Corpun file 8282 at www.corpun.com

The Times, London, 11 December 1947

Whipping as penalty

Amendments to new Bill

From Our Parliamentary Correspondent

Further amendments which have been tabled in the House of Commons Standing Committee on the Criminal Justice Bill seek to restore whipping as a punishment for male offenders.

An amendment by Mr. Manningham-Buller and Mr. Gage proposes that a male offender may be privately whipped provided that the maximum number of strokes should be 25, that they should not exceed 12 for offenders under 17, or 10 for those under 14, and that no whipping should take place after the expiration of six months of the passing of sentence. Mr. Hogg has an amendment down restricting whipping to male offenders over 21 convicted of offences under the sections of the Larceny Act, 1916, which deal with robbery with violence and kindred offences, and sections of the Offences against the Person Act, 1861, or the Garrotters Act, 1863, which deal with suffocation with intent to commit an indictable offence.

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Corpun file 8283 at www.corpun.com

The Times, London, 12 December 1947

Power to order flogging

Abolition approved in Committee

When a Standing Committee began consideration of the Criminal Justice Bill at the House of Commons yesterday Mr. Manningham-Buller, K.C. (Daventry, C.) proposed an amendment to the clause which abolishes the power of courts to pass a sentence of whipping. The amendment allowed the abolition of flogging to stand, but made it possible for a person to be birched, but with a great limitation on the existing powers for birching.

CAPTAIN MARSDEN (Chertsey, C.), supporting the amendment, referred to an attack on a jeweller in Mayfair some years ago by a gang of young men. "After that case everyone changed their minds, even the papers that advocated the abolition of corporal punishment," he said. "Everyone wanted these fellows to get the cat."

The HOME SECRETARY, Mr. Chuter Ede, said that he had followed the subsequent careers of the gang in the Mayfair case and there was no evidence that the punishment on them had proved a deterrent. For juveniles it was proved that corporal punishment was not a deterrent.

The amendment was withdrawn.

On the motion that the clause as a whole should stand part of the Bill, Mr. CHUTER EDE said that brutal assault by itself was not now punishable by corporal punishment, but a far slighter assault which included some trivial element of robbery would make an offender liable to corporal punishment. The existing law was so illogical that it demanded sorting out. The Government held that this particular form of punishment involved so many other people in brutalizing experiences, and that it was not fair to impose upon officers of the law the duty of inflicting this punishment unless it was certain it would have the effects desired.

It was agreed that the clause should stand part of the Bill. The Committee adjourned until Tuesday.

When a Standing Committee began consideration of the Criminal Justice Bill at the House of Commons yesterday Mr. Manningham-Buller, K.C. (Daventry, C.) proposed an amendment to the clause which abolishes the power of courts to pass a sentence of whipping. The amendment allowed the abolition of flogging to stand, but made it possible for a person to be birched, but with a great limitation on the existing powers for birching.

CAPTAIN MARSDEN (Chertsey, C.), supporting the amendment, referred to an attack on a jeweller in Mayfair some years ago by a gang of young men. "After that case everyone changed their minds, even the papers that advocated the abolition of corporal punishment," he said. "Everyone wanted these fellows to get the cat."

The HOME SECRETARY, Mr. Chuter Ede, said that he had followed the subsequent careers of the gang in the Mayfair case and there was no evidence that the punishment on them had proved a deterrent. For juveniles it was proved that corporal punishment was not a deterrent.

The amendment was withdrawn.

On the motion that the clause as a whole should stand part of the Bill, Mr. CHUTER EDE said that brutal assault by itself was not now punishable by corporal punishment, but a far slighter assault which included some trivial element of robbery would make an offender liable to corporal punishment. The existing law was so illogical that it demanded sorting out. The Government held that this particular form of punishment involved so many other people in brutalizing experiences, and that it was not fair to impose upon officers of the law the duty of inflicting this punishment unless it was certain it would have the effects desired.

It was agreed that the clause should stand part of the Bill. The Committee adjourned until Tuesday.

Note by CF: The Bill as a whole was approved, but the abolition of judicial corporal punishment did not come into force until September 1948. At least two further birchings were ordered in the intervening period.