LIST OF WITNESSES.

L. LEONARD BILTON, Esq., C.M.G., W.S., Edinburgh Juvenile Organisations Committee.

Miss HELEN M. BLAIR, Policewoman, Glasgow City Police Force. W. B. BUGLASS, Esq., Governor, H.M. Prison, Barlinnie, Glasgow. Capt. E. K. CARMICHAEL, M.C., Howard League for Penal Reform (Edinburgh Branch).

ERNEST H. CONNELL, M.B., Ch.B., sometime Assistant Lecturer in Psychiatry at University of Edinburgh.

Miss CATHERINE Dow, Superintendent, Maryhill Girls' Industrial School.

JAS. DREVER, Esq., M.A., B.Sc., D.Phil., Director of George Combe Psychological Laboratory, Reader in Psychology, University of Edinburgh.

Miss GRACE DRYSDALE, Warden, University Settlement, Edinburgh. Miss P. DUNCAN, Policewoman, City of Glasgow Police Force.

J. C. FENTON, Esq., K.C., Advocate Depute.

GILBERT GARRY, Esq., M.D., Medical Officer, Duke Street Prison, Glasgow.

Supt. WM. GRASSICK, County of Dumbarton Police Force.

M. L. HOWMAN, Esq., Procurator Fiscal, Perth.

Mrs. JAMES T. HUNTER, J.P., Glasgow.

Bailie Miss ISABELLE KERR, Greenock.

A. J. LOUTTIT-LAING, Esq., Sheriff Substitute, Aberdeen.

The Rev. A. E. LAURIE, D.D., Old St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh.

HARVEY LITTLEJOHN, Esq., M.A., M.B., B.Sc., Professor of Forensic Medicine, University of Edinburgh.

Mrs. SARAH M. MACARTHUR, Teacher, Glasgow Education Authority, some time in charge of Special School, Lock Hospital, Glasgow.

Detective-Inspector ALEXANDER M'GHEE, City of Edinburgh Police

Force.

Supt. D. M'PHATER, City of Glasgow Police Force.

CHAS. A. MACPHERSON, Esq., M.A., LL.B., Advocate, Public Prosecutor in the Police Court of Edinburgh.

HAMILTON C. MARR, Esq., M.D., Commissioner of the General Board of Control for Scotland.

Miss AGNES H. MARTIN, Balfour Place Special (M.D.) School, Leith. DAVID C. T. MEKIE, Esq., M.A., Ph.D., Headmaster, Bristo Public School, Edinburgh.

CHAS. MIDDLETON, Esq., Chief Constable of Stirlingshire.

Miss EMILY MILLER, Drymen, some time of the City of Glasgow Police Force.

JAS. STIRLING MILLER, Esq., Writer, Procurator Fiscal, Central Police Court, Glasgow.

T. M. MURRAY-LYON, Esq., M.D., Edinburgh.

Mrs. HAMILTON MORE-NESBITT, Edinburgh.

The Right Hon. Lord POLWARTH, ('.B.E., V.D., Chairman, Scottish Prison Commission.

Detective-Superintendent A. J. SANGSTER, City of Edinburgh Police
Force.

The Hon. KATHERINE SCOTT, Police Court Sister, Edinburgh.
Miss FRANCES M. SIME, Edinburgh, National Council of Women.
J. D. STRATHERN, Esq., Procurator Fiscal, Glasgow.

Miss EDITH TANCRED, National Council of Women.

Miss ISABEL VENTERS, L.L.A., M.B., C.M., Edinburgh.

DAVID WATSON, Esq., M.B., C.M., Lecturer on Venereal Diseases at the University of Glasgow and Surgeon of Glasgow Lock Hospital.

J A. WELSH, Esq., Advocate, Sheriff Substitute at Glasgow.
FOUR MOTHERS OF ASSAULTED CHILDREN.

Written representations were received from the following:GLASGOW SOCIETY FOR EQUAL CITIZENSHIP and GLASGOW WOMEN CITIZENS' ASSOCIATION.

Lieutenant-Colonel V. E. GOODERSON, D.S.O., Superintendent of Physical Education, Education Authority of Glasgow. NATIONAL COUNCIL OF WOMEN, PERTH BRANCH.

NATIONAL PLAYING FIELDS ASSOCIATION.

H.M. OFFICE OF WORKS, EDINBURGH.

SECRETARY, OXFORD ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS CRICKET SCHEME.
THE SALVATION ARMY.

SCOTTISH BRANCH OF THE HOWARD LEAGUE FOR PENAL REFORM.
SCOTTISH CO-OPERATIVE WOMEN'S GUILD.

Dr. JOHN THOMSON, Edinburgh.

THE WOMEN'S EDUCATIONAL UNION.

REPORT

OF

THE DEPARTMENTAL COMMITTEE

ON

SEXUAL OFFENCES AGAINST CHILDREN AND YOUNG PERSONS IN SCOTLAND.

To Lieutenant-Colonel The Right Honourable

SIR,

Sir JOHN GILMOUR, Bart., D.S.O., M.P.,

His Majesty's Secretary for Scotland.

Under the terms of reference set out above, we, the undersigned, were appointed by you to enquire into the subject of sexual offences against children and young persons in Scotland, and, having now completed our enquiry, we have the honour to report as follows:

We have held nineteen meetings, eleven of which were devoted to taking evidence. We regret that Mrs. Duncan, who assisted us in our earlier meetings, has latterly been out of Scotland and is unable to sign this report. A list of our witnesses is contained on pages 6 and 7. We are indebted to all of them, and to our correspondents, for the assistance they have given us. Our thanks are especially due to the Standing Committee of the Scottish Branches of the National Council of Women, who introduced to us many witnesses conversant with various aspects of the subject of our enquiry.

