§ Mr. LANSBURYasked the Home Secretary whether it is by his authority that the Governor of Pentonville Prison has refused permission to Thomas Henry Maddox, now under sentence of one month's hard labour for assault in the City of London, to sign a petition to His Majesty for the exercise of the prerogative of mercy by reason of the mental state of his wife, although the Recorder of London, after sentencing him at the Guildhall, intimated that the right course for the prisoner to adopt was to petition His Majesty?
§ Mr. McKENNAI am informed that a firm of solicitors applied for the prisoner to be allowed to sign a petition drawn up by them, and, in accordance with the usual practice, they were told that this would not be allowed, as the prisoner himself had the privilege of petitioning. The prisoner has himself petitioned in the ordinary way. It is, of course, open to a prisoner's solicitors to address to the Secretary of State any representation they may think necessary with regard to the prisoner's case.