IIESINESS REFORM IN PARLIAMENT.
A JIETURN obtained by Colonel Dunne goes far th explain the reason why the People's ll'ouse of Parliament habitually makes so little way with the work intrusted to it. The obstruction is ex- plained by the fact, that the Reform Bill did not so m.uch reform Parliament itself as it reformed the mere mode of appointing the Representatives. It did not throw open. the election to the whole people, nor did it profess to do so ; it only substituted one set of electfors for another. 'Unquestionably the change has resulted in giving "peer admission to a useful class of Members, more imme- diate representing the tradi g classes ; but it has not made so much difference in the conduct of Parliament or the eharaoter of its legislation as the public was led to expect. Probably the rea- son is, that the class neWly admitted to the franchise was more moved* the desire of Obtaining certain speCific measures favour- able-to-commerce or to the, local influence-of the trading classes, than by the desire of elevating the statesmanship of Parliament, or erren improving thelmachinery with which it works.
No .doubt.pithel inai3hinery has received some 'improvement, and
for an reason. 'The immense increase of business would:a:lave made it, impaslible to proceed at all, if some improve- ments had not been introduoed ; and accordingly, the -Commons have..reformed their ways just so far as to avoid a total stop-, page or break-down in- the- public business. The immense in- crease of election disputes, ,for example, would have made Par- liament' sink under the pressure and confess itself incompetent, if -successive improvements had not expedited business and fa- cllitatediithe selection of Members to *im.;.-the •Committe,es of
this class ;. improveznenV tliough4Viifte not realized fall and certain results in the skips "of inhatential L justice. Mem-
beim eau okanage Tie fiflj1j theAttquirynt;nlbut are im- potent:An preiventriscianlialb like'those with which-St. -bansdsfill casts oppolrima: aped :diltefortned,Parlianient. In like manner, theffillxilmiioitndf ordinary SelsotlOommitteework amongst the-
Members of the House has rendered it possible to make a show. of keeping up with the business; but it is only a show. The neglect, or rather the positive refusal, to extend reform to the nature of the business itself, or to the method of treating it, still exposes Members to that overwhelming increase which makes their pro- gress a jest. The little improvement which transferred a portion of investigatory duties in railway affairs to the Board of Trade is an exception, which at once admitted the necessity and proved how useless anything but a thorough improvement must be.
Not only must it be said that Parliament still undertakes to in- quire into every kind of details of the measures brought before it, from those which concern the fate of empires to the mere parish business of building a slaughterhouse, or even strictly private of- fairs, but that it has invited enormous additions to its labours of that kmd. It Members—all who are not too old or who are not disqualified—are parcelled out into the Select Committees which are required every session. By Colonel Dunne's return we find, that during the last four sessions, the average number of Com- mittees appointed in each of those sessions ranged from thirty- nine to forty-four. The duration of the several Committees was of course very various ; the average was about fifteen or twenty days, but in some cases the time extended to sixty or seventy days. In spite of the disengagement of Members by the termina- tion of inquiries, half the working strength of the House was con- stantly engaged in this sort of business. The House indeed does not possess a sufficient number of available men for a real distribu- tion of the work ; but in order to keep up a show of properly man- ning all the Committees that are required, the working Members are obliged to serve on several Committees—as many as six or seven in a session, nay, three or four at once. This is an evil which was pointed out at the very commencement of the Reformed Parlia- ment: at that time—nay, several months before the first House of Commons under the Reform Act assembled—we showed, in detail, how this plurality of seats occasioned that "impossible attendance in Committees" which burdens Parliament, not only with the too great mass of work that it does manage to scramble through, but also with the pretence of doing a great deal more, which really is an impracticable fiction.
One kind of improvement which has been effected is not very satisfactory in its consequences : Members have learned much more generally that art of cross-examination which is necessary for searching inquiry; but as the general tendency, of the Reform Act has been to introduce a class of Members who have marked or positive convictions only on a few topics, and those topics not im- mediately bearing upon the spirit and conduct of statesmanship, the effect has been to weaken the faculties of Parliamentary men for coming to definite conclusions. Witnesses are more actively cross-examined, subjects are more thoroughly discussed in Com- mittee; but the practice increases of "reporting the evidence" without any real report at all, and still oftener with a report that only evades the duty of stating the conclusion enforced by the evidence. The Committees burden the public mind with tons of blue-book information, but supply no clue to the drift or value of that information. Parliament is becoming the "grand inquest" &c., without a verdict!
The delusive idea that Parliament must continue to super- intend, in person, all the district and parish legislation of the country, makes it cling with eagerness to the lowest class of its duties—the local and private business ; which it cannot conduct so effectively as it could by delegates more closely acquainted with the places or subjects to be handled. At the same time distracted by those smaller matters, or enervated by its own neutralized con- victions, Parliament is suffering the political conduct of the country to fall into neglect, or is delegating its authority to the heads of departments for the time being, who substitute for the convictions of organic life the convictions of official routine. "If the business of Parliament is conducted only a little better than it is at present—if profusion is only a little checked—if legislation is only a Utile more enlightened—if only a little more activity, and a little more deliberate attention, are bestowed upon the complicated interests of this vast empire— the disappointment will be deep and the indignation bitter. The people will either be incited to tear in pieces a constitution which does them so little good after all the mending bestowed upon it, or will sink into indifference, and, not caring how they exercise a franchise so useless to them, will allow every abuse of the old system again to take root and flourish as rank as ever." So we wrote in September 1832: the sentence now reads like a warning written after the fact. The reason is, that in this twen- tieth.year of Reform, the cause of Parliamentary inefficiency re- mains all but untouched. This cause, we may still say, as we said in September 1832, "is the badness of the machinery of the House of Commons, which at present disables that body from per- forming its functions ; and the wasting of the powers of this ma- chinery, upon objects which do not belong to it." Lord John Russell has promised a new Reform Bill; but here we see that the old Reform Bill is not even yet completed ; al- though the supplemental reform so much needed might have be ç, accomplished long ago by any Government bent upon doing dated public work well and thoroughly. ghly. Let us remember, too, thin° " extension of the suffrage will effect this most necessaryao-r doauubtoi meat in the ways of Parliament. Anted and
or us; but
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