§ MR. NIELD (Middlesex, Ealing)To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will issue a circular to recorders and chairmen and deputy-chairmen of quarter sessions, as well as to clerks of the peace, pointing out the desirability of a permanent record of the evidence being made and preserved in all criminal trials, and recommending them at once to make the necessary provision; and whether, if there be an objection to make this recommendation to unpaid chairmen of quarter sessions, he will do so to recorders and others holding office under the Crown upon the nomination of the Secretary of State.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) As the notes taken by chairmen of quarter sessions and recorders are sufficient for their own purposes, I cannot ask them to bear the very considerable expense of having the evidence taken down in shorthand, and at present the law makes no provision for defraying such expenditure from public funds. As I have already said, the matter will be set right by the Criminal Appeal Bill.