On This Day March 22 1930

Caning bill gets its second reading

The second reading of a bill to legalise the caning of inmates of the Northern Ireland Borstal institution was passed in the House of Commons on Thursday.

In view of the universal campaign in favour of the abolition of corporal punishment and the ever-increasing antipathy to this means of correction, it is not surprising that the measure was criticised. Mr Jack Beattie moved the rejection of the bill and was supported by Messrs Cahir Healy, JW Nixon (Independent Unionist), Patrick O Neill and alderman R Byrne.

On the government side of the house, Professor Robert Corkey said he could not support the bill, but, in contrast to this, Mr William Grant advocated punches on the nose as well as caning, to make men out of the boys.

The minister Sir Dawson Bates, in moving the second reading of the Criminal Law and Prevention of Crime Bill, added that he felt that it was much more desirable that a really bad boy should receive a caning than that he should be locked up in his cubicle or in a cell with a reduced diet.

Mr Cahir Healy (Nationalist, South Fermanagh) expressed the hope that the house would reject the bill. It was in the nature of a throw-back. The government, he declared, were going back to the older punishment discarded by civilised communities many years ago. It was a shame that nothing better could be devised than that measure.


The bill was read for a second time with the voting in the division being 27 for and four against the bill.