345 Metropolitan Water {28 FEBRUARY 1907} with the question as to have made it possible for the undertakings to be purchased for some £33,000,000. On behalf of the district which he represented he entered an emphatic protest against people being put to the cost of appearing before a Committee upstairs, and opposing by counsel and witnesses a Bill which had been framed to carry out what was described as a statutory obligation. He represented the Ealing Division in part of which, viz., South Acton, almost the only industry was the washing of clothes for the West End of London. There were in that area 266 properties which were assessed for laundry purposes. If this Bill passed the interests of the laundry proprietors would be seriously affected, because the water supply would be liable to be cut off without notice or means without any adequate notice or being available for an alternative supply. Besides the places to which he had referred, there were an enormous number of laundries carried on in dwelling-houses which had the ordinary water supply. Apart from that aspect of the question there were upwards of 17,000 houses in the Ealing Division whose assessments were £30 and under, whose water charges would be increased under the Bill. He did not think the House should assent to a proposal which would be a gigantic means of professional employment if the Bill went upstairs. There was no neces sity to pass the Bill in the particular form proposed to enable the Water Board to carry out the statutory obligation imposed by the Act of 1902. *MR. MORTON (Sutherland) said the difficulty in connection with sending the Bill upstairs was the immense expense which would be involved, amounting probably to thousands of pounds. That might suit agents and lawyers, but it did not suit the ratepayers. Although the Water Board was obliged in honour to bring forward the Bill with the view of carrying out the obligation imposed, Parliament was not obliged to accept it. Besides the City of London, there were other districts which would be Abraham, William (Cork, N.E.) Board Bill. in 346 as injuriously affected by the Bill. The was a to proyears ago vide for a supply of water by meter, but it was defeated by the combined efforts of That Bill applied not vested interests. to the City alone, but to all London, and if the vested interests had been defeated the result would have been that the of the cost; say water might have been purchased at less than half one saving of at least £20,000,000 to the people of London. He quite agreed that there must be a special rate for water at high pressure for fire extinction purposes; but it should be remembered that the City had spent £40,000 in putting down hydrants. He was sorry to oppose the Water Board in any way, but as they would not give the citizens an undertaking that they would be protected from unjust and unfair charges for water, there was nothing left for them to do but to oppose the Bill now before the House. Question put. The House divided:-Ayes, 219; Noes, 44. (Division List No. 31.) Barnes, G. N. Barran, Rowland Hirst Barry, E. (Cork, S.) Beale, W. P. Beauchamp, E. Beck, A. Cecil Bell, Richard Bethell, SirJ.H (Essex, Romf'rd Brocklehurst, W. B. Brunner, J.F.L. (Lancs.,Leigh)| Buchanan, Thomas Ryburn Chance, Frederick William Clancy, John Joseph Clough, William Clynes, J. R. Collins, Stephen (Lambeth) Corbett, A. Cameron (Glasgow) Cotton, Sir H. J. S. Cremer, William Randal Crombie, John William Davies, W. Howell (Bristol, S.) Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.) Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness Edwards, Enoch (Hanley) Elibank, Master of Emmott, Alfred Essex, R. W. Evans, Samuel T. Eve, Harry Trelawney Everett, R. Lacey Faber, G. H. (Boston) Farrell, James Patrick Fenwick, Charles Ferens, T. R. Ffrench, Peter Findlay, Alexander Flynn, James Christopher Gardner, Col. Alan (Hereford, S. Gooch, George Peabody Haldane, Rt. Hn. Richard B. Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Worc'r) Harvey, W.E. (Derbyshire, N. E Hogan, Michael Hooper, A. G. Johnson, John (Gateshead) King, Alfred John (Knutsford) Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich Lewis, John Herbert Lupton, Arnold M'Laren, H. D. (Stafford, W.) Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil Partington, Oswald Pearce, William (Limehouse) Price, C. E. (Edinb'gh, Central) Rea, Walter Russell (Scarboro❜ Reddy, M. Redmond, John E. (Waterford) Rees, J. D. Richards, Thomas(W.Monm'th Richards, T.F. (Wolverh'mpt'n Richardson, A. Rickett, J. Compton Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln) Roberts, G. H. (Norwich) Robertson, SirG.Scott(Bradf'rd Robinson, S. Robson, Sir William Snowdon Roe, Sir Thomas Rogers, F. E. Newman Samuel, Herbert L.