involved in this crime. As regards the second part of the question, I have no information as to what took place at Waterford Gaol. The facts in regard to the case of Joseph Cahill are, I understand, that the confirming officer in the exercise of his discretion, while confirming the finding of the Court, decided to remit the sentence imposed.
    Viscount WOLMER: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the responsible leaders of Sinn Fein have yet helped the Government to find a single murderer?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: Yes, they have co-operated. They have helped the Government in several cases.
    Viscount WOLMER: Have you got the murderers?
    Sir H. GREENWOOD: They have helped the Government in inquiries endeavouring to secure the arrest of murderers.
    Viscount WOLMER: In how many cases have you got the men under lock and key?
    Sir F. BANBURY: Have you got the murderers?
    Mr. DONALD: Is the right Gentleman aware that the position of the Royal Irish Constabulary is a matter of very great concern at the moment throughout Ireland, and that, unless something is done immediately, I do not know what will happen in the North and the South?

  NAVY AND ARMY CANTEEN BOARD.
  Viscount WOLMERasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office the reasons for the continued delay in the publication of the balance sheets of the Navy and Army Canteen Board for 1920; and when the balance sheet may be expected?
  Sir R. SANDERS: I would refer the Noble Lord to the reply given to a similar question which he addressed to my right hon. Friend on the 27th October last. I can assure the Noble Lord that every endeavour is being made to ex-
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  pedite matters in connection with the publication of the accounts in question.
  Viscount WOLMER: Are we to take this delay as an indication of the business efficiency of the Navy and Army Canteen Board?
  Mr. WISE: Can the right hon. Gentleman inform us who are the chartered accountants?
  Sir R. SANDERS: I must ask for notice of that question.
  Captain TERRELL: Is it a fact that the Navy and Army Canteen Board have lost over £2,000,000 in the course of two years trading, and, if so, will the Government consider the question of leaving the matter to private enterprise?

  CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION DEPARTMENT.
  Captain W. BENNasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the work of the special department of Scotland Yard has been modified or curtailed since the retirement of Sir Basil Thomson?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Shortt): As I informed the House last month, the Department referred to is being reorganised with a view to securing greater efficiency and economy. To that end modifications are being carried out, and it is hoped that economies may be effected.
  Captain BENN: Is the work described by the late Chief as being his work being continued by his successor?
  Mr. SHORTT: I am afraid that I do not know what the late Chief has described as being his work.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Can the right hon. Gentleman hold out any hope of this purely War-time Department being wound up as being altogether un-English and against our traditions?
  Mr. SHORTT: It is not a War-time Department at all.
  Captain BENN: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to say that the work of cataloguing political opinions and watching political meetings—purely political work as distinguished from criminal work—has been now abandoned?
  Mr. SHORTT: No, Sir.
  Mr. GWYNNE: Are we to understand that this very important work, in view of the unrest throughout the world, is being curtailed at the present time?
  Mr. SHORTT: I have not said anything of the sort. I said that it was being modified with a view to greater efficiency.
  Mr. G. THORNEasked the Home Secretary what Vote bore the cost of the work of Sir Basil Thomson as recently described by him?
  Mr. SHORTT: The expenditure I described in reply to a question in this House on the 10th November is borne by the Metropolitan Police Fund, the Treasury grants to which are included in the Vote for Police (England and Wales).
  Captain W. BENN: Is any of the work described by Sir Basil Thomson in his articles paid for out of Secret Service money?
  Mr. SHORTT: I am afraid I cannot answer that, because I have not read the articles.

  POLICE PENSIONS (RE-ASSESSMENT).
  Sir J. REMNANTasked the Home Secretary whether a constable who retired after 31st March, 1919, has a right to have his pension re-assessed on the Desborough scale of pay which came into operation on 1st April, 1919, or whether such re-assessment is at the discretion of the police authority who granted the original pension?
  Mr. SHORTT: I do not think it can be said that police authorities were bound in law to carry out the recommendations of the Desborough Committee, either as regards increased pay or re-assessment of pensions, but I believe that these recommendations were in fact given effect to in all proper cases.
  Sir J. REMNANT: Is there any right conferred by this House on the men, or are the scales of pay and pension recommended by the Desborough Committee, and afterwards adopted by this House, subject to alteration at the discretion of the police authorities?
  Mr. SHORTT: I think that is the same question which I have answered.
  Sir J. REMNANT: I am sorry to be persistent in this matter, but I did not gather from the right hon. Gentleman's answer whether the amounts of pay and pension, as adopted deliberately by this House, are subject to alteration at the discretion of the various police authorities. Is that so, yes or no?
  Mr. SHORTT: That is a legal question, of course, and I am advised that the local authorities have a discretion in that, as I have said, they are not bound in law to carry out the recommendations.
  Sir J. REMNANT: Am I not entitled to ask the Home Secretary, who has charge of this matter, the simple question whether, after this House has approved of a certain scale of pension and pay, behind that the various police authorities have the right and discretion to alter it at their own free will?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is exactly the question which the hon. Baronet put on the Paper.
  Sir J. REMNANT: On a point of Order. Where my question is not answered, and intentionally not answered, by the Home Secretary, the Minister to whom I addressed it, because, as he says, there is some legal question involved in the point—in my humble opinion it is a matter of administration—surely I am entitled to press for an answer, yes or no, where the House itself has deliberately laid down that a certain scale shall be adopted in reference to these men?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Baronet has received a quite clear answer on the legal position, namely, that the Home Secretary was advised that there was nothing legally binding on the local authorities.
  Sir J. REMNANT: With all submission, that is not a clear answer. I asked the right hon. Gentleman if he would kindly say, yes or no, whether it is in the discretion of the various police authorities to alter the scale laid down in this House.
  Mr. SPEAKER: Perhaps the Home Secretary will read the answer again.
  Sir J. REMNANT: And if it is not clear may I have a clear answer?
  Mr. RONALD McNEILL: May I ask the Home Secretary whether he has taken the opinion of the Law Officers of the

  287
  Crown as to the right, of local bodies to over-ride a decision of this House?
  Mr. SHORTT: No, Sir; I have not taken the advice of the Law Officers, but if the House desires it I will do so. The answer I gave was that I did not think it could be said that police authorities were bound in law to carry out the recommendations of the Desborough Committee, either as regards increased pay or reassessment of pension. That is the advice I have been giveen. It is a purely legal question, and not a question of fact at all.
  Sir J. REMNANT: Will the right hon. Gentleman leave out for the moment the Desborough Committee's decision, and say whether, in view of what the House definitely decided, the local police authorities have the right at their discretion to flout the House, and do what they like?
  Mr. SHORTT: No, Sir.
  At the end of Questions—
  Sir J. REMNANT: On a point of Order. In view of the character of this extraordinary Session, and of what the Leader of the House has said about the desirability of devoting the Session to Ireland, I am in a difficulty, and I should be glad to have your advice, Mr. Speaker, on the position which arises out of the very unsatisfactory answer given to-day to the question which I put to the Home Secretary. The answer failed entirely to give me the facts to which I was entitled. In view of the great unrest that has been created throughout the police forces of this country——
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not entitled to make a speech. I understood that he had a point to put to me.
  Sir J. REMNANT: I was endeavouring to explain the point on which I desire your advice, and that is, how to bring this matter before the House, so that the House may show its decision, which, in my opinion, it has already given in connection with this matter. It is an urgent matter, because of the fact that there is great unrest among the police forces of this country, due to rumours that the Home Office will not stop, or will not do anything to prevent, local police authorities altering the scale of pay and pensions which have been definitely laid down by this House. Those rumours have been
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  confirmed to-day by the answer given by the Home Secretary, and they are against the opinion of the House. I should like to know how I can raise this question, and when, with a view to getting a decision of the House on this very important matter.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member had better consult me in the course of the day. I had no notice of this question. If he will be good enough to consult. me in the course of to-day, I will give him the best advice I can.

  WAR DEBTS (CANCELLATION).
  Mr. SPOORasked the Prime Minister if, in the event of this country agreeing to cancel France's War debt to Britain, one condition will be the evacuation by French troops of the occupied areas in the Rhine provinces?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot say what would be the conditions of an arrangement which has not yet been a subject of discussion.

  DISARMAMENT (WARSHIP CONSTRUCTION).
  Mr. RHYS DAVIESasked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government have asked at Washington that under certain circumstances they should be allowed to construct one of the Hoods rather than accede to the exact basis of fleet equality with America; and, if so, why?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir.

  RUSSIAN FAMINE (RELIEF).
  Mr. A. WILLIAMSasked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government is aware that the number of starving people in the Russian famine area is far beyond the reach of private charity and whether the Government has decided to recommend the granting of credits to the Russian Government for the purpose of food without which millions of people must starve during this winter?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The Government are fully alive to the serious nature of the famine in Russia. The answer to the second part of the question is in the

  289
  negative; the hon. Member is no doubt aware that Parliament has voted a sum of £100,000, representing the present value of Government stores, chiefly medical, to be placed at the disposal of the Red Cross Society for the relief of famine in Russia. The original value of these stores was 250,000; their present day value is £100,000.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Will not the Government, in addition to this relatively small sum, join with the other Great Powers in making the necessary credits to save the lives of these millions of people?
  Captain Viscount CURZON: Will the Government consider extending the same scale of relief to the distressed Cornish miners, who are now starving, as the hon. Member wishes them to give to the Russians?
  Colonel Sir C. YATE: Will the right hon. Gentleman give part of that £250,000 to the unfortunate refugees from Russia who are now in workhouses in this country?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The sum which has been voted by the House was voted to send stores, mainly medical stores, which were to he at the disposal of the Red Cross for use in Russia. I am not aware of any proposal as suggested that with other Powers we should collectively vote money from national funds, but it is quite obvious that in dealing with any matters of this kind we must have regard at the present moment to the condition of our own people.
  Lord R. CECIL: Is it a fact that no fewer than 10,000,000 or 12,000,000 persons will die of starvation in Russia this winter, and is it not also the fact that it was due to the refusal of the British Government to entertain any proposal for an advance of credit that the League of Nations was unable to take action at Geneva?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Both questions obviously ought to be the subject of notice. As regards the first I am unable to say what is the possible extent of the calamity which from various causes has befallen the Russians. As regards the second question, I will ask to be excused from answering as to what passed at the League of Nations without an opportunity of refreshing my memory.

  WAR LOANS (RATE OF INTEREST).
  Mr. N. MACLEANasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in view of his declaration that a cut of £175,000,000 is required in national expenditure, he has considered the desirability of a reduction of two per cent. in the rate of interest on war loans, which would effect a saving of approximately £160,000,000; and if so, whether he is prepared to advise the Government to take the necessary steps to effect this saving?
  Mr. YOUNG: The answer to both questions is in the negative. Any such action would be a direct breach of public faith.
  Mr. MACLEAN: Is it not the case that direct breaches of public faith have already been made by the Government, and that the same argument can be applied to this as to the reduction of wages of the workers, where also a direct pledge was given, namely, that the cost of living is coming down and that consequently the cost of money should come down as well?

  GREECE (PRIVATE LOAN).
  Sir N. MOOREasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the Greek Government is desirous of negotiating a private loan in this country; if so, whether it is understood that a substantial portion of that loan is to be expended in goods and material of a peaceful character purchased in Great Britain, and most of the remainder in the British Empire; and whether, under such circumstances, His Majesty's Treasury would view such a loan with favour, provided that the security offered was satisfactory to the parties negotiating it?
  Mr. YOUNG: I am aware that the Greek Government has given indications of its desire to raise a loan in this country. I am not clear as to the amount so raised which it is proposed should be spent in this country, and have asked for information on this head. As to the last part of the question, it is not the practice of His Majesty's Government to indicate favour or disfavour to loans on the London market.

  EXCHANGES (STABILISATION).
  Mr. M. STEVENSasked the Prime Minister whether, having regard to the fact that a trifling proportion of currency issues if continuously employed is requisite for exchanging imports and exports, he will consider the feasibility of a system of credits being jointly arranged between Great Britain, the United States of America, France, Italy, and Belgium, by which the necessary amount in pounds, dollars, francs, and lire can be stabilised over a period of years, and with little risk of loss?
  Mr. YOUNG: If I rightly understand my hon. Friend's question, I do not think that the suggestion contained therein is in present circumstances feasible.
  Mr. STEVENS: Has the hon. Gentleman any favourite charity which would receive a cheque for 50 guineas if he can show that the proposal is impracticable?

  KEN WOOD.
  Mr. N. MACLEANasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been drawn to the price demanded for Ken Wood by its owner and whether he is prepared to introduce legislation to tax land in Great Britain upon the basis of the price at which the owner is willing to sell?
  Mr. YOUNG: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative, and to the second in the negative.
  Mr. MACLEAN: Is there no intention on the part of the Government to introduce legislation to prevent individuals from withholding this necessary of public life from the public, or at least from imposing such an abnormal price as to amount to blackmailing the public of London?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is only putting in other words the question on the Paper.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Sir S. ROBERTS: In order to meet the general convenience of the House, may I ask the Leader of the House whether it is possible for him to make some general arrangement as to the hour when the Amendment to the Address is likely to be put this afternoon?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Of course, that does not rest with me. It is not within my power to fix the hour at which the Debate shall come to an end, but, so far as I can gather, we may hope that a decision may be taken about 4 o'clock. I cannot say definitely. A decision may be taken earlier, or it may prove, on the other hand, that I am over-sanguine. So far as I can forecast the probable course of our proceedings, from certain information which has reached me, I should hope that we may come to a decision about 4 o'clock.
Mr. M'GUFFIN: Does the right hon. Gentleman propose to closure the Debate at a particular hour?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No. We are not contemplating the Closure, but I believe that all of us, however strongly we feel and whatever view we take, would like to consult the general convenience of the House, and it is within the knowledge of every Member of the House that it does become a matter of grave inconvenience if we have to sit late on a Friday, and, above all, on a Friday on which, up to a comparatively short time ago, no sitting was expected. I hope, therefore, with the consent of all parties, we may reach a decision at an hour sufficiently early not to cause great inconvenience to hon. Members.
Sir J. BUTCHER: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether Parliament will be prorogued to-day or on Monday?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not know whether the hon. Member has seen what I said last night on the Adjournment of the House. Perhaps I had better repeat it. We think that it would be undesirable, and that Parliament would not wish to prorogue under any uncertainty as to the result of the discussions now taking place on the other side of the Irish Channel. If, therefore, we do not have the result of those discussions in time for the Prorogation to take place to-day, I shall move that the House do adjourn till Monday.
Sir J. REMNANT: Will it be adjourned sine die, waiting for the decision?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, I propose to move the Adjournment till Monday. It is necessary to do that because the Committee of Supply has not been set up. It is necessary to move the Adjournment from Friday until Monday, other-

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wise the House would have to meet on Saturday.
Viscount CURZON: At what time will the House meet on Monday?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The usual hour.
Ordered,
"That the Proceedings on the King's Speech (Motion for an Address) be not interrupted this day at Five or half-past Five of the Clock."—[Mr. Chamberlain.]

ORDERS OF THE DAY.
  KING'S SPEECH.

    DEBATE ON THE ADDRESS.
    [THIRD DAY.]
    Order read for resuming Adjourned Debate on Amendment [15th December] to Question [14th December],

  IRISH FREE STATE.
  "That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, as followeth:—
  Most Gracious Sovereign,
  We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to thank Your Majesty for the Most Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament:
  Having taken into consideration the Articles of Agreement presented to us by Your Majesty's command we are ready to confirm and ratify these Articles in order that the same may be established for ever by the mutual consent of the peoples of Great Britain and Ireland, and we offer to Your Majesty our humble congratulations on the near accomplishment of that work of reconciliation to which Your Majesty has so largely contributed."—[Lieut.-Colonel Sir S. Hoare.]
  Which Amendment was to leave out the words:
  "we are ready to confirm and ratify these Articles in order that the same may be established for ever by the mutual consent of the peoples of Great Britain and Ireland, and we offer to Your Majesty our humble congratulations on the near accomplishment of that work of reconciliation to which Your Majesty has so largely contributed."
  and to insert instead thereof the words
  "this House regrets that the proposed settlement of the government of Ireland indicated in the Gracious Speech from the Throne involves the surrender of the rights of the Crown in Ireland, gives power to establish an independent Irish Army and Navy, violates pledges given to Ulster, and fails to safeguard the rights of the loyalist population in Southern Ireland."—[Colonel Gretton.]
  Question again proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  Mr. A. HENDERSON: In view of the general desire of the House that the division should be taken as early in the afternoon as possible, I do not propose to engage the attention of the House for more than a few minutes. We, who are
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  associated with the Labour party on these Benches, have not shown any desire to monopolise the time of the House in this Debate. We felt that very largely this was a matter for the Government and their supporters, but especially we recognised the desirability of allowing as much time as possible to Members who represent constituencies in Northern Ireland, in order that they might have the best facilities given to them for stating what I believe to be their strong feelings about the present position. My right hon. Friend the Chairman of the Labour party (Mr. Clynes) in the early stages of the Debate stated our position. We welcome the Debate. We welcome the Articles in the Treaty which we hope will be ratified by a large majority of this House. But we also welcome the Debate not only because it enables us to consider the Articles in the Treaty but because the new situation represents in our minds a tremendous change in attitude in spirit and in policy.
  Those of us who do not always share the view of the Government cannot consider the position as we have it to-day without regard to the tragic events associated with Irish history, not only Irish history in days long gone by but Irish history in the very recent past, and the results of the Conference as they are set forth in this Treaty seem to us to represent a welcome and a very tremendous change in the relations between the Irish and the British peoples. The change is so great and has come so suddenly that it is almost impossible properly to appraise the value of the real position at this stage. Without any desire to enter into premature rejoicing, I welcome the Treaty as one who has followed the Irish question during the whole time I have been associated with public life, now some 30 years, and as one who has followed from the very first visit I paid to Ireland 50 years ago, when I had a lasting impression made upon my mind. My Friends from the North will excuse me for giving this little experience. I remember as a boy being taken along the Falls Road in Belfast and my relations saying to me "Do you see that street? No one but Orangemen dare live in that street." And I remember them taking me a little further along the Falls Road and saying, "Do you see that street? No one but a Home Ruler dare live in that street." That was 50 years ago on the occasion of my first visit to

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  Ireland as a boy. I have never forgotten it, and it seems to me from some of the speeches that I have listened to that so far as that part of Ireland is concerned unfortunately as it was then it is now.
  In considering the changes that have taken place, it is very difficult for me to say where I can appreciate the more the untiring efforts of the Prime Minister and his colleagues who conducted the negotiations, or the splendid courage and sincerity of those Irish plenipotentiaries who, knowing the risk they were undertaking—and they must have known the risk—were prepared to add their signatures to the Treaty. If it ever was incumbent upon the House to rise above the ordinary standard of party politics, party warfare and sectional interest, it seems to me that it is at a time like the present. Surely we all must recognise that issues hanging in the balance which must inevitably affect the vital interests of our people at home, and of the British commonwealth of nations, and, indirectly, affect the whole world at large. It would not be difficult for any one of us to approach the matter under discussion from a narrow personal, or from a mere selfish or party standpoint. We could have raised objections to this or that provision in the Treaty, and we might have occupied the time of the House in emphasising what we considered its blemishes, or in suggesting what we think might have strengthened or improved it. All this might have been done under the guise of what is so often termed helpful or friendly criticism. It seems to me that any sort of criticism at this moment would not only be unhelpful but unfriendly. I go further and say that it would be a useless and empty contribution and might prove to be positively harmful and embarrassing.
  That is one of the reasons why we have refrained from taking part in the Debate to the extent which we think the importance of the occasion demands, and I could have wished, I say quite frankly, that the Division on this Amendment could have been taken yesterday evening after the statesmanlike speech that was delivered by the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Central Glasgow (Mr. Bonar Law), which in my judgment was one of the best contributions to debate that it has been my privilege to listen to during the 18 years in which I have been a Member of this House. May I
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  suggest that I think that there is a danger in prolonging this discussion. I may be wrong. I do not wish to be misunderstood. I am not sure that there is not something in the nature of playing for position. We know that there is discussion going on over the water, and I have the impression, following the reports in the papers as I have been able to do,—and that is the only information which I have,—that there is a desire among some members of Dail Eirean to see what the decision of this House really is on this first Amendment, and I think that it would have assisted the position if they could have had our decision before they came to a decision on the other side. I think that it would have assisted their decision if they could have characterised the Division here as having the same striking unanimity which characterised the Division which was taken on the 31st October, when a Motion not dissimilar in spirit and intention to the Amendment now before the House was negatived by 439 votes to 43 votes. Both here and in Dublin the discussion has entered upon its third day, and, whatever be the cause of the delay there, I think that, so far as this House is concerned, the sooner we can see our way to ratify the Treaty presented by the Government the better it will be. The outstanding fact of the Treaty is that it means peace. That is a consideration beyond measure. If this House desires peace with Ireland—I am firmly convinced that not only the majority of the Members of the House, but the overwhelming majority of the people which the House represents, are deeply anxious for an honourable and permanent peace with the Irish people—the most permanent action in favour of peace is for us to endorse as speedily as possible the great work of the Prime Minister and his colleagues and to ratify the Treaty.
  In the Debate two points have stood out beyond the general question of the Treaty being an instrument of peace. One is that there has been considerable criticism of the method adopted by the Government in order to secure the Treaty. A good deal has been said about secret diplomacy. We on the Labour Benches are opposed to secret diplomacy. We believe that it is no more possible to carry out secret diplomacy in completion than for the executive of any organisation, even

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  a trade union, to do the whole of its work in public. If I interpret it correctly, the Motion which was discussed on 31st October was a Motion of Censure because the Government entered into conference. The overwhelming decision given against that Motion surely was a mandate to the Government to go forward with the method of approach they had decided upon in order, if possible, to secure an honourable settlement. In that case I think we showed clearly that we were prepared to trust the Government in carrying through their intentions by the method they had adopted. I remember saying in that Debate that the Labour Members were prepared to trust the Government in the matter, and I do not think a single speech has been made by any leader of the Labour party criticising the Government for the course they have pursued since 31st October.
  The other question that has emerged largely in this Debate has been the position of Ulster. I have heard it hinted more than once from Benches opposite, not so much in this Debate as in previous Debates, that Labour Members do not seem to have very much sympathy with the representatives and the population of Ulster. I want to assure my hon. Friends opposite that that is not the case. Hon. Members may laugh, but, after all, we can afford to differ with them on principle without losing all our sympathy with those on the opposite side. If there are in this House representatives who ought, in spite of their differences, to have sympathy with the position in Ulster, it is those of us who are and have been so long officially connected with trade unions. Those unions have large numbers of members in the North of Ireland. They are members whom we admire, though we differ from them, for we know how deeply they feel on this question. In some instances we have had rather bitter experiences from them, because of the strong feeling on their side and because they do not like the strength of feeling on our side. Do not let our Friends opposite be under any misapprehension; we are not unsympathetic. If they will examine the policy of, the Labour party they will see that we specially made one proviso designed to secure as far as possible the interests of Ulster, having regard to the religious question.
  Although we recognise the Ulster difficulty, I will say one thing without rais-
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  ing a single controversial point. We do recognise that whilst all parties ought to respect the feelings of the Ulster people and ought to examine carefully their desires, the last thing they can expect us to do is to allow Ulster to block the way to an honourable settlement with Southern and Western Ireland. They have a right to ask for their own position to be safeguarded, but, without digressing from what I have laid down, I must say that in some of the speeches in this Debate and in previous Debates I have thought that they were not content merely with trying to safeguard their own position, but they wanted to go a long way in the direction of preventing this Government or any other Government from finding a solution which would be satisfactory to the majority of the Irish people in the Southern and Western areas. We of the Labour party have strongly favoured the line of approach that has been followed by the Government, and in order to show where we have stood, not in the latter days, but for some time, I would remind the House that we tabled the following Amendment to the Address a year ago:
  "But regrets that in view of the present deplorable condition of affairs in Ireland there is no expressed intention on the part of the Government to make a real effort towards reconciliation and settlement by meeting in conference the elected representatives of the Irish people and exploring with an open mind every possible avenue to peace."
  It is a great satisfaction to us to find that five or six months later this method of dealing with the question has been adopted by the Government. I have already spoken about trusting the Government with this matter. In closing my speech in the Debate on 31st October I said we would examine the results of the conference and apply the following tests:
  "(1) Whether the proposal satisfied the majority of the Irish people; (2) having regard to the long religious difficulty there must be some form of protection for the minority; and (3) we shall examine the proposal from the standpoint of the security of our own Country."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st October, 1921; col. 1412, Vol. 147.]
  We can safely examine the Treaty from the standpoints of Nos. 2 and 3. At any rate, that is my judgment. My Friends on the other side may not agree with it so far as to say that the protection is adequate or that the form of protection is what they desire, but we

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  do think that a legitimate attempt has been made in some the Clauses in this Treaty to meet the Ulster difficulty. We have yet to find out how far our No. 1 test is going to be responded to, namely if the Treaty is to secure the approval of the majority of the Irish people. We shall await the result with interest and with concern, and we devoutly pray that the decision which is to be given by the representatives of the majority of the Irish people, may be, as I hope it will be by a large majority, a decision in favour of ratification. I will only say as my final word that, in our judgment, not since the Government was elected in 1918 has it reflected more accurately the spirit and desires of our people than it has done in connection with this matter. I sincerely hope they will continue to tread the new path they have taken, until they have placed upon the Statute Book an Act which will establish an honourable peace and open up a new era of friendship and mutual confidence between the British and the Irish peoples.
  Mr. O'NEILL: I should perhaps thank the right hon. Gentleman who has just concluded his speech for some small grain of comfort after many years—I was going to say of hostility, but shall I say rather of bitter criticism. At this stage I do not intend to go over the ground which has already been so fully covered in the course of the Debate. We have had some very remarkable and arresting speeches. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Widnes (Mr. Henderson) referred to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Central Glasgow (Mr. Bonar Law) as one of the finest contributions to debate in this House he had ever heard. With that I am sure every Member of this House most fully and most cordially agrees. There was a speech by the Colonial Secretary in regard to which I should like to say a word. There have been many occasions in the past when the Colonial Secretary has found himself in hostility to the views of the people of Ulster, but in this Debate he is the one Minister among all the others who have spoken from that bench who has had a word of friendliness or of thanks to say to Ulster in regard to what she has done in recent years to further a settlement. He fully acknow-
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  ledges that the people of Ulster have gone a long way towards doing what they could to bring about a settlement of this question. I wish the Prime Minister had had a word of similar courtesy in his speech, for those who in all these long years have done their best from the bottom of their hearts to support the close connection of Ireland with this country. There appears in the Press this morning a letter from the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland to the Prime Minister of the Empire in replying to the last communication sent to him when the agreement was presented. The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland makes many just complaints. I want to emphasise one of those very particularly. In these Articles of Agreement the Ulster people have been, in my view, scandalously treated. A fortnight ago in the House of Commons in Northern Ireland the Prime Minister read the following message from the Prime Minister of the Empire—
  "By Tuesday next either the negotiations will have broken down or the Prime Minister will send me"—(Sir James Craig)—"new proposals for the consideration of the Cabinet. In the meantime the rights of Ulster will be in no way sacrificed or compromised."
  In two respects the rights of Ulster have been sacrificed and compromised beyond any question whatever. First of all, she has been nominally put into the Irish Free State, even though it may be for a very short period of time. You may say that is largely a sentimental objection, because of course it is within the power of the Parliament of Ulster to vote itself out at any moment. Still, it is a distinct change of status and contrary to the statement of the Prime Minister of the Empire to the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. The second point, and the one with which I wish particularly to deal is the question of the Boundaries Commission. There is no sentiment about that. It is a vital, practical question and it is a question in regard to which the Prime Minister of the Empire knew perfectly well that Ulster held strong views. In the correspondence published the other day there is a letter in which Sir James Craig objects to the mere suggestion from the Prime Minister of the Empire that there should be a reconsideration of the boundaries. This question of the proposed Boundary Commission appears to me to be a question of very large Imperial and constitutional importance. I wonder

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  if there is any precedent in the Empire for an agreement being made that the boundaries of a self-governing State within the Empire should be subject to revision without the possibility of a word of protest from, or without the consent of, the State whose boundaries are to be altered. It is unique within the Empire.
  The Parliament of Northern Ireland has just been set up. Its proceedings were opened by His Majesty the King. It exercises its jurisdiction over a specific area. Yet here we have the Prime Minister of the Empire, in flagrant violation of his written pledge, making a Treaty with a third party, without a word of consultation with the Ulster people, the effect of which may be radically to alter the boundaries within which they now have jurisdiction. I should like to see the Imperial Parliament or the Prime Minister of the Empire making an agreement about the boundaries of Canada with the United States without taking the Canadian Prime Minister into consultation, or I should like to see this House dare to pass a Measure altering the boundaries between Quebec and Ontario, without consulting the people of those two provinces as to what the boundaries were to be. It is unthinkable, it is intolerable, it is contrary to all the best interests of the Constitution of this Empire, and it is a thing which if carried out in this case will be a grave blow to the great fabric upon which the Empire is constructed. It will make for ever impossible in the future for the Prime Minister of one portion of the Empire to trust the word of the Prime Minister of the Empire and the head of the great imperial structure.
  The day before yesterday, occupying in the Northern House of Commons of Ireland the position which you, Mr. Speaker, occupy in this House, I was shaking hands with the members of that House when they departed from the first Session of that House at its prorogation. Among those members were men returned from every corner of the area which has been given to us by the Act of last year. Those members had taken their part in deliberations which had resulted in the passage of several Acts of Parliament, which have received the assent of His Majesty the King, and in every possible manner our Parliament has been constituted with a particular area subject absolutely to no possibility of revision without the consent of the people who live
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  within that area. I understand the Prime Minister now to say that he merely wants a small rectification of frontiers. He says: "There are a number of Protestants and Unionists there who are outside your boundary, whom you might take in, and there are a number of Sinn Feiners, in such and such a place, whom you might equally with advantage allow to go to the South." I wonder if the Prime Minister said this to the Sinn Fein delegates. Did he tell them that he merely proposed a minor rectification of frontiers, or did he say to them something of this sort? I wonder if he said: "There are two counties in Northern Ireland where you have got a majority. We will appoint a Boundary Commissioner, and he is bound to give you those two counties, for you have got a majority there, and you may be quite sure you will get them." Did he put it to the delegates in such a way as to make them think that what he wished to do was to give them these two counties in respect to which they have had longings for some time past?
  If the right hon. Gentleman, whom I am very glad to see come in at this moment, means what he tells us now, namely, that he merely proposes a minor rectification of frontiers, to exclude Protestants and to include Catholics, something of that kind, and if that is what he told Sinn Fein delegates, why did he not put it in the Agreement? Would it not have been simplicity itself, if that was meant, to put a few words in the document to say that this Boundary Commission is to operate subject to the wishes of the population, subject to economic areas, and also why should not he have said that in any decision which it came to, there should be no diminution of the population of Northern Ireland? If he had said that, then it would be true and right now to say that all that is contemplated is purely a readjustment of boundaries. What the Southern Irish want are the counties of Tyrone and Fermanagh.
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Lloyd George): I understand my right hon. Friend's argument is that I told the Sinn Feiners that, inasmuch as they had a majority in Tyrone and Fermanagh, they would get the whole of those counties. I certainly never said anything of the kind. On the contrary, all I have ever suggested is what I have suggested

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  equally to the House of Commons, and, I think, to Sir James Craig—that the character of the population and the economic and geographic conditions must be taken into account. That is a matter which has to be decided upon by the Commission. I could not say beforehand what result there would be, whether to add to the number of the population of Ulster or to diminish it. I only know what is the opinion of a prominent Ulster man, namely, that it might have an effect which would be favourable to the Ulster area. It is not for me, but for the Commissioners to express an opinion upon that.
  Mr. O'NEILL: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman, but I think that all I said was that I wondered whether the right hon. Gentleman had told the Sinn Feiners that all that was intended was a mere rectification of boundaries, the result of which might be, as he now says, to include the population of these counties.
  The PRIME MINISTER: As a matter of fact, I did say to the Sinn Fein representatives that the representatives of Ulster who were at the Buckingham Palace Conference, when there was a discussion of this kind, were under the impression that it would have the effect of increasing the population of Ulster. That was their view of the effect of a Boundaries Commission, and if that be the case, it means that the population desired will be within that area.
  Mr. O'NEILL: Unless there is a desire on the part of Sinn Feiners to get the boundary of Northern Ireland reduced, I still think that a few words in the Agreement to the effect that the population was not to be diminished by this Commission would practically have put the matter right. There is one other point which has led the Ulster people to believe there is something behind this, and that was a speech made not long ago by the Lord Chancellor, in which he said that because of some emergency legislation which we passed through the Ulster House of Commons the other day, the Northern Parliament were coercing certain people in certain parts of Tyrone and Fermanagh. That is entirely beyond the truth. The enormous majority of the people in those counties would welcome, and do welcome, the legislation which the
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  Northern Parliament passed the other day. It was simply legislation to enable the County Council to function, and if it refused to recognise the authority of the Parliament and the Government of Northern Ireland, then someone must be put in its place to carry on its functions. So long as it refused to recognise the authority of the Government, it could get no grant. It is in a practically bankrupt state, it would lose its grants, the roads would become impassable, the asylums would not be kept up, the hospitals would have to be closed, and the whole local administration of that area would have fallen to the ground, and it was to prevent a state of affairs of that kind arising that the Northern Parliament of Ireland passed this Act, an Act which is welcomed by the great mass of the peaceful population, whether Roman Catholics or Protestants. This question of the boundary, in my view, stands apart from the rest of the Treaty, because it is the one point in which the Ulster Government have been definitely let down. It must be amended. Definite instructions should be given to this Boundary Commission, instructions which have got the approval of the Ulster Government. What will happen now without that is simply this, that it will be left for one man to decide. The Boundary Commission is to consist of one representative appointed by the British Government, one appointed by Southern Ireland, and one appointed by Northern Ireland. I think we may assume that Southern Ireland and Northern Ireland will wash themselves out, and it will remain entirely for the Chairman, appointed by the British Government, to decide this question.
  I have said all that I intend to say except one general consideration. I fully agree with what was said by the right hon. member for Central Glasgow yesterday (Mr. Bonar Law) that this new Irish Free State is not going to he the financial paradise some people seem to think. I wonder how many hon. and right hon. members of this House, particularly among those opposite who are always supporting Irish national demands, would feel inclined to go and live in this new Irish Free State on the chance that they will get off with a shilling income tax, instead of having to pay 6s.? I do not think there would be many of them. I personally take the view that we in the

