Harbour Commissioners

in

Belfast, and considering the conveni-
ence to the Navy to be able to have
battleships repaired there, he will make
inquiry as to the desirability of granting
a subsidy towards making a sufficiently
large graving dock at Belfast?
*CAPTAIN DONELAN (Cork, E.) asked
whether, before granting a subsidy to-
wards the construction of a private dock-
yard at Belfast, the Admiralty would
complete and equip the Government
Dockyard at Haulbowline?

Killin, at wages of 16s. and 20s. a week the amount of money expended by the respectively. It was explained to them Belfast that their pay at the Edinburgh office making docks and harbour works at would cease during the period they were so employed. As the higher wages were intended to cover any additional expenses for subsistence, it is not proposed to pay these officers their ordinary wages as well. Directions were, however, given in November last to apply at Edinburgh in future cases the arrangement in force at other offices, namely, to pay a subsistence allowance in addition to the ordinary wages. As regards the payment of railway fares, the Postmaster General is making inquiries and will communicate the result to the hon. Member when he has the necessary information.

PRISONER JOHN DALY.

MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether any change was made in the work allotted to John Daly, at present confined in Portland Prison, at the time immediately following his election as Member of Parliament for Limerick; and, whether during this week he was and subsequently has been employed in the class of menial work, on which only the lowest class of criminals are usually employed?

*SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: No, Sir, no change whatever has been made in the work assigned to John Daly since his election. He is required to take his turn with the other prisoners in his workshop in the performance of the duties to which the hon. Member alludes; but the practice is not a new one, and Daly has taken part in the work for years without any complaint. It is entirely a mistake to suppose that the work is usually given to any particular class of prisoners.

MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN asked

whether Jabez Balfour and his companions were required to perform the menial work which Daly had been made

to do?

[No answer was given.]

GRAVING DOCK, BELFAST. MR. M. MCCARTAN (Down,S.): I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty, with reference to the necessity for a graving dock at Belfast sufficient to admit battleships, whether, considering

THE SECRETARY TO THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. W. E. MACARTNEY, Antrim, S.) This Question is similar to one which was brought before the First Lord of the Admiralty last month by various hon. Members interested in the Clyde navigation. I must repeat the statement then made that the Admiralty have, as the House knows, extensive and costly plans in hand for the improveHer Majesty's ships, and that they are ment of the docking accommodation of not prepared at present to take up the further large question of subsidising private docks in this country?

MR. MCCARTAN asked whether they were to understand that the Admiralty refused to spend in Belfast any of the millions they had obtained from the House?

[No answer was given.]

HALFPENNY WRAPPERS.

*SIR ALFRED HICKMAN (Wolverhampton): I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether he is aware that a very large number of documents enclosed in halfpenny wrappers are surcharged because they are said to contain communications in the nature of a letter; whether an order for goods fixing the date of delivery is passed, but an order stating "urgently wanted" is surcharged, and an order defining exactly what goods are required is passed, but if simply as before" is said it is surcharged; and, whether the Postmaster General will endeavour to make some consistent regulations on the subject, and furnish the public with clear and definite information as to what is and what is not admissible?

66

MR. CHAPLIN: I shall be happy to

SIR HENRY FOWLER: The right

MR. HANBURY: The Postmaster General is aware that a number of do so after notice. documents enclosed in halfpenny wrappers are surcharged as containing hon. Gentleman has said that there is communications of the nature of a letter, little difference between the annual value and that orders are among the docu- and the rateable value. Is it not a fact ments so offending. Messages are often that a large reduction is always made on the annual value before the rateable value is arrived at?

MR. CHAPLIN: I shall be very glad to give the right hon. Gentleman any further information that I can.

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN WITU.

added in writing to orders for goods which constitute the documents letters, and render them liable to letter postage. The particular expressions "urgently wanted 66 or as before" are not, strictly speaking, admissible. The regulations on pages 4 and 5 of the Post Office Guide are as clear and as definite as it is possible to make them, and it is MR. ARTHUR PEASE (Darlington): from inattention to these that the docu- I beg to ask the Under Secretary of ments are so drawn as to be inadmissible State for Foreign Affairs if the total at the halfpenny rate. A line has, of abolition of slavery throughout the course, to be drawn somewhere, and it province of Witu, as fixed by an agreeis thought that already very large con- ment entered into at Jongeni, 18th cessions have been made with respect to March 1891, between Her Majesty's halfpenny postage.

AGRICULTURAL LAND RATING BILL. SIR HENRY FOWLER (Wolverhampton, E.): I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board, what is the estimate of the annual value, the rateable value, and the acreage of the agricultural land to which the relief proposed to be given by the Agricultural Land Rating Bill extends?

Consul and the Administrator of the British East Africa Company on the one part, of the Sultan and Chiefs of Witu on the other part, will take place finally and absolutely on 24th May 1896, the date specified in the agreement?

