asked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether Her Majesty's Government, having recently intimated its willingness to recommend to Parliament the grant of an annual sum of £600 for the maintenance of St. Stephen's Green, Dublin, as a public or people's park, on conditions, among others, that the Corporation of that City should forego a yearly rent of £276 now receivable there out, and should also contribute a sum of £600 annually, will recommend that, subject to such regulations as Parliament may approve, the control of said public or people's park, and the expenditure of the said Parliamentary grant be entrusted to the Lord Mayor and Corporation of said City; and, whether a precedent for such a course is not to be found in the Parliamentary grant to the Royal Dublin Society for the maintenance of the Leinster lawn?

The hon. Member's Question is based on the hypothesis that St. Stephen's Green is, or will be, a public or people's park. It is not so at present. Whether it will eventually become so is a matter for Parliament to decide, if the parties who are desirous it should become a public park make application to Parliament. If the Corporation of Dublin were to obtain a private Act vesting the Green in them as a "Public or People's Park," and giving them control thereof, it would be open to the Government to consider any application which might be made by the Corporation for a grant towards its maintenance as such; but it seems to me premature to express an opinion on the subject now. I cannot, however, admit that a precedent for such a course would be found in the grant to the Royal Dublin Society for the maintenance of Leinster Lawn; that is a small garden in the possession of the Royal Dublin Society, and bounded on three sides by the buildings of the Society and of the Government. St. Stephen's Green is, by the terms of the hon. Member's Question, an area of such size as to deserve the name of a park, and bordered by property belonging to a great number of owners.

asked the First Lord of the Admiralty, Whether his attention has been drawn to a report in the "Times" of the 22nd inst. of a statement made on the previous day by the Coroner to the jury summoned to inquire into the cause of the death of several victims of the catastrophe on board H.M.S. "Thunderer," on the 14th inst., as follows:—

"A few days ago Captain Waddilove had informed the Admiral that the contractors were desirous of being permitted to clean the engines. The Admiral had communicated with him, and, as he knew that the jury were willing that the requisite permission should be granted, he had given it, but with the precaution that an officer should be present during the cleaning to see that the stokehole was not interfered with. It was very necessary that the machinery should be cleaned, because the engines in a ship like the 'Thunderer' cost as much as a ship of war did in the past;"

, in reply, said, he had not seen the paragraph to which his hon. Friend referred; but in consequence of this Question and another by the hon. Member for Glasgow, he telegraphed to Portsmouth for full information on the subject, but no answer had been received when he left the office a few minutes ago. He had heard, however, that the contractors were desirous of being permitted to clean the engines, as it was apprehended that the great quantity of vapour which had escaped into the engine-room might cause considerable damage, but that that desire had not been carried out. It would be a mistake to suppose that admission to the engine-room implied admidsion to the stoke-hole. There were doors between them, which were closed, and a sentry was placed there, and no one was admitted without the Coroner's sanction being first obtained.

asked the First Lord of the Admiralty, Whether the inquest regarding the "Thunderer" explosion is being conducted by the same coroner who conducted the first "Mistletoe" inquiry; whether that person still holds both the office of Public Coroner and of Admiralty Solicitor; what steps, if any, have been taken to ensure an impartial inquiry; whether it be not the fact, as stated in the "Times" of Saturday, that that official has already permitted some parties who may be implicated in the result of the inquest to have access to the engine-rooms, previous to the inspection by the jury; and, whether he cannot take steps to put the inquiry in the hands of some coroner who is not in the employment of the Admiralty?

said, that the Question of the hon. Member was on the assumption that the Admiralty had something to do with the Coroner's inquisitions. The Admiralty had nothing whatever to do with Coroners; and as the hon. Member came from a country where there was no such institution as a Coroner, he might inform him that a Coroner was a public officer elected by the freeholders, of the jurisdiction within which he acted. In that case Mr. Harvey was the Coroner for Hampshire; he did not know for what division, but he sat as the county Coroner, and had been elected by the freeholders, and the Admiralty had no power to interfere with him or to say how he was to discharge his commission. He had no reason to doubt that Mr. Harvey was the same gentleman who presided over the inquiry in the case of the Mistletoe. Mr. Harvey was employed by the Solicitor to the Admiralty as law agent for local purposes. He was not a salaried officer, but was paid by fees for whatever work was done. With regard to the third part of the Question he understood from the Home Office that sanction had been given to the Coroner having as assessor a gentleman who was an expert in boilers to assist him in the inquiry at the public expense. With regard to the last part of the Question he had no power whatever to interfere; but he had intimated to the Coroner that the Admiralty would give every assistance for the inquiry, and would send down persons connected with the Admiralty, and also persons not so connected, to give him every aid that might be required.

