May I ask your ruling, Mr. Speaker, on a point of Order? A question handed in by me, addressed to the Prime Minister, has, I believe, not been accepted, on the ground that it is frivolous. In view of the fact that a Select Committee of this House has accepted the invitation of the Jockey Club to go to Epsom next Wednesday, is it frivolous to suggest that this House should, for once, revert to its ancient custom of adjourning for the Derby, so that Members who are not on this favoured Committee may have an opportunity of studying the possibilities of the betting tax?

The hon. and gallant Member has, I think, neglected to read his Order Paper. The Question is on the Paper.

I am sorry. It is not in the Order Paper for the week.

If the hon. Member will look at the Order Book, he will find that it is down.

On a point of Order. The point which I desire to raise is one that I have raised before, namely, whether this Bill, which purported, as we understood, to give a right to certain deportees to recover compensation for their treatment, did not require a preliminary Money Resolution in Committee of the whole House. I understand that that view has been ruled out by you, Mr. Speaker, and, therefore, I want to ask this: Is it a fact that by this Bill there is no contingent or prospective charge whatever upon the public funds, that is to say, that, no Money Resolution being necessary, there is nothing whatever in this Bill to give these deportees a right to recover public money by means of the Bill?

That is not exactly the question which the hon. and gallant Member submitted to me. I have gone thoroughly into the question, and have prepared a considered ruling, in answer to the point which the hon. and gallant Member submitted to me yesterday.

I am very grateful to you, Sir. I had not anticipated that you had thought it necessary or worth while to do that, but, in view of your consideration and courtesy in the matter, I would ask you now. I accepted your intimation that you could not accept my contention as final, and I had not proposed, therefore, to trouble you with it, but, in view of what you have just said, I will do so now. My contention is that this Bill, both in its form and in view of the statement made when it was introduced, was unable to confer upon the deportees a right to recover compensation from public funds, and I submit that that was in the minds of all Members when the Bill was introduced. In view of that, my submission was that any Bill which confers a right to a person to recover public money necessarily imposes a public charge, and, therefore, should be preceded by a Money Resolution of the whole House. In support of that, I would submit to you that Erskine May says that even a petition which prays for compensation or indemnity for loss out of public revenues is refused unless recommended by the Crown, that is to say unless a Money Resolution is passed. Erskine May moreover goes on to say that even contingent or prospective charges upon the public revenue come within the purview of the rule. It seemed to me clear that this Bill imposes at least a contingent or prospective charge upon the public revenue, and therefore I submitted to you that it must be preceded by a financial resolution and in view of the fact that you have been good enough to prepare a ruling on that point I submit it to you.

In reply to the hon. and gallant Member, I have to say that this Bill provides a tribunal for the assessment of damages, and gives directions as to the time within which claims are to be made, and the method by which the tribunal is to assess the compensation. There is no provision in the Bill for any payment of compensation, because, presumably, such a provision would be superfluous. Power is already possessed, and exercised from time to time, by the appropriate Department to pay compensation or damages awarded against the Crown or a Government official in his official capacity, and a Clause to that effect in a Bill like this is, therefore, unnecessary. The hon. and gallant Member raised an additional point with regard to the Act of 1920. With respect to that point, I may say that it is not left to the vigilance of Members of the House only to watch these money matters. The authorities of the House—the authorities at the Table and in the Public Bill Office—have that duty, and they are always most careful to call my attention to any matters of this kind. I have no doubt that my predecessor in 1920 would have had his attention drawn to it had there been any question on that Bill, which is quite parallel to this one, as to the necessity for a Money Resolution.

May I draw your attention to the fact that this Bill in its original form was intended to take away from the deportees their right to recover money, and, having taken it away in the first part of Clause 1, it proceeds to give a new right? I submit, therefore, that the right which they receive in the second part of the Clause is a new right to make a claim on public funds, and that is not the ordinary right which anyone may possess to recover damages by the Crown.

That is exactly what was done by the Act of 1920. The existing right was taken away, and a new form of claim and assessment was substituted, as is the case in this Bill.

On the point of Order. Accepting your ruling that the setting up by this Bill of a tribunal does not necessitate a Money Resolution, may I submit that there have been imported into the proviso the words "and awarded by a tribunal," so that there is not merely an assessment, but an award of the sum assessed.

On the point of Order. Is it not the fact that there is voted annually by Parliament a Civil Contingencies Fund, out of which any liability that may contingently arise under any Act of Parliament can, within the limits of such Fund, be met?

That is so. As far as this Bill may involve additional expenditure not contemplated when the Estimates were framed, a Supplementary Estimate will, of course, be necessary. Instances of such payments will be found in the Appropriation Account under the Law Charges Vote. With regard to the point put by the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. F. Gray), the adoption of the word "awarded" in addition to the word "assessed" does not, in my opinion, alter the position. It occurs also in the Act of 1920.

With regard to the Amendments on the Paper, the first new Clause standing in the name of the hon. Member for Springburn (Mr. Hardie)—[ Provision as to damages ]— is a matter which will be dealt with on Clause I of the Bill. Regarding the second new Clause on the Paper, it seems to me to be unnecessary, but if the hon. Member should desire to move it, I will allow him to do so.

NEW CLAUSE.—( Saving as regards act done in Ireland. )

"This Act shall not operate to indemnify any person resident in Ireland in respect of any act done in Ireland."—[ Mr. F. Gray. ]

Brought up, and read the First time.

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

There have been presented to this House a number of petitions which disclose a number of claims in respect of alleged ill-treatment in Southern Ireland-Supposing those charges are well founded, those persons, apart from this Bill, are undoubtedly entitled to satisfaction in Ireland. The object of my Clause is to make it quite clear that an indemnity is not granted excluding these people, who are resident in England, from having a remedy in Southern Ireland.

I beg to second the Motion.

I hope the hon. Member will not persist with the Clause. As Mr. Speaker has already pointed out, it is really unnecessary, and I think it is worse than unnecessary because it would assume that there is some possibility of a Bill in this form applying to Southern Ireland, which really would be an attack on the rights of the Southern Irish Government and might be resented over there. It is very important that we should not assume for a moment that Southern Ireland is in any different position from any other Dominion of the Crown in that respect. In these circumstances, I think the Clause is not only unnecessary but might have a pernicious effect, and I hope the hon. Member will not persist in it.

Motion and Clause, by leave, with-drawn.

CLAUSE 1.—( Indemnity for action taken under Restoration of Order in Ireland regulations. )

(1) No action or other legal proceeding whatsoever, whether civil or criminal, shall be instituted in any court of law against any person for, or on account of, or in respect of the issue before the passing of this Act, of any order purporting to have been made in pursuance of regulation 14 B. purporting to have been made under the Restoration of Order in Ireland Act, 1920, or for, on account of, or in respect of any act done for the purpose of carrying any such order into effect; and if any such proceeding has been instituted, whether before or after the passing of this Act, it shall be discharged and made void. Subject in the case of a proceeding instituted before the seventeenth day of May, nineteen hundred and twenty-three, to such order as to costs as a court or a judge thereof may think fit to make:

Provided that any person who, in pursuance of any such order, has been deported to Ireland since the sixth day of December, nineteen hundred and twenty-two, and therein interned shall be entitled within three months after the passing of this Act to claim compensation for any loss or damage he may have sustained in consequence of such deportation and internment, or in respect of any act done for the purpose of carrying such order into effect, and the amount of such compensation shall be assessed on the principles on which damages would be assessed at common law in a common law action for trespass excluding any statutory minimum and awarded by a tribunal consisting of three persons (of whom one shall be a person who holds or has held high judicial office) appointed by the Lord Chief Justice of England, or, in cases of persons deported from Scotland, by the Lord President of the Court of Session, and the decision of such a tribunal shall be final.

(2) A person may be compelled to attend and give evidence or produce documents in proceedings before any such tribunal in like manner as in proceedings before an arbitrator, and the tribunal shall have power to require any person appearing before them to give evidence on oath and to authorise any person to administer an oath for that purpose, and the tribunal shall have power to award and assess such sums by way of costs as they in their discreton may think fit.

I beg to move, in Subsection (1), after the word "person" ["in any court of law against any person "], to insert the words "who has acted in good faith."

I think this Amendment is one of very considerable importance. It was debated at very great length in Committee, but the actual point in conflict, as to the insertion of the words "in good faith," was not fully and completely debated because the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Spen Valley (Sir J. Simon) raised the point as to the meaning of the whole Clause and in that matter, which caused very considerable embarrassment to His Majesty's Ministers, no reply was made to the point which I now desire to bring before the House. I pointed out then, and I desire to reiterate now, that these words "in good faith" are contained in the Indemnity Act, 1920. The Attorney-General in every case, I think, when this Bill was before the Committee on that occasion, when he found himself in that state of embarrassment as to whether his ruling was to be accepted or not, said the Indemnity Bill was based upon the Indemnity Act, 1920. It will be found on comparison of the two that, in the main, the assertion of the Attorney-General is well founded. But it is a very noticeable fact that these words "in good faith," which appear in the Act of 1920, do not appear in this Bill, although the Act was taken as a basis for this Bill. Moreover, I pointed out that in inserting the words "in good faith" in the Act of 1920, His Majesty's Ministers at that time were only following the universal precedent which had been set in all cases of indemnity, whether in this country or in the Colonies, and I quoted and I will quote again from Keith's "Responsible Government in the Dominions."

"It is therefore important that Indemnity Acts should be worded so as to cover all that it is right to cover without affording a cover to acts of private malice done under the pretence of suppressing rebellion. The Irish case of Wright v. Fitzgerald shows that such an act is not covered by the ordinary Act of Indemnity, and the Colonial Office in 1867 followed this precedent by declining to approve a New Zealand Act which was not limited to an indemnity for acts done in good faith in the suppression of the native rising in that Colony, but covered all acts done in the suppression of rebellion without qualification."

I went on to show that that rule and precedent had been followed not only in respect of Indemnity Acts in New Zealand but in the Natal and the Cape Indemnity Acts. This was extremely noticeable, that whereas the Act of 1920 has been used as a foundation, these words are left out. I am sure the House would not pass a measure of Indemnity that protected persons who had been guilty of conduct which did not accord with good faith.

Information has been given to me—and I use it with the greatest reservation, because I have endeavoured since the Committee meeting, on which date I received the information, to obtain official confirmation—that the Government of Southern Ireland never in fact requested His Majesty's Government to deport these men from England to Ireland. What I believe they in fact desired was that these men and women, against whom they made certain allegations, should be arrested and confined, in preference in this country. I suggest that these words which have been inserted in every previous Act of Indemnity have a real foundation and a real meaning because, if it can be alleged hereafter that the act of arrest was at the request of the Irish Free State and for the protection of that country, that would be well within the meaning of good faith.

If it can be suggested hereafter that His Majesty's Ministers went beyond the necessities so far as Southern Ireland was concerned and in fact arrested persons—whether necessarily or not is immaterial—and proceeded to deport them to a place beyond the jurisdiction of the Courts in this land, then that point can be raised when it is sought to save His Majesty's Ministers from having proceedings taken against them under the Habeas Corpus Act in this country. In fact, it was held by the Divisional Court, on the argument propounded by the Attorney-General, that the act of deporting these men and women beyond the jurisdiction did deprive them of having the benefit which otherwise they would have had under the Habeas Corpus Act. If that case can be established by any of the deportees, the Government will only be saved under the Indemnity Act if they are successful in keeping out of the Bill the words "in good faith." I suggest therefore that we are entitled to have the clearest possible reason given to us why there should be so great a departure from precedent in this particular case.

I beg to second the Amendment.

This is an Amendment which I myself moved during the Committee stage. I am bound to say I have heard nothing since to induce me to modify the views which I then expressed, that it was a desirable Amendment and would not injure the Bill from the point of view of the Government. I may say, at once, I have no reason to follow what my hon. Friend the mover has said with regard to the action of the Home Secretary. I cannot help believing that my hon. Friend's information has been mistaken and that he has been misled, because it is my recollection that the Home Secretary made a specific statement from the Treasury Bench that he was asked by the Irish Government to send these deportees to Ireland and I accept that statement fully. That, however, is a point which does not affect the merits of this Amendment. As I pointed out at the time, it would be absolutely wrong for the House of Commons to pass an Act of Indemnity under which protection was given to persons who acted in bad faith, especially persons of the type of spies, common informers and the like. The argument of the Attorney-General was that if you introduced the words "in good faith"into the Bill, you would leave the door open for any of the deportees to bring actions. Insofar as any bad faith has been displayed, I think that would be a very desirable thing. Insofar as good faith was displayed, then the deportee would know in advance, that not only could he not hope to succeed in his action, but that he would certainly be condemned in costs.

I suggest that the Attorney-General's point can be met by introducing a proviso putting the deportee on his election as to which remedy he will take and not allowing him to take both remedies. I think that would be a perfectly logical course. If the deportee wished to bring proceedings against any person who had acted manifestly in bad faith, then he should have an opportunity of doing so and of clearing his character by establishing in a court of law that bad faith had been displayed. It seems to me that before the tribunal which the Government proposes to set up, good faith or bad faith will not be the issue at all. The issue will be the amount of loss or damage sustained, and it will be perfectly proper to allow the deportee the right to bring an action to establish bad faith, and completely clear his own character, if he so desires, provided you lay it down in the Bill that, having made his election, should he be unsuccessful, he will then be debarred from availing himself of the right to go before the compensation tribunal. I hope that the Government will see their way to accept the Amendment.

There are only two observations which I desire to make in support of the Amendment. I urge the Government to consider whether at the last moment it may not be possible for them to accept what appears to be a very reasonable Amendment. The first and principal argument advanced against the Amendment by the Attorney-General is that it would leave the way open for deportees who have grievances to bring action. The particular words in relation to which this Amendment appears to be of particular importance are the words in Clause 1 which bar proceedings—

"for, on account of, or in respect of any act done for the purpose of carrying any such order into effect."

I would point out to the Attorney-General very respectfully and with very great diffidence, not being a master of the law, that it appears to me it is open at the present time under this wording for a deportee to bring an action. You cannot prevent him, because he can bring an action in respect of an act done, and allege that it was not done for the purpose of carrying this order into effect, and his plea would be that the true and proper interpretation could not be twisted to bring such an act within these words. I do not think the Amendment creates any dangerous extension from the point of view of the Government by admitting the words "in good faith." Why, may I ask, should the House desire to protect an act which was not done in good faith? If the act is not done in good faith, in Heaven's name let the person concerned bring his action and recover whatever severe penalties he can. We are not concerned with acts done in bad faith.

The principal reason why I desire, very temperately but very urgently, to press this Amendment on the right hon. and learned gentleman is this. I believe it to be a precedent of the greatest evil to introduce an Indemnity Bill and carry it through the House without this saving Clause applying it only to acts done in good faith. The precedent of the Act of 1920 appears to me to be most valuable. I will detain the House long enough to give only one reason for that, which I believe to be a very important reason of general principle. Every fresh Indemnity Bill that is passed becomes a precedent that is looked to in future circumstances in which responsible officers, Ministers and public servants may be contemplating circumstances in which an Indemnity Bill may be necessary. It is no fantastic supposition to say that there are occasions when dangerous or risky action is contemplated when, before the action is performed, the conditions of an Indemnity Bill are taken into consideration by those accomplishing the act. The very conditions of this particular business which we are now considering were such that the Home Secretary has himself told us that before he performed these acts he took into consideration the possibility that they might be upset by a writ of habeas corpus. Therefore an Indemnity Bill, and the machinery of an Indemnity Bill, is a thing which ought to be contemplated, something which is taken into consideration, by public servants when they are contemplating risky courses. Therefore, let us hesitate once again before we establish the precedent that will lead public servants, when they are contemplating such a risky course, to think that there will be a Bill brought in which will not have this reservation. It is a matter of the deepest principle, and I would appeal urgently to the Government not to create a bad precedent by passing an Indemnity Bill without this saving Clause.

