said, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, What was the effect of the late change of dietary in Wakefield Prison on the Health of the Prisoners; and whether he will lay a Copy of the Correspondence on the subject, together with the Report of the Medical Officer, upon the table of the House?

said, in reply, that a change had been made in the dietary in Wakefield Prison as an experiment. At the end of six months the visiting justices said that it had not been long enough in operation for them to form a decided opinion on it. The medical officer, however, gave such an unfavourable report of the effect of the diet in lowering the health of the prisoners and in increasing the mortality, that he had ordered it to be suspended. An inquiry was at present going on into the whole question of prison dietary?

Upon whose Report was the dietary discontinued?

It was the Report of the Medical Officer to the Visiting Justices.