§ *MR. H. J. WILSON (Yorkshire, W.R., Holmfirth)said the circumstances connected with this Bill were peculiar and, 51 indeed, unique. Sandgate was a district in which there were an unusual number of hospitals and convalescent homes, and the Police and Sanitary Committee had given the urban council very remarkable powers—powers, in fact, without precedent—powers to license hospitals and to prohibit and, indeed, close hospitals not so licensed. He was not suggesting that the Police and Sanitary Committee's reason was wrong; no doubt something of the kind was needed under the special circumstances, and he would not detain the House by discussing whether greater safeguards against abuse of the powers might not have been inserted in the Bill. He only wanted to make two points; the first was that the Police and Sanitary Committee would have done well to have drawn the special attention of the House to the proposals, instead of merely using the formal and stereotyped phrase, and, secondly, be desired to urge the undesirability of allowing the powers granted in this case to be used as a precedent, with the results of shutting out the poorer classes from the smaller health resorts on our coast and elsewhere. All alike were entitled to the benefit of fresh air, and local authorities ought not, except under extraordinary circumstances, to be allowed to exclude sick people from their districts.
§ Bill read the third time, and passed with Amendments.