§ MR. SEXTONI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Irish Attorney General will appear on behalf of the Resident Magistrates who committed Mr. Blakeney, agent to Lord de Freyne, to be tried on a charge of burning an inhabited dwelling house, Mr. Blakeney having now applied to the Queen's Bench for a writ of certiorari, with a view to quash the committal; and whether there is any precedent for a motion to interpose a writ of certiorari between a committal by a competent tribunal and the trial of the case by a jury?
§ MR. ASQUITH (for Mr. J. MORLEY)The conditional order made by the Court of Queen's Bench in this case contains a direction that it should be served on the chief Crown Solicitor on behalf of the committing Justices. The Attorney General will, therefore, appear. As regards the inquiry in the second paragraph, I am advised that the question of precedent is involved in the legal points raised and to be argued before the Court, and that it would, therefore, be now irregular to discuss it.