§ 4 and 5. Mr. Swinglerasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) if he will take steps to ensure that damaging statements in preventive detention reports by the Prison Commissioners which are not directly relevant to the case before the court are withheld from publication;
(2) if he is aware of the damage suffered by Mr. G. W. Parsons, about whom the honourable Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme wrote to him on 15th November, as a result of the publication of those parts of the Prison Commissioners' preventive detention report relating to his domestic affairs; and if he will reconsider his refusal to make an ex gratia payment to Mr. Parsons in compensation.
§ Mr. SimonThese reports are made to courts and my right hon. Friend has no authority to prevent their publication in court. He has reconsidered the case to which the hon. Member refers and can find no ground for making an ex gratia payment.
§ Mr. SwinglerHas the Home Secretary no power or influence with the Prison Commissioners to ensure that when they know that a court is liable to order publication they can withhold from a report presented to the court sections which are defamatory? Is it not entirely wrong that defamatory statements which are irrelevant to the case being considered by the court should be made and that there should be no remedy open to the citizen involved or his relatives who have been slandered?
§ Mr. SimonThe Prison Commissioners have a duty to make a report to the court under the provisions of the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, on the physical and mental condition of an accused man and 523 his suitability for preventive detention or for corrective training. Therefore, they are bound to include in it all the relevant information about the accused man's personality and background. Only if they do that can the court take such matters into account in deciding what is the proper sentence. In the case to which the hon. Gentleman referred, the information was given to the prison authorities by the accused man himself.