Sir H. Parnell rose, not for the purpose of offering any opposition to the motion, but merely to say, that having on one occasion acted on a committee of the same nature with that proposed, he had heard abundant evidence to satisfy him of the expediency and necessity of investigating the subject. Many witnesses had stated before that committee, that the duties had of late years been doubled, without any improvement being effected in the roads. to form, while they approve of the discontinuance of the salaries of certain of the officers of state, who have hitherto, since his majesty's indisposition, been retained, yet your Committee recommend, that, at the head of the establishment, an officer of the rank of the groom of the stole should be placed, as they deem it important to have a person of rank and of high station, connected with the king's service, generally residing near his majesty's person. For the same reasons it appears expedient, that one of the king's equerries (the n'um mittee, ought to be limited to four) should be in daily and constant attendance at Windsor. The motion was agreed to, and a committee appointed, consisting of the follow-ber of whom, in the judgment of the coming members, viz.: Mr. Protheroe, Mr. D. Gilbert, Mr. C. Dundas, lord Granville Somerset, Mr. Frankland Lewis, Mr. Nicholson Calvert, Mr. Holme Sumner, lord Clive, Mr. Calcraft, Mr. Dickinson, Mr. Curwen, Mr. Wood, Sir C. Monck, Mr. W. Wynn, Sir J. Sebright, Mr. Newman, Mr. Estcourt, Sir H. Parnell, Mr. Walter Burrell, Mr. W. Smith, Mr. Tremayne, Mr. Shaw Lefevre, Mr. Stuart Wortley, Mr. Gladstone, and Mr. Cripps. REPORT FROM THE COMMITTEE ON THE ROYAL ESTABLISHMENTS.] Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald presented the following REPORT. The COMMITTEE to whom the Establishment of her late Majesty, and the estimate of the expenses of the proposed establishment of his Majesty's future household at Windsor, were referred;-Have agreed to the following Report: Your Committee have deemed it to be their duty, in the first place, to take into their consideration the arrangement which has been proposed for the future establishment of his Majesty. By the Act of the 52 Geo. 3rd, c. 8, the sum of 100,000l. was directed to be set apart annually out of the Civil List, for the expense of the king's household; and any surplus, after defraying this charge, was to be applied to the purposes of his majesty's civil establishment. In the examination of the estimates for defraying the charge of the proposed tables, and for the other branches of expenditure at Windsor, your Committee have received satisfactory explanations respecting them from colonel Stephenson, to whom the superintendence of the king's household has been in a great degree confided. It appears to them, that the estimates have been framed, for the services to which they are to be applied, with a due attention to economy; and they refer particularly to "the explanatory statement of the estimate for the expense of his majesty's household," which is annexed. A large portion of the expense which, as your Committee are informed, cannot be estimated at less than one-third of the whole amount, will be at all events to be incurred by the maintenance of Windsor Castle as a royal residence, and ought not to be set down as exclusively belonging to the establishment of his majesty. The names and descriptions of the officers, whose salaries have been discontinued, will be found in the Appendix, together with a list of the menial servants who have been reduced; and the amount of the wages and appointments which the latter received in the king's service. Your Committee next proceeded to the It appears to your Committee, that the subject of the establishment of her late reduction, which is proposed in that ex-majesty, which had been referred to their penditure, of one half, may with propriety consideration. be made; and that an annual sum of 50,000l. will be sufficient to provide for this service; and they refer to the estimates, under the different heads, annexed to this Report. In considering the scale and expense of the establishment which it is necessary His royal highness the Prince Regent having been pleased, by his gracious message, to place at the disposal of parliament, the sum of 58,000l. per annum, in consequence of her majesty's demise, and at the same time to recommend to the House of Commons, the claims founded on the faithful services of those who formed the separate establishment of her majesty, in order that the House might be enabled to judge what part of that sum it may be advisable to apply to the annual provision for such persons, your Committee have obtained accounts of such allowances as were made to the officers and servants of queen Mary on her demise in the year 1694; of queen Caroline in 1737; and to the household of the princess dowager of Wales in 1772; amounting annually, for the establishment of queen Mary, to 15,2781. 16s. 8d.; to that of queen Caroline, to 19,812.; and for the household of the princess dowager of Wales, to 19,7027. 