Perhaps I may be allowed, after the statement of my right hon. Friend, to say that the Coroner applied to the Home Office that some one should be appointed to assist him in the inspection, but I declined to appoint any one, because I thought the inquiry ought to be entirely independent. The Coroner represented that he had no funds, and that the county declined to bear the burden. I told him I had the concurrence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in stating that funds would be placed at his disposal; but he must clearly understand that the sole responsibility of the choice of the person to assist in the inspection and the conduct of the inquiry must fall on himself.

expressed a hope that the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Forster would not press his Amendment after virtually accepting the principle of the clause last night. The Amendment would limit the operation of the clause to something like half-a-dozen school boards.

entered a strong protest against any enlargement of the Motion, and urged that the Committee should keep to the principle on which the sanction of a majority of the House had been given to the clause. Therefore, in his opinion, the Amendment proposed by the right hon. Gentleman ought to be entertained by the Committee, as, in his opinion, any other course would not be honest, but an evasion of the explanation which the proposer of the clause was understood to give. Without his Amendment the clause which had been adopted would very much delay, if not frustrate entirely, the chief object of the Act of 1870—namely, to secure sufficient schools throughout the country.

said, there were two classes of school boards—namely, the voluntarily and compulsorily-formed school boards. He did not think his hon. Friend (Mr. Pell) intended to say that only those should be capable of being removed which the direct action of the ratepayers had brought into existence.

, in opposing the Amendment, said, he regretted to see that the once great Liberal Party had been reduced to such a state of impotence and distraction that the only possible means they could find of obtaining a temporary union was by manufacturing an imaginary grievance and making a mountain out of a mole-hill.

doubted very much whether the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down and those who thought with him would act as they had done and freely scatter charges of insincerity if they had taken the kind of interest in the work of education which he had been obliged to take. And he might just suggest to hon. Gentlemen opposite that to make insinuations would not tend to shorten the debate. He took a very sad view of the clause, and it was just possible he had gone too far in the way of concession in his Amendment. Most undoubtedly the main argument used to press the clause upon the acceptance of the Committee was, that it was considered reasonable to give districts which had voluntarily-formed school boards the right to get rid of them if they chose. The number of cases in which this power would be used would, he had no doubt, be very limited; but if the clause were to go forth without this guarded exception, they might be prepared for a very different result. The clause as it stood would simply, he would not say destroy, but frustrate the great object of the Act of 1870, which was to supply the country with efficient schools.

I must be allowed to free the Government from all charge of having procured the passing of this clause by a sort of false pretence—that we desired it to apply to both kinds of school boards, whereas we represented it as meant merely for voluntarily-formed boards. The clause was distinctly meant to apply to compulsorily-formed school boards. I myself most distinctly asserted that principle and argued upon it.

