the noble Lord opposite, and was called | midation," he did not think it could be the Trades' Union Newspaper, that the called intimidation at all. It was only an trades had now come to an understanding, exercise of that right which they were undeprecating the mode in which all former doubtedly entitled to exercise, of using all strikes had been made, and stating them to peaceable means of obtaining a just equihave been a total failure, and that they had valent for their labour. The hon. Member now resolved to try a new method by which concluded, by hoping, that the necessity of to effect their object--namely, that instead enlightening the people upon this and other of maintaining idle the labourer out of work subjects, would be an inducement to the they should themselves employ him. By noble Lord, the Chancellor of the Exchethese means it would be seen the Trades' quer, for repealing entirely the Stamp-duty Unions would become capitalists, and being on newspapers. so would thus keep up the rate of wages. But there was one thing which he would venture to press upon the noble Lord and on the Government, and that was, that there was a better mode of conveying to the labourers a sense of the truth of that fact, than by direct interference on the part of the Government. It would be a much better and more effectual mode of making them sensible of their error, to discuss the matter with them in such language as would come home to their understandings; and the best means of doing so was, by rendering accessible the ordinary channels of instruction. If the public Press were accessible to all classes, they should be able to convince the labourer, through its means, of the justice of that perfect equality which ought to exist between the master and the labourer, and with which the Government now so strangely attempted to interfere. If the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Admiralty were to take that mode of putting all parties in the proper position, he would find it a more efficient and more respectable mode than that which he had adopted. He admitted, that violence, threats, and intimidation had been used by the trades' unions; but he contended that those threats, and that violence and intimidation, were in consequence of the influence of the Combination-laws, and that they had decreased since the repeal of those laws. He regretted, that the noble Lord had ever mentioned the possibility of the re-enactment of the Combination-laws. Those laws had been repealed after much clamour and excitement; but, by to-morrow morning, millions would hear that the noble Lord had stated from his place in that House, that circumstances might call for their re-enactment. He (Mr. Roebuck) considered that nothing could be more dangerous to the country at large than the bare suspicion that such a project should be in contemplation. As to that intimidation which had been spoken of as "moral inti Mr. Thomas Attwood thought it highly imprudent on the part of the right hon. Baronet in thus throwing himself into the breach on the present occasion. These combinations were not confined to any particular trade or any particular locality; the principles extended throughout England and Ireland, as well as France and other parts of the Continent. Government were, therefore, premature in making war upon the poor journeymen coopers, and would have acted a more noble part if they had turned their arms against the Emperor of Russia, as they ought to have done. The hon. Member knew, that, since the present Combination-laws, there had been a general fall of prices all owing to the change in the currency. The workman had as good a right to keep up his paper wages as the First Lord of the Admiralty had to take his paper salary or paper rents in gold, or as the fundholders had to their paper dividends being paid in the same metal. He knew, from his own inquiries, that in Birmingham, in 1822, when meat was 3d. a-pound, and bread cheap in proportion, that the wages in paper money were about double what they had been in 1792. Yet the workmen would not consent to receive lower daily wages, and would work sometimes only three days in the week at full prices rather than take employment for the whole week at a reduced daily rate. He knew very well, that masters could not afford to pay these wages, yet he could not blame the workmen for trying to keep them up. They were quite justified in combining for the sake of their families, provided they used no improper acts of violence or intimidation. If the masters found themselves aggrieved, let them come hand in hand with their workmen to the noble Lord (Lord Althorp), and demand that free circulation of the currency, and that relief from burthens to which they were fairly entitled, and without which the country could not much longer go on. It was better for the noble Lord at once to seek refuge from the crowd◄ ing demands of the people in the regions of paper money, and no longer advocate a system that must spread discontent and confusion throughout the country. Mr. Robert Grant said, that he had been charged to present a petition from a large majority of the master coopers of the Metropolisa petition which was signed by about nine-tenths of the whole of that body, and he regretted that the forms of the House had prevented him from presenting it before the debate began. With regard to the arguments used by the Gentlemen who spoke on the other side of the question, he considered that they were all based on an obvious fallacy. Hon. Members talked as if the Government had used, or were about to use force, to oblige the workmen to come into the terms proposed by the masters. But was that the case? Had the AttorneyGeneral taken any steps on the part of the Government to punish those labourers who refused the terms offered? or had the Government called out the military to the assistance of the master coopers, to force the workmen to work for such wages as they chose to offer? No such steps had been taken; yet it was on this misconception that the whole of the arguments of the hon. Gentlemen opposite were