said, in rising to move the second reading of a Bill for the complete enfranchisement of the Police in Great Britain—the Bill did not extend to Ireland—he could promise the House he would not trespass upon its attention for a very long time. For he hoped to be followed by others possessing a prior interest in this subject, so far at least as the House was concerned, and particularly he might mention his right hon. Friend the Member for the Epping Division of Essex, who for years had taken a legislative interest in the Police Force, and upon whom the privilege of moving the Bill would have rightly devolved had not the chances of the ballot placed it in his hands. Moreover, the Bill was identical with others which had been introduced into the House, in favour of which arguments had been adduced and. repeated, which had twice, at least, prevailed to secure the practical acceptance of the proposals, although, on account of the pressure of other Business, they had never been placed on the Statute Book. It might seem foolhardy in the present and threatening state of Business in the House to hope that they should be more successful in getting the Bill through that Session, were it not a a Bill to which all parties were practically agreed. And he ventured to think that some special effort might be made, because it was a Bill involving an act of. tardy justice—of individual justice—to a body of our fellow citizens, to whose conduct and character we certainly owed any acknowledgments that we could pay; men who had long and patiently endured the deprivation of the first Constitutional right of Englishmen, a deprivation which could not he would attempt to show, bear for one moment the criticism of justice or expediency. The fewest words possible were necessary to demon-state the fitness of the police for the Parliamentary franchise. They were not only a body of men highly trained to their duties, but those very duties were such as to train their mind to a temperate, a careful, and almost a judicial method. He said this of them at least, in comparison with any other portion of the electorate in the same station of life. By those duties also they were endowed with a knowledge of many subjects which came within the range of politics, particularly with the large class of legislative proposals affecting the daily life of cities. Who, just to give an instance which came to his mind, would be better qualified to pass judgment upon Bills relating to the protection of life and property, or the regulation of places of amusement, or places in which large crowds assemble, than those men whose daily and nightly business it was to look after these things? And with regard to general politics, surely they were as well fitted as soldiers and sailors, and revenue officers and postmen, to all of whom they gave the franchise, while they denied it to the police. In all our Colonies he believed the police possessed the franchise. Again, he presumed, no one would deny that the English police were as well fitted for the franchise as the Scotch police, who in all cities and royal boroughs had exercised it for many years, and had done so, he would remind the House, to the complete satisfaction of the Chief Constables of Scotland. To point the anomalous state of things now existing, he might say that, side by side with these police now possessing the vote, the police of 32 counties, and of a certain number of boroughs in Scotland, did not possess it, an anomaly which that Bill was intended to remove. It might be illustrated still further by pointing out that when those Scotch police, now endowed with the vote, were, as very often happened, drafted into England, they at once lost it. In view of that state of things, and of such numbers of different grades of civil servants possessing the franchise, could they be surprised that the police themselves—he appealed to a deputation to his hon. Friend the Member for Central Sheffield, representing 10,000 of them—felt seriously slighted at the deprivation, and could not understand why they, in particular, of all classes of Her Majesty's servants, should be singled out for that ignominious mark of incapacity? The case seemed almost strong enough. for him to leave it here; but to render it complete he would like to answer the only objections which he could find to have been taken against these proposals. It was said that it would not be well to turn policemen into politicians. A line in a Statute Book could not transform a man into a politician. Political sentiments and sympathies were neither created nor obliterated by giving to or withholding from a man the right to record his vote. Rather where they the result of the increased spread of intelligence, the rapidity of communication, the general development of interest in public affairs, and the general demand of all classes of the community to participate in the government of the country. If a man was prevented from having political sympathies by withholding from him the franchise, that was tantamount to saying that each successive class which, in the extensions of the franchise, had obtained the vote, did not obtain it in satisfaction of pre-existing political aspirations. Few reformers would be found to agree with such a theory. By giving them the franchise you did endow these aspirations with a higher and keener sense of responsibility, and that, to every class and to every body of men, was a good and not a bad thing But if you withheld political rights from any class really qualified to exercise them, you did not prevent them from being politicians-—you left them politicians with a grievance, a most undesirable element in the community, particularly where it was unnecessary. The police were men, who, in common with their fellows, took an intelligent and watchful interest in affairs, and who, it must be within the general knowledge of candidates of all Parties, already had their political views and sympathies. You would neither create nor destroy these by giving them the franchise, and therefore he claimed that this objection in the main fell to the ground. He need hardly point out that these disabilities were imposed upon the police as early as the reign of George IV., long before the Ballot Act had been passed or oven thought of, and of course the ballot made all the difference to the significance of this objection about turning them into politicians. But there was a practical point in it which had been raised with regard to policemen endowed with the franchise appearing at political meetings either as participators or in the exercise of their duty to keep the peace. As to the first, he did not think it necessary that any regulations now existing should be relaxed. He could not see the harm in a policeman, when off duty, and in plain clothes like any other civilian, attending a political meeting. But, on the other hand, he did not think they would suffer very much if they were forbidden to attend. He did not think they would suffer in the soundness, correctness, and impartiality of their political views if they were deprived of the opportunities of coming directly under the blandishments of a Parliamentary candidate. Not one third of the voters in a constituency ever went near a political meeting. Therefore, in this respect, the police would be no worse off than the majority of the voters. In any case, it was a matter that might be safely left to the authorities. But with reference to their appearing at these meetings in the exercise of their duty, he would remind hon. Members that, in London at least, it was only in the last resort, in cases of actual serious assault, that the police were called in to political meetings at all; that when there they were the most prominent persons, their conduct could be seen and taken note of by every one present, and even if self-restraint and fairness were not of the essence of their training, the danger of their displaying the contrary, and the certainty that they would be brought to book for it, would prevent them from showing partiality. But the best answer to all such trivial suspicions was the fact that three successive Home Secretaries, the Ministers whose first duty it was to preserve the efficiency of the police, had emphatically approved the principle of this Bill. In conclusion, he would venture to address himself for a moment to a more general argument and one of more far-reaching importance. The Police Force of this country is essentially a civil force. Except so far as concerned their discipline when under orders, they did not partake in any way of the military character which attached to the police of many foreign countries. It was not only a source of pride to our people, but a cause of general content and of pacification—if he might say so—to the more turbulent elements of the population, that order did not have to be maintained as in other countries by a plentiful display of military uniforms and by the domineering officialism of a military caste, but by the restraining influence of a body of men who were far removed from such a discipline and from the spirit and temperament which it would involve. They were drawn from the people; they were of the people; and to the people in the hours when they put off their uniforms they returned. He had seen them himself, for many of them lived in the model lodging houses which were scattered over this City, living in their quiet homes, which were generally examples of neatness and order, at peace and in sympathy with their neighbours, to whom they often had to trust to give an eye to the sick wife or little children during their long eight hours of exposed and dangerous duty, leading the lives of intelligent, companionable citizens, with no prejudice of caste, with no affectation of superiority or power. On a hundred occasions in the exercise of their duty the consciousness of these civil characteristics had its weight among those whom they had to control, and people—he was not speaking of the downright criminal classes, but of those persons who from one cause or another were inclined to turbulence and disorder, and who formed the actual majority of the cases with which the police had to deal—people of this sort, who would wildly rebel against anything like military interference, were made amenable to the influence of social order, and were easily controlled by men who had no organized class feeling out of harmony with the general body of citizens. It was impossible to exaggerate the value of this characteristic of the police. If it did not exist, if it were not recognized, every petty squabble in the streets would bring the victims of momentary passion into the Police Courts, and every mob would become a riot. The police, therefore, were—and he trusted always would be—in this country a civil force. By what right then—by what reason of justice or expediency—did we deprive them of the first civil right of Englishmen, the exercise of the Parliamentary franchise? We claimed that they should be civilians, but we ostracized them from the pale of civil rights. We robbed them of the most important and the only means which we had of recognizing their civil position. It was not only in the interests of the police themselves but of the community of populations whom they had to control, that he asked for a redress of this manifest grievance.

said, in supporting the Motion, he was speaking for a large number of his constituents, who were anxious that the same privileges they enjoyed should be extended to a class of their countrymen which had hitherto been excluded from them. The police felt it as a great grievance that they had all the disadvantages of conducting an election without being able to participate in it. He was sure the privilege of voting would not be abused by the police, but used for the advantage of the State. It might be argued that there might be some fear on the part of citizens unless they followed the example given with regard to voting by a police officer; but if such an argument had ever applied, he contended that it was entirely removed by the provisions of the Ballot Act. Formerly electoral disabilities attached to employés in various branches of the Civil Service, including the Post Office and the Customs. The reason was, he suggested, the same as that for which the police were now disfranchised, and which he had indicated—namely, the possession of power and the fear which this might involve, and as the disability in the case of those officials had been removed, it had become an anachronism in the case of the police. One very distinct grievance of the present system was that a person who had been a police officer might be disqualified from voting for considerably longer than the prescribed six months after he had resigned. By the provisions of the Registration Acts, the Revising Barrister was bound to strike off the names of those incapacitated from voting, and that would include the case of a police officer. The lists were made out in June or July, and if a police officer retired soon after the registration he would be disqualified for 12 months—that was, until the next revision—although the Police Acts limited the incapacity to six months, and every possible cause of disqualification had ceased. That seemed to be an incidental result which almost demanded the passing of a Bill of this nature.

