§ Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
§ LORD HENNIKER, in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, the Bill was a very simple one; it had passed the other House unopposed, and was approved by those most conversant with the subject. The facts of the case were that the Act of 1876 provided that funds derived from the letting or the sale of the herbage of recreation grounds should be applied to certain limited purposes; these funds had accumulated in the hands of parish officers, and they had discovered, in many instances, that it was not within their power to apply them as laid down by the Act; while in the same parish field gardens remained undrained and unimproved for want of funds. The object of the Bill was to release these funds, which could not at present be usefully applied, or, in fact, employed at all, and to enlarge the provisions of the Act of 1876 in the direction indicated by the one really enacting clause of this measure.
§ Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.