§ MR. STANLEY LEIGHTON (Shropshire, Oswestry)I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he can inform the House of the names of the members of the Departmental Committee appointed last session to report on the custody of local records, when the Committee is likely to report, and whether their Report and the information upon which it is based will be printed and presented to the House in a Blue-book.
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR, Manchester, E.)I have to say that the following are the members of the Committee:—The Bishop of London, the right hon. Member for South Aberdeen (Mr. Bryce), Sir Francis Mowatt, Sir H. Maxwell-Lyte, Sir Courtenay Ilbert, and Mr. Spring Rice, of the Treasury. Since their appointment the Committee have been occupied in collecting from a large number of local bodies and persons interested in the question information in regard to the condition of local records. The answers are being tabulated, and will be appended to the Report which it is intended to present to Parliament. As, however, the information is still far from complete, it is impossible to say how soon the Committee will be able to report.