§ MR. HANBURY (Preston)I beg to ask the Attorney General if he will grant a Return showing, for the last five years, which, if any, of the Courts of the Judges of the High Court of Justice have either not sat or have risen before the usual hour on the Derby Day, with the reason for such omission to sit or early adjournment?
§ THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Mr. R. T. REID,&c.) Dumfries,(who replied) said: It is not in the power of the Law Officers of the Crown to grant 692 such a Return. They have no machinery at all for that purpose.
§ MR. HANBURYIs it not the fact that the same Court which was recently adjourned over a whole day for the Newmarket races was on last Wednesday adjourned at 11.35, after sitting only one hour; has the same practice not prevailed in the same Court for some years on the occasion of the principal races; and is it the case that neither the Lord Chancellor nor any other public authority can interfere to prevent this waste of public and private time and money, and that the only check left is the sense of public duty of the Judge himself—Mr. Justice Hawkins.
§ MR. R. T. REIDAs I am not now able to practise in the Courts of Law, I was not in the Royal Courts of Justice on that occasion, and consequently I am afraid I cannot answer the question.
§ MR. HANBURYI beg to give notice that I shall call attention to this matter on the Estimates.
§ MR. DARLING (Deptford)As a question has been asked about the recent adjournment of a Court of Law for the Newmarket races, may I ask the Solicitor General whether the Judge in question has not explained that the adjournment took place entirely for the convenience and by the desire of the litigants and of the counsel engaged in the case, and whether they did not all agree that that was so.
§ MR. R. T. REIDI do not know.