misconstrued, approach the other naval Powers concerned. It might be said that although that might be so now, it might not be so three or four years hence. He had been interested to see an estimate in the German Naval Annual of what the relative strength of the Great Naval Powers of Europe would be in 1907. Dealing only with battleships, in that year Great Britain would have a tonnage of 749,000 tons, France 340,000 tons, Russia 300,000 tons; the United States 260,000 tons, and Germany 213,000 tons. In other words we should be within 100,000 tons, three years hence, of the combined aggregate tonnage of France, Russia, and Germany. The same superiority, and more, would be maintained in regard to cruisers and torpedo boats. He mentioned these figures to show that even looking three or four years ahead we would be fully justified in approaching the other great naval Powers on the two-Power standard. But turning to the other side of the question, what did these huge annual charges for our Navy mean to the people of this country who paid the taxes? He would only take a few figures relative to the last thirty years. In 1870 we spent on our Navy £9,420,000; in 1880 £10,000,000; in 1890 £15,000,000; in 1900 £26,000,000, and in 1904-5 we were going to spend £37,000,000. These, figures were alarming; but a still more serious question was raised if these figures were examined in relation to the taxable capacity of the country. They meant that in 1870 the expenditure on the Navy was at the rate of 5s. 10d. per head of the population; in 1880, 5s. 9d. ; in 1890, 8s.; in 1900, 12s. 5d.; and to-day it was 17s. 8d. per head--man, woman and child. Put in another way the expenditure on the Navy was four times as much to-day as it was thirty years ago, and three times as much calculated at per head of the population. An hon. friend on the other side of the House might remind him that the wealth of the country had increased by 30 per cent. during the last thirty years; but his reply to that argument was that the weight of the burden of taxation on account of the Navy had increased by no less than 300 per cent. These were facts and figures which ought to receive the immediate attention of the House. Of course the Admiralty had a defence for this huge expenditure. The First Lord of the last said— Admiralty on Friday night The Navy Estimates are very heavy. What does that mean? What is their justification? It is by the Navy, with the assistance of the Army, that you hold these markets I have mentioned; that you hold the whole British Empire, and the rights of trade in China and countries like that. Why have you no anxiety about the continuance of your trade-cotton, woollen, iron, and all the many other manufactures? It is because their path on the great of the Navy." waters is rendered sure and certain by the work He thought there would be some difficulty in harmonising these views and those of his hon. friend opposite. He himself did not deny these facts, but maintained that a point must be reached some time, if we proceeded much further with this increased expenditure, when the drain on our national resources would seriously affect our industrial system. If his Motion were carried it would not in any way affect the paramount position. of Great Britain as the great naval Power of the world. Who could doubt, in this matter of the defence of the Empire, that the stability of the nation. and the Empire did not altogether depend on our strength of armaments, but that a good deal of the vitalising power behind our industrial enterprise and progress sprang from a buoyant Exchequer and an industrious people? If our resources were buoyant in time of peace the better would we be able to bear the strain of a time of war if that time unhappily arrived. He wished to say one word as to the possibility and advisability of taking some such step as was suggested by his Resolution. He knew there were immense diffi culties in the way; he admitted that we had not yet reached the millenium. But were those difficulties insurmountable? He did not believe that; and even if they were insurmountable that would not absolve us from the duty of attempting to carry this programme out. were one or two favourable elements in the present situation. First of all, there was what was going on in the great struggle between two great Powers in the Far East. Lord Selborne referred in his speech on Friday last to the lessons we were to obtain from that struggle. Was it not possible that when that struggle was over-and they all hoped it would be There These were explicit words, and he hoped that the hon. Gentleman when he came to reply on behalf of the Admiralty would make it clear how the Government now stood in regard to that explicit declaration, and how it was to be carried out. It was evident if those Estimates continued to expand at the present rate that they would increase far beyond the taxable capacity of the country. It was clear that they could not go on indefinitely in this manner and that the time would arrive when it would be necessary to settle the question in the direction of retrenchment. That was the practical side of the