said, in the course of a number of speeches, made by many hon. Gentlemen, including the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Mr. Pell), and the noble Lord who had charge of the Bill, the burden of the argument of hon. Gentlemen on the Conservative side of the House seemed to be that these school boards, having been formed by the voluntary desire of the particular districts in which they had been established, it was only reasonable that the ratepayers should be allowed to change their mind, and relieve themselves of the obligations placed on their shoulders. Hon. Members opposite seemed to recommend the clause upon those grounds. Those on the Opposition side wished to restrict the operation of the clause, and considered they had a perfect right to call on them to accept the Amendment of his right hon. Friend the Member for Bradford (Mr. W. E. Forster). He wished to point out to the noble Lord that it was not their desire to carry on a discussion on the clause in an unreasonable manner, and hoped to see a desire on the part of the Government to meet them fairly. Hon. Gentlemen seemed to think that the opponents to the clause were making "much ado about nothing;" but he wished to remind the Committee that there was a great deal involved in the clause, and they said that the Government, finding there was such a strong feeling on that side of the House, might with propriety consider how they could meet them. The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. Forsyth) had said just now that he thought that the Liberal Party had got into a miserable condition when they sought to unite on a matter of this character; but he could tell the hon. and learned Gentleman that the Party had united because they were entirely opposed to the views of the Government. The Liberal Party were not prepared to support measures which tended to promote the advantage of particular religious bodies. The proposal to adopt the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chester (Mr. Dodson) was really no advantage at all, because they did not accept that as any compromise. They believed that the effect of that Amendment would be simply nil, because it left it entirely in the discretion of the Education Department to suppress school boards. In the Act of 1870, to which attention had been more than once directed, there was a clause of very great importance; under that clause the Education Department, if it considered it necessary in any locality, gave notice that it was intended to make inquiries whether there was sufficient educational accommodation. After careful inquiry, if it was found that there was not sufficient educational accommodation, the Education Department gave notice for the district to provide the necessary schools. Under the same clause of the Act of 1870, if the district was dissatisfied with what was done by the Education Department, they had power to demand a special inquiry, and after that inquiry, most carefully conducted, had been held, the Department had a right to call on the locality to provide the wanting accommodation for educational purposes, and after giving a very long notice, if the district did not provide what was requisite, then the Education Department had a right to step in and require that there should be a school board elected in order to establish the necessary schools. He contended that when a school board had been compulsorily formed after so much care and deliberation, it ought not to be put an end to in the manner proposed by the clause. An hon. Gentleman—he believed the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer—directed attention to the fact that under the provisions of the Bill, if any school attendance committee made a default, then the Education Department would come in and act in its stead, and the right hon. Gentleman urged that under the Bill in such cases the necessity for the existence of school boards would be done away with. But inasmuch as under the Bill the default was merely with reference to school attendance, and the default under the Act of 1870 was with reference to school boards, he thought the clause to which the Chancellor of the Exchequer alluded did not at all remove the objection which he had to this clause. The argument of the hon. Member for Leicestershire was that school boards were inconvenient because they were costly. Hon. Members asked why should there be the expense of school boards in districts where there were bodies who might carry out the purposes for which school boards existed? He was quite agreeable to that if hon. Gentlemen on the other side would meet them on this question. If the Committee would give Boards of Guardians and Town Councils the same powers with respect to everything which was now possessed by school boards, he dared to say that the difficulty would be met. But so long as the Government proposed to do away with school boards, and substitute nothing in place of them, he should oppose them, because he believed it would be doing a great injury to the education of this country, and tend to act unfairly with school boards.

felt that the Bill as it now stood could not be accepted in that House without treason against the Liberal Party. It was time for the Liberal Party to stand together in that House and oppose the re-actionary attempts of the Party opposite. They had at last succeeded in re-uniting the Liberal Party. [Ironical cheers.] Well, it was some satisfaction to be able to take some part in that union, though he confessed that, after swallowing six camels they were now straining at something very like a gnat. The clause proposed to strike directly at the educational system established by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford in 1870. The speeches of the Secretary of State for War and the noble Lord the Vice President of the Council indicated that their opposition to school boards was a sectarian opposition, based upon bigoted sentiment, and one which ought not to be admitted in a country where the Established Church had no right to claim the supremacy which these Amendments endeavoured to establish for her. He complained that the Opposition had never had the slightest reason to anticipate that there would be sprung upon them at the last moment such an Amendment as that of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Mr. Pell). He thought they were entitled to ask the noble Lord also whether he was prepared to accept the further Amendments of the hon. Member?

said, at the commencement of his speech, when he explained the views of the Government respecting the Amendment of his hon. Friend the Member for South Leicestershire (Mr. Pell), he stated that the Government distinctly refused to accept the other Amendments which were proposed by his hon. Friend and by various other Members of the House, which proposed to enable localities to get rid of school boards which had schools. The hon. Member was probably absent, or he would have heard it.

said, it was impossible for hon. Members to be present during the whole of a debate; but he was very sorry if he had misrepresented the noble Lord's views. For his part, he hoped the Bill would be thrown out altogether, and that they would be able to establish a system of national education to give to the children that which the nation alone should teach, leaving it to the energy, and bigotry, and fanaticism, and enthusiasm of the Churches to do that which they could to bring the children under religious education.

hinted that the Government were not dealing with the House quite fairly, and observed that great public discredit would be brought upon the House by the unnecessary determination of the Government to hold to the strictest and severest in- terpretation not merely of their own clauses, but of those clauses which they adopted from hon. Members below the Gangway. The clause of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire was enforced by the Government on the ground that it was the ratepayers' right to have the power of destroying what they had voluntarily created. Yet they now refused to agree to an Amendment which would limit the operation of the clause to such cases. If the deep feelings of the Opposition were to be treated in that way, and no concessions were made to the strongest wishes of many of its most moderate Members, he should have no hesitation in joining those who would use every Form of the House for obstructing the progress of the Bill.

