The Sun.
London, England, 1845-02-08 00:00:00

PRIVATE BUSINESS-RAILWAYS.

Sir 11.Fia;:idti;ttheiion. Member for Greenock
had a motion on the paper which was of great import-
ance as regarded the private business of the House. It
was for a Select Committee to inquire into the present
mode of conducting private business before Committees
of that House,with a view to theitiprovement of the same.
Considering the increased number of railway Bills that
were coming before Parliament, he thought the time had
arrived when it would be expedient to appoint a Select
Committee, consisting of the Hon. Member himself, and
other Hon. Gentlemen who might hereafter be named,
to consider what arrangements could be made for in-
suring the facility and dispatch of private business.
Points of great importance connected with competing
lines of railway would arise, and great advantage to
private business might accrue from the Committee taking
the points of most pressing importance into considera-
tion, as it might be able to offer useful suggestions to
the House. If, therefore, the Hon. Gentleman would
postpone the motion of which he had given notice, he
(Sir It. Peel) would, in the course of next week, make
the necessary arrangements for the appointment of this
Select Committee.
Mr. WALLACE felt exceedingly obliged to the
Right lion.l3aroust for his proposition, which was en-
tirely in accordance with his own view of the matter.
He would postpone his motion.
POOR-LAW IN IRELAND.

Mr. F. FRENCH, seeing the Right Hon. Secretary
of the Home Department in his place, would again put
a question to him of great
importance to Ireland, and
one on which they had a right to expect the institution
of a searching inquiry. It was the working of the
poor-law in Ireland. Some alteration must be made in
a system which experience had shown was distasteful to
the people and unsuited for the country. The
question he had to ask was, whether the state-
ment which had appeared in the Freeman's
Journal was correct ? It stated that four executions
had been put into the
,union workhouse of Ballinrobe,
and the furniture and effects seized ; also that executions
had been put into union houses of Castlebar and Tuam.
Under these executions goods and effects had been sold
at Tuam at a great sacrifice of property, blankets that
cost ten shillings per pair, having been sold for five
shillings. He wished to know from the Right Hon.
Baronet whether these statements were correct ?
Sir JAMES GRAHAM said the Hon. Gentleman had
given him notice of his question with respect to one work-
house—that of Tuam ; but he was not aware whether the
statement he bad just read from an Irish newspaper as
to the other workhouses,was corrector not. Inconsequence
of the Hon. Gentleman s notice, he had directed his at-
tention to the state of the Tuam workhouse only. There
it was true that an execution had been enforced on the
goods and effects, but the circumstances were these :
The union house at Tuam was a hired building, and the
execution was put in by the landlord for rent.
The board of guardians of that union positively refusing
to carry the Act into effect, would not make a rate, or
appoint a collector. The I oor-law authorities in conse-
quence of these circumstances had, in November last,
moved in the Queens Bench fora mandamus to compel the
guardians to make a rate, and appoint a collector forthwith.
That mandamus had been served by order of the Court
upon the Board of Guardians, collectively and indivi-
dually ; and they would be obliged immediately to ap-
point collectors, and to levy the rate. The execution
would then be nullified, on the amount being paid out of
the rate.