The Sun.
London, England, 1829-05-08 00:00:00

question before the House, it would be both irregular and
inconvenient to continue the discussion any further.
POOR LAWS—(IRELAND.)
Mr. SADLER held in his hand a petition intimately
connected with the motion made by an Hon. Member re-
lative to the introduction of the poor laws into Ireland.
He thought he should best secure the attention of the House
by shortly reading certain points upon which the prayer of
the petition was founded. The petitioners stated that the
introduction of the poor laws into that country would .set
in motion a large capital, which would encourage and
foster industry in the same proportion that what was given
to the poor produced similar effects in this country. The
petitioners prayed that the'laws respecting the poor of Ire-
land might be assimilated to those of England, and com-
plained of the great discrepancy of public charities in the
two countries.—(The Hon. Member was proceeding to
state the opinions of Mr. Nimmo and other writers upon
the subject of the petition, but he was interrupted by
coughing and other signs of impatience on the -part of the
House.)—He begged to assure Hon. Members, that if they
were tired of hearing the petition, it would have been a
still further tax upon their patience had he offered his own
observations npon it. As matters stood, he should content
himself with moving that the petition be brought up.
The petition was brought up and read ; it was the peti-
tion of the freeholders and other inhabitants of Clare, in
the King's County, praying the introduction of the poor
laws into Ireland.
After a few words from Lord OXMANTOWN, General
Gascovar, and Mr. V. STUART, the petition- was or-
dered to lie on the table.
Mr. MAXWELL presented a petition, signed-by 1500
inhabitants of Renfrewshire, complaining of distress in the
trade there, and praying relief. They prayed the fixing of
a maximum and minimum of wages.
Mr. Secretary PEEL felt that any attempt to establish
a ?maximum and minimum of wages would prove injurious
to the petitioners themselves. These were the grounds
upon which he resisted the prayer of the petition.
The petition was read, and ordered to he printed.
Mr. W. PEEL brought up a Report of the number of
Charities and Charitable Donations in England and Wales.
On the motion of Sir G. MURRAY, it was ordered
that Copies of tke Correspondence between the Colonial
Government and certain individuals, relative to a Settlement
on the Swan River, be laid before the House. ,
EAST RETFORD.
Mr. HENRY FANE rose to move that a New Writ be
is,ued for the Borough of East Recford.
Mr. H. GURNEY seconded the motion.
Lord MORPETH declared that no support he had ever
given to any motion was more constrained than that which
he should afford to this.
Lord W. POWLETT—Although he should rather
have given the elective franchise to the town of Birming-
barn than to the Hundred of Bassetlaw, should certainly
prefer giving it to the inhabitants of Bassetlaw than to the
corrupt voters of East Retford.
Sir J. WROTTESLEY had another object than that of
punishing the delinquency of East Retford ; and that was,
to do what both the agricultural and manufacturing in-
terests required, namely, to give it to one of the large
towns. He was glad to hear the Right Hon. Member for
Liverpool. who was not an advocate for Reform, say as he
had done the other night, that Manchester, and Leeds, and
Birmingham ought to have representatives. He Opted
that that principle wouldsoon be acted on.
Mr. HEATHCOTE had no hesitation in acting on the
principle of preferring the respectable inhabitants of the
Hundred of Bassedaw to the corrupt voters of the Borough
of East Retford. He thought that at least this gain
Would result from throwing the writ into the Hundred of
Bassetlaw, that gentlemen of character would be returned,
upon whom dependence would be placed, and that cor-
ruption could not easily exist among 2,000 vntera. It bad
been said that it was the intention of Ministers to conci-
liate a Noble Duke by throwing open the Hundred ; but
under existing circumstances, there was, perhaps, no man
in the country they would he less desirous to oblige.
Lord J. RUSSELL eontended, that the opening of the
Hundred would he but a petty, paltry, insignificant re.-
form, and liable to the imputation that the House was en-
deavouring to keep the representation fa the hands of the
aristocracy, while it overlooked the paramoua claims of
Hit mingliam, Leeds, and other manufacturing places. He
begged to give notice that when, on Monday, the Hors.
Member for Herta should move for leave to bring in a Bill
to give the writ to the Hundred of Bassetlaw, he (Lord
J. R.) would take the sense of the House upon the ques-
tion ; and if he were successful, follow it up by a 11111 to
disfranchise East Retford, leaving it as a matter for future
decision whether the writ should be given to Biesaipparn,
Leeds, or Manchester.
Mr. FERGUSSON opposed the motion.
