§ Mr. Robert Shawrose, pursuant to notice, to move for the production of certain Papers relative to the Conduct of the Paving and Lighting Board of the City of Dublin. He thought that those papers contained information that would materially affect the judgement of the house in deciding en the merits of the Bill now pending; and as the citizens were not only averse to enlarging the powers of that board to so extravagant a degree, but very anxious to repeal several of the powers already granted to that board by the 47th of the king, as appeared from their proceedings at several of their corporate and parochial meetings, he begged permission to state shortly the facts that had induced him to call for these papers. And in doing so, he particularly wished that the house would bear in mind, that the citizens of Dublin are now paying, under the 47th of the king, heavy and enormous taxes for the support of this new establishment, and that common justice requires, that, if they are to pay a great deal more than formerly, the services they were to receive in return ought to be in the same proportion. It appeared, however, that the Commissioners of this board were more active in levying the taxes than in rendering such services; for by the act of last session, they were empowered to raise the tax on each house to any sum not exceeding 4s. 6d. in the pound, on the valuation of minister's money, and this power they carried into effect upon the very first meeting after the act, by assessing to the full amount allowed by the act; and yet, though this increase was more than double the former tax, the first step of the Commissioners was to take down nearly half the number of lamps in a city not too well lighted before. One of the papers he should move for would contain a return of the number of those lamps, and when gentlemen read that paper, they would, no doubt, think with him that it was rather a novel mode of improving the lighting of the city, to put out half the number of its lamps. Nor could he think it the most reasonable proceeding towards the citizens, first to make them pay double, and then to abridge their accom- 19 modation one-half. And indeed of the remaining half, the lamps were so badly fed with oil, that they were in general completely extinguished by one or two in the morning, so that the city was in total darkness from that hour till the return of day-light. It was wholly unnecessary for him to comment upon the many inconveniences and dangers which must result from a neglect of this sort. The next paper he intended to move for was a return of the expences incurred in opening a sewer in Capel-street, one of the most populous streets in the city. It seemed the Commissioners were very anxious to carry into effect a favourite project of their own; this project was, to make a sewer with ledges to support main pipes, and large enough for men to work in. And here he begged that the house would observe that this project had been submitted to the ablest and most eminent engineers in either country, who had one and all, after the maturest consideration, condemned it as intolerably expensive, most absurd, and absolutely impracticable. One would have expected that after such an opinion from the best judges, the Commissioners would have paused before they would have wantonly squandered away the public money in useless experiments; but so far from it, they immediately proceeded to open an immense gulph in one of the most frequented streets, widening the gulph until the very foundations of the houses were in danger, and the houses themselves were shut out from all access by the quantity of earth thrown up on each side, and all business actually suspended for three months in one of the most trading streets in the City of Dublin. So severely was this nuisance felt, that the corporation petioned the lord lieutenant, and his grace, with all his characteristic politeness and attention, interfered and put a stop to the work till the propriety of continuing it should be farther considered. The opening of this sewer to the extent of about 30 yards cost little short of 1,000l. The length of the pipes in Dublin exceed 50 miles, so that this circumstance in itself confirms the report of the engineers, when they stated the expence to be intolerable, and that they were equally justified in reporting the project as absurd, was evident from this consideration, that the water passing through pipes so placed must be unavoidably contaminated by the filth of the sewer, and of course be rendered unfit 20 for the use of the inhabitants. And it was to avoid an evil of this sort that the London engineers, in laying pipes, always lay them as far from a sewer as possible; and when obliged to cross a sewer, the pipes were always made of metal. The remaining papers he had to move for would, he was sorry to say, prove to the house how little inclined the Commissioners have shewn themselves to consult the wishes of the citizens, from whom they were levying such enormous taxes. The circumstances which led to the correspondence, of which those papers would be a copy, were simply these: The commissioners of the Ballast Board, a most respectable body, had just completed a wall on the quay of Dublin, much to the ornament and security of that part of the city, and not without considerable expence to the inhabitants; scarcely had it been finished, when the commissioners of paving erected a paling under the windows of the Ballast Office, in the handsomest part of the city, and against the new wall, enclosing a sort of depôt for sand for paving, though, at the other side of the street, there was a vacant piece of ground equally near the work carrying on, and the occupation of which could have been productive of no inconvenience whatever. The ballast office commissioners wrote to them, requiring the removal of the depôt upon two grounds, that it was a great nuisance to the street itself, and that it seriously endangered the new wall by the weight that it imposed upon it. The commissioners of wide streets, conceiving it to be their duty to prevent such a nuisance in so public a situation, made two applications to the same effect. The very extraordinary answers (to give them no worse name) which communicated to these two most respectable authorities the unqualified refusal of the paving board, will be found in the papers he now intended moving for. The grand jury also wrote, and indignant at a similar refusal, presented it as a nuisance. The paving board entered a traverse against the presentment; and thus the public money designed for the improvement of the city of Dublin, and placed in the hands of those commissioners for that purpose, may be thrown away in defending their wanton and outrageous insults upon the citizens who supplied that money. The papers he now moved for, he was convinced would satisfy the house, that so far from extending the powers of this board, they should rescind many of 21 those they already possess. The hon. member then concluded with moving, "That there be laid before the house a return of the number of lamps taken down within the city of Dublin since the month of August, 1807; also a return of the expences already incurred in making a sewer in Capel-street in the said city; and, thirdly, a copy of the correspondence between the commissioners of wide streets, the ballast office of Dublin, on the one part, and the commissioners of paving and lighting on the other, so far as said correspondence related to a certain nuisance on Aston quay, Dublin."—The motions were then severally agreed to without opposition.