ENQUIRY SUGGESTED.

Evening Post, Volume LXXX, Issue 21, 25 July 1910, Page 7

ENQUIRY SUGGESTED.

♦ LAW GUARANTEE TRUST. WHAT MR. T. GIBSON BOWLES WANTS. Bj Telegraph.— Press Association.— Copyright. (Received July 25, 10 a.m.) LONDON. 24th July. Mr. T. Gibson Bowles, Liberal M.P. for King's Lynn, is urging the introduction in the House of Commons of a special Bill enabling the President of the Board of Trade, the Bight Hon. Sydney Buxton, to order a public enquiry regarding the affairs of the Law Guarantee Trust and Accident Society, Limited. [In December last the society decided to go into voluntary liquidation. It was formed over 'twenty years ago, to deal with fidelity, mortgage, debenture, contingency, license, and trustee business, etc. The report on the past year's business, lately issued, disclosed sensational loss<es on transactions with breweries and hotels, particularly in connection with the unsound system followed" in guaranteeing mortgages and debentures. Xt was estimated that properties originally valued at £9,912,516 were now worth not more than £1,705,•173 The accounts showed that the whole of the capital (£2,250,000 fully subscribed') had been lost, and there was a- further 'deficiency of £200,000. The majority of the shareholders are barristers and solicitors and their clerks. Sir Charles Swinfen Eady, judge of the Chancery Division of the High Court, recently ordered a. second call of £5 a share by the society, the result of which, if enforced, -would, it was said, force many shareholders into bankruptcy. The judge has since, however, varied the order, and shareholders are paying the oall by instalments.]