§ Sir J. FERGUSONasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that the Commissioner of Police no longer gives local authorities particulars of street collections authorised by him over the whole Metropolitan Police Area, with the result that local authorities are handicapped in dealing with local collections and uneven distribution of flag-days follows; and whether he will instruct the Commissioner of Police to revert to the former practice of local notification?
§ Sir H. SAMUELThe granting of permission to hold street collections for the whole of the Metropolitan Police District or for any part of it rests with the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, who acts on the advice of an advisory committee. He always informs a charity applying for permission to hold a street collection whether the date selected by them clashes with some other collection either generally in the Metropolitan Police District or in the particular district. In no circumstances does the Commissioner give permission to two charities to hold collections covering the same district on the same day. Up to 1930, lists of street collections authorised by the Commissioner to be held throughout the Metropolitan Police District were supplied to certain local authorities who specially asked for them, but this practice has since been discontinued. Local authorities in the Metropolitan Police District have no power under the statute to deal with applications for street collections, but the Commissioner's advisory committee welcome any information which a local authority can give them regarding a charity which has applied for permission to hold a collection in that district.