PAYMENT OF MEMBERS. T HE reports of the debate on the
payment of Mem- bers " forthwith " will only appear to-day. We cannot, therefore, comment on the discussion on the present occasion. One or two significant expressions of opinion have, however, lately been made in regard to the matter, and with these we propose to deal. The passage of arms between Mr. Chamberlain and. Mr. Storey, in the course of the Uganda debate on Monday, put one aspect of the question in a very striking light, Mr. Storey declared that "if he had to choose to-morrow in this House as to whether be would spend £200,000 a year in improving the slums in London or in putting an end to the Slave-trade, he would spend it in attending to the slums of London." To this Mr. Chamberlain most happily replied that he was "tempted by his answer to ask him how he reconciles this intense sympathy with the poor with the vote which I understand he is going to give on Friday night,—to spend something like 4300,000 a year in paying Members of Parliament who do not live in slums, and who do not want to be paid." No one will, of course, pretend that this is a final answer to the arguments in favour of the payment of Members, but it does put a, neglected element in the problem in a very strong light. Money often has to be refused by Parliament, though the objects in regard to which expenditure is demanded are admittedly good and important. There must be a limit to payments out of the Treasury, and therefore quantities of very meritorious proposals have to fall to the ground. Hence the excellent general rule, that all schemes for putting new charges on the people shall be regarded with special jealousy ;—that it must be clearly proved that, unless the expenditure is incurred, some great evil will result, or some great positive good be missed ;- and, further, that there is no better object on which to spend the. money. From his own point of view, Mr. Storey was perfectly justified in saying that if £200,000 was to be spent, he would rather have it spent on the slums than on Uganda. We do not agree with Mr. Storey, believing that public money spent on slums is, as often as not, pure evil ; but that does not alter the principle which Mr. Chamberlain so cleverly brought home to the House on Monday. Before we determine to create a permanent charge of 4300,000 a year on the Treasury—when once Members are paid, there can be no return to the old system —a charge which has a capitalised value of £10,000,000, we are bound to ask the question: "Is there nothing better we can do with the money ? " Another point of importance in the controversy has been raised by the allegation that the proposal only to pay those Members of Parliament who are not rich enough to do with- out payment, puts a stigma on poverty. Surely that is a most absurd exaggeration? Not the slightest stigma ever attached to Mr. Burt or Mr. Broadhurst when they received salaries, as we believe we are right in thinking both of them did at one time, from Trades-Union sources. Again, what stigma has ever been held to attach to a Cabinet Minister who, like Mr. Shaw-Lefevre, has made the declaration of poverty which is a necessary preliminary to drawing a Cabinet Pension ? To force the nation to pay ..e300,000 year, instead of, say, £10,000, in order to save the amour- _pure of those who declare hi one and the same breath that poverty is far nobler and better than wealth, and that it is an infamy to stamp respectable men with the brand of poverty, is an absurdity for which there is no defence. In truth, however, if Members are to be paid, there is one, and only one, satisfactory solution of the pro- blem, and that is to give each constituency the right to levy a rate to pay its Member up to, say, £300 a year. This plan prevents wholesale dipping into the national exchequer; allows those who know best what the Member's resources are, to settle whether he requires to be paid or not ; and keeps the whole matter within its proper limits. It is said, of course, that this is a mere suggestion for getting rid of the matter, because no man who did not announce while he was standing that if he got in he should refuse to take any payment, would have a chance of being elected. We do not believe a word of this. Is it to be supposed that the miners who pay a Member out of their own pockets would refuse assent to his being paid by a rate levied on the constituency as a whole, especially since that rate would fall chiefly on their political oppo- nents? To say that the people of West Ham would refuse to support Mr. Keir Hardie if they knew that his return would mean the levying of a half-farthing rate, is utterly absurd. If the electors were really anxious to elect a working-man candidate, they would not be stopped by the dread of im- posing a rate so trifling as that required to yield £300 a year. Besides, the objection that a man might better his chances of election by saying that he would not ask fur payment, is equally applicable to the system of universal payment out of the Imperial Treasury. What is to pre- vent a rich candidate announcing that if he is returned he will devote the whole of his salary to public objects ? It might be held to be corrupt to say that he would sub- scribe his £300 a year to local charities, or to the local races ; but nothing could prevent his promising to spend it on public objects of a general character,—to subscribe £300 a year to the Consumptive Hospital, to the Earls- wood Asylum, or to the Society for the Protection of Children. It would be by no means only the Conserva- tives who would give undertakings of this kind. Plenty of rich Gladstonians, who fear Labour competitors far more than the Tories, would declare that they did not want any reward except "the honour of representing Little Peddling- ton ;" and that they would therefore every year find some deserving object on which to bestow the official salary. In a word, since it is impossible to force money on people, the objection that the rich man will seek to curry favour with the electors by giving back his pay, is as good against one scheme as another. You cannot put the poor man and the rich man on an equal footing in Parliament any more than elsewhere. Disguise it as you will, the rich man is rich, the poor man poor. What, then, we should prefer to do, if the Payment-of- Members question is to be touched at all, is this. We would give any constituency the right to pay any duly elected Member the sum of .e300 a year, or less, as long as he remained their Member. This would be a return to the old system. Oddly enough, we believe that at the present day there is nothing to prevent any Member of Parliament from claiming at common law his expenses (and expenses would include reasonable remunera- tion) at the hands of the constituency for which he sits. We wish some Member would test the matter by suing out a writ against the Corporation of his borough. It was Lord Campbell's opinion that such 14 course would be perfectly legal. If that opinion is good, payment of Members might be obtained in its best form without further trouble. Why will not Mr. Heir Hardie, who is full of the spirit of adventure, try his hand at an action against the Mayor and Corporation of West Ham?
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