(Cleveland) Shaw, Charles Edw. (Stafford) Simon, John Allsebrook Stone, Sir Benjamin Stuart, James (Sunderland) Taylor, John W. (Durham) Acland-Hood, RtHn.SirAlex. F Banbury, Sir Frederick George Campbell, Rt. Hon. J. H. M. Cavendish, Rt. Hn. Victor C.W. Main Question put, and agreed to. Bill read a second time, and committed. SUPPLY (ARMY ESTIMATES). Postponed Proceeding on Question, “That a sum, not exceeding £9,835,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge for the pay, etc., of His Majesty's Army (including Army Reserve) at home and abroad (exclusive of India), which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1908," resumed. Question again proposed. were MR. J. WARD, continuing his speech, thought those Members of the himself, were in House who, like favour of considerable reduction of Army expenditure ought to offer fair criticism upon the present proposals and point out what weak spots there might be, no matter about peace what their views and war. He did not suppose that there was anybody in the House who did not consider war a hideous method of They settling international disputes. would all like some other method of settling matters, but at present they were not in that position, and therefore he thought that the proposed policy should be carefully considered. He wanted to be very certain first of all that we should maintain the voluntary principle under the new scheme for a new territorial Army. If he had the slightest suspicion that it was intended to be used as a lever for compulsory service or would make compulsory service easier, it would receive his unstinted hostility. He wished to allude to one or two matters from a different standpoint from that from one The quality of recruits sioned officers. that would be got depended upon the opportunities offered to those recruits. He himself had been through a campaign as one of the rank and file, and he knew the opinions of the best of the rank and If we were file and the best of the non-commissioned officers he had come across. to have a successful national Army there must be opportunities given to the rank and file to obtain commissions. In the French army, he believed, a definite appointments were percentage of aside for those who had passed through Those who were qualified the ranks. ought to be given the opportunity of rising. It would solve the officer problem, do away with much snobbishness in the Army, and attract the best class of set men-men with foresight and ability. They would never escape the snobbery of the Army until the men who started at the bottom of the ladder were given the opportunity of reaching the top. A definite percentage of commissions should be set aside for men who showed the ability to obtain them, and an opportunity should be given at the depots for men who had become officers to educate themselves. If that were done many of the problems would be solved. That was his suggestion as one who had been through the mill, and he offered it to the Committee for what it was worth. *MR. HICKS BEACH (Gloucestershire, Tewkesbury) said that from the speech of the hon. Member for Salford one could appreciate the difficulties in which the right hon. Gentleman was placed. He had to try and please two sets of people, one section of the House which desired to have no Army at all, or an Army as small as it could possibly be made, and the other which desired to have an Army sufficiently strong to perform the duty that fell upon it in the exigencies of our great Empire. The desire of the Committee was to remove this discussion as much as possible from the arena of Party politics, and so far as he was concerned he could only express his regret that the Secretary of State had not taken the Committee a little further into his confidence. He would have liked the right hon. Gentleman to have told them what were the exact proposals of his military advisers at the War Office, and what were the particular restrictions that he had placed upon those proposals. They were unable to reconcile the right hon. Gentleman's statement that this was a soldiers' proposal with the suggestion that the standing Army should be reduced by 16,000 men. The right hon. Gentleman ought to have stated the particular reasons which guided the Army Council and himself in arriving at the decision to reduce the Army when only a few years ago it was considered essential that larger numbers should be maintained to preserve the interests and the prestige of the Empire throughout the world. As a Militia officer he could not but express his regret at the proposal to do away with that force. Both the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Gentleman the Under-Secretary for the Colonies had expressed their regret at Mr. J. Ward. the disappearance of that old constitutional force of the country, and in a small degree voiced their approval of the services it had rendered in the past. But the Militia forces would be much more grateful to the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition for his appreciation that afternoon of the services which they had performed in past years. Before the Government proposed to do away with an old constitutional force of that kind they ought to make every possible attempt to keep it under its present name, even if it was necessary to reorganise it in some degree. For no one could forget the services the Militia rendered during the South African war, when it not only took the place of the line battalions in garrisoning the towns in this country, Scotland and Ireland, but numerous battalions rendered valuable service on the lines of communication in South Africa, at Mediterranean stations like Malta, and in looking after Boer prisoners in islands like St. Helena. and Ceylon. Every Militiaman admitted that the force was not in a satisfactory condition at the present moment, and they had only to refer to the figures which the right hon. Gentleman had given to the House on Monday last. At the present moment they were 37,000 men under strength, and the officers were 1,000 short. Besides, out of 130 battalions, forty-six