PRISON (POLITICAL OFFENCES) BILL. (Hansard, 14 May 1912)

§ Mr. KEIR HARDIE

I beg to move, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to render political offenders misdemeanants, of the first division."

I can explain in a few simple sentences why I take this means of asking leave to bring in this Bill instead of handing it in in the usual way. Those of us who are responsible for this Bill are hopeful it may be possible to pass it as a non-contentious measure during the present Session. It contains one operative Clause. Its object is to secure that prisoners who are convicted of a political offence solely shall be treated as first-class misdemeanants. The definition of a political offender is taken from Section 3 of the Extradition Act of 1870. Since that Act was passed there have been several decisions in the Law Courts as to what constitutes a political offence, so that the Extradition Act and the case law which has grown out of the Act leaves no doubt as to what is meant by the term "political offender." As to a first-class misdemeanant, we have taken the meaning contained in Section 67 of the Prison Act of 1865. We are not, therefore, seeking to create any new special privilege for any section of the community. We are simply seeking to lay down that a person who is convicted solely of a political offence, as already defined by law and by decisions in the Law Courts, shall be treated as a first-class misdemeanant. Let me say at once, quite frankly, that the reasons for this Bill and the urgency for it is mainly the treatment of women political prisoners. These have been subjected to periods of imprisonment ranging from four weeks to six months for political offences. They claim to be treated as political offenders. The claim was refused by the prison authorities, whereupon what has come to be known as the hunger strikes were inaugurated. They had for their object to secure for women political offenders the same treatment as has been given to men political offenders in times gone by. In regard to the offence of which the women have been guilty, it is alleged that the breaking of windows disqualifies them from being considered merely political offenders, but our Law Courts have laid it down that even the killing of a person under certain circumstances is a political offence, and he is, therefore, exonerated from liability to be extradited for his crime. Perhaps the House will allow me to quote a few lines from the decision of Mr. Justice Denman on this very point. 979 The case was that of Castioni, who was accused of having killed a gentleman in Switzerland, and extradition was applied for. Mr. Castioni defended his own case, and Mr. Justice Denman, in giving his decision, said:— The question really is whether upon the facts it is clear that the man was acting as one of a number of persons engaged in acts of violence of a political character with a political object, and as part of a political movement and rising in which he is taking part. If so, the offence is political; but, if the offender's motive is to satisfy private spite or to gain some personal end, it is an ordinary offence. I submit that is the case of the women suffragettes. Their acts of violence were undertaken solely and exclusively to further a political end. I would remind the House that when Dr. Jameson and his colleagues were tried and found guilty of having invaded a foreign country, as the Transvaal then was, their term of imprisonment for a few months was that of first-class misdemeanants.

Furthermore, hon. Gentlemen opposite, whose case I have not time to go into, by fighting exactly as women have been fighting found themselves in prison for political offences, and got the very same treatment which women are now claiming, and which this Bill will confer on them the right to have. Then we have the case of other countries. In most other countries the political offender is treated on quite a different footing from the ordinary offender. He is regarded more as a prisoner on bail than as a criminal against society. What is known as Custodia Honesta (honourable custody) prevails more or less in Australia, Germany, France, Holland, Italy, and even Russia. Surely Great Britain can well afford to follow where these countries lead in this respect. As to the authorities in favour of this change, the Prison Commission, which sat in 1870, recommended that political offenders should be treated in a separate establishment from ordinary criminals. The reason for that is obvious. Then as to the authorities. Professor Bryce, His Majesty's Ambassador at Washington, in a letter which he wrote on this question, said:— It is certainly not easy to find a satisfactory definition of a political offence, yet we all feel the difference between the ordinary criminal and those whose treatment you describe. Perhaps we may say that whenever the moral judgment of the community at large does not brand an offence as sordid and degrading, and does not feel the offence to be one which destroys its respect for the personal character of the prisoner, it may there be held that prison treatment, ought to be different from that awarded to ordinary criminals. That is the opinion of Professor Bryce. Then the late Sir William Harcourt, deal- 980 ing with the case of the hon. Member for Cork, and speaking in St. James's Hall on 10th April, 1889, said:— Has Mr. Balfour triumphed in his war against political prisoners? A few months ago he laughed at the sufferings of Mr. O'Brien in prison. Mr. O'Brien was knocked down, stripped by force, and tortured into insensibility. Mr. Carew has since been stripped by force, but this week three Members of our party were sent to prison and were asked in the politest manner whether they would wear prison clothes and when they refused their refusal was in the politest manner accepted. Leave out the word "stripped" and insert "fed" and these words apply exactly to the case now under consideration. Sir William Harcourt wound up by saying:— The poisoned weapons of the coward are dashed out of his hands, and nothing but brute force is left him. … We desire that the system of brute force as applied to women striking for what they believe their political rights, shall be taken away and reasonable treatment substituted for it. Then the Prime Minister, speaking at Birmingham on 11th February, 1889, said:— They had not met to express sympathy with crime, or to demand lenient or indulgent treatment, but they have assembled for the purpose of denouncing the treatment of political and industrial agitators on the same footing as an ordinary criminal. That is our demand to-day, that political and industrial agitators, the women suffragists and syndicalists now in prison, shall not be treated as ordinary criminals but as political offenders on a different footing. My last quotation is from a gentleman whose word ought to carry conviction with Liberals on this side of the House. The late Mr. Gladstone, speaking on this same question in the House of Commons on the 1st March, 1889, said:— I know very well you cannot attempt to frame a legislative definition of political offences, but what you can do, and what has always been done, is this: you can say that in certain classes of the imprisoned a person ought not to be treated as if he had been guilty of base and degrading crime. The late Earl Beaconsfield when Mr. Disraeli, speaking in this House with regard to the treatment of the Chartists, said:— The proper treatment of these people was not to punish, but merely to restrain them from propagating their doctrines. That is our case. I ask the House to allow this Bill to be introduced in the hope and expectation that, with all these authorities behind me and with the progress which prison reform has made, it may be possible for it to become law this Session and remove what is undoubtedly a crying scandal from our midst.