§ LORD ST. LEONARDSsaid, he understood that a noble Lord in another place 25 had stated, that as it was the intention of Her Majesty's Ministers, in accordance with the resolution of the late Government, to put an end to the system of transportation to the Australian Colonics, and at the same time to introduce a measure with respect to secondary punishments in lieu of transportation, it would not he prudent, in his opinion, that he (Lord St. Leonards) should proceed with his Bill to consolidate the present law with regard to secondary offences until the question of transportation had been finally disposed of. Now, it was quite true that his (Lord St. Leonards') Bill, as it stood, referred to transportation; but although he doubted whether transportation could be altogether abolished, yet whenever a substitutionary punishment was enacted in lieu of general transportation, the new Act which he proposed simply declared that the new punishment should stand in the place of the old. He believed that the noble Lord, if he heard this explanation, would he quite satisfied with it.
LORD CAMPBELLhoped, that before the Bill of his noble and learned Friend came into operation, the question of secondary punishments would be finally settled; and he would also take that opportunity of expressing a hope that the Government would not abolish the punishment of transportation; as, from his experience as a Judge, he was inclined to believe that for the punishment and reformation of convicts it was the best that had over been devised, and that it was one which conduced more than any other kind of secondary punishment to the security of the public. With respect to the question of forcing convicts upon unwilling colonists, he would give no opinion; but he hoped the Government would be able to retain the punishment of transportation to some penal settlement, without doing injury to any one.