The Sun.
London, England, 1860-04-04 00:00:00

FORM BILL STATISTICS.

Lord PALMERSTON moved that the house at its rising
should adjourn till Monday, the 16th inst., a motion to
which he imagined there would be no opposition. (Hear,
hear, and a laugh.)
Sir J. PAKINGTON had no intention of dividing the
house upon the motion of the noble lord ; but he wished to
ask the President of the Poor Law Board in what manner
the numbers of houses at various amounts of " gross esti-
mated rental," in the cities and boroughs of England, as
given in the return upon the table of the house, were ascer-
tained. In the course of the debate upon the second reading
of the Reform Bill he stated his belief that this return was
delusive, and that the numbers shown in it were not the
number of houses actually let and rented at the amount
stated in the towns mentioned, but were founded upon a
statement of the number of houses which had in those dif-
ferent places been estimated by local valuers at the different
amounts for purposes of rating. The difference was very
material, because it was notorious that in all places the
'valuation upon which premises were rated was less than the
amount for which they would actually let. In support of
his opinion he mentioned that in two places—Pontefract and
Newark—the number of ClO voters upon the register was
greater than the number of £lO houses included in this re-
turn. He was followed in the debate by the right hon. baronet
the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, who informed him
that he was mistaken, and attributed the discrepancy which
he had pointed out to the circumstance that the scot and
lot voters had been omitted from this return. This might be
so with regard to Pontefract and Newark, but the fact was
that there were no less than 44 boroughs in this return in
regard to which the same anomaly existed, and in many of
which there were no scot and lot voters. In Droitwich, for
instance, there were only a few freemen, and no scot and
lot voters. The number of £lO voters on the register for
that borough was 392, but this return showed only 327
£lO houses. He believed that he had suggested the real
cause of this discrepancy; and it must be evident to any one
That if such was the case the real addition to the constitu-
encies under the Reform Bill would be much larger than
that shown by this return. It had also been suggested to
him that in the case of persons compounding for the pay-
ment of the rates of a large number of houses the number
if compounders, and net the number of tenements com-
pounded for, had been inserted in this return. He should
be glad if the right hon. gentleman the President of the
Poor Law Board could inform the house upon both these
points.

Mr. C. P. VILLIERS believed that ho was in a position
to allay the alarm of the right hon. baronet, and to assure
him that this return was the most complete and accurate
one that had ever been laid before Parliament upon a sub-
ject such as that to which it referred. The discrepancy be-
tween the number of voters upon the register and that
of £lO houses was one which was very likely to exist. In
many
places the register had not been properly revised for
yes oyers, and there would therefore remain upon it the
nampersons who were dead or disqualified. There
would also be upon it the
a names of others whose qualifica•
tion was made up partly ofhouse and partly of land ; and
there would be in addition in
would,me placest the scot and lot
voters. These three causes
of ebelieved, fully ac-
count for the discrepancy in the caseall the 44 boroughs
referred. to which the right hon. baronet had refe The right
hon. baronet supposed that the returns represented me erely
the property and not the persons that would be en-
titled to vote. It was not so. A special circular was
sent to the clerk of every union, directing him to make
careful inquiries as to the persons who would be entitled to
vote under a particular qualification, and the returns were
framed upon that principle. Under the Reform Act the
overseer was the person directed to make out the electoral
list. He took it from that column in his book which showed
the gross estimated rental, and not from that which ex-
hibited the rateable value only. The returns, therefore,
were made from the very lists which were now submitted
to the revising barristers, and upon which the House of
Commons was returned, but they were also drawn up, as he
had stated, with special reference to the persons who would
be entitled to vote. Great pains had been taken to get a
return of all occupiers whose rates had been compounded
for by their landlords, and only in a few boroughs, including
some of the metropolitan boroughs, had it been found im-
possible to obtain a list. But additional returns were in
course of being prepared, and he had no doubt that when
the house resumed. consideration of the Reform Bill it
would have in its possession full and accurate information
upon all points connected with the scope and effect of that
measure.
Sir J. PAKINGTON said the right hon. gentleman had
not given a distinct answer to his question. What he
wanted to know was, whether the returns represented the
tenements actually let at certain amounts, or the tenements
which appeared on the rate-books estimated according to
their rateable value. _ _

Mr. VILLIERS thought he had already answered that
question. He had stated that the returns represented nol
only the property entered on the books of the overseers, bul
the persons who would be entitled to vote.

Mr. E. JAMESlkelievedhe...wascorreetin saying that the
noblelord the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, when he stated
that his bill would not add more than 210,000 or 217,000'
new electors to th© existing constituences, underestimated
the probable increase by 200,000 or even 250,000. (Hear,
hear.) In Norwich. alone there were no fewer than 12,162
tenements rated to the owners instead of the occupiers,
who, consequently, were not included in the returns. He
believed that in his oina borough 5,000 or 6,000 persons
whose names did not appear on the rate-books would be
entitled to vote under a £0 franchise. In Finsbury the
number would be 8.,(0) or 10,000. One landlord might own
a whole street; each house might be subdivided into three
if the landlord did not live in it,
or four dwellings, r cad,
the occupier of each: tenement would be entitled to a vote.
Every one of the 1';,162 tenements in Norwich might pro-
duce two votes, and -the Court of Comtmenoanni; Pleas had decided
that if a landlord p aid the rates, wass entitled
werenar-
rowly vote. He was con ,winced that when
the re
tho
examined, it ; would befound that a £6 franchis
would extend the eight of voting to between 200,000 and
300,000 persons in ,addition
(
to the number stated by the
noble lord the Sec retary for Foreign Affairs. Hear.)
Sir G. GREY tl sought the estimate of the hon. and learned
ded on the
gentleman was gi fatly exaggerated. It procee