§ MR. STUART SAMUEL (Tower Hamlets, Whitechapel)To ask the President of the Local Government Board whether his attention has been called to the practice of the Metropolitan District Auditor of Poor Law Accounts in issuing a restricted and inadequate notice of his audit of guardians' accounts; and whether he will consider the desirability of issuing instructions for ample and convenient notice of such audit being given locally, as is the case with the audit of the accounts of metropolitan borough councils.
§ (Answered by Mr. John Burns.) I do not find that I have received any complaints as to the practice of the auditor in this matter. The statutes and orders relating to this subject require that the auditor shall give notice by advertisement, in some newspaper circulating in the county, a reasonable time prior to the audit, and further that he shall give to the clerk to the guardians fourteen days' notice in writing of the time and place at which he intends to commence the audit. The auditor states chat the notice given by him has in all cases been such as is required by statute, and that special care has been exercised in seeing that adequate notice has been given. I may add that the clerk to the guardians is required, on hearing from the auditor, to cause a notice in a pre scribed form to be affixed to the gate of the workhouse and other places where union notices are usually affixed. The notice refers to the deposit of certain books of accounts for inspection by the owners and ratepayers, the holding of the audit, and the power of any owner or ratepayer who may have any objection to the accounts to attend and be heard by the auditor.