I urge this Amendment on the Government, because I heard this matter debated in Committee, where the Noble Lord and the Attorney General were pressed heavily in that Debate that the onus was on them to prove that the words should not be in the Indemnity Bill. The onus was not discharged in that Debate, and I regret to say that in the end the Noble Lords resorted to the Closure. That was no solution of the difficulty. It reminds me of a passage in the works of Walter Bagehot. He says that in the days of George III, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Perceval, there was a great Treasury official, Mr. George Rowe, who, whenever he was confronted with an accusation which demanded an exceptional defence and there was a difficulty in making a decent defence, used to exclaim, "Dear, dear, this is too bad. We must apply our majority to this difficulty." That was the position of the Noble Lord a few days ago. There was no other solution. I hope that to-day there may be some explanation given to us, which was not forthcoming in the last Debate, showing that the onus has been properly discharged. As has been said by the right hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. H. Young) that this is creating a precedent which may be followed in future times. If the Noble Lord in his reply can refer us to any Indemnity Bill passed in previous times which did not include words such as those now proposed, there may not be the same reason for this Amendment.

The Government cannot accept this Amendment, for the reasons which were stated to the Committee most exhaustively in the Debate of Tuesday night. The Mover of the Amendment began by saying that in the Indemnity Act, 1920, these words appear, and therefore we ought to have them in this Bill. But the hon. Member must remember that, although it is true that the words "in good faith" appear in the first Section, they are followed later on by Sub- section (3) of the same Section, which provides

"For the purposes of this Section a certificate by a Government Department that any act, matter or thing was done under the authority of a person so holding office or so employed as aforesaid"

—that is, under the authority of an officer who was employed in the service of the Crown—

"or was done in the execution of a duty shall be sufficient evidence of such authority or duty and of such act, matter or thing having' been done thereunder or in execution thereof and any such act, matter or thing done by or under the authority of a person so holding office or so employed as aforesaid shall be deemed to have been done in good faith unless the contrary is proved."

Hear, hear!

I am glad to see that that qualification is welcomed with such enthusiasm by the right hon. Member for Spen Valley. In an Indemnity Act like that of 1920, which covered, not one particular transaction, but every transaction that had been done during the War, over a period of six years, it was obviously necessary to have some expression of the kind which is found there, because otherwise anybody who was a military or civil officer of the Crown in any capacity, when sued for anything, would always be able to say, "I did that in the discharge of my duty," and there was an end of it. Therefore Parliament put in the words "if done in good faith." Then it proceeded to provide that the certificate that the act had been done under the authority of a person in authority was in itself sufficient evidence of good faith, and required express evidence of bad faith to be given. In the present case the House is not being asked to pass a general Indemnity Bill. It is being asked to pass an Indemnity Bill in respect of one specific transaction, in respect of which everybody knows that there is already available the certificate of a person holding office, the Home Secretary, that the act was done under his orders. Therefore we have not the same necessity for such a Clause as in the Act of 1920.

But the hon. Member who moved the Amendment to my mind gave himself the most conclusive evidence why an Amendment of this kind would be most undesirable. He told us that he had information from an anonymous source, which he gave with the utmost reserva- tion but which he himself apparently believed, that the real reason why we want these words omitted is because the Government of the Irish Free State never asked to have these men deported to Southern Ireland, and only asked us to confine them in England. He said that if that were true, it would show that the Government did not act in good faith, and certainly it would, because, as the hon. and gallant Gentleman who seconded the Amendment reminded us, the Home Secretary in this House stated as a fact, on his responsibility as Home Secretary, that that specific request had been made to the Government and that it was in pursuance of that request that the deportations took place. The hon. Member who moved the Amendment may not believe that statement. Apparently he does not. I will not labour matters by repeating it because hon. Members who refuse to believe the Home Secretary will not believe me, and those who do believe the Home Secretary do not need my assurance that he is telling the truth. Therefore I um not going to waste time by repeating statements already made on the authority of the Government. But the fact that a Member of this House is so prejudiced as to believe that the Home Secretary has been misleading the House, and stating what is untrue, shows that others outside the House may be equally prejudiced.

The result will be that anyone who can screw his credulity up to the same pitch as that which the hon. Member for Oxford City (Mr. F. Gray) has reached, would be able to start proceedings, not merely civil, as has been suggested by the right hon. and gallant Member for Norwich (Mr. H. Young), but criminal proceedings if he chose, against the Home Secretary or against anyone for any act done in pursuance of the orders of the Home Secretary; and the whloe intention of the Act of Indemnity, that there should be an end of any proceedings in respect of these deportees, would be nullified. Moreover, the proceedings need not be started within the three months; they could be started at any time within three years, under the Habeas Corpus Act or something of that kind. One of the main purposes of the Bill is to ensure that, after the three months have expired, there shall be an end of everything and everybody will know exactly how he stands. If the Amendment were passed, there would be no end within the next three years. Everybody who has done anything under these orders would remain liable to be sued by any deportee, or by any of the deportees' friends for that matter, on a summons to stand his trial at a police court on a charge of præmunire or whatever it is.

There is the question of costs. It is said, "You need not be afraid of these proceedings, if taken, because the person who started them will be mulcted in costs. "There are two answers to that statement. First of all I will take civil proceedings. We have been told that many of the deportees are devoid of means. A judgment for costs against them would, therefore, be quite valueless. It would be quite easy for an Irish Self-Determination League or an Irish Republican body to start proceedings in some person's name, to find the money for prosecuting the proceedings, and to be quite safe against having to pay any costs. Criminal proceedings could be started without responsibility for costs. My submission is that the danger of a bad precedent, which has been foreshadowed, is not a real danger, because this is a Bill not of general indemnity in respect of a whole series of transactions—as were the Act in regard to the Jamaica rebellion and the 1920 Act—but is a Bill of Indemnity in respect of one specific transaction, a transaction in which the person responsible for initiating the proceedings was the Home Secretary, whose bona fides is not challenged by any substantial body of responsible opinion inside this House.

The other reason why it is useless to insert the words of the Amendment is that the deportees do not require to prove bad faith in order to recover their compensation. In this Bill we are starting by accepting the decision of the Court of Appeal that the act of the Home Secretary was ultra, vires, and we are giving to the deportees full compensation, whether the act was done in good faith or in bad faith. Therefore, the deportees will get just the same compensation in either case. The unfortunate victim who acted on the instructions of the Home Secretary would, however, if these words were inserted, gain an infinite disadvantage, because he would be exposed to the uncertainty of these attacks at any time within the next three years by anyone who has a grievance against him, or wishes to make himself disagreeable to him or to the Government. It was said by the right hon. Member for Norwich that you could start an action just the same even if these words were not inserted. It is quite true that you could start an action, but there are powers in Courts for staying frivolous and vexatious actions, and if you started an action for something which was quite obviously done under the orders of the Home Secretary the Court would strike the action out. But if you started an action alleging that an act was done in bad faith, since that requires issues of fact to be tried, the Court could not strike it out. With the Amendment left out there would be no difficulty, but if the Amendment were inserted every action would have to be tried.

The Attorney-General has exercised his powers of persuasion to the full, but I do not think he has convinced many hon. Members whose single object is to secure that this Bill shall leave the House in a form which in future will be thought to be most satisfactory in the interests of the legislation of the country. The Attorney-General has used two arguments, and neither of them is an argument which ought to govern our decision. He has used an argument which is from time to time used by all Governments. He has had recourse to flying to the point of honour-He said that if anyone insisted on putting this Amendment before the House, it meant that he cast aspersions on the honour of distinguished and honourable men. I say with the greatest plainness that that is not a ground upon which this Amendment is based. It is an Amendment which was urged on the Committee stage by the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) and by the right hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith). It is an Amendment urged also on behalf of the Labour Party, and it really does not lie in the mouth of the Attorney-General to tell the House at this stage that the Amendment is put forward to reflect upon the good faith or honour of distinguished men.

There was a second argument which appears to be a technical argument rather than one of substance. It can be stated briefly. Ought the House of Commons, when it is preventing the possibility of actions being brought against a variety of individuals, including some subordinate officials and some persons who may not be officials at all, to be satisfied with a provision that no matter how many these persons were or how they acted, they are to be protected, whether they acted in good faith or in bad faith?

Let me refer to the technical argument of the right hon. Gentleman. He intimated to the House that in the Act of 1920 there was a Section which showed that this Amendment was quite unnecessary. He referred to Sub-section (3) of the Indemnity Act, 1920, which, it is quite true, provides for the presumption being made that persons have acted in good faith, but when he came to the end of the Sub-section he read the words, "unless the contrary is proved." I should be quite content—and I advise my hon. Friend who moved the Amendment to be content—if the Government met us by saying: "We think good faith should be presumed, and we think it would be right, if only because of the example we are setting for the public service, and for all who act under the orders of public servants, to provide that while good faith should be presumed it should be open to anybody who is so rash as to pursue his remedy at common law to establish bad faith if he can." That would, at any rate, be fair. I earnestly beg the Government, even now, to consider this matter, because there is no question of anybody's amour propre. We are merely trying to get an Indemnity Bill, a very exceptional kind of Bill, in a form to which the House of Commons and all of us hereafter will turn for a good example for future cases. That is our object. I hope I have not spoken in language which has made my appeal difficult to accept, and I do ask the Government to respond. I ask the Noble Lord whether he does not think in that form it would be in the public interest, and in the beet interests of our own standards of British justice to say that if any man, in spite of the inference to the contrary, is prepared to take upon himself to go before the Court and try to establish bad faith he should not, by this retrospective legislation be prevented from doing so.

want to clear up what seems to me a rather serious misconception by the Attorney-General. He says that if an Amendment in this form, or in the form of the Act of 1920, be added, the result will be that any person who is sufficiently credulous to believe that the Home Secretary has acted in bad faith could go before a Stipendiary magistrate and get criminal proceedings started against the Home Secretary, and the Home Secretary would have no redress even in the matter of costs. The Attorney - General must realise that he is in error in regard to that. If you go before a Metropolitan Police Magistrate for criminal proceedings, you have to satisfy the magistrate that you have a prima facie case, and if the Act provides that the good faith of the Home Secretary is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, it will not be open for the person to go before the magistrate and merely say: "I believe in his bad faith, and I ask for process." He would be summarily dismissed from the police court. Unless he could satisfy the magistrate that there is a strong prima facie case of bad faith against the Home Secretary no process would be allowed to issue. The same would apply in regard to the High Court.

Under which Act of Parliament would he go before the magistrate?

I am dealing with the point raised by the Home Secretary, who told us that anyone could go and get process from a magistrate if this Amendment were passed. I suggest that that is not a right view of the law. As he has pointed out to the House, there is procedure in regard to a vexatious case. Such a case would be struck out. If a person went before the High Court and alleged, generally, that the Home Secretary had acted in bad faith, that also would be struck out. The fear that has been put forward does not exist. The Attorney-General raises a technical objection which, if he is right, will apply to every single Indemnity Act which has ever been passed. He puts forward the argument that never in any Indemnity Act ought these words to be included. I think the House will require a better argument than that before they reject the Amendment.

12 N.

This Amendment was closured in Committee, and I make no apology for speaking on it on the Report stage. The gravamen of the case advanced by the Attorney-General is that this Act only applies to one specific case. I am sure that is the intention of the Government, but the road to that destination where most Governments end is paved with good intentions. It was the intention of the Government to confine this Act to one specific case when they first introduced it, but it emerged in the Committee stage that it did in fact apply not to one but to 84 Regulations, and an enormous number of acts done without purview of the recent action taken by the Home Secretary. Regulation 14B was utilised for some time by Sir Hamar Greenwood in the régime which he initiated in Ireland. A great deal of the action taken by Sir Hamar Greenwood and by the Black and Tans was under this precise Regulation 14B. He used it for the internment of a great many people. Are we, in this oblique fashion, to pass an Indemnity Bill for action taken by Sir Hamar Greenwood? The late Government refrained from introducing any Bill of Indemnity in respect of the reprisals régime in Ireland, and no Act of Indemnity for Sir Hamar Greenwood or for the late Government or for the Black and Tans has ever been passed by this House, or ever been put before the House. It was a matter of astonishment to many of us who were waiting with some eagerness for that Measure to be introduced. It would be a strange irony of circumstances if the Noble Lord was involved in any way in furthering the passage through this House of a Measure which indemnified Sir Hamar Greenwood. I am entirely confident that he would not participate, consciously, in any such course. Therefore, 1 would, with all respect, invite him to give the assurance that no indemnity for any action taken by Sir Hamar Greenwood or the Black and Tans is contained in the Bill which we are now passing.

The House is entitled to some reply on the point just made. It is true that in the Committee stage the Noble Lord and the Attorney-General agreed that the Bill, as originally drawn, was too wide, and it has been limited. The question now arises whether the limitation is as great as the Committee supposed?

That does not arise on this Amendment.

The point has been made for the first time, because it does affect the matter of good faith. This House honourably agreed that this Bill should be passed to affect only the Orders which are now in question—the Orders which the Home Secretary recently made. There is substance in the points made by my right hon. and learned Friends on the Front Opposition Bench. The serious issue depends upon whether the Bill affects any Orders made before the recent Orders of the Home Secretary. It would simplify the matter if an indication was given as to the view of the Government on this point.

I certainly have always supported this Bill on Second Reading and in Committee strictly on the ground that it only applies to this particular set of transactions taken under the Orders of the Home Secretary, and I believe that that is done in substance by the Bill as it stands. There is an Amendment coming on next which raises that very point. If it is desired to make it perfectly clear by any other Amendment, that it does only apply to that, I personally should not be against it. It is not in order to discuss what I would do on the next Amendment, but I would meet that point absolutely so as to make it perfectly clear that this Bill applies only to the action taken by the Home Secretary, and it is only because I put that forward that I do, with great respect to my right hon. Friend opposite, resist this particular Amendment. It is not that I want, or that we want, to set up a precedent. That is not our object at all. I think the whole Government share to the full the view that Acts of Indemnity ought only to be just sufficient to cover the actual case that is in contemplation. If we put in these words, we should also have to put in the Section that is in the Act of 1920 saying that a certificate of the Home Secretary that he had done what he had said he had done would be sufficient to establish good faith. The whole point is substantially covered as it is.

It is not a question of it being substantially so. The question is whether it is open to a claimant to prove or not. As the Bill stands, it is not open to him, and if the Amendment were made, it would be open to him.

But here there is only one official involved, and that is the Home Secretary.

No.

