§ Mr. Ron Lewisasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department what evidence he has to establish a correlation between the decrease in convictions for the vandalising of telephones over the past five years and the imposition of heavier sentences imposed by the magistrates during that period.
§ Mr. JohnNo such evidence is ready to hand. To obtain the necessary data would be a costly operation; even then, any attempt to draw a deduction such as is implied would be complicated, if not vitiated, by the introduction in recent years of equipment in telephone boxes that is capable of withstanding considerable force.