§ Sir E. HUME-WILLIAMSasked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that the criminal lunatic asylum situated at Rampton, in the East Retford Union, has recently been changed into a State institution for mental defectives, who are gathered from all parts of the country; that if and so soon as a mental defective becomes a lunatic he is removed to the Notts County Asylum as a pauper lunatic and is made chargeable to the Retford Union, at a cost of about 28s. per week in each case; and that in such cases the guardians can only escape such payment by themselves proving the legal settlement of the lunatic and his chargeability to some other union; and whether, in order to remedy this injustice to the Retford Guardians, he will direct that in future the pauper lunatics who are removed from the Rampton Asylum shall be either maintained at the cost of the Department which is responsible for the asylum or else that the expense of dis- 254W covering and proving the legal settlement of the lunatic shall in future be undertaken by the Department?
§ Sir A. MONDI am aware of this difficulty, but it could only be met by legislation, and I am afraid that, in the absence of such legislation, the suggestions of my hon. and learned Friend cannot be adopted.