§ MR. BRIDGEMAN (Shropshire, Oswestry)To ask the Undersecretary of State for the Colonies what were the considerations which led the Secretary of State for the Colonies, on receipt of the Earl of Selborne's dispatch of the 20th November, 1905, to telegraph, on the 23rd December, 1905, urging the Earl of Selborne to obtain information on which to prosecute some 1279 person on the Witwatersrand Deep Mine, though he had received no affidavit in support of the prosecution, but to delay till 15th February, 1906, any recommendation to prosecute Mr. Pless, whose cruelty was sworn to by affidavit contained under cover of the same dispatch from the Earl of Selborne of the 20th November, 1905.
(Answered by Mr. Churchill.) The inquiry in the telegram of 23rd December, as to whether there was any information on which to prosecute, did not relate to the Witwatersrand Deep Mine, but generally to the proceedings brought into question by Mr. Boland's allegations. The hon. Member might have perceived this by studying the telegrams of 2nd January and 10th January, printed at page 46 and page 58 of the Blue-book [Cd. 2819].