§ 32. Mr. Kitsonasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many convictions there have been in England and Wales for sheep stealing over the last three years.
§ The Joint Under-Secretary of State to the Home Department (Miss Mervyn Pike)I regret that separate statistics for sheep stealing in England and Wales are not available. The numbers of persons convicted of larceny of horses, cattle and sheep under Sections 3 and 4 of the Larceny Act, 1916, were 48 in 1959, 36 in 1960 and 62 in 1961.
§ Mr. KitsonDoes my hon. Friend appreciate that the penalties for sheep stealing are very often lighter than those imposed for poaching? Has not the time come to revise these penalties? Does she not appreciate that there is a great number of undetected cases which the police ought to make a greater attempt to detect because the situation is getting rather out of hand, particularly in the uplands in the Dales?
§ Miss PikeI appreciate the seriousness of this problem in the Dales and in parts of Leicestershire, but I remind my hon. Friend that the maximum penalty for sheep stealing is 14 years' imprisonment.