SECOND READING. (Hansard, 15 June 1860)

THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATH
, in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, that by the present law the penalty for furious riding or driving through the streets of the Metropolis, so as to endanger the life and limb of any person, or to the common danger of passengers, was but 40s., a sum totally inadequate to ensure protection for the lives and limbs of Her Majesty's subjects. It appeared from a Return laid upon their Lordships' table that, within the last two years, no less than 134 persons had been run over and killed outright, and 1,827 injured. Of those who had been run over but not killed at the time, eight had subsequently died, and of those who had been knocked down, nine had afterwards died. Even this inadequate penalty of 40s. might, under certain circumstances, be reduced to 2s. 6d. He thought it was monstrous that any person should be able to set the law at defiance merely because he was able to put his hand into his pocket and pay the fine imposed. He therefore proposed that in cases of accident or loss of life through reckless driving, the perpetrators should be visited with imprisonment, and not mulcted in a fine. He had himself seen examples of reckless driving in the streets of London, particularly in those neighbourhoods in which the traffic was not very great, such as in Belgravia, which was perfectly inconsistent with the preservation of public safety. The furious driving was principally by persons in one-horse carts belonging to tradesmen and others. The noble Marquess cited several cases of the lamentable and even fatal effects of furious driving:—among them the case of one Thomas Barnard, who had been tried in February previously for feloniously killing a man by furious driving. It appeared that Barnard had driven against a poor old man of 70, and knocked him down, and he died in two hours afterwards. The defence was that the driver was on the right side of the road. That man only got two months' imprisonment; but within a few minutes afterwards a man was convicted of stealing 497 a watch, and sentenced to three years' penal servitude. He thought such an inequality of punishments afforded ample justification for bringing forward the present Bill.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR
said, he was obliged to the noble Marquess for his laudable efforts to improve the law in this particular, but doubted whether the Bill would effect the object. This question had very recently been considered by a Select Committee, consisting of all the law Lords and other Peers, and after great deliberation they came to the unanimous conclusion that the law upon the subject ought not to be altered as was now proposed. The noble Marquess did not appear to have accurately studied the existing law. It would be supposed from the noble Marquess's statement that if a man by furious driving killed another he was only subjected to a fine; but the law really was that if a man by furious driving maliciously killed another, he would be in jeopardy to lose his life; and if it were done by negligence he would be guilty of manslaughter, and would be liable to a sentence of penal servitude. Now, the Bill before their Lordships was only confined to improper driving where no injury was sustained. As the law now stood, upon any such occurrence a pecuniary penalty might be inflicted upon the offender by summary conviction before the magistrates; but the noble Marquess proposed that even where no injury had been done, any person might be convicted of furious driving—that was, in fact, for driving at a greater rate than some nervous or timid person thought he ought to do—before a single magistrate, and sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour. For so undefinable an offence as furious driving, unaccompanied by personal injury, he thought it would be hard to inflict a punishment so severe. Believing the provisions of the Bill to be inexpedient and improper, he must ask their Lordships to reject the second reading.

THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATH
said, he did not think the explanation of the noble and learned Lord was any answer to the very serious state of things disclosed by the Return which he had quoted.

LORD DENMAN
recommended the noble Marquess to withdraw the Bill.

THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATH
said, that after the strong expression of opinion from the noble and learned Lord Chancellor—an opinion from which it was, nevertheless, his misfortune strongly to dissent —he would not persevere in the Motion for the second reading of the Bill.