§ MR. J. G. TALBOTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, 475 Whether his attention has been drawn to the remarks of Mr. Justice Hawkins, at the Old Bailey, on the 28th November, on the subject of the failure of the Public Prosecutor in the preparation of prosecutions; and, whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTThe Public Prosecutor is sometimes supposed to be a subordinate agent of the Home Office; but that is not the fact. Mr. Justice Hawkins was entitled to make his observations; but they would have been entitled to greater respect, and would have been more useful, if they had been addressed either to the Attorney General or to the Home Office, instead of generally to the public. If any facts had been stated, it would have been more easy to inquire what the grievance was. I have always been of opinion that the office of Public Prosecutor ought to be established on a far more extensive scale. In fact, I said so at the time the office was created. At present it is established upon a very narrow scale indeed, there being only one gentleman, with an assistant, to do all the public prosecutions of the country, which greatly limits his power for usefulness.
§ SIR R. ASSHETON CROSSinquired whether the right hon. and learned Gentleman would put himself in communication with the Attorney General and the Treasury, in order to press the necessity of the original scheme being carried into effect?
§ MR. T. P. O'CONNORinquired whether the right hon. and learned Gentleman would ask the Judges to confine themselves to the discharge of their official duties in the future, and not to deliver public harangues from the Bench?
§ [No reply was given.]