Letters to the Editor
Vice Prosecutions Frank Singleton
Turkey and Cyprus M. A. Pamir
The Clue of the Blue-Faced Boobies
A. C. Barrington Brown
The Monorail Francis Jones
Christian Names David McCandlish De-Federating in Central Africa T. R. M. Creighton
GPs and Specialists Dr. W. S. C. Copenzan
Gallup Poll Henry Durant Registration of Estate Agents Lyndon Irving D'Annunzio's Italy Anthony Rhodes
VICE PROSECUTIONS Sta,—In the pursuit of truth in your columns last week Mr. Peter Wildeblood was, I think, betrayed, tripped up by an anomaly incidental to this par- ticular discussion but vital to it and to any other in which appeal is made to Hansard. Mr. Wildeblood, dealing with facts put forward by the Metropolitan Magistrate Mr. Frank Powell, says that Mr. Powell attributed to the Bishop of Rochester the assertion that there was at one time a homosexual club in Cambridge which shamelessly sported a tie. Mr. Wildeblood adds that this ludicrous assertion does not appear in Hansard in the report of the debate in the House of Lords on the Wolfenden Report.
Why did it not appear in Hansard? That is the single point I intervene to raise. Since the Bishop was reported in reputable newspapers as having said (and in more Anglo-Saxon terms) that he had been reliably informed of the truth of this fact the readers of such newspapers could only conclude either that he did say it or had been traduced. I wondered at the time if the source of his information was as reliable as that which asserted in my day that the university authorities had recently suppressed a Society for Photographing Deans in Bed. In the case of both organisations, and in all other cases, we were taught that what the policeman said is not evidence. If the Bishop had no other grounds for his assertion he ought not to have made it. But did he? According to Hansard, the official record, no. According to the press, yes. Anything other than the emendations which we know are permissible in Hansard would surely be most dangerous.—Yours faithfully,
Previous page
