one or two Irishmen on board the vessel. I remember that when he was in the throes of agony from the undulating motion of the vessel we called him on deck to look at various places on the coast where a harbour would be advisable, and extracted from him some promises on that account, but owing to his imbecile state at the time we did not bind him to them afterwards. I think that if the Chief Secretary would ask that honourable Member he would tell the right honourable Gentleman that Bray was one of the important places pointed out to him at which a harbour would be useful. having weighed the matter in his golden scales, is absolutely right. Now, I have always understood that in this House, when appeals were made to a Ministerat any rate English appeals-from both sides of the House, it was unusual for the Minister to continue to hold to his own opinion, even although he might feel that he was right, unless there was some point of principle involved. Four Irish Conservative Members have got up on that side of the House and have made appeals to him, and a number of Members of all parties on this side of the House have got up and appealed to him, but the right honourable Gentleman remains immovable and impregnable. I venture to say that if this were an English Bill, or a Bill dealing with the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands, or any other part of Her Majesty's dominions, English opinion would be able to make itself felt, and no Minister would venture upon any ground to take up the attitude which the right honourable Gentleman has done in this matter. But it is MR. GERALD BALFOUR: No, no, I because he conceives himself as a human did not say that MR. T. M. HEALY: The right honourable Gentleman has just given the Committee an exact view of the state of his mind on this question. He thinks that Irish Members as a whole are persons who are subjected to political pressure and bound in order to catch votes to advocate this particular claim MR. T. M. HEALY: But I understand that he, in the serene atmosphere of the Irish Office, where it is very difficult to see him, settles this and other Irish questions in vacuo, and having surveyed the whole of this question from east to west, and from north to south, has made up his mind that all Ireland is completely wrong in this matter; so that if it were not for the saving grace of having an independent English Irish Secretary the whole country might go to the dogs to-morrow. Apparently he is not under any pressure, but we, being mere slaves to political wire-pullers, are, of course, entirely in the wrong, while he, being superior-having been born in Eng- than that he is determined as a sort of political Pope to lay down the doctrine of his own infallibility, which is practically involved in the statement he has just made to the Committee, and Irish opinion, so far as it goes, is only to be treated with contempt. Question put "That the words 'poor rate made and levied' stand part of the clause." The Committee divided:-Ayes 160; Noes 240.—(Division List No. 112.) Donelan, Captain A. Doughty, George Ellis, John Edward (Notts) Field, William (Dublin) Haldane, Kichard Burdon Hayne, Rt. Hon. Chas. Seale- Healy, T. M. (Louth, N.) Jones, D. Brynmor (Swansea) Kinloch, Sir John G. Smyth Leese, Sir J. F. (Accrington) McDonnell, Dr. M. A. (Qn.'sCo.) M'Hugh, Patrick A. (Leitrim) Palmer, Sir C. M. (Durham) Provand, Andrew Dryburgh Redmond, J. E. (Waterford) Sinclair, Capt. J. (Forfarsh.) Steadman, William Charles Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath) Wallace, Robert (Edinburgh) Wallace, Robert (Perth) Young, Samuel (Cavan, E.) TELLERS FOR THE AYES- Acland-Hood, Capt. Sir A. F. Allhusen, Augustus Henry E. Arrol, Sir William Balfour, Rt. Hn. A. J. (Manch.) Boscawen, Arthur Griffith NOES. Bousfield, William Robert Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John Cochrane, Hon. T. H. A. E. Colston, Chas. E. H. Athole Cranborne, Viscount Curzon, Rt. Hn. G. N. (Lanc.) Duncombe, Hon. Hubert V. Dyke. Rt. Hon. Sir W. Hart Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne Galloway, William Johnson Gibbs, Hn. A.G. H. (C.of Lond.) Halsey, Thomas Frederick Kenyon-Slaney, Col. Wm. Laurie, Lieut.-General Manners, Lord Edward W. J. Murdoch, Charles Townshend MR. T. M. HEALY: The right honourable Gentleman has stated that these words have been selected with reference to clause 41. But how does he justify the distinction he has laid down in his speech? In that clause he will find the words "The Piers and Harbours Act, and the Public Loans Act, 1887, and under any special Act, whether public or local." Purvis, Robert Quilter, Sir Cuthbert Rasch, Major Frederic Carne Richardson, Sir T. (Hartlep'l) Ridley, Rt. Hon. Sir M. W. Ritchie, Rt. Hon. Chas. T. Robinson, Brooke Russell, Gen. F. S. (Cheltm.) Scoble, Sir Andrew Richard Sharpe, William Edward T. Stanley, Lord (Lancs) Stanley, H. M. (Lambeth) Strutt, Hon. Charles Hedley Wyvill, Marmaduke D'Arcy TELLERS FOR THE NOES- be given under clause 41. In this case the charge is a harbour charge, and is made for the purposes of a harbour only. Therefore, I think there can be no doubt, as a matter of construction that if a part of this charge fell a certain distance outside Bray relief would be given under section 41. The distinction, therefore, is under section 42. A charge which would be relieved in a rural district under clause 41 would be kept beyond the area of relief unless the rating authority is a county council, not an urban district council. Really I do not see what is to happen. I fancy there will be many such cases in Ireland, and the Govern ment may land themselves in difficulties in other places as well as in Bray. MR. T. M. HEALY: We really cannot any longer tolerate the kind of replies we are getting. The right honourable Gentleman first asks us to go to a Division on the last Amendment on the ground that harbours and piers will get relief under section 41. He smiled because we were in favour of maintaining the words of the Bill, and he thought that with our usual Irish stupidity we were making another of our numerous blunders. We then refer him back to clause 41, and we ask-What is the distinction? He says that clause 41 may now be wrong, and that if it is wrong it is to be amended, forsooth, by inserting "under any special Act of a similar character." But that is no reply to the arguments made. He originally refused to give relief to Bray on the ground that it was a harbour made under sub-section 3, clause 41. We point out to him that that sub-section would govern the case of Bray, and now he turns round and says he will amend sub-section 3, clause 41, on the Report stage. And yet Irish Members, who are united and unanimous on the point, are not to be heard. This is not a