MR. CURZON: The position taken up by the late Government with regard to slavery in Witu is fully explained in the "Further Papers Relating to Witu" Africa No. 1, 1894, which were laid before the House in January 1894. In view of the state of affairs on the mainland, it is not at present possible to put into operation the comprehensive measures there foreshadowed.

TELEGRAPH SERVICE.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. HENRY CHAPLIN, Lincolnshire, Sleaford): It is estimated that the rateable value of the agricultural land to which the Bill extends is £26,250,000. I presume that the annual value to which the right hon. Member alludes is the annual value re- MR. HENNIKER HEATON: I beg ferred to in Clause 9 of the Bill. I have to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as not the same material for making an representing the Postmaster General, estimate of the annual value as I have whether the sum of £7,600,000 has in the case of rateable value, but I have already been paid from postal revenue no reason to suppose that there is any for interest on the £10,000,000 originally great difference between the annual borrowed by the Government for the value and the rateable value of agri- purchase of the telegraphs in 1870; and cultural land. The acreage of the land whether he can explain what measures is estimated at 32,745,610, without in- are being taken to pay off the purchase cluding allotments and other holdings- money, and to relieve the telegraph the area of which does not exceed one service from the burden of the interest acre-as to which no statistics are

available.

MR. J. DILLON (Mayo, E.) asked, whether the right hon. Gentleman would give similar information in respect to Scotland and Ireland?

upon it?

MR. HANBURY: No sums have been paid out of either postal or telegraph revenue for interest on the stock created for the purchase of the telegraphs. That stock has been treated as part of

to the second part of the Question is the Dispatches, except those relating to same. I have stated, in answer to the details of unimportance, have been sent hon. Member for Derby on February to the Government of India since August 13, what the law is as to the proprietorship of the Matabele cattle, and I may now add that I have directed that, as soon as circumstances permit, an inquiry shall be made as to the manner in which

the law has been administered.

16th on the subject of Chitral. On the day upon which the Correspondence was laid upon the Table of the House-viz., March 27th-a Dispatch was sent to India dealing with proposals for reduction of military expenditure in Gilghit, but the correspondence on this point is not concluded, as further experience of BRANCEPETH COLLIERY EXPLOSION. the recent changes is necessary before MR. JOHN WILSON (Durham, final arrangements can be sanctioned. Mid) I beg to ask the Secretary of If the right hon. Gentleman wishes it I State for the Home Department, whether, will gladly show him these Dispatches. having regard to the serious nature of the late explosion at Brancepeth Colliery, in the county of Durham, he will appoint some one to represent the Home Office at the adjourned inquest on the 12th of May?

*SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: Yes, Sir, I have decided to appoint counsel to represent the Home Office at the inquest.

RIFLE RANGE (DOWNPATRICK, S.).

MR. MCCARTAN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War, with reference to the proposed rifle range near Downpatrick, whether any inspection of grounds has been recently been made at the instance of the Military Authorities; and. if so, if he will state with what result; and whether he has any intention of securing proper accommodation for a rifle range in that district?

VACCINATION (ROYAL COMMISSION). MR. A. B. BATHURST (Gloucester, MR. POWELL - WILLIAMS: No Cirencester) I beg to ask the Presi- recent Report has been received from dent of the Local Government Board if the Commander of the Forces in Ireland he can state when the Royal Commission as to a site for a rifle range in the on Vaccination is likely to make a neighbourhood of Downpatrick, the matReport?

MR. CHAPLIN: I can add nothing to the reply which, during the Session, I have frequently given in the House. I have communicated with the Commission, and am informed that they are considering their Report, and that it will shortly be presented.

CHITRAL.

ter remains where it was when the hon. Member asked a question relating to it on the 5th ultimo.

MR. MCCARTAN: I asked the hon. Gentleman whether an inspection was made, not whether a report had been received.

MR. POWELL-WILLIAMS: The only answer I can give the hon. Gentleman is the one I have already given. MR. MCCARTAN: May I ask the SIR HENRY FOWLER: I beg to hon. Gentleman whether he will inquire ask the Secretary of State for India, whether any inspection will be made, whether any Dispatches or telegrams and give the House the result of that relating to the occupation of Chitral inspection? have been sent by the Secretary of State to the Government of India since the Dispatch of the Secretary of State of the 16th of August 1895; and if there have been any such Dispatches or telegrams, will he inform the House why they have been omitted from the Correspondence recently presented to Parliament?

[No answer was given.]

RURAL LETTER CARRIERS (IRELAND).

Mr. L. P. HAYDEN (Roscommon, S.): I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, how often rural letterTHE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR carriers in Ireland are supplied with INDIA (Lord GEORGE HAMILTON, waterproof capes for their protection and Middlesex, Ealing): No telegrams or that of the parcels, etc., which they Secretary of State for the Colonies.

carry; and whether, seeing that the difficulty of determining the causes in supply has become irregular, steps will many railway accidents, he will consent be taken to see that this grievance will be remedied?