But while in these first years the prospects of success are apt to seem remote and high hopes seem doomed to frustration, the worst thing to do is to… - Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan

The promoters of every private bill have to satisfy the [Parliamentary] Committee that their proposals are sufficiently beneficial to the public to justify the Committee in entrusting them with the special powers necessary to carry them out; it is only on this condition that private rights and interests can be required to give way to public necessity. The task of the Committee is to examine the proposals from this point of view and for this purpose to hear the arguments and evidence both of the promoters and of thhe opponents, being specially vigilant to see that justice is done by way of compensation and protection to those who may be called upon to make sacrifices for the public benefit. The range of the subjects which may come before Parliament by way of private bill is immensely varied, including such matters as the construction of railways, the building of harbours and bridges, the extension of city boundaries, the development of water power and electricity, the provision of water supplies, and the alteration of the constitution and objects of charitable and educational institutions.

This was ultimately secured in a large chamber in the lower part of the Parliament House, known as the Laigh Parliament Hall, the traditional torture chamber of the Scottish Privy Council.

No question of priority arose to embarrass me in my loyalties to the railway companies until the Parliamentary session of 1924-25... In Scotland the Dean of Faculty [of Advocates] is the deciding authority... He pointed out that the L.M.S. Company which was claiming me was not the L.M.S. Company which had retained me... So I was awarded to the L.N.E.R. and duly appeared in the Committee Rooms on their behalf.