§ Mr. G. MACDONALDasked the Minister of Health the number of persons engaged in and the cost of the administration of public assistance in Lancashire, including the county boroughs, during each of the last three years for which figures are available?
Sir H. YOUNGThe returns made to my Department do not show the number of persons engaged in the administration of public assistance. The expenditure on salaries, superannuation allowances, etc., of officers and servants which was charged to poor relief in the accounts of the councils of the administrative county of Lancaster and the associated county boroughs in the year ending 31st March, 1931, was £924,964. Comparable figures264W for the two preceding years cannot be given as the returns relate to the former union county of Lancaster (which was not quite coterminous with the administrative county and the county boroughs) and, moreover, include particulars for a number of institutions which in 1930–31 had been appropriated for public health purposes, and were therefore not included in the figure given above for that year.