Member had said that what had followed | merits of that Bill, but it deals with on the policy of Her Majesty's Govern- that question in a large and comprement, to which so much of the public time hensive spirit; and I think it is due to had been devoted, was this" that at the trouble taken by the Lord Chanthe present moment"-he (Mr. Chaplin) cellor upon the matter that the House was quoting the hon. Member's exact of Commons should express its opinion words-"there was absolute war between upon the second reading of this Bill the Government and the people of some before any long time shall have elapsed. counties of Ireland." If the Government I am sure the noble Lord will agree had so misused the time placed at their that it is a matter of great importance, disposal last Session, and then called and one in which great interest is felt by upon private Members to sacrifice the the country. If the Government are days appropriated to private Members, going to take the whole of the Tuesdays and such results were to follow from into their own hands, I hope I may have that sacrifice, the less time that was in an opportunity of taking a discussion future placed at the disposal of the Go- upon the second reading of that Bill. vernment the better-for, so far as he I quite admit that, it being down for was able to form a judgment, the more Tuesday, which is a Motion day, there time they got, the more mischief they is some chance of getting it on; but if did. He therefore proposed to omit the you take half of Tuesday away, that words "at Two of the clock." chance is reduced to a nullity. I hope, if the Government persist in this Motion, cussion of that measure. some facility may be given for the dis

Amendment proposed, to leave out the words "Two of the clock."-Mr. Chaplin.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the

Question."

SIR R. ASSHETON CROSS: I am not going to enter into the large question which my hon. Friend has raised; but, with every wish to further the Business of the House, there is one matter upon which I wish to ask a question of the noble Marquess, not relating to any Motion for Tuesdays, but to the Bills which come after Motions. Very often on Tuesdays the Motions disappear, and the Wednesdays are absolutely absorbed already, so that no one has a chance of putting down a Bill for fair discussion. The only chance, therefore, is that any Bill which it is wished to promote should be taken on Tuesday, when the Motions are practically disposed of. But if the Government take four hours from the Tuesday Sitting, there is very little chance for such a Bill, and its chance is almost reduced to a nullity. It is sometimes said that the House of Lords have not done much work; but they have undoubtedly passed one or two Bills of importance, and it is with regard to one of those measures, which deals with a question of vital importance at the present moment, especially having regard to the recent agricultural depression, that I wish to ask a questionI mean the Bill relating to Settled Estates. I shall not enter into the

THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON:

I do not propose to follow the hon. Member for Mid Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin) into the remarks he has made with reference to the Procedure Rules of the Government, or their policy in Ireland. No doubt, the hon. Member thinks that any opportunity is a sufficient peg upon which to hang an attack upon the Government; but I am under the impression that sufficient time has been given to those subjects, and that, at all events, there will be other opportunities, perhaps more appropriate than this, for discussing them. The fact is that, although the time has varied in different ways, the practice of asking for Morning Sittings on Tuesdays and Fridays has been resorted to in previous years very much earlier than is now proposed. In 1878, when the Conservatives were in power, five Morning Sittings had actually been held before the date at which I am now addressing the House-namely, on March 19th, for Supply; on March 26th; on March 29th, for the Mutiny Bill; on April 12th, for Ways and Means; and on April 16th, for the Budget Bill. The hon. Member says the House might have considered this proposal if we had any measure of first-rate importance to bring forward. The hon. Member has altogether omitted to state whether he considers the Municipal Corporations Bill of importance or not. It does not appear to be one in

