An Asterisk (*) at the commencement of

a

Speech indicates revision by the Member.

THE

IN THE

SESSION OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH PARLIAMENT

OF

THE UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND,
APPOINTED то MEET 4 AUGUST, 1892, IN THE FIFTY-SIXTH YEAR
OF THE REIGN OF

HER

MAJESTY QUEEN VICTORIA.

FIRST VOLUME OF SECOND SESSION 1892.

HE TWENTY-FOURTH PARLIAMENT of the United Kingdom—which had met for the despatch of Business on Thursday, the 5th day of August, 1886-was prorogued and dissolved by Proclamation on Tuesday, the 28th day of June, 1892:-And Her Majesty thereon declaring Her pleasure to call a new Parliament, directed Writs to be issued accordingly; which Writs were made returnable on Thursday, the 4th day of August. The PARLIAMENT was opened by Commission.

Then Five of the LORDS COMMISSIONERS namely, The LORD CHANCELLOR (Lord Halsbury); The CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER (The Duke of Rutland); The SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Viscount Cross); The SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Lord Knutsford); The LORD CHAMBERLAIN (The Earl of Lathom)-being in their Robes, and seated on a Form placed between the Throne and the Woolsack, commanded the Yeoman Usher of the Black Rod to let the COMMONS know "The Lords

B

Jenkinson, esquires, Clerks Assistant, ber for Warwick and Leamington. attending in the House, and the other I do not doubt that the name of Mr. Clerks attending, according to their Peel will be accepted by the House duty, Kenneth Augustus Muir Mackenzie, with unanimous, nay, I may say with esquire, Clerk of the Crown in Chan- enthusiastic, approval. I am convinced cery in Great Britain, delivered to the that all Members of this House, old said Reginald Francis Douce Palgrave Members and new Members alike, will a Book, containing a List of the Names feel-the old ones from long experience of the Members returned to serve in of him, the new Members from that this Parliament. general public repute which my right hon. Friend has earned that this

Several of the Members repaired to House will be indeed fortunate if able their Seats.

ELECTION OF A SPEAKER. *(2.20.) SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY (Lancashire, N., Blackpool): Mr. Palgrave, in accordance with the gracious communication we have just received from Her Majesty, it becomes the first duty of the House of Commons, as it is our ancient and undoubted privilege, to proceed to the election of a Speaker. I hope I may be allowed to express my own personal feeling that no greater pleasure, no greater

honour, could have been conferred on me than that I should be invited to propose for re-election to that high olice my right hon. Friend the Mem

carry on

again to secure the services of a
Speaker so well tried and so successful.
We have been accustomed to look to
our Speakers to uphold the honour and
dignity, and to maintain the privileges
of this great Assembly, which is the
guardian of the liberties of the people.
We have looked to them to enforce with
of order and debate, so that there may
rigid and severe impartiality the rules
be in this House perfect freedom of
speech and due regard paid to the
privileges of majorities and minorities
alike. We have looked to them,
perhaps above all, to erect a high
standard of public honour, and
to promote and
those
unwritten laws of mutual courtesy
which
good feeling
and
ought
assuredly to be the key-note of all our
proceedings, and which are among the
most revered and most valued tradi-
tions of this House. In the past we
have never looked in vain for men of
high and independent character, and of
pre-eminent ability, to carry out these
duties; and at the present moment I
am sure I shall carry with me the
whole feeling of the House when I say
that Mr. Peel, during his long service
in that Chair to which he was elected
by a happy choice some eight years
ago, has maintained to the utmost the
noble traditions of his distinguished
has added additional lustre even to the
predecessors, and I will venture to say
honoured name he bears. The authority
of the Chair is based upon, and is derived
from, the confidence of the House.
Without that confidence no Standing
Orders, no powers, however conferred
upon the occupant of the Chair, can be,
or ever will be, of the slightest avail.
If we have been accustomed to expect
from our Speakers-as we have expected
from them - great capacity, great

my right hon. Friend that strength,
however at times it has been sorely
tried, has proved itself adequate. I
heartily trust that we may congratulate
him, with truth, upon health unim-
paired, and I express the hope, on
behalf of the whole House, that he
may be long spared to fulfil those
honourable and arduous duties to
which I now propose the House should
again call him. I move "That the
right honourable
Arthur Wellesley
Peel do take the Chair of this House
as Speaker."