said, the principle of the Act of 1870 was to give fair play to voluntary effort, supplementing it by the action of the Department and the compulsory power of the school boards in cases where the school accommodation was insufficient. In this Bill the Government had endeavoured to assist in the development of this voluntary effort. This attempt was entirely consistent with all they had ever proposed or done with regard to education. Their view had always been that where voluntary effort was sufficient, school boards should not be forced upon a reluctant district. It was a logical sequence to this principle that if, after a school board had been forced upon a district, voluntary efforts there were stimulated by public opinion, or possibly by the action of the school board itself, fair play should be given to the district, and it should have the opportunity of saying—"Trust us, and let us now swim without corks." The Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman would not allow a district this opportunity where once it had been necessary to force a school board upon a district.

would not have risen but for the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer against whose interpretation of the Act of 1870 he desired to protest; the intention of the Act of 1870 was to tolerate, but not to encourage voluntary schools, and the intention and belief of the framers of the Act was that gradually a national school-board system would supersede the voluntary system. But inasmuch, as the State, for the first time dealing as a State with the education of the people, found a number of voluntary schools doing work which the State had heretofore not undertaken, it was not deemed wise or fair to uproot or unduly to interfere with those voluntary schools. The right hon. Member for Bradford incurred considerable unpopularity on account of the tenderness with which he treated voluntary schools, and the return which, he got was, that when those whom he had befriended were in the majority, they endeavoured to assist the voluntary system to supersede the school-board system which he had established. The Chancellor of the Exchequer now openly avowed his wish, to see the two systems maintained side by side, and not only that, but to encourage the voluntary system so as to supersede that system which had been deliberately established by Parliament. By the course they had adopted upon the clause the Government had placed themselves upon the horns of a dilemma. The hon. Mover of that clause (Mr. Pell) had spoken of it as a small matter, but it had also been represented from the other side of the House as one of great importance. Thus the clause was a most unfortunate one. Either it was a very important clause, and if so, it ought to have been introduced in the Bill and discussed on the second reading; or it was of little importance, and in that case, it was to be regretted that so much delay had been caused and so much ill-feeling excited for the sake of passing it.

expressed his surprise at the remarks which had fallen from the hon. Member for South Leicestershire in the early part of the discussion. The hon. Member had said that the authority which, established a school board ought to have the power of disestablishing it. [Mr. Pell: With the approval of the ratepayers of the district.] On the introduction of the clause it was said that the power was to be from below; but now it was contended that the authority which established the board ought to have the power of disestablishing it. He had voted for the second reading of the Bill, but could no longer give it its support.

