§ Sir J. LONSDALEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that the National Health Insurance Commission (Ireland) holds that it has no power to authorise the payment of the expenses of the removal of the dead body of a patient sent by an insurance committee to a sanatorium and dying while under treatment, and that, in the case of many patients, this will mean their burial as paupers; and if the Government will empower the Insurance Commission to authorise the payment of the expenses of removal in the event of the death of destitute patients?
§ Mr. MASTERMANI am advised that the expenses of removal or of burial of a dead body cannot be regarded as part of the expenses of sanatorium treatment, and that the Commissioners have no power to authorise insurance committees to defray such expenditure out of their funds.