COMMONS' AMENDMENTS CONSIDERED. (Hansard, 14 July 1864)

§ THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY
rose to move, That their Lordships should insist on their Amendments in Clause 4. The noble Earl said, that as the Bill originally came from the other House, the fourth clause provided that a convict holding a licence should within three days after his arrival in any place notify his arrival to the police authorities, and should thereafter report himself once in each month until his term had expired. Their Lordships had struck out the words requiring a monthly report, and had made some other Amendments in the clause; but the Commons had refused to agree to the omission of the words regarding the monthly report; and he now had to move that their Lordships should insist upon their Amendment. The Commons had sent up four or five Reasons for disagreeing to this Amendment, to which he would call their Lordships' attention. The first was simply the statement of the wish of the House of Commons— That a monthly registration of the places of residence of all male licence holders should be systematic and regular. Against this their Lordships might place their desire to the contrary. There was some ambiguity about the expression "places of residence." If it was intended to apply to the actual domicile of the licence holder, all the time of one of these persons might be occupied in reporting his changes of residence to the police. They generally lived in common lodging-houses, adapting their residence to the situation of their work, and often changed their place of sleeping three or four times in a week. Upon the second Reason he need not make any observation. The third Reason was— Because, if the said Amendment were agreed to, there would be no security that any holder of a licence would ever be required to make a periodical report of himself to the police in any way. But when their Lordships struck out the words "once in each month," they left in the regulation that within three days of his arrival in a police district the licence-holder should report to the chief constable, and that if he went from one district to another 1441 he should give notice both of his departure and arrival. For the fourth Reason— Because, if any licence were issued containing such conditions as are referred to in trio said Amendment, such licence must be in a form different to that set forth in schedule A, and consequently no holder of such licence would be amenable to the penalties mentioned in the 5th and 8th clauses of the Bill. There was something more to be said, because he admitted that this Amendment was somewhat inconsistent with other parts of the Bill; but he entertained so strong an objection to this provision, which would most seriously interfere with the working of the present system of granting licences, that he should be prepared to meet almost any difficulty rather than allow it to become the law of the land. The fifth Reason— Because the adoption of the said Amendment would seriously interfere with the working of the present system of registration and supervision of licence holders in Ireland"— inclined him to think that the House of Commons had been induced to vote for the restitution of those words under the impression that the Irish system had been incorporated in the Bill, and that by their Amendment their Lordships intended to prevent its forming part of the measure. Nothing, however, could be more distinct than the system which was to be established under this Bill and that which now-existed in Ireland. As a proof of the difference, he would refer to the circumstance that he had that morning received the first report of "the Inspector of Released Convicts in Dublin." The existence of such an officer itself constituted a most important difference between the two systems, which became still more apparent when regard was had to his duties, among the most important of which was to provide employment for men when they were discharged from intermediate prisons—thus relieving them from the great difficulty of finding work, which pressed so hardly upon them in this country—and to keep up a frequent correspondence with discharged prisoners. The Irish system provided for the man most minutely and carefully all those things which under this Bill he was to be called upon to provide for himself. The Bill did not make any provision for finding a man occupation, or rendering him any assistance in contending with the difficulties to which he would be exposed directly he came out of prison. All that it did was to require him to report himself to the police once a month, and thus to impose upon him the necessity of diselos- 1442 ing his condition, not only to the master who employed him, but also to the men among whom he worked. Since the debate on the subject had taken place in that House, he had instituted very minute and extensive inquiries on the point, and the conclusion at which he had arrived was that employers of labour were most unwilling to engage ticket-of-leave men, while they would, he believed, be still more unwilling to employ men who were forced to report themselves every month to the police. He had also ascertained that the working classes themselves objected to having those men incorporated in their body, and that the police were by no means the persons who were most adverse to them. It should, He might add, be borne in mind that the holding of a ticket-of-leave was an incentive to deception— such a man found it most difficult to obtain