§ COLONEL BARTTELOTsaid, he would bog to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been called to the Report of the Lunacy Commissioners on the condition of St. Luke's Hospital for Lunatics; and, whether he is prepared to take some action with regard to that charity, either through the Commissioners in Lunacy, or by some Special Commission, so that the object for which the charity was endowed may be properly carried out? He would add that since giving Notice of that Question he had seen a memorandum of the Committee of the Hospital, and understood they were anxious that an impartial inquiry should be instituted.
MR. BRUCEsaid, in reply, that St. Luke's Hospital had been the subject of the criticism of the Commissioners in Lunacy for the last twenty years. With respect to the present site of the hospital, 686 they reported as long ago as the year 1851 that it was most objectionable, and also that the construction of the building was unsuited to the most improved treatment of lunatics. With regard to the structure of 1863, they reported that no amount of expenditure would cure its radical defects as a building for the proper treatment of insane patients. In the Report to which the hon. and gallant Gentleman alluded, they said that the structure was unsuited to the purpose to which it was devoted, that the rooms were dark and gloomy, and there was a difficulty in getting warmth into the wards. They admitted, however, that many alterations had been made with a view to lesson the disadvantages resulting from the incurable defects of the building; and to add to its cheerful-of late, he was bound to say that the churchyard had been enclosed, and was now converted into a lawn. In that condition of things, it was very perplexing, and he might almost add vexatious, to find that in the General Report of the Lunacy Commissioners on the state of the inmates of the asylum it was said that, with few exceptions, none of the patients were suffering from any degree of excitement on either side of the hospital, and that their appearance and general bodily condition were throughout healthy and satisfactory. He had no doubt that the criticisms of the Commissioners were generally correct, and he was also informed that it was the design of the managers of the establishment to submit it to the most searching inquiry. It did not seem to him that any advantage would result from instituting an inquiry by the Lunacy Commissioners. Those Commissioners had repeatedly reported their opinion on the subject, and they could only be expected to embody it again in the same language as they had used during the last twenty years. As to the appointment of a Commission, an application had been made by the Trustees to the Lord Chancellor; but his Lordship informed them he had no power to issue such a Commission. The suggestion had been frequently made that the property should be sold and the hospital removed to the country, where a more cheerful site could be got; but he was told that the property was held under a lease from St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and that the Trustees were not in a position to remove the establish- 687 ment. The only effectual mode of dealing with, the matter would seem to be by an Act of Parliament; but he could not say, on the part of the Government, that they were prepared to bring in such a measure.