land, but he entreated the noble Lord not | alternative was that the bank accounts to refuse it to Ireland.

would go without check altogether. He therefore trusted that hon. Members would allow this Bill to go into Committee.

MR. H. A. HERBERT contended that the Government was alone responsible for the late period at which this measure had come under the consideration of the House, and urged that the depositors who had lost money by the failure of Irish savings banks were entitled to the favourable consideration of Parliament; because, whatever might be the effect of the law rigidly interpreted, 99 persons out of 100 who deposited their money in savings banks, believed that the Government was responsible for the deposits.

MR. BROTHERTON said, it appeared to him that the opposition to this Bill was founded upon the wish some Gentlemen entertained to vest in local authorities the power of appointing unworthy managers of savings banks, and then to come to Parliament and demand compensation for the losses sustained by depositors on account of their misconduct. It was true that the Government were answerable for the money placed in the savings banks which they received, but they were not answerable for the faults of managers. savings banks in England were well managed; but the managers of Irish savings banks, instead of transmitting to Government the money which they received, put it into their own pockets.

The

The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER said, this was another instance of the difficulty of legislation in the present Parliament, for he had imagined that this Bill would excite no opposition, and yet here was the noble Lord charging them with legislating on this subject merely for the sake of extorting additional fees. [Lord G. BENTINCK imputed no sinister motives to the promoters of the Bill. He merely stated, as one of the inconveniences of this legislation, the undoubted fact that additional fees would be charged upon the alteration of the rules that this Bill would render necessary.] He was glad to find he had misunderstood the noble Lord. The sole object of the Bill was to insure a better management of the savings banks, for the benefit of the depositors; and with that view he proposed to make trustees liable to that extent which the hon. Baronet opposite himself proposed in 1844. At present there was no liability of trustees, and consequently no inducement to them to perform their duty. It had been proved that in one or two cases in Ireland they had neglected their duty; and in England, where the noble Lord said there was no complaint, it was a fact that one trustee had paid 7,000l. out of his own pocket to atone for his previous neglect. The hon. Member for Bradford (Colonel Thompson) had said that Government ought to make good the losses of the depositors; but he would ask whether it was fair that the Government should be answerable for the conduct of officers, secretary, treasurer, &c., whom they did not appoint, and over whom they had no control. They were at preMR. REYNOLDS felt called upon to sent under the appointment of the trus- say that there was not the least ground for tees; and the object of the Bill was by the hon. Member for Salford's assertion. rendering these trustees liable for a mode- It was too much the practice of hon. rate amount, to give them an inducement Members representing English constituento attend to their duty, and yet not to cies to look only at the dark side of frighten them into resigning their office Irish character. There was scarcely any altogether. Then with regard to the pro- act, however discreditable, which was not duction of the books of the depositors. It at once imputed to the Irish. The inhad been correctly stated by the hon. Mem-stances of mismanagement which occurber for Oxfordshire, that the only possible red in Ireland, he believed would, on incheck on the accounts of the savings banks were the books of the depositors. That was perfectly true; and the object of the Bill was to require depositors to produce their books once a year, that they might be compared with the accounts in the bank. He was perfectly aware there would be difficulties in this course; but he thought they might be overcome, and the

The managers

of the Manchester savings bank, in which there were 20,000 depositors, caused the book of every depositor to be exhibited once a year as a precaution against fraud.

quiry, be found to have proceeded from local unskilfulness; and he did not conceive that either the present or any other Administration was to blame for the unfortunate events that had occurred.

MR. KEOGH opposed the Bill because it was calculated to do harm. It was proposed to repeal the 9th George IV., and the provisions it substituted would make

BUSINESS OF THE SESSION.

prolonged discussions in the House of Commons that he would consent, although opposed to all tariffs, to a sort of rhetorical tariff; and that for his part (and he spoke, I suppose, also, for his Friends), he has no objection that the time allotted to him for addressing the House should be settled by a Standing Order. This is evidently a popular idea, and it may be (but we shall have opportunities of discussing that point) a very good suggestion; but I would remind the House that it is only very recently that this inconvenience of too much discussion has been experienced by the hon. Gentleman and the other Members of

(not very far distant, but a few years ago) when I do not think the hon. Member for the West Riding would have been satisfied with a limited period of time being fixed by the House of Commons for the addresses of hon. Members. I have listened to a great many able addresses from the hon. Member for the West Riding and his Friends, most of which exceeded that period of time which he wishes now to establish; and, far from thinking then that there was too much discussion, they were not satisfied with the House of Commons alone, but they built halls, and hired theatres, thinking that the House of Commons did not afford sufficient opportunities for the discussion of those great questions, and for the advancement of those great principles, which they wished to impress on public conviction.

