§ Mr. Harveywished to take that opportunity of asking the hon. Member for St. Alban's what progress had been made towards the completion of any plan by which the division of that House might be taken by authority? He was induced to put the question, because many hon. Gentlemen had reason to complain of the irregularity and inaccuracy of the lists which at present went forth to the public; and at the present moment there was no subject in which the public took greater interest, than the manner in which their representatives divided on important and interesting questions. When he said, that Members had reason to complain of the imperfect manner in which the lists were now made out, he alluded particularly to the Motion brought forward by the hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Wason) the other night for referring the Great Yarmouth petition to a Select Committee. Those Gentlemen who entered the House only at the sound of a bell, and who took no part in the debate, perhaps had no great reason to complain of any inaccuracy that might occur. But to those hon. Gentlemen who attended a debate of four or five hours duration, the greater part of which, in all probability, had no bearing whatever upon the subject in hand—an attendance which imposed no slight tax upon their time and 643 patience—he thought it was too much, on such occasions, to find that their names were wholly omitted from the list of the division. He (Mr. Harvey) had attended the debate on Tuesday from the beginning to the end; he had been in the House from the commencement of its sitting until the debate upon the Great Yarmouth petition was concluded, and yet he had afterwards the mortification to find that, by some accident or other, his name was wholly omitted from the list of the division. Under these circumstances, he trusted that the hon. Member for St. Alban's, who had brought forward a Motion upon the subject, would not relax in his exertions to bring forward some specific plan by which an inconvenience of which all had reason to complain, might speedily be removed.
§ Mr. Wardbegged to remind the hon. Gentleman that he (Mr. Ward) had for some time past left the matter entirely in the hands of the right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He had applied to that right hon. Gentleman upon the subject the other day, and was informed that the right hon. Gentleman had prepared an estimate which it would shortly be in his power to lay upon the Table of the House.