Sir Lyon Playfair opened the debate on Tuesday in a
speech in which he denied that the Procedure resolutions of 1882 had been a failure. In 1881, the Speaker had had to intervene 935. times, and the Chairman of Committees 939 times. He believed that 150 hours of the time of the House were in that Session waged in these wrangles between the Speaker and private Members, Sir Lyon Playfair advocated an automatic) motion for a closure of the debate at the hour of suspension. If the House did not approve the closure, that would at once be ap- parent; if it did, the motion that the question be now put would be carried. He was very favourable to the Grand Committees,. which worked admirably under fair conditions. Sir J. Mowbray disapproved of an automatic proposal for Closure at the end of each sitting, and insisted that the Speaker had now a much more difficult task to discharge in giving expression to "the evident sense of the House" than he would have under the new rule. Lord Harlington agreed in this, and said that unless the Speaker's assent were required, the proposal for the
would itself be made one of the most effective means of obstruction. Mr. Courtney advocated a new rule allowing Members to propose at the opening of a sitting the suspension of the rule for closing it at a certain fixed hour, on condition that this proposal should be voted on without amendment or debate. Mr. Bryce was for excluding any veto by the Speaker, but for allowing the proposal of the Closure to come only from the Member in charge of a Bill, or from the Government. Against the protest of the Leader of the House the general debate was again adjourned, on the motion of Mr. Flynn ; but on Wednesday, when it was resumed, it did not appear that Irish Members had any great interest in it, Mr. Flynn and Mr. J. O'Connor being the only Irish speakers, the one opening, and the other talking out the debate at 5.45.
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