, in rising to move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months, said, he opposed the Bill, not because he believed that the police were not well qualified and entitled to have a vote, but because he considered that the question ought not to be considered before the greater question of the removal of the disqualification of sex. There was one strong reason for enfranchising the police. It was desirable to prevent them becoming a military force; they should become citizens, and, so far as possible, they should have the same interests and form the same ideas as other citizens. He regretted to see that, year by year, there was a growing tendency in the opposite direction. Year by year the police of this country were becoming more of a military force; they were becoming a kind of standing army under the control of the Home Secretary. That was the case in London, and it was becoming, year by year, more and more so in the Provinces. He believed that nothing would do more to counteract that tendency, and make the police full and free citizens in every sense of the word, than entrusting them with the franchise. The Scotch burgh police had the vote already, and his own experience obtained in contesting a Scotch Burgh constituency was that they were intelligent and well qualified to discuss and decide questions of polities. He (Mr. McLaren) might be asked why he opposed this Bill, and he admitted that the question was a pertinent one; but if hon. Members would look upon the Notice Paper, they would see that he had give a Notice of an Amendment, which, however, he understood it would not be in Order for him to move, or he would have proposed—

"That this House, without expressing any opinion against the enfranchisement of the police fore a, declines to remove the electoral disability of persons employed in or in connection with the police until it has dealt with the electoral disability of sex."

He was not going to discuss the question of women's suffrage. It would not be in order to go into the reasons why the suffrage should be granted to women; but he desired to state, as briefly as possible, the reasons which induced him to take the course he proposed to do. He should like to state merely one or two of the leading points relating to the history of this question during the past few years.

I understood the hon. Gentleman was going to make a general reference to the fact that one of his reasons for objecting to the enfranchisement of the police is that the enfranchisement of women should precede or accompany it. I do not think a discussion on the past history of the women's suffrage question would be in Order.

said, that perhaps he had put it too widely. What he wished to show was this—that again and again, when the question of the enfranchisement of women came up, its advocates had been told that they must wait until those questions for the enfranchisement of men then before the House should be disposed of, because to mix up the question of the enfranchisement of women in these discussions would be detrimental to the interests of men. He thought the time had arrived when the validity of that argument should no longer be acknowledged. Therefore, he was strongly of opinion that the House should not proceed to deal with a removal of any other disqualification until it had dealt with the disqualification of sex. If they dealt with the question of enfranchisement at all, they ought to take that which was most important first. It might be said that the enfranchisement of the police and the enfranchisement of women were not alternatives. It might also be said that they would have a Bill before them on the 20th of July dealing with the enfranchisement of women. He admitted that there was a certain amount of force in the latter argument, and he desired to state, in connection with it, that in raising the present issue he was acting upon his own responsibility, and was not acting on behalf of what was called the Women's Suffrage Society. He had not consulted the leaders of that society in any way, and they were not responsible for his action. The position he had taken up might be illustrated by an incident which he believed occurred recently at a railway station. A burly Scotchman appeared upon the platform as a train was moving out, and when the guard prevented him getting into a carriage, he seized the guard, and said, "If I canna, ye shall na'." The result was that the train was stopped for a short time and both got in. He thought that was the position the advocates of women's suffrage were justified in now taking up. They should insist that the enfranchisement of women comes next in order in the matter of enfranchisement, and they should take every opportunity of fixing that subject upon the attention of the House. He observed that of the hon. Members whose names were on the back of this Bill five were in favour of Women's Suffrage. He appealed to them to support this position.

said, he thought the hon. Member had been allowed sufficient latitude. The enfranchisement of women was a separate question, regarding which there was already a Bill before the House.

begged pardon for having trespassed. Nothing could be further from his mind than to contravene the Speaker's ruling. He should not, therefore, pursue the subject further, but, while he was strongly in favour of the enfranchisement of the police, he was of opinion that the enfranchisement of women should come first. For those reasons he begged to move the Amendment of which he had given notice.

Does any hon. Member second the Amendment?

said, he had not the least wish to pro- long the debate; but as one who had had to administer the law in Scotland, and who had also had an opportunity, for 20 years, of observing the conduct of the police ill that country, he must be allowed to add his testimony to what had been said as to the character of the police. As a Scotch County Representative, he desired to protest against the very unfair disability that rested upon the counties of Scotland in contrast with the Royal Burghs in that respect, and he desired to give his cordial and hearty support to the Bill now before the House, because it took away that very unnecessary, arbitrary distinction, which cast a very unjustifiable and cruel disparagement upon the county police. What we wanted was to have confidence in our policemen, that they were men of character and men to be trusted; and he thought that nothing could be worse for the administration of justice thane to have a low class of policemen. Everything that could be done to add to their comfort, and to the respect in which they ought to be entertained by all parts of the community and by themselves, ought to be done. Therefore, he hoped that the second reading of the Bill, giving this wise and opportune extension of the franchise, would be adopted without amendment; for, when the proper time came, the object which the hon. Member who moved the Amendment (Mr. M'Laren) had close to his heart, would receive none the less consideration because they had done justice to a class of men who deserved, in the performance of their duty, the respect and the best treatment of this House and the country.

, in supporting the Bill, said, that he considered the hon. Member (Mr. M'Laren) was one of the strongest supporters of the Bill, though he would reject this Bill until women were enfranchised. He (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) had upon more than one occasion advocated the claims of the police to have the electoral disabilities which now lay upon them, and which applied to no other class of her Majesty's subjects, removed. Last year he had introduced a Bill, practically identical with that now before the House, which had for its object the removal of those disabilities from those whom he considered to be one of the most intelligent among the many different bodies of Her Majesty's subjects, and who wore quite as intelligent citizens, and took as much, interest in politics, as the other public servants whoso disabilities had been already removed. He believed his Bill would then have passed, had he not made the mistake, which he frankly admitted it to be, of extending its operation to the Irish Police; but he was now so convinced that it was un-advisable to include the Irish Police in such a measure that in the present Bill they were excluded, and he should be one of the first to offer his most strenuous opposition to the introduction, into this Bill, of any clause which would extend its operation to Ireland. He did not think that there was any danger that the discipline of the police would be interfered with by permitting them to exercise the franchise. He hoped that nobody would adopt the dog-in-the-manger policy recommended by the hon. Member who had just spoken, and that the Bill would be read a second time, for he regarded it as a simple act of justice to an excellent class of men.

said, that on behalf of the Irish Nationalists, he felt bound to say that he was extremely anxious that the right of voting at Parliamentary Elections should be exercised by the Police of Great Britain, in whom they had every confidence it would be rightly and independently exercised; but they did not think that would be the case in Ireland. He trusted, however, that he should receive a satisfactory assurance that those who supported this Bill would not only themselves not introduce any clause extending the operation of the measure to Ireland, but would oppose, to their utmost, any attempt to insert such a clause in Committee. He must press for an answer upon that point; for whether the Nationalists opposed or supported the Bill would depend upon the nature of the assurances which might be given to them upon that point. There was very good reason for apprehending that the attempt he had referred to would be made.

, with the permission of the House, explained that it was only by accident that a clause limiting the operation of the Bill to Great Britain had been omitted from the Bill. He begged to give the hon. Member opposite (Mr. J. A. Blake) the strongest, the most formal, and the most emphatic assurance that not only would no attempt be made by himself and his Friends to include the Irish Constabulary within the operation of the Bill, but that they would give any attempt to introduce such a clause their most strenuous opposition. He felt that if they wore to take any other course they would be guilty of a breach of faith towards many hon. Members.

said, that as one of the promoters of the Bill, he would resist every attempt to include the Royal Irish Constabulary within its scope. This arose from no want of respect to that splendid body of men, who most admirably discharged the most trying duties. They must all admit the sterling qualities of the Royal Irish Constabulary; but there were, unfortunately, circumstances which made their case in regard to the franchise at the present time different to that of the English police. Some reference had been made to the growing military character of the police force; but he felt sure that it was the desire of the Chief Constables throughout England to maintain the purely civil character of the force. The police, at the present time, voted at School Board elections and for Poor Law Guardians, and no objection whatever had been found to their so voting. There would be no inconvenience in their also voting at Parliamentary elections, and he hoped that, before the close of the Session, this measure of justice would be placed upon the Statute Book. During the period that this measure had been before the country, the feeling in favour of it had increased rather than diminished. No single objection had been put forward to its provisions, or to the principle of enfranchising the police, and the experience of the Chief Constables of boroughs in Scotland, from whom he had received several letters, including one which he would read to the House from the Chief Constable of Edinburgh, who had long police experience both in England and Scotland, was all against the idea that any inconvenience would arise from the admission of the police to the vote. He trusted that the House would agree without a Division to the second reading of this Bill, and so mete out tardy justice to a body of men with whom he had the honour of being closely connected for many years.

said, that though entirely in favour of the enfranchisement of women, he did not think that question should delay police enfranchisement. The duty of citizenship should carry with it the right to the suffrage, the only incapacity being imprisonment for crime or the receipt of parochial relief.

