HL Deb 17 June 1969 vol 302 cc909-10

2.56 p.m.

LORD MITCHISON

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

[The Question was as follows:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many Letters of Horning and how many relaxations from the horn were registered during the last year, or other convenient period, and how many debtors were put to the horn during that period.]

THE LORD ADVOCATE (LORD WILSON OF LANGSIDE)

My Lords, the answer to all three parts of the Question is, none. The last entry in the Register of Hornings was in 1936 and the last Horning in which a debtor was proclaimed an outlaw was in 1912. Outlawry, as no doubt your Lordships are aware, ceased to be a competent sentence of a Scottish court in 1949.

LORD MITCHISON

My Lords, may I thank my noble and learned friend for that Answer and suggest—

SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: NO.

LORD MITCHISON

Then may I respectfully ask whether the appropriate Committee which is revising the laws of Scotland would consider the four Hornings Acts, which appear still to be in full force and take their place in the list as current Scottish Statutes between the General Assembly Act and the Incest Act? These weighty Statutes are only one each; the Hornings Acts are four in number. May I inquire whether they should not be repealed, consolidated, or at least translated?

LORD WILSON OF LANGSIDE

My Lords, this may well be a matter for consideration by the Scottish Law Commission. The noble Lord will no doubt bear in mind that Letters of Horning were considered a great advance upon the Letters of Four Forms which they replaced, to the best of my recollection during the earlier part of the sixteenth century.