HC Deb 09 July 1896 vol 42 cc1102-3
MR. J. L. CAREW (Dublin, College Green)

On behalf of the hon. Member for East Wicklow (Mr. WILLIAM CORBET), I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, as President of the Local Government Board, Ireland, whether his attention has been called to a prosecution instituted on behalf of a person named Harris against Annie Hippel as to the right to a burying-place in the old graveyard at Delgany, county Wicklow; whether he is aware that the plot of ground in question was assigned to the Hippel family by the proper officer of the Board of Guardians of the Rathdown Union; that after six months had expired Harris claimed the plot, and sought to have the bodies of Annie Hippel's relatives exhumed; and, that when the case came before the magistrates at Newtown Mount Kennedy it was dismissed on two occasions; and, whether he will inquire into all the circumstances, and especially as to the fact of the Board of Guardians having supported Harris at the cost of the ratepayers, their own officer having assigned the plot to the Hippels?

THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,) Leeds, Central

Consequent upon a complaint of the members of the Harris family that two members of the Hippel family had been interred in their burialplot, an investigation was held by the Guardians, acting as the Burial Board, into the matter, when the complaint was ascertained to be well founded, and application was thereupon made to the Local Government Board and to the Privy Council by the Guardians to have the bodies exhumed; but both these authorities pointed out to the Guardians that the proper course for them to pursue was to institute a prosecution at Petty Sessions under Section 170 of the Public Health Act of 1878. The Guardians accordingly proceeded against the persons concerned, but not against Annie Hippel, and the magistrates, having regard to the fact that six months had elapsed since the date of the burial, held that they had no jurisdiction; but, on hearing the evidence and being satisfied of the facts, they defined Harris's plot on the Order Book and suggested that it should be marked out in the graveyard, winch was done by staking the ground. The Rathdown Board of Guardians acted in this matter in the discharge of their duty to preserve the existing rights of sepulture, and they have no authority and could have none, to assign the Hippel family a burial-place in this plot.