IRELAND,S_CHANCE

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 40, 17 February 1911, Page 7

IRELAND,S_CHANCE

HORSE RULE. DEBATE IN HOUSE OF COMMONS. STATEMENT BY PRIME MINISTER. IMPERIAL SUPREMACY. By Telegraph— Press Association.— Copyright LONDON, 16th February. The debate on the Addrees-in-Reply was continued in the House of Commons to-day. Mi. Lan Malcolm, Conservative member for Croydon, moved his amendment "to the effect that all effective debate on the Veto question is seriously hampered by the obscure and conflicting declarations of Ministers relating to Home Bule, which is openly avowed as one of the main reasons for altering the Constitution, and that the Government's proposal is subversive of the unity of the Kingdom and the well-being of all its parts. Mr. Malcolm, in his speech, criticised the Ministry's varying views on tho question of Home Rule. Lord Hugh Cecil (Unionist member for Oxford University), seconded the amendment, and said many Liberals did not favour the Home Rule which Mr. Redmond wanted. Unless Imperial supremacy meant interference with decisions, about which the Irkh people held strong convictions, Home Rul© was a. matter mainly of words. Ireland, by its representation in the House of Commons, had | self-government and therefore the anai logy to the colonies was destroyed. Home j Rule was~a retrograde movement. MR. ASQUITH'S VIEWS. Mr. Asquith, Prime Minister, said there was nothing obscure or ambiguous in his declarations from the beginning. He instanced his speech in 1893 on Mr. | Gladstone's Bill. He had never regaxdI ed Home Rule as an exceptional or desperate remedy for a desperate or exceptional disease. The case of Ireland wa» one of pa-ramount and undeniable uigency. Mr. Asquith proceeded to , quote a speech deliverered' by him in. 1901 in favour of granting revolutionary local powers, and declared the problems would only be solved by granting self-government in purely Is-ish affairs, while safeguarding the supremacy of the Imperial Parliament. There could be no question of separation with these conditions. That was the Liberal policy. Af&er his declaration of December, 1909, every voter in January, 1910, voted with full knowledge that if the Government succeeded its first task would be the granting of Home P^ule. (Ministerial and Nationalist cheers.} Continuing, Mr. Aequith said the lime of Parliament was increasingly occupied in the consideration of local questions. He agreed that Scotland and Wales suffered similarly with Ireland, bat Ireland's need was paramount. The policy, had been applied throughout the Empire, and lately in South Africa. Why should not the came remedy be successful in Ireland? He believed Home Rule was strictly on the lines of Imperial development and was true Imperialism. SPEECH BY MR. RED&SGriD. Mr. John Redmond, Leader of the ; Nationalist Party, said the people of Ireland had never regarded Mr. Asquith 's declaration as obscure They j accepted his definition, of Home Rule, which they honestly believed would be a final settlement. Mr. Redmond added : 'We admit and accept an Imperial supremacy which ought to put down any op- J pression of Protestants." He pointed j out that there might be fewer Irish re- ; presentatives in the House of Commons* j after the granting of Home Rule. As a I pacified South Africa was the greatest glory of King Edward's reign so King j George's, said Mr. Redmond, might be made more glorious by a friendly and ; reconciled Ireland. ! DETER&UNED OPPOSITION JUSTIFIED. ! Mr. W. H. Long, formerly Chief Secretary for Ireland in, the Balfour Cabinet, eaid it wa-s not the first time Mr. Redmond had promised a minority fair play. His experience under the Local Government Act did not justify a trust in Home Rule. If South Africa, offered an example of Home Rule, then Ireland' would become a separate country. The Government had furnished sufficient details to justify a determined Opposition to its proposals. " OLD PERILS HAVE DISAPPEARED." Mr. Winston Church ill, Home Secretary, said the events following -the grant of self-government in the Transvaal were the principal cause of the change of English opinion in favour of Home Rule. He admitted there were formidable difficulties, but, if freed from prejudice and rancour, the settlement of the details would not baffle honest-heart- j ed men. The old perils which had prevented English ministers in the past from granting Home Rule had disappeared. POWER TO V/IN QUESTIONED. Mr. William O'Brien, Leader of the Independent Nationalists, said he would do nothing to prejudice tlw> verdict and was content to record his inability to share the belief that by following the Government- blindly h& could make Home Rule a certainty during the present Parliament. He questioned the power of Ireland to win. by the present methods, and suggested that Mr. Redmond should make the Liberals and Conservatives join together and arrange a compiromi&e of the Lords' Veto ancl a reconciliation with Ireland. ALLEGED SLIM METHODS. Sir Edward Carson, Unionist member for Dublin University, taunted Ministers with absence of allusion to Home Rule in their election addresses. This, he said, was a slim way of sneaking the measure through the House of Commons. ARREARS OF WORK. Mr. Birrell, Secretary for Ireland, said the House of Commone had been given a liberal amount of time on Irish questions, yet it would take the Dublin Parliament five years to cope with the arrears that had accumulated. GOVERNMENT MAJORITY, 113. j On a division being taken the amendment was rejected, the voting being : ] Against the amendment ... 326 For the amendment ... 213 Majority against ... 113 REPRESENTATION AT WESI MINSTER. A CRUCIAL POINT. LONDON, 16th February. The Times states that Mr. Redmond's allusion to a smaller representation of Ireland in the House of Commons after the granting of Home Rule puts out of court every precedent drawn from local self-government within the Empire. Mi*. Asquith will not give information on this crucial point.

A good resolve ! Keep a box of Steams' Headache Cure at hand always. It surely cures headaches. —