Sheehan, Daniel Daniel Sinclair, John (Forfarshire) Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe) Thomas, Sir A.(Glamorgan, E.) Warner, Thomas Courtenay T. Williams, Osmond (Merioneth) TELLERS FOR THE AYES-Mr. Whitley and Mr. LaylandBarratt. Agg-Gardner, James Tynte Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John NOES. Gardner, Ernest Houston, Robert Paterson Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E. Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow) Coghill, Douglas Harry Dewar, SirT.R. (Tower Hamlets Lawson, Jn. G. (Yorks., N. R.) Manners, Lord Cecil MR. VICTOR CAVENDISH claimed that the original Question be now put. Newdegate, Francis A. N. Pilkington, Colonel Richard Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester) Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward TELLERS FOR THE NOES-Sir Alexander Acland Hood and Mr. Ailwyn Fellowes. MR. SWIFT MACNEILL asked what was the Motion before the Committee? *THE CHAIRMAN: The right hon. Gentleman the Financial Secretary to the Treasury has claimed that the original Question be now put. MR. COURTENAY WARNER (Staffordshire, Lichfield) said that the hon. Gentleman did not move the closure. MR. HERBERT GLADSTONE (Leeds, W.) asked if the Chairman put the Question for the closure. *THE CHAIRMAN: Yes; and it was unanimously accepted by the Committee. The hon. Member for Accrington moved the closure. I put the Question and the Committee accepted it; and then I put the Question under discussion at the time, which the Committee has just disposed of. The Secretary to the Treasury now claims that the original Question be put and that is the question to be decided by the Committee. MR. SWIFT MACNEILL said as the matter was one affecting the practice of Agg-Gardner, James Tynte Blundell, Colonel Henry Boscawen, Arthur Griffith Brodrick, Rt Hon. St. John the House he wished to ask a question regarding it. After the closure had been put and carried they all knew that the original Question might be put; but it should be part and parcel of the same transaction, that was that the hon. Gentleman who moved the closure should also claim that the main Question be put. The Motion for the closure was moved by the hon. Member for Accrington, and the Secretary to the Treasury moved that the main Question be now put. That was not part and parcel of the same transaction, and he never recollected a case in which the closure having been moved by a Member of the Opposition, the main Question was claimed from the Treasury Bench. He protested against it. *THE CHAIRMAN: It does not signify in the least who moves the closure. The question for the Committee to decide was whether the closure should be applied or not. It does not signify whether the Motion comes from an hon. Gentleman on my right hand or on my left. When the Committee has once decided to closure the Motion, the ordinary procedure follows. Original Question put accordingly. The Committee divided:-Ayes, 170; Noes, 123. (Division List No. 15.) AYES. Brymer, William Ernest Elliot, Hon. A. Ralph Douglas Fardell, Sir T. George Finlay, Sir Robert Bannatyne Fitzroy, Hn. Edward Algernon Flower, Sir Ernest Forster, Henry William Fyler, John Arthur Gardner, Ernest Garfit, William Gordon, Hn.J.E. (Elgin&Nairn) Cochrane, Hon. Thos. H. A. E. Gore, Hn. S. F. Ormsby- (Linc.) Dewar, Sir T.R(Tower Hamlets Gorst, Rt. Hn. Sir John Eldon Hoare, Sir Samuel Hobhouse, RtHn H(Somers't,E Hogg, Lindsay Hope, J.F(Sheffield, Brightside) Horner, Frederick William Hoult, Joseph Houston, Robert Paterson Howard, J. (Midd., Tottenham) Hunt, Rowland Johnstone, Heywood (Sussex) Kenyon-Slaney, Col. W. (Salop Kerr, John Kimber, Henry Knowles, Sir Lees Laurie, Lieut.-General Law, Andrew Bonar (Glasgow) Lawson, Jn. G. (Yorks., N.R.) Lee, A. H. (Hants., Fareham) Legge, Col. Hon. Heneage Leveson-Gower, Frederick N.S. Llewellyn, Evan Henry Long, Col. Chas. W. (Evesham) Long, Rt. Hon. W. (Bristol, S.) Lucas, Col. Francis (Lowestoft) Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred Macdona, John Cumming Maconochie, A. W. M'Calmont, Colonel James M'Killop, James (Stirlingshire) Malcolm, Ian Manners, Lord Cecil Maxwell, W.J.H.(Dumfriessh.) Middlemore, Jn. Throgmorton, Mitchell, Edw. (Fermanagh, N. Moon, Edward Robert Pacy Pilkington, Colonel Richard Stanley, Rt. Hon. Lord (Lancs Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester) Tufnell, Lieut.