asked the Secretary to the Treasury if he is aware that of the fourteen appointments to the outdoor staff of the National Health Insurance Commission made from 600 applications from the Customs and Excise service, one of the officers appointed to an assistant inspectorship was the son of a superintending inspector of Customs and Excise, formerly of the Excise branch, and one was the son of a collector of Customs and Excise, formerly of the Excise branch; what was the length of service and what were the special qualifications of these two officers appointed to assistant inspectorships; and whether, in view of the detrimental influence on the Customs and Excise service of indications which appear to point to an absence of impartiality, he can see his way to issue a general statement as to the methods of selection adopted in this case in order to remove the impression created in the Customs branch of the amalgamated service by these appointments?

Of the Customs and Excise applicants who were appointed as assistant inspectors under the National Health Insurance Commission for England, one, who was an officer of Customs and Excise and had had thirteen years' service, was the son of a superintending inspector of Customs and Excise, and another, who was also an officer of Customs and Excise and had had about fifteen years' service, was the son of a superannuated officer (not collector) of Excise. As I have already stated, the Committee of Selection consisted of five members, including representatives of other public departments besides the Board of Customs and Excise, and for chairman the First Civil Service Commissioner. Neither its constitution nor its action affords any ground for the suggestion contained in the latter part of the question.

I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a second time."

Although the matter dealt with in the Clause is not very large, it still is of importance, and is one which may and will grow in future if this Bill becomes law. It is the practice, I believe, of numerous French and German firms of wine merchants and distillers to send over representatives or canvassers to London to solicit orders for their products of wines and spirits, and to fill those orders from France or Germany, as the case may be. Whether that is legal or not I will not say, but it is done to a considerable extent under the present law. The proposal is that those canvassers who sell wines and spirits in this way in Scotland should be put on the same footing as Scottish firms who have to pay rates and taxes, Licence Duties, and the other heavy charges which fall upon anyone engaged in the trade, and that those foreigners should pay the same as Englishmen or Scotchmen. We cannot think it is desired to lessen the revenue by allowing this practice to continue, because it infallibly does affect the revenue of the country. Not only does the practice affect the revenue, but it hits the Scottish retailers and dealers because they have less orders; and as the revenue from their licences is smaller, they are more likely to be kept at a high rate than they would be if those licences were spread over a larger number of people, so that a larger revenue would result, and it might be possible to approach the Chancellor of the Exchequer for a reduction. Whilst this practice is carried on to this considerable extent I think it would be useless to approach the Chancellor of the Exchequer with any suggestion of the kind. It is a surreptitious way of getting round the present Licensing Acts, but I see no reason why, when we have the opportunity now, we should not put this matter straight by this Bill, and let those men take out licences before they are allowed to sell wines and spirits in Scotland, just the same as Englishmen and Scotchmen have to do.

This Clause is not in order. It ought to come as an Amendment to the Revenue Act.

I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a second time."

It appears to me to be a necessary Amendment, because it is not an unusual practice for auctioneers to promote sales of wines and spirits for their own benefit. They sometimes advertise these sales, but they are not sales in the ordinary course of their business. It is asserted by the licensed trade that auctioneers sometimes purchase certain quantities of whisky in parcels smaller than wholesale quantities, and in order to deal with these articles they ought to have a retail licence, whereas the auctioneers, if they have licences at all, have wholesale licences. There is nothing to prevent auctioneers from selling small quantities at retail prices at a bonâ fide auction when they are selling in the course of their trade as auctioneers, and not for their own benefit. It is surely not the business of an auctioneer to sell liquor on his own behalf in retail quantities, thereby obtaining an unfair advantage over his competitors.

I beg to second the Motion.

As far as I can see, the action which the hon. Member wishes to prevent is at present illegal under the Revenue Act of 1864. It is undesirable to bring into this Bill, with which it really has no connection, a matter which is already dealt with in the Revenue Act.

I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a second time."

Its object is to assist the publican, as far as may be, in the difficult position in which he is now placed in regard to intoxicated persons who obtain admission to his premises. In the case of an ordinary shopkeeper, if an intoxicated person comes into his premises, he may have him removed; but if the intoxicated person is there the shopkeeper has committed no crime. On the other hand, if an intoxicated person is found on licensed premises, the publican is guilty of a crime, and is punishable. That is a very serious distinction. This House ought to do everything possible to help the man who is managing his business properly, and to enable him to prevent these people from coming into his premises and creating a disturbance there by having to be ejected. I am told that considerable expense is entailed upon the publican by the necessity of having to employ a man specially for the purpose of keeping intoxicated persons from entering his premises. If such a person enters with two or three other people it is very difficult for the man who is guarding the door to distinguish him, and yet the publican runs a very great risk if the intoxicated person is found on his premises. This Clause will help the publican to some extent, inasmuch as it will render the attempt to enter punishable, and it will be a matter for the police and not for the man whom the publican hires to guard the door. There is nothing so detrimental to publicans as having intoxicated persons on their premises. They wish to keep them out, and they require the help of the police in doing so.

I beg to second the Motion. My hon. Friend's zeal in the cause of order and temperance is shown by the fact that he has moved this Clause. If it be accepted, I hope that some slight alteration in the wording will be permissible, as at present it does not read very well. What is the difference between "a state of intoxication" and "being drunk"? In England there is no difference at all; possibly there may be in Scotland. If the Clause be read a second time I shall propose to amend it in that connection. Such a Clause is, I believe, very necessary. If this Bill pass; it is possible that a large number of people living in a no-licence area may migrate, when their work is over, or before, to a more favoured area, and there obtain a considerable quantity of intoxicating liquor. The consequence will be that certain districts will be flooded by people in a state of intoxication, and it will be difficult for the publicans to prevent them from getting into their premises; but if they succeed in getting into licensed premises the publicans will be subject to very severe penalties. It is the greatest mistake to suppose that a policeman can arrest anyone who is drunk in the street, unless at the same time he is disorderly or incapable. The powers of the police, as they are at present, will not be sufficient to meet the danger which my hon. Friend thinks may occur. A similar point to this was dealt with by the Committee upstairs on a former occasion in which the point was raised of people going outside the district on a Sunday to get intoxicants. The question was whether when they obtained the liquor they were drunk or sober. I think, therefore, there is every evidence that it will be necessary in the interests of order alone that this Clause should be inserted in the Bill, and I have much pleasure in seconding.

I am exceedingly sorry not to be able to meet the hon. Gentleman, but if hon. Members will look very carefully at the proposed Clause, they will see that it not only introduces an entirely new legal position as regards intoxication or drunkenness—which I can assure the hon. Baronet opposite are the same thing in Scotland—but it introduces a very curious offence. This matter is dealt with under the Licensing Act of 1903, but as the hon. Baronet very truly said, it does not make intoxication by itself an offence. It is only when intoxication is accompanied by incapacity to take care of oneself or if the man concerned is not under the care of some person; or is disorderly. Under Section 74 of the same Act is an offence for any person, even on licensed premises, to attempt to procure drink for a person who is intoxicated. This matter was very carefully thought out in regard to the Licensing Bill of 1903, and the publican is not without protection, and can refuse admission to an intoxicated person or disorderly person who is at once liable to arrest. It is rather a serious matter to make a new offence. I should like the hon. Member to note the peculiar offence created by his proposal. It is not now an offence to be intoxicated in the streets, but this Clause would make it an offence if an intoxicated man attempted to enter his hotel or club for the purpose of going to bed. I should have thought the latter would be the best place for him under the circumstances. As the Clause stands, a person in a state of intoxication found in, or attempting to enter, licensed premises or any registered club would come under the law I have stated, though he is perfectly free from arrest so long as he wanders about the streets, however drunk he may be, and so long as he is not disorderly.

