Sir J. Mackintosh animadverted upon the conduct of the chairman of the committee, who ought, he thought, to have furnished rather than withheld any information which might be deemed necessary for the understanding of the committee. For the chairman, without any instructions from the committee, to have given notice of a motion of a criminatory nature against any of its members, did certainly appear to him not a little extraordinary. To say the least of it, it was very unusual. It was, in point of discretion, a very ambiguous act, and seemed to show, on the part of the chairman, a remarkable deviation from prudence. It appeared to have led to great intemperance and irregularity; and though the chairman might have been happily exempt from that impatience and irritability of temper which so unfortunately prevailed in the committee [a laugh], yet still it was imprudent of him, who should have stood impartially between all parties, to have, in the heat of the confusion, given notice of a criminatory proceeding against any of the members of the committee. There was one thing quite clear-that in the present temper of members at all sides, this business could not be investigated as calmly as it ought: he should therefore suggest to the hon. member to withdraw his notice of motion, and let the other party, whose conduct was purely defensive, do the same. The sooner the whole matter were dropped the better. Mr. Sumner said, he did not use the term "criminatory" in his notice, which was merely intended to show that the orders of the House had been contravened by members in the committee. He thought the subject was of great importance, and ought to be thoroughly investigated. He was either prepared to proceed with his motion as chairman of the committee, or with his defence in reply to the hon. member opposite. Mr. Wynn recommended that the matter should be allowed to drop. had arisen in the committee. He was still ready on Monday to forget them all, and go into the committee to discuss the bill coolly and dispassionately. He assured the House that they would derive little further information as to the cause of difference by postponing the question; for, whenever it came on, the House would find 25 gentlemen on each side flatly contradicting each other, It would be quite as well that the whole matter should be now postponed sine die. The Speaker was of opinion, that no party would compromise his feelings by a delay that should conduce to mutual conciliation. With reference to the forms to be observed in committees, they ought to correspond in most instances with the forms of the House itself. No member was entitled to vote in either who had not heard the question put, the question was generally put whilst strangers were withdrawing; but it did not follow that because a member came in whilst strangers were withdrawing, he was on that account entitled to vote, for he might not have heard the question. As to the receiving the numbers of the division, there could be no question but that they must be received when the tellers agreed upon them. Suppose an error to be made by the clerk in setting down the numbers; suppose that he transferred the numbers from one side to another; it must appear quite obvious in that case, that the reference must be immediately made to the tellers, and the moment they had decided, the error must be rectified by the clerk. The clerk was not the teller of the committee. He hoped the House would not be displeased at the statement he had made on this subject. He did not know but that he had gone farther than he ought to have done; but he had proceeded from a conviction on his own mind, and he believed on the mind of the House generally, that the most perfect confidence was, in the outset, placed in the judgment of those to whom the proceed Mr. Denison agreed in the recommen-ings of committees were intrusted; that dation. Mr. Sumner could not consent to flinch from the exposition of the whole transaction, after the language used by hon. gentlemen opposite. Mr. Bennet said, that as he was one of the parties, he could not, if the inquiry were to be proceeded upon at all, consent to one hour's delay. He was most ready to admit, that great heats and animosities in the second place, if they had misjudged, the House would lend its assistance to rectify the error, without casting an insi nuation on any party; and, thirdly, that if any of the points to which he had adverted had operated, either in part or entirely, to produce this disappointment in the committee, the House would perceive, if they concurred with him in any of those points, the necessity of having a fair and temperate decision. They would, METROPOLIS ROADS BILL.] Mr. D. Gilbert, in rising to move the second reading of the Metropolis Roads bill, went into a history of the modes of defraying the expence of the maintenance of roads, which had prevailed in this and other countries. He approved of the system of supporting the roads by tolls en them, as well as of the management by trusts, but the vice into which this system fell, was the minute sub-division, by which economy in procuring the materials, and the employment of scientific aid was rendered impracticable. He urged the benefits which would arise from the present bill, which would remedy these inconveniences, while it retained the advantages of the toll and trust system. Sir E. Knatchbull spoke against the measure, which he conceived quite unnecessary, from the improved state of the roads in the vicinity of the metropolis. He therefore moved, that the bill should be read a second time on that day six months. Mr. Denison seconded the amendment, deprecating any attempt to cast a reflection upon those at present invested with the several trusts