§ MR. ASHLEY (Lancashire, Blackpool)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to a presentment of the Grand Jury of the Central Criminal Court, on Tuesday, 23rd April, to the effect that they, the Grand Jury, being impressed with the number of cases in which aliens appeared, were unanimously of opinion that the exclusion of undesirable aliens and the deportation of others from our shores should be more rigidly enforced; whether he is prepared to give favourable consideration to these recommendations; and what action ho proposes to take in the matter.
§ SIR W. EVANS GORDON (Tower Hamlets, Stepney)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the presentment handed by the Grand Jury to the Recorder at the Central Criminal Court on the 23rd instant, animadverting upon the number of cases in which aliens appear, and expressing the unanimous opinion that the exclusion of undesirable aliens and the deportation of others from our shores should be more rigidly enforced; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter.
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. GLADSTONE,) Leeds, W.I have seen a newspaper report to the effect indicated, but have received no communication from the Court. If the presentment is submitted to me I propose to ask that I may be favoured with a statement of the facts and figures on which it was based. In the meantime 1 may point out, as regards the expulsion of aliens, that the matter rests largely in the hands of the Court. A certificate from a Court is a condition precedent to expulsion under the Act. During the sixteen months that the Act has been in force, only twenty-three certificates have proceeded from the Central Criminal Court, twenty-one in 1906, two since the beginning of the present year. In eight cases expulsion orders have been made; in the remaining fifteen cases the sentences of imprisonment have not yet expired. As regards the exclusion of undesirable aliens I am carrying out the provisions of the Act.
§ MR. BYLES (Salford, N.)Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the proportion to population of alien criminals is as great as or greater than that in the case of British criminals?