Motion. It also had another side. early a favourable opportunity might arise of bringing some such suggestion as he had made before the other great naval Powers? Again, another favourable element was that all the great naval Powers of Europe were now in the greatest possible state of efficiency. Very striking figures had appeared the other day in a great London journal to show the very great increase which had taken place in the last thirty years in the naval armaments of other countries. There was another element distinctly favourable to the consideration of his Motion in a practical spirit. It was the great part which His Majesty the King had played in promoting friendly relations between this country and other Powers in Europe. His Majesty had not only brought the The chief aim of Empire was to inCourts but the peoples of the three great which were honest and just and true. He fluence the higher qualities by all things Powers nearer to each other. Summing up the policy which would lead to a re- believed that if that ideal could be realised duction in our armaments and pave the it would bring inevitably in its train way to the realisation of the Motion now strength of dominion and permanence of before the House, there were certain power. While he was prepared to admit necessary conditions. First of all, every- to the full the necessity for an efficient body would concur with him as to the and adequate Navy, yet some kind of necessity for tightening the bonds arrangement which would lead to the between this country and the United diminution of annually increasing exStates, and the necessity for cultivating penditure would be a permanent blessing friendly relations with all the great not only to this country but to all other Powers of Europe. Some hon. friends on countries concerned. It would make for both sides of the House seemed to think international peace and for the progress that a reduction of the burden of the of humanity. He was reading the other Navy on the people of this country might day a speech delivered by the late Mr. come about through an increased contri- Gladstone in 1862, and he thought it bution from the Colonies. He was some- would be well if the House of Commons what sceptical of ever realising that. cherished, more than it did, something of Lastly, there was the necessity of consoli- the horror which the late Mr. Gladstone dating, instead of expanding, our territorial and his contemporaries entertained in Empire. If all these points were looked regard to extravagance in public expendito, he thought the time was not very farture. He said that all excess in public distant when a very advantageous and practical result was to be obtained in the realisation of the Motion now being discussed. Before he concluded he must refer to a very important statement upon this subject made, in this House, by Mr., now Lord, Goschen, then First Lord of the Admiralty, in the year 1899. In introducing the Naval Estimates in March of that year Mr. Goschen made use of these words "I have now to state on behalf of Her Majesty's Government that if the other great naval Powers should be prepared to diminish their programme of shipbuilding we should be prepared on our side to meet such a procedure by modifying ours." expenditure beyond the legitimate wants of the community, was not only waste but a great political and a great moral evil. The House and the country would do well to ponder on that sentiment, and it was on those general grounds and in that spirit that he desired to commend to the favourable attention of the House the Resolution which he now moved. MR. BUCHANAN (Perthshire, E.) said he wished to second the Motion of his hon. friend, and in doing so would not detain the House very long because his hon. friend had gone over the ground with great ability, and because he himself trespassed on the time of the House last session on the same subject. He beyond it; and judged by that standard approached the question almost ex- their position was amply secured at the clusively from the financial point of view. present moment. The Secretary to the He would not venture to put forward his Admiralty began his speech, as all spokesopinion on a purely naval subject, though men of the Admiralty in recent years he hoped he would be allowed to make one began their speeches, by a statement observation on the statement of the about the magnitude of the Estimates and Secretary to the Admiralty, who appeared the great burden they were imposing on to him to give a wider interpretation as the people, at which he expressed regret to what was known as the two-Power which no doubt he felt. He thought, standard than had hitherto been given however, hon. Members were getting to it. The hon. Gentleman limited somewhat weary of the introductory his comparisons to battleships, and ex- melancholy observations which fell from pressly excluded cruisers, which were, he the representatives of the Admiralty. said, to be reserved for the purpose of They reminded him of the annual observaprotecting com:nerce. tions of the hon. Member for West Islington on economy, which never led to anything. During the past ten years