The Gazette 1975

tore, Max Sorensen, Lord Mackenzie Stuart (Second Chamber). Advocates-General: Alberto Trabucchi (First Chamber with Mr. Mayras). Jean-Pierre Warner and Ger- hard Reischl (Second Chamber). Registrar : Albert van Houtte. On 7 and 8 October the Court of Justice was visited by a sizeable delegation from the Tribunal de Grande Instance, Paris. Case 32/75: Fiorini (née Cristini) and Societe Nationale des Chemins de Fer Francais (preliminary ruling) 20.9.75 A woman of Italian nationality living in France whose husband, also an Italian, worked in France where he died following an accident at work, leaving a widow and four children, was refused by the SNCF a card entitling large families to obtain reductions in railway fares. The applicant's request was refused on the ground of her nationality, pursuant to the French legal provi- Book Reviews Osborough (Nial)—Borstal in Ireland. Custodial Pro- vision for the Young Adult Offender 1906-1974. Pub- lished by the Institute of Public Administration, Dublin, 1975. £3.75. The word "Borstal", no doubt, conjures up for many of us a memory of the late Brendan Behan, or rather Niall Toibin's version of Brendan Behan, slouching across the stage of the Abbey Theatre with all around him the panorama of Behan's life in a Borstal institu- tion. Such a memory will probably be of an amusing nature, but such, you are assured, is not a correct impression of what Mr. Nial Osborough's book is all about. What is "Borstal"? In the first place, Borstal is a village in Kent, where in 1901 in a part of the convict prison located there, the first experiments were carried out in providing a separate custodial system for young convicted persons in the 16 to 21 age group. As con- ceived, the system was designed to provide basic educa- tion for those who needed it—probably the vast majo- rity—and vocational training in such trades as tailoring, shoemaking, carpentry and gardening, such as would prepare the inmates to return to the outside world rehabilitated and readily employable. The system depended on each Borstal boy being committed to the Borstal institution for a sufficient minimum period as would enable such education and training to be effec- tive. As a result of the Prevention of Crime Act, 1908, and the Criminal Justice Administration Act, 1914, the minimum period of committal by the Courts was one year and the maximum three years, with a right of release on licence after a minimum of six months. The Borstal system reached Ireland in May 1906 and a Borstal institution was located at Clonmel in an old disused prison. It was only for males and, in fact, there was never a female Borstal in the South. An attempt at establishing one in Armagh Prison between 1954 and 1961 was unsuccessful, because of lack of numbers.

sions laying down that the card entitling large families to obtain reductions is in principle reserved for French nationals alone and is issued only to foreigners whose State of origin has concluded a reciprocal agreement with France in that particular field, which is not the case with Italy. The plaintiff in the main action took the SNCF to court and following an appeal against the judgment at first instance the case came before the Cour d'Appel, Paris, which requested the Court of Justice to rule on the question whether the card issued by the SNCF entitling large families to obtain reductions constitutes a "social advantage" for workers of the Member States within the meaning of Article 7 of the Council regula- tion concerning freedom of movement for workers with- in the Community. The European Court has ruled that that Article is to be interpreted as meaning that the social advantages covered by that provision include cards granting reductions in fares, issued by a national railway organisation to large families, even where that advantage is requested only after the death of the worker for the benefit of his family which has remained in the same Member State. The Borstal system is what Mr. Osborough's book is all about and it must be distinguished from the Refor- matory and Industrial Schools systems designed for younger people, whether criminal or non-criminal, which had been introduced into Ireland as early as 1858 and which have in recent years been the subject of considerable public debate and controversy since the publication in 1970 of the Report of the Committee established under the Chairmanship of District Justice Eileen Kennedy. The Borstal system is also to be distinguished from the sentencing by the Courts of young persons under 21 years to ordinary terms of imprisonment in ordinary prisons. Mr. Osborough traces the origins of the Borstal system and sets out how the Clonmel Borstal was run as the only institution for all of Ireland, North and South, between 1906 and 1922. He describes the grading system of the inmates, the work they did, discipline, recreation and after-care and in subsequent chapters deals with the system as it operated separately both North and South after partition. Between 1922 and 1927 in Northern Ireland, any young offender committed to Borstal went to Feltham Borstal in England until, in 1927, part of Malone Prison in Belfast, became a Borstal Institution and remained as such until 1956, when Woburn House at Millisle, County Down, replaced it. Woburn was acquired by the Northern Ireland Government in lieu of £18,000 estate duty. This was the first Borstal institution in Ireland which, at least, had not started out as a prison. In the South, until 1956, Clonmel remained the sole Borstal institution, with displacement temporarily to other locations during the civil war and to Cork during the Second World War. The Borstal system effectively died in the South in 1956, when the Clonmel institu- tion, by then re-named St. Patrick's Institution (because of the stigma attached to the term "Borstal") moved to a wing at Mountjoy Prison, Dublin, which continues . 2 7 2