146
(Enclosure 1.)
Report of a Commission appointed by His Excellency the Officer Adininistering the Government to consider a letter from the Superintendent of Victoria Gaol reporting the overcrowded state thereof.
1. On the 8th April last a Commission consisting of the Honourable the Acting Attorney General as Chairman; The Honourable A. LISTER, Colonial Treasurer; The Honourable J. M. PRICE, Surveyor General; E. MACKEAN, Esquire, Acting Police Magistrate; Major-General GORDON, Superintendent, Victoria Gaol; The Honourable W. KESWICK, M.L.C.; C. P. CHATER, Esquire, J. P.; A. P. MACEWEN, Esquire, J. P.; P. MANSON, Esquire, M.D., J. P. was appointed for the purpose of considering a report of the Superintendent of the Gaol on the insufficient accommodation in that Establishment and the steps which should be taken to remedy the present state of things.
2. This Commission met at once and has held several sittings.
3. Two sub-committees were appointed, the first consisting of:-
THE CHAIRMAN, Honourable WM. KESWICK,
E. MACKEAN, Esquire, Major-General GORDON,
Dr. MANSON, and
C. P. CHATER, Esquire,
:
to visit the Gaol at night and report on the state thereof, and another consisting of :-
Major-General GORDON,
Dr. MANSON, and
Dr. AYRES.
to enquire into the diet of the prisoners and to report what changes, if any, should be made therein.
4. The reports of these sub-committee are annexed hereto.
(Enclosures 4 and 5.)
5. On the whole question submitted to us we beg to report as follows:-
We deem it necessary in the first place to bring prominently before His Excellency the Officer Administering the Government the peculiar position of Hongkong, a position occupied by no other Colony of Great Britain.
Hongkong is situate at the very door of two of the largest provinces of China, and close to and in daily communication with Canton, one of the most populous cities of China. A famine or want of work in either of those provinces or in the city would naturally send a certain number of the inhabitants to Hongkong in search of work or of subsistence, whilst the presence in Canton of an active or severe Viceroy at once forces or induces many of the criminal class to change the scene of their depreda- tions and to migrate to Hongkong, where even if detected a mild and lenient treatment awaits them instead of the sharp and cruel punishment which they would certainly receive in China.
This fact cannot be too steadily borne in mind in dealing with the question
of punishment for offences.
6. In Hongkong we have to legislate not only for the Hongkong criminal class but for numbers of that class elsewhere, who are only too ready whenever the occasion arises to repair to this Colony and prey on it.
7. From a return furnished by the Superintendent of the Gaol (Enclosure 6) it appears that of the 732 prisoners confined on the 11th April, 1886, 677 were Chinese; 274 were detained under sentences of six months; 114 from six months to twelve months; 60 from one year to two years; 39 from two years to three years; 44 from three years to five years; 142 from over five years.
Of those sentenced to penal servitude many have been convicted of simple Larceny after previous convictions for the same offence, and have been so sentenced as a long imprisonment was the only punishment left to secure the public from further depredation.