1.-NATURE AND PREVALENCE OF THE OFFENCES.

1. The natural starting point of our enquiry is a consideration. of the prevalence of these offences, and of the suggestion that their number has tended to increase in recent years. Accurate information on these points has been difficult to obtain :-

(a) because hitherto judicial statistics have not been compiled with special reference to offences against children and young persons, and

(b) because these offences are peculiarly clandestine in their nature, and many of them go undetected.

For the former of these reasons, the principal statistics we have considered have had to be specially compiled for the purpose of our enquiry. They necessarily refer to short periods, which, for purposes of comparison, are not so satisfactory as long periods. Also, we have found that statistics regarding these offences, for a specified period, have varied considerably when compiled at different times. This is not unnatural, in view of the overlapping

categories into which sexual offences can be divided, and of the possible classification of some of them as offences of another nature.

It is therefore necessary, at the outset, to indicate what we mean by "sexual offences against children and young persons.'

2. In reply to a Parliamentary question, the Home Secretary on 6th March, 1924, gave statistics of these offences in England, and, on the 30th September, in the same year, the Secretary for Scotland gave the Scottish statistics. As the comparison of these figures has given rise to some misapprehension, we think it advisable to point out that the Scottish statistics included more kinds of offences than the English. The former included cases of unnatural offences, indecency with males, rape and indecent exposure; the latter did not.

We have been furnished with a detailed classification of cases Appendix 1. in which proceedings were instructed for sexual offences against persons under sixteen years of age, in Scotland, during the three years from 1st August, 1921, to 31st July, 1924, shewing a total of 1050 cases, or 350 per annum. Of these, 226, or 75 per annum, would not have been included in a return prepared as in England. Further, it has long been the case that many more persons, in proportion to population, are annually brought to trial in Scotland than in England-possibly because the Scottish system of public prosecution secures proceedings in many minor offences which would not in England be brought to trial. For instance, in 1922, for offences of all kinds, 15.6 per thousand of the population were apprehended or summoned by the police in England, while the corresponding figure for Scotland was 22, or-relatively to population-nearly 50 per cent. more than in England. The result is that the English and the Scottish criminal statistics for particular offences are in no way comparable.

3. We have determined to treat sexual offences in the widest possible sense-that is, according to the Scottish statistics--with this note of warning, that the resultant figures are not in any sense comparable with those produced for England, and that they include a great number of cases which fall short of the popular idea of what constitutes a sexual offence.

Further, we desire to point out the small proportion of the total criminal offences which can, even in the widest sense, be termed sexual offences. In 1922 the total of these offences reached its maximum, yet in that year, if cases of indecent exposure are excluded, only 413 (.39 per cent.) of the 106,382 criminal offenders cited or apprehended were involved in sexual offences, whether against adults or children.

NATURE OF THE OFFENCES.

4. All these offences are usually gathered together in the statistics, and they are popularly supposed to represent broadly one type of offence, viz., a sexual relation, complete or partial, forced by an adult man upon a child or girl under sixteen years of age against her will, the variation in the enormity of the offence being determined solely by the age of the victim and the

Appendix 1.

degree of violence entering into it. This is a fundamental misapprehension, which we wish to correct at the outset.

If we think only of the normal sexual act and its preliminaries, without any complications of violence or perversion, we may classify offences simply as those against girls under puberty and those against girls who have attained puberty. The one class is an offence against natural sexual law, of which the common law of the land takes cognisance; the other is a yielding, prohibited by statute law, to a natural instinct. This is a distinction of primary importance, which should be kept carefully in view. We regret, however, that we cannot adopt this classification, because most of the offences are not of the simple nature indicated.

5. The cases detailed in the classified list above referred to may be divided into the following five classes :—

(1) Incest and unnatural offences.

(2) Rape, attempt to ravish, assault with intent to ravish, and indecent assault.

(3) Lewd and libidinous practices.

(4) Indecent exposure.

(5) Offences against the Criminal Law Amendment Acts.

The first of these heads, which accounts for 3 per cent. of the whole list, includes two special classes of offence-the first an offence against relationship, the second an offence against sex.

The second head, which represents 38.5 per cent. of the whole, includes practically all those cases which are popularly described as sexual offences, from a crime so serious as rape down to the slightest act which can be interpreted as a move in that direction.

The third head, which covers 21 per cent. of the whole, includes all cases of indecent behaviour not belonging to any of the other four heads. There is no element of physical assault in this class of case, and it is distinguished from the other classes by the fact that young children are frequently the offenders.

The fourth head, covering 16.5 per cent. of the whole, is a peculiar class of offence, differing entirely from the other heads in that the offender shows little or no desire to gratify sexual passion, but seems to be content with the exhibition of his person.

The last head, which covers 21 per cent. of the whole, includes offences against girls between 12 and 13, under Section 4 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1885, and offences against girls over 13 and under 16, under Section 5 of the same Act. We have no precise statistics enabling us to allocate the total figure between these two sections, but we think that probably 5 per cent. of the whole are under Section 4, and the remaining 16 per cent. under Section 5.

As the offences coming under these heads differ widely as to the offender, the cause, the victim, and the prevention of the offence, we think it advisable, in the first instance, to consider each head separately. Before doing so, however, we desire to report on the prevalence of the offences generally.