-Col. Edward Vincent, Sir Edgar (Exeter) TELLERS FOR THE AYES-Sir Alexander Acland Hood and Mr. Ailwyn Fellowes. Ainsworth, John Stirling Bayley, Thomas (Derbyshire) Bell, Richard Blake, Edward Boland, John Brand, Hon. Arthur G. Broadhurst, Henry Brunner, Sir John Tomlinson Caldwell, James Crombie, John William Devlin, Chas. Ramsay (Galway Ellice, Capt E.C(SAndrw's Bghs Esmonde, Sir Thomas NOES. Farquharson, Dr. Robert Ferguson, R. C. Munro (Leith) Gladstone, Rt. Hn. Herb. John MacNeill, John Gordon Swift M'Hugh, Patrick A. Mansfield, Horace Rendall Nannetti, Joseph P. Nolan, Joseph (Louth, South) O'Kelly, Jas. (Roscommon, N.) Palmer, Sir Chas. M. (Durham) Redmond, John E. (Waterford) Roe, Sir Thomas Samuel, Herbert L. (Cleveland) Sinclair, John (Forfarshire) Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £18,800, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1904, for the Royal Parks and Pleasure Gardens." DR. FARQUHARSON (Aberdeenshire, W.) said he did not now intend to move a reduction, he merely wished to inquire whether these improvements had been sanctioned by th eformer Estimate, or whether the Government had exceeded the original Estimate and had now come to the House to ask them to sanction this extra amount. He also wished to ask for some information as to what these improvements were; whether they were going to be improvements or not, or what was going to be done to facilitate the traffic and the convenience of those who lived in London. He would also like to see a plan of the improvements which were to be made. MR. JOHN BURNS (Battersea) said he thought it would have been better if the Department under whose care St. James's Park came had submitted to the House last session the old plans of the park, so that hon. Members could have carried in their minds the suggested alterations and alleged improvements which had been carried out there. Had those plans been submitted, suggestions might have been made which would have led to considerable improvements in the plan as now revealed by the work as finished. He suggested, if it were possible, that we should depart from the German and French method of Haussmannising our parks in this country, the only result was to make London a second-rate Berlin, a fourth-rate Paris, or a fifth-rate Vienna. He preferred the old Mall as it was, and he certainly regretted that the improvement necessitated, if it did necessitate it, which he doubted, | Williams, Osmond (Merioneth) TELLERS FOR THE NOES-Mr. as to the getting rid of so many old trees. Dealing with the improvement as it was, he said immediately in front of the Palace there was scope for making improvement, and he trusted that some attempt would be made to raise the lawns so hide the stone palisade, which, in his opinion, was rather too high. There was a still more important point, assuming that the new street from the Palace to Mall was carried straight from the Palace Spring Gardens was carried out, and the to Charing Cross, care should be taken that private enterprise and vested interests did not vulgarise what public money was trying to improve. Battersea had a particular claim on the Government in this matter, as £15,000 was to be diverted from the Battersea Park Fund in connection with the improvement of the eastern side of the Mall. Battersea was nothing if not generous and magnanimous, but they did like to be aesthetic and artistic. They did not object to being despoiled of this money provided it was spent in accordance with the true canons of art as understood in Battersea, but he doubted whether that condition would be fulfilled in this case. When the road was completed and the Nelson Column or the King Charles statue was made the visual objective, looking from Bucking ham Palace, it would doubtless be a desirable improvement for vehicular traffic, but one would then be confronted by the circular sweep at the northern part of Northumberland Avenue. The Grand Hotel was not a particularly handsome building, but it had not been vulgarised by sky-signs or advertisements of meat extract or pills, as was the case with the building on the western side of Northumberland Avenue. The only result of the expenditure of Battersea's £15,000 would be to see on the top of a high building in vulgar letters