ENGLISH POLITICS. A HOME RULER ELECTED. MR BALFOUR IN DEFENCE.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 318, 21 November 1888, Page 5

ENGLISH POLITICS. A HOME RULER ELECTED. MR BALFOUR IN DEFENCE.

London, November 17. The election of a representative fo Dewsbury in place of Sir John Simon' who recently resigned the seat in the House of Commons, took place to-day. Mr Holroyd, a supporter of Home Rule for Ireiand, was returned by a majority of 2,102 over Mr Arnold Forsler, wno stood in the Unionist in terest.

London, November 17. Mr A. J. Balfour, Chief Secretary for Ireland, addressed a meeting at Leeds this evening, and reviewed at length Mr Gladstone's remarks at Birmingham on the present administration 1 of affairs in Ireland. Speaking first as to Mr Gladstone's attack on Irish officials, Mr Balfour explained that many of the appointments had been made by the Gladstone Government. The speaker characterised the ex-Premier's utterances as shameful, and taid a more scandalous speech had never been made by a gentleman who was acknowledged to be a great statesman. In many instances, Mr Balfour contended Mr Gladstone had wilfully suppressed facts, and had attributed to the present Government crimes which he had committed hirasfclf. In the House of Commons, Mr R. C.Graham, M.P. for Lanark, N. W., delivered himself of a violent and bitter speech directed against the police. He scathingly denounced the administration of the Home Department by Mr Matthews, particularly condemning him for allowing the Whitechapel murders to go unpunished, while his officers clubbed the unemployed for asserting their light to meet in public places. He declared that Parliament alone stood between Mr Matthews and death ; for, if the people did not feel confidence in their representatives to see that justice was done, the life of the Home Secretary would have been in jeopardy many a time. If the present brutal policy was persisted in, there would be in London a repetition of the Chicago riots.

The Nonconformists' Unionist Associates entertained Lords Salisbury and Haitington to. a banquet last even* ing, and presented them with an address in favour of the Unionist policy as sustaining law in Ireland, signed by 864 out of 900 Nonconformist clergymen in Ireland. Lord Salisbury, replying to the address of the Nonconformists, said the singular unanimity of the address showed that a vast public opinion, hitherto ungauged in Ireland, regarded with teiror the insane policy of some English statesmen. No one knew the I meaning of Mr Gladstone's Home Rule scheme, and the Radicals appeared to 1 be in a similar position to the crew of [ a vessel sailing under sealed orders.