§ SIR ROBERT CUNLIFFEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it has not been ascertained that the sanction to the consecration of the the cemetery at Rhos, Denbighshire, was obtained as the result of an application by the Rev. Thomas Jones, the vicar of the parish, made without the authority of the Burial Board and contrary to the wishes of the inhabitants, and also based on information which, by reason of its inaccuracy and incompleteness, was calculated to and did mislead the Home Secretary; whether the consecration of such portion of the cemetery by the Bishop of St. Asaph was not the result of an application made by the vicar, and churchwardens, also without the authority and knowledge of the board, the Bishop, as well as the Secretary of State, being kept in ignorance of the real facts of the case; whether he will lay upon the Table the Correspondence which has taken place; and, whether, under the circumstances, he does not consider that some steps should be taken to prevent the vicar from exacting fees in or exercising other privileges over the whole of the ground the consecration of which has been obtained by such means?
§ MR. RAIKESasked if the right hon. and learned Gentleman would be good enough to state to the House the precise injury that the inhabitants of the parish had sustained by the consecration?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTSir, the state of the facts is this, that under the present law as to any ground which is consecrated, the Vicar has a right to have the fees, whether he performs the service or not. If the ground is not consecrated the fees are only paid to the person who performs the ceremony. The person who is responsible for appropriating the ground for consecration is the Secretary of State, and for that purpose he collects, as best he can, the wishes and the wants of the parish or the district as it may be. He has a right to expect that those who give him information on the subject should give him true and complete information. In this case, I am sorry to say, the Vicar did not take that course. He made representations to me which, in the words of the Question, were "inaccurate and incomplete, and were calculated to and did mislead me" as to the wishes and wants of the district. I have expressed, in a letter in the Correspondence which will be produced, my strong disapprobation of that course so taken by him. With reference to the further part of the Question, certainly if accurate information had been supplied to me what was done would not have been done; but the ground having been consecrated, I know no method by which that act can be undone, nor is there any method by which the legal consequences attaching to consecration can fail so to attach. I have no power to prevent the Vicar from exacting fees in the ground now that it has been consecrated.
§ MR. RAIKESasked, in justice to the Vicar, whether it was not the fact that he still maintained that the information supplied by him to the right hon. and learned Gentleman was both accurate and complete?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTThe House will be able to judge of that when it sees the Correspondence.
§ MR. STANLEY LEIGHTONinquired whether the Burial Board had not passed a resolution that no portion of the ground should be consecrated; and whether that resolution was not contrary to the law, which required a portion of every cemetery to be consecrated?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTI cannot say that such a resolution is contrary to law, because, in my view, the Burial Board have no legal authority with regard to the appropriation of the ground.