§ MR. H. FOSTER (Suffolk, Lowestoft)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will agree to supplement the Return of Expenses at Parliamentary Elections, 1892, recently presented to the House of Commons by the Home Office, by giving the total number of voters on the Register 1154 in each case and of the starred or duplicate voters?
§ MR. ASQUITHThis cannot be done, for the Registers for 1892 have been destroyed. The annual Return of Parliamentary Constituencies issued by the Home Office gives, so far as possible, the total number of Parliamentary electors, excluding all names marked by the Revising Barrister under Section 7 (5) of the County Electors Act, 1888, i.e., the net figures. To give the gross numbers (1) of names on the Register (2) of names marked under the above-quoted section would require a special Circular to Town Clerks and Clerks to County Councils; unless, indeed, an opportunity occurs of amending Section 37 of the Registration Act, 1868, by requiring Registers sent to the Secretary of State to be accompanied by a summary in a prescribed form. I cannot undertake to issue a Circular at present. As to duplicates other than names marked as above, officers in charge of registers have always protested their inability to give them.