founded. It had been argued that the labourers had a right to exact the best price they could obtain for their labour. He admitted that; but if labourers had, on the one side, the right to ask a full equivalent for their industry, surely the masters were entitled to a like privilege, and, if aggrieved, were entitled to seek assistance from individuals or from corporate bodies, from the public or from the Government. He did not mean as Government, but in their capacity as traders; and if they, the masters, could legally ask the assistance of the Government, it was a solecism to say, that what they could legally ask, Government could not legally grant. Yet that was the whole of the argument of his right hon. friend. He was satisfied, that, in the petition which he held from the master coopers, they stated nothing that they could not substantiate; and if, as he found from it, the workmen could, without illegality, form a combination to reduce their hours of labour from sixteen to thirteen hours, and subsequently to twelve hours, and yet demand the same amount of wages for the shortest period which they had for the longest, he would say, that the masters had just as much right to form a combination among themselves to bring down wages as the men had to keep them up. The object of both was legal, and each had a right to pursue it in his own way. He (Mr. Grant) was always opposed to the old Combinationlaws, and nothing would induce him to support the re-enactment of those laws. But his noble friend did not say, that it was the intention of Government to re-enact them. All his noble friend said, was, that such was the state to which those combinations were bringing the country, that if it continued, the masters might have it in their power, with some colour of reason, to call upon the House to re-enact those laws which had been repealed, and which he should be sorry to see re-enacted. It was a painful duty which devolved upon him to make this statement, as it might have the appearance of opposition to the working classes, but he made it on the ground of justice to all parties. He had such confidence in the good sense and feeling of justice of the operative classes, that he felt sure they were not capable of those excesses, which would make it necessary either for Government or Parliament to express any opinion on the subject of the Combination-laws; and as long as they continued as they at present stood, any interference would be unnecessary. Mr. O'Reilly said, that under the present system of combination, there was no such thing as free trade for the industrious and honest artisans of the country. Combination met the free exercise of industry at every turn. He would, by way of illustration, state the case of the master shipbuilders of Dublin. They were forced to employ old and comparatively useless men, because the young men who were brought within the vortex of combination, would not, or dared not, work for them. If a ship required repairs, she could not be repaired in Dublin, but the ship-owner was obliged to send her to England or Scotland, there to be repaired by Irish artisans, perhaps, who could not find employment at home. In his own parish, consisting chiefly of a fishing population, the fishermen could not get their boats mended by giving wages common to carpenters all round the country. There were a few persons there who monopolized the ship-carpenters' business, and they required double wages. There was no one more unwilling than he was to revive the Combination-laws. But if threats and combinations were carried to a successful point by the labourers, then he hoped there was a moral power in the country, or in the Government, to offer a successful resistance, and that no master | Office alone. He was certain that the would be prevented from employing as right hon. Gentleman, the Secretary for many labourers or apprentices as he pleased. Motion agreed to. Mr. Ireland, would not hesitate to give every explanation on the matter, in order that the credit or discredit attaching to it should be appropriated to the right quarter. Mr. Littleton begged to say, in reply to the call made upon him by the hon. member for Drogheda, that he had already twice or three times over, in reply to the hon. Gentleman himself, explained the transaction. He now begged leave to re PROSECUTION OF THE PILOT.] O'Dwyer moved for a return of the amount of costs payable to the Crown Solicitor, and the sum to counsel engaged for the Crown in the case of the King v. Barrett, tried in the Court of King's Bench in Ireland, in Michaelmas Term, 1833; with a specification of the various occasions, whe-peat a communication which had been adther on motions, arguments, opinions, con- dressed to him by a person in Ireland, sultations, trial, or otherwise, counsel re- whose name he did not feel himself called ceived fees; describing when counsel ap- upon to disclose, directing his attention to peared in Court, the number of counsel the clause of the Act of Parliament which employed or consulted on each occasion, applied to the case. It was not in his deand a statement of the rank of all counsel partment to deal with this information; employed, and their names, and the and he, as was customary in official matters, amount of fees paid to each on the several desired his private secretary to transmit occasions, and in the aggregate. The single this letter, addressed to him, to the deprosecution against Mr. Barrett cost 7001.partment to which it referred. He had reaSuch an enormous sum should be accounted son to believe, however, that before he for. It was known that 50,000l. had been expended by the Government in criminal prosecutions in Ireland, and the country ought to know how so much money was expended, There was one peculiar feature in the late prosecution, and it was, that an eminent barrister, who was never employed in that department of the bar, but who might have been employed by the traverser, was retained by the Government; and the object was to buy him up. He did not wish to impugn the motives of the Attorney General; but then he was a member of