I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, and the other occupants of the front Opposition bench, have at length begun to understand the true character of this measure. I am bound to say this for those hon. and right hon. Gentlemen, that whatever merits or demerits they may possess, they are at least a singularly long-suffering generation, that they display the most wonderful patience and equanimity in hearing the grievances and complaints of their own friends. Some of us within, and a much larger number of their most faithful supporters out of the House, have been trying for a considerable time to awaken them to a sense of the insidious dangers lurking in this Bill. But they chose to turn a deaf ear to our remonstrances, and rather to listen to the suave and skilful eloquence of the noble Lord, whose courtesy and amiability they are never weary of eulogizing. And I must admit that the speech in which the noble Lord introduced this measure was so conciliatory in its tone, and so plausible in its representations that he succeeded in disguising from both sides of the House what we on this side regard as the most obnoxious features of his plan, so that when the Bill came into our hands and we compared it with the speech, we were obliged to say that while the voice had been the voice of Jacob, the hands were the hands of Esau. But after the Bill made its appearance we had no excuse for being misled. I cannot admit, with my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Oxford, that any mine has been sprung upon us. I hold that what is brought out rather more openly and audaciously in the new clauses, was potentially in the Bill in its original form. I ventured to say, in moving my Resolution on going into Committee, that the Bill was a Bill for promoting, not national, but sectarian education; that its tendency, and, indeed, its avowed object, was to discourage in every possible way the establishment of school boards and the liberal and unsectarian schools to which they give rise, and to throw the education of the country more and more into clerical hands, just at the very time when the Romanizing tendency of one class of the clergy, and the fanatical hatred of the Nonconformists on the part of another class, less than ever entitle them to have this solemn and important trust committed to their charge. I maintained that its effects, even before the new clauses were brought forward, was to make a large number of denominational schools independent of voluntary subscriptions, and thus pre- sent to us the extraordinary anomaly of a large number of institutions, scattered over the whole country, completely supported out of public resources, and virtually under the absolute management and control of private and irresponsible persons, with this enormous aggravation of the anomaly, that you take power to force all the children of the people into these institutions without any adequate securities for the rights of conscience. I stated that there were already many schools up and down the country which did not require, and did not receive, any help from voluntary sources. The noble Lord charged me with stating that there were thousands of schools in that condition, and when I corrected him refused to accept my correction. But the statement which he then ascribed to me, and which I did not make, will be true enough under this Bill, for there will be thousands of schools in that condition. And because I protested against this, you charged me with being actuated by narrow sectarian views. Your theory, then, as I understand it, is this—that to support a measure for taking, by main force, the children of all classes of religionists, and compel them to enter into the schools of one denomination, is a proof of a large, liberal, generous, and catholic disposition; while to oppose that, and claim for parents some right to decide the religious influences under which their children shall be educated, is evidence of a sectarian and intolerant spirit. I contend, on the other hand, that you are sectarian and intolerant, and that we are, as we have ever been, the advocates of religious liberty. I contend, in regard to this clause, that no answer has been given to the numerous able speeches of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bradford. Surely it will be admitted on all sides that there is no man in this House, no man in the country, so competent to appreciate the meaning and object of such a clause as the right hon. Gentleman. He is the founder of the system of school boards, and he sees clearly enough that the tendency—nay, I think I may fairly say the intention—of this clause is to undo incomparably the most important and valuable part of the system with which his name is honourably associated. I fancy my right hon. Friend is learning several things in the course of this discussion. During those love passages which he so freely exchanged with hon. Gentlemen opposite in 1870, I believe he thought that he was winning them over to Liberal views on education. He flattered himself that by the large and ample concessions he was making to them, and which they professed to receive with so much cordiality and gratitude, he was converting them from the error of their way. But he is beginning to discover that the Ethiopian does not so easily change his skin, nor the leopard his spots, and that the only use they are making of his concessions is to take them as vantage ground from which to overturn the best part of his work. I trust that, at any rate, he will adhere firmly to his Amendment, and so do something to counteract these insidious clauses, which are aimed at the very existence of school boards.

observed that the last thing he should have expected, looking to the understanding that prevailed in 1870, would have been that more time should be given for the action of voluntary schools.

said, he was not accustomed to trouble the House unless he had something to say. This, however, was a matter on which he felt strongly, and he meant to say what he thought. Upon reflection the conviction had forced itself upon his mind that a more injudicious speech than that in which the noble Lord used covert threats as to what he should reveal against school boards if pressed to do so, he never remembered to have been delivered since he had had a seat in that House. On the 7th of April he (Mr. Mundella) received a letter from one of the most valued Inspectors of the noble Lord's Department, a clergyman of the Church of England, which, as it referred especially to school boards, he would read to the Committee. [Cries of "Name."] He should not give the name. While the noble Lord presided over the Education Department he would not give the name of any servant of the Department who differed from the Government; but he (Mr. Mundella) pledged his honour to that House that his correspondent was one of the most efficient Inspectors that the Department ever had. He (Mr. Mundella) would read the letter in which the writer bore his testimony, founded upon personal experience, to the "admirable and blessed work for the nation" which the school board system was doing; and he added—

"The dislike of education in itself, the denominational jealousies, the irritation against compulsion, all have united to make the task of the school boards difficult enough, and very little discouragement from the Government would be enough to make their work almost impossible, and certainly prevent the better class of men in our towns and villages from being willing to sit upon them."

denied the assertion, and hoped the hon. Member would not continue to misrepresent him.

said, he was not misrepresenting the remarks of the noble Lord. He could produce reports out of almost all the principal newspapers in the Kingdom to show that the noble Lord had been inconsistent. ["Oh, oh!"] He adhered to what he said, and he challenged the noble Lord to disprove it. The noble Lord had told them that he had something in reserve which he hoped he should not be forced to use against the school boards. He challenged the noble Lord to do any such thing. It was not because he would not, perhaps, but he dared not. He knew that the majority of the people and the Press of the country condemned his action in this matter. He did not care whether he pleased the noble Lord or not; for he believed the time had come for men who cared for these things to be plain-spoken, and to tell the Government that it was they alone who were responsible for the discreditable movement which had taken place. The clause was an attack on the Act of 1870, and the way in which it had been taken up was a breach of confidence on the part of the Government.

