Parliament. House of Commons - Cumberland and Westmorland Newspaper Transcriptions

Parliament. House of Commons

The Speaker took the chair at three o'clock
The Armenian question:

Mr. William AMBROSE asked again for a reference to any treaty obligation on
Great Britain as distinguished from a discretionary right to interfere with
Armenia.

Sir E. GREY said the article in the treaty of Berlin relating to the point raised was NO. 61.

Mr. AMBROSE: Is there any obligation?

Sir E. GREY: I must leave the article to speak for itself.

Mr. AMBROSE: Are the Government acting upon a sense of treaty duty. Or upon a policy entirely of their own.

Sir E. GREY: They are acting with two other powers but have been continually making representations to the Porte during the last few years. - Sometimes one Government and sometimes another. The representations lately made are only in continuance of that policy.

Mr. Gibson BOWLES: Is it not a fact that there is no obligation whatever on this country?

Sir E. GREY: The hon. Member must form his own opinion as to the scope of the
article. (Laughter and cheers.)

THE RESOLUTION ABOUT THE LORDS:

Mr. Gibson BOWLES asked whether the government proposed this session to
submit to this house the resolution relative in the house of Lords.

Sir. Wm. HARCOURT: Yes sir. (Laughter and Ministerical cheers.)

GRIEVANCES OF POST OFFICE EMPLOYEES:

Replying to Mr. KEARLEY, the Postmaster General named the committee to inquire into the alleged grievances of postal employees, Lord TWEEDMOUTH being chairman.

NEW BILLS:

Mr. BOULNOIS brought in a Bill to authorize County Councils to frame bye-laws regulating advertising displays in rural localities, and Mr. Archibald GROVE brought in a Bill to amend the Public Health (Amendment) Act,1890.
Both were read a first time:

THE CROFTER'S BILLS:

On the order of the day for the second reading of the Crofter's Bill,

Mr. Graham MURRAY condemned the Bill, because while interfering with contractual rights without adequate justification, it neither provides means for the improvement of the material condition of the poorer crofters and cottars in the Highlands, and the alleviation of the distress due to the redundancy of population in the over crowded townships, nor is calculated to diminish the difficulties which have in recent years arisen between the different classes of the community.

Sir George TREVELYAN said there was hardly a principle or detail of this Bill which had not been affirmed by Parliament nine years ago. All it did was to remedy defects in the Crofters' Act of 1886, by extending it's benefits to leaseholders and it's operations to all parts of Scotland where Crofters were to be found.

Mr. Shaw STEWART said the Bill contained proposals to which he was entirely opposed. It would have the effect of extending to Scotland the evils of the system of dual ownership.

Sir W. WEDDERBURN supported the Bill.

Mr. BALFOUR sympathized with the desire to give protection to small tenants for their improvements,but the machinery of the Bill was a clumsy and dangerous way of carrying out that object. The Bill was full of greater absurdities and anomalies than any Bill brought forward by a responsible Government. This was the deliberate extension of the system of land management only tolerable under urgent necessity. The Government had adopted the cheap and easy course of not spending a single sixpence of imperial funds, but of carving out from the property of one class any real or supposed advantage they desire to give to another. The Bill in its present shape would do nothing but harm.

Sir D. McFARLANE accepted the Bill as a small dividend upon a large debt.

Lord WILLOUGHBY de ERESBY opposed and Mr. KEAY supported the Bill.

Mr. W. ALLEN characterized the measure as an insult to the Highland people,for the poorest of whom it would do absolutely nothing. Why should not the same assistance be given to the poor Highlanders that was given to Irishmen.

Mr. RENSHAW regarded with great apprehension the proposed extension of the Crofter's Act of 1886 to leaseholders in counties outside Crofting counties.

Mr. BUCHANAN thought the suggestion of Mr. BALFOUR that advances the public money should be made to poor Crofters was when an election was pending, a gross abuse of position occupied by the right hon. Gentlemen. (Laughter.)

Sir Mark STEWART said he did not believe the Government really intended to pass the Bill or thought they could pass it.