§ MR. J. G. WEIR (Ross and Cromarty)I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland whether he is aware that Malcolm Campbell, a crofter at Garrabost, 1325 near Stornoway, Island of Lewis, recently beg an to improve his house by rebuilding it of stone and lime instead of turf, and by providing two doors, one for his family, and the other for his cattle; that when the walls were two feet high the factor of the landowner intimated that, if the work were proceeded with, and two doors put into the building, the structure would, under the Estate Regulations, be pulled down; that, as a result of this threat, the house was built with one door only; that after the house was finished the sanitary inspector summoned Malcolm Campbell for contravening the Public Health Act by constructing his house with one door only for the admission of both people and cattle, and that Sheriff Deputy Campbell, at Stornoway, gave judgment requiring the said Malcolm Campbell to provide two doors to his house before the 12th June, 1895; and whether he will consider the desirability of taking steps to protect small tenants in the Island of Lewis from Estate Regulations which conflict with the law?
§ SIR GEORGE TREVELYANThe Sheriff of Ross and Cromarty reports to me that Malcolm Campbell recently commenced to alter his house, but that in doing so he built only a thin dwarf partition, seven feet high and four and a-half inches thick, between the dwelling room and the byre, leaving a space of six feet open to the ridge of the roof, and having a doorway in it for the passage of cattle through the dwelling-house into the byre, there being no separate entrance to the byre from the outside. In doing this he contravened the Estate Regulations issued to the crofters both in Gaelic and English, and did not act under any other or contrary instructions from the Estate officials. In the course of proceedings taken against him by the Sanitary Authority he was required by the resident Sheriff to build a solid partition nine inches thick between his house and his byre carried up to the roof, and to make a separate entrance to the byre from the outside. I may add that the Sheriff is of opinion that the Estate Regulations are in this respect perfectly proper and consistent with law.