MR. PATRICK O'BRIEN (for Mr. CUNINGHAME GRAHAM,) Lanark, N.W.I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if his attention has been drawn to the decision of the Magistrate of the Southwark Police Court, given on 4th November, 1891, by which, under Statute 6 & 7 Vic., c. 86, s. 33, he fined a conductor in the service of the London General Omnibus Company for allowing "a person beside himself to ride on the steps and in the place provided for him," contrary to the Statute; also to the decision of the Magistrate at the Marlborough Street Police Court, on 19th February, 1892, dismissing the summons issued under the same section of the same Statute, 6 & 7 Vic., c. 86, s. 33, against a conductor of the London Omnibus Carriage Company, and characterising the summons as a "vexatious proceeding," and fining the plaintiffs £2 2s.; and also to the refusal of a summons by the Magistrate at Bow Street Police Court for the same offence, under the same section of the same Statute, on Saturday, 27th February, 1892; and is there any authority, other than that of an expensive reference to a Superior Court, such as that of the Secretary of State, or the Law Officers of the Crown, or the Chief Magistrate at Bow Street, to which an appeal might be made in these different interpretations of the law, so as to bring them into uniformity of practice and action?
§ MR. MATTHEWSI am informed by the Chief Magistrate that the different decisions which appear to have been given by Magistrates in the several cases referred to by the hon. Member were not produced by any difference of opinion among the Magistrates as to the law, but depended upon a considerable difference in the facts. The Chief Magistrate also informs me that in practice, when there is a difference of opinion among the Magistrates upon a point of law, the matter is brought before all the Magistrates at the next quarterly meeting, 1301 and in almost all cases a uniformity of action is arrived at as a result of the discussion which takes place.