employment unless he concealed the fact of his condition — and that the evil of the system in that respect would be very much aggravated if a man were compelled month by month to deceive everybody except the police-constable to whom he made his report. The action of the police with regard to those men must not, he would further observe, be judged too harshly. A policeman saw a man employed in a confidential situation whom he knew to be a convicted thief; and if he took no notice of the circumstance, and the man committed a robbery, he was held responsible for having concealed the real state of things from his master; while if he were to act otherwise he would, no doubt be frequently the cause of having a man driven from employment who was disposed to earn an honest livelihood. So long as a ticket-of-leave man was able to lax his friends for his support he went on all right; but when he began to seek the means of earning a livelihood himself, then his difficulties commenced, and it was necessary that some consideration should be shown by the Legislature for the position in which he was placed. Those men as a class were naturally very excitable, and were disposed to look upon the whole world as opposed to them, and in despair to throw themselves back on their old associates. Their Lordships would see that there was a very considerable difference between a man who bad been convicted for the first time and one who had been convicted ten or a dozen times; and it was a very serious thing that a man who had offended once, and who was desirous of returning to the paths of 1443 honest industry, should be driven back by legislation to his evil courses, and perhaps made a hopeless criminal. Another objection to the provision to which he was referring was that the requiring this periodical report tended very much to bind the man to the place he went to immediately after liberation, and thus to keep them to their old haunts, which was most undesirable, inasmuch as they were thereby exposed to temptations which they found it impossible to overcome. Of those who came out of prison a large proportion, he might observe, were anxious to reform—a statement which was corroborated by the testimony of Mr. Organ among others, as well as by his own personal experience of the men, several of whom had told him that it was impossible to exaggerate the horrors of their life. A few years ago, for instance, he had received an application from a great number of thieves in London, who requested that he would meet them at a particular place. In compliance with that request, he went to the appointed spot, and there met 250 of those men, with whom he had a long conversation, and who begged of him to give them some advice as to the best means of getting out of their wretched position. He never should forget the energy and force with which they stated their case, and he was happy to say that employment was found for about eighty of them (and he believed many of the others succeeded in obtaining employment), and that, so far as he could ascertain on the most minute inquiry, not twenty-five of the number had ever returned to the course of life from which they had been rescued. That furnished strong evidence that, if they were not driven back to crime by such a disclosure of their position as was involved in the necessity of reporting themselves once a month to the police, many convicts might be restored to society. He might mention another very remarkable case in illustration of what he had just been stating. A boy eighteen years of age, who had passed six years of that time in prison, and who was pronounced by the police to be an incorrigible offender, had presented himself at the door of a reformatory of which he (the Earl of Shaftesbury) was president, and begged to be admitted. Admission was at first refused, on the ground that the boy was beyond the prescribed age; but in compliance with his repeated entreaties his request was at last complied with, and nothing could exceed the propriety of his conduct during the year and 1444 a half after his entrance. It was then determined to submit him to a severe experiment, and they said to him, "Here, Daniel" — for that was his name—" here are five pounds for you to go and pay a bill in Whitechapel and bring back the receipt." Now, Whitechapel was the neighbourhood in which this young man had always lived; but he returned in an incredibly short space of time, his eyes sparkling with delight, and when asked, "What makes you so cheerful?" he replied, "Why should I not be cheerful — I have been entrusted with £5." They then asked him how it was he got back so soon, and he said that Whitechapel was his old haunt, and he ran the whole way because he knew the moment he got there his former companions would come round him, and if he stayed with them one half hour he should be a lost man. This showed to his mind that a desire existed amongst this class of people to abandon the vicious course of life they had been leading. But he was sure that if their Lordships insisted upon the proposed regulations the thieves would infinitely prefer remaining in prison and fulfilling their whole sentence, than submit to them. Their Lordships must admit that the whole thing was an experiment; but he thought it would be far better to be a little less stringent in their enactments, although it might allow a few men to slip through the meshes of the law, than by any arbitrary legislation force hundreds of them back to their old courses of fraud and violence.

