ABSTRACT OF SUMMARY JURISDICTION ACT, 1884.

[47 & 48 VICT., CH. 43.]

An Act to repeal divers enactments rendered unnecessary by the Summary Jurisdiction Acts and other Acts relating to proceedings before Courts of Summary Jurisdiction, and to make further provision for the uniformity of proceedings before those Courts. [7th August, 1884.]

9. Nothing in section two hundred and twenty-seven of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, shall be taken to have repealed section thirty-eight of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1879.

SCHEDULE.

ENACTMENTS (AMONGST OTHERS) repealed.

This schedule down to the year 1868 refers to the Statutes, Revised Edition, published by authority under the direction of the Statute Law Committee.

A description or citation of a portion of an Act in this schedule is inclusive of the word, section, or other part first and last mentioned or otherwise referred to as forming the beginning or as forming the end of the portion described in the description or citation.

282

Inquest.

6. (1.) Where Her Majesty's High Court of Justice, upon application made by or under the authority of the Attorney-General, is satisfied either— (a.) that a coroner refuses or neglects to hold an inquest which ought to be held; or

(b.) Where an inquest has been held by a coroner that by reason of fraud, rejection of evidence, irregularity of proceedings, insufficiency of inquiry, or otherwise, it is necessary or desirable, in the interests of justice, that another inquest should be held,

the court may order an inquest to be held touching the said death, and may, if the court think it just, order the said coroner to pay such costs of and incidental to the application as to the court may seem just, and where an inquest has been already held may quash the inquisition on that inquest.

(2.) The court may order that such inquest shall be held either by the said coroner, or if the said coroner is a coroner for a county, by any other coroner for the county, or if he is a coroner of a borough or for a franchise then by a coroner for the county in which such borough or franchise is situate, or for a county to which it adjoins, and the coroner ordered to hold the inquest shall for that purpose have the same powers and jurisdiction as, and be deemed to be, the said coroner.

7.-(1.) The coroner only within whose jurisdiction the body of a person upon whose death an inquest ought to be holden is lying shall hold the inquest, and where a body is found dead in the sea, or any creek, river, or navigable canal within the flowing of the sea where there is no deputy coroner for the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England, the inquest shall be held only by the coroner having jurisdiction in the place where the body is first brought to land.

(2.) In a borough with a separate court of quarter sessions, no coroner, save as is otherwise provided by this Act, shall hold an inquest belonging to the office of coroner, except the coroner of the borough, or a coroner deputy coroner for the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England.

or

(3.) In a borough which has not a separate court of quarter sessions no coroner, save as is otherwise provided by this Act, shall hold an inquest belonging to the office of coroner except a coroner for the county or a coroner or a deputycoroner for the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England.

Liabilities of Coroner.

8.-(1.) The Lord Chancellor may, if he thinks fit, remove any coroner from his office for inability or misbehaviour in the discharge of his duty.

Expenses and Returns of Inquests.

25. The local authority for a county or borough from time to time may make, and when made may alter and vary a schedule of fees, allowances, and disbursements which on the holding of an inquest may lawfully be paid and made by the coroner holding such inquest (other than the fees payable to medical witnesses in pursuance of this Act), and the local authority shall cause a copy of every such schedule to be deposited with the clerk of the peace of the county or with the town clerk of the borough, and one other copy thereof to be delivered to every coroner concerned.

27. (1.) Every coroner shall, within four months after holding an inquest, cause a full and true account of all sums paid by him under this Act to be laid before the local authority of the county or borough by whom the sums are to be reimbursed to him.

(2.) Every account shall be accompanied by such vouchers as under the circumstances may to the local authority seem reasonable, and the local authority may, if they think fit, examine the said coronor on oath as to the account, and on being satisfied of the correctness thereof, the local authority shall order their treasurer to pay to the coroner the sum due to him on such account, with the addition, in the case of a coroner of a borough, of six shillings and eight pence for each inquest; and the treasurer shall pay the same out of the local rate, without any abatement or deduction whatever, and shall be allowed the same on passing his accounts.

28. Every coroner of a borough shall on or before the first day of February in every year make and transmit to a Secretary of State a return in writing, in such form and containing such particulars as the Secretary of State from time to time directs, of all cases in which an inquest has been held by him, or by some person in lieu of him, during the year ending on the thirty-first day of December immediately preceding.

Savings and Miscellaneous.

33. Nothing in this Act shall affect the application to coroners of a borough of the provisions of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, with respect to the appointment, qualification, tenure of office, and payment of a coroner of a borough, and the appointment of a deputy by such coroner.

Definitions.

38. In this Act the expression "county," unless there is something inconsistent in the context, does not include a county of a city or a county of a town, but includes any division or liberty of a county which has a separate court of quarter sessions for which a separate coroner has customarily been elected, but the whole of Yorkshire and the whole of Lincolnshire shall respectively be a county for the purposes of this Act.

41. For the purposes of this Act

(a) The local authority of a county shall be the court of quarter sessions of the county; and

(b) The local authority of a borough shall be the mayor, aldermen, and burgesses of the borough acting by the council; and

(e) The local rate shall be, in the case of a county, the county rate, or rate in the nature of a county rate, and, in the case of a borough, the borough fund or borough rate; and

(d) In Lincolnshire and Yorkshire respectively the justices in gaol

sessions shall be the local authority, and the clerk to such justices shall act as clerk of the peace, and the rate in the nature of a county rate levied by those sessions shall be the local rate.