question, as some English Members originally thought, of increasing the grant and taking more money out of English pockets. It only concerns the distribution of the money. But the right honourable Gentleman says that Irish opinion, whether it be Unionist or Nationalist, is not to prevail, and that the only opinion that is to prevail is that of the Irish Office at Westminster. The right honourable Gentleman will not be Mr. Vesey Knox. He will pass always Irish Secretary. away, and will take his promotion after he has made his fame in connection with the Irish office. Irish opinion, which is the opinion to be consulted, is unanimous in this matter. The right honourable Gentleman may be superior to us, but we will have to live in the country when he is gone, and I think we are entitled to some better reply than he has yet given us. MR. SHEE (Waterford, W.): I would ask the Chief Secretary for an explanation with regard to this clause. There is at present in the town of Dungarvan a charge of 1s. 3d. in the £ levied by the Town Commissioners as the urban sanitary authority in connection with the guarantee of the county railway line. As I apprehend it, we are only dealing now with the amount to be raised by the county councils. Therefore, the relief which this clause gives would not appl where the railway charge is raised by the urban district council. The rate to which I refer is now levied by the Dungarvan Town Commissioners, and is not, of course, a poor rate. But the fact still remains that, as far as I can see, under this sub-section no relief would accrue in the case of such a rate, as the sub-section deals only with the amounts to be raised by county councils. very clear case, and I am sure there are a number of similar cases throughout Ireland. That is a DR. COMMINS (Cork County, Southeast): There are a number of other cases in Ireland, among them being one peculiarly hard case the case of Kinsale Har bour in my constituency. The harbour authority and the town commissioners at Kinsale got a private Act passed under which they undertook to construct a harbour, not for the benefit of Kinsale, but for the benefit of the fishing industry on the coast, and for the benefit of the Isle of Man, Cornish and Devonshire men who come there in the season. It was a matter generally affecting the whole country; but the people of Kinsale were public-spirited, and charged themselves with the expense of making this harbor and pier in order to render the harbour commodious and convenient. Through the blundering of the Board of Works— MR. GERALD BALFOUR: I cannot undertake to give a promise of that sort. MR. M. HEALY (Cork): Kinsale and other similar cases would be excluded from the grant by this clause, which states— 'Where the poor rate made and levied in any area by a county council in any local financial year, in order to meet any railway or harbour charge," etc. I wish to ask the right honourable Gentleman if he intends to maintain the words "by a county council"? for if he does his alteration will not improve the clause from our point of view. As I understand it, the clause as levied by a county council, but it has it stands refers to poor rates made and been pointed out to him that there are railway charges which are paid by urban areas, and that these railway charges, though raised by the county council from this Act by a levy from the county counthe urban areas, might be raised under cil on the urban authorities, and not by direct collection of the tax. This clause as it originally stood would only deal and I use that word without any exaggeration this work, which the Board of Works estimated to cost £18,000, cost £25,000 or £26,000, and an additional burden of £6,000, which the people had never calculated on, was put upon them; and instead of paying 6d. in the £ they are paying 1s. or a little more for this particular work. I trust that some relief will be given to these poor people. This charge is ruining this poor, decaying borough. Its fisheries are gone. The trade that the people calculated on is entirely gone, not through their own fault, but through one of those changes that will occur in the migration of fish and the places to which they resort. They have now only a tenth of the trade they had when they undertook this harbour and pier, and they should get some relief from the crushing burden they have put upon their own shoulders for the public benefit rather than for the individual or specific benefit of Kinsale. I am only asking for a share of the county grant, and I do not think there is a single person in the county whe would grudge Kinsale having a part of it. I am sorry the Secretary to the Treasury is not here, as he knows all the circumstances of this very sad case, and he will be able to inform the right honourable Gentleman regarding it if it has not yet been brought under his notice. Kinsale has a peculiar claim on a share of this grant. It is overburdened -almost bankrupt-and I would ask the right honourable Gentleman to take the opinion of the right honourable Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury, who has been constantly worried by me on the matter, as he will have all the facts fresh in his mind. MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The case of Kinsale has been brought before me, but I am not aware that it would be excluded under this clause. DR. COMMINS: Might I ask the right honourable Gentleman to look into it? with cases where the rate was directly collected by the county council. This Amendment, as I understand it, would cover the cases where the county council, instead of issuing the rate, issue a precept, the tax being raised by the urban authority. No doubt there are instead of being directly collected by the many cases in which railway charges, county council, will be raised not by direct levy, but by precept. But that is not the object of the right honourable Gentleman's Amendment. Our view in this part of the House is that his Amend ment is not applicable, and that he should cover not merely the rate collected the rate raised by precept, but also the by the county council by direct levy and cases and there are a number of such cases all over Ireland-where the local authorities themselves collect the tax for this purpose. Kinsale has been referred to by my honourable Friend. In Kinsale MR. GERALD BALFOUR: Oh, yes, of the tax is not levied by the grand jury, course I will; certainly. DR. COMMINS: And if the facts are as stated, will the right honourable Gentleman undertake to bring it within this clause? but by the urban authority. I want to ask the right honourable Gentleman how can he distinguish between the merits of the two cases, in one of which a pier is constructed under the Piers and Harbours Act by the Board of Works, and |