moved, as an Amendment to Mr. Pell's new clause, after Clause 21, line 2, after "by," leave out to "1870," and insert "nine-tenths of the ratepayers of the district." The object of the Amendment was to show that unless there was a unanimous, or almost unanimous, feeling on the part of the ratepayers, the school boards should not be done away with—they could not be dissolved. That was a most important object, and he hoped the Committee would adopt the Amendment.

said, the effect of the Amendment would be that in places where a school board might have been established by the casting vote of a single ratepayer, the consent of nine-tenths would be necessary to get rid of them. He could not be expected to give his consent to such an Amendment.

was sick and tired with the prolonged storm which had been provoked on this occasion. He thought the matter should and must be settled by a compromise, and that it should take the direction of this Amendment. He would suggest that the consent of three-fourths instead of nine-tenths of the ratepayers should be required.

was inclined to think that the suggestion of the hon. Member for Dumfries was not a bad one, and might with advantage be adopted by the Government.

said, he would willingly accept the proposition of "three-fourths" being inserted instead of "nine-tenths."

approved of the proposal to require the consent of three-fourths.

expressed a hope that if the Government made a concession in the matter it would be on the understanding that further Amendments would not be pressed.

suggested that the majority to be required should not be less than two-thirds.

supported the suggestion—the two-thirds to consist of the ratepayers voting.

was of opinion that such a compromise should be come to as would provide, as necessary to justify dissolution of a school board, a satisfactory majority.

said, that although he had supported the clause he thought a bare majority of 1 to get rid of a school board would be unsatisfactory, and he therefore trusted that some compromise would be arrived at.

complained that the Government displayed no desire to meet the Opposition, and their spirit and tone were not calculated to bring about a settlement.

said, that it was too much to hear such remarks, when they remembered the tone and spirit displayed opposite. After the remarks which they had had to endure from the junior Member for Sheffield, one of the Members for Dundee, and the hon. Member for Pembroke Dockyards, it was making a draught on their credulity, to ask them to believe in the conciliatory spirit of hon. Gentlemen opposite.

remarked that the way to invite compromise was not by making use of acrimonious and most hostile language. He was quite willing to put aside personal feeling in the matter; in fact, the subject of the Bill with which they were dealing was far too grave in its character to allow him to be influenced by personal considerations; but it was necessary for him to say something at this stage of the discussion, especially as, during it, his word had not been taken by an hon. Member opposite. He thought his right hon. Friend the Member for Bradford had wrongly understood the position of the Government in this matter. He entirely overlooked the fact that the Government had made very considerable concessions to the arguments and feelings of hon. Gentlemen opposite, and had taken the important step of throwing the onus of considering the particular circumstances of these cases upon the Education Department, which was casting upon it an enormous responsibility. On the part of the Government he was quite willing to assent to the principle that more than a bare majority should be required to dissolve a school board. They might, no doubt, as a matter of argument take their stand very properly upon the exact analogy of the Act of 1870; but he thought that the application to dissolve the board should be a deliberate one, and he would, therefore, propose to insert words in the clause providing that there should be a majority of two-thirds of those present and voting, which he was free to confess he considered would be a real improvement to the clause.

I rise for a personal purpose. Yesterday the noble Lord used my name, and immediately afterwards he spoke of Members who had used strong language and had been acrimonious. I hope I have not used strong language or been acrimonious. Also I trust that the noble Lord in the observations which he has just made does not intend to allude to me.

I need hardly say I never thought of alluding to the hon. and learned Member. The Committee is well aware to what hon. Member I alluded.

, remarking that the noble Lord had taken much credit for his concessions, said he thought it desirable to point out that he was by no means satisfied with this concession. His objection to the clause was that the children of the country would be under clerical influence. [Laughter and "Order!"]

invited the hon. Member to confine his remarks to the Amendment before the House.

thought he was as much in Order as was the noble Lord when he thought fit to accuse hon. Gentlemen on his side of the House of being influenced by acrimonious motives.

accepted the Government Amendment, on the principle that half a loaf was better than no bread.

thought that the Government had shown a very fair and satisfactory disposition in this matter. He certainly did not, in his remarks, make any observation as to any Member of the Government.

trusted that the Committee would hear a similar statement from other hon. Members below the Gangway.