said, he wished to say a few words, rather as the expression of his own views than that of the views of the Government. He thought there was really no valid argument against this Bill, the course of the debate having shown that whether the franchise was a right, as some persons said, or a trust, as he was inclined to regard it, the police appeared equally entitled to possess and exercise it. If it was regarded as a trust, the condition of obtaining it was the possession of the legal qualifications in regard to rating and residence, and also political capacity. It was, he thought, abundantly clear that the police in regard to political capacity and information, and moral qualifications, had a far better claim than most persons in their class of life, and he, therefore, thought that the franchise might be confided to them with the utmost safety. The hon. Member for the Crewe Division of Cheshire (Mr. McLaren) had suggested that the police force was somewhat of a military character. He (Mr. Matthews) agreed with the hon. Gentleman that the spirit of military discipline was not consistent with the fair and frank exercise of political privileges; but he did not believe that the police were tainted with a military spirit. So long as he held his present position he certainly should do his utmost to prevent that. No doubt, in a large city like London, it was necessary to have for the large Police Force what, in some respects, might resemble military organization; but every effort was made to prevent the Police Force obtaining in any way a military tone, and to allow the police when off duty to resume their civic character the only argument that could be used against the franchise being accorded to them was that it would interfere with the discharge of their duties. But experience had shown that the alarm on this head was not well founded. Some English Chief Constables were opposed to this proposal, but the Chief Constables of Scotland, who had had under them, for many years, men who possessed the franchise, stated that they found no objection to it. Indeed, the Inspector General of Constabulary for Scotland had given him the opinion that there was no reason whatever why the privilege of the vote, which had long been enjoyed by the police in the Royal Burghs of Scotland,' should not be extended to the police of the counties. But this he must say, that when the police had the vote, which he trusted they would have by the unanimous assent of the House, they must distinctly understand that discipline) must come first, and have the first consideration, and that any breach of their duties at election time, whether in safeguarding the peace at political meetings by keeping order impartially, or of protecting individual voters when exercising the franchise, would be severely punished. With that fact before their eyes, he thought—indeed, he was quite sure—that the police would discharge their duties as faithfully when allowed to exercise the franchise as they did now. He also hoped that nothing that occurred during election meetings would embitter or aggravate the political feelings of the police. It must also be well understood that if this Bill became law, no objection must be raised on behalf of the police to their being removed from the electoral divisions in which they were registered to other divisions. Such removals must be accepted as being incident to their profession; but at the same time, there would equally be an understanding that they would not be wantonly removed out of those divisions for political purposes. It might be worth the while of the advocates of the interests of the police in this matter, to consider whether it would not be better to repeal those clauses in the existing Acts which prohibited the police from canvassing or from taking any other active part in the conduct of elections. With regard to the Irish police, it might be only prudent that he should say a word to guard against its being supposed that, by the course they were taking in connection with this Bill the Government were conceding the point that, in their opinion, the Irish police stood upon such a distinctly different footing from the English and Scotch police that, at no time, could they propose that the Irish police should be permitted to exercise the franchise. He had no authority to speak on behalf of the Irish Government in the matter; but as he was expressing his personal view rather than that of the Government, he could not pledge the latter on the subject. He might, however, say that he did not apprehend that the Irish Government would think it necessary to deal with this subject in connection with this particular Bill.

said, he was desirous to add his tribute to the character of the Police Force of the country, and to express his hope that the second reading of this Bill would be passed nomine contradicente. He regretted exceedingly the discordant note of his hon. Friend the Member for the Crewe Division of Chester (Mr. McLaren), who, he was afraid, would damage his case by the course he was pursuing. He appealed to him to withdraw his opposition to the Bill. With respect to Ireland, it was a melancholy thing that the necessities of the situation should be such that the Irish Police Force, who were men of high qualities—physical, moral, and mental—should be excluded from the advantages of the Bill; but they must be looked upon as infected by what the Home Secretary called the taint of militarism. He, therefore, sympathized with the proposal that they should be excluded from the scope of the present Bill. But when this House had come to its senses, and had given a better government to Ireland, he sincerely hoped that the Police Force in the Sister Isle would be placed on the same footing as our admirable Police Force in this country.

said, speaking also as a private Member, he had had the honour of standing on two occasions for his native city—Edinburgh—where the police had the franchise; and he was in a position to say that their exercise of the franchise on both of these occasions had certainly not caused any public inconvenience. There had not been the slightest suggestion of any abuse of their privilege on the part of the police. On another occasion he had had the honour of standing for a group of burghs situated in counties. None of these burghs had a Police Force of their own, and the consequence was that the police who served in these burghs, being county police, had no votes. In that particular group of burghs there was a complaint made against one policeman, who had not a vote, of interfering improperly with the election. Probably there was little in it; but it was a remarkable thing that that should have happened while nothing of the sort had taken place in the larger burgh, where all the police had the vote. Speaking entirely as a private Member, he sincerely hoped the Bill would be read a second time, and would pass into law.

, in rising to support the Bill, said, he hoped that the Government would show their approval of this measure by consenting to afford special facilities to enable it to become law this Session. He was unwilling that the second reading should be taken upon the basis alone of the fact that the police were a civil force, because, although that was a very good reason, hon. Gentlemen did not seem to be aware that the soldiers, sailors, and Marines have now a vote. The Marine Corps always voted, and a regiment when stationed in a constituency had a right to the suffrage just as anybody else, and so had also the sailors. He appreciated the suggestion of the Home Secretary that they should guard against giving the public any reason for supposing the police were acting in a partizan manner by guarding against their having a right to canvass; and the police would readily recognize that when they wore obliged to be removed from one district to another. The hon. Member for the Crewe Division of Cheshire (Mr. M'Laren) had suggested that the Bill should not be allowed to pass unless they gave women the franchise. Why should they be asked to ignore and throw out a Bill of that kind when they were all in favour of it, merely because they had not passed another Bill which some of them were opposed to? The Women's Franchise Bill had been lost not through the action of the Conservative Party, but in consequence of the non-fulfilment of the pledges which had been given by a large body of Liberal Members. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Stephen Williamson would recollect that when the Women's Suffrage Bill was before the House, he (Mr. Puleston) and a great many others on that side of the House were in favour of it, but hon. Gentlemen opposite ran away from their pledges, and the Bill was thrown out.

said, he had opposed this Bill last year on the ground that the Irish police were included, but he should give this Bill his hearty support. He believed that the police would exercise the vote with great advantage to all parties. With the sentiment which fell from the hon. Member for Westminster (Mr. Burdett-Coutts) he quite concurred, and that was, that if the Police Force were to exercise the vote we must take all the consequences, and allow them to take part in public meetings. There was no reason why, if police were entitled to vote, they should not attend political meetings. At the same time, he should be opposed to the extension of the franchise to the Irish police, because they were really a military body. He wished the hon. Member for Crewe (Mr. M'Laren) would withdraw the Amendment of which he had given Notice. He (Mr. Handel Cossham) desired that the Police Force should be dealt with upon their own merits. He had many opportunities, some years ago, of receiving some very remarkable testimony in favour of the principle of this Bill.

said, that as the Irish Members had reason to look with suspicion upon this Bill, and as it would be in the power of any hon. Member to move that it should be extended to Ireland, they should ask an assurance from some Member of the Government that no attempt would be made in this House or elsewhere to extend this Bill to Ireland. He could conceive nothing more improper than to extend this Bill to Ireland, because the position which the police occupied in Ireland was very different from that which they occupied in England and Scotland. In England and Scotland the police were local men, who had an interest in a certain locality, and were not liable to be shifted from one end of the country to the other. He might say that, as a whole, the men were not violent politicians. But in Ireland they had the franchise, under the provisions of which the compulsory removal of a man for a single fortnight from one locality to another would deprive him of his vote. The police were officered by men hostile to the people, and the police were liable to be shifted about from place to place at a moment's notice. If they gave policemen votes they must go further and give them the right to nominate or second a candidate; and if a policeman were to nominate or second one of the Nationalist Members he would be hunted out of the force.

said, he was surprised that the Government had not given the assurance mentioned. It was not too much to expect from the Government an assurance that the principles of this Bill should not be extended to Ireland without giving them an opportunity of discussing the matter. He did not admit that there was any reason to fear that if the franchise were given to the policemen in Ireland they would use it in a manner unfavourable to the Nationalist Members. He believed that there was no unanimity on this subject to be found in either of the two sections of the Irish Representatives. The attitude of the Government showed that they considered it invariably incumbent upon them to do exactly the reverse of that which the Nationalist Members desired.

said, he was desirous of saying that he was not prepared to inflict any disabilities upon the Irish police. If the English and Scotch police were enfranchised, he hoped the Government would not consent to exclude the Irish police from the Bill, but would give them the like privileges.

said, he thought that the Government should give an assurance that if they intended to extend the franchise to the police in Ireland this Session, they should do so by a separate Bill. He had no fear of any kind about the Irish police, and he thought that if the subject came on for discussion it would be discussed in a manly and proper way. He thought they were entitled, at all events, to an assurance that if it was intended to extend the franchise to the Irish police, that intention should be given effect to by the introduction of a separate Bill, which he by no means promised to oppose.

said, he could assure hon. Members from Ireland that their opinions were listened to with as much consideration as those of any other section of the House. The Government had no desire to oppose their wishes; but it was not their fault that their opinions were unhappily so much at variance with those ordinarily expressed by hon. Members opposite. If he abstained from pledging the Government on this matter, it was simply because he did not know the views entertained by the Irish Executive. They had not considered this Bill, and, therefore, it was simply as a matter of courtesy to his Colleagues, who were not in the House, that he abstained from giving the pledge.

said, he wished to ask whether he understood the Home Secretary to give his pledge that the Government would not permit this Bill to be used as a vehicle for extending the franchise to the Irish police?

said, he could not promise for private Members of the House; but he thought, however, he could give the assurance asked for by the hon. Member—that if it was thought desirable to extend the franchise to the Irish Constabulary the Government would not attempt to do so by means of this Bill, but in a separate Bill.