in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, by whom the roads were kept in the best possible state. Mr. Curwen regarded the bill as one of the most extraordinary measures that had ever come before the House. He was of opinion that the hon. gentleman who brought it forward had been imposed upon by false information with respect to the trusts of the several roads. Mr. F. Lewis hoped the bill would not be disposed of, in the summary manner recommended by the amendment. The magnitude of the sums collected by the several courts made it imperative upon the House to take the business into their own hands. Mr. Calcraft said, he could not help stating that the trustees considered this measure as a bill of indictment against them. Out of between fifty and sixty trusts, the holders of at least thirty had petitioned against it. He could see no reason whatever for extending the provi sions of the bill to those larger trusts, of the execution of which no complaint had been heard, and against which there was no charge of corruption or improper conduct, Sir H. Parnell thought the bill was ren. dered necessary, both by an excess of expenditure, and a total want of science evinced in the execution of the present trusts. The roads might be kept in excellent condition for one half of the tolls now collected. Mr. Sumner was of opinion that after the committee had sat two years, and had at length brought forward a mature plan, it would be extremely ungracious to shut the door upon it at once. Although he did not approve of it, yet he should vote for the second reading, with a view of subsequently moving for its being referred to a committee up stairs. 16. The House divided: Ayes 83. Noes time. MOTION RESPECTING COMMITTEES OF SUPPLY.] The Chancellor of the Exchequer having moved the order of the day, for going into a Committee of Supply, Mr. Creevey rose to oppose the motion. The course which he was about to take might not, be said, be very agreeable to the right hon. gentleman opposite or to the House, but he felt it necessary, in the discharge of his public duty, to oppose the motion for going into a committee of Supply. Instead of going on, he thought it was the duty of the House to retrace its steps. There had been supplies enough voted; and what good had been hitherto effected? Notwithstanding all the petitions from all parts of the kingdom, complaining of the greatest distresses, and praying for the strictest economical reform, the House had still gone on voting away millions of money, and all the labours of his hon. friend the member for Aberdeen (Mr. Hume) had not produced the diminution of one single farthing in the public expenditure. Under these circumstances, nothing could induce him, as far as his vote or influence in that House went, to go again into a committee of supply. The members of that House had been called the trustees of the people, but they differed from all other trustees, for they themselves lived upon the profits of the estate. When the affairs of a private gentleman were deranged, missive. Was not this enough to make a man sick of the word privilege and much more sick of its champions? In the reign of Elizabeth, sir John Fortescue, on an occasion somewhat of this kind, replied to an objection to supply-" All is the queen's by right:" and it might be now asserted that "all is the king's by force :" yet there was much more decency in parliament even in the reign of Elizabeth than now [Cheers from the ministerial benches.] That was rather an interested shout: it was very easy to know from whom it came. It was an historical fact, however, that sir John was treated very roughly for his assertion; the house coughed loudly, and finally smothered his voice in an indignant and continued hoot. Yet, then, it possessed such men as sir Walter Raleigh and sir F. Bacon, and then no man had ventured to tell the people "not to halloo before they were out of the wood." He had drawn up a resolution on the subject expressive of his sentiments, and which he submitted for adoption, though without much hopes of success. The hon. gentleman concluded by moving the following Resolution, by way of amendment: the first thing his trustees did was, to cut off all needless expenses, and to discharge all the useless dependents and hangers-on. But here the trustees of the people were themselves the useless servants andhangerson. He had often thought that as the people of England found it was of no use to petition that House, it would be a good thing, and certainly an entertaining one, to see them represented by delegates at the bar of the House. What would be the natural language of delegates so sent to assert the rights of the people? They would say, "We are come here to talk to you, and we are bold to say, that we entertain a shrewd suspicion that you make a very good thing of us. We are aware that there are snug places to the amount of 150,000l. a year, which you enjoy, and which you will never consent to forego to relieve the distresses of the people. This may be a very pleasant arrangement for you, but it is no laughing matter for us." Such was the language which the delegates of the people would naturally use. Supposing the people to be so represented, he should like to have seen their delegates in the House during the last ten days. When his hon. friend the member for Essex obtained leave, about a fortnight ago, to bring in a bill for the repeal of the malt-tax, this was considered a great triumph-it was hailed as the beginning of better times. But he should never forget, and the people of England would never forget, the language of the noble lord who was manager of the trustees. "Do not triumph too soon," said the noble manager, "do not halloo before you are out of the wood." The noble lord, however, had