§ SIR WILFRID LAWSONasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether, since eighteen keepers of publichouses and beershops in Oxford have been scheduled as guilty of corrupt practices at the Election of May 1880, it is possible for the Home Office to exert any influence which would tend to prevent a renewal of their licences at the approaching licensing sessions?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT, in reply, said, he had never any great influence with the keepers of public-houses and beer-shops in Oxford, and what little influence he had had with them he had lost. With regard to his influence with magistrates, he had no official authority over them in this case. He expressed his personal opinion every day upon the subject; and as regarded the view of the Government on this matter, he thought his hon. Friend might obtain information by looking at the clauses 818 of the Bill of his hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General on Bribery and Corrupt Practices at Elections.