§ Sir K. WOODasked the Attorney-General if he will make available to Members of the House copies of the information and the instructions to counsel in the proceedings against Mr. Campbell, the editor of the "Workers' Weekly"?
The ATTORNEY-GENERALThere is no precedent for this application, and if it is to be granted it will create a new practice. If, however, the Leaders of both the Opposition parties will make the request to me, I shall be only too pleased to accede to it.
§ Sir E. HUME-WILLIAMSasked the Attorney-General whether the alleged fact that the article in respect of which Mr. Campbell was prosecuted consisted of a printed extract from some other publication, was supplied by Mr. Campbell to the Director of Public Prosecutions or by some other, and what, person; whether he has caused inquiries to be made in order to ascertain if the publication in question consisted of a leaflet or article circulated by the Communist party or what form it in fact took; and whether, in view of the fact that, although the publication amounted, in his opinion, to a breach of the law, the prosecution was withdrawn because he thought Mr. Campbell could 361W not be made responsible for it, he will now take every possible means of ascertaining who is the first and real author of this incitement to mutiny in order that that person may be brought to justice along with all who are responsible for its publication and circulation?
The ATTORNEY-GENERALThe information mentioned in this question was not supplied by Mr. Campbell. It was an362W inference drawn from the fact that the only manuscript that could be found by the police, either at the office or from the printers, consisted of a sheet of paper with a column apparently cut from some other newspaper pasted upon it. It has been found impossible by the police to identify the newspaper from which it was obtained, and the police are unable to identify any person as being the original author of the manuscript.