§ MR. E. W. PICKERSGILL (Bethnal Green, S.W.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) whether he is aware that the Middlesex County Council have proposed to make a bye-law, under Section 16 of the Local Government Act 1888, punishing as a criminal offence the use of abusive language in any house, building, garden, or other place abutting on or near to a street 949 or public place; (2) whether the words; "to the annoyance of any person in such street or public place" are contained in the draft bye-law; and (3) if such bye-law has been proposed, whether he has sanctioned or intends to sanction it?
§ SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEYThe draft bye-law referred to has been submitted to me by the Council, and it does not contain the words mentioned in the second paragraph of the Question. Even, however, with this limitation it appears to me to be somewhat too wide, and I have asked the Council to confine it to cases where the abusive language is such as to put some person in actual fear or to cause a breach of the peace.