§ MR. HOWORTH (Salford, S.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that in a recent case before the Borough Magistrates at Folkestone, involving an 116 important dispute between the consumers and the local Water Company, the Magistrates' clerk, who is also solicitor to the Water Company in question, insisted upon advising the Magistrates, after a protest from the prosecuting solicitor, and after an intimation from the Bench that they were willing to sit without a clerk; whether the clerk did, as a matter of fact, advise the Magistrates to find in favour of the Company; and, whether he will inquire into the conduct of the clerk in this case?
§ MR. MATTHEWSI am informed by the Justices' clerk that he is not the solicitor to the company in question except in Parliamentary proceedings, and that he never advised the Company in local matters. In this case he was not consulted by the company, who were represented by a London solicitor. He acted as clerk in this case, and advised on points of law with the sanction of the Justices. The proceedings in a suit of this nature must be regulated according to the discretion of the Justices, and this is not a matter in which I can interfere.