Colonial Empire will last long or speedily perish. The noble lord the Prime Minister, in his great speech on the introduction of this Bill, distinctly admitted that the Australian colonies ought to possess the greatest amount of self-government that is not inconsistent with the integrity and wellbeing of the whole empire. It must be acknowledged that this Bill would not fulfil the intentions of the noble lord in that respect, but would merely continue to the Colonial Office its present powers of interfering in the local affairs of the colonies. For if it pass unamended, there is not one single act which a colonial governor or a colonial parliament can do without the express or implied consent of the Colonial Office, nor one act which may not be reversed by the Colonial Office. I ask the House to consider carefully what are to be the powers of the Colonial Office under this Bill.

First, by this Bill, the Colonial Office would possess the power of instructing every colonial governor as to his conduct in all colonial matters. The governor would be bound to obey his instructions, whether he liked them or not. For instance, he would have to assent to a Bill of which he disapproved; he would have to dissent from a Bill of which he approved, if so commanded from the Antipodes. He would be, therefore, a mere puppet, moved to and fro by wires attached to Downing Street. By pulling those wires the Colonial Office would at once be able to put a stop to any colonial legislation; for instance, if this Bill were to pass, the Colonial Office could make a colonial governor set aside every one of its much-vaunted provisions, and could prevent a colonial legislature from

amending its constitution, from altering the salaries of its chief functionaries, from discharging useless functionaries, from reducing expenditure, and from appropriating money to the payment of any services which the Colonial Office might dislike to have performed.

Secondly, this Bill, in addition to empowering the Colonial Office to instruct a colonial governor how he is to act in all colonial matters, would require, in many cases, that a colonial governor should abstain altogether from acting until he have sent to the other side of the globe, and ascertained the pleasure of the Colonial Office. For by this Bill a colonial governor would be absolutely required to reserve certain colonial Bills; he would be able to reserve any colonial Bill; and he would be bound to reserve any colonial Bill which the Colonial Office might instruct him to reserve. These reserved Bills would have to be sent to Downing Street; there they would await the signification of the pleasure of the Colonial Office, and if that pleasure should not be signified within the course of two years, then the colonial Bill would be lost altogether. Thus, a Bill of great importance to a colony, affecting, perhaps very injuriously some interests, and very beneficially other interests (say, for instance, a Bill of the same importance to a colony as the Corn Law or Ten Hour Bill was to this country)—such a Bill, if it were reserved, would remain for one year at least, and might remain for three years, suspended over a colony, keeping a colony in a state of doubt and anxiety, and engendering the worst feelings towards the Colonial Office and the mother country.

Thirdly, this Bill, in addition to giving the Colonial Office absolute control over all the acts of the colonial governor, would empower the Colonial Office ultimately to annul every act of a colonial governor or of a colonial parliament; for by this Bill the Colonial Office would have power to disallow any colonial Act within two years after its arrival in Downing Street. Thus, after a colonial Act has been in full operation for three years, to the universal satisfaction of the colonists, it might be suddenly annulled by the arrival of a despatch from the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Thus, strictly speaking, by this Bill the Colonial Office would continue to have the power, in the first instance, of preventing anything from being done in a colony by a colonial governor or a colonial parliament; and it would have the power, in the second instance, of making null and void every thing which might be done by a colonial government or a colonial parliament.

Sir, you will acknowledge, that these are vast powers of government. To whom are they to be entrusted? To gentlemen, able and laborious, without doubt, but who have never had ocular experience of the condition of a colony, who have no personal interest in the well-being of the colonists, who are always obliged to trust to second-hand and partial information on all colonial matters, who are, therefore, necessarily ignorant and generally misinformed with regard to colonial affairs, and who, consequently, with the best intentions, cannot fail to commit numerous and grave errors in the management of the local affairs of the colonies, errors similar to those which every one admits that they have committed

M.

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within the last three or four years in New Zealand, New South Wales, Ceylon, South Africa, &c.

Sir, I might take colony after colony, and with regard to each colony, I might mention numerous cases illustrative of the evil consequences of the ignorance of the Colonial Office, combined with the exercise of its powers of instructing colonial governors, and otherwise interfering with the management of the local affairs of a colony. For instance, with regard to the Cape of Good Hope, I might mention that one Secretary of State for the Colonies1 imagined that the Kaffirs (who are the fiercest of savages, and the most warlike and faithless of barbarians), were a peaceful, pastoral people, imbued with Arcadian virtues and simplicity; the instructions which he, in his ignorance, gave to the colonial governor, and which the colonial governor was compelled, against his own better judgment, to obey, led to the series of Kaffir wars, which, at a low estimate, must have cost us nearly £5,000,000 in the last ten or twelve years. With regard to the same colony, I might mention that another Secretary of State for the Colonies, being utterly ignorant of the physical state of South Africa, fancied that the size of farms in that part of the world should not much exceed the size of farms in England; the directions which he, in his ignorance, gave to the colonial governor, and which the colonial governor was compelled to obey, against his own better judgment, made the Dutch Boers abandon Natal, and migrate to the centre of South Africa, where we had to follow them with our troops, and to reduce them to subjection. To illustrate the 1 Lord Glenelg. 2 Lord Stanley.

rashness and indiscretion with which the Colonial Office often acts, I might mention its conduct last year, in consulting the colony of the Cape of Good Hope with regard to the transportation of convicts, and simultaneously transporting them. To illustrate the obstructive character of Colonial Office government, I might mention that the Legislative Council of New South Wales has long wished to have an agent in this country, who should be regularly paid by the Colonial Treasury; the Colonial Office, naturally unwilling to be looked after, has offered every obstruction in its power to the appointment of that agent, by refusing to permit the Legislative Council to pass a Money Bill for his payment. To illustrate the minute interference of the Colonial Office in the local affairs of the colonies, I might mention (as I did on a former occasion) that the inhabitants of the town of Sydney, containing a population of about 50,000 souls, have for some time complained of the practice of slaughtering beasts within that city, as an abominable nuisance in that semi-tropical climate, and injurious to their health; that the Legislative Council two years ago recommended that the slaughter-houses should be removed, and that a plot of land should be sold for the purpose of paying for their removal and for the building of abattoirs; and that this recommendation has not been attended to, because it was necessary to send to this country to obtain the sanction of the Colonial Office before anything could be done. To illustrate the ignorance of the Colonial Office with regard to the condition of a colony, I might mention the constitution of New Zealand, framed one year and suspended the next. To illustrate