Evidence Type: Newspaper Report
14 November 1839
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL—(TUESDAY)
Present—His Excellency the Governor, the Chief Justice, the Commander of the Forces, the Colonial Secretary, the Attorney-General, the Collector of Customs, the Auditor-General, Messrs CAMPBELL, BERRY, JONES, BLAXLAND, MACARTHUR, Sir JOHN JAMISON, and Captain KING.
The Female Convict Transportation Abolition Bill was read a second time, and ordered to be fairly transcribed and presented by the Attorney-General and Mr BERRY.
His Excellency said, that by the regulations of the Millbank Penitentiary, under the Act passed in 1816, five years imprisonment was substituted for seven years transportation, seven years for fourteen, and ten years for transportation for life; but recent Acts had substituted three years for seven, four for fourteen, and five for life. It was for the Council to determine which of these periods they would decided upon.
The Attorney-General thought the maximum period of Imprisonment in solitary cells for women ought to be reduced to three years; if it were considered that that period was sufficient for men, whose frame was more capable of undergoing punishment, he thought females who were physically weaker, should not be subjected to a longer period. Besides it would be unnecessarily crowding the factory. Five years was fixed as the maximum period of imprisonment, and confinement in dark cells restricted to twenty days; an interval of twenty days to elapse between each sentence.
…
The Female Convict Transportation Abolishment Bill was appointed to be read a third time on Tuesday next.
See Original: “LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL—(TUESDAY.),” The Australian (Sydney, NSW : 1824 – 1848), Thursday 14 November 1839, p.2
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