§ 63. Mr. Pitmanasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will arrange for the prison population to be given the test for reading ability used for the report in the Minister of Education's pamphlet No. 18; if he will report the findings and, in particular, whether those prisoners found to have a leading ability of 11 years, or less, are proportionately less, or more, than the 30 per cent. of the school population of 15 years of age in 1948 as therein reported by the Minister of Education; if he will arrange similarly to test the reading ability of every new prisoner and obtain the records of school attendance; and if he will report on any correlation for the prison population between failure at school to learn to read fluently and absence and truancy from school and between truancy and crime.
§ Sir D. Maxwell FyfeNo. I am advised that the reading test to which my hon. Friend refers would be unsuitable for application to the adult prison population. A project of research such as is suggested in the third and fourth parts of the Question could not be undertaken by my Department, but I should be prepared to afford facilities to any properly qualified organisation that might wish to undertake it.