THE LUNACY BILLS. (Hansard, 3 May 1853)

§ LORD ST. LEONARDS
rose to remind the House of the objects severally contemplated by these measures. By the first—the Lunacy Regulation Bill—the proceedings before a Commission of Lunacy would be much altered. Instead of a party being put in every case to the expense of suing out a separate commission, for the future a general commission would be issued by the Lord Chancellor, under which the Commissioners would act in each particular case. The old mode of carrying back the inquiries as to when the party became a lunatic, was altogether dispensed with by this Bill, unless the Lord Chancellor should see occasion to direct those 1026 inquiries in a particular case; and dispensing with this inquiry, which, in a great majority of cases, was a very unnecessary one, would be a great saving to the estates of lunatics. The expense of obtaining grants from the Crown would be also done away with, and power would be given to the Lord Chancellor to make an order which should operate as a grant. Powers would be given to Masters to act in certain cases without waiting for orders and petitions to the Lord Chancellor; and orders by the Lord Chancellor, which led to delay and to very great expense, were done away with. Still great caution was exercised with a view to preserve the power of the Lord Chancellor, and due care was also taken that parties should have opportunities of objecting to any orders proposed to be made by the Masters. After the Masters had made their report, all difficulty was cleared away as regarded the present practice, which rendered it necessary to have petitions to the Lord Chancellor, references to the Master, and orders upon those references. One very great source of expense in these cases had been the inquiry as to next of kin, and the attendance of next of kin. The Lord Chancellor, therefore, had power given him by this Bill to dispense with that inquiry, where he thought it need not be extended, and to direct which of the next of kin should attend the proceedings. In that way great expense would be saved, great celerity given to the proceedings in lunacy, and in very many cases the Lord Chancellar would be able to make an order without the assistance of either solicitor or counsel, thereby saving a vast expense. Care was taken that there should be sufficient visitation of lunatics under the care of the Court; and then the Bill proceeded to enact very useful provisions in regard to the administration of their estates. It very often happened that the lunatic possessed but a small sum of money, and in those cases power was given to the Lord Chancellor to deal with the principal for the benefit of the lunatic; for instance, the lunatic might have relatives or friends who would be willing to undertake the charge of him on the security of these funds, and provision was made to enable them to do so under conditions imposed by the Lord Chancellor. The head of a family might be suddenly striken with insanity, and the family would find themselves unable to meet their immediate exigencies; yet at that moment there might be a great deal 1027 of ready money in the house, or a balance at the banker's, which they had no power to touch. In such a case power was given to the Lord Chancellor to deal with that money for the present exigencies of the family. In cases where a man became a lunatic, being at that time a partner in business, power was given to direct a sale of the partnership property, and make proper dispositions for winding up the partnership. Without going further into the details of this Bill, he trusted that the slight sketch which he had given to their Lordships would convince them that it would be found quickly and prudently to administer the law in respect to lunatics, and would provide for many cases which, as the law now stood, were in an unsatisfactory position. He would now pass on to the next Bill—that relating to the Care and Treatment of Lunatics. By it great care would be taken of the pauper lunatics of the country, who would not be treated as insane without sufficient evidence and without sufficient caution, and visitation was provided for to an extent which was never known before. Last Session a Bill was proposed to be introduced by a noble Lord to provide for such a case as that of Mr. Feargus O'Connor; but there was an objection to some of the provisions of that Bill, and it was accordingly postponed at his (Lord St. Leonards') suggestion, he being at that time in office. The provisions of that Bill were now, with proper cautions, introduced into the present Bill, and great care was taken to prevent the mischiefs which would arise to persons themselves whose minds, as in the case of Mr. Feargus O'Connor, were no longer in a sound state, from wandering about to their own manifest injury, and to the danger of the public at large. Provision was made by this Bill for protecting such persons, taking care, at the same time, that no man should be restrained or deprived of his liberty without due caution. The third measure—the Lunatic Asylums Bill — was an amendment of the Act called the Shaftesbury Act. By that Act five unpaid