7s. 10d. The grants, in the instances referred to, were not brought under the consideration or view of parliament, but were paid out of the civil list revenues; an annual saving on these revenues having been made by the discontinuance of the respective royal establishments to a greater extent than those allowances amounted to. In the year 1782, by the act passed for the regulation of the civil list, the amount of pensions to be granted out of the civil list revenues was limited, and in consequence of that limitation, and the present charge on the pension list, it is not possible to place such allowances as it may be wished to grant to the queen's servants upon that fund; but the whole sum of 58,000l., which was annually paid to the queen, being now at the disposal of parliament, it remains for parliament to make such provision, in this respect, as it may in its liberality think fit. hold, and for the domestic officers and menials, of whom the greater proportion have been for many years, and during the course of a long reign, attached to her service. The amount of this provision, together with the pensions to be continued to such as were the objects of her majesty's benevolence, is less than was given upon the two last occasions which have been noticed, without taking into account the difference in the value of money at those periods, and at the present. If parliament shall approve of what has been here submitted, legislative enactments will be required to carry these regulations into effect. It will be necessary to alter that part of the act of the 52d Geo. 3rd, cap. 8, which appoints the attendants on the king's person, and also to regulate the sum to be in future appropriated for defraying the expense of his majesty's household. That clause also of the act of the 56 Geo. 3rd, cap. 46, which enacts, that whenever the charge upon the civil list shall exceed in any one year 1,100,000l., an account of the exceeding, and the cause thereof, shall be laid before parliament, must be amended, so as to require a similar account to be submitted, whenever that charge shall exceed the amount to which the expenditure of the civil list shall be limited by the reductions which are now proposed. 17th February, 1819. Ordered to lie on the table, and to be printed. HOUSE OF LORDS. Thursday, February 18. In offering for the consideration of the LUNATICS' ESTATES IN CHANCERY.] House the annexed scale of pensions The Marquis of Lansdowne said, he held recommended for the servants of her late in his hand a Petition complaining of a majesty, while your Committee have had great hardship, and one which in a partiin view the expectations which those per-cular manner, called for their lordships atsons may reasonably have entertained, as to the provision which would be made for them when their services should cease, they yet feel it to be their duty to submit to the House, that this recommendation should not be drawn into precedent on the formation of future establishments. It will be observed, that the state officers, as well as some others, to whom their salaries were continued for life, in the instances referred to, do not appear in the list which is proposed. The general principle which has been adopted in framing it, being to suggest a provision for the female part of the queen's house tention as it arose out of their lordships' legislation. The petition was from two individuals who had obtained a decree of the court of chancery for the sale of the estate of a lunatic, but which could not be effected, as the estate consisted of copyhold property. It appeared, that in the act passed some years ago, for regulating the power and jurisdiction of the court of chancery with respect to the sale of the estates of lunatics, that the word "copyhold" had, by some mistake, been omitted. The consequence of this neglect was, that no sales of such property could be made. The petitioners prayed, that their lord ships would not fail to remedy this deficiency in the act. The Lord Chancellor, was of opinion that there was no intention to exclude copyhold property from the operation of the act; and as such a mistake had occurred, he was surprised that no bill had been introduced, either to declare that the act referred to should embrace copyhold property, or to repeal it, and substitute a new act on the subject. The bill was brought into parliament by the present lord chancellor of Ireland, and it was recommended in the master's report on the subject, that copyhold estates should be applied in the way provided for by the act. As it was certain that it had been originally intended to include copyhold estates in the act, it was proper that it should be amended; and his lordship, as we understood, intimated that he would himself introduce a bill for this purpose. The petition was laid on the table. HOUSE OF COMMONS. CORK COUNTY ELECTION PETITION.] Sir John Newport rose to present a Petition from the agent acting in London on behalf of the freeholders of the county of Cork, whose petition had been presented on the 22d of January last, complaining of an undue return in the elections for that county. The present petition prayed that time for entering the recognizances on the former petition might be enlarged. The ground on which the prayer of the petition was supported was, that an opinion had prevailed, almost universally throughout Ireland, that the act 53rd Geo. 3rd, which prescribed the time within which recognizances should be entered on election petitions did not extend to Ireland. The petition stated that several opinions from high legal authorities confirmed this construction of the act. The petition was then read. On the motion that it do lie on the table, Mr. Wynn said, that according to the general rule laid down by the House, the prayer of this petition could not be attended to. To state that the petitioner, or the party concerned, had acted on a misconception of that rule was not a sufficient reason to induce the House to depart from the rule. In the present case the misconception was most extraordinary and yet it was one which seemed to have pervaded the whole of Ireland. The only ground on which he could conceive it to have been founded was, that the operation of the first clause of the act was expressly confined to England and Scotland. But then, the other