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  North of Ireland, if we keep our heads and if we carry on steadily, will before many years are out have no cause to regret that all these large powers which are being given to the South are withheld from us. Personally I would rather pay a contribution to the Imperial Government with the result that we continue to have British troops in our midst, and in other ways keep up the British connection. I would rather do that because I think that financially in the future we shall benefit by not having to raise the large army and do those other things which we should have to do under the altered circumstances; we shall not have to go in for all kinds of expenditure in order to provide for the services which are being withdrawn. Several hon. and right hon. members in the course of yesterday's Debate uttered a word of warning. It was wanted. The transports of joy which have gone through the Government Press in the last few weeks have been a most extraordinary phenomenon. Yesterday I was looking at the history of Ireland at the time of the constitution in 1782. That was a time when it was thought that the greatest and freest Constitution had been produced for Ireland that it had ever had or would ever want. I saw in Lecky's History a curious and interesting paragraph wherein he states that the year after the Constitution of 1782 was given to Ireland there was a paragraph in the Address in reply to the Speech from the Throne in the Irish Parliament of the day, which said:
  "There will no longer exist any constitutional question between the two nations that can disturb their mutual tranquility."
  That was the view of the Irish Parliament in 1782. Sixteen years later Ireland was afflicted with one of the most bloody rebellions in the whole history of this United Kingdom, and eighteen years later the Constitution which had been so universally acclaimed as the end of all constitutional struggle with the Irish people was brought to a sudden end by the Act of Union. Let us be cautious now in our transports over this supposed final conclusion of a 750-years-long question. Mr. Lecky says, in a rather striking paragraph, so striking that in view of present circumstances perhaps the House will pardon me for reading it:
  "The victory which had been achieved by the Irish popular party in 1782 was a great one, but many elements of disquietude
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  were abroad. An agitation so violent, so prolonged, and so successful could hardly be expected suddenly to subside, and it is a law of human nature that a great transport of triumph and gratitude must be followed by some measure of reaction. Disappointed ambition, chimerical hopes, turbulent agitations thrust into an unhealthy prominence, the dangerous precedent of an armed body controlling or overawing the deliberations of Parliament, the appetite for political excitement to which Irishmen have always been so prone and which ever grows by indulgence, the very novelty and strangeness of the situation all contributed to impart a certain feverish restlessness to the public mind in Ireland."
  Let us take warning from that great historian, a man with so much power in forecasting what is likely to happen in the future. My final word is this, if this settlement does go through in a form in which it may be possible for Northern Ireland not actively to dissent from it—if it does go through I would counsel moderation to the British people and that they should exhibit that caution and that common sense with which they are supposed to be so abundantly endowed.
  2.0 P.M.
  Mr. RAWLINSON: I agree with the right hon. Gentleman who opened the Debate to-day and who spoke on behalf of the Labour party as to the vast importance of the change indicated by this Treaty. But I disagree entirely with him, I am afraid, both as to his conclusions with regard to the provisions of the Treaty itself and even still more as to the methods by which it is to be carried out. I agree again that he is fully entitled in his vehement joy from his own point of view to say, "you are now adopting a policy which those with whom I work recommended to you long since." I hope that as a fair-minded man ho will equally agree with me that this Treaty is a complete reversal of the policy of the Unionist party. I hate to read extracts to the House, but there was a speech which has been quoted before in this Debate—a remarkable speech by the late Lord Salisbury when he was pointing out the great inadvisability of this disestablishment of the Irish Church following directly after the explosion at Clerkenwell Prison. He was also pointing out the unfortunate incident in connection with the passing of the first Irish Land Act at a time when there had been a more than ordinary number of murders of Irish landlords, and he went on to say:
  "On Tory principle the case of the Government of Ireland presents much that

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  is painful, but no perplexity. Ireland must be kept, like India, at all hazards, by persuasion if possible, and if not by force. As to Liberal principles to govern a population which does not wish to be governed by you on the principle of implicitly attending to its wishes, appears to be as hopeless a task as ever politicians undertook."
  That was broadly the statement of Lord Salisbury which has been frequently referred to in these Debates. I heard an Irishman, in a smoking room the other night, say, after a somewhat heated Debate, "I do not believe in death-bed repentances, either in this world or in the next." What exactly he meant by that I cannot say. At any rate I disagree with him. I am the last person to object to a man changing his views. It is an exceedingly stupid man who never changes his views. But I am entitled to know when the members of my party found salvation, and the means whereby they found grace. The Prime Minister has given me no difficulty upon that point. The right hon. Gentleman told us the day before yesterday, in that very interesting speech, a little bit about a thing which I may say, with the greatest respect to him, and the highest possible opinion of his talents and powers, he rather over-rates his own powers, and that is the question of settling and negotiating. I had experience of meeting him in negotiation when a very young member of this House, and, if I may say so with respect, I think it is a weakness in an otherwise great man. He has told us something of the way in which he carries out negotiations. He said that, so far as these negotiations were concerned, a large number of people said that you might have given these terms, and more fittingly, a year or two ago. He said that that was not so, and referred to the right hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith), observing that they were in the same profession, and knew it depended on their choosing exactly the right moment—
  "You must not choose it when the parties are full of fight, when they are confident they are going to win, when they are confident not merely in the justice of their case, but in the invincibility of their counsel. Who can stand against it? That is not the time to settle. You have got to wait until difficulties have cropped up which they had never foreseen, when doubt begins to enter their minds as to the completeness of their victory, when the costs are mounting up and the only smile is on the face of the solicitor, when they are tired out by plead-
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  ings and counter-pleadings."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th December, 1921; col. 46, Vol. 149.]
  And so forth. May I, by way of illustration, and, incidentally, say that, on the merely professional side, I think I am entitled to speak with very much greater authority than the right hon. Gentleman on the etiquette of the Bar and the solicitors' profession, having been longer in it, and having greater experience in it? I protest most strongly against that being the duty of a good solicitor. A good solicitor or a good negotiator makes up his mind what are the fair terms his client can give, and offers them before a writ is issued or costs incurred. If necessary, I may refer to an ordinary action case taken up by the London County Council, who, quite rightly, make a fair and generous offer before the matter goes into Court, but, once it has gone into Court, they absolutely decline to settle on any terms. Possibly they know of the practice of some solicitors, who think it necessary never to settle until the costs have been run up to a high point. It means a very much more serious matter when applied to this subject. It means that you think now these were fair and reasonable terms to offer; you did not offer them before, because you thought it was not the right time. Is that so? Did the Government always think it was right to offer to Ireland a separate Army and a separate Navy? Did they always think it was the right thing to withdraw the British Army from Ireland? If so, why did they not do it long ago? Go back to 1914. To prevent misunderstanding, I do not think it was the right thing to do then, or the right thing to do now; but, if these are fair, reasonable and just terms to offer, why were they not offered in 1914? Of the hon. Members who frequently sit on these, benches, but are not here now, I think I can say we respect them, and I hope they respect me, although I have been diametrically opposed to them ever since I have been in the House. But if we had offered these terms in 1914, we should have handed over the Government of Ireland to men whom we knew and trusted—I will not say to men of honour, because that phrase has been blown upon of late—instead of handing it over, as we are doing now, to men who have been denounced with far greater oratory than

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  I can pretend to use from Members at that Box week in and week out.
  In 1920 we had the Act of Parliament. The right hon. Member for Central Glasgow (Mr. Bonar Law), whom we are delighted to see back here, although he has come back on the wrong side, is a man who inspires confidence. In 1920 he made, a speech on the Second Reading of the Home Rule Bill and persuaded many Members to vote in its favour. He said they had gone as far as they possibly could go, and the Prime Minister said the same thing. He said they had gone to the furthest limit it was right and safe to go. Did they really think at that time these were fair and reasonable terms, and the only reason they did not offer them at that time was because they did not think the right time had come? I have difficulty in believing that. It may be so, but, if so, it is highly undesirable to make those statements in settling an action, and, still more, in settling matters of this kind, it is better to say quite straightforwardly the length you mean to go, or, at all events, not to say too strongly that you do not mean to go further, because otherwise people may act on what you say. In his speech at Carnarvon, in September, 1920, the Prime Minister said:
  "So far as I am concerned, and I am speaking on behalf of the Government, we shall certainly resist out and out any demand for an army or navy being set up in Ireland."
  Did the Prime Minister at that time really mean to give them an army and navy when he said that? If so, it may be diplomacy; it may be a good way of settling an action, but it does not commend itself to me in any way. That is only a year ago, and on 23rd March of this year a very strong speech was made in this House by the Prime Minister, on the question of having a truce. He was pressed by my Noble Friend the Member for South Nottingham (Lord H. Cavendish-Bentinck), who had been very pertinacious, and kept on pressing him, not only in March, but in April and May. I think on the last occasion he was treated, quite rightly, somewhat severely by the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister made this perfectly plain, that he would never have a truce without the surrender of arms. He said he had been advised by all the people who advise him—as he supposed rightly—that it would be exceedingly dangerous to do
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  so. He pointed out that a truce without a surrender of arms would mean that Sinn Fein would have every opportunity of arming themselves, and that the thing could not possibly be done. That was repeated, as I have said, time after time down to as late as May in reply to the questions of the Noble Lord to whom I have just referred. In addition to that, the right hon. Gentleman declined always on these occasions to meet three or four of the men whom he and his colleagues have reason to believe were connected with the murders. He continued that refusal right down to May; that is insistence upon the two cardinal points of a truce—surrender of arms and no meeting with people who were suspected or known to be guilty of murder.
  On the 9th July the truce was entered into, and a more criminal or wicked proceeding could not well have been imagined. There was the document, or probably two or three documents, and nobody really knew which document they had really agreed to. This document, or documents, offered no sort of protection to those in the South of Ireland. This document—but there, I think enough has been said about it, that hon. Members may be spared my words on the subject! But it was a criminal proceeding. The document, too, was without specification. What had happened in the interval to make this sudden change? You are having a truce without the surrender of arms, which, as had been explained in the House time after time, was vital, and which would be a wicked thing not to do. Again, you are meeting people whom you had declined to meet time after time. What had happened? The only thing that had happened in the interval—and in this connection I may refer to the observations of the Secretary of State for the Colonies yesterday, because he referred to the matter fairly and honestly—the only thing that had happened was the King's Speech at Belfast. I do not propose to accuse anybody in this House, but I am sorry to say that a great deal has been said outside which has quite misrepresented the position of the King's Speech, and I do wish to thank the right hon. Gentleman the Colonial Secretary for the fair way in which he put the matter. I quote him:
  "The next step was the speech which Ministers put into the mouth of the King—it is the correct and constitutional form—at the opening of the Belfast Parliament; a

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  speech for which, of course, as well as every other utterance of His Majesty, Ministers are solely responsible."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th December, 1921; col. 174, Vol. 149.]
  That clears the matter up with which we are dealing every day, and it explains the telegrams. Of course hon. Members know how these matters are done, that these communications and telegrams are not private communications. We know perfectly well that the notification probably would never come to His Majesty's personal knowledge at all. A telegram of the sort is sent by the person who may happen to be in charge at the moment. I only regret—though I do not in any way blame any Member of the Government because the right hon. Gentleman has made it plain—that the matter has been so bandied about, because there are some Members of this House who appear to be under the impression that in voting for the Amendment before the House they will in some way be doing something which might be personally offensive to our Gracious Sovereign the King. I protest against the unscrupulous use made by the Press in this matter, at the same time acknowledging the service the Secretary for the Colonies has done in pointing out how these things are put into the mouth of the King by His Majesty's Ministers, and that they alone are responsible.
  The truce was entered into despite the various strong protestations made, and then towards the end of July a Memorandum was drawn up. It was not published or laid before Parliament. The only opportunity we had of discussing it was the very short discussion in the House on 19th August. On that occasion the Prime Minister spoke and he got into his speech his favourite subject of the question of how to negotiate and how to settle. He said:
  "In negotiations, there are two courses which you can adopt. Men who are accustomed to negotiations know that you can always, if you like, leave something in hand to use later on to purchase settlement. That is one course, a course to which my right hon. Friends opposite are very accustomed. But there is another point, and that is to put all your cards on the table. After considering carefully which of these courses we should take, without hesitation we adopted the latter, because of the importance of ranging on the side of our proposals all sane opinion not merely in this country and in Ireland, but throughout the world. That is what decided us in putting the whole of our terms into the letters without keeping, anything back. I think the sequel proves
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  that we were right in adopting that course, for I have heard of no suggestions from any quarter in this country, and no suggestions from any quarter in any part of the world excepting Ireland, that in these proposals we have not gone to the very limit of possible concessions. Indeed, I have heard it said we have gone too far."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 19th August, 1921; col. 1874, Vol. 146.]
  Here was a definite statement that the Government had gone to the very last possible limit of concession, and some thought they had gone too far. After that the matter went on. Under the Memorandum there was no power of any kind to have a Navy or the suggestion of a Navy for Ireland. Again, a very important difference occurred in the question of voluntary recruitment. There was no power under the Memorandum to prevent voluntary recruitment in Ireland for British regiments. That has gone. That is not reserved in any way. Last and by no means least there was the power of protection and of creating tariffs which are a matter added since the Memorandum. I am asking these questions for the purpose of pointing out the inconsistency involved. I am not trying to make party points. My right hon. Friend opposite, the Leader of the House, whom I am glad to see in his place, will acquit me, although a party man, of that intention. But I am putting this forward for various reasons. The one reason is the great effect these negotiations and the policy of the Government towards Ireland may have on our Indian Empire. Do not do what we have done in Ireland, that is, buoy up people's hopes by saying. "We will never desert you and we will protect you," and then after there has been bloodshed, yielding and giving up, as your enemies would say, to brute force what you decline to give because you thought it right. That is not the best, but the worst possible time to settle differences.
  A friend of mine had two boys, one was killed in the War and the other was sent out to Ireland. In Ireland the boy was taken prisoner, kept in prison 14 days, and was afterwards shot in cold blood. This is only one of hundreds. I introduced the father to the Irish Office, and I agree that everything was done that could possibly be done by the Chief Secretary, and I desire to thank him for his extreme courtesy in the matter. A reward was offered for the conviction of the murderer. Afterwards my friend went out yachting for a time, and he came back

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  in July. He had an advertisement put into the papers, and I believe the "Times" refused to insert it. I asked a question in the House about this matter, and I was told that no further assistance of any sort or kind was to be given to this gentleman by the police or the Irish Office.
  I make no complaint in regard to the action of the right hon. Gentleman because I know it was the policy of the Government which prevented him doing anything or lifting even a finger at the end of July. I believe the name of the person who ordered his execution is known. Of course, I cannot prove it, but I believe that is so, and I want to know what my answer is to be to this gentleman. I have done my best all the way through in regard to this matter. I told this gentleman to trust the Government, and now I want to know what I am to say to him. I have been to Ireland a good deal. There was a time when we had the Balfour administration there, and it was a great success and Ireland was really happily governed at that time. Later things began to get uncomfortable. I remember Presbyterians coming to, me in Ireland and asking, "Is it safe here; do you think the Government are going to hand us over to the Sinn Feiners?" I replied, "That is impossible, and the Unionists will never desert you." I am not a Politician, but people do ask my advice and I have given those people my word that they were all right, that they could safely stay in the South of Ireland, and that we were not going to run away from them at the last moment. I wish the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary would tell me what I am to say to those people now.
  I still believe in the principles which I have held before, but unless we register some protest against this method of carrying through negotiations for a settlement, when it comes to India think of the price you will pay if you make up your mind to withdraw the Army from India. If you believe it to be right to do that, then do it now before any bloodshed has occurred and before you leave your solitary outposts there to fight as you left them in Ireland. I wish to refer to the policy of dealing with matters in this way. I am not going to make an attack upon the Bill which is going to be introduced and which, whether it is good or bad, will not be the work of the House of Com-
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  mons. This is not the handiwork of the House of Commons. We cannot amend it and this is a most unsatisfactory way of dealing with a complicated and difficult question. We are being asked to deal with matters of the greatest moment without any power to amend the proposals, and that makes it exceedingly difficult.
  I want to deal with one or two practical questions of detail contained in this Treaty of which we have heard so much. We are told that it is necessary for Ireland to have an army to help the police at any particular time. A police force may be necessary, but surely aeroplanes, field artillery and maxim guns are not necessary for mere police work. Secondly, as regards the Navy, the Minister for War must have forgotten one of the clauses, which reads as follows:
  "but this shall not prevent the construction or maintenance of the Government of the Irish Free State of such vessels as are necessary for the protection of the Revenue or the Fisheries."
  It is a pretty wide clause and may lead to trouble if they wish at any time to build a navy. I want to put this point. Supposing we had given this power to Ireland in 1910 and supposing they had had it during the last war, what would have been our position? I am not a naval or military expert, but I fancy that we should have been in far greater difficulty than we were. There is one other point which I wish to put, but which I am almost ashamed to put. Has any sort of estimate been made of the cost to Great Britain? It has been suggested to me that the extra cost will be something like £60,000,000 per year. It may be that it will be worth while to pay that price for peace, but in these days, when there is a powerful Anti-waste party in this House, I think it is well that one of those who did the spade work before they came into the House should be the first to put this question. We were told yesterday that while we were denouncing the Government here for having given too much, probably somebody over there was denouncing their leaders for having given too much, but I think there are very strong arguments with which the plenipotentiaries might meet any such complaint against them. They might say, quite fairly, "We have got an army, we have got a small amount of navy; we have got an army which, like Germany's, can be expanded very easily without any

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  intervention from Great Britain, and we have full power, if and when we like, to break away from Great Britain."
  Of course, I am here speaking against my party, but I feel sure that the right hon. Gentleman will acquit me of any desire to be captious or to make mere debating points. I am doing so, because I believe that this is a vital and all-important matter and that a great mistake has been made. You are reversing great principles for which great sacrifices were made by men like Lord Finlay and the late Mr. Joseph Chamberlain. I am afraid that I did not hold those principles in my undergraduate days. I came over at the same time as them, and I have never changed my views. I hold those views at the present time, and that is my reason for taking the line that I do here. If this Agreement goes through, as undoubtedly it will, I will in my small way do everything that I possibly can to make the Treaty a success, but I fear, and fear very greatly, that this will not bring peace to Ireland. The grievance in Ireland, of couse, existed, but it has been engineered by people outside Ireland and by money outside Ireland, just as it is engineering discontent in India, here, and in Egypt at the present time. I fear greatly that this Treaty will be looked upon as a surrender of Ireland, and that it may mean that our troubles are only just beginning. Have the people in Ireland for one moment thanked the Government for what they have done? We have had pre-paid telegrams galore from the Dominions to the Prime Minister, but have m e had one telegram from Sinn Feiners thanking us for our generosity?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN (Leader of the House): My hon. and learned Friend spoke of pre-paid telegrams. The words may have slipped out of his mouth, or he may have a meaning in his mind. If he has, I think he ought to say what it is.
  Mr. RAWLINSON: I say at once that the word slipped out, but there was, we know, a telegram which was sent from Sandringham, and the Secretary of State for the Colonies admitted that the responsibility for that telegram rests with His Majesty's Ministers. I am not complaining in the least, and I only mean that suggestions are made in that way.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Of course, His Majesty's Ministers are responsible for every act and every word of His Majesty, but if my hon. and learned Friend suggests that that telegram from Sandringham was suggested by His Majesty's Ministers, then he is mistaken—profoundly mistaken. He spoke of pre-paid telegrams from the Dominions. What we did was to send to the Dominions a perfectly true and colourless summary of the arrangements come to, and the suggestion that we solicited or inspired telegrams from the Dominions is wholly without foundation.
  Mr. RAWLINSON: Can the right hon. Gentleman seriously make that a debating point for a moment?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not make it as a debating point; I make it as a statement of fact on a matter of great public interest.
  Mr. RAWLINSON: I am very glad indeed to hear it. Let us look at what the right hon. Gentleman says. This Government sends a telegram stating that peace with Ireland has been agreed to. If that be so, who would not congratulate them? If they had telegraphed to me that peace had been declared with Ireland, I, being at the other end of the globe, and having no means of knowing otherwise, of course, would have at once telegraphed my hearty congratulations. That is what I mean. I agree that possibly I ought not to have used the word "pre-paid," and I withdraw it, and I withdraw unreservedly anything which may offend my right hon. Friend. The point is this. Have the Sinn Feiners done anything since this Treaty has been in negotiation to show that they are grateful to us? Has there not been speech after speech by Mr. De Valera and others saying, "We have won this at the point of the sword"? It is for these reasons that I venture to take the line which I am taking to-day. Reference has been made to the settlement with the Dutch in South Africa. with whom I was intimately acquainted at one time. That, however, was not the first settlement with them. The first settlement with the Transvaal Dutch was after Majuba Hill, and, from what I have seen in South Africa between Majuba Hill and the time of the last Boer War. I think the surrender after Majuba Hill was as great a mistake as the making of the

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  Treaty after the last Boer War was a great act of statesmanship. May we not apply the same lesson here, namely, that when people believe they are at the top, it does not bring gratitude from them, but only adds to their conceit?
  Lieut.-Colonel J. WARD: I am sure the point is appreciated as to the responsibility which the party leaders have undertaken in attempting to settle this century-long struggle between Ireland and England. One has appreciated the situation, and the courage which Ministers have displayed, more after the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Cambridge University (Mr. Rawlinson) than one has appreciated it during the whole of this Debate hitherto. Fortunately. I am not in the same position as my hon. and learned Friend. I am not a Unionist. I am not a member, nor have I ever been a member, of the Unionist party, and I can quite understand, when one remembers the history of that party during the last 20 or 30 years, and the enormous part it has played in holding together the great body of Conservative opinion in this country, what a terrific wrench it must be, as well in personal friendships as in political associations, to face the changed situation which is before us at this moment. That, however, only shows greater courage on the part of the negotiators who have brought about this settlement.
  While I hold almost the same views with reference to the initiation of these negotiations as my hon. and learned Friend, I hold them from an entirely different standpoint. I did believe in giving legislative independence to Ireland. I have believed in it ever since I have been in politics. It was included in the first programme drafted by William Morris and others of the old Democratic Federation in 1883; and Mr. H. M. Hyndman—who, I regret, has not lived to see the fruition of his policy—insisted at that early date that one of the points in the programme should be legislative independence for Ireland. I subscribed to that myself, and have never receded from it in the slightest degree. When, however, the Irish Sinn Fein movement came on the scene, and when what had not been successfully secured by constitutional means was attempted to be gained by force, I certainly supported the Government in their determination to make every citizen obey the law; but I agree that the
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  negotiations and the policy of the Government should have been stated before the struggle rather than after, and, therefore, I disagree with the view that has been stated by the Prime Minister that they could not have been discussed before.
  I am especially interested in two things. One knows that we have lost during the last two years some 400 or 500 officers and men belonging to the different forces of the Crown in Ireland. I do not see anything in the Treaty itself stating what is the position, or what will be the position, of the relatives of those deceased officers and men. There is another important fact to which no reference is made, and to which, I would suggest, some kind of reference certainly should be made. There are several thousand men who have stood by the British Government and by this Parliament through all the difficulties of the last two years, and, when one considers the vicious way in which the servants of the Crown have been treated by these men when there was the possibility of danger to their hides, one wonders what sort of treatment they will mete out to them, unless provision is made beforehand, now that there is no fear whatever of punishment as a result of the crimes they may commit against them. I should have thought that, while it might not be included in the Treaty, we might at least, in the discussions that have taken place during the last two or three days, have had a statement with reference to the Royal Irish Constabulary, as to the position of the officers and men who have stood by the British Government and are now left in the lurch. I do not mean that offensively to the Government, because I do not think that the position of the officers and men of the Royal Irish Constabulary should influence our judgment in trying to form a concordat between these two peoples if it is possible to do so; but I think that at least we should show by our speeches in this House that some Members, at any rate, have not forgotten, and that, while it has suited the purpose of the country and the House of Commons to change its policy entirely with regard to the country which they have assisted the Government in administering hitherto, their position and interests should be protected. I think that that is a most essential item in the programme.

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  My position with reference to this matter is simply the position of the ordinary man in the street. The situation between Ireland and England had arrived at such a pass that some kind of conference, some method of getting out of the difficulty, was absolutely necessary, and I do not believe that among the ordinary English democracy there is a single discordant voice so long as the interests of our friends in the North of Ireland are not interfered with in any way. Far from advising them to leave us and go in under Sinn Fein, I am delighted to think that they have so much confidence in the English people that they have ignored the suggestion of the Government and decided to remain with us. We like the Irishman generally, but it would be unnatural if we did not look with a slightly different degree of favour upon the man who all the while is threatening to murder you if you do not allow him to get out of the nest, who swears that he is your enemy, and that the struggle between him and you is 700 years old. There is one advantage about that, and that is that neither the Leader of the House nor I had anything to do with the beginning of it. We are bound naturally, as every Englishman does, to look with considerable difference upon the struggles of these two elements of Irish society, the one all the while abusing and injuring us and struggling to get out of the nest, while there is another set of men who say, "We believe in you. We object to you attempting to turn us out of the nest because our friends want to go," and I look, and I believe Englishmen throughout the country and all over the world look, with Much more favour upon Ulster to-day, even the democratic element in the country, now when it comes to the final test that they say they prefer to be with us.
  But that is not really the point I want to bring to the attention of the House. I agree with this Conference and I agree with the Treaty to a certain extent, provided the interests of our friends are safeguarded, and I believe it is the duty of the House to ratify that Agreement. But I think that is all this House ought to do. As a democrat, seeing the enormous possibilities of this, if not unsuccessful, and the possibility for good if the experiment is successful, so terrible may
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  it be in one direction, so advantageous it may be in another, that before ever you make this an accomplished fact by law you ought to consult the English democracy. Even if he went down in the turmoil, the position of any Member in this House ought not to weigh with him in that matter at all. You are practically revolutionising the Constitution. You are taking away some 60 or 70 Members from this House. You are turning practically everything topsy-turvy. By your very Treaty you are, in effect, so far as the re-arrangement of the frontiers of Ulster is concerned, by implication repealing an Act of Parliament that was only passed a year ago, and it is only necessary to read the speeches delivered by Ministers during the passage of the Act of Parliament last year, where they said that that was really the policy that they had adumbrated at the last election, that that was the extent of their policy and all that they were prepared to offer. Circumstances, it is true, have intervened and compelled them to offer an entirely different settlement, but it should only be a tentative one to the extent of ratification immediately by this House of the Treaty, but before it is put beyond recall, in my opinion you are bound to consult the people who sent you here. I say that most emphatically, and that is the one point that I wanted to put before the House. It has not been mentioned before. I think it would be disgraceful if this House, and especially hon. Members above the Gangway, who have been clamouring, telling us all the while that we Englishmen——
  Lieut. - Colonel WATTS - MORGAN: Good old English democrat!
  Lieut.-Colonel WARD: I do not take my democracy from Wales.
  Lieut. - Colonel WATTS - MORGAN: "We Englishmen!"
  Lieut.-Colonel WARD: At last it is very likely that Englishmen will be allowed to say that they are Englishmen. In view of the criticism which has occasionally been passed and the declarations which have been made, that it was absolutely necessary before this Government went forward further into great legislative proposals, that it should seek the suffrages of the country, this has put the final seal upon that demand in my estimation from whatever quarter of the House

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  it comes. Do not let this be a mere gift of a dozen or twenty men in the Government, and the 500 or 600 men in this House of Commons. If there is to be a settlement and if it is to be part of the statute law of the country, let it be the gift of the people themselves and not of any particular party.
  Mr. MOLES: We are drawing near to the end of a memorable Debate, a Debate marked at some stages by considerable heat, marked at other stages, notably by two speakers, by at least good feeling and consideration. I do not wish to utter a word which would grate upon the susceptibilities of the most tender feelings. I will say no word to which even the most sensitive might reasonably object. While I must, as a matter of duty to those who have sent me here, and to the convictions which I cherish, speak with some plainness, I shall do it with no intention of giving irritation to anyone. I want to say to the Leader of the House, because he is my leader, that I complain of the atmosphere in which these negotiations were conducted. I protest against the deliberate campaign which was meant to poison public opinion. While at his suggestion, as well as that of the Prime Minister, we accepted the silence they had imposed upon us, the Press were brought down in battalions to Downing Street, and the very expressions in certain documents that passed between the Ulster Cabinet and the British Cabinet were dished up in the following morning's papers, coloured to suit the purposes of the Government and wholly distorted to misrepresent our position. We complained to the right hon. Gentleman and he admitted the justice of our complaint. I believe he, even promised to do what he could to put an end to this scandalous campaign, but he could not do it, and it went on to the end. Then we reached the critical stage in which the agreed statement was issued by the British Prime Minister to the Northern Prime Minister, and I call attention to the terms of it. It was that unless agreement was reached new proposals would be sent to the Northern Government, and meantime nothing would be done to compromise or sacrifice Ulster's right. Was it new proposals that we got? We got no new proposals. We got a Treaty thrown at us, as it has been thrown at this House, told we must either ratify it or go to the country. That is the spirit that has
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  animated the Cabinet in its dealings with Ulster, and there is not a fair-minded man in any quarter of the House who will say that the kind of treatment we have had at their hands is other than disgraceful. In this House the Prime Minister uttered these words, and I only wish that he had been here now to hear them:
  "Under no circumstances, and at no time, will Ulster be automatically included in an Irish Parliament."
  Has that pledge been kept? We are automatically included.
  Lieut.-Commander ASTBURY: Why?
  Mr. MOLES: I hope the hon. Member will not interrupt me.
  Lieut.-Commander ASTBURY: I only asked a question.
  Mr. MOLES: Can anybody dispute that we are automatically included? We are automatically included, and if we are automatically included what is the use of that kind of interruption from the hon. Member? We are automatically included, in spite of that pledge of the Prime Minister, and if we do not proceed to take the steps that we are empowered to take, and vote ourselves out, we should remain in in perpetuity. We will not remain in one hour. Immediately the clock strikes that confers upon us the right to vote ourselves out, we shall vote ourselves out.
  Mr. J. JONES: Oh! You are Unionists.
  Mr. MOLES: I hope I may be allowed to proceed without interruption from the hon. Member. If he wants to go on in that sort of fashion he ought to go into the Lobby and bray there. Though I have much to say that would be pertinent to this discussion, I wish to confine my observations to two salient features that vitally concern us in the North of Ireland. First, there is the Oath of Allegiance to be taken by the Members of the Parliament to which we are invited to go. The second is in respect of the boundaries of the Parliament which has been given to Ulster. I could not help a feeling of amazement at the pitiable and contemptible efforts that were made to defend the Oath of Allegiance last night by the Colonial Secretary though I gladly admit the conciliatory tone of the speech. If we had found more frequently the same attitude of mind evinced towards us it, would have

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  permitted us to have had a quite different atmosphere in Ulster. We have had to sustain one long campaign of abuse. You cannot go on doing that to people who are loyal, and who have trusted you, without, in the end, having a bitter and exasperated feeling. The Secretary of State for the Colonies told us that the new Oath of Allegiance is not only as good as the Oath of Allegiance that we take in this House, but even better. I wonder what Mike Collins would think of that. An Oath of Allegiance can be one of two kinds. It can be the natural Oath taken by a subject born within the State, the Oath which we take here which declares allegiance to the King——
  Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR: As by law established.
  Mr. MOLES: I have too much love for my old friend to turn aside to say anything against him.
  Mr. O'CONNOR Mr. O'CONNOR rose——
  Mr. MOLES: I will not give way.
  Mr. J. JONES: You are not in Ulster now you cannot dominate everybody here.
  3.0 P.M.
  Mr. MOLES: On more than one occasion the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) has insulted me. He has insulted this House. He has insulted the dignity of your Chair, Mr. Speaker, and I protest against these constant interruptions. I am addressing no observation to him, and I beg that I may be permitted to address the House without his interference.
  Mr. JONES: On a point of Order. Has an hon. Member of this House the right to refer to another hon. Member of this House as "Mike Collins"?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I did not hear that observation.
  Mr. JONES: You were not here, Mr. Speaker, when he made it.
  Mr. SPEAKER: An hon. Member must use respectful terms of another hon. Member of this House.
  Mr. MOLES: I hope you are not addressing that observation to me, Mr. Speaker, I have used no disrespectful language about anybody.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I did not hear the remark to which the hon. Member for Silvertown refers. In what I have said I was making a remark generally for the advice of hon. Members.
  Mr. JONES: You were not in the Chair, Mr. Speaker, when the hon. Member made the observation.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I was not in the Chair, but I have dealt with the matter.
  Mr. MOLES: I only wish to continue my discourse. Hon. Members who were here will agree that I did not break any rule of debate, and I hope that I may neither be insulted nor interrupted improperly. I was saying that the Oath of Allegiance could be one of two kinds: the natural Oath taken by a born subject of the State, or it can be the express Oath taken by a person who is a born subject of another State, but who, on coming here, renounces his allegiance to the old State and takes the Oath of Allegiance to the new. The claim of Sinn Fein is that it is no part of this nation, that it owes no allegiance to it, that it is a separate and distinct State, and that the only Oath which its people should recognise is the Oath of Allegiance to the Irish Republic. It is clear, therefore, that the natural Oath does not bind them. Then there is the express Oath, which is exactly in common form with the Oath we take at the Table of this House when we enter it. That Oath, Sinn Feiners refuse to take. If the Government really mean this as an Oath of Allegiance, if they expect it to be binding upon the consciences of those who take it, in the way that the Oath which we take here is binding upon us, why do not they give the Sinn Feiners the Oath in the same form? Why do they go in for this imbecile caricature of an Oath of Allegiance? If they mean allegiance to the King, why do not they put in the word "allegiance" before the word "King"? They cut it out deliberately, in deference to the Sinn Fein delegates with whom they have been conferring, and they cut it out because the Sinn Fein delegates refuse to be bound by that Oath of Allegiance.
  Will the Government look at what has been happening in Dublin? They say that this Oath is going to remain and that the Irish people, for whom Sinn Fein stand, will accept it. Will my right hon. Friend dare to make that suggestion in