I do not quite follow the arguments of the right hon. Gentleman. The best place for a man to be drunk is his club. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] The point the right hon. Gentleman has missed is that my hon. Friend wants to protect the proprietors of licensed premises, and though this proposed new Clause may be worded wrongly, the right hon. Gentleman and the Lord Advocate together can easily put the wording right if they wish to do so. What it is desired to prevent is drunken men hammering at the door of a public-house and trying to get in, and to give powers, either to the proprietors or the authorities on their behalf, to move them on, I should have thought that there was no particular reason why such a Clause should not be passed. Section 70 of the Licensing Bill of 1903 does not really cover the matter. There is nothing in it at all about a man attempting to get into a public-house or being a public nuisance in the street just outside a public-house, the one place where you do not want to see him. I quite agree that a man in the state described is far better at home.

The Secretary for Scotland has managed very successfully to dissemble the position he took up in his opening remarks, because I do not think he has advanced a single reason that will be considered by any reasonable person to carry any weight at all against the proposition of my hon. Friend. He tells us that the chief objection to the suggested Amendment is that it establishes an entirely new legal proposition and creates a new offence. I do really think that that is an extraordinary objection to come from a Member of a Liberal Government. It seems to me that we in this House should not shrink—and I hope the House never will shrink—from establishing any such proposition if we think it is for the good of the country or the people. I should like the right hon. Gentleman to tell us, if it is a serious matter to create a new offence, how many new offences are being created in the very Act we are considering! If the creation of new offences is necessary, let the House not shrink from creating them. The promoters of this Bill, I think, are anxious to avoid giving offence to those people who support them at the polls, and are anxious to give trouble to and thrust other responsibilities upon licensed holders, who are commonly reputed to vote against them at election times. The right hon. Gentleman told us that this Clause, as it stands, makes it an offence for an intoxicated person to go back into his hotel. I think that kind of argument is quite unworthy of the right hon. Gentleman. If the Clause is not as happily worded as it ought to be, he and his colleague could give it its proper wording, instead of the right hon. Gentle- man formulating an objection so trifling. If the right hon. Gentleman is sincerely grieved that he cannot accept the Amendment as it is worded, the wording can be altered, but I should have thought that difficulty was one which was too trifling to put forward. If right hon. Gentlemen opposite decide that the Amendment is one which ought to be accepted, they can very speedily so amend it as to do away with any trifling objections. On behalf of the licensed holders, who have very great responsibilities, which many hon. Members in this House do not appreciate, and having regard to the difficulties which my hon. Friend has spoken of in discovering on a busy night, perhaps shortly before closing time, with the House full, whether a person is over the border line of intoxication or not, I do think the Government might reconsider their decision and endeavour to relieve licensed holders of one very great responsibility.

The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down appealed to us in the interests of the licensed victuallers. But I should like to point out that in the new Clause, as I read it, the licensed victualler who had the misfortune of being overtaken by drink away from his own licensed premises would be committing a penal offence to go home at all. When the interests of the licensed victuallers are being put forward, I think it is only lair that that point should be made.

Does the hon. Gentleman, under those circumstances, wish the licensed victualler to go back and serve liquor to those who are drunk?

I would suggest that the best place for him is to go home and go to bed.

I really hope that the Government or someone on the other side will try to deal with this Amendment seriously. It is a serious Amendment, which represents a policy which is not that, I know, of many hon. Members on the other side, but which, I think, is the right way to deal with this question. The broad distinction between the two policies is this: Hon. Members on the other side desire to put restrictions in the way of selling alcoholic liquor. I believe that to be thoroughly unsound, and an unsound way of approaching this problem. My view has always been that the right way to deal with the question is not to hamper the sale of alcoholic liquors but to make it exceedingly disagreeable, difficult, and undesirable to get drunk. That is a broad distinction. The object of this Amendment is to add to the difficulty and disagreeableness of being drunk. I think it is a very desirable thing to pursue. It is perfectly futile for the hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Scotland or the hon. Gentleman who spoke last to put forward verbal criticism of the proposed Clause, and to point out that its effect will be what the Mover does not desire to bring about. That is not the way to deal with an Amendment or with the House of Commons. The Clause ought to be dealt with.

May I ask the Noble Lord whether he suggests that the criticism I ventured to put forward is ill-founded?

I really do not propose to give myself the trouble to consider whether it is well founded or ill founded. It really is a perfectly futile and irrelevant one. The question is whether we shall read this Clause a second time and whether we desire the principle in this Clause to be adopted and inserted in the Bill. Whether that principle is properly carried out by the wording of the Clause is a different matter, which can be raised a little later. What I would like to ask the House to do, and what I have a right to ask it to do, is to consider this Clause on its merits. Do hon. Members think that the evil pointed out by my hon. Friend is a real evil? Do they think it sufficiently dealt with by the Bill? If not, do they not think that some Clause of this kind ought to be put into the Bill to deal with the matter? That is the broad point. I venture to hope that even now we shall have some attempt made by those who oppose this Clause to approach the question properly, and that we shall not be "fobbed off" with miserable verbal criticism.

If this Clause goes to a Division the hon. Gentlemen opposite will, I am sure, get some support from this side. Obviously this Clause means, if the words do not quite express it, that a person in a state of intoxication, found in, or attempting to enter, any licensed premises or any registered club, shall be subject to the same power, and procedure, and penalty as provided in Section 70 of the Licensing Act of 1903. Obviously the man goes for the purpose of securing more drink, not for the purpose of securing rest or sleep. That man ought to come under this Section. Anyone who has gone out, say, on one of the busy nights of the week, and has watched the efforts of the publican to prevent certain people entering his place, must have been struck with the degrading aspect of it. Probably what you would find would be, especially near closing time, a man of a muscular type near the door of the public house employed very frequently in the work of forcing people into the premises. I do not see why a respectable publican trying to conduct his business respectably inside the law should not be protected from this type of man, any more than the general public, both in the streets and on his stairs very often in Scotland. I hope that on a small point of this kind obviously designed to promote the efficiency of the licensed Clauses in Scotland, we will get a more sympathetic answer than that already given from the Front Bench.

I see a point in this Amendment to which I am sure the Secretary for Scotland will give his full consideration. As to the objections put forward by the right hon. Gentleman, the Secretary for Scotland, and by the hon. Member for Norwich, I do not think there is any great force in the first, but I think there would be great force in the second if the conditions in England and Scotland were the same. I want to say a word upon both these things and also a word about what I understand really to be the point which this new Clause raises, because I think it is a point of importance in view of the legal conditions that surround licences in Scotland. The right hon. Gentleman says, as the Clause stands—and, of course, we are only on the second reading of the Clause—it would mean that a man who was drunk could not get into the hotel or the club where his bed was and where he lived at the time. So far as that objection goes I do not want to depreciate it at all, but I think it is answerable. It seems to me that the Clause would require to be amended in some way to prevent that result, and I think the real mischief would be remedied by substituting for the expression "licensed premises or any registered club" the expression "public-house." That is really the mischief which the right hon. Gentleman has in his mind, but with regard to the point taken by the hon. Member for Norwich I believe it to be true that in England, in country towns and districts, the public-house and the premises of the public-house proper are very often not only directly connected, but that you cannot get into one without getting into the other. In Scotland, if that is ever so, it must be very rare. I cannot remember any instance in which I ever knew it was so. I do not want to profess special acquaintance with the interiors of many public-houses, but one gets to know these things in other ways. I do know that, although it is not the law of the land in the sense of being statute law, it is the law of the justices in Scotland that if a publican lives on the premises which, as a rule he does not at all, that there shall be not only complete separation—I do not mean that the publican cannot get in by one of the doors and the like—but the residence must have a separate entrance. The licensing law of the land in that sense differs from that of the justices.