Mr. TENNYSON argued that a sufficient ease of moral
guilt had been established against East Retford, and ex-
pressed his satisfaction at the course of which notice had
been given by the Noble Lord (J. Russell). He recom-
mended that as the motion of the Hon. Member for Herts
was fixed for Monday, it would be better if the Hon.
Mover (Mr. Fane) would postpone for a fortnight or three
weeks his present motion, in order that time might be
afforded for discussion. He also suggested to the Right
(;lent. (Mr. Peel), that as he proposed last year to' give
one borough to the landed interest and another to the corn-
in.ercial interest, so, as there were now two Members, one
of them might be assigned to a commercial town, and the
other to an agricultural district. He moved as an amend-
ment. " That the Speaker do not issue his warrant to the
Clerk of the Crown for a new Writ for East Retford until
this day three weeks."
Lord NORMANBY supported the amendment.
Sir J. WROTTESLEY and Mr. Alderman WAITHMAN
also joined in recommending the Mon. Member (Mr.
Fane) to withdraw his motion.
FANE, in a low tone of voice, intimated his as-
sent to 1;,:a proposal.
After a few ;77ords from Mr. S. BOURNE, and Mr. Se-
cretary PEEL, tine I;:ntion was withdrawn.
POOR LAWS IN IRELAND.
Mr. V. STUART, in rising to introduce the motion of
which he had given notice, respecting the policy of intro-
ducing the poor laws into Ireland, said, whatever supe-
riority the peasantry of England appear to enjoy—and, in
point of ftct, do enjoy—over the peasantry of Ireland,
has grown up and matured under a compulsory provision
for the poor, and the wretchedness and misery of the sis-
ter country is the result of its poor being neglected and
unprovided for by law, and being left to such relief as
chance or private charity might throw in their way. The
fast is, that the poor of Ireland must be supported either
by private charity or by plunder and pillage. He asked
which of these two courses was least objectionable. He
asked likewise whether a fixed provision for the poor was
not preferable to that casual benevolene.e which was prone
to relieve the importunate object of charity, and to leave
the retiring, the blind, and the bedridden, to pine away in
unrelieved poverty and anguish. He knew that it would
be asserted that there was no inherent right in the poor to
demand maintenance at the hands of the rich. In answer
to that assertion, he would say, that if it were matter of
consequence to Ireland to maintain tranquillity and to se-
cure property, it did appear to him that without being
guilty of a moral as welt as political solecism, the House
could not fail to take into ita•tionsideratian the pt.invt of the
poor in Ireland. He would now consider the principle of
the poor laws as applicable to Ireland ; and with that view
be would advert to an argument often used...-namely, that
whatever had been effected for the poor of England by those
laws would have been effected without them, inasmuch as the
fear of want in old age, and the desire to better himself,
which is inherent to every man, would in themselves have
been sufficient incentives to the practice of industry and
frugality. Now the actual condition of It:eland affords an
excellent refutation of that argument : it fornishes irre-
fragable proof that without some system of poor jaws,
the extremest carelessness will pervade the lower classes of
the population, who require the interference of the Legis-
lature to direct them to the observation of their own in-
terests, about which they are habitually indifferent. Such
being the case, what became of the argument, that the
poor laws tended to debase the condition and the habits
of the labouring class:s ? He denied that they had any
such tendency in general. They might have such an
effect, in some particular instances, but generally they
tended to raise the condition and the chaeacter of the poor,
by rendering him independent of his employer. He
thought that he was not going too far when he sad that
in Ms country in the world, (save in Ireland), would it be
tolerated that the landlords should arrogate to themselves
all the advantages of the labour of their feliow.eountry-
men, without giving any thing to them in return: and
yet, without a system of poor laws, what was tkere to
bind an Irish landholder to rescue his fellow-countryman
from disease and poverty, or even from absolute starva-
tion? Hence it was, that he was so often indifferent to
their distressed situation, if indeed he happened to hear of
it in the distant country in which he was sojourn-
ing. Hence it was that he called in the aid of the
poor laws to make the absentee landlord identify him-
self with the tenantry on his estate,—a consummation
which, desirable as it was on many accounts, was not the
less desirable as being conducive to the circulation among
them of the money which he extracted from them. With
such an auxiliary, the labourer is enabled to make a fair
bargain with his employer: without it, the employer,
ending it advantageous to get labour cheap, limits the al-
lovrance to the labourer to the cheap allowance of rags,
ewe!, and potatoes ; such is, in putrid, the fate of the