§ MR. W. J. CORBETasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether he is aware that when Brian Merriman, a labourer on the Fitzwilliam estate, county Wicklow, applied to get the benefit of the Labourers Act, he was immediately summoned for keeping an unsanitary dwelling, and sentenced to pay a fine of 10s. a day for every day he remained in the house after the expiration of a fortnight; whether it is a fact that, on hearing the decision of the Newtown Mount Kennedy Bench of Magistrates, Colonel Tighe, Chairman of the Rathdrurn Board of Guardians, stated that the Board should not allow themselves to be made a medium for evicting labourers, who had no place but the poor-house to go to until proper buildings were provided; whether it has come to his knowledge that a great number of the dwellings of the poor in that locality are unfit for human habitation; and, 69 whether he will send a local inspector to examine into the facts?
§ MR. TREVELYANSir, the application made by Merriman with reference to the Labourers' Act did not fulfil the requirements of the Act, and therefore, could not be complied with. The proceedings subsequently taken against him, under the 113 section of the Public Health Act, were taken by order of the Board of Guardians, and on the representation of the Medical Officer of Health. Subsequently, the Guardians did not desire that the magistrates' order should be carried out; and I believe that, the matters complained of having been abated, Merriman was not disturbed. The Chairman of the Board of Guardians is reported to have stated that the Board should not allow themselves to be a means of evicting people. With regard to the condition of labourers' dwellings in the district referred to, the Labourers' Act places on the ratepayers the duty of initiating proceedings to remedy the evils which exist, and I am glad to know that the Act is not inoperative in the Rathdrum Union. The Guardians have put forward 12 schemes relating to 60 dwellings. I do not know any grounds upon which I could direct a special inquiry in this district.