What I ask the right hon. Gentleman's attention to is this: it is quite true that, under the Act of 1903, an offence is committed if the person is on licensed premises and complies with the double qualification (a) that he is intoxicated, and (b) cannot take care of himself and has no one to look after him. Therefore, to a certain extent, expressing my own view, this Clause goes a little bit too far, because the Clause would make it an offence simply for a person intoxicated to be found on licensed premises. I think there would be difficulty in amending the Act of 1903 in that way, but then it must be remembered that this is not in any Act in terms or in any of our Statutes directly, but it is in the statutory terms of the public-house certificate: it is an offence even for the publican if a man be drunk upon his premises, or for the publican to promote any drunkenness upon his premises, and, if he does so, his certificate is brought into peril and he has committed a breach of the certificate which involves forfeiture if he promote drunkenness upon his premises and the charge is proved—if you proved against the publican that so-and-so was on his premises drunk—and although this is not statutory, it is in the terms of the certificate, and it is really a very important affair for the publican, and also for the public, whom we want to protect, and it is important that if there are people whom it is dangerous for him to admit into his premises at all, to strengthen the law of the land in protecting the publican in this matter. Therefore, I do think, there is a point in helping the publican to keep these people out of his premises who ought not to go there, by making it an offence for a person who already has more than is good for him to try and get into the public-house. It seems taking a certan amount of liberty with this new Clause to try and bring it into harmony with what is in my mind, and although I cannot propose any Amendment now, it is only fair I should suggest what my Amendments would be. My Amendments would be to omit the words "or who is drunk"—I cannot understand how a person can be in a state of intoxication and not be drunk—and to leave out the words "in or" ["and found in or attempting to enter"] and to leave out the words "licensed premises or any registered club," and to insert instead thereof the words "public-house" so that the Clause would then read:

"Any person who is in a state of intoxication and found attempting to enter any public-house shall be subject to the same powers and procedure and penalties as provided in Section 70 of the Licensing (Scotland) Act, 1903."

I think that would give effect to what I have said, and therefore I hope the right hon. Gentleman may consider my suggestion and allow the Clause to be read a second time, and if that is done then I should move these Amendments.

If the House will allow me, I wish to say I accept the suggestions of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and I do so because he has agreed with all my criticisms and put forward an entirely different Clause, and I think it is desirable to see that the publican's position should not be made too onerous.

I beg to move "That the Clause be read a second time."

We are dealing with this Bill under rather unfortunate conditions, because the only attempt to consider the interests of the dispossessed licence holders is made in Clause? by providing a period of five years before any of the options in this Bill can be brought into effect, and therefore we have to deal, in the shape of a new Clause, with a scheme of compensation without knowing what view the House will take of the proposed length of time as threatened in the Bill. This course entails-very great difficulty, because one cannot move to postpone a Clause on the Report stage of a Bill, and it is essential to take the new Clauses first, and unless the Secretary for Scotland makes some declaration about Clause 1 and the time limit there granted, the House will have to decide this question without knowing precisely what is going to be done later on. There has been a great deal of discussion about this question of mutual insurance. We had a scheme submitted by the hon. Member for Blackfriars (Mr. Barnes) before the Standing Committee which, for one reason or another, the Secretary for Scotland did not see his way to accept, and effect has been given to some of these criticisms, if not to all of them, in the scheme now before us in this new Clause. Under ordinary circumstances I should consider it my duty to apologise to the House for the fact that this scheme only appears upon the Paper this morning, but if any apology is due it is due from the Liberal Whips, and not from me, because I only knew on the last day of the earlier portion of the Session that this Bill was to be taken to-day, and there was no opportunity until yesterday of calling together those interested in this question to ascertain their views. Therefore, any apology due to the House should come, I suppose, from the Scottish Whip, and not from me.

The House is asked to deal with this very complicated situation on far too short notice. It is a very complicated Clause and a very long Clause, and it would take a very long time to explain it even shortly. Of course, time is of no object to-day; we may be sitting here until nine o'clock tomorrow morning. I do not intend to take up any length of time explaining the Clause, but I will say something about it in order to meet, by way of anticipation, some of the criticisms which may be applied to it from the Government Front Bench. In the first place, I wish to say it is not pretended in any shape or kind to be a scheme of full insurance. That in the circumstances of the case is quite impossible; it is not possible to predict beforehand with what circumstances this particular insurance fund may have to deal. The whole situation is complicated by the licence options, so that it is impossible to arrive at a reasonable suggestion as to what particular licences may be taken away or as to what may be the effect of the options. Therefore, the scheme is only a partial scheme; it is nothing better than a solatium to what promises to be absolute ruin to a great number of people under the Option Clauses of the Bill. It is the best we could do, and when I said a while ago that I did not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer would take any great interest in the Bill I said so because it is impossible to propose anything but a partial scheme since the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his own Bill imposed such obligations upon the licence holders that it is impossible to place upon them now anything more than an obligation to meet partial insurance. It is an astonishing thing to me, although really nothing astonishes me in the case of the present Government. When the Government took this Bill out of the waste-paper basket they did not realise that what was considered unjust in 1908 would be equally unjust in 1912. With the five years' time notice it is impossible to do much in the way of insurance. My proposal in the first place is to make the scheme compulsory, for without compulsion it is of no use. There are a good many areas in Scotland in which it is very improbable that either a limiting resolution or a local veto resoluton will be carried, and under these circumstances the licence holders will have no inducement to insure, and they will rather run the risk. They will benefit by the possibility of one or other of those resolutions being carried in a contiguous area, because they will get an immense accretion of business, and therefore it is only right that they should pay something to those who are being dispossessed, and whose businesses they are going to acquire.

The scheme is shortly as follows: That an approved society, or as many approved societies as the licence holders choose, may form themselves into associations for the purpose of mutual insurance under the Act. The retailers of the societies as a whole and as a group shall constitute a central board of nine, who are to be the administrators of a central fund. That fund is derived from the payment in respect of each member of an association of 8s. 6d. per head. They pay 10s. each, but 1s. 6d. is for management expenses. When licences are withdrawn under the Clause an insured person has sources of compensation, first, from the central fund, and secondly, from the members of his own association. The claims of any association against the central fund are not absolute, and they are restricted to double the amount of its proportional interest in that fund. That is to say, supposing the central fund amounts to £1,000,000 at the end of a certain period of years, and the share of a particular association, taking its membership into account, is £50,000 in the event of its being divided up equally according to the interests insured, the extremest claim of an association upon that fund is £100,000 if the members lost their licences to an extent in excess of the available fund. It is essential to limit it, otherwise the fund would be depleted straight away, and that is why insurance can only be partial. The members of an association who do not secure full compensation from the central fund are entitled to a three years' levy of 30s. per cent, on declared value from the other members of their own association within their own district who would naturally be left in possession, and would benefit from the fact that the other licences had been withdrawn.