the Privy Council, and advised prosecutions which he was afterwards to conduct. He would not say, that the Attorney General advised prosecutions to pocket the fees, yet he should say, that it was not advisable to give a lawyer an interest in prosecutions. He wished to direct the attention of the House to the very imperfect manner in which the return of the correspondence between the Government and the Stamp-Office, relating to the suppression of the Pilot newspaper, had been made. The return did not set forth the letter written by the right hon. Gentleman, the Secretary for Ireland, directing the attention of the Stamp Office to the Act of Parliament, as it should have done; the way to explain this, as certain advocates of the Government had tauntingly defied any attempt to show that the Irish Government had interfered, or that the proceeding, which had excited so much condemnation, was not the work of the Stamp had sent the communication made to him, the Stamp-office department had determined to adopt the course which they ultimately did. He had no objection to the production of the bill of costs, but then he hoped that the House would be put in possession of the particular expenses incurred in the several stages of the prosecution. The ordinary expenses of the prosecution would be undoubtedly light, and the additional expenses arose from the delays, vexatious he would not say, and the opposition caused. As to the number of counsel employed, he would say, that as many had been employed in criminal prosecutions in England-Sir James Scarlett employed as many. It was usual, in Ireland, to employ the Serjeants and the senior King's Counsel in such prosecutions, and, in case any accident might occur to prevent their attendance, to give retaining fees to counsel to fill their places. Now it so happened, that the Solicitor General, Serjeant Pennefather, and Serjeant Perrin, were absent from Dublin, and the Attorney General directed that Mr. Holmes, the Gentleman to whom the hon. Member alluded, should be employed in their absence. That was the cause why so many lawyers were employed; eight, or even seven, were, perhaps too many, but he had stated the reason for employ ing eight. He would tell the House, that the Attorney General, though a member of the Privy Council, was not consulted about those prosecutions. He had neither voice nor influence in directing them, and from that learned Gentleman's well-known liberality in pecuniary matters, of which he had some knowledge, he was far above encouraging prosecutions for the sake of making money. The right hon. Secretary then moved an amendment, to the effect that the return of costs should distinguish the proportion of costs in the several stages of the prosecution. The Motion, as amended by Mr. Littleton, was agreed to. householders rated at above 10l. in the town of Leamington. Now, that was the third petition which had been presented; and he was informed that one-half of the signatures attached to it were not those of 107. householders, that fifty were the signatures of females, that forty were names signed twice over, a few names were signed three times, and one four times. He thought that the hon. and learned member for Dover, [seeing the error he had been led into in stating there was a petition of complaint when there was none, would not offer any opposition to the Motion. LEAMINGTON PETITION.] Mr. Tancred rose to move for the discharge of the order Mr. Halcombe felt confident, he could appointing a Committee to investigate an satisfy the House, that there were no imputed breach of privilege in the affix- grounds for the Motion of the hon. meming of false signatures to a petition from ber for Banbury. A petition had been Leamington Spa, praying for the exten- presented to the House, signed by 757 out sion of the elective franchise to that town. of 850, the total number of the 10l. houseHe did so on the ground that there had holders of Leamington Spa, praying that been no petition complaining of injury that place might not be included in the presented. When the Motion was made boundaries of the borough of Warwick. by the hon. and learned member for Dover Some time after the Warwick borough for the Committee, the noble Pay master of Committee published a report, in which the Forces had objected to it, on the they stated, that the petition to which ground, that there was no petition of com- he had just alluded had been referred to plaint before the House; upon which the them as well as another petition numerously hon. and learned Member had said there and respectably signed by inhabitants of was, and the opposition of the noble Lord Leamington in favour of the extension of was at once withdrawn, and the Committee the franchise to that town. When this reagreed to. Now, upon examination, it ap- port was known at Leamington, it excited peared that there was no petition as stated the utmost astonishment amongst the inhaby the hon. and learned Member. Of bitants, because, as he had before said, out of course the hon. and learned Member had the 850 101. householders in Leamington, been mistaken, and had conceived a pe- 757 had signed the petition against the tition presented by a noble Lord (Eastnor) proposed junction of the two places. The to be one of complaint; whereas its only petition to which the Committee referred in prayer was, that the franchise should not their report in favour of the extension of be extended to Leamington. Such being the franchise to Leamington was cunningly the case, he trusted that his Motion would worded, for though at the commencement not be opposed; and if it were, he should it was described as the petition" of the feel himself bound to persevere in the undersigned inhabitants of Leamington," Motion which he had submitted yesterday, it concluded by praying "that the boundand which was, that the petitioners sign-aries of Warwick might be extended to ing the petition complained of, and who Leamington, in order that your petitioners had petitioned to be heard before the Com- may vote at all future elections for memmittee by their agents or