HC Deb 09 August 1889 vol 339 cc904-5
MR. WILLIAM M'ARTHUR (Cornwall, Mid, St. Austell)

I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether it is the fact that the General Prisons Board of Ireland have detained a letter from Mr. Conybeare, containing a paper written by that hon. Member for the editor of the Mining Journal; whether the paper contained anything more than a mere expression of Mr. Conybeare's views upon the question of mining royalties, which the editor of the journal had asked him to send, with the object of comparing them with the views of other Representatives of mining constituencies who had already contributed similar expressions of opinion on this important question; whether there was in the hon. Member's paper any reference to controversial topics connected with the causes of his imprisonment, or with Ireland generally; and whether, under the circumstances, he will direct, that the hon. Member's letter may be permitted to pass?

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

The General Prisons Board report that a communication from Mr. Conybeare intended for the Press was submitted by the Governor of Londonderry Prison on the 31st ult., and in accordance with the established practice of the service he was informed in reply that no prisoner of any class is permitted to write to the Press. It would, in the opinion of the Prisons Board, be wholly incompatible with the maintenance of prison disci- pline if a contrary course were permitted.

MR. T. M. HEALY

May I ask—as the right hon. Gentleman has now made a definite statement that no prisoner of any class can now be permitted to write to the Press—whether the rule has been in existence since January 1, 1883, or whether it has only been introduced by the right hon. Gentleman himself?

MR. A J. BALFOUR

The Prisons Board have given me the information which I have given to the House. I know no more about the subject. If the hon. and learned Gentleman will put a further question on the Paper I will endeavour to answer it.

MR. MAC NEILL

Does the right hon. Gentleman not know that Mr. E. Yates and Mr. Stead were allowed to conduct their respective journals when in prison?

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

A question of that kind ought to be addressed not to me, but to the Home Secretary.

MR. MAC NEILL

Then I will ask the right hon. Gentleman a question as to prison discipline in Ireland. Does not the right hon. Gentleman know that the late Richard Pigott, when in prison as a first-class misdemeanant in 1866, was allowed to conduct his newspapers?