I have had provided for me by a thoroughly capable and thoroughly accurate person one or two figures to show what the central fund would amount to under certain circumstances. If the time notice is five years, at the end of that period there will be £238,402 in the central fund; if the time notice is ten years, the amount will be £514,777; if the period is twenty years, the amount will be £1,206,597. In five years the insurance a man has paid will be £2 2s. 6d. per cent., in ten years £4 5s., and in twenty years £8 10s. By the above figures he would receive on the basis of a double share in five years, for his 8s. 6d. per £100, £4 15s., in ten years £10 6s., and in twenty years £22 15s.; and in addition, without further contribution, he would be entitled to receive the share of the 30s. levy which members of his own association would be obliged to meet. That is limited to three years. Polls are allowed to be taken every third year, and it is essential to limit the claim upon the association during which there would be a period of rest before another poll was taken. It is not at all probable that at first 25 per cent, of all the licence holders would be blotted out, and by every fraction less the available funds for the dispossessed would be increased. Under the Temperance Bill the risks are unknown and undeterminable. Therefore the members are prepared to group themselves for insurance with their eyes open to the fact that in certain contingencies they may only receive something over 20 per cent., or 4s. per £ of their declared value. Even then each individual will only have subscribed five and one-fifth pence. We hear a good deal at the present time about giving ninepence for fourpence in connection with another Bill, but in this case you get 3s. for fourpence, with an off-chance of 20s. for fourpence. So that they are better off than the unfortunate insured person under the Insurance Act.

I do not want to go very fully into the question of all these funds, because they are complicated and would take a very long time, but I wish to point out to the Secretary for Scotland that he made an entire misstatement in Committee when he talked about the unfortunate publican having to pay a flat rate in the same way as the insured person under the Insurance Act. The publican does not pay a flat rate, but a percentage on the amount insured. If he insures for £1,000, he pays the same percentage as for £400, but not the same amount, and therefore the Secretary for Scotland is entirely wrong. One of the Lord Advocate's other objections was that there was no evidence that Members of the trade were in favour of a mutual insurance scheme. A postcard has been sent out to all the licence holders in Scotland within the last few weeks, and I have the latest figures with regard to the replies given to the question as to whether they were in favour of a compulsory insurance scheme or not. If there happened to be any very active opposition or any very serious objection on the part of members of the trade to a compulsory scheme, one would naturally imagine that they would sign their postcard and send them in at once. Out of 10,000 postcards which have been issued only 4,300 have been returned. Of these, 3,900 are in favour of compulsory insurance, whilst only 433 are against it. There have been some answers received to-day, in which forty-two people are for and only one against it. Of these, twenty-eight came from Caithness, ten of them publicans, seven hotels, and eleven grocers, and all of them are in favour of this proposal.

I think it may be assumed that there is no active opposition in the trade to this scheme of compulsory insurance, and that those who have thought it necessary not to reply are content to leave the matter in the hands of their leaders, who have unanimously agreed to back up this scheme. The percentage of those replying is as follows: There are in favour of a compulsory scheme 93.7 per cent, publicans, 83.6 per cent, grocers, and 81.6 per cent, hotel keepers. Although there was an agitation in Glasgow against the scheme, 98 per cent, of the voters there were in favour of it, and only fifteen, or 2 per cent., against it. So I think it is pretty clear that the trade as a whole is in favour of a scheme of this kind, not because they believe in any kind of way it is going to insure them anything like fully, but because naturally they regard half a loaf as better than no bread. They see in front of them in the Bill now before the House nothing but the direst ruin, and naturally they are anxious to go out with something to start afresh, and that they will secure under this proposal. When this scheme was first suggested in the Committee it had no more beneficent supporter than the Lord Advocate, and he said that a scheme of this kind must have certain distinctive features. One of them was that it should in no way interfere with the machinery of the Bill or the carrying out of the Bill's proposals. The scheme I have suggested in no way whatever interferes with that principle. It does not prevent polls being taken every three years, or options being adopted. Therefore it fulfils the essential principles which the Lord Advocate demanded. It does not interfere with the discretion of the justices. It creates no new vested interest of any sort or kind, and therefore I am entitled to claim that the Lord Advocate ought to support this scheme as he did in the Committee two years ago, although he did not do it on the last occasion. The right hon. Gentleman has supported it in the country over and over again.

I cannot for the life of me understand why it is that the extreme teetotalers have been making such desperate efforts to prevent the Government from accepting some scheme of this kind which is to be entirely carried out and paid for by the funds of the trade itself. Why in the world this House should in any way desire to prevent these unfortunate people palliating as far as they can the extremely uncomfortable position in which some of them are likely to be placed after the passing of this Bill I cannot understand. What arguments there are against this course I cannot conceive; in fact there can be no arguments against it. We had a declaration that there was no evidence that the trade favoured it, and I have tried to show that there is a very small minority of the trade against it. It does not matter whether the time limit is five or ten years, although I hope it may be fifteen years, but in any of these cases you still require an insurance scheme. It is impossible that any voluntary scheme can insure a man even within a fifteen years' time limit. I had hoped that the Government would have taken up this question in quite a different spirit. They have taken up a Bill which I understand was pieced together in a backroom by two or three hon. Gentlemen opposite, simply with a view of testing the House of Commons on this question in 1907 without the serious hope that it would ever become law. The Government picks up this practically derelict scheme which the last Secretary for Scotland never found any time in this House to give a Report stage to, and he would have found it very difficult to explain how in the end the Government had come to adopt this Bill.

The Government ought to have taken a comprehensive view of the situation, for they had an opportunity of dealing with the matter in a comprehensive and final way. If the State wishes to resume the control of the licences in Scotland, it is perfectly entitled to do so, and I see no reason why it should not do so on fair terms. I have not suggested that it should pay out the licence holders, I have only suggested that they should have sufficient breathing space to ensure their capital interest, and not run the risk of going out with the loss of all their money. When I come to his own Government's record in the matter, what do I find? In the Licensing Bill of 1908 the Government was infinitely more generous to the English licence holders than it is going to be to the Scotch licence holders. At that time the bitterest tears were wept over the unfortunate position of the free licence holders. They are all free licence holders in Scotland. The licence holder of Scotland is a free man who owns the place, it is his sole means of subsistence, and you give him five years' notice, and call that reasonable. It is monstrous. It is ruthless cruelty. In England, where the licences are held in great blocks by wholesale people, you proposed to take away a third of them in fourteen years, and compensation was to be given for those taken away. Two-thirds were left those people, but nothing is left to the Scotch licence holders. If this House is ruthless enough to pass this Bill, I do not believe the people of Scotland will adopt it. You will begin by putting the greatest possible difficulty in the way of your Bill becoming a workable measure at all. It is essential, if you desire to attempt this experiment in Scotland, and if you desire to attempt to try on the Statute Book the principle of local option, that you should make the Bill so fair and justly reasonable that the people of Scotland will feel they can take advantage of the privileges of local option without bringing blue ruin to people who have embarked in a trade under the ægis of the law in a perfectly honourable and straightforward manner. It is for that reason that, in addition to any time limit which may be granted, the traders desire to be permitted to have a compulsory insurance scheme, which, while not giving them anything like the value of their premises, will give them something to start afresh in the world when they are turned out.

I desire to second the Motion for the Second Beading of this Clause. We wish to know what is the reason the Government are opposed to this scheme. It is felt not merely on this side of the House, but in certain parts, at any rate, on the other side of the House that if you desire to try this experiment and try it with some chance of success, then you must have common British fairness. You must not penalise these unfortunate individuals because the State wishes to alter its policy. That will be felt from end to end of Scotland, and you will have to face an opposition of your own raising if you insist on refusing that which practically the whole trade is asking for, namely, not State compensation, but simply State compulsion placed behind the organisation which they themselves have set up. That is the position, and we can hardly understand the opposition to it; but, without dealing with the matter at length, I merely desire at this stage to second the Motion for the Second Reading of the Clause in order that we may obtain a statement of the reasons which can possibly induce the Government and their extreme teetotal supporters, though not all their supporters, to insist on their objection to compensation.