which he takes any interest; but I ven- | think it will be for the convenience of ture to think it is, at least, of as much the House and in the interests of the importance as any of those I have enu- public that, at all events, the mornings of merated, and which, during 1878, were these days should be applied to making discussed at five Morning Sittings before progress with Public Business. There this date. Then the hon. Member says is one other ground upon which I we are going to appropriate the Tues- may appeal to the House to assent days. That is putting the case a little to this Motion. I think that any too strongly. We are only going to ask Member who has attended the course of the House to give us the Morning Sit- Business during the present Session ting, and the Evening Sitting will remain must have observed how large a profor private Members; and if private portion of the time nominally approMembers will only avail themselves of priated to the purposes of the Governthe Evening Sitting they will still have ment is virtually appropriated to indeas long a period for the discussion of pendent Members. The hon. Member any Motion as they have thought it talks of our appropriating the time of desirable to take on any Tuesday up to private Members; I have shown that the present time this Session. The hon. we do not appropriate the whole of Member has alluded to some of the Tuesdays. We only ask for a certain Notices, and he appears to consider that portion of Tuesdays by taking a Mornthey relate to matters of very great im- ing Sitting; and if hon. Members will portance. All I can say is, that it is recollect how many Mondays and Thursextremely unfortunate that all the im- days, when Supply has been on the portance and apparent interest in these Paper, almost the whole time has been Motions should have managed to post- spent in Motions that the Speaker leave pone themselves until a Tuesday at the the Chair, I think they will come to the end of April, and that, on those succes- conclusion that some reciprocal concessive Tuesdays on which those measures sion is due to the Government. The of importance might have been brought hon. Member opposite said a short time forward, the House has been so unfor- ago that every delay in Business is owing tunate that nothing has been presented to the mismanagement of the Governfor its consideration except matters ment, and the Prime Minister said he which could not attract the attention of never recollected a time when that statea quorum of 40 Members. The hon. ment was not made by the Opposition. Member reproaches the Government I dare say it has often been made with with not having kept a House; but it is considerable truth; but, at the same time, impossible for the Government to take I think the House must admit that it is that responsibility. It never has been impossible for us, or any other Governtaken by the Government. I do not ment, to make bricks without straw; think a quorum of 40 Members is an and if the whole of the time on nominal unreasonable proportion to ask the Government nights is to be appropriated House to form; and if an hon. Member by discussions on the Motion that the has a Motion to bring forward, and can- Speaker leave the Chair, and we are not not secure the attendance of 40 Members allowed the privilege which has been without the assistance of the Govern- given to other Governments in the ment, I think he has no great reason to matter of Morning Sittings, I do not complain if the Sitting is cut short. The see how the House can expect the Gohon. Member has raised the considera-vernment to make any progress. With tion of subjects which are still on the Paper for discussion. I make this proposal, in great part, for the purpose of suggesting a way of preventing time from actually being wasted; and, as I have already said, on six successive Tuesday nights, although there is a great deal of work to be done, the House has adjourned within a few hours of meeting. That, so far as the Government are aware, is a state of things extremely likely to be repeated; and we

reference to what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir R. Assheton Cross), the Government altogether acknowledge the importance of the Bill to which he has made reference. That Bill was, I believe, accepted and supported by the Representatives of the Government in "another place," and I have no doubt whatever as to its importance. The right hon. Gentleman acknowledges that the prospects of taking a discussion on its second read

ing are somewhat remote. I do not | years, and a great deal of time was know that I can recollect any recent wasted on the discussion of that Bill; occasion upon which the discussion of but the noble Lord, on the 22nd of an important Bill has been able to take June, not only complained of the conplace on Tuesday night; and, therefore, duct of the Government in wishing to I do not think the right hon. Gentleman appropriate the time of private Memmakes any great sacrifice in regard to bers, but made an observation, on the the proposal I now submit. I am quite proposal to take Morning Sittings, which certain, however, that my right hon. induced the impression that he would Friend at the head of the Government hardly have made such a proposal as he will be willing to admit the importance now placed before the House. The noble of the subject, and to make any arrange- Lord said the Government had made a ment by which it would be possible to liberal use of Morning Sittings, that had give an opportunity for its discussion. begun as early as the 16th March. I trust the House will agree to what I There was another Morning Sitting on believe is a thoroughly precedented pro- the 30th April; another on May 4th; position. I may now add that, although another on May 11th; and the Morning we propose to ask the House to give us Sittings began, as a rule, on May 24th in a Morning Sitting on every remaining previous years. He (the Marquess of Tuesday of the Session, the only ques- Hartington) found that the exceptional tion before us now is that a Morning rule was never adopted earlier than May Sitting shall be taken on Tuesday next. 11th, and the formal Resolution had been adopted on May 26th, June 3rd, or July 2nd. The example of the noble Lord, in making these observations, had such an effect on the present Postmaster General (Mr. Fawcett), who was at that time very jealous of the rights of private Members, that he moved an Amendment, resisting the proposal to take the days of private Members, and made some strong observations on the importance of preserving the rights of private Members, which, no doubt, if he were in his place to-night, he would now have repeated. He called upon the then hon. Member for York (Mr. J. Lowther) and other hon. Members to support his Resolution; and so impressed were the Government of that day of the reasonableness of that opposition, that they consented to the adjournment of the debate until the follow

MR. GORST said, he hoped that the House would not be insensible to the observations of the noble Marquess; and if the noble Lord had asked the House to devote one Tuesday to the transaction of Government Business, he did not think that proposal would have been met with the opposition which had now been evoked.

THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: I said, in giving Notice yesterday, that my intention was to ask the House to give us, as a rule, Morning Sittings on Tuesdays, but that nothing was now before the House except a proposal for a Morning Sitting on Tuesday next.

