§ Order of the Day for the Second Pleading, read.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORKin moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, the Bill consisted of a number of details enlarging the powers given by existing Acts. It extended the powers of the 9th section of the "New Parishes Act, 1864" beyond the existing period of five years, so as to enable the Commissioners at any time to alter the boundaries of ecclesiastical districts, which may have become a new parish, for ecclesiastical purposes under that Act; and it enabled trustees or owners of private property, in whole or in part, to surrender their rights to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, in order that the churches might have districts assigned to them, and become to all intents and purposes parish churches. It enabled portions of a benefice, held in severalty, to be consolidated into one. The 8th clause rendered it unnecessary, where the patronage of any benefice is in the incumbent of another benefice, to require the assent of the owner of the advowson to the assign- meat of the former, the lay patron being compensated for the diminution in value of his advowson; and the last section 1583 removed the disability under which certain persons mentioned in 58 Geo. III., c. 45, sec. 31, & 3 Geo. IV., c. 72, sec. 1, were placed to grant land as sites for churches, &c, provided that no such grant shall exceed one acre.
§ Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a"—(The Archbishop of York.)
§ LORD PORTMANreferred, in an inaudible tone, to some of the provisions of the Bill to which he objected.
§ THE EARL OF CHICHESTERsaid, that some parts of the Bill were unnecessary and others objectionable.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, in reply to some of these remarks, explained that no trustee could convey a greater right in churches than he actually possessed, and that, while thinking a right of appeal, on the part of the parishioners, not unreasonable, such a privilege was not contemplated in any of the Church Building Acts, which it was the object of this Bill to amend. As to allowing- a veto, the operation of such a clause in the case of the City churches was a warning against the multiplication of checks of this kind.
§ Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Monday the 21st Instant.