It will be in the recollection of hon. Members that when this Bill was before the Committee last Session an Amendment of this nature was moved by my hon. Friend the Member for the Blackfriars Division of Glasgow (Mr. Barnes). It was debated at some length, but it went perhaps a little too much into detail, and the Secretary for Scotland found it was practically an unworkable scheme, and would not hold water. I then myself had the honour of moving an Amendment which I think was so elastic that it would have met all the desires of the gentlemen on whose behalf the right hon. Baronet (Sir G. Younger) has just spoken; but, not being in the confidence of the trade of Scotland, my Amendment did not receive that support which I think it was worthy of receiving. I make no claim to speak at all on behalf of the trade of Scotland, but I do claim the right to speak on behalf of the people of Scotland apart altogether from the trade and the temperance party. They have some right to be considered in this matter. They have some right to say, "We are not going to be driven by the temperance party or by the public-house party into a corner, one way or another, and we wish our case to be fairly and squarely put before the House of Commons," as it has already been put in most eloquent language by my right hon. Friend the Lord Advocate. No one spoke with such eloquence as he did upon the necessity of doing something for the moderate men in Scotland. The moderate men and women in Scotland have some claim to be heard before the Bar of the House of Commons.

What is the position in which we find ourselves now? Those people who are neither connected with the trade nor with the temperance party directly, those people who form the vast majority of the Scotch people, are strongly in favour of a measure of temperance reform. They see the evils of drink, the devastation and ruin it brings upon homes, every day of their lives, notably in the great towns. The position of the country districts is a little different. There in almost every village—outside my own district of Orkney and Shetland, which is specially favoured in this matter—there are two or three houses where one would be ample. I know many villages in the South infinitely overstocked with public-houses. The result of an overplus of public-houses upon the people at large is excessively mischievous, as anyone, like myself, who has gone among the people and know how they talk and feel about the matter, is aware. It results in this: Farmers coming into a local village or a small town go into one house to have a little meat and refreshment. If there was only one house they would walk out and have no more to drink, but they feel they must go to the next house in order to show there is no ill-feeling. I am speaking of what I have heard myself and seen. They go, not because they want a drink, but because they want to show a kindly spirit towards their neighbour. Perhaps they go to a third, and the state in which they go home to their wives is very much to be deplored, and we should very much rejoice if something could be done to alleviate some of these distressing circumstances.

What is to be the position of those who live in the country districts of Scotland? I do not think it makes very much difference in a town like Glasgow, though the representatives of that city will speak for themselves, but in the country districts we are exceedingly desirous that two at least of those three houses should be closed, and we should carry closing resolutions with very little difficulty. We are face to face, however, with this: When we go canvassing we shall be told, "You are going to ruin that poor widow who has the next house, and that old man whose family have been there for time immemorial, and you are going to make the one that is left infinitely richer and better off than he was before." That will not appeal to the common sense or the kindly feeling and honesty of the people of Scotland. They will feel you have passed a measure which it is absolutely impossible to put into practical working effect, and we shall not be able to get the houses in the country districts closed, though we are exceedingly desirous they should be closed. I therefore in Committee moved the Amendment I did, and I regret to say it was not accepted by the Government.

I sincerely trust something in this line will be done. We have all been deluged by the appeals of the temperance societies to vote for the whole Bill and nothing but the Bill, and to take it line for line. I hope the House of Commons will not do that, and I hope the Secretary for Scotland will not do that. He has already given us a very good instance of the manner in which he can meet a critical situation, and I hope before the Debate closes he will show some consideration and feeling for his supporters, not in this House, because that is of very little importance, but in the country, who are exceedingly desirous of having a temperance measure passed for Scotland. I have discussed this matter with many of my Friends in the House, and in Committee there was not a single objection made to the principle of this suggestion of mutual insurance except by the Secretary for Scotland, who said the scheme was not watertight, and the Member for Greenock (Mr. G. P. Collins), who also thought it was not watertight. Other Members for Scotland said, "Oh, yes, let them have a separate Bill of their own, and we will all vote for it." Is the trade to be put in that position? What chance will they have of getting a Bill of their own through the House of Commons at this stage, or, in fact, at any at all, in view of the attitude assumed by certain hon. Members? We have to make it perfectly clear to the House of Commons and to the country that there is no responsibility taken by the Government in respect of this Clause. There is no charge upon the National Exchequer for it. There is no charge upon the people of the country. It is simply a proposal, as far as I understand it—I hope I shall be corrected if I am wrong, because it is of great importance to many of us—that the trade shall be allowed to compulsorily insure themselves so that they shall not be met with absolute ruin should the closing of a house, which many of them know to be absolutely necessary, be required. I shall therefore have very great pleasure in supporting the proposed new Clause.

I am what my hon. Friend calls a moderate man, but I would like to tell the hon. Member for Ayr Burghs (Sir G. Younger) that if I were an ardent and earnest supporter of his scheme for compensation I am afraid the tone and temper of the speech which we have heard from him would make me, as a Liberal Member, vote against him. The bearing of the hon. Member is usually very suave but to-day his style, I suppose because of certain recent elections in Scotland, has been one of hectoring and bullying the Government. He gains nothing whatever by adopting that style of speech. We are endeavouring to be as fair as possible in this Bill. The hon. Baronet says that five years' notice would mean blue ruin to the trade.

That is a statement of fact.

It is thirty years since I first entered into politics, and at that time a Local Veto Bill was one of the measures before the constituencies. I stood for Parliament in the year 1892 and reduced the Conservative majority very greatly indeed at that time. I then advocated local option and local veto, and, therefore, it is utterly absurd and indeed untrue to suggest that we are only giving the publicans five years' notice. The licensing interest in Scotland has, in fact, had from twenty to thirty years' notice. The Scottish Licensing trade recently issued a circular to the trade and in about 10,000 circulars issued there were only 4,300 replies; less than one-half of the licensing trade condescended to reply to the circular. Yet it is suggested that 95 per cent. of the trade are in favour of this scheme.

I did not send out the circular; I had nothing to do with it.

At any rate, the licensed trade sent out 10,000 of these postcards and only got replies from 4,300. It cannot, therefore, fairly be said that 95 per cent. of the trade are in favour of compulsory insurance. I suggest that 6,000 out of the 10,000 are totally against it.

No, no.

I shall be glad to hear how I am wrong in making that statement. At any rate it shows that 6,000 members of the trade are indifferent upon the subject. We have no right to impose a tax upon the licence holders or to superadd another burden to those they already have to bear. For these and many other reasons, and because of the hectoring and bullying style adopted by the hon. Baronet opposite, I shall vote against the scheme.

I supported a scheme upstairs very similar to the one now under discussion, and on that occasion I was induced to believe that the trade in Scotland, to the extent of 80 per cent. or 85 per cent., were in favour of it. It was on that ground that I became responsible for the scheme. But I am not altogether satisfied that so large a percentage are in favour, neither am I disposed to accept the statement of the hon. Member who has just spoken that because 4,000 odd only have replied to the circular sent out, therefore the remainder of the members of the trade are not in favour of compulsory insurance. A large number of those 6,000 who failed to reply probably did so for reasons best known to themselves, and hon. Members who have had experience in these matters must be well aware that there are many reasons why replies are not sent in even by those who may be in favour of a given proposal. But I do suggest that the fact that 90 per cent. of the replies actually received were found to be in favour of this scheme may be taken as a fair indication that a very large proportion indeed of the licence trade in Scotland are in favour of some such proposal. Notwithstanding the failure of the trade to satisfy me as to the proportion in favour, I am going to vote for this scheme. Like the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, I want this Bill to be operative. I do not want it to be a plaything in the hands of temperance people in Scotland. I want, when it once becomes law, that it shall really be effective in reducing the number of public-houses, and thereby reducing the temptations to drink.

