COMMITTEE. REPORT. (Hansard, 29 July 1858)

§ THE EARL OF ST.GERMANS
objected to the clause which gave power to the Lord Lieutenant in Council to remove Assistant Barristers. Only those Members of the Council who were summoned would attend, so that the Lord Lieutenant, with two or three members of Council, might remove any assistant barrister. He did not see the necessity of the provision, and he hoped that his noble Friend would agree that it was not essentially necessary.

LORD CAMPBELL
said, he quite concurred that only those members of the Council who were summoned would attend, because no member who was not summoned had a right to be present. The objection would have been got rid of if the power of removal had been vested in the hands of the Judicial Committee. The Lord Lieutenant in Council meant the Lord Lieutenant, associated with such two or three of his colleagues as he chose to summon. Instead of the Lord Lieutenant in Council, he thought a better tribunal would have been formed of the Lord Lieutenant, associated with those functionaries who formed the court of appeal under the Incumbered Estates Act.

THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE
said, that there were sonic assistant barristers who were labouring under "permanent infirmity," and who were obliged to appoint deputies to perform their duties. The Bill gave these persons retiring pensions, and it enabled the Lord Lieutenant in Council to remove them if they did not resign. The assistant barristers would have the power of proving before the Privy Council that they were not labouring under permanent infirmity, and the clause as amended in the other house provided that all the members of the Privy Council resident in the county should be summoned to attend, and should receive notice of the business before them. He proposed to amend this clause by restricting the Privy Council to Members residing in Dublin and in the county in which the assistant barrister lived.

LORD CAMPBELL
thought the explanation was sufficient.

§ LORD CRANWORTH
thought it was a question whether they would not lower the position of assistant barristers by placing them on a different footing from that of the Judges of the superior courts. If assistant barristers were to be dismissed in this way, the question would be raised whether the same system should not be applied to others, and in that way great difficulties might arise.

§ LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY
stated the case of Mr. Jemmett, the local Commissioner of Bankrupts, which he had brought before the House recently, and said that there might be a demand in such a case for a dismissal in a similar way. The facts in that case were not denied, but the learned Lord on the woolsack said he had no power to dismiss a Commissioner of Bankrupts, who could only be dismissed upon an Address of both Houses. If dismissal by a summary mode were instituted the practice would be carried still higher. In the other House of Parliament many questions had been raised about seine Irish Judges, who could not, it was said, perform their duties, and yet would not resign until their political friends came into power.

THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE
wished to point out that as long as an assistant barrister performed his duty no question would arise. The only object was to prevent the duties of assistant barristers being performed by deputies who were incompetent and irresponsible.

LORD CAMPBELL
thought that the 2271 clause, as amended, would provide a tribunal which might be implicitly trusted.