, in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, it was unnecessary for him to dilate upon the present unfortunate position of agricultural interests in this country. The facts were sufficiently evidenced by unpaid rents, unlet farms, ruined tenants, as well as ruined landlords, and the considerable extent of land going out of cultivation, abandoned by both landlords and cultivators. This state of matters had been going on for the past 10 years from bad to worse, and they might well ask what Parliament or the landlords had done to avert the disaster which seemed to be impending. He did not know that the agriculture of the country had been sensibly benefited by the Royal Commission appointed some years ago, or by the concessions given by the Agricultural Holdings Act, as they had been of too niggardly and uncertain a character. They failed to give the tenant that security of tenure necessary to stimulate that higher degree of cultivation which was the only means of enabling him to meet with and contest against foreign competition. Although the agricultural depression might be due, to some extent, to bad seasons, the main cause of the existing difficulty, in his view, was the low price of agricultural produce, resulting from the competition of other agricultural countries. Farmers did not complain of the abundance of food, but that their hands were tied, that they wore overburdened with high rents, and other disabilities which it was in the power of Parliament to remove, and that, unless that were done, they could not enter into competition with farmers abroad. It seemed to him that the only hope for agriculture in this country was to place the farmers, as much as possible, in the advantageous circumstances possessed by foreign producers. Take the case of the Western States of America and the North-West of Canada as compared with this country. There the farmers owned the land; and even admitting that their farms were mortgaged, that would only amount to a tax of about 2s. per acre. They cultivated almost exclusively with their own labour, or that of their families; and even with 100 acres, he did not think the farmer would have to pay more than £30 for labour for outside help. The farmers in America and Canada had one disadvantage, however, in competing with the British farmer, and that was the large amount of transport they had to pay. The existing Atlantic rates was no criterion; for wheat was at present brought from New York to London at a cheaper rate than from places within 20 miles of the Metropolis. Taking the railway transit alone with the average Atlantic freight, the cost to the American producer was about 10 s. per quarter; while the average cost of transit to the British farmer was 2s. 6d.; leaving an advantage to the British farmer of 7s. 6d. per quarter, or about 30s. per acre. That was a very substantial advantage; and if the British farmer had free hands and security of possession, he would be still able to maintain his ground against the foreign producer, and, at the same time, be able to pay a moderate rent. He did not propose in his Bill to make the farmers of this country owners of their own land, neither did he propose that they should have land rent free; but what he did propose was that they should have perfect freedom of cultivation, that they should have security of tenure, such as would give them that assurance which was necessary, in order to encourage that high farming to which they must resort if they were going to meet the competition of the American farmers. Parliament could also offer facilities for the breaking up of large farms into smaller holdings. He was not going into the controversy as to the cost of production on large farms as compared with small farms; but he appealed to the experience of every landowner Member, whether he did not let his small farms with far greater facility than his large farms, and at higher rents per acre. He did not propose to make the subdivision of farms compulsory. He only proposed to give reasonable facilities for subdivision where landlords and tenants were agreed. The first part of the Bill proposed to deal with existing leases, and to make provision for the alleviation of the grievances of farmers in Scotland who now hold under 19 years' leases. That subject had already been discussed at some length by the Amendment of the hon. Member for South Aberdeenshire (Mr. Esslemont) to the Address, at the commencement of the Session, and he did not desire to take up the time of the House by again entering upon the various arguments which were then pressed; but he had some encouragement in recurring to this subject again, because it would be remembered that the present Chief Secretary for Ireland, who was then Secretary for Scotland (Mr. A. J. Balfour), opposed the Amendment, and declared that it was impossible for Parliament to consider such a proposal as to interfere with contracts, that it was quite unprecedented, and that the Government would oppose it to the last. Since then, however, a change had come over the spirit of the dream of the right hon. Gentleman and the Government, because a Bill had been introduced in "another place" which proposed to do for the leaseholders in Ireland that which the Representatives for Scotland unsuccessfully entreated the House to do for the farmers of Scotland. What grounds of difference wore there between the tenants of Ireland and Scotland? He (Mr. Barclay) ventured to say that the tenants under the 19 years' leases in Scotland had done as much to improve their land as the tenants in Ireland, The position was exactly the same. But political exigencies seemed to have coerced the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman and the Government; and now they had a proposal brought forward, on the responsibility of the Government, to give to the Irish tenants that relief which they would not give to the tenants of Scotland. He was, therefore, very willing to hope that the Government had come to a better frame of mind upon the question; that they had so acted because they recognized the justice of the case, and that they were not compelled by fear of the Irish tenantry to grant to them what had been demanded for the tenantry of Scotland. It would be a most unfortunate suggestion to put before the tenants of Scotland that the House of Commons would only legislate for them upon compulsion, and that the only hope they had of getting grievances remedied was not on the grounds of justice, but fear. With respect to leases, there was nothing in the Bill to prevent landlords and tenants agreeing to a reduction of rent; but either party could appeal to the Land Court to fix a fair rent. At the conclusion of the lease, the tenant surrendered his farm, and then the landlord and tenant might make such bargain as they thought proper. One of the objections urged against the Amendment on the Address was that almost all the landlords of Scotland had given fair reductions. He was there to deny that such was the case. He only knew of a few cases in which it could be said that landlords had taken up a fair position with regard to their tenants, and had given the concessions which the nature of the case demanded. Reductions had been given in a great many cases, he admitted; but small reductions were entirely inadequate. In many cases the reductions did not exceed 10 percent; whereas, if the rent had been reduced according to the reduction in the value of produce, there would have been no rent at all. In one or two cases, he had seen that landlords had agreed to give the tenants their farms upon mutual arbitration. The landlord appointed one valuator and the tenant another. He accepted that proposal as fair, where the tenant really had power to appoint his own valuator; but, in the majority of cases, the offer to arbitrate was a farce, as the valuers were appointed by the landlords only. Many of the tenants in Scotland under 19 years' leases took their farms when prices were at the highest rate, and for several years rents had been paid out of capital; but that could not continue. In many cases the landlord simply allowed the tenant to sink into arrears of rent, out of which it was hopeless he could emerge; and he would appeal to landlords whether it would not be wiser to face the difficulty in time, and put the farmers in an independent position by agreeing to give them their farms at such rents as tenants could fairly pay upon the present basis of prices, and when prices of produce increased, then the question of a higher rent could be reconsidered? He did not propose to give the existing tenants any fixity of tenure. He proposed that fair rents should be fixed, and that, at the close of the lease, full compensation for improvements should be given according to the principles laid down in the clauses of the Agricultural Holdings Act. He should be quite satisfied with the clauses inserted in the Crofters Act, and which gave the tenants and crofters in the Highlands full compensation for improvements, on the basis of the increased letting value of the farms due to their improvements. He could not see why the crofters and large tenants in the Lowlands of Scotland, were not on grounds of equity and justice entitled to the same consideration as the crofters in the Highlands of Scotland. The second part of the Bill dealt with the subject of future tenancies. He did not propose, under the Bill, that the State or any authority should interfere to fix fair rents under future leases. He contemplated that landlord and tenant should be free to agree as to what rents were to be paid for the farms; but he made certain statutory conditions for leases which, in his opinion, were indispensable to the successful cultivation of the land. The first condition was that the contract should be in writing; and, in the second place, that the tenure should be in perpetuity, so long as the tenant paid his rent. This latter he considered to be an essential condition of successful farming in the future. [A laugh.]Hon. Members might smile; but he did not think they had studied sufficiently the economical facts with which they had to deal. Where was the farmer now who was putting money into his farm? The land of the country was being impoverished from year to year; partly because farmers had less confidence in the future, and partly because they had not money to spend in manures. He wished, therefore, to make it a statutory condition that the man who cultivated the land should have the right of cultivating it in perpetuity, so long as he paid the rent, and did not dilapidate the farm. He provided, also, that the rent should be stated in money; but there was a provision which would enable the landlord and tenant to agree upon a produce rent. When they agreed on the money rent they were at the same time to agree what quantities of certain articles the produce of the farm represented that money; and at the end of every three years, the tenant should be be bound to pay the landlord, the following three years, the equivalent in money of the fixed quantities of agricultural produce specified in the lease, at the average price of the preceding three years. The proposal was, that a money rent should be fixed upon the basis of the average prices of a term of three years. He thought it would be inconvenient to have the rent changed every year. He did not think that three years was too long a period. He provided, also, an arrangement which would enable the Land Court or Commission to fix the average prices continuously of those articles of agricultural produce which might properly be selected to make up a produce rent. In fixing the average he did not confine himself to cereals; but would also take in the prices of beef, mutton, dairy produce, and also other produce of the farm. Taking such an average, they could eliminate, so far as practicable, the element of uncertainty as to the future. These were the princi- pal provisions of the Bill in regard to rent. He had endeavoured to bring about the changes, which seemed to him absolutely necessary, in a way the least injurious to existing interests, and which would be most for the benefit of all parties concerned, including the public. He did not propose, as he had already said, to interfere with the landlord and tenant in fixing future rents; but he thought the State was entitled to see that the cultivator should hold the land on such terms as would stimulate him. to adopt the best form of cultivation. No doubt, the change in the position of the landlords would be distasteful to many of them; but it was a change forced upon them, not because of agitation, but by economic causes, which they were powerless to resist. The change had resulted from competition, and the struggle would result in the survival of the fittest. But the system would not be without its advantages for the landlord as well as the tenant; the landlord would in future be saved nearly all the expense of management, for under this system the tenant would do all improvements. That would greatly facilitate the improvement of farms; and, as the tenant would work more economically than the landlord, the improvements would be carried out at a smaller cost It was well known that a large proportion of the income of the Legal Profession was derived from the management of estates. The change would be somewhat unfortunate for the Legal Profession, because under it the landlord would have little difficulty or expense in the collection of ground rents, while the tenants would have to undertake the repairs and improvements that would be necessary. He had now indicated the principal provisions of the measure as to fixity of tenure; and he would only say that the principle which underlaid the measure and which he was endeavouring to carry out was this—that by this system of tenure the tenant would be stimulated to make more out of the land than under any other form of tenure whatever, and if that were so, the tenant would be in a position to give the landlord the largest possible amount of rent that the land would yield. He was not much in favour of the tenant's owning the land. There were certain practical disadvantages connected with such a system; one being that it necessitated the tieing up of the tenant's capital to a much greater extent than would be the case under the system he proposed. In his view, the most desirable form of possession the cultivator could have was to have the land at a moderate rent, with perpetuity of possession. There was one provision of the Bill he wished to call special attention to. That was the part of the measure which proposed that any contract between landlord and tenant should be registered in a public register kept for the purpose. He proposed that the land should be transferred from tenant to tenant by written registered contract, and that the ownership should be determined by entry in the public register, coupled with possession. That seemed to him a solution of many of the difficulties attending the title to freehold land, and the difficulties of transferring land. By the system he proposed the transfer of freehold land would simply be a transfer of rent charges. He contemplated by the measure that the man who cultivated the land should have it in perpetuity, subject to the condition that the rant agreed upon be paid, and that he did nothing to depreciate the farm. The present tying up of ownership of land in various hands prevented the improvement of the land. Under the system he now proposed, seeing that the tenant would have free hands to improve the land, and to invest what capital he desired in it with security that he would reap the fruit of it, the tenant would make the improvements, the landlord would have his rent charges, and, so far as entails and settlements were concerned, any questions that arose would only be between the different beneficiaries, but the public would not be injured by it. The other important matter in the Bill was with regard to the creation of small holdings. He did not propose to make the breaking up of large farms compulsory; but he proposed that Parliament should give facilities for the creation of small holdings. The difficulty landlords felt at present in breaking up largo farms into small holdings was in providing capital for the new houses and buildings necessary. Now, he proposed that the Treasury should advance money to an extent not exceeding £2,000,000 in all, for the purpose of erecting the necessary buildings on these newly - created smaller holdings. He stipulated that the holdings should not be smaller than 20 and not larger than 100 acres; and he limited the advances to £5 per acre for holdings of between 20 and 50 acres, and to £4 per acre for holdings of between 50 and 100 acres. These loans would be repaid by instalments, in the first place, by the tenants to whom the money was advanced; but the loan would be secured as a first charge on the holdings, and that would make the loan perfectly secure. At the end of 25 years the tenant—the industrious tenant as he hoped—would have paid off the whole amount of the loan, and the landlord would have for the risk he had incurred during these 25 years, a better security for the due payment of his rent in the future. He believed that would be a very great advantage to the landlords; because it was the universal experience in Scotland that a landlord would get more for a farm of from 50 to 100 acres than for one of larger extent. Indeed, it was almost impossible to get tenants for larger farms, and he believed it would grow more and more difficult in the future. What he proposed the Treasury should do, should, no doubt, be done by the landlords themselves in their own interests; but, unfortunately, in these times many landlords were not well situated, and, therefore, he proposed that the Treasury should intervene with Parliamentary sanction to advance up to £2,000,000 sterling for the purpose of facilitating the creation of smaller farms. There ware some other provisions in the Bill as to the acquisition of land for public purposes; but he would not detain the House by going over these. He had as briefly as he could slated the principal provisions embodied in the Bill, and he would add that, under the system, the landlords would, obtain a much greater rent than under any other. He recommended it on that ground to the landlords; but it would be of great benefit to many of the smaller tenants also. He did not propose to give existing tenants any advantage in the retaking of farms. He proposed that, on the expiry of their present leases, they should make a new bargain; but he proposed that, in doing so, they should have that satisfactory system of tenure which must be come to in one form or another before very long. He would commend the measure as a very conservative one, for this reason, that it would give—more than now was the case—the people an interest in the land. If they had the people of the country largely interested in the land, it was one of the best securities they could have for the stability of their institutions; but, at present, only the few had such an interest. Another effect of the Bill would be largely to increase the rural population, for, by its adoption, they would be able to settle a great many more people on the land. By means of the smaller farms, he imagined that many of the population who were at present landless, would be able to make a comfortable living out of the land. They would also, under this system, get rid of the complaints with regard to, and at the same time very much relieve, the pressure of unskilled labour drifting from the country into the towns—a cause which had aggravated the distress of most of our large towns. If the people had a chance of living in the country, they would remain there; but, under existing circumstances, they were gradually being compelled to drift away to the towns. The increase of the rural population would also create an increased demand for our manufactures, and they would have more consumers and not necessarily more producers. If Parliament laid down a reasonable, a just, and an equitable system of tenure which would open up the means of livelihood, he thought they would spread contentment and industry throughout the country; and he had very great confidence that the system would stimulate the prosperity, not only of the rural districts, but also of the towns—not only of agriculture, but also of manufactures—and would produce a prosperity not less great, but perhaps more permanent, than that which followed upon the adoption of a Free Trade policy in this country. He moved the second reading of the Bill.

