§ MR. C. P. B. M'LAREN (Leicester, Bosworth)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the proceedings at a meeting held on the 27th June last in the vestry of the parish church of Stoke Golding, Leicestershire, for the purpose of electing three members on the Burial Board in that parish in the place of three members retiring by rotation, at which meeting the Rev. Hugh Bryan, vicar of the parish, was in the chair; whether he is aware that, on Mr. Robert Bust, Mr. John Lee, and Mr. Nathan George Bacon being duly proposed and seconded as members in the place of the three retiring, the vicar refused to take these nominations or put to the meeting any vote other than the re-election of the three retiring members, of whom the vicar himself was one; and that, on a poll being demanded and signed by three inhabitants of the parish, the vicar refused to grant a poll; and whether the Local Government Board will take any steps in the matter for the purpose of setting aside the proceedings at the meeting, or enabling the inhabitants of the parish to elect members on the Burial Board?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. ASQUITH, Fife, E.)I have no authority to interfere in this matter. I have received a letter from the vicar which traverses almost the whole of the allegations of fact in the question; but as neither the Home Office, nor, as I am informed, the Local Government Board, have any jurisdiction either to inquire into or to correct the proceedings of a vestry, I have no means of determining what is the true state of the case, or what, if anything, ought to be done. I should suppose that the matter is one which can be raised and decided in a Court of Law.