Yes, that is so. All these acts were done under the orders of the Home Secretary and could only be done under the orders of the Home Secretary by the terms of the Order, and if they were not done under that Order, they were not justifiable. The House has had an opportunity of forming an opinion of the good faith of the Home Secretary, and, therefore, it would be quite otiose to put in, first, these words, and then go on to say that a certificate of the Home Secretary, in the words of the Section of the 1920 Act, was necessary to establish prima facie good faith, since here the House is satisfied that the Home Secretary has not been guilty of anything in the nature of bad faith. I do not want to prolong the Debate. I hope I have explained to the satisfaction of the majority of the House, at any rate, why the Government thought that to put in these words would be merely an indication that it would not do what the House desired to do to put an end to this matter by providing full compensation for those who are aggrieved on the terms that there should be no further litigation. I hope

the House will support the Government in resisting this Amendment, which really has been discussed absolutely fully in Committee already, and if there be any further Amendment necessary to meet the point raised by the hon. Gentleman opposite, that shall be made under the next Amendment.

I should like to ask a legal question of the Attorney-General. I put this point in Committee, but I have not had a reply, and I ask permission now to repeat the question. I want to ask whether the Attorney-General will state whether any person, having a right of civil or criminal action or both against the Home Secretary or the Attorney-General, will be void of an action being entered in the Law Courts, having regard to the non-repealment of the existing Statute Law in the event of this Bill becoming law?

That does not arise on this Amendment.

Then I will put it later.

Perhaps it will help the House if I mention that I do propose to call the next Amendment on the Paper, suggesting a limiting of the period to which the Act shall apply.

Question put, "That those words be there inserted in the Bill."

The House divided: Ayes, 122; Noes, 194.

I beg to move, in Subsection (1), after the word "Act," ["this Act, of any Order"], to insert the words

The purpose of this Amendment is to secure that the extent of the indemnification shall be limited to the episode of which we are all aware—the wholesale deportations. I had not contemplated the possibility of the Bill being used for Sir Hamar Greenwood and the Black and Tans, as indicated by my hon. Friend, but I had thought, possibly, there may have been individual cases of deportation which did not receive the same publicity, and for which we would not think of indemnifying the Home Secretary, without knowing all the circumstances. I think, from what has been said by the Noble Lord, that, probably, he is prepared to give some consideration to this Amendment.

I beg to second the Amendment.

With a slight alteration, I shall be very glad to accept this Amendment, if the hon. Member will agree to the 6th December, 1922, that is the date when the Free State came into operation, and covers the period which is covered by the decision of the Court of Appeal in consequence. As a matter of fact, the only deportations which have taken place since that date are the deportations in this particular Clause, under the Orders of the Home Secretary, which we have been discussing all the time. The 10th March would not quite do. Some of the things in connection with these deportations had begun before the 10th March, and it would not really cover all the transactions we have been considering. The 6th December, 1922, would cover them. It will be seen that in the provision for compensation, the 6th December, 1922, is inserted, and it is desirable that you should stick to the same date in different parts of the Bill.

My hon. Friend (Mr. Maxton) has put down the 10th March, because on that day, and about that day, the final act which secured the deportations took place. Now the Noble Lord suggess the 6th December, 1922. He gives as the reason for that, first of all, that it accords with the date connected with compensation — a very substantial reason. The other reason is that on that date the Constitution Act was passed. Will the Noble Lord give us an assurance that, if we accept the 6th December, 1922, nothing else is covered?

Yes.

If nothing else be covered, except the acts and the preparation for the acts which we have been discussing in connection with this Bill, I do not see why my horn Friend should not accept it, on the understanding that it applies only to the acts we have been discussing. On that understanding, I hope he will accept the suggestion.

I do not know whether or not any people were deported before the 10th March. The date offered by the Noble Lord is no concession whatever, because everybody knows that, before the passing of the Free State Act, all these deeds were legal, and, therefore, to fix the date at the passing of the Free State Act is giving nothing in the way of concession, but merely saying that they will be indemnified subsequently to a date, prior to which they were not acting illegally at all.

It shows how difficult it is to satisfy the hon. and gallant Member. This concession was made in deference to an appeal by some of the hon. and gallant Member's followers, who said that, as drafted, this Clause might cover all sorts of iniquities committed by the Coalition Government. I was very anxious to keep faith with the House, and make it quite clear that we were only covering the Home Secretary's action. I have done what I can, and I think the hon. and gallant Member is ungracious not to accept it.

I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: In Sub-section (1), after the word "Act" ["this Act, of any order"], insert the words "and since the sixth day of December, nineteen hundred and twenty-two."—[ Mr. Maxton. ]

Further Amendment made: In Subsection (1) after "14B" ["Regulation 14B"] insert the words "made or."—[ The Attorney-General. ]

I beg to move in Sub-section (1), after the word "done" ["in respect of any act done "], to insert the words "before the passing of this Act."

I move this Amendment in order to carry out the promise given by my Noble Friend the Lord Privy Seal during the Committee stage of the Bill. We promised then we would give effect to the point made, that we would not cover any acts done hereafter. In order to meet that I have put down this Amendment. I see a good many hon. Members have taken the same point, and I think, therefore, the House will be able to accept this.

Amendment agreed to.

I beg to move in Sub-section (1) to leave out the word "order" ["such order as to costs"], and to insert instead thereof the word "directions."

This point was raised by me at the Committee stage. If this Amendment were not made, the only people who could recover damages would be those deemed to have been concerned in the pursuance of any action before the Court.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In Subsection (1) leave out word "a" ["a Court or"], and insert instead thereof the word "the."

Leave out the word "make" ["may think fit to make "] and insert instead thereof the word "give."—[ The Attorney-General. ]

I beg to move in Subsection (1), after the word "interned" ["therein interned shall be entitled "], to insert the words

I think the point involved here has not been adequately seized or seriously considered by the right hon. Gentleman. The Government have repeatedly said that full compensation would be given. We have reason, unfortunately, to believe that several of the deportees are ill, and may not be able to pursue their claims in person. If the Government in such cases wish to give full compensation to those aggrieved, I think the Bill does not in its present form carry out that intention. The Bill expressly confers the right of action on persons who have been interned. I cannot believe that the Government are wishful that the widows and orphans of a man who might die before the action was finished or commenced should not benefit in the same way as the other deportees. The Government will not be able to give effect to what we understand they desire unless this Amendment be made. Suppose a deportee dies just before the action is concluded?

I want to dwell just a little on the pecuniary loss involved in some of these cases. We in this House -are not accustomed, that is, many of us, perhaps most of us, to realise the conditions under which some of these people are living. You have, say, the case of a wage-earner, whose family are living week by week on his earnings. Suddenly, in the middle of the night, the wage-earner is carried away without any arrangements being made for the maintenance of his wife and family. They are hard up, and, it may be, wanting something to eat. That means that the wife has to go round and borrow from friends and neighbours, and perhaps incur debt. Then, on the top of that, the husband and the father dies while proceedings for compensation are going forward. Are the widow and the children to be deprived of what would possibly be given to the man? Are the Government going to take advantage of the old doctrine that if a person dies his action dies with him? The Government surely do not propose to take advantage of the premature death of a man in a case like that—a death for which their own act may conceivably have been responsible. Step by step, I will remind the House, the old doctrine to which I have referred has been falling into decay. I suggest that it does not pass the wit of man to find some way of securing compensation for these aggrieved persons.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I hope that the Government will make a concession on this point. The matter is such a small one that I think it must be very difficult to resist this Amendment. It is something which cannot apply to more than two or three persons at the most, if to any. At the present moment there is the case of one man, who is very seriously ill. If he should live for another couple of months, no doubt substantial compensation will be paid to him. He happens to be one of those persons about whom, admittedly, a mistake was made. If he should die within the next two or three weeks, as is more than likely, his widow will be deprived of this compensation. I do not think the Government would be so mean as to deprive that woman of compensation under these circumstances, and for these reasons I ask the Government to make this very small concession.

The House will remember that the principle upon which we try to go is to substitute the same sum for compensation as would have been obtainable at common law. There is no doubt that at common law if a man died his claim abated. Therefore the Government on that principle would have to resist this Amendment, However, we are not going to act strictly on that principle, although in making this concession we are departing from the principle upon which we purported to give compensation, because we are giving it by accepting this Amendment in cases where the common law would not have applied. There is not a very large amount of money involved. I agree that this principle is an archaic remnant of old technical rules, and I think the substantial justice of this Amendment will appeal to all sides of the House. For these reasons I ask the House to accept this Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

I beg to move in Sub-section (1), after the word "claim" [" passing of this Act to claim compensation "], to insert the words

This Amendment is designed to prevent any possible misconception. During the Committee the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Spen Valley (Sir J. Simon) suggested the words "against the Crown" or" out of public funds." The Government thought those words were undesirable, although we think it is better to have somebody named against whom the compensation shall be claimed. Therefore we ask the House to accept these words, which will enable the person to be designated by the Treasury. This proposal will tend towards clearness in the purpose of the Bill.

I gather that the-purpose of this Amendment is to designate the person who shall be nominally responsible for damage. Take, for example, the case of a person who claims, that while he was in Mountjoy Prison he-was subjected to wilful ill-treatment by the prison authorities. Is his case covered, and can he claim that his treatment there must be taken into account in assessing the damage if his claim is directed against such person as the Treasury designate?

May we have an answer to that question? The Home Secretary said that he, and he-alone, was responsible for what was done to these prisoners, and that is the pledge which was given to the House. Whatever decision the Government have come to now, I think we ought to know exactly what the position of these people is, assuming that they can substantiate the-claim in regard to their treatment.

It means that all loss or damage, apart from that for which the Home Secretary is not responsible would certainly be covered. For instance, if the loss or damage has been sustained through being kept in Mount-joy Prison, it is covered because it is sustained in consequence of the deportation. This Bill does not take away any right to claim compensation under the common law. What we are trying to do is to give exactly the same compensation as a deportee would be entitled to recover from the persons protected by this Bill. We do not want to give more or less than that. Any loss or damage which would' be held to be recoverable at common law against the Home Secretary or anybody else will be recoverable under this Bill. Of course, I cannot generalise upon a specific case, but I can give this answer, that exactly as much will be got from this tribunal as would have been got in a common law action.

I feel that the Attorney-General has missed our point. We come back to what the Home Secretary has repeatedly said, which is that he alone is responsible. Take the case of a person who has been confined in Mountjoy Gaol. Will this particular Clause cover an action that can be proved against a particular gaoler? The Attorney-General has not answered that question, and I think he ought to answer it, having regard to the repeated statements of the Home Secretary that he was individually responsible. We are entitled to have that specific question answered.

That point does not arise here. This Amendment introduces a specific person against whom the claim can be made, and I do not see how that point arises on these words.

May I ask for your guidance? The point that I, at any rate, have in mind is this: A person is to be nominated against whom the claim for compensation is to be lodged. That person will defend himself. Who acts for him? The Treasury Solicitor. All we want to know is, will the Treasury Solicitor, acting for this person, resist the claim for compensation in respect of damages done to the deportee while in Mountjoy Prison?

I think that I can give the answer by leave of the House. If the loss or damage was sustained in consequence of the deportation or internment, then it would not be resisted, but, if it was not sustained in consequence of the deportation or internment, then it would be resisted. We intend to give the deportee the same right as he would be entitled to have if he sued at common law — neither more nor less. If, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) suggests, the Home Secretary was responsible for the act referred to, then the deportee- would recover, but if the Home Secretary was not responsible then he would not recover. We are substituting for the common law right which we are taking away the compensation right which we are setting up. The two are intended to be exactly correllative, subject only to the slight concession which I made just now with regard to the personal representatives. Further than that I cannot answer, because it is a dangerous thing to lay down a general rule without knowing the exact circumstances.

There is one further point, and really quite a simple point, which I should like to put. Owing to the peculiar circumstances of the internment Order having been made in England and the actual internment having taken place in Ireland, there may be a question of great difficulty. I think it is the one which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Central Nottingham (Captain Berkeley) has in mind. The question may arise as to whether the actual prison officials in Ireland were the agents of the Home Secretary. If the Court or tribunal be called upon to decide, it will not know, and it cannot know, whether they were the agents of the Home Secretary or not. Supposing the internment had been in England and a deportee had been ill-treated or damaged by a prison official in England, there is very little doubt that the tribunal would say, whether this official acted properly or improperly, that the Home Secretary was responsible for his act. I think that is the difficulty which the hon. and gallant Member feels and which the Attorney-General might clear away, not as a matter of law, but as a matter of intention, because the tribunal will be guided by what it understood to be the object of the Government. If the Attorney-General, quite apart from any difficult or technical question of law, would say that it was the intention of the Government that any act of prison or other officials in Ireland should be treated on exactly the same footing as though they were in England, then, I think, the difficulty would disappear.

The answer to that question in that form must be "No." I certainly do not mean to destroy the difference, if there be a difference, between something done in Ireland and something done in England. I want the tribunal to decide for itself whether at common law the Home Secretary would have been responsible. If it decides that he would have been responsible, then compensation will be given; but, if it decides that he would not have been responsible at common law, then it will not give compensation, because the same remedy will remain at common law.

These persons have been removed into a jurisdiction outside this country. I want to know, if at common law someone acting illegally takes any person and puts that person into a prison where some person not amenable to the Courts of this country ill- uses him, whether that person who so puts him in that position is responsible at common law?

We have been told several times, and I have always accepted it, that the Government have come to the conclusion that they will, in respect of the action of deportation, give full compensation to those aggrieved. That was not limited by the condition that the compensation should be given only to the extent that the plaintiff could have recovered at common law but for this Bill. That was not limited by the Noble Lord. He constantly said that they were to have full compensation. But for this Bill the persons aggrieved would have had not merely their common law remedy, but their remedy under the Habeas Corpus Act, and that remedy is of very considerable magnitude, because there is a minimum which they can recover of £500 damages. I should like to point out that but for this Bill those persons could have recovered damages from the Government in respect of their deportation under the Habeas Corpus Act, with treble costs and all that sort of thing. Considering that the very object of the Habeas Corpus Act was to penalise the sending wrongfully of British subjects to the Kings Castles beyond seas, where they were outside the jurisdiction of the English Judges, it seems to be that it would have been relative to plead under the Habeas Corpus Act ill-treatment of persons in those castles beyond the sea. By the strange irony of English politics, Southern Ireland, very much to the public surprise, has become one of those castles beyond the seas outside the jurisdiction of the English Judges. The Noble Lord, speaking for the Government, declares that the policy is to give full compensation to the persons aggrieved. The Attorney-General, speaking more precisely, also says that he wishes to confine the compensation to that which could have been obtained but for this Bill at common law. But for this Bill proceedings could have been taken under the Habeas Corpus Act. Therefore, it is not fair. If, on the one hand, you are taking away the right to take proceedings under the Habeas Corpus Act —with which of course we all agree—you ought not to limit your compensation by what could be recovered at common law. If you want to limit it you should limit it by what could be recovered under the Habeas Corpus Act. The pledge which the Home Secretary has repeatedly made was that he still had the control, so far as the treatment was concerned, of these persons in Mountjoy Prison, because the Irish Free State Government had promised to treat them in such and such a way.

Is this discussion in Order on this Amendment? We are now discussing whether or not a person should be designated as defendant in the actions which are brought, and the general discussion taking place touches a totally different question, namely, the principles upon which the assessment of damages is to be made. That is already in the Bill, and the House has already determined it, because it has said that the compensation is to be given on the principle on which damages would be assessed in a common law action. The discussion at the present time should be confined to the question as to who is to be designated as defendant, and should not be upon the principles upon which the compensation is to be assessed.

