The second reading of the-Criminal Law Amendment Bill was moved
by Sir George Cave in the Commons on Monday. The Bill proposes to raise the age of consent in charges of indecent assault to sixteen, and to repeal altogether the "reasonable cause" proviso in Section 5 of the Act of 1885. The period within which proceedings might be taken was to be extended from lax to twelve months. Amendments were introduced en- larging- the scope and stringency of provisions dealing with disorderly houses, and imposing imprisonment for a second or I subsequent offence of soliciting. Further clauses-deal with venereal diseases; the most important being that which makesat an offence punishable with two years' imprisonment for an infected person to solicit or have intercourse with another person. It was provided that a person convicted of a certain offence might be examined by a doctor—a female doctor in the case of a female. Then the doctor who made the examination, or in case of imprisonment the prison doctor, might give the person suffering from the disease written notice-of the fact. Clause VII. extended tho provisions of the Act of 1888 dealing with- indecent advertisements about the cure of venereal diseases to newspapers, and increased the penalties. After some hostile comment on the part of Members who held that the ago of consent should be raised or regarded the Bill as unduly favourable to men, it was read a second time:
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