HC Deb 27 May 1892 vol 5 cc45-6
MR. PHILIPPS (Lanark, Mid)

I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the fact that the Registrar of Friendly Societies demands that the "Wishaw Building and Investment Society" should change its name to the "Wishaw Investment and Building Society," and, seeing that this Building Society was established in 1858, and incorporated under the Building Societies Act of 1874, and that the said Society lately resolved to alter and amend its Rules, whether it is compulsory for the Society to alter its name although unwilling to do so; and whether Section 7 of the Treasury Regulations, as to the names of Societies, applies only to Societies established at a date subsequent to that of the Act of 1874?

MR. GOSCHEN

I will answer this questson for my right hon. Friend. The hon. Member is mistaken in supposing that the Assistant Registrar of Friendly Societies for Scotland as Registrar of Building Societies in Scotland has "demanded that the Wishaw Building and Investment Society should change its name." It is not "compulsory for the Society to alter its name if it is unwilling to do so." As regards the last paragraph of the hon. Member's question, Regulation 7 of the Secretary of State's Regulations—to which I presume he refers—as to the names of Societies, does not "apply only to Societies established at a date subsequent to that of the Act of 1874," but, so far as regards a change of name, applies to all incorporated Building Societies. The facts of the case to which the hon. Member alludes are that, under Regulation 5 of the Secretary of State's Regulations, the Assistant Registrar of Friendly Societies for Scotland has refused to register a complete alteration of rules for the Wishaw Society until such complete alteration or new set of rules has been brought into conformity with the Building Societies Acts by the Society's adopting a name of which the last words shall be "Building Society"; but under Regulation 4 he has offered to register a partial alteration of Rules under the Society's present registered name.