If the people of Scotland are asked to vote in favour of depriving a large number of people of their living, I am sure they will be very chary in supporting this Bill. But even supposing the people were inclined to vote in this direction, I should still be in favour of some scheme of compulsory insurance. I am not disposed to regard the publican as beyond the pale of ordinary consideration. It is perfectly true that they are only granted licences to sell drink for one year, but we know that in these matters there should be something like common sense and the exercise of a fellow feeling. I had a talk recently with a gentleman at Hamilton, who told me that he and his father and his grandfather before him, had been in the licensed trade in the town of Hamilton all their lives. It was perfectly true that they had only held yearly licenses, but, surely, regard must be had to this state of affairs from the point of view of common sense. We cannot get away from facts like that, and they should have some bearing on the consideration of a Bill of this character. That is the reason why I am in favour of it. I want the Bill to become operative and without involving any deprivation of a man of his living, or even without giving opportunities to the publican to go round pitching harrowing tales of what will happen in the event of a measure of this character passing.

I did not hear the speech of the hon. Baronet the Member for Ayr Burghs. I am sorry he adopted a hectoring tone. I do not think such a policy is likely to ensure success. I have heard it suggested that this proposal will have the effect of preventing the Bill becoming operative, because the funds will be insufficient, and because there will not be enough money to pay out to publicans. I would like to suggest to hon. Members who hold that view, that surely it would be more likely to be the case if there were no funds at all. The operation of this Bill, as a matter of fact, is not dependent on the sufficiency or otherwise of the fund under this scheme. The publicans, so far as I understand it, know perfectly well that if this Bill operated to any great extent this scheme would not produce anything like 20s. in the £. But they say that if they are going to stand the risk of being deprived of their living, they ought to be sure of something out of the wreck. I think that that is a very fair position to take up. We are not asking the State to pay anything. We are not asking that the State should have any association with the working of the scheme beyond requiring the production of a certificate of a premium having been paid, which is a necessary condition of the granting of the license. I repeat that the operation of the Bill is not dependent on the sufficiency of the fund, and for these, among other reasons, I do not see why I should alter the opinion to which I gave expression upstairs in favour of the adoption of some scheme of this nature. Just a last word in regard to the suggestion that the publicans might do this for themselves. I suppose that in Scotland there are a large number of publicans who believe that they are perfectly safe and who, in the event of a voluntary scheme being put forward, would not pay the premium. We must face such a fact as that, and I, for one, have no objection to imposing a tax on these men. They are in the same boat as the rest of their trade. I believe the great bulk of them recognise that fact. They recognise that they have common duties and obligations to one another. I therefore hope that the scheme will be adopted.

I should like to congratulate the hon. Gentleman on having delivered a speech full of good, sound, and fair argument, although I fear it may not have the effect it should upon the Lord Advocate. I cannot congratulate the hon. Member for South Lanark (Sir W. Menzies) on the argument he brought forward against the proposal of my hon. Friend. May I point out that those arguments were not directed at all against the Second Beading of the Clause, but were directed against the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Ayr Burghs, it being sug- gested that he had moved the Clause in a hectoring and bullying manner. I differ from that view; but even had the hon. Member adopted that tone, surely it had nothing at all to do with the merits of the Clause itself, and hon. Members opposite should discuss the merits of the Clause rather than the faults and errors of those who may be supporting it. It is on the merits of the Clause that I propose to make a few remarks. The hon. Member for Orkney drew attention to the chief point when he told us that he had visited a great many public-houses in his constituency and found there was very considerable feeling against one particular public-house benefiting under the Act while two-other public-houses might practically be ruined. That is a sensible, sound, common-sense point of view to take, and any one who is going to vote against this Clause should endeavour to bring forward arguments to show that the Bill will not have that effect. If it does, it will only tend to lead people who are affected to combine together for their own defence, and that is all that the Clause of my hon. Friend does. The Secretary for Scotland has not given any indication of the action he proposes to take m regard to this-Clause. Unfortunately I was not on the Committee, and do not know what occurred there, but I sincerely trust that, in his own interest, the right hon. Gentleman will accept this Clause. It is going to done harm whatever to the cause of temperance; it cannot in any way injure that cause so far as temperance itself is concerned, but it may possibly render this Bill a little less unpopular in Scotland. From an electioneering point of view it would be rather foolish of me to support my hon. Friend, because unless a Clause of this sort is put in I believe the Bill will be so unpopular that there will be a great reaction against the people who have brought it forward.

I should like to congratulate the hon. Member for Orkney (Mr. Cathcart Wason) upon having freed himself from the trammels and shackles of the temperance party. I am glad he made that observation, because he has shown that there are Members on that side of the House who are really actuated by the merits of the case, and not merely by a desire to advance the nostrums and fads of the temperance party. I do not know what view the hon. Member for the Rushcliffe Division (Mr. Leif Jones) is going to take of this matter. It would be interesting to the House to know what his views are. I think the general fairness which actuates him would compel him to say that he must follow the views of the hon. Member for Orkney, and support this Clause. If that is so, I hope that he will get up and tell the House what he thinks. I have looked in vain at the countenances of the Lord Advocate and of the Secretary of State to see whether or not there was a glimmer of hope to be gained from those countenances. They are like sphinxes. I do not know exactly what they are going to do. Therefore, the best thing that can be done would be for two or three hon. Members behind them, who, like the hon. Member for Blackfriars, are desirous that people should not be altogether ruined, to get up and point out that the Clause is of a harmless character, and necessary if the Bill is to become law. I am quite sure that pressure from behind will induce the right hon. Gentleman to make up his mind to accept the Clause. The only difficulty I see about the Clause is that it is extremely long, and it is difficult to see whether it requires any amendment. At any rate, we might read it a second time, then we could spend time upon it afterwards to see if Amendments are required. The principle, I am quite sure, is sound; it is that, so far as possible, ruin should not be brought upon the heads of those unfortunate holders of licences, for whom, as the hon. Member for Blackfriars said, there is still hope.

Before we proceed further with the examination of the details of this Clause, I think we might clear our minds as to what is the state of the law in Scotland at the present time and what are the principles which this Clause introduces. I hope the Government will not admit this Clause. The reasons why I take that view are, these: According to the law of Scotland—nobody opposite will deny it—at the present time a licence is a licence for one year. The justices at the present time are a body of men in the county, appointed partly from the county authorities and partly by the justices. They have uncontrolled discretion to refuse any licence or to renew any licence they like. That is exercised at the present moment, for last year in Glasgow twelve or more licences were refused without a single penny of compensation being paid. Therefore, licence holders in Scotland know very well what is the state of the law in Scotland as regards the position of men who hold licences under that law. What does the Bill propose to do? It affects two classes of persons, those who are licence holders at the present moment and those who will become licence holders after the Bill has become law. The interests of these two classes of persons in regard to compensation are entirely different. As regards those who are licence holders now, they may possibly have some claim to consideration. The Bill gives it them. It gives them five years to consider and adjust their position before the Bill comes into operation. If I am not wrong, the Bill cannot operate on them until 28th May, 1918. Not only does it give them a five years' time limit, but by a Clause in the Bill it prevents the justices ordering any alteration in premises or putting additional expense upon them by ordering them to alter their premises. Therefore, to my mind, and to the mind of those who take a fair point of view, these licence holders will have had ample time to put their house in order. An hon. Member has pointed out that this question of temperance legislation on these lines has been before Scotland for thirty years, therefore all the men who have come under the law since then have known perfectly well that some alteration was going to be introduced, and they still have five years in which to do it.