made good his threat, he had brought up the trustees of the people from all parts of the country, and his hon. friend's majority of 25 was converted into a majority of 98 against him. This fact spoke volumes; but it was not all; a noble lord, a great northern grandee, the thane of Cawdor, had fallen a victim to his honest vote; he had lost 800l. a year by it. This was a direct attack upon the privileges of parliament, What had become of the hon. member for Yorkshire (Mr. S. Wortley)? Where was that redoubted champion of privilege the member for Montgomery (Mr. Wynn)? The printer of some poor paragraph against the House would instantly have been laid by the heels by them for a breach of privilege; but let the Crown make the grossest attack on the rights of parliament, and they were dumb and sub "That during the present session of parliament, petitions have been presented to this House from every part of this kingdom, and from every description of its population, containing statements of distress hitherto unheard of in this nation, and uniformly demanding, as one species of relief to their sufferings, the strictest possible economy in the expenditure of the public money; that the statements so made, have, in every instance, been fully confirmed by the local information of the different members of this House, who have presented such petitions; and yet, notwithstanding such universal applications for relief, the different Estimates for the public service for the year have hitherto been proceeded in, and millions of money voted for such purposes, without any the least possible reduction whateve by this House, although repeated effort have been made to effect the same:That this House entertains the stronges possible opinion, that this marked indif ference of the representative body to th sufferings of its constituents, is mainly at tributable to the following fact, viz. Tha a very numerous body of the members c this House derive for themselves, the families, connexions, and dependent large pecuniary provisions from the tax to complain, and he begged to call the attention of the House to a declaration of lord Grenville in the other House of Parliament in 1816," that if parliament continued to support the keeping up of a large standing army, and to lavish the public money as they did, he would not trouble himself to take a part in debates which he could regard as nothing less than a farce." In the time of the Pension Parliament 24 members were posted as individuals who received pensions from the Crown. Now he, on a recent division, had himself counted no fewer than 47 pensioners in a very small majority. Such was the difference in this respect between the present parliament and the notorious Pension Parliament, the measures of which were denounced by Andrew Marvel as calculated to leave neither liberty nor property in the country. As to the dis of the people; and as such provisions for the most part are made either for offices altogether useless or grossly overpaid, and therefore the fittest objects for immediate extinction or reduction, so the holders or disposers of them in this House have a direct personal interest in resisting every species of economical reform whatsoever: That, in addition to this great permanent bar to all economical reform, the House has lately witnessed, with the greatest indignation, the influence of the Crown displayed by its ministers in this House in a manner the most arbitrary, and with the express and avowed object of interfering with its members in the discharge of their duty to their constituents; the earl of Fife, who lately held the office of one of the lords of the bedchamber to his majesty, having recently declared in his place in this House, as one of its members, that he had been dismissal of lord Fife from his office of lord missed from his office as lord of the bedchamber to his majesty, in consequence of having voted in this House in favour of a bill to repeal a tax upon malt: of the bed-chamber, in consequence of the vote which he gave in that House, it was a measure taken in direct opposition to the spirit of the constitution, and in violation of the Bill of Rights, which de "That, under all these circumstances, this House is of opinion it will better con-clared, that freedom of speech in debates sult its own honour and the interest of the public, by immediately inquiring into the facts before mentioned, than in going any longer into Committees of Supply to vote away the money of the people without the slightest possible prospect of relief to the country. or proceedings in parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned. If the speech of a member of that House could not be questioned, still less ought his vote to be made the subject of animadversion; and if the ministers of the Crown could not get up in their places, and deny the charge, he had no hesitation in saying, that they were liable to impeachment for their conduct.