DR. RUTHERFOORD-HARRIS (Camberwell, Dulwich)To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that, although the allowances to medical witnesses in criminal cases in Courts throughout England and Wales have, in accordance with the recommendations or the Departmental Committee which reported on the subject last year (as stated in the Memorandum prefixed to the new Scale and dated 12th November, 1903), been considerably increased, there is no such increase in the fees allowed to medical witnesses in the Metropolitan Police Courts; and, if so, whether, seeing that under the statutory rules and orders establishing the new 1127 scale, all the previous rules and regulations made under Section 5 of the Criminal Justice Administration Act, 1851, have been revoked, he will explain why the regulations made for the Metropolitan Police Courts on 31st July, 1875, remain in force.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Akers-Douglas.) I think the Question is based on a misapprehension. The old regulations under the Criminal Justice Administration Act, 1851, have been revoked, and the new regulations, which increase the fees allowed to medical witnesses, have been fully brought into force in the Metropolitan Police Courts. There is no difference between their application in the Metropolitan Police Courts and their application in other Courts. The Act of 1851, however, does not provide for the payment of fees to witnesses in all cases; but only where the prosecution is for certain denned offences (including all felonies and the more serious misdemeanours). In the case of minor misdemeanours, the law makes no provision for the payment of witnesses. In those minor cases for which the law does not provide it has been the practice for many years in the Metropolitan Police Courts to pay certain fees to medical witnesses from police funds. These fees are not affected by the new regulations under the Act of 1851, and continue to be regulated by a different scale from that governing the statutory fees.