"GREAT DUTIES."

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 112, 13 May 1911, Page 5

"GREAT DUTIES."

NEED FOR A SECOND CHAMBER. SPEECH BY MR. BALFOUR. "ALMOST CRIMINAL INCONSISTENCY." By Telegraph.--Press Association.— Copyright. LONDON, 12fch May. In his speech at the Primrose League meeting in the Albert Hall, Mr. Balfour, Leader of the Opposition, said they must have a strong and effective Second Chamber, able to carry out the great duties falling upon it, not one with pitiful, beggarly, modicum of responsibility given by the Parliament Bill. The Government proposed indefinitely to postpone an admittedly necessary reform of the House of Lords, and insisted that they should meanwhile be governed by one Chamber alone. He called that a gross, palpable, and almost criminal inconsistency. The Labour party were consistent ; they constantly declared that they could see no object in having a Second Chamber, and they could vote for this Bill with a clear conscience. "This BilL" continued Mr. Balfour, "gives them a Single Chamber Government, and' their position is unassailable, but I cannot imagine any inconsistency greater than that of the Government of saying that the future Constitution must oe bi-cameral while the Parliament framing it may be-under a Single Cnamber Constitution. The only explanation of such humiliating straits is that able men have been driven to them by the necessity of keeping a majority together in the House of Commons." HOME RULE. Mr. Asquiih, at Manchester, had claimed, continued Mr. Balfour, that if Home Rule were relinquished the Government would have no difficulty in securing assent to the Parliament Bill. This was an inversion of the real facts. There would have been no Parliament Bill but for Home Rule. There , might have been reforms of the Second Chamber and a change in the relations of the two Houses, but never the absurdity of suggesting the transfer to a Single Chamber, elected on a different issue, of all the most fundamental, important, and invaluable elements of the j Constitution.!' Wiether what the Government proposes is Home Rule on Glad■6tonian or some other unknown model, it ought never to bo passed by a Single Chamber alone, but either to be subjected to revision by two independent legally co-equal Chambers, or referred to the people as a whole. (Cheers). The true solution of the Constitutional question, continued the speaker, was: Firstly, a change in the constitution of the Second Chamber, not an alteration of ite powers, and at all events not the fundamental alteration of ita powers proposed' by the Parliament Bill. Secondly, that deadlooks should be met byj conferences for conciliation and joint sittings. Thirdly, that matters of grave importance and special instances should be dealt with by a referendum. (Cheers.) Nothing could be more entertaining and pathetic than to see their opponente,, who had been talking about Democracy throughout their liv«e, struggling to chow that an appeal of the people on a specific issue was the worst service that could be rendered to Democracy. Mr. Balfour concluded by claiming that the Unionists were the only true Democratic party in the State.