AND

SPECIAL REPORT

FROM THE

SELECT COMMITTEE

ON THE

MATRIMONIAL CAUSES (REGULATION OF REPORTS)

BILL

CHANGED TO

JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS (REGULATION OF REPORTS) BILL

TOGETHER WITH THE

PROCEEDINGS OF THE COMMITTEE,
MINUTES OF EVIDENCE AND APPENDIX

Ordered, by the House of Commons, to be printed,
25th July, 1923.

LONDON:

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1923

Price 3s. net.

ORDER OF REFERENCE.

[Friday, 8th June, 1923]:-Matrimonial Causes (Regulation
of Reports) Bill,-read a second time:-Bill committed to a
Select Committee.-(Sir Evelyn Cecil.)

[Tuesday, 19th June, 1923]:-Matrimonial Causes (Regula-
tion of Reports) Bill,-Ordered, That the Select Committee to
consider the Matrimonial Causes (Regulation of Reports) Bill do
consist of Eleven Members.

Committee accordingly nominated of,-Lord Apsley, Sir
Thomas Bennett, Mr. Cassels, Sir Evelyn Cecil, Mr. Dunnico,
Mr. Hardie, Mr. William Jowitt, Mr. McCurdy, Sir Herbert
Nield, Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland, and Mr. Warne.

Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons,
papers, and records.

Ordered, That Three be the quorum.-(Colonel Gibbs.)

The cost of preparing for publication the shorthand Minutes
of Evidence taken before the Committee was £47 7s. 8d.

The cost of printing and publishing this Report is estimated
by the Stationery Office at £120 5s. 6d.

REPORT

The SELECT COMMITTEE to whom the MATRIMONIAL CAUSES (REGULATION OF REPORTS) BILL was referred have considered the said Bill, and taken evidence thereon which they have agreed to Report to the House; and have gone through the Bill, and made amendments thereunto, and have amended the title as followeth : A Bill, to regulate the publication of reports of judicial proceedings in such manner as to prevent injury to public morals.

SPECIAL REPORT

The Select Committee to whom the Matrimonial Causes (Regulation of Reports) Bill was referred have agreed to the following Special Report :

1. Your Committee have held 10 sittings, and heard 11 witnesses, specially qualified to represent the legal, general, religious, press, and educational standpoints. The enquiry entrusted to your committee divides itself into three parts; firstly, whether any such Bill as the present is required; if so, secondly, whether the present Bill is drawn on the right lines, or should be extended, limited, or varied in its scope; and, thirdly, what legal procedure is most suitable to be effective.

2. On the first question, while we accept with regret the Peaker, evidence given to us that owing to competition the press cannot

750-752.

to any agreement among themselves for eliminating objectionable and unnecessary details from divorce and similar reports, we think legislation is needed. Sir Henry Duke, as Duke, President of the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Division, 5, 84, 106. expressed the opinion that it is very desirable in the interests. of morality that something should be done to curtail the unscrupulous publication of indecent matter for purposes of gain, and expressed his very great doubt whether it is in the public interest that nullity proceedings should be reported in the manner they are. Sir Archibald Bodkin, the Director of Public Bodkin, Prosecutions, considered that the existing law is inadequate to 215, 214, deal with reports which unnecessarily encourage familiarity with what ought to be avoided, and in consequence take away half the horror of it. It probably did more harm than good, he (10881) Wt.

875 8/23 Harrow G.71

cf. 196.

&c.

Duke, 16, 17.
Bp. of

London, 435;

Dr. Scott

Lidgett, 378;
Bp. Bidwell
(R.C.), 404,
419.

cf. 830.

Bodkin, 237. stated, to institute a prosecution and fail to obtain a verdict, because in that case the subject of the prosecution obtained the imprimatur of the jury, and rather than risk this mischief he refrained from instituting proceedings. The Bishop of London, and other eminent witnesses representing religious communities and public societies, were strong advocates of restriction, and called attention to the excessive amount of space devoted by some newspapers to nauseating divorce details and to the apparent Peaker, 757; powerlessness of the present law to prevent them. The President of the Institute of Journalists also laid great stress upon the volume of space allotted in some newspapers to these matters, worked up as a serial story, and its degrading influence upon the young and impressionable. The King's Proctor, Sir John Mellor, thought the Bill went too far, but wished a distinction made between the general reports of matrimonial causes and the publication of indecent details, though he agreed it was a difficult task. Sir Ellis Hume-Williams, with many years' experience of practice in the divorce court, advocated no change, and doubted Knapp, 942. whether these reports under consideration had any very active influence on public morality. Your Committee, as above stated, have come to the conclusion that legislation is required. The recent Russell case, and others not always in the divorce court, are standing proofs, in their opinion, that the existing law is insufficient.

Mellor, 495 & 496.

HumeWilliams, 648, 665;

Cf. Bp. of
London, 449;

HumeWilliams, 635.

Bodkin, 244.

Duke, 68.

3. In answering the second question, whether the present Bill is on the right lines or should be extended, limited or varied in its scope, several complex problems arise. It has sometimes been suggested that a simple solution can be found by empowering Judges, at their discretion to forbid publication of any evidence or other part of the proceedings which they held to be injurious to public morals, under penalty of contempt of court; but apart from the likelihood of different judges taking different views, Your Committee are satisfied from personal knowledge that this course is not in fact practicable, and that even if the power were granted, its exercise would prove precarious and spasmodic.

4. Before going further, two outstanding essentials should be emphasized. One is the importance of publicity, which is a tradition and principle of British justice, and was broadly favoured by all the witnesses though they were not agreed on its value as a deterrent. Often it may be so; but with some human natures the tendency may be quite the reverse, when offenders are written up into "heroes to be snap-shotted" (as Sir A. Bodkin phrased it), and are placed on a kind of national pedestal. Sufficient publication, on the other hand, should be secured to act as a deterrent wherever it can, and also, which is a point to be remembered, to enable an injured party to free himself or herself from alleged blame. The other outstanding essential is the freedom of the press. But just as the freedom of