[BILL 179.] COMMITTEE. (Hansard, 5 June 1882)

§ MR. MONK
said, the House was aware that this Bill had been before the Select Committee, and had been considerably altered in detail. The Report of the Committee had only been issued 211 two or three days previously, and as hon. Members might not have had time sufficiently to consider its contents, he proposed merely to go into Committee pro formâ, and to put down the Bill for that day week.

§ MR. HORACE DAVEY
said, he was sorry to trouble the House at that late hour; but if his hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester insisted upon his Motion he should feel it his duty to take a division upon it. He had the strongest objections to this Bill. It was perfectly true, as his hon. Friend had said, that the Report of the Select Committee had only been in the hands of hon. Members for two or three days. That being so, he must press his objection to proceeding any further with the Bill at that moment. The objections he had were that the Bill was useless, and that so far as it was not useless it was absolutely objectionable. He ventured to say that this Bill would be of no use to any professional man; and, on the other hand, it would be mischievous to the public, because it pretended to be a Code of Partnership Law. If it were necessary that a codification of this law should take place, it should, in his opinion, be carried out by the responsible Government, with the assistance of experts. Without wishing to speak disrespectfully of the Committee which sat to consider this Bill, he ventured to suggest that they were not fully able to deal with this important branch of the law.

MR. EUSTACE SMITH
said, he hoped his hon. and learned Friend would not persevere in his opposition to this Bill, which expressed the unanimous feeling of the Chambers of Commerce throughout the country. The Bill came down simply in the form of a codification of the existing law. It was easy for his hon. and learned Friend to say that it would do no good to anybody; and, from the point of view of his hon. and learned Friend, no doubt it would do very little good to any leading Queen's Counsel or leading solicitor in the country. But it 212 would be a good text-book to men who wished to enter into partnership, and who desired to make themselves acquainted with the obligations by which they would be bound. He, therefore, trusted his hon. and learned Friend would allow the Bill to go into Committee, where any Amendments which he had to suggest would meet with the fullest consideration. It was generally the case, when any scheme for codification of law was presented to the House, to say, if it were a large scheme, the House had no time to deal with it; whereas, if it were a small one, it was alleged that it was dealing in a petty manner with a large subject. He would remind hon. Members that if that form of criticism were always enforced they would never be able to make progress with any measure of the kind. He appealed to his hon. and learned Friend to allow the Bill to go into Committee.

§ MR. T. C. BARING
said, he thought the Bill contained matter that should be left out, and left out matter which it ought to contain.

§ MR. WARTON
considered that the taunts which had been thrown out against the Legal Profession by the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Eustace Smith) were quite unjustified in the present case, because he was certain that a question of this kind would be considered in the minds of all impartial lawyers without any reference to their fees. The hon. Member had thrown considerable light upon the origin of this Bill, which was, in fact, legislation by the Chambers of Commerce. If these bodies considered themselves superior to the House of Commons in a matter of this kind, the better plan would be for them to codify the law themselves without coming to Parliament.

§ MR. WHITLEY
said, he was sorry to hear the remarks which had fallen from the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. Horace Davey), because he could assure the Committee that this Bill had met not only with the approval of the mercantile community, but also with the approval of many members of the Legal Profession. He represented one of the largest mercantile communities in the United Kingdom; and ho could say, from his own knowledge, that both the mercantile and the legal community in that town were strongly in favour of this measure. It 213 was a most desirable Bill for the codification of the law upon a subject of the strongest interest to the commercial classes in this country, and expressed in the most simple manner all that people could wish to understand with regard to the Law of Partnership. He was persuaded that the more this Bill was studied the more it would commend itself to the approval of those who were interested in the codification of commercial law; and, certainly, he hoped it would receive the sanction of Parliament. He did not know whether the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Monk) would press his Motion on the present occasion; but, if so, he, for one, was prepared to support him. He repeated that the Bill was a most useful one; it had on the back of it the names of Representatives of some of the largest commercial cities in the country; and he certainly trusted that the commercial Members of that House would give it the support which it deserved.

§ MR. CHAMBERLAIN
said, this Bill came before the House on the present occasion in a different form to that in which it was first introduced. The Bill originally proposed some important changes in the law, upon which there would have been considerable difference of opinion. But these proposed changes had been omitted from this Bill in consequence of the action of the Committee upstairs. The Bill now came before the House chiefly as a measure of codification. His own opinion was that codification of the law was of the greatest advantage wherever it could possibly be effected, and, in the present case, would be undoubtedly of the greatest advantage to the commercial community, even if it were not so to lawyers. If the Bill carried out what it professed to do, he said it was worthy of support in that House. With regard to the Bill, as a measure of codification, he admitted the necessity of having the opinion of experts upon it, and that the opinion of the commercial community alone was not sufficient. The matter had at different stages occupied the attention of the Department over which he had the honour to preside; and he had, to some extent, examined into the subject, with the assistance of the officials of the Department. But he had done something more than that. He had submitted the Bill to Mr. Justice Lindley, and that 214 learned Judge had been kind enough to go through it. On the whole his Lordship approved the Bill, but made some minor suggestions, which were adopted by the Board of Trade, submitted to the hon. Member for Gloucester, accepted by him, and then incorporated in the Bill. Under these circumstances, although he was prepared to admit that there might still be some points on which codification had not been properly effected, yet he submitted that these were rather matters for the consideration of the Committee of the House. He was in hope the House would allow the Committee stage of the Bill to be taken, and that his hon. Friend would consent to postpone further progress for a fortnight. Then in Committee of the House any further Amendments which the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. Horace Davey) had to propose could be fully considered. For these reasons he should vote for the Motion to go into Committee.

§ MR. HORACE DAVEY
said, as the Government would vote against the Motion for Adjournment, he should not trouble the House to divide.

§ MR. T. C. BARING
pointed out that, the Bill being now in Committee, it might on a future occasion be brought on at any hour of the night; and, therefore, he thought some undertaking should be given that it would be brought on at an hour at which it could be fairly discussed. This was essentially necessary if there were any Amendments of importance to consider.

§ MR. WARTON
said, he hoped the hon. Member for Gloucester would reply to the suggestion of the hon. Member for South Essex.

§ MR. MONK
said, he regretted he could give no pledge whatever. Hon. Members must be aware that it was not in his power to bring on the Bill at any hour he pleased. In existing circumstances it was useless to expect to bring 215 on a Bill before 1 o'clock in the morning.