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  view of what happened in Dublin yesterday? The whole City of Dublin was placarded from end to end with statements repudiating the form of the Oath of Allegiance, repudiating staying within what they call the Commonwealth, and reasserting again in its old and most violent form the sovereignty of an Irish Republic, and that is what your tampering with the Oath of Allegiance has brought you to. You have watered it down to this point, that they do not believe that it would be binding on their consciences, and when you have sold the pass in respect of the Oath they fling it back again with contempt in your face. The Minister for War last night asked, How was it possible that, within the terms of the Oath, they could set up a Republic and yet maintain the Oath? Surely the Minister for War has forgotten entirely what has happened.
  The Republic is in being. They have taken the Oath of Allegiance to the Republic as they will not take it to the State, and yet we are asked to believe that this new Oath prevents the possibility of the occurrence of what has already happened. I do not pretend to enter into the logic of such a contention. The kind of mind that would produce an argument of that sort to the House is really beyond reason, and I do not intend to follow such an argument. The Minister for War asked us to reflect on the utter impossibility of breaking this Oath. If they take the Oath in the form in which it has been put; in these Articles of Agreement they are bound to break the Oath which they have already taken to the Republic. There is no escape from the position, and you are asked to believe that these men are utterly incapable of breaking an oath, yet none the less will take another oath which involves the breach of the oath already taken. All that leaves me entirely unmoved. It is ridiculous to talk in that way. Before my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House came into the House I had stated that the Prime Minister had made this declaration. Perhaps my right hon. Friend will give me his attention for the moment.
  Mr. J. JONES: Listen to Demosthenes!
  Mr. MOLES: The Prime Minister stated that in no circumstances would there be an automatic inclusion of Ulster. My right hon. Friend subscribed to that statement. He was in the Government at that period and it bound him as much
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  as it bound anybody. It has been repudiated, as we know now, by the Prime Minister. I ask the right hon. Gentleman, is it repudiated by him, or does he stand by it? There is no answer. There is another pledge repudiated. We are automatically included, and I am sure he will not dispute that we are, and if we are automatically included, am I not entitled to say to the right hon. Gentleman that that is one pledge which he owed to his party and to the loyal people of Ulster who, however he treated them, never abandoned their loyalty to him?
  I now come to the question of boundaries. Why are these boundaries to be altered? Have regard to the circumstances in which they were fixed. Away back in 1916, when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith) was the head of the Government, he turned over into the hands of the present Prime Minister the negotiations in respect of the then proposed Irish settlement. They proposed partition, and it was from that quarter that the suggestion first came, though they would have us believe otherwise now. I am sure the House will remember that that was so. They proposed in the first instance one government of 26 counties and another, co-equal in authority, status and power, for the six. They asked my right hon. Friend, the then Member for Duncairn, to carry those proposals across for submission to Ulster, and they asked the late hon. Member for Waterford to carry them across to a Nationalist Irish Convention. Partition on the identical existing basis was accepted by both, though subsequently repudiated by the then Nationalist organisation. It was the Government proposal. Whatever the objections to it, they were as cogent then as they are now. Nobody at that period ever contemplated filching away so much as a yard of the six counties.
  Time went on and with it came the Act of 1920. My right hon. Friend knows that so determined were the Government to explore thoroughly, and to settle, this question that they set up a special Cabinet Committee whose business it was to look into every aspect of the question, and I know, and he knows, that they specially examined the areas of the Northern and Southern Parliaments. After the most mature examination they came to the final and fixed conclusion that six counties and 26 counties were just and right. They carried that decision to the Cabinet, and

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  the Cabinet unanimously confirmed it. They brought it down to this House and it was debated, amongst other questions, up and down, and finally by Act of Parliament we once for all by Statute fixed the areas. We were asked to do our best to set up our Parliament and start it working. I leave it to this House to say for itself, in view of what it knows has happened, whether we have made an honest effort to discharge the duty which the Government laid upon us. They will bear witness that we have. We had our elections. We returned in respect of two particular counties four of the eight members who are returned by them to the Northern Parliament. They sit there, and one of them is a Minister of the Crown, and now the Government brings forward a proposal which will have the effect of negativing that election and compelling a new election delimiting our area. To the extent that it may delimit that area it must necessarily reduce the representation in Parliament and affect the whole of our finance and everything else.
  The Prime Minister said, "Cannot we argue with Ulster?" They did not argue about that. They decided it. They did not even ask our permission. A more monstrous and more inequitable thing was never done to a free people. Nobody with any spirit would tolerate it, and no Minister with a particle of justice in his breast would defend it. The whole thing is intolerable and disgraceful to the Government that introduced it. The Prime Minister in the course of the speech of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South Antrim (Captain C. Craig), interrupted him to say, after my hon. and gallant Friend had called attention to this arrangement, that he did not mean what he was supposed to mean. I will show in a minute that he did. In his speech in this very Debate he spoke of entering into the area upon the principle of delimitation by rural district councils, parliamentary constituencies or otherwise. I hope that my right hon. Friend will look up the quotation. He may have one notion about that matter; Sinn Fein has another and entirely different one. I have in my hand a Sinn Fein document which indicates the county of Tyrone, and the proportion of Tyrone which they intend to take away is six-sevenths of the entire area. It is
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  coloured green, but I do not object to that; they are welcome to the colour. How did they get the information about the six-sevenths? I will tell you where they got it. They had an identical map before the Delegation of the British Cabinet with whom they discussed this matter, and they have come down into the country and told us in explicit terms: "We have arranged and are going to get six-sevenths of the entire county." If that is wrong the right hon. Gentleman ought to say so. He ought not to fence with this above all questions because it is vital to us.
  If that is the proposal, while we can make contributions to peace, while no party in Ireland more earnestly desires peace than we do, we hold that there will be no peace on any such basis. About 250 of the men who live along the frontiers came down to us in Belfast on Tuesday last and said to us, "The Government have sold you and betrayed you. Are you going to betray us?" We will not do it. That is the end of it. I do not desire to raise controversial points, but I told hon. Members quite frankly that it was necessary for me to speak plainly. What is the use of living in an atmosphere of hypocrisy? We want to deal with these things and to solve them justly in a way that will endure. You have to deal with them honestly on the basis of a just balance of opposing interests. Along this border line feeling is more intense than anywhere else. It is due to the very conditions under which they live. Feelings that are strong on both sides meet on the border line. Anybody who knows anything of life knows that that is so. It is because they live in this atmosphere that they so much dread the proposal of the Government to sell them. I do not know how you can expect them to be otherwise. Three times we have dealt with you on this particular question. Each time you have conceded to us the full limit of the six counties, and you cannot go on playing pitch and toss with it for ever.
  Let me look at another matter. The City of Derry is historic ground. It enshrines memories that no Ulsterman, no man who loves his country, ought ever to forget. The very dust of its churchyard heaves with the immortal dead. The apprentice boys who made a stand in

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  Derry created an Irish Thermopylæ as noble and historical as the old, and they are buried there. Our cathedral is there. There, too, are the walls behind which a famished garrison fought disease and fought the enemy and held high the lamp of freedom and kept its flame pure and bright. There is no Ulsterman who would surrender a yard of them. The thing is impossible. It would outrage every sentiment and every feeling we have ever cherished and respected, and I tell you that if an attempt be made to deprive us of Derry, you will succeed only when you have prevailed over a conquered community and a devastated country. Some hon. Members may say that we are using the language of bravado. We are not built that way. We have the defects of our qualities, but we do not boast. That sort of taunt used to be thrown at us. But on 1st July, 1916, when half a division of Ulster men died on the ground where they stood, an answer was given to all that sort of thing. The same spirit is abroad to-day, and the way the Government have treated us has irritated and provoked us almost beyond endurance.
  Do the Government imagine that we have not had our troubles in endeavouring to restrain our own people? They have made the task of the Northern Prime Minister and of others who are striving for peace and who have no object in public life except to promote peace—they have made our position nearly impossible, and if they let us down and we have to go, they will have to deal with others. If they really mean peace for Ireland, they ought to stand by a contract three times made. They ought to do some kind of justice to us. You will never get peace in Ireland by pitchforking people on the frontier or elsewhere into each other's arms. Friendship is got only on the basis of confidence and goodwill. You are going the right way about destroying confidence and goodwill by constantly re-opening a question the instant it has been closed. That is not the way to get on. When we ask you to stand by the area you have given us in the, Northern Parliament, we ask you to take the only right and wise course. You must know that the only effect of taking away territory from us now in these circumstances will be to irritate and to, provoke, and in the end you may produce an outrage. We do not want that.
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  We are resolved that within our area we shall set an example of justice and of good government. We will give to every man, whatever his creed or class, the same protection, the same rights of citizenship, which we claim for ourselves, no less and no more. We indulge the hope that when this gust of passion, fitful and wild, which is passing over Ireland, has passed away and an age of sanity has succeeded the age of passion, our opponents will address themselves in the same spirit to the task of treating our co-religionists as we intend to treat theirs, and will give them some place in the public life from which they are now wholly excluded. When that time comes you can come with your Boundaries Commission. If the final object be the getting of Ireland united in one Parliament, what is the use of quibbling now over a town-land or two? Leave the boundaries alone if you want to get on. Keep faith with us if you expect anybody to believe in you. Manifest some spirit of toleration for us. Show that at least you believe in your own good word and your own self-respect. If you will do that I can tell the right hon. Gentleman this, that while he and I may not live to see it, there will be another and a better Ireland.
  I should despair if I believed that just as our fathers have had to struggle in this wretched quarrel, and we have had to prosecute it, that we should have no better heritage to leave to our children. I hope for better, and I say to the Government in all seriousness: Do not destroy and dash that hope by a foolish action of this kind at this time. There is no justification for entrenching upon the rights which you have given to another Parliament. It is more than a debateable point whether constitutionally you have a right to do so. You dare not attempt it in any Dominion that you have. You have parted with the authority to them as completely as you have parted with it to us. Just because it suits your purpose, because you have been overawed—for that is the truth—you think you can go on plundering us and abusing us. No policy begun in fear has ever ended in other than folly. You have no right, I say again, to enter upon a yard of our ground. We cannot give it up and we will not give it up. You have definitely parted with it, you have no right whatever to withdraw it from us, and, believe me, the people who live along that

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  border line will be as safe in our hands as in the hands into which you propose to put them. I conclude with this. Do, for God's sake, try to keep faith with somebody some time. You have played with us and you have fooled with us. Do not continue it to the extent that, in the end, you will drive the most loyal people—for I make the claim for my countrymen in Ulster that they are the most loyal friends you have ever had, indeed, the only friends you have ever had in Ireland—do not., I say, drive them at last to despair and make them forget, if that were possible, even the country to which they have contributed so much, and to which they are so proud to belong.
  Sir F. BANBURY: The speech to which we have just listened shows the position which I think Ulster has a right to take up. I am sorry the hon. and gallant Member for Stoke (Lieut.-Colonel J. Ward) is no longer present in the House, because he drew attention to a constitutional point which has not been alluded to hitherto, and which I think should receive some attention from those Members who are going to support the Address on which we shall soon vote. The hon. and gallant Member for Stoke pointed out that if this Agreement were carried out, a great change in the Constitution would be involved and would necessitate an appeal to the country. I think I am right in saying that some of the greatest constitutional authorities in this country at the present moment agree with that view. If that is the right view, and if we are to have a General Election, what will be the position of those gentlemen who have voted for this Agreement? Voting for this Agreement commits them to the principle of the Agreement. When a Bill is brought in, they cannot object to the Second Reading of the Bill if they have voted for this Agreement, and in the same way, if there is a General Election they cannot oppose the principle of this Agreement at the General Election because they have voted for it in this House. Therefore, how can the democracy of this country express an opinion through its representative when that representative, without consulting them, has already committed himself to a certain course of action?
  Major-General Sir N. MOORE: They can turn him down if they do not agree with him.
  Sir F. BANBURY: They can, and I venture to say that very likely they will. We were extremely glad to welcome back in restored health the right hon. Gentleman the late Leader of the House, and he made an extremely interesting speech. Among other things, he said that once this question of Home Rule had been taken up by one of the great parties of the State it was bound to succeed, but was it, unless that great party who took it up could prove that they were right? May I point out to my right hon. Friend the present Leader of the House the position in which we all are. I have been for nearly 30 years—it will be 30 years next July—a Member of this House, and I do not see, except my right hon. Friend, any hon. Member who was here with me in the old days.
  Mr. J. JONES: A good job.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Well, we had principles in those days. I want to point out to my right hon. Friend, and I am sure he will not deny it, that never had the Conservative party a more loyal follower than myself. There never was a member of the Conservative party who was less anxious or more unwilling to go against his party than I was. The hon. Members in those days sitting opposite used to describe me sometimes—I do not think they really meant it, but they said it—as a "party hack."
  Mr. J. JONES: You were a four-wheeler.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I was described as a "party hack," who was always prepared to support his leaders. Why have I changed? Because the principles for which we were all returned in 1892—for which the right hon. Gentleman and I were returned to this House—have been broken by the leaders of the Unionist and Conservative parties and have been broken when those principles were shown to be right. Let me remind my right hon. Friend of what happened in 1885. Does he suppose that the late Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, the late Duke of Devonshire and the late Duke of Argyll left the party with which they had been identified for so many years without good and adequate reasons. Has not their action been amply justified? What did they say? They said that Home Rule was only the stepping stone to a Republic. I think it was Mr. Michael Davitt, but,

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  at any rate, some of the Irishmen at that time said they were very glad to breakfast with Mr. Gladstone because that meant obtaining Home Rule; while at lunch they could get something more, and at dinner time an independent Irish Republic. We always said that was going to be the result, but the Radical party said "No, you are wrong. If you once allow them to have Home Rule you will have a loyal and devoted Ireland."
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: And so we would have.
  Mr. LYNN: How do you know?
  Sir F. BANBURY: I shall deal with that interruption in a moment. The House of Commons in 1914 passed a Home Rule Bill. I would remind hon. Members, as was pointed out by my Noble Friend the Member for Oxford University (Lord H. Cecil) a short time ago, that in September, 1914, Mr. Redmond said that that Act would unite the two peoples in a friendly alliance which never would be broken.
  Mr. JONES: And you killed him for saying so.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Within two years, when this country was endeavouring to defend itself against the attacks of Germany, and when our position was none too good, that was the moment chosen by the Southern Irish to rebel against us in conjunction with our enemies. Had not we always said, had not the right hon. Gentleman's relative always said, that that would be the result? If Mr. Redmond was wrong when he made that prophecy—and when Mr. Redmond made that prophecy there was not a single dissentient voice in Ireland, they all agreed with it—what hope have we that the five delegates are right when they say that they hope a new era of peace will result from this Agreement, when we know that, at any rate, a minority of the Sinn Feiners in Ireland are bitterly opposed to the Agreement? The right hon. Member for Central Glasgow (Mr. Bonar Law) said yesterday:
  "It is absurd to think we have settled the Irish Question when both Parliaments agree to this. Ireland is in a state of demoralisation and chaos as great as ever has been almost in any country. That is not going to be changed by waving a wand."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th December, 1921; col. 208, Vol. 149.]
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  What comes of the recommendation by newspapers and other agencies to the electors of this country, that if we agree to this we are bound to open up a new era of peace—a new world, I think my hon. and gallant friend, the Member for Chelsea (Sir S. Hoare) said. We have had promises of a new world before.
  Mr. MILLS: Do not rub it in; we have done that.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I have a paper here which was issued in September, 1919, and it is in large leaded type. It says:
  "The old world must end. The Prime Minister's message to the people. Millions of gallant young men have fought for the new world. … If we fail to honour the promise given to them we dishonour ourselves. What does a new world mean? What was the old world like? It was a world where toil for myriads of honest workers, men and women, purchased nothing better than squalor, penury, anxiety, and wretchedness—a world scarred by slums and disgraced by sweating, where unemployment through the vicissitudes of industry brought to despair multitudes of humble homes."
  Then it goes on to say that the old world must come to an end, that it cannot be shored up much longer, but it really is all so foolish that it is not worth while reading it, although nearly every Member of the Government subscribed to it. I read a good deal of it to the right hon. Gentleman, the Minister of Transport, during the Railways Bill. I do not know about the Secretary of State for War, and I am not sure I have not got the Colonial Secretary writing in the same paper. I only use it as an illustration of the fact that we cannot attach any importance to any promise given by the Government.
  Mr. STANTON: Has Labour helped to fulfil those promises?
  Sir F. BANBURY: We are going to discuss what is called a treaty. We can make treaties with Germany and France, but we cannot make a treaty with Yorkshire, and how can we make a treaty with Ireland? The Act of Union has not been repealed. Ireland is still a part of this country, and how can we make a treaty except with a foreign country? Why has the word "treaty" been used? It is because the Sinn Feiners refused to have anything to do with it unless words were put in which involved the recognition of an independent nation. There was a little discussion yesterday between the

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  Secretary of State for War and an hon. Member as to the meaning of the provision which will allow the Irish Free State to provide means of coastal defence, and that at the end of five years the matter should be reconsidered. What does "coastal defence" mean? Coastal defence means that there shall be some small vessels which can defend the coast, and that those small vessels may include submarines. What is to prevent the Irish Free State establishing submarines, and when those submarines are established what is to prevent, if we unfortunately have another war with Germany, the Germans and the Irish Free State making art alliance, as they did before, and using those submarines against us? How are we to limit that number, and how are we to limit the size of their army?
  I ventured to interrupt the Prime Minister during his speech a few days ago when he said that the army would be limited, and I asked him how. He replied, "Oh, we should see that the Treaty was carried out; that has been done before." Has it? Have we ever interfered between ourselves and our Colonies, except once, in America, when we lost? Should we do it again? Does he mean to tell me that if Canada or Australia or New Zealand were suddenly to establish a large army we could in any way interfere Does he not know that if Ireland were to establish a large army and if we were to attempt to interfere, and if Ireland were to say, "We do not care for your treaty; we were a separate State with a separate power to have a separate army and a separate navy, and we are going to do it," does he think the Gentlemen who sit on that Treasury Bench would have the courage to come forward and say: "At the cost of large sums of money, at the sacrifice of many lives, we are going to interfere to prevent you carrying out the breaking of a particular article in the Treaty"? We should have the Prime Minister himself, if unfortunately he was still in power, coming down and saying: "It is not wise to consider whether or not they are to have an army of 40,000 or 50,000. After all, what is 10,000 men? It is not worth while having a fuss about." Consequently, the provisions of this particular treaty are, in my opinion, absolutely useless.
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  What about a tariff, which is rather an important thing, especially to Free Traders? Many of them, I think, are on the other side of the House. The Prime Minister, with regard to tariffs, thinks we have got Ireland under our thumb. We are Ireland's best customer. If Ireland puts on a tariff against us, does he mean he would put a tariff against Ireland, and would not that be breaking the Treaty? Has not everyone of the Dominions got a tariff against us, and would not the Irish say, "You have given us Dominion Home Rule"? [An HON. MEMBER: "It is a preference tariff."] It is a tariff. My point is that if the Irish Free State chose to put on a tariff against us, our only remedy would be to put on a tariff against them. I do not believe the Free Traders opposite would agree to that. I am not quite certain whether my right hon. Friend is still a Tariff Reformer or not, but I believe that he would be the only one who would agree to it, and, consequently, the idea that we could exercise any control over the Irish Free State in the matter of tariffs is, I think, a mistake.
  It has been said that we have agreed to this surrender—because it is a surrender—because otherwise it would cost money, and we might lose some lives. The right hon. Member for Central Glasgow said that that was an absurd argument, and it is an absurd argument from every point of view. First of all, what is this Treaty going to cost us? As I understand it, we are going to give £6,000,000 a year to start the Irish Free State. That, I believe, capitalised, would come to £120,000,000. We could do a great deal with £120,000,000 in suppressing a rebellion, and do not forget that, in a very short time, the Sinn Feiners will be fighting amongst themselves, if they are not fighting with Ulster, and we shall then have to intervene, when they have established themselves on such a footing that it will make our intervention more costly and more bloody than if we were to intervene now. I would like to draw the attention of the House to what I consider one very important matter. It makes my blood boil. Here is a letter from a lady. I have not the pleasure of the lady's acuaintance, but I know her family. She says:
  "I am only the mother of a young officer who served his country during the whole period of the War, gained many distinctions, and commanded his battalion in many engagements, won his D.S.O. and a bar and

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  the Croix de Guerre. He was foully murdered a few months ago in Ireland, where he came to help me after my husband's death, and his sole crime was that he refused to subscribe to Sinn Fein. My house was then burned to the ground, my cattle, horses and farm stock stolen, and since the 'truce' everything in my garden—all farm implements, carriages, electric engine, etc.—was sold by the Irish Republican Army by public auction, without any interference by the British Government.
  You can imagine my feelings, like those of many others, when I saw that the Irish delegates were received as welcome guests by the Prime Minister of England and his colleagues. And now the Government, in cowardly subjection to these criminals, whom the Lord Chancellor describes as sincere and honest men, have arranged, amidst a manufactured chorus of their subservient Press, entirely to forget those who were loyal to the British connection, and, without one single guarantee for our safety or one work of sympathy for our sorrows, to hand us over to their tender mercies."
  That makes my blood boil. I am prepared to sacrifice what little money I have got. I am prepared to go myself, though I am over 70, if I could bring those murderers to justice. I want to ask my right hon. Friend, Is he not aware that The men he has been receiving in Downing Street are the leaders of the men who committed those murders? Has he told those men that we would come to no agreement with them until those dastardly cowards were brought to justice, or has he agreed to wipe the slate, and that if there are no further attacks upon the Government policy, and if it will be possible to withdraw the large number of policemen who, I believe, look after the Prime Minister, then all these murders are to be condoned, and justice is to forgo its rights?
  My hon. and gallant Friend who moved the Address alluded in tones of eloquence to what happened when Casement went to the internment camp, where there were some Irish soldiers, and where he, with the connivance of the German Government, endeavoured to seduce those men from their allegiance. That was quite true. But those are not the men we are looking after. The men we are looking after are the men who rebelled against us in 1916. I have here a letter from a former Member of this House with regard to these men. He says:
  "I am endeavouring to ask some of those whom I knew personally in this House if something cannot be done to bring the case of Irish ex-service men before the notice of Parliament during this week's Debate. It has been part of my duty to correspond with
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  a number of men who have served in the regiment in which I have served, and even under present conditions their lot has been a very unhappy one in many parts of Ireland. It must not be forgotten that they were all volunteers, and while a small minority may have been induced by intimidation and boycotting to join the Irish Republican Army, the vast majority have remained loyal, with the result that many are out of employment and subjected to the derision of their more fortunate colleagues."
  Those are the men we are going to desert. When the Irish would not allow conscription, and the Government were afraid to enforce conscription in Ireland, those were the men who came forward of their own free will and assisted us in our hour of need. We are going to surrender them to their enemies, and to the men who were our enemies a short time ago. It cannot be wondered that even such a loyal supporter as myself of the ancient Conservative party, which no longer exists, is moved.
  Before I sit down I would like the House to consider for while what a very serious step it is going to take. There were two policies open to the Government. There was the policy of saying, "Let us surrender, let us have nothing further to do with Ireland." They have not done that, but the Government are trying to make out that they have got safeguards. Those safeguards are a sham. Why do they not say honestly, "We do not want to be bothered with Ireland any longer, let her go." They do not want to do that, they pretend they have secured safeguards and that Ireland is going still to remain a part of the British Empire. Do not forget this. This is a surrender to murder which you would not give to argument a short time ago. What is the effect of all this going to be on India? My hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Cambridge University (Mr. Rawlinson) alluded to Lord Salisbury's statement that we could not afford to let Ireland go any more than we could afford to let India go. I agree that the moment we allow our dependencies to go the British Empire ceases to exist. But what will the Indians say; what will the followers of Mr. Gandhi say, when they see that now a sufficient number of loyal subjects of the Crown, and of soldiers and policemen, have been murdered, these concessions are granted? I have a speech here of the Prime Minister delivered only a year ago,

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  in which he asked, "What is this warfare," and went on to point out that an apparently innocent farmer might be walking along the street and after he had been passed he might turn round with a revolver and shoot one in the back. These are the people we are surrendering to. If they had not done these things we should not have surrendered to them. What effect will that have upon India? I say it will be disastrous. I do beg hon. Members to pause before they give sanction to the proposals of the Government. We have had no time to consider them. We were summoned together at very short notice. It was hoped that it would all be over yesterday, and the Government have been rather surprised that it was not. Not very long ago I went to the Guildhall on the occasion when the freedom of the City of London was conferred on Mr. Roosevelt who, in the course of his remarks, referred to affairs in Egypt and said, "My Lord Mayor, let me give you a word of advice—govern or get out." That is the advice I would give to the Government in regard to Ireland. That is our alternative policy.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Whatever may be the issue of this Debate, it will, I think, rank as one of the greatest Debates in the history of this House, alike in the importance of the subject with which it has dealt, and in the character of more than one of the speeches which have been delivered. Among those speeches there stands out conspicuously the speech delivered yesterday by my right hon. Friend (Mr. Bonar Law), my predecessor in the position I have the honour to occupy to-day. That is one of those speeches which is more than a speech, it is an act—a great act of statesmanship and wisdom befitting the long experience of his high position.
  I cannot help contrasting the attitude of my right hon. Friend, who led my party for so many years with such success, with the attitude of my right hon. Friend who has just spoken (Sir F. Banbury), who claims, rightly. I admit, that he has been a faithful member of that party, and who, if he differs from it, does so with regret. Will he permit me to say that I think he is over despondent in supposing that, because for the moment he differs from us, our party is at an end. May I go even a little further and say that if, instead of having the honour of
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  my right hon. Friend among its members, the party had had the misfortune to be led by him, its demise would have come much earlier.
  4.0 P.M.
  Before I attempt to summarise the great issues of this Debate, there are a couple of preliminary matters—one of little consequence and the other of more consequence—which I should like to clear out of the way. My hon. Friend the Leader of this Ulster party (Captain C. Craig) invited me on the first day of the Debate to explain why we adopted the form of Address in reply to the Gracious Speech that has been used on this occasion. We did so solely in what we thought were the interests of debate, and to suit the convenience of Members. The House, being summoned for the consideration of these Articles of Agreement, and for that alone, we thought we could best meet the convenience of the House if we couched the reply to the speech from the Throne in a form which immediately raised the issue, and led at once to the great debate on which we had to enter. That is the whole explanation. There was no question of calculation about it, and we founded ourselves on a precedent which had prevailed uninterruptedly up to the year 1890.
  The other matter with which I wish to deal arose out of the speech of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Cambridge University (Mr. Rawlinson). My hon. and learned Friend in a phrase which he subsequently withdrew, spoke of the telegrams of congratulation received by the Government as "prepaid telegrams." The same charge has been made elsewhere, and I am quite aware that these rumours have been current in the Lobby. There is not a shadow of foundation for the suggestion which is made that the Government invited, and still less suggested, the character of the replies which were sent. I have here a copy of the telegram sent to each of the Dominions. It will be found to be a dry and colourless summary of the document which has been signed. I have also the messages to which the telegrams referred to were a reply. If my hon. and learned Friend wishes, or any Member of the House wishes, to see them, they can do so. They will at once see that there is no shade or shadow of foundation for saying that we invited or suggested the congratulations, or that the

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  expressions of opinion which came from across the seas were anything but the spontaneous declarations of the Governments concerned. And, indeed, is it conceivable that the great Governments of the Empire would permit themselves to have words put into their mouths, for the convenience or gratification of some foolish vanity on the part of Ministers, or that these gentlemen would speak otherwise than in the name of their own Dominions?
  It is a little difficult to gather up the threads of the Debate, which has roamed over a large area. I have listened to the Debate, which seems to me to have three or four currents of criticism united in condemning the action of the Government, and in support of the Amendment. In the first place, there are those who, like my right hon. Friend the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury), dislike the Coalition, and are ready to take any and every opportunity to get rid of it. At any other time I should have my answer to that aspect of the case, but I do not think it, is really germane to the great issue now before us, except in so far as it is true to say, as has been said on both sides of the House, that if we have—and I only say "if" we have—attained to an Irish settlement, we have only done so because it is not a party settlement, and because it is not a party Government in whose hands have been the negotiations. Then there are those who say that we never ought to have entered upon these negotiations at all, and that we of the Unionist party ought never to have abandoned our old position or altered our policy. The question of entering into negotiations, of whether we did right or not to enter into the negotiations, was settled, as far as this House is concerned, by the vote taken just before we adjourned in November.
  May I say a few words upon the attitude of my party, and on the spirit in which we, the men to whom they have given their confidence, have discharged the responsibility imposed upon us? I do not know how many Members of this House have found time to read the first two volumes—admirable volumes—of the biography of Lord Salisbury. They are a mine of wisdom. I venture to quote to the House—to members of my party, with whom Lord Salisbury was associated and
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  whom he led for so long—one sentence of profound wisdom which statesmen ought never to forget—
  "The commonest error in politics is to cling to the carcases of dead policies."
  What is the old Unionist policy? Let us consider whether the policy was alive. A great deal of this Debate has dealt with the case of Ulster, and as years went on that case became more largely the case of the Unionist party. I have been in this House for 30 years, and I took my first active share in politics in an Election in which Home Rule was, for the first time, the issue in the English Parliament. It was not the Ulster question which we fought at that time. We fought for the Union of Ireland with the United Kingdom under the supremacy of this Parliament. Was that policy sustainable? Has it been sustained? Did it remain in existence? I answer all these questions in the negative. If we had defeated Home Rule after Mr. Gladstone had adopted it so decisively as to make them retrace their steps, you would once again have had a national policy which would have had a chance of success; but to maintain the Union in that form as a party policy was impossible, and it proved to be so. The Home Rule Act was on the Statute Book. It was the Home Rule Act which could not be enforced, and which its authors said they would not enforce. But it was on the Statute Book, and definite legislative sanction had been given by Parliament to a policy contrary to that for which we had fought so long.
  What then were we to do? I submit that the wise course was to seek again how we could preserve the essentials by some policy which would not be a party policy, subject to all the fluctuations of party, but a national policy accepted and guaranteed by the whole nation. That is what we have done. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith) said that we might have done it a year earlier, and the Noble Lord the Member for Oxford University (Lord H. Cecil) congratulated himself on his success as a prophet, and gave himself some satisfaction by saying that the Act of 1920 had led only to a, cul de sac. He is quite right if he suggests that. The Act of 1920 was not the old Unionist policy; it was passed because the old Unionist policy had gone. And the change of which the right hon. Gentleman

  355
  complains took place not now, but when Home Rule was put on the Statute Book in 1914, and again when we altered it by the Act of 1920. When the Noble Lord says that is a cut de sac he is wrong. You never would have got an agreement out of these negotiations had the Act of 1920 not recognised the facts in regard to Ulster, giving Ulster as it did security for her own internal liberty, the control of her own internal domestic legislation and administration, and thus confronting those who spoke for the majority with the stubborn fact so often asserted, so profoundly true. Ulster was not to be coerced into the Union. Ulster could come into the Union only by her own consent, and only if she were ready to give that consent freely and willingly.
  Sir F. BANBURY: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman if he did not lead us out of this House in 1914 against the Home Rule Bill?
  Mr. J. JONES: He has learned sense since.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I was not the Leader of the party at that time.
  Sir F. BANBURY: You were one of the leaders, and we all went out.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Certainly, I went out, and I voted against it.
  Lord HUGH CECIL: You did not vote.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, I was wrong; we did not vote. Of course, I was a Leader of the party at that time. But what is there in anything that I have said since, or anything that I have said this afternoon, that contradicts that action? I do not follow my right hon. Friend.
  There is another current of objection, a current, which I think has been steadily diminishing in volume and in strength since the facts have become known, and as this Debate has proceeded. Undoubtedly, there was great anxiety on the part of many lest the promises which had been made to Ulster should be broken—I think that they might have had a little more confidence—and lest Ulster should be compelled to accept the rule of a Parliament of All Ireland without her own consent. Ulster remains under this Treaty, as I promised that she should remain, mistress of her own
  356
  fate. One of the hon. Members for Belfast complained that she was brought within the ambit of the Treaty, and then left to vote herself out. Yes, but until she has taken her decision, the Parliament of the Irish Free State has no authority in Northern Ireland, and, if her decision be, as evidently it is going to be, that at the present time she will not join in an Irish Free State, the Irish Free State Parliament in Dublin will never exercise any authority within the boundaries of Northern Ireland.
  Mr. LYNN: Stick to that!
  Captain CRAIG: What about the Act of 1920?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not follow the hon. and gallant Member.
  Captain CRAIG: By the Act of 1920 we were given our own Parliament. Now you have taken us, so to speak, and put us into another Parliament, and you tell us that if we do not like it, we must come out.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: My hon. and gallant Friend is, I think, trying to make a mountain out of a mole-hill.
  Captain CRAIG: This is not one of cur strongest points, I admit.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: He is imagining a grievance where there is no grievance. No act of the Parliament of the Irish Free State will affect Northern Ireland without the consent of Northern Ireland. Is not that the substance of what you have asked? That you have got.
  Captain CRAIG: The fact that you put us there shows that you think we ought to go there.
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: If I understand it, the argument of my hon. Friend is that we had no right to suggest to Ulster that she should go into the Irish Free State Parliament.
  Mr. MOLES: Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me——
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I am trying to get along. My hon. Friend the Leader of the Ulster Parliament gave his consent to the case which I have just put.
  Mr. MOLES: Does the right hon. Gentleman say that it is at all fair that, in face of the deliberate pledge given by the Prime Minister at that box—that under

  357
  no circumstances should we be automatically included—we have now been automatically included? Does he defend that?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Ulster is not effectively included unless she choose to be so. No legislative act of the Parliament of the Free State has any effect in Ulster without her consent. Hon. Members suggest that we had no right to invite Ulster to consider whether she could not come into an All-Ireland Parliament. If we had not put that proposition to them, we should never have got what we have got for the first time—the assent of the representatives of Southern Ireland to recognise the right of Northern Ireland to remain outside.
  There is only one point in respect of which the position of Northern Ireland is altered, if she chooses to exercise her option to stay out. It is that in that case we propose to set up a Boundary Commission. I feel the force of the objections urged by my right hon. Friend (Mr. Bonar Law) the late Leader of the House yesterday, to our having gone so far in that matter without further conference with Ulster. I understand how sensitive they may fairly be on the subject, and how strong are their feelings. No one regrets it more than I do. Had they been present here in London, as at one time we hoped they would, it would have been easy for them to get into touch with us, and I have no doubt that we and they would have come to an amicable arrangement. But my right hon. Friend the Member for Central Glasgow, even while he criticised us, offered the justification for the action which we took. To have held up at that last moment for further consultation with Cabinet Ministers who were not here, but who were in Belfast, the Articles of Agreement which were then ready for signature, and which the Irish representatives were prepared to sign, would have been to jeopardise, and in my opinion to destroy, all chance of an agreement.
  I recognise that there is a great deal of alarm on the part of my hon. Friends the Members for Belfast as to the setting up of this Boundary Commission. We recognised that it was impossible to settle this question by county option, impossible to settle it by constituencies, and what we have proposed, and what the Commission is required to do, is to revise the boundary between the North and the South, so as to include where
  358
  possible, having regard to economic and geographical considerations, men now excluded from the Government of Northern Ireland, who would wish to come under it, and to exclude from Northern Ireland men now included in it, who would wish to come out of it. We will do our best, as far as we are concerned, in the appointment of a chairman, to secure a man whose sagacity and impartiality will meet with the acceptance of both sides in this matter.
  Mr. R. McNEILL: What some of us want to know is, Why did you do it at all? The area was finally fixed by the Act of 1920, after consideration by Parliament. Why did you alter it?
  Lord H. CECIL: Will you put the names of the Commissioners in the Bill?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: My hon. Friend, rather more extreme in these matters than the Ulster Members, wants to know what justification there was for altering the boundary. May I put this question? If, in exchange for men brought reluctantly under the Government of Northern Ireland, you can give them men whom they abandoned with equal reluctance, and only under the compulsion of a desire for a peaceable settlement, if in exchange for those who were unwilling to submit to their rule you can give them those who long to be under their rule, what injury have we clone? Does not such a solution as that help good government in Ireland, strengthen their hands and make for peace on both sides of the boundary?
  There is one more matter with which I wish to deal. There has been a great deal said in this Debate by critics of the Government's action about surrender and about fear. Fear is the worst counsellor, whether for an individual or for a Government. But sometimes people seem to me to be dominated by the fear of being thought to be afraid. Even in the last hour or two men have dwelt on the unhappy incidents of the last few months, and upon the outrages which have been inflicted. The curse of Ireland has been the length of its memory. Do not let us, Englishmen and Scotsmen, cultivate the same unrelenting memory. Those who desire that there should be no peace will dwell on every incident. Those who desire that these Articles of Agreement shall not fructify on one side of the Channel or on the other will use every effort to provoke trouble afresh, and prevent peace

  359
  taking root. But is that going to be our attitude? We are a great nation—the heart and centre of a great Empire. We can afford to be generous as we are strong. As I listen to these speeches, as I hear these attempts to bring back again the attitude of passion when wiser men on both sides are trying to allay it, I think that the part this Parliament may best play is to turn its back upon the unhappy past, and look to a brighter and a more hopeful future. To have the power to forgive is our Imperial prerogative,
  and we who have the strength, and we who have the might, should be the first to exercise that Imperial prerogative.
  Colonel GRETTON Colonel GRETTON rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
  Question put accordingly, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  The House divided: Ayes, 401; Noes, 58.

