§ MR. W. J. CORBETasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If he has noticed the following passage in the last Parliamentary Report on Irish Lunatic Asylums:—
§ "Central Asylum, Dundrum.
§ "We give as usual the Report of the Resident Physician and Governor.
§ "As requested by the Inspectors, the Government assented to a Commission of Inquiry being held into the general local management of the Institution, and the official relationship existing between some of the officers, associating with them, for the purpose of a more efficient and exhaustive scrutiny, two experienced gentleman from other departments. Not only the imme- 1709 diate investigations, but the drawing up of the reports thereon, extended over a considerable period, so numerous and varied were the points gone into;"
§ whether that statement refers to certain grave charges against the resident medical superintendent; whether it is true that his Report of his own management of the Institution is always inserted in the Annual Report to Parliament; whether a similar practice exists in regard to the other public asylums; and, whether, in view of the allegations made, he will cause all the Correspondence on the subject of the inquiry, together with the Official Reports of the Commissioners, to be printed in the forthcoming Report to Parliament?
§ MR. TREVELYANSir, the statement quoted refers to a Departmental Inquiry, held by order of the Government towards the close of 1881 and in the beginning of 1882, into a number of matters connected with the administration of the asylum. Among other matters inquired into there were charges and counter-charges between the resident physician and the late visiting physician—much more, however, on the part of the former than the latter. It is the case that the resident physician's report is inserted in the Inspector's Annual Report presented to Parliament. This is not done in the case of the district asylums. The Reports of Departmental Committees of Inquiry, such as that referred to in this Question, are always regarded as confidential, and I cannot undertake to lay the Report or the Correspondence relating to it on the Table of the House.