Orders of the Day — Clause 1. — Provisions for giving the force of law to and carrying into effect Irish Agreement.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 3 March 1922.

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Photo of Mr Ronald McNeill Mr Ronald McNeill , Canterbury

The point I had in my mind, I am not certain whether it is in order or not is this, the right hon. Gentleman told us we were premature in raising this question now; that it cannot arise until after some subsequent Bill has been brought before the House. I understand that to mean that if it were possible to make any change in the boundaries that that opportunity would come when the constitution of Southern Ireland is brought before the House in the subsequent Bill. Otherwise I do not quite see the relevance of the way the right hon. Gentleman has met our Amendment by repeating what he said before, that we were too soon. It is only in order to deal with that point raised by the right hon. Gentleman that I challenge altogether his reading of this Treaty. What was in my mind was Article 11, which says: Until the expiration of one month from the passing of the Act of Parliament for the ratification of this instrument. This is the Bill for the ratification of this instrument. I understand the right hon. Gentleman challenges that, and he tells us of high legal authority for his opinion. I presume that he must mean the law officers of the Crown. I can only say that I myself have taken legal opinion which I think quite equal to that of the law officers of the Crown. I am advised that that is an entirely false reading. It is a matter of the actual interpretation of an Act of Parliament. If the Northern Parliament allows more than a month to run from the passing of this Bill they may find themselves out of date. Whether that is correct or not, it shows that there is very grave doubt upon that as upon other matters. The whole of this document we are considering is so ambiguous that no one can with confidence say what its interpretation may be in any clause.

It is, however, quite clear that the view I am putting forward is the most apparent and struck the most of us when we read this document, and it is certainly supported by very high legal authority. I do not think it is at all necessary for us here to offer any advice to our friends in Northern Ireland. They are quite wary enough, but if I were to offer any advice to my friend Sir James Craig it would need to be very careful not to allow the month to pass after the passing of this Act, and I hope he will so act. This whole matter we are discussing of this Amendment is the real central controversy which has arisen in regard to this Treaty, apart from its general aspect of surrender to the forces of disloyalty. It has been made clear already in the various debates, and I therefore need not dwell upon it, that again the difficulty arises from ambiguity of the terms employed. I do not know—I do not suppose anybody knows—whether the ambiguity is a deliberate and studied ambiguity or whether it is merely the negligence of the signa- tories to an important legal document in the middle of the night, after prolonged negotiations and investigations, tired and weary statesmen, not knowing what they were doing, in the small hours of the morning, putting their hands to a document which, when it comes to be considered, is seen in every clause to be bristling with ambiguities. We are, of course, met on this point, as on every other point, by the one and only plea that the Government have in their armoury, and that is that the thing is done, "we have done it, and we cannot undo it." If that be true—and for the moment I will not contest it—if it be true that here we have ambiguity on a matter of the very greatest possible concern to two populations—the Government admit that ambiguity, because they will not make an absolute pronouncement as to its meaning—not even the Attorney-General dealt with it—that, I say, is the most complete condemnation of what they have done, whether they can undo it or not. It is the duty of governments not to be ambiguous. It is the duty of any government, when they have distinguished legal ability at their disposal, either in drawing up important treaties or Acts of Parliament, to draw them up in such a way that they will be understood. I do not know whether the ordinary rules of interpreting Acts of Parliament will apply to the Commission which is to be set up under this 12th Article. I do not suppose the Chief Secretary can give me any answer. I do not suppose that he knows, but if he does not then he should have somebody here to answer who does know.

It is treating these matters with a great lack of courtesy and seriousness that when important legal points are likely to be raised we have no Minister present to whom we can look for a decisive answer. It is well known that when an Act of Parliament is cited before a court of law the judge will not take into consideration anything but the actual language of the Statute. If counsel desires to impress upon the court a certain interpretation of the Statute, and if he ventures to refer the judge to the OFFICIAL REPORT, the judge will hold that he is not entitled to look at the intention of the Legislature, but to what has actually been done. Is that rule to be followed by the Commission to be set up or not? If so, it makes the gravity of the case very much greater. It might be some alleviation of the grievance if we can be told that when the question of boundaries comes before the Commission that the declarations of the Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend the Member for Central Glasgow (Mr. Bonar Law) which were repeated by my right hon. Friend yesterday, could go before the Commission, and if the Commission were entitled to take them into consideration before interpreting the actual phraseology of the Article, that would go some way towards relieving our anxiety. I am very much afraid, however, that if some distinguished judge is appointed, as probably will be the case, he will naturally feel that he is constrained to apply to this particular work the same canons of interpretation which he is expected to apply in the courts day by day. If that be so, we shall not have placed before the Commission the declarations of the Government as to their intentions or the evidence as to what was the intention of this House when it ratified the Treaty, but we shall have the bare terms of Clause 12 put before a judicial tribunal.

