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18
METROPOLITAN ASYLUM DISTRICT.
Report ok the Committee for General Purposes.
1. 18th March, 1878.
2. Under the reference to them of the 9th instant, your Committee have considered
the memorial of the Board of Works for the Limehouse District "as to
providing accommodation in the Asylum Board's Hospitals for persons
suffering from contagious diseases who are not in receipt of parochial relief."
The Managers are aware that this subject has engaged their attention for some
time past. The question for providing Hospital accommodation for Patients of the
Non-Pauper class was first brought officially under the notice of the Managers by a
letter dated 27th December, 1876, from the Vestry of St. Marylebone, calling
attention to the want which then existed, as it does now, of proper Hospital
accommodation for the class referred to. In reporting to the Managers upon this
letter on the 13th January, 1877, your Committee expressed their opinion that
"the necessary powers for the reception and treatment of such cases should be
vested in some Central Authority charged with the responsibility thereof."
The matter, however, did not rest here, for during the following month (February)
a letter upon the same subject from the Vestry of St. Mary, Newington, was
referred by the Managers to your Committee, who, in reporting thereon, summarised
the conclusions at which they had unanimously arrived, as follows:—
(a) That such provision could be best made in a comprehensive and systematic
manner by one Central Authority acting for the whole Metropolis, not
only for Pauper Patients, but for other classes desirous of Hospital
accommodation.
(b) That such Central Authority should not be merely a Department of Poor
Law Administration, but should have the powers of the Sanitary Acts
conferred upon it.
(c) That either the Metropolitan Asylums Board should be merged into such
Central Authority, or should itself be that authority, in which case its
constitution should be altered and adapted to its enlarged duties and
responsibilities.
Your Committee explained, in a subsequent report, that they did not for a moment
contemplate that the proposed Central Authority should supersede or interfere with
the existing Vestries and District Boards in the ordinary and important duties which
devolve upon them, but merely that it should have such powers of the Sanitary Acts
conferred as would enable it to deal efficiently with all cases of epidemic infectious
diseases occurring in the Metropolis.
In adopting the Report which embodied the above conclusions, the Managers
directed that a copy thereof should be sent to the Local Government Board and their
careful attention solicited thereto, and farther that a copy of such Report should be
transmitted to each of the Sanitary Authorities and Medical Officers of Health in
the Metropolis, with an invitation to communicate their opinions thereon to the
Managers. This was done, and the purport of the various replies received from
these authorities, showing some diversity of opinion, was communicated to the
Managers by your Committee on the 16th June last.
During the last Session the attention of the Managers was directed to a " Bill to
consolidate and amend the Law relating to Public Health in the Metropolis," which
was then before Parliament, and as ccrtain of its clauses appeared to affect
materially the duties of the Managers, your Committee were deputed to seek, and