Counsel, mightbers for that borough." This was intended be so heard. He moved to discharge the order for appointing a Committee on the Leamington Spa petition. Mr. Hughes Hughes seconded the Motion. He did so chiefly on account of the great and useless expense the Committee would occasion should it be continued. He must remark, that the Leamington petitioners appeared to be very unfortunate. The noble Lord, the member for Reigate, had presented a petition the other evening purporting to come from above 500 of the to convey the impression, that the persons signing the petition were 101. householders, because no other description of persons would be entitled to vote in the event of the Warwick franchise being extended to Leamington; 418 signatures were affixed to this petition, of which he would undertake to prove, on the authority of most re spectable persons, no less than 281 were fictitious. The most diligent inquiries had been made in order to ascertain whether the 281 signatures attached to the pe Complaint was made to the House, that one of the names annexed to the petition from certain Protestant inhabitants of Kilrea, against the Catholic claims, was a forgery.-Ordered, that a Committee be appointed to inquire into the facts of the case, and to report the same, with their observations thereon, to the House." The Committee was accordingly appointed, with powers to send for persons, papers, and records: and the petition to which the fraudulent signature was affixed was referred to it. The transaction was thus described, in Hansard's Debates : tition were those of inhabitants of Lea- | (anno 1829), was the following entry :mington, and the result was, that only seventeen were found to be so, but all the seventeen whom those names represented had signed the petition against the extension of the franchise to Leamington. The House might form some idea of the manner in which the petition had been got up from the circumstance which he was about to mention. One of the witnesses examined before the Committee which had been appointed upon his Motion stated, that he and his father-in-law were sitting in a public-house in Leamington, when two mechanics entered with the petition, and asked them to sign it. They refused, Mr. Dawson read a letter which he had re-. stating, that they had signed the counter-ceived from the Rev. Mr. Waddy, of Kilrea, petition. The mechanics, however, in who stated, that having seen in the newsdefiance of their objection, signed their papers a report, setting forth the presentanames to the petition. The Committee tion by Sir George Hill of a petition from that would have ended its labours ere this, his name was said to be subscribed, he felt it parish against the Catholic claims, to which had it not been for a mistake on the part his duty to notify, that the signature of his of the hon. member for Banbury. The name must be a forgery, as he never signed, hon. Member entered the Committee on or authorised the signing of, his name to such the last day of its sitting, and introduced a petition. It was singular enough, too, that Mr. Joseph Parkes as agent for some per- this very petition dwelt with particular force sons who had petitioned the House, pray-upon the gross artifices which were imputed ing that they might be heard by their to the Catholics to create perjury and immocounsel or agents in support of the genuine- to expose the grossness of this forgery. rality. He meant not to proceed further than ness of the petition which was complained of as being spurious. He asked the hon. member for Banbury whether the House had ordered the petitioners to be heard by their agents, and the hon. Member answered in the affirmative; but it turned out that the House had made no such order, but merely referred the petition to the Committee. In consequence of this interruption, the labours of the Committee had been suspended, and the witnesses detained in town. The hon. member for Banbury now appeared to think, that it was improper that the Committee should proceed with the inquiry, because no petition had been presented from any of the persons whose names were alleged to be signed to the spurious petition; but he thought, that this argument was untenable. Could it be maintained, that a Member acquainted with a breach of privilege was not at liberty to institute an inquiry into the subject? Was he to stand in a worse situation, in this respect, than a person out of doors, who might present a petition? It was said, that he was not the party ag-son who brought the matter forward, he should Mr. Dawson said, that having been the pergrieved; but the House was the party ag- not shrink from prosecuting the inquiry, and grieved, and was bound to vindicate its own would therefore move for a Committee to inhonour. The course which he had pur-quire into the facts of the case. The Speaker: I hope that the House, when circumstances so strongly affecting a most valuable right of the subject, and so deeply affecting the dignity and character of this House, are stated to them, will not fail to do their duty. If they do not, I will venture to say this is the first time when such a proceedIf the hon. member should decline to proceed, some hon. Meming was passed over. ber will, I am sure, take the matter up. Mr. Sir George Hill said, that as he had presented the peution in question, the House would naturally expect some explanation from him. All he could say was, that the petition was enclosed to him by Mr. Digby, a Magistrate of the neighbourhod, who apprised him that it was most respectably signed. Digby and Mr. Waddy were both most rethat the latter did not at once require from spectable gentlemen; and it surprised him the former some explanation of the matter. It puzzled him altogether, and he knew not what to make of the business. He should not, of course, oppose any investigation. Mr. Hume said, he would make a Motion upon the subject if no other Member gave notice of one. sued was not without precedent. In the A Committee was accordingly appointed. Journals of the House, vol. 84, page 187, Hansard (new series) xxi. p. 22, |