On the point of Order, may I advance another argument? Is it not in Order to discuss this matter, when the Attorney-General makes a motion to define the person against whom the case for compensation shall be pressed? Cannot it be discussed on that?

I think that the km. and learned Member is right. It would arise on the next Amendment, to leave out the words "in respect." If the House will allow us to dispose of this Amendment, anything further that may require to be said, can be said on the next Amendment.

Question, "That those words be there inserted in the Bill," put, and agreed to.

I understand from the ruling which has just been given that we shall be limiting the compensation that may be claimed. I had not intended to do that, but only to make a drafting Amendment.

I suggested that anything arising out of the words could be said on the next Amendment.

I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words "in respect" ["or in respect of any act done "].

I want to make it clear that in moving these words out I do not intend to affect the amount of compensation which can be recovered. I am merely putting this down as a drafting Amendment because I think it would read better, but if it lie the case that the effect of leaving out the words will be to affect the amount of compensation, then I would rather not press it. However, I formally move that these words be omitted.

I do not want to take up more time, but the substance of our contention at present is that the Home Secretary did take up the position that the Irish Free State were acting as his agents in respect of these prisoners, and an assurance was given to the House that he had therefore sufficient control over their treatment. I am asking that the Government should not attempt, by their instructions to the Treasury Solicitors in this matter, to limit the compensation to be awarded in any case such as we are referring to, more particularly in view of the pledge given by the Noble Lord that there should be full compensation.

1.0 P.M.

Possibly the Noble Lord or the Attorney-General will clear our minds a little further. I want to take the case of a man subjected to an assault by his gaoler. I understand the Attorney-General to say that such a wrongful act as that would not be considered under the compensation clause because the wrongful doer would not be acting in the name of the Home Secretary. While I am quite inclined to agree that that is so, and I do not see why the public purse should be made responsible for gross assaults by public servants, I am sure the House will be anxious that the common law rights of action shall be preserved to the innocent sufferer. Can the Attorney-General assure us that that will be done? As I read it, legal proceedings may be taken against any person "for, or an account of, or in respect of any act done "for the purpose of carrying the Order into force. These seem to be very wide words indeed but I have some doubt whether the legal tribunal may not see in these words a bar to action for such a wrongful act as I have suggested. May I point out that the whole of this difficulty would have been avoided if the Attorney-General had accepted the words, "in good faith."

I think the Government must adhere to the principle we have always laid down, that the object of this Bill is not to put the deportee in a better position than the ordinary individual. As far as the Habeas Corpus Act is concerned, we have always said that the penal provision of that Act ought not to be applied and but the deportees should be entitled to recover the same damages as they would have recovered in an ordinary law action. We cannot go beyond that principle. I am unable, of course, to express a legal view, but it is quite clear that anything we are doing here does not apply to acts committed in Ireland. For what happened in Ireland there will be an opening for another action for damages. I cannot go beyond that principle.

But what about such cases as I have mentioned?

I cannot discuss that now. I cannot go into details as to the legal results of this Bill, because I am not so qualified as the Attorney-General. I have stated what is the principle underlying this Bill, and I must decline to be drawn into a discussion as to the consequences in particular cases of this sort or that. The Bill lays down the principle that the deportees shall be entitled to such damages by way of compensation as they would be able to obtain in a common law action. I do not think we ought to go beyond that. Neither do I think that the deportees are entitled to special considera-in that respect. We must adhere to the principle which is properly embodied in this Bill.

The Noble Lord has said that no special treatment should be given to the deportees, but we on this side are not asking for that. When, however, you bring in a Bill that gives absolute security to the men who committed the crime, why do you not, with the same sense of justice, give by this Measure to the deportees the right that damages shall be awarded to them, and only leave the amount of such damages to be assessed?

That is all we do.

You say they have the right to claim, and put it on them to come into Court, but you give to the other people the right to be absolutely free; they have not to claim it. Why do you not put in the Bill words to say that damages shall be given, and then let the Court assess them? There is no sense of justice in giving it to the one side and not to the other.

In my view, this discussion discloses fears on the part of my right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich (Mr. H. Young) which are unfounded. As I read the compensation Clause with which we are dealing, it says that compensation is to be given for any loss or damage that the deportee may have susutained in consequence of the deportation, and I cannot imagine any legal tribunal assessing the damages to be paid and leaving out of consideration any treatment that the applicant may have sustained in prison. It seems to me that that would be a very cogent matter. No question of agency appears to be involved. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Wallsend (Mr. Hastings) seemed to think that the man might lose his rights because it could be argued that the Governor or officers of the prison in Ireland were not the agents of the Home Secretary. It does not seem to me, however, that the question of agency arises at all You cannot have any wider and more comprehensive words than those contained in the Bill, which cover any loss or damage that he may have sustained in consequence of that which has been done. I do suggest that, if you are going to appoint a tribunal, as in this case, presided over by a high judicial official, probably an ex-Judge, it would be in the last degree unwise for this House to dictate to him as to what should and what should not be items in the compensation which he is called upon to assess. It is a matter entirely for him. It is a matter partly of law and partly of fact, and we shall land ourselves into all sorts of difficulties if we dictate to this tribunal what items they are to include and what items they are not to include. The intention of the Bill is that they should have a free hand, and should give generous and proper compensation to those who have been injured. I hope the House will not tie their hands by suggesting either what they ought to include or what they ought not to include.

I do not think that either my hon. and learned Friend who has just spoken or the Lord Privy Seal quite grasp the point we are trying to make. I do not accept the principle, which the Noble Lord seems to think will be accepted by everyone, that by limiting the right of deportees to their common law claims you are doing everything. I think quite the contrary. We are most desirous of seeing that this tribunal settles the claim of the claimant once and for all, without that claimant having to go to any other tribunal to get further damages. Is it not a mockery of justice to tell some person of limited means that he can go to this tribunal to get part of his claim, but that, if he has been knocked about in prison in Ireland —and I entirely dissent from the suggestion that the public purse ought not to pay for that—he can go over to Ireland and bring there an action for the sufferings he has endured in prison. Would it not be far better, considering how very few these cases ought to be, that the Noble Lord should face the fact that it is far more desirable that one tribunal should decide the claims once and for all, without sending any claimant elsewhere, than that we should simply tie ourselves to the common law rights in this matter. It is perfectly true that we have been urging that the common law rights of the claimant should not be in any way diminished, but what harm could be done to the Government if in this Measure the common law rights were slightly enlarged? There is the real difficulty in this case that poor people, and very likely the people who have suffered the most in this matter, will find themselves driven, in order to get compensation, to go over to Ireland, will find that to be absolutely beyond their means. The principle of making this Bill cover the whole seems to me to be so vital that the Government might stretch this point in order to cover all these cases.

There is an old saying that when the thieves fall out honest men come to their own, and I think the converse of that is true, that when lawyers fall out honest men do not come to their own. Here we have no less than four different legal opinions put forward by four different schools of law on this very difficult point. There is the point of view put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich (Mr. H. Young); there is the point of view put forward by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Crewe (Mr. Hemmerde); there is the point of view put forward by the hon. and learned Member for Wallsend (Mr. Hastings); there is the point of view put forward by the Attorney-General, and there is also the point of view put forward by the hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw (Sir E. Hume-Williams); and every one of them is different. I venture to think that the Government ought to clear this matter up. The real foundation of the matter, as has been so eloquently and feelingly put by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Crewe, is that poor people—and most of these deportees are in straitened circumstances—ought not, if this serious mistake has been made by the Government, to be put to the expense of having to go here and there through the land looking for the tribunals before which they are to make their claims. I am certain that that is not the intention of the House, and that the House will resist that. May I point out, as far as the merits of the argument are concerned, taking the point of view of the Attorney-General and the reply that was put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, that the case of these deportees does seem to be very seriously prejudiced? The Attorney-General said that so far as the Bill is concerned he did not wish the House to be under any illusion. If the deportees laboured under any sense of injustice by reason of acts done by prison officials in Ireland, or, indeed, in England, outside the scope of their authority—and that is the whole case we are `discussing—he wished the House to realise that their case was not covered by this Bill, but that they must bring any actions that they might think necessary at common law. The reply to that, and it is a complete reply, is that in Clause 1 of this Bill their common law rights are taken completely away. I was absolutely unable to follow the Lord Privy Seal in what he said upon that point. I am sorry to have to record a difference with so distinguished a Minister, but I am bound to say I could not follow him when he said that that was not the case. The words of the Bill are perfectly unmistakable:

Take the case of a gaoler who illtreats his charge. That is an act done in respect of carrying such an order into effect. Who could possibly contend that, by any meaning of English, such action is not covered by these words? If it be covered by these words, the common law right is completely taken away. I venture to beg the Government to reconsider this matter. It will not do their Bill any harm whatever to protect these people. They say it is their intention, and it has always been urged that it is their intention, that the deportees shall recover the full measure of compensation which is due to them for any act that has arisen as a consequence of this grievous mistake. I beg them to implement that pledge in unmistakable terms in the Bill.

I sympathise very much with the hon. and gallant Gentleman. I, too, have listened to these very interesting legal pronouncements, and have felt that each one was not only independent of the others, but very largely contradictory. I am not going into legal technicalities on the. matter. The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite made a statement which, had it been made from the Treasury Bench, I should accept. I do not know the technicalities of the matter at all, but I know this, that if the Home Secretary deported persons and sent them to Ireland he must have been aware of the state of Ireland, and he must have been aware of the risks those people ran when they got to Ireland. If any of these deportees were badly treated, I am not interested in what the legal technicality of their claim is going to be. I am simply interested in this. These persons were sent to Ireland by the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary gave us a pledge that he was responsible for their being held in Ireland, and between man and man—not between lawyer and lawyer—I hold that the Home Secretary and the Treasury ought not to resist any claim on the part of a deportee for what was done to him whilst he was in Ireland. I should have liked very much if the four learned Gentlemen who have addressed us had agreed about whether the deportee could force that claim. The alarming thing to me was the speech of the Noble Lord, who suggested that no claim will be admitted against treatment in Ireland, and if that claim is to be enforced it must be enforced by separate action on the part of the deportee in the Irish Courts.

I am sorry if I conveyed that impression. I do not remember what I said, but all I meant to say was that I did not want to express any legal opinion on the point, because I was really not competent to do so.

It was perfectly obvious that the Noble Lord was doubtful what was going to happen. He also conveyed the impression that the action would have to take place probably in Ireland. I emphasise "probably."

indicated dissent.

Possibly.

again indicated dissent.

The Noble Lord does not know. That suits me very well. In a previous part of the Debate he used the expression that we wanted no tricks, or something like that. We wanted to take the Bill as a common-sense and an equitable measure. If the Noble Lord says a person who has been ill-used in Ireland—we will assume he can prove his case—is not quite clearly protected under this Bill, I think there is something in the Bill which does not quite carry out the good intention of the Noble Lord when he used the expression 1 have just quoted. That is all my position. I am simple-minded in respect to it, but I want to feel that if this House pledges its honour to the deportees that we mean to compensate them we must be just and fair. I should like to be assured that the Bill we pass will carry out our intention and I do not think at present we have such a guarantee.

I should like the House to understand that this is really a matter of substance. On the Second Reading I gave a number of cases of women who protested that they have been very badly treated in the prisons and workhouses, and that their health had suffered. The manner in which the Noble Lord has treated this subject, especially the latter part of the time, shows that he has not appreciated the fact that a number of people were so bady treated that under ordinary normal circumstances they would have had a right of action against that Government if they had been Irish citizens living in that country. I think the Noble Lord loses sight of the fact, and has not met the point that has been made time after time, that the Home Secretary, in order to safeguard the rights of these people, did over and over again say he would be responsible. Not merely was the attention of the House called to the ill-treatment these people were receiving last Monday, but over and over again we called attention to it at. Question time, and the Home Secretary always said he was the man who was responsible, and because he was responsible he was sure our statements were not true. He put it quite politely, that we had been misinformed. When the Noble Lord says we are going to give these people all the rights they are entitled to at common law, and says we all agree about that, I want to tell him that I disagree. I want them to get all the money they have got under the original Act.

I have heard the Noble Lord and other hon. Members argue the rights of property, and they have always stood out for their full pound of flesh. I do not see why, in order to save the Home Secretary from being boiled in oil and having all his property confiscated, you should go one step further and say these people shall not have the money they are entitled to. If they had all the money they could have got under the ancient Act, which, if it were a case of taking people's land away, would have been made to apply right to the very letter, you have no business to say to these people now that they shall not have that right. The House has decided that you have no right to do them a further injustice and take away from them the right to whatever compensation they are entitled to for ill-treatment in prison. Those women who came to me the other day cannot pay their fares to Ireland and instruct solicitors there. It is not something we are imagining. We know definite cases where the people charge the authorities or those acting for them with gross ill-treatment. Therefore, I think the Noble Lord, instead of telling us he does not know what is going to happen, had better consult the other Law Officer next him and tell us what he thinks will happen. No one denies that lawyers are all honest people in the ordinary sense of the word, like the rest of the people, except when they come to administer the law. Then they are not dishonest, but they all find excellent means for disagreeing with one another, which apparently brings grist to the mill and makes their profession one in which you can get whatever opinion you choose to pay for.

This disquisition on the ethics of the Bar is not relevant to the Amendment.

We do not want to waste time.

It is not wasting time. During the few days that the Noble Lord has been sitting on that bench ho has become very impatient of other peoples' criticism. As he gets older he ought not to get into that frame of mind. I remember the Noble Lord being one of the greatest sinners in regard to killing time, when it suited him. I am not killing time. I am trying to put a definite proposition on behalf of people who cannot put it themselves, and to give them some protection, seeing that the Noble Lord and his Government are going to rob them of their rights. When the Noble Lord stands at the Box and says that he does not know, when a question is put to him, he ought to get on one side and let someone else come there who does know. We want to know what is going to happen to these people, especially the women whose cases I have brought before the House. When they get before the Commission, will they be able to get full and complete compensation not only for being sent to Ireland but for the results that have accrued from their being sent there 1 When we pointed out originally what was going to happen the Home Secretary brushed us aside in the same airy way that the Noble Lord has shown this afternoon. The things have happened, and we want a pledge that anyone who was ill-treated in the Irish prisons shall, when they go before the Tribunal, have the clear indefensible right to get the compensation to which they are entitled. I would rather that they got all the money that they would have had under the old Act, but, as the, House has determined they shall not, I hope they will get all the provisions possible under this Bill.

I will try to make this matter clear, but I cannot and will not be drawn into a statement as to particular cases; that would be madness. In reply to the hon. Member's rather discursive speech, if I said that the women to whom he has referred will receive everything which they claim it would be most unwise.

I did not ask for that.

I repeat now what I said on the Second Reading of the Bill. The statement which I then made was made with the full assent of the Government and after consultation with my colleagues, and it seems to cover what the hon. Member asks for. I cannot go further than that. I said:

That is the statement of the Government, and that is the policy which will be pursued in dealing with these cases. Furthermore than that I cannot go. To attempt to go into particular cases would lead either to gross injustice or grave disappointment later.

Will those words be inserted in the instructions to the tribunal?

Amendment agreed to.

I beg to move, in Subsection (1), after the word "purpose" ["for the purpose of carrying"], to insert the word6 "or in the course."