  Division No. 1.]

  AYES.

  [4.34 p.m.

  Adamson, Rt. Hon. William

  Chamberlain, N. (Birm., Ladywood)

  Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

  Addison, Rt. Hon. Dr. Christopher

  Cheyne, Sir William Watson

  Gilbert, James Daniel

  Adkins, Sir William Ryland Dent

  Chilcot, Lieut.-Com. Harry W.

  Gillis, William

  Agg-Gardner, Sir James Tynte

  Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

  Glanville, Harold James

  Ainsworth, Captain Charles

  Churchman, Sir Arthur

  Glyn, Major Ralph

  Amery, Leopold C. M. S.

  Clay, Lieut.-Colonel H. H. Spender

  Goff, Sir R. Park

  Armitage, Robert

  Clynes, Rt. Hon. John R.

  Gould, James C.

  Astbury, Lieut.-Com. Frederick W.

  Cobb, Sir Cyril

  Goulding, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward A.

  Astor, Viscountess

  Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.

  Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

  Bagley, Captain E. Ashton

  Colfox, Major Wm. Phillips

  Graham, R. (Nelson and Colne)

  Baird, Sir John Lawrence

  Colvin, Brig.-General Richard Beale

  Gray, Major Ernest (Accrington)

  Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley

  Conway, Sir W. Martin

  Grayson, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Henry

  Balfour, Sir R. (Glasgow, Partick)

  Coote, Colin Reith (Isle of Ely)

  Green, Albert (Derby)

  Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)

  Cope, Major William

  Green, Joseph F. (Leicester, W.)

  Barlow, Sir Montague

  Cory, Sir J. H. (Cardiff, South)

  Greene, Lt.-Col. Sir W. (Hack'y, N.)

  Barnes, Rt. Hon. G. (Glas., Gorbals)

  Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)

  Greenwood, Colonel Sir Hamar

  Barnes, Major H. (Newcastle, E.)

  Cowan, Sir H. (Aberdeen and Kinc.)

  Greer, Harry

  Barnett, Major Richard W.

  Davidson, J. C. C. (Hemel Hempstead)

  Gregory, Holman

  Barnston, Major Harry

  Davies, A. (Lancaster, Clitheroe)

  Greig, Colonel Sir James William

  Barrand, A. R.

  Davies, Alfred Thomas (Lincoln)

  Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)

  Barrie, Sir Charles Coupar (Banff)

  Davies, David (Montgomery)

  Grundy, T. W.

  Barton, Sir William (Oldham)

  Davies, Sir David Sanders (Denbigh)

  Guest, Capt. Rt. Hon. Frederick E.

  Beauchamp, Sir Edward

  Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)

  Guest, J. (York, W. R., Hemsworth)

  Beckett, Hon. Gervase

  Davies, Sir Joseph (Chester, Crewe)

  Guinness, Lieut.-Col. Hon. W. E.

  Bell, Lieut.-Col. W. C. H. (Devizes)

  Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)

  Hacking, Captain Douglas H.

  Bellairs, Commander Carlyon W.

  Davies, Thomas (Cirencester)

  Hallwood, Augustine

  Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)

  Davies, Sir William H. (Bristol, S.)

  Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)

  Bennett, Sir Thomas Jewell

  Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)

  Halls, Walter

  Betterton, Henry B.

  Dawson, Sir Philip

  Hambro, Angus Valdemar

  Birchall, J. Dearman

  Dean, Commander P. T.

  Hamilton, Major C. G. C.

  Bird, Sir A. (Wolverhampton, West)

  Denison-Pender, John C.

  Hancock, John George

  Bird, Sir William B. M. (Chichester)

  Denniss, Edmund R. B. (Oldham)

  Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry

  Blades, Sir George Rowland

  Dewhurst, Lieut.-Commander Harry

  Harmsworth, C. B. (Bedford, Luton)

  Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

  Dockrell, Sir Maurice

  Harris, Sir Henry Percy

  Borwick, Major G. O.

  Doyle, N. Grattan

  Hartshorn, Vernon

  Boscawen, Rt. Hon. Sir A. Griffith-

  Edgar, Clifford B.

  Haslam, Lewis

  Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.

  Ednam, Viscount

  Hayday, Arthur

  Bowyer, Captain G. W. E.

  Edwards, Allen C. (East Ham, S.)

  Hayward, Evan

  Breese, Major Charles E.

  Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

  Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Widnes)

  Briant, Frank

  Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

  Henderson, Lt.-Col. V. L. (Tradeston)

  Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive

  Edwards, Hugh (Glam., Neath)

  Hennessy, Major J. R. G.

  Briggs, Harold

  Elliot, Capt. Walter E. (Lanark)

  Herbert, Col. Hon. A. (Yeovil)

  Brittain, Sir Harry

  Elliott, Lt.-Col. Sir G. (Islington, W.)

  Herbert, Dennis (Hertford, Watford)

  Britton, G. B.

  Evans, Ernest

  Hewart, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

  Broad, Thomas Tucker

  Eyres-Monsell, Com. Bolton M.

  Higham, Charles Frederick

  Bromfield, William

  Farquharson, Major A. C.

  Hilder, Lieut.-Colonel Frank

  Bruton, Sir James

  Fildes, Henry

  Hinds, John

  Buchanan, Lieut. Colonel A. L. H.

  Finney, Samuel

  Hirst, G. H.

  Buckley, Lieut.-Colonel A.

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. Herbert A. L.

  Hoare, Lieut.-Colonel Sir S. J. G.

  Bull, Rt. Hon. Sir William James

  FitzRoy, Captain Hon. Edward A.

  Hodge, Rt. Hon. John

  Burgoyne, Lt.-Col. Alan Hughes

  Flannery, Sir James Fortescue

  Hohi er, Gerald Fitzroy

  Cairns, John

  Ford, Patrick Johnston

  Holmes, J. Stanley

  Campbell, J. D. G.

  Foreman, Sir Henry

  Hood, Joseph

  Campion, Lieut.-Colonel W. R.

  Forestler-Walker, L.

  Hope, Lt.-Col. Sir J. A. (Midlothian)

  Cape, Thomas

  Forrest, Walter

  Hope, J. D. (Berwick & Haddington)

  Carew, Charles Robert S.

  Fraser, Major Sir Keith

  Hopkins, John W. W.

  Carter, R. A. D. (Man., Withington)

  Frece, Sir Walter de

  Home, Sir R. S. (Glasgow, Hillhead)

  Carter, W. (Nottingham, Mansfield)

  Fremantle, Lieut-Colonel Francis E.

  Howard, Major S. G.

  Casey, T. W.

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Hudson, R. M.

  Cecil, Rt. Hon. Evelyn (Birm., Alton)

  Gange, E. Stanley

  Hunter, General Sir A. (Lancaster)

  Cecil, Rt. Hon. Lord R. (Hitchin)

  Gardner, Ernest

  Hunter-Weston, Lieut-Gen. Sir A. G.

  Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton

  Gee, Captain Robert

  Hurd, Percy A.

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. J. A. (Birm. W.)

  George, Rt. Hon. David Lloyd

  Hurst, Lieut.-Colonel Gerald B.

  Irving, Dan

  Murray, John (Leeds, West)

  Spoor, B. G.

  Jackson, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. F. S.

  Murray, William (Dumfries)

  Stanley, Major Hon. G. (Preston)

  Jesson, C.

  Naylor, Thomas Ellis

  Stanton, Charles Butt

  Jodrell, Neville Paul

  Neal, Arthur

  Starkey, Captain John Ralph

  John, William (Rhondda, West)

  Newbould, Alfred Ernest

  Stephenson, Lieut.-Colonel H. K.

  Johnson, Sir Stanley

  Newman, Sir R. H. S. D. L. (Exeter)

  Stevens, Marshall

  Johnstone, Joseph

  Nicholl, Commander Sir Edward

  Strauss, Edward Anthony

  Jones, Sir Edgar R. (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Nicholson, Reginald (Doncaster)

  Sturrock, J. Leng

  Jones, Sir Evan (Pembroke)

  Norman, Major Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

  Sugden, W. H.

  Jones, G. W. H. (Stoke Newington)

  Norton-Griffiths, Lieut.-Col. Sir John

  Sutherland, Sir William

  Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)

  O'Connor, Thomas P.

  Swan, J. E.

  Jones, J. T. (Carmarthen, Llanelly)

  Palmer, Major Godfrey Mark

  Sykes, Sir Charles (Huddersfield)

  Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)

  Parker, James

  Taylor, J.

  Kellaway, Rt. Hon. Fredk. George

  Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

  Terrell, George (Wilts, Chippenham)

  Kelly, Edward J. (Donegal, East)

  Parry, Lieut.-Colonel Thomas Henry

  Terrell, Captain R. (Oxford, Henley)

  Kennedy, Thomas

  Pearce, Sir William

  Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)

  Kenworthy, Lieut-Commander J. M.

  Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

  Thomas, Sir Robert J. (Wrexham)

  Kenyon, Barnet

  Peel, Col. Hn. S. (Uxbridge, Mddx.)

  Thomas-Stanford, Charles

  Kidd, James

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)

  Kiley, James Daniel

  Perring, William George

  Thomson, Sir W. Mitchell- (Maryhill)

  King, Captain Henry Douglas

  Philipps, Gen. Sir I. (Southampton)

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton, E.)

  Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

  Philipps, Sir Owen C. (Chester, City)

  Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)

  Knight, Major E. A. (Kidderminster)

  Pliditch, Sir Philip

  Thorpe, Captain John Henry

  Lambert, Rt. Hon. George

  Pinkham, Lieut.-Colonel Charles

  Tickler, Thomas George

  Law, Alfred J. (Rochdale)

  Pollock, Sir Ernest Murray

  Tillett, Benjamin

  Law, Rt. Hon. A, B. (Glasgow, C.)

  Pratt, John William

  Townley, Maximillan G.

  Lawson, John James

  Prescott, Major W. H.

  Tryon, Major George Clement

  Lewis, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Univ., Wales)

  Pretyman, Rt. Hon. Ernest G.

  Vickers, Douglas

  Lister, Sir R. Ashton

  Purchase, H. G.

  Wallace, J.

  Lloyd-Greame, Sir P.

  Raeburn, Sir William H.

  Walsh, Stephen (Lancaster, Ince)

  Locker-Lampson, Com. O. (H'tingd'n)

  Raffan, Peter Wilson

  Walters, Rt. Hon. Sir John Tudor

  Lorden, John William

  Ramsden, G. T.

  Ward-Jackson, Major C. L.

  Lort-Williams, J.

  Raper, A. Baldwin

  Ward, Col. J. (Stoke-upon-Trent)

  Loseby, Captain C. E.

  Raw, Lieutenant-Colonel Dr. N.

  Ward, William Dudley (Southampton)

  Lowe, Sir Francis William

  Redmond, Captain William Archer

  Waring, Major Walter

  Loyd, Arthur Thomas (Abingdon)

  Rees, Sir J. D. (Nottingham, East)

  Warner, Sir T. Courtenay T.

  Lunn, William

  Rees, Capt. J. Tudor- (Barnstaple)

  Warren, Sir Alfred H.

  Lyle, C. E. Leonard

  Remer, J. B.

  Watson, Captain John Bertrand

  Lyle-Samuel, Alexander

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Watts-Morgan, Lieut.-Col. D.

  Macdonald, Rt. Hon. John Murray

  Renwick, Sir George

  Wedgwood, Colonel Josiah C.

  Mackinder, Sir H. J. (Camlachie)

  Richardson, Alexander (Gravesend)

  Weston, Colonel John Wakefield

  McLaren, Hon. H. D. (Leicester)

  Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)

  White, Charles F. (Derby, Western)

  Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)

  Roberts, Sir S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Wignall, James

  Macleod, J. Mackintosh

  Robertson, John

  Wlikie, Alexander

  McMicking, Major Gilbert

  Robinson, S. (Brecon and Radnor)

  Willey, Lieut.-Colonel F. V.

  Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J.

  Robinson, Sir T. (Lancs, Stretford)

  Williams, Aneurin (Durham, Consett)

  Macpherson, Rt. Hon. James I.

  Rose, Frank H.

  Williams, C. (Tavistock)

  MacVeagh, Jeremiah

  Rothschild, Lionel de

  Williams, Col. P. (Middlesbrough, E.)

  Magnus, Sir Philip

  Roundell, Colonel R. F.

  Williams, Lt. Col. Sir R. (Banbury)

  Mallaby-Deeley, Harry

  Royce, William Stapleton

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

  Mallalieu, Frederick William

  Royds, Lieut.-Colonel Edmund

  Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Stourbridge)

  Malone, Major P. B. (Tottenham, S.)

  Rutherford, Colonel Sir J. (Darwen)

  Wilson, Lt.-Col. Sir M. (Bethnal Gn.)

  Manville, Edward

  Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)

  Winfrey, Sir Richard

  Marks, Sir George Croydon

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir H. (Norwood)

  Winterton, Earl

  Martin, A. E.

  Sanders, Colonel Sir Robert Arthur

  Wise, Frederick

  Mason, Robert

  Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.

  Wood, Sir H. K. (Woolwich, West)

  Matthews, David

  Scott, A. M. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

  Wood, Major M. M. (Aberdeen, C.)

  Mills, John Edmund

  Scott, Leslie (Liverpool Exchange)

  Wood, Major Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)

  Mitchell, Sir William Lane

  Seager, Sir William

  Woods, Sir Robert

  Molson, Major John Elsdale

  Seddon, J. A.

  Woolcock, William James U.

  Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred Moritz

  Seely, Major-General Rt. Hon. John

  Worsfold, T. Cato

  Moore, Major-General Sir Newton J.

  Sexton, James

  Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.

  Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T, C.

  Shaw, Hon. Alex. (Kilmarnock)

  Yeo, Sir Alfred William

  Morden, Col. W. Grant

  Shaw Thomas (Preston)

  Young, E. H. (Norwich)

  Moreing, Captain Algernon H.

  Shaw, William T. (Forfar)

  Young, Sir Frederick W. (Swindon)

  Morison, Rt. Hon. Thomas Brash

  Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)

  Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)

  Morris, Richard

  Shortt, Rt. Hon. E. (N'castle-on-T.)

  Young, W. (Perth & Kinross, Perth)

  Morrison, Hugh

  Simm, M. T.

  Younger, Sir George

  Mosley, Oswald

  Sitch, Charles H.

  Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Smith, Sir Harold (Warrington)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

  Murchison, C. K.

  Smithers, Sir Alfred W.

  Mr. McCurdy and Lieut.-Colonel

  Murray, Dr. D. (Inverness & Ross)

  Spencer, George A.

  Sir J. Gilmour.

  NOES.

  Adair, Rear-Admiral Thomas B. S.

  Butcher, Sir John George

  Dixon, Captain Herbert

  Allen, Lieut.-Col. Sir William James

  Cecil, Rt. Hon. Lord H. (Ox. Univ.)

  Donald, Thompson

  Archer-Shee, Lieut.-Colonel Martin

  Cohen, Major J. Brunel

  Erskine, James Malcolm Monteith

  Armstrong, Henry Bruce

  Cooper, Sir Richard Ashmole

  Ganzonl, Sir John

  Balfour, George (Hampstead)

  Coote, William (Tyrone, South)

  Gretton, Colonel John

  Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick G.

  Cory, Sir C. J. (Cornwall, St. Ives)

  Hall, Rr-Adml Sir W.(Liv'p'l,W.D'by)

  Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

  Craig, Capt. C. C. (Antrim, South)

  Harmsworth, Hon. E. C. (Kent)

  Blair, Sir Reginald

  Cralk, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

  Hopkinson, A. (Lancaster, Mossley)

  Boyd-Carpenter, Major A.

  Croft, Lieut.-Colonel Henry Page

  Jellett, William Morgan

  Brown, T. W. (Down, North)

  Curzon, Captain Viscount

  Kerr-Smiley, Major Peter Kerr

  Burn, T. H. (Belfast, St. Anne's)

  Davison, Sir W. H. (Kensington, S.)

  Lindsay, William Arthur

  362

  363

  Lowther, Major C. (Cumberland, N.)

  Oman, Sir Charles William C.

  Stewart, Gershom

  Lynn, R. J.

  O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Hugh

  Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray Fraser

  M'Connell, Thomas Edward

  Polson, Sir Thomas A.

  Townshend, Sir Charles Vere Ferrers

  M'Guffin, Samuel

  Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

  Whitla, Sir William

  McNeill, Ronald (Kent, Canterbury)

  Remnant, Sir James

  Wilson, Capt. A. S. (Holderness)

  Maddocks, Henry

  Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)

  Wolmer, Viscount

  Moles, Thomas

  Scott, Sir Samuel (St. Marylebone)

  Yate, Colonel Sir Charles Edward

  Nicholson, Brig.-Gen. J. (Westminster)

  Sharman-Crawford, Robert G.

  Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield)

  Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

  Mr. R. Gwynne and Mr. Reid.

  Question put, and agreed to.

  Resolved:
  "That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty as followeth:—
  Most Gracious Sovereign,
  We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to thank Your Majesty for the Most Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament.
  Having taken into consideration the Articles of Agreement presented to us by Your Majesty's command we are ready to confirm and ratify these Articles in order that the same may be established for ever by the mutual consent of the peoples of Great Britain and Ireland, and we offer to Your Majesty our humble congratulations on the near accomplishment of that work of reconciliation to which Your Majesty has so largely contributed."
  To be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of His Majesty's Household.

  ADJOURNMENT.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House, at its rising this day, do adjourn till Monday next."—[Mr. Chamberlain.]
  Mr. O'CONNOR: Having, I hope, liberated to-day one people, I crave the liberty of saying something on the Motion for Adjournment with regard to another people. I refer to the position as regards the Greeks and Armenians in Cilicia. There is a very strong feeling in favour of the rights of these peoples, and I ask if it is not possible under the Rules of Order to arrange for a discussion in reference to it?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I am afraid there is no opportunity for a general Debate on this Motion. I have looked up precedents as far back as 1856, and I find the rule has always been that no discussion can take place on the Motion for Adjournment from Friday to Monday.
  Mr. O'CONNOR: I would make this appeal, that the circumstances are ex-
  364
  tremely exceptional, that this is a very urgent question, that the Prime Minister is meeting with representatives of other Powers, and that we should be very glad of an opportunity of showing how strong the opinion of this Parliament and of this country is in favour of setting out the rights of these people.
  Lord R. CECIL: I understand the ruling you have just given to be that no general discussion such as takes place on an ordinary Motion for Adjournment is possible on this Motion, but I venture to ask you whether it would not be competent to urge reasons why we should sit to-morrow rather than on Monday, and, as one of these reasons, the great urgency of this question, in view of the meeting which is to take place on Monday between the Prime Minister of this country and the Prime Minister of France, and that therefore it is desirable if we were to sit to-morrow that we should, on the adjournment of the ordinary sitting to-morrow, have an opportunity of saying something, even if only for the half-hour that we are allowed at the end of the sitting. I agree that a discussion would have to be very restricted, but I submit that we are entitled to say something on that solitary point before the meeting between M. Briand and the Prime Minister. I do not wish to try to do something which you, Mr. Speaker, think improper.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I should have thought the Noble Lord's experience at the Bar would have taught him the answer to his question. If I were to give way to that seductive plea, the whole Rule, which has existed for about 60 years, would disappear.
  Lord R. CECIL: This is a special case.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I am here to administer the Rules of the House, and when I have looked up the precedents, I cannot see my way to allow a departure of that kind, which would break down the Rule altogether.
  Lord R. CECIL: May I give reasons why I think it undesirable that we should

  365
  adjourn till Monday? That must be relevant to this Motion. If this Motion be not passed, the House will sit normally to-morrow, and that may be a good thing or a bad thing, but it is open for any hon. Member, surely, to say, "I prefer that the House should sit tomorrow for the following reasons."
  Mr. SPEAKER: The Noble Lord will see that there might be 600 Members in the House who, on subsequent Fridays, would avail themselves of the leave given if I failed in my duty in maintaining the Rule. The procedure that he suggests would be a mere evasion of the established Rules of the House, and I could not countenance it for a moment, but the very fact that on a Friday we do not even have the half-hour or hour that is usual on the other days——
  Lord R. CECIL: That is a Standing Order. This is a special Motion, which should be discussed.
  Mr. SPEAKER: It cannot be discussed by bringing in the kind of questions which are relevant to an ordinary adjournment. It would be a mere evasion of the Rule, and my obvious duty is to stop it.
  Lord R. CECIL: I desire to offer some reasons why I think it is very important why this House should sit to-morrow and not Monday, and I must be very careful not to transgress the ruling which you have given on the subject of what may be discussed and what may not. I should like very earnestly to ask the Government whether we can be quite sure that no irrevocable decision will be taken between this sitting and the next sitting of the House on any of the urgent and burning questions which are agitating the public mind. I can only point out the very deep interest that is taken, and the very great anger that is felt in all parts of the country that we should find ourselves in such a position that we are unable to discharge the solemn pledges we have given.
  Mr. O'CONNOR: I will, of course, endeavour rigidly to adhere to the limits which you have put upon the observations which may be made, and my observations shall take the form of a vehement appeal to the Leader of the House and the Prime Minister for the discussion of a subject which to us is urgent, because tens of thousands of lives may be sacrificed even
  366
  in 48 hours. Under these circumstances, and in view of the fact that the Prime Minister and the right hon. Gentleman, and, I believe, other Members of the Government, are going to negotiate upon these important matters, they ought to have the full support of the House and country in the policy which we believe to be theirs, which has been proclaimed frequently, and never, so far as I know, has been departed from. I therefore appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to give us some opportunity to voice those opinions, and so strengthen his hands in the important negotiations.
  Mr. M'GUFFIN: I desire to ask the Leader of the House if it is intended that the discussion of the Amendments should be resumed on Monday next. As a member of the Labour party coming from Ireland, I hoped that I should have had an opportunity of speaking in the Debate. I interrogated the right hon. Gentleman earlier in the day, and I understood that there would be practically no limit to the time which would be given to the Debate to-day.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The House has come to a decision on that matter.
  5.0 P.M
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I confess I think there is something inconvenient in the course which the Noble Lord has taken, and of which, I think, he was sensible himself. It is quite obvious that this is not a suitable occasion to attempt to discuss the grave matters to which he has alluded, nor do I conceive that there is need for any such discussion at all. I do not understand that there is any difference of opinion between the hon. Gentleman who first tried to raise this question and the Government. We are all anxious that everything that can be done should be done for the protection of these Christian populations. I am reluctant to embark on any discussion on the subject after the sense of the House has declared itself, that it is not desirable the Session should be prolonged in order that other subjects may be debated, but that it should be devoted to the one subject for which it has been summoned, and which it has now disposed of.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: I see the Prime Minister has come in. May I ask him if it is not possible for the House to meet to-morrow instead of adjourning to Mon-

  367
  day, in order that the questions raised by the hon. Member for the Scotland Division (Mr. T. P. O'Connor), which are to be discussed by the Prime Minister on Monday with the French Prime Minister, may be debated here so as to give those who wish an opportunity of expressing their desire to secure the protection of the Armenians in Cilicia?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I am afraid I have been too lax in allowing the Debate, which, as I have already said, is not in order. If hon. Members will be good enough to look at the rulings of my predecessor on the 5th and 12th December, 1902, they will see that the Debate cannot be permitted.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: Will it not be proper on Monday, if the House is not prorogued, to have a Debate on a Motion that the House do adjourn till Tuesday? Could we not then raise this matter and discuss this or any other question which it may be desired to bring forward? If the House is prorogued on Monday, will it not be possible to speak on a Motion for the Adjournment of the House until such time as the Prorogation is actually effected by the appearance at the Bar of Black Rod?
  Mr. SPEAKER: In regard to the first question of the hon. and gallant Member, certainly if on Monday there be a Motion to adjourn till Tuesday—a Motion "That the House do nod adjourn" involving as it would a sitting on the following day, then the usual hour before 11.30 will be open to hon. Members for the purposes of discussion. With regard to the second part of the question, that I cannot answer as I do not know at what time Black Rod may come.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: But cannot we discuss matters until he does come?
  Mr. SPEAKER: Until he does come, there will be of course questions in the ordinary way.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: But when the questions are finished on Monday, presuming there are not many, as is likely, would it not be possible, on a Motion for the Adjournment, to discuss this matter until such time as the appearance of Black Rod terminates the proceedings?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I think only the Government could put forward a Motion at that time.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Seeing that the Prime Minister is now seized of the desire of the hon. Member for the Scotland Division, may I ask him if the Government, after questions on Monday, will be prepared to make a Motion that the House do now adjourn, and thus give an opportunity for discussing a question on which hon. Members feel more keenly than I do, and also giving the Government an opportunity of expressing their views on a subject on which they have been very mum ever since the Treaty of Sèvres was signed? Will not the Government take the opportunity of allowing hon. Members who, after all, have come here to support them in their policy, to raising another matter about which they also feel as keenly as we do?
  The PRIME MINISTER: I believe that question has already been answered by the Leader of the House. The House has been summoned to deal with one topic, and if a Motion of this kind be allowed it might lead to further discussions. Yesterday, or the day before, I received a deputation from the Labour party and the trade unions on the subject of unemployment, because there was not an opportunity of discussing the matter in this House, as we were dealing exclusively with Ireland. In view of that, they assented to the idea of a deputation.
  Captain W. BENN: On a point of Order. Supposing that on Monday Questions terminate before the attendance of Black Rod. What will happen between the termination of Questions and the appearance of Black Rod? Will you, Mr. Speaker, leave the Chair, or is it the intention of the Government to move, "That the House do now adjourn," or is it open to any private Member to move "That this House do now adjourn"?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I have just explained that it is not open to any private Member to move an Adjournment of the House, and that in the ordinary course it is my duty to leave the Chair till Black Rod appears with his summons.
  Lord R. CECIL: Would it be in order for me now to give notice that I will on

  369
  Monday ask that a Motion about the Armenian Question should be taken after Questions, unless the Adjournment is moved by the Government for the purpose? If it will, I will give notice at once.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The Noble Lord can hand in his Motion, and see what happens.
  Mr. A. WILLIAMS: If the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister is not able to grant time in this House for a discussion such as we desire, will he follow the precedent that he himself has just mentioned in regard to the question of unemployment, and will he receive a deputation?
  The PRIME MINISTER assented.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: A deputation of those deeply interested in this matter? I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will see the importance of the matter.
  The PRIME MINISTER: I shall be very glad to receive a deputation. Not only my convenience, however, but the convenience of the French Prime Minister will have to be considered in this respect.
  Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 3, till Monday next (19th December), pursuant to the Resolution of the House this day.
  Adjourned at Eight Minutes after Five o'clock.

UNEMPLOYMENT.
  BARROW-IN-FURNESS (GOVERNMENT WORK).
  BARROW-IN-FURNESS (GOVERNMENT WORK).
  ELECTRICAL INDUSTRY.
  ELECTRICAL INDUSTRY.
  ALLIED DEBTS (CANCELLATION).
  ALLIED DEBTS (CANCELLATION).
  SIR EDGAR SPEYER.
  SIR EDGAR SPEYER.
NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  MOTHER'S PENSION (MRS. JANE WILLIAMS).
  MOTHER'S PENSION (MRS. JANE WILLIAMS).
  TREATMENT ALLOWANCES.
  TREATMENT ALLOWANCES.
POST OFFICE.
  SUB-OFFICES, BRISTOL.
  SUB-OFFICES, BRISTOL.
  LYDNEY POST OFFICE.
  LYDNEY POST OFFICE.
  PROSECUTION, WEST HAM (MR. W. GOTT).
  PROSECUTION, WEST HAM (MR. W. GOTT).
  DANGEROUS DRIVING, WHITEHALL.
  DANGEROUS DRIVING, WHITEHALL.
  EXCESS PROFITS DUTY.
  EXCESS PROFITS DUTY.
  BRITISH ARMY (DESERTERS).
  BRITISH ARMY (DESERTERS).
  TEMPORARY ADMIRALTY CLERKS (COMPASSIONATE GRATUITY).
  TEMPORARY ADMIRALTY CLERKS (COMPASSIONATE GRATUITY).
  SAFEGUARDING OF INDUSTRIES ACT.
  SAFEGUARDING OF INDUSTRIES ACT.
  BUILDING MATERIALS (PRICES).
  BUILDING MATERIALS (PRICES).
  COAL SMOKE.
  COAL SMOKE.
  BOYCOTTING, BURMA.
  BOYCOTTING, BURMA.
  MEXICO.
  MEXICO.
  M. KRASSIN.
  M. KRASSIN.
  INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL, BRAIN- TREE (APPOINTMENT).
  INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL, BRAIN- TREE (APPOINTMENT).
  TANGANYIKA TERRITORY.
  TANGANYIKA TERRITORY.
  IRON AND STEEL TRADES (RAILWAY CHARGES).
  IRON AND STEEL TRADES (RAILWAY CHARGES).
  TRADE BOARDS INQUIRY (EVIDENCE).
  TRADE BOARDS INQUIRY (EVIDENCE).
Preamble
The House met at noon, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

ADDRESS IN REPLY TO HIS MAJESTY'S MOST GRACIOUS SPEECH.
Debate on the Amendment of the Duke of NORTHUMBERLAND to the Motion of the Viscount MORLEY of BLACKBURN for an humble Address—namely, at the end of the first paragraph to leave out all the words after "Parliament" and insert "But we humbly represent to Your Majesty that this House regrets that the settlement of the Government of Ireland indicated in the gracious Speech from the Throne would involve the surrender of the rights of the Crown in Ireland, give power to establish an independent Irish Army and Navy, would require further sacrifices from Ulster, and would not safeguard the rights of the loyalist population in Southern Ireland"—
resumed (according to Order).
THE EARL OF DESART: My Lords, I propose to detain your Lordships but a very short time, because I think everybody in the House is anxious to get to the period when we shall hear from the Lord Chancellor the explanations and answers which have been sought by many speakers in the course of this long debate. But if I intrude for a few moments, I think I have the excuse that I belong to a body of men who have their interests, their very homes, and everything they have more at stake, perhaps' than any who have spoken, or will speak, in this House.
In the course of the debate, by one speaker or another, almost every aspect of what I must call this tremendous experiment has been discussed and criticised. There is very little doubt, whatever his final conclusion may be as to the course he should adopt when we have to go into the lobby, every one feels alarmed at the character of the Articles of Agreement which are before us, and a good deal of dismay at the proposition which is suggested as to the impotence of Parliament to modify or amend those Articles in any degree. On this point I hope we may derive some consolation when the Lord Chancellor comes to reply, and I will say
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no more about it except this. Having regard to the fact that there are so many matters of importance to which there is no reference in the Articles, such as the protection of minorities in the south, Land Acts, appointments of Judges, and other things that I need not refer to, at least some hope may be held out that when the time comes to discuss the ratification of this Agreement, and to consider how the future Constitution of Ireland is to be drawn up and framed, there may be opportunities of urging the views that many of us hold as to what should be inserted for these and other purposes in the Constitution.
While I think there is no difference of opinion as to the anxiety, the alarm, and the dismay, there is a wide difference as to the policy which should be pursued in dealing with the Resolution and the Amendment that are now before this House. The actual situation is one that has led, and has naturally led, to very bitter criticism by the representatives of Ulster and by the mover of the Amendment which is before the House. My noble friend Lord Carson made a speech of exceeding bitterness on which I do not presume to make, and should feel great trepidation in making, any lengthy comment. It was a very powerful speech, as his speeches always are, a bitter and concentrated attack on the policy of the Government both in the past and in the present. Whether one can altogether accept every criticism he made as just or not, I am sure the House must have felt in listening to him his intense earnestness and intense feeling of loyalty to Ulster and this country, and the profound conviction which actuated his every word. We who have worked with him know his characteristics. But when I have said that, I cannot help expressing a little regret that there was so much acerbity in the speech. I do not say it was not natural and it may well be justified, but I think that for the purpose of a discussion of great difficulty and delicacy, in which complicated interests are involved, we should get as clear of strong personal attacks as is possible in the circumstances. More than that I will not presume to say. We know the noble and learned Lord's good faith and earnestness, and realise that he was actuated by a belief that what he said should have been said. I say no more.
The noble Marquess, Lord Londonderry, also spoke strongly and, if he will allow me

