§ Mr. WATTasked the Secretary for Scotland whether his Department has any statistics of the number of cases where the General Fire, Life, and Accident Insurance Corporation of Perth refused payment of farmers' claims for deaths and accidents of animals and forced the farmers making such claims to resort to-arbitration instead of taking proceedings in the law courts; if so, will he say what was the average duration of such arbitration proceedings; in how many cases did they exceed one year; in how many cases did the farmers abandon their claims, accepting the company's usual offer to return the premiums paid by the farmers; and will he introduce legislation this Session to prevent insurance companies which do business in Scotland from inserting in their policies a compulsory arbitration clause which enables them to refuse payment of claims made on them?
Mr. McKINNON WOODI have no statistics of the cases referred to, and as
to legislation, I can only refer my hon. Friend to my reply given on the 17th instant.