§ DR. KENNY (Dublin, College Green)I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether, in view of the fact that the Report of the Lunacy Commissioners (England) for the year ending 31st December, 1893, shows that the total number of registered lunatics in England and Wales amounts to 92,067, or one in every 336 of the population, and an increase of 2,245 over 1892, the largest annual increase yet registered, and that whilst said Report shows that 15.4 per cent. of all registered lunatics are due to heredity and 26 per cent. to intemperance, that still much difference of opinion prevails amongst alienists as to the exact causes of the great increase of lunacy observed in other countries as well as in Great Britain, he will recommend Her Majesty's Government to enter into negotiations with foreign Governments for the appointment of an International Commission to inquire into this most important and urgent subject?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. ASQUITH,) Fife, E.(who replied) said: I have referred the question to the Commissioners in Lunacy, who report to me as follows:—It will be seen by a reference to page 6 of the 48th Report of the Commissioners in Lunacy for 1893, lately presented to the Lord Chancellor, that they are of opinion that there is no disproportionate increase of insanity, or, at all events, none at all material in England and Wales. The increase in the number of officially-known lunatics is thus dealt with in the Report:—
The increase in the number of officially-known lunatics is a very different thing, and is due mainly, if not altogether, to accumulation resulting from a diminished discharge rate, as has been well shown in the General Report of the Registrar General on the recent Census. From this Report, also, we learn that the increase in the total number of enumerated lunatics in the Census of 1881 over the number in 1871 was 15,484, while the corresponding increase in 1891 over 1881 was only 12,880, being a diminution of 2,600 in the decennial increase; and the diminution, occurring contemporaneously with an increase of the general population, would seem to support the opinion we have above expressed. The accumulation has been aggravated by (with other causes) the change of feeling which has undoubtedly occurred in the poorer classes, and which now leads them, without reluctance, to see placed in asylums insane and mentally worn-out members of their families whom they would formerly lave retained in their homes.1564 The matter is, however, one of great importance, and I will consider the hon. Gentleman's suggestion.
§ DR. KENNYsaid, he was much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for his answer. The Commissioners, however, seemed to beg the question in their Report as to the cause of the increase in insanity. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would go fully into it.