23 OCTOBER 1959, Page 7

'IN A DECENT WORLD,' Mr. Justice Elwes said at Durham

Assizes this week, 'an adolescent would not be prosecuted on a criminal charge arising out of a sexual offence. He would be handed over to some intelligent sympathetic person who would help him out of his difficulties.' George Butler, aged seventeen, was not so helped: he was charged with the offence, and refused bail; and he committed suicide in prison. Perhaps, as the judge said, this dreadful thing may make the way of reform easier; but there is no indication that the present government intends to do any- thing. All that can be done, for the moment, is to try to create a more, favourable climate of public opinion; and it is to this end that a recently pub- lished pamphlet, Some questions and answers about homosexuality, is designed. It is obtainable from the Albany Trust, 32 Shaftesbury Avenue,