OFFICIAL SECRETS ACT

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 78, 29 September 1938, Page 8

OFFICIAL SECRETS ACT

THE SANDYS CASE

COMMITTEE'S FINDINGS

(Received September 29, 10 a.m.)

LONDON, September 28.

The Official Secrets Committee appointed- to consider the application of the Official Secrets Act to members of the House of Commons stated that there was no doubt that the document from which the figures were obtained by Mr. D. Sandys (Conservative) was secret. The Committee "believed that Mr. Sandys knew that he was receiving secret information,' but was satisfied that he was unaware that Captain H. T. Hogan, Adjutant of the 51st (London) Anti-aircraft Brigade, in which Mr. Sandys is a 2nd Lieutenant, was acting wrongly in that connection. The Committee added that the threat by Mr. Sandys to the Secretary of. State that he would put down a question in Parliament was unjustified and was an element in the subsequent misunderstanding which was originally introduced by Mr. Sandys. The Committee acquitted the Attor-ney-General of any intention to threaten Mr. Sandys with the use of compulsory powers of interrogation; but thinks that he could have prevented the circumstances arising in that regard. The Committee considered that no exception could be taken to the action of General Sir Edmund Ironside, G.O.C. of the Eastern Command, in instructing that Mr. Sandys be ordered to attend the Court of Inquiry as a witness.

Mr. Duncan Sandys, who is a member of Parliament and a Territorial officer, was involved in an incident in the House of Commons when, after he had given notice of intention to ask a question which revealed that he possessed confidential information about defences, he had an interview with the Attorney-General in which he detected what he thought a threat to proceed against him under the Official Secrets Act. He then raised the matter in the House of Commons as affecting the privileges of members and a Select Committee was appointed to inquire into the affair. There was also a military court set up to make inquiries.