§ MR. FORDE RIDLEY (Bethnal Green, S.W.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he can state the number of convicted prisoners of foreign birth who have been received in His Majesty's prisons in Great Britain and Ireland during the year 1904.
§ *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. AKERS-DOUGLAS, Kent, St. Augustine's)The numbers are:—In England and Wales, 4,396; Scotland, 342; Ireland, 95; Total, 4,833.
In reply to Mr. Keir Hardie's Question as to proportion of aliens to prisoners of the native population, Mr. Akers-Douglas said:—The number of convicted prisoners increased by 22 per cent. between 1899 and 1903. But the number of aliens among them increased during that period by 68 per cent.