Anybody who knows the facts must know that under the terms of Article 12 there are various interpretations, all equally plausible, if you take the bare terms. The real difficulty arises when it says "the wishes of the inhabitants." That is a slack phrase which has no precise meaning. Does it mean the inhabitants of Ireland as a whole, or the inhabitants of different counties bordering on the border, and if so, why? Counties are quite an arbitrary unit to take for arriving at the wishes of the inhabitants. If you take unions, town lands or baronies which are well-known divisions of land in Ireland, they are all arbitrary to select for this particular purpose, and yet if you do not have some recognised unit of administrative area it is impossible to give effect to the intention of this Article as it was represented to the House by the Prime Minister and other Members of the Government. I do not know whether the Tribunal will feel justified in travelling outside the borders of administrative areas and drawing an arbitrary line through this Union, that barony, or that town land, so as to take in Catholics on the one side or Protestants on the other. That is what we understand the intention to be, but we have no sort of security that such a method will be adopted by the Commission.

This difficulty is made greater when we find that the two main currents of interpretation are adopted on the one side by our own Government, and on the other side by those whom the right hon. Gentleman said yesterday were regarded as the representatives of all Ireland or the Irish nation. I need not refer again to the statements which our own Government have made, but I noticed a very significant article in an Irish newspaper the other day as showing what, at all events, is the intention of the people in Ireland itself. The article appeared in "The Republic of Ireland," which. I understand is the recognised organ of Mr. de Valera's group in Southern Ireland. The writer was arguing against the views of Mr. Michael Collins and the supporters of the Treaty, and the purport of the article was to make as strong a case as possible against the Treaty, upon the ground that it meant the partition of Ireland and sacrificing a considerable portion of it from the Free State. Therefore it was the view of the writer to make the sacrifice as large as possible and if he could have pointed out that nine counties were sacrificed from what they regarded as a united Ireland, he would have done so. It is very significant that the highest case he felt entitled to make was that Mr. Collins had sacrificed three and a half counties, and that shows what is the view, as I think, of the Republican Section and the Free State section. It shows the difference between the views and the expectation entertained by one side of negotiators and the other side, who have been making their declarations before us.

Under these circumstances, I think the Committee can well understand that it is a matter which must cause the very gravest anxiety to those of us in the North of Ireland who know something of the temper with which it will be regarded in that part of the country. The Government have, time after time, based the justification of their proceedings upon the majority which was given in this House, first of all in December, and then on the Second Reading of this Bill, and they have laid great stress upon the apparent approval of the evidence which they have brought forward in favour of their policy in other parts of the world. I am not now going to argue that question, although a great deal could be said upon it as to how these congratulatory messages were obtained. I do not say they were improperly obtained, but they were very hastily obtained, and the opinion upon which the Government laid so much stress in Ireland, as indicating approval of their policy, was certainly not the considered opinion of the Empire at large after full information as to what had been done.

I know that there are already very significant signs that a very different opinion is likely to prevail. I have had many communications myself, especially from Canada, and I am afraid that in Canada, as the terms of the Treaty and its implications become more widely known, there will be a very serious reaction of opinion, and the very large body of opinion in Canada, so far from being ready to congratulate the Government, are ready to express their deep disgust at the way in which this matter has been treated. What with regard to our own country? I am glad to see that my hon. and gallant Friend, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Colonel L. Wilson), has just come into the Committee. I do not know whether he can give us any enlightenment as to the present feeling in this country. The entrance of my hon. and gallant Friend was exceedingly opportune, because I was just wondering whether this Treaty which the Government claim has brought them such tremendous and overpowering support—