HC Deb 01 July 1898 vol 60 c797
MR. STEADMAN

I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if his attention has been called to a statement made by a police inspector, when applying for distress warrants in cases of non-payment of fines by vaccination defaulters, in reply to a question from the magistrate, Mr. Lane, the inspector said he was acting under instructions from the Home Office; and whether, seeing that the Local Government Board mow admitted that "adventitious" germs were in vaccine lymph, and that therefore there was a justification in parents refusing to run risks, he could see his way to cancel the instructions for application for distress warrants?

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT

My attention has not been called to the statement otherwise than by the Question; but it is the practice of the Home Office to take steps, after proper inquiry as to the circumstances, to enforce outstanding fines in cases of all kinds, and the statement was perhaps made in some case in which such steps had been taken. I do not see my way to give the instructions suggested in the second paragraph.