Sitting of 18 March 1863

MINUTES.
— SELECT COMMITTEE—-Thames Embankment—Mr. Western Wood discharged; Mr. Crawford added.
PUBLIC BILLS—Second Reading—Diseases Prevention (Metropolis) [Bill 41], after debate, deferred.
Considered as amended — Wares (Ireland) [Bill 51].
Third Reading —Consolidated Fund (£10,000,000) and passed.

DISEASES PREVENTION (METROPOLIS) BILL— [BILL 41.]

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Heading read.
  MR. BRADY, having presented several petitions in favour of this Bill, moved that the Bill be now read a second time. The principle of the measure had already been repeatedly affirmed by the House, and especially by an Act which had been passed in 1860 empowering the authorities in the metropolis to provide vehicles for carrying patients to hospitals. That Act having been found to be inoperative

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  he had felt it his duty to introduce the present Bill, for which great necessity existed. It was well known that much injury was done to the public health by persons labouring under infectious and contagious diseases being conveyed to hospitals, and from house to house, in cabs and other public vehicles. He therefore hoped the Government would see the necessity of passing the measure, and thereby removing the alarm in the public mind on the subject. What happened in regard to the London Fever Hospital, which was only one of the many hospitals and other institutions in the metropolis which received patients suffering from these diseases, clearly showed the necessity for the Bill. From the Report of that Hospital for 1861, it appeared that, during the year, 663 patients were admitted. Of that number no less than 110 died, which proved the serious character of the diseases with which the patients were afflicted. Out of the 663 patient, 265 Buffered from typhus fever, of which 18 per cent died, and 9 within 48 hours after they had been taken to the hospital. Of those admitted, 156 were afflicted with typhoid fever, of whom 21 per cent died. As cabs were now constructed, having the inside stuffed with wool or hair, and lined with cloth, it was impossible to calculate how long they would retain the contagion that arose from their having been used by persons labouring under typhus, typhoid fever, or the measles. When a servant was seized with typhus—which she might have contracted while attending upon the children or members of the family—the first thing done was to get a cab, and convey her to an hospital or the house of some relative, and no one could tell how long a time should elapse before it could be considered safe for any one to travel in the same vehicle. The cushions and linings of cubs were a kind of material which would retain the infectious matter for a very long period. In cases of scarlet fever, a small piece of linen was known to have retained the contagious influence for a very considerable period. Of the number of patients admitted to the Fever Hospital in 1861, 86 were the servants of subscribers to the hospital. It also appeared that 534 of them had been sent by order of parish authorities. This fact ought to satisfy the House that the duty of furnishing proper carriages for fever patients ought to be placed, as the Bill proposed, in the hands of the parish
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  authorities, and not in those of the police, to which there would be great objection. An hon. Member had mentioned to him a case in which a lady had been taken ill after travelling in a cab which had been employed to convey a person with scarlet fever, and who narrowly escaped with her life. Looking to the injury done to the public health by the present state of things, he hoped the House would agree to the second reading; and if the Bill was not sufficient to carry out its object, they could make whatever Amendments were necessary in Committee.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  MR. AYRTONsaid, he hoped his hon. Friend would, upon reflection, see the propriety of withdrawing the Bill. A few Sessions ago, when an hon. Member, who took an interest in metropolitan affairs, introduced into a Bill then passing a clause which would have the same effect as the Bill now before the House, he (Mr. Ayrton) pointed out that the clause ought to be permissive, leaving it to the inhabitants of the metropolis to take what course they might think proper. This was an attempt to legislate upon a matter which affected the general convenience and conduct of the inhabitants of the metropolis; but those who were most conversant with metropolitan affairs were the best judges of what should be done. If the inhabitants of any parish saw any real necessity to provide such special conveyances as were mentioned in the Bill, the House might depend on it that they would be careful enough of their own lives to avail themselves of the permissive enactment in the Act of 1860. The Bill was an example of minute and trifling legislation which would do more harm than good. The patient might die while his friends were consulting whether his was a case for a public or a private conveyance; or the cabman might say that his intended fare was infected with a contagious disease and refuse to convey him except on most extortionate terms. What evidence was there that disease had been propagated by public vehicles? He thought that the existing law was sufficient for the object in view; at all events, there had not been experience enough yet to prove its inefficiency.
  MR. DARBY GRIFFITHwas of opinion that the hon. Gentleman who introduced this measure deserved the thanks of

