§ MR. T. LOUGH (Islington, N.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, under what authority the Commissioner of Police for the City of London has made regulations 266 determining the course to be pursued by some omnibuses passing through the City, preventing these omnibuses traversing Cheapside; whether the Home Secretary, on the 27th July, 1895, approved of these regulations; whether the attention of the Secretary of State has been drawn to the provision contained in Section 11, Sub-Section (2), of The Metropolitan Streets Act, 1867, prohibiting the Commisioner of Police and the Secretary of State from limiting the number of Metropolitan stage carriages that may pass down any street in pursuance of their ordinary trade; whether these regulations violate the above provision, in that they limit the number of Metropolitan stage carriages that may pass down Cheapside; and, has he withdrawn, or does he intend to withdraw, his approval of these regulations.
§ SIR M. W. RIDLEYThe regulations were made under Section 11 of the Metropolitan Streets Act, 1867, and were approved by me on the date mentioned. My attention was drawn to the provision of the Act quoted, which I do not think is violated by the regulations in question, although the point is not absolutely free from doubt. The regulations were made for the public convenience, and I do not intend to withdraw my approval from them. Regulations equally open to the objection raised by the hon. Member were approved by my predecessors in 1877 and in 1891; and if there be a doubt as to their legal validity, it must be settled by the Law Courts. ["Hear, hear?"]