CO885(1-2) — Page 632

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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C.O.885

2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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the plan which I have described, to the extent that it may be necessary to do so. I feel the less doubt upon this point because the cost of so employing convicts will, in reality, he confined to that of furnishing them with the requisite supplies in a country in which all the neces- saries of life are cheap and abundant, and of pro- viding the superintendence which will be wanted to render their labour useful. Whatever they may earn besides will not have to be paid to them in money, but will go towards the discharge of their debt to the Government. It seems scarcely possible but that labour obtained at so cheap a rate, if applied with that judgment which under your directions it cannot fail to be, must be more than paid for by the increased value given to the Crown lands; and the only doubt which can exist is, whether purchasers enough for these lands will be found to realize this increased value as rapidly as would be desirable. It will contribute to avert any risk of difficulty arising from this source, and would be attended also with other advantages, that you should encourage the convicts to become occu- piers on lease of small allotments of land, with the option of purchasing them when they could earn

the means of doing so in the manner contemplated Parliamentary Paper, Feb. 1847,

in my instructions to you of the 30th of September, 1846.

19. Adverting to what I have already stated as to the principle on which the amount of payment to be required from the several kinds of convicts before they are considered eligible for condi- tional pardons has been calculated, I have to observe, that although these payments are to be enforced from all convicts, and though they will not be allowed to retain their tickets of leave upon any other terms, it is not to be understood that the mere fact of having discharged their debt will give them any right to obtain their conditional pardon. This must depend upon their general good conduct according to the present practice; nor, as a general rule, and in the absence of some special good conduct, will the earlier discharge of their debt entitle them to obtain the advantage of a conditional pardon before the expiration of the time at which, at the

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ordinary rate of payment, it would be liquidated. At the same time I regard it as desirable that they should be encouraged, if possible, to clear off their debt sooner than is imperatively required, and with this view I propose that for early payment an abatement should be made from the amount charged against them according to the scale which I enclose, and also that those convicts who may have thus relieved themselves from debt should not be subject to the new restraints which are now to be imposed on the holders of tickets of leave, and should have the indulgence accorded to them (pro- vided they have otherwise conducted themselves well) of residing in the towns if they should there be able to obtain better wages than in the country districts.

20. The only additional point which appears to require to be adverted to, is that of the recommen- dation which is so earnestly made both by yourself and the comptroller of convicts, that the law which restricts the Lieutenant-Governor from giving to a convict the benefit of a conditional pardon without the previous sanction of the Queen, signified by the Secretary of State, should be repealed. I recog nize the force of the reasons on which you have founded this recommendation, so far as relates to the objections you point out to the operation of the law as it is at present acted upon; but I am of opinion that these objections will be better obviated by a change of practice than by an alteration of the law, which I conceive to impose a proper and wholesome restriction upon the power of granting conditional pardons. The change which I propose

is, that for the future you should recommend for conditional pardons one year before you think that these pardons should take effect, those convicts whose conduct may appear to entitle them to the indulgence. In this manner, by transmitting to you these pardons with the usual power of withholding them in case of any misconduct on the part of those in whose favour they are granted, the object you have in view will, I trust, be sufficiently pro- vided for.

21. In conclusion, I have to express iny hope that I have explained the views of Her Majesty's

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