, in rising to second the Motion, said, that after the full exposition which the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) had given, he did not intend to detain the House at any length regarding the provisions of the Bill. If this Bill were passed, the relief given to the agricultural industry of Scotland would undoubtedly be very great. The Bill would be beneficial in three different directions. In the first place, it would be distinctly beneficial in the case of the tenantry. There was to be an opportunity for the revision of rents under 19 years' leases. There was to be given security of tenure, under which alone a tenant would have inducement sufficient to put into the land what was necessary to produce sufficient crops to benefit himself. Another important point was that under this Bill the tenant would be rewarded for keeping his farm up to the highest point of agricultural fertility. It was a great drawback that the Agricultural Holdings Act did not make that secure. The efforts of farmers to keep up their holdings to the highest point of fertility had been used against them by landlord or valuer in putting on an increased rent at the end of the lease. Under this Bill the tenant would be amply recompensed by the increased value of the tenant right. Then he would have the advantage of free cropping. Of course, the tenant would not be such a fool as to do anything which would diminish the fertility of the soil, and therefore he could be trusted with that freedom. He (Dr. Farquharson) advocated this Bill also in the interests of the landlord. He was himself a landlord—a confession which it required some courage to make now-a-days in that House—and he was certain, after looking over this Bill very carefully, and considering its provisions, that it was framed quite as much in the interest of the landlord as in the interest of the tenant. It would be a substantial advantage to the landlord. In the first place, the rent would be very much safer than it was at present. Then the landlord would be relieved of all expense of making improvements. He himself would be able to cut off every year sums of money which he was now compelled to spend on improvements. If he had not spent these sums, he should now be in a very tolerable financial condition, instead of being, he was sorry to say, somewhat in the other direction. Best of all, he would point out that, under this Bill, the tenant would get compensation by a sure and certain method instead of getting it under the Agricultural Holdings Act under conditions of litigation, annoyance, and expense, which not only very often put him on bad terms with his landlord, but often prevented him from getting his duo. Although a well-meant measure, the Agricultural Holdings Act had completely failed to give that confidence to the tenants which they required in the present depressed condition of agriculture. Then they were to have a Land Court to settle arrangements instead of the present hazardous plan of valuation. They knew what valuation meant. It meant that one valuer was appointed by the tenant and another by the landlord, that these disagreed, and that then the oversman came in and settled the matter according to his own views. The Land Court was well defined and carefully arranged—to be presided over by a Judge of the Court of Session. He had no doubt that under it agricultural arrangements would be carried out with far greater advantage both to landlord and tenant than they now were. Thirdly, he advocated this Bill in the interests of the general public, because it stood to reason that if the tenant had greater confidence that every improvement he made on the land would be absolutely his own, he would naturally put more into the land, and the more he put into the land the more would come out of it. The public would get the advantage of the increased produce. Then the tenant would not—so often as was the case at present—allow the land to run out in the latter part of the lease. The tenant would get his compensation from the incoming tenant in tenant right, and, of course, it would be to his advantage to keep up the highest point of fertility right to the end of the lease. A good many objections had been made at various times to proposals of this kind. It had been said that they would act very injuriously against the smaller class of tenants—that the agricultural labourer who had saved a little money, and wanted to take a farm, would not be able to compete with richer men for the tenant right. There would have been a good deal in that objection if it had not been that it was completely covered by the landlord's pre-emption. Then they had heard something of a landlord being only a rent-charger. If, however, the landlord was a sure rent-receiver, he would occupy a valuable position. He did not see why a landlord should be on worse terms with his tenants or get less pleasure out of his land under this Bill than was the case at present. A great many of the disputes between landlords and tenants arose in connection with improvements, but under this Bill the tenant would entirely make his own improvements. He should hope that the relations between landlords and tenants, instead of being injured, would rather be improved. In connection with the Irish Land Act, they were told that when property was sold round the residence of a proprietor, he ceased to live in the country; but the study of the recent Blue Book proved the entire fallacy of that statement. He had not the slightest doubt that, even if the tenants round a landlord's residence were in this condition of independence, the landlord would still remain and enjoy his position, and confer the benefits which a resident landlord always did. He had great pleasure in supporting the Bill, and hoped they might be in a position that day to arrive at a second reading.

said, that though he represented a London constituency, he was a Scotchman with some knowledge of his country, and he bogged to move the rejection of this Bill, which was ill-advised, unnecessary, and uncalled for. The hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) stated that for the past 10 years agriculture had been going from bad to worse owing to the depreciation of prices of produce. The remedy was certainly not to be found in this Bill. It proposed to give security of tenure to the tenant, which was, no doubt, a very good thing in itself. But in the present state of affairs in England and Scotland, with so many farms vacant, any tenant who paid his rent was practically quite secure in his holding. He knew many instances in Forfarshire and Kincardineshire where tenants hold under 19-year leases, and who found no difficulty in getting them renewed; and he knew instances in which farms had remained in the same family for several generations. The tenants of Scotland did not want the whole system of land tenure remodelled on the lines of Irish legislation, for the Irish Land Acts of 1870 and 1881 were proved to be gigantic failures. The only way of fixing a "fair" rent was to allow the laws of supply and demand to have free scope, and by agreements between man and man. Any attempt by third parties to fix a rent which should be fair for 15 years, must break down. The Bill also proposed to create perpetuity leases. But this would be most unjust. Why should a landlord be compelled to lease his land in perpetuity to anyone? Then, as to the proposal for a re-valuation every three years, he would point out that a tenant might let his farm run down just before the re-valuation, in order to get a low rent.

I do not propose that there should be any change in the rents except as depending on the value of the produce. There is to be no re-valuation of the farm.

No; but it depends on the amount of produce on the farm.

