The Sun.
London, England, 1870-01-29 00:00:00

THE DOCKYARD REDUCTION.

The first attacks upon the Ministry (said Sir John) are
made in respect of what has been called the dockyard ques-
tion, and which in substance is this—that the Liberal
Administration have discharged a vast number of
persons employed in the dockyards in a cruel, heartless,
and unfeeling manner, and have made no provision what-
ever for them. Now the answer to that charge is twofold.
First of all, recollect that when a Liberal Government
comes into power its great object is, and ought to be, to
lessen the burdens on the masses of the people, and if
there has been an enormous and extravagant expenditure
in any ono branCh of the public service, it is their sacred
duty to put an end to that expenditure in the in-
terest of the great mass of the community. That would
be the answer if the fact were true, but it is not. The
facts broadly are these. A large number of persons
were employed in the dockards far beyond the require
meats of the naval service. Mr. Corry, the First Lord of
the Admiralty in Lord Derby's and Mr. Disraeli's Admi-
nistration, a man of whom I will never speak otherwise
than with great respect, in the conscientious discharge of
his duty reduced by between 4,000 and 5,000 the persons
engaged in the dockyards. I do not blame him for that ; I
should he ashamed to make political capital out of what I
know to have been a necessity. While the discharges were
proceeding he went out of office, and Mr. Childers succeeded
him; and he, instead of discharging 5,000 men, discharged
1,500. He went on in a very limited way in the course
which Mr. Corry had very properly begun. Mr. Childers,
at a very large expenditure, made a more satisfactory pro-
vision than did Mr. Corry for nearly two-thirds of the
people discharged by him. The result, therefore, is that
a far larger number were discharged by the Tories, and
were not provided for, and that a smaller numbes were
discharged by the Liberals, and were provided for. Now,
this is the truth of the dockyard question. Did the
gory speakers know it to bo the truth? If they did know
.t, they were guilty of the baseness of attacking poli-
tical opponents upon grounds that they knew to be false.
I.f they did not they were guilty of the grossest ignorance.
The: c has been front the tcp to the bottom cf the ,:telminis-
aa tion, throughout all del :laments, a vigorous and un-
paring lit,nd laid at the root cf abuses, and immense
reductions have been effected in the miecellanecus and
civil expenditure of the country. I ant quite aware that
,eductions have a twofold aspect. All reductions are made
somebody's expense; there will always be persons who
will cease to be paid, and the friends of these persons will
be discontented. Therefore it is only a strong Government,
which can rely upon the people, which can fall back upon
the sympathies of the whole community, that can apply
vigorous and unsparing hand to abuses such as I
nave pointed out. A weak Government will be always an
extravagant one, because a weak Government, by the
very necessity of the case, depending from day to
lay and from vote to vote for its existence, cannot have
the courage and strength to do what a really strong and
popular Government can, and, if they can, ought to do.