MR. GORST said, it was the Notice of the noble Lord that he had that design on the rights of private Members which caused alarm. There was no action he studied in the opposition to the late Government with more interesting Thursday. Mr. Disraeli being present than the noble Lord's own example. He found that in 1875, which was the first complete Session of the late Conservative Government, when they made a proposal, which, he admitted, went further than the present proposal-namely, to take the whole of Tuesday, June 22nd, the noble Lord, who was then the Leader of the Opposition, thought it his duty to come to the House and protect the rights of private Members. That was rather a remarkable Session, because the time of the Government had been greatly taken up, in the early part of the Session, by the renewal of the Peace Preservation Act, which had been in force for five

on the Thursday, the Motion was not discussed, but was, for the time, abandoned. In consequence of the impression made by this opposition by the noble Lord and his Friends, in 1876 the regular Tuesday Morning Sittings did not begin until June 13th; in 1877 they did not begin until June 19th; in 1878, which was the year quoted by the noble Marquess, the general taking of Morning Sittings did not begin till June 4th; while in 1879 they only began on June 10th. He (Mr. Gorst), therefore, thought he was quite justified in saying that if the Government were now asking for a Morning Sitting for the specific purpose

of making progress with the Corrupt | night, in which the very illegitimate Practices Bill, it would be wise for the practice had been resorted to of moving House to agree for that particular pur- the Adjournment of the House at the pose; but if the Government were, as time of Questions. He ventured to call the noble Lord threatened, going from the attention of the noble Lord, and of Tuesday next to take every succeeding the Government generally, to the fact Tuesday, and so extinguish, to a great that if the legitimate opportunities were extent, the rights of private Members, taken away from private Members, they he thought he was justified in applying would invariably find that the temptato such Parliamentary proceedings the tion was the greater to have recourse to epithet "unprecedented." the illegitimate practices he had referred to, and that private Members would adopt less orderly means for calling attention to grievances, and for eliciting the opinion of the House upon Ministerial answers to Questions, which seemed to annoy them, and which were deemed unsatisfactory. The Government, in the New Rules of Procedure, proposed to take away the opportunity of moving the Adjournment of the House at the time of Questions; and the proposal afforded an additional reason why the non-official Members of the House should feel disposed to scrutinize very closely any additional weapons that were proposed to be placed in the hands of Her Majesty's Government. He hoped the noble Lord would not lose sight of the fact that by proposing to take away from the Members of the House the time-honoured precedents under which they were able to bring forward almost any matter in which they took a legitimate interest, the Government had contributed largely to those disorderly practices which, undoubtedly, seemed to have made considerable way during the time that the present Ministry had held the reins of Office. He hoped that the noble Lord, seeing that the feeling of a large section of the House was decidedly opposed to the proposal which he had brought forward, would reconsider the decision to which he (Mr. J. Lowther) hoped the Government had not definitely arrived; and that he would, at any rate, allow the ordinary proceedings of the House to take their usual course until such a period of the Session had arrived as would enable the Government to assure the House that they had certain definite measures to submit, and to ask the House to give up its time for that purpose. When this system of Morning Sittings was first introduced, he remembered that it was distinctly laid down at the time by Mr. Disraeli that they were only for the progress of Bills in Committee. If the noble Lord had

MR. J. LOWTHER said, he was informed that the right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster General, on a former occasion, had referred to him. He had not been aware that the right hon. Gentleman had done him that honour; but the sentiments which he had expressed on that occasion were identical with those which he entertained now namely, that the proposal to commence Morning Sittings was really one which it would be unwise for the House to decline to adopt. In regard to the question of "counts out," and the duty of keeping a House on private Members' nights, he ventured to differ from the opinion expressed by his hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin), that the noble Lord the Secretary of State for India (the Marquess of Hartington) was wrong in declining, on the part of the Government, any responsibility for the "counts out" which had taken place on various Tuesdays during the present Session. He agreed with the noble Lord that it had never been considered the duty of the Government of the day to keep a House on the days devoted exclusively to the Motions of private Members. The noble Lord also referred to the fact that much of the time which was nominally placed at the disposal of the Executive Government had been, during the present Session, monopolized, to a very great extent, by private Members in availing themselves of the opportunities afforded to them, on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply, of bringing forward independent Motions of their own. But the noble Lord might have gone a little further. He might have referred to the fact that not only had those legitimate opportunities of calling attention to grievances before going into Committee of Supply been taken advantage of by private Members, but that during the present Session there had been more than one instance, on a Government

his Hansard in his hand, he would be | but he gathered that the real intention able to see at once that that was the of the Government was to take possesground upon which the concession of Morning Sittings was originally advocated on that (the Opposition) side of the House. It had always been held that Morning Sittings should not be encouraged except when the pressure of Public Business was very great, and there were specific measures to bring forward.