Not at all. Read the clause.

said, he objected to the power given to Local Authorities to compulsorily acquire sites for dwellings. Such a power would enable a Local Authority to cut up a large estate and ruin it. Three-fourths of the land of Scotland was grazing land, and a proposal to cut out portions of large estates and pitchfork small farms throughout the country would work very badly. It would not be fair or equitable towards the landlord to empower Local Authorities to purchase land beyond their own district. This piece of legislation, which was an ill-advised, ill-digested measure, was one of the least desired and least required of any he had ever seen in his life. It was not asked for by the people of Scotland. He begged to move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.

seconded the Amendment.

said, he thought it rather curious that when a Bill of this importance had been proposed by the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) and supported by the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire (Dr. Farquharson) no one on the part of the Government, or on the Conservative side of House, who was in any way familiar with the subject, should have risen to address the House upon it. He assumed, from the silence of Conservative Members who represented Scottish county constituencies, and who were themselves landlords, that they admitted that a measure of this kind was urgently wanted in many respects by the tenant farmers of Scotland, and their silence did them credit. At any rate, he should be very much astonished to hear any of them deny that the hon. Member for Forfarshire had brought forward an overwhelming case for the interference of this House. But what did hon. Members do in this case? They knew that the Government had attempted to prevent the Bill being discussed, because one hon. Member had blocked it; and now, when it had come on for discussion, they selected an hon. Member for a London constituency to move its rejection. That hon. Member knew very little about it.

My claim to speak on a Scottish question is that I am a Scotsman.

said, he did not mean to say the hon. Member had not a perfect right to speak on matters relative to his native country. There were many Scotsmen who had not been in Scotland for a great many years, and who did not know what was going on among the Scottish agricultural population; and when he found that a born Scotsman, like the hon. Member, had found a refuge in St. Pancras, he could not help thinking he had not spent much time among the agricultural population of Scotland, and was not entitled to tell the House that this measure was not wanted. He hoped the House would consider that, perhaps, he (Mr. Anderson) had some right to speak on this question, because he represented a constituency that was deeply interested in it. He had from time to time discussed the question with his constituents, and only last week he had communications with many farmers in the North of Scotland respecting it. Such was the condition of agriculture in Scotland at the present moment, that the case of tenants under existing leases was abso- lutely desperate. It must be admitted that the existing rents for land in Scotland were far too high. Farmers were bound, under these leases, to pay these high rents. They struggled to pay them, and did pay them; and to a great extent they had paid them out of their capital—so much so that he was sorry to say that many who were called substantial farmers had very little of their capital left. They had sunk a great portion of it in their farms, and they were in this position—that, if they left, they had no means of getting it back. The present Agricultural Holdings Act did not give them any remedy. Everyone knew that the present law was inedequate, and he ventured to submit, when they had tenants in this condition, that nothing could be more reasonable than a provision for fixing fair rents, such as was introduced in the first clause of this Bill. That seemed to him one of the most important provisions. The next seemed to him also to be of great importance—namely, to practically abolish the schedules of the Agricultural Holdings Act. Then came the question of disposing of the tenancy. He had often asked the question, why could not the tenant of a farm be able to dispose of his tenancy? It seemed to him most extraordinary that, if he wanted to go to some other part of the country, that was the only thing he could not dispose of. It seemed to him if that could be done it would encourage farmers to expend capital and improve their farms. The question of allotments was one of very great importance, and he thought the Conservative Party had come to the conclusion that it was one of their cardinal principles. The principle of the compulsory purchase of allotments was admitted by the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington (Lord Randolph Churchill) in the now famous Dartford speech; and since then they had also understood that the "three acres and a cow" policy was accepted by the Conservative Party. Therefore he was astonished at the remarks of the hon. Member opposite.

said, that he had not spoken against the principle of allotments, but against the manner in which it was given effect to in this Bill.

said, he failed to see the distinction. He had never heard of any other principle of allotments than that which was embodied in their Bill—namely, that of giving Local Authorities power of compulsory purchase. It was of the highest importance that this House should encourage the agricultural labourers of the country to look to the time when they could get land for themselves. At the present moment it was absolutely impossible in many parts of Scotland for an agricultural labourer to get land. This was only a fair concession to make to the agricultural labourers of Scotland. He appealed to hon. Members not to vote against a Bill of this kind. Hon. Members opposite seemed to think that no reforms were to be carried out in reference to the land, until they had a rebellion in the country. Although there was no open agitation in Scotland, there was a very deep feeling among the tenant farmers on this subject. And if the opinion of the Scottish tenant farmers were taken, he believed they would be unanimous in their support of this Bill. ["No, no!"] He knew the lairds would not be unanimous. He was speaking of the tenant farmers. If the lairds persisted in saying "No," they would bring about an agitation such as they had had in Ireland. Feeling that many of the proposals of this Bill were most essential, and were desired by the tenant farmers of Scotland, he hoped the second reading would be agreed to.

said, that, probably, the hon. Member for St. Pancras (Mr. R. G. Webster) had had as much experience on this subject as the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn (Mr. Anderson), whose experience in Scotland, so far as he knew, had been confined to the two brief canvassing expeditions in which he had contested his seat. Before reading the Bill he looked to see who were the hon. Members whose names were upon the back, and he believed that everyone of these Gentlemen sat for constituencies in the North of Scotland. They in Scotland had always thought that the people of Aberdeen-shire wore those best able to take care of themselves; but now they found that the Aberdonians were the very people who were coming and asking Parliament to interfere with their contracts. He did not know what warrant the hon. Member for Elgin and Nairn had for saying that rents in Scotland were far too high, unless it was that in the course of his canvass he had met with farmers who were of that opinion. But the hon. Member took it upon himself to speak for the whole of Scotland. With regard to the Dartford speech, although they, on that side, agreed with the main part of the programme there laid down, they had not committed themselves to the whole of it, and certainly not to the compulsory purchase of allotments. In fact, he was not sure that the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington (Lord Randolph Churchill) had proposed it. He did not agree with the hon. Member that the tenant farmers of Scotland would vote for the Bill. At all events, if the hon. Member came to the county which he (Mr. Baird) knew best, he was perfectly sure he would not gain the seat. An hon. Member in supporting the Bill spoke of the advantages to the tenant farmers and others of having perfect freedom of cultivation. He (Mr. Baird) considered that the tenant farmers had already freedom of cultivation. There were very few landlords in Scotland who would interfere with a good tenant in regard to his methods of cultivation. Reductions of rent had been given in many instances to a much greater extent than 10 per cent. In some cases 30 per cent had been conceded. With regard to the disadvantages arising from the fall of prices, he might point out that, on the other hand, there had also been an enormous decrease during the last two years in the price of artificial manures. If this Bill passed, the interest of the landlord in his own estate would disappear altogether.

The rent-charge will remain.

The hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire (Dr. Farquharson) pointed out the advantages to the landlords of getting rid of the expense of improvements. All he (Mr. Baird) could say was that it had been a great pleasure to him as a landlord to make those improvements for a good many years; but if this Bill passed, he should leave them to his tenants, and whether they would be as efficiently carried out by the tenants as they had been by the landlords remained to be seen. Then it was said that the expenses of management would be abolished. To a certain extent, no doubt, the expenses of man- agement would be abolished by the provisions of the measure; but against that they must put the expense of the litigation that would take place between landlord and tenant. Great improvements had been carried out under the old system; and he appealed to the hon. Member for East Lothian (Mr. Haldane) whether he had ever seen a county in England or Scotland brought into such a magnificent state of cultivation as the county of which he was the Representative? He objected to the discussion of the whole system of land tenure in Scotland on a Wednesday afternoon in a thin House, and, in his opinion, a Bill of this nature—which revolutionized the whole land tenure of Scotland—should be brought in by a responsible Government, not by a private Member. The Bill was most drastic, and not only did it alter the whole system of land tenure in Scotland, but it introduced the Irish system of legislation, introducing the three F's—fair rent, fixity of tenure, and free sale. Fixity of tenure and free sale he objected to altogether. He could not object to fair rent; but he objected to the system by which fair rent was to be established, and he wished that it should remain as it always had been, a matter of arrangement between the man who wished to hire the land and the landlord. He denied that the old land system of Scotland had broken down. What was wanted was not a new system, but fair rents under the old system. He believed that if the farmers of Scotland received a reduction of rent they would not desire any of the other provisions. One provision, he must say, he agreed with—and if the hon. Member would bring in a separate Bill dealing with that he would support him—namely, a Bill to provide for money being advanced to landlords, for the purpose of breaking up large holdings and erecting the necessary buildings the tenants, no doubt, used to have a great grievance in respect of unexhausted improvements; but that grievance had been met to a considerable extent by the Agricultural Holdings Act of Scotland. This Bill proposed to do in Scotland what had already been done in Ireland, and he did not think the results of the land agitation in Ireland were such as to induce hon. Members to apply them to Scot- land. The Bill provided also for dual ownership; and he had always considered that the most objectionable feature of the result of the Irish Land Act, and, for his part, he would much sooner be purchased out altogether. If the House was to interfere with the relations between landlord and tenant in Scotland it would be much better to buy out the landlords at once. In the part of Scotland with which he was acquainted, the South and South-West, there was no feeling in favour of this Bill. The tenant farmers had been getting substantial reductions of rent, and they did not wish to be interfered with in regard to making their contracts, and he hoped the House would not consent to read the Bill a second time.

