§ 9.16 p.m.
§ Mr. Driberg (Maldon)I apologise to the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) if I use this last half hour of the Adjournment Motion, as is usual, to bring down the consideration of hon. Members from these grand and global themes to some particular problem. I want to raise a matter which is of interest, I suggest, to all hon. Members, because it may affect any of their constituents from whatever part of the country they come. I want to raise the question of the conditions in Stakehill military detention barracks. It is unfortunate that in this country it is, apparently, always necessary for a man to die before the attention of the House and the public generally is directed to the conditions in detention barracks. A year or two ago, as hon. Members will remember, there was a disgraceful and tragic episode at Fort Darland barracks, when Rifleman Clayton died as a result of ill-treatment. It will be within the memory of hon. Members what happened following that incident. As a result of pressure in this House, the then Secretary of State for War, Sir James Grigg, rather reluctantly and grudgingly appointed a judicial committee presided over by Mr. Justice Oliver, which toured the country, visited detention barracks without warning, took evidence from thousands of witnesses under conditions which guaranteed them immunity against victimisation, and eventually presented a report which 1391 did undoubtedly have some good results. As a result of the Oliver Report, many improvements were effected in conditions in detention barracks throughout this country and especially, I believe, at Fort Darland, the barracks which was the scene of the tragedy which originally led to the setting up of the Oliver Committee.
It is just a month ago today since an unfortunate man named James Hanlon was found dead hanging in Stake-hill Military detention barracks. Since that date a number of Questions have been asked in the House about the incident, and on 30th October I asked the Secretary of State for War if he could make a statement on this fatality and to what extent conditions in Stakehill detention barracks conformed with the recommendations of the Oliver Report. He replied that he could not at that time make a full statement, but that "all the recommendations of the Oliver Report" had been put into effect at Stakehill. The latter part of the reply is one of the things which I wish, with respect, to challenge tonight, because although the Oliver Report made a great many recommendations about sanitation and other material things, it also made some recommendations about personnel and other less material matters. I just want to read one sentence from the Report of the Oliver Committee.
The regimental sergeant-majors at the Military institutions and the warrant masters at arms at the Naval Quarters were, from our observation, quite admirable people who knew their work and did it thoroughly and sympathetically; but the staff below them varied a good deal in quality and were not sufficient in number. Some of them were past the work. Others were insufficiently trained and some were constitutionally unfitted for the task.I should like to ask my right hon. Friend if, when he comes to reply, he would tell the House whether those recommendations or implied recommendations of the Oliver Report have also been carried into effect, not only the material things, which we know have been done. I myself have visited Fort Darland and other barracks since the Oliver Report, and I know that the sanitation has been improved, perhaps the food has been improved, perhaps more educational schemes have been brought into effect; but the real essential basic difficulty about detention barracks, as far as one can make out, is the attitude 1392 of the staff towards the detainees. And obviously it must be rather a long-term business to replace the old wrong kind of staff by the new kind of staff who have a proper attitude towards those men who are unfortunate enough or foolish enough to get into their clutches. Can my right hon. Friend tell me, when he comes to reply, what steps have been taken really radically and drastically to reform the whole system of recruitment to the staffs of these detention barracks, because it seems to me to be a very important point?With regard to the particular case of Stakehill Detention Barracks, I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able tonight to give us some fuller statement than he has hitherto been able to do and, in particular, that he will be able to tell us whether the inquiry, which has already apparently been conducted—because he said on 30th October that he had received a report on 25th October from the Military Court of Inquiry which was then being examined—has gone fully into all the implications of this case. I cannot help feeling that besides that Military Court of Inquiry, which has already investigated the particular case of the unfortunate suicide or hanging at Stakehill, there ought now to be another and fuller inquiry which would not be of an exclusively military character. I cannot help feeling that there ought to foe another inquiry, perhaps not exactly the same as the Oliver Committee, but some kind of inquiry on which impartial civilians were represented and on which, it may be, the relatives of the man who died a month ago were represented, or at least before which they could say what they wanted to say about the events leading up to Private Hanlon's death.
I would also suggest that, on any such inquiry, there should be representatives, not only of officers, but also of other ranks. There is no reason whatever why there should not be ex-Service men, or Service men, warrant officers, sergeants and private soldiers—some, indeed, who may have had, through misfortune, to spend some time in detention barracks. [Hon. Members: "Why misfortune?"] If hon. Members think that that is a ridiculous suggestion, I would invite them to consider for a moment whether everybody who has been in detention barracks during the late war could be described as a hardened criminal. [Hon. Members: 1393 "That is not the same thing."] There may be men who have slipped up, and committed offences against military discipline and who found themselves for quite a short period in detention barracks, and I suggest, quite seriously and sincerely, that it might well be that some such man might be found, a man of normally good character and intelligence, who might well serve on such a commission of inquiry, and himself, from his own experiences, contribute something useful to the findings of that inquiry.
Above all, if there is such another inquiry, we have to safeguard ourselves in this House, since we are obviously interested in such matters, from any suggestion that we are merely concerned with whitewashing the authorities responsible. None of us want to do that. We do really want to get to the root of these matters, and I suggest that some thorough inquiry should be instituted, other than the purely military inquiry, about which I have no doubt my right hon. Friend will be able to say something tonight.
I should just like to refer, in passing, to the evidence which has been sent to me, and, I think, to other hon. Members and to the War Office, by a local clergyman, through whose instrumentality this matter really first attained a good deal of publicity and excited a certain amount of public disquiet—the Rev. Urien Evans, of Castleton, Rochdale. He has sent me statements of evidence which he has received from a large number of people, many of whom have served time in Stakehill Detention Barracks. Some are relatives of people who have served time in Stakehill. In all, there are 32 different statements, and the rather startling thing about them is that every one is signed with the name and address of the writers, including Servicemen who have served time there; and all of them allege pretty disgraceful brutality and other wrong things happening in these detention barracks.
