LEAVE. FIRST READING. (Hansard, 27 April 1860)

§ MR. BOVILL

said, he rose to ask leave to introduce a Bill to repeal so much of the statute relating to stock jobbing as prevents persons selling and disposing of 302 stocks or other securities, of which they are not possessed. He did so in order to raise the question whether there should be a total or only a partial repeal of Sir John Barnard's Act. It was uncertain what the intentions of the Government, with respect to Sir John Barnard's Act, were, for they had given no less than three versions of what were their intentions upon the subject. The Secretary of the Treasury had stated that what Government desired to legalize were simply those transactions which were bonâ fide dealings in stock; but that seemed to be already sufficiently done by an Act of Parliament then in force, and passed in 1845. He desired to retain the principle of the Bill of 1845, the provisions of which were very stringent against gambling on a small scale, while he did not wish to relax those provisions of Sir John Barnard's Act which were directed against gambling on a large scale. The question he wished to raise must, he understood, be decided before the second reading of the Government Bill for the entire repeal of the Act in question, because, after it had reached that stage, it would not be competent to introduce a Bill for partial repeal. If his Bill were carried forward, the House would have before it two propositions, one for repealing the whole, and the other a portion of Sir John Barnard's Act, and the House would then be able to decide between them.