MR. MACKINTOSHasked the Lord Advocate, Whether, under the circumstances of the expenses of the Sasine Office in Edinburgh during the last year being only £15,870, while the fees drawn were £32,526 16s. 11d., he will take the claims of owners of lands and heritages in Scotland thus burdened into favourable consideration, and deal with them in the promised legislation connected with Scotland?
§ THE LORD ADVOCATEWhen I introduced, in 1868, the Bill for concentrating in Edinburgh all the Registers of Sasines in Scotland, it was with the hope, among other things, that the cost of registration would be materially reduced, especially in regard to properties of small value. I have now the satisfaction to say that that hope has been realized, and that the consideration to the owners of lands and heritages in Scotland which my hon. Friend desires has already been shown, in so far as the reduction of fees of registration is con-corned. By a new table of fees, com- 409 mencing as from the 1st of April, 1873, and now in operation—being No. 147 of the Papers of last Session—no less a sum than about £15,000 was taken off the foes of registration, still leaving the establishment self-supporting after paying salaries, and with a surplus of between £1,000 and £2,000 to meet contingencies. The reductions have been chiefly on the expense of registration of small properties valued under £5,000, as the fees for large properties were not considered excessive.