770 EEPOEX — 1888. 



thus be better done, and the regular operations of the General Register Office would 

 not be interfered with as at present. 



A census is taken every five years by France and Germany, by Queensland 

 and New Zealand. The rapid gi'owtli of population in this country and the 

 acknowledged dependence of representation upon population demand that we 

 should have more frequent, and therefore more exact, information. 



For instance, the New Local Government Act makes several towns ' county 

 boroughs' on the assumption that on June 1, 1888, they had populations of 

 upwards of 50,000, whereas it is impossible to say, with any approach to certainty, 

 what their populations really were on that day. 



The recent inquiry into tlie immigration of foreign paupers into England to a 

 great extent failed, owing to the want of information less than seven years old. 



An exact knowledge of the population is mainly useful as a basis for the calcu- 

 lation of birth-rates and death-rates. In England much money is expended on the 

 calculation and publication of these in the various reports of the Registrai'-General 

 and the Medical Officers of Health. These reports are of great value in impressing 

 the need of sanitary improvements on the people and the sanitary authorities, but 

 the}' lose much of their value from the uncertainty as to the basis upon which such, 

 statistics must be built, viz., an exact knowledge of the population. Experience 

 has proved that the official estimates and the census numbers often differ by 10 per 

 cent, in either direction, and .sometimes by 15 or even 22 per cent. The Eegistrar- 

 General himself is ceasing to put any trust in the official estimates of populations, 

 as shown by recent weekly and quarterly reports. 



There is reason to believe that, mainly owing to unusually large emigration, the 

 population of the whole United Kingdom was, in April, 1886, or five years after 

 the census, between 400,000 and 600,000 less than the official estimate ; an error 

 of I5 per cent. ; in smaller areas the errors are often, proportionately to the whole, 

 very much greater. 



These errors in the estimation of the population maj- involve an error of two or 

 three per thousand in the death-rate, so that elaborate calculations made with a 

 view of correcting errors due to diBereuces in age and sex, and constitution of the 

 population, are thrown away. 



The cost of a census being 123,000/., it would not be a great bui'den upon such 

 a rich country to take one every five years instead of every ten. 



The author, therefore, urged the British Association to press upon the Govern- 

 ment, by memorial or deputation, the desirability of forming a permanent census 

 sub-department, and taking a census every five years. 



TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11. 

 The following Papers and Report were read : — 



1. Leasehold ErifrancJnsement. 

 Sy Charles Harrison. 



The author submits this paper on ' Leasehold Enfranchisement ' in view of the 

 vital importance which, he considers, the subject bears in relation to the social and 

 economic problems involved in the grave questions of tlie ' Housing of the Working 

 Classes,' and the reform of the existing Land Laws ; and also in view of the many 

 misconceptions entertained by certain sections of the public as to the proposed 

 enfranchisement of leaseholds, being neither more nor less than a communistic 

 violation of freedom of contract, and a socialistic confiscation of the rights of pro- 

 perty in private ownership. 



The importance of the questions discussed by the author can scarcely be rated 



*x)0 high ; it is demonstrated by the fact that a committee of the House of Com- 



Uons appointed to inquire into the question of Town Holdings in all its various 