a bold blinking beacon advertising Bovril. Battersea protested against spending £15,000 to give this extract bold advertisement, and he suggested there was a way in which the noble Lord could deal with the advertiser. This extract of meat claimed Royal Letters patent; the company had a royal crown on top of Bovril, on each side of it the royal monogram E.R., and underneath a vulgar illuminated sign. It seemed to him that advertisers holding the Royal Letters patent ought to withdraw such a sign in deference to the King, or out of regard for the amenities of the district. It they would not do so, he suggested that the noble Lord should advise the King to withdraw the Royal Letters patent from all their other advertisements until this sign was withdrawn. That is what he would do if he were King. If the noble Lord hesitated to adopt so drastic a measure, he might remember that in the House of Lords there were certain directors of this company, and he might appeal to them to withdraw the objectionable sign. If that were not successful, then other steps should be taken to prevent a public improvement being so vulgarised. Amongst other works which had been carried out he had noticed what appeared to be the beginning of a vehicular road across the small suspension bridge. He hoped there was no intention of making such a road; it was not required, and it would spoil one of the very finest views that he knew. He trusted that the noble Lord would display the artistic traditions of his house, and make the parks and open spaces even more beautiful than they now were. MR. COURTENAY WARNER, who thought the alterations would be a real improvement, understood that the plans were all prepared long ago. If that was so, why was this additional Vote brought in now instead of having been included in the original Estimates for the year? Long before the Estimates were introduced it was known that this improvement was to be undertaken, and the matters mentioned in this item were such that anybody would have known were certain to be included in such an undertaking. MR. COGHILL (Stoke-upon-Trent) entirely sympathised with the remarks of the hon. Member for Battersea. The Board of Works had acted in a most autocratic manner. Without having given notice to anyone they had proceeded to cut down trees, and they now asked the Committee to sanction the expenditure which had been incurred. The Estimate had been grossly exceeded. St. James's Park was one of the things in London of which they had every reason to be proud, and when he remembered the artistic demerits of Buckingham Palace he was not so sure that our ancestors were not wise to exclude it from view as much as possible. He suggested that if the arrangements with regard to St. James's Park were to be altered, the paths crossing the park should be kept open until eight o'clock in the evening all the year round. This would be a great convenience to Members on leaving the House at half-past seven. MR. EUGENE WASON (Clackmannan and Kinross) asked whether in this sum of £18,800 was included the amount necessary for carrying through the Mall and pulling down the houses in Spring Gardens; when that work was likely to be undertaken, what class of trees were to be planted in the Mall-whether lime or elm -and when the new thoroughfare was likely to be carried through to Trafalgar Square. while he sympathised with the remarks of MR. O'MARA (Kilkenny, S.) said that, He the hon. Member for Battersea, he sympathised still more with the people of Ireland who, although they had not been consulted in the matter at all, and would never receive any benefit from the improvement, yet had to contribute very substantially towards the cost. understood that the improvement had been brought about by the erection of a memorial to Queen Victoria, and that the country had subscribed £250,000 for the purpose. He had nothing to say about that, but to ask Ireland to subscribe this amount at a time when the Estimates were growing yearly was very unjust, more especially when they had no assurance that this Estimate was going to be the last one on this particular improvement. He protested against the spending of this money, and he moved a reduction. of the Vote by £5,000. Motion made, and Question, "That a sum, not exceeding £13,800, be granted for the said Service."-(Mr. O'Mara.) |