every representative of the Admiralty who had to submit increased Estimates for naval purposes always began his speech by a reference to their magnitude and how keenly the Admiralty felt the burden which they were imposing on the people. In 1898 Mr. Goschen, as he then was, in submitting Estimates for £23,500,000, described them as colossal. They would thank Heaven most sincerely if they could now get back to those Estimates. The present Secretary for War, when he was Secretary to the Admiralty, described the Estimates he introduced as quite unparalleled in peace or war. Still the Naval Estimates continued to increase from year to year, and the object of the Motion was to endeavour to get the House of Commons to consider how that increase could be arrested. MR. PRETYMAN said that perhaps he gave the House a false impression. He did not mean to convey that cruisers were not to be considered at all in arriving at a comparison between the naval strength of this country and of foreign countries. What he intended to say was that the comparison could not be confined to cruisers. MR. BUCHANAN said he gathered from the hon. Gentleman's speech that he excluded cruisers altogether. In his opinion that was hardly fair, particularly as far as first-class cruisers were concerned. First-class cruisers were ships which would certainly be in the fighting line and which ought to be taken into consideration in any fair comparison between the fighting strength of this country and of other countries. Their tonnage amounted to 12,000, 13,000 The First Lord's Statement gave most or 14,000 tons, and they were power- fully the expenditure under the various fully armoured and ought to be taken Naval Votes. He only wished the War into consideration. At present, as re- Office were in the habit of issuing a garded first-class cruisers, this country similar statement for, if any hon. Memwas equal to the whole world. Its power ber desired to see an illustration of the in this department of naval strength was difference, he had only got to compare overwhelming. The hon. Gentleman the information given in Lord Selborne's said that as regarded battleships alone Statement with very skimpy document this country was equal to the two-Power which had been put into the Vote Office standard. He wished to know if the hon. that afternoon by the War Office. This Gentleman included ships in course of table in the Navy Estimates was a very construction in that comparison. He valuable one, and conveyed information himself was under the impression that which the House had a perfect right to in 1906 this country would in battleships be informed of. That statement began be equal not only to the two-Power just at the period when the present standard but to the three-Power standard. Government came into office. In the There was no doubt that the country was year 1895-6 the total amount of naval not only well up to the two-Power expenditure was £19,637,000, but that sum standard but that it was considerably had gone up by leaps of £1,000,000, £2,000,000 and £3,000,000, to £36,890,000, and in the course of ten years there had been an increase of £20,000,000. That was an enormous increase at the rate of no less than £10,000,000 every five years. In the year 1895-6 they voted 85,000 men. They were now asking for 131,000 men, or an increase of more than 50 per cent. in ten years. In 1895-6 Vote A stood at £9,000,000 and now it was £18,000,000, showing an increase of 100 per cent. But this was not all the naval expenditure for the year. As the House was well aware there was a considerable amount of naval expenditure not included in the Navy Estimates, and the expenditure on that score had also been steadily increasing year after year. He alluded more especially to the expenditure under the Naval Works Act. In 1895-6 the annual expenditure upon naval works was comparatively small, but it had been going up year after year, and on the 31st of March this year it would have reached no less than £3,490,000, or nearly £3,500,000. Therefore the total figure which they were going to spend during the currency of the present year, assuming that the expenditure upon naval works would not increase next year, was £40,718,000. That was an enormous expenditure for the House to be asked to vote for naval purposes, compared with what was considered adequate and satisfactory only five years ago. But the story did not end there, because within the limits of these Estimates there was an enormous amount of consequential, or what had been called automatic, expenditure involved. The sums of money they were asked to vote and the increase in the number of men if passed must inevitably lead to a very large increase in the Navy Estimates. He was not capable of judging the amount, but it would certainly be several millions of money, and therefore, he wished to call attention to one or two facts upon this subject. The right hon. Gentleman opposite, dealinglast year with the naval works, said it was hardly sufficiently realised by those who initiated the wholesale expansion of the Navy what that would amount to. Every year they became more and more aware of the truth of