§ MR. BLAKEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Salmon Fisheries Act, 1873, which first gave power to boards of conservators to frame bye-laws, provides that those who pay licence duties for fishing "common" waters shall have the right to elect a representative member to the fishery board of their district; and, if so, whether he can explain why the licensed fishermen of the "common" fishery of Hoarwithy in the River Wye have never elected a representative to the Wye Fishery Board; and, whether the Home Secretary will take care that these "common" water fishermen shall in future be permitted to exercise and enjoy the right of election conferred upon them by the Legislature?
MR. ASSHETON CROSS,in reply, said, this was a peculiar case, and he understood that the right to fish in the Hoarwithy Water was given up on condition that all the salmon caught should be publicly exposed for sale on the highway for the benefit of women who were ill in child-bed. It was doubtful whether the fishermen were entitled to elect a representative, and this could not be settled until a Court of Law had decided whether this place was a fishery in the true sense or not.