§ 36. Mr. Bensonasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is in a position to make a statement on the subject of hard labour in prisons.
§ Mr. H. MorrisonI shall shortly be laying before Parliament the necessary amendment to the Prison Rules to abolish the requirement that a male prisoner should be deprived of a mattress for the first fourteen days of a sentence of hard labour. All those concerned with prison administration are agreed in recommending the abolition of this survival of the idea that arbitrary physical discomfort is of any value either as a deterrent or for reformative purposes. As the House may be aware, many of the then existing conditions of a "hard labour" sentence were removed during the last war in order that prisoners might be able to assist the war effort by engaging in productive work. It seems appropriate, therefore, that this war, to which prisoners have made so considerable a contribution by their hard work, should see the end of this feature of a sentence of hard labour. Certain technical differences between a sentence of imprisonment and one of hard labour will remain, but so far as treatment in prison normally is concerned there will now be no distinction between these sentences.
§ Mr. BensonDoes my right lion. Friend realise that his answer will give very considerable satisfaction?
§ Mr. GoldieCan my right hon. Friend assure the House that distinctions will still be retained between these two forms of treatment in order to keep the hardened criminals separate from prisoners of lesser criminal tendencies?
§ Mr. MorrisonI think that question had better be put on the Paper, because I am not quite sure about it.