Take the other class of men, who become licence holders after the Act becomes operative. How can they have any claim to compensation? They come under a system under which they know that licences can be reduced by 25 per cent, or abolished altogether in an area, or the justices' powers can be left as they are. In their case they will come into the trade with their eyes open to the conditions under which they will carry on that trade. Where is their claim to any compensation at all? What will be the effect of adopting the principle of compensation? It will introduce into the law of Scotland a principle which has never been there, which was introduced into the law of England in recent years, and which in its operation has failed in England. [HON. MEMBERS: "No, no."] Everyone knows that the amount of compensation put aside under the Licensing Act in England has been very small and inadequate, and that it has prevented justices from exercising the powers and the discretion they already had of putting an end to licences. What are we asked to do? To introduce, first of all, a new principle of law, the principle of compensation; secondly—and this is to my mind the insidious part of the Clause—we are asked to adopt that principle under the ægis of the State. You will have licence holders, if anything goes wrong with the compensation fund, coming to the State and saying, "You sanctioned this scheme, and you must support it." They did not hesitate to say it at their big meeting in Glasgow, when the chairman read a letter which said:—

"We are all agreed that if it were possible to get compensation from the public, who by their, vote deprive us of our property, we would endeavour to get such a principle of compensation established."

That is the principle embodied in this Clause. If anyone suggests that it will not bring in the State to guarantee the compensation he has only to look at Subsection (8), which says:—

The central board may act with a quorum of five and shall, within twelve months after the passing of this Act, make rules prescribing amongst other things—

(a) The principles on which the declared value of certificates is to be ascertained;—

That is the whole principle of compensation—

and the conditions on which these may be modified or readjusted;

(b) The manner of subsequent election of members of the board and the duration of their office;—

there you have the whole of the machinery for putting the principle of compensation into operation—

(c) Any matters incidental to the proper conduct of the affairs of the board and to carrying out the provisions of this Act.

Mark the next provision!

Provided always that the rules shall not be contrary to anything in this Act contained and shall be approved by the Secretary for Scotland.

The Secretary of State will be responsible for the rules for the Board, and, in the long run, will have to make up the fund if it is deficient. For these reasons I hope the Government will refuse to accept the Clause.

I cannot follow my hon. Friend who has just sat down in his argument. I approach the scheme put down on the Paper by the Hon. Baronet (Sir G. Younger) in the spirit which we were invited to approach it by the Lord Advocate. I ask myself in what respect does the scheme on the Paper in any way in- troduce the principle of State compensation? I cannot find the thinnest thread by which the scheme proposed by the hon. Baronet could be drawn into any State compensation without further definite legislation. My hon. Friend (Colonel Greig) says we have the principle. We have not got the principle established. It would be arguable that the principle had been established if this Bill did not set up an entirely new state of affairs. On that point I should like to observe that the Scottish publican has taken his licence from the beginning of one year to the end of that year, and that, therefore, the risk he undergoes of losing his licence may be theoretically great. Yet we must remember that it is practically small, and that, in consequence, that risk has been, up to recent years, at all events, and still is for the greater part, an insurable risk. Here we are overturning that insurable risk, or we are so supplementing the risk as to make it a totally different risk altogether.

I am perfectly persuaded that the argument put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Cathcart Wason) is absolutely sound in this, that the average moderate man in Scotland, who in this matter will be the balance in the election, will have in his mind considerations of the position of a particular individual or particular individuals who will be affected by this legislation, and that his vote, which will probably turn the referendum on this point in any given district, will be largely dictated by the fact of the presence or absence of some form of insurance. If he knows that the majority of the trade have accepted the insurance scheme it is proposed to put into this measure, his vote will be much more willingly given to an object which, other things being equal, he very greatly favours, but he will shrink—I am not speaking in the air, but with a full knowledge of such men in Scotland—from giving his vote unless he knows that at least the edge of the danger is blunted by such a scheme as this. I am not at all influenced by what has been described as the hectoring style of the hon. Baronet. He, of course, is out for a different purpose in regard to this measure than we are, and no doubt that is his way, but, as has been pointed out on both sides, the intrinsic merit of a particular proposal is what we are here bound to examine, especially when we are dealing with one of the later stages of the Bill, and when it will soon have passed from our hands. We are asked why then make it compulsory. That brings me back again to the point which I raised earlier in my remarks, that we must make it compulsory, because you have upset all the conditions under which licenced insurance is carried on at this moment in Scotland. You have thrust in a factor which is practically incalculable or rather is only calculable in this sense, that there are certainly certain districts in Scotland which could not for many years adopt local veto, and that therefore publicans in those districts will say, "We are free from that danger, or it is so far off that we will not need to insure against it, and we are not going to step in to help our more seriously threatened brethren." Therefore in order to make the scheme of this Bill satisfactory to public opinion generally in Scotland, some compulsion is necessary, and the only compulsion which can be applied is that of an Act of Parliament. Finally, I would repeat that this Amendment will act powerfully as a facilitating measure for local veto, and I would earnestly plead with those who are the most stalwart friends of advanced temperance reform in Scotland to consider very carefully whether there is not far more weight in the argument that has been adduced in favour of this insurance measure than they commonly suppose, and before they brush it aside altogether to try to put themselves in the position of the average elector in Scotland when he is brought face to face with a requisition for a poll, and I am perfectly persuaded that if he is able to put himself in that position he can only come to one decision upon this point, and that is that this Clause deserves a Second Reading.

I congratulate the hon. Member on the line that he has taken over this Bill, because I do not think it is really a question of temperance or non-temperance, but merely a question of equity. I cannot see why any man who is interested in temperance should not vote for this particular Clause. The hon. Member said he advocated this Clause for a different purpose from that of the hon. Baronet. I do not know what purpose lie was urging, but I know that the hon. Baronet is most anxious in the cause of temperance. I know that when he was in my Constituency the other day he was lamenting that there was too much taxation upon whisky. I do not know if that is the point of view which he is taking.

Is the Noble Lord referring to me?

I was.

If the Noble Lord will take the trouble to read my speech he will see that I said no such thing.

The hon. Member knows his speech, and we know the speech he made, and I do not think I need enter into the question of that speech at present. I think he knows to what I was referring. Certainly my Constituency does. I should also like to say a word with regard to what the hon. Gentleman (Sir W. Menzies) had to say. He made the extraordinary statement that all those who had not answered the circular that the hon. Baronet (Sir G. Younger) stated had been sent out must in consequence be in favour of the Bill. He might just as well have said that the 200 odd Members of the Radical party who are not here now, if we had a Division, were against this Bill. Of course, that is not an argument which will hold water for a moment. It is certain on the law of averages that if forty out of 400 vote one way and the rest vote the other way, the predominance of opinion, at all events, must be in favour of the whole lot of those who voted on the side of the 400. With regard to this Clause it will obviously cause very great distress among a certain section of people in this country who are engaged in a perfectly legitimate trade if in future they are not to be allowed to get compensation in some way or another, but hold their licences absolutely according to the whim of the popular vote, and possibly an excited vote, of the moment. In Scotland, in spite of what the hon. Member (Colonel Greig) said, there is a reasonable chance of security at present if a man conducts his licence properly. But if this Bill passes there will be no security. If you have prohibition, for instance, the whole of the licences, whether well or badly conducted, will go, and therefore a man has no security at all. I think the result will be that you will make the existing public-houses very much worse places than they are at present, because a man will find that he has only got five years and no insurance at all, and there is a chance of it being taken away at any moment, and he will try to make as much money as possible in order to cut any possible loss. It will simply make the houses worse conducted and drive men to making hay while the sun shines. But if they are insured and they know they will not lose money, at all events when the licence is taken away that gives them some incentive to take a pride in their house and to conduct it properly, and they will know that there is a chance of being able to continue possibly in the same premises, and possibly under the same landlord, and will gradually put up a fund which will enable them to make their houses more consonant with the ideas of public temperance than they are at present.

