NOTES OF CASES
| Date | 01 September 1938 |
| Published date | 01 September 1938 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1938.tb00402.x |
NOTES
OF
CASES
I63
NOTES
OF
CASES
No
case concerned with Parliamentary privilege since
Bradlaugh
v.
Gosset,
12
Q.B.D.
271, and the events leading up thereto, has given rise
to
80
much public interest
as
the Sandys
Case.
Actually there are
two
quite distinct points involved in
this
case. Much the more important of
these
is
the problem of the application of the Official Secrets Act, 1911,
to
Members of Parliament. The substance of
this
was admirably stated in
the
Economist
of 2nd July, 1938, in the following passage
:
“It
is imperative
even in
a
democracy that certain facts which might
be
helpful to a possible
enemy should
be
kept secret. The Government must
be
accorded adequate
powers to ensure that,
in
such cases,
this
secrecy
is
safeguarded. But it
is
equally essential, both for the safety of the State and for the preservation
of liberty, that the House of Commons and the Press should not
be
ham-
pered in exercising their traditional right-which is also their duty-of
criticism. This function can only be effectively performed if Members
of Parliament and journalists are well informed; hence it is part of their
day-to-day business
to
secure information from all possible sources.”
Few of us would
be
ready
to
put journalists upon the same level
as
Members
of Parliament, but otherwise there is not likely to be much dissent from
this passage.
Its
translation into concrete rules
is
likely
to
be dif3icult.
as
has evidently been realised by the members of the Select Committee
of
the House of Commons which is considering the matter, and which,
as
we write,
has
announced
that
it
will
not be able to report until the next
session. We hope to discuss this important matter in detail when the
findings of Parliament have been announced.
It may be convenient here to recall briefly the main events
as
they
occurred. On Monday, 27th June, Mr. Sandys, M.P., informed the Speaker
and the House of
Commons
that having received certain information as
to the state of the preparations against enemy aircraft he had prepared a
question on that subject to be addressed in the House to the Secretary of
State for War. Considering that
it
might be inadvisable in the national
interest to make publicly the disclosure involved in this question, he had
sent it to the Secretary of State with a covering letter asking whether there
was
any objection to
its
being put. Instead of answering this communica-
tion, the Secretary of State, who had formed the opinion that there had
been
a
breach of the Official Secrets Acts, 1911 and 1920, after consultation
with the Prime Minister, placed the matter in the hands of the Attorney-
General. The latter minister had thereon sent for
Mr.
Sandys and
attempted to extract from
him
the source of his information, employing
what at first blush appeared very like
a
threat to make use of the Acts
in question against
Mr.
Sandys himself, though when Mr. Sandys took a
firm
stand
his
attitude
had
become less aggressive. After informing the
House of these facts,
Mr.
Sandys proceeded to raise the whole question of
privilege of Parliament in relation
to
the Official Secrets Acts, and gave
notice of motion to refer the matter to a select committee. The
Prime
Minister accepted the notice, and indicated that he proposed
to
ask the
House
to
appoint such a committee, and this was of course eventually done.
It
may perhaps
be
suggested that in adopting the procedure just
referred to the House
has
got hold of the less important end of the stick.
The Sandys case is just a further piece of evidence that the executive has
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