-The hon. member then proceeded to observe upon the operation which the influence of the Crown had in that House, which had been growing up for many reigns, and threatened to overlay all public spirit, and utterly destroy the efficiency of parliament as the organ of the national will. On this subject, he quoted a passage from a famous pamphlet on Hush-money,* published in the reign of William 3rd, which complained of the manner in which the House was officered, the effect produced upon its suffrages by emolument and expectancy, the deceptions practised upon honest, mistaken country gentlemen, and other consequences of influence which enabled the king to baffle any bill, quash any com Mr. Hobhousse rose to second the motion. Nothing could be more constitutional than the course pursued by his hon. friend. It was not necessary to go back for precedents so far as the reign of queen Elizabeth; for, in the early part of the reign of Charles 1st, before the struggles between that monarch and the parliament, sir T. Wentworth, afterwards lord Strafford, moved a resolution in that House, that supply and grievances should go hand in hand. The individual who adopted this sentiment was a man of the first rank and talent in the country, and not liable to the imputation of being a heated enthusiast. In the parliament, called the Pension Parliament, the attention of the House was called to what was then considered an extraordinary fact, that 2,400,000l. were voted in 24 hours; but that House was grown familiar with in-plaint of grievance, and carry any measure stances in which much larger sums were that the administration might think expe voted away in 24 hours. He did not state this from any wish to exaggerate the gievances of which the people had reason ་་་་་ * See this pamphlet in the New Parlia mentary History, Vol. 5, Appendix, No. IX. dient. It stated, that 200,000%. had been employed for these purposes, to influence the votes of members by gratuities to themselves and relatives. But what was the case now? Why 150,000l. a year was devoted to the same purpose, and raised upon the people to be divided among those who were to vote against the people's interests; it was impossible that such distribution of the public money should not have a bias on the minds of those who enjoyed it. He hoped the House would consider seriously of the resolutions before them: he was certain that his hon, friend had not proposed them as any impediment to the public business, but strictly to remind the House of what were its duties, and what the people expected from them. Mr. Calcraft alluded to the statement made in the House by the earl of Fife, with respect to his removal from office. He contended, that the noble earl stated the ground of his dismissal was, the vote which he gave for the repeal of the malt tax. He understood it to be so; and was sorry the words had not been taken down. He agreed with most parts of the resolution of his hon. friend. It could not be doubted that in the present session, the petitions of the people had been totally disregarded. It was equally true that nothing like economy had been attended to in the estimates. It could not be denied either, that establishments were kept up much larger than circumstances could justify. He likewise agreed, that the influence of the Crown in that House was too mighty and too powerful, to allow any real effect to the representation of the people. But he could not agree with that part of the proposition which went in a sweeping way to deprecate the representation of the executive offices of government in that House. He was of opinion that those offices ought to be represented there, and he did not think the public officers too highly paid. However, although he could not agree with that part of the proposition, he could not withhold his assent to the proposition in general. Lord Castlereagh said, he did not consider that he should perform his duty, if he suffered himself to be led into a debate by the motion of the hon. member which seemed to bring back almost all the subjects which had already occupied the attention of the House this session. This species of opposition seemed to be a duty imposed upon that hon. member, and it was the more singular coming from him, as he believed, during the discussion of all the estimates hitherto, the hon. member had never pointed out any one item as too large, or proposed any specific reduction. His business, on the other side, seemed to be confined to that of protestor-general against the measures of government, and libeller-general of parliament. The hon. member had got up this prologue to the committee of supply in such a manner, and had attempted to support it by such comical arguments, that he (lord C.) had determined not to offer a word on the subject. He had not made this determination from any personal feeling to the hon. member. The hon. member had held a situation in the Board of Control, and no doubt had there discharged the duties of his office faithfully; but it was a little worthy of remark, that while the hon. member held that situation, he had never considered it his duty to complain of the influence of the Crown in that House. Not a word on the subject was heard from him during that time; but ever since he had been out of office, he had taken up his present plan and new occupation-in the exercise of which he wished he might long continue. He had come now, for the third time, with his plan against going into the committee of supply. After long preparation he had brought out his prologue to the committee, with little variation from his former ones; but it would not induce him (lord C.) to appear on the stage; nor would he have offered a word on the subject, but for a charge which seemed to be made against himself in the speech of another hon. member, as if he had done something against the privileges of that House. He, however, would not admit, that he was bound to offer any explanation on the subject alluded to. It was, he maintained, the prerogative of the Crown to dismiss its servants at pleasure; and he, as a minister of the Crown in that House, could no more be called upon to explain such dismissal, than he could be to account for the appointment of an individual to office by the Crown. He thought that such a charge as this came with a bad grace from hon. members on the other side of the House. They should be the last to make any such charge, in which must be inculpated some of their most distinguished friends, of whose services the country had been deprived at a time of great public danger, because they |