If these words were inserted I believe they would reconcile legal opinion and get rid of difficulty because it will then be made clear that the real danger has been swept away. The real danger may be this: Supposing a person makes a claim, the nominal defendant may say: The act was not really done for the purpose of carrying out the order into effect, therefore I am not liable." It is clear from what the Noble Lord has said that the Bill should cover acts which are done in the course of carrying an Order into effect. If these words were accepted, we should get rid of the difficulty discussed on the last Amendment.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I cannot accept this Amendment. I am afraid we have had no notice of it and I have not had very much time to consider it. The House will remember that the words which are at present in the Clause, and to which the hon. and learned Member now wishes to move an Amendment, are words which he asked us to accept in Committee, and which we accepted as a concession to his wishes.

It was late at night, and one did the best that one could, but one cannot on the spur of the moment get the exact words.

I am not criticising my hon. and learned Friend. All I am saying is that the words in the Clause were inserted to meet his wishes, and as a concession to him. With respect to the words which he put in, although it was done late at night—he is no doubt accustomed to do legal work at that hour—he seems to have acted with his usual legal accuracy, because he took the words, quite obviously, from the operative part of the Clause. It will be found in the first part of the Clause that the indemnity is given in respect of

the hon. and learned Member—I am not doing him an injustice when I say this —took these words, and inserted them in this part of the Bill so as to cover exactly the same thing as was covered by the part of the Clause affecting the indemnity. In the first part we give an indemnity in respect of acts done for the purpose of carrying the Orders into effect, and therefore in the payment of compensation my hon. and learned Friend desired that the same words should be inserted, to make it clear that the right of compensation was equal to and co-extensive with the right of indemnity. Now he wishes to insert extra words; but in doing so he would make the power very wide. The extent and effect of this Amendment I cannot quite foresee, but it quite clearly gives a much wider claim for compensation than the amount taken away by way of indemnity. In as much as the whole principle upon which the compensation Clause is based is that the two things are to be coextensive, I am, unable to accept the Amendment, and I hope he will not press it.

If the words that the Attorney-General says he cannot accept were put in here and also inserted in the operative part of the Clause they would cover the points that we have been trying to make by getting rid of possibly double proceedings. Surely the Attorney-General wants to give all the assistance he can to those who cannot go and bring actions in Ireland. How many of these poor people, let alone ourselves, could possibly go and bring actions in Ireland? The whole point is if you put in those words you get rid of a lot of difficulties which the lawyers have made in the course of years.

It would be interesting to know whether the hon. and learned Member who seconded the Amendment can speak again.

I did not second the Amendment though I rose with the object of doing so. It was seconded by the hon. Member for Seaham (Mr. Webb). The Attorney-General knows the great difficulties that do arise upon this question of whether an act is done "in the course- of." For instance, when we get certain brutalities which have been committed in prison, we shall be at once told that these were unauthorised and were not things for which the Government could take responsibility. Putting in these words will get rid of that legal quibble, as it is considered and as, to a very large extent, it is. The Government want, I am sure, to see that the people injured by the act of the Government are put into the most favourable position possible. What right have the Government to say, "We have wrongly taken these people to Ireland and we now say to them 'you have not got any claim in England for this. You have to go over to Ireland, because we declined to put in words that would have given you a remedy before the one tribunal which we are setting up.'" I would ask the Government to say why they cannot accept this simplification of the whole procedure. I have not voted against this Bill. On the whole I am in favour of it, but if the Government will not pledge themselves to simplify this procedure, and to give the people who have been injured a simple remedy which their means will enable them to pursue with advantage to themselves, then I shall vote against this Bill.

I hesitate very much to intervene in what is apparently a legal technicality; but if these words are not included I cannot see how the tribunal which is to be set up can take into consideration a case of the kind which I will mention. It is alleged, and I think the Attorney-General will find it out later, that a claim may be made in respect of moneys actually stolen from these deportees while in Ireland. I am told that the amount is approximately £60 which was taken from them. It was the duty of the military officers of the Free State to take the deportees from the port of landing to Mountjoy Prison, but the object of the work which they were performing was not to steal money from these people; and unless these words are included the deportees will not be able, in my view, to claim a return of that money. "In the course of" is a very old argument in the Courts under the Workmen's Compensation Acts.

There are two voices on the Government Bench to-day. There is the voice of the Noble Lord, who is apparently not a legal expert—I do not know whether he is or not, but that is how he appears to me—and then there is the voice of the Attorney-General who seems to understand every knuckle of the law—I will pay him that tribute anyway. I feel sure that he knows full well that the words inserted in this Bill will be the words acted upon by the tribunal, and I predict that unless these words are included in this Bill the tribunal will decide on the wording of the Bill exactly as it stands. I do press that these words should be included.

I, too, would like to press for the inclusion of these words. It is common form in an Act of Parliament to provide that compensation shall be paid for a thing if it arises out of or in the course of a man's employment. I see that the Attorney-General considers that that is a very foolish argument, be cause he smiles, but I think that it is a point of substance. It is not the intention of the Government to restrict these people who prosecute their claims. They want them to get fair compensation for what they have suffered. If there be any doubt in the wording of the Bill whether they will receive the full compensation to which they consider themselves entitled, we should remove that doubt by the insertion of the necessary words. I know some of the Members of the Government sufficiently to know that they have no- desire to take advantage in any way of a legal technicality to deprive these people of the compensation which they deserve. If words of this kind are left out of the Bill, it will be open to counsel to argue against these people that a particular act complained of though done—

There is nothing in the Amendment about leaving out words. The question is one of inserting words.

The words of the Bill as they stand render it possible for counsel, arguing against any one of these claims, to say that this is a very hard case, but the tribunal must administer the. Bill as it stands and these particular acts were not done for the purpose of carrying out an Order, though they were done in the course of carrying out the Order. If the only difficulty of the Attorney-General is that the introduction of those words at this stage will make this paragraph inconsistent with what is in the first paragraph, surely it is possible for the Government, before the Third Reading, to introduce the same words into the first paragraph and make sense.

We have had a short speech delivered by the hon. and learned Member for the Bassetlaw Division (Sir E. Hume-Williams), who is a very distinguished lawyer, and if the Attorney- General had indorsed that statement, I personally would have had no hesitation in accepting it as satisfactory. What we want is that statement incorporated in the Bill. The hon. and learned Member said that, in his opinion, the Bill as it stood would allow any person who was injured in prison or who lost any personal property to have all the facts brought before the tribunal and to have compensation given. He stated also that the Clause as it stood was wide enough for the tribunal to ascertain those facts That is what we want. We want the tribunal to go into the whole question of assault in Ireland and to go into the facts of a man's loss of personal property, or any loss that he might have sustained there. Why are we pressing this Amendment? Because we think that Government speakers on the Front Bench differ from a Member of their own party who has expressed that opinion. If that hon. and learned Member's opinion is correct, I see no reason why the Attorney-General should resist the Amendment. All that we ask is that the opinion expressed by the hon. and learned Member should be made absolutely certain in the Bill, as a matter of common grace and good faith.

If a man was abused in prison in Dublin, it was not his fault; it was the fault of the people who sent him to Dublin, and they ought to take responsibility for it. If a man lost personal property there, it was not because he

wished to lose it, but because of the foolish action of the authorities in sending him there. Just as he may have lost business or his employment here and can make a legitimate claim for that reason, so he ought to be able to claim compensation if he suffered personal injury of loss of property in Ireland. I cannot see why we should separate the one from the other. I agree with the statement that the Government do not wish to evade responsibility. They ought, therefore, to accept the Amendment. It may be argued that a man could take action in Ireland against the person who assaulted him. It may be that he could take action in Ireland for the recovery of the property that he has lost. That, however, is a proposition totally beyond the scope of at least 50 per cent, of these people. Speaking for those whom I represent in Glasgow, I can say that they are too poor even to proceed with an action in this country, let alone an action in Ireland. In this Amendment we have a simple remedy. The tribunal can go into the facts, and it is for the person claiming to adduce sufficient evidence to convince the tribunal. In such an event the tribunal ought to be allowed to grant damages for any loss sustained.

Question put, "That those words be there inserted in the Bill."

The House divided: Ayes, 132; Noes, 206.

The Amendment next upon the Paper, in the name of the hon. Member for Govan (Mr. N. Maclean)—in Sub-section (1), after the word "effect," to insert the words "and for any costs incurred in substantiating such claim"—raises a point of substance, but it can be, and I think it should be, taken on the Amendment of the learned Attorney-General which comes last upon the Paper.

I beg to move in Sub-section (1) to leave out the word "excluding" [" excluding any statutory minimum "], and to insert instead thereof the words, "but without regard to."

This is merely a drafting Amendment. The word "excluding" was put in rather on the spur of the moment, but we think these words will make better English.

I wish to make, not an appeal, but a suggestion to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. These words have reference to the limitation of the principle upon which the tribunal is required to act. The Attorney-General has been good enough already to accept an Amendment of mine allowing the personal representatives of a deceased deportee to claim. Now we have come to the principle upon which these cases are to be dealt with, and I cannot believe that an Amendment would have been accepted allowing the representatives of a deceased person to make a claim, unless the tribunal was to have authority to give compensation in such a case. I apologise for asking the question, tout I should like to know if that is made clear?

I would not have accepted the Amendment referred to without meaning to give effect to it. I accepted it in the hon. Member's own words, and I think they cover this point. But should he not think so, and if those learned in the law with whom he has consulted do not think so, I shall be glad to consider the matter.

Amendment agreed to.

2.0 P.M.

I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), after the word "minimum" [" any statutory minimum "], to insert the words

This is a manuscript Amendment. We have inserted in the Bill in Committee a provision that the principles on which compensation is to be given shall be the principles on which damages are assessed in a common law action for trespass. I am told by those acquainted with Scottish law that in Scotland an action for trespass only lies for damage to property, and therefore, in fact, as the Clause stands, we should be giving deportees in Scotland less than they are entitled to. That was not the intention, and it is in order to give the deportee from Scotland the same measure of right as the deportee from England that we suggest putting in the words. We put in the word "assault" to meet a point made in Committee that it might not be merely imprisonment which would be complained of.

Amendment agreed to.

I beg to move, at the end of Sub-section (1), to insert a new Sub-section:

I understand that this Amendment is affected by the Amendment which follows in the name of the learned Attorney-General, and, therefore, I shall content myself with moving it formally.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I cannot accept this Amendment, which I think would defeat the object of the Mover, because it would limit the right of being heard by counsel to particular cases in which the tribunal had come to some sort of conclusion. Our intention is that counsel shall be heard on every claim, where the claimant desires counsel to be heard. I think it would be a pity to limit the rights of claimants in this respect, and I think that the Amendment which I am about to move will safeguard the point which the Mover had in mind.

Personally, I should accept that statement entirely, but I am not sure that the Amendment of the Attorney-General provides for the point, and I am anxious not to let this Amendment pass without making the matter right. It is of great importance that everyone should have the right to appear by counsel, but they have not got that right under the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act as it stands. The Committee or Tribunal has a discretion in the matter. I am sure the Attorney-General does not desire that there should be any restriction, because there are some cases in which it would be very undesirable, but if the Attorney-General intends that this right should be safeguarded I do not press the matter.

I certainly intend that they should have the right, and I cannot imagine that any tribunal would wish to deny them the right, of appearing by counsel, but I am quite content to make it clear.

Amendment negatived.

I beg to move, to leave out Sub-section (2) and to insert, instead thereof, new Sub-sections—

The main purpose of the Amendment is to meet the point which was made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Spen Valley (Sir J. Simon) during the Committee stage. The House will remember that the right hon. Gentleman wished to insert words which would make it compulsory on the tribunal to sit in public, but it was pointed out that, whereas that was intended to be the normal mode of procedure, it might be possible, in given cases or in regard to particular witnesses, that part of the evidence might have to be given in camera, and that the same power ought to be with the tribunal as with a common law court to hear part of the evidence or a particular case in camera. The right hon. Member suggested that we should state that expressly in the Bill, but that was thought to be undesirable, for if you insert expressly in the Bill a right to sit in camera, you rather invite the tribunal to exercise it, which we do not want to do. We have, therefore, taken advantage of the provisions of an Act passed in 1921, called the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act, which gives power to tribunals which are set up to inquire into certain definite matters to examine witnesses, which provides expressly that they shall not refuse to allow any portion of the public to be present at any of the proceedings of the tribunal unless, in the opinion of the tribunal, it is in the public interest expedient so to do for reasons connected with the subject matter of the inquiry or the nature of the evidence to be- given. That, I think, carries out the object which the right hon. Gentleman had in mind without calling attention in an undesirable way to the power to sit in camera.

The Amendment has this additional advantage, that it meets a point which I, personally, have never thought a very serious point, raised by no less a person that the hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald), the Leader of the Opposition. He suggested in Committee that the power to award costs which was given by the Bill as drafted was limited to costs of witnesses, and he suggested that the power to give costs should be put in separately. I have taken advantage of this alteration to carry out that suggestion, and the House will observe that I am putting in now provision to assess costs separately, which will, I hope, meet the suggestion made by the hon. Member. The only other point I have to suggest is that, if this be carried, I think I shall have to find a word or two to meet the point just made by the hon. and learned Member for Wallsend (Mr. Hastings), and I am anxious to do it in any way that he thinks fit, but as he has only just suggested it to me, I would like a little time to consider the words.

I do not think there will be any opposition to the Amendment, provided some such words as the Attorney-General suggests are put in.

I may have to do it in the Lords.

If any person who is suing for compensation thinks that his case ought to be heard in private, or if any person who is going to give evidence wishes to be heard in private because of the nature of his evidence, will that person be able to apply to have it heard in private, and will it be done?

The answer is that certainly that person can apply. Whether it is done or not will depend on whether or not he satisfies the tribunal that it is expedient to do it for reasons connected with the subject matter of the inquiry or the nature of the evidence.

Supposing a man think the evidence he is to give may affect his business, will that be a good reason?

Certainly.

Amendment agreed to.

TITLE.

"A Bill to prohibit the institution and prosecution of legal proceedings in respect of action taken under the Restoration of Order in Ireland Regulations, and to make provision as to claims for compensation by persons affected."

I beg to move, after the word "under," to insert the words "Regulation 14B of."

My reason for moving this Amendment is that the Title of the Bill has not been amended in that respect since Clause 1 was changed and limited in application to Regulation 14B, and, of course, it is common knowledge that, owing to overlooking points of this kind, it is a subject of comment, even frequent comment, from the judicial Bench that the Title of a Bill does not accurately describe the contents of the Bill.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I am sure the Title as it stands is quite all right, because it only describes the general subject matter, and the operative words; of course, are in the actual Clauses of the Bill. There is not, therefore, very much importance in it, and I do not think it makes much difference one way or the other. I suggest to the hon. and gallant Member that it is hardly worth while pursuing the matter further.

If the right hon. Gentleman cannot accept the Amendment, of course, I do not wish to press it to a, division.

Amendment negatived.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the Third time."

