POWERS OF POLICE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 15 August 1928, Page 7

POWERS OF POLICE

COMMISSION TO INQUIRE.

SCOPE OF ITS WORK. WIDE ORDER OF REFERENCE. (United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph Copyright.) (Australian Press Association.) LONDON, Aug. 14. Satisfaction is 'expressed over the personnel of the Police Ooni'mvssion, of /which a good deal will probably bo heard later. It is a non-political body and its members are not members of Parliament. They include a moderate representative 1 of the' workers and two women. Lord Lee was a former Conservativ {Minister, Lord Ebbisham was formerly Sir Rovylamd Blades, Lord {Mayor of London in. 1926-27; Mr LanePoole is the head' of the firm of Lewis and Lewis, the famous solicitors; Mr Pick is the managing director of the London underground railway, and of the General Omnibus Company; Mr Brownlie is president of the Engineering Union; Sir Howard Prank was chairman of /the Liquidation Commission after the war. Dante Merrilil Talbot is a well-known social worker who visited New Zealand in .1909-10 as representative of the Victoria League. Miss Be:even’s groat public services to the city of Liverpool led to her being elected Loud Mayor of that city. The terms of reference are considered wide enough to include all the issues raised 'in the Savidgo case. Others are: To consider the general powers- and duties of the police in England and Wales in investigating crimes and offences, including the functions of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the police respectively; to inquire into, the practice followed' in interrogating and taking statements from persons interviewed in the course of the investigation of crime and to report whether such powers and duties are. properly exeeuited with regard to the rights and liberties of the subject in the interests of justice and the observance of judges’ rules 'both in letter and spirit. The commission is to make recommendation's in that connection. The ‘‘Daily Telegraph” says; .“Both the terms and names promise- am' inquiry which will came ifca grips with -tho causes of the recent troubles and help to restore the confidence of the public. Nothing caused so much uneasiness as the allegation that third degree method's had been introduced since the war. It may not be easy to mark the frontier where police zeal in the detection of crime violates the fundamental principles of individual rights and liberty, but (the public will insist that such a line be drawn.