said, there could be no doubt the hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Cambridge had made an appeal to him. He (Mr. Mundella) was told that a distinct reference had been made to him in his absence. There was no Member in that House more desirous that their debates should be conducted in courtesy and dignity than he was; but he had felt deeply, and did feel deeply, at the proceedings of the noble Lord. He referred, as he had repeatedly done, to the noble Lord's speeches; and he believed that he could convince the noble Lord that every word he (Mr. Mundella) had stated had been used. He had no desire to say anything personally offensive of any Member; he did not wish to say one acrimonious word in that House, but should always speak plainly on questions upon which he felt deeply. While he withdrew anything personally offensive to the noble Lord, he would withdraw nothing he rightly and honourably said. Hon. Members opposite who called for the name of the Inspector whose letter he had read must have been conscious that in giving it he would have been guilty of a breach of faith, and would have exposed himself to most disagreeable comment.

said, that little good would be done by going back upon heated expressions; but, having restrained his noble Friend when he was about to interrupt the hon. Member, it was right to say that when a Member repudiated the construction or the language of quoted speeches it was usual to accept the disclaimer. The course taken by the hon. Member—no doubt in an excited moment—in declining to receive his noble Friend's explanation was neither usual nor convenient.

said, if the noble Lord disclaimed the words he used on a former occasion, when he referred to the effect of compulsion on the national character, and said they would not bear the interpretation put upon them, he gladly accepted the disclaimer.

, in reference to an Amendment which he had submitted relating to such a majority of the ratepayers as he thought desirable to effect the removal of school boards, consented to withdraw it, the Government having accepted it in a modified form.

moved, in line 7, after "School Board," to insert, as an Amendment to Mr. Pell's proposed new clause—

"Where no requisition has been sent by the Education Department to such School Board, under section ten of 'The Elementary Education Act, 1870,' requiring them to supply public school accommodation."

, on the part of the Government, accepted the Amendment.

then moved to add after the Amendment just agreed to, these words—

"And no action has been taken by such School Board under the provisions of this Act or of 'The Elementary Education Act, 1870.' "

said, he could not accept that Amendment, as it would be inconsistent with the course which the Government had pursued.

supported the additional Amendment, remarking that it would exclude his own parish, of which mention had been made, from the operation of the clause. In that parish the school board had been not abolished, but suspended; the managers of the Church school were the same persons as the school board, and could act in the latter capacity if occasion should require. Here was a fair instance of how things might work. A school board was established because two considerable ratepayers would not contribute to the voluntary schools, and an undue burden was thus thrown upon others. But one of these ratepayers had since died, his successor had been willing to contribute and the school had been transferred back to the old managers. Now, the other large refusing ratepayer was a railway company; since the suspension of the school board the assessment of this company had been raised so largely that they would now pay something like half the rates of the parish. Under these circumstances the ratepayers might wish to revive the school board again. If so, they could do it without trouble or expense, whereas, if under this clause the school board had been actually abolished, its re-establish- ment would have been difficult and costly. His noble Friend (Viscount Sandon)had mentioned his parish (Smith) as an example in favour of the clause, and when he (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) had pointed out that it was just the reverse, had then turned round and said that he could not think of taking the little village of Smeeth as a model for the rest of England, but he hoped it might be left as it was by the adoption of the Amendment.

then proposed an Amendment to Mr. Pell's clause by inserting the words—

"It shall be their duty to take the circumstances of the case into consideration, and if they shall be of opinion that the maintenance of the school board is not necessary for the purposes of the education of the district it shall be lawful for."

said, that as his right hon. Friend (Mr. Dodson), who was absent, had a similar Amendment on the Paper, he should have been prepared to move and state his right hon. Friend's views upon it had not the noble Lord proposed this Amendment. He was obliged to the noble Lord for proposing it, who he had no doubt meant by it to meet the views of the Opposition side of the House, but the words proposed did not exactly do so. He demurred to the word "necessary," and would move to substitute for it the word advantageous."

said, that would go too far in the other direction, and he suggested the word "required."

said, he would accept that alteration.

asked to what extent this Amendment would operate?

said, it must, he should have thought, be obvious to everyone that it was quite impossible for him to say. It must be left a great deal to the discretion of the Department, and if the Department was not to be trusted, there was no use in having the clause at all. The Department was bound under this proposed Amendment to the clause to see that education did not suffer by the change, and if it could not be trusted to do this, it was quite unfit for its other most important and responsible duties.

moved, after the word "Board," inline 9, to insert the words—

"Provided, That no School Board shall be dissolved by whom bye-laws for the attendance of children have been put in force."