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to say so, made, I think, a speech in which there were many utterances showing a great breadth of view and a high character of statesmanship. I was not surprised at that, because I had the honour of serving with the noble Marquess on the Irish Convention, during which there was a time when we had high hopes that the result would be an agreement which would have led to what might have been a settlement of the Irish question on very different lines from those on which it can now be dealt with. His speeches at the beginning of that Convention were full of encouragement, and it was with deep regret, at a later stage, that we found an agreement between such of us of the Southern Unionists who were there and the Constitutional Nationalists and Ulster became impracticable. We know the result of that Convention.
Knowing the views of the noble Marquess, I was not surprised at what he said in one passage of his speech. It gave me, if not much hope for the present, at least encouragement for the future. He said—
"We have never expressed a determination to remain outside for all time. I can assure you that recent events have not stimulated those whom I represent to show any alacrity or any desire to enter a Parliament in Dublin. We have deliberately asked you to give us time to consider whether, after witnessing the establishment of a just and efficient administration in the south and west of Ireland, we may feel willing to co-operate. Speaking for myself, I do not hesitate to say that an efficient administration in the south and west of Ireland would go far to remove my objections to the establishment of a single Parliament for the whole of Ireland."
I welcome that statement; to those who think with me it is an encouragement and an inducement if we can, how we can, and so far as we can, to do what is possible to produce a stable and efficient administration in the south of Ireland. The path will be steep and hard to climb, but at least—and this governs much of the conclusions I have come to on the immediate point—we must try to take it.
The noble Duke who moved the Amendment now More the House expressed a view with which one cannot but feel sympathy and which represents a considerable body of opinion in this country. I do not agree with much that he said, but I do not at this stage propose to deal with it in any detail. I understand him, but I am afraid I part company with hint; and I will say why. With all respect to these three speakers, I do not think that
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the course they must be assumed to recommend could lead to anything but chaos and despair in Ireland. We all recognise the difficulties of the position in Ulster; but it seems to me that it is rather too strong language to describe the recent sequence of events as a betrayal or coercion of Ulster. A great many of the difficulties are necessarily inherent in the position in which Ulster has placed itself. You cannot exactly put on equal terms a population of about a million and a-quarter people, in a very small area (with a large minority at issue with the majority therein) and the overwhelming opinion of twenty-six counties, be that opinion right or wrong. The position itself makes impossible any proposal for the south and west of Ireland which cannot fail in some respects to prejudice or affect the position of the northeastern counties. What is described as betrayal or coercion is largely the result of that, and is practically unavoidable.
Ulster has rights. I fully recognise it has a promise which must be kept both in the letter and spirit, and I should deprecate any departure from that principle. But, after all, the Ulster people have absolute control, if they wish to have it, of their own local affairs. They have the choice so to remain. They have the choice to be again incorporated with Great Britain, or to enter into the larger powers that are proposed to be conferred on the south and west. They can do r hat, and they will be safe in doing it. If you are to use the word "betrayal"—I do not propose to use it—it would be much stronger if used in the ease of the loyalists of the south. In the event of Ulster coming in there are provisions for the protection of their minority, but in the provisions under which we must conic in there is, none for the protection of the minority in the south.
I have always, ever since I had anything to do with Parliamentary life, and before, been an opponent of partition. I was one out of, I think, twelve people who went into the lobby against the Amending Bill of 1919, and I have never varied in that opinion. While the problem of Ireland has long been and, I hope, is no longer—though it may be—almost insoluble, I believe that with partition it is absolutely insoluble. I will tell you why in a moment. I am convinced that, more than any one thing, it is the desire of the south, the thing they care for more than any other,

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that Ireland should be whole and united, and at an earlier stage—things have gone too far now—I believed that what is called a beau geste, a very little from Ulster, would have produced a remarkable result in the south of Ireland, and that we should some time ago have attained to a better settlement than any that can possibly be hoped for now. I have always thought, for what it was worth, that if you had given Ulster this complete power over its local affairs, had given the south complete power over its own local affairs, and had established a Parliament which might meet once a year alternately in Belfast and Dublin to deal with what were obviously all-Ireland questions that would have to be dealt with whatever system were adopted, then a year, certainly two years ago, the south would have been brought into agreement in a very different frame of mind from its present one.
As has been said, however, it is no use going back in the past; still less should I wish to do so at the present stage of this debate. Having listened to speeches that have been made not only in this debate but on previous occasions, condemning a settlement with those who appear at present to govern and represent Sinn Fein, I ask myself what would happen if what must be the policy suggested by this Amendment were now adopted, a policy which must mean the abandonment of this scheme. What is your policy after that? Is there any but one ever suggested, the policy of the conquest of Ireland, with its attendant hatred and bloodshed? You could succeed, if you put your back into it. But then, when you had succeeded, when you had for the moment quieted Ireland, put it under Martial Law and military rule, could you keep it there? How long could you keep it there, with the Liberal Party or the Radical Party here, with the opinion of the Colonies, of the United States and other foreign countries to be reckoned with? You could not go on with that, and you would reach a point when you would again begin negotiations under even worse conditions than you have now. You would have an added crop of hatred, there Would have been more bloodshed, and I think you would then—how far this may be short of it would be arguable—you would then head straight for a more complete independence than at the present time.
When, therefore, we have to decide what we are to do, no one can suppose that it is
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anything but distasteful and rather terrible for us to come under a scheme creating a far greater measure of separation than was ever contemplated in the past. I should like, and I am sure many of us would like, to say a great deal about that. But it would only add to the bitterness, and I want to assuage bitterness, if it may be assuaged. That, I think, is the object of all of those with whom I work. The thing is very nearly desperate. I will say just this. There has been, since 1914, chance after chance, as I believe, of settling this question on very reasonable terms, terms as different from these as water is from wine, and they have been lost. I should think those chances still endured up to July of last year, when it will be remembered that many bodies, calling themselves, I think, Moderates and Dominion Leaguers, and one thing and another, approached the Government and said, "Will you not make some effort now?" The answer was always the same: "Can you deliver the goods?" That was absolutely stopping the thing. Nobody could deliver goods in Ireland. Can the present people deliver the goods? We do not know if they can. That was an answer that was merely crushing, and the Government might just as well have said, "No, we will not." Anyway, they did not.
Then comes the horrible winter of 1920–21, through which we have lately passed, with its loss of life, property destroyed, anxiety, suffering and tension—and, believe me, the tension of those who lived in Ireland was very great. We who lived in the south of Ireland did not know from day to day what would happen. With our friends unprotected, and unable to protect ourselves, we went through a whole winter, and if the Government bad had any idea that they were going to do not this but anything short of this, I believe all that crop of hatred, all that tremendous suffering might never have arisen. On that I do speak strongly about the Government.
But allowing for all this, how do we find ourselves to-day? On one side, a military policy which is, to my mind, nothing but a blind alley: on the other side, a chance. I am not going to throw away that chance if I can help it, and I differ from some of my own friends in being perhaps a little more sanguine than they are that we shall build up something of a stable State in Ireland in time. As regards ourselves, I should like to refer to a passage in Lord Bryce's speech yesterday, in which he said—

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"There is far more friendly and neighbourly good feeling between Catholics and Protestants all over the south and centre of Ireland than your Lordships may be apt to believe from many statements that reach us from the newspapers."
I can only speak for the country I know, but my own opinion is that that statement is very largely true.
I myself, through all these troublous times, have met with nothing but courtesy and consideration, and have been exceptionally fortunate. I know I must not put that too high, but I am quite sure there is a very large element of people who not only feel good will to what I may call the gentry in the south of Ireland, but are beginning more and more to feel—particularly those who have any stake in the country, farmers and traders—that they must have that class in the country to work with them, and for that reason will be disposed to treat them fairly. How far they will come into the open and do it, and how far they will have the power to do it, is, of course, on the knees of the gods.
Feeling all this, after, I confess, much heart-searching and thought, I have come to the conclusion that both as a loyal subject of His Majesty, and as one whose interests and heart are in Ireland, I must vote with the Government on this issue. I am not happy. Who is? I am only fairly hopeful. Who can be more than that? But I think—God alone knows if one is right or wrong—that it is my plain duty, as an Irishman in the south of Ireland, to take this course. I believe that Mr. Griffith is in earnest in what he says. Whether he w11 have power to carry out what he desires is, of course, one among the many gambles involved in this great experiment; but I have conic to the conclusion that we must try to work what seems to me the only possible chance for Ireland in the actual situation, and do our best. That we will do, and I am not at all without hope. I know well the extent of the extremists' power in Ireland, but I think it is exaggerated as regards the rural districts. Of the towns I cannot speak. I do know, however, that at the present time the Transport Union in many parts of Ireland is being very strongly and successfully opposed by the leaders of Shin Fein.
I concur in everything that Lord Midleton said on the question of armed forces in Ireland. I can never understand the
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origin of that, and I find it very difficult to believe that the demand for armed forces came from the south of Ireland. I have seen no trace of any such desire, and it means an enormous financial burden on what must be a struggling Government. There will be forces on each side of the border, and what on earth they will be there for, except to look at one another, I cannot imagine. I hope that the Lord Chancellor, when he speaks, will be able to explain what was the genesis of this, because it was perfectly understood that there would not be armed forces, and I confess that when I first saw the terms that particular passage was a thunderbolt to me.
However, I must say, though sadly, that, with all the risks, I feel we must accept there terms, and do what we can to avert danger, and to create a state stable and sane, so that, adopting Lord Londonderry's words, we may give that confidence to Ulster which will one day make it a State united by ties of affection, of trade and commerce not only with Great Britain but also with the rest of Ireland. If that could be done, and were done now, it would add much to my hope of a successful result of this experiment. May I say this about Ulster? I have not been in the past always in agreement with her policy. I do not wish to say one word of acerbity, but only this: that they may sometimes think of us Southern Unionists struggling in the sea. In the old days, before 1914, we worked as one body. Now we are all in difficulties. Let them think of us, and if they can, how they can, and when they can, come down and help us as one State. I do not ask anything at once, but that they will have that, among other things, in their minds as a reason for trying to create a united Ireland.
I intervened to trouble your Lordships because I thought that, belonging to a body who have taken a rather active part in seeking agreement at an earlier stage, I was entitled to give sonic explanation of my reasons for giving the vote which I propose to give. Having done that. I need trouble your Lordships no longer, but before I sit down I hope that the Lord Chancellor, who has been asked a great many questions, will allow me to add to his burden. I wish to ask him a question as to Clause 17 of the Articles of Agreement, providing for the creation of a Provisional Government to carry on for the time. I have been puzzled a good deal as to how such a Government,

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unless created under the Act of 1920, could have any legal force behind it.
The noble Marquess the Leader of the House made some observations about it, but he did not, I confess, altogether clear away my difficulties. What he said was this:—
"The second stage will be that which is provided for in Article 17 of the Agreement, under which a Provisional Government is to be set up in Ireland during the period while the Constitution of the Free State is being drafted and set in motion. This will no doubt require some discussion, and will take up a certain amount of time. Legislation will not be required for that object—though it may be that when the Constitution is set up an Act of Indemnity may be called for in order to cover any informality that may have occurred."
I do not understand why an Act of Indemnity should be required if it is a Government armed with complete legal powers. An Act of Indemnity is required only when somebody does something which is beyond his powers. I could understand if the Provisional Government were to be set up under Section 74 of the Act, but I do not, I confess, quite understand how you can set up a legal Government except by Statute. Having said that, I do not think I need trouble your Lordships any further.
LORD SYDENHAM: My Lords, only the very strongest convictions would have induced me, as a very junior member of the House, to intervene in this very important debate—perhaps one of the most important that has ever occurred within the walls of this Chamber. I sincerely wish that I could join in the general chorus of praise which has been raised by those who support the Government, but this peace settlement came to me as a most complete surprise, because it flagrantly violated many of the pledges of the Prime Minister, some of them quite recent. So far as I can see the directors of the Red Army have obtained almost everything they demanded, except a Republic, and they have been placed in a position to declare a Republic whenever they happen to see fit.
I believed that the Oath of Allegiance to the King was a matter on which there could have been no surrender—that no surrender was even thinkable upon such a point. Instead we have a very ingenious formula, in which the rebel leaders promise only that they will be faithful to His Majesty so long as they belong to the British Com-
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monwealth of Nations. It appears that the term "Empire" could not be used. Germany alone appears to remain an Empire after the war. Have we really come to be ashamed of the old title of the greatest and most beneficent achievement that our race has ever accomplished?
I thought that adequate naval and military safeguards would be insisted upon. That has been definitely promised to us, but it is quite inconceivable that the war staffs at the Admiralty and the War Office could have approved the terms of this Treaty. The noble Marquess who leads the House said that the Admiralty had approved. I wish he could have read out their Minute or Memorandum of assent and could have told us the names of the officials who signed it. He did not mention the War Office, and I am perfectly certain that the Chief of the Imperial General Staff would never assent to the terms of this Treaty.
We shall not, in future, be able to control the great harbours of the Irish Free State. What is the use of retaining care and maintenance parties at Queenstown and elsewhere which could be overpowered at any moment? Are we going to maintain the guns and ammunition at these places? And what is Belfast Lough doing in this schedule, and at this particular stage? Article 6 implies that in the near future the Free State will undertake its own "coastal defence." But the coastal defence of an island depends upon a Navy based upon secure ports, on which it can count for obtaining supplies of all kinds. The terms of Article 6 imply that the defence by sea of all Ireland will be abandoned by the Royal Navy when what is called "an arrangement" is completed. There is really no doubt on this point. This is the Article:—
"Until an arrangement has been made between the British and Irish Governments whereby the Irish Free State undertakes her own coastal defence, the defence by sea of Great Britain and Ireland shall be undertaken by His Majesty's Imperial Forces."
That must mean that when this arrangement has been concluded the defence by sea of Ireland by His Majesty's Navy will henceforth cease.
Will the Trish Free State be allowed to fly the Sinn Fein flag and have its own Navy to fill the Irish Channel with submarines if it chooses? Only the other day the signatories of this Treaty were engaged in destroying lighthouses—perhaps one of the basest acts which they have com-

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mitted. But now they are to be in charge of all the lighthouses, and they can imperil the sailors of all nations whenever they like. I will not labour this point of defence, and. I will only add, as an old student of these affairs, that I am firmly convinced that the maritime interests of this country and of the Empire will in the near future be imperilled under the terms of this Treaty.
There is very much that is left quite vague in this stupendous surrender, are the historic regiments of Southern Ireland, with their long record of world service, to be disbanded and broken up? I see in the Treaty no valid guarantee for the adequate compensation of the splendidly loyal Royal Irish Constabulary who have suffered terribly from cowardly assassinations. Pour hundred and twenty of these gallant men have been killed, and 720 of them have been wounded. And then I see no valid guarantee for the lives and property of the tens of thousands of Southern Irish loyalists whose lives have been made a hell in late months by the high contracting Parties to this extraordinary Treaty.
As the rebel Government was constituted by the forces of terror, and as it could not, or did not, or would not keep the truce, which His Majesty's Government did not take tin trouble to get signed, why should they be expected religiously to observe all the terms of this very nebulous Treaty? Is it to be supposed that, by setting up a Free State, these men, who are now placed in a position of quite uncontrolled power, will change either their natures or their aims? If His Majesty's Government had been able to negotiate with the freely-elected representatives of the Irish people we might know where we stand, but we have not the least idea what the real public opinion of Ireland wants. We only know that they must long for peace after the, outrages to which they have been submitted, and any people in such conditions, living under a reign of terror, would naturally grasp at any straw. And therefore their acquiescence in this Treaty, if that acquiescence exists, really means practically nothing. I submit that we have no right to determine the fate of the Irish people without first knowing their wishes.
The whole case of Ulster has been dealt with in the powerful speeches we have listened to from the Ulster representatives in this House. I will only say this—that the pledges given to loyal Ulstermen have not been kept., and that they have been
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placed in a position which at once becomes extraordinarily difficult, and in the near future may become absolutely impossible.
The noble Marquess who leads the House laid great stress upon the effects of this Treaty as securing permanently good relations with the United States. I am sure that every member of this House would be willing to sacrifice much if that happy result could be obtained, but. I regret to be quite unable to accept the rosy picture which the noble Marquess held out to us. All the various forces which have been directed in the past to creating hostility and distrust of us will remain, even if our alleged barbarity to the Irish people can no longer be turned into political capital. That distrust has its basis far deeper than the question of Ireland. I trace it to the false histories which are taught to American boys and girls in their schools. As your Lordships may know, efforts are now being made to change those histories, and to bring them into some correspondence with the actual facts, but strong Opposition to this change has been manifested.
Can anyone believe that the. Hearst Press, which is very powerful, and which is irreconcilably anti-British, will change its tone because of this Treaty coming into existence? This is what Mr. Hearst said only the other day:—
"The heroism of the Irish people, soldier and civilian alike, has won for them a complete victory over British brutality."
Then he went on to speak of "the freedom and independence which the glorious arms of Ireland have wrested from the mailed fist of the English Government." That attitude of contempt is largely due to the surrender which is embodied in this Treaty. All thoughtful Americans whom I have ever met have always said: "Why do you not give Ireland State rights, and give them no more?" None of them ever contemplated the possibility of setting up a Dominion in Southern Ireland, and, if such a demand were put forward by any American State, it would be met and opposed by the whole of the forces of the Union.
It is sometimes forgotten that America has ceased to be an Anglo-Saxon nation, and that it is not now even completely English-speaking. More than sixty years ago America reached a great crisis in her national life. A most fateful decision had to be taken, and the choice was one

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of peculiar difficulty. Among the leaders of the revolting States were men of the very highest character, who believed firmly and whole-heartedly in the justice of their cause; they had behind them the unanimous opinion and support of the people they represented, and they were absolutely incapable of descending to crime. The momentous decision then taken was due to one great man, who had a simple code of honour and a clear discrimination between right and wrong, which it seems to me as if we were in danger of losing. He believed that the whole future of his country was then at stake, and he did not shrink from a long and cruel civil war, the very idea of which was hateful to him.
We have reached a somewhat similar crisis in the life of our. Empire, and we have decided, or we are deciding, to surrender to a small body of men who are nut even all of Irish birth, and who for months waged a campaign of murder and robbery, accompanied and interspersed by atrocities which it would be impossible to describe in this House. But for President Lincoln, America could not have been what she is to-day. Are we sure that our Empire, as we know it now, can continue to exist when it has been dangerously weakened at its very heart? Behind the President of the Irish Republic, as the noble Duke said, are all the forces which are being used to wreck our Empire. It was Marx, the German who has become the apostle of the revolutionary section of Labour in this country, who pointed out in the last century that Britain could be destroyed through Ireland, and that is what is intended. The Delegates with whom we negotiated were in close communication with the Communists in Russia and had drafted a Treaty with the vilest Government that the world has ever known. Is the Irish Free State to be free to have foreign relations and ambassadors abroad, such as the Cabinet of Mr. de Valera has maintained hitherto? If so, and if it chooses to complete that Bolshevik Treaty, how can we stop it?
The President of the Irish Republic has already repudiated the Treaty which part of his Cabinet signed after being in the closest communication with him throughout the negotiations, which means, as the noble Marquess, Lord Londonderry, said, that you will start with a Republican minority in the Free State which might at
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any time become a majority with foreign and communistic assistance. Only yesterday Dublin was placarded with Communist announcements of the very worst type. As regards finance, this Treaty is naturally vague. That, of course, could not be helped, but it must be remembered that further long and acrimonious negotiations must take place, and that they must end in further surrenders; because you could not jeopardise this peace for the sake of a paltry £20,000,000 or £30,000,000. All that is certain is that the burden on the taxpayers of this country will be increased.
While I believe the effects of this Treaty will imperil in certain directions the future of our Empire, I think that the moral results may be even more disastrous. We proclaim to the world that crime, if it is only carried far enough and carried on by means of a Red Terror, can count upon success. That has been already duly noted in India, in Egypt, and wherever, either inside or outside, organised forces, directed against this Empire exist. The Bishop of Down, speaking for the loyal Protestants of Ulster, said this:
"There arise time and again in our minds feelings of burning resentment against the unspeakable indignity that has been inflicted upon the Empire we love."
I am sorry that there is no sympathy from the episcopal benches for that burning resentment expressed by the Bishop of Down. The reason of that doubtless is that right rev. Prelates do not realise as perfectly as does the Bishop of Down the enormities perpetrated by the Republican Army—perpetrated in defiance of all law, human and divine, and with atrocities which, as the noble Duke said yesterday, we had been accustomed to associate only With the wild tribes of the Indian-frontier.
We all crave for peace, but peace has never yet been, and never will be, obtained by the victory of crime. As Lord Carson said on Wednesday, the Unionist Party is dead, and it must now reappear under some other title. But the verdict of history will be that the Unionist Party died in the plenitude of its power, when it had a large majority in both Houses, because it failed to save the Union. For the reasons which I have tried to compress as much as possible, I strongly support the Amendment moved by the noble Duke, not one word of which is in my opinion capable of contradiction. All

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our protests may now be perfectly futile but. I earnestly hope that many members of your Lordships' House, which is about to be revolutionised itself, will wish to record by their votes the grave misgivings which most of them must feel.
LORD FARNHAM: My Lords, it was with very great regret that I heard from the Earl of Donoughmore last night, and from the Earl of Desart this morning, that they and the noble Earl, Lord Midleton, were going to vote for the Government to ratify the Treaty which is to betray their fellow loyalists in the south and west of Ireland. They gave as their reason for doing, so that there is a chance that it might produce peace. How long are we going to tread this path of surrender and betrayal, seeking a peace which we cannot find? must take this opportunity of protesting, on behalf of the large majority of the loyalists in the south and west, that although the noble Earl, Lord Nidleton, speaks, and rightly and justly so, with such great weight and force to your Lordships' House, he cannot claim to represent the views of the vast majority of the loyalists in the south and west of Ireland.
The noble Earl, Lord Midleton, resigned from the Irish Unionist Alliance after they had refused, by an overwhelming majority, to endorse his policy, which in their opinion meant the surrender of their cause, in the Irish Convention. The Irish Unionist Alliance is a properly constituted democratic body, and represents the rank and file of the loyalists in the twenty-six counties in the south of Ireland. It. is as their Chairman that I rise to-day to support the Amendment of the noble Duke, and it is on behalf of those loyalists throughout the twenty-six counties, who are being so shamefully betrayed and so utterly and hopelessly abandoned by the Government of the country to whom they had every right to look for protection, that I make this protest. Is it any wonder that we look with feelings of disgust on the atmosphere of joy which has been created by Government servants and by a subservient Press at the idea of the so-called peace which it is believed that the Government proposals will bring about.
I could not help recalling the utterance of a great Prime Minister of this country in another great crisis of our British history:—
"They are ringing their bells now; they will be wringing their hands soon."
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Many of your fellow-countrymen in Ireland have been wringing their hands in agony for a long time past, and are now in an agony of apprehension as to the nature of this peace, and as to what the creation of an Irish Free State is going to bring them. The noble Earl, Lord Donoughmore, last night found great fault with the speech delivered by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Carson, for he said it suggested that every one in the south of Ireland was an assassin. Every one in the south of Ireland is not an assassin, but they are governed by assassins, and it is to the government of those assassins that you are now trying to ham! the loyalists over.
How easy it is, or seems to be, to conjure up the smiling faces, depicted in all our Press, apparently delirious with joy at having signed away a portion of the British Empire to its sworn foes. But one looks in vain in the same Press for any trace of tears shed over the graves of those who have laid down their lives for their loyalty to their King and the Empire. Men who have been through the great war were sacrificed by an ungrateful country—no, I will not say country, but by an ungrateful Government—as victims to the explosive bullets of victorious gunmen, and they have been sacrificed in vain, for the cause for which they fought and died has been abandoned.
Reference has already been made to a letter written by a bereaved mother which was quoted by Lord Carson, and again by the noble Marquess, Lord Londonderry. I will not quote it again, but that letter was an exceedingly bitter cry. It was, however, only one of many. There are hundreds of others uttering the same bitter cry. But I have a special interest in this mother's cry. I knew that gallant officer. I knew him well. We were brothers in arms. His was the battalion that I relieved with mine the night before the great German attack on March 21. His was the last hand I shook before I was taken away into captivity in Germany. Now he and so many others lie dead and unavenged, and we who remain, who fought. for our King and Empire, for the cause of freedom and liberty—we are to be handed over to a Free State without any defence, without any protection except a verbal assurance from Mr. Arthur Griffith which, however well-intentioned, however honest and earnest it may be, is worth nothing unless he is able to maintain the power to give effect to it.

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Why have we been abandoned? Not because of the defeat of British arms. I say it is an insult to British arms even to suggest that they could not long ago have established their supremacy if they had not been interfered with. No, I say again, it is not on account of their defeat, but on account of the cowardice of the British Government. We hear a great deal said outside your Lordships' House, in the Press and elsewhere, about Ulster. Ulster has met with great sympathy. But it has speakers of its own. But we hear little or nothing about those outside Ulster who have been betrayed. It is a great joy, apparently, that the enemies of the Empire have condescended to take an Oath of Allegiance to a Free State instead of to their King, but we hear not one sigh for those hundreds of thousands who throughout have been loyal to their King and have now to take an Oath of Allegiance to a Free State and give up their Oath of Allegiance to their King. There is no thought or provision for their safety or welfare, or for the protection of their property which stands forfeit this day to the members of the Republican Army as a reward for their services in bringing the British Government to its knees.
I ask the Government, what is to be done for those loyalists who have lost their all, whose houses have been burned, homes wrecked, and their lives ruined? I ask for-an answer as to what is to be clone for them. What is going to be done in regard to the decrees of His Majesty's Courts for payment for those properties? Are those decrees going to be honoured, and are they going to be honoured in full? I say it is through the British Government—or through their absolute lapse of government—that these men's and women's homes have now been ruined, and it is up to the British Government to give them full recompense for everything that they have suffered.
Why are we discussing this cowardly betrayal at this moment? Is this House really going to assent to what I believe nearly every member must feel in his heart is one of the most painful and humiliating acts in our British history? And, if so, are you going to assent before, and not after, a General Election? Apparently, it is in the minds of the Government that should their capitulation not be accepted by the Dail Eireann (which up to now they would have us believe repre-
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sents the people in Ireland) the Sinn Feiners are going to be given another chance of completing our humiliation by an appeal to the electorate of that country. But what about the electors of your own country? Are they going to be given no voice and no say as to the cowardly betrayal that has been perpetrated in their name?
Are the Cabinet so sure of their own infallibility that they can settle after a twelve hours' sitting in the middle of the night what has baffled our statesmen for hundreds of years? Do they really think that a simple, if ungrammatical, formula for showing when an oath is not an oath is really going to represent for this country all the responsibility of governing a turbulent and hostile portion of the British Empire? We are told that the Free. State is to be modelled on the Canadian Dominion. If so, why not the Oath also? I can think of only one reason, and that is to make secession more easy. Without being asked the electors of this country are being pledged to trust in men who have dared every crime to bring about a desired end. But mark this, that has not yet been achieved, and now that the first delirious rush of joy is over at the news of an Irish peace, people are beginning to wonder what it all means.
The cold facts are beginning to crop up. The rebel party in Ireland is not united. The sentimental grievances of hundreds of years ago and the hatred of the British Empire are beginning to make themselves felt, and if the terms of this Treaty are accepted by the majority of the members of Dail Eireann it will only be by being able to persuade them that it will ultimately lead to the goal they have at heart, of an Irish Republic. We have evidence of this. First of all, there is the evidence of Mr. Art O'Brien, who represents Sinn Fein in this country, and he says that—
"The document which has been signed by our five compatriots, is but another milestone on the long road of struggle to Irish freedom. … The time for rejoicing and thanksgiving will come when Ireland again enters the circle of sovereign and independent nations."
We have also the evidence of Mr. Michael Collins himself in an interview with the Manchester Guardian. He said that the—
"invitation to the Irish representatives to consider how association with the nations of the British Commonwealth can best be reconciled with Irish national aspirations makes it necessary to consider how far the members of the group

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have attained to independent nationality and what further steps should be taken to declare and secure such a standard of independence. … It is essential that the present de facto position on should be recognised de jure."
We have also the evidence of the Workers' Republic, which is the organ representing the Irish Communist Party. It says—
"We stand with all our resources at the disposal of ally movement, whether at the moment led by capitalists, by bourgeois democrats or by labourites, which attempts to destroy or injure British Imperialism in Ireland or elsewhere."
Then, from America we have the exponents of the extreme party like Judge Cohalan and Mr. Lynch, who say that they denounce the term "Irish Free State" as an insult to those who died fighting for an Irish Republic.
But the most important evidence of all comes from the organ of Sinn Fein. It says:—
"The Oath is objectionable. It is the real crux. It is objectionable only because it implies association with the British Empire. In itself it is harmless, and as its primary allegiance is to the Irish Free State it is as weak an Oath as could be devised. But it was obvious from the beginning of the negotiations that the Oath of Allegiance, or association, would be the end of it; and this is an Oath of Association far more than it is an Oath of Allegiance. This Treaty will not settle the Irish question. Bier destiny is to be an independent nation, not a member associated or otherwise with any Empire. The Irish Republican Brotherhood, which has been the political sheet anchor of Ireland since Stephens founded it more than sixty years ago, will go on."
With this evidence before us what right have we to be deluded by the Government into thinking that this surrender, this cowardly betrayal, is going to bring peace to Ireland? How can this be called a settlement? How can this be expected to be a settlement when it contains the one principle which every one in Ireland has united in opposing, and no one more boldly or more earnestly than Lord Midleton—that is partition of Ireland. I do not for one moment believe that the Irish representatives who signed the Treaty would ever have accepted this unless there was some dark and ulterior motive behind it unless they were assured that in sonic way Ulster was to be coerced under their domination.
If that be so they have totally misjudged the spirit of the Ulster people. Any attempt to carry out such a scheme would inevitably lead not to peace but to civil war. The Ulster people would fight
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not in the dark, not behind hedges, not with the weapon of the assassin, but in the open. If it came to this i wonder where the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack would be found? Would he be found once more galloping over the plains of Ulster defying arrest? It would be a bold man who would, prophesy where he would be found, such an apt pupil of the Prime Minister has he become. Such an unrivalled acrobat has he become that his lightning gyrations and backward somersaults are so rapid that it is impossible even for a normal political eye to follow his movements in the air, and no one could foretell whether he would ultimately land on the stormy plains of Ulster, or on the Sinn Fein saddle as canterer to Michael Collins, or on the more comfortable and secure folds of the Woolsack, from which he so ably presides over your Lordships' House.
This settlement can bring no peace to Ireland or to this country. It is but a repetition of history—the desertion of Gordon at Khartoum and the betrayal of loyal British subjects after Majuba Hill—acts of cowardice, not by the people but by the Government of the day; acts which had to be rectified by the people, just as this will have to be rectified by the people. But at what a cost ! Before you allow history to repeat itself be sure you have the people behind you. We know in Ireland that behind political Sinn Fein stands the revolutionary party prepared to bide their time, in their own words, "to smash the British Empire to smithereens."
We have some light as to how Unionist leaders of the Coalition regard what they are doing. Sir Robert Horne, the other day, said he could not believe that Ireland would ever be better governed than it would have been under the Union, but they, had to take account of the circumstance that many people preferred to be badly governed by themselves to being well-governed by somebody else. If that is the policy of our leading statesmen then I say it is the end of the British Empire. Our Empire was built up, and it became great and famous, entirely because we have been able to govern people who could not govern themselves, and when we did govern them we received the gratitude of all the people for the blessings bestowed.
Now, according to the doctrine of a Conservative leader, we are to abandon the Empire. If India wants to govern itself

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badly, we must let it. If Egypt wants to govern itself badly, we must let it; and so on. I ask: Is it not time to call a halt to this mad policy, to give our people breathing space to consider what it means, and let them pronounce whether the Empire is to go on or no? I appeal on behalf of those loyalists in Ireland, those who are not in a position to leave the country as sonic are, those who have no other means but their professions or the lands they occupy, those who have suffered so much and are suffering so much for their loyalty, that before finally betraying them you will at least give them that chance which it is in your Lordships' power to give—namely, a final appeal to this country.
LORD MONTEAGLE OF BRANDON: My Lords, I had not intended to intrude in this debate, and I will not delay the House for more than two or three minutes, but there is one voice that has hardly been heard at all, and that is the voice of such as I pronounce myself to be, the Dominionist. I ventured some eighteen months ago, greatly daring, to introduce a Bill into your Lordships' House very much on the lines of the Agreement that is now under consideration. Having had my chance on that occasion of stating my case, I am not going to attempt to re-argue the matter now, and in following the noble Lord who has just spoken with such energy and conviction, I will only say that his speech will take a great deal of answering, and more time than I can venture to claim from your Lordships on this occasion. I will not, therefore, attempt to answer the arguments of the noble Lord.
I have only two or three propositions to put forward. I ventured to mention having introduced a Bill last year into your Lordships' House, but I need not say that I am not claiming any patent rights in the solution that is now being proposed. I am not putting forward any claim on my own behalf, and if I were making any claim it would rather be for my friend, Sir Horace Plunkett, who, I think it. must be admitted on all hands, has done great spade-work in the last two years in preparing and educating the public in the conditions of Dominion Home Rule. We have heard in the course of this debate many somewhat reluctant converts to the principles laid down in this Agreement, and I only want to call your Lordships' attention to the surely significant fact that while we have heard converts
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in this House, and seen converts outside, there has not been much allusion to the very remarkable conversions that have taken place on the other side of St. George's Channel.
Surely it is not without significance that a man with the record of Mr. Michael Collins—and I believe even the noble Lord who has just spoken and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Carson, would not question the sincerity and conviction of Mr. Michael Collins—should be a convert to this principle, and that he should be willing to take the Oath that has been laid down. A great deal has been said about that Oath and its terms. The noble Lord who has just spoken said that he could not help regarding it as an attempt to make secession more easy. I feel with the most intense conviction that the framers of the Oath on either side have had no such idea in their minds. I am perfectly certain that they had the intention of making secession less easy, and of preparing the way for what I believe may come—not perhaps in the course of a few years but at any rate, if this settlement is adopted, within the next generation—the growth of that desire for closer union with this country which it has always been my earnest desire to encourage and support.
LORD MORRIS: My Lords, at this late hour in the debate it is not easy to contribute any additional argument in favour of the Treaty that we have been considering. Those who have had the responsibility of conducting the debate in its favour, especially those on the Government side, have placed the matter fairly and convincingly before the House, and I am only anxious now to place on record a few words with which I shall, with your Lordships' permission, occupy the House for a few moments.
I have listened with very great care and attention to all that has been said in this debate. I have attended all the sittings, and I have afterwards very carefully studied the OFFICIAL REPORT. I have been able to hear nothing and see nothing that in any way alters my conviction that no better settlement of the Irish question could be made than the Treaty that has now been entered into, and I congratulate the Government and the leaders of the Government, particularly the PrimeMinister, the Lord Chancellor and Mr. Chamberlain, who have taken such risks, upon being strong enough to lead in this matter and

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not to content themselves with being led or with following. They have endeavoured to approximate to the idea of the great Burke, who laid down what the real principle of a legislator should be, not merely to follow at the heels of others but rather to educate. Too many legislators in our day forget that a part of their duty is to point out the way to those who have not had the opportunity of studying history and studying the evidence.
A man is not returned or appointed to Parliament as a mere member for this town or that town, or this Party or that, but as a representative in Parliament and a representative of the people, and he should not be afraid to tell the people the Way to arrive at correct conclusions. That is what the Government has done in this case, and speaking here to-day without any Party leanings whatever—because, after all, I may be regarded to some extent as an outsider, having lived all my life in a Dominion, and I cannot claim the intimate acquaintance with these matters as others who have preceded me in this debate—I say, however, as one who, while having lived here only for the last three or four years, has followed this Irish question for the last forty or fifty years, that no better arrangement, no better settlement, no surer road to permanent peace could be travelled than by the adoption of the Treaty that has now been entered into.
I support it for two reasons. I support it because it gives to Ireland Dominion Home Rule; it gives to Ireland what she has for years been looking for. Secondly, it in no ways derogates from the authority of the Crown or from the British connection. The speaker before the last told you that Ireland was given, under the Treaty, Dominion Home Rule. That is the Home Rule which is enjoyed by Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Newfoundland. Have the people that live in those Dominions shown themselves capable and qualified to govern themselves? It seems to me that some people prefer to be governed rather than to govern. Then the sooner we get, away from that idea the better. The sooner we allow every part of the Empire, every part of the Free States that constitute the Commonwealth of Nations known as the British Empire, to have entire control over their own affairs, the sooner shall we remove all the unfortunate grievances and trouble from which we now suffer.
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There was only one strong Party speech made against the Treaty, and it was made by Lord Carson. Of course one can sympathise with him, because he has been on the other side pretty well all his life, and although he has now been exalted to the Bench, naturally he cannot easily divest his mind of the convictions that years have formed. But I want to say one word in relation to his speech in the nature of criticism, and it is this. I am sorry he is not here, because I do not care to say anything about any one when he is absent, and I judge his speech by this one statement. He was referring to the beautiful way, in which he said this whole matter had been staged by the Government. He told you how each person had a newspaper allocated to him, an I then he went on to say—
"How beautifully it has all been managed ! The stage management is one of the most perfect things I ever recollect. The chorus in the papers, frantic telegrams to every Prime Minister to send back another telegram in order that we might have it published here."
There I join issue with him and I say that the statement is unworthy of any man who is a member of this House, because it is a gross reflection on every Prime Minister in our over seas Dominions. It is a reflection on Massey, on Hughes, on Smuts and Meighen, and on the Prime Minister of the smallest, and oldest of our Dominions; and I challenge him here to-day to name the men to whom these cables were sent.
I want to remind him that when we were told, four years ago in this very Chamber, that this country was at war with Germany, no prepaid message was needed to be sent to the Prime Ministers of the Dominions to induce them to come in and loyally respond to the call of the Mother Country. This may do for Old Bailey practice, but it is not good enough for the intelligence of this House, and if the facts stated in the speech of the noble and learned Lord—the historical aspects—are no more true than is this unfortunate reference to the Dominion Prime Ministers, I need say no more on the matter, beyond saving that it is not going to end here. The heads of the Dominions will resent it. The people who live in these free nations will resent it, and they will wonder how a man, Who has now left public life and is living in the serene and quiet atmosphere of the Judicial Bench, can feel called upon, as a British Judge, to reflect upon the character of the men who live across the seas in the Dominions.