We have now come to' the very last stage of the Bill, and I do not think it need delay the House very long. When this Bill, in its original form, was presented to the House for Second Reading, we protested, as I believe we were bound to do. I am not going over that ground again. We protested against the character of the action taken by the Home Secretary. We protested against certain circumstances connected with it, and we felt that it was necessary on the Second Reading of the Indemnity Bill to register our opposition to it, in order to make it perfectly clear that the Opposition did not consider that it was necessary to do what was done, that the Opposition intended to the very last to stand by the old, traditional, personal rights of British citizens, and, thirdly, to make it perfectly clear that we believe that only on the very rarest and most imperative occasions can any British citizen be regarded as a criminal, except after the proper operation of the law. We divided the House, and the House decided against us. That done, we had to accept the Indemnity Bill as presented, and do our best to make it as good as it could be made in the circumstances. I think the House will agree with me that the Bill to which we are giving a Third Reading has got very few of the features of the Bill to which we gave a Second Reading. The additions are so numerous and so important that the- real features are all covered up. If I may widen out a little, I think it is another illustration of the fact that the British Parliament cannot be worked without an Opposition, that when your Coalition Governments come and weaken the benches on this side, it is not conducive to good legislation. All I can claim—and I do claim it for the Opposition—is not that it has done all that is in the Bill, but that it has been vigilant, and that the whole of the House has produced a Bill which is far more satisfactory than the Bill to which we were asked to give a Second Reading.

In the passing of an Indemnity Bill, I think there are certain things that ought to be very carefully safeguarded. First of all, the Bill should apply to a specific act, and should not be general in its character. The Bill before us has been amended to secure that object. The next point is one of regret—and this is the only substantial regret I have—that the learned Attorney-General did not see his way to recognise that good faith was a condition under which indemnity was to be granted. Perhaps I might indulge in the hope that another place will rectify that. It is very necessary that an Indemnity Bill should contain in itself, in some shape or form, a declaration that good faith must be assumed, or must be established. The whole of its privileges are based upon either the assumption or the establishment of good faith. I have been somewhat puzzled, and now and again bowled out, by quotations from, and references to, the Act of 1920. Well, but does not the learned Attorney-General see what the effect of that is upon my mind? What guarantee are we going to get that the Act of 1923 is not going to be used in exactly the same way as that Act has been? It is essential in drafting Bills like this, and passing them through our hands, that we should put everything in that ought to be put in, and I regret that the good faith was not put in. But the most important part is compensation. The whole of that has gone in since the Second Reading. We have considered it, and we have divided upon it, and we have come to the position we have, aided for the lawyers on all sides, and all I can hope is that the lengthy provision for compensation will do the gentleman's justice which we are very anxious should be done to these deportees.

The hon. Gentleman must not claim the whole of the credit for that. I spoke on the Second Reading, and said I should not vote for the Third Reading unless that matter were dealt with.

I am glad the right hon. Baronet interrupted me if I was conveying any such idea. The right hon. Baronet's interposition on the Second Reading was a most valuable aid. Really, all that I am claiming is, in a very gentle way, that this House has to be worked not merely by a Government, but also by an Opposition—

BANBURY: I agree.

—and that whether the Opposition may be found in corners of the Government side or on the benches here, it is essential that everything which comes from the Government should be carefully scrutinised by people who are in a position of independent action, and able to give independent expression of ideas. So that we come to this, that the Bill to which we are now asked to give a Third Reading, meets with far greater sanction, in the whole circumstances of the case, than the Bill presented to us for Second Reading. Therefore, as far as I am concerned, I have no intention of repeating the action I took on the Second Reading. One thing I want to say, however, is this. I hope in view of what has happened, the House will have seen the wisdom of refraining from taking this Bill at the beginning of the Report stage at 6 o'clock in the morning on Wednesday. I hope the Government will not again indulge in any sort of wild dream that they can get a Bill of this importance and this complexity through the Committee stage, to be followed by the Report stage, and the Report stage to be followed by the Third Reading, all at one sitting. If I might say so with respect, it is an absurd idea, and, what is more, it is now proved to have been a very bad idea. The learned Attorney-General to-day has put down in his own name nine Amendments to the Bill as it left the Committee at 5.30 or somewhere thereabouts on Wednesday morning, and hon. Members have only to read the Bill now before them without the learned Attorney-General's Amendments to see how very inadequate it would have been if it had gone through as it left the Committee. I am not referring to that to claim credit, and so on, but rather to ask the Government if, in their rather crowded programme, which we shall have to get through between now and the beginning of August, they will be good enough to remember the experience of last Tuesday, and the good experience they have had since, and not try to force important legislation through this House after 11 or 12 o'clock at night. The accommodating spirit of the House is too well established by custom to justify the Government in assuming that they can force their business through by a mere mechanical majority. Therefore, so far as I am concerned, I am willing to accept this Bill as it stands. It is not all that we should have liked in one or two respects, but we know that an indemnity is to be given, and we know that compensation is to be paid. The indemnity has been given quite handsomely; now all we can do is to hope that the compensation will be paid with an equal measure of handsomeness when the claims are put in by the deportees.

I would like to draw attention, in view of one or two of the observations which fell from the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, to the difference between the atmosphere of the House on this Friday and the atmosphere of the House on the Friday before the House separated. It will be remembered that a question was then put to the Home Secretary as to whether certain proceedings had been lodged, and with a certain levity, I thought, the answer was that he had been busy in other directions, and actually did not know whether or not such proceedings had been taken. At that time there was a tendency to regard this matter far too lightly. A note of that levity arose in the course of the Debate last Monday, when one hon. Member opposite said that this was a simple matter of taking some people from this country and moving them to another part of the United Kingdom. On the whole, there has been a difference established on this point between those who regard this as a matter of fundamental consequence and those who look upon it as a trifling business. But I think no Member of the House will complain of the time that has been spent upon this Measure, seeing that we have been dealing with fundamental issues, and that in giving serious consideration to this Bill the House has been acting along the lines of its traditions.

I took the opportunity a few days ago of looking up the records of the House upon a debate that raised this very issue some centuries ago. I think that our fathers and our forbears did set us an example in the importance which they attached to this subject which has been under consideration during this week. It was this subject that was raised during the earlier part of the Session of 1628 when the King sought to exercise the power illegally exercised by the Home Secretary on this occasion, and the great Leader of the House of Commons, as he was, John Pym, spoke of this as being "the greatest question "—let me quote his words:

When the next opportunity comes in the next Recess, I hope to be able to pursue my studies in this direction, and perhaps hon. Members would also like to pursue their studies into the debates on this very subject, which was discussed at great length. There was the great lawyer, Seldon, and Noy Wentworth, and Sir John Eliot and Edward Coke, who twice, once in the House and again in Committee, quoted words from the Acts of the Apostles:

So they even had to go back to the time of Festus and Agrippa expressly to enforce what they seemed to be agreed in calling "the greatest question that could arise."

As a matter of fact, we have argued in this Debate as though we were discussing the Act of Habeas Corpus. But we have gone back to Magna Charta itself, which Sir Edward Coke referred to as

I am bound to say that my respect for the Habeas Corpus Act has very sensibly diminished in the course of my reading, for I was astonished to find that, as a matter of fact, Habeas Corpus was passed by a trick. That, doubtless, is a horrible thought to the Attorney-General. [ Laughter. ] I do not suggest that the right hon. and learned Gentleman took any part in that, but it passed this House, and after it passed the House of Commons in 1678 it went up to the House of Lords. There it came up for Third Reading, and Bishop Burnet puts the story of it in this way:

At any rate it was because the fat peer was counted as ten that the thing went through, though I do not know that the present Attorney-General would rejoice at such an artifice. We, at any rate, congratulate him personally upon having taken a part in this discussion. I can only suggest that I think a very excellent example has been set in the seriousness attached by the House to this subject. It was argued in the first instance that it was not inconvenient, or most convenient, to proceed by the method which the Home Secretary had adopted. I can only quote the words of, I suppose, our greatest political thinker—and with this I will bring my remarks to a conclusion— written more than 100 years ago upon this very subject. They are by Edmund Burke, who said:

The fact is that these clogs and checks have been set up. The fact, too, that we have had this prolonged and keen discussion will I hope be taken note of by future Governments and that those who have the management of our affairs will note the importance of this lesson, and that whatever else they do they must play no tricks with Magna Charta or Habeas Corpus. I intend to support the Third Reading because, as a matter of fact, this Bill, introduced only a few days ago, has been so substantially amended and modified that I think its parents will have very great difficulty in recognising it at all.

I feel that I cannot congratulate the Government on what they have done. They have acted only through compulsion. They would not have done it at all of their own violation, had it not been for, in the first place, the decision of the Courts, to which they submitted in a grudging fashion. Had there been any way of getting out, I am quite certain they would have taken it. They have fought against compensation at various times, but there is one form of compensation which they have rejected—that which was proposed should be given to dependants of the deportees for the damage done to them. It is not certain that they will be reckoned in any compensation that will be awarded to the person actually deported, yet there will be losses, perhaps not only to the dependants, but to the whole family including the person who will be reckoned in the compensation paid. I regret that they have rejected that. They have not given any guarantee that the prisoners who were deported, who have now been released, and who have not been proceeded against are going to be free from further raids. Many of those people who were arrested have not been brought to trial. In the case of some of them a case could not have been made out against them, and yet they have been brought under the suspicion of the local police, who will keep their eye on them all the time. They may visit them and search their houses, and there is no indemnity for them against these further raids.

There is no magnaminity on the part of the Government towards any of the people whom they deported whether the Government thought them guilty of any serious crime or whether they are convinced that they were innocent. The fact that they have brought people to trial after the legal decision which put the Government in the wrong is purely an act of vindictiveness. If they had any generosity in them, if they really meant to accept the decision of the Court in the right spirit, then the Government should not have proceeded against those men at a time when they were claiming indemnity for themselves. The Government have only got their illegal actions absolved because they are in a position of power, and they use that power for indemnifying themselves against illegal acts, although they have elected to proceed further against those who are defenceless.

That is a most vindictive attitude which they try to justify in this House on the plea that the action taken was taken in good faith. The question of good faith does not arise so ion- as the Government are concerned. Whether it was done in good faith or bad faith, it was against the law, and the deportee has been penalised whether it was done in good faith or not. Nine out of every 10 of those in this country who have been co-operating with the Irregular forces in Ireland have been acting in perfectly good faith. They are just as honest men and women as those in any other walk of life, or in any political movement. Their point of view may be wrong, their methods may be wrong, but that they were acting in perfectly good faith so far as their principles are concerned nobody can challenge. If that is going to be the test as to whether indemnification should be given then all these deportees are entitled to it just as much as the Home Secretary. It is claimed that they have broken the law but that has not been proved. I regret that the Government have decided to proceed against any of them, and in my view they ought to have adopted a more generous spirt and allowed them to go free.

The Government claim that already the action they have taken has been responsible for breaking down the resistance of the Irregular forces in Ireland, and that the conditions for peace in Ireland have been greatly improved in consequence. In my view the action of the Government has stirred up discontent amongst people in this country who may have been associated with the Irregular forces in Ireland, or who may be innocent of any such association, but they have created a feeling of dissatisfaction and a grievance which is against the furthering of the peace movement in. Ireland. I think the Government ought to drop these charges and allow those men to go free, and if they had resolved to await the turn of events I think it would only have been an act of grace. I hope that in another place some of the things which the Government have excluded here will be considered, and particularly the question of the dependents and the sacrifices which have been imposed upon those dependants. I hope that will be taken into account, and that they also will be given the right to compensation.

In supporting the Third Reading of this Bill, I wish to say that I should have preferred that more Amendments had been embodied in it. In re-affirming my convictions that all the acts done by the Home Secretary were done in good faith and for the general good of the community, I should like to explain very briefly my reasons and my justification for having taken up so much of the time of the House on this Bill. Some of my earliest recollections are concerned with the administration of the law of Habeas Corpus in the very farthest parts of our Empire, and it has always been a great treasure that the protection of the English law and the maintenance of British liberty should run over so great a part of the world.

In the very Antipodes I remember natives who were subject peoples of ours were oppressed from the best of motives by the Executive appointed under the Colonial Office in those parts. I remember how, after bitter struggles lasting more than a year, the principles of Habeas Corpus were finally vindicated, and the chiefs who had been illegally arrested by the Executive were set at liberty and compensated. [ Laughter. ] I am very much astonished to find that the relating of these incidents and the fact that an hon. Member of this House is re-affirming his belief in the fundamental liberties of British citizens should be considered a matter for laughter by hon. Members on the other side of the House.

I was particularly interested in what fell from the hon. Member for Bodmin (Mr. Foot) with regard to his researches; into the past history of the Habeas Corpus Act. I was interested in him from a cognate point of view, although perhaps slightly different, because it so happens that on the night of the Committee stage of this Bill I absented myself from the House for the purpose of being present at the theatrical representation of a play by one of the greatest of our modern writers, Mr. John Drinkwater. The play was "Oliver Cromwell," and the episodes of this particular representation to myself personally were all the more remarkable because it so happened that that very afternoon I had been conducting some friends of mine from America over the buildings of this House and another place, and in a certain part of another place I showed them the parchment containing the death warrant of a King who had set his face against the liberty of the subjects, and who had tried to maintain the power of the Executive as against the power of Parliament. I recollect the way in which one of my visitors looked at the signature upon that document and remarked that it was the foundation of I modern liberty. That brings me to the last observation which I am anxious to make on this matter. My Noble Friend the Lord Privy Seal, in resisting one of the Amendments put forward from this side of the House, quoted at some length from a speech made by Lord Grey of Falloden, and I should also like to quote, as supplementary perhaps to the quotation of the Lord Privy Seal, from a speech made by the same Noble Lord in another place. He said:

Then the Noble Lord went on to ask his colleagues in another place to accept some words in the form of a Resolution:

I venture to hope that the passage of this Bill without opposition—and I hope it will be passed without opposition—will not be taken as being a derogation by this House from the great principle, and I should like to ask the Government whether, in view of the fact that such a proposal has been put forward, not by myself, but by so distinguished a statesman as Lord Grey of Falloden, they could not see their way to introduce a. Resolution to that effect to be passed by both Houses of Parliament.

I find myself on this occasion at total variance with the Leader of my own party and every other hon. Member. I cannot agree to the Third Reading of this Bill, and I feel in duty bound to enter my protest against its passing. I look upon it as one of the worst features of the political life of this country, that a Government should arrest persons illegally and deport them to another country, and, then, having done that, pass a Bill to condone its action. It seems to me a form of blackmail. In effect, they say, "We have done an illegal action. We have arrested people, and deported them." Then, to get the Opposition to agree, they say, "We will compensate the victims of our action." That does not make their action right or legal. They can pile up the compensation as high as they care, but it does not matter to me; the thing that matters to me, much more than either the Labour party, the Conservative party, the Liberal party, or anything else, is the freedom of the individual. If you are going to interfere with the right of a person to have opinions and to be free to express them within his country without being deported to another country, then you are going to violate all that is great and good in this country. I am sorry that I cannot agree with hon. Members. I feel it my duty, and I intend, if no other Member of the House does it, to enter my protest against the passage of this obnoxious Bill.

I am glad indeed to have an opportunity of making a final protest before the passage of this Bill. Had any Minister of the Crown, in the ordinary course of his business, unwittingly overstepped his legal rights or the legal rights of the Government, and had he so brought himself within the pale of the law, whether criminal or civil, I should have been the first to support a Bill of Indemnity, but this case is totally different. It was known at the outset that extreme measures were going to be taken, measures that were near the border line of what was and what was not the law, and for that reason the opinion of the great Law Officers was taken. The act which was resorted to exceeded the act which cost Charles I his head. Such a transaction, if it could be justified at all—I do not think it could be justified—could only have been justified if it had complied both with the spirit and the letter of the law. The only ground upon which it has been sought to justify the action is that the Home Secretary, as he himself has confessed, was a hero and saved —I forget whether it was a hundred or a thousand lives.. If there were any ground for that confession, then, since at least 90 out of the 110 criminals have been carefully distributed at our expense over the face of England and Scotland, neither your life nor mine is worth 10 minutes' purchase. If Ministers can stretch their powers, and if when they find that they have exceeded the law they can come down here and rapidly pass through a Bill of Indemnity without making any further sacrifice, then, I say, none of us are safe in the security of our liberty.

