The Sun.
London, England, 1848-02-15 00:00:00

to
right of the Woods and Forest department to contr
the architects of any works, but their bounden duty
do 60.-(Hear, hear.) The committee of 1844, in their
report, had stated that during the progress of the
building of the new Houses, certain deviations and
alterations had been made by Mr. Barry without snj
authority from the Goverment. Yet from that time to
this, no public functionary had called the attention of
the House to these alterations and deviations. With
respect to the delay that had taken place in completing
the new Houses of Parliament, what, let him ask, was
the House led to expect in the year 1836 would be the
term which the new buildings would require for their
entire completion ? The Hon. Baronet belosar him
(Sir R. Inglis) would remember in common smith
himself that six years was the extreme limit •0f
time fixed by Mr. Barry for the House to be ill
the occupation of the Members ; and further, he revel,
lected that on the occasion when this statement was
made Mr. Barry volunteered the assurance that from
the time that the foundations were laid there would only
elapse a period of two years before the Committee-
rooms would be ready for the reception of Members.--
(Hear, hear.) But then there arose a delay and a diffi-
culty in laying the foundations of the House, and in the
year 1846, when Mr. Barry was asked when the foun-
dations were'laid, he replied that he. could not tell, for
he kept no diary of the progress of the works. Would
any private gentleman act upon such a plan in his own
building?—(Hear, hear.) In point of fact the architect,
and all those who were officially concerned in the build-
ings, had been annually subjected to a running fire of
questions respecting the opening of the new Houses
which they had found it very inconvenient to parry.
In 1842 his Honourable Friend oa his left (Mr.
Hume) received for answer from Lord Lincoln,
then at the head of the Woods and Forests, the reply
that he had seen Mr. Barry on the very day the
question as to when the House would be opened was
put, and that he assured the House the buildings would
be ready for their reception in 1845. So, again, in the
year 1845, the Honourable Member for York repeated
the same question, and he was assured, in precisely the
same terms as before, that there was no reason why the
Houses should not be ready by 1847. Mr. Barry hip;
self, when asked by the Lords' Committee At
period he expected the House of Commons to be rell°)%
answered, that he had not the smallest idea—(A lattitt;
—and, lastly, Lord Morpeth had very recently AS3Utea
Hon. Members that the House would be ready, but at
what period the Noble Lord had totally omitted to state.
So that the House and the country were as much in the
dark on this point as ever. There was another point to
which he begged to draw the attention of the Noble
Lord, namely, as to the accounts furnished of the money
paid for the new buildings. There was an item of
25,0001. paid to the architect on account of his
remuneration for superintending the construction
after the original plan. But it was stated in
a note that this sum had not been accepted
by Mr. Barry as a payment in full for his services. Now
he (Mr. B. Osborne) distinctly assured the Committee
that 25,0001. was to be the utmost limit of the remune-
ration to be received by him, and a letter written by the
late Earl of Bessborough was on record, wherein that
Noble Lord stated that Mr. Barry had no claim what..
ever beyond the 25,0001. agreed to be paid on the ap-
proval of his plan by both Houses of Parliament. In
answer to this letter Mr. Barry said that he acceded to
the award, although the amount nas below what was
customary for architects to receive, and that he did 00
because he found it was considered by the Government
to be a liberal remuneration; and not only did the
Board of Commissioners think the payment liberal, but
when the sum was specified to Sir Benjamin Stephen-
son and Mr. Milnes, they were also of opinion it was
quite sufficient. Having thus laid the various facts con-
nected with the subject before the House, he could only
express his acknowledgments for the courteous attention
with which his statement had been received, and await
the information which the Government might think
proper to give.—(Cheers.)
Lord 11OR,PETH said he must preface the few ob-
servations which he had to offer to the House by stating
that he really thought his Hon. Friend who had just
concluded his speech had entirely mistated the answers
given the tiler night by his Noble Friend the First
Lord of tee Treasury and by himself. In the first place, he
thought hr might appeal to the House to say whether
there was anything like a sneer in the answer which he
gave. 'II( n, with respect to the answer given by his
Noble Friend, that surely could not be constructed as
indicating that the Board of Woods and Forests, or the
Treasury could not exercise any control over the ex-
penditure incurred in erecting the two Houses of Pare
liament. All that was said was, when the question
was asked whether the Government could guarantee
that the cost of the entire work would not exceed
1,400,0001., that the Government certainly could not
guarantee that the expense of a work of such prodigious
magnitude would not exceed the precise sum of
1,400,0001. His Hon. Friend had been rather severe
on his (Lord Morpeth's) department, and had stated,
that if it could not control the expenditure now going
on, it was useless, and ought to be abolished. Since
he had had the honour to hold the office of Chief Com-
missioner of the Woods and Forests he had made it his
particular business to inquire and ascertain in what the
duties of that department were understood to consist,
both by his predecessors, Lord Besborough, Lord Line
coin, and Lord Canning, and by those gentlemen who
permanently retained their seats at the board. All
these gentlemen conceived that they acted ministerially,
as a subordinate department of the Treasury, and that
they had no more power to control the amount of-ex-
penditure incurred than they had to settle the details of
the architecture. And, certainly, he thought it very
lucky that such was not the case, for if the Woods and
Forests were called on to control the expenses of the
building, and settle the details of the architecture, they
would probalil) make but indifferent work of it. He
conceived that this department was intended to inves-
tigate accounts, and to see in what way money was
applied after its outlay had received the sanction of the
Treasury, It had to see that responsible persons were
employed, and that proper terms were agreed upon ; it
had to examine accounts, to seo that the conditions of
contracts were faithfully observed, and that the bills
were paid.- The duties imposed upon the office were
very laborious, and he was convinced that they were
discharged with great zeal and ability. He might say
this in particular of that excellent public servant, Mr.