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I may tell you that this is not the method pursued by such men as Smuts or Hughes or Massey or Meighen, or Squires. They do not respond to prepaid messages from any British Prime Minister, and if you want to break up the British Empire the way to do it is by such an illustration of bad taste. You will not do it by asking the King to assent to this Treaty or by asking Parliament to ratify it. If you want to smash up the British Empire let them know that this is the class of legislator that we have over here, who can go out of his way wantonly to insult his fellow subjects in the Dominions. I hope I have not unduly pressed this point, but I mention it to show that "from one you can learn all," and if every part of the noble and learned Lord's speech is as valuable as the passage I have quoted we can afford to lay it aside.
Too much attention has been paid to the immediate facts in relation to the Irish case. You have to go back hundreds of years, and no doubt the framers of this measure on behalf of the Government have followed this course. Reference was made by Lord Carson to what happened in the war. He described with great pathos how the Ulster soldiers and officers fought—and I recall it now with gratitude to them as well as the men who fought from the South—and he told us a pathetic story that when the Ulstermen were fighting in the trenches for this country the south were murdering our men in Dublin. That was more than answered by a speaker yesterday afternoon, and there is no necessity to go over that again. But I would remind him that there were others fighting in the trenches and maimed in the trenches and remained in the trenches. It is that kind of argument which has got us into the trouble which we are now in, and if this House forty years ago, when Gladstone brought in his limited, simple Home Rule Bill, had taken it up and risen to the occasion, we would have had none of the troubles that we have to-day. The chances are that the European war, which has had such terrible results, might never have taken place, because we would have been a united Empire, and we do not know now how far division in our ranks may have influenced the Kaiser and his associates.
I support this Address in its entirety. I would not do it—I would register a thousand votes against it—if I did not believe that this Treaty means justice—long
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deferred justice to Ireland and the best interests of the British Empire. All my life I have been working and fighting for the Empire, and so have all those who live in the Dominions, and to-day you have a chorus not only from the Dominions but from the whole world, in support of this Treaty. Why? Because there has been an international jury sitting, and the world has said: "You are right." The world has assessed this claim of Ireland long ago, and has made up its mind that Ireland has a just grievance, and the world now says to this country: "You have done what is right; you have been strong enough to do it." That is the most potent argument in favour of the Treaty. And I make bold to say that time will reveal in a thousand ways that we are taking no risks, that we are doing what is right and that Ireland will prove to be one of the most loyal portions of the Empire.
LORD SUMNER: My Lords, I understand it is for the convenience of Ministers' arrangements that this debate should continue, even although, owing to circumstances over which so many noble Lords have no control, it is necessary that the benches should be less fully occupied for the next half hour than anyone addressing the House from this box could have wished to be the case. And, as the last thing in the world that I should desire would be to put upon the Lord Chancellor, who will carry the burden of Atlas in closing this debate, any manner of inconvenience by suggesting that there should be a postponement of the time when his entry into the discussion will take place, I respectfully offer myself as a sacrifice to the luncheon half hour, which must be filled by somebody, and may as well be filled by an unimportant member of the House like myself.
It does not matter, for this reason. I do not suppose any of us imagines that in this debate the result will be affected by the reasoning or the denunciation that may fall from those who are opposed to the Motion of the noble Viscount, Lord Morley of Blackburn. This is a discussion in which, I feel, minds have been made up already, not upon debates that have taken place here, but upon disappointed hopes or inflamed anticipations, upon despair of doing any better in Ireland on the one side, and despair on the part of Ministers, on the other of carrying on the duties of Government in the way in which a few

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months ago they told us they ought to be carried on. But it is necessary to liberate one's own soul sometimes, and therefore. I will detain- — I cannot hope to entertain—your Lordships by endeavouring to explain the reasons why I, for one, feel bound to agree with the noble Duke (the Duke of Northumberland), and to vote against the Motion as it was proposed by the noble Viscount, Lord Morley.
May I just refer to the course which the debate has hitherto taken? It is a course to which we are not at all unaccustomed in this House. It is this. After the first two speeches and, passing over for the moment the noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, we have had one speech, and one speech only, from Ministers in defence of their policy. Now, as to the first two speeches, of course, they were extremely interesting, and we were glad to hear them, but they, were both of them swan-songs, and when those noble Lords had sung their Nune Dimittis, and had explained themselves by many references to a past that is now becoming distant, though some of us still remember the early Home Rule days, and by many explanations to us that Ireland was now going to get more than they had ever dreamt of, still less hoped for, they left the proposal, not unnaturally, to be defended by the noble Marquess who leads the House. Then the noble Marquess defended, I will not say the policy of it, but the change of policy of it, and I think it must have been the judgment of the very large audience who were so deeply impressed by the speech of my noble and learned friend, Lord Carson, that as far as statesmanship was concerned, the noble Marquess's argument at any rate was torn to rags and, as far as political credit is concerned, he and his colleagues were left bankrupt.
Then there followed a long series of most interesting addresses from every point of view, sometimes resulting in a declaration that the speaker was going to vote for the Motion, sometimes resulting in a declaration that the speaker was going to vote against it. They agreed in this remarkable characteristic, that the proposal filled them with uneasiness, with alarm, or with despair, and not one of them was prepared to say that he viewed it with unmingled satisfaction, or was prepared to build upon it any solid fabric of future confidence. I ought to make one exception—the speech
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of the noble Lord who preceded me, who, in resounding tones, made an onslaught upon my noble and learned friend which he can answer for himself if he thinks fit, but which, at any rate, as far as I could gather, gave us no sound reason for believing that, from the point of view of the great Dominions overseas, this proposal rests upon anything except a mirage of rosy hopes.
There is one thing that I have noticed during this debate, as I have noticed in so many. We get no assistance from the noble Lords who sit assiduously on that front bench opposite, who pay us the courtesy of attending to our speeches, who faithfully discharge their duty to remain in the House and supervise the management of its business, but who, as little on this occasion as oh many others, ever seem to venture to support by speeches the policy of the Administration to which they belong. What is the reason of this? We have had at different times during the debate not only the noble Earl who is present now (Lord Crawford) but the noble Viscount (Lord Peel) who a few moments ago was by his side, and others, each qualified to speak for His Majesty's Government; but although, one after another, noble Lords at this box or in their places rise to explain the shortcomings of this proposal, nobody rises to support it; all is left to the Lord Chancellor, whose numerous other avocations make it impossible for him to be always present, even to hear what the objections are. Can it be that they cannot trust themselves to defend the policy of His Majesty's Government in this matter, or can it bet hat their colleagues cannot trust them to do so?
Is it the case that nobody really does understand how this agreement came about except the Lord Chancellor? Is it that none but he can make a reply to the posers that have been put to him? Is it that none but he can safely be allowed to explain the delicate but nimble process by which the stern, unrelenting enforcement of the law, which was the policy of the Government a few months ago, was suddenly, almost with the rapidity of a pirouette, converted into a policy of appeasement which can find no satisfactory outcome except in an Agreement which has filled every speaker without exception, with amazement at the distance to which the Government, has felt it right to go? I wish to express my personal disappoint-

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ment not to have had the advantage of hearing the views, the arguments, and the convictions upon this subject from each and every one of the noble Lords who represent the Government on the front bench, and who, I am sure, could have added very greatly to our debates, though possibly they could not have added very much strength to the Government arguments.
This Agreement makes its appeal to us in a variety of ways. Many of the speeches, and very moving speeches, have come from those who in one part of Ireland or the other know, or believe they know, their own end of the island, and claim to have some information at any rate as to the views of the inhabitants of the other end. Irishmen do not often agree with one another in matters of policy, but I notice that they all agree in this—and I think the noble Earl, Lord Donoughmore, last night afforded the last instance in stating it—that when an Englishman begins to explain what he thinks about Ireland they all agree in saying: "Oh, but you do not understand Ireland." I wish to start by making a confession that I do not, and although I have watched Home Rule politics ever since Home Rule first was, and thought until last year that I never could have brought myself to vote for any Home Rule measure, I have always found that the task of satisfying Irish aspirations, of appeasing Irish animosities, and of reducing Irishmen to the humdrum paths of peace and order and contentment, with one another as well as with us, year after year, is one that has always passed man's understanding and, I think, exceeds human hopes.
Therefore, I do not propose to detain your Lordships with a discussion of the way in which this Agreement will operate, harshly in every case, upon those inhabitants of Ireland who do not stand behind the negotiators who attached, their signatures to it in a language which none of us understands. I am content to look at it from the point of view of an Englishman and a lawyer. Let those who are Party men judge whether the Government was justified or not in a sudden and complete reversal of its course. Even the noble Viscount, Lord Bryce, who would not hurt a fly, especially in this connection, was compelled to say that it was a rather sharp curve, and I noticed that, though he veiled it in a foreign tongue, the term he selected for it was voile face, which involves not
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even a curve but an absolute right about face—a right about face not, I am afraid, from mental conviction, but accepted at the hands of those who must be obeyed.
It is for politicians to decide what effect this example will have upon our public life in the future. Let us remember that for the next generation or more the leaders of either Party, in whatever form and under whatever name they survive, whether they are called Unionists or Liberals or not—the leaders of either Party will be found among those who now occupy positions, greater or less, in the present Coalition Government, and it will be said of every one of them that in the year 1921 they were parties to a political manœuvre, which no one will pretend has strengthened the confidence of the public in politicians and which, as far as they themselves are concerned, must always be an indication of the limited extent to which the uninstructed but observant public can repose its confidence in them.
Considering the matter, if I may, as a lawyer, there is nothing so repulsive to a person of my turn of thought as to reflect that avowed, undisguised, undoubted crimes, attended by many circumstances of savagery and horror, have been committed by men who are known, whose participation in them is known, and who would long since have gone to the gallows if witnesses had not been terrorised so that the evidence to convict them in the ordinary way could not be obtained, and to think that, owing to the circumstances in which His Majesty's Government found itself, there is to be no step taken to bring these men to justice.
To think that for many months, if not years, there has been this succession of crimes which nobody denies, which nobody really defends, and which are to go unavenged, while those who organised them and those who participated in them are to receive their rewards, great and small, and to think that those who took human life for the sake of 10 s. a day, that those who took human life on the promise of other people's acres, and those who arranged for the taking of human life in order that they might become Ministers in a Dominion or an independent State, are to receive not their deserts but their rewards and are now to be spoken of in terms at least of restraint and respect, is a thing that offends, believe me, the conscience of any lawyer. You may

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doubt whether a lawyer has a conscience, and I am not sure that there is not some ground, perhaps, for thinking so. But to anyone who looks, from the point of view of a lawyer, at the interest and the security of civilisation in the country that he loves, I say it is a most repulsive fact to which to have to reconcile himself.
The other point I would like to make is one that has been dwelt on by the noble Viscount who is sitting Speaker (Viscount Finlay). I would like to enlarge upon it for a brief moment; it is the constitutional point. Does anybody seriously contend that the way in which this matter has come about, and the way in which it has been presented to Parliament at last, is anything but a breach in every constitutional usage that we have known as long as we have read Parliamentary history? It is not so wide as a church door, but it will serve. I doubt very much whether the authority of the Legislature will recover the shock which this treatment undoubtedly inflicts upon it. Let me explain why. The relations of one part of Majesty's United Kingdom with another are not. whatever else they are, relations between a foreign State and this country. They are not relations between a self-governing Dominion and this country. Constitutionally, since 1800, Ireland has been as much an integral part of the United Kingdom until last year, as Wales or the Isle of Wight, and, therefore, those relations are not such as can be left to the Executive, to determine in conclave with foreign representatives and then to present to Parliament, either with a statement that this is what has been arranged or for the passing of the legislation required to give effect to it.
In calling this document a Treaty or, to be more strict, in calling it Articles of Agreement for a Treaty between Great Britain and Ireland, not merely is every constitutional usage violated—that may be a small thing—but a deliberate attempt has been made to convey, as far as the negotiators dared, that Ireland was what the Sinn Feiners have claimed that Ireland always has been, an independent and separate country which has never bowed the neck to any admitted and voluntary allegiance to the British Crown. Now one asks oneself: Why was this done? Why is this called a Treaty? Why is it negotiated as if it was a Treaty? I can conceive of two reasons and two only. One reason is that it was hoped that it would appease
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the negotiators, Mr. Griffith and Mr. Collins and the rest. The other is that it was foreseen that it would be a very convenient way of introducing it into the Legislature when it had to be introduced at long last, and would save the Government a world of trouble.
Every Home Rule Bill has been announced long beforehand—introduced as a Bill, discussed line by line, and week after week, in the House of Commons and in your Lordships' House, and, with whatever ultimate result, it has been hammered out in the ordinary way of legislation. Nobody questions for an instant that that is the regular way in which this matter should have been dealt with and to suggest that by the device of calling the ultimate instrument a Treaty you could relieve yourself from the obligation to consult Parliament at every step, and to take Parliament into the confidence of the Government at every turn, and to submit to the decision of Parliament every word, is a doctrine that I am satisfied can find no sound justification in any constitutional authority of any kind.
If this was done to appease the Sinn Fein negotiators were they really taken in or were they not? If the fact of negotiating articles of agreement for a Treaty, afterwards to be submitted, if you please, to Parliament for its approval, or, as your Lordships are asked by the Motion today, for "confirmation and ratification"—if that was done with the idea of persuading these emissaries that they were being recognised as an independent country, they are now, or they are going to be, sadly disappointed, and so are their followers behind them. Does that hold out very much hope of a loyal and single-hearted execution of the new form of government within the British Empire?
If, on the other hand, they were not being deceived or deceiving themselves, if they knew quite well that a Treaty was exactly what this instrument is not, and that their relation to the negotiators on the Ministerial side was not that of plenipotentiaries at all but of politicians who were endeavouring to arrange with the Government the terms of a Bill which the Government would thereafter undertake to introduce into Parliament—if they understood that, then what are we to think of men who cannot resist the temptation to playacting on a point of such a serious character as this?

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Again, we can see for ourselves that the greatest importance attached to the unity of Ireland and that partition—the policy which has been apparently repulsive to numbers of the noble Lords who have already spoken ever since it was first mentioned—was by all means to be avoided, in spite of the fact that only last year the Legislature had enacted partition. The result of that, as we find it on the face of the Agreement, is that, first of all, Ireland is to be united in the Irish Free State, and then again, without anything having been done upon that, may be disunited if Ulster decides, as she has announced that she will decide, not to come into the arrangement. Who is going to be satisfied on the Irish side with a mere piece of camouflage like that?
Again—I do not understand the Irish—we are told that there, is sonic mystical unity which they cannot bear to see violated, and that the partition of the six counties from the twenty-six is rending the seamless garment, and so forth. It may be so. They are a strange people. Far be it from me to deride their faiths, if they have those faiths, but can anybody suppose that serious politicians attach any importance whatever to that kind of thing when, on the whole face of the document, it is quite plain that Ireland is going to be separated, as it was by the Act of last year? And if they are disappointed when the truth dawns upon them, what guarantee have we that this policy will succeed? Or if it is their people who are the dupes and not the negotiators, what right have we to hive confidence in the successful administration of negotiators who are capable of thus endeavouring to disguise realities from those whom they represent?
The third thing is the Oath, as to which a good deal has been said that I will not take upon myself to repeat; but when you find, without precedent so far as I know, a dual obligation expressed in an Oath, one which gives first an allegiance to the Irish Free State, and another which does not say allegiance but only says faithfulness to His Majesty—and faithfulness to his Majesty not in virtue (If allegiance but only by a complicated phrase, which looks well on paper but bears as much or as little meaning in its three lines as your conscience likes to put upon it—what is to happen if a person who has taken this oath should think that, there was a conflict between the two
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parts of it? What is to happen if the people who take this Oath, having already sworn allegiance to the Irish Republic sonic time ago, discover that there is a conflict between the allegiance to the Irish Free State and faithfulness to His Majesty, "in virtue" and so forth? Can they be accused of violating their Oaths if they prefer the Irish Free State to the rest of the Empire?
And if that is not contemplated, why was this curious instrument concocted except, once more, for the purpose of—I will not say ensnaring the Irish plenipotentiaries for I think it is extremely likely it was His Majesty's Ministers who were ensnared—but of arriving at some common form of words which both parties might accept largely because it means so little, largely because it can be interpreted by either side in the way that suits its interest or its conscience when the time for decision comes It is upon this sort of instrument that we are asked to build a structure of confidence and hope. It is to this sort of instrument that Parliament is asked to give its wholehearted and complete acceptance.
So far as I recollect there has never been a General Election at which, upon the Home Rule issue being put straight to the constituencies of Great Britain, the constituencies of Great Britain gave a clear and definite majority in favour of Home Rule. In this case, with no mandate, with no consultation of the people beforehand; on the contrary, with a course of policy steadily pursued that negatives anything of the kind; by way of discussions with the representatives of a part of Ireland, the Government proposes to create, and in fact does create, a Home Rule system that would have staggered Mr. Gladstone, and far exceeds the hopes of Mr. Redmond or any other great Home Ruler. The Home Rule question is settled not directly by Parliament in Parliament, but at No. 10, Downing Street, by Ministers who then present a fait accompli to Parliament and say: "There it is, in the lump, take it or leave it; dishonour the pledge we have given in-your name, dishonour our signatures to this document and take the responsibility; or approve, ratify and confirm this, and then in February we will tell you what the details are." My Lords, you will come then to the task of working out the details fettered within the limits of this document.

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My noble and learned friend, Lord Buckmaster, said yesterday that all we are asked to do is to pass a Resolution and so it does not matter very much. Others have indicated the view that when this has been passed and when the Bill has been prepared there will be nothing for us to do but to pass it. "Ours not to reason why." We are just to pass it. There I think a middle course between the two. I agree that this is only a Resolution, and in February Parliament may resolve on something different. What would be said if we did?
It is true this instrument leaves a good deal to the imagination and still more to the draftsman, but within the permissible limits of its vagueness I suppose we shall be allowed to discuss and vote, and pass or not, the detailed clauses of the Bill. At the some time, where the prescriptions of this document are clear, can Parliament, having ratified a thing in December, honour ably reject it in February? I should think nut. At any rate, it does not occur to me that one would relish the task of inviting either House to take such a course. There is a great deal that is left to be settled by Parliament when the matter conies up. I should like to have had the opinion of the Lord Chancellor on my points, but it is my own fault that I did not seize the opportunity of conveying them to him at a moment when they would have received his attention. I offer them to those who take his place at the moment.
It is worth while bearing in mind Article 8 of the Agreement. Them is an expression used which is either deliberate and, therefore, a vicious ambiguity, or is a provision which will startle Ulster, if my reading of it is correct. It gays:
"If the Government of the Irish Free State establishes and maintains a military defence force, the establishments thereof shall not exceed in size such proportion of the military establish ments maintained in Great Britain as that which the population of Ireland bears to the population of Great Britain,"
You will notice that it is not the population of the twenty-six counties. It is not the population of Ireland minus the six counties. It is not the population of the Irish Free State. It is the population of Ireland, and I do not see what Ireland means except the whole of that country which is geographically united and called Ireland. Speaking as a matter of interpretation—it is not for me to dogmatise—I think it will be contended, and with a great deal of
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force, when the twenty-six counties conic to raise their Army that they will be entitled to such numbers as the total population of Ireland bears to the total population of Great Britain, and that they may count in for the purpose of their numbers the population of Ulster. They will have the control and the expense of maintaining the bloated forces which may be raised. That interpretation may be wrong. If it is wrong, it is because at the meeting in the "wee slim' hours," when this document was finally settled, the negotiators did not dare to be frank with each other or were in too great a hurry to think of it. If it is right, I think it is a point the Government should consider in Parliament. Whether Dail Eireann will stand it is a different matter.
Then there is Article 5 which says:
"The Irish Free State shall assume liability for the service of the Public Debt of the United. Kingdom as existing at the date hereof and towards the payment of war pensions as existing at that date in such proportion as may be fair and equitable, having regard to any just. claims on the part of Ireland by way of set or counterclaim, the amount of such sums twin, determined in default of agreement by the arbitration of one or more independent persons being citizens of the British Empire."
This must run into millions and millions. Who is to make the agreement? Is Parliament to have any word in the matter, or is this agreement to be arrived at between the negotiators from Dail Eireann and Members of the Ministry? And are they to come to an agreement without being obliged to come to Parliament at all because they can plead the authority of this document and the confirmation of the Legislature? Is it the intention that they should have authority to make this agreement? And who is to appoint the independent arbitrator? And how many are there to be? If you appoint enough arbitrators you may be able to forecast the result of the arbitration. Is Parliament to have a voice in it? And what is the meaning of "having regard to any just claims on the part of Ireland by way of set off or counterclaim"?
I know to what it is directed, though what it means I do not know. Set-off and counterclaim are legal terms and do not apply to cases where there is no debt, no damages, and no breach of contract. It. refers to the old grievance, raised in Ireland over and over again, that owing to the relations between the English and Irish Exchequers Ireland has been over-taxed,

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and they have contended, with enormous figures, that not only was far too much money taken out of their pockets but that it should be repaid by Great Britain, and repaid with interest running over two or three generations. If you have calculations like that arising before a sufficiently complaisant arbitrator I think "a fair and equitable contribution" towards liabilities for public services will vanish like snow in the sun. However fair the initial figure may be, if you have this liberal counterclaim it may be wiped out altogether and Ireland will slip from under the burden of the National Debt.
Are all these things to be dealt with in the Bill? In that case we are free to deal with them. Or is it intended they shall be kept in the hands of the Government? In that case I want to know what has become of the authority of the Legislature at all. I do not want to press constitutional forms unduly, but constitutional forms have grown up by tradition and practice, not for the mere purpose of bowing to the Chair when you come out of the House but for the protection of the liberty of Parliament., to secure its independence and freedom of discussion, and to secure that the Legislature shall have authority over the Executive and not the Executive authority over the Legislature. If you practically clear out the old constitutional forms and start upon a new course, the result will be that any matter may be arranged by the Government and presented to Parliament not in the form of a Bill but in the form of an omnibus Resolution to be taken or left, to be discussed as long as you like, but to be taken or left, upon penalty of tinning out the Government., and then to be carried out obediently, in so far as legislation is necessary, in a subsequent session.
In 1911, rightly or wrongly, the power of this House as a coordinate member of the Legislature was broken, and we have never recovered from it. Any one who had much wisdom, I should think, would have supposed that when the other branch of the Legislature had secured, as it appeared, almost supreme power, it, would never consent to resign it, but I do not think anybody foresaw the swift Nemesis that was going to overtake that other branch of the Legislature, so that now, within ten years, neither House in the Legislature has much power against the Executive of the day, supported by a unanimous and managed Press.
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When history comes to be written, the story from 1906 to 1921 will not be merely the story with which we have been familiar; it will be the story of the process by which, step by step and little by little, the Imperial Ministry, relying upon direct action, upon the Press, or upon skilful and adroit management, displaced the Legislature from its place and transferred it from the position of master into the position of a more or less humble servant. I therefore regard with great dread this invasion of what I look upon as important constitutional principles. I am quite prepared to suppose that if some faint echo of what I have said were to reach the Lord Chancellor before he comes to reply, the whole thing would be brushed aside as a chimera or as pedantry. Believe me, to those who have thought over this matter, not from the point of view of Ministers who desire a pliable and manageable instrument, but of those who think that the Parliament of the United Kingdom is and should remain the supreme authority in the State, I am quite sure that all these things will assume grave and serious proportions.
Time is getting on, and those who have a real claim to your Lordships' attention will soon be ready to make it. Therefore, I shall not attempt to carry my observations much further. It has been a most pathetic thing to listen to this discussion. The oracles are mute among the supporters of the Ministry, but the noble Lords from Ireland come each telling his own tale in terms of passion, passion which I think is more than pardonable, in terms of grief, grief which might have been deeper than it has actually been, saying: "For God's sake give us peace ! We are willing to work for peace. We have been through a terrible time. Give us peace !"
Last night Lord Donoughmore stood at this box and told us in moving terms of the charms of his home, from which he tears himself with so much reluctance to discharge his important duties in your Lordships' House—his home that is a long, long way from here in Tipperary—and he said, I think, "It is the home that I love; I think of my neighbours, I intend to live among them, and I hope to do my duty to them," and he made a moving appeal from that point of view. I hope it will be no impertinence if I say that he is what in the language of the United States is described as a supreme "sob-artist,"

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because I think these appeals to the beautiful homes of Southern Ireland are singularly beside the point. Of course the happy men who live in those happy spots naturally regard them with affection, as one does one's small, humble home in. London, but does anything in this discussion turn upon the tender associations of the green valleys of Southern Ireland?
Again, noble Lords from Ulster have dwelt with wrath and indignation upon violated pledges, and I do not wonder at their indignation, but it seems to me that we have to look forward and not back, and—it, is the one thing in which I was able to agree with the most rev. Primate yesterday—recrimination is of little use now. It is no good telling us that six months ago something might have been done, or saying, "If you had listened to us twelve months ago," or declaring that if something had happened in the past which did not happen, or if Mr. Gladstone had not happened to be in the particular position in which he was in 1886, or if the Maamtrasna debate had not been conducted in the way it was conducted in 1885, this negotiation would not have happened—none of these things matter now. The one thing that matters is—What is the chance of peace?
The United States have to be drawn upon for a vocabulary in which to express this important point. Who can deliver the goods At this very moment there is a keenly contested struggle going on in Dublin—or is it all play-acting over again? —to determine whether the people who signed this Agreement can deliver the goods, or whether they cannot, and we are expected to approve this instrument, which the other side is still engaged in discussing, or not even discussing it, because apparently they are discussing whether the negotiators who came over here did or did not exactly carry out the instructions that they received. That does not seem a very hopeful omen for their being able to deliver the goods.
What is the foundation for these parties being selected as the parties most likely to be able to do so? Their prowess with the revolver—is that it? I do not quite know what the Government's case is—but we are told by some that the Government could, if they would, use such force as would suppress this rebellion completely. We are told by others who may be quite right that there are no men, no money, and no backing with which to do it. Which are we to believe? I thought the Government had
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no case unless they began by establishing that they could not have pursued the alternative of repressing the outrages and restoring law and order by force, and therefore that there was nothing left for them but to settle, and to settle on any terms. At the same time other speakers contend that if only we made up our mind to do it, even Great Britain could assert her power sufficiently to restore order in the neighbour island. Whatever we believe, what is there upon which we can build any secure hope or foundation for believing that these men can bring us peace?
I do not think there is very much likelihood of Southern Ireland securing its independence. The only instance that I happen to be able to recall of an independent State existing in part of a entail island is the rather unattractive one of San Domingo, where there are two independent Republics in one comparatively small island. Nobody I think would suppose that that illustration presents any attractions to any other community. But what guarantee have we that these men will be able to maintain that orderly government which it is expected or hoped that we may get from them? I can only discover—for the Government has never taken us into its confidence—a slight amount of information from what has been said by Ministers themselves, and it appears to rest upon the sympathetic accord which was established between Mr. Arthur Griffith and time Prime Minister, and upon the very favourable impression Mr. Collins made upon the Lord Chancellor.
It is the duty of statesmen to be judges of character, and to penetrate the secrets of all hearts; it is the duty of statesmen to take risks and to measure their policy by what they anticipate to be the needs of the immediate future; but I must say that to rest our relations with Ireland upon the very favourable impression which Mr. Collins made upon the Lord Chancellor is singularly like building upon the sand. It seems to me to be hardly any wiser than to rest our military preparations in 1912 upon the very favourable impression which the German Emperor made upon Lord Haldane. I do not think it is statesmanship of which any Ministers should be proud, that they have been brought to such a pass that they had to meet persons, whom I will not further qualify, in private conclave—where nothing for weeks and weeks was committed to paper and signed,

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where we were not informed of anything whatever—and ultimately to come forward and say there is this document, and the good faith and signatures of these plenipotentiaries, if they were plenipotentiaries, is pledged to it., and upon that the future of Ireland and the British Empire is to rest.
This has been called by some speakers an experiment, and by others a gamble. It is a gamble, but it is not an experiment. An experiment, of course, very often fails, and we must be prepared for the failure of this. But if one experiment fails you can make another, and it is the whole object of experiment by trial and error to discover the right way to safety and success. There is no going back here. Do not let any noble Lord deceive himself into the idea that this is an experiment. It is the same interesting experiment—interesting in t he eyes of some people—which has been made in Soviet Russia. It is one of those experiments which destroys the work of the past and cannot be undone by the work of the future. Do you think that an Act of Parliament establishing a Dominion can be recalled, and that Dominion status once given can be cancelled, even by the Imperial Parliament which passed the measure? It cannot be done without provoking trio indignation of every other of our Dominions, who are justly proud of their Dominion status.
You can treat Home Rule Bills in that way. The great Home Rule Bill of 1914 has never been worked. The Home Rule Bill of last year has never been worked. It was with the utmost difficulty that Northern Ireland had services transferred to it late in this year, and if pressure or other causes were to induce Ulster to enter into this scheme, the Act of 1920 Would pass away. But this experiment cannot be undone. When once Dominion status is given it is given for good or for evil, and we have to see what use they will make of it. No one would be more delighted than I if the experiment were a success. Perhaps it may be so, but what is the good of prophesying on the part of us English who do not understand Ireland? Perhaps it may be, and then what a triumph for Ministers. That is the gamble aspect of it. But ought we to be asked to desert the comparatively safe and tried path of constitutional procedure, and to embark upon this new course, for the sake of a gamble, however brilliant, for the sake of the extrication of the
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Ministry from a difficulty, however profound, for the sake of the realisation of hopes, however rosy, which rest, I fear, upon nothing but the soft hearts and heads the reverse of hard, of those who entertain them.
I have been trained to look at evidence, to have a preference for what is in existence, and to think that the burden of proof must be borne by those who suggest any change. I have been trained to think that it is better to do the best we can with the evils we know and with the means at our disposal, rather than to embark upon novelties, especially when those novelties are irrevocable, and when we are playing with the lives and fortunes not merely of Irishmen, north and south, but of the people of Great Britain and of the whole British Empire. I believe, as other speakers have said, that this is a great danger to the British Empire, but I will not pursue the subject, because after all there may be no more war, or human nature may change, which is the least probable thing of all. It may be that our children may see the issue of this thing, and that it may not be, so bad as we fear, but speaking as One who has felt it his duty to make up his mind how he shall vote upon this Question, and who has felt it his duty to give the reasons for his vote, I say that I have felt., after much tribulation, that it is my duty not merely to oppose the Motion in the form in which it stands, but to support the Amendment of the noble Duke, the reasoning of which I believe to be irrefutable.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I would not trouble you this afternoon with a speech had it not been for the fact that I, as an Ulsterman. I cannot allow some remarks made by Lord Donoughmore to pass by without comment. Yesterday the noble Earl quoted my noble and learned friend, Lord Carson, as saying that the Oath of Allegiance meant nothing. I gather from the noble Earl's speech that he left it to be inferred that this Oath of Allegiance was the same Oath as every member of this House takes. We all know that the Oath of Allegiance to which my noble and learned friend, Lord Carson, referred was the Oath of Allegiance found in this Treaty. The noble Earl asked why it was that the Sinn Fein members in another place had refused to take the Oath of Allegiance in that House, and he very properly gave the

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reason that they refused to take it in another place because it does moan something.
I should like to draw the attention of the House to the fact that these same Sinn Few members who refuse to take the Oath of Allegiance over here for the reason that it means something, are perfectly willing to take the form of Oath prescribed in this Treaty for reason given to the House at the opening of this debate namely, that to them it means nothing. There is another significant thing about this Oath; I do not know that anyone in this debate has drawn attention to it. The words which would consecrate that allegiance, the binding words, which are "So help me God," are not found in this precious Oath. They are words of special significance to all Irishmen.
Mention has been made in this debate of the boycott, and I cannot help reminding the noble Earl, Lord Donoughmore, whom I regret not to see in his place, that for us in Ulster there is Lo difference between the United Kingdom and Ulster. The United Kingdom, so far as we are concerned, comprises, Ulster, and what touches us toneches her. We cannot agree with the noble Earl, who seems in his speeches to find the boycott more excusable because it has ceased to extend to English goods, and is now confined to goods from Ulster; from any point of view it is not less of a crime for that reason. Does he find a thief kiss criminal because he has only stolen the goods which belong to other persons, and not from the noble Earl himself?
What I felt perhaps more than anything else in the noble Earl's speech was his reference to Ulster and the war. He seemed to accuse us in Ulster of forgetting what the south and west of Ireland had done during the war. He left on my mind the impression that Ulstermen claimed that only they had served and died for the Empire. God forbid that any one of us should forget a single one of those Irishmen who fought and died for us. We in Ulster do not forget those who came from the south and west of Ireland; they were men as good and true as any men in the Empire. We honour every Irishman, from whatever part of Ireland he comes, who fought for the Empire; but, as we in Ireland at any rate know full well, the soldiers from the south and west of Ireland who fought for us came not from the ranks of Sinn Fein, and Sinn Fein unfortunately speaks for
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the south and west of Ireland. I should like to ask any noble Lord who comes from the south of Ireland Whether to-day any man who fought for the Empire dare whisper it down there, dare wear his ribbons and medals, dare speak of his service to the Empire if he is seeking employment. No; while we in Ulster remember with gratitude and pride all those Irishmen who fought for the Empire, Sinn Fein calls them traitors.
Much has been said in the speeches that I have listened to suggesting that this Treaty may be a means of bringing peace to Ireland. Every sane man throughout the length and breadth of Ireland desires peace—the peace that has been passionately longed for during more years than I like to recall. I am convinced that, unless the loyalists and the men of moderate views from the south and west of Ireland can make their voices heard in the near future there can be no hope. We are apt to forget, over here at any rate, that for the past year or more the voice of the men of moderate opinion in Ireland has been inarticulate; it has been rendered inarticulate by a gang of revolutionaries who, by employing methods of terrorism unparalleled in the history of my country, have stifled all opinion except their own.
If the loyalists and men of moderate opinion in the south and west of Ireland can form a Government and can maintain it against these extremists all nay yet be well. But if, on the other hand, this gang of revolutionaries is still,to hold the field and sway the destinies of the Irish Free State, peace for Ireland will be banished to a dim and far-distant future. This Treaty, in plain language, comes to this. It is a question of whether men of moderate views in the Irish Free State will prevail or the extremists. That is the big gamble that the Government have taken, and no one can say how that gamble is going to turn out.
It may seem a small matter but we do not know what flag the Irish Free State is going to fly. We certainly know that the Union Jack is not going to fly over it. The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack has been asked many questions in the course of this debate, and I should like to ask him if he can tell us what flag is going to fly over the Irish Free State. We in Ulster stand for the British Empire over there. To us it is a grand reality, in which we take a pride. We have borne its burdens