abilities, and power to perform the as we all know, serious; and I rejoice most important functions, we have at-we all rejoice that in the case of the same time on our side, we, the House of Commons, always given them our confidence-always have we reposed confidence in them. The occasions are frequent, and they occur most unexpectedly, when the Speaker is called upon, unaided and alone and at once, to decide upon difficult points which may have most supreme consequencespoints which require not only accurate knowledge of the forms and precedents of the House, but which demand the greatest courage and firmness to apply those precedents to the exigencies of the moment. The voice of the Chair (2.30.) MR. W. E. GLADSTONE is the voice of the House, and it is of (Edinburgh, Midlothian): Mr. Palgrave, the supremest importance that every individual Member of this House the hon. Baronet (Sir Matthew White should, from his inmost convictions, Ridley) who has just sat down has feel that confidence in the Chair with- expressed, in the course of his speech, a out which, I will venture to say, there hope well warranted, I think, by the can be no security for order or circumstances of the case, that on the adequate protection for liberty of debate. occasion with which we have now to deal I am sure that I carry with me the conviction of the whole House when I there will be no discordant note in the say that in this respect also Mr. Peel proceedings or in the discussions of this has pre-eminently shown qualities which House. Sir, I rise to meet, so far as have, during his tenure of office, added depends upon me, the expression of to the due authority and efficiency of that hope; and I feel confident that the Chair, and have in the most with regard to all for whom, or in marked manner earned the approval whose name I may even in the slightest and confidence of the House. I hope I may be permitted to add that there degree be entitled, presumably, to is no Member in any quarter of the speak, that I can echo back in their House who has had occasion for fulness the just encomiums which the the advice and assistance of Mr. hon. Baronet has pronounced upon Peel, as Speaker, who has not ex- the perienced at his hands the most kindly

attention and the most unwearied courtesy. I am confident that I am right in saying there are in every quarter of the House the most strong feelings of personal regard and friendship for him. I feel, therefore, the most profound belief that when I am proposing the re-election of our tried and honoured Speaker of now three Parliaments there will be no discordant note whatever in the House; but, on the contrary, there will be an unanimous feeling that the House will be wise if it again puts faith in a man so well qualified to guide its deliberations and to maintain its dignity. The demands upon the physical strength of our Speaker are,

character, and the conduct, and the proceedings of the late Speaker of the House. Sir, the hon. Baronet himself has dealt with this subject in a manner as just as it was ample; and I have the satisfaction of thinking that while I am able to adopt, I think, every expression that fell from the lips of the hon. Baronet, he has left me little indeed to add. There is one word that perhaps I may say. I may anticipate, without the slightest doubt, in reliance upon what has already taken place, the unanimity of these proceedings, and I venture to anticipate the compliments which, had there been an uncertain issue before us,

it might have been wiser to reserve- tendency to a diminution in the minds the compliments and congratulations of Members of the House of the respect which I may offer to my right hon. and authority due to the Chair. I am Friend, with whom, in addition to my may take place, the practical good sense fully convinced that whatever changes experience of him in the Chair, I have of the people of this country will conenjoyed the privilege of a long friend- tinue to keep alive, and to keep high ship, dating perhaps from the middle in the mind and conviction of every part of my life, and from an early period Member of the House, a sense of the indeed in his. Within these recent necessity of the deference due to the years, and especially within the period Chair. But that deference may be of my Parliamentary life, great changes willingness according to the manner in paid with a greater or less degree of have taken place in regard to the which the power is exercised. And Chair. At all times, I apprehend, the undoubtedly, Sir, I may offer to the Speaker-although he may be regarded gentleman whose name is now before only as a single individual, yet as re- the House this congratulatory exprespresenting a position, and an influence, sion-that as it appears to me, great and a power so great forms an as was the honour always conferred integral and essential part of the upon the Speaker of the House by his existence of the House of Commons. selection for so important a position, The Speaker ceases in a manner to be that honour has undergone an aggranan individual when he takes the Chair, disement-a real and a true aggranand the House of Commons never can disement-in proportion to the increase be well unless the Speaker is firmly in the difficulties as well as in the lodged in the Chair, not only by the increase of the volume of the duties vote of the House, but by the un-imposed upon him. Sir, we do not questioning confidence of its Members. But, Sir, the change of which I speak is this that although that great office has always been an office of very high elevation and demanding qualifications of no uncommon order, unquestionably one of the most marked among the changes that time has brought with it in respect to the Chair-so far as my own experience is concerned-has been the

extraordinary increase in the demand made upon the Speaker of the House. I do not mean in formal additions to his duty-I do not mean in those additions which the increase of the volume of business naturally and necessarily brings with it; but I do not hesitate to say that great as was this office in the time of men like Mr. Manners Sutton - afterwards Lord Canterbury—it was an office comparatively small in regard to what it now is, and in regard to the calls that are made upon its occupant. Undoubtedly the activity of political life in the nation, its energy and vitality and the rapidity of its movements, are thoroughly reflected in the proceedings of this House. There is, I believe I may say, according to my experience and my conviction, not the smallest

expect infallibility from our Speakers;
that is beyond the claims we are
entitled to ask; but we expect from them
much-great acuteness, wide know-
ledge, great patience, and the dis-
position and capacity to acquire a
thorough mastery of all questions, how-
ever difficult they may be, that may arise
in the course of the proceedings of this
House. We expect from them-in a
degree unusual with respect to high
offices of this kind-that readiness of
mind which, as the hon. Baronet has
well said, is essential to the Speaker on
a multitude of occasions with regard to
which you cannot tell when they will
arise, but you know they must arise
frequently, and the Speaker must act
upon the moment, and act without
assistance. Sir, all these things we
have found in the mind and character
of my right hon. Friend.
But we
have found beyond them all this-a
sense of personal honour and a know-
ledge of the duty of absolute and, if
possible, more than judicial impartiality,
and these so deeply impressed upon
mind as to form a leading characteristic
of the individual and of his character.
The Speaker of the House must, as the
hon. Baronet has well said, possess the

the