Milne,• so long 'connected with this department. Fur-
ther, it was certainly the duty of the Woods and Forests
to report any deviation from the original design in at
public work to the Treasury, for their sanction or disal-
lowance, anti this rule, be believed, had been acted upon
by the department. But when his Hon. Friend threw
blame on the department of Woods and Forests, and
said he wished that a Parliamentary Commission had
been appointed, he must remind him that one of the
chief sources of expense had been, that this building had
been carried on under the special direction and superin-
tendence of a committee of the two Houses of Parliament,
which had sat on the subject, conducted their investiga-
teeis, and made their reports. He wished to
state to the House what, up to the present day, the
actual expenditure had been, and what was the excess of
expenditure over the original estimate. The original es-
timate furnished by Mr. Barry was 707,0001. The sum
advanced for works, including architect's commission.
clerks' wages, &c., was 808,0001.; but of this, 378,0001.
had been paid for embankments, river wall, warming
and ventilating, tire-proof construction, additional resi-
(l. nces, sewers, decorations, fittings, furniture of the
I louse of Lords, and other miscellaneous works, all of
which formed no part of the original estimate, leaving a
balance of 430,0001,, which had been expended oa ac-
count of the original design and estimate. It was fair,
therefore, to state, that in the execution of the original
design, only 430,000/. had been at present spent. lie
would not, any more than his Hon. Friend, venture to
pronounce any judgment upon the style of that building.
That was a matter of bygone times, and as there were
many Members of the House, there might be many minds
upon it. The style selected was the highly decorated
style, which they knew was a highly expensive one.
Neither would he now enter upon a discussion of
the propriety of appointing a Committee of Fine
Arts. Her Majesty's present Government ;were not
responsible for that commission, but he must say that be
did not think the country at large would at all syrups'
thise with the attempt made by his Hon. Friend to cast
discredit upon that opening which had been made for
Ovine. encouragement to the rising talent of the coun-
try.—(Hear, hear.) Of course he agreed with his Hon.
Friend that substantial utility ought not to be postponed
to decoration, but bare walls might properly be covered
by pictures, and he could not help thinking that his Hon.
Friend had been unduly severe upon the frescoes in the
House of Lords. They were not, it was true, perfect,
but they were very creditable examples of a new mode of
decorative art, and he had no doubt that the most com-
petent judges would confirm this verdict, which he yen-
tured, with diffidence, to pronounce. Of course he did
not mean to deny that' this had been a most expensive
building, and had considerably exceeded the sum esti-
mated as the cost of its completion, but he put it to the
House, whether it could fairly have been expected to
be otherwise?—(Hear, hear.) The original desigp
of a building of such vast magnitude and such vari-
ous uses could only have embraced the general
arrangement and character of the building. Mall
errors of the architect which must have been originally
included in the design—many difficulties which he did
not then foresee—could only be considered and cor-
rected as the architect came to deal with the require-
ments made upon him. The modifications required
from him had been endless, both from Committees of
that House and from the ,heads of departments con-
nected with the public service. Since the first stone of
the Houses of Parliament was laid, the growth of public
business had been immense, and required increased ac-
commodation, which the architect had to provide. lie
need only instance that splendid , corridor which
stretched its proud length by the committee rooms of
the House of Commons, and which, expensive as it
might be, scarcely bore a proportion to the costliness of
the transactions there carried on.—(Hear, hear, and
laughter.) Then, among other things for which the
architect was not prepared, and could not be prepared,
were the warming and ventilating arrangements, which
were not considered in the original estimate. His Hon.
Friend had talked of the great expenses which bad
been incurred for these arrangements ; but 5,11.'
Barry was not responsible for them, since the House
itself had determinee that the pleas and arrange'
ments of Dr. Reid should have full scope for develop'
went. He (Lord Morpeth) had himself announced tbst
it was the intention of the Government that those plap"
should be applied to the House of Commons, and that
announcement was received with an unanimous exprer
sion of pleasure in the House. With regard to thei
charge of stone, to which his Hon. Friend had alluded,
he believed that much difficulty had been experienced ie
finding sufficient quarries of stone for so vast a building/
and the charge for that item was consequently increased
i
by 22,000/. As to the non-completion of the crucial
residences, he agreed with his Hon. Friend in tbier:e
ing it was a great pity that they were not spared
necessity of paying a large sum for the hire Of tuv—