The Sun.
London, England, 1845-03-05 00:00:00

RAILWAYS.

Lord G. SOMERSET rose to propose the resolutions
recommended by the General Committee on Railways, of
which he had given notice; but the low tone of voice in
which the Noble Lord spoke, and the buzz of voices in
all parts of the House, rendered it quite impossible for
more than a word or two in a few sentences to be beard
in the gallery; bet the following is the substance of his
Lordship's observations as well as they could be understood.
He said there was an enormous number of railway Bills
now before the Board of Trade, many of which had
been reported favourably upon, and would therefore
be brought before the House; they amounted, he should
say, to about two hundred and forty-six, and those
Bills, be need not tell tl.e House, involved the outlay
of vast sums of money, much of which had already been
expended. The Board of Trade, the better to facilitate
the progress of those Bills, had divided them into
families or classes, and proposed that they should
be taken up in that order, and disposed of in
that way by the House, according as they should be
found to compete with or bear upon each other ; and he
hoped that this course would be found a convenient one
by the House, for the Board of Trade had found it im-
possible to proceed with the vast number of Bills be-
fore it without adopting this mode of classification,
unless injustice were done is some quarter.
The second branch of the inquiry related to the compo-
sition of the Select Committees to whom the Bills were
to be referred, and the main question to be considered
was, whether or not Members representing
local interests should be permitted to serve on
such Committees. He was fully alive to the
great advantage which was attendant in 33? an y
respects on the. admission of Members represetinetningnflotehael
interests on these Committees. The protec
poorer proprietors through w intended a
Members than it could be by any others.h
projected line should pass wawshboseettlearnadttietndßac_dsutt,owbhyelnochael
ap
sp
reluctantlyo m t m eti tof
these local members was to be regulated,
he
came to consider the manner in which
tevva•
to all compelled to admit that it would be utterly impracticable
to frame any rules so as to secure fair dealing
par-
ties. Let them take a lung line—the London and
for instance. How would it be possible to
York,
arrange any Committee so as to represent all the
l•eal interests on the line. He had been very
anxious to devise means to regulate the attendance of
these Members,• but he could not find any means of
attaining the ohject which would not give rise
to greater evils than those which they pro-
posed to remedy, and therefore he had given it up.
He understood that it was not probable that any rail-
way Bill would go into Committee before Easter. The
Noble Lord concluded b' moving the resolutions.
Mr. CHRISTOPHER said he wished to call attention
to that resolution the effect of which would be to exclude
Members who had a local interest in railways from
serving on Committees, and be thought it would
be desirable to know whether the House would
at once come to a decision, that any Member
whatever whose constituents had an interest
in railways which might happen to pass through any
particular county or district, was, as a matter of course,
to be exclucH from serving on Committees. die had