What penalty has this Government paid for the mistake it has made by a responsible Minister? In the days of Disraeli, or of Gladstone, or of the late Lord Salisbury it would have been impossible for a mistake of this magnitude, infringing the liberty of the subject, to have been made without it bringing about the resignation of the Government of the day. To-day it is not met even by the resignation of a Minister, and, so far as I know, the only penalty that has been paid has been the importation of the Noble Lord to strengthen the Ministerial Bench. I gathered from his speech during the Committee stage that my hon. Friend the Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) has passed part of his time in gaol, a very strange place for an hon. Member to spend his spare time. Probably the hon. Member was in the wrong; the more definite and assertive he was, the more I should think that he was wrong. But let this be said. He was not charged with stealing an apple. He was charged in a case in which he was trying to establish what he believed to be right. There is no indemnity for him. He was not in so favourable a position as to have the advice of eminent lawyers. Am I to go down to the poor in my constituency and tell them that great rights and great liberties have been infringed and that the only reparation that it is proposed to make is to be made by placing ½d. per lb. on sugar, because that is what it amounts to. For that reason I do not know whether any useful purpose will be served by my going heroically into the Lobby with the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan). I do not know, indeed, whether we two together would be allowed to go alone into the Lobby, but certainly at every stage I shall protest against, object to, and obstruct a Bill which I believe to be contrary to the Constitution of this country.

3.0 P.M.

The sentiments expressed by the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) are really the sentiments of many of us, although perhaps differently expressed, and though we may not have a chance of voting in the Lobby directly against the Bill, because that, perhaps, would be a needless process, we must not be taken on that account to be supporters of the principles embodied in the Bill— principles against which protests have been practically expressed more than once. The hon. Member for Oxford City (Mr. F. Gray) suggested that, if a Liberal or Conservative Government in the past had adopted such a Measure, the Government would have resigned as a whole. I may, perhaps, remind the House that a Liberal Government has taken similar acts in deporting persons without trial, and interning them. That happened under the regime of Lord Morley in my poor country—India, but it being the act of a Liberal Minister and of a Liberal Government, neither had the self-respect to resign. It is another illustration of the saying that what is sauce for the gander is not always sauce for the goose. Liberalism has its different faces to be presented to different people according to their particular convenience. I now appeal to the Government on two points. I want to know whether they are going to say—with this indemnity granted to them with a certain amount of hopefulness on the part of the Labour Members—that they will carry out in spirit the little concessions they are making to the deportees in a larger measure than has been indicated in some quarters. I appeal to the Noble Lord to reflect on his! remarks with regard to particular persons among the deportees and tell us how he intends to apply his logic in the case of those against whom further action is to be taken. This Bill of indemnity, as far as the deportees are concerned, is not a bonus for good character, neither is it a penalty for bad character. It has nothing to do with character. The damage to the deportees arises and becomes due, not from any bad action on their part, but from the wrong action of the Government. In the case of those deportees against whom the Government can take no action, probably we may accept the plea and give the benefit of it to the Home Secretary. But there is another set of deportees whom the Home Secretary interned, and against whom he is now taking definite action on the basis of evidence captured at the time of their arrest. In those cases he had a clear alternative in front of him. He could have taken action against them, but he preferred not to do so; he preferred to deport them without charge or trial, and so in their case his crime was greater than it was in the case of the other deportees. I submit that in their case the damage arising out of the unwarrantable action of the Home Secretary—technical though he may term it—gives them a more emphatic claim than exists in the case of those against whom no proceedings are instituted. I hope the words of the Noble Lord will not prejudice the tribunal and make the members of it think that these persons are entitled to less damages on 'account of their bad character. Character has nothing to do with it. These persons, in whose cases a legal course was open to the right hon. Gentleman, are undoubtedly entitled to higher damages than are the other deportees. The Home Secretary gave us an apologia which, to my mind, was a little worse than his crime. When he was appealed to not to prejudice the case of persons still to be tried, he suggested that the fact that only eight of the deportees registered their protest with the Advisory Committee, was a tacit admission that he had acted correctly in interning them. These were ungenerous and clearly unjust observations for a representative of the Government to make.

The Home Secretary did know that, in a written document sent to him from Mountjoy prison, it was clearly stated that the internees challenged the right of the Home Secretary to intern them. They challenged his right under that particular Act, on the ground that it was void The Committee was established in pursuance of that Act which the internees were challenging, and, on the particular occasion when they repudiated the right of the Home Secretary any longer to act under that Act, they, naturally, repudiated the authority of the Advisory Committee established under that Act; and they not only clearly refused to go before it, but 47 of the internees who, at first, hastily agreed to do so, on this definite principle withdrew their applications. The mere fact, therefore, that only eight persons agreed finally to go to the Advisory Committee was not any proof of their tacit admission of the right of the Home Secretary to intern them, but was a higher protest on their part against the entire action of the Home Secretary, and against everything connected with the Act and arising out of the Act on which the Home Secretary was, under a misapprehension, acting at the time. These are the only two submissions that I desire to make to the Government. The best way of expressing their regret and their sense of justice towards those who have been victimised for nothing is now to put into application the little relief that they are offering in a right spirit, instead of applying wrong logic and raising technical objections against the interest of poor men and women.

I should like briefly, on the Third Beading of this Bill, to indicate the view which is taken of the Bill by myself and those whom I can influence in this House. We opposed the Second Reading of the Bill because, as it seemed to us, the Bill at that stage, and in that form, was not a satisfactory way of dealing with what, admittedly, was a difficulty. I have said before, and I think it is only fair to the Home Secretary that I should repeat it, that I do not associate myself with those, if any there be, who may think that he acted in this matter otherwise than in good faith, or that he had not done so on extremely skilled legal advice. I do not conceive that the criticism of this proposal requires either of these very improbable assertions to be made. But, in order to show why we do not propose to resist the Third Reading of the Bill, I should like shortly to point out to the House, I hope not in too controversial a tone, what is the character of the change that has been made in it. The Bill, as the House will remember, was first announced by the present Prime Minister on the 15th May, and on that day the present Prime Minister, who was then Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced that the Government, in view of the decision of the Court of Appeal, would introduce a Bill of Indemnity; and he added —and I will venture to call the attention of the Noble Lord to this—that it would be a Bill

That was the original announcement of the Government. Thereupon the question was at once raised as to whether the Title and scope of the Bill would be such as to enable the Restoration of Order in Ireland Act, and the Regulations under it, to be cancelled or challenged; as the questioner was invited to put that question the next day when, said the present Prime Minister,

The next day came, and the question was put, as we were invited to do, by, I think, my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Leith (Captain W. Benn), and the answer at that stage was that the Government had not decided on the exact form of the Bill. I do not make any complaint of that, but refer to it because it shows that, as a matter of fact, at a very late stage, the form which the Bill was intended to take was still a matter of consideration by those who were preparing it for the House. When the Bill was introduced—and I have here the Bill in the form in which it was introduced— it was a Bill which neither by its Title nor by its contents contained what the Bill on Third Reading now contains. The Bill as introduced was a Bill, which neither by its Title nor by its contents contained any provision for compensation at all. It was at that stage a Bill which did this, and simply this: It barred all claims against individuals for damages or other remedy in respect of that which the Court of Appeal had declared to be an illegality. It denied to such individuals any damages which they otherwise might be able to establish at common law for trespass. In those circumstances I conceive that the Opposition was justified in saying the Bill in that form was not really satisfactory, and we must remember that on the Second Reading, the new Prime Minister opened the proceedings by making two statements which, in view of what has since happened to the Bill, are, I think, of much importance. He said first of all on 28th May that the Government would propose, in Committee, some changes which would secure that the "actual expense or direct loss" sustained by the internees might be claimed against the Government, and in the second place he said the Government proposed to set up a small expert Committee to consider the Regulations under the Restoration of Order Act, 1920, and to advise as to the amendment and cancellation of the Regulations.

May I say on my own behalf that both those announcements, as far as they went, created a more satisfactory situation, but neither at that stage was satisfactory and in both respects we have since had assurances in a more generous form? First of all, as regards compensation, we pointed out that if all that was going to be secured is what is called the "actual expense or direct loss," that was really, or very well might be, something a good deal smaller than the damages at common law which would be awarded for an action for trespass. I recall with gratitude that the Lord Privy Seal, in his final speech on the Second Reading, told us that the Prime Minister at the beginning of the day said this Committee would consider the Regulations under the Restoration of Order in Ireland Act, but what was really intended was to consider the continued existence of that Act altogether.

The Lord Privy Seal, I think, spoke under a little misapprehension in that Debate. He spoke as though there existed to-day volumes of war-time legislation or regulations, and he said it was impossible to deal with such a thing now and it would need examination. He thought he was repeating something I had said in the previous Debate. What I had said was that the Defence of the Realm Act, which was, of course, a war-time Measure, had been the fruitful parent of a very large number of Defence of the Realm Regulations. But the whole of that has disappeared long ago. There is no question of appointing any committee to consider that at all. The only thing that remains is that two years after the Armistice was signed, and at a time when the War Regulations were expiring, there was enacted, in the year 1920, by this House, the Restoration of Order in Ireland Act, which preserved and continued for an indefinite time certain Regulations which were picked out and put into a book. I hope I am not saying "anything that is contrary to facts. When I said there were only 84 Regulations, I had forgotten that a good many of them are duplicated in the form of addition of letters of the alphabet "a," "b," "c," and sometimes "aa," "bb," and so on. I have no doubt there are more than a hundred of them, many of them dead letters.

I would like to point out the real fundamental change that has been made in the Bill as a result of criticism, and, I must add, of some Amendment even by the Government itself, which justifies and requires the House to give this Bill the Third Reading, even though many of us voted against a Second Reading. The Bill as it was introduced, and as it was before the House on Second Reading, did nothing but bar the claims against certain individuals—the Home Secretary and his officials and subordinates—for damages for illegalities which had been found to have been perpetrated. The Bill as it is before the House on Third Reading adds a provision that exactly the same damages, measured in exactly the same way, and exactly the amount of damages which would have been got at common law for trespass, shall be provided for exactly the same people, and shall be provided out of public funds.

I understand the view is held that if we substitute a provision which says that these damages are to come out of public funds—in an action at common law, of course, you could only get damages out of individuals—it does not necessarily call for a special provision by way of Money Resolution. That is a matter on which you have ruled, Mr. Speaker, and I say not a word about it; but I would call the attention of the House to the fact that, as a result of amendment, this Bill is now a very innocent Bill. It is a Bill which says, while on the one hand certain individuals shall not get the damages to which they would be entitled from certain individuals, on the other hand those individuals shall be entitled to get exactly the same damages measured in exactly the same way by a tribunal which will operate on exactly the same principles, and those damages shall come out of public funds.

This Bill will long remain a curiosity in that direction. I doubt whether it was necessary to go through so elaborate a process to secure so curious a result. At any rate, it has been secured, and we have this advantage—although one would have thought that it could have been more simply secured—that the archaic remedies which are to be found in the Section of the Habeas Corpus Act—not criminal remedies, because I do not think that præmunire is a criminal process—are no longer available and ought not to be, and "the persons, whoever they may be, who have been interned will get exactly what they would have got before, by proving exactly the same things that they would have proved before, and by rules of law which are exactly the same rules that would have applied before, while they have the assurance that the Government will pay these claims out of public funds. As a result we find the Bill as it stands, and the Bill having been changed in that way, and changed, as I gladly recognise, at the proposal of the Government, in the face of a good deal of criticism, I suggest to my hon. Friends that we ought to give the Bill its Third Reading.

I hope that before this Bill reaches another place the Government will consider whether or not one or two matters of criticism may not still deserve a little further consideration. I think it unfortunate that the reference to good faith should be entirely omitted from the Bill. I do not make any complaint of it now, but if it be possible to consider that further, and in some form to see that that consideration is not omitted from the language of the Bill, I cannot help thinking that in time to come we shall be glad that no precedent has been set against that very necessary condition. There may be other things of less importance, but the conclusion of the whole matter seems to me that the Bill was introduced in order to prevent people getting certain damages, and the Bill was amended by preventing those damages being got by one process and giving exactly the same sum of money by another process. That does not appear to be a very ingenious contribution to the Statute Book, but as the damages can be got I do not see why the Opposition should entirely oppose the Third Reading.

The Opposition cannot claim the whole of the credit for the insertion of the compensation Clause, because some of us on this side have held the same view as they; and it also must not be forgotten that the Government themselves, before the Second Reading, intimated that they were prepared to introduce that very Clause. Therefore the credit really lies with the Government who, having introduced the Bill without that particular Clause, saw that it was necessary to put that Clause in, and, in order that there might not be any mistake, intimated to the House at the commencement of the Second Reading Debate that they would introduce the Clause. If I may humbly agree with the right hon. Member for Spen Valley, it does seem to me that it would have been simpler to bring in a Bill to the effect that the Home Secretary, and those who acted under him, should be indemnified from any criminal proceedings, but that if civil proceedings were taken, and damages awarded in the ordinary course, then the damages would be paid by the taxpayer. That would have been a simpler way of doing it and probably would have saved a considerable amount of time. The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan), if I do not misrepresent him, said that the chief thing which he had in mind was the liberty of the subject. I do not know whether the hon. Member is a member of a trade union, but if he is his sentiments will probably cause him to be expelled from his trade union, because trade unions do not desire the liberty of the subject. They desire everybody to agree with them. If a person does not, then they make it extremely uncomfortable for him when he is trying to earn an honest living. The hon. Member for Central Nottingham (Captain Berkeley) criticised the use of the power of the Executive to do certain things without the sanction of Parliament. I do not know whether the hon. Member is a National Liberal or a Liberal.

I am a Liberal.

The last meeting rather showed that there is a considerable diversity of opinion between the two. I and other members of the Conservative party always protested against Orders in Council, against the attempt of the Executive to assume to themselves the powers of Parliament. Who was responsible for them? The right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George).

The right hon. Member must not imagine, because I said I was a Liberal, that the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs is my leader. The Leader of the Liberal party is the right hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith). He is my leader.

I am sorry if, quite inadvertently, I have widened a breach that is already extensive. I thoroughly agree with the protest of the Leader of the Opposition against the taking of more than one stage of a Bill on one day. That is a procedure against which I have always protested. I hope that the Government will not attempt to take more than one stage on the same day, because such action always redounds to the discredit of the House.