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ungrudgingly; we have stood shoulder to shoulder with You in your hour of peril. We have helped, along with the loyalists of the south and west of Ireland, to make the Empire, and I trust we are helping it now. The Treaty, though it may not coerce us in words, is endeavouring to coerce us in fact; that cannot be denied. We who of old helped to save the liberties of the British people on the Boyne now ask you not to force us out at the bidding of these terrorists, but to deal with us as fairly, as straightly, as honestly as all history proves we have dealt with you.
LORD AMPTHILL: My Lords, I understand that there is still a little time to fill up before the leaders are prepared to take part in the debate, and, if no one else wishes, I will do so. I think it may not be out of place that a few words should be said from the point of view of the ordinary Englishman, more particularly because this Irish question is far more a question for the British Empire than it is an Irish question. That is a point of view which is too often lost sight of. In your Lordships' House it is too much our custom, if I may say so with all respect, to leave so-called Irish debates to the Peers of Ireland—to leave the matter entirely to them. I have always thought, and I think so more than ever to-clay, that the ordinary Englishman ought to say what he thinks about these questions.
There is another reason why a few words from the point of the view of the man in the street, which is all that I pretend to be, should be spoken. This House at its best has always been a mirror of national opinion; not of national opinion in its transient moods or at times when gusts of passion have swayed the populace, but in its more considered and sober judgments. And this debate would not be a true reflection of public opinion as it exists to-day upon the question we are discussing unless something were said from the point of view of that large class of our fellow-citizens who can conveniently be denominated "the man in the street." I think I may say something from that point of view as it so happens that, in one way or another, I meet all classes and conditions of men.
What I want to say, and I think it is to the point, is that nowhere have I found any signs of that exuberant jubilation of which the noble Marquess the Leader of
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the House told us, which the newspaper Press has endeavoured to engineer and has incorrectly represented to the rest of the world as existing in tins country. The noble Marquess used language to this effect. He said that when the announcement of a settlement was made there was heartfelt rejoicing in every home. Unfortunately, I have not got his actual words before me and perhaps I may be corrected if I am not giving the effect of them, but he said that in every home there was rejoicing, and that in every church sonic grateful allusion was made to the subject. The noble Marquess has been most cruelly misinformed, so far as my knowledge goes, and if he really thinks that there was this general rejoicing he has been living in a fool's paradise.
This House has been a true reflection of national opinion in this matter, because no single speaker, unless it was the noble Lord who spoke from the cross-benches a short time ago in a very exuberant manner, has struck a note of jubilation, or of confidence, or of pride in the achievement of the Government. Almost every one who has spoken has said directly, or has given it clearly to be understood, that he is not thoroughly satisfied with this settlement. There are many who think that it is the only way out of a difficult situation. But I venture to say that there are no two opinions in this House that it is not the kind of thing we would like to have had if we could possibly have helped it. That is the view of the man in the street. One and all, so far as I have been able to judge, have very grave doubts as to whether this settlement is a settlement at all.
A very large number—and of this I can give your Lordships most positive assurance—feel a very real sense of shame and humiliation at the failure of the Government to govern and of British statesmanship to avoid a situation like that which has arisen. They think—they cannot help thinking, and as they think it they have a right to say it—that this is a surrender to those who have been denounced, and justly and truly denounced, as rebels to this country, and have been described not incorrectly as a murder gang. That is the kind of thing which does not appeal to most Englishmen and they do not think it right. There are very many of our fellow countrymen, and I count myself among them, who hold the view that some things are right and some things are wrong, and that to do wrong in order to gain an

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advantage is a thing that can never succeed or be counted to the credit or the advantage of this country.
What puzzles the man in the street and fills him with a sense of utter bewilderment is that those same statesmen who recently denounced the Sinn Feiners as rebels to this country, now call them men of honour. A great many people are certainly feeling a sense of relief on account of the assurances they have had that the chances of bloodshed and civil war are at an end. But there are a great many, possibly more, who are not at all convinced that that is the ease. On what is the notion based or founded that the settlement is going to bring us race? I understand that one of the principal justifications for entering into a parley with the rebels was the assumption that His Majesty the King's speech at Belfast Lad produced a new state of feeling and it disposition towards reconciliation in Ireland. The facts stare one in the face. His Majesty's speech was delivered on June 23, and in the eighteen days that followed there were more murders, cruel, callous, cold-blooded murders of constabulary and British soldiers than there had been before. The actual facts are that in that space of time there were 124 murders or attempted murders. That does not look as if there had been any change of feeling on which we cold count for future reconciliation.
We are told again and again, as though it was something axiomatic, some fundamental truth, having the force and effect of Holy Writ, that force is no remedy. I venture to disagree with that. In the whole history of the world, in every age, and in every nation the only remedy for rebellion has been force. You cannot give me one single instance of a rebellion which has been put down in any other way than by force, and those who say that if you apply force the trouble and the bitterness remain are totally unacquainted with the ordinary facts of history not only in our own country, but in every country in the world.
I share the opinion of those who hold, rightly or wrongly, that this has been a shameful and an unnecessary surrender, a betrayal of friends in order to propitiate those who are our enemies and who always will be our enemies. It is not only that, but a treasonable violation both of the rights of the Crown and of the rights and liberties of the people of this country and,
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as such, a fatal injury to the British Empire. Those are my opinions. I wish I had not got to hold them. It is unpleasant to have to express them in your Lordships' House, but that is what I feel, and my conscience will not enable me to say anything less.
The noble Marquess the Leader of the House has claimed that we have got peace with honour, and he suggested that we might have feelings of pride akin to those which were felt in Parliament and by, the citizens of this country when Lord Salisbury and Lord Beaconsfield returned from the Congress in Berlin. That was not a very appropriate analogy, and I ask your Lordships: Where is the peace; where is the honour? With the best will in the world, I can see no prospect of the one and no retrospect of the other, What are the facts? Instead of maintaining law and order, which is the first duty of every Government, we are turning Ireland into two hostile camps, into two armed rivals. What has been done in fact by all this parleying and negotiating? We have encouraged and enabled one side to organise themselves more effectively, and we are going to compel the others, who are not yet armed, to arm themselves in sell-defence. And with all that, we are going to withdraw the protection of the forces of the Crown. I do not see, in these circumstances, what reasonable grounds anyone bas for assuming that peace is established.
Again, what good has been done? What cause have we for satisfaction? Rebel Ireland is not satisfied; they say they are not satisfied. Loyal Ireland is dissatisfied; they have said so, and no one doubts it. The Coalition Press even have been unable to disguise or to misrepresent the fact that nobody in Ireland is satisfied. And is England satisfied? How can England be satisfied with that which is by general admission a surrender to violence, that which cannot possibly be described as anything other than a commencement of the disintegration of the Empire, that which undeniably is going to lose us friends, and that for which, on the top of all, we are going to have to pay a heavy tribute? I ask again: Who is satisfied? The only people who are satisfied, so far as I can see, are the enemies of England, the enemies within these isles and the enemies outside.
I am not forgetting that we have had congratulatory telegrams from the Dominions, but those are civilities which can be very reasonably compared to the

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civilities in ordinary private life among individuals. If you announce to your friends that you have arranged a marriage for your daughter they naturally write at once to congratulate you. They may not perhaps know that the man to whom she is unhappily engaged is a blackguard and a scoundrel. Perhaps you do not know it yourself. But it is the way of the world that whenever you have arranged something which is regarded as an occasion for congratulation, everybody naturally congratulates you.
There is one other point with which I want to deal. We are asked to let bygones be bygones, and to forgive and forget. I venture to assert that that is a doctrine which, though beautiful in itself, cannot be applied to treason, to murder, and to rebellion. It is not even in accordance with the Christian faith, and I say, with all respect for the most rev. Primate, that the essential of forgiveness in accordance with the Christian faith is that it should be preceded by repentance, and that where there is no true repentance there is no occasion whatever for forgiveness. After all, if you are going to apply this doctrine of turning the other cheek—mea culpa and peccavi and all that kind of thing—you would justify the condonation of any crime or any sin both in public and in private life. You will do that if the moment a thing is over you say: "That is a bygone; do not entertain any ill feeling about it." But it is not in human nature to do it. You cannot expect those who have suffered so cruelly from all this wanton wrecking and barbarity to forget or forgive.
You are asking Ulster to become Sinn Fein. Is it reasonable to ask it, or to expect it to do so? You who are Conservatives, I ask, even though there was no question of your being terrorised by the bomb and the revolver, would you consent to put yourselves for the rest of your lives under the domination of your political opponents, the Liberals? You, who are Liberals, I ask, would you agree to any arrangement which would perpetuate Conservative government? Yet you expect it here, because the only condition on which the settlement can succeed is that Ulster should become Sinn Fein. You expect the men of Ulster to submit to those who have not merely been political opponents in absolute disagreement with them, but who have treated them in a manner which no words can describe.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend who has just sat down for having limited his very interesting speech in order to meet to some extent my own convenience. It is a compliment which has been paid to me, and one which, I most submissively assure your Lordships, I do not deserve. I was anxious, however, to say a few words to your Lordships upon this very critical occasion before you go to a Division. I think that the Houses of Parliament have, if I may say so, some reason to complain of the precipitation with which the concluding phases of this difficult crisis have been hurried through by His Majesty's Government.
Somehow or other His Majesty's Government never seem to me to take Parliament really into their confidence. We always see an element of tactics, of management, a desire, if possible, to surprise Parliament into decisions from which, upon more careful consideration and with longer opportunity, they might shrink. These decisions of the Government have been taken very rapidly. When the noble and learned Viscount upon the Woolsack was speaking at Birmingham he evidently did not expect that your Lordships would be called together before Christmas in order to pronounce an opinion upon this issue of supreme importance. And even in the present debate the noble Marquess the Leader of the House, with unwonted diffidence, said that he was not in a position to explain and defend the Agreement in all its particulars. That was a function reserved for the noble and learned Viscount upon the Wolosack. The House, therefore, is put in this position that, with hardly any time for the consideration of the Agreement before it was adopted, we have been called upon to discuss for two and a half days the actual Agreement without having in our possession the full explanations which the Government and the Government alone are able to give. The noble Marquess himself is not in his place. I am informed that there is good reason for my noble friend's absence, and I apologise for having even commented upon it. I am satisfied that the noble and learned Viscount upon the 'Woolsack, who is a host in himself, is ready to inform your Lordships.
Speaking for myself, and I think speaking also for all your Lordships who had the privilege of hearing him, we were all much impressed in the course of this debate by

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the speech delivered by my noble friend, Lord Donoughmore. Lord Donoughmore has a great Parliamentary experience, a cool judgment, and a statesmanlike attitude in approaching subjects, which always command confidence, and, if I may make a confession, I will say that I am never quite comfortable when I do not agree with my noble friend. What did Lord Donoughmore tell us? He did not say he was satisfied with the Agreement, much less did he say he was satisfied with the policy of His Majesty's Government, but he said, in effect, that we must make the best of it; that there were elements in Ireland which gave lain encouragement; that we must do what we can, accept facts as we find them and try and work the Agreement and the new system which the Government ant inaugurating. But there was at the end of his speech one phrase which struck me. The noble Earl, in effect, said that we have no notion, no idea, of the actual severity of the reign of terror under which people have been living in Ireland. That, I believe, is perfectly true, but I could net help remembering that it was to the authors of this reign of terror that it is now proposed to hand over the destinies of Ireland.
I want to be quite frank with your Lordships. This is not an occasion for make-believe. If it were to the mass of the Irish people I do not pretend that I should be wholly satisfied, but it would be infinitely better than the proposal to hand Ireland over to those who control Ireland now and will continue to control Ireland. They are the authors of outrage, assassination, murder and rebellion, and to them it is proposed under this Agreement that the destinies of Ireland should be handed. That appeared to me a very serious admission by my noble friend.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: The noble Marquess will excuse me. He has stated my opinion quite correctly, but he does not pretend that I went so far as to differentiate in any way between the leaders, or that I am satisfied that Ireland should be handed over to the present leaders. I assume that the whole people of Ireland will be concerned with the working of this Agreement, and not the leaders only.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I hope my noble friend is correct, and it is
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in that spirit I want to address your Lordships to-day. I have been a staunch fighter for the Union, but I know that the cause of the Union is lost. We are defeated, and we must accept the fact. There is no statesmanship in struggling against accomplished facts. Home Rule has come to Ireland, and has come to stay. In so far as we must make the best of it my noble friend is perfectly right. We must do our best, in conjunction with the Government, in trying to produce from the present lamentable and deplorable state of things some kind of good government in Ireland. I do not want to go into recriminations of the past. I have done something in that line on previous occasions, but this is not the occasion for that. My only serious criticism of the speech of Lord Donoughmore, as it is of the speech of the most rev. Primate, is that front their speeches you would not have realised how deeply they disapprove of the policy of the Government which has led up to the present state of things, and which, I am certain, is the ease with both of them.
I come then at once to the issue before your Lordships. The issue is the Address moved by the noble Viscount and the Amendment to it moved by the noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland. The Amendment takes a double fount, and I ask your Lordships' special attention to this point. The Address proposes that your Lordships should agree to say that we are ready to confirm and ratify these Articles—tremendously strong language— that we are willing now, without seeing the Bill, without any full explanation of them, to confirm and ratify these Articles. I am not a great Parliamentary historian, but I should think it is almost unprecedented that such an issue should be submitted to the House. The Amendment proposes to do two things. In the first place it proposes to strike out those words which ask your Lordships to confirm and ratify these Articles, and in the second place to insert other words in their place condemning the tenor and contents of the Articles. They are two distinct things, and in my judgment the striking out of the words of ratification is much the more important of the two. That is the real issue before your Lordships.
Let us consider for a moment what it is we are asked to ratify. The conditions which have been laid down repeatedly in your Lordships' House and elsewhere,

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which the Government and all Parties consider essential to be determined, are five in number. There is the question of the Debt. Of that I say nothing. There is an arrangement for a sharing of the Debt in the Articles which is rather obscure. Then there is the question of Imperial security. All these questions were dealt with at a meeting which took place at Liverpool not long ago and at which a Cabinet Minister was present. He made a speech, which I will not quote, which dealt with all these topics, and upon the strength of it a great Resolution was passed by the assembly at Liverpool, and a very important decision reached. In the third place, it dealt with the safeguards of loyalists; in the fourth place, with the supremacy of the Crown; and lastly, with no compulsion of Ulster.
Consider the question of Imperial security. I shall be very brief; I do not want to dwell upon it because I do not believe it is possible under any system of Home Rule really to ensure full Imperial security. That is why I was a Unionist; I do not think it is possible to do it. Whatever conditions you made, it would always be possible for the Irish Government to violate them, and there does not appear to be any competent method of controlling them. It is one thing to be convinced that it is not possible absolutely to achieve Imperial security in respect of Ireland, but it is another thing to leave the door wide open to Imperial insecurity; and that is what the Articles do. It would be perfectly possible, as I understand—and, indeed, it is permitted under the Articles—for the Irish Free State not only to have troops but to have artillery of the most modern kind, to have the biggest guns which are made, to have submarines—there is a certain rather dubitative clause about imperial defence, but that appears to be only temporary—to have mines, to have poison gas, to have, in fact, all the modern appliances of warfare.
These are permitted under the Agreement which you are asked this evening to say that you are ready to ratify. Is it not quite clear that the only security in respect of this upon which you can rely, if the Agreement is to pass in its present form, is the good will of the new Irish Government? That, no doubt, is what the Government do rely upon. I do not imagine for a moment that the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack will
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question that. They rely upon a sort of union of hearts, according to the old phrase, which is to arise out of this Agreement.
Take the next case, the case of the loyalists. I do not want to labour the point, because I agree with my noble friend the Duke of Northumberland that under Home Rule, or under almost any form of it, it will be impossible to protect the loyalists. That is another reason why I was always a Unionist. Nevertheless, it does come as a shock to all of us that there is no provision in the Agreement protecting the loyalists. There is something about the protection of denominational religion, but nothing to protect the loyalists. Is not that an astonishing thing? Why was there not an Article inserted that the Irish Free State would engage that no man should be injured in person or property on account of his political opinions, past or present? Why was that not put in? It is part of the case of the Government that the Irish negotiators are honest men. We have that on the authority of the Leader of the House of Commons. Why did they not go to those honourable colleagues of theirs and ask them to bind themselves in this Agreement to protect the loyalists properly, and not to punish them in any way for their ancient loyalty? But not a word is said for the loyalists.
I think it was my noble friend Lord Farnham who, a little earlier to-day, made the point that there is no provision for the payment of compensation which is due to the persons who have been victims of the rebellion in Ireland. What is going to be done about that, about the people whose houses have been burned, whose property has been destroyed, and who have every right to compensation? Who is going to compensate them? Why should not these honourable negotiators have bound themselves to see that this compensation is paid? Why did not His Majesty's Government, who are particularly bound to have regard to them—because these people suffered in fighting for the Government; it was for their sake that they suffered; it was for their sake for those who sit there, for the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, and for the country whom they represent that they lost their property, that their houses were burned, that their cattle were destroyed—
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: And their sons murdered.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY:—and no provision whatever is made for them in the Articles of Agreement. Surely that is a shame. Surely we cannot think of that without a feeling of mortification, that we as Englishmen, represented by the Government—for they are our Government; it is the people of England who have put them there—have done nothing for these loyalists. They are Left absolutely in the lurch, so far as this Agreement is concerned. No doubt my noble friend Lord Midleton has got an assurance from a Mr. Griffith. I do not know what the loyalists would have Clone without Lord Midleton. This is the last thing that they can hang on to, but it is not the same as having it in the Agreement. That your Lordships should be asked to confirm and ratify an Agreement with such an injustice standing on the face of it is surely asking too much, even from a subservient-Parliament and from the House of Lords, whose very existence is threatened at the present moment.
I turn to the supremacy of the Crown. It is said that it is protected by an Oath of Allegiance. The Leader of the House, speaking the day before yesterday, said that these Irishmen will "own allegiance to the same King." Where does he find it in the Agreement? It is not in the Agreement. The Oath does not bind them in any sense to allegiance to the King. The allegiance in that Oath is to the Irish Free State. It is a most remarkable Oath. I do not know whether all of your Lordships beard the speech that was made by the noble and learned lord, Viscount Finlay, yesterday, in which he analysed the Oath, and showed that a good deal of it was unmeaning, and that of the rest of it the singular circumstance was that it differed absolutely from the Oath which is taken by the subjects of His Majesty in every other part of the Empire. I have a list here—I can assure your Lordships I am not going to read it—of the Oaths of Allegiance of the various Dominions—the Dominion of Canada, the Commonwealth of Australia, the Union of South Africa. In every one the words are repeated, and they are approximately the words which every one of your Lordships has repeated at this Table—
"…be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty."
Those words are not in the Irish Oath and the noble and learned Viscount yesterday asked why they were not in the Irish Oath.
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It is impossible to escape from the significance of that. We know that this 0matter was very much in doubt in the negotiations in Downing Street. There is very little we do know; very little has been allowed to leak out; the whole thing has been done behind the backs of the British public; but we know that the Oath of Allegiance was a difficulty, and that the Government actually agreed that it should be suspended. That is to say, they allowed the Irish negotiators to suspend their adherence to the Oath of Allegiance while the negotiations were going on.
There are two limbs to the Oath of Allegiance in the Articles. The first is that of true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of I he Irish Free State, and the second of faithfulness to the King. What I want to know is this. Supposing, at a critical juncture of imperial history, the Irish leaders should consider that those two branches of the Oath were in conflict—that could never arise in the case of us or of the Dominions, because we simply bear true allegiance to His. Majesty—but supposing the Irish leaders thought that the two were in conflict, which is to prevail? I do not think we can doubt which is to prevail.
I ask another question. What is to become of the Oath of Allegiance to the Irish Republic? Everyone of the members of Dail Eireann has taken an oath of allegiance to the Irish Republic. Is that to be repealed? Did the noble and learned Viscount and his colleagues, who negotiated on behalf of the Government, stipulate that it be solemnly clone away with? Here it is:—
"I…do solemnly swear that I do not or shall not yield voluntary support to any pretended Government authority or power outside Ireland, hostile or inimical thereto, and I do further swear to the best of my ability I will support and defend the Government of Dail Eireann against all enemies, foreign or domestic, and I will true allegiance to the same"—
and then, finally which is significantly absent from the Oath in the Articles, there is this—
"I take this obligation freely and without any mental reservation, or purpose of evasion."
It appears to be thought very important in Ireland that you should not only take an oath but swear that you do not mean to evade it. It is absent altogether from the Oath of Allegiance in the Articles.

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I want to know about this Oath of Allegiance. What do the Irish leaders think about it? We do not know. We wait day after day. We hear there are discussions going on in Dail Eireann, secret discussions like the discussions in Downing Street, and the British people, of course, are not told. Perhaps at this moment Mr. de Valera is putting to Mr. Collins this question: "What precisely do you understand is the force of the Oath of Allegiance?" What I want, to know is what will the answer of Mr. Collins be, and that of his negotiators. Are they going to say: "Of course, it is an Oath but we look upon our allegiance to Ireland as coming in front of our faithfulness to the King, and you may make yourselves quite easy about that." Some of your Lordships may think I am over-suspicious, but we are asked to ratify this Agreement without knowing. Why should we not know first? Why should your Lordships be hustled in a few days into pledging yourselves to ratify what you do not understand and have no means of understanding?
Surely that cannot be designed, because I know that there is a doubt as to what the exact effect of the vote we are going to take will have. People may say that Parliament may do what it likes when it has a Bill before it. Technically that is quite true, and those who vote against the Treaty to-night will be free, but those of your Lordships who vote in the majority, if it is to be a majority—I hope it will be a minority—do you not think that you will be called upon hereafter to make good that vote? People will say: "It is no good coming at this time of day to question the Oath of Allegiance. You have ratified it. It is true that you did not understand it, but you ratified it without understanding it." I am quite sure that that cannot be asked of your Lordships. Even the most moderate man in the House can hardly be asked to do such a thing as that.
Then I turn to Ulster. We have been taught a great many things about Ulster. It is no good, this new-found faith of the Government as to the facility with which Ulster can be merged in the rest of Ireland. All their old records are against them. I do not want to recriminate, but it was the Lord Chancellor himself who told us, last August, of the unbridgeable gulf which lies between the North-east of Ireland and the remainder of the Island. We heard a great speech about Ulster—I suppose one of the greatest speeches ever delivered within the
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walls of Parliament—by my noble and learned friend, Lord Carson. As he spoke, and as I looked upon the faces of the Government who were listening to him, I could not help being reminded of a famous scene in the "Merchant of Venice."
Your Lordships will remember that Shylock, who was a good hand at a hard bargain with those he had to deal with, although he was not a Welshman, thought that a certain lawyer who came to the Court was going to contend in his favour, and when the lawyer began he hailed him as his saviour. I do not know whether my noble and learned friend will allow me to compare him to that lawyer. He is not so young, and perhaps he will allow me to say that in the matter of sex he is not quite so fair, but in other respects the parallel is sufficient, and when the Second Reading of the Home Rule Bill was going through Parliament my noble and learned friend was hailed as the saviour of the Government. He was not then in your Lordships' House, but a breach of the Orders of the House was permitted, and the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack read a message from Sir Edward Carson, and appealed to his authority. He was in favour of the Bill, and the noble Marquess welcomed this quotation. Hare was the Leader of the Ulster Party in favour of the Home Rule Bill. A Daniel come to judgment ! said the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, in effect.
But then they had forgotten. My noble and learned friend had made certain conditions, and those conditions had been violated, and the assurances which, on his behalf, were made to the House of Lords and which induced your Lordships—largely induced you—to pass a Second Reading have turned out not to be well-founded.
LORD CARSON: False, every one of them.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Was there ever anything more dramatic than the speech of my noble and learned friend two nights ago? Those assurances, which he told us he got repeatedly from the Government, that the terms to Ulster were a permanent settlement, and upon the face of which assurances your Lordships' House passed the Home Rule Bill into law — and I dare say the other House of Parliament: I know nothing about them—within

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a year are torn up, and we are asked to violate the conditions upon which Ulster assented to the Bill, and upon which your Lordships assented to the Bill.
Please observe, I am not for the moment entering into the merits of the case as to whether those were reasonable conditions or not. For the moment I do not say anything about it; but if what my noble friend told your Lordships' House two nights ago be accurate, that there was a repeated pledge that the conditions given to Ulster were given as a permanent settlement—aad, of course, it is accurate—that your Lordships should be asked to-day to ratify without fort her consideration, an Agreement which violates that pledge—well, how can we be asked to do such a thing? I have no doubt the noble and learned Viscount when he rises to reply will say that the pledge has not been violated. I do not know how he will get over the Boundary Commission; I do not know how he possibly can. If it were just a gentle readjustment of frontiers, a few acres here and there, no doubt that would come within a reasonable elasticity of interpretation. But I am afraid I cannot read the Articles like that, nor can I read the noble and learned Viscount's speech at Birmingham like that.
And, apart from this question of boundaries, there is an obvious pressure upon Ulster on behalf of the Government to come into the all-Inland Parliament. There is military pressure, and fiscal pressure is indicated. At the meeting at Liverpool, when a large body of important Conservatives and Unionists were induced to support the Government resolution, my noble friend, Lord Derby, made the last and, in ninny ways, the most important speech of the afternoon. Lord Derby is not a member of the Government—I congratulate him on the fact—but he was supporting them on that occasion, and it was largely because of his speech that the resolution was agreed to. This is what he said:
"That is the feeling in which I would ask you to support the amendment."
The Amendment was the Government's Amendment:
"It contains three things which we all insist should be maintained—allegiance to the Crown, the safety of the Empire, and no compulsion—"
That is, compulsion of Ulster. Then he said:
"I agree that moral compulsion of Ulster is nearly as bad as any other."
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I do not think my noble friend Lord Derby is in his place this afternoon, but if he were here I am sure he would be the first to say that he would not countenance anything like moral compulsion of Ulster.
Yet we have it from my noble and learned friend, and it is indeed evident, that under the provisions of the Articles it will be possible for the Irish Free State to put tremendous fiscal pressure upon Ulster to join the all-Ireland Parliament. They will be able to use a prohibitive tariff against Ulster, for there will be a line of Custom houses across. What; reply can Ulster make? That is what my noble mid learned friend asks. What reply can she make to the threats of armed force? Why, they would have to rely upon the Government to defend them; nothing else. Is it really suggested, after the history of the -last few months, that His Majesty's Government—His Majesty's present Government, I mean—because if there were another Government (I wish there were) it; would be different—but is it really suggested that His Majesty's present Government would really use their fiscal and military power to protect Ulster? Why, it is unbelievable after the history of the last few months.
But let the Government make it certain. I will not say, let them assure us, for, though I do not want to be as all offensive, your Lordships will understand that, after what has passed, we cannot absolutely rely upon the assurances of the Government. I do not impugn their honour for a second, but circumstances are too strong, and we know that they cannot make good their assurances. But they could pledge Parliament, by Resolution of both Houses, that they would resist, with the full power of Great Britain, anything like military or fiscal aggression by the Irish Parliament. That would be something. None of these things is in the Agreement; we have received no such assurance; we have got no such protection. And yet—I again remind your Lordships—in spite of that you are asked to-day to say you are ready to ratify these provisions.
I have not always agreed with Ulster—I do not want to pretend that I always agree with her. But, surely, after you have advised His Majesty to go to Belfast in order to inaugurate the independence of Ulster from the rest of Ireland, when you consider that Ulster is the only certainly loyal Province in Ireland, surely

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to estrange Ulster is really the limit of political ineptitude. I cannot find words to describe how profound I think is the mismanagement which is estranging the loyalty of the only loyal part of Ireland as the result of your policy.
I come back to the Motion and the Amendment. As I reminded your Lordship at the beginning of my observations, two Questions are going to be put from the Woolsack. There is, first, the Question that the words pledging your Lordships now to ratify this Agreement shall be stuck out; and then there is the Motion inserting other words in their place. I am prepared to follow my noble friend the noble Duke in both those Divisions, if there be two divisions. But this is what I would say, and say with all solemnity to your Lordships. With every desire to find a way out of these difficulties in Ireland, with every conviction that the Union is gone and that we must accept Home Rule, it is not necessary to-day, before we know what this Agreement actually imports, and before-we have seen the terms of the Bill which will carry it into effect, that we should pledge ourselves. Therefore, if any noble Lord has any doubt as to words which the noble Duke proposes to insert, which he may very well have, he may say: "I do not want to agree to propositions condemning the Agreement," which would be a very reasonable frame of mind, though I do not myself adopt it; he may vote against the insertion of the proposed words, but do not let him vote against the striking out of the ratification.
That is what I want to impress upon your Lordships. I have listened to most of this debate, and I have hardly heard a single man who is enthusiastic for this Agreement, not excepting my noble friends the representatives of the Liberal Party. And the loyalists of the south—the noble Earls, Lord Midleton, Lord Desart and Lord Donoughmore—obviously hate the Agreement in itself, although they think that you must make the best of it. Then I beg your Lordships, and these are my last words, to reserve full liberty of action by striking out the words which pledge us to ratify this Treaty. Let us be content, as is the usual practice in your Lordships' House, to thank the King for His most gracious Speech, and let us leave it at that. Even if you do not follow the noble Duke by inserting the other words, you will at
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any rate have done this. By striking out the words of ratification you will be reserving to yourselves full liberty of action, liberty of action on the part of the ancient House of Lords to do its duty by the country and, if possible, to save Ireland.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT BIRKENHEAD): My Lords, my first task should be to apologise to your Lordships for having absented myself for more than an hour in the middle of the day from my place upon the Woolsack. I had understood it was the proposal of your Lordships to adjourn for the luncheon interval, and I, therefore, thought myself at liberty to keep an old-standing engagement. My apologies are particularly due to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Sumner, whose speech, for the reason indicated, I was so unfortunate as to miss.
This debate has been a very remarkable one. It has continued now for three days. It has ranged over the widest possible variety of subjects, and it has been contributed to by almost every section of opinion in this House. In the closing and powerful speech to which the House has just listened, the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, has recommended that a certain course should be adopted. That, of course, is the issue upon which the House is shortly to pronounce. Everyone will give his vote upon that issue according to his judgment and his conscience. But let there be no delusion as to what the Amendment means. The Amendment means that this House will have rejected, and finally rejected, the proposals to which the negotiators on but h sides have set their individual hands. The noble Lord, Lord Carson, on whose speech it will be necessary for me to say more hereafter, told us that we dare not consult the country upon these proposals. Is he quite sure that we dare not? It is sometimes unwise to utter these taunts too confidently, and the development of circumstances can easily put into a position of absurdity those who make them with so much assurance.
I said that many sections in this House had contributed to the debate. The noble Marquess, a moment ago, made himself the custodian and the trustee of the interests of the Southern Unionists. He spoke with eloquence of certain matters which are concerned with the very important topic of compensation. I am struck by this circumstance. Many Southern Unionists have taken part in this

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debate. Several Southern Unionists took part in the debate in another place, and I believe I am right in making this claim, that not a single Southern Unionist in another place and very few in this have opposed the settlement which is now offered for the consideration of Parlialiament They have to live in that country; it is their lives which are affected by the future conditions of Ireland, and they have depicted at recurrent periods in terrible and sombre language the conditions under which those lives have been lived in the last few years.
The noble Marquess says, with perfect truth, that this is not a settlement of which anyone has spoken with enthusiasm. Who is likely to speak of it with enthusiasm? Was there ever an occasion in which there came a clash between the ancient antagonisms of history, in which there was ranged on one side all the passions of one people and all the vehemence of religious differences, and equally ranged on the other the feelings and the memories of those who were contending with them—was there ever a settlement that was made in those conditions that elicited enthusiasm from one single quarter? Who is so foolish as to look through the imperfect and fallible document to which we have set our names, in the spirit of a man who expects to rise from it with uplifted enthusiasm. It is not in this way that the great instruments of history have ever been reached. And I say plainly there is much in that instrument which I would have arranged differently had I the power; there is much in that instrument which would have assumed an entirely different form of expression if my colleagues and I had been able to impress our views upon those with whom we negotiated.
But what do your Lordships imagine that we were doing for three months? Strange as it may seem, we were negotiating. When you negotiate you exchange opinions; you balance suggestions; you consider what is vital to the one party and you weigh it against that which seems to be vital to the other. It is by this process, the only possible process, that one discovers in the end whether that which emerges after all these processes is such as, upon balance and upon the whole, is the best that is attainable in the existing and evident difficulties, and that which we should recommend, as we do to-day, not without heart searching, not without anxiety, to Parliament.
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The noble Marquess, Lord Londonderry, in a speech which he made yesterday, and to which I listened with deep attention, spoke of utterances which I have made in the old days of this controversy. I listened to them with a very considerable degree of composure. It is unquestionably true that some of those quotations, which his industry had unearthed, were expressed in a livelier fashion than I should, in my present condition, unless I am in a condition of cerebral excitement, repeat. It may be that they owe something to the atmosphere in which they were uttered, but I say here perfectly plainly that I recede not by one iota from the position which I assumed throughout the whole of those old bitter controversies. I do not recall one act that I would undo here and now if I could, and I only recall one or two incautious expressions which I would have put in another way if I had recollected that when I was Lord Chancellor they would be quoted against me in this House.
Let the noble Marquess plainly understand that I entertain not the slightest grievance against hint. I do not particularly like the word "censured" which he used in the Senate of Northern Ireland in relation to some observations of mine which seem to me wholly unworthy of any censure at all, but I heard the speech of the noble Marquess yesterday, and I derived some encouragement from it. That he should address your Lordships in an attitude of hostility to this proposal is intelligible enough. Such an attitude was certain, having regard to the part played in history by his illustrious ancestors, and to the lessons which he breathed in childhood from his distinguished father and front his not less distinguished mother, both of whom were known to so many of us. But, in spite of that atmosphere the noble Marquess used expressions more than once which suggested to me that he had not wholly purged his mind of hope that this arrangement might work, and that he looked forward to a future in which, if it did work, Ulster could make that supreme contribution to the prosperity of Ireland as a whole, and to the fortunes of her countrymen in the South of Ireland, which she and site alone can make.
It is unquestionably true, and many speakers in this debate have pointed it out, that you cannot, within the formula of any document, supply effective safeguards. That is undoubtedly true, I made the