that statement which had been reiterated from time to time in the House of Commons, and by no one with greater vigour and conviction than Mr. Goschen. In introducing the Navy Estimates in 1896 Mr. Goschen reminded the House 66 Thay any increase in the Fleet meant not only an increase in the number of ships but must be followed all along the line by expenditure in other directions. More ships meant more men to man them, more officers more engineers, more stokers and more ratings of every kind, more centres of training, more accommodation, both on shore and sea, more schools, more hospital accommodation, and more barrack accommodation." They were becoming now more and more alive to the overwhelming burden being imposed upon them by this continual expansion of the Navy. should like to know what was involved in this increase in the number of men by 4,000 or 5,000. He wished to know what addition these extra men would make to the annual expenditure of the country some five or ten years from now. One Vote had hardly been affected at all by this increase and that Vote was one for pensions, which still stood at the figure which was adequate to meet 6,000 or 7,000 pensions. That was a Vote which was likely to largely increase in the future. Last year the House would remember that sanction was given to two practically new dockyards. The extensions to the Chatham Dockyard practically made it a new one, and then there was the establishment of a large dockyard in the Firth of Forth. They had not been able to get a statement from the Admiralty with regard to expenditure under the Naval Works Act upon those two dockyards, and still less were they able to ascertain the amount that would fall upon the Estimates for those purposes. He asked by means of a Question what had been the cost of the dockyards, and he was told that it was impossible for the Admiralty to give the figure. If they were going to add two extra dockyards with a full complement of men capable of building ships of a heavy character, they would be adding several millions to their annual expenditure. He did not wish to weary the House with figures, but he wished to ask was there no possibility of finality in this matter, and was it not possible, with all the expert knowledge which the Admiralty possessed, to give the House some idea Reference had been made to the commerce on the lakes between Canada when they considered that the Navy was contended that this country could would be in accordance with the con- not take the initiative, asked what was dition of naval strength rendered the use of Government diplomacy, and necessary by the shipbuilding programmes cordial understandings, if this sort of of foreign Powers, and when they would thing could not be done. The House had consider they had made sufficient pro- a right to expect the Government to vision for that purpose. They had make the attempt. As to the contention occasionally had hopes held out that that we must follow in the wake of such a time might arrive. Mr. Goschen, action taken by other naval Powers, we in the year 1897, in one of his naval were confessedly the first naval Power in statements held out, if not the expecta- the world, and if the Government sintion, at any rate the aspiration, that cerely believed that their naval prosuch a point might be arrived at. If he gramme was for the purpose of defence, might quote that somewhat unreliable and not of offence, they could with a clear prophet the right hon. Gentleman the conscience and clean hands go to other Member for West Bristol, he stated in 1902 Powers and see whether some arrangethat, after his experience of seven years at ment could not be made, at any rate, the Exchequer of the expenditure upon as regarded future expansion of naval the Navy, in which they had increased their programmes. naval force relatively to the other great naval Powers, he saw no further reason for any increase in the naval expenditure of succeeding years. His anticipations had not been fulfilled and the expenditure went on increasing. They ought to get some promise that these Estimates would not continue to increase. Surely their naval expenditure ought not to increase out of all proportion to the growth of their revenue. He would remind the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the words of Sir Robert Peel, who, when pressed for large expenditure, both on the Army and the Navy, stated, in reply to the Duke of Wellington, that there was to be considered, not only the urgency of the demand, but also the capacity of the taxpayers to bear the expenditure. It was of overwhelming importance in case of war that there should be a full Exchequer, a lightly-taxed people, and the ability to raise money on short notice at a low rate of interest. The object of this Amendment was to repeat the suggestion which had been made before, not only by the Opposition but also by the Government side of the House. In fact, the words of the and the United States. Thanks to an burden might be diminished. Amendment proposed, 6 In "To leave out from the word That' to the end of the Question, in order to add the words in view of the heavy burdens placed |