LIEUTENANT-COLONEL PARKERasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been drawn to a statement in the "Leamington Courier" of the 15th March, that, at a meeting of the Labourers' Union in that town, a justice of the peace was instructed to communicate with the Labourers' Association in Ireland with a view of preventing their migration into this Country during the pressure of harvest work; and, if the statement is true, whether such an undertaking is consistent with the duties of a justice of the peace?
MR. BRUCE,in reply, said, that he had seen the Report to which the Questions of the hon. and gallant Member 101 referred. The magistrate did not appear to have been acting as a magistrate on the occasion, but unofficially; and, as he had done nothing illegal, he could not regard this action on his part as a private person as being inconsistent with his duty as a magistrate.