§ MR. OCTAVIUS V. MORGAN (Battersea)I beg to ask the Secretary of Stare for the Home Department whether the Metropolitan Magistrates have yet conferred together with the object of arriving at some common understanding as to the administration of the Sale of Food and Drug Acts?
§ MR. MATTHEWSYes, Sir; the Chief Magistrate informs me that he has conferred with his brother Magistrates on this subject. They were unanimous as to the importance of the Acts and as to the principle which should guide them in fixing the amount of fines: and they attributed the difference in the amount of fines inflicted solely to the variety of the circumstances in each ease, the variation ranging from gross fraud to simple accident, and from large to very small adulteration.