That is a very surprising thing, because one of the difficulties, as the Oliver Committee found out, in getting really dependable evidence about what is happening inside these places always is that, of course, people are either afraid of being victimised if they do speak out freely, or else, at the other extreme, we get the exhibitionist type, who, as the R.A.F. say, "shoot a line" about what they have 1394 been through. The great difficulty is to strike a balance between these two, and I must say that I am very much impressed by the evidence of these 32 people who have had the courage to give their names and addresses to the Secretary of State for War, and to Members of this House as testifying to the conditions of brutality which exist in Stakehill Detention Bar racks. This clergyman, in sending this statement of evidence to me, sent a covering letter in which he said:
It seems to me that the guards and privileged prisoners torment individual prisoners to such an extent, when no officers or visitors are likely to be present, that it is beyond human endurance. The unfortunate victim is then forced to retaliate, thereby giving the opening for him to be beaten up without fear of censure. Even strong men are so cowed under this treatment that they dare not complain.He adds:I have a letter here saying that the writer will murder one particular guard at Stakehill when he is demobbed because of the treatment meted out to him while interned at the camp. One cannot condone such a threat, but one must ask why such a state of affairs exists. Incidentally, the guard in question, under oath, denied ill-treatment at the inquest on the deceased, Private Hanlon.I suggest that there is sufficient prima facie evidence for us to agree that things are not as they should be in this particular camp at Stakehill, and I shall be most grateful if my right hon. Friend will not only tell us all that he knows as to what has already happened—the result of the Military Inquiry that has already taken place—but also what plans he has for the future to clean up, not only this particular place, but any other detention barracks there may be where things are not as they should be.
§ 9.32 p.m.
§ The Secretary of State for War (Mr. J. J. Lawson)I should like to thank my hon. Friend for raising this question and giving me an opportunity of making a statement upon the inquiry which has already been held. It is right, of course, that matters affecting the soldier who is under detention should, under such circumstances as my hon. Friend has described, receive the attention of this House, and this, particular incident was one of a very grave nature. With the general aspect of the question of detention places I cannot deal as my hon. Friend would ask me; all I can say is that, as he himself said, the Oliver Com- 1395 mittee was set up to deal with detention prisons generally, and a very useful piece of work was done which was welcomed by this House. I can say to him that, from the report I have received and from all the inquiries I have made myself, the recommendations of the Oliver Committee have been applied generally to these places of detention and, indeed, have been applied to this particular place, Stakehill.
My hon. Friend asked a particular question about the staffs. I can tell him that, since the Oliver Report was published, the staff have been increased by 12 per cent., and there is functioning now a school to train the new entrants for the purpose of becoming staff officers. With regard to the tragic incident which happened at Stakehill, there was, first, a coroner's inquest, at which the coroner himself made it quite clear that there was ample evidence that Private Hanlon had had very serious domestic troubles.
If the House will forgive me, I would like to read, for the purposes of greater accuracy, a statement of the conclusions I reached on a report which was submitted to me by the local military authority. This inquiry was assembled under King's Regulations on the day after Private Hanlon met his death, to investigate the circumstances in which the fatality occurred. It was in no sense a general inquiry into the administration of the Stakehill Detention Barracks, although its scope covered statements affecting the administration made by witnesses in connection with the case. I read the proceedings of the inquiry and the evidence obtained from witnesses at the inquest—in fact, I have spent many hours during the last two days reading this report and evidence, as well as the report of the inquiry. The court of inquiry, like the inquest, produced a number of conflicting statements, but did not produce any proof that anything in the nature of "beating-up" had occurred in this case. The information which I received confirms the view of the coroner that there were other reasons to explain the determination of Private Hanlon to take his life. It also shows the recommendations of the Oliver Report had been put into effect at Stakehill. There is, however, 1396 some indication that there have been irregularities of procedure in one or two respects. But, in general, I am convinced for whatever shortcomings there have been individuals, and not the system, must be held responsible.
Nevertheless, in view of the public anxiety which has been aroused, and which has been expressed tonight by my hon. Friend, and also in fairness to the staff and because certain allegations have been made since the court of inquiry was held, I have decided to convene a further court of inquiry of a more authoritative character. In order to elicit the truth, and in the interests of individuals whose conduct may be impugned, it is necessary that evidence be obtained from witnesses on oath, and for that reason the new court must be a court of military officers convened under the Army Act. I propose to invite a practising member of the Bar of standing, who holds a commission, to be a legal member of that court. The court will not have the power of a court of law to apply disciplinary sanctions to individuals, but it will be required to report to me, and in the light of its findings a decision will be reached as to what, if any, disciplinary action is necessary. I will inform the House of the outcome of the inquiry.
As regards the several allegations which have been made that the court will have no power to compel the attendance of witnesses who are no longer in the Service, but subject to the discretion of the court, those who have made allegations relating to recent events—all of whose addresses have been communicated to me—will be invited to give evidence on oath to the court in substantiation of the allegations they have made. I hope they will see fit to do so, because otherwise it will not be possible to make their statements serve any useful purpose. In fairness to those who have the difficult task of running detention barracks, I am sure the House will agree that it would, at this stage, be wrong and unjust to prejudge the outcome of the inquiry. With that statement, I hope the House will forgive me if I do not say anything more on this matter tonight.