battalions were 500 under strength. Would it not be better to try and reorganise the force, and make it as efficient as possible as a fighting force? The unfortunate part about the Militia was that the force had always been drained for the purpose of the standing Army. The Militia, the right hon. Gentleman had told them, furnished about 12,000 recruits a year for the line, which could not be got without the Militia. The Under-Secretary for the Colonies had stated that it had been asserted that the number of recruits required for the Army a few years ago was something over 40,000 a year, and that the number now required was only 22,000. As the Militia alone furnished 12,000, he would suggest to the right hon. Gentleman whether it would not be better to dispense altogether with the recruits got from the Militia for the line, and to keep the Militia a unit of its own. There were various ways in which the Militia could be reorganised and made an efficient force, and perhaps it could be maintained on a cheaper basis than at the present moment. To his mind the fault of the Militia was that there were too many units, and these units had only a small number of men. In his own county of Gloucester there were two battalions of Militia, both under strength, one having about 500 men instead of 600; and the other battalion was lamentably deficient in strength. Would it not be an advantageous and economical method to make the two battalions into one, and thus save half the staff? Then there was the question of training the recruits. The right hon. Gentleman had tried the experiment of training recruits in the winter months, and it had been very successful. He could refer to another fresh experiment, that of training the recruits at the battalion depot. That had met with very great success, and he could only say in regard to his own battalion that it had had a very good effect, and they had obtained far more recruits than for many years past. Then there was the question of the supply of officers. He would have thought that it might be possible to make it a condition on officers of the Line passing into the Reserve that they should train with the Militia for a few years, a plan which would be of great advantage to that force. In regard to training, a month was not sufficient, because a great part of it was taken up with musketry drill. He suggested that it might be possible to give the men the musketry practice at some time outside the month set apart for training. He thought that might be accomplished with local aid, if the War Office would give an additional grant for rifle ranges. Under the present scheme the Militia was to disappear, and in its place they were to have this special contingent, which apparently was to serve two purposes. One portion was to provide drafts for the Regular Army when war broke out, and another portion was to go into the territorial Army, and apparently to go out when the territorial Army was embodied and put into training for six months. In the first case they were only to be called upon for fifteen days training in the year, six of which would be for musketry, leaving only nine days. *MR. HICKS BEACH said that made twenty-one days (the Militia had now twenty-eight), including two Sundays, two days for entering and leaving camp, and one day for inspection. That did not leave very much time for training, and he failed to see that this force would be a bit better trained than the existing Militia. If they had a large number of soldiers only seventeen years of age with six months' training they would not be fit to take the place of the Regular Army in foreign countries for a period of two or three years. There were to be seventyfour battalions of these men, 500 strong, and that was a very small force from which to supply drafts for the Line in time of war. They had been told that 12,000 recruits came from the Militia into the Line. He would like to know what was going to happen in future if the Militiamen who in the past had gone into the Line were going to be used to form the special contingents at the depots? Where was the right hon. Gentleman going to get his 12,000 recruits? As to the Territorial Army he only hoped the right hon. Gentleman would be successful in obtaining it. Unfortunately there was a certain amount of jealousy between the different branches of the Auxiliary Forces. The Yeomanry looked down upon the Militia as an inferior class, the Militia looked down upon the Volunteers, and some Volunteers looked down upon the Militia. If the right hon. Gentleman could get them to work together he would congratulate him, but he had doubts on the matter. At the present moment they had a serious grievance against Ireland, because the Irish Militia were going to be allowed to remain as they were before, the reason being that there were no Volunteers in Ireland. The fortunate Irish Militia were to be enrolled to go abroad, and they were to be embodied in their unit and kept as Militia. He only wished the right hon. Gentleman would do the same thing for the English Militia. A Militia trained under its own officers was a far more efficient fighting force than the special contingents trained under officers whom the recruits would never see in time of war. But if it was the final will of the country that the Militia MR. HALDANE: There will be six were to be abolished he believed they days in addition. were sufficiently patriotic to give up all |