§ Order for Second Reading read.
§ MR. W. R. ORMSBY GORE,in moving the second reading of the Bill, said, it was a Bill to amend the law in certain cases relative to the recovery of penalties for trespass on lands in Ireland in pursuit of game, and to prevent the necessity of the occupiers of land not interested in such game being made party prosecutors in proceedings for the recovery of such penalties. The object of the measure was to assimilate the law of Ireland in this respect to that which had existed in England since the Act of 1831, and which had been found to work very well. According to the law of England it was not necessary to obtain the consent of the tenant to proceedings in cases of trespass. In Ireland, on the other hand, the tenant was in this unfortunate predicament, that he must either risk the displeasure of his landlord in refusing to lend his name to a prosecution, or incur the enmity of some ruffian who would be revenged if the tenant appeared against him. All the Bill sought to do was to oblige the landlord, where lie had the right of game, to make use of his own name in a prosecution instead of that of the tenant. As the law-stood at present, it was very inoperative. For instance, on mountain land, where tenants had the right of grazing cattle, when a prosecution for trespass became 1706 necessary, every such tenant's name must be put in the prosecution, and perhaps there might be forty or fifty of them, and the omission of a single name would vitiate the prosecution. He had had a number of letters from Ireland approving of the principle of the Bill, and there could be no doubt that it would relieve the tenant very considerably.
§ Moved, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. W.R. 0. Gore.)
§ SIR ROBERT PEELsaid, he did not object to the second reading of the Bill, but on several points it required amendment. It did not give the right of appeal which was given in the English Act, and the second clause was not sufficiently clearly drawn. If there was no agreement with the tenant in writing, the right of preserving game would not hold good; and he thought the probable effect of the Bill would be to induce landlords to enter into such agreements in order that they might have the right of sporting over their estates. He would be glad to assist his hon. Friend in carrying the Bill through.
§ Bill read 2o, and committed for Wednesday, 13th April.