The right hon. Baronet who has just spoken is to be congratulated on the part that he has played in this Debate. His Front Bench introduced a Bill making provision for an indemnity for those who had committed an illegal act. He was the first on his side of the House to get up and say that his Front Bench had entirely overlooked the fact that there were a great many other sufferers, about 112, who deserved consideration. I do not know whether it was in obedience to his threat to vote against the Bill, or because of the fierceness of his aspect, or whether it was because of arguments brought forward from this side of the House, but the fact was that a change was made. I listened to the whole of the right hon. Baronet's speech and said some complimentary things about it. I said that he had stated the whole thing in a nutshell. It was the case that the Government brought in a Bill indemnifying the Home Secretary for an illegal act, but they forgot entirely that there were 111 others who had suffered, and it never occurred to them that those other innocent people ought to have provision made for them. I am glad that it fell to the right hon. Baronet to point to the Government the enormity of their offence. The right hon. Baronet will surely be elevated to another place some day. [HON. MEMBERS: "Or the Treasury Bench!"] He is quite worthy of a place on the Treasury Bench or of being elevated to another place. We will then remember that he had the wisdom and justice to make this suggestion, and we shall not always associate his name with the Dogs Protection Bill. One of the distressing things about this Bill, to me, has been the enormous waste of Parliamentary time involved. If the lesson, to which I am going to point, is taken to heart by the Ministry, there will be a great saving of time in the future. They will have more consideration for the liberty of the subject and more consideration for those Acts which our fathers placed upon the Statute Book, in the future, if they contemplate the blunders already made and the waste of money and time already involved. I think it is an appalling tragedy. About the waste of time, I may point out that there are other matters which we might have been discussing. There are 24 Orders on the paper for to-day, any one of which is of very great importance. Somebody has mentioned the Dogs Protection Bill but there is also the Local Elections (Alternative Vote) Bill which I presented to the House some time ago. [HON. MEMBERS: "What about this Bill?"] I say that the tragedy of this Bill, to my mind, is that such an enormous amount of Parliamentary time has been wasted which might have been devoted I to other Measures. Apart from the waste of time and money involved the only thing we have gained is the education of the Front Bench in their duty, in how to keep down expenses, and in paying greater attention to the Acts of Parliament which should be their guide and which are the preservation of the liberty of the subject. I am glad a change has taken place in the Bill. As it was introduced it was a monstrous Bill. As it emerges, possibly with guidance from this side of the House and with the Amendments which have been accepted by and proposed by the Government, I think it now deserves a Third Reading.

If I may be allowed to do so, respectfully, I congratulate the House on the conclusion of this discussion. There was a considerable difference of opinion as to this1 Bill, and some passages in the discussion were even of a rather vehement character, but I hope we shall finish with something approaching complete unanimity, though I cannot say complete unanimity, because one or two hon. Members tell us they are still unsatisfied. Apart from those hon. Members, we are all in favour of the broad principle that the Home Secretary having made, as he did, an error in law, under very good advice and in common with one, at any rate, of the Courts of the Realm, should not be exposed to the penalties of Præmunire or the other penalties provided by the Act of Charles II. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Spen Valley (Sir J. Simon) said this Bill did nothing except change the method of obtaining compensation from one form to another. I think the right hon. Gentleman is mistaken. The essential part of the Measure is that it has saved not only the Home Secretary—I do not think that is the most important part of the Bill— but all his officials, all the policemen, gaolers and other officials who have been concerned in this action, not only from legal proceedings for damages, which might have been very harassing, but from criminal prosecution and from actions for those penalties provided by the Habeas Corpus Act. It would have been absolutely wrong to have left all these men under the threat of these legal proceedings, and it is really misstating very gravely the effect of the Bill to say that it has merely changed the method by which compensation is to be recovered by the deportees. It is quite true—and nobody holds it more strongly than I do —that it is of vital importance to maintain personal liberty in this country. No one is more adverse to a ixseless interference by the State, whether criminally or civilly,' with the subjects of His Majesty in this country. I think that is very important. Liberty is of vital importance, but there is also this, that it is an essential guarantee of liberty that the law should be maintained and obeyed. In regard to the case for this Debate, we have been told that opposition is essential. So it is, though I must admit that for some minutes—perhaps, indeed, for some hours—on Wednesday morning I was not quite so clear as to that truth as the hon. Members opposite. Opposition is of different kinds. There is relevant opposition, and there is irrelevant opposition, and I am not so sure that all forms of opposition are of advantage if they result in keeping this House up all night.

We have made you improve the Bill.

I do not wish to say that the Opposition was fruitless. Great changes have been made, and many of the changes have been suggested by the Opposition and accepted by the Government. I welcome them. There were some hon. Members who seemed to think that it was wrong for the Government ever to agree to any change suggested by the Opposition, and that to do so showed that they were incompetent in the preparation of their Bill; but I do not take that view. I have always thought, and I still think, that the House of Commons is a valuable body, and one of its duties is to suggest to the Government of the day those changes that they should make, and the Government ought to accept those changes if they are satisfied they are right, without any criticism being made upon them for doing so. But when an hon. Member opposite says we fought as hard as we could against compensation, that really is an entire mistake. When the Second Reading of the Bill was moved by the Prime Minister, he stated that he desired to secure, in one way or another, compensation. It may not have been in the exact terms, or as fully as the hon. Members opposite desired, but still, the principle of compensation was admitted and proclaimed by the Prime Minister in moving the Second Reading of the Bill, and with his assent—indeed, on his instructions—in replying for the Government, I made it quite clear, or at least tried to make it quite clear, that that compensation was to be full compensation, and that the Government would take means to secure it, if possible in the Bill, and, if not, in other ways—I was not sure, then, as to the rules of order—and that was done.

That was really what was done, and to suggest that the Government were forced by an energetic Opposition to insert this Clause against their will really is an entire mis-statement of the case. I will go further and say this, that apart from this compensation Clause—there is a very considerable change, I quite agree, in the frame of the Bill, but apart from that— all the other changes, I think, without exception, were introduced, and merely introduced, in order to clear up what was always, and always has been, the intention of the Bill and the intention of the Government as announced in the Second Reading Debate.

What about Regulation 14B?

It was never desired that this Bill should be other than for the protection of the Home Secretary. I am not going to argue what we went through then, but in my judgment the Bill would have been substantially the same if it had been passed in its original form as it is now. That is my own view of it. I agree that it has been put beyond a doubt, and to that extent it is an improvement, as it is always better to have a thing put beyond a doubt if there be a doubt, but it never was the intention of the Government to carry this Bill beyond the protection of the Home Secretary and those who acted under him in these transactions connected with the deportation of 110 persons.

I do not know that I can say anything more, except on one point. We have been criticised rather severely for not accepting the Amendment introducing the element of good faith. I quite agree that there ought never to be an indemnity for acts committed in bad faith, and I do not think that there is the slightest possibility of that happening under this Bill, for the reasons which I gave in Debate in Committee and on Report, and if hon. Gentlemen opposite are afraid that this Bill may be cited as a precedent under circumstances which would amount to an indemnity for acts committed in bad faith, I think it is useful to say, on behalf of those responsible for the Bill, that they are as much opposed to that principle as anyone in this House, and that this Bill can never be cited as a precedent for a Measure of that kind. For my part, I am quite satisfied that the Bill is a right Bill, that it will do good and not harm, and, indeed, is essential. Now that we have had this Debate and discussion in detail of every Clause, indeed, every line, I hope that this chapter is definitely closed, and that the House will be able to proceed with the other business which is before it.

The Noble Lord opened his speech by congratulating the Opposition on the changed atmosphere, but he proceeded to do something that was not conducive to the continuance of that atmosphere. No one knows better than the Noble Lord of the number of occasions when he was in Opposition and was party to exercising the legitimate functions of the Opposition, and I want to tell the Noble Lord that he could have got—and he knows he could have got—the Committee stage of this Bill at 12 o'clock instead of 6 o'clock, if he himself had been reasonable.

Does that mean that the Debate took place right through Tuesday night merely because the Opposition desired to delay matters?

It was because the legal gentleman had got into such a mess that the Opposition asked that they should have time to redraft their Bill and make it more intelligible, and that has been proved by the events of to-day. I have only to say to the Noble Lord that, while the Opposition will endeavour to conduct their own business, they at least expect the Government to recognise their obligations, and that lectures such as we have now had will not be conducive to the smooth passage of any Measure through this House.

The Noble Lord has announced, as he is quite entitled to announce, that the Bill in its present form represents the intentions which have animated the Government throughout. When one compares the original Bill with the Bill as it is now leaving this House, I think Members on both sides must agree that the Government have been singularly unfortunate in expressing their intentions with regard to this Bill. After all, the Noble Lord and the Attorney-General are both competent lawyers. They have the advice and assistance of very competent draughtsmen, and, to say the least of it, it is a most extraordinary occurrence that the Bill, which, according to the Noble Lord, was only intended to deal with the Order for the deportation of 110 men in March last, was so drawn as to give an indemnity as wide as it was possible by a Statute to give it— an indemnity not only wide in respect of what has happened in the past and dealing with everything that has happened, both in this country and in Ireland under the Restoration of Order (Ireland) Act, but which would also count everything that may be done in the future so long as that Act is upon the Statute Book. It will be disputed that the concessions that undoubtedly have been made have been due to the pressure of the Opposition or the discussions which have taken place in this House. I think those who have followed the discussions will be lead to a different conclusion. They will find great substance in the point which my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) has just made, that had; the Government really intended co do what the Noble Lord (Lord R. Cecil) now says they intended to do, and had they been anxious to meet, in- a, reasonable and conciliatory spirit, the criticisms and contentions of the Opposition that the greater part of the night Sitting might have been saved.

We have had references to the controversy relating to acts done in good faith. That controversy could have been restricted to a very small portion of our Parliamentary time had the Noble Lord' not taken up at the very beginning an attitude of irreconcilable opposition. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh! Oh!"] Yes, irreconcilable opposition. It was only when the grave constitutional aspects of the issue were clearly set before us that the Government were forced to make concessions on the latter part of the first Clause which has rendered it largely inoperative. Although the Noble Lord says that this will not be a precedent, that will not prevent people-in the future using it as a precedent. I myself think it is a most unfortunate precedent. It need never have occurred if the Government had decided to do what was necessary and only what was necessary. All that was required was to relieve the Home Secretary and others acting under his authority from the obsolescent penalties in the Habeas Corpus Act. A single Clause would have done and in half a dozen lines. I believe had that been introduced by the Government they need not have landed themselves or us in the troubles of the past week. It could have been done in half a dozen lines, and no bad precedent would have been created. I would conclude by advising hon. and right hon. Gentleman opposite to think in the first place of what they are going to do, and then to put their real intentions in their first draft legislation.

Before we part with this Bill — [HON. MEMBERS: "Divide, divide ! "]—may I say it is of very grave importance and it is in that spirit—[HON. MEMBBES: "Divide, divide ! "]—that I shall attempt to address a few remarks to the consideration of it. In the first place, I agree with the remarks of my hon. and learned Friend that this is the first Measure that the present Government have really handled, and I am sure that they have gained a lot by their experience. On this side of the House we have been very generous in making every allowance for the difficulty in which the Lord Privy Seal found himself in regard to this Bill. He has done his best to give it an honest name and I hope the next great cause which the right hon. Gentleman brings before the House will be more successful and I say that in no unfriendly spirit. I think that the Government having been fairly and squarely beaten on the main issue should not let the matter drop, and I look upon the prosecution of those Irishmen whose case gave rise to this Bill as unnecessary and indeed foolish. The rebellion in Ireland has finally collapsed and these prosecutions are only keeping open wounds. It would be much better if the Government would let these men go free, because they have done no harm and have committed no crime.

These cases are sub judice.

I think that the hon. and gallant Member for Bournemouth might have used his influence to see that these cases were not sub judice. I do not think that the Government has come out of this business with credit, either in their effort to relieve Ministers of the result of their mistakes or in the vindictive prosecutions of the unfortunate victims of these proceedings.

Question, "That the Bill be now read the Third time," put, and agreed to.

Bill read the Third time, and passed.

I was not aware that this Order was to be taken at this, time of the afternoon. When the discussion on the Indemnity Bill came to an end it was on the understanding that some other business was to come before the House, and my hon. and gallant Friend (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy) cut short the valuable observations he was making solely with a disinterested desire to give an opportunity for an important discussion which affects, I think,, some of my countrymen in the North of Scotland.

I understood that the Report stage of this Financial Resolution, which is required in order that the Bill may go to Committee, was to be taken virtually without discussion, but, if my hon. Friend has any objection, I will defer it till Monday.

It can be taken after Eleven o'clock on Monday, and, if anyone desire to say anything, there will be an opportunity then.

Question, "That the Debate be now adjourned," put, and agreed to.—[ Colonel L. Wilson. ]

Debate to be resumed upon Monday-next, 4th June.

Can the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health, Scotland, make any statement with regard to the position of the six men from Skye who are at present in prison?

Since the Debate on Wednesday, I have spent much time in discussion of this point with my hon. Friend the Secretary of Scotland and with other Members of the Government, including the Prime Minister. It is agreed in all parts of the House that there was very exceptional concern for these-men shown in the Debate and that the case was made in the most moderate form by Members of the Opposition, who had every reason to feel very keenly on the subject. The difficulty with regard to the case is simply this, that, if the belief be allowed to continue that only by raiding can small holdings be obtained, it will almost certainly 'destroy all possibility of any orderly schemes of land settlement being put through in that country. Consequently, I am anxious now to put forward some suggestions on the part of the Government in the hope that they will meet with the approval of hon. Members in various parts of the House, who urged the case of these men with so much force in the Debate on Wednesday night. The danger in the case is best exemplified in the speech of these men's counsel to the Court, where he pointed out that they bad the belief that only by raiding could email holdings be obtained in the High lands. We are bringing forward suggestions in this case in the belief that it will be recognised in all parts of the House that we are stretching a point and are doing our best to meet the Members of the Opposition in a fair and square fashion, believing, as the Noble Lord the Member for Hitchin (Lord R. Cecil) said just now, that the House of Commons is a place of great value and that suggestions made by its Members should have every consideration by the Government, who should be able, without hesitation, to meet them, if they think it is right, without having to make any apology. After discussion with my hon. Friend the Secretary for Scotland, I have arrived at the following suggestions, which I now put forward to the House: That the men should make a satisfactory apology to the Court for their breach of interdict. It is not a case of the Government or of the landlord or of the Board of Agriculture, but of the Court, and hon. Members will agree that before the Court—

It being Four of the Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."— [ Colonel Leslie Wilson. ]

I am sorry the discussion should have been extended so as to render this interruption necessary. I have further to say that the Government, on the men apologising, will undertake to convey these men's representations to the Court in the most friendly spirit; and, further, after consultation with the proprietor, I am enabled to say that he will act in the most friendly spirit, and, in particular, no objection will be raised to the reaping of the crops on the land which these men raided. I think it will be admitted on all sides that in this statement we have made a considerable advance towards meeting the views, pressed upon us from various parts of the House. I have further to make this statement, that an offer will be made next year of small holdings in Skye to these men. I hope that these suggestions will be accepted by the House in the spirit in which they are put forward. We deprecate any suggestion of having been led to this act of land settlement by the raiding. We have taken a great risk of such a precedent being established in this case. We took the risk with our eyes open, believing that hon. Members would realise that it would be a great disadvantage to land settlement if it were thought that that was the only way in which it could be brought about. To finish what I have to say, we desire to proceed with this work with the utmost expedition. The Board of Agriculture has come under much criticism, as indeed any Government Department must do in this thankless task. I believe they have been acting to the best of their capacity, and we are anxious and determined that this work shall proceed with the utmost expedition possible. With that I ask the House to consider these pledges which we have given and the suggestions we have made and to see whether it will be possible for not one section or any section of the House, but for the House as a whole to agree to use its good offices in the determination of this unhappy and unfortunate dispute.