said, he could well understand that there was no special call from the Central Division of Glasgow, which the hon. Member (Mr. Baird) represented, for that Bill, nor did he expect that there would be; but, if the hon. Gentleman spoke for the West of Scotland, he could only say that since he (Mr. Esslemont) moved an Amendment on the Address in regard to Scotch leases, he had been inundated with letters from tenantry in the West of Scotland, saying that they did indeed feel extremely the present depression of agriculture, and pleading with and praying him not to relax his efforts. The writers said that the dread of landlords and factors was continually upon them, because the factors and the landlords had been coming down upon those who were known to be agitators for the reform of the Land Laws of Scotland, and men had been sequestrated for no other reason than that. In fairness to the hon. Member who had just sat down, he must say that he knew a good deal about the family of the hon. Member, and that they, as well as the hon. Member himself, had been among the most improving proprietors in Scotland, and had done a great deal for the improvement of agriculture, and for the advantage of tenants. He (Mr. Esslemont) did not hold exactly the same views as his hon. Friend the Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) on the question of dual ownership; and he rather agreed with the hon. Member for the Central Division of Glasgow that it would be, per- haps, better to put an end to that system, and that some means should be adopted by which the cultivator of the soil should, in point of fact, become proprietor. But, at the same time, he must say he was rather surprised at some of the doctrines enunciated by hon. Members on the other side of the House. With respect to the Dartford speech, it had disappeared from view, and its author, the distinguished Member of the Government who was responsible for it (Lord Randolph Churchill), had disappeared too. ["No, no!"] Why, nothing else but closure and coercion, which had replaced it, had been before the House ever since the Session began; and the programme of the Dartford speech had been relegated to the dim and distant future. So far as hon. Gentlemen opposite were concerned, he should be glad to hear a responsible enunciation of policy on behalf of the Government on this question. The right hon. Member for the Sleaford Division of Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin) had introduced several Bills for the compulsory purchase of land for allotments; but, now, hon. Members opposite seemed to go against that policy; but he supposed that they were prepared to vote against the right hon. Gentleman on the question. The principle of compulsory purchase was admitted, and the only question to be settled was that of compensation. Compulsory purchase was no new principle. It was only looked upon as a monstrous thing when it was applied to tenants getting land from the proprietors. He would be astonished if any hon. Member would stand up and say that a proprietor had the right to resist the purchase of land for any public purpose, provided he was fairly compensated. The hon. Member for the Central Division of Glasgow said that tenants who went in for good husbandry were always allowed freedom of cultivation; but, if that was so, why did proprietors insert in their leases, that a tenant who deviated from a certain course would be liable to pay a heavy fine? Then they were told that reductions of 10 or 15 per cent on the rents were being made he (Mr. Esslemont) had seen many receipts for those reductions, and, as a general rule, they embodied a clause whereby, if any improvement belonged to the tenant at the end of the lease, the 10 or 15 per cent was to be deducted. It was in the power of the landlord, in the same way, to say that, if he allowed a change of cropping, the sum due to him for that change would be a deduction at the end of the lease. Then, the hon. Member opposite said there was a thin attendance; but that was usually the case when questions appertaining to Scotland were being discussed. Would the hon. Member deny that, if there was any hope of practical legislation, there would be a large attendance? The hon. Member, however, had paid a compliment to Aberdeenshire, and far be it from him (Mr. Esslemont) to reject it. The hon. Gentleman said he understood that the people of Aberdeenshire were as well able to look after their own interests as the people of any other county of Scotland. He (Mr. Esslemont) quite agreed with the hon. Member in that statement. It was on account of their intelligence, ability, and discernment of their interests, that they had sent two Members from the city, and two Members from the county, who were entirely in favour of the principle of the Bill; and he did not think it would be denied that these hon. Members to a large extent represented the most intelligent opinion of Scotland upon the principles of the Bill, and it was also a strong reason why the measure should pass. The hon. Member for East St. Pancras (Mr. Webster) was entirely at sea on the clauses of the Bill. It was true that leases had been held by the same family from one generation to another. He knew well about that succession; and he knew how effectively at the end of each lease, the capital that had been created by the tenant was appropriated by the landlord. It was because the tenant had not the accumulations of past generations to stand by, that now he had to look only to bankruptcy for relief. It had been said by hon. Members opposite that there was no agitation in Scotland upon this question. As to that it had been his duty, as well as his endeavour, to put down any agitation which he conceived to be an objectionable or un-Constitutional kind; but he warned the Government and the other Representatives from Scotland that were then present in the House, from information he had from all parts of Scotland, that it would not be possible to resist a very strong agita- tion in favour of the relief of the tenants of Scotland, and in favour of a large measure of reform of land tenure in years to come. There would be no want of agitation even among the law-abiding people of Scotland. It should be remembered that in consequence of an agitation in the Highlands, the Government had to pass the Crofters Act. He would, however, acknowledge that many of the landlords in Scotland had met their tenants in this crisis in a most generous and ready manner. For instance, one of the largest proprietors in the connty he represented had met the present emergency by offering his tenants either the relief due to outgoing tenants, or a re-valuation of their farms. But, generally, he knew that many more in the south of Scotland had met their tenants more fairly than in the north. In Aberdeenshire there was practically no fall in the rent roll whatever, and they had positive proof that the landlords in that county had not readily met the claims of the tenants. Legislation, however, was sought not on account of the benevolent and generous landlords, but for those who had not done their duty; and those who had met their tenants would not be touched by any Bill like this. Without committing himself to every detail of the Bill, he gave it his cordial support.

said, the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) had depicted the state of Scotland with great fairness and impartiality. But he (Mr. Stewart) could not say the same of some of his supporters, and he could not congratulate the hon. Member who had just sat down (Mr. Esslemont) upon the speech he had. delivered. All the landlords the hon. Member seemed to know were landlords of the most tyrannical and cruel character—

I did not say anything of the kind. What I said was, that a large proportion of the landlords had met their tenants in the most generous way, and I wanted this measure for the minority.

said, the greater part of the hon. Member's speech appeared to be taken up, not with a criticism of the Bill, but with inveighing against a class of men who were in very depressed circumstances, and had great difficulties to contend with. The hon. Member had stated that when the landlord did give a reduction of rent, it necessarily came off the compensation which was due to the tenant at the end of the lease. That might occur in Aberdeenshire; he did not know whether it did or not; but he had never heard of a case of the kind in the South of Scotland. Many of his friends had given abatements to a very large extent. His Party had been taunted with not giving allotments to labourers; but that was a mistake. With regard to the allotment system, he thought the more occupiers of the land they had in this country the better it would be for the country. They did not wish to tie up enormous tracts of land in the hands of a few men; on the contrary, they were anxious that the land should be better distributed; but no one would buy land in Scotland. In the South of Scotland there were large tracts of suitable land allotments; but no one could be found to buy it, and the consequence was that the land remained in the hands of a few proprietors. What they did object to was, that the Local Authority should come down and seize any choice portion of land on an estate, or a policy, or garden, they pleased. There was nothing to prevent them doing that in this Bill, and the practice would give rise to serious abuses. A Local Authority might seize some choice piece of land close to a mansion house, and convert it into allotments. They might even go outside the precincts of a locality where they had influence, and might claim, in another district, the jurisdiction which they exercised in their own locality. That, he considered, would be most unfair, and it would give rise to all sorts of complaints. He agreed with the hon. Member in the principle of giving allotments. He thought the Local Authority might have power to point out that such and such land was suitable for allotments, and ought to be laid out in allotments; but when it came to compulsory purchase he thought the landlord was justified in having an appeal to a higher tribunal, which would be perfectly fair and unprejudiced—in England, say, to the Local Government Board; in Scotland to some Board that might be constituted. The hon. Member said that the Dartford speech was now quite ignored; but it had been stated to him (Mr. Stewart), on the highest authority, (bat the principle of the Dartford speech was still adopted, and that measures on its lines would be laid on the Table of the House. He was aware of the great difficulties which the tenants had to endure at the present time; and he thought the landlords, in many cases, did not thoroughly realize the great gravity of the situation. If they had technical education in agricultural matters, such as he proposed, he believed that many of the present difficulties would disappear, and there would be no necessity for such radical measures as that now under consideration. The hon. Member for Forfarshire had stated that the main principle of this inroad upon old legislation consisted in this—that if they adopted his Bill they would get as much as they possibly could out of the land, and that the tenants would have every inducement, not only to work harder, but to make money and acquire a better livelihood and better means of paying their rents. He doubted that very much. He knew this—that there were thousands and tens of thousands of acres of land of a second quality in Scot-land. That land had once been brought up to a very high standard of production by the use of artificial manures, but it was now suffering from that cause. It had been thoroughly exhausted, and what that land required was rest. It either must be laid down in grass, or some system of husbandry must be devised by which they might bring it up to its old standard. The Bill before the House would be a very great invasion of contract. It would introduce into the Scottish system fixity of tenure, free rule of culture, free sale, and fair rent. They had succeeded in agriculture better than any other country in Europe. They had reclaimed waste lands, perhaps, on too large a scale; and they had shown that the system hitherto pursued in Scotland was one that had worked well. Up to a few years ago there was no system like the 19 years' lease system, and the tenantry throve under it. He maintained that the proper thing for the landlord to do was to have a revaluation of property, if he could not come to fair terms with his tenants. But that revaluation must not be made by one valuator, but by two valuators, so that they might have equal justice distributed between landlord and tenant. Hon. Members opposite invited them, on a Wednesday afternoon, in a small and listless House, to overturn the existing system of land tenure in Scotland, in order to satisfy what he hoped was a passing through a rent crisis. They had the bitterest experience of similar or analogous legislation since 1870 in Ireland; and if that did not stand as a warning beacon, he did not know what that legislation had taken place for. It had not done much good to Ireland. If they applied this drastic legislation to Scotland, they would find that, instead of a good feeling between landlord and tenant, and that "gif-gaf" which made good friends, they would have very sad results. In the place of that being as it was at present, the unwritten law of the land, a very different state of things would come rapidly about. As to the proposal for produce rents on the basis of the Cars' prices, his experience was this. Eight or 10 years ago, in one of the Southern Counties of Scotland, a great many tenants had rents based on the price of wheat; but the consequence was that the tenants preferred a money rent. he did not think the tenants of Scotland would be satisfied with the revision of rents every three years, as suggested by the hon. Member; nor did he believe that a multiplication of small farms would tend to increase production. Such a statement was contrary to experience. How was it possible for a small tenant to have the buildings necessary for the health of his cattle? They could not expect the small tenant to have the necessary capital for carrying on agriculture. He did not believe they would ever get any Government to advance the £2,000,000 proposed by the hon. Member for Forfarshire to enable the landlords to break up large farms and erect buildings for small ones; nor did he believe the investment, if made, would be a good one. As it was rents had been reduced in Scotland, not only by 10 per cent, but by as much as 20, 30, and even 50 per cent. While he was convinced that the hon. Gentleman who proposed the Bill was actuated by the best motives, he did not think the proposed legislation of the hon. Member, drastic though it was, if it passed, would effect what he intended, nor would it ameliorate the condition of the tenantry of Scotland. He was entirely opposed to the principles of free sale. Its only effect would be to make the landlords take less interest in the land, and would drive them away out of the country. Old people, also, whom the landlord now employed, would have to go to the workhouse or drop into the large towns. If they injured one class they might be sure they would injure all classes of society, and if they injured the tenant they would injure the landlord and the shopkeeper also. He did not think the Bill was wanted. As regarded fixity of tenure, the hon. Member, he was sure, would receive the support of neither the House nor the country; while, as regards free sale, the country would be dead against him. But with regard to fair rent, he would be very glad if the hon. Member could bring that about in the speediest way.