parts of the act most explicitly comprehended Ireland. Yet throughout the latter country the opinion prevailed that the operation of the act did not extend to it. Nor was this mistake confined to a few, for even persons of a high reputation in the law had fallen into it. Amongst the rest, Mr. Gabbet, a lawyer, whose character stood deservedly very high, and who was the author of“ Á Digest of the Comparative State of the Laws of England and Ireland," had made the very same mistake. In so extraordinary a case he did think that it might be allowable for parliament to grant the prayer of this petition. At the same time he could not but remark that it was not in the power of the House to extend this indulgence generally. Perhaps a remedy for this particular class of cases might be provided by passing a short act, which should recite the prevalence of the mistake in Ireland, and enact, that therefore a further time should be allowed for entering the recognizances on petitions already presented from that country. This, he submitted to the House, was a measure that would obviate the difficulty. He did not think it would be just, in this instance, to adhere to precise rules, because that would have the effect of striking off all the petitions from Ireland, and of shutting the doors of parliament against complaints, some of which, at least, might be just and constitutional. Mr. Bathurst thought the question deserved the serious consideration of the House. As to introducing any bill to settle the question, it was to be considered that its operation would be retrospective, and as such he could not think it desira. ble. Mr. Bankes, said, it was absolutely necessary for the House to consider the most proper course to pursue. In his opinion, either the subject should be referred to a committee, or an early day should be appointed to proceed on it in the House. It was not right to keep the petitioners in suspense. He was greatly inclined to lean to the proposition of his hon. friend. In his opinion it would be much better to introduce a short bill than to shut out the entire of the Irish petitions. Sir John Newport said, that he would to morrow submit to the House a motioned to the Crown, when remitted to this upon the subject of it. country. The Speaker said, that after what had passed on this subject, it would perhaps be proper for him to apprise the House that two other applications had already been made to them on the same subject, but that no definitive order had been yet entered upon the Journals respecting them, nor had the applications yet been absolutely discharged. The order with respect to them stood on the order book. The observations which might be offered to the House, now or on a future occasion would therefore include the case of the Drogheda and Galway petitions, as well as that just now laid upon the table. Mr. Wynn thought that, under the present circumstances, there were several considerations which demanded the attention of the House. The words of the act expressly provided, that the time for entering the recognizances could only be enlarged once. But on looking into the precedents on the subject, be found that on several occasions the House had thought itself competent to revive as well as to enlarge the time. The Shaftesbury case he thought a sufficient authority on this point. The Speaker begged to remind the House, that in two out of the three cases in which the application had now been made for enlarging the time, that application had been refused by the House; therefore, if on the petition now presented an order was made for enlarging the time, there would appear on the Journals contradictory orders on precisely the same question. Ordered to lie on the table Mr. DUTIES PAID AT GIBRALTAR.] Tierney wished to ask of the chancellor of the exchequer a question of considerable importance. He did not know whether he was or was not rightly informed, but he had been told, that certain duties were levied on the merchants at Gibraltar, for the payment of particular charges; after defraying which, a large surplus remained which was transmitted to this country. Now he desired to know, by what authority those duties were levied, and to what account the surplus was placed when it arrived in England? The Chancellor of the Exchequer said, the duties were imposed to answer a variety of charges, and, he apprehended, these being answered, the surplus belong Mr. Tierney-I ask under what authority are these duties collected? and by what authority are they considered the exclusive property of the Crown? The Chancellor of the Exchequer-I have not looked particularly into the subject; but ever since the capture of Gibraltar, the revenue of that place, as well as of other fortresses, has been vested in the Crown. Mr. Tierney-Then the right hon. gentleman does not know by what authority the merchants at Gibraltar are liable to the payment of certain duties. All he can say is, that the amount of those duties, not applicable to the payment of particular charges there, are appropriated to the use of the Crown. MOTION RESPECTING THE SYSTEM OF TRANSPORTATION, AND THE STATE OF NEW SOUTH WALES.] Mr. Bennet rose, pursuant to notice, to move for the appointment of a committee to inquire into the management of the Hulks, and the general conduct of the Transport system upon the voyage to, and the general government of New South Wales. That this was a subject of great importance to the interests of humanity and morals, would, he concluded, be readily admitted by every one who had taken the trouble of making any inquiry respecting it; it was clearly of such a nature, that it could not be fairly said to be comprehended within the scope