Against Home Rule | Page 8

Executive Government in dealing with a large and privileged class.
These considerations make one more reason for refusing the Colonial
analogy which is so ingeniously pressed by such apologists for Home
Rule as Mr. Erskine Childers. Mr. Amery analyses the confusion of
thought between Home Rule as meaning responsible Government and
Home Rule as meaning separate government which underlies the
arguments of Liberal Home Rulers. Ireland has Home Rule in the sense
of having free representative institutions. She is prevented by
geographical and economic conditions from enjoying separate
government under the same terms on which the Colonies possess it. As
Mr. Amery points out, the United Kingdom is geographically a single
island group. No part of Ireland is so inaccessible from the political
centre of British power as the remoter parts of the Highlands, while
racially no less than physically Ireland is an integral part of the United
Kingdom. Economically also the two countries are bound together in a

way which makes a common physical policy absolutely necessary for
the welfare of both countries. The financial arguments which might
have made it possible to permit an independent fiscal policy for Ireland
under free trade, have disappeared with the certain approach of a
revision of the tariff policies of England. There can be no separate
tariffs for the two countries, or even a common tariff, without a
common Government to negotiate and enforce it. If there were no other
objection to the establishment of a separate Government in Dublin, it
would be impossible because legislative autonomy can only be coupled
with financial independence.
The financial difficulties in the way of any grant of Home Rule are
fully explained by Mr. Austen Chamberlain. Three attempts at framing
schemes for financing Home Rule were made by Mr. Gladstone in the
past. All the powers of this great and resourceful dialectician were
employed in defending these various schemes in turn. He was not
deterred from pressing any scheme by the fact that in important details
it was inconsistent with or even opposed to what had been previously
recommended. But if there was one principle on which Mr. Gladstone
never turned his back it was in demanding a contribution from Ireland
for Imperial services. At one time he demanded a cash payment, at
another the assignment of the Customs, and on yet another occasion the
payment to the Imperial Exchequer of a quota--one-third--of the
tax-revenue in Ireland.
The effect of recent social legislation, such as Old Age Pensions,
Labour Exchanges, and Sickness and Unemployment Insurance has
been to confer on Ireland benefits much greater in value than the Irish
contribution in respect of the new taxation imposed. In consequence of
this change the present Irish revenue falls short of the expenditure
incurred for Irish purposes in Ireland. Mr. Chamberlain shows that if
any scheme even remotely resembling any of those put forward on
previous occasions by Mr. Gladstone is embodied in the new Bill, and
if a moderate contribution for Imperial services is included, the Irish
deficit must range from £2,500,000 to £3,500,000. If by any process of
juggling with the figures the Irish Parliament is again to be started with
a surplus the deficit must have been made good by charging it against

the Imperial taxpayer. But again there is no permanence in such a
surplus. It must disappear if the ameliorative measures which are long
overdue in Ireland are undertaken by an Irish Parliament; and previous
experience has already illustrated that even without the adoption of any
such new schemes surpluses would long ago have made room for
deficits. It will be the duty of the Nationalists party to say definitely
what are the fiscal reserves upon which they can draw in order to
establish permanent equilibrium between revenue and expenditure in
Ireland.
Not only does Unionist policy for Ireland involve considerations of
national safety and national honour, but it is also necessary for the
economic welfare of both countries. The remarkable success which has
attended Mr. Wyndham's Land Act of 1903 has alarmed the political
party in Ireland, which depends for its influence on the poverty and
discontent of the rural population of Ireland. Mr. Wyndham in his
article upon Irish Land Purchase shows clearly the blessings which
have followed wherever his Act has been given fair play, and the evils
which have resulted in the suppression of Land Purchase by Mr.
Birrell's Act of 1909. The dual ownership created by Mr. Gladstone's
ill-advised and reckless legislation led to Ireland being starved both in
capital and industry and brought the whole of Irish agriculture to the
brink of ruin, and under these circumstances, Conservative statesmen
determined, in accordance with the principles of the Act of Union, to
use a joint exchequer for the purpose of relieving Irish distress. Credit
of the State was employed