§ MR. VESEY KNOXI beg to ask the Attorney General for Ireland whether, seeing that the Irish Judicature Act of 1877 (sec. 73), providing that, on the death or resignation of judges exercising patronage, clerkships 474 in the High Court were to be filled by open competition or transfer, there is anything in the Judicature Act of 1897 preventing this course being taken in the case of clerkships in the Probate Department of the Queen's Bench Division; and whether the vacancy now existing for a junior clerkship in that division will be filled up by open competition?
§ MR. ATKINSONThe Government have been advised that section 5 of the Act of 1897 confers on the judge, assigned by the Lord Lieutenant under that section, the same rights of patronage and appointment as the judge of the Probate and Matrimonial Division had at the passing of the Act, and that the provisions of this section have, pro tanto, repealed by implication the provisions of the Act of 1877, as to filling appointments by open competitive examination. It is the intention of the Government, to introduce next Session an amending Bill, declaring that, subject to the rights of the assigned judge, junior clerks in the Probate Division shall thenceforward be appointed in like manner as all other junior clerks are appointed under the provisions of the 73rd section of the Act of 1877.