§ MR. TALBOT (Oxford University)To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to a recent exhibition of mutinous conduct amongst the convicts confined in His Majesty's prison at Maidstone; whether it is part of the policy of the directors of prisons to confine such prisoners within the narrow limits of ordinary prisons; and whether he would consider the advisability of employing such prisoners on the public works prisons, as heretofore.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) There has been no change of policy of late years. For many years convicts, except those employed in quarrying and farm labour, have been kept within the prison enclosure; formerly at Chatten-den, Wormwood Scrubs, and Dover, and now at all convict establishments, and employed in building operations and other trades. Maidstone is not an "ordinary" local prison, but advantage has been taken of the large and favourable site (not required by the local prison) to build a new prison for the detention of prisoners sentenced to penal servitude,
†See (4) Debates, clxi., 164,165.1303 who are employed in the work of construction—a healthy outdoor labour, similar to that performed by convicts at Portland and Dartmoor. It is pro posed to send only selected cases to Maidstone for this purpose—100 to 200 in number. The rest will go, as usual, to the so-called public works prisons, but at these prisons about 60 per cent, are employed inside the prison enclosure at various trades and industries. Most of the convicts who recently showed an insubordinate spirit at Maidstone had recently been transferred from Borstal, and no other cause can be assigned for the outbreak than dislike of the change, as their labour at Borstal had been comparatively easy, while at Maidstone they had to be employed on work of a more arduous kind.