42. In this Act, if not inconsistent with the context, the following terms and expressions have the meanings hereinafter respectively assigned to them. The expression "quarter sessions" includes general sessions.

The expression "borough means any place for the time being subject to the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, and the Acts amending the

same.

Temporary Provisions and Repeal.

45. The Acts specified in the Third Schedule to this Act are hereby repealed, from and after the passing of this Act, to the extent specified in the third column of that schedule.

Provided that

(1.) A coroner elected before the passing of this Act, shall continue to hold office in like manner as if he had been elected under this Act, and (2.) Any schedule of fees, allowances, and disbursements made by a local authority for a county or borough before the passing of this Act shall, until a schedule is made in pursuance of this Act, be of the same effect as if the schedule had been made in pursuance of this Act, and (3.) This repeal shall not affect

(a) The past operation of any enactment hereby repealed, nor anything duly done or suffered under any enactment hereby repealed;

or,

(b) Any right, privilege, obligation, or liability acquired, accrued, or incurred under any enactment hereby repealed; or

(c) Any penalty, forfeiture, or punishment incurred in respect of any offence committed against any enactment hereby repealed; or

(d) Any inquest on any death which occurred before the commencement of this Act or an inquisition found thereon, or any investigation, legal proceeding, or remedy in respect of any such right, privilege, obligation, liability, penalty, forfeiture, or punishment as aforesaid; and any such inquest, investigation, legal proceeding, and remedy, and the trial of any such inquisition may be carried on as if this Act had not passed.

(4.) This repeal shall not revive any jurisdiction, office, duty, fee, franchise, liberty, custom, right, title, privilege, restriction, exemption, usuage, practice, procedure, or other matter or thing not in force or existing at the passing of this Act.

(5.) Save in so far as is inconsistent with this Act, any principle or rule of law, or established jurisdiction, practice, or procedure, or existing usage, franchise, liberty, or custom, shall, notwithstanding the repeal of any enactment by this Act, remain in full force.

SECOND SCHEDULE.

FORMS.

[Form of Declaration of Office of Coroner.]

I solemnly, sincerely, and truly declare and affirm that I will well and truly serve our Sovereign Lady the Queen and her liege people in the office of coroner for this county [or borough or as the case may be] of

and that I will diligently and truly do everything appertaining to my office after the best of my power for the doing of right, and for the good of the inhabitants within the said county [or borough or as the case may be.]

THIRD SCHEDULE.

This Schedule repeals section 171 from "and thereafter" down to "office of coroner," section 173 and section 174 of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882.

ABSTRACT OF THE COUNTY ELECTORS ACT, 1888. [51 VICT. c. 10.]

An Act to provide for the qualification and registration of electors for the purposes of Local Government in England and Wales. [16th May, 1888.]

[Section 3 will be found quoted in full at page 28, ante.] 4. (1.) The Registration of Electors Acts shall, so far as circumstances admit, apply to the enrolment of burgesses in a municipal borough, to which the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, does not apply, and to the registration of county electors within the meaning of this Act; and the lists of burgesses, and of county electors, and of occupation voters for parliamentary elections, shall, so far as practicable, be made out and revised together; and the Registration of Electors Acts shall accordingly

as if it

(a) apply to every such municipal borough in like manner were a borough to which sub-section two of section six of the Registration Act, 1885, applied (subsection one of which section is hereby repealed), and revising assessors for such borough shall not be elected.

SCHEDULE.

REGISTRATION ACT, 1885.

Definition of Ten Pounds Occupation Qualification (see section 3 at page 28, ante). A person entitled to be registered as a voter in respect of a ten pounds occupation qualification in a borough, municipal or parliamentary —

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(a) must during the whole twelve months immediately preceding the fifteenth day of July have been an occupier as owner or tenant of some land or tenement in a parish [or township] of the clear yearly value of not less than ten pounds; and

(b) must have resided in or within seven miles of the borough during six months immediately preceding the fifteenth day of July; and

(c) such person, or some one else, must during the said twelve months have been rated to all poor rates made in respect of such land or tenement; and

(d) all sums due in respect of the said land or tenement on account of any poor rate made and allowed during the twelve months immediately preceding the fifth day of January next before the registration, or on account of any assessed taxes due before the said fifth day of January, must have been paid on or before the twentieth day of July.

If two or more persons jointly are such occupiers as above mentioned, and the value of the land or tenement is such as to give ten pounds or more for each occupier, each of such occupiers is entitled to be registered as a voter.

If a person has occupied in the borough different lands or tenements of the requisite value in immediate succession during the said twelve months, he is entitled in respect of the occupation thereof to be registered as a voter in the parish [or township] in which the last occupied land or tenement is situate.

ABSTRACT OF THE RECORDERS, MAGISTRATES, AND CLERKS OF THE PEACE ACT, 1888. [51 & 52 VICT., CH. 23.]

An Act to make better provision as to the appointment of deputies for Recorders, Stipendiary Magistrates, and Clerks of the Peace.

[10th August, 1888.]

1.-(1.) If at any time it appears to the authority having power to appoint a recorder or a stipendiary magistrate or a clerk of the peace for any place or county, that the recorder, magistrate, or clerk of the peace for that place or county is, by reason of illness, absence, or any other cause, incapable of