HC Deb 27 May 1897 vol 49 cc1410-1
CAPTAIN DONELAN

On behalf of the hon. Member for South Donegal, I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been directed to the report of the proceedings in Scotland Yard on the 14th May, when Sir Edward Bradford, the Commissioner of Police, received a deputation from the Humanitarian League to lay before him a resolution passed at a public meeting in St. Martin's Town Hall, on the 5th May, urging that the London Police should be instructed to act more promptly and on their own initiative when they witness any ill-usage of horses by Hogging or overloading in the streets, and to the remark of the Commissioner of Police with reference to the contrast drawn between the action of the Metropolitan and City Police in cases of ill-usage of horses, that the City Police are able to act more vigorously because they have a much smaller area to control, and convictions may be, more easily obtained before Aldermen of City Courts; and, whether he will take any steps to assimilate the practice of the Metropolitan to that of the City police in checking cruelty to animals in the streets?

*THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY,) Lancashire, Blackpool

I have communicated with the Commissioner, and he informs me that he had what he thought was a private conversation with three gentlemen representing this league; but that he cannot accept the report alluded to in the Question as an accurate account of what passed, and that he certainly did not intend to convey that the practice of the City Police in the matter differs from that of the Metropolitan Police. I am fully confident that the Commissioner will do everything in his power to further the humane objects which the league has at heart.

CAPTAIN DONELAN

asked whether it was not the duty of the police to see that gravel was used on the streets in slippery weather?

*SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY

was not aware that such was the duty of the police; he imagined it was the duty of those who had charge of the roads.