§ 102. Mr. WATTasked the Secretary for Scotland whether Commissioners from both Houses of Parliament were appointed to deal with Provisional Orders promoted this Session by corporations and others in Scotland; if so, who were these Commissioners; by whom were they nominated; were they asked to certify that neither they nor their constituents had any interest in the Provisional Orders to be brought before them; and did they in point of fact make such declaration?
The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Mr. McKinnon Wood)The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. The Commissioners so far appointed this Session to sit in Scotland are: The Earl of Galloway, the Earl of Wemyss, Lord Torphichen, Lord Ashton of Hyde, and the hon. Members for Argyllshire, Leith Burghs, South Aberdeen, and Dundee. The Commissioners are nominated in the other House by the Chairman of Committees, and in this House by the Chairman of Ways and Means, out of the panels appointed by the Committees of Selection of the two Houses respectively. The Commissioners signed the usual declaration as regards all the Orders upon which they sat in inquiry. In the case of one Order a Commissioner was unable to sign the declaration on the ground that his constituents might be deemed to have a local interest in the matter of the Order, and that Commissioner did not sit in the inquiry into that Order.