Commissioners were appointed, and six paid Commissioners, of whom three were medical men and three barristers. That arrangement was still retained; but a great many difficulties, which had occurred in the administration of the law under that Act, were corrected and amended, after an experience of some years, in the Bill now before their Lordships, and particularly one difficulty was 1028 met which had led to very great inconvenience. It very often happened that when a person became a lunatic, it was impossible to get at once two medical men, as required by law, to certify, so as to enable that person to be legally taken care of. This Bill therefore provided, carefully and cautiously, where necessity required it, for the admission of such a person upon the certificate of one medical man; but then it required, as it ought to require, that within three days after that person had been put into confinement, two other medical men should certify the propriety of his being confined, and should give their own reasons for that opinion, distinguishing what they themselves had observed as the ground upon which they had formed their opinion, from what had been communicated to them by other persons. One great check was provided by this Bill in regard to persons who had not been found lunatics under any inquisition, but who were detained in asylums under certificates. Power was given to the Lord Chancellor, after the alleged lunatic had been confined one year, to require from the person detaining him, or at whose instance he was detained, a general account of the property of the lunatic and its administration; that would show at once whether there was any improper motive for his detention, whether he was placed there for the improvement of his health, or in order that others might enjoy his property. The Bill did away with the exception from visitation which had hitherto been extended to Bethlehem Hospital. It was due to the governors of that institution that he should state publicly that they had not raised the slightest objection to the introduction of such a provision in the Bill; and that showed they were not afraid of the consequences which would result from the working of such a provision, and that they were willing the hospital should be visited and examined thoroughly, like all the other asylums in the country. He had now only to call the attention of Her Majesty's Government to a duty which he thought peculiarly devolved upon them— that of introducing a measure for providing generally for the criminal lunatics of the country. The law at present did not stand well upon that subject. With such a law as they had a right to expect, the administration of the law relating to lunacy in this country would be placed, he would fondly believe, upon a better foundation than existed in any other country in Europe. But, first, it was absolutely ne- 1029 cessary that provision should be made for the care and maintenance of criminal lunatics. If that were done, he had reason to believe that the expense would be much less than it was generally supposed would be incurred. The country was now at considerable expense in that respect, and One asylum in the north and one in the south of England, would be sufficient. It would be particularly necessary to meet, in a most cautious manner, the case of women afflicted after their confinement, who, in a state of aberration of mind, committed— he could not call it a crime, but a deed at which human nature shuddered. As the law now stood, she who ought to be in an hospital, and taken the greatest possible care of, was treated as a criminal, to be tried by the laws of her country; and, if they were to have such laws, as he hoped they were very near possessing, he repeated that it would be necessary to make provision for women of that description.

The LORD CHANCELLOR
, lest by saying nothing he should be supposed to dissent from the observations of his noble and learned Friend, wished to state that he had been unable to attend the Committee upon all these Bills; but he had been present when two of them had been considered by the Committee; and it appeared to him that the provisions proposed for reducing expense and delay in legal proceedings, in cases of lunacy, were well calculated to meet the desired end.

§ The EARL of HARROWBY
was decidedly of opinion that criminal lunatics ought not to be mixed up among the harmless unfortunates of the same description, and said this was often productive of the worst effects.

§ LORD ST. LEONARDS
, as a witness to the truth of the noble Earl's statement, might be allowed to say that when he had visited lunatic asylums, the ill effect of such a system had been constantly stated to him in the strongest possible terms. Those who supposed that persons who were insane were not deeply impressed with things which affected moral conduct, were entirely mistaken. He had frequently heard from persons confined in public asylums complaints of the hardship of being shut up with criminals. He regretted that the noble Earl (the Earl of Shaftesbury), who had devoted so much time and consideration to this important subject, had not been present that evening.