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  the community at large, for it proposed to deal with a very alarming evil. He mentioned a case within his own knowledge, in which a servant with the small-pox had been sent to the hospital in a public cab, to the great danger of the public. It was plain that that cab might be, and probably was, engaged within five minutes after its departure from the hospital for the conveyance of some person who was utterly unsuspicious of the dangerous purpose for which it had just been used. It would be a most extraordinary thing if some measure could not be passed to mitigate the evil. He should be sorry to believe that this matter was beyond the power of legislation. He admitted that it would not do to permit a cabman to refuse any fare; but he would be competent to be an informer. There would be other matters of detail which would, perhaps, require alteration, but that was no reason for ignoring common sense in dealing with these matters.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, he also was quite of opinion that they should take a common-sense view of this question, and therefore he was sorry that the House had not the assistance on the present occasion of that Member of the Government whose business it was to be specially informed on all sanitary matters, for it would have been desirable for the House to have been told whether any parishes had availed themselves of the existing permissive enactment. The House was left wholly in the dark on that point. With reference to the more difficult part of the Bill, the enacting clauses, it was impossible to see how it could be carried out. When he looked at the clauses of the present Bill imposing penalties, he had not the least idea where he was, or what he was standing on. The "interpretation clause" declared that the word "infectious" should include "contagious," and that every "contagious" disease should be deemed to be "infectious." That was working somewhat in a circle, and he was not one jot nearer to a knowledge of what was a contagious or infectious disease. It was right that this matter should be made somewhat clearer before the House subjected people to fines under the Bill. Most persons believed that the itch was catching, but he would not undertake to say whether it was contagious or infectious. At one time another class of diseases was placarded all over London with Dr. Eady's name chalked on the walls.
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  Was a £10 penalty to be imposed for employing a hackney carriage to convey to the hospital persons suffering from such ailments? He really could not tell, for, unlike the hon. Member for Leitrim, he was not a learned man in this matter. If the Government would undertake the responsibility of putting the Bill into a proper shape, he should be ready to support it; but if the Government did not see their way clear to that end—and he confessed that he did not see his way—he should then be quite disposed to vote against the Bill.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, that the clause which proposed to effect something of this kind in the Diseases Prevention Act had been afterwards withdrawn. The hon. Gentleman, in the present measure, proposed to make that which was then permissive compulsory; but there was no machinery whatever in the Bill to carry out the system, nor did he think that the provisions of this Bill were capable of being so altered in Committee as to carry into effect the object which the hon. Gentleman had in view. He was not prepared with statistics, nor did he believe that anybody else was, as to the propagation of diseases by public conveyances; but it stood to reason that diseases might be so propagated. Still, if the House passed an enactment prohibiting persons suffering under infectious or contagious diseases from being removed in hackney carriages, without at the same time providing that there should be a ready supply of special conveyances, the undesirable result would be the prevention, in many instances, of the speedy removal of afflicted people to the hospitals; and another effect would be to deter persons from using public conveyances at all. The first clause stated that in the different localities special conveyances were to be provided in sufficient number, and kept in convenient places; but there was no authority to decide as to the sufficiency of the number, or the convenience of the places. He therefore thought that the proposed enactment would be wholly inoperative; and if the object of the Bill was to be attained at all, it must be by different machinery. It was desirable to have some information, as to the extent to which parishes had availed themselves of the permissive Act of 1860; and he believed, that if a compulsory enactment were passed, it could only be carried out by means of the police. They had at their various stations

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  "stretchers," which were carried by a couple of men, and persons, on applying to the nearest policeman, might speedily have that kind of conveyance provided whenever it was required. He was in communication with the Commissioner of Police on the subject, and, under these circumstances, he hoped the present Bill would be withdrawn, or postponed, in order to afford time for further consideration.
  MR. HUNTtrusted that the hon. Member for Leitrim (Mr. Brady) would withdraw the Bill, for it was quite evident that the measure could not pass in the shape in which it stood at present.
  MR. BRADYsaid, he would act on the suggestion, and would postpone the Bill till after Easter.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Second Reading deferred till Wednesday 27th May.
  House adjourned at half after One o'clock