§ MR. NUSSEYI beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, under the Prisons Act, 1898, and the rules made thereunder, persons committed for non-payment of appears due under orders in bastardy, or arrears made under the Summary Jurisdiction (Married Women) Act, 1895, are entitled to be treated as debtors and not placed in association with criminal prisoners; whether, under section 54 of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1879, persons imprisoned for nonpayment of such sums have not been hitherto treated as ordinary criminal prisoners, and compelled to wear the prison dress; and whether, if persons so imprisoned are not now entitled to be treated as debtors, the court may give directions as to the division in which they shall be placed under section 6, subsection (2), which relates only to persons convicted by any court of an offence, and sentenced to imprisonment without hard labour?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENTThe answer to the first two paragraphs is in the affirmative, and consequently no answer is required to the third.