Mr. Healy obtained the third reading of his Municipal Franchise
(Ireland) Bill on Wednesday by the use of a sort of strategy in the Grand Committee which we should be sorry to see often repeated. If no amendment is carried in the Grand Committee, the whole House does not even consider the Bill on Report, unless a motion is carried to recommit it, and in this case the resolution was defeated by a majority of 62 (239 against 177). Yet it was proved that amendments were not only needed for the workability of the Bill, but that in one or two respects they were needed to bring the Irish municipal law into real harmony with the English, which was the declared object of Mr. If ealy's measure, For examples
the Irish time of residence qualifying for a municipal vote is to be less than that provided in the English measure. Now, as Mr. Balfour pointed out with great justice, nothing could possibly undermine the confidence of the public in Grand Committees more than to know that all amendments are voted down not because they are thought unnecessary or mischievous, but solely to get rid of any Report stage in the House of Commons. The excuse made by Mr. T. W. Russell (who admitted that the Bill needed amendment) for voting against its recommittal, was that Ireland had been denied municipal equality with England far too long ; that the delay of a recommittal might easily prove fatal to the Bill; and finally, that the House of Lords can amend its defects. We hope that may be so,. and that the Bill, so amended, will really pass this Session. But we hold strongly with Mr. Balfour that Grand Com- mittees will soon be discredited if the rules which govern them are abused for the purpose of getting rid of any Report stage, even when, as in this case, a Report stage is really wanted.
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