THE EARL OF CARNARVON
hoped that the Government would state what course they intended to take in this matter. Much as he was disposed ordinarily to rely on the authority of the noble-Earl who had just sat down (the Earl of Shaftesbury) on these subjects, he could not consider his arguments applicable to this particular question, and if his proposition were carried out, the Bill would become practically unworkable. The point had been very fully discussed already, and on a review of all the arguments he recommended their Lordships not to insist on their Amendment, but to acquiesce in the decision of the other House. He hoped the Government would not allow the matter to fall back into chaos, which would be the case if the Bill were prevented from passing.

§ EARL GRANVILLE
said, the noble Earl who had just spoken had precisely explained the course which Her Majesty's Government intended to pursue. From what he (Earl Granville) had said on the previous stage of the Bill, his noble Friend (the Earl of Shaftesbury) must be aware that he could not concur in the course his noble Friend now proposed, and he thought there would be great danger of losing this important Bill if their Lordships should insist on their Amendment. He hoped, therefore, his noble Friend would withdraw his Motion. He thought, also, that in a great degree the alarm felt with respect to the effect of the Bill, if it passed in its present state, had been greatly exaggerated.

LORD HOUGHTON
regretted that the House of Commons had struck out the words "if required so to do." The condition of the monthly report was now made absolute. There would be no power in the police or any other authority to remit the supervision, and he would much rather the Bill were lost altogether, than that the words should remain as they now stood in the clause. He and those who thought with him in the matter were not open to the charge of disregarding the interests of society, for it was because they believed that the convict by the monthly supervision would be placed in such a condition as would make it impossible for him to regain the paths of honest labour, that their Amendment was proposed. He should not divide the House, but he felt certain the time would come when their Lordships would regret allowing the clause to stand in its present form.

§ THE EARL OF LICHFIELD
objected very much to the indiscriminate application of the clause to all persons coming out of convict prisons. He thought there could be no doubt that it would put fresh obstacles in the way of ticket-of-leave men getting employment, while it would not secure the supervision which was exercised over that class in Ireland. Their Lordships ought to pause before introducing a system which could not be proved to have been successful in Ireland, and which had been entirely unsuccessful in France. He would rather see the Bill lost than introduce in it so clumsy a piece of legislation, under the name of police supervision.

LORD BROUGHAM
said, he had voted with the majority because he agreed entirely with the Commons, and wholly disapproved of the clauses as added by their Lordships after a previous decision against that clause; but that even had his opinion been different he should have voted with 1447 the majority, because a difference with the Commons must have lost the Bill.

CONTENTS.
Westminster, M.	Congleton, L.
	Cranworth, L.
Airlie, E.	Dartrey, L. (L. Cremorne).
Chichester, E.
Effingham, E.	Ebury, L.
Fortescue, E.	Houghton, L.
Harrowby, E.	Leigh, L.
Lichfield E. [Teller.]	Ponsonby, L, (E. Bessborough).
Shaftesbury, E. [Teller.]
Verulam, E.	Portman, L.
	Silchester, L, (E. Longford)
De Vesci, V.
Eversley, V.	Stratheden, L.
	Taunton, L.
Calthorpe, L.	Vivian, L.
Churchill, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.
Westbury, L. (L. Chancellor).	Oxford, Bp.
	Abereromby, L.
Armagh, Achbp.	Abinger, L.
	Annaly, L.
Buckingham and Chandos, D.	Brougham and Vaux, L.
	Camoys, L.
Manchester, D.	Chelmsford, L.
Somerset, D.	Clinton, L.
	Colchester, L.
Bath, M.	De Tabley, L.
Salisbury, M.	Dinevor, L.
	Dunsany, L.
Caithness, E.	Egerton, L.
Carnarvon, E. [Teller.]	Foley, L. [Teller.]
Clarendon, E.	Hamilton, L. (L. Belhaven and Stenton).
De Grey, E.
Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry).	Harris, L.
	Lismore, L. (V. Lismore).
	Monson, L.
Ducie, E,	Mostyn, L.
Granville, E.	Polwarth, L.
Hardwicke, E.	Redesdale, L.
Lucan, E.	Rivers, L.
Manvers, E.	Seaton, L.
Morley, E.	Seymour, L. (E. St. Maur).
Nelson, E.
Powis, E.	Sherborne, J.
Romney, E.	Stanley of Alderley, L.
Saint Germans, E.	Sundridge, L. (D. Argyll).
Hawarden, V	Templemore, L.
Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore).	Thurlow, L.
	Tredegar, L.
Leinster, V. (D. Leinster).	Tyrone, L. (M. Waterford)
Melville, V.	Wensleydale, L.
Sydney, V.	Wodehouse, L.
	Wynford, L.
Cork, &c., Bp.