REFORMATORY AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS BILL. (Hansard, 12 June 1856)

THE EARL OF CLANCARTY
asked whether it was intended that the Bill should extend to Ireland.

THE DUKE OF ARGYLL
inquired whether the Bill was to embrace Scotland, as he feared that if it was, it would clash with the provisions of another measure, more especially as regarded the removal of children.

§ THE EARL OF HARDWICKE
said, that the Government ought to take a decided course with regard to these reformatory schools, which had been left too much, he thought, in the hands of private individuals. The Government ought to be prepared to deal with the important question of dealing with our juvenile criminal population. He much feared that the educating and clothing of young persons in these reformatories only offered a premium to a certain class of parents to induce their children to commit felonies, in order that they might receive eleemosynary assistance. The whole question was in an unsatisfactory state, and it had become a matter of great importance to determine how these schools—which ought to be prisons— should be conducted. Criminals, he maintained, ought to be dealt with by the Government of the country in which they committed their offences.

§ THE EARL OF HARROWBY
said, the subject had not been overlooked by the Government, but the conclusion they had come to was, that this particular process of reforming juvenile offenders would be best intrusted to private hands. The influence exerted over such offenders must be the influence of kind hearts and of 1325 strong minds, and this sort of influence was difficult to be obtained through the medium of State machinery. Thirty or forty years ago this same method was, he believed, pursued with regard to refuges for the destitute. If the Government undertook the establishment of these reformatory institutions great difficulties, both religious and moral, at once started up. What, it would immediately be asked, was to be the religious training adopted? Was it to be the training of the Church of England? Such objections did not arise when these establishments were left to individual effort; and he thought, under all the circumstances, the Government had done wisely in declining to interfere by lifeless State machinery in a work which was at present being actively and heartily carried on throughout the whole country. As to the noble Earl's fears of danger to society from the establishment of reformatory institutions, which would to a certain extent tend to the encouragement of crime, that difficulty was met by a provision in the existing law, which enabled the magistrates, on committing a child to the reformatory, to charge the parent with payment of a sum for his maintenance. This provision could not be acted on in every case, but it was very generally carried into effect, and would exert, he believed, a wholesome influence upon parents.

§ LORD RAVENSWORTH
said, the observations of his noble Friend and relative (the Earl of Hardwicke) seemed to be directed against the very principle of reformatory establishments rather than against any special provisions proposed for adoption. Now, whatever opinions might be formed with regard to these institutions, it was an undoubted fact that they formed a part and parcel of the institutions of the country at the present moment. There was hardly a populous district or a populous town in England which had not besieged the Home Office with deputations praying for the establishment of these schools, and no less than three Acts of Parliament now appeared on our Statutebook which were passed for the express purpose of regulating reformatories. It was therefore beside the question to protest against a principle which had already been adopted, was now in full operation, and the working of which could only be tested by experience. In answer to the noble Earl behind him (the Earl of Olan-carty) he begged to state that the Bill could not possibly be applied to Ireland, 1326 inasmuch as Ireland did not at present possess reformatory institutions. There was a measure upon the subject before the other House which was being met, however, with strenuous opposition. To a certain extent, the measure would be applicable to Scotland.