of the motion of which the noble lord had given notice with regard to the state of crime in prisons in the country, and it was with some surprise he had learned therefore that his motion was to be opposed on the ground of the subject of it being comprehended in that noble lord's notice. Through the industry of a committee of that House only could accurate information be obtained on subjects of this nature, and the best way of getting at that information was, by the evidence of eye-witnesses. This indeed was pretty clear from the nature of the answers laid before the House with regard to the state of the prisons of Scotland. Those answers were from magistrates, to whom certain questions had been transmitted from the Secretary of state's office. But how different were the answers of those magistrates from the report of an eye-witness, Mr. Gurney, who had personally visited and examined the state of the Scotch prisons. It might be | to January 1818, 940, of these last there objected to his motion, that, in 1812, a were for 14 years 234; for 7 years 706. committee sat to consider this subject. From this statement, the great increase He admitted that two committees had sat of transportation, and the consequent nefor its discussion; but the object of the cessity of examining the system, became first related entirely to the propriety of evident. It was quite true that the con erecting penitentiaries, an idea suggested dition of the hulks was much improved; by an hon. friend of his (Mr. Holford), they were no longer the depositories of who was an honour to the House, and a disease which they had been; but great credit to his country. On the report of and substantive faults, which he would the committee over which his hon. friend presently point out, still existed in the presided, the Penitentiary at Millbank was system; of which faults the most serious established. With respect to the hulks, was the want of classification. The exthe committee on that subject recom- pense of maintaining convicts was also a mended many alterations, some of which very serious object. The average exwere attended to, but many were not car-pense of each convict was about 231. In ried into effect. The hulks were five in 1797 the total expense was 33,578l., or number-in three of them some altera- 23l. 19s, 7d. a head. In 1810, 59,2907., tions were made, but two were suffered to or 291. 12s. a head. In 1814, 66,328l., or remain in their old situation. The com- 321. 9s. a head. In 1816, 69,107., or mittee recommended, that separate hulks 31. 15s. a head. In 1817, 84,6087., or should be provided for those who were to 391. 7s. a head. In 1818, 91,958. or 37. be sent to New South Wales, in order 13s. a head. Thus, not only the total that they might not be mixed with con- expense was progressively increasing, but victs who were sentenced to a shorter the expense of each individual also; and period of imprisonment in those floating what a contrast did this expenditure pregaols. The committee also stated, that sent to that in the bridewells, penitentiain 1812-13, four hundred persons were ries, and houses of correction at home, sent to Botany Bay. Now, in the year where prisoners were punished, and cri1817, nine hundred and forty persons minals somewhat reformed. This fact the were transported thither, which materially hon. member illustrated, by referring to altered the features of the case, with re- and detailing the expense of maintaining ference to 1812 and the present time. the prisoners in the Glasgow Bridewell, But it was said, that those persons were the Preston House of Correction, and volunteers, that they preferred going out other places. Thus economy, which was of the country. Could any case more an important consideration, was comparastrong be laid before parliament to induce tively discarded in this transport system. them to inquire into the subject, than that The arrangements made in the hulks by such a body of persons preferred that Mr. Capper, who was the instrument of punishment which was classed next to lord Sidmouth, were productive of some death, to what was supposed to be the good, although the attempts at classificamilder infliction, imprisonment on board tion were quite ineffective. This failure the bulks? He knew how unpalatable it was peculiarly to be lamented; to let was to have recourse to statements of mere youths mix with the hardened poachfigures in that House, yet, as it was im-er, the deserter, and the bigamist, must possible to explain his case clearly without them, he would shortly advert to one or two documents on the subject. By one of those documents it appeared that, from 1804 to 1811, the average number of persons confined in the hulks was 1,750; from 1811 to 1817, 2,186; from 1817 to 1819, 2,418; being an increase in the last period of nearly 1,000. With respect to transportation, the number of persons sent out of the country from 1812 to 1817 was 2,840, of whom there were transported for 14 years, 838; for 7 years, 2,002; from January 1816 to January 1817, there were transported 508; from January 1817 (VOL. XXXIX.) lead to the most deplorable consequences, for it was known that as boys of about 16 years had the strongest passions and the most flexible hearts, they were the more easily wrought upon by example and precept. How dangerous then to expose such youths to depraved connexions. Yet those convicts who had attained that particular period were confined with old and hardened characters, and thus shut out from the chance of reformation. He knew that those praiseworthy characters, the chaplains of the hulks, were very strict in attending to their duties-and he trusted that what they said, in their re (2 H) |