MR. DISRAELI:* I take this occasion, as being, perhaps, the most convenient to the House, to make some observations on the conduct of public business during this Session. I think there are reasons which render it not inexpedient that the House should not be prorogued without offering some opinion on that subject. Whatever be the merits or demerits of this Session of Parliament, there is no doubt that it possesses, by general consent, one characteristic that of having been a Session of unexampled duration. There is, however, a suspicion very prevalent that its efficacy has not been commensu- his school. There certainly was a time rate with the period of its existence. It is said that, after having sat now for nearly ten months after having laboured with a zeal and an assiduity which have not been questioned-Parliament is about to be prorogued with a vast number of projects of legislation of great interest and value not passed, and many of them little advanced. Why, Sir, the very subjects recommended to our consideration in the Speech from the Throne have not even been dealt with by the House in the way contemplated when we first met. There is more than one reason generally offered to account for this unsatisfactory state of affairs for an unsatisfactory state of affairs I am sure every Gentleman will agree it really is, because it amounts to the acknowledgment, if it be true, of a very great public evil-namely, that our system of government is inadequate to pass those measures that are required for the public welfare. One of the most popular causes which is assigned for this unsatisfactory state of affairs, and for the existence of this great evil, is that there is too much discussion in the House of Commons-too many speeches-too much talk. This is an imputation that has been heard before this Session of Parliament. It was not so rife, but yet it was an accusation prevalent during the last Session of the last Parliament. I think it was first urged an obstacle to the conduct of public business by the Members of the Manchester school; and this year it has been brought forward by their distinguished leader in the most formal and precise manner. That hon. Gentleman, the Member for the West Riding, has even acknowledged to the House that, so far as he is concerned, he is so sensible of the evil of

as

* From a published report.

There is another cause alleged for the unsatisfactory state of public business, and that is, the forms of this House-the constitution of this House-which are now discovered to be cumbersome and antiquated, and to offer a great obstacle and barrier to the efficient, satisfactory, and speedy transaction of public affairs. This is the view of the case which is, I believe, principally relied on by Her Majesty's Government. Her Majesty's Government have on several occasions objected to, or rather deplored the use of the forms of the House, which hon. Members have availed themselves of; and towards the close of this dying Session, with the sanction certainly-not to say the instigation-of Her Majesty's Government, a Committee was appointed to inquire into the conduct of public business, of which I was a humble Member, and before which you, Sir, were a distinguished witness. From the appointment of that Committee it is clear that the Government did consider that in the forms of

Members. It appears from that report | stances under which this Parliament met. that there have been this year forty-five Such extraordinary events have occurred public Committees, some of more than since February, that we are apt to forusual importance, with an average number get, while reflecting on the fall of of fifteen Members serving on each Com-thrones, the uprooting of dynasties, the mittee. Then there have been twenty- toppling down of great Ministers whose eight Election Committees, with five Mem-reputation had become almost part of hisbers serving on each Committee; fourteen groups on Railway Bills, with five Members on each group; seventeen groups on private Bills, with five Members on each group; and there have been also one hundred and eleven other Committees on private business. Of the public Committees, that on commercial distress sat thirty-nine days; that on sugar and coffee planting, thirty-nine days; that on the Navy, Army, and Ordnance expenditure, forty days; and that on the miscellaneous expenditure, thirty-seven days. There have, besides, been presented this year upwards of 18,500 petitions, showing an increase of 25 per cent above the greatest number presented in any former year, except 1843.

tory, and who, for more than half a century, had moulded the government-one might almost say, of civilised Europe-I repeat, that while these catastrophes are fresh in our memory, we are apt to forget (so long has been the duration, and so eventful the period of this Session) the circumstances under which the present Parliament met. Hon. Gentlemen should recollect that when this first Session of the new Parliament of the Queen assembled, we were then suffering from events which, though not of a reputation so European, or of a character so comprehensive as those I have just referred to, yet, as far as we were concerned, were not less strange, and far more sad. The inscrutable and omnipotent decree had gone forth and stricken one of the Queen's Here I would make one observation on kingdoms with famine, and the great efthese petitions, since considerable error forts obliged to be made by the merchants exists out of doors among our constitu- of this country in consequence of that terents on the subject. There is an idea rible visitation, led-in addition, no doubt, that the presentation of a petition is an to other causes- -to a commercial crisis empty form that it is ordered to lie on perhaps of unprecedented severity. There the table, and is never heard of again. were uprootings of commercial dynasties in Now, it is as well that our constituents England not less striking than the fall of should know that every petition laid on those political houses of which we have the table is scrutinised by a Select Com- lately heard so much. Day after day. mittee of the most experienced and in- Gentlemen whom we had lived with in this fluential Members of this House-that House, and whom we respected and reevery petition which, from the importance garded-merchants of the highest Euroof its subject or the ability of its state-pean reputation-were during that crisis ments, appears to merit more particular rudely torn, I may say, from these benches, notice, is printed at the public cost, and afterwards circulated among the Members; and I believe that at this moment the right of petition (although it is not permitted to make speeches on every petition) is a more important and efficient right than has ever been enjoyed at any time by the people of England in this respect.

Having, therefore, fairly, I hope, stated the causes to which is imputed the great evil we all acknowledge-namely, the apparent inefficiency of our system of government for the transaction of business necessary to the welfare of the State-I shall proceed to see whether those causes are founded in justice; and if they are not, whether it is possible, before the Parliament is prorogued, to ascertain what the real cause is. It would be, perhaps, convenient to recall to the House the circumVOL. CI. {Third}

Series

if not with disgrace and dishonour, yet with circumstances of pitiable vicissitude seldom equalled. When Parliament met, there was this commercial distress of unprecedented severity-private credit was paralysed--trade was more than dull, it was almost dead-and there scarcely was a private individual in this kingdom, from the richest and noblest in the land down to the most humble among the middle classes, who was not smarting under the circumstances of that commercial distress. which was of a nature so severe and striking that it was one of the main causes alleged for calling the Parliament together in November. Her Majesty stated the reasons which induced Her to call the Parliament together then, and She was pleased to say that She "had seen with great concern the distress which has for some time pre

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