§ Mr. GIBSON BOWLESasked the Solicitor-General if His Majesty's Government will consider, in view of the arrears in the King's Bench Division whether it would be possible to shorten the long vacation of seventy-two days by eleven and the Christmas vacation of twenty days by six, thus reducing the total year's vacations of sixteen weeks and increasing the total year's sittings of thirty-six weeks by seventeen days, or, alternatively, whether it would be possible to arrange that, until the arrears are disposed of, the courts shall sit from 10 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. on the first five days of the week and from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturdays, thus increasing the sittings from the present twenty-five or twenty-seven hours to thirty-six and a half hours per week; or whether, by rearrangement and reorganisation of the judicial system, means can be found of dealing with the arrears otherwise than by the appointment of two additional judges at a cost to the country of £10,000 a year.
§ The PRIME MINISTERThe subject of the question was referred by the Government last autumn to a Committee of both Houses of Parliament. That Committee reported unanimously that the arrears in the King's Bench Division should be dealt with by judges and not by Commissioners, and that two judges should be appointed immediately for the purpose of clearing the arrears, and that the other matters brought under the notice of the Committee should be forthwith considered with a view to the adoption of so much as seemed advisable. Among these matters were suggestions similar to those contained in the question. The opinion of the Lord Chancellor was fully stated before the Joint Committee, and may be found in the evidence. He, in common with the Government, has accepted the Report of the Joint Committee including the recommendation that two additional judges should be appointed.