§ MR. BIGGARasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If his attention has been called to a report of proceedings in the Belfast Police Court, which appeared in The Belfast Morning News of 5th February 1885, in which it was alleged, and not since denied, that Mr. Forbes, one of the resident magistrates of the district, caused a summons to be issued against the chief of the fire brigade in Belfast for a supposed assault on a policeman named M'Lelland; that he (Mr. Forbes) issued and signed the said summons; that he fixed a day for the hearing of the complaint so that he (Mr. Forbes) might adjudicate on the case; is it true that when Mr. Forbes found that he could not be present to act judicially in the matter, he made an order to Mr. Coulter, prosecuting solicitor, to have it adjourned to a future date, so that he could be present; is it true that Mr. Harper, solicitor for the defendant, opposed Mr. Coulter's effort to have a date fixed to suit Mr. Forbes' convenience, and urged strongly the fact that Mr. Forbes' conduct in the case was charged with the suspicion of unfairness towards the defendant, and that if the case were adjourned for Mr. Forbes' attendance, his client would be obliged to make an affidavit that before Stipendiary Forbes "he could not get a fair trial;" and, what notice will be taken in case it be true that Mr. Forbes' conduct is correctly described?
§ MR. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANI find that in this case a summons and a cross-summons were issued; the former at the instance of the Constabulary, and the latter at the instance of the Solicitor of the Corporation. The summons was fixed for hearing on the 4th February, and the cross-summons on the 11th, and both were signed by Colonel Forbes, in the ordinary discharge of his duty. Some of the parties to the summons case appear to have desired an adjournment to the 11th, in order that both cases might be heard together, and that the presence of a Resident Magistrate—which was doubtful on the 4th—might be secured; but the Bench before whom the summons came on the 4th decided to proceed with 428 it, and the result was that both cases were then settled. It is not true that the cross-summons was fixed for the 11th, or that the adjournment of the other case to that day was applied for with the view of Colonel Forbes adjudicating on the cases, as I understand that he was on leave on the 4th, and that neither on that day nor on the 11th could he have heard the cases, as his turn of duty, on both occasions, would have been to sit in the other branch of the Police Court.