e of opposition the number of
peers which would have had to be created to ensure
the enactment of the bill would have been some
400.]

[Footnote 160: The final vote in the Lords was 131
to 114. The Unionist peers who voted with the
Government numbered 37.]

IV. THE PARLIAMENT ACT OF 1911 AND AFTER (p. 112)

*115. Provisions Relating to Money Bills.*--In its preamble the
Parliament Act promises further legislation which will define both the
composition and the powers of a second chamber "constituted on a
popular instead of an hereditary basis"; but the act itself relates
exclusively to the powers of the chamber as it is at present
constituted. The general purport of the measure is to define the
conditions under which, while the normal methods of legislation remain
unchanged, financial bills and proposals of general legislation may
nevertheless be enacted into law without the concurrence of the upper
house. The first signal provision is that a public bill passed by the
House of Commons and certified by the Speaker to be, within the terms
of the act, a "money bill" shall, unless the Commons direct to the
contrary, become an act of Parliament on the royal assent being
signified, notwithstanding that the House of Lords may not have
consented to the bill, within one month after it shall have been sent
up to that house. A money bill is defined as "a public bill which, in
the judgment of the Speaker, contains only provisions dealing with all
or any of the following subjects: the imposition, repeal, remission,
alteration, or regulation of taxation; the imposition for the payment
of debt or other financial purposes of charges on the Consolidated
Fund, or on money provided by Parliament, or the variation or repeal
of any such charges; supply; the appropriation, receipt, custody,
issue or audit of accounts of public money; the raising or guarantee
of any loan or the payment thereof; or subordinate matters incidental
to those subjects or any of them." A certificate of the Speaker given
under this act is made conclusive for all purposes. It may not be
questioned in any court of law.[161]

[Footnote 161: An incidental effect of the act is
to exalt the power and importance of the Speaker,
although it should be observed that the Speaker