I desire to call the attention of the House to a matter of privilege, to a very serious and libellous and intimidating statement which was made in the "Daily Mail" newspaper on Monday. I will be as brief as possible, because the facts are within the cognisance, I think, of nearly every Member of this House. A certain section of the Press has for a week past been engaged in publishing every day a list of Members who took a certain course and voted in favour of Government proposals on two days last week. I do not propose to allude to these cases of different papers. In some papers Members were called "wastrels," in others "wasters," and so on. [Interruption.] That is not the case which I wish to bring before the House. The case that I wish to bring before the House is the actual publication on 6th December, by the "Daily Mail," of two paragraphs in its leading article, both of which were of a very intimidatory nature.

I understand that it would not be in order for me to read them myself to the House, but I will hand them to the Clerk at the Table, so that he may read them before the House comes to a decision on this matter. At any rate, in both these excerpts the insinuation was made that eleven Members of this House had altered their vote owing to the intimidatory action of the "Daily Mail" newspaper. This House has from time immemorial most jealously guarded the honour of its Members and the privileges of this House and I submit that when this House has heard those paragraphs read, they will agree that this was an absolutely intimidatory attack upon certain Members of this House, and in being an attack upon their honour was, therefore, an attack upon the honour of all their colleagues in this House. I was not one of the Members concerned in that particular attack, but I think that, in view of the past history of this House in connection with newspaper articles, and in view of the growing abuse of the freedom of the Press which has been in vogue in recent times, that it is right to draw the attention of the House and of the country to this sort of tactics as regards certain Members of this House.

I do not think this case is similar in any way to the case on the last occasion of this sort, which occurred in 1901, when the editor of the "Globe" newspaper was called to the Bar of this House to apologise for certain attack? which he had made upon the Nationalist party; but, although it is a different giound, it is a very strong ground. On that occasion the House, which, if I am not mistaken, was, as regards the Majority, at any rate, hostile to the Nationalist party, backed up the Nationalist party in seeing that an apology was made, without any Division at all, although in that case it was simply an attack upon the Nationalist party. T submit that whatever our opinions may be about waste or extravagance, this House, at any rate, will support Members in defending themselves against unwarranted ' and unfair attacks of this nature. I do not propose to detain the House at any greater length, and I will therefore ask the Clerk at the Table to read the article? complained of.

Do I understand that the hon. and gallant Gentleman wishes to conclude with a Motion?

Yes.

What are the terms?

I was going to move it after the articles had been read.

I would like to hear the terms of the Motion first.

The Motion I propose to move after these articles have been read is: That the passages in the articles in the ' Daily Mail ' newspaper of 6th December complained of constitute a grave breach of the privileges of this House.

I am sorry to have to take exception to this Motion, but it is really out of time. The hon. and gallant Gentleman should have brought it forward on Monday. If he wishes to call the attention of the House to any breach of privilege "instantly arising," it must be brought at the earliest possible moment after the breach has been committed. I express no opinion as to whether there has or has not been a breach of privilege. It is still open to the hon. Member to raise it, but he must raise it in his own time. I could not accept a Motion of that sort now intervening before Public Business.

On a point of Order. Seeing that this article is written in a newspaper belonging to a Member of the other House of Parliament, is it not a breach of privilege for a Member of the other House of Parliament to impute motives and lack of honour to a Member of this House in the manner that has been done recently by Lord Northcliffe and Lord Rothermere? Would it be in order to move that Lords Rothermere and Northcliffe be compelled to attend at the Bar of this House, to apologise for the unfair and mean campaign carried on against the individual freedom of conscience of Members of this House in voting either for or against the Government?

If the hon. and gallant Gentleman will put down his Motion, and bring it forward in the ordinary way, there is nothing to prevent him.

May I ask whether the fact that these articles complained of were published only the day before yesterday does not make the protest on this occasion within sufficient time, in view of the fact that it is only 48 hours after publication?

The general rule of the House that has always been followed is that the matter must be dealt with instantly, and "instantly" means as soon as the House meets after the breach or the alleged breach of privilege has been committed.

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, "the articles of a scandalous nature which have appeared in the 'Daily Mail' and other papers relating to the conduct of certain Members of this House."

The pleasure of the House not having been signified, Mr. SPEAKER called on those Members who supported the Motion to rise in their places, and not fewer than forty Members having accordingly risen, the Motion stood over, under Standing Order 10, until a Quarter-past Eight this Evening.

I wish to raise a point of Order, which I tried to put before this Motion was carried, with reference to ordering certain Members of Another place to come to the Bar of this House.

It would be better to discuss the whole matter at 8.15.

But this does not arise out of the Motion.

The time to raise any question in connection with this general subject matter will be at 8.15.

But does my question arise out of the Motion? It is a question of bringing Members of Another place to the Bar of this House. Does that arise out of the Motion of the hon. Member for Finsbury? I do not gather that it does arise out of that Motion, and I think it would be out of order. I only ask the point of order with reference to Members of this House who own newspapers, and particularly the "Daily Chronicle," which have made vicious attacks on Members.