§ MR. MITCHELL HENRYasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether he will be good enough to lay upon the Table of the House, a Return showing the number of prisoners in each of the Government Convict Prisons in Great Britain and Ireland during each of the ten years ending on the last day of December 1877; and showing also the number of suicides and attempts at suicide in those prisons, and also the cases in which prisoners have mutilated or attempted to mutilate themselves, and giving in a condensed form the particulars of each such case of suicide or mutilation; and, further, a Return of the number of prisoners flogged in each prison during each of those years, with the number of lashes inflicted?
MR. ASSHETON CROSSSir, I am quite willing to give every kind of information connected with prisons so far as facts are concerned. All the facts I believe, not matters of opinion, are stated in the official statistics and annual Re-ports which are presented to Parliament, and I am told the Royal Commissioners have requested that some such statements as these may be prepared for them. They are in course of preparation. If the hon. Member desires that I should lay them on the Table of the House, I will do so; but I think they had better appear in the Reports of the Commissioners.