§ MR. HAY (Shoreditch, Hoxton)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether he will state the number of soldiers sentenced to penal servitude in South Africa for military offences now serving sentences in convict prisons in the United Kingdom, the number of sentences remitted, and the number now incarcerated; whether he will take steps to make other provision than in convict prisons for the detention of soldiers guilty of military offences; and whether he will adopt measures to ensure that soldiers now in convict prisons may not suffer on discharge therefrom the stigma attaching to the worst of criminals.
LORD STANLEYThe number of soldiers in convict prisons for sentences in South Africa is forty-seven. The rest of the information required by the first part of the Question would appear on careful investigation to entail so much clerical labour that I fear I cannot consent to grant it. The suggestion in the second paragraph would require legislation to carry it out. As regards the last paragraph, the distinction between military offences and those against the civil law is well known, and so far as the authorities are concerned, they will do what they can in the direction suggested. I may add that my right hon. friend was entirely in sympathy with the view of the hon. Member who asks the Question.