§ MR. HERBERT SAMUEL () Yorkshire, N. R., ClevelandI beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, seeing that there are no official statistics of the extent to which crime is the consequence of drunkenness, he will request the judges and magistrates throughout England to notify all cases in which a sentence is passed for a crime which, in the opinion of the Bench, is partly or mainly the result of drunkenness; and whether, if this be found impracticable, he will obtain similar information through the police authorities for publication in the Annual Return of Judicial Statistics.
*THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. AKERS DOUGLAS,, St. Augustine's) KentI am afraid that it is not possible to adopt either of the suggestions of the hon. Member. To ask magistrates and judges to make the Return indicated would be to ask them in every case that came before them to try an issue not in most cases included in the charge, and often very difficult to determine. As regards the police, I do not think that any such Return would be of much value. The experience of the Home Department in collecting the material for the Judicial Statistics is that on points of fact, e. g., the number of convictions, apprehensions, etc., the Police Returns, which are prepared with great care, are trustworthy; but when points of opinion are involved—as would be the case on the point under discussion—it is practically impossible to obtain satisfactory or uniform returns from the 200 separate police forces in England and Wales. I may add that whenever trustworthy information on any point of this sort comes before the Home Office it is always dealt with in the Annual Return of Criminal Statistics.