§ MR. J. MACVEAGHI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been called to the fact that Dr. Orr has resigned the position of registrar of births and deaths to the Lisburn Board of Guardians; whether the guardians-have refused to appoint a successor whether he is aware that the difficulty has arisen in consequence of the fact that the Belfast Corporation erected an infectious diseases hospital outside their city boundary and within the Lisburn Union, thus throwing upon the Lisburn. Union the cost of the registration of deaths in that institution; whether he is aware that two deaths have occurred in the union owing to infected diseases communicated to residents by persons visiting patients in the Purdysburn hospital; and whether he will use his-influence with the Local Government Board to exercise its powers to make the hospital a separate area, and thus place the cost on the Belfast Corporation, instead of the Lisburn Union.
§ MR. BIRRELLDr. Orr has tendered his resignation as registrar of births and deaths because he objects to persons, from fever-infected areas in Belfast attending at his office to register the deaths of persons in Purdysburn hospital. The board of guardians have declined to appoint a successor to Dr. Orr, and the appointment now rests with the Lord-Lieutenant. No difficulty is anticipated in finding a suitable successor to Dr. Orr, if he should persist in his resignation. It is the fact that the fever hospital in question was erected by the Belfast Corporation outside the city boundary, and in the Lisburn Union. The Local Government Board are aware; that one death from spotted fever in that union last year was attributed to 1323 the cause mentioned in the Question, but the medical officer described the source of infection as unknown. The Local Government Board have no power to make the hospital a separate registration area. That power, however, rests with the Registrar-General, who regrets that he cannot accede to the proposal. It would, he informs me, be entirely without precedent, in England, Scotland, or Ireland, to constitute a public institution, situate in a certain union, into a separate district to form part of another union.