Then I think it is obvious that if this insurance is not made compulsory you will probably have bankruptcies ail over the place, the premiums will be very much higher than is proposed now, and you will not find the strong supporting the weak. Certainly, I should think the Labour party would support us in this, because I should think they would be the last people in the world who wished to support what they are pleased to call blacklegs. So far as the Clause itself is concerned, the control is surely extremely democratic. It is left in the hands of the trade itself, and the way it has been drafted is that the licence holders themselves have the predominant control, and I should say that financially it is as sound as a scheme of that sort can possibly be, and the trade itself—I mean the brewers' interests and the distillers' interests—are certainly not predominant, but rather less than those of the retail holders. So it has everything to make it popular in Scotland, and I am certain, if we do not put some scheme of this sort in, you will do away with exactly what you want. I do not say the Chancellor of the Exchequer wishes it, but some hon. Members profess that they wish to do away with public-houses in Scotland. The difficulty might be removed in that way, but once the people see that the publicans have some grievance they will never vote for your prohibition, because they will say, "It is very hard luck on the man; he has no insurance and he has only five years. We have known him all these years and he will be hit by it." Take away that excuse and you will be far more likely to have prohibition or what I might at all events call an honest vote at the election. Of course, if the right hon. Gentleman opposite does not really want to have prohibition, to a certain extent I am with him. But, as it is, I am quite certain that this Clause is a fair one, and I cannot see why any hon. Member here should not vote for it, whether he is interested in temperance or not. It is a mere question of equity. Why is a man not to insure himself? Because hon. Members opposite, or the Secretary for Scotland certainly is in shackles, from which he cannot get away.

I trust an English Member may be permitted to say a word or two on this subject. Before the Government state what their views may be, I, speaking for myself, should like to say I think it is one which requires a very great deal of consideration before it is rejected. I do not agree with the suggestions which have been put forward by some speakers upon this side of the House that this is a compensation scheme. It appears to me to have nothing to do with compensation at all. It is an insurance scheme, and the only question that really seems to me to be relevant to the inquiry upon which we have entered is whether or not the trade desires this scheme. If the Committee is satisfied that this is a scheme which meets the views of the trade in Scotland I, for one, am entirely unable to see why the trade should not be allowed to adopt it. It is perfectly clear that under an enactment of this kind, if it is to be carried out, an enormous amount of loss and consequent distress must fall upon individuals, and I do not see why, however keen one may be for principles which are ordinarily called principles of temperance, one should oppose a combination for that purpose, and therefore I do not wish to pledge myself in any way to the details of the scheme. At the moment I am only referring to the principle of it. I would suggest that before this scheme is met by an absolute negative the Government should consider whether it is not possible to introduce into this Bill a scheme which may have, and which I think will have, if its details are somewhat amended and adjusted, the effect of doing away with a great deal of the loss and distress which must arise from the vigorous application of a measure of this sort. Therefore I hope that on this side of the House this scheme, which appears to be perfectly fairly put forward in the interests of the trade, may receive a fair consideration.

I must recall to the House what the practical proposition which is put before the Government really is, because the hon. Gentleman (Sir F. Low) safeguarded himself by saying that he would express no opinion about the scheme, and speaker after speaker on both sides of the House has been very careful to utter no words of strong commendation of the scheme. So eminent a financial expert as the hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury) made a speech on the subject in which he was very careful to say not a single word about the scheme. The hon. Baronet who moved the Amendment said of the scheme that he had not had time to consider it, and he quoted figures which he said had been supplied to him for which he could not vouch. The hon. Member for the Camlachie Division of Glasgow (Mr. Mackinder) said that the scheme had been so well explained by his predecessor that he would not talk about it at all. It is no use putting a general proposition before us, as you have done, before the licence holders. You are asking the Government to assume a grave responsibility. My hon. Friend the Member for the Black-friars Division (Mr. Barnes) said he did not think the Government should assume any responsibility. My hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Cathcart Wason) took the same line. I want to put this to the House, how is it possible for the Government to insert a provision in an Act of Parliament that every member of the trade shall compulsorily pay substantial contributions to an insurance fund unless that Government is to take some responsibility for the adequacy, security, management, and the general stability and probity of the fund? Is anyone on the other side of the House prepared to deny that the proposition is that we are asked to compel people to contribute to the fund, some of whom are admittedly unwilling, and then say, "We have nothing to do with this fund, for we have no responsibility for it." What is the position in regard to this fund? There have been a series of stages of this scheme. They vary enormously, and the last scheme to which we are asked to pledge ourselves as a Government and House of Commons is one which even the Gentleman who proposes it tells us that he has not had time to consider it. It is a scheme which we have only seen on the Paper this morning, and yet we are asked to compel the publicans of Scotland to adopt the scheme.

Nobody has defended the scheme proposed to-day. We had a scheme in Committee which was quite different. In fact, we have had several schemes, but the one put down to-day differs from them in essential principles. This proposes that new people should contribute. It may be quite proper, but supposing we put this scheme in the Bill this afternoon, what may these people say to us? They may say, "You have put us in as compulsory contributors to the scheme. We have never been asked about it. We have not considered it, and it is a monstrous thing that a burden should be put upon mortgagees"—that is how they describe themselves—"without our ever having had an opportunity of making representations to Parliament on the subject." That is the proposition put to the Government by the party opposite, and it is one to which on behalf of the Government I could not agree. Let us look at the evidence as regards the position of the trade as to approval or disapproval of the scheme. We are told sometimes that the whole trade approve of the scheme. It is a fair thing to say that if the whole trade, or nearly the whole trade, approve of the scheme, there is no obstacle under the sun in the way of their having a scheme of insurance. I wish them to have a scheme of insurance. I agree that it would facilitate the operation and working of this measure. What I object to is having a scheme of insurance put in this Bill as a condition of the reduction of licences. That is a principle I cannot concede. If they are right in saying, as the hon. Baronet and many people have said, that they are assured of the assent of the trade to the scheme, what are 1,000 licence holders in Glasgow doing at the present day? Insuring themselves.

It cannot be done.

Why cannot it be done if they are agreed? What is the other alternative? If there is a great deal of difference of opinion in the trade—it is my opinion that there is—and the Government says to those people who do not want to be compulsorily insured that they shall be insured, what will they turn round and say to us? They will say, "You compel me to be insured; you have accepted the scheme which was put before you the very day it was discussed, and which you confess there was no chance of considering. That is not fair. Make the scheme adequate and ample." That is what is behind the whole agitation, This is not an attempt to get this scheme into the Bill. Nobody believes in the scheme in my opinion. It is an attempt to get the Government committed to the principle of compensation before a licence can be taken away. I have always felt that, and every deputation I have received has confirmed me in that opinion. I was present at a deputation to-day, and the first thing they said was, "Why should Scottish licence holders be worse off than English licence holders? They have the same vested rights as the English trade." They have not. Hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite know perfectly well that they have not the same rights. The English right was largely created by the Act of 1904. It does not exist in Scotland, and, in my opinion, I would be betraying my trust if I accepted that principle, and admitted a vested interest in licences in Scotland. I am reminded that they could not carry a proposition like that for Scotland. By whom was it opposed? It was opposed by the then Conservative Secretary for Scotland (Lord Balfour of Burleigh).

It never was proposed for Scotland.