said, that the Proviso would do just what the hon. Member did not want to be done. Bye-laws did not of themselves secure the attendance of children at school. It all depended on the way in which the bye-laws were carried out, and sometimes in a year or two they became a dead letter. If this clause were adopted it would be impossible to get rid of school boards which were not doing their duty—namely, of boards, which, having passed bye-laws, neglected to carry them out—a by no means impossible or unlikely condition of things—and it would be impossible to transfer the powers with regard to school attendance which they had neglected, to the new school attendance authorities constituted under this Bill—namely, Town Councils and Boards of Guardians. It would be much better to leave the matter to the discretion of the Department. He hoped that the Amendment would not be pressed.

reminded the noble Lord that the Amendment applied only to school boards which had put the bye-laws into force. He believed the Amendment would fully carry out the object which the hon. Member for Hackney had in view.

supported the Amendment.

said, his object was to insure that in case a school board was abolished, the body, whatever it was, which was substituted, should be compelled to pass bye-laws for compulsory attendance or to enforce it if passed. At present school boards did both, while there was no security that either Boards of Guardians or Corporations would insist upon it. He proposed, therefore, that no school board should be abolished unless the body substituted should be compelled to pass bye-laws which would secure the objects intended by the establishment of school boards.

said, the effect of the Amendment would be that one person on a school board which passed compulsory bye-laws could prevent that board being dissolved notwithstanding the wishes of all his colleagues and of the entire district.

moved, as an Amendment to Mr. Pell's proposed new Clause, line 9, at end of first paragraph, add—

"Provided always, That no application shall be made for the dissolution of a School Board except within three months of the expiration of the period for which the School Board has been elected; and no order for the dissolution of such School Board shall take effect until after the expiration of such period."

said, he should be glad if they could come to some arrangement by which repeated agitation for the dissolution of school boards would be prevented. The hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Mr. Pell) had a provision which he intended to move at a subsequent stage of much the same character as that of the hon. Member for Reading; and what he would suggest was, that the Amendment should be withdrawn for the present, in order that both might be considered together. The Amendment of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire was to prevent agitation for the removal of school boards within the three years for which they were elected.

asked whether the Government accepted the principle of the Amendment?

Yes, so far as it involves the objection to repeated contests.

thought the Committee might very well decide the small point raised by his hon. Friend's Amendment without leaving it over for subsequent discussion, especially as the Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted the necessity for some such provision.

hoped that the question would be decided, upon its merits, and that in any vote that should be given the Committee would not be taken to express an opinion on the proposal of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire, to which he had very great objection.

said, the proposition of the hon. Member for Reading (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) was so simple, and recommended itself so much to every one, as well on that (the Conservative) as on the Opposition side of the House, that he could not believe, if hon. Members fully understood the Amendment, that any one would object to its adoption. It was simply this—that when a board was appointed for a specific period, its death was not to take place until that period expired. If school boards were liable to be dissolved after three months of existence, surely no man who had any regard for his own character would take office under them. The Amendment next provided that no order for the dissolution of a school board should take effect until the time when the school board would naturally expire. This Amendment did not affect the clause intended to be proposed by the hon. Member for South Leicestershire, and did not alter the principle of the clause agreed to by the Government. He would therefore ask the noble Lord whether he would not accept the Amendment without putting the House to the trouble of dividing. It being now ten minutes to Seven of the clock, House resumed.

I propose that we shall proceed with the Bill this evening. ["No, no!"] I understand there are no Orders of the Day which hon. Gentlemen are particularly anxious to bring forward.

said, there was a Bill of which he had charge, the Game Laws (Scotland) Bill, and he had waited day after day and night after night in the hope of getting it into Committee, but had hitherto failed to do so. He was one of the last men to throw any obstacle in the way of the progress of Business; but considering the importance of this question, and the great interest which the Scotch people took in it, he should feel bound to take every opportunity of bringing it forward.

observed, that the hon. and learned Member for Limerick was anxious to pass the Municipal Privileges (Ireland) Bill, which had already been read a second time.

Of course I am not resisting any Gentleman who has any particular interest in bringing any question forward. I will therefore put the Bill down for to-morrow.

wished to know whether it would take precedence of the Orders in which private Members had an interest, as in that case it would be a violation of the promise made by the Government that the proposal to take the Wednesdays would not be pressed.

replied that he had no intention of placing it before the other Orders.