§ THE EARL OF POWIScalled attention to the Draft Regulations submitted for the approval of the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State under the Prosecutions of Offences Acts, 1879 and 1884 (see Commons Papers 146 and 153 of 1885); and also to the deductions as agency fees imposed by the Solicitor to the Treasury on local solicitors employed to conduct prosecutions on behalf of the Public Prosecutor under those Acts.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR (Lord HALSBURY)said, that the noble Earl 657 was under an entire misapprehension, first of all with respect to the Regulations which he thought were in operation. He feared there was no possibility of their coming into operation for some time. By the provision of the Statute they must be for 40 days on the Table of both Houses of Parliament before they could come into operation. They were laid on the Table of the House of Commons, but not on the Table of their Lordships' House, and therefore they could not receive the approval of Parliament as required. He thought it would be absolutely necessary that they should be on the Table of the new Parliament before they should come into operation. That was an illustration of the great difficulty in the way of the administration of the Office of Attorney General. His right hon. and learned Friend (Sir Henry James), who had given great labour to this subject, had only the voluntary assistance he could get in his Office, and having laid those Regulations on the Table of the library of the House of Commons it did not occur to him to do the same thing in the House of Lords. The Regulations of 1879 were still in operation. And here he must ask the noble Earl to give him his attention, because he had made a most serious mistake, the result of which was to cast an imputation on a most distinguished and deserving public officer. The noble Earl had fallen under the impression that Sir Augustus Stephenson had some interest of his own in what he called the hocus-pocus of fees and the deductions. The noble Earl had been entirely misled by some technical phraseology which there was not a solicitor in the country who did not understand. When they spoke of agency charges what was meant was the charges made by one solicitor on another. When a solicitor accepted a retainer from another solicitor he did not make the ordinary charges to a client, but half-charges. The solicitor in London directed a solicitor in the country to take up this or that case as his agent, and under no circumstances could a solicitor acting as agent obtain the full charges of a solicitor. The noble Earl was in error in supposing that the full charges were made in the first instance and that afterwards the deductions were made. The solicitors made out their bills on the agency scale and were paid on that scale. 658 The foes which appeared in the account were the fees actually charged and paid, and there was not the smallest foundation for the imputation that had been made that Sir Augustus Stephenson augmented his salary by charging higher fees than he paid. Sir Augustus Stephenson had done his duty as a public officer in saving what he could save for the public in regard to these public prosecutions; and, on the other hand, the solicitors received every farthing for which they contracted.