THE DUKE OF ATHOLLMy Lords, I crave the indulgence of the House and beg to ask your Lordships' permission to make a very short personal 924 statement. In view of the fact that the Attorney-General has, in another place, denied the accuracy of a statement I made in your Lordships' House the other day, and as that statement concerned, to a certain extent, the Bill that is shortly going to be before your Lordships' House, I wish to say that I see no reason to alter one word of what I said to your Lordships on Thursday. It seems to me unfortunate that the Attorney-General, before making his statement, did not communicate with me first, either with a request for further information, or for the corroborative evidence which, fortunately, happens to be available, but relied solely on ex-parte information. I am glad, however, to learn that, although the police were sent to Blair Atholl by the instructions of the Public Prosecutor, they had no authority from him for some of the statements which I re-affirm were in fact made to me.
I have only to add that, before the summons was applied for, the Public Prosecutor was personally made aware by my legal advisers of the impropriety of the police action. One would have thought that, had there been no ground for this allegation of impropriety, the mere fact of its having been made would have been sufficient to cause the authorities to insist upon tendering the evidence so that the circumstances in which it was obtained could be fully investigated. At the trial, however, no attempt was made to use the evidence obtained by these police officers at Blair Atholl. I feel bound to take this, the first, opportunity of making this short statement, as not only do I feel that my personal honour as a member of this House has been impugned, but also because the Attorney-General, in the language he used, has conveyed the impression that, had my statement been made elsewhere, I might have laid myself open to the possibility of some unspecified criminal proceedings. I beg to thank your Lordships for the courtesy you have extended to me.