said, he thought they ought to be grateful to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) for bringing forward the Bill and letting the House know the opinions of the tenant farmers of Scotland, as the honest and industrious farmers were entitled to have their claims fairly considered by the House. But, in his opinion, if this Bill were passed, it would be injurious to the tenants, as well as to the landlords and the country generally. The Bill which was brought in, from the tenant's point of view, was a Bill that would really bind his hands; while the landlords would have no inducement to advance money to be spent on improvements, and but for which large tracts of land would at the present day have been lying waste. There were some good points in the Bill, but there were others which he did not like. The Land Question would have to be faced sooner or later; but he believed it could be postponed for a long time if the landlords tried to live more on their estates, sent away their factors and agents, and went into the question for themselves, and when there was any doubt as to the rent give the tenant the benefit of it.

said, he felt thankful to the hon. Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay) for giving the House an opportunity of discussing a most important subject. he objected most strongly to the proposal to make in future tenancies in perpetuity. That would not be of very great value to the tenant, and it would be a very great damage to the welfare of agriculture generally. What they ought to do was to enlist the sympathies of landlords and tenants in the same way as manufacturers and their workmen. If the Bill were passed, the landlord would be a simple rent-charger, and he would have no interest in seeing that the buildings were kept up, and in advancing money for improvements. Although agriculture was suffering from great depression at the present time, he hoped that by co-operation and by the improvement of implements they might be able to compete successfully with the immense amount of foreign produce brought into the country. If they took away the incentive to the landlord to advance money, they might be certain they would not have that improvement which was necessary to place the prosperity of the agriculture of the country on a satisfactory footing. He had no objection to the proposal to institute a Land Court. He had always himself endeavoured to meet his tenants in a fair spirit, and he had been in the habit of taking the fiars' prices as a basis upon which to calculate his rents, and in that way he and his tenants had got on uncommonly well. But if that were not sufficient, where landlords and tenants could not agree, he thought it would be an advantage to have a tribunal—such as a Land Court or Commission—which could fix authoritatively what was a fair rent, because landlords were sometimes debarred from making the reductions they might otherwise do owing to the awkward position in which it might place other landlords who were not so able to make similar reductions. the question of allotments should not be dealt with in a Bill dealing with rent and agricultural arrangements, but should be brought in by a Bill dealing with the subject of local government—such a Bill as was promised by the Government, or something like it. With regard to fixity of tenure, if there was a tenant right which was to be purchased by another tenant coming in, and if that man had a large capital, they would really be defrauding the poor man from being able to start in life as an agricultural tenant. In that way they would shut out the class of ploughmen who had really formed the backbone of the farming class of this country. That was an interference with the whole system in Scotland, and in the circumstances it was impossible that anyone who desired the welfare of agriculture could be able to vote for a Bill in which they had fixity of tenure.

We have an indication of the nature and character of this discussion in the fact that of the four authors of the Bill only one remains in the House at the present moment; two have never appeared at all; two have spoken, but one of the number only spoke, and then disappeared. At the same time, I thoroughly agree with what has been said on this side of the House quite as much as on the other side—namely, that the hon. Gentleman who introduced this Bill—the Member for Forfarshire (Mr. Barclay)—deserves the thanks of the House for the interesting speech he has made in doing so. His contributions on the subject of agriculture are always extremely useful to the House; but I say that there is a pretty plain indication that he and his Friends look upon this as a purely academical discussion, not likely—now or in the near future—to lead to practical results. The hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire (Mr. Esslemont) is a very sanguine man, and when he speaks of the unanimity of feeling in Aberdeenshire upon this question, it is only an indication of the extreme power which possesses the inhabitants of that region of looking after themselves. The most astonishing feature about the whole measure is a proposal to carry out what is practically an agrarian revolution for the purpose of getting greater produce out of the land of Scotland; when the fact is that Scotland, of all countries in the world, has, under the existing system, done the most extraordinary and incredible things in the way of obtaining production out of the soil. It is under the system that now exists between landlord and tenant that the farmers of Scotland reclaimed vast tracts of country in Scotland—that in the time of our forefathers were thought utterly unfit for agricultural purposes at all—these have turned it into gardens, and have been able to produce more to the acre than has been raised in any other country in Europe. I want to know whether it is supposed that if the hon. Member's Bill had been brought in in 1820, and had been carried, it is possible for any sane man to conceive that the state of agriculture in Scotland would have been higher than it is at the present moment. [An hon. MEMBER: Yes.] I venture to say that it would have been nothing of the kind. The sums of money which have been laid out by landlords—and I suppose the hon. Member for Forfarshire will admit that the landlords have laid out large sums of capital as well as the tenants—would never—as experience proved—have been laid out if the country had been broken up into small holdings, where the tenant, having no claim upon the landlord at all, because the landlord would have been a mere rent-charger, would have had to expend the money and make the improvement himself. Wherever we found, throughout the world, a person who had to do the work of the soil himself, and to find the capital necessary for improvements, we never did find that the land is properly cultivated—[Cries of "Oh, Oh!"]—I mean in countries similar to our own—I am not speaking of countries where the farm buildings may consist of a log-hut—in such cases we never find improvements carried out. But, further than that, we are now asked by the hon. Member what difference there is between tenants in Ireland and tenants in Scotland. I think the hon. Member will agree that that is not for those on this—the Ministerial—side of the House to answer, because the distinct ground stated by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone) and his friends for their agrarian legislation for Ireland was that the case of Irish tenants is different from the case of tenants on this side of the Channel; and when the Liberal Government dealt with the case of the crofters, the House was told that theirs was also an exceptional case, quite different from the ordinary case of landlord and tenant. Time will not permit me to go at length into the arguments on this matter, and a good deal of what I had intended to say has been said by my hon. Friends on both sides of the House. I would call attention once more to the extraordinary fact that what is now proposed to be introduced by this Bill is the very thing which, tenants at their request had excluded from leases a good many years ago. In the year 1850 almost all the agricultural rents in Scotland were wholly or in part calculated according to the price of grain, and not wholly according to money. It was at the instance of the tenants themselves that that was altered, and it was because although at that time it was thought that prices would never go up again after the Corn Law had been repealed, in 1853, 1854, and 1855 large fortunes were made by the tenants of Scotland in consequence of the extraordinary prices to which grain rose in those years. As to what is proposed in the Bill in regard to allotments, there seems to be some confusion in the minds of hon. Members between the question of allotments and that well-known question now described by an expression which has become classic—" Three acres and a cow." The two things are totally different. The object of allotments is to give the agricultural labourer in his leisure time the means of cultivating some small piece of ground by hand, with the view of employing that time to advantage, and to procure for his own use necessaries which he might have to get from a distance. This Bill provides for giving allotments anywhere that the Local Authority may fix. I think the House will agree with me that, until you have a Local Authority of a different kind from what you now have, you will not have a wise or prudent Board for carrying out any system of allotments—certainly not of the broad and comprehensive character contemplated by the Bill of the hon. Member. When you have a system of local government and of Local Boards, then you may without difficulty go into the question of allotments. By the interpretation clause of this Bill, power is taken to take allotments, and the authority may go out of its own jurisdiction to the distance of a mile, to take allotments from anybody who has land. Now, the "authority" is to be a Local Authority, appointed under the Public Health Act. What is the authority in Scotland at present? It is the Parochial Boards in Scotland who were originally constituted solely to look after the paupers in their particular district. [An hon. MEMBER: The Town Councils.] We are speaking of agricultural districts. It is for agricultural neighbourhoods that the allotments referred to in this Bill are primarily to be provided. I am not certain, even if we came to the large burghs, that I should care to have the Town Council going, say, a mile out of the boundaries of the City of Edinburgh to provide allotments to all and sundry. But it is agricultural labourers that are being attended to by this Bill, and you propose to give these extraordinary powers to grant such allotments to Parochial Boards. This, in itself, is sufficient to show how crude and unsatisfactory the proposals of this Bill are. We thank the hon. Member for Forfarshire for carefully studied information—which he always gives us—but I think he will see that it is quite impossible that this Bill can be passed in its present shape—and I do not think the hon. Member could have hoped it would do so. It is certainly quite impossible that the Government can agree to it.

rose to continue the debate, when—