§ MR. F. W. MACLEAN (Oxford, Woodstock)asked the Vice President of the Committee of Council, If he could explain why the income of certain property, assured by two deeds, dated the 30th October 1682 and the 28th February 1786, for the benefit of the poor of Bampton, in Oxfordshire, has remained undistributed and unadministered since the year 1868; why, notwithstanding local inquiries held by the 725 Charity Commissioners at Bampton in 1868 and 1878, relative to such charities, and numerous applications to such Commissioners, nothing whatever has been done in the matter; why such income has been allowed to accumulate for so many years, and whether it now amounts to a considerable sum; whether he is aware that great dissatisfaction exists among the poor and inhabitants generally of Bampton at the delay of the Commissioners in the matter, and what is the reason of such delay; and, whether any, and what, steps can be taken to cause the Commissioners to settle a scheme for the immediate administration and distribution of such income and its accumulations, and the administration of the funds of the charity generally?
§ THE VICE PRESIDENT (Sir LYON PLAYFAIR) (Leeds, S.)(1.) The income has remained undistributed because the Trustees have taken upon themselves to withhold the distribution in consequence of administrative difficulties which they conceived to exist. (2.) The failure to establish a scheme was due to the refusal of the Commissioners to permit the application of the funds of these Charities to the support of the national school. (3.) The accumulation is due to the cause mentioned in the first part of the answer. It consisted in December, 1885, of a sum of £394 1s. 9d. Consols held by the Official Trustees, and of a sum of cash amounting to £64 15s. standing to the credit of the Trustees with their bankers. (4.) The Commissioners received a Memorial from the inhabitants of Bampton in the year 1882; but it is only in the course of the present year that they received such an application from the Trustees as would enable them to proceed with a complete scheme. (5.) A scheme is now in course of preparation, and pending its establishment the Trustees have been advised to make a distribution from the funds in their hands.