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point myself repeatedly in the old Home Rule debates. The noble Marquess who spoke last said that the cause of the Union is lost. If the cause of the Union be filially lost everyone who takes that view must in some degree or another admit himself to be a Home Ruler. Any man who admits himself to be Home Ruler is in the position, most candidly admitted by the noble Marquess, that there are no safeguards that you can put on paper which supply a complete security to the population in Northern Ireland.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I was speaking of Southern Ireland.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I distinctly understood the noble Marquess to contemplate the risk of a military invasion of Northern Ireland. I do not know why he should take exception to my observation. I am dealing with what he very plainly said. How does that matter stand? It is quite true that on paper you cannot afford security or protection to Northern Ireland. You cannot protect any community on paper. The noble Marquess says that he would not trust this Government to afford protection to Northern Ireland if she were invaded in military force by the Irish Free State. The noble Marquess is very free in his invective at the expense of the honour of a Government which contains probably the most distinguished member of his own family. I have listened in this House on many occasions when the noble Marquess freely indulged in reflections on the honour and respectability and general truthfulness of the Government.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I am sorry to interrupt the noble and learned Viscount. I expressly said that I did not reflect upon their honour, but that they found circumstances so strong that their assurances could not be relied upon, and that is historical.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The noble Marquess does not reflect upon our honour, but he has observed that we are frequently making pledges which we do not carry out, and therefore he will not attach the slightest importance to any pledge we give now. I am very much indebted to him for the distinction he has made. My answer to this apprehension on the part of the noble Marquess that this is not an obligation on the part of any Government, is that it is an absolute and necessary obligation im-
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posed by people of standing upon the whole people of England. Does the noble I Marquess really think, if there were an invasion by Southern Ireland of Northern Ireland after this instrument was entered into, that the people that staked everything for the protection of the territory of Belgium would allow this Government or any other Government to carry on if they did not undertake the obligation which had been imposed upon them? The obligation the noble Marquess himself recognises, and he knows perfectly well that he has no right to utter such a libel upon the integrity of the public spirit of the people of this country. I suppose it is not disputed that on grave matters the people of this country compel this, and would compel any other Government, to act in accordance with their wishes. Do not let us confuse things where confusion is neither possible nor right.
We had another contribution to our discussion, one which was made by the noble and learned lord, Lord Carson. I shall be forgiven for saying that it was a very remarkable performance. The noble and learned Lord has publicly repelled and proscribed me from a friendship which had many memories for me, and which I deeply value. The noble and learned Lord can do that—no one can prevent him—but he cannot deprive me of memories indissolubly bound up in the past, when we ran common risks and in speech and act I matched and was glad to match the risks that he ran.
In one sentence in Ids speech, and in a most wounding imputation upon my personal honour, he spoke of the supposed use which he thought I had made of this Ulster issue. It is an odd and paradoxical circumstance that when I listened to the speeches made in the course of this debate by Lord Buckmaster and other members of the Liberal Party, even to some extent by Lord Morley himself, and heard the credit which h some of these speakers assumed to themselves for their attitude on this Home Rule controversy, I began to feel myself (so true to type is our fallible human nature) drifting rapidly into the opposite camp. I will tell you the way my thoughts travelled. I said: Here are all these distinguished men praising themselves for their prescience and foresight, and saving that they, and they alone, had the wisdom twenty years ago to descry the only right road along which lay security

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in our dealings with Ireland. I must absolutely challenge that.
Their whole policy was one which made no special reservation at all of the case of Ulster, which provided not the slightest guarantee of any kind at all to Ulster for the maintenance even in the humblest details of her own affairs, and it was one which then and there, the day that Bill became law, would have forced the population of Northern Ireland into a Parliament sitting at Dublin. I formed the clear view the I the attempt violently to impose t hat policy upon the population of Northern Ireland would necessarily mean an immediate outbreak of civil war, and haying formed that view I justify myself, oven in my present position, for every irregularity I committed, for every advice I gave, and for all the steps I took. I stood side by side with Lord Carson at grave and critical moments, and neither he nor I knew what advice would be given to His Majesty's Government by those who were then the Law Officers of the Crown.
Is that position the same as the position to-day? I have dealt with the grotesque military risk which is suggested to the population of Northern Ireland, and when I am told that there is financial pressure, that this is that moral coercion of which Lord Derby, who is fortunate enough not to be a member of His Majesty's Government, promised should never be exercised, I ask that. there should be a little more precision of thought and precision of speech in relation to this matter. Is it a form of moral coercion that if Ulster elects to remain within the British Empire she should pay the same Income Tax that you and I pay? Is that a form of coercion?
I do not know what the Income Tax in the Irish Free State will be if this arrangement is ever ultimately agreed to by anyone. I cannot give your Lordships any information about that. I do not take the sanguine view of those who hold out the prospect that the Income Tax in the Irish Free State will be 2s. or 2s. 6d. in the £, but, whatever the Income Tax may prove to be, where is the grievance of the Ulster citizen. He has the opportunity, if he wishes, not necessarily now but in the future, to use it, in one year, in two years, in five years, if and when he becomes satisfied of the sobriety of the Government of the South. What is the grievance that until he has become so satisfied he has been given the
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one thing he has been asking for all these years, the one thing which was denied under the old arrangement, and the one thing I fought for?
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: There is no grievance amongst Ulster citizens on that score.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I hear that with the greatest possible pleasure, and it only shows how unfortunate is the self-elected champion of the North of Ireland, Lord Salisbury—
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The noble and learned Viscount is hardly ever accurate in his speeches. I did not mention Income Tax, or any taxation whatever except Customs. I spoke of a preferential barrier or preferential duty.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I know perfectly well what the noble Marquess said and it is perfectly true that he did not touch on the matter of the income Tax. He confined himself to the fiscal question, but the case has been made here and elsewhere, and it has been made one of the gravest articles in the indictment against the Government.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: In the Press.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: In this House, too, and in another place also, and we have it now explained by Lord Londonderry that there is no grievance. He has made it with the candour I should have expected front him, and we know now that no grievance upon this point is experienced by those who are representative leaders of Ulster. But where is the analogy in the circumstances of to-day as compared with the circumstances that existed when I made those speeches to which attention has been called? Lord Carson has spoken of treachery of members of the Government. He has spoken of their violation of their solemn obligations.
I could not help thinking as he spoke that he could not have considered very closely how far the noble Marquess the Leader of the House was a fitting recipient of those bitter taunts. The noble Marquess played no conspicuous part in the negotiations. He was engaged, as many of your Lordships know, for months in negotiations, not wholly dissimilar negotiations, with

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the representatives of Egypt, and each day claimed many hours from him in attending to these duties. He was informed, as every important colleague of the Government was informed, from time to time of the progress of the negotiations, and I do not, I think, exaggerate when I say that more than once the noble Marquess indicated anxiety as to certain specific Articles, an anxiety which those of us who had to discuss the Articles and ultimately to agree to them equally shared. The noble Marquess took no other part until he examined the document as a whole, as every Peer sitting in this House is responsible here and now to examine the document as a whole; and my noble friend anticipated the responsibility which every Peer in a few minutes will exercise and indicated that he was prepared under all the circumstances and in view of the alternative to give his support to these proposals.
Then the noble Marquess, at my special request, was good enough to undertake, with all the public burdens he has to discharge, to master these proposals in sufficient detail to enable him to explain them to the House, and he did so in a speech which I will venture to call a masterpiece of compression and which was certainly uttered without a note of discourtesy or of disrespect to any member of this House. And then at its close, the noble and learned Lord is to rise and is to say of a man whose whole life has been spent in the service of the State, who has been a distinguished Viceroy in India, who laboured as a colleague with the noble and learned Lord in the War Cabinet during some of the most critical years of its existence, who has struggled for the cause of this country for all these years against a burden, known to many of your Lordships, of ill-health—such a man is to be told by the noble and learned Lord, in his first contribution to the debates of this House, that he is a traitor, who is to be repelled from the friendship and acquaintance of decent people. These are will and foolish words.
It is worth while to recall what are the circumstances under which we throw ourselves into negotiations which those who have done me the honour to study my speeches in the last two years know were as distasteful to me as they would have been distasteful to the noble Marquess to undertake. The noble Marquess (Lord Salisbury) says that we are prevented by circumstances from carrying out our pledges. In the jaundiced view of the
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noble Marquess we are weak puppets, kicked about from one crisis to another, with instability of purpose and insecurity of conscience. We are not, indeed, supermen, Napoleons; we do not belong to the class to which the noble Marquess in that respect belongs. It is perfectly true that we have changed our minds more than once in the last three years, and, for all I know, we may, on these and other matters, change our minds again. We at any rate realise this—we who have handled the burden and responsibility of the last three years—that we live in a changed world. Our difficulties lie in attempting to convince the mediaevalists among us that the world has really undergone some very considerable modification in the last few years.
Does anybody suppose that if I, at this moment, could persuade the population of Ireland to continue the Union as that Union existed in the year 1905, I should be standing at the Woolsack to recommend these proposals, or to give my vote for them? Anybody who knows me knows that nothing would induce me to take t hat course if I considered myself, in all the circumstances that exist, a free agent. We are dealing with a moment in which alternatives, and alternatives only, count. We must do something. We cannot remain idle and apathetic. Either we or some better Government must take sonic positive action. No man makes any contribution at all to our debates who does not suggest what, in the alternative, we ought to do.
The noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, says that he, too, is a Home Ruler now, and shares our turpitude to that extent, but he does not indicate what particular form of Home Rule he intends to honour with his support, or what particular body of people he thinks he will succeed in persuading of the merits of his scheme. As for the speech of the noble and learned Lord, as a constructive effort of statecraft, it would have been immature upon the lips of a hysterical school-girl. As both the noble and learned Lord and the noble Marquess have not thought it necessary to make any single suggestion for dealing with the actualities of the situation—
LORD CARSON: Perhaps the noble and learned Viscount would allow me to say—since he says I made no contribution—that I accepted last year, at his suggestion and at the suggestion of his colleagues, the Bill of 1920.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: And under the Act of 1920, with the single exception of the Boundaries Commission, those for whom the noble and learned Lord stands will retain everything which that Bill gave.
LORD CARSON: That is not so.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: That is an issue. But even the noble and learned Lord I suppose will agree that we as a Government—in the same way as lie, if he formed a Government, and as Lord Salisbury, if he formed a Government—have to consider certain courses.
LORD CARSON: Certain corpses, not courses.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I did not hear tie interruption; it is not very usual—
LORD CARSON: All right.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: We have to consider alternative courses. What are those courses? There are two, and two only. Either we were to invite no conference, and were to attempt mare successfully to carry out our policy of coercion and repression, or we were to take the course which in fact we have adopted. The noble Duke, the Duke of Northumberland, has no doubt which course we ought to adopt. In the mind of the noble Duke every soldier is a super-min, every politician is either a rogue or a fool, and every working man is a Bolshevik, actual or potential. The noble Duke has been stalking England for the last six months—avoiding, indeed, some processes of labour by always delivering the same speech—and explaining now to a Committee in the House of Commons, now to an extremely unconvinced meeting of his own neighbours, now to another audience elsewhere, that the whole of England is about to take the earliest opportunity of turning Bolshevist and destroying our Government by the process of violent revolution.
While the noble Duke has been enriching our oratory by these alarming predictions, we have had some responsibility in this matter for the last three years. We held tile reins of power at the moment when even the police seemed to be breaking
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in our hands, and we are able to say now, after three years of office, after emerging from the crisis of the great coal strike, that the heart of this country is true and sound, and if the noble Duke will turn his mind and—even more important—will enlist in our service an extremely fruitful and even heated imagination for constructive purposes in Ireland, believe me, he will add to his own reputation and will make a more practical contribution to the national interests.
The noble Duke has a clear opinion as to what course we ought to pursue. We ought to have carried on the war. "If only we had not interfered with the soldiers!" That is one of the sentiments in the mouth of the noble Duke. Now, my Lords, I for three years, more than any other Minister, except that Minister who at the moment was Chief Secretary for Ireland, have had responsibility for Irish affairs. For three years I have replied, and I have found it no very agreeable task, in every debate which has taken place in this House on the subject of Ireland, and I say this advisedly, and you will accept it from me because you know I believe in dealing candidly with the House, that I never remember any one single occasion on, which any soldier, in office in Ireland has asked for a single thing which he has not been given at once. Every General in command has been told, and even told by because I have had some authority in these matters—I have belonged to the Cabinet Committees which dealt with them—that he had only to ask and he would receive. We have said, "We will give you everything you want," and I have never heard the ease of one single soldier who in public, or by private representation to a Minister, if he is still holding military rank, will complain of being denied anything by the Government.
What then had we in the alternative, to which the House commits itself if it accept the Amendment of the noble Duke? What had we to decide upon? I will tell your Lordships, and in doing so will answer a question put by Lord Londonderry. We reconsidered the whole military situation. I myself made a speech in this House in which I said plainly that in my judgment the kind of war in which we were at that moment engaged was not proceeding favourably to our cause, and a close examination of the position was made. I do not, at this moment, speak of the

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result in greater detail than this—that it was clear that if we were to carry on this struggle it would be necessary for us to make an appeal for voluntary recruits to the young men of this country, and it would be equally necessary for us to make an immense, or very large, demand upon Parliament, for credits, because this had emerged: that that war could not be carried on by the then existing methods. Quite new instruments were required upon an immensely larger scale, and there is not a single Peer living in and coining from the south of Ireland who did not know that, and who did not tell me that an effort upon an immensely increased scale was necessary if this was to be carried through.
Now I am asked by the representatives from Ulster: "Is it because you have not the courage and the heart to go on with this quarrel that you are surrendering?"; and Lord Dufferin said: "We would not mind so much if you told us plainly that it was because you were lacking in courage, and through cowardice, that you were giving up the struggle." I confess that I am not much impressed by this representation. Is it, indeed, to be said that this country at this moment of all other moments is suffering a military humiliation because we decide, on balance, that it is wiser to make this experiment in statecraft? Three years only have passed since we drove the mightiest military power in the world in flight from before our trenches, at a moment when our Armies were stiffening the Italian Army, sweeping the Turk from Palestine, and storming the Bulgarian heights. This country raised more millions in soldiers than there are men, women and children of all ages in Ireland. Are we then to be told that we cannot accept this Agreement because we are making ourselves parties to national change and national humiliation? Is not the truth that those who are great can afford to do great things in a great way?
I shall be asked, Are you so confident that this is a great thing? What really justifiable hope which reasonable men can accept can you bring? I try to be an honest man, and I say it plainly, that I do not tell your Lordships too confidently. I am hopeful, but I will not dogmatise about the hope, for I see too many elements in the situation, even now, that make for uncertainty. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Buckmaster, contributed, if he will
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allow me to say so, from a mind which is both generous and profound, a criticism which was shallow and ungenerous. He could not make an observation upon this matter without involving us in censure, because we had not undertaken these negotiations at an earlier period. I observed, while I was making these remarks, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Carson, making common cause with the noble and learned Lord who sits in front of him, and perhaps it interested me—
LORD CARSON: All I said was that I hoped the noble and learned Lord did not mind cheap gibes.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Yes, I heard it. The noble and learned Lord is a practised adept at this species of retort. I do not object, but it is interesting to see these two noble and learned Lords, who take such divergent views, making common cause.
Loan CARSON: So are von and the Sinn Feiners.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Would the noble and learned Lord desire me to give way to him? It is customary in this House for only one speaker to address the House at a time. To continue, one noble and learned Lord alleges that we are treacherous scoundrels for entering into negotiations at all, and the other is of opinion that we are incorrigible fools for not having undertaken them two years ago.
LORD BUCKMASTER: My complaint was that you did not do it in 1918, and I have heard nothing to explain it except that murder has taken place since.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The noble and learned Lord fixes his particular date in 1918. Any other noble Lord can, of course, take any other date. It is a perfectly safe process. Nobody can ever be certain of anything in these matters, except that there are in the minds of men moods and in the affairs of men moments. Is it then certain that we have the mood and the moment now? What is going on in Dublin now I cannot tell you. It may be that we have not even now taken the right moment. All I can say is that we must be taken to have made the best exercise of I judgment in our power.

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I am asked whether I hold out any confident hope to your Lordships that this arrangement will succeed, and I wish upon that matter to speak very cautiously. The Irish people are a very strange, wayward, incalculable people. Nobody can ever say confidently whether they will do this or whether they will do the other thing in an unexpected contingency, but of this I am sure, that for the first time, with due and, as I think, adequate protection of the legitimate interests of Ulster, we have given a population which is overwhelmingly homogeneous an opportunity of taking its place side by side with the other communities which compose the British Empire. Now, that is an immense moment in history. They are, as was said by Mr. Churchill yesterday in another place, an ancient people, they are a people who are as entitled as anybody else to have all the respect that can be paid to that part of the country which is homogeneous and which takes a pride in its nationhood and in its history.
We believe that there is a chance that this settlement whirls We propose Will satisfy that sentiment in the minds of the overwhelming majority of the citizens of Southern Ireland. If it does, what will happen If it does, we shall see year by year the disappearance of those animosities which have poisoned our national life and weakened our national effort for several hundreds of years; if it does we shall see realised a state of things which Lord Carson himself once described in words which stirred deep emotions in the House of Commons—
"If the South and West would come forward to-day to me—or if there was anybody here who could say it for them—and say: 'You and I are members of the same country (I will not say nation, for Ireland never was a nation) and we each love our country; let us each do our best, starting in good temper, to govern in these Parliaments the district:, which are entrusted to them,' I would grasp his hand firmly, and I would say with all my heart: I accept it as a settlement and, what is more, as I have said before, I would look forward to a very short time elapsing before under these conditions, we would be more likely to unite in one Parliament.'"
I do not know whether the arrangement we propose now, and to which we have set our names, and for which we accept responsibility, and which, if it receives the support of Ireland, we shall submit to the last test which it is in our power to apply, if any development, should make such a course proper or necessary—I do not know whether that scheme will, or will not,
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produce a tone and temper which will make it certain that. Ulster—which after all is inhabited by very sensible and very patriotic people—will say: "There is a Parliament in the South which we can cooperate with"; but I will give, very shortly, some reasons which have led me to the conclusion that that hope, though not certain, is not wildly extravagant.
Now, let me say here and now, at the expense of incurring the censures of the noble and learned Lord and others, that I have formed a clear view as to the intentions and dispositions of the men with whom for so long we negotiated. I ask nobody else to accept that view from me; one must form these impressions for oneself; one may be right or one may be wrong. But when we are told that we ought not to hate gone into a Conference at all, one very remarkable circumstance emerges. Who set us the example of discussion with these men? It was the insight and the statesmanship of Sir James Craig which first realised that no lasting peace could come about in Ireland unless there was discussion between himself and the representatives of Southern Ireland, and he went, long before we had our Conference, and had a conversation with Mr. de Valera in Dublin.
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: I think I ought to draw attention to this, that the invitation came from Mr. de Valera, and not from Sir James Craig, as the noble and learned Lord seems to imply.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: To be perfectly honest, I thought it did come from Sir James Craig, but it was equally creditable to lain in either case. He realised that this old, bloody, unhappy quarrel cannot be carried on indefinitely, that some time or other there must come peace; and of those who criticise us most bitterly to-day I would ask this plain question—Is your alternative any other than this, that we shall now resume the war, that we shall take and break this people, as we can with our military strength take and break them? And, when we have done that, how shall we be any better off? Shall we be any nearer a settlement than when Lord Salisbury, if he becomes Prime Minister to-morrow, has raised the Army, has carried fire and sword into every village in Ireland, and has finally brought back a new laurel to add to

211
the military standards of the great war? When all that has been achieved shall we be any nearer an Irish settlement? There is no one listening to me now who does not know that at the conclusion of that war, with memories a thousand times more bitterly inflamed, you would then—Lord Salisbury would have to do then, what we have done now—have to enter into negotiations with these people, to define the conditions under which they and we will live our lives in these islands.
Let us give this vote, not indeed in a spirit of light and easy optimism, but nevertheless let us be bold to give it in a spirit of high hope. I am, indeed, expectant that, in one form or another, the sanction of the people of Ireland will be given to this proposal by an overwhelming majority, and that they, too, will share in the sentiments of the civilised world which the noble and learned Lord thought proper in this connection to disparage and to decry. I was particularly shocked by an observation which the noble and learned Lord made, suggesting that the telegrams of congratulation from the Prime Ministers of the self-governing Dominions had been elicited by suggestions from persons on this side, in order to stage-manage the atmosphere. The noble and learned Lord has held high office, but I will nevertheless make bold to tell him before this House that that is not the manner in which the relations are regulated between the self-governing Dominions and Ministers in this country; and I will place at the disposal of the noble and learned Lord, if he cares to satisfy himself how baseless the suggestion was, every communication that has passed since the negotiations began between each of the Prime Ministers of the self-governing Dominions and his Majesty's Ministers.
No, the expression of opinion from the Empire, in its general and spontaneous character, has exceeded any movement which we in our day have witnessed since the outbreak of war. I suppose it was suggested from No. 10, Downing Street that the Australian Parliament should stand and sing "God save the King," after the news was conveyed to them that the settlement had been reached? It is not only in the Dominions: in every country in the world in which these old islands of ours have got friends this settlement has been hailed with acclamation and with enthusiasm.
And I would invite your Lordships to vote to-night with a deep sense of responsi-
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bility—not confidently, but still hoping that we shall see in the future an Ireland which will at last, after centuries, be reconciled with this country; an Ireland to which both the contrasted systems will make each its own splendid and individual contributions; and an Ireland which will sit when the Dominions meet at 10, Downing Street to decide, according to the evolutionary organisation of the British Empire, the supreme issues of policy which affect the fortunes of that Empire; and the Prime Minister of Ireland, an equal by the side of equals, will lift up his voice to support and give expression to the historic destinies and the rightful influence of that unhappy country.
THE EARL OF MIDLETON: Might I ask the noble and learned Lord to be good enough to answer a vital question which I put yesterday, before we go to a Division? In what form will this Agreement be submitted to Parliament? Will it be submitted to Parliament in a form in which we can move Amendments to the new Constitution, or will it be submitted simply in the form of a question on which we are to say Aye or No? That is my first question. And, if I may trouble the noble and learned Viscount with a second, to whom will the Government which is to be set up in Ireland, if we pass this Agreement and if it is ratified in Dublin, be responsible—to this Government or to the Viceroy?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I should perhaps have said, but I had much else to say, that I have been asked, I think it is, 37 Questions by different noble Lords in the course of the debate, and the whole of my speech would naturally have been devoted to answering those Questions had I undertaken the task. I intended to say, but I forgot it, that if any noble Lord who desires a more precise answer than the general lines of my speech afford to any question, would be good enough to write me I would gladly make him the best answer that was in my power and, of course, in a form which he would be entitled to treat as being as public and authoritative as anything I have said in this House.
As to the noble Earl's first question, the developments will, as I understand it, be as follows. There are, of course, many details in these Articles of Agreement which will require, conformably with their general content and scope, to be supplemented. The noble Earl is as well aware

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as I am that they do not even pretend to be the whole of the necessary details, and the process, as I assume it, will be this. If and when the representatives of Dail Eireann approve of these Articles of Agreement it will be necessary that there shall be meetings in order to deal with matters which are supplementary and must necessarily be added in order to make the document a complete one. These will be agreed upon after discussion between the negotiators, I most sincerely hope and have every reason to believe, and when that part of the subject is reached which concerns the noble Earl he and his colleagues will be most closely consulted. When that is agreed, that which has been so agreed will, of course, be presented to Parliament in the form of an agreed Treaty for the assent or dissent of Parliament. Not that you can invite Amendments to that which is so agreed. How could you? Would you permit Amendments in the Dail in the Committee stage? We must reach a conclusion; we must recommend it, and if we can justify it Parliament will accept it; if we cannot justify it Parliament may not accept it.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Are we to understand, then, that the only liberty left to Parliament will be to assent to or reject the arrangement in tolo without the possibility of Amendment?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The noble Marquess will understand nothing of the kind. That would be the advice which we shall undoubtedly give to Parliament, and when flat advice is considered and pronounced upon by Parliament the arguments in favour of that advice and those against it will be stated. Parliament, of course, can do anything. Parliament can accept the noble Duke's Amendment now. Parliament can accept an Amendment from the Earl of Midleton at a later stage. We have no power to sterilise Parliament.
With reference to the second Question pub by the noble Earl, I had intended to look into the matter last night but I have been very much engaged, and if he will allow me to discuss it with the Attorney-General, as it is a grave matter, I will send him an answer.
THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND: My Lords, as the mover of the Amendment, I should not have said anything at this stage but for one or two observations which were made by the noble and learned
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Viscount on the Woolsack. In any case I shall not keep your Lordships more than two or three minutes. I would only point out that of the five subjects mentioned by the noble Marquess Lord Salisbury—which were Finance, Imperial Defence, the Oath of Allegiance, the position of the Southern loyalists, and Ulster—the noble and learned Viscount has only mentioned one, Ulster. He has argued that there is going to be no coercion of Ulster. But as he said in his historic speech at Birmingham the other day that he did not see how Ulster could permanently stand out of this arrangement, it is very evident that Ulster will be put in sick a position that she will have to come in whether she likes it or not. What the exact process may be does not very much matter.
He has called those of us who hold these opinions mediæval, but I would remind him that he was a mediævalist only five months ago. I would further remind him that, after all, we are only following the advice he gave on the very same day as that on which His Majesty made his speech in Belfast, when the noble and learned Viscount said that the Government had gone to the furthest limits of concession and could not go an inch further, and that unless the Sinn Fein leaders were willing to come into the scheme which the Government presented to them, the Government would know how to employ the necessary measures in order to suppress them. I must say I do not think that the noble and learned Viscount is the person who should come down to the House and reproach us now.
He also called us "armchair critics." Perhaps we are; there may be something in that criticism. It. is perfectly possible that had we been placed in the position in which the noble and learned Viscount and the Government were placed we might have acted as they have done; we might have been as weak as I think they have been. But there is one thing we should not have done. If we had told this House that we would adopt a certain course, and had then made up our minds that we could not adopt that course, had thrown over the House and adopted a totally different course only twenty-four hours afterwards, we should not have come down to this House five months later and reproached and taunted those whose only fault it was that they had not been able to discard their principles with the alacrity with which we had discarded ours.

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The noble and learned Viscount has told us that we have offered no constructive policy. That is to some extent true. I am not concerned with a constructive policy. What I am concerned with is whether this House does or does not perform its duty. I have only asked myself two questions. One is, has the Government any moral or constitutional right—constitutional, I mean, save in the most technical sense—to ask this House to ratify this Agreement? Has it any moral
or constitutional right to pass this settlement at all, and if the answer is "No," then I say that this House has no moral right to do it. Why should we go down to history with this betrayal on our conscience? Why cannot we leave the issue in the hands of the people of this country?
On Question, whether the words proposed to be left out shall stand part of the Address?—
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 166; Not-Contents, 47.

CONTENTS

Birkenhead, V. (L. Chanceller.)

Falmouth, V.

Inchiquin, L.

FitzAlan of Derwent, V.

Inverforth, L.

Devonshire, D.

Gladstone, V.

Islington, L.

Marlborough, D.

Goschen, V.

Kenmare, L. (E. Kenmare)

Portland, D.

Haldane, V.

Kenry, L. (K. Dunraten and Mount-Earl.)

Sutherland, D.

Hampden, V.

Hood, V.

Kenyon, L.

Aberdeen and Temair, M.

Hutchinson, V. (E. Dommghmore.)

Kilmarnock, L. (E. Erroll)

Bath, M.

Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)

Bute, M.

Peel, V.

Knaresborough, L.

Cambridge, M.

Pirrie, V.

Leigh, L.

Crewe, M.

St. Davids, V.

Loch, L.

Curzon of Kodleston, M.

Ullswater, V.

MacDonnell, L.

Exeter, M.

Marchamley, L.

Lincolnshire, M. (L. Great Chamberlain.)

London, L. Bp.

Marshall of Chipstead, L.

Meldrum, L. (M. Huntly.)

Aberconway, L.

Merthyr, L.

Ancaster, E.

Abinger, L.

Monteagle, L. (M. Sligo.)

Bandon, E,

Ailwyn, L.

Monteagle of Brandon, L.

Beatty, E.

Ashton of Hyde, L.

Morris, L.

Bradford, E.

Askwith, L.

Muir Mackenzie, L.

Buxton, E.

Avebury, L.

Nunburnholme, L.

Chesterfield, E.

Beaverbrook, L.

Oranmore and Browne, L.

Chichester, E.

Boston, L.

Pentland, L.

Clarendon, E.

Buekmaster, L.

Playfair, L.

Denbigh, E.

Cable, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Ressborough.)

Drogheda, E.

Carmichael, L.

Dundonald, E.

Castlemaine, L.

Rathcreedan, L.

Eldon, E,

Chalmers, L.

Ravensworth, L.

Granville, E.

Charnwood, L.

Revelstokc, L.

Hardwicke, E.

Clinton, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Kimberley, E.

Clwyd, L.

Romilly, L.

Lucan, E.

Cochrane of Cults, L.

Rotherham, L.

Lytton, E.

Colebrooke, L.

Rowallan, L.

Macclesfield, E.

Coleridge, L.

Russell of Liverpool, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Cottesloe, L.

St. Audries, L.

Midleton, E.

Crawshaw, L.

St. John of Bletso, L.

Morley, E.

D'Abernon, L.

Sanderson, L.

Nelson, E.

Dawson of Penn, L.

Save and Sele, L.

Onslow, K.

de Mauley, L.

Shandon, L.

Pembroke and Montgomery, E.

Dalziel of Kirkealdy, L.

Shaw, L.

Plymouth, E.

Denman, L.

Shute, L. (V. Barrington.)

Portsmouth, E.

Desart, (E. Desart.)

Somerleyton, L. [Teller.]

Sandwich, E.

Dewar, L.

Southwark, L.

Scarbrough, E.

Dunedin, L.

Stanmore, L.[Teller.]

Shaftesbury, E.

Dunmore, L. (E. Dunmore.)

Stewart of Garlies, L. (E. Galloway.)

Strange, E. (D. Atholl.)

Ernle, L.

Wharncliffe, E.

Faringdon, L.

Stratheden, L.

Wicklow, E.

Farrer, L.

Stuart of Wortley, L.

Fingall, L. (E. Fingall.)

Sudeley, L.

Farquhar, V. (L. Steward.)

Forteviot, L.

Teynham, L.

Allendale, V.

Glenarthur, L.

Treowen, L.

Bryce, V.

Greville, L.

Wavertree, L.

Chelmsford, V.

Harris, L.

Weardale, L.

Chilston, V.

Hawke, L.

Weir, L.

Cowdray, V.

Hemphill, L.

Wemyss, L. (E. Wemyss)

De Vesci, V.

Holm Patrick, L.

Wigan, L. (E. Crawford.)

Devonport, V.

Hylton, L.

Wolverton, L.

Esher, V.

Illingworth, L.

Wrenbury, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Argyll, D.

Lovelace, E.

Dunleath, L.

Bedford, D.

Northbrook, E.

Erskine, L.

Northumberland, D. [Teller.]

Stanhope, E.

Farnham, L.

Somerset, D.

Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.)

Forester, L.

Gisborongh, L.

Abereorn, M. (D. Abercorn.)

Bangor, V.

Grinstead, L. (E. Enniskillen.)

Dufferin and Ava, M.

Chaplin, V.

Lawrence, L.

Normanby, M.

Finlay, V.

Monson, L.

Salisbury, M.

Templetown, V.

Newton, L.

Ampthill, L.

Northbourne, L.

Devon, E.

Armaghdale, L.

Oriel, L. (V. Massereene.)

Doncaster, E. (D. Buceleuch and Queensberry.)

Atkinson, L.

Raglan, L.

Bellow, L.

Banfurly, L. (E. Ranfurly.)

Fitzwilliam, E.

Berwick, L.

Savile, L.

Grey, E.

Carson, L.

Sudley, L. (E. Arran.)

Lanesborough, E.

Clements, L. (E. Leitrim.)

Sumner, L.

Lindsey, K,

Deramore, L.

Sydenham, L. [Teller.]

Resolved in the affirmative and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
On Question, Motion agreed to, and Address ordered to be presented to His Majesty by the Lords with White Staves.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE MARQUESS CURZON OF KEDLESTON): My Lords, I propose, presently, to move, for reasons which have been publicly stated, that the House do adjourn until Monday next. I cannot make the Motion at this moment because we have to go through the stage of dispatching our Address to the Sovereign and receiving his reply. I, therefore, suggest that business be suspended during the next half-hour, or whatever may be the period required, and at the end of that time the Motion will be made that the House adjourn until Monday next at the usual time.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: May I ask hat business there will be on Monday?
THE MARQUESS CURZON OF KEDLESTON: The nature of the business of Monday will depend entirely on what happens in the interval. The reasons for moving the adjournment until Monday are, as your Lordships will conjecture, that we need to know what is happening at Dublin in the interval. So far as I know, if matters go well in Dublin, no business will be submitted to this House and we shall be able to prorogue. I cannot give a more definite answer at the moment.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: if things do not go well in Dublin, what does the noble Marquess suggest we shall do?
THE MARQUESS CURZON OF KEDLESTON: That will depend on the decision of the Government in relation to the news we receive.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: As I understand there will be no prorogation even then, the session will go on into the New Year. Or will Parliament be prorogued and a new session opened next January? May I also ask on what day we may expect Parliament to reassemble next year if, according to his view, things go well at Dublin?
THE MARQUESS CURZON OF KEDLESTON: The intention on Monday, if nothing happens in the interval, is to move the prorogation, and Parliament should meet again for the new session at the end of January. January 31 is, I think, the contemplated date.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

MESSAGE FROM THE KING.
His Majesty's Answer to the Address reported by the Lord Chamberlain (The Duke of Atholl) as follows—
"I have received, with great satisfaction the loyal and dutiful expression of your thanks for the Speech with which I have opened the present session of Parliament. I rejoice to be assured that you are prepared to confirm the Articles of Agreement signed by My Ministers and the Irish Delegation; and I pray that this Agreement stay speedily accomplish the complete reconciliation of the peoples of Great Britain and Ireland."
House adjourned at a quarter before six o'clock till Monday, a quarter past four o'clock.